:: The Ruminant ::

The Ruminant's first visitor, amayamaya, left a nice comment requesting more posts. Just as retailers often display their first dollar, I am going to display this first comment for a while. Rest assured, amayamaya, when I get my thirty minutes of fame, you will have your fifteen. I hope I'm not too selfish to keep some of the fame for myself.

:: Tuesday, December 30, 2003 ::

I'm sure all the other nerds have already noticed this, and maybe I've noticed it before and forgot about it... At the end of the "Hotel Royale" episode of Star Trek, the Next Generation, Capt Picard says to Commander Riker, "perhaps, like Fermat's theorem, it is a puzzle we will never solve."

Of course, Fermat's last theorem was finally proved in 1995 by Andrew Wiles. Writing about the future is always a gamble in terms of credible suspension of disbelief. The writers no doubt expected this sentence retain its weight for more than just a couple of years.


:: Chris 1:00 PM [+] ::
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Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to everyone, but just so you know, Erin and I had Christmas yesterday, so you are all suckas having Christmas a day late. I got Erin a Creative Nomad MP3 player, which kicks ass. I got an HP PSC 1300 multi-function printer, which kicks ass. I can print, scan, make copies, and print digital photos directly from the memory card [pause for drooling]. For dinner we made a Christmas chicken, some unspellable potato dish, and a giant pot of banana pudding. All of our relatives sent us candy, and my sister gave us a pizza pizzazz, which we have already used to cook pizza. We are absolutely overflowing with chocolate and sugary things. I will no doubt have diabetes by the New Year.

There's a lot that I've been meaning to write about, but I've let this blog slip. I've been learning Japanese. It is a fascinating language. Learning it almost feels like playing a video game. I get really absorbed in it. I can now say and understand sentences such as:

"How many pencils do you own?"
"I own three pencils."
"How much does this pencil cost?"
"Will you please give me the pencil?"
and so on.

I've also been hacking the hell out of my computer. I got a memory upgrade a few weeks ago, so I now have 256MB (the max for my laptop). My system finally works properly under RedHat 9. Everything works great. It is orgasmic. I've spent many hours upgrading all my libraries and software packages, often to the CVS versions. I'm out of control. I was planning to document everything, to keep track of what I needed to do to make things work (I have modified the source of a few packages). I just did so much so fast that it may be hopeless now. Ah well. The system works: I can write my thesis, draw my diagrams, download/view pictures and movies from my digital camera, print and scan on my new printer, and maintain my CV and job application letters in OpenOffice. I am now also running Mozilla Firebird and Thunderbird, which are so wonderful they nearly replace the need for sex.

Our good friend The Chairman (Michael) came up to visit us in Edmonton a few weeks ago, and we all took a trip to Banff, in the Canadian rockies. It was gorgeous. I took lots of great photos, and scanned them with my schnazzy new printer. I made a little photo album on this page:

Photos: Our Trip to Banff

We found a number of interesting things in Banff, but by far the most perplexing was this ad from a local tourist guide:


What mental pictures does this image evoke...? It gets even worse when you see full ad. Bon apetit.
:: Chris 1:31 PM [+] ::
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It's been snowing for days. It is very strange to me to see this much snow in October. And, of course, it came right during all of those solar storms this week. They're seeing the northern lights all the way down in Texas. Here I am in Northern Canada missing it because of constant cloud cover. Oh, the bitter irony.
:: Chris 9:17 AM [+] ::
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I haven't been blogging in a while due to massive technical difficulties. First my machine went haywire. I fixed it; but then the networking services mysteriously disappeared in the grad student office where I work. It took me three weeks to figure out why. When I finally found the right people to ask, they were pretty angry with me.

"All http access is down in our office, and has been for weeks," I said.

"That's because you guys are spewing viruses!" was the reply.

Campus Network Services had "black holed" us because there are viruses circulating on some computers in the office. It was apparently rediculous that I would inquire about network access when, from their perspective, I know damn well what I'm doing. The nerve I must have to request network access when I'm only planning to use it for criminal purposes.

The network is back up now, but I have to authenticate in order to use it. The new setup is extremely slow because all the traffic is now routed through some sub-standard hardware. I suppose I should be happy to get anything at all. The department here has made it resoundingly clear that "students" are at best freeloaders and at worst security threats. "Staff," on the other hand, are bright, useful people who can do no wrong.

The student/staff distinction is a puzzling one, particularly concerning the difference between a "PhD candidate" (such as myself) and a "Research Assistant." Both positions require a Master's degree in engineering. A PhD candidate, though, is expected to do work of greater significance than a Research Assistant. The PhD candidate is expected to work perhaps twice as much as the Research Assistant. The PhD candidate is expected to produce novel results which significantly contribute to the knowledge of electronics engineering; this is not expected of the Research Assistant.

Nevertheless, the Research Assistant is referred to as "staff." This affords him a salary of perhaps five times that of the PhD candidate. The Research Assistant also has access to office supplies and billing codes. He can sign purchase orders. The secretaries will cooperate with him. He gets keys to special offices. He can get security access to most floors (including the secretive faculty floor). He can access the special staff stairwell. And most importantly, he can access the special staff kitchen.

I just don't understand why he can be trusted to make Xerox copies and long distance phone calls and faxes, but I can't.

I better wrap this up. The bell rang and I don't want to get caught without a hall pass...


:: Chris 1:00 PM [+] ::
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Smoke, but you must also drink

The Edmonton smoking ban made it onto Fark today, with this article:

Catch-22 for Edmonton Sober Club: "A 'sober bar' in Edmonton, Canada that has been a refuge for recovering alcoholics and addicts for years has been told by city officials that it must now get a liquor license if it wants to continue to allow patrons to smoke. But when they applied for a liquor license, they were turned down because they did not plan to actually serve alcohol.

The Keep it Simple Club in north-side Edmonton serves juice, soda and food to 300 members, who can also attend 12 step meetings in a back room. The club is like many 'Alano Clubs' that provide an alternative for alcoholics who want to stay away from the temptation of alcohol-serving establishments.

But attendance at the bar has dropped since the city passed a new no-smoking law that allows smoking only in establishments that have a minors-prohibited liquor licence, according to the Edmonton Journal. Most recovering alcoholics smoke -- researchers believe as many as 75-90 percent of recovering alcoholics smoke."

Establishments with liquor licenses are only exempt from the ban until next July, so this "alcohol-free bar" would have gained less than a year's worth of smoking if they'd been granted a license. In the mean time, though, their complaint is interesting: asking a recovering alcoholic to also quit smoking is an undue burden. Evidently some of the patrons of the non-alcoholic bar have been migrating over to real bars where they can hang out and smoke -- and drink.


:: Chris 7:42 AM [+] ::
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Unexpected

For those one or two readers who might recall my past encounter with Space Mormons: I quite randomly stumbled upon this site this morning: www.spacemormons.net. I wonder what those bastards are up to...


:: Chris 7:09 AM [+] ::
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I arrived at my office today and checked my mail box, where I found more forms to fill out for awards that I won't get (they appear give preference to students who already received an NSERC award, which is off limits to foreign students; the guy who sits next to me in my office comes in about once a month, does almost no research, and has about three of these awards; he makes nearly a professor's salary; I'm sure his grades are much better than mine, though, because he doesn't mind wasting his time doing unpublishable crap for uninformative classes).

