Hi, I’m Herb Bowie, a writer and software developer, and what you’ve stumbled upon is my eponymous website. Here you’ll find stuff I’ve written, as well as links to my other sites showcasing larger projects.
How the Dems Lost It
Everyone else already seems to have taken a crack at explaining how the Democrats lost so thoroughly in our last national elections — and what they need to contemplate by way of course correction — so I guess it must be my turn to weigh in.
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11 Apr 2025
You can't dance cheerfully
As a dancing partner Rose Tuttle was not a bargain. She was equipped for it physically and she had some idea of rhythm, that wasn’t it; it was her basic attitude. She danced cheerfully, and of course that was no good. You can’t dance cheerfully. Dancing is too important. It can be wild or solemn or gay or lewd or art for art’s sake, but it can’t be cheerful.
Rex Stout, 1958
From the author:
Welcome!
That’s me and Hank, in a photo taken at Discovery Park, in Seattle. We’re glad you’re here!
From the same author:
Built with Notenik
Available for free from the Mac App Store, Notenik can be used for taking, organizing, formatting and publishing notes, with each note consisting of multiple fields, as well as chunks of Markdown text of any length. The HBowie.net website has been built using Notenik.
Contents Outline:
This site’s content falls into a number of different categories. Feel free to drill down into any area that interests you. Stay connected through one or more of several avenues.
Hot Off The Press…
See a list of my latest original writings, as well as the latest quotes added to my commonplace book. Visit the Discourse Forum for the latest Notenik news.
Follow/Connect
If you’d like to keep up with my work, and/or connect with me, the following avenues are available.
Mastodon
Notenik Discussion
Source Code
Software
Notenik is my note-taking, web-making, content-managing app, written in Swift, using AppKit, exclusively for the Mac. Find out more at Notenik.app.
Big Ideas in Software Development is my web book about software development. You can find it at SoftDevBigIdeas.com.
Songs and Music
I’ve written many pieces discussing songs that I’ve found compelling in one way or another. I talk about their themes and meanings, as well as how they work.
- Songs Index – A list of content on this site.
- Lexicon of Song – A separate site offering this content.
- Reason to Rock – A separate site offering an entire online book discussing the aesthetics of rock music.
General Essays
Here’s an alphabetical list of essays I’ve written on a variety of topics. I’ve culled out any dated, topical pieces, so what’s left should still be useful reading.
You can also see a list of all my original essays grouped by primary topic, which makes them a bit easier to sort through.
Reference Summaries
I’ve written a number of pieces that serve as convenient summaries of ideas and models more extensively described by others. I’ve broken out a convenient list of these.
My Commonplace Book
One of my uses for Notenik is to maintain a digital commonplace book, containing brief quotations from others that I have found meaningful. This content can be accessed in a number of different ways.
- Authors Index – A sortable list of all cited authors
- Latest Additions – The most recent quotes added.
- Portable Wisdom – Daily Quotes randomly chosen
- Random Quote – Pull up a random entry
Recurring Topics
I use tags to identify various types of content touching on particular topics. You can use the tags cloud to find content on particular topics.
Finding Stuff
See the alphabetical index for an index to significant terms, authors and creators referenced from my original writings hosted on this site. Or just search for something.
Credits
See the Credits page for credits and licensing.
Donations:
I am happy to make all of my content on this site free for anyone to read and share, without any fees, personal data collection, advertising, or restrictive copyrights.
But if you would like to express your appreciation for my work by making a small financial donation, then all gifts will be gratefully accepted!
Clicking on the button below will take you to a page on the Ko-fi site, where you can “buy me a coffee,” if you’d like.
Thanks!