Good trouble. This is the answer.

And good books, we’re not alone out here.

I just finished One Day, Everyone Will Always Have Been Against This by Omar El Akkad. Not just about Gaza and the collateral damage of empires, but also about the tiny manipulations we’re all subjected to that make us feel alone.

Great reading.

Note: the link is to the Chicago Review of Books.

Off and on since the late 90s. Mostly observational, stray thoughts, ideas for designs, or writing. Intense emotional moments are often channelled into my writing.

It was The Corporation for me. Then, I discovered Adam Curtis. Smartest Guys in the Room, some Michael Moore stuff, then I really started taking a look at War docs with Smedley Butler and Dalton Trumbo and Charlie Chaplin shouting at me from the 1930s and 40s. Errol Morris kicked ass in the Fog of War, John Pilger kicked ass in Occupation 101, and BBC kicked ass with the Death of Yugoslavia.

This was 20 or 25 years ago. All this seems trite by comparison to where we are now.

Anti-hero: the protagonist whose methods, while effective, are not openly supported or celebrated because they fly in the face of “norms.”

While I agree with your analysis on Holden. Reluctant hero, to be sure. He sure did screw over Earth and Mars on a fairly regular basis to make his points stick. He disobeyed orders and protected a Belter ship, which got him bounced from the Navy. He declined promotion so he could keep shagging the pilot of the Cant. He went alone on sending out the message that got them caught by the Donny… and that was all before shooting down a medical relief vessel, shearing off the drive section of a UNN vessel, targetlocking every ship in the Ganymede AO as he escorted the Weeping Somnambulist away. In-universe, Holden will do just about anything to advance his own ends. He’s a privateer, his motives and methods transcend in-universe moralities, which we can only see because we know all the pieces. It’s not 'til the Behemoth that he gains the patina of “saviour” — in contact with the dead, chosen by the protomolecule for direct communication, and having escaped death enough times to engender trust.

For most of the others — Amos (that guy --> just walk away), Naomi (clubbing Cyn ‐‐> waking the Presence), and Alex (we don’t talk about Alex) for running with Holden; Fred (stealing missiles, selling Inaros out to the Inners --> “in my quarters, stop them”), Drummer (executioner --> “speak plainly”), and Bobbie (warrior, defector, ronin, mercenary --> fucking Valkyrie) for materially supporting Holden; in-universe, they would also be regarded as Anti-Heroes until they’re not because of their arcs. Don’t hate the playa. Hate the game.

Maybe “hero of the belt” = anti-hero precisely because it undercuts the frame of a “classic” hero. Much to be learned, then. Maybe I just want them to be anti-heroes because I have so much respect for these characters, their subversion of “norms” and willingness to address a greater good.

Nice touch with the comparison between Amos and Shinji Ikari. If this had been 2 years ago, I wouldn’t have known. I see it now.

Also, Clarissa Mao?

Are you me?

Everyone in the Expanse. Naomi, Drummer, Fred Johnson, Bobbie Draper, Chrisjen Avasarala, Monica… Obviously, Amos, Peaches, Miller, and even Holden.

All of them do reprehensible things. Some did them and made up for it. Some still do them to win.

If I said yes, I’d caveat that by saying, “we’re not special.” There’s no interaction, quid pro quo or otherwise, with whatever presence, energy, or overmind that I would conceptualize as a deity.

Not an architect. Not a creator. Omnipotence and omniscience defy temporality. There are, similarly, no subdivisions of the deity; there are no places that it is present, and others that it is absent. No underboss gods, angels, demons, heavens, hells, or purgatories.

The deity, in my understanding, is simply a unity: An answer to paradoxes, a solution to the incomprehensible, a layer beneath and above all other measurements, concepts, and capacities. A holographic whole that encompasses and inhabits every possibility. It is older than the universe and beyond our feeble attempts to comprehend it, let alone write its character and tell its story.

A bearded white dude who impregnated a virgin, hates masturbation, holds vendettas, destroys cities, sends plagues, and permits humans to hide from “HIM” in the garden of good and evil… it is all just silly by comparison. At that’s just from the tradition I was raised in.

I mean, a burning bush? Or tests of faith?

We, people and all other organisms that are aware of one another, need to get on with finding ways to coexist. Biodiversity is the scorecard.

/rant

The metric is biodiversity.

How many kinds of life are there, and are they thriving? What are the bottlenecks and boundaries for species that slow or stop their progress?

Well, as a living, all-consuming, extinction-level event, I’d say we are making the experiment more impossible. We are a confounding factor, a bias most foul, and the primary flaw in the experimental design.

If only there was guidance in terms of balancing our biological impact and capacity for sustainable development. If only there were some models that have and had worked for millennia. If only there were living groups who could share their wisdom.

If only.

So, for now, plunderous expropriation rules: violent, resource-heavy, rational modern warfare; apathetic, resource-heavy, throwaway consumer culture; and ignorant, resource-heavy, industrial machinations.

What could go wrong?

Nice to meet you, too. Thanks to 세종대왕 (Sejong Dae Wang, King Sejong) for creating a Hangeul, a stronger phonetic system. I look forward to its use for a long time to come.

IIRC, the food, therefore the word, was introduced to Korea. It is a transliteration. Like “tae-kwon-do” is a transliteration from the Korean 태권도 (taegwondo).

Note: Korean is not my first language. It is first non-English script I’ve managed to learn to read and write and makes me happy every time I interact with it.

My read/spoken Korean is atrocious and barely functions.

치즈 (chi-jeu)

So there’s this Rick and Morty episode (s05e04)

If more people realized this, life would be a lot more simple. I never grew up. I just got older.

The password entry screen for Metal Gear.

Love that tune. So calming.

That Super Mario Bros 2 - Game End lullaby is perfect.

3D printed buildings and neighbourhoods.

The design implications are endless and including modular rough-ins for water, power, and HVAC, which would make design accessible to all. Get an AI engineer to test the design and a human engineer to double-check the results, and you can get printing.

Hopefully, the type of concrete is getting less specialized and more sustainable. If we can jazz up the exteriors, that would also help.

The voice I used for “piece by piece” was Denzel’s from Man on Fire (2004).

I’ve seen a bunch of those. Enough to know of his April 1st gags and to be able to shill for his website.

Which I won’t do here.

I’m more wondering about doing it as a career. What’s the annoyance/danger factor? How much work do you need to stay afloat? What do start-up costs look like? What would cause a locksmith to walk away and get into something else?

And so on.

Any insights about locksmithing? Aside, of course, from odd hours

I’d also like to hear about the journey toward being a master carpenter.

Wow. Hadn’t heard of this one. Power of Nightmares and the Century of Self are among my favourite docs.