A WHALE OF A PROBLEM

My father sent me this. I don't know why.

Basically, there was a dead whale on the beach and nobody knew what to do about it, but it was rotting and started to stink. The whale was too big to push back into the ocean, nobody was willing to cut it up to bury it, and it couldn't be burned (on this last part, I don't know why; the whale certainly would have burned with a little gasoline, but maybe the townspeople didn't want a giant grease fire on the beach). So they hired an engineer, who placed a whole lot of dynamite (20 crates, in fact) on the leeward side of the whale. It was supposed to blow the whale towards the ocean, and break it up into tiny pieces that crabs and birds would eat. Instead, it sprayed large chunks of decaying whale all over the surrounding area, including on passers-by and their vehicles. The next few days were spent repairing damage and using machinery to bury huge pieces of whale. After the fact, everyone sort of shook their collective heads and said, "Wait, we tried to blow up a whale? That was stupid." But the fact is, it wasn't that stupid. The problem wasn't the method - I defy you to find a better solution to dispose of a rotting whale. The real problem? They used too much dynamite.

Dynamite is a high explosive, meaning that the shock wave of the detonating material moves faster than the speed of sound...meaning that it blows stuff up really fast and really hard. The engineer in question decided that the whale should be treated as a "large boulder". Unfortunately, the force a boulder can absorb before cracking is a whole lot more than the force a decomposing whale body can withstand. The blood-red mist appearing high over the blast site is already an indication of a serious miscalculation. Small wonder that, instead of a controlled detonation, bits of whale ended up showering the area in a quarter-mile radius.

The plan was good; the execution was lacking. According to a quick Google search of "How much crap can I blow up with a case of dynamite?" (cue CSIS knocking at my door in 3, 2, 1...) a few sticks, not crates, nestled under the whale would have done the trick without the whale shower.

Also, how is this the first time anyone has dealt with a dead whale?! Whales beach themselves frequently, to my understanding, and not all of them are pushed back to the water in time. Surely, even in 1970, somebody must have already developed a method for handling whale carcasses. Or at least an estimate of how much dynamite it would really take to blow one up.

USING GUNS TO STOP PEOPLE FROM USING GUNS IS A GREAT IDEA, YOU GUYS

I am late to the party on this one but I spend too much time trawling the Internet and running across macros like these in the months since the tragedy at Sandy Hook:

The NRA (and apparently some young people with too much time on their hands) believe that teachers should be armed to defend against school shooters. This is a terrible, terrible idea. The argument that one needs guns to defend oneself from other maniacs with guns is bullshit; what is really necessary is better control, licensing, and regulation, so that nobody has a gun and everybody avoids ballistics-related injuries at school. Virtually all of the weapons used in school shootings are obtained legally and legitimately, but the NRA somehow thinks the problem lies in a LACK of guns.

I mean, sure, it’s technically possible to fix a problem with more of that same problem. For example, the government could probably get rid of drug dealers by importing and distributing kilos and kilos of heroin – effectively flooding the market, dropping the price of a piece through the floor, and putting dealers out of business. But you don’t see anybody jumping at THAT plan, do you? Just because something will technically work doesn’t automatically make it the best plan, or even a feasible one.

Arming teachers is a similarly terrible idea. This residual Cold-War obsession with mutually assured destruction doesn’t work on a small scale because school shooters aren’t afraid of their own destruction. Arming teachers doesn’t keep maniacs out of schools, it just increases the likelihood that more children will be caught in the crossfire.

Oh, also? The spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry says the comparison between terrorism in Israel and school shootings in the US is nonsense, and that Israel actually depends on incredibly strict gun licensing laws. Nice try, Neo-Republican Assholes.

FELLOW HUMANS:

People, I cannot stress this enough: DO NOT FIRE GUNS INTO THE AIR.

Yes, the bullet will go up. Yes, at some point, its velocity will reach zero. But after that, it will fall back to Earth, and the effect of acceleration due to gravity will make sure it is travelling very, very fast on its return trip. Just like that penny thrown off the CN tower, a bullet falling from a thousand feet is going to hurt.

BRITISH SCIENTISTS SECRETLY HATE THE ENGLISH TOO
Britain. What are you people smoking over there, and where can I get some?!
Apparently, some British scientists are recommending that single servings of cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins be given to fast-food customers along with their extra-value-double-up-big-whatever meal, in order to offset the damage done to the heart by eating food high in fat and cholesterol.
OK, I already dislike statins because I believe they give people the impression that they can just take a pill instead of making productive changes to their lifestyle in order to improve their health. Well, guess what? When you hand someone a statin with their Big Mac, you're not just giving an impression - you might as well hand out leaflets that say, "Stay on the couch! Eat Big Macs every day! Do not take the dog for a nice long walk - these pills will save you!"
And the worst part is, they won't. High LDL cholesterol is but one warning sign for heart problems - others include obesity, inactivity, and high blood pressure. Obesity and inactivity feed off each other, and tend to be supported by a diet rich in Chicken McNuggets and extra-large Cokes. High blood pressure is very commonly due to overconsumption of sodium - i.e., that stuff they sprinkle on your fries. Since dispensing statins along with SuperSize burgers only give the false impression that eating fast-food is okay, I can only assume that these scientists are actually secretly attempting to kill off much of the British population.
One more problem - the article states that statins cost "about the same as a packet of ketchup". Oh yeah? Then why the hell are some of my customers at the pharmacy paying ninety dollars a prescription for Lipitor?! Or is it only multi-national fast food conglomerates that get the special discount price?

