On Sunday, I had lunch with an old student of mine, Ryan.
Ryan recently graduated from UCSB, and he is just now starting
up his own graphic design firm,
Gryphin Graphics.
Ryan’s a really nice guy, and he’s got a good head on his
shoulders — I think he’s gonna do great.

Although Ryan is full of energy and enthusiasm, he is starting
to slow down a bit. “I
used to be able to go out dancing and stay out there for
two hours straight,” he said. “Now if I don’t keep in shape,
and eat right, I can only dance for half an hour before I
get winded.” Good Lord, my students are showing signs
of age. I don’t even know what to think about that.

I also have a nice story that I should have mentioned in
yesterday’s entry, but I forgot.
Somehow it got swallowed by the miasma of hatred that bubbled
up when I started up on the Windows 2000 topic. Well, here goes:
early last week, Nancy sent an email out,
asking if we wanted to attend an Jewish Singles Hiking Club
event on Saturday. I responded, “Why go with them? Let’s just
go on a hike on our own.”

Nancy admonished me, saying that it is always good to meet
new people and “expand our circle of social influence” or
some such. At this, I turned very snippy — I gave her my standard
spiel about young Jewish men and women being completely undatable.
But in spite of that, I grudgingly agreed to go. That’s me in
a nutshell — I’ll do what you want eventually, but I’ll make
you regret you ever asked in the first place.

So Saturday morning I arrive at the appointed spot at the
appointed time — and lo and behold, the crowd was almost
entirely composed of senior citizens. The hike, as it were,
would consist of a four-mile, three-hour jaunt across the
Stanford campus. “You look cold, dearie,”
said a nice lady who did not in the least remind me of my late
grandmother Ruth. “Would you like to borrow this sweater?”

I smiled politely and waited for Nancy and
Mike to show up. They got out of the car
about 75 yards away and frantically beckoned me over. “Ummm,”
said Nancy. “So we were thinking, maybe we should go hiking
on our own.”

So we did. We even stole away the one other person under 55,
a nice, quick-thinking young woman named Rita (“Ummm… are
you guys going off on your own? Can I come with you?”)
And we had a great hike up in the foothills, with perfect cool
weather and lots of green foliage. And Rita brought almonds
and raisins.

In any case, the lesson from this experience is clear.
The road of the single person is a dangerous one, full of
pitfalls and traps for the unwary. Woe to ye who dare tread
it. Woe, I say! Whoa.

Good afternoon, plucky aspiring fiction-writers! Do the vagaries of the business have
you down? Well, cheer up — things
could be worse!

Had lunch and a couple of beers with J.C. Flores. I didn’t even know he was living
up here until Brian mentioned it offhandedly. And now I discover J.C.’s probably
moving back to L.A. in three months or so. Thanks, Bri.

Anyway, J.C. recommended that I get cable modem and buy a splitter — I should be
able to get basic cable for free that way. Plus, if you want HBO, the cable guy
will probably *cough* sell you a filter for it *cough*. But you didn’t hear me say that.

I wonder why they don’t pay those cable guys more? I haven’t heard of a single one who
doesn’t make money on the side. It makes me wonder, at what point does systematic
bribery merge with the “legitmate” economy? If I don’t rip off the cable company, am I
ethical, or just stupid? Aren’t I just subsidizing the millions of people who
do rip off the cable companies? And it’s not like AT&T cares about my
welfare…

No, I don’t buy that. If a price is unfair — don’t pay it. Do I need cable? Do I
really need TV at all? Nah.

Maybe I would feel differently if this were Pac Bell or E*Trade. But no — I still think
it’s not right to rip off corporations directly. What I can do is
explain to my friends and relatives how those companies treated me. I’m sure I’ve
killed a few prospective Pac Bell DSL contracts, and at least a couple of
prospective E*Trade accounts. That’s enough to make me happy.

I just got back from a ski trip to Big Bear (with a brief stopover in
Santa Barbara to visit Rachel). Joining me on the trip were Nancy,
Mike,
Eric, Susan, Byron, and Karen. My philosophy is that all
trips are in some way educational. On this particular excursion to
exotic Southern California, I learned the following:

• Rachel is doing fine, but she has become very annoyed with another
  graduate student who is working with her on the same giant project.
  “I’ve decided to use my knowledge from my sociology classes to crush her,”
  Rachel said. No, Rachel, no! You must learn to use your powers only
  for Good, never Evil!

• Rachel’s husband Ben seems to be doing just ducky. He always seems
  to be doing just ducky. I think I’m not very good at reading him.

• It is good to know friends who have friends who have large cabins
  with vaulted ceilings in which you may stay for free.

• Lucky Charms are, cup for cup, healthier than Kellogg’s Raisin Bran.
  Lucky Charms are equal or better in every vitamin/nutrient category,
  and they actually have fewer calories. The one category where Raisin
  Bran wins is fiber: 28% RDA to 7% RDA. But who needs regular BMs
  when you can have purple horseshoes and red balloons?

• Skiing in 50 degree weather is really nice, aside from the occasional
  slushy patch.

• Skiing in rental boots is not so nice, particularly when they give
  you blisters on your calves.

• Proficiency in Boggle does not translate into proficiency in
  Scattergories (vindication for the domain-specific knowledge
  theory of intelligence?)

• The official legal way to refer to
  “insider
  trading” is to call it a “Section 10(b)-5 violation”.

• Contrary to popular myth, in blackjack a “bad” third base player
  does not affect the odds
  of another player winning or losing. Consider the following example:

  Dealer is showing 12, and so will bust if he draws a 10.
  The deck has N cards:  
    G   "good" cards (tens), 
    N-G "bad" cards (non-tens).
  
  If the third base player stays, the dealer's odds of busting are
  simply G/N.
  
  If the third base player hits, there are two cases:
  
    Case 1: a G/N chance he receives a "good" card.  There are then G-1 
    good cards left, so the dealer's odds of busting are now (G-1)/(N-1).
  
    Case 2: a (N-G)/N chance he receives a "bad" card.  The dealer's odds
    of busting are now G/(N-1).
  
  The total odds of the dealer busting are therefore:
  
    (odds of Case 1) x (odds that dealer busts given Case 1)
      + (odds of Case 2) x (odds that dealer busts given Case 2)
  
  Or:
  
    (G/N) x (G-1)/(N-1) + (N-G)/N x G/(N-1)
  
  which is, putting everything under a common denominator:
  
     G x (G-1)   (N-G) x G
     --------- + ---------
     N x (N-1)   N x (N-1) 
  
  which is, expanding and cancelling terms:
  
     G^2 - G + GN - G^2      GN - G       G x (N-1)     G
     ------------------  =  ---------  =  ---------  =  -
          N x (N-1)         N x (N-1)     N x (N-1)     N
  
  Which is the same result as if the third base player had stayed.