My personal glimpse into the first half of the 21st Century for some yet to be known future
Friday, August 03, 2007
There is no Santa Claus, Timmy
One of the engineering interns at my company mentioned to me that his boss asked him if he was interested in staying on, becoming a regular employee. He didn't specifically ask me how much money he should expect, but the conversation moved in that directly quickly.
It turns out, by listening to braggarts and what not in informal society settings, he was under the impression that an Engineer makes 80 to 90K a year right out of school. Man, the next words out of my mouth really changed his ideas and plans after school. I just made it clear he could expect maybe 40 to 50K a year upon getting his degree.
Seeking confirmation of this soul crushing realization, he asked one of the other Engineers. That Engineer didn't answer right away, but asked "What do you think an Engineer should expect?" After waiting through the awkward pause, I piped up for him, "80 to 90K". To which he laughed through a dry spit take. A couple of the nearby Engineers then quoted their starting salaries, in the 35 to 45K range.
Without getting in to personal details, I'll just say that the intern was a little concerned about his post graduation prospects at that point.
To give him some perspective, I quoted off some general wage levels, such as Senior Managers are in the 80 to 90K and Directors may push into the six digits. Even in Silicon Valley, people aren't making astronomical wages. Besides that, the cost of living is so high here that it negates much of the wage advantage we have in this area.
He then told me what a couple told him at some party. He said they had just graduated with degrees in EE and got picked up at some local company for 90K a year. To which I simply replied, "They lied. People lie about what they make and what they do all the time, especially at society gatherings like parties where they want to make themselves seem more important. It just happens."
Well, I'm sure he will figure out how to adjust based on more realistic expectations, but it just sucked that I had to be the one to tell him there is no Santa Claus.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Organize
Friday, July 27, 2007
Simpsons
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Dear Lord!
There was a blind girl who hated herself
just because she was blind..
She hated everyone, except her loving boyfriend.
He was always there for her.
She said that if she could only see the world,
she w! ould ma rry her boyfriend.
One day, someone donated a pair of eyes to her.
She was then able to see everything,
including her boyfriend.
Her boyfriend asked her,
" Now that you can see the world,
will you marry me?"
The girl was shocked when she saw
that her boyfriend was blind.
She then refused to marry him.
Her boyfriend walked away in tears
and later wrote a letter to her saying:
"Just take care of my eyes dear,
for I loved you so much
that it was I who was the donor of your gift."
This is how the human brain changes
when our status changes.
Only few remember what life was before,
and who's always been
there even in the most painful situations.
"Life Is A Gift"
Today before you say an unkind word -
Think of someone who can't speak.
Before you complain about the taste of your food -
Think of someone who has nothing to eat.
Before you complain about your boyfriend or
girlfriend or husband or wife -
Think of someone who's crying out to GOD
for a companion.
Today before you complain about life -
Think of someone who went too early to heaven.
Before you complain about your children -
Think of someone who desires children
but they're barren.
Before you argue about your dirty house
someone didn't clean or sweep -!
Think of the people who are living in the streets.
Before whining about the distance you drive -
Think of someone who walks the same distance with their feet.
And when you are tired and complain about your job -
Think of the unemployed, the disabled,
and those who wish they had your job.
But before you think of pointing the finger
or condemning another -
Remember that not one of us are without sin
and we all answer to one MAKER.
And when depressing thoughts
seem to get you down
-
Put a smile on your face
and thank GOD you're alive and still around.
Life is a gift, Live it, Enjoy it, Celebrate it,
And Fulfill it.We Serve an AWESOME GOD !!!!!!
To which, I replied:
Devils advocate is whispering in my ear:
Dude! This kind of technology doesn’t exist.
Even it did, it would be unlikely her boyfriend would be a donor match.
Besides that, why would she hate herself for being blind?
What’s this with hating everyone except her boyfriend?
What does this say about blind people?
Honestly, isn’t it saying that blind people pretty much hate everyone
because they can’t see and everyone else can?
Isn’t this rather a presupposed bigoted statement?
