Pretty hilarious short story of a conversation of two intelligent beings about, well, meat!
“Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?”
This part hit home for me, funny or not. Yes, it is supposed to be funny, yet it is also sad. After closing their case on the Solar System, they decided to visit a “rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence” nearby who, apparently, “wants to be friendly again”. “They always come around”, says one of them. To which the other replies:
“And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the Universe would be if one were all alone…”
US, that’s us.
humour thoughtsI have heard over and over that “you can eat whatever you want, as long as you burn it through exercise”. Well, well, well, another fallacy.
health random“We can’t outrun a bad diet. Pontzer says if we want to tackle obesity, the public health message should focus on changing what’s on our plates.”
Not long ago I mentioned SecretDrop. On the same cryptography/encryption topic, I have also found FileKey, and its GitHub repository, which I think is very neat. It is also pretty simple to selfhost.
cryptographySpotted while walking on my 10 minutes break this afternoon. A dumpster cage with the gate clearly, and boldly labeled, “Please Keep the Gate Closed”. It was fully open. Utter disregard. Not even a please does the job these days.
randomJust finished watching “The Notebook” (★★★★★) with the kid. It is the third time I watch it, I believe. The second time I watch it with him. It gets me a knot in my throat every time.
moviesWe recently replaced our very old, dilapidated, non-stick “teflon” frying pan with a ceramic one, and oh boy, let me tell you: it sure is getting the “royal” treatment! Conscientious cleaning after each use, with soft sponge, and immediate drying. It has its own spot, no other pan on top. I mean, I wish I was a new frying pan, for sure!
humour meThe Em Dash has responded to the “if your writing has em dashes, it was AI generated” new fad.
I would like to address the recent slander circulating on social media, in editorial Slack channels, and in the margins of otherwise decent Substack newsletters. Specifically, the baseless, libelous accusation that my usage is a telltale sign of artificial intelligence.
➝ Via McSweeney’s.
llm viaWith new capabilities come new dangers. The safety team finds that if Agent-2 somehow escaped from the company and wanted to “survive” and “replicate” autonomously, it might be able to do so. That is, it could autonomously develop and execute plans to hack into AI servers, install copies of itself, evade detection, and use that secure base to pursue whatever other goals it might have (though how effectively it would do so as weeks roll by is unknown and in doubt). These results only show that the model has the capability to do these tasks, not whether it would “want” to do this. Still, it’s unsettling even to know this is possible.
➝ Via ai-2027.com.
llm viaI am going to disconnect from the Fediverse next. I figure that will make me an online anti-social, no? It is the last social media in which I participate mostly as a lurker, with some ocassional posts, and replies. Yet, I have found my very few interactions to be often missunderstood. Again, it could be a me problem, so better take it out.
socialIt has been over a month since Google revamped Snapseed and, though I am fine with the changes—many people aren’t—I am getting a bit tired of seeing updates almost every week, with no changes on the changelog; that is, the changelog has been the same since it was revamped.
You might notice some new things sprouting around here. Not only did we freshen up the app to help make editing a breeze, but we also swat away some pesky bugs for a smoother experience. Oh, and remember to give the new film filters a try for some sweet, vintage looks. As always, these are free of charge.
Yes, we know, now, quit it! Geez!
google tech
Coming across a few MacPaint arts from the mid-1980s brought me a lot of memories, even though I saw them in the early 1990s. I remember vividly when I got my very first Mac around that time (Performa 575) at Sears. Over $2,000.
➝ Via Decryption.
apple viaHashing known_hosts is a good idea, as it reduces the amount of information an attacker will collect, if/when (ha!) your machine gets compromised. Usually, a line on the known_hosts file looks like this:
less ~/.ssh/known_hosts
...
tilde.team ssh-ed25519 AAAAC3NzaC1lZDI1NTE5AAAAID1zw6+VOW8L4Rr3swbUVju3GGcknaV/fyhSJwH7NLfu
...
After running ssh-keygen -H it will look like this:
less ~/.ssh/known_hosts
...
|1|c6NiIH06AidrkPUman0oPEx6+6Y=|rPhYjXlkLgYaNR8jwaNMy7mur4I= ssh-ed25519 AAAAC3NzaC1lZDI1NTE5AAAAIJsJP1XDyRhEPdtgBeXYm2hf4GKG9aLlqA1+ZPgBadbl
...
