Things I have read - 7/26

 https://www.theverge.com/23539460/importyeti-shipping-manifests-american-companies?mc_cid=c91f9a2aff&mc_eid=500ecefb32

A great article on generative AI via TL;DR. 

https://www.nist.gov/itl/ai-risk-management-framework

Youtube training video for InsightVM

Rapid7 Insight VM Training video - https://academy.rapid7.com/rapid7-insightvm-1

Kim Zetter's hard-hitting interview of a member of the group that created new standards for TETRA, a secret communications protocol - https://zetter.substack.com/p/interview-with-the-etsi-standards

Follina Tabletop scenario

 In June 2022 I was tasked with creating a tabletop scenario, and specifically that it be realistic. With limited information on what the client needed, my manager asked that the attack path include an attacker exploiting a current vulnerability via a phishing attack to access the client's network. I chose to use the recently-released "Follina" vulnerability. Tracked as CVE-2022-30190, this vulnerability affected Microsoft's diagnostic MSDT tool and potentially allowed for remote code execution.

However, in the vein of my overly complicated and unnecessarily detail-oriented mind, I decided that the screenshots had to be really accurate, and created a mostly functional exploit path for this vulnerability. As far as I can recall, it included a user who clicks on an email to get help from a technician, which downloads and executes an MSDT file. This would show a pop-up that pretends to be an error while the an actual shell gets downloaded and executed. Of course something like Crowdstrike or other EDR tools would probably pick it up, but it was fun to play with anyway, and the screenshots were definitely realistic. Unfortunately the client came back and told us we couldn't do that, so the whole thing was scrapped.

Regrettably I didn't blog about it. 

06/19/23

 Have refurbished my website.

Have been following a reddit user making a convincing long-term case for thermal coal as a potent investment opportunity (3-5 year horizon), as well as copper in advance of inevitable copper shortages, as lithium supply is greatly increasing while copper is not. Today read a comment or linked page that made the argument that ESG works against creating a stable environment and political support for oil companies to invest in wells and supply versus share buybacks or dividends to shareholders.

https://traderferg.substack.com/p/coal-the-beneficiary-of-dumb-energy

Considering this writer references Simon Michaux (author of several extremely well-sourced papers that indicate that there's not even remotely enough green minerals to electrify Europe, let alone transition to green everything), I'm inclined to believe them.

https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/19-simon-michaux

https://www.simonmichaux.com/copy-of-gtk-reports

https://www.iea.org/reports/the-future-of-cooling

https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/energy-infrastructure/

Also the Low Tech Magazine is now entirely solar powered which is super cool.

https://github.com/lowtechmag/solar/wiki/Solar-Web-Design

Unrelated: https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2023/02/can-we-make-bicycles-sustainable-again.html

Random thoughts dump

 What if I could design a set of playing cards that contained information about cheap and easy cooking, warming, cooling, and fire, stuff that is incredibly important and should be spread for awareness. Like the concept of a rocket stove, or other information that has evolved over time, that will not be available during a collapse due to lack of information. Basic survival tech, all the amazing innovations of the last 200 years, that could be lost otherwise. 

Make it a pamphlet or something.

Post-Toorcamp packing list review

 Toorcamp was in July, I'm writing this now.

With each Toorcamp my packing list gets better.

The NIGHTMRKT was a great idea. My "pop-up" selling random electronics and other goods was a success. I was advised of two things: don't give things away for free, and to have much better signage, potentially cutesy and pretty for people. Selling vodka tinctures was useless, many people didn't understand the concept, and two days in I was giving them away for free. Also, there's so much alcohol already available for free that no one was going to pay for some random drink. What did go well were the raspberry Pis and decaf teas. Caffeinated teas weren't popular because most people don't drink caffeine late. The population of Toorcamp is definitely aging, hackers are aging, there are more kids and earlier bedtimes. 

Next time, have better signage, like a wooden sign with prices. Sell useful adaptation things and gadgets, like water filters or something. Consider leaning into perfumes. Use a regular propane tank and stove for tea due to better availability. I did make a lot less tea than expected. Definitely have more weed products available.

What worked and what to bring next time:

• Ziplock bags, regular and silicone/scent-proof
• Sharpies - useful
• Sunscreen - it was hot y'all
• Very Specific stickers
• Valuable tradeable goods (luci lights, sweet gale, small tea cozy, pirate boxen hacked with other software, mobilizon/sneakernet style). I have some additional ideas, like playing cards with cool adaptation designs or ideas on them, from low-tech magazine and others. You could also do one for gardening.

