Recent Articles
New Site
So I've moved the site, or rather changed how it's displayed. The old site used Microsoft Expression to manage it, and while I really liked MS Expression, Microsoft didn't. They stopped updating it in 2014... in the tech world, that's ancient software. The web specs were out of date, I was beginning to get warnings that there were security issues, and all in all it was time to find a new way to run things. So I poked around and found Publii. Really liked it, had to make some adjustments, and just when I thought everything was good I realized it wouldn't display posts as I had originally created them - it would summarize, which meant on the homepage wasn't showing things like photos and such. Also things like paragraphs were missing, so something that has several paragraphs turns into one long ass piece of text. Had to open a post to view everything the way I created it, which I think is weak. A photo can be a real interesting part of a post, but if you don't see it due to Publii summarizing the homepage, then what's the point? So now I'm looking at another software package to manage things. Think I've found something I like, but it's going to take some time getting used to things. Publii was good because it was pretty intuitive, whereas this new software will take time to fully understand. But at least it will let me show photos on the homepage.
Happy Father's Day
Busy day... Somewhere in the middle of all that a cigar and bourbon are patiently waiting, toes tapping, looking at the clock. Would be nice to enjoy that cigar while driving to Mt. Madonna to take some pics.
Whiskey and Bourbon
Just looking into the diffs... WHISKEY BOURBON Also found out scotch (also a subset of whiskey) has arguably tighter specs than bourbon. And like bourbon, it has to be made in a specific place - Scotland if you didn't catch that. But never thought about it - bourbon is Made in USA.
Saturday Morning
Used to be a quiet time with coffee and quiet music. Now my mind clangs with alarms and electric fences, one false move and boom! Tread lightly my friend - your next move determines tomorrow.
A Special Place in Hell
You know that special place in hell everyone talks about? "There a special place in hell for people that..." Yeah, I'm pretty sure that special place is running TV loops of the WNBA and The View 24/7.
Hendrix in the Army?
Whoa, that blows my mind more than any psychedelics back in the 60s... just kidding, I grew of age in the 70s and never touched drugs in the 60s. That's pretty crazy... I'm sure his press agent didn't want that getting around too much. Maybe Hendrix didn't want it either, but at some point it has to be recognized as an accomplishment. It takes a pretty special person to jump out of an airplane, let alone going thru the rigors of military qualification. Much respect for Mr. Hendrix!
AI Freedom
A co-worker was sharing his AI experience, he’s a young software engineer, and he admitted to being wrong about a previous decision. A few days ago he said he’d never pay for AI, that he could do the coding himself and it wouldn’t be worth it.
Time
If time is passing by too quickly, like on weekends or vacations, and you want to slow things down - do a leg workout for an hour. Time will stand still. You probably won’t be able to stand afterward, but that’s the price you pay for playing with an immutable force of nature.
Apricot Jam
A home isn't complete without a jar of apricot jam in the refrigerator.
Music Madness
I love music. When having to choose between music I'm streaming (most often Jazz masters) while browsing the net, and a YouTube video I might come across, I will nearly always choose to listen to the music instad of watching a video with sound. Watching videos without sound is always an option, but it really does take away from the experience. So with my love for music comes the situation where a flea market close to home has live music entertainment, and though the flea market is a half mile away, I can clearly hear the music in my backyard. It's become quite annoying. It's always Spanish music sung in Spanish, think mariachi band, and when the wind is blowing right, the performers seem to be as close as the other side of my back fence. It can be very frustrating - this happens regularly every weekend, both Sat & Sun (it's happening as I write this) from noon to 4pm. I despise the flea market for this reason. But I still love music, and so if I'm not paying attention I'll catch myself absentmindedly bouncing along to the flea market music even though I hate it. Internal voice: "Stop nodding and tapping your foot to the music, you're supposed to not like this!!"
