EarlyWords's recent activity
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Comment on Question about breathing while exercising in ~health
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Comment on The day return became enter in ~tech
EarlyWords Link ParentMy grandmother was so proud of her typing skills. 80 WPM. That alone made her one of the most valuable secretaries in the office. She met my grandfather at Fort Mason in San Francisco in 1940....My grandmother was so proud of her typing skills. 80 WPM. That alone made her one of the most valuable secretaries in the office. She met my grandfather at Fort Mason in San Francisco in 1940. They both worked for the US Army.
Her arthritis got so bad in the last couple decades of her life and she was so depressed that she couldn’t show us her mastery.
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Comment on The day return became enter in ~tech
EarlyWords LinkDid anyone else do their earliest writing on a typewriter? I was a very young author in the 70s. My grandparents had a couple typewriters, including an antique from the 19th century, so I was able...Did anyone else do their earliest writing on a typewriter? I was a very young author in the 70s. My grandparents had a couple typewriters, including an antique from the 19th century, so I was able to learn to type on it with the manual return lever (very satisfying).
I wrote my first fiction on an electric typewriter, which felt futuristic at the time but is VERY HARD. The trope of a suffering writer pulling out the sheet of paper and crumpling it up to add it to an overflowing bin is true. It was more like carving stone tablets than word processing software. As not only a preteen writer but also typist I was terrified of mistakes. Fixing them was a laborious task with correction tape, where you would reposition the white tape over the black ink and strike.
I have never had a linear brain, and the constraints of handwriting and typewriting nearly sunk me as a writer. Each 8.5x11 page has its own energetic introduction and cliffhanger. Each 8.x11 page must be formatted just so. And may all the writing gods help you if you make a significant third draft revision--you'll be manually re-typing the entire project again.
Then I got access to my friend's Macintosh in 1981. Writing changed. Instead of being a very narrow tightrope I must walk across it was instead a garden, a recursive place filled with epicycles and mini-seasons and ecologies. I could go back to previous pages and cut and paste and rearrange everything. My creativity blossomed.
I am in awe of the great writers of yore who created masterworks with typewriters and quills. Especially the epics. Either their minds were truly superhuman or they developed some killer outlines. Probably a little of both. I wonder what the future holds for the kids. AI-collaborations done over VR?
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Comment on Jessica Joslin in ~arts
EarlyWords LinkAs an artist, thank you for promoting the work of someone you like! Online consumers of art don’t often understand how difficult it is for us to spread the word about our current projects without...As an artist, thank you for promoting the work of someone you like! Online consumers of art don’t often understand how difficult it is for us to spread the word about our current projects without being accused of fouling the internet with self-interested campaigns.
And I get that spam for art and artists is as bad as any other. But the rules have become so draconian that unless you are a major artist with major representation you can’t find an outlet to take a chance on you. On Reddit, nearly every sub on writing has made it impossible to share my self-published work. Even r/suggestmeabook has rules against recommending your own book even if it is suitable because it smacks too much of advertising.
Many of my projects die of neglect. This is true of nearly every artist you like. And one of the main reasons is this cultural aversion we have to amateur people promoting themselves so that they may become professional, even if they are doing it well.
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Comment on Therapists are secretly using ChatGPT in ~health.mental
EarlyWords Link ParentThat was instantly clear in my introduction to psychology class many years ago in college. Whatever interest I had in the field was immediately lost when I discovered nearly everyone in the class...That was instantly clear in my introduction to psychology class many years ago in college. Whatever interest I had in the field was immediately lost when I discovered nearly everyone in the class only wanted to discuss their own problems.
They were nearly as neurotic as the modern dance department!
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Comment on What's a question you could ask to determine if someone is an expert in your line of work? in ~talk
EarlyWords Link ParentThere are some heritage breeds but the wrong people are in charge of dog breeding. Health and disposition take a back seat to aesthetics for nearly everyone. Even the most enlightened prospective...There are some heritage breeds but the wrong people are in charge of dog breeding. Health and disposition take a back seat to aesthetics for nearly everyone.
Even the most enlightened prospective dog owner, when faced with a choice, goes with the conventional option. Nobody wants to experiment with a 10-15 year relationship that will be among the most important of their lives.
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Comment on What's a question you could ask to determine if someone is an expert in your line of work? in ~talk
EarlyWords Link ParentI love French bulldogs! They are funny and stubborn and have very strong opinions. Historically, they were bred to bait bulls and other animals as Court entertainment in France. They do nothing...I love French bulldogs! They are funny and stubborn and have very strong opinions. Historically, they were bred to bait bulls and other animals as Court entertainment in France. They do nothing better than leap, bite, and hang. Nothing makes them happier.
