A Photograph
I took the most poignant picture of my life on Thursday.
I was on the Interstate, driving down to pick up Eli 20.1, and there was a traffic slowdown due to a wreck. As I got closer, I realized it was serious--a small car (maybe a Mini-Cooper) had run up under a box truck, almost all the way to the trunk.
I wanted to take a picture to show to Eli, because a somber discussion about how dangerous driving can be is always useful, so as I was going by the wreck at about 5 MPH, I just raised my phone and took a picture (barely even looking).
Incredibly, the picture was perfect.
I captured the truck and the small car almost in the center of the frame. I caught the back half of the stretcher, right next to a policeman. In the rear-view mirror were a fire truck and an ambulance.
This would normally be the point where I show you this picture, because from a photographic and compositional standpoint, it's glorious.
I can't show you, though, and here's why:
EAST LANSING, MI – Michigan State University rowing team captain Olivia Long has died, the school announced. She was 20.
Long, a native of Lake Orion, died on Friday Aug. 27. According to the Lansing State Journal, her vehicle rear-ended a box truck in Ionia County’s Portland Township while traffic was slowed on I-96 due to another crash in Clinton County, causing her to suffer significant injuries.
Twenty. The same age as Eli.
It's so hard for people to understand how far they can go in a second or two of inattention. The Interstate speed limit is 70, but almost no one goes 70. The standard speech on that stretch of road is much closer to 80, and in one second at 80 MPH, you travel 117 feet. That's almost forty yards in one second.
And if you lapse for two seconds, you almost travel the length of a football field.
It can be difficult sometimes to be fully focused on the road, but the price you pay if you don't is so horribly tragic. And everyone has to live the rest of their lives without you.
Wartales
There's an interesting article over at RPS today about
Wartales:
It's about to hit Early Access, and there's a very early demo available, and boy, the demo is really my style. It's slower paced, there's lots of exploration, the fights are turn-based, and visually it somehow reminds me of Darklands.
It's definitely not Battle Brothers, in case you're wondering, because I've played BB plenty, and it's a much faster-paced game than Wartales. It's measured, and it has much more of a role-playing feel in that you'll struggle to earn enough gold to pay your company their wages. Scraping by, as it were, which feels much more authentic.
Oh, and the people making this game made Northgard. Strong pedigree there.
You can find the demo
here, if you're interested. It seems to have enormous potential.
Friday Links!
This is an amazing article (with some remarkable implications): At least one species of primate underperforms when the heat is on.
From Wally, and it's a fascinating story: The Nazi Who Saved Paris from Destruction During World War II. Espelette pepper fans, it's your lucky day: What’s A Good Espelette Pepper Substitute? Once again, NPR is incredibly useful: We Asked, You Answered: Your 50 Favorite Sci-Fi And Fantasy Books Of The Past Decade. Lots going on here: Best of Japan - Guinness World Records.
From Gloria, and I would be surprised if they didn't: Apes say hello and goodbye, just like people do, research shows.
From C. Lee, and hadn't it already happened? How the Pandemic Radicalized Evangelicals. This is terrific: The bee in Skyrim. This is outstanding: Historical generals pointing out the toilets. Buyer beware: Crucial Swaps P2 SSD’s TLC NAND for Slower Chips and Newegg Forced People to Buy Gigabyte Power Supplies With Catastrophic Failure Rates. This is very, very smart: Doctor tackles gap in public’s view of COVID-19 symptoms. An excellent obituary: Sudoku maker Maki Kaji, who saw life's joy in puzzles, dies. A deep-dive: A very serious investigation: What’s actually the best meat for a San Francisco burrito?, and one more: The mysterious tale of Oakland's super burrito, a deliciously absurd 15-incher.
From Meg McReynolds, and it's phenomenal: How Data Science Pinpointed the Creepiest Word in “Macbeth”.
