Right now my mind is teeming with thoughts. So many that it is giving me a headache. I hate when I get like this. There is nowhere to go, nothing to do. I have no place to put these thoughts. My head just wants to explode.
Pacino usually is in entertaining if not solid movies. This one is both. Matthew McConaughey also is very solid as is Rene Russo. Solid offering all around. I like how it wasn't too formulaic. You could follow the story easily and it was a familiar tune but it didn't make those blatantly obvious turns. The acting is what made this movie better than what the plot gave it. The plot wasn't overly complex and didn't try to explore a lot of complex issues. The characters were clearly the centerpiece. Pacino really did a good job I thought although his character was kind of murky in some respects. If only because of the unbelievable situation of a person like him was in. I won't give away spoilers but it didn't seem to fit. This movie is definately entertaining and worth seeing if your looking for something to do.
I read about how a certain flu drug is in short supply everywhere on the planet and only made by one company. Let's see here. We have patents and companies trying to protect profits or at least not "give away" their money makers. We also have the potential for a deadly pandenmic that pretty much everyone is in agreement that it will happen and we need to be prepared. Furthermore we have the technology and know-how to contain and stop such a pandemic and everyone is in agreement on that. I fail to see how this turns into a pandemic. If you can't tell that last sentence was sarcastic. The pathetic part about this situation is that everyone agrees how bad it could be and how to prevent it. Yet nothing is done. Not even a hint of cooperation among pharmacuetical companies or world governments. Pathetic. They will give you a million excuses as to why they aren't doing anything. Does anyone wonder why I have no respect or confidence in the world at large anymore or why I could care less about standards and policies or working for THE MAN.
For whatever odd reason I am still raring to go from this morning. My day hasn't been particularly good. I just walked in from the movies theater to the same empty house and weak smell of the turkey burgers I had for dinner (again). Saw this lizard on my doorstep when I walked in. Never seen something like that around here. I didn't think animals like that lived around here. I took a pic and put it in the banner rotation. Just keep hitting reload to eventually get to it. It might not even be a lizard, maybe it is a salamander. Which apparently there are salamanders that call Pennsylvania home. Yeah I probably was a salamander. Judging by the other pics I've seen and the fact that it came out in the rain.
I went to subway for lunch and there was this woman and her coworker talking. Mainly it was here complaining about her husband and the cleaning lady. Also they were discussing the corporate environment. I was thinking I could listen to that shit all day, because my life is that uninteresting that this amuses me. I was also thinking that her husband is banging the cleaning lady and she has no idea. But that is evil so I didn't explore that to much. I want to tell her, that I enjoyed eavesdropping on her conversation but I think she was the type that would have chewed me out if I did. Not because I eavesdropped but just because I told her and someone she needs to put me in my place. Then again who knows what she would have said.
In the parking lot at work after lunch I saw a gopher. I get real excited and wanted to go chase it. I was thinking, look at that fat little bastard run. It provided about 30 seconds of amusement. I didn't chase it.
I wake up this morning full of pip and vinegar. Raring to go. Carp Diem and all that shit. Just downright jolly. Why? My bed is empty, my job is mind numbing and I have not prospects or even the slightest glimmer of hope to change any of that. But for whatever sinister reason this is how I felt when I woke up.
Fast foward to now, at work, I still feel the same. Although walking in the door made it take a small hit. Not much though, this place isn't bad just boring. Full of pip and vinegar, raring to go, carp diem. That shit is going to give me a heart attack because I ain't got shit to do except worry about not having shit to do. I hope this crap is amusing you because it's not amusing me. At least my sore throat is almost gone.
I just can't sit here. I have to many wicked awesome projects to work on.
