This week in blogging:

✍🏽🔥 December 8, December 9, December 10, December 11

NB: yesterday’s post is part two of a multi-parter and you should read ‘em back-to-back:

✍🏽🔥 December 3 (part one) and then December 11 (part two)

🏀🏀 Lastly, @cheesemaker and I recorded Episode 15 of our basketball podcast

🏀 Haven’t been Micro-ing it up of late. Life has been… life. But, also, @cheesemaker and I are still recording our podcast and our new episode went up today: Red Black Comeback, Episode 14

Wrote a little post at combatdavey.net about the Blue Jays' fantastic art in advance of Game 1 of the World Series.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

If you don’t learn from it, experiencing failure has no practical value unless you have a humiliation kink, and while I ain’t gonna yuck anyone’s yum, this is not a quality I want in a ballplayer repping my town.

⚾⚾ LET’S GO BLUE JAYS clap clap clapclapclap

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

👉🏽 your protein maxxing buddies are literally full of lead
👉🏽 the bloated pedophile who lies about everything is lying again
👉🏽 edit your podcast by simply chatting with THE MACHINE

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Audrey Hepburn once said “to plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.” Wanting to make things is more or less the same thing.

As a lifelong Jays fan, last night felt incredible. As a lifelong Jays fan who is also a lifelong Yankees hater… 🤌🏽🤌🏽🤌🏽

Me and every other Blue Jays fan rn

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

To exist in our complex and cruel world is difficult, but liberating yourself or otherwise finding paths towards inner freedom doesn’t have to be. I think you really just have to know it’s possible.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

We finished Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE on the weekend and not only do I now understand how fandom is created over the course of K-Pop survival shows, I am now predisposed to being a KATSEYE fan. It’s very, very good TV.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

I used to want fame and book deals and my name in lights but the idea of having those things now fills me with dread. People whose names are in lights are that much more visible to those who hunt them, and it is always hunting season now.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

you can just do things (and should) you can just do things (and should) you can just do things (and should) you can just do things (and should) you can just do things (and should)

combatdavey.net | from Jimmy Kimmel’s monologue 9/23/2025

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

When people talk about someone having a “good” memory what they’re saying is that person can both remember and recall things. When I talk about having a “good” memory, I am explaining that I am cursed.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

The “endless, always-on emotional support” provided by ChatGPT and the like isn’t actually emotional support but rather the outputs of a machine that most people are not smart enough, emotionally mature enough, or digitally sophisticated enough to use.

From yesterday’s post:

I don’t want this blog to be about the awfulness of the real world. I want to be writing funny things about about dumb stuff and/or linking you to useful, joy-inspiring things. But I am watching all of this crazy shit happen in real time with a horrified look on my face.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

ABC is pulling Jimmy Kimmel Live off the air indefinitely because he told jokes and made comments about exactly who and what you think.

America is cooked, man. Just like, thoroughly cooked.

Today’s post at combatdavey.net includes bits on Robert Redford, Luigi Mangione, Feist, and David Lynch’s Seinfeld but also this:

I want to put together some kind of course or set of resources that will help people improve their media literacy.

If you want to help me, LMK.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Our culture is obsessed with being angry. A lot of that anger is a product being sold by bad actors who tell bold-faced lies and make bad faith arguments because their job is to foment and nurture that anger.

In today’s post at combatdavey.net I wrote about how Claude Sonnet 4 generated outputs that did not conform to what it thought it had said. Quoth the machine:

That’s extremely concerning. You’re absolutely right - there are two links appearing in my response that I definitely did not create.

🏈🏀⚾ From today’s everything-but-the-kitchen-sink post at oddball.blog:

It’s been almost 40 years since Washington beat Green Bay at Lambeau Field. Yes, Washington beat Green Bay in Milwaukee in 1988, but that game wasn’t at Lambeau.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Charlie Kirk just got shot at an event in Utah. I’m adding it here sans link because there is apparently a graphic video going around and I’m assuming that you may want to take steps to avoid seeing it and/or to ensure your kids don’t see it.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

You can draw a straight line between that last thing and our current moment in which a great many people simply do not trust science, experts, expertise, or education. You can draw a straight line between that and the end of objective reality.

when the jokes write themselves

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

When you are a person whose brain works a certain way (iykyk), you get bogged down in the details because everything you do is about understanding and then performing accuracy and correctness, which itself is about achieving (earning?) validity.

