Built to Brain

I want to start off by saying watch this video since everything I talk about will hedge in around this video and exploit it to unreasonable ends. For those of you who aren't developers, some of this will be outright nonsense, but, I'm telling you of the freakin' gold that's in this elegant and personal keynote.

"Testify!"

First, mad respect for Kathy Sierra. I don't know her at all, but this little presentation gives me enough to say that she's definitely "one of the good ones". BriAnna brought this to my attention and I have been referring to it more and more often because, well, of things I'll get into later.

When I was growing up, I was fascinated with the concept of Computer Science and Psychology. Computer Science because I was fascinated by computers and wanted to know how they worked, well, actually, because I wanted to make games. Lots and lots of games.

And, as a somewhat disparate path, Psychology was something I wanted to get into to understand myself. I felt broken and I didn't know exactly why. I find, lately, that everyone feels this to some degree. Feeling like an imposter or incredibly alone or being far too different to be normal.

Sure, this is when people say, "Well, you're special."

"Well, Thanks. But I don't really want to be special."

I went through a battery of ADHD tests and they put me on Ritalin, but then they realized it made things worse. Honestly, there wasn't a chemical imbalance, I was just that way.

"By they way, this means I have more fun than other people. Lots!"

My approach to both paths was eventually to unify them; I wanted to marry Psychology and Computer Science into a single experience. I will say that I was before my time on this, because they've since come out with courses for Human Factors Engineers which could have been my dream job.

So, with Psychology, I wanted to see where I was broken so I could fix it. In a manner of speaking, I lost interest in just myself—well, that's a stretch—and started reaching out to others and using the things I learned from studying myself to gain insight into others. I used a tool called The Luscher Color Test to dig into people's current situations and experiences. It was something that my Uncle Billy, I believe, showed me and fascinated me. It's since out of print, but you can still find it... both online and in the book form.

I could pull some crazy stuff from people with this... it was like I was a freakin' fortune teller and it helped me dig in and reveal more about the core person I was talking to. I had no idea how I would do it, either. But the practice and feedback mattered immensely.

"There's no basement in the Alamo! Oh, color test, I know your ways."

What in the hell does any of this have to do with this above video? Let's talk about that.

No... wait. Not yet. There is more pontificating to do!

The concept of limited cognitive resources, I hadn't heard about, even if I could understand the concept. The way that Kathy presents this idea is beautiful. She approaches it with "you probably already know this, but..." to make sure that, even if you heard a slice of it in the past you could still say, "Yeah, I knew about that." She gives you the ability to pat yourself on the back while she fleshes out this idea without going through the barrier of annoyance from being slapped in the face with something you thought you already knew. You can tell that she's used to talking to know-it-alls. (a.k.a. Developers.) Again, mad props.

Stress on your cognitive resources will damage your ability to direct those resources for more important tasks. And, oh my god... hold on to your hats. Because the depth of this concept will blow your mind. Well, it blew my mind. Maybe I'm just easily impressed...

For as old as The Doctor is, I'd say he's easily impressed.

What's an introvert? What's an extrovert? I hate these either or definitions because it creates further divisions in a world of needless, nay senseless, dichotomy. How about this?

Does it take (energy/self-control/effort) for you to be around others?

Do you find being around others (recharging/refreshing/revitalizing)?

You could say that an "extrovert" is someone who does not burn cognitive resources when around others, but actually finds those situations stimulating and even enjoyable. These social situations are easy for them. Where "introverts" are constantly trying to put up a persona that's difficult for them to wear, playing nice to expectations, which is inordinately draining.

I guarantee that about 20% of the population still finds social activities very draining. You have to play nice with everyone or else you run the risk of conflict which is considerably more taxing than simple social engagements. That is... unless you both enjoy awkward social settings and conflict. To each their own, but, if I were a betting man, I'd wager that you suck to be around.

This is one of many, many modes of thought that can apply to this same situation. The Cognitive Resources you expend maintaining self control are downright painful. In the Making Badass Programmers video, if you watched it like good boys and girls, you would see that being in a situation that requires self-control will burn off so much effort (unless you're particularly good at this kind of self-control, mind you) that you end up not being your stunning self and accomplishing Earth changing things.

"Yes, this is actually a representation of you. Unable to change the world."

Can I bring religion into this? Shoo... why not. I bring in a religious bent to everything I've posted to far.

Religion begets rules, morality, and lots and lots of self-control. You could say that religious makes you a pro at self-control. Or, perhaps, awesome at pretending to have self control. Critical piety always worried me because you saw a darkness lurking just below the surface.

But, if you're doing it for you... or perhaps your parents, it makes you very good at patience and long-suffering, as they say. I grew up religious and I can honestly ssay that I'm a better person for it, if only for the practice at being all of the above.

And, as a side note, I wonder if I should be asserting this kind of activity with my kids, putting them in a rule laden social setting and having them beef up on these important skills of patience, tolerance, and self-control.

Naw. They're good. In fact, they're totally awesome.

Some other examples around burning cognitive resources was the difference between individuals in the same situation. In talking with BriAnna about this last night, her self awareness prompted by this video allowed her to express, out loud, the things that she resisted while in a meeting with many other people. Then she heard one of her co-workers say, "I couldn't believe how much I burned in self-control to avoid picking up my phone." She was surprised because she was thinking to herself, "I am burning so much self-control to not interrupt the speaker to express my opinion."

"Practice self-control... practice self-control... practice..."

I find this hilarious. BriAnna has such an awesomely strong personality and her thought didn't surprise me in the least. The key to the example, though, was how very different the two of them approached the same situation. And how the burned their respective Cognitive Resources in their effort to maintain self-control.

If the co-worker didn't bring his cell phone, he wouldn't have had a choice to check his phone. I'm sure there would have been another thing he'd think of. And, uh, if you taped BriAnna's mouth shut, she wouldn't have had an option to speak...? Not likely, she'd rip that crap off and punch me in the face. Win!

If I were in a meeting, what would be these points of disruption that would have me thinking about the distraction and not what I should be paying attention to? Unfortunately, with a head full of distractions, it's not easy to narrow one particular distraction down in order to eliminate it.

A bit of topic jump, but I promise it is related. Remember Freud? Remember Libido? His thoughts around Libido as sexual energy is, to me, a bunch of crap, but, without the sexual overtones, the concept is interestingly similar to Cognitive Resources.

"Yes, for Freud, it really was all about his mother."

Directly from the video, if you are in a state of constant stress, you will not have enough energy to progress or develop good skills. Yes, you'll have plenty of half-assed skills that are poor at best. And, now I'm talking about coping skills. While the video above focused in on specific development practices, it can be expanded to any life skill, including interpersonal skills.