RAT TAIL THE WORK OF EVIL POLITICAL OPPONENT...PROBABLY
NDP House Leader Mike Farnworth found a rat tail on his doorstep on Tuesday. He understood that a disgruntled opposition member was trying to send him a pointed message the night before a meeting that would have the NDP tabling a citizens' petition to eliminate the HST. This would be extremely cool as far as Canadian politics goes. Unfortunately, after stirring up all of this fuss, Farnworth concedes it was probably - shockingly! - his cat who was responsible for the distasteful "present" on the doorstep. Clearly, Mr. Farnworth has never seen The Godfather. The still-warm, still-dripping severed head of your favourite racehorse left in your bed is a message. A rat tail is just a sign of a cat who hasn't been declawed.

OH CRAP
This article highlights one of the ways in which our country is incredibly special - somehow, a recent Nanos poll has managed to show bad news for the NDP, the Liberals, AND the Conservatives. Normally, bad news for one party (CONSERVATIVES DOWN 20% - HARPER IS APPARENTLY A 'PUNK-ASS LOSER') means an uptick in popularity (aka "good news") for the others. How can a poll result be bad for every major party? I have no idea...except I sense we're going to be speaking a lot more French around here in the future.

A Livent Lecture Series?

Drabinsky and Gottlieb, who single-handedly proved that even doddering old guys can still rip you off, cooked the books at their failing Toronto theatre company not once, not twice, but every single quarter for six years to hide their decreasing revenue. Some people might call this creative accounting; the federal government prefers to call it fraud. They were arrested and charged accordingly, and now their lawyers have apparently decided that, instead of jail, it would be a good idea for Gottlieb and Drabinsky to give lectures to university students.

Of course, the Crown immediately dismissed it out of hand, for some crazy reason like "We don't let people who repeatedly manipulate their financial accounts get out of fraud charges by giving lectures on the 'discipline of the craft'".

But let's not be too hasty here:

In prison, the two gentlemen will likely face aggressive guards and inmates, restricted movement, lots of time confined to a cell, gangs, drugs and riots.

In the lecture hall, they'll be exposed to rampant texting, the slack faces of the stoned/hungover/drunk, an endless parade of latecomers who are neither apologetic nor quiet, temperamental slide projectors and sound systems, and a sea of open laptops indubitably all cruising through Facebook and Twitter, ready to deliver a different type of verdict on them in a few short lines of text:
"wtf who duz this guy think he is? im sooooooooo bored! y do i even come to this class?!?!!"

The lectures are starting to sound more and more like a serious punishment to me. Frankly, I think Gottlieb and Drabinsky are better off going to prison.

Great.
So, because the person who made me get this blog in the first place then announced that 95% of all blogs die within a year, or something like that, I've been guilted into firing this one up again.
The good news is, I have a list of topics I want to cover. So, I can promise at least one update per week. I can't promise it will be exciting or hilarious, but it will be written.

That is all.


Actually, on another note, I just attempted to download GoogleChrome. What I got was the BSoD. Another quality product from the Google family!

Well, shut my mouth wide open!

So...
The Dvorak experiment failed. Well, failed for now. I just couldn't adapt fast enough...although Dvorak has left its own peculiar handprint on me.
It really is much, much more efficient, and as a consequence I still have to fight the urge to type "the" as "kjd", the corresponding Dvorak keys.
Anyway. This summer. Rumour has it that Mavis Beacon teaches Dvorak.

Also, I'm going to New Orleans now. Peace!

DVORAK--DAY TWO:
Forced brevity due to lack of profiency with Dvorak layout.
Am getting pretty good with the home row, though.
aoeu-id-htns

Where has the semicolon gone?

5:22PM:
Current WPM: 11
I don't think I'll be ready by tomorrow. But I can definitely feel the improved efficiency, even going this slowly. Dvorak is much more intuitive than QWERTY.

Hello, neglected blog!
I promise to use you more now.

DVORAK:
I've decided to learn how to use the Dvorak simplified keyboard. I switched my keyboard settings and made myself some key caps with adhesive labels. Very high-tech, I know.
These words I'm typing are the last I will type (hopefully) on a QWERTY keyboard. I expect the learning curve for Dvorak will be very steep, but hopefully the longterm benefits will outweigh the costs.
For the record, according to an online wordcounter widget, my average WPM is only about 80 on a QWERTY keyboard (although writing awkward words like "QWERTY" certainly doesn't help me type any faster.
I don't have class tomorrow (Thursday), but I do have a class on Friday at 12:30, which is when I'll be needing to take notes on my laptop. It is my goal to be able to type fast enough in Dvorak simplified to keep up in that class.

HOUR ONE:
I can't seem to find any of the keys I want. Even the apostrophe has been moved. Current WPM: 8.