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I would be writing Mac OS X security software. That is, if I get the job.

A recruiter contacted me on LinkedIn quite a long time ago. I don't check LinkedIn very much at all. I apologized for my late response then asked her to email me. She and I spoke on the phone a few days ago, then I emailed her my resume this morning.

The manager responded just one hour after she submitted me. She said he was very enthusiastic.

She called to ask when I could interview on-site. I said "anytime". She must now ask the manager when he wants to see me, but she expects it will be late next week.

Happily I just bought a new dress shirt at Nordstrom Rack. It looks really sharp with a tie. I'm going to wear blue jeans with the dress shirt and tie; I used to have a suit, a really nice one that I enjoyed wearing, but I donated it to a thrift store because I got the impression that no one believed I was really a coder.

Real coders don't wear suits, see.

My shoes are thrashed. I'm hoping saddle soap and shoe polish will make it less apparent that I live in poverty.

My new apartment is working out well. Happily it is close to the best bus line in Vancouver. I can stay out late in Portland, then get home at one in the morning.

I've developed a problem with sleeping excessively. I'll be up for one day, sleep round the clock the next day, up for one day then round the clock again. In part it's because I have no commitments of any sort, in part it's because the bus doesn't run during the early morning.

If I go out after waking up, I have no problem staying awake, but if the bus isn't running there's no where to go. Eventually I go back to bed.

A friend is going to lend me a bicycle. That would enable me to go to a 24-hour restaurant if I wake up early in the morning.

I don't know yet but the kind of work I'd be doing, I expect they'd be cool with me working at night. It's uncommon that employers object to that, but sometimes they do.

I have grown weary of eating rice and beans.

Maybe it's just me, but I've been getting this vibe (it's strong here, but I'm feeling it elsewhere too) that there are folks who would like to see our entire society come crashing down.

Perhaps they think we can build something better, and like the Phoenix, emerge from the ashes, strong and vibrant.

And I guess I can see the attraction. Our government has been co-opted by the monied interests, our waking lives seem to be either being tracked by corporations or one government agency or another, the same monied interests seem determined to depress wages to keep us docile and hungry for the resources we need to keep ourselves and our families alive. And on and on. It's as if our society has been taken over by greedy, corrupt and amoral scumbags.

And to an extent, all of this is true. Which begs the question: What can/should we do about it?

There is one thing most of us can agree upon: That those elected to administer our governmental systems aren't acting in the best interests of the greater populace. Rather, they seem to be taking their marching orders from those with the resources to command their attention, their wallets and their votes.

There's quite a bit of agreement about that. The problem is that there are large groups of people on various sides of this question with different prescriptions for solving these problems:

Some think we need to strip the Federal government of most of its power and leave things to the states/counties/municipalities.

Some think we need to reform our existing political systems to reduce the influence of money on our elected officials (at all levels of government).

Some think it's just a lost cause and we need to just tear it all down and start over.

The biggest issue, IMHO, is that those same folks who are controlling our political systems for their own benefit use these differences of opinion to divide us. This keeps us from putting aside our differences so we can work together to create the kind of society of which we can all be proud.

Which brings me to the folks who want to tear our system down. With what shall we replace it?

Destroying one of the bulwarks of our society seems like we're creating change. But what are the consequences of doing so, intended or otherwise?

History (cf. all the infighting and problems with the Articles of Confederation) tells us that a strong central government was necessary back in the late 18th century, and (again, IMHO) is even more important today.

Could government be more distributed than it is? Possibly. Should there be stronger controls on how the central government treats its citizens? Almost certainly.

But if we destroy the "beast in DC" to punish those who have so egregiously abused it, who will pay the price when chaos ensues.

Just some semi-random thoughts.

This is a story that can only be found on NextBigFuture and wire services:

Super controversial Brilliant light Power aka blacklight power claims to be generating bursts of megawatt power and claim independent validation

Wikipedia article.

I discovered the SFWA website last year, and it was a treasure trove of useful information. I'd probably have given up trying to sell stories by now were it not for that site.

There's an article by Terry Bison, one of my current favorite SF writers, titled "60 rules for short SF." Another is by a slush reader (someone employed by publishers to read and pass stories they like up to a junior editor) has an article about what you need to get her to pass it to an editor. And a whole lot more, I still haven't read them all.

I discovered that almost all of the advice and rules they pontificated on were things I was already doing. I also discovered how damned hard it was, how nearly impossible to get a good story published, because of the sheer mass of competition. There are only a dozen or two SF magazines, and they get a thousand submissions a month each, and print six each.

That's some damned bad odds.

