Today, I am angry. A completely preventable disaster has occurred in my city. "Unfortunately, the Grenfell Action Group have reached the conclusion that only an incident that results in serious loss of life of KCTMO residents will allow the external scrutiny to occur that will shine a light on the practices that characterise the malign governance of this non-functioning organisation." - 20th November, 2016 Sometimes corruption means wasted taxpayers' money. Sometimes it means projects get completed late. Sometimes it means people die.
On a plane bound for San Francisco. Lot's happening in my world right now. Wife is very pregnant, daughter on summer break, we are about to renovate our home, we are following this crypto stuff closely, Forever Labs is doing well, just lots and lots happening. Have a big announcement that I hope to make here in the next month. Forever Labs is now operational in Michigan, NC, Nashville and San Francisco and we are expanding FL in to LA, Houston, Austin, DC, NYC and Chicago. So much work happening, but it's a lot of fun to work hard when it's for your business. Also, it's pretty kick ass to build something with people you like. Ahem... b_b, mk, ecib and elfassy. -Need to get Laith on Hubski! Forever Labs starts our animal work in late July. We aim to put together the gold-standard for how to reintroduce young-adult stem cells, later in life, for health maintenance purposes. Look forward to extending the healthspan in mice and then humans. Rad stuff!
Things that are on my wall Since we met, my BF and I have had a shared appreciation of shitty landscape paintings from Goodwill. Conservatively, I would say we've bought over 50 in the 5 years we've been dating. Almost all of them will get painted on by one of us in some way. This started with the below painting, which has a quote my bf said on shrooms once and I refuse to let him forget. This is a place, man We thought we had lost that first painting, so we made another (needs some touching up). We both kept one of them when we moved apart, and it feels nice to have them back together again. Hausuuuuuu. One I made yesterday. Things that children have said to me this week I teach preschool now, which has been a good change of pace. Kids are weird. Ian, age 2, likes hiding things/himself a lot. When I try and play along and ask "where did ____ go?", his response is always "anywhere!!". Deep kid. Things I could do better I went to an open mic last night. It's the first time I've played in public since I moved to Portland in December, and I fucking bombed. Kept forgetting the words, had some technical difficulties, played the wrong songs. Glad I signed up with a fake name.
Congratulations on bombing! I used to do stand up and I always did my best work after bombing. There's some kind of freedom around hitting rock bottom in front of a dozen people that can help make you fearless. Though right now I'm sure it just feels shitty.
TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. GLASSES 2. KANSAS ----------- §1 GLASSES Have I mentioned that I got new glasses? It is my first time with plastic frames. I really like them so far, although I'm not sure how durable they will be. §2 Kansas I keep turning that over in my head. Kansas isn't my ideal, but it's not bad. Lawrence is ok. My big issue with living in the KC Metro was that I never felt like I belonged there. I had no sense of community. Lawrence, though? I fit in. My issue isn't the people. They make sense to me in a way I haven't felt since I left in '08. I've realized that when I think of "falling in love with a place", what I'm thinking of --what I'm not feeling here-- is landscape. When I think of places that I enjoyed going to, what stands out for me is the environment. Ours is now corn and soy.
I grew up in California, and once planned on dying on top of a mountain in Colorado or New Mexico. I now live in the Ohio Valley. I'd rather not live here, honestly, looking at the politics of the place. But the people on a person to person level are nice, I can afford to live here and bank a shit ton of money into 401K and savings, have lots of money left over to do fun stuff and not work myself to death in the process. Maybe the poetry thread is rubbing off on me, but home is where you are and what you make of it. A house is a building, but a home is something different. Pick a place with decent neighbors and make the place a home, or travel. or keep renting and saving so you have a stash of "fuck you" money and can do something else later. Mine is literally bourbon and horse racing and college sports. Three things I give no shits about. but in Kansas City you get to see the August Eclipse without leaving home, so keep that in mind.When I think of places that I enjoyed going to, what stands out for me is the environment.