In the 19th century they were used by the streetwalkers of Paris. The dogs would hide under the skirts of the sex workers, keeping them warm. But if they had trouble with any of their clients, all of a sudden this little goblin would come boiling up from out of nowhere and leap, bite, and hang.
That said, the modern French Bulldog is a walking tragedy. It is the most popular new dog in many places and for a dog breed, that is a death sentence. Unscrupulous breeders capitalize on every trend, selling every puppy, regardless of their fitness. It is called the Dalmatian problem after the incredible working breed who used to be known as firehouse dogs were exploited by Disney in 101 Dalmatians in the 50s. It started a craze that completely ruined the breed.
We have also seen it with Golden Retrievers, Dobermans, Doodles, and now French Bulldogs. As an expert, if somebody tells me they are getting a French bulldog, it means to me that they are making their decisions based on status and social media and that they have no idea they are about to spend $120,000 on medical bills.
Buford, one Frenchie I have been walking his whole life, just had brain surgery because a severe ear infection went misdiagnosed. He has had perhaps five other life-threatening medical emergencies in the last five years.
In a word, DON’T.
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Comment on What's a question you could ask to determine if someone is an expert in your line of work? in ~talk
EarlyWords Link“So you’re thinking of getting a French bulldog?“ I’m a dogwalker of 33 years.“So you’re thinking of getting a French bulldog?“
I’m a dogwalker of 33 years.
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Comment on [Rant? Vent? Musing?] I've become a surprisingly judgemental semi-sober person in ~life
EarlyWords (edited )LinkI’m happy for you and your approach to these issues. In my 50s I’m still a steady consumer of my weed and wine diet. But I take a lot of breaks and listen to my body when it needs to be cleaned...I’m happy for you and your approach to these issues. In my 50s I’m still a steady consumer of my weed and wine diet. But I take a lot of breaks and listen to my body when it needs to be cleaned out.
I have to admit I find it quite ironic that you finish your post with:
This was mostly a ramble, on disrupted sleep from some surprise caffeine last night.
It indicates to me that we all have very different ideas of what constitutes health, purity, and drugs. I have a sensitivity to caffeine that makes it borderline dangerous to me. I live in constant amazement that this powerful drug is still legal while so many others are not. Four bites of chocolate will send me into irritable paranoia and muscle spasms. I’ve never had a cup of coffee. A can of soda will keep me awake for 24 hours of misery. I’d prefer to snort lines of coke rather than drink a cup of green tea.
The only other drug that really messes me up is nicotine. Give me LSD, MDMA, psilocybin, hell even ketamine before any of our so-called “harmless” legal drugs.
This isn’t any judgement on you, though. Caffeine and nicotine affect us all in different ways. As do wine and weed.
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Comment on How do you find the words? in ~health.mental
EarlyWords LinkA few decades ago, back when Scientific American was still delivered every month in the mail, one of their articles discussed a study on depression. They focused on what a “depression metric”...A few decades ago, back when Scientific American was still delivered every month in the mail, one of their articles discussed a study on depression. They focused on what a “depression metric” might be and how difficult it is to define, because we all exist with varying degrees of mental performance and what is normal for one is abnormal for another.
What they learned is that, regardless of the character of one’s non-depressed state, they could define someone as depressed when their ability to express language fell by 30% or more.
I found that it made a lot of sense for myself. I’m a writer with a normally huge vocabulary, but when I’m down, sometimes my ability to express myself is reduced to little more than grunts.
I’ve looked for the study many times over the years but I’ve never been able to find it again. Yet that finding has brought me a lot of solace. There’s nothing really wrong with me. I’m just mildly depressed sometimes in fairly normal cycles.
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Comment on Is AI actually useful for anyone here? in ~tech
EarlyWords Link ParentI’m also a writer and I hardly ever use any LLM. But I actually like them—as they are now. To me, the problem is that people misuse them so much. An AI program to me is like a Wikipedia page....I’m also a writer and I hardly ever use any LLM. But I actually like them—as they are now. To me, the problem is that people misuse them so much. An AI program to me is like a Wikipedia page. Mostly right and gets me started on a path once I check it for errors. But anything more than that it is more trouble than it’s worth or actively harmful.
