Weekly Update 2026-01-15: The Brief Grief Edition
What happened during the week of January 12th - January 15th, 2026:
π΅π» I am writing this weekly update early, on Thursday 01-15. Tomorrow, L. and I drive to the Chicago suburbs so we can attend my grandmother's funeral service on Saturday 01-17. This week's update will be much shorter as a result.
πͺ One of the best ways of dealing with grief is to sidetrack it, by occupying yourself with unrelated tasks and duties. I certainly engaged myself this week by taking care of numerous responsibilities. Of course, one of the drawbacks of this approach is when you have some idle time, your grief decides to play catch-up. I have fallen prey many times to my grief making up for lost time. Right now, in fact, I have half a mind to scrap this post as I just don't want to bother, but I know that's not me talking, that's my grief.
π΅ However, I don't have much more to say in this portion of the update. Next week will surely be different.
A Couple Two Tree Items To Note From Last Week:
Outbound Actions
- π¨ Create: On Monday 01-12, I reformatted my /now page on omg.lol, ironically making it more of a semi-static page. Next, I fixed some of the categories listed on my blog's navigation bar. RIP to Spiels, and hello to "How am I?"
- π§βπ§βπ§βπ§ Encounters: Took care of a recall notice with my Kia on Tuesday 01-13, along with two smaller maintenance items. I'm done with my car's upkeep for a long time, though tires will need replacing later in 2026. I met with a couple folks at Side Project on Wednesday 01-14, one day earlier than my usual routine due to the upcoming trip.
- βοΈ Health: Usual round of three 7-minute workouts this week, though they were done a day earlier than usual. My sleep schedule has remained poor, and probably won't improve until this weekend is over.
Internal Obligations
- ποΈ Organize: The apartment was fully de-Christmasized on Monday 01-12. My usual joke about playing holiday tunes backwards landed with a thud, as it usually does (mainly because I don't have the music to back it up). Unsubscribed to a few email subscriptions, then also cleaned up my background photo collections for iOS and macOS. Otherwise, L. and I were prepping for the upcoming trip.
- π¬ Testing: Upgraded to Developer/Public Beta 2 for iOS 26.3 and macOS Tahoe 26.3, respectively.
- πΌ Work: Lots of meetings, including one I hosted about Haiku and Canto on Tuesday 01-13. On Thursday 01-15, my last hours were frustrating due to my possible inability to explain myself in a meeting, then following it up by causing a mistake on a printer ticket that I ended up making worse, which led to me asking for help to resolve it. I learned a lot about what not to do, and what I should have done with the printers, but I probably should have left that ticket alone at the end of the day.
Media
- π Listen: The ICE Tool That Tracks Entire Neighborhoods, 404 Media Podcast
- π Read: Inside the greatest FA Cup upset of all: Bandages, tractors and a club driven by grief, The Athletic
- π₯οΈ Watch: 5 Day Trip to Turkey on Turkish Airlines Business Class! πΉπ· | Istanbul Ankara, YouTube, Solo Solo Travel
More Info About The Media Selections From This Week:
Just like last week, I had a hard time concentrating on media, and I'm still not talking about the big mess happening *everywhere*. I'll keep it really short this week, highlighting one media element to talk about. Normal programming shall resume next week.
404 Media once again comes through with investigations on tools used by ICE to track people. The short version is that yes, it's through your phone, and yes, it involves advertising that's targeted by location and demographics. Who knew that Don Draper and his fellow ad-men would end up killing us all? The link in this paragraph refers to the original article published by 404 Media, which is well worth your time to read. As for actions on how to avoid this targeted advertising (or, for that matter, any type of targeted advertising)? Β―_(γ)_/Β―
The Solo Solo Travel YouTube channel has featured an unknown Japanese man who has a serious bank account, as he has flown on some luxurious flights in the past: first class on Emirates; first class on Qatar; and so on. This time, he's in Business Class to fly to Turkey in what was very clearly a sponsored tour by the Turkish government for various travel influencers. As a result, SST had a great time on his journey, ate sumptuously, and was able to visit tons of historic sites in both cities. If you don't mind the obvious sponcon, and you just want to see some places in Δ°stanbul and Ankara, give the video a go.
Finally, I'll end on an oddly uplifting note. Odd, not because it's against my nature, but rather because of the topic: soccer. English soccer is currently experiencing the FA Cup, a tournament that features teams from 9 levels of the league system: the first four levels are in the English Football League, whereas levels 5-9 are in the National League System. I guess the best way to describe this would be to have an NFL team in the very top of the 9-level pyramid, with junior colleges at the bottom, and various college football divisions in-between (Division I-AA, Division II, Division III, NAIA). Maybe you could put other pro football leagues on top of the college teams to stretch it out to 9 levels. Anyway, teams from these levels play each other, oftentimes with the higher-level teams decimating their smaller opponents. Every so often, this seemingly "natural" result gets flipped on its head. On Saturday 01-10, Macclesfield, a sixth-level team comprised of semi-pro players, beat Crystal Palace, who are not only a Premier League team, but who are the defending FA Cup Champions! The Athletic article dives deeper into the human interest stories behind the folks playing for Macclesfield, including the team's owner who bought the team during a drunken bender in Ibiza! Now if that last line doesn't hook you in, I'm not sure what will.