Directionally Challenged...
8 years ago
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Hi There
Been Working a Day Job for months now. Good money but can't seem to keep much of it. Bought some Roman Coins on EBAY and have been trying to patiently clean and identify them - tonight finally attributed a GALLIENVSAVG that I had been staring at through my magnifying glass for the past few weeks! Very exciting and I hope a few of the others turn out to be attributable. I have really tried several techniques to clean them quickly and have had mostly poor results with: Electrocution - CLR - sand paper (yup, sand paper) - soap - water - have ruined more than a few coins with these ridiculous techniques, sand paper is especially harsh. Anyhow, the rest of em (the better ones) are peacefully resting in Olive Oil, I read somewhere that some fellow has left em' in for as long as two full years. I probably won't have that much patience!! If I ever get a decent camera I will post some photos.
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Friday, September 04, 2009
A few long lost-ish kinda friends have shown up on Facebook recently, so I went ahead and joined, although I really don't want or need yet another 'social network' kinda thingamajiggy to waste my time on. I have not been keeping up with my web site, and low and behold my domain has expired - so if I don't pay up my site will not be found. Sigh. I suppose I will cough up. Anyhow, I am a few draws behind the Mega Millions, going over to the Beer Store here in a minute to get a couple tickets and a beer or two. Got a new full time job gig, it has been interesting so far but I think it might get 'old' really quickly as I have so been around this 'horn' before and the pay is a little lower than what I am used to - although it could be that if I work my 'ass off' I could get into another aspect of the business that I would like better. It's a long commute for as much dough as it is - sigh - can't complain I guess since I was going broke. Anyway, off to the beer store!
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Mega Squillions
MEGA MILLIONS:
Only a single winner of the match-all-5-non-mega ball prize from last nights Mega Millions drawing...some lucky soul in Maryland. That's one happy quarter million dollar winner!! Usually there are a whole bunch of those 5 ball match winners, must not have been that many tickets sold.
PROBABILITY:
Probability, as you 'probably' know, is expressed as a number between 0 (zero) and 1 (one) with a probability of 0 (zero) being HIGHLY IMPROBABLE (impossible) and a probability of 1 (one) being a CERTAINTY. Pick up and book on probability for a more complete explanation...if you want one (it all gets pretty damn complicated)! Anyhow, the probability of matching all 5 non-mega balls in the Mega Millions game is pretty small, really small at only .000000256 (expressed as a decimal) or 0.0000256% (expressed as a percentage) chance of matching them all in a single drawing.
LAST NIGHTS MEGA MILLIONS:
In last nights MM drawing I took three sets of numbers, two non-mega ball sets I picked myself with AP (Auto Pick) Mega Ball and one set of AP (Auto Pick) for both the NMB (Non Mega Ball) side and the MB side of the Pick Grid. I matched one non-mega ball, number 53. And the one AP I played on both sides of the Pick Grid matched a single non-mega ball, number 45.
MATCHING A SINGLE NON-MEGA BALL IN MEGA MILLIONS:
The probability of matching a single non-mega ball is pretty good anyway, at 31.99% for a single drawing, not a big deal since there is no prize for matching only a single non-mega ball.
MATCHING THE MEGA BALL ONLY:
The smallest prize is the two dollar winner for matching the MB (Mega Ball) alone and the probability of matching the MB all by itself is 1/75 or about 1.33%
READING:
Anyhow, I have been chewing away on this Russel Targ book "Do you see what I see" and it is really interesting as I am smitten with the idea of retrocausality. Not to mention remote viewing, I know, it sounds kinda spooky and weird ... of course it is still considered spooky and weird!!!!! ESP and PK and PSI are considered fringe science, and of course people have been burned at the stake for claiming to be able to 'see into the future' so there is good reason to think of ESP as 'out there' or even worse (magic) but nonetheless there is a TONS of scientific evidence supporting ESP, PK and PSI and Russel Targ has been swimming in the deep end of the ESP pool for most of his life, having been the recipient of a long term government grant to study Remote Viewing.
Only a single winner of the match-all-5-non-mega ball prize from last nights Mega Millions drawing...some lucky soul in Maryland. That's one happy quarter million dollar winner!! Usually there are a whole bunch of those 5 ball match winners, must not have been that many tickets sold.
PROBABILITY:
Probability, as you 'probably' know, is expressed as a number between 0 (zero) and 1 (one) with a probability of 0 (zero) being HIGHLY IMPROBABLE (impossible) and a probability of 1 (one) being a CERTAINTY. Pick up and book on probability for a more complete explanation...if you want one (it all gets pretty damn complicated)! Anyhow, the probability of matching all 5 non-mega balls in the Mega Millions game is pretty small, really small at only .000000256 (expressed as a decimal) or 0.0000256% (expressed as a percentage) chance of matching them all in a single drawing.
