Running logs and rhythm games!

Okay, I think I've had enough winter. I would like to return the remaining cold days in exchange for shorts and t-shirts. Every year I look forward to the cold and I don't mind a little snow, but lately it has been single digits here in New York which is too cold to enjoy anything other than movies and hot chocolate. Unfortunately, life doesn't stop. Even as I write this I'm dreading taking my dog Zuri on a walk because it means that I need to dress like an arctic explorer just so she can take a sh*t.

in this issue:

🎸 Clone Hero

🏃 What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

🖊️ Tombow Airpress

✨ Bonus round

🎸 Clone Hero

I feel bad for the children of today. Not because of the state of the world. Not because of the economy. Not even because they don't know what physical media is. I feel bad for them because they'll never know the feeling of having a fake crowd clap along with you as you crush the solo in "Beast and the Harlot" by Avenged Sevenfold. Playing Guitar Hero after school was a mandatory activity and I've been chasing that high ever since. So after some googling the internet says that Clone Hero is the next best thing.

As the name implies, this is a clone of the classic game but with the added bonus of having a larger library of songs made by its community. You can play it with any compatible gaming controller and apparently you can even just use your keyboard, though honestly I haven't figured that part out yet. Of course, I still wish that I had my old Guitar Hero controller to rip on this but this gets pretty close to the experience.

🏃 What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

I must enjoy pain, because this year my sister and I decided to both sign up to run the New York City Marathon. I ran the Strava virtual marathon a few years ago so I know what it feels like to run 26.2 miles through Manhattan, but after completing it I told myself never again. Funny how you always forget promises you make yourself. Over the last few weeks I've been slowly getting back into form, and I guess the YouTube algorithm noticed as well because it started feeding me all kinds of running content. Including a video about the journaling method of the author Haruki Murakami who tracked his runs along with his thoughts in his journal. That journal eventually got published as the book What I Talk About When I Talk About Running.

I'm roughly halfway through the book right now and I'm really enjoying it. The book is half memoir, half philosophy book? It's more like a book about his stream of consciousness thoughts that he had during training. But what's nice is that he occasionally stumbles upon something deeper and a little more profound. I think that's a nice metaphor for running in general. It's not for everyone, but if you're interested in running or just curious to learn his method of journaling then I highly recommend it. Unless the ending sucks. Then forget I said anything.

🖊️ Tombow Airpress

Last year on my birthday I promised myself that I was not going to use any digital productivity tools. For the last four months I have been strictly analog, except for work obviously since I can't force everyone to send me paper notes all day. Any time I have a random thought, idea, or am simply making my to-do list for the day I put it in my little pocket Field Notes. My habit tracking/journal/calendar is then in a separate Leuchtturm1917 which I wrote about previously. This two book system has been working wonders for me but the one piece of the puzzle that has yet to fall into place is a good pen.

I have a few good pens that I enjoy using like the Grovemade desk pen, but it's heavy, doesn't have a pocket clip, and worst of all it's expensive as hell. Losing it would hurt me physically, so it just lives on my desk. When I'm out and about I've been using a Sakura Pigma Micron Pen which is relatively cheap and writes nicely, but they dry out too quickly for me. So I've been looking for something in the middle and the one that has my attention right now is the Tombow Airpress. Not only does the transparent one look super cool, but it's pressurized so you can write on paper even if it's wet. I'm not sure how it feels to write with yet so I need to find my way to a stationary store soon but at only $7 I might just f*ck around and find out.

✨ Bonus Round

Last week I finally got around to using Claude Code and it is indeed impressive. I always have ideas for random tools and pieces of software that I want to make but I they always ended up stuck in limbo and abandoned. But Claude Code has actually helped me to finish one. Well, actually two. So if you want to try them out I'm linking them here! Keep in mind, this is week one learning Claude Code so things might be a little jank, but if you have any feedback or ideas I'd love to hear them!

1) Something Sweet 🍭. The first is a telegram bot that randomly messages you to do something sweet for your significant other. Messaging the bot with the command "/start" will begin the onboarding. It'll ask you how frequently you would like to the messages, and that's it! After that it'll do its thing. You need the Telegram messaging app to use it but I'll likely add WhatsApp/SMS messaging eventually.

2) Stash It 🌰. The second is chrome extension that is just a clipboard for your browser. I use the clipboard manager in Raycast and find it super helpful, but I know not everyone is a sicko like me that likes to mess around with Raycast hot keys so I figured this might be easier. You can stash any string of text and if you pin it, it'll stay there even after you close the browser. PLEASE DON'T PUT ANYTHING SENSITIVE IN THERE! I'm not a security expert and I literally just made this so that I can stash links to things I want to talk about in this newsletter. Do not put passwords or anything important because I'm assuming everyone on Earth can probably see it.

🆒 Special thanks to Cool Supply members! 🆒

Abstronautica, Taylor Cash, Ben Sorensen, Daniel Hernandez, Becca Farsace, Charles Malave, Dean D, Jacob Mitchell, Justin Oster, Jonathan Potopovich, Ali Rabbani, Airton Zanon, Ben Murphy, Tristan Onfroy, Felipe Catano, Anita, Colt Cox, and Ben Shearin! ❤️