I wish they would change the education system. I absolutely hated school. All of it. With the exception of a few classes. I hated school and the way they did things. Tests, grades, homework, rigidity. I hated that shit. I dreaded going to class everyday because I knew it was going to be more of the same shit. You know what I particularly hated when I was real little. Sitting through lessons about things for days when I had already learned the stuff in like the first hour. That shit was annoying. Like writting. I taught myself cursive writting in 2 hours by myself one day at home. Then having to go through those freaking writting lessons throughout 1st - 4th grade was annoying as hell. I was like, dude, I know this shit already lets move on. I also remeber someone telling me I couldn't read in pre-k. I was flabberghasted when they told me that. I remeber reading this little book about an orange and a giant. And my teacher and mom were like "your not really reading yet." I wanted to say "the hell I ain't." I don't think they recognized that I could read until months later. Or even the next year. It was funny sometimes being a little kid who was smart and always finished things before everyone else. What happened though is that I got progressively more bored and began to pay less and less attention in class until like 8th grade when I just tuned out completely and never went back. My mind would just wander while in class. I was never disruptive but I was rarely focused on what was going on in class. It was funny in math class though, because I never paid attention so I did bad. But like the 4 times that I did pay attention I always got like the highest grades on tests. One week i'd get like the lowest grade then the next I'd get a perfect paper. I hated school. I think I've talked about this before. Aw hell I'm repeating myself again. Fuck. I hated school.
Email from a recruiter I stay in contact with just came in. 5 month contract, 38/hr, but in Wilmington. I don't know if that is enough money to make me go there. Gas will be at least $100 a week. To go that far I want more than that. Now I'm just tired. Maybe I should just work one more month then try and start that web hosting thing. That is the best idea I have.
Why doesn't anyone challenge car makers and engineers to come up with an automated highway system in 10 years. Not build one, but in 10 years have the plan to begin to start to build one. Like the interstate higway project of the 50's it would be a great challenge and and great thing. I don't hear people talking about that kind of thing. All I hear is making cars more fuel efficient. Let's virtually eliminate vehicular accidents on highways. This is so freaking possible it is not even funny. Fuck, I'm just mad at people and their patheticness. I read about Microsoft wanting to launch a system of satelittes to provide global internet access or something like that. Great idea, to bad they are too busy making crappy software and arguing with the rest of the crappy software industry to do something awesome like that.
I think everybody has generally the same goals. They just don't agree how to get there. I guess I don't know. I think about the software industry.
I don't get how anybody keeps defending anything our government and president bush does anymore. I can't remember the last time the government made a decent policy deicision. Not in my lifetime probably. You know what I always hear a lot from defenders of conservatism. "Stop being so liberal" and "the media is smearing government" and "you lost get over it". It is like they have nothing to show for the government they suppport so they simply attack the detractors. Usually when you support something you cite the benefits of it. But there aren't any (or at least very very few) to speak of. I don't know what kind of arguement "you liberals want him to fail" is. As if somehow that is the reason for a crappy performance. Very weird.
I wish I could gather articles back from Clinton's presidency to see how things were said when they were the other way around. First of all, since the country was in much better shape there was probably less things to fault someone one. But then again.
I try to think about each issue and the parties stance on each. See where they are going wrong. War on terrorism, ha just think about the war on drugs. War on terrorism must be some kind of joke. First off you send armies in to destabalize and secularly ruled country. Now suddenly that secularism is going out the window and along comes religion. Besides the fact that religion is nonsense this stuff is extreme radical religion. Ok forget about actually going to war, because that shit already happened. How do you end it? Ha, apparently no one knows. Not the supporters not the detractors nobody. You can only decry the crapulance of a situation for so long when it is obvious no one is listening (this is know personally). So when I hear a whole bunch of countries withdraw support from the shit in Iraq and that is it I want to shit in their garden. How is it that we are always personally chastised for complaining and not doing anything but that seems to be the norm and the encouraged way of doing things on the world stage. Supporters of the war have the right to call them cowards for sure. Not for pulling out of Iraq, but for sitting there with their thumbs up their asses and doing jackshit about it. That is playing loserball and I am a regular at loserball. I'm tired now.
Saw that movie Maria Full of Grace. It was solid. But the thing that I noticed the most was how authentic it felt. I guess being in Venezuela for just over a month got me so used to that kind of life. So when I was watching the movie all I could think about was, damn that is exactly how things are.
Fuck I'm bored. But I have energy. But not focused energy to do anything constructive. I see that Gwen Stefani is playing the Wachovia center soon. I'd go except that somehow I wouldn't fit in with screaming 14 year old girls. I guess it is not as bad as wanting to go to an Enrique Iglesias concert. Maybe I should just go anyway, by myself and be the creepiest guy on the planet for one night.
