Even though the title of What the Hell Did I Just Read is self-referential in the same the previous novel was (This Book is Full of Spiders), I still kept reading expecting some sort of arcane book to play a part in the story.
Don’t be dumb like me. The only book is the novel itself, the third adventure of David, John and Amy, twenty-somethings living in Undisclosed, a small town beset by supernatural as well as super gross manifestations.
Like the previous entries, What the Hell Did I Just Read is filled with weird (Batmantis???) and gruesome (giant squirming larvae) monsters that the would-be heroes must stop before the town and possibly the universe itself is destroyed.
It’s more fun than it sounds.
The story starts with a child kidnapping and as the saying goes, things escalate quickly, with seemingly immortal not-government agents, a biker gang and others tossed together as an unceasing storm threatens to sweep the town away in a devastating flood.
Jason Pargin, going under the pen name David Wong, does his usual excellent job juggling all of the elements while tossing in regular dollops of absurdist humor. There are even a few serious moments of personal growth for some of the characters. But only a few. Mostly it’s dildo guns, silicone butts, dimensions of endless despair and children who may not be quite as they appear.
My only real disappoint with the story is how it builds to a climax that never really happens. Sure, stuff happens but not necessarily what you’d expect, although you could argue that’s not necessarily a bad thing, either. It’s open-ended when I was not expecting it to be open-ended. Maybe Pargin wanted to leave room for a direct sequel, because who can’t get enough of giant squirming larvae that could potentially destroy the world?
This is an easy recommendation for anyone who enjoyed the first two Books (the first being John Dies at the End). For anyone else who is not averse to some well-written and occasionally gross-out horror with tongue in/through cheek, it’s still a solid recommendation (though you should still read all three in order for maximum effect).
Yes, terrible pun. I’m pretty sure I’ve used it before. Sorry.
As the weather prognosticators foretold (yesterday) it has indeed started snowing tonight and is sticking, with 10-15 cm expected in time for the morning commute.
But I am not complaining, as weather happens and until I can magically control it, I will accept it. Plus I don’t have a walk to shovel.
My only concern is whether this will impact my running, as snow has only had minimal impact this winter on my runs, and has even at times been a bit delightful. The forecast suggests it won’t stick around, so one last blast of winter is fine by me.
I shaved this morning the same way I always do–I used the electric razor on my face and neck, then used a trimmer for my Van Dyke. It’s properly known as a circle beard but no one seems to know what a circle beard is.
Anyway, the beard itself is more a vestige at this point, as I don’t use a guard on the trimmer, insuring the facial hair is there but in a minimalist sort of way.
Tonight I noticed the fuzz on my chin and upper lip was more pronounced than one would expect after a little over 14 hours of growth. I clearly remember trimming it this morning and I’m pretty sure I haven’t been struck by lightning since then and acquired the power of super fast hair growth as a result (though a little more on the top would be nice).
Instead I’m left to ponder how my facial hair has become the folical version of Michael Meyers, coming back stronger and more resilient no matter how often I whack it down.
I’m going to take pictures of this to prove it’s not just me being weird. Well, weirder.
One sample below. I think my favorite part is the Pacman ghosts on the arrow keys.
The Simon Stalenhag Art Gallery. Stalenhag has created a delightfully weird alternate universe where the 80s turn out…a little different. One example below. The art is an amazing blend of realism (the composition and light/liquid effects are terrific) and the fantastic, with giant robots, and curiously controlling electronic devices everywhere. The imagery ranges from intriguing to funny to horrifying, sometimes simultaneously. Buy his stuff.
In the interest of keeping to a complaint-free lifestyle, I’ll emphasize again for Bad Design I am doing a couple of things:
pointing out the bad design as a way to highlight how something should not be done, even if it seems logical or a popular way to go, in the hope that it encourages others not to repeat what I feel are mistakes in design
offering a solution or alternative design that addresses the flaws
And I only pick a lot on Apple because I own and use a lot of Apple products (which I will address in another post) and because as the world’s largest, richest company, they have the power to influence a lot of others (see Samsung and its weird and lawsuit-attracting tendency to follow Apple’s designs very closely).
And with that, I present:
The iMessage fireball
For those unfamiliar with Apple’s message app, it works like most text messaging apps and allows people to send and receive messages across Apple devices, including the iPhone, iPad, Watch and Mac. If you send a message to a non-Apple device, it shows in a green bubble as a regular text message. If you send a message to an Apple device, the bubble turns blue and it becomes an iMessage, sent through Apple’s servers.
