Congratulations to the Boston Red Sox, winners of the 2013 World Series! It couldn’t have happened at a better time for the city of Boston, to win the World Series at home in historic Fenway park. This is the first time the Sox have won a World Series at home since 1918 — only six years after the park opened in 1912.
(Trivia fact: the 1912 World Series was played in Boston that first year, and the Red Sox beat the New York Giants four games to three.)
In his 1982 book, Megatrends, John Naisbitt famously wrote, “We are drowning in information, but we are starved for knowledge.” What was true 30 years ago is true today at a level that is both jaw-dropping and mind-numbing. The interweb highway speeds past at a breath-taking pace; yesterday vanishes rapidly behind while tomorrow constantly barrels down on us. The sheer volume of traffic (meaning both ‘lots of’ and ‘very loud’) can be overwhelming.
I’d like to take the topics from last Thursday and Friday to a new level and talk about how we find knowledge and truth amid all that information. In a world filled with opinion and conflicting assertions, how do we tell fair from foul? When facts and expertise compete with ideology and status quo, how do we pick among them?
This is about ways to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Ah, it’s that time of year again, so here again is unvarnished truth about our yellow-orange friends and their lifestyle.
Sad personal fact: I’m not a fan of most vegetables. At the very bottom of that list are the squashes, including my Gourdian friend, the Pumpkin. Not a fan of cooked fruit, so pie is off my menu and never more so than “squash pie.” Revolting!!
Speaking of revolting, a good friend loves this time of year, because all the microbrewery pumpkin ales come out. Ewwww…. “squash beer!”
Halloween candy on the other hand….. 🙂
Today you get a re-post of a post from last year at this time. And it was a re-post then, as well. It’s piece I wrote several years ago for a writing exercise in another venue. I thought it turned out pretty well, and I still like it after so many years, so I thought it was worth sharing again.
The original writing exercise (and it was just an exercise; there were no winners or judges) was to write a short piece from the point of view of a pumpkin. The exercise was given to us around this time—fall—just before Halloween. (It was the same guy who gave us an exercise to write a piece from the point of view of our car!)
Most writers took the tack that pumpkins suffered horribly at this time of year. Naturally, I took a different tack, and so I give you…
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Today I’m deep in some POV-Ray project work and waiting to see how the Los Angeles Dodgers do tonight at the St. Louis Cardinals. The Dodgers have a tough boat to row; I think the Cards will have to stumble, and the Dodgers will have to be excellent. For two games. I’d like to see it, but dot, dot, dot. The Detroit Tigers are in similar straits with the Boston Red Sox. It’s looking like the World Series will be red against red.
But due to something that came up in a conversation from yesterday’s article, I’m interrupting my previously scheduled day to bring you this special announcement:
I’m only going to say this once: Global climate change is real.
I would say that I’ve been watching the goings on in Congress with growing horror, but my horror-level with regard to politics these days is largely tapped out. I’d also like to say that Great Evil must be at work here, because no one could possibly be as stupid as to participate in — or as to allow — this horror show. Unfortunately, there seems no limit to human stupidity, and perhaps Hanlon’s Razor* applies: “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”
I’d already been pondering the spectrum that leads from discontent through activism and ultimately to terrorism. In the USA, we saw extreme activism with regard to civil rights. And we’ve certainly seen terrorism throughout the world, including on our own shores.
Lately, I think you can view the Republicans as having become home-grown terrorists!
I was catching up on last week’s shows (a word about that in a moment), and it happened again, twice. It’s gotten to the point of almost becoming another “countdown game.” How long will it be until I hear it again? It might also make a drinking game for people who don’t like to drink all that much, because — while very common — it usually only appears once per story. (Still, multiple sightings have been documented.)
Being common yet infrequent, it wouldn’t normally stand out at all, but it struck me as such an odd thing to say (even the first time I heard it), that I’ve noticed it ever since. I suppose my love of LEO stories brings it my way more frequently. The most common context where you’ll hear it is from a suspect or person of interest being interviewed by cops.
It’s the line, “You gotta believe me!”
As reported earlier, this week got off to a rough start. I let my guard down (foolishly) and got nabbed by the greedy PC rapists. All I wanted was to find a particular font for a project. The next day a more careful search turned up exactly what I needed, the fonts and just the fonts (ma’am).
Monday I mentioned that I planned to share my font-needing project with you. It’s not finished (many of my projects live a long time as I tweak them — some are living things that grow and improve forever). But it turned out so much better than I expected, I just had to share it with you this Science Fiction Saturday.
I’m also going to boldly try a new WordPress blogging trick!
One of the first blog articles I wrote concerned the idea of Yin and Yang. It’s a topic I’ve touched on several times since (and revisited in particular talking about men and women). I reference the concept so often, because I think the duality of opposing concepts is a fundamental truth about the universe.
It’s not the only truth, of course, but it’s a very useful way of seeing things and understanding them. We see duality everywhere! Sometimes it’s something versus the lack of something (heat/cold, light/dark, full/empty). Sometimes it’s truly opposing pairs (north/south, positive/negative, male/female).
Today I’d like to expand on the concept and tell you about the Johari Window.
I am not a happy camper right now. In fact, I’m fucking pissed! I was working on something I’ll be showing here later, and I needed a certain font (or at least to identify the font). I found exactly what I needed, and it was a “free” download. You gotta love the interweb!
Except that upon downloading, I got a bunch of unwanted software that installed itself unasked,… and no font! I ended up with AVG’s free anti-virus suite, some sort of “register (i.e. pay) to actually use” backup software, and a bunch of new toolbars for my browsers. None of it asked for or wanted. You gotta hate the interweb.
So this is a hategram to the fucks at AVG and anyone else that pulls this fucked up bullshit.
And so it begins (again)…
Here we go, another MLB playoff season! (click to embiginate)
October is here, bringing with it shorter days, autumn leaves and bulk candy sales.
And the Major League Baseball Playoffs leading up to the World Series!
Posts pertaining to programming!