Unlike fixations, which you just generally hope to make a breakthrough using psychoanalysis, there are way to revisit those skills pull them back to the forefront and make them into good versions of those skills. The idea is that you learned it in a particular way and that's the way you've done it from then on out.

Again, this is all conjecture... I'm not a psychologist, but I am a Broad Spectrum Pattern Matcher™. It's all connected, baby.

(That's not actually trademarked, but it should be.)

And there's my segue, boom!

Kathy's assertion that your brain is a black box that does far more for you than you'd expect. And that information is based upon deep and credible research—of course, I'm assuming because she's like that. I can tell, I recognize a deep researcher. Also, it feels very right.

As an aside, relying "The Feels" or "Your Gut" is dangerous, by the way. Your pattern matching might have responded to the nugget of truth in a pile of poop and your pattern matching might have some very bad examples it is using as reference material.

"First one's free, kids!"

That aside now being part of the conversation. Having a wealth of good examples gives you, and your brain, a mountain of correct pattern matching criterias that you can rely on. The more exposure you have to a certain set of problems and their solutions, the better you can emulate and relate to it. And after enough examples, you detect the nuances and can course correct in order to hit your target.

Here's another perfect example of exposure to many correct examples. How do you teaching Bank tellers to spot a counterfeit? Expose them to the real thing, gratuitously. The pattern matching gets enough good examples that they can automatically detect the fake when they see it and/or touch it.

The funny thing is, in all of these situations, these people can't even describe how they know or why they are awesome at it. It's now inherent in their skill set. In fact, that pattern matching is now always active in some subprocess of the brain, acting on its own without your help. Yes, it deteriorates over time with limited exposure, but it's because you need fresh examples to sharpen the saw.

Let's focus on me for a moment, because I'm more than a little conceited. Heh, I'm practically infatuated with myself.

"Oh stop, you. You're the handsome one."

I never finished college. That CS and Psych degree? As soon as I found out how useless the degree for Psych was—because you need a Masters to get anywhere in it—I all but abandoned it.

As for CS? My math doesn't brain well. I would say that's my highest drain of cognitive resources, ever. Math. I know why, too, as I work on math with my kids, I still find myself stumbling over subtraction and wanting to slap my inner child for being unable to fix it. I should... go back and get myself all robust on early math again and see if I can perfect the things I learned poorly early on.

I'm not feeling it, though. Which is why I'm a good example of a bad example. I learn on the job. As long as I get a good reference to get into the job in the first place, I can prove myself beyond that.

For instance, I had very little experience before my previous job, but they took a chance on me because of my track record. I came in and sizzled in the frying pan, getting asked questions I didn't know, taking copious notes, doing research, and finding solutions. Wash, rinse, repeat. I created a bank of my own good examples to work from and, in the process, deepening my understanding the software stack associated with it.

At 6 months, I felt good. At 2 years, I felt like a god. At 4 years, I was bored, bored, bored. As it should be, right?

I tried training others on this stuff. I crafted material to expose people to both the questions and the information and found that it just didn't work. I have trained call centers with the information that I researched out for myself.

THIS CAN'T BE DONE EASILY

Suddenly, I realized why I didn't like school the way it is. You are taught to memorize, not to think. Critical thinking, which is part of the conscious side of pattern matching, was part of my childhood. It was part of my life outside of school, except for trade skill-like classes. Wood shop. Ceramics. Metalworking.

Mike Rowe, a great and wholly genuine guy, pointed out the coming trade skills gap.

He's right. You know what apprenticeships are? On the job learning by both doing and being exposed to many good examples from someone who "can't explain why they're so good at their jobs".

"Training through examples worked very well. Why has it been replaced it with memorization and testing?"

So, right now, back to me, I'm struggling with being a technical resource that is also technical sales. I could be both a Pre-sales and Post-sales Engineer, but I want to stick on the Pre-sales side of things to maintain my home life in proper order. Plus, Post-sales can become a black hole that you—and your soul—could get lost in.

Because I learned much of my job through live fire exercises, as I mentioned above, I have learned this particular sales skill in one way. I am incredible at my job when I can listen to the customer, ask them appropriate questions, and feel them through the phone, catching the nuance of both speech and attitude. In person, I can do the same thing, and it's amazing.

"How to get a concussion at 30 yards. Do not try this at home kids."

But, for the life of me, I can't prepare sales material appropriate to the situation without having some touch with them. I also have a terrible time selling something that they don't need, even if it would ultimately help them. I have spent so much time in the frame of mind that I could do just about anything with duct tape and baling twine. So much so, that I have shorted myself in large deals where they don't want to do everything manually. They want hands-off automation because there's far too many spinning plates to maintain.

The hardest part about the job I have now—while there are aspects of this job I feel that I have mastered—it's these little gaps in experience and examples that make me stumble, where I feel like I'm very very far away from being good, or even competent, at what I do.

Whew... while I hope that someone from work would see this and go "oh, so that's how he works", I don't want anyone from work to read this and say, "oh, so that's how he works".

While I collect my thoughts after that ... unmitigated emotional upheaval I just splayed out there—which I needed, so thanks for being there—there was this fun little wholly-not-safe-for-work-and-please-don't-watch-it-if-you-don't-like-the-f-word video. I'll cover the topic fully below and you don't need to watch it. This means you, my immediate family that still thinks I have a shred of dignity.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

So, now that you likely watched it anyway—and I'm very, very sorry—this does actually apply to the next part of our magical pattern matching black-box of a brain. And when I say black-box, it's a term I learned in Quality Assurance. You don't know the inner workings of a program, so you throw stuff at it to see if it comes back with an unexpected result, then you write a bug up. That being said, white-box testing is knowing the inner workings, meaning that you are partially a programmer who can see the code and get how it works.

Our brains are wholly black-boxes to us. We may think we know what's going on in there, but we've only scratched the itsy-bitsy surface of the cavernous wonder that's in there. I always thought it'd be better to have biological computers than stupid silicon based ones. But, you know, there's a time and a place. And the future will let us use "people" genetics to totally screw ourselves up in other ways. I guarantee I'll get to see this in my lifetime. Hee!

Where was I going. Black-box, yes. We often mistake the results from the black-box as divine. Yes, THE UNIVERSE (thus the not safe for work video above), God, Xenu, the Earth Mother, your higher self, or ... whatever form of the divine you want to believe in ... could actually be your brain sparking on a series of patterns you had inadvertently been collecting data on.

Newton: "Is that you, God?"

