2026 Reads: The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami 📚

Pretty heavy handed and a little too on the nose for my taste.

After a long dalliance with lazily streaming music, I’m working through cleaning up tags and cleaning out the cruft from my personal 30,000-track MP3 library. Doing some random listening and enjoying albums I’ve forgotten I had. This afternoon: “Passenger Seat” from Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors.

A little personal news: this week is my last week at Collins Aerospace after nearly 27 years here. It’s been a good long run, but a new opportunity awaits. More about that next week. This week is for tying up loose ends and saying some goodbyes.

2026 Reads: God After Einstein by John F. Haught 📚

Very disappointed with this one. Tedious and repetitive. Not enough science to be science-y, not enough theology to be theological.

Ah, here’s the January weather we’d been missing in Iowa.

-3F, feels like -23F this morning.

Couple of warmer (20s) days this week, then multiple nights at -10F or lower next weekend. Oof.

2026 Reads: The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd 📚

Saw Chris Thile play tonight at The Englert in Iowa City. That guy is the real deal. Wowza.

A man in a light suit on stage playing a mandolin

The plan for today:

Gym ✅
Work
Record a podcast
Dinner with my wife at a new (to us) restaurant
Go hear Chris Thile play the mandolin

Last night: vestry. Tonight: library board!

Love my AirPods Pro 3’s but this morning was the second time I’ve had them in the case overnight only to show up at the gym in the morning and find out the airpods’ batteries were completely run down. A glitch in smart charging maybe? Super annoying, regardless.