2026-01-25 00:00:00
Ricky Mondello, from the Apple Passwords team, shared a crucial hidden feature for saving arbitrary data in their app:
[I]f anyone ever wants to save some non-password data in Passwords, but is annoyed by having to put a password in and see a useless “Password” row, use a password of “-”. Passwords will omit the password from AutoFill and hide the “Password” row from the detail view.
This might be the final piece of the puzzle to help me move away from 1Password… Except it doesn’t seem to work for me on iOS 26.2. I’ll keep checking as new versions are released.
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.
2026-01-24 23:46:00
Note: I drafted this back on December 4th, but never got around to posting it.
Just this morning, I was thinking to myself, “I wonder what Lisa Jackson thinks about how cozy Tim Cook has gotten with the Trump administration?” Just a few hours later, we have a clue: she’s retiring.
I don’t know that they’re related, but I think it’s telling that Jackson isn’t sticking it out to see the Apple 2030 initiative through, which which has championed since its 2020 introduction. With no direct replacement for her role in directing the company’s environment and social strategies, I’m curious how they will progress.
Related, I listened back to John Gruber’s 2017 interview of Jackson on The Talk Show. It was still a delight these many years later. I loved her straight-shooting style. I’ll miss her from Apple’s leadership team.
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.
2026-01-24 23:45:00
The premise of Netflix’s Famous Last Words is simply brilliant. From its announcement:
What would you say if you knew it would be your last opportunity? New Netflix documentary interview series Famous Last Words asks some of the world’s cultural icons to do just that, recording in-depth, intimate interviews with the understanding that they’ll only be aired posthumously. […]
Each interview is conducted with extreme discretion — conversations so private that only the interviewee and interviewer are present. The session is recorded by remotely operated cameras and is then preserved. This ensures an intimacy of conversation and fidelity of reflection from some of the world’s greatest minds.
Each one, starting with Dr. Jane Goodall, promises to be captivating and, I bet, quite spicy.
The level of trust that Netflix will have had to earn from each subject is very high. The contents of their interview leaking early could be disastrous. I cannot imagine traditional media networks, or their related streaming services, securing the same reputation anymore.
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.
2026-01-01 01:33:57
I’m on a flight to Vegas for New Year’s with only about 30 minutes left before touchdown, so let’s quick recap a few fitness-related goals I set out to achieve in 2025.
I have a friend who, a few years ago, set out to do 360,000 feet of elevation gain in a year. That seemed a big bite to chew, so I settled for 500 feet per day — or 182,500 feet in 2025.
Well, I crushed it. I did a ton of hiking this year for work, plus a bunch of uphill ski touring last winter. They contributed to 319,914 feet of elevation gain tracked this year. I only counted ascents during workouts like hikes, skiing, and running, so my overall number with rock and ice climbing, and day-to-day life is likely much higher. Maybe I could have gone for 365,000 after all!
(I love that the little tracker I built for my self tells me that I’m 275 days ahead of schedule on this goal. 😆)
I aimed to run a total of 365 miles this year. One mile per day seemed pretty reasonable, but this goal was a real challenge.
I love to run, but going through motions of getting ready and out the door are sometimes a challenge to push myself to do. And momentum plays a huge role. If I miss one run, I’m more likely to miss the next. Suddenly, I haven’t gone out in weeks and the mileage needed to catch up starts looking daunting.
By the end of November I still needed to run over 100 miles — almost a full third of the total mileage for the year. I needed to decide if I was going to commit to it or not. Thanksgiving’s Turkey Trot was the clincher. I had a great time, and was all in. But it meant I needed to average four miles of running every day until the end of the year.
I started putting in the miles, trying to go more than four miles any opportunity I got in an effort to get ahead. Six miles turned out to be my sweet spot, but I managed to eek in a few eight, 10, and even 13.1 (half-marathon) runs.
Even so, getting runs in around the holidays and my work days that are often 10+ hours was a big challenge. I ran on treadmills (yuck), in the 0°F or colder temps, and when I was sick. But, in the end, I got it done. 114 miles over 17 run in December. Next year, I won’t leave it so late in the year. 😅
Though I’ve guided most of the Adirondack high peaks multiple times, there were still a few that I hadn’t yet summited. This had to be the year I got them done!
I hiked the last of the 4,000+ foot tall peaks, Big Slide, on July 30th of this year. It was my 132nd high peak summit. Feels great to have that off my back!
These number-based goals seem to do well to motivate me, especially when I can break them down to daily or weekly totals. With that I mind, I’m aiming for three 365-based objectives.
I’m not setting an elevation goal because I think that just comes with my profession now, and I often have to defer to the mountains that my clients want to hike. But I’ll keep an eye on the total, and if I get close to 365,000 feet, you know I’ll be gunning for it!
Mostly these goals are intended as motivation to continue to get outside and do what I love. The added bonus of getting to tick off a few more miles or pitches on the chart is sometimes just enough to get me off the couch.
2026, bring it on!
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.
