Bunk

May you live in interesting times.
—Ancient Chinese Curse

"May you live in interesting times!" is a falsely attributed Chinese curse with no historical or linguistic basis in China. It appears to be a Western invention, likely emerging in the early-to-mid 20th century, and popularized due to its catchy and ironic nature.
—ChatGPT

Interesting Times

Regardless, we certainly live in "interesting times." Here's an update to what I've been doing to cope with the breakneck changes and developments in 21st Century Life. Many people ask me why I haven't retired, but really, in my lifetime there never has been a period of so much opportunity for interesting, fulfilling and even profitable existence. It's great to be alive, even if I don't always agree with what the herds of the world are up to.

New Paths

My old skill set is outdated, not to my liking, not in demand, or is too demanding on this old body now entering its ninth decade. So I decided it was time for some changes.

It turns out that my old IT skills are not completely without value, but they certainly need to be updated. And my life-long interest in photography actually builds upon the technology we now use for digital still and video production. Artificial Intelligence proves to be a very alluring path for a number of reasons. So given all of that, I turned to my current AI advisor, ChatGPT who offered more alternatives than I could employ in three lifetimes. (Floods of choices is something ChatGPT excels at.)

All that being said, here's where I'm currently headed:

1. Continue to work at and improve my still and video skills, especially sound production, which turns out to be the most difficult part of a video for me.
2. Pursue an educational course that ChatGPT and I narrowed down to something I can manage over the next six months. We identified a number of excellent instructional options that are either free or modestly priced.

What I've Actually Been Doing

Looking over my time logs I discover that much of my effort is devoted to the following:

• Freemasonry- I'm the Assistant Grand Historian, and that offers lots of opportunities for honing my photographic and video skills.
• Toastmasters- I really like my fellow club-members, plus I get to learn new skills and approach things from a "soft skills" standpoint.
• IT Development- I do a lot of things that provide a continuous learning opportunity. Right now the heavy emphasis is on new languages, based on the learning path ChatGPT and I worked out. But my own infrastructure and system maintenance also provides great opportunities.
• Health and Fitness- This is becoming increasingly important and while I neglected it for several months, the habit is reforming and regular exercise and gym attendance is vital given my age.

Toastmasters

This has been a great experience. Not only has it given me greater public speaking confidence, but it has also opened new doors for my other objectives. I just did a video shoot for fellow Toastmaster Lisa Torens and her collaborator John Phillip Shenale. Both are concerned with popular music, with deep roots and knowledge of the subject. Lisa is an author with an enviable track record of well-known artist interviews and John is a producer, composer, arranger and artist who has worked with many well-known names in the record industry. They did a presentation at Gman Tavern on Clark Street near Wrigley Field in Chicago recently, and I captured the presentation on video. Shenale is handling the editing, so I don't have any links to videos at this time. However, the feature photo on this post is a screen shot of Lisa and John at their presentation.

Here's a shot of Jill Hopkins, who is a great moderator and handles both Gman as well as Metro, a cavernous music venue next door. Along with Jill is a shot of another Toastmasters member, Renée Wege giving us her customary high energy and trademark pink blazer.

Freemasonry

This takes a lot of my time but gives me some great photo and video opportunities. Here I am at Grand Lodge with my boss, Grand Historian Merle Fox.

I also take a lot of event photos. I can't count the number of times I've taken photos of Lodge Officers just after an Installation ceremony. But I also get a change to take some interesting photos at other events.

Here's a photo of Hesperia Lodge's recent Installation along with a photo from last year's Christmas Party for families. The really tall guy, Joshua, in the Lodge photos is 7'4"tall. We had a magician who specializes in kids' entertainment and in addition to magic, he has animals. The young lady shown enchanted me because not only is she unafraid of having two snakes draped around her with a lizard on her head, she actually seems really happy for the experience. I predict a career for her in some kind of biological field. She seems to love the animals.

Illinois Masonic Academic Bowl

I recently did a photo shoot at the Illinois Masonic Academic Bowl state finals at Bloomington High School. It struck me that for one day, we Masons held in trust one of the State of Illinois' most valuable assets, with over thirty high schools from across the state sending winners from the Sectional competitions to the State Final. I walked over three miles according to my pedometer that day. It was about an 18-hour day by the time I got back home after Amtrak and schlepping a bunch of photographic gear through Union Station in Chicago. But it was worth it.

We took "mug shots" of the competing teams, which are required to wear matching tops of their own design and choosing. One team member is holding the name of the school in the photo so we can identify them by their respective tops in the remaining photos. There was quite a variety. The two boys in Cumberland's photo are apparently twins and share the same surname according to the program. I thought our one and only Goth young lady was also intriguing. One team had a plethora of girls, although the competition in general seems to tilt towards boys. Here are some selected photos. Check out Reagan in the mug shot, smiling and pleasant. Then check her out during competition, poised and armed for the kill.

The last photo is a posed winner photo. I have a dozen of those, with three classes and four places. All the same. The photo includes the team, usually their coach, plus the Tournament Masonic Chairman (left) and the Grand Master, David P. Lynch (right). Waubonsie Valley (Aurora), the Class 3A winner, was unstoppable.

Complete Tournament Results, a list of participating schools and other information is available at Illinois Masonic Academic Bowl. The 2026 Tournament is already in the works. There's still plenty of time to get your school into the fun and competition.

Health and Fitness

I doubt that anybody would be entertained by a photo of me pumping iron or running on a treadmill, so I'll just say that I have managed to hold the weight to a very reasonable 180 pounds despite the constant temptation of Masonic donuts (at every event.) All indications are that it will be some time before I join what ChatGPT jokingly refers to as "The van Gogh Society." I'm back to three days a week at the gym and try to get some walking in on every non-gym day.

IT Development

Similarly, I also doubt that anybody would be interested my code samples, so I'll just say that I'm in the beginning month of an ambitious program of learning arrived at with ChatGPT. I'm starting with Python, that is my weakest language, and then probably adding some additional Python related things involving statistics and presentation. Then on the some Artificial Intelligence learning, something Python uniquely supports. C# is on the list, one of my weaker languages. Of course, I'll still keep my hand in at my old Delphi skills (Pascal language) simply because of familiarity speed of development. I might dig into R (that's a language, actually) because of its outstanding statistical capabilities, but that also involves taking some statistics courses to refresh and upgrade stuff I learned 60 years ago as an undergraduate! Then, assuming I'm still around and enthusiastic, I may look into C (another "one-letter" language) or C++.

It's a Great Life

So despite the hoax of the Chinese curse, I think I'm well-positioned to enjoy and take advantage of the "interesting times" we now experience.

Hope all goes well with each and every one of you, too.