First came the Clarke Axiom, named after the guy who coined it, science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke:
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Now we have Maciej Ceglowski’s brilliant quip from the #joiito IRC channel:
Any sufficiently advanced society is indistinguishable from Canada.
Clever, and at least partly true.
My favourite neocalvinist, Gideon Strauss, isn’t afraid to ask some Pretty Big Questions. It’s food for thought, and stuff like this is why I like reading him so much.
If only he were into gangsta rap. Then I could buy him two brass knuckles — one with the word FAITH and the other with the word REASON (along the lines of “Radio Raheem’s” LOVE and HATE brass knuckles in Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing). I think they’d suit him. He could even use them to bang loudly on his desk when his students aren’t paying attention.
This one goes out to The Redhead:
(A little aside: Yes, I have a lucky accordion, and I also have lucky socks. I like to stack the odds in my favour.)
When I did a little accordion stand-up comedy as a warm-up act for the Slap and Tickle comedy troupe, I mentioned the existence of a web site that covered the topic of having sex with dolphins. (No sex pictures, but really not safe for work, and you may never sleep as well after reading it, knowing that there are people who enjoy this sort of thing. You have been warned.)
I mentioned that one line really got me:
WARNING! In the considerations of safety, you should NEVER let a male dolphin attempt anal sex with you.
I mean, really, do people need to be told this?
Here’s something a little more recent that elcited the same reaction from me: Barbara Amiel’s article, titled No matter how you cut it up, eating people is simply wrong.
Last night’s band rehearsal — the first for me — went quite well, if late into the night (I got home at 2:30 a.m.). Pete’s driving the bus song-writing-wise, and he’s excellent: the songs structures are remind me at times of The Smiths, Radiohead (especially with Pete’s singing) and Game Theory (especially with the me manning the synth).
It’s been a while since I’ve played synths with a band — the last time was probably 1999, with our improv ambient electronica band Lion, with Karl Mohr, Krista “Lederhosen Lucil” Muir and Rachel Smith.
Pete’s providing a Korg Triton, which is probably the best synth I’ve ever been assigned. Even through the guitar amp that I used last night, I can hear great things coming from it. I need to fix up my trusty Rhodes keyboard amp this weekend and bring it back to life. The last time it saw active duty, I was with Kingston’s loudest band, Volume, and George (on bass) and I cranked both our instruments through it. That’s probably what blew its speakers in the first place.
The rehearsal space is a little shack out in Mississauga, a satellite city just west of Accordion City. It is blessedly close to a Starbucks and a Rabba (a chain of 24-hour grocery/deli/convenience stores), an absolute necessity for band rehearsals.
Goofy band exchange of the evening:
Wil (raising his fist and looking right at me): Asian gang!
Me (returning the gesture): Asian gang, yo!
Wil (to the other three guys in the band): Look out whitey, me and Joey outnumber you.
Me: Uh, Wil…there’s two of us and three of them. Two is less than three.
Pete: I thought you guys were supposed to be good at math.
There was also an interesting discussion where we concluded that you should not get a Brazilian wax from family members, even if they’re in than line of business. Ewwww!
I think that this will be interesting to all of about a dozen people who read this blog, but here goes:
I’ve posted the results of the OpenSRS Client Survey on The Farm.
If you’re a developer or technically-inclined reseller who makes use of OpenSRS, you’ll probably find it interesting.
If you develop web apps and are interested in what other developers who build web apps think, you might find it interesting.
If you don’t fall under either category above, perhaps you might find this interesting: an article titled Men “stop thinking rationally” in the presence of “beautiful” women. If you’re over fifteen and observant, you’ve probably figured this out already, but it’s always nice when some researcher has some empirical evidence to back up what you’ve always suspected.
