Thanatopsis

Dawn and I went to a funeral this weekend. I would say for a friend, but I didn’t really know him that well. Dawn knew him, they were friends. But from the interactions I had with him I would say that I liked him. With more interactions we probably would have been friends.

During the funeral it struck me that the event didn’t really represent what I knew about the guy. I suppose funerals aren’t for the dead but for the people close the dead. Maybe they’re not supposed necessarily be modeled after what the dead would have enjoyed. All in all it started me thinking about Dawn’s funeral. I told Dawn as much over dinner and she was a bit taken aback.

Dawn: You were busy planning my funeral!?!

Bill: Yeah, I assumed I’ll be off the hook when it comes to planning mine. I’ll be dead.

Dawn: Oh really? Well, what’s my funeral going to be like?

I told her there would be a wake for her, and instead of everyone gathering around and putting whitewash over her life we’d probably sit around and laugh about all the truly nasty and evil things she did. She seems content with that plan.

The conversation was morbid and a bit awkward to be sure. It didn’t take too long before I made a verbal misstep.

Bill: I think the hardest part will be getting your parents to go along with the plan.

Dawn: My parents? Has it occurred to you that I might out live my parents? When exactly are you planning on killing me?

I tried to explain that this was a worst case scenario type planning. It would be worse if she died sooner instead of later (who says romance is dead). There’s no doubt about it - it’s a slippery subject. It’s hard to talk about without sounding too morbid or even worse - hopeful.

Why blog if not to complain?

People who have been in proximity of me this week have already heard me vent about this. For those of you deprived of the pleasure of my company let me catch you up.

ARGHGHGHRARHGHGH GRRRRRR.

That ought to do it.

I believe a professor owes me two evening of my life back. During the course of doing homework I ran into a problem which seemed to block all progress. I couldn’t prove what needed to be proved. I sent the instructor and email stating the problem I ran into and suggesting perhaps a new basic rule needed to be added to our system in order to construct the proof. I even suggest a name for the new rule.

Later that evening I received a terse reply back. It said that there was no need to introduce a new basic rule into the system because what I proposed could already be derived from the existing rules. I spent the next two evenings trying to derive the new rule and failed miserably. Eventually I just gave up and label the step with a technically incorrect justification.

Lo-and-behold when we get our homework back we are told that he did not take off any points for the proof if we used the incorrect justification. It turns out it is impossible to prove using the basic laws available to us and a new basic law needed to be added. He even gave it the same name I suggested (although to be fair the name I suggested was the obvious choice).

I’ve taken two things away from this experience.

One: I now understand just how little consideration my email questions are actually given. He obviously hadn’t bothered to work the problems he assigned ahead of time and didn’t stop to take my query seriously.

Two: I should not give rules obvious names because then I suspect (probably incorrectly) that people have stolen my ideas. Plus it lacks a certain amount of style. Next time I have to create a new law or lemma to complete a proof I’m going to call it the Edict of Snuffleupagus. That way if I see anyone else using [EoS] as justification I can be sure that my clever logic is being plundered.

Her elegant ruse revealed.

I owe giant top-hat tip and monocle flourish to friend Jamey who sent me these photos last week. I’ve been either too busy or too lazy to post much lately. Take your pick.

Whilst today’s post is just another in a long line of half-hearted attempts to post something – it may at least make you smile. I know it makes me smile.

Dawn and I have long suspected our cat Riblet’s alter ego. We devote a significant amount of our evenings postulating what crimes Riblet may have committed while unattended during the day. Instinctively we know some of her crimes are inappropriate, but the exact nature of her other crimes are a mystery. Is she using our broadband connection to “hack teh internet?” Does she attempt to raise money to finance a guerrilla army who will one day storm our house and claim her freedom? Is she involved in a plot to blow up the outside so she can expand her indoor domain? These are all possibilities we somberly weigh during the wee hours of the evening. Often while staring at Riblet and accusing her of ever present thought crimes.

Jamey has found undeniable evidence of Riblet’s criminal activities. Perhaps now her sinister web will start to unravel. While traveling he crossed paths with what can only be one of Riblet’s many minions. He sent us pictures of a pickup truck with Riblet’s name written across each of the four mud flaps. This is in character with Riblet. She loves to mark her territory and possessions. I’m surprised she only bothered to label it the four times. She inherited her dad’s OCDs. Further evidence that the vehicle belongs to Riblet is the Indiana license plate. We adopted Riblet in the state of Indiana. It’s no surprise that her powerbase stems from her home state. No telling what as-of-yet unidentified assets she’s still hiding in the Hoosier State.