Beneath my mailbox, on the shelf, I noticed a big package with my name on it. It was all my stuff that I left in Japan! The hotel packed it up and mailed it to me! Now I have my CD drive again, so I can fix/upgrade my system! I have my sync cable for my Clie! I have my computer lock chain so I can go to the bathroom without feeling nervous! And I have the charge cords for my electric razors! I am so pleased.

Ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a shaved man.

And with that shall I end the dreaded week of puns.


:: Chris 8:44 AM [+] ::
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Pay Early, Pay Often

Following the ingeneous legal reasoning of SCO, I too have decided to cash in on freely distributed internet content. Things shouldn't just be distributed freely, all willy-nilly. If the author isn't going to make money, I should. It's only right. I am therefore contemplating legal action in the matter of Cory Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, a novel which is freely distributed as an E-book. This novel loosely resembles a story that I once thought about writing, and shares numerous words in common with things I have written. I believe I retain the copyright on those words. I am therefore demanding a $50 licensing fee from anyone who is reading, has read, or plans to read Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom electronically.

I may seek a court order against Doctorow to divulge download logs revealing the identities of his readers. They will be hearing from me shortly if I do not start receiving substantial payments. The $50 fee is only introductory. As of October 15, it becomes $500. So pay up.


:: Chris 7:01 AM [+] ::
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Cyborg!

I'm watching a movie called Cyborg 2087, and it totally rocks! A super-human cyborg has come back in time from 2087 to 1966 to stop a scientific discovery which results in the enslavement of mankind. He is pursued by evil cyborgs from the future who are trying to stop him from succeeding in his mission. They all wear fairly shiny suits. It is probably not necessary to state the similarities between this film and another classic: American Graffiti. Cyborg 2087 is full of youthful lingo, kids who "groove," wild teen dancing, hot rods and loads of footage of people making three-point turns in 60's cars. It is also action packed, featuring show-downs in ghost towns and powerplants, complete with electric sparks and invisible ray guns. And there are scientists, big computers, large glowing buttons, foil hats, and a chimp. This is the best movie ever.


:: Chris 9:58 PM [+] ::
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A Week of Puns

It has been a week of awful, terrible puns. I confess that I started it all. Here's the story:

Sheryl, one of the students in my lab, mentioned that there are some new multi-processor Itanium machines available to run processes on. "Cool!1" I said, getting all excited for big-time simulations. "But you need to use them now, because the admin said they'll only be around for another month or so."

"They're only going to be here for a month!?" I asked. "Where are they going? Do these machines move from school to school like some kind of Touring Machines?"

Bwaahahaha.

Its been nothing but puns ever since. I'm not even sure I want to go to work today.


:: Chris 5:37 AM [+] ::
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A Milestone

The core circuit of my new chip has passed its final verification tests (we call them LVS and DRC, meaning "layout vs schematic" and "design rule check"). That means that what I have drawn will be physically fabricated. Over the next few days I will pencil in the minor interface connections and bonding pads, and then the chip will be "taped out" (which in these modern times probably means emailed) to the fabrication service provider. Then I wait about four months for the design to work its way through the process. During this time I will perhaps learn juggling, or tightrope walking, or maybe write my thesis or something. I kind of like the pattern of doing two years worth of work in about five months, and then screwing around for the remaining seven months (if only it were true!!!!). Here are some photos of the physical design, with various stages of zoom:



In case anyone is interested, this circuit is an analog implementation of a Turbo Product Decoder for error-control applications (error-control decoders are used to protect information stored on hard disks, CD ROM drives, etc, and information transmitted through noisy channels as in telephone modems, digital cell phones, IR transcievers and so on). This particular decoder is built from 32 simpler decoders. They are all joined together in a scheme in which each decoder cross-checks the results from the other decoders. By exchanging information between the component decoders, the performance is vastly improved (performance is measured by how much signal power you need in order to acheive a specified bit error rate). My designs use a specialized form of analog computation which is very efficient in its needs for silicon space and power consumption. The circuit is very slow overall because of its ultra low power operation, but attains high speed per bit because it can process many bits simultaneously. The size of the circuit shown here is about 1.8mm by 1.6mm.



:: Chris 2:45 PM [+] ::
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How GW Bush will help me learn Japanese

While wandering around Yokohama, I found myself most drawn to bookstores. Something about all those titles -- most of which I couldn't read -- kept me absorbed for hours. I found some good Japanese language materials, and some dual language books. I also found a book which was apparently designed to teach Japanese men how to talk to English-speaking prostitutes. Another book was filled with Japanese interpretations of American slang (including "hillbilly English" and "black English"). By far the most entertaining book was this one:



The book is filled with the verbal bumblings of GW, in Japanese! It contains the original statement, in English, followed by a Japanese translation in which a comparable error is made. The opposite page contains the corrections:



Yeee hoowee! I'm'll learn me up some Jap'nese!


:: Chris 6:08 PM [+] ::
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Ooops...

I just got back from Japan... the other day. I've been mostly asleep since I got home. Japan was fantastic. I have a lot of crazy crap to post about. The trip was too short and too much of it was spent conferencing. I definitely plan to go back, after I've gained some proficiency with the language. I at least want to be able to read Japanese books. Nothing fascinates me more than a book I can't read. I spent hours in bookstores while I was there.

I also left a bunch of electronics in the drawer in my hotel room. Oops. I tried calling the hotel today, but I have the feeling that it will be more economical for me to just buy replacements. I think I can replace it all for under $200, and I could easily spend more than $200 just on the phone trying to communicate with them. I'm just worried that I left something important in the drawer... perhaps a book or some notes or something. I definitely left one of my learning-Japanese CDs there. Thank God for the Miracle of MP3's: I copied the CD onto my computer, which I did not leave in Japan.

In other overly personal news: I injured my ass yet again on this trip. I'm going in a few minutes to waddle my crackety ass down to the chiropractor's office. May God have Mercy on my Sacrum.


:: Chris 10:16 AM [+] ::
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Runch

I just came from our complimentary awards lunch, and I'm about to go look for more lunch. They served a small piece of chicken, much of which was bone, and roughly one leaf of lettuce. For dessert, there was some sort of non-vegetarian mango custard with solid globs of something in it. I asked some Japanese people sitting next to me what the globs were, and they said "fish eggs." That surprised me. So I went and asked a guy I knew who had lived in Japan for a while. He said the globs were actually a rice-noodle product, and that the Japanese guys were just fucking with me. Hooday!


:: Chris 12:02 AM [+] ::
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My Quest

I just got back from the opening social at the conference. I had wine and beer and gin and tonic and possibly some olives. I didn't take any videos this time though (especially not of myself...). Now that I've been here three years in a row people are recognizing me and talking to me like I'm a real research guy. Its neat.

I have to admit something: the Kirin beer, the sushi, even the Pocari Sweat are all things that I can acquire at home. I've been slightly frustrated in my quest for something truly Japanese, that I can't get at the grocery store by my house. I've decided to seek out octopus ice cream. I've also heard that there is a kind of canned sake that has an auto-heating button so its hot when you pour it. These and other strangely authentic Japanese items are my quest for this trip. I already found sesame ice cream. As soon as I figure a way to get some Japanese cash, I'm having a scoop.


