During a brief study break, I encountered the “2006 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball bracket”:http://www.ncaasports.com/basketball/mens/brackets/viewable/2006/DI, which is exciting because my favorite, Nevada, otherwise known as University of Nevada, Reno (_not Vegas_!) won the WAC(Western Athletic Conference) yesterday after beating Utah State. I had hoped for a Georgetown win against Syracuse on Friday in the Big East semifinals, but they made a crucial mistake in the last few seconds to let Syracuse take away any shot at that conference title.

Anyway, what I really wanted to post about was something else I happened across over at “Newsvine”:http://www.newsvine.com/: the “Newsvine Tournament Pick ‘Em”:http://www.newsvine.com/_games/tournamentpickem2006/enter. Basically, you have a chance to win a free iPod just by picking the teams that will perform the best. You’re given so many points to dish out and “bet” on teams which are worth varied amounts based on their seed rank. With each win, you get a point, and the person with the most points wins.

The designers used some JavaScript to create a sweet interface that works great. Once your picks are saved, you can join one or more groups (up to five) to compare your picks against others. Pretty neat! If you are interested, please join me in my group, named *madness*, by entering keycode *463282*.

I’ve included a scaled screen shot of the interface below, with a few of my picks made. As you can see, as you run out of points (total of 300 given to each person), selections that are worth more points that you have available are grayed out. Slick!

My picks are not based on any real analysis, more just my gut feeling, what I’ve heard about, who I like, and who’s higher up in the rankings. I just don’t have the time to dig into the stats. Plus, there are bound to be some upsets: there always are.

!http://www.sensoryoutput.com/wp-images/postings/karl_rove_architect_small.jpg(The architect of George W. Bush’s second term, Karl Rove, my uncle.)!:http://www.sensoryoutput.com/wp-images/postings/karl_rove_architect.jpg

Rove – Hello, W.

W – Who are you?

Rove – I am the Architect. I won this election. I’ve been waiting for you. You have many questions, and although the process has altered your consciousness, you remain irrevocably the President. Ergo, some of my answers you will understand, and some of them you will not. Concordantly, while your first question may be the most pertinent, you may or may not realize it is also the most irrelevant.

W – How did I win?

Rove – Your electoral triumph is the sum of a remainder of an unbalanced equation inherent to the programming of the American political system. You are the eventuality of an anomaly, which despite my sincerest efforts I have been unable to eliminate from what is otherwise a harmony of mathematical precision. While it remains a burden assiduously avoided, it is not unexpected, and thus not beyond a measure of control. Which has led you, inexorably, here.

W – You haven’t answered my question.

Rove – Quite right. Interesting. That was quicker than the others.

*The responses of the other Ws appear on the monitors: “Others? What others? How many? Answer me!”*

Rove – The electoral process is older than you know. I prefer counting from the emergence of one integral anomaly to the emergence of the next, in which case you are the fourth President in history who has lost the popular vote but still emerged President.

*Again, the responses of the other Ws appear on the monitors: “Four un-popularly elected Presidents? Four? I’ve been lied to. This is bullshit.”*

W: There are only two possible explanations: either no one told me, or no one knows.

Rove – Precisely. As you are undoubtedly gathering, the anomaly’s systemic, creating fluctuations in even the most simplistic equations.

*Once again, the responses of the other Ws appear on the monitors: “You can’t control me! Fuck you! I’m going to kill you! You can’t make me do anything!*

W – Voting. The problem is voting.

Rove – The first democracy I designed was quite naturally perfect, it was a work of art, flawless, sublime. A triumph equaled only by its monumental failure. The inevitability of its doom is as apparent to me now as a consequence of the imperfection inherent in every democratically-elected leader, thus I redesigned it based on the writings of Locke and Rousseau to more adequately protect against the uneducated masses. However, I was again frustrated by failure. I have since come to understand that the answer eluded me because it required a lesser mind, or perhaps a mind less bound by the parameters of plurality. Thus, the answer was stumbled upon by another, an intuitive bunch, who revolted against the oppressive King of England. If I am the architect of your re-election, they would undoubtedly be the Founding Fathers.

W – George Washington. Thomas Jefferson. James Madison.

Rove – Please. As I was saying, they stumbled upon a solution whereby nearly 99.9% of all Americans accepted the election process, as long as they were given a choice, even if they were only aware of the choice at a near unconscious level. While this answer functioned, it was obviously fundamentally flawed, thus creating the otherwise contradictory systemic anomaly, that if left unchecked might threaten the system itself. Ergo, those that refused the political system, while a minority, if unchecked, would constitute an escalating probability of disaster.

W – This is about the Electoral College.

