Been a while since I posted. Busy busy. Anyway, a few thoughts I'd like to share:
1.) Is it me, or is every website trying to become just like every other website? What's up with that? (Evidence: Facebook overhaul, Google Buzz, I heard Twitter is becoming more social-networky...)
2.) If I'm ordering a Papa John's pizza online, don't you think they should tell you the expected delivery time is 90 minutes BEFORE they bill your credit card? What do people consider acceptable maximum pizza wait times? I think 20-30 minutes is normal, 45 minutes to 50 if they're super busy. 90? Really? For shame.
3.) Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and Chinese New Year. How come I'm celebrating Chinese New Year, but all my Chinese friends are celebrating Valentine's Day? (Disclosure: I'm not Chinese, but compared to some of the people who are, boy do I feel like I am.)
4.) Why is it when the Republicans are in the majority, it's 51 votes to get something done, but when the Democrats are in the majority, it's 60? The obvious answer is because the Democrats don't threaten to filibuster as much...but my theory is a little different: the Democrats are more afraid of the filibuster. Filibustering is hard...the Republicans can't filibuster EVERYTHING, and if they did, it'd be political suicide to appear CONSTANTLY intransigent in the face of widely popular bills (with which the Democrats would lead, if they were smart). Call their bluff, or if it's not a bluff, use it to win some desperately points going into the midterms. I'm not professional political strategist, but when your enemy is announcing their intended strategy--and it isn't that great a plan to begin with--why be afraid of it? Lose a few battles, win a few wars. It shouldn't be that complicated. Am I missing something...or are they?
Showing posts with label rants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rants. Show all posts
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Geek Movie Plot Holes
So Wired magazine published a list of the Top 10 Unanswered Questions in Geeky Movies. (HT: Neat-O-Rama)
I thought it was a good read that merited sharing, but not without comment. A few of these plot holes aren't really plot holes at all. Specifically, the Star Wars ones. Maybe some of the others have explanations too, but I don't know enough to offer a rebuttal.
Quoting from the article:
"4. Star Wars: The Death Star’s slow attack - So the Death Star follows the tracking device on the Millennium Falcon to the rebel base. They jump out of light speed, and, for no clear reason, emerge on the far side of the planet Yavin from the moon where the base is. This light-speed jump takes a split-second, but now they have to wait minutes so they can clear the planet. Not only that, but the Death Star is capable of blowing up entire planets, not just moons, so why don’t they just blow up the entire planet of Yavin? Surely that would effectively destroy anything on its moons as well."
Resolution: The Death Star is a giant space station that travels very slowly. Hyperdrives (the faster-than-light) technology operate on completely different principles than the sublight drives. The Death Star followed the Millennium Falcon to the Yavin system, and once it got there, had to use its slow engines to get around the planet (the long lag time makes sense). Why not hyper-jump around the planet? Hyperdrive jumps take a while to calculate, and gravity is a big obstacle that limits where you can go safely. Intra-system jumps were never part of the story--hyperdrives only get you from system to system.
Why not blow up the planet Yavin itself? This one bothered me too, and several answers come to mind. One, it's a gas giant, so blowing up the relatively tiny core might not be a guaranteed kill against the moon, especially if most of the planets mass is actually in the gas or there are other strange principles at work (magnetic ones come to mind, but I won't expand on that here). Why not blow up the planet, THEN blow up the moon if you miss? I'm guessing a giant superlaser like that takes long enough to recharge that it made sense to go for a guaranteed kill after a 20 minute trip than to risk having to wait around for hours (maybe more) for your second shot, giving the Rebels plenty of time to evacuate.
A bigger unanswered question in my mind would be: why didn't the Rebels start evacuating the moon of Yavin IV immediately, just in case 24 one-man fighters didn't manage to destroy a space station that was 235 miles in circumference?
"2. The Empire Strikes Back: Time dilation - Luke and R2D2 leave Hoth to go to Dagobah at the same time Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C3PO leave to go… well, they never really say what their initial destination is. Anyway, on Dagobah, Luke embarks on an intensive Jedi training course with Yoda — it’s never stated, but it’s heavily implied that this takes a long time; and besides, you would think a full course of Jedi training would take at least months, right? (We know it’s a full course, because when Luke comes back in Jedi, Yoda tells him he doesn’t need more training.) So, at the same time that Luke finishes this months-long training and runs off to Cloud City, his friends have clearly just gotten there a short time before. Yet all they did on the way was flee from a Star Destroyer and fly down the gullet of a giant space worm. That must have taken hours, not months. So was the Millennium Falcon flying at close to the speed of light (but not at light speed) for a while and thus experiencing time dilation? Yeah, that’s the ticket."