:: Chris 4:26 AM [+] ::
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Beer or Something Like It

Ohayo! I am now in Japan. I am upside down, and it is currently tommorrow. I am staying at the Navios Yokohama, which is a hotel built to house foreign seamen such as myself. There's an International Seamen's Club downstairs. I can't seem to get any cash out of the ATMs here, but there's a market next to the hotel that sells grocery items and all other products of human design. And they take VISA. I feel pretty dehydrated after my long trip (especially after my long trek through the wrong side of town), so I picked up a bottle of Pocari Sweat to replenish my ions


The label says "Pocari Sweat is a healthy beverage that smoothly supplies the lost water and electrolytes during perspiration. With the appropriate density and electrolytes, close to that of human body fluid, it can be easily absorbed into the body." It tastes like sea water sweetened with lemon.

I picked up a sushi lunch at the market and brought it home. The housekeeping staff had been by (and they had been nice enough to prop my door open so I wouldn't have to fish for my key). I was amazed by what they did. They restored the room to the state it had been in when I arrived, and the organized my things for me. They even folded my dirty underwear:


I decided to wash down my lunch with what I think is a Japanese beer. It's called "Gokunama", and while it doesn't identify itself as beer, it is brewed. On the can is printed "Kirin's passion combined with its brewing technology brings you the masterpiece of Happo-shu. A refreshing taste you will never forget. Enjoy it on any occasion." It tastes like PBR.


My hotel room has broadband internet service (although there's an extra charge for it). It also has a smart toilet which works as a bidet, although I'm not into that French stuff. There's a big sign on the toilet warning not to spill water of it because of electrical shock risk. Actually, I've noticed, there are large caution signs on almost everything in Japan. In the back of the manual of most electrical appliances and gadgets there is a page of warnings, disclaimers, and compliance notices. I guess in Japan they have to actually make that page into a sticker and put it on the product.

Well, I'm off to do some more exploring. Here is a photo of me, which clearly confirms my claims that I am in Japan.



:: Chris 9:17 PM [+] ::
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Yin and Tang

Edmonton is green and beautiful, now that summer has technically arrived. Its been cold and rainy over the past few days, but now the sun is out again and things are warming up. I kind of like the cycles; by the time I get fed up with the heat, the weather cools off, and vice versa.

There are a lot of nice things about living in Edmonton, but there sure does seem to be a lot of stupid, petty crime. Some punk keeps sneaking into our parking garage and stealing things and setting off the fire alarm. It must be hilarious to watch dozens of people pour out of the high rise and wait while the fire department looks for signs of actual fire. I'd almost find it amusing, except that last time the building actually was on fire. Someone decided to throw fire down the garbage chute. Burning garbage. Jeezus.

I have to write about this eventually: someone keyed my car. They put a big, deep scratch in it running from the back of the car to the front on the passenger side. The scratch covers both doors and the front and rear side panels. The parts I just had fixed. If I caught the little bastard who did that I'd be selling his internal organs to pay for the repair work.

In better news, my chip has been approved for fabrication in August, which I wasn't expecting since I applied two weeks after the dealine. The bad news is that now I have to start working on it again. I'm going to Japan on Thursday. I'll be back on July 5. Then I go to a conference in Calgary on the 10th or so. Then there's something in Banff a week or two later. Its nice to be so active at conferences and to have so many publications, but it would be nice to have the time to do some actual research work. I suppose I'll have to work 'round the clock on the three or four days when I'm not traveling.

I need a bulldozer to clear my workload. Failing that, I take solace in large amounts of coffee. I also indulge in orange soda, and various other orange products such as Cheetos. According to Oprah, I should have diabetes by the end of the summer. Truly the good and the bad dwell in each other.


:: Chris 8:40 AM [+] ::
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Frenzy

It has been eons since I updated the Ruminant. After I got back from Montreal I had to scurry to finish my chip design. I started working 10 hour days, then 12 hours, then 16... As of the deadline -- June 4 -- I had only slept a handful of hours during the week. In the last hours approaching the dealine I had a layout-vs-schematic error. Of about 100,000 connections, 256 were in the wrong spot. The error was fairly basic, but in my sleep-deprived state I couldn't seem to fix one error without creating another one right next to it. In the end, the design didn't make it do to a single error in a single cell, which I simply couldn't track down in time for submission. So now we're postponed for a few months.

Of course that doesn't mean I've been sleeping; over the past three weeks I've been feverishly working on a book chapter and journal and conference papers. My advisor suggested that an old report of mine might be updated and used as the basis for a chapter in a new revision of his book. This sounded great to me, although as the work progressed "updating" evolved into "completely replace the content with new, comparatively unfamiliar material." So I've had to make myself a minor expert on the subject. Back to 16 hour days...
:: Chris 11:29 AM [+] ::
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Chili Hot Hot

Having become fed up with the record cold temperatures in Edmonton this winter, the atmosphere decided it was time to switch to record hot temperatures. It is in the 90s or so today. The last time it got this hot during May was in 1844.


:: Chris 6:21 PM [+] ::
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ET PC

This guy has stuffed an ET doll with a working PC. I want one for some reason.








:: Chris 3:26 PM [+] ::
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Open Source 2

As it turns out, some people are already thinking about open source science textbooks [link]. The author of this essay notes that not one of his students has ever opted against a printed version. I wonder if this is mostly a function of habit. I have found that as I read more and more papers (hundreds of them) which I need to keep around for references, I am printing fewer of them. This is in part because my printer sucks, and the printer in our lab is hosted on a Windows network that no one can figure out how to use (I can access it from Linux, but the authentication process is a serious hassle; I can't access it from Windows at all, on any of the three Windows machines that I have access to). The new Tablet-PCs are shipped with software that allows highlighting, annotating, and bookmarking of documents (I think -- the demo may have deceived me). To me, these are the essential features of paper documents that computers have lacked. If tablets are the future, then the need for paper books may disappear.

There's also the California Open-Source Textbook Project for K-12 textbooks.


:: Chris 11:40 AM [+] ::
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Open Source

In engineering and science, textbooks and books on specialized technical topics are too expensive. I get the impression that, in many cases, relatively little of this high cost goes to the author. Students are paying through the nose to support the companies that distribute the books. A lot of professors write their own course notes and distribute them to students either electronically or through a campus copy center. This is a much better deal for students. The natural extension of this approach is to distribute the text book as an e-book, freely available online to everyone, perhaps in pdf format. But this lacks the promotional apparatus that exists with major publishing houses, and it also lacks the prestige and credibility that can be derived from editors, reviewers, and a well-known publisher. What if a textbook was written in an open-source format, using Latex, inviting the reviews and contructive participation of many authors. It would only take contributions from a few highly-recognised names before the textbook gained credibility. And with potentially many authors contributing to the text and spreading the message through word-of-mouth, it would be in a sense self-promoting. I suppose that, since everyone has different styles and ideas about formatting, it would only work if some author wrote a complete book and then opened it for modification and addition.
:: Chris 11:14 AM [+] ::
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Exhaustion

When I was driving through Montana, I saw a sign for the "State Korean War Veterans' Memorial." I thought to myself, "are there really that many Koreans in Montana?" Today when I left my office after a leisurely ten-hour day, I went to get my bike and saw that the lock wasn't latched to the frame. "Damn," I thought, "somebody stole my lock." The lock, of course, was in use holding the bike to the bike rack. My brain does strange things when I'm tired.


