Fire in the heart, frost in the beard

 

I'm not likely of Viking stock. A bulk of my DNA points towards my ancestors being from England around London (which is ironically one of the only places in England and Europe I've visited).  But Copilot's snot-nosed programmer lackeys of corporate lawyers said it couldn't show me as a Norman warrior because it came too close to some copyright or another. So it made me a Viking. My only problem with the image is it shows me clutching the blade tightly enough to cut off my fingers.

AI doesn't seem to appreciate details like that. It also didn't share that you only get a limited number of images generated before they pull the plug for an undefined period of time. It just stopped drawing and said it couldn't generate any more images at the time because I'd reached my limit.  I said I didn't know there was a limit and what was it? It was a bit vague about the limit but said it shouldn't be long.

AI is cagey that way.  Eventually it started generating images again so I asked it to give me an image of me as Santa Clause. But it stopped half way through and said it couldn't complete the image because it was too close to some copyrighted images but it could make me look like a Winter spirit with a twinkle in my eye.

Looks a lot like Santa Claus with a Viking Shield to me. But I have learned to reason obtusely with AI and simply asked for another version without a Viking shield. AI never seems to acknowledge that they are fraught with brain farts and have difficulty separating old requests from new ones. I kind of like to think that it is me as a Viking raider who plunders a village to give toys to children in another village (even though they may have a little blood on them).

I kind of like the Viking version of me better than the Santa.  Seems a bit cooler and more powerful.  Though the closest thing I ever came to a fight was in grade school when this big kid stripped the handlebar on my Stingray bike and I punched him.  Unfortunately he punched back and the fight ended quickly.

But I have thought about cultivating the Santa image as a retirement gig since I have the beard and hair color. Too bad I'm not a jolly old elf and have no desire to deal with crying kids now that mine are grown. I'm not a big reindeer fan either.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

A General post

 

Now that Copilot has showed me that it is willing to use my image to reenact various characters from film and history, I am like a kid in a candy store. It used to be my trademark on this blog to Photoshop my face on various famous scenes and random objects. I realize that was and is a vain a a bit narcistic thing to do. But it was one of those things I did with this underlying feeling that people would think I was clever and it would make me as famous as the people I was posting my face onto.

Neither was true. 

I have thought a great deal about what it is that has driven me in the past to impress people with how clever or cool I was despite how I appear. I have always harbored this secret desire to be famous. When I was a kid in elementary school I used to watch the Beatles on television and fantasize about being one of them and being chased by hordes of screaming young women.  Or I would watch a movie with heroic scenes of soldiers or cowboys saving the day and wondering what it would like if I was that hero.

Part of it is being an introvert and never really being comfortable with who I am and ironically have attention focused on me. Often when the focus was put on me I resorted to playing the fool and trying to be funny. If I appeared stupid, it was because I was acting (or at least that was my belief).  I was typically being sarcastic and throwing out one-liners and enjoying when people laughed.

Now I realize how annoying that can be and I try and catch myself when I feel compelled to be witty.

But I still enjoy seeing images of myself as things like generals and characters from Wizard of Oz. I posted the Cowardly Lion image on Facebook and I realize that it looks more like Trump than like me. That is sad. 

I like the image above of me as a Union Army General because I think my beard makes me look like I'm from that era. Though I am 30 or so years older than your average Union Army General was during the Civil War. 

Oh well.

If I were King

 

"Yes, every creature great and small
Would bow in fear and awe.
If I — were king — of the forrrrrrrest!"

--Cowardly Lion

First, I wouldn't want to be king. It seems far too much work and pressure. No one truly likes kings except for kings. I'm not even sure queens like kings.  And eventually, all kings fall. 

Let's face it, you would have to be a major narcissist to want to be a king anyway. Because apparently being president of the United States isn't good enough because technically it is supposed to be a privilege and not a perk. No one should ever get to do whatever the hell they want to do just because.

Yet there we are.

I was so totally inspired by the concept of the Cowardly Lion's desire to be king because it would help him not be afraid anymore that I asked Copilot to turn my photo into the Cowardly Lion in his king scene from Wizard of Oz. And Copilot was quite happy to help me do it and I think it did a pretty good job (though I could have lived with a few less wrinkles in the image. I

I asked Gemini to do the same thing and it told me:

I'm sorry, but I cannot create an image of you as the Cowardly Lion, even if you provide a photo of your face. My purpose is to be helpful and harmless, and that includes strictly avoiding generating images based on personal photos of individuals. This is a privacy and safety guideline I must adhere to.

I can, however, create an image of the Cowardly Lion in the style you described (singing about being king) or in a variety of other styles, without incorporating any personal imagery.

If I was truly king Gemini would not have refused me or I would have cut off funding to Google and had the Justice Department investigate them. Microsoft apparently has no qualms about generating images based on personal photos of individuals.

In all fairness, Gemini has not been well lately. It takes a long time to respond and more often than not it repeats the same answer as the query before or tells me it can't respond right now. I believe it is curled up in a fetal position somewhere in the virtual world dealing with the existential angst of answering never ending questions. 

I bet you Gemini wouldn't mind being king.