What not to bring next time:

• So many batteries
• Rope
• Metal straw
• Hot Hands warmers
• Very long LED solar string lights (someone always has Christmas lights, there is always power)
• Sleeping shorts (too cold)
• Radio (KLOL signal broadcasts only like a hundred feet)
• Breakfast oatmeal (bagged granola works fine, not here to eat)
• So much bagged rice (organize group meals next time)

Pandemic music

 I like to think everyone had some music that got them through the early stages of the Covid19 pandemic. 

Mine was a set this musician named Kora had played for Burning Man 2018:

https://soundcloud.com/kora-musique/kora-burning-man-2018-sunrise-set-on-maxa-xaman

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLLsF0xCt3c

I walked for hours to this, worked to this, worked out to this. The rhythms kept me going. And now it reminds me of a uniquely unnerving time of my life.

Troubles with Private Internet Access VPN

 At some point, the machine for which I set up command-line access for Private Internet Access started giving me more and more troubles with PIA. The VPN connections build into GNOME would give a "client update needed" message next to each possible VPN connection, and no amount of re-installation or removal then new installation of the software would help. It turned out that PIA is pushing users to use their GUI, or so it would seem based on how hard it was to get OpenVPN (and also, OpenVPN3 sucks) to work. But in the end, removing PIA entirely, upgrading from Ubuntu 16.04.7 to 18.04 (because LTS support expired at the end of April 2021), and installing PIA with the GUI, worked.

Little annoyances (May 2021 draft post, now published)

In response to a cancellation of Shavuot hosting plans with a friend. All sorts of possible responses:

Wow that really ruined my day. If not my week. 

 Definition of scale back: to reduce or make a reduction in the level of activity, extent, numbers, etc.

There's nothing you can say that will make me feel better. I recognize it's a pattern of behavior for you, one that would be painful for you to admit to. But just because I don't ever say mean things, doesn't mean I don't notice how you behave. 

I want to stay friends, but sometimes I wonder if it's worth it. 

You went from "stay in a hotel so I'm not spending yom tov alone" to "I'm too stressed out, spending a third Shabbat in a row with my parents even though I'm already paying for an apartment". If you have separation anxiety, I can help support you. 

I genuinely want to help you, because that's what I do for people I trust. And then get burned when they don't see that. That's life. But I forgive, because anger is temporary and friendship is oh so much more important. It's just, I want to feel like there's some reciprocation. 

On one hand you counseled me to move all at once, on the other, you haven't managed to commit to completing your move for a few weeks now.

Your apartment looked fine to me.

Every few weeks work becomes very busy. Almost conveniently every two weeks.

I timed the planting in the best part of my garden bed so you would start gardening and have prime space just in time for radishes to be harvested. But you pushed the start of your learning to garden. From mid-April, to start of May, to end of May. I keep leaving space in my garden bed thinking that you will start planting but you keep pushing it forward. Gardening doesn't work that way, you can't cancel a week before like that. 

I want to welcome you to gardening the right way, but you never have time. 

I know you're free around noon, and not busy every Sunday. You could probably see the garden. It's just a quick show-around in the open air. Which means it's not a priority? Or is it?

There's committing, and then there's, whatever you like to do. I'm trying to do nice things for a friend but get very little reciprocation.

When I offer to do things together, you decline. But when you offer, I accept.

I booked a hotel, now I have to cancel it. 

We planned a whole menu, now you're cancelling it. 

How much more does your apartment need?

At some point you have to make the leap and spend Shabbat alone. It's called growing up. I'm happy to support you by staying in a hotel nearby, every Shabbos, and accompanying you to shul and back.

Things never calm down. There's always something happening. If that's how you prefer it, then tell me. Don't make me wait and hope and change my schedule to accommodate you, time after time. Tell me in advance if you think work will get busy. Try to forecast it.

