Dorks Geeks and Dweebs: A Taxonomy

Who am I?  Why am I here?  Where do I fit in this big universe?  These are questions we've all had.  I have discovered a diagram that helps to answer those questions.  If you've ever wanted to know who you are and how you fit into society, refer to the venn diagram below.  You can see the clear difference between the distinctions of  dweeb, geek, dork and nerd.

I was born a nerd, but have slowly moved myself towards the geek area.  Like a true nerd I had no ability to participate in social atmospheres.  But, also, like a true nerd, I knew how to read books that could solve that problem.  I read many books that helped me to learn what the rest of civilization already knew about interacting one with another.

Lest you worry that I am self deprecating when I declare my geekship, remember that in the epic battle of jocks vs geeks, the geeks always win.  The jocks can make some serious money if they're good.  Look at Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Kobe Bryant; they're all millionaires.  But look at the world's best geeks:  Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs; they are all billionaires.

Truly, the geeks shall inherit the Earth.  (It's possible I misquoted that.)

The Sunshine Patriot

"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered."

Those are the words of Thomas Payne. Words that he wrote during the Revolutionary war. A time when freedom truly hung in the balance. Today, though some may not see it, there is another war going on.

On Sunday, members of Congress declared that healthcare is a right. On the sabbath, the Lord's day, they declared with a loud voice that rights come from government and not from God. This chilling declaration means that government, and not God, has the power to take our rights whenever they see fit.

Watch this video. It is a compilation that I put together about socialism. If you don't want to watch me, skip to the last minute and a half, there is a quote by Ezra Taft Benson you really need to hear.

As you can see, there is a radical change that is taking place. Don't get me wrong, there are some good things that will come out of this bill. I am happy about the people that couldn't get care before, that can now. But there are radical reductions in freedom that are too high of a price to pay.

This is why we need you. We can't afford sunshine patriots at this point. We need people willing to stand up for freedom. I'm not calling for a revolution or any kind of violence. We already fought a revolution over 200 years ago that gave us the system we have now. That system contains the means for change, but only if we use it.

This past week there were more people at our Caucus than I have ever seen. That is great! But it needs to continue. Not only do we need to show up and be heard, but we need to educate ourselves. Read Adam Smith and F.A. Hayek to learn about the economy. Read Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, study the constitution, learn about the founding fathers.

For those of you who disagree with me, study why the founding fathers tried to make socialism illegal in the constitution. It's not enough just to say that their thinking was flawed. They thought about it, and decided it was wrong. Read enough books that you understand why you think they're wrong. If you think there's a book that will change my mind, I'm not afraid of information. Suggest it to me and I will read it if I haven't already.

Please, whatever your stance is on this issue, educate yourself further and make sure to vote in November. Make yourself heard. Be willing to be a patriot in the sunshine and in the darkest night.

The Yuzh: The Story of my Ascension to Greatness in Consumerism

Have you ever watched a show on TV and it shows one of the main characters at a restaurant? Have you noticed how they never give a real order? They always order "The usual." Have you thought about what this means about that person? They are either so important that their food preferences are well known by the entire city/state/country/world so that they can just order "the usual" wherever they go and plan on that person knowing what they're talking about, or they frequent one place so often that everyone that works there knows what they want. I have always desired to be one of those people. They seem so important, so powerful. Are there real people like that in the world?

I've tried so hard to achieve this great pinnacle in life. At Los Hermanos I always order the combo burrito. Yet, I never get the same server twice. If I ordered the yuzh, (The yuzh is the cooler and shorter way to say, "the usual." It is spelled that way because if I wrote "the us" you wouldn't pronounce it properly. I feel that 'yuzh', portrays the first sounds of 'usual' properly.) I would just get a funny look.

I want you to know, however, that it can happen to little people like you and me. I've written before about how my coworkers and I make a weekly trip to Costco for lunch. We eat all the free samples, chat with the free sample ladies and then buy lunch in the food court.

There is a hero in the food court at Costco. His name happens to be Jeff. He doesn't know my name, but he knows my order. For a while, he was trying to remember and he struggled. A couple times he said, "A slice of pepperoni, a slice of supreme and a polish dog." He was embarrassed when I told him I prefer hot dogs. But now, I don't even have to correct him. I can just say, "The yuzh."

As a consumer, I feel I've reached my peak. If only there were heroes like Jeff at every establishment. I could walk into any restaurant and order "the yuzh." O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! I would chortle in my joy!

Of course, there would be less variety. Jeff pointed out to me last time I was there, "You know, we do sell other stuff." He's right, but other stuff isn't "The Yuzh."

Pie and Pi, I love Them Both

It's that time of year again.  The crown of the holiday season is upon us.  Yes, today is a day of rejoicing for math lovers everywhere.  Today is Pi Day.

