I am currently struggling with the selection of my next project. Liberally speaking, I have around 12 different projects at varying stages of development. My first thought was to concentrate on those projects that are at a more advanced level of completeness, but that would be a mistake. The more I spent looking at the list the more I realised that what I might actually want to consider is focusing on those projects that could have the maximum impact to those around me, which will then enable me to continue to meander and create more things in the future, because of the knowledge that I am not just creating these things for myself and a few devotees who appreciate and get what I am trying to do.

Over the last few years, I have poured a lot of myself into my the two books I’ve released, Built Environment Compendium Volume.1 and Moon Racket! Ambient Hum. And while I believe that they’re good packages, sadly they have not penetrated an audience. Life is anything but a series of failures that we build upon and learn from. I genuinely believe that we should never dwell on failures. The work that I’ve created is mostly evergreen. You can read it now and in 10 years time and it will be (mostly) relevant.

So with that I have decided to focus my efforts on the following projects:

1. How We Design and Build Our Environment
2. Stet Newsletter

The first project is a something I have been meaning to develop since the summer. It’s partly a manual for all those looking to enter the construction industry but I am hoping to create a number of things that will look to enhance this project. The ultimate aim is to create a really useful resource for those interested to get a better understanding before they dive in and make considered decisions.

The Stet newsletter is going to be a different affair this time around as well. Rather than massive article that delves into a specific topic, I am going to collect different items of interest over the course of a month, sprinkle some commentary and send these out. This time however I am going to leverage LinkedIn this time around as I felt had the most interaction on that platform as it has a larger concentration of the type of people that are more likely interested in this kind of thought.

As I delve into the above, I will likely review and develop two other projects that are actually at a reasonably advanced stage of development, Automated Construction and Built Environment Compendium Vol.2. These projects can ultimately act as feeders into the newsletter while also exercising a different type of creative activity.

That’s not great. Just noticed that the price of the Stet domain has gone up in price. I was already not particularly happy with the price I was paying for it, so will likely switch to something else when it expires in August.

Inside Real Madrid’s $1BN Stadium Upgrade. Great overview of a stadium that looks completely insane, in the best possible way. The most fascinating part for me is tracking how much this site has changed through its history. Where do they go from here - because you know at some point they will likely have to.

Eco House designed to Passivehaus premium. Since putting a pause in the work around Stet, as I settle into a new life in Canada. This story of building integrated PV is exactly the type of thing that I miss the most. Deep dives into the built environment and everything around it.

Fuuuucccckkkk. I’ve been doing it all wrong. Picked up a book today that makes so much sense and has showed me why and where I have been going wrong with Stet.

Had I read it 3 years ago at the peak of Stet, I likely would have moved a lot differently. In hindsight I followed the wrong advice - or at least it didn’t work for me. I don’t feel bad about the work I did (I’m actually very happy with the work itself), but everything around the work? I totally messed up.

I have been waiting to jump back into that particular project when I had the right ideas to move it forward. The reality is that I think I will be there pretty soon. So that’s exciting.

Amazingly full day.

1. Wrote a super important few pages in my notebook for Stet. I need to flesh it out a little bit but I have a really good feeling.
2. Watched some Manchester United pre season game and could see what the future is meant to hold.
3. Took kids swimming for a few hours.
4. Cooked Greek souvlakia for everyone (including making the pita).
5. Did some reading with the kids
6. Took a long walk with the kids (they were on their scooters).

What summer is all about :).

Over the last couple of days I have felt a little restless. Recently I’ve felt the need to put a little less pressure on myself, when it comes to my creative hobbies. I guess part of this is the realisation that all of these endeavours are a hobby. They all contribute towards a body of work that ultimately helps me get through life; yet they are hobbies nonetheless.

Then I realised how many book projects I have on the go, which likely contributes to that restless feeling. Turns out I have 8 projects in different stages of development. The thing is, a considerable amount of effort goes into the production of any of these book projects. Beyond the writing, illustrating or compiling, putting it all out there takes effort.

KAA Books

With all of these different book projects that I am working on, I thought it would be good to create a new imprint called KAA Books. I did consider KAA Press or even KAA POW, but books just does what it says on the tin. Still on the fence about whether I always keep the books word in there, or just keep the KAA word mark and call it a day.

What’s interesting to me is that these are all different forms of work. Comic strips. Children’s book. Cook book. Illustrated novel. I also have a design book (even have the name ready), and a short story collection (have the first 3 written and published).

In writing this, I imagine part of the restlessness has to be the fact that there are all of these projects that I want to get over the line in some way.

1. Moon Racket! Ambient Hum Vol. 1.

I have had to switch to Affinity Publisher, as this image heavy book was really taxing the Pages app, which is better with other kinds of nooks. This will be my next book. The biggest hurdle is the cover, however I now have a clear idea of what I want it to look like.

2. Moon Racket! Our Solar System.

This is a children’s book idea I have had for a while. what I hadn’t realized was how much I had actually written across 2017. I’m glad I waited a little while as I will need to rework some of this and use the latest character designs which I am really happy with.

3. Leila’s Kitchen.

I started collecting this book earlier this year. It’s a cook book based on my mum’s recipes. The way I see it, we’re co-writing this. I get the receipt, test it out myself and edit according. This is probably a little way off, but I’ll have a ton of fun putting this together and will have something pretty unique and special at the end of it all. This also works really well into the video space, something I’ve not really delved into.

4. Moon Racket! Season 3

This is something I am writing whenever I get an idea. It’s an outlet that I have missed having, it’s been 10 years since I wrote season two. As I have been rereading the older strips, I’ve found that where I have felt most engaged is when I am commenting on the political landscape .It’s a definite change of course (considering I’ve written a children’s book), but I guess the one thing that is clear with these characters is how they have evolved both in their themes and their design.

5. Colours

Originally conceived as a graphic novel, I’ve now decided to work this as a short story. The main concept gave me incredible brain crack, however I think it works well in the 1500-2500 works/season. There will be at least 4-6 seasons. The final version might be a single book with illustrations but honestly that is years away.

Stet

1. Built Environment Compendium Vol.2.

The purple volume. Finally got a print version of this. Will be editing this throughout 2023 and then hopefully Mike can review next year, for publishing summer of 2024.

2. Automated Construction.

The yellow volume. Chapters 1-9 are written, need to stick the landing. This one is proving harder to write because it all has to come together as one volume.

3. Built Environment Compendium Vol.3.

The orange volume. This is the last full volume that I wrote on Stet. Volume 4 is a way off considering all these other projects that I have going.

⚡️ It’s not every day that you get one of these - but I think I have the next phase of Stet in a hazy vision in front of me. Just need to put a little more polish to the idea.

I don’t know how else to be.

On my latest trip Florida it dawned on me that I generally am genuinely happy in, when I’m in creation mode. Originally I had thought that this mode was mainly going to be spent around the creation of comics. Turns out that was pretty limited conceptually.

The last few years I have tried to combine all my interests together, in all things Stet. While that does remain my focus hobby, I have found that I do want to continue doing other things as well. Making things and putting them out into the world is something that makes me happy. None of these things are commercially viable. I’ll stick to my day job thank you very much.

I do these things very much for myself and if others find value in them as well then that’s an awesome bonus as well.

I do these things because I don’t know how else to be.

Issue 003 of my newsletter Stet, is now out. This issue looks at the opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum.

