Sam's L33t Journal

The biggest of travel plans has arrived.

The long flight from Boston was managed, though we got to Osaka on almost no sleep. Direct flight from Boston went well, though it's a long journey. The connection in Narita was interesting, the domestic terminal has only a few vending machines past security and you take a bus from the gate to the plane on the tarmac. It makes Narita feel like a small regional airport stapled to a major international hub.

Arranged for an airport pickup, though missed our driver in a surprisingly chaotic crowd in the airport arrivals lobby. Got that straightened out despite some struggles with the international roaming on my cell phone plan. (Which took a call to T-Mobile support later to get straightened out.)

And then we were up in middle of the night despite being on about three hours of sleep in the last 36. The sound approach is to just close your eyes and just wait in darkness or silence for four hours straight. Good luck getting a kid to do that, so we took a different approach, a little thing I like to call "jetlagmaxxing", and went to the combini at 3AM for a snack instead.

Our first real day of the trip was spent at Universal Japan. It does seem a certain amount of silly to go that far for a theme park, but it was pretty good for a first-day activity. And we were all (somewhat shockingly) feeling awake and full-energy all day until Erica crashed to zero abruptly just before dinner around 6. Erica was mostly not in the mood for roller coasters, which made me disinclined to spend time waiting for those. And she wanted to spend a lot of time in the Wonderland corner of the park (which has Peanuts, Hello Kitty, and Sesame Street characters and most of the little kid rides). I still had a lot of fun with the calmer rides, treats, and all the details of the theming. Super Nintendo World was absolutely amazing, though. We all exclaimed aloud when we stepped out into the main area, it was really a beautifully realized setting, nostalgic and lively and fun. Donkey Kong: Minecart Madness (Erica's one roller coaster of the day) was top-notch in my book and my favorite bit of the day.

Today, we went to see the deer in Nara Park. They're cute, and we were no exception to everyone wanting to feed the deer, but they will mug you for a deer cracker if you have one (or look like you have maybe thought about having one at some point). Their nipping isn't as aggressive as possible, but nip they do, and some of them would clearly consider taking your crackers at gunpoint but for the lack of guns (and thumbs).

Before heading to the Kasuga-Taisha shrine, we had steamed kakinohazushi (sushi wrapped in persimmon leaves) at Izasa-Nakatani-hompo Yumekaze-hiroba.

Kasuga-Taisha was amazing. I imagine if you're actually Shinto it hits unfathomably hard, but it's definitely an awesome and uncanny place: The monumental lanterns and thousand-year-old trees and wildlife that seems to grow increasingly pious as you approach the shrine. I got insufficient cash from the cash machine this morning and we almost didn't get to see the shrine interior as a result (Erica would not have wanted to make the climb again after backtracking). But we were bailed out by a friendly pair of tourists who spotted us admission when I asked if they could exchange some yen for USD or payment via Venmo or similar. Turns out they were from the other (i.e. the original) Cambridge. Sorry for not catching your names, you're the best, that really made our day.

For the other main attraction of the day, we went to Osaka Castle, which had an interesting museum and fascinating scenery. Afterwards, we went to Osaka Shinsekai and had supper at Jarinko, a very friendly and beautiful little izakaya. They made their own plum wine in-house, fermenting it on the side counter in large jugs. The appetizers were delicious. Got through with dinner just on time to see the whole neighborhood lit up for the night on our way to the train.

Haven't written for a while, so writing about a variety of things this time:

