Greetings and welcome to the Ninja-Blog!

The purpose of this blog is akin to a journal for me. I’ve never been able to get one to stick. Although I have had many sketchbooks, notebooks, online workspaces, and notes to myself that function in the same way, none of them ever lasted if I had any requirement to work on them. My 2022 annual theme is focus. So to that end, instead of writing a relatively free form but daily regimented letter to myself, I though I would write on specific subjects that are on my mind, and really take the opportunity to investigate and report on whatever topic interests me at the moment.

Why ninja blog?

Ever since I was a kid I loved ninjas (or ‘ninja’ since 忍者 is both singular and plural in Japanese). I dressed up, watched the anime, read the comics (O.G. Naruto fan from the first issue of Shonen Jump released in the US around 2003) and found books on actual historical ninjas, and modern day practitioners of traditional ninjutsu. I’ve adopted the 忍 kanji as a personal symbol for a few decades now so this will be the ninja-blog. :) Will ninja actually have any bearing on this blog? Probably not, however there are 2 ways in which they are tangentially related. (At risk on straying into the incredibly nerdy) historical ninja were not the exclusively cold hearted assassins commonly depicted in pop culture. Many were former (or disgraced) samurai ¹ and almost all historical ninja clans from which we have any records, had an emphasis on perfecting their craft. This may have been a culturally Japanese trait in general or specific to warrior cultures, but in either case I think it is one way my annual theme of “focus” can be captured as it pertains to my educational and professional development this year. The second way in which ninja will be related is stolen from the title and theme of Ben McCarty’s book “Cyberjutsu: Cybersecurity for the Modern Ninja”. In as much as historical ninja skills with daggers and grappling hooks are required less in the modern world, cybersecurity and hacking skills very much of use. McCarty frames his book on cybersecurity by stating states “ Cyberjutsu aims to turn the tactics, techniques, strategies and mentalities of ancient ninjas in to a practical cybersecurity field guide”. I’ll buy it.

Who is this blog for?

Me. That’s it. If you found this, are reading it, and think what I have to say is interesting, I’d love to hear your thoughts! I’m also pretty sure the comments aren’t enabled just yet (and I dread to think of trolls on the lower levels in the darker corners of the planks of rotten plywood undergirding the rainbow-bridge we call the inter-webz), but part of this blog is also to make it look pretty and learn about various GitHub/web connectivity features, so they will probably be enabled eventually. For now, if you’re reading this it is HIGHLY likely that you know me already. So just reach out.

Topics COMING SOON!

I’ve been keeping a running list of topics I want to think more about and write about for a while now so here a few of them I might get around to in the next year. Not expressly listed but also included in topics of future writing are any project I’m currently working on that I want to invest a bit more time explaining what I’m doing in a sort of a “you learn better if you teach someone” kind of way. Hopefully it’s interesting and helps someone else out there.

• Meta-Learning
• Math is “Bullshit”
• Non-metphysical classification/hierarchy of “Souls” (vis-a-vis consciousness)
• Non standard tools used for unintended purposes
• Robotics interfacing and how humans understand computer understanding
• TEOTWAWKI
• Open Source Prepping
• Meditation, Themes, and Focus
• Amateur Radio and home automation

Goals

As mentioned above, this blog is basically for me. I don’t really intend to stick to a timeline although I did set up a calendar reminder to ping me once every couple of weeks to write something. But when I write something I want it to be deliberate so if I don’t write for a couple months thats ok! In any case I look forward to it. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you in a couple weeks.

P.s. I wrote this post in the GitHub enabled VSCode originally, and before committing I copied it elsewhere to do a quick spell check. I’m appalled (although perhaps not surprised) at how many words I misspelled and didn’t even catch. I hereby make it another goal of this blog to work on my spelling. ~JL