Comments? Email the editor: pjbevel[*at*]gmail[(dot)]com
Sunday is generally blog day for me, although I find myself writing less lately. Somehow I think living with someone else zaps your creativity, because you don't have as much loneliness which I think somehow spurs more creativity. Or insanity. And it was Mother's Day and also my sister Megan's birthday, who is about 15 months older than me. And it just so happens that it was summer T-shirt purchase day. I came up with 5 today, from J. C. Penney. There were 5 T-shirts selected, as shown in Figure 1:  Figure 1. Summer T-shirt Selection. Now, let's start in the upper left. Clearly I like tie-dye. Tie-dye is the symbol of the hippie, of the counter-culture, of the laid back and freedom (anti-establishment, non-republican), happy-go-lucky symbol. The upper left shirt has a mushroom from Super Mario Brothers. First, that's good on a number of levels. Super Mario took a good chunk of my childhood, something I really enjoyed playing and then discussing with friends and family. Kind of a waste of time, but fun to get excited about anyway. Secondly - mushrooms. Did you know that me, you and any mushroom have a common ancestor? That's a side rant, but it is cool that mushrooms are our cousin. I've learned about amazing mushrooms - they grow on trees, bark, shit, soil, plants, etc... Very, very diverse, beautifully colorful, and this is to say nothing of the psychedelic variety, some of which turn blue when pinched. So this shirt is definitely going in the summer rotation. The next two T-shirts are Grateful Dead tye-dye shirts. Both are distinct, both are solid. Now, why would someone my age like the Grateful Dead? They don't sound that great on cd or iTunes, so you can't pull them up on your iPod and figure out why they rule. I just know that Paullie has taken me to see Furthur a couple times (remaining members of the Grateful Dead) and it is just an awesome scene. They can play a song for 15-20 minutes and have it just be great. The whole scene is just a great vibe - and now I know why people picked up and followed them around the country when they were on tour. It's a cool thing. Moving down, we have the Beavis and Butthead T-shirt. This is a good one. When I was 16 I tried to order a Beavis and Butthead T-shirt from a mail-order catalog (Alchemy Gothic?), and made the mistake of sending cash. So I never got the shirt. This shirt, about 14 years later, completes the loop. And the slacker anti-establishment youth thing is always fun to project. They are funny stupid, and that's worth wearing. Finally, we have the sesame street t-shirt. I'm a big fan of the count and the cookie monster, and this takes me way back to my childhood. It is a little silly. But when I saw it, I thought about days when I'm in an argument with somene at work or whatever, and it strikes me as somewhat of a psychological boost if the other guy is arguing against somebody in a sesame street t-shirt. It works on a few levels. You can't get really angry, it calls into account the common past, we're all just kids after all. So there you have it! Oh and I also ordered a Barack Obama T-shirt (support the cause!) from his website, but I haven't got that in the mail yet.
When I was a child, I remember riding the school bus. And for whatever reason it would always go through my head "what if we were stuck here for the rest of our lives?" And never mind that there wasn't food or water, just what would life be like if we were confined to this bus forever? Would we marry somebody, rotate positions, attempt employment? I don't know why that thought comes into my mind. As a young child I also remember thinking that somehow my life was a big joke that everyone was playing on me, and that at some point everyone would pop out and tell me this was a goof, and it's not really this way. But it never happened. And I've always liked to hide. To sneak around. Ever since I was a child, and maybe it was growing up with so many other people in one house, I like to have hidden things. It's peculiar and I don't know where it comes from. Maybe it is being confined that allows the mind to wander. So from time to time I am on the bus that connects the long term parking garage and the terminal at the airport. It's a loop that is probably about 15 minutes to make. And I find myself thinking about that job. That repetitive, horrible job. How can doing this loop over and over again be anything short of miserable? No coworkers, just counting the loops, counting the repetitive times you take the same turns over and over before your shift ends. For some reason that pops into my head as the worst possible job. But I don't do it. On the surface. But possibly we both do. And that's the mystery.