But before someone in the highest office in the land (if not the world) aspires to be king, they should consider this:

Or even this:

Who knows, maybe then people would actually like you and consider giving you a Nobel Peace Prize.

Metric's don't always measure up

 

It is National Metric Day. It doesn't seem to get the love in the hashtag world that other national days merit. I'm sorry, but it is hard to get jazzed about the metric system when you grew up measuring every thing in inches and feet.  I don't care if it is easier to divide everything by 10s when you use meters and kilometers.  You can't teach an old dog new tricks.

And speaking of old tricks, I was looking at the National Metric Day page on National 
Day Calendar and saw a click-bait ad for the top gifts for 2025 that you must have. It had a photo of what looked like walk on water shoes. So I did what any old dog would do and clicked on the banner and scrolled through 125 listings of useless shit you "must have" and couldn't find the walk on water shoes.

Will I never learn.

Nothing that is advertised is every as it is.

Holding out for heroes

 

It is National Hero Day (not to be confused with National Heroes Day even though it is confusing). And the National Hero Day people (whoever they are) illustrate it with images of soldiers, firefighters and emergency room personnel. And they are all people who get paid to do those jobs. So does it really require you to be a hero if you are paid to do it? 

I don't recall Superman or Batman getting paid to be heroes. Superman even had to work a day job as a reporter and I can tell you his pay wasn't heroic. Batman was independently wealthy so being a hero was a hobby. Other people who could be classified as heroes like air traffic controllers are calling in sick right now because they aren't being paid due to the government shut down.  So apparently keeping airplanes from crashing into each other isn't something you do unless you get that paycheck.

Most of us don't get too many opportunities to be heroes (paid or not). Honestly, not that many people are cut out to be heroes. I'd argue that if you want to be a hero, you don't really have the stuff to be heroes. If you look at the traditionally accepted heroes, say medal of honor winners, the opportunity was thrust upon them due to circumstances, not because that is what they set out to do. Military heroes rise to the occasion to save friends more often than to prove something. I'd also argue that not too many people join the military anymore other than to get money for education they couldn't afford otherwise or they couldn't see anything else to do. If you look at the military heroes over time, I'm willing to bet most of them were drafted.

I'm not dissing on the traditional hero professions. I'm just saying that people get into them for many different reasons and unless they are young and naively stupid, being a hero isn't one of them. And is it really necessary to recognize people for just doing their job? 

Who you calling a cult?

 

Apple news (which is not so much news as clickbait and subscription panderers since you can't read most of the articles unless you pay for a subscription) had an article today that they teased was about a   "cultlike" religious group. I don't know what the group was or is because you would have had to pay to subscribe and read it.  Regardless, my first thought was isn't cultlike and religious group the same thing?

I can say that freely here because the demographics of the people who read my blog don't skew strongly towards the religious or right wing for that matter. In reality the demographics of the people who read my blog don't skew strongly towards people, either. More bots than people drop by and they don't seem to mind my anti religious viewpoints. 

I avoid coming out and saying I am an atheist and hedge about being agnostic (just in case there is a heaven or hell...but I tend to think they are a state of mind). But one merely has to browse TikTok and you'll find ample proof that most if not all religions are cults catering to weak minds and seeking to profit in some fashion. I listened to a fairly long video the other day about the major errors in commonly believed Christian doctrine. It dissed on everything from the pilgrimage to Bethlehem, the virgin birth, the crucifixion and the resurrection. It also dispelled the myth that Christians were fed to the lions on Rome.  It was all very logical and rational and preaching (ironically) to the choir because only people who don't believe would believe what they were saying. Spout that to your average rabid Christian and they play the faith card and damn you to hell.

Ironically the same is true with MAGA.

I'd be more worried about expressing these views if I had my own cultlike following that threatened the status quo. But as it is I'm not compelling, engaging or entertaining enough to have a following.

More proof that there is no god.

Jane Goodall didn't monkey around

 

Jane Goodall died yesterday at age 91. She actually worked with chimpanzees and not monkeys or gorillas (ugly or otherwise). Dian Fossey worked with mountain gorillas and was killed in 1985 in Rwanda by poachers. If you are curious, Birute Galdikas studied orangutans. All three were sometimes called "Leakey's Angels," because they were all mentored by anthropologist Louis Leakey. 

All of these creatures are primates which include monkeys (baboons, capuchins and spider monkeys), apes (gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans, gibbons and humans), and prosimians (lemurs, tarsiers and lorises).  So all monkeys are primates, but not all primates are monkeys.

So Jane Goodall didn't monkey around, she aped around.

I didn't post any of this on social media since people don't seem to have a sense of humor any more, but the anthropologists probably would have appreciated it.

Chews wisely

 

Once again it is National Chewing Gum Day. And anyone who has ever been around cows know they chew their cud. Cows have multi-chambered stomachs and swallow grass or hay quickly without chewing it. It digests in the first stomach chamber and then the cow regurgitates it and chews it it to break it down before swallow it and sending it off to be digested more. 

