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About This Author
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Complex Numbers
Complex Numbers
A complex number is expressed in the standard form a + bi, where a and b are real numbers and i is defined by i^2 = -1 (that is, i is the square root of -1). For example, 3 + 2i is a complex number.
The bi term is often referred to as an imaginary number (though this may be misleading, as it is no more "imaginary" than the symbolic abstractions we know as the "real" numbers). Thus, every complex number has a real part, a, and an imaginary part, bi.
Complex numbers are often represented on a graph known as the "complex plane," where the horizontal axis represents the infinity of real numbers, and the vertical axis represents the infinity of imaginary numbers. Thus, each complex number has a unique representation on the complex plane: some closer to real; others, more imaginary. If a = b, the number is equal parts real and imaginary.
Very simple transformations applied to numbers in the complex plane can lead to fractal structures of enormous intricacy and astonishing beauty.
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November 30, 2019 at 12:20am November 30, 2019 at 12:20am
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PROMPT November 30th
Congratulations on making it to the last day of the competition! What was your favorite prompt from the last month? Did you learn anything new about your fellow competitors? What was the most rewarding aspect of participating in the competition?
Well, that was a fast 30 days.
I am shocked to report that my favorite prompt was the Thanksgiving one. You remember, the five-sentences one? I didn't expect that one to be my favorite. No, not at all. I went back to my hotel room on Wednesday, having achieved beerenity, and read the prompt and was like, "But there's nothing I'm going to enjoy about Thanksgiving."
And then the next day I saw that damn rainbow and I nodded and I was like, "Okay. Okay, Universe. Fine. You win this round."
But hey, to be fair, the rest of the day wasn't bad. It's just that it had a high bar to clear after that.
Today, though... you know, some days just work out. Er... by "today," I mean of course yesterday, because I'm posting this at my usual first-hour time on Saturday, but since I haven't slept I still consider it to be today. But it was yesterday. Time is relative; shut up.
Point is, today I saw Bob Dylan on stage. Whatever you think of his music - honestly it's not my favorite, either - there's something special about being in the same room with someone who redefined an entire art form.
But even before that, as I was pre-loading at a taphouse - I did say in a blog entry earlier this month that I wanted to drink more before the end of the year, and, well, mission fucking accomplished - I had just achieved beerenity when this song played over the place's speakers:
Which is Counting Crows' homage to Bob Dylan.
Mr Jones and me
Stumbling through the Barrio
Yeah, we stare at the beautiful women
She's perfect for you
Man, there's got to be somebody for me
I wanna be Bob Dylan
Mr Jones wishes he was someone just a little more funky
When everybody love you
Oh! Son, that's just about as funky as you can be
Seems like the surefire way to make me feel actual happiness is beer and music. Especially if there's something meaningful about the music. There is, of course, always something meaningful about beer.
So. Anyway. Fellow 30DBCers, thanks for reading and commenting - really appreciated all the comments, also enjoyed reading your blogs. Hope you'll stick around; I'm not going to stop posting, though I can't say I'll hit every day in December because I have more traveling (and drinking) to do. Until then, rock on! |
November 29, 2019 at 10:34am November 29, 2019 at 10:34am
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PROMPT November 29th
Write about gifting! What’s on your list? What do you have your eye on for yourself and what do you want to gift to your family and friends? Homemade or store bought? What was the best gift you ever received?
Yay! An opportunity for me to Grinch out!
Here's the thing about gifting: it's an unnecessary verbing of a word when there's a perfectly good verb form already available.
Here's the thing about giving: I'm weary of it.
Oh, sure, it was fun to get presents when I was a kid, just like with everyone. But now that I'm ancient, and already have enough stuff, it just takes up space. I feel terrible about throwing it out (honestly, I feel terrible about throwing anything out, because even if it wasn't given to me then I remember the joy of the acquisition of it). Look, if there's something that I want that I can afford, I just buy it. If there's something that I want that I can't afford, nobody who is likely to buy me a present can afford it either. Between Amazon, Uber Eats, Instacart and other services, I can have anything I want delivered to my door in a week or less - usually 24 hours or less. Sometimes even half an hour. I want a movie? Instant. Music? On demand. A game? Almost instant download. I truly live in a utopia.
Well, a utopia for me, anyway. The peasants doing the manufacturing, packaging, sorting and delivery might not see it that way, so I'm always on the lookout for signs that La Révolution is finally here
But I digress. Yes, I do take some joy in giving gifts. But I'm absolutely terrible at matching a gift to the recipient. And then I get worried that they'll think that this is because I don't care enough. "How can he not care enough? Am I wrong about us being friends? Maybe I'll just back off." And since I've had a lot of friends go away, I can't help but think that it might be at least partially because I can't figure out a good present for them. Partly I know it's because I'm an antisocial asshole, but the gift thing causes me tremendous anxiety is what I'm saying. And probably contributes to the antisocial thing.
Handmade gifts are nice, but they, too, make me feel bad because I have absolutely no creative talent whatsoever, so I can never, will never be able to reciprocate.
So yeah, what I'm saying is: I have mixed feelings about gifts. I always appreciate the effort. Always. Even if I get a rock. And I try to make the effort, myself; it just always makes me feel inadequate.
