Carnage and Culture, Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power

Some years ago a coworkers described a TV show which tried to unravel a mystery of how Zulu warriors overwhelmed a British garrison.  All that stuck with me from his account was that there were sealed boxes of ammunition still left.

This came to mind as I read “Carnage and Culture, Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power”, a family-friendly compendium of carnage by Victor Davis Hanson.  Among the battles he discusses is Isandhlwana where 250 horsemen and 300 native foot soldiers were annihilated by the Zulu’s.  This was probably the same battle.

Hanson’s analysis is that the officer in charge underestimated the opposition to the extent that he violated standard military practice.  In short, the British forces were spread to far apart which, when they ran out of ammunition allowed them to be swarmed over by the Zulu. The British ran out of ammunition for several reasons:

1)   Bureaucratic stupidity – a quartermaster refused to dispense ammunition to one set of troops because the ammunition belonged to another troop.

2)   By not following standard practice, the troops were spread out - too far away from ammunition stores and separated enough to be enveloped by the Zulu.

To quote: “ It was as if their officers—like the Roman generals at Cannae – had done everything to ignore their intrinsic advantage of Western discipline and superior offensive power. “  There’s more of course, but Hanson points out that the next day, the same Zulu warriors were unable to best a hundred British soldiers at Rorke’s Drift where the troops followed standard military procedure.

What make’s it so striking (besides the blood and gore) is that the Boer’s had long before worked out the gold standard protocol for defense against Zulu attack:  a tightly defended area (encircled wagons, walls, stockades), readily available ammunition, and steady disciplined rifle fire.

The author maintains that the Zulu never developed anything other than their single envelopment strategy despite horrific losses against Europeans.  There was also the cultural difference, the author’s main thesis.  The Zulu’s fasted before battle, did not carry supplies, and did not seem to have much in the way of strategy other than to get as close as possible to their enemy by stealth and then swarm over and envelope them.  By the time the Zulu army got to Rorke’s Drift they had not eaten for 2 days.  They had never developed the idea of a siege.

I’ll spare you a book review, (see below) but to say that in the section on Cortes and the Aztecs, repeated the theme: the Aztec’s idea of war seems to have been to capture sacrificial victims.  If they managed to knock down a Spaniard or one of the native forces allied against them, the captive was bound and dragged to the rear for later sacrifice rather than dispatched on the spot.  The idea of killing your enemy on the battlefield was quite literally a foreign notion.  The Aztec's horrific losses didn't seem to change their strategies.  It didn't hurt the Spanish conquest that their weaponry was centuries ahead of that of the Aztecs.

There are plenty of reviews of the book including one by Newt Gingrich, he of the "Contract On America" fame, on Amazon.

It only struck me later that the book is about battles, not wars and it is a history.  I have yet to read the section about the Tet Offensive in Vietnam.  While the Viet Cong may have been defeated as a strategic move the Tet Offensive accomplished two things: it shocked the American public ("I thought we were winning") and it removed the Viet Cong as a potential home-grown adversary to the inevitable victory.  This last is reminiscent of the Soviet Army halting their advance through Poland in July of 1945 to give the German army time to decimate the Polish partisans, effectively removing a source of opposition to their seizure of post-war power.

Battles are not wars.  Guerrilla warfare is a different situation.  I noted that there was no mention of Napoleon's Iberian campaign, arguably the first modern example of guerrilla warfare. Mathematical models in the 1960's predicted that guerrillas were more likely to lose because even though the probability of success in each engagement was large, the large number of actions reduced the probability of overall success was low.  I've always been cautious about accepting mathematical models as predictors of human behavior.  We're just too squirrelly. 

Current events (Afghanistan, Somalia, your suggestion here) with an opposition where death/martyrdom is interpreted as success suggest that if nation states have progressed beyond confrontation warfare (Hello, Iran?) in favor of letting proxies do their fighting (Hezbollah for Iran and Syria), battles will be few and far between.  What armies will be facing a continuing series of attacks.  With more advanced technology (remote controlled bombs) I would expect the balance of a war of attrition to shift in the favor of insurgents. 

An Interesting Watch

For reasons known only to those beaming thoughts into my brain I've been interested in watches.  (Note to self: double the thickness of my aluminum foil cap.)

This hasn't transformed into a watch collection.  (Full disclosure: a number of years ago I was about to bid on a vintage Breitling on eBay, but I couldn't find anyone who might wear it.  My father was happy with his Armitron.   Clients have given my brother expensive watches, but he doesn't usually wear, fearing that he'd lose them.  "The Rolex is nice," he said, "but it's too heavy."  He usually wears a plastic watch because he finds it's less trouble than checking his cell phone.)

Nevertheless, when I see an interesting watch I take note.  And here it is, a watch from Ziiiro. The leading edge of the outer ring indicates the minutes. The inner ring shows the hours.

They're girls!

Just recently I got an old 27" Sony TV for free on Craig's List to replace the much smaller TV fried by our local power company. I hoped that having the TV might interest my mother, giving her something to do other than nodding off over the papers.

I didn't realize how big and heavy it was, but with help from my brother we got it into the house. Getting the TV hooked up to cable required getting a new cable box because that too was fried in the power surges.

With the TV finally connected to cable a friend turned it on to see if something would interest my 92-year old mother. Flipping through the channels they found a broadcast of a local high school basketball game. My mother's eyesight has been getting worse, but after a short while she exclaimed, "They're girls!" Title IX made manifest.

My friend reported that my mother watched the whole rest of the game, switching away only during half-time and occasional breaks.

Counting Problems in the Pool

Yesterday was my first day back in the school's pool after the Holiday break. I usually swim a pair of laps in one style, then a pair of laps in another, etc. About half way through my usual routine I realized that I had not completed a pair of laps, but - brain cramp - started on the next style.

It reminded me of a joke from either Mad magazine or the National Lampoon which attributed the longevity of certain isolated villagers to their inability to count correctly.

Search around for a graphic for counting on my fingers I came across this:

Gas With Class

A number of years ago I remember reading about a group of guys at a party in Silicon Valley trying to guess the make of an exotic sports car.  None of them got it.  The car was either a Ferrari or Lamborghini.

This perplexed me because, living near some very wealthy neighborhoods, I get to see some expensive cars through the windshield of my 22 year old Honda Civic.  I would have expected that the guys in Silicon Valley would have seen more than their share of expensive cars.  Perhaps they do, but they don't remember or try to match the image with a label.

All this as a preface to say, hey, guess what pulled up next to me as I was getting gas (click the picture for a larger image):
I don't know if there are boasting rights associated with gettng gas the same place as a guy with a Lamborghini, but if there are I'd like them.  (The guy didn't take offense at being photographed. I appreciate that. A lot of people are bothered by photographed in public.)

I Get Dumped On

Or more accurately, a tree service offered 6 yards of wood chips fr free on Craig's List.  It turned out to be more chopped up pine boughs than chips.

I was concerned that Scott, guy with the truck, would arrive at the house, not see me, decide it was a hoax, and take off.  I was truly surprised to see that he'd backed his dump truck into the back yard and was dropping his load.  It wasn't as easy as it sounds: it had rained the night before and frozen so that the chips and pieces of branches at the bottom were frozen so they had to be scraped from the truck bed.  Also, being that he had an older truck the bed didn't angle as steeply as newer trucks so Scott had to leap with a rake to pull the stuff closest to the cab.  

