Tonight's batch of three-dot splendor comes from loose notes from the late 1990s.
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Neologism file: anomalicious—not just strange, but evil. (1995-07-20)
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You got a broken muffler belt. (Rural mechanic diagnosis)
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Marcia's requirements for potential marriage partners: Don't marry anyone until you have (1) seen them vomit, (2) gone on a long car trip, and (3) met their parents. I would add, for those of us of a certain demographic, met their kids.
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A change is as good as a rest. (Lioness's mother on staying busy)
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The first duty of a revolutionary is to get away with it. (Abbie Hoffman)
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Conceit causes more conversation than wit. (La Rochefoucauld)
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It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to students that have had prior exposure to BASIC; as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration. (Edsger J. Dijkstra; I think you could say the same about FORTRAN, my first language.)
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Romeo wasn't bilked in a day. (Walt Kelly)
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Transcendental defenestration (idea for a new cult, 1999-2-21)
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It's difficult to make a good show if the ingredient doesn't bleed or twitch. (Irondad, a fan of the original Japanese Iron Chef)
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Everybody is somebody else's weirdo. (Unix fortune file)
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Kaa's method for getting rid of religious proselytes: say “Well, I'm a nudist. If we're going to talk religion, I've got to be naked.”—and start disrobing.
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My hometown of Hobbs, NM, is not exactly a culinary Mecca. Here are my notes from a trip there in 1998. Chinese Kitchen: rubber General Tso's chicken. Furr's cafeteria: broiled salmon with half a cup of tartar sauce; overcooked carrots; Iceberg lettuce and plastic tomatoes; cold toast; nice new potatoes with onion; German chocolate pie. Got the runs.
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You can't underestimate the power of fear. (Tricia Nixon, according to a Unix fortune)
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Back when Zen Rhino was a chef they had a special called “Happy Trails”: stuffed triggerfish and a Roy Rogers.
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Philately will get you nowhere. (JS 1998-8-26)
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Thank goodness modern convenience is a thing of the remote future. (Walt Kelly)
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I can do without actually having to traipse around in leather lace-up boots and be hit upon by furry men in codpieces. (Sen, on why she doesn't like the SCA or RenFair scenes)
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Ambiguity is a two-edge sword. (JS 1998-6-6)
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Nobody can be like me. Sometimes even I have trouble doing it. (Talullah Bankhead)
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The public at large tends to confuse the composing of a symphony with the writing of its score. (Edsger J. Dijkstra)
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(1) If my girlfriend calls me passive-aggressive one more time, I'm going to make her pay in ways she won't even be aware of. (2) I'm not going to stop torturing myself until I figure out the cause of my pain. (The late Ycho)
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She's about as stable as a coffee table perched on an epileptic penguin's beak. (Djinn, on an acquaintance of his)
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Visual Basic? I might as well build my program out of mud and popsicle sticks. (nails)
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But it's not *TRUE* object-oriented programming unless you can subclass a semicolon. (jafo, 1997-12-3)
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Do you think reading about cowboys is sufficient to ride a horse? Like horses, real programs tend to throw you. (JS, late 1997, to a programming student)
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
100 meteors
Meteor-watching is the wide-angle form of astronomy. No optical aid, just lie flat on your back with a good all-sky view. On 2010-12-14 from 0058 to 0230 I observed 100 meteors of the Geminid shower, plus three sporadics. That's better than one a minute. Two of them were brighter than Sirius, and one had a strong blue-green color. Several of them left trails visible for a few seconds.
The Etscorn Observatory here on the NM Tech campus is not a bad place for meteor-watching. There is a berm surrounding the observatory compound that cuts off most of the nearby light sources. However, it was pretty chilly out there tonight: the thermomenator in the car read 25F when I was heading back home, and there was frost on the roof of the car. My hands were so cold after packing up that I had hand cramps. I had to stick my hand in my armpit for a while just so I could operate the car key.
Equipment: foam pad; sleeping bag; heavy coat; fur hat with the fur on the inside where it will do the most good; gloves; water; flashlight. If you do this sort of thing in the winter, keep in mind that you will not be moving much, not generating much heat.
For comfort, I much prefer the Perseid meteor shower in early August. My friend Elinor the astronomer uses the term “sucker holes” for those gaps in the clouds that make you hope it will clear up, but then it doesn't. For the Perseids this year I was lured out to the observatory by some sucker holes, but before I'd been out there an hour, it was socked in.
Tonight, though, the sky had that diamond-hard clarity that we often get in wintertime here on the altiplano. Nothing like staring at the entire sky for an hour or two to give one perspective.
The Etscorn Observatory here on the NM Tech campus is not a bad place for meteor-watching. There is a berm surrounding the observatory compound that cuts off most of the nearby light sources. However, it was pretty chilly out there tonight: the thermomenator in the car read 25F when I was heading back home, and there was frost on the roof of the car. My hands were so cold after packing up that I had hand cramps. I had to stick my hand in my armpit for a while just so I could operate the car key.
Equipment: foam pad; sleeping bag; heavy coat; fur hat with the fur on the inside where it will do the most good; gloves; water; flashlight. If you do this sort of thing in the winter, keep in mind that you will not be moving much, not generating much heat.
For comfort, I much prefer the Perseid meteor shower in early August. My friend Elinor the astronomer uses the term “sucker holes” for those gaps in the clouds that make you hope it will clear up, but then it doesn't. For the Perseids this year I was lured out to the observatory by some sucker holes, but before I'd been out there an hour, it was socked in.
Tonight, though, the sky had that diamond-hard clarity that we often get in wintertime here on the altiplano. Nothing like staring at the entire sky for an hour or two to give one perspective.
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