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| Tuesday, the 22nd day in the month of July in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 4:05 am
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Just a quick post to say that I've had the music from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog stuck in my head all day.
Also, I still hate iTunes DRM. I can't give these people my money, unless I only want to watch Dr. Horrible on my laptop.
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(2 musings | muse)
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| | Monday, the 23rd day in the month of June in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 5:27 am
My first gig
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My previous post about George Carlin reminds me of a story from ages ago.
Growing up, I think it's safe to say, I idolized stand-up comedians and absorbed like a sponge every joke book I could find. My family got The Comedy Channel (later re-christened "Comedy Central") and in those heady, pre-Daily Show (and pre-Viacom) days, they showed a lot of stand-up acts of people I'd never heard of and I learned to absolutely adore - Rita Rudner, Whoopie Goldberg, Robin Williams, and of course, George Carlin. Of course, being basic cable, I'd have to wait until we had a free trial of HBO to hear half of the words that came out of the mouths of these brilliant funny people. Still, though, I got the gist, and I thought that their particular form was the pinnacle of the comedic arts, and I spent my days (then and now) just noting to myself observations that would be funny if uttered on a stage behind the power-imbuing microphone.
( Read more... )
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(8 musings | muse)
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Inscribed: 5:03 am
RIP, George Carlin
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I just saw that George Carlin died, at age 71. Lately, I've been surprisingly unmoved by celebrity deaths. When Heath Ledger died, I felt sad that anybody had died, but I wasn't upset, nor did I feel particularly personally invested. Even Tim Russert's passing, a standard bearer for American journalism, I was intellectually but not emotionally sad. But George Carlin's passing I'm truly saddened by. I grew up idolizing stand-ups like George Carlin, Rita Rudner, Whoopie Goldberg, and Robin Williams. I memorized their jokes and routines - to this day, George's "Airline Announcements", "Sanctity of Life" and "Seven Dirty Words" are some of the few routines I'll carry around on my mp3 player. It took me a long time to realize that the same guy with the potty mouth on Channel 62 was Mr. Conductor on channel 26, and it was odd, because though the two personas seemed so different, I loved them both. I've never seen George Carlin fail to make people laugh when he wanted to, and almost every time it was a strange mix of a whole-hearted belly laugh and the awkward self-conscious laugh you have when somebody mentions tells you your fly is undone at a dinner party. George Carlin held a foul-mouthed, straight-talking mirror up to society and made it uncomfortably hilarious, and the world is a little poorer for losing him.
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(muse)
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| | Wednesday, the 4th day in the month of June in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 3:21 pm
Dear Lazyweb...
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Okay, I asked this ages and ages ago on ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) geeks_at_home, and was told, essentially that I wanted X10, which is not the case.
Here's the situation - I have light switches which control outlets, and I have lights that are plugged into outlets. Unfortunately, these outlets are not always the same. I would, however, still like to turn on and off my lights from the switch. Logic tells me that since there are a variety of remote-control switches on the market, it should also be possible to replace the remote with something plugged into a switched outlet, so that when this transmitter has power, it signals the receiver, which then closes a circuit and turns on the lamp plugged into it. The end result is that when I turn flip my existing light switch, a light (or multiple lights) plugged into another outlet turns on or off.
I don't believe that this is a unique situation, nore do I believe that this is hard to make, so I'm wondering why I can't find these things. I can't find the right set of magic words to type into Google to find this particular project, so I turn to you, my friends, to tell me where to find such a product, or tell me why it doesn't exist.
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(3 musings | muse)
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| | Thursday, the 15th day in the month of May in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 3:44 pm
Yay CA!
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| | Sunday, the 27th day in the month of April in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 4:08 am
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Linky
I drove Maddy to school this morning. She has an extremely cool crescent-shaped scar next to her eye, from when, as a small child, she ran into the corner of a table. She said,
"Will you get a scar?"
"Maybe."
"I like my scar. You know, I get people I've known since kindergarten asking me about it, these days, as if they've just noticed it."
"Really? What do you tell them."
"What you told me to tell people who asked."
I racked my brains. Nothing. "What was that?"
"I tell them I got it in a swordfight."
"Oh. Good."
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(muse)
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| | Tuesday, the 22nd day in the month of April in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 12:01 am
A purely hypothetical problem...
