When the race starts at the Salt & Pepper 500, they blast “What’s New Pussycat” and leave it on repeat until a winner is crowned.

That is wild.

Well there’s another sensor to add to my wish list!

Although, we have a lot of HVAC flow into the bedroom so maybe the difference wouldn’t be huge.

One foot in each world here!

I still have my tech job (embedded systems) and in the next few days I am literally going to be building a chicken coop and finishing a filter upgrade on my pond.

I’ve referred to this meme several times in the past few months to describe myself, lol.

I will do that! It might be a while, who knows.

Do you have anything specific you have started, or have started eyeing up?

Yeah!

I have lamented in comments before that it seems like society treats technology and “success” as things that mean you don’t have to put in any effort to do things or learn things.

Admittedly, I’m an engineer and enjoy learning about the world and creating things starting with the basic building blocks, so I probably enjoy the learning and doing more than most. But I also recognize how engaging with the world around us is good for us, and my experiences keep reinforcing that.

Some parts of it, especially my pond, are an area where I’ve done a ton of DIY and learning and designing from first principles or close to it, and where other hobbyists often need help. So I’ve taken photos along the way and have pondered making videos at simmer point.

That might actually happen, but my number of projects in flight right now is kind of ridiculous, lol.

I’m in the best shape I’ve been in about 2 decades, and you know what my hobbies have been since spring of last year?

Amateur farmer, construction worker, and landscaper. And I guess mechanic too, to a lesser extent.

I live in a pretty standard suburban US neighborhood of single family homes, but my little fenced-in back yard is an active construction zone rather than a patch of grass.

My oasis is coming along pretty well. I can’t wait to share it with those around me once it’s more presentable.

If AI hasn’t actually, really, been here for even a single fiscal year then it explains away everything. Suddenly the fact that it’s made zero impact on productivity, that no one is making any profit on it, all of that becomes justified. “It’s still early.”

I think you’ve nailed it.

I clearly remember 2023 being the year where AI and ChatGPT hit the mainstream. Looking back, nvidia’s stock price had already doubled in the first half of 2023.

On one hand, fuck that guy and what he’s trying to do to the world.

On the other hand, he’s saying the CEOs are lazy and want to look smart. Can’t argue with that point, even if it’s a small piece of a larger stream of bullshit.

Thank goodness that isn’t their default state. First officer Jean-Luc T. Lincoln over there world be incapable of leaving any women (or men) for the restv of us.

Sounds like her issue is their otherness, not their medical history.

Racists and xenophobes are capable of believing some really stupid, easily disproven shit.

I love being able to post this yet again:

I have a lifetime Plex pass I got during a big sale like a decade ago, at 1/10 the price they are raising it to. I haven’t used it in about 6 months and never plan to even log into it again. Jellyfin 4 life!

I mean, I also have a whole bunch of windows keys from old MSDN accounts and stuff, but I am sure as shit not going to install Windows on my machines just because I can!

Ah, well thanks for the correction! That number just attached to the wrong variable in my brain I guess.

It should be minimum wage plus standard mileage cost at minimum, perhaps. In the US the IRS rate is 72.5 cents per mile right now, so if you figure that in for the 19 mile trip that’s over $13 just to break even.

The world’s best troll will be when this project gains a critical mass of publicity and Obama himself agrees to play the role of trump. Then several voice coaches would volunteer to help Obama perfectly reproduce Trump’s slurred speeches and memorable lines.

Or maybe it goes in the opposite direction, where he emphasizes his own trademark mannerisms in order to erase any similarity to Trump. He’d be wearing a tan suit, a blue tie, and be all "Look. Uhhh… Nothing bad… can happen! It uh, it can only good happen. But with Tylenol, don’t take it. Don’t take it!”

I think the answer to the question she asks is that an unholy alliance of focus groups, market analysts, and accountants have calculated that the Path to Most Money ™ goes over in the opposite direction, away from the fun stuff.

I’m sure there’s usually good low budget feature-length stuff out there being made, but in today’s media landscape it’s up to the viewer to find interesting and unique content. It isn’t going to be blasted into the faces of all the passive viewers like Avengers 37 will be.

I think his internal answer is “it doesn’t matter” but the narcissism gives him just enough energy to continue to gaslight, obstruct, and project to keep the attention flowing.

1980s: Please do not use drugs. They seem great at first but you don’t want to get hooked.

2020s: Please DO use the AIs. They seem like shit at first, but you DO want to get hooked because we have about a trillion dollars in new mortgages to keep up with.

Another tech headline, another thing that would have sounded pretty cool 20-30 years ago but today sounds like an absolute nightmare to stay FAR away from. And this one more than most!

At this point I’m just trying to enjoy what I can in my immediate surroundings. When I am outside tending to my critters, I often wonder if today will be the day the sky is filled with a blinding light from the south then a very chaotic and consequential minute or two after that.

But deep down that is probably a fantasy. The world is not that exciting. Instead we get to slowly watch how many people the billionaires can starve as long as we still have a working internet.