E Tenebris Lux Dormiens

The heart

2012-02-21T17:40:00.001-08:00

Every week be working like the heart, going tick-tock, tick-tock.

Spicy

2012-02-18T09:42:00.001-08:00

Last Saturday, I ordered taco with pollo and when he asked whether I wanted spicy or mild.

I replied, "Picante."

He was pleased enough that he grabbed my hands and said something to me in Spanish.

2012-02-15T20:02:00.000-08:00

Two alternative Ruby methods of generating an 8-character passwords:

puts [].tap { |l| 8.times { l << ('a'..'z').to_a[rand 26] }}.join

puts Array.new(8).map { ('a'..'z').to_a[rand 26] }.join

An inarticulable mystery

2012-02-12T00:25:00.001-08:00

"An inarticulable mystery
Is _this_ anxiety
Cannot say yes — or no —
Cannot approach, just want to go"
Wager my fingers
Be buried in the air

Re: It's Friday, Feb 10 - How did your day go?

2012-02-10T21:19:00.001-08:00

I am including Blogger in the email to see if it works. I think I would like to publish to both simultaneously.

Today was a short day again, but I dragged it out a bit longer so I could get the full six hours that my supervisor told us we have. I think it is disappointing that we didn't have so much work. In a way, I get a sense of what it would be like if our healthcare system moved toward preventative medicine. It would likely render a lot of labs like ours less necessary if not completely unnecessary. Our lab is focused on diagnosing patients that already have health problems (primarily renal dialysis), and so doctors order tests that occur with varying degree of frequency, sometimes quarterly, sometimes monthly, and sometimes weekly.

Still, with the knowledge that so much of our economy is devoted toward treating sick people, it would be a good thing to reduce spending on this area so we can do something else. We don't need a drain on the economy as much as we need new stuff, new paradigm.

2012-02-09T21:19:00.001-08:00

Short work day, which on one hand is disappointing because I don't earn as much money. On the other hand, I'm home early. I prefer to just be able to go home. I think my biggest negative regarding this job is that it is 25 miles away. It is a commute with an unpredictable drive time. Sometimes it will go smoothly, and other times, an accident will slow everything down. More cars can come mysteriously from nowhere and cause every other car to slow down. I have to deal with people. I try to be a little more zen about it, but it's difficult. I hope that I can find another job either closer to home or which earns enough money for me to move out. Both at once would be quite good right now.

Check out Shakespeare In Bits: Hamlet iPad Edition

2012-01-30T12:20:00.001-08:00

Shakespeare In Bits: Hamlet iPad Edition

Check out this application on the App Store:

Shakespeare In Bits: Hamlet iPad Edition

Mindconnex Learning Ltd.

Category: Education

Updated: Jan 24, 2012

iTunes for Mac and Windows

Please note that you have not been added to any email lists.
Copyright © 2012 Apple Inc. All rights reserved

Sent from my iPad

So shall I

2012-01-16T22:46:00.001-08:00

So shall I
Pay for liberty
Without the fee
Of me?

The sound of the ether
The punitive release
That happened to be stayed

2012-01-14T22:40:00.000-08:00

Liberals and libertarians are unhappy with the bailouts but for different reasons. Liberals think that the government should have given the money instead to the homeowners on whom predatory lending took place, and if that couldn't happen, the alternative would be to step in and force the banks to take a loss by writing down the loan. This would have made the mortgage worth the same as what its collapsed price would be and would have set the stage for perhaps another speculation bubble, as unavoidable as dust. The banks, as a result, could have either collapsed, but it would have been fit for the government to nationalize them as needed, the way it did with auto industry.

Libertarians, however, think the banks should all have collapsed, because banks would then not be able to foreclose any house since they wouldn't exist anymore. At least, that's how I understand it.

Short-term profits, innovate or die, free market, they are all idiotic systems based on consumerism. The things that Apple are doing, like offering a recycling program, doing audit to ensure that workers have sanitary condition, eliminated toxic metals, are all things that it didn't have to do, and they are also things that don't benefit Apple's bottom line. Is there anything in the free market that suggest engaging in activities beneficial to society would make them more profitable? I say no because the free market doesn't care. It is an abstract, ideal system that has nothing to do with largely irrational people who buy Coke rather than Pepsi, and drink 64 oz of sugar water instead of plain water.

Purple Communications

2012-01-13T06:46:00.001-08:00

Purple Communications seems like it should be a good company, but it has been difficult to contact anyone about its other services, like the IP-Relay and ClearCaptions. They don't have a Contact Form, and where an email is available, I don't get a reply. Looking at Hamilton CapTel, I was surprised to get a response within a day.

I wonder if the reason Purple had been having problems is still the fine from the FCC for fraud.

Parasites

2012-01-10T18:36:00.000-08:00

Felis Catus

2011-12-29T23:28:00.000-08:00

It looks like Perl enjoys looking outside the window in my room. She spent all day napping and now is watching outside. When I was in my room with the light on, which caused a reflection in the window making it hard for her to see outside, I feel like she sometimes look at me, or dashes between the room and out, as if to signal me that she wanted me to have my light off so that she can look outside.

I closed the curtain, and turned off the light and left her alone in the dark.

Mum was asking where Perl was. I told her in my room. She went there and back and told me that she didn’t find her.

I went to the room to look for her, and found her hiding behind the curtain. She was looking outside as usual, as if in deep contemplation.

She just pooped a half hour ago, and oddly, she didn't try to cover it up. It turned out there was another spot of urine on one side. I wonder if our cat is really that finicky, or it will turn out that the litter box is too small or something.

