Day 837, Quasi-Quarantine: Two Decades On, "Elements of User Experience" Remains The Definitive UX Playbook

"Designing the user experience is really little more than a very large collection of very small problems to be solved. The difference between a successful approach and one doomed to failure really comes down to two basic ideas:

- Understand what problem you're trying to solve.

- Understand the consequences of your solution to the problem."

"It is user experience that forms the customer's impression of a company's offerings; it is user experience that differentiates a company from its competitors; and it is user experience that determines whether your customer will ever come back."

Jesse James Garrett's "The Elements of User Experience: User-Centered Design for the Web and Beyond" is a relatively difficult-to-find UX textbook that's as relevant two decades later as it was upon release. 

"Although trying to hit a moving target can be a tremendous waste of time and resources (not to mention a huge source of internal frustration), strategies can and should evolve and be refined. When revised and refined systematically, strategy work can be a continuing source of inspiration throughout the user experience design process."

"Any time a person uses a product, a sort of dance goes on between the two of them. The user moves around, and the system responds. Then the user moves in response to the system, and so the dance goes on. But the typical way that software has been designed doesn't really acknowledge this dance."

Garrett's introduction of the five planes (strategy, scope, structure, skeleton, and surface) of user experience -- and their corresponding layers of abstraction -- continues to be a game-changer in web design and other disciplines. 

"If it involves providing users with the ability to do things, it's interface design.

"If it involves providing users with the ability to go places, it's navigation design.

"If it involves communicating ideas to the user, it's information design."

"Page layout is where information design, interface design, and navigation design come together to form a unified, cohesive skeleton."

Full of useful diagrams, the book covers everything from how to treat edge cases to incorporating eyetracking data to defining functional elements. This is a work I wish I would have read much earlier in my career in web publication, but I'm grateful to be building a common language based on Garrett's terms.

"The first question you should ask yourself (and the first question you should be able to answer) about any aspect of the user experience is: Why did you do it that way?"

Day 836, Quasi-Quarantine: Bringing The Nihilistic Horror Of "Squid Game" To Real Real Life

Last September, "Squid Game" took the world by storm. A "dystopian K-drama," this South Korean series become a global phenomenon, with even SNL going in hard on it.

Not only has a season two been greenlit, but now Netflix is further capitalizing by delving into the reality TV genre. Enter "Squid Game: The Challenge," a competition featuring 456 players trying to win $4.56 million. There's a legit casting call happening right now.

Hopefully, the actual stakes involved in this reality show aren't as high as in the series itself. But considering the state of the world, I'm just not ruling anything out.

Day 835, Quasi-Quarantine: Melvin Ingram Fills Need For Veteran Pass Rusher As Free Agency 2022 Ends

Mid-May NFL moves don't tend to move the needle very much, but Miami made a transaction that could end up making a sizable impact on the team's 2022 season. The Dolphins inked free agent defensive end Melvin Ingram to a one-year, $4 million deal -- including $3.32 million guaranteed.

The pluses: A three-time Pro Bowler, Ingram plays angry, racking up 10.5 sacks per season in 2015 and 2017, then adding nine in 2019. He's been rated as high as No. 48 in the NFL's list of top 100 players (2019), and last year proved that he can still make an impact. Pro Football Focus rated Ingram as the No. 13 edge defender in the league (out of 108), putting him No. 8 against the run and No. 22 as a pass rusher and assigning him his best overall defensive grade (80.9) since 2017. PFF credited him with 42 quarterback pressures, with Pro Football Reference counting 11 quarterback hits.

The negatives: Despite the impressive ratings and rankings, Ingram had just two sacks a season ago, after a season that saw him shut out in that category. His six games with Pittsburgh ended in a contentious fashion, with the Steelers trading him to the Chiefs for a sixth-rounder. Now 33 years old, knee injuries have taken a toll, and one wonders how an undersized (6-2, 247 pounds) end will make up for an inevitable loss of speed. 

The bottom line: I was hoping the 'Fins would sign him last year, as I felt a lack of proven pass rush would eventually catch up with Miami. Adding the former Chargers first-rounder in the post-draft timeframe is a nice pickup for a franchise that had dedicated next to nothing to the defense in free agency to that point. With 51 sacks, 74 tackles for losses, and 119 quarterback hits in 128 career games, Ingram is a proven factor on the defensive front. Even on a rotational basis, it seems likely that he can be a significant force while providing veteran leadership to a young Dolphins "D" in 2022.