That said, if anyone wants to give me GPs or money, I promise not to feel bad about it. Just saying. That's the best gift I ever received: money. It's so useful for so many things, it takes up hardly any space, and hopefully it's not handmade. |
November 28, 2019 at 7:13pm November 28, 2019 at 7:13pm
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PROMPT November 28th
Today, the prompt intentionally asks you to be succinct. It is also an invitation to enjoy your day first, before sitting down to write your entry, which I know is not the typical habit of some of you. But bear with me 
Intentionally enjoy your day before writing today’s entry. Be present with your family and friends or make an effort to do something you love. At the end of the day, when you are content and the house is quiet, write a maximum of five sentences describing the most positive thing you will remember about today.
A rainbow spanned the Hudson River.
I saw it today while riding in an Uber from Newark toward Manhattan; it appeared against ominous clouds to the north while the low-slung sun shone from the southern sky.
Delicate, ephemeral, attenuated, it would not have survived capture in my phone's camera, so I didn't even try. I just stared out the window, glad for once that I was not driving so that I could etch its image into the contours of my mind: a rainbow at noon, prismatic colors sprayed over that most bleak of urban/industrial landscapes like otherworldly graffiti.
Remarkable, really, how you can find beauty in the most unexpected of places and at the most unlikely of times. |
November 27, 2019 at 7:09am November 27, 2019 at 7:09am
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PROMPT November 27th
Write about a time when you surprised yourself with your abilities. Is there a specific time you can remember when you were convinced that you could not do something, and then you did it? Tell us!
No, but I can think of thousands of times when:
a) I was convinced that I could not do something and then I couldn't do it, or
b) I was convinced that I could do something and then I couldn't do it.
A bit rarer is the case where I was pretty sure I could so something and then I did it, but that's called "my career."
In fact, it is so rare that I'm wrong about being unable to do something or right about being able to do something that the only example I can think of comes from when I was, maybe, 5 or 6 years old. The training wheels were off my bike but my dad still helped me mount the thing, and I was certain that he had to help in order for me to get on. One day I begged him to help me onto the bike, yelling, screaming, pleading, hollering, wailing, etc. (there are many reasons I never wanted children but a big one is they might be like me), but he sat there like a lump and ignored me. Finally, in frustration, I hopped onto the bike all by myself and wobbled off.
Smart guy, my dad. If that had been my kid there would have been a disassembled bike and a kid with something real to cry about.
So yeah, that was probably the first and last time that I was convinced I couldn't do something and then proceeded to do it. Part of the reason is that if I don't think I can do something, I don't bother to try, because why make an even bigger idiot out of myself than I already am? If, you know, that's even possible. |
November 26, 2019 at 12:30am November 26, 2019 at 12:30am
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PROMPT November 26th
Thanksgiving is coming up later this week in the US. Today, tell us what you’re thankful for. Make a list describing at least five things you’re thankful for.
I'm not ungrateful. Really, I'm not. Not sure who or what I'm grateful to, of course. Life, the Universe, whatever. Doesn't matter - gratitude is about the person doing the gratting, not the... recipient or whatever.
It's just that I really hate following crowds and trends. If we're supposed to be grateful at Thanksgiving, my first instinct - my gravitational pull, as it were - is to list the things that piss me off.
That's just the way I am. I suppose I'm contrary. I always identified with the Grinch, and I used to stop watching that cartoon right before his heart started expanding. That shit was creepy, anyway.
So here's my list of Top Five Things That Piss Me Off. If I can get this out of my system, then maybe - maybe - I can express some gratitude as if I were a worthwhile human being.
These are in no particular order. And the list could change at anytime. Hell, it will probably change as soon as I post this. But it's true for this instant.
Top Five Things That Piss Me Off
1. Traffic. I'm about to travel to New York City. During Thanksgiving week. That's going to piss me off.
2. Weight Loss. It is frustrating to be unable to do things that bring me joy and be forced to do the things that I hate.
3. Internet ads. Fortunately, I'm able to block most of them. Some still get through.
4. Robocalls. These have subsided somewhat. I'm only getting 5-6 a day instead of 20-30. Still, I will not be happy until it is 0.
5. Earworms. Get that stupid song out of my head.
Whew. Okay. So now let's see if I can actually list five things for which I'm grateful.
Medical science, booze, this website, my cats, my friends.
Ha! That wasn't so hard, was it? I just need a drink now to get the taste out of my mouth.
Like I said above, I'm traveling this week, so posting may be erratic for me until the end of the month.
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November 25, 2019 at 12:05am November 25, 2019 at 12:05am
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PROMPT November 25th
If you could be a fly on the wall of any living person’s life for one day, whose life would you want to observe?
Nope.
13 Year Old Me might have found some perverted use for such a superpower, but Adult Me knows everyone's life is boring and, besides, there's a 100% chance they'd go to the bathroom and/or pick their nose at some point so... nope.
About the only use of such a fly-on-the-wall scenario that I can think of would be to catch some politician making deals with, say, Russia, or banging some underage kid, but that's only useful if I could then use that information to extort money from themhave them face justice.
But the problem with that is they'd just be replaced by another corrupt politician, even if it's one that's corrupt in a different way.
Yeah, I'm cynical. So what?
Basically, I don't care how famous or public a person is, or even how egregious their sins might be, they deserve to not be watched by sentient flies on walls. And even if it were possible, I wouldn't care to do it.