2025-12-10 03:10:00
I’m not a ring guy. My parents had to cajole me into getting a class ring back in high school, telling me that it would be something that I would later regret if I didn’t get one. So I got one, tried wearing it, and ended up hating the feeling of it always spinning ’round my finger. And then I lost it in my bowling ball bag for like a year. I’ve got no idea where it is today.
My next ring was my wedding band. Again, following customary traditions, I spent so much of my savings on an engagement and wedding ring combo for my wife. But for my own ring, I wasn’t particular. I looked around online for design ideas, liked the look of a tungsten one, found one for like $15 on Amazon, and clicked ‘Buy Now’. It still looks good as new over seven years later. And while I liked the feel of it better than my old class ring since it was symmetrical and didn’t tend to fall to one side of my finger or the other, I still prefer my fingers unornamented.
In fact, since becoming a mountain guide, I’ve worn my wedding band on a piece of cord around my neck, lest it get wedged in a rock somewhere while I’m climbing, which could be disastrous. I’d like to get a tattooed ring on my finger someday.1
Likewise, I’ve tended to be skeptical of the fitness rings, such as the Oura, partly because I figure I’d dislike wearing it at least as much as any other ring. But also because my Apple Watch already handles all my fitness tracking, and I wouldn’t want another thing to remember to charge.
All that being said, I’m as surprised as anyone that the Index 01, Pebble’s latest gadget, caught my interest.
It’s a ring, but instead of packing in more features than its competition, the Index is designed to do less. Its primary role is to be an ever-present way to record short notes-to-self. It’s got a tiny LED and a little microphone that’s activated by pressing a physical button. That’s it.
Eric Migicovsky, Pebble’s founder, is selling the Index as “external memory for your brain”. It doesn’t have any fitness tracking sensors. It doesn’t record everything around you, 24/7, like other AI gadgets, to make a perfect transcript of your life. It’s basically a dedicated personal note taker, and that’s what makes it so interesting to me.
In fact, I’ve been trying to solve this ‘take a quick note’ problem on my own for years. My brain comes up with its best ideas when I’m out for a hike, but that’s also when I least want to pull out my phone to type it out. So, I rigged up a solution with Apple Shortcuts to trigger voice-to-text with my iPhone’s Action button so that I can easily save my ideas and to-dos to Drafts without breaking stride. But it’s an imperfect solution as I look a little goofy in front of my clients when I mutter into my phone in the backcountry. Plus, I have to have my phone with me, and the audio isn’t saved, just the transcript.
The Index remedies a lot of that rigmarole by virtue of being a dedicated device that’s always with you, that saves the audio recording, and that’s less intrusive and distracting than pulling out a smartphone.
The physical button. You have to hold it down to make a recording. No wondering if it’s working. Migicovsky insists it has a great click-feel, and I’m inclined to believe him.
It’s designed to be worn on your index finger, putting the button always in reach of your thumb to start a recording. That’s so smart, as it means it can be used discreetly with one hand. My Apple Watch often needs to be operated with the other hand, and its raise-to-speak to Siri feature is somewhat unreliable. Adding the button was a great idea.
You can’t charge it. This one’s a bit controversial, I know. Just read the comments on the announcement video — it’s basically the only thing people are talking about. The non-replaceable battery is a bummer, but I get it. I’d want a ring to be as unobtrusive as possible, and leaving out the charging bits and accessible battery cuts down on a lot of bulk. It’s definitely more svelte than an Oura.
Furthermore, I have enough gadgets that I need to remember to charge every day. If it can just stay on my finger, it has a way higher chance of becoming an ingrained workflow. While I don’t want to contribute to e-waste, Pebble says they’ll recycle it when the battery dies, supposedly in two or so years with typical use.
The price. If this thing cost $300+, like most smart rings, I certainly wouldn’t be psyched to replace it every two years. But at $99 ($75 for pre-orders), I think they priced it well to be a reasonable curiosity purchase. And it’s a one-time payment — there’s no ongoing subscription cost!
Additional actions. While its primary purpose — and my main interest in it — rests with its always-ready note-taking, it sounds like the Index can do a little processing and take action on some commands. From the announcement post:
Actions: While the primary task is remembering things for you, you can also ask it to do things like ‘Send a Beeper message to my wife - running late’ or answer simple questions that could be answered by searching the web. You can configure button clicks to control your music - I love using this to play/pause or skip tracks. You can also configure where to save your notes and reminders (I have it set to add to Notion).
Customizable and hackable: Configure single/double button clicks to control whatever you want (take a photo, turn on lights, Tasker, etc). Add your own voice actions via MCP. Or route the audio recordings directly to your own app or server!
Supposedly, you’ll be able to hook it up to MCP to do more AI stuff with the recordings. I don’t know enough about MCP, so that’s not of huge interest to me. But if it can send quick messages, make reminders and calendar events, and control audio playback — and do so reliably — that’d be pretty great.
Works offline. It doesn’t have or need an internet connection to work. Transferring the audio file goes directly to your phone, and the transcription is done there, on-device. If you set those additional actions that need the internet, that’s another story, but the Index will serve its primary purpose offline, without sending your (potentially very personal) recordings to anyone’s servers.
