Noisy Deadlines

“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.” – Douglas Adams

  1. Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green, audio [5h 36min]: I really enjoyed this as an audiobook since the author narrates it himself. I loved John Green's voice in this one since it is a mix of personal stories and historical data about tuberculosis. I learned so much from this book, and it also made me cry. It's well-researched, and it brings together social, political and human perspectives on such a stigmatized yet curable disease. It doesn't shy away from discussing the dark global injustices that slowed down or prevented communities from accessing treatments. It is a call to action that left me feeling both devastated and hopeful.

  2. The Tainted Cup (Shadow of the Leviathan #1) by Robert Jackson Bennett, 410p: Unique world building with weird botanical magic and giant creatures. It's a murder mystery, with an interesting “Holmes-and-Watson” style duo. Dinios Kol (aka Din) is the young apprentice to the Empire's eccentric Immunis of the Department of Justice. He also has a type of magical eidetic memory, a super cool and useful trait for crime investigations. His mentor is Anagosa (aka Ana) Dalabra, an older woman who never leaves her house and essentially blindfolds herself to avoid overstimulation while she puzzle out cases. The two have unique quirks and great chemistry working together. The assassinations are gruesome, involving these 'dappleglass' plants, that suddenly bursts out from the victims' bodies. With plenty of twists, false trails, and secretive characters, it’s a gripping read.

  3. Done and Dusted (Rebel Blue Ranch #1) by Lyla Sage, 356p: Cozy romance, in a farm, with cowboys and horses. Perfect to just relax and read something lighthearted. It's a slow burn romance and I found it cozy. I think I enjoy a small-town homecoming story once in a while. This was my first time reading a contemporary cowboy romance.

  4. Tiamat's Wrath (The Expanse #8) by James S.A. Corey, 534p: This one felt a bit different. I wouldn't consider it my favourite of the whole series, but it is still pretty good! The pacing is tight, and the stakes are high. There is tension and atrocities going on as the Laconian empire continues to expand its power. It's a very sad book in many ways. We see the Rocinante's crew scattered across the system, still trying to save the world, or at least, make it a better place. Even though the plot is bleak and at times despairing, the ending felt relatively hopeful. I’m excited for the final book!

#readinglist #books #reading

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

I have a 2018 Corsair Strafe mechanical keyboard with the Cherry MX Red Switches. I’ve been getting tired typing on it, and I’ve been noticing a lot of missed keystrokes while I type. I am a fast typer, and I think I got tired of this keyboard.

So, I was looking for another mechanical keyboard, specifically one that I could customize, change the caps and switches if needed. Basically, a keyboard that could grow with me without being too complicated. I tested some keyboards on my local computer store, and the Keychron ones got my attention.

I wanted a more tactile experience (the Cherry Red is linear), so I went with a Keychron V6 Ultra 8K with the Tactile Banana switches. I love it! 😍

It worked well with the cable connection, and also connected with Bluetooth and the 2.4G dongle on my Ubuntu 25.10.

The issue: Can’t use the Launcher to customize the keyboard

In order to customize and remap the keys and for this keyboard, we have to do it online, via the Keychron Launcher.

The manufacturer guide says that the Launcher only works with Chrome/Edge or Opera browsers.

I had Chromium installed via Snap and I opened the launcher website. The site recognized my keyboard, but it wouldn't connect.

Solution attempts

I did some online searching and I discovered that Linux has some security measures in place that avoids a userspace application to write to hardware input. So the solution is to create an “udev.rule” to add permissions. I followed the instructions from this article: HOWTO: Get the Keychron Launcher working in Debian GNU/Linux.

So my steps were something like this:

  • I identified my keyboard vendor/product information using lsusb | grep -i keychron

  • Which gave me following info: Bus 003 Device 013: ID 3434:0c60 Keychron Keychron V6 Ultra 8K

  • Great! Then I created the rule with sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/99-keychron.rules

  • And this was my first try to create the rule: KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="3434", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0c60", MODE="0660", GROUP="ariadne", TAG+="uaccess", TAG+="udev-acl"

  • Then, I ran the two commands to reload the rules and trigger them: sudo udevadm control --reload-rules sudo udevadm trigger

  • It didn't work, Chromium still could not connect to the keyboard.

