IU vs. Ohio St.

Yesterday's dramatic comeback win vs. Nebraska moved the IU women's basketball team into Round Two of the Big Ten Women's Basketball Tournament. And their assigned Round Two Game has them playing Ohio State this afternoon. The exact time of this game has yet to be determined. One source tells me 2:30 PM CST, another source is saying 3:00 PM Eastern Time. I'll try tuning into B97 – The Home for IU Women's Basketball plenty early, maybe 01:30 PM CST or so, hoping to catch the game. Go Hoosiers!

And the adventure continues.

This is a blog with a reaaaally long title!

I hope to share interesting thoughts about things and stuff.

Seed you all out there!

• Cooper

Bruce is my best friend. Anyone who knows us knows that, it’s almost impossible to think of one without the other. We lived together for five years and spent most of our time side by side. His friends became my friends, and mine became his. My family considers him my brother, and his family treats me like one of their own. Back to my twenties, when I was proudly tech averse and constantly letting my phone die somewhere at home, it wasn’t unusual for people to call him just to reach me. And he never once complained. If anything, he’d tell me about it laughing.

I am not sure if there is something about me he doesn’t know. Honestly, sometimes I’m convinced he knows me better than I know myself, and at this point, I’m pretty sure that’s just a scientific fact. I used to lose everything. Everywhere. Constantly. I am, without question, the most distracted person I’ve ever met, and I turned it into a lifestyle. Every day was a treasure hunt. I’d walk into the living room like: “Bru, have you seen my keys?”, “Have you seen my sunglasses?” “Uni card? Phone? And Bruce, instead of getting annoyed, which would’ve been fair, would just smile, reverse engineer my entire thought process from the past 24 hours. Then, with absolute confidence, he’d walk straight to the most absurd, illogical corner of the apartment and grab the missing item like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “What would be of you without me, Paula”. And he's absolutely right. It's really hard to think of my life without him.

But I take the credit of recognizing him very early as my best friend. It was just a regular day. I was working as a copywriter in our student run agency, minding my own business in front of my computer, when he, the new guy who had just joined us, walked into the room. He started chatting with some girls he already knew, saying that he’d forgotten to renew a couple of library books, and now the library was closed, meaning he’d have to pay the late fee. That’s when I swivel around in my chair and go, “You know you can do that online, right? Come here, I’ll show you.” That was it. I invited him to have a cigarette, we bonded over books we both liked, and movies. We found out our birthdays were only one day apart, and we were living very close to each other. He would laugh at all my jokes, I liked his laugher. All of that happening in a 20m ciggie break. I was sold. But Bruce was slightly shy, and he definitely didn’t make things easy for me. Every time I’d try to warm up to him or suggest we do something together, he’d suddenly have something else to do: laundry, groceries, reorganizing his socks alphabetically, who knows. It got to a point where I genuinely wondered if he secretly hated me.

One day, when I got home, the doorman told me someone had left something for me. It was a half kilo pack of my favorite chocolate granola, wrapped with the cutest little post it note from him. He remembered. He actually remembered that I had mentioned my favorite granola. Now I was comfortable enough to thank him and tell him for some months, I thought he did not like me, and he burst out laughing that big, contagious laugh and said he had actually just been awkwardly intimidated. By me. It was my time to laugh. Whether it was the way I tied my hair in a messy bunny, or the random questions I would throw at him like a philosophical ninja, he wasn’t sure. But eventually, I guess he concluded he liked me too and we would be best friends.

Bruce invited me over Easter to visit his parents living 300km away from São Paulo. Of course I was in. His family was absolutely adorable. His dad was hilarious, his mom was the sweetest person alive, and the two of us would sneak outside to smoke ciggies together. I remember sitting in their living room reading a Millôr Fernandes book, joking about life as if I’d been part of the household forever. At one point, Bruce nudged me and whispered that I was the only girl he had ever brought home. Small detail: he hadn’t come out to his parents yet. But I knew. I had known from the start. Their hopeful little spark “maybe he finally got a girlfriend!” died instantly the moment Bruce and I started chatting openly about a guy I liked. You could almost see the disappointment float out of their souls like a cartoon ghost. Later, we laughed about it while wandering through the city to buy some beer. Any lingering hope that I was a potential daughter in law disappeared, and they quickly understood the truth: I wasn’t the girlfriend. I was the best friend. And they adopted me just like that.