And why didn’t the boyfriend communicate with her better so she’d know what he was doing? And why wouldn’t she immediately know it was his eyes since he wasn’t blind before anyway?
Why would she be so self-centered as to not marry him before she was able to see?
How would she know how to magically read all of a sudden after being blind?
She wasn’t blind to begin with?
And what’s this with the random statement about brains tacked on at the end of the story?
It could’ve been put at the end of a knock-knock joke and still have been similarly appropriate.
Ok, and the rest of this
is rehash of altruisms that are either self-evident to adults, or are
actually bad advice (particularly the part about depression). BTW, since I’m my own God, I do agree that yes, I am awesome, but hey, so are you. :)
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Disabled
The problem is that mechanisms can be modified by simply changing out materials and improving design. They are no representative equal with that of the human body which is allowed. In fact, efforts to unnaturally improve human body performance is specifically against the rules in most sports. Yet, here is someone trying to replace entire body parts with machines! Where is the equal footing here? There is none. If this is allowed and accepted, what is to prevent someone from volunteering to amputate body parts to replace them with machines that might perform better than their nature body? This is less ridiculous than it soudns. One only has to look at some of the unnatural lengths people go through to try to improve their bodies right now with steroids, blood replacement therapy, etc. There's no difference beteen that behavior and that of using mechanisms in place of human limbs in sports.
Vacuous
shoe lace. Normally, string type things get hung up on the belt drive.
Normally. Well, the string made it past the drive and all the way into the
blower. When the motor stalled, it took out both a secondary house breaker
and one of the main breakers in the box outside our house. Needless to
say, it took a while for us to hunt down that issue.
So yesterday, I set about to repair the dang vacuum. Allie watched as I
methodically took the vacuum apart, piece by piece until I had the blower
in two pieces.
At that point I let Allie have the fun of digging the string out from being
wrapped around the axial with scissors. I hate doing that, and she's
pretty good at it.
So then I reassembled the vacuum, with no left over parts. :) I plugged
it in and it ran great again.
Allie hasn't seen my mechanical skills too much, so she wasn't all that
sure if I could take the vacuum apart. Apparently the fact that I'm an
Engineer and I build devices for a living didn't register. Women are
funny like that. Quick to assume a guy can't do sumfin just cuz they
haven't seen it for themselves. I mean, it's fun to impress a woman, but a
little faith in the first place is nice too. This is a lovingly critical
comment about all the women in my life. :)
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Monday, July 09, 2007
Transformers 2
The only enjoyment flaw in the movie is near the end in the final showdown. Because of the way the robots are made in the movie, the view might lose track of who's who in a couple of the battle scenes. Other than that, this movie is great. One particular point I enjoyed is that it has the best car chase scene I've seen in a movie in a very long time (with near perfect mix of pacing and excitement).
Now, here's the spoiler. There's seems to be a teaser trailer for Transformers 2 before the Transformer movie. Did anyone else catch that?
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Economy America
Although government and economy work together, one particular type of government does not require one particular type of economy. It is possible to have a free society yet have an economy based on the sun worship. That's not an ideal mix, but it's not outside the realm of possibilities.
Free Market has its place in our country. It is necessary to regulate that Free Market to prevent abuses. Anti-trust, monopolies, rigging or hording of necessary supplies are examples of possible abuses that hurt both the individual and the market overall. However, redundancies in a Free Market can also lead to inefficiencies. Examples of these are if a city privatizes services such as water piping, garbage collection, electricity routing, and other infrastructure services without a central contract giving one entity the sole right and authority to provide such services. For example, it is OK to have more than one source for water, but it is bad to allow one property to be serviced by 4 separate pipes that bring that water in from the outside. In such as case, the city is responsible to regulate infrastructure services efficiently to prevent wasteful redundancies that can drain the overall resources of the city.
More on this some other day. :)
Friday, June 22, 2007
Bad vision
Friday, June 15, 2007
Superman vs. Spider-man Mac/PC Spoofs
Friday, June 08, 2007
Paris Hilton back to jail?
That said, I do believe she does have to pay for her crimes, but that punishment should be in line with punishments handed down to her peers and normal folks for the same charges and behavior.
