Posts

122. Sight Seeing

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These last few eternities we have been in an Alaskan cruise ship. My wife and I aren't exactly cruise folk. We like to make our plans and build our own adventures with as little people around us as possible when on vacation. We are definitely not minglers at the promenade kind of people. That said, this trip has been magical. Seeing whales and bears and cracking glaciers has been a unique experience when combined to the absolute decadence of a cruise ship. Want to have three lunches composed of desserts? It’s OK, in this lumbering, luxury liner. Two dinners, one of New York pizza and the other of Malaysian fare? You absolutely can in this bloated floating city.  At least my wife has gone to the gym thrice in this geriatric grand ship. Me, I’ve been failing at the one thing I thought I could do: Drink my 15 drinks a day provided by my drink package. My record is 12. Today is our last day and I hope I can do it! Edit: I got 13 and a Perrier ☹️ We saw whales. Lots of whale

121. Paper Towels

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I love thee, paper towels. Most men that I’ve ever met love paper towels. These absorbent tapestries of angelic white are definitely a better invention than sliced bread. I have not been able to properly communicate to my wife how important paper towels have been in my life. All the errors they have been able to undo. Cat vomit from 5 different pets have posed no trouble for my bleached, thick friends. I’ve been able to harmelssly evict countless bugs with these corrugated beauties. Cooking misshaps? Not here! Mystery blood from a rowdy party? Not in my house! Never mind the weird side glances I get from my wife when I use a fresh paper towel sheet to pick up a dirty paper towel sheet. How many other tools let you do that ad-infinitum? She doesn’t believe in the miracle anti-bacterial goodness of a simple sheet of paper. Once, when I cleaned pre-used kitty litter that I spilled in the kitchen, she didn’t believe that a quick wipe with my pick-a-size banners of pulcritude would be

120. Open Minded

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Hey folks! You can try this at home! Start broadcasting that you need a change in life, that you are willing to try something new. You will start receiving an advice avalanche from people you know (and some you don’t). The amount of life improvement nuggets that exist in the universe of humans seems absolutely infinite.  We are all culpable of this. I remember when I first tried meditation for anxiety. I couldn’t help myself telling people to try it! Meditation, or more specifically the perceiving of oneself without emotional engagement, worked for me during hard times. The thing is, it is not for everyone. Not everyone needs to meditate. Terry Pratchett’s quote has always stayed with me: “The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.”. In it’s most benign interpretation we have people really trying to help, from their limited focus. In one of the more pernicious interpretations we have cult leaders

119. The Choice Patient

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The choice patient is a Republican talking point. Most people in the United States already have no options in their insurance as it is done through their employer. If you have a public option that will pay for your main healthcare needs, only a portion of Americans would need to supplement it with  something else. And this is the United States of America so there will always be VIP options , I have no doubt. We need to go to Universal Healthcare. On that the Democrats mostly agree ( Biden's 97% promise falls short to most others ). They disagree in how to get there. You heard on the democratic debate one of the main rifts: Should we have a federally managed, exclusive public option or should there be a space for private insurance? I am not intelligent enough to know what will be best in our current economic and political climate but hear me out. An exclusive single payer system is very rare in large countries. France, Spain, Germany and Canada have a role for private in

118. Shortcuts

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I'm not going to lie. I loved drawing this one. I’m on the second week of forced unemployment and being able to draw this one was a great release of tension and anxiety. This comic combines some of my favorite things. It is about  clever shortcuts, diversity and the one game that changed everything for me: Super Mario Bros. for the NES. I can barely remember what I had for breakfast (and I made it myself), but I remember the day my mom bought me the NES and this game like it was yesterday. Seeing the box art for the first time, with its blown up pixel art, was an indelible memory. My brother said that the graphics looked like shit, because it was so blown up. When we were finally able to hook it up at home, all kinds of people came by to marvel at the graphics. I remember everything from the first goomba to the first time (after lots of tries) that we lowered the flag in world 1-1. It was a good time to be alive and young. Video games have always been there for me when

