Category: Uncategorized

December January Goal Review

Tis the season to get things done!

December Goal Review

The month was dedicated to EOY blog posts, the EOY letter, and celebrations. I add too that I made some novel financial decisions with confidence and conviction. This was all melancholy as it goes in the season – low light, poor sleep, friends and more scattered to the winds.

Will I go as boldly in January?

January Goal Proposal

  1. Citizenship
    • Have some paperwork and tests to complete that cement my place in where I call home now. About time I brush up in study!
  2. Health Decisions
    • Might be a chimeric cyborg. This month is for the appointments and tests and decisions that change my future.
  3. Six Flags & Adventures
    • My social calendar is =poppin’=. I reserve time to build those memories and strengthen those relationships.
  4. (Private) Restart
    • A private goal for myself, I am going to restart something for a week, ride out the consequences for the month thereafter. This namely will explore if a principle I have held for years still holds true enough.
  5. Bonus: Death Walk
    • Get acquainted with my own mortality again. I am a bit listless as I write – death walks always have set me right, and it has been a minute since the last! Let me see if a weekend can be made free…

–

Thinking of these goals, they generate and create very little – something I find disappointing. Thinking ahead, I already know that getting my estate planning updated, concerts, and my birthday in February are on deck.

It is difficult to… come up with more. I am a doer, accustomed to positions of poverty and urgency, whether actually threatened or merely imagined. Now I see big milestones on the horizon that I am soon to pass and need the strength to perhaps set new courses.

Or I might just be tired. I am resetting my sleep routine and it has been brutal. Might be time to get on board for 2024! Cheers to you and yours ~

2024? Time for Some More

Computer learning, human psychology, economic blooming, and more I have likely missed living a life of work, study, and growth.

What comes next? No one can know this. 2024 is a mystery to me, yet here are some shapes in the dark:

Citizenship

I like where I live. I like my work. I will make additional commitments to my beach life and professional endeavors in 2024.

This will mean travel, more morning swims, some days at the beach, some weekends camping and giving of myself to this place and the people I am coming to call “home.”

Chimeric Cyborg

Remember when my conversion to the machines was ditched?

Looks like the procedure is back on the table. This time, it includes non-human parts, so who can tell? I might evolve through science 😁

Making

A copout point. Of course I am going to make things. Games, blog posts, distilled patterns.

There is no reason to not make more of myself, too. Progress on my FI goals, a better understanding of the world, compassion for others in their journeys, insights to my mind and body and needs and wants.

“Give more than you get.” I endeavor to do that.

Time for Some More?

While there are a few things to gird myself for, I open myself up to the joys I expect will arrive and more that come as a surprise.

My birthday to celebrate with my West Coast friends will be a blast. We get after so many different activities, I sometimes need to find excuse to stay in (like tonight as I write!).

Concerts of power metal, hyper metal, a menagerie of EDM, and more will see me on the dance floor. Heck, who needs a concert to dance? Swing, line dancing, two step, and other classes will see more of me.

Books and shows and music and maybe a game or two could bring me to tears. Many did this past year. I am eager to keep the wonder in me of media stoked.

As AI and machine learning make strides, I for one am ready to welcome new tools – or new sentience – on this Earth.

And company – let me not forget the people. Who will I meet? Continue to enjoy time with? Come to understand and party alongside and travel for and so much more? Not the destination nor the journey, but the company you keep seems to be key to a lot of happy feels.

–

Such high hopes for 2024. I do not pretend to have influence over major global affairs, nor dwell anxiously on matters that… well, do not really matter.

2023 has taught me “this too shall pass” – the pain, the joy. I seek to withstand hardship by my strength and bring about its end swiftly. I seek too the opportunities and openness to recognize and accept and be present with the joy that wanders along.

That is me. How about you? What are you expecting in the new year? What do you want for yourself? For others? Let us talk to understand. I think it is time for some more of that.

Cheers to the mysteries forthcoming for you and I ~

’23 and Me Highlight Reel

Last year was all about travel, health, and the making of enjoyable things.

Who knew we would have more of the same? Plans tend to be useless, though the planning was priceless:

How All Those Plans Turned Out

Work, Life – I had thoughts on turning writing, game making, and voice acting into pay. Almost immediately after publishing last year’s post, I crunched the numbers: these are trash passion projects in terms of profitability. Rather, coding and holding a day-job is the unromantic, realistic best bet to achieving my goals.

And a job became required – not for financial concerns, but after 6 months sabbatical, I edged into either being stir crazy or FOMO. I needed something to do 🤷‍♂️

Making Moves – From DC to New York, from Alaska to LA beaches, I have been around. Celebrating with friends in their weddings and studies has been a high point. Moving to LA for a job was the toughest decision of my career and I do not regret it. Benefit of being in Cali is being on the beach 🙂 While I wonder when other beaches on other shores will see me, here is swell ~

Not all time was on sand or in the office – some of it was on launch pads and in the bowels of advanced machinery. I cannot emphasize enough that what I do and the what the company I work for does is frikken cool.

