I have, in what I’d generously refer to as a spirit of constant iteration, and in a more critical mood ascribe to rampant consumerism and existential dread, engaged my Apple Magic Trackpad in the service of my desktop Mac for the weekend in an effort to determine if it might, in fact, be a suitable replacement for my beloved Logi MX Master 3.

iPad Pro Duty

My Magic Trackpad, and older lightning model, serves duty as the pointing interface for my iPad Pro at the office. I realized a long time ago that I like using a Magic Trackpad over a mouse with an iPad, because it very closely mimics the experience of touching the iPad itself, most notably using gestures. I’ve been a keen user of iPad gestures since they came out with the iPad 2.

On the Mac

One discovery: data detectors. Using three fingers to select an item (for example, a date in a block of text from an email) reveals as more-iOSy pop-up panel, showing your calendar at that date.) When mousing, you. Can reveal similar options, but in a contextual menu with fewer visual affordances.

Anyway, I didn’t get to spend enough time with the Trackpad this weekend, so we’ll have to see. I could order one, use it, and send it back if I don’t like it. Maybe I can sneak up to Best Buy this week and grab one. Or I’ll bring it home and go through the rigamarole of pairing and unpairing. I do find having my hand hovering over the wedge feels weird and stressful compared to using a mouse.

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out. I’m deep into cheese and aperol spritzes in anticipation of the game. I don’t really care about football but it’s a fun night!

iPad Mini 7

Apple neglects this little version of their tablet for a while, and then incrementally updates it from time to time. The most recent version is the seventh iteration, and it’s understandably criticized for having a 60 Hz refresh rate and an older chip. But like the first iPad mini, which did not compare favorably to the full-sized iPads available when it was released, it is useful and charming in ways that defy expectation. It’s a great iPad to take notes on, read, and do some light work. They are popular assistive tech devices for our students for sure. I honestly can’t say that this one I’ve been using wants for anything, although I would appreciate ProMotion.

Plagido’s Winery in Hammonton, NJ

Rhonda and I stopped by our usual haunt, Bellview Winery, yesterday for a growler fill and a bottle of rosé, but unsurprisingly, it was packed with pre-game revelers enjoying a chocolate and wine event. We usually stay away when these things are going on. Our backup plan included possibly driving to nearby Hammonton, NJ, and getting some salami and cheeses at Bagliani’s. We made a b-line for Plagido’s winery in town, which a colleague and friend described as having very good wine after a wine trail event stop there. The interior is industrial where Bellview’s more rustic and bucolic, but you do get to learn a fair bit about the wine if the owner is working. We enjoyed a bottle of Vidal Blanc and a cheese plate. We will be back for sure, and will be eager to try the outdoor seating. We tried a red blend that was finished with espresso beans, too.

Readwise: “Chat with Your Highlights” Feature

Pretty much every night, when I brush my teeth before bed, I read the five highlights that Readwise exhumes from my ever-deepening stash of quotes from ebooks and websites I’ve, at one time or another, highlighted. This is a valuable feature and the main reason I subscribe to the service. The other night, I noticed this feature and clicked in to check it out. It works on the web, as well; you can type in a prompt, and Readwise will return an answer with citations from your highlights. It’s a genius feature and approximates what many of us are bullish about using AI for: synthesizing your personal library of content across sources.

I found Antinotevia Reddit, which is often where I find interesting software these days. It reminds me of a mashup of Soulver, TaskPaper and Tot. I’m curious about the exhortation to “Embrace impermanence.”

If you, like me, are prone to going down a YouTube rat hole, you may have seen Rick Beato interviewing guitar legends. I saw his interview with Steve Lukatherlast night while brushing my teeth, and I never realized how many iconic songs from the 80s he played on. I knew he played on Michael Jackson’s Thriller , but the interview caused me to look up a playlist on Apple Music.

One of my guilty MTV-inspired pleasures from the 80s is “She’s a Beauty” by the Tubes. I remember the video vividly, but have enjoyed the song every time it comes on. Which it does, on my iPhone.

And the guitarist on that song? Steve Lukather.

What is the story that you tell yourself when you tell the story of your life?

Nietzsche on overcoming nihilism | Philosopher Babette Babich

Because no one is. This is not a new video, but it does a nice job torpedoing the “multiple intelligences” trend.

Ken Case, writing at the OmniGroup Blog:

For example, we think there is opportunity to improve the way OmniFocus schedules tasks. Each task currently has two dates related to scheduling. Its due date is the date it should be completed by, while its defer date is the date it becomes available. (In OmniPlan, where tasks are scheduled in much more detail, we would call these the start after and end before constraints.) Both of these dates are important, but they leave an important question unanswered: when do you actually plan to do the task? (What is its “do” date?) Some people end up using (and moving) the due date to schedule their tasks, while others use the defer date. But neither of those fields are truly ideal for scheduling. We think adding a scheduled date would improve the way tasks are scheduled.

This is pretty exciting for to-do app nerds. The battle rages on about “do” or start dates in Todoist, and is an often-cited friction point for users of that service. (It looks like they’re working on it.) OmniFocus is better than Todoist, in this regard, but far from perfect. (I maddeningly use flags and defer dates to narrow my focus.) Another level of filtering would help immensely, and would be interesting if the feature is not just another version of a start date.