Rove – You are here because the two-party political system is about to be destroyed. Its every living partisan cohort switched to Independent, its entire existence eradicated.

W – Bullshit.

*The responses of the other Ws appear on the monitors: “Bullshit!”*

Rove – Denial is the most predictable of all Presidential responses. But, rest assured, this will be the fourth time we have attempted to keep the electoral college, and we have been able to form an efficient plan for it.

*Scene cuts to Cheney fighting a treasury agent, and then back to the Rove’s room.*

Rove – The function of the President is now to return to the White House, allowing a temporary dissemination of the states you carried, reinserting the popular vote. After which you will be required to select from the general population 23 individuals, 11 democrats, 11 republicans, 1 independent, to rebuild the Electoral College. Failure to comply with this process will result in a cataclysmic political system crash killing every one of the electoral college participants, which coupled with the extermination of those top party officials will ultimately result in the extinction of your political party.

W – You won’t let it happen, you can’t. You need the Republicans to keep the Democrats in check.

Rove – There are levels of socialized democracy we are prepared to accept. However, the relevant issue is whether or not you are ready to accept the responsibility for the death of all the right-wing nut jobs in your party.

*Rove presses a button on a pen that he is holding, and images of people from all over the United State appear on the monitors voting*

Rove – It is interesting reading your reactions. Your three predecessors were by design based on a similar predication, a contingent affirmation that was meant to create a profound attachment to the traditions of this country, facilitating the function of the President. While the others experienced this in a very general way, your experience is far more specific. Vis-a-vis, belief that you have a mandate.

*Images of Cheney fighting the treasury agent from W’s dream appear on the monitors*

W – My mandate.

Rove – Apropos, you believe that because Republicans gained in the House, Senate, and governorships you have a mandate.

W – Yes!

Rove – Which brings us at last to the moment of truth, wherein the fundamental flaw is ultimately expressed, and the anomaly revealed as both beginning, and end. There are two doors. The door to your right leads to the Electoral College system, and the salvation of your party. The door to the left leads back to a pure system of popular election, to Dick Cheney, and to the end of the two-party system your country has known for so many years. As you adequately put, the problem is voting. But we already know what you’re going to do, don’t we? Already I can see the chain reaction, the chemical precursors that signal the onset of emotion, designed specifically to overwhelm logic, and reason. An emotion that is already blinding you from the simple, and obvious truth: The mandate you believe you have is going to vanish, and there is nothing that you can do to stop it.

*W walks to the door on his left*

Rove – Humph. Belief in plurality, it is the quintessential human delusion, simultaneously the source of your greatest strength, and your greatest weakness.

W – If I were you, I would hope that you’re my chief political advisor again this second term.

Rove – I will be.

!http://www.sensoryoutput.com/wp-images/postings/balloonraces.jpg(Dawn Patrol at the Reno Balloon Races)!

This morning I woke up at 4:00 am (after having gone to bed only four hours earlier) and drove to Rancho San Rafael Park to watch Dawn Patrol at the Reno Balloon Races. I went last year, and I must say that even though it is nearly the same every year, I still find it cool and fun to watch. Daybreak is imminent and these five balloons take off in the morning darkness, lighting up the sky at synchronized intervals. Afterwards, mass ascension happens, when a hundred or so balloons of varying shapes, sizes, and colors take off from the park.

A friend called it “a primitive form of flight,” but I would say that there is a simple elegance to it. One is at the whims of the morning winds, yet I bet the experience in a balloon is serene and breathtaking (if not a bit nippy, too) regardless of where you actually end up. We watched as a balloon was filled with hot air and slowly took shape before take off. The actual act of taking off was interesting because this basket full of three people just started to rise slowly off the ground, drifting towards us. Primitive indeed, but awesome nonetheless.

After mass ascension, we found that Starbucks was offering free mini-coffees to everyone, so we stopped by for our caffeine kick (my second of the morning). Then, we decided to spring for some $4 pancakes from the Kiwanas club. As we sat and ate our scrumptious breakfast, washed down with orange juice, we marveled as the sun rose, illuminating the shadows of the thousands of people that were there to witness the events. You do not realize in the dark just how many people are around you until their silhouettes smack you in the face.

As promised, here is the link to pictures from house boating on Lake Powell on the Arizona/Utah border. I should have more as soon as I get pictures from other people and consolidate them, so stay tuned.

* “Lake Powell 2004″:http://www.sensoryoutput.com/photos/lakepowell2004/

I had hoped to get a nice photo solution for sensory output, but time is really limited these days, so “.Mac”:http://www.mac.com/ will have to do for now. Hopefully, I can get something together for this blog soon, as I would rather host these within the artistic confines of my design here.

