Quote

There came boom and bust, bankruptcy, depression. 

Great public thieves came along and picked the pockets of everyone who had a pocket.

And even childhood was no good any more -- not the way it was.

Worry had crept on a corroding world, and what was lost -- good manners, ease and beauty? Ladies were not ladies any more, and you couldn't trust a gentleman's word.

These quotes, you'll note, are from East of Eden p. 129-130 and he is of course referring to the end of the 1800s and turn into 1900.

Hot Take

You know who knew how to handle delusional autistic nerds like Elizabeth Holmes, Sam Bankman-Fried, and Mark Zuckerberg? It's the same group that knew how to handle the fat, ugly socialists who want to take over our cities and the Democratic Party.

Bullies.

We got rid of the bullies and unleashed holy hell on ourselves with the nerds controlling the economy and the ugly losers controlling our politics. Bullies solved these problems on the schoolyard and had the rightful order - a controlling triumvirate of jocks, charismatic socialites, and student council strivers - to create an American order that worked for the majority. 

We got rid of the bullies like the Chinese got rid of the sparrows and now the locusts run rampant. 

That's A Hot Take

If you were a 90s girl, everything was about becoming a mini boy.

Explains why very few women of my generation can cook well.

Probably True

The film about a fraud is a fraud. 

Pretty good take. One of my unreported immediate reactions to the film (and all Nathan Fielder work) is that I'm glad I saw it, but I will never watch it again.

Movies

Trailers used to be made to promote movies, but now movies are built to finance the trailers. More people rewatch Top Gun Maverick trailers than the film. I'm positive.

Logging

TV: War

Film: The Invite 

Should be watched together if you would like to feel poorly about marriage. How did this idea of War get pitched? What a terrible pitch...a show about two divorce law firms fighting over a big public divorce? Safe to say, they're not making this show for me...

Logging

Film: You Can See Everything

Tons to say about the film, but what stood out most was how utterly banal and pointless all her "inventions" and "business" ideas seemed (to me anyway). When Fielder asked about what the Theranos device did - she kept repeating it could "perform any chemistry tests known to the cloud." I came away thinking to myself - so this thing can connect to the internet? Isn't this literally what every device can do? The film spent three hours with a woman who has apparently devoted her life to inventing things, but as far as I could tell, her next big thing is she and her husband are re-branding Theranos with some updated tech. My takeaway is that a lot of Silicon Valley startup culture are simply scams.

The other thing that struck me was the ending dissection of Holmes's marriage to her obviously quite strange husband by Seyfried and Fielder. The detail that stands out like a sore thumb is that both Seyfried and Fielder were both single (for obviously very different and visible reasons) and here they are spending a great deal of energy critiquing and dissecting a relationship that is surviving - maybe even thriving - if you count the births of young children - despite a prison sentence. We the audience are pulled into their psychoanalysis, but the implied ending of the film, is that this autistic never-in-her-life-liar's marriage to a borderline psychopath is a pretty good outcome for them on a spiritual level and the genius filmmaker and beautiful actress are both quite alone and melancholy despite their worldliness. All she has her horses and their farts and he, memories of the ocean. 

Makes you wonder.

Brazil

I have no clue what's going on in Brazil, but I distrust the communist. That's my heuristic.

The School Shooter Hero in Bend

What these cases show: 9-11 operators and hired security guards are repeatedly too slow or fail to act when the shit hits the fan. But a father with a gun and teachers in the line of fire are the ones who actually take action to save lives. 

My Sense

The majority of American workers view their workplace as a dying carcass and are just trying to get the most meat off the bones as they can before it's gone. 

Not good.

Try It

Alex Cooper and Sofia Bush think women contemplating divorce can "do better." And I say: good luck. 

Note

Reading about my local school district, which has financial problems, saving money by having fewer "English learners" in the district. So these immigration crackdowns help school district finances and rent cost (less demand). Interesting. Two of Democrats biggest concerns are addressed by the Trump admin immigration policy.

Netflix

Stock down almost 50% in one year since the market realized it's really just Seinfeld reruns and slop.

Question

Why hasn't AI made the deli counter any faster? 

AI Weak Sauce Argument

Just as a thought experiment: why is our imagination of AI creativity limited to writing novels and making movies or TV shows? If it were a truly profound technology, shouldn't it be doing something humans cannot do? Why can't it imagine other art forms and create those?

And ps - as far as I can tell, it still hasn't written a hit book, movie, or tv show.