Getting Better All the Time 3.18

politics

It looks like they won't be drilling in ANWAR.

And Judge John E Jones, appointed by Bush, allegedly a Republican and a church goer, sharply rebuked the Intelligent Design folks in a 139 page decision

And the PATRIOT ACT got six months of probation. Now maybe the 98 Senators * who voted for it can explain what exactly they were thinking. If their reasons for voting for it were:
a) I didn't have time to read it
b) I had to for political reasons/pressure
then maybe they don't need to be a Senator, because they are:
a) stupid
b) cowardly

Looks like even though the Republicans have the House, Senate, White House, and have appointed most of the Supreme Court the RightWing does not get what ever it wants handed to them on a silver platter.

keep feeling assassination

I don't know why I did this, but last night I watched "Collateral". The movie where Tom Cruise is a hitman, and Jamie Foxx is the cab driver that drives him around all night. Well, it wasn't as boring as KingKong, but it wasn't good. Side note, the giant ape, much better actor than Tom Cruise... if Kong had been a hitman riding a taxi around LA...now that's a movie.

Anywho...if you are in the mood this Christmas season to watch a professional killer, might I recommend:
"Leon: the Professional" featuring a young N. Portman
"La Femme Nikita" watch the original french version
"Grosse Pointe Blank" Minnie Driver is dreamy, and Aykroyd is funny
"Nurse Betty" very sad

habits

After NaNoWriMo I kept writing. There were a few characters that had another story arc that seemed fun to me. So I kept writing, although at a slower pace. I kept this up until a couple of days ago. Since writers write (everyday) I am proud to say that for 44 days, I was a writer.

Yes, I have gained an appreciation for how difficult the job is.

King Kong

Happy Holiday season sports fans!

Every now and then I am know to make a bullheaded foolish decision. And I have been known to stick with that decision, even if it was irrational.

In the spirit of the Holiday, I decided maybe, I could open up my mind and try and change my bullhead mind.

Previously I had decided that Jack Black was verboten. As you may know, Mr. Black is in King Kong.

Spoiler warning: maroon

Dear Mr. Jackson,

Having a couple of supporting characters talk about “The Heart of Darkness” for a couple of short scenes does not infuse your movie with philosophical depth.

The most potentially interesting part of the movie was never discussed. Why is the captain of the ship time and again risking his crew to save a fugitive filmmaker? Oh but wait, convenient for the movie, the ship captain for fun when not sailing the world, is also a big game hunter. But not until like the 4th rescue does the ship captain even think about trying to capture the beast. And then when that quickly goes bad he yells retreat. Convenient for the movie, the fugitive filmmaker had a good shot that K.O.ed the super-ape.

The characters were boring.
The music was cliché.
The attempts at humor were awful.
A lot of the effects seemed like left over orc-scenes from LOTR.

I know it is my fault, I try to avoid advertising, I am sure that you would have warned me. I am sure that the ads would have said something like:

“Have you ever wondered what running with the brontosauruses would be like?
“Have you ever wondered what it be like to be attacked by giant cockroaches and big slimy worms at the same time?
“Have you ever wanted to see a giant ape attacked by giant bats?
“Wonder who would win a WWF smack-down between King Kong & THREE Tyrannosaurus Rexs?
“Do you think ‘out of the frying pan and into the fire’ ad infinitum is the pinnacle of adventure?
“Have you ever wanted to see a gorilla on ice?
“Then you must see KING KONG!!!!”

Mr. Jackson, if that was not your ad campaign, you owe me six dollars and twenty-five cents. In American currency please.

You know, more money doesn’t mean better movie. I was thinking about this during the boring movie. The StarTrek Next Gen movies were never better than some of the two part episodes. Same with X-Files. It seemed Jackson had cash to spend and just kept on tossing on special effects laden scenes that didn’t add a whit to story.
I have not been this let down since I saw “A.I.”
I prefer story to effects.
I prefer substance to style.