:: Chris 9:32 PM [+] ::
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Montreal 2

I just took a walk up Saint Catherine street to this internet cafe. Saint Catherine St could be described as the street of churches, cabarets, prostitutes, and Burger Kings, as there seems to be at least one of each on every block. There's a church called "Saint James United Church" across the street from "Super Sexe." Saint James apparently leases its street-front space to various businesses, including two currency exchanges. There's also a large tawdry neon sign out front that says "St James's Church." These factors led me to wonder whether the church had in fact been taken over at some point by subversive ironists looking for a good private joke.

I also went today to see Le Tour Olympique, the world's tallest thing-that-is-about-to-fall-over. It was built for the 1976 Olympics, but was not finished until the mid-eighties (during the Olympics it was just Le Stump Olympique). Vincent (my professor) told me all about the construction project, complete with coerced removal of occupants from a housing area, mafia involvement, mass embezzlement of money and materials from the project, the poor building materials which led to repeated collapse of the roof, and the sudden shift in materials used to construct the tower to keep it from crumbling during construction. And apparently the provincial government was officially Catholic until 1960. They built an average of 1 church per year in Montreal until 1960. Then, separation of church and state was officially revoked. It turned out that people here weren't that religious after all, so they've been tearing down an average of one church per year ever since.

Montreal is pretty damn interesting. In the rest of Canada, all the signs have to be dual-language. Here, most signs are French-only. All businesses must have Frenchified names. And all signs which contain English must contain an equivalent French message printed above the English in letters twice as tall. And sometimes different prices are marked on French signs than on English signs. And apparently the Quebec separatist movement is somehow connected with anti-semitism. It was so huge over the past decade that most of Quebec's Jewish community relocated to Toronto. Concordia University is apparently so pro-Palestenian that they have crossed into blunt anti-semitism and even other Canadian universities are finding it difficult to have any interaction with them. The anti-English sentiments have been so strong that a lot of business and tourism was driven away, leaving Montreal's economy in the toilet. Crazy place.
:: Chris 3:48 PM [+] ::
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Montreal

I'm in Montreal until Thursday. Beautiful city. Limited internet availability. North America could learn a lot from Australia about how to run internet cafes...

Many exciting posts are forthcoming, pending my return.


:: Chris 1:39 PM [+] ::
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Piracy

The rising tyranny of the RIAA and MPAA is a premonition of the coming negative techno-utopia in which media corporations gain total control over the advance of technology and the collective experience. They make up fancy concepts like "signal theft" and "information piracy." They have agents in movie theaters wearing night-vision goggles to guard against piracy. They lobby every nook and cranny of governments at all levels, in all locations. They are the octopus. But their present tactics will seem tame once we all receive our radio ear tags. The timeline will go something like this:

2030 - Scientists at NASA's SETI program announce that they have detected a bonafide signal which originated from intelligent alien beings. The signal had some simple modulation, and they are able to replay it at press conferences and over the internet. The signal, a complex of strange chatter and noise ending with the ominous phrase "klatu barata nikto!" is broadcast all over the world.

2060 - Flying saucers land at the United Nations. An amorphous, many-tentacled creature marches into the chambers and grabs a microphone. "I speak for Klatu!" he says. "30 revolutions ago, you received a transmission from Klatu. It was not intended for you! The broadcast was transmitted toward Blixnar, and for technical reasons the signal was inadvertently detectable here. You received it and retransmitted it many times, in spite of the clear license specified: Klatu barata nikto!"

A delegate poses the question, "What does 'Klatu barata nikto' mean?"

The alien answers: "It means 'this transmission may not be rebroadcast without the express consent of Klatu!' Five revolutions ago, the Xynzytes were awakened from their hibernation cycle. According to our research, all of them were planning to watch our special rebroadcast of the Klatu Bicentenial Academy Awards that evening. But instead they saw your retransmission! You announced the results hours before our scheduled broadcast! We estimate damages in excess of eighty-seven trillion Harxax. In response to this, our government has ruled that Earth will be impounded and its inhabits enslaved to Klatu Broadcasting Corporation for two generations. You have six revolutions to prepare!"

2066 - Humanity enslaved by alien media corporation.


:: Chris 7:44 AM [+] ::
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Angry Inches

A theater company in Edmonton has been doing a production of "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" for the past month. I didn't manage to see it before my trip to Salt Lake, and I expected to miss out on it altogether. In Salt Lake, it turned out that another acting company was also doing a perfomance of Hedwig. Jim and I looked into it, but the show was sold out for all performances. I thought I was out of luck, but the Edmonton group decided to extend their production by another week. Erin and I went and saw it today. It was the last performance, and it fully rocked.


:: Chris 9:07 PM [+] ::
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Meat Pies (mmmm)

My friend the Chairman (aka Michael in New Zealand) just added a post to his blog about meat pies. I spent a few weeks in Australia a while back, and the one thing that I truly truly miss is the meat pies. Strange, of all the memories I have from my trip, the most vivid one is of pies stuffed with beef. And bacon that was really ham. They put "steak pie with french fries" on the breakfast menu, and it was great. I long for the day when I might return to the land down under and sample another of those pies.


:: Chris 9:39 PM [+] ::
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7.84 mm2

After bitching and whining about the inadequate space allocated to my microchip design, I ultimately withdrew my entry from the last scheduled fabrication. I resubmitted the design with a strategy of making them feel guilty. It worked. Last time I asked for 6.25 mm2 and they offered me 4 mm2. This time I moaned and cried and they gave me 7.84 mm2. How 'bout that? Now I can design the chip of my dreams.

I still have no Masters degree though. I've sent some random angry letters around to administrators at the University of Utah. Some of them have been forwarded to my advisor, Christian, by a frightened office staffer. I was discussing the situation with Christian yesterday, and he simply said, "poor Sally" (Sally being the department's grad student secretary). On one hand, I feel bad that Sally must be the recipient of my angsty remarks. On the other hand, she isn't being particularly helpful, and that's her job. I may be annoying people by making a stink over my degree, but my overwhelming experience has been that you won't get anywhere by being quiet and passive. I can't accept that a single fucking sheet of paperwork that I filled out three years ago overrules the rest of my work at the University.

I currently have no idea who to talk to at the University. Christian has suggested that the issue might have to go as high as the University President before I can get anywhere. So I've been picking random targets for emails. Here's one I sent to Stayner Landward, the Dean of Students. He's forwarded this on to someone else who may or may not have jurisdiction over the issue:

Dean Landward:

I was enrolled in the U of U ECE PhD program from fall 2000 through spring 2002. In spring of 2002, my advisor moved to the University of Alberta. I decided (on short notice) that my thesis would be best served if I also went to the University of Alberta. I took a lot of courses in Utah, though, and it would be a shame if I had nothing to show for them. It turns out that I completed the credit hours required for an ME degree. I'm being told, though, that I can't be given the ME degree without re-admitting to the university and taking a 3 credit hour course. This course would not contribute to my degree; it would simply qualify me as a currently enrolled student, which for some reason is necessary to be given credit for work completed in the past. Moreover, it seems that in order to re-admit I must be granted a "retro-active leave of absence" by the Dean of Engineering.

From my perspective, this seems at best absurd. The University is telling me that I need no more work to satisfy the requirements of the degree itself. If I must register and pay tuition for an unnecessary phantom course, that sounds to me like a bribe. Is the University of Utah in the business of selling degrees, or awarding them on the basis of having earned them? Have I completely lost my ability to assess the logic of a situation? Or is the Mad Hatter now writing University policy?