  • In Chromium I checked: Settings -> Privacy and Security -> Site settings -> Additional permissions -> HID devices and ensured HID access was allowed.

  • I tried different rules, tweaking here and there, played around with user groups, and nothing worked. I unplugged, plugged, restarted the computer, I even tried to run Chromium with root access temporarily. Nothing worked.

  • All the time I was checking chrome://device-log/ to see what was going on, and got a list of errors like this: HIDEvent[21:52:54] Failed to open '/dev/hidraw7': FILE_ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED

HIDEvent[21:52:54] Access denied opening device read-write, trying read-only.

  • I did some more tweaks to the udev.rules, and I ended up with this in my rules file:

# Keychron V6 Ultra 8K - Normal Mode KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="3434", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0c60", MODE="0666", TAG+="uaccess"

# STM32 Bootloader - Required for Firmware Flashing SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="3434", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0c60", MODE="0666", TAG+="uaccess"

  • It was still not working. I knew it was something to do with permissions from Chromium.

  • Then the next day I did more digging online, and I read that Chromium installed via Snap is actually sandboxed and often cannot see hardware even if the udev rules are current. The solution? Get the .deb install package for Google Chrome.

  • So I downloaded and installed the official Google Chrome .deb native package directly from the Google website.

  • And then it worked!!! 🤘

  • Keychron Launcher connected to the keyboard, I could do the Firmware update and started playing with remapping keys.

My Final Checklist

So, as final checklist, these are the steps to take if I want to remap or update firmware on my Keychron keyboard :

Preparation of udev.rules (needs to be done only once):

  1. Identify keyboard's vendor/product information using : lsusb | grep -i keychron

  2. Create rule with: sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/99-keychron.rules

  3. Add these lines to the rules: # Keychron V6 Ultra 8K - Normal Mode KERNEL=="hidraw\*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="3434", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0c60", MODE="0666", TAG+="uaccess" # STM32 Bootloader - Required for Firmware Flashing SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="3434", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0c60", MODE="0666", TAG+="uaccess"\

  4. Save and exit (Ctrl+O, Enter, Ctrl+X)

  5. Then run these commands to activate the new rules: sudo udevadm control --reload-rules sudo udevadm trigger

  6. Disconnect/Connect keyboard.

Run Keychron Launcher

  1. Connect the keyboard with the cable
  2. On the keyboard itself, select the physical toggle to USB connection
  3. Open Google Chrome (not Chromium, make sure it is the .deb version of Google Chrome, not Snap)
  4. Go to https://launcher.keychron.com/
  5. Choose to connect the keyboard, and voilà!

#linux #tech

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • 🖥️ I’m in the middle of one of those crazy periods at work with two big deadlines at once. I do my best to make sure I wind down at the end of the day and don't carry all the stress into my personal life, but I still feel the consequences of a stressful work day: depleted energy so it's harder to make good choices for recovery afterwards. But overall, I'm doing the best I can. Going for a light walk right after work helps a lot.
  • 🎭 Stress at work means bubbling anxiety all day. I started drinking an espresso at work, and it’s visible that caffeine makes me feel more anxious. I can notice how it makes me jittery. My eyes start twitching. Instead of giving me energy, it exacerbates the stress. So no more coffee for me, it's not worth it.
  • 📠 I needed to renew my stomach medication this week, and I got a virtual consult with the same doctor that always renews it for me. All is great, he says he sent the prescription to the pharmacy. A few days later, I don't get any notification on the pharmacy app that the prescription is being processed. So I started a back and forth between the pharmacy and the clinic to make sure the prescription gets where it needs to go. I get on the phone, talk to the clinic, and they tell me I need to send an email for them to FAX the prescription again. I send the email, and I ask if they can just send me the PDF, and I'll print it and take it to the pharmacy, but they said they can't email me anything, but that they REFAXED it. The pharmacy gets nothing, and I reply the email, and they ask me to confirm the pharmacy's FAX number. Which I do, and they REFAX it again! Eventually, the pharmacy gets it, but at this point I don't know if it was really by FAX or some other form of communication. It's a mystery to me.
  • 📖 I'm really enjoying “Tiamat's Wrath” the 8th book of “The Expanse” series. It's tense, the stakes are super high, people die, there's a lot going on.
  • 🍄‍🟫 I've been having nightmares lately! I wake up between 3am and 4am in the middle of it. They are usually about me losing control of something (like while driving) or getting lost or loosing something.
  • ⌚ My partner got a Casio CA-53W-1, you know, the classic one with a calculator!
  • 🧩 We did some more of our “Starry Night” puzzle. It's a tough one!
  • 🎮 I started playing “Pillars of Eternity” again. I was missing a good RPG, and I never went too far in this game. My progress is extremely slow, because I have not been able to look at too many screens in my spare time and I like playing on my laptop (which, btw, runs great on Steam with Ubuntu).
  • 👏 I added to my Someday-Maybe list: Jailbreak my old Kindle Paperwhite and install KOReader as an experiment (thanks Joel for letting me know KOReader exists!)
  • I don't have the energy to make a list of videos or cool articles today, so maybe next time! 🙌