Less-than-stellar water-resistance. Pebble’s billed the Index as something that you never have to take off, but then notes it’s water-resistant only to 1 meter. They note, “You can wash your hands, do dishes, and shower with it on, but we don’t recommend swimming with it.” That’s not a deal-breaker, but I’ve grown so used to not worrying about swimming with my watch that I’d be a little grumpy about having to remember to take off my ring before jumping in a pool or lake.
Short answer, yes. I’m intrigued enough that I placed a pre-order this morning. But I’m still a little iffy on whether I’ll keep it. As I mentioned, I wear my wedding band as a necklace so that it doesn’t put my finger at risk when I’m climbing. That would still be a factor with the Index. But I’m willing to give it a shot.
My wife insists that I put my wedding ring back on my finger for date night, or culturally significant events like weddings and such. I don’t mind.↩︎
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.
2025-11-18 21:01:35
My maternal grandmother, Laureen Ann Beck, recently passed away. We had a memorial service for her yesterday, filled with family and friends. Here are the reflections of her that I shared at the service.
Grandma Beck was a wonderful woman.
Whenever I think of her, the first thing that comes to mind is her warmth.
The fullness of her laugh.
The tightness of her hugs.
The fondness in her eyes as she looked at her husband, her daughters, and her grandkids.
The second thing that comes to mind is her ruthlessness when it came to beating the pants off all of us when playing family board games.
She had a wit sharp as anything — you had to in order to keep up with Grandpa — and deployed it masterfully.
Once we knew the rules, Grandma didn’t give an inch whether we were playing Sorry, UNO, or Parcheesi.
Parcheesi is still my favorite board game to this day, precisely because it still brings a smile to my face thinking back on the many evenings spent at the kitchen table at the Lake House — and how we used to beg Grandma to take it easy on us, and how we’d then laugh and laugh when she wouldn’t.
To be fair, we never went easy on her, either.
Heading down to Colon to see Grandma and Grandpa was always a treat growing up.
Partly because it meant getting out of the normal routine and spending time with family that we didn’t see all that often.
Partly because I loved getting out on the water, speeding along in the boat, on skis, or getting jetted out of the water tube when my Dad, Aunt Bobbi, or Grandpa were driving.
But it was also a favorite time because of the food.
Grandma always made a point of cooking our favorite meals when we were visiting.
For me, of course, that was spaghetti.
Her recipe is still the one that I love most in the world.
I remember back when I was 8 or 9 years old and was spending some time with Grandma and Grandpa by myself for a few days, I was a little nervous to be that far from home on my own.
But as soon as I walked in the front door and smelled the spaghetti simmering on the stove, I knew it was going to be a great time.
She had remembered, and that meant so much to me.
Now, I’ve never been one to love cooking, but when we were at the Lake House as a family, all the grandkids helped in the kitchen — and Grandma made it fun learning how to cook new dishes.
Whether it was a grand Thanksgiving feast stretched across the dining room table, or simple sandwiches in the kitchen after getting off the water, mealtimes brought all of us together, which you could tell was always Grandma’s favorite time.
She sure loved us, and made sure we felt it.
But what I especially enjoyed was learning how to make pies from scratch with her and my mom.
Pressing, kneading, and stretching the fresh dough took patience and skill.
Two things that I didn’t have right away, which was frustrating, but still okay because Grandma never made us feel bad about not getting it quite right, and we got to eat the scraps of dough that didn’t make the cut for the crust.
And then I could practice the next time — make it a little faster, a little tastier, with a little fancier weave on top.
When I think about slowly getting better at a skill over a long period of time — something that I teach frequently in my career — I think about baking pies in that kitchen.
Still, I never got the hang of crimping the edge quite as well as Grandma could.
In her later years, the thing I enjoyed most when talking with Grandma was about the books she was reading.
Grandma’s always been a voracious reader, but when she started listening to more audiobooks, it felt more like a shared activity.
I’ve always adored listening to stories, and stayed up waaaaay too late listening to tape after tape of Harry Potter at the lowest volume possible on my bedroom boombox growing up.
Talking to Grandma about all the different books she picked up from the library gave me a better appreciation for the breadth of her personal interests — and I was always tickled when a book she enjoyed overlapped with one that I liked too.
It’s how I’ve enjoyed picturing her these last few years as mobility became more challenging — comfortable in her chair, eyes closed, but face obviously intent, listening to the next story.
It’s what she’s probably doing now.
Spending long-awaited quality time with Grandpa — telling and listening to stories of her family.
I loved her, and I’ll miss her.
As I know we all will.
But we’ll remember her, each in our own way.
For me, it’ll be when I eat spaghetti or bake a pie, when I start a new audiobook, or when I break out Parcheesi — which I brought with me in case anyone is up for a round later.
I won’t go easy on you, because Grandma sure wouldn’t.
HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, shortcuts, wallpapers, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!
I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.