Friday, March 31, 2006

Working

Working for a living in today's businessocracy has become an ugly and stupid game, upgraded from a merely unpleasant game.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Slowhand

Birthdays:

  • Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, nicknamed "Slowhand", Grammy Award-winning guitarist, singer and composer, garnering an unprecedented three inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the illegitimate son of 16-year-old Patricia Molly Clapton and Edward Walter Fryer, a 24-year-old Canadian soldier; Fryer shipped off to war prior to Eric's birth, and then returned to Canada; grew up with his grandparents, believing they were his parents and that his mother was his older sister; years later, his mother married another Canadian soldier, moved to Canada, and left Eric with his grandparents, 1945

  • Moshe ben Maimon, aka Moses Maimonides, aka Maimonides, rabbi, physician, and philosopher, March 30, 1135 – December 13, 1204

  • Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes, painter and printmaker, March 30, 1746 – April 16, 1828

  • Vincent Willem van Gogh, Post-impressionist painter, March 30, 1853–July 29, 1890

  • John Cassidy, aka Seán O'Casey, dramatist, committed nationalist and socialist, the first Irish playwright of note to write about the Dublin working classes, March 30, 1880 – September 18, 1964

  • Ted Heath, bandleader and trombonist, March 30, 1902 – November 18, 1969

  • Marc Fraser Davis, animator, March 30, 1913 – January 12, 2000

  • Frank Paul LoVecchio, aka Frankie Laine, singer, 1913

  • John Lee Williamson, aka Sonny Boy Williamson I, blues harmonica player, March 30, 1914 - June 1, 1948

  • Turhan Gilbert Selahattin Sahultavy, aka Turhan Bey, actor, 1922

  • Milton Acorn, poet, writer, and playwright, March 30, 1923 - August 20, 1986

  • John Astin, actor, 1930

  • Henry Warren Beaty, aka Warren Beatty, actor, producer, screenwriter, and director, 1937

  • Graeme Edge, drummer, best known for his work with the Moody Blues, 1941

  • Lili-Marlene Premilovich, aka Lene Lovich, singer, 1949

  • Anthony Robert McMillan, aka Robbie Coltrane, OBE, actor, 1950

  • Paul Reiser, stand-up comedian and actor, 1957

  • Maurice LaMarche, voice actor, providing the voice of The Brain and numerous secondary characters on Futurama, among many others, 1958

  • Tracy Chapman, singer-songwriter, 1964

  • Geetali Norah Jones Shankar, aka Norah Jones, multi-Grammy Award winning pianist and singer-songwriter, 1979


RIP:

  • George Bryan BEAU Brummell, celebrity and dandy, June 7, 1778 – March 30, 1840

  • Maxfield Parrish, painter and illustrator, July 25, 1870 - March 30, 1966

  • James Francis Cagney, Jr., actor, July 17, 1899 – March 30, 1986

  • The Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, later Queen Elizabeth, was the Queen Consort of George VI of the United Kingdom from 1936 to 1952 and the mother of his successor, Queen Elizabeth II, the current British monarch. From 1952 to her death, she was officially styled Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, August 4, 1900 – March 30, 2002

  • Michael Jeter, actor, August 26, 1952 – March 30, 2003

  • Alfred ALISTAIR Cooke KBE, journalist and broadcaster, November 20, 1908 – March 30, 2004

  • Rosemarie Timotea Aurro, aka Timi Yuro, soul and R&B singer, August 4, 1940 - March 30, 2004


Also:

  • Thomas Cranmer becomes Archbishop of Canterbury, 1533

  • Remington Rand delivers the first UNIVAC I computer to the United States Census Bureau, 1951

  • The first subway in Canada opens after five years of construction, in Toronto, 1954

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Today

Birthdays:

  • Fra Bartolommeo, Italian artist, March 28, 1472 – October 31, 1517

  • Freddie Bartholomew, Irish actor, March 28, 1924 – January 23, 1992


  • Aleksei Maksimovich Peshkov, aka Maxim Gorky, author, March 28, 1868 - June 14, 1936

  • Willem Mengelberg, conductor, March 28, 1871 – March 22, 1951

  • Paul Whiteman, bandleader, March 28, 1890 – December 29, 1967

  • Rudolf Serkin, pianist, March 28, 1903 – May 8, 1991

  • Marlin Perkins, zoologist and television host, March 28, 1905 - October 5, 1986

