Archives October 2025

I spent last night on the Naples Princess for a short two hour dinner cruise. I was on the boat previously but it was a long, long time ago with my mom. It was storming hard right up until the ship departed but luckily once we got out on the water the skies on the horizon started to clear. My girlfriend and I had a really nice dinner and enjoyed the experience. Once snowbird season hits it’s next to impossible to get openings on the ship so I was glad we got the unique opportunity to take in a sunset while on open water. It won’t be the last time.

I got home in time to watch the Eagles stink up the field, losing to the 1-4 Giants in an embarrassing manner. The defense seems to be a bit of a joke recently and Saquon can get absolutely nothing going so far this season. He hasn’t cracked 100 yards in a game yet. Hurts is not a throw 40 times a game sort of qb. At least the team now has an extended period to get their heads together before the next game. Some changes obviously need to be made.

My weekend is looking to be of the standard variety thus far. I like it that way, most of the time.

Yesterday I got access to Sora, an AI video creation app made by the folks that created ChatGPT. Access to the app is invite only, I gained access from a friend of mine that was already in who gave me an access code. It is sort of nuts.

To create your AI doppleganger is incredibly easy. The app has you look at the camera, turn your head left and then say three numbers, that’s it. With that little effort you can now create endless 10 second videos of yourself or other AI generated characters in any scenario you describe.

Yes it’s cool but it also demonstrates just how easily fake yet realistic content can be created now in a matter of seconds. It’s a dangerous world we live in where fact and fiction blur together seamlessly. I have no idea how that can lead anywhere but to dark outcomes and unintended consequences.

I had some free time last night so I decided to get a live stream in. It had been over a month since I last did so. In the stream various things were covered including the new wheel from Inmotion that supposedly has a top end of over 90 MPH, which sounds insane. It was roughly a two hour stream which was enough for me. I don’t have the desire to stream or create content as much as I have in other time periods of my life.

I made the call to Comcast/Xfinity today to cancel any and all services I have with them, a company I have been a customer of for close to 20 years. They have been a company that has annoyed me regularly over the years with the games they play. Their favorite tactic was getting you signed onto a seemingly attractive plan that had a limited duration. When that duration expires your costs increase significantly. They play this game betting that most people won’t take the effort to do something about it.

For a long time I did just that, every time my plan expired I would get on the phone and get put onto another plan, usually having to sacrifice something or agree to add something to the service to do so like a landline or wireless phone that I did not need. Again the intent is to charge you full boat for these services when the promo expires.

Xfinity was also one of the worst offenders of bill creep. Every few months my bill would go up a few dollars. When I used to inquire about why the answer was always the same, new fees/taxes for this and that. It was maddening. They stopped being as agreeable when it came to negotiating a new promo for existing customers as well. The savings got to be so minimal I stopped trying and resigned myself to paying $230+ per month for the last couple years, which is ridiculous IMO.

One of the things I like about my Quantum Fiber arrangement is the price is $105 per month, period. Unless you change your service level that is what you pay, forever. It’s a refreshing change from bill creep and bait and switch pricing that Comcast loves so much. So in total I will be shaving almost $270 per month from my budget by saying goodbye to Comcast/Xfinity since I also had an Xfinity Mobile line I was paying for. Good riddance.

One of the things I was less than happy about when my Quantum Fiber install was complete was my line speeds were not what they should be although the wifi speeds were very fast. My speedtest.net numbers hung right around 1gb despite installing a 10GB card in my PC to give me a fast connection to the router. Just for the hell of it last night I reran the test and got much better numbers, my download and upload speeds were well above 2GB. It’s still not at the advertised 3GB speed but maybe as they continue rolling out the service that will improve. It’s still lightning fast, especially on the upload side which is great for someone that is posting internet content like I do.

Hey the federal government is still shutdown. It’s a very bigly shutdown. People are saying it’s the best shutdown ever.

Saturday morning I played pickleball for the fourth time during the week, having sessions Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday as well. I only played three games Saturday but they were all long games. I had a unique situation where my last game was played with another player named Shawn, spelled the way I do. What made it more interesting was it was a woman. We won our game. If cutting volleyball out of my routine means I can play pickleball four times a week that is a trade I am happy to make.

During the day I went outside and reconfigured my exterior RGB lights to talk to the new wifi network. As far as I know it was the last iOT devices in my home I had to touch. I was confident enough in my work that I turned off the Xfinity router. I noticed no ill effects from doing so. Now I need to see if I can shave down my Xfinity account to the point where I only have barebone access that allows me access to their streaming app while dropping the internet connectivity. If they want to overcharge me for that I will just kick them to the curb permanently.

