Wordsmithing and tweaking scripts

- New weeknote covering the week's shipped work, reading, gaming, cooking, and observations
- Fixed list templates to show description excerpts consistently across main index and weeknotes page
- Updated layouts/_default/list.html to check .Params.description before .Description
- Updated layouts/weeknotes/single.html to display full excerpts with reading time

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

.claude/settings.local.json

@@ -13,7 +13,9 @@
       "Bash(git commit:*)",
       "Bash(./deploy)",
       "Bash(mkdir:*)",
-      "Bash(chmod:*)"
+      "Bash(chmod:*)",
+      "Bash(ls:*)",
+      "Bash(pkill:*)"
     ],
     "deny": [],
     "ask": []

content/posts/2026-01-10-weeknotes/index.md

@@ -0,0 +1,60 @@
+---
+title: "Weeknotes: January 4–10, 2026"
+date: 2026-01-10T09:00:00-05:00
+description: The chair arrived. Buddhist monks walked through town. Fried chicken achieved maximum cronch.
+draft: false
+tags:
+  - weeknotes
+  - cooking
+  - conventions
+---
+
+The chair arrived.
+
+![A reclining chair with gray upholstery and a bentwood frame, paired with a dark desk surface with pegboard holes for accessories](chair.jpg)
+
+I backed a Kickstarter back in April, maybe, from a Ukrainian woodworker for a reclining chair and desk combo. A reward for finishing the LocallyGrown conversion, I told myself. I work almost exclusively at a standing desk these days, but sometimes you need to sit for reading, ketamine treatments, or experimenting with multiple giant monitors in VR. The chair finally showed up this week, assembled without drama, and it's exactly as comfortable as I'd hoped. Quality time was had.
+
+---
+
+## Shipped
+
+It was back to work this week after the holidays. Things are uncomfortably slow in general, but my role has me touching nearly every project and potential project we're engaged with. There's been lots of context switching, lots of architecture decisions, and lots of opportunities to put new dev tools through their paces. The context switching suits my brain, honestly. It's the *unexpected* interruptions that wreck me, not the deliberate pivots.
+
+## Read
+
+I started *Automatic Noodle* this week. The real world is on fire and this was exactly the respite I needed, a few delightful minutes at a time.
+
+## Played
+
+I didn't do much gaming this week. I did pick up [A Gentle Rain](https://dryad-games.com/shop/a-gentle-rain-bloom-edition/), a meditative tile-placement game where you arrange lotus blooms on a pond. It takes about fifteen minutes, there's no competition, and it's pure pattern-making. It should be a good mental reset between tasks.
+
+## Cooked
+
+It was mostly a week of working through holiday leftovers, but I made one big production: a giant pile of fried chicken using Babish's "Ultimate Fried Chicken" recipe. The process involves a dry brine, a tempura-ish batter, and a double fry. He specifies a particular flour blend for maximum crunch, but I needed these gluten-free, so I improvised my own mix.
+
+![Close-up of golden fried chicken pieces with a craggy, textured crust resting on a wire rack](fried-chicken.jpg)
+
+I achieved plenty of cronch. I'd make these again when I'm feeling ambitious. They're more involved than my usual southern style, but worth it.
+
+## Noticed
+
+It was hot and muggy this week, which feels wrong for January. That'll flip hard next week; the highs won't reach this week's lows. Our youngest cat has some Maine Coon in him and his winter coat has fully arrived. He's more fur than flesh at this point, which will serve him well come the cold snap.
+
+The bigger thing I noticed this week: Buddhist monks from the Walk for Peace pilgrimage passed through Lexington, Georgia, on their 2,300-mile journey from Fort Worth to Washington, D.C.
+
+![Monks in saffron and maroon robes walk down a rural road, led by a monk with a tall walking staff. Aloka the rescue Peace Dog trots alongside. Community members line both sides of the road, many with palms pressed together in greeting, as a police vehicle with blue lights escorts the procession.](peace-walk.jpg)
+
+My own philosophies lean more Taoist than Buddhist, but there's considerable overlap. It was a wonderful opportunity to be mindful and let them lead by practical example. I'm glad my youngest daughter and I could share a meal with these monks as they walked through our part of the country.
+
+## Thinking About
+
+I've written quite a bit lately, here and on the company blog, about using AI-powered dev tools with thought and intentionality. For various reasons I've felt the need to articulate the philosophy and ethics behind how I use them, not just demonstrate the workflows. Having it down in black and white creates accountability. It's harder to quietly drift when you've already said where you stand.
+
+## What's Next
+
+Inuhele, the tiki convention I help with, is in two weeks. CONpossible, the steampunk convention I help with, is in four. I have so much to do before then.
+
+---
+
+The vibe this week: I need the coming weeks to run well above my usual productivity, and my usual has been solid. I have a suspicion this is only going to ramp up from there. It's a good thing I have a comfortable chair for the occasional sit-down.

