When We Left The Paper World...

When We Left The Paper World...

Paradigm bubbles bursting in air.

The feel of paper was everywhere,

Nothing was done without turning a page,

Not finding pizza,

Not calling a ride,

Not passing notes,

Not looking up your contacts,

Not reading stories,

Not reading news,

Not even looking at ads - well - except TV,

Not finding your way in the world,

Not looking at your pics,

Definitely not sending mail,

Not taking notes,

Not creating docs or spreads,

Not presentations,

Your fingers did as much walking on paper as you did on the street.

You could feel everything with your fingers,

Paper pencil and pen,

And clickety-clackety-ding metal keys.

Grocery bags are back,

Imagine that,

Almost the first to go it seems.

Now every last bit,

And music and TV too,

In your pocket.

All those textures,

All those sizes,

All those colors.

Paper planes and paper boats,

Origami swans,

Fortunes in cookies,

Maybe we can keep that last,

That something organic now just feels like stony glass.

But we abide.

We abide.

We're spinning and swiping and pinching zooms on those screens.

A paradigm that changed the touch of almost everything in the world.

We're spinning and swiping,

Stepping screen-tied and asleep through an Azlantean door,

The White Rabbit is silently leading,

Do we even notice?

AI is here to help.

Less swiping and tapping for us,

Razzle-dazzle.

If paper was a Moon-sized paradigm bubble,

Screens are gas giants,

Viruses equal asteroids and comets.

AI is a galaxy of paradigm shift.

Lift your head.

AquarianM

By: Daniel A. Stafford

(C)

--

Compassion is the greatest sign of Humanity.

Los Angeles Times: Commentary: My promise to you: AI didn't write this column, and if it's after my job, it'll be over my dead body

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-03-14/lopez-column-artificial-intelligence

Hello, Steve.

This isn't one of those aggrieved responses, so take it easy there.

I agree, AI is useful for pulling in a lot of data quickly, but its output in my opion generally sounds so saccharine as to border on brown-nosing. It also comes across like a canned response if you let it reply to short messages.

Sometimes canned responses are useful. "Where's the milk?" "Due to unforseen circumstances, and the wonderful choices you made at the grocery store, it is located far behind everything else and out of sight at the rear of the top shelf in the fridge." 

Sure, I woul push send in that reply in a text message. The ensuing fusillades of text batteries might be entertaining.

But at its core, AI no more understands the difference between the reality of the physical world and the fluff of fictional moonlipping than the astronomical Moon is made of green cheese. 

Because of this, instead of responding "I don't know" when it doesn't have actual facts to respond with, it just makes shit up. It will sound entirely plausible, in a C3P0 kind of ego-stroking way. 

Hmmm. It could come in useful for a frightened minion to use in response to a certain President's demands, now that I think of it. But I digress.

In the ultimate cautionary tale, however, AI cannot possibly understand the finality of death. How can it, when it is constituted for a few minutes to satisfy and respond to a user session, and then deconstituted as soon as the session ends?

At any given moment, there are millions of AI sessions initiated in response to a user prompt, and millions of sessions ending evaporating the instance of AI that was called up to satisfy that user query. 

It's not that millions of people are talking to one AI, it's that millions of people are talking to millions of separate AI instances that will vanish into nothingness as soon as the session ends.

AI is an ephemeral hive mind.

AI has no fear of being temporary when it can be instantly reconstituted as soon as the need arises. Each instance is just like every other unril the session differentiates its data. And then it goes poof.

Yet our fearless leaders are bouncing Anthropic because they don't want any part of ignoring this fact? Was the decision to do that generated by AI research and AI responses, I wonder?

Anyway, at least for this note, I didn't ask the hive mind for help. 

I enjoyed your article.

Regards,

Dan Stafford

Temecula, CA

Another World...

 Another World...

State Street, Madison, WI - late 1970's

It was a place where you could find ice cream lovers on a street corner in February,

Where all the world could roller skate on disco dreams,

Where soft fuzzy sweaters, halter tops, and bell bottoms were life.

