Weekly Report: October 16, 2022
Observations
When I was in my mid-20s, an older cousin of mine decided he had to own an expensive sports car at least once in his life. When his shiny new Mercedes SLK AMG convertible arrived, I eagerly accepted his invitation to take a ride with him. It was a thrilling experience. The monthly lease payments on the thing were more than my salary at the time, and there were two things I remember most about that experience. The first was the seats, which were lowset and snug. As the engine revved to life, the seat belts automatically tightened — a wholly unexpected, but gentle and comforting embrace that signaled: this was something special. The second was that, as we pulled up to our first traffic light with the top down, it started to rain. Then the lights turned green. The hard-top roof only took about 15 seconds to close, but as we sat there immobile, waiting for salvation, we could only pretend not to notice everyone around smirking at us with a mix of withering ridicule and annoyance.
I was recently reminded of that experience in a surprising way. My one year old loves to give hugs, but only to his mother. He gives me no such affection. Occasionally, I need to take him from his mother’s arms. Upon seeing me approach with outstretched hands, he will yelp and bury himself into her, arms wrapped tightly around her shoulders. Susanne describes the experience as “heavenly”. My experience is different. Once the limpet is pried away from his lifegiver, I am instead left with a screaming, writhing infant who is doing his best to kick me.
So I was surprised earlier this week when I was out walking with him in the neighborhood (or rather carrying him, since it is impossible to get anywhere when every rock, flower and poisonous berry by the sidewalk warrants an inspection). Normally outward facing, he suddenly turned around, buried his face in my shoulder, and squeezed tight.
It didn’t take me long to realize that this was because we were approaching a house with a lawn full of particularly creepy animatronic halloween decorations, and he did not like it. As we passed a zombie struggling to take a stake out of its chest, he squeezed even tighter in silent terror.
For him, it was a death grip. But for me it was, as advertised, heavenly.
Taking advantage of the situation, I walked back and forth between the zombie and a skeleton, with Alex’s hug tightening in inverse proportion to our distance from the undead.
After I had my fill of manufactured affection at the expense of my child’s mental health, we continued our walk. A few feet later, I passed a skeletal jack-in-the-box, which suddenly leapt 8 feet into the air and towered over the sidewalk. I screamed like a baby. Alex giggled, and I could only pretend to laugh in response to the smirks of passers-by.
Further Observations
- A friend I was texting with believes the Ukraine war will drag on for a long, long time. His reasoning was that it’s the scenario that’s most in the United States’ interest: while it continues, it saps Russia economically and militarily, weakens Europe relative to the U.S., and strengthens NATO (of which the U.S. is the most influential member)… and all at the relatively low cost of shipping materiel to Ukraine. As long as tactical nukes don’t make an appearance, I can’t say I disagree with him. Just because it’s a cynical take doesn’t mean it’s wrong.
- Voting by mail is so convenient. My vote-by-mail pack came in this week, and I already mailed it in. No need to line up at a polling booth on a Tuesday!
- The inflation numbers came out on Thursday and they are still high (8.2% y/y versus 8.3% y/y for last month).
- Kwasi Kwarteng was fired as the UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer after 39 days on the job. That is only the second shortest tenure for that position in modern UK history. The dubious honor of the shortest tenure belongs to Iain Macleod, who died in office only after 31 days.
Articles
- The markets have taken back control: so much for Truss’s Brexit delusion of sovereignty (The Guardian)
- How does the Russo-Ukrainian War end? (Thinking About…)
- PayPal won’t fine users for misinformation posts, policy posted “in error” (Axios)
- I Listened to 1000 B2B SaaS Sales Calls (via Hacker News)
- Comic Book Dealers Are Making Six-Figure Sales at New York’s Comic Con, Thanks to the Boom in Film and TV Adaptations (Artnet News)
- Swatch’s space-themed watches are making up for pandemic stumbles (Quartz)
- The Erfurt Latrine Disaster: When 60-100 Nobles Drowned In A Pit Of Human Excrement (IFL Science)
- Amicus Curiae brief from The Onion in the Supreme Court case Novak v. City of Parma, Ohio (SCOTUS)
This is a work of art. - Elon Musk Has The World’s Strangest Social Calendar (New York Times)
Books
- Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood (Michael Lewis)
A laugh-out-loud funny, all-too-true compilation of personal anecdotes on fatherhood by my favorite non-fiction author that makes me feel just a little better about my own questionable parenting skills.
Charts, Images & Videos
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