Great article over at Our Built Environment newsletter which looks at the magic that has seemingly become less common within the built environment. I would say that there still are many contemporary examples. You just have to know where to look. Maybe something for the next issue of Stet.

Issue 002 of my newsletter Stet, is now out.

📬 Stet newsletter has now finally dropped. Feels good to have this as part of my routine again.

Stet Newletter

If you’ve missed my newsletter In Abeyance, sad news, I’ve decided to stop publishing my thoughts on the built environment in that format. For those wondering if I will do my 1500 word articles, the answer is of course, however they will follow their own schedule and will be released when they are good and ready. In the meantime you can read previous articles here, www.stet.build/articles.

The good news is that I’ve started another newsletter, Stet. Stet will share one single idea about the built environment and will be published every 2 weeks.

The very second article written for the old In Abeyance newsletter was centred around photovoltaics - it’s therefore fitting that Stet starts life on the same topic.

Read the first issue of Stet, Photovoltaic Carrots & Sticks. If you’re not already subscribed, now is a good time to remedy that monsterous error in your email diet.

I am now using three different blogging tools. Each uniquely suited for it intended use. Status.lol is for short, pithy updates. Micro.blog is for short and slightly long posts. Blot is ideal for longer form writing.

It did pain me to do it but I moved my In Abeyance newsletter over to Substack from Buttondown. My main reason for the move is the constant spam that I was getting and having to manage.

I get the value of something like Substack now.

They have also managed to add some pretty nice features to the newsletter itself. Having the ability to start a discussion thread with everyone subscribed (and that is connected to the app) is an awesome feature. It’s a discussion thread and newsletter manager all wrapped into one.

Another great little feature is how the software generates these little thumbnails that you can share:

So if you’re interested in the built environment and want something concise and punchy, subscribe at Stet.Substack.com.

This one is a little late but there is a story there.

I knew I needed to have something ready to go for this year. A way to track my No-S Diet and also how often I worked on all things Stet.Build. The aim being to rebuild habits that I developed several years ago and that have no fallen away from me because relocating your life to a whole new country is major disruption.

I did most of the design work, but then lost steam when I bought a bunch of calendars from Muji. My thought process was that I won’t need this particular calendar anymore. The Muji ones were more than enough. And yet I found out that they were not enough. They allow me to see the month, but this Actions Calendar gives me so much more information and appreciation of my goals across 12 months.

Available in 2 printer friendly configurations. The Letter edition (for all the North Americans) and the A4 edition (for the rest of the world?). I’ve included a small ‘manual’ in there to describe the design decisions behind the calendar.

I’m also using Gumroad to distribute all things digital come from the site.

Download 2023 Actions Calendar ➔

Falling out of habits is very easy. Falling back into the habit is harder.

1. Micro habits are the start of establishing macro habits.
2. Stacking these habits is an important trick to use at the start.
3. Making habits discoverable to carry out the habit is the last piece of the domino.
4. Establishing a time and a place.

Journaling and Writing

This is an important way of settling my mind. In 2022 I fell out of the habit, jumping back sporadically. So I’ve decided to stack, time and place. Stack the habit when I make my coffee in the morning and tea in the evening. My journal and pen are located in my kitchen drawer.

Reading

I completely fell off the wagon. Part of this is the habit, but equally part of this was having a stack of books that I could jump into. I made a list of books that I have bought that I would like to get stuck into at some point this year. 9 -12 I own and about 3 would be new.

Kindle is now located next to my bed. The aim is to read for 30 minutes a day.

Writing

Writing for Stet.Build every day is the other activity that settles my mind. This break I was able to map out Season 5 of In Abeyance while also looking to starting work on volume 2 of the Built Environment Compendium.

The writing will be a daily morning activity, with the achievable aim of writing 100 words. This is the most productive hour of my day.

Designing

I’ve found that what little energy I have in the evenings has generally been squandered on aimless internet-ing and the occasional show. The one activity that I have been able to carry out (on those occasions where I could yank myself away from the internet), has been designing. Books. Websites. Whatever.

I don’t tend to talk very much at what I am planning to do throughout the coming year, having said that this coming year appears to be a pretty busy time with the release of multiple projects that have been gestating for several years. Some will be brand new projects, while others will be putting together of material I have created in the past.

1. Calendar ‘Bubblegum’ 2023 (kaa/002)
2. Typeface 01 (kaa/003)
3. Goodnotes Templates (kaa/004)
4. Moon Racket! Collection. Will need a new cover. I might also add a few new one page ‘stories’. (kaa/005)

I also fully intend to write a short story in November as well and I would like to finish off the short story I started last year as well (but maybe I get to that this year).

Stet

Beyond that there will be three Stet.Build projects that I would like to tackle:

1. BEC Vol.2 - The Purple Edition. This will need a new cover, a ton of editing and pulling the document together in pages. (SB/002).
2. Automated Construction. Complete the draft, currently sitting at 75% complete. (SB/003).
3. Season Four of In Abeyance. Six issues published bi-weekly.

It took a while to get there (over 5 months), but I finally updated the landing page for my book. I had done the design for this a while back but wanted to spend time on coding it up only after I had actually created all the different versions. The book can be found digitally on Amazon, Apple store, Gumroad and a paperback version from Lulu. Finally I have a link that I can share which has all the information in one place: www.stet.build/bec.

Summer holiday was all about recharging and getting a few things out of the way - formatting the books and sorting out the website is a good haul.

Now that I have completed putting my book up for sale (in all the places I intend to sell it in) thought it would be good to record the experience and what I learnt (in case others might be looking to replicate the journey).

Editions

All in all there are 4 editions across 4 stores:

1. Digital Edition. This is hosted on Gumroad. Comes in two flavours, pdf and Epub3.
2. Paperback Edition. This is a print on demand copy and honestly my favourite version - but I am very old school like that. The only difference for this edition is the lack of full blue page blue insert at the start of the book. I found that this page impacted the binding. This edition also comes with an index at the end (more on that in a bit).
3. Amazon Kindle Edition. This does away with the double page photo images that break the chapters. The graphs and tables are images and does not have an index.
4. Apple Bookstore Edition. The exact Epub3 file. This one is coming soon, as it’s being reviewed by Apple.

Pages

Nearly 3 years ago I lost my Mac. At the time there were rumours of Apple silicone on the horizon and it didn’t feel like the right time to make a purchase that would least me at least 5 years. My only machine was my 2018 iPad Pro, a device with hardware that was (and is?) way ahead of it’s competition. All that was missing was suitable software.

My original hope was that Affinity would release their desktop publishing app, Publisher, on the iPad relatively soon. We’re still waiting for that release. What I found was the incredibly capable Pages app that could do just about everything I wanted. It did take a while to get used to understanding how some of these things were setup, but being able to edit things across my iPad and iPhone allowed me to iterate at a much faster rate.

Being able to share comments and update a file between myself and Mike (my editor) made the editing process seamless. This space could be better in keeping the comments history (after you’ve accepted the comments), but honestly it’s a nitpick at this stage.

The one feature that I hope Apple adds is the ability to create an Index. This was by far the most time consuming and painful exercise - and which I had to do manually. What is encouraging is that Apple continues to update this app several times a year and continues to make it even more capable with every iteration.

Formatting

For Gumroad, creating a pdf and an Epub was trivial. As was uploading to the Apple Bookstore. The web interface for iTuneConnect is ok. You can tell which parts are still legacy from before Apple decided to take the web more seriously but overall no complaints.

