Personal microblog without a character limit
Stolen from a website belonging to someone I admire
Here you will find ponderances, ideas, cool things I found, plans I’ll likely never execute, and other things that don’t quite fit elsewhere on the website nor warrant a full article. Consider it the more personal, human, and admittedly ugly side of this website.
To those used to the technical writing found elsewhere on this website, this may present a stark contrast.
From A Man for All Seasons, by Robert Bolt:
Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ‘round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down — and you’re just the man to do it — do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!
— Sir Thomas More
Believe it or not, I found this gem while watching meeting #131 of the (2nd session) 44th Canadian Parliament’s Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates (OGGO). You can read the minutes of proceedings if you prefer text. It led me to this really nice article about the rule of law by the Sutherland Institute, too, that I think is worth a read.
While looking for the lyrics to 優しい嘘 (Yasashii Uso) by 上原れな (Uehara Rena), I ended up finding a Smule page for it. On it, there were a few recordings of people singing the song submitted years ago. These are very sweet amateur renditions of the song, and I found myself smiling like a parent listening to their children’s school recital.
I made it so I can enable MathJax on a per-page basis on this website. It’s really cool to be able to write mathematical notation. I used to use Pandoc to convert Markdown with inlined LaTeX to PDF for notes and assignments back in university, so this is a nice throwback to those days.
Look at it:
$$ \mathbbm{E}(X) = \sum_{x \in \mathcal{X}} x \cdot \mathbbm{P}(x) \longrightarrow \mathbbm{E}(f(X)) = \sum_{y \in f(\mathcal{X})} y \cdot \mathbbm{P}(y) $$Not that it’ll get much meaningful use, but it’s nice to have the option.
To the person with whom I recently reconnected,
I doubt you are reading this. If anything, I hope you aren’t, for I’ve gone out of my way to avoid linking my different online presences together. However, if for whatever reason you scoured the Internet looking for me and stumbled upon this website, know that I appreciate the effort and find it endearing.
Reconnecting with you has been a bittersweet experience. I did tell you this, but more than reconnecting with you, it feels like I am reconnecting with someone I used to be. Life has changed me in many ways, some for the better, some for the worse. I’m at a strange point where I’m not entirely sure what direction to take, and speaking to you has thrown me into a tailspin of nostalgia and introspection.
I’m glad I sent you that text. I’m happy that you replied, and it still surprises me how friendly you were to me after everything that transpired and the time that has passed. I hope we can keep in touch, even if only sporadically. You were an important part of my life once, and I’d like to be a part of yours again, even if only as a distant acquaintance.
Only time will tell where this leads us. For now, I want to express what I won’t bother texting you in short bursts:
- Your website inspired this page. Sorry I copied the idea, it was precisely what I was looking for.
- Your writing style remains something I admire. Thank you for publishing so many of your thoughts.
- Life is difficult and complicated. I’m sorry for the hardships you’ve endured.
- It’s refreshing to see how much individuality you’ve retained and developed.
- The records of our past interactions bring a smile to my face, and have given me motivation to preserve history.
I really liked you, y’know? You may not have thought me sincere, but I was.