Geography

http://thinkzone.wlonk.com/./MathFun/Triangle.htm

Neat huh? I haven't been able to figure out the solution yet. I very much doubt I will be able to reason it out. But it's problems like this that make me smile. Apparently the answer the question posed in the geometry puzzle in the link (find x) can be found using very simple means. I just have yet to figure it out.

I had a conversation on saturday night about high school and the subjects I studied, and most of us agreed that we wouldn't be able to solve any trigonometry. I figured I would probably be able to do algebra since I use it fairly frequently in my job, but I almost never ever use geometry. And lo and behold I found this problem online, and I'm hoping that working on it will make my day better. See my day sucks today for a bunch of different reasons, but I think that doing some numbers puzzle will help, sudoku used to help when I did that. So hopefully I'll be able to figure out this mess. I guess we'll see! I'm almost always wrong about the solution I find, I almost always overlook some key point that I worked on without. But in the trying is where my mood will improve, because it is fun to deal with something like this that I don't do on a daily basis. Putting my mind to that task is so much better then worrying about the problems in my life. Also it is things like this problem that give me a new found respect for my parents, who valiantly struggled to ever help me do my homework. Most of the time they could never help, now I understand why, it's because they hadn't looked at a geometry problem in 20 years.

Regret

Regret can be an ugly thing. I try to have as few regrets as possible, I've known people who try to do the same thing. But at the end of the day there are always some things that linger in my mind much longer then maybe they should. After all I've only met one or two people in my entire life who I ever thought truly lived their lives with out regrets or things that they could have done differently.


There are always specific moments of my life that I wish I had done differently, most of them wouldn't have mattered in the grand scheme of things. But some of those things aren't necessarily one moment. Some of and specifically one of the regrets I have revolves around an entire night. Just one night that could have been so great and yet at every opportunity I had inside of that night to make it great I screwed up. It's hard to remember what my motivations were or what I was trying to do or prove. It's hard to imagine why I made some of the choices I did, or said some of the things that I said. Every time I think about it I replay different times of that night, from different angles, and I try to run the different possibilities and what might have become had I done things better, or not even better but just differently.


I just hate how one night fills me with so much regret. How the consequences of that night still haven't played out yet, and all I can do is wonder how they will play out and if I fucked certain things up to badly for repair. I wonder how the consequences would play out if I had done things the way I meant, or in a way I wouldn't have such bad feelings about.

The worst is when you regret small things, when you regret the way you say something or the way you imply something. It sucks when it's not what you meant or it was misunderstood and you just wish that you could explain in detail, and do it right. But lots of times life doesn't give you those second chances, sometimes you miss when life is giving you that chance and you miss it. It is hard to learn from your mistakes when you aren't in a position to correct them, when you don't ever have the opportunity to make the correct choice. Life is about change and learning but it really illustrates some of life's beauty when you accept that things are about learning and changing and you still don't get a chance to show that you've learned.

I guess at the end of the day I really hate regret, I hate that it enters my mind and sits there like a poison. Like a television show rerun that you are watching but instead you are the star and all you are left with are the memories of what you did. I really do wish I could lead my life with no regret. Because I think people without regrets are much happier.

Very Very Lucky

I drove into work today, mostly because I was lazy and felt like sleeping for an extra half hour. On the way into work I had a very close call. An elderly lady was crossing a busy road that I take to go to work, she was crossing the opposite side of the street coming to the median. This particular road has quite a bit of traffic and has long stretches of downhill parts. On the part I encountered this woman it was in themiddle of a long decline, and she was crossing at a light that was green for both sides. She was wearing very dark red and I know she saw me coming because we made eye contact, which wouldn't have mattered normally because she was going to reach the safety of the median as I passed by and before she started traversing the road on my side. However, she tripped on the curb to the median and stumbled past the median into my lane and almost into the right lane. If it weren't for my paying attention that would have been the end of her since I had to slam on the brakes, and swerve into the right lane to avoid hitting her. It was a seriously close call and I'm quite shaken and thankful that nothing happened.

