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So much ridicule and noise about Amazon and Just Walk Out technology using 1000+ contractors in India to label what shoppers were shopping through video. Well folks, thats how AI/ML works. Its called ground truth and part of training your ML model is to actually have humans validate what your ML model is doing & train it appropriately. AI/ML is not some magic wand out there that just “knows” what to do – it has to be taught, and sometimes it has to be taught for years and years, and the teaching may just never end. In fact, humans should hope that the training AI never ends; the day AI reaches a state where it doesnt need a human to validate ground truth, we are in trouble.

A friend’s parents who have been in middle east for the last 45+ years are now planning on migrating to India or here for retirement. They *want* to stay in the middle east because, well, 45+ years of building your life there. But they can’t anymore because without a work permit (visa) they don’t have anything to stay for, and its expensive. This is why I hate all those middle east countries with a heart – you can give those countries your entire fucking life, but you will always remain a second or third class citizen in their eyes. Forget citizenship, they won’t even offer permanent residency to folks who’ve lived there forever, contributed to their economy, and in this case created jobs and run a big factory there. While the immigration system here sucks bad as well, at least there is a pathway and a hope that you will become a part of this country permanently one day.

Canada’s rightward turn happened faster than people anticipated didnt it? Immigration has pretty much become bane of Canadian society it feels like. Of course I could be all wrong here and its election year so I might be reading only bad stuff. That said looking at my cousin’s own take wouldn’t be surprised. (She loves Canada, but also regrets making the move coz no jobs at all)

Biden continues to be enraged about all the things Israel does and put out statements after statements but won’t do the things that you know, as Israel’s biggest backer, can and should. I am not going to blame progressives or arabs who are upset with Biden over this one. The alternative is even worse is not a good enough reason for Biden to not do something. How long before Israel effectively starts a large scale middle east war and Biden continues to be “enraged”?

I have seen enough. Jon Stewart should have stayed retired. He is just ruining his own legacy at this point.

I finally got annoyed with our landscape guy and asked for a refund for spring seeding work he did this march. I went out of our way to take some risks with our sprinkler system just so he could seed at the beginning of march. We are now more than 5 weeks in and it has been a total failure.

My favorite spring **flowers**

One of kids closest friends from childhood who is Jewish invited us to her bat mitzvah. This was a unique experience this morning in a Jewish temple seeing their traditions and customs honoring the girl coming of age. Post the ceremony we had a small meal with the families and in the evening will join them for the reception. Like Indian upanayana ceremonies this was also a multi-day affair for them, and I am glad we could join them today.

This past winter in particular has been one of those life affirming moments with doggo. It’s no surprise I detest cold and yet this entire winter come snow or bitter cold I have been out with him for a walk almost daily for a min of 30-40 mins. It probably has increased my cold tolerance (and no I still hate it with heart), but I feel a sense of accomplishment about this small thing and I have only him to thank for it.