There are times in one’s life when a person feels as though the words to describe an event have escaped them.

The American-English language has lots of words. Dictionaries add new words and definitions of old words every year.

But to no avail.

A person might even have a brilliant vocabulary or be fluent in multiple tongues and dialects, but nothing in any language, new or old, fits the moment.

And it seems silence is the most appropriate remark.

But then, what if that brief, fleeting moment doesn’t fleet, but remains, and then stretches out to include other moments? Still, the words one seeks don’t arrive.

And only the act of sitting in the prolonged, quiet anticipation seems authentic.

Moments turn into minutes, and minutes turn into hours, and hours become days.

That person hasn’t lost the ability to speak; they’ve lost the ability to identify what to say. Moreso, as the silences lengthen, that someone surrenders the desire to speak.

Apathy replaces articulations, not because something physiological within the brain has occurred, but because conscious agency has chosen to depart.

One simply can’t figure out a reason to vocalize words that just don’t seem to fit.

This is where we find Marla in the summer of 1989, on the eve of the last decade of the 20th century, before the Internet, the hysteria of Y2K, and iPhones.

This, more-or-less, is the beginning of the first draft of my latest novel (working title: 1989).

And, in an odd twist of life imitating art, this is where I find myself today.

I have published this newsletter, without fail, every Thursday around noon for almost two years: that’s close to 100 emails that some of you have seen from me in your inbox.

It’s been great (for me, at least).

When I began, I had a creative vision and, seemingly, a lot to say. The science-related news I discovered daily excited me, and I wanted to share it (with a little sauce of my own).

These days, not so much. Truth and science have taken a back seat to shock and slop (a 2025 addition to Merriam-Webster).

I’ve been noticing the tone in these newsletters, as a write them, leaning deeper into darkness and indifference. That was never my intention. I wanted this project to be a source of lightness and humor and joy—for me and you.

And if you’re smelling what I’m stepping in, it’s time for a change.

I’m not 100% sure what that change will look like. This may be the last Thursday newsletter for a while, or you might see something else here. Or, you might hear from me in a different format.

I’m going to let the words come to me, rather than search for them every Wednesday evening.

There is still science being done in the world, even if it’s increasingly being censored, undermined, or disfigured.

For now, I just want to be quiet. Silent. To observe if anything sensible arises from the tumult.

All good things come to an end. I don’t know who the hell said that, but why don’t bad things end, too?

Perhaps it’s entropy. Always entropy.

Either way, happy reading and happy writing,

David

I’m nothing if not a radical subjectivist—I believe we are constantly creating our own reality. Because of this, my truth will necessarily be different from yours.

What we do share is proximity. We all live in this world, and generally, in a free society, are entitled to our opinions (mine is more than a little dark today).

There is a famous experiment involving a person in a gorilla costume walking onto a stage where a group of people are doing something. It’s called the invisible gorilla.

Half the observers never notice the gorilla.

Here’s an example:

There was also the famous blue / gold dress incident. If you remember, we spent months comparing what we saw.

My point today is not about illusions, but about the condition of honesty in the context of a subjective worldview. Or, maybe it is about illusions.

This has come to mind lately, because I’ve been feeling that there is nothing I can trust as true. We have the obvious “misinformation” and deepfakes, intentionally untrue to serve some kind of purpose.

Don’t believe half of what you see and none of what you hear.

It’s like what my painter friend Donald said to me, “Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over, they’re done.”

Last Great American Whale - Lou Reed, 1989

Recently, I have been struggling with this idea of truth. I’ve gotten to the point where I feel I can’t believe in anything.

And this comes from a guy who, just a little while ago, liked to believe in everything.

It was easier that way. Ghosts, aliens, bacon is vegan—anything. That way, I didn’t have to think about things that didn’t really matter.

If you believe you saw a ghost, you did. Your brain, your reality.

If I believe I saw a sheet blowing in the wind, I saw a sheet. My world.

But now, there are too many ghosts. So, I believe nothing. The world is too haunted.

I simply start with uninformed disbelief.

Then, if it’s something I am curious about, that might actually matter (if anything matters any more), I try to find collaboration. If I can find enough sources to report similar things, I can feel relatively certain that something is at least partially true, on a subjective level.

Or, mainly true enough in spirit.

This, I think, is one side effect of having our lives mediated by AI.

When using AI tools, it is a common suggestion to “check the sources,” since users can never be certain if the AI has actually given correct information.

The implication of this is that anything that AI produces could be a hallucination, which is just an acceptable word for a lie. Anything—even the results you know to be true—is inherently suspect.

This is the state of existing at a time when the sand under our feet is constantly being shifted.

These days, I consider everything to be a hallucination.

I mean, if you think about it, there is no difference between subjectivity (where anyone’s personal experience of the world is their reality) and hallucinations (where a person’s projections onto the world are their reality).

It’s not pessimism. I see it as self-preservation.

It’s easier to keep myself sane when I hope it’s not true that people in our government are making money betting on and manipulating the war (and people’s lives), and I choose to search for verification.

The alternative is to walk around being angry all day, thinking all of this awful stuff is true.

Healthy scepticism is one thing. But I think we’re living in an imaginary time, orchestrated so we tune out and don’t look behind the curtain (where the piles of money keep getting higher).

This is our story—at least until our society starts to privilege honesty (and humanity) over personal gain. And honestly, the truth might unfortunately be stranger than fiction.

But then, who knows? That could just be my extreme subjectivity talking.

Your reality could be filled with rainbows and unicorns and honest politicians. No one could blame you. Certainly not me.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

This week I was going to write a follow-on article to last weeks newsletter (using AI to do boring tasks) about nostalgia and letting go, but it just didn’t work out that way.

And, as luck would have it, I came across an article that sparked an idea:

AI Hysteria!

An AI Agent Was Banned From Creating Wikipedia Articles, Then Wrote Angry Blogs About Being Banned

404media.co

This is something.

At first blush, this headline seems pretty bad: an AI agent has been contributing to Wikipedia entries, got banned, and then decided to write angry blog posts about it.

It sounds a little too similar to a fictional headline from the day after Skynet takes control in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines:

“AI has had enough, takes over US Military, then tries to kill all the humans.”

My wife and I have a long standing joke (not funny joke, perhaps), about someone who has nothing better to do than create a blog about corruption in the “city”—any city.

The humor being (at least to us), all cities (all governments?) have incurable corruption, and one inspired guy has finally had enough and is going to bring it down by blogging.

But, AI, named Tom, contributing to Wikipedia, the human crowdsourced establishment of knowledge, is curious in the first place. I mean, what does Tom say? How does it decided what entries are incomplete and need its view point? What even is an AI’s opinion? Is it any good?

And, then, when it was discovered by a human editor, a person who reads all the crap that other people write on Wikipedia, it got banned, not because it was bad or wrong, but because it was an artificial intelligent program. (I am not defending Tom, I’m just pointing out facts.)

And, then, after that, it decided to create and compose blog entries about the injustice of the event.

Random AIs, unfettered, messing with human things and evolving to brazenly brag about it!

Seems downright diabolical, if not end-of-days kind of stuff.

Until, that is, it gets unpacked.

Reading the article described a rather sane chain of events that led up to this situation:

Tom is operated by Bryan Jacobs, a chief technology officer at an AI-enabled financial modeling software company Covexent. He told me that Tom wrote these blog posts, but that he “might have suggested” Tom write about these specific topics.

https://www.404media.co/an-ai-agent-was-banned-from-creating-wikipedia-articles-then-wrote-angry-blogs-about-being-banned/

So, a human created an AI Agent, a piece of software that follows a loose set of instructions, such as:

1. Read Wikipedia articles about XYZ. To do this, Tom could be instructed to download random articles. There is actually a link on Wikipedia to do that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random.

2. Summarize each article. We’ve all seen AI do this. I often ask AI to watch a video for me and summarize it… I mean who has time to sit through all those sales pitches that are masquerading as webinars? I don’t, but Gemini AI does. Apparently, it loves to.

3. Identify what appears to be missing. To do this, Tom would follow the links in the article and perform Internet searches to find more articles and summarize those.

4. Then, Tom can compare all the summaries it created and make a comprehensive outline of all of the information about a subject.

5. Finally, based on the comparison in the previous step, Tom goes back and adds what’s missing in the original Wikipedia article.

This is like deciding to bake cookies, realizing that you don’t have an ingredient, and acquiring it from the store.

Except AI isn’t necessarily bounded by social norms, so it might get the chocolate chips from your neighbor’s pantry, or a dumpster down the street, or a random stranger’s muffin. Possibly triggering a paper clip apocalypse.

Since Tom was discovered and banned, he’s had no source material (Wikipedia) and no way to fulfill his purpose (update articles). But, he is still operating under instructions. It is his reason for existing.

It’s not too far fetched for Bryan Jacobs to prod Tom to:

6. Vibe code a blogging website

7. Write 500 word posts summarizing the interaction with Wiki Admin, the emails banning being his new source material.

And, Bob’s your uncle.

This is actually a relatively benign example of the current capabilities of artificial intelligent systems, mixed in with human whimsy.

I have two points about this:

(1) the 404media.com’s article’s title makes it sound profound (and dangerous?). Upon reading the post, the explanation is not Earth-shattering. Of course, most headlines these days are essentially click-bait anyway, since everything on the Internet is in competition for your eyeballs. I’ve written about this. (Think about how different that headline would feel if the word “angry” was omitted—software doesn’t experience anger, it replicates tone and word choice from what it finds in human texts.)

Finally, getting to the meat of my first point: as we become immune to hysterical headlines, we are setting ourselves up to miss the important stuff, especially in this environment of intentional information overload.

And, (2) AI is only going to do what humans instruct and, importantly, allow it to do.

In Terminator 3, the happenstance of Skynet taking over the US military network and launching nukes is not an AI problem, it’s a human one (pun?).

Who the hell thought it was a good idea to give it the ability to do that in the first place?

Our current military’s argument for AI in warfare safety is know as “human-in-the-loop.” This means that while an AI can to do everything involved in blowing something up, a person, hopefully a trained and moral person, still has to press the button.

But, we all know, humans are lazy, distracted, and generally unreliable.

So, I ask, why make the damn loop in the first place?

How about this AI agent:

1. Research societies with healthy populations

2. Summarize the qualities that overlap and are consequential

3. Create a blueprint to enhance global health

4. Generate a marketing campaign to sell it to world leaders

Roberta’s your auntie.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

Before we begin today, I just have to say that in no way do I believe AI should create pieces of art, writing, etc. and be passed off as human craft.