I also learned from SFWA that if your rejection slip comes from an editor rather than a computer, you came really close to being published. I've had three! I'm not going to stop writing because I love doing it so much, but if I hadn't ran across SFWA I'd have stopped submitting them a long time ago. I am going to cut down on submissions, because I want to finish and publish "Voyage to Earth and Other Stories" by some time next year, and most of the magazines are REALLY slow at getting through their slush piles. I may keep submitting to Asimov's and F&SF since they're quick, but then again if they buy it I'll have to replace it with another story for the book.

Then late last week I was reading an article on SFWA and discovered that Stephen King had written a book about writing, called "On Writing".

King is one of the very best writers of our time, IMO. I don't like his genre so haven't read much of his stuff, but what I did read was brilliant and beautifully written, sucking you into the story and not letting go (and I don't want to be sucked into horror, I hate horror movies and books are even more intense than movies). So I opened a new tab on the browser and checked to see if Lincoln Library had a copy.

It did, even in e-book form so I wouldn't even have to go up there. Then I made another discovery -- my library card expired last month. That was Friday night, so Saturday morning I went to the library. I renewed my card, checked out the hardcover copy of the book, and started reading. I finished it last night; I'd been alternating between reading King's book, SFWA articles, Google News, the Illinois Times, and working on "The Pirate".

Another discovery: this book would be a great read even if I wasn't looking to improve my writing. It gives insights to a reader who isn't a writer on the connection between reader and writer. Kind of why you like to read what you like to read.

The first third of the book is an autobiography of sorts, and it starts with a child's pain (it IS Stephen King, after all). But from the time he reached high school until he gets to the writing part (even though the part before the writing part was about writing, too) it was hilarious. I don't nean it made me grin and maybe chuckle, I mean I was laughing so hard I had to put the book down to wipe the tears off my face. Well, I did have some pretty good pot. Anyway, If you're a reader, do yourself a favor and read it. If you live in Springfield and have a library card and a smartphone you can read it for free without even going to the library. In other cities as well, I checked last night and Belleville residents can access e-books from that library.

So this morning I decided that I wanted a copy of my own sitting on my bookshelf, because this isn't a "read once and throw it away" book. So after two frustrating hours trying to get a hardcover copy I'm flustered and frustrated and annoyed. Damn publishers and bookstores!

First, publishers. The paperback and e-book was released 3 years ago, but the hardcover is out of print. What, did Rority kidnap me last night and take me back to 1970 when books were written on typewriters and printed on presses designed a century earlier? Because now that we have computers and the internet, there should be no such thing as "out of print". Now there's "print on demand", so why should any book ever be out of print?

It's stupid.

Amazon said simply "out of stock" so I tried B&N. Their offline stores are excellent; large, with friendly, helpful staff.

Their website is a total clusterfuck to buy from. They should fire the incompetent webmaster who is enamored of flashy bells and whistles and hire someone who can design a usable interface.

First those stupid mouseover menus that open and cover whet you're trying to read. If you're doing that on your website, STOP IT!! Pissing off a prospective customer is brain-dead stupid. Where do companies find all these educated idiots?

So after navigating their awful interface to actually get to the book, there are three buttons: paperback, $11.95; e-book, $11.95; hardcover, $19.06. So once again there's stupidity, or rather, stupid greed. There is absolutely no reason whatever why an ebook should cost as much as a paperback. No paper to buy, no ink to buy, no pages to bind, nothing to ship, nothing to warehouse. An e-book costs almost NOTHING to produce and deliver once it's written.

The button for the hardcover didn't work. No feedback, it just didn't work, which is how the morons who designed the site set it up to work when an item was out of print.

By now I was annoyed and frustrated. I finally found a used copy there, and went to order it. They wanted to use an old credit card I no longer have, and it was more frustrating trying to get the damned thing to change cards.

I finally managed that, entered all the info, and it told me there was a problem with the card. IT'S A VALID CARD, DAMMIT! So I say "screw it" and call the local store. It's out of print, so they give me the 800 number.

After almost five minutes on hold a rude woman who keeps trying to interrupt me answers. I finally hung up on her, saying "fuck it, maybe one of the used stores in town has a copy."

I'll take it back to the library today. They sell books, maybe they'll have a copy for sale.

But I learned a lot from this book, a whole lot. But what he says you should do I already do, so maybe my stuff... nah.

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Juno Makes It to Jupiter Orbit (submitted to Breaking News)

"Welcome to Jupiter!" a mission commentator announced just after the burn ended, eliciting a second round of cheers and then, a few moments later, a standing ovation.

      "It feels great -- this is phenomenal!" Geoff Yoder, acting Associate Administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, said when the celebration died down.

      Space.com reports that:

NASA's robotic Juno probe began circling the solar system's largest planet tonight (July 4), ending a nearly five-year journey through deep space and becoming the first spacecraft to enter Jupiter orbit since NASA's Galileo mission did so in 1995.

