Dan's Movements

A Simple Example

2012-02-02T11:35:00.000-08:00

Occasionally, people make far fetched claims about the flexibility offered by lisp.Here is a simple example: editing the source code of a running program.


(defun foo () t) ;; foo returns true when called
(loop (when (not (foo)) (return))) ;; call foo repeatedly, until it is false.

This is of course a simple while true do nothing loop.But then we evaluate this little bit on the same system in a separate interaction session/slime buffer.


(defun foo () nil) ;; foo returns nil/false when called.

Amazingly, our loop exits, returns nil, and we are back in business. This is of course a contrived example, but not so far from the mark in expressing the simple idea that editing a program at runtime can yield a lot of power.

A sigh of relief

2012-01-07T08:58:00.001-08:00

Wikileaks to Release 5000 Open Source Java Programs with Abstract and Final removed.

Somehow I found Steve Yegge's blog, and was drawn by some of the humor.

Busy Week

2012-01-06T16:40:00.000-08:00

We wanted to see "The Artist" on New Years Day, but the showing we planned on was sold out. Our second choice, "A Dangerous Method", left us with one hour of free time. The theater in Evanston has a Cost Plus next door, so we decided to while away the time in there. My wife found these very attractive blue leather chairs, and launched on a mission to replace our used Ikea chairs with the white slipcovers with these 'more adult' chairs. We placed a hold that day and borrowed a truck from someone who owed us a small favor for moving their things on New Years Eve. We were able to find a home for the other chairs with a friend the same day, and now we are back to a normal set of two chairs in the living room.

While at the friends apartment delivering chairs, I picked up her copy of "The Winter of Our Discontent" by Steinbeck and have since devoured it. I look forward to returning it with positive reviews.

Lately I've been reading through some of the published ACL2 'books' for inspiration. The system looks quite readable, and after wrestling for some time with Cyc, it's a pleasure to find something so aesthically pleasant. The modifications and extensions to the main CL functions are mostly removable from the axioms file, and implementing and testing some of the methods has been a relaxing pastime. Having the full source in /usr/share is a wonderful benefit to the curious. Anyone looking for hints on how to bootstrap lisp in lisp is encouraged to read through the beautifully documented acl2.lisp file, which sets up all packages and handles masking out the existing language while preserving the system's symbols in another area.

School starts Monday. I picked up my bus pass and last book yesterday. I look forward to the interaction and stimulation that a group effort to understand some thorny subjects will bring.

I've recently started using github. Somehow, within 24 hours, a friend from school had found me and followed me. Amazing how quickly information spreads. Nothing I've put there is particularly interesting, but it's useful to think I can have an additional backup, and starting to use vc is enlightening. I think I hear sourceforge slowly collapsing.

Beth left town tonight for the weekend. That leaves me to indulge in stuffed green peppers and Sabado Gigante. I can't wait to watch el Chacal de la trompeta eliminate some more contestants.

Branding

2012-01-05T16:22:00.000-08:00

xkcd: Brand Identity

In an unrelated note, I added "No Logo" to my wishlist yesterday.

Euler

2011-12-29T14:15:00.000-08:00

I finally got around to doing what I intended to do over the break, which was to make a little progress on project euler. I knocked out a few problems today, and will likely make some more progress between now and the 9th, when I go back to class. It's a useful activity if only to remember how to write what you mean when you have an idea and need a computer to do the boring parts. It's a challenging list of problems if you don't have a great mathematical preparation (guilty as charged). The best part is of course unlocking the forums, to see how others solved the same problem. Sometimes it's a radically different approach.

Gloves and Mittens

2011-12-22T08:17:00.000-08:00

Watching children dismantle the careful barriers their parents erect to keep them warm reminds me how much we all dislike wearing gloves. Watching babies removes their socks or booties makes me wonder how long it takes a young person to learn to ignore the discomfort of wearing shoes. Looking at the footwear of the women downtown makes me think we may have taken a necessary process far beyond its original intent. Those can't be comfortable at all, and seem not to provide much protection from the environment. The open-toed dress shoe is a strange beast.

Bridges

2011-12-20T14:11:00.000-08:00

One of the many simple ideas of economics is the principle of diminishing marginal utility. A single bridge linking two sides of the river has a very high marginal utility, boosting trade from one side to the other, opening opportunities to residents of both sides to conveniently work, shop or play on the other bank. However, any economic benefits derived from the first bridge will need to be revised downward for each additional bridge. Downtown Chicago has an enormous network of bridges over a rather small river, with the business core spilling over to the north and west from the loop. More or less every street in the central district bridges the river, since the river magically makes a 90 degree turn at wolf point, so that the loop is bounded by water on 3 sides. Although the short length of these bridges made construction less costly than longer bridges (Astoria or San Francisco), each bridge costs money to maintain, at approximately fixed levels (a low value bridge is likely just as troublesome to operate each year). I can see in the future a number of these being abandoned, and traffic routed over some of the remaining ones.

The government highway inspectors lament the sad state of the network of highway overpasses and bridges in the US, after considerable scrutiny followed the collapse of the I-35W Mississippi crossing in Minneapolis. The obvious answer is to pour more federal and state funds into repair and replacement of an aging infrastructure. Which is great, since the federal government of the US, just like that of Italy, Greece, Ireland, Iceland, Spain, Mexico and all the other countries of the world, can just print money indefinitely, and use its sterling credit rating to finance an over-sized network of roadways. Hmm...

Recent Thoughts

2011-12-18T20:34:00.000-08:00

So, this morning I was reading an article in this month's Harpers, where a woman had traveled to Cuernavaca with her daughter to learn Spanish. She noted the immediacy of the dead in the life of the host family. I started to think that maybe a great thing about having decidedly distant places for the afterlife is that the dead are not in the backyard complaining to you, wondering why no one cleans their graves, and generally being troublesome for the living. It may be that the progress of Christianity and its cosmology has allowed more freedom from the ancestors.

Second, I occasionally find myself thinking back to 'The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted' and the system of Individual Mutualism. When I was 12 (and read this), the existence of a long line of anarchist thinkers was far from my imagination, so any relation to historical mutualist theory was lost to me. I think I may want to add some of these 19th century thinkers, probably Proudhon more than Kropotkin to my reading list. It's a shame that anarchy and its philosophy have been hidden from young people by rather loud shouts from metal heads (do these still exist?). I think reading Chernyshevsky's 'What is to be Done' over my vacation this summer may have rekindled some interest in the matter. Any technical measures to bring this about should do a little reading into the history of mutual aid or friendly societies as they were known 200 years ago in the US. The big advantage of small scale local social units is that we won't require a revolution in the state to effect the kind of change and organization required to put these ideas into practice.

Unfortunately, the state and finance are balanced in favor of a debt driven consumption system, as anyone who has tried to get a mortgage for a coop can attest. My understanding is that a coop is owned jointly by the tenants, so unlike a condo, cannot be foreclosed at the unit level, only the whole building. This makes bankers hesitant to lend without security. It makes me wonder what other types of organizing property are prevented by the structure of lending and the legal system upholding property.

color themes

2011-12-05T15:37:00.001-08:00

Frankly I'm a little excited for emacs 24 to be released (I occasionally build and toy with the trunk to see what's coming). I'm really happy that elpa is going to be standard, color-themes is preinstalled, and life is generally good. Plus this will be the first time I actually care to maintain my .emacs in a version aware fashion, since I'm not sure there aren't things in 23 that I can't live without.

But anyway, I'm using solarized-dark, which I find I almost can't live without now. I would probably give the author a few dollars if he somehow held me hostage, it's that nice. It was worth installing color themes in 23 just to get this feature working.

A million little languages

2011-12-05T13:18:00.001-08:00

When we drop down to the algorithm level, I think OO can seriously thwart reuse. In particular, the use of objects to represent simple informational data is almost criminal in its generation of per-piece-of-information micro-languages, i.e. the class methods, versus far more powerful, declarative, and generic methods like relational algebra. Inventing a class with its own interface to hold a piece of information is like inventing a new language to write every short story. This is anti-reuse, and, I think, results in an explosion of code in typical OO applications.

Rich Hickey, from Code Quarterly.

Republic of Letters

2011-12-04T12:55:00.001-08:00

So I thought recently about all the books I've had to read, and those I've read for pleasure.I'll omit purely technical works and focus on literature.

High School Assigned Readings

Romeo and Juliet
Julius Caesar
As I Lay Dying
Things Fall Apart
The Awakening
The Old Man and the Sea
Ethan Frome (didn't read it)
The Red Badge of Courage (also didn't read it)
Fahrenheit 451
Animal Farm
Thus Spake Zarathustra (I'd read it once and followed up to do a term paper)

College assigned readings

Hamlet
Henry V
History of the Peloponnesian War
Crito
Phaedo
Apology
Symposium

Personal Reading (In no particular order)

The Trial
The Castle
Amerika
The Stranger
Man in Revolt
Essays of Montaigne
Republic
Why I am Not a Christian
Power
Conquest of Happiness
Marriage and Morals
The House of Mirth
Farewell to Arms
In Our Time
Mrs Dalloway
The Years
Orlando
To the Lighthouse
This Side of Paradise
Adam Bede
Middlemarch
Silas Marner
Moll Flanders
Felix Holt, the Radical
Daniel Deronda
Vanity Fair
Pride and Prejudice
Emma
Jane Eyre
Wuthering Heights
Sense and Sensibility
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Rameau's Nephew
D'Alembert's Dream
The Gay Science
Geneology of Morals
Ecce Homo
Beyond Good and Evil
The Antichrist
Crime and Punishment
Anna Karenina
Brothers Karamazov
The Merchant of Venice
King Lear
Macbeth
Titus Andonicus
Timon of Athens
Pericles
Dead Souls
The Nose, The Overcoat, How Ivan Fyodorovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovitch
Plays of Aeschylus
Plays of Sophocles
Plays of Euripides
Brideshead Revisited
Devil in Paradise
Tropic of Cancer
Stand Still Like the Hummingbird
The Air Conditioned Nightmare
Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch
The Crime of Father Amaro
The Master and Margarita
Faust (Goethe's version)
Angle of Repose
The Mill on the Floss
1984
Point Counter Point
Island
Brave New World
My Antonia
Hard Times
Great Expectations
Our Mutual Friend
Bleak House
Franny and Zooey
Nine Stories
Dubliners
Foundation/Robot cycle
Dune cycle

github

2011-12-03T09:37:00.000-08:00

Well, I added an account (and some code from Project Euler plus some coursework) on github. I will see how useful this becomes to me. I'm not sure how the public keys will work if I commit as the same person from multiple machines. I will have to experiment with that further.

