David Erik Nelson's Blog, page 34

Welcome to the Rap Singularity, Ladies and Gentlemen

(FYI, this is NSFW if your workplace is *lame.* Headphones, children!)

reggie watts - fuck shit stack - YouTube

Also enjoying this, 'cause I remember going to Steve Miller concerts and making sure my Zippo was all fueled up in advance.

DIY Standing Desks

(Reposting this from my more DIY-oriented blog, because I love you guys and want you to be comfortable as we squander our hours at the keyboard, together, like a family!)

On the off chance you missed the memo: Your chair is killing you!!1!

The tl;dr goes something like this: Human bodies are really ill-served by sitting in a chair for periods longer than ~30 minutes; it tangles up your digestion, causes problems all up and down the spine, and if you are typing at a keyboard is also pretty hard on your blood circulation. Also, "resting" this much strains the heart, as we're evolved to use the big muscles in our legs to help circulate our blood, thus relieving stress on the heart. We evolved to move around a lot--mostly walking from place to place--not sitting super still while moving our fingers super fast. If you prefer this sort of thing as a totally excessive infographic, the canonical one is to the right.

Anyway, over at the Workantile--which is populated by folks whose jobs are to sit very still while their fingers move very fast--we talk about the health ramifications of our sedentary jobs *a lot*. One of the easiest solutions--in addition to mandating regular perambulations--is to add a standing desk to your office. Our space includes a couple of high cafe tables, as well as one of these bad boys:

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This is one of the best store-bought standing desks I've seen, because:

It has an adjustable monitor mount: Many folks choose standing desks because looking down at their hands all day is screwing up their necks and backs--looking straight ahead is much more comfortable
It's convertible: The whole thing can raise and lower so that you can take periodic sitting breaks; shifting from sitting to standing (and being able to sit in multiple different postures) is ideal
It's flexible: This fella clamps to a wide variety of existing desks, and is really quick and easy to set up

I'm 99 percent sure this particular model (which a member donated) is an "WorkFit-S Single HD Sit-Stand WorstationErgotron WorkFit-S Sit-Stand Workstation," which costs several hundred dollars.

For those on a budget, their are *tons* of ways to rig up a workable (if, let's face it, ugly as hell) standing desk. This is a project that's totally responsive to Roosevelt's Law of Task Planning (aka Akins Law #34: Do what you can, where you are, with what you have.) Here's mine:

(The sheet is just there to aid visibility; otherwise it's hard to see the damn thing against all the clutter hung in my cave)

Yes, this thing--the Fool's Swing--is ridiculous. I originally hung it up as a platform to test different standing-desk heights in order to determine what I wanted to build (it's next to my sit-down desk--in ancient, dented Steelcase monster I bought for a dollar--so I can readily shift between sitting and standing). But I discovered that the swing--which took all of five minutes and no dollars to construct--was a good solution for me. Part of the reason this works is that my neck and spine are in great shape--looking down all day doesn't bother me (also, I touch type, and frequently look away from the screen and just stare into space in front of my as I write); I use a standing desk because working a sit-down job wrecked up my digestion pretty badly (a hereditary thing, as it turns out). The other advantage here is that the swing pushes away from me. I have a tendency to put too much weight on my wrists and lean into them, and the swing doesn't let me do that. My wife constantly predicts that this arrangement is going to end in a computer-dumping disaster, but it's been a year and some change, and I've never even had a close call. Seeing as how it is basically the same structure as swings I've hung--which have put up with much greater weight and abuse without collapsing--I'm not that worried.

Another member of our workspace has this rig, which I love:

Totally ad hoc, but it allows him to pace while working, which is brilliant. Again, zero-cost, and under 30 minutes to build.

Another option is just to boost your desk as a whole. One thing I envy here is that he has an entire raised workspace; when I'm revising (which I do on paper) at home, I generally have to sit at my desk; on book projects, this can mean full days seated, which gets pretty miserable by mid-morning. Although this method requires a lighter desk to begin with (my Steelcase would crush those milk crates), it's another no cost/quick build solution:

Finally, here's a link to the canonical $22 Standing Desk from Stock IKEA parts. No one I know has built one, every standing-desker I know has been inspired by it.

FYI, if you're going to shift to standing and you have a hard floor (mine is vinyl tile on concrete), invest in an "anti-fatigue" gel mat. I got a "Martha Stewart" branded one for $20 at the hardware. Your feet and lower back will thank you. (These are also great in the work room and, if you cook a lot, in front of the sink.)

