Roundup Post [August 2023]

 I wrote 20 articles this month.

 

Annotated list by theme:

Living

• Travel
• Cooking
• Media

Education

• Robotics
• Teaching
• Higher Education

[Draft update].

Collecting Comic Books as a PhD Student

Comic books serve as time stamps to key weeks. I have to intentionally pick books from the wall, or curate my subscriptions.

Storage space in a small studio apartment becomes an interesting challenge.

Temporary storage before sealing read books in a more permanent plastic box.

Each book is about $3.99 or $4.99 for about 32-pages of an ongoing story.

[Draft update].

Nimona: The Movie is better than the Graphic Novel

 The graphic novel was great! I read it during my flight cancellation.

I appreciate the details on the cover.
I don't like the "A Netflix Film" image.

However, the movie had more entertainment value for me. "Chloe Grace Moretz (CGM) is so cute," I texted to the friend who recommended the movie.

[Draft Update.]

SodaStream Terra: Is it worth buying?

I mainly bought a Sodastream so I don’t have to carry two-liter bottles of soda or sparkling water home. The Sodastream Terra model appealed to me because it doesn’t need power, so I can set it up and put it away more easily. Although the environmental argument for the reduction of plastic bottles might seem compelling, I remember that I could have opted to just drink water. I already use a system of filters to store water in my fridge, yet I find it mindlessly industrious to transform that inventory into bottled elixirs.

Some key assumptions match my personal preferences:

• I will usually only use three presses for carbonation. 
• I will use the serving size recommended for the mix.

The Sodastream Terra cost $90 with two cylinders included. A six pack of Pepsi Zero mix was about $35, and each can make about 9 L.

 

One-liter sparkling water precursors.

Initial Purchase

The initial purchase doesn’t quite pay for itself. Including the cost of the Sodastream Terra, for $125, I can make about 54 L of Pepsi Zero, or 27 two-liter bottles. In stores in Seattle, a two-liter bottle of Pepsi Zero costs about $3; sales tax is 10.25%., so each bottle is about $3.31, meaning I can get 37 two-liter bottles for $125. That means we don’t break even quite yet. It would take additional orders of mix and CO2 canisters to “get value.”

Discussion

I like it, but I think families would get more value out of it.

 

 

[Draft update.]

Time Spirals

On August 29, the University of Washington underwent its Google Change where our shared gmails and drives for certain shared accounts stopped working. This change affected my office, but besides some tedious hangups with Outlook, Teams, and OneDrive, I think we managed.

I had scheduled two appointments that day since I figured if anything broke, I wouldn’t be able to fix it right away anyway. On August 29, after all, Skynet becomes self-aware. At least back in 1997.

August 29 is also the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina’s landfall, yet it’s salient. During my sophomore year of high school, I adopted a style change that led to longer hair. For the most part, my hair had been cut short, but eventually I grew out my bangs and sides.

A picture of a yearbook picture.
Post-Katrina sophomore A.J.

 

I was early so I picked up a treat, noticing three very similar, yet distinct choices: Wetzel’s Pretzels, Auntie Anne’s, and Cinnabon. All things equal, Cinnabon wins for me because of Better Call Saul, and general overall deliciousness.

 

Hair

Overall, my haircut took about an hour, but I wonder how much shorter it would have if I didn’t laugh.

Part of the ritual included a shampooing and an awkward walk back to the chair. One side of my hair was longer than the other. Whenever she ran the comb through she pulled up strands of long hair. The mullet-like, Tiger King style midpoint Halfway through the haircut, I started laughing so hard because her deliberate cuts and sneaky footwork reminded me of Salt Bae. She started laughing, then I laughed because she laughed. We managed, but the serious face led to more laughing.

The spin with the mirror to look at the back of my head is a smile and nod.

I didn’t shave, so my shorter hair blended into the beard, a look I just wasn’t used to.

 

Between Time

Since my bus transfer pass had until 5:30, I took a trip to a different mall with a convenient route back. The app gave accurate timings for transfers, so I budgeted my time and picked up some new threads and comic books. The comic book store had new DC books out already, although the traditional “New Comic Day” is Wednesday.

