A Little Something for You Ute Fans

This won't die just yet. Click on the photo.

Innovation

Okay, I'll admit, the majority of the posts that have accumulated in this-here blog could be easily categorized as "rants," and if you have a problem with that, I would advise that you immediately avert your attention towards something that would be undoubtedly more profitable for you on a intellectual, emotion, physical, and metaphysical level. I bet you're just quaking in your boots, itching to learn what I'm going to rant about today. Well, I am pleased to to announce that you have to wait no longer.....than a short moment while I tell you a COMPLETELY UNRELATED story.

So I was at Subway today grabbing a cheap lunch, and I saw some guy who just looked trashy (judge me all you want, but I look at appearances .) He clearly had his girlfriend with him, and the thought that came to my mind (judge me) was "How would a self-respecting girl really want to be involved with someone who doesn't respect himself." (note: I could only see her from the back.) So she turned around as I was explaining this to my coworker, and I stopped mid-sentence: "Oh, well, that explains that." to everyone: take care of yourself.

So...rant: patents. That's what I'm going to talk about. Patents. Not Patients. Patents. Completely different. If you don't know the difference between patents and patients, I recommend hooked on phonics. I was even nice enough to give you the link right there. Get hooked. Studies have shown that phonics are more  addictive than meth and crack COMBINED. And by studies, I mean "studies," as in, the ones I just made up right now. Actually, it'll probably talk more about litigation of patents, but I guess that works too, right?

The motivation behind this rant is thusly: when I'm at work, and I just can't seem to focus on figuring out code for any longer, I'll peruse some tech blogs. The past couple weeks, these blogs have been riddled with various accounts of companies suing other companies over things claimed as infringement of "intellectual property." Now, I'm extremely far from being a lawyer, but if I understand it properly, intellectual property is essentially an idea that has come to fruition in a tangible form. For example, if you remember from one of my first posts, I brought up an idea for a product that my friend had thought of called the "Spatchet" which is a spatula and hatchet combined to be the ultimate cooking utensil. If I were to build this, I could file for a copyright, or trademark, or a patent. So this is the general idea behind the litigation.

There is a certain company, which I will call A****...hmm, too obvious, I'll call it *pple. So this company developed a tablet device, which some of you may know as the "iPad," which millions and millions of people bought, if for no other reason than they are incapable of using rational thought. (I'm kidding. I'm sure it's a lovely device. It should model.) So this company is in the process of suing Samsung because their tablet device "breaches intellectual property." It was found today, also, that in that litigation is also contained a suit against Motorola for their tablet. Oh, and they're also suing HTC because their devices contain code which also "breaches intellectual property." There are plenty of other instances in which App...I mean, this company is attempting to remove competition. I'm not going to discuss so much the operating system suits as I am those pertaining to the tablet devices. For your information, however, Apple was granted a preliminary injunction against the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Germany, preventing sales of that product in any of the European Union nations.

Like I said, I'm far from a legal analyst, so there are probably many little nuances in the law that I just don't understand. I mean, there are reasons why I chose to become an Electrical Engineer....which we won't get into. Apple enthusiasts would claim that Apple is fully justified in their suit because the Samsung tablets resemble the Apple tablets to the point where if you had been drinking, and squinted JUST right, you may get them confused. I mean, their operating systems are virtually identical, right. I should note, that the patent claimed to be infringed are entirely "look and feel" patents, and not relating to the operating system (in these instances.)

The fact that the patents are being "infringed" means that the patents were granted. Here's how I picture it going down. Guy at the patent office gets the application, looks at it, studies it, thinks about it, and thinks to himself, "Yeah, okay, whatever. This will never catch on," and he approves it. I bet he's kicking himself now (the fact that I made conjecture means that it actually happened...in my mind).

