Warm and damp transitioning to hot and damp, with a touch of rain… not unlike yesterday. The rain held off until the kids were back from the beach, but then it came and got everything wet.
I got a few things done during the day. Slept in my chair most of the evening. Made pork chops for dinner. Tasty pork. Kid had brownies in the oven when I got home, so I put the chops in too. The brownies are what pulled the plug on my consciousness after dinner.
Today I’ve got local stuff, and I might try to get to my client’s place. He can’t see one of the cams remotely, and I can start getting some of the upgrades installed. I think the cam is probably lightning damage. I have one that appears to be too. We’ve had quite the big storms this week.
I’ll be ‘fluid’ today, trying to get the most out of the day, while still doing the kid stuff that is on the calendar. Can I keep the plates spinning?????
Stack something,
nick
Coffee doesn’t always help, but it never hurts..,
John Ringo has an alien describe coffee drinking as a weird human social ritual involving ‘bean broth’… can’t say I disagree, and I love it when something like that resets my brain and how I see something.
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sunny and warm, getting warmer, with some clouds in the sky.
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The interview linked in this article is fascinating. The media whore just can’t get it thru his head that Musk isn’t beholden to the same masters that he is… you can almost see him questioning his own existence at one point. I like Musk more and more as I see more of his actual words and ideas. It may all be a distraction from other things, but if so, it’s one with a lot of personal cost.
n
From the local Faux News last night.
Looks like the “interim” white male City Manager isn’t going to last much beyond the first 90 days.
Didn’t he learn from what happened to the last white male City Manager following the freeze?
Looks like the City Council will repeat the gathering around the small animal by the Israelites, just as specified in … Deuteronomy?
https://www.fox7austin.com/video/1221786
Yeah, surname. White, tho.
Messing with the WFH Mommy (and Daddy) Mafia, now, and everyone with a desk job is a “made man”.
yeah, I know. You can burn your tongue. Someone can take issue with your nasty disposition before coffee and clock you in the head with the pot. meh. quibbles
So at first I was like, Wow, where’s the diversity? And then I was like, oh, yeah, there it is…
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12093345/Not-Happy-Place-Brawl-breaks-two-families-Orlandos-Disney-World.html
n
Locals. The Mouse resumed Annual Pass sales a few weeks ago after suspending them during the Pandemic. In addition, the reservation restrictions were lifted for all Annual Passes, which limited the park hopping in the afternoon when the adults were more likely to enter tanked up from liquid lunches at the bars at the other parks, Germany at EPCOT being a particular favorite with the amateur functioning alcoholic set.
When we were there on the first of April, security was still air tight at Disney Springs, which tells me that the gang problem there has still not been solved. That was before the Annual Pass sales resumed, however, so lots of locals gathered in the complex in the early evening eating at the “cheap” windows of the fancier restaurants and just “chillin’”.
IIRC, this upcoming weekend is Orlando Invades Daytona, and I imagine the Mail will find no shortage of material to post from the national wires. At least Disney will get a break … until Gay Days after Memorial Day if that still happens.
Gay Days without the Parliament House activities will be interesting whenever that resumes. Parliament House used to be near the Citrus Bowl before they went bankrupt for the final time and the resort closed.
Implementing new dietary intervention, pure carnivore.
In the past 24 hours I learned:
Hard boiled eggs, sliced in half and drizzled with mayo, are excellent.
You can make homemade butter mayo with an immersion blender in just a few minutes. Melted butter, egg, mustard, and vinegar. No industrial seed oils.
I learned a better way to bake bacon. Previously, it was thick cut bacon, on cooling racks placed on a baking sheet, at 250 degrees for 2+ hours. Now I use cheap thin bacon, fold it in half on parchment paper on the baking sheet, and do 375 for a half hour. It’s crispier, and the drained bacon grease is a little purer and easier to save.
Upvoted lpdbw’s comment for the bacon suggestion. Not for the mayo suggestion. Blech. Mayonnaise. Blech.
There are brief mentions in books subsequent to Friday, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls and To Sail Beyond the Sunset.
Harry Shipstone’s secret to success was to not file for a patent, and to boobytrap the devices so they couldn’t be reverse engineered, iirc.
n
ech says:
Interesting. I’ve read all those books – I still HAVE all those books – and didn’t associate “Shipstone” with Heinlein. Thanks.