 

Teeth

After a trip involving a long walk from the transit center, I took a five-minute appointment at the orthodontist for “Looks good. You might want to check with a periodontist for any final detailing. Any questions? I’m here for you.” I have a removable retainer for right now, and I called the periodontist’s office for an appointment in three weeks.

 

Discussion

I don’t mind occasional appointments with professionals when they get results.

 

[Draft update.]

Back Home [August 2023, Days 10 – 11]

I was supposed to have an uneventful flight taking the Link back to my Seattle apartment around 9:30 p.m. PST. Takeoff was scheduled around 6 p.m. CST. I had an aisle seat close to the front with no checked bags, so I was ready to get home, and write up a post.

This was supposed to be my last look out before flying back to Seattle.

We boarded, backed out, and then stopped.

“Uhhh, we just got word from the crew on the ground that something came off the wheel. You know as much as we do.” We waited around 30 minutes.

“We recommend deplaning at this time, so you can get some dinner. Come back around 7.”

I was glad, since even though I was in row 11, I had to put my bag in row 13. I shook my head since I couldn’t place my bag like a book on a shelf. Someone stowed their musical instrument that should have been checked in. My carryon was full, taking a CPR-style compression to close and zip. With deplaning, I figured it would reset the overhead bin space so I can actually put my bag closer to me.

Dropped off clothes from Seattle to New Orleans,
so packing was lighter on the way back.

I jumped up and took back my bag before Row 13 got up. I walked around, and came back. I washed my hands. I laughed at the sign because instead of singing Happy Birthday, it prompted you to sing “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong. I tried, but the water was scalding. I tried, but stopped at “Red roses, too.”

Strolling around, watching the Alaska Airlines 737 wheel get patched.

“We now have an estimated boarding time of 9:30. We will be landing in Seattle tomorrow. Our flight crew wants to get back home, too.”

Around 10, they finally cancelled the flight. They sent people to the 3^rd floor, and in the confusion, I walked ahead of everyone. The worker at the desk calmly, but firmly told first-class passengers “Back up, calm down. We don’t like this any more than you do.”

There was a sign for a QR code, and a few texts with support in Seattle cleared it up for me in about five minutes. My seat was upgraded to row 6. I left the line since I didn’t need hotel arrangements. I was satisfied, since instead of arriving really late, I’d just be arriving midday tomorrow.

If this happened to my brother, he’d send a karenesque email “Make it right.” Some of it would be expected, but then he’d probably over ask while vaguely threatening to take business elsewhere.

Incidentally, they’ll be sending a coupon for future travel. I guess I’ll be flying Alaska Airlines for Christmas and New Year’s coming up.

 

Waiting

I stayed at my uncle’s place, and read Nimona with plans to watch it some other day. I slept around 4 hours. We left for around 5 that morning for a 24-hour IHOP where I got the plant-based power combo with pancakes and fruit. That wasn’t on the menu before so I tried it over the usual omelet. Slow wallet.

 

Picked up some New Orleans flavors.

We had a lot of time, so we went to three different grocery stores looking for the smaller snack size Elmer’s Chee Wees. In retrospect, I could’ve gotten a larger bag, but opted for the mid-size barbecue flavored one. I also picked up some red beans seasoning, since here in Seattle, the version on the shelf already has dried beans in it. I could get Zapp’s honey mustard pretzels here in Seattle, but the Chee Wees come at a premium price.

 

Mulligan

Getting through security at MSY never takes long. I walked around the concourse, appreciating the art, realizing how much different A was compared to B and C, more business-oriented wings. I took a slow walk, thinking whether this art should be set aside or more integrated with the rest of the airport. I wondered what happened to the golden, hanging Icarus statue in old MSY.

 

I wish there were plaques with details, not signs to not touch it.

 

I secretly hoped to see some Avengers fighting each other at old MSY.
Anthony Mackie is from NOLA.

It wasn’t a good sign when we had to switch terminals from A2 to C3. We were going back on the same plane, and they finally changed out the tire around 8:30. People sitting around me were telling each other about their hotel stays and what they did in New Orleans or Seattle. Before we boarded they bonded enough that one person felt comfortable leaving their bags, offering to buy pretzels, drinks, or a Lucky Dog before liftoff. The other person politely declined, but expressed loyalty for watching the luggage.