How I long to be
A shadow on the wall
I will make no sound at all
And when the sun goes down
The shadow on the wall
It cannot be seen at all
At all |
November 24, 2019 at 12:18am November 24, 2019 at 12:18am
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PROMPT November 24th
What numbers hold special meaning for you? Consider dates, times, ages, years, or anything else you can count.
Interesting thing about numbers. Well, there are lots of interesting things about numbers. But specifically, for the purpose of this prompt, there are no uninteresting numbers.
Bold claim, considering there's an infinity of numbers, yes?
For the record, I didn't come up with this. I heard it somewhere. I do this a lot - hear something and then forget the context. But I don't want people thinking this is original to me. Lots of things are, of course; just not this.
The argument for "there are no uninteresting numbers" goes something like this: Consider the set of positive integers (which are what most people think of when they think of "numbers," even though when I saw the prompt the first thing I thought of was π).
You can think of something interesting about a lot of ordinary integers. 1, for example, is, well 1. It's the multiplicative identity, among other things. 2 is interesting because it's the only even prime. 3 is interesting because it's the first odd prime (1 doesn't count as a prime number). 4 is interesting because it is the sum of its factors (2+2=2*2). And so on. Some numbers might be interesting for nonmathematical reasons, like 11 is interesting because "these go to 11" and 42 is interesting because it's the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything (according to Douglas Adams).
But like I said, there exist a lot of numbers. An infinite number of numbers. Surely once you get past the numbers we can expect to encounter in our lives - past the hundreds, thousands, millions, billions, maybe? What about 8,345,232,098,712,450? A real mathematician might be able to rattle off something interesting about that particular string of digits, but I'm stumped.
So it stands to reason, then, that as you count upwards from 1, you'll eventually come to a number that's not interesting, right? You'd think so, but wait - that number is The First Uninteresting Number! That makes it interesting! Keep counting, and you reach the actual First Uninteresting Number, but hold on - that makes it interesting. And so on. And so on, out to infinity.
The upshot of this seeming paradox is that there are no uninteresting numbers.
So, what numbers have special meaning for me? As a fan of number theory, I should say "all of them," but that raises another paradox: if everything in a set is special, is anything in that set special?
I already mentioned a few above. 11, for example. That's from this scene:
And for some reason, more than just about any other scene from any other movie (with the possible exception of Star Wars), that bit of comedy genius has embedded itself forever into pop culture. It's become a meme in the sense that the word "meme" was supposed to have when Richard Dawkins coined the word, coincidentally (maybe) right around the same time that movie came out. For example, ever watch a video on the BBC website? Next time you do, take a good look at the video player. The volume goes to 11.
When I first noticed that, I couldn't stop laughing all day.
As far as dates go, well, my birthday, obviously. That's the most important day of the year.
With ages, I noticed something in my own life: I tend to go through phases in a 7 year cycle. Every 7 years, something changes the way I live or look at life. Of course, once I noticed this, it might have become self-fulfilling, but that's okay; I can think of worse ways to arrange one's life. Fortunately, I still have a couple of years to go before the next cycle.
Still, like I said way up there  , the first thing I thought of was π. It seems to be fundamental to everything in the universe, from the smallest scales up to the largest, and yet its definition is simple: the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. There's something immensely powerful about such a number, and yet it's utterly impossible to know it to the last decimal place, because it has infinity decimal places.
And that's interesting. |
November 23, 2019 at 12:22am November 23, 2019 at 12:22am
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PROMPT November 23rd
Write about writing. What makes you feel inspired to write? What steps do you take to get your words from your head onto the page? What does your editing and rewriting process look like? What have you learned from fellow writers?
Inspiration is a funny thing. If I always waited for inspiration to write, I wouldn't write much. Certainly not every day. I don't get inspired often, but once I commit to start writing, somehow I almost always come up with something to say. Sometimes even something funny or inspiring, but not always.
The word "inspiration" etymologically has the sense of "spiritual guidance," or "divine guidance." But the Latin root, spirare, was probably far more mundane: it just means "to breathe," and the word inspire can be rendered as "to breathe into." The connection between breath and spirit is an ancient one, and it figures in ancient Hebrew writings as well, most famously the part where God breathed life into clay to create a human. The dividing line between the living and the dead was seen as that the former breathe while the latter do not. Of course it's not really that simple - we can stop breathing for many seconds or even a few minutes and survive, under certain circumstances - but the metaphorical connection remains.
Obviously, I don't accept the notion of divine guidance. It's all in my head, even if triggered by external events. Lots of things can spark the urge to write. Perhaps oddly, one of these things is seeing, reading, or hearing a badly written story. "I could do better than that!" and then I proceed to probably not do better than that, but at least it got me writing.
But like I said, inspiration isn't a requirement for writing. Nor should it be. Like, when I started this blog entry, I didn't know where I would go with it. Nor did I really feel like writing. I still don't, because there are other things begging for my attention (cats, video games, mild hunger, desire for a cigar and a whiskey, the Netflix binge I'm in the middle of, sleep, etc.) but if there's one thing I've learned from other writers - both amateur and professional - it's this: a writer writes. If you don't write, you are, by definition, not a writer. You don't have to be published, you don't have to be good, and you don't even have to have your words seen by others. But if you write, you're a writer. Hooray for tautology!