Again, I don't want to take inspiration entirely away from Theism, because, like I've said in the past, I still have hope that this is out there, but, remember, hope is not an actionable strategy.

So, exerting some self control around being a sane and rational being working from hard, measurable facts, I will admit that our brains are overwhelmingly awesome at putting two and two together on a very abstract level. Thus, when profound inspiration strikes, this is likely and purely the result of your brain making a fantastic connection.

Let's say, for instance, you've got a bad feeling about someone. In Kathy's video, she mentions code "smelling bad", which is hilarious, but then you can see it, can't you? You get this eeriness about a situation or people. Something doesn't feel right.

BriAnna shared with me a thought about a boy she knew who ended up being a really bad guy. I won't share much detail other than she got that sickly, oily feeling of someone who isn't ... right.

I was able to think of a similar situation. There was a woman I worked with whom I immediately recognized as dangerous and/or toxic. Strangely, I promptly "made friends" with her as an effort to remain in good standing with her. As a defense for when things went South—AND SOUTH THEY DID GO. But my earlier instinct to connect actually protected me from bad things happening.

Years later, she ended up on the news after killing her children and then herself.

What... the... hell...

But I knew it. I knew it. I recognized it immediately. But to that extent? Should I take the blame because I didn't do anything? Do I choose to be devastated by it because it was something I could have prevented?  How would I have ever known that it'd come to that?

So, why should believe that I had control over something that was never in my hands in the first place? Am I that conceited? (Sometimes, yes. But this time? No.)

Then there's a second stark realization ... "Uh oh, who were my plentiful good examples that allow for that kind of pattern matching? Are some of these examples inherent? Are they learned through experience or ... can we actually recognize them with less information?"

No, really, I mean it. These are interesting questions that I don't know the answers to.

The other aspect of this to be aware of, as I had mentioned earlier, THE FEELS and THE GUT can be wrong if you have bad examples that end up in that black-box. You have given that precious little hunk of neural tissue that is performing billions upon billions of pattern matches against bad information.

Let's consider abject racism as bad pattern matching. I clarified abject because, as Louis C.K. points out, there is a sliding scale to racism. Probably another video that I should call out as ... don't watch it, but it was on Saturday Night Live, which should allow for a certain lateral edginess. Oh, and yes, he also talks about pedophilia as objectively as I've seen anyone talk about it. You're allowed to be offended, but realize that he's also correct. He talks about the symptom, though, and not the actual problem.

I consider Louis C.K. a Broad Spectrum Pattern Matcher™, because he finds the threads of cross-relevance in unrelated things. And that makes those things even more humorous.

Racism can be among other examples of bad pattern matching that equates to "bad feels". The key is to go back and rewrite those situations about individuals and not use overarching stereotypes to define a class or race according to an individual's actions. But, inherently, there's always a bit of residue... it's about being aware of that residue and not letting it become a chronic problem. Living in Utah, I end up being something else altogether, ignorantly racist. Sorry!

Back to Broad Spectrum Pattern Matching™... Kathy's Making Badass Developers video on the seemingly unrelated topic broke a barrier for me and I could see it apply to every aspect of my life. In stark and terrifying—as well as awesomely cool—detail. I'm sure that she, herself, sees the same patterns or she wouldn't have used non-programming examples to elaborate on her points. And... probably because there aren't a lot of good related examples that are easy to demonstrate. I mean, how totally and extremely dry would that be?

I'm going to consolidate my thoughts, because, for some reason, I have bullets in these kinds of posts. Bullets. Damn, I'm so corporate. So, the thoughts distilled from this little adventure. You can even call these take-aways if you want to keep up with the corporate theme:

• Pattern Matching:
• Your brain is better than you, but you're also better with your brain. Don't fight it, work with it.
• Surround yourself with good examples. Your brain needs fantastic source material to create fantastic results with pattern matching.
• When "The Universe" is telling you something, you've got enough data on a particular topic or area of interest that your black-box gave you an alert to check your inbox.
• There is such a thing as bad pattern matching.
• Broad Spectrum Pattern Matching™, as defined, is the ability to draw threads through seemingly unrelated topics and find pertinent examples across various dispositions. And, no, it is not actually trademarked.
  
• Cognitive Resources:
• It's all coming out of one bucket, as Kathy says, work becomes personal and vice versa.
• Things you aren't good at will drain those resources. Depending on your level of proficiency at certain tasks, you could drain your reserves more or less quickly.
• Patience is not just a virtue, it's a practiced skill. I added this for BriAnna. I called it tolerance, she called it patience. I'm still not sure which is more applicable. :)
• Things that require "decompression" after are high drains on your Cognitive Resources.
• Basic Criteria: Attempting to do things or solve problems you are not good at.
• Examples: Meetings. Impersonal social settings. Tests. Math, for me. Worrying. Monumental tasks.
• Things that you are good at, or are considered meditative, are cognitive resource maintaining or building solutions.
• Basic Criteria: Things you're very good at which takes little to no effort.
• Examples: Games, Puzzles, "Brain food", personal/fun social settings, "Making", hobbies, working with your hands, meditation, hiking, being awesome.

I didn't really touch on the renewing of Cognitive Resources, but making this little bullet list brought that back to mind.

"I prefer this over that, but maybe doing either of these naked might work out better."

Meditation is key. We all have our meditative forms. Actual meditation, to me, is a resource drain . But it's because I haven't trained it as a practiced ability. I prefer the meditative things of hiking, gaming, and writing. I remember, as a kid, exploration, biking, and imagination were important aspects of withdrawing to recharge.

I just asked myself, "What's a kid need to escape for?" But I realized how important those times were for me. I spent a lot of time in my head and... my writing reflects that. The characters I write through are sometimes exclusively in their heads for pages upon pages at a time. It's a bit much, but I like to explore that inner monologue because it reflects my own thought processes.

Remember, I'm infatuated with myself.

I'll wrap this with a reflection back to my experience with The Luscher Color Test and being a freakin' fortune teller. I gave my brain enough good examples to figure out how to observe and take in specific cues to gain insight into others. In a sense, I made my black-box pattern matching engine into a purpose-built, fully conscious psychological testing system that I could apply at will.

Now I want to take this a step further, with your GUT and your FEELS about the people around you. I mean, I've talked about the bad people that we should be aware of. I've even referred to some absolutely amazing, genuine people in this post. The short list: Kathy Sierra, Louis C.K., Bill Nye, Mike Rowe.

"Srsly."

Yes, there's plenty of off-color examples in this short list which may reveal the people I'd prefer to hang with. I believe all of the above are genuinely amazing people, even if I haven't met them directly.