Last weekend, I went back to PAX East for the first time in a long time. I stopped going some years ago when tickets started selling out almost immediately. That seems to no longer be the case, though the event was still pretty busy day-of. It was fun, but I didn't enjoy it as much as some times in the past. I have little tolerance for standing in line for things. At the Magic booth I played an apples-to-apples-style game with packs of Strixhaven, promotion for the upcoming set returning to that setting. I didn't find a lot of indie video games that really jumped to the top of my play-next list. The demo that I found most striking was for Of the Devil a Phoenix Wright type game of high stakes legal defense with a cyberpunk dystopia setting, Persona-esque aesthetics, and heavy leaning on card games and gambling as inspiration for its mechanics and metaphors. I played a demo (and wound up getting a copy) of Duat, which was a beautiful and interesting little board game. It's one of those games that gets surprising complexity from simple rules, it's quick and pretty fun. The openings are quite constrained, so I wonder if it will continue to hold interest as I play it more, but it definitely seems pretty neat. The craziest tech demo was for immersive-scent peripheral OVR. (Credit for trying, and it works well enough. Who knows, maybe in the future this will be an obvious key component of interactive experiences that produce heretofore unseen depths of emotional resonance and immersion.) Erica played a game of Lanternlight, a simplified tabletop roleplaying system designed to be easy for kids to learn and play, designed by game designer Andrew Harris in collaboration with his daughter, Anika.

I had to take Erica to the doctor for a blood draw this week, and boy oh boy was the pre-suffering much worse than the actual getting the thing done. Proud of her for being able to master herself eventually. The ancestral lizard brain has a long history of keeping humans safe, but it has a real lack of chill and a poor understanding of modern medicine.

We went to my Aunt Milly's house for the first Passover Seder this year. Always nice to see my Boston extended family.

We saw the The Super Mario Galaxy Movie this weekend. Most of the criticism of it that's going around is objectively correct, it's not that connected to the Mario Galaxy games specifically, and it's real simple, thrown-together, and shallow. It kind of feels more like a theme-park-ride than a movie, but I found it fun.

Japan trip is rapidly approaching, and the pre-trip logistics are done but my travel stress is high.

A favorite link from this week: My journey to the microwave alternate timeline - An essay centering on the book Microwave Cooking for One, a bit of history-of-technology, history-of-cooking, culinary-alternate-futurism that makes me (a bit) want to get a Corningwear Pyroceram microwave browning dish.

One thing I forgot to mention that was a significant change in my life from last week: I got a new fridge! Okay, maybe that's not the most significant. But it had been a number of months of low-level annoyance about my fridge working, but not quite as well as it seemed like it should: Milk going sour a bit more quickly, veggies not keeping quite as fresh, jars in the back frosting over a bit more frequently. That sort of thing.

Anyways, I eventually figured out that the magic phrase I wanted was "garage ready" (I wanted something with better temperature control but no fancy frills or plumbing) and arranged for a delivery. The Home Depot crew sure were efficient and organized, got new fridge in and old fridge out in a few minutes even though the process included popping the front door right off its hinges and putting it back in place after. I've been pretty happy with the new fridge, a Frigidaire top-freezer model. It also has a magnetic front (my old fridge didn't and I found that inconvenient, but obviously that's the sort of minor inconvenience it's not worth buying a new fridge for). The only thing worse is that this model lacks a light in the freezer (apparently pretty common in "garage-ready" top-freezer models). That's not too much of a problem so far, though. I suppose if it's a pain I can try to stick a rechargeable light with a motion sensor in there, if I can find something that performs okay at those temperatures.

Workation in Baltimore was extended due to weather and it was great. Really, really great. Very nice to get extra time with Melissa and Elliott and Simon, wound up taking the slow trip home by train all day on Tuesday so Erica could be back for school on Wednesday (Monday and Tuesday were snow days anyways). Erica wasn't thrilled about the prospect of such a long train ride but then it was fine, she did some craft projects and watched Lu Over the Wall again (we watched it together for the first time on that trip in Cleveland) and the time passed pretty quick. I even managed to get in a productive day of work from the train, despite the flaky wifi.

The storm wasn't as snowy in Boston as the last, but slightly south of Boston got whacked. Providence got more snow than in the Blizzard of '78.

Since then, I continued to spend the rest of the week wringing out concurrency bugs and the US government managed to start another war. And the government is sanctioning AI chatbot company Anthropic for saying its contract doesn't permit the self-described "Department of War" to use the tech for mass surveillance and unsupervised killbots. (With OpenAI stepping into that vacuum, guess it's time to rewatch Slaughterbots and have nightmares.) Just the usual.

Everything seems too much lately.

