- After three days of non-use, my AirPods have died a mysterious death and will not charge, pair or play. This has forced me to go back to wired earbuds and it makes me realize how nice it was to not have to untangle the spaghetti of wires every time I listened to music. I will probably look for an alternative for now, rather than paying what would likely be a ludicrous repair bill from Apple.
- We had a more traditional Vancouver snow this week. It started out like recent years, with it staying cold and several days of snow piling up. Then it warmed up past freezing and started raining. Fortunately there was a gap between the snow and rain, so we have not seen a slushpocalypse. Also, the rain stopped and the snow is just melting on its own. Yay.
- The Lego Movie 2 was all right, but not as good as the original. Several of the new songs are catchy, but “Everything is Awesome” is still the one that got stuck in my head after.
- Nic did not want to watch Close Encounters of the Third Kind, despite never having seen it. He is now DEAD to me. Or mostly dead.
- It seems like people have mostly and finally stopped quoting from Monty Python now. I’ve watched some of the original episodes on Netflix recently (Nic will watch those) and it’s very stream of conscious, clever, funny, but also uneven, with some sketches not really going anywhere.
- Speaking of watching things on Netflix with Nic, the Star Trek animated series is not bad at all, but the animation is terrible. Too bad there isn’t money in redoing the episodes with modern (good) animation, while keeping the original voice work and music.
- Let’s keep talking about Netflix. Jaws just turned up and I must watch it again. Nic also won’t watch this because he doesn’t like movies about sharks eating people or something. I loved sharks as a kid (after seeing Jaws). I would draw sharks all the time. And dinosaurs. And roller coasters. But never all three at once (which I would totally do now).
- I broke my rule of not snacking in the evening tonight and feel bad. And full.
- I have been weirdly and correctly predicting little things lately, like I’m a low wattage psychic.
- I have actually started working on Road Closed again. One might say Road Opened, ho ho.
- Somehow my iTunes folder has bloated to around 50 GB. That is a lot of “onion on the belt” (old guy) pop music.
- As always, I like lists
random thoughts
Things I may or may not believe in, 2019 edition
Who really knows?
- God: Maybe?
- Bigfoot: Seems plausible, but probably not
- Loch Ness Monster: Got to say no here. We’d have found some tangible evidence by now.
- UFOs: By definition, these exist, because people do see objects flying in the sky that can’t be identified. I’ve seen them, though they were probably meteors or distant planes, rather than spaceships piloted by grey-skinned aliens.
- The innate goodness of people: Sometimes
- The soul: Yes, I think there is some part of us that exists outside of the physical body. There is some scientific evidence to suggest this. Think of it as being a kind of energy that persists after the body has kicked off.
- Ghosts: Although I can’t say they’d exist as the traditional ghosts we think of in the western world, I can see them being some form of the soul (see above). So…maybe!
- Aliens: Absolutely. It seems silly (and arrogant) to think the only life in the universe could exist on one planet. Ancient Aliens? Not so much.
- Alien abductions: Maybe? There is some physical evidence and I believe a lot of alleged victims are sincere, but the mind is a strange place and isn’t always trustworthy.
- Reincarnation: Maybe. Again, this has some evidence behind it.
- The Bermuda Triangle: No. Ships and planes crash or vanish in equal numbers all over the world’s oceans.
- Fate or destiny: No.
- Global warming: I’m not a right wing politician who rejects science and logic, so yes.
- World peace: Maybe, eventually. Odds seem low right now, but the optimist in me hasn’t been completely snuffed out.
Once more into the late night
Well, it’s late again and I was so tired after work (for seemingly mysterious reasons) that I ended up taking a nap at 9 p.m. for an hour or so. Now I am thinking less about writing and more about how nice that nap was.
Speaking of sleeping, I remember–to a degree–a sequence of dreams I’ve had over the last few nights. One was neat. I could fly. This happens rarely in dreams. In this particular flying dream it seemed not only could I fly, but that it was almost mundane to do so, no different really than flying.
But I was still the only one that could do it.
Flying would be very convenient. I could fly to work way faster than the SkyTrain gets me there, and I’d never have to be delayed by medical emergencies (which happened today–I even saw the person trundled into the ambulance on a stretcher. He looked young, appeared to be either sleeping or resting peacefully [but presumably not resting in peace] and had a blanket pulled up to his chest. I couldn’t determine what had happened, and details of such things never get released, so it will be a mystery for the ages). I would be at possible risk of lightning strikes during storms, though. And I’d always be paranoid about flying into power lines. Still, I’d accept the risks in exchange for never having a fare gate refuse to accept the tap of my Compass card.
