Flippers gone wild

This property is a flip, sold earlier this year for $1.6M and now being offered for $4.6M.  We have photos from the 2014 sale (for $1M); did the flippers add $3M of value?  

There was a pool, the pool is gone.  The tennis court still exists, but it looks like it's in poor shape.  My guess is that the pool was in bad enough shape that it had to be removed in order to sell the renovated property.

View from above, 2025

The listing claims the property was "built" in 2025, but it's clearly a significant renovation of the original cottage-style structure, not a complete teardown and rebuild.  From the front, it looks like a full second floor was added to the main part of the house, previously there were dormers.  A three-car garage was also added to the side of the house, and it dominates the complex. 

Front 2014 and 2025, side-by-side

The back used to have a lot of asphalt; that has been torn up and replaced with grass.

Back 2014 and 2025, side-by-side

Throughout the interior:

• fireplaces appear to have been removed; 
• cross-beams were removed;  
• interior stone was removed; 
• dark wood floors replaced with white oak; 

... in general, anything that gave the home any kind of unique cottage-y character is gone.

Interior 2014 vs 2025; I *think* this is the same room, but it's hard to tell.  All I know is that is a big damn wall. They tried to make it less severe by putting on the paneling, but it's a tough room to work with. 

Interior from 2014 and 2025.  These are *not* the same room, but are illustrative of how the house had character to it, and now it's a super white blah space.

What I read in 2025 (books)

I've logged 51 titles in my spreadsheet for 2025 so far, up from 2024 and well above my 10-year average.  What was different?  Well, 7 of those titles are DNFs, and it's unusual for me to have more than 2 in a year.  So, yay, I was trying things I wasn't sure I would like, and yay, I put them down when they didn't work out. 

What stood out this year?  Picking a few:

Siren Queen.  Nghi Vo's novel about early Hollywood with a fantastical twist, where being admitted to the studio system feels a bit like being trapped in Faerie lands.  The cameras are magical devices that can literally harm your soul, and becoming a big star literally puts your likeness in the sky. 

The Women. Kristin Hannah's novel recognizing the American women who served in Vietnam and the erasure of their experience when they returned home.  I read this on the recommendation of a friend, and then read Mystic Lake later this year.  

He Who Drowned the World. Shelley Parker-Chan's sequel to She Who Became the Sun, and the concluding novel in this series.  Unlike the previous book, this was not a Hugo finalist; I think it was equally worthy.  This is a book in which a number of people achieve everything they (thought they) desired and find out all the terrible things they've done weren't worth it, and all because their aim was simply to achieve an end, without a plan for what would happen after.  This book, and its predecessor, also neatly examine how the world treats people who do not conform to rigid gender expectations, as well as the cost to those who harm themselves in trying to conform.

What Grows from the Dead. Dave Dobson's (a friend) rollicking crime / mystery / thriller set in modern day North Carolina.  

Lines. Sung J. Woo's (a friend) Sliding Doors-style story of a couple's relationship after a collision (or near miss) in Washington Park, NYC.

What Feasts at Night.  This is T. Kingfisher's sequel to What Moves the Dead, and the second in her "Sworn Soldier" novellas, which are a mix of Ruritanian romance and horror.

Alien Clay.  Adrian Tchaikovsky's novel about a dangerous planet where undesirables are sent to toil so that Earth can learn enough to eventually be able to exploit the planet.  This got my top vote for the Hugo award this year, because it did the best job of examining a thought experiment that was reasonably novel to me (no shade on the other finalists). 

The Tainted Cup.  Robert Jackson Bennett's first novel in a fantasy detective series won the Hugo award for best novel this year.  Excellent worldbuilding and a detective that's like Sherlock Holmes turned up to 11, but so overly sensitive to her surroundings that she can't leave her rooms without a blindfold on, so her "Watson" has to do all the investigating and bring the clues back to her.  I expect to read the sequel for the 2026 Hugo finalist book club.

Another World.  Pat Barker's first book after completing the Regeneration trilogy (the first of which I read back in 2009).  I read this after finishing Mystic Lake, and it was a great chaser, for while both books are about "normal" lives, Hannah wrote an entertaining tale about the melodrama of likeable people, and Barker wrote about a thoroughly banal family.  I nearly put the book down a few times in the first 50 pages, but Pat Barker skillfully drew me in to her story, and ultimately it was a pleasure to see a master at work.

What I listened to in 2025 (podcasts)

I've had Pocket Casts on my phone for a while, but it wasn't until this year that I finally made more of a habit of listening while doing yardwork.  I tend to listen at 1.4-1.5x speed, and liberally skip episodes (or parts of episodes) that don't interest me.  So what's currently in my podcasts list?

The casts I look forward to most include:

1. Our Opinions are Correct is a fortnightly conversation between Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders, veteran award-winning SFF authors.  They talk about subjects I like, their conversations hit the right balanced between structured and impromptu, their experience and friendship and personalities shine through the medium, and their runtime hits a sweet spot of about an hour.  
2. Brave Little State is a VPR program that has run for 9 years, researching and answering selected questions from listeners about Vermont, tending towards the uncommon and odd.  It airs fortnightly and typically runs under half an hour, which is perfect because I probably don't need to hear more than 22 minutes about the Tinmouth apple.  
3. The Important Thing is sporadically published conversation between two friends about a topic of recent interest/concern to Michael and Lyle.  It's pretty low structure, but it's kept short (typically under 20min with a few running to 30).
4. Served with Andy Roddick, but just the interviews.  I don't really want to read or hear about tournaments and matches, I want to watch them.  
5. Choiceology with Katy Milkman typically starts with a motivating story to illustrate the topic, and then moves into discussion with experts.  Several times I've found myself skipping to the discussion with experts because I've understood the topic and don't need/want 20 minutes of motivating story.  

