Jonathan Stephens

@jonathanstephens

Fond of — semicolons, and‽ Late-realised AuDHD—always a bit queer. Garden: jonathanstephens.us Business: poetandscribe.com Newsletter: craftandpractice.com

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Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· 27d

Feels like there's real symmetry in that. bsky.app/profile/jona... This post, was at the beginning of Chapter 2. I'm now on Chapter 8. There are...quite a few more bookmarks & dogears. And this whole Cosmological Physics of Design resonates on a deeply Craft level of Metaphor.

A photo of a book, laying open on its spine, stop a high-top bar table. The photo is vertical, with a forest of multicolored tabbed pages. Hints of dog ears can be seen on some of those pages (as if for extra emphasis).

There's a G2 Pilot Pen resting on top of the open page, to help hold it down. A gray notebook is blurry, but resting stop the far side of the spread—holding it down.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jul 4

Decisions, decisions. #booksky

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jun 29

Just one chapter in... Entering chapter two of @chanda.blacksky.app 's The Edge of Space-Time and already know it's gonna be impactful...fundamentally reframing my understanding of Life, the Universe, and Everything.

A photo of a hand holding up a book, using their thumb and pinky finger as feet of a book stand. The book is open to the spread, introducing chapter two, The Voyage Home (In which we realize we have no fucking clue about "space"), on page 21 of Chanda Prescod-Weinstein's book, The Edge of Space-Time.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jun 22

And I do mean the whole series...not just those.

A row of books, sitting on a bookshelf, highlighter-colorful spines, showcasing the full Dungeon Crawler Carl series, minus the most recent release.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jun 3

Latest critter find— Found after eve'nin poop loop/ dog walk: a feather.

A photo of a—guesstimate—12" long brown feather with down tufts at the quill's base. It's being held by a white man's left hand, that's also holding a tied bag of poop, has a wrist tattooed of be Kind, and a dog's leash loosely held on the upper forearm. All this with a lens blurred background of flower greenery topped with opened orange lily blooms.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· May 6

It's that time again. Deer coming to the yard for midnight snacks ot lilies. They prefer the bigger ones but go for the tall skinny early bloomin' ones too. These are the first buds gone, before they had a chance to bloom. We enjoy the fact that we're one of the first snack shacks to visit.

A photo of a chewed off bud of a lily. The background is filled with a strong lens blur of all the other lilies, yet to be smacked on by deer.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· May 4

@monteiro.bsky.social howdy. _SMALL, SMALL_ catch of an errant space after this em-dash on line 10/p.95 of the 2025 edition of Ruined by Design. Sharing since you make so many edition's ❤️ Everywhere else the em-dash is used, no extra space. The dog-ears show how much I'm enjoying the whole.

Photo of a page of a book, full and only showing typographic characters and words. Circled is the end of a word (parachutes) followed by an em-dash, a space, and another word (even).

A photo of a book, opened but positioned on its side so the pages take up half the photo and the open spread takes up the other. Many of the pages...most of the pages are dog-eared to indicate something important was witten on that page or spread.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Apr 11

Nearly a month-ish since planting—from a sapling and 7-gallon container—our Quercus texana, Shumard Oak, is nearly two-Jonathan's talk. When we purchased it, I was taller. Been an exciting experience witnessing this tree's growth.

A growing quercus texana sapling, with still evident fresh wood mulch from its planting.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Apr 7

I like it (attached). And phew. Yes. That year.

A photo of a very fresh tattoo on the inside of my left wrist that reads be Kind, with a rainbow infinity symbol below it, where one of loops is in the form of a crashing wave.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Mar 30

Homemade de-frozen, tacos carnitas for dinner tonight

Photograph of carnitas in a round, white bowl, with a playfully decorated fork resting and waiting for use. On the right and left are parentheses looking containers of a bell pepper and onion mix. All sitting on top of a wooden serving tray.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Mar 14

Yep! For a very long time. Then finally Oct 2020—one of the best decisions I've ever made.

Photograph of a border collie, lazily seated in a round chair. She's looking directly into the camera as she guards her soccer ball | football that rests between her head and dangling paw.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Feb 12

Yesterday, submitted my first open source pull request ever. Today, worked through my first full pull request process, along with @travelmats.bsky.social ! I think it's fun that the first one was about re-architecting CSS to start implementing design tokens. 🥳

A screenshot of a git pull request timeline that reads "jonathan-stephens requested a review from Matsxmats 4 minutes ago". Below that is the notification that the commit was merged by Matsxmats into the main branch one minute ago. Then, an inline-alert that says the pull request was successful, can be closed, and can be deleted (with a handy, dandy action button to Delete branch right beside the alert).