Reformatting for Amazon was painful but hopefully worthwhile. For this edition I had to move off my iPad Pro and onto a Windows machine I have access to. Export from Pages to Word. Import it into Kindle Create and then go about formatting everything to suit the different format (ePub2?). Sadly I feel that this is a lesser edition than the others on account of not being able to provide some of the native elements that I have included in the other versions (full page images, native tables and graphes). Having said that everything looks sharp on both my Kindle Paperwhite and my iPhone.

I gave up on Draft2Digital pretty quickly because the final version was asking for too many compromises. My text and supplementary images don’t marry well with the type of book that service is catering towards. If you have a ‘novel’ type of book (a cover and then text), then this system will work a charm for you. Everyone else, it’s probably an exercise in frustration.

This has been a really incredible journey for me. From my original ideas of creating these concise books, I now have my first release across several stores and formats. The barrier to entry is exceedingly low, considering that apart from using a windows machine for a day to format the Kindle edition, everything else was done on an iPad (including all the illustrations). Creatively this has been one of the most complete things I have ever worked on. I have 3 more in the tank, although none have gone through the editing process yet. Now that I know the process, hopefully the next ones will come out faster.

Its clear that I can do a better job with promoting my book. It’s been amazing to see the idea resonate with people but I have been asked on more than one occasion is how do I get a copy. Will work on something this week to make it easy for people to know where to go.

I write and draw because I absolutely love it. I do it because I find tremendous value in the research, writing and creation process and hopefully you find value in receiving these missives as well.

I don’t however have a team of people doing things for me. I am the sole person responsible for everything around these parts. Doing many things, which I enjoy, takes time. Having an infinite weekly deadline doesn’t really work for me now that I have to split my attention across multiple channels (the newsletter, the books, the website).

And so my In Abeyance newsletter is moving to a ‘seasons’ model.

My intention is to give myself the summer off. Write season 5 and release it in the autumn. The size of each season will depend, but I imagine between 6 and 12 issues. Each season will have a theme, with the next season concentrating on ports. Airports. Shipping ports. Spaceports. Their history, economics, design and future.

The Built Environment Compendium, while the work of three years, is actually the very start of the journey with all things Stet.Build. I am incredibly excited about how the first book turned out - even more so now that physical copies are available.

I am however still learning what works and what doesn’t work in the indie self-publishing world. Pricing was something that I did agonise over a fair amount. I loved the idea that Derek Sivers uses however it didn’t really work for me.

I’ve decided to change the pricing model for the books, but only after I took care of the super early (and incredible) supporters by sending them a paperback version of the book as well (these are now all in the post and on their way). They now have all the versions for roughly the same price as the new pricing:

• Digital Edition ➔: $4.99
• Paperback ➔: $12.99 / €12.99 / 17.99AUD / £10.99 / 17.99CAD

The final version I am currently working on is the Kindle version. This will likely be priced the same as the digital version and will hopefully drop sometime in the summer.

For all those who have bought it already I want to thank you for the support and would love to hear back from you. For those still on the fence, consider buying a copy (or 2), it’s a concise package of goodness about how the world is built.

Issue 061 of my newsletter In Abeyance is now out. Been on a roll with the new format and schedule and have been enjoying the diversity of topics I’m covering.

Just stumbled on Cusdis, a lightweight, privacy-first, open-source comment system that is exactly what I was looking for across my various sites. Already integrated into Stet.Build (coming soon to kaa.bz). Already contributed as I like what Randy is doing.

That was disappointing. Just got a printed copy of my book from Lulu.com. A little over a year ago I got a similar print which I thought came out really well.

Fast forward to today and the results are not the same. For a start the binding is worse and the cover has separated already from the front page.

There are issues with the printing alignment - checked the pdf and everything is fine at the source.

The colours have been printed in CMYK, even though previously they would be done in an RGB palette. I’m pretty sure this is a different printing house (the book came from France rather Spain).

Also, so far noticed one small error which I am correcting as I also pull together the Kindle version as well.

My presentation for Micro Camp 2022 is now live. Had a lot of fun doing this and actually I intend to play around with this format on future Stet projects.

Building something is difficult.
It take incredible patience.
It takes conviction.
And it takes belief.
Belief that things will eventually resonate with a wider audience. Belief in that this thing you are building is the best use of your time. What is the opportunity cost? Are you a victim of the sunken cost fallacy?

Even though I have been building Stet for 3½ years now, in many respects the road begins now, with the very first publication out. Creatively speaking, Stet has been one of my most consistent outlets. It has allowed me to combine all the things that I love to do in a consistent manner. My only concern however is that it is not reaching the wider audience that I imagined for it.

I had hoped that creating something good and useful would yield more reach. I was wrong. At the moment it is a creative distraction. Maybe I overestimated the audience of people interested in reading concise and (I want to believe) interesting articles about the built environment?

Advertising

I have dipped my toe into Twitter ads, but I feel that this isn’t exactly where my audience is. Rather the one that appear to ‘engage’ more with my posts are definitely living (lurking?) on LinkedIn. The thing is it seems that barrier for entry into this space is $120 minimum from any campaign. Seems like burning $120. I don’t mind betting on myself, what I do mind is betting on myself when LinkedIn makes the rules and I have no idea what the outcome could be.

Newsletter

I have been meaning to review what and how I write about this particular newsletter. I really believe in the format. I love sending it out. I love writing and have really developed a love for it. I love the research, I would do the research and write even if it wasn’t being shared with others. However I did conflate two issues. Writing 2000 word essays is a commitment from anyone to read. It has also lacked a consistent publishing schedule this past year. My antidote to all of this has been to reduce the size of what I am sending out but generally send it out every week.

A follow-up on my presentation, another great indie typographer that I love and follow is Mika Melvas. Today he dropped a wonderful sans serif typeface, Nietos. I have used Melvas' work on Stet (notably when you sign up to the newsletter).

The full version of issue 053 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out, Extreme Environmental Design. This one was actually meant to be published in The Prepared newsletter (this one didn’t quite fit), but I really enjoyed how this came out.

Issue 053 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. No link to the issue yet (but you can sign up), because I am doing something a little bit different with how I publish things going forward (which I need to write about).

You can grab a freshly minted copy of my first book the Built Environment Compendium Vol.01. If you are actively curious about the built environment, this book is for you.

I’ve written about how the idea behind Stet.Build came to me. I quickly set about developing the ideas on my study wall. Never shared this photo but easily one of my favourite exercises when brain storming. In the top right hand corner you can see the original sketch for what I wanted the covers to look like. Also its interesting to see my thoughts on pricing which have evolved since then.

The last year has been all about editing and polishing the script and thankfully had Mike Summers, who was the perfect editor, because he cares about the English languages and its nuances. He pushed and he prodded. He questioned and he commented. We did it all using Pages. Technology has evolved to remove incredible amounts of friction and this has been a perfect example of this. Right there baked into my phone and iPad.

Buy the digital edition of the BEC Vol.01

Creating a book for the digital age brings with it a different set of parameters to consider. The book cover is no longer a tall rectangle. Feeling good about the final book. Woo!

Day before releasing my book. Everything is nearly ready to go. Just need to do final, final, final check. Its turned out even better than I originally imagined 3 years ago and having Mike edit the book has made it infinitely better. Will have more to share about this process.