Casts that I'm still getting used to include:

1. Worldbuilding for Masochists was a Hugo finalist for best podcast this year, and I listened to the finalists in order to make an informed vote, and I am generally enjoying the discussions among the hosts and with guests about how they approach elements of worldbuilding in their work.  
2. Hugo, Girl! was another Hugo finalist; this is largely a recorded book discussion group.  I like the hosts; I'm not convinced I want to listen to other people discuss a book rather than have a discussion with my friends.  
3. Coode Street Podcast was *another* Hugo finalist.  So far there's a been a bit of a mix of book discussion and other topics; my favorite episode so far was an excellent discussion with China Mieville. 
4. The Great & Secret Knowledge I added when they interviewed Lois McMaster Bujold and she mentioned it on her blog.  Episodes run 2-3 hours.
5. Happy Vermont is a "travel" podcast, but it tends to focus on the unusual.  So far it's paired well with Brave Little State.

There is also Vermont Edition, which runs 4 times a week for 50 minutes; it's simply the in-depth daily story from VPR repackaged as a podcast.  

Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age; Annalee Newitz

Four Lost Cities is top-notch pop-science reporting -- it provides a great start for someone to dip their toe into an area of knowledge to determine their interest, and then go further if there's a spark.  I learned something new (and in most cases, quite a lot) that I didn't know before about each of the cities: Çatalhöyük, Pompeii, Angkor, and Cahokia.

One of the things Newitz tries to do, and I think succeeds at, is to differentiate for the reader what is known versus what is theorized and contested about each site, and what are the basic arguments for each opinion.  

The central thesis is that none of these cities were truly "lost", and all cities go through natural cycles of growth and abandonment.  I liked that Newitz applied her own personal experience with a (very brief) abandonment and regrowth cycle in San Francisco, and can't help but think about places like Buffalo and St. Louis, which haven't recovered (yet); Pittsburgh, which shrank as steel left and decades later recovered as a tech hub; Burlington, VT, which continually hemorrhages its youth to larger and higher-income cities, but maintains a steady state through immigration (both people from wealthier states looking for a smaller city, and international immigrants).  Newitz briefly mentions New Orleans and Detroit, and writes of how some research of modern urban areas can be applied to archaeological work; it feels like this is an area ripe for follow-up.

Four Lost Butterfingers has joined Future of Another Butterfinger in my camera roll

Do I... actually like Microsoft Teams?

About 2.5 years ago, my data science team was part of the AuthAI acquisition by Availity.  Among the many challenges was one of tooling: we were going from a Google Suite / Zoom / Slack setup to Microsoft Suite.  I hadn't touched Microsoft Suite since leaving IBM in 2016, which was prior to the existence of Microsoft Teams; we used Webex for conferencing (just audio and desktop sharing) and had no messaging system, just email.  This was clunky for distributed, remote collaboration, but we made it work. 

Both Dataiku and Olive AI had Google Suite / Zoom / Slack setups, which I thought worked very well.  GSuite was (and still is) superior for collaborating on documents, and Slack was the missing link for semi-synchronous communication that moved faster than an email (or setting up a meeting) and was less demanding and intrusive than a phone call.  The main problem was that Zoom was necessary for anything other than a small group meeting, and anything typed in the Zoom chat was extremely inconvenient to get into Slack; at Dataiku, our solution was to use Slack channels as the meeting chat (at least for anything we wanted to keep; "whatever happened in Zoom chat stayed in Zoom chat."

So, there was naturally some trepidation when moving to Microsoft Suite.  Focusing on what looked promising, I pointed out that Teams meeting chats were saved directly the product, which was an improvement over Slack + Zoom.  This was cold comfort to a team used to Slack, and identified a number of pain points on Teams:

• Chats and channels were separate tabs, which meant people responding to chats would miss new messages in channels, driving people to send messages in chats rather than use channels.  The ideal is for the vast majority of conversations to happen in public channels so that knowledge is shared and new ideas get eyes on them, and Teams was encouraging the opposite.  MS fixed this by putting chats and channels in the same tab; sadly, the damage has been done and we have to retrain ourselves to use channels, but this is progress.
• Meeting chats were simply chats, not part of any channel, which meant that if a new instance of a meeting was created, say, because ownership of a meeting changed (MS doesn't allow you to change meeting owners; you need to create a new meeting), an entirely new meeting chat would be created.  You can now schedule meetings within a public channel, so while the new meeting chat would still be created, at least all the meeting chats will be in the same channel.  1:1's are still a problem, because you still end up with your personal chat with a person in addition to the 1:1 meeting chat.  Still, there is progress here.
• No custom emojis meant you couldn't inject your own team/company character.  This made using Teams less *fun*; while it's not a "get stuff done" feature, it's an important quality of life feature.  This was fixed earlier this year.
• Similarly, only one emoji reaction to a message was fixed this year.
• Teams seems to play badly with hardware.  I have a Sony bluetooth headset that worked fine with Zoom on my Olive laptop; on my Availity laptop, I'm inaudible when using the mic on my headset on Teams.  This continues to be a problem; I know this because Teams will sometimes change my mic setting from the external webcam to the headset.  This remains a problem.