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Let's imagine we have a fully-connected undirected graph of N nodes. Let's call these nodes "guests". Further, let us imagine that each edge has some associated color. The problem is to perform graph cuts so that we have x roughly-equal size partitions (let's call them "tables") -- that is, the largest partition should at most contain one more node than the smallest. The constraints are based on edge coloring. A green edge means that the two adjacent nodes must be in the same partition (and indeed, nodes connected by a green edge can be considered a single node with twice the size, or "seats"). A blue edge means we prefer that these two nodes are in the same partition. A red edge means the two adjacent nodes should never be in the same partition. All other edges are grey, conferring no value to the solution.
So given the graph and x (and therefore the maximum and minimum "table" sizes), how do we partition our "guests" into x "tables" into an optimal solution such that the green and red edge constraints are fulfilled, and the fewest blue edges are cut? Note: it's pretty easy to construct an unsolvable problem, so we can either assume the problem is solvable, or propose a solver that can detect this. For bonus points, include code.
current mood: goofy
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(12 musings | muse)
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| | Sunday, the 13th day in the month of April in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 3:18 am
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This should mean nothing to people who it means nothing to, but maybe somebody will know what I'm talking about.
All Along the Watchtower WTF...
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(2 musings | muse)
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| | Wednesday, the 9th day in the month of April in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 2:23 am
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So, as usual, I have much to make up for in the interim between posts, but for now, let me say that totally random science geeking out with the Berkeley Chemists is definitely a worthwhile way to spend an evening.
Oh, and I don't especially recommend 21, but more on that later.
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(muse)
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| | Friday, the 14th day in the month of March in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 4:21 am
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Anybody, whether Clinton or Obama supporters, who cares about Democratic politics should watch this:
I should say I'm not a fan of Hillary Clinton, but while I have high hopes for Obama, I don't know how I feel about him either - I want him to win the democratic nomination as much out of antipathy to Hillary's brand of backstabbing, issue-straddling politics as because his rhetoric moves and inspires me in ways that until recently was reserved for fictional politics.
Hillary Clinton, afraid that her grip on power has been slipping, is seeking every edge she can find, in often ugly and disastrous ways. She is trying to capitalize on race while appearing not to. She has all but said that if the Democrats of the nation pick Obama, they deserve to have McCain as a president, even while attempting this hollow conceit of offering Obama the vice presidency from second place. Whatever else I can say about Obama, I can say that his campaign is not tearing his party apart in a grasp for personal power. Consider this my official endorsement of Barack Obama.
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(4 musings | muse)
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| | Sunday, the 9th day in the month of March in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 5:34 am
More or less speaks for itself
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| | Wednesday, the 27th day in the month of February in the year 2008 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 5:13 am
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I realize I've been woefully remiss in updating, but I wanted to share this:
pilatesplusla says...
what a waste of money. Google has been throwing their money away for three years. If they want to invest in something how about getting rid of microsoft? All they would need to do is work on Hyperspace by Pheonix and other bios manufacturers. Then windows would be no more!
I really wanted to click on "report offensive" just for sheer stupidity...
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(3 musings | muse)
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| | Thursday, the 27th day in the month of December in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 2:20 am
People?
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I'm in Northern VA. I have been for a little while now, and yet have managed to see almost nobody. So - if you're in town, I want to see you. My weeks on the East Coast are limited now (leaving Jan 26, at last estimation). Call/email/IM/comment if you're free! (You might even meet the lovely Lauren, for those of you who never have.)
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(7 musings | muse)
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| | Monday, the 24th day in the month of December in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 3:26 am
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"Bill Clinton about tore this country apart when he was in office."
Oh, really? Apparently the country was nearly rent asunder by Clinton's shennaningans. Never mind that the only thing that he did was have an affair and subsequently lie about it. Apparently, my perspective of those dark, rocky times is askew, because I always felt like while everybody liked expressing opinions about it, nobody really cared what other people's opinions were. Certainly, the country has never faced a more divisive issue than President Clinton's inability to keep his pants on.
I also like the idea that though it took 6 years where he was in the most scrutinized office in the world for Clinton's previously well-documented infidelities to come to light in the public consciousness, that we can determine right now that until-recently-unknown Huckabee "goes to church for the right reasons". Apparently, commenter jessica has eyes that can see into our candidate's souls!
This is why I should never, ever, read user/reader comments on large sites, especially not Fox News.
current mood:  annoyed
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(2 musings | muse)
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| | Wednesday, the 5th day in the month of December in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 8:47 am
Terror Setting In
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So, I have ome work left to do, but mostly now, the enormity of moving in two months is beginning to set in. I'm realy going to miss this place, my friends, family, seasons, etc.
