Mr T's rants and ravings

Thoughts Around the Democratic Convention

Mr. T — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 03:47:22 +0000

So I have watched some of the Democratic convention tonight. I heard a speech on energy that made a lot of sense though I think it was less than completely honest about McCain’s position. McCain would like to include nuclear power as well as more drilling. It was poorly delivered as well.

I heard some of Biden’s speech as well. The parts I heard were very well done. But I also watched a lot of commentary by Democrats on Twitter. That really ticked me off. Oh not because they loved it all or even because they disagree with me. No what bothers me is these seemingly intelligent people (most are in education) do not appear to have the least understanding of the people who disagree with them. They are too caught up in the emotion of the event to understand any of the politics either. Scary.

Now to be fair a lot of Republicans don’t understand Democrats either. But I expect more from educators. When I hear people say that pro-life people are anti-women I want to scream. That is one of the stupidest things in the world to say. It is a gross admission that one doesn’t even try to understand the objection to abortion. Anyone who says that is either too ~~stupid~~ closed-minded or too dishonest to be elected to public office. Oh it gets me so upset. Pro-choice is pro-women in the same way that pro-slavery is pro-African-American. At least it is to pro-life people. Actually if you look at how abortion is used in China and India you’d have to be blind not to see pro-choice as seriously anti-women. I admit that I do not understand why the Democratic party is not violently pro-life. I mean I understand why some people are pro-choice but if any party on earth should be pro-life it is the Democrats.

But I digress. One person on Twitter didn’t understand why Biden wasn’t hitting on the issue of the Supreme Court in his speech. The obvious answer is because Biden is not a complete idiot. For a lot of people the Supreme Court is a defining issue. It is the main reason I voted in the last two presidential elections and probably the only reason I will vote (if I vote) this time around. During the convention a lot of people who are undecided are listening. Why would Biden use that platform to say “we’ll make sure baby killing stays legal and take away all your guns?” The Supreme Court is an issue to take up with your supporters to get out the vote not a platform to win votes.

A week ago I was pretty sure Obama would win. Now I’m not so sure. I think Biden was really a bad choice. If people were starting to believe that Obama wasn’t too far to the left the choice of Biden will likely convince them otherwise. You have to run to the middle to win. Of course McCain could similarly blow his choice of a running mate so it is still too early by far to place bets. This one is going to the wire I think.

Bowling

Mr. T — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 18:26:07 +0000

So I went bowling last week. Ten pin not candlestick. First time I did real bowling for decades. It was a group social event and there were no real bowlers there. I was the second high score with is really scary as I bowled a 99.
I have an excuse though. Besides not bowling for years my left leg would not hold me up on a proper approach. It is still weak from some problems I had some years ago and on the first try I fell at the end of the lane. Not pretty. I wound up standing at the end of the lane, bracing my leg with one hand and trying to bowl. That I got any strikes or spares at all is amazing and as much luck as anything.
Oh but most of the group was really bad. I can imagine real bowlers cringing as balls bounced down the lanes rather than rolled. To say nothing of a good number of fouls besides my own.
Still it was fun and I realized that I missed bowling. But I’ll have to exercise my leg before I can try it for real again.

Would you like to …

Mr. T — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 18:09:24 +0000

So I have learned a few things about women over the years. One of them is about “would you like to …” You see women will ask a man “would you like to” and follow it with something no man in history has ever wanted to do of his own free will. Now when a man asks “would you like to” he is asking if doing the said thing will make the person more happy than not doing it. For example “would you like some food?” Or perhaps “would you like to go to the baseball game.” If one answers “no” that is fine. It was a real question.

A woman uses that sort of question the way a man asks “would you please do me a favor and …” In other words the ask is for something the askee wants the asker to do that they may or may not want to do.

I learned rather quickly that when a woman asks a question like this she really expects a “yes” answer regardless of the request. At first I thought that meant they wanted a man to lie. In other words, the wanted the man to say “yes I would like to do that” no matter how distasteful the task was. Well I was half right.

