Up at 4:20 AM after getting to sleep after 10 PM. When I woke up, I was in no mood to go to the gym, but I ate breakfast, got ready, and headed into the office. By the time I got to the office, my mood was better and I went to the gym.

25 minutes of cardio today, abbreviated mainly because I became famished while on the elliptical. Even though I ate breakfast, I was still hungry and the feeling was growing more intense with each step. So I made it to 25 minutes and called it quits. When I got back to the office, I had my "second" breakfast (toasted peanut butter and banana sandwich). I feel much better.

You'd think the big news this morning would have been that Obama won North Carolina and nearly split Indiana, all of which was good news for Obama (it would have been better if he had decisively won both, of course). But no. The top story this morning (while I was at the gym) was the fact that northern Virgina area experienced a whopping 1.5 magnitude earthquake.

You didn't read that wrong: 1.5.

For those of us who lived in Southern California, a 1.5 magnitude earthquake making top story in the news would be the equivalent of a 1.5 cm snow storm making top-story of the news in Boston in the middle of winter. Of course, this isn't Socal, but still, a 1.5 earthquake is what happens when a truck passed by on the street.

I may be biased here. I lived through numerous quakes, including the deadly Northridge quake in 1994--in fact, my family lived in Northridge at the time, and had to relocate for a few months while damage to our house was repaired. It got to the point, eventually, where I didn't even get out of bed for anything less than a 5.0 magnitude earthquake, mostly because I am a heavy sleeper and I simply slept through them.

I'm donating blood this morning. The Red Cross is here at my office taking donations and I signed up a while back. I have a 9:30 appointment. This will be my second time donating. The first time, my blood type was identified as O positive and since then, I get at least 1 call a week from the Red Cross, asking me to donate blood. This, despite the fact that you can only donate once every 45 days or so. If ever the term "vampire" applied...

This has probably been going on for quite some time, right under my nose, but my attention was drawn to it by this Yahoo!Tech article I saw this morning. Apparently, cheating at video games has been steadily on the rise and has become enough of a problem that cheaters are being punished.

Set aside the fact that I find it incredible that a person would feel the need to cheat at a video game. What impresses me most about this is that it seems that the video game industry is stepping into to actually do something about this, which is more than can be said for, oh, I don't know, major league baseball, to pick one random example. (I know, I know, baseball did do something about it but it seems too little, too late.)

I don't know why I find it amusing that someone would cheat at a video game. It somehow seems to me to be a particularly sinister form of cheating although I cannot say why this is. I guess it's because I tend to associate a kind of laziness with video games (they are played while sitting on a couch), and that cheating is the lazy-person's attempt at winning, and the combination of a lazy game and cheating at a lazy game seems to me to have a Milton-esque irony to it. But then again, I've never been able to understand cheating at any game. What's the point really? The cheater knows that they didn't win by any legitimate means. Any bragging rights associated with the cheat are built on a self-delusional house of cards.

I think it says something about society that we have to spend so much time and effort dealing with cheating in various forms. And what it says can't be very good.

Duh! See the New York Times article. Via SF Signal.

I'm a pretty mellow, easy-going guy. It takes a lot to get me really agitated and even more to get me down right pissed off. One thing that almost always does the trick are stories of censorship.

Apparently, a school board in West Virginia is trying to ban Pat Conroy's books so that high school students can't read them. (For those of you who don't know, Pat Conroy wrote Prince of Tides, among other books.)

Fair warning: the rest of this entry is pure anger talking.

At first, I was mildly surprised by the article. I hadn't been aware that West Virginians over the age of 18 could read. I don't mean to single out West Virginians here; if this vile act had taken place in, say, California or New York, I would have been equally surprised at West Virginians' literacy. Yes, I am denigrating the intelligence of those who would ban books. But only because banning books is one of the most stupid, backward, and ignorant things a person can do. I'm just reading the landscape people.

Pat Conroy called people who would ban his books "idiots", which is succinct, but greatly understated. There are few words that come to mind right now to describe these morons, but then again, I only have the English language at my disposal. When the school board backed down from outright banning the book, they suggested labeling the book with a warning. I do have a word that describes that brave move: meretricious.

What's the big deal? I suppose the argument can be made that a school is requiring students to read a book. The students have no choice if they want to get a passing grade. Parents who object to the subject matter (and it is always the people who would never read the book in the first place that seem to object to it) then argue that they can't teach their own values if they can't keep their children away from such filth.

Bullshit!

It seems to me that one of the best way to highlight one's values is by comparing them to what else is out there. Parents who teach high moral standards to their children need only reinforce those standards by letting the children read about people who don't meet such high standards. If you ask me, some of the characters in Pat Conroy's books go through quite a bit of hell. It's enough to turn rotten kid sweet. And they can gain this knowledge without actually having to stoop to the low moral level these books seems to parade.

