WED 20 MAR 2002

Contest
Since January, I've been working on a piece of interactive fiction called TimeTrap. It's far from finished -- coding IF takes a very long time -- but I've entered the beginning of the story into a competition called IntroComp, sponsored by xyzzynews.com. Wish me luck!

Thought for the Day
"It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad."
-- C. S. Lewis

Thought for the Day
"Time is an illusion. Lunchtime, doubly so."
-- Douglas Adams

Thought for the Day
"When we try to bring about change in our societies, we are treated first with indifference, then with ridicule, then with abuse and then with oppression. And finally, the greatest challenge is thrown at us: we are treated with respect. This is the most dangerous stage."
-- A.T. Ariyaratne

New Enron Logo

Another Alcohol-Related Embarassment
From Texas, the state where drinking and driving is considered a sport, comes this true story. Recently a routine police patrol was parked outside a local neighborhood bar. Late in the evening the officer noticed a man leaving the bar so intoxicated that he could barely walk.

The man stumbled around the parking lot for a few minutes with the officer quietly observing. After what seemed an eternity and trying his keys on five different vehicles, the man managed to find his own car, which he fell into. He was there for a few minutes as a number of other patrons left the bar and drove off. Finally he started the car, switched the wipers on and off (it was a dry night), flicked the hazard flasher on and off, tooted the horn and then switched on the lights. He moved the vehicle forward a few inches, reversed a little and then remained stationary for a few more minutes as more patrons left in their vehicles.

At last he pulled out of the parking lot and started to drive slowly down the street. The police officer, having patiently waited all this time, now started up his patrol car, put on the flashing lights, promptly pulled the man over and carried out a breathalyzer test. To his amazement, the breathalyzer indicated no evidence of the man having consumed alcohol at all! Dumbfounded, the officer said, "I'll have to ask you to accompany me to the police station. This breathalyzer equipment must be broken."

"I doubt it," said the man. "Tonight I'm the designated decoy."

The Morality Party
What does it take to get nominated for Republican of the Year? Manufacturing drug paraphernalia? Molesting children? Or merely unrepentant displays of self-serving hypocrisy, such as these little gems by Trent Lott (courtesy of the Smudge Report):

"How dare Sen. Daschle criticize President Bush while we are fighting our war on terrorism, especially when we have troops in the field."
-- Trent Lott, February 28, 2002

"I cannot support this military action in the Persian Gulf at this time. Both the timing and the policy are subject to question."
-- Trent Lott, December 1998, criticizing President Clinton during Operation Desert Fox, when we had troops in the field.

Thought for the Day
"Personally, I'm in favor of democracy, which means that the central institutions of society have to be under popular control. Now, under capitalism, we can't have democracy by definition. Capitalism is a system in which the central institutions of society are in principle under autocratic control. Thus, a corporation or an industry is, if we were to think of it in political terms, fascist; that is, it has tight control at the top and strict obedience has to be established at every level -- there's a little bargaining, a little give and take, but the line of authority is perfectly straightforward. Just as I'm opposed to political fascism, I'm opposed to economic fascism. I think that until the major institutions of society are under the popular control of participants and communities, it's pointless to talk about democracy."
 -- Noam Chomsky

Thought for the Day
"There was never a genius without a tincture of madness."
-- Aristotle

Thought for the Day
"Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. The source of better ideas is wisdom. The surest path to wisdom is a liberal education."
-- Alfred Whitney

Thought for the Day
"The man who has no imagination has no wings."
-- Muhammad Ali

Limited Services Ahead

Notice of Continuing Sporadicity
This is the first update here in over a week, due to my current obcession with writing text-based interactive fiction (such as the games put out by Infocom in the 1980s) using the Inform programming language. Since I'm still in the middle of writing my first game, updates will probably continue to be sporadic for at least the next few weeks. But fear not! Creative Dynamix lives on, and when the game is finally finished I'll make it available here (and elsewhere) for your enjoyment. For the moment, though, I'm busily exploring codeland....

Thought for the Day
"The writer who possesses the creative gift owns something of which he is not always master -- something that at times strangely wills and works for itself."
-- Charlotte Bronte

Thought for the Day
"Nothing is more curious than the almost savage hostility that humor excites in those who lack it."
-- George Saintsbury

The Case of the Exploding Dildo
From the New Haven Register:

EAST HAVEN Police believe someone blew up a pickup truck early Thursday morning using a bomb fashioned out of a 12-inch sex toy.

Police said an older model pickup truck parked in the Rabbit Rock Court driveway at the home of a local lobster fisherman was ripped apart near 3 a.m. by a pipe bomb-like explosive device, the remnants of which they believe to be a sex toy.