The person sitting next to me left their expensive
dragonfruit drink, watered down by melted ice.

Thanks, ground crew. Extra props for how humid it was.

I was in Boarding Group F, but when I sat down, I hoped nobody would have to sit next to me. I got Seat 6A, the window seat in Premium Class. I kept saying “Close the door” as more people came in waves, like an emptying clown car.

A good amount of legroom with nobody sitting next to me.

When we took off, overhead slow claps and cheers came from behind. “This is it!” I remarked at the camaraderie that the shared experience of a canceled flight imparts to passengers.

I napped between takeoff and the beverage service ritual where I got a can of Coke Zero, no ice. I read Robins: Being Robin, and it solidified my thoughts that Tim Drake is the best Robin and Dick Grayson is the template but should just be Nightwing. I had a headache, probably from not sleeping enough, but it subsided around Mount Rainier.

On Old Olympus's Towering Tops,
A Finn And Germ Viewed Some Hops.

We had a smooth landing, but the taxi back to the terminal took a few laps with some long pauses.

Travelers packed the N and C concourses, expected at Sea-Tac on a weekend. Still, the walk out and over to the Link went uninterrupted. I took the Link with a roundtrip pass for $7. Passengers filled the car about halfway. We had to stop occasionally, and more people got on around Westlake and Capitol Hill.

 

Errands

I dropped off my luggage and headed to the comic book store to pick up some of the titles I missed from these past two Wednesdays, mostly Knight Terrors, and then went back to the Roosevelt Whole Foods for four packs of tofu and two bundles of green onions. They have the best price for tofu around here at $1.69. I left paying under $10, but my pantry was stocked well enough that I’d be good for the week. I haven’t done a breakdown by unit price, or factor in that brand of tofu needs to be drained and pressed, but it beats some of the Asian food markets by a lot. Regional price differences come into play; back home around New Orleans, the same brand at Whole Foods costs $2.49.

 

Remembering Bob Barker

News of Bob Barker passing hit when I landed. Based on the news that was playing in the terminal before takeoff, I half-expected some more flavor text and justice related to Trump’s arrest, but scrolling through the news update was sad. Bob Barker, former host of Price is Right, died at 99.

I would always watch Price is Right with my maternal grandma in the morning before lunch. As a teacher, whenever asking students for an estimate we’d use Price is Right rules of closest without going over.

My two favorite cameos of Bob were in Happy Gilmore when he fights Happy at the celebrity golf tournament and in Futurama at the Miss Universe pageant with Bender and Flexo.

 

Discussion

I postponed my arrival in Seattle by about 15 hours, but I don’t think the delay was consequential at all. This was the first time my flight was cancelled while waiting at the gate, but I was satisfied with how we all handled it. I caught up on sleep with an earlier bedtime.

 

Other Parts of This Trip [August 2023]

• Visit Days 1-3.
• Visit Days 4-6.
• Visit Days 7-9.
  
• View a Stylized Reimagining of this trip back home using DALL-E.

 

Back Home [August 2023, Days 7-9]

I’ve only been an uncle for under 1.5 years now. It’s an acquired identity

"Come on Mimi. It's too hot outside."
*slow wallet aftermath*

 At the time of writing, it’s past midnight here in Louisiana, but it’s a different day in Washington. I scheduled a few emails and deliveries ahead of time. I still have to hear back whether my conference presentation moved to a later timeslot to avoid a schedule conflict with my Saturday teaching.

At the risk of misapplying some philosophical idea, I’m supposed to always already be a teacher, learner, and lover of wisdom. That’s what the PhD, doctor of philosophy, means.

This reflection fits more of a pre-sleep, pre-travel collection of connecting thoughts situated within the last few days. I’m also on a streak that I will allow myself to break tomorrow in order to get some sleep over in Seattle. I will also edit this by adding to it. I think this one will act as one of those hub posts.This trip has been fun, and it was good to witness my nephew growing up, live, instead of via text.

