Saturday, September 18, 2010

Some random thoughts in the past week or so

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(1) Stereotypes reduce the spectral richness of the world from continuous Lorentzians to discrete Dirac deltas.

(2) Every snippet I read in Ann Lauterbach's The Night Sky projects a multidimensional array of imagery and ramifications. Meanings morph with space and time. At a particular moment, she could not have quoted Richard Feynman better...

(3) Doctors of Philosophy nowadays usually don't get very philosophical in the traditional sense. But the name stuck somehow.

(4) I don't think having many separate online identities represents a disjoint self. In fact, quite the opposite...

(5) My new rig will be composed of an all-star cast with a first-time director/ system integrator.

(6) I like dragonflies. I associate them with a freedom of a sort of carefree youth. Seeing them hovering above the RNB lawn makes me happy.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Les updates...

- - -

(10:13:12 PM) Friend: How's life?
(10:13:38 PM) Me: For the last 3 days... (insert google spreadsheet link)
(10:13:47 PM) Me: parts list for my new desktop
(10:15:21 PM) Friend: Having fun with that?
(10:17:38 PM) Me: yes
(10:17:41 PM) Me: a little too much
(10:17:49 PM) Me: I think I need to make sure my parts are compatible.
(10:18:01 PM) Me: although I think they should be... unless I missed something
(10:18:39 PM) Friend: You sure have done your research
(10:20:14 PM) Me: Yes
(10:20:28 PM) Me: Now I have headache from reading too many webpages, sigh
(10:20:55 PM) Friend: You could take a break.
(10:21:21 PM) Me: Yes, but I forgot
(10:21:22 PM) Me: oops
(10:21:30 PM) Me: was too possessed.
(10:21:53 PM) Friend: Girls do like shopping.
(10:22:04 PM) Friend: Not always for desktop parts.
(10:22:29 PM) Me: That's right
(10:22:39 PM) Me: I'm not like most girls, but I also like shopping.
(10:22:48 PM) Me: for media.
(10:22:53 PM) Me: and gadgets.
(10:23:13 PM) Friend: I didn't know you're a gadget person.
(10:23:27 PM) Friend: I bought a bluetooth dongle for $2 today.
(10:23:50 PM) Friend: I couldn't figure out how to get pictures from my phone to my computer using it.
(10:24:15 PM) Friend: It was a sad moment
(10:25:05 PM) Me: oh nooo!
(10:25:32 PM) Me: it's doable though right?
(10:25:37 PM) Me: any manual?
(10:26:11 PM) Friend: Well I finally realized that my phone is crippled by verizon to make it hard.
(10:26:18 PM) Me: ohh
(10:26:22 PM) Me: rawr.
(10:27:51 PM) Me: yeah, when one thinks about it, it's a miracle that RF devices work at all.
(10:28:24 PM) Me: To quote one of the Intel fellows in the panel today... the director of the RF stuff
(10:28:42 PM) Me: http://www.intel.com/idf/
(10:29:15 PM) Me: Intel is certainly good at making taglines for the giant banners I saw.
(10:29:53 PM) Friend: I see.
(10:31:29 PM) Friend: I only recently learned that bluetooth is named after a guy named bluetooth.
(10:32:04 PM) Me: I didn't know that hahah
(10:32:17 PM) Me: Imagine if he had a different name
(10:32:25 PM) Me: Like Greenbutt
(10:32:55 PM) Friend: Yeah, harold bluetooth
(10:33:12 PM) Friend: I haven't heard of any vikings named greenbutt.
(10:33:56 PM) Friend: The best name I've heard of so far is erik bloodaxe.
(10:34:11 PM) Me: ohohoh
(10:34:13 PM) Me: That's killer.
(10:35:03 PM) Me: People were joking about Wolf Blitzer being too tame for his name, but I don't know enough about him to have an opinion on that :P
(10:36:21 PM) Friend: Maybe I will rename my cat erik the bloodaxe
(10:36:44 PM) Friend: He did slay a giant roach today.
(10:37:23 PM) Me: niiiice
(10:37:30 PM) Me: how big was the roach?
(10:37:57 PM) Me: (I guess it was in the kitchen)
(10:39:20 PM) Friend: It was trying to hide under the sofa I was napping on, and it was the size of a large human thumb.
(10:40:15 PM) Me: That's pretty scary.
(10:40:28 PM) Me: Then again, many scary things in the tropics.
(10:40:47 PM) Friend: Yeah.
(10:41:04 PM) Friend: The cat keeps the bugs away at least.
(10:41:21 PM) Friend: crickets, wasps, roaches
(10:41:34 PM) Friend: He's been catching a lot of them lately.
(10:42:15 PM) Me: yayyy
(10:42:20 PM) Me: Kitty power!
(10:42:56 PM) Friend: At least he's good for something.
(10:43:46 PM) Me: awwwwww
(11:05:51 PM) Me: I need to consult gadget geeks about my parts list
(11:06:18 PM) Friend: Do you think it's not a good list?
(11:07:13 PM) Me: I need to make sure parts are compatible
(11:07:18 PM) Me: then I should be set to oder
(11:07:20 PM) Me: order
(11:07:50 PM) Me: and the building/verifying is another mountain
(11:08:35 PM) Friend: What would you need to verify.
(11:09:44 PM) Me: That the connections go with one another.
(11:09:54 PM) Me: plugs and sockets and pins are the right types.
(11:10:00 PM) Me: etc.
(11:12:39 PM) Friend: I doubt it'll be a problem.
(11:13:49 PM) Me: I hope not
(11:13:57 PM) Me: I think the more likely problem is parts DOA
(11:14:17 PM) Me: Like each part has a 5% chance of that
(11:14:26 PM) Me: so 8 parts means... hahahha
(11:14:40 PM) Me: 0.95^8 =
(11:15:31 PM) Friend: It looked like you were buying good brands.
(11:15:36 PM) Friend: I think you'll be ok.
(11:16:55 PM) Me: haha I hope
(11:18:09 PM) Friend: I didn't have any problems when I built this desktop, but I guess that was 7 years ago.
(11:18:24 PM) Me: hahahhaha
(11:18:37 PM) Friend: The only parts that died so far was the psu, which I've replaced twice already.
(11:18:38 PM) Me: I had a desktop in 2000? 2001
(11:18:44 PM) Me: and it lasted until a few months ago
(11:18:51 PM) Me: when a cap exploded inside
(11:18:51 PM) Friend: Also the caps on the video card exploded.
(11:18:57 PM) Me: yess.s
(11:19:03 PM) Friend: Oh.
(11:19:10 PM) Friend: Well for me only the video card died.
(11:19:16 PM) Me: wow
(11:19:20 PM) Me: and HD were okay?
(11:19:23 PM) Me: nice.
(11:19:26 PM) Friend: I just switched to an older pci one lying around.
(11:20:09 PM) Friend: I heard bad caps are a common problem.
(11:23:15 PM) Me: yup
(11:32:34 PM) Friend: Finally learned how to take pics off phone.
(11:32:54 PM) Friend: So annoying.
(11:33:04 PM) Me: sigh!
(11:42:51 PM) Me: rawr sleep time soon
(11:43:28 PM) Friend: later
(11:44:17 PM) Me: later
(11:44:30 PM) Me: gnight