SUBHEADINGS, BABY inspired by flac Things that are on my wall As some of you know, I am in Key West (with mivasairski where the town motto is So on my wall is a window opening into greenery. I also have on my wall this sign: It always makes me giggle. Things that children have said to me this week Sadly, I have had no conversations with children this week. I did have a conversation with my child who is an adult. She told me she is working 10:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. shifts stocking shelves at Toys 'R Us and trying to combine that with other shifts at other jobs. She has two undergraduate degrees and a teaching degree. Can you hear my silent scream? Things I could do better hubski-ing, writing, thinking, working, playing.
This is, indeed, a good sign. :) I have something like this I want to put somewhere. I was browsing an AskReddit topic about language peculiriarities around the world. One point that came up was the Polish word "hejt" - local rendition of the English "hate" as used by the younger generations. One of the replies to the comment was "Hejters gonna hejt". I've never had any single meme - as in, unit of memory - that would make me giggle for months on.
I don't need this shit. Roommate 1: In her 40s. Has 3 cats, two are super cool, one is horrible and I spent a half hour this morning trying to coax it out of my room. Quit her job a couple weeks ago. A family member is moving in. Neither of them have their shit together. Oh and she baby talks her cats all the fucking time. Made a big deal out of making space and consolidating things when I first moved in, yet leaves her shit everywhere. Guess I know what that was about now. Roommate 2: Extremely passive aggressive. Loud. Generally an unpleasant person. Which is weird because I met em both through running and they're fine in those groups but, I'm moving out sooner rather than later. Make enough money to not have to deal with this kind of shit.
I've thought about this quote like six times since I first read it Wednesday. Life is short. Spend it involved in the never ending and often thankless toil for improving the lot of fellow humans? Or noping the fuck out and squeezing life's lemons? That's a false dichotomy, but it predicts a lot of human behavior.
Get out! One small regret that I have is that I have never lived alone. I have always had roommates, or a spouse. It would have been nice to have had a year or two in there with just me.
I was living alone prior to this. It was awesome. I would like to return to living alone.
Insufferable! I've lived with people like that before. The worst thing is that sometimes they'll actually end up using the baby-talk voice on you.Oh and she baby talks her cats all the fucking time.
all the cool kids use subheadings Kosovo Just when I got comfy with the idea of leaving and only looking back fondly, I met and clicked with an academic who wants me to write an article on the policymaking environment for an upcoming book. I said something about having already bought a ticket home being my reasoning for solidly leaving, and he said something about it being simple to find the funds to keep me here... not sure if he meant in terms of just a plane ticket or something to live on. Not so sure about sticking around, but I'm gonna write the article and it can definitely be done remotely. I'd really like to go home haha Things Done My 2 research interns (yeah weird to think about having interns... I'm not so far removed from being an intern myself lol) presented some killer work that I assisted them with and they'll be graduating next week pending my evaluations. Acquired while overseas a beautiful Ethan Allen set of chests of drawers and tables and stuff... FO FREE. Upcoming Ditching work to go wine tasting in the South tomorrow. Going to Ljubljana again but this time as a work thing. Going to Berlin for 5 days shortly after that. then it'll be July which means the end is nigh!
Subheadings Subheadings are used by the cool kids because subheadings are useful. 1. They prepare readers for the content to come. This is a good thing because if the reader continues past the heading, it's because they are interested in the proposed content. A subheading is like saying, "Do you want to hear more?" 2. They help the writer focus. Life presents an infinite number of subheadings. Where should we put our attention? What's important? What's actually interesting and readable? How can we best reveal ourselves (Is that the purpose of Pubski?) while also amusing others? 3. Subheadings can also challenge us to think differently. Quatrarius says, "pubski's harder than it appears" It's easier if one uses subheadings. Here's some: Feelings Wishes, Hopes, Dreams Epiphanies and Awakenings Identity-Defining Experience What I'm Doing Right Now I find all of those inviting and might use them myself.all the cool kids use subheadings
Oh man, have fun in Ljubljana! Beautiful place. Great people. I hope you don't plan on bringing the Ethan Allen back home with you. Shipping is pretty brutal, and importing could be a problem, depending on whether the wood is stamped FSC certified somewhere, or not.
