Blog of James David Williams

Last Thursday, I accelerated my normal weekly dinner out and took it during the week instead of on the weekend. I was tired of eating almost all of my meals alone and so reached out to a friend to see if I could bring dinner for us to eat together. Meeting his family out is a logistical challenge as they have two young children, but that’s less of an issue when I act as both the delivery drive and guest. It’s such a simple thing that I should have been doing it much sooner, but in the whole time they’ve been here this was only the second time I’d been over for dinner. We had my favorite Thai place, which I picked up downtown after I finished my work for the day.

The older child knows me and so he came to the door to greet me when I arrived. He couldn’t quite get the door open and his dad still had to come help him, but in fairness the door does stick. He almost always smiles when he sees me, and he did so this time too. We jumped straight into racing his toy cars around on the floor after I took off my shoes and set the food down. I hadn’t seen him in a few months, so he was a little taller. We talked about all of the fun things he’d been doing at his summer day camp. Then it was time for dinner.

I hadn’t seen the younger child for an even longer period of time. He looked completely different, much more like a little human now that he’s almost a year old. He didn’t manage to get much of his food into his mouth, but he sat in his highchair and smiled while the adults had a conversation about life and work and near future plans. The older child ate well until he decided he was done and then refused to eat more. He went back into the living room and played more with his cars before he came back for dessert. For that dessert, I introduced him to the wonderful treat that is mango sticky rice. He was a fan. 

Last weekend, a friend came to town on short notice. This meant scrambling to find activities. A highlight was a sketch comedy show on Friday evening hosted in the same little black box theater where I took improv classes some time ago. Did I understand all of the jokes? Absolutely not, and for the same reason why it’s a bad idea to rely on me during the pop culture portions of a trivia contest. Did I enjoy some laughs? You bet.

It also meant eating out more than normal. Though my favorite Thai place was out of commission due to some kitchen maintenance, overall I was satisfied that I offered my guest a sampling of the Durham food scene. Handmade pasta, seafood from the coast, Mediterranean-inspired spreads, Peruvian rotisserie chicken, and Carolina-style BBQ (even if he chose not to get the chopped pork) all featured. We also tried a mix of cocktail bars and taprooms, but the new spots we tried aren’t going to become regular destinations for me.

We capped off the weekend with a Sunday evening walk through Duke Gardens since my friend is a plant guy and a small time gardener. For some reason, he chose not to bring his phone and then got mad at himself for having left it in the car when he was unable to take pictures. It’s not like I’d told him that the gardens are impressive or anything. Maybe next time he’ll be a better listener. Oh well, it was funny for me. 

Last Wednesday, I wrote my weekly missive from a hotel room in Atlanta. I was waiting on my brother’s early morning flight to arrive and got in a little bit of work before the day’s events began. Thankfully, he had a much less eventful travel experience than I’d had the day before and arrived to the hotel by about 10:30. He deposited his things in the room and we set off for what turned out to be a brunch of chicken biscuits at a local spot nearby.

Given our experience from Seattle and how long it took to enter the stadium there (and the fact that we had nothing else planned for the day), we went ahead and got a ride towards the Georgia Dome after our late breakfast. Things were much smoother this time and we were in within just a few minutes. We waited in what turned out to be another interminable merchandise line, just like in Seattle, only this time they sold out of the match scarves right before our turn to purchase. At least they weren’t as nice as the US-Australia scarf that I have downstairs.

Our seats were in the rafters for this chance to see the great Lionel Messi. That meant riding escalators up and walking even more steps once we reached the top concourse. As we ascended, even though it was hours before kickoff, the chanting had started. It was all in Spanish and they were excited. This was a different sort of match emotionally than watching the US play. That was another level of emotion. I’ve been to both England and Argentina twice. I’ve spent more time in Argentina, and I have fond memories from both Buenos Aires and from the plains in the north around Cordoba. I don’t share that same fondness for London. My brother doesn’t share those experiences; he’s only been to England and that was only briefly. It meant I was more emotionally invested than he was, which again wasn’t the case when we watched the US play earlier in the summer.