With iOS 10 Apple revamped the Message app, expanding what you can send.
When you are in the Message app, tapping on the App Store icon presents a small black window that you can doodle and do other things in (it defaults to this, though tapping the icons to the left or right of the heart will allow you to use stickers from other apps, search for images and more):
By tapping on the horizontal gray line above the window it expands to give you more room and also exposes a small information icon in the lower-right corner that, if tapped, presents an explanation for the various actions you can perform:
The Heartbeat option only works if you are wearing an Apple Watch, as it includes a heart rate monitor.
The first option is Sketch and it seems pretty straightforward. Draw with one finger.
The next option is Tap. What is a tap? There is no explanation.
The fourth option, Kiss, puts a pair of lips in the window.
Let’s go back to the third option, Fireball. This puts an orange fireball-like blob in the window and as long as you keep pressing you can move it around. As soon as you release, the Fireball message sends.
Bad design #1:
Some actions send the message instantly, others require you to tap a send button to send it. This is inconsistent and can result in messages being sent prematurely.
Bad design #2:
There is no explanation for what a Tap is. The others are straightforward, but what is a Tap? It’s a ring that dissolves. If you do a bunch of taps in succession you can send multiple rings–er, taps–but if you pause too long the message auto-sends. I am unsure as to why anyone would ever want to send a Tap.
Bad design #3:
The Fireball and how it is invoked. Like the Tap, I’m not sure why you would send someone a Fireball. It looks more like a glowing orange ball than an actual fireball and it also auto-sends. The worst part, though, is that to invoke it you press your finger on the screen. You might think this is the same thing you do to make a Sketch, but there is a subtle difference. The difference is so subtle that you may find yourself sending off fireballs when you meant to start a sketch, and you may receive fireballs for the the same reason. In fact, since iOS 10 launched I have only sent two fireballs deliberately. The first was to see what it looked like, the second as a joke. Pressing the screen is a very basic gesture and it shouldn’t be tied to a fairly obscure action that few people would seemingly ever use.
Solutions
Bad design #1: Require tapping the Send button for all actions before the message is sent. Give options to edit or cancel the message.
Bad design #2: Rename Tap to Rings. Change text to “Tap with one finger to place one or more rings.”
Alternate solution: Remove this option altogether if it is seldom-used.
Bad design #3: Change the action required to invoke the Fireball to something that is not likely to be used accidentally, like tapping with three fingers.
Alternate solution: Remove this option altogether.
My personal feeling is the Tap and Fireball options could be removed. I have no evidence to back this up, but based on anecdotes and my own experience, neither is used much at all and the Fireball is almost exclusively used unintentionally.
Run 569 Average pace: 5:25/km Location: Brunette River trail
Start: 1:53 pm
Distance: 5:02 km
Time: 27:15
Weather: Sunny with high cloud
Temp: 5ºC
Humidity: 54%
Wind: light
BPM: 174
Weight: 166.5 pounds
Total distance to date: 4430 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone 8
Due to a very late start and being naughty again by not running during the week and also recovering from a pulled muscle in my mid-back, I opted to skip the full 10K run at the lake today for a 5K at the river. I did get some extra walking in by starting at the end of the trail first.
It was a rare sunny day but a brisk 5ºC so I wore two layers up top, but stuck to the shorts. It worked out fine.
I briefly experienced two issues: a cramp near my right shoulder that sorted itself quickly, and my left knee started feeling a bit stiff about 3.5 km in. The knee never got really sore and was not a factor, really, as my fastest pace was in the last km.
My overall pace was 5:25/km, which is not bad for a pudgy, out of shape 5K run. The BPM was 174, which is again too high, but perhaps understandable given the combination of cold, flabbiness, and exertion.
I may run again tomorrow, assuming I don’t wake up in the morning feeling like a broken pretzel.
The gate to gate distance on the river trail is said to be 1.9 km, so after I started my run, I checked when I got to the second gate and it was, to my surprise, showing 1.9 km. What’s weird is that the 5K ended with around 610m left. If you add up the two full lengths I ran–3.8 km–then add what is needed to hit 5K–1.2 km–that means there should have been about 700m left when I stopped running. Now, there was a delay of a few seconds after I stopped the run and started the walk, but not enough to account for 90m of walking. Still, it’s actually better than I expected, so maybe the GPS is in the iPhone 8 is magically improving or something.
Anyway, here’s to more runs and staying healthy in 2018.
