This is the personal weblog of Vinney Cavallo. Here you'll find musings on life, technology, philosophy, the utter meaninglessness of existence, and other fun topics.
This letter was printed in my local newspaper in early February, 2026. I oppose aggression by State agents (ICE or otherwise), and support peaceful protest. …But I also feel compelled to speak out against what I see as (accidental?) attacks on small, local business in the name of identity-alignment and coalition politics of any variety. I want to reiterate at the top here that this reflects my…
Government currency used to be money. The money has been siphoned out, but the currency hasn’t changed. We’ve been down this road before - but I think this explanation is much more easily understood: In 1964 a burger and fries was about $0.50. Today, it’s about $20.00. In 1964, the melt value of the silver in the coin was about $0.50. Today, it’s about $20.00. In 1964, you could pay for that…
Fuck the State: eat like an ungovernable caveman. TL;DR: Fuck the State: eat like an ungovernable caveman. Just some light, fun dinner party conversation! “Vinney, why do you avoid eating grains?” The short and boring answer is: “I believe this is metabolically optimal for a human being.” But since you’re here, I assume you want the long and insane answer! So let’s go: Because of coordination…
Coming at you with an additional YASDA - Yet Another Simple Debasement Analogy. This time using physical space as a reference. I like coming up with ways to make currency debasement understandable to those who haven’t studied economics ( Last time it was a bit deeper in the weeds with gold coinage). here’s a simple one: You have a 1,000 square foot house. At some point, the government declares…
A meditation on an 1899 gold coin reveals the palpable, indisputable truth of how our time is stolen from us and what the world would be like if that were otherwise. If you’re looking for a much simpler explanation of the same phenomenon, check this post . I was recently in a situation where I was handling an 1899 $20 gold coin in the company of others. In the moment, I tried to make a point about…
Imagine that every piece of technology and social infrastructure on which you rely had its apparent political polarity reversed. Would this harm you or help you? Disclaimer: i don’t believe this election was stolen (that is, corruption and organized fraud sufficient enough to make a difference in the result). i haven’t seen credible evidence of it, and i’ve looked and asked those I know to be MAGA…
Day 3 - 2020 03 19 Baked two loaves of sourdough bread. Make some pretty terrible pancakes. A lot of them. Bit of a rollercoaster this morning with a tickle in my throat that sent me down a few spirals of anxiety and bad feelings. Taking my temperature helped with that, which is sort of silly. Adam dropped off supplies and did a macarena dance in the driveway briefly. Thinking about Jai-Lee’s…
Day 2 - 2020 03 18 Quinoa grain bowls with harissa sesasame chick peas started sourdough discard buttermilk pancake sponge loaves formed for baking tomorrow i’m drawn to making bread during this. i didn’t think about the fact that bread is historically the symbol of basic sustenance found out about helpwithcovid.com and a few other volunteer communities adam and isabelle stopped in the driveway to…
Day 1 - 2020 03 17 If you don’t know me, here’s a bit of context. My girlfriend and I were in New York City two weeks ago. I came back last week and she stayed longer for work. As the news began to snowball she cancelled the remainder of her job and I drove back to pick her up yesterday. Since pulling off the road into our driveway yesterday, we haven’t been off our property and won’t be for two…
A Google Sheet updated at least daily with coronavirus cases in New York City, including Growth Factor tracking. It’s easy enough to find current live stats for Coronavirus cases at the country or even state level, but it’s tougher to find for a particular city - and even more time-consuming to dig up the historical numbers. I did some legwork and caught up on all the NYC reporting, collecting it…