But that's just reason talking.

Banning a book (or a TV show or a song) is about the worst thing a parent, school board or government can do. First of all, it reinforces ignorance. Second, it teaches cowardice. Third, it instantly makes the banned object desirable. Students will begin to lust for it, wondering what could possibly be so bad that their school won't allow them to read it. (It doesn't hurt book sales either, I suppose.)

People speak in great tones about our freedoms and how we must defend them at all costs. Our freedom to read, to learn, to grow, is among the most precious of all and we must defend that freedom at all costs. Banning books is a cowardly, shameful act. In case that wasn't clear to the members of the Kanawha County Board of Education: Yes, I'm calling you a bunch of cowards. And you should be ashamed of yourselves. You are cowards because you took what you felt was the easy and "expedient" way out, rather than defend the most precious of freedoms that we can pass down to our children, that of free-thought. What level of Hell is reserved for cowards? I can't remember. I suspect that in cases where banning a book is successful, the cowardice and ignorance is ultimately passed down to the students. They learn that such behavior is acceptable. Perhaps without intending it, these school boards and parents hurt their children far more than the banned books ever would have hurt them.

If I were a senior at George Washington High School where some of this book banning is taking place, I'd remember this day. And from now into the future, when asked about what I learned in school, I'd say as loudly and widely as I could that my precious high school taught me that it was okay to be a coward, that it was acceptable to hide behind a veil of ignorance, and that it was never worth it to fight the good fight.

And I'd throw it in their faces as often as I could manage.

Yes, I am referring to our nation. Anyone who says that our freedoms are not shrinking daily is either deranged or so completely out of touch with reality that they might as well be deranged. It's always the little things that bug me the most because they are insipid. When seemingly harmless activities are banned, you know big trouble is just around the corner.

Take for example, the ban on hugging at an Illinois middle school.

Yes, you read that right. A ban on hugging.

Why? Two reasons are given: (1) hug lines were forming outside hallways and students were late to class; (2) hugging students are sometimes too close to one another and it can be deemed inappropriate.

So it seems that we really are a nation of cowards, when something as innocuous as 6th graders hugging scares us so badly that we ban it. Consider what's been banned from schools since I was in middle school: many schools have uniforms because teachers and parents are afraid of students whose clothing stands outs. Schools have banned baseball caps because they are afraid of gang affiliations. Schools have banned cell phone use because, like China and Myanmar, they are afraid of what might happen to students if they are influenced by the outside world. Some schools still ban books because they are afraid of what students might read. I say this without any hyperbole: schools will soon be banning thought.

There is a solution to all of this and that is to teach. Teach students about appropriate behavior and where to draw the line. Teach students about respect for others. Teach students why some books are deemed more risque than others. Teach students about sex and take the mystery away. Teach students about drugs and why they are bad. Teach, teach, teach. There is a reason why teaching is one of the noblest professions. Teachers who teach are brave.

But we live in a nation of cowards. Cowardly principals, cowardly school boards, cowardly parents, and yes, cowardly students.

And it damn near breaks my heart.

I've grown to hate network TV news broadcasts and hate news reported in newspapers almost equally as much. It all focuses on depressing topics. We could do better.

But today, finally, some good news!

Today, August 6, marks the 62nd anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. I have read 3 books on the history of the atomic bomb, those involved in building it, and those involved in trying to prevent its proliferation thereafter. It gives me a bit of hope that in the 62 years since Hiroshima and Nagasaki, governments have been smart enough not to use them in anger again. And while no one can say for sure that they won't be used again (whether by sovereign nation or terrorist group), restraint seems much the way it would be in a 12-step program. You take it one day at a time, steadily building a history and before you know it, you've got 62 years sober.

As my Grandpa would say, Oh boy!

During a quick lunch break this afternoon, I browsed the web, as usual, checking the headlines, markets, baseball news, science fiction news, etc. I ran into three things while browsing that were unusual enough to get me thinking, so I figured I'd write about them here and see what you all think.

Do web ads take into account "speed browsers"?

While checking the headlines on Yahoo!, there was a small ad on the web page for Dish Network. I glanced at the ad and it appeared to read: "There's never anything on Dish Network" which I thought was odd because it didn't sound like a positive ad. I checked the logo to see if, perhaps, DirecTV placed the ad, but indeed, the ad was for Dish Network. So I read the tag line again, and realized that I mentally replaced some words. What the tag line actually said was: There is never "nothing on" on Dish Network.