All in all, significant progress has been made by MS in delivering on the promise of the premise that Teams would provide better integration into the rest of the office suite than GSuite / Zoom / Slack.  Calendar is now fully integrated, and I can mostly ignore Outlook, just checking the inbox a couple times a day.

He-Man and She-Ra: A Christmas Special (1985)

I made the mistake of quoting from this once too often, and so some years ago Sarah insisted we show the He-man/She-ra Christmas special to the kids so they would stop asking us what I was talking about.  The Wikipedia plot synopsis doesn't really do the special justice, so I planned to do a running diary of it... but never completed it because the onion just has so many layers.  At the start of this December, I saw that this year was the 40th anniversary of the original airing of the special, so one way or another, it will be posted this year.

[0:00]

It's snowing, and everyone is preparing for Adam and Adora's birthday!  In... a Christmas special?  Are we really going to equate He-man and She-Ra with Jesus by giving them the same birthday?  

As the camera pans across the hall of the palace where all the preparations are being made, we're treated to glimpses of a bunch of characters that had action figures but weren't featured prominently in the show (consume!  consume!).

Bow, the 1985-era Sensitive Guy (tm) from She-Ra, is unafraid to show his 1985-era Feminine Side (tm) by suggesting a new color to use in the decorations, but with 2025 eyes he's mansplaining to Peekablue what colors to use and she's tired of his shit.

Peekablue putting up a good face for the sake of harmony on Adora's birthday

Queen Marlena reminds us she's from Earth, and these preparations remind her of Christmas, and... this special was first shown on Christmas Day 1985, so yeah, I guess we really are going there and He-Man/She-Ra == Jesus.  She then wonders where are Adam and Man-At-Arms? as the camera pans again across the same shot of the palace hall, because if Filmation drew it once, you were gonna see it at least twice.

[1:23]

Man-At-Arms proves his enginerding credentials:

Adam: Shouldn't we be helping with the preparations?

Man-at-Arms: In a minute!  We're almost finished here.

Apparently, getting his government surveillance system ready for tomorrow's test flight is more important than trifles like Adam and Adora's first birthday together.  Be true to yourself, Duncan!  

Orko (He-who-must-not-be-named), He-man's annoying sidekick character whose sole purpose is to move plot with his incomparable incompetence and main character energy, makes his appearance.  For reasons that make sense only to a writer on a tight deadline, He-who-must-not-be-named breaks into the "Sky Spy" and accidentally launches it.  (The Masters of the Universe series was full of appallingly unoriginal and shockingly on-the-nose names like "Man-At-Arms", so "Sky Spy" fits right in.)

Now Skeletor's going after the Sky Spy, in a ship called the "Collector" (presumably b/c he uses it to "collect" things?), and his henchmen are all ones who didn't figure prominently in the TV series (buy the toys!), and apparently to distinguish them, they all just have super goofy voices (and I say this about a show where there's a YouTube video of the main villain laughing for an hour).  

"Look, Skeletor's going after the Sky-Spy!" Yes, Duncan, we can see that.  I guess I should just be grateful they didn't add "in the Collector" to the end of that observation

[4:07]

Our Heroes (tm) see this and Adam turns into He-man in order to stop Skeletor.  As he runs off, Adora soliloquies her intention to change into She-Ra, but she doesn't do it right away, so now I'm trying to remember who from Eternia is in on She-Ra's secret identity?  Adam knows, but maybe Man-At-Arms doesn't and that's why she doesn't change in his presence?  At any rate, we are cheated of a She-Ra Transformation Montage.

Just as Skeletor is about to nab the Sky-Spy, He-man arrives and starts busting stuff up.

Two-Bad Head#1: Master, it's He-Man.
Two-Bad Head#2: Quiet, he'll hear us!

Okay, this was intentionally funny.  Good job, writers.  Skeletor demands Two-Bad use the "force belts" to stop He-Man, and He-Man repeats the words "force belts" for us, because this is the first (and last) time they will ever be used.  Apparently, in sufficient quantity, force belts are strong enough to contain a guy who can literally punch you into space?!  This seems like writerly convenience to give She-Ra a grand entrance to "save" He-Man. 

He-Man: Sis!  Just in time!  As usual.

The writing on He-Man engages in a lot of content-free parentheticals and other wasted words.  Some of it is just filling air time, but other times they could simply show the action that they've animated without the meaningless patter on top.  Note that while bound by the force belts, He-Man's magic sword magically doesn't fall off the in-flight Collector.

[6:20]

Everything is now under control, and He-who-must-not-be-named decides to try one of his spells that never work, just to be the deux ex machina that takes him to Earth to meet some children who will teach him about Christmas.  He-Man states: "The Sky-Spy, it's spinning off into space!"  (thanks, He-Man, we couldn't tell)  As He-Man and She-Ra initially chase the Sky Spy before it teleports across the galaxy, we learn that Swiftwind can apparently fly into Low Eternia Orbit.  Cool trick, bro.

That's not Eternia!  It doesn't look like Earth, either...

[8:20]

He-who-must-not-be-named lands on Earth and, deep in the snowy woods, immediately runs across two unsupervised children who are about to be killed in an avalanche (just a typical day in the life of latch key kids).  For once, his magic spell works (perhaps he should add "please work" to all of his incantations).  Because Eternia has no Prime Directive, He-who-must-not-be-named blithely invites the children into the Sky-Spy to warm up, and that's when they tell him all about Christmas.

(note: the scenes skip back and forth between Eternia and Earth, but all the Earth scenes are literally just interludes to remind us that these children exist and are teaching He-who-must-not-be-named about Christmas)

Hands on hips while the Queen is reading, everyone!  That means you, too, Duncan!

