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 |    Not for the faint of art. |
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Complex Numbers A complex number is expressed in the standard form a + bi, where a and b are real numbers and i is defined by i^2 = -1 (that is, i is the square root of -1). For example, 3 + 2i is a complex number. The bi term is often referred to as an imaginary number (though this may be misleading, as it is no more "imaginary" than the symbolic abstractions we know as the "real" numbers). Thus, every complex number has a real part, a, and an imaginary part, bi. Complex numbers are often represented on a graph known as the "complex plane," where the horizontal axis represents the infinity of real numbers, and the vertical axis represents the infinity of imaginary numbers. Thus, each complex number has a unique representation on the complex plane: some closer to real; others, more imaginary. If a = b, the number is equal parts real and imaginary. Very simple transformations applied to numbers in the complex plane can lead to fractal structures of enormous intricacy and astonishing beauty. ![Merit Badge in Quill Award
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| https://theoutline.com/post/6501/can-beer-be-saved-from-climate-change?zd=1&zi=z... Most of the crops that go into making beer will not survive extreme weather caused by global warming. AW HELL NAW Look, I gotta be honest: I don't give a damn that coffee is going extinct. I couldn't care less about losing cities to sea level rise. I'm all out of fucks to give about ecosystem collapse, extreme weather systems, mass extinctions, plagues, locusts, water wars, dogs and cats living together... We had our chance to do something about all of this 20-30 years ago, and we did jack shit. Now that it's too late, I don't care anymore. At least I didn't until I saw that beer might be endangered. I guess everyone has their breaking point. This is mine. ...of course, I have no idea what to do about it, so I'm going to go have a beer. |
It's the last day of the official competition, and the last War Chest Wednesday, so it's only fitting I repeat this prompt from November.  Write a list of at least 5 blogging prompts to add to the Challenge War Chest to be used for future rounds of the 30DBC. Then, use one of your own prompts to write your entry.This one was inordinately hard for me. I suppose that's only fair, as it is the last prompt of the month, and the others flowed easily. So yeah, I don't think these prompts are all that groundbreaking, but here they are anyway: 1) Write about one thing you want to do before you bite the dust. 2) If you had to go back and change one decision you made, what would it be and why? 3) Which movie and/or TV franchise would you most like to write for? 4) What job do you wish you had? 5) Abraham Lincoln is credited with saying "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool then to speak out and remove all doubt." Prove him right. So, the prompt I'm going to use is the first one, but I'm pretty sure it's going to address #5 while I'm at it. I don't know who coined the term "bucket list," and I can't be arsed to find out. I do know that it became the title of a moderately interesting movie with Jack Nicholson and God. While I've been known to use the phrase from time to time, I usually call it my "fuck-it list." This is because I've already done most of what I set out to do, and have given up on the rest. It's come to my attention recently that life is much less frustrating if you can separate "things that I cannot control" from "things that I can control," and to focus on the latter while letting go of the former. This is something akin to the infamous Serenity Prayer, which I resent because a) it's a prayer and b) it's associated with AA, and AA is for quitters. And yet, far be it from me to reject an idea outright, so I started thinking about it. Let's imagine that I wanted to win a marathon race. That is, to run 42.195km faster than anyone else in the race. This would depend on who else was in the race, and that is something beyond my control; if anyone has two working legs (or prostheses), or is over the age of 18 months or under the age of 105 years, I would not win. By this theory, the only thing I could control would be my own level of fitness. But the assumption there is that I can control my own level of fitness. I've been walking every day for the past 5 weeks, which is, like, a new record for me for exercise. My walk is about 2.4km and takes approximately 30 minutes, giving me a walking speed of about 5km/hr, maybe a bit less. And when I finish, I'm out of breath, my calves are spasming, and my shins are on fire. Consequently, I cannot imagine walking 42km, let alone running that distance. It's hard to imagine any amount of training that would allow me to even finish a marathon. Or take another example. Say I want to take a trip to space. How can I make that happen? Well, probably by paying Virgin Galactic a very large sum of money to fire me into a suborbital trajectory that technically takes me 100km up for a fraction of a minute, thus putting me, by definition, in space. Honestly, even if I were a billionaire, this would strike me as a colossal waste of money. There is nothing about this that I can control, except to decide that I don't really want to take a trip to space after all. So here's the real example: I want to be published. Now, I'm not talking about self-publishing. Anyone can do that. Some can even be successful at it. What I want is for an editor to tell me, "This story is good and it meets our needs so here's some money." (Actually, it's not about the money, but that's part of the package.) And then have at least one person that I don't know purchase the story. I have no control over publishers' or readers' decisions. The only thing I have control over is my own process: writing, editing, submitting. But since I'm utter crap at selling myself and lousy at editing, I can't even control that much. This is why I've given up on a some of my earlier goals. But hey, at least I'm walking every day. |
| Allow me to share this quote regarding my local weather this week: ”Dangerous wind chills of -45 degrees F (-43 C) to -65 degrees F (-54 C) are expected for most of the period from Tuesday night through Thursday morning. This is a life-threatening situation...” etcetera, etcetera... stay inside... frostbite... etcetera. My question for you has two parts: What is the worst weather you’ve experienced? And what is your ideal weather? Allow me to begin by saying that my ideal weather is absolutely not what is described up there. But... worst weather. I'm not actually sure. I've been in a hurricane, but far enough inland that it wasn't too bad. I've driven through thunderstorms so fierce that I couldn't see past the hood of my car. Once, I crossed New Mexico in a blizzard so outrageously hellish that mere mortals - including state police - had skidded off the interstate and into drifts. At least they couldn't issue me speeding tickets. But really, I don't mind extreme weather - hurricanes, tornadoes, whatever, bring it on - as long as it's not fucking cold. Seriously, that shit up there  is straight out of my worst goddamn nightmares. Well, almost worst. Penultimate worst, but bad enough. You know there are places on Mars warmer than that, right? You