 

Choosing

Before he was even born, my first gift to my nephew was a choice between Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle. In the end, he’ll always wind up with all three, like Ash from the anime or Yellow from the games, but his initial preference is probably contextual. The predictions I heard were Charmander because he’s orange, or Squirtle because he vaguely looks like a baby. I didn’t really hear anyone predict Bulbasaur, reasoning something like “Bulbasaur looks the most edible of the three.”

"That one."

Bulba-bulba.

Bulba-saur!

 

Your turn.

By the way, my first starter Pokémon was Pikachu, since I played Yellow Version first.

 

Learning Theory

Na’ilah Saud Nasir, a top scholar in my field, former AERA president and current Spencer Foundation president, describes three kinds of resources for becoming or practicing an identity:

• ideational resources – self-concept of relationship to a practice and what is good in the world
• relational resources – relations which reinforce becoming part of a practice
• material resources – ways in which the physical world shape our relationships

Learning is a part of sociocultural practices, or being part of a group, organization, or community. Onto-epistemic heterogeneity (see Chapter 16 in The Handbook of Cultural Foundations of Learning), a fun term, really has me thinking about what the atoms of an education would be, in the Deweyan sense of “Education is life itself.”

I looked at the mouse flashcards, a pack of A to Z and 1 to 10. This is a material resource to be used by a teacher. I doubt my nephew, as smart as he is, couldn’t learn the alphabet or counting through the resource alone. It would require mama, dada, mimi, or papa, or someone at his daycare, or someone else with prior knowledge of the canon order of the alphabet, or the counting relationship between these positive integers. That relational resource pairs with the judgment that the learning of the content was worth it for my nephew at a time when he’s younger than 18 months old. The pack says pre-K.

A very important question:
Why does that mouse have pecs?

I will call it now that if Common Core State Standards still exist when he reaches kindergarten, homework sessions between my nephew and brother would be worth watching. That prediction is based on the fact my brother shares math memes that usually have ambiguous order of operations or some other gimmick, with the accompanying text to ‘splain.

When evaluating the educational value of the flashcards, the cartoon mouse on the box was kinda random considering all the other products of the same brand. Was it just to differentiate the packs? Were the drawings on the cards supposed to be a form of associative learning? The flashcards cost $1, so there really wasn’t too much of a downside to picking them up.

 

Collecting

My brother has a lot of stuff. Someday, the collection will have to pass on, right?

That's just the half of the room that fits in the picture.

He also has a lot of toys.

I did zero cleaning or de-cluttering in my ten days here. Before I get back to Seattle, I have an air fryer, a Sodastream, and a long comic box headed for my apartment. My thoughts on those purchases were they’ll make it so I’ll keep more organized.

On the plane ride back, I plan on reading Nimona. I have a backlog of low-commitment reads on my shelf back in Seattle, but I think I’ll get through it.

 

Cooking

My studio apartment doesn’t have a dishwasher, and the convection oven seems inefficient; I cook a lot of food on the stove, so I hope the air fryer expands the ways I heat food and make meals. The Sodastream is an experiment to see if I can get personal value. I could just drink water, but this seems to make some economic sense for me, assuming I use it and spend less on getting soft drinks. It's a way to better titrate my caffeine intake instead of coffee and tea, assuming I'd drink them ad libitum.

 

Whipped cream into Shaq face.

Louisiana does have great food. I’m going to miss the “slow wallet” phenomenon of getting my mom to pay for some meals. It’s when you hesitate or pretend to get the check, fulling to be too slow for the other person to get it first. I did cook more than usual on this trip though.

General Tso's Bean Curd (GTBC) with
air fried mushrooms and quick pickled onions.

Discussion

Overall, I do feel recharged after this trip. It was a good break after my summer teaching and before my fall dissertating.

Other Parts of This Trip [August 2023]

• Visit Days 1-3.
• Visit Days 4-6.
• Visit Days 10-11.
  
• View a Stylized Reimagining of this trip back home using DALL-E.

Stylized Reimaginings Back Home Using DALL-E

I won't pretend to have a fully developed position on the use of AI to generate digital art. I'm hesitant in using the verb "create" here. However, the thought of trying it out on a slow day back home opened up a whole new world, inspiring my comparison to isekai anime.

