View source for Blog:Fabrice/The last 1001 of my 3003 tweets

On this [[New Year]] and this Wolf Moon—as the World decides if it's time or not already to start the [[World War]]—I looked up, for my now [[Blog:Fabrice/The_1001_tweets|traditional Scheherazadean tribute]], at how my life gets snapshotted by {{X}} (ex‒[[twitter]]), through a selection from the last 1001 tweets that I posted on the platform.
--more--
You don't have to accompany me down the memory lane, but I don't care if you do. I got a Poisson burst of unrelated feedbacks these last weeks on me posting private things online. All from young people. In fact, from people of a different generation. One was surprised I even had my private address listed there. I replied that "in my time", everybody had their address listed in the phonebook. And also that nobody has showed up at my door, yet (and unfortunately).

When I was in high school, I actually once brought a couple of friends to the door of our teacher of technology, Mr. Raboisson, to hand over our work. At his private address—which I got from the phonebook—rather than in class. I was a prankster, I was constantly doing this sort of things, trying to perturb the universe in a way that would cause some reaction from someone or something. Mr. Raboisson came out in pyjamas, although it was well in the afternoon, to greet us at the gate of his garden. He was clearly disorientated, in shock of a situation which he didn't have time to process. But he still managed to provide some rapid comments on our papers. For me, this was pure theatrical gold, of course. I was telling him we were unsure whether he had wanted the results in octal form, and in front of this little committee seeking advices, in his PJ bottoms, he was magnanimously informing us that no, no, this was all right, that he had no doubt we would have been able to make the conversion if needed. With the full dignity one can have in pyjamas, he then thanked us for passing by and reporting our work, and went back home, saluting us with our papers in one hand, the door knob in the other and with this priceless expression of maximal confusion as to whether he should have been honored or upset by such a visit. The fact that it was several of us somehow seemed to have convinced him that this was some official matter. And people were civilized, then, so he treated us with maybe even more ceremoniality than if we had been in class, where he always wore a tie, which was rare even then.

Good memories. I was like that. I was feeling invulnerable. Was I? Or was I only pausing to impress my friends? Maybe... who knows? I don't.

Anyway, here we are today with more of me opening windows and doors on things that should be private. If that bothers you, don't look. I'm not expecting you to. Really. I'm always genuinely surprised when people tell me they've read this or that on my web. I had a web presence since before the Wikipedia, since even before Google existed. At a time when literally ''nobody'' I knew, not even this teacher of technology, was on the Internet. Go figure. Why am I doing it? Because it's a nice thing to do, to write, to commit yourself to squeeze an opinion out of your mind, to refresh your memory with an old picture, to talk to yourself. Are we even talking to anybody else but ourselves, anyway? And I have things to hide, sure, but not those. Things that I don't bring in the open, things that I hide—they exist—those, by definition, are private. We're on tautological grounds here. There are even things that I destroy. I just destroyed a big chunk of my privacy, of my inner world, no later than last night, with the Wolf Moon howling at me. How much more private and modest than that can you get?

But pictures of beautiful landscapes, of shared moments, of happy outcomes, of successful attempts at doing something, these I don't feel I should hide them. I know some people say you should respect the privacy of children and put a smiley face on them. To such people I say "Fuck you!" I don't put a smiley face on a child just as I wouldn't deface a relief of Horus and Isis in the Temple of Edfu, to "protect" and "preserve" something which cannot be shown, shouldn't be seen. I am a great admirer and devoted follower of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icon_of_the_Triumph_of_Orthodoxy Icon of the Triumph of Orthodoxy] that celebrates the victory of the iconic representations over the Byzantine iconoclasm that tried to suppressed them, like the [[Islamic]] prohibition to show images of living beings, because that is imitating God. But aren't we imitations of God? Isn't everything we do—which is good, that is—an imitation of God? Isn't calligraphy a most intimate and presumptuous imitation of God? What is this nonsense? And as for idolatry, I understand a painting is not [[God]] and I understand a child is not an object, but their suppression, their censorship, making them taboo, this is imitation, namely, of [[the Devil]]. It is, as is often the case, the other way around. I want to see and I want to show. God asked me to:
{{quote|14 You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds. |[https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205&version=NIV Matthew 5]}}

So here we go, in all my careless, insouciant pedantry, let me look at myself!