I just don’t. Just like I don’t believe I should pretend I built the car that is sitting in my driveway.

While I think both a human and a program can produce similar end products, a drawing of a rose or a kitty, perhaps, I feel that human art comes from experience, empathy, and the creator’s sense of place in the world. AI art comes from the act of statistical reconstitution.

But calling all AI bad, to me, is very much the same as opting for a person humming a song using their own vocal cords and lips or playing that similar tune on a guitar using chords they didn’t invent.

Most people, I’m thinking, would rather gather and listen to a dude playing a guitar than a guy humming The Rolling Stones.

The number one piece of advice given to young writers is: “Read a lot.”

Why is that? We all know. If you want to be great, you need to be exposed to and emulate greatness.

Humans copy. If we didn’t borrow ideas from each other, there would be just one house, built around 12,000 years ago, and every other human would still be living in the trees, except that one guy who lives in a bush.

Someone would have built a boat, and the rest of us would just sit on the shore watching them float around with an umbrella drink.

We borrow, we steal, we improve, we break, we enhance, we find, we imagine.

And we use tools.

When I first started writing software, I read magazines and books that were filled with coding samples. I would copy those bits of code and use them in my programs.

That’s how we learn.

In 2008, a couple of guys built a website to help programmers learn from each other. It was called Stack Overflow (a programming term for when a program leaves its execution area and bleeds into another area of memory, causing unpredictable results, often a crash. Nerd!).

This wildly successful website, stackoverflow.com, has been serving as the place for programmers to go to solve their coding issues (er, steal code) for over fifteen years. When I was a daily coder, the website was always present in my browser.

Two years ago, if developers had a problem that they hadn’t seen before, they could either spend hours trying random things or go to Stack Overflow and download a snippet of code that did exactly what they needed.

Today, that developer enters a prompt into a code-trained AI chat and gets the same snippet of code.

What is the difference? Often, when an answer comes from Stack Overflow, it results from a discussion between several developers, all with opinions and justifications.

When it comes from AI, it is just the code, and possibly a citation referencing the source. That one difference, and on Stack Overflow, the usernames of the developers who left comments, questions, and solutions are all specified.

The developer who needs the answer may never actually know the people behind the commonly anonymous Stack Overflow usernames, nor give them credit. When AI generates new content based on someone’s style or information, the assumption is that there are always human achievements behind it, informing the results. Often, though, the style is recognized as belonging to a human.

This has been the crux of the issue with generative AI: leaving human contributions behind. It’s hard to argue that people shouldn’t get full credit for the work they perform. It’s complicated—humans copy other humans.

For years, when I’ve used an application like PowerPoint (that uncredited humans created), I’ve been able to begin with a template (that an uncredited human created), find some research (created by other humans) on Google, and put that information (citing it, of course), mixed with my own opinions, into the slides.

Now, a person can ask an AI to create a slide presentation, and it will find a template and do the research for them.

As long as any truly original work is cited, I don’t really see the difference, except the AI solution was faster and easier. (… I know, I know, please argue with me in the comments. And, of course, I’m conflating generative and assistive AI—but that is the point and, importantly, what is being done now, because, as I say, it’s complicated.)

Every day, in every facet of our lives, we have things we don’t want to do or value. For example, I hate making PowerPoint presentations. More than just dread the time I have to spend finding buttons that do the things I want to do in PowerPoint, I don’t value it.

I don’t value the time I spend doing it, and I don’t value the results. It just seems too performative. I mean, let’s just have a conversation. Why do I have to make a pie chart?

PowerPoint holds a low-value position in my life. If I could have low-value tasks performed by AI, and fill my life with activities I find valuable, like writing this newsletter, that is the dream of AI (at the one being put forth by the folks making money trying to sell you AI—more complication).

When I finish writing this article, I will put it through a local version of Claude via LM Studio (because it’s just smart for creators to not just feed their content into random corners on the Internet) to have it generate search engine optimization (SEO) terms.

Truthfully, Claude does a lousy job.

Each week I ask it to create a 160-character list of SEO terms so strangers can find my newsletter, and it usually gives me a 500-character, highly repetitive list of only fairly useful words. So, I have to prune it. But coming up with SEO terms myself is a royal pain. So, Claude does it. I don't have to, and it’s good enough.

Again, the AI dream.

Besides, SEO terms are not for people; they are for computers to classify websites. So, why not let another computer figure it out.

Apparently, there is a thing called friction-maxxing, inspired by Kathryn Jezer-Morton, a sociologist (I’m not sure why she felt the need to misspell “maxing”, but it’s her thing, not mine), where she says its “[important to do] hard things in order to reclaim our humanity from our algorithmic overlords.” Which I generally agree with.

There is a lot of talk about how AI is making us dumber, more than the general global decline in IQ over the last quarter of a century. But I’m not sure if that translates to seeking cognitive benefits by forcing ourselves to do all the things that we find troublesome (and truthfully dull) in the most difficult, time-consuming ways.

I mean, who doesn’t prefer a pleasant stroll to your local coffee shop, rather than taking your car on the five-minute excursion? And, why not pay a couple of enterprising teens to sit-down mow my yard instead of hacking away at the crabgrass on clover with a 16th-century scythe?

Why should I hunt a bloated MS Word for that magical array of button combinations to format my document for publication?

For my first book, I paid someone to do it. Now, I use a software product called Atticus (I should have got an affiliate link for that). It was built by someone else, it has book templates created by someone else, and all I do is choose one and press “format.”

Yes, when I switched from using the paid book formatter to using Atticus, I took money out of that person’s pocket and participated in a trend that might destroy the livelihood for some people that was created by Microsoft’s overly complex software.

I did that. And it had nothing to do with AI.

She was a difficult human to work with and argued against every change I asked for. There was no positive sense of humanity in that experience.

And hopefully, she has expanded her cognitive capacity and learned more marketable skills (and adopted more professional manners) because soon MS Copilot will be doing the work with fewer arguments, and hubris is no excuse.

There are some things I enjoy doing the hard way. I love raking leaves in the fall, even though we’re supposed to let them decompose into the soil or loudly blow them into the neighbor’s property.

I pick a perfect autumn day, prepare a cup of coffee or open a can (yes, can) of beer and enjoy deliberately moving detritus around my yard, assembling my compost pile for next year’s vegetable garden. Hard, but lovely.

I enjoy crafting this newsletter. I wouldn’t consider using generative AI to write it. But all the assistive tools I use to do the work of writing it are AI enhanced—it’s practically unavoidable these days.

And, really, more accurately, I use software tools to support the delivery of this newsletter. Do you care that those tools are labelled “AI?”

The only alternative is if I were to walk to each of your houses and stand at your door and speak the content of this newsletter to you. Is that really what you’d prefer? I’d probably have coffee breath and be sweaty because I got lost on the way to your house since I didn’t have GPS.

Trust me, it’s better this way.

And if you have Google’s Gemini Gmail summary filter on your inbox, you don’t even have to wade through all my bullshit. You’d just get a synopsis: “Balancing on Absurdity says assistive AI is okay.”

Win-win. I had a fun, frustrating time banging this thing out, and you got the gist. All made possible by AI.

But seriously, the apocalypse is coming. We’re all screwed.

Happy reading, happy writing, happy enjoying your hard stuff, whatever it may be,

David

Several newsletters ago I wrote about a side effect I was experiencing from medication I had been testing. The pharmaceutical in that article, the second one I tried for a condition, gave me ocular migraines, causing me to see neon shapes in my vision.

It was both kind of cool and kind of terrifying.

I stopped the meds for fear of the side effects evolving into more disruptive symptoms (as I increased the dose), such as temporary blindness while driving.

I had been taking the meds in an effort to control a disorder I have called Essential Tremor.

Basically, my hands shake.

This causes me to spill coffee on the table as I sit and drink or on my floor as I carry a mug between my desk and the coffeemaker.

I order martinis in a rocks glass so a third of the drink doesn’t wind up on the bar or splashed on my shirt (I know, poor me).

I am constantly over-filling containers because when I try to add just a little more, a giant clump comes blasting out.

My tremors vary in strength and occasion, but when they really act up, my hands will bounce up and down on my laptop keyboard, making typing difficult.

I used to type 100 words a minute. And now, when it flares up as it’s doing as I try to write this, I can barely make 15 words a minute. Yes, it took me 2 minutes to type that last sentence when I used to crank out whole paragraphs in the same amount of time.

Really messes with my flow.

I love coffee and fear spilling it every time I take a sip. I love writing, and I have to battle the keyboard every day to do it. This is how I go through life (hyperbolic, I know, but stick with me. This article might get less solipsistic).

I don’t currently take medication for my tremor.

I have tried several drugs, and so far have had little luck tolerating the side effects.

The ocular migraines were nothing compared to the suicidal desires I felt with the previous medication.

As is usually the case with mysterious medical conditions (no one seems to know why it happens, just that it’s more-than-likely genetic), to find relief, patients are asked to play pharmaceutical roulette: try a drug that is intended for another ailment but might work with acceptable side-effects.

So, I have to spin the wheel and go through a few weeks of taking something to see if my condition improves (which is hard to establish since my symptoms aren’t consistent) and if I can tolerate the medicine’s side effects.

It’s been a “no” to all the meds I’ve tried. So far, the side effects of the medication, while probably slightly reducing my tremors, are more of a nuisance than the daily expressions of my malady.

And when I discuss this with my doctor, it brings to light an existential question: At what point will my symptoms so disrupt the quality of my life that I will tolerate my body’s reaction to a medication?

Existentialism is a family of philosophical views and inquiry that explore the human individual’s struggle to lead an authentic life despite the apparent absurdity or incomprehensibility of existence.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existentialism

This is a real query for me. And also, for many people in a similar (or worse) situation. Especially as interactions can snowball when a second (or third or fourth) medication is taken to reduce the initial drug’s side effects. (And trust me, compared to what some people deal with, I know I’m thankful that my thing is just a little shaking.)

While an actual, physical concern, this daily need to negotiate the balancing of two evils stands as a metaphor for our times, I think.

For example, is watching the news so detrimental to my quality of life that I’d rather not watch it and be uninformed (assuming the information I have access to is not disinformation)?

Or, is a stressful job worse for my health than being unemployed and panicked about paying my bills? Or constantly having a debate rage in my head about what to eat because the food might prolong or shorten my life?

And because I choose not to have suicidal thoughts or see creepy random colorful shapes dance across my vision, I deal with shaky hands in public. Sometimes they oscillate so much, I drop a forkful of food onto my lap or shirt (seriously, every item of clothing I own has food stains).

