Statistics

As I mentioned before, everyone in my family but me is an expert at statistics. It’s hard to explain…

When my brother was angry that O.J. got away with it, my dad calmed him down by pointing out that in was a natural consequence of our legal system minimizing Type II error.

When my mom pointed out how unfair it was that her children were the highest rated teachers in their departments and she was the lowest rated in hers, my brother joked, “That’s just mean reversion, mom.”

I won’t get into how many times we’ve seriously argued about what the proper null for our discussion was…

Which brings me to last night’s dinner after Spontaneous Drinking Night, with my geek friends:

Statisticians

(Sometimes I think I’m living in an xkcd comic.) Also apologies to Benjamin Disraeli…and my family 😉

L by the pint

Overheard over dinner.

Girl: “I’d like to order some expensive beer but I can’t finish it.”

Boy: “Don’t worry, honey, I’ll chug this equally expensive beer and help you with yours later.”

Now that’s love right there.

Bailout

I was pointed to this Paul Krugman article, which is a sequel to this piece. The Bear Stearns buyout is what touched it off. To which, someone wrote:

“Ahh, GOP capitalism—where profits are privatized and losses are socialized.

Conservative blogs start quoting Paul Krugman and the Times… You hear that? That’s the sound of the pendulum swinging back to reality.

I started writing after the 2004 election—the disaster we have wrought. But sometimes, we have to have a little faith. So, even in the face of futility, we send our words into the ether, the internet, this community we are a each a citizen of.

Nobody loves a recession, but four years was not a long time to realize our mistakes… and our social obligation to right them.

The Trouble with Techies

While researching the previous article, I came across this hilarious quote:

This is a far cry from 1966, originally the Klingons were scotch tape Asians (Fong, 176); White actors given slanty eyes. The Klingon race incarnate all the characteristics that most scare White America. The Klingons are violent, ill tempered, lustful, and drunk. They are on a mission to destroy the peaceful Federation and take over the universe. Finally, they fight to the death preferring death to defeat or capture. One scene from an episode entitled The Trouble with Tribbles almost mirrors a scene from the 1944 film Dragon Seed. In both scenes the evil Asians show up at a restaurant and demand liquor, when they are denied they go on a violent rampage. Often, they are shown eating large hunks of meat off the bone Gengis Kahn style.
—“As-liens: The Final Frontier in Depicts of Yellow Peril in Popular Cinema

I’m so going to have to do this at the next geek event.

Captain Koloth

Clearly Capt. Koloth would be much scarier if he were darker, but apparently demanding liquor is scary enough.

Joel B Sacks sendoff

I stopped by XYZ Bar to say bye to Joel B. Sacks, formerly of AdBrite and CNET. I came late and couldn’t stay for long.

Joel gets all the hotties

Joel gets all the hotties
XYZ Bar, South of Market, San Francisco, California

Nikon D3, 14-24mm f/2.8G
1/6 sec @ f/2.8, iso 6400, 24mm (24mm)

Andrei left me my SB-800 so I did get to try out my new camera and remind myself that I need to relearn flash photography and crack open the manual sometime.

I had never been to XYZ Bar before. It is right across from the convention center and has a restaurant is on the first floor while the bar is on the second floor.

XYZ Bar

XYZ Bar
XYZ Bar, South of Market, San Francisco, California

Nikon D3, 14-24mm f/2.8G
1/30 sec @ f/2.8, iso 1100, 14mm (14mm)

[three more photos after the jump.]Continue reading

Geek. Set. Match…

Just now, Mager messaged me:

“I am excited for Lunch two dot oh—I don’t say “point-oh” anymore.

Flashback.

In the summer of 1992, a friend was reading me a geek purity test he got from USENET.

One of the questions was:

Do you pronounce “*.*” as “star-dot-star?”

Of course, since he was reading it aloud, I heard:

Do you pronounce star-dot-star as star-dot-star?

Needless to say, I was quite confused. 😀

[More geek after the jump]Continue reading

Must…resist…urge…

I’ve been a big supporter of Zivity.

My PHP friends tease me about this because Zivity is built on Rails.

Well, I got an invite to Zivity Beta the other day, so I figured I should subscribe to their blog. Today, I just wanted to link this great article from Forbes when I ran across this…

I mean it’s just a friggin’ blog! 😉

[Ruby stats after the jump.]Continue reading

Being popular

After the merkley??? party, I went with some friends to Matt Mullenweg’s birthday party.

(Matt, for those of you who don’t know, wrote WordPress which over the years has become the premier blogging application on the internet. Matt also gets a lot of shit from me when I talk about programming)

My friends and I are chatting in line outside BigFoot, when this pretty girl, K—, who I’ve never met before, ahead of me in line, turns around and says, “Wait, is your name ‘Terry Chay?’”

“Oh noes!” Morgan says, “Terry, you’re internet famous!”

So this is what it feels like to be popular?, I thought. Is it wrong that I sort of like it?

[Internet Fame after the jump]Continue reading

My analog blog

I showed up late to the Pownce party and crouched into the back of the line. Since there was not much else to do, I started to write something down in my notebook, which I’ve been carrying around since my iPhone replaced my Palm T|X.

(Isn’t it ironic that we used to be able to beam people our contact information and now, seven years in the future, we have to resort to pen/paper, or a phone call/exchange. Technology, why hast thou abandoned me?)

A friend, further up in the line, made the comment, “Terry Chay is writing in his analog blog.”

Pownce Launch Party” by magerleagues

Yeah, it’s a moleskine. Don’t shoot me.

Then ensued some Q&A about what I write down in there?

Answer: really boring stuff like shopping lists, task lists, an occasional outline for a blog entry I’ll never write

So if you ever see me writing in “my analog blog,” you know it’s nothing interesting.

[More pownce after the jump]Continue reading