ShawnT 🔧🐀

I was in a high school computer literacy class filled with Commodore 64 machines. First lesson was a typing tutor. Teacher knew I wrote BASIC on my own TI-99/4A, so I could type, but it was all keywords from muscle memory.
Teacher took me off the Commies, put me in the corner with the Selectrics, handed me a typing book, told me open to page 1 and begin.
I hated her so bad. Fires of Hell. But I goddamn learned home row method, and it made all the difference in my life.

2026-04-17 02:18:04 UTC

Raise your homerow fingers if you were force-trained how to touch type on an IBM Selectric with the keys painted over with nail polish.

2026-04-03 15:46:26 UTC

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I watched this episode last night! What a dashing brigand (90's sense)!

2026-03-12 14:26:52 UTC

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Today's six-million-dollar man is just a guy who went through aggressive cancer treatment.

2026-03-07 19:41:35 UTC

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I have a working hypothesis that goes like this:
If a game has Tux in the name, it's going to be a terrible also-ran of a more popular title that's not available in stock Linux repos. Its existence is to breathlessly exclaim "we have games, too!", but it doesn't do that convincingly either.

2025-12-31 19:39:02 UTC

Gentle reminder that if you want #Mastodon to turn #2026 into a hashtag, you have to add letters, or else it'll think you're just typing "number 2026". Use something like #2026CE or #2026AD or whatever. Hope this helps!

2025-11-07 15:33:23 UTC

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Spinjas are their mortal enemies. Their warfare is fierce, open, and absolutely silent.

2025-09-21 21:32:05 UTC

Fried chicken strips with gravy.
-OR-
Where you dip the solid chicken in the liquid chicken
so you can dip the solid flour in the liquid flour.
#food

2025-09-10 18:16:55 UTC

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the oldest of schools!
Yeah, after Jared disappeared, it all kinda fell apart. Big ups to electronic-mp3. I see magic_silver_box posting to his tumbler on occasion. Most of the others I don't keep up with, except for elleinad. She's doing well.

2025-09-10 04:00:44 UTC

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HOLD UP is this the same Aliceffekt from the anal0g dot org Wires compilations, and from the Mario Paint EP?

2025-08-22 23:21:16 UTC

I'm like a packet
of Folger's instant coffee
In a grand tea house
#haiku

2025-08-11 15:09:37 UTC

If an LLM were to scrape your hard drive, what assumptions would it make of you?
I know, from the idiotic terrorist manifestos I grabbed from the internet before the federal cops told the hosting providers to take them down, it would have a completely incorrect idea of who I am. That's for sure.

2025-07-28 14:50:21 UTC

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Pro-pain and pro-pain accessories...

2025-07-15 15:22:07 UTC

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SEO is the air downwind of a Torchy's Tacos, where it smells amazing and tasty, and you go in hungry, and order a taco, and what you get is bland and boring, because all the flavor was sent up the vent hood.

2025-06-26 14:40:23 UTC

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screenshot from "The Man in the Iron PBS Logo"

2025-06-02 16:06:33 UTC

Panic! At the VPN.

2025-03-30 18:02:12 UTC

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I could try installing Linux on this ancient Chromebook, or I could go outside, touch grass, and read a book.

2025-03-30 06:29:31 UTC

NOT ME at 1:30am Sunday morning looking up how to install Linux on my antiquated Samsung C303 Chromebook because it's still perfectly usable except where Google stopped supporting it. I would never do such a thing.

2025-03-16 17:30:48 UTC

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Is that... *carpet*??

2025-03-10 02:53:48 UTC

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Is there a blurb in the liner notes about using a custom program on an Apple II to control a pen plotter to draw the cover art? Because it's definitely in the liner notes of my CD copy. What a wild flex. Not enough that there's a Fairlight CMI touching every track, they gotta brag about graphics tech.

2025-02-19 03:54:57 UTC

Blustery cold weather?
Quarantini time!
#martini
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/114/028/525/347/856/954/original/9f1fd68fad1a5a88.jpg

2025-02-13 03:08:03 UTC

Y'know, I haven't seen Overly-Attached Girlfriend in a while. I hope she's doing alright, maybe sought some therapy, stayed out of prison, got into hobbies.
#memes

2025-01-30 03:42:26 UTC

Does #Activitypub support #Upvote and #Downvote verbs? Just wondering. Just thinking out loud.

2025-01-26 05:49:14 UTC

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Did you have a cool DJ on-air name?

2024-12-05 07:53:03 UTC

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EXCEPT when your IT org pushes some random-ass NFS mount earlier in your $PATH and puts some random-ass bash there, and suddenly you're dealing with some random-ass issues. Ask me how I know.

2024-11-05 14:20:07 UTC

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Ugh, yeah, the "flying scabs" episode.

2024-11-01 17:18:54 UTC

"Sorry I was on mute"
Every. Goddamn. Call.

2024-10-31 16:13:13 UTC

Starting off this #Halloween day with Carpenter Brut's "LEATHER TERROR".
#CarpenterBrut #horror

2024-10-31 06:52:18 UTC

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Thing is, I **work** with one of these guys. Maybe it was him. I dunno. But we've gone to Noonday with these kinds of weirdos, right? Lord knows *I* was one of those weirdos.
But, y'know, being part of that scene in our own day maybe inoculated us against whatever this is. And thank God, right?