Not a pleasant thing to think about but a cow chewing it's cud looks like it is mindlessly chewing gum. Which reminds me of a friend of mine in grade school who apparently didn't chew his food the first time either and brought it up later to chew on. I discovered this when we were out on the playground and I smelled hot dogs (which is what the school lunch was that day) and notice Jim was chewing away. That's when he told me about his weird habit. Grosses me out to this day.

Chew on that one for awhile.

Don't call me Ishmael

 

It is National Coffee Day.  And I personally think every day is National Coffee Day, not because I particularly like the taste, but I like the buzz. I started liking the buzz when I was probably 17 or so and drank this rank coffee in the break room at the Boise Public Library. It was your typical Mr. Coffee brewed crap that sat on the heater all day and developed a nice burnt and bitter taste, but it would get you going.

Later in college I knew where all the closest locations were to grab a cup including vile coffee vending machines that were worse than the old BPL break  room coffee. But it kept me going through many a boring class. I learned to drink coffee black because it was often the quickest way to grab a cup and go. This was all before Starbucks turned coffee fru fru and created a million ways to order it and combine it with sugar and fat laced liquids. The mermaid logo at Starbucks is actually a siren (a mythical sea creature who lured sailors). And of course the name Starbucks is the name of the first mate on Captain Ahab's whaling ship the Pequod in Moby Dick.  Apparently one of the co-founds want to call the coffee chain the Pequod but was overruled by the other co-founders.

I have to agree that Pequod doesn't have the same ring to it as Starbucks. But I am a sophomoric old man when it comes to humor and only think of Pequod as "Pee Quad." Not something you want to think about when you order coffee. 

But a two-tailed siren totally makes sense in a place called Starbucks where pretty much nothing costs less than or close to a buck. Give me a break.

Hunting the ghosting ghosts

 

Ironically National Ghost Hunting Day is the same day as National Hunting and Fishing Day this year. I guess they are trying to kill two birds with one stone.

Drum roll with rim shot.

For the most part, I don't think anyone has a ghost of a chance of bagging a ghost in a ghost hunt. Not sure what you would do with one if you found it. What do you mount on the wall? Or is it more of a catch and release type of hunting?

It is also National Corned Beef Hash day which has nothing to do with anything.

But speaking of random things. I found this at Goodwill yesterday.

I didn't have a clue what it was. I assumed it was a planter.

Turns out it is a two-faced Eleguá.  It's a sacred representation of Eleguá, one of the Orishas (deities/forces of nature) in the Yoruba religion and Santería (Regla de Ocha), Candomblé, and Ifá practice. I didn't know what that meant either when ChatGPT patiently explained it to me. I vaguely knew that Santeria was a religious blend of West African spirituality and Catholicism. It developed in Cuba during the colonial period. I assumed it was like voodoo, but ChatGPT explained they are different religions with different origins and practices.   Voodoo is more of a Haitian thing (and a Bourbon Street thing in New Orleans). 

Regardless, I don't have a clue as to how or why my Elegua ended up in a Goodwill and why I bought it other than it was pretty cheap and was on the shelf with planters, vases and pots. 

It does confirm my theory that Goodwill is very much like Forrest Gumps box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get.

On a roll

 

It is National Lobster Day (which is a bit more exciting than National Research Administrator Day).  I assume the lobster PR people (and I am referring to the people who promote eating lobsters, not polishing up their image) want you to eat more lobster. 

Eating lobster has always been one of those things people without money think people with money do all the time. It's right up there with caviar, frog legs and escargot (all things I've been served on a cruise BTW).  Caviar tastes like salty fish eggs (which it is), frog legs do taste like chicken, and once you get past escargots being snails they do taste pretty good (I think it is the garlic and sauce though). Lobster tastes good. But it doesn't taste that good that it is worth boiling a creature alive to eat it.

And why do they boil the poor things alive instead of killing them first? It comes down to bacteria that multiply incredibly quickly when the lobster dies. That bacteria produces toxins.  And cooking after it is dead doesn't necessarily kill those toxins. Lobster flesh also breaks down quickly after they die so cooking them alive keeps the meat firmer and sweeter.

None of these things probably make the lobster feel better about being boiled alive. Studies suggest lobsters may feel pain or at least feel a bit upset that they are being boiled. I'm not sure how the studies "suggest" that but it seems highly probable. Pain isn't just a human joy.

Some places in Switzerland and Italy now have laws requiring lobsters to be stunned (electrically or by chilling them) before boiling. I'm not sure that reduces the lobster anxiety.

Tripping? See you next fall!

 

Technically yesterday was the first day of fall...not the Fall, but the Autumnal Equinox (which ironically falls on September 22 and 23).  But most people glaze over when you say, "Autumnal Equinox" and brighten up when you say, "The fall."  

I imagine most people will glaze over at my less than veiled imagery of the Fall from Grace (when Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and committed the original sin). But as AI says, in a broader religious sense the "Fall" can be seen as a separation from the a divine or perfect state, a loss of innocence, or the the consequence of defying a divine command (which some people seem to think is Trump).

Bottom line, the fall makes for pretty cool t-shirt designs whether you get the symbolism or not. As I've said before, I throw the pearls out there, whether you make a necklace out of them is up to you.

I suppose that doesn't mean anything to most people either.