Northern Lights in UP, May '26
Captured on May 13, 2026.
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Answer Tactics on the PE Exam
Summary
Once a question has been classified by type (see the question triage article), different tactics apply depending on the classification. This article documents three workflows derived from an analysis of questions representative of the NCEES PE Metallurgical and Materials exam:
1. Calculation workflow — for fully handbook-answerable questions (~33% of
Question Triage on the PE Exam
Summary
The PE Metallurgical and Materials exam provides approximately 6 minutes per question (9.5 hours of total exam time divided by 85 questions, less a tutorial and optional break). Efficient time allocation requires a triage decision in the first 10–15 seconds of each question: is this a Handbook
Handbook Relevance on the PE Exam
Summary
An analysis of questions representative of the NCEES PE Metallurgical and Materials exam produces the following distribution with respect to the PE Metallurgical and Materials Reference Handbook:
Category
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Definition
Fully handbook-answerable
~33%
All formulas, tables, diagrams, or data required to solve the question are contained in the Handbook,
Markdown with Tables in Ghost Articles
Ghost renders Markdown beautifully out of the box — until you paste a table. Depending on your theme, tables can wrap letter-by-letter, blow out the content column with horizontal scroll, or refuse to wrap long cells at all. The root cause is the theme's CSS: default Ghost themes style
Hard Truths About Building Products
Throughout my career, I've watched smart people make the same mistakes over and over again when building products… and I’ve made them myself. These aren't edge cases or rare missteps—they're systemic delusions that kill products, burn cash, and waste years of effort.
Northern Lights in the UP, Sep '25
Photos were taken from a pretty old iPhone so the quality isn't great but the experience and seeing it in person is magical.
Perplexity’s Comet
Perplexity has been one of my favorite AI tools for a long time. It’s prominently bookmarked in Chrome on all of my computers; I use their extension, I have their Mac and Windows apps installed, and it occupies the spot directly under my thumb on the home screen of
Freshwater Jellyfish in Michigan
On a quick visit to a local lake, we found this little guy powering himself under a dock and onwards. I was shocked because I've spent a lot of time in and around freshwater rivers, lakes, and streams in North America and I've never seen one
Deming - Innovate
"𝐈𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐞.
Allocate resources for long-term planning. Plans for the future call for consideration of:
• New service and 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭 that may help people to live better materially, and 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐚 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭...
• Performance in the hands of the user.
• Satisfaction of the user.
One requirement for innovation is faith that there will be a future. 𝐈𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞, cannot