So, let's talk about Love and first sight ... in conjunction with our amazing Pattern Matching system of awesome? Part of this discussion last night with Bri was how involved our is brain when it comes to LAFS. (I even acronymized it, keeping with the corporate theme.) Is it purely chemistry? Is it Astrology? Is it fate? Is it compatible personalities? Or, perhaps, it's all of the above?

Our brain find a match in someone. You see True Love across the room and you know because your pattern matching criterias lit you up with lightning and fire.

The idea is that your brain, as long as it has had good examples, is already doing that matching for you. People say it's your heart... but, really? Let's not get doey eyed romantic here, we all know it's your brain. Remember... good examples of people with whom you want to be.

I had a whole section here on astrology, but ... peh, I'll skip it. Besides sounding like an awesome system for determining Non-Player Character personalities, Astrology's systemization of all human life makes coarse, primal love to our pattern matching black-box of a brain. No wonder it's both complex and fascinating, however, something like that will be wholly unable to be explained by science... far too many variables.

And, seriously, if you think about Astrology, how meta is that? We really do look at the world as if we live in The Matrix.

"What's the point of a singularity if you're already part of it?"

Whoah, wrapping this up ended up being an event in itself. You have an amazing tool that needs plentiful good examples in order to work most effectively. Those good examples can be both painful and positive experiences, as long as they reflect the true nature of the thing you are seeking.

So, seek on. Seeker.

*rolls eyes*

Heh, I can't even end this bizarre brain dump of a blog properly.

Breaking the law, breaking the law...

I got a ticket yesterday. I haven't gotten a ticket in ages. Ages.

The rolling stop will always be my bane, but I should be smarter at a four-way stop when the policeman pulls up to my right.

Perception is king, though. The way events played out in front of me were very different than what played out in front of him. Plus the fact that the car in front of me hadn't even cleared the intersection before I "stopped" and pushed on.

Yeah, I was wrong. I know I was.

Roll with it. Ya feel me?

But the next part was the insightful part. I am highly, highly aware of the feeling that we're spiraling into an imminent police state. And, this is me being as objective as possible in light of all of this.

The policeman pulls me over. I pull into a parking lot. He walks up after a moment and he's already wary.

"License, registration, and proof of insurance."

Handed it to him, but I couldn't find proof of insurance.

"Do you have any weapons in the car?"

"No. I don't." I said, feeling weird about the question, but understanding why he asked, "I'm sorry, I can't find the recent insurance card. It is covered, though, I know that."

"Who's car is this?"

"BriAnna McKissen's car. She's my girlfriend."

"Ah. I can look up insurance."

This whole time, it was the wariness that unsettled me. I'm a big guy and, after a couple days of unkempt bearding, I'm sure I didn't look like the kindest, gentlest soul in my ... Salmon colored polo.

I've been in sales, hell, I've also been a Mormon on a mission. I've knocked door to door offering religion, political pamphlets, and ... well, probably just those two things for any considerable amount of time. What I was seeing on this man's face was a person who was selling something that no one wanted to buy.

Now, I want to say, Utah is relatively mild compared to some other locales where cops appear to be just plain ol' bad news. I mean, horrible things are happening. And they keep happening with very little being done about them.

But, taking a step back, again, focusing on the soul crushingness of it all. When all you sell is bad news, you regularly expect the worst reaction possible. Preparedness is a matter of playing through all possible scenarios in your head, watching for clues, being constantly wary.

Why? Because nobody likes bad news. And if bad news becomes worse news?

"Oh, you have a warrant for failure to appear when you did that thing back in the 2010."

So, back to my scenario:

"Is this still your address?"

"No, I recently moved." Which is true, but my old address would still apply since I still own the place.

"OK. One moment."

I'm sitting there, feeling deflated that I did something wrong. As basic as it was, I realized that I was the dumb one in this situation. I broke the law and, not only that, intentionally, in front of a police officer. And, strangely, I had this thought in the back of my head: "You work for me. You protect me. You don't target me for this minor offense!"

Well, that's telling. There's my conceit at play in all of this. I would call it a series of rationalizations.

"I'm going to give you a ticket for not having your address updated. This is the least impacting fine that I can do for you considering that running a stop sign is a moving violation that will also increase your insurance."

I could feel his annoyance with this process as he spoke. Not with me, but basically Fine Bartering in order to let you know that you dodged a bullet. (Ironically.) This is likely the last thing he ever wanted to do when he joined the police force.

But, ya know what I did? I let that, "but how wrong was I?" creep in. Because, like I said earlier, perception is king. But do you really want to bring your perception up against the guy who enforces the rules? Peh. The little voice in my head pops off, "I guess so? Why not?!"

"Was it because I went before the other car cleared the intersection?"

This is where the telling exasperation came in. This is the other aspect of his job that's likely intolerable, the damn know it all who saw things a different way and will debate with you about it.

"You didn't stop. I had the right of way."

"Oh, I swore I stopped before you did. Sorry."

Of course, I'm absolutely harmless. And, after seeing his reaction, I realized that, oh, yeah this is the thing he liked least about his job. People debating the situation, wasting his time, and wasting their time while wasting his time.

I nodded, even if my perception didn't exactly line up with what he said. But, at the same time, did it matter? It was likely moments, barely a second, when all this went down. And, for me, mincing perspective is a losing battle that will likely get that "bartered down" ticket to a full moving violation.

I signed the paper and he said, "Be safe," and moved back to his car.

I pulled away, going over to my ex's house to pick up the kids, actually no, it was to get some bad news about something they had done and then pick them up. I was still within sight of the policeman as I did this.

And, with that perpetual wariness in play, I can imagine that he looked at me and wondered what I was doing. Was I cheating on someone? What was my motivation for being here? Crawling into the mind of a cop is perspective changing, while not necessarily empowering.

Again, I thought about all this bad news, lately. I wondered who would take these jobs?

In some cases, it's like taking a job on an active battlefield. (Remember, perception is everything.) Where you are the good guy and ... unfortunately, you end up looking at all the citizens as the bad guys. Mix in military training, hardware, and tactics.

"Poof! Welcome to the Police state."

But really? Is that true? How are policeman more beholden to "the man" than they are to "the citizenry"? I don't believe that's how it works. However, when both are diametrically opposed, both will feel justified when standing their ground against the other. This kind of conflict stems from both a cultural and a systemic problem.

"Ya think?", you say, "Well, since you're complaining about it, do you have a solution?"

Well... maybe. Maybe? What do you think about...

CITY MILITIAS!?!