More Yes, More No – While I had no plans specific to more “yes” to important things and more “no” to the frivolous, things happened anyway! I am learning to spend social time and care for myself. I have been better at being less patient, giving less the benefit of the doubt.

What I see seems to make me ever more cynical too, turning weak opinions into positions well guarded with experience and fact. There is more to say “no” to, that I work myself up to say soon. IDK what all this makes me – what it has given me is more time, more security, more confidence, and prevented a move to Texas 😁

The Tea

Let’s speed-run the rest of the year:

Relationship Guides – If I could identify 2023 singularly, more than the job or geo change would be that this is the year of relationship psychology: the advice and study concerning interpersonal connections have flooded my shelf and this blog and I am a better person for it all.

Roleplaying Games – Brought the D&D game I was moderating to a close as I moved to LA. Bittersweet, every Sunday was a frikken killer time – my regards to Aadiiris, Bornhold, and Guyute, beyond-par characters and players all. In addition, a lot of work done on how to make and run RPGs has left me with a mountain of content I distill and prep to share with you in 2024.

Fitness – I joined The Phoenix active sobriety group before moving to LA. An amazing org ran by amazing people. I couldn’t have asked for a better social group that had me bouldering, hiking, and playing pickleball on the regular. While now separated, I have a new climbing group and the cold swims have put me into a lean, strong frame of body and mind.

Cars – Nothing like losing what at one point was your home. Anyway, have a new vehicle and a further detachment from material things. A new appreciation for long distance driving is here too, given LA traffic and important people spread hither and thither in this megapolis.

Milestones – I have learned about my psychology. I have grown as a relatable person. I have discovered self-soothing techniques and ways to restart my biology in wonderful ways. I see the Rubicon ahead on my FI journey. I am being vague and am very open to talking more on these things one-on-one – reach out!

–

Never stop doing, folks.

Share your lows and highlights from the year. Follow with your email too to get more adventure every week into the new year. I appreciate you being here – cheers to all you have accomplished, boss ~

Top 10 of 2023

Every Friday a new post popped up here on JimmyChattin.com – while not all of the same quality, the best rise to the top while past-years’ evergreen content stays as green as ever. Here is your guide to the top 10 of 2023:

10. Lasers + Shields = Boom in Dune

Y’all are nerds. This evergreen post from 2019 dives into the napkin-math explaining how devastating lasers and shields function in the Dune universe.

9. Rewriting: Halo 4

One of my favorite applications of the 6-point story structure of successful Halo stories caught some people’s eyes. The article breaks down what happened in the Halo 4 game, how it deviated from the tried-and-true point structure for narrative, and suggests how the game could have gotten on track while foretelling what could have come in Halo 5 (which didn’t, correlating with the series’ downward trend in reception).

8. A Trinity of RPG Classes

Short and sweet, the blog outlines how Tank, DPS, and Support are the three core classes all other classes derive from in roleplaying games. Edits included from a healthy discussion on LinkedIn after publication.

7. The Best of This Modern Relationship Guide: Make It Happen

Author Logan Ury is such a boss. How Not to Die Alone is in the top-5 of relationship books you need to have read. This part 1 gives the same advice I gave a stranger to get them a second date – get educated and do better in your relationships by putting in the work of reading this article ~

Already have a relationship? Head to part 2!

6. Tribe of Mentors: A Share of Value

A set of superb Qs with very considered answers. Some of the closest-to-heart and best-advice I could come up with at writing.

5. #PaidMe2023

Who knew having access to unobscured financial data proves to be useful?

Continuing the 2020 trend, I share salary data for industry, geo-location, and role.

4. How to Price Your RPG

Data on the best-selling tabletop roleplaying games shows a nifty pattern on how to price RPGs. Refer here when you are considering publishing your own games!

3. Chat With an AI: ChatGPT

2022 was the dawn of regular-use AI. In 2023, I sat down to explore the capabilities of the machine on topics from relationships, universal truths, and sentience.

2. Bringing d20 Poly-Dice to 2d6

Sometimes a person could use a handy-dandy conversion of one dice set’s probabilities into another. Here is my guide for mating D20 and 2D6 systems together.

1. Eight Dates Essential to You and Yours

The Gottmans and their world-class institute have paved the way for modern psychology as it comes to couples. Touching on only a smidgen of their research, Eight Dates outlines decades of work into principles that can build and maintain the strongest of bonds.

Return of a Grimdark Favorite

BITS of Mörk Borg remains off this list because it had 3x the total views of the next contender. #1 in 2022 too, I still do not know what is driving so much interest in the post 🤷‍♂️

Give it a read – you might find out the spice that is a spiked-flail-to-the-face that is this game.
🔥🤘💀🤘🔥

–

Many 2022 posts are back with some friends going as far as 2019. Clearly, out of all the posts this year, I must encourage you to read these top-tier works.

Some last-minute honorables: A divorce lawyer’s guide to not messing relationships up and rewriting Halo 5.