Miriam's Non-birthday
Dinner was good and we did do some catching up. We are starting to get back to normal, one step at a time. I know we aren't going to have a lot of personal time from here on out, but it's always feels good when we do, and we are getting more time with each other in group, couplish activities. ...looking forward to the official non-birthday gathering (back in Mountain View) on Saturday. It's non-birthday cuz she's now in her late 20's, and the looming 3-0 is knocking on the door. She's trying not to count the years. :)
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
I Memorialize
On Sunday, we met up with Miriam, her kid and her b/f for a day at the "new" Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. It's really the same as the former Six Flags Marine World, so don't let the new name fool you. The day slipped away. I only got on two rides twice, and saw one short show. Kinda unfulfilling. However, Allie did get a little sicker from being out and about all day.
On Monday, my cuzin and her new husband visited us for lunch at Khans Garden. We then walked around nearby Santana Row. Afterwards, while Allie recovered (still a bit sick with a cold), I spent a couple hours with with couple of other friends at their BBQ. Allie slept. We later met up at her folks place for a BBQ dinner. uhgghghghg, I was so stuff.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Pray for our Schools
I witnessed a lie just now. While channel flipping, I caught a preacher talking about the "Wall separating the Church and State" (in the context of a discussion about our schools and government buildings) and how the First Amendment of the United States Constitution does not mention a "wall", a "separation", the "Church" or the "State". Those words themselves do not appear in the First Amendment. So, how is this a lie? Well, yes, there is no mention of a wall. That was a metaphor created to Thomas Jefferson regarding a specific proposed Bill in his day. However, there is a statement that prevents the Congress (the "State") from making laws establishing or prohibiting (a "separation") religion (which includes the "Church"). There's the lie. It means that the government has not right to force someone to worship; it does not endorse any form of worship; and it does not prevent anyone from worship.
Of course, there is some leeway inheritant to this separation. It is wrong for a public school to endorse prayer on its premises because prayer is a form of worship. However, where some have taken this to far is that they feel the school has to prevent worship in order not to endorse it. This idea is also a lie. It is a lie that fuels Churches in their lie. "See, they don't allow us to worship in schools!" Both positions are extreme. The interested parties on both extremes of this issue feed off of each other.
There is no wall. But there is designated limits on the authority of our government to impose its will upon the people. This is one of several cornerstones built into the Constitutional Amendments that prevents the majority of our population from oppressing any minority.
It also serves as a rule against the supporting of religion by public deeds or use of public funds. Again, some have taken this too far. Some have interpreted this prohibition of support to mean prohibition of religious activities on public school premises. They don't understand the difference between endorsement and equal access to public properties. As long as a Church pays the same as any other similar group renting a school auditorium, there is be no prohibition against that Church from renting it. If the school gave some sort of special "Church discount", then that would be an endorsement. The discount itself would be unconstitional, not the Church using the school facilities. This applied misunderstanding is more fuel for Churches to preach about how our system is being used to oppress religion. It gives them the opportunity to propagandize their lie about the First Amendment.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Environmentalist
It is true that each of us does contribute to the overall effect that humans have on the environment. It is not so true that individual actions taken by each one of us can have a counter-effect. We act as a force collectively. For us to counter our negative impact on the environment, we must collectively act.
The term "Invasion Species" is use to describe a species that somehow arrives and often thrives in an area where it did not previously exist (non-native). Invasion species can be animals, plants or other types of lifeforms. In the past few decades, scientists and other conservationists have taken upon themselves to somehow magically know that all invasion species must somehow be stopped. Conservationists often feel that every remaining natural environment must be absolutely preserved in the manner in which they believed it originally was prior to human influence. This is pure human arrogance and is not based on factual examination of nature. Who's to say that humans are not playing a natural role by introducing species to new areas or adjusting the environment (intentionally or accidentally) to allow some species to expand into new areas? Who's to say that humans have any role at all in some cases, to protect, prevent or be the cause of such movement of species populations? Why is it that nature must be preserved in the exact way it was when we discovered it? The answer is in nature itself. Survival of the fittest is the only rule applied. Anything else is human emotional response to things we truly shouldn't try to control. I once saw an interview with a local county park ranger. The ranger discussed plans with the news reporter to destroy some trees that had grown on a previously bare hill. What harm did the trees cause? They where supplanting native species. But, as mentioned, the location they grew was previously bare, so which native trees were being displaced? Additionally, this world is about survival of the fittest. Why should humans interfere with that process when humans are negligibly impacted?
