Blog title

Making machines

2012-01-28T21:52:00.001+13:00

My work consists of constructing machines for others by merely describing them. It seems to be a favoured vocation at the moment, where many people consider the skills required as "too difficult to learn", and never bother. I wonder how long it'll be before everybody catches on and it becomes the obvious way to get anything done.

The United States of Fried Chicken

2011-11-22T07:31:00.001+13:00

Last week I got very sick and had to stay home for a day.

Before I fell ill, I noticed that pretty much every fried chicken place around London was named after a Southern US state, like "Texas Fried Chicken" or "Mississippi Fried Chicken". That gave me a thought... what about other US states that aren't known for their fried chicken, how often do their names appear alongside the words "fried chicken"? Seeing as fried chicken is known as a Southern US food, despite being fairly ubiquitous, perhaps there would be a trend between the fried-chickeness of a state and its latitude?

Being the nerd that I am, and having much time on my hands being sick at home, I got to work compiling a list of US states, their latitudes (of their state capital cities), and the number of Google-indexed pages named "<state> fried chicken". My investigation into fried-chickenality began thus.

Methods

All web queries were run during the 16th of November 2011 UTC.

A list of US states and their capital cities was compiled from Wikipedia. The cities' latitudes were obtained from their respective Wikipedia pages, recorded to the nearest minute, then transformed into a decimal number via a custom Ruby script.

The District of Columbia (DC) was considered a culturally significant entity within the US, and was included in the list as a state for the purposes of this study.

The Fried Chicken Index is the number of pages returned when a Google search is run for the phrase (quotes inclusive) "<STATE_NAME> fried chicken", entirely in lowercase letters, where <STATE_NAME> is the name of the US state in question.

The result recorded for DC was the sum for the phrases "district of columbia fried chicken" and "dc fried chicken", because the district is almost exclusively referred to as "DC", and the city's name "Washington" coincides with that of the state.

The correlation between the relative Southerliness of a state and its fried-chickenation was calculated using Spearman's rank correlation coefficient. This metric was used because both a state's Southerliness and fried-chickeness were only meaningful in relative (ranked) terms.

Results

States varied widely in fried-chickenment. The minimum recorded Fried Chicken Index (FCI) was South Dakota (44°22'N) at 8 and the maximum was Kentucky (38°12'N) at 5.88x10⁶, a range that spans nearly 6 orders of magnitude. The mean FCI was 228101, the median 17100, and the standard deviation 880663, indicating an extreme inequality in the fried-chickenation of states.

Over 80% (41) of the states had an FCI between 10³ and 10⁵, reflecting the relative ubiquity of fried chicken in US states and forming a tight fried-chickenhood in the middle of the distribution.

Data points outside that range are listed below. The highest FCIs (above 10⁵) were:

California	433000
Texas	477000
Kansas	583000
Louisiana	1020000
New York	2240000
Kentucky	5880000

Figure 1. FCI of US states ranked by latitude (high) States are ranked from north to south. Exceptional states are orange and labelled by name. The linear Y-axis shows how the exceptional states dwarf other states in absolute fried chicken indices.

The lowest FCIs (below 10³) were:

Wyoming	735
Rhode Island	10
North Dakota	9
South Dakota	8

Figure 2. FCI of US states ranked by latitude (low) States are ranked from north to south. Exceptional states are in faded orange and extend beyond the top of the chart. When the Y-axis is adjusted to exclude the exceptionally high FCI states, a clear trend in fried-chickenality can be seen going from north to south.

The Spearman's rank correlation was 0.60, indicating a reasonably strong correlation between the Southernity of a state and its fried-chickeness rank. (1 indicates full correlation, 0 indicates no correlation)

Several states appear to be much higher their neighbours in the fried-chickenhood. Of note are Wisconsin (4.49x10⁴), Maryland (6.25x10⁴), and all 6 states with an FCI over 10⁶.

Discussion

In Anglophone countries, and especially the United States of America, fried chicken is generally regarded as a "Southern" food. This study attempts to characterise the link between the latitude of US states and the respective notabilities of their fried chicken.

Statistical analysis of the Fried Chicken Indices (FCI) of the states showed a good correlation between the states' Southerliness and fried-chickence, confirming the basic hypothesis. The study also revealed several states with exceptional FCI levels, some coming from relatively northerly states; possible explanations for some of the more unusual cases are suggested below.

Kentucky (FCI: 5880000): Situated in the heartland of the US, Kentucky is the home and namesake of the most famous fried chicken restaurant in the world. Its exceptionally high FCI is of no surprise given this fact.
New York (FCI: 2240000): New York is a Northern US state, home of New York City, the most populous city in the US. The concentration of people may provide a clue into cause of the high FCI found here. More research is required to identify the true reason behind this exceptionally high fried-chickenality.
Maryland (FCI: 62500): A mid-Atlantic state, Maryland lends its name to the well-known fried chicken dish Chicken Maryland, giving a moderate creamy gravy boost to its fried-chickeness.
Wisconsin (FCI: 44900): In the far north of the US, Wisconsin was a surprise winner in the fried chicken stakes, besting many Southern contenders. This researcher could not find any obvious reasons for its prominence in the fried chicken world.

Imagine a dinner table

2011-10-23T12:30:00.001+13:00

Imagine a dinner table, with a family sat around it.

There's Father, who built the house they're all sitting in; Mother who cooked all the food; Sister who set the table and put some music on; and there's little baby Billy. Billy's just learned to feed himself - to the entire family's delight.

Everybody's hungry and ready to eat. In fact, everybody's so hungry that the conversation is mostly driven by food.

Whenever the food is needed, it is brought in from the kitchen. Thanks to the work of Mother, they have enough food to feed the whole family several times over.

There's a rule in this family: each person only gets food if someone else hands it to them. And someone only hands you food if you ask them and give them what they want. This is a civilised family, after all.

Since the conversation is driven by access to the food, whenever someone happened to have some food, he finds that he could steer the conversation to whatever he wants. If he happened to be in possession of most of a table's food, he could make everybody listen to what he has to say.

Dinner starts, and everybody gets down to the business of eating. Conversation begins, a little slowly. Mother asks Sister how school was, Father regales everyone with tales from work, Billy manages to pass the bowl of peas. Everything proceeds like a regular family dinner.

Then something happens. Billy realises that when he's holding to the food, everybody is more likely to entertain him, whether he gives them the food or not.

Kids eh? They catch on fast. Billy positions himself in the middle of the table, passing food left and right. He's having a great 'ol time being the centre of attention... some might say that's where the baby belongs in a healthy family. Since Billy's doing most of the passing, he also gets to decide how much food is brought from the kitchen.

This works out well for some time and at this dinner, everybody's having more fun. It works out so well that the food coming out of the kitchen goes straight to Billy, who promptly distributes it to all. But soon the situation changes for the worse.

Billy, the baby that he is, starts playing with the food.

Nobody minds at first; Billy would pretend to hand a plate over, but refuse to let go for just a moment and have a mini tug-of-war with the recipient. Sometimes he would pass so slowly that the others had to wait for their turn. But occasionally Billy would give someone a little extra, and that person would be slightly happier for a while.

