Month: October 2025

It is odd to say, but the Big Sky Rankings look identical to my fantasy leagues. Lots of teams at 3-4 and outside of the top two, the separation from the top to bottom is a single game. It is a tight league. I don’t know who is going to win in fantasy or in real life. I wish the FCS had conference championships games. I’m not aware of any conferences that do. They just let the records talk. Those records are what is in question now that the Bears dropped yet another heartbreaker this week. They fell to Sacramento State, a team they are clearly better than. However, it is tough to overcome four interceptions. The defense erased two of those, but one resulted in a field goal and the other was a pick 6. That’s 9 points off turnovers in a game they lost by 5 on the goal line. You cannot ask for more from the defense.

Except you have to ask for more from the defense this week. UC Davis QB Cade Pinnick has thrown for 1400 yards this season on 150 attempts. 104 of those were completions. two were interceptions. He is accurate and smart with the ball while also serving as their 3rd leading rusher to the tune of 127 yards across 55 carries. That’s more than RB Cade Vargas who has 312 on 43 carries, but less than leading rusher Jordan Fisher’s 489 on 69 carries. He’s rumored to be the best back in the conference and the Bears run defense is porous.

So, what is going to happen? I think my kid finally gets some serious action in the pass game. He needs a game like this in order to firm up his tape. I think he is the best cover corner in the league, but I am supposed to think that. Let’s see what the tape shows. Last week it showed coverage sacks. This week it needs to show more PBUs and hopefully a pick or two. If that happens, the Bears win.

AWS is down, throwing the majority of the academic super structure that is Canvas into chaos. That means students cannot access their work. That isn’t the end of the chaos. A large chunk of the internet is down. That means a large chunk of the internet–at least the part used in this country is being channeled to us through a single provider. That is great for corporations and crap for society and societal freedom. At any rate it got me down a rabbit hole and into this interesting and quite enlightening podcast called Surrounded. The idea behind this is that 20 or so people from one side of an issue or ideology debate one person on the other side. It is wild and barely contained, but it shows how people think. I am wondering how many people feel this way on these issues or if this sample size is not indicative of a larger population. If it is, I’m a lot worried about what we are thinking as USA residents and where that thinking is coming from. I love and believe in free speech. It allows people to understand where each other are at. The problem is where we are at and that level of polarization and bias is only heightened and we are only getting more and more insular. That is the result of media expansion. It worries me because not only are we becoming more insular but but we are finding these divisive spaces and expanding them to physical spaces.

I’m feeling pretty good today. Assembled and mounted a fan and assembled a weed whacker and tested that sucker. I’m going on two days of putting things together and it feels totally solid. I’m not writing as much as I am building, but this is a step forward in terms of feeling like I am getting things done. I’m happy and back on the grind. It has taken me a really long time to get started, but I feel myself moving in the right direction.

Some Thoughts:

1. UNC Bears sold another late game. That’s 3, though one was actively stolen from them. They should be a six win team right now, but they’ve failed to convert at the goal line, and that has cost them. This last one hurt me, because it was a big game and the loss was self-inflicted. I’m not talking about the 4 interceptions (two of which were pick of the six variety, meaning this QB has thrown 4 pick sixes this season through 7 games). I’m talking about the choice to throw a slant on 4th and 1 from the 3. Marshawn Lynch knows what I mean…
2. It is hard for me to watch my kids lose. It is happening all the time now…

I gotta say, getting stuff done feels really good. I changed the kitchen sink faucet today. Tomorrow I’m building and mounting a fan. I do these things without the aid of videos or AI, which is a reminder that I am actually fairly intelligent. It doesn’t come up much these days. There isn’t much of a premium on actually being smart. the preference leans towards being able to do stuff cleverly or, more to the point, being seen as popular and doing things in general. We’re sliding away from caring if anyone actually has brains and falling into this sense of its okay so long as they are popular and or has charisma.

I blame Obama. Not because the dude isn’t smart–he’s a damn intelligent man. It is because he is a black man who also had the charisma and the moment to be seen as the future of America. That pissed off a lot of people who saw that as a sign that the future of America didn’t look like them or speak like them. So, we slid backwards. We’re still sliding.

So, now we have the Orange one in the office as a holdover from a past where his slimyness was representative of American Idealism. Trump is the late 80’s early 90’s of a particular class of people. Unfortunately, we’re very far past that. We need to remind ourselves that being intelligent and actually getting our hands dirty by learning how to do things matter.