So we kept choosing each other. He moved from his aunt's house to live with me and now we were flatmates. Five years, not a single discussion. Five years of our lives, lived with pure joy. We’d text each other after work and meet at the same corner, like it was our unofficial checkpoint. From there, we’d wander down Avenida Paulista next to where we lived, grab a coffee, spontaneously slipping into a movie theater, or just watching the city breathe as the sun slowly set behind the buildings. We would get home and read to each other, or just talk our best talks. Shopping groceries at 1AM, going to gym early in the morning. Friends would show up, and friends of friends, and eventually there were people around I did not even know, but someone was playing the guitar, and we were singing to it. The twenties. We were happy, and we knew it. Through the hard moments, he was my biggest cheerleader, and I like to think I did the same. He says so. We would do things for each other out of pure love. I still remember the pile of clothes perfectly folded over my bed, as an image of how spontaneous and caring that friendship was.

Last year Bruce visited me in Vienna and we got to travel together to India, a long plan we had from all the years I told him about my first trip. Thirteen years later, we're still very much part of each other's lives, although we live miles away. And we don't always talk, because life is happening, for us both, and that's great. But when things get weird and we lose a bit of sense of purpose, it's just great to have someone who sees you, who knows you deeply and is willing to remind you of who you are. The most honest connection I ever had in my life is my best friend. I told him that recently and he said he feels so lucky that we have each other, which is funny, because I always feel like I am the lucky one. And I am so thankful he forgot to renew his books at the library that day.

/mar26

Jeg har bodd på Søndre Nordstrand i 7 år nå. Jeg jobber i IT, og kunne i teorien ha bodd hvor som helst, men familien min bor fremdeles på Lambertseter, og jeg trives her. Det er rolig og fredelig.

For 1 år siden kjøpte jeg meg en sparkesykkel. Det har blitt min måte å komme meg rundt på, det funker veldig bra. Ofte ruller jeg bare rundt med den for å se nye steder i området. Det mer mer miljøvennlig enn bil, men også mer praktisk og billigere. Enklere. Mindre. Stillere.

Jeg har begynt å ta førerkort, men ikke kommet helt i mål ennå. Jeg stresser ikke med det. Det er ingen hast.

I’m someone who thinks best when I should be asleep. By day, I function — responsibly, convincingly — but by 3 a.m., the real curriculum begins. I overanalyze conversations from 2017, question the nature of time, and draft philosophies I’ll pretend were intentional.

This blog is not a guide, nor a thesis I’m prepared to defend. It’s a record of spirals, soft revelations, and the occasional almost-brilliant thought that arrives between exhaustion and clarity. I read too much into everything. I light candles for dramatic effect. I take metaphysics personally.

If you’ve ever mistaken insomnia for enlightenment, you’re in the right place.

– Epikurus.

¿Quién es ese que va por ahí y dice que soy yo, mientras sueña con las playas desiertas, remotas?

¿Ese que se engaña y dice que ni siquiera roza el sufrimiento?

¿Quién, aquí, por la razón atravesado y los prosaicos hechos?

¿Y el que dice tan quedo que hay algo profundo, aquí adentro?

THE SCOOTER INCIDENT

I'd say that most of the time, I’ve got the temperament of a monk: pretty calm, progressive, possibly glowing. And that’s great, because it means I can trust my own judgment: If I’m angry, congratulations to whoever pushed me through five layers of the “normal people don’t go past this” boundary.

But behold, because there is only one thing stronger than my patience: my sense of justice. The smallest unfairness and I instantly morph into an avenger, ready to challenge any authority figure in front of me. By the way, authority figures and I? Not the best match. In my head, their authority only exists because as civil citizens, we provide them with it, and their whole job is basically to serve us. So whenever authority gets used in a way that feels even slightly wrong, I struggle a lot to respect it. To the point that I sometimes fear my own mouth and avoid interacting with them entirely, because I will end up telling some truths they did not ask for. Given this huge intro, the story now:

It’s 1:40 AM and I wake up with that strange feeling that something is off. Whenever my intuition kicks in, I listen, cause I love to be wrong, but normally, unfortunately I am not. So now I am sitting on my bed, I switch on the tiny salt lamp so I don’t bother my dog, who’s sleeping in her bed next to me, and I wander through the flat under that soft orange glow. I pretend I’m just getting more water from the kitchen, but really I'm checking every room along the way, just because situation says paranoid but experience says: something is happening. Water in hand, I crawl back into bed and try to sleep again. Twenty minutes later, I’m ripped out of whatever half dream I managed to fall into by the alarm of my scooter, the one I left ages ago right by the door, suddenly ringing. So I ran to my door to check through the peephole and I see the light from the hallway on, and my scooter is not in front of my door anymore. I can also hear the sound of the lift coming, to which I run to the balcony, where I can see it stopped on the floor below. Obviously I am scared to open the door. Because a thief is someone in stress peak mode and one second away of potentially becoming violent. So I call the police, explain the entire story and they said they are sending someone to check, which I am thankful for, as “I'm scared and I don't know if they are still around”

