Every Rule Has a Scar
The rules file is for how to work. Everything else has a home, and putting it in the wrong one is how a rules file turns into a junk drawer.
The VM That Never Sleeps
Last year I wrote a whole post about letting a jump box kill itself, because I couldn't be trusted to shut it down. The agents clean up exactly as well as I did. Same answer: don't ask, enforce.
The Only One in the Room
I've been the only technology person in the room for most of my career, and I never learned to write software. This year I built an environment where AI agents do most of the development, plus the rails that keep them from doing damage. This is the record, not a victory lap.
I Gave Up Too Early. The Problem Was One Line.
Three months of Google Analytics on a blog I built to avoid Google Analytics. The problem was one Caddy directive. I stopped looking too soon.
Letting a Jump Box Kill Itself
I wanted an ops host I could start when I needed it and forget about when I didn’t. What I built instead was a jump box that shuts itself off when I stop paying attention—and taught me more about cost, discipline, and designing for human failure than I expected.
Standing Up a Control Plane
What I learned the hard way about control planes, SSH, and trust—written as a snapshot of real decisions, not a step-by-step guide.
I Didn’t Break Git. Git Broke My Brain.
A small failure that exposed a bigger assumption about tools, context, and how easily mental models can drift.