Curveball
I found out that I need to pick up Eli 20.0 in Ann Arbor today and bring him back to Grand Rapids to pick up his car. It's going to take up most of the rest of the day, so I triaged and did the Links post for tomorrow, but no regular post today. Have a great weekend and I'll see you all on Monday.
The Hawk
I've talked about Johnny before. He lived two doors down, and was my surrogate father for many years.
His daughter sent me this on Monday:
I'd mentioned that he was an excellent wood carver (which he didn't start until he was 60). This was a piece that won third prize in a statewide concert.
I texted back and forth with his daughter after I received the hawk, and found out a few things I never knew about him.
Remember, he ran a concrete precasting business.
His daughter said he played the violin in high school and studied art. He wanted to be a portrait artist, but never pursued it (probably because of the war). He also enjoyed the poetry of Robert Lewis Stevenson and Robert Service, along with the stories of Rudyard Kipling.
A real Renaissance man, in a little South Texas town of 7,302. With my Mom (Master's degree in English) two doors down. Oh, and Johnny's wife Marilyn was super smart as well.
Definitely not what you'd expect to grow up around. I was lucky.
Hikes!
Eli 20.0 has been in San Diego, and last week he went to Zion National Park.
He sent pictures, of course, and they're amazing.
The two hikes he did with his best friend are both famous: the Narrows (which is through an extremely narrow canyon, walking through water about half the time) and Angel's Landing. Enjoy the photos!
This next one is definitely from the Narrows:
I think this one was from their campsite. Maybe.
This was near the finishing point of Angel's Landing (again, not totally sure):
He's had more adventures in one summer that some people have in a lifetime. And his Oxford tuition is officially paid as of today, so he'll have another adventure starting in about a month.
Assembly Fear And Trembling
Uncredited Delivery Driver #2 dropped off three large boxes on Saturday. Inside was the Ikea MALM bed frame, unassembled.
I opened the boxes, unaware of the evil lurking within.
A good indicator of the the amount of hell an assembly will require is the number of items in the "little pieces" box.
In this case, there were two little boxes, with approximately 150+ pieces. Little ones, obviously.
If you're thinking this sounds more like a LEGO set, well, you're right, if the LEGO set also included enormously heavy, large pieces of lumber.
This was my fundamental error: bed frames are heavy. I somehow did not feed this variable into the equation I call Do I Actually Want To Do This?
The default answer to this, in case you're wondering, is "no."
Inexplicably, I ignored the default in this case. It was a regrettable decision.
It's hard to describe what I went through in seven hours over two days. You know how you go to a Lakota Sweat Lodge and you black out at some point?
Yeah, it was like that.
In my case, it wasn't copious sweating and the resulting dehydration that made it happen. It was more the thousands of movements my body went through. The lifting, the pushing, the twisting.
The twisting, oh God, so much twisting with a screwdriver.
Improbably, I did somehow put it together (with your help at a critical juncture), and it's even correct. Allegedly. Here:
Why do I have llamas on my bed? I feel like every right-thinking person has llamas on their bed. I will brook no disagreement.
For Anyone Who is Better at This than I Am, Which I Assume is All of You [Update: Ideas Received]
[UPDATE: Good ideas received. Thanks very much!]
Ikea:
Those are two edges of a bed frame. They're supposed to just magically slide together and be flush. According to instructions and assembly videos, that is.
Nope, nope, nope.
There are four of these mysterious junctions. They all look like that. It's three dowels and two metal screw-type things, and I can't get even one of them flush.
The little metal wheel dealies are red herrings. They don't even have a function until the edges of the frame are flush.
Hammer? Oh, yes, I've hammered. It's brought them closer, but still not together. And maybe I'm just not willing to really cut loose and Paul Bunyan the whole deal, but I don't want to risk destroying it.
Ideas accepted at the front counter.
Friday Links!
Leading off this week, and why on earth has no one told me about this show before, it's Carrot in a box.
This is stunning: Floating Micro-Origami that Magically Unfolds in Water.
