Tag: transit

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SailGP is on this weekend. We were fortunate to have a view of Saturday’s racing action from the (covered) comfort of the Adrenaline Lounge. Light winds, heavy rain and a strong current made for challenging racing conditions. It seems like those boats spread out a lot more when the wind is light, perhaps because falling off the foils kills their momentum and it takes time to start flying again. When the boats are all over the course, there aren’t as many contentious mark roundings and finishes, which are the crowd favorites. Even with the rain, it was a great time. I hope today’s race sees better conditions though.

There are another handful of AI related links below. One of which is an example of a corporation using these tools the right way (AI documents the legacy system, humans write the new system). Denis Defreyne writes, more eloquently, about some of the same AI thoughts I did last week. He mentions his employer’s mandate to use AI, which doesn’t seem uncommon these days. These mandates seem like an effort to force the x% savings their tech leadership promised AI would bring.

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Last week, I renounced YouTube, sort of, in hopes of redirecting that time towards other, more fulfilling activities. A week in, YouTube is still blocked on my computer–excellent! However, bass practice time increased only slightly. Judging from the number of links I’ve collected this week, most of that tubetime went towards reading feeds. While this may be better than watching rando videos, it’s not what I was shooting for. This week, more bass!

Even with only a couple practice sessions this week, jam night was better for me. Every little bit helps.

Also, full disclosure, I did watch CityNerd’s latest video on my phone. For me, it’s much easier to stop at the end of one video on the phone than on a PC.

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The weather is getting warmer here in the northeast; sailing season is imminent. People ask if I’m getting ready to put the boat in the water. When they learn that it was sold, their next question is “do you miss it?” My consistent answer is “nope, well, not yet anyway”. It’s complicated.

As a non-boat owning sailor, in April, my thoughts would be on the upcoming season and, maybe, racing. As a boat owner, this is the time to figure out when the requisite, pre-splash work will get done. The clock is ticking and the erratic spring weather can render a well-planned day off useless for outdoor activities like painting. Inevitably, time gets tight and any projects that can happen on the water are postponed (sometimes longer than expected).

All that work happens for a reason though. The thing that keeps a sailor going while sanding, engulfed by a toxic cloud of bottom paint dust, is the promise of the season ahead. Great times and stories are almost guaranteed, and there will be at least a couple, true champagne sails. Is this made just a bit sweeter by having to work for it? Ask me after this season.

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Significant progress was made on the historic blogroll graph. Most of the work was transforming the OPML files that can be rendered with D3. There were also a few anomalies in the data that needed to be handled. The results are on the blogroll page. It needs work, especially from a visual standpoint. Some basic interactivity would also go a long way towards making it more usable.

I made heavy use of Copilot on this, which reduced what might have been a day’s worth of effort (for me) to a couple hours. Watching some random dude on Youtube attempt to vibecode his way into a money-making app was the inspiration for using Copilot. Watching the way he worked for a few minutes changed how I used these LLM tools. Thanks random Youtube influencer!

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US Political Links

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Photo of several people, including David Johansen on the left, at the 2005 Mermaid Parade in Coney Island. One person is holding a toy, devil's pitchfork aloft, another is holding a large cardboard cutout of a key with the words "Coney Island" written on it.
David Johansen (left) as Mermaid King 2005

David Johansen died on Friday. There are much better pictures of Mr. Johansen out there, but I only have this one that I took. He was the Mermaid King at the 2005 Mermaid Parade. I first knew Johansen as Buster Poindexter, likely from his stint on SNL. It would be a couple more years before I was introduced to the New York Dolls. Rest in peace, David.

Something else died on Friday. Our President and Vice President berated an ally in full display of the media for not saying thank you. What a couple of assholes. Zelenskyy remained composed, which just made them all the more upset. One of the members of the White House’s hand-picked press pool joined in by mockingly questioning the Ukrainian President’s attire. It was a sorry display. At least everyone knows where this administration stands now, if they didn’t already. Timothy Snyder’s post, The War Trump Chooses, is a good analysis of this.

We didn’t really have quorum for our Jamulus jam this Friday without a singer, but we forged ahead anyway. Perhaps it goes without saying, but not having vocals makes it much harder to remember where the changes are. It was a good time nonetheless. I think I’m learning to project more when I sing, because my wife shut the door to “the studio” during this session. This also says a lot about the quality of my singing.

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