Holy butts, why has no one ever said this sentence to me before

“If you knew what it was, you’d be using it already.”

One of my best friends in high school was a Norwegian exchange student. He was easygoing and smart and we rode the bus together because his host family lived nearby. Some of the funniest conversations of my life happened on those bus rides.

When he went back to Norway we lost touch. I think it must have been difficult for him to be here—the isolation, the culture shock, the language barrier, I can only imagine. Maybe it was a relief to leave our little town in the rearview mirror. But I’m forever glad I met him.

This is a great concept. I hope it catches on.

I participate in a pledge called #50forFOSS. On the first Friday of every month, I choose an open source project and give the maintainer $50, no strings attached. It lets me target small projects that may not have a lot of users, but are valuable to me, as well as bigger ones with more expenses. My mindset these days is that I need to insist on paying for the software I use, because if I don’t, someone else will (i.e. advertisers and venture capitalists, which is bad) or no one else will (i.e. abandonware, which is worse).

Disclaimer: I started #50forFOSS and there’s a very small group of us who are doing it.

I had 12 weeks of paternity leave at my last job. The only rule was that, as secondary caregiver, I couldn’t take it all at once.

I spread out the last 8 weeks and took every other Friday off for several months. It was awesome, and if it reduced my productivity, the difference was imperceptible. I had to be a little more keyed in on Mondays, sure, but I always felt more than capable after a long weekend.

Only for the floors that are labeled correctly, though.