But after a while it starts to get annoying. People get hungry waiting for food. Billy starts demanding that each person gives him their food before he returns it with more food. He creates schemes where food is given to someone other than the person asking for it, so that he could get a bigger cut by passing it back and forth. He starts throwing food all over the place; there is food on the floor, the walls, smeared over the furniture.

Because nobody noticed the bad behaviour when it started, now all are too hungry to change the way dinner works. Billy doubles his efforts and food is brought from the kitchen at twice, three times the speed and promptly flung on to the floor. Rats, mice and cockroaches are scurrying around the dining room snatching up all of the scraps - and the vermin are now consuming most of the food coming from the kitchen. Everyone is constantly hungry and begging Billy for food; and if you had no food to begin with, then hard luck; it doesn't matter if you built the house or cooked the food or set the table, you are probably going to starve.

Dinner conversation has been reduced to the squeals of a baby throwing food all over the room, and the constant drone of begging from everybody else. Anger increases in the room. A baby is about to get kicked.

What was the source of the problem? Consider yourself the maker of rules in this family. What would you do to resolve this situation? More importantly, what would an improvement look like? What would an ideal dinner look like? Certainly it's not useful kicking the baby; creating and protecting babies is the reason a family exists.

The analogy might not be entirely accurate, but I'm sure you know what I'm talking about here - it isn't family dinners with strange rules. It's a problem that we're all facing today, and if not handled properly, then we all might have trouble putting food on the table or some real people harmed. The thing is, there might not be a proper way of dealing with the problem; and we must differentiate between prolonging the problem by reducing its effects, and a real, sustainable solution. It's a thought that all minds should be thinking about at this moment, and perhaps it would help if tried to imagine that we weren't sitting at that table, hungry and angry and wanting to kick babies out the door.

The Immune System - a haiku series

2011-06-23T20:46:00.004+12:00

So I was in the shower this morning and thought, if studying immunology for years isn't about writing stuff that only immunologists understand, then what the hell is it about?

And so here it is: the immune system as film noir characters, presented as a series of English pseudohaiku.

Dendritic cell (as: the mugger)

Lying there waiting
Rob you of your antigens
Sell them to my fence

Tc cell (as: the soldier)

I have been summoned
To cleanse this place of poison
Now come out and die

Thymus (as: military school)

Have you what it takes
You will become a soldier
Or die in training

Th cell (as: the weary detective)

I will come to you
See through your inner workings
And you shall be judged

Memory B cell (as: the patent medicine man)

Going town to town
Fervent pitch in every square
Waiting to hit gold

Mast cell (as: the femme fatale)

A single soft touch
Mayhem is quickly unleashed
Your life will be ruined

Macrophage (as: the bushman)

Exiled in wilderness
Hunting game is all I have
Lonely existence

NK cell (as: the murderer)

What's the magic word
You know you cannot escape
I will be your doom

The last supper

2011-06-05T00:02:00.006+12:00

Once upon a time there was this guy who knew how to party. One day he threw an awesome party where he got so high he said some really weird shit, and everybody believed it coz they were all high too. After the party broke up, the revellers went to the Olive Garden to get a feed, but then the cops showed up and laid on some serious damage. The host of the party ended up getting crucified coz that's how the cops rolled back in those days.

But all in all the party was a success; people were talking about it for years afterwards. They kept adding more and more to the story and it become a true legend. The legend inspired countless pieces of art for thousands of years afterwards. The end.

13 years ago

2011-06-03T20:25:00.004+12:00

Me, 1998: A relationship is constantly learning new things about the other person... *approving looks from friends* ... and then deciding whether you'd want to live with it.

Eternity

2011-05-11T23:42:00.003+12:00

People who think you can burn in hell for "eternity" have no idea how long an eternity really is.

Provided that you believe in the possibility of heaven and hell, an eternity is long enough that:

Infinite versions of heaven and hell will begin, exist and end an infinite number of times, and;
all possible versions of you will exist, live and die an infinite number of times, and;
for each of those versions of you, ascension or damnation (or other) could happen for any combination and definition of good or evil, or for no discernible reason at all, and;
for each of those of you, there will also exist a version when an ice-cream cone will spontaneously appear in your hand for no reason at 3pm in the afternoon, and;
a very large number of those ice-creams will be flavoured with used motor oil, and;
for a large number of those versions of you that got the ice-cream, eating it will be your punishment for all eternity; but for most of the others that ice-cream will have nothing to do with anything and just be an absurd occurrence, and;
a large number of those of you being punished with motor oil ice-cream will enjoy the experience.

Eternity: it's longer than you think.

Things I learned in Italy

2011-05-02T23:22:00.002+12:00

Your ceiling is not high enough
Most women are 5-10cm shorter than she appears
It's not soft porn; it's a legal drama
Ask the locals for directions; they're the ones who look like the mafia
Why drive when you can race?
I wish I could grow a sexy beard

Happy Easter everybody

2011-04-24T19:15:00.004+12:00

Once upon a time there was a bored programmer called the creator who had all the time in the world coz he was living in his mother's basement, and he decided to make an MMORPG. For extra lulz he made it so everybody was an admin and could create new players and ban anybody he or she wanted. First it started with two players and they had no idea they had admin privileges, and when they found out the creator decided to change the game mechanics around just to mess with their heads. As the game progressed more and more players joined and when they all found out they had admin rights they started banning the crap out of whoever they liked whenever they felt like it. This guy banned his brother coz he thought the creator liked him more, but that was just bullshit coz the creator was high on cocaine the whole time from the profits the game was making. Then later on this other guy came along and said to everybody "Hey let's use our admin rights for good and not evil and I'm totally best buds with the creator and he thinks it's cool too" but really it was just the creator playing with a puppet character coz he was sick of all the players just banning the crap out of each other and ruining his game. To prove he was "best buds with the creator" he broke some of the game mechanics and the players who saw it tripped some serious balls. Some of the players thought this was a pretty good idea (I mean this guy was like Neo from the Matrix and could bend spoons and shit) and he gained a fairly decent following, but a group of trolls decided this idea was shit and permabanned him after a while. Seeing his player banned the creator went on a heroin binge for a few days and then resurrected his character saying "screw you guys I'm outta here" while flying in the air and giving the finger to everyone. Then he left all the players to their own cesspool of filth and went on a long cruise with a pile of hot models and ecstasy on the superyacht that he built with the game profits and hasn't been seen since.

And that, kids, is why we have Easter today.

