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september 2023

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---
title: "Favorites of September 2023"
date: 2023-10-02T14:48:00+02:00
tags:
- metapost
---
_Dear dr. Groeneveld, when are you finally going to properly start preparing for your next big thing? Time is ticking! Yours sincerely, just Wouter._ I know, I know, Wouter, but all in due time. October is still a long way off, and---woah, did that just creep up on us? It's still twenty plus degrees (Celcius) outside! Our lovely capitalist-powered CO2-producing economy seems to have abolished autumn, which in turn seems to have messed with my ability to get off my ass. All in due time?
Anyway, that's more than enough waffling. Let's see whether or not I have interesting links to share.
Previous month: [August 2023](/post/2023/09/august-2023).
## Books I've read
I'm still powering thorugh Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer's Brieven uit Genua (_Letters from Genoa_), currently on page 400 of 650 or so. As usual, it's great, and I especially love the letters he writes to his former self. It seems like a good idea to jump-start a bit of reflection (and a lot of dirty humor).
Apart from that, in September, I did finish:
- The School of Life's [What They Forgot To Teach You At School](https://www.theschooloflife.com/shop/what-they-forgot-to-teach-you-at-school/): a collection of short essays that dip a toe in subjects such as self-love, beginning (and especially ending) relationships, emotional maturity, and more. It's very easy to recommend but not very thorough.
- Mary Karr's The Art of Memoir that [left me disgusted](/post/2023/09/short-author-bios-on-books/) thanks to the Americanized writing style, ridiculous showcase of diction, and the words shit or fuck thrown in on every odd page. Deep down there, there's some good advice on how to write. I guess.
- Daniel Klein's [Travels with Epicurus](http://www.travelswithepicurus.com/) (in Dutch: _De wijsheid van de tandeloze glimlach: gelukkig ouder worden met Epicurus_); probably the one I enjoyed the most because of the laid-back writing style and the philosophical point of view. I especially enjoyed sections where the Kairos vs. Chronos interpretation of time debate (re)appeared.
## Games I've played
Yes! I mean, _yes_, I finally made some time to pick up a game or two.
- [Jazz Jackrabbit](https://jefklakscodex.com/games/pc/jazz-jackrabbit/) was the DOS Game Club's August game I finished 2 days overtime. I used to love the shareware episodes. Now I think it's a mediocre Sonic impression on PC. The soundtrack still rocks, though.
- I'm going back to retro shooters or retro-inspired ones, with [Quake (2021 Remaster)](https://jefklakscodex.com/games/switch/quake/) as the first I thought I'd enjoy less than I did. As a Duke 3D fan, I never really played it back in 1996 (and I probably didn't have the Voodoo card that helped run it). The remaster is awesome, and the new expansion map pack alone is worth its ridiculously low €10 price. I collected some thoughts and screenshots, so be sure to give click on the above link.
After _Quake_, I wanted to play _DUSK_, a more recent shooter with _Quake_/_DOOM_ influences that's supposedly very _very_ good, and also a good fit for the Month of Spookiness. But then I bought _Nightmare Reaper_ instead---after years of secretly admiring gameplay footage, but without access to a console port. I'm almost done with it: boredom is setting in.
## Selected (blog) posts
- Slightly related, here's a YouTube video of [10 essential components behind every great nineties shooter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGP9c61125k). Just in case you need a reminder.
- Feenk talks about [teaching moldable development](https://lepiter.io/feenk/teaching-moldable-development-dkbj2hlidhiph2eodusb87ye6.html/), a way of programming in which you build custom tools for reach solution to help systems become more explainable. I need to let this one ferment for another month: it's a lot to take in!
- Koshka's [Dos/Windows 9x Game Reminiscences](http://koshka.love/dos/reminiscences.html) were fun to read. Another good _searchmysite.net_ find.
- Alan Moore implies us to [read terrible books, too](https://austinkleon.com/2023/09/07/read-terrible-books-too/) (via Austin Kleon).
- A paper by Michael Muthukrishna and Joseph Henrich called [Innovation in the collective brain](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/epdf/10.1098/rstb.2015.0192) yet again confirms my ideas on collective creativity.
- Ruben Schade made a startling discovery: some 486 [cache chips can be fake](https://rubenerd.com/fake-486-cache-chips/)? I didn't know that! Better be careful out there on eBay, kids!
- I love Ernst Meijer's [Kom Denken](https://komdenken.nl/) approach to philosophical practice: you can book him to talk about anything, and he also does walk-in consults in the library of Utrecht.
- Timo Tijhof wrote [An Internet of PHP](https://timotijhof.net/posts/2023/an-internet-of-php/): PHP is still impressively _huge_!
- Dan North's [The Worst Programmer I know](https://dannorth.net/the-worst-programmer/) perfectly illustrates why developer efficiency metrics are bollocks.
- I switched from Node to Bun, but perhaps that's not such a good idea, since apparently we [learned nothing from Yarn](https://dev.to/thejaredwilcurt/bun-hype-how-we-learned-nothing-from-yarn-2n3j)? An interesting perspective on the evolution (and staggering speed) of JS build tools.
- I used Edward Tufte's layout for my dissertation in `TeX`, but using smart [nuclear anchored sidenotes](https://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2023/09/12/nuclear-anchored-sidenotes/), Eric Meyer teaches us that you can do so too in CSS!
## Other random links
- Dopefish has its own [official webpage](https://www.dopefish.com/fishinfo.html), yay! Dopefish lives, people!
- In [The old Apogee FAQ](http://www.rinkworks.com/apogee/s/2.1.shtml), we can read where the Apogee theme jingle came from.
- In case anyone wants an overview: someone made a [Google Sheet for Limited Run releases](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ko7iYqZDcr5Leq6I_1byupsVcyFjFZDYItTK5qhOwxk/htmlview#), because their own site is incapable of rendering a decent overview.
- [DOS Haven](https://www.doshaven.eu/) houses hidden 21st century DOS games, complete in stylized ASCII prompt.
- [Strudel](https://strudel.tidalcycles.org/) is a live REPL where you can hack together dynamic music pieces. It's basically the JS version of Tidalwaves.
- The Kagi search engine has a [Small Web webring](https://kagi.com/smallweb) that acts as a Stumbleupon for smaller sites. Be sure to add your favorites!