I actually had a pretty good dinner tonight. I cooked it too. Ha. No I cook a lot. But not enough. It was basic, two turkey burgers with some fresh tomato and green leaf lettuce. On a wheat kaiser roll. Not the best roll but much better than your typical hamburger bun. The fact that I took the 30 mins to prepare something like that impresses me. Not really, but it makes me feel better than going to Wendy's.
New iPOD with video support came out today. Not that exciting, not even new as far as portable video goes but its Apple so people make a big deal. The design is exactly the same as the nano except it is bigger. Although it is bigger than the nano it is smaller and thinner than any previous regular iPOD. Screen is slightly bigger too. What would have been really impressive is having the whole face of the thing be a screen and get rid of that ridiculous wheel. They can make the whole screen touch sensitive and I know there are platics that scratch much less than the screen for the iPOD nano. I think they were just being cheap there. I just think about how you can't scratch polished grantie with a really sharp knife. Some kind of plastic with that kind of durability would be great. But seriously revealing a video iPOD that was all screen would have been cool. Lets take that coolness to a next step. A whole screen iPOD capable of displaying holograms. Its possible. The technology exists just not in that kind of size yet. That would be a movie viewer. The LCD screen could be like a window into viewing a movie. You really have to had read some about holograms to be excited as I am about these things I am throwing out. Get some books from the library and read up on how they work.
Some technologies that excite me the most right now are polymers that glow. I forget the name for it. But basically it is plastic that glows when you run electricity through it. Another one is thin plastic solar cells that convert infrared light to electricity. Again basically a solar cell that converts heat into electricity using the photovoltaic effect, not just heating water to make steam. Also new battery technologies such as fuel cells, whether they be hydrogen or methane or something and the thin plastic battery research that I hear is coming out of some company in Israel. Advances is photo capturing technology. So that eventually a digital camera will be able to capture a picture at the same and greater resolutions than the human eye. Although the human eye doesn't see images the same way as a camera, getting a device that could at least make something look as good as what the human eye sees is one step closer to artificial eyes. Replacement eyes will happen eventually. Maybe in my lifetime. I also think about artificial replacement parts and real replacments body parts grown in labs. Which will come first? Which will dominate? Will one way be better for certain things than the other way? Which is more difficult to do? You see the two battling today, kind of. We have heart transplants and we have artificial hearts. So far I think transplants are winning out, but is it just a matter of time before the artificial heart becomes ubiquotous. Or will we simply grow another heart using our DNA in a lab when we need another? Which is better? Which will people want? Will it simply be a matter of preference?
Biometrics still out of reach for U.S. ATMs
Now Columbia is kicking our ass. Fucking Columbia. I love it. Where are the fucking patriots when this shit happens. Those fuckers sing songs and are so proud of america and its gun toting soldiers beating the bad guys. But those asswipes haven't a clue where we are really getting are ass kicked. The most ironic part is that American companies are doing the work. Columbian banks, people and governnment have more sense than the U.S. when it comes to this stuff. They have more sense! How can this be? They are the #1 exporter of cocaine. Ha. I love it. Viva Columbia!
When I use computers now I just imagine what they could be. And what I imagine goes beyond Microsoft, Google, IBM, etc.. and their small minded ideas that we see presented in the media. Although the actual ideas by the individuals inside may be more what I am thinking about. The focus of software is still not its actual use. People will use certain software because they are accostommed to the interface and certain features. But the idea of features needs to go away. Software needs to be designed with the way a person naturally thinks. Input methods have to be completely overhauled from the keyboard and mouse standard. Voice recognition should be the primary. Not just voice recognition, but semantical voice recognition. Working with a computer should be like interacting with a human that can do everything you can think of with data but 1 trillion times faster than you physically can. Think about how we work on computers now and how we are at the mercy of input methods. Not just the input device but the type of input. We have to point and click our way around an interface, type in commands, etc... Think about something you would do on the computer like search for directions. You have to go to a website that is like 5 clicks right there. Then you have to type in starting and ending adresses wait for the website to respond and then display the map that is like another 10 clicks. You then have to scroll down and read each line, then scroll back up and look at the map, then if you want to zoom you need another click. Getting directions should be as simple as; Saying starting and ending addresses and BAM! a map popping up with all routes. No clicking no waiting none of that bullshit.