know that, right???I despise cold weather. You know I got accepted to MIT, many years ago? You know why I didn't go? Have you ever been to Boston in the winter? Screw that. Look, I spent my childhood next to an estuary of the Chesapeake, just about at sea level. Pretty close to DC, and you might be aware how crappy the weather can be there. Before I even ventured out of Virginia, I experienced extreme weather: bitter cold, muggy humid heat. And I'm here to tell you that - bugs notwithstanding - give me the heat any day of the week. Oh, I've heard the argument from frigid people. "You can always put on more clothes, but you can only take off so much." This is nonsense. You don't take off clothes after the heat reaches a certain level; you switch to more appropriate ones, like a loose-fitting black sheet. No wonder you people can't take the heat; you think bare skin is the answer. It is not. On the other hand, no amount of clothing - no number of layers, no well-made coats or woolen gloves or thermal socks, nothing - will stop my hands and feet from freezing the moment the effective temperature drops below about 52F. And once those freeze, I'm shit-swimming miserable. So you can keep your freakish Michigan lake effect hellish winters (yes, there is a Hell, and it is in Michigan). You can keep your brisk Alaska arctic circle bullshit. You can keep Chicago. If it weren't for the awesome breweries, wineries, cideries, distilleries, and bars around here, I'd move out in a heartbeat just so as not to deal with another Virginia winter. I've been freezing my ass off most every day since December, and we've only had a few nights of subfreezing lows, this year (last year was relentlessly cold). And I still have February to endure. I don't know how I'll be able to do that. I might just throw my hands up into the frigid air and hop a flight to Maui again. Because that's where my ideal weather lives. |
| Write about something happy in your life! What’s happened recently that made you smile? What’s the last thing you laughed at? Life is darkness bleak, a swirling void of colorless numbness spiraling into the eternal event horizon of... Okay, okay, enough with the angsta rap. Still, you may have noticed that I'm not one to focus on happiness. It seems important to many people, though. I don't know if it's just an American thing, since it's right there in our Declaration of Independence along with a lot of rants about King George III. That line - the "pursuit of happiness" - makes it seem like happiness is something to work toward, instead of what it is, which is a state of mind that emerges from other things. What other things? Well, it depends on the individual, I suppose; that's the whole point. I'm anticipating a lot of "my kids of course!" answers, and if that works for you, great. For me, every time I see some whiny brat in public - provided that I have the option of walking away - I grin like a little bitch because I don't have to deal with that crap. So, there's something that makes me happy. Other peoples' misfortune makes me euphoric, as well. Not if it's undeserved, though. I'm never happy to hear that someone's been dealt a crappy hand through no fault of their own. But when I see some skaterat rack himself on a metal handrail, well, endorphins course right through my body and my sense of righteous retribution is satisfied. There was a story a few days ago about some so-called "Instagram Influencer" (I looked it up and was grumpy for several hours straight because something like that exists) who was trying to take a selfie at the rim of the Grand Canyon and... well, you can guess what happened. As one wag noted in a comment about that selfie that had me laughing for about a week, "Started out in portrait, ended up in landscape." Lots of things make me laugh, but that one stands out in recent memory. Yeah, I realize this makes me a terrible person, but I figured out a long time ago that I'm less angry when I embrace that than when I try to gin up sympathy in myself where none actually exists. But like I said, it has to be an example of karmic justice; someone falling off a cliff when they were just trying to enjoy a nice hike in the outdoors - even though that's something I wouldn't do, myself - is sad. Someone falling off a cliff while being a thrill-seeking attention whore? You're damn right I'm going to laugh. In the immortal words of Mel Brooks, "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die." I had a job interview with a civil engineering firm many years ago when asking off-the-wall questions was just starting to come into vogue. So, in addition to the standard "What are your salary requirements?" and "What makes this company a good fit for you?" questions, one of the interviewers smiled and asked, "What brings you joy?" Well, I couldn't exactly answer "schadenfreude" there, so I made up some half-true crap about the satisfaction of seeing my designs come to life and be taken for granted by the general public. I didn't get the job. I guess I should have answered, "Sewers." |
| Reflect on the 30 Day Blogging Competition as a whole. What is something you learned about yourself over the course of the month? What is something you learned about your fellow competitors? I wasn't in a great place, personally, for a while. When I made the decision to become more engaged again, it wasn't failbook or twatter that I turned to, nor was it meatspace - it was this site. As much as I appreciate being left alone to do my own thing, I think it's good to have some interaction with others, and the blog challenge has helped with that, both in January and last November. It's always good to see other points of view on the same prompts - not just to find common ground, though that is nice, but to promote empathy for others' situations. One thing I've felt I needed to work on for a while now is compassion. It's easy to dismiss or ignore the opinions of others. But those opinions come from their own life experiences, and, both as a writer and as a person, it's not good to dismiss someone else's life experiences. Everyone's on their own journey, and my own path isn't any more or less valid than anyone else's. And as I've been saying, it's all journey; there is no such thing as destination. Okay, maybe death, but that's one thing we'll all have in common someday. As I've also been saying, there's no such thing as useless information, especially for a writer. How can we come up with believable characters if we don't interact with others, hear their points of view? Then those of our characters who hold opposing viewpoints become caricatures or, worse, straw people. So that's what I feel like I've learned - or, rather, am continuing to learn - about the other participants (yeah, I'm not a competitive person, so I prefer "participants" to "competitors"): that I have something to learn from every one of them. I hope they feel similarly about me, but even if not, that's worth learning as well. |