"Is that a good idea at all? A militia? Sounds like hooligans promoting lawlessness! VIGILANTISM!"

The citizenry allowing enforcement of a commonly accepted law is neither lawlessness or vigilantism. It's a community managing its own affairs by their own dictates.

That may sound like a quote, but it's not a quote.

Well, as the Bible says, 'cause we can always turn to the Bible to legitimize things, and I'm paraphrasing a bit here: "Society, police thyself."

(Footnote: "Physician, heal thyself" came from "Cura te ipsum") I love how tiny this font is. I should use this all the time.

Here are the problems that I see in the current system:

• Police are a unified body that seems to relate better to itself than to those it protects.
• Being "the law" can promote an attitude of being "above the law"
• Always dealing with "bad news", very little (visible) community outreach 

These are symptoms of the current enforcement model, but, if you look closely, I can guarantee that these issues are very close to the actual problems.

This is turning epic, mind you. It will be an epic post, and I have no intention of breaking this into two, nope.

So, I'm going to attack these bullets first, then maybe talk about how bad this idea is because we can't expect communities to treat everyone with equality.

Police relate better to each other

Welcome to the Brotherhood

This is why people see police as more of a fraternity. (Begging the pardon of my sister who also works in Law Enforcement.) And, it should be, to a certain extent, because you want to know that the people you work with are dependable.

I'm going to get this terminology wrong, but think military squads, operating closely, watching each other's backs. That trust needs to be there for you to work effectively.

Unfortunately, this behavior can lop over into covering up wrongdoing. Here, we thought it was just the movies, but then we see evidence tampering caught on tape in order to legitimize a shooting. I realize that these are people acting in isolated cases doing stupid things then trying to cover them up. The problem becomes systemic when it happens more than once. In fact, more than hundreds of times in various situations around the nation.


The "Law" protects it's own and, sometimes, regardless of culpability

How about some Hot Justice!
See what I did there?

But really, who puts Justice in a revealing blouse? Srsly.

And, moving on to those same police being acquitted just because they're police. Again, unfortunately, the double standard also becomes systemic as police are not punished as the citizenry would be punished. Their hands are slapped and, some could say, they have even been "empowered" to take violent action against the citizenry that they protect.

I can understand why upstanding police, even judges, don't want guilty police to go to jail. Jails are full of criminals. Just take boiling hot oil, and drop in some water... yeah, that's about the right reaction.

This doesn't legitimize it, by any means, but you see where this problem becomes recursive, leaving the citizenry to wonder what in the hell is going on.

Finally, it's always the bad news first.

I love the Internet. Because I can still find stuff like this!

Is this a media problem? Is this a TV show problem? Ya know, I remember CHIPs with Erik Estrada. I know that because he's got my first name, yup!

(And, no,  I wasn't named after him. Erik the Red, baby! Oh and .. Lamont Cranston, The Shadow!)

Uh, moving on... Consider how the "beat cop" persona has deteriorated in TV in the last 20 years. Now it's all detectives and edgy undercover work. Actually, more recently, it's distrust of the entire system and reliance on gritty vigilantism to overcome both the systemic corruption and unlawful use of force. There are the good cops and the bad cops, quite literally.

Now, regardless of how police are portrayed, when a policeman comes to your door. What's your first thought?

"Are they collecting donations for a local school?"

What about ... oh hey, bad news? Yup, it's likely bad news. I've called police on neighbors. I've never had the police visit me after an incident, they'll usually have dispatch give me a follow-up call. Sometimes our conversation will simply be gathering information after an accident, which was not my fault, I promise.

Unless I call the police, the police aren't there to simply wish me well. Honestly? Why should they? It isn't their job! And we shouldn't expect it to be their job.

Well... that sucks. I remember thinking of the police as kind, friendly men and women who you'd go to in case something really bad happened. Who thinks that now-a-days? God, that's a frightening change in thought.

So, let me get these other thoughts out there:

Part of Law Enforcement's image problem is based on separation from the community

"Uh, maybe they're a bit too happy."

Ever heard of Defensible Space Theory? Thanks to the brilliant and talented BriAnna, I was exposed to this concept during much discussion with her about how the world is going to hell. Again, I'm based in emotion and irrationality. I wear my feels on my sleeves, for the most part. Thankfully, some of that irrationality is balanced out by her stability. (Awww...!)

I'm just going to wholesale steal these points from Wikipedia:

1. Territoriality – the idea that one's home is sacred
2. Natural surveillance – the link between an area's physical characteristics and the residents' ability to see what is happening
3. Image – the capacity of the physical design to impart a sense of security
4. Milieu – other features that may affect security, such as proximity to a police substation or busy commercial area
5. Safe Adjoining Areas - for better security, residents obtain higher ability of surveillance of adjoining area through designing the adjoining area

I'm going to focus on Territoriality and Milieu. (And wholesale ignore the rest.)

One thing that people adore about the latest spat of truly lovable non-powered vigilantes on the big and small screens—Green Arrow, Daredevil (c'mon, don't fight me on this), and Batman—is that they love their respective cities, feel a sense of responsibility for it, and want to protect it at all costs, even if it costs them their very soul ... well, not quite their souls, but really really close.

Conversely, police don't always live in the places they patrol. I dare say, they likely don't want anything to do with the places they patrol. They can walk away from the trouble. But, conversely, that attachment to the community is why a hometown Sheriff is a loveable character while the generic beat cop is ... uh, generic?

This segues neatly into Milieu, which I had to look up because, yeah, I know the concept, but not the actual definition, which is simply "your social environment".

Remember this guy? Whatever happened to him?

If you know that the loyal crime dog McGruff is really in the house next door, then you know you can safely go to that house if you ever had a problem. In reality, we stopped being able to trust ... anyone. I have heard the phrase "we tend to keep to ourselves". This may be more and more of a problem due to commuting families not living in proximity of each other, but also, social groups becoming less and less physical and more and more ... Internet-based.

Personal investment in community allows for a balanced approach to Mercy and Severity

"The balance of righteousness and truth."

This is usually called "Letter of the Law" versus "Spirit of the Law" but that was back from my days of dabbling with the Kabbalah and The Tree of Life.

Uh oh, so, where did I go?

The Letter of the Law does not take into account the individual and their situation, motivation, and/or ignorance. The law is the law and all should be bound by it. Any flexibility in the law is weakness in the law. In fact, there are times that if I'm breaking the law, I better be punished for it. If I'm driving 15 MPH faster than the speed limit, even if I'm just going with the flow of traffic, I, and everyone else, should be immediately ticketed.