Yeah, I'm an obnoxious bastard.


:: Chris 9:51 AM [+] ::
...

One Small Step...

I finally got my wireless network card working under Linux! This is one more step toward total freedom from Windows. If I can just somehow convince Tanner Labs to produce a Linux version of their chip software, I can sever all ties to the evil empire. Ha ha ha ha ha!

In other news, I discovered a whole nuther semester of courses that I took, giving me even more credits toward my hypothetical Master's degree. They especially better give it to me now.


:: Chris 11:02 AM [+] ::
...

Renewed Appreciation

It only takes a few hours at the University of Utah to be reminded of what a hostile, dreary place it is. I walked through the halls of my old dungeon, the Merrill Engineering Building, and wondered how I'd ever accomplished anything in such a dismal place. Every face wore a scowl. People who no doubt recognized me gave no indication of it. I spoke to some people who knew me and they seemed annoyed, the way everyone always seems in that department. Even the building groans with anxiety. After some negotiations with the Registrar's office, I obtained a list of all my prior courses. If all goes well, I could leave today with a Master's degree. I'll probably get an ME (course-based, not thesis-based) because it won't be feasible for me to arrange a formal defense for a master's thesis. Sadly, though, the U of Utah ECE department has so laced the program with technicalities that I may not satisfy the requirements. I have taken more than double the number of course hours which would be required for a PhD or MS at any of the best universities, but most of my courses don't count. I took a bunch in excess of my BS requirements, but they don't count because I wasn't technically a graduate student when I took them. Other courses, such as coding theory, low-power circuit design, and information theory, don't count because they were listed as "special studies." I have taken every course at the University that is remotely related to my field and many more besides, but it still doesn't add up to a degree. It's no wonder the U of U has so many career students. Ultimately the department will decide whether I've earned my degree. If they have any decency or sense, they'll give it to me.


:: Chris 10:01 AM [+] ::
...

Repatriation

On Tuesday I hopped in my car and drove roughly 1200 miles from Edmonton to Salt Lake City. I've been digitally challenged ever since. My trip could, perhaps, have been better timed: my parents are getting high-speed internet next week after I leave (to replace their useless old phone line that can't even sustain a 36k connection), and Dave was here last week, and I missed him :(. I managed to get my W2 from the University, and I discovered why I haven't received W2's for the past two years. They were sending them to my sister's old house for some reason. My Clie decided to erase all of its data as soon as I got here. I lost all of my phone numbers, my schedule, various addresses, and my check-list of things to do while I'm here. Sucktacular.

The drive down was gorgeous. There is an area of northern Montana where the freeway crosses the Missouri river. The spot is simply breathtaking. Almost no one lives there. I nearly drove off the road looking at the hills, the river and the clouds. I didn't take any pictures of it :(. I would have spent all day there and been unsatisfied with what I could get with my digital camera. I had thought about grabbing my 35mm camera before I left Edmonton, but then I would have wasted many hours stopping for photos along the way. I did take some photos of my trip by just clicking the camera while driving. Here are some of the unrediculous ones:





:: Chris 3:07 PM [+] ::
...

Dreams

I seem to dream in repetitive themes. They aren't repetitive dreams, but underlying concepts seem to surface over and over. A few years ago I had almost nightly dreams in which I discovered a dead body tried to hide it. I had never had anything to do with the dead person, and usually I didn't know them. But I was always terrified of being implicated if I simply reported the body (the bodies were almost always in my house somewhere). So I would take the bodies around and try different things. I put them in dumpsters, but then removed them to look for some place better. I buried them but wasn't satisfied with the graves. I thought about lakes and rivers. The search for a good hiding place always became increasingly desperate as time passed. I was terrified of the police, but in these dreams I never once saw a cop. Typically I never even saw any other people. I went around to normal places but they were all strangely vacant, as though everyone wanted to leave me alone with my corpses and paranoia.

The potential symbolism in the above dreams is easy to probe. But more recently I've been experiencing a stranger pattern: time travel and Stephanie Geerlings. I don't usually (to my knowledge) have dreams involving either of these themes alone. In one dream I was younger (I reverted to about age 12), but I had full memories of my future life. I believe I encountered Stephanie in that dream while trying to contact a tow-truck company via a pay phone at the Grand Canyon. Last night I dreamed that I went back in time to prevent the murder of Stephanie Geerlings. For some reason this dream involved a lot of running through suburban houses filled with criminally insane middle aged men and women. It had kind of a David Lynch feel to it. I don't remember if Stephanie was even actually in that dream, but she was the premise at least. I'll send a box of fine Canadian candy bars to anyone who can make sense of these dreams for me.


:: Chris 8:43 PM [+] ::
...

Science Fair!

I judged at the Edmonton Regional Science Fair today. There were lots of interesting projects with entertaining names: "Bathroom bacteria -- the invisible invisible;" "Hair as fertilizer;" "Are grade 5 kids active enough?" "Why I don't like Kool-Aid;" "Catapult;" "Edible shampoo;" "Interesting iridology;" and "Is your world safe." One guy built an interferometer with a computer interface for automated measurements so that he could test the speed of light in various gasses relative to vaccum. Another guy figured out that if you burn potato peels in your fire place, it causes the soot in your chimney to become brittle and flake off, thereby preventing house fires due to clogged chimneys. Cool stuff. No photos this time.


:: Chris 7:05 PM [+] ::
...

A Parable

Today I was chatting with one of my supervisors about a rival researcher who will be visiting our department soon. We expressed our mutual concern that the visiting researcher does not embrace the collaborative spirit with other groups working in the same field, such as us. His group, we agreed, assumes an unearned air of superiority toward everyone else. They don't share complete information, and they publish inaccurate descriptions of our work in order to cast theirs in a better light.

"Perhaps we shouldn't make these complaints known when he comes," I said. "We should treat this as an opportunity to foster a better relationship with them. This is not a time to air grievances, but to nurture!"

"That's a good idea," said my supervisor. "But why did you raise and shake your clenched fist when you said 'nurture'?"

"Because," I replied, "I am an American!"


:: Chris 3:21 PM [+] ::
...

We finally had a warm spell last week. Most of the snow melted. I went for a walk around campus, and to my dismay I discovered that there is an LDS Institute of Religion on campus, within spitting distance of my office. The spindly fingers of Mormonism have spread nigh to the North Pole. There's no escape anywhere. I've seen some missionaries around town, but thankfully they leave me alone. In fact, I see missionaries almost everywhere I go, from Adelaide to Edmonton to DC to Munich. And they have never approached me, ever. I think my body secretes a natural "Mormon-off" chemical that repels missionaries. Perhaps I could harvest these secretions and market them. "Mormon-off: keep unwanted pests away. Works for 12 hours. At work and at play. Also try new DeepWoods Mormon-off."

I've been refining my theory of Mormon perception. I think the average Utah Mormon divides the world up into five categories:

• Mormons (righteous folk who can do no wrong)
• Potential converts (temporary friends and acquaintances, usually expiring within a few months)
• Jews (who are not "gentiles" and therefore have ambiguous classification in Mormonism)
• Others (non-Mormons who are unlikely to convert -- the minions of Satan)
• Celebrities (folks who would be minions of Satan except for their widespread popularity, which elevates them to the level of permanent potential convert)

Explanation: it seems as though Mormons who seek romantic involvement with non-Mormons are regarded as being in a state of sin. Someone like Larry King, on the other hand, is a self-proclaimed agnostic. Yet he has a successful marriage with a devoutly Mormon woman half his age who is also close friends with Marie Osmond. If you do a google search on Larry King and the Mormon church, you'll find a number of Mormon-authored articles which refer to King as though he were an honorary Mormon. He and his wife were certainly not married in the temple. In some circles in Utah, a non-temple marriage isn't even considered valid. Unless you're famous. That changes everything.