The creator of the NAT fix for IPSec, Tatu Ylonlen of SSH fame, patented the approach but gave it away for free to keep Microsoft and Cisco from doing their usual “embrace and extend” tricks.
Unfortunately, it was arguable the end of IPSec VPNs, which is unfortunate in my opinion.
The only reason Cisco produced a 64 bit IPSec client for Windows was that we built one under our NDA agreement at the Death Star for a large oil company customer who was unhappy with Cisco’s proposed AnyConnect replacement.
If your life and/or financial future depends on your VPN tech, don’t depend on SSL tunnels like AnyConnect or Microsoft’s SSTP.
I’m not sure what GlobalConnect uses. I think it depends on the customer, but they seem to be the big VPN player since the Death Star’s offering came up short on Mac.
Of course, I had something to do with the Mac NetClient failure just by walking away in disgust in 2010, but, really, guys, 13 years? It was eight lines of code to fix the problem.
The secret is to bang the rocks together.
The secret is to bang the rocks together.
Hey ! How did you figure out my programming style guide ?
Interesting. I’ve read all those books – I still HAVE all those books – and didn’t associate “Shipstone” with Heinlein. Thanks.
I lost many of my Heinleins and all of my Asimovs, Andersons, Harrisons, etc in The Great Flood of 1989. Several I rescued but they have obvious water damage. I have rebought many of them over the years.
And yes, despite what Thunderbird says, rebought is a word. I guess that I could use repurchased.
This is Texas. Rebought is a word.
They have different meanings. Repurchased, to me, means you had it, sold it, and bought it back. Rebought is “you bought another”.
Dilbert: Wally Is A Shooter Suspect
https://www.reddit.com/r/dilbert/comments/13jyvjx/dilbert_reborn_may_16th_2023_shared_by_scott/
Only if Wally could shoot coffee. Or, if he is being programmed as an assassin by the CIA. Does Wally own a copy of “The Catcher in the Rye” ? See the documentary film “Conspiracy Theory” for more information.
Arlo and Janis: Beer For Slugs
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2023/05/17
Personally, I would go with Lone Star.
Everyone wants an LLM AI right now, to the point that we’re getting crazy feature requests which management doesn’t turn away because of the dollar amounts involved.
AI going “Foom”? Or GPT anyways:
https://steve-yegge.medium.com/were-gonna-need-a-bigger-moat-478a8df6a0d2
Everyone wants an LLM AI right now, to the point that we’re getting crazy feature requests which management doesn’t turn away because of the dollar amounts involved.
LLM = Ladder Logic Mind ?
Fortunately you have an LLM to do the coding, right?
Large Language Model I believe. ChatGPT.
That would only work with fixed specifications and stable hardware.
Every now and then, a trigger has to be pulled.
Or not pulled. Hard to know which sitting in your pajamas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcgG_E9gQJM
Daniel Craig’s birthday is within a month of my own. I also share my high school graduating year with Jeri Ryan and the newest “Star Trek” “Captain” actor club member, Todd Stashwick.
BTW, if someone were to take $6,000 in cash over to a local coin dealer and buy a couple of gold coins and several silver coins, do they keep records of who bought the coins ? Asking for a friend.
US Coin on I 10 around Silber.
n
I believe you are well under the threshold to trigger an IRS form. I also believe there is no such form for silver. I don’t remember the specifics, however.
US coins on I-10 told me they don’t. Buy or sell. I think they said that only applies to currency, so the gold coins would have to be from the US Mint. Don’t quote me on that.
I only halfway recommend them now. My purchase experience was fine. Later, I took a single coin to them to sell as part of my brother’s estate, and they lowballed me. Like, a lot low. It was an 1880-O Morgan silver dollar, AU. I didn’t expect them to pay me the same they would charge for purchase, they need markup, but that was ridiculous.
If you know your market prices, and you’re buying, you should be ok.
I believe you are well under the threshold to trigger an IRS form. I also believe there is no such form for silver. I don’t remember the specifics, however.
I’ve been written up for transferring $7,000 in hundred dollar bills between banks. If I did not have to get some money in my son’s account that day, I would have walked out. I was shocked when the teller called the manager up and told him that he had a suspicious transaction.
“Russia Says It Took Out US-Supplied Patriot Missile In Hypersonic Strike On Kiev”
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-it-took-out-us-supplied-patriot-missile-unit-hypersonic-strike-kiev
“Russia’s military may have taken out a US-supplied Patriot anti-air battery in Ukraine, which if true would be a very significant first since the advanced Raytheon-made defense weapon was deployed there.”