They do want the man to say “yes” but they don’t want it to be a lie. They want to man to actually want to do the thing. Really! Now that can be hard for a guy to understand. We don’t really want to lie but we do get asked to do things we really would rather not do. So to learn to live with myself I decided that a woman was really asking a different question. “Would you like to change the litter box?” translates to “Do you love me enough to change the litter box?” Now that question I can honestly answer (to my wife anyway) “Why yes I do!”

That way I don’t have to lie and my wife is happy because I change the litter box. It’s the difference between a literal question and an idiomatic interpretation. I pass this bit of wisdom off to you guys who are not yet married or who are recently married.

Sports Missing From High Schools

Mr. T — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 15:55:57 +0000

I have been watching some of the Olympics. Not much on TV though. The TV never shows the sports I am interested in. So I hvae been watching a lot of the shooting events at NBCOlympics.com. It’s been really cool because I have long wondered how those events were run at the Olympic level. Also it turns out that some of the women shooters are very attractive.

The US does surprisingly well at shooting. I know we have a lot of guns but we really don’t support the shooting sports that much here. (I should say that I was truly amazed at the Japanese shooters because I think they all have to leave the country to practice their sport.) There was a time when there were a lot of high school and college shooting teams. Today not so much.

Personally I think that is a shame. We have many violent sports - football, hockey, lacrosse, wrestling and on and on. In many of these sports we encourage athletes to "get angry" and to "go get" the other players. In football so many players get hurt that an ambulance is required to be at every high school football game. We could use some non-violent sports and it seems like shooting and archery fit that need nicely.

I’m not sure what the objection could be. Clearly violence is not a problem because a) the shooting sports are completely non-violent (if a gun even accidentally points at someone the holder is disqualified on the spot) b) there are lots of violent sports in high schools. Weapons are not an issue because clubs are an important part of many sports including baseball, lacrosse and golf. And safety is not an issue because football for example sees more high school athletes killed every year than have been killed in organized shooting sports at all levels in well over 100 years combined. Cost? Also not much of a problem. Guns last a very long time and shooting ranges exist and most private ones would be happy to support local teams for the good of the sport. Ammo is the big thing and even that is not as expensive as a lot of sporting equipment. What are football helmets these days? $300 a piece? With annual expensive safety checks.

Shooting teaches patience. It teaches calm – you are trying to shoot between breaths and heart beats for goodness sake. You cannot do that while angry. It teaches self-control. It’s just about everything you want to teach high school students.
The world is a crazy place sometimes.

New Meaning For Working Outside

Mr. T — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 18:34:29 +0000

So I have to finish writing up my business commitments for the new year. The first draft is due today. Yes I am taking a break. I’ve been working on it most of the day so far. After the last several very rainy days I felt like I needed some fresh air and some sun. So I moved out to my back yard. I am under a sort of awning I guess you could call it and sitting on a hammock. Occasionally I lay down but I’m pretty much working on the laptop except when I am going through printouts (I still need paper some times). It’s a relaxing environment.
There is a rill with babbling water running through it about 40 yards behind me. I hear birds singing and there is a squarel eating some food I left out for him about 30 yards away. He just chased a chipmonk away. Occasionally of course a car goes by and that is less calming but since the road is freshly paved it is not so jarring as it was.
Technology makes this possible of course. The wi-fi reaches hear easily. I have both my cell phone and a portable landline for my business number sitting on a chair beside me. I can easily send things to the printer inside as it is on the network. I have all the benefits of an office but a whole lot more. It would be very hard to have to work in a regular office on a regular basis again. I could do it if the job was right but honestly there would have to be more than just money involved.
Is this the way of the future? A year ago I would have said yes but the price of gas may change things. Oh sure one saves money going to work but if it become to expensive to live outside of cities because any other travel is too expensive people may not be in such a hurry to adopt the idea that they can live and work anywhere. City life causes its own troubles though. Without good mass transit travel in the city is no fun at all.
Well for the time being I can afford to live where I do. And I can work from anywhere. So life, for now, is good.

