Hints of Spring — Janet Szabo

I’ve always said that spring in Montana happens slowly, then all at once. This year is no exception. We’re having a string of mild days here with temps in the 50s. I spent some time in the greenhouse yesterday afternoon, organizing and cleaning. I’ll be back out there this afternoon. Fruit trees will need to be pruned. And there is this mess to clear:

Infrastructure is always at the top of the spring to-do list. The husband will cut up the tree, stack logs to dry out, and replace the fencing.

I sorted potatoes—the ones in the root cellar have started sprouting—and will get more seed potatoes in town soon. I’ve got four classes scheduled to happen in the next three weeks. Easter is coming. Choir will practice after the service on Sunday. (I think the basses will like the song I chose for Easter Sunday. 😇 ) Our fire department auction is the first weekend in April. Literally every Saturday between now and Memorial Day has something scheduled.

This transition happens every year when we wake up from winter. Settling into a new routine takes some getting used to, and it almost always involves putting sewing on the back burner, at least for a few weeks. I am waiting for that tension assembly part for the Necchi BV to arrive, so the Portsmith Tote is on hold. I don’t want to start anything else. I’m going to put away the cold-weather fabrics and get out my tote of woven fabrics. The break from making clothing has been good, but I still need some blouses for summer.

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The podcast continues to grow. According to my download and listening stats, mine is in the top 25% of podcasts. It has all five-star ratings on iTunes and Spotify. I have gotten many nice e-mails from listeners. With one glaring exception, every podcast guest has been a joy to work with. (That person never made it to the recording stage.) I think the interviews are the best part—searching out interesting people, getting to know them as creative human beings, and introducing them to the audience. I do wish I could get a handle on Instagram; it frustrates me to no end. I might need to take some lessons.

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I dipped my toe into the world of AI (artificial intelligence) this week. I am not sure how I feel about it. Nicole Sauce of the Living Free in Tennessee Podcast and Jack Spirko of The Survival Podcast have been talking up AI for months now—mostly about how content creators can take advantage of it—so I signed up for a ChatGPT account. I asked it to write a description for last week’s podcast. The description was so good it was scary. Full disclosure: I did not use the AI description. I wrote one myself. I can see why educators hate AI. And I admit to wondering, as I was deep in sermon prep, what kind of sermon ChatGPT might write for me. Like many things, the quality of the output depends on the input. Asking detailed, coherent questions of ChatGPT results in better responses.

I have mixed feelings about AI. Just because humans can do something doesn’t mean they should, and I have zero faith in humanity’s ability to use technology responsibly. (Because kids in school will default to the path of least resistance.) I’ll probably continue to play around with it here and there, but I enjoy the challenge of writing too much to rely on ChatGPT regularly. I also suspect you’d be able to tell immediately if I posted an AI-generated blog post.

And you all know how I feel about excess technology in general. A writer named Amanda Fortini posted this on Twitter/X: The amount of persistence and grit one needs these days to get what were formerly minor tasks accomplished is kind of unreal. Like you need two of you.

Preach, sister.