Wow. I can't believe someone wrote this let alone my favorite GenX writer PT. I live in OKC, just one mile from the arena. I can't go to games because it's so ear-crushing loud. 😩 Nerve deafness runs in my family. My mom, aunt and grandfather were all deaf. Not a deafness from birth but a progressive deafness that made verbal communication nearly impossible. 💔 It was so lonely growing up with a mom who couldn't hear. 👂 She'd lost about 90 percent of her hearing by the time I was in my twenties. Sadly, we can't go to Thunder games because it's too risky given our potential for hearing loss.
I'm so happy the Thunder won. Life is very hard for so many Oklahomans. Poverty, addiction, mental illness, low wages - all rampant here. But last night I could hear joy in the streets. I wish being loud at games wasn't a value of the NBA, fans and city leaders, etc. They literally call it Loud City. I can't watch a game without thinking about all the people who are potentially damaging their ability to hear.
Jen, thanks for your perspective. I want to also share the link you sent to me this morning - about how the mayor is directing people to be loud in the stadium. It really underlines the fact that it's not a place for babies:
I get how proud OKC is about the team. The matching t-shirts are so fun to see. But I have to admit I'm surprised by the directives: be at your seat by the start of third quarter, get to the game early for warmups, stand the whole time, etc. The team is fun to watch. I don't think I'd go in person, even with ear plugs. But OKC is a fun team.
This is so helpful. A lot of times, I think to myself, why am I making a mess of this piece? No one can keep up. What is the point. And then I have to edit it for two weeks to figure out how it fits together in my head. What I hear from you is that there is no point in tidy. If I had held this post, and thought about why I was so upset, it would have been a more interesting post. I would have had the upset and the why and I would have had the messiness of figuring it out.
I appreciate your unfiltered writing, I am a direct to a fault a lot of the time, thankfully the LLMs are amazing and my messages to colleagues are less pointy.
I didn’t even realise you, Penelope, were writing this until I saw Cathleen’s comment and read who the author was.
I paid more attention and read all the words once that clicked, I wasn’t initially onboard with article until then. It’s clearly obvious we need to elevate early human development instead of being so accidental about it all.
I don't know why this feels like it was written or edited by AI. Something about its style feels off, like its not your voice. Is this a social experiment you are doing?
It's me. But I have to point out that many, many experiments have shown that if you ask a person to pick which is human and which is AI, we mostly get it wrong. Because AI is better at most stuff than we are, but we like to believe that a human did what we like best. This is true for writing poetry, doing couples therapy, writing essays. AI is just better.
Given this, I think we are going to have to start looking for what we do for the sheer pleasure of it, since we can't compete with AI. And writing my blog -- or whatever you call it on Substack -- is too much a part of who I am for me to start delegating to AI. But I think I need to remind myself that I take more pleasure in sorting out messiness than ranting about injustice.
When you ask if it's written by AI, I think what you mean is, "I didn't like this post." Which I can understand. After thinking about your feedback, I think I feel that way, too.
That is very interesting. And I thought my AI detector was great
It's short, it doesn't have your usual through line of surprising story and things that seem random until it all makes sense until the end in a completely fresh way, and AI loves em-dashes.
You are right to call the use of child as prop out.
Well, since we're talking about it. The em dash thing stresses me out. Because I use them SO MUCH and now they are probably a grammatical anachronism reserved only for nonhumans.
Wow. I can't believe someone wrote this let alone my favorite GenX writer PT. I live in OKC, just one mile from the arena. I can't go to games because it's so ear-crushing loud. 😩 Nerve deafness runs in my family. My mom, aunt and grandfather were all deaf. Not a deafness from birth but a progressive deafness that made verbal communication nearly impossible. 💔 It was so lonely growing up with a mom who couldn't hear. 👂 She'd lost about 90 percent of her hearing by the time I was in my twenties. Sadly, we can't go to Thunder games because it's too risky given our potential for hearing loss.
I'm so happy the Thunder won. Life is very hard for so many Oklahomans. Poverty, addiction, mental illness, low wages - all rampant here. But last night I could hear joy in the streets. I wish being loud at games wasn't a value of the NBA, fans and city leaders, etc. They literally call it Loud City. I can't watch a game without thinking about all the people who are potentially damaging their ability to hear.
Jen, thanks for your perspective. I want to also share the link you sent to me this morning - about how the mayor is directing people to be loud in the stadium. It really underlines the fact that it's not a place for babies:
https://www.news9.com/story/6856d689a7c35889a257f07c/nba-finals-game-7-mayor-holt-shares-thunder-message-ahead-of-historic-match
I get how proud OKC is about the team. The matching t-shirts are so fun to see. But I have to admit I'm surprised by the directives: be at your seat by the start of third quarter, get to the game early for warmups, stand the whole time, etc. The team is fun to watch. I don't think I'd go in person, even with ear plugs. But OKC is a fun team.
Yeah, this doesn’t sound like you. It’s too tidy.
This is so helpful. A lot of times, I think to myself, why am I making a mess of this piece? No one can keep up. What is the point. And then I have to edit it for two weeks to figure out how it fits together in my head. What I hear from you is that there is no point in tidy. If I had held this post, and thought about why I was so upset, it would have been a more interesting post. I would have had the upset and the why and I would have had the messiness of figuring it out.
I appreciate your unfiltered writing, I am a direct to a fault a lot of the time, thankfully the LLMs are amazing and my messages to colleagues are less pointy.
I didn’t even realise you, Penelope, were writing this until I saw Cathleen’s comment and read who the author was.
I paid more attention and read all the words once that clicked, I wasn’t initially onboard with article until then. It’s clearly obvious we need to elevate early human development instead of being so accidental about it all.
Onwards and upwards!
I don't know why this feels like it was written or edited by AI. Something about its style feels off, like its not your voice. Is this a social experiment you are doing?
It's me. But I have to point out that many, many experiments have shown that if you ask a person to pick which is human and which is AI, we mostly get it wrong. Because AI is better at most stuff than we are, but we like to believe that a human did what we like best. This is true for writing poetry, doing couples therapy, writing essays. AI is just better.
Given this, I think we are going to have to start looking for what we do for the sheer pleasure of it, since we can't compete with AI. And writing my blog -- or whatever you call it on Substack -- is too much a part of who I am for me to start delegating to AI. But I think I need to remind myself that I take more pleasure in sorting out messiness than ranting about injustice.
When you ask if it's written by AI, I think what you mean is, "I didn't like this post." Which I can understand. After thinking about your feedback, I think I feel that way, too.
That is very interesting. And I thought my AI detector was great
It's short, it doesn't have your usual through line of surprising story and things that seem random until it all makes sense until the end in a completely fresh way, and AI loves em-dashes.
You are right to call the use of child as prop out.
Well, since we're talking about it. The em dash thing stresses me out. Because I use them SO MUCH and now they are probably a grammatical anachronism reserved only for nonhumans.