For me, if AI could stay just as it is, we would be fine with it. The excitement over its supposed efficiency and omniscience would eventually fade and we’d be left with a digital tool that helps but doesn’t dominate. Since I’m not a coder I like how it is now for the things I encounter because its outputs are clearly synthetic. We know how it writes. We can tell AI art at a glance, same with music.
For the arts, AI isn’t currently capable of replacing humans. But when I need a quick image of an NPC for my D&D table, it serves admirably.
The problem is that people have bought the hype and try to use AI to replicate actual work. And this flood of laziness is currently destroying global culture. The other main issue is our very real anxiety over what AI makes the world like in a year or two.
We won’t keep LLMs the way they are. They’ll get better and the problems others list here will intensify. But right now I like the inept assistant who always shouts it is AI with its output.
I know I don’t use these things nearly as much as others, and this is a minority viewpoint about just a single aspect of the phenomenon, but as someone who lived and worked through the dotcom boom/bust in San Francisco, this is just the latest example of capitalists ruining everything they touch. This is just the tool they’re currently using the most.
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Comment on What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking? in ~food
EarlyWords Link ParentThis comment, oddly enough, contains a snake trigger warning. Well it's definitely my digestive system. It hasn't been healthy in nearly twenty years. I can't eat a majority of food most people...This comment, oddly enough, contains a snake trigger warning.
Well it's definitely my digestive system. It hasn't been healthy in nearly twenty years. I can't eat a majority of food most people can. So I'm just cutting the portions way down and trying to steam them with water-based liquids instead of oil and butter.
If you can believe it, all my digestive troubles started with a rattlesnake bite.
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Comment on What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking? in ~food
EarlyWords Link ParentI like simple flavors. Just a sauté with butter and salt. They have such a delicious flavor I don’t like hiding them.I like simple flavors. Just a sauté with butter and salt. They have such a delicious flavor I don’t like hiding them.
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Comment on What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking? in ~food
EarlyWords LinkAt the local farmers market they sell a box for $25 that contains a block that, after a couple weeks of squirting with water, grows into a gigantic 3-4 lb lions mane mushroom. This is the second...At the local farmers market they sell a box for $25 that contains a block that, after a couple weeks of squirting with water, grows into a gigantic 3-4 lb lions mane mushroom.
This is the second time I’ve done this. It’s quite satisfying watching this monster grow, at first so white, then a bit yellowish with long tendrils.
It allows me to make truly decadent dishes. I fry up fat slices of the mushrooms until they’re golden brown and eat them on toast or in pasta. I also like they’re medicinal, with positive cognitive effects.
But I’m coming to the inescapable conclusion that such heroic doses lead to equally heroic amounts of diarrhea the next day. Poor me. I evidently need to cut back the amount I ingest at a time. No more luxurious amounts at a single sitting.
Anyone else have issues eating so much of a lions mane at a time?
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Comment on The cultural decline of literary fiction in ~books
EarlyWords Link ParentThanks for the recommendation. I haven’t read it. And being a lifelong stoner, perhaps I should.Thanks for the recommendation. I haven’t read it. And being a lifelong stoner, perhaps I should.
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Comment on The cultural decline of literary fiction in ~books
EarlyWords Link ParentI had a similar reaction. Remains of the Day is one of my favorites. But I didn’t hate Buried Giant. I just didn’t think it was as successful in its concept or execution. But I’m a writer. I’m...I had a similar reaction. Remains of the Day is one of my favorites. But I didn’t hate Buried Giant. I just didn’t think it was as successful in its concept or execution.
But I’m a writer. I’m entirely forgiving of a work like that. It’s very ambitious and Ishiguro absolutely committed to it. Yet it just didn’t come together in the same way.
The literary crowd don’t see it like that. But for the most part, they don’t create, they study and critique.
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Comment on Tom Lehrer, influential musical satirist of '50s and '60s dies at 97 in ~music
EarlyWords LinkFirst saw this on reddit. Here's my eulogy from there: Oh, Tom. You gave me so many lovely memories. I was an actor at UC Santa Cruz in the 80s. Tom taught math half the year at Harvard and half...First saw this on reddit. Here's my eulogy from there:
Oh, Tom. You gave me so many lovely memories.
I was an actor at UC Santa Cruz in the 80s. Tom taught math half the year at Harvard and half the year at UCSC, with an extra musical theater class for us in the Spring.
I was in a show that he came to see, and afterwards mutual friends told me he liked my performance and wanted me to audition for his class. I'm not much of a singer but you just don't say no to this kind of opportunity.