A writer also edits, but I kind of suck at that with my own writing. I could edit other peoples' writing, but I often suffer from the delusion that I can write something, give it a quick once-over to check for egregious grammar, spelling, punctuation, and style mistakes, and then I'm done. I'm wrong about that, of course, but that doesn't stop me from losing interest. Once it's written, it's written, and that's that. There's always someth- SQUIRREL! |
November 22, 2019 at 12:09am November 22, 2019 at 12:09am
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PROMPT November 22nd
Write about a missed connection.
I'm convinced that USB connectors exist in four-dimensional space.
You try to plug one in and it doesn't work, so you give it half a turn and try again. It still doesn't work. So you give it another half a turn - rotating it 360° from its original orientation - et voilà! It slides right in, no problem.
A 360° rotation in our normal, everyday universe is the same as a 0° rotation. But in the subatomic realm, you get weird things like electrons and other particles with "spin ½," which only return to their original orientation after a 2*360=720° rotation. One hypothesis for this weirdness is that it's partially rotating in a fourth (or fifth) dimension, a property limited to fermions - and USB connectors. "But you only rotated the USB connector by one and a half turns." Yes, but the first time it didn't work, remember? Another half-turn and it would go back to not working, which was its original orientation.
I'm going to be traveling next month. It's only for six days, but the complication here is that, usually, when I travel, my housemate is here to take care of my cats - and vice-versa. Well, this time, she's going to be away as well, so we needed to arrange for cat-sitting. All my other friends live too far away now, so I opted (this became my responsibility) to go with a professional pet care service. So I did extensive research (translation: I chose the third result on Google Search, not trusting the first two to be anything other than a Search Engine Optimization scam, which is my advice for the day) and called a local place that does that sort of thing.
I spoke with the nice lady and we arranged for a meeting at chez moi so she could meet the cats. This is harder than it sounds because all the cats tend to be shy around strangers. So on the arranged date, which was Wednesday, I took the time to ensure that all the cats were at least inside where there was some chance she'd be able to get to know them, and that their litter boxes weren't too bad. The time for the meeting came - and went, without a sign of the pet sitter.
I called her and, lo, she had utterly forgotten about the meeting. This does not bode well, of course, because what if she forgets when the cats need their food and water? But it's the accursed holiday season, and at this point it's probably too late to pick someone else, so when we finally did connect, yesterday, I wanted some reassurance that someone would actually show up to feed the cats. She assured me that, yes, it was on the calendar, and she'd contact me every day after the deed was done.
My reasoning for going ahead with this was simple: she messed up once, and when you're running a business and mess up once, you do everything in your power to recover a good impression. I thought about installing a few nanny cams for insurance, but then I remembered that I would also get notifications when someone (dis)arms the security system, so I'd have verification that at least someone showed up.
So yeah, sometimes you have to rotate something by more than 360° to get it to fit, but then it runs as smooth as anything. |
November 21, 2019 at 12:18am November 21, 2019 at 12:18am
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PROMPT November 21st
What do you value most in a job/career? What about a job makes it satisfying and fulfilling? If you currently hold your “dream job,” what makes it perfect for you? If you are still seeking your dream job, how will you know when you’ve found it? If you are retired, think back to how you felt when you were working. 
What do you value most in a job/career?
Money.
What about a job makes it satisfying and fulfilling?
Money.
If you currently hold your “dream job,” what makes it perfect for you?
Money.
If you are still seeking your dream job, how will you know when you’ve found it?
Money.
Okay, so I'm... sort of joking, there? Sort of, but not really.
I would like to think there are some jobs I wouldn't do for any amount of money, but I'm in the fortunate and probably enviable position of being able to pick and choose. I don't mean that I'm above menial labor; if I needed money I'd muck toilet stalls, wash dishes, bus tables, turn big rocks into little ones, pick crops - whatever honest work is still out there and not being done by robots. No, the stuff I wouldn't do for any amount of money would include shady crap like telemarketing (also mostly robots now), promoting pyramid schemes, pump & dump penny stocks. Stuff that makes the world a worse place.
Okay, I probably would violate my principles if you paid me enough. The harsh truth is, I do have a price. It's just a very, very high one. If you want me to do something shady, the remuneration needs to be worth it. If you want me to do something outright illegal, then you need to set me up for life. $2M, minimum. Otherwise it's not worth the potential hit to my freedom and/or reputation. And since I'm not going to trust anyone who offered me that kind of money to keep their promise, I think it's safe to say I won't become a hit man or jewel thief anytime soon.
But none of that is very helpful.
As regular readers know, I identify as an engineer. I went to engineering school. I am technically-minded. But I'm not someone whose identity requires a career. My reason for working really was almost entirely about the money. Yeah, I liked having a visible impact on the world around me, but that also came with a dark side: in spite of regulations and best practices, there was always an environmental price to pay. Point is, a job, to me - even a career - is about making money, not any nebulous "fulfillment" or "satisfaction" or anything like that. I am fulfilled if I have enough money to live in a decent house, eat decent food, and take the occasional vacation. More is nice, too. I get satisfaction from not being hungry. All of this is dependent entirely on money.
People tell me "but money won't keep you warm at night." It literally does.
Anyway, it's all an intellectual exercise because I'm pretty much where I want to be in life, and I'm not about to ruin that by working.
There is only one thing that's bugging me right now, and I'm still not sure what to do about it: I don't have health insurance.