Limerick Friday #549: That Friday When Democracy Detonated -- Day 832

They pose a threat dire

Each a hypocrite and liar

The highest court in the land

Betraying every oath hand

While setting democracy on fire

Each a traitor and louse

With hate you can't douse

On the call we're homing

And we're sure it's coming

From inside your house

Fascists they praise

In their un-American craze

Now they've bought the court

And justice they did abort

Among a nation's darkest days

Above silly bad

And beyond really sad

The erosion will escalate

As rights they denigrate

Just a stumble from Gilead

Of our parts we're the sum

A collective embrace of dumb

In democracy's dying hour

They chose cruelty and power

Who in the fuck have we become?

Last time ...

Day 831, Quasi-Quarantine: "Call Us What We Carry" Sets A Shared Pandemic To Verse

"There was another gap that choked us:

The simple gift of farewell.

Goodbye, by which we say to another--

Thanks for offering your life into mine.

By Goodbye, we truly mean:

Let us be able to say hello again."

~"Fugue"

The immensely talented Amanda Gorman is back with heady, elegant thoughts on COVID-19, collective memory, and inequality. Several entries cleverly use type to make shapes that support the poems' themes, and others play with techniques such as anaphora, parallelism, and erasure.

"We stumbled, sick with shame, groping for each other

in that heaving black. We were mouthless for months.

We could've been grinning. We could've been grimacing.

We could've been glass & so, we must ask:

Who were we beneath our mask.

What are we now that it is trashed."

~"ANONYMOUS"

"Call Us What We Carry" is a beautiful, intense, gutting collection of poems from one of our most important contemporary voices in American literature.

"We wonder how close

Can we come to light

Before we shut our eyes.

How long can we stand the dark

Before we become more than our shadows.

Pay attention.

Concern is the debt

We always owed each other."

~"In the Deep"

Day 830, Quasi-Quarantine: Disney Day 2 Allows Us To Lose Ourselves In The Star Wars Universe

 

After an initial day in the Magic Kingdom, Day 2 at Disney World featured our long-awaited first trip to Batuu, an Outer Rim Territories planet.

Featuring rogues like smuggler Hondo Ohnaka, Black Spire Outpost is a gritty spaceport. The heat was occasionally overwhelming, but the level of detail and intricacies built into the experience were phenomenal.

A journey on Smuggler's Run was an essential place to start. With crew members assigned to pilot, navigator, and gunner, helming the Millennium Falcon represented a dream come true for any '80s kid -- or younger.

Visiting the various shops around the outpost, we tried blue and green milk (with and without alcohol), did some shopping (landing a rebel helmet, among other trinkets), and encountered some familiar figures from the Star Wars universe.

After building our own droid, we also rode Rise of the Resistance, a phenomenal ride that took you through being captured by the Empire and then escaping back into Batuu.

After a full day in Batuu, we had an appointment for late drinks at Oga's Cantina, which not only gave us an opportunity to experience an iconic cantina, but to take pictures of a near-empty park. The T-16 Skyhopper (Tito's vodka, Bols melon liqueur, kiwi, and half & half) and the Bad Motivator IPA from Sierra Nevada were standouts.

A whirlwind, immersive day in Black Spire Outpost for sure, and with nearly 32,000 steps as a family, we were ready to hyperdrive back to the hotel.

But Batuu was everything we hoped it might be, and more -- a not-insignificant feat considering the lofty expectations we brought with us to the Outer Rim.

Day 829, Quasi-Quarantine: Lego's Rebel Pilot Helmet Had Me Nostalgic For Jek Porkins

I finally got around to putting together Luke Skywalker's Red Five Helmet (set 75327), a birthday gift that had been lingering for a minute.

This was my first crack at one of the "Lego for Adults" (18 and older) helmet sets, and it was very satisfying to see the disparate elements come together and the way various pieces were repurposed for other uses.

Though somewhat smaller than expected, this 675-piece set includes an integrated display stand and some compelling color combinations. The final result had me ready to run the Death Star trench in pursuit of cosmic fame.