Resolution

2011-12-02T17:19:00.001-08:00

Whereas chickpeas have firm, non-porous outer husks.
Whereas chickpeas have high moisture content within.
Whereas microwave ovens excited water molecules more efficiently than anything else.
Whereas heated water expands and steams, pushing outward material around it.
Whereas a steaming chickpea tends to crackle and pop.
Whereas conventional ovens are perfectly capable of heating delicious foods without massive messes.
Whereas pots are dishwasher safe, while microwaves are hard to fit into a dishwasher.
Finally, whereas once is enough to learn our lesson.

Therefore, let us resolve to not place a plate of uncovered chickpeas in the microwave, regardless of how much time we may believe we'll be saving. Let us further resolve to just take a sharpie and cross off any references to the microwave oven.

gcc does binary search in switch (not nested if blocks)

2011-11-26T10:48:00.000-08:00

So I started looking at Write Great Code, and one of the examples he offers is a comparison of a switch(x) versus if(x==1) else if (x==2) else if ... there were 1-4 matching and a default case.

so I threw that together into a dummy source file, asked for an assembly output, and looked. I was a little surprised to see this:
movl -4(%rbp), %eax
cmpl $2, %eax
je .L4
cmpl $2, %eax
jg .L7
cmpl $1, %eax
je .L3
jmp .L2
.L7:
cmpl $3, %eax
je .L5
cmpl $4, %eax
je .L6
jmp .L2

It looks like it peeks into our variable (argc gets loaded into eax for this example) and starts a binary search of the possible literal values it expects. I didn't turn on any extra optimizations, so I assume this is just a practical good idea. I feel slightly less dumb (at the machine level) feeding ploddingly literal switch statements to gcc now, though I still feel like a chump typing them.

The nested if blocks follow a more familiar pattern... is it 1? well, is it 2? Ok, is it 3? Hmm, what about 4? Well, I give up, lets take this else else else else action. I guess its nice to know this. It may be a reason only a literal can be used in a switch, that the language designers were expecting this type of optimization on the back end.

My take-away from this is that if there is a higher probability of some options, nested if/else blocks make sense. If the possibilities are equally likely, switch makes sense. If the purpose is to guard against bad things (dereferencing a null pointer) if/else is a necessity, and it's proper that gcc didn't optimize it away (it would be disastrous if it did!)

Javascript and Flash

2011-11-26T08:02:00.000-08:00

It's funny how little of the modern web works when you turn noscript on. It's refreshing to see all the broken assumptions developers have (especially the number of sources a script might come from). I imagine that a graceful fallback (fairly sure weblocks does this, and google has a broad range of feature levels for their services) in the absence of javascript would be a usability requirement for any serious site. The number of pages with inescapable flash intro splash screens, or worse still, entire ui's in flash, seems to be on a decline. That's good...

Thoughts on Control Software

2011-11-26T07:24:00.000-08:00

I used to work for an electronic controls company, and I recently started thinking big picture about how the software was laid out. When I was knee deep in the details, I had a mind full of notions about what was going on. Fundamentally, I think this is my takeaway.

Object Oriented design makes a good deal of sense when you really are modeling the behavior of physical objects. Many of the basic principles were there, like a powered down smalltalk system. The design tools were essentially object databases which were compiled into microcode for the appropriate hardware. On the large scale (full building to campus scale) systems, the compartmentalization was fairly rational. So to design a building, you divide it into floors or other reasonable real world divisions (maybe an exterior area for all outdoor controls), then divide those into rooms or suites of rooms. Within a room, you add controls and controllable objects (lights in my case, but it could easily have been other items). Some systems provided default behavior for free, which could be customized afterward (a light switch in a room automatically turns lights on and off until you program it otherwise). Some systems did not do this at all, but had a much richer set of allowable programming. For example, the residential system used a separate hardware and software system targeted to third party integrators, while the commercial system was essentially an internal tool. Building the database essentially consisted in reading the construction diagrams and adding each unit and its function into the database.

This model (Object Oriented drag and drop database tool) had its limitations. For example, a common residential control had a large on/off button, which supported a double-tap as a special command, and a raise/lower rocker off to one side. The raise lower were likely to be left alone, since there are few sensible overrides, but double-tap could be adjusted to do just about anything. Just about... It seems one downfall of the OO ideology is that some objects support a different set of methods than others. So while a multibutton keypad could handle fairly complex conditional behavior, this was not allowed in the single button toggle switch, even from double tap. This behavior was not extensible at runtime. Many of the buttons allowed chaining other buttons (sending a keypress event) to allow some impressive logic. Some types of controls did not support this 'dolikepress control key' method. Sadly, the workaround was that it did allow sending rs232 commands from the onboard serial port. I once had to install a few loopback wires to tie com1 to com2 so that the second class control could implement first class behavior (using the rs232 serial command to send a press event to a key which could handle the command I needed). This of course was done with cryptic string literals. Try showing someone how that's done and expecting them to be able to replicate it.

One other thing I saw while I was there was the evolution of the granularity of control. The company moved from a circuit based centralized concept to a distributed item level design (with a mix and some tension between cabling controls to the nearest connected device or back to a central hub). This introduced a new level of complexity (in that rather than addressing a unit as 12, attaching it to wire 3 running back to the hub, it now was indirectly accessed as the control attached to device 20 on link 4, etc) but freed up the electrical topology and cut costs of cabling for installers. I see how on the business end this made a great deal of sense. There also was a general tendency to move away from addressing (via dip switches, in software menus etc) to serial number addressing. Unfortunately, the database design ideas still required a set address/location pair for the design, and some time was spent on each installation associating control serial numbers with database id's. The goal was to make replacement simple, with only removal and replacement sufficient to allow the hub to infer the new devices behavior, but this had problems if there was more than one failed item on a cable (since there could be no unambiguous solution, the system did nothing) or multiple replacements at a time. This led to some interesting hangups where power was removed from a portion of a floor (not uncommon in construction). In the end, some manual intervention in the software was required to overcome this hurdle (in the several years since I left, I imagine this has been corrected, since manpower costs money).

On the whole, although I found the drag and drop available actions easy to explain, but it failed to abstract away the details, since the desire to maintain programmability and flexibility (yes, we can do that) outweighed the need to provide an intuitive and flexible system for end users. Really, the end user only wants the lights to turn on when he hits a button, and the support/maintenance team that inherits a beast of a control system is used to dealing with 10 different hardware control platforms.

I think the BACnet integrators are making a good deal of headway into alleviating this pain for the building managers, though not coming from a ladder diagram world, I found programming with Vizio a little queer. But having one software control system to view AC, alarms, security, lights, and handle all timed control events is a big win for the maintenance staff.

Google Nonsense

2011-11-18T21:31:00.000-08:00

So I have this recollection (badly) of something I read, that some people would rather spend a lifetime making a X second process into a Y < X second process, and these are the real agents of change in the world. It's totally botched, google wants to direct me to 20 pages about personal finance, miscellaneously grouped quotes don't help. So I obviously misremember some wonderful comment about engineering perfectionists, and if anyone finds this and would love to help, it would be much appreciated.

Arlo Guthrie

2011-11-18T20:23:00.000-08:00

And friends, somewhere in Washington enshrined in some little folder, is a study in black and white of my fingerprints.
...
And friends they may thinks it's a movement.

Why don't more people sing Alice's Restaurant on Thanksgiving? Grr, Sometimes I miss you, Kevin.

What's wrong with jobs postings?

2011-11-18T19:37:00.000-08:00

Why not require strong problem-solving skills and desire real-time multithreaded c++ experience? I can see requiring strong communication skills but desiring excellent ones, but this list is indicative of what's wrong with job postings. I would think that a person with 'strong problem solving skills' would be able to identify how they were under-qualified in ASP.net and rectify it quickly, while someone with FIX and ASP experience who somehow was weak in communication and problem solving would fail to correct the remainder of their (doubtless numerous) deficits, since they perhaps fail to identify them.

Were I hiring, I would move ability to communicate, work in a team, solve problems seriously to the top of the requirements list, and figure the rest is trainable for desirable people, in other words, desirable... I understand business is tricky, there is an army of duds out there trying to find a job, and your job's on the line when these things fall through--but, really, who writes these things? Who applies? Liars and folks who won't work there long. Seriously, pay 10-20% less and get someone who will learn things your way, rather than hoping the 'ready day one' candidate who shows up knowing you have only money to offer them (rather than seeking to learn from your long heritage of market leadership) will apply in a timely manner and settle for the proper salary.

Qualifications and Education Requirements:

· Real-time, multithreaded C++ software development using data structures and performance optimization techniques

· Knowledge of Financial Information Exchange (FIX) protocol

· System Life Cycle experience, data storage strategies

· Experience Derivative trading system development.