#weeknotes

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

I love space photos!

I have a folder where I’ve been saving NASA’s missions for years: from the moon landing, the Curiosity Rover, the Cassini and New Horizons spacecrafts, the Hubble telescope, etc.

And now it’s time for an update from the Artemis II mission!

I love this view of the Moon with the eclipsed Earth on the background, it’s on my desktop now:

There are more stunning images available at the NASA’s website here.

#NoisyMusings

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • ✏️ I almost didn’t write this post today. Things are extremely busy at work and the last thing I want to do when I get home is to look at another screen. But I always feel good after I’ve written some notes about my weeks, so here it goes!
  • 🎧 I’m listening to “Fear of the Dark” by Iron Maiden while I type this.
  • 🖥️ It’s one of those periods at work when two deadlines compete against each other, and the amount of work is disproportionate, but it still feels achievable. And it really would be. Rant starting in 3, 2, 1… I use Windows 11, which has annoying mandatory updates every week. I also get random Bluetooth bugs depending on the phase of the moon (my Bluetooth headphones sometimes just stop working once in a while for no apparent reason… it must be drivers). On top of that, there are 4 or 5 layers of apps for security (things like ZScaler, antivirus, and who knows what else). The result is that it literally takes 8-10 min to boot my computer. If there is an update, that will turn into 10-15 min at least. And on top of that, we use software that are hosted in Citrix. And all of them are painfully slow. I work with design drawings, and I take off quantities based on those drawings, so imagine trying to click points on the screen with 5 seconds of lag between each click. It’s insane! And I know that there is a better way.
  • 🐧 Which brings me to Linux! 🥰 It’s a joy to use, it’s quiet, stable, light, and I can actually feel like it’s my PERSONAL computer. Because I can make it mine!
  • 💻 Now we are a Linux household! My partner was very frustrated with his old gaming laptop running Windows 10. It’s a 2017 Asus ROG. He was running into a bunch of issues. He was trying to run a program called “RealityScan” to create 3D Models of a historic building, and his laptop kept either: running out of RAM or disk space. He tried to clean up Windows, with limited results. His Onedrive was acting up, it wasn’t syncing, it was crashing, and he was afraid he was losing his data. He thought about installing Linux last year, but he kept pushing it. So after a day completely frustrated with his Windows machine, he finally got a big enough external hard drive to back up everything (which had its own challenges, I won’t get into that here, but it takes FOREVER to copy files out of Onedrive… I know because I’ve been there).
  • 💾 After all the backups were done, I gladly provided him with my Ubuntu USB stick, and we installed Linus on his computer in 6 minutes. Seriously, I timed it, it took 6 minutes! Everything worked straight away, he could run his RealityScan, he transferred his cloud data out of Onedrive, and he just avoided spending money with a new laptop. He was very happy!
  • ♣️ We both installed the AisleRiot Solitaire game, because we all need some downtime.
  • 🀄 Speaking of downtime, I also installed KMahjong on my computer, and it’s been so nice to have this quiet and relaxing game to relax for a bit. I know I could play my Steam games, but sometimes I just need something simple and low-pressure that lets me unwind without having to think too much.
  • 🤘 We went to a live orchestra concert with heavy metal! It’s called AnesthesiA – Hommage à Metallica symphonique and it’s basically a cover metal band playing Metallica with an orchestra. Super cool!
  • I want to learn more about Linux. I’ve been slowly getting more comfortable with the command line, and I watched a few very introductory videos.