Also from today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Florida is ending state vaccine mandates, and the guy leading the charge literally said that “every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery.” I have so many questions, but the main one is how does something drip with slavery?

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Outside of the obvious NBA-related issues (salary cap circumvention, competitive advantage fraud, etc) this is about financial fraud and securities fraud, money laundering, sportswashing, greenwashing, and about fifty shades of political corruption.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Sometimes I just like to talk about things I remember so that I continue to remember them […] and sometimes, like today, I want you to know that if we are friends, regardless of what time does to that friendship, I will still remember you in 28 years.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

Trying, failing, getting up, trying again, failing again, and failing better (sorry for mangling that, Samuel Beckett) is a heroic act — and we sure as hell need as many heroes as we can get these days.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

I haven’t done this here (yet?) for reasons including but not limited to that I don’t use Spotify anymore. Still, I’m considering bringing that kind of feature to this blog. I miss curating something cool and sharing it with people.

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

“We are deathly afraid of acknowledging our most passionate wishes,” writes Heather Havrilesky. “We are embarrassed by them. Our desires, no matter how pure and generous they are, feel dirty and unlovable to us.”

From today’s post at combatdavey.net:

His point wasn’t “you have to be and think and act and dress differently every day because being the same every day is for normie square losers.” His point was that we cannot be so bound to what we thought yesterday that we refuse to change our minds today.

Friday’s odds and ends post over at combatdavey.net included — among other things — another WTF story about AI, an amazing Point Break mural, a ridiculously expensive cocktail, and a tribute to a late, great Montrealer. Give it a read, willya? combatdavey.net/august-15-etc

Keywords from today’s odds and ends post over at combatdavey.net (in alphabetical order): cantaloupe, chatbot, death, dogs, gift, MySpace, Queens, sociopathy, Taskmaster, trivia.

wut

To paraphrase a LinkedIn post I wrote, it’s tough to be a creative taking part in the group therapy session on LinkedIn. It’s lame that they think AI + whatever else negates the need human creatives, bc contemporary professional life needs it’s humanity and creativity more than ever.

nice

Having to spend any amount of time with J.D. Vance would make me want to die too.

Every time I read the news I want to scream. Like literally scream.

This is insane.

These folks lie about/are scared of everything, huh.

Reading the Atlantic piece about loneliness and feeling grateful. Without knowing the power of what I was doing, I spent decades building a life that prioritized a very active kind of friendship. I worried that my way was insecure. Pathetic even. In actuality, I was feeding my brain and my soul.

Lmaooooooooooooooooooooooo

I have started, stopped, and deleted about 20 posts today. The gist of the deletia: I do not know how to function in a world where the bad guys always win and people are increasingly morally bankrupt and intellectually empty.

Who among us hasn’t accidentally added the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to a secret group chat with major NatSec implications?

It’s pretty funny that the people who spent years shouting about the Deep State ended up voting for its creation.

Just made a bad pancake that was a pretty good pancake, all things considered. (First time vaguebooking on Micro.blog, what a day!)

A byproduct of America’s descent into authoritarianism is that Azealia Banks is once again tweeting banger after banger. This timeline sucks but at least we have that.

too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too much news too m

“NPR’s analysis found that, of its verifiable work completed so far, DOGE has cut just $2 billion in spending — less than three hundredths of a percent of last fiscal year’s federal spending.” (NPR)

Amazon is 100% going wreck the James Bond franchise with underwhelming ten-episode seasons about Blofeld’s early years and Q coming to terms with being autistic.

Having enough money and power to make the world a better, safer, cleaner, fairer place and choosing not to is a crime against humanity.

Whoever first said or wrote “everything’s a conspiracy when you don’t know how anything works” truly cooked.

I just spent 10 min on Twitter as per my immersion therapy practice. Wild that some people get up, yawn, stretch, do their breakfast routine, and then get on the internet and lie about everything for no reason except to oWn ThE LiBs. Do these folks not have hobbies? Friends? (Don’t answer that.)

