markjgsmith

Weird shoplifter bloke has been making more and more appearences. He just sits at the other end of the bench and tries to see when the nearby shop staff go into the back room so he can swipe stuff. At the same time to this, not unco-incidentally police have been turning up in other places that I go to. Yesterday one, who was enormous and a bit fat, sat directly on front of me next to a small young woman that had been sitting there for a while. He proceeded to continuously pat her on the back and side, just like how you would pat a dog. He then was basically necking with her interspersed with patting for most of lunch time.

Once again perhaps not uncoincidentally previous to this at the internet place there were used condom packets in the street in the gutter.

And once again previous to that, an old women dressed entirely in red was ostensibly doing early morning exercises in the exact spot where last week the gang stalkers had left a dead rat. Her exercise was very strange. She was facing the wall, both hands on it, then girating her torso backwards and forwards, so she was basically being the man in some bizare doggy style position.

Don’t try to tell me none of this stuff is linked. That’s fucking bullshit. All these events are totally linked. It's anger goading, it’s intimidation, and it’s a total time suck for me, and that’s equivalent to murder. Get your feets off my neck world.

Whenever shoplifter bloke shows up, I’ve started loudly saying 'go to bed little boy'. I have to deter him peacefully, because I’m going to end up being blamed for his shoplifting. Not to mention that people don’t stop to help when he’s loitering there, so he‘s literally starving me. He's now showing up early morning and all through the evening.

Rowdy scummy gang stalker kids on motorbikes are driving by shouting 'Lie!' loudly right after shoplifter bloke leaves now. These are the same type that a few weeks ago physicslly assaulted me. They have attacked me with rocks many times before. Once they threw a huge stone brick at me that hit me directly in the face. These events always have huge aftermaths that last for days.

Just another impossible situation. I’ll be the one who ends up being mutilated, and blamed for everything, then starved even more than they are already starving me.

I wish I had more positive things to write about, because it’s not doing much for my employability, but this is life for me at the minute. And since I'm a blogger, I write about life, so it would be disengenuous for me to pretend it wasn’t happening.

Everything is a catch-22 these days. #

What the world says: Commons for everyone!

What the world really means: No safe commons for you, and if you try not to use the commons, we'll punish you too! #

John Gruber on iPadOS [01:53:34]:

It’s like they’ve painted themselves into a corner and blindfolded themselves so they can’t see that they are painted in a corner. […]

There is no easy solution. […]

I feel like collectively Apple is just pretending it’s not a problem. […]

General rule of thumb, you should eliminate modes, cause modes just aren’t intuitive, and they aren’t how people think. But the iPad is all about modes.

From my blog post The Future of iPados vs Macos [30/05/2024]:

Would Vim style quick mode switching solve the MacOS - iPadOS integration connundrum?

John Gruber on The EU and DMA [02:19:16]:

I really can’t help but think though that there are a lot of DMA proponents who really think it’s just about busting up the App Store, when it’s way more far reaching than that, and really does open up Apple non-compliance fines for anything that they do that is vertically integrated within their own products and services. […]

I think henceforth, every future thing Apple does is going to come late and possibly limited to the EU. If Apple Watch were brand new, it would definitely be delayed, because it only works with iPhones. I think that’s illegal under the DMA, or it could be. They would need them to rule, and they don’t want to rule in advance, and Apple doesn’t want to tell them in advance. That’s not the Apple way of doing things.

"Hey we’re thinking about unveiling these new smart glasses next year. What do you guys think in the EU?" - They’re not going to do that.

Alistair Campbell and Rory Stewart on the french mind [30:06]:

Alistair: And she said, I'll translate as I go, she said "it's not the least of the paradoxes, that on the evening..."

Rory: I love the fact that when you translate french you have to go, "it is not the least of the paradoxes". If you were editing this into english prose, would you start with "it is not the least of the paradoxes"? [laughing]

Alistair: "Ce n’est pas le moindre des paradoxes"..."that on the eve of the most important european elections in history, the most european of french presidents, took the least european of decisions to shake up Europe."

Rory: Wait wait wait...before we go on, what a beautiful expression of the french mind. Not the least of paradoxes, the most european of presidents, on the eve of the european elections, took the least european of decisions...

Alistair: It’s brilliant, exactly exactly, exactly

I absolutely love this interaction. You really have to listen to it to get the full picture. The thing is, both Rory and Alistair speak very good french, as do I, and the unspoken bit, is that when you read the french press, it really is absolutely packed with this kind of unbelievably flowery language.

It’s such a wonderful insight into french culture. But it’s great because it’s two politics nerds and admirers of France stumbling upon something that is so very very french.

They are both taking the piss somewhat, but also being affectionate, at the same time. I can confirm it really is a very french turn of phrase.

And it probably says something about the UK and even Europe in general as well. Btw, the english press has it’s own quirks when it comes to turns of phrase.

Imagine all the shit we’ve had to go through that have resulted in these ridiculus yet beautiful ways of speaking. It boggles my mind. #