Yeah, so, just in case the Bluesky post didn’t make it clear, I stole borrowed alluded to everything here.
Oddly enough, I don’t think I explicitly alluded to Jonathan Lethem’s “The Ecstasy of Influence”, although, I mean, c’mon, yeah… duh.
Continue reading “In Massinger’s Grove [LP]”† Assuming that I both remember and bother to do so1.
Here is a thing:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/parsecink/bad-romance-an-anthology-of-trash-couples
One story is a formal experiment of an in-joke for the crayon-eaters2 that accidentally morphed into an homage to… a(n — I’m assuming —) USENET post reprinted in the November 1998 issue of White Dwarf?
A recent Miss Manners column1 discussed the “appalling”2 practice of shelving books “backwards”, with the spines toward the wall. Despite the column begging the question of using books for decoration to begin with, I was pumping my fist – despite my default reaction to the stuffy old ‘rules’ of etiquette being a good ol’ Bert stare3, I’ll pick cherries like Pac-Man – as I read her excoriation of those who would shelve by color4, until I realized that:
(Alternatively, per Mencken, “[T]here is always a well-known solution to every human problem — neat, plausible, and wrong.”1)
Prompted by a couple of recent letters to the editor in the Washington Post, referring to Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics:
Continue reading ““You keep using that example. I do not think it means in what you think it means.””Asimov’s three laws of robotics are:
- A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
- A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
- A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
Asimov recognized and dealt with the challenges and dangers of AI that others are just now becoming aware of.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/13/brooks-robinson-orioles-mlb-speaker-day-game/
So, after scanning in a bunch of old Star Course materials for OCR training, I figured why not toss them up here, too?
(Broken into four parts because while I was originally going to just cram it all into one post, I figured that at least three of the bits were distinct enough to warrant their own things and the fourth was… not so much really, but by this point it was halfway in-between two of those bits, so why not just go for it? And totally not because of anything like this… And oh yeah, maybe in honor of our getting 4th? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) So!
(And just to clarify for those too lazy to click on the link to Post 4 above [or, well, an inch or two ago], or the “Read More” below – the event was great. The stream-of-consciousness-profanity is about, well… let’s just say that if you didn’t sign up for the event when it was first announced in the middle of 2019, you would have had no idea that it was held this past weekend.)
Continue reading “(RWC 001) 2020̶1: The AAR Itself&Proper (4th)”
So, I’m not planning on adding a bunch of pictures here eh fuckit there’ll be some pictures, because this AAR has taken way too long to finish already, because the Speed Rucker doesn’t seem to be available anymore, and because I’ve already got several in-depth ruck posts in the queue. That out of the way –
Wherein I go on and on about the formats of the Star Courses and Rucking World Championships, talk about how they’re the same, how they’re different, what I like or don’t like or simply prefer about each compared to the other, and – unless you’re super into that sort of thing – come off as a cross between Abe Simpson
and Jeff Albertson.
Just to be clear, the event itself was awesome, as’ve been all the GORUCK events I’ve done. (I’ve done somewhere between the median and the mean, I’d guesstimate.) Lots of fun, very nicely organized (even the parts that we initially thought were a bit iffy turned out to be actually quite solid) and a great – and tough – field. And, despite our occasional quibbles with particular pieces of gear, GORUCK makes very nice stuff – there’s a reason everyone in the family has a ton of it, from OG discontinued stuff like the Man Tie up to the latest pants and rucks.
I’ve also gotta give a special, specific shout-out to Cadre Mocha Mike – from chatting with him afterwards about differences between the Star Courses and the RWC, and the various considerations taken into account when planning the event, to how he went above and beyond the week afterwards, it was all a top-shelf class act, just amazing. (Seriously – he spent the weekend doing the event, then spent his birthday with his family, whom he hadn’t seen in a long time, and the very next day he’s reaching out to all the participants with the spreadsheet of official finishing times and all of the photos and videos he took.)
That said, the handling of this event by HQ – specifically whomever’s responsible for social media, publicity / promotion, and general coverage – was abysmal. Correction, would have been abysmal, if it – the handling of it – had in fact existed at all, in any form whatsoever.
… and, fittingly enough, 3 months late!
Overall mileage was down about two hundred and change from the year before (a big chunk of which was due to the week I spent in Phoenix coughing blood and fretting about a pulmonary embolism), but similar race plan as 2018 – focus on bigger, funner races mixed in with some “training runs” and sentimental favorites mixed in.
Continue reading “Running Recappening Redux AKA Part 3R for One-Nine the Gritty Reboot”
Don Norum 