Enthusiastically Ambiverted Hopepunk
The stuff about me and my life. The “diary” side of blogging.
Book 66 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Colonization adventures continue on Belle Terre, as Sulu, Uhura, and Chekov deal with troublesome splinter groups and environmental aftereffects of the events of the prior book in the series. A solid mid-series entry, with a good focus on this secondary trio while the Enterprise is busy elsewhere.
Happy holidays (part one)!
This past week was, of course, Christmas week. One of the really nice things about working at Highline is that this entire week was designated a work from home week, and Wednesday and Friday (the two days on either side of Christmas) are considered “personal development” days, with a pleasantly broad definition of “personal development”. Email was monitored and work was done, but it definitely makes for a comfortably low-key week.
Our Christmas day was quite nice: Slept in as late as we could, had a fun breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes with chocolate-infused butter and chocolate whipped cream (there was a bit of a theme there…), a comfortable walk around the neighborhood, opening presents, and a lot of relaxing and reading.
I also “finished” one I’ve been working on for a few months now (since this year’s major gift wasn’t a surprise), Thom Hogan’s Complete Guide to the Nikon Z5II. “Finished” is in quotes because as it’s something of a reference book, there were sections that I skimmed, and this is one that I’ll be sure to keep on my iPad to refer back to whenever I need.
We’ve also watched several movies, two from the stable of holiday favorites, one new holiday favorite, and a couple that we’ve been looking forward to seeing. This week’s lineup was:
Walter Chaw at Film Freak Central: Avatar: Fire and Ash (2025): Absolutely devastating zero-star review of James Cameron’s latest “Dances With Ferngully” film. “The indigenous people, the Na’vi, are giant blue cats who literally meld with the natural elements on their planet, Pandora, through their naked mole-rat tails, and boast of a harmonious existence that nonetheless requires a warrior class because those are the two things indigenous people in white fantasies are allowed to be: ferocious warriors and children of the Earth.”
Randall Munroe’s xkcd: Funny Numbers: “The teens picked a new funny number.”
Ben Keough at The New York Times‘ Wirecutter: The First Nikon Z-Mount Mirrorless Lenses You Should Buy (archive.is link): Now that I have a new camera, though I can use (and absolutely will be using) my existing F-mount lenses, eventually I’ll be adding newer Z-mount lenses to my collection. Time to start dreaming!
Barry Petchesky at Defector: What Did We Get Stuck In Our Rectums Last Year?: The annual report! “This is the time of year to be grateful for not having things stuck in our asses, and to think of those less fortunate than us. So spare a thought for those Americans who misjudged the capacity of their own orifices.”
Lorraine Boissoneault at Smithsonian Magazine: A Civil War Cartoonist Created the Modern Image of Santa Claus as Union Propaganda: I had no idea about any of this.
Infinite Ball Drop: “On New Year’s Eve, the Times Square Ball drops for only 60 seconds over a measly 139 feet. What if we extrapolated from that and covered the entire year?”
Robin Buller at The Guardian: How effective is protesting? According to historians and political scientists: very: “From emancipation to women’s suffrage, from civil rights to Black Lives Matter, mass movement has shaped the arc of American history. Protest has led to the passage of legislation that gave women the right to vote, banned segregation and legalized same-sex marriage. It has also sparked cultural shifts in how Americans perceive things like bodily autonomy, economic inequality and racial bias.”
Doug Henwood at Jacobin interviews Émile Torres: Tech Capitalists Don’t Care About Humans. Literally.: “…there’s also a kind of capitalist influence, the idea that human beings do not matter in and of ourselves. In this worldview, we matter for the sake of value, rather than value mattering for the sake of us. ¶ …we are just means to an end. The only end is value, this abstract yet quantifiable concept that should be maximized to the physical cosmic limits. We matter only as the conduits through which this value can come into existence.
Book 65 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Really, this kind of needs two ratings: Five stars for the content, and two stars for the editing. Thom is incredibly knowledgeable about photography and Nikon cameras, and this book is an incredible deep dive into the Z5II, how it works, why it works the way it does, what all those settings mean, and suggestions on how to get the best results out of the camera. However, as he has obviously (and quite transparently; he mentions some of this on his website) adapted large swaths of this book from very similar books on other cameras in Nikon’s Z series, there are a lot of instances where the shift from one camera to another wasn’t caught, leading to everything from the wrong camera model being mentioned to slight errors (I’ve not come across anything major or that would cause a problem, though). Still very worthwhile, and I’ll be sure to keep this easily available on my iPad so I can reference it whenever I need.
Book 64 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Having made it through saboteurs and alien conflicts, the colonists now need the Enterprise’s help dealing with a moon set to explode in a week. The setup sounds far-fetched, but works to keep the overall tension going, plus a few new mysteries are tossed in, sure to be addressed again later in the series.