I am now thoroughly in the dip phase with the thing I’ve built. Has the newsletter reached the audience I imagined for it…in a word no. I am super grateful to the readership that I have. I do however feel that there are many others that have yet to discover the newsletter. Others hungry to learn more about the built world around us, presented in an interesting manner. I just need to work through the dip and come out the other side.

A ‘postcard’ of all the covers from my newsletter In Abeyance for 2021. Complete archive of all 52 issues can be found here.

Issue 052 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out, ‘White Elephants’. This is the second from last major thing I wanted to get done this holiday. This is also the last issue that uses the orange colour as we move onto the lime green for 2022.

Procreate has an amazing feature which tracks how a piece of art is made. The cover to the Built Environment Compendium Vol.1 was drawn across a few months and remains the most complicated (technically) drawing I have ever worked on.

Now I find out about Tailwind CSS? Looks amazing, although based on my needs, I think Skeleton is just fine for the most part, the hard part is maintaining and cleaning my CSS file (which halfway through the process devolved into a bit of a mess).

Super excited that I can finally say that the digital edition of the Built Environment Compendium Vol.1 is now available for pre-order. For release on the 15th of February 2022. For pricing format, I am following Derek Sivers.

It has been years since I designed a completely new website. My toolbox of tricks has remained mostly the same - still using Skeleton, which I absolutely love. What has been fascinating is the scope a modern website now needs to serve. Now you have to effectively design four websites in one - desktop, tablet, mobile and dark mode.

Desktop

Version 2.0 of Stet.Build, which has seen very little love since it was launched 3 years ago, is a huge leap forward. I’m glad I took the time to make this the best it can be. I always recognised this was a major project and this has taken me around 6 months to complete (not full time of course).

The mock-ups were done in Affinity Designer - probably over a decade since I have used a vector app to design a website. For the most part I was able to replicate these. The annoying part was loosing some of the mock-ups half way through the design process due to some random name saving error. Top tip, save your work outside the Affinity system.

One of my favourite features of the new site, is the archive feature. A little bit of javascript and filtering the table like magic.

Mobile

When it came to the mobile version, I left it to serendipity and let the pieces fall. I could have spent a little time on this during the mockup stage, however I think that it worked out well in the end.

Dark Mode

This was (and remains) the biggest hurdle. This issue was that the individual artwork looked completely out of place in its native form with the bright white background. The only way around this is to recreate 51 drawings that are more suited to the darker background. This is going to be a work in progress as it is not a top priority - but will get to it all eventually. Issue 50 shows where I am heading with this.

Coding

Finished the mock ups months ago but needed the space (mentally) to dive into the coding. Certainly rusty, I leant into my constraints. My primary machine is my iPad Pro. I lost my MacBook a couple of years ago, and due to all the Apple laptop keyboard fiasco I never pressed the button. I began coding this on the iPad, but it really was an exercise in misery. Forget what they say, the iPad does not have the versatility for something like web production. Until Apple bring the Dev tools over with Safari, its all counterproductive.

The overall Blot system also made it super easy to work on the site while everything else was live. Probably the best setup for developing a website I have ever worked one. Local files that I save and see the impact direct on the site. Genius implementation.

Got an email this morning that amCharts is shutting down its live website in the coming 6 months. This is one of the clear reasons for not relying on a service that you cannot easily replace. At the start of Stet.Build, I incorporated several graphs into my articles. For the last few years I have avoided this as creating and maintaining these is not based around simple and standard solutions - unless the landscape has changed?

Latest issue of my newsletter In Abeyance is finally out. Over the last year I have fallen out of my routine for writing in the morning. Part of this has been due to my regular work creeping outside it’s time boundaries.

I have considered making the newsletter easier to write (by writing less) but that defeats the whole point of this endeavour. What I have settled on is accepting that sometimes I will be late but (hopefully) worth the wait.

Surrounding your desk.
Around your television media area.
Across your kitchen (over and under the counters).
Deep inside your walls.
Running under your feet.
They deliver power and signals.
Cables are ubiquitous.

Yet even for an electrical engineer like myself, it would be difficult to argue that they are great to have around. They get tangled up. They fray. They are a necessary evil.

What a glorious place it would be if all your appliances and devices where always charged and ready to go. Wireless power. An idea nearly as old as electricity itself.

Read issue 051.

Currently doing a major overhaul on the Stet.Build website (first time I do a complete update the website since I started publishing 2½ years ago now). A true revelation has been Textastic, which is by far the most polished environment for writing code on the iPad.

Issue 050 of my newsletter In Abeyance is now out. Special issue as it doesn’t dive into a specific topic, rather it provides a loose taxonomy of the built environment and categorises all the articles so far within this taxonomy.

It’s probably been over a decade since I spent any meaningful time inside a vector tool designing a website. Usually most of my designs are pretty simple and so this step is seemingly superfluous. However the new version of Stet.Build needs a more considered approach, as I intend to live with this design for many years forward. I do wish I could magic the coding up once the design is complete but that is at least another week’s worth of work afterwards.

Issue 049 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out, and focuses on biomimicry. This one was harder to write and finish - probably because I have not regained my rhythm since my whole iPad debacle. I also experimented a little bit, veering more on opinion than just facts and analysis.

🖋 About once a year I finish off an A5 notebook dedicated to all my creative projects (in this instance anything that relates to Stet.Build, In Abeyance and kaa.bz). This time around I decided to pull out the big boy, the Nanami Seven Seas notebook. A 480 page brick of a notebook complete with tomoe river paper. This book is likely going to be around till August 2023. Can’t wait to fill it with ideas, sketches, articles and notes.

Issue 048 of In Abeyance is out. This issue is late, a first in the 2½ years of publishing. It’s hard to write when your main and then your backup work machines both fail. This knocked my writing, researching and publishing rhythm off its axis. So I took a month off. This month its all about nuclear power, Olympic beds and Muji horology.

Took a forced month off from publishing In Abeyance - because of computing issues that knocked me off my rhythm. This is the first time I have had to miss a month in 2½ years. In the back of my mind I hope to make it up before the end of the year but won’t beat myself up if it doesn’t happen.

Issue 047 of In Abeyance is out. This issue is about Brutalism, a subject with seemingly infinite avenues to explore. Also in this issue, Art Gensler and Dieter Rams.

For the last month there has been a steady number of new subscribers to my newsletter. It ranged between 2-5 new subscribers a day. The thing is I couldn’t understand where they were coming from. My site analytics did not reflect this influx. Turns out they might have been added by a bot. Buttondown makes things easy to manage users and send a simple email to confirm (by doing nothing) or unsubscribe if it is a bot.

When I set to work on Stet.Build, I knew that this was a longterm project. That the many pieces that I was putting in place would not really find their complete form until many years later.

Now three years later I am edging closer and can finally share some of the very original ideas that got me excited so long ago. The very first book, the Built Environment Compendium Vol.1 is complete and is now ready for pre-ordering. I am still in conversations with my editor for final edits to the text, which should hopefully be done within the month.

This is the first time I use Gumroad and I am actually pretty excited to see what this platform has to offer to digital content creators. Overall I like the simplicity of the platform.

Issue 046 of In Abeyance is out. This issue is about Shipping Container Architecture. Also features The Ocean Cleanup, Prometheus Fuels, Michael Sorkin and the Ferrule.

This issue is a little late, but I’ve been a little preoccupied with life recently. Had a lot of fun creating the artwork this time.