Note that the vehicle in question is a heavy duty pickup truck with a well worn tow-hitch. I’m not sure exactly what she is moving, or how she keeps her minions in her employment….but I’m fairly confident whatever her game, her intentions are malevolent in nature.

Perhaps now we will finally start to find some answers to the dark questions that haunt Riblet’s past.

Milk is Evil

I saw an article about carbon emissions yesterday that made me smile. I smiled because the article kind-of sort-of implied that I’m more environmentally friendly because I’m lactose intolerant. How cool is that! Does it make sense? Hell no. The article has been conflated and misinterpreted and passed around the internet and further maligned. But that’s why it’s fun.

Chris Goodall is the poor author who is at the center of the brouhaha. He’s an environmentalist of some sort and he was giving an interview to promote his book. He was attempting to make the point that while a lot of attention is given to the carbon impact of transportation there is still very little attention given to the carbon impact of our food supply production. In particular Chris is worried about the carbon impact of animal products in our food supply. Chris made the mistake of concocting an example to try and explain his point. The following example was printed in the New York Times:

“If you walk 1.5 miles, Mr. Goodall calculates, and replace those calories by drinking about a cup of milk, the greenhouse emissions connected with that milk (like methane from the dairy farm and carbon dioxide from the delivery truck) are just about equal to the emissions from a typical car making the same trip. And if there were two of you making the trip, then the car would definitely be the more planet-friendly way to go.”

Basically Chris is just trying to say that food production does have a serious carbon impact. I think it’s a bad example…but I don’t really care. What’s funny is while he trying to raise awareness of the evils of carbon emissions he’s become the patron saint of hummer drivers. People have latched on to his example and are using it to justify how all those smelly hippy environmentalist are killing the plant with all their walking instead of safe eco-responsible driving.

Personally I love this argument. The only way we’re going to save this planet is if we all stop eating food and start burning fossil fuels! Who’s with me?

What I really love is milk is made out to be the villain. Yes, it’s about time someone has stuck it to Big Dairy. It’s not bad enough that they make a product that makes me physically ill to consume…then they have to go and rub my nose in it by claiming its super healthy and my bones will disintegrate if I don’t consume it. Yeah well….at least I’m not killing the planet.

Sold to the dorky man with emo glasses…

You can stop chewing your fingernails now. The need for nervous pacing, awkward askew glances, anxious hand wringing, and stressful silence is over. Take a deep breath. Now let it out. The 700 MHz auction has officially ended.

Naturally some of you were able to relax a bit when you noticed the reserve price for the C block of the spectrum was met on January 31st. Meeting that reserved price meant that the winner was going to have to abide by the open access rules associated with the block. This is generally seen as a big win for wireless communication customers. The alternative could have been that no one was willing to bid the block with rules that forced them to not so brutally screw over their customers…. In which case the open access clauses would have most likely been stripped from the block and it would have been re-auctioned off at a later date. But that didn’t happen, at least with the C block.

The D block is another story. That was the other big chunk of spectrum that was being sold off. Its reserve price was not met….so now the FCC has to figure out what to do with it. The winners of the D block were supposed to use part of the spectrum to build a special wireless network for first responders. Basically the winners had to foot the bill for building and maintaining the next generation of first responders communication. I guess no large cooperation found that to be very tantalizing.

As of right now we have no idea who won what. All the bidding was done under strict secrecy. Most people expect Version to walk away with a big chunk of new spectrum. The FCC has announced that the winners will be made public within 10 days. Overall the auction is being viewed as a big success. The FCC had hoped they would have been able to raise 10-15 billion dollars via auctioning off the old spectrum….it turns out they actually raised a bit over 19 billion.

So now we just have to wait and see who the winners were. The last bit of intrigue the auction has to offer is whether or not Google’s names will be on the list of winners. Personally I don’t think it will be, but there is always a chance…

View and be satiated.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This doesn’t really count as a post. There is no meat on its preverbal bones. Yes, I of all people should know the dangers of showing up without meat. Trust me people, I know the dangers. If this were a dinner date with Dawn I wouldn’t show up with tofu. Still, perhaps you should use this time to stop and reflect what an absolutely depraved deviant Mr. Arbuckle is.

That is all.

Number theory humor for the masses?

The following is an excerpt from an actual conversation that took place in our house last night. We were counting something…what exactly is a trivial detail that does not enrich the story, but the counting was the motivation for the following.

