Tim Johns

Tim Johns

@timjohns.com

I characterize the emergent behavior of complex systems and react accordingly. That could be debugging code, culture building, or coaching for organizational change. Other interests include security and privacy, photography, and road trips.

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Tim Johns reposted

HAPPY AGENTIC AI PEACE DIVIDEND DAY TO ALL WHO (unwillingly) CELEBRATE Thread of today’s security shitshow, feel free to contribute…

Tim Johns reposted

Well I mean, who among us has NOT had a possessed printer try to print the Necromonicon?

ACARS Drama@acarsdrama.bsky.social

Air to Ground Message: PRINTER BACAME POSSESSED AND WOULD NOT STOP PRINTING THE NECROMONICON POWER RESET/TRACKING Area: Killeen, TX, USA Type: Airbus A220-300 A: #aa816c0b876 F: #f2c4f4503c4

It's 10:30pm, the house is dead quiet, and I'm editing photos at the dining room table. My 19yo grown-ass adult child strolls nonchalantly into the kitchen and lets loose an absolutely EARTH-shaking belch. I swear to God the windows rattled...

Me: <shook AND annoyed>: WHAT THE F*** is WRONG with you? Child <gleefully>: I don't know, but you raised me. There's a lesson in this somewhere. But I don't know what it is. Yet.

Squad leader trying desperately to convince rebel leadership that this thermal exhaust port right below the main port leads directly to the reactor system...

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...while simultaneously doing everything I can to convince my own squad that no, they can't just go try to blow up the Death Star all by themselves, no matter HOW many womp rats they use to bullseye in their T-16s back home.

Well, it's that time of year here in the Pacific Northwest, where my desperate attempts to cram in a few more golden hour outings before the days get too short practically guarantees that dinner is either late or cold every night. #photography #pnw #fall #goldenhour

I suspect my wife and kids would tell you this is reason #1,274 why having a photographer in the family is annoying.

Husky Stadium, shot from the Burke-Gilman trail ramp at dusk, Thursday September 10. #uw #huskies #universityofwashington #gohuskies #udub #pnw #fall #dusk #fall

Bit of an ominous-looking cloud rolls into Seattle just after sunset, taken from the UW ramp on the Burke-Gilman trail near Husky Stadium, just before 8pm Thursday September 10. #wawx #clouds #uw #photography #ominous #fall #sunset

Time lapse of the pyrocumulus cloud from the Little Giant fire in Washington state, taken from just north of the Kingston ferry terminal Thursday, August 20, 2026. #pyrocumulus #wildfire #littlegiant #wawx #watchduty #mountpilchuck #pugetsound #photography #pugetsound #washington #fire #kingston

The M/V Puyallup departs the Edmonds ferry dock under Venus and the crescent moon after sunset on Saturday August 15, 2026. #edmonds #ferry #pugetsound #moon #venus #puyallup

This thread reminded me of one of my physics professors, Dr. Gruebel, who was essentially invincible. www.dailysentinel.com/life_and_ent... He got bitten by a coral snake while working at the SFASU observatory one afternoon. For him it was NO BIG DEAL.

dailysentinel.comProfessor saw action at famous battles of WWIIGrade school in Wisconsin was a dreary place to be in 1941.
Tim Johns@timjohns.com

I only know of one friend (and separately, one of my college professors) who actually got a venomous bite, and neither from cottonmouths. Pretty much everyone else I grew up with has a handful of close call stories...although none quite as good as this kid's 😂.

There used to be a photo of the (clearly dead, a shovel was involved...) coral snake posted in the physics department with the caption "Coral snake bit Gruebel. Guess who died?"

The coral snake story, and the article about his WW II service barely scratches the surface. He was shot down MORE THAN ONCE. When he was like 90 he was arrested for trying to stop the demolition of a building. The stories go on and on and on. They really do NOT make them like this guy anymore.

I mean, I know he does it for the lolz, but I definitely remember the feeling of being simultaneously drunk enough and hungry enough to have done this all entirely unironically at least a couple of times in college.

Dolphin Pilot@theamitie.bsky.social

There’s a guy on TikTok who posts just him taking a pizza out of the oven every day with tongs and all of the comments are about how their day is ruined from having watched this

I feel like "Can't watch the abandoned out of control rocket crash into the moon because of all this wildfire smoke" should definitely be one of the higher levels on the qualitative dystopian scale.

American cold war nuclear weapon mishaps. In other news, I have only been asked to host my company's Friday all-hands trivia exactly once.

ETX Gov@etxgov.myatproto.social

You've got a captive audience on a plane, and you know they can't open the doors and yeet you out. What subject are you gonna do a 30 minute sermon on?

This is a little abstract and I don't have time to list ALL of my specific answers anyway, so I will go with this: Nothing has ever made me doubt my own ability more than trying to get my kids to do stuff they just didn't want to do.

Zach Weinersmith@zachweinersmith.bsky.social

Hey parents of bsky: What are some theories of parenting you were very confident in right up until you had your own kids?