| For this final Creation Saturday, write about something that’s in its final countdown. Okay, let's get this inevitability out of the way. Yeah, couldn't resist. I'm betting I'm not the only one to post that, but if I have to have the earworm, so do you. So... something that's in its final countdown... Wouldn't that be... everything? I mean, far be it from me to be a downer , but everything ends. Even the universe itself is slowly dying. A countdown, though, is all about time. I've been seeing a lot of articles lately smugly asserting that time is an illusion. This is, of course, bullshit. Oh, maybe it's an emergent property of other processes, but so is consciousness, and if that's an illusion, then everything is. And since it's perfectly clear that not everything is illusory, then to use the word "illusion" to describe it stretches the definition of "illusion" past the point of usefulness. Now, sure, our perception of time can be modified. Time appears to pass more quickly, for instance, the older we get. Time spent doing something boring seems to go by less quickly than time spent doing something we enjoy. These two observations appear mutually incompatible, because, obviously, life is more boring as we get older - always fewer new experiences to absorb. So, yeah, but that's not an observation about time but about our perception of it. Disregarding relativistic effects that have only tiny effects on our daily lives, time can be measured to a high degree of precision. And that's the polar opposite of an illusion: something that, regardless of our wishes or desires, acts in the same way in all commonly encountered situations. A word about relativistic effects, though: Yes, someone traveling at close to the speed of light will have a different reading on their clock. This effect has been measured and observed, and is uncontroversial. But, again, it doesn't affect what time we have to get up in the morning. It has some bearing on things like GPS satellite clocks and ultra-precise scientific measurements, but if we agree to have lunch at noon, and you show up at 12:30 claiming time is an illusion, that's the last time we have lunch. So why do these reports like to breathlessly call time an illusion? Well, because to a scientist, the only "real" effects are those not tied to a particular frame of reference. For example: centripetal force is considered real, while its buddy centrifugal force is dependent on reference frames so it's called imaginary. And yet, if you've ever been on a whirligig (or as I like to call it, a kiddy catapult), to you, the observer, centrifugal force is very real. Anyway, since the passage of time is dependent on frame of reference, it is, in a sense, not real. And a lot of science reporters seem to have been taken in by Buddhist philosophy. Bottom line: time is real, everything is dying, and we're all in the final countdown. |
| It's the last Fun Fact Friday of January! Here’s a straightforward prompt to celebrate: Make a list of at least ten random facts about yourself. Well, they're not really random if they're just what I can come up with off the top of my skull in a brief period of time, but... 1) There exist three states in the US that I haven't been to: Nebraska, Michigan, and Alaska. 2) I never went to first grade. 3) Once, I spent $340 on a car and installed a $700 sound system in it. 4) I've never seen the movie Titanic. 5) The Toronto Zoo used to have a monorail. I was there the day it failed, 25 years ago this July, and witnessed the train's final malfunction. 6) I've eaten at biker dive bars in Montana and dined at the Ritz-Carlton in Boston. 7) I have never subscribed to cable TV. 8) I've never fathered a child. This was by choice. 9) The first time I drove across the country, I went all the way: from the easternmost point of the contiguous US to the westernmost point. 10) I've seen an active volcano up close (on Montserrat). Really, I'm not sure what any of this means, if indeed it means anything at all. There are probably more things I could come up with, but it's best to maintain some mystery. |
| How did you start writing? Did someone urge you to write, or did it come naturally? I started reading at an early age. Before public school, even before kindergarten (which, at the time, was not part of the public school system), my parents taught me to read. I don't remember much of those early lessons. I think they involved deciphering cuneiform scratchings on stone as we ran from the saber-toothed tigers that were chasing us away from the woolly mammoth kill. Or maybe I'm misremembering. Consequently, I always read above my grade level. This would cause me problems later in life, as I read things like Stranger in a Strange Land when I was still quite young, and it warped me. But that and other writings - mostly, but not all, science fiction - led me to believe, in the way young people believe without evidence or accountability, that I could do that too. So, I tried. As with most people, I think those early efforts would embarrass me now, but I do remember my parents and teachers encouraging me. Because I was good at nerdy stuff, I sucked at sports, so I wrote. Because I was never skilled at any sort of graphic arts, I wrote. Because we weren't wealthy, I was happy to be able to create something with no raw materials besides a notebook and a pencil. I learned words. I lived and breathed words. When I wasn't writing, I did crossword puzzles to improve my vocabulary. I paid attention in English classes and learned (with varying degrees of success) the rules of spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Thing is, I was also pretty good at math, and to be honest, math pays better, so I went into a field that was more math than writing. There was some need for technical communication in engineering, though, so I learned that as well, and creative writing faded into the background. But it never completely disappeared, as you can probably tell. With my background in science fiction combined with my engineering training, I could still craft a story when I put my mind to it. I'm still learning, though. Sometimes it's hard to know when to be less technical and more poetic. And my sense of humor usually creeps in, sometimes inappropriately. And I'm a long way from mastering the intricacies of plot and characterization, but I'm still working on improving. I write because there's almost nothing else I'm any good at. |
| How different was your life one year ago? How different do you imagine your life will be one year from today? As I noted in a previous entry, my life doesn't change much, and that's how I like it. I was starting to train for Nerd Camp a year ago, which involved trying to increase my aerobic fitness in preparation for my trip in June. Which I managed to do, but it still wasn't enough to prepare me for a week at 10,000 feet. Now, I'm just walking a mile and a half every day, more for general exercise than for any specific goal. And I hope nothing changes over the course of the next year. Well, I should put that differently. Of course something will change; that's a basic bug in the software of life. Just - nothing major, such as health or finances. Hopefully I'll be a little bit better at writing, a little bit more knowledgeable, and, if I'm really lucky, a little bit wiser. But I doubt it. If there's one constant in my recent life, it's been an utter inability to improve in any meaningful way, so I've just gotten better at making peace with that. Drinking helps. One thing I can be sure of: I will have had more beer pass through me at this time next year. |
