Brandon Notices

This is from April 2 of this year. I found it odd and downloaded it to my computer. I've stumbled across it again, and I thought I might share what's possibly the strangest Marmaduke comic I've ever seen. WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON???

I've noticed that many newer video games don't seem to have time limits, but there's something about them that has been bugging me.

Think back to Super Mario Bros. The timer for each level would typically start with a few hundred "seconds," even though it always ticked down much faster than that. When the timer reached 100 or so, the music would speed up, causing a great deal of panic for the player. When the timer reached 0, Mario would die.

I understand that this just is a gameplay device to add some challenge to the game, but why does he die? By what mechanism is Mario killed when the time runs out?

I was at Walgreens yesterday, looking for a new portable FM radio. Instead, I bought a calculator.



The TI-30XS Multiview Calculator, normally about $22, was on sale at $15, and it looked cool, so I got it. It has a neat feature called MathPrint mode, where it displays mathematical expressions in a more natural way (like how you write math on paper) rather than relying on a bunch of parentheses and junk.



On the left above, you can see a particularly complicated and useless expression as it would have to be typed on the TI-84 Plus Silver Edition. It has a lot of parentheses, and it's kinda hard to see what's going on. On the right is how the expression looks on the TI-30XS Multiview Calculator, with the MathPrint mode on. It's obviously a lot easier to see what's going on. (MathPrint can be turned off so that expressions can be typed in the classic mode.)

The TI-30XS also automatically simplifies fractions and roots. The first picture in this post has two examples of it doing this. On a different calculator, the answers would instead be displayed as decimals. There's a button you can simply press on the TI-30XS to convert these fractions or roots to decimals and vice-versa. It seems to be called the answer toggle button, and the button looks like this ◄ ►. There are two ways to input division: as a stacked fraction, or simply using the ÷ sign. The stacked fraction will try to give another fraction as an answer; the ÷ sign will yield a decimal answer.

  

You can see in the picture above that the calculator is also pretty smart with trigonometry. The TI-30X IIS on the left above calculated the sine of π as an ugly decimal. The TI-30XS is smarter than that, though. It displays the answer in exact terms using a fraction and a root, as it should. By pressing the answer toggle button, this can quickly be converted to a decimal, too.

So the TI-30XS seems to be able to do everything the TI-30X IIS can do, but there are still a few gripes I have with it. The answer toggle button is right above Enter (=), which is where plus usually is on TI calculators—the +, -, ×, and ÷ buttons are all moved one button up on the calculator, which takes a little getting used to. I keep pressing the answer toggle button when I mean to press plus.

Another issue is that there doesn't seem to be a way to wrap fractions or roots around expressions you have typed already. For a simple example, say you've typed 4, but then you realize you need to take the square root of 4. On the TI-30X IIS or the TI-84, you could move the cursor back in front of the 4 and insert a square root symbol. If you try to do that on the TI-30XS, though, it'll put a square root radical to the left of the 4, but there'll be a blank inside the radical, waiting for you to type in a number to go under it. The 4 will be to the right of the root, implying multiplication. I suppose you could work around this by raising 4 to the 1/2 power, but that seems imperfect.

Overall, it's a snazzy little calculator with a bunch more features I didn't even mention. The colors are bold and modern looking, but one of my friends said it looks like a child's toy. It's pretty thin (even more so without the cover slide case) and fits comfortably in the hands, and the buttons repsond well. (I think the TI-30X IIS is a bit too narrow to hold comfortably, and if you try to press a button before releasing the previous button, it'll ignore the second button press.) I would recommend to anyone looking for a cool calculator.

This is a sign I saw in the Mukilteo Walgreens parking lot. What I find interesting is that this Walgreens has a one-hour photo lab, but they apparently insist that you leave before your pictures are done. Walgreens seems to be really serious about the 30-minute limit: they have a half dozen or so of these signs posted in the parking lot. The parking lot was mostly empty, so I don't see what they're worrying about.

Being able to type flawlessly, without error, is a great skill to have, but for most people, the only way to decrease the number of errors is to also decrease the speed of typing. Thank goodness for the backspace key. With a single press, you can delete the last letter you typed.

The problem with this is that maybe you made a typo early in a word, but you didn't notice it until after you finished typing the entire word—for example, "spgahetti". You could backspace all the way back to the P and then start typing again: "aghetti". But that requires 7 backspace presses. You could move your hand to the mouse and highlight the errors, but it takes time to follow through with that.