 

Limerick Friday #548: Normalizing A Coup Attempt And Other Hypocrises -- Day 825

Traitors did their bidding

While they tried to stay hidden

Asking for pre-emptive pardons

While watering terrorist gardens

Who the fuck are they kidding?

Gave everything that he had

Even when things looked futile and sad

A one-man Wolfpack at times

As he looks for new mountains and climbs

For Dereon Seabron, let's be glad

Injuries becoming a thing

As the Mets take wing

Running outta depth

A roster bereft

A revealing West Coast swing

You've never been a fit

Because you don't really do shit

With existential "thoughts" you smother

But we don't need a den mother

Do something and stick a sock in it

Can you buy a spine

On the taxpayer dime?

Because Merrick Garland is in need

Down his leg he's peed

History will crucify him in time

Last time ...

Day 824, Quasi-Quarantine: "Stranger Things" Owns The Summer -- And Closed-Captioning Horror

 

The first part -- comprising seven episodes -- of the fourth season of "Stranger Things" felt like seven mini-movies, making the wait for the final two episodes on July 1 feel interminable.

On the plus side, the Duffer Brothers are indicating that there will be a fifth and final season, though, which is welcome news for those who were working under the assumption that this was the last we'd see of "Stranger Things."

For now, let's appreciate the pure terror involved in the phrase "Demogorgon feeding wetly" as we bide our time.

Day 823, Quasi-Quarantine: Haunting "Sundial" Channels The Eerie Desert In Propulsive Ways

"When people say something is 'unthinkable,' what they usually mean is that they don't want to think it. They are resistant to an idea. But that is not what unthinkable means. I understand that, now. It means to be confronted with a thought so vast, dark, and monstrous that it will not fit into any known shapes in your mind. It is poison and madness flowering behind your eyes."

Thirty pages into Catriona Ward's "Sundial," I was already terrified. The feeling didn't abate much over the ensuing 250+ pages.

Set in the Mojave desert, this book is a psychological thriller, a ghost story, and a true-to-life depiction of the unerasable scars of abuse and neglect. Featuring an untrustworthy narrator, the tale winds through a series of harrowing events as a mother seeks to protect her daughters from the past, the present, and the future.

"I am caught in his golden eyes. All the desert is in them. He is still a king."

With frantic pacing, "Sundial" features a breakneck rhythm with a satisfying ending, replete with the twists, turns, and ghosts that turn it into an irresistible read.

 "It's possible to feel the horror of something and to accept it all at the same time. How else could we cope with being alive?"

Day 822, Quasi-Quarantine: Funko! Pops Share Their Take On The White Stripes

 

Released in 2003, "Elephant" was the fourth studio album by the White Stripes. One of the most impactful albums of my listening career, this collection featured "I Just Don't Know What do Do with Myself," "Ball and Biscuit," and the era-defining "Seven Nation Army," among other standouts.

I first became fully aware of the genius of Jack White with this album, and whether you call it punk blues, blues rock, or garage rock revival, his work with Meg White is nothing short of transcendent. 

Cheers to Funko! for making a couple of Pops celebrating this band that reshaped music in the early 2000s.

Day 821, Quasi-Quarantine: Fun With Closed-Captioning

 

I'm not sure what was happening in this Louisville-Texas A&M game, but I'm reasonably sure that the play-by-play person wasn't accurately describing the action.

Day 817, Quasi-Quarantine: Braving Florida For A Toe-In-The-Water First Day At Disney

 

The crew chased away April with a long-delayed journey to that most magical mystifying of places.

Disney World.

The first day involved a very early morning flight into Orlando, followed by a harrowing Uber (due to there no longer being Disney transportation at the airports) to the Swan hotel. We ducked into the Magic Kingdom for a few rides (including the family favorite and not-long-for-this-world Splash Mountain), spending the bulk of our time in Frontierland and riding the Liberty Square Riverboat for the first time.

With a much-anticipated and long-awaited visit to Batuu and Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge looming for the following morning, we had a relatively low-key afternoon, netting just 21,470 steps.

That would change in a big way.

Soon.

Day 816, Quasi-Quarantine: Meandering "Anthem" A Poignant Commentary With A Missing Point -- Which May Be The Point

"Perceived loss of standing had torn our country apart. The fear of losing ground to those beneath us ... Rather than elevate those they perceived as lower status to their own level. Deep down, it seemed, many Americans were convinced that a gain for others was a loss for themselves."