Chet Baker
So when listening to music during cigar and whiskey time, I spin up a playlist called Best Jazz. It's a compilation of what I think are some of the best jazz songs. Everything from Miles Davis to Duke Ellington, Mary Lou Williams, Chucho Valdez... and Chet Baker. just some good stuff. But recently I've noticed that when Chet Baker comes on, I have to interrupt the playlist in order to queue up some Chet Baker. I have a couple of his albums and will listen to all of one or the other before continuing with Best Jazz playlist. Chet Baker plays jazz trumpet and is very good, but his voice is very unique. It's not a strong singing voice, but it's very - for lack of a better word - vulnerable. His voice always seems to be close to cracking, but it never does. Other singers have strong voices and can really belt one out - think Joe Williams or Ella Fitzgerald. Chet Baker just has a simple voice that carries a melody with a vulnerability that's hard to describe, but nobody else has it. And I like it.
Nala Pics
AI Economics
Was diving into the AI world, not so much as using AI so much as trying to understand the business landscape. Claude, ChatGPT, and Grok are the leading AI models, and the companies that own them have market caps in the billions and trillions. Also, AI data models, which are built on interactions AI has with users, are far and away the most valuable asset of a company. So if an AI company were to fail, then they would likely consider selling off their most valuable asset - which is the conversations AI has had with users. And that data set is huge. It far overwhelms data sets from the traditional search engines developed by giants like Google. The take away being anything and everything you do with AI has a good likelihood of being sold some day. Careful what you do with AI...
Nala's Faith
I'm out here in the garage, cigars and whiskey, doing my thing... and Nala always wants to be here. Or at least I think she does. The garage kind has become a special place for her, but not necessarily on nights I'm out here. During the day we sort of made trips to the garage our thing - "Wanna go to the garage?!" is the trigger and she's always eager to join. Usually I'm out there for a few seconds getting something, then back to the house, so it's a quick trip. But she's always up for it, excited and thrilled to "go to the garage". It's the fun thing to do 😅 So when setting up for an evening I have to make several trips back and forth getting drinks, cigars, keys (gotta move cars), music speakers, sometimes a guitar, and maybe something else I'm forgetting. And Nala sees me doing this and is primed to "go to the garage", so when I settle in she ends up staying out here with me. In the beginning she's excited but that wears quickly and soon I can tell she's bored. If daytime, she'll have the option to come and go thru the side door of the garage. But at night DT wants the back door locked and Nala can't go in if she wants to. And a lot of times she wants to, I'll go to the house for some reason and she's inside. What i noticed was that even though she'd get bored quickly on cigar and whiskey nights, still she wants to be out there. I'm pretty sure she does that because she just wants to spend time wh me. That's a huge compliment by the way... she'd rather be bored spending time with me in te garage instead of sleeping in a nice bed inside the house.
Funeral
Went to a memorial today, attended my second Catholic mass in a month. I have a lot of respect for Catholics, I grew up Catholic. Attended St. Patrick's school and church from 1st-4th grades, then we moved to West San Jose and I went to St. Francis Cabrini until the 7th grade.
It's interesting, having that background and my experience with Protestant churches.
Rufus Where Art Thou?
What happened to Rufus? I'd sort of gotten used to him when checking out things on Amazon. It was pretty nice, if there was a certain spec I needed for something, I'd just pop open Rufus, tell it what I needed and get a list of items to consider. Disappointing. I also should add that Alexa has sort of a black mark - it has that "big brother listening" feel because if you have the Alexa device (we do) it's always on listening to everything. Not that we ever discuss plans for overthrowing the government when it's around (sorry Alexa, those conversations are saved for out in the garage, where whiskey, cigars, and dangerous conversations are safe from recoding devices). But that feeling of being spied upon makes me a little sad that Rufus has been replaced. We miss you Rufus!
AI is Pretty Awesome
Okay, I got the basics of this site setup using Publii, but xAI Grok has been absolutely fabulous for figuring out how to do this. It walked me thru themes, setting up the sidebar, adding the Photos link, fixing a hyperlink color using CSS. Cannot say enough for how it's walked me thru every step so far, having success each time.
New Site
It's been a long time since the site was updated. Have to move it from Microsoft Expression, which MS has allowed to die on the vine (no new website protocols), to a new platform called Publii. xAI Grok is helping, and seems to be quite valueable at getting the site up and running. NIce. Oh, and the links on the side don't work yet.