LAST NIGHTS MEGA MILLIONS:
In last nights MM drawing I took three sets of numbers, two non-mega ball sets I picked myself with AP (Auto Pick) Mega Ball and one set of AP (Auto Pick) for both the NMB (Non Mega Ball) side and the MB side of the Pick Grid. I matched one non-mega ball, number 53. And the one AP I played on both sides of the Pick Grid matched a single non-mega ball, number 45.
MATCHING A SINGLE NON-MEGA BALL IN MEGA MILLIONS:
The probability of matching a single non-mega ball is pretty good anyway, at 31.99% for a single drawing, not a big deal since there is no prize for matching only a single non-mega ball.
MATCHING THE MEGA BALL ONLY:
The smallest prize is the two dollar winner for matching the MB (Mega Ball) alone and the probability of matching the MB all by itself is 1/75 or about 1.33%
READING:
Anyhow, I have been chewing away on this Russel Targ book "Do you see what I see" and it is really interesting as I am smitten with the idea of retrocausality. Not to mention remote viewing, I know, it sounds kinda spooky and weird ... of course it is still considered spooky and weird!!!!! ESP and PK and PSI are considered fringe science, and of course people have been burned at the stake for claiming to be able to 'see into the future' so there is good reason to think of ESP as 'out there' or even worse (magic) but nonetheless there is a TONS of scientific evidence supporting ESP, PK and PSI and Russel Targ has been swimming in the deep end of the ESP pool for most of his life, having been the recipient of a long term government grant to study Remote Viewing.
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
More Global Warming and Weirding
Hmmmm I have noticed that I actually have a couple of blog readers! Wow!! I suppose if one wants to get noticed then one needs to put one's self OUT THERE. I am trying to put myself out there a bit then, and thanks for stopping in to read my blog.
READING:
Been reading lots of books, not every single word cover to cover speed reading..no I am a reader who likes the words, actually, most of the time it's a narrator in my head who is reading the words, as if to an audience. So reading for me is slow and pleasurable....I don't stress out over getting my reading done, however, since most of my books come from the library they do have to go back eventually. And so in regards to getting as much as I can from a book as quickly and pleasurably as possible: STYLE An author's style of writing falls into three broad categories for me: engaging - neutral - dry/boring and I will read more chapters/words from an engaging author, that narrows down the sheer bulk of the writing to plow through. You know, if it's dry I just don't get as much out of it and probably won't spend as much time with the book. ORGANIZATION Some of the books I read, mainly science writing recently, are organized into chapters that are easy to 'grab' as individual entities. The books I like best are not necessarily organized as 'stories' (although some of the really good science writers put a good story together) they are more like magazines without the ads and pictures and glossy pages. If I am not digging into a story then the more granular the writing the better, the more chapters there are and the easier they are to 'grab' makes a book a piece of cake, just take any piece you like!!! I think between those two basic headings lay a ton more ways to rate a books read-ability --- I just go through them one after another and some of them I will spend more time with, others I will wing through them. Tada!!!
RECENTLY:
Julian Havil: "Impossible? Surprising solutions to Counterintuitive Conundrums"
I got this one for the problems/solutions in regards to binary probability - specifically, the probabilities associated with getting a certain number of consecutive 1's or a 0's (heads or tails) in a certain number of random trials (coin tosses). Interesting, Julian writes (quoting Fred Mosteller):
Eeeegads the math is pretty thick but the basic idea here is kinda flabergasting in that our brains are tuned up to be extra suspicious of non-random looking patterns in what are supposed to be random strings of numbers? I suppose that's part of what makes us good at pattern recognition. Anyhoooo - non-random looking strings of numbers happen all the time in the MegaMillions Lottery game, I wonder when we will see 3,4,5,6,7 come up and I am trying to figure out if 3,4,5,6,7 is any MORE or LESS probable than any other combination of the 56 non-mega balls. So far I have NOT been able to determine an answer to that question and this particular book is not helping at all - not one bit - not so far.
Russel Targ: "Do you see what I see? Lasers and Love, ESP and the CIA, and the meaning of life"
Great book so far, lots of biographical background and stories about/from the author who is a genius physicist, ESP researcher, remote viewer (remote viewing is always an interesting subject especially when a respected scientist writes about it) and self professed blind (legally) motor biker. I have read a few chapters ahead, I am not just reading this book page after page. The author, Targ, also writes about his inability to recognize faces!!! He cannot recognize faces of those he has knows for his whole life!!! It has a fancy name, hmm ,lookitup, better yet read this book! I am just getting started on this one and will probably chew away on it for several more weeks.
