ConcreteMethod

There's a Hiatus Pun Here Somewhere...

2011-03-08T19:50:00.000-08:00

After putting away my brewkettle for several months, I've finally gotten back to homebrewing this year. Three batches in less than three weeks have gone all but perfectly, and target gravities have been within 2% (that's really good).

So yay.

Also: expect there to be a lot of beer that needs drinking soon.

Cherry Dubbel

2011-01-19T18:53:00.001-08:00

Made with ten pounds of two types of cherries and aged for a year.

Yum.

- E

:-)

2010-12-18T22:55:00.000-08:00

I am writing this to you from my brand new CR-48.

If you know what I mean: cool.

- E

Teaching Software Engineering in College, Problem #534

2010-12-17T20:36:00.000-08:00

At my college, a semester was 13 weeks. At most, a class met five days a week - usually less - for an hour or so. That means that a college semester has around 65 hours of class time.

In software development, a typical sprint is between two and four weeks - let's split the difference and go with three. Each work week has forty hours. That gives us 120 hours per sprint.

In other words, a college semester is equivalent to just over half a sprint.

Think about that.

It's OK, I Have the Right Glasses (Part II)

2010-10-14T16:07:00.000-07:00

I've been brewing for almost two years now. One of the styles that eluded me for so long was the Saison, a spicy farmhouse ale from France and Belgium.

With my most recent batch, I declare this nemesis defeated.

It's OK, I Have the Right Glasses

2010-09-13T21:02:00.000-07:00

Tonight's a cognac night. Does that make sense to anyone but me?

- E

Understatement

2010-09-12T18:56:00.000-07:00

It's been a really long year.

For that matter, I can barely believe that it's been just over a month.

At any rate, long week ahead. Need to do laundry, take a run and prepare for a funeral.

Update: I came within a hair's breadth of my first seven minute mile. Everyone jump to the thirteen second mark with me...

Random Thought for the Day

2010-08-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

Cheeseburger without a bun: poor man's steak or rich man's meatloaf?

One Stroke Over Par

2010-07-27T21:59:00.000-07:00

So, my dad recently had a stroke that landed him in the hospital for a while. First off: he's now home and seems to be doing alright, and his future prospects look good assuming he makes some drastic changes in lifestyle.

Regardless, it got me thinking.

You know all of those movies/shows/books where family is supposed to be all magical and whatnot? Well, I don't buy into it. I like to think that my position comes from the same irreverent mindset that makes me an atheist, but I'm also left wondering how much it has to do with my own history with family. Besides the whole mother thing, I just don't have that much. It's me and my dad, and that's pretty much it. But that's not the point of all this...

It was a stark moment when my dad all but broke into tears in the hospital. He was telling me that, even assuming this one visit turned out minor, there's going to be more such incidents in the future, probably over the course of decades. And he didn't want to be a burden. He was in the hospital for days after a stroke, but that's what he was thinking about: he doesn't want to be a burden. That's why he didn't want me spending that much time there, that's why he was reluctant to ask me to bring him anything, that's why he wouldn't ask me to visit more. He just doesn't want to be a burden.

How does an only son respond to that?

I gave him a hug. I tried to reassure him. I made fun of his (lack of) hair. Should I stop that last one?

Like Shoes, When You Think About It

2010-07-12T20:36:00.000-07:00

It's a couple's world.

There's so much I want to do, and it's oh-so-hard to do them single. The world, you see, is designed with an assumption: that just about everything will be done by two people together.

I've been thinking of taking a road trip to Chicago or Nashville or Denver, but that's not much fun alone. And the drive is a pain with no relief driver.

I'd love to call up my best friend and say, hey, why don't you and your wife and me and my gal take a weekend trip to a few local wineries, but...alas. And a trip with him and his wife and me...that's a recipe for awkward.

I want to go to one of the local theaters, but alone...it's not only substantially less fun, but I find myself treated pretty crummy when going to such an affair in a party of one. I could call up a friend, but they're all coupled - and we're back to the me and friend and friend's wife/husband/boyfriend/girlfriend scenario.

Say the same for anything from a movie to dinner to a night on the town. Even getting out with a friend without their partner can be tough, with the inevitable awkwardness of that conversation when they say, "oh yeah, we can go" and you try to explain that you weren't inviting we. That perhaps you're looking for a fun or exciting night out instead of a measured - albeit lovely - dinner, followed by, "oh, hmm, it's getting late..."

I won't even get into solo homeownership.

This is not to say that I have anything but warmth for my friends' significant others. Even you (I know we had a rough spot there, but I think we've gotten past that). I do genuinely enjoy those Italian dinners and jocular outings, even when I play the odd man out. I'm not sitting home depressed and glum. And I'm certainly not pining away for her.

Just frustrated, 's all. I always seem to find a way of breaking assumptions.

Whew!

2010-07-01T21:19:00.000-07:00

I did it. For the first time in I-don't-know how long, I just ran an honest-to-god eight-minute mile. Outside, heat and humidity, up and down hills, no stopping, no skimping on time - the works. And it feels great.

Yay me.

Blind Satellite Bloggage

2010-06-22T15:25:00.000-07:00

We've been jumping back into recording pretty fervently within the last week and have decided to take a unique - and public - approach this time around.

Head on over to http://blindsatellite.blogspot.com/ to read (and hear) what it's all about.

