Greater power

Which seems more powerful, to dodge Death, never letting it lay a glove on you and mocking it always just beyond its reach, or to let Death do its worst and shake it off three days later? Which has more promise?

Looking for little people

I'm sure there are people traveling to the Northern Cordillera of the Philippines right now (Yunnan would involve more surveillance and New Guinea more wicked insects) to find mushrooms, either to try them themselves or to sell to curious Americans. And quite a number who are finding similar-looking mushrooms and lacing them for sale to those curious Americans.

That particular hallucination is so specific... little humans running around, swimming in your drink, climbing the bookcase ...

We tend to see faces in things, so maybe there's something hardwired in the brain to reconstruct people-images, but these are supposed to be always small, and dynamic. If everyday experience weren't so devoid of traces left behind by little people, it would be fun to imagine these as invisible imps, but it's hard to write a story about characters that don't seem to do anything.

Archaeology of play

Some Sami stone circles were made by children, not priests.

The default explanation for things archeologists don't understand is that "it's religious."

Fortunately the Sami knew about them: "The local representative who accompanied Thomassen even showed him the place where his great-grandfather had made circles like these when he was a child."

I'd like to say "I told you so," and if I could remember when I posted about hard-to-classify artifacts, I would. Kids build too. I know I did. Their artifacts shouldn't last as long, being made of things children can carry, but accidents can preserve things.

Party platform

Running against Farage one finds a range of candidates, including Howling Laud Hope of The Official Monster Raving Loony Party. Count Binface et al are likely going to be ephemeral, so I will preserve the OMRLP's platform for posterity.

I like "Social Media will be taken down one day a week for a 'Remember when we used to talk' Day"

Doing the dishes

Some jobs we have to do over and over and over -- washing clothes, cooking, cleaning up afterwards, mowing the lawn, watering and weeding ... over and over.

It would be nice to have a "one and done" effort, where we didn't have to be so faithfully persistent. (Quite a few home improvement offerings cater to this desire.)

On the other hand, we're not so keen on "one and done" blessings: we like having blessings like our food supplied persistently.

What if..

we had a world without nuclear weapons? Donald Sensing has a picture. Or 12.

Old vulnerabilties surfacing

About 17 years ago I was designing the SCADA (PVSS II) control/monitoring of an alignment check system. It had taken a bit longer than it should for me to translate the programming jargon, but I got the hang of the paradigm after a while.

Word on the street was that this same software was used by the big boys for power generation and distribution, ditto water, etc. And that the security on the installations was laughable--once you got into the network you could monkey at will. It might be hard to cause damage unless you knew the details of the system. But if you coordinated an arson attack with a water outage... Something as naive as "clicking the power off" button could cause temporary problems, but editing the reaction scripts would cause harder-to-find issues.

This was a few years after 9/11, and one would have expected a certain heightened awareness of vulnerabilities. Perhaps there was, and the details were kept quiet while people tried to fix them. Or perhaps there was, and the cans were quietly kicked down the road.

I gather from the news yesterday that some vulnerabilities still exist--not least to denial of service attacks on such service infrastructure.

You can tell a friend had a big life

when you recognize less than a quarter of the faces in the crowded funeral reception line.

Ouch

Back in the early 70's a short book of humorous, sometimes ascerbic, religious poetry came our way. No, I have no memory of who the author was. I only recall a few fragments, one of which was:

Savior, like a shepherd lead us.
In Thy pastures fatly feed us.
We are Thine, do Thou defend us.
In Thy cause do not expend us.

Pilot verses

I'd not heard of them before, but the idea makes good sense: landmarks and directions set to verse to make it easier to memorize the way to pilot the ship.

Shakespeare it isn't -- doggerel, but with rhythm and rhyme enough to keep in your mind. "As you draw near to the Fogo land, you'll have fifteen fathoms in the sounding sand, -- From fifteen to eighteen, never more, and that you'll have close to the shore."

At the moment the linked site only has the one sample.

The site also has a collection of shanties and of sea songs. I assume these are slightly sanitized versions. Hard work, alcohol and female company are prominent. "The other mornin' I was walkin' by the river When I saw a young girl walkin' With her topsails all a-quiver" Several of the shanties are about the life and troubles of black sailors.

New roads

If you were assured that the journey were reversible -- you could hike back again when satisfied -- would you try that adventure? (after first running back to the car to get some extra food and a parka, of course)

The temperature yesterday made the possibility extra enticing. Yes, I'd go, even without a camera to prove things with later.

Lapham Peak is a kame, named after Increase Lapham who "made weather observations here and issued the first published national weather forecast". Lots of birds for Eldest Son, a butterfly garden -- a good day out in the air.

Learning through trials?

Maybe not the best paradigm.

I'm a lousy photographer

My wife has a much better eye for composition. She's been trying to teach me the basics.

Beyond the basics: I like this man's take on the profession.

The new normal

Milk tastes slightly harsh--more so the less fat content it has.

BBQ meat tastes pretty much the same as before--slightly drier, perhaps. But BBQ sauces might just as well be ketchup; there's little taste to them.

Generic Cheerios are made differently than brand name ones. Ask me how I can tell. I'd read that generics were made by the same factories as the brand names, but perhaps not.

Fruits seem to have an aftertaste now (apples particularly). No, it isn't pesticides; we don't use any in our garden and the raspberries taste off too. Maybe I'm finally tasting the natural anti-bug flavors the plants use.

Diving

Is this the way to cure it in soccer?

Speaking of performative injuries, the intersection of South Baldwin and Williamson streets is blocked off by protestors who need space to "mourn." They've managed to get the last and penultimate Concerts on the Square canceled too. For "mourning."

Pillar

Revelation 3:12: "He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write on him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name."

The three-fold naming caught my attention this morning. Jesus refers to his "new name"--presumably new to us, since we just have the human name of Savior. He sometimes refers to God the Father as "my God". So what is the relationship of the name of the new Jerusalem to the other two names?

The presence of the Holy Spirit, maybe?

Fuzziness

The videos that were posted immediately after the shooting were taken as proof that the Madison policeman murdered the man 5 of them were trying to arrest.

Perhaps my eyes are just not what they used to be, but I can't tell exactly what went on. It doesn't help that a car moves across the field of view for part of the time.

Madison police do not wear body-cams(*)

Madison police have a reputation for being more community-sensitive and better trained than most. It could be true; I haven't had enough interactions with police here and there to have any basis of comparison.

I don't care to render a judgment myself; not right now. I do not see what the accusers profess to see. Nor do I see evidence of innocence. I see blurriness. And therefore I harbor deep suspicions of those who claimed perfect clarity from the very beginning of the reporting. It is possible for someone to have lied even when what he says eventually proves correct. Consider Joseph McCarthy.

And I wonder who is having AI generate video recreations of the incident right now.

(*) Former mayor Soglin, famously known as The Red Mayor, wrote this:

Why Madison Police do not have body cameras:

Prior to 2016, real reason: cost of storage of data

Since 2017: stated reason, "Invasion of a citizens privacy."

Since 2017, real reasons:

1. It increases the city's liability not having information a body camera provides.

2. The police want it, therefore we say, "No."