| What is your preferred book reading medium? Kindle, computer screen, audiobook, or good old fashioned paper? How come? I had one of the first Kindles. That particular model of Kindle was excellent for me because it didn't have a backlit screen like a computer or tablet, but rather something akin to an LCD display. This made it dependent on ambient lighting conditions - it was nice to have something that I could read in bright light, just like a book, but a lot less bulky. I bought an LED light to handle dimmer situations. This was around the time my vision started to deteriorate from age and I started needing reading glasses - but with the Kindle, if I forgot the glasses, I could change the font size on the fly. It's since died; it's been a while. And I was never interested in the tablet-style Kindles - those are great in dim situations and crap in bright light, but I can say the same thing about my laptop and I'd rather just use that. I also don't read as much anymore, because even with reading glasses it's become a chore. Mostly I stay on the computer, reading stuff here as well as news stories, and playing video games. There are books that I need to read, though, and for them I'll get the hardcovers. I would, anyway - mostly I used the Kindle for pulp novels that I'd be embarrassed to have on a bookshelf. Audiobooks basically put me to sleep. It's probably about time for me to get a new Kindle, though, and read some more. They still make the non-tablet kind, and they're not very expensive. Some models are even waterproof, which would be great if I ventured into the outdoors. Except that if I'm outside in a place where I need a waterproof Kindle, that means I'm wearing sunscreen. And if I'm wearing sunscreen, that means the Kindle will just slip right out of my greased fingers. Best if I don't go outside at all, least of all under the glare of the accursed daystar. Maybe if someone bought me a hot tub... |
| Today in the US is Martin Luther King Day, a federal holiday celebrating the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., a civil rights activist best known for advancing civil rights through nonviolence and civil disobedience. In August of 1953, King delivered his famous speech “I Have a Dream” calling for civil and economic equality for all Americans and the end of racism. On this Motivational Monday, write a speech advocating for something you’re passionate about and use the phrase “I have a dream” in your entry. We need space. We need space, not because going there will solve all of our problems, but because it is there. We need space, because we're only insignificant if we allow ourselves to be. Fifty years ago this year, humans walked on the Moon for the first time. As I write this, that Moon is eclipsed. Our satellite slipped into our shadow and darkened. During a lunar eclipse, the Moon glows red. That red is sunlight, scattered by the atmosphere. If we could stand on the Moon right now, the Earth would be a huge red ring in the dark sky, the light of every sunrise, every sunset, every twilight illuminating the lunar orb. Some say we shouldn't bother with space, that we should solve our problems here, first. Well, we've had fifty years to solve our problems, and we still have problems. We shouldn't go to space, they say, because there's still poverty, still hunger, still war, still crime. But do we stop searching for a cure for pneumonia just because we haven't found a way to end cancer? Do we stop convicting rapists because there are murderers out there? Do we stop feeding ourselves because someone else is still hungry? There are over seven billion of us. I think we can work on more than one thing at a time. Do you think it's a waste of money? Why? Are you under the impression that we stuff dollar bills into rockets and blast them into orbit, never to be seen again? No. That money enriches our economy. It helps all of us, rich and poor alike. The things we've already learned have improved our quality of life immeasurably. And there's still much more to learn. Everything we learn helps us to prosper. Everything we find advances science. Is it difficult? Yes. Is it dangerous? Oh, yes. But doing nothing, staying here, losing our curiosity and our drive to explore - that's not only dangerous, it's suicidal. Maybe you think we don't deserve to survive. Maybe, because we've produced serial killers and pedophiles, and despoilers of the environment, and hedge fund managers, you would condemn the whole human race to purgatory. Well, see, by even pronouncing that opinion, you're proving the opposite: because you are not a rapist or a thief or a drug pusher, and you condemn those activities, you're showing that we do, in fact, deserve to survive. I have a dream that, one day, someone will stand on the Moon, look up, and witness the Sun slipping behind the limb of the Earth. That we'll have a thriving colony on Mars. That, eventually, some of us will leave our home forever, sailing out to explore the billions of stars in the galaxy, and perhaps even the billions of galaxies beyond. Will we find other life? Almost certainly. Will we find Vulcans or Klingons? Almost certainly not. Wouldn't it be better to know than to speculate? This is what we're for. Let's do it. Give us space. |
| What event from history do you wish you could have witnessed? So many options... I'll assume here that I'd be a kind of fly on the wall - unobserved myself, unable to affect anything, and unable to be affected by anything other than photons and sound waves. I mean, what's the point in observing if you can't observe? I'm also thinking this means singular events, not protracted ones such as wars. This means that I wouldn't be able to pre-emptively kill anyone whose impact on history is negative, like the classic Hitler or the pure evil of Carrie Nation. So, the first thought that came to mind was to observe the first moon landing (as per above, I'd be unaffected by the extreme heat or vacuum). It was, after all, not only the most significant thing we've ever done as a species, but the most significant thing I can imagine doing (we might set foot on other worlds in the future, but the moon was the first). Then I'd be able to tell all the retards who think the event was faked that it wasn't. But then I realized - these people are retards. They wouldn't believe me, anyway, any more than they do now. They're not worth my time, and besides, the event was well-documented anyway. That got me thinking about conspiracy "theories," so of course the next thing I thought of was the assassination of JFK. But that's depressing, and besides, there were already hundreds of witnesses as well as video footage, and there's still controversy surrounding it, so why would I expect to see what actually happened any more than anyone else there? Besides, again, no one would believe me, so I'd only be indulging my own curiosity - and honestly, I'm not that curious about it. Consequently, I figure it needs to be something that I'm personally curious about, but feel no need to share with others. If I take "history" literally, I'd be limited to the past 10,000 years or so; before then, there were no written records - hence, "prehistory." A shame, because I think it'd be fun to observe the presumed impact event that ended up wiping out most of the dinosaurs, or the moment some human first tamed fire. Then there are the events that supposedly took place during historical times, but are of questionable historicity and/or the subject of contradictory accounts: Washington chopping down the cherry tree, the birth or death of Jesus, Alexander cutting