But, to be honest, this could all be solved if companies like Samsung would just pull the stick out (I don't know of what), and just alter their design. I mean, what's so bad about sharp corners on a tablet any way? Or, even better, what if instead of having a back-lit LCD screen they used a projector. they could just drape a cloth over the opening and have the images project on to that. Then they could implement a Kinect-like technology and have the whole thing be worked solely through hand motions. Hmmmm....looks like I'll be making a trip to the patent office, if I do say so myself.

What I'm getting at is that this whole thing is ridiculous. I don't like Apple, but I don't hate them (2 years ago I did). Now I've come to the point where I think that anything that spurs on invention and innovation is something that should be encouraged, and it's more important that people find a device that they actually like, rather than one that other people tell them that they should like. In the official Google blog, this is what they said,

         "Instead of competing by building new features or devices, they are fighting through litigation."

That's where my problem with it all lies. So what do you think?

Demon Infested

Let's just get straight to this. I've had something happen to me in the past week that has never happened before. Long story short, my voice is absolutely gone. Like....gone gone. Typically, in the past when my voice was damaged, it would simply drop in pitch. So, instead of hearing my typically semi-whiny, tenor voice, those around me had the privilege of being soothed by my melodic, Barry White-esque tones.  This time, however, the sound production took a sabbatical for an undisclosed amount of time (yes, it's undisclosed. Despite my frequent entreaties to determine the length of its absence, it has yet to respond. I blame that on irresponsibility...or possibly an inability to hear those entreaties.) Because this has never happened to me before, I'm going to share the evolution of such an experience as well as some fun experiences I've had in the mean time (note: I use the term FUN very liberally both in this post and in my personal life. You've been warned.)

It all started Saturday, the 30th of April. I arrived home after enjoying some friend time at about 10 p.m. because I wasn't feeling super great, and I commenced watching some TV show...or something. Well, the coughing started, which prevented my efforts to sleep, so what did I do? Looked at computer components. Yes, the same activity that anyone in their right mind would engage themselves in (As a side note, if you're looking to upgrade computer components, make sure you check compatibility, otherwise the purchase of one item will necessitate the purchase of another, and so on and so forth, and eventually there goes your paycheck.) Eventually, around 3 a.m. I was able to sleep, however, much to my chagrin, I woke up the next morning (the waking up was to my chagrin...on second thought, that makes it sound like I have some sort of death wish, which I don't. Pfff. Pffsh. . Anyway.) Generally speaking, when I wake up, I let out some sort of noise (let your imagination run wild). That day, it was a groan of sorts. I noticed immediately that my efforts to produce sound were hampered by something; I don't know what. (Another side note, being an engineering major, I find that whenever I feel to use a semi-colon, it's basically a leap of faith. And they say my generation is disbelieving and faithless.) As the day progressed, I found I was able to produce lower pitched sounds, but not in the same way as times past (refer to first paragraph if you're confused). I had to consciously make an effort to lower my voice to make any noise, which just wasn't going to work considering how lazy I am. So, whenever I would speak, I would produce some sort of demonic sound that has hints of human speech mixed with voided nothingness. So, that's where I am now. (This explanation was far longer than I expected, but you know how when I start rambling I just kind of go on and on and on and on. If you don't know that, learn it quick...or else (this is not a threat. I have to make sure I say that for legal
reasons) <---Rambling. Case and point.)

