Defenestrating Thoughts from the Bivouac

Crissy’s been hard at work making her jewelry business a reality and has made a ton of progress. So far, she has:

• Etsy Store (buy your Christmas presents today!)
• Design Gallery for people to get ideas for custom orders
• Merchandise in two stores: Art Mart (on Pearl Street Mall in Boulder) and the Lafayette Library.

If you are interested in buying something, you can order right now at our Etsy Store. Or you contact either of us to order directly or for custom orders.

I’m also working on getting our own web store up and running. Hopefully it will open soon. Crissy’s whole product line will be available on that site.

And no, this isn’t one of the businesses that I mentioned I was starting in my Birthday resolutions. One of those will hopefully launch in mid-January. Currently we’re working on the setting up the domain, designing the landing pages, filing the corporation paperwork, and opening a business bank account.

It’s all very exciting! :-)

A friend sent me links to these two great YouTube videos

• Calculus in 20 Minutes, Part 1
• Calculus in 20 Minutes, Part 2

(I wanted to embed the videos, but for some reason the owner of the videos disabled that option.)

I really liked watching these. I was surprised at how many calculus I didn’t forget; while I forgot some memorizable facts (like the derivative of ln(x)), I did remember most of the concepts.

I also had a few moments during the conceptual discussion where things “clicked” in my head (also known as a “Aha!” moment). Unfortunately now that I’m not in school and not learning new conceptual stuff full-time, these moments occur a lot less often than I’d like.

Forget working for Detroit or Wall Street, I need a job where someone pays me to sit around and learn new stuff. Perhaps I should consider becoming, as Professor Richards says, a “gradual student”. :-)

A couple of weeks ago, my parents hosted a pooja at their house. About 10 families came, so there were a good number of kids running around. Half the parents made their kids sit still and participate in the pooja, while the other half left their kids to their own devices.

We learned an important lesson a few years ago about kids left to their own devices during a pooja. At that pooja, while all the adults where partcipating in the services, the kids dismantled the Taj Mahal 3D puzzle I’d spent weeks assembling. And once they finished taking it apart, they proceeded to tear some of the pieces in half.

Anyway…

After that incident, we started to set up a small TV in the adjacent room so the kids can watch movies. I usually tell the kids that they can quietly watch TV, but if they are loud I’ll make them participate in the pooja. That usually scares them straight.

There’s nothing like the fear of having to worship God to set a kid straight. :-P

All our kids movies in my parents house are on VHS and the small TV we use is a 13 inch tube. When the kids saw it this setup, they got really excited! One tiny kid screamed “It’s puny!”, while the other kids started bragging about the TVs they have in their homes and rooms: “We have a 46 inch LCD!” “Oh yeah, we have a 60 inch LCD!” “I have a 52 inch plasma in my room!”

Kids nowadays have 52 inch TVs in their bedroom?

I never felt so old in my life.

Until 15 seconds later.

“Why don’t you start the movie?” asked one kid.

“Oh, the tape needs to rewind,” I replied.

And then there was silence.

I asked them, “Have anyone of you seen video tapes before?” Only one 12 year girl had. She said she found a box of them in her parents’ basement.

“Why does it have to do that?” (“that” == “rewind”), interrupted another kid.

So I started to explain “Well, it’s like… um…” I was at a complete loss, what’s a good analogy to teach kids about the why you need to rewind tapes? Their world is all digital, mine apparently is analog. As I tried to figure out what to say, I got interrupted.

“That’s puny! That’s puny! That’s puny!” yelled the smallest kid pointing at the TV while dancing gleefully. Fortunately Crissy walked in, picked up the screaming little kid and teased him, “Short little boys shouldn’t be calling things puny.”

He laughed and squealed, and finally settled down.

Just then the tape stopped rewinding! I pressed Play. Success!

Except that it was a Disney movie. So there were 30 minutes worth of previews. So now I had to fast forward and you knew what came next: “Why can’t you hit Root Menu?”. Anyway, we eventually got everything working.

On the topic of feeling old, it’s a strange feeling being an adult at a party your parents host. Growing up the screaming kids were my peer group, but now all the adults are my peer group. But given the circumstances of a party at my parents’ house, I still associate myself with the kids and not the adults.

Growing up, the adults are the weird people with jobs, that sit around and talk about politics, the economy, and — oh wait.

As the party was winding down, one of the adults asked their kid, “Did you thank Vijay Uncle for showing you the movie?”

