I have no hole into which you can pigeon me. I'm unique. Just like everyone else. I'm equal parts seven, seventeen, and seventy, and have been since elementary school. I've got the open ended curiosity of a seven year old, the suicidal bravery of a seventeen year old, and the wisdom of an old man. I am equal parts George Orwell, Kurt Vonnegut, Hunter Thompson, and Charles Bukowski.
Public Key
npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Profile Code
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2026-08-19T18:36:46Z Event JSON
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Last Notes npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…0hde I just watched Black Mirror S3E01: Nosedive and it makes this point in a pretty dystopian way. Pretty good show, too. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj It's easier to get forgiveness than permission. Source of quote: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/06/19/forgive/ npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj @nprofile…x2fp I forget who keeps pointing this out--Thom Hartmann? Paul Krugman? Whoever, it's true that a stolen election needs to be plausible. Bush2 could only steal his election because it was actually close (after millions of people were disenfranchised in the red states, of course). This one won't be close by any measure. Flagrantly stealing it might be enough to rouse the white middle class from its privileged slumber. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…px8z Same game: https://archive.org/details/advanced-dungeons-and-dragons-intellivision npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…px8z That looks like the dragon in the old Odyssey Dungeons and Dragons game. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odyssey_series npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…uj37 "normal" America is exactly what allowed things to get where they are now. At root, it's 'cuz we're running the beta test Constitution, and deliberately sabotaged it to get the slave states to sign on. That's why 70% of our senators represent 30% of the country. If it were balanced, the first thing Americans would have used their democracy to do is free the slaves, and that couldn't happen. So we ended up with a traditional European feudalism sporting a superstructure of bullshit democracy. The surprise is that the bullshit held together this long, rather than that it dissolved so easily. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk #WritersCoffeeClub #PennedPossibilities #ScribesAndMakers A question for writers: I've thought for a while now that if the book I'm writing were a movie, it would have to be made without music. The soundscape of the film is claustrophobic spaces and the grunts of combat. Would your WIP have music? What would be its soundscape? My protagonist is an enthusiastic consumer of music, so yes, there would be a thread of music all the way through. It might be fun to do it Dogs style and only use diegetic music. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…63pg Thanks! npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk #books #bookstodon #software #reading Does anyone know any book reading software that's not grabby about my files? All I want is a reader. I don't want a reader with file management built in. I've used Calibre for years, but it appears they've jumped the shark. It's a little thing, but I like to use a file navigator to get to the book, then click from there. New Calibre won't allow that. I have to launch Calibre and then launch the book through it's in-app interface. Is there anything left that'll just let me read an epub and manage my own files? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…mv7s @nprofile…x8t7 This raises more questions than it answers. How do you go about finding a drug kingpin? Once you do, how do you make him actually pay you for the gold rather than just take it? I thought this through when the story broke. I'd learn jewelrymaking and sell hand crafted jewelry on etsy or something. Self-laundering that kind of money has to be a slow process, but I bet I could live pretty well with minimal work if I had free gold to start with. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…kyza I like this idea for restructuring the minimum wage: It's $100/hr for the first 5 hrs/wk worked $50/hr for the next ten $25/hr for the next twenty $10/hr for any more Adjusted for inflation, of course. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…7q7j You might want to change "were" to "where". I'm not trying to be a dick; I'd want someone to point it out to me. Sorry if I offend. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…m7l3 Based on your tag, I'm betting you know about freeze and fawn as well as fight/flight, but if "fawn" is new to you, this sounds vaguely similar. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…a4ar @nprofile…v8f8 Yup. 4 was actually pretty good. It was made from a white paper, not fiction, and about a wholesale hacking attempt against America. That series was always good on the cutting edge tech of its time, and antiracist in a very 80s way, which was probably the only way you could get away with it in a big movie back then. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Weed question: I've been told that Delta-9 THC isn't hemp, but it clearly is because I don't have to go to a dispensary to buy it. Plus the high's different. I don't like it. What's the name of the THC in real weed? Even Wikipedia couldn't help me on this one. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Weed question: MJ is sold by %THC. Everyone I've asked says that's the percentage drug by weight, but this is obvious bullshit and a terrible indictment of American critical thinking skills. That means there would be twenty 10mg doses in 1g of 20% flower. Does anyone know what it really measures? The internet is freaking useless as a source of information any more. Searches just turn up junk. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…emk6 You got a couple on me, but not many. I will never learn how to spell the place with a bunch of dinner tables where servers bring you professionally prepared food from the kitchen. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…2c6z "Oh lord, give me chastity. But not yet." He walks in lionized footsteps. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj There is something wrong with thousands of men raping thousands of girls and the only one in prison over it is a woman... npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…vdqp "The sun's setting over there. Which way's West?" She really said that, even before the weed. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk #LongWordASong #HashtagGames Floccinaucinihilipilification of Seagulls npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…vrfe @nprofile…pmna TIL: a morepork is a real owl: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morepork npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…9vwg @nprofile…xfct Rickman was amazing. He totally outclassed Bruce Willis, and Willis ain't bad. Also, did you know the guy who played Karl, the big scary German, was a ballerina? Dude drank himself to death young. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…9vwg The cinematography in that is impressive. It broke new ground. That's hard to do, 80 years after the invention of the movie. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…g4vn Are you fucking kidding me? We kidnapped the leader of a sovereign nation? Yeah, this is going to end well. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj My mom was a math teacher. She just barely got through...I think it was called "Differential Equations" at the time. The class you take after calc3. And she wasn't a dumb woman. Respect. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj That's one of the most racist things I've ever heard. You might like this guy's story. It's horrible, but he's a really funny storyteller. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oomlb9xm-YQ npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…pfuj Trump pardoned the biggest drug dealer of all time. But when hasn't he been full of shit? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Is there anything you can actually do about the hiccups? Besides shooting yourself in the head? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr "A good knife is gold" I know this, and had some. I had to abandon everything I owned about a dozen times in my homeless period. Now I avoid buying anything I can't walk away from tomorrow. Hence the two dollar pot metal knives. I'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll just buy another batch of two dollar knives. They start out sharp. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk All my knives are dull so I just got a sharpening rod. It wants me to push against the grit. Blade forward. I always pulled the blade backward against the grit. Does anyone know anything about this? It seems counterintuitive to me to scrape the blade aggressively against the sharpener. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…a0z2 "Meaning, would I write a protagonist who’s our current president?" I took it to mean more like Fight Club, Breaking Bad, and The Sopranos. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk The #MastoPrompt for Saturday 11 October 2025 is: #marbles When I was homeless Sitting on an old truck tire in the middle of an abandoned parking lot Because of the ferocious hailstorm, with lightning. I'm smart enough not to sit under a tree. I watched marble-sized hailstones bounce off my head And got to thinking. Marbles, as a game, is the opposite of a video game. Video games are painless. You save, fail, and reload. Old school marbles more accurately reflected the real world. You suffered real, tangible loss when you lost. You literally lost your marbles to the winner. I'm thinking society would benefit if more kids played games like marbles where they took real risks and faced real consequences. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…wuyc Please. Pretty please with a cherry on top. Don't. We didn't even like the slave states, but Lincoln fought the bloodiest war ever on our soil to keep the union together. Please don't give trumpie Lincolnesque stature. Please. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…3sml I used to smoke weed with a flat Earther. Sometimes I had to literally physically throw him out of my apartment and push the door closed against him while he was still spouting his nonsense. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…jt9x We're done with the concept; might as well return the statue. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr I grew up in NJ and loved autumn there. Last couple years I was there it went from Indian Summer to winter without much gap. Glad it's back to the old ways for a while. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Does autumn still happen anywhere? Like, do you get more than a day or two between running the air conditioner and running the heater? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…sqcg You old enough to have dropped two quarters into this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon%27s_Lair npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Pick three Won't Get Fooled Again by The Who "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." 