Poor Mojo's Almanac(k) Classic issue #403 (published October 9, 2008): "More insights per pound than the Bible."

Poor Mojo's Almanac(k) Classic issue #403 (published October 9, 2008)

More insights per pound than the Bible.

Giant Squid: Ask The Giant Squid: A Mollusk Does Not a Cephalopod Make by the Giant SquidDear Giant Squid,

I received this question from my mother and thought you might best answer it, as it concerns a mollusk.

"Do snails hop?"

. . .

Fiction: Night in a Tree by Richard LeeHe ran, ran, stumbling and rolling, the feral dogs always just a step behind. As he ran he scooped up rocks and sticks to fling back blindly at the beasts, but now the path turned to cross a meadow where there were no stones, and instead he beat across it to a copse of sturdy trees and hurled himself up the first trunk like a squirrel, and so he sat for a long time in the top, panting. One of the cuffs of his shirt had torn or frayed, and this he absentmindedly put in his mouth while he watched the dogs below. Then, looking around, he noticed that there were others in the trees, people, like himself, gaunt and silent with eyes flashing in the near-dark.

. . .

Poetry: Photo Gallery 1983 by Leah MuellerI didn't own any photos of myself

from my rollicking early adulthood

until recently, when I had dinner

with someone I hadn't seen in twenty years.

He and his ruddy suburban wife were friendly . . .

Rant: Direct Translations of Six Phrases I Used in Costa Rica by David Erik Nelson<< Perdoname, doña, ¿usted tiene una machina para eliminar el sombrero de mi coca-cola? >>

"Pardon me, madam; do you have a machine for to use to eliminate the hat from my coca-cola?"

(August 6, convenience store, village of Brasil de Mora) . . .

Gun Numbers and Online Comments

I like writing for the Chronicle for a lot of reasons--I like the publisher and editor as people, I like that they let me eat up 2k words to really lay out an argument, I like that they'll do the fiddly business of making a good looking pie chart--but one of the things I like most is that, in an age when newspapers basically insist on having open comment threads (something I generally don't support, especially when they are basically unmonitored), the Chron has *excellent* comments--*because* they carefully husband them, trashing the spam, hate, and stupid vitriol). The result: Meaningful discussions where readers bring different perspectives and new *factual* information into the conversation. So, that's one thing that's happening with my latest column: Some readers are showing up with links to legal précis that outline the current state of interpretation of the Second Amendment, and new data visualizations that can be meaningfully inform the discussion in my column.

But what's most telling, for me, is the response from pro-gun folk--and not the glancing ad hominem or the patently absurd notion that gun owners constitute a minority in the same protected-class sense that, say, African-Americans do. What interests me is that the act of laying out these numbers--even as I clearly state that I *am not taking a position on gun control,* because I don't *have* one (for reals!)--implicitly reads as an argument *for* gun control to many gun owners.

More than anything *I* might say about gun control, *that* says it all: Pro-gun folks see the numbers on gun casualties and intent in this country, and just those *numbers*--with no surrounding rhetoric--read like an argument for gun control.

I think we maybe found the place that this conversation *really* starts, America.

The Ann Arbor Chronicle | In it for the Money: Running Gun Numbers

Here’s a favorite Glib Gun Lover comparison: There are roughly as many cars in America as guns [9], and there were 2,771,497 motor vehicle occupant injuries in 2010, and 33,687 deaths for a total of 2,805,184 American motor vehicle casualties. Cars are 27 times more dangerous than guns!

But, the thing is, of those 2,771,497 automotive injuries, only 8,954 were acts of malice or sorrow, and only 1,789 were attempts at suicide.

Check the pie charts: Orange represents blameless accidents; red and blue (and green) represent active human efforts to inflict pain or suffering. We’d have included a pie chart of Automobile Deaths, but it would have just been an orange circle.

In other words, those 2.8 million car accidents were basically just that: accidents. Those 33,000 corpses on the highway were largely the result of bad decision-making and bad weather, bad maintenance and bad luck. Meanwhile, our 30,000 gun deaths weren’t accidents – sorry, 4% were accidents. The rest were acts. They were deliberate expressions of hate and sorrow and frustration and desperation. That should mean something to us as human beings.

Oh, Canada . . .

Jimmy Fallon's 'Do Not Read' List For Spring 2013 (VIDEO)

SPOILER ALERT: Check this subtitle!