· Strong written/verbal communication skills – particularly interfacing with customers

· Bachelors’ degree in Computer Science or related field required. Masters preferred

One year of experience minimum

Preferred Skills:

Strong problem solving and analytical skills.
Excellent communication skills.
Professional work ethic and a team contributor.

Playing around with graphviz

2011-11-17T06:00:00.000-08:00

In my data structures class we've been talking about binary trees. One of the example programs used a stack and space counting to display the tree to the console in a very fortran way. I mentioned to my instructor that using dot would be much simpler, just generate the dot file, hand it off to graphviz, and read the svg/png when you've finished.

Initial experiments were unsatisfying, since a node with only one child tends to have a vertical bar straight down, giving no indication which link (left or right) it is attached to. So I threw some color in, with blue indicating a left/less than link, and red indicating a right/greater than link. This was simple and easy to see. I couldn't shake the suspicion that there was a way to push the links to the right sides, and started thinking about making tables within the records with named ports, but this seemed to be more trouble than it's worth, and I didn't understand why the example code worked, but my hand edited version went unrecognized. Then I remembered reading that invisible edges to invisible nodes will make graphviz count more nodes at a level than there are. Observe the 'balanced' image:

and the unbalanced original:

Honestly, I prefer the density of the original to the strange, warped feeling of the corrected version. In many cases, the links still point downward (especially on outer branches pointing in), but some sense of angular proportion can be felt. With the original, most of the nodes at any given depth are bunched together, giving a sense of feel for the completeness of that level, while the corrected/balanced image has (artificially inserted) gaps to create angular distinctions between left and right, which makes seeing across more difficult.

A rather weird twist, I tried only inserting dummy nodes on the left and leaving the right alone to see what might happen. This is from a different data set, so the overall shape is different, but see how wrong this became:

While I'm at it (complaining)

2011-11-06T17:47:00.000-08:00

I really think Marmalade is great (emacs package site). I really wish installed packages weren't shown as installed if they error out. But getting up to speed quickly (starter-kit) is great, and it works everywhere... makes a more consistent ui possible when you work on multiple machines. It's almost as pretty as quicklisp for elisp packages. And again, after an upgrade, I find that ditching as many of the native packages in the lisp arena as possible is a must. Step 1, install sbcl. Step 2, build a fresh and current sbcl, step 3, uninstall sbcl, redirect /usr/bin/lisp to /usr/local/bin/sbcl. Uninstall common-lisp controller, install slime/swank, install quicklisp, and proceed with the rest of the world.

ELPA looks like a nice second if for some reason you aren't nearly as excited about marmalade as I am. Really, including failed packages as installed is my only gripe.

Seriously, Ubuntu?

2011-11-06T17:11:00.000-08:00

Every six months I foolishly endure another distribution update from the jokers at Canonical. This fall's oneiric ocelot was no lack of surprises. For once, I didn't revert to classic, and have struggled to work through unity (I think there are people who like this, I doubt they use a trackball). Although I am growing less opposed to the poorly thought out hovering scrollbar, I still am not able to adjust.

My number one complaint, besides the absence of the nice footprint menu with a categorical grouping of installed applications, is the second class status of the terminal, perhaps the one program I use the most. Open a terminal (if you didn't figure this out, it's C-M-t, now switch applications to something else, M-tab, now try to get your terminal back? It's absolutely invisible, like a second class citizen. Clip it to the Launcher (dock). Can't see the window list? Not there... open 20 terminals, try to get to any of them... Curiously, they had to purposefully exclude this, since a dumb old xterm works just fine and is a first class citizen.

Really, I think the move to netbook optimized interfaces is going to leave unhappy dinosaurs like me migrating to a sane environment. I started using Window Maker again on my primary laptop (still on 11.04 since I see no reason to ruin two computers) and apart from manually having to handle pm-hibernate and nm-applet, it's rock solid and a positive environment. I can live with compiz not making my windows wobble while I move them.

I guess it's user friendly to make the terminal a one shot deal, but that's what M-F2 used to do, rather than conjuring a powerless launcher that looks like a heads up display for an action game. It used to call up a 'run' dialog. Hail the 'run' dialog.

More reasons why C++ gives me headaches

2011-10-23T09:31:00.000-07:00

This gem is from the wikibook More C++ Idioms, to get the address without needing a valid operator&. Enjoy the cast once, cast twice, wait, I didn't mean char at all goodness.


template 
T * addressof(T & v)
{
  return reinterpret_cast(& const_cast(reinterpret_cast(v)));
}

Don Quixote

2011-10-21T17:59:00.000-07:00

Just bought a ticket to see Don Quixote this Sunday. Anyone? $40 for the Joffrey Ballet? I'll just go alone.

Contemplating Spring

2011-10-19T04:47:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm thinking these are the things I'd like to take (from what's available).
I need Abstract Algebra and Writing (required), and I think I'll add to that Algorithms, Theory of Computation, Graph Theory, and Financial Mathematics. Then I believe I'm done. There are a hundred things I think I'd have liked to take, given the time, and perhaps a nice graduate school will consider my case, but if not, it's off to find work.

Intermediate Values

2011-10-08T05:55:00.000-07:00

We were talking about the intermediate value theorem (can't get from here to there without sometime being in between them) in my real analysis class and the thought occurred to me that the interval is a very restrictive notion. How does this generalise to more dimensions?

Is there a natural way to extend the IVT beyond real valued functions? I could see that the length/radius of a set of points in R^2 or C would have this property (since we have length in R, and the curve is continuous implies the changes in its distance are continuous), but I don't see what it means for say the helix f:R-->R^3 where f(t)=(cos(t), sin(t), t) except when considered as three separate continuous functions. (i.e., let a = 0, b = 2*pi, and see that nothing more can be said than that there exist z values between 0 and pi for which the z component of f(t) obeys the intermediate value property).

Is the problem in the notion of an interval, or of betweenness? Is there a better way to describe this phenomenon when talking about parameterised curves?

Seriously, Emacs is a winner

2011-10-01T14:52:00.000-07:00

Anyone using rfcview? This is about as useful as an umbrella in a rain shower! The fact that I just give it a number, and it fetches a well formatted text file for me is a feeling of power. When was the last time your editor gave you a feeling of power.

The gdb integration is superb, and I'm on my way to making it my primary email editor (largely due to finger inertia, after a few hours of write compile debug, it's easy to forget how to use more 'friendly' software.) How do you kill a line in Evolution, anyway?

I recently forced w3m to start working, which is pretty slick as far as non-javascript powered browsers go. It's a lot prettier than lynx.

As if slime weren't reason enough.

Quicklisp

2011-09-18T13:53:00.001-07:00

I think Quicklisp is incredible. I may have to add this


(ql:update-all-dists)

to my list of things to do once in a while. If only I had an automatic alert when a new sbcl version was released. Painful is the way when you are one or two point releases back.

Sometimes I'm ashamed

2011-08-23T19:34:00.000-07:00

to write such ugly things. This clearly was a trial-and-error design. Strip away all the comments, and mourn your 'cleverness' ever after.



long fib(long n){

  long a[3] = {1, 0, 1};

  int i = 1;

  while(n > 0) {

    a[(i+2)%3] = a[(i + 1)%3] + a[i%3];

    i = (i+1)%3;

    n--;

  }

  return a[i];

}

Of course, you could define a class of integers mod n, and replace int i with
modular i = new modular(3);

Adwords sometimes gets me laughing

2011-08-13T04:56:00.001-07:00

Notice the ad? I keep clicking on the spam folder, and I keep getting great recipe ideas for Hormel's magic meat.

C++

2011-08-12T11:33:00.001-07:00

It looks like I will have to add STL/C++ to my repertoire to deal with the Data Structures class I start in a little over a week. I picked up the second edition of Stroustrap's book (dated but beautiful) for $2.5 from a local used book store and will chew through it. Sometimes it's funny how much I enjoy dead tree editions of computer books, even with the lack of copy paste. I have an electronic 3rd edition, but I think I'll get through this in the meantime.

So, when playing around with Java over the years, I've actually found BlueJ to be one of the best working environments, largely due to the support for runtime creation of objects, and allowing exploratory programming. I think I'll use a mix of Code::Blocks and good old Emacs for the time being, but does a better solution exist? One in which files are presented as the parts of a class hierarchy and methods can be invoked in an interpreter. Code::Blocks seems straightforward enough for creation of boilerplate constructors, destructors, assignment operator, and copy constructors, automatically making headers and implementation files and including header guards.

As an aside, is there an IDE with built in support for TDD in C++? It seems like TDD might be my next side adventure in self-growth. I recently saw a few people from 8th Light give a live demo in python and ruby of a simple TDD walk-through for a trivial change counter. Having never taken principled software creation practices seriously (no more than sane names and proper decomposition of functionality, an 1970's level solution), this was intriguing. Not going to run out and buy Uncle Bob's books, but I'd like to see what proper unit test first program design feels like.

Constantly I need to suppress the 'knowledge' that C++ is a steaming pile of horse manure to dive forward and gain competency. Really, could you find a way to write const any more times in a declaration? Isn't there a better semantics for specifying this sort of compiler hint? One const to say that the arguments are unchanged, one const to say that the object is unchanged, one const to say that the return type is immutable. All using the same word, all dependent on context. I pity the programmers who are forced to think like the compiler to get work done. Although I was reading a talk by Kiczales Why are Black Boxes so Hard to Reuse where he points out numerous times the danger in an implementation deciding in advance what a typical use case will be.

Music

2011-08-09T10:15:00.000-07:00

I've been toying with a few music services lately (I used to enjoy last.fm but it seems to have stagnated lately, and the gnome move away from rhythmbox leaves a poor substitute in banshee for this service.)