Sitting next to us was a couple in Mexico jerseys holding a homemade sign that made clear they were rooting for England. That did not endear them to the predominantly Argentinian crowd around us, nor did the fact that they continued to hold the sign up even while the match was going on and they blocked the view of some of those behind them. Mercifully, they eventually gave up on their dream of being on the jumbotron. We went back to the concourse for some chicken tenders for lunch and then sat and ate while the stadium filled around us and the atmosphere built.

On television, announcers often say that being at an Argentina game is like being in Buenos Aires. I’ve been to a match at La Bombonera, the home of Boca Juniors, and I have to see that the comparison falls flat. This was a cavernous dome, everything was very clean, and there were no ribbons or tifos and only a few drums. This atmosphere was more sterile and corporate than would be the case in either La Bombonera or El Monumental (the two great stadiums of that city), amazing though the atmosphere was. One of the articles I read after the match said that both sets of fans tried to drown out the other nation’s national anthem (the Falklands/Malvinas are still a live issue), but only the Argentinians succeeded. The shrill whistle that is common throughout Latin America did the trick much more than the Anglo boos. The first half was tense and cagy. There were few chances for either team. Any time one of the English misplayed a pass, the crowd was quick to call them a burro (donkey). I found that funnier than I should have. Otherwise, my main memory of the first half was standing up and sitting down repeatedly. Then things exploded in the second half.

England scored on the break about ten minutes into the half. It was a sucker punch given the way Argentina had started the half, but then England choked. The Argentinian fans only got louder after England scored, and the team rode that momentum and laid siege to the English penalty area underneath our seats. England invited the pressure, both through their play and through their substitutions. After the goal, they had under 15% possession during the subsequent 40+ minutes. And Argentina heaped even more pressure with their own substitutions. The fans around us never wavered, never panicked. They knew that Argentina would score. They’d seen it over and over in recent years. That is a very different feeling to the one I had when the US conceded the first goal to Belgium. England retreated more and more, and eventually the levy broke. Messi found Enzo Fernandez at the top of box and on what was his third attempt from that range he finally put a shot on target and past the diving keeper. The place got even louder and the outcome was settled; it was just a matter of time. Sure enough, Messi found Lautaro Martinez somehow wide open just a few yards out and he headed home the second ten minutes later. The place exploded, and I was part of the yelling chorus. England sent on subs in desperation, but it was too late. They were out and Argentina were through.

After the final whistle, the Argentinians serenaded their team and Messi, their hero. They even kept going after the team left the field after over half an hour. The English were stunned, standing on the field for nearly twenty minutes before they sauntered into the tunnel. We stayed in our seats until all the players left the field. I wanted to feel the energy, passion, and love that the Argentinian fans have for their national team. It was a beautiful thing to take in.

Following the match, we walked all the way back to the hotel. We had to walk some distance to get away from the street closures and then decided just to keep walking. During the first mile of the walk, we were in the midst of an Albiceleste wave. We spoke English to each other, but other than us, a few street preachers, and one brave, idiotic, and probably drunk woman yelling at people saying they needed to go back to their own country, Spanish was the language of choice. We ate dinner in courses at different places in the food hall in Ponce City Market, which was near the hotel, and then we walked along the beltline for another couple of miles before getting a ride back to the hotel and wrapping up our day. It was only during that walk that my voice gave out, which was equally frustrating since I couldn’t talk with my brother and surprising as my voice had stayed with me through everything else. 

Yesterday I flew to Atlanta for a short not-work trip. Had I instead gotten in my car and driven in the other direction on I-40, eventually joining with I-85, I would have arrived at my hotel sooner. Of course, this would mean having driven for six hours, having to pay to park in Atlanta, and having to drive back tomorrow, but it still gives a sense of things. We boarded the plane for takeoff and everything was in order. Then during their final checks the pilots discovered an electrical failure of some kind. That meant we deplaned, and after turning everything off and back on again didn’t solve the problem we were forced to wait for a spare part that was delivered on the next flight coming in from Atlanta. The irony was not lost on me.

When we reboarded some three hours later, I was next to two different people than those who had been in my row earlier. Mind you, those people were also on the plane, just a few rows up. I don’t know where the new ones came from. Presumably, there were other flight delays and people were shuffled around. It was just odd. Then as we descended, the pilots aborted the approach and we climbed into the skies again as a downpour had temporarily inundated the runway. I just laughed. There was nothing else to do. We circled and landed on the next approach a few minutes later.