From Jonathon W., and the pictures are terrific: What Malls Looked Like From the '50s Through Today.
From Wally, and I'm still not quite sure what this dog is doing: Golden Retriever Practices His Mean Face. This is an absolutely spectacular story: The South Vietnam Pilot Who Performed a Daring Feat To Save His Family.
From Brian B., and it's fascinating: The ancient Persian way to keep cool.
Tremendous links from C. Lee, as always. First, a tremendous act of courage: The Black Reporter Who Exposed a Lie About the Atom Bomb. This is brutal: The Pain Was Unbearable. So Why Did Doctors Turn Her Away? We all knew this was coming: Why artificial intelligence is being used to write adverts. Damn it: Fire Exit Locks Recalled After Failing to Open at Least 56 Times. This is fantastic: Visualizing the Gravitational Pull of the Planets. This is bizarre: Inside the Secretive, Semi-Illicit, High Stakes World of WhatsApp Mango Importing.
From jdv, and it's a classic headline: Mad with power, fishing sim developers release an entire expansion about scallops.
Better Than My Short Game
There was a wonderful moment on the driving range today.
A guy in a learn-to-play college class, who had pretty obviously never hit a golf ball before, lined up with an iron and took the most heroic swing I've ever seen.
He lost his grip.
The club flew in a majestic arc down the range, with a perfect trajectory. It flew for a long time.
What did I do? What anyone would do of course. I got out my range finder and gunned the distance.
57 yards.
He was, of course, an instant legend.
Weights
There will be no Hulk Smash during this post.
I've mentioned weight training a few times, but I never talked about the program I'm using. I realized since most of us are getting up there (quite far up there, for me), it might be useful for me to share the program itself in case any of you are interested.
First off, I was surprised by how much I enjoy lifting weights again. I didn't do it for years because of a minor problem I have with my wrist, and weightlifting always seemed to make it worse. With this program and schedule, though, I don't have any problems. And (incredibly) I've gained significant muscle mass since I started (which was about nine months ago, I think). Almost ten percent on my bicep, and I'm too thin to put on muscle easily, so that's a huge gain for me.
One of the most important parts of this program is the schedule: you only lift every fifth day. You lift to exhaustion, when you do lift, but you take three full days off before you lift again. This has made a huge difference. I've been almost uniformly healthy this time, and any minor things that do happen have plenty of time to heal. It's been great.
It's is also not a big time commitment. It takes less than half an hour, and given that it's only every fourth day, it's easy to look forward to it instead of feeling like it's drudgery.
There are only five exercises, and you do them with dumbbells. You do only one set, but you do it to exhaustion, so as many reps as you can until you can't do any more.
Another nice element is that you can use the same weight dumbbell for all of these exercises and just adjust the number of reps. And in terms of reps, I'm using a light dumbbell (25 pounds) and performing a high number of reps (20-30, depending on the exercise) instead of trying to go with a heavier weight and fewer reps. It's not optimized for strength gain, necessarily, but the lighter weight makes it much less likely that I'll injure myself, I think.
I do all these one arm at a time, with the exception of Seated Triceps Extensions, where you use both arms with the same dumbbell (which also means higher reps for this exercise than the others).
1. Seated Press
2. Seated Triceps Extensions (you do this with one
3. Biceps curls (seated or standing)
4. Bent over row (standing)
5. Bench press (seated)
There are a ton of videos available for each of these, so I'm not linking to any particular one. They're very basic exercises, and most of you are already familiar with them.
They work, though, and it feels good.
Badass of the Week
I texted this to Eli 20.0 today about our public golf course:
Trails: a grown-ass man with a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles headcover.
That's what Trails is like, a wonderful collection of funky people who are wildly divergent and entirely pleasant.
We all know each other. Not by name, necessarily, but the people who are out there often all recognize each other. We'll chat sometimes, or just wave as we're passing by.
