mashedfries

[mashedfries]

friends, if I can give you one piece of advice for those of you who are new to work, or are about to enter the workforce, especially if you have any sort of office job:

Do not work on your days off.

"But--"

DO NOT WORK ON YOUR DAYS OFF.

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In case it wasn't clear: DOGE is working with Russia, providing a backdoor for SOMEONE in Russia to login to US systems. PBS Newshour interviewed the whistleblower and yeeeeeah it's pretty damning stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWpqJ8pD2Ng Basically the cybercriminal version of hiding a blood stain on the floor by ripping out the floor and leaving a gaping hole where floor used to be.... But leaving a great big bloodsmear from the hole in the floor all the way to a suspiciously stinky truck in the parking lot, that's owned by the known neighborhood hitman, which also happens to be piled high with blood-stained flooring.

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Years and years ago, I read a book on cryptography that I picked up because it looked interesting--and it was!

But there was a side anecdote in there that stayed with me for more general purposes.

The author was describing a cryptography class that they had taken back in college where the professor was demonstrating the process of "reversibility", which is a principle that most codes depend on. Specifically, it should be easy to encode, and very hard to decode without the key--it is hard to reverse the process.

So he had an example code that he used for his class to demonstrate this, a variation on the Book Code, where the encoded text would be a series of phone numbers.

The key to the code was that phone books are sorted alphabetically, so you could encode the text easily--picking phone numbers from the appropriate alphabetical sections to use ahead of time would be easy. But since phone books were sorted alphabetically, not numerically, it would be nearly impossible to reverse the code without exhaustively searching the phone book for each string of numbers and seeing what name it was tied to.

Nowadays, defeating this would be child's play, given computerized databases, but back in the 80s and 90s, this would have been a good code... at least, until one of the students raised their hand and asked, "Why not just call the phone numbers and ask who lives there?"

The professor apparently was dumbfounded.

He had never considered that question. As a result, his cipher, which seemed to be nearly unbreakable to him, had such an obvious flaw, because he was the sort of person who could never coldcall someone to ask that sort of thing!

In the crypto book, the author went on to use this story as an example of why security systems should not be tested by the designer (because of course the security system is ready for everything they thought of, by definition), but for me, as a writer, it stuck with me for a different reason.

It's worth talking out your story plot with other people just to see if there's a "Why not just call the phone numbers?" obvious plot hole that you've missed, because of your singular perspective as a person. Especially if you're writing the sort of plot where you have people trying to outsmart each other.

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i love that nate is meant to be the Normal Guy in the leverage team bc he wasn’t a thief, but what we know of nate’s past tells us he was a guy who:

had weird tense post-work drinks with his rival on rooftops

was frenemies with sterling

dropped out of seminary school... to become an insurance claims investigator

but still stayed friends with at least one person who actually completed seminary and became a priest

has a masters degree in statistics. which is not necessary for insurance investigation (not like it’s unhelpful of course, but it’s very much not a job requirement). it’s also clearly not necessary for being a priest, so idk why he has that exactly. just did a masters in statistics for fun

would love to receive a secret button camera as a gift. to the point his wife would buy him one as a birthday present.

is the first person you’d suspect of faking a miracle

caught the eye of world-class grifter sophie devereaux, long before he had any inclination of becoming a thief too

seemed more shocked and taken aback by being called a wanker than by being SHOT

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They don't actually want a heterosexual pride, they don't want a natural family month, they don't want the Christian flag represented at government buildings.

They want two things.

They want there to be no pride months, they want no pride flags, no pride festivals. They want the ones in existence to end.

But most importantly, they want to piss you off.

They want to make the news, they want your angry phone calls, they want you to make threats.

Don't feed them. Staaaaaarve themmmmmm.

Tell them that they're welcome to start their own initiatives, start their festivals, put up their signs. Do whatever they want, it's a free country.

There's a reason most straight pride festivals fizzle out after one year. Festivals are a lot of work and they're only worth it if you have a good reason to have one. Their reason sucks.

Don't feed them.

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MAGA are addicted to projection and deflection.

The inability to define socialism or communism or fascism or marxism is manifest, whether it is MAGA comments online or from the White House itself.

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A: occupied Poland.

First Felon has over 3500 court cases.

Now that he is a convicted felon, fraud, and adjudicated rapist, he wants to skip judicial process and one-way ticket innocent people to concentration camps in El Salvador.

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I love you dead punctuation marks.

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Strong progressive parties with engaged labor unions are the best defense against fascism.

Corporate tyranny is the enemy. Billionaire overlords want you destitute.

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Here is your mission.

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No Amazon. No Walmart. No Target. No Disney. No Google. No Apple. No Visa or Mastercard. And especially no Facebook. I will not be posting on Meta platforms for the next 24 hours in support of the economic blackout.

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ya’ll were really gonna let me live my life in ignorance thinking mr. rogers was straight???

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i will never forget and i will never forgive the people who chose this. we all have to suffer the consequences they alone deserve.

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USA people! Buy NOTHING Feb 28 2025. Not anything. 24 hours. No spending. Buy the day before or after but nothing. NOTHING. February 28 2025. Not gas. Not milk. Not something on a gaming app. Not a penny spent. (Only option in a crisis is local small mom and pop. Nothing. Else.) Promise me. Commit. 1 day. 1 day to scare the shit out of them that they don't get to follow the bullshit executive orders. They don't get to be cowards. If they do, it costs. It costs.

Then, if you can join me for Phase 2. March 7 2025 thtough March 14 2025? No Amazon. None. 1 week. No orders. Not a single item. Not one ebook. Nothing. 1 week. Just 1.

If you live outside the USA boycott US products on February 28 2025 and stand in solidarity with us and also join us for the week of no Amazon.

Are you with me?

Spread the word.

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The World Of Becca Blake

Art by Dan Schkade