Tasks and Taxes

2011-12-18T22:27:00.001-08:00

They are words I keep making with my tongues. The way the back of my throat hits to make the k sound is somehow unsatisfying.

Inflation

2011-12-14T21:38:00.001-08:00

It is amazing how things have changed. Just 20 years ago, we could see a ballet in Oakland for just $15. A nutcracker would have a price of $30. Now, I am not even sure we can have that expectation. Not only would we not want to go to Oakland to see a ballet, but we also would have to pay $400 to get a good seat.

Reboot

2011-12-12T13:31:00.000-08:00

Well, let's reboot this blog. I haven't posted much because I haven't felt like I had something worth saying, but you know what, bloviating has the same root word as blogging. So, I shall bloguiate.

I have tried other blogging platforms, Posterous, WordPress, Tumblr, etc. Yet the only one I still feel comfortable with is Blogger.com. Even with the changes that Google made, it feels easy, intuitive, and I don't need to get annoyed. I don't feel, like with Tumblr, that I need to make my contents special or photography-related. I don't feel, like with Posterous, that I need to have friends and families to post to. I don't feel, like with WordPress, that I have to remember to press "Enter" one time to get a new paragraph or that I have to deal with various buttons either confusing me or giving me choices that leave me paralyzed.

With WordPress, I get a button like Save as Draft that is more prominent than Publish, making me feel like I should somehow censor myself. In contrast, Blogger puts Publish in orange, and the rest in tasteful background gray.

I did, however, feel that Blogger was for a time getting complicated in trying to copy other platforms, offering features like labels and tagging (what's an obvious way to tell the difference?). I know the difference between labels, tags, categories, and folders, but I don't want to deal with them when I'm writing. I may geek out, but when I'm writing, I prefer not to be fiddling with the styles, organizations, and classifications.

Like I pointed out before on Abraham Williams' Google+, Google should be the Netflix of text. It should figure out how to parse the contents and offer suggested categories. I believe it already does so with the Internet, so why can't it do so with people posting on Google+ as well? Like Netflix's 5-star rating system, Google can use each individual's +1 to filter out what people aren't interested in.

Naturally, there is worry about privacy, but I think it could be implemented like advertising in emails.

Mamihlapinatapai

2011-10-30T11:56:00.001-07:00

Unsure of - But the soft Blue - Belied by the look of you

Sounds like an enjoyable night I'll miss out on

2011-09-24T20:04:00.001-07:00

http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterdark/

super in Ruby

2011-09-03T23:02:00.001-07:00

<code>

class Person

def initialize(name)

@name = name

end

def name

return @name

end

class Doctor < Person

def name

“Dr. “ + super

end

</code>

That, in short, is how super works.

super

2011-09-03T23:00:00.000-07:00

class Person
	def initialize(name)
		@name = name
	end

	def name
		return @name
	end
end

class Doctor < Person
	def name
		“Dr. “ + super
	end
end

That, in short, is how super works.

Student debt

2011-08-19T15:11:00.001-07:00

Kenyon has erected a $70 million sports palace featuring a 20-lane olympic pool. Stanford's professors now get paid sabbaticals every fourth year, handing them $115,000 for not teaching. Vanderbilt pays its president $2.4 million.

http://m.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/08/the-debt-crisis-at-american-colleges/243777/

Fitting in

2011-08-07T18:12:00.000-07:00

From Ars Technica:

Fitting in to a group without helping the group: We've all met the sorts of people who adjust their behavior to fit in better with a group. And now a study has come along that confirms our worst suspicions about them: they don't actually care about the wellbeing of the group they're trying to fit in to. Some researchers from the University of East Anglia set up a public goods game, where participants could contribute some resources so that the entire group would benefit. Those that valued being accepted by the group the most were less likely to share resources for said group's benefit. The highest contributions came from those who had the lowest interest in being socially desirable, but only under specific circumstances: the experimenter had to praise their previous contributions to get them to cough up more.

Interesting. I don't think it's related to introversion. It seems that people who are less interested in fitting in would be willing to contribute more if they were praised compared to people who aren't that interested in the well-being of the group in the first place.

2011-08-07T14:04:00.000-07:00

What happened to Obama's Passion?
It is a continuation of your narrative that Congress is too beholden to Wall Street, because even though Americans strongly believe in certain things, like requiring the wealthy to give to charity and not receive it, Wall Street is too intent on preserving the status quo that keeps them very, very rich.

Congress is deadlocked, and even if Obama had tried to fight, he would still have to fight against a distinctly recalcitrant House Republicans and doubting liberals that have been corrupted by Reagan's words.

Our president is too Nixonian because our politics are changing. Just as many conservatives have been so disappointed by Nixon for passing Clean Waters Act and other acts that while liberal, were distinctly disappointing to both liberals and conservatives, were still acts of the Progressive movement. Now, Obama is the other way, acts of the Conservative movement toward cutting government down and down, while yet preserving it in so many ways, disappointing both parties. Just as Nixon was never accepted as a liberal, Obama is not accepted as a conservative. Just as Nixon might be considered a corrupted conservative, Obama is considered a corrupted liberal.

2011-06-25T23:44:00.000-07:00

It is interesting to read the news over Final Cut Pro X. The way so many people have gotten upset at how Apple threw away what was venerable for what a new, improved, and yet incomplete paradigm.

Area 51

2011-06-12T14:01:00.000-07:00

Radio Habana

2011-04-02T23:18:00.001-07:00

Posted via email from Alan's posterous