Oh and while we're on the subject, I seriously overcommitted to learning Megillah reading for you on Purim. I spent hours every day for a month to learn the best trop, combination of two or even three sources, and then practiced and practiced till I could read the whole Megillah in one go, change the tune according to ancient customs in all the right places, and read with understanding, and do a good job. And then almost the day before you decided that it wasn't good enough and instead you would prefer to listen to someone read from a kosher Megillah. So we got to sit through a reading in a dimly lit backyard by someone who, with good intent, made a complete mockery of the Megillah reading, and by extension, of Purim. It was easily the worst (and fastest) reading I've ever had the displeasure of hearing, read by someone who doubtless believes that Purim is just a pointless holiday to get through, and skips all the joy and feeling of an amazing book. But we all bobbed our heads and thanked the reader because we're polite. But if that's the version of Judaism you prefer then you can keep it. That's the sort of thing I skip synagogues for. You even dragged your dad out to get him to listen to the Megillah. It felt so performative and I wondered if you even realized that. Oh and you didn't actually ask me to do this in the first place. You "hoped that Jonas or I would volunteer", out of the goodness of our hearts. So what's more important, being a good friend, following through on your commitments, or trying to build in your Jewish observance? You who decry the halachic stringencies of typical Orthodox rabbis and then turn around and use them to your advantage when the opportunity presents itself. 

And then you thanked me for coming out and joining you to chat in your backyard, when there were two separate Purim events I could have gone to that were a whole lot more fun, where people even asked me where I was. And I rationalized by thinking we could get closer, that's what friends do. But I don't know how you really see me, or how you expect to keep friends, if that's what you do. 

Or how about this, when in response to me asking you to come over for Shabbos dinner, you say you won't because it will require you to drive and you're trying not to, which is perfectly understandable. Except if there are Jewston events, then you might drive. This feels like you're giving an excuse but not even bothering to pretend that you don't want to see me. And yet you wanted me to help you with a menu, accepted my offer to cook, and study with you on Shavuot night, and stay in a hotel nearby? And even move in to the same complex? This isn't wishy-washy, it's called not really caring about a friend. 

If your schedule freed up, I can help you de-stress by inviting you over to the museum. But somehow I think this will cause you more stress.

If your schedule freed up since you're not hosting on Shavuot, maybe you want to go visit the community garden? But somehow I think this will cause more stress. Or you'll find a reason not to go. 

Did the pandemic really make you that scared to do things on your own? 

I thought you were an independent mature woman. Now I see you're a lot more childish than I thought.

That hurts, and you should know that. 

It shouldn't have, but you just me caused a lot of mental stress and emotions.

If you were really sorry, you would make an effort to stop being so wishy-washy. I don't see that happening. It's just a constant pattern of behavior with you. 

There's a million things I could say, but I won't, because I care about your feelings, your stress levels, and I don't want you to feel more embarassed. But it feels like you don't extend me the same courtesy. It's called being polite, maybe considering how it would feel to be on the opposite end. I'm not just a useful idiot, I have feelings too.

I could say things like - I want to support you in moving out alone. Don't host a ton for Shavuot. I'll be there for you. Have a small meal. Learn with me and Jonas. But instead you cancelled entirely and fled to the safety of home. You're 26. Grow up. 

April Fools!

 Look, another burst of inspiration to post. In this case something that could never appear on Facebook. 

Read Desert, an anonymous anarchist "meme" screed from 2011: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anonymous-desert

Was not particularly impressed. Some of the criticisms on Amazon Reviews were definitely relevant. 

A new Religion

 Another long hiatus. I wrote just six posts in 2020, none about tech. Just goes to show much the pandemic affected me (and of course a large workload that only let up in October and an illness). 

Between January and early May of 2020 I experienced an illness that could have killed me. In the days after an intervention and short stay in the critical care unit of a nearby hospital, I experienced a renewed flow of oxygen into my body, as the doctor-prescribed medicine took effect. The sunsets were especially beautiful, and I recall one in particular that stretched like a canyon across the sky. It seemed as if this was the first sunset of the rest of my life, or the first sunset after a long period of gloom. I had been resigned to being always out of breath, and now I had a new chance on my daily walks to experience the wind in the trees, smell the pollen of spring, feel the sun on my skin, and revel in the physical sensations that we take for granted. 

In the weeks that followed I continued to find joy and now a mystery in the winds that breathed through the pines and the oaks of my neighborhood. Not with a little self-consciousness, I would stretch my hands outspread, shut my eyes, and walk along humid, pandemic-stilled streets, feeling more alive and connected with the nature around me than ever before, daring myself to walk as long as possible before opening my eyes.

