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I touched on Homelander in my last Sunday Serial in nominatng The Boys for a pick. I don’t think he’s terribly hard to figure out, even from a purely behavioral level; I don’t think the writers are trying to be subtle with his character or cagey about his development. But still…it was something I wanted to write about.

Screenrant:

Homelander’s origins set the foundations for a truly broken character. He was raised from birth in a lab to be the world’s greatest superhero. He never had any parental bonds, and cold Vought scientists constantly tested his powers. Throughout The Boys there are two Homelander personas on display; one persona is the clean-cut superhero adored by the public, and the other is the homicidal monster who privately gets away with murder.

Distractify:

Throughout Seasons 1-2 of The Boys, Homelander’s only weakness was his desire to be loved…What’s wrong with Homelander? It’s not his superpowers. It’s the fact that he’s a full-blown narcissist…[When] Ashley informs Homelander in The Boys Season 3, Episode 3, that his numbers in the popularity polls have skyrocketed…Homelander is genuinely thrilled.

Sounds like a narcissist. What are narcissistic traits?

• Grandiosity and self-importance
• Fantasies of perfection and superiority
• Sense of specialness and uniqueness
• Need for praise and attention
• Strong sense of entitlement
• A tendency to exploit others
• A tendency to exploit others
• Arrogance and scorn

What’s interesting about Homelander, of course, is that some of these are actually true. He is special and unique (he’s the most powerful supe on the planet). It would be hard not to feel that way. But he flips the switch into narc territory because he checks all of the other boxes, too.

So why are narcissists narcissists?

One popular explanation is parenting: too permissive or too critical a parenting style is thought to cultivated the personality disorder. Again, with Homelander, he likely was cultivated in the perfect conditions to become a narcissist. He was grown in a lab, for starters, to be an incredibly powerful superhero. He didn’t experience anything approaching normal attachment to a parent or caregiver. And the expression of his powers surely informed how his caretakers handled him.

From PsychCentral:

Grandiose narcissists, on the other hand, have tended to experience a more avoidant attachment pattern early in their lives which has led them to feel they have to take care of themselves, that they don’t need anyone else, and they should be pseudo-independent.

Again, with Homelander, in addition to being raised in lab conditions, he likely was feared by everyone around him as he realized his powers, He could, in some real (and terrifying) ways, solve his own problems, from the point of reference of being an under-developed but incredibly powerful child.

I’m not going to get into attachment styles here, but they are fascinating to learn about. There are three broad types: avoidance, anxious, and secure. There are some combinations that don’t mix well in relationships (without conscious effort), and some that do. John Bowlby is a psychologist who introduced the framework into the lexicon, but Mary Ainsworth is credited with applying his ideas to adult relationships. Attached by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller is a great book if you’re interested in the topic. And psychologizing yourself, if you like.

As with most things, YouTube is an overwhelming source of advice, information, and exhortation about all things, including rowing. One of the themes I’ve seen repeated is shooting for a lower cadence, expressed in strokes per minute. By way of example, if you rowed for 20 minutes, your rowing computer would not only tell you your current stroke rate, but report your average. So you might start off slower, maybe 2:12. but finish higher, say at 2:08. On the Concept2’s PM5, ideally synced to their RowErg app, you can look at your stroke rate in real time, and later in terms of cadence per split and for the whole piece. It’s all interesting data, if you are so inclined.

In pursuing a 10k in 40 minutes flat, I noticed lately that while my time hadn’t measurably changed much, I was starting to see lower stroke rates. This corresponded with both how blown out I fell after a hard effort (lower stroke rate felt easier) as well as things I was seeing both on YouTube and Reddit.

Having to wake up earlier for my new job, and again for summer hours at work (7:30 start time instead of 8:00), I decided to lean into lower stroke rates, but still try for the same power I’d need to get to a 40-minute 10k (2:00). I guess the idea is to increase your power while rowing more slowly.

So I exported by last season (2024) and this season (2025), the latter or which only started in May and so includes fewer data points. I restricted the data to distance-defined sessions: 1k, 2k, 5k, and 10k pieces.

Regarding my average stroke rate, I learned this:

Interestingly, my cadence for all four pieces is lower this season compared to last. So if my goal is to row at a lower cadence, what does that mean for my power?

Regarding my average power over the two seasons?:

My power is lower for all of the pieces… except for the 10k. I’d of course like to see the lower cadence pieces increase in power, but this is interesting.

Next: times (aka “work times”).

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out:

1. Glass: Glass started as an app on the App Store for iOS; it’s a Flickr-like service where you can upload photos, follow other photographers, and browse. The founders describe it as “a sustainable home for photographers.” I take a lot of pictures but I hate posting on FaceBook and Instagram save for once in a while. Glass lets me share.