So in that moment I decided to write a children's book. I had a basic idea - a bear that wnats to be an astronaugt, but due to no fault of his own the space program was canceled (as in real life) and he falls flat on his a$$. A few days later the whole story came out in a 30 minute session, 22-pages of reality. This was approximately late October or Early November. Since it was a children's book, I needed illustrations. I knew I could probably do them myself, but they wouldn't be the best quality and it would take me forever. So I thought it would be a good idea to hire an artist, possibly some art student. I put an ad on craigslist, and received a few responses. Most were from professional artists, who had previously done children's books - the typical bull $hit artwork and stories that make up the genre. And they wanted $100/page, and some lived in New York or San Francisco, which wouldn't work. But I got an email from someone at the Art Institute of Sunnyvale, which is very close, and I thought I had a winner. He sent me a facebook link with his pictures and I said let's meet. The guy seemed cool, but you never know. Art students could be morons or not understand time or whatever. So I said, let's do this: I'll pay you $40 and you do the first two pages, then we'll re-evaluate and see if we want to go forward. So he gave me black and white sketches about a week later, and we were in business. This was the right guy - little direction was needed and the stuff had the right tone. So we met about twice a month over 3 months as he got me the 22 pages I needed. The coloring process was then in place, and I elected to do it with coloring pencil, as it gave it a vibe I kind of liked. This was about 4 months into this process. Then I had to figure out how to convert it to epub book format, and this took me a few weeks. Apple has its own proprietary ebook format for children's book, and the layout was pretty solid so I used that. Once that was done, I had to apply for an iBooks author account, set up billing and tax information and then submit the book - which was about March 28th. Then I didn't hear anything for 5 weeks. Which sucked. I assumed they were going to reject for some dumba$$ reason. The app process was the same way - except it only took about 7 days to hear back. However, with no email or notification given, the book went live on the iBooks Store Tuesday May 1st. I encourage you all to check it out. "Dreams Don't Pay The Bills" - by Peter Bevelacqua. I'm proud to have completed an artistic and completely non-scientific work.
In the summer of 2008, I was taking a regular stroll around the Boeing campus with a friend Travis ("T-bone"). Typically we would make fun of the horrid management and practices of the Boeing Company. But on one walk T-bone brought up that he heard a story of someone writing up a dumbass World War II website, placing Google Ads on there, and was earning $10,000 a month. Well, I knew I could write a website, so I was motivated to try this out. The topic was the first question: I considered information-based sites, and knew a bit about optimization and electromagnetics and whatever, but ultimately I decided on a website about antennas. This wasn't that big of a leap - the job I hired into Boeing as was Antenna Research Engineer and my Ph.D. was on antennas. It's not that I care that much about VSWR, but this is what knowledge was readily available. So I was ready to go, despite my original skepticism (what is to stop someone from ripping off my site and posting it themselves?, aren't there already other sites discussing the same thing?). The first obstacle is the domain name, as I found every name related to antennas was taken, often by cash-parking domain companies that had no content, just ads. So I had to include a hyphen, and Antenna-Theory.com was born. The domain registration and server costs were about $70. And I learned something that day: whenever I spend my own capitol on an investment, I become very motivated to see it through as I don't like wasting money. I wrote up a few sections on antenna basics, and then launched it with ads. The first day I earned $0.91, but this was all fake earnings due to clicks from people I knew. So I resolved to never click my own ads, and whenever I would show someone my website I would tell them not to click my ads, lest I skew the results of what was actually going on. And ultimately I didn't want to defraud a program that I thought made the web a better place. I began steadily adding to the site, and tried to get people to go there however I could. I tried to get links on other pages, tried to spam forums with my own link, and put my site as an external reference on Wikipedia pages about antenna topics (which is probably not spam, as the site had better info than what Wikipedia had). And what is the snapshot of the history? I present Figure 1, which is the income from Google Ads (and a little that was due to Amazon when people ordered books there through the site):
 Figure 1. The Income per month, by month, For My Websites.
First, let me just say the last data point on that chart, at about $675, completes one of my 2011 New Year's Resolution of website income of over $600 in one month. Second, I think the website has had quite a splash, seeing as the monthly page views are now over a quarter million and total all-time page views is 3.8 Million. Over the course of this, I have continued to add to the site, but not steadily. Now I add a page here and there. I also did a series of antenna explanation videos on youtube, which weren't great but the goal was to try to get the site's name out there. I authored a Fourier Transform website, along with my When Does the Time Change site, and bamzL (which was fun to code but I never really had time to do anything with it). But the bulk of everything is from the antenna site. Now I'll present the same graph above, but measured in US Dollars dB (decibels). And I'm uisng the power version of dB, 10*log10(), because ultimately money is power. The graph:
 Figure 2. The Income Per Month in decibels - with my hand drawn fit.
This is a great graph - for me, as you can see. With an initial offset of about 14 dB dollars, I fit a curve with a slope of 15/43 (where delta-y is in dB-dollars, and delta-x is in months). So basically this says that every 8.6 months the site will increase in income by 3 dB, which is a factor of 2. Which is cool. Further, I project then that I'll be earning $1000 per month this September, and about $10,000 per month in March of 2015. Now, as you can imagine, the above projection assumes a constant growth rate and isn't probably very realistic. The saturation is bound to occur, and there's also the inevitable technological changes that are bound to happen where people switch learning mediums. But for now things look nice. I'll post again in a year or 5 and keep you posted. Want to help that which is my site collection? Don't click anything unless you are going to buy it - and if you have a website or any web presence link back to me. That is the currency and real estate of the future. Finally - in the quest of ever doing new things in an attempt to earn unadulterated entrepreneurial income, there is a children's book coming to iBooks in the very near future - entitled "Dreams Don't Pay The Bills". Stay tuned.