The funny things that happened probably won't be funny unless you either visualize them happening to me, or you put yourself in my shoes and imagine how you would react should it happen to you. First thing: I don't know if my parents have short-term memory loss, or if they were intentionally toying with me, but I think that they started asking me more questions when my voice was gone. So I would be walking through the room in which they were, they would ask me a question, and I just had to stop, look at them and shake my head. Funny, right? Right? Okay, moving on. I was at work today. Someone was calling me...no one ever calls me, let alone while I'm at work. As a note (yes, another note), whenever I see someone is calling me, the first thing that goes through my mind is "does [insert callers name here] know they're calling me? I bet it's just a butt-dial." And then I have to evaluate whether or not I should answer. Typically, if I don't answer, I wait to see if they leave a message. If they do leave a message, I know their call was intentional, and I'll return it promptly. That's just for you to note should you ever call me.) Where was I? Ah, yes. Phone call at work. So I looked at my phone to see if I recognized the number. I don't know why I thought that...ever since the introduction of cellular phones, my desire to memorize phone numbers has simply gone to something that's really small. Anyway, I picked up the phone. Here's the conversation as could be overheard:
Me: "            "
Person: "hello?"
Me:
Turns out my short-term memory might not be great as I forgot my voice was gone. Silly me. The third thing that's funny is thusly: I sing...a lot. Whenever I'm alone, I'm singing (unless I'm playing video games...because at that point my focus is very intently...focused...elsewhere.) I get home from work, and I'm listening to a song that has some sort of rousing chorus. So the verse ends, a brief stop, and as I attempt to join in on the chorus, nothing happens. What the...oh yeah. Try it sometime, you'll laugh too, except you will have a voice and you'll sing, which probably will lose all the humor. So, on second though, don't try it.

So yeah, I bet this post was one long "had to be there" type situations, or recounting of situations. Whatever. Die (don't actually....again, for legal purposes.)

As ANOTHER note, I realize that the pictures in the post have absolutely nothing to do with the post itself. I'm just getting bored with purely text-based posts, and I figured a few pictures would spice things up, even if they were irrelevant. What do you think? Good idea? Ptsh. What do you know...

...also, I have no idea what's in that Magic Eye photo, so don't get mad at me if it's, for some reason, vulgar...or vulcan.

Takin' a Trip Back

So I make it a point not to share personal details about my life in this blog. This post, however, is going to be devoted to something that I don't feel too personal, but I think it'll give some of you an idea about who I really am and why I am the way I am.

I came home tonight from spending some time with my friends and discovered that my mom have found an old notebook from my Elementary School days. When I was in elementary school, we had these vending machine type things that you'd put two quarters into and it would give you these little notebooks. This is the one that my mom found for me tonight:

As you can see, I was very particular in how I wanted my notebooks to look. I also wanted it to be extremely easy for those around me to understand my notebooks, so, considering that, you can clearly see how many individual tire treads there are. Isn't that nice?

So, I'm going to come clean right now. This post is going to walk you through some of the drawings I found in this notebook. So, why don't we just jump right in?

As a small sidenote, I understand that some of the text may be difficult to read, so I'll do the honor of transcribing those for you. This one is a triceratops. I guess I drew these while I was going through a dinosaur phase (which, I'm pretty sure was 85% of my childhood.) He's clearly "a run away from t. rex". He's saying, "you. ha. rire." Yes. I think the meaning is evident. You can also see two disco balls and a...bomb. Or two grenades. Or two pineapples? You be the judge.

This time we have another dinosaur of sorts. It could be of the same family as a triceratops, but this one is hairy and has weird spines. It is also "run away from t. rex". There's nothing else dissimilar from the others, so we'll move on.

Woot. Change of pace. Now we have a very geometric helicopter...which also has a jet engine in the back. Best. Helicopter. Ever. I'm just going to say this now: it seems that keeping secrets wasn't really my forte when I was young. Clearly, the box this helicopter is carrying is labeled "top secret," but someone did the good pleasure of labeling what is "in side box." How rude.

Now we have a somewhat similar helicopter carrying another box labeled "top seceret." This one was more secret because it had an extra 'e'. Once again we have that same jerk telling everyone what was inside the box. We have an allosause, which is probably related to applesauce. This time the divulger of secrets was also careful to tell you which box the allosause is in just to clear any confusion which may have come from 

previous drawings.

This time we have a trick in the box. I have to warn you not to open it because it may be a trick, but it also might be a trap.