      The milestone came late tonight, as Juno fired its main engine in a crucial 35-minute burn that slowed the probe down enough to be captured by Jupiter's powerful gravity. That burn started at 11:18 p.m. EDT (0318 GMT Tuesday) and ended on schedule at 11:53 p.m. [Photos: NASA's Juno Mission to Jupiter]

Former E.U. science adviser Anne Glover on U.K. research after Brexit (Submitted June 29, rejected July 10)

      Anne Glover, is a Scottish biologist and academic. She was Professor of Molecular biology and Cell biology at the University of Aberdeen before being named Vice Principal for External Affairs and Dean for Europe. She also served as Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission from 2012 to 2014 [Wikipedia].

      So, she knows her way around science and EU...and the politics of the EU. (With a tiny budget and an ill-defined mandate while she was the Chief Scientific Advisor, she was often frustrated in her attempts to get politicians to acknowledge scientific evidence when it went against positions they held.)

      In an earlier SN article about science in the UK after Brexit, she was quoted: "Our success in research and resulting impact relies heavily on our ability to be a full part of European Union science arrangements and it is hard to see how they can be maintained upon a Brexit."

      Science has published a Q&A with Anne Glover about UK research after Brexit in which she expands upon that thought. Some quotes from that article

It's very early days, I know, but it's hard for me to see under the current climate, whatever government there will be in the U.K., that they would be able to make up that shortfall [in lost EU research funding]. It's not my natural state, but I'm very pessimistic about how we will maintain scientific excellence. Just even getting the best minds from around the world to work with us, whether that's by attracting them to come here or the ability for us to go elsewhere and to work in partnership with people. There will be barriers to this.

      [...]

        I think it is very likely that Scotland will have a second vote on independence. By staying in the U.K. we are now being pulled out of the E.U. against our will. The impact of the research we do in Scotland relative to our [gross domestic product] is No. 1 in the world. So we are a science nation and we rely on the best in the world coming to work here and our ability to go elsewhere. I hope that we can have a vote on independence before there is a Brexit agreement, so that we can somehow remain an E.U. member and don't have to reapply. I feel it would be better to be part of the E.U. than to be part of what in my mind seems like a little England.

The Troubles and Brexit

      The Troubles...not a rock group from the 60s, but darn close. Depending on your age group, you may not even have heard of the Troubles. Some of us remember that time well. Bombings, murders, political/ethnic/sectarian conflict, really good protest songs. Children being shipped to the US so that they could experience something relatively like peace..

      Wikipedia quotes Brendan O'Leary and John McGarry, "...nearly two per cent of the population of Northern Ireland have been killed or injured through political violence [...] If the equivalent ratio of victims to population had been produced in Great Britain in the same period some 100,000 people would have died, and if a similar level of political violence had taken place, the number of fatalities in the USA would have been over 500,000."

Vox picks up the story:

Those tensions settled down after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, and the border is now porous again. Today, people travel freely between Ireland and Northern Ireland, signage is scarce, and it's often tough to tell where the border even sits. The open border is a tangible sign of the end of the Troubles, and it's a way for northern Catholics to maintain ties to the country they identify with.

      So now comes Brexit. One of the main arguments for leaving the EU was that Britain should be able to control its own borders. Under EU law, the UK currently has to allow unlimited migration from France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, or any other EU member. During the eurozone crisis, Britain has seen a sharp rise in immigration from less affluent countries. Lots of British people don't like this.

      By leaving, the UK could legally restrict those flows. But, of course, any migrants in the EU could all travel freely to Ireland and hop over to the UK via Northern Ireland if they wanted. So if Britain really wants control of its borders, it will have to tighten up the Irish border.

      The catch is that no one knows what this would entail. Peter Moloney, a visiting assistant professor of history at Boston College who studies EU governance, explains that the details will have to be negotiated between the EU and UK. But as an example, other borders between the EU and non-EU countries involve checkpoints, traffic stops, fences, and so on.

      Practically speaking, that could prove difficult in Northern Ireland. The 310-mile border with the Republic of Ireland is poorly marked and often crosses existing farms and properties. Plus, there are tons of small country roads and byways throughout the region. Do they all get checkpoints? On top of that, many people live and work on both sides of the border. A recent tweetstorm by Seamas O'Reilly illustrated this well:

9. A border is bad for practical reasons; people like my sister live in Donegal and work in Derry, and thousands more vice versa...
        - Shocko (@shockproofbeats) June 27, 2016

      Politically, things get even dicier. The 1998 Good Friday Agreement created a delicate power-sharing structure within Northern Ireland that was marked by compromise and ambiguity. The Protestants implicitly conceded that it was reasonable for Catholics to pursue closer ties with Ireland, while the Catholics implicitly conceded that formal unification with Ireland was unlikely. The free flow of people and trade enabled by the EU allowed Catholics to pursue those ties without requiring actual unification.