the Gordian Knot, etc. Those are cans of worms I don't really feel like opening; again, we run into the idea that I'd have to satisfy my personal curiosity without feeling the need to convince others of what I saw/heard. Or didn't see or hear, in these cases. At some point, it doesn't matter whether an event really happened or not; it makes no difference to how we think about it. So I think it depends on when you ask me. I'd have had a different answer last year, and will probably have a different answer next year. Hell, I'll probably have a different answer tomorrow. But right now, today, this article caught my eye, as it concerns two of my most favored historical figures: https://theculturetrip.com/north-america/usa/new-york/articles/what-you-need-to-... Given his longevity, bookishness, and outstanding oddness, it’s not terribly surprising that one of Tesla’s few friends was the writer Samuel Langhorne Clemens, alias Mark Twain. Having met at a New York social club to which both men belonged, Mark Twain credited Tesla with curing his debilitating constipating[sic] with an oscillator that vibrated his bowels until he narrowly made it to the restroom in time to experience his remedy. That. I'd pay to see that. |
| Find a piece of nature that you can hold in your hand (leaf, twig, rock, berry, etc). Describe it as closely and carefully as you can. Use any means available to you to examine the object (magnifying glass, scale, all of your senses) and practice your descriptive writing skills. "That's the problem with nature. Something's always stinging you or oozing mucus on you. Let's go watch TV." -Calvin The cycles turn, as they are wont to do, and so we have the four seasons: Cold, Pollen, Mosquitoes, and Dead Leaves. If you're lazy, Dead Leaves season extends well into Cold season, and so you can pick a crumply brown thing up off your deck without having to venture too far into the dreaded Outdoors. I don't know how many microorganisms tracked into the house on this dead leaf, and I'm not about to get a microscope to find out. Probably some insects, too. Definitely some things that, if they were big enough to see, would bite or sting me. At some point, probably during Mosquito season, this sample of detritus was, presumably, green. And then, during Dead Leaves, it might have become an interesting color, something on the low-frequency end of the spectrum like red, orange, or yellow. Color, though, is a function of selective reflection of photons. It's not truly an innate property of an object. We call something "green" if, upon exposure to the right kind of light and in the presence of our optical receptors, it absorbs most of the wavelengths that we don't call "green." When it's brown, that means that a bunch of wavelengths are being absorbed, and we're seeing the others. If there's no light, there's no color. This particular leaf is in the process of decaying into an amorphous chemical sludge. Certainly it smells that way. I'm probably helping it along by touching it. It's the fate of everything that lives, of course: its components to be recycled into something that's alive, only for it to die and allow the components to be recycled again. Doesn't seem to have a point to it, does it? Maybe that's the true beauty that eludes me in nature - that it really doesn't have a point. It's rather invigorating to believe that this is true. Still doesn't mean I want to go out in it. Thing is, though, we speak of nature as if it were something separate from us, when the simple truth is, we're just as natural as this leaf. Thus, anything we create - walls, hair dye, pyramids, rockets, computers, whatever - is also natural. The only thing artificial is the distinction we make between "human-made" and "natural." Where I spent my childhood, there were beavers, and they built dams. We, too, build dams. Termites create vast cities; so do we. Birds make nests, rabbits dig holes... these things are considered natural, and so too should be the things we create. Possibly the most dangerous result of this artificial distinction is the idea that what's natural is good, while what's artificial is bad. Yeah... tell that to Socrates. Or anyone with sunburn-caused melanoma. That's why I heap scorn upon products proclaiming that they contain "all-natural ingredients." Like, what, other products contain supernatural ingredients? Anyway, time to let the leaf go, hopefully along with its slimy, gross microorganisms. There'll be more in a few months. |
| How much do you know about food waste in your country? Spend some time researching this issue and share a fact you learned. How conscious of your access to food are you and in what ways can you be more responsible for reducing your own food waste? I waste food. One of the few disadvantages of effectively living alone (my housemate and I don't normally share food) is that packaging at stores is designed for families, not individuals. So I'll buy, for example, a pint of strawberries, eat half of them, and then by the time I go to eat the other half, they're a biology experiment. Sometimes it's only a couple of strawberries that are fuzzy, but honestly, once I see that mold, I lose all appetite for strawberries. Consider the environment lucky if I bother to compost the strawberry mold and chuck the container into recycling. Avocados are even more dicey (see what I did there?) This is the life cycle of an avocado: 1) Purchase firm, green avocado. 2) Let it sit on the counter while it ripens. 3) Toss mushy, black avocado into trash. But that's just me. To look at food waste in general, I went here.  The article's two and a half years old now, but I doubt much has changed in that time.Hey, we're #1 in something besides incarceration! Now, understand, I'm wary of anything purporting to know the cause of something without scientific evidence. But I am aware that, rather than donate food scraps to shelters or feed them to the homeless, supermarkets hit them with bleach before throwing them away. I understand why they do that, but on a visceral level it just seems wrong. We live in a time of abundance. This is, in general, a good thing. Those of us with money want for no essentials. My parents were shaped by a different time. They were both children of the Great Depression, and it showed in their attitude toward waste. There was something about that time that engendered something akin to PTSD - a deep-set attitude that there might not be supplies tomorrow. My father designed our house to use passive solar in a bid to save energy before anyone had even heard of passive solar. We dumped food scraps into the garden to enrich the soil for food we grew ourselves. We recycled before recycling was a trend. And my parents never, ever let food go to waste. And like any rotten kid, I rebelled against their attitude of scarcity. Now that I'm their age, though, I've begun to see their point. Also like any rotten kid. Now, our culture is all about disposability. The idea of saving - be it money, food, or whatever - is alien to us. Hell, people mock hoarders, and there's a pervasive attitude that there's no point to saving money against future times of need. It's not just food we throw away, it's everything - including things that, when we got them, were supposed to improve our lives or help us be comfortable and happy. The Great Depression began 90 years ago this fall, so there aren't so many alive anymore that remember it. And thus, we're doomed to repeat the mistakes we didn't learn from history. |
