One of my concerns would be durability of the software over time. In 20 years from now, will the site still be running? Will I need to hunt down old hardware or dependencies to regenerate my key?
You can, in fact, do it manually. T4r means letter T, digit 4, facing right. The directions are 't', 'r', 'b', 'l' (top, right, bottom left), which makes for a mnemonic you can follow with "right here in river city".)
Before you transcribe, just rotate the box so that the first letter in the alphabet appears in the top left, than read in English order (left to right, then top to bottom).