2019 is the year that the movie Blade Runner was set in. That is all.

I love how brie, portioned and wrapped in plastic and saved in the fridge, will grow more mould across the newly exposed portions of cheese under the plastic.

​​​​​​​It's alive!

I ate too many grape leaves. I'm having an intense grape leaf craving lately. [Cover your ears, boys.] I'm ovulating and I have no idea if that's involved. [Ears uncovered.] Yeah, I know this is written word.

I'm writing this as I lie sideways on the bed in the period of time where I'm supposed to be sleeping but am nowhere near sleepy-ville yet. It's a place I visit a lot, sans all medicines and potions at the moment. Too much was too much for too long. The cat has passed out in a fuzzy black and white impossible-shaped pretzel. Good for him, my little Boo.

In a happy accident, I see all my lady friends this week. I managed to get booked pretty solid and I just noticed it's my Greatest Hits of gal pals. Pretty nice. Tonight was a little too cool for it, but I sat on the deck with my friends Kathi and Lana. Tomorrow is bracelet making and wine (mostly wine) with Natalie and Cassie, and so on and so forth. I don't get this much in a month sometimes. Whee!

I went to the Celtic Fest on Saturday and it was my first time. I don't know how I missed this all these years, but I'm thoroughly hooked. Men in kilts everywhere. Awwwww yeahhhhh. My guy wore one, too, as he is Scottish and his sister finally got him into one. He went formal-style for the parade, with dress shirt and suit jacket, and dayam does that look work for him. Too hot to maintain though, it was a blistering 80-something degrees with him in wool head to toe, so he switched to the lesser known traditional "What's Under The Kilt?" t-shirt. (Answers below).

Sunday was Arts Fest, and coincidentally a collegiate marching band competition across the way at the local high school stadium. That was incredibly awesome to stumble upon. More so even than the Arts Fest (I dare say). Unfortunately the heat was hammering me so hard I couldn't stay long. A little visiting afterwards and then to bed for the usual battle of the blankets, aka the alligator wrestling contest.

(These grape leaves have sticking power. Whew.)

Okay, rolling onto my back again. The cat grumbles every time I move. I feel like I'm married.

Where was I. Oh, would you like to know What Is Under The Kilt? At least according to USA Kilts?

1. Bagpipes
2. The Earth
3. My Celtic Pride
4. The Loch Ness Monster
5. Socks and Boots
6. MacNuggets
7. Freedom!

There you go. Curiosity satisfied? No? I took a peek. I saw #4.

music: America - "Horse With No Name"

mood: tired but not sleepy

d is doing regimens out of the Nike app on their phone; there's an enormous variety of plans from beginner to athelete, with some equipment or none, routines targeting any or multiple muscle groups or activities, and specific moves with video demos of each one. It's an impressive system, which costs nothing, and isn't demanding of personal data beyond an email address.

It almost makes me want to buy a pair of shoes just to say thanks.

I'm composing my own workouts based on routines from the Nike repertoire and my own desires, as some of my limitations are harder to avoid (like, no lateral knee strain -- I guess this is what braces are for?).

We graduated to this from the limits of a professionally created set of three workouts d had made for themself last year; we'd extended the routine as far as we could and needed more challenge. 

Which we did because we moved into a building that had a dedicated gym space.

We'd done 7 minute workout routines, as well as 100 burpee challenges, in prior years when we had the house, but they didn't really stick for long.

Now I've got a watch that nags me when I sit for too long, and says ping when I do enough exercise or move actively, so there's a little gamification which I already feel taking effect.  I get 3 minutes of "workout" when I climb the 9 flights of stairs from the basement.  I also get credit for walking  briskly on errands. It also tells me about my heart rate, which is resting around 60, and confirms that I have the occasional premature ventricular contraction (PVC), which is harmless.

We walk almost everywhere in this city, and when we don't have time to walk or the weather is ass, there's the TTC. The motorcycles are just getting dusty and I don't think I can justify keeping them. 

Rambling, I guess.

ETA --

Tomorrow is Toronto's big Climate Strike/March. We'll be starting at Queen's Park (provincial capital) and I am expecting it will be truly frigging epic in size. I dyed my hair and beard last night. A dark red with tints of blue. Not my eyebrows though. Christ no, I like my vision.