To the People of Earth - In about 4 days, Apple's ubiquitous app store will be losing 3 key apps, namely the organic fart applications by me. They've been downloaded 10s of thousands of times in over 50 countries and 6 continents (no thanks to the people of antarctica). For a variety of reasons, I have decided to let them go, like a fart in the wind. But the connection I have made with the many downloaders, on a deep personal level, will live on in all of our hearts. I would like to close with a comment from a user that touched my heart: "Best joke app ever by Kiwi360(TTR3 Name) This is da best app I could ask 4!! Lol u guys rock. I bet you could out-fart anyone....cept my dad. He can clear out a football stadium lol not jokin. Anyway,keep doin what you do. Peace Peace indeed. If everyone could take the time to chuckle at life's foibles the world would be a much better place. So in conclusion, you have about 4 days to obtain these free apps, and then they are forever lost into the ether. Thank you all for your great support. Sincerely, Peter J. Drinkwater, Ph.D.
An Argument for Evil in the Quest for More Good I love harmony and tranquility. I loathe, detest, hate, whatever you want to call it, those (humans, carnivores, whatever) that cause ill of someone for personal gain, or much worse, simple stupidity or assness. Typically, most humans or enlightened beings possess empathy, whereby they alter their own actions in consideration of another beings happiness or good will. The Chinese do not possess this empathy towards animals in the same way as Western cultures. But I'm more concerned here with general asshole dickishness, whereby an oaf is loud when need not be or physically or verbally threatening or assalting to another individual. Now, in the case of general assholeness, where someone bumps another individual and says "fuck off" and walks on, or is extraordinarily loud in a situation where other individuals have a certain desire or expectation of tranquility, it would be beneficial to society as a whole if there was a deterrent to this type of stupidity, for the common mass who also lacks empathy. Now, someone without empathy and little fear of retribution then will continue to be the oaf, the sluggish waste of a buffoon that he is. But if, as in for instance the maffia culture (a culture of respect), these acts were met with retribution, even the slowest of the pig mass culture would alter their actions, thus giving rise to "simulated empathy". [The empathy here is for themselves, but to the victim or person who is not offended by their actions, it does not matter]. As such then, the people who punish the dimwitted (typically illegally) are adding significant value to our society in my opinion. Hence, someone who observes an oafish or callous act, to which common courtesy of a sorry or whatever is not applied, and thereby goes and causes a reasonable amount of harm to the offending individual, does so rightly in my opinion. Example. Loud, large asshole who feels entitled to his dipshit lifestyle sits on an airplane using loud (if not offensive) language lowers the quality of life for all who are in auditory proximity of said individual. Or, said dipshit individual lights off fireworks at odd times, whenever they feel so inclined, and leaves the trash residue on the street. This persons actions lower the quality of life of those around him, due to lack of empathy or whatever. As such, it would be justifiable, and a net benefit to society as a whole, if you went at night and let the air out of his tires. Further, it would be a larger benefit as well, if a note was also left, letting the offender know the reason for the action, so that they might think twice in the next situation. The oaf will not be thankful, but it would be proper. My buddy Freddo recently stood up to some asshole on the BART who was playing loud offensive music. He told him to shut it off, and the offender proceeded to barrage him with verbal insults. Freddo, though calmly called the police, to which the dipshit fled like the vermin he was. Now, Freddo is a hero in this case, someone who stood up for society as a whole. And the dipshit may be more likely to think twice the next time he acts the dipshit role. But ultimately he got away with it, so capital damage to the offender's person or property would be more desirable. And this, is the act of a hero. Having grown up in Green Bay, WI, I often heard fellow children talk of pride of going hunting with their dad. Or overhearing people talk with bride of having shot a 12-point buck or whatever it is. How can there be anything to be less proud of than hunting? Amazing. You sit and wait, for a defenseless animal (no doubt more beautiful than yourself). Then, you take a shotgun, that you didn't design (can't build, but dumbed down to the point you can use it), and shoot the animal. Very impressive. I'm not sure what's worse, the act or being proud of this as if an accomplishment.
