The difference between how I think the world is, and how it appears to me couldn’t be further apart. I suppose this applies to most people. It is hope (or belief) that makes us see a better world. Too bad so few (including myself) act on that belief/hope in any substantial way to cross the gap.

It is said that Practice makes perfect, but I think it should be Passionate practice makes improvement. Being dispassionate and detached from the world is a good defense mechanism against a cruel world, but it does squat for making art. Hence, artists must suffer, from mostly indifference.

It amazes me how much can be done in one sitting, and yet how little it seems compared to what one can do in multiple sittings. However, much of the spontaneity is lost over the sittings.

AI is made of people…

I sometimes wonder why the world is the way it is. Then I realize it’s hard to change what has been developing over billions of years. The most one can do is tweak some things. Free will is an illusion, to keep humans sane and seemingly in control.

My code is almost twice as fast as the original Print Maze routine,

10 printchr$(205.5+rnd(1));:goto 10

0 d=205.5:fori=.to39:printchr$(d+rnd(.));:next:goto

It turned out I was over-exhausted from all the running lately. After a restday it was much easier to draw.

Having paid for a year subscription for ibis Paint X didn’t make me want to draw more. After the free month was up, I struggled to draw daily. Maybe it’s the shortening of days making me gloomy.

I found a proper and informal method to add a description to an image,

1. figcaption
2. emphasis after a line break

However, they still trust each other to snuggle up.

Alas, markdown has no code for captions, _nor_ does it work inside an html container.

Drawing without reference can take you only so far. I guess I use it from now on, yet without wholesale copying.

Oh my! Is it December already? How time flies when you’re being lazy.

I’m amazed how adaptable the human body is, now I’m dealing with yet another injury. The cause of those injuries is mostly overweight and over-ambition. If I had a coach experienced with older runners, he’d probably told me to act more responsibly and put myself on a diet.

It suddenly appeared to me while watching Adventure Time on Netflix (S01E18, “Dungeon”), where Demon Cat has “approximate knowledge of many things.” It’s how I would describe chatGPT.

Someone dug a trench across a footpath, and I stepped right into it, hurting my ankle badly. Who does such a thing, making a trap for pedestrians? The ankle is swollen and hurts, but not enough to go to a doctor. I suppose R.I.C.E. will reduce the swelling, as in Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation.

If everything goes as planned, I will have run around 3300 km (2050 mi) in 2023 when the New Year rolls around. With a little over 5 weeks to go, I’ve already passed 2930 km of running this year, an average of 63 km (39 mi) weekly, 272 km (169 mi) monthly, despite injuries and other mishaps. 🏃‍♂️

I did my civic duty by voting in the Dutch general election today, November 22, 2023.

I suppose Apple Inc. deems iOS 17.1.1 stable enough to be installed by the general user, so I did. No immediate surprises, so that’s good.

After reading this opinion piece by @ploum@mamot.fr I’m convinced communities are all relatively small, niche, and valuable. The means to strengthen them are irrelevant, ephemeral even. Instead of herding communities into a single walled garden, they should be enabled to fend for themselves.

After doing some research to find out which marathons can be reached in time by public transport, and finding out I already knew those, I’m going for a recovery run, to clear my mind from the realization that a car is still needed for early hours on Sundays, (or late hours in Summer). I’m carless.

On Caturday we share our favorite spots to elicit an aww from the resident hooman.