The bright side of a Moon
Asteroid impact update:
The asteroid named 2004 MN4 is being tracked by NASA. Since my last post on the topic, the odds of impact have decreased from 1/300 to approximately 1/56000.
*phew!*
I can now delete the reminder from my calendar.
I saw “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou” last night. It’s my new favorite Bill Murray/Owen Wilson/Wes Anderson movie. The entire movie maintains a very skewed view of the world, just slightly out of step with the world we live in. The only inauthentic scene, I think, is a minor one, seen in the previews, where Bill Murray is dancing to the electronic music being piped over his SCUBA helmet. I thought the computer-animated sea-life would be jarring or out of place but in context of the movie they were perfect.
Owen Wilson’s Kentucky accent comes and goes, but I think (I’m hoping) that it was deliberate.
I think the David Bowie songs, sung acoustically in Portuguese, were an especially apt touch.
I added permanent links to my posts. I had to kludge around in Blogger to get it all to work properly (mostly to get my sidebars to show up), but it’s working for now. I can figure out how to make it pretty tomorrow.
It also increases the total size of my blog by a lot; and increases the time it takes to publish it once I make a post. But it will be worth it.
On this day one of the greatest philosophers of our time was born. A man of genius and intelligence, whose ideas shaped the world.
Celebrate with me the birth of Sir Isaac Newton, 362 years ago (more or less; his birthday is on 25 December by the Julian calendar in use at the time; in our calendar his birthday would fall on 4 January).
Even his strict adherence to a literal interpretation of the Bible can’t cloud his status as one of history’s greatest scientists. Newton invented calculus, codified the laws of optics and light, and stated his three laws of motion that remained the final word until the revolution of quantum mechanics in the 20th Century.
Note to self:
Make sure and finish everything important before 1 January 2029.
Hmm… I’d better set a reminder on my calendar…
…check.*
*(Yes, my calendar now has a reminder set nearly 25 years in the future.)
The family of a soldier killed in Iraq is fighting Yahoo! over access to the soldier’s email account.
Yahoo! claims that email accounts are not transferable, even after death.
Luckily I don’t put anything important into my Yahoo! email account. My important email is either on Caleb’s server, or archived on my own computers, or backed up somewhere remotely. I’ve got email saved that goes back to 1998…
In the event of my death, I’d want my survivors to see it. I mean, how else are my biographers going to piece together my life? A lot of important conversations in my life have happened in email. (quiet, you… email is part of my life!)
I guess if I ever get around to creating a will, I’ll have to include what to do with my email and other data…
See what happens as I approach 40? Sheesh. At least I’m not worried that no one will want to read it all. I’m sure that there will be a huge demand for it. Really.
There’s a cool-but-geeky (but cool) post over at the Pacfic Tech site, telling the story of how Graphing Calculator came to be written and included on the first Power PC-based Macintosh computers.
Basically, it was done by two guys sneaking into the building. Ron Avitzur wrote it up. He’s my new favorite hero.
My favorite parts:
At 1:00 a.m., we trekked to an office that had a PowerPC prototype. We looked at each other, took a deep breath, and launched the application. The monitor burst into flames. We calmly carried it outside to avoid setting off smoke detectors, plugged in another monitor, and tried again. The software hadn’t caused the fire; the monitor had just chosen that moment to malfunction.
NOTE: I’ll bet it probably was an AppleVision 1710 monitor. Apple was always replacing those. Although the timeframe is a little off…
I asked my friend Greg Robbins to help me. His contract in another division at Apple had just ended, so he told his manager that he would start reporting to me. She didn’t ask who I was and let him keep his office and badge. In turn, I told people that I was reporting to him. Since that left no managers in the loop, we had no meetings and could be extremely productive. We worked twelve hours a day, seven days a week.
Oh, man. My dream job. Imagine a world without managers… it’s easy, if you try…
Most engineers at Apple had been through many canceled projects and completely understood my motivation.
I think this is true at many companies, especially post dot.bomb.
My skunkworks project was beginning to look real with help from these professionals as well as others in graphic design, documentation, programming, mathematics, and user interface. The secret to programming is not intelligence, though of course that helps. It is not hard work or experience, though they help, too. The secret to programming is having smart friends.
Interesting… as well as a compliment and support for open source development.