117. The Layoff Episode

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Last week, my department got laid off, along with dozens of others around my organization. In my  job as an internal consultant, I made use of my talents to help the people I cared the most about: the employees (from front line to leaders). It was in the direct help to employees that I derived the most work satisfaction. I will definitely be mourning the loss of the opportunity to help my co-workers for a long time to come. I am unsure what I will pursue. At this moment, many roads seem viable that I hadn't seen before. I am both strengthened and overwhelmed at the choices. I really want to be in a position in which I can continue to help workers achieve better outcomes for their customers and themselves. Extra Panel: The Psychology of it All It had been telegraphed to us that we would lose our jobs, so I had time to build up to it emotionally. Or so I thought! The mixture of shame, disappointment and anger that comes after a moment like this is not possible to prep

116. Travelling Without Moving

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Travelling is the activity my wife and I enjoy doing the most. We love everything about the process. We love perusing our Lonely Planet books before a trip, learning some basic phrases (if the destination is in a different language), and having something to look forward to. I find it funny that we frequently find ourselves in very similar places no matter where we go in the world. Dark, underground places with craft beer and cocktails. Honestly, if you wanted to abduct us in a foreign country all you need to do is advertise local craft beer in your basement. We are completely different people when we travel. She is comfortable with a lesser amount of planning (she leaves her planner at home!) and I become observant and experience every pebble of every road we take. Perhaps our Nirvana would be to achieve these states in our own backyard! Another thing that happens to us is that we become ravenous. If we do plan, we mostly plan where we are having our three meals, dessert and mi

115. Murder, She Heard

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My wife took me to a live recording of  “My Favorite Murder” in Houston this year. It was a great show, but it was also very eye-opening. First of all, the crowd was 90% female. The hosts, too, are female and hilarious about this dreary subject. Not until recently had I noticed the connection between these kinds of shows and gender. It dawned on me during this show that this is about female survival. By far, the victims in the murders discussed in the show are female and the perpetrators are male. It is something that I barely register in my daily life but is probably at the top of women’s minds frequently. There was a good episode about this in Aziz Ansari's show "Master of None" in season 1. Going home alone is a completely different experience for boys and girls and it sucks a lot. "My Favorite Murder" works with that and evolves it. There’s useful tips embedded in the show, like “f#!k politeness”,  a lot of the murders happen to people that felt some

114. Facing Issues

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When I am walking down my work’s hallway, I see lots of faces. Sometimes, out of the blue, my processes break and I let out a mess of a face in return. It’s like a Jim face  if Jim had diarrhea and was afraid people would notice. Where do we learn to do these faces? I sure as hell didn't plan to develop this response to another human being. I must have caught it from some other awkward nimrod. The people in my head are based slightly on Khaneman's 2 system theory . You can find out more in this earlier blog post.   Some days I love the slower, thoughtful #2 (blue) and some days you can’t but appreciate your instinctual, hurried #1 (red). The origins of these creatures can be seen in this popular post , as well. I often think about these two theoretical processes. Number one is the one who types posts in twitter and starts fights with Trump supporters and horrible people. Number 2 is the one who erases these posts before they are sent. Extra post: It’s contagio

113. Truth Bombs

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Having iron-clad thoughts written in stone is not as laudable as it seems. For some reason, people seem to idolize personalities with unwavering opinions. I feel it's a dangerous thing to celebrate. We should be ready to update our opinions with the introduction of new evidence. Like most Venezuelans that escaped that socialist dystopia , I was a libertarian when I came to the United States. I believed that all people needed to do was to work really hard and they could make it in a place like the USA. I have learned a lot since then. I have learned that we are definitely not all in equal footing. I came across evidence that hiring practices were racist against black sounding names ( This is a recent  meta-analysis);   redlining has deprived many communities from prosperity and even children are disciplined differently in school . Over time, African Americans also get longer prison sentences . All this paints a picture that is particularly harrowing for black males in th