on the arxiv…

A misogynistic workplace is bad for male employees too

“I would have thought people playing the lottery would have above average intelligence.”

In response to this article. (Found via Ross Burton’s blog.)

My brother is married.

I saw my brother’s new house this weekend. Quite nice! They closed on it the Friday before Labor Day but are still working on the painting and, this weekend, replacing doors. I hadn’t seen it before this Saturday. There’s a nicely sized backyard which abuts a wooded creek bed area. There’s a fairly large unfinished area under the house. There’s three rooms, one of which will be a study, and two which will be bedrooms. And there’s one bathroom, a living area, the kitchen and a two car garage. Very cool.

The wedding’s only 3 weeks away!

Oh, it was only one year ago that I rode public transportation to change into a tux in the church bathroom. And then of course change back in the bathroom of the hotel where the reception was held. I made fun of the D.J. wearing orange, and my street clothes included a red T-shirt. :) I missed the Total Eclipse of the Heart dance… Ah, memories.

Think Regent. Almost 70% of their graduates can pass the bar. And they have excellent placement opportunities….

My brother has a conditional job offer as a firefighter for Denison, TX.

And he’s getting married. Probably Nov, 16.

WOOT!

Jack Bauer vs. Mooninites

In an advertising stunt for a cartoon, a firm put up little light displays throughout Boston, New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Portland, Austin, San Francisco, and Philadelphia. It was basically a board with a bunch of LEDs in the shape of a cartoon character, powered by a few batteries. Here’s a picture of one. Here’s one up close, not illuminated. Here’s a video of some of the installation. You can see the scale. They’re Lite-Bright’s, basically.

A student who saw one of the devices in Boston said:

It’s so not threatening — it’s a Lite-Brite. I don’t understand how they could be terrified. I would if it was a bunch of circuits blinking, but it wasn’t.

A policeman in Portland said

At this point we wouldn’t even begin an investigation, because there’s no reason to believe a crime has occurred.

A police spokesman in Seattle said

We haven’t had any calls to 911 regarding this.

However, in New York, they shut down a bridge for a short period of time. Seems prudent enough. They didn’t know what it was. It was weird. They had to be safe.

And that’d be the end of the very boring story if not for Boston…. They shut down bridges; they shut down harbor traffic. They sent bomb squads all over the city, and brought traffic to a standstill. They spent hundreds of thousands of dollars…. Even if you think that they responded appropriately, they did it much too late. The devices had been up for 3 weeks. If they really had been bombs…

But I doubt you think they responded appropriately. Overreacting at non-threats really does nothing for security. If you were a terrorist, and for your nefarious purposes needed a distraction, or wanted to shut down a city, now you know that you should go to Boston. If you can so easily manipulate them into wasting time and energy and frustrating traffic, hey, what else do you need?

What’s worse is that they have the chutzpah to charge the advertisers and ask that the TV company reimburse them for their unneeded bomb-chasing efforts. Why can’t I ever find someone to pay me for running around and chasing my own tail? Why do they get to do pointless, ineffective things and not have to pay for them? Fortunately it seems the Judge is sane, and the charges don’t apply (no criminal intent) so at least the advertisers won’t go to jail simply because the local Boston government is too proud to admit their (pretty egregious) mistake.

Scientific publishers hire high price PR guy… to fight open access.

I ordered 3 shirts from Men’s Wearhouse online yesterday. Chose (free) ground shipping, estimated at 5-7 days.

They showed up today, even beating the charge…

So there I am at work at 3:30 p.m. I have a headache, and it’s loud, and there’s not a whole lot that I need to be there to do. I decide to leave a bit early.

I get all but 2 miles from home when my car dies. I’m told that when the water pump goes, it usually does so gradually. Mine had to be Shakespearean about it. Very dramatic. No one saw it coming. By the time I get pulled off into a parking lot and get the hood open, there is fluid all over the place. It looks like something green and watery had exploded under the hood.

I wisely decide that I can do nothing. Even if I walk to a gas station and replace the antifreeze the car won’t make it home. Such a catastrophic failure is not so easily alleviated.

I walk the rest of the way home, take some much needed Tylenol and await aid. My Dad soon comes to look at the car, and decides also that nothing can be done.

In the end, we get a strong chain, and drag the car back to its proper place. It’s out of commission for a few days at least.

So is Dallas like the Orlando of Texas?

Wednesday I’ll be heading out to SuperComputing ‘06 in Tampa.