I had a good time standing on the mounds as the pine scent rose about me.  It's been a long time since I've been in pines.  I asked them to keep me in mind the next time they had a load of chips.

Reading History in Barrons

I'm a little behind in my reading:  I just finished reading "Numbers Game" by Johnathan R. Laing from the September 13, 2004 edition of Barrons.  In the article he dissects the numbers at SPX, pointing out the artful accounting behind SPX's financial statements.

My general sense from the article was that the company boosted their numbers by overvaluing the "goodwill" of acquired companies, moved poorly performing businesses into "non-continuing operations", and other fancy financial footwork.  While the numbers were on the balance sheets, the ramifications would elude myself and most people in the stock market.

I'm hesitant to use the term "investors" as I think most people in the market have only a general idea of how businesses work.  Money rolls in and get spent.  We know that, but how does that relate to the price of the stocks we purchased.  "Investing" may be no more than trusting others by purchasing funds.  As Howard, my broker, likes to point out, people don't buy stocks, they buy stories.

I did some web searching to see that John Blystone, the CEO in the article, left the company 3 months after the article came out.  His retirement package was somewhat less than the bonanza he might have been expecting.  How did the company fare?  I took a look at finance.yahoo.com.  The stock price about the time the article was written seemed to be falling from $60 to about $40.  Pretty sickening, but nothing compared to its plunge from ~120 to ~33 in October of 2008.  I have no idea what that means.  I expect that  there is plenty of material for financial writers and social writers.

 

 It would be an interesting exercise to have finance students write a paper explaining the article for those like me.

Little Drummer Boy and Tool Porn

I had to move some money at the bank today.  (Yes I could have done it online, but it gives me an excuse to get some exercise and maybe look at stuff in the shopping center.)  Instead of coming directly back home I decided to take the great circle route back home: walking through the the shopping center, drop by the library, and then home.  It might have been about a mile, all told.

It was at a sporting goods store at 1:17 PM this afternoon that I heard my first "Little Drummer Boy" of the season.  Garrison Keillor weaves the "Little Drummer Boy" into his Pre-Christmas skits on Prairie Home Companion as a malevolent force, causing plagues, havoc to air travel, nausea to music lovers, etc.  Hearing it reminds me again why I listen to public radio.

Yesterday I spotted an ad for a $59 table saw at Lowe's.  I had to go to the Lowe's site to determine the brand.  Tradesman?  What's sort of brand was a Tradesman?

I wasn't the only one.  A quick web search turned up "Tradesman Table saw, junk, or worth $60? on lumberjocks.com.  The considered opinion that it was better to save your money for a better quality saw.  If you were really strapped for cash go ahead, but be forewarned that the rip fence didn't align correctly.  (I wandered around the net looking at portable table saws, aftermarket rip fences, advice about blade alignment, etc.  One thing led to another. I strayed into mechanics tools, ratchets and things.  I kept reminding myself that I had purchased a set of screw drivers with interchangeable sockets and bits a few months before.  I'd even used them.)

Nevertheless, the ad stoked tool lust, was barely sated by ogling the tools in Sears.  I'd like to do building stuff with my hands. Uncertainty about impending changes in employment has me heading to the economic mattresses, cautious about buying anything.

For the time being I'll just look and struggle with the conflicting desire to stay employed and having all the time I want to do whatever I want to do.

Black Friday Ads: Norelco Sensotouch

Thumbing through a Bed Bath and Beyond circular I spotted -  what the bleep was it?  A shaver with design award ambitions.  Then the price hit me.  $279.99!!

The Norelco Sensotouch Ultra 3D Deluxe Edition Electric Razor (to give its full name) may be filling a niche far beyond my ken: Masters of the Universe who need another overpriced article in their bathroom cabinet.

OK, I admit to leading a sheltered existence.  Minimal TV and public radio stations have shielded me from a lot of the hucksterism.  I get to see ads in the NY Times and learn about products primarily through its business section so I missed the introduction this past July.

A quick search of the web turned up a lot of laudatory reviews, but nothing ecstatic enough to make me even consider shaving again.

Tattoo Shirts Who Knew?

One of our profs kindly consented to create a video describing how she uses Twitter to keep connected to and motivate students in her classes.  During the initial e-mail discussions as to where and when, she jokingly asked for makeup and hair stylists.  I said sure and, knowing that she had some tattoos, I said I'd throw in a free tattoo.

I was thinking more along the lines of press-on/washable tattoos.  But as with almost everything else these days I turned to the web and turned up bewild.com (http://www.bewild.com/fubotashtacl.html) with "full body tattoo shirts".  Who knew?

I would have lucked out: the Womans Geisha Dragon Full Body Tattoo Shirt had just been reduced from $89 to $52. 

Of course, now that she's made the video I need to come up with something.  Instead of ordering over the web, I'll see if I can find something in a novelty or 5 and 10 cent store if they still exist.

What do you get a woman who's already got 5 or 6 tattoos?  Is this the same existential question as the perennial problem of getting something for someone who has everything?  (The answer to that problem is easy:  steal something from them and give it back.  Works every time.  My family's problem was slightly different.  My father would say that all he wanted to be left alone so we had to think of something for someone who didn't want anything.)

There's a post script to this.  I made the video on my own time.  The director, without asking permission from the prof linked to it from her blog.  Not polite in my estimation.  When I asked the prof about it, however, she said, sure, wasn't the whole world about her anyway.  (I'm always the last to know.)

Bleeping Power Company!

In the last few days we've had power surges and outages.  The toll so far:
2 TVs,
2 phone answering machines,
3 cable boxes,
1 cable modem,
1 vacuum cleaner,
1 computer (I think it's the power supply),
2 surge protectors,
and about 8 incandescent bulbs.

It is a "Gaslight" experience.  I'm in drag playing Ingrid Bergman with the power company playing Charles Boyer's part trying to drive me mad.  To drive home how apt the analogy is, consider this: we're the only house in the neighborhood having this problem.

If my mother were hooked to some medical apparatus we'd have been in deep doo-doo.

The next time someone refers to the web infrastructure as a utility just like phone and power I'll feel compelled to say something snarky.

Hey, I'm Sick

Last Thursday afternoon I left my breakfast in the wastebasket in the Computer Science lab.  It's been a long time since I had anything other than a cold or flu so this was a remarkable experience.  Perhaps most remarkable was that while I was heaving there were two students in the lab, so engrossed in their programming that they didn't notice.  (Perhaps that is so old fashioned.  More typical these days would be students engrossed by their smart phone.)

I still feel a little rocky, having difficulty swallowing, tightness in my chest, and an occasionally congealed feeling in my stomach.

It's unlikely that whatever it is will kill me, but it does lead to idle musing about something which seemed dismissible but wasn't.  I think of a former director's husband who had an annoying pain in his shoulder/back which turned out to be the first symptom of the cancer which killed him.

"The closest thing I have to vacation is sleep."

