Shut the Back Door

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When life shuts a door…. open it again. It’s a door. That’s how they work.

Continuing this year’s home improvement spree, we are replacing our two back doors. We’ve lined up a contractor, who has already sent out their measurement team. Our next step will be to pick the new replacement doors, any options and then schedule the work. This should be accomplished early this week. It is such a joy dealing with contractors who are willing and able to do the work. It is a far cry from what we have had to do for the cabin, where we had to chase the contractors. No idea yet on how soon the new doors could be installed, but the process has been painless so far. These people did our windows so, I’m unconcerned with their quality.

When a door closes another door should open, but if it doesn’t then go in through the window. 

Attack of the Killer Robots

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Today, on 9/11 the New York Times was harping on the imminent threat of the coming robot revolution. On this National Day of Mourning already devoted to paranoia why not add some fresh fears to the pile? Apparently, the threat is so near that we should all just stop whatever we are doing, run in circles and yell Panic, Panic! Or I could just sell all my tech stocks. Apparently, a bunch of AIs that belong to one company decided all on their own to attack an AI belonging to another company. In Silicon Valley, where could they have learned such behavior? Maybe from some disgruntle tech bro. Anyway, don’t mind me, if I elect to walk, not run to the nearest exit.

In contravention to all these dire warnings, I bought a new computer. Another one. This will be my third new computer this year. I bought a refurbished laptop earlier this year, but it died at the beginning of the summer. Just after its puny unenhanced warranty had expired. I then bought a second replacement refurbished laptop, but this time with an extended warranty. This week, I bought a new not refurbished desktop, with an extended warranty. The need for all of this technology investment was necessitated by a long lack of any technology investment. Starting last fall with a new iPhone, I have now renewed all of my computers. I am now up to date.

From Up North to North of North

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In Michigan there is a certain one-upmanship involved with being up north. People in the northern lower peninsula (LP) look down upon the people of lower LP and people in the upper peninsula (UP) look down upon all the people of the LP. They like to call the LP Troll Land, because like in the fairy tale, they live under a bridge. In this case the Mackinac Bridge. This false sense of superiority is belied by the largest of the Great Lakes—Superior, which in the original French refers not to any moral superiority, but the position of that lake on a map relative of all of the other Great Lakes.

All of this discussion is preamble to an introduction of the new Netflix Canadian comedy series, North of North. This new series debuted last year on CBC, Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) and Netflix and has been renewed for a second season. Anna Lambe plays Siaja, a young Inuk woman in the small fictional Canadian Arctic community of Ice Cove, on Prince of Wales Island in Nunavut. North of North, while fictional, is heavily inspired by small Inuit communities in the Arctic. I have watched its first two episodes and enjoyed both. This sweet show does not forge new comedy frontiers; its familiar tropes are cast in a new light.