In shittier news -- Saturday the fash have promised to march up Church street right through the Village, which is not going to go well. Every queer organization has called up people to non-violently march in opposition and it will probably be at least 10-1 if not much higher. I'd be surprised if there wasn't just a human wall on Church street somewhere keeping them from getting farther than Alexander St.  Anyway, I'll be joining that party, too, though probably just wearing earplugs and holding a sign. We have plenty of black-bloc trained people who will engage to keep vulnerable folks safe if needed. 

One does not simply listen to music.  Sure, you can listen to a whole album at a time, old-school, or just throw everything into the shuffle blender, but the vicissitudes of statistics lead to things getting neglected.  In addition, one wants to listen to new stuff, and listen to it more often in order to become familiar with it. How to balance listening to neglected stuff with the need to listen to new stuff more often?

After various attempts that were eventually unsatisfying, i developed a Fibonacci-based approach; songs are added to a list according to how many times they've been played, and each list has a backoff value where a song isn't allowed to show up until it has been Fn days since it was last played. These lists are aggregated into a master list. Another list is created for songs above a minimum number of plays that have not been played for a number of days that is larger than the largest value from the previous lists. The value varies in an attempt to balance the amount of tracks in the latter list with those of the former aggregated list.

As it stands now, I have lists for tracks played up to 11 times, aggregated in the ‘lessthan12’ playlist, which itself is bound to the ’Not Recently Played’ playlist in ‘listen’. I recently ran through the entire playlist, so I am back to playing my entire catalog on shuffle, in order to allow the lists to repopulate.

Dana Falkenberg, 3, American Flight 77, The Pentagon. Her remains were never found.

My dad sent me YouTube videos about how superintelligent AI is going to destroy us or something, and how Elon Musk says we have to get off this planet if we're going to preserve humanity.  I sent the following in response:

I’m far less worried about superintelligent AI than about regular old AI, or as it should be called, Machine Learning, that’s used to disguise the human biases that went into creating and training it and thereby used to perpetuate systems of injustice around the world.  You can ask a person why they made a decision and they may answer, but a ML model is almost completely opaque once it’s been trained.

That’s what I’m worried about: Facebook and YouTube turning people into fascists through machine learning that optimizes engagement with a screen rather than empathy with their fellow humans.  

That’s the real problem of AI.  It’s not a hardware problem, it’s not a software problem, it’s a problem of politics; with business being allowed to set the agenda of what is right and normal.

As for Elon Musk — What if Tom Swift, but a megalomaniac?   Like Amazon guy Jeff Bezos, another one of the richest men in the world, who simply can’t fathom how he could possibly spend all his money — on a planet full of climate change, increasing social inequity, and the re-emergence of fascism, and decides to build rockets instead.  

Fuck ‘em.  

If you have power, you should use it to help those less fortunate.  Noblesse oblige — nobility obliges. "Noblesse oblige is a French expression used in English. It translates as "nobility obliges" and denotes the concept that nobility extends beyond mere entitlements and requires the person who holds such a status to fulfill social responsibilities.”

No one does anything alone, we all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, and if we’re so lucky we get a head start due to wealth or intelligence or race or gender or what country we’re born in, we owe those around us an outstretched hand to help them along. 

That’s the real strength of humanity.  

Not clever white boys who launch sports cars into space for a laugh.

Cheers!

Vince and I were driving home on Kelly Drive. He was driving, I was catching up on email on my phone. 

ME: Hey honey, John Hodgman has a new podcast.

VINCE: Mmhm.

ME: he's recapping and discussing "I, Claudius." 

VINCE: Surprise, surprise.

ME: Guess what it's called.

VINCE: (stops breathing)

ME: "I, Podibus."

VINCE: (Long sigh)

ME: Guess how it's spelled.

VINCE: GET OUT. 

~fin~

Sunday mornings we clean. d has taken on kitchen duties, while I do bathrooms, K sweeps thoroughly, then I damp mop. One or another of us will occasionally go around and dust something, or clean light switches, door jambs, handles, under the oven, whatever sticks out as needing attention. It's a ritual. With the number of users and size of our place, a week is about how long it takes for grime/scum to become visible and the cat hair to start drifting out from the corners. Of course, there's spot cleaning when a cat horks, and frequent counter wipedowns and cutting board swaps. But this level of effort and cleanliness works for us.

Sundays are also pickle inspection, and they're doing fine. I pulled out an XTRA MUSTARD and gave it to d to test, and they said "it's got a long way to go, but I can see where it's going."  I ate the rest: it's got a nice flavour on it but needs more bite. So that's a month of fermentation down.