It's almost halloween! October moves fast. i didn't realize i haven't written an update in nearly three weeks. i have been in a big swing of doing nothing and lying in bed all day. the career fairs drained me so much... i did not enjoy them. ive been such an empty shell of mindless consumption. but this morning the wind has changed
I am reflecting on some things I wrote last couple posts about how I could almost *tell* that i was about to burn out. namely, i wrote a little sentence about how i hope the wave of energy lasts. this last week has been solely consumptive. i spent it in bed and playing diablo 4 and not opening vscode. i didnt learn nor grow. i didnt apply to a single job. I didn't generate, i just consumed.
i mean, i enjoyed it. i consumed a lot. I watched the notebook, brokeback mountain, and the new taylor swift eras tour. i got addicted to car youtube and i got reaaaallly into cars. i watched a ton of youtube videos about car interior detailing and modification and i spent maybe 3 or 4 hours cleaning out my car so now it feels brand new. i also bought a car trash can and one of those funny little tree air fresheners. its awesome. fun times haha. i painted a bathroom (mostly. I still need to paint a couple final areas, such as the area around the light switch.). but for the most part, ive been lying in bed and playing diablo for hours on end
however, after this huge wave of consumption, today I woke up at 4am filled with zeal and passion and i can tell im on a new wave of generation rather than consumption. i think it would be interesting to see if there are any readings on this. i want to know how to be able to switch out of the "consumptive potato mode" faster. perhaps its a matter of discipline. i think most of the time it is external forces that wake me from periods of complacency. someone will call or email me asking me if i'm available to do a project. i should be doing this on my own. reflecting back, i think most of my life has been more consumption than generation. i don't make many projects nor develop anything publicly most of the time. growing up and even through college, after school id play video games or read. reading can be generative but often for me its just recreational. mostly fiction. scifi. hyperion and neuromancer. (oh my god hes talking about neuromancer again). even my nonfiction reads tend to be for fun (side note: lots of people love to hate on harari. i think hes a fun guy. i enjoyed homo deus and im enjoying sapiens)
anyway, im finding that i tend to write these blog posts when i have caffeine in my system, but its not a one to one relationship. i think it relies quite a bit on how passionate i feel. last couple weeks i didnt feel passionate.
i think it would be interesting to know if anyone actually reads these. i mostly am keeping this to myself as a little journal i can refer back to. the vain and futurist in me refers to this blog as how i can return from the dead once there is a system can replicate my consciousness, and a replica of my knowledge and personality can be gained from what i dump onto here. my digital lazarus, my broken recollection. a system built on fragments of my publicly shared experience
(sam edit post-writing: i found out that there is a black mirror episode that talks about something similar to this called "be right back." i read the synopsis and it sounds interesting about how the copy of the dead guy was missing important personality traits such as the negative ones, or the inability to like. resist things. but maybe this can be chalked up to insufficient data. i'd watch it but most of the time i find black mirror episodes pretty one dimensional and like they are 30 minutes too long. anyway, i talk more about the digital resurrection shenanigans again later)
i find the idea of digital resurrection so interesting. sometimes ill ask chatgpt to roleplay as famous figures like mark twain, or characters from novels like dixie mccoy or case from that one william gibson novel i really liked. (god he wants to be a cyberpunk guy so bad). i think that placing more words and my thought processes out there can help save and create a future me. or at the very least, itll let my loved ones and colleagues know how insane and unhinged i am >:) just kidding. im just an excited young fella who is too optimistic about technology
here are some ways i may choose to be generative this week:
i think if i reaaaallly wanted to digitally come back, i would need to all in into putting myself online. but this is at odds with my fears of privacy and such. i often complain about meta's new camera glasses. i am afraid to embarrass myself and i hate seeing my reflection and the image of myself. (damn, oversharing!) but yeah, anyway. that's all i got. ive emerged from my diablo 4 hibernation and i just wanted to share.
final thought: i heard the craziest thing in the world a day or two ago on twitter! there was a thread that was saying that they could tell openai's speech transcription was trained on youtube data because it would often transcribe uncertain inputs into "Thanks for Watching!" and i thought that was pretty cool. but heres the crazy part: someone in the comments was saying that there was a baby who had been on youtube a lot and said "thanks for watching" who had learned it from youtube as a form of goodbye. i thought that was so silly and crazy. no evidence beyond anecdotal but i thought that was pretty silly and insane. imagine if your baby sounded like a youtuber. nightmare
bye bye have a good one. i hope i have something cool to share in my next lil update.
i wonder what is so alluring about the life of a bounty hunter in media. i think it is the spirit of one who lives and dies solely upon his skill in his profession. i'm a lil obsessed with bounty hunters in media. western movies, star wars, cyberpunk (god, again?), all filled with the stories of those who live solitary, wandering lives, making their often meager livings from one job to the next. is it the hunt? im not sure. its just on my mind right now. full time career seems like such a slog to me right now. i feel like a deep part of me doesn't want to work from 9 to 5 to secure a reliable paycheck. i think i'll have to, and honestly i think id probably enjoy always having something to work on. but idk. its a bit scary. i enjoyed my time working full time in a hotel. i liked cleaning the rooms and doing laundry. i still dont have full time white collar experience. i fear the horror stories of people being robbed of their lives. but it isn't robbery if theyre paying you. but i dont feel myself that i could be paid enough to work through some of the horror stories. worst case, i think id rather live in my car and do gig work and my part time job to make ends meet. maybe its immaturity. i just want to Live. i want to be free.
im not sure if ive talked about it on here. but i loooove cowboy bebop. its my goto comfort show. it has ruined most media for me, because nothing else so far has lived up to it for me. i love how they are always starving. they spend lots of time lounging and complaining. not much really happens. its just a hangout most of the time. its a lot like rio bravo to me in that way (tarantino says that rio bravo is the best hangout movie. i agree.). to me, indie programming feels like bounty hunting for ideas. i haven't caught a bounty yet, but maybe one day i will. i just have to get better. there was some movie or show that was talking about how most bounty hunters don't have a long career. i think it was for a few dollars more. but i want to be one that does have a long career.
long ramble today. i had fun. maybe one day ill write a blog post that is actually valuable and not just a ramble. what a thought that is