This is not a day-to-day problem for me. I can handle my few check-ups and prescriptions without a problem. The issue is, what if something catastrophic happens? That's what insurance is for, of course, but even if I pay the $850 a month or so (that's the lowest premium I can find on the marketplace, and it carries an enormous deductible), what guarantee do I have that the corporation will actually cover something that happens to me? I hear about peoples' insurance claims being denied all the time.
It's not that I can't afford it. It's that I feel like I'd be better off dedicating that money to a savings account or other safe harbor, rather than gambling on the dubious honesty of profit-motive insurance companies. The best insurance is wealth.
This is only relevant because, for better or worse, insurance wouldn't be an issue if I were still working a professional job. Or, you know, if I lived in a civilized country. |
November 20, 2019 at 12:01am November 20, 2019 at 12:01am
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PROMPT November 20th
Do you remember your first friend? Under what circumstances did you become friends? Are you still in contact with them or any of your other childhood friends?
Well, now, I don't know - if I can't remember one, how would I know if the one I do remember was my first friend?
A few friends from childhood have contacted me over the years, especially after Facebook became a thing. Most of them, once they found out I didn't have kids, stopped contacting me. I prefer to think that's because they're jealous, but it was probably more like not knowing what to talk about with me. There's only so much "Hey, you remember Miss Martin from third grade?" you can put up with.
Being an only child living in a rural area, I didn't have many friends. This prepared me for the realities of life, so I'm grateful for it. The few I did have were mostly associated with whatever school I was going to. In retrospect, I think most of them were my friends because my parents were friends with their parents, and that's about it.
One guy I met in middle school I'm still in contact with. We were friends all through high school and college, and took road trips together, including a very memorable one to Florida that ended up with both of us completely broke. Eh... not as interesting a story as you might think from that description; we were just young and therefore crappy at budgeting. Point is, we drifted apart after college, but got back into contact after he moved back to my area. He wasn't my first friend, of course, but he's the only one from before high school that I still talk to.
I have, at times, wondered whatever became of certain people from my childhood. But I quashed that curiosity once I found out one of them was serving 20+ for homicide. Yeah, some things I could have done without knowing. |
November 19, 2019 at 12:05am November 19, 2019 at 12:05am
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PROMPT November 19th
What characteristics do you admire in a leader? Is there or was there a time in your life when you took on a leadership role? Research different leadership styles and describe which style you would most like to follow. Which style are you? When you are in a leadership position, do you exemplify the qualities you admire in a good leader?
A good leader leads by example.
I am a Bad Example. I even printed up "business" cards with my name followed by "Bad Example." I also had such phrases as "Millionaire Playboy" and "Evil Genius."
Basically, I don't want to be a leader. I don't like it. The benefits don't outweigh the constrictions, for me. I admire those people who can do it, and maybe they're more appreciative of the admiration of others than I am (thus changing the cost/benefit analysis). But there's one thing I hate more than being a leader, and that's being a follower.
Of course, I've done both, especially in my engineering career - though when I ran a business, it was with a partner, so a lot of the "leadership" things were shared. But I tried to set a good example for employees by following the same schedule as, or sometimes a more hectic one, than I expected of our employees. "Never expect anyone to do what you won't." I didn't have that in a boss; all my previous employers thought that it was just fine to expect us to work 8 to 5 while they could show up at 10 and leave at 3. Just to use one example. Of the two modes, I decided I preferred being in charge - not for any perqs (the higher salary was nice, though), but just because when I make the rules they are, by definition, not idiotic. Perhaps my employees felt differently; I don't know. I suppose not knowing makes me a bad leader after all. In any case, preferring it doesn't mean I enjoyed it.
Fortunately, life isn't binary, and I choose Option C: going my own way. It's enough to be responsible for my own situation, and I'm not always so good at even that.
There are, of course, other qualities that define good leadership. The ability to delegate is one. And I don't just mean foisting off work on just anyone, but matching peoples' strengths to the tasks at hand. I wouldn't assign an artistic type something that's math-heavy, or the other way around. Knowing what people are good at is important. Knowing what they could be good at, given a chance, well, that's even better, and I wish I were better at it.
Another thing I'm terrible at is motivating people. I like it when people motivate themselves. Any attempts I make in that direction always seem hollow to me. But I think good leaders find ways to motivate their team, though how they do it might as well be sorcery for all I understand it.
Anyway, yeah, this is kind of rambling, but the bottom line is: don't look to me to set examples, unless you enjoy drinking at bars. |
November 18, 2019 at 12:02am November 18, 2019 at 12:02am
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PROMPT November 18th
What is something that most people misunderstand or wrongly assume about you?
I've sometimes been mistaken for someone who gives a damn.
Nope, I hoard my damns like they're gold. Never know when you're going to need one. Like when you pop off the highway onto a scenic overlook in the Rockies, take in an eyeful of the vista and go, "Damn!"
Or, you know, you get a good look at the enormous hunk of concrete at the south end of Lake Mead and go, "Dam!"
Can't just go around giving damns away like Halloween candy. Those things are valuable.
Other than that, well, I'm not coming up with much. Some people at bars have said stuff to me about sports, probably on the assumption that I'm in the bar to watch the ubiquitous TVs, I guess because I'm a dude. But no, I'm there to drink. That's what a bar is for. That and using the bartender as a low-cost therapist. I generally ignore the screens, and I know that sports exist and that's about the extent of it.
There are some attributes I try to cultivate as protective camouflage, though. I generally don't wear my thoughts about politics or religion on my clothing or car. So sometimes people assume I have a certain political orientation based, I'd assume, on my demographics.