Peeping in on the kid’s football game while I am blogging. It’s already 40-14 and they look awful… as usual. Smart coach would look to next seaosn already–deciding how he can build up his Juniors and below while giving his Seniors a last chance to enjoy their careers. From a pop perspective that means lettign my kid play both sides of the rock and develop into the weapon the QB needs next year. Maybe even pulling the Senior starter late in blowouts to give the next man up some real reps so he doesn’t show up senior year with minimal game time.

That isn’t happening. I hope the guy gets fired. Trash everyone but the very solid DC (who is a great DB coach). This is how I feel after the latest beatdown. They’re a team that doesn’t have a winning culture with a coach (a series of 5 in a row now) that has no idea how to create one. It is a tough thing to watch, but I believe that it will harden my kid. You have to learn how to lose and you have to learn how to win. That second part is easier if you have a history of losing. Losing is adversity. Being able to deal with that holding your head up high is what I want to see the kid learn.

The upside is that the last three games are truly winnable games. The next one ought to be the hardest of the three, and if they can pull that off, they may get to a 5 win season for the first time in a long time. The bad news about that is that it will engrain the coach aa a winner, but the proof of what I am seeing game after game is that he isn’t that.

Some Thoughts:

1. Not much to be said more on the subject. Moreover, too much is constantly said on the subject already. Balance in all things. Balance for the sake of my mind!

people talk a lot about finding themselves—as though they’ve been lost through time and circumstance or perhaps never once found in the cacophony of years and travel. I don’t know that I believe you can find yourself because you are always who you are, in spite of the layers of doubt, situation, and even opportunity that clouds our awareness of self. I suspect finding yourself is a shorthand for cutting though all of that to the core of who you are, the way a sauna burns out all of the sweat accumulated and seeps away the sick that lives within it.

I don’t have that sense of being lost or displaced from a core sense of who I am—perhaps I am detached from who I want to be or what I want to obtain. I know I don’t fully live the life I hope to experience before I can experience no more. I should be fueled by that hope. I should be pushing forward towards a future self and situation that is filled with the adventures and stories and opportunities and experiences I wish to claim as my moments of life. Instead, often, a sourness settles over me like a kid who has seen his parents doing something terrible and realizes at once that the world is not the magical place he once believed it was.

the trick to life is not finding yourself but realizing that you can find your space and happiness within the sour. No, I haven’t found the perfect place—not by leagues. I’ve found a place that is good for now. I’ve uncovered Sarah Mac’s “Good Enough” and I’ve settled into it as if this good enough is going to last long enough to wipe away the need for more. I know it isn’t and that is what unsettles me.

I’m running out of time to enjoy would could, should, and eventually must be.

half my roster has a Q or worse next to their names. It isn’t looking good for seeing enough of them for this to be a solid win. It’s gonna be close or I’m going to lose badly. I’m hoping I don’t need to worry… but I know I do and ought to build towards

who am I kidding… it is gonna be what it is gonna be.

fantasy aside, life is really good this week. I’ve stepped away from the house and that has allowed me to recognize how important it is to prioritize myself. I don’t do that. I rarely prioritize my writing even. I live in the margins of the lives of the people I love. Wrong kind of person could really take advantage of that. Fortunately I’m married to the right kind of person and that makes me feel safe—not only about protecting some time for myself but feeling like I have a partner who understands that we both need to prioritize ourselves from time to time.

Balance in all things, right? I am truly falling into learning what that means as well as how much it means to me to have someone with me who wants to see the best version of me. I’m wanting to be that for the both of us.

Some Thoughts:

1. Doing this one in the phone. Didn’t go as well as I planned in terms of how I was able to organize this piece. I don’t know how these kids do it…
2. actually, they don’t. Nobody blogs anymore. On the other hand, they do manipulate much of the world through this singular interface. I don’t know how they do that either.
3. look at me sounding like a geezer .

Kendrick Bourne. I had a shot at that dude and I didn’t take it. I am still regretting the mess up, which at this point has cost me two games. I was waiting on Juan Jennings to buck up. He hasn’t–won’t. The same scenario may be unfolding for the speedy little Tez Johnson. He of “why they chanting MVP for me” status did finally light up the scoreboard. He has a lot of opportunity to keep at it given the MASH unit that is the Bucs receiving corps. Those MVP cries were for Baker. He kinda has an inside track based on his current performance. If you need a flyer on a W/R/T you may want to take a look at Bourne first and Johnson right after. Both if it do ya.