Dawn: …so there are four, no wait, five left then?

Bill: If you’re using the conventional natural numbers to count.

Dawn: Screw* you, I prefer to use the unnatural numbers.

Bill: So you think there are 4i left then?

Dawn: I said unnatural, not imaginary numbers.

Bill: Well unnatural numbers don’t exist so I assumed you were imagining them.

Dawn: I’m not imagining them. Riblet taught me how to use the unnatural numbers.

Bill: Do you trust anything that cat tells you?

Dawn: Unnatural numbers are the numbers that cats use to do math.

Bill: Ha!

Dawn: They have to use them because it’s unnatural for cats to do math.

For those of you who have never been exposed to the different flavors of numbers in high school and/or college, or perhaps you have been fortunate enough to scrub the vile filth from your brain….let me vandalize your mind with some simple number theory…because it might help explain the conversation above (but I won’t promise it will make it any more enjoyable).

Natural numbers are the positive integers normally used for counting (0, 1, 2, 3…). Some people might exclude zero from the set of natural numbers…but those people probably aren’t computer scientists.

An imaginary number is a complex number whose square valued is a real number not greater than zero. You’d don’t have to care or understand what that means. Just take away that imaginary numbers are an actual set of numbers that mathematicians use.

Unnatural numbers are something that Dawn made up. They aren’t a “real” thing like imaginary numbers are. That would be the where funny is in this conversation.

I thought the conversation was highly amusing…I’m not sure how other will interpret it. Perhaps you’ll just think we’re giant nerds…Even at home.

* Dawn used a slightly more colorful variation based on the same general concept.

Beat a horse to death, reanimated it, beat it down again.

Another column update? Yes, yes it is. I don’t have a lot of other material to work with right now. Do you want to learn about structural induction of sequences? (I suggest that you shake your head and back away). Alright then, column updates it is.

When I pulled into the driveway last night I waved to our neighbors on the right. They have also recently put their house on the market. Dawn and I must be horrible neighbors because now both of our neighbors are trying to move away. Their departure is a predicament that I am less than thrilled about. We liked both our neighbors and considered ourselves lucky to have two good neighbors. Now we have to roll the dice and see what moves in next.

Anyway, our neighbor was talking to another guy I didn’t recognized. As I was pulling up the driveway I noticed that this other guy disengaged from conversation with our neighbor and started to walk towards our house. As I pulled into the garage I noticed he was following my car…..and he was walking into my garage. Being a paranoid person, I instinctively looked for the something to club him with. In my mind strange people following me into my house equals trouble. I noticed a nice heave tool just outside my car door. I could pop the door open, grab it, and bludgeon the interloper if he didn’t have a really good reason for following me.

Fortunately (for him) he quickly introduced himself as our roof/column contractor. It turns out that our neighbors were discussing getting a new roof with him and he stopped by to talk about our columns. To his credit he seemed very embarrassed while standing in front of our mismatched columns. He said he had no idea how a carpenter could leave the job site thinking that this would be acceptable and apologized repeatedly. I guess since we are a source of referrals we’ve been bumped up on the important jobs to finish list.

So now our columns are supposed to be finished within a week. I’m opting not to hold my breath because I’ve heard that before. They were actually supposed to start today, weather permitting. It’s been raining all morning, so I think it’s safe to say that the weather is not permitting. Perhaps this three month debacle will actually come to an amenable conclusion.

What we have here is a failure of communication

Days have turned into weeks, weeks have turned into months, and still our front columns have not been completed. Not to our satisfaction. Actually, since the last time I’ve written about them, the columns have not even been touched. They are in the exact same state of cattywampus mismatch. Evidence that a carpenter, who is more monkey than man, has worked on our house. Occasionally we’ll call the contractor and ask about them. We are assured that the contractor is also unhappy with the state of things and he is diligently working to set things right. The skeptics in us raise an eyebrow.

Yesterday was a watershed day in column correction history. Dawn had multiple phone conversations with the contractor. I think they help illustrate the how endlessly baffling columns can truly be.

[I was not privy to the actual conversations…so I’ve taken some creative liberties with how they might have transpired. The gists of the misunderstandings are accurate.]

Contractor: I’ve finished pricing out the new columns. I’m ready to replace the one we did before with round columns….

Dawn: Why round columns? We wanted square columns. The fact that they are square-ish in shape is not the problem. It’s the fact that they are both not the same shape that is the problem. It’s the fact that only one of them is actually square.

