Great news today at my follow-up with my hypertrophic cardiomyopathy specialist. Camzyos is really starting to work. My most recent echo earlier this week was excellent, and so was the heart cath I had in late December.
In fact, the heart cath showed that Camzyos is working well enough that I do not need to rush into an alcohol ablation or a septal myectomy. If I ever do need an intervention in the future, my doctor said I would be a good candidate for septal alcohol ablation.
I also told my doctor that, if at all possible, I would prefer to stay on medication and avoid any surgical treatment.
More good news: I will not have to see him or have another echo for six months.
I told the doctor I have been feeling great since starting Camzyos. My metoprolol dose was increased last month, and I have been sleeping much better. He said everything seems to have calmed down, and my gradients with exertion have improved greatly. So, no immediate decisions need to be made.
He also had a positive conversation with the cardiac interventionist and personally read my echo himself. It looked good, and he is pleased. I told him that I think staying consistent with my medication has helped. Lately, I have not had delays caused by the pharmacy needing certain tests before refilling my prescription, and I have not had any breaks where I was off the medication.
That means my main job now is simply dealing with the pharmacy and making sure I get my Camzyos on time each month.
So let's pray it keeps trending in the right direction. I actually feel normal for once.
I just wanted to put up a quick blog post and wish everyone a Happy New Year. Let's pray and hope that God blesses us all.
I'm looking forward to this year on many fronts. I want to continue getting my heart under control with my Obstructive Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy, do more self-hosting with AI, and learn more coding. This is also my 25th year of proper blogging (more posts coming on that later).
With all the computing power I'm putting together, I'm hoping to learn more about web development, self-hosting, and becoming less dependent on big tech. I'm one year closer to retirement, which I'm looking forward to. Instead of focusing on an employer's needs, I'll be able to focus 100 percent on what interests me and devote more time to my faith. Putting my love of God and technology together.
So Happy New Year to everyone, and let's see what 2026 brings for us all. Should be an interesting year, especially on the home front with the United States of America hitting 250 years.
Amidst a cascade of light and time, a visionary crafts his dreams for 2025, blending art and aspiration in his timeless sanctuary.
I thought I would give a roundup from my point of view for 2025 and share some thoughts on 2026.
2025 brought so many new things for me. I left InMotion Hosting and WordPress after 9 years with them. I probably would still be with them if it weren't for three factors. First, they had given me a discount for three years, and when it expired, they would not renew it and offered me nothing. Second, they had switched to a new spam email system called MailChannels that was more concerned with outgoing spam instead of incoming spam. I think they started to concentrate on outgoing spam because of complaints coming in. The last issue was WordPress. I started to get the same feeling of craziness from the owner/co-owner that I got from Elon Musk.
I moved to Write.as and thought I would like it. I had been trying it out before I left InMotion Hosting. I purchased a 6-year stint up front after trying it for about 3 months on the free version. But I soon learned it was not all that I had hoped for. I went to Micro.blog, and even though it had a shorter trial, I really liked it and saw how outdated Write.as was. I really liked, and still like, what Manton Reece is doing. So I changed from InMotion Hosting to Micro.blog and MXRoute for email hosting (as Micro.blog doesn't offer that and InMotion Hosting had the whole bundle). Both services have been fantastic, and Micro.blog is operated by an individual, not a big corporation and Manton Reece cares about his service. MXGuarddog is a small company from what I can tell and has been flawless. I will be making a detailed post about these services coming up in the new year for a one-year usage review.
In recent months, I've been building a social media aggregation platform using the Windsurf AI IDE. The platform displays a multimedia timeline that pulls content from Mastodon, Bluesky, Sharkey, Nostr, and Micro.blog. The goal was to centralize my social media interactions in one location instead of checking multiple sites.
Developed in Python using AI coding assistants (Claude and ChatGPT 5.2 High Reasoning) to accelerate development, I designed the platform structure and verified the implementation through testing. The screenshot shows the current interface. Some posts appear duplicated because I follow the same people across multiple platforms.
I was reading my RSS reader BazQux the other day and came across a post by rscottjones about retirement planning. With approximately 8 years until my own retirement, I've started planning too. I found his approach very interesting.
I like reading what other people are thinking and comparing ideas. Since he shared his and his wife's general plans, I thought I'd share mine to help organize my own thinking.
A visionary stands at the crossroads of innovation, contemplating the expansive network that may redefine the future of technology.
I have been a loyal Microsoft Windows customer since I've owned a PC and MS-DOS was a thing. I went to the events they had for major OS releases with my Dad. We both went to see the exciting things that happened when they used to stream them at movie theaters. I was there for the launch of Windows 95.
But it is my opinion that Microsoft has totally lost its way with regards to the consumer and Windows.
Yes, this is a rant, and I believe it may be too late for Microsoft and Windows with consumers. I know I am not a very techie person, but I believe that Windows is getting too messy in a lot of areas like advertisements everywhere, sloppy code, updates that seem like beta versions, telemetry, privacy concerns, and just all around not caring.
An engineer lost in thought, surrounded by a maze of circuits and the glow of futuristic interfaces.
Lately, I’ve been swamped with projects and short on energy to tackle them, partly because of my worsening eyesight. I have glaucoma, but thankfully no loss of vision. My treatment includes twice-yearly eye pressure checks and nightly latanoprost. Even so, my glasses prescription seems to need constant updates, and I’ve always had a lot of floaters. My ophthalmologist reassures me that the floaters and eye pressure are fine, but my vision keeps changing, which is frustrating. After a recent visit to an optometrist for new glasses (an immediate improvement at first), I quickly found myself struggling again. It’s baffling how fast my eyesight shifts.
This ongoing vision issue is a big reason I’m putting off other projects. Other medical concerns, like my heart health, are actually improving. I have two SunFounder Pis to build, a few minor tasks, and I’m refining my blog and social-event posting software. I expect these projects to be fully functional soon, and I’ll update my blog as they progress.
Despite having plenty to work on, my motivation is flagging.
I don't typically blog about every anniversary or special date. However, I have a soft spot for “this day in history” and similar themes. Yet, some memories from my youth, like Space: 1999, truly resonate with me. Watching it on Saturday afternoons or evenings, I always thought it was an incredible show. I even bought the 30-year complete edition on DVD.