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Dec 8

It's beautiful! Wonderfully tiny and textured. I am having an issue with the mode toggle...these screenshots are from stable Chrome on Android. (Thought it could have been my Firefox browser at first).

A screenshot of Lynn's website as default dark system setting. Text is visible, but barely as the text is pure black on an off black background

A screenshot of Lynn's website in light(?) mode. It's set up as a single table od contents: text in red, a textured black. The contents are set in full uppercase—ABOUT, WORK, THOUGHTS, ARCHIVE, GIFS—with trailing dots to the right of Roman numeral demarcations of the "pages".

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Nov 16

And this is the official end of the thread—with the resulting loaves! Two ended up decent. The other two are a bit thin. I won't be doubling the recipe again, any time soon. Don't know enough about deleting out the adjustments needed for the change. FIN

Four loaves of bread, resting on a cooling rack, just out of the oven. One of the loaves rests, leaning on two of the larger loaves. The two loaves on the side are MUCH thinner than the two center.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Nov 15

The section & subsection titles are fun throughout, and have character (another thing missing from a lot of other recipe books I've collected over the years). "Beyond, Before, and Besides Yeast Bread: A Plethora of Categories" Love an alliterative listed section head; titled & subtitled. 🧵

A screenshot of page 21 of the book. The section is titled, "Beyond, Before, and Besides Yeast Bread: A Plethora of Categories."

The subsection is titled, "Batter Breads, or How to Have Yeast Bread without Exerting Yourself."

The first paragraph reads: Face it, some people just don't enjoy kneading, even enough to make homemade bread. But there is another way, batter breads which are beaten, not kneaded. How much depends on your stamina and patience. The minimal effort will still produce a tasty bread. If you're lucky enough to have a heavy-duty mixer you can get superb breads with practically no effort at all on your part."

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Nov 15

This is a spread that illustrates the the style and vibe of the book quite well (though, it _is_ missing the 1970's display font used for "chapter" headings). The whole book is printed in black and white because...printing's expensive! Every color you add multiplies the cost significantly. 🧵

A spread of the book The Garden Way's Bread Book by Ellen Foscue Johnson, pages 16 and 17.

The first ppage, on the left, shows a—crunchy? softy? fresh? tasty— bread, looking freshly baked, puffing out of a ramekin (the "mushroom cap" is the size of the ramekin itself!).

On the second, right page of the spread is a paragraph, followed by a simple list. On either side of the list (in the first and third columns of the three column page layout; with the images flush to the edge of the center column's margins) are the twelve signs of the zodiac, illustrated as woodcut style line-art.

At the bottom of the page (the lower third), there sits an illustration of a human man, sitting at an "outdoor, European café style" table, dressed in a suit—shoes resting flat on the ground, legs resting in a comfortable position. In his hand, he holds up a slice of bread; just taken from the plate at the opposite edge of the table, other slices of bread resting and ready to be eaten).

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Nov 11

Our new mission — Helping teams shape accessible web products, thoughtfully built to grow. What we do — We specialize in design systems and product strategy; whether you're establishing foundations, scaling what's working, or untangling what isn't. 🧵

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Oct 9

I'm just waiting to get to one full year of a steak. Then I'm done with Duolingo. Manipulative, annoying, guilt-tripping, constant, anti-human interaction, programmatically problematic behavior. And yet, that "one year mark" keeps me. But, geez.

A screenshot of a push notification sent by Duolingo. The message contains around 50 emoji owls as a text. That's it. No other context or anything. Annoying fuckers.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Oct 1

#bloomscrolling ! Oh wow—this is a new favorite. Thank you. 😍 Fantastic butterfly! This is one of my favorite shots.

A glass wing butterfly rests on a bright green leaf. The butterfly, itself, has two wings that gradate from dark-brown to a natural orange-red/brown. But the magical bit is in the center of the wings—those colors are just a thin, inner border. These wings. They're clear...as glass.

The glasswing butterfly's probiscus(?) is spiraled up, not actively sucking any nectar.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Sep 22

There are so many quotes that resonate. "...[an] overwhelming jungle of rituals & group identities [&] normative behaviors [&] seemingly abundant but actually restrictive sociotechnological covenants that make up what we pretend will eventually feel like belonging in tech..." 5/n

Highlighted text: In this current version of tech we built–which is to say the overwhelming jungle of rituals and group identities and normative behaviors and seemingly abundant but actually restrictive sociotechnological covenants that make up what we pretend will eventually feel like belonging in tech–someone else will always control genius.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Aug 10

Ahh; my mind went straight towards Amethyst from Steven Universe. I love the Fairy Crash Site designation though. Have found a few fairy villages and gnome homes in the North Carolina woods—but no such crash sites yet.

