James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead

So much response. If I posted the same on Blogger I would have gotten nothing. So I guess that sort of seals where I should be putting things. If a blog posts in the woods and nobody is there to read it, did the blog get published?

I started up my subscription to the New York Times again today. I've been going to the store recently and picking them up on a one-off basis. I got the Sunday edition and it was an unbelievable SIX dollars for a single copy. I know inflation hits everything but I am pretty sure that I can rent David Brooks to come spew opinions at me for that price. I found a 2 month special that costs $2 a WEEK for the newspaper to be delivered every day. That's $16 for 2 months, as compared to $6 for a single Sunday edition.

Regardless of your gut reaction to reading the words "New York Times" (and I know for many of you it's just as strong as the adverse reaction to the word "trainer") the paper is a wealth of information. Sure, I read the world news and all that stuff, but I find the various things in the arts/entertainment section especially interesting. I remember when I used to subscribe years ago, I would clip out sections and save pieces of the paper. And before long, it was more than I could handle and it overwhelmed me. Even this Sunday I found myself with a pen, pulling out pages and circling things. Then I broke out my notebook and started writing down movies I want to see, or shows to hit up in the city, or books to read, and so on.

I even admit I was fascinated to read the review of Tosca yesterday. I was briefly hell-bent on going to see it but after reading the review and watching a clip, that desire may be dialed back a little bit. I am sure D will be happy to read that.

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So to answer the 3 inevitable questions:

1. Yes I had espresso today
2. Yes I used a q-tip today
3. No I do not remember doing that

But that's what the side table looks like today. Incidentally, this is also where I worked, which is especially close to the fire. I may or may not work in the same location tomorrow as we are almost out of firewood stacked behind the back door. We have plenty in the back yard, but that is far away and thus far colder than jumping out the door and grabbing a few logs. I may just turn up the heat and spend the $48 to heat the house tomorrow. It sure is damn cold out there.

I also admit that I like the totally random things you get from reading a newspaper. I am not an e-book reader nor am I much for the online version of the newspaper. It is the same theory that makes actual shopping somewhat worthwhile. Sometimes you'll find something while walking through a store that you would never find online. The online mechanism is what one might refer to as "shopping by algorithm" which is all well and good but I ask this - how do you get exposed to something new if the robots tell you what you like?

Anyway, I am enjoying reading the newspaper though I was a little disappointed in the Science Times today. The most interesting piece was about the UFO footage from (I think) 2004. If you have not seen it, Google David Fravor and draw your own conclusions. I have no strong opinion either way but I will say that I find the conversation interesting from 2 high-level thought processes:

1. The Universe is beyond bigger than big. There must be life out there.
2. The Fermi Paradox countering that contention.

I know, these are sort of one and the same. But I think you need to assume #1 before you get to #2. If you do not believe #1 then there is no paradox.

Ok I will throw this out there as a 9 minute discussion on the algorithm comment above. I only watched part of it but this channel is usually really good:

 
I think Fermi's Paradox supports the notion that "intelligence" is just one survival mechanism, and not always the optimal one at that. Intelligence is slow to develop and not especially effective in many instances. Think about it -- every thriving species on earth has to be optimally suited to its environment, and about five billion species have existed and so far only one of them has developed intelligence to the level that it's asking questions about what exists elsewhere in the universe. So the batting average for intelligence being necessary for survival is pretty low. Maybe the successful species on other planets just never needed intelligence.. Maybe the answer to Fermi's Paradox is that life does abound in the universe, but there just isn't much need for that life to be "intelligent" in the way it would have to be to want to venture off into space. I think we, as humans, tend to think of ourselves as a lot more special than we actually are. We are able to manipulate our environment using our (relatively) large brains, and it's a good thing we can because by all other measures, we'd have died out long ago - we're weak, we have little in the way of protective armor, we can't run fast, and our constitutions are really wimpy by comparison to other mammals. But we thrive because we used our evolutionary advantage to ensure survival. But so did ants, bears, monkeys, cockroaches and tardigrades. If we take our ego out of it, maybe it's a little easier to imagine that there are thousands of planets out there with many thriving species, none of which needed to rely on the slow development of intelligence to survive.
 
