Improving on the Fallible Coin Flip

Posted on 14 April 2012 by Larry Russwurm

Have you ever had to settle something with a good old fashioned coin flip? It’s not 50/50 odds here in Canada when we use a quarter to settle the dispute. In that case the first side to call the flip almost always wins. You see one side of our quarter is a moose’s head and the other side is an old, old, moose’s head (do your worst monarchist league!) Naturally the first call of heads, wins.

 And a coin flip can be indecisive and land on edge. It’s very rare but can be made more possible when using the coin on lawn to decide something in a sports game.

 Whenever possible, I like to use cats to solve problems, as I own one. For 50/50 odds some might try to use the gender of a strange cat as a deciding factor. But I know that exposure to chemicals can bias the human gender one way or another. I bet it’s the same for a litter of kittens. Then of course there are life factors that can alter things. For instance a mother cat can die in childbirth which could bias the gender of cats toward male.

 But there is a better way to get perfect 50/50 odds with a strange cat. Get the cat to lie on its back and pet its belly. There is exactly a 50% chance that it will love you for life and exactly a remaining 50 % chance that the strange cat will try to shred your hand and arm.

 But wait, you say, what about genetics? Surely some cats have bred just with tummy scratching loving cats. And maybe the arm killers bred with just the arm killers. To disprove this one you need to get kittens from the same litter. You will find litter mates are as unalike as stranger cats.

 So next time you have a problem that can only be solved by pure 50/50 chance, use a strange cat. Be sure to use someone you hate as the tester. Get the tester to rub the cat nicely on the tummy.

 And I don’t want my cat, Bast, stolen for random testing. So I will just out and out say she’s an arm killer. And often times in the middle of a pet she will taunt me by rolling over on her back, exposing only her belly for petting. I stop petting or my arm will become shredded. Who is master of whom?

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Being Negative About Positronic

Posted on 11 April 2012 by Larry Russwurm

Isaac Asimov filled his robots with positronic brains. Positronic was largely a buzz word. The recently discovered (1940’s) positron inspired the name. Asimov may have known more. Like for instance the positron was the antimatter version of the electron. So presumably positronics worked like electronics. A reason to go over to the dark side of antimatter was never given.

Personally I can’t see any positronics being worth the risk of making on-Earth robots out of it. Antimatter has one very troubling feature. When it comes into contact with matter there will be a mutual destruction. Matter-antimatter explosions are a whole level worse than hydrogen bombs. Do you really want a robot with a positronic brain cleaning your house? Are any safeguards good enough, later in the life cycle of the robot, when you have millions of decaying robots, all exposed to different things?

 Positronic brains are silly and should be dismissed easily.

 Still, Star Trek: The Next Generation’s creators thought the positronic brain was so good that they had to get themselves some of that. That show’s robot, Commander Data, also used a positronic brain.

 Maybe they were silly to try this tack.

 Still I can’t get the idea out of my head that there could be an awesome ST:TNG movie where the Enterprise is stuck and needs to leave an area stat. But there are no Dilithium crystals to make the ship go. I can just see Geordi La Forge say to Captain Picard, “If I could just have Commander Data’s head, I could jury rig it into a powerful power source!” Everyone could have a tear soaked goodbye where only Data keeps a dry eye. But of course Data sacrifices himself for the good of the many.

 And if it was my movie, I’d end with Geordi saying “Whoops!” and then a terrible explosion would destroy the Enterprise.

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Confessions of the Japan Thief

Posted on 7 April 2012 by Larry Russwurm

It was after being locked up for theft by Batman in Gotham City that I heard him speaking to Commissioner Gordon. I don’t know why Batman was being confessional but he said to the Commissioner, “You know Superman has no powers at all under a red sun.”

They continued to talk but I only heard bits and snatches of the rest. I gathered that Superman was off in space for his latest mission. Eventually the eavesdropped upon duo left and my mind was abuzz. I knew where to head as soon as I was released.

You know Metropolis’ slogan, “If the cops don’t catch our criminals, Superman will.” Indeed there had been a bit of an exodus of the criminal element from Metropolis and now most of Superman’s crime fighting was done in neighbouring cities.

With the reliance on Superman, Metropolis was probably an easy score.