2. The Boys: We just watched Season 4, and it was another good one, different than the first two. I want to write a post about Homelander, as he’s the most obviously disturbed character, but the whole shebang is pretty fucked up. When a former coworker mentioned it to me, I imagined a cop show. The Boys is most certainly not. The boys (Joey and Aaron) informed me that Homelander is a roman à clef for Donald Trump.

3. Glasstown “The Manor” Saison: I read an article on The Manual celebrating this style, which described the style as “subset of the farmhouse ale is often pale in color, is very effervescent (almost sparkling wine-like), and has a dry, lightly spicy, fruity, often yeasty flavor profile.” I grabbed a four-pack while we were out shopping for the holiday weekend. I’ve always liked the style, but I wouldn’t describe Glasstown’s version as yeasty. I had it with some passable Chinese food, and enjoyed the whole pint. Gluggable at least.

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out:

We finally got an über-modern car wash around the corner. Ran all of our cars through it, and took this pic of the fast ones:

See the most popular cocktail in every state with this map of the U.S.

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out:

1. Aeropress Go Plus: Leo and Micah mentioned this on on Ask the Tech Guys; it’s a travel Aeropress with an insulated tumbler you press the brew into.
2. Morning View XIII: Incubus’ Brandon Boyd on ‘Morning View’ Re-Recording, Tour, Lizzo (rollingstone.com) I found this while searching for something to listen to this weekend; Incubus re-recorded their 2001 album Morning View. This was my introduction to the band, so it was fun to hear it anew. You can hear the age in Brandon’s voice, but the versions are all great and looser versions of the originals.

…we did our very best to honor the songs in as many ways possible, but we did embellish here and there, and the embellishments that we made were things that have evolved out of live performances of the songs. So the versions that are on _Morning View XXIII_ are very true to the originals, but it’s almost as if we did real recordings of the versions that we’ve been playing live of them.

3. Glasstown 609 IPA): I may have include₫ this is a previous list, but it’s worth a re-mention. We can get it on tap everywhere around here, and it’s a great version of the style: hoppy, malty, high in ABV.

;

Aaron picked up some cheese and I griddled it up. It was really good, less salty than I expected.

I’ve been using the Eisenhower Matrix in Todoist to categorize my tasks:

1. p1 means it’s an important and urgent task; I probably don’t get any long-term fulfillment from this kind of task, but it has to be done soon.
2. p2 roughly corresponds to "decide" but is important, but not necessarily urgent. I don’t look at p2 tasks daily. These are long-term things to work on that have impact.
3. p3 tags are things I might be able to delegate to someone else or possibly take care of quickly, urgent but not important on the matrix.

This post on Twitter showed a novel rethinking of the Matrix’s quadrants. The key difference here is the language used for the four quadrants; I don’t remember seeing them put this way before: Do (p1), Decide (p2), and Delegate (p3). You don’t need to put "Deletes" in Todoist.

You find yourself in need of a second spritz, but dispirited by a lack of prosecco, having finished your stash with someone special. The obvious answers–beer? White Claw?–prove unsatisfying. You lapse into a moment of despair, but alight from this fog inspired: what if you subbed out the prosecco with some Chardonnay?

You extract yourself from the pool and trundle to the kitchen. Plenty of Aperol. Plenty of seltzer. Oranges, too. You pour some of the white stuff into a shaker filled with ice. Pour in the correct proportion of Aperol, 3:2 if you’re doing it right. You shake the mix up like Tom Cruise in a bad movie, strain into a glass with ice, and top up with seltzer and orange for garnish.

You pad back out to the pool, deliver the drink, and pretend you didn’t taste it and already declare it a worthy backup (but not a replacement for the real thing).

You done good.

Here’s this week’s list of things to check out:

1. Zwilling Double-Walled Wine Glasses: The challenge, if you will, of enjoying a cocktail by the pool (often, in our case, an Aperol Spritz), is enjoying the drink cold while it’s nearly 100 degrees outside. These glasses keep the drink reasonably cold in comparison to your standard wine glass.
2. Stoicism: You may have described someone as “stoic” when you meant alexithymic. But Stoicism, as a philosophical movement, is less about adopting an uncaring attitude than it is an unflappability when faced with things you cannot control. And plenty more. Memento mori.
3. Snapdragon-Powered CoPilot PCs: If you prefer Windows to macOS or are at least curious, but have found the Intel and AMD chips wanting in comparison to Apple Silicon, these things are the real deal. Fast, quiet, and well-specced, Copilot PCs have renewed the competitive landscape in the Mac vs Windows debate.

Still short of my 00:40:00 goal but I got back in my top 10 of ll time. Hopefully adjusting to my new schedule.

Usually the Chemex is my office go-to for a jolt, but it comes in handy for keeping flowers on the right side of mortality until I can get them home.