May 11, 2011

           This is the kind of thing that inures you into stereotyping people. See this accident? Right smack into the wall of a building beside the road in clear, dry weather. Flat smooth road, unlimited visibility. What is less obvious is that this is not an intersection, but a divided road with a tree-lined median down the center. How did this lady hit the building at a right angle? See, no skid marks, no damage to the sides of the car.
           She ran into this building by driving sideways across three lanes of traffic and a bicycle path. Are we not supposed to notice she was Cuban? Of course, the media will never point out that the vast majority of this kind of senseless accident is caused by a minority of drivers, but are we not supposed to notice?
           Calling all programming geniuses. You know who you are. Here is some code that obeys the rules and compiles, yet it does not work. Don’t look for logic errors, there aren’t any. (Hey, I wrote it myself.) It is a syntax error, but which one? Hint, it is the most basic of mistakes. If you can’t spot it, you should go schedule school busses or something, cause you ain’t no programmer, that’s for sure. It took me fifteen minutes so I’ll allow you a week. This will separate the whiz kids from the kids who whiz.

           for (i = 255; i >= 0; i = i - 1)
                      {
                      analogWrite(BasePin3,i);
                      delay(vDelay);
                      analogWrite(BasePin4,i);
                      delay(vDelay);
                      }

           On the lighter side, here is some trivia. You know that 12 oz can of soda you are drinking? It required 30 oz of water to produce it. The same source reports that before the invention of the light bulb, people slept 10 hours per night. It is now 6.9 hours. And the average house price in Florida has fallen (from the 2006 high) by 55.4%, to around $161,000. I long ago predicted it will eventually fall by 85% to $43,500. That is about what they are really worth. Only a fool would buy a single family dwelling before then. Live in a tent, but wait this thing out.
           This affects not only the suckers who bought this century, but the big-mouths who bragged for the last forty years about their “home equity”. It isn’t there, much like their ability to think clearly. You can pick up I’m not a shoulder for that crowd cry on, it serves them right. If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the oven. That’s a joke, son.
           Sure, I gave Staci-O the talk, and we rehearsed tonight. I insisted she use my practice methods, if you put the time in, make sure the time is effective. It that seems harshe, I point out no band I’ve ever created has failed to play some manner of live gig. I’m satisfied she put in some effort since last week but there are still many hours to go. But now she knows first hand the curve I expect to see. I demonstrated to her the process of instant feedback, rather than listening to a tune and trying to figure it out later. That doesn’t work worth a damn.
           For fun I sat down in the gravel and pulled up weeds. It is in the fine print. If I leave the place vacant and go to Canada, they cut the weeds. If I stay, it is my chore. Makes good Florida sense. I’m obligated to keep the flower bed free of invasion. But, but, they all grew flowers and I’m no botanist. How was I to know? Yielding to the rule book, I am slowly ripping every last weed up by the roots.