Promiseland

[Fetian]

Dad has a doctor's appointment tomorrow for his leg, which on the one hand good, and on the other that very likely means it's gotten bad enough he can't ignore it anymore

[Fetian]

You might not notice it in your peer group, when you are not their age, but my daughter showed me that many 20-30yr olds are switching to dumb phones, are cancelling their Facebook/tiktok/twitter accounts and are discovering libraries and printed books. As a conscious decision. Not all of them, but quite a lot and it's growing.

1/3

They are not anti-technology. They have gaming PCs and quite some of them are picking up software development, 3D printing etc. But they have recognised how mobile devices are sucking up their time, energy and attention span. They also have lost trust in social media and are aware that every move is being analysed. In a world that needs us all to move around with open eyes and ears because we have real world problems to solve. I am learning from them, not the other way round. Good!

2/3

It's not a coordinated movement. It's leaderless (for now, and I hope it stays that way) and very diverse. More a set of shared principles and desires that is continuously evolving in many directions. Mistakes are made. Discussed. Typically in person (and sober, alcohol consumption is not "cool" anymore Oh, and saying "I asked ChatGPT" will not go over well

3/3

-jwildeboer

 
Interesting if true. Notably, one wouldn't be able to really verify this from a position on the internet -- the people who you run into are going to be the people not doing this, by and large.

[Fetian]

So today Oz started yelling at me at around six o'clock (she wanted food but not her food) and wouldn't let me sleep uhhhhh the rest of the morning. Eventually it was time to get her her pill, so I did that and then I hung out online for a while and did some Japanese review. At 4:30-ish I got up to go make some experimental mochi in the kitchen -- one experiment was splitting the ingredients so I could make two different kinds and wouldn't end up with 20 mochi, this kind of worked. Another experiment was folding caramel syrup into the mochi while I rolled it into little mochi balls, and this had a very subtle effect that I liked but want to either make more pronounced or incorporate into a different experiment. And the third was putting matcha powder in with the other dry ingredients before making the dough, which did not work. I'm not sure if the dough didn't get cooked enough (because I was splitting the dough I was also messing with cooking times), or if the inclusion of the powder threw ratios off, or some other thing. But sometimes experiments fail, that's what makes them experiments

I want to get a food syringe so I can try injecting fillings into the mochi balls, I think that could turn out well. I also want to make a matcha-cream filled mochi topped with whipped cream, and I want to make a cocoa flavoured mochi with a jam filling. I also still have several other experimental ingredients to play with, though I only have enough rice flour for one more batch (I think.) But ash has offered to get me a big bag of it the next time he's at the asian market, so that's nice

We had pizza for dinner, and ash and I watched the second Taskmaster New Year's Treat, and then we played some more RE3. I'm really enjoying it, despite feeling like it's not guiding me to my goals well enough. But I'm intrigued by Jill's motivations (and to find out what they actually are), everything so far is pretty navigable, and I'm delighted by the voice acting. The Nemesis has so far not given me too much trouble, but has been very effective in driving me out of an area and giving me a sense of urgency. (I have not opted to fight him at all, yet)

Since ash went to bed, I have been watching videos and playing Chef Life. I have also been updating my computer again and it is again taking a concerningly long time. There's been some oddnesses with my computer of late and I'm starting to worry the SDD is failing. Very Important Things are backed up to dropbox, so I'm not terribly worried about losing data, but I am worried about losing computer because I really can't afford to replace it. Touch wood it's actually nothing (and just in case I should go through and make sure that everything I want kept safe is actually safe)

Last night I started reading I'm Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom, by Jason Pargin, and it is very Jason Parginy (he is the John Dies at the End series author, if anyone is familiar; he's also the former executive editor of Cracked)

Alright, it is time to pill the Oz again, so I'm going to go do that and then get ready for bed.

[Fetian]

I know this is rich coming from a Stephen King fan but I don't think books need to be 1400 pages long

[Fetian]

(I looked it up and the unabridged director's cut of The Stand is only 1,152 pages so like, I'm right actually)

[Fetian]

Having a pretty good day despite being up pretty late and not getting enough sleep! I left the computer updating while I slept, and when I woke up it was waiting for me to confirm the installation, and that finished up in a couple seconds. I was of course nervous that on restarting the computer it wouldn't boot up again, but no new issues here. The long update was something about changes to the compiling languages, which is always a big one

I hung out for a bit, did some more Japanese review (I now need to reread chapter 7 to refresh myself on what's in there, before I can continue with my workbook pages), and then I turned the computer off to lay in bed for a while. I was considering napping for a couple hours but instead I ended up reading some more, and then I got up to get some lunch (leftover christmas ham)

Oz was doing poorly for a couple days, but is doing very well, now. I need to get her into the vet soon to get her thyroid levels checked, because I think she needs her medicine upped a little.

The holidays and some other needs made schedules weird for a couple weeks, so I have not had the house to myself in a while. It's very nice to have that again and I'm looking forward to getting back into something like a routine

[Fetian]

My problem with very long books is less a 'big books scary' issue and more that I just cannot read a book that length in the three weeks the library gives me to do so, and then that means that there will be a period in the middle where I can't continue it because I have to wait for it to be my turn with the book again, which then means that I will have switched my attention to something else. I am not a fast reader and these days I also don't have much reading endurance

But it is also that the longer a book is the higher my chances of putting it down partway through and never picking it up again, you know, because of my brain thing.

[Fetian]

But also like, movies do not need to be four hours long and books do not need to be 1400 pages long. Just make it a series

[Fetian]

People desperately need to get more comfortable with being uncomfortable and they need to get more comfortable with being bored

[Fetian]

When I thought to myself "I have got to stop going to bed at 4 AM" I did not mean that I should start going to bed at 5 AM