      Creating a hard border could reignite those tensions. "If you're setting up a border again, it brings back that 'us-versus-them' mentality and the echoes of confrontation, which has been broken down a lot in the past generation," says Moloney.

      Even more concretely: Under the Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland can technically hold a referendum on whether to gain independence from the UK and unite with Ireland. So long as an open border existed, this was never a real issue; polling last year suggested that only 14 percent of Northern Irish people wanted to unify with the Republic of Ireland, with even Catholics preferring to stay in the UK.

      But now? "The whole thing is uncertain," Moloney adds. "And it's a totally self-inflicted wound."

      Fintan O'Toole put it much more bluntly in the Irish Times: "English nationalists have placed a bomb under peace process." And here's Pauline McCallion in Vox: "I live in Northern Ireland, and I'm scared Brexit will bring back the chaos of my childhood."

New version of Ipe, the extensible drawing editor

      If you use LaTeX, you may be one of us who rely on Otfried Cheong's Ipe drawing tool to create figures for documents. Last week, Otfried released Ipe version 7.2.4 which adds several new features and fixes many bugs.

      Looking through the change-log since the version currently in heavy use on my machines (7.1.6) there are many additions/changes/fixes. Time to upgrade!

Mississippi Burning

      If you're involved in, or at least aware of, the politics of race in the US, the last few months have been kind of a headbutt. (Jamar Clark's death in Minneapolis, Freddie Gray's death in Baltimore, to name a few such situations.)

      During the focused news coverage about the Freddie Gray case this week, another important case was semi-quietly pushed out the door.

            In 1963, Bob Moses and others conceived of the idea of recruiting hundreds of students to join the civil rights movement in Mississippi in hopes of breaking down barriers that kept African Americans from voting and getting the education they needed.

            Some movement leaders opposed the idea, but when Louis Allen -- a witness to a civil rights worker's killing -- was gunned down on Jan. 31, 1964, Moses pushed the point and won the day.

            The first day of that Freedom Summer began with the disappearances of three civil rights workers, James Chaney, Andy Goodman and Michael Schwerner. (From a 2014 article by the Clarion Register)
     

      Wikipedia continues the story:

            The three young men were chased in their car, abducted, shot at close range, and buried in an earthen dam by members of the local White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the Neshoba County Sheriff's Office, and the Philadelphia, Mississippi Police Department.

            Initially classed and investigated as a missing persons case, the civil rights workers' car was not found until three days after their disappearance,[1] and their bodies discovered 44 days after their abduction and murder. The disappearance and feared murders of these activists sparked national outrage and a massive federal investigation led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and filed as Mississippi Burning (MIBURN), which was used as the name of a 1988 film loosely based on the FBI investigation. After the state government refused to prosecute, the United States federal government charged 18 individuals with civil rights violations in 1967. Seven were convicted and received relatively minor sentences for their actions.

            41 years after the murders took place, one perpetrator, Edgar Ray Killen, was charged by the state of Mississippi for his part in the crimes. He was convicted of three counts of manslaughter in 2005 and is serving a 60 year sentence.
     

      This past Monday (June 20), after 52 years of what many consider to be lukewarm effort, the case was officially closed. From the LA Times article:

            The killings are one of 113 pre-1970 cold cases of racially motivated murders the FBI doubled down on since the passage of a 2008 unsolved crimes law named after teenage lynching victim Emmett Till. According to a 2015 Justice Department report, 105 of such cases have been closed, with "very few" prosecutions.

            Yet "this is one of the biggest cases of [the] century," and among those cold cases, said Cliff Johnson, director of the MacArthur Justice Center at the University of Mississippi School of Law. In a time when minority voting rights are again being fiercely debated among activists and lawmakers, the Mississippi Burning killings are all the more relevant, he said.

            "You'll find two groups of people in Mississippi. There are those who were alive at the time and have acute knowledge of these horrific acts. People that recognize that justice was never done," Johnson said. "Then you have a second group of people from whom this is something from a history book."
     

      David Goodman, brother of the slain Andy Goodman, concludes the LA Times article by saying:

"My brother wasn't murdered because he was white or because he was an activist. He was murdered because, to the people that murdered him, black lives didn't matter. To a lot of people, they still don't matter," he said. The case is "an opportunity for us to recognize history in the context of the present moment. Nothing is closed about racism in America."

      Googling around, it appears that Minnesota Public Radio didn't let this slip away unnoticed. Their rebroadcast of the compelling documentary "O Freedom Over Me" is an appropriate reminder that even the darkest clouds have a hint of silver somewhere inside them.