:: Chris 8:20 AM [+] ::
...

Another cold day in Edmonton... thank God for those hamster tunnels.




:: Chris 6:25 AM [+] ::
...

Proposition

Erin was busy at work today when a large, sweaty man walked into her coffee shop. He stood around the counter and waited for the line to clear. After everyone cleared out, he nervously made his way up to the register. "Um..." he said. Erin noticed he was carrying some Jehovas Witness literature. "Oh, I'm a Jehovas' Witness," he said, gesturing dismissivley to the pamphlets. There was an awkward pause. "Um," he continued, "this may surprise you, but I'd like to take you out to lunch."

Naturally, Erin was floored by the suggestion. She wanted to tell him she was married, but she was just too curious about Jehovah. They're meeting up tomorrow. She wasn't sure how I would take it when she told me about her date. "Heck!" I said, "If it's for Jehovah? Sure!" I mean, this guy has actually witnessed Jehovah. Sleeping with a large sweaty man isn't too high a price for that kind of insider access to the Lord. I might even tag along and see if I can sleep with him.


:: Chris 9:46 PM [+] ::
...

Science Fair

Yesterday I judged at a science fair for grades K through 3. I was really surprised by how much the kids knew about sciency things. I judged two boys who made a "security device" out of some cardboard and aluminum foil, and a little 5 year-old girl who endeavored to study surfaces to which temporary tatoos will or will not stick.



Another kid grew triops, which are like sea monkeys only way cooler. You get them in little pouches of eggs, and you can grow them in a cheap plastic acquarium. They grow into crab-like things a few inches long. They've been around since before the dinosaurs. One kid also made these way-cool motors:



In conclusion, I had fun at the science fair. I might judge at another one.



:: Chris 12:26 AM [+] ::
...

Happy Birthday!

Edie Brikel turned 37 today, and I turned 26 on Friday. This was my cake.


Usually my birthday herald's the coming of spring. It comes shotly after winter's last howl, and on most years my birthday greets me with a promising warm breeze and the smell of new leaves. This year, it was -30 degrees outside, tying for the coldest day of the year in Edmonton. This was the view from my office today:



Yes, I work in a remote arctic tundra.


:: Chris 7:47 PM [+] ::
...

Danger is his name

Yesterday I went to a seminar presenting work co-authored by a scientist named Jean-Luc Danger. Could there be a cooler name for a scientist? He's bound to be using his scientific powers by night to fight crime. He's like a cross between Captain Picard and Batman.
:: Chris 11:47 AM [+] ::
...

Intervention

I went down to the subway station today to catch the train to school. While I was waiting, a teenage girl stormed in, sobbing loudly (almost comically). She walked over to the pay phone on the train platform and began making calls. After several failed attempts and a lot of melodramatic sobbing, she evidently reached her boyfriend and informed him (very loudly) that he would never see her again because she was going to throw herself in front of the train. I figured it was an idle threat, an attention-getting device. I looked around and no one else on the platform even seemed to raise an eyebrow. She repeated her threat. The train was coming, so I casually moved to stand between her and the tracks, just in case. I was disturbed when no one else did the same. I would feel quite responsible if I watched a girl throw herself in front of a train just a few feet in front of me. You can at least try to stand in the way. Of course she didn't seem serious, but why gamble with the whims of a teenage girl? She ultimately didn't try anything. But what a disconcerting way to start the day.


:: Chris 1:26 PM [+] ::
...

I, Gatsby

E-Trade reported to me today that I have been paid dividends in the amount of $3.29. I don't know what happened with Bush's big tax cut plan, but if he succeeded in eliminating taxes on dividends I'm going to fly all of my friends up to Edmonton for a champaign gala. You can all bring your significant others/domestic partners, and you'll fly here in the finest charter jet. No cost is too great for my friends. I am an investor!


:: Chris 1:51 PM [+] ::
...

Jesus Freaks

I swear to God, Jesus is stalking me. It was irrationally warm yesterday, and when a slow old man blocked me from catching the train to the University, I decided to walk. As I approached the campus, I decided it was such a nice day that I should keep on walking. I eventually came upon the fabled Whyte Ave, which is rumored to be full of interesting things. After passing a block of frat houses, I came to a block of musical instrument shops, followed by a block of cafes. I went into a cyber-cafe called "Dabar," got some coffee and sat down to do some work.

I looked around the shop, and a frightening realization dawned on me: I had stumbled onto yet another Jesus freak coffee shop. The barista had a Bible open behind the counter. A couple of girls were doing a Bible study at a table in the back. There was a bookshelf filled with religious stuff, including "Evidence That Demands a Verdict," "In the Beginning," "Families of Faith," and of course "The Holy Bible," which has a note on it stating that it is "not for sale." A newspaper article hangs on the wall titled "A Whyte Ave cafe even Christ would love." The article's box quote says "Dabar isn't out to save the world, but it might save your soul."

How do I keep finding these places? The coffee was good (Seattle's Best), the decor was nice, the atmosphere tolerable (they seem to have the same CD collection as the Salt Lake Roasting Company). They have nice furniture, solid tables, good-looking food, good new computers, and Jesus freaks. I should note that no one actually bothered me or tried to convert me while I was in there (in fact no one has ever bothered me at any Jesus-Freak coffee shop). It just gives me the creeps that I can't seem to find a coffee shop that doesn't have an evangelical mission.

Now that I've covered the Jesus-freaky aspect, I'd like to gripe about cyber-cafes in general. No one seems to get it right when they set up these cafes. They are seldom inviting to laptop users (there was a cafe up the street from me called "the Bohemian" which had a laptop bar, but they recently removed it). They never think to offer WiFi services, and they seldom have ethernet jacks that you can plug into. There must be a solution to offering billed WiFi access in short-range venues! They could charge $1 per hour and have minimal setup costs (they're already a cyber-cafe -- they just need to buy a wireless router for a couple hundred bucks). These places always fail because not one damn company ever does it right. Ever.


:: Chris 11:28 AM [+] ::
...