“This came as Ukrainian officials have cited an exceptionally dense attack on Kyiv overnight, which included cruise missiles and drones, and even allegedly Kinzhal hypersonic missiles. Ukraine was hit by at least 18 missiles and nine drones were sent, with media reports saying some six ballistic missiles (including Kinzhal) were launched. But the Ukrainians are claiming that most or all of them were intercepted.”
Whoa. Guess who is reading the Russian news release. The Iranians and Palestinians and all of our other enemies XXXXXX friends.
https://goldsilver.com/blog/irs-1099-gold-reporting-private-gold-private-silver-bullion/
A fairly thorough explanation of an online dealer’s reporting triggers. For gold coins, more than 25 troy oz. Otherwise, mostly concerned with Capital Gains when you sell to them, particularly from an IRA or when using more than $10k cash.
BTW, those Patriot missiles are expensive:
“Commenting on the video of the purported Russian direct hit on the Patriot battery, Kim Dotcom wrote on Twitter, “30 US Patriot PAC-3 MSE launch at a cost of $5 million per missile. That’s $150 million gone within 2 mins. At the end the Patriot launch platforms were destroyed by Russian missiles. Why would any military still want to buy Patriot after this failure?” ”
“Thousands of hydrogen-fueling stations must be built this decade to meet increasing demand. To build at this scale, you need reliable, easy-to-install solutions that dispense fuel quickly, reliably and safely. Read how Emerson can help you attain efficient hydrogen fuel dispensing solutions here.”
http://gpc-whitepapers.com/register.aspx?r=controlling-hydrogen-fuel-flow
No smoking !
Yeecccch!
“BioFire” smartgun.com
Either facial recognition or fingerprint sensor will “enable” firearm operation. Removing sensors or other mucking about will not enable. Trigger by wire, not mechanical.
Shades of The Weapon Shops of Isher”.
I’d be happy to purchase a “smart gun”, after it’s been tested for at least 10 years by police officers. Police are, after all, the people most likely to have their own guns used against them. If the police like them, then I might be willing to use one.
AI going “Foom”? Or GPT anyways:
https://steve-yegge.medium.com/were-gonna-need-a-bigger-moat-478a8df6a0d2
“In related news, these “billion dollar”-class LLMs can now be cloned on macbooks and copied directly onto Boston Dynamics robots via their Raspberry Pi adapter, at which point…”
“Oh yeah, it was training costs. Remember when it was roughly $1B to train an LLM like GPT-4?”
“According to the leaked Google memo, world-class competitive LLM training costs just dropped from a billion dollars to… that’s right, you guessed it…”
“A hundred dollars.”
“Before last week, there were, oh, maybe five LLMs in GPT’s class. In the whole world. It was like back in the 1950s when there were like five computers in the world, and IBM owned three of them.”
“Which sounds to me like a very safe and defensible moat. That is, until you realize LLMs can f*****’ copy each other. So their so-called “data advantage” was really only going to be safe for as long as all the big players kept the AIs locked up.”
“I swear this is a damn Jerry Bruckheimer movie, unfolding before our eyes.”
Uh, it did not go well for the human race in the Robopocalypse book that I just read and reviewed. 99.9% dead in three years.
https://www.amazon.com/Robopocalypse-Contemporaries-Daniel-H-Wilson/dp/0307740803?tag=ttgnet-20/
oohhh…. tasty…
Smear merchant accidentally releases donor list to reporter, and shows that he paid himself salary of 49.8% of his donations in 2021 and 2022.
Director of Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh Smear Group Begs for Mercy After Releasing Confidential Documents
https://redstate.com/streiff/2023/05/17/director-of-clarence-thomas-and-brett-kavanaugh-smear-group-begs-for-mercy-after-releasing-confidential-documents-n747428
Yeecccch!
“BioFire” smartgun.com
Either facial recognition or fingerprint sensor will “enable” firearm operation. Removing sensors or other mucking about will not enable. Trigger by wire, not mechanical.
Shades of The Weapon Shops of Isher”.
I guarantee you that the bio smartgun will misfire in a crisis. And, these are only semi autos, no revolvers.
“Which sounds to me like a very safe and defensible moat. That is, until you realize LLMs can f*****’ copy each other. So their so-called “data advantage” was really only going to be safe for as long as all the big players kept the AIs locked up.”