- E

E.T., Home Phone

2010-04-03T09:15:00.000-07:00

My cellphone just rang with a promotional call from my cable company. They first tried so sell me expanded digital cable packages, which I politely turned down since I don't actually, you know, watch TV (the cable is just for internet access). The kind saleswoman then tried to sell me on their digital phone service, which I also turned down. When she asked about my existing land line company, I told her that I had none. Surprised, she asked how I was able to survive without a telephone.

"Well, you're talking to me on the phone now, aren't you?"

So a Guy Walks into a (Coffee) Bar...

2010-03-17T12:06:00.000-07:00

After running errands last night, I decided to stop in at Starbucks for an evening treat. As I walked through the door, a couple of teenagers were playing the What-Can-We-Tell-About-A-Total-Stranger-At-First-Glance game. One turned to the other, nodded her head my way and, in a total failure to whisper, declared, "wealthy gomer."

I stopped, turned my head and replied, "people living with their parents."

The barista comp-ed my cappuccino.

A few months ago, this kind of comment would have destroyed me. Now, it gets me free coffee.

Crazy Ideas

2010-01-13T13:01:00.000-08:00

The recent economic catastrophe can be summed up thusly: people respond to incentives. Much of the financial sector made bad long-term decisions because individuals were highly rewarded for thinking exclusively of the short-term.

The response from our leaders and media has been a typical outburst, decrying those individuals as greedy. Its a fruitless proposition. People respond to incentives, and I'd bet even money that most people would have made the same decisions. Rather than name-calling, I suggest we change the incentive structure. What follows are a few ideas off the top of my head.

For starters, we need to encourage a longer term personal view by executives. The current bonus structure rewards short-term thinking with huge bonuses at the expense of long-term corporate health. Look at AIG, Bear Stearns, Lehman, Citi, Enron, Worldcom...the list goes on.

What about creating a special class of stock or stock option that cannot be sold, traded or redeemed for, say, seven years? Then apply a progressive scale to compensation; cash bonuses or other immediate compensation gets taxed at a high rate, while the new long-term stock is taxed much lower. If the executive makes decisions to help the company prospers long term, he or she will be rewarded. Short-term decisions, on the other hand, become self-defeating.

On the larger scale, what if we made corporate taxes progressive? The last year has seen terrifying examples of the problems with ever larger corporations, compounding the problems of shortsightedness. What's more, politicians of both parties are always praising small businesses, calling them engine of innovation, the heart of the American economy, etc. So why not reward smaller businesses with slightly lower tax rates while discouraging bloated "too big to fail" mega-corporations with slightly higher ones?

I haven't researched these ideas, I'm just throwing out the first things that come to mind. But let's start coming up with solutions - new solutions, real solutions - rather than relying on dogma and ideology to maintain a failed status quo.

Lessons in Bar Hopping, for the Novice

2009-12-10T20:20:00.000-08:00

1. Chesterfield Valley? Bad choice, even though the intent was to find somewhere a bit more familiar and perhaps simpler to ease into.

2. Don't go alone. You're bound to get nasty looks and bad service.

3. Do not - under any circumstances - talk to a fellow guy. Even if he is speaking loudly about a professional topic trying to figure out something with which you have a great deal of experience, you will not receive a warm welcome.

4. People go out in groups. Do not try to talk an individual that is out with someone or someones else, no matter the circumstance.

Good Lord...

2009-11-22T21:47:00.000-08:00

I was sent on a business trip recently, and that means plenty of time on planes. I usually sit silent and read next to strangers, sometimes get talking, often times get job offers. This time, I wound up sitting next to a preacher that wanted to talk. Really wanted to talk.

We were flying to LA and I mentioned that I used to live there.

"Oh, you have family there?" he asked.

"Well, I did when I live there. My mother."

"Oh? She moved away with you?" he continued.

"No...she passed away."

"Oh, illness?"

"No..."

"An accident?"

At which point, I hesitantly filled in the blank. "Suicide."

I should take the time to point out that I have no problems with people of faith, no problems with preachers at all. Hell, two good college friends wound up heading to seminary and we can still talk with no problems whatsoever.

But this preacher replied along the lines of, "I'm sorry. The path to salvation is a tough one, and some just aren't strong enough."

Did he just tell me that my mother's going to hell? Well, now I've got to fuck with him...

I started innocently enough. "So, tell me about your denomination. Are they liberal...?"

"Oh, yes, we're fairly progressive."

"Oh, so you accept homosexuals and such?"

"Well...ummm...no. As leviticus says..." at which point he quoted fairly convincingly, ending with the bit about an, "abomination."

I'm glad he did. Because then I was able to jump in, "Oh, that's a nice shirt. Looks like it would be a pain to iron. It is 100% cotton, right? 'Cause Leviticus also bans clothing woven of many materials."

At this point, he started going on about what really matters in the Old Testament and Jesus's new contract with mankind and such. I let him go on for a few minutes before jumping back in.

"Oh, but you agree with the Bible on the big stuff, right? Like, what is the order of creation?"

He proceeded to do a pretty good rendition of the seven days story of Genesis 1.

To which I replied, "Oh, so you don't believe in the literal word of the Bible?"

He shot me a confused look, and I asked to borrow the Bible sitting in his lap. Opening it to chapter two - the Adam and Even story - I read out what it described as the order of creation - a different order than the first chapter.