Scheme - not the language

Mr. T — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:14:31 +0000

For the longest time I have associated the word “scheme” with something bad people do. In the movies, TV and in many books the word “scheme” has been associated with some sort of evil plot. And in fact if you look up the word at Dictionary.com you will find one of the 11 meanings is “an underhand plot; intrigue.” But in the last couple of years I keep running into people for whom its meaning is basically another word for plan. In the UK the word scheme is used where I would use plan on a very regular basis. This has caused a bit of cognitive dissonance for me. Everytime I hear the word used it makes me think about the meaning of the work rather than about the scheme that is being discussed. I expect that will wear off some time but so far it hasn’t happened.

I wonder if this is also part of why I have so much trouble being open minded about Scheme the functional language while I find it easy to be open about F#? Although it may also have something to do with the people who introduced me to each of those langauages. But that is a discussion for another time.

Hello Kitty Hell

Mr. T — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:18:51 +0000

So I just found out that there is a blog that posts a lot of wierd stuff about Hello Kitty. Some of it is pretty wierd indeed - Hello Kitty pasties?? Anyway it is called Hello Kitty Hell and is by a man whose wife is seriously into Hello Kitty.

His wife didn’t believe that a lot of people read his blog so there is a bet on about number of comments. If he gets 1000 comments on this post by unique people he a) gets his wife to donate 200 Hello Kitty items to an orphanage and b) gets to avoid a Hello Kitty themed trip. So go leave a comment - its the only humane thing to do.

Travel Casual Goes Too Far

Mr. T — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:00:05 +0000

Once upon a time people dressed up to travel. This was actually true for years with air travel. I can remember getting all dressed up as if to some place special to get on an airplane. Today air travel is taken for granted. I think I’ve taken 5 trips this year for about 20,000 total miles. Ho hum. So the focus has moved to comfort in travel.

I don’t get dressed up. I frequently travel in jeans for example. But I do wear a nice shirt, usually a button down shirt and only occasionally a polo shirt. I don’t feel comfortable being in public looking too shabby. But apparently that is not a unanimous opinion. On this last trip a lot of people were in shorts (ok fine but gym shorts?) sandals (ok easier to take on and off at security but why not socks?) and sleeveless t-shirts. I really draw the line at sleeveless T-shirts. Seriously those do not belong outside a sports activity or maybe the beach.

I really think that some people take travel casual too far. I know someone who wears sweat pants and a t-shirt when he flies. Ok they are neat and clean but call me an old foggy if you must but gym clothing belongs at the gym. It’s not just the airport where it bugs me of course. I am tired of seeing people in all sorts of public places in gym shorts, sweats and other recreational clothing. Stopping on ones way to or from an athletic event I can see it. But you’d better look like you were participating in sports.

Yeah this is a rant and probably (actually definitely) a lot of people disagree with me but I really needed to vent.

Deep Zoom Obama

Mr. T — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:58:35 +0000

Even if you are not an Obama fan this is cool.

I Was Right

Mr. T — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:11:07 +0000

Well the Supreme Court released the Heller Decision today. The short version is that the Second Amendment is about an individual right to keep and carry weapons that is not tied to the militia. Use for self-defense as well as hunting are permitted and expected uses. The DC Gun law has been struck down.

Now I could ask for a little more (striking down the machine gun restrictions) but none of that was part of this case. I don’t think that anyone who believes in reasonable gun laws will be upset either. People who believe in unreasonable restrictions will of course be disappointed. There are a lot of loose ends though. What is reasonable in licencing? What are reasonable places and circumstances to not permit guns? Oh yeah the courts are going to be busy with this one for a while.

The interesting thing is that if someone does decide to overturn some gun restrictions, like the one on machine guns, they will use the dissenting argument more than the majority one. That will be fun to watch.