And I thought, who’s this “Vijay Uncle” character? :-P

(Because of the British influence on India, Indian kids don’t say Mr. and Mrs., they say Auntie and Uncle.)

So, I guess it’s official, I’m not a kid anymore.

What happens if you have a 6-foot alligator fight a 13-foot python? Apparently, the fight ends with a draw as they both end up dead. Recently in the Everglades (Florida), rangers found the remains of this epic battle:

The Burmese python tried to swallow its fearsome rival whole but then exploded.

…

The python’s remains were found with the victim’s tail protruding from its burst midsection. The head of the python was missing.

The slightly disturbing picture can be found here.

Experts said that there have been four known similar encounters in the past; in these cases, the alligator either won or the battle was a draw:

The rangers say the find suggests that non-native Burmese pythons might even challenge alligators’ leading position in the food chain in the swamps.

Wow. Now I’m very scared of Florida.

I stopped by Mom and Dad’s house on the way home from work the other day and as usual, I brought in their mail. In addition to the usual mail, there was a small ad (like 3 by 5 inches) torn out of a newspaper for a charity that will take your old car.

This didn’t come from the post office; this was placed in the box by one my parent’s neighbors.

Why? Well, Mom and Dad have an old car parked in the driveway. It’s a 1985 Camry that’s in good shape and still runs great. And they use it from time to time when one of their cars is in for repairs or when we have someone visiting that needs to borrow a car.

But, apparently its existent is offensive to one of the neighbors. Apparently Boulder, home of easy-going, fun-loving, mountain-climbing hippee is being slowly taken over by people who wish they lived on Wisteria Lane.

Two things annoy me about this. First is, who cares if your neighbor has an old car? Second, what’s up with the passive-aggressive note? If you don’t have the conviction to be honest, and have to hide behind anonymity, you probably don’t have much of a case.

I imagine if the neighbor was honest, they would come to the door and said, “Hello, I just wanted to tell you that my friends came over the other day and they saw an old car in your driveway. Because that car is in my neighborhood, my friends thought I was poor and now I’m not being invited to the good dinner parties. Can you please get rid of the car? My self esteem is suffering.”

Sheesh, what a sad world some people live in.

Crissy and I don’t drink beer, but we do buy some when we host a party. And then, since our friends know we don’t drink, they bring beer to the party assuming we don’t have any. But our guests never consume more than they bring. Either we have generous guests or boring guests. :-)

So, anyway, over time, our beer stash grows.

Last night, I was cleaning out our second bedroom (the office / guest room / storage room) I realized that we had over 50 bottles of beer. This morning I carried them all out to my car and brought them to work with the goal of giving them away.

As luck would have it, one of my colleagues is having a party in 2 weeks, so she is inheriting all the beer. Yay! 50 fewer things to take to Colorado!

The Internet is a wonder; with it you get to learn all sorts of strange and interesting things. The other day a friend mentioned that I, as a vegetarian, shouldn’t drink Guinness because it has fish in it.

One quick Google search later and I learned that Guinness and other beers use Isinglass, which comes from fish bladders, as a finishing agent to clarify (remove sediment from) the beer. Strictly speaking, the Isinglass stays on the bottom of the vat, but it’s likely that minute bits are still in the beer.

Wow, I wonder what else is in that glass. :-)

And some more geek humor to tickle your nerdy bone: I present a real engineer’s calculator:

(If you don’t get this joke, congrats! You’re normal!)

“Experts” say that when you open your car trunk to load groceries, you should leave your car doors locked. That way, while you’re distracted putting things in the trunk, no one can sneak into your car.

It sounds good in practice, but I find myself doing the exact opposite. Now that I replaced my old Accord, I actually have a key remote that unlocks my doors and opens my trunk. So as I walk up to my car, I unlock the doors and pop the trunk. This way if I accidentally lock my keys in the trunk, I can open the car door and use the trunk release to get the keys.

Not that this ever happened; I’ve never locked the keys in the car or the trunk (knock on wood). But it seems prudent. The chances of my locking my keys in my truck are much, much higher than some guy sneaking into my car as I load groceries (especially now that I have a job, I don’t have to shop at the sketchy grocery store like I did while I was in college).

Even if it’s 100 times more likely that I lock my keys in the trunk than a guy sneaking into my car, I think it’s worth it. Imagine locking your keys in 100 times; now imagine a random guy getting into your car — whom you will likely see or hear anyway, since it’s hard to hide in a sedan.

Seems like a prudent trade-off. What do you think?