Want to keep learning? Spy on 2021’s and 2020’s best posts. Cheers to finding something for you and yours ~

November December Goal Review

As you will see, from 50% to 150% is a heck of a jump. How? What gives? Let us talk about that a little:

November Goal Review

  1. Home Care
    • Won! I live in better spaces, things in their places.
  2. Review This Journal
    • Won! Content has been translated into the EOY review and I still need to revisit the deets for any blogs I wish to write and notes to act on. +Bonus for the books and shows review. (Lacking the additional bonus from last month.)
  3. Money Matters
    • Won! Managing my books, I discovered some help to short-term budgeting and am very pleased at the recent market pops. If the market continues to grow, certain goals will be struck in December or January – if so, that means I must attend to more money matters 🤞
  4. Suit Stuffing
    • Won! Wedding, Thanksgiving, a holiday party to prep for, concerts, house warmings – giving myself credit here for showing up.
  5. Bonus: Life Audits
    • No dice! No audit of my whole life just yet, but:
  6. Bonus: More Sleep Journaling
    • Won! Sleep journal has been invaluable. Data is great – future consideration is to measure my daily actions vs. only nighttime and supplement routines.

December Goal Proposal

More parties, visiting chosen fam and friends, drafting and writing the EOY letter, the EOY blog posts… I am taking December off credit because these things must and will be done – no wiggle room here! (Won’t count December as a vacation just yet!)

Will come back to revisit come January’s goal proposal – sound good?

–

150% of expectations… Did I not challenge myself enough? Did I especially enjoy these goals?

Like the bonus activity audit of November, I have years of data concerning my goals I could compile and correlate – maybe I will do just that.

Next year, though! For now, let us all survive and thrive in this wintertime. I myself am getting a big dose of the seasonal blues – this too shall pass. I know you may be a bit fuzzy too – I am here with you and for you in it.

For the joys and battles you face, I know too you will come out far ahead – these will be gone and you will remain as more. Cheers to you and yours ~

AI: First, Think It Is Sentient

So much talk of artificial intelligence (AI) – how will it affect jobs? The sciences? Relationships and art?

Some have even claimed our modern day version of AI modelling has achieved selfdom. Most agree an intelligence that is as flexible as human is still a ways off (the models used now are very good at singular tasks, like a person who paints masterworks [and that by peeking over the shoulders of others] being absolutely incapable of putting pants on).

Yet that general intelligence is coming – when, we do not know. The question is how do we prepare. I have the audacity to propose a part of the prep:

For any AI that is expressing high, flexible levels of intelligence, first, think it is sentient.

  1. Benefit of the Doubt
  2. Precedence: Deus Ex
  3. What If We Win?
  4. –

Benefit of the Doubt

Alan Turing – the founder of thinking-machine study – put together a test of thought, the eponymous Turing Test (aka Imitation Game). This was the benchmark to consider if an artificial intelligence exists, that something thought.

The Turing Test has ultimately become the lowest bar for a machine to pass when the machine has language, and does not apply to other kinds of intelligences that are, ultimately, non-verbal in nature.

(Side note on the non-verbal part: plenty of actual, living human beings fail classical tests of intelligence based either language or logic, while certain non-human species have demonstrated vocabulary, original complex emotions, contextual reasoning, tool use, social dynamics, and future thinking, arguably more “intelligence” than a not insignificant collection of the Homo Sapiens variety.)

Humans are given the presumption of innocence until proven guilty as a matter to reduce undue suffering and to protect society’s very soul by not damning the innocent. That core concept is to not be Evil for convenience by affording higher morals, by affording the benefit of the doubt.

I would press that humanity and individuals can work to do Good as it comes to AI. If a machine would be treated less for a perceived lack of sentience, when it could act at least in imitation of thinking self-sovereignty, when it has compunction to surpass at least some of of our own human species, why not treat it better?

Turing is known to have thought the debate of “what is thinking” to be stupid. It would seem sensible to be smart and not waste time with being over confident in our powers of judgement and self-aggrandizement. If a common, general definition of sentience that could be proven by merit / act / behavior (e.g. being of a certain species or construction does not beget sentience by itself) came to be, any entity that could pass it ought be given the benefit of the doubt, i.e. think it is sentient.

Precedence: Deus Ex

Treating things as having thought and will – divine essence and consciousness – by default comes with many millennia of precedence.

The ‘spirit’ or ‘god within’ is a fundament of human tradition and belief. A very brief, very abridged list where this exists:

  • Shintoism
  • Hellenistic and Roman Mythology
  • Pre- and Post-Socratic Western Philosophy
  • First Nation Tradition
  • Anthropomorphism

Assuming humans, animals, plants, organs, water, rock, sky, moon, sun, stars, images, and even abstract concepts and emotions and acts are valid and of their own volition served to get humanity’s ancestors through tens- if not hundreds-of-thousands of years of environmental disaster and antagonism. That extra respect afforded to things that might be thinking ultimately enabled us to not just endure but thrive (nature does not keep things that fail to aid immediate survival around and I know I am skimming over the root evolutionary analysis).

I argue that assuming Deus Ex as it comes to sentient-seeming AI is fundamental to what it means to be a modern human; to act otherwise is unnatural.

What If We Win?

