About me

Welcome.

Eons ago, when the web¹ was a new thing, ISPs tended to provide free file space for people to have little personal websites. Back in those days, one did so with whatever FTP client one could find, what we now know as static HTML files (but not CSS, not yet anyway), and lots and lots of dialup modem noise.

And, yes, I had one, back on what then was called GTE.net. In fact, I was a “Charter Subscriber” to that ISP.

Yet, as that free-file-space thing gradually went away, so, too, did many personal sites — mine among them.

Over the years, database-driven content management systems (CMSs) like WordPress appeared. They provide click-and-drag ease in building a personal site, but they tend to be security nightmares unless properly maintained, which many aren’t. They also introduce a great deal of technical overhead.

And then there are creatures like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, which for all too many people have become the only Web-based locations for ordinary folks’ thoughts. Of course, all these platforms want is to grab your information, show you ads, and — particularly in the case of Facebook — contribute to the dumbing-down of your culture and the political polarization of your society. What’s the harm??!?

(Don’t worry. This site is, and will remain, apolitical by design unless we’re nearing World War III or something along those lines. Maybe even then, since I doubt my little ol’ site is going to stop The Really Big One.)

Anyway, it seemed a lot of the fun had gone out of puttering around on the web and actually creating content. Then — first among the techno-cognoscenti and, more recently, among us ordinary folks — came websites powered by static site generators (SSGs) and written in Markdown. I found them a source of curiosity at first but gradually became more interested in the prospect, especially as I learned more about their technical advantages; and, so, here we are.

As for me . . .

So, who am I, and what business do I have putting yet another site on this already overstuffed web?

I love to write. More often than not, the muse is in one of her oh-let’s-go-“techy”-instead-of-“fictiony” moods and so she tells me to write more stuff on this site. Sometimes it’s even about the app or apps I use to write, which leads me to the next point . . .

Am I anybody special? Nope; just an ordinary working guy² who, for decades, has used a multitude of computing devices, operating systems, and apps — and learned a few things (and formed more than a few opinions) along the way. I’ve been told I can make complicated things easier to understand, and I try to do the same here.

Finally: since the Kewl Kids went off and left us non-SSG users in the dust, it behooved me and my geek’s curiosity to give this stuff a try, and that was the main reason I started the site in the first place. As one who’s long delighted in hand-coding websites whenever possible, I love seeing the comeback of static sites.

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you find this site a source of various little nuggets of helpful info, and occasionally a laugh or two — even if I hadn’t intended it, but especially if I had.

Again, welcome.