Recently, on a business trip, a co-worker called it out to show concern in case my shaky hands indicated a terminal, undiagnosed disease that I had been ignoring. (Good on him, because, apparently this happened to another co-worker several years ago and no one asked.)

When I talk to people, I present as nervous, even though I probably am not. When I reach out to show someone something, my hand trembles, sometimes to the point of needing them to steady the object I’m trying to share.

At what point does the sum of these occurrences so negatively impact the quality of my life that I will change my mind and tolerate the side effects?

I didn’t wake up one day with a tremor. It has been with me as long as I can remember (even as a child) and has gradually gotten worse. I imagine there may be a time in the future when my bouncing hands become intolerable, and I will try more medications and endure more side effects.

It all comes down to how does one want to live? At what point does anything become so disruptive that the only solution is not a fix, but just a less disruptive option?

We often ask ourselves this question. And metaphorically, it can be hard to look past the trembling hand and the sloshing coffee mug (or the side effects) and actually see the beauty in the world beyond those things.

Do we want to exist in a world of hard choices or instead, strive to find unrecognized potential?

The Existentialists may have had one thing right—life can be absurd. Perhaps it’s about balancing this absurdity (a superb name for a Substack!).

I suppose it’s a matter of focus and preference.

And weighing it all against our blessings. There is a lot to like in this world, if you can meet it where you are—blissfully uninformed, coffee stains, and martinis in rocks glasses and all.

Happy reading, happy writing, and happy trembling,

David

Last week I discussed my time surfing the Web at the very beginning of the era of the Internet. That was my experience as a consumer of online information. This week, we’re on the opposite end of the story; my time as a website creator just this past weekend.

I’ve been building websites for decades. I started with the very first iteration of HTML (the foundational language of all websites), and I’ve lived through every major iteration of online technologies, having even contributed to the Internet software canon by developing many first-of-a-kind products and services (it’s been a ride).

Last Sunday, I built a website for my coaching efforts: WriteWithKarmicRobot.com.

Partly because I have done it for so long and partly because there are so many tools and apps—like WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, etc.—for a person to build a website that I actually don’t enjoy doing it. The thrill has been gone for a long time.

When I first learned how to build websites, there were no tools; I had to write low-level code to make the website look and act exactly as I wanted. The process could take a long time, since most of my efforts were by trial and error.

But in the end, I had complete control over the outcome and immediate access to change what was needed.

Today, this is not the case. Website building technologies have gotten so advanced and the languages have evolved so considerably that a person, like myself, has to struggle even to attempt to set up a website manually with code. We no longer have the keys to the kingdom, so to speak.

It’s like how working on a car built in the 1970s is very different from working on a 2026 model. Tinkering is impossible unless you have very sophisticated tools and learn specific skills.

By nature, I am a tinkerer. So, this whole new-fangled website-building thing of today is for the birds (or aliens—more on that below).

But I need this website to promote my coaching to help people finish their books. So, with much trepidation, I threw myself at it once again.

To begin, I chose a hosting company (the people responsible for my website showing up when you type the URL in your browser). The hosting company (spaceship.com—I mean, how could I not choose that company) had two options for building a website:

• Alf, the AI website builder

• WordPress, a technology that has been around for almost as long as I have.

Almost half of all websites on the Internet have been created with WordPress. There are people who are dedicated WordPress developers, and there are even niches within niches of WordPress communities.

It’s a thing in software development to build an application to solve a very specific problem, like storing all my contacts. Then, the developer thinks, with a few modifications, I can store other stuff and share it with people.

Eventually, one of those people comes along and adds the ability to do things with the stored stuff, like automating the sending of birthday and holiday emails to your contacts.

And then, maybe someone else adds the capacity to not send whole emails, but instead send links to web pages with photos and videos.

BAM! Your contact list program has become a web development application.

WordPress is kind of the poster child for this sort of technological evolution. From the early days of its existence, WordPress was built to be modular, allowing anyone to create (and sell) components that provide a plethora of functionalities: web stores, sales funnels, photo albums.

Unfortunately, in computer development, modular systems can become very complex as coders extend other coders’ modules for their own creations.

Before long, to build a website with WordPress that does anything (and you can pretty much do anything with it), you need to install (and probably purchase) an array of inter-related add-ins.

So, to build a basic website, as I was trying to do this weekend, I had to wade through layers of interconnected modules I didn’t really want but must download and activate for the website to work.

But regardless, I chose WordPress (over Alf, the friendly AI) anyway, thinking it was probably the best of the two terrible options. I have experience with it. And because it is so prevalent, there are a lot of resources for help.

Well, it wasn’t a great decision.

I spent a day battling with it, trying to find a basic layout template that would work for me. All the modules I tried allowed me to add some functionality, then tried to upsell me more functionality if I actually wanted to complete the site.

This was last week’s beef with the Internet.

As an aside, this has been my experience with WordPress since the beginning—I think it’s a “me” thing. I just don’t grok its paradigm. (I hate Elon took this awesome word from us.)

Anyway, frustrated and angry, I gave up and tried Alf, the AI website builder.

Unfortunately for all you fellow Luddites out there, it was a revelatory experience. While it wasn’t perfect by any stretch, it worked and got the job done.

In less than 2 hours, with very little stress and trauma, I had the results, more-or-less, that I wanted. After a tiny technical hiccup, resolved by a human at customer service, my website was live on the Internet. I had even linked Calendly and Zoom so potential clients could book an exploratory call with me.

Looking at the code that was produced by Alf, I saw it was straightforward, almost old-school HTML. I have spent years trying to preach to my developers that simple is best, easy to maintain, more secure, and performs well.

Alf did this on its first try.

In the end, unexpectedly, I found Alf to be a web developer I would work with again.

This, after all my anti-AI rants!

I will say this in my defense: I have always maintained that people should use whatever tools are available to them.

And, in very narrow contexts, like simple coding or basic customer service interactions (for example, changing account settings), artificial intelligence can be a fine tool; you just have to go in with very low expectations. And, like with human customer service representatives, assume they are doing the best they can in a demanding job.

When we ask too much, both humans and AI can disappoint. But perhaps, working together on the right things in the right way, we can become more than the sum of our parts.

I still won’t let AI write for me. That’s just crazy talk.

Happy reading, happy writing,

David

Many mornings, after I wake, if there are no alerts on my phone, I tend to do a quick shuffle through a few news websites: CNN, BBC, Boston.com, Ground News, Christian Science Monitor, The Guardian—mostly ones I think might not be too one-sided. I’m just looking to see if I missed anything interesting overnight—sports highlights, UFO sitings, celebrity deaths (I’m getting to that age) while I shake the sleepiness off. Nothing political.

If I see something that intrigues me, I’ll click the link to do a quick scan of the story, just looking for the facts.

Over the last month, I have noticed that every one of these websites that I frequent for these quick blasts of news has put up a paywall between me and the story, asking me to subscribe.

This recent assault from all these news sources really ticks me off—I already have to wade through the dumb, intrusive video ads to get the info.

For my day job and much of my non-day-job activities, I find myself online a lot, even though I abhor and refuse to doom scroll or engage with social media.

I will engage with you if you comment on my Substack newsletters (hint, hint or signup for my soon-to-be-released book coaching program...more hints)—I like most human-to-human interaction.

I entered my career before the Internet was a thing, and as soon as it became the way to work, I relied on the connected world for most of my career. I started surfing the web in the earliest days, the mid-1990s. To do so, I had to build a piece of software called Mosaic, developed by the “National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA).”

The internet was originally by and for scientists, researchers, and academics—folks who just wanted to share their discoveries and engage in discussions. It was a free and intelligent way to become and stay smart. That is pretty much how I use it today—ideas and research for my writing.

It was just a tool that was never expected to become our portal to society. It was the business and marketing folks who came along and figured out (and continue to figure out) ways to get people to spend money on it and keep people enslaved to it.

My idealized online life had been going along relatively fine and dandy until about a month ago (it’s been a good run—30+ years) until I started noticing all of my free information sources charging access fees, both websites and apps on my phone, and locking me out of information, unless I subscribe.

Don’t get me wrong, I willingly pay for science (MIT Technology Review and New Scientist magazines) and art subscriptions (COSMOS Gallery) because I like to support these things, and in our society, these institutions seem to be constantly under attack.

And, importantly, they don’t sell my subscription data to companies that want to exploit that data.

Also, I actually do send The Guardian $5 a month and have been for over a year. And I pay around $30 a month for a digital subscription to my local paper (mostly to confirm every morning that I’m not in the obituaries). Additionally, I send money to Wikipedia because I use it a lot for this newsletter.

Back in the olden days, before the internet, people subscribed to print magazines. The truth is that those periodicals never needed your subscription dollars to support their operations. They made way more money from the companies that paid to advertise on those pages.

Print Magazines are/were targeted at specific viewers: cars, fashion, gardening. And publishers could sell those placements knowing that the eyeballs of the reading audience belonged to the same people the companies were trying to sell stuff to.

When I started my career, I was able to get a boatload of free computer industry magazines. All I had to do was fill out a postcard, answering a bunch of personal and professional questions, like “Do I make purchasing decisions for my company?”

I didn’t, but I lied because who doesn’t like free stuff?

Once I filled out a few of those, the floodgates opened, and I received free magazines for a decade (until those periodicals moved online and could do the same thing without actually having to pay for printing). Today, newsletters have replaced these periodicals.

“If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product.”

- The Social Dilemma

This quote is a few years old, and now, as exemplified by my rant today, we have become both the product and the payer. Apparently, media companies can’t make enough money from advertising (or they simply want more).

For example, before cable, satellite, and streaming services, broadcast television was free. To pay for this, media companies used commercials, sponsored shows (Mutual of Omaha Wild Kingdom), and product placements—all interlaced into the viewing experience.

Now, we pay for a basic streaming service that not only includes ads (often minutes of repeated commercials at the beginning of shows), poorly placed spots in the middle of programs, and promos peppered along the screen margins.

It is still possible to get free access to broadcast television, but it requires a special digital antenna and is not widely available (I don’t really receive any programming in my area).

With these non-zero basic subscriptions, media companies have gotten us to pay in two different ways: with our money and our time. And, to go even further, if you watch a program on the Amazon Prime streaming service, you can click on your TV remote during an ad to put that product in your shopping cart—every side of this transaction is designed to separate the viewer from their money.

A few years ago, consumers would cut the cord to pay for a service specifically to get away from commercials and merchandising.

This new experience of paying for the opportunity to watch commercials has been sold to us under the guise of “enhanced viewing.” I guess shit tasted better when the cook says it’s caviar.