The look on his face was priceless. He didn't say another word the rest of the flight. And I had no guilt about hogging the armrest.

Obvious Joke

2009-11-15T22:32:00.000-08:00

I watched The Men Who Stare at Goats this evening. It wasn't great, but it's definitely the best movie about Jedi that Ewen McGregor has ever made.

Talkin' 'Bout My Generation

2009-11-10T19:12:00.000-08:00

I got into an interesting conversation with my father this evening. His father has recently passed away and his reminiscence turned to the so-called Greatest Generation. He talked about World War II and it's aftermath.

After a while, I had a thought: his Greatest Generation got done fighting a massive world war and immediately set it's sights to rebuilding all of Europe (and Japan).

We can't even keep the lights on twenty-four hours straight in a small-ish Middle-Eastern country.

That's What She Said

2009-11-05T15:48:00.000-08:00

I overheard a gal asking her friends to send "positive energy" her way. I had to resist telling her to go lick an anode.

The One-Handed Chef

2009-10-10T19:23:00.000-07:00

You know what I like? Salad. It's still tough to type from my wrist surgery earlier in the week, but here's a recipe that can even be made with one hand:

Grab a shot glass. We're going to make a single serving of fresh vinagrette salad dressing.

Start by adding around an eight of an inch of good balsamic vinegar. This will contribute a lot of the flavor, so do yourself a favour and get a good wood-aged balsamic. Or something.

Fill the rest of the glass with extra-virgin olive oil. You don't need to go to the top; leave room to stir.

Finally, add some mixed Italian seasonings. Pretty much any type will do, and it can be fun to mix it up. I generally like something with at least a little saltiness.

Mix it up, stiring vigorously up and down, and set aside.

Next: go get yourself a big bowl and fill it up with the lettuce of your choice. I like spring greens for their pungent flavors, but anything will do. Just don't do iceburg. Really, it's not worth it.

You can add just about anything else you want. I like raisins for their sweetness and almond slices for their...almond-iness. Crutons are tasty, too, as is just about any fresh fruit. Be creative.

Finish by stirring up that dressing again (it settles quickly) and poring it over the salad. Done!

There you go: a good basic recipe that can be thrown together one-handed in less than five minutes. It's extremely healthy and there are plenty of opportunities for variety. It's the type of recipe you can make a couple of times every week and never get bored. Or fat.

If you try this, leave a comment and let me know how it goes.

Under Ten

2009-09-22T21:05:00.000-07:00

Against my better judgement, I tried to watch the premier of the new season of Heroes. It started off with Claire starting college. She is convinced to take a placement test to land a limited seat in "Linear Algebra 170."

If someone in the writing department bothered to research a single thing, they'd know that not only do colleges generally not have competitions for placement - especially not with freshmen - Linear Algebra is in no way a 100 level class*.

I turned it off under ten minutes in.

*Just for reference, my college placed Linear Algebra just after Calculus III.

Wha???

2009-09-07T21:52:00.000-07:00

Ok, I've had extra free time lately but not free motivation.

I was looking for something to put on in the background, something to throw in the upper-right corner of my screen as I surfed the interwebs. I confess: I'm a sci-fi geek. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far in 1999-or-so, I remembered watching a few episodes of The Invisible Man, a B-show on the Sci-Fi (NOT the SyFy) network that didn't make it past the first few seasons. Funny thing: Hulu.com has the whole run available, free.

It's got some interesting bits going for it, though I can't say that I would have kept it running.

The closest comparison I can fathom is Joss Whedon. It is an irreverent tale of an inmate-turned-super-agent thanks to a bio-somethingicall gland that allows him to turn invisible. The catch? If he doesn't get continuous dosages or CounterAgent (I always see it capitalized, in CamelCase, when I hear it), he turns psycho. Hence the government job.

There's a lot of typical spy story thrown in, except that it feels that the writers had nothing but contempt for spy stories. You have the The Agency (operating under the guise of the Department of Fish and Game) facing off with The Organization, the hero telling his nemysis that he's absurd for overcomplicated plans, the real experienced agent - short, bald and rightfully paranoid. Perhaps imagine Seth Rogan writing a spy series and you get a pretty good idea.

And that's where it stops. It's fun, it's watchable and each episode has at least one really good joke. More than that? It's no classic, it's nothing special and it's no Joss Whedon. Watch it for something in the background. Watch it to learn how to lampoon a genre. Watch it to...to...

Just don't watch it if you have something better to do.

Coolest Fact Ever

2009-09-04T14:48:00.000-07:00

So it turns out that B-vitamins play a big role in mitigating and treating hangovers.

Yeast cultures are a pretty good source of these B-vitamins. Bottle-conditioned beers in which yeast is left in suspension to add carbonation, are, unsurprisingly, great sources of yeast.

In other words: beer cures hangovers.*

* Sure it's an exaggeration, but it's a really cool exaggeration.

Codex Republica

2009-08-25T21:07:00.000-07:00

I think I finally figured out a big part of the disconnect between me and most conservatives.

I don't believe in magic.

No matter what topic we turn to, it always seems that conservatives have some kind of simple, easy, magic answer. Uncontrollable health care costs and rising inequity? The Magic of the Market will control prices, expand coverage and drive medical advancement. Problems with the economy? The Magic of Tax Cuts will cure all ills. Fear attack by terrorists? Why not try a Waterboarding Spell?