Resolution: This one's pretty easy: the Millennium Falcon's hyperdrive was out. They had to make the trip from Hoth to Bespin at sublight speeds. I think it's more amazing that didn't take YEARS, as planets are typically pretty far apart (and Hoth was in a supposedly remote region). What's amazing here isn't that Luke's training was so short--it's that the OTHER storyline was so chronologically compact (or, conversely, that the training was so long and the Falcon had enough emergency rations so no one died of starvation or dehydration along the way).
I thought it was a good read that merited sharing, but not without comment. A few of these plot holes aren't really plot holes at all. Specifically, the Star Wars ones. Maybe some of the others have explanations too, but I don't know enough to offer a rebuttal.
Quoting from the article:
"4. Star Wars: The Death Star’s slow attack - So the Death Star follows the tracking device on the Millennium Falcon to the rebel base. They jump out of light speed, and, for no clear reason, emerge on the far side of the planet Yavin from the moon where the base is. This light-speed jump takes a split-second, but now they have to wait minutes so they can clear the planet. Not only that, but the Death Star is capable of blowing up entire planets, not just moons, so why don’t they just blow up the entire planet of Yavin? Surely that would effectively destroy anything on its moons as well."
Resolution: The Death Star is a giant space station that travels very slowly. Hyperdrives (the faster-than-light) technology operate on completely different principles than the sublight drives. The Death Star followed the Millennium Falcon to the Yavin system, and once it got there, had to use its slow engines to get around the planet (the long lag time makes sense). Why not hyper-jump around the planet? Hyperdrive jumps take a while to calculate, and gravity is a big obstacle that limits where you can go safely. Intra-system jumps were never part of the story--hyperdrives only get you from system to system.
Why not blow up the planet Yavin itself? This one bothered me too, and several answers come to mind. One, it's a gas giant, so blowing up the relatively tiny core might not be a guaranteed kill against the moon, especially if most of the planets mass is actually in the gas or there are other strange principles at work (magnetic ones come to mind, but I won't expand on that here). Why not blow up the planet, THEN blow up the moon if you miss? I'm guessing a giant superlaser like that takes long enough to recharge that it made sense to go for a guaranteed kill after a 20 minute trip than to risk having to wait around for hours (maybe more) for your second shot, giving the Rebels plenty of time to evacuate.
A bigger unanswered question in my mind would be: why didn't the Rebels start evacuating the moon of Yavin IV immediately, just in case 24 one-man fighters didn't manage to destroy a space station that was 235 miles in circumference?
"2. The Empire Strikes Back: Time dilation - Luke and R2D2 leave Hoth to go to Dagobah at the same time Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C3PO leave to go… well, they never really say what their initial destination is. Anyway, on Dagobah, Luke embarks on an intensive Jedi training course with Yoda — it’s never stated, but it’s heavily implied that this takes a long time; and besides, you would think a full course of Jedi training would take at least months, right? (We know it’s a full course, because when Luke comes back in Jedi, Yoda tells him he doesn’t need more training.) So, at the same time that Luke finishes this months-long training and runs off to Cloud City, his friends have clearly just gotten there a short time before. Yet all they did on the way was flee from a Star Destroyer and fly down the gullet of a giant space worm. That must have taken hours, not months. So was the Millennium Falcon flying at close to the speed of light (but not at light speed) for a while and thus experiencing time dilation? Yeah, that’s the ticket."
Resolution: This one's pretty easy: the Millennium Falcon's hyperdrive was out. They had to make the trip from Hoth to Bespin at sublight speeds. I think it's more amazing that didn't take YEARS, as planets are typically pretty far apart (and Hoth was in a supposedly remote region). What's amazing here isn't that Luke's training was so short--it's that the OTHER storyline was so chronologically compact (or, conversely, that the training was so long and the Falcon had enough emergency rations so no one died of starvation or dehydration along the way).
Saturday, December 20, 2008
My Cash
I just read a stupid article about good and bad places to hide massive amounts of cash you have lying around the house. Bad is in a purse or under the mattress. Good is in a fake electrical outlet or a tennis ball you've cut open, put money into, resealed, and stuck in a can with 2 other tennis balls. Seemingly good, but bad because of movies and the number of websites recommending it, is a secret hiding place in a toilet tank.