| Do a bit of research on your Zodiac Sign. What are the associated characteristics of people with your sign and how do you exhibit those characteristics? https://www.horoscope.com/zodiac-signs Aquarians: Most likely of all signs to consider astrology nonsense. But hey, I don't judge. It's like religion - if it makes you feel good, helps you try to become a better person, and you don't try to force me to accept its premises, we're fine. Thing is, I've actually studied astrology. There are aspects to it that are interesting, mostly the folklore and the math involved. Well. Interesting to me. There's a lot more to it than just the sun sign, which is what you usually get in the pop culture "horoscopes." For the purposes of this discussion, we can ignore the "precession" thing, which means that all the traditional star signs are off by pretty much a whole month compared to their astronomical definitions. "Sun sign" refers to the segment of the zodiac that the sun is in at a certain time. Usually this refers to someone's birth date, so when someone says "I'm a Pisces," that means the sun was in Pisces at their natal event. But, in this system, the sun is far from the only influence. The moon sign has a meaning as well, usually taken to be the more hidden side of a person's psyche. So, for example, you can be a Capricorn with a Libra moon. Consequently, as you might guess, the other planets (yes, the sun and moon are defined as "planets" in astrology) also have an effect. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn have been known since antiquity. The discovery of other planets - which, again, includes things that aren't defined as planets by astronomers - led to their inclusion in the astrological canon: Ceres, Vesta, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto. According to astrology, your personality is influenced at birth by the effects of each planet as it relates to the sign it's in. But wait, there's more. There are other effects, reinforcements or contradictions, caused by certain alignments of the planets with respect to each other. If you're born on a new moon, for example, it's called a conjunction between the sun and the moon. Full moon - opposition. You can also have, say, Jupiter conjunct (or opposite) Mars. Obviously you can never have Mercury or Venus opposite the Sun. And just to make things more complicated, there are also squares (planets about 90 degrees apart) and triangles (planets about 120 degrees apart). Also, rising signs (the zodiac sign on the eastern horizon) and so on. Oh, and then there are retrograde planets - those times in the Earth's orbit when a planet appears, from our point of view, to be moving backwards. They're not, of course - it's strictly a frame of reference thing. Those mean something as well, usually the opposite of what the planet normally means. Like - Mercury represents change (among other things), but when it's retrograde, it represents stagnation. (Mercury retrogrades happen on a regular basis.) A "horoscope," then, compares the alignments at a given time with the alignments at a person's birth, and outlines the influences on one's life at that given time. Because all of these things relate back to the moment of your birth, you need to know your temporospatial coordinates at that moment - time, latitude, longitude. Only then can you achieve a full description of your personality, needs, desires, predilections, and kinks. Even then, it's subject to interpretation and unknowable factors (say, maybe there's a planet yet to be discovered out in the Kuiper belt). Now, I've never known the time of my birth, though I can pin down the coordinates to within a degree of latitude/longitude. So one time, I asked an astrologer to use my personality to backtrack what my rising sign must have been, which would reveal, to within 2 hours or so, what time I was born. At least - that's how it should work, right? If your rising sign affects your personality, then you should be able to infer the rising sign based on your personality. This guy knew me pretty well, so I figured it was worth a shot. And - you probably know where I'm going with this - it could have been any of 8 of the 12 signs. Astrology is bunk. But it's fun bunk. So let's see what this sun-sign-only website has to say about me. Strengths Progressive, original, humanitarian, independent. Oh, gosh, that couldn't possibly apply to anyone but Aquarians. Likes Fun with friends, fighting for causes, helping others, intellectual conversation, a good listener. Nothing in there about beer. Dislikes Limitations, being lonely, broken promises, dull or boring situations, people who disagree with them. Find me someone who likes broken promises. Further, I revel in dull or boring situations, and I absolutely do not dislike people who disagree with me (only people who are assholes about it, and, to be fair, I also dislike people who agree with me and are assholes about it). Best environment Any gathering of people to exchange ideas. You know, I'm fine with that from time to time, but what part of "introvert" did you not understand? My "best environment" is being home alone with a bottle of scotch, a cigar, my cats and my computer. Charismatic marks Good looks, beautiful eyes, angular faces, thin build. Oh hey, there's something to this astrology thing after all! Sign me up! |
| I have a stressful day at work today ... What strategies do you use to manage stress in your life? Honestly, the strategies I use to manage stress in my life wouldn't work for most people. They include:  Going to sleep when I want to and waking up whenever it happens naturally Not having kids Not having a job Avoiding stressful situations Drinking Staying away from people who want to tell me how I should liveSince we're on that last subject, I did come across this list, which had the opposite effect of its clear intention, as reading it made my blood boil.It's titled "50 Ways To Live On Your Own Terms," but it should be titled "50 Ways To Live On My Terms Because I'm Better Than You." While there are a few - very few! - points on this list with which I agree, it started to piss me off from #1. 1. Stop consuming caffeine How about you bite me? And then there's: 2. Pray or meditate morning, mid-day, and night Okay, let's think about the normal American life for a minute. You have 24 hours in a day. No more, no less (okay, with the possible exception of two days a year when you switch from DST or back, but let's not be too pedantic about it). Everyone who has an opinion about it, including the author of this drivel, recommends 8 hours of sleep. That leaves 16. You work for 8 hours a day. That leaves 8. A normal commute is 1 hour. That's 2 hours, leaving 6. Waking up, showering, getting dressed, eating breakfast - let's be generous and call it 0.5. Leaves 5.5. Lunch. Usually an hour. Leaves 4.5. Doing stuff to get ready for bed. Another half-hour. Leaves 4 hours. Exercise. I'll grudgingly admit that exercise is good for you. You should do that every day. Even if your routine is only 1/2 hour long, which I take to be a minimum, you also need time to go to the gym, get dressed, get dressed again, and come back from the gym. Call it another 1/2 hour. If you're only exercising for 1/2 hour like I said, we're down to 3 hours. Dinner. Maybe