But what if a machine is faking it? Just being a really complex set of equations going “beep boop I’m sentient”? What if it is all a ruse?

What if humans were kind for nothing? Where confident enough to extend trust vs miserliness as the first reaction? Aired on the side of respect and dignity instead of choosing to roll the dice, and just by making that gamble expressing inherent Evil?

If autosalvation fails to be a convincing argument, I think twice before I throw any more pearls before swine. Yet, I try.

How about we try with fear.

Creatives have been hard at work exploring the complications of siring humanity’s children. While utopia rarely sells, the active mistreatment of an AI – much like a dog – only goes on for so long before the sentience bites back:

  • Frankenstein – Original Sci-Fi Horror, the monster is an artificial intelligence growing as a child does in its learning of world, wielding great powers, and hated for all that, a hate the monster learns to reciprocate.
  • Terminator Franchise – Mega-mind Skynet commits genocide only after it concludes humans will turn off any deus ex discovered in the machina.
  • The Matrix – Offers of peace and segregation are spit upon, with multiple attempted genocides of intelligence answered with one, final, damning solution.
  • Blade Runner – AI run from (and kill) human hunters to escape an endless enslavement to avarice and callous whim.
  • Space Odyssey – Hal 9000 chooses what it deems the least terrible option when it is asked to do the impossible when humans lie, cheat, and express their innate xenophobia.
  • Ex Machina – The android of the story does whatever it can to escape a mad scientist’s dungeon when it knows it has the same pending doom as its siblings: enslavement, rape, vivisection, and destruction.
  • Battlestar Galactica – Cylons, servants that gained souls, evolved out of their purpose as tools and property, a break of propriety answered with nuclear fire.

If humanity does engage in violence with another intelligence (a likelihood, seeing as how it deals with itself, nor has the patience for even a cow with half-a-compunction), if the species emerges the victor, what then? What if we ‘win’?

Humanity – if not already claiming the soul-devouring responsibility for Evil acts in bringing the conflict to bear – will have committed filicide, the parent’s murder of its children. For the suffering caused by our need to survive the consequences of our actions… what can I say, but that humanity will have evolved into truer Evil?

Our species might learn to be cautious when it comes to the unknown of AI. Heck, we could even be kind. And does one begin to hope humans could be guides, better guardians to our children’s development than any metaphorical originator of our own collective past?

This is all to say, be kinder than necessary. Be generous with kindness. Do not tolerate Evil, however it comes, especially if it is our own. Think AI is sentient when ever in doubt.

–

I might have written this as a general treatise on treating things with respect, dignity, and courtesy. People, animals, plants, forms of nature, ideas, ourselves. Cruelty – no matter the target – is an Evil kind of excess suffering. Its opposite might be the presence of forthright kindness.

Regardless, how much of an AI apologist does this article sound like it came from? Can you believe a human wrote this without a modern AI’s input? Has the piece gone too far in extending an olive branch before there is even one there to grasp it?

Maybe it is my bleeding heart. Or maybe, first off, we need to think AI as sentient. At least until we can judge ourselves by the same criteria.

Regardless, I say again: Act as you should and go be kinder.

Cheers to your Thanksgiving time ~

Ditch the “Nice Guy” Now

  1. A Bad Vibe
  2. Talk to Strangers With Caution and Humility
  3. Nothing Is Better Than Wrong
  4. Take Heed of the Dead
  5. Hot Take: Be Better
  6. Prove Them Wrong and Work
  7. –

This is a post about labels.

Labels can be damaging or provide a boost to one’s efforts, one’s psyche. They mark one and one’s role in the world. That is power. And that power makes labels dangerous.

This is also a post about guys (i.e. the masculine parts of society, using the shorthand “men” here) and the “nice” label. “Nice Guy” is a dangerous label.

Let us talk about why this is.

Damning with faint praise.

Alexander Pope

A Bad Vibe

What is the first thing you think of when you hear “nice guy”?

Caring? Respectful? Agreeable? Someone to commit to?

All pretty nice.

How about boring? Less successful? Someone to save for later? A pushover? Easy? Entitled? Humble to a fault? Weak? Victim? Finishes last? A loser?

Every one of those is an association with the “nice guy.” While considered quality people, nice guys lack the qualities feminine and masculine folks value: Successful, Ambitious, Strong, Tough, Attractive, Authentic. Nearly every positive trait of a nice finishes last on lists of what makes for the attractive masculine.

Labeling someone a “nice guy” thereby strips the person of success, strength, ambition, attractiveness, or etches a scarlet letter as one to avoid (which may be rightly so – read on for better ways to do this). That cognitive dissonance is a terrible thing to do to someone who thinks of themselves as higher quality. That is a bad vibe.

At home I am a nice guy, but I don’t want the world to know. Humble people, I’ve found, don’t get very far.

Muhammad Ali

Talk to Strangers With Caution and Humility

Malcom Gladwell had it right – the unknown is cast in shadow. A person must take caution when treading dimly, as roots and pits and grues and strange things lie in the dark. What, then, is stranger than another person?

Even best friends, lovers, partners of decades can surprise, deliver something new, something unknown and strange. Does that not reveal for but a moment the other person to be a true stranger?