it's my 2nd trip. really pretty place, tasty food. sorry that was kinda unclear -- i found it on craigslist at DC and had Topher pick it up. and it was free.
one of my best friends when i was a kid is half slovenian and half croatian and introduced me to potica so i hunted it down while there. their layer cake too is top notch.
pubski's harder than it appears hello friends n' acquaintances - i miss you sometimes
Some kind of frog Know what kind of sucks about working all morning and then coming home? It's kind of hard to find the energy to say anything meaningful in Pubski. I kind of wanted to talk about how I hear the Toyota C-HR is kind of disappointing in that its looks are promising something the car can't deliver. I'm kind of hoping Toyota makes a hot-hatch followup to it, like the Focus ST, Mazda Speed3, Golf GTI, etc. I also kind of want to talk about how Buick is coming out with a wagon option for the latest Regal and Dala loves wagons and the boring side of me loves Buicks and I kind of hope we get a used one a few years down the road when her car finally kicks it. I kind of wanted to complain about how I think it's ridiculous that I have to wear flannel shirts in the middle of summer because my roommates want to keep the air conditioning on so high. Something tells me that's definitely a first world problem. I kind of wanted to talk about how Dala got a thundershirt for the dog and that it works really well, but I'm concerned that maybe we should use it sparingly so she doesn't grow dependent on it. What if there's an afternoon storm and no one is home to put it on her? Won't she start to feel worse? Additionally, I feel kind of like a jerk about the whole thing because I want my dog to learn how to tough things out but I also know some things are beyond her control. Speaking of toughing it out, my friend is marveling that I'm sticking with DS9. I'm almost done with Season 2. I'm positive of 4 things. 1) Dax is a wasted character. 2) The filler episodes are awful and there are podcasts and radio shows that go into much deeper philosophical discussions than some of these filler episodes touch on. 3) There totally needs to be a Star Trek series where the protagonists need to navigate around a central theme that in the eyes of a lot of nations, The Federation is an unwanted, even antagonistic presence. 4) This paragraph has too many numerals in it.
Well yeah. I mean, it's all about Babylon Five, really.Speaking of toughing it out, my friend is marveling that I'm sticking with DS9.
Can we talk about how much I want an electric car? Full disclosure: I work for an electric utility. The company has some Chevy Volts we can use for company business, and I'm using them as much as possible to keep miles off my own car. The novelty of driving 40 miles without using gas hasn't worn off. I saw a Bolt on Monday and didn't hate it. I looked up the list price and hated that, though.
$36k isn't too bad. You could see what you could find in terms of rebates, employee discounts, tax deductions, etc. to bring down the price. If all else fails, you could haggle the car sellers and go in knowing you're more than comfortable walking away. If it helps, I've heard good things about the leaf and a lot of other companies are coming out with electric cars in the next few years (I even hear Ford is considering an all electric Mustang, yes please). The additional competition might help drive down prices if you're willing to wait.
My Subaru is only nine months old, and I just rolled over 10,000 miles on Sunday. I'm super happy waiting. I think the timing might be perfect right about the time I'm ready to replace this car. Hyundai has an electric car available in California, and I talked to someone leasing an e-Golf who liked it. There seem to be more options coming, and I'm happy to wait. I do think it's pretty neat, running a car on electric. It might mean renting occasionally for long trips, but that's ok.
I like it! I got the Impreza five door. The AWD is great in snow. It's a really great all around car which is just what I wanted. I really liked my old Honda Civic, but I wanted a small, practical, AWD car, and that's what the Impreza is.
Yeah. Electric cars are pretty cool. I'm a bit worried about whether or not we have the resources to keep making them, such as lithium. There seems to be a bunch of back and forth arguments to that issue. Though, if space mining ever becomes a thing, that issue might get resolved pretty quick.
Yeah, I see the same back and forth, and the debate is such a mess I don't think anyone can make sense of it. I'm worried the prices won't come down enough to be widely adopted.