A few thoughts on Chandran Nair's talk

2011-04-19T09:15:00.003+12:00

A thought-provoking talk by an eloquent and interesting speaker. A few points that caught my attention (during the talk and after-talk chat):

Western civilisation's model of consumption cannot be implemented in Asia because it simply isn't scalable
The major factors are overpopulation and overconsumption
The current economic system has packaged up "green" and marketed it as a consumable, which is entirely useless
There isn't enough serious action in the form of top-down regulation to avert the inevitable disaster
The Japanese model could be a way forward in creating a more socially-responsible culture

My thoughts on the matter:

Draconian measures taken by the government, especially taken without adequate empathetic education of the population, will either end up as a culture of fear or erode the government's power. Perhaps more elegant social-engineering and technocratic schemes need to be invented (eg. voluntary sterilisation in exchange for continued monetary benefit).
The problem of both soft and hard power, which could be bought (marketing of culture, the military), gives more resources to those who consume. There needs to be more international cooperation and less nationalism; however, nationalism is often a major source of power for the domestic government
Culture is a major factor. In China at least, conspicuous consumption has always been a measure of status. This must change.
The concept of competition and group selfishness has created many cases of races to the bottom. Full transparency with oversight at every level (central government over local, local govt. over the people, the people over central govt. policies) is required.
Even with full transparency, it is difficult to determine the outcome of many processes that affect the environment. A simple and authoritative metric to measure damaging effects will help decision-making; however the truth is often more nuanced than what a number can represent.

Facebook Rehab

2011-02-12T12:05:00.003+13:00

In an effort to reclaim my life, I've changed my Facebook password to a 40-character random string of upper and lowercase letters and numbers that I don't know. Hopefully it'll be enough. I'm not deleting the profile though.

If you're seeing this on Facebook, the original post is at jimworm.blogspot.com... a link that lets you wonder if you care enough to waste your life on it.

Life in the City

2010-09-17T04:17:00.002+12:00

In London and the (temporary) end of my journey round the world. Time to settle down and work on my career a bit more.

Very active job market here. So many interesting jobs... and so much to learn about placing oneself on the market. I'm sure there will be many bumps along the way, especially the way I've been clicking on "apply" buttons like some maniac on ecstasy.

Lots of recruiters out there as well. Being the yes man that I am, I wouldn't be surprised if I got forwarded to the same jobs by multiple recruiters, and that's not how you make friends around here.

A new take on CAPTCHA

2010-07-08T00:02:00.005+12:00

Several months, 15000km and an entirely new life later, it's a new blog post!

A few days ago a friend tweeted about this Lukew post which got me thinking: yeah CAPTCHAs are pretty annoying. I've tried quite a few CAPTCHAs in my time and there are some pretty hard ones out there, even for a human.

The aim was to make CAPTCHAs easier for humans to read, while still being reasonably hard for spambots to solve. And I thought if people are willing to slide, wouldn't they be willing to slide and read? Instead of the not-quite character-destroying distortions of today's CAPTCHAs, we'll give the users a drastically distorted picture, but then give them the tool to un-distort the picture in a way that easily makes sense to a human.

So I sat down and started writing a Rails plugin that would do the above, and SlideCAPTCHA is the result:

Same "enter the letters you see" mechanism as most current CAPTCHAs
Letters are chopped in half and the top/bottom halves are offset to the left/right by a random amount, making the letters pretty much unrecognisable
Users move a slider to adjust the offset until the letters appear in the normal form

What that means is you see a form like this:

You move the slider...

Then you enter the text, and click submit.

Now has anybody got a spambot to test this with?

Stress relief with mental arithmetic

2009-12-08T01:02:00.009+13:00

A few weeks ago I decided that I'm gonna learn to not die after falling out of the sky. Since the school-of-not-dying-after-falling-out-of-an-aeroplane near Dunedin is not longer operating, and the nearest such school was 317km from my place, it meant that I've been giving the 'ol Nissan a bit of a workout.

It's hard not to get bored when you drive many Mm down the same road week after week. And when you're in a hurry to get somewhere, before the weather changes for instance, then it kinda sucks when slowpoke is holding up 2 milk tankers making a nice 100m moving roadblock in the middle of the highway.

So on my last trip, instead of thinking "Crap crap crap crap the weather's gonna change and I'll have driven 1000km for nothing again, FML", I gave myself a small distraction.

Arithmetic has been a part of travel for me since I was fairly young; when I was 3 or 4 years old, my father's friend would shut me up on trips using the following process:

"Hey kid I heard you were really smart."
"Can you tell me what 3+4 is?
"Wow that's great, what's 4 x 5?
"Hey you can do that too, what's 365 x 256?"

And of course I couldn't let my "reputation" of being smart be shattered by being unable to answer. So they'd get hours of silence out of me until later on in the day, when I'd tug on his trousers and tell him what I thought answer was (most likely wrong) and he'd be totally bamboozled because he'd completely forgotten about it and probably didn't even try to work it out himself. (Yes I'm so old that when I was 3, people didn't carry cellphones with calculator functions all the time. In fact, the DynaTAC hadn't been invented yet.)

But I digress. On this last trip I was working out how much longer your trip would take if you were held up at certain speeds for certain distances and times. (The calculations take an idealized assumption of instant acceleration and deceleration.) Here are my results:

Time added to journey if held up for various times and distances at speeds below a 100km/h speed limit
	Times (minutes and seconds)
Speed (km/h)	1 hour	1 minute	1 km
100	0''	0''	0''
90	6'0''	6''	4''
70	18'0''	18''	15''
50	30'0''	30''	36''

As you would expect, as you slow down more and more, the time you're set back approaches the time you're held up in a linear fashion. In the most extreme case, at a speed of 0 km/h, if you were held up for 1 minute you add another minute to your journey.

In a similar vein of mathematical obviousness, for the same distance, the speed you're held up at increases your trip time exponentially, the extreme case being you being unable to travel any distance at 0 km/h, and your journey taking forever.

So there you go. The next time you're stuck behind a truck travelling at 90 km/h, and the sign says there's a passing lane 5km ahead, you can relax; using this table, you know that you're only being held up for 20 extra seconds, and that isn't very much at all.

The semantic ambiguities of the phrase "fuck bitches get money"

2009-11-14T16:54:00.007+13:00

Have sex with bitches, acquire money [using means independent of said bitches]
Disregard bitches, acquire money [using resources otherwise spent on acquiring bitches]
Get paid for having sex with bitches
[I want to] have sex with bitches, and therefore require money in [my] immediate possession
Scam bitches in order to acquire money
[Imperative] bitches, acquire money [for me]
[Imperative] bitches, acquire money [for yourselves]
[Imperative] bitches, acquire money [for a third party]
[Interrogative] [Surprise] bitches now receive money?

Has anybody got more?

The difference between religions and cults

2009-10-29T21:42:00.007+13:00

Brian Tamaki had the whole country buzzing in the past few days with the covenant oath of the 700 "sons". Accusations of Destiny Church being a cult reached ever higher levels, scholars of religion were invited to broadcast their views, citizens voiced their opinions on the matter. So what's so different about this church, now that the existence of this oath is made public, that emotions are running so high among the people?

I think it's because they are sensing, whether they realise it or not, the power of faith over large groups of people. Tithing and social segregation, while real and essential to the church, is quite unlike this mass oath-taking as a display of the power Mr Tamaki possesses. People are shocked at his ability to command - let's face it - what is essentially a group of former criminals and losers. They automatically feel unease at the situation; what if they decide to do something? What if my child was one of these people? How can this happen in my free and beautiful country? And my favourite: how can this charlatan do this to Christianity?

