I came across this video (linked below) by Jared Henderson (BTW, he totally looks like a Jared and no, I can’t explain why, he just does. He also has a great Jared voice. I wish I had his voice. I still kind of sound like a teenager, which would be handy if I wanted to impersonate a teenager on the phone or something) in which he talks about how we’ve lost our focus. The culprits are exactly what you’d expect–first, TV, and now the internet, smartphones, TikTok and the rest.
The chief consequence of losing focus is that we can no longer engage in activities that require concentrated, sustained thought, like…reading.
A few years ago, when my book reading began to trail off, I thought it was because I’d lost my “reading time”. When I worked at Langara, I had two SkyTrain routes for my route, with the Expo Line portion being about half an hour long–a solid hour every day, five days a week, that I ended up devoting to reading books. One year I read 40 books. It almost seems surreal now. And they weren’t all short books! When I left Langara, I lost this structured reading time, and I filled it with other things–nothing in particular, just stuff. I tried reading at night, but it never stuck. Again, I thought it was just failing to find the right “time” to read. But I think this video nails the real cause: I just can’t focus like I used to. And it’s because of the internet. And I don’t even watch TikTok.
I am making some changes going forward, and one of them is to limit my “brainlessly graze the internet to passively entertain me” time. We’ll see how it goes. I’m not making an actual resolution or anything yet, but it’s an option.
I remember when I would go with friends to a video arcade to play games, circa 1980 to around the early 90s. We’d get a roll of quarters ($10, or 40 plays for most games, except maybe new ones or fancy ones using laser discs like Dragon’s Lair) and we’d spend (ho ho) a few hours bopping from machine to machine, sometimes playing in turns (Player 1, Player 2), sometimes playing co-op (Mario Bros.) or head-to-head (Joust). It was great fun (kids, ask your parents!)
But the brutal reality was that the games were designed like slots–to give you just enough to keep you coming back. And that’s if you were a half-decent player. I was maybe one-quarter1I swear this is not a quarters joke decent. Still, I persisted and on some games I was respectable, like the aforementioned Mario Bros. or Space Ace, another laser disc game where I managed to memorize the moves so I could play through the entire game on a single quarter (after it dropped in price to a single quarter).
But there were so many games that I adored, but kind of sucked at. Most of them were made by Williams:
Defender
Robotron 2084
Stargate (Defender sequel)
Joust
And yes, Sinistar. Not only was I not great at the game, it had voice synthesis, so Sinistar himself offered commentary on my pathetic efforts. “Run, coward, run!” That’s the idea, my interstellar disembodied terror head! This only made it all the more satisfying when I did manage to blow Sinistar up. He screamed something fierce.
Here’s the actual video from above if you want to journey back to 1983:
UPDATE, later that day: Somehow I managed to set the keyboard backlight to a searing white instead of the usual soothing green, and it is no longer allowing me to change the colour now. Another attempt to update the firmware failed.
I have plugged in my CTRL keyboard while I ponder what to do next. I am now sans knob and a little sad, as one who is suddenly knobless might be.
So much for fixing my U problem! (lol)
The keyboard I’m using currently is generally very nice.
As per the order placed January 9, 2022, it’s a:
Keychron Q1 QMK Custom Mechanical Keyboard Knob Version - Fully Assembled Knob / Navy Blue / Gateron G Pro Blue
The knob is handy for adjusting volume. I am too lazy to program it to do anything else. The keyboard is built like a tank and could legit kill someone as a blunt force weapon (the body is metal and weighs about four pounds). The keys are lubed, so they feel extra silky smooth. But!
There is the U key. Although you never see it in my posts or other writing, the U key often acts as if it’s been double-pressed, like so:
I see what youu did there, youu nauughty U key.
A few other keys sometimes double up, though much more intermittently. Now, in theory, this means the switch below the U key may just be wigging out and needs to be replaced. I could even do a test by swapping out the switch for another key I rarely use, like the tilde (sorry, programmers, I am not one of you! I assume programmers use the tilde key a lot).