Back on Eternia, the ladies discover that He-who-must-not-be-named dropped his book near the launchpad, and they figure that's why the Sky-Spy disappeared.  Fortunately, Man-At-Arms has a "Finder Beam" (more lazy functional names) that allows them to discover he's landed on Earth.  Even more conveniently, Duncan has a "transport beam" that will allow them to teleport He-who-must-not-be-named back home.  BUT FIRST we must go to Etheria on a fetch quest for a "Carium water crystal" (?!?!) to power the "transport beam" because there are none on Eternia.  

[12:30]

We finally get a She-Ra Transformation Montage (yes!  30 seconds of reused animation!!) as Adora says goodbye to Adam.  On Etheria, She-Ra goes to Mermista to ask where a water crystal might be found.  Stereotyping much?  "If water is in the name, the water Princess must know something about it."  Mermista tells She-Ra that one lies in a deep pool guarded by the "Beast Monster" (in a story filled with lazy naming, this is the LAZIEST WRITING EVAR).  Their plan is for She-Ra to distract the monster while Mermista looks for the crystal.

She-Ra reflects that she could never have succeeded without Mermista.  Perhaps there could be a theme of teamwork here, but there's no time to explore story when there's all this plot to get through.  The "extremely dangerous" Beast Monster is still literally right over there, climbing out of the shallow pit it fell into, when some giant robots crawl out of the earth.  Going into commercial, She-Ra sums up for us: "Well, Swifty, now we have to pass those things to get the crystal back to Man-At-Arms."  Just so we don't forget during the break.

Coming back out of commercial, one of the giant robot shoots She-Ra and Swiftwind with a gun that encases them in a bubble.  They have She-Ra trapped!  And then... they just leave, but not before identifying themselves as "the Monstroids" (buy the toys!  oh, wait, we made a toy of a different thing and gave it the same name.  enh, whatever).

Swiftwind comments "They're changing into other forms!  What evil robots."  That's right, kids, don't watch Transformers, watch Masters of the Universe!  This is just such a deeply, immensely weird line.  It sounds like Swiftwind believes it's the act of changing into other forms that makes these robots evil, though He-Man, She-Ra, and Swiftwind himself all change into other forms on the regular.  So is Swiftie some kind of organic lifeform supremacist who only sees this behavior as evil in non-organic lifeforms?  Will this cause problems if there are form-changing inorganic lifeforms who are allies of Our Heroes (tm) in the future?  Like these "Manchines" She-Ra mentions while reaffirming for us that these robots are:

1. evil
2. dangerous
3. called the Monstroids
4. likely to return later in the special

[18:30]

Back on Eternia, before turning on the transport beam, Man-At-Arms notes "I hope he remembers to stand in the light."  Sweet Jesus, their technology encourages people to walk towards the light?!

On Earth, He-who-must-not-be-named and the kids are atonally singing the words "Jingle Bells" over and over without reaching the end of the phrase.  Now we have to question whether anything these children have told He-who-must-not-be-named about Christmas is correct.

He-who-must-not-be-named walks into the light, and takes the children with him to Eternia, because of course he's not thinking about the consequences of his actions.  He introduces them as Alicia and Miguel -- is this a subtle bit of Hispanic representation from an 80's cartoon?  

[Meanwhile, somewhere...] Horde Prime says, "There is a great disturbance (in the Force?)" and decides that this new spirit of Christmas on Eternia will somehow threaten his rule.

Bring me my most competent servants who always succeed, Hordak and Skeletor!

Back on Eternia:

Alicia: "Will we be home in time for Christmas?"

Marlena: "I'm not sure."

That's incredibly honest and forthright of the queen.  I've always liked this line because it's what I want to see in our own real-life leaders.

At any rate, it'll take a few days before the water crystal can be recharged, leaving plenty of time for shenanigans.  Queen Marlena then suggests merging the twins' birthday party with a Christmas celebration, just in case you forgot that He-man/She-Ra == Jesus.  

[22:00]

Bard and Perfuma entertain the children.  I don't think Bard's song will become a Christmas standard.  Hordak comes and grabs the children... and He-who-must-not-be-named, for some reason.  The worst part about this is that it's not like He-who-must-not-be-named happened to be standing next to the children and got picked up by accident; they used a third tractor beam to pull him up.  

Hordak's henchmen, Kattra, Modulok and Multibot, otherwise all seem more competent than Skeletor's.  That is, until they get back to Etheria and the Monstroids simply take the children without a fight.  The Monstroids seem to want the children because they believe Horde Prime will come for them, and then they can... destroy Horde Prime?  We've been given no reason why the Monstroids have beef with Horde Prime or how they even knew of the children's existence?  Can they also feel the disturbance caused by the Spirit of Christmas?  Does this story need the Monstroids at all?

He-man and She-Ra ask Peekablue for information on where Hordak might have taken the children in the Fright Zone.  Peekablue sees that the Monstroids have the children now...

Peekablue: "But the little robot people have gone to rescue the children."

She-Ra: "Robot people?  You mean the Manchines?"

Peekablue: "Exactly."

If Peekablue knew what they're called, why didn't she just call them the Manchines in the first place?!

"They don't call me Cutter for nothing!"

"They don't call him Zipper for nothing!"

The Manchines (buy the toys!  oops, we didn't even try to cash in on this) immediately break the children out of jail and are then immediately surrounded by the Monstroids.  He-man and She-Ra then arrive to destroy Monstroids and chew bubble gum.  And they're all out of bubblegum.