Trying to remain calm.
current mood:  nervous
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(3 musings | muse)
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| | Wednesday, the 14th day in the month of November in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 6:30 pm
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Inscribed: 5:52 pm
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I should be working, but just a quick link to point out how cool Warren Buffett is. This is the third richest man in the world, and he has three children who will (presumably) split his wealth among themselves when he shuffles off, and yet he says things like:
"A progressive and meaningful estate tax is needed to curb the movement of a democracy toward plutocracy."
All in all, it's nice to see a position counter to self-interest, and for the interest of the nation as a whole in our tax policy. Admitedly, with $52 billion split 3 ways, even with a hefty tax, his kids aren't going to be hurting, but still it's refreshing.
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(muse)
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| | Sunday, the 11th day in the month of November in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 6:30 am
Two thoughts, spurred by the French
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The French are... interesting.
Take, for example, this ad (vi ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) jwz). (WARNING! Depending on your particular proclivities or sensitivities, this video may disturb you greatly.) This is a weird ad. I mean, there's certainly a furry market out there that it could tap, but certainly not one big enough to base your entire marketing direction upon. The ad itself is kind of beautifully animated, but it involves a kind of strange sexualization of animals that I feel the majority of the American populace, at least, would simply not be okay with. (Not the least of which being the bizarre cephalopod juicer moment immortalized by jwz as an animated png.) Nonetheless, I link it here in the hopes that it will gain notoriety as yet another of example of the weird, wonderful, and only minorly scarring things the internet has brought to all of us.
On the other hand, I recently (re-?)stumbled across a three-year-old story about a secret cinema-cum-restaurant discovered in the Paris catacombs. There are so many ways that story captures the imagination, it's hard to think of one thing to say, but the idea of something so ambitious - of such an amazing secret world right under the streets of a major metropolis in real life is almost too fantastical for me to properly wrap my head around. Tunnels, especially of the old and abandoned variety, have a kind special allure to those of us intrigued by the secret and the unknown. This is the reason that people explore the steam tunnels at UVA (as I have done only once, and too briefly to deserve the appellation "exploring"). I don't know if I could commit myself to it as completely as our Parisian cinemaphiles - there are dangers whenever we approach the unknown - cave-ins, other secret-seekers, floods, asphyxiation, steam burns, losing yourself forever, every manner of thing you can imagine becomes suddenly possible when you contemplate breaking the contract to live within the bounds of normal society. To be sure, this very fact adds something to the seductiveness of these secret places, but as the brevity and singularity of my one steam tunnel adventure give evidence, I fear I may not be made for such a secret life. The fact that there are people with, as far as I can tell, no ill will who can gives me a strange kind of hope for the species.
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(2 musings | muse)
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| | Sunday, the 4th day in the month of November in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 2:53 am
Birthday!
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So, the lovely alatyr organized a birthday shindig for me this evening. We had a ridiculous number of people in her fairly small apartment, but it was a lot of fun. We got crepes form The Flat, played GH3 (which was fun - "Knights of Cydonia" is a pretty sweet Guitar hero song), played a huge game of Cranium, and then some eight-person (original) Halo, which I haven't done in ages. Was really nice to have people over and seeming to enjoy themselves. All in all, I thought the night was a rousing success, and I got to really hang out with some people I haven't in a long time.
I want to thank Lauren and everybody else who came and made the night so awesome. You guys are awesome.
current mood:  happy
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(4 musings | muse)
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| | Wednesday, the 24th day in the month of October in the year 2007 of the Common Era |
Inscribed: 6:33 pm
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I can cross off a couple long-standing item in my "why don't they..." list:
- As some of you may have heard, last week Steve Jobs announced that Apple will release an iPhone SDK in February, which means third-party apps can be put on there. This reduces my hesitance about the iPhone, but still, I want to see how this pans out, since there's some talk about "Trust" and "Digital signature " which usually translates to "developer lockout".
- But the more venerable "why don't they..." to be felled is that Google is now allowing IMAP access to Gmail. Now, I've come to love the Gmail interface, and with keyboard shortcuts, there's not much I need an actual client for, so by and large I probably won't use this feature. However, this means that a whole bunch of different systems can now magically interface with your Gmail, without having to download all the messages to your device, which is pretty darn sweet.
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(1 musing | muse)
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