  • Edmund Muskie, politician, March 28, 1914 – March 26, 1996

  • Sir Derek Jules Gaspard Ulric Niven van den Bogaerde, aka Dirk Bogarde, actor and author, March 28, 1921 - May 8, 1999

  • Ken Howard, actor, 1944

  • John Evans, aka John Evan, keyboard player with Jethro Tull, 1948

  • Dianne Wiest, actress, 1948

  • Karen Kain, ballerina, 1951

  • Reba McEntire, singer and actress, 1955

  • Chris Myers, radio host/sportscaster, 1959


RIP:

  • Modest(e) Petrovich Mussorgsky, one of five Russian composers known as The Mighty Handful, innovator of Russian music, March 21, 1839 – March 28, 1881

  • Virginia Woolf (née Stephen), author, considered to be one of the foremost modernist/feminist literary figures of the twentieth century, January 25, 1882 – March 28, 1941

  • Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff, composer, pianist, and conductor, April 1, 1873, – March 28, 1943

  • Jacobus Franciscus JIM Thorpe (Sac and Fox Nation: Wa-Tho-Huk), athlete, May 28, 1887 – March 28, 1953

  • William Christopher Handy, blues composer and musician, often known as "the Father of the Blues," November 16, 1873 – March 28, 1958

  • Dwight David Eisenhower, aka IKE, 34th president of the United States, October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969

  • Arthur BIG BOY Crudup, delta blues singer and guitarist, also known for writing songs later covered by Elvis Presley, and dozens of other artists, August 24, 1905 – March 28, 1974

  • Emmett Kelly, clown, December 9, 1898 – March 28, 1979

  • Marc Chagall, painter, July 7, 1887 – March 28, 1985

  • Patrick Troughton, actor [The Second Doctor], March 25, 1920 – March 28, 1987

  • Morris MOE Koffman, musician and composer, played the flute, alto and tenor saxophone, and clarinet, December 28, 1928 - March 28, 2001

  • Sir Peter Alexander Ustinov, born Peter Alexander von Ustinov, actor, writer, dramatist and raconteur, April 16, 1921 – March 28, 2004


Also:

  • In Pennsylvania, a pump in the reactor cooling system fails at Three Mile Island, resulting in the evaporation of some contaminated water causing a nuclear meltdown, 1979
  • President George H. W. Bush posthumously awards Jesse Owens the Congressional Gold Medal, 1990

Sunday, March 26, 2006

Statics

Statics is the branch of physics concerned with physical systems in static equilibrium, that is, in a state where the relative positions of subsystems do not vary over time, or where components and structures are at rest under the action of external forces of equilibrium. When in static equilibrium, the system is either at rest, or moving at constant velocity through its center of mass.

By Newton's second law, this situation implies that the net force and net torque (also known as moment) on every body in the system is zero, meaning that for every force bearing upon a member, there must be an equal and opposite force. From this constraint, such quantities as stress or pressure can be derived. The net forces equalling zero is known as the first condition for equilibrium, and the net torque equalling zero is known as the second condition for equilibrium.

Three things to remember:

  • At its most basic, Moment = Force * Distance

  • Moments about a point net to zero, and

  • You can't push a rope

Saturday, March 25, 2006

Random Numbers

Robert R. Coveyou of Oak Ridge National Laboratory once titled an article, "The Generation of Random Numbers is Too Important to be Left to Chance."

Friday, March 24, 2006

Bread and Circuses

First, we suffered through a decade of who smokes the biggest cigar.

Now, everybody plays poker and , even better, watches televised poker or Celebrity poker. Personally, I'm looking forward to watching Celebrity Solitaire, which promises to be even more exciting.

Wait ... this just in: Celebrities smoking cigars while playing Celebrity Freecell.

A dream come true!!

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Books

Reading some excellent books:

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

World Baseball Classic

Congratulations to winner Team Japan and runner-up Team Cuba.

The rules need tweaking, but the baseball was great.

Team Japan manager Sadaharu Oh:



So, if Team Japan are the World Champions, what is the status of the Chicago White Sox, and their 2006 counterparts?

Final Four

I thought it was a comic book. Who knew?