The Subsequent Shoe

Pretty much ever since my heart surgery in 1984, I’ve resigned myself to a kind of semi-permanent suspense. Would I need another surgery? Am I “fixed” now? What would life be like now that I could play outside and have a reasonable expectation of not passing out? How long would that last? A common refrain from those in the adult community of congenital heart defect survivors is “You are never fixed.

Insane in the Fake Brain

AI has reached an inflection point that I feel should be concerning to anyone who works in a white-collar job. The capabilities of natural language and creative-based AI engines were often ridiculed over the past few decades, but recent advances have changed the picture substantially. The reason I say this isn’t really what most would assume. The problem in a nutshell, is that while current AIs are not perfect, the sobering realization is that they don’t have to be!

Thanksgiving 2022

With Thanksgiving past, Winter is now upon us. Let these coming, colder days and nights bring us closer in the gloom. May we find solace in each other, and thanks for the company and bounty we share. Jen and I traveled up to visit her parents for the holiday, along with Aunt Joyce. Everyone else had to bow out due to one or more members of the family being sick, so it was a small affair this year.

Searching for Sleep

Ever since I stopped taking Lexapro, I’ve had chronic sleep maintenance insomnia. Nothing I’ve done over the years has helped alleviate the problem, from medications, to meditation, to CBT-I administered by a sleep psychologist. I have a veritable pharmacy of sleep meds in my closet from past attempts. A Little Backstory A few years ago, I’d heard of a new type of sleep medication that doesn’t work through the GABA system like most of the others.

A Fist Full of Quarters

I took a week off of work for my birthday, and as can probably be expected, I spent much of that playing games. Stray Being in a cat-like mood, I started with Stray. Meow It’s a relatively short 7-10 hour game where you control a cat on a quest to rejoin its friends after being separated from them. Like any cat, you can’t talk and must interact with objects using only your mouth and claws.