Today, I was on the sixth tee, with a backup ahead of me, and I looked back on the fifth green and saw an older woman I've spoken to before. She's about seventy, I guess, and she was walking with a push cart and an umbrella.
Respect.
It was hot as hell today on the course, with a heat index in the high 90s, and anybody still walking deserves full marks. I asked her if she wanted to play the last few holes together, because we weren't going anywhere, so we walked and talked for the last three holes.
She was walking eighteen, unlike the wimp who was only doing nine (me). And she was a solid golfer, particularly for her age.
We finished the ninth hole, and she went over to the back to continue being a badass, while I took my soaked shirt (humidity at a mathematically impossible percentage) and went home happy.
Trails. A place where you usually leave a little happier than when you came.
Prince
Max Weinstein sent this to me two weeks ago and I absolutely forgot to post it. It's in reference to Prince's "new" album and his unmistakable genius.
It's from this thread: You know how amazing... I've collected it in one longer post for you.
You know how amazing it is when you hear LeBron James recite an entire quarter’s worth of plays from memory, flawlessly? This is a good metaphor for understanding one aspect of Prince’s genius. Let’s look at his 1986 platinum-selling album, Parade…
It’s an incredible album, one of Prince’s very best. (It’s the one with “Kiss” on it.) But structurally, it’s a bit odd — the first side of the album is a continuous suite of songs that segue together, bridging a whole range of styles and tempos.
That’s not so odd; all of Prince’s albums mix styles! But what’s extraordinary is how he *recorded* those songs. On April 16, 1985, just days before the release of his “Around the World in a Day” album & only *ten days* after the end of the Purple Rain tour, Prince got to work…
At Sunset Sound in Hollywood, Prince hit the studio and sat down at the drum kit. There, he played the drum track for four songs, the entire first half of one of his greatest albums, straight through. From his mind. Right on time. All the fills, every break & every tempo change.
Next, he layered on the bass. Then keys. Then guitars. Recorded all the vocals, including his own harmonies. Though they’d do another session a few weeks later with an orchestra to add strings to the tracks, in one day, Prince created four brand new unrecorded songs from scratch.
A couple days later, Prince went back to work, releasing the Around the World in a Day album; it immediately hit number one. Those 4 new songs would come out a year later when Parade was released. And all these years later, it’s still amazing.
Unmatched musical genius.
Travel Advice for Eli 20.0!
When Eli 20.0 goes to the UK at the end of September, what are his best options for cellphone service? Apparently, Verizon (his current carrier) is a bad choice. Is he better off starting service with a UK-specific carrier when he arrives, or is there some other strategy he should use?
If you've gone from the U.S. to the UK for an extended length of time, and have sound advice on this topic, please let me know.
We played golf on a heinously slow Sunday, and in-between shots he was reading a book from his massive reading list for his International Politics between WWI and WW2 course.
Grinder.
Friday Links!
Leading off this week, a heartwarming story:
Note From a Dad.
The Ten Greatest Inventions of Mankind
In no particular order (or are they?):
The printing press
Sloppy Joe seasoning packets
The number zero
The Slinky
Electricity
WD-40
Vaccination
Jerk chicken (including Wavy Lays Jerk Chicken flavor)
Select-a-size paper towels
The linear particle accelerator
Entirely Fair
I was recently told that my food preparation philosophy, instead of being "farm to table," is "table to trash can."
I have no problem with this.
Chair (update)
As always, you're smarter than I am (which I enjoy, mind you).
I received two excellent chair suggestions. The first, by Syndi R., suggested enclosing the chair in plastic and loading up the free space inside with crumpled newspaper to absorb the smell (which she has used before to excellent effect). The indomitable C. Lee recommended rubbing dryer sheets on its surface.
As the chair was a bit too large (and I'd gotten rid of the plastic packaging) to try the newspaper idea, I went with the dryer sheets, and I definitely think it helped. I actually sat in the chair for a while today, and while it still doesn't smell normal, it's moved beyond egregiously unpleasant.