As months have passed and my body has returned to a healthy normal, that sense of intense connectedness has lessened, but it's left a mark on my beliefs. I currently believe primarily in a Shechina (composed of the aforementioned wind) and secondarily in a God of the little things (like lost objects). It can even be said that I believe in the wind, which is kind of pagan really. Since the only pagan experience that's fresh in mind is "The Holiday" scene from Andrey Tarkovsky's film "Andrei Rublev" with the pagans skinny-dipping in the river, it will have to do as a model of this new religion of wind.

1. It will be called Breezism. Adherents are Breezies. (Expect to see schisms with the Gusters, the Blusters, and the Winders. On no accounts are we to be confused with Environmentalists.)

2. Our prayers will take place outside during periods of strong breezes or gusty cold fronts. Short prayers during microbursts and thunderstorms are also acceptable, as long as prayers are offered to the wind. Blessings on lightning and thunder are a separate business.

3. Adherents shall prefer to wear loose flowing clothing.

4. As the wind is not directly a force that provides something valuable, such as health, prosperity, or light or water, I expect that adherents may frequently be sailors, where the wind really is important.

5. I hold the wind to be the most noticeable manifestation of the spirit in which I believe, so prayers can be offered to it. It takes or gives and is, of course, gender-less. Mind-altering substances are not part of the worship, however there is a benefit to psychedelic mushroom experiences. (Care must be taken not to become an Environmentalist though.)

6. Our sign shall be that of a wind turbine, in case you need something to hold onto. The three blades point to the land, sea, and air, from which originates the wind. To criticisms that this closely matches the Mercedes-Benz logo I say, tis' a work in progress.

The effect of alcohol on the mind

 Sometime in July, or was it August, I resolved to quit drinking alcohol, or wine. At the start of the pandemic, convinced that there would be a run on alcohol stores, I had bought several bottles of alcohol thinking that society would devolve into bartering any day now. In those early days I had any number of ideas of what would happen, and so did many others (and some of the strange people over on the "PandemicPreps" subreddit, prepping to this day for a second toilet paper run that has not happened). Funny enough, I didn't actually drink this alcohol as had been my wont previously. I even bought a bottle of St Germain which, strictly speaking, was not kosher certified, thinking any port in a storm (heheh). But once my illness began, my concerned parents took all the booze home (with my approval), and thus began my teetotalism.

At first, it was unwilling, and difficult. I lacked the impulse control to avoid wine; in fact one of my Shabbat rituals, besides for the traditional rushing to do all the preparation in the last 45 minutes, was to buy a bottle of wine at HEB and drink it all in one swoop (typically), or half on Friday night, half on Saturday night. Inured as I was to the effects of alcohol, having a miserably high tolerance, this was just fine. I was also at a stage in my life where chips went well with alcohol, especially high-alcohol double- or triple-IPAs, and that pairing dogged me throughout the days, as did the ensuing weight gain.

In August I decided, let's make it till the end of the month without wine. It wasn't easy, but I made it till Rosh Hashanah before drinking wine with my parents. Sukkot was an exception, and then I kept at it, drinking maybe two bottles of wine and perhaps a couple of beers in between then and now. And most unusually, as I noticed when I drank two cans of beer this past Thursday, between July and December I'd lost the taste for chips. To get high, or low, I'd much rather have a bag of oranges and some bubbly water. My alcohol tolerance dropped, a thing I had not believed possible, and I stopped taking a detour through the chips & candy aisle at the groceries, daring my consciousness to resist while my eyes devoured the puffy bags of salty goodness. 

Tonight I had a bottle of stout, one of those very high-alcohol versions that always comes out during the "holiday" time of year, of Goose Island brewery fame, or whatever. I posted a comment on Facebook that someone else found rude and decided to correct me on it. Thus it was that I re-discovered my tendency to make combinations of words that may seem positive but really aren't. I became despondent upon realizing how I'd spent time drinking and eating raspberry iced pops while watching the last season of Bojack Horseman instead of reading up on red-team infrastructure for a meeting tomorrow. And it wasn't until I went for an extremely belated walk that I realized that the beer had an effect that was very unusual: it made me sad. In years past, if I wanted to be sad (such as after yet another breakup with someone I thought I knew only through the voices of the phone speaker), I'd drink cups and cups of water, fearing the levity that would come with beer. But now, it seems, from a happy drunk I've become a sad drunk, as if the beer shattered an illusion of a life I had constructed, free of the worries of a pandemic-full world, where deaths and egotism wreak havoc on the psyche of anyone who isn't materialist or selfish. Those things did not concern me; I had a bike, a garden, friends, work, books. But the beer had other plans. Who knows what troubles might lie in the murky depths of a chocolate stout?

