Today I was running errands and ran into a guy I used to know. I say "used to know", because I hadn't seen him in a few years. You get pretty used to people moving away around here. He used to work in the town next to me behind a counter.
It was at a new business in my town. I was making small talk with him as I was buying something and he says - I have helped you before. Which completely took me off guard. It was only the second time I'd been into the place. And I didn't recognize him due to the masks. I tilted my head in the way I do trying to place him.
Not to mention, I'm always a little surprised when people remember me. I try to be like the wind. Maybe you aren't sure I was ever really there at all.
I said to him, maybe it was "this place". Because they are similar businesses. And he was like, yes! I ask - is this your place? And he said yes.
We talked a few times about him wanting to open his own place. But, everyone has dreams. They are often just that. It's so incredibly hard to make those dreams come true. Everything is stacked against you.
I sort of can't believe the joy I have for him. He made it. He's living the dream. It's been so long since I've had that feeling for anything. I love the underdog. Silicon Valley used to be ALL underdogs. Now it's just filled with conmen. But maybe the magic is still here.
It feels strange to feel so happy for someone starting a business right as the pandemic is taking out so many, but he managed the magic intersection between skill and luck. Which is a very beautiful thing to watch.
How are you enjoying the transition to military power?
ReplyDeleteStarting to get why I was in a real hurry to get out?
Are you enjoying this part of the movie where things get all "Bridge to Remagen" or "The Dirty Dozen"?
Maybe I was expecting this American commander to be more Lee Marvin-like.
Get on that, American military guys! :-)
I still have to file my 2020 taxes, and I'm still waiting on paperwork, but that's something I can live with.
It's a lot better than having a front row seat for a coup.
BTW, apparently I'm not formally persona non grata because my one remaining credit union account and two remaining credit cards in the US haven't been forced closed by government order, so for now I can keep throwing money at existing online accounts and subscriptions.
There are a lot of local options for electronics and books, and so unless I'm buying something that requires US voltage, English language, and so forth, I just buy locally now. Anything coming out of Amazon now typically is from Amazon France or Amazon Germany which work better with my payment cards (as in credit cards that are really debit cards).
When I first arrived, I stuck with Amazon, but after discovering that there's a lot of really good options with "click and collect" or inexpensive delivery, I just stopped bothering with the cost and the wait.
Buying apps and subscriptions on the Google Play US store, that's most of what that plastic gets used for now.
"Silicon Valley used to be ALL underdogs. Now it's just filled with conmen. But maybe the magic is still here."
Yeah? Nah. What I wrote about the replacement of Big Tech, that's not going to happen without blowback and without non-participants who just happen to be close bystanders being affected.
The world has been shocked out of the slumbering state of believing that they can trust Americans with their data, especially those in Big Tech in the Bay Area. This state of digital hegemony has only been tolerable because the true state of affairs hasn't been so bleedingly obvious before. As I wrote before, even Merkel and Macron had to wake up when the head of government was outright banned by Big Tech.
Given that you're already looking at moving because of Shitbag Neighbor, why not cast the net a bit wider?
North Carolina works better for you than Texas, BTW, but if you could wrangle Tennessee ...
The Bay Area has already run out of ideas: this year's hugely promoted thing from CES was a super-pricey pet door with an RFID pet collar opener, as if that wasn't going to stop a burglar who brought his kid to make nice with the pet before stealing the collar and using it to open up the house.
If I recall correctly, this RFID-enabled portal into getting your house broken into by burglars with kids costs around $2500 and is being sold by an American manufacturer of garage doors.
Oh, about your earlier rabbit artwork picture: nice cultural subversion there.
"Follow the white rabbit" ... yeah, except that bit of drug culture has some muscles and aggression, and those "Videodrome" people aren't fun or safe to be around.
It's a bit dramatic and creepy. Better than 6 hours of sunlight like where you are. But, it's predictable posturing by Biden. It's always pretty weird when beta males try to compete with alphas. They always try to act tough in a very tone deaf way and miss terribly. That's going to be the whole Biden Presidency. But that is the way things have to be sometimes to compare and contrast.
ReplyDelete"Starting to get why I was in a real hurry to get out"
Let's be 100. If you can't come back, that's not the only reason you were blazin' to get out. No judgement.
"The world has been shocked out of the slumbering state of believing that they can trust Americans with their data, especially those in Big Tech in the Bay Area. This state of digital hegemony has only been tolerable because the true state of affairs hasn't been so bleedingly obvious before. As I wrote before, even Merkel and Macron had to wake up when the head of government was outright banned by Big Tech."
Silicon Valley is more than those 5 big asshole companies. And I've been here long enough to know that everyone dies. I cheered Europe on with their privacy rules, but even that hasn't made any difference. And honestly, as much as you think they are going to be stronger against them, the truth is..... they like to spy too.
Sadly, the quickest way to put these companies to of business is to stop letting them make money off your content by removing it. It drives me absolutely nuts that conservatives bitch about free speech and then let those same companies make money off them so they can get meager crumbs on the back end. Those companies only have power because people LET them. And it's annoying that they act so powerless. They are just LAZY.
"The Bay Area has already run out of ideas:"
Yeah. Let's go with that if it makes you feel better. You should just be glad there was no actual CES this year because it would be filled brim to brim with face mask technology. And to keep it 100 again, there are really no new ideas anywhere. Most of the stuff we have today is just incremental improvements from ideas they had 50 years ago.