- Back in my day …
- (Oh, boy, here we go, right?)
- Do you feel you have agency in your life?
- If not, did you cede control willingly, or did it just kinda happen gradually.
- Like one day you woke up and thought, “I’m not doing a damn thing I enjoy.”
- And it’s not like you can be mad about it.
- “Duty is heavier than a mountain.”
- You did it to yourself, at least to a degree.
- Complicit.
- Given my child’s commentary on the last list, I will endeavor to keep this one out of the Pit of Despair.
- But, c’mon, I earned my rep, right?
- Right now, this moment (and I just paused to type this before I forget it because in the 50s after a brain thing, I have goldfish memory), I’m reading a thing about “Punk Coding,” which apparently is an anti-establishment spin on vibe coding.
- If it were not an in-person seminar, I’d go.
- (Btw, it’s being offered by the Strother School of Radical Attention in Brooklyn, which as I’m reading about seems cool af.)
- Squirrel: Do you ever think about the opportunities you miss out on because of your physical geographic location?
- Anyway.
- Why is Punk Coding interesting to me?
- So many reasons.
- For one, it’s about using the tools of infrastructure to fight the infrastructure.
- Tools for asserting control and agency of things the establishment would rather you not.
- Also … sigh. How do I even get into this?
- When I was little, my grandfather got into home PCs early.
- He had one of those machines where you had to swap the 5.25” floppy discs back and forth because HDDs didn’t exist yet.
- First time I ever used a word processor was on that thing, and yes, I tried to write a fantasy story.
- Dude bought me a TI-99, and I coded.
- Made the little word bounce around the screen in BASIC.
- I think I was meant to be a coder.
- Alas, words got their hooks in me … deeper.
- But I’ve never been able to shake the want of that skill.
- (Phil, btw, became an actual coder. Makes his living writing code and can do it in like a dozen different languages.)
- Why am I telling you this?
- Because I feel the lack of that skillset and missing information like a phantom limb.
- I would’ve been one of those hackers in a warehouse with cables all over the place. You know, like Neo at the beginning of The Matrix.
- Probably best it didn’t work out that way.
- I hate being uneducated in areas that call to me.
- I chose to try to fit in instead of chasing my own interests.
- Everything has a cost.
- And here in the last third, continuing to mask instead of learn is a constant irritant.
- There are barriers, mind you.
- Like attention span.
- And indentured requirements.
- And that goddamn dopamine addiction.
- I often make the joke that if I won the lottery, I’d become a permanent student.
- Because I need the structure of a class to keep me on the path.
- Not because the info isn’t out there for free.
- Some of us need guardrails to grow.
- Here’s the other thing.
- I value education because of the “they can’t take it back” part.
- I want to know all the things.
- And I don’t.
- Constant irritant.
- Education fosters growth and fulfillment.
- Education is agency.
- Besides which, how can you argue when you don’t really understand what the fuck you’re talking about?
- What I’m saying is that all I want to do is learn new shit at this point.
- And I have plans in that direction.
- I’m also scheming to remodel my office at home. Going to be an investment/learning process.
- It’s stuff I’ve always wanted to learn to do, so fuck it.
- I am going to make what I want.
- (See the theme?)
- You age the fastest when everything becomes routine.
- Novelty is the key to time slowage.
- Embrace the new or perish.
- Heh.
- Speaking of new, Anthrax dropped a new album this week.
- Good shit, so far, if you’re into that kind of thing.
- If you’re not …
- Are you into Nothing Bundt Cakes?
- The seasonal one is apple pie.
- Looks magical.
- Been a trying couple of weeks and my limited brains are fried.
- Like, between Anthrax and the Bundt Cakes, I tried figuring out what the coolest way to do a low-key adhd/squirrel t-shirt.
- SQRL stands for some dumb IT thing, so that’s out.
- I’m always adding to my list of t-shirt ideas.
- For the shop.
- And for those fucking hacks to steal and replicate in different ways.
- How the fuck do you keep ownership of your ideas when theft is normalized?
- Jesus.
- This one is pure stream-of-consciousness.
- Trying to wake up on a Friday.
- To Embrace that 36 hours of freedom before the dreads kick in.
- Sigh.
- Sorry, kid. I tried.
- Okay, but … why?
- Where the hell else am I going to have this conversation?
- (In the shower, talking to the wall. In the car, talking to the traffic. In my head, talking to the other Mes. Zombie, zombie, zombeh eh eh.)
- For real, man.
- What the hell do you people do?
- Just not share at all?
- Don’t bullshit me and say you don’t think.
- These thoughts are what make us human, and they are the things the machines cannot do.
- And here’s where we could get off on a philosophical discussion about consciousness that I do not have the knowledge to actually participate in properly.
- What’re your gaps?
- Have the Friday you deserve.
Posted in The Black List
One response to “Wake Up”
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I share with my AI…I know you love that thought LOL 😛
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skepticlysm 
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