Zimbabwean Dollar worth more on Ebay than in real life.
The 100 Billion Dollar note in Zimbabwe, which is approximately equivalent to $1.85 US Dollars, is worth somewhere around $40 on ebay.
That’s profound.
Category: Random
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I'm Psyched about $3.92 Gas
It’s frightening.
I got honestly excited because I had the privilege of buying $3.92 gas today, as opposed to the $3.95 from yesterday.
Little victories. That’s what counts, right?
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Wiiiiii!
Jenn got me a Wii for out anniversary1. My arm is sore from playing tennis.
1We decided that the five year anniversary gift of wood and/or is silver silly. Electronics is much more in vogue. I got her a camera.
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Destroy! Before you get Eaten/Kidnapped/Killed
There’s a great BoingBoing short concerning the employment of the Fujitsu ME-P3M Hard-Drive destroyer. The story is very telling:
Terabytes stacked on terabytes, all into the Fujitsu ME-P3M. The big old machine that Sarah had helped carry down here. Laughing at the hand crank, screwing her face up as she pantomimed. Amazed at the grant for $35,000, but proud that she’d wrangled it. Please be dead, Sarah. Be dead and asleep.
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"Geopolitical"
“The Chairstone recognizes the distinguished Schist from E-stone-ia”
I was listening to NPR on the way to work this morning and realized that I had no idea what the term “geopolitical” really meant. You hear it all the time in discussions of world events and foreign policy. After checking the definition (“The study of the relationship among politics and geography, demography, and economics, especially with respect to the foreign policy of a nation”) I don’t think it’s used in the correct context most of the time. This morning’s story would probably have been better off using “political” rather than “geopolitical” to describe some of the ramifications of Obama’s visit to Germany, but I’m (obviously) not an expert.
As the first sentence of this post shows, I started to think about the confluence of Geo (earth) and Politics. I was going to take the punning a bit further, but then I’d have sounded like an episode of The Flintstones, and that’s just not me.
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I Used to Do This
When I was a lad of 27 or so, my wife (then fiancé) was a Ph.D. student. We would occasionally go to department parties where I was the S.O. and would wander around chatting with students and faculty. I would see lots of people including those who had no idea that I had no idea about what they did. However, I was also the editor of my wife’s papers and articles. This gave me a detailed knowledge of her jargon plus a layman’s command of some of her field’s esoterica. Thusly, I could take a visiting grad student, or newly minted Ph.D. student, and bullshit the hell out of them. Some never did figure out that I was just stringing words together, pulling things out of my butt.
This caught me flack from Jenn.
At least I don’t do it anymore. For one thing, there’s a huge difference between a graduate student’s S.O. screwing around with other grad students and a professor’s husband doing it. For another, I don’t know enough to successfully bullshit a professor. Alas.
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Electrical Issues
I’ve been an electrical person the last few days. On Sunday, I was eating lunch with Courtney and Kapow KABOOM KABOOOOOMMMMM!!!! a thunderstorm came rolling over us. We were sitting outside at Apres Diem in Virginia Highland and at least 5 of the strikes were within 100 yards. It was impressive, to say the least.Then, yesterday, I witnessed a power cut-out go kablooie outside my office window. Also impressive.
And last night we had a thunderstorm roll over the house with several strikes within a very short distance; close enough to make the TV go BzzzT! BzzzzzzZZZZZT! Also, consequently, fried Comcast cable service. Hopefully that’s temporary. I cannot live without my internet, obviously.
Perhaps I should stay away from electrical circuits for a few days, just in case?
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Chess
My Dad was visiting a few weeks ago and we played several games of chess while he was here. I think we were both rusty, but a few were intricate and exciting. At least half weren’t the type of game where it’s whoever makes the least mistakes who wins, but rather whoever outmaneuvers the other side. I always forget how much I like playing chess against a person, rather than a computer. For some reason, I just cannot get into computer chess. I end up playing too fast and missing stupid things which makes it no fun. People are different, though. Probably because it brings out my competitive nature, which few games do nowadays. -
Martini Weekend
This fourth of July seems to have been the Martini Weekend! Hats off to whomever invented everyone’s favorite upside-down cone glassware. I hope everyone else had a great fourth of July holiday. Enjoy going back to work tomorrow!
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"Are you a Productivity Hobbyist?"
Do you spend all your time on Lifehacker.com? Do you anxiously read and re-read David Allen’s Getting Things Done? Then you may want to read this short essay by Clay Collins.