However, this should come as no surprise to watchers of religions. Religious groups always target vulnerable people: children who don't know any better, teenagers finding their identity and purpose, foreign students far away from home, down-and-out losers with no direction in life. Single mothers, drug addicts, the unemployed and uneducated.

It happens in a variety of ways. Maybe the group will give you friends that you thought were so hard to find; maybe they'll help you kick your drug addiction; maybe they'll teach you skills to help you find a job. Not bad things by any measure. The end result is that an ordinary person will slowly come to accept "their way" of doing things. How to make friends, how to stay clean from drugs, how to lead a good life. After all, these are pretty neat guys, aren't they?

Of course, every group has its own values and principles, and religious groups in particular have their faith and beliefs. No harm in accepting them if it's part of the way, and perhaps the only way you now know, to live a good life, right? You'd want to share the good life/ clean up the streets/ preach the truth to your fellow men, right?

From there it isn't a big step to just state your beliefs, when you already believe them.

So while Brian Tamaki's "700" seems shocking to outsiders, to the 700 themselves, it's only a formality that legitimises their long-held beliefs. There is absolutely no harm in stating so in order to consolidate their social standing within the church community. They are the warriors, the defenders of the faith, a symbol of the brotherhood within the community that they are part of.

On the outside, we see Mr Tamaki spending large amounts of money on luxuries and generally taking advantage of the people he had defrauded. But what's the reality of the situation? Has he really defrauded them when the people are fully convinced that they've gotten what they've paid for? We can't speak for those people; we don't feel what they feel.

So we call the Destiny Church a cult. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't; it doesn't matter. The only difference between religions and cults is that in a cult, at least one person on the inside knows that it's a scam... and I'm not sure if Mr Tamaki himself can tell the difference any more.

Thinking of the children

2009-10-11T23:11:00.003+13:00

If we listen to some of the most vocal political groups, it would appear that our children are in serious need of protection against the dangers of modern sources of information. When I was in Hong Kong, a prominent banner urged citizens to protest for harsher laws against obscene materials, because our youth are in so much need of protection.

Where is it printed that this world was built for children?

If children were fully prepared for life on Earth, then we'd call them adults. Childhood is a necessity, a stage that one has to go through in order to become a mature human. "Preserving childhood" is a myth perpetuated by those who never realised that it was because of genetics, parental care, acquired skills and luck that they had survived to maturity. Those four factors are more powerful combined than legislating your neighbours into eternal imprisonment.

So who's thinking about the children? Who should be thinking about the children?

This post is dedicated to Mark Johnston, who might've taught his nephew an important lesson about life (and Santa) next Christmas.

The Joneses

2009-07-21T14:17:00.004+12:00

Let's not get too caught up in catching up...

A couple of months later, here I am crammed into a tiny space on a tiny chair at a tiny desk with a huge computer here in hot, humid Hong Kong. I share a living space with various humans and at least one adult flat-tailed house gecko, who freaks out and does amazing acrobatics every time I see him. It's an infinitely more enjoyable defence mechanism than say... spraying me with foul-smelling faeces, which other members of his species are apt to do.

With that in mind, I'm not going to pursue my (awesome) dream of having a reptilian friend sitting on my shoulder snapping at passing dragonflies with a double reverse somersault and a half twist. He's an effective little guy though; since his arrival my room has become a sanctuary from the legions of females that await outside for their chance to make babies with the resources I bring. I am of course referring to the mosquitoes that now thrive in the abandoned farmland outside my childhood home.

Things have changed here. The fields used to be planted with vegetables, and before that, rice. My friends used to live quiet lives of leisure, and now they're working hard, getting married and having babies. I've changed too... but in this environment I feel a little left behind, even though I'm really not. Well, maybe a little. Not all of us have to run on the same tracks, even if the destination is the same.

Soon it'll be time for me to decide what else needs to change, which track I'll be running on. In the meantime I'll pretend that it'll all be ok if I say "ta-da" at the end of it all.

Status: divorced

2009-05-12T10:10:00.003+12:00

Strange human emotions overcome me. Logic and experience are superseded by the natural reactions of knowing when one is no longer loved. I need another me sitting on my shoulder telling me that everything I'm doing is completely stupid.

I suppose I needed someone who wasn't me sitting on my shoulder that told me everything I did previously was completely stupid as well. I'm sure she was there, but I just didn't listen.

In pursuit of the truth, part 1

2009-04-17T20:51:00.001+12:00

Reality is what we cannot escape from; it's everything that's there whether we like it or not. In this post (and subsequent related posts), the "truth" is defined as information about reality.

There is nothing more important than survival to living beings; and survival is being able to cope with reality without losing one's life, such as knowing when one's body is in need of nutrition or water, or to stop before walking off a cliff. Humans do this with one particular organ: the brain.

As far as we know, human brains develop a model of reality by detecting patterns of input. We understand the world by remembering previously-sensed things in the past and comparing our current senses with our memories. We can do this positively, such as associating certain stimuli with others, or negatively, such as creating a new concept for the only unknown object in a given situation.

Combining these two methods allow us to adapt to a very wide range of situations. Newborn babies only take a few years to integrate and understand the world around them, bringing only the smallest amount of information from birth. They learn to feel and control their bodies, develop a rudimentary grasp of mechanics, learn the relationship between seeing, hearing and touching, and manage to master whichever language that is spoken around their parts of the world. No small feat indeed, seeing how difficult it is to engineer a machine to do one of these tasks, let alone all of them.

Our brains can do all of this while consuming less power than current desktop computers. Awesome, right? Well, kinda. Because our brains keep finding patterns and rearranges them in a way that is reliably repeatable, it doesn't need to come pre-programmed with the laws of the universe. But this also means that we don't know the laws of the universe; we can only try to guess at what they are. While we can see objects fall out of our grasp repeatedly, and learn the effects of gravity, we do not intuitively know gravitational theory. While we can sit in a circle mimicking the calls of farm animals, and learn the sounds that they make, we are not born with the concept of chickens, cows, and sheep; and it's very difficult to gauge how much our perception of these sounds are affected by the suggestion of others.

The way our brains work also leaves us prone to sensitive periods in development. If we never open our eyes to learn the patterns of light shining on our retinas as infants, those impulses from our optic nerves will remain a mystery to us forever.

This means that our perception of reality is so dependent on past experiences that it cannot be called a reality at all. Every person's perception of this seemingly infinitely large universe is more a product of his or her own experiences, extremely limited in both time because of our limited lifespans and space because of both our lifespans and physical limitations. As an example, try to think back to the time when you believed in Santa Claus. Or that people lived in TVs. What if your entire life was spent in front of a TV, or inside a video game; what would your perception of reality be then?

So our realities are affected over long periods of time. What about a short timespan? Surely we can believe in the present? Not so. Brains are easy to deceive. Our brains are finely tuned to both detect and ignore patterns, and have a plethora of vulnerabilities allowing these illusions to happen. Sensory deprivation demonstrates how our brains project their own reality into the world around us, rather than the other way round.