See? Even me saying all that feels terrifying. But really, what good is a posted speed if you could simply be using it to cherry pick offenders? (I'm not saying that that happens all the time. But I'm sure it does happen. And, again, I'm sure that traffic violations are one of the least fun things for a policeman to enforce.)

One annoying thing about having flexibility in laws, is that you have to "crack down" by making situational laws to "protect" fringe cases. This overreach gets more and more dramatic to the point of where things ended up in Demolition Man and Denis Leary's character gave us some quotable lines like:

"I want high cholesterol. I want to eat bacon, and butter, and buckets of cheese, OK?"

Simply said, the laws built to protect ourselves from ourselves are classic over-reach. Laws created to protect us from each other are within reason. In those cases, the Letter of the Law becomes acceptable, because you can only break them by crossing that moral boundary that we should all have an inherent sense of.

That's too reductive, but the gravity of the concept should tug a little bell in your mind. At any point in time, I could be breaking three laws. How... and why do I not know this?

Now on to the Spirit of the Law which is, in essence, what my police officer did for me. He weighed my past and my compliance and provided a reasonably palatable result. He doesn't really know me, but he could see that I'm not overtly a bad person. I have no record. Just being both distracted and stupid in a relatively harmless situation.

"To forgive is divine!"

Having a policeman involved in the community allows for a personal touch that could both intercede or vouch for those he associates with. I realize that there's more to the story, here. Budgets being whittled down to nothing and this level of interaction is impossible and ... improbable.

But one thing I could compare this to is the community volunteers at Fire Stations while I did a "stint" in New Jersey. Some were crazy, some were awesome... all of them had a love for the job and a love for the community. They took it very seriously. Now, I wouldn't go out and give everyone guns, but I would give them all the tools that it would take to keep their community safe.

This is where I think that Militia's may be a bit far ranging, but a group of concerned citizens that bond together to protect their community with some oversight. Not a lot, just some.

Deputize the Community!

Buddy Woody says, "Yer mah faaavorite deputy! Use with discretion."

Well? Why not? Put out a call for volunteers and get a voluntary community that meets regularly with officers. It's a lot of extra work for some people, and you'll likely get some crazies in the mix, but it doesn't mean that it couldn't be a long term solution for both involving citizenry in the community, but also softening the US vs. THEM mentality that pervades the current social commentary.

In smaller communities, this should be easy—a no brainer. In more diverse communities, you have to make sure to pick from all walks of life and treat them as equals in this partnership. Holy geez, wouldn't that be a strange turnabout?

Didn't I say epic?

I'll say that I respect the job even if I don't always respect the people who do it. It's cliche to say "one bad apple spoils the rest", but it's appropriate that a series of bad actors have tainted public opinion to the point that we need some positive or, yes, there will be something akin to civil war. The more distrust, the more likely there will be escalation on both sides.

So, let's ... try to avoid that. OK?

Terror in the Skies!!

An intelligent mind, when not fed with interesting things, will start to make stuff up on its own from the scraps it finds lying around. Treat this marvelous brain as, well, not a person, but it's own entity that goes into overdrive trying to stay engaged.

Think of the story of A Beautiful Mind. Now stop thinking of it, as it is definitely an extreme example.

Now, think of other hyper-intelligent people that don't readily use the bumpers of common sense, science, and education that teach us to contain those meanderings—and, yes, that was a bowling metaphor. I think this "crazy" is far more common than we supposed—speaking of the moments of conjecture that I will attempt to destroy later in this blog. Super smart people who, by genetic heritage, are built to perceive patterns in the white noise out there, and, when enough of those patterns come together, their minds begin to invest so heavily in order to occupy itself, that is attempts to solve problems that aren't there.

Want an example? We have a white noise machine. I will sit there listening to the blaring noise blanker that keeps us "quietly" isolated. After a moment, I hear a tick and my brain starts to count off. Yes, there it is again, the tick is there. A perceived pattern starts to form and now I'm counting. This damn white noise machines is a 13 second loop. Really. There are points where I want to take it back because I consider that a flaw. A flaw! But then I fall asleep.

Funny thing, I run into the same thing each night. If I wake up in the middle of the night, I'll pick out another tick noise in the white noise loop. And the crazy part, it's never the same. I find it hilarious that I can still pick out the 13 second loop even when the pattern my brain perceived isn't the same.

Do you know why I can eventually fall asleep without driving myself mad? Because my conscious self has the wherewithall to tell my unconsciously processing brain that it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter! There's nothing more than a noise that lasts 13 seconds and seamlessly loops.

It's like me telling my dogs to "Go play!", and leave me the hell alone.

I have realized that my penchant for researching conspiracies has come from a sort of social isolation in my early life. I... have also realized that I got a lot of it from my mom. :D

I am a total sucker for conspiracy. I love the thought, the process, the idea that there's something "controlling" all the whatsits and whothats out there. See, I just made "whothats" up right there, but, really, isn't that the essence of conspiracy?

Anyhow, my prescription for curtailing the crazy is fairly quaint... a simple self-awareness of where I'm at in all of this. I don't accept or rebutt the things I don't understand. I can judge the credibility of such things by their sources, but I won't say they don't exist, either. Seriously, how would I know...?

Life and knowledge are not clean things. Not as cut and dry as people would assume. As advanced as science is, we still know relatively little about how everything works. Unfortunately, we seem to also be that society is taking steps backwards to a more archaic "things happen by magic", or—in most recent cases—God, approach.

If God is involved—which is one of those "things that I will not rebutt" because I have a unrealistic hope for it—he/she will operate by the same principles already prescribed in whatever advanced science he/she participates in. Rules are rules. Breaking rules for "whim" is unjustified and therefore not Godlike.

"Roll a Will Save to see if their god is greater than yours."

See what I did there? Answering random prayers is not Godlike. It divides the "deserves" from the "not deserves" with the illusion of God's will in action. Oh, and do I hate the word deserve.

Hell, how did this become a religious discussion? Oh, I know, because, beyond that idea that we are slowly being consumed by conspiracy, it seems that the same people who heavily believe in conspiracy also believe that the world will end horribly... but someone will still come to save us. Aliens? Our future selves? ... Jesus?

As a story-ist and game-ist, the world's rules must be contiguous. They must to make sense in order to suspend disbelief. That seems ironic in either a fantasy or science fiction setting, but it's ab-so-lute-ly critical to keep the intelligent people involved.

Rules give the world an overall wholeness in action.

If you want to include an omnisicent, omnipresent, omni-whatsit being, you have to give them a vehicle to achieve that.

OK, sorry, I'll walk away from the religious conundrums.