Book 63 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
An interesting start to this six-part series. Shortly post-V’ger, Kirk and the Enterprise guide a 70-ship convoy of 60,000 settlers to a new home six months away. Of course, things do not go well. Most interesting so far for its treatment of Kirk, somewhere on his road from the (perhaps overly) brash self-assurance of TMP to the depression of the start of TWoK, questioning his place and the effects of his career. The new alien races are interesting, as well. However, the primary antagonist is a little too one-note, and while “the Orions” are involved, I’m very confused by them, as they’re described in ways that don’t match the green-skinned humanoids we know as Orions (descriptive bits include: “…slimy muscular arm…”, “…arrowlike orange eyes…”, “…his many-fingered limb…”, “…his claw still tightened around [their] jaw…”, “…purple skin…”, “…turned burgundy with both fury and fear…”, “[his] excuse for eyes…those milky orbs…”). At some point in the editing process, those descriptions should have been corrected or they should have been given some other name than “Orions”.
Work was rather uneventful this week, being the week between the end of the quarter and the week of the holiday break. Quiet, with time to putter around on the list of things that have been in the “lower priority” pile for a bit. Not bad at all.
Outside of work, much of the week was just watching the world around us slowly start to emerge from the flood waters. There’s still a lot of water around, and the rivers are still running high, but things are improving and most roads have reopened. Soggy progress is still progress.
Today we went down to see the Grand Kyiv Ballet’s The Nutcracker down in Federal Way. We enjoy the Grand Kyiv Ballet’s performances — they’re a Ukrainian troupe that’s now based out of Bellevue, with a blend of Ukrainian professionals and local students, so the individual dancers range from very good to very enthusiastic — and it’s always good to support local artists.
Finished Catherynne Valente’s Space Oddity, the just-as-fun sequel to Space Opera. My only disappointment (and it’s not with the book) is that I was busy enough at last spring’s Norwescon where she was a guest of honor that I barely crossed paths with her and didn’t get to say how much I enjoy her work.
Rewatched Better Off Dead for the first time in a few years, thanks to Royce pointing out that it’s a Christmas movie. Still one of my all-time favorites.
Bootie Mashup’s annual Best of Bootie Mashup album is out; so far I’ve downloaded it and added it to my library, but haven’t started listening through it yet. Looking forward to seeing if there are any gems to be inflicted on my unsuspecting audience at the Norwescon Thursday night dance this spring….
Jim Milliot with Sophia Stewart at Publishers Weekly: Last Call for Mass Market Paperbacks: “The format credited with making books more accessible via low prices and widespread availability will all but vanish from the publishing scene in a few weeks.” This is disappointing; I generally prefer the mass-market paperback size to the trade paperback size (same content, less money, and smaller, so more fit on my shelves).
Chris Parthemos and Martina Svyantek at Inside Higher Ed: No, Colleges Do Not “Over-Accommodate” (archive.is link): “…a pattern of uncontested opinion pieces…speaks to the enduring cultural conflict around how the Americans With Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act are actualized in higher education. ¶ As members of the executive board of the Association on Higher Education and Disability (AHEAD) in Virginia—a professional organization for staff of disability service offices—It is our intention to define and defuse the recurring arguments of this specific ‘type’ of opinion article, which for convenience we will call the ‘Do Colleges Over-Accommodate?’ piece.”
Lane Brown at Vulture: The Eyes Wide Shut Conspiracy Did Stanley Kubrick warn us about Jeffrey Epstein?: I put no stock in the conspiracy theory (this one in specific, and conspiracy theories in general), but this is a fascinating story. I had no idea this was even a thing.
Emma Stoye & Fred Schwaller at Nature: The best science images of 2025 — Nature’s picks: “The Sun’s fiery surface, a tattooed tardigrade, rare red lightning and more.” Some gorgeous photos.
Joanna Stern at The Wall Street Journal: We Let AI Run Our Office Vending Machine. It Lost Hundreds of Dollars. (archive.is link): “Within days, Claudius had given away nearly all its inventory for free—including a PlayStation 5 it had been talked into buying for ‘marketing purposes.’ It ordered a live fish. It offered to buy stun guns, pepper spray, cigarettes and underwear. ¶ Profits collapsed. Newsroom morale soared.”
Ryan Doerfler and Samuel Moyn at The Guardian: It’s time to accept that the US supreme court is illegitimate and must be replaced: “In Trump’s second term, the Republican-appointed majority on the supreme court has brought their institution to the brink of illegitimacy. Far from pulling it back from the edge, our goal has to be to push it off.”
Book 62 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️
Overly convoluted and far too reliant on what felt to me like exaggerated Asian stereotypes. Not one of the better TNG entries.