It made me wonder if writers of web ads take into account speed-browsers. While I am not a speed-reader, I am a speed-browsers. I read web-pages, regardless of their content, by gestalt. What happened in this case was I saw the words "There's never" and "on Dish Network" and I assumed the missing word was "anything" (or "anything good"). I didn't actually read the whole phrase word for word. I am very consistent about this behavior when I read web pages and I wonder if others are too. And therefore I wondered if the writers of web ads take into account the fact that people don't read the ads word-for-words, but instead fill in the gaps in their mind, with unusual results from time to time. Perhaps jkashlock can answer this.

23 stocks that doubled

I came across another ad that indicated that "Since they launched Motley Fool Stock Advisor in April 2002, a full 23 of their recommendations have doubled in value or more." This was one of the more bizaire statements I'd seen in a while. Even at first glance it doesn't seem impressive. Then as I thought about it, it gradually grew even less impressive. April 22 was nearly 5 years ago. One must ask the question: how many stocks has Motley Fool Stock Advisor actually recommended in 5 years? If the number is 23 then it is very impressive. But I doubt it. In fact, I suspect the number is more like thousands. So in 5 years and thousands of stock recommendations, 23 of those recommendation have doubled in value. I think my heart just skipped a beat.

Customer service doesn't matter

I was reading an article (by gestalt) about how the CEO of DTE Energy (in which I own some stock) earned $7 million in 2006. It broke down his salary ($1.1 million, non-equity compensation ($1.9 million) and stock ($3.9 million). It went on to say that "DTE Energy's compensation committee...bases part of its' executives compensation on performance benchmarks, and the company met most of the objectives for 2006." Here's the kicker. It pointed out the one benchmark the company did not meet were performance targets for customer satisfaction "and other items". So when people say that the customer is king, the customer is always right, you know it's just a bunch of hooey. Here's a guy who got $7 million last year for running a company which didn't meet it's own customer satisfaction standards.

I was reading this article on Yahoo! News and came across the following paragraph, quoted verbatim:

He added that some Russian scientists who violated this ban have been punished — an apparent reference to Valentin Danilov, a physicist who was convicted of spying for China in 2014. Danilov pleaded innocent to the charges, saying the information on satellites he provided was not classified and that he had published some of it in scientific magazines.

Does the above paragraph contain a typo? Or will the event referred to take place a little more than seven years from now?

They may be just around the corner, according to this item from the BBC. Of course, we always expected dome cities to appear in places like the moon and Mars. I'm not sure we wanted to see them here on Earth.

Okay, I realize that there are many people out there who don't have access to the Interweb (as "House" likes to refer to it). But I keep coming up with more and more creative ways to make use of it.

Case in poiint: During House last night, there was one of those commercial spots for the evening news that lasts about 10 seconds, where the anchor said something like, "He graduated with a degree in math and physics in one year...at eleven." I've always hated these types of ads. It goes to show the lengths that the news organization will go through to get your attention. Since when did the news become a mystery story? Whatever happened to "Who, what, when, where, how and why?" Even when these late night news broadcasts start, they tend to lead with some tantalizing bit, and then say, "But first..."

Well I don't watch the late night news. Aside from the fact that it's terrible, it's on at 11 PM and that is past my bedtime on a school night. But I was particularly curious about the person who "graudated with a degree in math and physics in one year". I decided to use the Interweb.

It took me two google searches. The second search (search term = "degree in math and physics in just one year") took me right to this article from a local news radio station. In ten amount of time it took my local anchor to blurb this story, I had read the entire article. The commercials weren't even over yet. I had defeated their clever little attempt to suck me into watching a "news" broadcast that would have Edward R. Murrow spinning in his grave!

I felt great!

With the Interweb, who needs the evening news?

Apparently, we are getting fatter and dumber.

In an effort not to be cynical about this, I am trying to look on the bright side: We are becoming a nation of Homer Simpsons!

Doh!

It occurred to me in a moment of contemplation earlier today that the phrase, "No news is good news" actually has a triple-meaning. I'm sure most people have figured this out and I am once again the last pig at the trough, but discovered it I have:

First meaning: The absence of news which one is expecting to receive (e.g. from a doctor, and interview, etc.) is good news, because you don't yet know the outcome and can imagine that the outcome is still in your favor.

Second meaning: The absence of news, in general, is good news because the news, and in particular, the TV evening news broadcasts in prime time, have been going steadily downhill ever since Edward R. Murrow graced our TV sets. Thus, turning off the TV and not paying any attention to the news is a good thing. For instance, when you are on vacation and there is no television, then no news is good news!

Third meaning: NO NEWS is good news. Or, to put it conversely, ALL NEWS is bad news. Top stories especially. It's always something like, "12 year old P.G. county boy kills mother and brother". You never have a top story like, "12 year old P.G. county boy slays dragon" or "Bush Admits Pact with Devil". It is all categorically bad.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.