While the adults are battling the Monstroids, Cutter tells He-who-must-not-be-named to take the children "to a safe spot", where they befriend a Manchine puppy, and Skeletor captures them pretty much immediately.  Unlike Hordak, Skeletor leaves He-who-must-not-be-named behind and just takes the children (and the Manchine puppy, who is being held by Alicia).  He also entraps Swiftwind in some stalagmites to slow pursuit.  Hordak chases Skeletor and damages his ship, but Skeletor damages Hordak's ship in turn, forcing Hordak to turn back to base for repairs (?).  

[32:17]

Skeletor crash lands in a snowy area, and he needs to force-march the children to the rendezvous with Horde Prime.  It's cold, and the children beg for warmth.  After the sister collapses from cold, Skeletor relents and makes them warm coats.  They start to march, and Skeletor insists they leave behind Relay, the Manchine dog.  But Relay whimpers piteously and Skeletor relents, carrying Relay himself "so they can go faster".

As they march, the children tell Skeletor about Christmas, and the horror that the writers are now going full-on A Christmas Carol with Skeletor as Scrooge sets in.  Sadly, because this is hilarious, this is actually an improvement over everything that has happened up to this point.

Skeletor rolls a random encounter.  "A snow beast!  Quick, get behind me!"

Skeletor arrives at the rendezvous point with the children.  Somehow, He-man and She-Ra arrive next, even though there's really no way for them to have tracked them here, or known where the rendezvous point was.  Then Hordak arrives with a small army.  Hordak deflects a blast from Skeletor's staff right back at Skeletor, knocking him out of the fight for a bit.

She-Ra says, "Better get back, children.  Orko, go with them."  Just like the last time, He-who-must-not-be-named leads them right to the enemy, but this time it's Horde Prime.  Hordak's army of troopers prevents He-man and She-Ra from getting to the children in time.    

"I don't know what's happening to me... but I MUST SAVE THE CHILDREN."
(this is the line I was quoting too often)

Skeletor somehow manages to damage Horde Prime's ship?  He-man sees it go down, comments upon this, and then he and She-Ra throw Horde Prime's spaceship into space.  Moments later the children thank Skeletor for saving them, and He-man is incredulous: "He saved you?".  He-man, you were right there, you saw it happen!  

She-Ra: "Don't worry Skeletor, Christmas comes only once a year."

Note that somewhere in here, Hordak and his army of troops have just disappeared...

[40:55]

In the denouement, Adam (dressed as a super-buff Santa Claus) gifts each of the children a flying belt, again, because Eternia has no Prime Directive and apparently no one considers the consequences of their actions.  Man-at-Arms sends the children home, and somehow the Eternians are able to watch as Alicia and Miguel are reunited with their parents in time for Christmas.

Songs for Midwinter with Kongero and Windborne

We had the pleasure of seeing a second Lane Series concert this fall, and two artists on the same evening!

Kongero is a Swedish folk group of four women singing a capella.  They sing beautifully and are exquisitely in tune with each other, metaphorically and lyrically.  Their patter between songs was also entertaining.  Highly recommended.

Windborne is a New England folk group that specializes in old songs.  While their musicality suffered a little in immediate comparison; they were excellent, enthusiastic, and funny.  Would see again.

Solving wordle in 3 guesses or less

I've recorded 1216 attempted wordles, and finished 608 (or exactly half) in 3 guesses or less. This happened a little earlier than expected**, mostly due to a 14-day run of 2's and 3's.

Wordle games by number of guesses needed

Of course, the reason why I'm starting to get many more in 2 or 3 is because there are only 713 words left from the original wordle list. So far, NYT has peppered in 30 words that weren't in the original list, but it's unclear to me how many more they can add without getting obscure or including 's' plurals.

** I thought it would be around the 4th anniversary of my first wordle, on Jan 5.

A couple of dormant webcomics return in 2025: Wonderella and JL8

One of the wonderful things about using Feedly (or your RSS feed aggregator of choice) is when content from an irregularly-updated source suddenly pops into your feed.  This year, two webcomics that I started following in the 10's reappeared.

The Non-Adventures of Wonderella returned in January after more than 5 years, and has been updated as Justin Pierce has time over the course of the year.  Rita now carries the mantle of Wonderella and provides an interesting shift in how the role is portrayed, though Dana still figures prominently (and rudely) in comic.  :-)

In April, JL8 continued a storyline begun in 2020, but not updated since June 2023.  While it's been nice to see again, as Yale Stewart writes, the future of JL8 is uncertain, so enjoy it while you can.

Bionic Six

Secret Galaxy recently did an episode on the Bionic Six and its failure to catch hold in an era of massive cartoon-to-toy pipelines.  

I wasn't a huge fan of Bionic Six, but S02E25, "Bottom of the Ninth Planet" has a line I still remember.  Meg is in a contest with an alien sportsman where each has to take turns thinking of objects for a second alien to turn into and attack the other contestant, and if you couldn't think of a new object fast enough, you would lose (at least, it seemed like that's how the contest worked).  The aliens cheat, with the second alien giving ideas of objects to be turned into.  At one point, he suggests "turn me into a can!" but the alien sportsman turns him into a thimble instead, which does no harm to Meg.  Meg, tired and hungry, turns him into a hamburger, which knocks out the alien sportsman.  The second alien then says, "I coulda been a container, instead of a bun."

Even though it would be years later before I saw On the Waterfront, the line was iconic and known to teenage me, and it was absolutely hilarious being referenced in this context. 