Twenty minutes later, police calls me again. A different officer comes on the line and hits me with the classic: “So… what’s happening?” I roll my eyes so hard happy by the fact he can’t see my face, and I repeat the entire story from the beginning. By the end, I ask, “Are you already close to my building?” And he goes, super uncomfortable: “We had another occurrence, but everything is fine, we were there.” Now I start laughing in a sassy way, I won't deny. It's the best I could do when the avengers mode is warming up, and ask back: “You were here? Here in my building? You were here in my building and you did not call me?”. Because I knew they weren’t. If they had checked the floors through the open altbau staircase, I would’ve heard it. If they’d taken the lift, I definitely would’ve heard it. And no police officer came anywhere near my floor. It finally hits him that I’m not buying it, and he gets all shaky and starts interrupting me with an increasingly angry: “Everything is fine, ja? EVERYTHING is fine.” At this point, I’m done. My anger has officially outgrown my fear. I laugh once more and hang up, march to the kitchen, grab a knife like I’m about to audition for a horror movie, open the door, and there it is. My scooter, abandoned in the middle of the staircase. Too heavy to drag down five floors while the alarm rings, so whoever tried to steal it had to abort the mission. Now I'm going down the stairs in this ridiculous action scene of knife in my hands, sound and movement hyper aware, until I grab my scooter, lift it for some ten steps, and bring it back home. Door locked. Partially relieved. Dignity, well, questionable.

What really pisses me off is the dishonesty. Telling me they were here and that “everything is fine” gives me a fake sense of security that actually puts me at risk. They assume I need comforting when I say I am scared, but what I truly need is factual information: Is the building clear or not? Because truly, nobody knows what could’ve happened. I fully understand they might have twenty thousand emergencies happening at the same time. I genuinely would have respected something honest like: “Look, we can’t come right now because of another incident. Watch over yourself: stay inside, double‑lock your door and tomorrow morning we can follow up and file an incident report.” Totally fine. Completely understandable. There's just so much they can do. I get it.

But instead, they choose to infantilize and dismiss my fear, treating it as some sort of nonsense and lying to me simply to get rid of the problem. And that, exactly that, is upsetting, because when I pick up the phone and call for help, I’m trusting them to give me clear, honest information, I am providing them data, I am doing my part. And all I expect back is receiving clear information in return, even if that's all they can do to keep me safe.

/mar26

1 March 2026

Found a £5 National Lottery “£500 Loaded” scratchcard on the ground near Wood Green station (not a winner; apparently the odds are around 1 in 1,400 to win the full £500, meaning you'd have to spend over £7k on scratchcards for a statistical guarantee). Those things are like mini paintings, the topmost layer clawed away to reveal the information hidden underneath. Which is why I picked it up—it's a potent feeling to find and hold such a clear recording of a stranger's touch in your hands. The rhythm of the diagonal scratch marks (this person was probably right-handed) held the urgent speed of them. Spooked me a little, honestly. The palpable charge of hope turning to disappointment. And yet there was something undeniably alive about it. It had been addressed with someone's undivided attention at one point. Going to see if I can make a drawing with one.

少年が十九歳でいられる最後の夕方は、地面が湿っていた。 梅雨の合間の曇り空で、駅前のアスファルトは乾ききらず、歩くたびに靴底がわずかに吸い付く。 「お前、雨男だな」と友人に言われたことを思い出すが、梅雨なんだから当たり前だろうと心の中でつっこむ。そう思いながらも、明日から成人だというのに、俺は相変わらず他人に意見を言えないままだった。 最後の10代だから、せめて今日くらいは一人で、少しでもこの日を長く過ごそうと思い、いつもと違う道を歩いてみる。

バイトの帰り、俺はいつもの道を外れた。 塩ラーメンを食べるために、あえて少し遠回りする。 バイト先の便座の保温が壊れていたのを思い出す。まあそろそろ辞めるしな、と思いながら、腹が減ってきた。アーモンドをリュックに常備するようになってから無駄な菓子を買わなくなり、こういう寄り道がささやかな贅沢になった。