So I am watching the evening news and I see this consumer report on tires. Specifically filling your car tires with Nitrogen. I decided to listen carefully to the whole report before I went out and shot somebody in the head. Why do they continue to give such half-assed reports. Holy freaking shit. The only mention that regular air is 80% nitrogen was an off the cuff remark toward the end of the story by the reporter. Throughout the whole report and even after the only astute comment they continued to make a distinction between filling your tires with oxygen or filling them with nitrogen. Go ahead and fill your tires with pure oxygen and see what happens. They just kept saying that throughout the whole report. Even when the mechanic they interviewed properly said air the reporter kept using oxygen as if they were interchangable. They are going to confuse the hell out of a ton of people with garbage reporting like that. They don't even go into the reasons why nitrogen is beneficial. All they say is NASCAR stock cars have been using them and that it stays in the tire longer because the molecule is heavier. Those kinds of statements don't mean shit. "The molecule is heavier", I can't believe they would say something as vague as that. It is a wonder some assclowns don't want to believe certain scientific things because of lack of "evidence". When people get their information presented to them like that crappy ass report there is no evidence presented. How is the hell can you connect a molecule being heavy with it being better for your tire because it doesn't leak out as fast. Holy shit! How much more ignorant can you get in your reporting. They also had the nerve to make tenuous connections to increased safety with nitrogen in your tires. Really the increased safety is from having your tires properly filled. Which they say, but the way the presented it was as if fillinf your tires with nitrogen will give you some intrinsic safety benefit. I also love how they used the poor mechanic as some kind of expert for their slipshod reporting. They edited the shit out of him. This guy was actually trying to present a clear truthful picture of what nitrogen in the tires actually does for you but they cut up his words and probably cut of more of his important statements so much that he looks like he is suppporting the crap the reporter is trying to push off as good reporting. I don't even want to think about all the information they just left out. The report was pathetic and I hate to imagine that this is the standard. Fuck man, you don't have to do much research or need advanced physics degrees to get that report right. It is like these fuckers don't even try. Fuck man, fuck.
I have one project that I really want to get out of startup stages. I've tested the concept and created basic software that is in use and feedback has been extremely positive. If I don't act soon to pull this together my opportunity for this thing might slip away. Not that there won't be others but this is one that has solid interest. I wittled down some other pressing things so I do have a bit more time now. I think my next step is to sit down and come up with an initial plan. I have bits and pieces but nothing cohesive. One of the main things to work on for the software is the GUI design. I haven't really put much thought into it yet. Back end DB is more solid right now but that also still needs work. I'll at least try to get a plan laid out this week.
Holy freaking snit my mother is a creationist. She rejects the idea of evolution because there is no evidence. Yet somehow she can find evidence for some mystical being magiking up people. She also thinks it is the end of days. Now I knew she was never the most rational thinking of people but holy shit I never took her for a complete moron. I spent three hours trying convince her how fucked up "faith" is. I failed. At least my father still has some sense. The day he subscribes to such ludicrous ideas is the day he walks out the door and is greeted by the rapture. Ha.
"The whole idea is to make voting as simple as possible." - full article
Well dudes, Estonia has kicked the crap out of the United States when it comes to a voting system. Have you seen those pathetic e-voting machines they use in the U.S. They are an abomination. They look like and operate in the fashion of glow pegs. You see they massive sheet of paper covered in thin plastic with these little green lights to light up when you press the buttons behind the paper. There are no pictures are anything, no confirmation, no nothing. And if the designers and supporters of those things think they are doing security a favor they are just plain wrong.
I've been taking a lot of different cold medecines. Maybe not a lot but more than usual. Most recently I've been taking Nyquil, which I've never taken before. That shit fucked me up some kind of good. Strangest feeling in a while. My body felt like I was drunk. I felt numb all over and my head swam. But none of the nausea or heavy kind of depressive body mood associated with being drunk. I have really bad sore throat right now so I've been taking these throat lozenges with Benzocaine and Menthol. I've eaten two over the past 24 hours or so but right now as I eat it it gives me this strange feeling, like being drunk again, though not as intense as the Nyquil. Also it numbs my whole mouth like novacaine. Exact same kind of numbness that you feel when you get novacaine at the dentist.
