December 30, 2020
New Year's Resolutions
Gonna try to quit smoking.
Gonna try to have a more normal blog.
Moar
Having some really good days for the most part. As many of you know, I just had a birthday. It was a very good day, for the most part. Sometimes I get a little morose as the sun sets. It was a very good birthday overall, however. Really pretty pleased about my VPS provider, a lot of things are really going fantastically. I'm really even more or less happy with Google :) it is nice to search myself and stuff, documentation... Things are pretty good :) Someone has suggested I make a page for my boot image, maybe with some tutorials and stuff. I think I will do that :)
Ushering in the new year on a very bright note! I have a good feeling about 2021. With enough effort in the right areas, a 9-year cycle seems to reset again. To new beginnings and many more years of fantastic human endeavors, innovation, blogging, and peace :)
December 28, 2020
Sandy Robot Vagina
Today is shaping up to be a very bad day and the time is now: 07:00.
Decided I was going to do some Android development. How silly of me, with a blog like this!
I will instead spend my day forced into prayer and meditation after some light blogging. Sadly throughout history people also came to kill and eat the monks. There's just no escaping :'(
May Bob be safe.
May Bob be happy.
May Bob be healthy.
May Bob live with ease.
Update
All I had to do was chat about it in the proper channel! Gremlins have fixed it again. God Bless Bob.
December 27, 2020
Complaints of the Day
It's very sad looking at the small corner of the world I put so much energy into. Modern technology seems to lie at the intersection of malice and incompetence. I told one lady I used Linux, and she never trusted me again. Maybe she was right for that speaking generally, too.
Someone told me I just focus there with tunnel vision. There are many things in the world going wrong at once, why focus on computer technology? It was a good point. I have too much of my mind devoted to staring at this screen, like I am wearing blinders to everything else.
People say I'm not clear about my complaint. I will try to be... People are sharply divided along so many lines, it's how the world keeps ticking. I used to be shocked Americans didn't rise up and stick our leaders into guillotines. Apparently a lot of people were thinking roughly the same thing. Accusing each other of being sheep for following someone different. What good is thinking for yourself anyway, either flooded with misinformation or in a complete vacuum when you stop reading fabricated news?
People are divided along the line of computer security. Bill Gates, for example, says end-to-end encryption should be suppressed or made illegal. His reasoning is it would counteract misinformation. In the world Bill Gates helped shape, little kids grow up and formulate opinions about computer security with no basis on previous computer history. It comes down to an issue of control. Breaking into systems is glorified, it's the "shiny" people rush to from one side or the other. It's a violation of the CFAA at the same time tons of people think it's the coolest thing ever, necessary for law enforcement, etc, etc.
I am a "maker." I enjoy making things and sharing them with people. Years ago I plugged some LEDs into my computer, pointed a webcam at them, and let people turn them on and off through a website. Now, all I have to do is turn everything off. The Internet of creation is largely dead.
I was also really into chatbots, programs that you type into and they talk to you. Think Cortana, Siri. I've been doing things like that for 20 years. Recently I set one up and decided I wanted it to be able to google stuff. If you say "who is Bill Gates," it googles the answer for you. I gave up on that after noticing that part of the software was somehow showing file listings. I gave up and turned it off. Someone violated the CFAA.
Recently I reinstalled on my laptop and just installed Firefox and used it before getting around to installing Google Chrome. Xorg would consistently crash when I was at google.com, gmail.com, any Google site. What do you make of that? Someone framing Google? I also installed Android Studio around that time. I would close my laptop as I always did, and now, with Android Studio running, it would fail to suspend to RAM.
The more you know, the shittier it gets. I don't even want to know any more. People are sheep, truly. User-friendliness is definitely nice for lots of use cases. What I'm objecting to here is the hostility towards people who aren't the average user.
December 25, 2020
Merry Christmas
Beautiful snowy day here ☺
December 21, 2020
Happy Solstice
Well, it's too overcast here to see the Christmas star, very disappointing. On my mind are a few things. In the 1970's as I recall, there was a mysterious television broadcast claiming to be of extraterrestrial origin. "We come to berate you, earthlings." People are such fuckups. Why would anyone try not to be? There is a scale, to give you an idea. On the smallest end is nothing. On the largest end is everything. Which end do you suppose a human being is closest to? Tiny speck of fuckup, lol.