So while our brains' projections of reality seem adequate for generating a set of working assumptions, it would be a terrible mistake to confuse these with the actual reality around us. So if it's the truth we're after, what recourse do we have?

Extinction super-power: activate!

2009-04-08T13:55:00.005+12:00

Humans have driven many species to extinction. Famous cases aside, we're covering the planet and smothering many other lifeforms, much like the trees did back about 364 million years ago. A powerful force indeed, and many say that like it's a bad thing. I haven't made my mind up on that yet.

What puzzles and frustrates me is that some people prefer to live the way they do and drive thousands of harmless species out of their existence, while flatly refusing to kill nasty stuff, like deadly diseases. And I meet these people everywhere. Not just lay people, but professionals, even doctors. Have they gone insane, or are they just very very stupid? What's a couple of extra species on their consciences? The religious arguments are the most absurd of all. Let me say this: fuck you and your non-existent gods. A quote: adults with imaginary friends are stupid.

Why should we not act collectively and use our destructive forces for good? It takes so long for a deadly disease to evolve, and it's so quick to drive one to extinction, that we could have very long periods without needing vaccination.

If you ever want to say no to a vaccine for a disease that could be driven to extinction, please think about this: what is more important than the opportunity to literally wipe a plague off the face of the Earth? If you still say no, I hope you have a very good reason.

A man's house

2009-04-03T11:42:00.003+13:00

Whoever heard of a man becoming a king because of his queen? No... a man becomes a king because of his castle. He gets his shit together, builds a huge friggin' castle, snatches up some hot princess and slaps her into queen-like material. That's the way it's done.

So while she's away, I get to redo some things in the correct order.

Saving the reputation of one of my favourite molecules part 2

2009-03-21T01:18:00.005+13:00

Hello Dr Hamid

I've enrolled myself into FOSC206 this year, and I'm just looking for some advice on a bit of research I want to do for personal interest.

My girlfriend is just completing her masters over in the department of public health, and has mentioned to me that many of her colleagues in the department avoid using MSG in their food because they believe that it's unhealthy. Reasons given include headaches and a dubious assertion that MSG causes cancer. As a sceptic of such assertions, and a frequent user of this additive in my daily cooking, I had a good look at the current literature on the health effects of MSG, and came up with nothing that resembled their fabulous claims, at least for plausible levels of everyday use.

I was appalled that people of science were capable of such superstition, and resolved to antagonise them by conducting some research of my own. There was no use beating a dead horse of trying to find negative health consequences; as you know, science has no way to prove that something doesn't exist. The closest we can get is to prove that we can't detect anything, and obviously that's not enough for these people.

Because I only sought to be a smartass by scholarly means, I thought of another method. Since the molecular weight of MSG is much higher than that of salt, and like salt only contains one sodium atom, the amount of sodium per gram of MSG is much less than salt. Therefore I hypothesised that it might be possible to reduce dietary sodium by replacing salt with MSG where appropriate. And because diets of most industrialised people are generally high in sodium, reducing the added sodium could be considered "healthy". So if my hypothesis was true, then one could make a counter-claim of "MSG is good for you" that is supported by real data.

I tried searching for similar studies, but couldn't find any. Most research was on optimal flavour mixtures and increasing the palatability of food. If there really aren't any studies in this area, this might be a nice little piece of low-tech, low-budget original research.

To test this I thought up an experiment where people were given food flavoured with various mixtures of MSG and salt, in increasing levels of concentration/intensity. The subjects would choose their preferred concentration for each mixture. The sodium concentrations between the preferred points of each mixture would be analysed for any trends, whether adding MSG would increase or decrease sodium intake, have non-linear effects, or no effect at all.

That's where enrolling in FOSC206 comes in. I don't know the first thing about doing tasting trials in a controlled environment. I also don't have any equipment to produce accurate and precise testing samples. The hope was that I would be able to get both of these by enrolling for this paper.

I don't even know if I'm on the right track, or which questions to ask. But I'm hoping if you've gotten this far down the email, that you would find this topic as interesting as I do, and might be inspired to give a response.

Eagerly anticipating your reply,

-Pete

I'm so vain

2009-01-16T11:06:00.004+13:00

I probably think this blog is about me... oh wait. It is. It's a vanity blog. Doesn't that just make me more vain?

First of all, heaps of thanks to the (very good-looking) women who stopped and gave me a hand pushing my car uphill into the nearest parking space when my clutch cable snapped. I might've done it without you, but I might've also given myself a hernia.

New year, new plan for physical fitness. I'm getting oh-so-close to crossing the "finally grown up" line, and that's making me feel that my table tennis days are pretty much over. So, I'll move on to something easier.

Bought meself a pair of boots, the first decent pair I've owned for about 10 years. Gonna climb me a mountain every week... or a small hill, at least. On average. That's the plan. Currently... 1.7. Working myself ahead for the winter months.

T'is the season

2008-12-22T00:35:00.002+13:00

For: eating, drinking, awkward conversation. Mindless consumerism. Lack of motivation due to holiday madness. Inconvenience. Parking frustration. Road rage. Road rage of others. Repeatedly shopping for the same things over and over without buying anything. Buying useless crap. Bits of wrapping paper on the floor. Having nothing to do. Having too much to do. Listening to bad singing. Playing party games. Making up new rules for party games. Making a mess for others to clean up.

My glasses finally fell apart. Worst time of the year for it, have to wait quite a while for new ones to arrive. My fault for being picky I guess. My eyes will have to suffocate under these contact lenses for a few weeks.

The weekend: made some cupcakes, wrote a play.

Teeth

2008-12-12T18:04:00.002+13:00

No, not that kind, the regular kind.

Who's the 28-year-old who's growing wisdom teeth? That's right me. Chewing gum really helps.

Note to self: the electric razor is for emergency use only. Your skin is now too soft and girly to handle that rough razor stubble. Perhaps the only salvation of your manhood now lies in upping the danger level a couple notches.

Home... and sick

2008-12-09T10:09:00.005+13:00

In bed, writing emails and adding another snot-laden tissue to the overflowing bin every few minutes.

Happy to say though that the project has already started, albeit as a few scratches on a piece of paper. Next: the world! (Or just a whole lot of work for no reward, one or the other)

Told a secret yesterday. Maybe I shouldn't have. At least it was my own. Sick of the things anyhow.

I, for one...

2008-12-05T00:30:00.004+13:00

Some people think that being ruled by robots is either by being bonded in slavery to artificial intelligence, or to somehow be a mere tool to the machines, fully oblivious.

I think I've thought of a third way, where people rule themselves (in a roundabout way) using machines. Like we do now, by machines called bureaucracy; except these machines aren't made of people that are apt to be greedy and corrupt. These inorganic automatons will work to amplify "the good" in human nature, and forgive us when we succumb to "the bad". Actually, they won't care much one way or another, but that's the way it's supposed to work isn't it?

I think I'll start building our new robot overlords.... let's say next weekend. Yep, that sounds like a good time to start conquering the world.

