…in the Gray Lady

http://www.chrisrivard.com/the-future/

Amazing story.

But read the book first.
http://www.amazon.com/Unbroken-World-Survival-Resilience-Redemption/dp/1400064163

http://www.strava.com/activities/117024698

This run is recorded, indexed, tagged and I’ve got a few materialized views for the more problematic sections. No wrong turns today. No surprises. It’s in my mind palace.

Notables:
Temperature varied about 15 degrees during the time I was out (about 3 hours).  Started out in a light drizzle wearing a thin long sleeve zip and the OR centrifuge jacket. Stopped just before the Hawthorne bridge and took off the jacket. Stayed in the long sleeve top until the lookout at Hoyt Arboretum and made the executive call to switch shirts – peeled off the thin top (soaked) and put on just the (dry) centrifuge jacket. I had been pondering doing this for about 3 miles after I dropped down to the Burnside crossing from Pittock mansion and started seeing my breath. I was sweating quite a bit and starting to get cold, but had a few uphills so I knew I would warm up.

The highest elevation on this run is the top of Council Crest and it’s always colder. It’s so steep after crossing 26 that I shuffle/run/power walk (there are railroad tie steps) some sections and I thought I would be okay with a heavier layer and not overheat (and soak my jacket). It all worked and I didn’t overheat too much going up and I was cozy when the wind picked up on the East side and I started the long descent.

I’m finding that I’ve got a mental focus/motivation drop at about 11 miles. I think that’s my first real mental valley of a long run. On this loop at mile 11 I’ve already dropped back down into the arboretum and run some gently rolling singletrack before making a hairpin turn and running up to the lookout (just before the Zoo). It’s not a steep climb, but it’s sustained and boring and it saps my energy because I’m trying to prepare for the big up to Council Crest.

Nutrition:

• 3 gels
• 2 bottles of Cytomax

I’ve been drinking Cytomax for 15 years (heh) and I’ve found it’s the best for my stomach and I can actually find low end power when I’m starting to fade. Specifically, when I’m almost completely depleted, I can always find a little kick if I’m drinking it. There is a reason it’s been around for so long.

That’s it. Just putting time in to do the work.

Oh! And saw a few other runners, harley wave.

I should have gone a little wider to get the correct radius on the sides – and the top was a little flat, should have crossed the road.

Snapped this excellent rainbow on my walk to work in Palo Alto this morning.  My Airbnb was also excellent… I would describe it as the “Garden Court of Airbnb’s”.  Hummus at Oren’s shop this afternoon… also excellent.

Meetings:  productive and necessary.

Morning run:  (first time running through Stanford in the rain), cut short because of the first meeting of the day. Didn’t make it up to the dish, but I did manage to shape the run like a map point icon. So that counts as fun.

Victorian box aka mock orange (Pittosporum undulatum)
That’s the tree responsible for the scent of Palm Drive on the Stanford campus.

“But the wild things cried, “Oh please don’t go – we’ll eat you up – we love you so!”

And Max said, “No!”

The wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws but Max stepped into his private boat and waved goodbye.”

― Maurice Sendak

Time for me to decamp to Portland.

Starting some lists.

People who self-identify as both “introvert” and “instigator”. In Portland we just call that passive aggressive. Very common among the designer set.

People who empty their coffee cups onto the street while sitting in their parked car. What other nasty habits do these people have? I’m certain they can be classified.

People who use the word “utilize”. Is there any word more useless in the English language? No. Pretentious or ignorant… probably a little of both.

0.0001% flappable

Completely losing the ability to communicate a coherent thought, where every word uttered or written undercuts the concept or idea attempting to be conveyed. Entropy as the measure of uncertainty in human communication. It’s a thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Mathematical_Theory_of_Communication

 “…well I could be condemned to hell for every sin but littering…”

Evolutionary

Dancing desks to follow standing desks.

I’ve seen the future in Singapore, and I have basically stopped using the social media.

This is a good observation of where technology mediated human interactions are going. I wouldn’t say what is observed by the author is limited to Singapore, but it’s still a good example.

I’m not going to tweet it, because then I wouldn’t be able to comment on it. Such a massive shortcoming of twitter (wow what happened to Branch?). I don’t agree that conversations should be limited to 140 characters. What idiocy. As a software designer, one of the barriers I constantly run into (and attempt to circumvent) is implementation model design. Designing a system because there are engineering limitations to the design, or worse: engineering setting the direction of the design. Twitter is limited to 140 characters because the underlying technology (SMS) is limited to 140 characters. Think about that for a few seconds…time’s up.

We’re living in the time where platforms for human interaction have been developed by technologists. Ask an engineer how they would solve a human communication problem and they start writing code.

The article reminded me of the issue that arises when I’m suffering in beautiful places, a passion of mine. Climbing or skiing or running. The surroundings are sublime. So why should I pause to take a picture? Who is the picture for? Does the picture capture the moment? Almost never. An image is only a weak representation of the experience. A copy of a copy. Inadequate in my opinion. Oftentimes the picture is meant to broadcast the signal that “I was here and did this thing, had this experience, and you were not”. Sad you. #fomo. I abhor stopping to take pictures as it interrupts the flow of whatever I’m doing at the time.

I was at a conference years ago and one of the speakers (a very popular speaker on the circuit  [the intelligentsia]) was speaking about her use of social media, specifically Twitter. And she said that every tweet is carefully curated to establish her online persona. I was shocked at the time to consider that someone would only choose to broadcast information that furthered the construction of a persona that may or may not be real. This was naiveté on my part (5 years ago). It’s only lately that I’ve learned to embrace my maladroit social habits as a way to make the pretentious uncomfortable. I’m just having fun.

A parallel to this same concept is that when I meet people in person who have LARGE social media presences, it is oftentimes an enormous letdown to learn that in the flesh they are really not very interesting. In fact, they are the antithesis of someone you would invite to join you for coffee. You say captain of industry,  I say one dimensional.

And throughout all of this advancement of technology and mediated social interactions, exists the divide between the rich and the poor. White collar workers have Linkedin, where they can carefully curate their professional reputations, laborers and service workers have Angie’s list, where they can be reviewed by said white collar office drones.

Consider an article in the Economist from a few days ago, The wolves of the web. There is a quote in the article by Robert Reich where he points to the “secession of the successful” and notes the difference of the past where the monied moved from the city to the suburbs, in this case, techies want the benefits of the city and are “seceding in plain sight” by buying up and gentrifying “whole urban districts”.

Success will allow you to buy gluten-free, free-range organic [X], but it also allows you to check out if you like. Poor people will not have that option. It strikes me as eerily similar to the food deserts that exist in the deep south of the U.S. There is a KFC or McDonald’s on every corner and a dearth of organic brussel sprouts. There is useless information being generated and consumed at a record pace, but well-written, well thought-out ideas are quite rare.

Being unplugged will be reserved for those who can afford it.