Since it was a Tuesday, I was able to keep my same dinner plans even if they were rather delayed. I don’t know if it was the delays, the air blowing directly down onto my table, or how loud the place was, but I wasn’t able to enjoy the food like I’d imagined. Alas, that’s not why I’m here. Today is.

We don’t take every official holiday. It’s part of the reality of running your own business. But I took off last Friday for the observed Fourth of July holiday. It was such a different sort of day that it offered a wonderful refresher even if it left me physically drained.

I set out on a long commute about the time the sun rose. Well, it would be more of a super-commute if anyone made it regularly as I drove nearly two hours to Pilot Mountain State Park. It is a distinctive stone pillar topped by trees now, the result of a mountain that has eroded much more slowly than its surroundings. You can see it for miles and miles.

With temperatures spiking above 100 degrees with some humidity thrown in, I limited activity to the morning. I did the same Saturday and Sunday as well. As a result, I took the lazy approach and drove to the top of the ridge instead of hiking up from the bottom. I chose this in order to get some diversity in my trail miles, but the trail along the Yadkin River in a different part of the park was a disappointment relative to the trails along the Eno closer to home.

Atop the ridge, there is first a short little trail to a promontory to observe the mountain. Then I walked along the trail at the base of the exposed rock. It isn’t a long trail, not quite a mile, but it is always imposing standing under a sheer rock face. The views looking out over the Yadkin Valley are really something too, even if the far vistas were shrouded even under clear blue skies. Once I completed the circuit, I extended the walk by walking down the ridge a little to an area where groups of people were climbing the rock face (you cannot climb the main mountain itself). I picked a few wild blackberries along the way and stopped to eat them in the shade amidst the cooing of pigeons nesting in the cliffs. Then I scrambled up a gully and connected with the main trail up to the top of the ridge and completed by little figure eight. I was off the mountain before eleven and then drove to the second part of the itinerary that proved less exciting.

I did not visit any of the wineries in the area on this trip, but I did stop for lunch at a good little diner in the town of Pilot Mountain for a nice country breakfast style meal. There are many more places to explore in this state, but I’m satisfied that I did this one justice.

Last Wednesday afternoon, I headed to the airport for a flight across the country. I’d forgotten just how long those flights are, but even though it was roughly five and a half hours in the air we were still able to see Mt. Ranier as the sun was going down during the descent into the SeaTac airport. I met my brother and sister-in-law in the terminal as their flight was a little delayed so that our arrival times synced up.

We stayed in Fremont, a quirky neighborhood where I’d stopped for lunch when I drove through Seattle on my cross-country road trip a few years ago. We walked around before breakfast on Thursday having all woken up way too early given the time zone difference. Thursday was our tourist day. We started at the Chihuly museum looking at the glass installations and watching a glass blowing demonstration. Then we went up in the Space Needle to take in the city and Puget Sound on what was a cloudless day with great visibility. We could see the Cascades off to the east and snow-capped peaks to both the north and south. To the west was the water, and in the foreground on all sides was the city itself.

After some fish and chips, we went to MoPop. If anyone is planning to visit Seattle, they can leave that off the agenda and be satisfied with their choice. Oh well, not everything can be perfect. Then we walked down to Pike Place Market to watch them throw the fish and eat some fresh cherries. We also walked past the original Starbucks, but I don’t speak that language and so it meant little to me. Next came a brewery and dinner in the Capitol Hill neighborhood, a spot I chose specifically to enjoy a main course of black cod on my visit to the Pacific Northwest.

Friday was gameday. Kickoff was at noon and so we left around 9:30. The atmosphere built and built and built as we got closer to the stadium and more and more people were around us, all headed in the same direction. There were some Disney lines to get into the venue and the line to purchase the matchday scarf moved at a glacial pace, but we secured our physical souvenirs and headed down to our seats. I splurged on this purchase so we headed down for a while, all the way to the third row as I wanted to be close to the action. You could say that next came the calm before the storm, but it wasn’t calm as kickoff approached. Then the teams walked out, the flags were unfurled, and Australia’s anthem played first. They showed up well given the travel distance involved, but it was a road game for them. All the while the energy continued to build. During our national anthem, the atmosphere hit a crescendo. Never mind political differences between us. This was tens of thousands of people proud to be Americans about to watch an American team. Even typing about it gives me goosebumps. It finished with a flyover from some helicopters and the loudest USA chants I’ve heard, then the match began.