The other series of dreams included me thinking about or looking over computers, including NUCs. I also did other everyday-type things. When I woke up, I wondered why my unconscious mind would construct a bunch of utterly banal activities for my dreams. If I want to sweep the floor or plan a grocery list, I can do that when I’m awake. Dreaming is for flying and other super powers. Take note, brain!
And now to see what said brain has in store for tonight.
In before midnight
I kind of forgot to write something today, so here it is with minutes to spare.
Look both ways before crossing the street.
And…uh…impeach Trump!
Things I miss, Part 27
- My beard. I sort of have a stubbly version going right now, because when it’s really short the white doesn’t stand out. The reason I don’t have a full beard is because it would be white and I don’t fancy the “distinguished gentleman” look. Yes, I’ve thought of growing a beard and dying it. I think it would be weird, but I’m more open to weird these days.
- 10 cent candy bars. This is the lowest price I can remember, circa 1970 when I was six or seven years old. This is not a bad thing, though, because if they were still 10 cents apiece, I would weigh 300 pounds.
- A full head of hair. I shaved my head seven years ago, and I’ve made peace with never having a proper head of hair again, but I still kind of miss having hair on my head.
- That section of my National Novel Writing Month novel that got eaten when Scrivener didn’t sync properly. My fault, I’m sure, but I’ve never experienced that “afraid to lose stuff” with software before and it is always in the back of my mind now when I use Scrivener.
- My original copy of The Ever-continuing Saga of the Round Balls comic I wrote back around 1984 or so. I did 11 issues of varying length and at some point tragically lost them, probably left in a box under the stairs of a townhouse I used to live in.
- Not completing my swimming lessons in 2007. Technically I can swim, but it’s more accurate to describe it as “not drowning.” Living on the coast it always seemed like a good skill to have. But water kind of terrifies me. Probably because I can’t swim.
- That childhood sense of time, where the summer stretched on forever. Now it goes by in a blink. There’s actual science behind this.
- World peace.
Still technically writing every day
I have not found my groove yet early in this new year when it comes to writing, but I am writing something every day, as I had vowed to do. So yay for sticking to it for nearly a whole week so far! Only 51 more to go.
Part of the problem is my mind feels cluttered by negative thingamabobs, mainly but not exclusively related to a growing professional dissatisfaction. Maybe all those years of not working in a field I am passionate about is finally having an effect. I’m not saying there is something I am passionate about–clearly I struggle with writing, no matter how many books I read on the subject, and how diligently I follow all the little tricks and things to keep you going–but I can’t help but think there might be something I’d be generally more satisfied in doing in my work life.
But every time I take one of those “This is the work you SHOULD be doing!” tests, the results are always somewhat dubious. So I’m not sure how to go about investigating a possible career side-step. I’m also aware that I’m not exactly a 20-something that can freely experiment with a bunch of different jobs to see what sticks (or maybe I could, who knows?)
Anyway, the important thing is I wrote something today and maybe I’ll hit the treadmill again tomorrow. Also, only two more months until we are back on Daylight Saving Time, hooray. All right, this concluding paragraph was a little random. Maybe I accidentally lapsed into free writing. There are worse things that could happen. Like scurvy or the return of parachute pants.
Rain today
It rained today, the first rain we’ve had this month during daylight hours (we had one other brief shower overnight). It took 25 days to arrive, which is impressive, but in a somewhat depressing way, less impressive than it once was because dry summers are no longer uncommon.
The rain is good because it helps reduce the likelihood of the tinder-dry forests instantly going up in flames, it helps to douse the smoke drifting down from all the current forest fires already raging due to the tinder-dry aforementioned, and it may slightly revive the very very brown grass seen everywhere.
As I am the lucky recipient of a return of the cold I had a few weeks ago, I probably wouldn’t have run, anyway, but even that turned out to be okay–I enjoyed the indulgence of a true day off, where I shrugged off not completing my activity rings, enjoyed some comfort food, and bought a couple of Frisbees. Er, flying discs.
The weather appear much the same tomorrow, but if I’m up to it, I may try a short, soggy run. And like it!
Three abilities that would be handy or maybe kind of dumb
I’ve always meant to do a best/worst super power list. Consider this the B version of that. These are abilities that might be interesting to have. Or not.