I’m dealing with a rash of injuries and at the point where I don’t have enough Wrs to even fill the slots. So, I’m going to be looking at Tez and Luther Burden (who I dropped weeks ago). These are the fliers I’m taking. I need to do something to pull myself up out of 7th of 12th in that league. I’m 7th of 8 in the other, which means there are more options to claim players. Still means I need to get to 6th to be in the playoffs. The bottom 4 teams are 2-4. Part of it is bad luck. I lost to the highest scoring team of the week by ten and blew out every other team in the league. That level of scoring is why I’m not dead last. Still, to win the playoffs you gotta make the playoffs, so I have work to do.

I’ll let you know how the rebuilding goes tomorrow…

I have my bluelight blocking glasses on and I am writing my ten before the two hour writing session starts. I wanted to get it in on the front end, because I want to make sure I am warmed up. Writing hours have been quite atrocious as of late (likely mirroring the sad state of the blog). I’m facing this extended lull driven by finishing (what I hope to be) the final edit of the Novel, tossing in 4K on an upcoming Shadowrun book and trying to edit the first chapter of the Justice Engine without having a realistically thought out structure for anything beyond that first chapter. This is the between time where I always look up at my whiteboard and see pages upon pages of fantasy work stuck to the wall and wonder, when? Meanwhile there is that undisclosed post apocalyptic RPG project humming lowly in the back of my mind.

You would think by all of the things I’ve listed that I have too much going on. In fact the opposite is true. I don’t have enough of one thing going on to hold my attention. None of these projects are leaping up to grab me by the throat. There’s even another Shadowrun story out there that I was hoping to write and fold into the grad class starting next week, but haven’t truly gotten the opportunity to explore. In short, I am lost and in need of a shore upon which the waves of fictional ideas, plots, and constructs may lap against. I need to get my mind in the proper shape and my focus back to the wonderful place it was not 70 days prior.

It is hard to fathom that I’ve been back in the desert for two months. It feels like I’ve been here an entire lifetime–this with leaving no less than three separate times in order to visit greener lands (with a 4th arriving this week and more to follow in quick succession). Maybe leaving twice a month is part of why settling in feels so far away. Maybe being here is why I feel so far removed from anything stable.

Remember being a kid locked in timeout or the further back idea of ‘on punishment?’ Being in the desert feels a little like that. I feel stilted, which stems from a lack of sleep and a poor flow of ideas. Knowing this is a step towards a solution. I hope…

In this topsy-turvy reality few things are truly certain. Death, for now, and taxes continue to be stalwarts, but other sure-fire bets aren’t so sure anymore. So, here are a few things I think I think…

1. The Gaza ceasefire ends in a bloodbath: The fact remains that Bibi wants to hold on to power and war gives him that option. Elections are approaching and once he gets the hostages back later today, the expectation will be that he pulls the troops all the way back. That is not going to happen. He’s too closely aligned with the No-more-Gaza contingent to do anything less than a full re-escalation. I think he finds a way to kick things back off. The Wall Street Journal already hinted at such, claiming Hamas has refused to leave the area. We’re well into the genocide stages now folks, and the victims will be blamed for the next decade. After, blowback is gonna be a bitch.
2. Parity is coming to everyone but the Power 4: Football prediction, folks. I’ve watched the FCS start to lose cohesion because voters are ranking by logo and are constantly surprised when an unranked or unheard of team gets hot. It is good for the sport, and it is going to happen more. Football is more and more about money, and the people who have it are at the Power 4 level. Everyone else is just playing second fiddle. Once those top talent kids (or top rated) get paid, they’ll realize they cannot play where they are at and they are going to hit the portal for a chance to play. That chance more often than not will come at the FCS level. These are hungry clubs with limited resources, but a great chance to start and earn the clout and numbers to claw back up into the P4 where the payday hits. A lot of teams will be talented.
3. AI Authors are on the way: Type.AI, Squibler (I hate these silly names), SudoWrite, AuthorCraft…. We are mainstreaming AI writing. It is cheaper and faster to produce books that are not actually written by people. I suspect the romance genre will be the first hit, because so many of the plot elements are coded into the genre. Thrillers will follow closely…
4. AI movies are on the way: Shane Black’s latest film feels like AI Slop. Not sure that it isn’t. It may feature real actors, but the stuntwork is performed at the level of GTA 6. While the Guardian praised the film it it’s review, the truth is much sadder. 2 out of 10 and that is Sunday generosity. At some point in the film the actors chucked their characters and began to freestyle the roles. That was probably better.