Once we had a plausible way to ship, Apple became the ideal work environment. Every engineer we knew was willing to help us. We got resources that would never have been available to us had we been on the payroll. For example, at that time only about two hundred PowerPC chips existed in the world. Most of those at Apple were being used by the hardware design engineers. Only a few dozen coveted PowerPC machines were even available in System Software for people working on the operating system. We had two. Engineers would come to our offices at midnight and practically slip machines under the door. One said, ‘Officially, this machine doesn’t exist, you didn’t get it from me, and I don’t know you. Make sure it doesn’t leave the building.’
Waitwaitwait… the folks developing the SYSTEM SOFTWARE only had a “few dozen” PowerPC machines to work with? NO WONDER the first PowerPC units shipped ran System 7.x so FRIGGIN’ SLOOOOOOW.
And the reason they did it all:
I view the events as an experiment in subverting power structures. I had none of the traditional power over others that is inherent to the structure of corporations and bureaucracies. I had neither budget nor headcount. I answered to no one, and no one had to do anything I asked. Dozens of people collaborated spontaneously, motivated by loyalty, friendship, or the love of craftsmanship. We were hackers, creating something for the sheer joy of making it work.”
Truly awesome.
New music is so cool.
Got to work this morning, turned on the computer, opened up iTunes, and KEXP was playing “Interstate 5” by The Wedding Present, this week’s new favorite song. I’ve heard it every day this week.
As great as it is having an iPod with nothing but my favorite songs on it, there’s still something magical about turning on the radio and hearing a good song. I guess it’s the difference between being in control and being surprised.
Surprises are good.
Just one week left for me as a “Thirty-something”.
The following essay was written to illustrate a metaphor. However, after I wrote it I realized that the metaphor is, well… flawed. It’s still worth sharing, however.
I’ll add this to my “revise later” file.
*****
Is there no choice so wrenching as deciding whether or not to pick up a stray?
Poor little animal. For me, a cat person, stray cats are always the hardest to ignore. They’re often so affectionate, and seeing their dirty coats of fur and often skin-and-bones bodies, and hearing their cries and yowlps… so difficult.
I always try to scare it off. I yell. I make wild arm movements. I jump towards it, run at it. I throw things near — but I’m not an accurate thrower so I rarely continue lobbing things. I don’t want to hurt the poor thing. I don’t want to increase their doubt about us two-legs.
Isn’t that pathetic? I assume that a stray cat has seen humans at their worst; that they’ve been beaten and thrown out into the cold and had to forage for food, that sadistic children have had their fun by heaping torment on the little animals, and that, in spite of all that the animal still seeks assistance from our duplicitous and cruel species.
I consider that the creature’s instincts are generally good, since it’s true that I don’t seek to harm it further, and that I would take it in if I could. Yeah, it’s an ego-stroke to think that a cat can judge my inner qualities. OK, that all is probably just in my head.
Yeah, it’s probably just seeking food or warmth or might even just be bored, saw me walking by and, having vaguely associated my upright form with the basic necessities, started meowing and following me.
Thing is, I’ll never know. Can’t judge motivations well in humans, even with the benefit of sharing a biology and communication, let alone something as alien as a cat. Is it opportunistic? or seeking a higher form of compassion?
At any rate, frightening it off never works. It only draws attention, gets me involved with the thing, rewards its attention with more attention. It will only continue to follow me, since I have now become the most exciting thing it has found.
So, the choice. Can I take it in? And often, the choice is, no. It’s not the right time. I can’t have pets. I don’t want the responsibility. I think of how one-sided it would be — I offer warmth and love and food and care, cleaning up after it, and it gives me… what? What is the return? Intangibles like the comfort of knowing that I helped a fellow creature on this planet. The knowledge that my actions increased, by a tiny fraction, the amount of caring in the world.
And… selfish, I know… but… is that enough?
I mean, it’s a stray. A wild animal. It really isn’t compassionate in the way that humans are. I was only projecting my need for love onto it, giving it credit for higher emotions that it, honestly, probably doesn’t have. It just just as likely to turn on me, scar me and bite me and shit on my floor, as it is to become a gentle loving companion. And it’s likely not to matter how much effort I put into it; the end result is likely to be random.
That’s when I ignore it. I walk away. I stop shouting at it, stop looking at it, even. I continue on my way. I can still hear it behind me, crying. It may even catch up to me and rub up against my legs. I keep walking, going over my justifications in my head.
It’s a cruel choice. I can convince myself that it’s the correct choice. The time isn’t right to take this animal in. I’m not a rescuer.
Just walk away.