Month: September 2024

Random things I enjoyed this past month, September 2024 edition

  • The song (and video) for “New Sensation” by INXS
  • A Coffee Crisp ice cream bar
  • Toast with strawberry jam, from a loaf of bread I’d just freshly baked
  • An elderberry-scented bubble bath
  • Using Linux Mint without any crashes or weirdness
  • Learning new keyboard shortcuts
  • Getting back into coding/programming (it still hurts my brain)
  • Drawing more
  • Writing more
  • S’mores1Not really
  • Rewatching Gravity Falls yet again
  • Running regularly without my legs falling apart
  • And other stuff

Would I pay for The Verge?

The answer follows Betteridge’s law of headlines1In case you don’t click the link, the answer is no..

Article here (kudos for the shameless wordplay): On The Verge of a Paywall

Bonus irony points for this appearing in the link above:

Why would I not pay? It comes down to how I am visiting the site less these days, and the reason for that is a general steering toward clickbait-style content, opinion pieces of dubious value, and an increasing lack of awareness in the people reporting on tech and what is happening. There is also a distinct lack of a critical eye on companies that have long passed the point of getting the proverbial free pass.

EDIT to add more: The redesign they did a while back, just before Dieter Bohn left to join Google, was a horrible mess. Purple text. PURPLE TEXT. It’s still a mess, really, and it has one mode (on the front page)–dark. Too bad if that’s hard on your eyes, it’s hip. They also love embedding X stories and Instagram (which shows nothing if you are not logged into your Instagram account–you have one, right?) And they also repeat stories multiple times on the front page, which feels like hitting the reader on the head repeatedly with a Nerf hammer. Gentle, but annoying.

Plus, I’ve been engaged in The Culling for a few years now, and having one less site to read would be no big thing. Sorry, Verge!

But to be fair, The Verge does have good writing, as well, and they’ve occasionally experimented with the design of some stories in ways a site like Ars Technica (see below) never has. That’s good! It’s just not enough, overall.

EDIT, Part 2: I wanted to add that I am willing to pay for sites. I have subscribed to Ars Technica for several years now–they remove ads for paid subs, but even better, the design takes advantage of the ad-free space and everything flows better, even compared to using an ad blocker. But mainly, I support the site because they produce lots of articles I enjoy, the discussion is good (and the comments system isn’t atrocious, unlike The Verge’s).

Birding, September 30, 2024: Flappin’ ‘n a-fightin’

Where: Piper Spit, Burnaby Lake (Burnaby), Tlahutum Regional Park (Coquitlam)
Weather: Mostly cloudy, 14-17°C

The Outing

Piper Spit, Burnaby Lake

View looking east from the pier, some of the landmass visible on the left.

We started near the dam and when we got to The Stump and Fungus Face (as I will now call the spot), we spotted a red squirrel enjoying seed (this is normal), but several birds were impatiently waiting in the wings (ho ho) for the squirrel to move on, so they could get in on the seed action. The squirrel seemed determined to fatten itself up for winter in one sitting, but eventually the birds made their moves:

  • A blasck-capped chickadee. Adorable, but pretty common around the lake.
  • A Steller’s jay. The very pretty blue boi returns!
  • A rare (especially for me) sighting of a red-breasted nuthatch

The light was not quite faboo, but we made due, got our photos and moved on.

At Piper Spit itself we noticed ther water level of the lake had been lowered quite a bit, with the landmass east of the pier back and occupied by various mallards and geese, mostly.

We didn’t see any new winter arrivals, but there were a few pintails, a scruff-looking green-winged teal, even more coots, plus some Northern shovelers sitting inconspicuously on a log off in the water. There were shorebirds, too, but they were situated a little too far away, boo.

What we saw mostly was drama: coot drama, goose drama, mallard drama, interspecies drama. It seemed everyone wanted to chase everyone else, so there was a lot of fussin’ and a-feudin’ going on, punctuated by the strange cackles of coots.

On the way out, another (or maybe the same) Steller’s jay taunted us by flitting all over the place. I guess it was filling in for the goldfinches.

I was experiencing a lot of issues with my camera again, and with the original battery, so the battery theory is out the window. I did not clean the camera beforehand, but it was thoroughly cleaned a week ago, so unless it is exceptionally good at accumulating crud on the contacts (possible) I don’t think its cleanliness is an issue. As we left Burnaby Lake, I had a plan.

Tlahutum Regional Park

Coquitlam River: shallow, yet full. Like me, after a meal.

Anticipating that we might not see a lot of birds at Tlahutum, I switched to the kit lens and focused on only taking scenery shots, to see if the issues I encountered with the telephoto lens and adapter would persist.

They did not! Which makes the telephoto lens or the adapter the likeliest suspect. I must ponder this.

In the meantime I took many shots of the scenery, the river, ponds, and anything else that caught my eye. The big pond had all of two wood ducks in it. Apparently this place is not the cool spot right now.

We ended at the community garden, where I added shots of flowers, hoses and birdhouses to my repertoire. There were actual birbs here, too–golden and white-crowned sparrows, along with a spotted towhee and a song sparrow or two. I was somewhat tempted to switch lenses, but I stuck to my plan.

