`Is it maths time?' = True

I wonder if I can post Latex equations?



Looks like I can. Sweeet!

Well, that's it. Now I'm ramping this blog up to `maths' status. It's numbers time here at Empty Nest. I'm bringing on the science. (As you can probably tell, I'm missing my thesis.)

special X-mas post

At your family meal together this christmas, mentally go through this list and match up with various family members and friends. If you play this game with a partner, to forget to scream out `BINGO!' when you finish.

Not about washing machines.

For those who like sounds, this is fun. And for those who like design, or wine, this is pretty (though, it's true, Alex, that it won't help a hangover).

And for those who like to have a little fun on the web, chew through your download and 15 minutes of your life with this little beauty from an advertising company.

Washing machines and bliss

This is a blog which has been a long time coming.

It's time we talk about washing machines.

We all know what they are. Most competent adults are comfortable with using them (or at least they should be). And they are part of a weekly process we all go through, without much thought, and probably with more than a little resigned resentment.

However, I believe they are magic. Not magic in a literal sense. But they are wonderful pieces of modern technology, that can seemingly perform miracles on a daily basis. And subtly, we have learnt to take them, and their miracles, for granted. You see, they can take everyday normal objects i.e. items of clothing, and transform them from grotty, disgusting articles of wear into something you can literally pick up and inhale the scent of freshness on.

Imagine a night out on the town. Traipsing through the mud, oil on your jeans from riding your bike. You dine and smoke and drink, spilling all sorts of rubbish on your 501s, then spend the evening in the bar, dragging your apparel over the urine-covered floors. You crap your pants, vomit on your jeans, then head home to peal them off in the laundry to clean tomorrow.

And tomorrow is when the magic occurs. You chuck these filthy, reeking jeans in the washing machine, along with a whole bunch of other less-filthy cloth, add some powder, and then press the button. And 45 minutes later, they're clean. Just water and powder. No x-rays, no high temperature process, no steam cleaning. The things are just clean. It's like you dipped them in bowl of cold water, sprinkled with a little fairy dust a.k.a washing powder, and pulled them out without a single bacterial piece in sight.

And after you hang them up, or chuck them in the dryer, they're fresh and clean. Like they were never drawn through that awful process of the night before. As I said before, you can stick your nose in them and smell the freshness.

It's madness. How is this filthy piece of clothing transformed into something you can dip in to your coffee and suck on? We don't really question this process, it just happens, but to me this process is modern magic.

And that's why I love washing machines.

Post-election excitement

I was looking through some old blogs, and found some interesting posts. Like a conservative backing Obama. Also, it shits me when people jump on the Obama bandwagon too late.

But this beautiful site seems to explain quite well how a 6% difference in popular vote can be considered an overwhelming landslide. Awesome.

Erdos patience

I don't deal too well with a situation where it seems to me that someone should know something that they don't. Like a physicist not knowing what a Hilbert space is, or a scientist unaware of an Erdos number. So strange.

I worked out today that I have an Erdos number of at most 8. This is a little tenuous, but goes as follows:

Erdos (0) -> Ernst Gabour Straus (1) -> Albert Einstein (2) -> John Archibald Wheeler (3) -> Kip Thorne (4) -> Carlton Morris Caves (5) -> Gerard Milburn (6) -> Cassius D'Helon (7) -> Stuart Wilson (8)

I need to check the Wheeler/Thorne connection, though it's gotta be strong. Perhaps there is a more direct route.

Workin'.

I spend alot of my spare time writing. Though the process of writing often involves reading.

In some of my spare time this last week I've been reading David Foster Wallace's Everything and More, a story about infinity and it's history.
Tis a darn good read, `specially given my vaguely mathematical background. I find the idea of infinity interesting, and it turns out to be an important, almost crucial, to the analysis I often find myself doing. Historical perspective and contextual understanding really helps. Hence, I'm taking lots of notes, and am hoping to write up a review at some stage.

I'd like to add that the Prime Ministry Obama having a sense of humour only adds to his appeal. Though he is probably an Arab.

Not much to say really...

Who would have thought so much time could pass and so little could happen? Well, I jest, but in all honestly very little has changed in a while.

• I got a job pulling coffees in a cafe in Kingston, and I'm enjoying it way too much. I wonder when I get to officially call myself a barista?
• I missed my good friend's birthday. When I get a chance, I'll send a package. And write a letter to another old, dear friend. And another for the first one.
• Dan's gone overseas, on a trip with his father to Spain. I'm envious, but then again I get to go sailing with my father and tell lewd jokes over a few VBs. I'll send his partner-left-behind a postcard.
• I lost a flatmate to Mongolia, so we need to start a new search. I'm wondering who the next one will be?

So, who would have thought Matt Damon could inspire a Disney movie? Some people may say she was asking for it.

And I'm fascinated by the idea of a Republican government bailing out a flailing, failing capitalist economic system. Should an old broken system be propped up and supported, or should it be allowed to dissolve, even though many innocents (?) will suffer, so that a new system can be started? It will probably be a compromise of a bailout with caveats, but how does one negotiate appropriate pay for the entire company structure, when at some level the company (responsibility of CEOs) has failed?

Ach, I gotta work tomorrow and it's a long ride to the coffee-parlour.

Erupting into movement.

Holy crap.

Sometimes...