We celebrated on Saturday and once again, had a fabulous gathering.  Old friends, new friends and non friends all showed up to celebrate with us.  (Feel free to try and guess which category you might be in.)  This year's winning pie was Todd and Lisa Glazier with a peanut butter pie.  Since Robyn had her sweet new camera we decided it would be fun to see what people love about pie (or pi).

We also have our sweet new iMac.  So we tested out our movie editing skills.  Here is what Robyn and I put together.

iDevelop for Apple Platforms

Robyn and I made a few important purchases this last weekend. We have been saving for a while to get Robyn a sweet new camera. In addition, we've been talking for a few months about getting an iMac. (As seen below)

The camera is something Robyn has wanted to get so that she can practice her photography. She was once a guru with a fancy film camera and she wanted to regain some of those skills.

The iMac surprisingly enough, was mainly for me. I have really wanted to develop the skill of programming for the iPhone. I think there's potentially a lot of money to be made there, but I also think that it would be great on a resume to say that I have that skill. Any Mac would do for programming the iPhone, but we decided to get a fancy iMac because it has all the fancy software as well. Robyn will be doing lots of photo editing and movie editing. I might even get into the movie editing. iMovie looks pretty dang cool, so you might just see some movies on my blog in the future.

It's been rough for me. I have had some bad experiences with Macs in the past, and those experiences gave me some deep seated prejudices. One particular time about ten years ago, I worked at a software company called Nextpage. I needed to burn a CD to send to a client. This was before every machine had it's own CD burner. We had a lab that had a bunch of computers, and there was only one in there that had a CD burner. I sat down at that machine, all I needed to do was to put in a CD and access the CD burning software. That shouldn't be a difficult task. I spent about 30 minutes searching in every possible menu to try and find how to open the CD drive. Finally, feeling like an idiot, I asked a random stranger that happened to be in the lab, if he knew how to open it. "Yes, you just drag it into the trash can." This made me very cranky. How could I have possibly thought of that ever? Everyone talked about how intuitive Macs were supposed to be. For the record, that is not intuitive.

I've been trying to overcome my prejudice. It's difficult though because I feel so dumb when sitting at a Mac. I'm a software engineer, I should know how to use computers. But just yesterday I yelled to Robyn, "How do I open up a second browser?" Like I said, it's been difficult. But you will be proud to know, I am currently blogging from our sweet new iMac. We're getting along fairly well and I'm learning to use it.

I better learn to use it, because I'm going to be writing software for it. I have to learn Objective C, which is the language of the iPhone. It's a little intimidating, and it makes me miss Microsoft compilers and environments. But, I'm committed to move forward. I even spent $75.00 of my fun money(Robyn and I each get an allowance of money we can spend on whatever we want each month) on books about iPhone programming. Robyn promised me that if we make a million dollars from the skills I gain, then she will allow me to use 75 dollars of it as fun money. So it's all good.

So here's where you come in. I need good ideas for iPhone apps that people would really want to buy. If I decide to write the app you think of, I will give it to you for free. So dream up some cool stuff and let me know what it is and how much you think people would pay for it.  (apps seem to run from free to about $9.99)

A Theory Confirmed

Today, there was an important announcement on Yahoo! News. There has been some debate about whether the dinosaurs were killed by a bunch of volcanoes or by a large asteroid hitting the earth. It seems the debate is over and they've concluded that the asteroid hit in Mexico, causing earthquakes all over the world. In addition, debris in the atmosphere cut off the sun and caused a global winter. (That sounds like a good cure for global warming.)


There's a reason this is important.  It reminds me of a conversation Robyn and I had recently.  I was telling her how if I was a god and was in charge of creating the Earth I would put lots of cool dinosaur things all over the place.  The only difference is I would make them all dockable like on Pandora.

Anyway, this helped us realize why the dinosaurs exist and why they suddenly ceased to exist. Heavenly Father was creating all sorts of super cool dinosaurs. He made great big ones like supersaurus and diplodocus. He made super cool predators like deinonychus, which hunted in packs; or tyrannosaurus, which hunted alone.

He was having a great time. He couldn't believe all the cool creatures he had come up with. Finally, his wife came to him. She said lovingly, "I know you're having a lot of fun down there, but I think it's time to put away your dinosaurs so we can start a family." He looked at her with his puppy dog eyes, but he realized she was right. Reluctantly, he stretched forth his hand.

METEOR!

That was the end of the dinosaurs. He had to clean up the earth a little after the meteor; but when He was done, He had a fabulous garden for Adam and Eve.

This theory jives perfectly with what paleontologists are saying. So, I'm fairly sure it's correct. Unless they're still alive and just hiding.