Today’s Tough Times Tuesday focuses on lithium fields, as an extension of last week’s reflections on lithium-ion batteries and tailings dams.

Next week, we’ll shift to a different slice of global politics—but understanding our new energy economy is extremely important to civic empowerment.

Are we prepared for what’s next in the global markets that support our current lifestyles?

#BetterWorldsTheory #GreenEnergy #Environment
https://mlclark.substack.com/p/lithium-fields-and-water-politics

I'm finishing a piece on lithium fields right now, but next week I really need to get back to writing on #Colombia. The cartel, guerrilla, and government politics are just so rich.

The government currently has a fundraiser to finish 4G connections in remote areas. CLAN DEL GOLFO donated to this fund, in part because it knew the suspicious donation would slow down government highway projects while every donation now needs fresh scrutiny.

🤦🏻 It's a genius form of sabotage!
https://m.elcolombiano.com/antioquia/estrategias-para-blindar-la-vaca-de-las-4g-de-los-ilegales-antioquia-NO24088522

😅 We'll see how today's fast goes, because I felt very good this morning and did an easy 3k run... only to realize after that I'd forgotten my predawn glass of water and pinch of salt. We shall see~!

[TO BE CLEAR: Health over this Ramadan experiment, but I am curious. After the first awful week, the body has totally acclimated to a daytime dry fast. I often forget to break it for hours after sundown. We are both *so* fragile and *so* resilient.]

Catching the full moon properly on my phone is never possible - but that just encourages me to enjoy the experience of watching it with the naked eye instead.

And who wants to capture the moon anyway?

(A few tech billionaires aside.)

A moon in the wild--
the gift in its rise
and its passing

I might talk about this more on the BookTube this week. I needed a topic smaller than reviewing a whole book, magazine, or multiple podcasts anyway. 👍🏻

#Essays #SFF #Writers

"But if we accept that SF is struggling as a literary genre because of a combination of the shift towards blockbusters-as-adaptation impacting the tie-in market, having caught up with the grim future predicted in lauded sci-fi of decades past, and the rise of new genres and subgenres drawing away the educated, persistent, high-volume readers who constitute SF’s core readership then there remains two final questions: can we save SF and should we?"

https://www.typebarmagazine.com/2024/03/24/nobody-wants-to-buy-the-future-why-science-fiction-literature-is-vanishing/

One good thing, which I'm sharing here because everyone who supports me ends up supporting my community, too:

A little while ago I helped two people deeply suffering: one ill and long food-deprived, one covered head to toe with grime, with a vicious infection at his ankles.

Saturday, I ran into the first - looking far healthier! Tonight I ran into the other: no more infection!

One doesn't always see the successes. But what a gift, when it happens.

Thanks for helping me make these possible. 💛

Random midday gratitude. 💛

The sheer *layers* of harm in this world, eh? From systemic and cultural incentives to hurt one another, right down to the personal.

Thanks for being the best rotten sods you can, in a world of so much sound and fury.

Two weeks since my father went radio silent after articulating fury and "disappointment" in me when I expressed how sad I was that we haven't had a phone call or videochat in six years (he always claims he's too busy).

But I *have* set up a chat with step-cousins and -uncle for this Friday, so... we lean in to the family that wants to show up, eh?

Off for more writing now.

Have a beautiful day, all.

Know that you are worthy of love & healthy, constructive, mutually affirming relationships. ❤️

#War

Psychological damage from war has many dimensions. This essay on the "uniform effect" of Israel-Gaza on local Israeli dating culture is one such example.

But I have to stress caution.

When I read such pieces, I'm reminded that if soldiers in WWII had access to Tinder, they'd have been doing the same thing.

There is *always* crude, cruel, and exploitative conduct among soldiers in any war.

War does deep damage to all participants. Healing comes later, if at all.
https://archive.ph/vEDwG

Just a wee meditation on estrangement to start off our week. Drawing from the beautiful TV series Scavengers Reign, I reflect on how the “alien” in science fiction of this type ultimately speaks to something much closer to home in our lives.

Do we know how to respond to a real world that often feels “alien” to us, too?

#BetterWorldsTheory #SFF
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/scavengers-reign-and-our-estranging

This report on the state of #crypto in Ontario is from November of last year, but I just came across it today. Some interesting tidbits in here, for any #finance followers.

I especially "yikes"-d at the 7% of people who held crypto to pay ransom to a hacker. We are certainly living in strange financial times!

https://www.osc.ca/sites/default/files/2023-12/inv-research_20231129_crypto-asset-survey-2023.pdf

This morning I watched a flock of eared doves feed from piles of feed laid out daily by a street vendor.

Even though there were three heaping piles of food set apart, one jerkwad in the flock would not let *anyone else* get close to any of them, while he was feeding from one.

He'd rather stop feeding and drive them away from other food than just enjoy his own take.

🙃 Even in our worst tendencies as humans, we still aren't exceptional, eh?

We're just better at being selfish at scale.

#Nature

...Although I also have 40 minutes of voice messages to get through. 🤦🏻 At double speed, methinks!

Ho ho! My "sociopath pod" has an episode this morning that seems perfect for improving my exercise today. 🙃 I look forward to being thoroughly annoyed by this one, which further claims that "human work, aided by AI, will remove the premium captured by extremely high-paid, experienced professionals (like doctors or top lawyers) as their capabilities become more diffuse".

That is *not* where the "premium" lies.

This episode is going to be very, very wrong.

:) But great fuel for the morning run!

Hey, we're doing OK here, gang.

This weekend we saw frayed nerves, and a whole lot of sh--aving cream on the feed.

There's plenty in the news to agitate us, too. So much pain and ignorance.

The world has deeply flawed leadership, and many fields are rife with uncertainty.

It's really not fair to ourselves and others to expect impeccable conduct in the face of it.

We *will* screw up. We all have our breaking points, and we do bite sometimes.

And we will surmount it.
We already have, and do.

Okay. I'm just about finished catching up on email correspondence and today's volunteer gig responsibilities.

That should give me a bit of time to shape tomorrow's newsletter and maybe even sneak in another hour of fiction-writing, before bed to wake in time for a pre-dawn walk, when I'll listen to all the voice messages still in queue.

Heinlein comes to mind right about now. 🙃

Have you seen this delightful form letter for fielding correspondence in the Great Beforetimes?

#WritingCommunity

On a different note of amusement.

An acquaintance is super excited that I'm posting BookTubes again, because he feels this is an area where he can provide unsolicited feedback re: how I stage myself, mostly based on his love for a range of YT pundits.

I'm long past getting insulted by unsolicited advice, but it is amusing to hear his suggestions that I focus on performance gimmicks and his hints at makeup (absolutely not), when I'm plainly working on developing consistently thoughtful content.

Hot tip for dealing with tankies:

If you're hearing Putinist trash, maybe conspiracies about the Moscow attack serving US interests too well not to be a secret Western op...

🙃 Don't get mad.

They want you to, but don't.

Just laugh at them for falling for Western psy-ops. Double down on how this is how the West keeps you hooked on its so-called supremacy: by tricking you into thinking no global action happens outside its purview.

Out-hate the West-hater!

It'll confuse the heck out them. 🙂