Notes — Andy Arthur.org

And I return on August 9th

Andy | July 30, 2026

Yesterday was kind of a crazy busy day as I closed up the as many loose leads before heading out on vacation this morning. Didn’t get to the bank, so I”m leaving at 7:40 AM not 6:40 AM in rush hour, so I can hit the bank and get small domination bills prior to vacation.

Still raining this morning, so that’s another reason to slow my departure, 🌧️ I was going to shower first and then pack, but that’s dumb as I’ll get real wet. So instead I loaded the kayak up, after the drizzle turned into a good soaker, got my gear in the truck, and now it’s slowed down.

Bank opens at 8 AM 💵 so I can get the small demonization bills I need for farm stands, tag sales, other things I come upon my trip. It will be mean hitting traffic 🚦 potentially on the Thruway with rush hour, but I’m heading west, and except for commuters heading to Schenectady it should be reasonable. I’ll drive carefully, take my time, the SuperDuty has excellent brakes and accelerates like a bat out of hell.

Mostly the truck is loaded, 💼 and I’m at the point where I am checking my list, doing a bit more cleaning, going to shower, trim my hair and nails 💅 and then be on my way by quarter to eight. Get some money at the bank, fuel and bacon in Rotterdam, and then I might stop in Oneonta if I need to pee or move my knees around and get maybe some cottage cheese and grapes at Wally World, though certainly not essential. I ended up deleting the remote start for 6:40 and then 7:40 AM, it’s kind of silly this time of year, mostly just motivation to leave by a specific hour. I have my key fob, and I can fire it up a minute or two before I leave, just to get the oil moving in the engine, though I’ll hit traffic and it will have plenty of chance to get to temperature before erging on the highway.

Should be a great adventure. 🏕️ Ten days away from it all, the rain is pulling out. Much lazy crazy then yesterday, when there was so much loose ends to pick up, and then I spilled hot wax all over my recently cleaned office carpet, the file cabinet, and myself as I was rushing out to the shuttle 🚀 which I didn’t want to miss in the pouring rain, as five projects came my way. It was obnoxious to say the least. Ended up working late downtown 🖥️ but hoping for a very quiet vacation 🩴 but inevitably there will be some projects to do.

AI is coming for your brain 🧠

Andy | July 29, 2026

Sure seems like that times when you read the alarmist headlines. AI is going to be everywhere, it’s going to use up all the electricity, demand building millions of gas-guzzling power plants, put everybody out of work, break every security code, and give the everyman the information they need to build nuclear and biological bombs in their backyard.

I’ve been quite interested in AI, getting to the bottom of it, avoiding the hype. It seems like much of AI is just hype – all of the proposed AI data centers if built would increase the United States’ data center capacity by 15 fold. As if the world needed that kind of compute. Not to mention, whose paying for it and building all the electric plants to make it happen? Much of it is just speculation. People chasing money, on the possilbity of a need.

Likewise, much of the demand of the big US AI companies for cheap electricity, environmental exemptions, restrictions on the use of open models, seems primarily to be about incumbent US players. If you can’t build a better product, then you can try to get Congress to pass a law banning the use of your competition. But over time, the best product wins. If China is making better, more efficent models, then their open models will win. Americans have long had a very unhealthy obession with bigger is better.

I am a believer in small, efficent models are often better. I hate the idea of a few centralized companies controlling AI, I would rather have billions of small, task specific AI models running on individuals computers rather then some slow API calling distant know-it-all models on server farms hundreds or thousands of miles away. Most of the time, specific knowledge of a task beats encyclopedia knowledge. General reference has it’s place in this world, but most tasks are narrow and don’t require terabytes of data and knowledge to process.

Truth is things like Google Gemani are fun, and can help you think about problems and provide data in a way like an encyclopedia does. But they are generalists, and when you dig into them a bit and ask specific non-encylopedia type questions, they aren’t very good. They’ll try to churn out a probable answer and sometimes good answer, but at their roots, their little more then a giant encyclopedia that makes good predictions on what you want to hear. And I’m not sure we need 15 times more of their capacity. We need more efficiency in these models, something the Chinese are good at, but also we need more task-based, local models rather then these big encyclopedia remote models.

In 24 hours the SuperDuty will come rumbling to life, and I’ll be fighting traffic to escape the city 🛻

Andy | July 29, 2026

The bacon place opens at 7 AM I believe, and I want to be merging onto Warren Anderson’s expressway shortly thereafter with Bainbridge on my mind, though I’m sure there will be piss breaks on the way and maybe a stop at Oneonta Wally World to piss and get a few supplies. Then Ithaca and the Chicken Co-op.

I feel fine, talking about piece of mind, 🤯 sings that old Tommy James and Shondells song on the radio. 📻 I saw that August 22nd was the Cruize in at Mine Kill and was reminded how truly awful that band was when I was swimming last year. 🎷 But it will feel good to be rolling down the Susquehanna Valley on the 88, with that SuperDuty not even struggling. Then up and over old NY 206 with all those ups and downs, and then fighting 🤜 that traffic along NY 79 into 10 square miles of traffic surrounded by reality.

