Sam Grover

I built a wall-mounted rack for a bathroom and am quite happy with how it turned out.

The bathroom on the main level in our house is used occasionally by us. It is also the one that is used by visitors. It has never had a good place to put stuff. The sink doesn’t have enough room on it for anything besides the soap, and there is no vanity cabinet in which to put things. We decided a long time ago that there needed to be something.

It is a small room, so the only real option was a wall, and this was pretty much the only place to mount something like this on the wall in a manner that it wasn’t in the way, or in an awkward spot.

At some point I came across this video and realized that this design could work well. The main constraint as shown in the video was depth. This was also the case in our bathroom so as to not interfere with the shower door next to it. A secondary constraint was the light switches but that was straightforward to design around. Also, unlike that video, I couldn’t drill the sides into a wall because there is just trim board on one side and stone tiles on the other. So I made some adjustments to adapt that design to our needs.

And so many months ago I got the materials. Then something or the other delayed the project but a couple months ago I finally started on it. And in small increments I built it up. A few weeks ago and after some mistakes and corrections, I finally applied paint and finish, and mounted it.

Here’s how it looks in perspective with a wide angle lens.

P.S. The video I linked is from the Darbin Orvar channel, of which I’m a fan, and have followed for many years. Highly recommended!

Images uploaded using Mimi.

A new version of Mimi Uploader is now out with my favorite new feature in a while. You can now access your Recent Uploads for reference or export! 🎉

Recent Uploads can be accessed by the icon on the top left of the main screen. Once in there, you can see a list of your ten most recent uploads sessions. Each of those can be independently exported to get the URLs in Markdown or HTML. Now if you miss exporting right after an upload, or somehow lose the exported text, you can still get to it later. I hope you enjoy this feature and find it useful like I do.

This release has been a long time coming. Working on this app is another one of those things that’s slowed down in the pandemic. I’m hoping to give it more attention in the future and have a list of features and improvements that I would like to bring to you.

If you find Mimi useful, please let others know, and leave a rating and/or review. It is very much appreciated.

Thank you for your support 😊

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We recently replaced an old failing fence with a new one, and also got a pergola built. I took before and after pictures, and it’s really nice to see the improvement.

And here is a photo of the pergola that is in the garden, adjacent to the fence. It is a really nice space and we’ve been enjoying using it, and look forward to spending more time there, even with friends!

If you’re local to Portland, these projects were done by Chris Sanderson, and I gladly recommend him for your projects.

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I wrote a small script to convert an Apple News URL into a regular URL. Here it is.

I usually need this on macOS and have a terminal handy so a Python script works well for me. You could extract the logic and make a different automation out of it, e.g. an iOS Shortcut. Do share if you do :-)

I’m really excited about a new feature for Mimi Uploader that I’ve been building. Recent Uploads! See a list of your recent uploads for easy reference or export.

Here’s the first look at it 🎉

A TestFlight build with this feature is under review so all of you that have opted into that should have it soon. If you haven’t and would like to opt in, follow this link.

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iOS 14.5 is out and has two great new features.

Apple Watch for unlocking when wearing a mask

For those of us who use an Apple Watch, you can now unlock your Face ID equipped phone when wearing a mask. This works very well. You can find it in Settings -> Face ID & Passcode and scrolling down. “Mercury” in the screenshot is the name I’ve given my watch.

Turn off tracking

Now you can opt out of any systematic tracking by apps. If you leave that switch on, some apps will ask you for permission and you can allow or deny on a case by case basis. It was off and I’ve left it as is. You can find it in Settings -> Privacy -> Tracking.

Images uploaded using Mimi.