Intro 🚧

In hindsight—that is, in 20/20—everything is crystal clear, but of course. The thing, though, is that life has to be lived forward, without the benefit of hindsight (in realtime at least.)

So I figured we would cast an eye at the year past, but with a twist: We’re going to see it refracted through some of the quotes that have adorned the essays which appeared during the past year.

So here goes.

Memes Lend Themselves (Well) To Distribution (Really Well) 🐙

If you leave the smallest corner of your head vacant for a moment, other people’s opinions will rush in from all quarters.
– George Bernard Shaw

Flash crowd or something, I can’t tell, but it sure looks like a distributed systems problem in disguise! But what’s this coming our way?

The story was told in Meme-Wrangling (Part 1), back in January, 2021.

Where We Had Gone Then ⛩

Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
~ T. S. Eliot (in The Rock)

Following on the heels of the previous post—Meme-Wrangling (Part 1)—that being the first in a two-part series, we had in store for you some more (but with a twist.) That was when we had let the images do the talking; fancy that, the accompanying images miming away their messages to you!

All that—and that, too, happened in January, 2021—can be found here.

Where Do Those Microservices Keep Going? 🐳

All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.
― J.R.R. Tolkien (in The Fellowship of the Ring)

Next up, in February of 2021, we had the chance to behold how it all starts innocently enough: You add a service—or two, or three—to your glorious application and soon enough the beatific menagerie of services appears headed in the direction of a bestial mess, one veering toward the vortex of chaos.

The full, unexpurgated story appeared at these coordinates.

With that, very best with your ventures—and with your reading—in the year ahead that is shaping up as 2022.