Don't even get me started on religion.

But as attractive as all of these solutions seem on the surface, the world is a lot more complex. These are all vastly oversimplified approaches that routinely fail to deliver results in the real world.

It's time to cast off these superstitions. Let's click our heels together* and repeat after me...

There's no such thing as magic
There's no such thing as magic
There's no such thing as magic

*Heel clicking optional

Righteous

2009-08-21T18:26:00.001-07:00

Left4Dead party. By candlelight.

'Nuff said.

Common Gound

2009-07-28T14:58:00.000-07:00

When it comes to religion, Atheists and Christians* agree on almost everything. They only disagree about one god.

Christians may be offended when you reject their source of holy writ, but they are themselves rejecting the Torah, the Quran and the Bhagavad Gita.

I've been told by Christians - on many occasions - that morality comes directly from their god, and thus our laws and politics should reflect that. There's also a pretty noisy group of Muslims that say the same thing, except with entirely different laws.

I've had several Christians tell me that they believe in god - and that I should as well - because they've felt his presence. Of course, I've had a Hindu and a Jew tell me the same thing.

Ad infinitum.

Remember kids: we're all heretics, some just a little more than others.

* I don't want to pick on Christianity. Feel free to apply this post to the religion of your choice.

Misplaced Focus

2009-07-25T21:23:00.001-07:00

I've been feeling crappy today. It's a long story involving a really bad reaction to inhaled dust. Regardless, it means that I spent my precious day off watching a lot of Hulu.

Hulu has a new (well, not that new...) option of watching a one or two minute commercial before a show rather than a few shorter commercials throughout. It's usually a pretty good bet, but some of the commercials - often billed as "short films" - wind up kinda confusing.

To me. the reigning champ is the ad for depression drug Cymbalta. The first twenty-five seconds is your normal "doesn't depression suck?" diatribe. The next minute or so consists entirely of side effects and warnings, ranging from worsened depression to "liver problems, potentially fatal."

They say corporate America doesn't care about the consumer, and here's a company willing to spend so much money to tell us how dangerous their product can be.

Civil Rights Museum

2009-07-13T10:02:00.000-07:00

So I just got back from Memphis where I've had plenty of inspiration to write and absolutely no Internet connection. I'll try to get as much of this out as I can this week. I say "try" because I will be heading to America's Second Great Internet Black Hole: Kansas City, since my grandfather passed away.

Anywho...

For those less informed, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated in Memphis, and the hotel at which he was shot has been turned into a museum.

That's pretty much the beginning and the end of the problem.

The Museum focuses hugely on Dr. King's death, and yet oh so little on his life. There is a huge exhibit - conveniently placed in the boarding house across the street from which the shot was allegedly fired - about the assassination. You can even look from the bathroom from which the shot was fired across the street to the balcony on which Dr. King was standing. Very morbid.

There was a timeline of King's work in 1968 - juxtaposed right next to a timeline of the alleged assassin. There is an evidence exhibit holding everything from the rifle to the assassin's undershorts. Wall after wall is filled with explanations of the plot and musings about possible conspiracies.

That's right - the dipshit who killed Dr. King gets equal billing.

As for other exhibits...they focused on the wrongs perpetuated against the black community. They highlighted violence. They highlighted strife. There was even a mock prison to show where protesters would be locked up, where visitors can sit and see how terrible it was.

I expected to see a celebration of change, a window into how visionaries can bring new light into dark times. I expected to read about life and hope, not death and violence.

And yet I can't get over this idea that these people studied Dr. King's life - and death - and somehow completely missed his message.

I Got Your Space Rocks Right Here...

2009-07-02T11:10:00.000-07:00

I just came across this article, care of Slashdot. I really don't know what to say.

Universal recently won a bid for the movie rights to Asteroids. This isn't some fancy Asteroids here, this is the 1979 Atari video game whose gameplay pretty much boils down to "turn, fire, repeat." I thought that it had to be a joke, until I found this article in nothing less than the New York Times. How does one even make fun of this?

Do you ask if they plan to shoot it in black and white to be true to the original?

Do you start suggesting casting? I'm thinking they should get Schwarzenegger to play a giant space rock!

Do you debate whether or not they should keep the score in the upper right hand corner?

Or do you simply lament that Universal won a "four-studio bidding war?" That's right: this isn't just one crazy guy at one studio - there were at least four crazy guys with millions of dollars behind them.

Good lord...

Go ahead - post your best one-liners in the comments section. At least we can get a good laugh out of this.

Bass Ackwards

2009-05-15T12:15:00.000-07:00

Three of us decided to head out to a small concert at a local venue. Being the tech-savvy guy I am, I looked up the ticket prices at the venue's website: $17.50 a piece. Perfectly reasonable. I should have known better when the "Buy Tickets" link redirected to Ticketmaster.

In addition to $17.50 a ticket, Ticketmaster tacks on an additional $5.00 per ticket "convenience fee" - though only on the final checkout screen. In addition, they want to charge $2.50 for me to print out my own tickets. Add that up and you get $17.50. That's right: at Ticketmaster, you can get three tickets for the price of four!

I understand that Ticketmaster needs to make money. I have no problem with a tech company providing technical services and charging for them. Hell, that's how I make a living. I even understand the technical challenges with managing a "gold rush" sale - an event where lots of people try to buy something at once, like, say, when a big blockbuster concert goes on sale.