The newest Mark III SkyTrain cars feature a few nice improvements:
all four cars are joined together through an articulated “accordion” section, meaning you are free to move between all cars on the train. This also means there is more room overall for passengers
larger windows provide a better view and the lower frames work better as pseudo arm rests
better fittings all around mean the trains are quieter
roomier design all around, so there is less of a sardine can feeling, even when the train is full
But in among these improvements is another that doesn’t really work, and it’s not the fault of the designers. It’s more of a people problem.
The first and last car on each train has one of the middle sections of seats removed and in its place a single bar that runs underneath the window. This is a designated bike area. Making trains bike-friendly is definitely a nice move, as more people are commuting by bike.
However, there is a problem with the execution: it doesn’t take into account normal human behavior and the general likelihood of bikes being on the train at any given time. This leads to the following:
as the train fills, people move first into the seats
they next stand in the areas that are most open (not between seats), such as the doorways
conveniently the bike space is wide open, so it often fills up with standees before the rest of the train
a cyclist boarding the train at this point will find it impossible to park their bike in the already-occupied space. Even if people wanted to let them, it’s unlikely there is room for the people in the bike space to stand elsewhere; the cyclist typically props their bike in the doorway area, same as they would without a bike space on the train
Given that cyclists are still uncommon on the SkyTrain and that they have no better chance of boarding before anyone else, there is only a small chance they will actually get to use the designated space for their bikes. There’s also no way to keep other people out of the space (nor should there be).
Conclusion: the dedicated bike area is a well-intentioned idea that ultimately doesn’t work. It’s really just a standing room section that would be better serviced by putting the seats back in.
However, there is a better solution that, while still subject to the whims of the crowd on the train, at least doesn’t remove a bunch of seats. Some rail systems have hooks in the ceiling that bikes can be hung on. This works well for a couple of reasons:
the hooks aren’t likely to be used for something else, so they will almost always be free for cyclists to use
the bikes stand vertically as a result, taking up a lot less space on the train
the hook provides a solid anchor for the bike, reducing the chance of it hitting someone or getting away from its rider
I hold out hope that Translink will ultimately switch from the dedicated space to a hook system and am doing my part by suggesting it to them, not just here, but directly via email as well.
Until then, the bike space on the Mark III trains is likely to remain standees-only.
Things I have done to complete all three activity rings on my Apple Watch:
paced quickly back and forth in the living room
gone for a spontaneous six block walk
walk to the grocery store to buy several non-essential items
jumping jacks without the jumping
running on the spot (this can actually get your heart rate up pretty quickly, just like running where you actually move forward)
hung my arm down at my side (to get a Stand goal during a meeting. It’s a cheat but it totally works and beats suddenly standing up in a meeting and staying like that for a minute while everyone stares at you)
gotten up to use the washroom (also for the Stand goal; this is one of those win-win situations, killing two birds and all that)
reduced the Move goal for the day (when I’ve been sick. Since getting the watch this has worked every time I’ve fallen ill except one day when I was too weak and just laid like a lump and broke my streak)
The reason I’ve done all the above is to maintain a streak, because streaks create a positive feedback loop and you don’t want to break them. Breaking them is where the donut-eating starts. And Apple doesn’t allow for mulligans, so you can’t take a day off due to illness/accident/utter laziness.
It’s worked pretty well so far. I did four of these just today (I am unwell). I prefer hitting the goals all legit-like, though, because it means I’m healthy and stuff.
Back in 2014 I proposed a writing exercise on a now-defunct site I ran. It was to write a scene or short story based on this photo:
(You can see the photo in context as Blue Mist Road here.)
Being the clever type, I called my effort “Road Closed” and somehow tied it in to being about ghosts, somehow.
As I fleshed out the story I realized it was going to be more than just an exercise or even a short story and it became my official National Novel Writing Month project in November 2014. I won! I didn’t actually finish the novel, but I did complete 50,000 words, so it was more a technical win.
Four years later and I have made progress on the story (it’s sitting at 72,000+ words) but stalled late last year after making some good progress.
The essential problem is I’m not confident in the story arc I’ve developed and I’m hesitant to invest more time if it all ends up being poop. Or ghost poop.
At some point I want to properly write out the outline of the story but this post is really about the title.
The title “Road Closed” made sense when it was a short story and the road played a big part in the whole thing. It may not even survive the final draft now, so I’m casting about for something new. It could even provide a spark that could lead to other changes and get the whole ball rolling again.
Or I could just write that outline and go from there.
Here’s the elevator pitch for the story:
A 20 year old moves to a new town and starts college as a journalism student, determined to get away from a troubled past. His efforts to start over are stymied by two things: a drinking problem he brought with him, and a ghost he starts dating without realizing the ghost part.
