I have too many musical tools that I don't know well enough to use fluidly. So instead of creating music, I just think about it a lot. Play my guitar or bass unplugged. Every once in a while I will turn on a synth and try to lay down something, but quickly get frustrated at the tools, and shut it all down again. And when I went to take piano lessons, I didn't do the homework. I wouldn't make time for it. And I need to do these exercises and stretches to keep on top of my knee and wrist issues, but I don't make time for it, and don't do it. There's a pattern here of poor self care, and not supporting myself in the things I want to do. Self-defeating tendencies. At least I know that. Now to DO something about it...
I'm tired. Been working from home full time for a few weeks now, just feel really sluggish in the mornings. Some of it I think is how goddamn dark and dreary it is until like 8am still. Some things to look forward to, but for me, February is usually the hardest month of the year. And it hasn't been snowing much which has made skiing really suck. Crazy, though, to think that I'm already 6 months into a new place and a new job.
Holy anxiety, Batman! or something. Last year was tough, way harder than the first year of the pandemic. Maybe something to do with trying to walk through walls because the door is Wrong. Maybe some burnout. Maybe turning 30 didn't help. Dec & Jan have been better so that's nice. We have a puppy. The current puppy phase is 'ADHD & teething'. She's tiny though, so she hasn't managed any large scale destruction. The forecast keeps adjusting the expected precipitation down, but also lowering the expected temperatures. We might get 2 years in a row with single digit temps. I don't remember the temperature ever dropping below 15F at my location before last year.
Best of luck to you in surviving this season of Greg Abbott's Texas Funhaus, brother.
hahaha save the gas, if the grid collapses you've got 500 miles of mostly empty to get through to El Paso. I've got less than 80 miles to the Red River, and by avoiding I-35 and Plano the drive will only take... I should just walk.
I spent the last week in a kind of mental stupor, with background stress slowly going off my mind. Booster got me ten times more sick than the previous two doses combined, but at least it'll last a while. From time to time, I get hit by the amount of time that past, but it's so rare I end up shocked by it. This was two-and-a-third years ago. I'm on the way out and my niece is developing so ludicrously fast it's straight up saddening how much I missed and will miss. Despite everything wrong between us, I even miss my father. Every day before and since felt so dense with events and information, but when it's the norm, it's all too easy to lose track of those tiny changes, especially while everything tries to be in the spotlight. Nothing observant, sure, but I rarely slow down while remaining lucid enough to notice or reassess. Take care.
Do you mean on the way out of your PhD program, or are you fucking dying?????I'm on the way out
I'm literally breathing a massive sigh of relief. You are absolutely allowed to graduate. You are absolutely NOT allowed to die. Congratulations :)!! Any post-doc plans yet?
Thanks. And I need to die some day, otherwise I'll be stranded in the infinite with morose sods like Dr Manhattan. Well, neither China nor USA, so not much beyond 'abroad'. Quite a few places doing condensed matter also branch into topological physics, and there's hardly a place that doesn't do something with some variant of DFTs, but didn't do much about it yet. Frankly, it's FAR too early to talk about it beyond habitually-bitter, cynical grumbling. Assuming no administrative inertia (come on) and reviewers not taking their sweet-ass time, I might be able to defend around April. August is realistic. October-December is absolutely possible (or at least I think so). Not exactly good layout for planning.Any post-doc plans yet?
We’re in week 3 off virtual schooling. We have had more time off than we have actually had schooling starting after thanksgiving. I actually have a pretty good system going but it still sucks, we really need to find another parent that’s equally affluent and pay for half a nanny, but all our friends seem to have other better arrangements or are too poor.
