/reader

Shortly after that, I stepped down from Fosstodon and switched to Micro.blog.

Oh, I also cancelled my Kagi and YouTube subscriptions while I was at it – the latter because YouTube is like crack to me.

Oof, that's a lot, right? So to save you reading lots of posts on all these changes in isolation, I thought I'd hit them all up quickly in a single post.

How very efficient of me, hey? Ok, let's jump in...

Framework 13

I already posted my initial thoughts after a week of use, most of which were positive. After using it for a couple of months, I'm extremely happy with my purchase. The screen issue was fixed quickly, as the Framework folks immediately sent me a replacement, and I’ve been able to test the repairability by upgrading the keyboard to the v2, which has no Windows key.

Battery life isn't as good as the MacBook, but it was never going to be. It is, however, more than good enough for my needs. I've been sat on the Framework in the lounge for the last 90 minutes or so, catching up on work emails and writing this post, and I still have 81% battery remaining.

Ubuntu runs perfectly on the Framework – I've had no issues with it and no occasion where I've felt the need for Windows or Mac.

Pixel 9a

Meh. It's a phone. It's fine. Battery life is good, camera is fine, it doesn't have much bloat on it (except for Google apps that I don't use), and I can do everything on it that I could on my iPhone. It was also half the price of the iPhone and will be supported for 7 years.

The Pixel doesn't wow me, but it does what I need it to do. Having said that, I don't remember the last time any phone wowed me.

iOS frustrated me in certain ways. Android frustrates me in other ways. Neither is perfect, but the significant difference in price is the clincher for me.

Micro.blog

I don't miss Fosstodon one bit. I have a lot more free time now, and once everything is fully handed over to Gina, I'll have more money too. 🙃

Micro.blog is a nice little community, and I can still interact with all the peeps on the Fediverse too, so I’m not missing out in that regard. What I have noticed is that I'm spending less time on Micro.blog than I did on Fosstodon. Not because the former is bad – far from it. I think it's a combination of things:

1. I'm not an admin, so there's less work for me to do and I don't need to spend as much time on the platform.
2. Manton – the founder of Micro.blog – has put a number of guardrails in place to prevent gamification. No likes, no boosts, no follower counts, no image replies, etc.

I'm really happy with my decision to switch to Micro.blog. If you're thinking about a move away from the Fedi, I'd consider Micro.blog first. It's a slower pace and has a lot of features that allow for customising the feed to make it more deliberate – or a firehose, if you prefer.

Kagi

I'm a search Luddite, so I don't need a lot of the power features that Kagi offers. I love what they're trying to achieve over there, but DuckDuckGo is perfectly good for my needs, so I might as well save myself $10/month.

I've been back on DDG for a little over a month now, and I haven't missed Kagi once. Says everything, really.

YouTube

I was finding that I was spending a shit-tonne of time on YouTube. Like, any time I had a spare 30 seconds, I'd whip my phone out and start wading through the crap that's on YouTube Shorts.

I cancelled my subscription to YT Premium and disabled the app on my phone (can't uninstall it on Android, which is annoying). I've also started deliberately not carrying my phone with me. I have a place in the kitchen where I leave it so I know where it is, but it prevents me from unconsciously pulling it out of my pocket.

I have to say, it's working really well. I very rarely go on YouTube at all now, even when in bed with my iPad. I'm mostly reading my Kindle in bed instead. My iPad isn't long for this world, being around 7 years old at this point, so when it stops getting updates, I don't think I'll replace it.

If I start to miss it, I'll probably buy a Pixel tablet. But something tells me I won't. We'll see...

Final thoughts

So there you go – I just saved you around four extra posts to wade through. All in all, I'm happy with the changes I've made to my tech. I'm saving money and will hopefully have hardware that lasts a lot longer.

Overall, I feel like my relationship to all this crap has shifted over the last few months. Before, I felt like I was perpetually online, but now, not so much. They're just tools at this point. Don't get me wrong, they're tools that I enjoy using (especially the Framework – it's bloody lovely), but tools nonetheless.

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My morning walk with the dogs is one of my favourite times of day. It’s so quiet where we live, and at this time of year, all the wildlife is out with plenty to see.

This particular route is around 3 miles (5 km) and takes me out of the village, up into the hills, and back down the other side. Going up the hills gets the heart pumping too, so it’s decent exercise. Anyway, here’s the route we took this morning…

First, we walk out of the village and head under this beautiful old bridge. This is where we start our ascent into the Welsh hills. On the way back down, we’ll go under a viaduct as we return to the village.

Apparently, this bridge and viaduct date back to Roman times (obviously they’ve been improved or rebuilt since then). A popular history show in the UK, Time Team, actually did an episode in our village:

Anyway, I digress. On with the walk…

We start heading up the hills. The dogs are starting to pant and I’m starting to sweat, but it’s worth it once you see the views.

On the way up, we see some of Carl’s sheep (he’s the local farmer). We always stop to say hello, but I was too busy scratching an itch between one of the ewe’s ears to take a photo – sorry!

As we head further over the hills, we notice that Carl has some of his calves out in the fields too. So we stop, and they wander over to see what we’re doing. Both dogs and calves have a good sniff of one another. I’m even subjected to a couple of sniffs myself.

All sniffed out, we continue onto a bridle path and start heading down the other side of the hill. We go past the wonky tree (that’s what our kids call it). Lots of horses use this path, but we didn’t pass any today unfortunately.

As we come out of the bridle path, we’re greeted with more lovely views of the Welsh hills, and Barnie, the local Shetland pony, comes to say hello.

We’re well on our way down from the hills now, moving onto a fire road that winds down through some woodland.

Halfway down there’s this lovely house with an old canal boat in the garden. I always gorp at this house as it’s so gorgeous. I didn’t take a photo of it though – that felt a bit rude. But trust me, it’s beautiful.

At the bottom of the fire road, we head under the viaduct and back into the village.

As we head back in, I hear one of Carl’s cows mooing in the distance – probably mum to one of the calves we saw earlier, and likely related to the cows he put on our land a couple of years ago.

That’s a lot to take in on a relatively short 3 mile (5 km) walk, which is part of why I love living here. It’s just so beautiful. Imagine how much we see when we do the much longer walks at the weekend!

Anyway, the dogs are tired, I’ve done some exercise, and it’s time to sign on for work as my first meeting starts soon.

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