Knowing that weakness of Superman, I now had an in. I made a suit with the emblem of the rising sun, or setting sun if you will, and copied Japan by making it on a field of white. I knew the time of the sun reddening would only be a few minutes but in that time I could make off with much money.

I travelled to Metropolis and indeed that city was easy pickings. I got away with three sunset robberies. Really, I had enough to retire comfortably on but I continued because I wanted to see if Superman would ever dare to show his face for my robberies. They called me the Japan Thief since I wasn’t there to set the record straight to the press.

Finally I had just finished loading up my unmarked minivan with the bank windfall when Superman showed up. “Don’t come any closer Superman.” I said. “Look at my shirt then look at the setting sun.”

“I knew you had nothing to do with Japan. It was robbing banks at sunset. You should be called the sunset burglar.”

“Run away Superman or I’ll shoot.”

“Crime has no place in my town.”

I decided to become a hero to the oppressed criminal element in Metropolis. I opened up fire and shot Superman in the head, groin and chest. He started approaching me.

“Damn Krytptonian physiology. I have no idea where to land a fatal shot.” I threw the gun away. “I’ll handle this with my fists!” I ran up to Superman.

“Wha?” said Superman.

“I know you’re powerless under a red sun!”

I hit him hard in the head and heard a large, “HA, HA, HA!” I guess it was some weird Kryptonian pain register because Superman fell on his back, continued to make the sound and gave me enough time to get away.

Nightfall came and that precious red sun was soon gone. I was parked in a building 5 miles away from the crime.

All of a sudden a whirlwind came, took the minivan and me to the police station and dropped the load off. The accursed police knew how to handle the situation.

Next time I will continue to attack Superman after that convulsive, “HA, HA, HA!” sound. Obviously he recovered completely when the red setting sun left and he regained his powers. Then he flew and quickly spotted me with his X-ray vision.

And even if I can’t figure out Kryptonian physiology on time to kill him, next time I’ll hide under lead so his X-ray vision will not sniff me out.

Metropolis, I have yet to do my worst.

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Uniqueness of Humanity

Posted on 3 April 2012 by Larry Russwurm

If you’re like me then you’ve heard that humanity sets itself apart from the rest of the animal world in many ways. Like for instance in our use of language.

Of course this particular brand of uniqueness has been under fire for some time. Dolphins and other cetaceans are suspected to have a rich, almost pictorial language. As well, cuttlefish seem to communicate to each other with visual, colourful signals almost like blushing. Even the prosaic wolf is in some circles thought to converse with facial expressions.

And who could deny the overwhelming evidence of Koko the sign language speaking gorilla? This other primate has broken the barrier and said not only are other animals capable of speech, some of them are carrying it out.

So I’ve listened to other characteristics that humanity seems to possess but other animals are not supposed to be capable of. For instance humanity is supposed to be the only species capable of synchronized rhythm.

But then my prosaic black cat named Bast, was twitching her tail the other day to the beat of the song The Scientist by Coldplay. Yes, I realize she has good taste, but I had quite emphatically heard that humanity was the only species capable of keeping the beat to such a song.

We should give up on claiming humanity is so distinctly unique from the animal kingdom. I think the biggest problem with such claims is that all of humanity is being held up as unique.

Why not try for some of humanity being unique? Some of humanity understands quantum physics and this is unique in the animal kingdom. Some of humanity understands history cycles and why it’s not best to repeat the bad parts of history. Don’t worry about holding all humanity to these unique tests. And then you will find we are as unique as we’ve wished to be all these years.

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Drop Dead for Being First, Far East

Posted on 31 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

What are we in the west shown on New Year’s Eve day? We are fed a diet of videos showing Sydney or Asia or New Zealand whooping it up with fireworks and partying in their earlier day and thus first New Year. It’s sad but some of us have to work in North America while seeing these images. It probably wouldn’t be that bad if it weren’t the same iconic landmarks shown every time.

Sydney, I hate you. I hate your smug harbour bridge. I hate your iconic shell opera house. I know exactly what your harbour looks like when lit up by fireworks. And I must tell the rest of the world’s press that we wouldn’t know the difference if they used New Year fireworks from, say, 2009 and didn’t bother buying new footage of Sydney next year. We’re all trying to cut back, after all.