Heavy, heavy rain during the early hours of the morning. 🌧️ Mr. NOAA sent a flash flood warning ⚠️ to my phone, urging people like me to stay off the roads due to flash floods, and to turn around and not drown. Despite my contemplation last night, I wasn’t seriously thinking of driving the SuperDuty with it’s 22 inch deep fording tubes through the flooded Erie Boulevard in Albany, which often returns to a canal in this weather. I’ll let Ray, the shuttle 🚀 driver do that crap and keep my 13 1/2 MPG SuperDuty off the road for one more day. Hoping though we don’t have this crazy 🤪 rain crap tomorrow for driving through, not to mention packing, or setting up camp. 🏕️ Indeed, they mostly promise that it will pull off by the time I get to camp. I packed the heater regardless, in case it is chilly and I want to warm my hands, but I expect it won’t get used, but I am unsure of how cold and wet Sunday will be 🌧️ – some models talk about all day rain and others showers. Regardless, it will be a day to hang out in the National Forest, maybe do some fishing, drink beer 🍻 and maybe smoke some dope. Sounds fun, like vacation.

Camping at Piseco Powley Road – July 6, 2025

Andy | July 29, 2026

Just some thoughts and exploring my campsite up at the House Pond Campsite on a summer day, floating down the East Canada Creek.

Bar exam 🧑‍⚖️

Andy | July 28, 2026

There was a great mass of people coming onto the Concourse as I walked laps on the Plaza. Such young people. I read the sign, bar exam.

I guess most people taking the bar exam would be in their twenties. 🧒🏻 Not gray and getting old like me. Still it seemed overwhelming to see all those young people come pouring out of the Empire Plaza Meeting Rooms.

Like many things, I had second thoughts, 💭 the times I thought about going to law school after college. But I got an internship and then a job with State Assembly, and have been there going on over 19 years now if you include my internship. Hard to believe after all that time, now the Director of Data Services. Love coming up with great ways to target things and overseeing a big data unit, still much like the SuperDuty, I always have questions about my life choices.

I could have caught the earlier local home, but it looked like it was actually running on time, too little time to catch it 🚌 but a few refreshes of the real-time bus info showed I actually had plenty of time. So I ended up catching the later home, walking laps 👣 through the crowd but also getting some steps in.

Got home, fried up summer squash 🍳 lunched around a bit, and decided with the volt meter not being delivered to wire up a USB/12 volt outlet to the starting battery and use my portable plug in battery gauge at least as a temporary solution. To hopefully keep that from getting fried, ⚡ I also inserted a RC Snubber Board into the circuit. Also moved the old dash cam into my truck, using electrical tape around the cable and jamming it under the headliner as a temporary solution. I want to get a good, lens fog free camera for the truck, but not until prices come down again and expenses are a bit lower.

Then just a little packing and not enough cleaning. 🧽 I am such a dirty hick, my apartment run down and I don’t really care that much anymore. Hell, I’m going to the wilderness to camp in the mud for 10 nights, or at least in a forest next to a cow pasture. 🐮 Shit will smell like cows and farm, and I kind of like that. Someday I’ll have my own land, off-the-grid, simple, with livestock but the week plus in the National Forest also works for now. I had wanted to go to Michigan but it just wasn’t going to happen this year. Rain for driving out but it should clear relatively early in the Finger Lakes, and then the next chance for good rain is Sunday.

What the heck, I’m packing my propane heater for summer vacation. 🪭 Essential? No, but I think I can fit it, and on Sunday when it’s raining out, I might rather sit next to it on a low compared to a smokey campfire. Really, I don’t bring that much more stuff on summer vacation then what I brought for my autumn trip to the Adirondacks, and I think I’ll have room, and it’s not like the SuperDuty is going to notice one way or another if I bring it or not. Once I’m at camp, I’ll just chain it up and won’t bring it everywhere. I have the propane for camp stove, regardless. Still it strikes me as just wrong to be packing it for late July.

I am just trying to pack the essentials – things I can’t live without all the week. 🩳 The thing is I will have access to stores, so I’m not worried about grocery stores, 🛒 and while I don’t want to buy an extra bottle of sunscreen, 🧴 something like that if it gets forgotten or used up can be purchased. I am not going to get groceries before I leave, though I might stop at Oneonta Walmart both for a pee break and a few supplies. Friday I’ll be down in Watkins Glen most likely to swim and maybe kayak. Looks like a nice day. Saturday is good too but rain Sunday. Cool and rainy on Sunday. Then thunderstorms likely as often is case most of the week. But not a wash out most likely. Got the clothes packed, water containers filled and loaded, tent in the truck, propane and heater in the truck. Packing tools like a the cassette puller, extra spokes, spoke key, allen wrenches, electrical tape and crimp, rubber cement so I can fix as many things as possible as I go along.

Debating if I should bus it in or drive tomorrow. 🚍 Continued rain tomorrow, and I have a meeting downtown, but I thought about driving, as it would be convienent. The thing is parking downtown, even in the DACC lot is a pain, as I don’t have a spot and the SuperDuty is one big mother in the city that really guzzles gas. 🛻 I probably won’t, no need to burn more then I need. The bus is fine, hopefully I’ll catch the earlier local tomorrow. Or maybe if its’ really bad out, I’ll just spend my afternoon downtown and not had back to Enterprise, though I have likely a few more loose ends to patch up before leaving for vacation.