A colleague passed along this old paper:
What Do Prototypes Prototype?It's from the '90s (I saw the @ix.netcom.com email address and thought that was weird before reading on about the Apple Newton). It's about how prototypes should be specific and limited about what they prototype. In addition to allowing you to learn more from them, they make making them much more possible.
I went through a "we (or I) should always prototype everything first!" phase about a decade or so, but it often didn't help me. Without a narrow focus, making them wasn't that much easier than just building the real thing. So, subconsciously, I drifted back into always "doin' it live" especially for my personal projects.
I think that paper has reinvigorated the spirit of the prototyping '90s in me! Partly because the implementation time of the still not done,
Observatory has me demoralized, I'm gonna try earnestly prototyping stuff again!