Now that the manuscript is done, time to turn my attention onto the Stet.Build website. In dire need of a ton of attention. The iPad has been a wonderful machine in creating the work, the only area it really doesn’t do a very good job with is coding.

That’s not entirely true as there are a number of capable code editors (Coda from Panic being one of them). The only reasonable option is Inspect Browser. It was recently upgraded to 2.0 but it really is an unfortunate omission from the iPad toolbox - easily one of the things I miss the most from not having a Mac.

Today is one day (to the day) that I started working on compiling my first book, the Built Environment Compendium. Timing is pretty incredible really. Without planning, today is also the day I finally completed the work inside the book. The cover is mostly done — there are still some small tweaks needed. There is still much work to be done before I can release it to the world, however that day is fast approaching.

This was a major project which included working out how to use Pages app on the iPad. I have been amazed at the completeness of features that Pages offers. The only missing feature has been creating an index.

Issue 045 of In Abeyance is out. This issue is about Seismic Design. Also features Vortex Bladeless & Field Notes Brand.

One of the joys about spending a little longer researching and writing each article is that I get to dive in a little deeper. Get to discover a little more. Sometimes I am genuinely surprised by where the journey takes me.

The March issue of In Abeyance is in the can. Just need to draw the cover, which I have a pretty good idea of what I want it to be. 45 issues in and honestly it is clear that I have really only scratched the surface of what I want to explore, research and write about. The monthly schedule suits me better as it allows me to balance work and family and the other Stet.Build projects I’m working on.

Issue 044 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out.This issue focuses on the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, architectural practice Snøhetta and urban maps.

With this issue I am reverting back to my monthly schedule again in releasing the newsletter. Part of the struggle I have had is that I actually enjoy the researching and writing something that is a little longer form than what the bi-monthly schedule allowed.

I have decided to use Twitter in a different manner than I have previously. The idea is to share links, videos, images of the research that goes into each and every issue, as I am writing the issue. I’ll also be collecting these against a hashtag that is not being widely used. This means that in the future after you have read a specific issue you can jump onto the Twitter hashtag as a companion stream that allows you explore a topic in a different way that my 1500 word essays do.

Yesterday I was reminded just how powerful Drafts is as an app on any platform. My only criticism is the fact that I can just connect it to a folder with a bunch of md files. What it does however it does exceptionally well - using it to post to my site and my Twitter. Totally seamless.

Issue 043 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue considers carbon capture and sequestration.

This issue was surprisingly easier to write than a lot of them in the recent past. I attribute it to the fact that Having decided what I want to write about throughout the year means that I get a bit of time to let the ideas develop.

The first issue In Abeyance for 2021 is now out. Issue 042 is now out. The issue looks ferrock, Neom’s The Line, ACME Studio’s architecture line and more. I also spent some time updating the design of the email slightly. As always you can sign up here.

The last few months have been a bit of a whirlwind for my newsletter. I felt like I was not giving myself the necessary time to let ideas percolate. Rather once I had settled on the idea, the writing process felt a little hurried.

Following on from the release of the latest issue, I sat down and mapped out all of next year’s issues, at least in principal. Surprisingly I am only revisiting 5 topics discussed in the previous 2 volumes. I think it is important that I review some of these topics from time to time if I feel that there is more to discuss. I’m sure new and wonderful ideas will bubble up throughout the year but in this way I hope to have a place to throw ideas and links into the document over a period of time. Takes a little bit of the friction from starting to write an idea.

Issue 041 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This is the last issue of 2020 and volume 2, the purple volume. In this issue, house of the present, AuReus, circular economy and architectural watering cans.

As alway you can sign up and receive it direct in you inbox.

For 2½ years I have been working on Stet.Build. It has been some of the most enjoyable work I have done in that time and aim to continue writing it for years to come. Lately I have started to wonder why it isn’t receiving traction with more readers.

The truth is I have tried a few things on LinkedIn but Twitter is where those most likely to engage with the articles hang out online. I have never had a good relationship with the platform but I have recognised that it is what it is. So I will be spending the next few months trying to build over there. What I will be posting over there is considerably different to what I post here on my site. It has been an interesting few days and my mind is switching into this mode a little bit.

There is actually a lot of excellent information and people posting on there in the science ans engineering sphere. Already got two new ideas for future articles and I’ve only been on there for a few days. The main issue is that the information is desperately dispersed. Building up my lists of accoubts to follow has been the hardest part of this process - my reasoning is that once this is set it will be a matter of managing and pruning.

Issue 040 of my email newsletter, In Abeyance is now out.

Always feels good to get an issue done. Most times I have no idea what I am going to write about until a week before it needs to go out and there is some frantic searching and banging my head against the wall for a few days. I might even get a little grumpy. This is the 23rd issue of the year and what a year it has been. Next issue is the last for the year.

From my introduction:

As a child one of my deepest fears was that of loosing my eyesight. Something about living such a life filled me first with sorrow and dread. With age that point of view transformed into admiration and respect. Throughout my life I have not had any real interaction with anyone that is visually impaired or blind. One of the only real interaction that I have had is those elements present in the built environment meant to cater to the blind. These elements have become more noticeable to me since moving to Copenhagen last year and were the clear inspiration for this week’s issue.

If you are curious about the built environment I urge you to sign up, best email on the subject you will get roughly published every two weeks — I’m trying to resolve my publishing schedule so that I can get rid of the roughly part of that sentence.

Issue 039 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out, The Shinkansen. This is one of those topics that practically wrote itself. I could have easily written two or three times as much. An incredibly rich topic and one I hope to expand upon in the future.

Issue 038 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one covers one of my favourite architectural and art movements, the Art Nouveau.

Issue 037 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out now, Enviromental Graphic Design.

I did something a little different with the newsletter this month. Typically I ensure that there are a few images sprinkled throughout the issue. This time I decided to go text only — except for the cover. I want to see if this has any demonstrable impact on people’s engagement with the newsletter itself. Nearly 2 years into this newsletter and I continue to experiment with the exact form it should take.

Had to take my iPad Pro to the shop. I couldn’t take the battery drain any more.

Realising that this could take several days, I had to make sure that the cover to next week’s issue was done.

Now is as good a time as any to sign up to the best (totally objective opinion) newsletter about the built environment.

Issue 036 of my newsletter In Abeyance is now out. This issue concentrates on adaptive façade, David Attenborough’s latest documentary, Ørsted, The 99% Invisible City and Signify.

Issue 035 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. Leader topic for this week is submerged floating tunnels. Yes, as mad as that.

This one is a day late but issue 034 ‘On Bridges’ of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue equals the same number of issues sent out last year. As always the subject crept up on me but I ended up learning a lot about bridges over the last few days.

Issue 033 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue has a decidedly Japanese flavour and touches upon circular architecture, the Hobonichi Techo, Perskovite and some vertical agriculture.

Issue 032 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out now. This issue we talk about hydrogen energy, the future of BIM software, and the work of Mateusz Urbanowicz.

Issue 031 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This is an important issue for me as I am changing the format a little bit to allow me to finish my book (currently finishing off chapter 07 of 12).

Sometimes you need a good old think, a piece of paper and a pen to solve the difficult problems. Today I ‘solved’ two issues that relate back to the work I am doing on Stet.Build. The first related to the format that will unlock a bunch of things for me. The second is in how I use Twitter.

Issue 030 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one has empathetic leadership, world energy and some analogue vs digital.