<center><wz tip="A british lake in the Peak District. We worried about the clouds obstructing the view, but it allowed us to actually touch them! (we're the little people on the top right)">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_190643.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My wonderful student, who reminded me what it means, to be French. I don't know how far he went. Probably not even up to Moscow, and if he did, I wonder if he came back.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_190741.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="An impromptu theater role for Julia during a National Trust visit to some local West Midlands heritage.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_190838.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Eduardo minutes after successfully defending his PhD thesis, in front of our Physics headquarters at Wolverhampton. Always the same face of quiet wisdom.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191015.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Julia and Luz enjoing a privilege not available in Spain: snow for Christmas.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191043.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Julia when she was British. She became comfortable, especially as compared to the last photo of my previous selection, and kept the cutest accent.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191132.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Alexey making us the honor to visit us at Wolverhampton to give an IOP talk, on topological physics.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191210.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="While waiting for the bus home, I'd spend considerable amount of time also waiting for the full moon, to look at this distant companion hovering over the brick skyline. It was so poetic. Here in its  Waxing Gibbous evening dress.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191313.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My old friend Tom Taylor in another IOP Lecture. I remember the thrill of bringing state-of-the-art physics to the public at large. It wasn't a job anymore but a mission; not even that, a blessing.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191411.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Eduardo on his 2nd thesis defense, this time listening to Serge Reynaud who couldn't come in person.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191532.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1650937416323047433?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Some of our Wulfrunian students showcasing sneaked pictures of their lecturers on some memorial day as I was closing the course. Here Ceri speaking and Dylan laughing. I miss them.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191839.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="A poem by Julia at a time where she was drawing everything with at least two pairs of eyes.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_191914.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="At the BSc graduation of some of our students. Luke, Katarzyna and Keyshawn.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_192717.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="A rare breed, the Master, Dylan!">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_192808.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Julia and a friend as we were pacing up and down the streets to ask for sweets. I hated doing that. They didn't like to like it so much either.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_192845.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My little Luce courageously crossing the event horizon. I've never seen her scared of anything; which is a bit worrying.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_192952.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1733871405572194328?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The newly appointed head of the Cavendish gave our last IOP Lecture in Wolverhampton. This reminds me that I should still upload his Lecture.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193039.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The last class in Wolverhampton. Online. How sad.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193115.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Now in Spain. A page of my life was turned. It was the page, if not of a full book, at least of a chapter.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193149.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Now with a new position. I hated pausing for this picture and I hate the result. ''This'' is exhibitionism.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193354.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="At least we were back to the Plazza Mayor.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193511.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="In Tbilisi, trying to reminisce of my first time being there, but feeling in a new same-place instead.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193543.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk, on my behalf.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193640.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk, on Eduardo's behalf.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_193708.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Now in Mexico, where we had bugs with the beer.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204130.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="I participated to the first Heavy-Light school there, in Etic Tlahuilli.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204224.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Online chairing of a session at ICLO.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204405.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The first Multiphotonics, where I could finally meet my hero: Andras Muller.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204458.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk, on what I did ten years ago in Munich. Rempe, at the front seat, didn't like the term 'bundler' and I told him that if not, I would have had to call it the 'Focker', which he liked even less.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204555.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The only way to eat the Weisswurst. A favourite pastime of mine, to do that in public, take pictures of it and plaster them all around the internet. The closest thing to pornography accessible to my petulant way of feigning invulnerability.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204736.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="With Camilo at the PEPS for breakfast before the conference. I ordered a 'mimosa', thinking it was some egg thing, but it was actually a champagne cocktail.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204809.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk at PEPS.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204838.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="On the anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing, with a Japanese temple artifact retrieved from the rubbles.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204914.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="With Dario Ballarini, trying the rotten shark.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_204944.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="With Michael Fraser. I also brought him to try the rotten shark, which he said, after an expletive, 'smells like a cleaning product'.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205030.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk at the PHP in Syros, on my simpler formula to compute areas of polygons which was rejected on Wikipedia for lacking a source!">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205243.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="A break with Luce on the shooting of 'The cat is mine.' Here with a small Tingles.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205322.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Bringing Miguel Bastarrachea to the Pedriza after his talk.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205455.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Amir, also after his talk, but to a different spot of the Pedriza and with different challenges.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205535.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My last Christmas in family.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205619.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Julia now bringing me to ice-skating, following years of reciprocated services.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205647.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Luce back from the Plazza Mayor.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205724.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="En route to Xiamen for the PLMCN, which Julia attended, thinking she was going to 'almost' Japan.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205811.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1908813349690781943?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My talk at the PLMCN.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_205854.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1909980306121314637?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Meeting Mikhail Glazov again, after years of uncrossing trajectories. Here localized in some Korean mountain woods.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210002.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Discussion at a Korean pub after a talk at the IBS where I was showing Dalibard naked.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210040.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1918573096849817613?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Photos from the organizers of my PLMCN talks, with polaritons and elephants.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210127.png|400px|link=https://x.com/fplaussy/status/1921113722665275645?s=20]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="This blessing was actually a curse. This one, Maki, didn't feed properly, and died the following days. They all looked like that at the time; uncanny that the one taken for the picture was the one which didn't make it.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210209.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The last tweet before Elena takes her big decision. The insouciance of the time... I was worrying on updating the mediawiki engine.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210309.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="One of my lectures in the Escuela-Congresso of Medellin, where I would meet someone that would .">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210408.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Choosing between being Honda or Isao, though being neither as not being Mishima.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210443.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="In charge of the 2nd Multiphotonics, but wanting to be elsewhere doing something else.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210514.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My reaction to Naroditsky's untimely death. By clicking on the little Grock button, I got to start having the AI interpret for me emails which were not open to interpretation.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210701.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="I was once there, and someone was standing instead of the reddish shadow, now looking like a splash of blood spurted onto the canvases.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210751.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My imitation of crouching tigers and hidden dragons for a Chinese audience.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210911.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Treated like a king by my hosts from Pavlos Savvidis' group: Pavlos (taking the picture), Alexandros, myself, Stelia and Natalia.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_210938.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="With Luz insisting to go down the ramp with her skaters.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_211013.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="The ending of Runaway Horses, as I entered myself into the final act of a project in part inspired by Isao's quest for purity. And which was equally mistaken.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_211051.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="Ending of Chap. 18 of the said project.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_211131.png|400px]]</wz></center>
<center><wz tip="My greetings for the new year, from my Medellin lecture, where I look like I'm contemplating what is finally left from all the past months.">[[File:Screenshot_20260102_211209.png|400px]]</wz></center>

See also a selection of [[Blog:Fabrice/Another_1001_tweets|the previous 1001 tweets]] on the period {{thisday|25|January|2019}}‒{{thisday|22|November|2022}}.