prot flux escape_from_new_york: and i didn't even visit the Last_Diner - the restaurant off astorplatz that a__ and i arbitrarily decided on our first visit was the true and only escape portal from millionaire's island, as if eating shit hamburgers was the only way to shrug off the illusion that The City was The World. but i needed to get out. i was falling apart, mentally, emotionally, and physically, and then the only thing that was really *keeping* me there fell apart - i got laid off, along w/ two thirds of my company, about 800 people. i probably could have argued my way into a secure position if i'd wanted, but i instead realized that this was an Opportunity to move on, and less than two weeks later i was driving what possessions i could fit into a rental SUV out west. unlike my previous cross-country excursions, i was alone and in a rush, and almost fuck-all happened, opting to just drive 16 hours a day. i had a brief urge to down an 8 year old nuvigil pill i'd been given and keeping for a special occasion, and beat a dead friend and mentor's 47-hour non-stop cross country record, but i really didn't want to kill anyone in a sleep deprivation hallucination and took it like an approximately sane person. a flat tire in indiana wasted half a day. an enormous nocturnal thunderstorm in illinois in the middle of a major construction zone left me blinded and unable to find a safe place to pull over, and i had to tailgate a semi for an hour in order to keep in my lane and out of oncoming traffic until there was a clearly marked exit. shit was so bad that i was completely unaware that i'd crossed the mississippi until i pulled into a diner in iowa, where i met a young, friendly waitress with no additional aspirations and a smart phone that could get a weather report. i couldn't stop thinking of "american_pop" until i got back on the road. and wyoming is stupidly beautiful when the sun is setting, and i pissed on the continental divide so my fluids would eventually find their way back to both the atlantic and pacific oceans (a sailor always pisses downstream, so that their fluids will rejoin the ocean). and southern idaho (where the antelope roam) is also stupidly beautiful when the sun is rising. and eventually i got to portland, where i've got friends but it's not so crazy as the bay or seattle, where i can ride a bike without daily flirting with death. and i've been taking a long needed vacation and thinking about things, and writing computer programs to solve All Possible Games of Boggle, and meeting people and going on small adventures. but i guess i can write on those things elsewhere. 160803 ... flux actually i did end up solving all_possible_boggle_games, though a couple years later. it never quite became a paper like it should have, though. i'm pretty sure i invented a couple new combinatorial optimization techniques (or at least i could find no mention of them in existing literature, i never spoke to anyone in the specialty). and i definitely should have added some sequences to the OEIS. starting to feel better finally, i really ought to finish that up 210207 what's it to you? who go blather from