I look back and sigh in disgust

I don't want to talk about AI. But as an educator, I have to. It's one of those Great Old One concepts, where the more you talk about it the more power it has to adversely affect its surroundings. Conceptually it's a bunch of gibberish, built by people who think in hours instead of centuries and powered by the ever-shrinking rainforests. It's an objectively unacceptable misuse of resources. Yet it's the Trendy Bullshit of the moment, picking up the slack left by fading or hiding crypto.

So. Consider one of my degrees: a B.Sci in Foodservice Management from Johnson & Wales University. It wasn't hard to get. The technical skills are largely a matter of repetition, but somehow the majority of the student body had trouble with the academics, something I found as astonishing then as I do now. Nobody who comfortably got through middle school in my hometown would have had any trouble with them. 

It was difficult to imagine how some (most) of the students in my classes were ever admitted to university in the first place. Often, as I proofread and (desperately) edited my classmates' work, it really just felt like "Can/will they sign the loan documents?" was the only real requirement, and that soured me on "higher education" quite profoundly. 

My distaste for industry-wide deceptive advertising and predatory loansharking aside, there was very little recourse for the students once enrolled. Either graduate and leverage the degree to try to get a job, or leave and hope for a wealthy benefactor or other miracle that lets them pay the bill. To that end, many instructors understood the limitations of the student body and resigned themselves to making the best of a bad situation. Now, though, things are very different.

The massive upsurge in AI-generated plagiarism and fabrication has left principled staff and faculty grasping at straws for keeping the learning process going and curricula moving forward. Grading has become an obligatory verification process before it gets to become what it's actually for- an improvement process. Instead of being spent improving the students' understanding of a given subject matter, that time is wasted making sure there's any hint of understanding to start with rather than fabricated and parroted bullshit artistry.

What, then, does one do about trade-centric schools, where academic classes are already unlikely to be paid beyond lip-service? I can almost guarantee that current JWU students are taking judicious advantage of AI to fake their way through academics even more desperately and empty-headedly than before, and graduating with even less understanding of / utility to the world they're being inflicted upon.

If they'd hired me like they ought to have, I could fix the problem. 

But they didn't- and there's no way they can. 

Bit of a shame though. If they'd learned how to do research properly they'd have made better choices. Irony.

On the Validity of References

Someone I am vaguely acquainted with tried to make a point about the misuse of the media to create a 'both sides' narrative, rather than directly creating a path to a positive and comfortable future.

He went with Dante Alighieri. 

"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality."

A fine phrase, and one that makes the point perfectly. Yet it's also one that exemplifies a robust quandary for me, as it should for many.

So much perfectly sensible philosophy, even laudable rational thought, springs up in the most absurd of places. The Divine Comedy is, at its core, no different from something like 50 Shades of Grey. It's self-insert fanfiction based in the universe of a story that was never worthy to be told in the first place- proven over and over again by the thoughts, words, and deeds of some of its staunchest advocates. 

But does the poisonous origin invalidate the impact of the works that follow? Where does one draw the line for where you draw the core tenets of your way of life? How profound a turn of phrase can come from the last place you might ever think to look?

"Do you think God stays in heaven because He, too, lives in fear of what He's created here on Earth?"

If you don't know where that quote is from, take some time to think and then make your best guess. 

Look it up afterward.

A moment of exasperated philosophy.

Lately I've been seeing lots of variations of the "I'm starting to realize that the 'what would people think' barrier is holding 99% of people back from their dreams." bit. How disappointed such notions make me is hard even to quantify, let alone express. But not for the reason most would expect.

Whether you do something or not should only have one qualifier: That you earned the privilege. Doing something because you want to? Fine- if you're finished. If you're worthy of autonomy and choice.
And if not? Doing what you want is simply wrong. Your existence does not have intrinsic value. It does not automatically make the world a better place. Assuming otherwise is a dangerous and terrible but unforgivably common habit.

Do the work to validate your existence before inflicting it upon others and wasting resources that might otherwise be better served.

Don't poison the world for those who put in the time and effort- those that can prove we deserve to be here.

Vegas is Not For Me

My endeavours in Las Vegas were successful! I made some new contacts, spent lots of time exploring, and relished the experience, taking a lot of time to wander and see what it's really like, on-strip, off-strip, and yet further hidden away.

I gave my physical security talk to a couple groups of people, and it went over quite well. Didn't get a lot of questions, but I did get a lot of thanks from the lawyerly-looking types. Seeing my expertise be suitably acknowledged feels good, even if it's on a small scale and a couple of decades late. 

Still. I don't think I like Vegas. 

Somehow, the casinos manage to feel both organized and organic while the general miscellany comes across as hopelessly dissonant and artificial. Further still, the noise and spectacle outside had me feeling like I was at a riot that used to be a house party. 

There's no cohesion to anything outside of the casinos when it comes to entertainment, just endless effort through visuals, audio, and advertisement to get attention- whether the attention is positive or not. 

Shock value seems to translate quite well to cash value, in Vegas, and I do not like such notions at all. It speaks quite strongly of the educational and ethical deficiency of large numbers.