My problem with this isn't that it's obvious, but it's also wrong. You know what the best place to hide lots of excess cash is? A BANK. Or a money market fund that only invests in US Treasury securities, or another money market fund participating in the fed's money market insurance program. Even if you're worried about your bank, your deposits are insured by the federal government up to $250,000 right now. Anyone who for some reason feels the need to hide MORE cash than that, can just get a bank account at another bank, and stash another $250,000 there! It's not that complicated! Also, you know what you usually get with all the options I just mentioned (you know, besides massively better security)? INTEREST.
That's right, people will pay you for your deposits (kind of like, you know, a LOAN to a bank or the federal government, guaranteed by the best credit on Earth). Now, I'm not an expert in banking, but to the guy who's hiding massive amounts of cash in a tennis ball or toilet tank, I can confidently say that there are people who will pay you for the privilege of keeping your money SAFER than you ever could at home.
And, once again, to all you fearful, blog-surfing, cash-hoarding, burgeoning economics students: the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT will personally guarantee the safety of the money you deposit or "loan" in all of the cases I mentioned above. And yes, they're a better bet than a tennis ball.
My problem with this isn't that it's obvious, but it's also wrong. You know what the best place to hide lots of excess cash is? A BANK. Or a money market fund that only invests in US Treasury securities, or another money market fund participating in the fed's money market insurance program. Even if you're worried about your bank, your deposits are insured by the federal government up to $250,000 right now. Anyone who for some reason feels the need to hide MORE cash than that, can just get a bank account at another bank, and stash another $250,000 there! It's not that complicated! Also, you know what you usually get with all the options I just mentioned (you know, besides massively better security)? INTEREST.
That's right, people will pay you for your deposits (kind of like, you know, a LOAN to a bank or the federal government, guaranteed by the best credit on Earth). Now, I'm not an expert in banking, but to the guy who's hiding massive amounts of cash in a tennis ball or toilet tank, I can confidently say that there are people who will pay you for the privilege of keeping your money SAFER than you ever could at home.
And, once again, to all you fearful, blog-surfing, cash-hoarding, burgeoning economics students: the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT will personally guarantee the safety of the money you deposit or "loan" in all of the cases I mentioned above. And yes, they're a better bet than a tennis ball.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
My Problem with Menus
You know what really grinds my gears? When a menu lists many, but not all, of the ingredients of an item. It's one thing to say "Turkey sandwich." Then you know to ask.
But some places they don't give you relevant information, while pretending to. Even at my beloved Quizno's, which for some reason fails to mention they put MAYO on a cheesesteak. Epic fail. Or when the Harrisburg Hilton lists the type of cheese, the type of bacon, even the type of roll they serve a grilled chicken sandwich on, but doesn't mention they serve mayo, which I hate. It's one thing to not mention the lettuce; I can take that off. But mayo? Come on, people. A little notice would be nice. Especially late at night.
But some places they don't give you relevant information, while pretending to. Even at my beloved Quizno's, which for some reason fails to mention they put MAYO on a cheesesteak. Epic fail. Or when the Harrisburg Hilton lists the type of cheese, the type of bacon, even the type of roll they serve a grilled chicken sandwich on, but doesn't mention they serve mayo, which I hate. It's one thing to not mention the lettuce; I can take that off. But mayo? Come on, people. A little notice would be nice. Especially late at night.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
My Dissatisfaction with the Media
The media clearly doesn't know what it's talking about when it comes to the economy. They never did, but it's becoming painfully obvious. I've observed the following headlines/clips/quotes in the past week (note: may not be 100% accurate as I'm doing this from memory):
"Buffet's $5B investment in Goldman Sachs could pay off." Wowzers. The world's premiere investor puts a whopping five billion dollars into a single company's preferred stock and there's actually a chance one of the greatest financial geniuses of our time could MAKE money on such a deal? Jimminy-Gee Willikers!
"Buffet's $5 billion investment in Goldman Sachs is good for Goldman Sachs." Thanks. No, really, thank YOU.
"It's as American as apple pie. McDonald's apple pie that is. 2,000 of them. That's how much 700 billion dollars would buy for every single American." All right, CNN. Several questions. How is that relevant? How is that a remotely good comparison? What does it have to do with the situation? Who's going to understand anything better than they did before that? Do enough people think in terms of thousands of tiny pies to make that an accessible analogy? And finally, how does the fact that money CAN purchase apple pies--though in this case the money in question won't--make the situation, the bailout plan, or even the sum more "American"? Lizmonster, I want an answer to at least that last one.