This apocalyptic novel delves into long essays at various points during the narrative, but Noah Hawley has painted a dark, vivid, oppressive picture in "Anthem" -- and one that is ripped from our incessant news cycles.

"In simpler times this would have been called irony, but your author would like to point out, dear reader, that the times in which he lives stopped being simple long ago. In the new times -- the Age of Tribal Thinking, the Age of Inverted Reality -- irony has been stripped of its humor.

"And irony without humor is violence."

"The internet, invented to 'democratize information,' has turned out, instead, to be a tool of self-affirmation. Whether you believe you're suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome or that 9/11 was an inside job, the World Wide Web exists to tell you you're right.

"You're always right."

Despite a problematic ending, Hawley has captured a disaffected generation as they come to terms with the lies and broken promises handed down to them by their parents and grandparents. A broken planet, rampant abuse of power, and a mind-numbing war on reality itself are the legacies transferred to contemporary teenagers, and the author finds fertile ground with which to work.

The through-line is a hive-mind group suicide phenomenon, which has rendered parents captors and families beating to the march of a perpetual egg timer.

"Suicide, you see, is an idea. And like any idea, it can spread from person to person to person. Anyone who has ever stood at a great height and felt the impulse to jump recognizes the draw. And what is adolescence if not a great height from which we are all expected to jump? A precipice of hormones and doubt, of alienation and longing. No longer a child. Not yet grown. Trapped in the pain of becoming.

"But what if you could make the pain stop?

"What if the answer was not to endure the transition and all its adjacent misery but to end it?"

While the occasional humor and -- for some of us -- joy-inducing Stephen King references soften some blows, the reading can be difficult and disturbing. 

"I am Randall Flagg, the Walking Dude, the Ageless Stranger, who can call beast and fowl alike to my defense, who haunts the dreams of mortal men. Randall Flagg, the Man in Black, Old Creeping Judas, the Grinning Man. Only an atom bomb can kill me."

"Anthem" falls short of what it purports to be, offering no answers, no encouragement, and no haven -- just a mirror held up to who we are and a hint at what lies along the smoldering path.

"'I figured it out,' he repeats. 'It's grief. The five stages of death, right? Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance, but we're all trapped in the first two stages. The whole country, or maybe the Earth. We're in denial and we're pissed, because something we love is dead, except, for half the country, what they're grieving is the past they think they've lost, and the other half is mourning the progress they thought they'd made, but everyone feels the same way. Like someone they love has died.'"

Day 815, Quasi-Quarantine: Miami Caps Free Agency 2022 With An Intriguing Scheme Fit in Running Back Sony Michel

 

Fortifying what has recently been a subpar running back corps, Miami inked former enemy Sony Michel to a one-year, $1.75 million contract, with $850,000 guaranteed. The post-draft addition adds another proven veteran to what has become a crowded offensive backfield.

The pluses: At just 27 years old, Michel is coming off his second Super Bowl title in four years in the league. The 5-11, 215-pounder has 3,137 career rushing yards, with 18 touchdowns and a 4.2 yards-per-carry average. After starting 35 games in three seasons as a former first-round pick in New England, he was traded to the Rams prior to last season for fifth- and sixth-round picks. The Orlando native led Los Angels with 845 yards and four scores, averaging 4.1 yards per carry. Michel has just three lost fumbles in his career and shined in games against the Dolphins, racking up 437 yards and four touchdowns in six career contests against Miami.

The negatives: Michel has never had a 1,000-yard season and was an afterthought in the postseason for the Rams a season ago, posting just 80 yards and no scores on 3.1 yards per attempt. He's not much of a threat to break chunk plays (with a long run of 48 yards in his career) nor is he a receiving threat, with just 47 catches for 386 yards and two touchdowns in his career. The Patriots gave up on him as a former first-rounder in an injury-limited season after he averaged 5.7 yards per carry, and Michel now joins his third team in as many seasons.

The bottom line: Michel is best as a grinding, between-the-tackles runner, making him an interesting candidate for Miami's new zone blocking scheme -- especially with the injury histories of the Dolphins' current backs. With Raheem Mostert and Chase Edmonds adding speed to the backfield in free agency, Michel is likely to be counted on to earn the tough yards, with his shifty style in the hole probably making him a better fit than incumbents Myles Gaskin and Salvon Ahmed. While his career is no longer trending in the right direction, one gets the sense that there is still some meat on the bone for Michel, and as an extremely late addition in post-draft free agency, this feels like a low-key strong move for the 'Fins.