I ran up my sleep deficit a few days ago: staying up until 3 in the morning to get several teaching labs ready for the students.  I had help: my main squeeze and a guy from the Systems group who saved me from myself.  Both stayed until 3 AM.  I was back to teach a class at 9:05 that morning, tasting the fruits of my labor (I taught in one of the labs I set up), put in a regular day, staggered home about 8 PM and into my sleepers before 10 PM.

Now, a few days later, I chanced across an article about entrepeneurs ("Some Business Skills to Go With the Passion", NY Times, F6, August 26, 2010) in which Ms Saudia Davis who started an environmentally friendly cleaning service is quoted: "The closest thing I have to vacation is sleep."

I understand the sentiment.

Rostenkowski RIP

Dan Rostenkowski (January 2, 1928 - August 11, 2010) served 18 terms in Congress and 17 months in jail.

Will similar expressions be the usual summation of political careers?  I have a faint memory of a politician (Wayne Morse?) who said that he was leaving politics "unbowed and unindicted."

Bar Codes

I went into the city to watch the fireworks yesterday. The most memorable part for me was reading an article in Government Technology about Web 2.0 technology in Manor Texas (pop 5,000). (I'm not a lot of fun at parties.  To appropriate Don Rickles description of Johnny Carson: I'm the guy who sits in the corner and watches the avocado dip turn black.)  They, or rather their 23 year old CIO, Dustin Haisler, put 2-D bar codes all over town including City Hall.

Thinking that the idea might be applicable to the University I forwarded the article to two guys in web development.

It took a few minutes during which I located a 2D bar code generator/decoder (Qr-code) and then an unzipper (jZip) to unZip a rar file for me to think: "Hey!  T-shirts!"  I could have spared myself the exclamation points and thinking about commercializing it.  People were way ahead of me.  When a search engine prompts you with your brilliant idea you know the idea is past its sell by date.  From zazzle.com:

We'll see soon enough if the University already had its own 2-D bar code initiative underway.

Practical Advice from Patti Smith

There is this gem within Patti Smith's May 24, 2010 commencement address at Pratt Institute:

"I say this because you want at night to be pacing the floor because your muse is burning inside of you, because you want to do your work, because you want to finish that canvas, because you want to make that design, because you want to help your fellow man. You don't want to be pacing because you need a damn root canal." The take-home message? "Floss, you know, use salt, baking soda, get them professionally cleaned, you know, for a bit, take care of your damn teeth."

- http://www.mediabistro.com/unbeige/education/patti_smith_to_pratt_grads_be_happy_take_care_of_your_teeth_162167.asp

I saw it in the NY Times (June 21, 2010), the same article quoted Glenn Beck's address to Liberty University: "Shoot to kill."

I'll take Patti Smith.

Mother and Child are Doing Fine

One of the directors had a child a week or so ago.  The announcement ended with "Mother and child are doing fine."  That's nice, but there is some mystery here.  (She's got to be in her mid to late 40's.  Who was the father?  Did she feel her biological clock ticking a la Marisa Tomei in "My cousin Vinny"?)

It's none of my business of course, but the photos of mother and child started me thinking.  Thinking may be the wrong term.  Let's just say that the next day the thought struck me that mother and newborn child pictures could be like the photo setups in carnivals: mother and father stick their heads through a cutout.  An appropriate colored baby is inserted and there you go: the happy family's first picture.

Musing on the subject I regretted my lack of Photoshop expertise.  Just think how tiny baby fangs would look.  Or how about a little tail poking out of it's blanket - a baby Splice?

Donburi for $2.99

If there was any doubt that the suburbs have become more ethnically diverse, a recent supermarket flier should lay that to rest.

I have no idea if $2.99 for 11.29 oz of Ajinomoto Donburi is a good price, let alone what Donburi is.  (Thank goodness for the web: from www.japan-guide.com/e/e2342.html"I learned that donburi is a general term for 'bowl'.  However, it also popularly refers to a bowl of cooked rice with some other food served on top of it.")  A closer look at the ad shows a simplified oriental script beneath each description.  Kanji? Hangul/Chosongul?

Does this have ramifications?  Does it mean that the Chinatowns, Little Koreas, Little Indias in the city will lose customers as those shopping for ethnic supplies shop closer to home?  Check back in 5 years.

Forwarded Insults

I received a forwarded email from a friend (see below) entitled "When Insults Had Class‏".  I was annoyed for several reasons:

• My friend didn't have enough courtesy to remove all the other names when forwarding e-mail or to use a BCC.
• The famous poison quote between Winston Churchll and Lady Astor was probably mangled.
• All the quotes seemed to come from a single web site.  I thought it would have been more intellectually honest to include several quotes and a link to the web site with the quotes: http://msbookish.com/the-art-of-the-insult/.  
• One of my favorite quotes was mangled and mis-attributed.

 The Churchill response to Astor was probably "I would take it." or "I would eat it."  I remember Churchill's phrasing seemed odd.  Also I do not believe Astor used conjunctions.

Instead of the phrase "unspeakable disease" the original of my favorite insult was closer to "Sir, you will surely die on the gallows or of the pox." ("The pox" referred to syphilis.")  Although the exchange may have been recycled to address Disreali, the original was surely earlier.  See for example: http://www.rateitall.com/i-42795-egad-sir-i-do-not-know-whether-you-will-die-on-the-gallows-or-of-the-pox-that-will-depend-my-lord-on-whether-i-embrace-your-principles-or-your-mistress-john-wilkes-to-the-earl-of-sandwich.aspx.  (This insult was a personal favorite of mine after hearing a review of a book I thought was called, "The Art of the Insult".  I have been unable to find a book of that name.)

I found a web site which had the same text as the forwarded e-mail and asked my friend why the guy who sent him the list of insults (which is a worthy list, make no mistake about that), didn't just send the URL (http://msbookish.com/the-art-of-the-insult/).  

There are plenty of links which turn up if you search for "When Insults Had Class‏", most contain the same insults, but he one I found missing was Jack E. Leonard's "There's nothing wrong with you that reincarnation won't cure."

Of course, if one wants to be witty, there's this wonderful caution from Dorothy Parker's:

If, with the literate, I am
Impelled to try an epigram,
I never seek to take the credit;
We all assume that Oscar said it.

How about this?  I thought it was associated with the British politician Fox:  When a British politician was dying, one of his critics came to visit.  The critic was turned away by the houseman who explained that his master was indisposed.  When the politician was told who had come calling, he said, "If he calls again show him up.  If I am alive I will be glad to see him.  If I am dead he will be glad to see me."

And although it was probably much wittier in French, it works well in English.  Voltaire replied to a critic:  "Sir, I am in the smallest room in my house.  Your letter is before me.  It will soon be behind me."  (The translation may be inaccurate because I don't believe indoor plumbing was available in Voltaire's day.  The original might be closer to the smallest room I own, and the translation makes it more accessible to us now.  Be that as it may, I love it.)