Healthy econonic eating

2008-09-12T12:07:00.004+12:00

I'm quite happy to see that, here in New Zealand at least, yoghurt manufacturers are engaging in some healthy competition, good 'ol Adam Smith style. While a little competition is wonderful, I hope they're not gonna take shortcuts and cheat like the these guys.

Hmm... tasty

2008-04-15T11:30:00.004+12:00

For the past couple of months, I've managed to work in a decent table tennis training regime into my daily morning ritual. It's hard work, but well worth it, and for a moderate amount of pain and suffering, I'm feeling quite a bit fitter than the av-er-age bear.

The university gym is usually pretty crowded, but not so at 7:30 in the morning. That time is mostly dominated by hardcore body-builders, weight-loss treadmill stompers, aerobics girls and the guys who want to look at the aerobics girls. And they should... girls who get up early in the morning to do aerobics are usually worth getting up early for.

Since the place is nearly empty, it's a great time for table tennis training. We just take a corner at the end of the three basketball courts; there usually isn't anybody around to get annoyed by, or step on, the hundreds of little balls. Occasionally there'll be a loser or two shooting air-hoops, and there's one girl who's actually pretty good that comes on Wednesdays, but most of the time we're there by ourselves.

That's all pretty boring stuff. The real reason I'm posting is because of this middle-aged bald guy I meet in changing room/showers every day. I don't know if he's staff, or student, or just some person who paid a ridiculous amount of money to be in a crappy university gym (to drool over the girls, perhaps?). Every morning he's there, after his workout, and sits on the changing room benches eating sandwiches. Let me repeat that... after he's drenched himself in sweat, he went into a warm, moist room with other half-naked men, sits on a bench that has been marinated in about 30 years worth of man-pheromones, surrounded by walls that have built up decades of sweaty palm prints. And eats.

There are worse places for it, I suppose.

Saving the reputation of one of my favourite molecules part 1

2008-03-03T16:30:00.006+13:00

Chinese people are very closely connected with their daily food. To them, food is not only nourishment, it is also entertainment, a social event and medicine.

Being Chinese has made me very closely connected to the various beliefs surrounding food ingredients. And no food ingredient has got a more undeserved reputation than one of my favourite food chemicals, monosodium glutamate, more commonly known as MSG.

MSG is the sodium salt of a simple amino acid, an amino acid that is present in large amounts in all living organisms. In fact, almost all natural food combined with table salt will contain a reasonable amount of MSG. However, popular rumours have all but ruined the reputation of this wonderful chemical; most people I've spoken to consider MSG as a nasty food additive that causes headaches, flushing, sweating and even cancer, completely unfounded assumptions that do not stand up to scientific scrutiny, yet persists in the collective consciousness.

Well, I'm going to go against popular opinion with my slightly-scientific hunch: that health freaks are killing themselves with these misguided beliefs. Well, no. Let's put it in a softer and more accurate way: MSG is better for you than table salt (NaCl), because it can lower the amount of sodium in your diet.

My rationale is this:

Extra sodium in food additives is generally regarded as harmful in the modern western diet
Therefore a flavour enhancer with a higher sodium-flavour efficiency is generally regarded as better for your health, with respect to sodium
Table salt is about 40% sodium
MSG is about 13.5% sodium
Therefore at the same mass, table salt has about three times more sodium than MSG
Both are used as "savoury-type" flavour enhancers
Therefore table salt of mass n must deliver the same perceived amount of flavour as 3n of MSG to be equal in terms of sodium-flavour efficiency

(I will declare at this time that I am not a full supporter of the absolute link between high dietary sodium and poor health. However, this study will only test the link between sodium levels and the perceived flavour effects on human subjects; I leave the real health risk up to nutritionists and their bloody annoying diet questionnaires.)

With assertions such as this, debate is useless: let the myth debunking/confirmation begin!

In the next instalment: the method of the first experiment in the series.

Sticking it to other men

2008-02-06T15:11:00.000+13:00

Continuing on the topic of the road.

Strange idea came to me this morning: what if bumper stickers weren't stuck on by the owners of the vehicles, but instead were applied by whoever wanted to stick something on your car? We would have to invent a whole new set of bumper stickers to serve this purpose. I put together a couple of quick ones:

Anybody got more ideas?

Safety vs the human mind

2008-01-21T00:26:00.000+13:00

Road rage is an intriguing phenomenon. It happens so often that probably all of us have encountered it in one form or another. Why would people, who are normally less confrontation, turn into raging madmen on the road? Why would they go so far out of their way to inflict violence on somebody else, even when no accident has actually occurred?

There are your usual suspects, of course, people who are normally violent anyway. They are likely to bash you head in for every trespass whether they're on the road or not. But I'm talking about "normal" people here, people that usually have the reserve to not resort to violence over every little transgression.

As usual, I'm going to go into my thought experiments here and bypass real research, and pull this list of rage-causing factors out of my butt:

The real life-threatening seriousness of road safety
Lack of body and verbal expression when one is inside a vehicle
A feeling of righteousness and justice

I believe that these factors add up to one lethal combination. Let's think about it: somebody, in your opinion, performs a dangerous manoeuvre on the road, seriously threatening your personal safety. You, being inside a vehicle, are unable to express yourself to the other person. In a few short seconds, the combination of a feeling of injustice, indignation and the desire for retribution fills your feeble human mind, and reason is quickly replaced by pure rage. This person needs to be punished for his/her sins, and it must done now.

The resultant rage makes the road even less safe for all of us.

I sense some inventions coming on... oh yes. "Fuck you" and "Sorry" LED panels for cars. Much healthier outlets for a misdirected sense of justice. Yep, I can feel the rage calming already.

Posts from the shower

2008-01-04T11:19:00.000+13:00

I've started a few posts in the past week or so, but really, there are some things better left to the imagination, and also things that do not need to be recalled from memory, ever.

But there are other things that do need to be recalled, lest you regret not having given it a chance for a long and fruitful existence.

Every so often, especially when I'm in the shower, I'm inspired to dream up hypothetical scenarios that I find rather interesting. Pretty much all of the time though, I'm too lazy to actually do anything about it. So here's a compromise: I'll put the ideas here, and hope that somebody else gives them wings.

Here's one I had today: Weather control technologies have become so advanced that communities around the world have each scheduled a fixed weather pattern over themselves. However, as now the weather changes are both abrupt and predictable, it allowed elaborate schemes of criminal intrigue.

I can imagine this scene playing out: a high speed car chase during a clear moonlit night on a long highway in a desert. The protagonist is making his escape and a detective in hot pursuit. Our anti-hero (let's call him Joe) veers off to the side, and the chase continues off-road. Suddenly, both cars skid to a halt at the top of an escarpment. It's a dead end.

Lit by the detective's headlights, Joe gets out of his car with a backpack, containing the secret documents that could destroy civilization/humanity. The detective points a pistol at him and yells "It's over Joe. This is a dead end, you have nowhere to go." Joe turns around, puts the backpack on, flashes a smile at the detective, and jumps off the side. The detective runs to the edge of the cliff; but it's too late... clouds suddenly appear and rain starts pouring down, and the escarpment turns into a pitch black, bottomless abyss. Joe had escaped again.

