Today is the 25th anniversary of my weblog. Hooray! It’s been a long time on the Internet and a lot has changed. But some of the sites I linked in that first month are still around, like the Half Bakery and urinal.net. There’s a funny update on the EA / Ultima story.

I’m still around too! I don’t blog as much as I did, no one blogs like they used to. I have more places to publish now. I write short posts on Fedi. Links are now shared on my linkblog. Casual tech posts go to my secret work blog. This blog has become a place for the occasional thoughtful essay of general interest.

I’m grateful to have my blog! It marks me as a member of early Internet culture that I still find aspirational, folks who are excited by the promise of this social computer technology. Some of us are still around doing the same old thing, like Matt and Andy and Anil and Jason.

I plan to keep this blog around for at least 25 more years. I recently switched to a bespoke static blog engine that should help guarantee longevity. I’ve also been refreshing a lot of my other publications with help from AI, it’s been a lot of fun and I’m proud of the results. Some new things too! My book reviews and my travel postcards.

I got this recipe from a tech industry friend as a JPG labelled “Twitter congee”. I don’t know if that means “seen on Twitter” or “served in the Twitter cafeteria”, either is possible. It’s very simple. Garnish with whatever: I usually use some chili crisp, some pickled mustard greens, or some sauteed vegetable like bok choy.

Ingredients

• 1/2 pound ground chicken
• 4 ounces sliced shiitake mushrooms
• 1 tbsp minced ginger
• 1/2 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tsp shaoxing wine
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1 tsp oyster sauce
• 1 tsp fish sauce
• 2 tsp sesame oil
• pinch of ground white pepper
• 6 cup water
• 1/2 cup jasmine rice

Directions

In a bowl, combine chicken, mushroom, ginger, garlic, shaoxing wine, salt, oyster sauce, fish sauce, sesame oil and let it marinate over night in the refrigerator.

In a large pot, add water and the rice and bring it to a boil. when the water starts boiling, turn down the heat to simmer and cover the pot. 15 minutes later, stir the rice making sure it’s not sticking to the bottom. cover the pot again and stir the rice one more time 15 minutes after the first stir. cover the pot one last time and simmer 30 minutes. When the jook is done (1 hour total), it should look creamy and silky. (Nelson: that’s a long cook for the jook!)

Add the ground chicken mixture to the jook, breaking down the meat (a whisk works well). Simmer with the lid off until the chicken is cooked, about 10 to 15 minutes. Add a pinch of white pepper and enjoy!

Servings: 2 Prep Time: 15 minutes Cook Time: 75 minutes

Hello friends, big day on my little blog! If you’re reading this post you’re reading my blog via a brand new blog engine. I call it “Flourish.” If all goes well you won’t really notice a change. I tried to get the Atom feed right so posts don’t show up as new, but if they do be assured it’s a one-time thing.

Much love to Rael Dornfest and his Blosxom blog engine. I’ve been running that for 25 years. I may be the last person left who was running it, or at least the 2004 Perl CGI. Flourish is a static generator I custom built in Python with Claude Code / Opus. I’d spent several weeks hand-writing a prototype a couple of years ago and couldn’t ever get it launch-ready. The AI rewrote and finished it in two days with a much better testing plan than I ever would have done.

The new blog looks more or less the same as the old blog. A few broken things fixed and some cosmetics improved. There’s a slick JavaScript page search now, try it! Once the new system proves itself I plan to modernize the visual design. Who knows, I may even start blogging more!

I cannot say enough about how great AI coding tools have been for me. In just a few weeks I’ve totally updated the server software infrastructure, launched a major new personal content site, built a new blog engine, and done a bunch of little projects. I know there’s a lot of tension about AI coding but I’ve found it very productive for my personal hobby projects. And fun too, I feel like my expertise still matters. I’m just not bogged down anymore in the scut work.