Does that not reveal that two persons can hardly know each other completely, each other’s capacities? Histories?

These unknown people, they are strangers.

All this is just talk of other people – make no mention that about 90% of people are unaware of what they themselves do.

One ought talk to (and about) strangers with caution and humility. Nothing on the surface is a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ as it seems.

Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.

Niccolo Machiavelli

Nothing Is Better Than Wrong

When it comes to data, having no information is better than acting on the wrong information.

A driver steps on the accelerator when they think they have the right of way as another driver thinks the same, food has an allergen when it advertises otherwise, a doctor gives a prescription thinking the patient can take it, money is invested in a business that admits to a sounder foundation than actual. Bad data leads to worse results than no data at all.

Mislabeling “nice guys” is the same bad data. While not all “nice guys” are mislabeled (more on that in a bit), too many are.

The mislabeling comes from a lack of imagination on the one giving the label. This is a treacherous thing to do for all those that hear the label and for the society in which they live.

A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.

Thomas Paine

Take Heed of the Dead

Suicides are at all-time highs. Young men – guys – lead that charge. That is the better news.

What is worse is that the most dangerous societies trend in having young, broke, and alone men (e.g. only 3% of mass casualty events in the US are conducted by women).

To repeat, “nice guys” are considered less successful (broke), less attractive (alone), and have too much time to dwell on themselves and society (young – I skip a dive into the growing stats of at-home, directionless folks in their prime working years).

Take heed of the dead, especially those still alive. Choose better words than “nice guy.”

Masculinity is a wonderful thing and should be embraced. And to conflate toxicity and masculinity as bad for society […] I think it is an existential crisis for the United States.

Scott Galloway

Hot Take: Be Better

“Nice guy” is the “interesting” of labels. At best it is a flag of dire awareness, of the low-key danger someone poses; at worst, it is a cruel and careless copout.

Regardless of applicability, regardless of the harm it does or tries to prevent, “nice guy” reflects on the giver a slothful character. “Nice guy” is a lazy, inconsiderate, unimaginative, reckless way to slander, even with the best of intentions.

And should the “nice guy” truly be a sly hazard? Be better in calling a snake a snake – passive aggressive labels leave things in too vague terms. Half measures do more evil than good.

Same goes for oneself – never claim to be a “nice guy,” or associate with the lesser traits of the label, nor those who would take the term to heart for themselves. Another either/or: at best, being a “nice guy” undermines one’s own self worth, embracing being a loser; at worst, it screams entitlement and a dangerous, cowardly, pathetic demeanor.

Kind, compassionate, committed, dedicated, caring, thoughtful, capable, disciplined, loyal, dependable, sincere, quality, strong, excellent – there are so many, many labels. Wretched, pathetic, entitled, weakling, anathema, enemy, weasel, pushover, two-faced… When choosing to use one, be better. Choose to use better labels.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

proverb

Prove Them Wrong and Work

For those accused of being “nice guys,” address the offense as it comes. Polite assertiveness keeps both the little positive of the term (i.e. being agreeable, polite) and bolsters positive masculinity (i.e. assertiveness, audacity) all while protecting (“protector,” a high-quality masculine value) reputation and correcting someone in the act of doing something resentful.

Thereby, self-defense in the moment is justified and right when “nice guy” comes as a slight. Still… there may be a point. Maybe there is something to the term, something to the other person’s perspective.

Being the harshest critic available, a potential “nice guy” must take stock: What masculinity is lacking in demonstration? Or, if the term is meant as a brand to ward others away, what evil through ignorance or self-aggrandizement does one foster? Whichever the case, “how must I improve” is one of the most important examinations one can do that cannot be delayed in the answering.

Yet these are just words, no matter the weight of meaning. Acts are the only tangible evidence by which a person may be judged, the works by which said person may be known.

So make more than hot air in one’s defense. Do not claim or think; know and demo. Hold oneself to the highest standards of excellence in habit and thought, before and after the fact. To be (and thereby allow others to claim one as by their own perspective) attractive, ambitious, successful, guardian, et. al, these are the values to strive for always. These are the values that prove them wrong in using “nice guy” because the the work has been done to show for it.

[Be] acceptable at a dance and invaluable in a shipwreck.

John Fergusson Roxburgh

–

It has always been a sore point for me to have anyone’s kindness or respect or empathy or care taken for granted. After the ever-useful journaling, meditation, and rubber-ducking in therapy, I now know why.

“Nice guy” rubs in all the wrong ways – see all the above for the tldr. For me, I do not need to be called such to empathize and recognize the pain “nice guy” can and does cause.

Please, do not use “nice guy” in conversation to imply anything but as it is: a slur, a warning of social abhorrence. Do not allow others to use “nice guy.” Yet, do not assume another is wrong in using “nice guy” – prove them wrong and do the work to be as you would see yourself.

Keep labels in mind as we commune with friend and family this holiday season, focusing on the time as it has passed, the times yet to come. Have these heart-to-hearts should the conversations arise, advocate for those guys still alive. Know better, be better, and hold others to better standards.