I have wondered about whether to use stock photography in my articles on Stet.Build and have decided to add some photos where I think there is something really appropriate. The surprising thing is the quality of the photos that are now freely available from places like Unsplash.

Issue 028 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one was different. The tock issues are usually a lighter affair, but with my renewed attention and focus I was able to expand on several subjects. Also updated the design of the email itself.

Writing is often messy business. At least in those initial stages when a piece is not fully formed. You have the various threads. The ideas are relatively clear in your mind. They’re just all in the wrong place. Paper doesn’t judge. It doesn’t care for such things. I’ve ‘relearnt’ the importance of staying on paper for as long as possible. The text in the photo became the introduction of my latest issue.

Issue 027 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one is all about wind turbines and easily the most fun I have had writing an issue. I attribute this to the manner in which I am now writing these pieces, which I’ll go into in future posts.

Issue 026 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue is about 3D printing, the true cost of solar, the cooling prize and AutoMEP.

Incredible analysis of the general cost of solar and how all previous predictions (including the author Ramez Naam) have been wrong. Now it’s time to work out all the stuff that goes around this pillar. See also issues 002 and 015 of In Abeyance for added context.

I now understand why Google can ‘afford’ to give much of its stuff away while Apple continues to charge you for iCloud storage. They don’t have enough of their own infrastructure. Probably why they rely on AWS? Apple clearly needs more data centres to be in a better position to give storage away with their devices.

A couple of interesting facts from the issue 025 of In Abeyance. Firstly Google uses nearly 5 times as much electrical energy for its operations compared with Apple. Secondly, data centres account for around 1% of all global energy use. What’s more impressive is the fact that these values have remained flat since 2015.

Went on a bit of an ebook shopping spree. Top of my list was Drawdown, which ‘describes the 100 most substantive solutions to global warming.’ Hadn’t appreciated that the book was the work of an army of contributors.

Issue 025 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one is all about data centres and marries my love for the built environment with my love for technology.

Issue 024 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one looks at the construction industry’s response to COVID-19, Hadrian X and Monograph.

I’ve been a little quieter than usual. I’ve actually been keeping real busy working on two projects (both project Stet.Build related) all within my new favourite Apple app,….wait for it….Pages?! Yes Pages.

I will at some point delve into some of the things that this app does exceptionally well, along with some of the things it doesn’t, but needless to say it has comprehensively blown my very low expectations. So much so I have probably spent 10 hours over the last few days exclusively using this app.

If you are in the market for putting together any form of book that needs some typographic love and attention without going full InDesign you really need look no further.

Issue 023 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This one was more difficult than usual to write, as it’s one of the first opinion pieces I’ve chosen to write.

Issue 022 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue focuses on Energy Vaults, Microlino, hydrogen trains and Zettelkasten.

Just finished the cover gallery for my newsletter In Abeyance. Writing and drawing this newsletter has been one of the most fun and satisfying projects I’ve ever worked on. Special thanks to @blot for all his help on this.

I’ve been really enjoying CJ Chilver’s recent series of posts on one of my favourite subjects, newsletters.

Taking some of the advice in this series, which coincides with my general theme for the year, I’ve now updated the Stet.build website to include a new sign up and about pages.

One of the quotes I recently read in Seth Godin’s book, The Dip, was in the early days of Google:

So we were never in a big hurry to get you to use it today. Tomorrow would be better.
— Sergey Brin

Whenever I add something new to the site, it’s a small step that makes it better for the person who has just discovered the site.

Issue 021 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out now and shines the spotlight on drones. This one was fun to research but tough to write about because of the sheer volume of information around the subject.

The latest issue of In Abeyance is totally kicking my ass this weekend. I’m nearly there, but I have been totally overwhelmed by the volume of information. Didn’t think this subject would be so expansive, but once I jumped in, I realised it was an entire world I knew nothing about. Should hopefully go live tomorrow sometime.

Issue 020 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue is about blade graveyards, cities and roads.

Isssue 019 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out, The Circular Economy. This one has a lot of noise and material being generated for it. Definitely a topic to watch for how it moves in the future.

Issue 018 of my In Abeyance newsletter is out. For Volume 2, I’ve gone for purple.

As I put the finishing touches (still need to draw the cover) for issue 018 for In Abeyance, I was reminded that I announced the newsletter a year ago today. It’s easily been one of the most satisfying projects I’ve ever worked on. Still in its infancy and only starting to learn how to walk.

For all of the criticism laid on Twitter, yesterday I was reminded of its reach and network effect. A single tweet from a reader added the number of subscribers for In Abeyance by around 50%. One single tweet. Amazing really.

2019 was the year of release was one that set up foundations for a lot of the projects I wanted to focus on. I had been working on these projects at different stages in the previous years. The intention of this year was to stop working in the background and start to release as many of these as possible.

Using this guiding principle, I was able to issue the following:

1. Calendar C01
2. Stet.Build website
3. Stet.build logo
4. In Abeyance newsletter, issues 000 to 017
5. kaa.bz website
6. Inktober artwork
7. The Mark short story
8. Green Mill website
9. yel.bz website

Following the Cortex podcast idea of yearly themes, 2019 was my year of Release. I think overall the theme served me well as I tried to keep releasing ideas, projects large and small throughout the year, regardless of what was happening around me, which admittedly was a lot.

Did I release everything that I wanted? In some cases I actually released more. In other respects I didn’t achieve everything that I was hoping, but that is the point of the yearly theme. It’s not a resolution, it’s an idea to guide me through the year.

2020 is the year of Consolidation and will not have major new releases. Rather it will be building upon the blocks that I have established already - namely all things Stet.Build and everything on kaa.bz. I’m excited for the coming year.

Issue 017 and the last issue of the year (and volume one) of my newsletter In Abeyance is now out. The title of this issue is ‘Green Concrete’.

Issue 016 of my newsletter In Abeyance is out. I have found that I am oftentimes looking to the future and highlighting the road we need to take or make happen. In this issue, I want to bring some positive vibes and put the spotlight on where we have already made progress and projects that showcase built design at its best.

Next issue will be the last for 2019.

Writing The Mark was a really interesting and unfamiliar process to me. First of all it was written as a narrative, while all my previous works of fiction were written as scripts intended for being made into comics. This was obviously a very different muscle that I had to use. For example I didn’t know how to format dialogue (even though I’ve thousands of line of dialogue), I ended up referring back to this page time and time again throughout the month. Apart from the mechanics there is also a question of flow and structure. Two elements I really only considered in the most superficial manner. I will be revisiting the story to see what I did wrong and how I can improve.

One of the limitations I included (constraint is the mother of all creativity), was to the daily word count to around 50 words. This constraint allowed me to peck out the story predominantly on my iPhone. Every night after work I would take 5-10 minutes and just type something out. Having the bar so low meant that I was able to do achieve my goal every night, even when I was busy, or tired or had a headache.

As the process moved forward I finally realised that this was the perfect way to move several fiction ideas that I have had serious brain crack over. So that’s what I’m going to be doing. As an experiment I’m going to see if I can move a story that I’ve had in different stages, 50 words at a time. The thing is I also think that my site isn’t really the perfect place to show the work as it progresses, rather to showcase completed chapters. So I’ll be writing it on a service I’ve been looking for the right project to try out. So I’ll be running a new newsletter that has nothing in it but text (eventually a little logo) that I will hopefully publish to on a daily basis. Once a chapter is written then I’ll publish that on the site.

