Howdy 👋,
Square February brought about a minor dispute in my household. In a month that precisely mapped to four weeks in the calendar, I came across the concept and history of the 13-Month calendar, in which every month of the year did the same (see below).
On a walk through a park near my home, I explained the merits of such regularity in timekeeping to my partner. I described the randomness of our current system in which certain months have certain lengths just because some Roman emporer needed the longest one to be named after themselves.
My partner couldn’t disagree more. “I like calendars being messy.”, she explained. “The quirks in our current one represent so much of our history. And history is messy.”
In the end, I had to concede. “I guess you're right. Though I really enjoy it when someone questions something everyone else takes as a given and tries to improve it. I think that's really admirable.”
“Yes,” she said. “That we can agree on.”
It seems some things don’t need improving. At least not for now.
Here are Seven Things I was curious about lately:
Design: I’ve finally gotten around to designing something in the style of Neumorphism during a hackathon. If you ever do, neumorphism.io is helpful.
Design/Tools: Penpot is an open-source design tool to rival Figma
Data Visualisation/Tools: Those who have heard of D3 for visualising data might enjoy Observable. Their website also has plenty of non-tech resources on the topic that’s quite helpful.
VR/Remote work: Glue offers virtual reality meetings that are meant to feel like the real deal
Space/Tech: I could not contain my excitement over 4k footage of the Perseverance Mars landing and the tech behind it. (Video)
Innovation: The aforementioned story behind the 13 Month Calendar
Books/Art: I’m half-way through John Porcellino’s collection of comics titled From Lone Mountain, hailed for their minimalism and appreciation of the simple, beautiful moments in life. The book struck me as quite unusual, so I dug and found an article about just why his work came to fame.
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Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of any current or previous employers.