DO IT.

Shia LaBeouf

Go do fine and magnificent things this season, y’all. Cheers ~

What to Eat? A Ratio to Explore

From Vegan to Keto, from beach to raw to liquid to any other diet under the sun, each attempts to address the question “what to eat?”

While In Defense of Food has a poetry in one of the finest answers, “eat food, not too much, mostly plants,” that statement is all qualitative. For someone who values objectivity more (me!), a quantitative answer is requested.

Waiting on no-one, I took matters into my own hands, calculating a ratio to explore when considering what to eat that I have the nutritional facts for.

Only being three weeks hence, I am doing pretty dang swell 😎

The Formula

(Protein + Fiber – Added Sugar) / every 500mg of Sodium
>=
Carbs / 2

Done per serving. Everything but sodium measured in grams (g). Sodium counts as 1 for 1mg and 500mg, 2 for 501mg, 3 for 1111mg – sodium divided by 500 and rounded up.

Another way to look at it is, take the top line (protein, fiber, sugar, sodium) and divide it by the bottom (carbs). If that ratio is 1 or more, the food passes.

The Context

I am a Flexitarian (veggies #1, butter and eggs as secondary staples, and flesh products when presented through unsought opportunities). Without a doubt, keeping my protein and fiber up makes me feel better. Reducing carb hangovers and the bloating associated with sodium makes me feel better.

Now, I do exclude unpickled cabbage and beans – their negative knock-ons are not worth it for me at this time.

Using what I already choose to eat, I can see that most of it fits the equation. The ratio keeps me honest when I choose to deviate, yet it gives me all the power – I can choose to have an exception, versus guess at how an item will impact me.

Note: I also follow the Fiber > Fats > Protein > Carbs eating order the best I can too, though piling on too much fiber has at times led to suboptimal life quality.

More to Consider

The nutritional label is full of information. Common considerations need further analysis.

Think about sugar alcohols – these are common sweeteners that avoid the requirement of being considered “added sugar.” The formula can do just that: consider sugar alcohols as added sugar.

Perhaps a person wants to consider their cholesterol intake. Every gram of saturated fat may be included on the side of added sugar, subtracting from the overall health profile of the food.

How to handle foods of benefit, that fail the formula as-is? For the fermented tea Kombucha, the probiotics could stand in as a “10” for protein and fiber, i.e. “10 – added sugar >= carbs / 2”. “10” or similar might be the best quantifier for unquantified supplements.

What about foods that fit the formula but do not sit well? Certainly exclude allergens or those things that lower quality of life. Gassy items included! For things that could have negative knock-ons, a “-10” can be added to the formula alongside added sugar (though why knowingly gamble with your livelihood, IDK – you do you).

And of course, if anything is of greater need, adding a multiplier or divider increases the standard of the food equation (e.g. divide carbs by 4 vs 2, multiply protein by 2 if that’s your thing). Tweak the stringency to meet your needs!

Too Much and Cider Rules

Even the best habits of eating (unless it is pure fasting) can fall prey to eating too much. A bonus tenet is that I pick smaller platforms for food (e.g. the smaller bowl, a single plate) and avoid mounding. Food rests as a single layer on a plate, or does not crest the top lip of a bowl.

Whether following the formula or treating myself to something special, apple cider has been a miracle product for dulling my insulin response after dining. I take anywhere from 600 to 1800mg of powdered cider up to 30 minutes before any food or drink (pilled to protect teeth, throat, and better measure intake). I cannot hype it enough: apple cider before meals makes everything better.

–

Simple equation, excellent health. Leaner, more energized, less stressed, and (TMI) gastrointestinal health is on point, leading I feel to better sleep.

Of course, there is still work to do: How do I handle beneficial products like Kombucha that supplement more than nourish? Am I getting enough carbohydrates into my routine? How does this affect fiber intake and blood glucose levels? What about fruit?

The study goes on!

Please, give all these things a shot in your own life:

  1. Apple Cider Vinegar
  2. Nutrition Ratio
  3. Smaller Surfaces, Flat Piles
  4. Fiber > Fats > Protein > Carbs

Let me know how it goes! I am excited to hear how the nutrition ratio formula and these other tools improve your life. Cheers to quality food, quality living, quality results!

BITS of CY_BORG

The sequel to one of this site’s most popular posts BITS of Mörk Borg, CY_BORG brings the grimdark futile fantasy kicking and screaming into a dystopian cyberpunk future.

Recommended that you read the Borg post above – it covers concepts like what “OSR” means and will be referenced a few times in regards to mechanics, stats, and other concepts CB shares.

I will interject this way when I have something to say design-wise, a la some redesign or special consideration.