Here for my semi-annual post on Hubski.. I've spent the last couple weeks in the Baltics. I haven't been able to travel as much as I'd like but nonetheless I've enjoyed my time here. I may do a trip report if there's any interest. Apology to ThatFanficGuy-I never did get around to replying to your tutoring offer. I may get back to you on that soon, if the offer still stands. On my front I've realized that I am absolutely horrid at expressing myself. This has been increasingly evident as I've needed to express opinions in Russian, and found myself unable to say anything even in english. So here we go, I think it's time to actually start commenting here and talking. Self improvement and all that. Maybe I should have gone to college after all?
Alright gotcha, enjoy the travels. I may very well do that. My school finishes mid july and I'm fully expecting to find myself in sudden need of somebody who will humor my constant desire to speak in Russian
Current commitments preclude me from going for quite a few years. To be honest the older and the more financially stable I become the less I feel like college is a necessity. If I do go I think it'll be because I wasn't able to learn what I wanted by myself and/or intellectual curiosity.
Automation I got two rooms on switches - one single, one double - and I didn't get electrocuted! I also got a Harmony Hub on sale and synced it with my switches and google home. Now when I say "turn on the projector", the projector and receiver turn on and the living room lights turn off. I'm trying to get "time for bed" to turn off the living room and turn on the bed room, but it's running into trouble (I think it's already a keyphrase). Home Improvement We got an unpowered push mower and it's fantastic. I thought it would be miserable, but it's actually easier than a motor mower in a lot of way, and it's super quiet and relaxing. My wife and I take turns mowing because it's a great way to get some exercise and listen to a podcast. The shelving project got shelved (:D) because it's way more complicated than I thought it would be so I'm making real plans this time. I got a new case for my computer. My old one was over heating. I thought it was because it was such a small case, but on taking it apart I actually put waaaaaay too little thermal paste on the CPU. I'm trying to hide this fact from my wife who thought a third case in a single year was foolish already. Work I made a proposal to change jobs. I stated what I was good at and how my current job was moving me away from those strengths and my manager was super supportive! It's crazy that I have this narrative of slave driving management in my head, and how that keeps me from speaking up, but in reality they're just nice people who want other nice people to succeed and be happy. It's a really nice thing to see.
I got that Fiskars mower. It actually requires less effort than the NiMH powered Craftsman it replaced (which our tenants stole, along with everything else that wasn't nailed down). You gotta keep up on it, though, and you're going to want to buy a string trimmer to get the nasty weeds. I have one that's powered by the same batteries as my drill, which also has like hedge trimmer, router, impact driver, air compressor, jigsaw, zip saw and a million other pieces. It's rad.
http://www.blackanddecker.com/products/product-stories/matrix None of these things are as great as the dedicated tools that do those things but considering how little I need a router, it's a great router, for example.
Finally went out canoeing and it was beautiful out. I always feel a little bad when it's raining/foggy since this might be somebodies only day here but the fog makes the mountains/lake look really nice and calm. I'll take a picture of that next. I fully intended to post this yesterday but I played baseball instead. I love summer.
I have this beautiful piece of clothing I wore exactly once and something terrible happened during it. Then I held onto the piece for 7-nigh-8 years. It's so beautiful - but I can't ever wear it again without thinking about that night. I want to do something symbolic to get rid of it. It doesn't feel right to give it away like it means nothing. I loved it, and it was awful. Anybody know a shaman?
Cut it into teeny tiny squares, blend it to a pulp with some water, make the pulp into paper, bind it into a book, write down some feelings on it, burn the book, gather the ashes, bathe in the ashes, roll yourself on a sheet of butcher paper, bind THAT into a book, put it on a bookshelf, burn the house down, sleep in the ashes, become the ashes. Or, at least, that's one option.
Turn it around. There is a whole subculture of brides who "Trash The Dress" in epic photoshoots that wind up being amazing images, that totally ruin the wedding dress. Examples: http://delsolphotography.com/category/trash-the-dress/
Turn it around. There is a whole subculture of brides who "Trash The Dress" in epic photoshoots that wind up being amazing images, that totally ruin the wedding dress. Examples: http://delsolphotography.com/category/trash-the-dress/
Mercury is a pretty metal. It's also highly poisonous, with the effects unseen before it's too late. Don't hold on to it. The best way to get rid of poison is to put it away where it can't find you.