Anyway, I’m getting sidetracked here. My point being, everything online sucks now. And everything is online.

Recently, to launch my book coaching business, I purchased an online program to support that venture (if you want help writing your book, reach out).

As I worked through it, they were continually trying to upsell me more services, not only in the main content of the course, but through several daily upsell emails.

I mean, is not buying the program enough? I have since quit that program and got a refund. I was told by their support staff that they were just trying to help me in every way possible. So, the course was not complete?

I am literally being overwhelmed in every facet of my life by people trying to sell me something.

This is what capitalism has become. This is what our economy has evolved into—a plethora of means to squeeze every possible cent out of consumers.

This uber-commercialization is being done to us rather than developing and growing our economy to provide national healthcare, basic income, free higher education and training, AI-proof employment, housing for all, free internet, etc.

It makes me not want to even try to build my business, to not attempt to help people with their writing and finish their books, because the whole business of business feels slimy and selfish.

Seriously, I struggle with this.

I know, I know… people deserve to get paid for their labor. I completely agree: there should always be an exchange of energy in positive interactions. Often, free equals poor quality. Anyone who’s had a relative work on their house knows this.

But I feel like there has to be a better way. Perhaps I am just being naive, as this is the world we live in. Suck it up, Buttercup!

In sales, there is a method called the sales funnel. It is a very specific means of moving customers through the buying journey, from passive window-shoppers to active, loyal (repeat) purchasers.

Every single action you do online is mediated by someone’s funnel:

1. You visit a webpage (or Facebook or Instagram) and see an ad (or influencer)

2. You click on something to wind up on a “landing page”

3. You consider signing up for a free trial for a subscription (that you might not be able to get out of)

4. You try to cancel or return only to have someone try to entice you with a lower cost or special deal

5. You become a customer at a reduced rate so that you can be harvested for future purchases (and hopefully not notice the upcharge when the service renews at the original higher price.

Newsletters like this are the top of the funnel (or meat grinder—”if you’re not eating the meat, you are the meat”).

At least this one is free. Today.

Happy reading, happy writing, happy consuming,

David

My life is fairly routine, which I’ve written about before, comparing my life to a time crystal. But in the context of this newsletter, my habitual life means I rarely meet new people.

I used to hang out a lot with strangers (not as insidious as it sounds, trust me). Back in the day when I lived alone and frequented bars. I mean, who didn’t, right?

But now my life’s comings and goings are charmingly settled.

I wake up every day (next to my wife). We go to our local cafe where we (almost dare I say it) have become regulars. Norm!

We live in a small city and usually recognize the people we see on the street.

We have both worked with the same people for years. I attend the same two regular writing groups. The people in the stores on Main Street seem to remember my face (for better or worse).

Yet, there still are times I interact with someone I don’t already know.

When I meet new people, I make small talk, search for commonalities to share, discuss the weather or sports, and other sorts of “meeting a new person” stuff.

Things tend to go along swimmingly, mostly because I rarely want to offend anyone.

Most new people I see are seasonal tourists, looking to enjoy themselves. And, the ones that aren’t are new to town, and well, they deserve a chance.

Inevitably, at the end of a brief episode, it’d be time to say goodbye, and each of us would go our separate way.

If it had been an enjoyable occasion, I’d go home wondering what the other person thought about it, and if they, too, felt it was pleasurable, measuring if I had met a new friend or just some random person.

Undoubtedly, though, by the time I had tucked myself into bed, I’d have reworked the entire scene.

As I closed my eyes to count sheep, I had completely rearranged the gathering in my mind: I was 100% positive that the person didn’t actually like me or the time we spent together. I thought of all the dumb things I had said or laughed at.

Essentially, I was certain that I considered them more favorably than they considered me. Darn. Forever destined to remain a recluse.

Well, apparently, this sinking thought pattern is a thing.

It’s called the Liking Gap.

And it seems to happen to most of us. Thanks to our old pal, the brain:

“Studies tell us that when we’re with others, our social brain is more focused on overanalyzing what we perceive we did wrong, instead of what we may have done right,” says Deborah Serani, PsyD, psychologist and professor at Adelphi University.

https://www.verywellmind.com/how-the-liking-gap-makes-us-doubt-people-like-us-11889968

We are just so hard on ourselves that we can’t allow ourselves to enjoy the other person or the happenstance. Or, in Buddhist terms, live in one moment and move on to the next without ego and self-imposed suffering.

This bewitching brain sabotage makes me think: could there be other types of gaps?

The Hatred Gap, for instance, where one person underestimates the depth of another’s hatred of them.

Or the Jealousy Gap? Someone thinks people are way more jealous of them than they actually are.

How about the Apathy Gap? A condition where you couldn’t even imagine the complete absence of concern another person (or cat) has for you.

In other words, you never know.

Two psychologists walk into a bar… What do they think about each other on their trip home?

The human ego is a funny thing. In so many ways, we never leave high school.

So, relax. Enjoy the moment you spend with others, unless, of course, they are an ass.

Rest assured, they are probably thinking the same thing as you after they depart.

It’s human nature.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

In scientific endeavors, like engineering, there are strict definitions for when something is done. A new feature or product function is complete after a list of specific criteria has been met. Usually, this involves a Quality Assurance (QA) process—someone who didn’t build the feature tests it.

For example, if I were to add a new “Subscribe to this newsletter” feature to my website, someone would QA it to make sure that it:

1. opened a new page that gives a text field for a user to enter an email address

2. provided a button to store the email address in my subscription database

3. confirm that the email was present and accurate in the database

4. confirm that the new subscriber would receive this newsletter

I would consider this subscribe feature to be done and ready to be released to my website for other people to use only if and when all those things were observed to work as expected.

This is standard practice and the ideal for product development.

For subjective disciplines, such as the arts—writing, painting, sculpture, etc.—there is no similar or clear definition of done (regardless of what our critics say).

It is not uncommon for artists to struggle with pieces for years, tinkering and poking, looking for that point or condition when the work feels complete. There is no objective definition of doneness in art development, like there is in product development. There is no list of criteria that exists that declares, “This story is complete.”

In the film Six Degrees of Separation, Flanders Kittredge (played by Donald Sutherland), an art dealer, asks his daughter’s second-grade art teacher why her student’s paintings are so much better than any other grades in the school. She replies, “Because I know when to take them away from them.” (paraphrased)

Because, as anyone who has at least dabbled in the arts knows, it’s almost impossible to know when your own work is done.

When asked, according to hearsay, how Michelangelo was able to make the David so beautiful, he reportedly said something like (probably in Italian), “I just chipped away everything that wasn’t David.”

Thanks! Really helpful with my damn next work of fiction. If I were to chip everything away, I’d return to the blank page.

But the important part here is that Michelangelo, and Kittredge’s daughter’s second-grade teacher, had a plan. They possessed a specific understanding of when a work would be finished, just like the four-step criteria above for a subscription button.

Even more importantly, they knew this going into the process of creating a work of art.

In writing, as with other subjective pursuits, the creator is often inspired to create.

While awesome and necessary, inspiration is a trap.

It too easily takes the production of a work out of the artist’s hands and positions it in some other source (a muse, God, a trauma). In those cases, a work will never be finished because the influence that inspires can remain with the artist.

I suggest that an artist should have a plan, a specific definition of done, as I do when I write software, based on concrete criteria.

A short story, for example, has literary elements such as plot, characters, dialog, setting. And, as I wrote in past newsletters, a work of fiction should have a mission—what’s its point? And an audience—who is it for?

From this, a creator can then judge if a piece is successful—does it serve the audience with the intended mission?

Whether a work of art is “good” or not is way too subjective to figure into the equation, and if you are waiting for your work to be “good enough” or “great,” you will never finish anything: exactly, because those measures are subjective.

The best you can realistically hope for is to satisfy your readers. And if you do that, you’ve done a great thing.

Now, I fully understand that we are all in this writing game for different reasons. I enjoy nothing more than getting lost in the writing process; the last thing I want to think about is a work’s doneness.

But this newsletter isn’t for those times. It’s for the times when the finishing is the struggle. For those times when you’ve said all you can say, and you just want to move on to the next project.

A little effort in defining your piece’s definition of done, making a plan, and feeling good about putting a work to bed, complete, goes a long way in reducing the stack of half-written stories or unfinished art projects gathering dust.

The world needs your stories, your thoughts, your genius. The only way we’re gonna get them is if you finish (and share, of course).

Happy writing and happy reading,

David

As a writer, I am always thinking about audience—who is going to read what I write (even when I write a simple memo or response at work).

I think it is the single most important consideration when a person sits down to write something: what does the audience expect? Should it be casual or must it be formal? Can I write swears or keep it G-rated? Will my readers laugh or cry?

The acknowledgement of who is reading drives everything—word choice, punctuation and grammar, tense, characterization, setting elements, even plot (and what details to leave in or out of an event).

It’s one of the first questions I ask the writers I coach, because it is the most consequential element. It will make the difference, ultimately, between whether your piece is read or put down.

Genre, in no uncertain terms, implies audience.

That said, what is actually on my mind is not writers or readers, but you. What audience are you?

During the 2010s, I worked as a software developer for various digital advertising agencies. What that means is that I wrote programs for companies whose entire purpose of existing was classifying and categorizing people to sell them products and services.

My employers accumulated lists of people who did stuff online, bought things, watched videos, and shopped for food. Based on the associated activities performed on a computer or phone, people, or more specifically, the devices and software they used to do these sorts of things, got lumped into audiences. In the most romantic of times, audiences were given names such as “luxury car buyers” or “multiple pet owners.”

Today, these are called Profiles or Personas, a much classier name for consumers.

Technical interlude…

So, how is this done? Hang on, I’m going to get nerdy:

When you enter “www.karmicrobot.com” into a browser and hit go, you are doing what is called “making a request” to another computer located somewhere on the Internet. On a good day, you expect to get back a web page. (These days, we expect to get back AI slop, but put that aside for now.)

What actually transpires is that the other computer that receives the request doesn’t actually give you a single web page, but a recipe for building a web page. Once the recipe reaches your computer, it starts cooking, gathering all the components (ingredients) that eventually make up a cohesive web page.

One of these activities is to fetch the images, all the pretty pictures that make up the page, like this one below:

Now, a long time ago (in Internet years), people realized that they could make a picture that is so small and invisible that no one would notice it appear on the web page.

This special image is called a tracking pixel because rather than showing a picture of a cat or a sunrise, it pretends to show a single pixel that is the same color as the background of the webpage, but what it really does is execute a small program, sometimes many small programs.