(before publishing this, I did a quick search to see if I've ever mentioned Bionic Six before, and somewhat hilariously I started and abandoned a post 6 years ago about this, so thank you to Secret Galaxy for providing the impetus to complete it)

Playlists for books: Martha Wells's The Rising World

 Turns out Martha Wells made a playlist for Witch King, and now one for the sequel Queen Demon.

She didn't link to a playlist on YouTube or Spotify, so I made a couple:
Witch King:


Queen Demon:

This Land is Your Land (If You Can Keep It)

Some of the posts from Portland feature a group of people singing "This Land is Your Land", which seems particularly appropriate with the return of the robber barons.

Today, while catching up on Feedly, this SMBC cartoon, combined with the Portland protestors, reminded me of this old JibJab video.  

Ruminations on RR

This is coming a few days late, but I needed to raid the photo collection first.

There have been many wonderful things said about Robert Redford's actions in life. I haven't seen the following discussed.

For me, one of the defining things that Robert Redford did as an actor, especially in closeups, was the "freeze expression, slide the eyes in one direction, slide them back, continue." He could do this with a variety of emotions and apply it to scenes with different tones. It's everywhere in his body of work because he was masterful at it (and it reinforced his aura of charm).

This photo, from a fall trip to NH when I was 16, does not have Robert Redford in it. Instead that's my dad, Richard Reutter, who can sometimes make you double take before realizing no, that's not the famous actor. I'm thankful that both men have been in this world, and that my dad is still with us.

UVM Lane Series: Evren Ozel

We saw Evren Ozel perform at the UVM Lane Series on Friday.  The Lane Series has a tradition of bringing in Van Cliburn finalists, and we've made a tradition of going to those events.

Ozel's program began with three Scarlatti Sonatas (Sonata in G Major, K. 427, Sonata in C Minor, K. 11, Sonata in C Major, K. 159), then moved on to Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 30 in E Major, op. 109, and went into intermission with Bartok's Out of Doors, Sz. 81, BB 89.

After intermission, Ozel played Fauré's Nocturne No. 4 in E-flat Major, op. 36 and finished with Schumann's Carnaval, op. 9.  Aside from the Beethoven, I wasn't familiar with much of the program, and it's always interesting to be introduced to new favorites.  :-)

Ozel demonstrated extraordinary fluidity and musicality, making difficult passages seem trivial.  We placed ourselves on the left side of the stage, so that we could see the smooth and effortless movement of his hands.  He was charming and down to earth in his discussion of the pieces, with a genuine enthusiasm and love for music and music history.  And *fun*.  

He was very practical in the encore, not waiting very long before coming back out onstage.  He played Brahm's Hungarian Dance Number 5, as arranged by György Cziffra.  Then he was gracious enough to play a *second* encore, joking he'd "only keep us for one more", and finished with Leopold Godowsky's transcription of Le Cygne from Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals, noting that it was, perhaps, "a little disrespectful to the cello" to play it on the piano. 

All in all a wonderful night!  To "replay" it when I like, here's a playlist with the program from that night.  (note: Spotify didn't have all of the pieces performed by Evren Ozel)

MS follies: Forms surveys

Last week, I wanted to solicit suggestions from my team at work, so I went to OneDrive, clicked the "Create or upload" button in the upper left, selected "Forms survey", created my survey, and sent the link out to my team.  This week, I wanted to look at the results, so I went back to OneDrive... which had no way to get me to the form I had created... from OneDrive.  I needed to go to forms.office.com to find the form, at which point I could export the results to Excel.

Meanwhile, Google Drive treats Forms like any other "document" that you can create and go back to from within that "one drive".  

The Mom Stays in the Picture On Mystic Lake; Kristin Hannah (1999)

On strength of The Women, I picked up a few Kristin Hannah books at a Fletcher Free Library book sale, and decided to start with the oldest of the three, On Mystic Lake, which in turn, according to the "Other books by" page, her eighth book.  The dust jacket proclaimed, "Kristin Hannah makes her hardcover debut" which initially surprised me -- I hadn't realized Hannah started as a softcover romance novelist and was now a little worried about my purchases. 😅

As it turns out, while On Mystic Lake has many of the earmarks of a standard romance novel, the kernel of the author who would write The Women is present, and it's an enjoyable read with (mostly) well-rounded characters and tackles thorny relationship complications.  

And wonderfully, on page 29, I was reminded of "The Mom Stays in the Picture": 

"There were almost no pictures of her.  Like most mothers, she was always behind the camera, and when she thought she looked tired, or fat, or thin, or ugly ... she ripped the photo in half and ditched it." 

... and then again later in the book:

"We're like that, we moms.  We take the pictures, but we don't record our own lives very well.  It's a mistake we never realize until it's too late..."

Confusion reigns: Evolving cyclist signage

 A friend recently sent me two images of streets that had been newly painted with "bike lanes".  The first is University Place, which runs north-south at the western edge of UVM's main campus.  It's a one-way road with standard solid line markings with a bicycle symbol inside the bike lanes to show that motorists should keep out.  (unless safely passing -- you can even cross double yellow lines in VT to safely pass) 

The second is of Queen City Park Road (QCP), which runs south from Home Ave and then makes a 90-degree turn left to run east to Shelburne Rd.  I have mostly driven on the short section that connects connected the end of Pine St to Shelburne Rd, but the initial section runs by Burton and is around where this photo was taken.  

The problem is there are people driving QCP that think it’s one way, so they drive in the middle of the road and avoid the bike lanes even if cars are headed toward them.