But, since I do it on purpose... I don't give a damn. |
November 17, 2019 at 12:08am November 17, 2019 at 12:08am
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PROMPT November 17th
There are 45 days remaining in the year. What do you want to do or accomplish before 2019 is over?
Drink more.
Today I went to a beer release party. The beer in question is a bourbon-barrel graham cracker imperial stout, and it is delicious. Moreover, they had samples of the bourbon in whose barrels the beer was aged, and... wow.
And to top it all off, they were giving out t-shirts from the distillery what made the bourbon. I got a size L. I fit into a size L t-shirt now. I'm fucking cut.
Ahem.
Anyway.
Drink more. I'm out of practice.
You know, there is one thing I was hoping to accomplish before the year's out. I was doing really well at writing a contest entry every week, and then September happened and all the contest prompts became birthday this and cake that and I just couldn't cope. If I write a lot of contest entries, I could theoretically catch up by the end of the year. But I have a week of travel next month, and the actual holidays, and this blog activity, and all kinds of other excuses, so I don't know if I can do it or not.
Probably not. There is only so much winning I can do before I start to feel bad about being so awesome. |
November 16, 2019 at 12:05am November 16, 2019 at 12:05am
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PROMPT November 16th
If you had to spend one million dollars in one day, what would you spend it on? 
Shares of publicly-traded companies.
Usually I lead with the joke answer, but no, that's my actual answer.
So, what if stocks aren't a legitimate answer? Well, I'd also answer "bonds" or "real estate." Maybe even "fine art" or "coin collections."
But okay. I think the spirit of the prompt is about blowing through the money, not investing it in assets that have some chance of appreciating in value.
Can't resist embedding this video.
It's harder than you might think to spend a million dollars, especially in a limited period of time. The median annual income of US residents is somewhere in the neighborhood of $50,000 a year (it's actually less than that, but I can't be arsed to look it up, and $50K is a nice round number.) Assuming you live hand-to-mouth on a $50K annual income, it will take you 20 years to spend a million dollars.
On the other hand, a million ain't what it used to be. Retirement counselors often quote a "4% rule," which can get a little more complicated, but basically once you're retired you should live on 4% of your net worth per year. 4% of a million is $40K, also close to the median annual income for the US, but hardly "fuck off" money.
I like to work with the concept of "effective net worth," which is something I came up with, but someone else probably already has because I always seem late to these things. Basically, using the 4% rule, what is your effective net worth considering all your other income (salary, bonuses, royalty checks from those sweet publishing gigs, etc.)? It's not hard, just work backwards: if your income is $40K then your effective net worth is $1M; if it's $80K, then your effective net worth is $2M, etc. This gives you an idea of how much you'd need to have saved for retirement if you want to continue your current lifestyle. Of course, there are other considerations.
Shit, I could write about this sort of thing all day. Back to the actual topic.
If we leave out assets like houses and such, I'd be hard-pressed to come up with a way to blow through a million dollars in one day. Give me a couple of hours on Amazon and I could probably do it, though. Or, more likely, I'd find some experience to spend it on. Rich people go on these round-the-world cruises, I've found, and they get expensive. The cruises last for months, but you have to give them a deposit; I'd imagine they wouldn't say no to getting the whole price up front.
Or, it'd be tempting to sign up for one of those space tourism services. For something on the order of a million dollars, you can reserve a spot on a suborbital flight that technically takes you past the imaginary line separating atmosphere from space. The flight lasts maybe an hour, though, and all you really get to show for it is bragging rights. "I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth!" "Yeah? I've been scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef."
I should note here that I'm also deliberately leaving out any variation on "giving it to charity." That's not spending it, by my definition, and usually all you're doing is enriching the charity itself, and its organizers. I'm not suggesting we shouldn't give to charities, but I am explicitly leaving them out of this particular discussion.
And then, of course, there's the old standbys. I wrote the following around this time last year, so it's appropriate I trot it back out now. If I had to spend a million dollars in one day, I'd spend most of it on...
The rest, I'd probably waste. |
November 15, 2019 at 12:20am November 15, 2019 at 12:20am
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PROMPT November 15th
In your entry today, write about focus. Use the following questions to guide you. At what time of day are you the most focused? When you need to focus on a task, how do you prevent distractions? How do you manipulate your environment to keep yourself focused? How else do you practice focus in your life? Any tools or techniques you can share?
Let's see if I can focus long enough to respond to this...
Nope. Just checked my phone. Had texts. Responded to them. Now, where was I?
Oh, yeah. Focus.
You may be wondering why I didn't know I had texts. That's because I have to keep the sound off on my phone during the week. I get up to 20-30 calls a day (no I am not exaggerating) from "health insurance" robocall scams, and if I don't keep the sound off, that's all I hear, all day: my phone going off. It's not so bad around midnight when I'm writing these entries, but if I turn the sound on in the evening and forget to turn it back off, then the fucking things wake me up in the morning and I get grumpy for the entire day.
No, I can't block them. I've tried, but they spoof numbers and it's worse than playing whack-a-mole.
What's more, when I'm trying to actually DO something on the damn phone, like compose an email or text someone or simply take notes, I'm often interrupted when the incoming call screen silently pops up. And then I have to wait. I have to wait, because if I hit the Reject button, I think they'll know that someone actually interacted with the other end and they'll call even more. This makes me grumpy, too, because only I am allowed to interrupt myself, which I do a lot, because I can't focus.