I've been reading Richard Dawkins "The Greatest Show on Earth", and must say it is a real eye opener. The author walks through the evidence for evolution and the history of the Earth, and where the all dating methods come from along with their range of validity. The entire thing, when I've sat down and really thought about it, is genuinely fascinating. To understand the evolution of the human, along with the joint evolution of other species, and the evidence that exists for it, to really think about things on scales of millions or billions of years, is pretty awesome. The shared mammallian history of our many species is just great. And it really cements ideas I've had on how religion is most certainly egregiously fake. I always had a somewhat mistrust of christrianity (the false religion I know the most about), and have been certain in its fraudulence for quite some time. But this book does manage to add to my degree of confidence in how fake christianity is. Now, I read a fare amount. Maybe 1 out of 10 books I read has a bunch of very wise nuggets of information or creative thoughts that I end up forgetting. Which is unfortunate. So I endeavour here to lay out one such nugget from this mentioned book. And that is about the Lyryngeal nerve. There is a nerve, that exists in humans and giraffes and sharks, that connects the brain and the larynx. The nerve travels down your neck, and passes within inches of the larynx. But no, it doesn't connect there. That would be intelligent design. That would make sense. The nerve travels south, down the whole length of the neck before coming back up and connecting with the larynx. Interesting? This is fascinating to me. Check out the picture of what happens in a giraffe, your close mammal cousin, who also has similar genetic makeup:
 I drew the path of the nerve in pink dots to make it clear what I'm illustrating. There are two amazing points that come from this existing:
But possibly the creator was endowed with whimsy? I doubt it. Crappy design is not whimsical. Intelligent design, as I've seen in the iPhone, is fighting for 10ths of millimeters, to deliver the best possible product. The nerve that you have and the giraffe has is poor design; an evolved design, a sequence of locally optimal decisions over millions of years. As such, the very existance of this nerve in the giraffe, is proof enough that no god produced the animals. Evolution exists, and can be verified with your local giraffe. And that's cool.
Recently, I read an article in which a 6'9" passenger on an airplane argued that he should be given a first class or premium seat, since his 'condition' should be classified, technically, under disability status. Now, a sidebar. Many people people have snorted in derision about the same argument for fat people. Should obese people be forced to pay extra, because of their 'condition'? They argue that, in many cases, their problem is genetic, and as such should be protected. Ixo Facto, they should not be disadvantaged economically, and therefore should pay the same price as someone who fits in the chair. I reject that argument. Now, obviously I object if someone's fat rolls are spilling over into my seat. I deserve the small amount of space that I have paid for and been allocated by the airline. Economically, it does cost the airline more to fly an obese person around, both because of the volume taken up and the extra fuel required to move the weight. Now, as I have yet to see an American-style obese person in China (12 trips, maybe 120 days and counting), and as I've never opened a national geographic to the tribes of Africa, Amazons, Aborigines, Native Americans, whatever, and seen someone even remotely fat, I have to reject the argument of 'not at fault', and insist someone who takes up two people's worth of space pay twice the price. And now to tall people. Clearly they are inconvenienced by their plight. With their long legs and all. And you must also argue that there is nothing they can do about it, as a 6'9" tall person cannot do anything to change their situation. But of course, I have to disagree with Mr. Tallguy. And my argument can't focus on 'they can help it'. No. In this case, I must point to the many intangible benefits to being tall, that cannot be returned. First, everytime said tall person goes to a concert, he has a clear view of the stage, giving him an advantage, through no merit of his own. In addition, said person lowers the quality of all people around him, as anyone near behind him cannot see, and must bunch up. Second, said tall person probably has a false sense of confidence from playing basketball as a child or in high school, where his height advantage gave him a place on the team, thereby making him feel like he is good at something, and that confidence is of great value and cannot be returned. Third, the so-called female of our sorry species has a tendency to prefer tall men. As such, the tall man also has the advantage of preferential mate selection, another advantage that is not given away. Fourthly, the inherent sense of security that comes from being 'bigger than everyone else' cannot be overstated. As such, because there are a multitude of benefits, not all enumerated here, that the tall person has no trouble accepting and cannot be returned, I must insist the tall person sit in economy, legs scrunched and all. And I don't feel bad. Now, to you, the tall man who is genuineley interested in equality of people. Here is what you must do in order to obtain a fair size-adjusted seat at equal prices. (1) Refuse to participate in any sport or activity in which height gives any advantage. (2) Determine the tallest person on earth, let the height be X. For every person for which their height h < X, passionately work towards a solution whereby all shorter people are provided with shoes of lift (X-h), so that no bias exists in terms of watching things. (3) While some people will have very tall lifts, ensure that long pants are also provided such that no one looks odd when they have 3 foot lifts on. Further, naturally tall people should seek to disguise their appearance so that the female of the species cannot tell the difference between the very tall and a midget, easily. If the tall guy in the article had done a fraction of the above recommendation, I may be receptive to his plight. But of course not. As such, I feel zero sympathy to the man with his legs scrunched up on a flight, and must insist he pay full price for any seat with extra leg room.