Subheadings Music & Travel Last week was my third trip to New York to sing at Carnegie Hall! I performed the Mass in Time of War. The performance was incredibly moving, and I walked offstage with tears in my eyes at the majesty of it. The lasting effects of the concert/rehearsals is rather striking. My ear seems to be much more attentive than it was before this past week, and the change is noticeable to those who hear me sing. Somehow, being playfully insulted for days on end has dramatically improved my musical ability. I was also very fortunate because my Robust Pleasure Source and two of my closest friends from high school were able to attend the show. I'm very grateful to have been able to share that with them, and to have someone who knew /cared about me in the audience, which is a Carnegie first for me. All that said, I'm also incredibly grateful to not have to sing any more Italianate Latin Masses for a while. Rather than stay in the hotel room I paid for (And would have been splitting with two other dudes) my RPS and I stayed across the river in New Jersey with the aforementioned friends from high school. I'd never been to NJ before, and from what I had heard, I figured they had just paved over the whole state right up to the beach. We were pleasantly surprised to find that rural/not coastal Jersey is actually really gorgeous! We took an afternoon to go for a hike in one national park, and then spent another afternoon touring a site where General Washington and his troops made camp in the winter of 1779. Regarding the actual travel bit, I am never flying with Spirit airlines again. Double-charged for our luggage, had to pay extra at the gate to get that resolved and my support ticket for a refund is pending, but my hopes are low that I will get anything back. After that, and a hassle with the TSA regarding a vase that we were given as a gift, the RPS and I have decided to stick to driving if we are going to be staying within the continental US and Canada. By the time we got from the NJ/NY border, through the city, through TSA, we could have already been back at home in our beds if we had just left straight from Jersey. Lessons learned. Job Stuff Two paydays left with the current gig. Because I am 'Reduction in Force' status and not like, quit or fired, I can't touch any of my retirement funds to ease the transition period. Equal parts bad luck and poor planning on my part, and I will remember how this squeeze feels in seasons of plenty in the future, so that I hoard my acorns more carefully for winter. Lots of applications sent out, my RIF status makes me a hiring priority within the University, not sure what that translates to in real-world terms, but I'd like to think my resume and solid recommendations from high ranking, endowed doctors will at least get my foot in the door. Sending lots of applications outside of the U as well, but I'd love to keep all my benefits, the package is pretty sweet. The RPS is searching for a new gig after a serious miscommunication with her current job. Among her prospects is a admin job with a local dispensary/coffeehouse which she is really hopeful about. Considering she has her medical card that opens a lot of doors in this area. Food service blows, and we're trying to get her out of that ASAP before she re-starts school come fall. Health Stuff I biked 15 miles yesterday while crushing t3h n00bs at Overwatch. I felt so good afterwards I did a half hour of yoga with the RPS and found myself better able to keep up with it than her, which is more than a little surprising. I am consistently biking 10 miles a day plus some amount of yoga between 15-20 minutes, the goal being a consistent 10-15 miles and 30 solid minutes of yoga. I consider myself to be in a self-directed cardiac rehab, and it appears to be having results. Assuming I continue to feel good, I can go another year or two without having any large gauge needles shoved unpleasant places. My weight has come up a bit and is stubbornly staying between 185-195 depending on fluid load. I want to decrease my carb-load, but staying low-carb while also maintaining low-salt and high protein content is difficult. Sure, you can be a healthy vegetarian, but it's hard to do that without eating lots of brown rice and other starchy goodness. Spiritual Stuff Went to an unprogrammed meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, aka Quakers on Sunday with the RPS. Felt a similar sense of calm that I get from meditation nights at the Buddhist temple and a really robust and involved community. There is a frazzling but relatively peaceful ongoing 'conversation' between myself, the RPS and her parents about 'the state of our souls' because we are cohabitating, AKA living in sin. I'm more than happy to engage in some soul-searching, and have actually found a fair bit of inner peace as a result. I do know however that we will not reach the conclusions they want us to (Her move back in with them, we see each other once or twice a week for a few hours with chaperones. A Courting Style relationship) and it feels dishonest to 'agree' with them on so much and then continue to live my life as I see fit. A shame that they can't take the 'love and accept everyone as they are' bits as seriously as the ' Don't wear mixed fibers, eat shellfish or fuck before marriage' bits. I made the point once to them that there are