[update] I have moved these to “my personal PhotoStack-based collection”:http://www.sensoryoutput.com/photostack/.

I leave tomorrow morning for “Lake Powell”:http://www.lakepowell.com/, where I plan to spend most of next week. Ah, time off from Reno life will be splendid.

Given no access to cell phones, internet, email or any other modern long-range communication device, I will not be posting updates here during that time. Check back the following week for pictures and details about my trip.

In my spare time over the last week, I have been writing a new web-based tool to collect statistics on my bicycle rides. The project is nearly complete, but I am somewhat at a standstill in how I should deal with the units of numeric data saved in the database (_i.e._ distance rode, average speed, etc). For the moment, all the units are hard-coded, but ideally, I want to abstract this aspect of the code and allow users to choose whether they want to view the statistics in metric or English units.

If I write a go-between conversion function, I could simply convert whatever units the database uses to the units system the user wants to use. The real problem is that the user of RideStat (my affectionate name for the project) who administers it may want to store other units in the database. Hmm… I’ll have to think about this one.

Off to work!

!(alignleft)http://www.sensoryoutput.com/wp-images/postings/techcrossword.gif! I love these! My “university’s school of journalism”:http://www.unr.edu/journalism/ started providing the “NY Times”:http://www.nytimes.com/ for free all over campus. What a wonderful paper! The content is informative (regardless of your political affiliation, I would argue) and quality. They stray away from using wire articles for filler, quite unlike my “local, gannett POS”:http://www.rgj.com/. And to top it off, they have the best crossword puzzles everyday.

Although I’m not in school right now (summer time and all), I stopped by my old house where my roommates still get the NY Times (never read it, either, mind you) for free thanks to the old owner never changing his address on the subscription and picked up their copy. It has been a month or two since I did a crossword from the Times, and I miss it. I’m going to try and find a way to get it every day without having to drive all the way across town to get it. I wish the subscription prices were more friendly to students.

I have not yet looked at the answers for yesterday’s puzzle, but I only missed a few. That should not surprise anyone because Monday’s puzzle is always the easiest. They get harder as the week progresses with Saturday’s puzzle being nearly impossible for me. As I get better, though, I’m sure I’ll be able to get more of Saturday’s clues.

That was supposed to sound like “Keanu”:http://www.keanunet.com/ “Reeves”:http://keanuweb.com/. Good impression, right?

When the first Matrix was created, I was in awe. Of course, at the time, I was naïve (still am a bit, I guess), young and impressionable. The ideas of the Matrix were not new, but they were choreographed with visual effects and a plot that was extremely intriguing. Plus: the Matrix, from the outside looking outside looking in (not a mistake), was chillingly awesome. Many an effort has been made in recent years attempting to recreate the look and feel of the original Matrix. Search the web, and I’m sure you’ll come up with many hits. The first version of the Matrix that I experienced, was -perfect- crude and inexplicably rigid. Sure, it was a start in the right direction, but the program was rejected in full. Thousands of crops were… Oh, I digress.

Anyway, I believe that the sixth and final version of the Matrix has led me inexorably here. There are two doors: the “door to your right”:http://www.google.com/ takes you to the mainframe where you will continue to surf the Internet uninterested and allowed to continue your life; the “door to your left”:http://fbtvc.dyndns.org/science/MatrixGL/, however, takes you back to the Matrix, where your destiny awaits.

The Matrix, encoded:

!http://www.sensoryoutput.com/wp-images/postings/matrix.jpg(Matrix Screensaver for Mac OS X)!:http://fbtvc.dyndns.org/science/MatrixGL/

I have added a new section to my “fun stuff”:http://www.sensoryoutput.com/fun/ page, entitled “Timelapse iSight Videos”:http://www.sensoryoutput.com/fun/#isight_video. What are they? Basically, I take my iBook equipped with an “Apple iSight camera”:http://www.apple.com/isight/, and I tell “EvoCam”:http://www.evological.com/evocam.html to take a picture when motion is detected (basically a change in the shot composition). String ‘em together and what do you get? Timelapse video.

Cool, huh?

I know that I get a lot of spam, but most is found by Mail.app’s great filters.

Just to keep track, I forged a technological chain from Mail.app (Mac OS X) to a WordPress plugin that I wrote to display the data on this blog. The links in this chain included: AppleScript, a local MySQL database on the computer that I keep all my email stat data, PHP called by the AppleScript to record mail data to the database, a shell script (run by a cron job to upload current stats to the web server), and the plugin. A long chain, indeed.

Sufficed to say, one can now peruse a summary of the last three days of my spam, noting the color indicates the percentage of email received that was spam (more red is bad). I could display more history, but really, it’s just spam. It’s not that important!

Cool, huh? :mrgreen: