Current status: I’ve got a good, old fashioned cold. I’ve forgotten how weird it is: you just find yourself sort of staring at nothing. And the snot. I didn’t have time to self-promote my content. Next time! Also, you know where to find it. English Class Essays, Insider Sales Emails, Webinar Landing Page Copy - More ChatGPT ExperimentsLike I said last time, my theory is that the ChatGPT thing is a great tool for brainstorming and writing - for thinking.

_Current status: there's about two weeks left before the work year is over. I'm lucky that I get a lot of time off at the end of year. VMware gives a whole week. The idea of the world being shutdown and, thus, feel guilt free about doing nothing is more appealing than it's ever been. I'm going to try a slightly new format this issue: "less."_ Suggested Theme Song: Planets by Masaru Imada Trio

Big one this week. My thoughts on Twitter; what to do with your past-self; CFP'ing; some music recommendations; as always, lots of links - some tasty ones on kubernetes market-sizing (a lot smaller than you'd think). Suggested epigraph: “I woke up this morning Didn’t recognize the man in the mirror Then I laughed and I said, ‘Oh silly me, that’s just me.'" Suggested theme song: (We apologize for forgetting to add a suggested theme song to last week’s edition.

Some notes on attending conferences, notes on enterprise open source comercio-community, asides and waste book…lots of links. Suggested epigraph and theme are on vacation this week. FOMO and Family at ConferencesFOMO is OK, but it is also not OK. All the things you’re missing out on are extra work that drive only marginal profit (for you). Better to enjoy your free time. Also, those FOMO’s might be worthless, or introduce risk.

_Suggested epigraph: [see title]_ Suggested theme song: Middle Cyclone by Neko Case Current Status I am a big fan of not “talking about the show on the show,” but, obviously, in the little nerd-corner of the Internet that I mostly exist in, there’s a big export of people from Twitter to Mastodon. I setup two accounts there: @cote@hachyderm.io which is my “person” account and my cross-posting firehose account. The first is, you know, me.

It's hard to know if there's too much stuff should be doing, or if I have it project managed well enough that I don't need to worry about it right now. Below, a little bit on being cool with security in open source usage (survey says!) and the usual collection of interesting words seen, stuff I've produced, and links I liked. Suggested epigraph: “it’s pretty darn hard to protect a painting from somebody throwing a can of soup at it.

Do you really like winging it, or do you like more structure? And, of course, the emptying of the waste book and links relevant to your interests. Suggested epigraph: “I don’t care that much." Suggested theme song: Why Choose by Shopping First, this Platform Engineering Follow-up Thinking I think what I missed in my thinking out loud was: I should just use that community’s own definition and work within the parameters of the intention and spirit of the thing.

Or, “is platform engineering just another excuse to use the infinity loop SmartArt in a PowerPoint?” Preface: I usually have a whole passel of random stuff in the newsletter, it’s my waste book, by design. This past couple of weeks I’ve gotten obsessed with figuring out what the deal with platform engineering is, I mean, beyond the obvious. Here’s my write-up so far. I don’t know, it’s a draft of an idea to see if it feels right.

(I've been consolidating all the past places I've had newsletters. If you got this email in error, or don't want it, here is the [unsubscribe link]({{ unsubscribe_url }}). I apologize for the merge-madness.) Epigraph for this issue: it’s probably fine. Theme song: “Rise,” Herb Alpert. The Beautiful House As the Old Sing, So Pipe the Young I like a Jan Steen house because it’s beautiful (and not another Christ, Madonna, or Greeks scene), and, because it’s intricate and so fun to look at like a Richard Scary world.

Epigraph for this edition: "Most things I worry about, never happen anyway." Or, equally well said. Art as Therapy, or, The Buddha Had No Kids Part 2. Sometimes you forget that, like, good things are out there, are possible. That you can do more than the same grind. de Botton’s whole deal is, sort of, that good art - culture and philosophy, outlook - does this for you: reminds you about smiling and pulls the corners of your mouth lips gently up.