random thoughts

Five random thoughts, July 31, 2025

In random order:

  • The “Liquid Glass” UI redesign being spread across all of Apple’s operating systems has pretty much confirmed in my mind that Apple’s best designers have either left the company or are being overruled by people who have no sense of design.
  • I’m not sure if I like having a Conservative prime minster who ran as a Liberal.
  • I did not have getting multiple injections into my abdomen this month on my bingo card (see: Stabbing the abs for more.)
  • I continue to be puzzled and occasionally flummoxed by the lack of awareness exhibited by so many people when in a public space.
  • Smartphones are a good thing, social media owned and operated by Big Tech is a very bad thing.

Canada Day random thoughts, 2025 edition

  • It could be worse.
  • It could also be better.
  • It’s very summer-like today, after the first week of summer was cool and a bit damp. A lot of people prefer the latter, even though we get it for about six months of the year.
  • There will probably be some fireworks going off later this evening.
  • The new sidewalks on our street are very bright in the sun.
  • I feel like more people cheat now than, say, ten years ago, possibly because more people are realizing they won’t get caught. This is not a good thing.
  • I have an itchy bug bite on my left leg. I have nothing in particular to help with this, except the power of my mind insisting it’s not really itchy at all.
  • I still love Bongo Cat. He is currently wearing a pineapple.
  • Apparently, Canadian patriotism is surging. A house a few blocks away is positively festooned with Canadian flags. I’m not sure how I feel about this, because nationalism generally leads to bad things.
  • I’ve seen reports that people are getting dumber. This feels right to me.
  • Am I getting dumber? My phone is often at 90% charge at the end of the day (even though it’s 4.5 years old). I think this is helping to preserve some brain cells.
  • When birding in Pitt Meadows, I went to check the temperature on my phone and it couldn’t pull the data in because of a very weak cell connection. It please me that such places exist, and you don’t even have to go too far to find them. Also, places where you can’t hear any traffic.
  • My leg is still itchy.

I never remember what SMH means

I know, I am typing this on a blog, which means I have the vast collected knowledge of the web available to me and even with Google flailing and AI slop overrunning everything, it’s still pretty easy to search and find out that SMH is short for Shake My Head (expressing mild disgust, disbelief).

But for whatever reason, my brain refuses to remember this, and I don’t want to search every time the term pops into my head, because it reminds me my brain can’t remember this specific abbreviation. I can remember LOL and IANAL (lol anal) and IDK and lots of others, but this is one that just never sticks.

But instead of wondering what it might mean, my brain always offers up the incorrect, unhelpful, and weird: Smell My Hand.

I want to say it still kind of works, but it really doesn’t. It’s just weird.

I am weird.

“Creep” has 1,143,126,864 views and 202,075 comments

At the time of writing this post, of course. Presumably, both numbers will continue to go up.

I saw a mention of the song on the interweb, so checked out the video again. The video is fine–I like the colour and lighting, and Thom Yorke looks appropriately weird. The song is one of those quiet-LOUD-quiet numbers that is predictable, but extremely well-executed. I can see why it has so many views.

But 202,075 comments. An average novel is around 80,000-100,000 words. Even if every comment was a single word, that’s more than double the word count of an average novel. That is a lot of words.

It makes me wonder how long it would take to read every comment. It makes me wonder if anyone has tried. And what they felt when they were done, assuming they were still conscious.

Also, here is the video in question:

Remember surprises?

I said this to Nic tonight in reference to him checking what people on eBird have reported seeing at a local park where we’re planning to do some birding.

The full question I posed was:

Remember surprises, before the internet?

It’s nice to be able to research things in advance, but I feel we’re losing something by constantly doing that and stripping away all surprise and mystery from…everything. Little things, big things, medium-sized things. Just look it up! No need to imagine, or wonder, just look it up, be as efficient as possible and leave nothing to chance.

I might be turning into a cranky old man, but really, I think I’m just kind of fed up with the way the world is. We’re losing our humanity in ways that we may never recover. But maybe we’re destined to be giant throbbing brains, anyway. How many quatloos would you bet on that?

The nice thing about trees

Trees don’t make you feel anxious or full of existential dread.

I mean, unless it’s stormy and one looks like it’s going to fall on you, which has admittedly happened to me.

But in general, trees don’t do that and I like that about them.

THIS POST IS COMPLETELY UNRELATED TO CURRENT WORLD EVENTS1Haha, naw. It’s totally related to it. But I am actually doing fine, here with my trees and nature and such..

Trite or profound? Maybe both.

I saw this, uncredited, on Mastodon. On the one hand, it’s kind of trite. On the other, I like the actual colour and composition of the photograph and agree with the sentiment. It seems so much of our world is built around competition and while competition is not bad in itself, it perhaps shapes too much of what we do in our society, and encourages a kind of selfishness that isolates us from each other.

Anyway, that’s my deep thought for the morning!

I like Mandarin oranges

We’ve gone through one box and are working on the second. They’re small, sweet and juicy. No seeds, no weirdness, what’s not to like?

Probably the best thing about December.

I haven’t tried any eggnog yet. I’m not sure how it will hold up. It’s kind of the anti-Mandarin orange, in a way.

JOMO

Joy Of Missing Out. I am totally into this. Or not into this, whichever is appropriate.

Sadly, I did not see any attribution to the concept or the illustration. Seen on Mastodon.