On the other side of the coin, Jack Black did not ruin this movie for me. He performed decently. So I don't know what to do about my holiday lesson. I tried to change, by going against a rule I made to keep me from being burned by a bad movie. But Mr. Black did not let me down. Mr. Jackson let me down.
I guess the lesson for me is not to waste my time at the movie theaters.

final grade D as in dumb

class

Just turned in my take home final for Anatomy & Physiology, and boy am I tired.
Now I got to finish "Guns, Germs & Steel" for my boss.

I was reading

The Hammer and the Axe

Book 2 of Dwarven Nations trilogy. I liked book 1 alot more, it gave more culture of the dwarves. This one, it had like four of five story lines going, they were still introducing major characters half way in. It just didn't grip me, I just didn't finish it.

Stalking the Rieman Hypothesis

I will give this one a C-
The Riemann Hypothesis is one of the Millennium Problems, meaning a Holy Grail of modern mathematics. It deals with the distribution of prime numbers.

So what? Well, I would say there's the beauty of math, but for a more practical reason, we need lots of prime numbers for cryptography. (pg 18)

In an effort to be either helpful or cute, or poetic or profound, the author used alot of metaphores to try and explain what the math is about. I found it distrating.

There was a section about lens filters as a metaphore for something, there was a Billard Hall analogy where the balls don't follow normal physics. That was the worst ananolgy. "A (unknown) is like B (known) except please remember B is like something you think you know, but it is different from what you have experienced."

The author compares the mathematical harmonic series to musical harmony. Evidently the author is unaware of the significance of "the Well Tempered Klavier", that for modern (post-JS Bach) we don't tune by harmonics, we have to temper our tuning, so that the piccalo and the tuba can play in tune.

There was the connection between prime numbers and quantum physics. Yeah, I didn't get that part.

We are introduced to people who have done work trying to prove the hypothesis, J. Gram an insurance industry, Arthur Caylay - lawyer. The people involved I found interesting.

nice quote
"...mathematics is frustrating. If it's not frustrating you're probably tackling a problem that is too easy. ...in mathematics your stead state is that you are stuck." pg 216

what's this?

Hey sports fans....I don't spend my entire life in front of a 'puter. This "novelist" knows how to crawl around under a house and insulate pipes.

First, thanks again to AfterCixLabs, Zorloc & the ExorciseJounal for helping with insulation last summer.

Quick question, there's an insulated copper looking wire that is attached to water pipes in a few locations. Now someday, I hope to be able to submit a picture into a Google search engine and get information about that picture. We'll call that future feature "GoogleStalker". I think it would be very handy for times like this, when a picture is worth a thousand words.

From preliminary Googling I found
http://www.dbsinstall.com/Whatis/Whatisgood-5.htm
http://www.birds-eye.net/house/phase_18.htm

Which makes me think it's a ground wire.
Should I insulate around it? Or keep insulation away?

photo from under house warning: grey & coppery

Mo Money Mo Problems

these crazy kids can't ever be happy

I don't know what, they want from me
It's like the more money we come across
The more problems we see

politics and poverty warning: orange

So, we are facing a budget surplus.

I kinda hope we give it back, rebate check style, to the tax payers.

Or, we save it for a rainy day. but since politicians can not be trusted to save, then, give it back.

I was talking with a friend who works with alot of poor kids. There is a poverty mentality, if you get money, spend it no something good, cuz it might be gone tomorrow.
Example: She would had shoeless students would tell her about their weekend Circus-Circus.
There is more better research. More later.
It seems our politicians, because the want to be re-elected, have no vision for the future. The constituents want something now.
Bugger.

rants on congress

I will be ranting about congress over stepping its bounds.
If I remember correctly, Senator Bob Dole campaigned on the virtues of the Tenth Amendment.
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
If I remember correctly, the Republican Party was allegedly the party of smaller government. My how things change when you are in power.

Congress investigated the high price of gasoline.

Congress investigated steroids in baseball.

And Congress wants to investigate the BCS system!

ranting warning: red, like a stop sign, for example "Dear Congress, stop what you are doing!"

