Month: September 2024

Tomas settled back on the couch, tv remote balanced precariously on rim of a bowl of chips. He shifted and the black device plummeted into his lap, but the chips didn’t. With a smile he set down his soda, freeing his hand to power on the TV. He didn’t get the chance.

“Want to go shopping with me?” Laura said from behind him.

He turned to look. She was wearing a black dress with her hair up in a bun. Her face looked Neutrogena scrubbed. Red hoop earrings dangled from each ear. She was smiling. He said, “I mean, if you want me to, I guess.”

“You don’t have to.” The smile straightened into more of a line.

“I don’t.”

“I mean if you don’t want to go shopping, it is perfectly fine. I can go by myself.”

Tomas started to speak but managed to stop himself. In truth, she sent him out for things all the time. He shopped alone far more than he shopped with her. It wasn’t a thing he thought about very often, but now in the midsts of an ask he started to wonder what he was supposed to say. Then he said, “What am I supposed to say here?”

“Just say how you feel.”

Tomas paused again, masking his growing confusion with a bite of a chip. This was beginning to take on the appearance of a trap. He found this strange, because Laura wasn’t the trapping type, yet there he was settling in to watch TV and there she was preparing to leave… with him. He said, “I’m in. Let’s go shopping.”

“Only if you want to.”

Now it was definitely a trap.

I think I need to write the corporate commandments series. The idea is to have a series of ten books that follow a single individual who works corporate security on his journey from being just a corp sec guy to getting more and more twisted up in the politics of corporations and the underpinnings of what corporate society really is developing into in our modern world. This is not a shadowrun book. This is a cyberpunk book in the sense of having those connections to the punk ant-corp culture and the relationships with technology. It is a book series I have had on my mind for years. I feel like I wait too long between books and wind up spinning my wheels when the reality is that I have a ton of projects and ideas just brewing beneath the surface that do not ever get properly addressed.

So, what is CC? It came to me when I was doing web research for teaching. I found a series of, well, business theorems that felt to me like lead-ins for interesting plots that could help me dive into the inner workings of corporations and how those corps impact the world around us. I turned one of them into the outline for The Law of Diminishing Returns. That was meant to be the first of the series, and I staged it in the shadowrun universe. However, it doesn’t truly belong in that world. It is not about magic or cybertech or the shadows between the corps. It is about the shadows cast by corps over everything else. It is a chance to have that conversation in a way that I want independent of the world rules by which I am bound. It is also an opportunity to stretch my legs and really get back to thinking about story in unique ways and allowing myself to channel the stories that come to me.

I want to get back to that. I want to write more stuff as opposed to waiting around to write more shadowrun. I’ve allowed myself to be typecast as one thing for twenty five years. That means I have been doing that one thing half my life. Crazy. Time to do more.

If you’ve ever wondered what it looks like to watch a fantasy team (and fantasy manager) implode in real time, just keep your eyes on this post once a week. I am in the midsts of a terrible season. Perhaps midsts is being too forward. It is week, what, three? I’ve already lost CMC and Kupp to IR. I have yet to be featured in the wins column or even sniff the dang vicinity. I drafted poorly (in retrospect). Now I am trying to salvage what I can with backups and late waiver grabs. At least the Beach Born league looks vaguely promising. I managed to offload CMC for Barkley an A. Jones prior to the IR announcement, giving me something vaguely resembling hope during a 1-1 start to that season. This is how it goes in fantasy. You want something to happen and then reality steps in.

The reality of this week is games that should be blowouts but may be winnable. At the college level my kid faces a #6 FCS ranked South Dakota. They lost by two scores to FBS Wisconsin, a team that gets highlights for being in the Big 10 but is not actually terribly good this year after having essentially the same margin with Western Michigan as they did with SD and getting blown out by Ohio State pretty much in the first quarter. South Dakota is good. Drake is better than people think. They’ll try to make it a fight.

Desert Vista is facing a very young Hamilton team. They’re top 8 in the state and undefeated with wins against two middling teams and a tough W over A Centennial program that was in the open state championship last year but has not one a game since, currently standing at 0-3. I don’t know who Hamilton is, but I know who DV is. I know that if they keep their heads in the fight they can make this a game. I expect that they will.

I’m turning it back to a version of 4.85 that apparently never was printed. I found it on the list of drafts. It goes as such:

Long day today. Not a lot of sleep from yesterday and a ton of activity across the span of the day. It felt like the hypertension was surging towards stage 2 for the better half of the morning, and then I came down to stage 1 again. That may have something to do with the anticipation of all that I had going on over the course of the day. It has been a really good day overall and has already transitioned into a very good night. I’m pausing on the night for ten to get this in.

