Gifted Slacker

In the last 3 and a bit days my software has gathered over 125,288 posts from 96,000 blogs. 37,594 blogs have at least one post from that period.

Below’s a crappy table ripped right from the mysql console. The first column is the total number of posts and the second column is the number of sites that have the corresponding number of posts.

+—————–+—————–+
| number of posts | number of sites |
+—————–+—————–+
|             100 |               1 |
|              89 |               1 |
|              87 |               1 |
|              83 |               1 |
|              79 |               2 |
|              75 |              12 |
|              74 |               1 |
|              72 |               1 |
|              70 |               1 |
|              69 |               1 |
|              68 |               3 |
|              66 |               1 |
|              65 |               3 |
|              63 |               3 |
|              62 |               2 |
|              61 |               1 |
|              60 |               3 |
|              59 |               2 |
|              58 |               4 |
|              57 |               1 |
|              56 |               2 |
|              55 |               2 |
|              54 |               2 |
|              53 |               4 |
|              52 |               8 |
|              51 |               2 |
|              50 |               2 |
|              49 |               3 |
|              48 |               6 |
|              47 |               4 |
|              46 |               2 |
|              45 |               3 |
|              44 |               4 |
|              43 |               8 |
|              42 |               9 |
|              41 |               8 |
|              40 |              10 |
|              39 |               5 |
|              38 |               7 |
|              37 |              10 |
|              36 |              10 |
|              35 |              12 |
|              34 |               7 |
|              33 |               7 |
|              32 |              12 |
|              31 |               9 |
|              30 |              16 |
|              29 |              19 |
|              28 |              16 |
|              27 |              32 |
|              26 |              27 |
|              25 |              43 |
|              24 |              28 |
|              23 |              45 |
|              22 |              45 |
|              21 |              49 |
|              20 |              66 |
|              19 |              69 |
|              18 |              78 |
|              17 |              71 |
|              16 |             116 |
|              15 |             106 |
|              14 |             140 |
|              13 |             166 |
|              12 |             184 |
|              11 |             259 |
|              10 |             312 |
|               9 |             410 |
|               8 |             548 |
|               7 |             791 |
|               6 |            1093 |
|               5 |            1699 |
|               4 |            2959 |
|               3 |            5139 |
|               2 |            8170 |
|               1 |           14695 |
+—————–+—————–+

No, really?

The following quote is true of my programming skills to some extent. Definitely for my .NET skills and, to a lesser degree, my Lotus Notes skills.

Most people who perform a job over a number of years will become experienced non-experts, not experts.

The other programming languages I use are more well honed. And I’ve been applying more deliberate practice to my programming theory, though I wasn’t aware of the term.

Bill Hicks on Gays in the Military. (LA riots, hooligans, and poking fun at the English here.)

Bill Hicks is pretty funny, I can’t remember where I got the pointer but I first saw his marketing skit.

Here and, to a lesser degree, here.

When I’m writing, the voice whose words I transcribe change depending on who I’m writing for. Some people make me have funnier, sadder, or more serious thoughts than I usually would. It sounds new-agey, but it’s almost like I’m channeling whoever my intended audience is.

For example, if I’m writing to someone who is thoughtful, what I write is more thoughtful.

This mirrors the way I act in face-to-face social situations, too. If I’m talking to a goof ball, I’ll be more goofy than normal (if that’s even possible).

The following is one of my favorite quotes:

Anyone desperate enough for suicide…should be desperate enough to go to creative extremes to solve problems: elope at midnight, stow away on the boat to New Zealand and start over, do what they always wanted to do but were afraid to try.
– Richard Bach

Early in 2007, I vowed to live by the maxim behind this quote.  I don’t think I’ve been doing that well following it since I got to school.

I’m not suicidal, not by a long shot. But I’m truly and fundamentally dissatisfied, disappointed, frustrated, and fed up with school.

I just thought I’d share a partial list of things that I need to accomplish over the next week and 3 days.

1. Polish Project Connect and re-open it to outside users.
2. Get a good start on my literature review going.
3. Read the research methods textbook. Dry as fizznuck.
4. Clean my room. Worst chore. Ever.
5. Fix my sleep schedule: I haven’t slept properly since getting back from the States on Tuesday.
6. Write 5 reflections for advanced seminars. I’ll probably do one a day starting tomorrow.

I had a curious thought while writing this. How similar are programming languages to natural languages?

They both have ever-changing structures, they’re often standardized, and those standards are rarely followed completely. I’m sure there are even more similarities that I haven’t thought of.

The one big disjoint that is immediately apparent is that programming languages are not spoken, while natural languages are primarily spoken(as we all know, writing is just captured speech). It’s true that you can speak code, but it’s not a common or very useful activity.

I’ll have more to say about this in the future, but for me the essence of manhood was defined by Raymond Chandler.In his last and greatest adventure, Phillip Marlowe is parting with a woman who he is likely never going to see again, with some wistful regret on both their parts.

She asks, “How can a man who is so tough, be so gentle?”

He replies, “If I weren’t tough, I wouldn’t be alive. If I couldn’t be gentle, I wouldn’t deserve to be alive.”

From here. I think I’ll be getting a hold of some Chandler to read…

When there is great uncertainty in the world, is there a surge in the popularity of fantasy?