After reading @manton’s post and Rob Shearer’s “Mastodon Exit Interview” at v.cx, I decided to spin up a Sharkey instance 🦈. I have to say—I like it! If the price is right, I plan to keep it alongside my Mastodon instance. I’m hosting it with K&T Host 🎉. #sharkey #fediverse
I follow this group of talented young siblings, and this song feels so appropriate for today. 🎶 They’re incredibly gifted!
#Music #LifeIn3D #FamilyTalent #Easter
Not a Throne, but a Cross
Scripture Reading: Luke 19:28–48 (ESV)(Luke 19:28) And when he had said these things, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.
(Luke 19:29) When he drew near to Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount that is called Olivet, he sent two of the disciples,
(Luke 19:30) saying, “Go into the village in front of you, where on entering you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever yet sat. Untie it and bring it here.”
(Luke 19:31) “If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ you shall say this: ‘The Lord has need of it.’”
(Luke 19:32) So those who were sent went away and found it just as he had told them.
(Luke 19:33) And as they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, “Why are you untying the colt?”
(Luke 19:34) And they said, “The Lord has need of it.”
(Luke 19:35) And they brought it to Jesus, and throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it.
(Luke 19:36) And as he rode along, they spread their cloaks on the road.
(Luke 19:37) As he was drawing near—already on the way down the Mount of Olives—the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen,
(Luke 19:38) saying, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”
(Luke 19:39) And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.”
(Luke 19:40) He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”
(Luke 19:41) And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it,
(Luke 19:42) saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.
(Luke 19:43) For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side
(Luke 19:44) and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”
(Luke 19:45) And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold,
(Luke 19:46) saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers.”
(Luke 19:47) And he was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy him,
(Luke 19:48) but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were hanging on his words.
(Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version. © Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.)
It’s almost that time of year again—when the whole world owes so
much to one part of the Trinity: God’s Son, who became man—the King and
Lord of all men, Jesus of Nazareth.
The Tomb is Empty
Luke 24:6 — “He is not here, but has risen.” (ESV)
After enduring betrayal, a rigged trial, brutal beatings, and the agonizing walk to Calvary—Jesus was crucified and laid in a tomb. The skies had darkened. The veil had torn. And now, by Roman command, the tomb was sealed and guarded.
You know, the Romans went to great lengths to guard and seal a dead man.
If He was truly just a dead man, why post more than one soldier? That’s because, I believe, they knew—deep down—this was no ordinary man.
The Table, the Betrayal, and the Prayer
(Luke 21:5) And while some were speaking of the temple, how it was adorned with noble stones and offerings, he said, (Luke 21:6) “As for these things that you see, the days will come when there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” (Luke 21:7) And they asked him, “Teacher, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when these things are about to take place?” (Luke 21:8) And he said, “See that you are not led astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and, ‘The time is at hand!’ Do not go after them. (Luke 21:9) And when you hear of wars and tumults, do not be terrified, for these things must first take place, but the end will not be at once.”
After Jesus rebuked the Pharisees and drove out those misusing the Temple courtyard—turning what was meant to be a place for God into a market—He spoke many parables about what was to come. Then He turned His attention to the Last Supper and the betrayal that would soon unfold.
The new Samsung One UI 7.0 will take some getting used to 🤔. I don't have a definitive opinion yet—it’s still new. However, I’m leaning toward the view that some of the old icons were nicer, while a few of the new ones are better 🎨. I'll have to explore it more now that it just updated 🔄.
📺 This Week’s Watchlist:
From Netflix:
- The Recruit – Season 2 (All Episodes) ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Just finished this one—very good in my opinion! Except for the last episode, which needed a little work. It felt a bit too unbelievable. But overall, the whole season was better than The Night Agent! 🎬
Tags: #TV #Entertainment #Netflix
When AI Can't Tell Life from TV
Let’s just say… I stopped wearing it pretty quickly. 😅
I muted the device and put it aside — but not before it captured one of the funniest AI-generated summaries I’ve ever seen. The device itself, called the Bee Pioneer, actually looks great 🐝. The idea is solid. I first heard about it from @leo on one of his shows, and I figured it had promise — if it worked well.
So on Saturday, I went through my usual routine: watched some TV 📺, paid a few bills 💸, and muttered about the President and his latest round of tariff nonsense 🙄. Then on Sunday, I opened the Bee app to see what it had recorded and summarized from my day.
And according to Bee’s AI… this is what I did — all in a single day:
My First NAS… Which One Should I Get?
Over the last few months, I’ve gotten into the home lab/server kick—mostly to learn, do some things for myself, and finally put to use a lot of the computer tech I’ve collected over the years. (I’ll make a blog post about that in the future.)
My Experience with MXRoute and MXGuardDog: Affordable Email Hosting Solutions
This post details my experience with MXRoute and MXGuardDog for
email hosting and spam filtering.
I've been using MXRoute for my email hosting since January 2025. When I started looking for a new web host, my previous host included email in its shared hosting plan, which worked well initially. However, I explored several alternatives, including Fastmail, but found it too expensive for my needs. I also considered using my paid ProtonMail account. While I could have used it for myself, it would have introduced complications for my parents, who are in their 70s and not very tech-savvy.