Also, Adam O. sent it a very concise explanation of just what the hell was happening:
I went through the same thing when I bought the two recliners for my home theater. The recliners have polyester microfiber upholstery, which is treated with formaldehyde and off-gasses VOCs (volatile organic compounds). My office is adjacent to the theater area and in addition to the smell, the formaldehyde and VOCs kept my throat irritated for a week or two while working 12 feet away from those chairs.
That all checks out, and it explains both the smell and my sore throat the first day, which is when I decided to seal the chair away for a few days.
Sitting on it today was fantastic, though. An amazing chair.
It Was The Best Of Chairs, It Was The Worst Of Chairs
So I got this chair.
Writing is hard on your body, believe it or not. Very hard. Sitting for four hours a day, plus forgetting to move because you're so focused, is murder on your hips and your back.
Mine, specifically.
I've been sitting in a simple wooden chair, and my hips have been enough of a problem that I broke down and did some chair research. I had an expensive Herman Miller chair a long time ago, and it was supposed to be the most supportive, healthy chair ever.
And I hated it.
It was just hard plastic, really. Not comfortable at all.
This time, I kept seeing one company get mentioned: Secretlab. Their Titan Evo chair seemed to be loved by everyone, and it was both highly supportive and relatively inexpensive (under $500, which isn't much for a high-end chair).
I bit the bullet and bought one.
I'll just say this straight out: I've never had a greater assembly experience in my life. Immaculate packaging, impeccable instructions. It was a master class in how to make it easy to assemble a product.
And the chair is incredibly comfortable, even though it's very firm.
I couldn't believe the greatness of this chair. I would have given it the coveted Dubious Quality Award of Greatness, which doesn't actually exist, but I was thinking of creating it just for this chair.
If only it didn't smell.
I don't mean some minor odor, either. It smells like I painted the entire apartment. It reeks. I had to resort to the Dickensian punishment of locking it in the second bathroom until it smelled less. I've been shuttling it around to make sure that there was no odor in the main space where I write.
This is the fifth day, and it still smells. It's gotten better, but it still has a long way to go.
And yet.
It's still an incredible chair, and I can't wait to use it all the time when I write. It'll be fantastic. And Secretlab even offered to send me some upholstery cleaner (this isn't the first time this has come up, based on Reddit).
So if you want an amazing, quality chair that isn't too expensive, this is the chair for you. You'll just need a place to air it out for the first week. Damn it.
Vertical Versus Horizontal Art
I had a wonderful conversation with an artist on Saturday.
Her style is extremely unique, bordering on the surreal, but in a deeply whimsical fashion. She was appearing at a festival, and we started talking about art (as one does).
Most of the work she displayed was in 16"x12" format (wait, which measurement goes first? Taller than wider, in case I did it backwards). I asked her how the format affected her work, and did she approach larger canvases differently?
This was the right question, as it turned out.
She'd done several murals (I looked her up later, and she's extremely accomplished), so she knew exactly what I was talking about. She said wider formats were difficult for her, because she was used to working vertically instead of horizontally. Much of her work is completed in a single day (everything from concept to sketching to inking), and she builds the drawing up vertically.
After we talked, I thought about this and realized this is also true of writing. Short stories are vertical, while novels are horizontal, and this explained why my initial approach to The Man You Trust was so off. I wrote a series of chapters that could stand on their own as interesting pieces, but they weren't connected in meaningful ways, and it took a long time (years) to fix that properly.
Now, though, thinking about a book as a mural instead of a silo really helps me understand what I'm trying to do.
Friday Links!
Leading off this week, and it's wonderfully funny: NBA Free Agency Recap: Otto.
I couldn't possibly have said it any better: NBC paid $7.75bn for its Olympic rights ... and we got televisual vomit.
From Wally, and I still remember the magnificent mess that was Mad Magazine: The Don Martin Dictionary: A collection of sound effects from his Mad Magazine pages. Next, the reincarnation of Harpo Marx: Cat Existential Crisis.
