Non-Tech

The trip from Cleveland to Indianapolis was pleasantly uneventful until about an hour outside of Indianapolis when we ran into a backup caused by an accident. It must have been a big one, because as the delay approached an hour and people were starting to get out of their cars, Ashley found a news brief stating that I-70 West was completely closed and the estimate for opening was another 2 hours!We started noticing a few cars riding the shoulder. After wondering where they thought they were going, we, too, joined them and exited the highway. A convoy of traffic plowed down an “Unknown Road” (Google’s terminology) at break-neck speeds (no speed limit signs were posted). With farms on both sides, this road was not big enough for two lanes of traffic, but we managed when we passed a few trucks going the opposite way. In the end we lost about 30 minutes and made it to the hotel just before 6:00 PM. ...

Terrified of Clowns? We got up at 5:30 AM and were on the road to Detroit before 6:30 AM. We needed to get to Screamer’s Costumes before they opened, so we could meet David Howard Thornton (Art the Clown) from the Terrifier film series. We arrived just before 9:00 AM, and it was good that we did. There were probably 200 people in line in front of us by then. We finally got to meet him and Amelie McLain (the Little Pale Girl) just before 1:00 PM. It was a long day of standing in line, but it was made tolerable by a few cosplayers who entertained the crowd and took photos. It was also a great day weather-wise: sunny and 80 degrees. Luckily the line was outdoors but under an overhang that prevented us from standing in the sun for hours. ...

I don’t buy this theory that simply writing things down somehow reduces stress. All it means is that those things are now on a piece of paper or some kind of digital list, usually in our pocket at all hours of the day, mocking us for not being able to finish them. Maybe instead of optimizing our means of capturing ideas, we need to optimize our brain’s spam filter. Good ideas and important reminders will rise to the top, and if we think about them once we’ll think about them again. Matt Wood - The Important Stuff Will Come Back ...

The First Symptoms In July 2022, I was on day two of a weekend party at the lake about an hour from home. We had lodging accommodations, so I’d been drinking. Not to the point of inebriation, but enough that I was glad I didn’t have to drive all the way home. I’d spent the previous evening drinking beer and the entire day drinking Corona Seltzers. I had probably 9 seltzers in as many hours. Again, not inebriated (not even buzzed), but I’d had nothing else to drink all day. The weather went from stifling hot overcast with no moving air to sunny and very windy all day long. ...

I’m no bibliophile, but I’ve read a lot of books and recently while discussing the “book was better” trope of horror movies, we talked about how it is pretty common knowledge that Stephen King hated Stanley Kubrick’s take on his story of “The Shining”. Not because it was better, but because Kubrick fundamentally changed the story. I was asked if I’d ever heard about Stephen King being upset over other screen-versions of his books, and I admitted that I don’t know. I’ve read a lot of Stephen King, but not everything. It’s rare that the movie duplicates the flow of the book, and in some cases there are elements of a book that just do not translate to film and have to be either forced via creative effects and bad CGI or eliminated altogether. ...

https://stirfriedrandom-blog.tumblr.com/post/686444288015532032/i-just-had-one-of-them-40-hour-days-and-now-my https://stirfriedrandom-blog.tumblr.com/post/679982407036862464/im-in-this-picture-and-i-dont-like-it https://stirfriedrandom-blog.tumblr.com/post/689129746251071488

I’ve taken a keen interest in note-taking in general and recently I’ve been obsessed with how other people do it. I’ve always taken a keen interest in note-taking in general, and recently I’ve been obsessed with how other people do it. There tends to be a push toward avoiding information silos while at the same time making your content available or at least putting it online where it can be found, (even if you specifically aren’t writing for mass consumption). ...

Today I am 50. This is one of those big birthdays. Being a technical-minded person and realizing there have been a lot of changes in the past year, I decided I needed to document these changes in a proper changelog: Notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. The format is based on Keep a Changelog, and this project adheres to Your Version Number Chuck v5.0 – 2019-08-31 Chuck v5.0 debuts the first version in over 15 years wherein all diagnostic tests have passed without a margin of error. Several changes have been implemented in an effort to improve stability and reduce wear and tear. Increased overall CPU speed by one year (linear) and overall memory has been given an upgrade Fixed bug to remove the embarrassment of exposed chassis to the sun, water, air, and sand Added ...

Yesterday morning I achieved the century mark in weight loss. After stalling at 90-something pounds down since the beginning of the year, yesterday I officially lost 100 pounds! I said that when I saw 234 on the scale I would take a picture and post in on Facebook and make a big deal out of it. Well here’s the picture. There has yet to be a Facebook post. Or a big deal. ...

I have had exactly one drink in the last three months since starting my liver-healthy diet. I had an especially bad day yesterday. Not really bad in the grand scheme of things, but bad in my own head. Too many unplanned things happened in too quick succession which left me feeling under attack and over-whelmed. A few hours later things looked much better and I was able to process everything. ...