Some Thoughts:

1. I still love the keyboard feel of the very old (2013) macs and the recently not new (2017) macs. At the same time I am hugely disappointed in the mouse click feel. Such a letdown.
2. This tells me that I am definitely a weirdo to have so much to say (and more to think) about the feel of a keyboard.
3. Enjoying the youth football season. Kids are doing well and really growing and adjusting to not being the best–but wanting to be. I can see that transition and growth happening and I love it.
4. I also love that a lot of these teams that once seemed invincible are not. It furthers this nascent idea of hope and competitiveness.
5. In the end though, it is still JUST youth football and not a big deal. In the end it is just me diving into everything around me and swimming around in the drama of it all. Totally a me thing.
6. Maybe also a writer thing? That there is my version of hope…

Me diving into everything has been a thing for most of my life. I remain convinced that I can do and be all things without stressing. Ace of all vs. Jack, because I can never settle for Jackdom. A lot of that blog still feels current despite being years old. The feel of keyboards, the hypertension, the football… I’ve always been intrigued by the theory (perhaps false) that the body renews itself every seven years. I think about being at the point of renewal now and what seems to remain as a core tenet of my personage. I am all about particular things. I am all about the football, though I’ve transitioned from improving myself as a player to improving myself as a coach–even if I am no longer that either. The tech crawls forward, but the feel of what I like remains. The high BP is being dealt with, though it too creeps upward all the time.

I guess what I can take away from all of this history is that there are things that I recognize as making me me, but I never dive too deeply into what it is about those things that defines me. Looking backwards today gives me a moment to pause and think about that aura I create and more importantly, why.

Sloppy.

Yet another day where I come to the blog only to realize the previous day’s post was not published. This is becoming habitual. I can attribute it to two things: The first being me not paying attention. The second being that extra click of the mouse in order to publish the work. The deeper reason is the first reason. I am not focused on the blog. I am not focused at all lately. There is so much madness swirling around me that trying to pay attention to all of it leaves me scattered. There is work drama (namely individuals who want to teach the stuff I am teaching and are mad that I get to do it and they don’t). There is politics (a headache for all of us). There is life. Kids. Writing. There is football (self-induced drama to be certain). I allow all of these to surround me like a gang of angry voices shouting to be heard over one another and the end result is chaos and fatigue.

Some Thoughts:

1. On the work drama stuff: I haven’t taken to the blog to discuss work in some time, but I will now only to say that people always want what they see and not what they have. I’ve worked to create an amazing schedule for myself. I’ve developed new classes and honed older ones to the point where I know what I want to accomplish and will continually improve that on a semester to semester basis. Now people are trying to take these classes away, simply because they want them and think it is okay to change or remove what I worked my ass off to develop. I am not good with that. I will never be good with that. I like the situation I created for myself and my students. Changing it fundamentally damages the way I develop content. I try to create new experiences for the students, which are based on past progress. If you strip that out–If I am robbed of the iterative process and or the ability to shape these experiences, then I’m just a guy teaching rote stuff I found in a stinky textbook. We invest in what we love and what we are good at. Stop trying to take it away because you want to play in what was created.

It is only 5, so calling it night is a bit much and part of the problem really. I was ready to tuck in for the day an hour ago at least. I found the idea of being locked away in the peace of my room and languishing with my lover far more appealing than anything else I could think of. The rest just felt like biding time. Indeed it usually is, unless I have things I really want to be doing. I suppose having the house to ourselves has left me feeling like I am far more relaxed and have more relaxing time and moments than I otherwise would, so that trigger of feeling like I ought to be curled up is only a natural response to the life change of having ourselves a childless home.

That is a temporary situation. Still, I intend to take advantage of it as long and as much as possible. In order to do so I need to figure out how and when to work on the things I need to work on. I have things to get fixed and writing that needs to get handled. I tend to shut the productivity down more than I should. I need to work on that.

Some Thoughts:

1. A productive conversation with the Lady Talis had me realizing today that football, at this point in the year, is a 5 night a week-a-thon. Most of those nights are NFL. She noted how they ought to stop pretending that Sunday is the ‘day of football’ when it goes from Thursday till Monday Night. I will be watching Monday Night. Saquon is Must See TV.
2. Speaking of the beautiful game (yes, I know), finding good film on Hamilton is hard. The game is going to be tough. Winnable? Not sure. There is a talent gap that is not in our favor. We just need to come to play and those kids need to support each other and not make mistakes on the back end. Not to be afforded this week…
3. There are winnable games on the schedule beyond this one. Probably three others at a glance. That may be enough for a playoff bid.

This is a bit of a sports blog. I know I do it more and more in the fall, and that is because of what the kids do and how what the kids are doing impacts my mind and habits. Just before I started this I found myself scrounging for film on Hamilton High. I’m not finding anything, but I will get back to looking later today or tomorrow at the latest. The goal is to have a deepr understanding of everything taking place on the field so that I can be helpful to my son and get him to the next level. This is fun for me. This is probably a style of living vicariously in terms of failing at the goal myself. Having one kid already playing D1 only makes me think I can get two in the game and get at least one beyond Saturdays…

In the meanwhile, I’m just here watching football, and enjoying a weekend of chill.