'Nuff said. #70smusicfortoday npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Second pick Karn Evil 9 by Emerson Lake and Palmer Science Fiction didn't get nearly the respect back then that it does now. A lighthearted take on an environmental apocalypse. With Moog! #70smusicfortoday npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk This is a great hashtag. Can I contribute? First pick: Paradise by the Dashboard Light Meatloaf self-consciously makes fun of the romantic tropes of early, sax-driven rock and roll in about the best album of original flavor rock and roll ever made. #70smusicfortoday npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…y4js It's calculated that the top 1% have stolen $50 trillion dollars from the rest of us since Reagan. In a nation of 350 million people, that's almost $150,000 per citizen. I say we appropriate it back and redistribute it. Call it a jubilee to compensate for forty years of neoliberalism. $600,000 for a family of four. Who wouldn't vote for that? You could start a new political party and take over with just that plank in your platform. And it's not like the 1% really have any room to bitch. They're getting the same hundred-fifty grand as the rest of us. We're not exactly leaving them poor. Call it the Guillotine Party. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…35w2 An observation of mine: Books require focus. It's a type of concentration that's hard to muster at the literal end of the world. The planet is dying, fascists are rising, hate and scapegoating are everywhere, and we're under 24/7 surveillance from birth. Plus, anybody who grew up since about the year 2000 has never had any real freedom at all, not the way us latch key kids did in the 80s. The stress of all this is probably inhibiting people of any age's ability to concentrate on a book. I know I find it difficult any more. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…dukv Bob actually inspired me: https://poloniousmonk.substack.com/p/a-modern-religion npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…dukv Wow. Blast from the past. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…sqcg @nprofile…z8kp FWIW, Rob Reich earned his respect. He had so much integrity he walked on Clinton. He was secretary of labor, but saw how right wing Clinton actually governed and walked away to become a teacher. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Here's something you probably didn't want to know: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figging npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…5e0f I guess MD got overfished. Overcrabbed? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…5e0f Damn! 5"! That's a big crab. What state? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr https://shalomauslander.substack.com/p/pictures-of-people-in-straw-hats npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk This is a brilliant observation: " Adding to my befuddlement is the fact that he’s every single stereotype of a loathsome shitheel from the last one hundred years of popular culture, all at once—the ignorant blowhard at the end of the bar, the entitled silver spoon trust fund asshole, the clueless boss who does nothing but create crises for his employees to clean up, the lecherous old man, the vapid self-important celebrity, the penny pinching miser who stiffs the honest working man, the oily corrupt politician, the cowardly bully, the draft-dodging faux-patriot, the scumbag crook who gets off on a technicality. He’s almost literally every repugnant trope from generations of literature, movies, and TV shows. This is the man— the clown, the ignoramous—who ends our Republic? " https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2025/09/no-method npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…eqw3 You're higher-brow than me :) npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…eqw3 "Pyramids" by Terry Pratchett. Before that it was "Youth in Revolt" by CD Payne. Before that it was "The World According to Garp" by John Irving. Even before, 'twas "Firestarter" by Stephen King. Books have always been my best friends. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…rh2x I'm not saying it's right in the ethical or international law sense, but unless we changed things Bush2 got the arbitrary authority to declare anyone of any nationality anywhere in the world an "enemy combatant" and assassinate them with a drone strike. I was hoping he'd do Rupert Murdoch first, but no such luck. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk James Dobson croaked. If you want to read a litany of his disgusting actions, a historian compiled them: https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2025/08/james-dobson-burn-in-hell npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…uhjq I always thought of the word "set" there as a singular noun, with "television" being the modifier. Fucked if I can figure out why. "Settee"? Something that was "set down"? I know old teevees didn't move. They were in giant cherrywood cabinets and weighed a ton. My best guess is that it's an archaic definition, probably referring to some upper-class piece of furniture. Like the way they call fancy dishes "service". npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…avnq I gamed then, and this is pretty damn good for a chiptune. Richer than most video game songs. 42k sounds impressive, although I have no idea about the sizing of that stuff. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…u28k We had one in suburbia in NJ when I was growing up. They are giant plants. Those flowers stink. They're extremely hard to kill. Not bamboo-tough, but close. Yeah, cool, but not something I want in my yard. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…lwgl That's a good observation. The corollary is true as well. People who enjoy interacting with new immigrants are universally in favor of immigration. In my own case, it's selfish. I mean, I know all the macro reasons immigration is a good thing but I like immigrants because they're fucking interesting. They came from a totally different culture than the one I know. They have wisdom to share. Their wisdom may be elementary-school shit where they come from, but it's something my people haven't figured out yet. I just have to get them talking to find it. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…kvnh If you don't want to be spurned by women... ...become a man worth knowing. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…ysde Good. Eventually, Russia will weary of smashing its face against the Ukrainian fist. Just hold strong, Zelensky. Putin's days are numbered, precisely because he bit off more than he could chew by attacking you. I bet you even get Crimea back out of all this. