KemoNine's Blog

Non 'Smart' E-Reader File Naming and Reading Time

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-04-02: Initial publication

Background

For many months I’ve been trying to migrate away from my Boox Palma. I’ve had it for pushing 3 years now (I think, definitely over 2 years now) and the Android updates have stopped. This worries me because the Android version is old enough now to risk going unsupported by Google. This won’t happen ‘soon’ but it will happen. For me this is A Problem. That said: I adore the Boox devices and still strongly recommend them if you’re ok with an Android based device.

Dictionary Shenanigans

Mon, 30 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-03-30: Initial publication

A Critical Note

I live in America, I’m a career programmer and I have horrific health problems.

Normally I’d assume folk know what that means but I need to be explicit: this means my survival requires me to have a practical, useful and ‘reasonable’ understanding of Generative AI. Particularly models that programmers use.

Self Hosted Search

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-03-10: Initial publication

Preface

This blog post is the result of two humans bringing up self-hosted search within days of each other. I was curious and ended up dancing with the Red Queen.

This post will discuss two options I find useful for self-hosted search and my thoughts regarding both. However, it must be noted: this is a wholly different approach to search than going to some big name (Google / Bing / Duck Duck Go / Others) search engine and casting about the internet.

KOReader

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-03-11: Add section about reading statistics 2026-03-07; Initial publication

Preface

I’ve been eyeing the XTeink X4 for awhile now but the whole ’no book metadata browser’ gave me significant pause for quite some time. Historically I’ve used readers like the Kobo Clara HD, Moon+ Reader Pro and Librera Reader which provide me a good way of viewing books by tags, series and similar metadata which I rely on to filter my ’to read’ list.

Shaving & Hair Removal Revisited

Sat, 07 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-02-07: Initial publication

Preface

It’s been over 5 years since I was nerd sniped in a way that triggered a deep dive into the world of shaving, personal grooming, body scaping and soap. It’s time to revisit the topic with a mega post.

Royal Hair Trimmer

Mon, 29 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2026-01-04: Add image gallery
2025-12-29: Initial publication

A Note

I know this post isn’t quite ‘shaving’ but is definitely in the same realm so I’ve tagged it ‘shaving’ for better discovery.

Preface

As I’ve aged, I’ve gotten hairier. Particularly my nose and ears. This, annoyingly, is a fairly common feature of age in humans. I’ve also been trying to move away from electrified devices for things like personal grooming.

Phone Alert Forwarding

Sun, 07 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-12-07: Initial publication

Context

Historically I’ve been Not Fond of traditional telco services (sms/mms, phone calls, voicemail) as they are strongly tied to a specific device and it’s next to impossible to work with them from multiple devices. Signal, XMPP, Telegram, Matrix, Delta.Chat and others don’t suffer this problem. I can link up multiple devices and work with the data freely.

Rose-Thorn-Bud Obsidian Vault

Wed, 20 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Figure 1: Rose, Thorn, Bud quick reference

Changelog

2025-08-20: Initial publication

Rose, Thorn, Bud

First some context and background before getting to my thoughts.

The Rose, Thorn, Bud mindfulness exercise is designed to get you to think about the day’s events. It’s basically a mini journal entry.

Old School PDA

Tue, 19 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Some History

Recently a friend got me thinking about the old Palm Pilot, Sony Clie and Handspring Visor PDA’s (personal data assistant) and how they were particulary useful.

They existed prior to having the internet always at-hand, they are very focused environments, they use a stylus for text entry which mimicks writing in a notebook and there were a ton of great apps available.

They worked ridiculously well as pocket notebooks, date books, todo list managers, course work managers and a hell of a lot more. I should know, I had a Sony Clie during my Uni years and it’s the reason I didn’t wash out or fail out of Uni. I relied on the Clie heavily and it truly was a second brain for me.

Photo Backup OTG

Sun, 15 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-06-15: Initial publication

On The Go Photography Backups

On the go backups can be run using an Android phone with the following hardware. A dedicated device is no longer necessary. Use a file manager that can read/write OTG disks and use the phone to copy/paste data from SD cards to backup storage.