So two that I have tried are shuffler.fm and wearehunted.com, both installable via the chrome web store. At first I thought We are hunted was really good, but I get a little sad about the selection (seems to be finite, and non-adaptive to rating). Of course, there may a dozen ways to personalize my experience that I haven't explored, but I haven't toyed too much with it.

Shuffler.fm seems to aggregate music blogs, and pick music linked from them. The plus side of this is that a good deal of the music is downloadable while you listen. Since I'm one of the five people on the planet without an iPhone and permanent internet connection, downloads still seem like a great idea to me (it turns out that buying 1-2 terabytes of storage per year is cheaper than mobile internet).

All in all, I appreciate being exposed to these services, and the new music they are introducing to my ears.

Troubling

2011-07-24T12:38:00.000-07:00

I just noticed that my bag of coffee beans from Aldi has clever badges stating that it is a gluten and lactose free food. I'm suddenly reminded of xkcd's take on this trend .

Sadness

2011-07-23T06:08:00.000-07:00

One of the worst parts about running a nonstandard operating system on a nonstandard architecture is compiled packages. Amazon correctly noticed I appeared to be running linux, and went more than half way in offering a compiled .deb file for debian/ubuntu. Alas, 4 seconds later, I find it's a 32 bit package, and can't find a 64 bit package. A few fumbling --force-architecture mistakes later with dpkg, and I now have installed a mess of broken dependencies.

How did I dig myself out of this? Launch wine, install firefox for windows, install cloud player/mp3 downloader, and go. Interestingly, wine (as close as I can tell) only supports win32, while my linux seems to choke on dynamically linked 32 bit executables. Years ago I had a debian 32 bit sandbox installed in a chroot environment for dealing with this, but the sands of time make even Ozymandias look weak.

Oh, L No!

2011-07-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

Speak English or Cry

I was coming home from work on a weekday afternoon, 5:45 or so. The train was pretty packed — all seats taken, lots of people standing, but not crammed in tight. There was a guy near me sitting in one of the single seats. Late 40s, balding, librarian glasses, very old button-down shirt and faded jeans, the uniform of someone who’s worked 30+ years in one place. He’s staring out of the window, livid, clearly came onto the train with his own sets of worries.

Standing above him in the aisle were two early 20s men speaking in Spanish. Not loud, just conversational, no louder or quieter than anyone else on the train.

All of a sudden, the man turns to them, eyes bulging, teeth gritted, nearly in tears, and he loudly hisses “SPEEEEAAAAK…ENGLIISSSSSSSHHHHHH!!!!”

The two men, without missing a beat, start speaking English, but a very exaggerated, “Masterpiece Theatre”-style English. “Oh, very well…would this be the manner of speaking which I ought to be engaging upon, sir?” etc. They continued their conversation to each other in this exaggerated English accent for the rest of the ride, while the man stared out the window, fuming but clearly embarrassed at his outburst.

Street Fighting Mathematics

2011-07-17T08:47:00.000-07:00

I stumbled on this book and course (18.098) available both in print from MIT Press and as a download (earlier edition) from OCW here . I'm perusing it a little now, if it contains half of the heuristic greatness it says it does, I expect to enjoy this and gain a good deal from it. In math, so much effort is wasted on fruitless approaches that a little reasoning would rule out early.

So, thanks to the author Sanjoy Mahajan for making this available to us all.

Priority Inbox

2011-07-14T09:50:00.000-07:00

I'm always surprised when Gmail adds a new feature, as I mainly use IMAP with evolution. So I had to do a little reading to understand why I had a new folder called Important. I think I read about it a few weeks ago, and didn't think much of it. I don't know how much use I will get out of this, but it's an interesting idea. The problem I think is that I tend to save and read a lot of nonsense, which is anathema to the perceived use pattern they are training against. However, the evolution mail clients 'mark as important' doesn't equate to gmail's mark as important, so I think I may have to just ignore it.

Maybe it's because I have too much time, but I often do read all the lottery winning and bank transfer appeals. When a Nigerian prince finds his way to the important folder, I will truly have defeated the system (not the case, thankfully).

Alphascript Publishing

2011-07-11T20:00:00.000-07:00

I'm horrified that someone has the brilliant idea to bind 80 pages of wikipedia content and sell it for $40. I'm impressed that someone used the terms of free documentation licensing to make a buck, but even with a giant medallion on the cover stating that it's 'quality content from wikipedia', I think I feel bad for the first dozen people who shell out for this. Don't I recall a nice little pocket wikipedia device running from a sd-card priced about $100? Curiously, the publisher's office is in Mauritius (a tiny island country off the coast of Africa), never suspected that to be a hotbed of literary creativity.

I hope their 'portfolio' includes more than just reprinting free content at high prices...

Philosophy
Nearly all media worldwide – such as newspapers, magazines, TV – use internet for their researches and as a basis for their texts. This is exactly what Alphascript publishing does. And we go even further: with the Wikipedia-texts at free disposal we create books on interesting topics.
There is hardly another platform for quick and better processing of information than by Wikipedia – and this is too for the benefit of the Alphascript publishing-readers who want to be informed on a specific subject. Of course you can have online everything free of charge, but for good reason you have decided for a book. Alphascript publishing is internet in form of a book. There can hardly be a faster process.

Finally a nice program!

2011-06-10T08:30:00.000-07:00

Java Decompiler

Having seen the mess that 'reverse compilers' or disassemblers typically provide, I am awestruck at the quality of this Java decompiler. Now I just need to avoid getting into trouble by peeking where I shouldn't.

If anyone cares to try it, the installation (or lack thereof, unpack and execute) was a breeze, and the product is beautiful.

Blast from the Past

2011-06-01T21:16:00.001-07:00

Don't bother asking why, or how, but I was finally getting around to setting up shared key authentication for the accounts I use, and I launched a help location from Sun Project Workshop (itself running as an inferior process from XEmacs). Up pops Netscape 3.0 for Solaris.

It must be that nobody test for Netscape 3 compatibility anymore, since every external site I went to had multiple issues (Did php exist in 1996?) Javascript must have changed quite a bit since then, and SSL was pretty much not ready to be used (couldn't start encrypted connections). I didn't check if the version of netscape had valid 128 bit encryption, there was a painfully long period of 40 bit export restrictions.

Dying Suburbs?

2011-05-29T22:49:00.000-07:00

Crains Chicago Special Report

Man, my overpriced condo seems like a smarter idea every year. (Not minding four and a half dollar gas...)

2011-05-29T09:41:00.000-07:00

Horrible Moments in the History of Philosophy

"411 and 404 B.C.E.- Students of Socrates set about demonstrating their teacher's key claim that the study of philosophy makes one more ethical. First, they destroy religious statues and help the Spartans defeat their own city state of Athens, and then they institute murderous reigns of blood upon the struggling democracy. This is all topped off by establishing violently class-based dictatorships. Sadly, both dictatorships were short-lived in Athens, and it would be over two millenniums before the philosopher king (and student of Plato and Rousseau) Pol Pot was able to finally achieve a lasting society based on Socratic principles."

And so much more...

Stupid Government

2011-05-24T20:09:00.001-07:00

It turns out that Firefox 4 for linux is not a supported browser, and that I cannot continue to even attempt a FAFSA application without either windows or mac os and an approved browser (Firefox 4 on either of those works fine).

Good old User Agent Switcher to the rescue. Don't tell uncle sam that I don't really have IE7 on Windows, and I won't break the internet.

Ubuntu

2011-05-24T10:21:00.000-07:00

Every six months when a new ubuntu release comes out, I timidly install it first on one machine, then another, and am amazed at the changes. Sometimes, it's good. Sometimes it's bad. For example, I recently discovered that support for my CanoScan 200 has been incorporated into xsane (this wasn't the case a year ago). That's a good change.

The unity desktop is easily enough discarded by logging out and choosing classic. The sticking downsides would be that the console fonts or screen resolution changed without my doing anything, and are now painfully small and wrongly aligned. It also seems like my maximum X resolution given the same card, driver, and monitor have been inconsistent from release to release.

But I scanned an image, it works, and I'm happy:

The future

2011-05-20T20:34:00.001-07:00

So, I am at an impasse... a year ago I had very set plans to sit for two years of college, complete a degree, and find work in the insurance or consulting industries as an actuary. The longer I have to think about it, the less likely I think this will be the best fit for me.

Firstly, I fail to find statistics fascinating... I imagine many people aren't as excited about it as the newspapers might make you believe. Some of it is very straightforward (probability), some of it is more technical than many people can intuitively grasp (statistics, estimators, convergence, significance tests, obscure distribution functions). Secondly, I don't think a desk job with low stress and clean fingernails is really in my nature. I prefer to stand an walk and talk too much.

I started wondering about atmospheric modelling as an application for numerical computing (lots of data, lots of pde's, a little physics and chemistry, and a wealth of feedback from the real world). I have always been intrigued by high-frequency trading software and options pricing/arbitrage.

I worry about graduate school, largely because it seems like a large commitment, and I am overall a fairly unambitious and laissez-passe type. Alternately, I'm concerned that the short two years I have at UIC will be insufficient groundwork for access to better programs (UChicago and Northwestern are shining stars in nerdland). I anticipate taking the GRE this August, and applying to applied math programs at Northwestern, UChicago, and UIC. I expect I can at least be accepted to UIC, and will have met the required courses in the applied mathematics track (ODE/PDE/Complex Analysis) and may be able to talk my way out of retaking them. It's one of the first times in my life when I have looked about me for opportunities and been unable to relocate freely to pursue them. Thankfully, being beached in Chicago is a wonderful curse.