members of their congregation who are biblically living in adulterous relationships, because they remarried after they split from a spouse, but apparently that's a separate issue. Ye gods, I'm ranting about in-laws and I'm not even engaged yet. Maybe it would be best to just pack up, move west and not talk to anybody for a few years. The though crosses my mind often and the RPS says she's down to go if it's really the right move for us. I keep sending feelers out Seattle way just to keep the idea alive in some meaningful way. I felt like I had either an earth shattering emotional insight or else a minor psychotic break yesterday. I was in traffic, listening to a podcast about early church fathers of Quakerism and a few other similarly 'radical' groups and I had the sudden, blindingly beautiful realization that the whole point of spiritual exploration/discovery is to find what works for me, what I can live with, what inspires me to be a better, kinder, more tolerant and caring person, and that the only person I'm really accountable to for that is myself and whatever deity does/does not exist. If heaven is indeed closed to those few people who claim to be a part of 'The One True Church' then I don't want to go anyway. I've intellectually known this for many years, accepting it and feeling it and BELIEVING it feels very different. It's pretty awesome. Vidya Games What little I've seen of E3 2017 has been a shitshow. I'm looking forward to Destiny 2 and that's about it. I haven't touched a drop of Skyrim in years and I'm not suddenly going to pick it up again because they ported it somewhere else. Still crushing at Overwatch, which is really funny because I play with a controller when I am working out and controller is always supposed to lose to mouse and keyboard. I wish that Civ 6 got my heart rate up enough to be fun to play while doing cardio.
Almost done with the exams. I'm dedicating today to Grammar and learning the semester's worth of data in a day. I'm dedicating tomorrow to Philosophy, something I'm leaning to study well just out of spite, similarly in a day's fashion. There's also the tiny issue of PE and me... khm... taking liberties in participating in classes. Something to solve tomorrow... hopefully. That leaves two exams to the autumn, meaning I have the whole summer to prepare to them. I intend to do unlike this year and give a bit of every single day to learn a tiny bit more, so that, come September, I be ready to crush it. Been talking to the Psychology teacher. She was impressed by the work I've made with one of the projects (a team work which I did alone) and offered me to write papers with her if I want to. It's an exciting opportunity by itself, but our interests in what we'd like to study don't align. My instincts tell me I could bend over to make it work... The mature and rational part cuts it off: "You've been through this. This never works". I slowly come to accept the seemingly inevitable thought that people are never going to be comfortable around me because of who - what - I am. I can be charming and sociable, but it takes so much effort that it isn't worth it for most people. Otherwise, I'm that guy in your group you wouldn't talk to, the guy who's always alone doing some odd stuff you've never even heard of. I don't know how to open up to people - as in, I don't know what it constitutes and how it is expressed, in practical terms - and I don't know where to start learning that. The way I express myself with people, the things I say are often left unattended, even if it's the best damn piece of writing I've done in a long while (warning: Reddit). Those who break through the invisible wall tend to be people with major character flaws... or at least, that's what I tell myself when they get close. If I'm not going to be sociable, I might as well leave behind me the kind of work that would make people go "Oh, this is good". I'm sure Dr. Peterson has something to say about it. The man and I speak the same language, I enjoy listening to what he has to say. He's brutally honest about what parts of humanity he's learned about as a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, and I appreciate hearing of all the flaws in how we think laid out the way he lays it out. Last year, I felt awful about going back to Kemerovo for the summer: it meant that I'd have to be living with my parents again - a thought that, at the time, seemed unbearable. This year, I'm eager to finally return there. I miss the city, I miss the familiarity and the... commonness of it. I miss having a park right beside the yard. I miss the long walks down the street that would give me an hour or two to think about stuff. And the parents? I can stand that. I noticed how resilient I've become to controversy and disagreement with people, to the point where I can hold my own when assaulted verbally (which some immature people still try to do in games). I don't take things personally lately, which has definitely contributed to my well-being. My parents are going to be mostly living on the dacha for the summer, anyway, and I might very well find myself travelling. In a proper long message, this would constitute a conclusion. I don't have one for now, so - be well, everyone. P.S. I'd love to meet some of you and just chat for a while if I ever had a chance. You sound like an awesome company to be in, Hubski.