It's still inexcusable.

What drives me nuts is that Ticketmaster manages to charge so much more over the Internet than a brick and mortar venue. You see, Amazon made a killing by leveraging the inherent efficiencies of the Web to sell things cheaper. There's no salespeople to hire, no rent to pay, no shrink (retail for theft). In fact, there was a huge outcry when it hit the scene - Amazon could undercut everybody by intelligently leveraging technology.

So...why does it take Ticketmaster 33% more to sell a ticket? I know my technology and I know people who work with "gold rush" scenarios as bad or worse than Ticketmaster - technology costs are no excuse.

And seriously: does it really cost more to have me print my ticket than for them to print it and distribute it to the venue?

Make no mistake - this is about wringing every last cent from customers.

I was about to hit publish on this post when Tera arrived. She'd taken the time yesterday to drive all the way to the venue to pick up tickets in person in order to avoid the Ticketmaster fees. I'm now watching her frown.

In person, it seems, the "convenience fee" is merely $4.50.

That Was Awesome

2009-05-13T09:29:00.001-07:00

Watched Star Trek last night. 'Nuf said.

The Power to Define...

2009-05-08T14:12:00.000-07:00

I've been talking around atheism for a while and have had several people ask me exactly what I believe. Even though this should probably have been Monday's post, let me take some time to explain my definition of an "atheist."

First, some bad definitions:

"Someone who does not believe in God."
"Someone who denies the existence of God."
"Someone who believes there is no God."

For starters, I feel that most atheists are not absolutists. Due to more scientific epistemologies, most atheists - at least, myself - don't believe that there are no gods, they believe that there are probably no gods.

I cannot prove that there isn't a flying plaid unicorn behind me, but I'm pretty sure there isn't. I will keep my mind open to evidence to the contrary, but I am certain enough to live my life as though my office is unicorn-free. I approach religion the same way.

The common threads that makes these definitions truly terrible, however, are semantic: pluralization and capitalization.

In leaving the word "God" as singular, we've placed the discussion into the context of monotheism. By then capitalizing "God," the definitions turn the word into a proper noun. This isn't just some god, it is THE god. Almost subliminally, we've jumped into the Judeo-Christian theology.

Semantics matter. Through definition, the discussion of atheism is suddenly a discussion on Judeo-Christian terms. This makes it easy for those religions followers to make it an us v. them discussion, making it much tougher to have a more open conversation.

When I discuss atheism, I prefer to define an atheist as, "one who lacks belief in gods." An atheist isn't someone attacking your religion, he or she is someone that does not believe in any religion.

This is the same kind of issue framing that can be seen when discussing an "estate tax" versus a "death tax," or when you hear a talk-radio host ironically attacking the "liberal media." If we are to have an open and honest conversation about atheism, we need to start with our own definition.

Good Social Sinners?

2009-05-07T08:00:00.000-07:00

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...

- U.S. Constitution, First Ammendment

I've always loved that the first things our founders decided to put in the Bill of Rights are the separation of church and state and religious freedom.

I've always hated how they worded it.

You see, written into the text of that amendment is an inherent contradiction. In order to protect religious freedom, Congress does, indeed, need to craft laws targeted towards particular religious establishments.

Let's consider that part of a religion mandates that religious organizations do something illegal. It's a big religion, let's say, 70-80% of the public, so Congress doesn't want to step on toes. In the name of freedom of religion, it exempts religious organizations from that law.

Nonsense? Churches are exempt from anti-discrimination laws, specifically because, well, most religions are fairly discriminatory. For instance, women cannot be priests (nor can, say, Jews, for that matter). If Christian churches (amongst others) had to obey the same laws on discrimination as the rest of the nation, plenty of people would be up in arms.

(Aside: I have to confess that I'd find it bizarrely fun to apply to a job opening for a priest as an atheist, then threaten to sue the church for discrimination when I got turned down.)

Most would say that this is no problem - all religious institutions are treated the same, regardless of religion, so it's not a law about Christianity. So why is this "respecting an establishment of religion?" Because while it applies to all religions equally, it was crafted specifically for one of them. There is no blanket exception from all laws, only those laws that are specifically inconvenient, yet somehow still socially acceptable.

And for good reason. Imagine if there were just such a blanket legal exemption and some silly religion had a commandment to stone sinners or kill infidels or some such.

So we can't give religious groups a blanket pass - that could prove tremendously destructive to our social contract. On the other hand, don't treat religious institutions as special cases and we will wind up inadvertently criminalizing tradition. Damned if we do, damned if we don't.

Instead, we've crafted laws to allow specific religions that we find acceptable to break laws in ways we find acceptable, on a case by case basis. The law might not mention specific "establishments of religion," but those exemptions were implicitly created for certain religions.

So what's the answer? Break the establishment clause or risk breaking the free exercise clause?

For what it's worth, I have no interest in deciding how the Catholic church is run (or in working for it). I also don't care about the words "In God We Trust" on dollar bills or the contents of the Pledge of Allegiance.

But I also have no illusions: we have decided that religion is so special that churches can do things that we find deplorable in any other context.

Why The Bible Has No Moral Authority

2009-05-06T08:00:00.000-07:00

Politicians and world leaders will often say something along the lines of, "Sure, I accept a separation of church and state, but we can still look to the world's religions for moral guidance on tough issues." I feel the following (badly formatted) table debunks this position soundly.