But why the ire at this time of year? It was daytime here when I watched footage for tonight’s Earth Hour on North American television. And they were showing Asia and New Zealand and, of course, Sydney powering down for Earth Hour. Because they are first once again. So I am shown a familiar harbour in Australia. But instead of extra lights, the night scene shows the harbour bridge being unlit. It shows the shell opera house being unlit and disappearing.

One event a year I might handle. But two such events make me go off the deep end. Drop dead, far east, I might say, but you know they’re never going to do it. So we are left with the ridiculous things that I might say when angry.

This time I say we should move the International Dateline to the mid Atlantic.

Firstly this would enhance trade in the Pacific Rim area we hear so much about. In the Pacific you wouldn’t be confused about what day it is. And why not there? The biggest Ocean in the world should have perhaps the biggest deference paid to it.

Then the rest of the world could watch the Eastern Seaboard of North America hail the New Year first. Even Eastern Standard areas could be used. So the closest world wide landmarks I know of: the CN Tower and Toronto’s skyline could show fireworks first in the new year. We could also watch it darken first to show Earth Hour participation.

But we’d have to get the world to switch to this new International Dateline. And Japan has a vested interest. They are known as the land of the Rising Sun and indeed their flag shows a red rising sun on a field of white.

Maybe we can say that the Japanese are under a red Sun like Krypton. Thus they are all super men and super women. And then they can keep their flag.

A good public relations marketing scheme might get the whole world to change that International Dateline. Then the whole world will know Eastern North America as being first. How do you like them apples, Sydney? Suck it up and watch us every New Year and Earth Hour.

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Putting the Vanity in Vanity Plate

Posted on 29 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

I’ve been continuing with my trick of using a text box for signs and plates in Bitstrips. That’s the easy way of doing things and I do wonder if I’ll find a way to make a non yellow box or sign. Still there are things I haven’t finished experimenting with. The tree in the panel one background highlighted when I clicked on it so I’m wondering if I can put things in the tree – even characters. If not, you might be able to put a character behind the tree. I went with the plainer background for panels 2 and 3 because I didn’t want the set up and joke overshadowed. There’s much to be explored with Bitstrips.

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Mercedes Woods

Posted on 28 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

Is the closeness of the peace symbol to the Mercedes Benz symbol a coincidence? We at Many Rants doubt it. The Mercedes Benz symbol was established first so somehow that car company, through chicanery, got the peaceniks to adopt a very similar symbol as their own.

But ‘wait’, you say, ‘ peaceniks are usually hippie types and Mercedes Benz owners are usually frothing capitalists.’ That may be very true. I think the whole story has to do with age.

The young capitalize on things as much as adult capitalists. Just try saying to your child “You’re always welcome in my home.” You could find that your child might only move out at 43 when they are getting married.

Anyhow, only those under 40 are generally at risk for being drafted for a war. This one detriment to being young gets fought by many, many young people because they know it is their lives that are on the line. So they back peace protests. They are capitalizing on their protest abilities to try to improve the situation. And this is where they get that peace symbol burned into their impressionable brains.

Now when they turn 40 and give up their hippie ways, what happens? Inevitably they are attracted to to the Mercedes Benz emblem like hippies to a peace sign, and many of these “new capitalists” will buy a Mercedes. Now that’s clever branding. I’m not quite sure exactly how Mercedes pulled off this coup.

And someone who is likely to have an upscale car like a Mercedes Benz is Tiger Woods. And he made the news by winning his first golf tournament in over 2 years just last weekend. That’s right, since the scandal of his divorce and mistresses he’s been unable to win up until now.

A lot can happen in over two years. Sampson can grow back his long hair. And someone with Tiger’s money might be able to set up a new network of 15 mistresses all across the professional golf tour.

Now I’m not saying that having 15 mistresses would make a man the best in his chosen field. But what if it were true? Good luck young Chinese men with the lack of women your age (because of birth laws) to be a mistress. If this correlation is to hold true, expect China to do poorer in the London Olympics than they did in Beijing. Expect older polygamist men from Colorado and BC to bring home many medals to Canada and the US.

So I’m basically looking forward to London 2012 to test this theory. Everyone has their own reasons to watch.

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Foiled by a Simple Law

Posted on 25 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

“I figured out how to shut the library computers down!” said my friend in a whisper though I could hear the exclamation mark.

I was an easily distracted York University student in the late 1980’s so I simply said “Wha?”

“We can shut down the library search computers!”