I used Open AI's DALL-E, named after Salvador Dali and Wall-E. For $15, you get 115 credits. Each credit corresponds to one prompt that generates four images. Each generation costs about 13 cents. Although each image comes down to 3.25 cents each, usually one or two fit the prompt well. Refinements take up a credit, but generate new variations.

It's Salvador Dali!

"a brain melting, synapses firing, taking in the mysteries of the universe,
cosmic, yet quantum, in the style of Salvador Dali"

 

My First Impressions using DALL-E

I don't actually recommend using DALL-E just to take a look. Since it costs money to get credits, the use-case would need to justify the premise. For me, this could be a tool for future blog content, and here are some tips to get some better results:

• You have to be oddly specific to get what you want. It's a monkey's paw or a genie's lamp. Or you need to be okay with the four generated images from your prompt.
• It is awful at generating realistic looking images from prompts. Sculptures and buildings didn't come out looking like a single object.
• It fudges hands, feet, and faces. In some ways, it's not too dissimilar compared to human artists. 
• Refine the prompt. This usually made better results than generating variations.
• If it does generate an image you like, go for a variation. I rarely liked the new images over the first one, but sometimes it nails a desired style.
• It is decent at interpreting styles. As I'll share below, I just added "isekai anime, digital art" to all of my prompts and it maintained the style pretty well.
• Simple and specific works well. Nouns, relationships, and positions show up pretty well, but sometimes the framing of the subject needs to be prompted. Fewer objects seems better.
  

Isekai Anime Reinterpretation

Isekai anime are ones where the protagonist goes to another world. After playing around with DALL-E, I settled on trying prompts from this very blog. On Day 8, I reinterpreted Days 1-3 and Days 4-6 on my trip back home. Like in comic books, different artists draw the same character differently, sometimes jarringly differently. I haven't figured out a literary description of myself just yet. Also, any hair color seems possible, true to the anime inspiration to my prompts. The "slice of life" mindset seems decent if you can ignore the changes in character design since their isn't any continuity between prompts.

Days 1-3

This was mostly travel from Seattle to New Orleans, and doing things around the house.

Vacuum sealing and packing.

Taking the light rail.

That whole bag mix-up episode at the airport.

Animoo Tatiana Erukimova.

Thai lunch buffet with mom.

Blending up almond milk.

Fixing the treadmill.

Jump to the real version of Days 1-3.

 

Days 4-6

These days were spent going to Baton Rouge and seeing movies.

Driving on the interstate in Louisiana.

At Taste and See, the Sushi Buffet.

Trip to the bookstore before the movie.

Watching a superhero movie.

"Something about the woke mob," said the LA governor front-runner,
posing with books he never read. smh

I didn't actually write about this, but I scored applications.

It went overboard with purple.

Jump to the real version of Days 4-6.
 

Discussion

My brother compared my blogging to Kevin McCalister from Home Alone narrating his day or the nostalgia of having a  LiveJournal. This is a shareable journal to freestyle and remix some scholarly and some silly thoughts.

At the time of writing, I have about 60 credits left. I won't generate too many images for future blogs, except in some recap posts or a composited story. A similar post for Days 7-10 will probably be folded into getting ready for the quarter to start at UW.

I feel like I will usually go with photos and videos I take from my phone or painting pictures with words, but an occasional short project can be fun. I will probably explore some of the learning and pedagogical implications of AI; I tend to favor its deliberate use as a tool, rather than something to suppress. 

Blogging about using AI digital art generation.

I want to ask students, "What do you think about AI generated images? Is it art? Will it put people out of a job? Will it create new jobs?"

Other Parts of This Trip [August 2023]

• Visit Days 1-3.
• Visit Days 4-6.
• Visit Days 7-9.
• Visit Days 10-11.
  

Animals in Seattle: Urban Ecologies

Seattle’s vibrant urban wildlife has many niches where they can thrive. In this list, I want to combine my personal observation of animals around Seattle with reflections of what I want to learn more about. In addition to the photos and gif’d videos of animals, I throw in some research, because more research is always needed.