From Brian Brown, and it's a terrific read: The ballad of the Chowchilla bus kidnapping.
C. Lee, and stellar as always. First, and this is fascinating, it's The Marriage Pact. This is awful in every way: As China Rolled Out Its COVID-19 Shots, Victims of Earlier Vaccine Scandals Vanished. This is brilliant: Wild Parrots in Australia Are Teaching Each Other How to Break Into Trash Bins. This is concerning: Over half the deer tested in Michigan have been exposed to SARS-CoV-2. Death of a legend: Ron Popeil, Inventor and Ubiquitous Infomercial Pitchman, Dies at 86. I can't quite get behind this concept: You Don’t Need to Pay $12 for Mac and Cheese Ice Cream. Make It Yourself Instead. Oh, and I botched this link last week: The Soviet spy steam railway that's still running.
And With That, He Wins The Derby
DQ Story Advisor And Olympics Enthusiast John Harwood was trying to tell me about sport climbing in the Olympics.
While he was trying to explain the sport to me, I mentioned that Eli 20.0 was a speed climber at U of M his freshman year and was likely going to nationals if it hadn't been for COVID.
"Why didn't you tell me that?" he asked.
"That's just what happens with him," I said. "You get used to it."
Last night, he texted me this:
Oh, Equestrian was excellent. Did Eli also compete at a national level in Equestrian?
I texted this back:
He carried the horse.
Well
Activision's actions so far remind me of Midwestern Mexican food: they use all the right words, but it doesn't really mean what you think it does.
Things Activision is willing to do:
1. Loudly proclaim that they want the best culture for all employees.
2. Appoint a law firm to investigate
3. Fire executives.
What they won't do:
1. Hire a law firm that focuses on harassment instead of union-busting.
2. Fire Darth Vader, whose human name is Fran Townsend.
3. Eliminate arbitration, which would be an actual, huge benefit for employees.
4. Stop actively trying to prevent unionization.
What this all means is that Activision is willing to do anything as long as they don't lose a scintilla of control.
So the words describe all the right flavors, but the flavors don't seem to actually be in the food.
A Film Project
I'm getting to do something deeply fun. It's the kind of thing you get to do when you're older, if you're lucky, and life slows down a little.
I asked DQ Film Advisor And Nicest Guy In The World Ben Ormand where I should start if I wanted to gain a deeper appreciation of film. He suggested the
British Film Institute 100 Greatest Films of All Time, and I've been trying to watch one a day (not always, but that's the general idea).
I've seen seven films so far (starting from the bottom), and here's where they come from, along with the year:
Imitation of Life (U.S., 1959)
Madame de... (France/Italy, 1953)
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (UK, 1953)
Fear Eats The Soul (Germany, 1974)
Touki Bouki (Senegal, 1973)
A One And A Two (Taiwan, 1999)
The Seventh Seal (Sweden, 1957)
It's an amazing range of cultures as well as styles (Toukie Bouki uses French New Wave techniques, which is fantastic, although there are two scenes with animals being killed that are both meaningful and terrifying).
Tonight is Aguirre, the Wrath of God (Werner Herzog). Then 92 more to go.
Dear Aardvark
There's a Dear Abby ripoff called "Dear Annie." I look forward to Dear Angler and Dear A-Train, which should both be coming soon.
I saw this headline today:
Dear Annie: Our friend is deep in debt, asked us for money and hasn’t told her husband. What should we do?
Is this really a situation where we need to bring in Annie? Shouldn't we be saving her Yoda-like wisdom for more complex matters? When I try to answer questions, I always use the Run Like Hell threshold. Before I spend any length of time trying to evaluate a situation, I ask myself if the question is above or below that threshold.
If it's below, I know exactly what to do.
I feel like in this particular situation, the situation is obviously below that bar.
Actually, I could use that concept to start my own advice column.
Dear sir or madam,
In answer to your question, run like hell.
The Aardvark
