tilthouse

List the towns or cities where you spent at least one night away from home during 2009. Mark with a star if you had multiple non-consecutive.

[edited to add SB and correct some technicalities]

Santa Barbara, CA [added]
San Simeon, CA
Tempe, AZ* [was: Phoenix, AZ*]
Las Vegas, NV*
New Orleans, LA
Seattle, WA
Pittsburgh, PA
South Yarra, Vic., AU [was: Melbourne, Vic., AU]
Sydney, NSW, AU
Palm Cove, Qld., AU
Covington, KY [was: Cincinnati, OH]

Apparently, this essay, A Mathematician's Lament by Paul Lockhart (original link is slashdotted, this is hopefully the same revision of the essay), was written in 2002,  But I was unfamiliar with it.  it made the rounds today because Scott Aaronson just had it pointed out to him by a student, and his blog post about it was on Slashdot.

It's a scathing indictment of "math" eduction, pretty much from top to bottom.  I am basically agree, with the same reservations as Scott Aaronson.  Go read the critique and the whole damn essay (yes, it's 25 pages long).

The essay also makes a point that I have tried -- much more clumsily -- to make many times.

One reason people cannot fathom mathematics as an interesting subject is that they have never had a math class. They have have more and more complicated arithmetic classes. And math is not arithmetic. Arithmetic is basically accounting.  No one thinks accounting is interesting.  Especially mathematicians.

It is unfortunate that in an average curriculum, math is hidden away until you are beyond your calculus/ODE sequence of classes.

PS: I used to say this sort of this when I was being a stuck-up little snot about "real" math, etc. But I don't mean it that way at all. It's not about "higher", or "pure" math, or it being somehow more "advanced."  I've been humbled many times since then.  I mean it in the same sense as the original essay.

And the quest begins again...

So I have a new machine (new model 15" MBP), courtesy of the new work, and would like to find a new bag. The old Samsomite backpack is just getting old, and I'm currently tired of the backpack form factor, so I'm looking a messenger bags. It needs to be able to hold:

• 15" MacbookPro
• Power brick and cables for same
• iPod
• Camera, plus card readers, power charger, and memory stick case
• Deck of bridge size playing cards
• Eye glasses cleaner and cloth
• Passport, cards not kept in wallet, etc.
• Pens and such
• Place for keys
• Optionally: room for a couple of technical books and/or binders
• Optionally: compact umbrella (which I currently carry, even though it doesn't rain often)

Ideally, it would be small, but then, I would also like a pony.  Or a convertible.

I like the look of the vertical messenger bags, but am worried about the space tradeoff.  I'm impressed with the PacSafe bags, and they make a vertical bag for laptops -- 13" laptops that is.  The STM Alley and the like are also possibilities.  (Apparently Australia is the only country allowed to design messenger bags these days...)

If I go for function over size, the Empire Builder from Tom Bihn must be one of the best reviewed bags I've ever seen.

Then there's the going old school idea.

Anyone have a favorite laptop bag?  Or one to avoid?

Monkey see, monkey do. Ah, "glorious" Photo Booth.app.



Take a picture of yourself right now.
don't change your clothes, don't fix your hair...just take a picture.
post that picture with NO editing.
post these instructions with your picture.

I don't forward a lot of email around, but this dKos diary, Students: Watch Out for Lying Voter Registrars, needs to be read by as may college students as possible.

If you can be drafted at 18, be sent overseas to kill and die for your country, you should be able to cast a ballot. That rationale got the voting age in the United States lowered from 21 to 18 in 1971 when the 26th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified. And ever since, despite a Supreme Court ruling in 1979, many county registrars have been illegally doing their best to block students from registering and voting in the towns and cities where they attend college.

Those efforts include making utterly false claims of consequences befalling students who register to vote at their college address.

This brand of voter suppression is happening again in 2008. So, if you’re a student and the local authorities are telling you that you can’t vote in your college town and warning of dire consequences if you do, don’t fall for it. And report it.

Please forward this every college or university student you know and ask them to send it to their friends.

I'm hoping a better candidate than I will start a viral Facebook group.

In the meantime, this was great:

If they IM'd: Obama's VP Prospects

Also: best comment I've read all day:

'He' s gonna drunk-text the nation around midnight. It'll say "my vp pic is hak jfjdj"'

Just felt the strongest quake I've yet experienced: a 5.8 (preliminary) magnitude centered near Chino Hills in Los Angeles county. I was in a tall building, so I probably felt a big stronger to me and lasted longer.

http://tinyurl.com/67pu5h

This morning's keynote with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA08) featured a surprise: Vice President Al Gore showed up. Very cool. Gore rocked the crowd. Even Nancy seemed genuinely excited about his visit.

On a more bizarre, but interesting note, Bob freakin' Barr is here (he's actually attending the "Races to Watch" panel, a couple of tables over from me).

Plans finally come together. Very convenient and inexpensive housing: secured!

So I'll be at Netroots Nation this week in Austin, Texas.

Via BoingBoing, Where the Hell is Matt?