And the initial lackluster titles I’ve come up with to replace “Road Closed” are:
Ghosts and Other Spirits (a play on spirits referring to both ghosts and alcohol–geddit?)
Impersonal Demons (I’m not even sure what this one means)
School Spirit (simple, accurate, but also very banal and easy to misinterpret)
When I look over these titles I feel driven to make “Road Closed” work. While the name suggests street construction and detours, it can also suggest that an avenue is closed off, which can work on several levels for the story. Still, it’s also pretty generic.
I know!
BOOze
I’m sorry, I’ll see myself out.
(I’ll do the outline this week and report the grisly results.)
Which is to say I think I’ve gone 21 consecutive days without making a complaint to someone else, either in person or online.
I say I think because it’s possible I could have slipped one in and not realized, but it doesn’t feel like I have.
I have complained in my head, of course, but even there the volume of complaining has dropped off. I indulged a bit today when my phone and watch stopped talking to each other again (how 21st century!) but instead of grumbling, I just updated both, signed back in and all is well. Because results are much more satisfying than complaints heard by no one that accomplish nothing except setting me slightly on edge.
I’m going to doff the blue rubber band, though. It looks chintzy. I am going to try to find a “proper” purple bracelet to wear instead, possibly when I am out and aboot tomorrow.
And if I don’t find one? I won’t complain to a single soul.
Run 568 Average pace: 5:57/km Location: Burnaby Lake (CW)
Start: 12:29 pm
Distance: 10.03 km
Time: 59:41
Weather: Cloudy
Temp: 8-10ºC
Humidity: 86%
Wind: nil
BPM: 161
Weight: 166.6 pounds
Total distance to date: 4425 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone 8
I was bad and did not run last weekend–but I was also good because I used an elliptical trainer for half an hour on both Saturday and Sunday. While the combined calorie burn is similar to a 10K, there is no doubt that it’s an easier experience, so I was ready for today to be a bit tougher.
Because there was a chance of rain I wore a long-sleeved shirt, but it stayed dry and was quite mild.
The iPhone 8 again was consistently reporting distances as shorter. Suddenly 4 km was not really 4m so to walk 4 km I had to walk more than 4 km. Kind of annoying but no so far out of whack that I feel compelled to spend time researching the issue. Plus a little extra walking and running is fine, anyway.
I was unsure of the status of the bridge at Still Creek–the original end of the replacement project is this month and as of two weeks ago they’d done essentially nothing–so I chose a clockwise route. This would allow me to get to 5K regardless, and allow me to turn back to get the other 5K. This didn’t prove to be necessary because while the project has advanced (new additions to signs note that Phase I began on January 25) the only change was several large piles of dangerous-looking rocks near the bridge, along the river bank.
Surprisingly, my legs felt pretty much fine, though I had a few moments of creakiness in my right knee (the good one). The lack of running may be having the side benefit of healing. I did feel some cramping in the abdomen and it persisted for awhile, though it wasn’t too severe. It was hard to imagine it was from running too fast because I did not feel too fast. Or fast.
Still, I kept going and there was no doubt I’d complete a full 10K, so even though the pace was pokey–5:57/km–the BPM was fine (161) and I generally felt okay.
The bear in the woods part came around the 9.27 km mark. I had used the bathroom before heading out (I’ve learned my lesson) and even took a quick whiz upon arrival, but a little over halfway through it became clear that I would have to commit to number 2. Just past the 9K mark the urge to go was becoming, let’s say, a force of nature. It would take me 6-7 minutes to finish the run and get to the Jiffy John™ and those minutes felt like hours. I made a bold decision.
I paused the run and leapt off the trail like a deer spooked by a poopmonster. Then I committed the deed behind a large tree. Just in time, as I passed someone shortly after resuming the run and frankly the big tree didn’t really provide as much cover as you would expect from a big tree.
The rest of the run felt much better.
I should also point out that my weight loss regime has gone completely bonkers and I weighed 3.2 pounds more at the start of today’s run vs. the last one. Yeesh. At least I finished lighter (TMI, I know. sorry.)
Overall I was glad to get back out again, and doubly glad to do so without being in the rain. Triply so for the BPM staying reasonable.
I can feel the legs already stiffening up. There will be a reckoning for all those regular runs I’ve skipped. Stiff legs, basically.
Still, progress! This time last year I was still not able to run outside at all due to the Snowpocalypse and the mild temperatures means there is little chance of a sudden repeat this year. Yay.
What the Hell Did I Just Read by David Wong