Mark Lynas: "Six Degrees: Our future on a hotter planet"
Good book, I recommend you check this one out - the organization is wonderful. The various sections are grouped into 1 degree of warming, two degrees or warming, etc and so forth. So it's really easy to skip around this one ... but it has gripped my attention and it looks like I might get some millage out of this book ... I like the way the 'chapters' are further sectioned into interesting headings as well, so a reader can thumb through, looks for a heading, and read until the next heading. Good bathroom reading.
Whew, anyway maybe you will want to look at a couple of these books. More later, goodnight!
READING:
Been reading lots of books, not every single word cover to cover speed reading..no I am a reader who likes the words, actually, most of the time it's a narrator in my head who is reading the words, as if to an audience. So reading for me is slow and pleasurable....I don't stress out over getting my reading done, however, since most of my books come from the library they do have to go back eventually. And so in regards to getting as much as I can from a book as quickly and pleasurably as possible: STYLE An author's style of writing falls into three broad categories for me: engaging - neutral - dry/boring and I will read more chapters/words from an engaging author, that narrows down the sheer bulk of the writing to plow through. You know, if it's dry I just don't get as much out of it and probably won't spend as much time with the book. ORGANIZATION Some of the books I read, mainly science writing recently, are organized into chapters that are easy to 'grab' as individual entities. The books I like best are not necessarily organized as 'stories' (although some of the really good science writers put a good story together) they are more like magazines without the ads and pictures and glossy pages. If I am not digging into a story then the more granular the writing the better, the more chapters there are and the easier they are to 'grab' makes a book a piece of cake, just take any piece you like!!! I think between those two basic headings lay a ton more ways to rate a books read-ability --- I just go through them one after another and some of them I will spend more time with, others I will wing through them. Tada!!!
RECENTLY:
Julian Havil: "Impossible? Surprising solutions to Counterintuitive Conundrums"
I got this one for the problems/solutions in regards to binary probability - specifically, the probabilities associated with getting a certain number of consecutive 1's or a 0's (heads or tails) in a certain number of random trials (coin tosses). Interesting, Julian writes (quoting Fred Mosteller):
'If you toss a coin repeatedly in a college class and after each toss ask the class if there is anything suspicious going on, 'hands suddenly go up all over the room' after the fifth consecutive head or tail in a row. There happens to be only 1 chance in 16 (0.0625) - not far from 0.05 or 5 chances in 100 - that 5 heads or tails in a row will show up in five tosses 'so there is some empirical evidence that the rarity of events in the neighborhood of 0.05 begins to set people's teeth on edge'
Eeeegads the math is pretty thick but the basic idea here is kinda flabergasting in that our brains are tuned up to be extra suspicious of non-random looking patterns in what are supposed to be random strings of numbers? I suppose that's part of what makes us good at pattern recognition. Anyhoooo - non-random looking strings of numbers happen all the time in the MegaMillions Lottery game, I wonder when we will see 3,4,5,6,7 come up and I am trying to figure out if 3,4,5,6,7 is any MORE or LESS probable than any other combination of the 56 non-mega balls. So far I have NOT been able to determine an answer to that question and this particular book is not helping at all - not one bit - not so far.
Russel Targ: "Do you see what I see? Lasers and Love, ESP and the CIA, and the meaning of life"
Great book so far, lots of biographical background and stories about/from the author who is a genius physicist, ESP researcher, remote viewer (remote viewing is always an interesting subject especially when a respected scientist writes about it) and self professed blind (legally) motor biker. I have read a few chapters ahead, I am not just reading this book page after page. The author, Targ, also writes about his inability to recognize faces!!! He cannot recognize faces of those he has knows for his whole life!!! It has a fancy name, hmm ,lookitup, better yet read this book! I am just getting started on this one and will probably chew away on it for several more weeks.
Mark Lynas: "Six Degrees: Our future on a hotter planet"
Good book, I recommend you check this one out - the organization is wonderful. The various sections are grouped into 1 degree of warming, two degrees or warming, etc and so forth. So it's really easy to skip around this one ... but it has gripped my attention and it looks like I might get some millage out of this book ... I like the way the 'chapters' are further sectioned into interesting headings as well, so a reader can thumb through, looks for a heading, and read until the next heading. Good bathroom reading.
Whew, anyway maybe you will want to look at a couple of these books. More later, goodnight!
Thursday, July 02, 2009
What I have been reading....
I like to read. I read tons of books, although I don't make it all the way from front to back, every single page, all of them. No, most of them I read either in chunks or until I get bored or stuffed full of the subject matter and need to move my ADD fueled 2009 mind along. The books you see listed on the right there are ones I have been looking at recently - and of them FLOTSAMETRICS is a stand out. Some funny stories, the writing is fluid and not typical dry science writing, and some of it made me laugh out loud.
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