About Wyrd Smythe
The canonical fool on the hill watching the sunset and the rotation of the planet and thinking what he imagines are large thoughts.
Milla Jovovitch, I’m sorry, I loved you long time, and it’s not over (I’ll keep buying Resident Evil movies as long as you make them), but Michelle Rodriguez just stole your crown in my heart for most beautiful kickass woman in the world. I’m afraid you’re now number two.
Michelle Rogriguez! We’re talking baying-at-the-moon beautiful! We’re talking bullet in the eye beautiful! I’ve liked her since her appearance as Rain Ocampo in (coincidence alert) the first Resident Evil movie in 2002. This was only two years after her first film, Girlfight in 2000. Since that time, she’s proven to be a major star (and apparently quite a handful). She’s been in several of the Fast & Furious movies, and many know her from Lost (a series I avoided like the plague — I’m allergic to trendy)
What can I say, I like a woman with some attitude.
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9 Comments | tags: El Mariachi (film), Machete (film), Michelle Rodriguez, Milla Jovovich, Quentin Tarantino, Resident Evil (film), Robert Rodriguez | posted in Movies
Nearly all science fiction fans share a meme about the number 42. This meme comes from the Douglas Adams book, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, one of the great “modern classics” (an apparent oxymoron, but it is just shorthand for ‘a recent work that is so good that someday it will be counted among the classics’). The book is the first in the “increasingly misnamed” trilogy that shares its name.
The trilogy is “increasingly misnamed” in that it now has five books. The joke is that, in science fiction, trilogies are as common as aliens, spaceships and time travel. In fact, depending on the context, there are two trilogies that have easily earned the sobriquet, “The Trilogy.” (Issac Asimov‘s Foundation series in the context of pure SF; and, of course, J.R.R. Tolkien‘s Lord of the Rings books in the context of SF + fantasy.)
In any event, the number, 42, is the answer to the question.
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1 Comment | tags: 42, Douglas Adams, Hitchhikers Guide, Isaac Asimov, J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, reading, trilogy | posted in Basics, Books, Math, Sideband
Last time, I wrote about irony and the perverse universe. This time I want to write about something just as fundamental. It has the technical name, entropy, and there is a very technical definition that goes along with that name.
I’ll return to that later, but for now consider this simple truth: If you have a barrel of fine wine, and you add a teaspoon of sewage, now you have a barrel of sewage. On the other hand, if you have a barrel of sewage, and you add a teaspoon of wine, you do not have a barrel of wine.
You still have a barrel of sewage!
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31 Comments | tags: entropy, perfection, spaghetti sauce, stew, thermodynamics, wine | posted in Basics, Life, Physics
I’m on a numeric kick with regard to Sidebands. Don’t worry, it can’t last past 13, because 14 and the numbers that follow are fairly uninspiring. Maybe #21 will be special (or not); Sidebands become adults or something. I’ll have to think about that.
I’ve also noticed that Sidebands have taken on more life than I intended. The plan was for them to be short and frequent, but some of them are pretty meaty. That’s okay, meaty words are the point here. And I’m still searching for my “voice” as I write. Many years of more formal writing, much of it technical, seem to push me away from the personal writing I wanted for this blog.
Well, it’s a journey, isn’t it — a process.
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7 Comments | tags: code, Cogito ergo sum, data, engineering, programming, Star Trek | posted in Sideband
“These go to eleven.“
I know people who feel the funniest moment in all of film is the bit in This is Spinal Tap about the volume knobs that go to 11. It does seem clear that the bit has become a well-known cultural meme. Just about everyone (who’s anyone) knows exactly what you mean when you refer to turning it up to eleven.
For those of you just exiting the cave (Plato’s or otherwise), here’s the bit:
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9 Comments | tags: 11, 11:11, Monty Python, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Nigel Tufnel, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Spinal Tap | posted in Quotes, Sideband
The universe is perverse. I don’t mean that in the peeking into windows sense (although the universe is indeed peeking into all our windows every moment), but in the ironic sense. The universe is deeply, hugely, fundamentally ironic in ways that are incredibly perverse.
It is ironic in that the only constant is that nothing is constant.
It is ironic in that the only absolute truth is that nothing is absolutely true.
It is ironic in that its most basic everyday aspects are its greatest mysteries.
It is ironic in that the toast always lands buttered side down.
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15 Comments | tags: death, George Carlin, irony, Spider Robinson | posted in Basics, Philosophy
Sidebands are 10; a full hand; a (very small) odometer moment.
The accident of genetics and evolution that gives us ten fingers (and ten toes) causes us to count in tens and celebrate things that occur on tens boundaries.
Turning 30, 40 or 50 years of age is viewed as cause to bring out the black balloons and mocking birthday cards. Yet celebrating 30, 40, 50 or 60 years of marriage is cause to celebrate (especially these divorce-prone days).
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4 Comments | tags: decimal, Derek Jeter, odometer, tens | posted in Basics, Math, Sideband
In earlier Sidebands I have tried, as our English teachers used to say, to “compare and contrast” related pairs of concepts that are sometimes mistakenly conflated. The first pair, Truth and Facts, are similar enough to make distinctions between them debatable. Even the language can twist you up once you start talking about true facts and false facts. The next two pairs, Good vs Like and Ignorant vs Stupid, are well-defined and distinct.
In all three cases, there are similarities and differences (hence “compare and contrast”), but a key difference between those and the current topic, Analog vs Digital, is that none of them are really opposite pairs. There is no Yin and Yang aspect to them; one does not exclude the other. I’ve already mentioned true facts. Something can be both good and liked (or neither). Someone can be both ignorant and stupid (being neither is both good and likeable).
Not so with analog and digital! They are true Yin-Yang pairs; one excludes the other.
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4 Comments | tags: analog, digital, Dualism, quantum physics, Yin and Yang | posted in Basics, Sideband
Readers of this blog may have noticed by now that a lot of the links in what I write lead to Wikipedia.
I don’t work for Wikipedia, and I’m not even a contributor to its content. I am a big fan of that site (for several reasons), and I’d go so far as to say I think it’s the best site on the internet.
I mean, come on, how cool is it having a free online encyclopedia that doesn’t assault your senses with those increasingly annoying ads that infest just about every other site out there.
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Leave a comment | tags: Wikipedia | posted in Sideband
Last week a friend of mine experienced one of the worst things that can happen to a parent: outliving your very young child.
The past 16 months of her thread in life’s tapestry is particularly tragic and heart-breaking. It started a year ago March when her son, seven years old then, was diagnosed with a brain tumor and given 12 months to live. Then, last November, her husband died at age 35 in an unexpected asthma attack. At that time, she was pregnant with their third child, a girl born this past May.
Last week this part of the thread finally ended having taken both men from her young life and leaving her to raise her newborn and five-year-old daughter. If there is anything that leavens this heavy loaf, it is that she has the strong support of family and many friends. She is well-loved, which doesn’t balance the scales or make it easier to bear but provides some solace. Her journey also should serve to remind us all just how rich and blessed our lives are and how we must cherish and appreciate each day.
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7 Comments | tags: death, John D. MacDonald, Travis McGee | posted in Basics, Life
Logos con carne 
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