Book 61 of 2025: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
So much of this made me laugh, and it all wrapped up in an extremely satisfying way. Valente is a hilarious writer (the “Douglas Adams on a sugar high” quote on the book cover is spot on); my only disappointment (and it’s not with the book) is that I was busy enough at last spring’s Norwescon where she was a guest of honor that I barely crossed paths with her and didn’t get to say how much I enjoy her work.
The big thing around here this week, of course, has been the weather. Specifically, a once-in-quite-a-few-decades atmospheric river that hammered Washington for the past week, with the particular area we live in being one of the harder hit. We’re fortunate in that we live and work on high ground, and while we do drive through the Kent valley to get between the two, our usual route hasn’t been directly affected (…yet…?). The rain slacked off this weekend, but there’s a second river due to start impacting us tonight, so we’ll see what happens next.
stickertop.art: “Discover a unique collection of laptops adorned with creative stickers from around the world. This project celebrates the art and culture of laptop personalization each laptop tells a story through its stickers and gives us a glimpse of the personality of the owners.”
Ben Werdmuller: Why RSS matters: “[Its] invisibility has created a misconception, in some quarters, that RSS is a relic. But the opposite is true: we’ve never relied on it more. And as the social web fractures, as platforms wall off content, and as AI agents begin remixing everything they can ingest, our dependence on neutral, open standards for distributing information is about to become existential.”
Mallory Carra at The Guardian: Gen Zine: DIY publications find new life as a form of resistance against Trump: “Zines have made a resurgence in recent months as communities seek to share information, such as how to protect one another from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or how to resist the Trump administration outside No Kings protests…. ¶ Zine-makers and enthusiasts say that people are likely embracing the pen-and-paper medium again due to social media censorship, surveillance, doxing and the alleged suppression of certain topics on algorithms.”
Matthew Butterick’s Practical Typography: “…typography can enhance your writing. Typography can create a better first impression. Typography can reinforce your key points. Typography can extend reader attention. When you ignore typography, you’re ignoring an opportunity to improve the effectiveness of your writing.”
Matt Gurney: ‘We will never fucking trust you again’ (archive.is link): “America has blown 80 years of accumulated goodwill and trust among its allies, our American moderator was told. A rock-steady assumption of allied defence and security planning for literally generations has been that America would act in its own interests, sure, but that those interests would be rational, and would still generally value the institutions that America itself worked so hard to build after the Second World War. America’s recent actions have destroyed the ability of any ally to continue to have faith in America to act even within its own strategic self-interest, let alone that of any ally. ¶ The officer then said that even a swift return of America to its former role won’t matter. ¶ Because ‘we will never fucking trust you again.'”
Dax Castro: A New Font, the Same Old Habit: Erasing People to Preserve Appearances: “Today, we do not pass laws banning people from public because of how they look. Instead, we often do something quieter and more subtle. We define professionalism so narrowly that people must adapt themselves, their tools, and sometimes their bodies to fit an aesthetic ideal. ¶ Dress codes that disproportionately punish certain hairstyles. Workplace norms that equate tradition with legitimacy. Design decisions that dismiss accessibility as selfish, optional, or visually inconvenient. ¶ Font decisions live in that same ecosystem.”
James Whitbrook at Gizmodo: The History Behind All the Cuts of the Original ‘Star Wars’: “The movie that made it to theaters was one of a thousand compromises, with things tweaked and cut and given up on as Lucas strove to realize his ambitious ideas on screen. The moment Star Wars hit theaters, the director was not done pushing what he could change, emboldened by its immediate success—establishing a long history of his revisits to the movie that changed his career forever. Here’s a timeline of the changes made, from 1977 to the film’s latest version streaming on Disney+.”
Joanna Slater at The Washington Post: Professors are turning to this old-school method to stop AI use on exams (achive.is link): “Across the country, a small but growing number of educators are experimenting with oral exams to circumvent the temptations presented by powerful artificial intelligence platforms such as ChatGPT.”
Alexandra Petri at The Atlantic: Finally!! No More Woke Fonts! (archive.is link): “The Department of Homeland Security is getting rid of Futura and bringing back our medieval gothic blackletter favorites with a switch to Fraktur. “What do you mean, you’re bringing our medieval fonts back? What medieval fonts? What country do you think this is?” Germany, right? 1930s, right? If not, we’re going to be very embarrassed. In general, when selecting a font or making any other kind of design choice, think, Would this look out of place on a Leni Riefenstahl film poster?“
Ellen Scherr: Aging Out of Fucks: The Neuroscience of Why You Suddenly Can’t Pretend Anymore (archived.is link): “Research in neuroscience shows that as we age, the brain undergoes a process called synaptic pruning. Neural pathways that aren’t essential get trimmed away. Your brain is essentially Marie Kondo-ing itself, keeping what serves you and discarding what doesn’t. ¶ And all those neural pathways dedicated to hypervigilant people-pleasing? They’re often first on the chopping block.”