The US dominated, forcing in an early goal via an Australian defender and scoring a second (after a VAR review that meant we got to celebrate it twice) off a looping deflection before half time. The crowd energy barely ebbed at all during the half and exploded at the moments when we scored, so much so that my sister-in-law reported hearing the noise from inside the stadium from some distance away as she watched the game at one of the watch parties hosted in a city park on the approach to the stadium. The second half was comfortable; Australia never really threatened and the US was content to pass the ball around. During one of their late attacks, one of our central defenders shoulder barged their winger, taking him out with an audible crunch that we could hear in the stands even if the field mic may not have picked up the sound for the television broadcast. Sometimes when you watch a professional sporting event on TV, you can get illusions that you’d be able to compete on the field. Being as close as we were to the field offered a very clear reminder that those are just illusions and that the speed at which the professionals play is insane.

When the final whistle blew, neither I nor my brother was in any hurry to leave. We’d just watched a solid performance and the energy was still pulsing through both of us. It would take several hours for that energy to dissipate, so it’s a good thing that it was a noon kickoff. Otherwise, I doubt that I would have slept Friday night. The US players weren’t eager to leave either, and we stayed and cheered them for several minutes as they walked slowly around the entire stadium and then off the pitch and into the tunnel. Only then did we head towards the exit.

No matter what happens during the rest of this tournament, we were a part of something truly special.

I’m on a kick of trying to escape algorithmic capture and expand into new media. Part of this includes watching videos about the backstories of famous musical events, especially a few about which I had previously known very little. One of those videos was about the Koln Concert.

Keith Jarrett played a piano concert in Koln in January 1975, late at night after an opera performance. The concert promoter was an eighteen year old young woman, which is impressive in its own right as she sold out the venue for a show starting at 11:30 PM, but there was a snafu with the venue and the piano placed on stage was an out-of-tune baby grand. Jarrett wanted to cancel the concert, but since the sound engineers who were going to record it were already set up he agreed to play anyway. He improvised the whole performance, working with the piano instead of fighting it. The recording became the best selling piano album and the best selling solo jazz album of all time. I listened to the whole thing this week. Though I don’t know enough about music theory or how to play the piano to comment on its technical merits, I enjoyed listening. My grandmother would be proud.

One of my regular YouTube subscriptions also mentioned the Koln Concert this week. The channel (Michael MacKelvie) is mainly video essays on sport science topics and analytics, but the most recent video was a complete and deliberate break from that and hinted at some troubling aspects of pop culture being so recursive at present. He doesn’t use the word recursive in the video, but what else encapsulates a world where all ten of the highest grossing films last year were either sequels or prequels (and most of the nominees for best song in pop categories sampled prior tracks as well)? He used the Koln Concert as evidence that humanity doesn’t actually want perfection in art, an assertion that can be generalized beyond art. 

I’m making a concerted efforted over the next few months to do more things with people. Part of it is addressing the fact that curling stops during the late spring and summer, but there are other motivations as well. I pitched a few ideas last week, but only a couple took. One of those that did was me hosting brunch after church on Sunday.

I busted out my new muffin pan for the first time, a small victory. I often buy a muffin on Saturday mornings, but it is overkill to make a dozen just for myself. I did leave them in the oven a couple of minutes longer than I would have liked, but cooking times get weird when there are multiple things in the oven and I was simultaneously cooking bacon. I also brought out a venison tenderloin to share because having guests over is something worth celebrating and nothing says celebration more than a choice cut of meat. We rounded out the meal with eggs, strawberries macerated in limoncello (that was an experiment that needs some refinement), mango, and dragon fruit. I was proud of my little spread even if it would not trouble the editors of the Michelin guide.

