Thursday, October 8th, 2026

Yesterday was another day of painting for me. I ran out of paint for the bathroom in my new garage, but I was able to get the areas that the future plumbing fixtures would block done, which was my main purpose. At some point when the shower is done and all the fixtures are in, then I can go back around and paint the room fully. The garage is going to be in a partially completed state for a good long while, I believe. I made good progress on painting the parts for my motorcycle. I should have only one more layer of paint to add and touch up a few spots. Then I need to take apart the crash bars on Val’s motorcycle to touch up the scratched up areas. So far these crash bars are working well. I just don’t want the scratched sections to start to rust on our longer trip. It will be easier to touch this up now while in our garage. I am not sure it will make much difference in the long term. We are going to put these bikes through hell.

I keep thinking about my limited use of social media and just how, like many, I wish these platforms didn’t exist. Or at least how what was set out as the original purpose of many of these platforms shifted towards just distracting and angering us. There are a couple of user groups related to travel that seem pretty valuable on Facebook. But the problem isn’t the group, it is the fact that you need to go to Facebook to interact with the group. I’ve deleted my Facebook and Instagram accounts before. And although there are some things I lose, like the ability to see when actual friends are doing something I want to congratulate them on, I wish it wasn’t 98% complete shit and 2% value. I think it likely would be best to get off of these platforms, or find a way, like my music listening, to constrain my usage in a way that serves me, and not the platforms.

What is most disappointing to me is that we had all the technology to make the web a good place for people and groups. In many ways that technical infrastructure still exists and is being leveraged by a comparatively small number of people. Protocols such as RSS, Activity Pub, etc. But, most people don’t want to think about how they interact with other people. They just want to have it provided for them. Which is completely reasonable. So the large social media companies found a business model that makes getting billions of people online work for them. It doesn’t mean it works for society. There is also the possibility that humans have not adapted to interacting with the numbers of people that the internet and the social media platforms enable. Our historical ability to live in a society started to break down at a few hundred people. And we were clearly not meant to get inundated with news from thousands of miles away.

The biggest idea that I need to be okay with is just not having the ability to be part of the conversation. When I’ve deleted or disabled my accounts on these platforms in the past, there is the realization that you can no longer engage. 98% of the time this is a good thing. But you are also giving up that 2%. And that I just need to be okay with.