Why publish it at all? Part of it is building accountability and movement behind something that I otherwise won’t touch. It’s also a break that my creative brain needs in addition to the work that I carry out over on Stet.Build

I was kindly reminded that I haven’t posted about the latest issue of In Abeyance. Issue 015 is out now and it’s all about Batteries. Subscribe here if you like the good kind of email.

I’ve now been in Copenhagen for a week and have had a tiny bit of time to get a feel for the city. The closest city I can compare this to is London. However I keep reminding myself that this is not the UK, things are decidedly different here. The best example I can think of was when I was walking, I take a turn off the main high street, onto what looked like a simple residential area, and there at the end of the road I could see the wind turbines¹. It was just another reminder, things are different here. However, the biggest difference that I can gather is the city’s approach to transport.

Transport

The truth is though the city’s layout is different, the streets are wider. They have very distinct lanes for the different modes of transport. The lack of total dependence on the car is absolutely evident here. Every form of transport has been catered to in one form or another. Walking, cycling, scooters, boats, metro, train, buses and even the ‘humble’ car. The first few days I spent walking. That’s because this simple act of taking a long walk and watching what’s going on in the world has been an exercise that I have not been able to do over these last decade(?!). The Gulf is many things, but a haven and promoter for walkers it is not.

Most telling for me is that I’m about to have walked more in the month of October, than any other month over the last year (according to my iPhone, which is missing a great deal of steps I know, but I’m using it as a loose indicator).

I’m now also looking very closely at buying a Segway Ninebot Kickscooter as a fun and simple way to get around town. While there are scooters everywhere for hire, the cost adds up really quickly (by my calculation use the scooter for 140 trips and you’ve paid off the scooter). That’s the other thing about micromobility, it’s generally really affordable, even if you have to replace the scooter relatively regularly - it’s a utility cost more than anything.

Local Not Global Country

The other element that is clear here is the fact that this is not a Global city. There are no Amazon Prime trucks running around. There isn’t a MacDonalds or Starbucks on every corner (although these two staples do exist here). There is no Apple store. Vodaphone doesn’t operate here (at least I haven’t seen the Vodaphone logo anywhere). And so it goes. In this regard, it feels like a place caught in time…with it’s own home brands, made by and catering it’s own people. Some companies I’ve never heard of before, others have actually made the leap outside these borders.

Over the last 8 years, the word ‘local’ was seen as a bit of a derogative term. Somehow, local here is celebrated, as it’s the main part of your every day life. It’s another part that I will need to recalibrate my thinking.

Food

Since arriving in Copenhagen, I’ve eaten at one restaurant and it was a magnificent. The one thing that I do have to say is that the produce here is exceptional. I knew that strawberries here have a good reputation, but I didn’t expect that. Bringing the shopping into my apartment, I could smell them straight away. I haven’t smelt a strawberry in so long.

Buying local chicken, local tomatoes, berries, have all really elevated my meals considerably. I’ve been getting more and more into Jamie Oliver’s Food Tube channel as well and have been really loving it.

Language Barrier

I knew that this would be a thing. I’ve not gotten into a habit yet for listening and doing my Danish lessons but I do intend to do incorporate into my life very very soon.

Issue 013 of my newsletter In Abeyance is now live. This one was a lot of fun to research and write about, although I barely scratched the surface. Also it’s linked to my theme for Inktober.

This is the second edition of the Micro.blog feature request post. Last year, I reviewed what I hoped Micro.blog would add to the service. @Manton and co have had a very, very busy this year, so this isn’t to diminish all the work they’ve done. Rather these are a list of features that I would like to see included into the platform at some point.

Canonical Website

All these features unfortunately haven’t made it into the service. Although we’ve drafts have been added, I do have one additional feature I wanted added:

1. Let me filter the type of posts from people I follow. So if I want to see everyone’s photos then let me do that. Let me see everyone’s podcasts. Sure you can do something similar from the discover section, but that’s everyone (?) on the platform.
2. It would be nice to see how many responses have been made on any individual post. Could be a small little number next to the ‘conversation’ link.
3. Allow more than one photo to be uploaded at a time.
4. Highlight the emojis that are supported on the platform directly underneath and allow you to insert them from there.
5. Once drafts are saved, they can’t all be found in a single list, they become part of the entire stream. Also drafts don’t show up in the official iOS apps.

Photos

Totally nailed this feature request.

Photos should be showcased on a grid of three squares across. Ideally this should be another standard page found at mydomain/photos.

Stats

I’ve asked for this before, I’ll ask for it again. I want to know how many posts I’ve written. How many photos. A histogram of my posting to get a feel for when and how often I post. How many replies have I made?

I would love to see a yearly view of the number of posts I’ve made on a month by month basis. Each month could have two bars showing how much stuff gets posted to my site and how much stuff is interaction with others.

Better theme control.

A year ago we were limited to tweaking CSS. Now we have a LOT more power behind us. So the initial request was completed…however I’ll be that guy. While I’ve sorted my design for the foreseeable future, apart from the occasional colour tweak, I don’t intend to change my design while I’m on Micro.blog. Partly because I’ve spent a ton of time on it as it is. Partly because the manner in which I make these changes is pretty cumbersome. It should be easier than it is, especially for someone not technical.

Bonus related feature: I don’t think that theming in general is easy on the web. A proper feature changer is to be able to design your site in a block type editor.

I initially used to love the fact that I was limited in what I could do which was to play around with the CSS and that was it. Since then the addition of updating the footer has been added. A great additions for sure, but I want full control of my site. I’m paying for hosting, eventually I’d like to be allowed to control the whole look of my site.

Subscription

Yup. Sorted.

This is finally being offered, but not officially (blink that reply and it’s gone)? I’d like to see a yearly subscription to the service become official.

Two Streams

Not yet, but something tells me that this is on the docket very soon.

Micro.blog by it’s nature has two streams. The first is your website stream, and only includes your posts, while the second stream is the social one that includes everyone you follow and your posts starting with an @ symbol. As a user both are important, yet they are given wildly different treatment.

Categories

There has been some movement on this, with the addition of new icons. However it’s not as granular as I would want it.

There are currently 9 categories that you can contribute towards. It’s a good start, but hardly what I’d call comprehensive. I’d like to see a great deal more categories. Architecture, Engineering, Comics, Stationary, Country-specific-categories, and the list goes on.

Faster Updating

I use Blot for my other website, Stet.Build. What I’ve noticed is that updating anything using that system is instant. That includes posts, css design, etc. I’d like some of that updating speed on Micro.blog if that’s possible (maybe I’m asking too much).

I recently had to update a few things on my CSS (it was for this post actually) and it actually seemed to me that Manton has sorted the original slow gremlins that impacted the design control, so scratch this item of the list as well.

This is interesting. I’m now being forced into living the iPad lifestyle as my main computing device (until I can revive my Mac or worse replace it).

Let’s see if Federico is onto something with his commitment and enjoyment of the iPad as his favourite device. I haven’t really had to do this on account of having a Mac. I found what I believed the iPad was ideal for - everything involving the Apple Pencil.

It’s going to be interesting to write, research, edit and draw several issues of my newsletter on this device. Unfortunately I’ve still not switched to iPadOS, so the experience does feel somewhat hindered and limited at the moment.

Funnily enough, the only app that doesn’t have an iOS equivalent has a web version available, everything else I use has a fully functional iOS app.