---

When Insults Had Class These glorious insults are from an era before the English language got boiled down to 4-letter words. The exchange between Churchill & Lady Astor: She said, "If you were my husband I'd give you poison." He said, "If you were my wife, I'd drink it." A member of Parliament to Disraeli: "Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease." "That depends, Sir," said Disraeli, "whether I embrace your policies or your mistress." "He had delusions of adequacy." - Walter Kerr "He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire." - Winston Churchill "I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure."  Clarence Darrow "He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary." - William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway). "Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I'll waste no time reading it." - Moses Hadas "I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it." - Mark Twain "He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.." - Oscar Wilde "I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend.... if you have one." - George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill "Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second.... if there is one." -  Winston Churchill, in response. "I feel so miserable without you; it's almost like having you here." - Stephen Bishop "He is a self-made man and worships his creator." - John Bright "I've just learned about his illness. Let's hope it's nothing trivial" - Irvin S. Cobb "He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others." - Samuel Johnson "He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up." - Paul Keating "In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily." - Charles, Count Talleyrand "He loves nature in spite of what it did to him." - Forrest Tucker "Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?" - Mark Twain "His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork." - Mae West "Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.." - Oscar Wilde "He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts.. . for support rather than illumination. " - Andrew Lang (1844-1912) "He has Van Gogh's ear for music." - Billy Wilder "I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it." - Groucho Marx

Outstand Young Man of America

One of the profs is retiring at the end of this semester after 30 years at the University. ("I've served the university 30 years - 5 years more than one gets for murder.")

One of his favorite set pieces highlights his multiple degrees: "If a couple comes to me for advice I have to ask them who they're coming to see: If they're asking me in my capacity as a rabbi they want me to keep them together. If they're asking me as a psychologist they want me to approve the decision they've already made. And, if they're asking me as a lawyer, they're asking me to make the divorce happen."  I guess he couldn't work in his rank as a Marine captain.

When I expressed surprise that he wasn't taking most of his plaques and awards he said I could have them.  If I didn't come by to pick them up they were going into the trash.  My interest, quite frankly, was in the frames, not the awards and certificates.

When I went over to get them just the other day I passed the prof in the parking lot.  "I left a knife for you on the frames - I can't take it with me on the plane and I don't think it's worth packing."  Oh, cool.  I had visions of a Bowie knife.  It turned out to be a quality folding knife.  In contrast with the fastidiousness of the instructor, there was schmutz on the blades.  I thought it odd.  It was if he had used the knife to cut an apple and neglected to wipe off the blade.  Also, one of the points was broken.  Not something I'd expect of someone so neat, fastidious really, and careful in his writing and spoken word.

Outstanding young man? I thought you'd never ask.  One of the plaques cited him as an "Outstanding Young Man of America".  I presumed it was one of those scams like "Who's Who in Floor Waxing", but no, if Wikipedia can be believe, he was in an exclusive club with some very impressive people.  Only 10 people are chosen each year.  The award was rename to Outstanding Young American several years after he was chosen.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Outstanding_Young_Americans.

A Camera for My Main Squeeze

An e-mail from MicroCenter advertised a very good buy on a camera which had very nice consumer reviews.  When I called My Main Squeeze to ask if she'd mind if I bought it for her, she was hesitant about carrying something which might be expensive and attractive to thieves.

Knowing my finances and my reluctance to part with money, she should have known that it couldn't be very expensive.  Still she was concerned because it would look new.  I overcome her concern by promising to reduce the camera's appeal by sticking some duct tape on it.

She's now off to a conference with a brand new camera accessorized with a patch of duct tape.  There are so many  buttons, knobs, and functional areas on the camera that need to be exposed, that I could only put a 1"x2" strip of tape on one side. 

Muscles to Smile

I wanted to quote Prairie Home Companion: It takes 41 muscles to smile, but only 4 to give them the finger.   It was a new twist on the common expression that it takes more muscles to smile than to frown and I wanted to cite the correct number of muscles.

When I turned to the web for an answer I found that the answer is actually unknown (snopes.com).    Answers.com got David H. Song of University of Chicago Hospitals to enumerate the number of muscles as 12 to smile and 11 to frown.   (In counting the muscles ("A genuine smile takes two muscles to crinkle the eyes, two to pull up the lip corners and nose, two to elevate the mouth angle, and two to pull the mouth corners sideways. Total smile: 12.")  I come up with 8.  Perhaps "lips and nose" meant two muscles each.)

The Answers.com article also pointed to the ability of human's to distinguish sincere smiles by the recognizing the small but characteristic changes to the eyes and nose in a real smile.

Snopes provided a jibe from Auburn's basketball coach, Sonny Smith, at his rival, Wimp Sanderson: Sanderson's smile led Smith to conclude that Sanderson was suffering from muscle fatigue.

My only contribution to the number of muscles to frown vs the number of muscles to smile literature is this:  "Frown: consider it an aerobic workout for your face."

Nose Job

My brother decided that a spot on my nose needed the attention of a dermatologist. I searched through my parents' phone book to find the dermatologist who looked at my nose when my father told me to have someone look at a spot on my nose. (I told my father that he could look at the spot on my nose right then for free, but he'd better hurry because the price was going up soon. He was not amused.)

That time the doctor said that it was nothing to worry about. This time the dermatologist looked at me with sorrowful eyes and said the only hope was for me to join the Tea Party and vote Republican. Seeing the tears brimming in my eyes he offered an alternative: he'd lend me a razor and the use of his tub.  For slightly more he'd lend me a gun and guide me to the men's room.

What actually happened was that he said my skin was pretty good for my age and that if I wanted he could scrape the spot off, but it wasn't necessary.  bye.  See you in October.

The Morning the Milking Was Finished

I stumbled across the article, "The Morning the Milking Was Finished" on the day it was written, February 3rd of this year. The single column article by Peter Applebome described how in the morning of January 21 Dean Pierson, 59, a dairy farmer in Copake, New York, finished the morning milking and then shot each of his 51 cows. He then killed himself.

An extension agent was quoted: “They lost money on every cow every day of every month last year.” The author probably paraphrased the family vet wrote: "Being a good farmer gave Dean Pierson a life where you worked a 15-hour day and at the end of it handed someone a $100 bill for the privilege."

When people I know complain about overwork and under paid, I usually make a comment about stoop labor or share croppers. This bleak story of a man who strained to maintain a way of life against economic pressures will be what I cite.

A Peculiar Smell

Last week I noticed a peculiar chemical odor in the air.  The smell had a hint of rubber.  It didn't seem to come from a particular direction so my first thought was something from airplanes.  On the third day I realized that it was the smell of spring. 

It's been a long time.

It Might Get Loud

On Friday night I saw "It Might Get Loud". I didn't bring my mother along explaining that rock was still not something she'd like. She responded that at her age (early 90's) movies should be entitled, "It Should be Loud".

In a memorable scene, Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin) thumbs through some 45s, puts one on the turntable, and plays air guitar to Link Wray's "Rumble". As he strums his imaginary guitar, Page's smile widens and an ecstatic look spreads across his face as the distortion increases in waves.

I still marvel at the thought of Jimmy Page playing air guitar. It would make a great hard core rock trivia question.

Foreclosure of the Day

A sure sign of our time: "Foreclosure of the Day" as a feature in Newsday. Public hangings being a thing of the past, perhaps the county can post eviction notices so we can gather an gawk.

Those who stumble onto this from another part of the country may want to stop reading right now. West Hempstead is not a wealthy area. The taxes on the property are $7,430, with additional village taxes of $4,300.

