Observation

Whoever is primarily responsible for Rick Perry's image is not doing him any favors.  The glasses never have been right.  Now his toupee really seems to be way more obvious than it should be, almost as if he borrowed it from someone.  Sad.

Uh, Well, Guess So

Was walking through Walmart on a regular work day, and it struck me that there were a large number of crusty, gray haired guys there.  Then it hit me that I'm one of 'em.  At the time, I was feeling early twenties I guess.  It was a shock.

Halfs

Early morning sleeplessness somehow hosted thoughts of halfs.  The number 5 is associated with halfs.  0.5 is 1/2 and 50 is half a hunnerd.  With time, halfs are associated with 30.  30 seconds is half a minute, 30 minutes is half an hour.  Half a day, though, is 12 hours.  Half a dozen is 6.  There are six five-minute periods in a half an hour.  There are five 12 minute periods in an hour.  So, halfs can be made of 5s, 6s, or 30s.  5x6=30.

Interesting, For Some

It just seems a little intriguing to me that we refer to transportation as "shipping," even when no marine vessels are involved.

Shelf Life

I guess I'm just ridiculously intrigued by Pop Tarts.  The little pastries with the slightest touch of something that gives the perception of a fruit filling, although filling is much too encompassing a term.  I wondered today of the shelf life of a box of the little jewels that we have probably had for 2-3 months already.  May 2013.  Really?  12 month or so shelf life for a skiff of sugary stuff surrounded by slightly undercooked dough.  Wow.

I Wonder

There was a little comment in a recent Consumer Reports magazine, saying a college study had shown that people who wore a pedometer took a certain number more steps than those who do not wear a pedometer. I couldn't help but wonder: how did they know how many steps were taken by the people who didn't wear the pedometer?

As It Should Be

It seems I spend a lot of time just trying to keep things like they should be. I mow the grass and clean up the yard, because the yard should look like it does after I do that. I water the grass because the grass will die without water, and grass is supposed to be alive. I go to the grocery store to stock the pantry that shouldn't be empty. I pay bills because they are supposed to be paid. I work on computers - seemingly almost all the time - not to enhance their performance, but simply to try to keep them doing what they should do. I patch cracks because the cracks shouldn't be there in the first place.

The unending human battle against the natural force of entropy.

Idioms

Folks in the media need to be more careful about using combinations of words that they have heard others use, but that they have no idea what they mean. Sometime back, I noted someone who described something as a "long road to hoe." One does not hoe a road, one hoes a row. Hoeing is a method of removing weeds from crop plants which are generally planted in rows. A long row to hoe is a lot of work. Some will identify something as a "hard row to hoe." That's OK, because rows with a lot of weeds or rocky or hard soil are in fact hard to hoe. Many who use these terms in current day probably have never held or used a hoe, and probably don't even know what one is.

Another troublesome composition is "pedal to the metal." Those not living through the CB radio days probably really don't know what this means. It simply means pressing a vehicle's accelerator pedal down as far as it will go (assuming there is a metal floorboard underneath the carpet), maximizing acceleration, fuel consumption, eventual speed, and risk. In the context of today's world of public highways and typical vehicles, there is never a logical reason to reach the point of having the accellerator pedal touch or remain for any period of time as it's lower extreme limit.

Using "pedal to the medal," even if it is misunderstood by the speaker, is still better than saying "depressing the accellerator." While functionally correct, depressing something that is intended to increase speed seems counterproductive. It's psychologically unsatisfying anyway. "Punch it" has too many violent connotations, and a punch is an action not normally undertaken with one's foot. "Kick it" implies something you want to get rid of. "Skin 'er back" would take too much explaining about the connection to spinning the tires and leaving a little "skin" of rubber behind them on the road.

In this case, perhaps "shut up and drive" is the best combination of words.

Way Back Machine

For some utterly unknown reason, I was thinking today about "new math". This was the experiment tried on several of us unsuspecting school kids back in the 60's. The School Mathematics Study Group (SMSG) came up with a curriculum, bound in a yellow paperback textbook, that was supposed to take us all to another level of capability in mathematics excellence. I thought it was stupid and confusing, and they lost me on set theory, which I believe was the first chapter. I was busy still trying to understand how to solve the "a train leaves Seattle, traveling east at 50 miles per hour...." problem, and they wanted me to describe the resulting set that is formed through the confluence of set A and set D. So what? It just leads to academic discussions of junkified weirdness like considering that the set of all sets of unique elements cannot exist. Okay, fine, but that won't solve a quadratic equation (which I never understood the importance of, but we spent almost two years in high school math learning how to solve one).

So, one assumes that 2+2 equals 4, having realized that in kindergarten. However, now we understand that 2 could represent a theoretical set of uniquely relational numbers, in which case 2+2 equals the union of the two sets represented each by the number 2, although in this case, 2 does not necessarily equal 2, since each 2 could represent a discrete set. If each 2 represents the same set, meaning that 2=2, then 2+2=2, since the union of a set with itself is the same set. See, I got it, even though they lost me there. It's difficult to understand how 2+2=4 only in the most elementary and simplistic environments. In more enlightened environments, 2+2 equals an unknown array of potential answers or, if 2=2, then 2+2=2. Wait till we get to subtraction, let alone multiplication and division.

So, as a gullible 4th grader, answer this one: What is the denominator of the fraction that solves the equation 3x-7=8? Well, the simple answer is x=5. But that's not what they asked. 5 is not a fraction, unless you know SMSG. 5/1 is a fraction, equalling the number 5, so the denominator is 1. However, x could equal 10/2, 15/3, 20/4, etc. So the real answer for the denominator is the set of whole positive numbers from 1 to infinity. But wait. What if the numerator is negative? What if it is a non-whole number? The only denominator then that doesn't work is zero. And that's the answer: The set of all numbers not equal to zero. Doesn't have a flippin' thing to do with the reality that you have 3 times as many apples as Billy Bob. You give 7 apples to Emmy Lou, and have 8 left. How many apples does Billy Bob have? Uh, it could be any number other than zero, unless we are constrained to actual whole apples or apples in hand rather than imagined or forecasted, in which case the answer would be all whole numbers greater than zero. Give me a break. Give that answer in class and Billy Bob will meet you on the playground after school, beat you up, throw your SMSG book in a puddle, and take all your apples.

Some Mess Some Garbage, as we called SMSG back then, apparently was a failure and has been abandoned. It left an impact, though. I still feel uncomfortable when I see a yellow paperback book, including the Yellow Pages, at least until I have proven to myself that it really is just a phone book.

Handy

If you are using Word 2003 or earlier, Ctrl+Shift+8 will turn on and off the display of hidden characters. Not quite as good as the old reveal codes in Wordperfect, but it's better than not knowing how to see any of the hidden stuff. Apprarently, this is a ribbon choice in Word 2007.