I managed to get issue 011 of my bi-monthly newsletter In Abeyance out. Wasn’t sure if I was going to make it this month (on account of the move).

Just finished listening to episode 361 of 99% Invisible. I found myself enjoying it even more as the second part of the episode talks about two topics I’ve just covered in my newsletter, Tall Timber and Two Carbon Targets.

The interview with Vince Beiser was excellent. Sadly they beat me to the topic on sand - to be fair Vince was way, way ahead of me on that one. He does an amazing job of explaining the premise of his book, called The World in a Grain, which I can’t wait to read.

Because it’s always good to give stuff on your birthday, here’s issue 010 of my newsletter In Abeyance. This one is about modularity, the circular and plastics economy and Finch.

40 today.

I spent the first 20 years riding my bike. Listening to grunge. Learning how to draw. Reading comics.

The next 10 years I spent learning about graphic design, the web and talking about make comics.

The last 10 years were spent actually making some comics and learning to be both a husband and father. At some point I gave up on putting my energy into comics.

Instead I’ve embraced putting all my energies into an endeavour that brings together all of the things that I love under one roof. The work on Stet.Build has only really just begun. For the first time in a long while I’m really excited to see what the next 10 years brings.

Spent some time sprucing up the success message when you subscribe to my newsletter.

Yesterday I learnt a great new word, turgid (excessively ornate or complex in style or language). It was the perfect desciption of the carbon footprint subject I just posted about and came from one of my readers. Mike is now going to be my editor on the larger project and I couldn’t be more excited. I’ve been looking for an editor for over a year now, can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner.

I hope everyone is having a great summer so far. If you live in the northern hemisphere, chances are you’re experiencing some form of heatwave. Issue 009 of my bi-monthly newsletter, In Abeyance, is fitting of a world getting noticeably hotter every year.

It is somewhat late this week, but issue 008 of my bi-monthly newsletter, In Abeyance is out.

Issue 007 of my bi-monthly newsletter about the built environment, In Abeyance, is out. This issue is concentrate on Tall Timber. This one practically wrote itself and I could have easily written several more 1000 words. Maybe for a future issue.

I consider my life online across three distinct stints. The first ran been 2004 to around 2010. In that time I wrote around 1800 posts, many long form articles. The second stint was across 2010 and 2017, which I refer to as the nomad years. I meandered from platform to platform, changing the reason for writing with every move. The third stint began last year and with it brought much needed focus.

I’ve managed to publish 680 new posts (the rest where stuff I imported from Instagram and a handful of posts from Medium). During this time, I was rediscovering my writing muscle. Rediscovering how to write online again. And most importantly, rediscovering why I should post online. I’ve been writing more consistently online than ever before - usually it seems that I don’t go more than a few days before getting the itch. Going forward I really hope that I start writing more about the process of writing and drawing for my online publications over at Stet.Build.

Issue 006 of my bi-monthly newsletter, In Abeyance, about the built environment is out. With this issue I’m trying a slightly new format that will come out every third Thursday.

5 months and 2 weeks into the year and I’ve just completed 16,000, written and edited, words. I’ve published 8,500 of those words as part of In Abeyance.

This could only have been possible using the show up every day and do maximum 30 minutes at a time method. My aim was to carry out at least one session every morning as a bare minimum. If there was more juice in the tank, I’d do some more. I may not have hit my mental goal but the system is clear. I’ll get there eventually, one day at a time.

Issue 005, of my ‘monthly’ (it’s moving to a bi-monthly schedule) newsletter In Abeyance is out. This issue considers the role of urban agriculture within the built environment.

Sneak peak from tomorrow’s issue of In Abeyance. Subscribe now over at www.stet.build/ia

I know I just put the latest issue of In Abeyance (read it here) to bed a few days ago, but the idea for the next one is burning a hole in my head. I find it best not to struggle with these things and let the ideas flow when they wish.

Issue 004 of my monthly newsletter In Abeyance. This is the second part of my series on Hyperloop, focusing on pod technology and the industry. You can also read part 1.

Cover artwork for issue 004 of my monthly newsletter In Abeyance. This issue was a lot of fun to put together. It also comes with a bunch of changes to the format of the email itself and changes to the website from earlier this month.

A year ago today, while fighting my own demons from a professional disappointment earlier in the year, my mind was searching for a project to put my energy behind. I’d sleepwalked through evening and was feeling a little deflated. After grabbing a shower, I put my head on my pillow and like a bolt of lightning the idea was in my head. Formed. Galvanised.

I looked excitedly at my wife. Fast asleep. I quickly rushed back to my room and started scribbling the very first ideas in fear that when I wake up the next morning it would be gone. There was literally no chance of that happening. The force was strong with this one.

Over the next month I would be using a wall to throw as many ideas as possible on there. The crux of it all would be a vehicle to allow me to do all the things that I loved to do and that I’d spent the better part of my adult life doing. That is engineering, graphic design and illustration.

I began sharing the starts of this journey at the start of 2019 over at Stet.Build. The first output being my monthly newsletter In Abeyance. It’s been an amazingly productive year to go from that initial idea to something a little more tangible.

Every once in a while I’m reminded of how cool the internet can be. I’ve been trying to sort out tooltips for the graphs in my newsletter. The system I settled on, Chartist, has this ability but the existing plugin is clearly broken. Thankfully user LukBukkit’s JS-FU is strong. He’s updated the plugin and works as intended. Found him on Twitter so was able to thank him for the work in updating the plugin and making things better for the rest of us. Now we just need Gion to update links to the website.

Super impressed with how straight forward it is to add good looking charts using Chartist.js I’ve updated the charts for the latest issue of In Abeyance.

Now that I’ve finally sorted out the Stet.Build website (it was the easiest to resolve), I can turn my attention to aligning the newsletter as well. Think I’m going to go with Foundation for Emails. Looks comprehensive and well documented. Recommended for all Buttondown users.

Finally got the latest issue of In Abeyance out. Issue 003 is all about Hyperloop. This was a really fun topic to write about, so much so that I’ve had to break it into two parts.

Here’s the cover to issue 003 of my newsletter In Abeyance (comes out tomorrow). This will be my first 2 parter and centers around Hyperloop. If you’ve not subscribed yet, now’s an excellent time to rectify that easily avoidable error.

I’ve recently updated my websites, kaa.bz and stet.build with some proper typographic love and attention. Two things spring to mind. The first is that a professional typeface (read the last paragraph of that link) will totally elevate a design. The second is how far browsers have come with their support for all manner of great typographic features.

New issue of my monthly newsletter, In Abeyance, is out. Issue 002 is all about Photovoltaics. If you like the issue please consider sharing it with others.

Next week issue 002 of my monthly newsletter, In Abeyance , comes out. Here’s the cover for the next issue.

You’re still not subscribed? Go and fix that. If you’re wondering why you should subscribe, I’ve got you covered.

✉️ The first issue of my newsletter, In Abeyance, is finally out! Go have a read and subscribe if you found it useful. Hit me up with any questions or thoughts would love to hear them.

✉️ If you’ve not subscribed to my newsletter, now is a great time to do it. Subscribe over at www.stet.build/ia. The very first issue will drop on Thursday.

Here’s the cover.

I will be talking about my new project, Stet.Build. For now, if you work in the construction industry or are interested in architecture, engineering and the built environment I’d like to point you to my monthly newsletter In Abeyance.