They already have their bought-and-paid for Democrats trying to figure out a bill to slip the liability insurance requirements into law.
Or maybe we just get a National AI Act and require a tax stamp for each one.
Or maybe we just get a National AI Act and require a tax stamp for each one.
Will never happen, AIs are software. After all, what is an AI ? You’ve probably got a few primitive AIs in your car. Ford’s Ecoboost engines use an incredibly sophisticated AI just to fire the spark plugs between 4 to 7 ? 8 ? times per revolution. It was invented by a professor at the University of Houston who has one of the best funded labs in professordom.
Whoo boy. Home from the middle school band recital and dance showcase. Band, three levels and took about 20 minutes. Dance, three levels and took about 400 hours… ok, only 1:15. Jeez it was loud.
Grabbed what I thought was my ear pro off the charger, but it turned out to be just a standard set of wireless earbuds. I had them in and OFF the whole time. They are very uncomfortable. Gave them to the wife immediately after the show. Even my teen thought it was too loud and wanted to leave.
One song in a radio edit with chopped out words. One song (and dance) that needed a PG warning. I’d say it was pretty inappropriate, and I’d want to know why a 14 yo can move like that. CPS might want to know, it was that disturbing.
Jack in the Box on the way home, two burgers, one fry, $17. F me.
n
Some security cams have AIs in them, kinda specialized and low power, but they are there. The clothes washing machines claim it, although I don’t believe half of what SAYS it includes AI.
n
“Jack in the Box on the way home, two burgers, one fry, $17. F me.”
Stayed home. Napped longer than planned. Got a couple minor tasks done, then it was too late to do the oven-fried potatoes and onions, so I just had a burger, molded from my own hands from beef that was recently on the hoof and adoring me for dispensing the ground corn and oats that supplemented his diet for the last six months before Journey to See Dave at The Locker.
NY Times takes a look at the BLM trade-off
from a comment on the article:
https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2023/05/17/ny-times-takes-a-look-at-the-blm-trade-off-n551636
I’m going to use the word:
In the face of an unprecedented increase in crime and blue shiiteholes hollowing-out in real-time–after generations of being governed by Democrats–what is remarkable is the paucity of writing about the cause and effect. It’s not just the cops that are pulling back, it’s the “journalists”, the educators, the business owners, and anyone else that is tempted to try to advocate sanity.
We live in an age where a freaking cake shop owner in Colorado has been persecuted for years by insane attorneys and the full force of the State of Colorado because his personal beliefs will not permit him signing on to other people’s full-blown perversion. How many other people have just quit and walked?
The only area where there is starting to be successful pushback is in schools, where parents have finally taken a look and have not been happy at the shiite that is going on. Too little, too late, as what history will probably label as “The Truly Lost Generation” is largely the demented shock troops of the forces that are killing our society.
Nero, at least, had some accomplishments if you look beneath his most famous epitaph. Biden has nothing: it’s corruption, meth, and perversion all the way down to hell.
I’m calling it an early night before I fall asleep in my chair.
n
>> If you know your market prices, and you’re buying, you should be ok.
Go on a rainy day so you can wear a hoodie and a ballcap and your “China Flu” mask and gloves. They always say how many germs there are on money. And cough every minute or so…
>> “Jack in the Box on the way home, two burgers, one fry, $17. F me.”
Use their phone apps (on your burner phone of course), a lot of deals, at least from Mickey D and Wendy’s for the spousal unit.
Busy week, yet somehow I don’t feel like I got much of anything done.
I taught on Tuesday, and from the blank faces I could see that it was way too complicated. This is at the trade school, and I overestimated what I could expect from my crop of 16-year-olds. Since that was the first of a series of three weeks I had planned? I had to go back and completely re-do the series, to tone down the complexity.
Meh… It’s still just a neural net.I just did an interview with someone all worried about this stuff. I pointed out that the typewriter vastly increased office efficiency. Then the word processor did it again. Now we have text-generation engines to do it again. It’s a tool.
The AI engines will have a major impact on boring office work. They can serve as tutors for students, but really, it’s only a consolidation of knowledge that was already only a quick search away.
Of course, the technology will continue to develop, and that’s great. But it’s not Skynet. The cry for regulation is just the big companies trying to find a way to lock out the competition.
Write the school a little letter. Tell them about decible thresholds. About causing hearing loss in their students. Mention liability.