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Year: 2025

  • An 8-year-old boy in a white t-shirt and shorts crouches on a grassy trail, alongside a panting French Bulldog. The boy is holding a large green test tube.

    Found GC5FGMC R65: Hazelborough 1: Abby's woofday cache

    This checkin to GC5FGMC R65: Hazelborough 1: Abby's woofday cache reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs. Found after a brief hunt with the help of a boy and his dog. Definitely needed the hint! TFTC!
    AltAn 8-year-old boy in a white t-shirt and shorts crouches on a grassy trail, โ€ฆ

    Read more - about 1 minutes (19 words)

    • Checkin
    • to GC5FGMC
    • posted 27 April, 2025
  • Dan crouches alongside an 8-year-old boy in a forest.

    Found GC9KWV4 Hazelborough trail

    This checkin to GC9KWV4 Hazelborough trail reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs. Found after an extended hunt with the younger child.
    AltDan helps a child open a small geocache container, in a forest.
    A tough search: we were glad of the CO's recent comment to reassure us it's โ€ฆ

    Read more (28 words)

    • Checkin
    • to GC9KWV4
    • posted 27 April, 2025
  • Composite screenshots showing the Chrome performance metrics and Network download sizes for the React and Web Components versions of my traffic lights. LCP - React 0.06s, Web Components 0.04s. INP - React 16ms, Web Components 8ms. Transferred - React 62.3kb (compressed), 202kB (uncompressed), in 37ms, Web Components 5.2kB (compressed), 19.5kB (uncompressed), in 22ms.

    Deprecate React

    Just to reassure myself that I really can do all the things I say on my CV, I've been looking at tech tests that touch on each of them. I can definitely write React, for example... but... I might question the wisdom of a company that's exclusively recruiting for React skills in their front-end developers...

    Read more - about 6 minutes (1406 words)

    • Article
    • 6 comments
    • posted 26 April, 2025
  • Carefully-censored letter from Halifax, highlighting the parts that show my correct address, last four digits of my card, and my credit limit... and where it shows a pair of names that are not mine.

    Halifax Shared My Credit Agreement!

    Today, my partner's husband received a letter, addressed to him, about a change to his credit card agreement. Except the letter wasn't about his credit card... it was about mine! Halifax dun goofed.

    Read more (268 words)

    • Article
    • 3 comments
    • posted 24 April, 2025
  • Venn-Euler diagram with circles representing Romantic Breakups and Open-Source Tech Layoffs (the former overlaid with a broken heart icon, the latter with a background reminiscient of the Automattic logo). The items unique to each are 'paired': Who keeps the dog? / Who keeps the laptop?; Half your friends take "their side" / Half your friends still work for them; Slim chance of make-up sex / Slim chance of meaningful reference; Find out in person (unless they're a monster) / Find out by email (with 10 minutes notice); Comes with a brutal list of your flaws / Comes with no useful feedback whatsoever; "I'm happier on my own anyway!" / "Oh fuck, how am I going to pay the bills?"; Bags in the hallway / Bags under your eyes. The intersection of both circles includes: Trash talk; Risk of rebound; "How did I not see this coming?"; Sadness when you wake up without them; Still feel responsible for the things you produced; Emotionally gruelling.

    Breakups vs Layoffs

    I've had a few breakups, but I've only been made redundant once. There's a surprising overlap between the two! Here, let's put a Venn-Euler diagram together...

    Read more (112 words)

    • Article
    • 3 comments
    • posted 22 April, 2025
  • Grassy meadow between small forests.

    Found GCAR5HV Ivy

    This checkin to GCAR5HV Ivy reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs. The (long) log for Mossy describes the adventure to this geocache, too. Go read about it there.

    Read more - about 1 minutes (17 words)

    • Checkin
    • to GCAR5HV
    • posted 21 April, 2025
  • Map showing the journey described.

    Found GCB61ZC Mossy

    This checkin to GCB61ZC Mossy reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs. Saw GCB61ZC "Mossy" appear yesterday, but I'd already had an Easter Sunday beer or two and couldn't drive out here... in fact, I realised, I probably wasn't in a state to cycle out here either and so I resolved โ€ฆ

    Read more - about 4 minutes (937 words)

    • Checkin
    • to GCB61ZC
    • 1 comment
    • posted 21 April, 2025
  • The Devil's Quoits (Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire, UK) looks particularly striking in the bright sunlight of this Spring morning.

    Full image of A circle of standing stones in a henge, in a clearing flanked by trees, under wispy clouds in a bright blue sky.
    Alt

    A circle of standing stones in a henge, in a clearing flanked by trees, under wispy clouds in a bright blue sky.