📺 Videos I watched:

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#weeknotes

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  1. Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany, 311p: This is a book ahead of its time, with a strong and intelligent main female character. It's weird and bizarre, with psychedelic vibes. It's full of interesting ideas: neurolinguistic programming, language being used as weapon, polyamorous ship navigators, discorporate people, pilots good at wrestling. It's queer-norm, it is cyberpunk before cyberpunk was a thing. It has an anti-war message, illustrated brilliantly in the weapons gallery scene (if you know, you know). Also, that dinner party scene: I never read something so intense and vivid. This book feels remarkably new and modern even though it was written in 1966. I missed some more character development and more information about the Invaders. The writing style was not exactly my cup of tea, it had highs and lows for me.

  2. The Brush of Black Wings (Master of Crows #2) by Grace Draven, 135p: I wanted to read this novella because it's the sequel of a book that I love: Master of Crows. But this novella did not measure up to the previous book. The mystery plot was not interesting enough, and it was too easy to predict the ending.

  3. Diplomatic Immunity (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #13) by Lois McMaster Bujold, 320p: We start with an older Miles and Ekaterin, in their honeymoon, getting into a messy investigation of a man disappearance in the Quaddiespace. Also: scary biological weapons, station lockdowns and mysteries unravelled. We meet again Bel Thorne, former pilot in the Dendarii Free Mercenaries and our favourite hermaphrodite. I liked the contrast of the different cultures: the quaddies focus on work and the Barrayarans focused on honour. The stakes are high, I wasn't prepared for all the tension! Another book with excellent pacing and good climax.

  4. The Thursday Murder Club (A Thursday Murder Club Mystery #1) by Richard Osman, 388p: I was very curious to read this book. I was intrigued by the premise of a group of retirees investigating murders. I don't read a lot of mystery nowadays, and this book didn't work for me. I thought it started well, but it gets convoluted in the middle with so many new characters being introduced to the story. It has a unique sense of humour that worked most of the time. The chapters were super short, and the writing style felt choppy to me. It alternates different points of view in each chapter and I found it hard to track which characters were active. I didn't like that the plot was clearly manipulating me and steering my attention away from the real clues. I could see when the author was meandering just to fool me. It was not my type of mystery.

#readinglist #books #reading

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • Has it been almost a month since the last week notes? What is time, anyway?
  • ☃️ There was a sequence of above freezing temperature days, so it started to look like Spring is knocking at our door. The Rideau Canal Skating rink closed, most of the urban ski trails also closed for the season already.
  • 🎿 But, the last weeks of February were still very snowy, so I did complete a Level 2 Classic Ski Class and a Classic Ski Workshop “Help with Hills”. I am not that afraid of going down a slope anymore. And I got a bit better with my gliding and pole coordination. And right when I started to understand the ski mechanics better, the snow was gone and the season was over. Well, I will be ready for the next winter.
  • ⛸️ I completed my Level 3 Ice Skating class as well. I got better at using both edges in 1-foot glides and around a circle. Also, backwards skating felt less impossible, but I still haven’t got to the point where I could do backwards cross-overs. And that’s fine, I’m happy with what I can do so far, which is light-years away from when I started ice skating in 2019. I’m so glad I didn’t give up and kept coming back to ice skating every winter, regardless of how challenging it was.
  • 🎭 I’ve had varying degrees of energy levels since the beginning of the year. Some days I feel tired overall, and all I can do is go to work, keep up with the bare minimum of house/life chores and maybe read a bit before sleeping. And that low energy state goes on for a week or so, and then suddenly there is a week when my energy is back to more normal levels. I blame it on perimenopause, because I keep doing all the good things: meditation, yoga, exercise, balanced diet.
  • We finally got an opening to see a Family Doctor! We used to have one but when the pandemic started, the doctor went back to his home country, and me and my husband had to navigate the health system here using the walk-in clinics when needed. That helped me get in contact with some specialists, but now I have the chance again to do a full check-up, and it makes contacting the specialists easier.
  • 📖 These past weeks I focused more on reading books rather than reading online articles.
  • 📕 I finished reading “Babel-17” by Samuel Delaney for my local book club. Classic sci-fi written in the 60s, truly ahead of its time, with a strong female protagonist, queer normative, seeds of cyberpunk with psychedelic vibes. Very weird!
  • 🌳 We were gifted with a bonsai!