They were open auditions with a hundred hyperventilating college kids and Tom on the piano. He could sightread anything. I did my best Mack the Knife and I was in. The class was incredibly intense. UCSC is on quarters, I think 10 weeks each? We performed 8 musicals in those 10 weeks to huge crowds, script in hand.
He started us with Gilbert & Sullivan then up through operetta to Vaudeville, tin pan alley, then the golden age of American musicals into the 60s. He had no use for anything after that, despised Andrew Lloyd Webber, and was proudest of the fact in his life that he had once shared a cabin as like an 8 year old camp kid with Stephen Sondheim, whom he worshipped. Okay, I guess Sondheim was to him the only worthwhile modern creator of musicals. But this was the 80s and I don't know if he ever found anyone else to admire.
I recall we did Pal Joey and the Music Man but one of my greatest moments on stage my entire career was playing the MC in Cabaret with Tom fucking Lehrer as my backing musician. It was utterly magical. And then I introduced him to my parents and for the first time in my life I saw them truly starstruck and they allowed that maybe I could make something of this acting hobby. I was in heaven. Nowhere to go from there but down lol.
I recall him extolling Sondheim to us once, telling us that he only ever used perfect rhymes instead of cheap homophones, and he lost the love of about half the class when he said the worst offender of this was Stevie Wonder, who had just come out with "I Just Called To Say I Love You." Tom whined it out in a mocking tone, emphasizing the sloppy line ends and puerile sentimentality. That dark edge from his songs was who he was. He couldn't help but slash at the world. But it was because he loved beautiful things so much and he hated to see them ruined.
I think the last time I saw him was the end of that semester. I went over to his condo in faculty housing. I was producing my own play and it began with a man trapped in a small cage singing both parts of the duet All For The Best from Godspell, which becomes manic gibberish by the end. We sat at the keyboard and worked out the switches and had a wonderful time. I loved that he treated me as an equal. I've prized no man's esteem as much. RIP.
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Comment on What is your silly or (kinda) useless talent? in ~talk
EarlyWords LinkI fall down exceptionally well. When I was six, I took judo for several years. One of the first things you learn is how to hit the ground without hurting yourself. Keeping your head up and chin...I fall down exceptionally well.
When I was six, I took judo for several years. One of the first things you learn is how to hit the ground without hurting yourself. Keeping your head up and chin tucked is the most crucial part, but shoulder rolls and break falls are also important. In the Japanese tradition, a martial artist who rolls well is said to have good Akemi.
This skill has literally saved my life several times and also made me a much better physical comedian in my youth with some spectacular prat falls to my credit.
In my 50s now, I’ve learned how important it is to keep learning new things, have the beginners mindset, and be humble. So when an ex MMA friend invited me to join his gym a few years ago, I jumped at the chance.
There I was, the oldest, smallest, and least experienced fighter on the mat. But I convinced everyone I knew how to take a fall and they wouldn’t hurt me. So for a couple years I worked on my beginners mind by having these brutes throw me against the floor for an hour.
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Comment on Damian Lillard reaches deal to return to Portland Trail Blazers in ~sports.basketball
EarlyWords Link ParentWell since it looks like they're starting Cole Anthony at PG, I'd say not much. They better hope that Andre Jackson and AJ Green can take the next step. Maybe Bobby Portis can have a career year?...Well since it looks like they're starting Cole Anthony at PG, I'd say not much. They better hope that Andre Jackson and AJ Green can take the next step. Maybe Bobby Portis can have a career year? Maybe Kuzma?
I liked their championship squad. Comprehensive defense and overpowering offense. Pairing Dame with Giannis seemed a no-brainer, but as we've seen time and time again, just combining top players doesn't a winning squad make. My favorite example will forever be the corpses of GP and Karl Malone on that villainous Lakers squad that lost to the Pistons in 2004.
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Comment on Damian Lillard reaches deal to return to Portland Trail Blazers in ~sports.basketball
EarlyWords LinkI find it so funny how linked the careers of Damian Lillard and Jrue Holiday have become. Lillard replaced Holiday in MIL. Jrue won a ring with Boston while Damian underperformed alongside...I find it so funny how linked the careers of Damian Lillard and Jrue Holiday have become. Lillard replaced Holiday in MIL. Jrue won a ring with Boston while Damian underperformed alongside Giannis.
Now they are both on the Blazers. Maybe after the All-Star break we might actually see them share the back court.
Portland has always been one of my favorite teams. They have a lot of players young and old to enjoy this upcoming season.
Watched a video of an amateur cyclist trying to keep up with Olympic riders. One thing he said that has stuck with me on my own rides:
“It never gets easier. You only get faster.”