Month: November 2024

What Are You Looking Forwards To Next Year?

I think I might have had a thought about something that’d sparked my interest when I was trying to come next year.

I’m not really sure, to be perfectly honest. I’m kind of luxating in the fact that something I was worried was going to disrupt my holiday plans.

As I’ve said, I’m looking forward to attending the final Shmoocon. If I can get tickets.

Am I looking forward to the change in Administration in DC at the end of January? Mmmm….

Well, I didn’t vote for him, because I have serious questions about how things are going to work with the incredible Federal debt, and looming Social Security problems.

Things like Elon Musk’s tweetpost should inspire excitement, but it’s just not there.

I just can’t find the optimism Elon has. I still think things are about to get really, really, really bad, and it’s not primarily because of something the US has done; sorry Libertarian Institute folks.

So. What else might be interesting? I don’t know. There’s some interesting teams in the NFL, though there’s a disgusting uniformity among many of the teams. It’s nice to see that what Sean Payton’s doing in Denver looks to be finally catching on, but there’s so much else that’s just dull “West Coast Offense”/Cover-2 zone defense.

I am somewhat excited by the potential of some of what I’m doing work-wise, though I am a bit worried that what I’ve been tasked with might be overcome by events.

On the health side, I’m curious to see what’s going on with my health, but I don’t think I’m going to have any real answers until the middle of the summer.

I guess we’ll see. But it does feel like a long way off.

Things Get Better

This is one of the things that I really have been on lately. In fact, I was discussing it with someone this morning.

I think it was in relation to the reignited discussion of fluoridation in public water.

There might be some negative health effects from fluoridated water. I don’t know. I do know that public water supply fluoridation was something implemented during the twentieth century to fight tooth decay.

The measure served a good public health purpose in the 1950s and 1960s. If you lost your teeth, your only option was dentures.

While the number of TV ads for various pharmaceuticals has gone through the roof in the past twenty years, I’d like to see a line graph overlayed with the decline in the number of ads for denture cleaners and bonding agents.

Why?

The price has come down significantly. I do have a dental implant. It was a necessity due to problems from not having my wisdom teeth removed soon enough.

While the actual surgery to have the implant installed wasn’t fun, it’s been there for almost twenty years without a problem.

today, you can find someone who’ll do basically a full set of teeth for really not a lot of money. If one of the ceramic or composite teeth attached to the implant is damaged, you just replace the false tooth.

That sort of improvement was completely unthinkable not terribly long ago.

But, no, we’ve gotta keep putting fluoride in the water to, you know, keep ceramic teeth from decaying.

Things Get Better.

There’s so many aspects of life that are immeasurably better than they were not a long time ago.

Science builds atop what’s been discovered in the past. Things that once were very expensive become cheap due to ubiquity.

While medical advancements are the first thing that come to mind, it’s true in so many other areas of life.

In the vast majority of instances, the regulations from the past can just go by the wayside. And people won’t be worse off.

Part of this was prompted by thinking about watching the snowfall on the hill behind the Clinical Research Unit at Georgetown in, um, 2019? I was enjoying the warm radiator against my thighs as I waited to make sure the Tysabri infusion I’d just gotten wasn’t going to kill me.

The warmth of the radiator brought back memories of my childhood in Germany.

But you wouldn’t build a building with giant boilers to feed radiators for heating anymore. Hot water is dispensed fairly quickly from devices that only heat what’s needed. Indoor climes are regulated by small, efficient devices requiring a lot less fuel than the old boilers did.

I also probably wouldn’t build a house with a septic system if I could avoid it. Public sewers have had an incredible effect on public health.

Things Get Better.

Free-Write

There’s too much going on, but I’m not going to write about that publicly.

The SNL Digital Short last night was pretty damned good, but not for the reasons they intended.

My instant response was that I’d bet the writers voted without compunction for Officer Harris and Komisar Walz.

Also had this gem from Reason.

With the Internet, the scarcity argument for broadcast spectrum goes away. Why do we still have the FCC?

So nitpickers can report people to the cops.

Can you not find something better to do?

*checks NFL since the For(mer)skins lot on Thursday night*

I guess the Pittsburg-Baltimore game could be worth watching.

Falling towards the bird. Well, part of it, at least. I think I’ve pretty much gotten the major obstacle at work cleared, so I should try to enjoy myself some.

I know, I know, good luck with that.

Write About Begin Sixteen

Sixteen was a strange year for me. I would imagine that a lot of people are kind of settled in to the whole being-a-highschoolers thing.

Trying to think of the best way to tie all of these things into a bit of a bundle.

School

Sixteen saw me start my fourth-different school in four years. Trying to figure out how different districts’ curricula mapped was frustrating, but they managed to stitch it all together. I ended up being about a half a year ahead of the other people entering my class in Bad Newz. Because of that, I knew I was going to have a somewhat-strange senior year.

I started getting prepared for college applications. My first shot at the SAT wasn’t great, but good enough to get me into most state schools that might be of interest. My first test would have been mid-fall. I took it again in the spring, and saw something like a 90-point increase in my score. Most of that increase was on the math side.

Computers

i was still really enthralled with Linux. Various telnet talkers, Usenet, email. I’d gotten somewhat proficient with elm early in my use of email, but there was this program floating around that was much easier to use. It also allowed for easy NNTP access allowing me to read and write messages about various topics. I’d also gotten pretty adept at reassembling, then decoding binaries from various Usenet groups. Mix of warez and pr0n; I was sixteen, after all. I think I started doing things to network around the house. Mainly RS232/SLIP. I didn’t have the money for any hardware. I think I set up a few personal websites, and assisted with setting up email.

