I commute to work three days per week, about 160 miles each direction. I wake up at 5 am and am out the door between 5:30 am and 6 am, putting me in the office around 8:30 am. The irony of me spewing carbon all over the place while working for an organization that is also combating the effects of climate change has not gone unnoticed by me. I don’t say this with any cynicism, I work with incredibly smart people doing incredibly smart and impactful things under tight budgets, and I’m willing to try and solve this commute issue and certainly commit my time to continue being a part of this.

Economics plays a big part in this arrangement: at my current salary it is cheaper for me to continue living where I live and pay for the gas vs. relocating to Lincoln and incurring debt and significantly increased costs to reduce my commute distance. Over time as I build my relationships and more importantly, trust, I suspect I will be able to switch to a different model. In parallel I am researching hybrid options (I don’t think I can justify fully electric in Nebraska winters) to trade my current vehicle in for. Emotionally immature me doesn’t want to do that because I stupidly love my car and I know it will last 500k plus miles.

Being on the road a lot I haven’t been online very often, which is refreshing. Over the last ten days, give or take, I have come across a few interesting tidbits.

• America is getting more and more burdened with rising energy costs. I know I’ve seen our utility bills rise significantly, our usage patterns certainly haven’t changed. AI and the data centers that can’t get enough energy of course is becoming a primary driver (and the increased cost gets passed down to households).

  “Working families are already on the brink—with millions forced to skip meals, dip into their savings, and turn to credit cards and other risky financial products and practices just to get by.”

• I think I had seen this earlier but the Light Phone 3 received a best invention of 2025 by Time Magazine in October of this year. I can’t speak to how relevant Time is anymore.

• Speaking of the Light Phone, someone has made middle layer of services accessible by SMS for dumb phones.

• AI CEOs keep telling us that their companies will wipe out humanity if someone doesn’t intervene. I suspect the Enron style funding timebomb may be the intervention they are looking for.

• The Federal Government is now running its kidnapping operations in Charlotte.

Staying away from a regular internet consumption habit has been good for me. When I do dabble, I see the tinted glass everything tries to put on our eyes, rose or other shades, and I’ve felt my responses be more pragmatic vs. reactive with one exception, I downloaded the 26.1 iOS update to my phone and enabled the “Tinted” setting for liquid glass and I find things to be much more useable.