I’m not now right here.

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Superior leadership, make no bones about it, is pure selling…establishing the perception, the feeling, the picture, that your view is right, that you listen, hear, and understand, that you are worth listening to and following.

A Passion for Excellence, pg 109. Written about 20 years before Twitter.

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When the little ones reach a certain age, your home is filled with the pitter-patter of face plants.

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1440×900, up from last year.

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This month’s electric bill is brought to you by GE: “We bring good things to light.” ™ (c)

Usage by GE appliances: $0.18 per KW/h totaling $23.48

Usage by Kenmore appliances (see note 1): $0.53 per KW/h totaling $50.23

Usage by unlisted appliances: $0.26 per KW/h totaling $39.32

Total Due: $113.03

Note 1: PG&E is currently involved in litigation with Sears Kenmore, Inc. Since utility access fees are not being paid during the course of the pending legal action, full uncompensated rates apply.

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Pi, an irrational number, cannot be expressed exactly as a fraction of integers (and all real-world length units are ultimately based on integers). So either pi is not a circle’s ratio of circumference to diameter, or circles don’t exist (or both!)

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So, Yahoo! is looking for a new CEO.

Bill Gates just retired.

Hmm.

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To celebrate the unlamented demise of Valleywag, use as many of the ten insulting words you should know (along with any other appropriate words) as you can in a single short paragraph. Post in the comments below. This site is for geeks of all ages, so keep things PG. All right, PG-13. My favorite will be announced later.

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A special comment. My most vivid memory of my late Grandpa.

Even after retiring, Grandpa needed to do small jobs around town to make ends meet. One was cleaning a small sporting goods store. Once, with all the excitement of visiting family from out of town (that would be us), he forgot to clean one night. The next day, the shopkeeper was understandably irate, and waited around to speak face-to-face. “I screwed up,” Grandpa simply said. A short exchange followed, with typical Midwestern bluntness and politeness, the resolution being that it would never happen again. The shop got exceptionally well cleaned that day. Crisis averted.

That’s been a powerful lesson for me. When you screw something up, admit it, fix it the best you can, and move on.

-m

P.S. No, I haven’t done any major screw-ups lately, at least any that I know about. I was reminded of this by a much-publicized interview on Letterman.

Polyhedra: n. (plural) – Sketches done by an artist of the male gender.

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Tough economic times? Take 1.2 volt, 2.5 Amp/hr NiMH batteries (technically “cells”). Call it 3 W/hrs of energy each. The going electricity rate here is about $0.15/KW-hr. Thus fully charging four batteries with a 50% efficient charger costs approximately $0.0036.

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Debates are boring. Host your own through the magic of RPG. GURPS character sheets for the 2008 US Presidential candidates:

Obama: ST:10 DX:11 IQ:14 HT:10

Advantages: Allies (Wright, Ayers) [0 point advantage], Charisma, High Fatigue Threshold, Unfazeable

Disadvantages: Elite, Pacifism, Stuttering, Pronunciation of “Pakistan” [quirk],

Skills: Administration:14, Computer Operation:12, Diplomacy:12, Enthrallment:11, Law:13, Politics:14, Public Speaking:15, Strategy:13, Writing:12

Advantages: Allies (Lieberman, Hannity, Petraeus), Combat Reflexes, Daredevil, High Pain Threshold, Military Rank

Disadvantages: Age, Bad Temper, Chronic Pain, Stubbornness

Skills: Administration:12, Carousing:15, Diplomacy:9, Gambling:10, Leadership:13, Piloting:11, Politics:16, Public Speaking:13, Soldier:11, Tactics:13, Special skill–Maverick:18

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chromatic: O(n^3) isn’t so bad when n=1 or 2.

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Google is a much better search engine for everyday calculations in the search bar, like say

[439600 light years / 200 km/sec]

(compare Y!, search.microsoft.com, er, msn.com, er, live.com)

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Blackberry singing in the dead of night

Take these calendars, and do invite

All your life

You are only waiting for this email to arrive

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P.S. Got a better one? Post it. -m

I hereby refuse to eat any fruits or vegetables that are not certifiably carbon-based.

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The color magenta has no wavelength. It exists only in your mind.

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By now you’ve likely noticed the Geek Thoughts postings here. This is an experiment on a few different levels.

What makes comics special? To what extent are pictures, often little more than stick figures, a critical part of the web comic experience? Can a web comic still be funny and thought-provoking with only words?

Specifically with regard to yesterday’s posting, an homage to Garfield minus Garfield, and slightly-more-than-homage to xkcd: what does taking away the seeming-essential part reveal? Is it of the same or different nature as before? On the plus side, don’t worry about this blog becoming an xkcd transciption service–that’s not the point. Thinking (and maybe laughing) is.

It’s also an experiment in zero-overhead publishing. Setting up a dedicated blog, separate site, separate comment moderation, all that jazz…would be hard. Lower friction is the difference between a smooth running engine and a smoking heap of metal, and the same goes in life. If Geek Thoughts develops a huge following, maybe some day there will be all of that and T-Shirts too. But for now, it’s easy enough that I can actually do it, which is what matters in the beginning.

If this line of argument seems faintly familiar, it’s because I’ve used it before, with my (still sporadically updated) Patternalia series, inspired by Christopher Alexander’s works.

If you appreciate any of this, the best way to show it is with a link. Thanks! -m

Reporter: So quantum teleportation–

Geek: The name is misleading. It’s a particle statistics thing.

Reporter: So it’s not like Star Trek? That’s boring.

Geek: Okay, I’m sick of this. Every time there’s a paper on quantum teleportation, you reporters write the same disappointed story.

Reporter: But–

Geek: Talk to someone else. I’m going to the Bahamas.

<click>

<vrmmm…>

Attribution: xkcd 465.

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Next time you drive on a freeway, look up to see how many power lines you pass under. Most people never notice these, even on common commuter routes. But once you perceive one, you’ll be seeing them all over the place. What else works this way?

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