	My Reaction	Bible's Reaction
Man Mows Lawn on Sunday	Probably needs a beer	Stone him to death
Man sells daughter into slavery	Beat the living %&#! out of him	Okie dokie

Whipped

2009-05-05T08:00:00.001-07:00

In a recent discussion over the future of the Republican party, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor defined his party's beliefs thusly:

"the essence of being a Republican is a belief in free markets, a belief in individual responsibility, faith in the individual, faith in God."

Well, for starters, I'm an atheist (just in case you haven't figured that out yet). You just told me not to vote for you.

But Cantor didn't just single out me and my (growing) ilk. Cantor declared, "faith in God." Not any general religiousness, not some deep-seated profound American spirituality. He didn't say "gods" or even "god or gods," there's no reference to spirituality or upstanding moral virtue. Make no mistake, "faith in God" means, "Christianity."

I'm not quite sure how this is supposed to mesh with Cantor's other statement: "We should be an inclusive party."

One would expect a national party to be interested in governing the entire country, but the GOP...eh, not so much. Depending on the survey (I find The Pew Forum very usable), broadly defined Christianity makes up around 70-80% of Americans. What about the rest of us?

Take the attitude that you can ignore and marginalize 20-30% of your countrymen and Democracy will come back to bite you. Take a read over the constitution, look back over history: Democracy is designed to protect the minority from the majority.

Also: you lost.

Slippin' Away

2009-05-04T07:25:00.000-07:00

Kurt's been having a lively discussion about same-sex marriage, which, as usual, gets me thinking.

Inevitably, the good ol' "slippery slope" argument comes up when discussing the topic, and someone throws out, "but if allow same-sex marriage, then polygamy and interspecies marriage and all kind of nasty things will happen!" I don't want to rehash why that's a ridiculous argument - Kurt's already done that nicely. My concern is another slippery slope:

What if we allow religious doctrine to dictate legal definitions?

We might wind up with all manner of ridiculous things. We might decide that the criteria for being a safe and legal driver simply excludes women. We might decide that it is perfectly fine to execute minors, despite a global consensus to the contrary. And hey - there's no problem with religion in school. They're just trying to help the community, right?

As for that all-holy institution? We might decide that the definition of a perfectly acceptable marriage is one between an unwilling eight year-old girl and a fifty year-old man that paid the girl's father $13,000.

Think this is ridiculous? I can find biblical passages that would support each and every one of these.

Ad Nauseam

2009-04-27T20:58:00.000-07:00

I absolutely despise junk mail.

So I got a piece of mail from my bank. It looked just like any statements, important notice or other piece of mail I get from them. I opened it and find not the trusted correspondence I expect, but a letter saying something to the effect of, "we know what you really want is some insurance, like this here partner of ours."

In other words, the direct mailers know that we just toss their junk away without opening it, so they have to have someone we trust pass it along as a Trojan Horse.

The other mail I got? A Discover Card offering - with no return address or other identifying marks. It's just like the one I got last month and the month before, so I felt confident enough to toss it without opening. If I haven't taken them up on the offer the last eight or ten times, why this one?

So here's my plan. We put up a website, something like "noiwontbuyit.com." Users sign their names to a virtual pledge to never buy from companies from whom they have received junk mail. They can build a list of companies who have sent them junk, along with a tally of sales they have avoided. In turn, the site can keep a wall of shame list of top offenders and a running total of sales lost.

Sure, it's a publicity stunt. It'll still make me feel better.

Uncomfortable Irony

2009-04-07T15:35:00.001-07:00

I'm tired, I'm hungry and there's no food in the house. I just went to Papa John's website to order a pizza and the X-Men Origins: Wolverine promotions made me chuckle. The funny bit?

The tag line closes with, "ONLY IN THEATERS."

Guess they missed the news.

Out of Shape

2009-04-07T08:00:00.000-07:00

Man, am I out of shape.

I'm not referring to the pushups here. I used to write all the time. Advanced Placement classes had me writing at least one (and usually more) fourty-minute writes a week, plus papers, plus other work. Debate wasn't quite writing, but it was still word-smithing. And now, when I'm working more intensely on blogging, I can't help but feel off my game.

I guess it's back to practice, practice, practice...

Sweet Sixteen

2009-04-05T14:39:00.000-07:00

I'm a bit late to the party, but I'm finally getting into the Hundred Pushups program. My count for today's initial test: sixteen. Congrats to me. Unfortunately, that puts me in the tougher third-column for the program.

I need to know when to underachieve.

Also: I'm conflicted. Hundres Pushups itself says that they're "pushups," but Blogger's spellchecker tells me that they're actually "push ups." Has anyone else ever had a spellchecker put them in such an intellectual dilemma?

Between a wrock and a hard-place, that's where I am.

Empire: Total Blah

2009-03-31T21:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, Ben, you've inspired me. Here it is: my first video game review!

(Ignore the careful discussion of human-computer interface issues. It's really just a game review. Keep reading...)

Anyhow, I've been sick lately with the stomach flu. That means two things: Jello and free time. I've been using at least some of that for the mindless enjoyment of Empire: Total War.

By my count, Empire is the sixth volume in the series of schizophrenic strategy games. The premise is pretty tried and true: the player manages his or her empire on a turn-based macro map and then dives into an RTS to manage individual battles. The first time I encountered the split strategy style was XCOM: UFO Defense and I've had mixed feelings. It's like trying to play two different games when sometimes I only want to play one.