I saw the Q-tip before your comment about it and thought, holy shit he's lost it and started using heroin. I'm still not drawing any conclusions from it but I think addressing it directly removed most of my concern. But then you talk about aliens and abstract robot learning. Don't color the cabinets.

I like the Darwin's principle for the Bots. It's a little spooky, to be honest. Carbon-based evolution takes thousands and thousands of years (okay maybe hundreds for dogs); bots are doing it in nanoseconds. I read somewhere that robots were now teaching other robots and that could be the start of the downfall of mankind. Makes a little more sense now. Thanks for the pick-me-up.
 
1speed said:
I think Fermi's Paradox supports the notion that "intelligence" is just one survival mechanism, and not always the optimal one at that. Intelligence is slow to develop and not especially effective in many instances. Think about it -- every thriving species on earth has to be optimally suited to its environment, and about five billion species have existed and so far only one of them has developed intelligence to the level that it's asking questions about what exists elsewhere in the universe. So the batting average for intelligence being necessary for survival is pretty low. Maybe the successful species on other planets just never needed intelligence.. Maybe the answer to Fermi's Paradox is that life does abound in the universe, but there just isn't much need for that life to be "intelligent" in the way it would have to be to want to venture off into space. I think we, as humans, tend to think of ourselves as a lot more special than we actually are. We are able to manipulate our environment using our (relatively) large brains, and it's a good thing we can because by all other measures, we'd have died out long ago - we're weak, we have little in the way of protective armor, we can't run fast, and our constitutions are really wimpy by comparison to other mammals. But we thrive because we used our evolutionary advantage to ensure survival. But so did ants, bears, monkeys, cockroaches and tardigrades. If we take our ego out of it, maybe it's a little easier to imagine that there are thousands of planets out there with many thriving species, none of which needed to rely on the slow development of intelligence to survive.
Click to expand...

IMHO: the idea that only 1 high intelligence developed might be better described using the word survived. As a species, or even a culture, (or individual?) we tend to eliminate any threat. Also this might assume humans are six sigma out into the tail. We know we continue to learn, and that learning is geometric (kurzweil) - or maybe we are nearing the end of human existence, and instead of surviving, a species can only get so smart before something catastrophic happens (like building a nuke plant on an oceanside shoreline subject to tsunamis, or militarizing viruses)

---

My spouse has had the star ledger delivered forever. She only wants the sunday paper, but to get that, the subscription starts on thursday. I don't understand it, but your theory helps - if the googlebot doesn't know i want alternate/new, where will i find them?

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Throwback to 'Ask Norm'

My son goes out this morning in a fuzzy hat, gloves, and a sweatshirt. My w1f3 says, "It's 6 degrees out." His answer, "That is better than 4."
Is this a positive attitude?
 
I do not, nor have I ever done, heroin. It's really never appealed to me on any level at all.

On that note, today marks the 269th consecutive day that I have not had a drink. I guess at this point I have become a non-drinker, or teetotaler as the expression goes. I neither embrace nor reject that classification. It is what it is. I really have little desire to drink anymore...for the most part. @woody and I had that discussion a while ago, about what makes you "need a drink". He had some interesting perspective about trying to investigate this "need" when it arises as opposed to succumb to it. Since that conversation I think it is nothing more than man's "need" to just get drunk when he/she gets annoyed at life. For better or worse, life annoys people constantly.

I have a headache.

So we ended last year with 266 days without a drink and 17 hours over my goal of 365 hours, for a total number of 282. What that means, I don't know. It kept going up and frankly, towards the end, it wasn't something I paid much attention to. But for the sake of completeness I will report 282 as a number, and 266, and then 382 as my hours. Not amazing but not terrible either. I hit a goal, even if it wasn't exactly the biggest goal I ever set for myself.

