Archive for 'Other'
Answers are for losers
Posted on April 12, 2010, under Other.
What do you want: questions, or answers? Most people want answers. There’s a problem you need to solve, and the answer’ll let you continue working. That’s fine. That’s valid.
But is it interesting?
I was talking with @ghuber about a new idea I had. Without going into details, it’d pigeon-hole me into That Answer Guy.
How do you solve X? Here you go! The answer’s ABC.
BOR-fucking-ING. If you’re That Answer Guy, you’re giving away valuable resources, but not actively facilitating much further discussion or innovation. Your community’ll appreciate the answer. Kudos to you. Thanks, Teach!
But it doesn’t make you interesting.
Instead, you want to ask questions. Lots of questions. Oddball questions. Edge-case questions. What happens if I turn this to 11? What if I mix lolcats with quantum theory?
Think of it this way: Who do you want presenting at a conference? Who do you want to shoot the shit with over a beer? Who thinks of wacky stuff? The guy who knows how to do X when you have Y, or the guy who asks interesting questions and ponders new ways of doing things?
The latter, damn it!
That Answer Guy is useful and appreciated. He definitely is. But the role’s limited. It confines you. It defines what questions you ask, and what problems you solve.
Ask more questions. Write more software. Pursue tangents. And talk about it.
Toblerone
Why is Toblerone so damn tasty? Y’know what? It doesn’t matter. All that matters is access to it when desired. My parents each gave me a huge Toblerone bar for Christmas. The first one went quickly, and I’ve been savouring the second one…but it’s nearly done, too!
Windows Preview: BSOD
The power went out last night, so I’m at my Dad’s house right now, leeching his heat, electricity, and intertubes connection.
I opened up Finder, and noticed that MacOS had found a computer on the LAN. I clicked “Get Info” on it, and well..I’ll let the image speak for itself:
I love finding small touches like that. It reminds me that there are real people at work behind the things we use every day.
+1 for the thought, -10 for the execution
I just received an email from the anti-virus company ESET, reminding me that a license that I purchased for one of their products is coming up for renewal soon. I appreciate the email, but honestly, do you think they could’ve put some more time into formatting it and making it readable and appealing?
Scanned by NOD32 ( http://www.eset.com.au )
and NetBox Blue ( http://netboxblue.com.au )
There isn’t a single newline in the message…WTF?
Joining the military
Last night, I had a dream that I was joining the military. It was one of those dreams that’s so real, you can’t tell that you’re in a dream…I was sh*tting myself.
What’s ironic is that, back in university, I applied to join The Canadian Forces as a Combat Engineer. I ended up not pursuing that, because a) I didn’t want to learn how to kill people, and b) adventuring around Australia sounded like a whole lot more fun. Oh, and Black Hawk Down was released after I’d started my military application, which gave me a dose of reality and what war can be like.
The scariest part of the dream wasn’t that I was joining a military, but that I was joining the American military…and being shipped off to Afghanistan or Iraq. *shudder*
Idiots and Angels
I went to see the movie Idiots and Angels at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival today. The animation style was amazing, and the movie was pretty good, too. Check out the trailer:
Longing.au
I’m reading Jupiter’s Travels right now. It’s about a guy who motorbiked 63,000 miles (that’s over 100,000km!) around the world…starting in 1974! His recounting of biking in Australia really made me miss Australia.
I miss the sun and warmth, the laid-back approach to life, the friendliness of most people, and of course the lizards, echidnas, and wombats. I even miss the spiders.
But I have to accept that I’ve decided to live and work in Toronto for now. As much as I love Australia, it’s not where I should be at the moment.
So as Chopper would say, “Harden the fuck up, Nick!”
PS: Matt, thanks for that HTFU reminder.
Books
As a kid, I devoured books like most kids devoured free candy. They took me to different worlds, fuelled my imagination, expanded my vocabulary, and did so much more. I even got into trouble for reading too much at night. I read throughout highschool, but when university came, the urge and time to do so sunk like a submarine with a screen door. In the past..8 years!..I’ve probably read only a couple of dozen books max. It’s probably closer to 15-20, excluding required readings for uni. That’s embarassing. Well, it is for me, at least.
But, the light has shone through the clouds! I sauntered into a comic/graphic novel store on my way home last week, and stumbled upon Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchet. 10-15 years ago, my brother was expounding upon Terry Pratchett’s fantastic British wit and style. Plus, I was in the mood for something along the lines of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.
I’m about half of the way through Good Omens. It’s no Hitchhiker’s Guide, but it definitely makes me laugh and is helping renew my lust for reading again.
If you’ve been meaning to kill the current lull in your literary absorptions, why not pick out something that you feel like reading – something that’s got its tractor beam set on you – rather than what you think you should read. You might just enjoy it…