Cars

I was scouring around for one, but there was only so much money I could raise bagging groceries at the Commissary a few days a month. Much to my amazement, after I did something, my parents bought me a Jeep. I would go on to put something like 150,000 miles on that Jeep. 4.0 I-6. 5-speed. The first owner had been an Army diver, so it was kind of set up for exploring sandy environments.

Human Stuff

I had a lot of the typical sixteen-year-old stuff going on. Too-long/unkempt hair. Acne. Bad teeth. Being the mid-90s, I had more than my fair share of flannel. Kind of my typical outfit was jeans, a black T-Shirt, a flannel, and usually combat boots. I met my longest-friend at the new student orientation at school. Fellow Army brat, but his, and his parents’ path was completely different than mine. His dad was stationed at a different post, and they were living off-post near the school. While we’d go on to interact quite a bit junior and senior years, our friendship really became a thing after high school, after he’d gotten back from a not-so-good fit at a different college. I wasn’t playing any sports, really, but I’d started doing things like JROTC. Stag to various events on color guard. I do kind of remember dancing with a girl at the dance where we got our high school rings, “Ring Dance,” but really not much on the relationship front. Where I was was temporary. My dad was still on active duty, and I figured I’d be leaving for college where life would begin. So, in the meantime, listen to the radio, mess around with computers, and take care of my Golden Retriever buddy. Watch football, etc.

And that’s about enough for today.

Halftime

So, I’m halfway through this streak, and have been actually having a lot of trouble finding time, especially since I got back from Biloxi, to sit and write.

It’s not so much that I don’t feel like doing it, but because I’ve been so thoroughly-consumed with work that I don’t have time.

I would say that it’s a nice situation to be in, but I do wonder if my body is telling me to stop. Thankfully, it appears that all of my work might actually lead to a good open period over the holidays where I don’t actually have to do anything.

Can I bring myself to just relax?

I kinda doubt it.

But since the election, as busy as I’ve been with work, I’ve kind of been keeping news at an arm’s length. I did hear a good one today, where the guy from The Blaze expressed some very similar sentiments to mine.

I need to email Heaton welcoming him back to the Beltway Swamp. But, before I do that, I’m going to watch the Tyson fight.

Seems pretty much everybody wants to see him beat the everloving shit out of the guy. I have no idea who he is, but why not?

Nintendo should re-release his Punch-Out!

I wouldn’t last nearly as long as Tyson on that.

I almost called him “Iron Mike,” but that could also be Ditka. Does anyone have a better precedent than “Iron?”

Where You Spend Your Mondy

This is kind of a replacement for “Small Business Saturday,” which falls this year on the last day of the month, so the day of my wrap-up.

Honestly, probably the two big things for me lately have been food and recreation. Obviously we spent quite a bit on the trip to Biloxi recently. While I was able to pay a good part of it via points, we did end up having to spend some extra.

I’m trying to figure out what I might want to spend my money on locally, but I don’t really know. With the family wanting to do the potluck-style Thanksgiving, won’t be as much purchasing.

I’ve also been spending money on the house in Biloxi to keep that up. I need to figure out getting my mom’s stuff out of there, and back to Virginia.

Very, very long few days, and my body is not happy with me for overdoing things lately.

Thanksgiving Plans

These are coming a bit better into focus. My wife, and her family, are doing a multi-cook effort culminating with dinner here in NoVA. It’s fine with me; I don’t think there’s much for me to do.

*checks NFL Thanksgiving schedule*

Bears at Lions

Giants at Cowboys

Dolphins at Packers

What? Only the night game is cross-conference, and probably three very bad games — five not-very-good teams.

That’s fine I guess.

I think the folks coming through are taking my wife away to a hockey game or something, so I’ll probably have a couple of days to myself.

We’ll see how it goes.

Thankfully work actually might be somewhat calm through the holidays.

I can hope, at least. Can I figure out how to relax some?

Relax. I’m not sure I really remember how to do it. But I need to go do some work stuff now. Pfftt.

I had a topic for today, and had started plunking away at it. But I really don’t feel like finishing it.

First full day back at work. Progress made in places. But the big takeaway is that the overly-aggressive schedule for a rather big effort.

Just so much to do, and a lot of it is complicated by some decisions made against my recommendations previously.

I don’t like saying “see I told you,” but I did.

I’m bad about that, myself. I trade maintainability for familiarity.

Shouldn’t do that.

Otherwise, it’s still reaction to last week.

Things move forward…..

Veterans’ Day

I’ve been thinking about how I might want to address this one since the birthday dinner for my grandfather last weekend.

He was interwar Navy. My cousin, who was at the dinner, was also Navy. Along with his brother. My uncle, one of the people at the party, was Army Nat’l Guard (and retired from that after his final trip to Iraq). My father-in-law was career Navy. My dad was career Army. (His marker at ANC says “Vietnam” and “Persian Gulf,” even if he wasn’t boots-on-the-ground in either…)

So, lots of military alignment here.

I wonder how much realignment is going to be happening with the return of President Trump.

This isn’t directly-related to US military policy, but I do wonder if it’s a bit of a failure of Western Europe.

The US paid a not-insignificant amount of your defense bills, and your countries have turned to absolute garbage since the Soviet threat ended.

Seriously?

One of the school trips I really remember was going to the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, then Bergen-Belsen.

Can anyone ever really say “never again,” with pogroms happening in Amsterdam, and the perpetrators are being released?