(Yeah, that's an associate link; you click that link and buy this book, and I'll get a dime or something. I'm not ashamed.)

MI voters: Plz take 10 seconds to help preserve public education in Michigan! Plz Share & RT! #PureMichigan

If you live in Michigan and give a crap about local-control of the public schools you pay for, please contact your rep *right this second*--you can even crib from my letter, included below!

The state House Education Committee will likely vote this afternoon on House Bill 4369, which expands the Education Achievement Authority “takeover” district (currently dicking things up big time in Muskegon Heights and throughout Detroit) to a statewide entity . I wrote about this extensively back in December--the bill numbers are different, but the bad plan remains the same. The website of the Michigan Educator's Association (I.e., my wife's union) has a concise bit on the current bill.

Here's the letter I just sent. You can use it if you want, modify it how you choose, customize it to best speak to your concerns and community--just write your rep and do it *RIGHT NOW!*:

SUBJECT: I OPPOSE HB 4369! DO NOT EXPANDED THE EAA OR PRIVATIZE PUBLIC EDUCATION IN MICHIGAN

Dear __________________,

Please do everything you can to oppose any expansion of Michigan’s as-of-yet unproven Education Achievement Authority, and to limit the implicit privatization of public education in Michigan. This includes opposing House Bill 4369 (which expand the Education Achievement Authority to a statewide entity composed of charter schools). I have deeply held philosophical reasons for opposing the operation of our public schools on a for-profit basis.

Handing over our public institutions – and tax dollars – to private companies with no demonstrable record of success, and doing so without strict oversight, flies in the face of reason and should offend rational, honest public servants on both sides of the aisle.

For a detailed analysis of the hazards of pitfalls inherent in the EAA, charter schools, and “cyber” schools, please take a few minutes to read this 2012 article by Ann Arbor Chronicle columnist David Erik Nelson: http://annarborchronicle.com/?p=102112

Thank you for your time, consideration, and good faith.

Sincerely,

NAME

ADDRESS

(Obviously, plugging my old column is totally optional--but the details are all there, and the concerns for citizens laid out clearly, with citations and everything!)

The MEA suggests contacting both your own rep and the entire House Education Committee. I agree with this strategy; info for the entire Committee is pasted below:

LisaLyons@house.mi.gov Rep. Lisa Posthumus Lyons, R-Alto (chair): (517) 373-0846

RayFranz@house.mi.gov Rep. Ray Franz, R-Onekama (vice chair): (517) 373-0825

HughCrawford@house.mi.gov Rep. Hugh Crawford, R-Novi: (517) 373-0827

KevinDaley@house.mi.gov Rep. Kevin Daley, R-Lum Township: (517) 373-1800

BobGenetski@house.mi.gov Rep. Bob Genetski, R-Saugatuck: (517) 373-0836

PeteLund@house.mi.gov Rep. Pete Lund, R-Shelby Township: (517) 373-0843

TomMcMillin@house.mi.gov Rep. Tom McMillin, R-Rochester Hills: (517) 373-1773

ThomasHooker@house.mi.gov Rep. Tom Hooker, R-Byron Center: (517) 373-2277

BradJacobsen@house.mi.gov Rep. Brad Jacobsen, R-Oxford: (517) 373-1798

AmandaPrice@house.mi.gov Rep. Amanda Price, R-Park Township: (517) 373-0838

KenYonker@house.mi.gov Rep. Ken Yonker, R-Caledonia: (517) 373-0840

EllenLipton@house.mi.gov Rep. Ellen Lipton, D-Huntington Woods (minority vice chair): (517) 373-0478

DavidKnezek@house.mi.gov Rep. David Knezek Jr., D-Dearborn Heights: (517) 373-0849

WinnieBrinks@house.mi.gov Rep. Winnie Brinks, D-Grand Rapids: (517) 373-0822

ThomasStallworth@house.mi.gov Rep. Thomas Stallworth III, D-Detroit: (517) 373-2276

ColleneLamonte@house.mi.gov Rep. Collene Lamonte, D-Montague: (517) 373-3436

TheresaAbed@house.mi.gov Rep. Theresa Abed, D-Grand Ledge: (517) 373-0853

(And here's all those emails in one easy-to-copy&paste-string: LisaLyons@house.mi.gov, RayFranz@house.mi.gov, HughCrawford@house.mi.gov, KevinDaley@house.mi.gov, BobGenetski@house.mi.gov, PeteLund@house.mi.gov, TomMcMillin@house.mi.gov, ThomasHooker@house.mi.gov, BradJacobsen@house.mi.gov, AmandaPrice@house.mi.gov, KenYonker@house.mi.gov, EllenLipton@house.mi.gov, DavidKnezek@house.mi.gov, WinnieBrinks@house.mi.gov, ThomasStallworth@house.mi.gov, ColleneLamonte@house.mi.gov, TheresaAbed@house.mi.gov)

Thanks! GO FORTH AND HASSLE YOUR ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES! Be the Boss!