I listened to the Eagles game against the Broncos. It looks like the curtain was pulled back a bit on the team. I think the 4-0 record assisted by some incredible good luck they have had up until this point has masked some of the issues the team has. They allowed the Broncos to score 18 unanswered points in the second half to come all the way back from a 17-3 deficit. There was some pretty terrible officiating in the game from what it sounded like but regardless, they should win that game, especially at home. Oh well, my emotional investment in the team is nowhere close to what it once was so the lingering effects of bad losses is much more minimal.

I saw pictures on Facebook of my 40th high school reunion which went down this weekend. It was a relatively small gathering of maybe 30-40 people. I have never attended a high school reunion yet the idea of 40 years passing since I graduated is crazy if I allow my mind to dwell on it. Some people I could still identify from the pictures while others I had no clue who they were thanks to the effects of four decades of time passing. Perusing the pictures made the time, energy and effort I have put into remaining active seem worth it.

The other thing that impacted me was a list of classmates that have passed away. There were 17 or 18 names on the list. I knew about handful of them but most of the names I had no idea about. It was yet another reminder that you better appreciate the here and now because tomorrow is never guaranteed.

Last night I put out my sole remaining Halloween decoration, the Spidey Pumpkin. By my calculations it has been with me for over a decade. Last year I don’t recall doing anything at all for Halloween, I wasn’t in a great headspace at that time. I mounted the “pumpkin” on a spare trashcan in the entryway so it would be more visible to passers by. I flipped my garage RGB lights to orange as well. Sometimes simple is better, at least nowadays it is for me. With my old house there was a lot more decorating going on both indoors and out.

Back then I had multiple inflatables spread out across the front yard. I had two or three containers of them. Inside the house there would be Halloween things scattered around the living space. Ironically even with all of this decorating I NEVER got trick or treaters visit my place. I viewed the decorations as something nice for others that drove by to look at. Now I would view that amount of effort as mainly a pain in the ass and little else.

Speaking of the old house, it is still for sale. My old neighbor has been giving me some updates as we are trying to figure out why it is back up for sale. It appears there is only one person living there currently so it seems some sort of significant life course altering event has gone down. If you have a spare 682K you too can experience what I did living there for 22 years. Ten chickens are included for that price.

After my weekend in Orlando I am looking for a more “normal” variety this go round. I have plenty of potential things to keep me busy from both the work and fun categories.

So I took my 3D printed pickleball paddle out to the courts yesterday with no clue how it would play or if it would last 5 minutes until breaking. After playing two complete games with the heavy paddle it appeared to be completely fine. I would not use the word “fine” to describe what it is like playing with the paddle although I did win one of the two games I played with it. It’s a heavy beast and there is no real “feel” at all. The paddle just plows through the ball. The extra weight definitely affected my hand speed in shots that require it. Still, it was kind of fun to play with a paddle I created and I may bring it along more often just to see how long it will last.

I have decided to not play volleyball this week. My enjoyment to aggravation formula has swung too far towards the wrong direction far as my body is just not responding well to playing. I have to play between 3-4 games before I even think about trying to jump. If I am forced to choose at this point in my life if I am going to continue to play pickleball or sand volleyball it is a very easy selection for me. Pickleball wins instantly.

There are a lot of people I like that I play volleyball with so it will be a bummer to not see them regularly but the physical reality of approaching 58 years old makes one make decisions that they would rather not have to. If I get to a point where my lower body feels solid once again maybe I’ll give it a go again but this last 365 days has been a physical struggle pretty much the entire time.

Last night I got a couple things done. When I was doing the work connecting to the new fiber internet last week I made a revelation that for unknown reasons did not strike me before. When I set up my PC at the new house I set it up in a way that hid the glass side which allowed visibility to the plethora of RGB elements inside the PC. All the fans, the water cooling and even the DIMM memory has RGB lights on it which look cool. I have no idea why I did not account for that when I set up the PC two years ago. I corrected it last night.

Doing this required me to unhook everything connected to the PC and reroute it to the other side of the desk. A simple task for “normal” computer users but I have a lot of shit as you can imagine. The work was tedious and slow but eventually I got everything moved and working once again. Having visibility into the RGB wonderland inside my PC after two years was appreciated.

I also got to do the finishing touches on my 3D printed pickleball paddle, adding a skin to the face, an edge guard and an overgrip for the handle. It looks somewhat odd but when you pick it up it becomes apparent this is not a normal paddle because of it’s weight. Tipping the scales at 12.5 ounces, this paddle is roughly 50% heavier than normal paddles. I plan to mess around with it a little bit during play today but just the weight alone would make the paddle not viable long term, not to mention the odds of breakage being high. Still, it’s one of the more interesting 3D projects I have undertaken.

Hey, the federal government is shutdown, awesome. I found out that government shutdowns were never a thing until Reagan’s terms. What a great idea, it ranks right up there with allowing corporations to create Super PACS. I SMH so much nowadays that I have a permanent neck deformity.