So why don't I change my number? No. I've had this number for 20 years and I'm not going to change it. I shouldn't have to. That shit simply needs to stop. Besides, they'd just start calling the new number.
Lately the calls have been in Spanish and Chinese (presumably Mandarin, but I can't distinguish between dialects of Chinese). I guess they figure that since I'm not responding to English, they'd try the other two major world languages.
I'm waiting for them to try French. Then at least I can use my newfound skills. Now if they want to impress me, they'd call in Klingon. Not that I've spent any time studying Klingon, but the language is unmistakable. If a Klingon offered to sell me health insurance, well, that'd be an offer I'd have difficulty refusing. Fortunately, I'm all out of latinum.
Hey, I wonder why with all the proliferation of various cryptocurrencies out there, how come none of them are called latinum (after the fictional medium of commerce of the Star Trek universe, if you're unfamiliar)?
Oh. I should have known. 
But I'm meant to be talking about focus, aren't I?
Anyway, I've given up on focus, I've given up on trying to prevent distractions, and I arrange my life around knowing that I'm going to get squirrelled on a frequent but irregular basis.
Really, it's a miracle I get anything done at all. |
November 14, 2019 at 12:04am November 14, 2019 at 12:04am
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PROMPT November 14th
Think back to a moment in your life when you were faced with making a difficult choice. (Which city to move to, which college to attend, what to ask Santa for, etc) How might your life be different if you had made a different choice than the one you did?
Once, long ago, I was dating two women at the same time. Yeah, I know; I was young, shut up. Edith was a petite strawberry blonde who always laughed at my jokes (my primary consideration in a girlfriend) and loved the same kinds of movies I did. Kate, by contrast, was tall, brunette, and enjoyed games (the board and roleplaying kind, not the mind kind). Put them together and you have the perfect woman, but putting them together was the one thing I spent most of my time and energy to prevent.
One day I was humblebragging about this to a friend, who said, "Dude, you have to choose."
"What? Why? I really dig both of them." (We said "dig" at the time.)
"It's just not fair to either of them. Besides, one day they will find out about each other, and then you're well and truly fucked."
I sighed. "Shit. You're right."
"Besides," he went on. "Everyone knows you can't have your Kate and Edith too."
...
Okay, I just made all of that up. Well, most of it. Never let the facts get in the way of a good joke, I always say. Or a bad one. Especially a bad one. Even more especially when you can use the joke to illustrate a point, which is:
Regrets are a bad idea.
Putting aside for the moment the array of scientific evidence to support the idea that one could not have made a different choice given the exact same circumstances, I can't think of even one decision that I made that, had it gone otherwise, would have put me in a better place than I am now. That's because I'm pretty much where I want to be. Oh, life isn't perfect - anyone who tells you their life is perfect is lying worse than I did up there - but I've got a pretty good situation going, even if it's with 0 women instead of 2.
That's probably for the best.
But the question is about how life would be different, not potentially better. Still, my point stands. Besides, if I could have made different choices, I wouldn't be me, and I usually like being me. Or, at least, I prefer it to the alternative.
On the other talon, if I could have made those different choices, the person I would have become would probably prefer that to being me. Unless, of course, he knew what a sweet setup I've got.
Additionally, I can't really think of too many major decisions I've made; life seems to make them for me. At one point, I almost joined the military, but that choice was taken out of my hands on medical grounds. Again - for the best.
So there's a non-answer for everyone, but at least it's some insight into my thought process. Besides, you got to read a funny joke. Right? ... Right?? |
November 13, 2019 at 12:09am November 13, 2019 at 12:09am
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PROMPT November 13th
In what circumstances do you believe it is okay to fib or tell a white lie?
What? It's never okay to fib, and white lies are lies! One should always be completely honest with both oneself and-
Oh, I can't go on like that. There's only so much bullshit I can spew at one time.
The truth is: lies keep the world running smoot- okay, less roughly than if there weren't lies.
When I was younger, I might have actually believed what I was starting to say up there, that honesty is always the best course of action. But I learned better, oh yes. All it took was one honest answer to "Does this dress make my butt look big?" and I learned. (Of course, it seems like, these days, that's the goal with clothing.)
And, of course, I am sometimes a fiction writer, and what's fiction but a lie? Sure, everyone involves knows it's untrue, hence the name "fiction," but it's still premeditated dishonesty.
Do I always tell the unvarnished truth? Hell no. But I have a few guidelines for myself when interacting with people.
First and foremost, don't lie more than you have to; keeping a story straight is hard enough when you tell the truth. I'm naturally full of contradictions and hypocrisies. Compounding those by lying about them, when you'll have to remember which lie you told to which person later, takes too much mental energy.
Second, before you lie, take a second to check yourself: are you trying to make yourself look good, or gain some advantage, or are you just trying to grease the wheels of conversation? I expect everyone puffs themselves up a little bit, but saying you've hiked across Antarctica, gone into space, or swam the English Channel when you didn't can be detrimental to your reputation. (Then again, if you've done any of these things, shut up; you're making the rest of us look bad.)
Third, rather than enumerate the situations in which it's okay to fib or tell a white lie, I will enumerate the situations in which it's not okay to do so: 1) in a committed relationship; 2) in court. That's... well, that's about all I can think of at the moment.
