The opinions expressed in this [FOO] are mine, and not those of my employer. In fact, they may not even be mine. I may have changed my mind. I may have grown beyond a particular opinion. I may be trolling you. I may be engaging in Socratic dialog to tear down your beliefs. I may be tearing down my own beliefs. γνῶθι σεαυτόν!
This the first in a series of articles where I do a brain dump
pf something like 40 years experience with “social media” of
various forms: Dial-up BBSs, Fidonet, Usenet, IRC, CompuServe,
AOL, Slashdot, Sourceforge, blogspot, Facebook, Jabber, Google+,
Twitter, LinkedIn, Mastadon “…we didn’t start the fire
(flame-war?)…” OK, maybe we did.
I hope this is useful, or at least interesting. It may wind up
just being a mix of introspection, hubris or narcissism, it may
be part of working up the nerve to quit Twitter as I quit
Facebook in 2016, maybe I’ll even work up the nerve to go cold
turkey as tychi is doing.
If you ever thought to yourself, “Gee, Emacs Org mode is a great
outlining and authoring tool, and I wish there were a powerful
and simple way use it to publish static websites on github or in
S3 buckets, I wish my blog could look as slick ast
https://eludom.github.io/” your’re in luck, All but the
simple part. Here are some of the references I used.
You learn things when you read original sources for yourself.
I recently picked up a copy of Plato’s allegory of “The Cave”. I had
known some of the highlights of the story before, the shadows on the
wall, prisoners thinking that the shadows were reality, since that’s
all they ever knew, of one prisoner being taken out to see the sun and
seeing the true light, coming back down and trying to, literally,
enlighten his fellows, and being thought crazy.
I recently picked up reader of samples of important ancient texts that I’ve had for a LONG time and read excerpts from Socrates Apology. Short version:
Oracle of Delphi “Socrates is the wisest man” Socrates Nice hypothesis, Apollo, you may be a god, but let’s test it…. Socrates Seeks out “The Wise” of his day, Politicians, Poets, Artisans … questions them … has them all expose themselves as blithering idiots. Socrates OK, “The Wise” are all blithering idiots.
So, when life turns uncertain you have two choices. Cling to things that seem to add stability and certainty, i.e. try to “stay safe”, or embrace the uncertainty, live now, carpe diem, and do things would seem to be fulfilling now.
I’m choosing the latter. At 58, in the middle of a pandemic and social unrest, I’m moving to a startup. The following are notes from a friend who has been playing the silicon valley startup game for a few decades.
So my attempt at “just blogging something” for 100 straight days as
part of #100DaysToOffload https://100daystooffload.com/ has
stalled, but that’s OK.
I have a home painting project going that keeps expanding in scope
every time I look at it. I’ve gone on a couple weekend
backpacking/canoeing trips, and (biggest time sync of all), I’m in
the middle of a job change. That sucks down time and energy. Oh
yeah, and the country/world is in a little turmoil right now
(COVID-19 and protests) which is, to say the least, distracting,
disorienting, disturbing, destructive and otherwise detrimental to
a simple goal of blogging every day.
Opening day [of baseball] in Cincinnati has always been a time of
hope and optimism, a time to look forward to, a time to enjoy
being with family and friends, a time to enjoy looking at the
forsythia and daffodils heralding spring, to walk across the Ohio
River on the Roebling bridge, to take in the annual Findlay
Market Parade, and to hear the umpire (or Marty and Joe on the
radio) say “Play Ball.” I am declaring today my personal
“Opening Day 2020”
In my never ending quest for synthesis, this post combines thoughts on
the OODA loop and falling out of a canoe twice this weekend in rapids
on the Shenandoah river. There is a connection. Maybe.
If you want to see the full trip report, pictures, etc. go here Things
that fall in the river get wet. If you’re interested in how this relates to
the OODA loop or, better, if you have experience/thoughts on applying
the OODA loop to operational cybersecurity settings, read on (and
comment !)
Figure 1: On the river during calm between crisis events
1500 miles down, 700 to go to finish section hiking the Appalachian
Trail with 215 miles completed this year in 3 trips.
Of course, I have some of the hardest miles left: the Smokies,
Mt. Washington, the Whites, the Presidentials, the Bigelows, but with
persistence, luck, health, constant gear tweaks (and some HARD hiking)
I should finish in a few years.