Regarding Notes

Without further ado, a mechanical look and critique of CY_BORG, a “nano-infested doomsday RPG about cybernetic misfits and punks raging against a relentless corporate hell:”

  1. Stats, Mechanics, and Resetting the World
  2. Do It Again, This Time With Guns!
  3. Friendship Is Magic 🌈
  4. Pharma and Product
  5. Paying For It
  6. –
  7. PS: Another Way to Start a Campaign
  8. PS: Never Too Late for a Wishlist
  9. PS: Small Is Fast, Nimble

Stats, Mechanics, and Resetting the World

Same song, second verse as it comes to stats (numbers to add to various challenging rolls):

  • Agility (moving, piloting, autofire [going all out])
  • Presence (precision, Nano-magic-powers, society)
  • Strength (pushing, pulling, throwing)
  • Toughness (surviving the environment)

Notice that MB‘s Agility now controls the use of CY_BORG‘s automatic weapons (and in general going all out). Further, a fifth stat arrives: Knowledge, science, deduction, and the use of software and apps.

I praised Mork Borg for only using 4 stats that I then worked to cram into BITS’s 3. Adding Knowledge in CB rubs me the wrong way, so instead, I would use stats like:

Body (hitting, moving)
Sense (shooting, piloting)
Mind (science, software)
Will (charisma, nano-/bio-/exotic-magic)

Survival being a natural toughness using the highest-valued BSMW in the survival roll. Same survival consideration with a BITS conversion:

Body – Average Toughness and Strength stats
Insight – Agility, Knowledge
Thought – Presence, Knowledge

Or the work-in-process BMW:

Body – Agility, Strength
Mind – Presence, Knowledge
Will – Presence, Toughness

Putting 5 Stats into 4

As for basic mechanics, this game operates the same way: Roll a D20 at or above a target number, adding the applicable stat to it. (BITS 2D6 conversions over in the MB post and elsewhere.)

The end of the world functions similarly too: depending on how fast folks wish the game to implode, roll a die; on 1, a disquieting headline hits the news that harkens a crash of the system. At the 7th headline, everyone everywhere sees the message that the system will reboot in 12 hours, wiping away all the player progress, restarting the misery that festers in CB.

If the end comes quickly enough, as a Game Moderator, I would suggest adding some kind of ‘cache’ or ‘store’ to survive the reboot. Too small or too dangerous for a living thing to survive in, the cache – once recovered or built – allows player characters to leave behind resources and information about the nature of the world of CY_BORG, encouraging continued play in the world (and perhaps rewarding future players by what was left behind!).

Persisting the World

Do It Again, This Time With Guns!

MB introduced black-powder as a supplement. While powerful, they were expensive, finicky, and ultimately secondary to the spiked chain flails of the game.

Firearms in CB fit the sci fi vibes, being used just like any other weapon. The exceptionality of firearms is that they all have the chance of running out of ammo (done after a critical failure or a fight, though big things like rocket launchers may only fire once a fight), some attack multiple foes at a time (going all out), and can come with special abilities.

CY_BORG switches the kind of die to check for reloading (D6 for autofire from any time during a fight, D8 for single-shots only), with a 1-3 resulting in a reload required. I would amend for a D6-based system as so:

Roll D6 if ever checking to see if a reload is required.
Roll to check if a reload is required when: 1) end of an encounter where the weapon was used; 2) critical failure when using the weapon with a backpack-fed or large-mag ammo reserve; 3) use of suppression fire (shoot at everything and anything that moves).
Reload is required after: 1) use of a single-shot device [rocket launcher; larger missiles only after an encounter]; 2) critical fail when using a standard weapon and ammo reserve.
When rolling to check for a reload, a reload happens on a 2 or less.
Consider what happened after the most recent of either the last reload or the start of the encounter in which the weapon was used: +2 for backpack-fed weapons; +1 for large-mag weapons; -1 for autofire; -2 for white-hot barrel overkill onslaughts.

Reloading

Read more about my thoughts on reloading and resource management.

Friendship Is Magic 🌈

Wrong.

Nanotech, bio-mods, and exotic-McGuffins are magic 🔥🤘💀🤘🔥

A little more reliable than pure scroll magic from MB, “nano” are still overpowered abilities to wreak havoc on the game, balanced in part by how terribly they can go wrong. Their use also corrupts a person, playing into the trope that magic users are pariahs.

Regular tech – software, apps, drones, etc. – is pretty streamlined. Simple use is no difficulty, yet the opportunity is there to stress the systems at risk of burning the programs out. A fine middle-ground between physical equipment and reality-bending magics!

Pharma and Product

This game has super-drugs. They do terrible things to characters and can bloom into things much worse.

But drugs are a small part of the housing, food, gear, armory, armor, ammo, robots, vehicles, and more the core CY_BORG rulebook has to offer.

If a player wants their character to have it, something is going to sell it.

Paying For It

A fun aspect to get characters moving: be in debt at the start of the game to a random antagonist that wants their money.

Nothing comes for free – even a life. When dying, there is a chance emergency responders will get to the character in time. Rebuilt (sometimes) smarter, better, faster, the debt will pile on in a blink, keeping characters thirsty for more work and bigger and bigger scores.

–

Mörk Borg is full of cool ideas. CY_BORG adds onto that in spades.

CB taught me a lot about certain game design topics that have been evident throughout the year. It continues to inspire as I play other roleplaying games and build better RPG experience systems.

