Good evening.

Although the region itself was inhabited for a long time by Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and more, what we generally think of as “Cairo” is considered to have been founded by the Fatimids in the 10th century.

When it was founded, they built stone walls and gates, and a number of mosques. Cairo has expanded to become one of the biggest cities in the world since then, but this smaller area of “Old Cairo” still stands within the city, and you’ll find among the densest collections of medieval Islamic architecture within a couple kilometer area.

Driving up to it is surreal, because on one side of the street there’s a thousand year old fortress wall, and on the other side of the street there are decades-old buildings with brutalist architecture.

Inside of the walls there are markets, restaurants, hotels, etc. The marketplace/streets are quite loud and hectic and messy, and yet some of the restaurants and hotels are absolutely amazing.

So like you park, get hounded by an informal-looking guy for parking money (sometimes they are legit and sometimes not), walk through the thousand year old gate, there’s tons of music and street food and aggressive merchants, stray cats and dogs, you might have to dodge the random motorcycle or get pooped on by a pigeon (happened to me), a man in a Sufi-style dress is whirling around, there’s a sickly-thin toothless man asking for money as a group of teenagers race by, etc. But then right amid that there will be a beautiful entrance to a luxury boutique Ottoman-style hotel with professional staff, intricate handmade furniture and an amazing Egyptian restaurant on the roof that overlooks the area. A sea of contrasts.

As you walk along the cobblestone roads of this old portion of Cairo, you pass by various buildings that range from the 10th century to the 19th century and were built under four different dynasties (Fatimids, Ayyubids, Mamluks, and Ottomans). Then there are also some more recent brutalist buildings. It’s all woven together, so for example there will be an 800-year old stone archway with an active cafe under it. There will be a merchant selling cheap metal pyramid trinkets made in China underneath an intricate wooden 500-year old medieval window.

Anyway, some friends and I went there for the second time yesterday to eat at that rooftop restaurant. Some pics.

We did it, we won another league 🏴‍☠️

Always trying to find more active people on Nostr.

Current Status:

1) Have positive interaction

2) Check that you actually post

3) Follow

I love Bitcoin, but would you buy more at these prices?

What future would hurt you more?

-Buy more Now, watch it tank and buy more at $15k?

OR

-Not buy and watch it go to $500k

Having Bought the Top and ridden it all the way down 2x, I can tell you which I'd choose. #Bitcoin

Alright, after watching 5+ hours of Dune part one and two, I’m going to need someone to explain to me why this is a good movie.

Whatever other people are seeing, I am not seeing it.

My friends often tell me that they prefer my explanations over reading a book. Since I can’t be with all my friends at all times, lol, I try to highlight key parts that I would likely mention if we were having a one-on-one conversation.

I focus on highlighting passages that convey key bits of information, such as specific concepts, definitions, dates, patterns, or quotations that I feel they should remember. By marking passages that are particularly meaningful or insightful, my friends can focus their attention on critical ideas and themes, making it easier to grasp the author’s message or argument, allowing us to have deeper conversations later down the line.

When I was young, my mom would highlight vocabulary words in my school books to help me understand and comprehend complex, challenging, or simply new material. When she highlighted key parts, it encouraged active reading, prompting me to engage with the text actively rather than passively consuming information. I tried this technique a few years back with one friend, and she said the highlighted parts helped her so much that it became her favorite book. It made me so happy to hear that from then on, whenever I have time on a flight or by the pool, I highlight passages in books I plan on gifting to friends (for their birthday, Hanukkah, Christmas, or some occasion).

In books like this (technical or bitcoin-related), I try to avoid focusing on highlighting bits that have a personal connection to me (like a special date that also coincides with my birthday or something) because there is no point in them reading a book highlighted with my emotions as they can have this side of me when we go for tea.

Something I shared on Twitter, interested in the perspectives here too:

“I want #bitcoin  to do three things well:

1. Send

2. Receive

3. Store

Personally, I’m only interested in development which ensures #bitcoin  does these three things better, faster and more securely while maintaining maximum decentralisation.

All other use cases to me represent a grift on the #bitcoin  system from privileged people who don’t prioritise these three things highly enough.

So many people have worked so hard over the last 15 years to get #bitcoin  where it is, battles against so many powerful forces, yet #bitcoin  survived.

Now we are degrading the #bitcoin  system for non-monetary use cases.

H/t to @GrassFedBitcoin - something we discussed deeply yesterday.”

Running nostr

The U.S. broad money supply currently consists of approximately 2.1 quadrillion cents.

The Financial Times #bitcoin New Years Resolution.

What's your favorite web client for #nostr?

I've bene using Primal for a while and thinking it was going to get better on desktop, but its had the same problems for months and its frustrating

(issues: after first zap it doesn't properly ping Alby ext anymore, they just stop working, really long initial load times, I always get error on posts saying "no relays responded" but when i hit cancel the post succeeded about 80% of the time, a few other little similar things.)

Curious for recommendations here.

What are your favorite hardware wallets, among the latest generation of them?

And are there any that you really don’t like?