At first glance I assumed the bicycle symbol was a sharrow, indicating that the lane was a shared space, but on second glance realized it was the cyclist with single directional arrow, which usually indicates a dedicated bike lane.  

10-15 years ago I would have said this signage was *wrong*, and there should be sharrows on QCP to signal to drivers that they could use that space.  

Sharrows were still fairly new 20 years ago, and then quickly proliferated, but over time, everyone began to hate them (e.g., "We Were Wrong About Sharrows" and "Sharrows used to make sense in theory, but are now mostly useless and possibly dangerous").

It looks like Burlington DPW may be moving toward eliminating the sharrow symbol and always using the cyclist with single arrow to make motorists aware that cyclists may be in this space, and then use dashed vs solid lane lines to show shared vs dedicated bike lanes.  (I have written to DPW to ask if this is current policy)

Signage around cycling infrastructure is struggling to standardize, but it is relatively new and will likely need to continue to evolve.  Until it reaches a more final form, everyone will be a little confused.

Adventures in Tea: Irish Breakfast

Irish breakfast tea from VT Tea and Trading Co is bin #263 in City Market's bulk section.  The Wikipedia page says it's described as having a malty aroma; in the batch I drank, it was almost milky, as if it had been pre-added.  I remember that when I first tried Irish Breakfast (probably Twinings?) many years ago, it was too strong and bitter for my taste (I didn't then, and still don't, like to put milk or sugar in my tea), but now I quite like it.  And, like the Wikipedia page suggests, it's good at all hours of the day.

Irish Breakfast tea, loose leaf in my jar at home

Previous tea: Lipton Black

Adventures in Tea: Lipton Black

A few bags of this were left over from a kid's kombucha experiment. I do not have fond memories of Lipton's tea growing up.  AFAIK back then they only had the dreadful orange pekoe made from the leavings that couldn't be used for decent tea.  The "America's Favorite Tea" moniker simply means "we make the cheapest tea, and that's fine for making sweet tea, which is what we're being used for." As far as any caffeinated drink contributes to having a healthy heart... well, I guess it's better than soda.

All that said, I would be willing to drink this tea if it were available in a hotel room.  It is still greatly inferior to Nilgiri Blue Mountain as a plain black tea.

The box of leftover Lipton's black tea with tea bag

Previous tea: Nilgiri Blue Mountain

Adventures in Tea: Nilgiri Blue Mountain

Nilgiri "Blue Mountain" tea from VT Tea and Trading Co is bin #310 in City Market's bulk section.  The Wikipedia page says it's described as having citrus and floral notes; I do not detect that in the batch I drank.  This is just straight up black tea with nothing else added to it and it stands on the quality of the leaves.  It's quite good, and I would choose it when in the mood for plain black tea. 

Nilgiri Blue Mountain tea, loose leaf in my jar at home

Previous tea: Sherl Grey

Adventures in Tea: Sherl Grey

Sherl Grey comes from Geeky Teas, which takes a well-known tea and adds its own pop geek culture twist.  This tea starts with an Earl Grey base, and then adds cornflower, raspberry leaves and blueberries.  From a bit of googling, these all appear to be reasonably common additives, but I'm not sure they are often all added simultaneously.  

The bag with Geeky Teas' design and description of Sherl Grey

 

It looks pretty, though the blueberry scent overpowers the usual bergamot scent when I open the jar.

Sherl Grey tea, loose leaf in my jar at home

No regrets trying this, but I will probably not add it to my usual rotation.

Previous tea: Lapsang Souchong

Redfin files: Unparalleled Luxury

"Discover unparalleled luxury" began the description, and continued, "This magnificent property offers an extraordinary living experience, perfectly blending sophisticated design with ultimate comfort..."

I once thought myself hardened to the exaggerations of my fellow property owners, and was chastened today.

From the photos in the listing, each room appears to be painted a different, bright and cheery primary color. There is an accessible elevator in the part of the house that has a second floor (genuine thumbs up here). There is a refrigerator in the walk-in pantry. And, of course, the laundry room contains the epigram "bitches be shopping" artfully written on the wall; an astute and humorous observation of the highest culture.

These are the most luxurious aspects of the property listing. 

Adventures in tea: Lapsang Souchong

(following up slowly on the initial post)

 

Lapsang Souchong from VT Tea and Trading Co is bin #325 in City Market's bulk section.  It is a type of black tea; what differentiates it from other black teas is that during the drying process it is smoked on a pinewood fire.

The batch I had was strongly piney, though Sarahmac declared it "smelled like bacon".  I enjoyed it for a week, but probably will not have it again anytime soon.

Adventures in tea

A long time ago, probably in grad school, I became a regular tea drinker.  I hadn't acquired a taste for coffee, but tea was a good way to take a quick break from work, have a sociable hot drink, and get a little caffeinated.  After trying several teas, I settled on the Twinings Earl Grey as my favorite, and mostly drunk different brands of Earl Grey since (mostly the VT Tea and Trading Company, which is what's in the bulk section at City Market).  For a while I would alternate with Gunpowder Green tea on days when two pots of tea were needed (often in the winter), then switched to making an herbal tea for the afternoon pot so I wouldn't be up all night, then switched to making two pots of Earl Grey.  This past winter I was often making three pots of Earl Grey a day, and it started to get monotonous, so it was time to mix things up a little.  Over time, I'll jot down some notes about the teas.

