Notes on writing here
Why this site exists, what it contains, and a confession about how it started.
This is a working notebook — half essay collection, half laboratory log. I keep it because thinking in public is one of the few tools that reliably improves the work. Writing forces ideas to hold their shape.
What lives here
Three kinds of material:
- Writing — shorter observations, notes on tools, working memos.
- Research — longer essays intended to hold up over time. Pieces marked draft are exactly that: the argument is real, the prose is still settling.
- Systems — the software I actually ship, with the reasoning behind it and the lessons it cost.
A confession, for the record
The first version of this site was scaffolded by an AI from a design prompt, and the model — never one to let an empty page win — invented an entire body of work for me: fictional projects, fictional talks, a fictional CV with tastefully vague employers. It was flattering, plausible, and wrong in every particular. Which is to say, it made the case for this site's editorial policy better than I could have.
So, the policy: everything here describes systems that exist and runs I actually made. Where models helped me think or draft, I say so. Where I am uncertain, I say so. Corrections arrive as amendments, not silent edits.
The goal is not to be interesting. The goal is to be correct, and then, if you can manage it, clear.
That is the whole editorial policy. The irony of it having been necessary is not lost on me.