Bingo success can usually be determined by whether I go uptown or just over to Dunkin for Sunday brunch. Not today, despite an excellent bingo, it is Dunkin as the Jag is coming over a day late for rehearsal. What’s that all about? Well, if you’ve ever been to college you might know that Saturday mornings aren’t the best time to feel motivated, ahem. And I can be very forgiving when the issue is educational or musical. No questions asked, we re-scheduled for Sunday. As for bingo, I’m placing a big order for electronics parts this week.
What's this? Some readers are already squawking about my observations of college Friday nights. They way it was not like that at all. Well, if you really were on campus and your after hours were different than mine, well, that just tips us off which crowd you ran with. Can you spell n-e-r-d?
Boring. That brings me to the secondary topic of what is boring. Most people associate it with the slow-witted, yawning, straw-chewer, snapping his suspenders and asking when’s supper. Let’s look at the other side of that same coin. Sharp, educated, all the catch-phrases, totally immersed in social maneuvering, polished and politically correct. Versed in current affairs, knows the scores, reads the bestsellers and quick with the wits and comebacks. They can ape anything or anybody, but never, never an original idea. Like my brothers, they pour every ounce of energy into presenting that façade and have nothing left over to actually learn or do anything. And that type are equally boring. You’ll find both extremes down at the local bars, cheating on their wives and nipping out back for a half-time toke.
Two hours a day. That’s about what I put into the database development. It isn’t hard to tell how little would get done if one had to work eight hours a day first. What I’m saying is how difficult it is for a anyone who works for a living to create anything. Even one’s peak creative levels did follow any schedule (they don't, the odds of having any major inspirations after you get off work at the mill are mighty slim.
And when is a police report not a police report? When they use the media to lie through their teeth, I suppose. Today they released a story that a prison escapee was captured after 37 years on the run by using “facial recognition software”. This is nonsense. I work with computers and that is a cover story if I ever heard one.
They further claim that a military photo from 1981 was matched up against a current Florida driver’s license photo to “yield” a match. I’m not buying it and neither should anyone with any brains. This software is a smokescreen for some extra-legal process they want kept under wraps. The police have long since learned if the public believes they do it a certain way, no questions will be asked.
A parallel would be the age-old bull-donkey about how so many crimes are discovered by the police on “routine patrol”. No such thing. That was always a complete fabrication to cover up illegal police wire-tapping on a massive scale, such as I witnessed at the phone company. Using this method, the cops knew well in advance precisely when and where to stage a “routine patrol”. And since the suspects are caught red-handed, the issue of a wire-tap is never brought up at trial.
Never forget the cops have had 150 years experience and tons of public money to get around inconvenient matters like the law, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. There is the school of thought that says the police have the right to use every resource imaginable to catch the bad guy. But that school is kindergarten. The framers of the Constitution full well recognized the danger of allowing the police to break the law to enforce it.
There is also the issue of the Fifth Amendment. Regardless of its wording, the intent of that rule is that no person is to be compelled to testify against himself. The burden of proof rests upon the accuser. It is openly un-Constitutional to use a driver’s license for any other purpose than to determine if a person has passed a driving test. Identification used to be a totally different matter, did you know that? A lot of people have real difficulty grasping this. They’ve been conditioned to believe that ID and a driver’s license have always been the same thing.
Yet in fact, making it compulsory to give ID to get a driver’s license is directly in contravention to the principle of the Fifth. Please, spare us the nonsense that nobody “has” to get a driver’s license. Most people would not get a driver’s license if they had any other choice. A driver’s license these days is nothing but big trouble. And that old saw about driving being a privilege has long been debunked. There is no such law. It is a totally contrived phrase believed only by uneducated dolts. To those who say if one wants to drive, one should obey the law, I wish they’d make a driving law that tells those same people to go jump in the lake.
What fascinates me is: What are the police really covering up?
ADDENDUM
I thought about heading uptown last evening, but elected to stay put and mull over two important subjects. For me, that is, and for now. Music and database. If you ever wonder if your head is on straight, try programming a computer to operate a database. It would be easier to train somebody else to do it, or hire somebody, but if you can do it, you have successfully created a machine that is smarter than most people. It is databases that will ultimately enable robots to surpass humans in intelligence, beginning with sheer power of recall.
I was reinventing the wheel, sure. My program is a “flat file”, that is, it can look up records one after another, but does so very rapidly. Put another way, it is not random access or relational. Wanting record 5,000 means you have to read from the beginning. But the mental exercise is worth the headache. I look at it and see problems I solved—but DID NOT necessarily understand--years ago while in my teens. Like what happens if you want to delete a record, say in the middle of the file. Do you leave a placemarker? Do you collapse the remainder records to close up the space? How about sorting the file? Hint: that is why you use an index. Then you sort the index.
This tells me why a lot of commercial database software has snags and quirks they are not telling you about on the package. Like MicroSoft Access, with its upper limit on how many files it can handle. Sure, it is 100,000, but it is still a limit. Knowledge of the file structure does not seem usual for many coders, they prefer to work with “building blocks” without knowing how those function. Hence, I can get into almost every database but try as they might, my co-workers back at the old office could never get into mine. How? Well, for openers you don’t tell a guy like me to never use your caps-lock key when creating a password. That’s just setting yourself up.
Working best while distracted, I was pondering Karaoke the whole time. Going out to sing (which I would have given anything to be able to do when much younger) is no longer a challenge. I’m not the best singer, but I’m the best at the songs that I do. I avoid doing songs other participants chose but it is not uncommon for people to outright steal songs that I dug out of the locker. I was at most of these Karaoke shows for years before I learned to sing and know exactly who does what.
That is not what I was mulling over. Lots of people can sing but what makes a star? For about a week I’ve been scrutinizing videos to see what makes the difference. I’ve won every Karaoke contest I’ve ever entered but I am not always the best singer present. For that matter, I’ve gone up against professional Karaoke types (remember the Mardis Gras) who have taken lessons, know the disk jockey, and show up wearing evening gowns. Um, the women, I mean. And most of the good singers have been doing 50 year old songs for at least 25 years. The prize money weeds out the wannabes.
My conclusion? It is only 60% singing. That’s still the biggest factor, but the rest is a combination of looks, presentation, demeanor, stage presence, choice of material, working the room, time of day, not being grossly overweight, and not singing too early or too late in the evening. Exception? If there is a crowd already in the building, try to be the first singer of the evening. This most certainly works for me.
