Blogs

Since buying our first house about a year ago, I’ve gotten really into DIY home repair, home improvement, etc. As a software engineer, I find that working with physical tools on physical problems is a refreshing change of pace after staring at a screen all day! Plus, it’s an excuse to buy a bunch of tools! Speaking of tools, I’ve been thinking about diagnostic tools that would be helpful for a homeowner to own. Here’s a list of the ones I own, organized roughly in order of importance. ...

For the past few years, I’ve loosely followed the “Bullet Journal” method of note-taking. Usually in a Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover A5 notebook with dotted pages (the best!). Whenever I finish one notebook and start another, among other things, I like to write down some key questions and mental models at the front of the new notebook, so that I can easily refer back to them whenever I need to. Here’s what I’ve written at the start of my current notebook. ...

In November 2024, I bought a 55-inch Hisense U6 4K Smart TV on sale for $350. It’s been great so far! Definitely an upgrade over our old Samsung. I’m not a TV expert, but I did a fair bit of research and the consensus seems to be that the Hisense U6 series is a great deal for the money. Here are some of the online reviews I found helpful: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-4k-tv/ https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-budget-tvs https://www.rtings.com/tv/reviews/best/budget (Linked from my Questions page, where I keep track of questions I’m asking and answering.) ...

Until the past few days, our 4-year-old son, Andrew, has mainly prayed something like the following before dinner: “Dear Jesus, help us to have a good day tomorrow, and help this food to be good.” However, in the past few days, he has started to pray more spontaneously and creatively before dinner. Here are some highlights: “Give us this day our holy bread” “Help us worship you even when we are in heaven” ...

“O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” has long been one of my favorite hymns. This Advent, I’ve decided to write some additional verses. They emphasize God’s heart for the poor and the powerless. If you read the Bible looking for these themes, they show up almost everywhere. However, in particular, I’ve drawn from Leviticus 25, Psalm 113, Isaiah 58, Amos 5, Luke 1, and Luke 14. O come, Defender of the weak, Teach us their welfare first to seek. May widow, orphan, refugee Find rest within Thy jubilee! ...

UPDATE: This now seems to work! The post made it to Micro.blog, BlueSky, and Mastodon, at least. Just not to Threads. I’m trying to troubleshoot what’s going on with my current crossposting configuration between my Hugo website, my Micro.blog account, and my accounts on BlueSky, Mastodon, and Threads. What’s supposed to happen is that this blog post, after I merge it to my GitHub repository, will end up on the JSONfeed at https://joshuapsteele.com/blog/feed.json. ...

Source: Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman Where in your life or your work are you currently pursuing comfort, when what’s called for is a little discomfort? Are you holding yourself to, and judging yourself by, standards of productivity or performance that are impossible to meet? In what ways have you yet to accept the fact that you are who you are, not the person you think you ought to be? In which areas of life are you still holding back until you feel like you know what you’re doing? How would you spend your days differently if you didn’t care so much about seeing your actions reach fruition? Want more self-elicitation questions like these? Check out “Questions Worth Asking.” ...

Source: Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman Adopt a “fixed volume” approach to productivity Keep two todo lists, one unbounded and one limited to a certain number of items (max 10); you can’t add a task to the second list until you’ve completed a task Might also need an “On Hold” or “Waiting For” todo list Set predetermined boundaries for your daily work Focus on only one big project at a time Decide in advance what to “fail” at (“strategic underachievement”) Focus on what you’ve already completed, not just on what’s left to complete Consolidate your caring (pick your battles!) Embrace boring, single-purpose technology (like the Kindle) Seek out novelty in the mundane Be a “researcher” in relationships (be curious, on purpose) Cultivate instantaneous generosity (act on the impulse to be generous right away) Practice doing nothing

I’d love to blog more regularly, and I love answering questions. So the “WeblogPoMo AMA” challenge caught my eye! For this challenge I want to foster writer interaction: write a blog post starting with a question—the AMA—and then answer the question yourself in the blog post. Others will likewise write AMA/question posts, but also answer the AMA/questions from other bloggers, linking to their initial post. I brainstormed a bit on this idea when I first thought about creating WeblogPoMo Challenges. ...

In God’s economy, the most important people are not the billionaire, the business owner, or even the blue-collar worker. Instead, in God’s economy, the most important people are the widow, the orphan, and the immigrant. Which is to say, the poor and the powerless. I’ve previously gone into depth on what the book of Proverbs has to say about poverty and wealth, as well as how Christians should think about wealth. Here are some more biblical passages relevant to the topic. All quotes are from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV): ...

Today should have been my cousin Eric’s 32nd birthday. Instead, having lost him earlier this year to some serious health complications after a devastating motorcycle accident, we gathered to remember him and celebrate his life. Another member of our family gone too soon. Two passages of Scripture came to mind as I thought about Eric today. First, this one from Ecclesiastes (which I previously wrote a bit about after the untimely death of my Uncle Tim). ...

Lest my previous parenting post suggest that things are all doom-and-gloom at the Steele-haus, here are 10 things I love about my kids. I got to baptize all 3 of them as babies, a poignant reminder that they are beloved children of God. They all love books, which warms my nerdy heart. The way Eleanor (1yo) greets me. It used to be a very excited squeal. Now it’s “Ah! Daddy!” Andrew (4yo) has a great memory for stories, especially Bible stories. I was redoing our fire pit, and spraying it with a hose to cut down on dust as I re-leveled the ground. Andrew: “Elijah put water on the fire, too!” (see 1 Kings 18). Eva (6yo) is smart as a whip. She asks great questions, and I’m looking forward to (re-)learning with her as she gets older. Eleanor’s recently learned how to do an overly-exaggerated “angry eyebrows” face, and I find it absolutely hilarious. She now does it to get a laugh. Andrew loves Spiderman, and he goes back-and-forth on whether or not he thinks superheroes are real. Listening to him as he narrates Spiderman scenarios while running around in his Spiderman costume is always entertaining. Eva will sometimes read books to Andrew and Eleanor. They will then imitate her–Andrew, by reciting stories from memory as he turns through the books, and Eleanor, by babbling to herself as she flips the pages. I can get them all to watch things with me like This Old House, DIY videos, tool reviews, etc. Partially because they’re all curious and enjoy learning about tools. Partially (OK, mostly) because they’re thankful they’re watching *something* on the TV. They’re all still young enough that they frequently want hugs and snuggles.

I love my kids, but I sometimes regret having them. Pardon the clickbait-y title and opening sentence. But are we parents allowed to say that? Are we allowed to feel both of those things at once? We’ve got a 6-year-old, a 4-year-old, and an almost-2-year-old. And, no, I don’t actually begrudge them their existence! I want what’s best for their lives and futures. And don’t get me wrong; there are moments of laughter, poignancy, joy, etc. ...

I don’t know what it is about mini toolkits, but I love them. Actually, scratch that. I know why. It’s the same reason I love buying tools and books, more generally: the illusion of control. I like how having tools (and a great personal library) makes me feel like I’m ready for whatever life throws at me (ha!). It’s why I liked carrying around a pocketknife as a kid, and it’s why I’m into EDC (everyday carry) and tools as an adult. ...

You Can’t Follow Jesus and Hate Immigrants You can’t follow Jesus and hate immigrants. Of course, this does NOT settle every question of immigration policy! But, if you’re a follower of Jesus, consider your overall posture toward immigrants. If you call yourself a Christian, I want you to think about this seriously. What comes into your head and your heart when you think of immigrants and refugees? Fear? Anger? Disgust? ...