Scholarly Gainz

A while back I cleaned up my desk at home and found these white papers. I printed them like four or five years ago. At that moment, I realized I had implemented and have made sum scholarly gainz.

Watch “Hillerman Writers Conference (2015)” on YouTube

Going though my personal archive and realized I hadn’t shared these memories on-line! I really miss this conference and working for and with wonderful, creative spirits every year.

My Kind of Math

Dr. P and Rogan Hash it Out

Love this discussion and I agree 100%. It’s between Joe Rogan dropping F bombz with tough love and Dr. Rhonda Patrick, who has a Ph.D. in biomedical science and a B.S. in biochemistry- chemistry. This lady has done extensive research on aging, cancer, and nutrition in addition to the importance of mindfulness, stress reduction, and sleep. The latter being critical to me right now. 

Dr. Patrick’s studies improved her personal battles and her findings have shown that vitamin D “is critical to serotonin production,” and serotonin makes you happy. Less than 30% of Americans get adequate levels of vitamin D.” She says that when people feel “negative or low-energy,” that “it could be as simple as vitamin D.” You can read about that in 5 Foods for a Better Brain.

Calves on Fleek \(“.)/

BRAINS and BRAWN

I absolutely loved this article that I recieved in my inbox today. Down with stereotypes. We can be many, many things… never limited by the box that is drawn around us. ~~•Felicia
×××××××××××

BRAINS AND BRAWN: HOW SMART (OR DUMB) ARE WEIGHTLIFTERS?
Posted on: February 22, 2016
Posted by: Physical Culturist
Article by: Dresdin Archibald
for Breaking Muscle

Intellectuals Love Pop Culture

I had a great learning experience at the 2016 Southwest Popular/American Culture Association (SWPACA) Conference thanks to scholarship funds. If I can’t find outside funds to attend this conference again next year, I would gladly pay my own way. I thought ARMA San Diego was the best conference I had been to until SWPACA. I love being around like minded intellectuals. There is really nothing like it. I do want a PhD someday.

I made it a point to keyword search the program (which was close to 150 pages) for the words archive(s), culture, history, and New Mexico. I focused my time at the conference on those sessions for the greater good. I love learning things to benefit both my knowledge and my agency. Everytime I could, I supported New Mexico professors and students by attending their presentations. There was so much great research presented during this conference. I also made a presentation there.

I did attend a small handful of sessions that were chosen because of personal interest. One was a session titled “Myth and Metaphor in the Works of J.R.R. Tolkien,” which happened to be delivered by a University of New Mexico (UNM) professor. Another awesome presentation gave an analysis of “Penny Dreadful,” which I love, by a teacher from Texas. That session featured another presentation on the research of a UNM professor and student on violent video games and children. There was one on how Batman’s suit employs STEM!! Then there was one on fetishism and the villainess. You know I went to that one!!

The mission of SWPACA is “to promote an innovative and nontraditional academic movement in Humanities and Social Sciences and to celebrate America’s cultural heritages. To provide an outlet for scholars, writers, and others interested in popular/American culture, to share ideas in a professional atmosphere, and to increase awareness and improve public perceptions of America’s cultural traditions and diverse populations.”

Amazing…

Whatever It Takes

What will I do?
Whatever it takes.

•Digital composite by Felicia•

Dark Archivist Evolving

••• "Evolving" a papercut by Val Rangel of Ch'osh Lichii Designs for Felicia •••

I recently made a presentation for work during my friend Val’s history class. It was one night in October and was my Tales of a Dark Archivist presentation. This class of students from the Santa Fe University of Art and Design was large. I’ve presented to her students before, but these ones really listened and actually engaged, which is awesome! They asked so many questions and I knew that by the end of class I had really won them over.

It was also so sweet of Val to give me a unique “thank you” papercut. She is such an amazing artist and I loved the design!! The symbology in this piece was perfect, perfect, perfect for me… just perfect!! This email I received from Val was great as well. I hope I’m getting better with age baby! She recognizes that I am always busy, but I do like it that way. No matter how busy I am… I always make time for people that I love.

Archivists’ and Records Managers’ Identities

This post is a good read. I completely agree with #2, as #1 is a reflection of professional ignorance! The articles cited at the end are interesting as well.
~~F

Archivists’ and Records Managers’ Identities – Two Opinions: Different Species or United as One?.

