Cold-ish
Tonight’s low is tomorrow’s high, and then it’s gonna get cold.
Glad I went cheap…
Friday, I was faced with this choice:
I did not pay $20 to get it a few hours earlier on Monday. As a result, I got it on Sunday. Signature required, and FedEx promised to have it in my hands by 1:15 PM, but then it stopped here:
See that little parking loop on the left? The truck with my package stopped there for about an hour, starting about 20 minutes before the end of the promised delivery window. And then the tracking page updated with “by end of day”. Eventually it reappeared on a truck a mile or so away, but without a new delivery window. It did show up, so I’m happy, but there’s something curious about the location.
Obviously there are no customers at the water park when it’s 20°F outside, but since it’s been undergoing major renovation all year, I don’t think there were employees there on a Sunday afternoon, either. But that’s not what’s curious. The curious part is that the last time I had a FedEx package get delayed for half a day, the tracking stopped at the exact same location.
“You keep using that word…”
(story is not new, but recently linked by Insty)
Upon hearing that AI models are accurately detecting patient race from X-ray images, regardless of what body part is featured, a professor of “biological anthropology” sought out for an opinion by The Boston Globe says:
“it is likely based on where a person’s ancestors evolved, rather than based on race”
Of course, he has a book called “Racism Not Race”, the blurb for which can be summed up as “I’m here to reinforce my woke bonafides”.
Garlicloaf
Thursday was a long day that involved picking up my parents (20 minutes), driving them to Columbus (90 minutes each way), lunch (60 minutes), killing time at a nearby store (30 minutes), waiting around until their medical appointment was over (~70 minutes hanging out in Barnes & Noble, which is a long time in a bookstore with basically no interesting books; I bought a pen), driving them home (90 minutes), grabbing a quick takeout dinner (15 minutes), and driving home in the dark (20 minutes). All after a half-day of work.
Dinner was from a gourmet grocery that makes their food in-house, and generally does a pretty good job. Today I Learned, however, that their idea of “meatloaf” is underseasoned meat mixed approximately 50/50 with slivers of garlic. They had a sugary glaze to cover it with, which I’d declined, expecting some actual flavor.
No. All I could taste was slightly-crunchy undercooked garlic. I ended up pitching most of it, because it was just terrible. Fortunately I had a frozen pizza handy.
“🎶 Memories, all alone in a GenAI…”
Perhaps the greatest flaw in Z Image Turbo is that it has no idea what a “catgirl” is. Even LLM prompt enhancement usually doesn’t help…
Fun with LLM-enhanced prompting
“I ain’t never seen whores like these before, fellas, but I’m willin’ to give ’em a go. Y’with me?”
Original prompt:
A large collection of steampunk sex dolls, arranged in a victorian-era brothel. A group of dusty cowboys are staring at the dolls, looking confused.
LLM output:
Steampunk-inspired design with intricate brass and gears; large mechanical sex dolls arranged in a Victorian brothel setting, emphasizing detailed craftsmanship—padded waistbands, visible internal mechanisms, delicate filigree. A group of dusty cowboys stand behind, dressed in frayed leather hats and weathered boots, their faces partially obscured by wide brims, staring at the collection with curious confusion. The scene is captured in a dimly lit, atmospheric interior with flickering gas lamps casting long shadows across polished brass fixtures and antique mirrors. The composition balances social commentary with fantasy elements—dusty silks, oil-stained hands, and a sense of time-worn mystery. Rendered in rich color palette with high contrast highlights on metal surfaces and soft warm tones for skin tones, achieving an immersive, tactile quality.
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