One easy option is that you could simply press Ctrl + Backspace* and delete the last word entirely. "But then I have to type the whole word all over again!" you whine. Well, it isn't so bad. First of all, I find it hard to gain typing steam having to start typing in the middle of a word. Typing "aghetti" doesn't seem as natural as typing "spaghetti". Second, perhaps forcing yourself to retype the word will give you practice typing it correctly, particularly if it's a word you find yourself misspelling all the time.

After a while, it doesn't feel weird typing Ctrl + Backspace (especially if you use the left Ctrl key), and with practice, this is a very efficient and natural way to correct your typos.

*I use a Windows machine; I don't recall how this works on Macs, and I don't care to look it up. Also, some programs are stupid and for whatever reason don't support this, instead doing nothing or typing a dumb box instead.

I got to the university faster than usual this morning, so I was half an hour early for my 8:30 class in the Electrical Engineering basement. I sat down in the classroom, but decided that instead, I should walk around outside. I walked up to Drumheller Fountain. I noticed that the water was insanely calm, and I could see some insanely undisturbed reflections.


Reflections in Drumheller, facing toward Red Square.


Bagley Hall and its reflection in Drumheller.

There were no ducks in the pond. If it weren't for the fascinating reflections, this fact would have disappointed me. Actually, the reason the pond was so calm was because the ducks weren't in it. (They must have been asleep still.) Also, it probably helps that the fountain wasn't running.


The EEB, Guggenheim, and smokestack.

I checked back after my classes four hours later to take a comparison shot. Ducks were frolicking in the pond now, making tiny-enough waves to completely ruin the awesome calmness.


Tiny waves in the fountain, later in the afternoon.

Does anyone know what the deal is with the floating crocodile heads? They look like the result of some people just having fun, but I thought they would have been gone by now.

I was at Safeway this evening, looking at the huge variety of toothpaste products, trying to choose which one to buy. I was looking at the price tags, and noticed something very irritating.


This Crest Whitening Plus Scope Toothpaste has a red sale tag, and it says that the box of toothpaste costs $2.99. It also displays the toothpaste's unit price: 37.4¢ per ounce.


This Colgate Total Advanced Whitening Toothpaste also has a red sale tag, and it is the same price, at $2.99. The unit price is displayed on this price tag too: $8.26 per pound.

Wait! Why does Safeway give the unit price for the Crest in cents per ounce, but gives it for Colgate in dollars per pound? These are not compatible!

It should be that I could look at the price tags for both the Crest and the Colgate and be able to compare them very easily. But I can't do that, because the units are incompatible! I would have to pull out my calculator and multiply the per-ounce price by 16 to compare them. (Incidentally, the Crest toothpaste contains 8 ounces of toothpaste, whereas the Colgate has 5.8 ounces, so you get more toothpaste per dollar with the Crest.)

AUGH! I shouldn't have to do this! I thought the point was to give customers the opportunity to quickly compare the price per amount of something without having to whip out the calculators!


This last example makes the whole situation even worse. This 6-ounce Colgate Max Fresh Toothpaste has a red tag price of $2.49. Unit price: $41.50 per 100. Per hundred of what? From what I can tell by shaking the box, there seems to be only one tube of toothpaste in it. If I bought 100 of these boxes, that would cost $249.00, not $41.50. I thought about this a moment and did some calculations to check: Safeway means that this toothpaste costs $41.50 per 100 ounces! Why??

Safeway, you're driving me crazy!

I think it was great that ABC took the risky decision of putting Pushing Daisies on in the first place. Taking risks is a great, but scary, thing for such a huge network to do. Most of the time, it seems that networks don't go for the risky shows because they know what their audience likes already. But when a network takes a chance and goes with a risky decision, it can pay off.

That said, I'm disappointed with how you, ABC, are handling the consequences of the risk you took when you chose to air Pushing Daisies. I really appreciate the risk you took: I really love the show. I'm sorry that Pushing Daisies didn't get the large number of viewers you were hoping for, but it's wrong for you to pull the plug on the show.

Your actions have consequences! Cutting the show short, mid-season, is a cowardly thing to do. You gave the show the go-ahead in the first place. In doing so, you created a contract not only between yourself and the studio making Pushing Daisies, but also innately with your audience—especially the show's greatest fans. You should be obligated to allow the season to run its course. Cutting the show short is disrespectful to the production companies and the audience who also went into this risk with you.

You need to give Pushing Daisies some more episodes, not as a chance for the show to pull in bigger numbers, but as an opportunity for the show to reach a conclusion. (Kristin Chenoweth, who plays Olive on the show, has reportedly said that the show, as is, will end with a cliffhanger and loose plot ends.) You allowed the show to be on TV in the first place. Shouldn't you give your viewers the chance to watch the full story to its narrative conclusion?