Short of unplugging I didn’t see how. So intelligently I asked, “Wha?”

“The programmers put in a secret code that can shut a terminal down. I’ve found it.”

“I don’t believe you,” I said.

“I can show you.” So we went to the nearest search computer in the library. No one was there.

“See,” said my friend,” if you press these 2 [or was it 3?] keys simultaneously, the terminal shuts down.”

Even seeing the blank screen I didn’t believe. So I tried some keys on the terminal to bring back the screen. Nothing happened. “What keys again?” I was getting as excited as my friend.

He told me and I went to the 2nd closest terminal and shut it down. Nothing would work on it. My friend and I were thinking the same thing. “This is cool. Let’s shut down all the terminals in the library.”

Perhaps my friend had already imagined it. Essays due tomorrow wouldn’t be completed. Research would halt in its tracks. This was Scott Library, the 5 floor monstrosity that Arts majors relied on. Without search it might be almost useless. Did they have accessible cards anymore? Probably not.

Perhaps the university would need to call in some expert who could only fix things late the next day. Perhaps the university would have to put a halt to deadlines the next day. Perhaps life would be so disrupted they would cancel classes the next day. It could be a party day. And it would all be due to my friend and I.

If we pulled this off, we could brag to our friends. The non believers could be shown what I had been shown.

There were about 20 terminals in Scott Library. We went around quickly, shutting each computer down as we went. We got all the upper floor terminals down. Most people did searches as they entered on the first floor which had by far the most terminals. Still there were empty terminals there, too and we shut those down.

We shut down about 15 of the 20 before we realized something. The remaining 5 terminals had lineups. With the other terminals down, the line ups would only grow.

Now we could stand in line and wait our turn to shut down the rest of the terminals one by one. But the law of supply and demand stated that the lines would only get larger. It was inevitable that there would be a person behind us watching as we shut down that terminal. Frustrated they would surely rat us out. And we had to go through this five times.

So we had to pass the rest of the year, knowing the code, but unsure how to wield the knowledge in anything but a nuisance fashion. Operation: Shut Down Scott Library was a fail.

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Mostest Burger

Posted on 22 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

I finally figured out how to use ‘scenes’ in Bitstrips. Of course I had a problem with layering in the middle panel where Charles is in front of the fire hydrant but from perspective he should be behind it. Maybe he is in front, on the street, and jumped there!

I like it but the scene is a bit busy and there is something to be said for plain backgrounds.

Seriously if you have something to say but aren’t the best artist, try Bitstrips. You can do single panel cartoons or cartoons with many more boxes. Just saying.

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Don’t Worry, 2030 Will Come At Long Last

Posted on 21 March 2012 by Larry Russwurm

The saga of the baby boomers has filled the media for many of the last decades. Like no other group before them or since, they have been coddled. Except possibly in their most recent life milestone, where retirement ages have increased, since too many baby boomers were set to retire.

Of course the increased retirement age will affect me and younger generations, too. And those cushy jobs that demand seniority? My generation will be kept out of them even longer than anticipated.

So it is with a trembling feeling of happiness that I look forward to 2030 – when those lead year baby boomers are most statistically likely to die.

Oh, the baby boomers have seen it. That’s why we have two, not one daily shows dedicated to doctors and medicine. As more panic sets in, expect to see a doctor network on television.

The baby boomer great dying is not going to come about with poetic justice. That would only happen if the most coddled of all baby boomers – the lead years, those born in 1945 or 1946, would all die that year. Because dying is statistically random (if fated).

But for this case, the lead baby boomers are those who died young. Like Freddie Mercury, Patrick Swayze or Michael Jackson. So let these ones hog the glory and for once give none of it to the lead year baby boomers.

So what will we see in 2030? Maybe they’ll tear down high rises to put up cemeteries.

Cremation will be banished to far outside of city limits because of the damaging heat island effect processing so many bodies will take.

And in every other life milestone, the baby boomers have claimed it to be a new game. And basically baby boomers are the first generation to live as adults where cryogenic services were possible. Expect more and more baby boomers to try this service. Because what they truly thought would happen, huge life extension, probably won’t happen by 2030.

So these huge cryogenic storage facilities will allow baby boomers to waste electricity just as they did while they were alive. Expect rolling blackouts everywhere else, because even in death, baby boomers will be catered to. Ask the media.

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