"Bush: U.S. in midst of serious financial crisis." I suppose the fact that this is news to the president makes it news, but I'm pretty sure even Bush was told to say it was a crisis before tonight, when that headline was posted. If you don't have anything productive to say, don't say anything at all.
Which actually brings me to another disturbing media trend: celebrity news. I've noticed a lot more celebrity news creeping into my regular news, in part because most of the real news is economic, and not enough reporters think they can fake looking like they know something about economics. So we get celebrity gossip, which I suppose might also be a marketing decision to make readers feel better ("I don't understand any of these current event headlines, but I totally get that Lindsay Lohan's dad is pissed off his daughter's dating a lesbian stripper.")
Yeah, I figured I'd mention Lindsay Lohan, since her name seems to generate a lot of hits for me. Maybe I should work the word "nude" into this post too. Hey look at that, just did. Anyway, the following celebrity news is almost equally stunning:
From the FRONT PAGE of USA Today: "America loves New York" (actual headline). Now, it turns out they meant America the actress (from the show Ugly Betty), who is apparently filming there and seems to find most aspects of the city acceptable or better. Front page? Really? You couldn't just show a graph of corporate credit spreads to treasuries or a cartoon of Hank Paulson's old Wall Street buddies leaving a bag of flaming poo on his front porch in the middle of the night (you could depict them snickering behind bushes as the bathrobe-clad Treasury Secretary yells at no one in particular--I seriously think this would be a great political cartoon, by the way).
Also, yes, Lindsay Lohan is having a homosexual relationship with a stripper. I expect this to make the news, because it's (a) Lindsay Lohan (b) a stripper and (c) another gay celebrity. But Lindsay Lohan's dad (whose name I couldn't conjure if my life depended on it) is getting as much coverage as the celebrity would get under normal circumstances. First, who cares, and second, how is it news that overprotective fathers might not be thrilled about their daughters dating lesbian strippers.
In other gay celebrity news, American Idol runner up Clay Aiken has announced that he's a gay father--claiming he didn't want his 8-month old son to grow up with a father who wasn't completely honest. Thanks for the update, Clay, but everyone knew you were a gay father from the minute they found out you were a father.
And in further celebrity news, Sarah Palin has met with several world leaders, and is planning on meeting several more, for a total of 9 this week at the UN. This brings the total number of foreign leaders with whom she's exchanged a few words up to 9, and the total number of Americans with more foreign policy experience than she has down to several million.
"Buffet's $5B investment in Goldman Sachs could pay off." Wowzers. The world's premiere investor puts a whopping five billion dollars into a single company's preferred stock and there's actually a chance one of the greatest financial geniuses of our time could MAKE money on such a deal? Jimminy-Gee Willikers!
"Buffet's $5 billion investment in Goldman Sachs is good for Goldman Sachs." Thanks. No, really, thank YOU.
"It's as American as apple pie. McDonald's apple pie that is. 2,000 of them. That's how much 700 billion dollars would buy for every single American." All right, CNN. Several questions. How is that relevant? How is that a remotely good comparison? What does it have to do with the situation? Who's going to understand anything better than they did before that? Do enough people think in terms of thousands of tiny pies to make that an accessible analogy? And finally, how does the fact that money CAN purchase apple pies--though in this case the money in question won't--make the situation, the bailout plan, or even the sum more "American"? Lizmonster, I want an answer to at least that last one.
"Bush: U.S. in midst of serious financial crisis." I suppose the fact that this is news to the president makes it news, but I'm pretty sure even Bush was told to say it was a crisis before tonight, when that headline was posted. If you don't have anything productive to say, don't say anything at all.
Which actually brings me to another disturbing media trend: celebrity news. I've noticed a lot more celebrity news creeping into my regular news, in part because most of the real news is economic, and not enough reporters think they can fake looking like they know something about economics. So we get celebrity gossip, which I suppose might also be a marketing decision to make readers feel better ("I don't understand any of these current event headlines, but I totally get that Lindsay Lohan's dad is pissed off his daughter's dating a lesbian stripper.")
Yeah, I figured I'd mention Lindsay Lohan, since her name seems to generate a lot of hits for me. Maybe I should work the word "nude" into this post too. Hey look at that, just did. Anyway, the following celebrity news is almost equally stunning:
From the FRONT PAGE of USA Today: "America loves New York" (actual headline). Now, it turns out they meant America the actress (from the show Ugly Betty), who is apparently filming there and seems to find most aspects of the city acceptable or better. Front page? Really? You couldn't just show a graph of corporate credit spreads to treasuries or a cartoon of Hank Paulson's old Wall Street buddies leaving a bag of flaming poo on his front porch in the middle of the night (you could depict them snickering behind bushes as the bathrobe-clad Treasury Secretary yells at no one in particular--I seriously think this would be a great political cartoon, by the way).