Proselyte 2

(Read Part 1)

   I thought nothing of the Space Mormons for several hours. They didn't concern me, until I started bumping into the elders in strange places. Almost everywhere I went, Elder Buzz would appear. At the bank: "Hi! Making a deposit there?" At the engineering building: "Well, fancy meeting you here! Are you an engineering student?" At the train station in front of my house: "Well hello again! Do you live near here too!?" I was running out of ways to elude them.
   On day two I was snaking through the library in a desperate bid to avoid any place where I had seen the elders before, when I was stopped in my tracks by a group of five beautiful women in the stair well. "What are you doing tonight," asked one of them. "We're having a party, and we'd love it if you could come." I was aroused and alarmed.
   "Well," I said, "I think I have plans to do some very entertaining things with or in the vicinity of my wife. That's right; I'm married -- so, um, sorry." Do married men attend super-model parties? I figured it would be easier not to find out. I tried half-heartedly to get past the girls and continue up the stairs.
   "Oh, please," said one of them, "there's a lot we'd like to show you." I was blushing until I saw that one of them was carrying a Book of Space Mormon. 'Damn them,' I thought. 'They're pulling out every damn trick in the book.'
   "No thank you, ladies, but I'm a comitted non-Space-Mormon." I started boldly marching away, when one of them grabbed me from behind. I fell into a trance-like state of pure bliss. They'd slipped me something strange that made every sensation feel really good. I liked having their hands on me or not on me. I liked feeling the floor on my feet through my very comfortable shoes. I enjoyed it when one of the girls seemed to kiss me, and I enjoyed when a strange prickling, numbing sensation went into my mouth, down my throat, and into my stomach. I passed out.
   I awoke curled on a couch in the library, and felt sick as a dog. I thought perhaps I should report this incident to the police, but I wasn't sure how to explain it without looking schizophrenic. So I nervously headed for home. When I came up from the train station in front of my house, there were two policemen waiting for me. "Sir," said one of them, "we need you to come with us."
   "What's wrong," I asked. He answered: "Just come this way." They led me to a car, threw a bag over my head, handcuffed me and threw me into the back seat. "We're sorry about this inconvenience," said the officer, "We won't take too much of your time." We drove on for several minutes. When the car stopped, they pulled me out and led me through a doorway. They sat me in a chair and removed the bag from my head. I sat facing two clergymen.
   "Hello," said the larger of the two. "I am Bishop Toledo and this is Father O'Keefe. We understand you've had a run-in with some Space Mormons?"
   "Yeah," I said, "they've been following me around for a few days. And they did something wierd to me today. Who are you?"
   "We represent the Roman Catholic Church. We've been keeping an eye on the Space Mormons for the past century. We know exactly what they did to you today."
   "You monitor other churches?" I asked, "Why? I thought the Catholics didn't proselytize from other Christianish denominations."
   "Well," replied Father O'Keefe, "Yes and no. Publically, the Catholic Church prefers an image of harmonious coexistence. The Space-Mormons hate us. They see the Roman Catholic Church as their arch-nemesis, for some reason. We try not to acknowledge them at all in public. But privately--" Bishop Toledo interrupted: "Privately, we want to keep them from proselytizing our followers, and from doing other ungodly things."
   "What sort of ungodly things," I asked. "What did they do to me?"
   "Well," said Bishop Toledo, "you may or may not know that the Space Mormons have long had an interest in cloning. In particular, they've been trying to produce a clone of their prophet, Yosef Jung. They haven't had much success with a direct clone. But they have developed a retroviral delivery mechanism for haploid genetic material. Today, they delivered that to you."
   "Haploid?" I asked.
   Father O'Keefe answered: "Yes, the retrovirus replaces the DNA in your sperm cells with that of Yosef Jung. Their current goal is to produce new offsrping of Yosef Jung. We brought you here to warn you: Do not have sex with your wife. Any children you have will not be your own. They will be Yosef Jung's, and the Space Mormons will try to take them from you."
   "Well," I responded, "we use birth control. We won't be having kids any time soon..."
   The Father and Bishop looked at each other, surprised. They hadn't expected that. "Of course..." said Father O'Keefe, "you're not Catholic. Right. Ehem. Nevertheless, you'll want to avoid having any children for some time, until DNA tests verify that your sperm is your own again."
   "Okay," I said. "I'm not Catholic, so why are you guys so interested in helping me?"
   "Because," answered Bishop Toledo, "we, as Catholics, believe in the sanctity of human reproduction. Nobody messes with sperm."
   With that, the police re-entered the room and walked toward me with the bag. "Hey," I said to the Bishop. "These aren't real cops are they? Abduction, impersonating officers; aren't these things illegal?"
   "Illegal?" Bishop Toledo acted like he hadn't heard the word before. "We're God's Holy Church! Goodbye now, and good luck. We'll keep in touch." The bag went back over my head and they marched me to the car. After ten minutes or so I was released in front of my building. I went inside and up to my apartment, where I found Erin (my wife) watching television.
   "Hey," I said. I didn't know how to tell her about my day, so I skipped to the end: "You haven't missed any birth control pills or anything lately, have you? Do you need any more? Just let me know when you need them and I can go get them refilled."
   "No," she said. "I can keep track of it myself. Why are you so worried about it all of a sudden?"
   "Well," I paused and gestured erratically. "Because I'm filled with the sperm of a Space Mormon prophet."
   "Oh." she said. "American Idol is on. You wanna watch?"
   "Oh yeah, I almost forgot!" I hopped onto the couch to watch. The painful singing of would-be pop stars helped me forget about Mormons and Catholics for a while. Lurking under the surface, though, was the nagging and disquieting knowledge that my body housed the sperm of another man.


:: Chris 11:18 AM [+] ::
...

Proselyte

I was walking across campus the other day in desperate search of a course I'm supposedly taking. I was gliding through the student commons building when I noticed two young men wearing cheap suits with the hair tied up into neat little buns. They were moving toward me on an intercept course. When I saw their nametags I knew I was in trouble. "Oh great," I thought, "Space Mormons."

    "Looking for something?" asked one of them with inappropriate boldness. "Yes," I answered, "a Xerox machine."
    "Why settle for a poor copy," continued the bold one, "when you can have direct access to the source?" I lost the will to fight, and I couldn't muster the courage to be rude and say "piss off!" So I sat and softly wretched while they continued.
    "I'm Elder Buzz and this is my companion, Elder Nephraimichi, and we're with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Space." Elder Nephraimichi interjected: "You can call me 'Neph.' You may know us as the Space Mormons, but these days we actually prefer to be referred to as 'The Church.'"
    "That's right," continued Elder Buzz. "We'd like to share with you our knowledge of another Testament of Jesus Christ. You see, not only did Jesus preach in Israel. God has many children everywhere, and after His resurrection Jesus went to other worlds to preach His gospel there. The testament of these events is written in The Book of Space Mormon."
    "Okay," I replied, "what 'other worlds' did Jesus visit?" I decided this conversation would at least be better than my class on using Lexis-Nexis.
    "Well," chimed Elder Buzz, "perhaps you've read in the Bible about how, thousands of years ago, several of the original Tribes of Israel were driven from their homeland. They're now called the Lost Tribes. The Book of Space Mormon tells about how they wandered in the desert until the prophet Nephraim had a revelation from God. God showed them the way to build spaceships, which they used to immigrate to the moon. The people who live on the moon today are actually the descendants of these ancient Israelites."
    "I always figured there weren't any people on the moon, what with no atmosphere and all," I said.
    "Oh, there are!" said Elder Neph. "They're very tall, and they dress like Quakers. And God has provided them with plenty of oxygen to breath."
    Elder Buzz added: "Sadly, though, they have all fallen away from the true knowledge of God. Space Mormon was the last of the righteous Nephraimite tribe. He compiled the Book of Space Mormon shortly before he was killed by the sinister Laminates, who practised a synthetic idolatry and forgot about the true Heavenly Engineer who had made mankind in His image through cloning.
    "The Book of Space Mormon was nearly lost, until in the early 19th century, when the Prophet Yosef Jung was inspired by God to create a substance that repelled gravity. Using this with some deep-sea diving equipment, Yosef travelled to the moon. God led him to find the ancient inscribed optical plates of Space Mormon. He fought off the evil Moon Laminates and returned to Earth, where God helped him to build special equipment capable of reading and translating the sacred optical plates."
    I let the elders rattle off their story, but I became more bold in my criticism once we began reading from the Book of Space Mormon. "Do you really mean to tell me that God couldn't write better English than this?" I asked. "I mean look at it:

...and it came to pass that the men didst hear unto God and in hearing didst heave upon themselves up to the mountains, where did they molten from the rock helmets which were clean, and smooth, and clear, and behold! That the helmets were opaque, so'st to blocketh out the harsh solareth radiation upon their flight... and it came to pass that the suits they did make were tight, like unto a dish, and the gloves thereof were tight, like unto a dish, and the boots thereof were sturdy with wide tread, and where they didst meet the pant leg they were tight, like unto a dish...