歩きながら、ふと左手が髪を引っ張った。 「あ、伸びたな」 脳より先に左手が気づくのが面白くて、少年は小さく笑った。

ラーメン屋に入る前、イトーヨーカドーに寄った。特に買う予定はない。 各フロアに置かれた椅子が目に入る。あれは自分の休憩場所だ。ヨーカドーはフロアに椅子が多いのが好きだ。今日も長めに座ってみるかと思いつつ、スマホの時計を見ると、いつもどおり10分ほどしか経っていない。

信号待ちの間、少年は過去の自分の文章をスマホで読み返した。 「目的も決めずに車を走らせて、その場でお金を稼ぐやつをやってみたい」 そんな文章が残っていて、思わず苦笑する。 そういうのもやってみたいよなあと、ずっとうっすら思っているのに、そんなことをやる元気はいつだってない。

ラーメン屋に着く前、ジムの前を通りかかった。ガラス越しに見えるトレーナーたちの笑顔は、いつも妙に明るい。ストレッチを教えている彼らの笑顔に反射して、俺がいつだって無表情なのが分かる。 その瞬間、後輩が先輩に向かって「先輩って意外とリテラシーありますよね」と言っていたのを思い出す。次の瞬間、後輩は突き飛ばされていたが、そのあと先輩に引っ張り上げられて、なんだかんだで愛されていた。 そんななつっこいコミュニケーションを、俺はまだしたことがないし、これからもできないだろう。

塩ラーメンを食べ終えた帰り道、近所のコンビニに寄った。 前のおじいさんがQR決済をしようとスマホを差し出し、スキャナにググゥ～と押し付けている。 おじいさんって機械を信用してなさすぎて、やたら押し付けるよなと思いつつ、後ろで見守った。こういう場面でも、俺は事象を確認しているだけで、物語にはいつも参加できていない。

家に帰る途中、ふと東京で食べたビリヤニの味を思い出した。 家の近くではなく、わざわざ東京まで一人で食べに行ったあの日。 ビリヤニはもちろん美味しかったが、「なんか起きろ」とうっすらいつも思っていて、何も起きないから、いつも寂しい。そもそも、なにか起きたことなんて一度もないのに。

家の玄関の鍵を開ける前、少年は空を見上げた。 明日、自分は二十歳になる。 ただ数字が変わるだけなのに、胸の奥がざわつく。

十九歳の最後の夜は、静かに湿っていた。 その湿り気の中で、少年は思った。 明日は今日の自分より、もう少しうまく歩けますように。

そして鍵を回した。 ドアを開けても、自分の家の玄関が、ただそこにあるだけだった。

5.3.26:0730

HRV: 60 Body Battery: 78

Last night I was in bed and lights out at exactly 2214, up at 0645. Woke twice in the night for the bathroom. Not having any alcohol or sugar from today so I can improve the quality of my sleep. Everything is all about the sleep now. I have years of deprivation to catch up on.

The next four days my body will be ridding itself of the leftover products from breaking down alcohol, and after that I can start healing.

Triple-fisting three Claude Code instances is my limit — I can't practically monitor the output of one more without ignoring another; this must be the feeling of being in a polycule, except with none of the fun parts. And yet the rain keeps pouring.

I want to record an important principle I follow when writing on this blog. I do not use AI to write significant portions of text for me, and I have no intention of ever doing so. The process of writing is so helpful that I can't give it up.

There was an article where GPT-4 attempted to write three posts in my voice, but it was clearly explained as such. I also occasionally use AI to help with my grammar or other phrasing, but in those cases, I never lift more than a few words from the response. I consult with AI about wording like that about as often as I consult a thesaurus.

AI slop doesn't worry me as much as it worries some others. I expect AI-generated content will improve dramatically over time and will become indistinguishable from content produced by the human mind. We may already be there, for all intents and purposes. As far as I'm concerned, that's not the point. Again, the process of writing benefits me, and I'm not willing to forego that benefit.

There is an upcoming post which uses an image generated by ChatGPT. That post credits ChatGPT as the creator, and I plan to always credit AI for images it creates.

#Life #Tech

What if things went wrong because we assumed they would, based on our past pains and disappointments?

What if we always have the power to rewrite our story?

And what if everything works out?

It will.

This review originally appeared at Grimdark Magazine on February 12, 2026.