In fact, now that I’ve type this out, I should try it…right now!
FAKE EDIT: I have done this. We’ll see if this provides a workaround for my U issue. Also, taking the switches out was harder and more nerve-wracking than anticipated. The idea of doing it for an entire keyboard makes me want to pay a 17-year-old keyboard nerd to do it for me.
Also, my keyboard:
And for future reference, since I had some issues getting the backlight working again afterwards:
Fn + Tab = backlight on/off Fn + Q = toggle lighting effect Fn + D = Toggle colour Fn + F = Change to white (and get keyboard stuck, so white is all you get) Fn + W = increase brightness Fn + S = decrease brightness
Posthaven was not bad and was a finalist in my “replace WordPress” quest/fool’s errand. But I just wasn’t using it, so even $5 a month was too much. It turns out if you stop paying before having made 12 monthly payments, they nuke your site, posts and account. But you get a thank-you message for trying them!
I assume they figure you won’t be back.
I guess I probably won’t be, if I have to commit to a full year to avoid starting all over from scratch again. I’m curious how well this model is working for them.
(And yes, this particular culling was inspired by the IG culling. It’s cullings all the way down.)
It turns out the last time I posted to Instagram was July 30, 2023, over 16 months ago. That seems to be a good indication of how much value IG brings to my life currently.
I downloaded my data–786 MB worth–then made a post today, announcing I would be nuking the account (more precisely, I used the metaphor of sending it into a black hole). Yes, I could just leave the account alone, “just in case” but I looked over the last few notifications and it appears that sexy bots with strange names are liking my posts. That makes me feel a bit icky. I’m pretty sure I do not need validation from sexy bots with strange names. I will not miss the site.
In a few days, I’ll go back and delete the account. I’m giving the handful of people I had “friended” there a little notice. Do I miss their posts? I mean, maybe a tiny bit, but not enough to keep me active and willing to post on a platform and through a company that sees genocide as a fair trade for engagement.
If I really want attention for my photos, there’s always Pixelfed or some other site or service. But I am finding a kind of unnameable pleasure in stripping away these sites and platforms that attract billions (of sexy bots). Maybe I’m regressing to my teen rebellion stage, pushing off the man, or the mainstream, or whatever. The mental headspace it clears up is nice, and the bonus is I no longer have that insufferable teen angst to go along with the rebellion. It’s just pure rebellion now, baby!
Here’s a photo of the sun-dappled Brunette River I took yesterday that you won’t find on Instagram:
As noted before, I find The Verge wildly inconsistent, so they won’t get my money. But here’s another reason:
I’m also delighted to say that subscribing to The Verge delivers a vastly improved ad experience — we’ll get rid of all the chumboxes and third-party programmatic ads, cut down the overall number of ad units, and only fill what’s left with high-quality ads directly sold by Vox Media. It will make the site faster, lighter, and more beautiful — more like the site we envisioned from the start, and something so many of you have asked us to deliver.
Nilay Patel, editor-in-chief
I mean, on the one hand, I admire that Nilay Patel could seriously write “vastly improved ad experience” and “high-quality ads” without his keyboard exploding, but here’s the thing: If I am paying you, the number of ads I want is zero. None! It’s how Ars Technica does it. They also don’t mention if paying gets you a track-free experience.
We’ll see how it goes.
UPDATE: Nilay Patel has a warning for people using adblock:
For the first time in a week, I convinced myself to run outdoors, in nature and stuff. It was just past noon by the time I started, but thanks to chilly low clouds, it still felt like early morning. I wore my running pants and while shorts might have been fine, I didn’t feel overdressed.
I opted to start the week gently on the river trail, and my first lap was surprisingly swift at 5:31/km. I quickly ran out of proverbial steam, falling to 5:41, then 5:44 before picking up the pace and eventually ending where I started at 5:31/km. My overall was 5:37/km, which is perfectly cromulent. My BPM was 150, which is also fine.