Contractor: Uh… ok. I’ll have to price out some other stuff then. I’ll give you a call back later.

[time elapses]

Contractor: Alright, I got it figured out this time. I’ll tear out the existing columns and replace them with a square aluminum columns….

Dawn: Why are you going bother doing that? The fact that the current columns are built out of wood is not a problem. It’s the fact that they don’t match!

Contractor: …

Dawn: I have an idea. Why don’t you just re-box the current non-square column so that it is square? Then our two columns will match. You won’t have to replace both columns that way.

Contractor: …. ok?

The process is infuriating. We also had a neighbor asked about our new roof yesterday. They are preparing to sell their house and think they need to replace their roof first. They noticed that we just had our roof replaced. We told them that the roof work was done very well….but don’t hire the guy to do any carpentry. He can’t figure out how to build a box the same way twice.

They Might Be Giants still rock

Dawn and I got to see They Might Be Giants on Sunday night. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen TMBG in concert now…but it always a good show.

The opening act was a two man band from Northern Ireland called Oppenheimer. One guy was the drummer and lead singer. The other guy did everything else, which is to say, played guitar, triggered sequenced tracks and messed around with two keyboards/synthesizers, and occasional vocals. He was a very busy guy. The music sounded a little like Freezepop to me. My favorite part of the show was when they worked an air horn into one of the songs. As the drummed pulled the air horn the guitarist flipped his guitar over so we could read a sheet of paper taped to the back of his guitar that read “Air Horn Solo.” Overall, it was fun and energetic opening act….but not more fun and energetic than the last opening ac t we saw at a TMBG concert: Corn-mo. Corn-mo sets the opening act bar for fun and energy almost unattainably high.

The Giants themselves were in good form. At first they looked like they weren’t into the show that much. Flansburgh said that this was their sixth consecutive concert in as many days and they were in a daze. But after a couple of songs the band seemed to get really engaged and start having fun. They have a new drummer since the last time I saw them and he seemed really happy to be there. He smiled the whole way through the show.

I was pleased with their set list. It was a pretty eclectic sampling from their body of work. They played "Hey, Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal," which I don’t think I’ve heard them play live before. They played a smattering of stuff off Apollo 18 (I Palindrome I!!!) and Flood, as well as some newer songs off of The Spine and The Else. They even played some of the children songs off of Here Come the ABCs and Here Come the 123s…but with decidedly non-child safe intro’s.

No want.

Dawn and I often check icanhascheezburger.com while getting a cup of coffee in the morning. This morning’s offering was a big hit.

So this is a pretty complex image. My question is: who does the text belong to?

The obvious answer is the cat, after all there is a devil-baby torturing it. I expect that is what the image's creator intended. However, I’m not content to let things go at that.

Some of you know my version of heaven does not include dogs and cats (heaven is a clean and orderly place.) So the devil-baby might be concluding that it’s in hell since a cat is present. Of course since the devil-baby is in fact a devil-baby that should come as no surprise. Also, I’m pretty sure there are no babies in heaven. What would be the point of being perpetually a baby? No intellectual development possible, constant crying. That sounds like the opposite of heaven.

To my mind, the text belongs to the viewer of the image. The text is an echo of the viewer’s inner-monologue. Cats, check. Baby, check. Yup, this is hell. I expect that there is probably a dog running somewhere in the blurry background.

Oh well, I think I’ve run this into the ground enough. Obviously I didn’t have a clever blog topic to post about so I pounced on a funny image and tried to construct a blog about it. But the schtik is getting old and weak. Best move on. But don’t worry loyal reader; I’m sure I can find it in myself to make fun of pets and babies again in the future. You can count on that.

Project Runway Conclusion

While I might have been a bit ambivalent about the start of Project Runway this season, I have to say I’m very satisfied with its conclusion. I’ll go so far as to say that I’m even more satisfied with this season’s finale than previous Project Runway seasons. I think I can trace my design-driven reality TV contentment back to two root causes.

Root cause number one: I actually liked all three collections. That is to say, I think all three were good collections, personal athletics aside. I’m not sure how much of this is a factor of having multiple New York Fashion Week runway viewings under my belt and how much of this is simply the designers did a good job. The first time I saw a Fashion Week collection (which would have been during Project Runway season 1) I thought it was utterly ridiculous. I was judging clothes based on the same merits I might use if I were trying to buying them in the mall. I think I now take the rarified atmosphere of Fashion Week into account and allow it to help shape my impression. I suppose Tim Gunn might say I now use a different “lens.”