Conan the Barbarian #26

By Jim Zub (Writer) and Fernando Dagnino (Artist) – Titan Comics – October 8, 2025

Review by Robin Marx

In Conan the Barbarian #26 by Jib Zub (W) and Fernando Dagnino (A), the once-mighty nation of Aquilonia is declining under the harsh misrule of “mad king” Numedides. With the monarch largely withdrawn from daily affairs, vassals in outlying holdings have become uneasy, especially in the southern province of Poitain. Emboldened by the brewing strife across the border, the neighboring realm of Zingara launches an offensive into Poitain while the province’s count is away petitioning King Numedides. When news of the invasion reaches Numedides, rather than dispatch the full military might of Aquilonia, he instead elects to send a single expendable mercenary company: the Westermarck Wolves. Already a seasoned adventurer by this point, Conan the Cimmerian follows his sellsword brethren into the fray. When the leader of the Westermarck Wolves falls in battle, Conan instinctively assumes command, turning what could have been a disastrous rout into a more ordered retreat. Outnumbered and with no reinforcements from the royal army forthcoming, Conan must join forces with Poitain’s beleaguered Count Trocero to expel the invaders.

Conan the Barbarian #26 covers a massive amount of ground in a single issue. While battle scenes take up much of the page count, Jim Zub manages to incorporate some nice character work and set up the chess board for events to come. While Conan has either been solo or in a subordinate role for much of the Titan Comics Conan the Barbarian run (e.g., serving as Bêlit’s second-in-command, or with the Aesir reavers in the frozen north), here we see Conan smoothly and naturally assume the top leadership role during combat and have that battlefield promotion immediately made permanent by his comrades. Conan also wastes no time distinguishing himself in other ways; where chivalrous Count Trocero hesitates to stoop to “dishonorable” measures even despite the massive imbalance between the Aquilonian and Zingaran forces, Conan has no such compunction against “uncouth and unorthodox” (dare I say barbaric?) tactics and executes his plan with ruthless efficiency. Readers of the original Robert E. Howard stories or the Marvel and Dark Horse comic adaptations are accustomed to seeing the Cimmerian commanding various mercenary companies, ship crews, and bandit mobs, but between the King Conan story last issue (Conan the Barbarian #25) and his new generalship in this issue, Conan the Leader is becoming a more prominent element in the main Titan Comics Conan the Barbarian title.

While the invading Zingaran army serves as the primary enemy for this particular issue, Zub heavily foreshadows conflict between Conan and King Numedides. Conan is presented as a leader who puts himself at the forefront of every skirmish, whereas Numedides is an aloof tyrant unconcerned for the plight of his subjects. Longtime fans know where this is headed. What realm does the future King Conan rule? Aquilonia. The ruler immediately prior to Conan? King Numedides. While Conan’s ascension to the throne is only covered by Howard in passing—first in Conan’s debut story “The Phoenix on the Sword” (1932), then later in “The Scarlet Citadel” (1933) and The Hour of the Dragon (serialized 1935-1936)—it appears Zub is setting us up for a much closer look at the forging of King Conan. Pastiche novelists L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter offered their own take on the Cimmerian’s rise to power in Conan the Liberator (1979), but de Camp and Carter’s additions to the Conan canon are viewed less enthusiastically now than in decades past, so I suspect Zub will ignore Conan the Liberator (and its unpopular satyrs).

Artist Fernando Dagnino’s return so soon is a surprise, seeing as how his last issue was Conan the Barbarian #24. Given how artistic duties have been rotated in the Titan series thus far I would have expected either Roberto De La Torre or Doug Braithwaite to handle the new arc, but since I rate Dagnino highly his return is a welcome one. Facial expressions remain Dagnino’s strong suit, but his montage-like battle depictions also stand out. The breakneck pacing of this issue leaves little space to cover multiple combats, but Dagnino manages to communicate both the desperation of the fights and Conan’s gory heroics. The storytelling economy on display is impressive. Also be sure to note the banner above King Numedides’ head on the final page for a fun visual hint.

Conan the Barbarian #26 is packed, from start to finish. While its breathlessness means some of the supporting characters’ deaths do not quite have the emotional impact they would in a less compressed story, the stage has been set for exciting and turbulent times ahead.

#ReviewArchive #ComicReview #Fantasy #SwordAndSorcery #JimZub #FernandoDagnino #TitanComics #ConanTheBarbarian #GrimdarkMagazine #GdM