At times I worry that I lack sufficient focus to gain admission into a great program. My current pursuit of math, statistics, and computer science nearly evenly reflects what I hope to learn, and what I hope to find a place to apply in life. Information is everywhere. Statistics is a great way to extract and abstract it, and to test the importance of hypotheses with real data. Computer Programming is an obvious requirement for applying these statistical methods to real data, and a decent amount of exposure to theory will prevent sloppy mistakes. Mathematics underpins it all. But in following this balanced path, I may be missing on the niceties of deeper pure math. I don't intend to take Topology this year, and will sit through a single abstract algebra course, missing out on mathematical logic, and perhaps it will be possible to take graph theory in spring. At the end of two years, I may be merely a very clever calculator. Wouldn't that be disappointing?

vacation

2011-05-20T20:21:00.000-07:00

Well, my short 4 week summer break is in full swing. All except the summer. I went to UW Madison last weekend to attend my brother-in-law's graduation (PhD). We had a barbecue at a state park. It was cold, windy, and wet most of the time. I have the unfortunate habit of dressing for whatever weather there was yesterday, and this is a terrible idea when packing for a few day outing.

I finished up finals the first week in May. I will be starting two classes in June/July to get some nuisances out of the way.

I am continuing to work on Knowledge Representation, investigating Cyc. It's a bear of a system, gobbles up RAM like there's a bonbon at the bottom of the heap, and tends to be a little persnickity. Anyone recall 3rd grade computer lessons where before letting you get your hands on a Logo system, they told stories about the stupidity of robots... something along the lines of:
"If you have a bucket on the table, and want it filled with water, you can tell a man to take the bucket to the well and fill it. If you want a machine to do this, you have to tell it to move forward 10 feet (to the table), reach for the item at 3-1/2 feet, grasp, lift, turn (whatever direction the well is) advance so many feet, stop, lower bucket into well (at this point the robot has probably fallen in with the bucket since we left off telling it about the rope and crank)..."

I am struggling to get this enormous warehouse of mundane facts to produce sensible answers. What's a thing like both a knife and a spoon? Of course a snowmobile also has a handle and is a man-made tool, that's just the right answer. This was a productive answer... Every time I try to whittle it down closer, I reach less and less satisfactory answers. Did you know that the greatest common denominator of dashboard and spoon is 1, and that they are thus relatively prime numbers? I didn't, and I sometimes worry about the leaps of ingenuity that allow this program to steam-roll through common sense.

I think Cyc is a great way to represent knowledge, and for some simple questions it is fitting, but for many of the things an eight year old would think you were stupid to have asked it flounders. It is, of course, just as likely that I don't have the nuanced feel for the thousands of available predicates to ask just the right question to lead it to the best answer (Fork would win a gold medal).

vocation

2011-02-04T17:14:00.000-08:00

I just accepted a position as a research aide in the computer science department at UIC. Looks like it should be interesting, and hopefully developmental. I guess getting a paycheck is a good thing, too. Not sure how much or what exactly it will entail, I have some hints, but we'll see. I also don't know how large of a team is working on this problem.

Glenwood disaster area

2011-02-02T13:33:00.000-08:00

This is the side street by our home. Mostly little antennas sticking out of snow banks. Reminds me of a Norwegian commercial where a guy spends all morning digging his car out of the snow, hits his key fob to open it, and the car in front unlocks.

Snow removal

2011-02-02T13:30:00.001-08:00

This is our task force at work! My having the camera makes it look like I didn't do any of the work, but I assure you it was quite the opposite.

Christmas

2010-12-31T12:38:00.000-08:00

After bailing on our planned expedition to Omaha at the Iowa border, we had a very relaxing Christmas day. We went in the early afternoon to catch the first showing of Black Swan, which was incredibly intense. I understand why some reviewers accuse Natalie Portman's acting of being passive, but the visuals combined with the music kept us both on the edges of our seats.

We went back that evening to see The Fighter, which was a good movie, but not a surprise, since you rather expect things to go the way they do. The sisters had to be the best part of the film, sitting on the couch, complaining and organising trouble...

This has to be the first Christmas in years we haven't been up to our ears in family members. I don't expect to set a precedent, but it was a welcome change.

Grades

2010-12-31T12:18:00.000-08:00

For anyone who found this and is concerned, I managed to get a 4.0 this (Fall 2010) semester at UIC. In the words of the internet:

Dealing with failure is easy: Work hard to improve. Success is also easy to handle: You've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to improve.
Unknown

So now I am dying to see what it can feel like when I'm in over my head. Registered for 16 credits again, and informally auditing another 3 credit course. So I should be set with Intro to Adv Math, Linear Algebra I, Macroeconomics, Programming Tools, Intro to Probability, and Financial Mathematics. That's 2 graduate level courses and 4 undergrad. Hope it all goes as well this time

Project Euler

2010-12-31T12:16:00.001-08:00

I just advanced to level one on Project Euler, after solving the 25 easiest problems. (Actually, 1-23, 25, and 48).

I'm pretty happy about that, and will be calling it a day right now. I need time to digest these amazing bit-field sieves, where membership is binary. That is way faster than my naive listing of all members and their values...

Latest Readings

2010-12-22T18:22:00.000-08:00

Shame on me for stumbling on something wonderful. I sure am a sucker for koans. (I'm especially a fan of ones where Sussman is the apprentice). But these are fine, too:
Zen Stories to Tell Your Neighbors

Who's your friend?

2010-12-16T12:38:00.000-08:00

Anyone who supposes that Facebook's users are its customer has got the business model precisely backwards. Users pay nothing, because we aren't customers, but product. The customers are the advertisers to whom Facebook sells the information users hand over, knowingly or not.

You may think that your Facebook friends care what you're up to, but they'd drop you like a stone if it cost them money to learn you had just become imaginary mayor of an imaginary town, or even that you had just had a row with your mother and slammed the phone down. The only people to whom that information is worth even a fraction of a penny are those who want to take advantage of it to sell you something you don't need – except, that is for your real friends, but imaginary ones are so much more reassuring.

Guardian original article.

Full Page Preview

2010-12-05T17:39:00.000-08:00

Google Support Forum

I have to say I'm glad I found this. And I'm sad that it's come down to blocking google. This was a major headache as I often scroll through the results using the keys, and each time a new page pops open on the right, which certainly wasn't expected, and nowhere is there a button in search options to disable this. I understand google is under some pressure to be friendly and helpful, but really, a clean simple interface is good for the world, and was google's biggest success. I might have had to find an alternate search site if this was not fixable.

Score one for ad block plus.

urbanrocker
Level 2
11/17/10
The only thing I can suggest is a solution that unfortunately only works for Firefox users however it does in fact work like a charm.

If you have Firefox, you'll need to install the "AdBlock Plus" add-on as well as the ABP 'Element Hiding Helper' extension companion. Once installed, restart and search for anything on google (i.e. "bonsai trees"), then go to the ABP icon in the upper right corner of FF. Click "select an element to hide" and hover over any result on the page or click the magnifying glass icon, a red box will show up over the icon; click it and voila! It's good riddance to this godawful page preview.

Alternatively you can press ctrl+shift+k, hover over a search result until the preview shows up, click on the preview until the red box shows up over the entire thing, click it and all subsequent previews are gone for good.

Thanksgiving Shopping

2010-11-21T17:30:00.000-08:00

I know everyone wants to go shopping the day after thanksgiving, but sometimes you need to buy drinks on the way to dinner. I poked aimlessly around Binny's website for some time before I found a great hint at Gaper's Block and found out they'll be open until 4PM. Wonderful. Then I realized this was from 2006, and now I'm still digging...

Cafe Hoang

2010-11-18T19:28:00.000-08:00

This afternoon Beth and I were pretty hungry, and we were already south of downtown, so we made our way to Cermak and stopped in for a late lunch at Cafe Hoang (just east of the Archer intersection in Chinatown). First, it's been a long time since we got spring rolls that were perfect. These had thin, sticky wrappers, a long piece of pork, shrimp in the center, and stuffed with basil leaf and vermicelli. Couldn't have asked for it better. Then we order the vietnamese pancake (Banh Xeo), which was a little crispier than the last time we enjoyed this. Served with a plate of lettuce, basil, cucumber and carrot slivers. This was again a huge relief. At this time, we should have just stopped and paid, but we'd already ordered plates. Beth had a vermicelli and chicken bowl, and I ordered a spicy beef stir fry.

This was a great meal! The service was very solicitous. The restaurant was quiet (it was after 2PM when we arrived) and it all kept coming on schedule. For about $7-10 per item, this was a good deal. I think I won't be going to Argyle again when I want some Vietnamese food.

Halsted and Roosevelt

2010-11-15T16:19:00.000-08:00

It's a good idea to come to a complete stop before turning right on red. Only day I drove in two months.

-- TICKET INFORMATION --

Ticket Number Violation Description License Plate State Issue Date Ticket Amount
7003031XXX Red light violation XXXXXXX IL 10/27/2010 $100
Grand Total $100

Funny Stuff in comp.lang.c

2010-11-09T04:34:00.000-08:00

Date: Mon, Nov 8 2010 1:13 pm
From: MartinBroadhurst

On Nov 8, 7:43 pm, "Jon" wrote:
>
> >>>>> Just because you found other incorrect usages of the term doesn't
> >>>>> make it correct. A "concrete" class in C++ is one who's object
> >>>>> instances behave like built-in types. Such a class must include
> >>>>> the following special member functions: a default constructor, a
> >>>>> copy constructor, a copy-assignment operator, a destructor.
>

Jon, you're so wrong that people who are merely massively in error
look to you for consolation.
You're so wrong that the people of the planet Wrong have rung to say
that they don't know you.
You're so wrong that somewhere in Paris, there is an aluminium
simulacrum of you; it is the SI unit of being wrong.