📺 Cool Videos:

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#weeknotes #skiing #iceskating

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  1. The Just City (Thessaly #1) by Jo Walton, 368p: This novel begins with an interesting premise: Apollo, trying to understand consent after Daphne escapes him by turning into a tree, joins Athena’s experiment to build Plato’s Just City and chooses to live there as a powerless human child. The philosophical discussions about agency, sentience, and whether robots are slaves are thought-provoking, and Socrates questioning the status of the workers was the highlight for me. In the end, I didn’t really love it. The ideas are interesting, but the whole thing just left me feeling uncomfortable. The sexual assault parts weren’t handled in a way that felt properly addressed, which is especially weird in a story that’s supposed to be about justice and consent. The society often seemed oddly unquestioning and cult-like, I couldn't connect with any of the characters. Overall, it felt more depressing than thought-provoking, and it just didn’t click for me.

  2. Persepolis Rising (The Expanse #7) by James S.A. Corey, 622p: It opens with a time jump, where the Rocinante’s crew are older and even beginning to think about retirement. The pacing was excellent, and it kicks off a new arc in the story, introducing a new military force determined to dominate everyone else, as they tend to do. This book has some great action scenes and great character development. The military occupation is somewhat quiet and brutal, very passive-aggressive style, which makes it even more violent. It employs all the fascist propaganda methods of oppression, which makes it unsettling and real. I definitely want to know what happens next.

  3. Dreamweaver's Dilemma (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #9.1) by Lois McMaster Bujold, 26p: This was an interesting short story in the Vorkosigan universe. As per the author's note, it is her first draft of what has become the “Vorkosiverse” or the “Vorkosigan Saga”. It takes place around 600 years before the first in the series Cordelia's Honor. It's about a “feelie-dream” composer who is asked to compose a particularly bizarre dream from a mysterious and eccentric client, who is offering a big sum of money for it. The “feelie-dream” is a kind of 3D-sensory-virtual reality experience that people plug-in to experience, kinda like a very immersive Virtual Reality experience. The story is mysterious and exciting, with noir-like tension in the way the composer tries to understand who this man really is and why he wants this particular dream created.

  4. Falling Free (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #4) by Lois McMaster Bujold, 237p: I loved that this book if full of engineers problem-solving with whatever resources and tools they have available. There are fun references to typical engineer quirks. But on top of that, it deals with genetically altered humans subjected to a big corporation's greed. It takes place 200 years before Miles Vorkosigan was born. The “Quaddies” are genetically modified people who have four arms: instead of legs, they have a second pair of hands, which makes them very efficient in zero gravity. However, the Quaddies are legally considered corporate assets, used as space labor, and we see their struggles for autonomy and recognition. I read this after finishing the Brothers in Arms / Mirror Dance / Memory / A Civil Campaign sequence. It's a nice addition to the Vorkosigan Saga world-building, especially since the Quaddies are referenced again in the next book in the series, Diplomatic Immunity.

  5. Do You Want to Start a Scandal (Castles Ever After #4) by Tessa Dare, 384p: This one was a funny and light read. The mother's sex education dialogue was hilarious, I'll remember it every time I see aubergines and peaches from now on. I liked that there was a bit of a mystery to the story and Charlotte was playing amateur detective with Piers. The mystery resolution was nothing extraordinary, and I missed some more spy action from Piers.