Definitive Biography of PDQ Bach

I spotted a copy of the Definitive Biography of PDQ Bach by Peter Schickele as I was leaving the Systems area. "Whose is this?" I asked. With no answer I declared it mine and ran. Not really. I spent a few minutes regaling them with PDQ Bachianna: the drunk musician sprawled on the concert stage, the left-handed sewer flute, "last and least loved son", "Trance and Dental Etude", the "Unbegun Symphoney", etc. and then I ran. Finding PDQ's biography (oft cited as the long-awaited hoax) in Systems was astounding. To my knowledge only Ray reads books. His readings fall into two narrow categories: waaaaay right-wing/libertarian screeds (the last I knew his crush on Ann Coulter was unrequited and undiminished) and job-related computer security tomes. Most of the Systems guys don't read books, understandable since most of what they need to read is online. Recreational reading, if such a thing happens for Systems guys, seems confined to Cigar Aficionado, Money magazine, and Car and Driver.

Back to PDQ: Shickele's humor is sophomoric -- dead aimed at my level. It's Chicken Inspector No. 23 (SJ Perlman) humor: "One of the reviewer mentioned 'long lines at the box office,' but in all fairness it must be admitted that the lines consisted of people demanding refunds." There's the visual humor:After hearing about it for many, many years I finally got to see a picture of the legendary left-handed sewer flute, an instrument whose performance use declined with the advent of indoor plumbing.

Loose Lips Sink Career

Robert Maley, Pennsylvania's CISO (Chief Information Security Officer) was terminated after mentioning a recent incident at the early March RSA security conference. A driving school was able to circumvent security to schedule its students ahead of others in the queue.

Rules governing Pennsylvania State employees require prior approval before discussing official matters publicly, but it seems that he aired some dirty linen (2008 cross-site scripting vulnerability in a voter registration website, SQL injection attacks, etc.) and the driving school case was under active investigation. For more see the IT Knowledge Exchange and a Computer World interview with Maley.

What is Not Said

IBM stops disclosing U.S. headcount data

The headline says it all. Citing the practice of it's competitors, IBM no longer breaks out employment by country. Two stark figures appear in the article: in 2009 IBM reported 105,000 domestic works. Two years earlier (2007 for the math challenged), IBM employed 121,000 people. Slightly less than one-sixth of its work force was no longer employed by Big Blue.

I look around and wonder when my term to be RIFfed. In my mind, RIF (for Reduction In Force) is a particularly sinistereuphemism as it suggests RIP (Rest in Peace) and the thought that a "reduction in force" is an extreme prejudicial way of saying KIA (killed in action).

Alien Abduction/British Understatement

In an article entitled "Keep Calm and Never Mind, Britain Says in Its X-Files", the British Ministry of Defense is quoted as responded to an inquiry as follows:

"Abduction is a criminal offense and as such is a matter for the civil police to handle. The police can only investigate allegations of abduction if there is evidence to suggest that such a crime has taken place."

That sure clears things up.

Hip by Accident

My brother knows hip when he sees it - it's part of his job. "I hope this doesn't come as a shock," he said, "but you're wearing what hip people are wearing."

Now we both know it wasn't true, but from a distance you might be fooled.

I was wearing pants which were too short - showing a couple of inches of white socks, a flannel shirt of indeterminant age, and an over-sized sweatshirt. The pants were tight because I've put on a few pounds in the 15 or 20 years since I bought them. The truly hip buy skin tight skinny jeans. The over-sized sweatshirt was either road kill or a thrift store purchase by my main squeeze. She knows I wear enough layers in the winter to fill out the sweatshirt.

On the subject of clothing, my favorite remark was recounted by a friend who, knowing I always wanted one, bought me a tattersall vest. As she was buying it the salesman, trying to be helpful, said, "You know it's not in fashion." She replied, "He doesn't care."

Saved by the Snow

I forgot to mail in my mother's tax payment.

I remember dropping a whole bunch of mail into the local post box, but not the tax payment. I like to make sure the letter has a validating postmark. (For years I made my own local tax payment in person and getting a receipt. Only recently have I been mailing in my own tax payments, but making sure to get a postmark.)

Last night I opened a manila envelope and, Oh blast! There was the envelope for my mother's payment. Was there any way I could evade taking the rap for a late payment? Maybe the me everyone saw was a substitute from another dimension where I was trapped in a block of carbonite like Han Solo. Better yet, I selflessly volunteered to take Hans's place so he could save the Universe. It was only, now through a series of brilliantly complex actions (much too complicated to explain here) that I was able to escape back to earth. Unfortunately I got here too late to get the tax payment in on time.

OK, that was fun but stupid. I just got off the phone with the tax office. I had called to see if I could drop off my mother's check and my own check for the late payment penalty. It turned out that, because of the recent weather, the governor pushed back the payment due date for taxes until tomorrow. AllI'll need is today's postmark.

Saved by the storm. I'm a lucky guy.

Right after I click PUBLISH POST I'm off to get my mother's payment postmarked.

Albert Across the Street Dies

I went to my house yesterday to shovel more snow from the driveway and remove nails and screws from some old louvered shutters so I could set them out for trash collection. I hadn't been to the house since I'd shoveled out a path to the front door for the mailman and a place for the car a few days ago. I had to go because it was the day the mail delivery resumed.

I was surprised to see an empty yellow recycling container in the path to the door, but I decided to figure out why after I shoveled and took care of the nails and screws in the shutters. (I didn't know what local ordinance I'd be violating if I didn't remove protruding nails and screws, but I wasn't interested in learning about it either.)

So after all that I trotted across the street to see Carol, the neighborhood busybody (her own description). When I rang the bell, I saw the blinds blink, but I didn't hear Albert's growl telling Carol that I was at the door.

I started to describe the recycling bin, when Carol said, "You didn't hear?" Carol usually starts with a mock complaint or an accusation. ("Back from your secret mission?" or "Well, hello stranger.") Something was wrong: Albert wasn't in his chair. The TV was off.

Albert had died in his sleep over a week ago.

There had been a going away party for a fellow headed for Afghanistan. Afterward Al had gone drinking with his boys and Carol had headed home. The next morning before she headed off to church, he'd asked her for some chocolate milk, his usual morning after drink. When she came back, she could see that he'd had the chocolate milk. She went into the bedroom to ask if he wanted another, but couldn't rose him. He was gone.

The police and EMS came. Because he died at home, toxicology tests have to be performed. It'll be several months before Carol can get widows benefits because those are dependent on a death certificate, and the death certificate won't be issued until all the toxicology reports are in.

Carol handled the household accounts so she knows how much money she has and what she can afford, but it's all the unnoticed things he did in his part of their marriage which see sees now. Carol, for example, never put gas in her car. Al always did that. (It reminded me of a friend who misread her utility meters the first time after her husband's death. "So that's what guys do." she told me. (She'd always wondered.) That thought seems especially timely: my friend and here husband were getting ready for bed on Valentines Day when he collapsed right before her eyes. He too was a nice guy.)

Carol said that people came over and said just ask if you need anything, bu tshe'd been there as one of the people saying the same thing. And after a while everyone else goes on with their life, not through callousness, but because life has to be lived.