There are several things I'm thankful for in that situation, and then several other things that could have prevented the situation all together. I'm thankful that I have such good vision first of all, because it was very dark outside (overcast + being 6:00am) and she wasn't exactly wearing bright colors. I'm thankful that I wasn't distracted or doing anything besides driving, because I would have hit her without seeing her then, and we all know that there are plenty of people who drive to work distracted. I'm thankful that there were no other cars around me so that I could pull off that manuever without endangering someone else. And I'm thankful in the end that all she did was stumble, she didn't fall down and she quickly retreated to the safety of the median after I missed her. Lastly I'd like to thank the fact that I was paying attention to this person crossing a dark street and nothing else at all, because for some reason I thought that it was worth paying extreme attention to and I remeber having my mind focused on her.

There are almost an unlimited number of things that could have prevented alot of the risk here. We'll start with me, I could be driving a less heavy car or sit on the breaks going down that hill more so that I'm not speeding at all, I was probably going 5 or so miles over the speed limit. I could also not drive in the left lane when there is no need for me to do so (albeit I had taken a left turn onto the road less than a block before). I could also get more sleep somehow and be sharper in the morning (which is it's own problem that hasn't resolved itself). That particular stretch of road could stand some more lighting, it is incredibly dark for such a major road and I understand that their are some houses on the left side of the road but it is frankly dangerous. Also, I'm not sure why the pedestrians I see every morning I drive through that dark stretch of road always seem to wear the darkest clothes imaginable, I swear last week someone ran across the street wearing all black. The last criticism (although I could continue) I'll levvy is at myself for not stopping the car and getting out to see if she was ok. A better person would have and I guess I've got a ways to go.

Impeccable Timing

Sometimes you aren't funny, for me that's all the time and despite that I still try to crack jokes. Every once in awhile my timing with jokes is so unfortunate that it makes me think some cosmic being has a real sense of humor. Today for example I was standing talking to a secretary when the administrative officer walked up to type something. I made a joke that I had made with the AO a bunch of times by asking, "So when am I getting fired?" Not funny right? On any normal day that probably wouldn't be funny but today it took on a life of it's own...

Several hours later I found out that someone had been released because of their conduct. A scandal to be sure, and something that doesn't happen very often. I didn't think much of it because it has nothing to do with me. But several hours later my boss asked me what the hell my problem was. I didn't understand what she was talking about until she said, "The comment you made to the AO this morning? Something you want to tell us?" It took me a second to realize what had happened and once I figured it out I cursed my tremendous timing/unhilariousness. Good call Marty, you accidentally made a joke about being fired several hours before someone got fired and now you are this callous asshole.

So I had to go around and explain to several people that not only was my joke just mistimed (and not funny), but that it had absolutely nothing to do with the other issue. And in fact I hadn't known about that issue prior to making my ill fated comment. Needless to say the person who the AO told about my joke has an unnatural ability to talk at high speeds to everyone about everything. I mean seriously, it's uncanny. So there will be some people who heard what I did without the explanation that I really didn't mean anything, I just have unique timing. Oh well, guess I should know better by now to joke about these things. I still have so much to learn about being an adult sometimes.

You know what day it is?

It's the first day of spring! And the first day of spring is predictably very cold and rainy outside today. But it's also one of the most anticipated days of the year...the beginning of the NCAA Tournament. Yes young athletes from all accross the country will converge today and ply their skills against one another on the wrestling mats in St. Louis. There is also some basketball games on but I am generally much more interested in the wrestling tournament. Every year there are upsets and unknowns who come out of nowhere to win their weights title. I can't wait. Also some spring weather would be swell.

Happy Easter

I think that you are a sick individual when you think certain things would be funny while the majority of others would find them disturbing. For example. Today someone put up a giant easter bunny picture on the door to the conference room for an egg hunt we're having tomorrow. When I saw it I thought it would be hilarious if I put in an quote block next to it that said, "I'll eat your soul!" Needless to say that probably wouldn't have gone down well. In the past someone had a giant mechanical Santa in the office. I thought it would be neat to roll up a piece of paper to look like a joint and put that in Jolly old Saint Nick's mouth. It wasn't well recieved.

My ultimate dream is to assasinate a santa in front of legions of adoring children. Or maybe the Macy's thanksgiving day santa. An alternate plot is to get the job as the Macy's Day santa and hire someone to shoot me while I'm on TV in the living room of millions of homes. I think the holidays are enhanced by severe childhood trauma, don't you?