I think I need to stop being astounded at how ignorant people are. The lack of understanding and knowledge people have of things is disturbing. The only solace I can find is in looking back over history and seeing the trend on humans towards gaining more understanding and leaving ignorance behind. Will the time period during my lifetime become that second renaisance or enlightenment where we will make huge gains in that area once again? Or will human society be as stagnant as the middle ages?
So now I can't sleep. I was thinking about the universe and this intelligent design thing. Not just the intelligent design thing but the meaning behind what it states. Life is so complex that an intelligent designer had to put it together. I think that is an odd statement. First I think that the statement presupposes some kind of total perfection in the universe. They say that evolution and the randomness it has could not have come up with the world we know today. I don't get that kind of thinking. We know one world. And some seem to think it is the only world possible. I don't know how to put this into words. It is our definition of randomness. Randomness to most people is chaos. Randomness to most people is unorderly. Randomness is imperfect. Think about what pops into your head when you think of randomness. Think about it for a second. All the examples of randomness that you have stored in your mind. What are they? I won't name any here so I don't influence people, but just think for a second about what randomness means to you.
Do the examples you've thought of have order to them. Even the dictionary skews the essense of randomness. First defintion from answers.com goes as follows.
I was reading some article of a few quantam physicists and their thoughts about the universe and randomness. They were tossing the idea around that the whole universe now is truly random. That the essence of this universe is simply the noise of tiny particle zipping around in no particular pattern. That the universe is simply just noise. This goes back to subjective consciousness that I talked about earlier and perception. How is it that we as people seem to take this noise and make it into an orderly world. Not only that, but can we ever be sure as to what the person next to us perceives the world as. Is their perception of this noise radically different from mine? Do we only agree in our perception through the commonality of communication? What that means is the color red the same to me and you simply because we have agreed to call it the color red? What if my red is the explosion of a supernova. I don't think about or take thoughts like these to deep because you'd go insane. The world would fall apart. But I always keep these questions of subjective consciousness in mind. Even as just a way to stand back from things and try to view something differently.
Are people just so afraid of the unknown that they have to make up something to comfort themselves. I don't get it sometimes. I've come to almost enjoy the unknown. Maybe I wouldn't go that far. But I don't know why I would say anything or anyone had everything figured out. When I read about certain physicists trying to come up with a theory of everything I laugh because they are starting to sound like religious zealots who know all or at least say they will someday. Fear of the unknown is a huge thing in humans. We grow up with this fear. Being scared of the dark and whatnot. The unknown has come to drive me. Maybe not all the time but more and more. I makes me want to live forever sometimes simply to keep on trying to discover and know everything and not be sure whether I will or not. The idea that there is no end is kind of comforting. The idea that I may never know an end is interesting. Even with this fear of the unknown that is apart of humans it is the unknown that drives us. Philosophers ask why and look for answers. But it seems to me on some level that by asking the question why and looking they have answered their question. That is kind of funny thinking but so is that stuff we call faith.
I wonder about those who take their faith seriously or even those who don't take it seriously. Why do they believe. Is it fear. A fear that no one can admit. Take the most devout muslim, christian, hindu whatever. One who lives his life in peace and tranquility with his faith. One who has found jesus or god or whatever. So now through this knowledge of god or relationship with jesus christ they have found something. Something to hold on to something that they know is truth. That they "know". I often hear christians talk about knowing god. I'd hate this point turn into something purely semantical but it is almost that way. They become confident in their knowledge. They don't even want to think about the unknown. Contained in their faith is disregard for the unknown. They give a name to the unknown and call it god. I just can't make the jump. Now this is where things get hairy. Because maybe one would call into question my vehement assertion that unknown is unknowable as some sort of knowing. I don't know what to think of that but I ask myself the same question sometimes. I don't have the slightest idea where to go from here. I always get stuck here in my thinking. So then I just go back, to basic things like what I am going to eat for breakfast. Bagel sounds good. I'm confused and don't know what else to write.