Carol and the FBI (her next door neighbor) tried to reach me by phone, but as I don't have a home phone, cell phone and I occasionally forget to put fresh batteries in my beeper, they never reached me. Carol said that Albert's friend's came in groups: his post office buddies, although he'd been retired for 14 years, his biker friends, and his bar friends.

Al had a lot of friends for the simple reason that he was a nice guy. He looked out for me because he was a neighbor. It was a simple as that.

Hadju at Port Washington

Riffing on the January 24 entry in Tom Bodett's blog: while I was out shoveling snow a few days ago, someone else while enjoying a stroll on a sunny beach cut their foot on a sharp stone. Now, due to inattention, they are writhing in agony while I'm typing this blog entry.

Ahh, life can be sweet.

On another matter, I got to see David Hajdu at the Port Washington Library talking about his book Heroes and Villians and buy an autographed copy of the book. The program scheduler at the library told me that my name actually meant first born and beloved. That's nice I told her and in my case was probably appropriate. With tongue firmly planted in their cheeks, my parents referred to me as "the Jesusil". (The simplest explanation would be Yiddish for the infant Jesus.)

I will probably have the last photograph of Hajdu with his beard. To his surprise his beard came in almost white. He intended to shave it off the next day. (He pointed out that my beard is unusually darker than my hair.)

There was a young woman at the checkout desk with strikingly dark makeup around her eyes. The effect was more Edward Gorey's kohl-eyed woman than Goth. I asked her if I could take her picture. She wasn't sure, asking me if I was a photographer. "I replied that I was an indifferent one." I went on to tell her that her appearance changed markedly from front to profile and that her eye makeup was more reminiscent of the 70's than the young women around the college. It turned out, surprise, surprise, that she's a student where I work.

I gave her my e-mail address in case she should change her mind about being photographed. I've got to remember to print out and carry release forms.

"Hell hath no wrath like a woman with proof." - Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me"

Champagne Bubble Bath

Among the items which show up in my mailbox is Clipper, a coupon magazine. Alongside offerings to reduce wrinkles without Botox and discounts at local eateries was a 50% off offering from three places in the Poconos for 3 days/2 nights for $525 in a "Champagne Tower Suite". The ad was illustrated with a picture like the one below.
My initial response was, Whoa! I wouldn't want to take a header out of that! Nothing says romance like slipping out of a gigantic champagne glass and crashing to the floor. It would be talk of the EMS for years.

Now here's something worthy of investigation. Someone must find this appealing. A quick web search for "Champagne Tower"showed that not only was there a "Champagne Tower by Cleopatra", but a "Champagne Tower from Rome". Who knew? The site says it's for couples. Same sex couples? In this economic climate their money may be gratefully appreciated.

I must have a defective romantic gene combined with an unreasonable fear of bodily harm. The ad has no appeal to be except as a voyeur. I wouldn't be surprised if an upcoming Survivor type reality show has a "Champagne Tower Challenge". Those more creative than myself will dream up the challenge, but I imagine that the contestants will have to perform something requiring manual dexterity and balance in a tower filled with Ripple "sparkled" with seltzer.

True Cost of Credit

Today's NYTimes's article "The Damage of Card Rewards"identified truecostofcredit.com as a site which would give the reader a sense of how much the rewards associated with a credit card cost a merchant.

I found that because my card doesn't have any rewards associated with it, I was startled to find that a convenience store could be paying 18.7% for the purchase of a pack of gum. According to truecostofcredit.com I'm "in the minority, since the majority of credit cards are now rewards cards." Seeing what merchants have to pay brought up the usual arguments about cash discounts.

Semantics are marvelous: credit card companies prohibit surcharges for use of their cards, but do not prohibit cash discounts. You can almost hear the rim shot: what's the difference?

I've always felt that shopping was a game of wits between the merchant and me. They want me to part with my money and I'm trying to minimize what I spend. The credit card is a tremendous convenience for me, and as it turns out, a reduced number of cash transactions also reduces the business as a target for robbery.

All told, the article and the web site made me think that I should start paying in cash. The gas station with that lower price for cash may be getting my business. We'll see.

Show Boat

The December 10th New York Times carried a piece about the scaled down staging of Rogers and Hammerstein's "Show Boat". (I just got around to reading it.) Originally carrying a cast of 50 and an orchestra of 28, Arlington, VA's Signature Theater's production had just 24 actors and an orchestra of 15.

While the article discusses the various incarnations and staging of the musical, I was struck by the thought that it will be increasingly rate for us to see musicals the way they were back in the day due to production costs. How can you get that many people on stage?

Knowing that most of us couldn't afford to see something close to the original staging made me doubly sad.

How Full of It?

I weighed myself after the Thanksgiving meal without an intervening stop in a small room. While my weight was at the upper end of my guesstimated weight range, vanity wanted it to be at the bottom.

Weighing myself again today with the same clothes after emptying my pockets and an intervening pit stop, the difference was 5.8 pounds.

Now when people tell me I'm full of it, I can agree and provide a quantitative response.

Childhood in a Strict Modernist Household

Once again I find myself reading the NY Times out of time. I couldn't tell. The cover said "Design & Living Winter 2009". (I didn't know when it was published. After a few perfunctory searches I decided to bag the baloney and move on. Here's a quick scan of the cover.)

On second thought, I went to the NY Times site and searched for the title of the article. "Empty Nest Syndrome" and there it was with the subheading "When your parents are hard-core-minimalist, you grow up with nothing — and like it." by Fred A. Bernstein. The article was practically new having been published on November 8, 2009. A passage bothered me:

In Chicago, Emanuela Frankel has spent her life in a loft with concrete floors, white walls, black leather furniture and not much else. Even in her own room, ‘‘I can’t have anything on my desk except a pencil holder and a tissue box,’’ says Frankel, 15, whose parents are both designers in the strict Modernist camp. And nothing on the walls — ‘‘no posters, no magazine cutouts,’’ she said. She compensates, however, with a colorful wardrobe.

No clutter. I can appreciate the thought, the dedication, the rigor and ruthlessness of their lives. I am appalled. I've been in very modern designer residences saddened by the lack of the warmth, the absence of humanity. They don't have a dog do they? Who would want to live in such a sterile environment? Weren't kids supposed to be able to hang posters in their room so that 10 or 15 years later they could mock their younger selves?

Where are the books that a kid in sheer desperation and boredom might pick up and hours later, where did the afternoon go? Perhaps kids of those parents have enough of the parental gene and psyche to be able to live in that environment. To me it smacks of Harlow's maternal-separation and social isolation experiments on rhesus monkeys and infant macaques. (See for example A Critique of Maternal Deprivation Experiments on Primates and The Nature of Love by Harry F. Harlow, first published in American Psychologist, 13, 673-685. I remember reading reports of the experiments not long after they were published.)

The only claim I have to knowing about child-rearing is that I was one once. (My immaturity allows me to speak with greater authority on the subject, but I'll wait to be asked.) A strict modernist house, as I interpret the term, doesn't let kids be themselves. In that regard, the "100 feet of sock-sliding potential" cited by Phoebe Greenwood might be a saving grace.