The street theatre was a mix of astonishingly impressive and poisonously unpleasant. Some of it was truly incredible, but in equal measure there was dreck best discreetly tossed in front of a train. Likewise for the shops and omnipresent souvenirs, from keychains to clothing, it had the feel of a flea market made by dumpster diving and designed by /b with some /pol thrown in. I have a 'novelty' shirt or two- most people do. But a great deal of what I saw there, I cannot imagine EVER being worn. Even seeing it exist was staggering.

And then there were the dark corners. Vegas turns up the lights and the noise so nobody looks too hard at the many broken fragments and castoffs that hover around the edges of the scene.

Yeah. I don't think I like Vegas much at all.

Right on cue...

Just as I'm starting to get a handle on my second new position -taking over the running of the city's Meals on Wheels operation- I've got to run out of town. Now admittedly I knew this was coming months before I took this new position and everyone relevant to it knew, but the timing is still less than stellar.

On the flip side, it's going to be fun. I'll be in Vegas handling some contracts for a chunk of the next week, which I've been looking forward to very much. A few orgs have finally bit on my physical security panels. "Clipboards and Catering Carts: Low-Tech Pentesting" got enough eyes on it that I'm being flown out to give proper in-person lectures and demonstrations.

Being noticed (and well regarded) for being invisible. It's an interesting way of things.

An Opportunity! ...As if.

Pete Wells is stepping down as the NYT Food Critic. This pleases and intrigues me, because that's a job *I* want. The relocation, I can handle. The requirements, I blow away. The expertise, I blow out of the water. The physical strain, I have no worry over. A lifetime of athletics and a thorough understanding of culinary nutrition and exercise science have left me more than prepared for fending off high blood pressure, diabetes, and gout.

Now, given the very predictable results I've seen when I put in for similar positions (Washington Post, Eater, etc), I'm not likely to get the call. But whoever they pick is almost inevitably going to crash and burn. It's all I've seen from every single not-me choice so far throughout the last several years, and I expect that to continue.

A dish I've been considering lately

No reason in particular. Certainly not a critically acclaimed expansion to Fantasy Meso/South America or anything.

'Cochinita Pibil'. It's delicious. One of a great many variations around the world of what one might call 'pulled pork' (and probably get smacked for calling it that, but it gets the gist across). It's not necessarily hard to make , but it definitely can be a bit tricky to get all of the commonly accepted essential components.

First and foremost, it's a pork dish. A slow-roasted pork dish, which means temperature control is more important than other slow cook methods like braising. Usually/traditionally it involves a whole or half pig, though for the home cooks, a sizable chunk of shoulder or butt will do nicely. If there's a fatcap or a slab of skin? Leave them on. Maybe score the fatcap with a nice crisscross to ensure faster and more even rendering, but you don't really need to play with it.

Next, the marinade. It's extremely vigorously acidic, so it shouldn't be done for too long before you get it cooking. The traditional method is heavy on the juice of the Bitter Orange / Marmalade Orange. I didn't have a lot of those, so I fine tuned with Cara Cara orange juice and Calamansi lime, both of which I happened to have on hand.

Other universal components are garlic (shocking, I know) and Achiote. The latter is a seed (looks rather like Fenugreek, actually), and when toasted/ground, provides a mild flavor and massive burst of color, somewhat akin to a red version of what you might get out of Turmeric. However much you're using is probably not enough.

One last necessary is the banana leaf. They become the vessel in which the marinated pork and other miscellany are wrapped to ensure the slow-roasting process doesn't dry it out. (I'm reminded of Beggar's Chicken there) You can usually find these frozen at Latin or Asian markets. They're pretty cheap and keep for ages.

The rest is other aromatics. You'll see varying quantities of things like Oregano, Allspice, Cinnamon (the real stuff), Peppercorns, and Bay Leaves. You'll also see additional water-heavy aromatics like onion, fresh chiles, and tomato for extra liquid generation (hedging one's bet- no way to tinker once this goes in the oven) and flavor development. I added smoked paprika to my marinade for additional color and smokiness since I didn't have access to the traditional cooking method.

My recent effort didn't use all of those spices I just listed in the marinade (a mistake, in retrospect). My concerns that the flavors would be too potent and throw off the balance of the finished dish led me to apply some of them in the preparation of the accompaniments instead. 

Most commonly this is served with a violently spicy salsa as well as pickled onion (wherein I used cinnamon, bay leaf, and smoked peppercorn to enhance my pickling liquid and apply those flavors from a different direction). I should have spiced up both. So don't be afraid to go hard.

Now, the cooking itself is interesting. The 'pibil' in the name denotes the usage of a pib, a sort of underground oven. Imagine doing this like you might a clambake, or on a campfire, covered and with coals. Since most of that's a little rough to manage in a home kitchen, I simply used the oven, and in case my banana leaves cracked open, I put everything in a lidded cast-iron pot. Wrap the pork package as airtight as you can in those banana leaves, then set it in the pot, clap the lid on, and away you go.

I mentioned temperature control. I meant it. When I say slow-roasted I mean s l o w. We're talking the 250-275F for four or five hours kind of slow. You've got to give it time for the collagen to convert to gelatin, and the tissues to break down / soften. Without the added liquid from, say, a braise, it can take longer and it's much easier to accidentally end up with a dried-out, sad result.

But that's the lot of it, really. Once it's tender, just shred it and make tacos. Meat, spicy salsa, aromatic pickled onions, maybe some cilantro. Can't beat it.