ZOMG KITTENS MEW MEW!

Yes, sadly, we were defeated by a team of professors from the other college in town in the Super Mega Aggro-Crag Spelling Bee Challenge 2K6. Ok, actually it was just a benefit for the local public library to fix up their bookmobile, but it sounds cooler when there are references to old Nickelodeon shows in the title. We made it to the final round (well, there were only two, but whatever) and got out on some weird-ass word starting with "geu-" than I don't even remember now because none of us had ever seen/heard of the word before. Damn and blast! Oh well, we did pretty well, and learned that "froufrou" is not only a good band, but also elaborate decoration, as frills, ribbons, or ruffles, esp. on women's clothing. Knowledge!

Also, to soothe our feelings after the game, we went over to my friend's house and played with tiny tiny kittens, 6-8 weeks old. Holy shit. So tinsy and fuzzy. And psychotic, one kept thinking she was in the Matrix and running up walls/sofa backs and jumping off them. Good times!

I'm almost prolific

So this is one of the things I've recently contributed to the CLAP - the Carleton Literary Association Paper. I'll post my "You Might Be Living In A Dystopia If..." article later, I need to reformat that bad boy.

Also, I have a spelling bee tomorrow! Thought they only did those in grade school? Well apparently they do them for all ages (18 and up) to benefit the local public library. One of our profs (Bill North, Esquire and Master of All Things Historical) is sponsoring a team, and so I sally forth to exercise my perspicacity. But until I have the results of that particular contest, I present for your consideration...

Fractals are our friends

The things people think of never cease to amaze me. One thing I've recently come across is Electric Sheep. Ostensibly, it's just a screensaver (albeit a really pretty one), but then I read the background info and concept statement. Basically, it take random strings of code from your idling computer, uploads them to a central server, combines them with lots of other strings from other computers and combines it all into a really pretty fractal MPEG which it then sends back to all the computers running the program and acts as a screensaver. Apparently you can also vote for the prettiest "sheep," as the patterns are called, and make those more likely to reproduce/recombine with other sheep and create new, shinier patterns.

So in essence, your computer is dreaming. If our dreams are, as we know it, seemingly random firings of neurons combining into interpretable, if sometimes random (like my path-through-the-forest-paved-with-coins dream; I just really like that image), images and sensations, then the metaphor is even closer. We have neurons, the computers have code. I'm not nearly technical enough to understand how the code is selected, but it's interesting to think that, if the selection is systematic enough or operates under a stable set of rules, then there could actually be a similar "dream language" that the program could be tapping into! Or at least, we could be seeing some graphical representation of the datastream crossing the planet. Which, even if you're not in an excessively poetical mood, is pretty interesting.

Also, ganked from a random visit to Sean's blog:



I am amused.

And in music news, I want a complete copy of the new Decemberists album - The Crane Wife is amazing, and I want the whole thing. Dark, yes, but not necessarily without remittance and not in a bad way. I'm looking forward to the whole thing.

And finally, the first Giant Fkn Party of Sevy 209 was a blazing success; immense amounts of fun were had, my first attempt at DJ-ing seemed to go over quite well, and we crammed an ungodly number of people into our modestly sized room. All in all, fantastic, and a fitting celebration of John's birthday.

The Life Aqueous

So, lots of water-based happenings these last few weeks. First, I flew over several great lakes several times, and had many musings about Lost and Todd's "Sole Survivor" post, which were a bit morbid but fortunately I was distracted from them by the glory of flying.

Until last week, I hadn't flown since...I think winter of two years ago. I'd forgotten how much I liked it. It's probably very cliched to say such things, but there is a certain je ne sais quoi to seeing everything melt away into vaguely defined networks of roads and the motley of farm fields. You also get to be reminded of how ugly cities are, but by that same token I got to leave the urbanized parts of Michigan we were flying over and pass into the comparative verdant western New York.

Then there was the most tragic news I've heard in a while (also aquatic-based, as it happened while filming underwater) - much worse than those poor astronomers in the underworld - Steve Irwin had died. I don't know how many episodes of his show I'd watched, at Grandma's house and my own, and realizing that he had more balls than all of upper-class Victorian England and a McDonalds play pit combined. I have to respect the ability to truly revel in the most diverse and dangerous beasties nature has to offer. R.I.P. Steve Irwin, Crocodile Hunter.