Sure, behavior modification is like psych (and parenting) 101, but once my kids figured out they actually had some agency, it went from psych 101 to something akin to a post-doc, real quick.

Just another stunning Edmonds waterfront sunset. This place is a cheat code for beauty, and especially with the cool breeze tonight, it was another all-around spectacular summer evening. We are lucky to be alive; we are lucky to be here, now. #edmonds #marina #dock #sunset #boats #photography

Seems like the vast majority of us stragglers took it all in stride, and appreciate the @ferries.wsdot.wa.gov crew that are going to be working late to get us home. People are playing cards, taking naps, laughing and joking.

Tim Johns@timjohns.com

Earlier tonight, passengers waiting to board the last M/V Puyallup run after the Kingston fireworks sung the Star Spangled Banner. It was genuinely kind of moving. But right after that, the ferry reached capacity and had to leave a bunch of us here. 😂 Word is they are making an extra run, though.

Earlier tonight, passengers waiting to board the last M/V Puyallup run after the Kingston fireworks sung the Star Spangled Banner. It was genuinely kind of moving. But right after that, the ferry reached capacity and had to leave a bunch of us here. 😂 Word is they are making an extra run, though.

Strongly resisting the urge to spin up a web site that offers public GitHub repos saved to various novelty formats like floppies, QIC tape, 9 track tape, punch cards, printed by a dot matrix printer on fanfold paper, lots of options.

GitHub@github.com

We heard you. We agree. In light of recent developments in physical media, GitHub is proud to announce that you can now obtain your public repo on CD-ROM. Keep it. Lend it to friends. Pass it on to your children. Your code is physically yours, forever. Until you lose it, let's be real. gh.io/cd

Seriously, someone talk me out of this, quick. I'm afraid if I start another business my wife will (justifiably) strangle me, and I certainty don't need another hobby, either. ...sure would be fun, though...

Sophisticated and oddly specific -- but not spearphishing. I won't hazard a guess as to what the threat actors here might be up to, but I am already looking forward to a good Darknet Diaries episode once it all gets sorted.

I wonder if this is one of those decisions that goes all the way to top before it gets shot down, with half the folks in the org overtly referring to the prior incident with glee, and the other half pretending as earnestly as they can they have never heard of the prior incident.

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Or perhaps the idea never even gets brought up except by that one brave soul who suggests "maybe we could blow it up" l, only to be dog-piled and razzed mercilessly by their co-workers at every level.

Might be a missed opportunity here for #Lynnwood to really lean into the big hair #80's vibe, but these lineups actually look really good anyway. Plus I'm a sucker for food trucks and free live music. See you there. ilovelynnwood.com/summer-sounds/

ilovelynnwood.comSummer Sounds - I Love LynnwoodJune 17 July 8 July 29 About Summer Sounds Outdoor Concert & Market Join us this summer at The District Plaza for Summer Sounds, a new free outdoor concert and vendor market series happening June 17, ...

I am, apparently, that nerd. I think I got it all out of my system by blogging through it, though, and now I'm going to go touch grass. #security #privacy #chrome

I took the #scenicroute on a #roadtrip from Southern California, zig-zagging back and forth across the state. We spent one of the nights in Fort Bragg, California, where I caught this #crescentmoon setting over the #puddingcreek trestle. #photography #california #moon #trestle #sunset

Obscure thought of the morning: "I wonder if anyone has done a study of how the Zeigarnik effect applies for various Claude Code settings.json configurations." I might have kicked off a "few" Claude Code sessions "Just so I can stop thinking about this for now" and it worked a little too well.

Me to my wife tonight: "<Kid> is really into storm chasing. Maybe I could lean into that a little bit as a bonding opportunity." ...

Tim Johns@timjohns.com

My 13yo recently got into storm chasing video games. We live in the PNW, but I grew up near the south end of tornado alley, am a long-time amateur radio operator, and had some basic familiarity with SKYWARN. So hey! Bonding opportunity, right? ...

Me to my wife this time next year (possibly): "OK if I cash out my retirement so I can get all this radio gear, camera gear, a couple of high-end drones, and a new fully-customized Ineos Grenadier? Also, I need to pull <kid> out of school two months early so we can head out to the Midwest."

My 13yo recently got into storm chasing video games. We live in the PNW, but I grew up near the south end of tornado alley, am a long-time amateur radio operator, and had some basic familiarity with SKYWARN. So hey! Bonding opportunity, right? ...

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Granted it's been a few decades since I listened to a SKYWARN net, and my only times encountering a tornado have all been by accident, but this all seems a lot more dramatic and over-the-top than I remember. Is there like a "quiet professional" storm chaser group someone can hook me up with?

My 13yo recently got into storm chasing video games. We live in the PNW, but I grew up near the south end of tornado alley, am a long-time amateur radio operator, and had some basic familiarity with SKYWARN. So hey! Bonding opportunity, right? ...

He's been asking me to take him storm chasing, but I figured I'd start doing a little research before I even consider the idea, so I downloaded the first season of Storm Chasers and watched a few YouTube videos, and I have to say, this is...different than I remember...