In short, lies make life better for everyone - up to a point, and that point is when someone gets harmed by false information. But that doesn't fall into the category of "fib or white lie."
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to prepare for my hike across Antarctica.
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November 12, 2019 at 12:04am November 12, 2019 at 12:04am
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PROMPT November 12th
What is one thing (sight, smell, sound, object, etc) that, when you encounter it, instantly brings you back to your childhood?
Well, there are these woolly mammoth reconstructions at natural history museums...
Apart from that, there's the barometer.
As I've mentioned before, Dad was a sailor. He'd stopped roaming the seas before I was born, but he had some mementos of his travels, one of which was an old-time mariner's barometer.
It's a simple device, really - a tube with mercury, and a gauge, mounted on wood. It did what it was supposed to do, which was provide a reading of current atmospheric pressure, useful in the times before satellite imagery and official updates as a weather indicator. When I was a kid, it hung on the wall near his antique desk, which I suppose when he obtained it was a new, state-of-the-art writing and organizing surface.
When he died, a lot of the stuff from my childhood home went into storage, awaiting a time when I can either lighten myself of some of these possessions, or find space for them at my house. China cabinets. The desk. Books and a bookshelf. The dining table around which we'd sit in the evenings. Things I don't really have a use, or a place, for, but couldn't bring myself to discard (fuck you, Marie Kondo).
Most likely, I'll keep paying rent on the storage space until I, too, bite the big one.
But the barometer came home with me, and hangs on the wall in a hallway. I pass it several times a day. I can see it, in fact, from my usual workspace.
See, that barometer was probably my first introduction to the world of science, and while I didn't pursue the career of a scientist, it's a reminder to me of our efforts to understand and quantify the vagaries of the inconstant universe in which we find ourselves. And also of the curiosity and objective worldview that he, with some degree of success, attempted to instill in me.
There are other things that take me back to those times long ago, of course - whenever I see Orion looming large in a chill night sky, or gaze upon a wide expanse of still water - but the barometer is a constant presence for me.
Appropriate, I think, given what it measures. |
November 11, 2019 at 12:52am November 11, 2019 at 12:52am
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PROMPT November 11th
Today, your prompt is one word: Transformation.
Everything changes and nothing stands still. -Heraclitus
The thing about those ancient Greek philosophers is that they lacked the 2000 or so years of history that we've experienced since they wrote their stuff. You might be tempted to say, "But Waltz, that quote survived all this time." Well, yes and no. No, because the original statement was written in Ancient Greek, and is thus subject to some of its meaning being lost in translation. It's not, as a physicist might say, time-invariant. Its meaning is also informed by one's cultural milieu. So even the quote about change changes over time.
And yet, there's something inviolably true about it.
Heraclitus also apparently was the originator of the nearly koan-like quote, "You could not step twice into the same river." (also on the wiki page linked above). I heard that quote a long time ago, without attribution. At the time, I was actively working in hydrology (the study of rivers and other water flow), so, being the technical-minded person that I was and am, I mentally changed it to "You can't step into the same river even once." Because between the time your foot touches the surface of the river and the time it touches the bed, the river has, in some sense, already changed - water has flowed out, evaporated, and/or seeped into the soil beneath; some has also, most likely, flowed or rained in.
Which doesn't change the basic fact, or the metaphor: that change is constant, inevitable, and defines existence. We may not always see the change - after all, rivers don't usually change in a very visible, macro kind of way in the few microseconds it takes to set foot in one - but it happens, anyway.
I think a most people feel a tension between the desire for change (preferably in a direction that benefits us) and the desire for things to stay the same, in defiance of all evidence and physical laws. That goes back to the "wish" entry a couple of days ago, doesn't it? What I mean is, maybe you want to win a major jackpot in the lottery, but what does winning the lottery actually look like? Ideally, you go on with your life as it was, only with more money, right? But you add that kind of money to a life, and it, necessarily, changes.
Life is change. Or transformation; I'm using a synonym here, and synonyms are an example of transformation. I'd even go so far as to assert that reality is transformation. Periodically, we humans (including another famous ancient Greek philosopher, Plato) come up with ideas about things that are "eternal" and "unchanging," but to me, that's how I know that something isn't real: it's conceptualized as nontransforming.
What is real is change, and the most pernicious lie ever foisted upon a gullible humanity is that what we see around us is illusion while "reality" is something unchanging. As I've noted before, this alters the definitions of "real" and "illusion" to the point where both words become meaningless.
There is, however, as far as we know (though our understanding could change) one thing that is constant, and that is the speed of light. Interestingly enough, this seems to be a true constant, for both light and matter, which are the same thing but transformed into one or the other. Every particle, every thing in the universe is always moving at exactly the speed of light - through spacetime. If it's not moving at the speed of light, that is, the constant c, through space, it's also moving through time.
What this means, if it means anything at all, eludes me.
I've mentioned in previous posts the predicted heat death of the universe. Billions or trillions of years from now (can't be arsed to look it up at the moment, and even that theory is subject to change as new data is interpreted), all thermodynamic processes stop, and we won't be around to see it because we are thermodynamic processes. But even then, change will still be occurring, in the form of fluctuations as a result of basic quantum uncertainty.
It is possible, and therefore, given the amount of "time" (which itself loses its meaning), inevitable, that such a fluctuation will bud another universe, like or unlike our own.
And so change continues. Eternally.
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