This is my personal favorite. We have a man-like being, possible something out of one of the Mario Brothers games, but with a rake for an arm. He's saying "Rooooooooorrrrrmmmmmmmmmmmmmmbbbbbbbbbddddddddddddddduuule" followed closely by "I don't now wat I am saing" (translated, I don't know what I am saying.) This reminds me most of myself these days. A series of unintelligible noises quickly followed by a disclaimer. Good work, 10-year-old me.

More helicopters. But this time, the artist got wise to the stuff the other jerk was doing. The artist wasn't about to let the other person divulge what was in the box, so he beat him to the punch. Top seceret (Gun's) possessive. Figure that one out. It's like "hey, this box is very top secret (by the way, it has guns in it ." For you grammar nuts, I intentionally included the wink inside the quotes because he was quoting someone else's action of winking. Don't think that makes sense? Well, grow up.

We'll conclude with this. Guns. Every man child's goal: be good at drawing guns. But, I decided to take it a step further: why only draw awesome guns? Why not get down the grenades, bombs, and explosions at the same time? Plus, a lot of people can draw guns, but I can draw a Nerf gun (top right. It says Nerf, if you can't see it.) What's more intimidating to evil-doers than a Nerf gun? That's what I thought.

So, these are the types of things I imaged as a child. If you're a little bit scared, then you're probably on the right track. Hope it's been an enjoyable look in the psyche of my youth.

Skyline isn't just a High School

I determined to spend this post writing about a topic that I haven't spent much time discussing as of late. If you've noticed, posts on my blog tend to take on three different topic: interpersonal behaviors, video games, and movies. If you took the time to go through my past several posts (I would advise against doing this), you would notice that I haven't recently posted my thoughts about a movie, and so that is what I intend to do here. Rarely do I come across a movie I absolutely loathe (notice, I use the word loathe fairly liberally. When I don't like something, I laugh at it, so bear that in mind). I mean, sure, I see movies available on Netflix regularly that seriously make me wonder if there's any hope from mankind (Killer Klowns from Outer Space anyone?), but it is rare that I indulge myself in watching it. Last week, however, was different. A little over a week ago I saw a preview for a movie right on my Xbox dashboard which both caught and released my attention (unfortunately, the releasing part was halfway through the movie, and by that time I was committed). For those of you who don't know what it is, which is all of you, the movie is called.......Skyline.

If you plan on watching the movie, I would seriously discourage you. If you still plan on watching it, I would stop reading this post as I plan on divulging everything about it. And I mean e..very...thin...g.

So, let's start with the cast. It stars such notable actors as Eric Balfour and Scottie Thompson. I know! Star studded cast. But, to be honest, I felt a little more validated on this by the fact that Donald Faison did grace the screen with his presence. If you don't know who that is, go watch Scrubs. Seriously, go watch it..but at the same time, Turk (I'll now refer to Donald as Turk because it just feels right), felt like a fish-out-of-water in this more serious role. Also, I felt violated when Turk dropped the F-bomb halfway through the movie. But, if there's any consolation, he got what was coming to him and got eaten. More on this later. So, in a nutshell, there was no reason to really be attracted to the movie by the cast, so this wasn't what motivated me to watch it.

Now on to the storyline. Okay, so think Independence Day....and you've basically got the gist of Skyline. A mysterious Alien ship comes and hovers over a major metropolitan skyline (get it? GET IT?!) The begin abducting people. Sounds familiar. But this way is different. In this movie, they do it with light. Yeah. I know. Light. Oh wait, it turns out that the light doesn't actually abduct people. It just puts them in some sort of hypnotic trance where their veins turn black. I don't really know what that has to do with  anything except give the make up artists more work. So they get abducted, and that's it. They're gone. This is the process that the writers chose to whittle the cast down. One of the more enjoyable abductions happened when a guy - I guess one of the main characters, although I'm not exactly sure how - decided not to go quietly, so he turns on the gas burners from the stove, and he lights a cigarette with a lighter. Man. Showed them...except the lighter didn't work. Oops. Should probably check those minor details before hatching an elaborate plan to blow up an alien outside your apartment from inside your apartment. Turk gets eaten. I guess that's a fairly important detail. When the people get abducted, they're actually consumed. See? It's so bad that I don't even care about putting that detail in its proper spot chronologically. I'll get into the ending later.