Warning

External USB storage and USB SD card adapters use a lot of power and a powered hub / dock is required for this process.

Videography Notes

Sun, 15 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-06-15: Initial publication

Mirrorless Camera Videography

This post is a collection of my notes on how to use a mirrorless camera for videography. These notes are specific to the Sony a6500 mirrorless camera but should be adaptable to other models and brands.

Bindings and Lashings

Sat, 31 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-31: Initial publication

What’s Here

This post is less ‘macrame project’ and more ‘useful information’.

Overview

As I continue to work through learning macrame, experimenting with sinnets, learning to tie various knots and more I realized I need a basic method of tying things together (duh?). I also need a way to organize my materials for everything I’m working with at any given moment.

Cat Scratcher Rewrapping

Sun, 25 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-25: Initial publication

Cat Scratcher Rewrapping

It’s surprisingly easy and cheap to re-wrap a cat scratcher. The hard part is finding a technique that’s straight forward, easy to learn and doesn’t require specialized hardware (tools).

The below outlines a way of re-wrapping cat scratchers that fits the criteria. The only special tool needed is a fid (lacing needle) as the finishing step that holds everything in place needs the rope to be laced through the main whipping wraps. Thankfully fid’s are not expensive and easily obtained.

Book Carrying

Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-23: Initial publication

Book Carrying

A simple way to wrap a book for carring. This is meant to allow attaching a book to a bag via caribeaner and similar.

Materials

Paracord 550

Techniques

Main Wrap: Unnamed Parcel Wrapping - 2087
Short Strand Stopper: Oysterman’s Stopper - 526
Loop: Unnamed Adjustable Loop - 1021

Gallery

Figure 1: The Ashley Book of Knots and an A5 notebook wrapped for carrying

How I Macrame

Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-31: Minor updates based on some adjustments I’ve made as I dig deeper into macrame 2025-05-23; Initial publication

How I Macrame

I’ve finally made enough progress with Macrame and related to start publishing my work. This post goes through the ‘why’ of my interest, my current tools, organization practices and more. It’s a general run down of what I’ve put together in order to practice macrame effectively.

Rolling Pin

Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-23: Initial publication

The Post

A handy trick: a rolling pin is cheap, easy to obtain and can simulate a post. This can be super helpful for learning hitches and whippings.

Simple Bookmarks

Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Changelog

2025-05-23: Initial publication

Simple Bookmarks

A simple, easy way to create bookmarks.

Materials

550 paracord, interior removed

Techniques

Length: measured on diagonal from upper to lower corners with extra cord to allow tying knots at both ends
Figure 8 - ABoK #520 for top of bookmark
Double Figure 8 - ABoK #523 for bottom of bookmark

Gallery

Figure 1: 4 bookmarks laid out on a table

Digital Drawing

Mon, 03 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Going Digital

Given I gave up on Analog coloring and drawing due to health and living space needs, I figured it was time to really commit to figuring out digital for coloring and drawing. Note I intentionally avoided making desktop or laptop computers a requirement for my setup. I want to have this whenever/wherever in it’s simplest form.

A Digital Anti Bad Habit Notebook

Fri, 06 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Analog Version

This post is about the digital anti bad habit notebook. For an analog version implemented as a pocket notebook, see this post.

The Post

Not going to lie : I have a few bad habits and have used my analog anti bad habit notebook to break some in teh past.

Sadly, I can no longer reliably use analog methods for my notes and similar. Due to this I went ahead and re-implemented the anti bad habit analog notebook as an Obsidian vault. So far it’s proven very helpful for tracking a bad habit I want to break and should work well for pretty much any “bad habit” one may want to break.

How I Computer

Sat, 30 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What’s Within?

This post contains a breakdown of how I use a computer, laptop and phone. I’ve made some significant changes over the last few years due to worsening health hassles. Everything here has been iterated over time in order to create a compute environment that makes my life easier to manage. Especially when my my health hassles are at their worst.

Feel free to borrow ideas, adapt things and generally use the contents of this post as you see fit. As always: this is a highly individual approach to computering. Take what works, leave the rest.