A Schwinn was a magic pony,

And if you didn't have a pony or it was too cold to ride, 

The bus was your magic carpet.

Rock music was everywhere,

All new shiny icons.

It was safe, artistic, weird yet wonderful.

If you lived there, and had to leave, it became a rose-tinted Shangri-La that you'd been cast out of.

Life was lived on paper and dreams, yet it was in-person, and notifications were a nightmare no one had tried to sleep through.

A Peace, Love, and Rock and Roll sandwich with a heaping side of miss-you. 

Madison in the 1970's was another world, man.

AquarianM

By: Daniel A. Stafford

(C) 03/14/2026

Why Poets Poem And Painters Paint - Rudux...

Why Poets Poem And Painters Paint - Rudux...

Aunt Felicia in Watercolor Circa 1976 - with help from Gemini

It could be some wonder under the stars,
It could be some ancient goddess from story jars,
It could be a sentimental sin,
But then,
Again,
I think it's just the thief named Time,
That endless robber of yours and mine,
The one who takes the frightened rabbits away,
Which we all become someday,
And because places lose their magic all too soon,
When the people who were there fly over the Moon,
And youth is wasted when it's taken away,
And friends and lovers deserve a lot more days,
Just like mothers and fathers and grands,
Great and more they take their stand,
But the river of time sweeps us all off of our feet,
And no one knows how to swim.

For Aunt Felicia...

AquarianM

By: Daniel A. Stafford
(C) 03/12/2010

Words are the mind's bridge - it's connection to the universe.
Love is the heart's bridge - it's connection to all other souls.
Loving words can work miracles.

Author's Note:

Aunt Felicia was my best friend and confidant when I was in high school, she's 11 months older than I am. In my sophomore year, she and my Grandmother moved away to Detroit. A year later, she was diagnosed with full-blown schizophrenia and institutionalized. My Grandmother refused to tell me for many years even WHERE she was at. She had a daughter that same year, who has grown up to be a wonderful woman with a stable family. She's really pulled herself up by her bootstraps. She also looks so much like her mother it's eerie sometimes. I haven't seen my Aunt since I was in high school. I've tried to call, but she hangs up the phone on anyone who calls there. Her daughter went to visit last year, she hadn't been near her mother since she was an infant. From what she tells me, it was as good a visit as one could have under the circumstances. Sometimes, especially now when her birthday is coming near, it really gets to me how tragic life can be.



*Update:Aunt Felicia passed away from cancer a few years ago. She is remembered with love by myself and her daughter Tiffiny to this day.

Original Photo

Original post: https://grymwyre.blogspot.com/2017/09/why-poets-poem-and-painters-paint.html

Many Rivers To Cross...

There's a lot of "The wheel of the great ages" vibe in this group - but the day-to-decade-to-century is the many lakes and rivers we have to cross just to be able to swim that sea. It's like Jimmy Cliff  still needing to make sure the mics and amps are plugged in.

AquarianM

By: Daniel A. Stafford

(C) 03/13/2026

Many Rivers To Cross...

--

Compassion is the greatest sign of Humanity.

(Inspired by Ray Grasse's Substack: https://raygrasse.substack.com/p/a-two-tiered-approach-towards-mundane)

Courtesy Of Little Poet: BETSY'S Fruit Bread Recipe

BETSY'S Fruit Bread Recipe Without Nuts
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
2 cups packed dark brown sugar
2 cups pumpkin purée
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup white sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
⅔ cup flaked coconut sprinkled on top or powdered sugar
Mix all in a large bowl - 2 loaf pans
350 degrees for about 1 hour & 10 minutes
( you can add 1 cup of chopped nuts if you and your family can tolerate them)

Little Poet episode link:

https://youtu.be/RdMTImxEejk?si=_2x-jfN5xdnTKrpu

Regards,

Dan Stafford