[read more...]

Thought for the Day
"We are told that talent creates its own opportunities. But it sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents."
-- Eric Hoffer

Baby's First Beer

A Tale of the New West
A successful rancher died and left everything to his devoted wife. She was determined to keep the ranch, but knew very little about ranching, so she decided to place an ad in the newspaper for a ranch hand.

Two men applied for the job. One was gay and the other a drunk. She thought long and hard about it, and when no one else applied, she decided to hire the gay guy, figuring it would be safer to have him around the house than the drunk.

He proved to be a hard worker who put in long hours every day and knew a lot about ranching. For weeks, the two of them worked, and the ranch was doing very well.

Then one day, the rancher's widow said to the hired hand, "You've done a really good job and the ranch looks great. You should go into town and kick up your heels." The hired hand readily agreed and went into town one Saturday night. However, one o'clock came and he didn't return. Two o'clock and still no hired hand. He returned around two-thirty and found the rancher's widow sitting by the fireplace. She quietly called him over to her.

"Unbutton my blouse and take it off," she said.

Trembling, he did as she directed.

"Now take off my boots." He did so, slowly.

"Now take off my socks." He did.

"Now take off my skirt." He did.

"Now take off my bra." Again with trembling hands he did as he was told.

"Now," she said, "take off my panties." He slowly pulled them down and off.

Then she looked at him and said, "Don't you ever wear my clothes to town again!"

Trivia Quiz
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Thought for the Day
"At every crossroads on the path that leads to the future, tradition has placed 10,000 men to guard the past."
-- Count Maurice Maeterlinck

Thought for the Day
"Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love."
-- Turkish proverb

Taliban Hold Going-Out-of-Business Sale

Germany Revisited
The German air controllers at Frankfurt Airport are a short tempered lot. They not only expect one to know one's gate parking location, but how to get there without any assistance from them. So it was with some amusement that we (a Pan Am 747) listened to the following exchange between Frankfurt ground control and a British Airways 747, call sign "Speedbird 206":

Speedbird 206: "Top of the morning, Frankfurt, Speedbird 206 clear of the active runway."

Ground: "Guten Morgen. You vill taxi to your gate."

The big British Airways 747 pulled onto the main taxiway and slowed to a stop.

Ground: "Speedbird, do you not know where you are going?"

Speedbird 206: "Stand by a moment, Ground, I'm looking up our gate location now."

Ground (with arrogant impatience): "Speedbird 206, haff you never flown to Frankfurt before?"

Speedbird 206 (coolly): Yes, I have, actually, in 1944. In another type of Boeing, but just to drop something off. I didn't stop."

Thought for the Day
"It is necessary for us to learn from others' mistakes. You will not live long enough to make them all yourself."
-- Hyman George Rickover

Diversions, Modern and Primitive
Over the weekend I took a small break from Inform programming to find some larger rocks for the fire circle. There's sort of a primal satisfaction in moving large rocks to a specified place and constructing something from them. You feel a bond with people who may have done much the same thing thousands or even tens of thousands of years ago. In a time when so much of what we do involves activities that would have been impossible even a hundred years ago, that connection with our primitive past provides an odd form of comfort and continuity. In the case of moving rocks, it's also good exercise.

Character Counts!
Bill Clinton, Britney Spears, Janet Reno, and George Dubya are travelling on a train together. At one point, the train passes through a long dark tunnel, and an unmistakeable slapping noise is heard. When the train emerges from the tunnel, Clinton has a large red slap mark on his cheek.

Janet Reno thinks: "Bill must have make a move on Britney, and she slapped him."

Britney Spears thinks: "Clinton must have tried to make a move on me, and grabbed Janet Reno instead, and she slapped him.

Clinton thinks: Dubya must have tried to make a move on Britney, and she slapped me by mistake.

Dubya thinks: I hope there's another tunnel soon so I can slap Clinton again."

Thought for the Day
"Big Brother is watching you."
-- George Orwell

Thought for the Day
"In art, all who have done something other than their predecessors have merited the epithet of revolutionary; and it is they alone who are masters."
-- Paul Gauguin

Thought for the Day
"This I conceive to be the chemical function of humor: to change the character of our thought."
-- Lin Yutang

Thought for the Day
"At best, most college presidents are running something that is somewhere between a faltering corporation and a hotel."
-- Leon Botstein

New Toys for New Times

Quick Thinking
A man boarded an airplane and took his seat. As he settled in, he glanced up and saw an unusually beautiful woman boarding the plane. He soon realized she was heading straight toward his seat. Lo and behold, she took the seat right beside his.