content/posts/2026-01-13-ai-as-tool-not-creator.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 ---
 title: "AI as Tool, Not Creator: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Front-Load the Thinking"
-date: 2026-01-13T12:00:00-05:00
+date: 2026-01-09T00:00:00-05:00
 description: The craft is in the decisions. The tool just handles the transcription.
 draft: false
 tags:
@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@ tags:
   - Writing
   - Technology
   - Philosophy
-lastmod: 2026-01-07T16:05:11.204Z
+lastmod: 2026-01-12T20:30:45.342Z
 ---
 
 _The craft is in the decisions. The tool just handles the transcription._
@@ -69,7 +69,7 @@ I'm not naive enough to think my choice of vendor solves the larger problems. Th
 
 So that's where I've landed. AI as tool, not creator. Front-load the thinking, hand off the transcription. Stay alert to where the ethical lines are, even when they're blurry.
 
-If I learn that even careful, front-loaded use still displaces working creators in ways I haven't seen, I'll have to reconsider. I'm not attached to being right about this. I'm attached to doing less harm than I would by ignoring the question entirely.
+New tools have always created disruption, this I know. But if the balance shifts in ways I haven't anticipated, if my careful approach turns out to violate ethical lines I thought I was respecting, I'll have to reconsider. I'm not attached to being right about this. I'm attached to doing less harm than I would by ignoring the question entirely.
 
 Other people will draw the lines differently, and I'm not here to tell them they're wrong. The technology is genuinely new, the implications are genuinely uncertain, and reasonable people can look at the same situation and come to different conclusions.
 

deploy

@@ -3,6 +3,10 @@ USER=admin
 HOST=social
 DIR=../../var/www/blog/www   # the directory where your web site files should go
 
+# Clean build directories to force full regeneration
+rm -rf public resources
+
+# Build site and index, then deploy
 hugo && pagefind --site public && rsync -avz --no-t --no-p --delete public/ ${HOST}:~/${DIR} # this will delete everything on the server that's not in the local public folder
 
 exit 0

layouts/_default/list.html

@@ -17,6 +17,8 @@
             <div>
               {{ if .Params.preview }}
                 <br />{{ .Params.preview }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
+              {{ else if .Params.description }}
+                <br />{{ .Params.description }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
               {{ else if .Description }}
                 <br />{{ .Description }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
               {{ else }}

layouts/weeknotes/single.html

@@ -13,9 +13,25 @@
       {{ range (where .Site.RegularPages "Params.tags" "intersect" (slice "weeknotes")).ByDate.Reverse }}
         <li class="posts-list-item">
           <a class="posts-list-item-title" href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
+          <span class="posts-list-item-description">
+            <div>
+              {{ if .Params.preview }}
+                <br />{{ .Params.preview }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
+              {{ else if .Params.description }}
+                <br />{{ .Params.description }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
+              {{ else if .Description }}
+                <br />{{ .Description }}<br />(more inside)<br /><br />
+              {{ else }}
+                {{ .Summary }}
+              {{ end }}
+            </div>
+          </span>
           <span class="posts-list-item-description">
             {{ partial "icon.html" (dict "ctx" $ "name" "calendar") }}
             {{ .PublishDate.Format "Jan 2, 2006" }}
+            <span class="posts-list-item-separator">-</span>
+            {{ partial "icon.html" (dict "ctx" $ "name" "clock") }}
+            {{ .ReadingTime }} min read
           </span>
         </li>
       {{ end }}