So to update my total hotel count, originally recounted here, I ended up with 7 more nights at the Grand Hyatt Shenzhen, one night at the prestigious Green Lantern Inn near the Nevada/CA border, and one night at the Hyatt Fisherman's Wharf for New Years Eve. So all told I stayed at hotels about 73 nights in 2011. Which is more than I would want, on average.
Notes on the Steve Jobs BiographyFirst, this is a must read. The only authorized biography based on months (years) of interviews with the man himself, who wanted an honest account that he refused to read before it was published. The death of Steve Jobs was monumentally crushing for the people within Apple. What was interesting and deserved is the way the mainstream media picked up on the death and dedicated an enormous amount of time to the death and life of SJ in the days following his death. I expected Steve to be considered a footnoot with the majority of the population, the way one might react if Steve Ballmer (microsoft ceo) would die (who cares?) or the CEO of Boeing (not sure which is more worthless). Why was his life worth reading about? SJ wasn't the most intellectually brilliant man, or the most creative, and definitely not the nicest (considered an asshole by many). What he did have was an extraordinary drive and an irrational commitment to excellence. And he had the ability to motivate people, and people wanted to work for him. The last two sentences, along with a huge helping of luck, made the man (in my opinion) the most influential person of the last 50 years (care to argue? who else? Leaders of countries do little to change the world in any long term manner). In fact, I might say you have to go back to Hitler to find someone who had more of an impact on the world (and to be clear Hitler did not have a positive influence on the world, to put it lightly). But what is the reason I say that his death got the attention from the media it deserved? I believe Steve Jobs represents, in many ways, the best of the human race. His success was many things coming together - opportunity, drive, excellence, etc. His life represents the potential of people, the potential to create extraordinary things that empower people in a positive way. It's the story of an adopted child who started (from nothing) what would become the world's largest company (which it was sometime in mid 2011). And personally, I've always loved the story of an iconoclast (as in steve's case, a hippy who did LSD and said it was one of the most important experiences of his life) who didn't give a $hit about the rules and confounded the "squares" or the masses who fall into line behind authority. And the man did it all while rejecting religion, another plus. But I digress and apologize for that sidebar before my notes on the biography. First, if you have one, you must buy it on the iPad or the iPhone. To read the story on his own creation adds to the book. Plus the physical copy is bulky and will take up space. In this biography, which I read on the iPad, I found I had highlighted passages on multiple occassions, things I repeatedly found myself saying "wow". So I will present the review by talking about some of the notes I found more interesting:
Wow. This is the story of how Woz, the engineering genius behind Apple's early days (without which there would be no Apple), literally was such a stand-up/ethical guy that he felt that since he [Woz] worked at HP while developing the original Apple Computers on the side, HP technically owned it. Wow. Had the people of HP had any vision, Steve Jobs would never have become Steve Jobs. Amazing on so many levels, particularly that a company that now has most of its revenue from the PC could have been in on the ground floor. Steve had the vision - or at least he had nothing to lose and wanted to run something of his own - and drove it from there. But wow to Wozniak for his honesty, and wow to the situation just how amazing it was. And it notes how Steve wasn't really the enegineer behind the original Apple products. But to be clear - he did define what they needed to be, which is not something easy (ask the morons at microsoft or HP's last 5 CEOs).
Wow. Someone telling SJ he added no value at the beginning. Again, SJ's rise is the result of extraordinary luck - if he was born 10 years later or earlier he could have been a failed slot machine producer (interestingly, this is something he wanted to do in the book, when he met a guy at Atari who had tried and failed in that business).
Rare to find a young person with that type of vision. I believe this was around 1977, way before the Macintosh. Contrast this with the dot-com boom, where all the tech morons were trying to sell their stupid .coms to Wall Street pigs.
Amazingly bold, and exactly right. Never ask the masses what they want. Contrast this with Henry Ford: "If I had asked people what they wanted they would have said a faster horse". A related quote from SJ "Did Alexander Graham Bell do any market research before he invented the telephone?"
Ha, but Bill Gates got VERY lucky. Vision trumps codemonkeys.
Very true. To be aware of it is to rise above it. Something to think about. ...I think I underlined 30 or so passages. This was a small sample. Like the character Thornton Melon played by Rodney Dangerfield in "Back to School", I love the story of a guy who bucks the system completely and succeeds to the awe of the falling-into-line masses. The story of SJ is clearly the best book of 2011 from a good-read and an informational point of view. Haven't read it? Do. Have read it? Hit me up with some comments of your own. Peace!
The Optimal Field Goal
Merry Christmas Eve from the staff of Peterules.com! I hope we've all had a solid 358 days of this year or whatever
it may have been.