Martin

Halloween

2010-10-31T14:56:00.000-07:00

Well, I haven't got a costume or any plans. I am not too concerned about this. We have a few gummy snacks should some small person make his way up the stairs to our door. I don't expect he will (I think there is only one child in our building--most of my neighbors prefer dogs).

In other news, I have three exams this coming week, in Comp Sci, Stat, and Diff Eqs. I hope to do well.

Still on the cusp of playing with lisp enough to make a meaningful program. Learned just a small amount of SQL last weekend. We'll see when I can make use of that.

Math woes

2010-10-02T15:58:00.000-07:00

So I had an exam yesterday in Differential equations. My biggest difficulty, it seems, now that I think I remember calculus, is knowing what I just have to leave alone. I had a problem that started well enough, y' = e^(x^2/2)(x+xy)/y. This solves pretty easily to y - log(y+1) = e^(x^2) + C. I wish I hadn't believed it would be a good idea to try to solve for y. Although wolfram suggests the answer lies in something called a lambert product-log function, it's a horrible solution, and can't be expected to pop into the head of an undergraduate math student (esp. not before complex analysis). So the good news is that I got all the parts on the page. The bad news is I didn't put them all next to each other, circle, and move on. The other 5 problems were either really easy or I did them all wrong.

Apple Holler

2010-10-02T15:51:00.000-07:00

Went up to Wisconsin this morning to have a trip through the apple orchard. It was windy and chilly, so we were glad we dressed appropriately. Unfortunately, only the jonathan and golden delicious were really harvestable, so we mostly walked through rows of barren trees. We had a fun time regardless.

Cristin with our bag of fresh fruit.

There was a pig race at noon, 4 little porkers running to get their dinners.

This little guy can probably get through the fence if he really wants to.

Today

2010-09-24T21:02:00.001-07:00

I woke up a little late today. Beth went with me to school, so I was only 15 minutes late for my 9AM class.
It was really hot last night. Around 11PM we gave up and turned on the air conditioning. It was super hard to sleep lying in pools of our own sweat. Maybe that's why I didn't get up at 7AM.

I had a much better time on my math quiz than I had last week. I'm pretty sure I got the answers right, and quickly (which makes me feel good, I never enjoyed spending a lot of time on a test.) I compared notes with someone who finished right when I had, and we had identical answers and both had high levels of confidence.

I almost solved the wrong problem (again!), and originally produced an answer for 2.0 instead of 0.2, if you weren't there, it's tough to explain, but the answer for 2 was 7, while the answer for .2 was about 5/4.

We had JB Alberto's tonight (a little friday night ritual for us), and went to see the Town (Ben Affleck) at the 400. Buzz came over and rubbed my faux pas at Anne's house in one more time. Fun for everyone.

Tonight

2010-09-17T04:43:00.000-07:00

Going to try to get into a free concert at the Art Institute tonight. Mexican music for cello and piano... we'll see how it goes. We hope to sup at the Bennigan's on Michigan first.

This went really well. I had a good time at the concert, and didn't add an unwelcome horn section after dining on the french onion soup. The concert was free, a little under 90 minutes, and very interesting. I hadn't heard of any of these people. I think I may look into Blas Galindo more in the future. Some of the musicianship was really interesting, and Beth wanted to get a little closer to the cello to see the music happening. We had a great view of the pianist.

We tried to hang out in the little garden just south of the art institute entrance, but they wanted to lock up and chased us out (their definition of dusk is a little different than ours.)

Bennigan's should never be a destination, only a speed bump along the way. It really isn't that great. I understand why they went under. I bet if I bought more beer it might be less distressing.

Funny things happened

2010-09-16T21:23:00.000-07:00

Well, I went to see the play. Beth had to sit with the designer to review notes. One of the actors was injured during the first half, and didn't reappear, since he'd gone to the hospital. It looks like his bloody nose was just the noticeable part, and they think he's got a concussion. So it was cast change during intermission, and an apologetic director explaining what had happened. Previews can be the most fun.

All the fighting is taking a realistic toll on the fine clothes everyone wears. One of the blood capsules went off before a man was injured, but he had plenty left to make the bloody death more real after the false start.

Found a parking spot just across the tracks. Things went well!

Progress

2010-09-16T05:59:00.000-07:00

Well, I have started chatting to a few people on a regular basis, and a few have at least introduced themselves. My homework is no problem, and differential equations is a rocky harbor to moor in. I hope that the less manipulative algebra classes will be of a different tenor. The calculus instructors seem to be a bit abrasive.

Going to a preview of Romeo and Juliet tonight, then hoping to catch a concert tomorrow night at the art museum.

The barber on campus is competitive with the shops in the neighborhood, and it uses my two hour lunch a little better than I could do myself.

Today

2010-09-01T17:57:00.000-07:00

Okay, turned in my statistics homework. I took a quiz in Diff Eqns, which was a relief how easily it went. I wasn't as pleased at how little trouble I had with it as I was at how much quicker than most of the people I was finished. I always feel like the professor is trying to scare people away in the lectures, so I was pretty happy to turn in a good piece of easy work to at least justify my space in the class.

I think I was the only person who typed the stat homework, and I may be the only person using R instead of excel... it seems an entire generation has grown up thinking TI makes the only calculators, and courses include hints on how to use them. I don't know maple or TI calculators, so a lot of the hints in the classes about how to use computers are lost on me. Of course, I know enough C to solve my problems the hard way...

Catchup

2010-08-31T15:38:00.000-07:00

I started school last week. So far, so good. We'll see how I feel in a few months.

I am attending UIC M-F 9AM-4PM. If you are in the Greektown/Little Italy areas around lunch, please give me a call, I could use a little excursion now and then.

I realized that I am a big violator of Comcast's TOS regarding data use. If they decide to punish me for exceeding their 250GB monthly allowance, I will probably give AT&T or RCN a call (since their policy is to disable internet for abusers). Seeding Free Content is apparently not something they want their 'home' users to be able to do.

I picked up basic LaTeX the other day while trying to type my homework for statistics (Couldn't figure out how to embed nice looking Sigma's into a document, figured now was as good a time as any to learn a necessary typesetting skill). I am certain there are countless style violations, my main concern was putting it all on paper efficiently.

I am learning R as I go. The catalog for the Stat course implies that SAS or SPSS would be used, but since there is no lab component, it's a free for all on software. If you have a lot of time on your hands, use a pen; if you like office, use excel; and if you are a guy like me, use R. It is good enough for my brother in law, Chris, so it can't be all wrong.

My second lab of CS was fruitless. Basically still learning to effectively type and transfer files. Copying code snippets isn't what I had expected at this point. I expect things to move a little faster in the future.

Econ is going well, until I realized that there are many people more mathematically illiterate than I. The instructor put a derivative on the board today, and a lengthy argument about how something could vary at a point came up. I bet the 17th century was full of some heated discussions about the meaning of the differential, just like this. Some people don't have an I believe button to block out the impossible notion of an infinitesimal change. I breath deeply and think they may be right. But if you allow for it, see how many problems you can answer!

Best Robots.txt file?

2010-07-27T13:32:00.000-07:00

http://github.com/bentruyman/fiveoclocksong/raw/master/robots.txt

For The Win

2010-07-20T19:58:00.000-07:00

I'd like to thank Cory Doctorow for continuing to give away inspiring and thoughtful content. I chewed through this in two days, and will likely be buying someone a copy in the future. Fast, light, and bewildering.

Planning to Go

2010-06-17T18:56:00.001-07:00

My manager called yesterday to ask me to reconsider. He of course
hoped I would have thought about the benefits of staying a few more
years. I've thought about it, and these are the general trends I'm
concerned with.

The company has introduced a new platform and has been shipping it to
customers over the last year. The system is scalable, modular, and
everything you could design into a system of it's type. Unfortunately,
the continued maintenance of this is a problem. We have moved past the
point of shipping a product than can be simply replaced, and the end
user ability to reconfigure added parts or replacements is limited (by
design). This will increase the amount of time service personnel are
tasked with maintaining and upgrading existing systems. I see why this
makes sense from a business perspective, as it makes service contracts
much more attractive to the end user.

As the service engineer, I foresee more weekend and night work as
upgrades to customer sites are performed without interfering with
their business. A growing number of these sites have disparate and non
transferrable security background checks, and maintaining these will
be a logistical issue dropped onto the shoulders of field personnel.

Given the slow growth in commercial construction, more focus will be
placed on existing systems as an avenue for revenue growth. These are
typically much more involved both in planning and execution. The days
of 2 hour solutions are gone, as projects on that level are sourced to
third party contracts.

The potential for personal growth in the company, both in increased
salary and more involved roles in product development, are confined to
positions requiring relocation to the east coast headquarters. I am
very happy where I am, but I understand I have arrived in a static
position.

Additionally, now that my plans are set in motion, and I've registered
and received a green light to move ahead, the thought of staying where
I am is so personally unrewarding that I can't imagine it. I'm sure
there could have been some salary negotiation or accomodation to keep
me where I am, but I'm on track for a better life, and my wife and I
look forward to my staying home every night for the next few years.

Basically, I'm excited about what the future holds, and am curious to
see what I am capable of.

--
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What are kids coming to?

2010-06-16T06:57:00.000-07:00

Happy Slap

I thought Sack Tap was a bad enough one. Some boys in Britain just pleaded guilty to manslaughter after recording beating an old man to death. Nothing more fun that using a cell phone to collect evidence for the police.

The New Face Of Apple

2010-06-14T09:59:00.001-07:00

Sent to you by Dan via Google Reader:

The New Face Of Apple

via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan by Andrew Sullivan on 6/14/10

The iPad has the instincts of the Pentagon.