So, the story wasn't new. It wasn't hip (whatever that is). So what about the special effects? Think Independence Day. Okay, it's slightly different. Instead of sending out small alien fighter ships, they send out....oh wait, small alien fighter ships. But wait! It has a shield that deflects any type of firefight! AND the human fighters end up firing a nuke when nothing else works, but this time it WORKS. As far as effects go, nuclear explosions are awesome...except this one was from a distance, so you could only see the semblance of a mushroom cloud. Wait a second....the light I talked about earlier. Super neat right?! No, it's just a light...that had something behind it, but I couldn't really see what it was because the light obscured any background image. For all I know they could be holding up a tortilla (shout out to all my Latino friends) behind the light. Ugh.

Okay, it wasn't the effects that caught my interest. In fact, I don't even know what made me watch it, but hopefully the ending saved some sort of respect for the movie. Remember Independence Day? WAY different. In fact, our two lead characters get abducted. Yeah. Didn't see that coming, did you? But wait, that's not the end. Oh, I should probably mention now that the two leads are in love. Okay. After the abduction, we pan into the alien ship and see just a heap of human bodies slowly being harvested. But it's not their whole bodies being harvested, it's just their brains. The human brains are taken from their bodies and placed inside those of the aliens. Why? They need to know how to make a really good sandwich? I don't know. That's not the point. THE BRAINS are TRANSPLANTED! CAN YOU HEAR ME!? Surely the couple will find a way to take down the alien ship from inside. But no, the guy's brain is taken. All of the brains, when placed inside a human, turn a glowing blue, but not this guys'. His stays red. Could it be? Yes. His human passions are still in tact. The end. Seriously. I can't make this crap up.

One thing I need to mention: this whole movie is filmed at one apartment complex. Every time they try to escape (a la Turk) something happens (most often someone dies). Low budget anyone?

Okay. I sound bitter. I recognize it. And sure, I had the chance of stopping the movie at any point. But it was an instance of the Train Wreck Effect (TWE), you know, it's so bad you can't look away? Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. Don't watch this movie, people. That's all I have to say (that and everything I have hitherto said).

New Name, Same Game

So this is more just an FYI than anything else. I think my level of nerdiness reached a new level. When I found this domain name...while at dinner...at a restaurant, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to purchase it immediately. In fact, I was basically laughing to myself for 5 minutes at the prospect. So here we are. New location, same information. Www.GiveMeAVirus.net has never looked so good.

Here's a picture of a random sequence generated just for good measure.

No. this really is meaningless, in case you were wondering, although I'm told that a certain line contains an encoded message that will lead you to the lost Ark in the secret government storage facility, a la Indiana Jones. Prove me wrong.

Phil Battles Sarcasmar

There are certain personality traits that I just can't seem to find a purpose behind. These are personality traits like being excessively needy, always feeling the need to talk loudly (have you ever been around someone who just can't seem to figure out how to whisper? Imagine being in a physics class and having someone say, "Man, I was sweaty.") , and, in all reality, I can't quite see the need for sarcasm. I'm not talking about the types of comments people often make that others deem as "sarcasm," but I'm talking more specifically about genuine sarcasm. As defined, sarcasm has to have an element of scorn, and that "sarcasm" term that people tend to throw around definitely does not encompass the true meaning of the word.

In complete reality, what is the point of sarcasm? I mean, sure it serves its purpose of allowing those of us passive-aggressive individuals (yes, I fall into that category...hence the usage of the word "us".) to discharge our backed-up rage, and possibly affords the occasional laugh at another person's expense, but aside from that, I see about as much of a point to sarcasm as I do to it's counter-part, the sarcasm detector.

