Well it is almost 2 o'clock in the morning and I can not sleep. Guess I should write and see what happens.
Had an dull weekend. Believe it or not I had to go back to the doctor last week. Finally get over the cold I had and I developed an ear infection. The ear doesn't bother me too much but I have recurring tinnitus in the ear so it is annoying.
Anyway, Friday night we went out to dinner, grocery shopping and we went and bought Xander a new kick pedal for his drum set. The kick pedal is nothing more than a step with a mallet on the end and you use it for playing the bass drum in the set. For some reason the drum set that Santa had brought him included everything but a kick pedal. I thought this was weird. About the only thing I can compare it to would be buying a computer and not getting the hard drive. Sure you could USE the computer and run everything from disk like in Linux..but you can't use the computer for its intended purpose without one.
Saturday I begged off going to Xander's drum lesson down in Tuscaloosa. I love the fact that he is having so much fun with the drums but I did not see the point in Paula and I both going down for the lesson. I missed the guy so I don't know if I will miss any more. After the lesson they came back and we went over to 2nd and Charles which is a used book/movie/music store over in Hoover. They took over a rather large department store and it is by far the nicest used book store I have ever been in. In a miracle I did not see coming, I convinced Paula to get rid of some of our old DVD's. I hate to admit it but we have like 300 DVDs...and we might watch 20 of them. We loved the movies, that is why we bought the DVD..but when it comes time to put one in we always go back to the same 15-20. So, we took in a bag of DVD's to trade in and used the money to get a toy for Xander and a poster for me. Plus we have a lot of money on account there so when they do their book sales we can take advantage of them. The poster? Oh it is cool. It is a take on the British WWII propaganda poster but with a Doctor Who slant. Blue with a Dalek on top and it says "Keep Calm I'm the Doctor". I joked that Paula could get it for me and we could frame it for my graduation.
Today I do not think I left the house. It POURED all day. One of those soaking pours we seem to get here that never hit up in any other part of the country. Anyway, it rained and rained so I saw very little sense in going out into it. Instead I stayed home and watched TV. In particular I have been watching a BBC show called "Whitechapel". Like most BBC shows it was a miniseries - in this case, 2 miniseries. The first was on a copycat Jack the Ripper, the second a copycat of the Kray brothers organized crime spree. Very well written and acted. It is amazing, from what I can tell the costs of filming BBC shows is MUCH less than that of shows made here in the US but the quality of the shows writing and acting is infinitely higher.
Monday, January 14, 2013
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Three Courses
Yeah, I should have posted by now. I am terrible and I know it.
School started back this past week so had my first classes of the year. I honestly think it is going to take a few more before I have any idea what I have gotten myself into. Per my usual I am taking 3 classes this term - 2 graded courses and a required 1 hour pass/fail seminar course.
The seminar course is a bit of a joke - for half the semester we sit around and professors from different programs at UAB or even from different schools come in and talk about research they are currently conducting. The second half of the semester consists of the students giving presentations into their research. I say it is a joke for two reasons - one, since everyone is always in there, we already KNOW what everyone else's research is. We know Mikey is going to talk about carbon sequestration. We know Alonzo is going to talk about 3-D training simulators. We have all been giving almost the exact same presentation since we started. The second reason I say that is because of the nature of the course itself. I understand it is designed to educate us on existing research AND to give us experience in presenting out research. But I have an MBA. I have spent the last 4 years doing half a dozen presentations a year. After a while the shock and awe of presenting goes away and it becomes...boring.
The other two classes seem more appealing, both are in the Computer Science department and both will have some benefit to both my job and my research. In the first one I am taking a class in Shape Design taught by Dr. Johnstone. The class is basically how to use math to draw smooth objects on the computer. Bezier and B-Spline curves will probably play a pretty big role in the whole thing.
The second class is a Visualization course taught by Dr. Sloan. Dr. Sloan is sort of a scary legend at UAB. I had him last semester for a Computer Graphics course and thought he was a great lecturer with some rough edges. He reminds me of Dr. Powers from my MBA days - great guy but some definite pet peeves you have to watch out for. The class is basically just a typical visualization of large datasets course. The key is to find new ways to show the data that are cool to look at AND informative. There is no point making a pretty picture from the data, if you can't tell what the data is once you have the picture. Anyway, Dr. Sloan teaches 4 graduate level courses at UAB on a revolving schedule and Dr. Soni has told me I will be taking all 4. I am also assuming this means I will be asking Dr. Sloan to sit on my doctoral committee at some point as well.
School started back this past week so had my first classes of the year. I honestly think it is going to take a few more before I have any idea what I have gotten myself into. Per my usual I am taking 3 classes this term - 2 graded courses and a required 1 hour pass/fail seminar course.
The seminar course is a bit of a joke - for half the semester we sit around and professors from different programs at UAB or even from different schools come in and talk about research they are currently conducting. The second half of the semester consists of the students giving presentations into their research. I say it is a joke for two reasons - one, since everyone is always in there, we already KNOW what everyone else's research is. We know Mikey is going to talk about carbon sequestration. We know Alonzo is going to talk about 3-D training simulators. We have all been giving almost the exact same presentation since we started. The second reason I say that is because of the nature of the course itself. I understand it is designed to educate us on existing research AND to give us experience in presenting out research. But I have an MBA. I have spent the last 4 years doing half a dozen presentations a year. After a while the shock and awe of presenting goes away and it becomes...boring.