An animated .gif of Amethyst from Steven Universe. Amethyst exclaims to Steven, standing beside her, "It's my hole! It's me sized!" As she says "size" she stands with her back to the wall, arms down, staring forward and glides backwards into the cavity—a perfect fit. Steven looks inside, surprised, at the discovery. And blinks.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jun 23

Woke near the day's first light. With 100°F | 38°C + days, the wee hours are the only times to enjoy reading outdoors. So, starting my day off with Miffy, coffee, and the history of typography & punctuation—adding my own thought breadcrumbs of marginalia, along the way.

A book sits open on a mosaic table, outside on a wooden porch. Three corners of the spread are folded—tagged for future reference. Marginalia is seen scrawling on the left-most margin; a black Pilot pen rests in the centerfold. The book sits in front of a full cup of coffee—the mug is of Miffy, the Dutch children's book character, as an artist; holding paint brushes behind their back, in front of a painted white wall of Miffy heads.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Jun 12

Continuing to enjoy @shadycharacters.co.uk 's book. Today, I've finished the &— and monkey's tail @. Now on the asterisk and dagger: *† I believe, and hope, my own marginalia and bookmarking honors all the history of the very marks' histories being detailed. 1/?

A photo of the paperback book: Shady Characters—thesecret life of punctuation, symbols, and other typographical marks—in my hand. It's opened to a spread with every corner of the pages multiply folded.

The top left, doubly folded, hints at the marginalia on previous pages and reveals the layers of many pages' corners folded throughout the book thus far.

On the right, both top and bottom corners are double-folded. The top paragraph is squared off in black pen. Marginalia scrawls every margin of the page, stemming from the paragraph that reads:

Alphabetical labels, asterisks, daggers, and other typographic marks were all employed to link notes to text in this fashion.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· May 14

This week in co-existing with wild animals. Saw a fawn yesterday, in the back yard, as it tried to get back into it's day's hidey hole. Today: fireflies are back! Also, accidentally uprooted one of the favorite nightly snacks of the local deer. 1/n

A photo of me holding a 3-foot-ish | 1-meter-ish long lily plant, roots and all.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· May 2

Democracy dies behind paywalls.

A screenshot of the Washington Post's mobile website, in dark mode, of an article published today; tagged topic, Immigration.

Titled: Fearing deportation, a beloved music teacher gives a final lesson.

Subtitle: Jesús Rodríguez, worried about being detained, decided to leave the country before his humanitarian parole expired.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Apr 19

This is a print I did while studying Graphic Design in University. We had a letterpress lab—forget specifically which kind. I spent 8-hours one Saturday creating and printing this. Needed two or three full sets of letters. Tons of furniture and such.

A screenshot of the majascule/capital R appearing in the whitespace, surrounded by two or three full character sets. Printed using a letterpress. There are two quotes in the composition, one above the R and one below.

Above: Fall seven times, stand up eight.
Below: Stories are for eternity, when memory is erased, there is nothing to remember except the story.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Apr 18

I was cleaning up cobwebs from the front porch...then got distracted. Ended up pulling up lots of vines in just a few square meters of space. Off the side of the house's vinyl, brick, electrical boxes...wrapped around wires, bushes, and other plants. Carolina Ivy, it's called.

A photo of me, standing on our driveway, holding a large amount of Carolina Ivy vines...a result of following my distractive energy. This was just a few square meters of vines pulled...off the side of the house's vinyl, brick, electrical boxes...wrapped around wires, bushes, and other plants.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Mar 25

Post a ship that's not Star Wars or Star Trek.

Two frames from the show Supernatural. The top frame shows Castiel, an angel, looking longingly into Dean Winchester's eyes—full of concern, and love. The second frame, the bottom, shows Castiel's hand resting on Dean's soldier—the same place where the angel had pulled the human Dean out of hell and raised him from perdition—but is focused on Dean's face as he looks back at Cas. His eyes are watery, as if he feels Seen for the first time; cared for with kindness, tenderness, and care.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Dec 8

Here you go! A photo of my most recent tattoo, the seventh. Located on the inside of my left wrist, it reads "—be—Kind" above a rainbow-colored Infinity symbol, one side being a cresting wave, curling towards & to complete the line's cross stroke.

A photo of my most recent tattoo, the seventh. Located on the inside of my left wrist, it reads "—be—Kind" above a rainbow-colored Infinity symbol, one side being a cresting wave, curling towards & to complete the line's cross stroke.

"be" is set in Inkwell Script.
"K" is set in Inkwell Blackletter.
"ind" is set in Inkwell Sans.

Jonathan Stephens@jonathanstephens· Nov 15

A very eventful final two chapters. Slow Productivity by Cal Newport. Also: yay embracing marginalia.