I sometimes teach an enrichment animal behavior and neuroscience class where we watch animal videos, dissect brains, try to make sense of what we observe, and then ask more questions. We do some preliminary research, pose tentative models, and push our thinking. Even though I’m typically working with younger elementary students, they can grok concepts as well as some of the high school and undergraduate students I come across. I always frame the class as a “college course” since they take it in one of the campus classrooms. I combine Ambitious Science Teaching with STEM Teaching Tools.

I know this list does not include any cold-blooded animals, invertebrates, and anything that lives in waterways. I also didn’t list geese since they’ll have a special place in hell… I also don’t have any photos or recordings of the various singing white-crowned sparrows. They sing incessantly in the springtime, but now I miss them. The neural mechanisms of birdsong fascinate me. Here’s a research review: Birdbrains could teach basal ganglia research a new song (Doupe et al., 2005).

Dogs

I only know two dogs by name, and Cessna the family dog is pretty and pampered. The other one I know is our mascot, Dubs II. Dogs do that cute head-tilt, and here’s some research on that: An exploratory analysis of head-tilting in dogs (Sommese et al., 2021).

Cessna!

Dubs II gets his diploma (June 2023).

Cats

The only two other animals I know by name are two cats with the same human parents.

Whenever I teach my animal neuroscience class, the topic of cats falling out of windows emerges from cats always landing on their feet. Here’s a technical paper: Design of a Practical Cat-Righting Reflex (crr) Model (Manerikar and Anandpara, 2015).

A handsome orange loaf.

Rabbits

Throughout the parks and gardens around Seattle, even the sculpture garden outside the Chihuly glasshouse, rabbits seem abundant. Here’s an article that shows the hippocampus associates a conditioned eye-blink response in rabbits: Hippocampectomy disrupts trace eye-blink conditioning in rabbits (Moyer et al., 2015).

 

I wish I could track their family trees.
There are a lot of these floppy-eared grass eaters.

At Chihuly Garden (2023).

Squirrels

There are a surprisingly high number of wholesome squirrel-based fictional characters: Squirrel Girl from Marvel, Marshal from Animal Crossing, and Sandy from Spongebob Squarepants. In real life, though, squirrels seem to have a reputation of being pests that swarm. Research suggests squirrels are taking over our urban centers: Urban grey squirrel ecology, associated impacts, and management challenges (Merrick et al., 2016).

 

A muscular squirrel flexing.

Not sure if avoidant or just into eating.

Racoons

I saw what these critters can do. Look at High Evolutionary. They’re not too concerned about being eaten, apparently: Racoonvigilance and activity patterns when sympatric with coyotes (Chitwood et al., 2020).

 

Usually found on paths near water.

Gulls

These glaucous-winged gulls often have beef with the other animals. Here’s a study that meters how much plastic was found in gulls, but with increasing impacts as more and more plastic gets into the environment: Plastic consumption and diet of glaucous-winged gulls (Larus glaucescens) (Lindborg et al., 2012).

This fight escalated right outside my office.
Five gulls, one squirrel, and one crow
fight over a bag of chips.

Crows

I secretly want to start a trading system with crows to see if they can help me find loose change in exchange for some treats. These birds, an offshoot of dinosaurs, evolved social and perceptual intelligences: Abstract rule neurons in the endbrains support intelligent behaviour in corvid songbirds (Veit and Nieder, 2013).

 

I wonder if they have different talents and dreams.

Ducks

These represent one of the UW's athletic rivals, but I'm not sure if that's true anymore with the Big 10 changes. These ducks are far better visitors than the geese that land in our ponds. Here is a review of birds imprinting, a form of learning: Visual imprinting in birds: Behavior, models, and neural mechanisms (McCabe, 2019).

Drumheller Fountain on Rainier Vista.

A very polite duck. Other people passing by
also took pictures.

Coyotes

I’m one of the sole students who might stroll into my office before 5 a.m., but on W Day this year, I saw three coyotes in front. I think I could take one, but I waited for them to pass by. I’m more scared for the tiny critters they may eat. Here’s a link to the Seattle Coyote Study.

 

Of all days to choose to go in early
(W Day, 2022).

Discussion

The animals around Seattle get me to think about how much we know about, how much we don’t know about them, and our relationship to our shared environment. I also marvel at the methodological repertoire of the sciences to better understand this world and the beings that inhabit it.