What if new species where to suddenly appear? With the current conservationist's mindset, new species would need to be destroyed in favor of the current state of things. Crazy? It's already happening. A newly discovered type of ocean based alga has been growing just off shore in Southern California and in the Mediterranean Sea. Granted, this isn't an actual new species (yet) and it has the potential to become a pest to human interests, but as it stands now, it appears that evolution is taking its course through survival of the fittest. Humans have a two part role in the spread of this species. First, we have been warming Earth's environment for many years, and new species are likely to emerge to adapt to the new environmental realities. Second, we are very effective as transporting species from one ecosystem to another very quickly, giving old species the chance to become something new, as in the case of this alga.
Two humpback whales (presumably a mother and its calf) have recently swum up the Sacramento River in Northern California. There's been a ton of sensational Media coverage. The first thing interested scientists start talking about? "How are we going to rescue these poor lost whales?" What rubbish! Almost everyday the news reported a new reason why the whales must be rescued.
1. "They are lost and need to find their way back to the ocean before they starve!" This is nonsense. Adult humpback whales fast at this time of year, feeding off of their own blubber. The mother feeds the calf with milk sourced from the same.
2. "It appears that one of the whales was catch in a fishing net and needs help getting back to the ocean!" To the best of my knowledge, fishing nets of the size needed to snare a humpback whale aren't even allowed in the Sacramento River as they would likely interfere with industrial shipping, which has the right of way in all waterways. Not only that, both whales have been swimming freely since they arrived.
3. "It appears that the mother has a huge gash caused by a boat propeller and needs help finding her way back to the ocean so the salt water could help naturally heal the injury." Within the same news report, the reporter admits that the injury couldn't be deep enough to adversely impact the whale in any way (didn't even cut through the outer layer of blubber). Not only that, both whales have been filmed over and over in recent days swimming along the surface, and no such gashes are even visible.
All of these were excuses that some interested parties have been trying to propagandize in order to have public support for trying to remove the whales from the river. Some of the efforts have been ill-thought out. The first attempt was to use male humpback whale songs to lure the duo out of the river. Umm, correct me if I'm wrong, but this humpback mother has already mated and is raising a calf. Why would she swim to a male humpback song? Also, each whale comes from particular groups that sing in different dialects. Having a song from a male singing in the wrong dialect is exactly like trying to talk to an English speaking person by showing them a newscast spoken in Japanese. Needless to say, the two humpback swam away from the recorded whale songs that were piped into the river waters.
What if humpbacks are starting their way towards a fresh water river dwelling evolutionary path and we humans are interfering with that natural progression? I hinted at the real reason people wanted to remove the whales above. It's not because they have the whales' interests at heart. They are using Conservation as a cover story to their real intentions.
These are anecdotal tellings of recent events of environmentalism out of control, being used by a select few to support their own hidden agendas. 1. We are all told we can make a difference individually. There's a budding environmentalism technology industry starting up. They are trying to create the need for their existence so they can get support from the government via public funds and investment money. 2. The park ranger needs justification for his job, so claims to have a need to protect native trees against supposed invading trees that aren't actually growing anywhere near the natives. 3. New species can potentially become pests that interfere with human interests, so when they do appear, only the ones that adversely affect us get attention. 4. Conservation is used as a cover story for business related agenda when it suits industry.
I'm for environmentalism tempered by reasoned thought. Human population on Earth is expanding an at ever increasing rate. We have to mold this planet; gearing towards our survival. This involves preserving the environment is some cases, and creating new environments for our habitation in other cases. We need to do what is in our best interests to find a new equilibrium with nature. This is our nature, and it is in the best interests of our survival if we are to be as fit as we believe ourselves to be.