Realm of the Wombat

I used the word “catharsis” last night in a conversation with Beaudry, and he wanted to know what it meant. Here’s the definition according to The American Heritage Dictionary (via dictionary.com):

noun
1. Medicine. Purgation, especially for the digestive system.
2. A purifying or figurative cleansing of the emotions, especially pity and fear, described by Aristotle as an effect of tragic drama on its audience.
3. A release of emotional tension, as after an overwhelming experience, that restores or refreshes the spirit.
4. Psychology.

a. A technique used to relieve tension and anxiety by bringing repressed feelings and fears to consciousness.
b. The therapeutic result of this process; abreaction.

Doesn’t it feel good to learn.

This is a feeling I’ve had for a long time. It’s been a rainy week in Berkeley, so there have been tons of umbrellas out lately. And I find it extremely annoying. I acutally think it’s disrespectful. These people walk around taking up the whole sidewalk, unwittingly running into you, potentially poking your eye out! Then the umbrella-toter reaches their destination and has to put the contraption in the hallway or someplace to dry off.

“But Jer, it’s an effective way to keep me dry!”

Oh is it? Why is it then that they are not designed to deal with rain’s tricky brother wind? Whenever I see people carrying these infernal devices, and there’s a wind of any strength, half of them are inverted and thus rendered useless until fixed. The other half of the umbrella carrying chumps are walking with the thing pointed directly into the wind to keep the convex face outward. Of course, this means their field of vision is completely obscured, leading to a rainfall of gouged eyeballs. Umbrellas are also ineffective when lost, and apparently they’re lost frequently judging by the number I see laying here, there, and everywhere. And what about your frigid hand there, holding this stupid item when it could be in a warm pocket. This is ridiculous.

“Jer, everyone I know uses umbrellas, so I think you’re the only one that hates umbrellas.”

First of all, everyone you know is an idiot for using umbrellas, but I did wonder if anyone else hates umbrellas like I do. So I googled “hate umbrellas” and got 379 hits. I won’t win any elections on a “Ban Umbrellas” platform, but 380 people took the time to post how they hate umbrellas on the internet. Get a raincoat people. Stay dry, warm, and respectful.

So we were at the Mallard last night celebrating Jim Dandy’s birthday. While JD wanted a low key birthday, Odie is anticipating a birthday for the ages. Inspired by Talk Like A Pirate Day, he wants everyone partaking in the celebration to dress like a pirate, and go into various SF bars and talk like a pirate. Now this might sound like a hair-brained scheme. Well, it is. But last night, Odie committed to making this a high quality event, and his empassioned talk convinced Beaudry, Will, and Stefan to be involved (obviously I was hooked regardless). The big day is fast approaching (although is unscheduled as of yet), so practice your “Arrr!”

If you liked Stick Figure Warning Man (and Family!), you’ll love Signs of Life.

Odie and I continued the search for the elusive cloud car this weekend, with no success. However, we did find this cloud roofed car. The hood has the quote “We’re the ones we’ve been waiting for,” apparently a quote by poet June Jordan [more info]. There’s a lot of detail in the stones and button adorning the sides and trunk (see more pics for closeup.)

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The NSC released the memo below from Richard Clarke to Condi Rice from January 2001 outlining the need for attention on al Qaeda. How closely this advice was this advice followed? To the letter …. after September 11th. Would 9/11 have been averted? We don’t know. But we do know that precautions were suggested and ignored. If your inactivity led to disaster, you’d probably fear for your job, maybe get fired, but certainly not get promoted. Ah, the perks of working in the Bush administration.

Bush Administration’s First Memo on al-Qaeda Declassified

I don’t know how it is at your workplace, but in Latimer Hall at Berkeley, we have a thing called “lazy undergrads.” They like to do things like take the elevator from the first floor to the second, or the second floor to the first. My favorite is when they’re on the second floor, call the elevator, then realize it’s going to take too long, so they walk down the stairs, causing me to stop at 2 for nothing. But at least they learned about the use of stairs. Even worse, this week one of our elevators was out of service. Add this to the normal flow of grad lazy faculty and staff, and it becomes almost unbearable for the grad student needing to go down seven floors before he misses his NMR time. The experienced grad student will, of course, adapt to his surroundings and take advantage of alternate means of transportation, e.g. the freight elevator around the corner, elevators in the adjacent Tan Hall, or (gasp!) the stairs. Fortunately, the “normal” elevator was put back in service two days early, so our hero can revert to his usual strategy of using the Latimer elevators and complaining about lazy undergrads and lamenting the lack of an escalator for the staff that work on the fourth floor.

As I read this book it didn’t seem like the author was really accomplishing what he set out to do, which was to understand how people make split second decisions, but now that I think about it, it was pretty successful. One of the conclusions is that having a expertise in what you’re deciding gives you an advantage of some type. It doesn’t take a great leap of faith to accept that. However, the book’s real strength is the compilation of experiments to support conclusion. For instance, most people can tell the difference between Coke and Pepsi in a direct taste test. But if you’re given three unlabeled samples (two Cokes/one Pepsi or vice versa), you’ll have a difficult time determining which two are the same, let alone what brand they are. It turns out that the colas are so similar that, unless you are a food expert, when you sip sample three you won’t be able to remember what the first was like. It’s the series of these experiments that made Blink a good read.

It’s been a while since I added any Berkeley cars, but I found quite a few over the last week, and my first non-automobile Berkeley vehicle. Enjoy!

Here’s another car that’s eluded me for a long time. I used to see it parked on Dwight when I’d go to church on Sunday afternoon, but never captured it. But this morning I sniped it. It was purely coincidental since I got a ride from Susan, which isn’t part of my normal routine. As we approached downtown Berkeley, there it was. What a great start to the day. Notice the zebra figures on the roof and hood, adding to the well-done paint job.

Vans have an excellent track record to become Berkeley cars. This must be because of the large, flat surface for decoration, especially of the graffiti variety. See this latest example.

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I had some time this weekend to search for the elusive cloud car, and while scanning Berkeley I came across this ’80s vintage Toyota van. That crazy blue/gold line is definitely custom.