I would like to discuss optimality in terms of effort. In many things in life, you are not rewarded for
"going the extra mile". For instance, if you brick it up and work all night and all day, you're still just going
to get paid. Sure, maybe you might get a slightly bigger raise or bonus at the end of the year, but likely
your efforts are only known by you. And hence largely wasted. Therefore, since the reward scale is
99% binary (that is, continued employment or fired), one should strive to do the bare minimum while maintaining
employment.
A strong analogy is in the world of sports. Whether you shoot a basketball exactly through the center, or it banks around
the rim and rolls in, you get the same points. And in American football, if you kick a field goal that limps in it is worth 3-points.
If the kicker kicks the field goal and goes above and beyond, clearing the bar by 50 feet, the team is still awarded by
only 3 points. Therefore, all the extra effort the kicker used in clearing the bar only serves to furthur the decline of
his own leg.
To put it in pictorial/simple math terms, the kicker's goal should be to minimize the distance X in Figure 1,
while maintaining X non-negative (so that the points are awarded):
 Figure 1. A kicker's non-rewarded wasted effort is given by the distance X.
Now, the worker/kicker should be doing the bare minimum, but not so little that he encoutners the failure situation:
 Figure 2. You want to get the points, or stay on the team or whatever.
Now, the optimal situation, and an anlogy to dwell on, is the following figure. This will maximize your personal time and creative potential:
 Figure 3. The optimal situation. Thank you for your time.
Here's why the moral or ethical objection to eating meat is a temporary situation. First, let me just state I am sympathetic to the plight of vegetarians, and do wish animals were treated better. Particularly, in China, animals have zero regard and I'm not real comfortable with that situation. That said, I am not a vegetarian, but wouldn't mind being one, if the proper food alternatives were available. Now, back to this as a temporary situation. The moral or ethical objection arises from the animal's loss of life, particularly because it can feel pain and has its own thoughts, amongst other things. The loss of life isn't so much the issue, as vegetarians don't stop at eating plants, which ends the life of the plant of course. So, as technology improves, it seems straightforward that animals (to be eaten) will be genetically engineered, for taste or size or whatever. In addition, it would be advantageous to have an animal without a nervous system (so it can't feel pain), or in general brain dead, which would be easier to control, and I don't see how PETA could object to the stacking of these "animals" in increasingly tight confines. In this case, the animal becomes a plant, and no distinction can be made between the two. This isn't to say the vegetarian movement will end. Particularly, there are health advantages to being a vegetarian (although presumably the advanced engineered meat may have the problems resolved). Side discussion: High protein (meat-based) diets make people larger; this can be seen from the increase in size in the Chinese over the last quarter century, oweing largely to the availability of more meat to the average citizen. Now, it is not that the Earth can only handle "15 billion people"; that would be an arbitrary bull shit figure. Let's assume that figure is correct, for an average weight of a person of 160 pounds. This means the Earth, in more fairness, can support about 2.4 trillion Pound-People. So, here's a nice tradeoff between number of people and average size:
The above equation can be plotted versus average weight to see the number of people the Earth can hold:
 Figure 1. Plot of Earth's Capacity (in billions of people) versus Average Person Weight (pounds). From Figure 1, we see that as the earth's population approaches 400 pounds, we are at about 6 billion people for the maximum capacity of Earth. So if everyone was 400 lbs, the Earth wouldn't be able to sustain life, or much quality thereof. The better news is on the other side of the curve. If people could shrink in height by about half, the volume would go down cubically (by a factor of 8), and we'd be looking at an average size of about 20 pounds, where the Earth could support 100 million or so people. So it is my contention that the Earth doens't necessarily need to worry about overpopulation, as long as the average weight decreases at a faster rate. Thank you for your time.
After about 30 years of interacting with the so-called humanoid Earthlings, I've noticed an implicit, voluntary class system. That is, I notice the vast majority belong to what I call the "observer class". These are the masses. They spend their free time engaging in passive activities, like watching sports, watching tv, watching youtube, etc. And not only that, they are thrilled to do it. This is actually an opportunity. A large number of observers, with no inclination to do any creation of their own, enables the minority who want to do their own stuff. As such, this conglomeration, affectionately known as the worthless masses, actually have a fair amount of utility. If you want to write a website about antennas, for instance, you can do that, and the observer class will support it. If you want to make a tv show about a talking burrito, you can find an audience. So I've come to a couple realizations: (1) the observer class is a good thing, and (2) the class selection you choose is completely voluntary, which is pretty interesting. Amongst other things, I am now engaged in writing a children's book, called "Dreams don't pay the bills", which will be released hopefully in a few months. It's the antithesis to the standard children's book about "you can do whatever you want to do" and "everything works out". And the observer class is large enough I believe it will find an audience. Now, I close with an idea. During my iPhone Application Development days, when I created such hits as "Organic Farts" and "Whole Farts: The Deluxe Edition", I would google how to do some part of the coding. So I would start googling "iPhone Application" and google's autofinish feature would list the most common searches, amongst which was "iPhone Application ideas". This means the masses were trying to figure out what to do for an iPhone app, and googling so that the non-observer class would tell them what to make. Pretty funny actually. Anyway, the take away there is you can start typing something and google will tell you the most common searches. So I typed "when" and I get, as one of the top searches, the autocomplete "when does the time change". Which is a fair question, because who can remember? Given the vast observer class, how can this be taken advantage of? So as an experiment, I registered the domain when does the time change?.com. I'm going to put up a little info, when the clock changes, and of course ads. And see how many people go. Net cost to me: $10. Results pending.