Also, yes, Lindsay Lohan is having a homosexual relationship with a stripper. I expect this to make the news, because it's (a) Lindsay Lohan (b) a stripper and (c) another gay celebrity. But Lindsay Lohan's dad (whose name I couldn't conjure if my life depended on it) is getting as much coverage as the celebrity would get under normal circumstances. First, who cares, and second, how is it news that overprotective fathers might not be thrilled about their daughters dating lesbian strippers.
In other gay celebrity news, American Idol runner up Clay Aiken has announced that he's a gay father--claiming he didn't want his 8-month old son to grow up with a father who wasn't completely honest. Thanks for the update, Clay, but everyone knew you were a gay father from the minute they found out you were a father.
And in further celebrity news, Sarah Palin has met with several world leaders, and is planning on meeting several more, for a total of 9 this week at the UN. This brings the total number of foreign leaders with whom she's exchanged a few words up to 9, and the total number of Americans with more foreign policy experience than she has down to several million.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
My Theory on Female Leaders
Dr. Nicholas Kristof is generally one of my favorite columnists (he write for the NY Times). He tends to highlight important issues and to go straight to important details. He's not the type to give unnecessary analysis, and he's not anything close what I'd call a talking head (or writing head in this case).
Today, though, he posted an interesting editorial with which I have to take exception. For the first time since I started reading his column, he's overthought and overcomplicated an issue. And that issue is the success of female leaders. He explains that studies routinely show that women are better at consensus-building, a key skill for successful leaders. He notes that female monarchs had better success running nations (on a per-leader basis) than their male counterparts. He also points out that women haven't done as well in Democratic societies. And here's his "pet theory" as to why:
"In monarchies, women who rose to the top dealt mostly with a narrow elite, so they could prove themselves and get on with governing. But in democracies in the television age, female leaders also have to navigate public prejudices — and these make democratic politics far more challenging for a woman than for a man."
I think that if we're going to base our answer off his premises, a much simpler theory provides a much better explanation: in monarchies, the leader was in a very masculine power role, and having a consensus-building monarch helped balance the pressures of the system of government. Meanwhile, in a government centered around building consensus, like a democracy where things happen by voting, one needs that masculine type of leadership to navigate and rise above the system.
It's a simple matter of balance. Under my theory, the only thing you need is to acknowledge that leaders with more tools and skills at their disposal will do better than an equally talented leader with fewer options and strengths.
Maybe I'm oversimplifying things. But it seems to me that a consensus-builder with top-down power or a powerful figure in a consensus-building system would make for a more effective leader than another face in the crowd of aspiring consensus builders or an iron fist personality with powers to match (and powers to abuse).
Any thoughts?
Today, though, he posted an interesting editorial with which I have to take exception. For the first time since I started reading his column, he's overthought and overcomplicated an issue. And that issue is the success of female leaders. He explains that studies routinely show that women are better at consensus-building, a key skill for successful leaders. He notes that female monarchs had better success running nations (on a per-leader basis) than their male counterparts. He also points out that women haven't done as well in Democratic societies. And here's his "pet theory" as to why:
"In monarchies, women who rose to the top dealt mostly with a narrow elite, so they could prove themselves and get on with governing. But in democracies in the television age, female leaders also have to navigate public prejudices — and these make democratic politics far more challenging for a woman than for a man."
I think that if we're going to base our answer off his premises, a much simpler theory provides a much better explanation: in monarchies, the leader was in a very masculine power role, and having a consensus-building monarch helped balance the pressures of the system of government. Meanwhile, in a government centered around building consensus, like a democracy where things happen by voting, one needs that masculine type of leadership to navigate and rise above the system.
It's a simple matter of balance. Under my theory, the only thing you need is to acknowledge that leaders with more tools and skills at their disposal will do better than an equally talented leader with fewer options and strengths.
Maybe I'm oversimplifying things. But it seems to me that a consensus-builder with top-down power or a powerful figure in a consensus-building system would make for a more effective leader than another face in the crowd of aspiring consensus builders or an iron fist personality with powers to match (and powers to abuse).
Any thoughts?
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
So I started a new job yesterday...is it weird that I like working, and I don't mind long days at all, but I am annoyed by getting up early and wearing funny clothes? Seriously, those two things annoy me more than everything else put together. Well, I better stop blogging or I'll be late for work...
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