Grand Strategy's first challenge is that it's, well, grand. There is an overflow of information thrown at the user and if it isn't carefully organized and presented, the player can get lost. Playing the game becomes about managing little details and suddenly it feel a whole lot like work.

Games like the Civilization series have nearly perfected this kind of UI. Empire makes me feel like I'm at the office.

Let's start with the macro portion of the game. The world map is beautifully detailed - and that's it's first problem. There's way too much clutter. To combat that, designers need to pay careful attention to the visual cues they provide. When a town or city or...other doodad...can build something, there is a gold symbol floating over it. Great!

Except that farms have a very similar looking gold crop symbol over them. It's not possible to quickly scan for what needs to be built.

Similarly, smoke rises from towns and...stuff...that have been damaged and need repair. Unfortunately, the same smoke starts wafting from just about everywhere as the industrial revolution begins. I appreciate the ambiance, but what I really want is the signal to repair my damn stuff.

You might have noticed that I'm pretty vague with the "things" on the world map. If there's a name for them, I haven't encountered it. Names help us crystallize concepts. I've often said that good naming is 90% of good programming. Extend that to UI design.

Colors and simple, distinct symbols help us do the same. I think schools and churches are two of those things on the world map, but they are pretty much the same white buildings until zooming in really close. Same for workshops and smiths, except orange. All three kinds of ports look pretty identical. The designers were obviously going for awesome super detailed. Instead, they need to be simple and distinct. At the bare minimum, can't we at least get different colors? Eventually, I just clicked the little box that let the AI manage all building and taxation on the grand strategy map - it just wasn't fun any more.

I was feeling pretty lost, anyway. You see, the tutorials really don't teach much about the big-picture game. (See? Still no name for it.) The "Road to Independence" campaign does a little bit more, but still not nearly enough. I finally resorted to reading the manual, only to find out that there isn't much more in there, either. In-game help would be a big plus. You can right-click on just about anything for a detailed description, but rather than tell you the in-game significance, we get a short historical essay.

As fascinating as the history behind the six-pound horse artillery may be, I really just want to know how to use it to crush my enemies, and why I should choose it over that other twelve-pound artillery or four-inch mortar. That's why Civilization has two different tabs: one for in-game details, another for history.

One of my biggest pet-peeves of games is waiting. Everyone knows that making the player wait is a big no-no. It takes the focus away from the fun. That's why there has been a crusade on loading times for a while now. So why do I have to sit through the animation of my arming walking across the map every single time I move one? I can chart a course for a ship so that I don't have to manually move it every turn, so why do I have to take eight seconds (yes, I timed it) to watch every single one of them move every turn? When two armies meet, their icons draw swords, cross them and then re-sheath them, before the Start Battle screen pops up. Every. Time. Why?

I could keep ripping on the problems with the macro game, but it's time to move on to what I feel is the real focus: the battles.

I know that I can click on that little 'X' to close a window in Windows. (Excuse the obvious awkwardness of that sentence.) I know that control-c copies, control-x cuts and control-v pastes. I know that I can click on the mini-map in the lower-left corner of the screen to jump to that portion of the map. Just like you can in the world war part of the game.

Except: no. The battle part has the same mini-map, but clicking on it does nada. You have to manually scroll the camera. Which makes perfect sense, since it's the real-time part of the game and you're always in a rush and there's no way to zoom out far enough.

I could keep going for a while. But there you go: symbolism, discoverability, focus and uniformity. Four key human-computer interaction and UI design issues. 'Nuf said.

- E

Pleasantly Surprised. Somehow.

2009-03-23T22:30:00.000-07:00

I'm so used to lambasting the latest film/show/game/etc. that I really don't know how to say that I liked something.

I set down to work on electronics this evening and decided to put on some Hulu in the background. On a whim, I put on Kings and...huh.

It took about five minutes before I realized that I was watching something vaguely Final Fantasy. Don't get me wrong, I'm not referring to magic or giant swords or over-choreographed fights. I've always respected the way the games would drop you in the middle of a new world, not bothering to hand-hold you through exposition. Kings does the same, dropping the viewer into a new world vaguely familiar to the present but absolutely not. And every time you think that you've figured something out, that you've foretold the plot or figured out a character, it hints at another layer.

Unpredictability? Character depth? Opposing ideas and dilemmas without a right answer?

I bet it's canceled in two months.

Are RIAA Employees a Protected Class?

2009-03-21T10:09:00.001-07:00

We're getting close (I know, I know...) to having some songs ready to put up at Blind Satellite. In the interest of protecting our intellectual property, we will need some form of license that will allow users to download and listen to our music for personal use, etc. I think we need to make sure to include a provision along the following lines:

These songs are free to download for all individuals that are not employed by the RIAA.

- E

Religion vs. Science. Fight!

2009-03-16T19:52:00.000-07:00

Kurt and Walt have been having a back and forth about the struggles between religion and science. Being the nosy, opinionated guy that I am, I feel obliged to weigh in.

The issue that Kurt began to touch on in his last post is epistemology, the philosophical discipline concerned with the source and nature of knowledge. Science is, at it's root, an epistemological philosophy, explaining that knowledge comes from observation of the natural world, refined through experimentation.