I have started this year on a better note, if you can count 3 days a reasonable basis for making that assessment. In 3 days I have not left my basement but I have totalled 3 hours and 12 minutes. I am putting the Strava yearly goal at 400 hours on the bike and 52 hours in some form of "running" which really means an hour a week of hiking, or walking, and so on (up to and including running). I am sure this year will bring more travel (Chicago and Durham loom in my potential future, retreads of trips I did last fall) and on those trips I may end up trying to treadmill again. For those of you who remember, I ended up running 26+ miles when I went to Vegas in 2016 and I have not run a second since.

I have no real other goals beyond that. I do have some things I want to do. And maybe I would like to do ONE endurance race of some sort. But it's not that important right now.

I had every intention of riding CR today but work got in the way. I will talk more about work in a future post (yeah, assuming this keeps going) but some days it just kicks me in a direction I did not intend it to. I am making a more concerted effort to get my daily riding done over the past few weeks. But some days the best plans are foiled by unpredictability and incompetent humans.

Incompetent humans are a form of job security.

I took Zac to buy shoes today. He started playing basketball in the fall and he's just slipping all over the place. So we got him a dedicated pair of basketball shoes.

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I believe that the Sunday paper was 35c when I had my paper route. Daily was 25c
But I also remember monthly being $8 or $2? For just Sundays and this math isn't working.
In used to deliver papers on a bmx bike before school.
I'm totally ready to be a grandpa after telling this story.
 
gtluke said:
I believe that the Sunday paper was 35c when I had my paper route. Daily was 25c
But I also remember monthly being $8 or $2? For just Sundays and this math isn't working.
In used to deliver papers on a bmx bike before school.
I'm totally ready to be a grandpa after telling this story.
Click to expand...

delivered papers also - i had 30 customers, took 20 minutes. It was a 6sq blk area of lower boonton.
Probably 1974-1977? I don't remember how much it cost each customer, but I do remember i made $23-$25 every two weeks.
Which wasn't bad, cause the min wage was in the $1.50/hr area. I put $15 away to buy a car - into a passbook savings account.
Spent the rest on movies and building model airplanes and cars.

I can't remember the model of the bike! had the high handlebars, chopper style, and banana seat. no gears, cause i had to stand to climb from the res bridge area...
Good times!
 
Delivered the Bucks County Courier Times via BMX bike as a kid... I started delivering to the apartment complex behind my neighborhood and that sucked because it was tough to get them to pay... Who remembers going around and collecting?

Then my neighborhood route opened up and I dropped the deadbeat apartment route and upgraded to middle class route and started rolling in the dough...$$$ Not only did they pay, they tipped well. With that money, I was able to walk through the mall and go to chic fil-a whenever I wanted, buy whatever CDs I wanted from The Wall, pay for BMX races and parts (That is when I finally got those GT Pro series 3 piece cranks - still have today), and take my girlfriend out for lunch without asking for money from my Mom. What a great life! Sunday's sucked because the papers were so heavy... Had to make two trips...
 
Mountain Bike Mike said:
Delivered the Bucks County Courier Times via BMX bike as a kid... I started delivering to the apartment complex behind my neighborhood and that sucked because it was tough to get them to pay... Who remembers going around and collecting?

Then my neighborhood route opened up and I dropped the deadbeat apartment route and upgraded to middle class route and started rolling in the dough...$$$ Not only did they pay, they tipped well. With that money, I was able to walk through the mall and go to chic fil-a whenever I wanted, buy whatever CDs I wanted from The Wall, pay for BMX races and parts (That is when I finally got those GT Pro series 3 piece cranks - still have today), and take my girlfriend out for lunch without asking for money from my Mom. What a great life! Sunday's sucked because the papers were so heavy... Had to make two trips...
Click to expand...

Delivered the Daily Republican (now Evening Phoenix) from ~ 1970-73. About 1.5 miles from downtown to home, I think 60 customers or so. Yeah collecting blew. No bikes, always walked. Luckily the paper was pretty thin, no weekend editions. Heaviest day was Wednesday with all the insert filled with ads - sometimes they got chucked in a sewer!
 