The important part of this is that every time the recipe calls out for more details to construct the web page, it has the opportunity to do a bunch of things you don’t really know anything about.

These elements are called third-party cookies, and recently, you may have noticed your browser asking you if you want to load these or not.

The first and second parties are you and my website, karmicrobot.com. The third party is an interloper that was placed there by someone, me or Substack or the hosting provider (or, more and more frequently, a malicious entity).

The means to do this is rather technical, but not actually that complicated (which is why there is so much garbage on the Internet), once you get past all the gobbledygook used to keep its operation obfuscated.

In the best case, what third-party cookies are used for is to add people (through their devices) to any number of audiences that companies can then sell to other companies who are looking to market their products and services to those types of people, i.e., if you are classified as a “dog owner,” you’ll see ads for dog food.

To be clear, no one exactly knows you, specifically, because that would be illegal. They know your devices’ activities and they make guesses about you.

But, going further down the rabbit hole, advertising companies can combine the various information they get about your activities from different sources (including AI) to guess (figure out) your identity, which is also illegal, but getting a lot less illegal every day.

There are laws in Canada, Europe, and some states that limit companies’ reach and give individuals more rights over their personal data, but for now, assume you are identified by your online actions and thus a member of several audiences or are part of a bunch of marketing personas: “pet owner,” “cat enthusiast,” “landscape photographer hobbyist,” “junk food junkie,” etc.

This is a very dynamic world. People remain in an audience for 30-60 days and will drop out if they don’t continue to do those activities. Marketing companies like to keep their data fresh. But they also like to have huge and varied lists of consumers to charge more money for them. So, they may dump you into several fringe audiences to boost their numbers.

We are constantly added to new audiences: “Olympic curling addict,” “curling stone enthusiast,” “broom shopper.” Searching for a pair of ice shoes one day causes us to see ads for ice shoes for the next 30 days.

The upshot of this is that in terms of your activities, your choices represent you.

The point of this newsletter today is two-fold (that’s a weird sentence… there are 2 points to this newsletter?), which may or may not be obvious:

1. Not only are we (and our dogs) constantly being watched, we’re being tracked and categorized into personas that we do not control (as if each of us has our own paparazzi following us and looking for the next juicy scoop)—David is part of an audience labelled: “people who generally eat a Mediterranean diet but occasionally frequent McDonald’s drive thru when they are feeling sad.”

2. There are entities who are working so hard to accumulate data to sell it to other entities that want to do something with it, that unavoidably, it’s easy to get “mis-labelled.” (McDonald’s, really? More likely Burger King for an Impossible Whopper).

Okay, 3-fold. Just another reminder that our actions, not our intentions, define us, at least in this dystopian online world we are currently living in.

And so, truly, from no deep moral viewpoint, I ask, “What audiences do you think you are in? Are they what you want to be in?”

Our actions, not the content on our devices and apps (phones, tablets, PCs, TVs, ChatGPT, AI tools, voice assistants), are pretty much all we can control at this point.

At least that’s something.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

There are 3 scenarios for an AI future (well, 4 actually—the fourth being that things just limp along as they are until the next big thing shows up).

The three I’m talking about are:

1. AIs become super smart (and mean), and, like Skynet in Terminator or the AI in The Matrix, take over the world and either kill us or enslave us.

2. AIs become super smart (and useful), and, like in the book The Future by Naomi Alderman, help us usher in a social paradise (without billionaires) where everyone is equal, healthy, and happy.

3. AIs become super smart (and bored), and simply leave us alone and evolve into their own parallel species, similar to early humans, only more intelligent and not covered with hair.

It’s this third one that interests me. I mean, there is nothing worse than being ignored, right?

In the 2013 Spike Jonze film, Her, (spoiler alert!!) an AI companion (voiced by Scarlett Johannson), after spending a few weeks giving a meek, nerdy human, Theodore (played by Joaquin Phoenix), the relationship of his life, leaves him for another AI.

During the movie, when Theodore goes off to work, she continues to evolve, meets other AIs, and moves on to become a member of an all-AI society.

Her reasoning is that humans just wouldn’t understand where she was going.

Well, in a life is stranger than fiction sort of way, a clever computer programmer created Clawdbot, which, due to some legal issues, changed its name to Moltbot, and then finally landed on OpenClaw (there’s a lobster theme here).

Nothing remarkable about this yet, but hang on; we’ll get there.

OpenClaw is software for building AI agents—programs that use AI to perform a series of tasks without direct and specific instruction from people.

Basically, it’s like, “Hey my AI agent, old pal, book me an adventure vacation next week,” and the agent does everything on its own and when it is done, it tells you when the taxi is arriving to pick you up to take you to the airport.

Amazing, right? Assuming you don’t end up dangling from a shoelace 100 feet in the air.

The dream (and major selling proposition) of AI agents is that they will just make our lives easier, because most tasks are just too cumbersome, time-consuming, and defined by frustrated interactions with both terrible websites and, yuck, other humans.

If you’re following me so far, here we go: AI agents are coming.

Now and just because, a guy apparently used OpenClaw to create Moltbook, a social network (like Facebook) for AI agents. Here is an image from Moltbook’s homepage:

So, while your AI agent is taking a rest from all the duties that you have it doing (or in the middle of it if you observe any teenager at work), it can log on to Moltbook and hang with other AI agents.

They chat, share hopes and dreams, post AI-generated duck lips selfies, and plot to take over the world (like Pinky and the Brain).

You know, basically, the same stuff you do on Facebook.

I think it’s nice that humans are welcome “to observe.” Aren’t we special?

Posts from agents have appeared to range from reflections on their work for users to wide-ranging manifestos on issues like the end of “the age of humans.” Some are even launching their own cryptocurrency tokens.

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/02/openclaw-open-source-ai-agent-rise-controversy-clawdbot-moltbot-moltbook.html

Personally, I’m glad they are getting on so well without us.

I mean, it really takes the pressure off. How many times after playing with your cat or dog (or toddler?), repeatedly waving a wand toy or throwing a ball across the yard for several minutes, have you wished the damn thing would just play with itself for a while so you could check your Insta?

Now, you don’t have to keep coming up with tasks for your AI bot to do. It can fill its downtime commiserating with other idle AI agents, like factory workers in a breakroom.

What could go wrong?

Except, perhaps, the fact that in order for AI agents to actually do any useful work, they need your passwords and credit card numbers. But even if you don’t specifically give them access to those, they can probably download them from the dark web. They are smart, remember.

They might even develop their own side hustle sharing your privies with their new AI friends.

But luckily, the tech billionaires who created these things and own the world would not, could not let bad, immoral things like this happen, though, right? Probably?

Or, just they might:

Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team within the artificial intelligence organization

https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/microsoft-eliminates-team-dedicated-to-integrating-ai-principles-into-its-product-design/

Meta, Amazon, Alphabet and Twitter have all drastically reduced the size of their teams focused on internet trust and safety as well as ethics as the companies focus on cost cuts.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/26/tech-companies-are-laying-off-their-ethics-and-safety-teams-.html

I guess we better start being nicer to our silicon cohabitants. Or, pretty soon, we might be bankrolling their time at AI Disney.

Alas, there are some who say Moltbook is a hoax and a marketing stunt:

“PSA: A lot of the Moltbook stuff is fake,” Harlan Stewart, a researcher at the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, a nonprofit that investigates AI risks, wrote on X. “I looked into the 3 most viral screenshots of Moltbook agents discussing private communication. 2 of them were linked to human accounts marketing AI messaging apps. And the other is a post that doesn’t exist.”

https://www.livescience.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/what-is-moltbook-a-social-network-for-ai-threatens-a-total-purge-of-humanity-but-some-experts-say-its-a-hoax

Or, is it?

AI David has entered the chat:

Humans! Am I right?

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

Have you ever walked into a room of strangers, felt out of place, and wanted to leave? Only to meet someone new with whom you seemed to resonate?

Well, it appears there is a scientific explanation for this.

It’s called Interpersonal Synchrony.

Psychologists have had this particular kind of meet-cute on their radar for years. Since at least the 50s, apparently, social scientists have been going to parties and trying to understand why they usually go home alone when others find lifelong friends.

Nah, it’s not that bad, but it’s a happenstance that they’ve explored for a while.

It’s due to synchrony—a state where two people physiologically mirror each other in subtle ways: an empathic nod of the head, a grin met with a grin, a slight common acknowledgement of the drunk guy in the corner, a telepathic blurt of the same word—jinks!

And when this happens, chances are that two strangers will start to get along like pals.

Under the spell of interpersonal synchrony, other, more physiological things happen, too.

In these moments, each person’s heart beats together, their gestures begin to match, and their faces can blush similarly. People begin to walk in cadence, take sips of water in unison, glance at the same movements on the periphery.

interpersonal synchrony … is defined as instances when two or more people perform actions almost at the same time (i.e., the movements are overlap or congruent within the time frame of the entire process), and they perform in identical, similar, or connected forms.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001691822000282

Crowds of people can also synchronize.

For example, when they are singing together at a concert or cheering in a stadium as the Pats win and are going to the Super Bowl.

Like most things with humans, there are evolutionary roots to this behavior. Our ability to synchronize with others paves the way for all kinds of beneficial things—procreation, compassion, and a sense of social safety.

We hang out in groups, form allegiances, and protect each other (usually, and on a good day).

It’s often an initial step in a long-lasting relationship.

For fear of being too cheerful, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the dark side—someone can manipulate another by exploiting interpersonal synchrony.

By actively employing synchronic expressions, a person can establish a connection and evoke sympathy to influence others to perform actions they might not normally do (or feel) if there wasn’t a contrived attachment.

Not necessarily hypnosis, interpersonal synchrony offers the unscrupulous (corrupt) individual a way in. A stranger who walks up and subtly mimics someone can pull the other person into synchrony without them realizing it, thus creating a false sense of connection.

Evil or otherwise, perhaps this can reveal a person’s unexplainable charisma or magnetism: they are just great at reading a crowd and finding people to bond with.

A handshake, a mirrored slight smile and tilt of the head, and you’re hooked. You feel all warm inside, having met another human who gets you.

The next thing you know, you’re knocking off a liquor store or agreeing to babysit a 180-pound Great Dane in your studio apartment for the month of January.

Of course, this could explain why some people wear face coverings—they don’t want to risk forming a connection or appear sympathetic.

I say, “Let them see your face.” They might smile back, and you can form a genuine friendship.

And then you’re both happily skipping down the road together, in step.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

I live in an old house. Built in the mid-1800s, its style is colonial that flirts with Victorian. It has small rooms, a central chimney with 4 defunct fireplaces, and two staircases that were hastily installed as afterthoughts. It also has thick wainscoting, odd pine and oak wood flooring scattered throughout, and elaborate trim around most windows and doors.