First let me start with one of my political philosophies.
Not all good ideas make good laws.
For example, it is a good idea to floss your teeth daily. This would make a bad law, it would be difficult to enforce, it limits people’s free will and it would overstep the bounds put upon Congress by the Constitution.

I’ve read the Constitution a few times. I have not seen “baseball” or “steroids” mentioned in it. I have not seen “entertainment or sporting industry” mentioned in it.
Steroids are legal. If an athlete takes a steroid, it is between him and his employer. It is an issue between Major League Baseball and the fans to decide. Congress has no business in it. Did President Bush, in a State of the Union speech, threaten professional sports to look into steroid abuse/use or the feds would do it? Why do we care what professional athlete’s do? Taking steroids is bad/unhealthy, and we don’t want children doing it. OK, sure. Still, a matter between fans and MLB.
Yes, the Interstate Commerce Clause, the part of the constitution that allows politicians to stick their noses everywhere. Let’s see if we can apply this….dental floss is manufactured and sold between people in different states. Dental insurance companies can have members in different states. We want to promote good dental hygiene in children, which will make the nation healthier, which will reduce the burden of taxpayers and insurers that have to pay for those that didn’t take care of their teeth. Should Congress look into me flossing my teeth?

Oil execs were in front of the Senate. They looked so ill prepared. When a Senator made instating remarks about the executives pay and bonuses, the oil man should have responded with “I have helped bring profitable returns to __ million American people, the share holders who have invested in the company.” When the Senator showed a chart of how gas prices have recently risen, the Oil Company should have responded with a chart of housing prices in the Senators hometown. The Oil Company should have brought out a pie-chart showing how much of the cost of a gallon of gas is actually for taxes. And don’t companies get in trouble if they severely undersell the competition? The Oil Men should have ended with, “…there was a place where the government attempted to regulate the price of goods that people would buy, fortunately the USSR is not around anymore.”
I believe that American company executives are grossly overpaid. I think it is bad. I hope that someday soon, besides outsourcing factory worker jobs to third world nations, we start outsourcing company executive’s jobs, “sorry Mr. Chairman of the Board, we found a guy in Indonesia that will do your work for 1% of your salary.” How much are European executives paid, versus American executives…even if they work for the same global company? Still, not a problem that Congress should try and fix.

College football? What the _____ are they thinking. Read the article, this was initiated by a Republican. “Limited government”!! What a bunch of hypocritical liars. Or maybe the Republicans have changed; they aren’t the party of limited government any more. Well, I just checked the 2004 RNC Party Platform, page 42, “We must maintain our commitment to free and fair trade, lower taxes, limited regulation, and a limited, efficient government that keeps up with the new realities of a changing world.” Or page 48, “The President’s management agenda is an effective tool for making sure that government is active but limited, focusing on results and obtaining them efficiently.”

What should Congress be doing? How about balancing the budget? How about paying off the National Debt?

gold digger

First I saw him on Ellen, then he performed on SNL with a string section (and it worked)...and now I've been listening to this for like the twentieth time tonight...but the thing is, it ain't like this is a song I want to go around singing...it looks like it was edited a bit not to upset the FCC...lots heavy bass drum,... plastic clap beat straight on the 2 & 4 beat..."string section" quick syncapations...looped sample of Jamie Foxx singing...

...but he drops the N-word, lots.
(And I do believe we've come to far, to be using that word.)And I don't think it has an uplifting message. (Yeah, I know, art don't have to be uplifting.)

None-the-less, very nicely produced, and young Mr. Kanye West can sling the words together, and I find it catchy.

copyright infringement warning: azure

If you aint no punk holla We Want Prenup
WE WANT PRENUP!, Yeaah
It's something that you need to have
Cause when she leave yo ass she gone leave with half
18 years, 18 years
And on her 18th birthday he found out it wasn't his

You got out to eat and he cant pay y'all cant leave
There's dishes in the back, he gotta roll up his sleeves
But why y'all washin watch him
He gone make it into a Benz out of that Datson
He got that ambition baby look in his eyes
This week he moppin floorz next week it's the fries

Get down girl go ahead get down