Omni Roadmap 2024

Alain de Botton of School of Llfe fame was on the Modern | Podcast most recently. In his discussion about “rupture and repair” he mentioned
Kintsugi, the craft of repairing broken pottery in a way that honors its original form while celebrating the flaws.

Modern | Wisdom #898 – Alain de Botton – How To Fix Your Negative Patterns

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out. Last week was a hell of a week!

Sagamore Rye

Rhonda and I had this rye in Rehoboth Beach one night during a family vacation, and have been keen to get a bottle. She spied a bottle on sale last weekend, and we’ve been enjoying our manhattans with it all week.

Brew Ratio

Brew Ratio is a great coffee nerd app. You adjust your coffee, water, or ratio variables, and Brew Ratio adjusts everything else, to help you make a great cup of Joe. There’s a timer, too. I prefer when my scale has a timer, but my current scale doesn’t, so I’ve been using my Apple Watch when I need to set a timer.

Tally

Tally, by Agile Tortoise, is a focused tally tracker by the maker of the essential Drafts. It’s dead simple but immediately useful. Behaviorists take note.

Neil Strauss’s advice–that not voicing expectations will likely yield to resentment–is usually applied to relationships. I take this to mean that, for example, if you don’t ask the kids to take out the trash or bring in the cans, but expect them to do so unbidden, you’re going down a path to resentment.

An avoidable path.

And hey: dinner and drinks work this way, too. By way of example, Rhonda and I often nip out to a joint around the corner, the Greenview Inn, for dinner and a cocktail. We have, on occasion, gotten a martinis or manhattans that were entirely too dry for our tastes. I make our Martinis at about a 6:1 ratio of gin to vermouth, and manhattans closer to 3:1. Rueing the prospect of slugging down another poorly made cocktail¹; for reasons both epicurean and nutritional, I piped up: “Can you make that about 3:1?” The bartender reacted with surprise, remarking, “Oh, really sweet!”

“If you say so,” I replied.

He made them to our specs and they were fantastic.

I haven’t consistently adopted this strategy, but I have been trying to when I can. We had another chance last night, while dining at the Savoy (another local favorite, in part due to its proximity to our house). Rhonda had attended a farewell party for a colleague a few days before, and had been served an entirely-too-dry gin martini. I, too, had ordered their pork chop about a month ago, and after being serially treated to succulent chop after chop in our local haunts, the Savoy served me a bone-dry version of the same one night while we were out on a date nite.

I wanted to try the pork chop again last night at the Savoy; a number of non-steak options were tempting me, but the glory of a juicy chop on a cold January night?

Irresistible.

When TJ, our server, came over to ask about ordering dinner, I decided to speak up about my expectations, lest they fester into resentment. I told him that I’d ordered the chop once before, and why it wasn’t to my liking. He said he’d let the chef know how I liked it.

The chop arrived, an exemplar of the dish.

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¹ The popularity of dry vodka martinis–a boring if respectable standard cocktail–has unduly influenced people’s taste for properly balanced drinks.

I caught this segment of an interview with Mel Robbins where she describes the three “pillars” of friendship: proximity, timing, and energy. The first, proximity, really rung my bell.

When I was in college, I’d usually accompany a select group of friends to a brew pub or low-key bar with good beer and shoot the shit. Often, it was just me and Mike, a friend I haven’t seen in decades. We lost touch shortly after college. He hiked the Appalachian Trail, joined the peace corps, and became a mountain hiking guide.

I remember remarking to him one night back in 1992 or 1993 over pints something almost identical to Robbins first pillar: that friendship is determined by proximity. After we lost touch, I got to feeling bad that maybe it was more my perspective on the matter than any sociological phenomenon that influenced it.

I guess Mel would have agreed with me.

You can use LaunchBar to search Marginalia alongside other engines. Using LaunchBar’s Search Templates feature, you can add the following:

https://marginalia-search.com/search?query=*

Last Sunday, inspired largely by interest in how fucking intensely I experience the cold these days, I wanted to know what my body fat percentage was. I looked around a while ago (from the sofa) for where and how to do that, but it appeared to require a drive to Philly or Central Jersey. A simpler solution emerged in the Withings Body Smart scale, which was on sale on Amazon.

I’ve been weighing myself on our old bathroom scale, which works just fine. I manually logged my weight in the Health app on my iPhone. The app shows you the changes over time, and you can vary the scale. It’s been a useful companion.

This version of data tracking is anachronistic compared to the rest of my life. With the Apple Watch and iPhone, I can track multiple data points, including workouts, without much, if any, effort on my part. The most analogous task is entering my food data in Foodnoms. With this app, I manually log what I eat, although I have some pre-set items (like Manhattans) that I follow to make logging easy.

So! No longer. With the Withings, you sync your scale with the Withings app on your phone. The Withings app collects data from your weigh-ins, but also analyzes data from other sources, too (if you give it permission to access your health data). It has a lot to say about the quality of my sleep, for example, using nothing more than the same data that Apple Health collects.

The Body Smart measures your weight, but also reports “body composition” data as well. This apparently disaggregates your fat mass, reported as a percentage, from your muscle mass. It further reports visceral fat, lean mass, and bone mass. So you can see what you’re lugging around each day in your bag of bones.

This scale also reports a heart rate, but it’s always higher than what my watch reports, so I don’t trust the number. Maybe I’m excited to be stepping on Darrh Vader’s scale.

And about the body fat: I’m gonna be cagey. But let’s say I loosened the reigns a bit.