While I wasn’t crazy about the designers starting out I think they all stepped up their game and delivered some interesting clothes for the finale. That’s the key; they did a good, competent job. Too often reality TV is about people acting stupid and contrived confrontation. It’s refreshing to see talented people create something of value in a professional manner.

Root Cause number two: they finally choose the winner correctly. I think Project Runway actually stands to have a lot to gain from their choice this time. I’ve had a problem with some of their previous season winner choices. If the point of the show is to help launch a designers career, why do they keep skipping over the obviously talented young designer who needs help launching a career and award the already establish designer? Especially when one of the main prizes was a mentorship (which I realize wasn’t the case this time around). Time and again the winner threw the mentorship back in their faces and basically just walked away with the free media exposure.

I see this season’s winner as actually being grateful to the show for helping their career and will probably promote the show and process as much as possible….and not in the cheap contractual obligation kind of way.

Finally project runway thought: In a juxtaposition of my reality TV watching habits, did you know that America’s Next Top Model girls walked in the Project Runway show? Three of them. Jaslene walked for Jillian Lewis (but thankfully she did not have to annunciate a single syllable). Bianca and Dani both walked for Chris March (he got to show as one of the Project Runway final three decoys.)

Is there an ichthyolocial haberdasher in the house?

I owe a big hat tip to the presurfer blog. That’s where I saw a link to the art work of Brian Despain. Brian Despain makes art that I like. I don’t think I ask for much from an artist, lovingly rendered robots, ichthyological surrealism, and an occasional cephalopod thrown into spice things up. Brian Despain delivers in spades.

I’m having a hard time picking a favorite piece. I’m partial to The Stranger….but I think it’s because I have a predilection towards tophats.


Due to some strange synchronicity of the universe he has painting featuring a robot and octopus enthralled by a red spot. I too am currently enthralled by red spots. I wonder if I’m the robot or the octopus? There’s a windmill in the background that I choose to interpret as a giant. I think I understand the obstacles that these two will face. I can connect with them on a deep emotional level….


If I could buy a piece of his artwork and hang it in my house today, I think I would have to go with the clockwork fish. The color palate would work well in our family room and I am rather taken to it.


Of course I don’t think that piece is actually for sale. Which is a pity.

However if I were decorating some room on a robot theme….for a child…like say a nursery… I would be tempted to try and acquire some uplifting piece of robot art. I think a robot/humming bird piece would work well.


If that were the case then I’d be in luck, because prints of that particular piece actually are for sell.

Where's the household FAQ?

Dawn and I were talking about how great it would be if life were more like a video game. Specifically we were talking about what it would be like if life presented you with achievements and unlockables as you went along. Naturally, life is like a RPG in the greater sense. If you put your time and effort into some goal you’ll eventually achieve it. But we weren’t talking big picture stuff though. We were talking about the obnoxious grind and reward system most video games have in place.

For example, imagine that common household tasks rewarded you akin to a video game. Take food preparation. Let’s say in the course of preparing dinners you’ve just cut your 100th onion, you just unlocked a new knife. Cool! The new knife has reassuring weight and balance and is obviously sharper than your old knife….man, cutting onions is going to be much easier now….which is good. Because you won’t unlock another new knife until you’ve mise en placed your 500th onion.

Heck, if the kitchen gave away cutlery like that there would be a pile of chopped onions in our sink. I would totally munchkin that up.

Or perhaps you would receive upgrades to your vacuum cleaner as you repeatedly vacuum your house. I dunno, new accessories or something. You’d probably have to check the household FAQ to figure out what you’d get. All I know is that I would rig it so the vacuum would run 24 hours a day until I got the ultimate vacuum unlock…..mega-suction capable of vacuuming up not just cat fur but actually the whole cat!

I guess what we were getting at is how much more enjoyable common household chores might be if there was always the possibility that this repetition might be some nice big round number of times this chore has been performed and you might be rewarded with a prize.

For the rest of the weekend Dawn kept rewarding me with items as I “unlocked” various achievements around the house. I completed the dishes and unlocked a cooking magazine that just-so-happened to be sitting on the counter by her. Most of the unlocks were a bit uninspiring, but there’s definitely some video precedence for that as well. However, I did noticed that she unlocked some "consuming a meal" achievement and was rewarded with a fudge-pop. I’m starting to wonder if the system is rigged.