UPDATE: Even When Bloggers Are Bad at Math, Global Climate Change Is Still a Reality

Late in 2012 we--along with most of the pinko-hippie blogosphere--posted a link to a blog entry over at Grist; here's ours: Poor Mojo's Newswire: Climate Collapse: If you’re 27 or younger, you’ve never experienced a colder-than-average month

In mid-January a dedicated--or at least attentive--reader in Australia wrote in to point out:

Dear Poor Mojo,

I have become aware that the statistic given in your article "Climate Collapse: If you’re 27 or younger, you’ve never experienced a colder-than-average month" concerning the 27 years of never colder-than-average months is incorrect.

From the original information source, the NCDC report: "The average monthly temperature across the United Kingdom was 1.3°C (2.3°F) below the 1981–2010 average, making this the coldest October since 2003. Regionally, Scotland had its seventh coolest October since records began in 1910 and coolest since 1993." Further, from BOM in the Annual Australian Climate Statement 2012 states, in the first sentence of this report "The first half of 2012 was cooler and wetter than average".

Therefore this statistic cannot be true. I know how the accurate reporting of information reflects upon an organisation's integrity and reputation, and I'm sure swift and appropriate action will be taken.

Thank you, I look forward to your response: ***********@*******.com

What caught my interest--and sparked some editorial discussion here at the Newswire--was that this reader had a point (sort of) even if it wasn't the point Reader thinks Reader has. Reader is 100% correct in saying that the Grist blogger's title--which most of us link-blogging this item blithely copy-pasted--is wrong: Plenty of humans younger than 27 have experienced colder-than-average local temps. Shit, just look at the graphic: anything blue shows a colder-than-average temp. I'll note that *little* of the world's human population lives in those blue zones, but obviously some folks do, including kids born after the theatrical release of BACK TO THE FUTURE. So, the title is inaccurate.

But just because the *title* is spurious, that doesn't make the *statistic* untrue. Again, look at the pic: it's likewise obvious that *most* of the world has seen warmer to much-warmer--and even *record high*--average temps in the last year.

So how did the Grist blogger arrive at this spurious title?

Just bad math; the blogger is basically claiming that if a "mean" average is greater than X, then all the components of that mean must also exceed X, which is clearly not the case (e.g., a four man crew can have an average salary of $15/hour, but that doesn't mean none of the dudes was paid *less* than $15/hr; the crew could be one dude making $57 per and the others making a buck an hour).

Just to step through:

Grist blogger says: "If you’re 27 or younger, you’ve never experienced a colder-than-average month"

But what he means is "in the last 27 years the average temperature across land and ocean surfaces has never been below it's year-to-year global comp"

Ergo, it would be correct to say "If you’re 27 or younger, then the *world* has never experienced a colder-than-average month in your lifetime," even though specific points on the map--and thus people--have experienced colder-than-average months during that period.

I don't want to be tedious, but I do believe that attempting to be both accurate and math-literate is important in this-thing-that's-replaced-journalism. E.g.,: I read a FOX article about the new biggest prime number which asserted--and I've simplified the numbers here--that "two multiplied by itself 10 times" equals "(2^10)-1"--which is so clearly false it makes my head hurt, and I barely scraped by in high school math. In the next sentence they said that large primes have no use in and of themselves, apart from being curiosities. That claim is simply mind-bogglingly ignorant.