Apple - IPad - United States - IPhone - Search

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NorthSide Federal Credit Union

2010-06-11T01:49:00.001-07:00

from http://www.newsweek.com/2008/11/14/a-risk-worth-taking.html :

Ethical subprime lenders are now expanding beyond mortgages. Ed Jacob, manager and CEO of Chicago's North Side Community Federal Credit Union, was alarmed to learn that many of his 2,700 members, most of whom have less than $100 in their accounts, were relying on the "second-tier financial-service marketplace": check-cashing outlets and payday lenders, which charge exorbitant fees. So he rolled out a Payday Alternative Loan (PAL), $500 for six months at 16.5 percent. The delinquency rate on the more than 5,000 PALs extended thus far is 2.5 percent. "For payday lenders, it's a success if customers keep taking out loans. To me, it's a success if they don't have to anymore," Jacob says. He believes such loans can build a credit history and help "move people to better products for them and us—auto loans and, eventually, mortgage loans."

I was looking at NorthSide's webpage, and suddenly realize I was looking at a picture of Anna from Inspiration Cafe and her son (saw her once when we got cubs tickets delivered to our door.) Although I appreciate the convenience of Chase I really feel like I could be doing something better with my money. Always felt like credit unions were a more ethical (if less convenient) place to keep money. It's refreshing to see people taking positive steps to break the stupid cycle of poverty in so many lives.

Feature Request

2010-06-10T17:04:00.001-07:00

Am I the only person who thinks integration between latitude and gmail
would be a good thing? You see your friend is around, and you can
touch their pushpin to contact them, start a phone call, etc.

Maybe there's a smug android user confused why this doesn't just work
on blackberry... Maybe there's a google feature request crawler
already starting to implement this.

(Anyone google world cup and see the Gooooooooooal yet?)

--
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Copyright: The Elephant in the Middle of the Glee Club

2010-06-10T14:19:00.001-07:00

Sent to you by Dan via Google Reader:

Copyright: The Elephant in the Middle of the Glee Club

via Balkinization by Guest Blogger on 6/8/10

Christina Mulligan

The fictional high school chorus at the center of Fox's Glee has a huge problem — nearly a million dollars in potential legal liability. For a show that regularly tackles thorny issues like teen pregnancy and alcohol abuse, it's surprising that a million dollars worth of lawbreaking would go unmentioned. But it does, and week after week, those zany Glee kids rack up the potential to pay higher and higher fines.

In one recent episode, the AV Club helps cheerleading coach Sue Sylvester film a near-exact copy of Madonna's Vogue music video (the real-life fine for copying Madonna's original? up to $150,000). Just a few episodes later, a video of Sue dancing to Olivia Newton-John's 1981 hit Physical is posted online (damages for recording the entirety of Physical on Sue's camcorder: up to $300,000). And let's not forget the glee club's many mash-ups — songs created by mixing together two other musical pieces. Each mash-up is a "preparation of a derivative work" of the original two songs' compositions – an action for which there is no compulsory license available, meaning (in plain English) that if the Glee kids were a real group of teenagers, they could not feasibly ask for — or hope to get — the copyright permissions they would need to make their songs, and their actions, legal under copyright law. Punishment for making each mash-up? Up to another $150,000 — times two.

The absence of any mention of copyright law in Glee illustrates a painful tension in American culture. While copyright holders assert that copyright violators are "stealing" their "property," people everywhere are remixing and recreating artistic works for the very same reasons the Glee kids do — to learn about themselves, to become better musicians, to build relationships with friends, and to pay homage to the artists who came before them. Glee's protagonists — and the writers who created them — see so little wrong with this behavior that the word 'copyright' is never even uttered.

You might be tempted to assume that this tension isn't a big deal because copyright holders won't go after creative kids or amateurs. But they do: In the 1990s, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) asked members of the American Camping Association, including Girl Scout troops,to pay royalties for singing copyrighted songs at camp. In 2004, the Beatles' copyright holders tried to prevent the release of The Grey Album – a mash-up of Jay-Z's Black Album and the Beatles' White Album — and only gave up after massive civil disobedience resulted in the album's widespread distribution. Copyright holders even routinely demand that YouTube remove videos of kids dancing to popular music. While few copyright cases go to trial, copyright holders like the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) don't hesitate to seek stratospheric damage awards when they do, as in the Jammie Thomas-Rasset filesharing case.

These worlds don't match. Both Glee and the RIAA can't be right. It's hard to imagine glee club coach Will Schuester giving his students a tough speech on how they can't do mash-ups anymore because of copyright law (but if he did, it might make people rethink the law). Instead, copyright violations are rewarded in Glee — after Sue's Physical video goes viral, Olivia Newton-John contacts Sue so they can film a new, improved video together.

So what should you do in real life if you and your friends, inspired by Glee, want to make a mash-up, or a new music video for a popular song? Should you just leave this creativity to the professionals, or should you become dirty, rotten copyright violators?

Current law favors copyright holders. But morally, there's nothing wrong with singing your heart out. Remixing isn't stealing, and copyright isn't property. Copyright is a privilege — actually six specific privileges — granted by the government. Back in 1834, the Supreme Court decided in Wheaton v. Peters that copyrights weren't "property" in the traditional sense of the word, but rather entitlements the government chose to create for instrumental reasons. The scope and nature of copyright protection are policy choices — choices that have grown to favor the interests of established, rent-seeking businesses instead of the public in general.

The Constitution allows Congress to pass copyright laws to "promote the progress of science" — a word often used in the 18^th century to mean "knowledge". The stated purpose of the original 1790 copyright statute was to encourage learning. So you tell me — what promotes knowledge and learning: letting people rearrange music and learn to use a video camera, or threatening new artists with $150,000 fines?

Defenders of modern copyright law will argue Congress has struck "the right balance" between copyright holders' interests and the public good. They'll suggest the current law is an appropriate compromise among interest groups. But by claiming the law strikes "the right balance," what they're really saying is that the Glee kids deserve to be on the losing side of a lawsuit. Does that sound like the right balance to you?

Christina Mulligan is a visiting fellow of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. You can reach her by e-mail at cmulligan at gmail.com

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Orientation today

2010-06-09T14:01:00.001-07:00

Well, orientation went pretty well. My biggest complaint wasn't the
company, but the lunch. They did not offer coffee. In fact, since it
was summer, a lot of the coffee shops were shuttered. I made it
through, met with an advisor, confirmed my registration, and checked
my progress. Apparently some things dropped down and I moved from
Junior to Sophomore (57.5 credits). I think that will only affect me
for the next four months. So my schedule stands, mostly 9-3 or 9-4 5
days a week. It's odd to say a full load sounds like a vacation, but
it really does.

--
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Kobo eReader

2010-06-05T12:16:00.000-07:00

Well, I must not be the only one willing to put down 150 bucks to see what this can do. According to Borders website, the kobo is sold out for it's initial June shipment. They are preordering for July 2nd.

Firstly, I am glad I don't have to try and find this at Chapters, and secondly, I am glad that it's generating interest faster than they can make them.

Everything I have seen indicates that as far as gadgets go, it is a single purpose machine, and I expect it to be good at it's only function. It's also by far the cheapest on the market, and comes unbundled from internet access and a monthly data plan. I can always harvest the news with Calibre and load it daily if that's what the internet was for.

UIC Fall 2010

2010-06-02T15:12:00.000-07:00

Tentatively I am scheduled for the following courses this fall, any of which may change at orientation next week:

STAT 381 Applied Statistical Methods I M W F 09:00 AM 09:50 AM
LALS 127 Latin American Music (Lecture) M W F 10:00 AM 10:50 AM
MCS 260 Intro To Computer Science (Lecture) M W F 01:00 PM 01:50 PM
MATH 220 Differential Equations I (Lecture) M W F 03:00 PM 03:50 PM

ECON 220 Microeconomics (Lecture-Discussion) T R 09:30 AM 10:45 AM
MCS 260 Intro To Computer Science (Labratory-Discussion)T 01:00 PM 02:50 PM
MATH 220 Differential Equations I R 01:00 PM 01:50 PM

Superstition

2010-01-25T18:56:00.001-08:00

I always hate when the 13th floor is missing. It's so common, I was
surprised the other day to be in an elevator that had one.

--
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Just donated

2010-01-20T21:03:00.000-08:00

Man am I ever slow to heed the clarion. Made a donation to MSF to assist them however they need it. I think they sent me a map once or twice with a request in the past. I just hope they don't pile on address labels. Can't use any more address labels, charity people. Two years supply sitting in the drawer.

Offline Book "Lending" Costs US Publishers Nearly $1 Trillion

2010-01-20T19:38:00.001-08:00

Sent to you by Dan via Google Reader:

Offline Book "Lending" Costs US Publishers Nearly $1 Trillion

via Slashdot by Soulskill on 1/19/10

An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from a tongue-in-cheek blog post which puts publisher worries about ebook piracy into perspective: "Hot on the heels of the story in Publisher's Weekly that 'publishers could be losing out on as much $3 billion to online book piracy' comes a sudden realization of a much larger threat to the viability of the book industry. Apparently, over 2 billion books were 'loaned' last year by a cabal of organizations found in nearly every American city and town. Using the same advanced projective mathematics used in the study cited by Publishers Weekly, Go To Hellman has computed that publishers could be losing sales opportunities totaling over $100 billion per year, losses which extend back to at least the year 2000. ... From what we've been able to piece together, the book 'lending' takes place in 'libraries.' On entering one of these dens, patrons may view a dazzling array of books, periodicals, even CDs and DVDs, all available to anyone willing to disclose valuable personal information in exchange for a 'card.' But there is an ominous silence pervading these ersatz sanctuaries, enforced by the stern demeanor of staff and the glares of other patrons. Although there's no admission charge and it doesn't cost anything to borrow a book, there's always the threat of an onerous overdue bill for the hapless borrower who forgets to continue the cycle of not paying for copyrighted material."