Religion - or at least, a major component of most religions - also contains an epistemological component, explaining that knowledge is to be found on page 128. "Faith," by definition, belies questioning, asserting a trust the precludes the very need to question. Even if your particular strain of religion is not as fanatical about faith as some (e.g., those Kansas evangelicals), to take something by faith means to trust an answer absent empirical observation and experimentation.

And that's the crux of it: science and religion are indeed opposed. They both assert a different source of knowledge. There is no reconciling that, and no way for both to be right.

- E

Fork

2009-03-16T19:51:00.001-07:00

I've been going in two directions lately - one about software engineering, one about politics, religion, etc. In the interest of not boring (and insulting) my readers, I've decided to split my blogging efforts in two. Abstract Method will contain my thoughts on software engineering, while this one will dwell on more personal topics.

Update your links, change your bookmarks, etc. etc.

- E

Sacrifices

2009-02-24T22:03:00.000-08:00

I'm not Catholic, but if I were, I know exactly what I would give up for Lent. I'm not one to go halfway, so I'd make sure to give up the most important thing in my life: Jesus.

- E

Politics, Redux

2009-02-13T12:34:00.000-08:00

Post-partisanship only works when both parties are interested in governing. Seeing as the Republican party's basic platform includes, "government is bad," I don't think they qualify. They have a a nasty tendency to turn that idea into a self-fulfilling prophecy (reference 2001-2008).

I would suggest that, instead of either fighing GOP or playing nice, that President Obama should make them completely and totally irrelevant. Point them out for the small-minded narcissists that they are.

Step One starts with the Right's propaganda machine. Call a press conference and announce that the White House Press Corps will be reorganized to better reflect the top standard's of America's elite journalists. As such, Fox News will no longer have a spot. Nothing against them - no lawsuits, no FCC crackdown - just that they are no longer considered journalists. Cite the number of factual errors and outright lies propagated by the organization.

Finally, announce their replacement: an organization with tremendous popularity that succeeds in educating their viewers, a group who's followers are consistently more aware of world events and have a more accurate understanding of the issues - Comedy Central.

Close the event by asking the Press Corps to vote for who gets to decide the new representative: John Stewart or Stephen Colbert.

- E

Going All Political

2009-01-30T22:01:00.000-08:00

Newly elected RNC chairman Michael Steele declared:

We’re going to bring this party to every corner, to every boardroom, to every neighborhood, to every community. And we’re going to say to friend and foe alike: ‘We want you to be a part of us. We want you to be with us, and for those of you who are going to obstruct, get ready to be knocked over.’

The problem is: no, you don't want me.

I'm an atheist - nothing against religion or the religious, but it ain't for me. The GOP have made it quite clear that they feel there is no room for me in this country.

I s'pose I'll just be waiting to get knocked over.

Webisodes

2008-12-29T22:30:00.000-08:00

I've been trying to watch the "webisodes" of Battlestar Galactica produced for the winter break. Let me go ahead and say it: watching webisodes sucks. Unless there are some substantial revisions to the format, I'm going to go ahead and declare the idea DOA.

Who ever thought that this was a good idea: you click on an episode, you watch a thirty-second commercial, you sit through a four-minute chunk of story, and then you have to go find the next episode in the list and repeat the process. Except this time, you've already seen the damn ad. And the first twenty seconds or so are the title screen and a recap of the last episode.

Let's go over that again: You spend a minute searching a list, watching the same advertisement and title screen, and then part of an episode you've already watched, all for a little bitty fragment of a story. No possible chance for immersion, only an irrepressibly irritating experience.

Have I mentioned that it's repetitive?

I applaud the networks for trying something new and innovative, and for actually trying to make use of the Internet. In an age where every big media corporation seems terrified of ones and zeroes, this is something laudable. We need more people trying new things.

I just hope they find different people.

Legend of the Seeker / Star Wars

2008-12-11T21:58:00.000-08:00

So, on a whim, I decided to try and watch the pilot of Legend of the Seeker. It was on the front page of Hulu. Also: I was too tired to do much else.

Here's a synopsis:

Kahlan / Leia, a woman in a resistance movement, flees the Midlands / the Empire in search of a wizard, Zed / Obi Wan. Their ultimate hope is the plucky young hero Richard Cypher / Luke Skywalker, who has no knowledge of his past, taken from a mother who died in childbirth and hidden from a great evil. Unbeknownst to him, our hero is a Seeker / Jedi with supernatural powers and the wizard gives him a magic sword / lightsaber. Rushing home, out hero finds that the Bad Guys have burned his house and murdered his aunt and uncle / adopted father. Enraged, they set off to vanquish Darken Rahl / Darth Vader and save the land from Evil (with a big E).

I'm only about twenty minutes into it, but I'm just waiting for Rahl to deliver the line, "No, I am your father."

Talking to Myself

2008-04-28T13:45:00.000-07:00

Ok, so there's no one reading this. I might as well be in a big empty stadium. Still, I created this blog several months ago - after days brainstorming the perfect, ridiculous, punny title - and have yet to finish an entry, so I feel that I owe an explanation to the ones and zeros out there.

In short, it's not that I haven't written anything, I just haven't finished anything. I have mostly-complete ramblings on configuration files, build systems, documentation, metadata, team relationships and azaleas, but, alas, nothing quite complete, nothing with that spark that truly ties it together.

I'd love to blame insomnia, but its given me plenty of time to write.