September 17th, 2011, approximately 6:15pm:
At this exact moment, the minister Lee nervously awaits his duty. Pat-baum, on the far right of the groomsmen line, is wondering about the score of the Wazzu game (which they lost). Aron is trying to remember how late Burger King is open (or possibly deriving a general solution for string theory, tough to tell with him). And Paullie, leaning over whispering something. As the crowd is taking in the bride's entrance, Paullie, on queue, leans over and says "One vagina for the rest of your life, real smart Pete. Way to think it through." Michael, next to Pat, can be seen observing the moment, a little confused. I love this picture. It's a nice little tidbit people don't know. And I did ask Paullie to do that. I wanted to recreate the scene from the beginning of old school, if only for a moment. And it was not without utility: the moment was quite emotional, and helped take the edge off.
Notes on "It's So Easy", the Duff McKagan autobiography. Duff moved from Seattle to LA with the explicit intention of starting a band to do something new, and lead in a new era. He specifically turned down offers to be in established bands, because he felt they weren't pushing the creative envelope as he had wanted. At the same time, Axl and Izzy moved to LA with the same goal. And slash and steven happened to run an ad in a music newspaper, that Duff saw, called them up and began the relationship, e-Harmony style, via the then-version-internet, newsads. So you had a group of talented people that all (like the salmon of capastrano) instinctively flocked together. And they shared a common vision, of pushing the creative envelope while holding sacred their craft, which was music. And for the first few years they worked together and were like brothers. Living commune style, helping each other out, doing what they could for the cause. They had a strong "we're in this together, it's us versus them" mentality. And that is what you need. I'm struck by some things. First, no one does it alone. This was a group of people where the sum was far greater than the individual members. Talent feeds on talent. Iron sharpens iron. To do great things, you really need great people around you. Solitude breeds mediocrity. Second, they came together and gave it all for their cause. Duff, in particular, knew why he was there. He didn't settle for a half-a$$ed band. He had a goal in mind. And even though they were somewhat reckless with their lifestyle, they didn't let it get in the way of the band and their common goal. Of course, it all came crashing down when (particularly Axl) got larger than life. Once you believe the success is purely your own (instead of reality), you forget the guys you needed to get there, the required commaraderie and working togetherness dies, and the goal dies. The story of Guns 'n Roses is a story of human existance; of the rise and the fall. The reasons for their success and then failure are paralleled in business and life. So today Axl still has guns 'n roses, but without the original ingredients it is a good band, but not even a great band. The rest came together in Velvet Revolver, but chose a lead singer who also imploded on himself, and while they are all successful, can't get back on the top shelf again. But the story of Duff has another theme to it. After guns 'n roses he needs to maintain sobriety to literally save his life, and begins mountain biking, and enters races. He takes it seriously, and becomes really good at it; before long he's training with some of the best riders in the world. Later he learns martial arts to further get control of his life and prevent a relapse; before long he is training with some of the best martial artists in the world. Finally, he decides to go to school; and with little more than a GED in education ends up getting admitted to a university, and finishes his degree in business (while getting all A's). He has a common theme of success in his life. After reflection, it appears to arise firstly from following his heart and doing what he is passionate about; secondly, what he chooses to undertake he does 110%. So, success arises from (1) following your heart, (2) work at what you do 110%. And if you get very lucky, you will have those guys around you that will catapult you to greatness, so - the third leg is (3) work with talented, driven people. The last leg is one you can't do on your own.
So...in regards to the human race. We've accomplished a fair amount, and firmly have a hold on the planet's resources. Survival of the fittest has chosen brain over brawn. Now, what's the point of continuing the race? Once your so far ahead of the game, what's the point? Now, as I see it, we have two options: (a) Continue the whole charade, until a (i) meteor hits the Earth or (ii) the sun's energy dies out or (iii) humans themselves end it in some sort of moronic nuclear war (probably over something imaginary like religion, no less). (b) We do something creative. We take the artistic route. We collectively decide that as a species, we've succeeded and by continuing we can only f it up. Much like a boxer retiring at the peak of his career. Staying in the game only ends poorly.