On Writing Digitally

Sat, 30 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

It would seem I’ve regained the ability to write more frequently and regularly despite my health hassles

My Preference

Normally I write posts for this blog by hand using a pen, Tomoe River paper and a clipboard. Sadly, my health hassles make this approach to writing very difficult and I do not have the capacity to write using analog methods regularly or reliably. Over the last few years I’ve had to patiently wait for windows when my health hassles doesn’t interfere with my writing. With analog I have to slowly write blog posts over the course of weeks and sometimes months. It’s quite frustrating but I enjoy writing and refuse to give it up, even if frustrated by my health hassles.

How I Research

Fri, 29 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What’s Within?

This post lays out how I research topics. I’ve struggled with “research” in the past and, thanks to a friend, finally figured out a methodology that actually works for me. This post goes through my methodology, how I use it with success and the details needed to recreate and/or adapt it.

What / Why / How

Important Context

Over the years I never really figured out how to research a topic properly. Basically if I needed to research anything I just sort of went digging around the internet, read books, read published articles and similar but didn’t really take notes or create summaries or similar. At best I’d catalog very basic snippets that I could turn into something actually useful at a later date.

My notebook & organizer journey

Wed, 27 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What’s Within?

Within is a walk through of all things analog and digital that I put together to be effective with notebooks and organizers. Things I’ve cataloged, setup, used, tinkered with and more. It even includes the how and why of my personal needs, preferences and opinions.

In short: it’s a very long breakdown of everything that actually works for me as well as many things that didn’t work for me. Think “Kemo’s Notebook & Organizer Autobiography”.

Health Hassle Handwriting

Sat, 16 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Editors note: KemoNine wrote this post before realizing they had already written Digital Writing Tablet Mini Review 3 ish months ago. Some information below overlaps with the prior blog post but the core of this particular post is how KemoNine is using a drawing tablet day to day for handwriting.

Prelude

Let’s get this out of the way up front: I am a pen and paper human at heart. Despite being labeled a ’tech nerd’ I use pen and paper as a default medium. I do have some health hassles (read: serious, chronic health issues) that prevent me from using pen and paper with the frequency I desire and, arguably, need in order to stay on top of daily life and more.

MS VC++ Redist As Non Admin User

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The below is an amazing trick for working around the need for an updated Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable runtime on a Windows machine where you do not have admin rights. It’s not ideal (you have to copy the dlls to every app folder) but it will let you run apps that need a more recent runtime than the system admin of your computer has installed.

This process was tested with Saber which I use for note taking at my $dayJob.

KemoNine's Blog

Non 'Smart' E-Reader File Naming and Reading Time

Table of Contents

Changelog

Background

Dictionary Shenanigans

Table of Contents

Changelog

A Critical Note

Self Hosted Search

Table of Contents

Changelog

Preface

KOReader

Table of Contents

Changelog

Preface

Shaving & Hair Removal Revisited

Table of Contents

Changelog

Preface

Royal Hair Trimmer

Changelog

A Note

Preface

Phone Alert Forwarding

Table of Contents

Changelog

Context

Rose-Thorn-Bud Obsidian Vault

Table of Contents

Changelog

Rose, Thorn, Bud

Old School PDA

Some History

Photo Backup OTG

Changelog

On The Go Photography Backups

Videography Notes

Table of Contents

Changelog

Mirrorless Camera Videography

Bindings and Lashings

Table of Contents

Changelog

What’s Here

Overview

Cat Scratcher Rewrapping

Table of Contents

Changelog

Cat Scratcher Rewrapping

Book Carrying

Table of Contents

Changelog

Book Carrying

Materials

Techniques

Gallery

How I Macrame

Table of Contents

Changelog

How I Macrame

Rolling Pin

Changelog

The Post

Simple Bookmarks

Table of Contents

Changelog

Simple Bookmarks

Materials

Techniques

Gallery

Digital Drawing

Table of Contents

Going Digital

A Digital Anti Bad Habit Notebook

Analog Version

The Post

How I Computer

What’s Within?