    "What does any of that even mean?" I asked. "And look at this rediculous passage:

    'Lo and behold ye,' saith the Lord to the Brother of Jordash, 'I hast given thee mighty plans that shall carry thee far.' 'Yeah verily thou hast,' saith the Brother of Jordash, 'But, oh Lord, shouldst we require air, what shall we do?' And the Lord thought for a minute and did say, 'Verily, I thought of that. Thou shaltst put a hole in the top, with a stopper in it. And when thou shouldst needeth any air, verily shalt thou unstopper it. And if any space should leak in, thou shalt replace the stopper. Verily the Lord shall provide.'
    And it came to pass that the Brother of Jordash had another question, and asketh him thus, 'Oh, Lord, one more thing; how shallst our space craft fly upward into space? What bringeth them thus?' And it came to pass that the Lord didst say 'Oh ye of so littleth faith! Didst thou thinketh that I forgot about that? No! As a test of your faith, I decided that you shouldst solveth that problem!' And so the Brother of Jordash sat outside and did think for three longeth days. And on the fourth day he did exclaim, 'Oh, Lord! I hast figured it out! Thou shalt touch the rear of the craft and it shall glow, causing it to fly!' And the Lord did reply, 'Yeah, that sounds like that will work.' And it came to pass that the Lord didst bring down his mighty finger from heaven, which was 9.76 meters in length, and He did touch the craft and they did do all the things that the Brother of Jordash expected them to do.

    "I don't even know where to start with this. Language problems aside... Hell, even setting aside the scientific problems, don't you see the major plot holes in this?"
    They evidently did not. They stood smiling at me, shaking their heads. "You need to understand the power of faith" said Elder Buzz. "All the science in the world couldn't make those spaceships fly. Only the touch of the Heavenly Engineer, through the faith of the Brother of Jordash, could give life to their crude cedar engines. You too can have that kind of faith. Pray now to the Heavenly Engineer, and ask him to send you a transmission confirming that the Book of Space Mormon is true. Let Him switch on the Spirit in you the way He switched on those engines!"
    "Maybe later," I said. "Right now this all just seems like a load of crap. You still haven't answered how they live on the moon with no atmosphere. We've been to the moon, and didn't see anybody. We've had telescopes aimed at the moon for centuries with no signs of any civilizations. It's all just dead craters. And who is the Brother of Jordash anyway? Why is he the only guy in all this who doesn't get his own name?"
    "The true name of the Brother of Jordash was revealed to Yosef Jung through revelation. His name was Mhngxzn. It apparently cannot be pronounced and could not be spelled in the ancient language of short-hand Spanglish that was spoken on the moon when Space Mormon wrote his books. As for the other things you said, you have to learn to see past all this 'science' to the more powerful world of faith. The power of God gave them air to breathe on the moon, but their rejection of Him bred centuries of war which destroyed their civilizations. They mostly live on the dark side of the moon now, where we can't see them."
    Elder Neph interrupted: "In the end, though, these are all just words. Words aren't what's true. The Church is what's true."
    I started edging away. "I think I'll keep my faith with equations and experiments," I said. Elder Buzz gently grabbed my arm and said, "Can we meet with you later for another discussion?" "No," I said, "I really don't think I'm interested." "Well, we're very sorry to hear that," said Elder Neph, "We only want what's best for your soul. We hope you will come around to The Truth. Good bye."

Getting away from them had been surprisingly easy. Maybe they just realized they could use their energy more effectively with someone else. I was glad to be away from them. But the encounter has stuck with me for some reason. They unnerved me. I've been having trouble sleeping since I met them. I'm trying to distance myself from the experience by indulging heavily in the one beverage they think is ungodly: RC Cola. I sure hope it helps me forget that there are such nutty zealots lurking around my own home town.

:: Chris 5:27 PM [+] ::
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It is natural for the author of a brand new blog to be curious about the hits it receives, and to wonder who might be stopping in for repeat visits. While there are only a few posts on The Ruminant and I understand that there won't likely be much traffic here, I nevertheless look eagerly at the site-meter details to see if anyone stopped in recently. Usually, they have not. But I began to notice a pattern: someone from a domain named ARTMENG1 showed up several times in the list. This piqued my curiosity. Who is this mysterious "ARTMENG1"? I went sleuthing. I'll spare you the boring story of my mystical nslookup ritual, and skip to the end: it was me. I am the mysterious repeat reader of my own blog. How narcisistic. And yet, perhaps there is a certain zen aspect to writing for an audience of myself. I write not the words which many may want to read. I write the words which want to be written. That's something to chew on during the train ride home...

:: Chris 4:22 PM [+] ::
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The Edge of the Earth

A lot of people don't realize that you can actually see the edge of the Earth from Edmonton. It shouldn't be that surprising; to get here, you just head to Montana and drive north for a day or two. After traversing the deadly Alberta badlands, you arrive at the mythical frozen land of Edmonton. If you go to a high point, like my office window or apartment balcony, you can look across the horizon to the northern-most rim of reality. It looks like this:

Some people mistake this for the sunset. In fact, it is the Fires of Valhalla, the colliseum of the gods and the birthplace of dragons. Sometimes, when I'm bored with the dull activities of my neighbors, I turn my binoculars toward the northern rim. I see dragons rising and descending in a terrifying and seductive dance of fire.

I may fall victim to my curiosity about the north. On many days I look toward those mysterious fires, and a deadly yet irresistible thought infects my mind: "road trip."

:: Chris 4:53 PM [+] ::
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Blog Spawn

This is my newly spawned blog. Here is where I will record the events of my life, as opposed to Corpse Divine, which will contain my opinions and arguments about things. I currently live in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, so I'll open with a story about the snow. Last night I drove out of my underground heated parking garage to return a rented video game. The snow was a foot deep on the roads. It had been snowing for days, and the city made no effort to clear it from the roads. Slow going and cold it was. When I returned from the video store the snow was so dense and slick that I couldn't pull back into my garage. So I parked on the street.

Today I took Erin to the grocery store. She instantly regretted not wearing her gloves, so I gave her mine. It's -30 degrees Celsium outside, by the way. She went into the store and I decided to clear some excess snow off of the car. I held the brush with my gloveless arm and wiped one window at a time. My arm slowly froze. Not only did it freeze, but in the intense cold it compressed to such a density that it could only be called a new state of matter. It was harder and stronger than any rock, and it did not soften when I returned to the warmth. I am now called The Neutron Fist, and I intend to strike heavy blows for justice, restoring order and ending the sinister corruption that has so long held Edmonton in its claws. I shall start by dealing with a truly evil supervillain... The Landlord.

I hope someone enjoys this blog.

:: Chris 6:31 PM [+] ::
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