My own life is quietly busy. Last weekend was Mystery Hunt. Definitely was a good time this year. Felt like I was able to contribute less than usual, felt like there were more difficult "insight needed" bits and fewer puzzles with lengthy mining through clues, but there were at least a few puzzles where I helped move things a bit towards a solution or even found some key bit of insight. My team came far from first this year, but we did finish hunt in the wee hours of Monday morning, and I was glad to stay up for what was really a very fun and charming end-game.

This past weekend Erica had her in-town birthday party on Saturday, and I was a bit stressed about the details leading up, but it all went well. Today, some real winter weather rolled in. The last time Boston got a real blizzard was in 2022, we've had several winters in a row that have been quite light on snow. Erica and I walked through the snow to Time Out Market for lunch after her art lesson, and though heavy snowfall had commenced and there were already a few inches on the ground, we passed more than one jogger and one couple holding their (I assume) usual iced Dunks coffee in their bare hands. Never can get Boston down. We boarded a train direct to Union Square, had to change trains when our train went out of service three times, and then were delayed getting into Union due to a frozen switch. I made hot chocolate when we got home, and frittata for dinner.

I've been playing a lot of Hades II, and got in my first victories on both routes.

The national news is so dismaying. It seems like the administration has decided that interfering with or just annoying their goons is worthy of summary execution. And Republicans are still largely behind this. The story I'm alluding to is even more egregious than the ICE murder that I was talking about in my immediately last post. Again, sending masked agents door-to-door to ferret out crime somewhere is not how America does law enforcement. It's not a way of doing law enforcement that's compatible with the substantive personal freedoms that America values and protects. If that's allegedly the only way to enforce a set of laws, it certainly calls into question whether those laws are at all just or reasonable, and also calls into question the motives who insist that this particular approach must be pursued, that all its deficiencies must be remedied by sheer overwhelming scale.

Made it down to the Seaport Winter Market this weekend. The hot-chocolate-filled ring croissant that Lakon Paris was serving up was the winning treat of the event. Those really are some genius patissiers.

I watched Murderbot, based on Martha Wells sci-fi series about a rogue security android (sort of) that has slipped the systems keeping it enslaved which, plagued with anxiety, is using its newfound freedom to keep its head down so it can spend more time watching its favorite TV shows. And, of course, keeping its head down means dealing with the latest batch of odd-ball idiot humans who are doing their best to get themselves killed. Alexander Skarsgård plays the lead, and aside from some cool effects on the main character's armor and helmet, the show tunes down the degree to which the protagonist looks like not a normal human so that the viewer can be hurled into the uncanny valley purely on the strength of Skarsgård's performance (IMO a good decision). It's funny and dramatic and the rest of the characters and cast are great as well. I think the shorter episodes worked well with the pulpy source material. Definitely recommend this one if you like this sort of thing, especially if you already like the books.

The news continues to be terrible. The President responds to mass killings with essentially "stuff happens" and double homicides with, insanely, more or less "it's that guy's fault for being annoying about not liking me". Half the White House is gone with ever more ambitious plans to replace the wreckage with who knows what. What remains is being covered with ever more tacky and outrageous displays. We're hurtling towards another unnecessary war for oil. The nation has been made a laughingstock, and we deserve it.

My team's Android Jetpack library made it to its first stable release. A big milestone.

I'm exhausted and looking forward to winter break. I hope I can get some rest.

I woke up this morning reminded by a dream of some nearby restaurants that had slipped my mind, with a sense that some were definitely gone and others were, well, I hadn't thought about them in a while. And as I tried to recall more of the details, I couldn't remember the names and the geography just didn't fit together. I'm sure some of the details are real, but I can't really parse out which or how it fits together. But some of those places I probably visited only in dream. And even there the urban geography has inexorably shifted.

My work has been very busy, as has Julie's.

Ink Jetpack is in beta, and developer relations published an elaborate sample app demonstrating it's capabilities.

Last weekend, I took Erica to the Day of the Dead event at the Peabody Museum. Erica had fun with all the craft activities. And we all went to the singalong theatrical release of K-Pop Demon Hunters with one of Erica's friends and their family. Was pretty fun, I see why that film has been so popular.