I love to be around people, though. I'm not misanthropic. I'm not anti-social. I am afraid. I get scared of people when I'm around very many of them at once at all. Then turn around with a blog like this. How odd.
What do you suppose those little gray aliens are? The ones that are depicted so often in pop culture. I wonder if they're real...
In Star Trek humanity is mostly united, peaceful. Klingons are like, bad guys. The Borg are bad guys.
The story of the tower of Babel comes to mind for me in this context. Arthur C Clarke said, the space elevator will only be built 50 years after everyone stops laughing about it. The tower of Babel was an enormous structure, reaching to the heavens. Well, you'll have to read it yourself. Just something I wonder about.
The Protestant work ethic lives on only as worship of the Golden Calf. Free speech and religion sure are nice, I do like blogging and stuff. Is it working out so well though really?
People need education, first and foremost. I would have been perfectly capable of learning Greek, Calculus, Philosophy, etcetera in elementary school. I should accept some responsibility, that's true, but I'm not in charge of much here. A blog I'm not sure I want anyone to see anyway. If someone hates me for something I can't change about myself, should I accept responsibility for it?
In the broadcast, the alleged extraterrestrials said they wanted peace. Some thoughts of the day. Sometimes I do look back at things I've written and wonder what the fuck I was thinking. It seems to me there is a Chinese prophecy, I wonder now, I can't remember. Something or other about the world ending...
December 20, 2020
USB Boot Image
amd64 live/install boot image for Alpine Linux, OpenBSD, and Plan9front updated to Alpine Linux 3.12.3
sha256 checksum is: 32c5e053935f9111bdc5526431eb7e8c281412e1ab70bbc947d96cf7d2841a8c
available here
December 16, 2020
Song
Mixed this song today. More beeps mixed in audacity.
Story
Wrote this story, too.
Anders was crying, in the corner of the yard of the building. He was stuck here now, and he had fucked up. He just had to start over. He would have to come clean to someone, somehow. Nothing had worked. He had talked to his main supplier. That fucker had gotten him in this entire mess. The plan was clean, simple. Anders would sneak into rehab for his problem, never admitting to anyone what it really was. He had everything in order, everything had been lined up ready to go. He would be completely able to leave at any time, that's how it worked. If anything started to go wrong, he could just get up and go. No questions asked. Two weeks ago he had made the move. With his supplier's help, everything had gone perfectly according to plan. The problem had been Anders himself. Two weeks into rehab, he had relapsed. Everything they told him would help him hinged around honesty, and there was no possible way he could tell anyone his true story. As he sobbed, a woman on the staff came up to him. She said she knew it was hard in here, but he could do it, she believed in him. He couldn't possibly tell her what was going on. He cried even harder. --- Six months ago, the plan had begun to take shape. He would lie and come clean as a drug addict, that was the first part. Everything had to hinge around that. They don't let normal people into rehab. He went to his supplier, they weren't on first name basis, but the dude knew him well enough to know Anders' problem. He waved a disc in front of Anders' face, assuring him it would work. Didn't everything always work? Anders always worried, but everything did always work. Anders worried a lot. He had always worried too much, his whole life. The dude was telling him not to worry. They were professionals at stuff like this, his supplier assured him. He would need this disc, of course, and it was gonna be worth it. He would come out a new man. His supplier built him up, and Anders was sold. This was gonna work. He used the disc exactly as it was designed, and he got into the system. He would have to play his cards very carefully. Before long he was well on his way, in outpatient treatment. He was doing a good job of it, hemming and hawing like he had a terrible drug problem. This was gonna be a cakewalk. Before long, people started suggesting he go to rehab. Score. He played it cool, like a tragic Amy Winehouse song. He couldn't possibly go to rehab! How long would it take to get in, how long would he be in there? Anders didn't have much of a social life, so he played the act well. It all fit together. --- Being in the company of addicts was no problem for Anders. He mingled with them often for the line of work he was usually in. Anders was a hacker. It wasn't exactly like people think it is. Nothing ever was though, was