Reading History/Boxing and Cleaning Gutters

Just as I was bundling the November 14th New York Times Saturday Sports section for recycling, an article about Joe Santiago, Cotto’s Trainer Learned Outside the Ring caught my eye. The nice thing about reading old newspapers is that the internet makes it easy to jump to the end of the book to see if the butler did it. Did Cotto beat Manny Pacquiao in their World Boxing Organization welterweight title fight?

A quick search gave me the answer: Pacquiao had won. If I were really interested I would have tried to do a competent job determining if ring aficionados blamed Santiago for the loss. Instead, I posted this.

This day was noteworthy because after several weeks of fantasizing (if that is the correct term) I cut a Styrofoam™ block (a Dow registered trade mark for a polystyrene plastic), stuck it on the end of a ladder to avoid marring the siding and unblocked the drain on the gutter of my parents' house.

The whole gutter cleaning operation was unremarkable except that I was reminded once again how aluminum ladders wiggle and why spending a lot of time on ladders with sneakers is a bad idea. (In my case it's because a great deal of pressure is applied to a small area of the foot by the round ladder rungs. I used to wear very stiff soled boots which distributed the pressure evenly on the foot.)

12 - 8 = 4

I'd had a few e-mail exchanges with a student about tutoring. Our original schedule didn't fit her schedule, but as more tutors came on board and the schedule was changed she let me know she was coming in. That she did. The tutor did the best he could, what with two other students also being there.

She was having problems converting values between number systems. (It is possible to teach students to convert from decimal to binary in their head. I've done it. They've even done the conversion with negative numbers which seems impossible until you learn the trick. I'm shading the truth a bit. The students do the conversion by having each student act as a binary digit. Each student performs a subtraction and passes the remainder on to the next student representing the next smaller digit. I've wandered afield - back to the narrative.)

All that conversion requires is that the student be able to recognize which of two numbers is bigger (most get that), be able to multiply and subtract. Having spent a long time among technical people I was taken aback when the student needed to use her fingers to calculate the result of subtracting 8 from 12.

I thought she was a joking. Then I saw that she had no feel for numbers: when asked "how many times 4,096 went into 49,000" I expected that she's say "a little more than 12." I never expected her to say, "I dunno" and then start guessing.

Hoo-boy we're in trouble here. She said she didn't like math, I replied that part of the reason that the country was in the financial mess it's in might be attributable to people quite literally being unable to do the math on their mortgage commitment. Her answer was something I never have expected. "Oh, I'd only get a fixed rate mortgage.

Take home message? Maybe a heuristic is an adequate substitution for knowledge. Even so, seeing a college student use their fingers to perform simple math still upsets me. (One exception: computer science students learning once again how to use indexes which begin at zero instead of one.)

The Drummer/TPE_U-theatre Drum

Last Friday I saw "The Drummer", a reckless-youth-becomes-a-novitiate film. In this case, it is a drum troupe (U-Theatre) that the young man wants to enter. When first heard, the drums are a faint sound coming down from the Taiwanese hills.

The drumming didn't raise the hair on the back of my neck like the drumming in the Chieftains version of "Loch Lomond", but
TPE_U-theatre Drum

Film Critics United

I stumbled across Film Critics United (http://filmcriticsunited.com/) which seems to be a one man operation by Christopher Armsted. The reviews are enjoyable, but especially so for me because almost every one contains at least one typo. Dirty Pretty Things was an exception: the page was blank.

The mailto: link is labeled "Let Chris How wrong He Is" [sic]. I sent him a list of typos, but have yet to hear back.

The following reviews are worth reading if only for style:

• The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3


• Pan’s Labyrinth
• Star Trek


• Angels and Demons

and especially "Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors" because among the typos he omitted a word making the review seem a damning confession. About one of the characters Chris wrote:

"His presence in the film I found the most perplexing and I would probably have to watch the film to get a better understanding of his place in the film."

Ah what a difference the word "again" would make.

Glory for Christ Football League

On June 25, 2009 The New York times published "Home-Schooled Football League Thrives in Georgia", an article by Mike Tierney, about a football league for home schoolers.

The picture of a sign on a practice field misspelled two of their 4 priorities and says more about their education than the proverbial thousand words.

The Internet to the Rescue: Brakelights

I lent my car to my main squeeze. Later that night she called to say that all the brake lights (left, right, and high mount) would not go off. She tried pulling the fuses, but that didn't work. I suggested that she just pull the battery cable, but she didn't feel up to doing that in the night. It took a call to AAA in the morning for her to get started.

Being ever resourceful, when she got back, she searched the web to find the brake wiring diagram on about.com which seemed to show that the brake light switch was the culprit. Some more searches and I had a decent idea where to find the switch and what to do on answers.yahoo.com. (Being who I am, there was an interlude to notify all-parts.com that they'd misspelled "Cadillac" as "Caddillac".) With her watching the rear lights we determined that two thicknesses of a postcard were all that separated the switch indicating the brake being on or off. My guiding principle in this regard is to ask myself, "What would Bob do?", Bob being a fellow graduate student with a firm idea of quality workmanship, integrity, and what slapdash fix would hold until the cavalry arrived.

I didn't have the necessary open end wrenches so I wrapped the brake pedal lever with the necessary cardboard and went looking for a sale on open end wrenches. My usual source for cheap tools (tools I can lend or lose without getting upset), National Wholesale Liquidators, closed it's stores in my area due to the credit crunch and there doesn't seem to an obvious replacement.

Stay tuned.

Stats Update

One of the stats profs dropped by for something else and I managed to inveigle him into analyzing a particular set of stats. It looked to me as if there was a difference between accredited departments and those which weren't. Sure enough a Chi-square showed significance way out to the p=.0001 level.

What was interesting because I don't yet understand it was that calculating Chi-square using a spreadsheet was half the value generated by SPSS. The stats prof said it was because of the way Chi-Square stats treat a 2x2 matrix. Beyond me, but I passed the good news along to the prof who wanted to find something significant to say about her survey.

Only later I found that "significance" is not as significant as it once was: statisticians seem to prefer describing confidence levels rather than specifying the probability of significance.

My Favorite Porn - I

Watching math videos is a rarefied perversion, but a fascinating one none the less. The poster child is BottemasTheorem. The theorem is simple to state: Draw squares on AB and BC on two sides of the triangle ABC. Let R and S be the points on the squares opposite vertex B. Then the midpoint M of RS is independent of B.

The setup looks like this:
The point labeled M does not move regardless of how the red triangle is changed. Mathematica's Demonstration site shows the deformed triangle (below) but the understanding of the theorem conveyed by the triptych is nothing compared to the impression of the online demo.

Click on any of the images to go to the site and start the animation.

The mathematicians who stumble onto the Mathematica are mesmerized by the demos until the need to tap a kidney bring them back to reality.

If math doesn't attract you, you still might want to take a look. Measuring the Speed of Light with Marshmallows is fascinating even for mathphobes.

Enjoy.

Blind Shaft

Based on familiar scandals in China's mines, Blind Shaft is a raw Chinese film about two ruthless grifters who, by pretending to be the relatives of miners who die in "accidents" they've staged, collect money from the mine owners. Mines owners pay because the mines are operating illegally or with substandard safety.