Back to my prescription, ask yourself the following questions:

• Does it affect you or those you care about?
• OK, if it does, or even doesn't, could you change it?
• How much are you willing to sacrifice to change it?

Funny thing, I'm not even going to ask if the crazy theory is credible... That drives BriAnna nuts, actually, because I'm not denouncing it immediately. I don't know? And, unfortunately, I don't trust usual sources to give me legitimate information. It's not that I don't inherently trust doctors, lawyers, scientists, political figures, or religious authorities... I trust that everyone is fallible and has an incomplete knowledge of the world around them. We—and by we, I mean humanity—run off of assumptions that we legitimize as truth and we end up contradicting ourselves continually and, usually, completely as time goes on.

Then you get the idea that we reinforce the things that we are attached to with such wholehearted zeal that it becomes something akin to faith and, yes, I'm sorry, belief. We establish quasi-religions to fulfill the safe structures of "what we know" by filling the gaps in our logic with a firm belief that what we've got is it, baby. Our belief rocks! And, ends up rocking more than that punk over there.

See, everyone does that. Smart or dumb. Young or old. These are bonafide people problems! And probably why any AI worth its salt would say, "If they weren't so gosh durn inconsistent, I'd be fine with keep thing them around."

So, how can we, as people, be so fragile as to require this level of stability? Physically, we seem highly adaptable...

But then why is belief so ... not?

"Hah! Our God rocks, but that guy's belief in the Singularity is so dumb. I bet it only runs on a Mac."

Scientific studies are awesome and I do reference those often, if I really want to establish fact, as it were. But, as an unfortunate side of my own "crazy", the stuff that I find interesting is in the discrepancies—the stuff on the fringes—not so much the thing being researched. This is the stuff that will never get funding. And that, to me, is unfortunate. Because that's what my "crazy" wants to know about.

Let's take vaccinations, for instance. From a random search I hit a random article that is based off of a CNN interview with a doctor from the CDC. The report says 3,500 to 4,000 negative reactions, with 10 to 15 percent of those were "life changingly bad". Let's, then, take that and compare to how many people have received vaccinations in the last year. This number ends up being out of more than 10 million.

Saying neither good nor bad about vaccinations, what do the statistics say? Less than a percent to avoid an epidemic? Or, should we even worry about these diseases?

Won't we react to the more personal story of severe complications by way of vaccinations when we don't see the counterweight or severe complications by the host of illnesses it avoids? But ... then, what about the fallibility in the equation. There was a whooping cough outbreak very recently—hell, even I got it and it laid me low for months. Funny thing, this was likely because of an updated vaccine. Which, was found, could actually make people not showing symptoms into carriers.

You know who didn't get Pertussis in my household? My unvaccinated kids.

Yes, due to the fringe statistics of personal experience that involved the death of my ex-wife's child, declared as SIDS as another fringe statistic for SIDS, a 15-month old, I didn't vaccinate my kids early in life for fear of them having a similar reaction, figuring a predisposition in genetics as rationalization. We have since decided that it would be best to get them vaccinated, but ... still haven't felt the urgency due to this problem with both my "crazy" and seeing far too many enemies where I should be seeing helpers.

This kind of stuff sucks. Because we, as a population, want to believe that we're protecting ourselves, but the science we rely on isn't innately infallible. And, unfortunately, society doesn't forgive so easily.

It's a bit of a cycle, people screw up and, shamefully, try to keep it quiet. Other people catch hold of it and see it as something bigger than it is. Conspiracy is born. Boom! Welcome to the suck.

I guarantee that some of the claims from the anti-vaccination side of things are true. Yet, they are not statistically significant. Any time you rely on something that is built for the common man, but not custom built for you, consider yourself entered into the "how will this affect me?" lottery. This is always the case.

Yay! Bell curves!

Hell, conception/birth is the same phenomenon... who really knows what you'll get from your parents? I mean, seriously, I knew a girl whose body processed white bread and created alcohol! Seriously, she could get drunk off of a loaf of white bread! What a huge win?! No wonder Jimmy John's is still in business!

Oh, and she could also see ghosts. And, by the way, she believed all of these were a curse. Damn. What a fine bunch of curses to be afflicted with.

So, back to whatever topic I am on now, this leads nicely into the "not statistically significant" exceptions to the rule, and, I think, that's part of why we're all giddy about superhero movies. The potential for metahumans, or, whatever the hell you want to call 'em. Just take a moment and ask yourself 'Why?' and see what your honest opinion is?

Don't you want to be special? Ya know, beyond this zombie plague of a society we live in that is a perpetual cycle of work, school, financial obligations (Read: debts, loans.), and social status quo. Heh, speaking of the suck, we're living it, amirite?

Being super special gives you an exit. We're envious of that ability to sidestep mainstream—even if, after exploring the idea of being a superhero for just a little bit, we could see how painfully isolating it is. Remember the curse of alcoholic white bread ghost girl? Again, amazing!

I read Beggars in Spain, by Nancy Kress recently. And, while there was an explorative socio-political objective to the book, its emphasis on The Sleepless, a genetically modified human; unaging and unparalleled in personal industry, and the social ramifications sent my mind into a sort of downward spiral on envy, want, and desire. In fact, knowing how I am when I write, I believe Nancy probably felt that same level of envy of the creatures that she, herself, created.

The social constructs that perpetuate around seemingly immortal beings also fall in line with, again, conspiracy.

"Yes, he's still talking."

And, holy hell, I'll stop with this thought, because... sheesh, enough rabbit holes for one post.

This belief in an immortal organization is very interesting: Let's talk Illuminati. People have to surrender themselves to an immortal ideal that binds them indefinitely. Insanely focused individuals could set up an organization that perpetuates and indoctrinates for long term sustainability of such an organization.

Money isn't a problem after the first generation of such an organization, because the future is all that matters. All the investments have been made to that end. Power by position isn't a problem because the system is a sort of nepotistic cycle of selection, building, and indoctrination.

But, really, this is a lot of effort and there will always be bad eggs in the mix. You can't guarantee that human fallibility will not mess up this fine tuned system. Which is why ... immortality in an organization like that makes a lot of sense. A strong, consistent vision.

You know who else thought of this whole thing? William Gibson in Neuromancer.

Interesting, eh? Although, I'm not saying that there are immortals, but if there were, you wouldn't even know it.

Oh, and I lied, I'm still going.

Strangely enough, we talk about smart people pushing boundaries. There are few people who have the resources to "push boundaries" plus have the general population in mind as they do so. The survival of humanity is paramount, for sure, but so is the perpetuation of the ideology. In essence, human life isn't as important as an idea.