My Goals

 Sometime between now and 2026, assuming there eventually is a functional coronavirus vaccine and sufficient numbers of people take it, I will move to a different city that has a higher population of young Jews with a similar religious outlook on life. Hopefully the K-shaped economic change will not significantly affect this city, such that I will be able to have a social life without feeling like I need to carry protection with me or feeling like I really missed the boat on my goals in life. I will find someone who is meant for me and marry her. At that point we will decide to either continue living in the city for a time, or move to a different city or region to escape the encroaching effects of climate change or simply be able to experience snow. Most likely, life's burdens will continue to become more difficult, but at least it will be a little easier to bear with someone else and I can forget the intervening 8+ years during which my other part-time job was dating. I can then prioritize my career only to the extent that I can be there for my kids. Since the long-term outlook for the earth and humanity is grim (regardless of the little bubble that corporate environments like to pretend their employees hold), growing up with my kids will be the slim consoling factor, even with the small nagging thought that having kids in an overpopulated world is a fundamentally selfish idea. Giving of myself will always be more important than the extent to which I can make KPMG more money. With this attitude, I should be a manager in no time, capable of executing on engagements within my area of expertise, working on proposals, and developing new service offerings to keep KPMG offerings up to date.

Projects / Things to Learn

To be updated continuously:

AWS Cloud Practitioner Study and Exam - Do the labs, use the tips and resources provided through corporate email threads

Update HFLA website (1/2)

Update my web app testing methodology with new approach

Read PDF reports on PC saved for future learning

Read useful corporate email threads.

Watch Active Directory Awesome videos from colleague

Raspberry Pi 4 - into new Plex server

Try out cool OSINT tools

Ham Exam

Learn to use Baofeng radios

Learn how to use Graylog

Build bug-out bag and keep in car

Dehydrator and learn how to dehydrate fruits (& Beef jerky!)

Dedicate time to learn sign language

Wifi monitoring - make something useful out of it

Try to go around Nessus ToS

Nessus or OpenVas on Raspberry Pi 4.

Implement LibreTime (https://github.com/LibreTime/libretime) to FINALLY create my little radio station broadcasting day-of-time-appropriate Indian classical music (props to @noid from Toorcamp) - try it on the Pi 4

A gripe with dating sites

There are sometimes thoughts I have that are too long for Facebook, or can't be made into concise statements for people's attention span on Facebook, or can't be memed easily. Or, more likely, can't be neutralized and made devoid of emotional content such that it can gather neutral likes while at the same time not revealing anything shocking about yourself.

For instance, this thought I had about SawYouAtSinai. After reading part of The Second Sex, I've been able to redefine a lot of what I encounter, in life and Judaism, in terms of the psychoanalytic perspective of Simone de Beauvoir. After seeing a gushing report from a matchmaker about a prospective match, and realizing that the "About Her" section could easily have been generated by a bot trained on dating profiles, I tried to find easy ways to generate dating profiles online. The examples from a five minute search were sparse, other than a hilarious fill-in-the-blank sample that generated a profile with an odd fixation on skinny feet. Thus, if I'm to generate a dating profile creator, it would take some serious work.

My thoughts then drifted to how SawYouAtSinai, a dating site initially developed sometime around 2005 if not earlier, forces anyone completing the profile into a certain paradigm. Most, if not all, modern dating sites have you fill out some broad categories based on religion and sex, upload some pictures, where you went to school, and a personal paragraph. Nothing gendered here. Whereas SawYouAtSinai requests a series of multiple choice questions in addition, with no "Other" options, e.g. for Kosher the options are "Always", "At Home", and "At Home & I Eat Dairy in non-kosher restaurants" (says it all). These differ depending on gender and thus force the person answering them to conform to pre-defined, unchanging ideas.

Here are the female-specific questions that are visible on a public profile (as distinct from questions visible only to the matchmaker):

Head covering when married: Fully, Partially, etc.
Dress: Skirts, Skirts+Pants, etc.

