Good morning. Hello. How are you? #1146
Eclipse, temporarily missing cat, Happy birthday Emma, new privacy bill
Good morning! Hello! How are you? Greetings from Chatham County, NC. Boy it is good to be home. Solid floorboards, warm weather, no rain. Good times. Jane was excited to go to school today. We were very early. I brushed her hair in the car. She has not pooped in a day, though. Will this be the day that she finally poops at school? Maybe, maybe. Will this be an entry that some day she reads and is mortified I have said such things? Maybe, maybe. When does a human gain agency over what is written about them. Silly rabbit, the answer is never. I am a writer we are lawless!
We should start by saying Happy birthday Emma, real human being and my amazing wife. I’m glad you didn’t lose one of your cats for your birthday. I hope you do something to treat yourself.
We are listening to a gentleman named L.A. Salami. He is from England, not L.A. He is a real human being and not a band. He is very clever. I am impressed.
Last night when we got home, we realized our cat Keely was missing. Forensic research on the cameras indicated that in the five minutes or so, on Friday, between when my studio door blew open, the camera alerted me, and I asked my Mother in Law to come close the door and when she came over and closed it, somehow Keely snuck out. It was really windy so I assumed the door blew open, but what really happened is that clever cat utilized the door, and her new opposable paws, to open the door and make a run for it…
…To the patio above the door. Which was only learned after over an hour of searching a 5+ acre area. But I didn’t mind. It gave me a chance to go check on my greenhouse plants, because my ultra-high-powered flashlight was over at Chore House. Man. That thing is bright. It is insane. Strong recommend if you ever need to light up the entire night. Wandering all the trails in the dead of night, listening to the owls and bats and one weird incessant bird and whatnot was just great. Spooky and fun. Except for the missing cat part.
But in the end it was Emma who found her with her vastly-better-than-mine “meow.”
Jane was befeft, couldn’t sleep, we had to go tell her in her room that Keely was safe and then she finally zonked out about 2 hours past bedtime, for like the fourth night in a row, which is very stressful will she ever sleep again.
Keely was fine, but my seedlings did not make it. I had hoped they could make a week without water, because I tested this before I left, but they in fact went nine days without water, and nope. I watered them in the hopes they can be revived, but I think I’m gonna have to start fresh. Oh well, lesson learned. Soon we’ll have the irrigation in. Rest of the garden was fine. Oh man the lettuce and spinach are almost ready I am so excited.
Also I would like to state for the record that Jane really is a phenomenal road-tripper for a six year-old. Just fantastic.
We watched the Eclipse from I-95 and the BWP between Baltimore and DC. It was rad. I looked it through my sunglasses, tinted window, and camera lens. It was fine. People get really paranoid about this sort of thing. It’s fine. My eyes are fine. Anyway there was about 90% coverage in the DC area. At one point we could see the eclipse out of one window and the Capitol building out of another. That was cool.
Just had to do my regular force-quit of Apple’s Notes.App because it never updates and it freezes, and in the force-quit menu, Notes had the same icon as Chrome. Super reassuring. Fine, everything’s fine.
Chore Day Sunday in Somerville was just great. I meticulously took measurements of the front, three-season room as a precursor to my plan to remodel it. And I meticulously took measurements of the couch and wall behind it as part of my precursor of making a table for being the couch. It is shockingly complex. I packed up all the stuff from Real Wild Child — hard to find a place to keep a large, padded dance floor in the space of a normal Somerville apartment. Watched Jane all day, Emma was off visiting people all day. We went to the playground twice. Jane and I, not Emma.
Oh! I took Jane to Dunkin Donuts for the first time, that was super fun. She is a real Masshole now. She got a croissant and egg, which she regretted and stole my bagel sandwich, and she tried the chocolate frosted, and regular glazed donuts — we kept it simple for her first visit. But we sat there, and she took in the Masshole ambience and just loved it.
Though she may have asked questions about Boston accents slightly too loudly.
She also consented to go to the grocery store with me, which was very nice.
I did two loads of laundry and took out the recycling I am just putting that here so you think I am a great husband.
Jussi babysat Jane for an hour and I went to a dispensary in Somerville and man, it is so weird to be in a state where you can just walk in and buy some THC shit. Real divide in America right now. Just surreal.
And then we spent the evening with Sean and Jussi watching some English dog adoption reality show that is scientifically engineered to tug at your heartstrings and fuck with your emotions even if you are a cat person. Really is a devlish brew.
And now we are home. Much work today, many chores to tackle this week. Already made a quick grocery store run.
Wiccan antics afoot at the Albion playground. Captions are broken today on Substack all good.
Gotta read the draft of the new national privacy bill that was created on a bipartisan basis in the senate, in an agreement struck by Senators Cantwell and Rodgers. I’d never heard of them either lol. But good for them. The measure will have a giant impact on my work, but that is okay, because we have spent the last six years building the most privacy-respecting ad solution out there, and GDPR and CCPA were just fine with us, and if you want my opinion, AdTech would work a lot better without a bunch of personal data being used at all, but that is just me I guess.
Apparently it gives the Republicans what they want — superseding 50 individual state bills — and what the Democrats want — the ability to bring civil suit against violators. And that is just great because even though I am a crazed woke lefty, turns out in this case I want what both of these parties want. One national bill can, of course, mean that some stronger state bills don’t come to fruition, which is sad, but it’s just not workable to code for 50+ different bills. It’s already a mess with just EU and CA. In Theory, if these different jurisdictions could all make “unique” bills that are all just different combinations of a series of choices, it could work. “Our state is opt-in, notification required, ability to revoke not required, portability required,” for example. Then you could just code each aspect of it and use feature flags for each jurisdiction. But this hasn’t worked out in practice. Different geos have been introducing whole different concepts, unique things that all require bespoke coding. It’s too much for a small team. A panopoly of bills would be a boon to the monopolists. I’m not happy about this compromise either but it’s the best solution.
Oh wait. Seems there’s no draft yet. Just an agreement and a framework. Well. I await with bated breath. Baited breath? Don’t make me Google it (sorry, Kagi it). I can never remember that one.
All right Tuesday’s the busy work day, and I am obviously do bedtime tonight what with it being Emma’s birthday and all, so I gotta go get some stuff done.
Today’s Media of the Day is this fantastic new single from Orville Peck and Willie Nelson, entitled “Some Cowboys are Secretly Fond of Each Other,” which is just great and you will enjoy it as much as Willie did filming it, where is obviously breaking out into laughter while shooting, more than once.
Ya’ll take care now, y’hear?