Yes, it sounds amoral. But, holy geez, is it effective. After all, isn't it a series of beliefs that have built the ideologies, which create the divisions, that are currently artificially/logically dividing humanity right now? What better way to control all of the little pawns in the game, give them an ideology, then give another group a counter-ideology to keep them in check. An ecology of social control. Now that is damn smart.

And, yeah, we're the pawns. But it really doesn't make sense if there is a thought for long term control... because there would have to be a future. Right now, there doesn't seem to be much concern for a future.

All of the decisions being made by the people in power—ahem, that "we" put in power, no less—just don't seem to be future looking decisions. At least, with the ideologies that people have associated with groups like The Illuminati, even if population control may seem dastardly—they have a long-term view of humanity.

Heh, and this "in a world..." where the majority of us can't see beyond the next paycheck. (Did you hear Don LaFontaine? I was channeling him there. C'mon.)

It's funny that, in the long run, we are not even thinking about the long run. We're hoping someone will save us ... from ourselves, like the petulant, deserving, and entitled children we, as a society, have become. Holy crap, we're the same children who feel that we should be special, not of our own merits, but of genetics, God, aliens, heritage, belief, whatever. And this is all because we believe we're worth saving!

Not to sound fatalistic, but ... are you? (Worth saving, that is.)

And, hey, I'm including myself in that. I do feel, finally, that I'm actually making some headway to take control of my own crazy. Self-control, especially on the financial side of my life, which seems to be the key to true freedom. Where I'm at now, I feel, is firmly in the middle of all the crazy, but not exactly on the fence. Yup, fair and balanced.

I want to be like Fox New's motto. But not like Fox News itself.

This thought process, dare I say ideology, includes the idea that I don't have to have an opinion on everything because, by my "control your crazy" rules, it isn't important for me to have an opinion everything. Because the stuff that matters is obvious to me, the other stuff doesn't necessarily qualify.

Although, I dabble in opinion, I'm never good at supporting it. And I will readily admit it. :D

If you choked your way through this far, I commend you on your tenacity to abide crazy people. Because of your tenacity, I'll give you a fortune cookie fortune: "The next substitute teach you encounter will make you watch a video."

Conversations with Insomnia

“That was an interesting dream you were having just there.” Insomnia said, lightly, as my eyes opened.

“A bit cryptic, ominous, but not altogether bad.” It continued.

I sat back and sighed, eyes open into the darkness.

“You know what it was that woke you? It’s funny, you even heard it in your dream and tried to dismiss it.” Insomnia chuckled at the futility of it, “That banging from your rental’s garage. I remember the last time the winds started up, you swore you’d take care of it. Heh, how’d that work out for you?”

“Gah, leave me alone.” I turned and looked Insomnia in the eyes, “You are so not welcome here.”

It’s ghostly gaze looked back, unperturbed.

“Well, I may have come for the bang bang banging going on outside, but I thought I’d stay for the everything that’s on your mind.”

He leaned forward, “Remember those quotes you were going to get to that customer. He asked you about them last Thursday. It’s Monday now.”

“I handed that off.” I said, now absolutely and unconditionally awake.

“Blindly, yes. You should follow up.” It furrowed it's luminescent brow and gave me an grimacing half smile, “Are you writing this down?”

“No. I am not writing this down.”

“That’s fine. I’ll let you get back to sleep.” It said, now leaning back, but still gazing at me.

I covered my head with my pillow. The winds picked up again.

Bang bang bang

“Hmmm, won’t be able to sleep through that. You are overestimating your powers of ignoring things.” Insomnia whispered, “But, while you’re awake. Did you plan to fix up your other house to sell? Or are you just going to carry both a rental and a mortgage indefinitely? It seems wearying.”

“God, yes, it’s wearying.” I shot back, “What am I supposed to do about it?”

Bang bang bang

“Something?” Insomnia mused, questioningly.

“The times I’m not working, I’m taking care of kids or enjoying my own free time. I need to take care of myself, too, you know.” Then anger touched my voice, “I knew it was going to be like this, too. It’s better just to pay someone else to button the whole thing up for me.”

“That’s a thought. Sacrificing some free time is also a thought.”

“Yeah, I could sacrifice some free time for work, too. That just doesn’t sound like a habit I want to get into.” I scowled at the ceiling.

“Taking some of your own free time to dig yourself out of a bad situation isn’t wholly bad.” Insomnia looked to the ceiling, following my gaze in the lightly lit interior, “Plus, if you take the time now, you’ll make up for the time later. I guarantee it.”

“It’s a flimsy guarantee.”

Bang bang bang

“Think of it this way,” Insomnia said frankly, “The effort it will take to fix the roof of that garage, that little bit of effort, will save you from repeat frustration. See, I like your company and all, but you always seem cranky when I’m around.”

“Heh. Cranky.” I chuckled despite being very cranky.

I got up, put on some clothes and gathered some tools. The ladder was set and I was on the roof in a matter of minutes.

“It’s 4:27 AM, if you get this done quickly, you might be able to get back to bed for a bit?” Insomnia said, its formless shape hovering close.

My response was a flat expression, there was no way I’d be getting back to sleep after this.

“Who puts sheets of tin on a roof? This has to be ancient.” I said, bending down and putting screws into the sheets to hold them in place. The nails had come loose and every gust of wind made the noise like a warbling sort of clashing thunder.

“Very likely. And this isn't tin, this is non-galvanized sheet metal. Tin doesn't rust.” Insomnia said absently.

I glared at it, over my shoulder.

“Know it all.”

“Just being informative.” It shrugged. “It’s a warm night tonight. With all these gusts, it’s a storm front so it’ll be cold tomorrow.”

I nodded. The constant run of information was strangely soothing as I screwed down the remaining shreds of rusted sheet metal. I descended the ladder and put the tools away. Only an hour had passed.

“See? That’s done.” Insomnia smiled. “So, what’s next?”

“I am not doing this now.” I growled.

“You seem to be wide awake to me. Your mind is fresh, might as well take advantage of it.” Insomnia’s passive attitude toward my well-being was less than shocking.

“I have a late night tonight. I am not going to make it worse by getting up this early.” I settled back into bed, staring at the ceiling, a sheen of sweat standing out on my arms from the effort.

“It’s a little warm in here. Maybe you should take a chance and turn on the fan? I know it dries you out, but maybe it’ll be more comfortable?” Insomnia mused absently, glancing around the room for other topics to bring up.

“I’ll deal.” I smirked at Insomnia’s clinging. I closed my eyes took three deep breaths and drifted back to sleep.