Math is hard. It hurts my brains. A boy once tried to teach me The Joy of The Möbius Strip using a paper strip and a Bic pen. It was magic to mathematically challenged brain.
This YouTube video was created by 22-year-old Vi Hart who believes that calculus should be replaced with recreational mathematics.
"There's all this fun beautiful stuff that people would enjoy. While some of the other math is more useful for some jobs in the real world, it isn't actually necessary for the average high-school student to know calculus. We should be focusing more on how beautiful or awesome things are." via NewScientist
Visit vihart.com where she has even more math fun with music boxes, food, plastic swords and laundry baskets.
Maybe it's not too late to teach my old brain some new math tricks.
I predict a John Hughes movie marathon in my future. It's been far too long since I've seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off, The Breakfast Club and Say Anything.
Chuck Klosterman, in his low culture manifesto, wrote a brilliant essay on "fake love" in which he blames John Cusack for his inability to experience "a mind-blowing, transcendent romantic relationship."
Here's an excerpt:
I once loved a girl who almost loved me, but not as much as she loved John Cusack. Under certain circumstances, this would have been fine; Cusack is relatively good-looking, he seems like a good guy (he likes the Clash and the Who at least), and he undoubtedly has millions of bones in the bank. If Cusack and I were competing for the same woman, I could easily accept losing. However, I don't really feel like John and I were "competing" for the girl I'm referring to, inasmuch as her relationship to Cusack was confined to watching him as a two-dimensional projection, pretending to be characters who don't actually exist. Now, there was a time when I would have thought that detachment would have given me a huge advantage over Johnny C., inasmuch as my relationship with this woman included things like "talking on the phone" and "nuzzling under umbrellas" and "eating pancakes." However, I have come to realize that I perceived this competition completely backward; it was definitely an unfair battle, but not in my favor. It was unfair in Cusack's favor. I never had a chance.
It appears that countless women born between the years of 1965 and 1978 are in love with John Cusack. I cannot fathom how he isn't the number-one-box-office-star in America, because every straight girl I know would sell her soul to share a milkshake with that motherfucker. For upwardly mobile women in their twenties and thirties, John Cusack is the neo-Elvis. But here's what none of these upwardly mobile women seem to realize: They don't love John Cusack. They love Lloyd Dobler. When they see Mr. Cusack, they are still seeing the optimistic, charmingly loquacious teenager he played in Say Anything, a movie that came out more than a decade ago. [...] This is why... the kind of woman I tend to find attractive will never be satisfied by me. We will both measure our relationship against the prospect of fake love.
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I must confess, I am STILL in love with Lloyd Dobler.
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Zelda Link: The Legend of Neil A web series (one of my faves) about a gas station attendant from Jersey who finds himself trapped in Hyrule.
My brother-in-law, not so recently, recommended that I check out TED.com. It was Easter Sunday and the familiar banter ranged from militant atheism to anal sex and covered pretty much any and all topics Emily Post would deem highly inappropriate for a family gathering. This is not unusual behavior for me and mine. We are a good time.
By the way, Juan's fear that my family, as a result of his silly ravings, would
never look at me the same again or let me eat off the good
china at the holidays is, to put it mildly, misguided.
We were drinking heavily. talking about Richard Dawkins and his latest book The Greatest Show on Earth, when Paul mentioned that Dawkins is one of the speakers featured on TED.com.
Me: /blink. /blink. Does not compute. (Insert ultra-annoying orange-faced 'blank stare' emoticon here.)
As of this morning, I am happy to report that I am no longer uninformed.
The site basically features an abundance of eighteen minute lectures on a variety
of topics (militant atheism! yay!) designed to inspire and engage (enrage?) its viewers. The list of featured speakers is long, but distinguished. (Slider: Yeah, well so is my Johnson.)
I came across this commencement address given by Steve Jobs that I think is worth spreading.
*Only one Guinness was harmed during the making of this post.*