Paper boy here checking in.
I delivered the Daily Journal out of Elizabeth in the late 70s. My bike was an Apollo Racer with a milk crate lashed to the handle bars. It held about 40 papers. My route was in Roselle, where I grew up. The papers where rolled and bound with a rubber band, so I could throw them from my bike on sidewalk to their door. I broke a window once but stopped an fessed up. Occasionally I got harassed by black kids but never really beat up. Collecting was $2.10 every 2 wks, this one black dude on my route owed me $4.20...he would never answer his door. One day I got pissed while ringing his bell, out of frustration I yelled out NIGGER. Instantly the window from upstairs opened and the dude started yelling at me, i was like look...just pay me. I don't recall whatever came of it but I do remember it being awkward after that.
 
pooriggy said:
Paper boy here checking in.
I delivered the Daily Journal out of Elizabeth in the late 70s. My bike was an Apollo Racer with a milk crate lashed to the handle bars. It held about 40 papers. My route was in Roselle, where I grew up. The papers where rolled and bound with a rubber band, so I could throw them from my bike on sidewalk to their door. I broke a window once but stopped an fessed up. Occasionally I got harassed by black kids but never really beat up. Collecting was $2.10 every 2 wks, this one black dude on my route owed me $4.20...he would never answer his door. One day I got pissed while ringing his bell, out of frustration I yelled out NIGGER. Instantly the window from upstairs opened and the dude started yelling at me, i was like look...just pay me. I don't recall whatever came of it but I do remember it being awkward after that.
Click to expand...

Similar to the apartment complex situation I mentioned...

Rubber banding them papers, always hated when one would snap.. My garage always had a mess of rubberbands in the corner where I used to bundle them up.
 
@fidodie haha I had a passbook saving account too. I was trying to save up for a used xr80 but my dad wouldn't take me to get any.
I did save up at $5 a week for my own Nintendo. My mom covered the sales tax at checkout because at like 9 years old I didn't factor that in.
Hey can anyone figure out why I'm obnoxiously frugal and have dirt bikes today?
 
Mountain Bike Mike said:
Sunday's sucked because the papers were so heavy...
Click to expand...
I had the local free Sunday garbage paper that was stuffed with all the inserts. I think I had something like 180 houses. Everyone got one. I got paid based on the number of inserts included each week. 2-4 was quick to bag up, but they didn't carry well when you chucked them, too light. 6-8 was the sweet spot. Not too much more time to organize and bag, but they always made it too the driveway. Holidays were when the money rolled in, 10-14 inserts!!
With that many papers, I'd fill 2-3 of those large canvas paper boy bags and sit in the trunk of our station wagon with the gate closed and the glass window open. Quiet neighborhoods in Huntington, my dad would drive down the middle of the road and I'd chuck out the back to both sides of the road. Pretty sure I blew most of that money on RC cars.
 
So i'm thinking about what we were charging for the newspaper - i remember being upset that 'my cost' went up with the advertised rate, something like 1.65->1.85. so the customers would still give $2, and i lost a couple $$ each cycle. then it went to something odd like $2.10, and i made more in tips again. amazing what a couple dollars meant back then. bubble gum was actually $.01 - you could find a penny, and get a piece of gum! or go down to the train tracks, and have it squished flat, cause that was fun too.

@MadisonDan - i did the pennysaver too - for a month. it sucked compared to the "real" route!
 
fidodie said:
So i'm thinking about what we were charging for the newspaper - i remember being upset that 'my cost' went up with the advertised rate, something like 1.65->1.85. so the customers would still give $2, and i lost a couple $$ each cycle. then it went to something odd like $2.10, and i made more in tips again. amazing what a couple dollars meant back then. bubble gum was actually $.01 - you could find a penny, and get a piece of gum! or go down to the train tracks, and have it squished flat, cause that was fun too.

@MadisonDan - i did the pennysaver too - for a month. it sucked compared to the "real" route!
Click to expand...
I don't think it was the Pennysaver. Could have been though. I can't remember. It was only once a week though, so it really wasn't too much of a hassle to work around sports and stuff.
 
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