A note to a colleague entitled "where we fucked up". We had our whole lives to go to grad school and then become corporate slobs. We should have gotten a bunch of people outta sandia in 2002 and made a tv show or a website or a store or whatever. That was the time. Now we're all married or in debt or lazy so there's no way out. Way to think it through Lol are you drunk or high or what? Besides I think I'm less restive than you. I don't mind being a corporate slob for the moment. Until something better comes around. Til then we just do stoopid shit and enjoy our shit more than 95% of the fucking dumbasses you see driving down 880.
Nah, it's bull shit. We can budget 2 hours a week to doing our own shit, but then 75% of the weekends we need to be at home depot or the olive garden so that won't work.
Basically we are doing our own shit upwards of 12 hours per year. The ship has fucking S A I L E D.
You know that feeling, when you've been traveling all day - and I mean more than 12 hours or so, and you finally reach your destination? You're happy, you're tired, you just want to get to bed and rest. And so it was that I left Zurich Saturday morning, took the 9 hour flight to D.C., went through US immigration for an hour, waited an hour on my next flight, and then landed in SFO 5 hours after that. Good to be home. And then you get off the SFO parking shuttle, find your car hop in and go. Or possibly somebody filled it with packing peanuts:
After a couple year hiatus, I've begun painting again. Here is an oil-on-canvas painting I've done over the last month or so, entitled "The iPhone 3e7 is now available in ....":
 Also: Making of the iPhone 3e7...
Hotels and Such 2011 thus far, amongst other things, has been the year of the hotel for me. I estimate that at this point in the year, I've spent 49 nights in hotels. Which is about 20% of the time. The year began that way, as I opted to stay at a Grand Hyatt in downtown Seattle on New Year's Eve, so I wouldn't have to drive. Then there was about 36 nights at Grand Hyatt in Shenzhen, China, along with 9 nights at the Westin in Shenzhen. Then 1 night at the W Hotel in Hong Kong. Then another night in a Hyatt in Seattle for Patrick's wedding, and 1 night at the Vadara in Vegas. And tomorrow I leave for my wedding/honeymoon. The breakdown there is as follows: 4 nights in a hyatt in Seattle (all the staying at hyatt's gets me free nights), then 3 nights at Hotel Napoleon in Rome, then 2 nights at the Hotel Panorama in Florence (I think), 2 nights in a bed in breakfast in cinque terre, 2 nights in Venice, and then 2 nights in Zurich, at (of all places) a Grand Hyatt.
How long have you been working? 30 years, 10 years, 2 months, are you still in school? At Sandia National Labs, I remember the second summer I was interning there, a 17-week internship, I did about 4 weeks of work (so 4/17=23% work ratio). Little did I know this can be the norm in engineering. I went on to my first job at Boeing, where I stayed 3.16 years. There I estimate I had nothing to do 75% of the time, so a slightly better (albeit an estimate of 25% work ratio). But at Boeing, I also knew a lot of the stuff I was doing did not need done. My second major job in consumer electronics faired significantly better than the others, being private industry and all. However, even now I find times where there's not much that needs done. So, you can work hard on things that don't need done or do nothing. Maybe it is a consequence of a large company, or that it is impossible to keep a constant work flow, or whatever. But it got me thinking.
Thursday, July 21st, 2011
When Texas Gets It Right
Update: How about the 90 people killed in Norway by a moron? He's looking at
an upper bound of 21 years. Hat's off Norwegians! Way to be rational.
Texas. The home of the not-so-great G. W. Bush. When I think of Texas, I think of
evangelical christian republicans; what comes to mind are those who can't think for themselves, follow archaic texts
and mindsets (whether it is the nonsense of the jesus-father-holy ghost 'trinity' that enables god to be different beings
but enables christians to claim also a monotheistic religion; or whether it's the right-to-bear arms no matter
where or what). People who all dress the same and don't like outsiders or anything different ("we
support our president here, you can do what you want in San Francisco....").
So, in summary I don't think I would thrive in Texas and I have an overall negative image of the place.
Now, one thing I do respect is that they don't give a rats a$$ what I think. They are going to do things
the way that makes sense to them, and the rest of the world be damned. Somewhat of a dangerous attitude,
but at least you won't be swayed by others in some sense.
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One day, after a particularly upsetting annual work review, I was contemplating life.
And all the misfortunes that fall within it. And, as many do, I wondered what mis-steps
I had taken to arive at this particularly poor situation. Life is supposed to work out well,
you follow the rules and things will align the way you wish them to align, over time.
It is in that moment I had a thought: someone should really write a reality children's book. A "life is more luck based
than you could possibly imagine" book. A be careful because it doesn't always work out book. Something to give
the youth something to think about, so that they won't grow up and say "no one ever told me".