An Educational Trippy Trip to the Lone Star State

•••Flight Out•••

Last week I went to a conference in Austin, Texas to make a presentation and accept a leadership award. I learned so much during the course of the week and networked with many people. I visited the beautiful capitol and the Texas State Archives while I was there. 

Austin is an interesting city to say the least, and I can see why they have the saying “keep Austin weird.” After 5 was always a trippy adventure… from the crazy street people, to the bat bridge, to good eats. I didn’t take photos of the weird stuff though!

Amongst a gazillion bars, there was one real gym. It was a Gold’s. I like having a few drinks occasionally, but a gazillion bars is a far cry from my cup of tea! In my off work/downtime, I had the most fun on Lake Travis on my last day there.

•••Amazing Stonework Here•••

•••TX Archives actually had up a NM Archives Poster and a View of the Capitol from my Hotel Room Window•••

•••D Loooooved This Car and Lady Bird Lake•••

•••Me and D on the Bat Bridge on Congress Street and Our Ride in an Electric Car•••

Crime Writing: Here is to a Killer Future

Yeah… I would say crime writing is a viable option for me. I knew that before I worked and attended day one of “Finding Your Inner Sleuth.” It was a great day. I love learning and with every bit of knowledge I get, I feel more and more empowered. I want to be both a physical and intellectual monster! I’ll be Queen of Iron and Ink!!!

All of the presenters did a great job today! I had such a good day. My bosses keep pushing me to write a book, and I’m getting closer to jumping. I love that I have found my place in the world of writers. I fit in there like hand-n-glove. I learned some interesting things from Detective Mark Manary, Christine Barber, Dr. Irene Blea, Laura Sanchez, and Don Bullis.

I’m looking forward to working in Albuquerque again tomorrow! I wanted to share some of the photos from today and a few of the more interesting things I learned. Here is to a killer future of crime writing!!!

Interesting things about Detective Mark Manary:

å He went into homicide work because he is the survivor of an unsolved cold case. In 1989, his father was murdered.

å His career in law enforcement started as a military cop with the Air Force.

√• He went to a Handwriting Analysis School, where he “learned so much about writing and the use of words.” 💜’ed that!!

å He is President of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP- Albuquerque Lodge#1).

å He had to read and look at data for six months straight to get up to speed on the West Mesa murder cases.

√• His first step as lead in the 118th West Mesa Murders Task Force was to secure the records room. He allowed only two keys. 💜’ed that!!!

Interesting things about Author Christine Barber:

√• She is an amazingly smart woman, former journalist/editor, and friend who I have known for years. 💜 her!!!

å She took the show hands down today!!!

å Her current research into the West Mesa murders will likely give Detective Mark Manary great tips.

√• She is working with an anthropologist who is using scientific techniques to conduct soil analysis for potential West Mesa murder burial sites. 💜’ed that!!!

√• As part of her research for her new book “Rules of Survival,” she has completely emerged herself into the world of sex workers in Albuquerque.

√• She is now publishing the “Bad Guy List.” It is a freaky scary, but informative printout which highlights Albuquerque’s criminal activity.

√• She knows a lot more than anyone I know about serial killers, sex acts, what they cost, who is involved, and the dark fate of Albuquerque’s sex workers.

√• I met Christine years ago… not as an archivist, but as a writer. I invited her to the archives to conduct research for her book “When the Devil Doesn’t Show.” That book is about David Parker Ray, the “Toy-Box Killer” from Mountainair, New Mexico. He was a suspected serial killer. Though no bodies have ever been found, Ray is said to have murdered at least 60 people between Arizona and New Mexico. Together, Christine and I uncovered possible burial locations on mining property owned by Ray.

An Ad to Attract Crime Writers

~~Ad Designed by Felicia Lujan~~

Today I received the final approval for an advertisement I designed last week. It is scheduled to run in the Albuquerque Journal on Sunday. I’m really excited to have been asked to design this particular ad for the 2015 Tony Hillerman Literary Landscapes Series. The ad is for a 2-day workshop titled Crime Writing: Finding Your Inner Sleuth (which we all know I have already found). I’ll be working the workshop on June 19th and 20th in Albuquerque at the South Broadway Cultural Center as part of the Wordharvest/Tony Hillerman Conference staff. The ad went through internal approval, as well as approval by the Cultural Services Department of the City of Albuquerque. When I sent it to the ad rep for the Albuquerque Journal, he said it was “beautimous!” I took that as a compliment being that he has seen so many! It will not look as good halftone, but it will run in a newspaper. I have been doing a lot of design work at night and I love it. I’ll be talking about some of the other projects I have going on soon.