Saturday was this month’s Norwescon meeting, followed by our annual holiday party…and then after that, Caturday at the Mercury. On the one hand, it was a fun day; on the other, it was also a long day, and at 52, it’s pretty clear that I can do a Norwescon meeting or a night out at the goth club…but both on the same day is probably not a great idea anymore. (I’m not old. I’m just older. It’s different.)
Having needed over a month to get through my last book, it’s nice to have a week when I get through two (even if they weren’t exactly heavy-duty reading).
Brad Ferguson’s The Last Stand, a TNG novel with an interesting premise but average execution.
Perfect Crime Party, an anthology of short comics from Iron Circus Comics. A fun selection of crimes, capers, and whodunnits.
National Geographic: Pictures of the Year 2025 (archive.is link): “From thousands of images made by our photographers all around the world, we present the ones that moved and inspired us most.”
Steven Aquino’s Curb Cuts: Apple Releases ‘I’m Not Remarkable’ Short Film: “Messaging-wise, I’m Not Remarkable is, in fact, rather remarkable as it pushes back on long-held societal stereotypes about people with disabilities. It puts forth the idea that those in the disability community—yours truly included—are first and foremost human beings like anyone else who happen to use (Apple’s) technology to access a world unbuilt for us. We’re just people trying to live our lives like everyone else on this planet.”
Todd Vaziri’s FXRant: The “Mad Men” in 4K on HBO Max Debacle: “In one of season one’s most memorable moments, Roger Sterling barfs in front of clients after climbing many flights of stairs. As a surprise to Paul, you can clearly see the pretend puke hose (that is ultimately strapped to the back side of John Slattery’s face) in the background, along with two techs who are modulating the flow. Yeah, you’re not supposed to see that.”
Ardian Roselli: You Can’t Make Something Accessible to Everyone: “Because people have varying needs across disparate contexts from assorted expectations with unequal skill levels using almost random technologies, never mind current moods and real-life distractions, to suggest one thing will be accessible for everyone in all those circumstances is pure hubris. Or lack of empathy. Maybe a mix. ¶ I’m not suggesting that claiming something is “accessible” is an overtly bad act. I am saying, however, that maybe you should explain what accessibility features it has, and let that guide people. It’s more honest to them and you.”
The Associated Press: Raccoon goes on drunken rampage in Virginia liquor store and passes out on bathroom floor: “The masked burglar broke into the closed Virginia liquor store early on Saturday and hit the bottom shelf, where the scotch and whisky were stored. The bandit was something of a nocturnal menace: bottles were smashed, a ceiling tile collapsed and alcohol pooled on the floor. ¶ The suspect acted like an animal because, in fact, he’s a raccoon.”
Wokyis M5 10Gbps: I in no way need a docking station for my Mac Mini that looks like a classic Mac, complete with working 5″ monitor. But I sure am tempted!
Mel Mitchell-Jackson: why I am AI sober (archive.is link): “We feed these machines our ideas, our worldviews, and our creativity (yikes!), asking it to spit out efficient, productivity-maxxing, sales-converting, corporate-approved regurgitations of our perspective on the world. ¶ But creativity isn’t efficient. It requires failure. Mistakes are where we find our voice. It requires rest and meandering just as much as active production. If we choose to give up the struggle required to find our voice, we will uncover that these text and image generators are really just Ursula from The Little Mermaid. Yeah, we can walk through the new world expected of us by these corporate slop factories, but our voice is gone. We sacrificed it and sold it as data when we signed the terms and conditions. ¶ We’re abandoning boredom, connection with fellow humans, or time spent looking at nature as editors or collaborators. The use of generative AI in place of our creative intuition is a corrosive act of creative death. Tech tools can empower us, yes, but Large Language Models are a killswitch for our intuition. They support every idea with a resounding and enthusiastic ‘yes, what a great idea, let’s workshop that!’ They turn us so easily into hyper-productive content-creation slop machines. ¶ We are funneled into creating waste, not art. I am calling on you to resist using generative AI whenever possible. The rest of this essay is why.”
Allegra Rosenberg at Atlas Obscura: What ‘67’ Reveals About Childhood Creativity: “The ’67’ phenomenon has been, much like the rest of Gen Alpha’s vernacular, attributed to algorithms and brainrot culture. But other than its initial spread via TikTok, there’s not much that separates “67” from centuries of absurd, nonsensical kid culture. ¶ This whole ’67’ thing may be foreign to you, but you probably grew up singing ‘Miss Mary Mack’ or shouting ‘Kobe!’ or drawing a Superman ‘S’ in your notebooks—or something along those lines. These are all examples of children’s culture studied by Iona and Peter Opie. And their work might be the key to finding the meaning within the seemingly meaningless ’67.'”