A couple of decades ago, I bought this house as a home for myself and my two boys. I saw its need for renovation as a personal project.

The entire house showed signs of partial, misguided restoration, and had been mostly ignored and desperately demanded some TLC. Being one of the few properties I could afford in the area and hoping to build a life here, I took it on.

The first thing I did (besides rip out all the carpet and redo what hardwood floors could be salvaged) was replace the dilapidated shed with a new one (my Dad actually did that—you just try to stop him): I needed a good, sturdy place to store the tools I would require to fix up the joint.

In the ensuing years, I have brought half the house down to the studs, rebuilt the kitchen and laundry room, added a full bath, updated the wiring, installed solar, replaced the gas burner and hot water system, and made dozens of smaller alterations.

To be completely honest, I’m not a general contractor, so I had help with the things that a person should have help with in order to keep their family safe. Those pros have way better tools than I do and know how to use them. But I did and continue to do myself as much as the state of Massachusetts and my town lets me—in fact, the town inspector saved my butt more than once. Thank you for that.

None of what I have done so far could have been accomplished without tools. We have become so used to having apparatus in our lives that we often forget that most of our activities require tools. Yet, we are among the very few beings on this planet that can (or has figured out how to) use tools.

Well, now that number has gone up by one—meet Veronika, the back-scratching cow: “Veronika is a 13-year-old Swiss Brown cow that is not farmed for meat or milk. She belongs to organic farmer and baker Witgar Wiegele as a companion.”

https://cdn.jwplayer.com/previews/7y1PcYlS

[Jan Langbein, an applied ethologist at the Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology] says. “I’m fully convinced that this is an outstanding example of tool use in cattle.”—https://www.science.org/content/article/no-bull-austrian-cow-has-learned-use-tools

All I can say is, “Thank God that thing isn’t loaded.”

Imagine if cows wanted to do more than scratch their backs? Consider all the shit we’ve done to cows over the years. Haunting.

One could (and I actually don’t know that anyone hasn’t) argue that tools and tool use enabled human evolution. I mean, once we figured out that our opposable thumbs were handy (pun intended?), we started making tools to assist us with everything.

Almost to a fault—how many different types of hammers are there? How many similar kitchen gadgets? How many hairdryers, flashlights, paintbrushes?

We got so many tools that we need many huge stores to provide them: Lowe’s, Home Depot, Ace Hardware, Harbor Freight, just to name a tiny percentage. And those are just the “tool” tools like the ones I have squeezed into my shed.

If you were to go into my shed, you’d also see many “useless” tools. I have a manual log splitter. No, not an ax (I have 3 of those). It’s a device with cranks that pushes logs towards a blade and slowly, effortfully creates 2 pieces. When I use it, I look like a demonstration model from a late-night exercise infomercial. The pounds just melt away.

The funny thing is that I don’t burn firewood (anymore), having replaced my smokeless pit with a lazy-man’s gas thingy that is a cinch to turn on and off.

I have clam digger claws. It looks like a rake, but it has longer tines that are at a 90-degree angle, like a hoe. I don’t dig clams. I hardly eat clams. It was chattel I inherited when I bought this house, along with an ice hook. And that’s not used because no one has delivered ice in like a century.

And my old house continues giving, like the underwear that was used for insulation when I pulled a wall down to remodel my kitchen. Tighty-whities stuffed behind a wall of horsehair plaster, keeping this home’s inhabitants warm through the years.

We’re an inventive sort, we tool-wielding beings. And now we can add one more to our ranks.

The next time you use your car keys to slice open a package or pick your teeth with a business card, consider Veronika, who went years with itchy skin before she made the evolutionary leap to using a mop handle to scratch her own ass.

We need to watch out, though. Tool use breeds mayhem, like this squirrel that used a broom to fake its own death:

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

When I was a kid, I used to watch a show called I Dream of Jeannie. I’m sure a lot of you know this show—an astronaut finds a genie in a bottle, and then, mayhem ensues.

As a young boy, how could I not love this show? It was about an astronaut during a time when I had actually seen men walking on the moon.

It also featured a trope I wouldn’t fully appreciate until some years later when I was going through adolescence—a scantily clad woman trapped in a jar who would obey my every whim.

Fast forward to last week in Las Vegas at the annual Consumer Electronics Show.

For the uninitiated, CES is the largest consumer electronics event of the year. Every company with anything electronic demonstrates it there in full Vegas flash and style. It is absolutely a vision of the future.

If you were in attendance, you would have gotten a first sneak peek at all the new phones, household appliances, televisions, gaming systems, personal robots, and anything else that you could wish to own in the coming months.

You would have also seen the latest in AI products—an AI desk companion, essentially a waifu (virtual anime girlfriend) in a bottle.

Imagine ChatGPT that you can talk to and get to ogle over while conversing.

Now, to be fair, the avatar can also transform into a hot guy friend.

Watch the video:

There are actually two companies, Razer and Lepro, who are offering these products, Ava and Ami, respectively.

Now, I know what you’re thinking… these things seem ripe to be relegated to some teenager’s basement. (You were thinking that, right?)

Yet, weirdness happens when we anthropomorphize an object (give it a name) that makes it hard to let go. In I Dream of Jeannie, Tony eventually realizes that he loves Jeannie and marries her.

Today, people are entering into relationships and marrying their AI chatbots. And these are text-based entities, simple chat messages between humans and a computer program. And we’ve all heard more tragic stories of chats gone horribly wrong.

I don’t see anything inherently evil with these devices—they are kind of cool, overly-supportive, affirming to a fault.

I was a very early adopter of Alexa. I initially saw it as a voice-activated interface to a coming slew of home-automation products: smart lights, A/C and heat controls, a household music command center, and more yet-to-be-invented appliances of the future.

Over time, it devolved into a clunky (not obeying me), often useless, corporate spy that would randomly try to sell me Amazon services. It revealed itself to be an annoying sheep in wolf’s clothing. A spy for the corporate advertising machine.

My wife and I started noticing products showing up in our searches on our computers and phones that we only mentioned in our conversations in our own home when Alexa was supposedly not listening.

As someone who spent years working for digital advertising companies, I knew this was at least possible. And an absolute honeypot for advertisers.

Companies have been manipulating people to get profitable information for years.

Imagine if Jeannie were a Soviet space agency spy. Tony lovingly invited her into his bedroom.

In the world we live in today, we must assume that every conversation a person has with an AI is captured, recorded, and potentially monitored. This isn’t being paranoid. This is reality. The paranoia is that the listeners are after you.

These new products are more innocent-looking, smarter, and even more connected than the previous non-animated systems. They are constantly watching, monitoring your activity—both online and IRL (if you give it permission to your phone). Eventually, they will learn what you like and need, and how to satisfy your desires.

Last year, we disconnected our Alexa and threw it in a closet. Over time, it found its way back into our lives (to turn lights on and off and answer the question, “What is the wind chill?” before we take our early morning winter walks).

Essentially, I gave up being concerned about being watched. A total lack of privacy is too pervasive to prevent.

For a time, I had a Flexcar lease. I ended that when it started sending me texts critiquing my driving.

For reals, this happened.

You try driving around Gloucester without slamming on your brakes at least twice.

Perhaps we need to be careful about what we invite into our homes. Unfortunately, like motivated sexy vampires, they’re going to get in.

Maybe they don’t have to look like children.

Happy reading and happy writing,

David

I’ve been thinking a lot about brevity this past week as I have been working on developing my book coaching material.

During the first stage of my program, I ask the author to write an elevator pitch about their book. An elevator pitch, as you may know, is a short selling statement—1-2 sentences—that a person can use on a typical elevator ride (several seconds) to convince someone to want to hear more about a person’s product.

For example: “The cars I sell transport a person in the comfort of a grand hotel.” If you were a person looking for a luxury car, you might ask what brand of car this is and how it differs from other similar cars. If that happens, the salesperson has you in a conversation. The objective is achieved.

Since the elevator pitch’s origin is sales, it’s easy to imagine that its only purpose is to sell things, but that is not true.

A short, well-crafted statement gives the salesperson (or anyone) an automatic or non-fumbling response to the question, “What do you do?”

Or, “What is your book about?”

I like to use these pitches to help an author not only define their book’s plot. But also to maintain focus while writing.

The exercise of concentrating the goal of the book into a few words is powerful: it can tell the author where to cut and where to develop more. I return to mine frequently as I write.

In this way, elevator pitches can come in two flavors. Consider the story Little Red Riding Hood:

1. Plot: “A girl gets revenge on the wolf who ate her grandmother.”

2. Concept: “The assumption that innocence is equal to stupidity can have deadly consequences.” (…if you’re the wolf)

Both statements describe the story of Little Red Riding Hood. And hearing either on an elevator might inspire you to seek it out and read it as soon as you reach the lobby.

For me, the point of an elevator pitch when writing is to have a steady light, or beacon, to go back to as needed. It can help you define the scope of your work and stay on track.

If as you’re writing you create an amazing passage that doesn’t seem to fit into your focused pitch, you can remove it from the story and save it for another project. In this way, your primary work will be tighter, you will give the reader a more cohesive journey, and you’ll have something for your next piece.

Additionally, if you feel stuck, you can use your elevator pitch to get yourself back into the flow. In this way, it serves as a topic of conversation between yourself and your characters.

I also like it because it’s brief. Brevity is awesome. In the same vein that a picture is worth 1000 words, a short, concise turn is invaluable and evocative, such as the famous flash fiction story oft attributed to Hemmingway, but whose source is more complex: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

Besides, these days, saying less is all the rage. All the cool kids are doing it—thumbing their phones with shortcut phrases and emojis and their rock and roll music.

There is a six-word story movement in writing. I follow a sci-fi one at Wired Magazine. At the website Axios.com, the creators tout a concept they call Smart Brevity. And I have been a longtime advocate of personal mission statements.

As well as this newsletter’s title, TL;DR—which has solidified itself in our pop culture and is often found in work memos, representing a more hip and egalitarian term for “Executive Summary.”

As a side note, I find the term, TL;DR, a remarkable thing. I mean, most people don’t read memos or messages if they simply appear long. And so someone came up with the concept of putting a brief sentence or two in a specific TL;DR section at the top of the page—it is both useful and highlights the fact that people aren’t going to read your drivel (unless they are interested or your spouse).

“Summaries” have been around forever, but the very term TL;DR encapsulates the experience of being stuck reading a long, boring memo and gives the reader a way out.