2024-10-31 06:49:36 UTC

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When I say "memes" and bible verses, I mean this bullshit.
IDK even where to begin with this.
The difference between a raver and a prophet apparently is a StartHere.html, and there's not even that. It's just files. Lots of files. And meme images or whatever. I swear, this is just some guy and his cause. Or girl, I dunno. Whatever. Everybody got a mission these days.
I'd call the cafe and tell them to trash every last thumbdrive, but they're all innocuous. Why bother.
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/685/534/723/266/original/5b74a11b01ddfcb8.jpg
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/685/972/253/468/original/e60d382aec82b052.jpg

2024-10-31 06:44:44 UTC

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It's, uh, it's just a regular-ass USB thumbdrive filled with the blatherings of some drive-by preacher. It's so pedestrian. It's a product of some Austinite with a mission of self-proclaimed christofascist import. We're not strangers to memetic priests around these parts. I wish it was more dastardly, but no, it's just some guy with a ministry. :sigh:
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/677/770/397/817/original/bb531eb4f988474e.jpg
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/678/418/326/502/original/de43ed627a6849d2.jpg

2024-10-31 05:45:09 UTC

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Main USB-HDD interface chip is "FC2279", which is a no-name USB-NAND interface controller. The NAND (or whatever) is potted, so no idea what it actually is.
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/442/117/129/397/original/d99f124e8f8a398e.jpg
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/444/692/962/552/original/11c60bf31be5d6c1.jpg
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/445/791/000/730/original/f366a761404b3f0d.jpg
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/400/446/732/811/032/original/ff6cf42090c6a08a.jpg

2024-10-31 05:18:06 UTC

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Exactly. It could be anything from a USB Zapper, to Bad USB, to a USB worm, to just somebody's shitty album that's not even good enough for Soundcloud. Who knows. I'll be deliberate in this investigation, for sure.

2024-10-31 01:57:37 UTC

Random-ass USB thumbdrives in the coffeeshop community offering plate. WTF? I'm taking one home for research.
#hacks #sketchy #caution
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/399/542/054/812/198/original/2296039e8c9f5b1f.jpeg

2024-10-16 06:19:14 UTC

The cool thing about having an electric toothbrush that doesn't need to be paired with an app is that my dental insurance provider can't buy blocks of info and cross-reference me and put me in a higher risk group and charge my employer more for our group healthcare plans if I don't brush 5 times a day.
#pii #infosec #enshittification

2024-10-12 20:00:31 UTC

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Start at the lowest level: make sure both USB-C sockets are clean and free of the fluff that accumulates. Dental picks are great.
Next level: make sure the cable is rated for the voltage/current that the phone and charger are agreeing to. Cables have logic that notifies each end that, "Yes, I can carry that without melting" when in reality they probably can't. You mentioned you tried a different cable with the same charger with better success. Go with that.
Good luck!

2024-10-11 01:33:21 UTC

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Thassalotta knives, mister.

2024-10-10 02:36:26 UTC

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The whiskey (no matter the variety) really does help with the compliance of the metal against stone. Good effort!
What grit stones do you have? I have a kit with soaking stones of 400, 800, 1000, 3000 grit, and a stone for sanding down the others. Still can't get the 3000 to do anything impressive, so most stuff is just 800 then 1000 and I call it a day.

2024-10-08 06:02:28 UTC

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Oooohhh Mike, you keep bringin' it, and I'm glad for it. This reply is [checks notes] chef's kiss.

2024-10-08 05:05:55 UTC

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#Monday night activities, as foretold in the prophecy:
#blades #sharpening #knives #whiskey #chores
https://cdn.mastodon.coffee/media_attachments/files/113/270/046/099/873/010/original/479cbacd0af7fb7d.jpg

2024-10-08 02:13:53 UTC

Monday night seems like a perfect time to sip whiskey and sharpen all my kitchen and pocket knives. Hyep. I reckon.

2024-10-07 15:03:35 UTC

Ethical snacking.

2024-10-06 04:47:52 UTC

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NO WAY. Dude. Did this happen?

2024-09-30 03:44:06 UTC

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I know phone cams do shiesty stuff like beautifying images, but, c'mon, just look at that. Beautiful. Makes me want to move there. <3

2024-09-07 06:20:12 UTC

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These are GREAT pictures!

2024-09-02 23:22:04 UTC

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They took away our home buttons, our aux jacks, and our HREFs and sold them all back to us.

2024-08-31 06:22:19 UTC

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NOW who's gonna be complicit in all the benchmarketing of all the major hardware companies? Who will take the money and fill that role now? I can't trust anyone anymore!

2024-08-26 16:08:11 UTC

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I suspect it's the chemistry (and that it's more profitable to make them fade faster). If I use modern markers on the board I've had since college, it just doesn't want to erase cleanly, so either there's a resistive layer on the board that has worn off, or the chemistries are incompatible.

2024-08-20 06:36:07 UTC

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You are standing at the end of a road before a small brick building.
Around you is a forest. A small stream flows out of the building and down a gully.
#textadventure

2024-08-20 05:38:01 UTC

Holy fuck, I just found out that the O.G. #InteractiveFiction game #Adventure is already installed on my #Ubuntu system for years, waiting on me to play. What am I doing with my life?

2024-08-13 17:25:31 UTC

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What if - stay with me - what if the carrot IS the stick?

2024-08-13 15:01:50 UTC

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Thanks for the inspiration; I just grabbed it from the Internet Archive!

2024-08-12 16:59:30 UTC

For every carrot, there's a stick.
#humanresources

2024-08-08 08:02:09 UTC

My wireless #earbuds keep falling out of my ears. Maybe I should make some kind of band that goes over my head to hold them in.