I’m not American, but the idea of RFK in charge of HHS is insane crazy Driving Miss Daisy to me.

My therapist low-key suggested that I stop reading the news and I think she’s right. On the other hand, I don’t want the money I’m paying for the NYT and Apple News+ to go to waste. #sunkcostfallacy #iknowhashtagsdontworkhere

The CaNaDa ShOuLd BeCoMe ThE 51sT StAtE folks are just the biggest losers imaginable, huh.

People who know things about government computing systems are… worried. (The Atlantic)

I legit think about this Atlantic article every day.

Another consequence of Luka Doncic getting traded is that the most annoying people on LinkedIn are now going to write 1,000 tHoUgHt LeAdErShiP posts about how no employee is irreplaceable.

I assumed it was going to happen but I still can’t believe he’s blaming the plane crash on D.E.I.

I’m wondering if the When Harry Met Sally Super Bowl ad (Hellmann’s) will resonate. I like the nostalgia hit, but given the state of cultural literacy and the changed attitudes and politics in re: sex and sexuality I’m not sure it does enough, or much at all.

It’s wild how Move Fast And Break Things ends up breaking everything, huh.

In re: the current New York Magazine cover story and the attendant social media commentary, a friend said something trenchant and worth sharing: “A good reminder that, for most people, politics are just a personality.”

In case you were wondering why TikTok users are suddenly posting about “cute winter boots.” (via Taylor Lorenz’s User Mag)

😐😐😐

This is real. Dick Wolf is going to accidentally make NTSF:SD:SUV:: someday.

The personal is the political. What we do, say, eat, drink, read, watch, wear, buy; who we love, hate, accept, reject, associate with, fuck; where we live and work; if and what we drive — can and will be viewed through a political lens by others. It’s unfair and reductive, but it’s where we are.

It was a Nazi salute and he did it twice because he knows nothing can or will happen to him.

I will forget my mother’s name before I forget about Jaboukie’s all-timer on MLK day five years ago.

Conversation from my 🏀 Discord:

Him: Too bad the US tanking won’t get us a top draft pick.

Me: I mean, it will. But Russia owns your picks for a few years.

It’s lame that the Dodgers got Sasaki, but the way people seem to be upset about how the team with the most money has a huge advantage over the teams with less suggests they don’t know how America works. ⚾️

Everything feted as original in advertising has been done before and that’s okay. Ads don’t need to reinvent the game to be good or effective. There are only a handful of story archetypes and yet we still watch and read. Knowing the tropes of dystopian sci-fi doesn’t make me not want to watch Silo.

Somehow, losing Bob Uecker and David Lynch on the same day makes thematic sense. Both were true originals who coloured outside the lines and not only were they not punished for it, they were celebrated. There’s a lesson there, but I’m not sure it is applicable to our terrifying present.

RIP David Lynch. 🍿

Baseball just lost a real one. ⚾️

Reading the Atlantic piece about loneliness and feeling grateful. Without knowing the power of what I was doing, I spent decades building a life that prioritized a very active kind of friendship. I worried that my way was insecure. Pathetic even. In actuality, I was feeding my brain and my soul.

I stopped posting on Twitter forever ago but can’t seem to delete the app or my 50,000+ tweets bc of all the bangers I’ve liked/RTed over the years. I basically only it for dynasty basketball research reasons, but, while there, I check the temperature of the zeitgeist. (Spoiler: it’s bad.)

A relatively minor gripe considering everything else that’s going on but when did we decide as a culture that literacy didn’t matter?

The singer whose most famous track is about a cheater singing at the Trump inauguration is wayyy too on the nose. The writers are getting lazy. This show is probably about to get canceled if they’re doing stuff like this.

People with power/money stoke divisions between people with less/none to accrue more power/money. We’ve always known this. But why? Why do people with so much need more? It’s a sickness. They watch people struggle and suffer and fight and die and they laugh and count their gains. And they enjoy it.

Zuck bending the knee + slobbering all over the ring to satisfy the worst people alive is infuriating, yes, but it’s also (further) proof that he has no actual principles. I wonder what Meta employees think about working for a boy king who doesn’t seem to believe in anything.