Terry Pratchett. It was at a book signing. He stayed very late, until every last person got their book signed. Generous and warm with everyone in line.

Time to pull up my big boy undies and start riding my bike. That sucker ain’t controlled by anyone but me. <middle finger to the car companies, wobbles down the road on a two-wheeler>

Spam musubi! Yummmmmmm

And burp loudly. Good times.

It’s a familiar process for those who lived through the early days of the internet.

We were using “real” and “for real” in the 1970s in the US.

It’s very telling that their protocol was messages every 15 minutes, but they were so used to losing contact with the Titan that nobody bothered to report the sub missing for several hours. The voice recordings could prove problematic for them.

Embrace the suckage.

I will never be able to create a painting like Dorothy Napangardi. But trying (and failing) made me have a deeper appreciation for her work. I can stand in front of one of her paintings, and know deep in my bones that it is far more complex than I can fully grasp because I’ve tried.

(If you ever get the chance to see any of her paintings in person, do it!)

I hate autocorrect for constantly changing my “its” to “it’s”.

(I just had to fight it to get the above “its”)

Yeah, can’t say I think much of his fan club…

There is always a relevant XKCD

As I recall, Beehaw defederated with them because we were getting swarms of bots and spam from their instance, not because of their communities.

“You have the freedom to speak, and I have the freedom to stop listening.”

There was this one pretty cool dude a couple thousand years ago…

To (badly) paraphrase Good Omens:

“What did he do to make them so angry?”

“Told them to be kind to each other.”

Oh, I’m not wise, I’m just pissed off. Gotta use my anger as fuel to burn a raging bonfire of KINDNESS.

I don’t know that it will be ok, but I’m certain it will be different. I see the US emotionally and culturally sliding down the same slope that Russia is going down. I figure they’re 10-15 years ahead of us.

Remember how excited we all were when the Berlin Wall fell? We had that Jesus Jones song roaring in our souls.

There is a wave of negativity and helplessness being thrown at us. We are being driven to be passive, to shrug our shoulders and go buy something to give our lives meaning. Our helpless selfishness feeds profits for others.

We must disengage from that helpless/selfish/profit way of life. It will destroy us. It will eat us up from the inside and leave us hollow and empty.

That doesn’t mean we have to move off-grid and become self-sufficient hermits. It can be as simple as learning to mend our clothes so we don’t buy as many new ones, and not buying into the shame of wearing mended clothes. (Visible mending is punk as fuck.) It can be as simple as saying thank you to cashiers, holding the door for that overloaded mother at the doctor’s office, giving others the benefit of the doubt. (Kindness is punk as fuck, too.) It can be as fulfilling and challenging as joining or creating a knitting group or live music jam or walking club. (Community is also punk as fuck.)

what the fuck can we do?

Save yourself. Be the example, even if you are only an example to your family or to your block. Know you are not alone. Join up with others and make a difference where you can. Be the good apple. Ration your energy and effort.

I’ve watched people I know burn out obsessively trying to change the world, I’ve watched others turn their back on the world and go whole-hog into selfishness.

There is a middle ground for each of us. Find it and occupy it. And have the courage to be kind.

Your idea is good, not silly. Aspects of it would work, if the dude designing the ludicrous sub had used steel like everyone else does. Magnets are very useful things, useful in a lot of ways.

The guy designed a bad sub, and fired the staff who told him it was a bad sub.

And this particular sub is made of carbon fiber and titanium, so non-magnetic.

Thank you!