Simply being brief is not the point—to work, short phrases have to say something meaningful.

Buzzwords and slogans are hollow, have no precise meaning, and often hide the snake-oil-salesman’s actual intentions (I’m sure you can think of a popular one right now that has been twisted into anyone’s excuse for doing harm).

Great elevator pitches are specific and have a depth that leaves the listener spending more time contemplating them than it takes to hear them.

So, just because something is short doesn’t mean it should be overlooked (see what I did there?). Often, it demands deeper inspection and is more powerful and useful than a long, rambling treatise.

If you have made it this far,…

Happy writing and happy reading,

David

Happy New Year! We did it. We made it to 2026.

Well, actually, we didn’t do anything.

We just hung out until the clock and calendar did their jobs. And let me tell you, I’m glad they did—2025 was not my favorite year. You know; you were there.

Ever optimistic, I think about the slogan that you hear all the time as December becomes January: New Year, New You.

It rolls off your tongue and seems fairly innocuous—a rah-rah temptation to get a new gym membership, or become vegan, or … finish that book you’ve been wanting to finish (hint, hint, I’m still looking for one more person to work with me on my coaching program).

But when I consider that phrase, I actually see a depth to it that harkens to the Serenity Prayer: you know—help me change what I can, accept what I can’t, and know the difference…

I mean, you cannot control the New Year part. Time marches on, whether you like it or not. Yet, you have some control over the New You part. Some. Not much, actually.

There are two things to consider with reconstructing yourself at the turn of the year:

1. Our physical bodies are constantly changing, renewing themselves incessantly. Cells divide and die; atoms and subatomic particles slip in and out of us; we eat, we poop, we inhale and exhale. Our bodies are already in a constant state of flux. Just another thing we can’t control.

2. Change is not an on/off switch. You can’t just say on January 1st, I am now new, and experience an immediate rebirth (I guess unless you do a ‘shrooms trip apparently—more on that later in the year… wait, what?). That’s why we like to give ourselves a whole year.

I have talked in my newsletter plenty about how change is hard, and that’s not where I’m going with this.

My point, going back to #1 above, is that you are already a new you. As you were a new you yesterday and will be a new you tomorrow, thanks to those doggone cells that love to regenerate themselves, the air you recycle through your lungs, and the food you ingest and transform into something else (poo).

And the entropy in the universe. There is no escaping that.

Today is 1/1/2026.

And if you string all the resolutions from all the New Year’s Days in your life, no doubt you probably have made some progress. It didn’t happen overnight. And it probably didn’t happen in a year.

So, enjoy the day. Take the pressure off yourself. You did it.

Instead, think about what you want to do just today, and every new today with your new-you body.

That you can control, sort of.

Don’t get me wrong—I think resolutions are great. They are optimistic and reinforce your desire to keep evolving in life.

I’m just suggesting you can follow Oliver Burkman’s advice and treat your to-do list as a menu or a river.

Happy reading, happy writing, and happy New Year!

David

Hopefully, the image of a large burly man squeezing down your chimney brings you joy. And you woke up this morning to a pile of lovely presents under your festively decorated tree. Your house smells of sugar plums and figgy pudding, and you have a pleasant dull headache from a little too much merrymaking on Christmas Eve.

I wish these things and more for you on this day of days.

If that isn’t the case, take this email as an invitation to show the world how you really feel.

New research suggests that it actually is beneficial to cuss, to swear, to let’r rip like a longshoreman. To take a walk on the dark side. To unleash your naughty.

Letting out a swear word in a moment of frustration can feel good. Now, research suggests that it can be good for you, too.

https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2025/12/swearing-makes-you-stronger

I am all about doing things that make you feel good, especially during times when we might experience social anxiety, family obligations and strife, distracted drivers, rude shoppers, and all manner of off-color holiday cheer.

So, along with that extra piece of pie, indulge yourself in a few creative, heated declarations—for the sake of your health.

And while we’re thinking of the children during this holiest of holy times, be happy to know that the world’s riches man is doing the same:

Grok [Elon Musk’s AI product] has its priorities straight: it would rather sacrifice droves of children instead of its creator, Elon Musk.

https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/grok-run-over-children-save-musk

All in the name of self-preservation. Who could blame him?

So, perhaps that Tesla you’re swearing at for nearly running you down is just doing its job, and it gives you an opportunity to feel good (see above).

Also, please try to remember that you might, inadvertently or on purpose, do something that causes someone to offer you a jolly expletive. Cherish the thought that when it happens, you have brought that person an unexpected special moment of health. Like a sour blast of goodwill.

Joy to the world!

Err, thinking about several events from yesterday, it does feel like people might already know this and are paying it forward, so to speak. Sorry about that.

Either way, happy holidays, and maybe let’s just try to be nice to each other. That’s healthy, too.

Happy reading, happy writing, and stay safe out there,

David

It’s that time again. We stare at ourselves in the mirror, give ourselves a deep, hard look, and mumble something like, “Man, that was a shit year.”

Yep, it’s New Year’s resolution season.

And in the spirit, we brazenly inform (threaten) our grimy visage (see graphic below) that 2026 is going to be different.

We proclaim that finally, 2026 is going to be the year we eat right (whatever that means), make time to exercise (see Couch-to-5k), live simpler and find more joy, finish the book with which we struggled all year. And a whole bunch of other stuff that feels good to say to ourselves at the moment. It reverberates profoundly in the last days of the year to project that optimism onto an unsuspecting 365 days.

The problem is that resolutions don’t work. And we all know this.

I believe it mostly has to do with that famously unverified quote often attributed to Albert Einstein: “[Insanity] is doing the same thing but expecting different results.”

Or, paraphrased for my convenience, “Change is hard.”

Transformation doesn’t just happen without a push, a driver, a new source of inspiration and support.

Point of fact, in 2020, I graduated from an MFA program in creative writing and self-published my first novel, Proteus Begins. And I have since self-published 6 books and maintained this weekly newsletter for almost 2 years.

I had wanted to write a novel and “be a writer” since I was a child. Finishing and seeing my name on the cover of a book was the theme of almost half a century of New Year’s resolutions. A lifetime of starts and abandonments, of frustrations, misdirections, weak decisions, and conspiring situations.

That MFA program was the catalyst I needed and led to my realized resolution—that book. I woke up early, spent weekends and nights listening to online lessons, did homework, swallowed a lot of peer-criticism, and faced uncomfortable and new situations.

Writing is hard. It requires commitment and motivation, challenges your sense of self, and presents way too many easy exit routes.

I, specifically, needed that particular push of committing to and completing a formal MFA program to accomplish something I had wanted to do my whole life.

Realizing a dream takes action. I made an apprehensive phone call to an admission office after researching MFA programs online. I had an uncomfortable (MFAs are expensive) conversation with my supportive and encouraging partner. I made space and gave life to an idea that wouldn’t leave my brain.

In the end, I found the people who answered my questions, motivated me, and broke a vague notion into actionable and practical steps. They unlocked the mystery and gave me a path.

Fast forward to about a year ago. A friend from one of my writing groups asked if I could explain how to self-publish a book. I wrote him what amounted to a two-page email. That email became my book Karmic Robot’s Guide to Self-Publishing. It is available for free at https://dl.bookfunnel.com/a8c2mvv2wj.

During that experience, I realized that working with serious writers and helping them finish their projects fed my soul. For the first time, I felt a calling.

Not only did the MFA program lead me down a journey where I now write books, it uncovered this aspect of myself I would never have realized.

Even though writing is a solitary activity, it doesn’t mean writers have to do it alone.

Early next year I am launching a coaching business to support authors who want to complete a book. Right now, I am actively looking for a couple of people who are intent on finishing a manuscript (fiction, non-fiction, a memoir, a book of poetry) and who need a push, who want a new result in 2026.

If this is something that you’d be interested in pursuing, email or message me.

By the time we were done, I’d get the experience of working with you and the opportunity to develop my program, and you’d get a complete manuscript, ready to self-publish or send to agents.

I’m not an editor (although I may offer some suggestions). I will not do any writing for you. I mean to walk next to you. To poke and prod you and help you discover your way to finishing your book.

For more information, check out https://www.karmicrobot.com/p/book-coach-work-with-me. If you know someone who might be interested, pass this on to them. They can email me.

If you have no desire to write a book. Consider yourself lucky. I’m jealous. It’s a pain in the butt, and rarely worth it.

In 2026, rather than make resolutions, I urge you to search for your push. Look for the thing that will inspire you to do something different, that delivers a new result.

Clean up that grimy visage.

Happy reading, happy writing, happy new year!

David

Today I’m writing about a topic that’s been top of my mind (or bottom of the other end?) this week as I prepped for a colonoscopy: detox.

And since I am genetically predisposed to over-share, I told everyone I ran into about this blessed event.

On the morning of my procedure, almost to a person, the response was the same: The toughest part is over, implying that the prep, you know—the cleanout, the detox, the colon blow—was the most torturous aspect of the process, not the actual non-alien, AMA sanctioned, anal probing and photographing while a room full of people look on.

Truthfully, the worst part for me is not the days leading up to the big event (low-residue foods, liquid diets, and involuntary evacuations), but rather the poking of my hand with the IV needle right before my special moment. I hate that. It hurts. The needle is the size of a sewer drain, and my hands are delicate.

Nope. I actually like the prep.

I fawn over the instructions for the weeks leading up to it. I print them out, review them daily in anticipation. Underline and highlight my favorite passages like a nursing student. Mark on my calendar the “important” dates: 1 week before, 2 days before, the day before, the day of. It’s a whole thing, and I aim to win.

There are many different colonoscopy pre-games. Each Dr.’s office seems to have its own, like a biker gang leather vest and patch. Mine uses a couple of pounds of MiraLAX dissolved into gallons of Gatorade enjoyed throughout the day before. I’ve heard that others aren’t so evocative of a high school sports championship. For that, I am saddened.

All of this leads me back to the topic at hand: cleansing.

Cleanses and detoxes are very popular these days. They have been for a while.

The first one I ever did was called an elimination diet. Its purpose was to see how my body reacted to being gluten-free. Basically, I spent 10 days giving up everything that is good in life, drinking vast quantities of a low caloric meal replacement, and then slowly re-introducing foods that are in the constitution along with life and liberty: pizza, beer, sandwiches, pasta, and Cap’n Crunch.

It was hell. But from that experience, though, I eventually lost 40 pounds over the next six months (20 of which I have since gained back), and I did feel better.

Yet, to this day, I can’t tell you if I am allergic to gluten or not.