• Sometimes giving up the comfy chair means your back is straighter.
• `I can be assertive, if you'd like me too....'
• `Equality is not in regarding different things similarly, equality is in regarding different things differently.' - Still Life with Woodpecker
• Here are is one of a list of really, really good ideas for job applications. Good for a laugh out loud, good for the soul. Ties in with the accusation recently that I'm `what's gotta change with the Engineering department's culture', regarding positive discrimination. Whatta riot.
  
• A description of 60 seconds in the life of commuters was that `I laughed so hard coffee came out of my nose'. Keep some tissues handy.
• Jefferson Airplane is my new love. Well, one of.
  

These days.

Sometimes I wonder whether ironic events are a sign of God, but often enough they're provided by a lexicographer with a wicked sense of humour. For example, note the Oxford English Dictionary's`word of the day', on a day when Hillary didn't quite make it across the line. (Click on the picture below if it's hard to see..)


For all of our librarian friends out there, an in-joke for you:
" I Y 020.5 ".

And while you're at it, give Roy a quick lookie.

"Now with GPS!"

Some random ideas to boost the mind

So I'm the 3rd person on tonight, and so to prepare me mentally for my presentation this evening I've found some interesting things to read and watch.

Firstly, someone get this Nobel-dude an O.J. Second, in 1957 spaghetti DID grow on trees. And finally, if you're going to drive in N.Y.C, this may not be the best car for it.

So.

I wish I had more time to say the things I really want to say.

Favourite quotes

• "If this were a shampoo offered with your first shower after sleeping rough for two months in Nouakchott, you’d opt to keep the lice." - Luca Turin on the fragrance `Creed’s Love in White'.
• "In a few days, you'll be `right to reign'.'' - Stuart Wilson on sickness
  

Things of interest I've noticed this week:

1. Salman Rushdie broke up with Padma Lakshmi.
2. Kubrick was as bad as Hitchcock.
3. The pope is not down with Muslims, Jews, academic freedom or ``The Vagina Monologues.”
4. I'm actually surprised at the above three statements.
   

He kinds looks like Robert De Niro

"Who's your Daddy, eh?"

I like a man with pizazz.

Church-hopping

Well, I've been church hopping these last few weeks. Checking out the various pieces of majestic, religious construction that exist around Canberra. Sometimes I pop in to see what's going on. I enjoy it, it's like a form of meditation. Simultaneously I often find it amusing to listen to the sermons. I always chuck in a few bucks for the entertainment.

Today I visited the celebrated St. Johns cathedral in Reid, on the corner of Anzac Parade and Constitution Avenue.

It's one of the oldest churches in Canberra, with the first stone laid in 1841 (this is old for Australia), which is crazy considering Canberra was kick-started around 1908. Above is a picture of it covered in snow in 1926.

It's a beautiful old building with gorgeous trees smothering the pathways around the grounds. There's also a fascinating graveyard on the grounds, if you're one who likes to read headstones.

So, this evening when I got back from the pool, I put on my sneakers and scarf, grabbed my MP3 player and paced over to the church. It must be said at this point that Reid is a most wonderful suburb to walk around in Canberra, especially during autumn.

Striding up to the church I see a rector (priest? minister? pastor? bishop? father? meh?) standing outside, pacing around and looking as nervous as I felt. So I walked up and said `Have I missed the show?' and he says `No, starts at 6. I'm Paul.' I walked in, accepted the instruction manuals, and sat down up the back. And I see about 5 people sitting in pews up the front. It's tall, relatively long, but so skinny, only about 15 people could sit across it. Below is a picture of it from 1939.


An old man encouraged me to sit up the front to `feel more cosy' so I sidled up and found a pew of my own. They had cute little embroidered pillows for when you're feeling naughty and need to kneel. The stained windows were about average.

The main man Paul gets up front and walks us through the last vestiges of the Easter shenanigans. He read out Psalm 23, which made me want to stand up and say `yeah, mutherfuckers!' and pull a gun. Then he reads from some sheets of paper, a passage that I can imagine was downloaded from the Anglican-Priest-Quickie-Sermon website. It explained the shepherding imagery in the modern context. I felt acutely uncomfortable when they started talking about ".... I say to you, he who does not enter by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber." I thought they were talking about me. Metaphorically, of course.

Next when he asks us to stand and sing a hymn, I noticed a distinct lack of enthusiasm from the crowd. Perhaps next time I'm going to jump and yell `Hell yeah! Let's do it!'

So I practice some singing for my next (first) rock gig. I notice a cute girl in the row behind me, and I get to shake her hand and say `Piece, bewitch you'. The old man also said that to me. Creepy. I get some aerobic exercise from the standing and sitting. I notice that a plaque on the wall about a couple that lived till their 90s; she was a year older than him. Gnarly. I notice they're serving wine in this establishment, and I'm coming back next week.

At the end of it, I follow the cute girl out. Turns out she's a backpacker looking for work. I'm going back next week. Paul tells me that Kevin Rudd is a regular. I'm DEFINITELY coming back next week. Paul also tells me he's born in Rockhampton, raised in Melbourne, and took his 15 year old nephew ballooning last weekend. I laugh, leave, stroll back home, wading through the leaves on the pavement, smoking a cigarette.

Lies

She wasn't even real.

A quick update

I'm working on this thesis thing. It's kinda tricky. But here is a quick video of David Lynch reviewing the iPhone. Enjoy.