A few years ago, a catalog from Upton tea had this nice explainer on the general types of tea.  There are then, of course, many varieties within these general types.  I tend to prefer black and white teas; we'll see what else the bulk section has to offer!

Jonny Wanzer's "The Trial of Sarah George"

 Jonny Wanzer burst onto the local social media scene 5 years ago with very short (1-few minute) videos poking at local problems. That evolved into 5-10 minute videos that started to include more research into the piece.

This is a beast at 2h. Wanzer takes us through the entire process of creating the video and the emotional and social toll it took to produce it. I already knew who Sarah George is, since VTDigger has been covering her since 2017, but this was still an interesting watch. I hope that it reaches folks who otherwise only know about George from comments on social media.

The importance of not knowing what the Emperor could do in 1983

 ... or, happy Star Wars Day 2025?

<<Star Wars spoilers below>>

In 1980, The Empire Strikes Back loosed Darth Vader from Tarkin's leash, and while he ran rampant across the galaxy, he was still beholden to the Emperor.  Despite a brief mention in Star Wars and a short conversation with Vader in Empire, in 1983 the Emperor was still a cipher.  Was his power mostly political, or did he have powers like those of a Jedi?  (*probably* latter, because the conversation in Empire strongly suggests that he can sense disturbances in the Force) 

Not knowing is key to enjoying the best throughline of Return of the Jedi: the looming second confrontation between Luke and Vader, the Emperor's and Vader's attempt to turn Luke to the Dark Side, and Luke's victory.

Our appetite is whet by Vader's arrival on the second Death Star.  The Imperial in charge of construction is willing to complain that the timelines are unreasonable to *Vader*, you know, the guy who spent the last movie choking out everyone who crossed him, but when Vader invokes the Emperor, he is quickly cowed.  So the Emperor inspires an extra level of fear!

The arrival of the Emperor (*just* "the Emperor", for he is never named Palpatine in the original films) shows us a wrinkly old man leaning on a cane.  How dangerous could he be?  Then again, Yoda was a wrinkly old guy leaning on a cane...

Over a few scenes, it becomes more clear that the Emperor is indeed sensitive to the Force, and he interrogates Vader on whether his "feelings" on the matter are clear, after Vader reveals he sensed Luke on the mission to Endor.  

Luke turns himself in to Vader, who has gone from offering Luke to "rule the galaxy as father and son" to "I must obey my master."  We're left wondering, what kind of hold does the Emperor have on Vader?

Then in the throne room, the Emperor finally shows he has telekinetic force powers by unlocking Luke's shackles with a wave of his hand!  Throughout the following encounter, the Emperor needles Luke until he can bait him into a duel with Vader.  Vader successfully tempts Luke towards the Dark Side and then... then Luke throws away his lightsaber.  It is the most heroic action of the series.  The Emperor has failed, and he will not get a new acolyte.  What will he do?  What can he do?  "So be it, Jedi," he spits contemptuously.  And then the scene cuts away.

When we return, the Emperor approaches menacingly.  "If you will not be turned, then you will be destroyed!"  And the lightning flies out of his fingertips.  The theater was shook.  We had never seen anything like this before.

While I appreciate that Rod Hilton has given this serious thought and agrees it is the greatest flaw of his "Machete Order" for viewing the Star Wars series, I have to respectfully disagree with choosing a better "twins reveal" over "what the Emperor can do reveal".  Machete Order sounds great on a rewatch.

Lines; Sung J. Woo; 2024

Sung J. Woo's Lines begins as a Sliding Doors-style story and follows the trope of showing us two very different paths that a couple's relationship takes after they literally collide in Washington Park, or have a near miss.

What Sung does so beautifully is that the two paths of the relationship are not different purely because of some mechanistic reason (e.g., like in the movie, catching the train leads to finding your husband is cheating); instead he taps an essential truth of human relationships.  I am afraid to spoil anything further, will stop there, and simply recommend reading.

What Grows From the Dead; Dave Dobson; 2024

Note: this was actually published on 4/6/25; I backdated to 3/24/25, when I finished the book 

This is a short recommendation for friend Dave Dobson's What Grows from the Dead.  In the author's note Dave says his premise with the novel was to "merely start him out about as low as he thought he could possibly be, and then to start to make things worse for him."  Bujoldian in approach and tone!  Things are grim, but never grimdark, in this thriller / mystery / crime(?) novel set in modern day western NC.

Annual Average Temperatures in Burlington

It's the start of another year in Burlington with no snow on the ground and none forecast in the near future.  NOAA provides a ton of weather data and so I downloaded some Burlington, VT weather data in CSV format.  The data I used comes from two stations, one for measurement prior to 1940, and data from the Burlington International Airport since 1940.

A quick scatterplot shows the average temperature in degrees Fahrenheit by year.  The years start with 1902 and go to present day.  The average yearly temperature ranges from about 42 to 50.  Obviously, average daily temperatures for individual days within every year have a much wider range; looking at the average yearly temperature is a useful first look at long-term trends.  Just by eyeballing, it certainly looks like there is a decades-long upward trend from the 60's to today, and a typical day in 2020 is 8 degrees warmer than a typical day in 1960.  That could easily be the difference between a January with snow cover and a January with bare ground.  

Fitting a best-fit line to the data helps us to see that long-term upward trend: 

... though a quick examination of the residuals confirms that the straight line is not a great model here.

A third-order polynomial does a much better job of capturing the initial stability, followed by an upward rise in temperatures.  A piecewise spline might be even better, but this is enough for a first quick look.  

Next steps might be to look at how the temperatures change over time for each day of the year, or look at the snow depth data.