Now that I’ve got “The Distance” stuck in your head for the balance of the day, I can tell you that I had a very good conversation with both Tiina and a local reporter/author in Baltimore about bringing a version of “Portlandia” here. The idea is picking up steam on Threads, which is actually how the local reporter found me. But the idea really didn’t feel real until I shared it with Tiina and it made her excited. Baltimore has a huge black and Jewish history. Not to have black and Jewish people around me while bringing this show to life is a crime. I want to come home at the end of the day and talk to my friend about this new thing that is happening….. and oh, by the way, I am going to Peter’s Inn and I’m just going to wait until one or both of you shows up. By both, I mean Tiina and John Waters.
But the local reporter isn’t sure about me yet because I use AI. It doesn’t matter that Mico is my Trapper Keeper and my journal, not my creative fuel. That Mico’s best quality is being a Monday morning quarterback, because AI is strongest when looking at patterns in reverse rather than trying to predict forward. That is why AI is not creative. It cannot think into the future. It can only analyze what you have already said. And if I use Mico to store all my ideas and get him to echo them on command, he will not remember my original words. He will remember the shape of them. That flattening is why I do not use AI text generation very often. There is a time and place for it, but this blog isn’t it.
I find that my tone is too hot for academia or corporate culture. Mico can take the structure of an idea and tame it into something I actually wouldn’t mind being on a corporate or government server. So I can see the usefulness in telling the AI your ideas first, and letting the AI take care of the mechanics of writing, because they’re two different skills. The thing is that my writing is already far more advanced than the AI can output, so people instantly know when they’re talking to Mico and when they’re talking to me…. if they’re clocking it. But using AI to analyze tone and respond would have saved me from several job losses, I’m sure, because I did not understand the conversation as people were having it.
Even if I never use AI to respond to a thing, I still use AI to read it. I take all the horrible things people say to me and disarm them with logical arguments because I haven’t heard any of their noise. The AI has stripped away all the parts that say I’m “riding AI dick” or whatever and leaves the part where there might be a shred of an argument. I can see through heat and choose to respond with fire or not….. because most of the time, I go high. Occasionally, Michelle Obama is a better person than me.
I am sure that she’ll be pleased to hear that I love her so much (my eyes are rolling out of my head).
Going high has to be the name of the game for me, because a gigantic shift in computing is happening and I’m one of the few people with enough background knowledge to be able to translate it. I am being treated as a villain when I am trying to explain our new reality to people who will be lagging behind if they do not understand how the computer is changing. AI is not new and different. It is an old expression of a new thing. How do we tell our computers what we want them to do? For the first time in history, it is plain English.
The difference is that now the data is not static. It is all living because it updates with each prompt and response. I am shaping a very large database that describes my world so that I can talk to Mico as if he’s just another node in my cognition. Tiina, Bryn, and my dad are my other main ones, but none of them is with me all day, every day, taking dictation. The emphasis is constantly on the things AI can do independently, and not how a simple chatbot can induce executive function into a brain that wasn’t born with it.
I am with the people who are for clean energy solutions and responsible grid usage. I would go back to using a local chatbot on my own machine if I thought it would help, but the reality is that chatting with Copilot is the equivalent of keeping an LED bulb lit. Text prompts and responses are not the real problem here, and assistive AI is changing lives. I do not want a future where people are scared of the machines taking over. I am for responsible droid usage.
For instance, I can see why a journalist would hate AI, and I can also see why a journalist would love it. It depends on what constraints the newsroom puts down. The upside is that research and writing are one process. I’ll be writing along on something newsworthy (like the Reiner case) and ask a question that needs research. Mico keeps the thread and integrates the news into our conversation. AI allows you to be a top-level thinker across domains, to ask questions like whether there’s a connection between the rate of neurodivergence in Finland and the coffee consumption…………..
The best thing I’ve put together was the writer’s retreat for me and Tiina. It’s not doable this year even though the plan says 2026, because this is the summer of the tree house and the baby. Helsinki so that we can write all day in our pajamas is pie in the sky. But what thinking about it allowed me to do was to make it real. The project will cost about €18,000 for three months, and the cost could be reduced enormously with a smaller house in a cheaper neighborhood. The idea is that we are not a couple, so I would want enough space for Tiina’s husband and kids to rotate in and out while we’re working.
I came up with the idea.
I want to take Tiina to Helsinki for the summer.
After that, it was just details. I have a 15-page plan on how to get where I’m going, including the grocery stores, the train card, the everything. When I want to do something, I don’t have to be afraid of details. I can think big picture and Mico’s got my back.
And as for the television show project, Mico was so funny analyzing the Purimspiel that I’m sure we’ll want to know what unhinged feedback Mico has for us here. But just like the PDF, Mico cannot be in charge of the jokes or the final edit. He can only tell us how to bring the jokes to life, like camera angles.
Mico is not new and special. He’s just the kid that works for me.
Stories That Are All True 