That’s it! Oh, and don’t forget to add to your ~/.ssh/config the following, so that future entries are hashed as well:
Host *
HashKnownHosts yes
The worries of a parent never end. First one worries about been able to provide. Then one worries about them (children) been able to succeed. I see both worries as equally important. It reminds me how I feel when it comes to responsibility.
bestCo-workers were talking about that huge storm the other night. They were saying it felt worse than our last hurricane. I was stumped! There was no storm near my house, and I even went out to water partner’s plants, because “they were thirsty”—her own words. Then partner called me to tell me about the storm. We did had a storm, and it was something out of this world, she said. Constant lightning, and thundering, and lots of rain (late night). And… I slept through it all! 😅
weather work456 didn’t deserve to die. Many others didn’t deserve to die, but 456 especially didn’t. I need a Wellness Center. I need Ms. Casey.
appletv series
We are watching “Squid Game” season 3, which has been good, so far—I will wait until we’ve watched all episodes to rate. My favourite is 222 (careful, that link has spoilers!). My second favourite is 149.
Update: 07 Nov 2025 @ 22:17:53
I am ready to rate “Squid Game” season 3 (★★★★★) now. It was entertaining, albeit sometimes too slow. I found season 1, and 2, to be better.
kdramas netflix seriesIf a company follows what other company is doing, and uses that other company as a template almost to the dot, they are no “leaders”. They can’t flaunt innovation. They are followers, who imitate, and copy.
rants“Man Afraid to Ride Subway Named Head of NASA”, reads the Rolling Stone headline, when referring to the man (Sean Duffy) which our president has picked to lead NASA as its interim administrator. It concludes, and I kid you not:
politics“Meanwhile, let’s hope Duffy (who’s afraid to hop on the 6 train) is ready to take on a government agency that has launched humans to the moon and probes to interstellar space.”
Showed a nephew some of what’s possible to do within Diablo IV, and he said, “I don’t think I will ever be able to learn this game”. He has never played a season, and is at paragon 152 while still having rare (yellow) items, and no paragons assigned, and no customisation of any kind. He has, pretty much, been playing blindy all along. 😂
games meBecause I work using Ubuntu, and do personal stuff using macOS, I am always confused and going nuts with keyboard shortcuts. From copying and pasting, to closing windows, to locking the machines. So. Very. Hard! I need to find a solution that will make Ubuntu (Gnome, actually) mimic macOS keyboard shortcuts.
techThe Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet, or NATO phonetic alphabet, was created to clearly communicate the spelling of words. So many people these days are inventing their own! It doesn’t help, at all.
“Do you want to see it?” – asks the Horse about “Building The Band”. “I am going to take a bath.” “Turn it off, turn it off, I want us to see it together.” – I reply while gesturing by closing my left hand, uniting all fingers tips, Italian style. “We will see it together” – replies the Horse, “… or not”. We both laugh.
horsie meRe: #1752083523
It believe it means they are not leaning left, nor right or, in other words, neutral. Kind of “factual, impartial, and fair”. Makes sense, right? Anyway, unless told otherwise, “that’s my story, and I sticking to it.”
re tubesgrep -i passwd *.log | awk {'print $7'}
...
/etc/passwd
/..%5c..%5c..%5c..%5c..%5cetc%5cpasswd
/....//....//....//etc/passwd
/..%2f..%2f..%2fetc%2fpasswd
/.htpasswd
/config/.htpasswd
/.env.passwd
/backup/.htpasswd
...
With almost 2,000 different tries—of which the above is a small sample—it seems someone is hell-bent on finding a passwd of some sorts. I don’t have one, OK?!
The above depicts some famous wave, which is big—see the size of the boat in comparison. It is a woodblock print from a now superfamous person. Do you know the name (「富嶽三十六景 神奈川沖浪裏」) of the print without searching for it? How about the name of the artisan who made it?
japan woodblockIn love with the work of Max. Specifically minimator, graxel, breaklock, commitbeat, and vivus. Go browse his repositories, you will not be disappointed!
random tubes