Day 814, Quasi-Quarantine: Next-Leveling Your Run-Of-The-Mill Rum Cocktail

 

I've discovered Kraken Black Spiced Rum. There's no going back now.

Originating in Trinidad & Tobago, this rum contains hints of cinnamon, ginger, and clove. If you're into Scooter levels of sophistication, this pairs ideally with Trader Joe's Jalapeno Limeade.

The current state of the world calls for diversified heavy drinking decisions, and the Kraken perhaps best embodies that in both spirit and spirits.

Limerick Friday #547: "Barry" Doing Its Best To Redeem (*Gestures Aimlessly*) All The Things -- Day 811

Every week I see

But can't believe the quality

"Barry" is a revelation

In a time of desolation

The best thing on TV

Moon shots galore

But never more

A bittersweet word of thanks

To Tommy "Tanks"

The latest walking out that door

The arrival of season four

Couldn't have been anticipated more

"Stranger Things" back with a bang

More horror and drama for the gang

The Duffer brothers dialing up the gore

Tensions run high

Burnout is nigh

Emotions close to the surface

Ignorance without purpose

That sense we're all living in a lie

Same bullshit now as then

Screwed once again

Pack baseball targeted every day

By a vindictive NCAA

Fuck 'em in every way you can

Last time ...

Day 810, Quasi-Quarantine: "Ozark" Could Not Possibly Have Constructed A More Awful Ending

Welp. I have never wanted to boo the finale of a series I liked more, and the robotic video above was chosen to reflect the mechanical nature of how the show ground to a halt.

To be fair, I would have been pissed about any "Ozark" conclusion that didn't involve Wendy -- one of the least likeable characters I can recall by a gifted actress, Laura Linney, who seems to specialize in playing such roles -- getting blown away. 

However, to snuff out the iconic Ruth -- who carried the entire show -- while allowing the Byrdes to emerge scott free was too much to bear. The classist nature of having the Byrdes skate while the entire Langmore and Snell families were wiped out rang hollow and disturbing.

It became clear that the writing/directing team lost control of the plot line over the past couple of seasons, allowing what should have been a two-season show to meander into oblivion based on mass appeal.

Introducing random new characters, allowing the Marty-Wendy relationship to persist (they didn't even like each other, much less love each other), ignoring interesting subplots like the criminal maturation of Jonah, and reducing Three to some sort of occasional reminder that there were once way more Langmores ... these are unforgivable mistakes on a prestige show.

For a while, "Ozark" qualified as can't-miss art. By the end, it was reduced to swing-and-miss TV.

Day 809, Quasi-Quarantine: Wistful Journey Turns Troubling Precursor To The Dissolution Of A Nation's Soul In "Travels With Charley"

"For how can one know color in perpetual green, and what good is warmth without cold to give it sweetness?"

Facing his own mortality and a sense that the country had changed while he wasn't paying attention, John Steinbeck set out to travel America with his standard poodle, Charley. The result is a memorable travelogue that dissects the author's feelings about the degradation of the environment and overall morality coursing through the veins of a new nation.

"There seemed to be no cure for loneliness save only being alone."

Much consternation has been made about the truthfulness of Steinbeck's account, and it's overtly apparent that many dialogues and episodes are made up. He has improbable conversations with fairly wooden characters and uses Charley as a stand-in to monologue about what he thinks he's learning.

A harrowing trip through the deep South near the end of his journeys paints the overall experience in depressing and somber tones. 

"I faced the South with dread. Here, I knew, were pain and confusion and all the manic results of bewilderment and fear. And then South being a limb of the nation, its pain spreads out to all America."

"Beyond my failings as a racist, I knew I was not wanted in the South. When people are engaged in something they are not proud of, they do not welcome witnesses. In fact, they come to believe the witness causes the trouble."

Over the course of some 10,000 miles, Steinbeck reckons with an America at war with itself, serving up prescient warnings that -- some 60 years later -- ring frighteningly true.

"I do know this -- the big and mysterious America is bigger than I thought. And more mysterious."