I decided to consult Chatgpt for workout advice. The results are not wonderful. It hasn’t reached the level of personal assistant that everyone expects from the device. I am considering an AI deep dive in order to see where it is at vs where we want it to be (based on our fiction) and how the two could or should ever meet. I’ll be having it design a suitable work schedule and workout routines and more. I hope to use the device to fully dive into the possibilities of what AI can do to improve lives without replacing actual intelligence and learning. That is a tough boat to row, so to speak. Presently the fears surrounding AI (which were created by stories) are hampering the use of the tool. However, laziness is more of a hinderance, because the masses don’t want to put effort into what they don’t want to put effort into and things such as AI make it much easier to overlook the fundamentals. This leads to generations of nonsense. The future is not, however, set.

I think a lot about the future in the turn to midlife (and the existential crisis therein). By some accounts I am deep into my middle years and I tend to act like it all too often. I’m hoping AI can jar me out of some of that. I think the trick here is really working with the AI and not just asking a simple question. One of my kids taught me about programming your AI, and I have since observed how and when it updates its own memory to my presumed preferences and information. This is more frightening to me as an older man than it is to the young people who are used to being tracked and have developed a comfort level with the practice I refuse to match.

All of this is to say that AI may be useful as a tool if it is used as a tool and not a crutch. AI can be an extension of the way google search tools may be properly used if we allow ourselves to treat it as such. However, how we DO treat AI is quite a large spectrum, and as the intricacies of the medium (for there are so many large language models and other types now) increase we find ourselves pushed away from the center in a near-political manner.

There is good and bad to be had from any new tool. We’ve known this since sharpened sticks; since fire. We have our new tool and as we continue to grow and master it, we must understand that like fire, it may spread out of our control… should we mistakenly or even purposely let it.

My youngest is asking me to give him a pep talk before each home game. Honestly, the idea of it is wonderful, but the execution has me stressed. I am not very good at pep talks. I was never that kind of hype coach. I had the chant–I can lock in on a script–but to freestyle and really say something inspiring may be beyond my can. Still, I will go out there tomorrow and attempt to do my part to help him lock in and be successful as his 15 yr old confidence starts to take form. He needs the help. He isn’t him yet. He needs to believe in the ability he has in order to be successful, and he hasn’t quite gotten to that point. Partially that is my fault. He’s often the best player on a good team. He and his brother played with kids who are being featured on Saturdays now, and he feels like those kids all surpassed him. The ones from his grade/team already all have multiple collegiate offers and trips, etc. Heck, one just was named high school player of the week… for the nation. I would argue that starting alongside these giants would show him that he is that guy too, but he feels more like an imposter.

I’ve experienced imposter syndrome my entire life, and I was never as good as these boys are. Yet I don’t know how to shake that feeling or shake him feeling like he isn’t ‘that guy’. He feeds on success, so once he gets going it is going to be fine. He just needs to get there. That is why he’s asking for that pep talk. That is why I need to figure out how to deliver.

You dad the way you need to dad, and for me, this is the way I need to dad right now. This is what is going to help him step forward. He needs support and encouragement, so I am going to provide exactly that.

The other day I was hyped to see my kids play and have a shot to compete. I was hyped for Deion’s team to face a kid I used to coach. I was super hyped to se Saquon go out there and prove he is one of the best in the league. I was not even a little hyped to see the Giants come out in those busted-ass throwbacks and try and pretend to be a legit NFL team. They are bad. They are so bad that when we (i’m still down, so I say we) got a pick on the 20 yd line I knew we would have to settle for a field goal. The G-Defense is going to need to do it all. They cannot though. We watched them get worn down even by the Vikings. Beyond that, the offense gave up 6. That is more than the offense scored. All Game.

This week the Giants face a terrible Washington team that has every chance of beating them. I mean, they look like my kid’s High school team out there! Speaking of whom, the DV Thunder slipped in the polling to 29… out of 31 Division 6A teams. They are right behind Friday’s opponent Valley Vista who isn’t very good but looks remarkably better than DV. This is still an opportunity to turn up and make some things happen. The offense was productive in spots against backups in the second half last week and the team they will be facing has the skill level of those backups. Offense? They have some skills there. Could be fun to watch him play the deep pass.

Some Thoughts:

1. I’m drifting into that dangerous realm of not being at all focused on anything anymore. It is a bad look for me and argues that I will end up paying for it one way or another. I already am forgetting to click that second publish and the sadness associated therein. How long before I forget to blog at all?
2. Yes, I want to talk about the debate… tomorrow.