- the ability to draw whatever I picture in my mind, exactly as I want it to appear. Basically, to draw magic, instead of stick men and art that looks like, “Dude, you should practice more. A lot more. Like, for years and years lol.” I’d impress a few people, but I wonder how it would affect how I see things, knowing I could later capture them just how I wanted. Would I become indifferent to the ability? Find clever uses for it? See it is just being a practical thing, albeit rather unique?
- the ability to zoom in with my eyeballs. I can think of many practical (and a few prurient) uses for this, with no real downside, apart from the occasional “I didn’t mean to look at that” moment. It would be like having a permanent set of binoculars with me, and while I don’t often wish I actually did always have a set of binoculars with me, it very mildly irritates me when I don’t and I want to make out something in the distance and can’t.
- the ability to touch type. A boy can dream. Maybe if I typed faster my hands would be gnarled claws by now and I’ve actually saved them by typing slower using my refined hunt and peck method. Yes, that’s it, I’m sure.
I refuse to sink (to using logic, apparently)
This was pointed out to me yesterday–a lot of people have tattoos that bear the image of an anchor with the accompanying text “Refuse to sink” to some variation of the same.
Now, think about this while looking at a sample:
“Refuse to sink” is obviously meant as an affirmative phrase, so hooray for that. Affirmative phrases are good!
What is an anchor’s primary function? To anchor a water-going vessel–you know, a boat or ship. Perhaps a very fancy floating log. How does the anchor perform this function? By sinking to the bottom of the body of water and dragging/getting stuck in the muck/rocks along the bottom.
An anchor’s purpose is to sink. If an anchor did the opposite–float–it would be completely useless.
You see where this is going.
This is like the people using literally to mean figuratively.
“I literally just walked a million miles to get here.”
A “refuse to sink” anchor is as logical as a “refuse to fly” airplane. Perhaps the airplane secretly wants to be a truck. I don’t know. Who am I to judge? But really, this is kind of silly. I’m just wondering how this expression–which perhaps would be better-accompanied by an image of a buoy–becamse so popular, especially as a hard-to-remove tattoo.
The most generous take I have for now is people are weird.
My beard is like a horror movie
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.
Swimming poo(l)
Today I found out what happens when poo (officially “fecal matter”) is found in a public swimming pool.
They close the pool.
This makes sense, of course. Who wants to swim with poo? After the poo is fished out, the staff must conduct a sweep of the pool using their poo-meters or whatnot to make sure the water is fit for swimming. Thid can take awhile as public pools tend to be large.
This happened at the Canada Games Pool, and while it didn’t inconvenience me–I was there to use an elliptical trainer–the closure of both the main pool and the large kids pool meant that anyone who wanted to get wet had to:
- use the swirl pool, which is not really the same thing
- sit in the sauna and sweat profusely, which is definitely not the same thing
- make do in the very small kiddie pool, which is really just a shallow wading pool
The swirl pool and kiddie pool were both more crowded than I’ve ever seen them. I felt bad for everyone. And sweaty. Because of the elliptical.
I started thinking about why or how someone would poo in a public pool and then stopped. I think I made the right choice.
In their pocket
I got an email yesterday from Pocket, the service that lets you save stories on the web to read later (various browsers and other apps do the same thing but I glommed onto Pocket, in part because it was bought by Mozilla and integrated directly into Firefox).
Email from Pocket is not unusual–I get several per week with recommended and sponsored stories. This one was different, though (and yes, it included the little rocket because that’s become a strange and slightly annoying trend in email subject lines over the past few years):
Stan, you made the Top 5% of readers in Pocket this year!
It goes on to elaborate a little:
You’re a top reader in Pocket for 2017, and you should be proud! Not only did you make it into the top 5%, you’ve also exercised your brain and undoubtedly learned a ton in the process.
I just find this weird. There are about five hundred billion people on the internet, so how did I manage to get in the top 5% of Pocket users? My first thought is that Pocket is drastically unpopular and any moderate use by anyone would put them in the top 5%. This is also my second and third thought because all other possibilities seem so much less likely. But perhaps most people only use Pocket occasionally because they read a story right when they find it, rather than holding off until later. Maybe we live in a culture of instant rather than delayed gratification and I’m an outlier.
Maybe this would all change if Pocket featured Facebook integration (I would then hate it forever and plunge into the bottom 5%).
Anyway, I suppose it’s nice but mostly still weird that I’m in the top 5% of anything on the internet. Go me!