it? The addicts weren't the problem. Being caught sneaking into rehab was almost unimaginable. No one did that. No one would think to check a thing like that. Anders would finally overcome his problem, the same way any drug addict overcame their own. Rehab was the perfect plan. Until he got there. Anders had been sitting in the bathroom taking a dump when everything started falling apart. He had been sitting there and noticed another odor, an odor he didn't recognize. He could guess though. Someone was doing drugs in the stall next to him. Two weeks into rehab, not a worry in the world, everything going to plan, he was about to relapse. It had stressed him out so much, he couldn't hold on any longer. Everything they were telling him in here wouldn't work in his case. The honesty. He couldn't be honest about a damn thing! How could he? He had literally snuck into rehab. A man on the staff banged open the bathroom door, screaming that it smelled like someone had been smoking shit in there. Anders' heart pounded. He wasn't caught, there was no way he ever would be. People wouldn't think to check a thing like what had actually happened. There was no way in hell, but he was flipping out. The staff member kicked open the door to Anders' stall as he sat there. He saw what was going on and apologized. Wrong stall, sorry. Anders finished pooping, and got up to wash his hands. On the outside he knew he looked perfectly calm. Inside he was going to pieces. Anders washed his hands as best he could, and stopped at the door to the bathroom. He would have to touch the bathroom knob, then his hands would be dirty again. That's when Anders relapsed. --- He was sobbing to the woman on the staff. He said it couldn't work for him. There was no way any of this would work for him. She said that was common. People always felt that way new to rehab. He was just coming down, she said. He looked up at her, expecting her to see it in his eyes. That it was something more. She didn't see it. She just saw an addict. He looked down again, another tear rolling down his cheek. He decided to take a chance. They said only honesty would work. He told her everything, the whole story. Deep down inside, he always worried too much. He had snuck into rehab for his problem biting his nails.
November 26, 2020
more beep boop
November 25, 2020
beep beep
November 21, 2020
Oof
Well. Since my blog seems to be inadvertently about mental health anyways...
A Schizophrenic Manifesto
echoline
People in psychosis can be very unsettling to deal
with. Through interacting with other people who appear to be
in acute psychosis someone can gain perspective on things
they never imagined, from their own self to the nature of
reality.
Psychotic doesn't mean incorrect, and it doesn't mean
violent. It doesn't mean stupid or smart, cruel or kind. It
is generally thought to be characterized by a departure in
the mind from reality, into delusions and hallucinations,
things that are not "real." Using known methodologies, it is
possible to check information for validity, even in mathe-
matical senses.
Does the word "psychotic" have any more intrinsic mean-
ing or worth than the bark of a dog? Maybe it's a matter of
perspective. If one tried asking a dog... how could we
define psychosis?
How could one describe absolute nothing? How could one
understand things they cannot perceive? This begins to
define psychosis.
A defining hallmark of psychosis is to "incorrectly"
find patterns in the world all around ourselves. To see sym-
bolism where most people agree there is none. Some things
have become "obvious," taught in kindergarten. Counting to
ten on one's fingers. The first person to claim they could
count to 1023 on their fingers must have been thought to be
insane. When they proved it, however, it became part of
known reality.
Astrology is thought to be at best arcane, outdated,
and baseless. There cannot be logic or reason to celestial
events affecting a human being in any way. Well, what about
the turning of the Earth? Biologically, verifiably, and log-
ically, the planet would rotate into night and humans would
fall asleep.
Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am." He discarded
almost everything taken for granted about reality, looking
for the simplest proof of his own existence. It could be
easy to want revenge against Descartes... This proves myself
to me, what about you, Descartes? It's certainly not an
exercise in pragmatism.
So now we have practicality to deal with, more rigorous
symbolic logic, and talking to dogs. The underlying point is
one of perspective. Sometimes the right thing to do really
is to ask a dog, count on one's fingers, or even throw out
every fact you know, looking only for the simplest answer
you can find.
November 21, 2020