Therefore, I began researching other email hosting providers and looked into Purelymail (purelymail.com), Migadu (migadu.com), and finally, MXRoute (mxroute.com). After reading various reviews, MXRoute stood out as the best option. I was particularly drawn to its affordability: 25GB of storage for just $30 for three years (essentially $10 per year), with renewals at the same price. Best of all, transitioning my parents’ email to MXRoute was effortless. I only had to update a few settings on their computers, and they didn’t even notice the change.
This brings me to MXGuardDog.
My mother, who freely shares her email address, receives a significant amount of spam. I found that MXGuardDog (mxguarddog.com) was highly recommended for effectively filtering spam. At less than $2 per month, I decided to try it, and I’ve been using it for the past month. It provides an easy and convenient way to monitor my mom’s inbox and filter out spam, ensuring she only receives legitimate emails and the promotional messages she actually wants.
I'm still within the first 30 days of using MXGuardDog, but I'm already seeing her inbox clearing up on MXRoute. Overall, I'm really happy with this setup and glad I found both services. They were both easy to configure in my DNS records and started working immediately after I switched over. I plan to write a longer-term review later this year, but so far, I'm really impressed with both MXRoute and MXGuardDog.
One aside: both MXRoute and MXGuardDog offer noticeably better spam protection than Hotmail/Outlook accounts, which highlights a significant difference in spam protection. Even Google’s Gmail outshines Microsoft’s spam and phishing protection.
Tags: #EmailHosting #Spam #MXRoute #MXGuarddog
A Big Heart in More Ways Than One
A visit to Dr. Patrick Chang revealed the need for a cardiomyopathy specialist as my ongoing symptoms and elevated LVOT gradient persist.
Well, I’m glad I only have 9 years until retirement. Hopefully, Social Security sticks around, because who knows if my 401(k) will rebound. The President keeps shooting us in the foot economically 🦶🎯. It took years to get this bad—it’ll take years to fix, but he thinks months will do! #politics
There’s nothing more frustrating than waking up and thinking, I’m going to do a simple task to start the day. 😤
I planned to clone my nearly full 2TB NVMe drive to a new 4TB drive. I grabbed my external drive case, connected the new drive, and launched EaseUS Clone Disk. The first 566GB copied without issue. Then, suddenly, the speed dropped to a crawl. 🐢 Around 70%, I got the dreaded blue screen of death and a reboot.
After three failed attempts with the same result, I tried installing the new drive and cloning in reverse. One more blue screen later, I gave up after nearly 12 hours of troubleshooting. 🤦♂️ Frustrated, I ordered a disk cloner so I can copy directly between the two NVMe drives without interference.
Both drives check out fine, so I have no idea what’s causing the issue. This whole experience was a headache 🤯, and I didn’t get around to the other things I had planned for the day.
Tags: #NVMe #SSDUpgrade #TechFails #PCProblems
Why is a civilian tech CEO with significant business interests in China being briefed on potential US-China conflict scenarios? Seems like a concerning conflict of interest.
I have a new avatar! It’s now live on Micro.blog, Bluesky, and Mastodon. This was my first time using Fiverr, and I think it turned out pretty lifelike. Let me know what you think!
How AI Is Bringing My Ideas to Life
Today, I leveraged my single Mastodon instance, my Raspberry Pi, and my paid Claude AI account to create an automated weather posting system for my home location. Using Claude AI, I generated code to automatically post weather updates and other information—tasks I previously relied on IFTTT for. It was an interesting project, and I plan to extend it further with additional automated posts.
I can see IFTTT and Zapier either having to step up their game or eventually fading away. AI is a game-changer for those of us who aren't coders. While I’m sure the code isn’t the most optimized (Claude AI is supposedly the best at code generation right now), it’s incredible how AI allows regular people like me to experiment and bring my ideas to life.
This is how I envision AI—not as a replacement, but as a helper and a great equalizer. I know this technology will inevitably change lives (not necessarily for the better) and eliminate some jobs, but it’s also making powerful tools and knowledge more accessible to the masses.
Tags: #AI #Selfhosting #Automation
This Weeks TV Watching
📺 This week’s Watchlist:
- Matlock – S1 Ep. 15 – Game Face ⭐⭐⭐
- Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage – S1 Ep. 14 – A Sportsbook and a Breakup, This Is That Moment ⭐⭐
From NetFlix:
- The Night Agent – S2 Ep. 2 – Disconnected ⭐⭐⭐
- The Night Agent – S2 Ep. 3 – Government Property ⭐⭐⭐
Hoping to squeeze in a few more episodes this weekend! 🎬
Tags: #TV #Entertainment #NetFlix
Subscription Fatigue
I canceled my Paramount+ subscription on
Saturday, just before the renewal day yesterday, and I’m thinking of
dumping a few more. I canceled Apple TV+ a few months
ago. There are TV programs I like on both, but I just can't justify it
anymore. These subscriptions are like vampires, siphoning a few dollars
here and there until my budget is bled dry. These little charges are
starting to eat away at my budget.
You know, the Republicans through Trump and Musk have found the key to cutting money to everyone but their rich owners and hiking taxes in the form of tariffs so they can say they don’t raise taxes. But a tariff is a tax. #Taxes #Tariffs #politics