Eager to strike up a conversation, he blurted out, "Business trip or vacation?"

She turned, smiled and said, "Business. I'm going to the Annual Nymphomaniac Convention in Chicago."

He swallowed hard. Here was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen sitting next to him and she was going to a meeting for nymphomaniacs! Struggling to maintain his composure, he calmly asked, "What's your business role at this convention?"

"Lecturer," she responded. " I use my experience to debunk some of the popular myths about sexuality."

"Really?" he asked. "What myths are those?"

"Well," she explained, "one popular myth is that African American men are the most well endowed when, in fact, it's the Native American Indian who is most likely to possess that trait. Another popular myth is that French men are the best lovers, when actually it is men of Irish descent. We have, however, found that the best potential lover in all categories is the Southern Redneck."

Suddenly, the woman became a little uncomfortable and blushed. "I'm sorry," she said. "I shouldn't really be discussing this with you. I don't even know your name."

"Tonto," the man said. "Tonto O'Connell, but my friends call me Bubba."

Thought for the Day
"Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself."
-- Leo Tolstoy

Apple Broadens Product Line

Wandering in CodeLand
Regular visitors to this site (all three of them) may have noticed the sporadic quality of recent updates. This is because I recently discovered, and have since been absorbed in, the Inform programming language. This is a code used for writing interactive text adventure games, such as those put out by Infocom in the 1980s. Although text-based games fell out of popularity with the rise of more graphics-capable computers, I've always enjoyed them, and it's thrilling to be able to (at least attempt to) write one.

You do have to be careful though. One thing to remember is that just because the code runs, it doesn't necessarily follow that the code does what you want it to. If you don't define game elements properly, they may behave in unexpected ways. For instance:

You are in a crowded airport. A sentry patrols the lobby.
> Take sentry
Taken.
>Put sentry in suitcase
You put the sentry into the leather suitcase.

As with anything, you learn through mistakes, although in this case the mistakes can have amusing results. So far I've constructed a small game with four rooms and numerous objects, a few puzzles to solve, and a moderately simple non-player character capable of some interaction. Considering that I have no programming experience and the only coding I've ever done before is HTML, I'd say things are progressing fairly well.

Thought for the Day
"Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare."
-- Japanese Proverb

Thought for the Day
"The Universe does not have rules. It has habits. And habits can be broken."
-- Anonymous

Thought for the Day
"Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity."
-- Gustave Flaubert

Thought for the Day
"Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought."
-- Albert Szent-Gyoergyi von Nagyrapolt

Watch Those Abbreviations...

Cager Lunch
Had lunch today for the second time with Salana, whom I met in Shan's Cage. We had a great time discussing ancient history and contemporary politics. It's been great having a fellow cager living so close by, but sadly this is about to change. Salana has been studying at Duke, but will soon return to Cornell, somewhere in the frozen wasteland above the Mason-Dixon line. Have a safe trip, Salana! We'll miss seeing you, but fortunately there's always cyberspace....

Why Rats Race
A boat docked in a tiny Mexican village. An American tourist complimented the Mexican fisherman on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took him to catch them.

"Not very long," answered the Mexican.

"But then, why didn't you stay out longer and catch more?" asked the American.

The Mexican explained that his small catch was sufficient to meet his needs and those of his family.

The American asked, "But what do you do with the rest of your time?"

"I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, and take a siesta with my wife. In the evenings, I go into the village to see my friends, have a few drinks, play the guitar, and sing a few songs.... I have a full life."

The American interrupted, "I have an MBA from Harvard and I can help you! You should start by fishing longer every day. You can then sell the extra fish you catch. With the extra revenue, you can buy a bigger boat. With the extra money the larger boat will bring, you can buy a second one and a third one and so on until you have an entire fleet of trawlers. Instead of selling your fish to a middle man, you can negotiate directly with the processing plants and maybe even open your own plant. You can then leave this little village and move to Mexico City, Los Angeles, or even New York City! From there you can direct your huge enterprise."

"How long would that take?" asked the Mexican.

"Twenty, perhaps twenty-five years," replied the American.

"And after that?"

"Afterwards? That's when it gets really interesting," answered the American, laughing. "When your business gets really big, you can start selling stocks and make millions!"

"Millions? Really? And after that?"

"After that you'll be able to retire, live in a tiny village near the coast, sleep late, play with your children, catch a few fish, take a siesta, and spend your evenings drinking and having a good time with your friends!"

Thought for the Day
"Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats."
-- Howard Aiken