The Beautiful People fly to a posh resort and tell us peasants how to live our lives? Yeah, right.

That the weather is nuts is obvious. We've solved harder problems. Let's solve this one. With answers, not dogma and hypocrisy.

...laura

My most recent foray in to assembly was porting some legacy embedded software to a more modern development environment, from Sun Programmer's Workbench on Solaris (yikes!) to gcc and make on Linux. Since the code ran on the bare metal there were some pieces I needed to code in assembly, translating the original assembly to something gas understood. All the while making sure my code was compatible with the compiled code it linked against.

This started as one of those Friday afternoon playing around sessions. I downloaded gcc, built it as a 68k cross-compiler and fed it some legacy source code. The results were interesting, I discussed it with my boss, and the rest was history...

...laura

People need to re-learn how to think critically and evaluate what they read. Just because it's online doesn't mean it's true.

And, of course, the usual. All too often disinformation is anything a particular group doesn't like. With the Overton Window so far to the left these days it doesn't take much to be branded disinformation.

...laura

A few years ago my employers had ideas about setting up shop in Alberta, and with "Engineering" in the company name we promptly got a cease and desist letter from the nice APEGA folks claiming exclusive rights to the word "engineer" in the province.

The powers-that-be changed their mind before anything more happened.

...laura

I've scrapped lots of portable devices. Several reasons: they quit working outright, their battery life was no longer acceptable, their vendor no longer supported them enough for them to be useful, or the network they used was shut down. The last was my most recent, the phone company shut down a legacy network and my old phone became a paperweight. So I got a new one and dropped the old one off at the recycling depot. I assume the right thing happens after that. If not, we have a problem.

I wonder about the historical value (if any) of some of these devices. Like my 1st generation iPad. High-tech in 2010, a relic now.

...laura

Exactly. I've looked at the labels on plant-based products and shuddered. I've looked at the price tags and put them back on the shelf. I have no issues with expanding my diet. But not at this price.

What problem were they trying to solve in the first place? The processing has an environmental cost too.

...laura

First used: IBM 370/168 as a CS undergrad.

First owned: IBM PS/2 Model 25. I kept it for years as a host for PIC and Basic Stamp programming tools.

...laura

I used to support legacy equipment that used 3.5" floppy drives. I figured out a way to burn disk images (it used its own format) from a Linux system with creative parameters to dd and we packaged this as a bootable Linux image for our customers to use. We also noted a sharp drop in floppy manufacturing quality from 2000 to 2010.

The hardware had only recently been upgraded from 8" floppies. We threw out several boxes of those - nothing we could do with them. I tried to talk my boss in to a software upgrade to use USB storage but he wouldn't go for it.

...laura

Also, Rte. 28, along the Fairfax/Loudoun county border has a natural gas pipeline running under it, installed during the 2005-2012 period. There are a number of data centers and office buildings there with generators, including one with five or six at least as large as a diesel locomotive.

If my call was important they'd answer it promptly. If they are experiencing higher than normal call volumes they need to hire more people. And please stop rearranging your options, set them up right and leave them alone.

I don't give a crap about the skin colour of the person on the other end of the line, but I do expect them to be able to help me, with the level of English you would expect from a frontline customer service position.

...laura

If you look like somebody famous you can make good money. Sometimes to great effect. Who would have thought Lady Gaga and Greta would hit it off so well? And just what were 007 and Putin cooking up in the corner?

I have a clone. Partly because people have reported seeing me in places I knew I wasn't, and a couple of times people thought I was her. I've also seen advertising campaigns at places like H&M with models who are clearly selected for their resemblance to more famous (expensive) models.

...laura

At first we genuinely didn't know what we were dealing with. Now we do.

Long after we had the information we needed the media and government continued with the OMG WERE ALL GOING TO DIE narrative, regardless of what the data said. Yes, people died. Few died of COVID, most died with COVID. A difference. The vast majority were in well-defined risk groups - if you're fat or old or already have lung issues COVID will fuck you up - but we shut down our entire society anyway. Why? Was it worth it?

COVID is no joke but it's not ebola, either.

...laura

I do lots of dead bug electronic construction, which includes using high-value resistors as standoffs when needed. My current supply is a bag of 22 megohm resistors I got cheap at a surplus store. The old-timers look and have to count "red red BLUE?!"

...laura

Back in the day I worked for DEC, a company with neat technology and total buttheads deciding what to do with it. I worked with DECnet (mainly via PathWorks) and knew it well. Making it run in 640k and having enough memory left over to do anything else was a challenge.

I didn't know Linux even supported DECnet. Shows how much attention I've paid to it since then.

...laura

I was skinny, to the point of looking anorexic, in my teens and 20s. My weight crept up on me and by my 40s I was in a state of total denial about just how much I weighed.

I had my gallbladder out (fat, forty, female) and realized I could now pass an aviation medical. I had always been interested in learning to fly and was now in a position where I could afford to do something about it. I got as far as the left seat of a 172 and couldn't get the seatbelt around me. I was crushed, but motivated. Over the next year and a half I lost 160 pounds, finishing with a tummy tuck to get rid of the residual flab roll. I didn't gain it overnight and wasn't going to lose it overnight...

In addition to the new energy and direction I felt in life - flying is a hoot, the most fun I've had in a long time - losing weight and getting in shape may have saved my life. If I hadn't done something about my health I might not be here now.

I've struggled to maintain my fitness the last couple of years, government restrictions plus anxiety and depression, but do what I can.

...laura