A short post

2007-12-21T21:33:00.000+13:00

My name is Pete, and I endorse this clip.

The blue drink

2007-12-16T21:19:00.000+13:00

Two more days of exquisite solitude. In the meantime it was love at first sight between me and "Koop Island Blues" from the Swedish band Koop, as could be expected from a Portishead listener. Having the volume maxed out on the crappy laptop speakers beforehand also added to the effect; indeed I may not have noticed it if I'd had the headphones on.

The blue drink is whisky (I have way too much of that stuff... both as in drinking it, and having it lying around), bitters, blue curaçao and lemon. Blue curaçao? It's ok, nobody is watching.

I can distinctly remember the last time I felt like this. I had just broken up with my girlfriend, lost my job and dropped out of my postgraduate course, and I was spent an entire summer all by myself in an empty house. I consider that period as one of the most influential experiences that made me who I am now. Looking back, I don't think I ever really knew myself before that summer.

Hhmmmmmmmmmaaaaah

2007-12-12T22:56:00.000+13:00

Ah... this is the life.

So here I am, sittin' in mah chair, typin' in mah blog, sippin' on my G&T, in the corner of a room lit only by a single lamp pointing at the ceiling. The kitchen is clean, the heater is off, and the washing machine is running sans the terrible red sweater. Free as a bird. My space. My space.

I don't know how many of you can understand this, but deep inside, I know that I don't like people. Not in a misanthropic way... in fact, I can't say I really understand it. I suppose it's because social interactions are simply too much work for me, and I'm really too lazy to make an effort making others feel comfortable, especially where it matters the most, in my own home.

So here I am, enjoying the quiet solitude. It is comforting to know that the only human contact I will have are the ones that I choose.

I hope they enjoy their little adventure. I will certainly be enjoying myself right here at home.

Turning your back on reality

2007-12-11T10:20:00.000+13:00

Here's a bold statement: Science and technology are the only things that consistently improve the human condition. Nothing else really matters in the long term: not politics, not economics, not art, not religion. Some are necessary evils (making laws to enforce order) and some are temporary benefits (arts to entertain the people), but nothing, apart from science and technology, has even the potential to improve life for all human beings that come into contact with it.

Science is the attempt to understand nature, by testing its own theories with observations, continually detecting flaws in the current understanding, and updating the theories to fit. I think of it as starting from the wrong place, and moving in directions that are less wrong all of the time.

Technology is the engineering of nature to suit our purposes. Weaving, for example, turns fibres into cloth, which allows us to clothe ourselves. Technology could be developed without much understanding of the nature behind it; for instance, beer was brewed for many centuries before yeasts were discovered to be responsible. However, with coupled together with science, technology flourishes, with engineers creating all kinds of devices and products that enhance our lives. The Internet, for example, would never have come about without a certain understanding of electricity.

However, wisdom comes at a price, because while humans are intelligent, there is not a lot of motivation to use that intelligence in a logical manner, especially with abstract matters. It is far more difficult to partially understand the world with science and technology, than it is to create an illusion of complete understanding, especially an illusion devised by somebody else. And so we suffer, and cause others to suffer, because of our own intellectual laziness.

I guess that's just the kind of life we like to live.

Must she be so cruel?

2007-12-03T00:13:00.000+13:00

More pink undies and socks? You betcha. The devil never sleeps.

Just in time for the next business trip too.

On marriage 2

2007-11-26T14:05:00.000+13:00

For those that haven't read it, see the first On marriage here.

Having "the mother" over was bound to surface some problems. Problems that are, of course, completely expected. It's hard to wake from a dream if the dream is your life.

This probably sums up my thoughts on the matter:

I've been with your daughter for years now, and no matter which way you look at it, we're practically married. So if we actually go through with the process, it won't be her I'm marrying. It's you. And if you want me to marry you, you better start acting like you want me to.

What's better, a sleeping baby or a screaming one?

Tuning out

2007-11-23T21:07:00.000+13:00

Finally got some real work done. Not sales, not administration, not office politics... real work, the kind that actually improves the world a little when you're finished.

This week was my week, where I had the unwanted responsibility of managing the place by myself. The problem was that we had humans in the staff, and those are some weird machines. Smart and can think for themselves, sure... but that comes at a price of having some high-maintenance brains to look after, and I'm definitely terrible at that. Oh well, they gotta work with the boss they have, not the boss they wish they had.

Home is getting a little awkward.

Negatives first. "The mother" is starting to get her motherly instincts out, offering suggestions and criticism at various places. Which is bad, because I can't indulge in my favourite pastime of shooting people down intellectually due to our language difficulties. A weird pronunciation isn't the best weapon, and I only shoot to kill.

She's also bought a whole bunch of pots and pans and other kitchen things and stuffed it into the tiny kitchen, which is totally against the "an empty kitchen is a tidy kitchen" philosophy.

And she's mean to Buzzy sometimes.

On the positive side, she's been keeping the kitchen clean, which is a very high virtue in my regard. Triple points for that one. The only thing is that I can imagine it all falling apart as soon as she leaves.

So I don't know what to think. I guess it's not that important... as long as she's not a psycho bitch everything should be fine.

Must... stop... the madness!

2007-11-21T12:09:00.000+13:00

I gave in to the whole social networking fad and started using Facebook, sans-irony. A friend, a 'net old-timer like myself, said "Welcome to the evil beast that is Facebook", and how true that is. It switches on your inner accountant, turning you into a crazed IRL-Internet acquaintance reconciliation machine. I guess all successful products are finely tuned to excite your instincts, and Facebook, in my opinion, fits that description nicely.

Tips for a jealous girlfriend

2007-11-17T10:12:00.000+13:00

#308

Wash all his underwear with your reds, turning them all pink. When questioned, smile sweetly and say "Sorry dear, I made a mistake. Oops!"

He will be too embarrassed to be seen with pink underwear, reducing the probability of infidelity by at least 50%.

On the road again

2007-11-15T21:10:00.000+13:00

This week: Tauranga. The provided accommodation was a terrific bachelor pad, filled to the brim with panty-moistening luxuries. If we had taken advantage of the situation, there would be absolutely no problem getting into a lot of trouble splashing around in the multi-seated spa pool.

The sales presentations were at Mills Reef. Magnificent venue, great food, excellent service. The wine was very agreeable too. The staff were very well presented.

All of these sales trips are giving me a lot of exposure to various styles. Selling drains you. Salespeople have to be upbeat, sociable, determined, emotionally detached, quick-witted and resourceful (or at least sound like it). That's not even enough; building a relationship and letting your clients trust you is not just a full-time job, it's a lifestyle. Those guys wake up at 5am to play golf with a client if it's what gets a sale next month, and they drink a bottle of tequila at night if another client does the same. It's like living a bunch of different lives at the same time. Superheroes and their measly double identities have no idea.

I, on the other hand, am a smartass. I like to spew my economic theories at people and rub technical jargon in their eyes until they bleed. Honesty must be delivered with the maximum amount of harshness; dysphemisms flow forth effortlessly. Short of getting a sale, I am most happy when drunk, slipping in toilet humour during the presentation, and subtly chiding clients for not being my kind of entrepreneur. Those salespeople must loathe me.