I don't intend to make this post dedicated to my feelings towards sarcasm. I'm sure that some of you reading this are currently labeling me as a hypocrite, as some would use the word sarcastic to describe my personality (However, I have discovered that generally speaking it's the social definition of sarcasm that tends to be applied the most liberally and not that of the proper sarcasm.) These first few paragraphs I have written to provide an overly-extensive introduction into how if sarcasm shouldn't have a genuine place in today's society, how much less of a place should it have as a super-power (how many of you saw THAT coming?)

As a general rule, super heroes/villains are born out of some tragedy or science experiment gone wrong. How would one with Super-Sarcasm be created? Perhaps they were raised in an always-happy society, and one of these always-happy people killed his/her parents, and so to exact his vengeance, his/her ability to use sarcasm reached such a level as to be deemed "super." I just can't imagine an ability like this being caused by exposure to some toxic chemical. Rich people tend to be sarcastic...perhaps SUPER rich people are SUPER sarcastic. The world may never know.

I think that one of the determining factors that places a power in its proper place in the hierarchy of awesome powers is what would be needed to counteract it. For example, Spiderman had an enemy called Scorpion whose acid could melt Spiderman's webs. What would you use to battle super sarcasm? Really high self-esteem? I just don't think a villain could reach the levels of super villain if all that's needed to battle him is a guy that feels really good about himself.

So, like it should have no place in common society, sarcasm definitely doesn't belong in the super-hero realm. If it doesn't belong in either of those, I don't really know where it would go. Maybe Denver?

The Numerical Caste System

I'm going to be up front with all you people: I don't have a definite topic for today's post. Instead, I'm going to be  discussing a couple different topics of which I've been thinking. I'm not going to write some overly-lengthy post at the beginning here, so let's get right down to it.

First off, I've been strangely addicted to another individual's blog. Those who know me know that one of my more visible qualities is my nerdiness. The blog falls in line with what I love. If you're interested, check it out: vihart.com. I love it. I love the number games. I love the elegance that is evidenced by all of it. It's another signal to me that there is a higher power behind it all, organizing the beauty behind it. With that in mind, I started thinking about prime numbers. More specifically, do you think prime numbers get lonely? Or possibly do they get jealous of all the other numbers? I mean, all those other numbers are constantly mixing and mingling with all the other numbers, but the prime numbers are destined to only be with them and the number 1, who we all know is the loneliest of all numbers. Maybe the number 1 is kind of like Eor from Winnie the Pooh. He's kind of annoying to be around because you feel obligated to constantly remind him that he's not as bad off as he tends to think he is. I mean, we all have an obligation to strengthen those around us, but we all have our limits.

On the other hand, perhaps prime numbers have a certain sense of elitism. They're the Brahman of all numbers, which makes me wonder which numbers would be the pariahs, but that's another topic for another day. I mean, after all, the prime numbers can only be divisible by themselves and one. If they're not being divided by anything but themselves, while all other numbers are being divided by who knows how many other numbers, these primes hold strong. After all, there is a race of superior robotic life forms who claim the "Primes" to be their chiefs and leaders. Maybe we could learn a thing or two from them.

And what's up with that number Zero. I mean, he both exists but is unquantifiable. It's like he's there but not there at the same time. He's like the creepy guy that sits in the corner who is all mysterious, but for some reason he gets all the girls. I would also imagine him to be kind of emo. Tight jeans, long-ish dark hair. Maybe even weird, dark make-up. There's no way to be sure. I also would imagine him saying stuff like, "We don't even know who we are, man!" or "What IS reality?!" And then he has some melancholic look come across his face as all the women swoon.

The number Two would be the dirty rag. I don't feel like I need to explain that any further.

Sometimes I just wish I could show those dang prime numbers how difficult they are sometimes.