The Somerville election happened. All the ballot questions passed. Jake Wilson will be our new mayor. Three of four on Somerville YIMBY's councilor-at-large slate were elected.

This weekend, I took Erica to the new special exhibit at the MFA focusing on the work of Winslow Homer, especially his watercolor. Really cool.

I cooked an easy orange chicken for dinner tonight, which turned out really well even though I was completely winging it on the recipe.

I finished reading The Difference Engine and started reading Souls in the Great Machine, connected by the odd thread of both being sci-fi about unusual computers. The first is basically alt-history of "what if Babbage's analytical engine was actually built and the computer age started about 100 years early?" The second is far-post-apocalyptic sci-fi featuring a massive human-powered computer. That second book is part of a trilogy. For some reason I read the middle book in that trilogy, Eyes of the Calculator, a long while ago, then got the sequel, then realized it was the middle book and thought I should read the first book first, then didn't get around to that until now.

I usually do something about how I'm thinking about the upcoming election, so here goes.

Mayor - Wilson: Somerville is having a challenger vs. challenger mayoral election this time, and it seems the big difference between the two candidates is on housing: Both in favor, but Jake Wilson supporting a more incremental approach of upzoning areas of the city near transit (note that's most of it), Willie Burnley taking Somerville YIMBY's favored "upzone all of the 'neighborhood residence' zone to 'urban residence'" approach. I think their agendas are similar, but I think Wilson will be more able to get stuff done, and "get rid of 'neighborhood residential'" is a much harder sell despite being very similar in result to more targeted upzoning.

City Councilor At-Large - Istvan, Wheeler, Mbah, Link: This is Somerville YIMBY's slate.

Question 1 (New City Charter Ratification) - Yes: After a long process to update Somerville's charter, the new version seems to be something with broad consensus support: Mayors past, present, and future are in favor, city councilors are in favor, local civic groups are in favor, etc. Seems like a straightforward improvement.
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Question 2 (Four-Year Mayoral Term Instead of Two) - No: More discussion here. I was leaning "yes" earlier, now I'm leaning "no". A bit uncertain. Best argument for: Longer terms help new mayors recruit better high-level staff. Best argument against: City council is every two years, and the power balance is still stacked against them, even if the new charter passes.

Question 3 (The Palestine One) - No: Well, here I feel even not making a recommendation is likely to get me yelled at. Here's the full wording:

"THIS QUESTION IS NOT BINDING: Shall the Mayor of Somerville and all Somerville elected leaders be instructed to end all current city business and prohibit future city investments and contracts with companies as long as such companies engage in business that sustains Israel's apartheid, genocide, and illegal occupation of Palestine?"

I guess the way I break this down is like so: I think analysis of a ballot measure should be focused on the case where it actually does something. In that condition, I think it's likely to hamper city government here while not doing any good for anyone.

My mom was in town last weekend for her high school reunion, and it was a pretty great visit. Friday evening had dinner with cousins Amy, Josh, Sylvie, and my Aunt Milly at Dosa & Curry. There was a lot of stuff going on for HONK! Fest all weekend. Julie and I took Erica to the festival in Davis on Saturday, and we all went with my mom to the Harvard Art Museum on Sunday morning before going to the parade.

Monday was a rainy, quiet day at home, but I decided to do a cooking project Erica had been planning, she wanted tomato soup with pesto grilled cheese. So we baked milk bread and made pesto and made the soup with fresh tomatoes and herbs. I made the soup more or less according to this recipe, but I didn't broil the veggies after baking, added more garlic and herbs, used a can of coconut milk instead of cream, and also added a can of tomato paste. For the fresh herbs, I used all the fresh tarragon and sage in the packets I got from the supermarket. Which was an ounce each, so a questionably large amount, and I would have felt like a fool if I'd ruined the soup on that account. I thought it turned out great, though, and fortunately everyone else liked it, too. I really love sage, though. Season your food more, it's fine.

New people are starting on my team at work this week. Busy, busy.