Bataphant Feedback

"Is it some sort of rite of passage that in order to become a Bataphant, elephants need to lose their ears? This must be the Siberian elephant whose ears are incredible tiny. I see holes behind the mask. Maybe it is the awkward lovechild of an elephant and a crocodile. And now that I look at the picture closer, I hope that the wing apparatus is connected to some sort of diaper. I cant imagine gotham city (or London, judging from big ben) would last too long with a crime-fighting, house-crushing, ginormous-guano-producing packaderm." - peter

Guano comes from bats dickhead.

Phony

Did you ever get the feeling that someone is going to come by your desk one day with a bunch of police and accuse you of being a fake. Telling the police to arrest you because you don't know how to do your job, and you've been deceitful the whole time? And then you'll be like, "Wait I really can do my jobe see? I'm good at it!" But the police haul you off anyway because they aren't convinced despite the obvious.

Well that happened to me, last night, in one of the 25 nightmares I had. Fun stuff.

Bataphant

Believe it or not but this was actually a request. Well not so much a request as an answer to the question, "What should I draw next?" It's an elephant with batman wings, and I added a Batman Mask for effect. As you can see I apparently don't understand things like perspective, and how to draw things in the distance. I also apparently never figured out that elephants have necks and a mouth. Also I tried to slide in a joke from "The Tick" by drawing the moon with writing on it. I'm bad at drawing.

Kinds of People

A man once told me, "There are two kinds of people in this world, those who tie their shoelaces every time they put on their shoes, and those that leave them tied so they can slip them on again easily." The moment he said that I thought it was very profound, a deep look into the human spirit and a broad sweeping generalization of the world. The statement was brilliant in its simplicity but divine in its elegance and meaning. That lasted about two seconds before I started poking holes in his theory.

"What about people who wear sandals? They don't tie their shoes."
"I'm sorry what?"
"And what about the people who don't wear shoes. Because there are plenty of people in the world who don't have sneakers or anything with laces."
"I think you are being too literal minded about this."
"I think you are a fraud! There are way more then two types of people in this world when it comes to how they wear their shoes, you need to shape up or ship out buddy"

It was at that point that the bartender gave me another beer and I went over to the corner by myself to cry. My image of a duality world theory shattered once again. Here are some other theories that I have seen put to rest very quickly, they all start with, "There are two types of people in this world..."

"doers' and 'watchers'..."
Oh yeah what about people who assist the doers but don't actually do things themselves, and what about people who just plain don't care.

"those who accept dogma and know it, and those who accept dogma and don't know it." - G.K. Chesterton
I would like to point out that there is in fact people who know dogma and don't accept it, they're called atheists, deal with it."

"good and bad. The good sleep better, but the bad seem to enjoy the waking hours much more. "- Woody Allen
Funny, but wrong nonetheless.

"those who do the work and those who take the credit." - Indira Gandhi
Oh yeah? What about those people who don't do any work and don't care about getting the credit, there are plenty of people who find their niche and just sit tight. They don't worry about credit or not.

"one uneducated and coarse, which always places utility before honor, and the other, humane and civilized, which places honor before everything." - Cicero
Frankly there are people who outright just don't care about honor or utility, but some of the most honorable people I know never stepped foot in a school.

"those that like Candy Corn and those that don't"
In my case I sometimes like candy corn, sometimes I find it repulsive.

" those who believe there are two kinds of people in the world and those who don't."
What if I think there are sometimes two kinds of people and in other regards there are not...

The only statement I have ever found to be applicable is from South Park, say what you will about them, but sometimes they hit the nail on the head. "There are only two types of kids in this world, those who like Animaniacs and those who don't, which one are you?" You may never have seen Animaniacs, but rest assured if you did, you would either like it, or dislike it. There may be no more polarizing force in the universe.

Makes me smile

http://sport.guardian.co.uk/golf/osm/story/0,,2260273,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=fromtheobserver

It's stuff like this that makes me really happy. Completely frivilous and unecessarily odd lawsuits filed by a convict. This guy has a real imagination.