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#readinglist #books #reading

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • Week notes in the middle of the week? Yes, why not!
  • ✏️ So, I was doing the 750 Words journaling daily and even though it's great exercise, I can't keep up the pace everyday. And because the website tracks streaks, seeing that I broke my streak makes me frustrated. And some days I was just writing for the sake of completing the streak. So I decided to get back to my journaling using Standard Notes, where I don't feel that much pressure. I still strive to write everyday, but it doesn't need to be 750 Words.
  • 🎭I took some time to acknowledge that January was busy for me, and that I needed to rest. There was a lot going on, and I was putting my standards way too high. I had to slow down and remember my own lessons learned.
  • 🎿 I completed the Level 1 Cross Country Ski course! It was crazy to have classes so late at night from 8pm to 9:30pm. This night routine affected my energy levels a lot! It just made me realize how much I need my sleep time and my daily routines for me to function well. I don't regret it, tho. Cross country skiing is harder than I thought, and I will continue with a Level 2 class this weekend.
  • ☃️ It has been pretty cold around here the past few days, so I didn't have the courage to go ice skating or skiing outside too much. I did, however, go skiing once on a beautiful trail called Mer Bleu. It was the first outing after I was done with the ski class, and it was very challenging! First of all, it was cold (-17C) and even though the trail was mostly flat, skiing for 2 hours for the first time was too much. My partner was with me, and he got excited to go on the big loop, and we didn’t know how long the loop was. So, 2 hours later, I was dead tired. I did take a long nap afterwards that day to recover.
  • ⛸️ I'm still doing my ice skating classes once a week. I'm doing very slow progress skating backwards. I don't think I'll ever be able to do backwards cross overs.
  • 📕 I read “The Just City” by Jo Walton for my local book club, and it was a weird experience. I heard very positive praises about this book, but it wasn't for me. It's basically a thought experiment on making Plato's Republic idea of a “just city” a reality, which is an interesting premise. But the book was constantly pointing out how this is actually a terrible idea, showing all the bad consequences, and I missed having more characters that actually questioned the status quo. Anyway, it was interesting having the discussion with my book club, since it's philosophy adjacent, but I won't continue with this series.
  • 📖 I'm almost done with “Persepolis Rising” (The Expanse #9) for my other book club, and it's so amazing!
  • ❄️ Looking forward to the upcoming long weekend!

📌 Cool online reads:

📺 Cool Videos:

#weeknotes #skiing

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

1. The Left Hand of Darkness (Hainish Cycle #4) by Ursula K. Le Guin, 364p: This is a classic sci-fi book that doesn't hold your hand at the beginning, with lots of world building terms being mentioned without too much explanation. But the world is rich, and eventually we understand pieces of it by reading further and making our own connections. This was not a plot heavy book for me, it shines on character building. It explores the clash between two different societies, one which is traditional gender binary and another (the Gethenians) which is essentially genderless and sexless, except during a mating season. It was a slow read for me, but it pays off when the two main characters have to team up and go on a long journey, trekking a cold and snowed-in landscape together. It is a great though-experiment on gender, cultural oppression and colonization. Having been written in the 60s, this book paved the way for future sci-fi gender conversations by daring to imagine a world where gender isn’t a constant and can be fluid, contextual, and socially constructed.

2. Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It by Cory Doctorow [audio] 10h17min: This book lays down all the foundation and reasoning behind the phenomenon that is the systematic decay of services everywhere. The author coined the term “Enshittification”, and he presents various examples of the mechanism happening in services like Meta, Amazon, Uber, etc. I enjoyed the audio version, narrated by the author himself. Cory Doctorow uses sarcasm and he is often funny. But at the same time, the sad reality of capitalism exploitation is distilled in great detail. There is also a final section where he offers solutions. Very informative and timely read in our current moment (I read it in early 2026). After finishing it, it’s hard not to notice enshittification everywhere.

3. Winterfair Gifts (Vorkosigan Saga #13.5) by Lois McMaster Bujold, 90p: A nice novella where we can see Miles and Ekaterin's wedding! But we actually see it through the eyes of Roic, a Vorkosigan House guardsman who we met in the previous book, A Civil Campaign. We also get a chance to see Sergeant Taura again, which was great in this story. There's a bit of a mystery, but nothing complex.

4. A Week to Be Wicked (Spindle Cove #2) by Tessa Dare, 384p: The first time I tried this book, I didn’t like either of the characters from the first scene. I gave this book a second chance, and it was okay. The trope is the smart, bookish girl (Minerva) who really doesn't want to get married because she wants to be a geologist and the unrepentant rake (Colin). It's a road trip novel, with the two faking an elopement so that Minerva can travel to Scotland and present her findings in a Royal Geological Society Symposium. It's a light, funny read.

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#readinglist #books #reading

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By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

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