I was surprised when I was prompted to switch batteries a second time (I took 411 shots total, which is not very many for 2.x batteries) but the batteries are getting aged and clearly losing capacity. I’ll look into getting new ones once I get well into the third battery, which hasn’t happened yet.

Speaking of batteries, Nic was also prompted to change batteries. His Sony camera reports when they are “exhausted”, which sounds like they just get too tired to take more photos. His first replacement battery was also dead–bad luck! But so was his second replacement battery. That concluded Nic’s photography for the day. Luckily, we were pretty much done. I’m not going to make fun of him not charging either of his spare batteries, but I will mention that he also forgot to charge his phone, so it died shortly into the outing, too.

In all, a perfectly cromulent outing, with some nice surprises and no real chance of getting sun burnt. Now I just need to figure out what to do about my camera.

The Shots

Soon™

The Birds (and other critters). Rare, rarely-seen or recently returned birds highlighted in bold.

Sparrows and sparrow-adjacent:

  • American robin
  • Black-capped chickadee
  • Golden-crowned sparrow
  • Lincoln’s sparrow (heard, not seen)
  • Red-breasted nuthatch
  • Red-winged blackbird
  • Song sparrow
  • Spotted towhee
  • Steller’s jay
  • White-crowned sparrow

Waterfowl and shorebirds:

  • American coot
  • Canada goose
  • Great blue heron
  • Green-winged teal
  • Long-billed dowitcher
  • Mallard
  • Northern pintail
  • Northern shoveller
  • Wood duck

Common:

  • American crow
  • Assorted gulls
  • Rock pigeon

Raptors:

  • None!

Non-birds:

  • Several red squirrels
  • A few errant pollinators
  • A millipede kind of bug, plus some sort of beetle

September shleptember

September was not a great month.

It started with something like three new temperature records being set as we got multiple days of 30C+ weather, but not long after that the reverse happened, with periods of rain and cooler-than-average weather. That trend has continued right to the end of the month, where today the high is supposed to be 16C, two degrees below the usual 18C. And yes, I can feel the difference!

My birthday was a bit of a dud, but it got better a few days later, weirdly.

Strata stuff is basically all bad and weighs me down. I wish people could just be better, but that world is clearly a fantasy. Maybe we’ll evolve to be more enlightened in a few million years. Haha, sure.

On more positive notes, I am doing more stuff and being more productive, both creatively and otherwise. I have resumed regular runs and my legs have not betrayed me–yet!

Also, as per the previous blog entry, I am down very slightly in weight, which is better than being up.

In all, a hearty meh, with a side of “could be worse!”

September 2024 weight loss report: Down 0.3 pounds

Yes, technically I lost weight this month, but considering the amount–0.3 pounds–it pretty much means the last two months have seen little movement. Some, but not a lot.

I am now down 6.3 pounds for the year, a rate of less than one pound per month, which is not weight loss so much as weight slippage.

Still, better than going up.

I did a lot of running in September and completed my 10,000+ steps every day, proving exercise is indeed not a great way to lose weight. Not snacking is!

I currently have no stores of snacks, apart from a few Tostitos multigrain chips. Once they are depleted, I will try, again, to go 100% snack-free in October and see what happens. If I still go up or don’t lose weight, I will curl my fist and shake it at the sky, possibly several times.

Stats:

January 1, 2024: 172.3 pounds  
Current: 166.0 pounds
Year to date: Down 6.3 pounds

September 1: 166.3 pounds
September 30: 166.0 pounds (down 0.3 pounds)

Body fat: 
September 1: 24.9%
September 30: 24.9% (unchanged)

Skeletal muscle mass:
September 1: 29.7% 
September 30: 29.7% (unchanged)

BMI:
September 1: 23.8
September 30: 23.8 (unchanged)

Historical: January 1, 2022: 182.8 pounds

Am I thinking about writing a novel again?

Photo by Leah Newhouse. Also an accurate reflection of how I type.

Sort of.

The AI debacle over at National Novel Writing Month prompted me to look at my collection of unfinished novels and ask myself, “Hey, would I like to start yet another novel and probably not finish it?”

And the answer is…maybe!

The nice part is that this time I’d be doing it outside NaNoWriMo, meaning I can work on whatever schedule I like, such as:

  • Write 500 words per day
  • Write 1,000 words per week
  • Think, sincerely, and at length, about one really great idea for a novel while writing absolutely nothing
  • Write 2,000 words, start over in a different piece of software, then repeat several times before being distracted by something else
  • Switch to longhand, write three pages, have my hand cramp up horribly and wonder what the hell I was thinking
  • Look, it would have been a great novel, OK?

I’ve got options, is what I’m saying. Let’s see what happens next!

Time sequences

Every time sequence that consists of incremental numbers (1, 2, 3, etc.):

12:34
1:23
2:34
3:45
4:56
2:10
3:21
4:32
5:43
6:54

Why do I find this bit of trivia interesting? I don’t even like math, which means I should also slightly dislike numbers on principle.

But I made a vow to post anything that pops into my head1Don’t worry, there are some limits., so here we are.