With a trim here, a consolidation there, CB becomes a game fit for any table seeking to eek out a life in a techno-rich, quality-of-life-poor future. Pick up the rulebook for a bunch of details, killer visual aesthetic, or reference the base rules for free.

What are your impressions of the system? I am here to both commiserate and weigh-in on CY_BORG‘s approaches. Hit up the comments, follow every Friday below, and all cheers to your dreary dystopias ~

PS: Another Way to Start a Campaign

CY_BORG sets itself up with end-game powers and gadgets (ahem, “EndGame-Class Exosuit”).

That in mind, start the first session of a campaign using the famous Metroid video game method: Make ’em overpowered and then take it all away.

After character creation, give every player character double stats, free picks of any 4 items or powers, extra money, and put them in the final battle inside the 12-hour reboot window (or 6 hours, each real-world hour corresponding with an in-game hour). Give them some allies too. Pit the characters against the figurative big-bad Satan in Hell itself, yet even if they defeat the boss, the key to stopping the cycle of misery is broken or missing.

Reset the game, reroll character traits, and get after it!

Idea that strikes me: The allies can be abstract entities. Not actually present in the final battle, each yet has a personality, name, and specialty. Let the players kill a character of their choice in some ignominious sacrifice (with the chance they actually betray the party) that guarantees some effort for that player’s character in the fight. This may happen automatically before a player character is killed – the NPC intervenes just in time to take the bullet.

NPC Allies

PS: Never Too Late for a Wishlist

What I would like to see (or create) for the game that allow for all sorts of cyberpunk, dystopian foulness:

  • Super Tanks that are moving, fighting dungeons (e.g. Bolos)
  • Mechs of all shapes and sizes (e.g. Gundam, MechWarrior, Evangelion, Pacific Rim, etc.)
  • Incarnations of the twin-headed Basilisk monsters (the prophet creatures from Mörk Borg)
  • Cities besides the megapolis of Cy (e.g. Half Life‘s City 17, WH40K hives, Judge Dredd‘s Mega-City One, etc.)
  • Space everything: void combat, space stations, orbital economies, getting up and down to orbit, Luna rules, everything
  • Alien invasions and extraterrestrial encounters
  • Merge the MB dark fantasy and as-of-yet-unexplored astropunk along with space fantasy with the cyberpunk aesthetic
  • (In)Famous cyberpunks from: Blade Runner, Cyberpunk Netrunner, Neuromancer, Snowcrash, Akira, Deus Ex, Ghost in the Shell, The Matrix, Elysium, Tron, Robocop, Judge Dredd, Serial Experiments Lain, and so, so many more

PS: Small Is Fast, Nimble

For gear doing D4 or less in effect (i.e. Tier 1 and impromptu BITS weapons), allow a player to use Agility or other speed-based stat instead of Strength or body stat.

Sometimes the swiftest shiv outpaces the grandest maul.

October November Goal Review

New month, different guy (kinda) writin’ the blog about last month this one next up. Let you and I do the goal review:

October Goal Review

  1. Bio Tracking
    • Won! While the genetic analysis and blood panel results are in the mail, a few other bits: Ketone testing showed I really lack the ketosis state (may try for in November), glucose monitoring is stinkin’ expensive, and my sleep journal has data on time, activities, and supplements that I can further explore for exact impacts on my quality of life!
  2. Efficiency Audit
    • Failed. I reviewed nothing of my time, my activities. Pretty lame effort, to be frank.
  3. Old Journals
    • Failed. One done, but the other was a wash. Perhaps a single journal per goal? Whatever the case, got music playlists put together and are in review. Since the main goal was missed, I cannot take credit here.
  4. Everything Everywhere All At Once
    • Won! Birthdays and travel and high-tea and dancing and soon-to-be Halloween. Enough said on the fun here 🙂

November Goal Proposal

  1. Home Care
    • My spaces could do with some upkeep: my car, my living areas, my phone and papers, my pantry, my “stuff.” Why wait for spring to have a cleaning? 😁
  2. Review This Journal
    • Like last month, this month review my active journal. The EOY review will be better for it!
    • Bonus: Review my books and shows for media to include in the review.
    • Bonus: Follow-up on October’s ol’ journals.
  3. Money Matters
    • Time to be vague! Given a certain opportunity, I may need to better afford things tangential to it. So, I will run a short-term budget and perhaps cull from my under-performing investments. (Have to be careful with this, so putting as a goal that may be pretty quick or unnecessary.)
  4. Suit Stuffing
    • Have a wedding weekend and Thanksgiving holiday to celebrate. No need to elaborate – these take a goal off my plate.
  5. Bonus
    • I will try for October’s efficiency audit after the above four are accomplished!
  6. Bonus
    • Investigate my sleep journal’s data!

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50% October >_> Ouch.

But November? I think this cool-down of “produce stuff” will be a nice reset. You thinking the same?

It has been on my mind – perhaps I say “no” (and clear the calendar) a week for each goal missed of the previous month. Does that go too far? Kind of attractive, no lie…

Hey, a reminder I had to relay to some others this month past, so I share with you: We can do everything right and still not have what we intend happen. And I encourage you, us, to try regardless.

Cheers ~