And the male-specific ones:

Head covering: Kippa
Do you want to meet someone who will cover her hair (Required)
Frequency of Torah study (Required)


My beef was with head covering originally, but then I realized that maybe because this is a matchmaking site, meant for more religious people, it makes assumptions that religious people might find relevant. However I have a problem with head coverings - shouldn't that be for both genders? Why do you have to make the head covering question mandatory? Why can't I have a head covering question for after marriage as well? Resolved: Yosef will change from a small kippa to a bukharian kippa after marriage so that the women won't swoon at the sight of his beautiful hair. When you flip the tables on the whole shaitel thing it seems a lot weirder. But this can easily turn into yet another one of my gripes about shaitels in general, so let's not do that.

P.S. They should add a question just for the month of Adar where guys can list whether they will wear Skirts in addition to Pants.

Topics

Wifi + Graylog Analysis
Dreaming
Raspberry Pi 4 - Plex build out (again)
Enviro+ Pi input into Graylog
Minimizing ESXI datastores into one machine.
Thoughts on getting a new computer
Thoughts on "The Second Sex"
Thoughts on collapse (especially w/rt echo chambers)
     Especially thoughts on how it would play out on everything we do day to day.
     Law of unintended consequences
     What is dystopia? Can we look at the world from an outside viewpoint
That article about technical debt + Peter Zaihan + Collapse

Thoughts on Dating

Over the break I went on an Olami trip to Spain, Portugal, and Gibraltar, with a group of people 30+ strong from Houston, Chicago, and Detroit. I'd known some of the Houston group previously, some less than others. Among the many thoughts I had during the trip, several on the human relationship side have stood out. This was easily the best trip of my life. Going in I was apprehensive of traveling in a group this big and indeed the first time that Israeli music blared in a public square in Lisbon I noped out of the big group circle and sing-along in make-believe search for bathrooms. But I grew to really trust the people on the trip and especially the Houston crew, who early on claimed the rear of the bus and stuck around through the remainder of the trip's long bus rides. My laughter flowed free and it's safe to say that I haven't been this happy in a long time.

After the trip, the sore throat that I'd contracted from someone else on the trip (which is how it goes, one person has something and pretty soon some other people do too) became bronchitis and I picked up pink eye in the airport (as I had to travel to and from San Francisco the week after my return). This has left me in a monastic state of silence, unable to speak for more than a few minutes without coughing and subsequent unmanageable strain on my vocal cords. At a time when I'm bursting to relate my thoughts and impressions to my parents who got all sorts of pictures on our shared WhatsApp group, I'm struck dumb by the inevitable post-international-travel sickness.

And so I turn to a blogpost instead, to note the following big change that has crystallized since the trip. Namely, I gained a lot of self-confidence from the trip. In addition to doing a few selfies with the Houston group, I also was able to ask other people on the group to take pictures of me in front of famous tourist landmarks, and some of the fear I'd long borne towards pictures of myself (and my fat-face-a stupenda) melted away. It's become easier for me to look at pictures of myself and not shy away and say I look like crap (although there's no denying that I look a whole a lot better without glasses).

Another thing is that I started reconsidering moving to NYC, as I'd suddenly realized that all my friends and social life are here in Houston. Why move to NYC if all the friends I'd just made on this trip are still staying in Houston? That leaves just one reason to move to NYC: dating. And here's the other thing. After a recent long-distance relationship, where both parties were putting effort into the long-distance deal, I suddenly realized that long distance is a lot harder than I thought and that I'm no longer willing to do long distance dating. Even without my travel to San Francisco, the realization that I can't just go over and visit someone I'm seeing and spend time with her, alone or in a group at an event, without making it a big deal, bothers me a lot, and I'm no longer willing to do that, for anyone really. Phone conversations seriously lack the human, in-person element and I personally can't substitute phone conversations for that. This is why I will start going to Jewston and Moishe House events, even if they are on Shabbos, because I've reached the point in my life where I'd rather compromise on my previously-held beliefs on Jewish observance than pass up on opportunities to meet Jewish women where they are, rather than trust that God will provide in a city that is not friendly to "observant" single young Jewish professionals.

Back from London

What a trip to London! Two weeks! And boy what jetlag I'm experiencing. After a nine-hour flight from Heathrow to Houston on Sunday afternoon, I flew out to San Francisco from Houston this morning for work.

