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Unfortunately only the record of my blog is record of many of these events. This time I am making a prediction and holding myself accountable through the LongNow Foundation service LongBets. I posted a prediction up there that by 2010 passenger diesels will outsell hybrids. See the prediction here and support it, bet against me, or comment. If you bet against, the money goes to charity so it is fun!
Bet against me, I dare you.
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There are lots of doom and destruction books out there painting a bleak picture of the post industrial world. Most paint a kind of Mad Max future of renegades. I am not sure that is how it would go. I think it would be more a slow steady slide with people hanging on all the way down, mostly in denial. That is what Kunstler sees. The story starts 15 years after a big bomb destroys NYC and LA. Not unthinkable in today’s terrorist world. The infrastructure just sort of breaks slowly. Various diseases run rapid. Transportation fails due to lack of oil. Do you know that the overstuffed grocery store next to you only has about two days worth of goods? If the distribution system breaks down, the food runs out QUICK! Look what happened during Katrina. That was not the future, that was the recent past! And Burma. The only reason these regions survived is that the greater organism (the US, the whole world) was still healthy and could provide life support to the damaged part. How many bleeding sores can one country have at a time? Can one world have at a time? There is a tipping point somewhere. We haven’t found it yet and I pray we never do. But if you want to see one VERY plausible vision of how the world would be with multiple open sores coming quickly next to each other, read this book. I rate 5 out of 5.
Was flying back from NYC to Seattle yesterday. Grabbed Harlan Coben’s new book in the airport. Read on the plane and late last night. Quick read. Coben does something in this one I don’t really like though. Many thriller writers do it, but Harlan usually is more economical with this device. He starts four or five different narratives with different characters, in the beginning of book, and eventually ties them all together. Part of the fun of reading is trying to figure out how the narratives are connected before the writer tells you. Usually each narrative is individually compelling enough to stay involved in and the transitions are logical enough to not mess the flow too much.
This one had jarring transitions and seeming totally random separate narratives that had no apparent link until 3/4 of the way through the book. The problem with that is you are reading one narrative you like and are engaged in, then he throws you into another that you could care less about and all you can think about is “when am I going to get back to the story”. In the end, the final chapter of course it all ties together, but with gum and sticky tape.
I wouldn’t put this up as one of his best, but it was an enjoyable waste of 7 hours. I rate 2 of 5 stars.
1. KeepUp. If you only do tasks that everyone else on the plante does like "anniversary" and "daylight savings time" and "pick up the kids". then this one is for you. I actually have my own life and my own tasks. Making a "custom task" is a pain. No outlook upload. Dead.
2. 43actions. Only for the hard core geek. Very minimal (good). too minimal (bad). Feels like the old line editor "vi". No instructions. No outlook upload. You gotta have read the GTD book and love that system. Next...
3. Sandy. Cute graphics. appeal to the undersexed geek in me. No outlook upload. Simple command understanding like "remind", but separate calendar. You can subscribe to the Sandy calendar in outlook on the web (cool), but unfortunately that is not my main calendar. bad. Next.
They all suck. So it seems that Jott has integated with a bunch of sucky task managers. Hummmmm....
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