    • Note
    • posted 20 April, 2025
  • Y'all seemed to enjoy the "overworld" map I shared the other day, so here's another "feelie" from my kids' ongoing D&D campaign.

    The party has just arranged for passage aboard a pioneering (and experimental) Elvish airship. Here's a deck plan (only needs a "you are here" dot!) to help them get their bearings.

    Full image of In the style of a passenger ferry, a floorplan for a dirigible, weighted down by polyhedral dice. Fantasy world quirks like bilingual text in Common and Elvish and the emergency exit sign depicting a fleeing witch complete the effect.
    Alt

    In the style of a passenger ferry, a floorplan for a dirigible, weighted down by polyhedral dice. Fantasy world quirks like bilingual text in Common and Elvish and the emergency exit sign depicting a fleeing witch complete the effect.

    • Note
    • 1 comment
    • posted 19 April, 2025
  • In preparation for Family D&D Night (and with thanks to my earlier guide to splicing maps together!), I've finally completed an expanded "overworld" map for our game world. So far, the kids have mostly hung around on the North coast of the Central Sea, but they're picked up a hook that may take them all the way across to the other side... and beyond?

    Banana for scale.

    (If your GMing for kids, you probably already know this, but "feelies" go a long way. All the maps. All the scrolls. Maybe even some props. Go all in. They love it.)

    Full image of On a dining table lies a old-style map comprised of 12 sheets of A4 paper, sellotaped together. The map shows the 'Central Sea', an inlet from the 'Terminic Ocean', around which various settlements, forests, mountain ranges, and swamps can be found. An underripe banana sits in one corner of the map, weighing it down.
    Alt

    On a dining table lies a old-style map comprised of 12 sheets of A4 paper, sellotaped together. The map shows the 'Central Sea', an inlet from the 'Terminic Ocean', around which various settlements, forests, mountain ranges, and swamps can be found. An underripe banana sits in one corner of the map, weighing it down.

    • Note
    • 2 comments
    • posted 18 April, 2025
  • Trip to Waddesdon Manor with the kids for an Easter Egg Hunt.

    Full image of Dan sits on a bus, a dog in his lap, alongside a boy and a girl. All three humans are wearing cardboard 'rabbit ears' hats.
    Alt

    Dan sits on a bus, a dog in his lap, alongside a boy and a girl. All three humans are wearing cardboard 'rabbit ears' hats.

    • Note
    • posted 18 April, 2025
  • 90s-style-homepage version of DanQ.me, as generated by geocities.live. It features patterned backgrounds, Comic Sans, gaudy colours, and tables.

    Geocities Live

    Geocities.live transforms any web page into a 90s-Geocities-style variant of itself, and it does a surprisingly good (if slightly "samey") job of it. Its take on DanQ.me got me thinking, though: are there things I can learn from 1990s web design and apply to the next generation of my theme?

    Read more - about 3 minutes (477 words)

    • Article
    • posted 18 April, 2025
  • GeoGuessr screenshot showing a guess in Dhaka being compared to the correct answer of Chittagong.

    ChatGPT beats GeoGuessr

    Given nothing more than a screenshot or two of my game screen, from the starting position only, ChatGPT plays GeoGuessr better than I ever could. Apart from cheating at GeoGuessr, what else could this mean? Is this going to be a scary new weapon in the toolkit of Internet stalkers?

    Read more - about 6 minutes (1408 words)

    • Article
    • 1 comment
    • posted 17 April, 2025
  • Rarely seen nowadays, these UK road signs were eventually declared "too impolite" and "brusque" and have now almost entirely been replaced with the ones that Brits are familiar with today, which read "Terribly sorry for the inconvenience, I hope it's no bother, it's all our fault really, so sorry, really sorry, sorry, I'll put the kettle on shall I?"

    Full image of On a grassy roadside verge, next to a temporary wire fence, a yellow-and-black metal sign reads 'Sorry for any inconvenience'.
    Alt

    On a grassy roadside verge, next to a temporary wire fence, a yellow-and-black metal sign reads 'Sorry for any inconvenience'.

    • Note
    • posted 17 April, 2025
  • Found GC3PP3Q LOL #2 โ€“ Swimming

    Second time lucky! As the pup and I approached the GZ we found a strange handwritten more on the ground, and, having not seen it on the way up, figured that it must belong to a woman we'd passed a little while ago. So we doubled back and returned it to her - turns out it was her shopping list - and chatted about tree beautiful bluebells (which is what she'd come out to see) before parting ways and returning to this cache.

    Read more (130 words)

    • Checkin
    • to GC3PP3Q
    • posted 17 April, 2025

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