Turns out bikes and bike parts are fragile. I ride 120-150 miles a week, depending on whether it's a 4-day or a 5-day week (my schedule is 4 days on, 2 days off, which causes some odd precessing away from traditional weekends). Which means every four days, I put the bike up on the stand, wash it, clean the chain, lube everything and deal with the stuff that's been bugging me for a hundred miles (squeaky front brakes, sticky shift on 8th gear, etc). I put the beastie away at the end of last season having just gotten to 75 thousandths wear on the chain... a chain that gets cleaned and lubed every 120 miles but which also has 3,000 miles on it. The intent was to change the chain when I had time, which was Sunday. Mmmmyeah. So now it won't take any power in the bottom two gears 'cuz the cassette is thrashed, apparently, and in attempting to adjust around this I also discovered that the rear derailleur is donezo and that the front tire has cracks in it you could drive a nail file through and my buddy told me he put like 10 miles on it while I was gone and I believe him. Also he lowered the seat an inch and a half and I raised it an inch and kept it there for two days and I'm still saddle sore so apparently I'm rather using this bike. It also hasn't been that hot and I went through a 24oz bottle of water twice yesterday (thank god for the water fountain at Griffith Park) and since I left my camelbak up in Washington 'cuz I hate riding with shit on my back I'm gonna be one of those doofi with water bottles hanging off the saddle 'cuz it's a good 15-20 degrees cooler this year than it was last year but I remember 115 in Glendale and apparently I need even more water this year than last and that heat wave got legit scary.
That's three quarters the length of Nile and Amazon, one-point-two times New York to LA and one-point-four times diameter of the Moon at the equator. I'd say that's not "fragile": that's heavily distressed.a chain that gets cleaned and lubed every 120 miles but which also has 3,000 miles on it
Most motor vehicles being designed for far more aggressive and strenuous driving. Not that I know much about either. This is me exercising my knowledge and critical thinking on something that didn't sound right. To be frank, I'm surprised the oil change is so infrequent for cars. Must be quite a substance.
And to be honest, bike parts have more in common with jewelry than they do with actual mechanical components. They're delicate. And the shit is all out in the open where it can get abraded by dust, scunge, rust, etc. But yes. Hydrodynamic bearings are no joke.
A wonder, then, why it hasn't been developed to a more endurant level. Humanity starts a "new level" of something whenever there's the abundance of resource and workforce for it, isn't that true? Maybe we're just waiting for graphene to become mass product... but then, we'll just suffer over it not working in zero-G or something. :) Fluid bearing made no sense to me 'cause it's late and my brain is tired. If you could ELI5 it for me, that would be appreciated.
Mechanical objects cannot follow Moore's Law. Newtonian physics has been a settled thing for 200 years now and while we can make improvements in materials science, the equations that govern mechanical design have no shortcuts. A fluid bearing uses a fluid (in physics terms, this means either a liquid or a gas) to absorb the shock of impact and friction. The design of the bearing is dependent on the viscosity and other properties of the fluid. Basically, if you have two parts that should have friction between them, and put a layer of properly designed fluid in between, the friction between those parts becomes the friction between the fluid and the surface instead of the two surfaces. The archetypal example is a connecting rod and a crankshaft journal: In a fluidless scenario, the impact of the exploding gas on the piston is transferred down the connecting rod to the crankshaft and the inner diameter of the rod and the outer diameter of the crankshaft rub together, make lots of heat and wear. In a fluid bearing scenario, the impact from combustion is absorbed by the fluid, which has much lower friction than the two metal surfaces, and which is also under constant replacement by the oil pump. This allows the friction heat of the surfaces to be removed from the site. That was more ELI10 but that's the idea.