An unsparing camera follows the two men and their next victim, an innocent 16-year old who's trying to earn money to get back into school or get the school fees for his sister.

In a karaoke type singalong in a brothel, one of the grifters selects "Long Live Socialism" on the karaoke machine. As the men start to sing one of the girls asks if he's a hick. He's singing the old lyrics? Old lyrics? The new lyrics (according to the subtitles) include "The capitalist came back with their American dollars."

In one of the nicer touches in the film, one of the men who has misgivings about this particular scam tries to give him a last good taste of life with session with a prostitute. The boy bolts, but later, by chance, meets her again at an office where both have goneto wire money home.

The very fact that the film got made speaks volumes about changes in China. There is no musical sound track. There are no special effects. The production values are low. The story seems to have been caught on home video and seems just as real. The depiction of the underclass and the relentless drive for money makes its case more than any proletarian socialist realism film ever could.

The Future of Textbooks is Colored Orange

This has been sitting in draft since May 25^th 2009.  In the interim the textbook rental market has taken off.  The references to the movie theaters, airlines, and credit card companies are still relevant as business are still nickel and dime-ing, "breaking out services", or scrambling to make up forlost revenue.

On the very first day of Stats the instructor asked who had purchased the book, where they got it, and how much they paid. One student said she rented her book on line from Chegg.com for ~$40. Others had paid over $150.

I took a look, rented the text on Wednesday, paid for expedited shipping, and, lo and behold, an orange box arrived via UPS on Friday. The book looks pristine. Amazing!

Chegg.com and the recent Credit Card Bill Of Rights legislation got me thinking about capitalism, movie theaters, and credit cards. It seems that credit card companies cannot make money on people like myself who pay their bills on time in the same way that supermarkets can't make a profit from me because I've never left the impoverished graduate student mentality behind.

Credit card services provide an exceptionally useful service by minimizing the need to use cash for transactions and speeding commerce. If I had to pay for the textbook by check I would not have gotten the textbook anywhere as quickly as the check winged it's way to the vendor and being routed through the banking system. Add on the delay of a weekend and I would be half way through a summer course without the book unless I forked over considerably more money.

If the credit card companies are making money, they're not making money on me.  Someone else is taking up my slack. Thank you, but is it fair? It is analogous to the movie theater owners who can't make money on what is ostensibly their business: showing movies. I'm told that their profits come from the (overpriced) concessions.

(It was not always thus. Back when I was an undergraduate, someone obtained a large brown paper sack of popcorn. I was told that the sack was what theater owners poured into their popcorn machines. The popcorn machines in theaters only warmed the popcorn.   The machines didn't actually pop the popcorn. (It was one of many myths shattered in college.) I remember bringing the sack into the theater with about half a dozen others. The kid with the sack sat in the middle seat in the second of 3 rows with the sack extended lengthwise so it overlapped the seat of the guys next to him. We punched a hole in the top side of the bag at either end and in the middle so all of us could reach in for popcorn. Nowadays, something like that could only happen at free films.)

In this regard what is fair? Am I taking unfair advantage of the poor credit card companies, enjoying the good life financed by the wretched of the earth who can't manage their credit or driven in desperation to borrow at exorbitant rates? (Will Jesus not drive these money lenders from the temple?)  Could be.  On the other hand, by taking advantage of the situation I'm revealing flaws in the business plans of the credit card companies thus strengthening the capitalism's Darwinian imperative. (The Cato Institute is invited to donate to my PayPal account.) Or helping to destabilize evil Capitalism. (Surviving members of the International Communist Conspiracy are invited to donate to my PayPal account.) Or playing into the hands of the Capitalist masters so they can appeal to their government lackeys to use legislation to save them from the proletarian onslaught when their profits tank. (Whoo. the 60's are coming back with a rush!)

Is there a sensible way of viewing the situation?  I always considered credit card purchases as a short term, no interest loan. In my days of impoverishment (make a note: not a bad title) I would keep a mental tally of what I owed. I was fortunate enough that I didn't need to cover a large unexpected medical bill. Are the frequent flier miles programs essential for their business or a marketing idea come back to bite airlines? Does the need to offer inducements or grow their market by extending credit to those who can't repay the total represent a flawed business model or have credit card companies found themselves caught short like Long Term Capital Management: strategies which worked well during "normal" economic times fail disastrously in times of upheaval.

Statistics - Aaarrrggghhhh!

My knowledge of statistics is embarrassingly poor. I've a layman's sense of what variance, covariance, and standard deviation means. The calculation part is simple. Understanding when to apply a measurement (1-tail, 2-tail, general linear model) and the significance of the result is beyond me.

I can usually skate by with just this, but I created a program which, among other things, calculates Cronbach's coefficient of alpha. From my readings, Cronbach's alpha is not a statistic, but a measure of internal consistency. As an example, does the overall exam grade reflect the overall question grades? Described as a measure of internal consistency, as I understand it alpha let's you see how the the variations on individual questions compare with the variation of the entire exam. (I've been told that the coefficient of alpha was really designed to be used on Likert scales, e.g., scales from excellent to very poor, rather than on test scores, but I'm having enough trouble wrapping my mind around the concept that I'll agree with anyone who purports to know what they're talking about.)

Onward.

I recently volunteered to analyze the stats of a recent survey figuring that I'd learned something in the process. What I learned was that the survey was not constructed well, that there was no universally accepted way of analyzing the survey, and I needed to know more about stats.

The statisticians were uniformly kind and most enjoyed themselves richly making derogatory comments about the people who constructed the survey. I could smile because I had nothing to do with creating the survey.

In the end, only one of several important questions on the survey yielded a significant result if you made certain assumptions about the responses: instructor's teaching distance learning courses seemed to think that the size of the classes they taught were appropriate. (The reason the results are questionable is that there was no indication that the instructors were answering questions about the same type of class(es).)

But that's not why I started this post. I had rewritten an Opscan/Scantron grading program and all the stats but Cronbach's Alpha worked out correctly. We know that only one instructor actually checked those statistics, so I was able to let that slide citing the press of other work. It looks as though I'll have the time now. So...

Always one to shirk duty, but having used up all my excuses, I searched the web for information about Cronbach's coefficient of alpha and was disappointed to find that the example on the NIH's web site had an error. The bleeping National Institute of Health! Sigh. Double check me: Table 18-2. Number of Teeth in the Sex Comb on the Right (x) and Left (y) Legs and the Sum of the Two (T) for 20 Drosophila Males contains an error. If you've got a moment, find the average value of column labeled x. The total of 20 numbers comes out to 133 with an average of 6.65 by my calculations. The illustration shows the average to be 6.25. The error seems to have escaped the authors and reviewers because the value of 6.65 is used about a quarter way down the page in the calculation of cov xy. The book, should you be inclided to investigage is Modern Genetic Analysis by A. J. F. Griffiths, W. M. Gelbart, J. H. Miller, R. C. Lewontin published by W. H. Freeman and Company (1999) ISBN 0-7167-3118-5.

I'm off to find another reference which will show me how to calculate Cronbach's alpha. Alternatively, maybe I can convince people that they don't need alpha calculated. Most instructors just look at the grades. Only one instructor actually looked at the kurtosis values, but then he was a Psych prof and measurements was his specialty.