Cool Things – Leibniz Clockwork

I like Stef. The cute, puffalump bit doesn’t really work for me, but Stef is a straight-up car nerd. I like her authenticity. She’s also fairly optimistic and up-beat, and her articles rarely delve into indiscriminate complaining. Thirdly, when she has to cover some details about a car, she does the parts that should be professional professionally. If a car doesn’t have the straight-line speed of another, but handles better while breaking, that bit of story doesn’t need too much editorializing. When GM reports sales, I don’t really want to hear how Cadilac’s year-over-year sales changes are interpreted in the author’s views of social justice. I want a little context but inside the box. They’re cars. They’re cool and I like them, but let’s keep perspective.

This one’s a human interest story, but she can string a few sentences together to make a cord of memories. It’s worth reading.

October 18, 2023October 18, 2023

BJJ

I was rolling the instructor in my BJJ class on Monday, and in the middle of our match, he starts giving advice to the people in the match next to us.

That’s kinda demoralizing.

September 23, 2023September 23, 2023

Boreas

Trying to spend more time looking up and around. Headed to Boreas Pass today just to be there.

I particularly love the tree-tunnel effect when the mountains are tall enough to be seen.

September 22, 2023September 22, 2023

BJJ White Belt

The basic order of operations in a BJJ match is take them down, get past the legs, achieve a dominant position, execute a submission.

In early white-belt, you’re learning how to roll in control, how to control your breathing, that you can control your breathing, and how not to kill the smaller people. The smaller people tend to think this is easy, just don’t murder me, but it’s actually very difficult. If I push left on someone and bend their spine, the movements are all off. On a big person, it’s a little twist: not comfortable but not significant. On a smaller person, the bent spine can mean an injury. The smaller people need to learn than yes, they need to tap to avoid the accidental-broken-spine submission, which they don’t necessarily think about either.

All that comes together to the main lesson of white belt which is: what’s going on and what do I do about it? The process of asking those questions is the skill. You look down at a tangle of arms and legs while you can’t breathe and need to process that into half-guard with chest pressure.

Going along with that, white belt is where you start learning moves. You get a few down and combined them with recognition to get to execution. So looking down at that tangle of arms and legs, you start doing the appropriate escape and move on.

What you don’t do yet, and I see this but I can’t do it, is the sequences. I can’t do an escape while thinking about how I want it to land. I’m still too busy figuring out what’s going on right now. The gateless gate before me is this position leads to that position, and that’s what I need to do. But I don’t know the positions, the moves, the analysis well enough. I require practice.

September 10, 2023

Facts

DnD: Honor Among Thieves was a better and more faithful adaption than either LotR: Rings of Power or Wheel of Time.

August 4, 2023

Oppenheimer

I’m deeply conflicted about Oppenheimer.

Not apathetic, as in I don’t care enough to have an opinion. I’m not mildly ambivalent as I am with many good action movies. The fight scenes are fine, the script is terrible, but it is what it is.

No I feel with passionate intensity both affection and dislike for the movie, and I’m not sure what to make of that. I haven’t felt truly conflicted about a movie in years.

This is probably the mark of good cinema.

March 17, 2023April 9, 2023