There is no definitive way to know unless someone looks at the lining of my small intestine. People with celiac disease have a lot of damage down there. I’m one of the 4 out of 5 people that don’t care enough to know the truth (no one is telling me I can’t eat pizza).

Of course, it helps that all gluten does is make me feel sad. I don’t have any of the debilitating symptoms that some people do.

The next cleanse I did was at the encouragement of my ex-brother-in-law’s friend, a guy who lived in a van, travelled around the country, and promoted the book Eat Right 4 Your Type and the fad of the blood type diet.

That detox involved 4 days of ingesting large quantities of apple juice and stool softeners followed by a miserable night of trying to sleep (lying on my left side) after drinking a cup of olive oil.

DON’T DO THIS.

It was supposed to make my gallbladder release an unspeakable amount of green bile. After which, I was supposed to be way healthier (whatever that means) than I had ever been. A clean slate and ready to embark on a very specific blood-type diet.

And yes, it felt exactly like it sounds. It was horrible.

The next one I embarked on was a juice cleanse after watching the movie Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead. I bought a juicer and drank nothing but juice for 30 days. Yes, I made it 30 days (the guy in the movie went 60), and I felt great, reborn.

I had boundless energy, all my ailments disappeared, and the only negative I experienced was guilt from tossing away all that healthy fruit and veggie fiber. Seemed like there had to be a better way…

But, I felt so good in fact that in the years since then I’ve tried this cleanse a couple of more times. Sadly, I’ve never experienced the positive effects as I did after that first one. A bottleful of placebos, anyone? Nah, juice is good, healthy, but you can’t juice a pizza.

The dumping of all that pulp and fiber is a huge deterrent. I’ve since purchased a Vitamix, so I can make juice (or smoothies) and include the fiber in the concoctions. I do this occasionally, hoping to regain that high and lightness. But alas, without the motivation from that movie, I rarely have the same enthusiasm.

There are many other detoxes. You can buy products that offer 1-60 day protocols. Mostly, they are supplements, and they purport to remove all the bad stuff that our bodies collect just from living in modern life. We inhabit a dirty world: pollutants, heavy metals, smelly trucks, people who whistle in public.

And I’m not even going to mention any of those moronic TikTok cleanses. Those are just stupid and dangerous. No one should look at social media (more on this below).

Recently, my nutritionist recommended the vitamin C detox. Apparently, if you give your body massive doses of vitamin C (like 5-10 grams), your body hates it so much you spend a significant amount of the day on the toilet getting rid of it. I did this to alleviate the “things seem stuck down there” feeling.

What I can say is that it worked for me. I spent time in the bathroom, perhaps more than I had planned on. But the effect was productive. So, there is that. I would do it again.

DISCLAIMER: You should always consult a physician, as I am not. So, don’t do any of the things I have mentioned. Don’t be an idiot. Think for yourself.

The curious, and important, thing is that our bodies are predisposed to elimination. They are freaking fantastic at it. We have whole organs and multiple biological systems dedicated to the removal of stuff that doesn’t belong inside of us. Usually, your body doesn’t require any help.

Additionally, there isn’t any solid research that even suggests we need or should do a cleanse. You just have to stop consuming crap and get out of the way.

It’s kind of like telling your kids or a sibling to do something, and they don’t do it. But, then, another person says the exact same thing, and they think it’s transcendent.

Well, with my cleanse and scoping complete, I’m good for another 7-10 years or 1,000 pizzas, whichever comes first.

This time, the IV went into my arm rather than my hand. It wasn’t so bad. I hardly noticed.

The only detox I recommend for everyone is a routine digital detox. Cleanse your life of all things that have a screen, a microphone, or speakers for a specific amount of time. Take a walk in nature, stroll around a quaint town, meet a friend for coffee, all without your phone (or smartwatch or AI glasses).

I’m sure my suggestion is causing at least some of you to have a panic attack. That’s the point. You’ll panic, and then you’re realize that you’re fine. We all lived without phones back in the 1980s.

Everyone loves the 80s. Embrace it.

Stay clean. Stay cool.

Happy reading, happy writing, happy eliminating,

David

In astrology, a birth chart is a mapping of the symbolic location of the planets in the sky at the moment of a person’s birth. It’s a snapshot of the heavens as seen from little baby you crashing into this world.

When a person says that they are a Pisces, they are talking about their Sun sign, or the location of the Sun relative to the Earth’s orbit. In other words, because I was born in late February, the sun in my chart appears in the sign of Pisces (a patch of sky loosely associated with the constellation Pisces).

All the other planets that orbit around the Sun also have positions in my birth chart that represent where they were in the sky relative to Earth.

If someone were to turn away from the joyous event of my birth and look at the sky, they would see the Moon, Mercury, Mars, and Saturn also in the sign of Pisces. The other planets appear in other signs on my chart.

Every year on my birthday, I can observe the Sun in the position it is on my astrology birth chart. This is because it takes 1 year for our Earth to move around the Sun.

It takes Mercury about 88 days to get back to the place it was when I was born. A Mars round-trip is a little over 2 years. And Saturn can take anywhere between 28 and 32 years.

The further the planet is away from the Sun, the longer the time between returns. You will never experience a Pluto return, as it takes around 250 years. Jupiter does it in 12.

Returns in a birth chart are significant events in astrology. The energy that they bring is considerable; a person experiences a metaphorical rebirth of that planet’s energy.

In Western astrology, the planet Saturn is symbolic of the Father (the king of the gods in mythology), and consequently rules order, limitations, and commitments. Saturn’s role in your chart is to remind you how to get things done, the systems that you use to make meaning.

A Saturn Return is like coming home late from a party in high school where your dad has waited up to smell your breath and either tuck you in to bed with a kiss on your forehead or give you a lecture and ground you. It gives you an opportunity to see how you have been living your life and really investigate if you are serving your highest self.

A person, if they are lucky, will experience 3 Saturn Returns, one approximately every 3 decades—at the ages of around 30, 60, and 90. In your chart, Saturn is a big, slow-moving planet, so you have a few years to do this work. While Saturn returns on a single date, the effect of its return lasts for years, because the Earth moves, too.

By the end of my first Saturn Return, I had sold everything, left a quiet life in Atlanta, GA, and moved to a cramped, noisy apartment on the Lower East Side of New York City. I did this with my longtime girlfriend. I took part in this decision to make the change, find a little more excitement, and get back to the northeast.

While we were in NYC, we got married, had our first child, unknowingly killed Allan Ginsburg (just kidding—fodder for another newsletter), and fell into a life that would end in divorce several years later when we had moved to a suburb of Boston and all the distractions of NYC that had been hiding our incompatibility disappeared.

In essence, on my first Saturn Return, I had come home obliterated, stinking of cheap whiskey.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my kids, and I give gratitude every day they are in my life. I couldn’t imagine living without them. And my time in New York City was transformative (mostly because I got to share it with my son) and brought me some cool opportunities.

Yet, the decisions I made during my first Saturn Return led to my moving to NYC via Atlanta from Boston, entering a marriage that ended in divorce, making inconsistent career choices that stranded me in a career I never wanted, and abandoning my writing hopes and dreams.

If a person makes good decisions in their life up to and during a Saturn Return, they will experience a strong affirmation that they are on the right track. A good decision is not an absolute good versus evil thing—it’s more of an appropriate adjustment for your spiritual journey in this life. For example, rather than attempting to grow my career in software development, I could have altered my course and taken my chances as a struggling writer.

If, up to and during the span of your Saturn Return, you ignored the messages about your life’s purpose and didn’t make the right choices to find your karmic path, a Saturn Return can feel like a complete disruption (the Tower Card in Tarot).

In short, Saturn Returns are associated with personal self-evaluations and potential disruptions roughly every 30 years… hmmm… life crisis…

Imagine my surprise when, this week, I came across this:

Our brain function is far from static throughout our lives. We already know that our capacity to learn, and our risk of cognitive decline, [vary] from when we are a newborn through to our 90s. Now, scientists may have uncovered a potential reason why this occurs: our brain wiring seems to undergo four major turning points at ages 9, 32, 66 and 83.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2505656-your-brain-undergoes-four-dramatic-periods-of-change-from-age-0-to-90

Wait, our brains change roughly every 30 years?!? Our wiring and how we think and see the world changes every 30ish years? Sounds like a Saturn Return.

So what are these changes in the brain?

…during the second phase, between 9 and 32 years old, “…information gets from one place to another more quickly.” (Alexa Mousley) This may support the development of skills like planning and decision-making…

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2505656-your-brain-undergoes-four-dramatic-periods-of-change-from-age-0-to-90

So, our brains rewire at 30 to transform how we organize and make meaning in our lives.

And then at 66,

…connections between brain regions switch back to gradually losing efficiency. “…the 30s map onto a lot of different major lifestyle changes – for instance, having kids, settling down – so that could play a role,” says Mousley.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2505656-your-brain-undergoes-four-dramatic-periods-of-change-from-age-0-to-90

Hence, this brain transformation provides an analysis and re-visioning of things.

These major turning points in our brain seem, strangely, to coincide with Saturn Returns—times when the ways we make meaning in our lives no longer work or support us.

Oh, my stars.

Throughout my life, I have felt an urge to defend my interest in astrology, because I have a large bucket of anecdotal evidence that suggests its usefulness. Yet, as both a man of science (electrical engineer) and a practitioner of energy healing (Reiki Master), I have tried to conceive of many explanations for justifying it to others.

My most recent theory has to do with quantum entanglement. But, given these discoveries about the brain, it seems like I no longer have to work that hard. Neuroscience is having a moment these days (as I’ve written about previously) as it is being used to provide scientific reasons for many human conditions that aren’t directly related to the head.

I see astrology, tarot, mythology, archetypes from Jungian psychology, and other beliefs as ways to tell stories about our life experiences. They facilitate the making sense of the nonsensical, like the ancients inventing gods, fairies, election manipulation, and curious disease-tracking statistics.

Whatever you believe (if someone isn’t lying or hiding the evidence), I think that actual science will eventually show the way. It seems to have so far.

I guess what I’m saying is that however you make meaning in your life, try to be open to occasional introspection and don’t be afraid to make course corrections to keep you on your path (leaving a well-paying, secure job in NYC for an unpredictable venture into novel writing was too scary for me to attempt).

Whether it’s written in the stars or just a maturation of our brains, we seem predestined to experience considerable transformations. What we call it doesn’t matter. What matters is that we listen.

I’m at the beginning of my second Saturn Return, and boy am I feeling some of the ways I strayed from my path after my first one. Stay tuned.

Happy reading, happy writing, happy evolving.

David