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…s85r Nudism lost its appeal to me when I learned they carry around little towels to sit on so they don't get ass grease on the furniture. No thanks. I'll just wear underwear. Not every sartorial development of the last couple centuries is purely aesthetic. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr Yeah. I really don't eat much. I don't have a very strong connection to hunger. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr I just went from beer to vodka and dropped from about 205 to about 180 in two months. Dammit! I like beer! npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr Switch from beer to vodka. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…85tn HIPAA is a placebo. I was looking into online therapy, and the HIPAA standard at the time was an app called Bluejeans. I read the terms and conditions and they scraped and sold every bit of data but the actual content of my therapy session, and I couldn't find any clause that would prevent them from simply storing my session until they get the law changed. HIPAA is like airport security. It's performative. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…rqac The world is full of nazis. Substack is where anybody worth reading publishes. I'm sticking around until it enshittifies more. There literally is no alternative, and 'm not talking about network effects. Everybody else wants money up front. I don't monetize my writing and am broke af. And I don't know how to code well enough (or at all) to self-host. If you want to design me a web page and get it on the search engines, I'll migrate there. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…8x2j Ahh, I can't even code beyond a little BASIC and basic html. I just remember the way things worked in the olden days, and I miss it. Of course a 386 counts. You're probably not old enough to have had to navigate an 8086. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…8x2j Idea: Before working in programming, you must demonstrate the ability to write for an old 64k RAM computer. That'll teach you tight code. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…0qap I had a little garter snake as a kid. He once mistook my index finger for the frozen minnow I was feeding him for dinner. The little guy was ambitious, though. He seriously tried to eat me. My mom's standing over me with a meat cleaver while I'm yelling, "Don't kill my snake!" He eventually spit me out. A 1cm diameter snake can't open wide enough to eat even a little human's palm. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…6gnj What kills me is that someone could reverse-engineer it and restore all functionality, probably for five bucks apiece. Or for free. And /that/ is very illegal. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr Attica! Attica! Attica! Goddamn, I'm old. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk #ScribesAndMakers 7/26: Talk about the book that got the fewest votes in yesterday's poll, or share something about all three. Apparently, nobody read any of mine. They even made movies out of the two with zero votes--Michael Cera starred in "Youth in Revolt", which I haven't seen, and Joaquin Phoenix starred in "Buffalo Soldiers", which I have. He had to happy it up tremendously to get it filmed. The book is a /lot/ darker. There's no way to condense "Youth in Revolt" to a movie. It's far, far too complex. Maybe a miniseries. "Youth in Revolt" far surpasses anything Douglas Adams wrote. It's actually a philosophical treatise as well as literally the funniest book you'll ever read. Nick Twisp models a personality that really doesn't give a shit about things that don't matter. This is a skill we all need to learn. "Maia", the only book with a vote, is by Richard Adams, the "Watership Down" guy. It was pretty formative for me. I read it as a kid, and despite being a straight guy, I identified with the female protagonist. Now that I'm older, I'd say she comes off as autistic, but basically she's an ingenue who only operates out of positive motivations and still manages to plausibly come out on top in a brutal, GoT-ish world. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…60lz It seems to be less pervasive outside the US. Piketty and Varoufarakis diverge pretty far from this orthodoxy. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk #PennedPossibilities 735 — What books or magazines do you read regularly, and which ones would you recommend to aspiring writers? I read Harper's. I can't recommend it enough to aspiring writers. It generally is a little thin on fiction but long on nonfiction that actually explains the world, and has only the highest editorial standards. Anybody published there, in any capacity, is a better wordsmith than most published fiction authors. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Does anyone know a legit site to order weed online in America? It's legal where I live, but there won't be any stores for at least another two years. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…naem Consent. Consent is the word. the consent of the governed, the consent of your sex partner, the consent of your tech user. We have a major problem with consent here. It's almost like we were founded as a slave society or something. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…lwgl @nprofile…sjkw @nprofile…eqw3 Naaah, their minds are calcified. The way you defeat fascists is by giving them what they want and making them choke on it. Make them change their own minds. Seems to be happening apace. Epstein! npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr Is it mild like Frank's? I don't like my hot sauce to overwhelm my food. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr Yup. Nothing wrong with a chicken cheesesteak, and that sounds like a pretty good one. Me, I buffalo them. Frank's and butter. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…qgtr I'll validate this, except the marinara is very much a voluntary addition. Totally not necessary. A "cheesesteak hoagie" with lettuce and tomato is a fucking abomination. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…wuyc I tend to have a contrarian take on things, but I see two positives outcomes of this. 1) They gave him until next May. Almost a year. It's very possible that the execs at CBS aren't expecting trumpie to last that long and intend to backpedal. or 2) They go through with it, further delegitimize the crappy mainstream media, and drive Colbert into the independent spaces, where he'll pull his massive following along. Win-win, far as I can tell. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk 728 Write about something your antagonist (or villain) frequently forgets. That kindness and compassion are even more motivating than greed and cruelty. #PennedPossibilities 728 npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…9r3g Who removes moss? I remove shoes when there's moss around. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Just in case anybody missed it the last time I posted it, I'm a lil' proud of this piece of #microfiction Armistice Day He said he'd had enough. I distinctly remember him saying that as he dropped his rifle and went over the trench. "That's fucking enough", he said. But he didn't charge. He just sat down on the battlefield and looked bemused. There was a small smirk on his face as he settled in to die. We all waited for the shot, but it didn't come. Hell, we stopped firing just to see what the crazy bastard did next. Eventually, he opened his eyes. I was no further from him than you are from me, and I heard him say, "Ha! That's unexpected." Then the speech we all heard. "So hows about y'all try getting along instead? I mean, it can't hurt. You can always go back to killing each other when it doesn't work out." npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…t5r6 Thanks for educating me. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…t5r6 The best I can offer you is to stay out of air conditioning. Your body does eventually heat adapt. In Florida, we called it "your blood thins". Like Mexican farmworkers, out there in hundred degree weather and crippling sun but wearing flannel shirts and long pants. Also, hot showers rather than cold. They get your body thinking endothermically. Cold showers are counterproductive. Good luck. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…ewpr Try being a Brian and watching "Life of Brian". npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…843t Beautiful. I always travel against traffic if I'm not in a car. That way I can see, and hopefully dodge, the car that will kill me. Fuck ALL bike laws that demand I put my life, health, and safety in the hands of every drunken, raging nitwit who can own a car rather than take responsibility for it myself. Like the character said in "Zodiac" when lectured about wearing dark clothing on a bike at night, "If I'm trusting the driver not to kill me, I've already fucked up." npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…plfp Thank you. Ever hear of a puff plane? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_AC-47_Spooky npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…plfp I hafta admit, it sounds like you didnae understand the question. Miniguns were developed because the barrel of regular machine guns would overheat under heavy fire. But we'd already solved that problem with water cooled machine guns in WWII. So what's the improvement? Carrying a battery rather than a water tank? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…vqv6 I was just wondering--why a minigun rather than something water cooled like a Vickers? Anyone know? npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Interesting story. My buddy got drafted into the Vietnam War. He lucked out and got to stay stateside as a DI, but his lieutenant was a racist prick and my friend was kinda anti-racist, so he knocked his officer out for being obnoxious to a Black recruit. This does not endear you to the army. He spent the second year of his tour murdering peasants in Cambodia. Do we even admit we were sending troops in yet? We certainly didn't at the time. It was the worst job in that war. The fun bit is how he got dropped off. I'm watching "Predator", and the choppers are a lot more acrobatic than you usually see in a movie. When he got dropped in Cambodia, the helicopter pilot simply turned the thing off and dropped like a stone. He'd fire it up a couple hundred feet above ground and screech to a halt, drop the passengers, and get the fuck out of dodge. I can't imagine trusting my mechanics that well. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…4fn8 I defenestrated it in a paragraph: https://poloniousmonk.substack.com/p/darwinian-ai npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk What short movie scene or piece of dialogue do you think best respresents the tone of your favorite movies? https://www.fxoxo.com/190388/ #Movie #MovieNews #Movies Go (1999) https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=n96Twb3rSIA npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…f0x4 Carter wasn't president in the 80s. Reagan actually did allow amnesty for all the "illegals" already in here. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…j3rp They're not "pro-life", they're anti woman. --George Carlin npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk @nprofile…s0yq @nprofile…jpfa I agree. 100%. Make it as painful for the people doing this as possible. I'm sorry, but you have to hurt my people to help them. Life shakes down like that sometimes. npub10ucvzcnfl46t6mwzsxy7q4chgs97k4jrh75gtsncjkd794jyaezs44mrnw Poloniousmonk Pretty cool. It's a bunch of charts detailing an inflection point in America that happened in 1971. Site title; WTF Happened in 1971? I can answer that: Richard Nixon https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/