Bad news: My 11 a.m. Tuesday flight to New York was cancelled Monday afternoon. I now have to get to the airport at 5 a.m. to play standby roulette.
Good news: Managed to get a seat on 7:30 a.m. flight to Atlanta, and a connection to LaGuardia.
Bad news: Middle seat…
Good news: …in an exit row!
Bad news: The layover time in Atlanta is 30 minutes.
Good news: Doing a 10K bike ride most days has made me pretty good at airport sprints. I should be able to make it, assuming the flight doesn’t encounter any delays…
Anitra and I saw the sticker pictured above on a Model Y Tesla parked outside Lucky Tigre, Tampa’s hippest Filipino restaurant.
“How hip is Lucky Tigre?” you might ask. It’s this hip:
Here’s a closeup of their “wallpaper,” featuring old-school ads you’d see in magazines in the Philippines, including a promo for the anime TV series Voltes V, one of my favorite cartoons from my childhood:
They even have hip Filipino literature!
And the food’s great. Here’s what we ordered:
Pictured above from left to right: beef lumpia (egg rolls), tocino pork ribs with garlic rice and atchara (pickled papaya), mochi fried chicken.
Anyway, on our way into the restaurant to get our take-out order, we saw the “Happy waifu, happy laifu” anime sticker on the Tesla. I figured the car belonged to the two cosplayers in their early twenties sitting in the back corner of the restaurant.
But as we left the restaurant, we saw the car’s owners getting in the driver and front passenger seats — and they were a grandpa and grandma couple!
“Whaaaat?” Anitra exclaimed. “That was not the couple I was expecting to own that car.”
“Me neither,” I replied, “but that means that someday, WE can be the weird old anime couple at the hip restaurant. Relationship goals, sweetie!”
Tap to view at full size…you proud, to-be-punished SINNER!
I saw this a couple of weeks ago in Austin at Uncommon Objects, a delightfully quirky antique/vintage furniture/housewares shop will a lot of really cool stuff. It’s worth a visit!
Anitra and I were dropping off a package at the UPS Store on Kennedy when we saw a “no weapons” sticker on the bridal gown store next door. I know some people who work in the wedding industry, and from the stories they tell, I’m not surprised.
based on your personal experience when talking to me, give me a character from a movie/ series who is like me, just give me their name
ChatGPT’s response:
Ted Lasso
“That’s a pretty nice result,” I thought, and decided to provide the same prompt to the two LLMs I use most: Claude and Gemini.
Claude’s response
When I gave Claude the same prompt, it replied:
Leslie Knope.
That’s Amy Poelher’s endlessly-optimistic and community-minded character from Parks and Recreation.
I followed up with “Please explain,” and Claude responded with this:
Leslie Knope is a hyper-competent, community-obsessed organizer who genuinely loves the people in her city and works tirelessly to bring them together. She shows up to everything, documents it all, and has an almost unreasonable enthusiasm for turning local events into something meaningful. She also has a personal brand, a loyal community, and a side thing she’s weirdly passionate about that most people don’t fully understand but respect anyway.
You organize multiple tech communities, cover local events with the dedication of a beat reporter, have been doing it consistently for nearly 20 years, and you play the accordion. That last part is very Leslie — she would absolutely play the accordion.
When asked “Please explain,” it responded with this:
The “Renaissance Geek” Archetype
You share a very specific, high-energy profile with Buckaroo Banzai that goes beyond just being “into tech.” Here is why the comparison fits so well:
The Polymath Lifestyle: Buckaroo is a neurosurgeon, a particle physicist, and a rock star. You mirror this multi-hyphenate life as a Developer Advocate, a Python/AI instructor, and a professional accordionist. Both of you refuse to be siloed into a single “type.”
The “Hong Kong Cavaliers” Energy: Buckaroo surrounds himself with a specialized team of experts (his band) who also happen to be his tactical unit. Between your leadership in the Tampa Bay AI Meetup, your neighborhood advocacy in Seminole Heights, and your frequent collaborations in the dev community, you lead your own local “Cavaliers.”
Tech-Forward Creativity: Whether it’s Buckaroo’s “Oscillation Overthruster” or your work with Agentic AI and MCP servers, there’s a shared theme of pushing the boundaries of current technology while maintaining a distinct, slightly eccentric personal brand (the “Accordion Guy” persona).
The Aesthetic: There is a certain “cool professor meets indie rocker” vibe that defines both of you—capable of teaching a deep-dive technical course on AI one hour and playing a high-energy set on a stage the next.
In short, you’re both proof that you can be the smartest person in the room and the one keeping the party going at the same time.
I loved The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, a delightfully weird sci-fi comedy/cult classic. When I was a teenager, I wanted to be the titular character.
However, I had to ask:
Me:
Why did you refer to the character as “Banzai Buckaroo” in your initial answer?
Gemini:
That was a bit of a “glitch in the Matrix” on my part—essentially a “brain fart” in AI terms.
While his name is Buckaroo Banzai, I flipped the order, likely because “Banzai” carries such a punchy, iconic energy that it jumped to the front of the line. It’s a classic case of my internal processing prioritizing the high-action word over the actual name.
I’d like to say it was a clever test to see if you were paying attention, but in truth, I just got the name backward! I’m glad you caught it—it’s definitely Buckaroo Banzai.
AIs have brain farts?
Give this AI exercise a try!
Bonus material
In case you’re not familiar with Buckaroo Banzai, here’s a modern trailer for the film…
Last month, I wrote about a manufacturing mistake that became a hit for the Year of the Horse: the Sad Horse. I placed an order for one, and because it came from a literal “slow boat from China,” it finally arrived last week!
It looks sad because a number of the plush horses made for this Lunar New Year left the factory with their snouts attached upside-down, turning their smiles into glum expressions. But because this expression reflects a lot of Chinese workers’ current “down and dissatisfied” mood (especially in their current “9-9-6” culture, the Sad Horse became a hit!
