Recently finished Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. Much of the novel is a real slow burner, but the third act hit me right in the feels. I can’t stop thinking about the author’s wonderful misdirection, which caught me by surprise.

Similar in Ireland. Had my kids’ passport applications co-signed by their school receptionist.

One of my team members is based in the US, and he told me after the election: “The media told us all about how bad Trump was. But nobody ever told us how good Kamala was.” I guess voting only for the lesser evil has its limits.

Didn’t the European commission recently declare that Twitter had become too irrelevant to regulate?

It’s their body and their choice. Simple as that.

You are absolutely correct that I’m seeing the news, and the social media posts. I don’t feel either offer an accurate representation of the candidates. The legacy media seems to be focusing on the campaigns, not the actual proposed policies of the candidates (apart of some “sky is falling” clickbaits). Social media is pure hyperbole: Trump wears makeup and his running mate an eyeliner; Harris has a weird laugh, etc.

Within context of my voting, I make the effort to explore the parties’ previous performance, and read their election manifestos. I didn’t actually bother to find the election manifestos of the two main candidates, so I don’t feel that I’m well informed to make a good voting decision. I can go by the candidates’ previous record. When Trump was President, the sky didn’t fall, his presidency didn’t affect things in my country, just some people were better off and some worse off. When Harris was the VP, same thing applied. Much of criticism towards Trump, especially his mental capacity, can be applied to the current Biden presidency, and I somehow fail to see anything catastrophic happening.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some fundamental differences between the proposed policies of Trump and Harris. However, I can’t see them when casually perusing both legacy news and social media. Or, better to say, I don’t feel I can trust either. To get an accurate picture, I’d need to do proper research, and I can’t be arsed with that. I don’t think either candidate’s win will affect me significantly enough to force me to do my research and campaign on-line for one or the other.

Believe it or not, but the US is not the centre of the universe. I genuinely have no idea what policies either candidate is proposing, and the occasional descriptions such as “literal Nazi” or “real Antichrist” aren’t really informative. I’m much more interested in which of my local parties would most likely decrease housimg prices, build better public transport infrastructure or finance more equitable social welfare support. Neither US candidate will have any effect on those, apart from perhaps a few more American immigrants on our shores. So, I really don’t feel competent to speak about American politics, and I doubt Greta is any more competent. It would be an insult to Americans to presume that they need foreigners to tell them how to vote.

Breaking: I also refuse to endorse either candidate. That’s because I’m not American, and I know shite about American politics. I do trust, however, that Americans can make up their minds without any foreigners telling them what to do.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

We have access cards to unlock the office doors; this is tracked. Everyone is required to be in the office for a certain amount of days per month, and a monthly report is always generated. I found when the fewest people are coming (nobody on my floor), and that’s when I come in, given that my entire team are digital nomads, so I’d communicate with them via Slack anyway.

I’m on hybrid, but my entire team is all over the world, so I’m just as alone in the office as at home. The only difference is that in the office I’m bound by the train schedule, so I can’t take out of hours calls. My coworkers and manager keep petitioning HR to let me work from home full time.

I once went to a proctologist who had a “This too shall pass” plaque on his desk. I decided to trust him, there and then.

Everyone is talking about taping, but the real MVP is baby wipes.

Steam owen. Haven’t reheated my food un the microwave ever since.

HoMM is a turn-based strategy game, not RPG (with the notable exception of HoMM IV where you had real hero development). That said, there was a genre of RPG’s, which used to be very popular in the 80s and 90s, and which all but disappeared. Those were party-based first-person RPG’s with turn based (or close to it) combat. Popularized by Wizardry, and followed by Might and Magic, they inspired other series like the Ishar Trilogy. Other games employed real-time combat, but slow enough or pausable, to mimic turn-based. Popular series were Eye of the Beholder, Lands of Lore, Dungeon Master, and others. Nowadays, I occasionally see one of these games from independent projects, but it seems that the golden age of this sub-genre has passed.

I used to and still do, but I see it as an investment. In the past, I used to donate to various environmental organizations. Lack of money and disillusionment with the progress in environmental protection stopped this. Nowadays, I have a small monthly direct deposit to the armed forces of Ukraine. Living in Europe, I see this as investing into a peaceful retirement.

Spoiler alert: it’s already happened, and all the virtuous people already ascended to heaven.

Where’s the “four slices per freezer bag and keep in the freezer” option? Or am I just too good for this chart?

20C and sunny today, possibly the best beach day of the summer around here. And the local Starbucks had a sign up, saying that yhey ran out of pumpkin spice…

Two years ago, I quit FB for six months. Then I checked my feed, and counted six friends’ updates and zero group posts in the first 100 items. 94% of posts were ads or “suggested” content. So, I closed FB and never went back again. Whatsap statuses is where I find my friends’ updates these days.