Leaving to Mexico tomorrow! If you have off the beaten track suggestions around Sayulita, Guadalajara or MX city, let me know! Got a rough plan and some ideas, but I like to leave it open to play it by ear a little. My partner wants to spend the first few day at the beach, so I might take a one day class and try out scuba diving for the first time to keep occupied! It will be a good time to reflect on my work situation, I'm quite torn about it at the moment. It's been an emotional roller coaster since I've started and it's hard to get the perspective on wether it's the work, the environment, my personal mindset at the moment or my incompatibility with work in general. Time away might help me see it clearer. I feel I've only been sticking it out lately because I don't want to let down the project and my colleagues and because I don't have a more appealing alternative. But then the funk has been omnipresent. Not feeling the vibe with friends either. It's easy to blame it on the fact that i'm unhappy at work and it's permeating everything - but it could also be a wider feeling shitty thing that won't be solved by switching occupation. Damn i need some perspective right now... One good thing has been my newest fling with a super caring chill dude. Where things are simple and we're just having good times together without any complicated bullshit. It's a breath of fresh air and a welcome distraction from everything else.
In CDMX check out the cafe/bookstore Cafebrería El Péndulo, the location in the fancy Polanco neighborhood is amazing. I am not big on shows but the Ballet Folklórico de México was great, and a good reason to see inside the Palacio de Bellas Artes. Picking up tickets in advance from TicketMaster was an adventure, it’s probably easier today. Teotihuacán is a long drive north to climb the pyramids, something it might not be possible to do in the future. It is impressive to go 50 km from the city center without leaving the urban environment. Be sure to take the toll road to save time. We were told Uber would only take us one way so we arranged a driver with the hotel. Restaurants are great, but it’s a huge city with many nice districts scattered around, so get a ride to the destination and then explore on foot. The Frida Khalo museum was interesting but crowded. 
Gracias! Is ahijic the place to go when visiting Chapala lake? I had the lake on my places to visit list, but it’s huge with many towns around. Also planning a day trip to tequila like any good tourist too. We’ll be there almost a week so looking for many activities :)
We had to detour to Ajijic when our accommodations in Guadalajara didn't work out the day we arrived. It seemed like an ex-pat retirement community. Quiet and friendly with nice views from the hills. It got so dark at night I thought maybe I saw Andromeda. Any chance of a #tripreport?
Our public health school is back in person full time. Rumor mill is CDC will declare an end to pandemic precautions and just throw their hands up and say it's endemic, such is life, godspeed y'all. Healthcare facilities will never be the same, and I think a lot of people in liberal areas will continue to mask for a while universally and slowly slip to either not masking ever or only when sick. Conservative areas will rejoice and return to business as 2019-and-before. Had a class today where a guy relatively high up at the CDC's healthcare quality section came and gave a talk on infection prevention in congregate settings and used a lot of COVID examples. He talked about pros and cons of a lot of things including universal testing. He never mentioned the annoyance of residents and staff being routinely tested nor did he bring up cost of tests. I asked about the cost, and he just said the healthcare system in this country is bad and we'd never have been able to succeed if the fed didn't pay for a lot of the tests for LTCs. (1) we didn't fucking succeed don't pretend that (2) good luck creating an intervention that no one can afford and as such no one will follow. He was super cool and it was an interesting talk, but certainly some different viewpoints on things.
In retrospect I think the cdc was actually actively harmful. We would have had better outcomes of they had left the entire Covid response to the states. The south could have continued to do nothing but at least the blue states could have had a science based approach. Instead we still don’t believe it’s airborne and we don’t believe in real n95 level masks (unless you work with the president) and we split the difference on quarantine between 0 and science… people from both parties think the cdc is a bad joke.
Since we're talking snow today: the big storm is missing us. It was 40° yesterday, and the forecast has mid to upper 30s next week. This should be late March weather, not first weeks of February.
Whatever has more libraries and/or is most similar to Python, right? If the Python vector of growth isn't the most current and significant, please tell me what else is. I develop in Python, and my wife does the JavaScripting, so you can imagine what an existential crisis this may pose for our marital programming language divide. No but the the stanzas before the second comma are true.