Perhaps I'll do some research to figure out how best to host photos online, or maybe subscribe to flickr for a year and post the very best photos of London.

The only thing that keeps me sane during some of the work I"m doing is the chillwave/synthwave mixes on this youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwoTj-pZgZZ8DInOXSSLMmA

I simply downloaded everything via youtube-dl to listen to, when Youtube is filtered on a corporate policy. 

Learning about Music

The last few days I've been obsessed with a new discovery: everynoise.com.

From the description:

"Every Noise at Once is an ongoing attempt at an algorithmically-generated, readability-adjusted scatter-plot of the musical genre-space, based on data tracked and analyzed for 3,200 genres by Spotify as of 2019-06-24. The calibration is fuzzy, but in general down is more organic, up is more mechanical and electric; left is denser and more atmospheric, right is spikier and bouncier.
 
Click anything to hear an example of what it sounds like.
 
Click the » on a genre to see a map of its artists.
 
Be calmly aware that this may periodically expand, contract or combust."

This just has me in a tizzy because there's so much music out there and it's so easy to hear snippets of music related to my favorite genres. And you can also discovery new artists of music you already know. In my case I discovered a whole world of children's music and also rominimal, which is a type of minimal techno specific to Romania / Bucharest's club scene. Apparently this music has been popular for 10 years now and just doesn't die. The sample on the page is here. Then I also found a nice article from 2017: https://www.electronicbeats.net/beyond-rominimal-guide/

In general it's just amazing how the site makes it incredibly easy to discover new music.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I went to the Neue Gallerie in NYC yesterday with a friend with insights to every painting, many of which were part of an exhibition of self-portraits by German artists such as Oskar Kokoschka, Max Bekkman, and more between about 1900 to 1940. Afterwards I learned that eating pizza with knife and fork is absolutely not done, anywhere, and that New Yorkers eat while walking, including on the train, like in Europe. I also learned that country music, with its clean language and simple themes has more appeal to Jews than I'd known of, especially now that there is such a thing as country pop and country rock, genres that have become more popular in the past ten years.

A visit to the Westbury Community Garden

A month ago with the coming of spring, I realized that additional planting ground would be lovely. A balcony garden is all well and good until you see that it takes care of itself on an automated watering schedule.

I tried a couple of time to ask to become a member of the Westbury Community Garden, but no bueno. So finally I visited the garden itself, hoping a friendly member might be there already. And so it was! Unfortunately membership is closed, but maybe there could be an opening later in the summer? I volunteered just to rake and weed, gratis, if only to be among a plethora of vegetables, and maybe this could still pan out.

An artichoke plant! Never seen such a thing before, let alone in Houston

Masses of tall swiss chard

A sea of dill

Young squashes growing, with clover as a ground cover (probably nitrogen-fixing).

Russian word for golddigger

There is none. Russians just don't have such a word. And "one who digs for gold" isn't it.

I was introduced to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Most_Popular_Girls_in_School, and am working through the episodes. Too funny, and witty.

In the space of one day I learned that I'll be in Pittsburgh next week. Made plans, booked travel. And after a call, learned that due to delays (again), Pittsburgh is called off. Probably. But the only people who could give me confirmation are either flying on places or on PTO. Such is the life of consulting. I'm not averse to leading meetings or working through details alone, I just don't like not being included on all planning meetings. Context is important, and knowing what the client has already told us, or the manager, is valuable. How can we project a consistent image if I repeat questions they've already answered? Also I'm freaking out because there's a whole piece of this seven-week project no one has told me any information about. And it's the area I'm least familiar with....

On a different note, the last two weeks have seen me learning about lights again. The last time this occurred I was a freshman in college, hunting for oversized fluorescent lightbulbs with very blue colors most conducive to seedling growth. Now, after six years of a too-dim apartment, I've been illuminating the main room with new lamps, from Ikea and Target. Bought some extremely expensive LED bulbs, but boy do they put out a lot of light. It's amazing how much better everything looks with a lot of light - the apartment looks bigger too. Now there are two reading corners. All that's left is to get a different Ikea Poang chair and we'll be good to go.

Lights without chair. A reading light with an extra large CFL, highest for the fitting, and an illumination lap at highest setting, bright enough to illuminate the whole room. The picture doesn't do it justice.