Smartphone Photography 101

I’m by no means an expert photographer, and I don’t even own a camera other than my phone. But I tend to photograph with intentionality, and that alone goes a long way towards improving the quality of my photos. The following tips will help too, but they are mostly guidelines to keep in mind, not hard and fast rules. My most important advice is to carefully consider each photo you take, and the more you do that, the more you will develop as a photographer.

This post is a written guide adapted from a brief, for-fun class on smartphone photography that I taught for my company’s annual in-person conference. So it’s meant for a wide audience and the tips are very introductory. But even if you are more experienced than me, maybe something here will be useful!

A month of Broadway productions

Between January 10th and February 11th I was lucky enough to see four excellent Broadway shows (one in NYC, and three on tour in Chicago). Instead of doing full reviews, I wanted to highlight one cool aspect from the production of each of them. They all had great music and acting but the set design and effects always stand out to me especially in these high budget Broadway shows. If you’re like me and like the surprise of what effects happen on stage, then mild spoilers ahead.

A whirlwind 48 hours in NYC

In October of last year, Nikki and I took a five day trip to New York City together. This was Nikki’s first time on the East coast and I was excited to show her around. We hit a mix of the highlights, lower-key neighborhoods in Brooklyn, and also crammed in a day-trip excursion to Sleepy Hollow. The whole trip was fantastic, but not even three days after returning home we had booked another trip to NYC for January. Why? Because a concert was announced for one of my favorite games and game soundtracks of all time, Nier: Automata. I absolutely had to drop everything and go.

Orange cardamon syrup

Nikki made me a bottle of orange cardamon syrup for Christmas and it significantly improves all of the drinks I have tried it in so far. While great in a latte or cappuccino, I have been mostly using it for cocktails. It is not a syrup you can readily buy and that rarity gives the drinks a more elevated and unique feel. The syrup itself is a 2:1 sugar to water simple syrup base, plus a sliced orange and 5g of cardamon pods. This video by Morgan Eckroth covers the full process!

Here are a few of my favorite cocktail recipes that I’ve adapted to work great with this specific syrup. Enjoy!

A five star scale is ideal

While I rarely have strong opinions on the scores myself or others assign to things, I do have strong opinions on rating scales themselves. A scale should be easily understood, appropriate for the medium it is scoring, and granular enough to provide a quick heuristic on whether something is worth your time but not too arbitrary in the degree. The five star scale is ideal for checking these boxes and here’s why.

The 10 best games of 2025

I rotate in and out of hobbies, but gaming will always be my favorite way to spend my free time and relax. I rate both video games and board games, but I’m a little bit more rigorous with the former thanks to Backloggd.com. The following list consists of reviews that were written originally written for that site, and they assume the reader is already somewhat familiar with each game. I recommend looking up the trailer or Steam page for the games that sound most interesting to you!

I played 38 games that came out last year, and completed 24 of them. The others were either a DNF (did not finish) or a NTKOGMFF (not the kind of game meant for finishing). I gave six of these games a 5-star rating, which is more than any other year I’ve been rating games. Read on below for the top ten, or click here for my full ordered list on Backloggd.