There were a few people on the trail, but not many dogs. I don’t think I saw any on the trail. I did see two Great blue herons, but they were hanging out on the river, not the trail.
Overall, a good start to the week. It was nice to run outside and not get rained on. I will savour it while it lasts.
Post-run: Another shot of the river, but with bonus heron hanging out.
Stats:
Run 905 Average pace: 5:37/km Training status: Maintaining Location: Brunette River Trail Start: 12:02 p.m. Distance: 5.03 km Time: 28:13 Weather: Low cloud Temp: 6-7°C Humidity: 79% Wind: light BPM: 150 Weight: 168.6 Total distance to date: 6,385 km Devices: Garmin Forerunner 255 Music, iPhone 12, AirPods (3rd generation) Shoes: HOKA Speedgoat 6 (155/280/435)
Apart from the weight gain, assorted technology failures, the U.S. election, strata-related nonsense and various existential threats, I guess it was nice that what little hair I have left on my head didn’t spontaneously burst into flames or something.
And the bacon was good.
I hope December will be better. I am making plans for it. Ho ho ho.
Where: Reifel Bird Sanctuary (Delta), Piper Spit, Burnaby Lake (Burnaby) Weather: Mostly cloudy, some drizzle, 5-7°C
The Outing
Reifel Bird Sanctuary
Mashland, with Rusty in the center, and a distant ship on the strait.
The last time I was at Reifel was September 21. It was still summer! Last time it got to 19C. It was 5C when we arrived this morning, “but feels like 2C” as per the weather app. I renewed my yearly membership, more than a month after it had expired. This is why you don’t renew early on memberships affected by weather.
Since my camera decided to shuffle off its electronic coil, Nic generously loaned me his old camera, a Sony A7iii. The biggest difference is, well, it’s bigger. It’s a full-frame camera, but worked similarly enough to mine that only minor adjustments were needed. I only needed five shots to actually learn how focus was set up.
After that, I had a few fuzzy shots that I blame myself on, but also a lot of very nice shots. I had trouble with birds walking or swimming by, with motion blue or just plain old blur in most shots, something I generally didn’t find with my camera. I will experiment, while pondering what to do with my old and currently mostly-dead camera.
We quickly found at Reifel that it is now All Birds Love You season, as towhees and chickadees were bopping all over the place and being downright friendly, hoping we were carrying caches of seed. I’m pretty sure we had mallards occasionally following us.
Reifel actually had a surplus of both sparrows and waterfowl, though some that we rarely see there, like common mergansers and cormorants, were far off in one of the sloughs. A guy mentioned a green heron in one of the inner waterways, but we never saw it. We did accidentally spook a couple of great blue herons, though. Whoops!
Most of the winter migrants have arrived, though a few, like the ring-necked ducks, are still relatively few in number. Shovellers are starting their annual takeover, showing up pretty much all over the sanctuary, while the Canad geese vacated the place entirely. Instead of their constant honks, we got the adorable peeps of wigeons.
Piper Spit
Piper Spit, looking east. Gray all the way down. And up.
After lunch, we went to Piper Spit, and despite a relatively low water level (the land mass by the pier is quite large now), there were no shorebirds to be seen. We did see lots of gulls, which had largely claimed the land (when they were not pecking away at the dead salmon), plus mallards. Lots and lots of mallards. There were geese here, but only a handful, assuming you had giant goose-holding hands. They were quiet.
The wood ducks put on a good show and I got some spiffy shots of them. My attempt at capturing gulls in flight was no better with Nic’s camera than with mine, so I’m going to chalk that up to me not taking the time to shoot these kinds of shots properly. I am a lazy photographer.
Also, with the weather cool and dreary, we often had the entire pier to ourselves. I felt special! And the camera worked the whole time, which also felt special!
In all, a good outing.
The Shots
Soon™
The Birds (and other critters). Rare, rarely-seen or recently returned birds highlighted in bold.