Most of you know that I have been called “The Darkivist” and “The Dark Archivist” at work. This workshop is right up my alley. I have helped with research on several law enforcement investigations over the years. There are going to be 10 amazing speakers during this 2-day writing workshop, but there are two that are going to be very interesting. Detective Mark Manary will talk about being a member of the 118th Street West Mesa Murders Task Force. He has worked with the Albuquerque Police Department for 16 years. These murders mark a very dark time in New Mexico history. The buried remains of 11 women were discovered in 2009 by a woman walking her dog. The remains were discovered on the mesa in Albuquerque. The case is unsolved and the murders are believed to have been committed by a serial killer. Later that day, Dr. Irene Blea will talk about her research for her new book Daughters of the West Mesa. I’m really looking forward to the crime writing workshop.

The People’s Mission

Artificial Intelligence, Deep Neural Networks and Deep Learning: Oh My!!

♥In Love with Technology♥

I can’t explain how much I love learning about technological breakthroughs. I’m not scared in the least bit by much when it comes to the forefront of intellectualism. I recently read a hard copy article in the May 2015 issue of The Economist titled Artificial intelligence:
Rise of the machines. The byline says… “artificial intelligence scares people—excessively so?” Really? What a bunch of wimps!! People continue to fight enlightenment, progression and change to stay in boxes they have built. Not me.

At a speech in October 2014 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a scholar said that artificial intelligence (AI) was “summoning the demon.” People are paranoid that machines will take over in employment’s race for productivity. With industry powerhouses like Google and Amazon buying AI start-up companies, maybe human worries are justified? We will just find other jobs right? It’s called perseverance.

•Photo I snapped while reading the article in the library.•

Will computers continue to replace some of the things that people normally do? Probably. I loved this quote. “The torrent of data thrown off by the world’s internet-connected computers, tablets and smartphones, and the huge amounts of computing power now available for processing that torrent, means that their algorithms are more and more capable of understanding languages, recognizing images and the like.” Why didn’t I visit the San Diego Supercomputer Center many years ago when I had the chance? I also could have ditched my conference last October to go there! Now that would have been a real memory to cherish!

The article in The Economist said “signs of the AI boom are everywhere.” Google recently paid $400 million for DeepMind. Have you ever heard of DeepMind? If not, you should so check it out!! Pure awesomeness if you like video games. Just Google it and see. There is also a great article in The New Yorker which discusses how deep neural networks operate. Deep neural networks are used by companies like DeepMind. These artificial networks are much like the neural networks in the human brain. It is amazing to read about.

The newest form of AI tied to deep neural networks is now capable of “deep learning!” Computers can learn through the analysis of large amounts of data using algorithms. Freak out on the algorithm Facebook recently deployed. Did you think you were anonymous in that untagged photo? Think again… DeepFace “can recognise specific human faces in images around 97% of the time, even when those faces are partly hidden or poorly lit.” I want to be that smart and write programs like this. It’s not fair!! Male engineers created DeepFace and I give them tons of respect, but why are intelligent women often seen as  domineering? That’s not fair either.

•Smart Woman Army•

Another thing I found interesting in the article was that since most data is labeled by humans, and algorithms need that data to learn better, another race is on. It is a race to develop “unsupervised-learning” algorithms. This way, the need for human labeling is basically eliminated. How accurate will it be? I guess we will see. Artificial neural networks were invented in the 1950s by people with big brains who wanted bigger, faster, more accurate brains! I lovvvvve brains!! I am so not turned off by them!! Haha… These smart people were simulating the neurons and electrochemicals in a human brain to create artificial intelligence. It worked!!

♦"Just watch! Imma make my perfect woman!" (Dr.J before the chemical waste accident that birthed The Joker and this is not Harley Quinn)♦

If you are a brave fellow intellectual and enjoy all things mind blowing, you should read the article in The Economist. It so so worth the read. You can also learn about the interesting problem with AI. Do you know the one thing people can immediately identify that a computer simply can’t define? Porn… Yes… pornography. I guess machines provide plenty of access to porn, but don’t ask a damn machine to intelligently recognize porn lol. We can leave that type of analysis to the humans!