Fifty hours of work in three days, but still a great time had by all. A big thanks to JB, Kate, Nadine and the crew. Although I hope that none of them will ever see this blog, I do hope we've created many opportunities to work together again in the future.

Oh no!

2007-11-08T19:04:00.000+13:00

Waay too much work, too little time.

Flying out again next week, better start doing nights as well... That or stop reading so much Wikipedia at work.

Capital city

2007-11-07T21:22:00.001+13:00

Didn't win, I'm afraid. However, the weekend away was excellent, exactly what I needed. There is never any harm in sitting in a bathtub, chomping on chocolates and sipping good champagne, then going out later for a couple of hours of hardcore DDR action.

The awards itself reminded me a little of this book. Is it a good thing that I'm now part of it?

Spring clean

2007-11-01T12:15:00.000+13:00

Because her mother will be arriving next week and living with us for two months, we've been doing a bit of cleaning to make space for another bed.

Unfortunately, her idea of cleaning was to take out everything that has been stacked away tidily in boxes, and clean up the subsequent mess. That, in theory, has some merit. I suppose if there's a big mess in front of you, you're more likely to clean it. In practice, however, it created such a huge mess that we weren't able to make our home livable for an entire week.

We ended up going out each night when I couldn't bear to see such horrors anymore. Last week must've cost close to $1000. Which was still less than what it could've been, when we almost threw away a giant stack of cash. It's been stored in an old inconspicuous envelope. Could've sent a paper recycler away on holiday for a few weeks.

I finally let go of my pile of old computers. It doubled the contents of the computer box at the recycling centre. I kept the storage media and a single Am486 DX40 chip.

The week is over. I think it's time to pop open that bottle of Moët now.

Accountants

2007-11-01T11:53:00.000+13:00

Some nice people from PriceWaterhouseCoopers dropped off a bottle of Moët a few days ago, to congratulate me for becoming a finalist. And to peddle their wares as accountants.

They were a bit disappointed when we told them that we've got so many accountants among our shareholders and board members that we're completely overrun by number-cruncher-munchers. Nice try though.

Death of a Mouseman

2007-10-27T16:08:00.000+13:00

My mouse died yesterday. He was so old we both knew it had to come one day. We've been through good times, and lord knows a lot of bad times together. He was the mouse that saw me through my worst days. After five years, it's hard to think that I will ever be so close to another mouse again.

A most accurate mouse even by today's standards, I will think of him fondly every time his younger brethren make my cursor skip across the screens, ruining yet another carefully-crafted Photoshop selection.

Requiscat in pace, little mouse. May your precious metals be recovered, your plastics recycled, and your spirit live on eternally in the years of work we've created together.

Business trip

2007-10-18T16:23:00.000+13:00

So many sales presentations, I'm sick of hearing about my own product.

Unfortunately, there are many things that has happened that I can't talk about here. I also can't tell you where my anonymous blog is, so... you guys get the boring short version with nothing in it.

I haven't met many stars yet, but from what I've seen, the lives of people in the entertainment industry aren't as glamourous as I previously presumed. They act like they are, but they're really not. Not exactly clean-living, but the platters of cocaine and heroin aren't forthcoming.

Staying in a hotel is nice, but after a while I actually tipped the maid just to feel a little less isolated. This probably isn't the life for me.

In other news, ! It was the award I least expected, coz my entry was quite unimpressive. Maybe they're short of entries this year. My parents will be proud.

Secrets of a bad writer

2007-10-02T13:25:00.000+13:00

In the absence of real talent, I follow two principles almost dogmatically as a substitute: cohesion and coherence.

Cohesion is the gradual introduction of the story by building upon previously mentioned ideas. These ideas join consecutive sentences together, forming a continuous bridge throughout the entire text that logically connects the various parts of the story. The story can then climb mountains and cross rivers with this bridge-building ability.

Coherence is when sentences flow from one to the next in a clearly understandable stream of thought. The sentences maintain their direction, revealing the thickening plot word by word. As their story unfolds, they draw you in, closer and closer to the paragraph's inevitable climax; then they let you down again, leaving you basking in the afterglow of the experience.

Do like I do, and turns terrible pieces of writing into literary gold: results guaranteed, or your money back!

Punch

2007-09-27T21:22:00.000+12:00

Tomorrow:

Yummy.

New office

2007-09-24T16:31:00.000+12:00

One week in the new office and everything's going just fine. Got mah l'il corner, internal-access carpark right downstairs, a board room, a play room and a water cooler. What's that? A real water cooler? Yes I do believe we're a real company now! One small problem though; other water coolers I've seen generally output 2 things:

Cool water
Cold water

As opposed to ours, which does:

Smoke
Fire

So I think we still have a bit of work there. But the rest of the machinery, like the spankin' new VoIP server and the minibar in the board room are running just fine. The copying machine has also been raised to chest-height to facilitate the copying of chests, rather than the clichéd bottoms. Much safer for bottoms everywhere.

Hat

2007-09-16T00:20:00.000+12:00

The wait is over! I've been waiting for this for too long...

The first time Buzzy saw me wearing the hat he stared at me for almost an entire minute.

Too bad snow season is now over so I can't take this silly hat on the slopes. Oh well, wasn't looking forward to getting hit on by guys anyways.

Netball

2007-09-13T16:33:00.000+12:00

To the web developer in me, a function means "bunch of commands that runs when you call its name".

To the business guy in me, it means "sitting and/or standing around getting boozed while having awkward conversations with strangers".

We'll be sponsoring a yet-unnamed netball team next year, so I'm showing my face at their launch tonight. It'll be a room full of very tall girls, which will up the awkward meter a little... seeing as it's gonna happen in a furniture store, I hope there'll be more sitting than standing.

The bird

2007-09-09T21:33:00.000+12:00

The Internet is a powerful tool of convenience and education. Using the web, one can easily learn about a certain topic, research it in some depth, and then apply it to real life. For example, I have recently started a habit of cooking food I'm unfamiliar with, by reading recipes found on Google and watching examples on Youtube. The results have been generally pleasant. I'd recommend it to anyone that's fond of cooking, and would rather spend a weekend instead of $50 having fun.

Having a certain mastery over many useful websites, then, really endows a man with more power than he might be able to handle. But he doesn't realise it, until certain events happen.

It was fateful moment of whimsy, brought on by the bravery of a man high on 'net fumes, that I decided to explore beyond the bounds of everyday hum-drum cooking and venture forth unto the forgotten niche of New Zealand cuisine: the muttonbird. Little did I know it was the beginning of a night of terror.

The unholy essence of that bird still lingers in our kitchen, punishing us for causing its premature demise... I can only hope that concentrated sodium hydroxide will be sufficient to exorcise its spirit.

Dead dead dead

2007-09-09T18:32:00.000+12:00

My PC died.

I think Buzzy went inside and pulled something out and it shorted something. There was a burning smell and I burned my hand on a really hot wire.

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2007-09-05T13:47:00.000+12:00

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