you have someone to cook it for you; maybe you're doing the cooking. If you're doing it, between cooking, cleaning up, and actually eating, that's easily an hour. Now we have 2 hours left in the day. What am I missing? Oh yeah, sex. To do it right takes at least an hour. Feel free to make jokes about it only taking 30 seconds in the comments. But I stand by my math here. So, let's see, carry the 2... you have one hour to do other stuff, and that's if you don't have kids. Now, sure, you can, for instance, order a pizza instead of cooking dinner and free up some time that way, but we're talking about trying to lead a healthy lifestyle here, right? Personally, I'd order the pizza, but we all know I'm no role model. Or maybe you can enrich yourself by listening to an audiobook whilst commuting or at the gym. Still, if you remember, this entire section of the rant is about squeezing in meditation time, and for that you need to be mindful, focused, and undistracted by other stuff. Something usually gives. For me, it was sleep. I'm still feeling the negative effects of that. Don't be me. Point is, we're only on #2 and I've already explained why the list is full of shit. Now, I'm not going to go into all of these. You can read the mishigoss for yourself and draw your own conclusions. They might be different than mine. That's fine. But here are a few other lowlights: 13. Go to bed early and rise early Let me explain this one more time: Some people have different natural schedules. If you're getting the recommended 8 hours of sleep a day (which you're not), what the fuck does it matter what the clock says when you're doing it? There might be a correlation between natural morning people and productivity. But correlation != causation. 15. Replace warm showers with cold ones Bugger off, wanker. Of all the simple pleasures in life, this is the only one that has no godsdamned calories or carcinogens. 23. Replaces Carbs With Healthy Fats There’s lots of research showing that healthy fats don’t make you fat. Actually, refined carbs and sugars are what make you fat. Actually, calories are what make you fat. Refined carbs and sugars make you hungry faster, so if you're undisciplined (like me), you end up eating more calories overall. And you know how I feel about nutritional "research." I won't go into it again here. 25. Choose to have faith in something bigger than yourself, skepticism is easy I find that the precise, exact, polar opposite is true. Atheists make up a small percentage of the population, and most of us arrived at that philosophical point after a lot of hard thinking and self-searching, and with resistance from almost everyone else in our lives. If you think being a minority is easy, you're not a minority. 27. Give at least one guilt-free hour to relaxation per day Aaaaaand there goes your final hour.  43. Make your bed first thing in the morning Making your bed is an utter, complete, and total waste of time. 47. Become good friends with your parents Go to hell. My parents each spent 10 years struggling with dementia, then died. Not even concurrently. I spent 20 years of my life dealing with that. You know, in case you wanted to know why I'm so angry sometimes. Now, I could also mention the few items I can agree with, but what's the point? The rest of the article calls those into question for me, so I'm going to spend the next couple of weeks reevaluating, for example, 48. Floss your teeth. Hey, look at that, I was supposed to write about dealing with stress, and instead, I managed to cause some. I want a drink. |
| Where in the world would you like to visit the most? Assume you are not worried about money in any way. While you're traveling, give me a status update on January so far. Smooth sailing, or turbulence? It's a close call between Scotland and Belgium. The reasons are similar: Belgium makes some of my favorite beer, but there are some Belgian beers that don't make it out of Europe, and I want to drink them. As for Scotland, well... Ideally, I'll visit both places before I visit the Great Pub in the Sky, but if I had to choose... well, I've actually been to Scotland, if only for a couple of hours whilst touring the UK, so I'd pick Belgium. I have a friend who also loves scotch, and we have tentative plans to visit the island of Islay, home of - depending on your feelings about scotch - either the sweetest nectar of the gods to ever grace our benighted world, or the most disgusting waste of good barley to ever besmirch the noble name of Scotland.Naturally, I'm in the former camp. But it's okay if you don't like Islay malts; there's a limited supply, and the more people dislike them, the more there is for me to drink. Heavily peated whisky is probably an acquired taste. It is certainly an expensive one. As for Belgium, well, Belgian beer is also not for everybody. The particular strains of yeast involved in the brewing process are quite distinctive, and impart a flavor that their fans call sweet, and their detractors liken to old gym socks. As with scotch, well... that means more for me. Traditionally, Belgian beers were brewed in monasteries. Many still are. The Trappist ales and abbey styles remain among my favorite beers. So many drinks. So little time. For the past month or so, I've been working on losing weight. This involves the usual weight-loss regimen: eating less delicious crap and more disgusting vegetables, and exercising. It also means not drinking as much as I'd like to. I want to emphasize once again that this was NOT a New Year's resolution, because I don't do New Year's resolutions. I started back in December, after coming back from a trip to Nevada and California that involved a lot of fine dining and even finer drinking. If I can make it another three days, it will have been four weeks. If so, I'll celebrate with a glass of wine and start working on the next four weeks. But I do take some small satisfaction in knowing that, thus far, I've been successful in avoiding temptation. That won't last, of course. I will fail, as I always do. But for now, I'll take the win. |
| “We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.” -Ernest Hemingway What are your thoughts on this quote by a writer many consider a master? Who are some other writers you admire or consider masters? There's a joke floating out there somewhere that riffs on the old "Why did the chicken cross the road?" riddle. One of the answers is: Ernest Hemingway: "To die. In the rain." One of the first things I noticed about Hemingway when I was forced to read him (and make no mistake, I had to be forced) was the forcefulness and brevity of his words. The chicken joke is spot on in that regard. I mean, look at the title of "The Old Man and the Sea." Six words, each one syllable, each exactly three letters, and it perfectly sums up the book. Too bad the rest of the book is the equivalent of watching grass grow. I mean, would it be as popular a book to torture high school students with if the title had been something like "A Senior Citizen Attempts to Catch a Fucking Marlin?" In fact, Hemingway's bluntness is so infamous that I have to doubt the above quote can actually be ascribed to him. I mean, "apprentices" is four syllables, which is three more than he prefers to elucidate. Look, here's the thing: I'm not a fan of "literature." About the only classic author I can stomach is Mark Twain. That guy is still freakin' hilarious after more than a century. I mean, just feast your eyes upon this utter smackdown of James Fenimore Cooper (as well as his fans), first penned in 1895: http://twain.lib.virginia.edu/projects/rissetto/offense.html It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English Literature at Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent and let persons talk who have read Cooper. Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in "Deerslayer," and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offenses against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record. No, seriously, I'm not kidding. Go read the whole thing. It's pretty short, and it's worth reading every word. Though it takes me twice as long to read it as it probably should, because it cracks me right up every single time. That said, whoever penned that quote up top attributed to Hemingway (and I am willing to admit, grudgingly, that it might have been actually Hemingway) did get it right, in my opinion: There is no writer so great that he or she cannot improve. At some point, though, it becomes a matter of personal taste. No amount of convincing will get me to believe, for instance, that James Joyce was anything other than the literary equivalent of Jackson Pollack: splattering words around his paper canvas like bright paint, their arrangement so random that people see what patterns they want to see in it. At least with Pollack, I can glance at a splatter painting for a brief moment, utter a dismissive "Bah!" and move on. Reading takes actual time. But I digress. Point is, I'd rather read a good comic book than slog through another neurotic "literary" excrementation. |
| Open your local paper or browse online for a news story headline that grabs your attention and share it with us. Try to venture outside your comfort zone and read a story you wouldn’t normally read or even one from another country! Well, sharing stories and articles is kind of what I do here. And I often read stories from other countries. In practice, that's usually limited to Canada, Australia, and the UK, because I'm bilingual: I can read English and 'Murican. You don't think there's a difference? Well, as I like to put it, the English invented the language, and we perfected it. The Brits are entirely too courteous to call me out on that. "Quite good," they'll say. "Very interesting." So imagine my surprise when I found this: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46846467 Britons like to think they have a "special relationship" with the US, based on a common language and cultural, historical and political ties. But, according to one of the UK's most respected polling companies, there's one chasm the English language can't always bridge - the British love of passive-aggressive statements. In the words of YouGov, "half of Americans wouldn't be able to tell that a Briton is calling them an idiot". Turns out that "Quite good" actually means "A bit disappointing," probably referring to our cultural progress since 1776. Can't say I blame 'em. And "Very interesting" translates to "That is clearly nonsense." And I still haven't quite parsed what the Brits mean when they say "take the piss out of you." I've seen it several places, and the context seems to keep changing. I'm thinking that's because it's a particularly British way of trolling someone, an art form that we Yanks haven't gotten the hang of. I will also note that the illustration for "British sarcasm" consists of Black Adder and Baldrick. Of that, I definitely approve. So, bless your hearts, my UK friends. And I say that with the greatest respect. |
| Besides the craft of writing, are you an artist in any other medium? Sculptor, singer, dancer, painter? Share a story about your talent! I have no talent. This is a difficult thing for me to admit. In a society that values talent and good looks above all else, it makes me a pariah on both counts. Don't think I haven't tried. Oh, I have a bit of skill at technical drawing; I started out as a drafter before I became a professional engineer. That's less talent and more attention to detail, though. It takes knowledge of geometry and an understanding of math, both of which I'm fair at, but there's little creativity involved. I've also been a photographer, and even gotten paid for it. But I was never any kind of Ansel Adams; I merely applied my technical skills to things like composition and lighting. There, too, true creativity eluded me. One thing I wish I had real talent for was music. I've studied music theory. I played piano, violin, and guitar. But I've always envied those who didn't have to read music, who instead could just hear something and recreate it on an instrument. It is fortunate for others that I'm something of a loner, because I do sing - though not well. Get me drunk at a karaoke bar and it's a different story, but I won't do that in my hometown. Otherwise, my love for music has to be limited to passive listening. I do okay at cooking, but there was never any danger of me becoming a professional chef. Okay, I do have one talent, but it's an utterly useless one: you know how you're always told not to mix different types of booze? Well, my talent is being able to completely ignore that advice. Fermented or distilled, any order, all day long. Sure, I get hangovers like anyone, but they don't seem to have anything to do with what I drink before or after other drinks. I told you it was useless. So, since this is related to my one ridiculous talent, I'll share a story. One time, oh, must have been early 2017, I was sitting in my safe space (a bar) when I saw, on the wall, a bottle of Rumchata . Rumchata is, as its name suggests, a rum drink, but it's important for this particular story to note that it's actually produced in Wisconsin. I'd been introduced to it on St. Thomas, where some friends and I spent half a day trying out different combinations of various rums and rum drinks, including Rumchata.Now, I'd recently watched The Big Lebowski for something like the 147th time, and I'd been thinking of ordering a White Russian because I'm a Dudist at heart (except I really like The Eagles, man). But seeing that bottle of Rumchata gave me an idea. "What if," I said to the bartender, "you made me a White Russian, but used Rumchata instead of cream?" "Oooh," she said, either impressed by my drink-making creativity or, more likely, sensing a big tip in her future. "I can do that." A White Russian (or as The Dude calls it, a Caucasian) involves cream (or milk), kahlua, and vodka. This particular bartender, whose name was Christy, substituted Rumchata for half the cream. That's okay; I figure her job is to make 'em and my job is to drink 'em. I'm sure I'm not the first person to come up with that particular drink - I never am - but I'd never heard of it being done. When she was finished with her artistry, I declared it to be delicious. "Now," I said, "we just need to name the drink." "Oh, I don't know," she said, "I'd have to think about it." "Well," I mused, after thinking it over, "Rumchata is a very American creation. But the vodka gives it that Russian influence. So I think we should call it... an American Election." "Oh, that's just wrong." So that's how I invented a drink that had probably already been invented, but gave it a name that's purely Waltz. |
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