Lasering

Chill Amusing

To destroy the earth (overcome its gravitational binding energy) with a space laser, you’d need around 375 trillion petawatts over 10 minutes.

That’s about 1,000x the total output of the sun over the same timeframe. If you could focus 100% of the sun’s output energy on earth, it’d take about 7 days to destroy the planet.

Just so you know.

Crashes

Chill Regular-ass Post

It’s funny how sometimes you don’t realize things about your family and events therein till so much later in life.

When I’d just turned four my mom and I got into a serious car accident. She claimed the brakes didn’t work when she’d applied them. The car rolled over three times and came to a violent stop deep in a farmer’s field. I barely remember the wreck1; that’s what I was told later. The old Vega sat in the yard after for years so I got to observe the destruction. The car was mangled. It’s amazing anyone survived. The cabin was crushed and it looked like it’d been stomped by a dinosaur. But I walked away without a scratch on me. My mom wasn’t quite so lucky and was in a wheelchair for a few weeks with some sort of pelvic strain but was otherwise fine.

But there’s something strange about it, I now realize. There were no other cars involved and the day was clear and sunny. There were no witnesses and the stretch of road was completely straight. My mom was also not an aggressive driver and was not prone to road rage.

What I do know about my mom, though, is that she really did not like being a mother and had attempted suicide later in life several times.

And here’s another thing: my dad rebuilt that car nearly from scratch. Also, he was a great mechanic. There’s no chance the brakes failed. Just none. His work was quality and the only way they would’ve failed is if someone had cut the brake lines.

What I think happened now, looking back after all these years, is that my mom decided she wanted to opt out of being a mother and me being alive and crashed that car on purpose. Except it didn’t work. We both lived. It probably changed her tune on dying, at least for a while, that brush with death.

Now, I do not know that my mom intended a murder-suicide. It’s just a guess. But given the evidence and knowing what I know about my mom, I’d bet on it. It’s far more likely than not.

  1. Mainly I remember the paramedics checking me over right after. One was a really kind woman who made me laugh at something.

Pulp Up

Chill Movies

I know it makes me an Evil and Bad Man in the eyes of many women, but the dialogue in Pulp Fiction is just so spotless. It’s an unrelenting stream of the most brilliant patter written for film.

I think I know why there is such deep hatred for Pulp Fiction among so many women1. That’s because it is probably the most masculine movie ever made. And I don’t mean the jock-y frat boy masculinity many men (and women) mistake for masculinity. No, I mean, it’s all about and based on how the masculine psyche actually functions. Exaggerated a little, sure, as all movies are. But basically correct.

Many women say to men, “We want to see how you really are.” Or, even more ludicrously, “I want to be treated just like a man.”

And to this I say:

1. No you don’t.
2. No, you really really, really don’t.

Pulp Fiction demonstrates raw masculinity and its concern for power structures, the casualness of violence in many men’s worlds, and that nearly all men care far more about what you actually do rather than what you say, or claim, or how you look, or seem to be. This is very different than how women relate, which is more often based on social presentation and though it involves just as much (arguably more) competition, their terms of the social contract are much more subsumed in obfuscation and plausible deniability.

So I can understand why women strongly dislike the movie. It must be for many of them like watching a scrambled film in a foreign language where scary people do bad things for unclear reasons. I would not like that either, to be fair.

  1. Though not all women hate the work. A friend of mine was goofing around with the remote in a hotel room and turned the TV on. Pulp Fiction happened to be playing and she sat rapt watching it. “I’d forgotten how damn good this movie is,” she said.

Chill Links

NIST Ion Clock Sets New Record for Most Accurate Clock in the World.

On July 4, the Guadalupe ripped our home from its pillars, pulling my family into its waters and into the night. Then morning came. Now that is a writer.

Congress moves to reject bulk of White House’s proposed NASA cuts.

What Caused the ‘Baby Boom’? What Would It Take to Have Another?

The tariff-driven inflation that economists feared begins to emerge.

If You Like 35 Percent Inflation, Go Ahead, Fire the Fed Chair. MAGA clowns really are gonna FAFO, aren’t they?

Is remote work only for the rich? Double standard ignites workplace tension.

The Democratic Party Can’t Go Back to the Clinton Era, as Much as “Experts” Claim It Should.

Notes from the ER in an Anti-Science Age.

Large study squashes anti-vaccine talking points about aluminum.

The scars of the flood: Navigating loss on the Guadalupe River.

How weather conspiracy theories moved from online fringes to state laws. The morons are in charge at every level now.

Computer sales have perked back up while we’re buying fewer smartphones and tablets every year, according to research firm IDC. A computer is the only actually-useful tool that does not brain-rot you.

Trump is enabling Chinese power.

No existing theory of political economy appears sufficient to explain the self-sabotage of Trumpism.

How we lost the ability to think.

Why Donald Trump is facing doubts in the ‘manosphere.’

Heavy Fail

Chill Clowns, Political Economy

The liberal degrowth heavy breathing about all they will “have” to take away you from was always doomed to fail. To be fair, there are a lot of right-wing degrowthers now too. Evil no matter which side they are on.

AI Bye

Chill Political Economy

The economist and Reddit conventional wisdom is that AI is not replacing any jobs.

But of course it is. And will replace many more. If you listen to normies and econs, you’ll always be 2-20 years behind the times. Don’t do it.

P Grim

Chill Political Economy

The future for a lot of white collar workers is looking pretty grim.

Chill Links

Gen Z and the End of Predictable Progress.

The Grand Canyon Lodge was an elusive getaway for nearly a century. Now it’s gone.

Gen Z is right about the job hunt—it really is worse than it was for millennials, with nearly 60% of fresh-faced grads frozen out of the workforce.

China Isn’t Playing The Same Game Anymore. And the West still doesn’t get it.

Inflation heats up in June as President Trump’s tariffs start to bite.

Red States, Defying Reality, Are Reclassifying Gas as a “Green” Fuel. Alrighty then.

Window Heat Pumps Could Change the Game.

Irish tourist jailed by Ice for months after overstaying US visit by three days: ‘Nobody is safe.’

Europe offers platitudes, Trump dithers, and Ukraine and its extraordinary people stand on the brink. Nato must step up.

Comp Time

Chill Annoying, Clowns

I’ve seen this happen dozens of times. Mainly when I was in the army. What was usually happening is the woman’s “friend” was acting as a blocker so that she could head off the guy and then talk to him later and go home with him. Sometimes it was simple jealousy by the less attractive “friend,” though.

Another example of female intrasexual competition.