The other two classes seem more appealing, both are in the Computer Science department and both will have some benefit to both my job and my research. In the first one I am taking a class in Shape Design taught by Dr. Johnstone. The class is basically how to use math to draw smooth objects on the computer. Bezier and B-Spline curves will probably play a pretty big role in the whole thing.
The second class is a Visualization course taught by Dr. Sloan. Dr. Sloan is sort of a scary legend at UAB. I had him last semester for a Computer Graphics course and thought he was a great lecturer with some rough edges. He reminds me of Dr. Powers from my MBA days - great guy but some definite pet peeves you have to watch out for. The class is basically just a typical visualization of large datasets course. The key is to find new ways to show the data that are cool to look at AND informative. There is no point making a pretty picture from the data, if you can't tell what the data is once you have the picture. Anyway, Dr. Sloan teaches 4 graduate level courses at UAB on a revolving schedule and Dr. Soni has told me I will be taking all 4. I am also assuming this means I will be asking Dr. Sloan to sit on my doctoral committee at some point as well.
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Seven Plots
It has been said that there are only seven main plots in all of literature. In the broadest of terms I guess this is true but only if we talk in REALLY broad terms. What is more surprising (or maybe less) is that sometimes there only appears to be about four different ways to realize those plots in Science Fiction or Fantasy writing.
With the between term break from school I have been reading a little, I mean what else was I supposed to do while resting in bed. When it comes to reading I have a set list of about 20-30 books I do not mind reading over and over again. These are what I consider to be excellent exemplars of the craft. Authors I was introduced to at a young age such as Orson Scott Card, J.R.R. Tolkien, David Eddings, and Raymond Feist factor heavily in these selections. I also like to branch out and find new authors that might add some flavor to my set list, which is how Larry Niven, Patrick Rothfuss and Robert Jordan found their way onto the list as well.
The problem I face these days isn't finding a new author, it is finding a new author that does not copy from my set list.
For Christmas Paula and Xander bought me a couple of books that Xander would like to have me read him as bedtime stories. Now I have to admit that reading to Xander at night is one of the highlights of my day. I get to introduce him to great works of literature (in my opinion), and he actually enjoys it because I use "voices". I got to looking at the two books they had bought and discovered that one of them is actually book 10 of a series...oops.
I told Paula about this and she was a little upset because she had not caught that before they purchased it - we buy everything digitally no so it is not like we can return it. I told her not to worry and went ahead and bought the first book. I figure if Xander likes it, great, if not it is just one more book. The book is clearly aimed at young teenage readers and follows a young castle orphan who is passed over by all of the craft masters in the castle on his choosing day until one who is poorly thought of takes pity on him and selects him to join his guild, meanwhile his friend gets to join the knights and becomes a natural swordsman. If you know the authors I have mentioned before you might think I was talking about the Magician series of books by Feist, but you would be wrong. This is the "Rangers Apprentice" series by John Flanagan.
And that is how we get back to my original point. Two books basically taking the exact same early subject matter and following the exact same blueprint to get to the exact same point. Not exactly breaking new ground. I mean I remember thinking "Oh, this is what would have happened if Pug had been chosen by Martin...o.k.". I give Flanagan credit, the book is a very easy read, it does grab your attention and it is a good page turner...but it will not make my list of rereads.
With the between term break from school I have been reading a little, I mean what else was I supposed to do while resting in bed. When it comes to reading I have a set list of about 20-30 books I do not mind reading over and over again. These are what I consider to be excellent exemplars of the craft. Authors I was introduced to at a young age such as Orson Scott Card, J.R.R. Tolkien, David Eddings, and Raymond Feist factor heavily in these selections. I also like to branch out and find new authors that might add some flavor to my set list, which is how Larry Niven, Patrick Rothfuss and Robert Jordan found their way onto the list as well.
The problem I face these days isn't finding a new author, it is finding a new author that does not copy from my set list.
For Christmas Paula and Xander bought me a couple of books that Xander would like to have me read him as bedtime stories. Now I have to admit that reading to Xander at night is one of the highlights of my day. I get to introduce him to great works of literature (in my opinion), and he actually enjoys it because I use "voices". I got to looking at the two books they had bought and discovered that one of them is actually book 10 of a series...oops.
I told Paula about this and she was a little upset because she had not caught that before they purchased it - we buy everything digitally no so it is not like we can return it. I told her not to worry and went ahead and bought the first book. I figure if Xander likes it, great, if not it is just one more book. The book is clearly aimed at young teenage readers and follows a young castle orphan who is passed over by all of the craft masters in the castle on his choosing day until one who is poorly thought of takes pity on him and selects him to join his guild, meanwhile his friend gets to join the knights and becomes a natural swordsman. If you know the authors I have mentioned before you might think I was talking about the Magician series of books by Feist, but you would be wrong. This is the "Rangers Apprentice" series by John Flanagan.
And that is how we get back to my original point. Two books basically taking the exact same early subject matter and following the exact same blueprint to get to the exact same point. Not exactly breaking new ground. I mean I remember thinking "Oh, this is what would have happened if Pug had been chosen by Martin...o.k.". I give Flanagan credit, the book is a very easy read, it does grab your attention and it is a good page turner...but it will not make my list of rereads.
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