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Spoke with Chase again

2010-01-20T13:38:00.000-08:00

Well that was unpleasant. I really didn't enjoy having to call them again, and I didn't get a conclusive answer from the nice man on the phone. Apparently Chases outbound robocall number has multiple departments behind it, and there's no way to determine which center the calls originated from...

Besides my frustration that asking to have the number removed resulted in about a two week reprieve, I was equally nonplussed by his inability to prevent further calls.

Chase

2010-01-17T12:13:00.000-08:00

Chase started the robocalls again. I guess the request to stop calling me didn't register loudly enough.

Sadly, as long as I have an existing account with them, the FTC won't consider it an unsolicited call. And as long as there isn't a closer branch in my neighborhood, the convenience outweighs the nuisance of answering a robocall.

I just wish they weren't so creepy when you call them back.

Line of Credit

2010-01-17T12:05:00.000-08:00

Every time I think Navy Federal has nothing to offer me, I find another way that they can make my life better. I just opened a $2500 line of credit with them (unsecured at 14.9%). I don't intend to use it, but it should make my types of credit accounts improve, since I control my borrowing rather tightly. Another interesting product Navy Federal offers is a credit line secured by CD's (share certificates). Interest rate is the CD apr +2%, since it is secured, and the term can be up to 5 years. If you need to borrow your own money (short term need to access the money you have locked up in a certificate), this is a startlingly clear way to do it. If they had a branch closer than Waukegan, that would be better still.

Some day in the distant future, I may even borrow money for a car. I don't really want to, so that day will have to be in the distant future.

I would gladly have opened this at whatever usurious rates Chase suggested if they would only offer. Sadly, they do not.

(side note, why does spell check think of Milwaukee, Waukesha, Pewaukee, but not know about Waukegan?)

extensions

2009-12-22T22:50:00.000-08:00

I'm a little sad that the google docs uploader uses file extensions to identify content. That's very DOS of them, and a little uncool. So do I need to save all my sources as .txt if I want to preserve them... maybe I should uuencode them and make it a .uu.txt, nothing like ascii armor to make the eyes hurt...

Collections

2009-12-22T13:31:00.001-08:00

I told Chase Brother Grant doesn't live here. They were a little standoffish. I hope to hear the phone a little less.

Mind Blowing

2009-12-08T17:46:00.001-08:00

Knuth Arrow Notation

Well, why didn't I see that before... I understood the addition, multiplication, exponentiation analogy... shouldn't have been hard to consider tetration.

However, Pentation (triple arrows) scares me to no end... what a model of growth. What physical analogue can there be to a process like that?

Canada and Content

2009-12-08T17:08:00.002-08:00

What do the canadian copyright holders groups have against the people of canada? Netflix won't work. Pandora won't work. Last.fm (free in the US) gives you a thirty track trial.

What else doesn't work in Canada? At least I can see the internet turning a bored and cold shoulder to me from here. I wonder what an internet cafe in Riyadh is like?

Pandora

2009-12-08T17:08:00.001-08:00

Dear Pandora Visitor,

We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.

We believe that you are in Canada (your IP address appears to be 70.76.0.251). If you believe we have made a mistake, we apologize and ask that you please contact us at pandora-support@pandora.com

If you are a paid subscriber, please contact us at pandora-support@pandora.com and we will issue a pro-rated refund to the credit card you used to sign up. If you have been using Pandora, we will keep a record of your existing stations and bookmarked artists and songs, so that when we are able to launch in your country, they will be waiting for you.

We will be notifying listeners as licensing agreements are established in individual countries. If you would like to be notified by email when Pandora is available in your country, please enter your email address below. The pace of global licensing is hard to predict, but we have the ultimate goal of being able to offer our service everywhere.

We share your disappointment and greatly appreciate your understanding.

Linux

2009-11-22T08:21:00.000-08:00

Finally got a working linux on my laptop, had to jump through some hoops to get all the parts working. Installed Ubuntu on an HP DV4 laptop. 9.04 had support for wireless, but the sound wouldn't work (worked okay out of the jack, but the speakers weren't able to play sound). Installed 9.10 and the speakers worked, but getting the wireless stable was a nightmare (in this case a broadcom 4322). Finally got a working plan by installing 9.04, setting up the wireless, then upgrading to 9.10. Now I have sound and a working wifi.

Total process took some time, bare minimum assuming I anticipated all of this must be on the order of 3-4 hours. Compare to a windows installation and quit gloating, Linux folks!

But then, now I get great applications that work, and a command line not written by morons for idiots...

Progress

2009-05-27T05:12:00.001-07:00

I love the sight of a rusty metal sign reading 'newly renovated
apartments available'

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Looking for me

2009-02-05T18:36:00.000-08:00

Well, I installed Google Latitude, so go ahead and find me. If I'm near you, I'm sure I like to eat as much as the next guy. Give me a buzz, or spy on me during the day!

What I have to look forward to

2008-10-22T18:27:00.000-07:00

Chicago Parking 101 from the expired meter.

Dedication to Small Government

2008-10-12T23:33:00.000-07:00

Ah, the bailout... what bothers me (and many Americans) about that? First, that the money is being given to a former Goldman exec to dispense with how he (or the Treasury) sees fit. Second, that it fails to address root causes, and does nothing to prevent another out of control financial mess. Third, that it seems insincere of our congress to favor silence and laissez-faire only on the way up, but a falling price of stocks, and a tightening credit market is somehow a malfunctioning market? Markets work, they say it again and again, but did they only mean that markets work when they favor people with existing assets? There are generations yet to be born, and many of my generation who have yet to get a grip or claim on some of these overvalued assets, largely because they are overvalued. Lower prices are democratic. Low prices of homes hurt short term homeowners, speculators, and banks... but are a boon to first time homebuyers and future homebuyers. Low stock prices give me a head start in earning return on capital (think value investing). Overvalued stocks are great for fund managers and the nearly retired, but at the cost of the earnings potential of the next wave of Americans. Did we forget to vote? Did we forget to do the math? Did we buy the hype...

How many days did it take the white house to get this rescue plan through congress? Congress, which never agrees on anything that quickly, has once again responded to the gong of emergency, taken assurances from the administration that it held America's best interests at heart, and raced to pass a bad idea into law. I haven't been this upset since the patriot bill reauthorization...

Are the credit default swaps any more regulated now than in the past? Are banks required to maintain higher capital levels for soundness? Did the FDIC raise the insurance premiums it charges bank for deposits?

Does this government have any better ideas than throwing away money into a sinking ship? It seems the recent plunge in prices was largely due to lack of confidence and uncertainty. Propping up bad companies to restore confidence (that was quite reasonably withdrawn) distorts pricing signals, and only socializes the risk of default. Insuring all banks against failure creates such a ridiculous moral hazard that in future dictionaries, it will be the example we use to clarify the term.

Why did this bill pass with little citizen input, at the behest of the government, with votes from the crooks who will be seeking reelection over the next four years? Where were our options?

Somethings burning

2008-08-18T19:03:00.001-07:00

Dust is rising, and the smell of burning brush is blowing in with the
heavy winds here in spokane. It's warm and dry, and we've started
having light fires on the highway in tacoma. I'm surprised it isn't
worse in the east. Maybe there's enough water in the columbia to keep
the risk low in most areas.

The smell makes me nostalgic for california. I remember a few fires
there. Last month I saw a fire off i-90 near the dells (just outside
the kalahari). I didn't call it in. Should I be so ashamed?

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Mead

2008-08-18T12:11:00.001-07:00

Yes, there is more than just a salvage yard. I worked at a brand new
middle school, and went to lunch at a diner off hwy 2. We'll see how
the food is. The best part of spokane is the continued existence of
blue collar diners outside the truck stop environment. My last long
trip to spokane had a nice dining experience. What is it about coffee
cups with brown paint that feels so welcoming. Sterile white porcelain
feels like a hotel catering service to me, while the simple brown
diner mug says free refills like no other.

--
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Travel

2008-08-05T00:02:00.001-07:00

There was a very young girl next to me on my flight to edmonton
tonight. Since most canadians I meet on the plane are coming from
mexico, she seemed a bit odd. No sunburn, no holiday clothes, and
travelling alone. I asked her if she was almost home, she said after
her parents picked her up it would be an hours drive, and added that
she had been travelling almost 2 and an half days. I asked if she was
coming from india. She corrected me, she had just spent a month in
wujin, china. What a trip! I spied her declarations card, 1987. How
old have I become that she seemed a mere girl? Maybe she was just
short. Reminds me a bit of island warrior Michelle.

--
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Review from Netflix

2008-07-18T19:52:00.000-07:00

A travesty. If you love Shakespeare, you'll hate this. If you love musicals of the 1930s, you'll hate this.

Guess I won't get too excited to see Love's Labours Lost.

Warm Sunshine

2008-07-11T19:31:00.000-07:00

What I will miss the most about the west is the perfectly calm, warm sunshine of the summer evenings. Even on hot days, as the sun declines, and the dried grass bathes everything in a beautiful golden glow, I feel the most satisfied sensation that all is right with the world.

In Minnesota, the same time was a summer morning, as the sun rose over the cool earth, and the last of the morning doves cooed their sad sound. Watching the stars finally fade behind a brightening sky nearly brought me to tears.

Midday has never been pleasant for me. The heat and sweat on my forehead, dripping salt into my eyes, and nearly singeing my hair is a trial to be born, but not a pleasure to be sought out.

They say Akhnaten built a temple with no roof, and held court in the brilliant Egyptian sun. It was his pleasure, but I'm sure the ministers were relieved to watch the evening approach, and the desert's winds calm and cool. Even now, the only way many can bear to sun themselves is at a beach, where the wind of the ocean cools the air with moisture.