(I will not nitpick that Newtonian physics existed long before Newton. I will not nitpick that Newtonian physics existed long before Newton. I will not nitpick that Newtonian physics existed long before Newton. I will not nitpick that Newtonian physics existed long before Newton.)
Well, that's kinda what I was getting at, philosophically. Technically, the equations just are a way of describing the phenomena or principle. So in a way, Newtonian Physics are only the equations describing the principles. So sure, those principles existed before he described them in mathematical calculations. I dunno... I'm sitting in a long and boring conference call/training, and my mind is wandering off into the weeds... government contracting, my friends... my brains are leaking out my ears...
Philosophically, sure. But if you want to act on it, you have to know it, and that knowledge isn't eternal. My bicycle has 27 speeds and tires that run at 90psi. None of the physical laws that governed its construction came into being recently. But without the knowledge of metallurgy, chemistry, manufacturing science and materials technology that have been developed in the past 100 years it'd be a velocipede. I mean, carbon fiber spokes. Beat steel in many many ways, but utterly unheard of 40 years ago. Multiply by everything. However, hydrodynamic bearings? That's steam engine shit. Internal combustion has advanced much slower than semiconductors despite the fact that the laws of the universe have been knowable (but unknown) since its birth.
I'm in a train headed for Utrecht right now, will have dinner with my friends and figure out how we're gonna plan our road trip to Norway in August. Gonna be awesome! Also, I just realized that it's only four weeks until I get the keys to my new place. Considering my current place doesn't have climate control and the weather has been lovely, I am counting the days until I won't have to sleep in a sauna anymore. (The smell of sewage in the hallways also hasn't left yet.) My thesis is going along nicely. Every time I have explained it, I refine the core idea a bit more. This week I spoke to my thesis counsellor, an architect, a PhD student and a municipal worker and I managed to pique their interest, so I must do something right. Another thing I realized is that my 2018 will definitely be shaped by how ETH will do, and that I couldn't be happier with that. :)
Medicine, as the joke goes "There is a reason a Doctor's office is called a Practice." But there is a whole multitude of science disciplines behind it along with some weird brain stuff. Draw blood and get a bunch of numbers. Certain numbers mean you are healthy, certain numbers mean you are not. When I began my own personal medical fuck over, the numbers were more in the line of "Holy shit how are you walking?" Now the numbers are more along the line of "Eh, we can keep going and fix this shit now." I still feel, physically, like shit. But the numbers are moving in the right directions. I've only had three fights this year with insurance fuckery, and spent my entire deductible. Docs now think that as the body gets healthy it is taking time to realize it is moving in the right direction and the brain stuff is getting in the way. But the numbers are moving the way they should be. My hobby is consuming me, and not in a "Oh boy this makes me all sorts of FUCKING HAPPY." It might as well be another job. All I gotta do is make it to September. Other than that nothing changes, same shit, and I am not sure the days change sometimes.
Shaking my head at an SF UPS worker shooting three of his coworkers (have fun in SF, thenewgreen !)about two hours after another gunman shot a couple of Republican Senators and security folk playing baseball... ... on the same morning that Congress was to hear arguments for loosening restrictions on civilians being able to buy silencers/suppressors for their guns... I'm sure the Republicans will just power on with it again tomorrow after the usual platitudes and mandatory 37 seconds of mourning/silence. Even Paul Ryan had to run for cover from a crazed gunman today. But I don't expect that'll affect his policy stance in the least. These fucker Republicans are fully hardcore psychos.
Absolutely. Anyone who has ever actually shot a gun with suppressor on it knows that, "Holy shit! That was loud! Is it broken/working?" question that blows through your mind afterwards. And the ringing in the ears. Suppressors have an excellent marketing department called Hollywood.