Anyway, you no longer need math and news from NOAA to know the climate has shifted: It has fundamentally changed crops here, in Michigan. Talk to any farmer in the state: our growing season and hardiness zone have grossly shifted since the birth of my son, and he's a first-grader. Traditional crops (like apples, cherries, and berries) are now struggling while new crops are becoming viable, even profitable. This can be directly observed, regardless of how you vote or what you think of Al Gore--so, to my mind, denial is a non-starter. But still, these are *local* effects, and I'm in Michigan; as we all know, where Reader was in Australia, the first half of 2012 was both colder and wetter than usual--which is actually also probably a Bad Sign. Remember, it isn't global *warming* we're worried about; it's *climate collapse.*

In the end, this isn't about math, or even about politics; it's about humans working through the Kübler-Ross stages of grief. Our world has changed, and no semantic nit-pick can wind that back. In the last six months we felt hurricane winds from an Atlantic superstorm *in Michigan*. We saw lake effect snow stretch from Lake Michigan to Detroit, *crossing the entire state.* I can't find anyone with a living memory of storms like these here. Again, we don't have to look at a map from the federal government, or a picture from a satellite. These things happened in my yard, and they've done so since my last birthday.

Back on track: from a rhetoric standpoint, if we settle for sloppy math--even just in titles--then it makes it easier for deniers to just pretend the point as a whole is invalid, and there is tremendous motivation to do just that, because when you are grieving a loss, the first step is always to say: "No; this just isn't true. It can't be, because this being true hurts me too much."

And sometimes, the thing we have to do for a grieving loved one is very cruel: We have to take him or her by the shoulders and very calmly say: "A very bad thing has happened, and now we need to deal with it."

RECOMMENDED READING: The Last Policeman by Ben H. Winters

The Last Policeman is a really enjoyable read, both as a literary novel and as a low-grade mystery/crime thriller. About 60% into the book you suddenly realize that the crime has been solved and all loose ends secured--which leaves one to wonder what the hell is going to occupy the remaining pages. At this point, though, the investigator tracks backward through his solved mystery (not temporally, just in terms if the relationships of cause and effect), and unwinds a whole second layer to it all. So, right there, it would be a great piece of mystery writing, wonderfully managing expectations and non-cheating reveals (a la the best of Christie or Doyle). Throughout, it's also great crime writing, showing the way that ordinary folks can resolve--without cognitive dissonance--the mismatches between their external and internal lives (I think of Price's Clockers as being the epitome at this aspect of crime fiction). This is all pinned against an almost classic SF backdrop: Impending meteor strike is gonna end the world on a known date. Everything that means for workaday humans--including this fair-and-square regular-joe cop who's found himself suddenly bumped up to detective--brings these "lowly" genre pieces up a notch. It's fine *craft* being used to explore the poignant humanity of Kobayashi Maru, which is basically the thing we mean when we say "art," right?

Takeway: Read this. It's a quick one and worth your time.

(DISCLOSURE: Those are indeed Amazon affiliate links to the book; if you click on them and buy it, I'll get some minuscule percentage. Also, the book itself was a gift from my mom; all of these factors may have swayed my opinion. I'm only human.)

New Thing to Worry About: Giant Robo-Dog What Throws the Cinder Blocks!

Unofficial Poor Mojo's Military Correspondent (and Constant Mojoketeer) Milt draws our attention to this devil's business:

Just in case anyone missed the first chapter in the coming robocalypse:

BigDog robot throws cinder blocks in viral video

As someone who knows a little about the military I say: Super. Creepy.

*thanks, milt, for repopulating my nightmares!*

On Guns and Control, Tools and Instruments

I'm back to writing a monthly column for the Ann Arbor Chronicle. February's column kicks off a series on guns (and largely builds off thoughts I posted here back in January). If you have experiences of guns--your actual first-hand experiences--that you'd like to share, please feel free to hit me over Twitter or email.

The Ann Arbor Chronicle | In It For The Money: Guns And Control

A gun isn’t a tool – it’s not a hammer or a drill that you can pick up, use to solve a problem, and put away until you have the next problem you want to solve. It’s an instrument, like a guitar or piano. It requires constant care, it requires checking and tuning before each use, it requires an intimate relationship with its mechanisms, with its parameters, with what it can do and what it should do and what it is meant for. It requires care and feeding. And it requires practice, near constant practice for you to be any good at doing anything with it.

But most of all, it requires attention – all of your attention. You are exquisitely focused when you are holding a gun – and not just because the gun can hurt or kill anyone nearby, including you. (Our cars are far more likely to hurt and kill anyone nearby, and we zone out behind the wheel all the time.)

There is an essential quality to this instrument compared with others; its nature is to make us aware of how vital and powerful our attention is, in and of itself. I don’t look at my father when I’m holding my loaded shotgun. I don’t look at my son when I’m holding my loaded pistol. I look at the target – only at the target, because whatever I’m looking at is the target.