Category Archives: design

art: Jhane Barnes greatness

Posted on 2024-08-25 by skierpage

Jhane Barnes‘ legendary shirts are just too beautiful to hide in a closet. I need a glassed-in mobile of shifting shirts that move close and recede. Failing that, after I wear one I leave it out to catch my eye … Continue reading →

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screwing squinting customers instead of helping them

Posted on 2023-02-13 by skierpage

Companies treat government-mandated disclosures as a bureaucratic cost to be minimized rather than a chance to help their customers. So I get illegible tax form verbiage on Umpqua Bank’s 1099-SA form, printed on the envelope of my form to save … Continue reading →

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computers: put the screen above a laptop

Posted on 2022-12-31 by skierpage

If you search for “external laptop monitor”, most images show a screen beside the laptop. So you have to look sideways at it, or use a separate keyboard. Some even show a tray raising the laptop to the screen height … Continue reading →

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design: buttons barred, suit yourself

Posted on 2021-05-13 by skierpage

When I had Perry’s of Bangkok tailor a suit for me (in a very different time and place!), I knew I didn’t want that anachronistic row of buttons on the jacket sleeves. They used to work: I had a science … Continue reading →

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eco: reviving an IKEA Jansjö light

Posted on 2021-01-21 by skierpage

The IKEA Jansjö was amazing 12 years ago, a cheap bright LED lamp when others cost $150. It was $40 (went down to $15 and now may be discontinued). But the switches on them were awful. Both of ours flicker … Continue reading →

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design: a Black Lives Matter poster

Posted on 2020-09-03 by skierpage

It is the least I could do; downloading this PDF and printing out the first three pages is the least you can do. I made it in the free and open source LibreOffice program, using the fonts Cantarell Extra Bold … Continue reading →

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skiing: technical wear as fashion

Posted on 2020-03-13 by skierpage

Keegan Brady wrote an article in GQ about the rise of “technical outerwear” in fashion. I wear and love this stuff while skiing, but once I’m off the mountain it goes in a storage tub. He mentions the rise of … Continue reading →

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Minox James Bond off-hours camera

Posted on 2018-09-22 by skierpage

Minox was moderately famous for making a tiny spy camera using 16mm film. But they also made the smallest 35mm camera in the world (100 x 61 x 31mm or just 2.4″ tall), and I owned several as each broke … Continue reading →

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computers: my legendary Herman-Miller Levity standing desk

Posted on 2018-04-06 by skierpage

For months I tried to give my old adjustable desk to a museum, or at least to someone who has a use for it. It’s the Levity by Herman-Miller, an impressive piece of late 90s office design. It goes from … Continue reading →

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art: the greatest walks away from her canvas

Posted on 2013-08-03 by skierpage

This is like Morris Louis, Agnes Martin, or Piet Mondrian putting away their brushes. (And Jhane Barnes is way better at geometric abstraction than every capital ‘A’ artist who’s practiced it.) Jhane Barnes’ blog post is frank and clear, in … Continue reading →