I was close with my timing and portion estimates with almost everything. The only thing I overshot was the dragon fruit, a little bonus that I picked up a few days prior when I happened to be near the Asian grocery store while doing other things. At least I wasn’t short on anything and the dragon fruit has kept in the refrigerator.

I don’t have the greatest amount of seating in my living room, but there is enough for five to sit comfortably. Yet as normally happens, people congregated in the kitchen as I finished cooking and people chose which juice or syrup to use for their homemade soda. Once everything was ready, people got their plates and we moved to the dining room for the meal and discussion. It was a sprawling conversation, flowing from topic to topic, a far cry from my usual posture of eating alone at that same table. Then I had a nice nap after everyone left as I didn’t feel like walking during the hottest part of the day.

There are new AI tools and features coming out every month or even week that are changing how we go about our workflows. But I’m also working with AI to try to enrich other aspects of my life. I’ve set up two projects for my personal life, and while I am in the earliest stages there have already been a few good results.

One project is called “Cooking.” I envision it as a repository for completed recipes eventually, but that isn’t how I’m starting things out. What I did to start was to feed it all of the sauces, herbs, spices, dry ingredients, etc. that I have in my kitchen. This is kept as something like a running inventory list. Also, the last time I went to the Asian grocery store I asked what 2–3 things I should pick up in order to expand what is possible. I haven’t used any of those things yet, but I will. What I have used it for thus far is something like this: I have x, y, and z vegetables and meat to cook tonight; give me recipe ideas. Then it offers three directions, I choose one, and then we quibble about portion sizes based on how much of the main ingredients I have and then I execute as best I can. I’ve already had to insert system instructions to account for a slow oven and the quirks of my stovetop, but with each round of feedback the results improve a little. It’s definitely not to the point of preparing a full menu card to a crazy high standard, but I am using some of those things I bought with grand ideas but never actually used before.

The other project is called “Books and Media.” It is more ambitious and even newer. The goal is to enable content discovery, whether books, podcasts, television shows, music, or movies, beyond what a Netflix or Spotify algorithm will show me. I’m still building out the base content layer, but I’ve already ordered a few books to read in advance of my big summer trip based on a pattern from the data and some AI recommendations. We’ll see how that works out, but it would be really cool if it works out well. I haven’t really used it yet for anything else, but I’ll probably try out some cross-pollination soon. I expect it will take some refinement but I’m hopeful.

Last week, I was in Tucson for a retreat. It is one of those “work” trips that I get to take as a business owner a couple times a year. It was certainly a productive trip from the perspective of building my business, but that’s not why I’m part of Rhodium. I also would not have chosen to go to southern Arizona on my own volition, but I did get to visit the Saguaro National Park and see plenty of the famous cacti.

Rhodium is a group of people from all over the country (and a few even from outside the US) who are unified by (1) being entrepreneurs and (2) operating digital businesses. They fudge a little on #2 for me as I often represent people buying and selling digital businesses, but they don’t hold it against me too much. It is a group I’ve been a part of for several years and a group to which I attribute a good deal of the growth in business we’ve seen in recent years as it is an incubator and sounding board for me. I also enjoy being around people who understand what it’s like to run a remote-first business and who are working on some really cool projects.

As with almost every conference right now, there was plenty of conversation around AI. The difference is that almost everyone in the room has been using Claude Code for several months now and several people are working with it for hours each day. It’s the whole “if you’re the smartest person in the room, then you’re in the wrong room” thing. I definitely took some things home with me as I continue to build infrastructure and tools for our little law firm. At this point, I’ve also been in the group long enough that we’re familiar with each other’s lives and every meeting is meeting with friends I get to see in person twice a year. Some of the best moments were those spent around the fire at night telling the sorts of crazy stories that you can only share with people you’ve known for a while and with whom you have been through some travails.

The resort itself was something of a fever dream. It is about half an hour away from downtown and the university. It has two golf courses, manicured lawns on the grounds, and plenty of flowers. It is set against the backdrop of the Catalina foothills, but the whole area is the Sonoran Desert. It was lovely but felt incongruous. For one of the group activities and since we were staying at a golf resort, we had a drive, pitch, and putt contest with some handicaps. It was the first time I’d picked up a golf club in years. I also won the overall competition; it’s not exactly a golfing crowd.