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Rob Teszka

@robteszka.bsky.social

220 followers 590 following 98 posts

I'm a former academic, semi-professional magician, and partially-trained clown who used to work on the railway and now gives historical walking tours. But I have interesting hobbies! ... Get tickets for my various shows at https://robteszka.ctcin.bio/

robteszka.ctcin.bio

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Nov 19

WHO IS THIS NERD

Hello! I am basically a wizard.

You may know me from the magic and storytelling I perform on the Fringe Festival circuit, the historic walking tours I lead with Forbidden Vancouver, or producing and hosting Vancouver's monthly Parlour Magic Show!

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · 4d

Well this is enormously enjoyable youtu.be/NZx9fAk22Qg?...

BOO!!! - A Halloween Music Video

YouTube video by Piemations

youtu.be

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · 5d

Excellent! May more hyper-niche essays hit your Venn bullseye.

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · 6d

I stumbled upon this wonderful, extremely niche essay about poetry, close reading, odd fads, T.S. Eliot, animal imagery, and the infamous cryptic crossword setter Torquemada: publicdomainreview.org/essay/beastl...

Beastly Clues: T. S. Eliot, Torquemada, and the Modernist Crossword

Just a few years after The Waste Land appeared — a poem whose difficulty critics compared to some “pompous cross-word puzzle” — Edward Powys Mathers (alias: Torquemada) pioneered the cryptic: a puzzl...

publicdomainreview.org

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · 25d

I think it would be pretty fun if, whenever someone would write

"THIS"

underneath a post they vociferously agreed with

They instead wrote

"Quite."

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Sep 1

"Some mornings it just doesn't seem worth it to gnaw through the leather straps."

- Emo Phillips

Just been thinking about this line more and more, recently...

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Aug 30

This article for @thetyee.ca is fantastic and wonderfully timed as I have just been thinking about how Vancouver seems to be afraid of standing out, fashion-wise--and yet whenever I'm out and about in period dress after a tour, so many people enjoy the hat & bow tie.
Wear what makes you smile!

Look Out, Vancouver! I’m Dressing for Joy | The Tyee

Regional blandness was getting me down. Here’s how I turned things around.

thetyee.ca

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jul 29

I am genuinely offended that Spotify's discovery playlist keeps recommending me electroswing no matter how much I don't listen to it

Reposted by Rob Teszka

Mary Gillis @marygillis.bsky.social · Jun 19

I genuinely think the reason execs were so certain AI could replace other workers is that they know it could replace them and they just assume everyone else does as little real work as they do.

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

We all agree that we like arts spaces & they make communities feel good & neighbourhoods nice to live in. Right?

And yet: look at what happened to The Giggle Dam in PoCo. And what happened to the Opening Nite Theatre in Mission.

Landlords and city halls shouldn't be able to kill venues so easily.

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

Would that even be possible? Would the landlord just be able to say "no. Dollarama will make me more money."? Would Pitt Meadows City Hall just say "that sounds like it'd be too much paperwork. denied."?

And if so: how the fuck are community-owned arts & culture spaces supposed to exist?

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

Ive been wondering: what if the community got together and raised funds to buy the Hollywood 3 and run it as a co-op performance venue? Keep one of the screens, convert the others into a stage for local theatre and/or a cabaret for comedy, improv & music. Apply for a grant, try and make it work...

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

The landlord is demanding an unreasonable amount, forcing them to close. And what for? To put in another fucking Dollarama!

I don't need to tell you this, but *we, as a society, need to decide we want to protect independent businesses, especially arts & culture spaces*

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

Oh hey, a petition to save one of vanishingly few independent cinemas in the Vancouver metro area: chng.it/HmbZ8pzrYV

The Hollywood 3--previously Harris Road Cinemas--fuckin *rules*. A local, independent, second-run house with cheap popcorn!

Guess what?

Sign the Petition

Save Hollywood 3 Theatre in Pitt Meadows

chng.it

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

I love this quote from the article:

"But the best ideas often come from wandering, from play, from slowness. Real understanding takes time. Sometimes, it takes failing. Sometimes, it takes boredom."

You cannot replace the process!

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

It is yet another way we are willingly giving up control to some other corporate-owned interest. They tell us its empowering: "anyone can make anything now!" Meanwhile, it's terribly, insidiously the opposite: nobody knows how to do it themselves.

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

...a capitulation. It's giving in to the corporate, industrial, product-oriented mindset. The only thing that matters is how much *stuff* gets done. But in so doing, we abandon understanding of the process, curiosity for other approaches, care for the people involved, and the benefits of learning.

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

This isn't a "but we have calculators so we dont need to do math"situation. Calculators don't replace problem solving. You still have to think about and understand the problem in order to deploy the calculator.

The enthusiastic uptake of LLMs by students and academic institutions is...

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

Having curiosity and working through a problem or trying to create something yourself are *vital* in not just learning things, but also--and I genuinely believe this--in having a full and complete human experience.

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

Like, there might be a way we could make it more energy-efficient, teach people to expect inaccuracy, make sure only people who consent have their data used, etc etc

But ultimately, it's still cutting out such a crucial element of learning

Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

(AKA fancy autocorrect)
which is that it's designed and encouraged to be used as a replacement for *process*.

All of the other ills are potentially fixable (barring the will of corporate interests preventing anything that harms their bottom line):

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Rob Teszka @robteszka.bsky.social · Jun 16

I really like this article by Ashima Shukla in SFU'S student paper, The Peak: the-peak.ca/2025/06/the-...

It captures one of the things that I fundamentally dislike about AI