05 November, 2008

yayyyy

To quote some guy I saw maybe 15 minutes ago, “I am looking at everything and I only see one of shit, which means I am not drunk yet.”

30 October, 2008

Smily icon

It is amazing to me how you can write a really scathing, mean thing to somebody and then end it with :) or ;P or whatever, and they won't get upset at all.  Do people really get that complacent when they see a smile?  Really?

Also, when I spend a really long time doing statistics, I begin to wonder why we work that way.  It's like, grab a random human, and you can't be sure how he or she will act.  But grab 500, and you know exactly how they will act.

You don't know which ones will do what, but you know how many people will do what.  You hear a lot of people arguing that we are individuals and sociology is bullshit, but damn.  If everybody had truly free will, wouldn't we be less predictable?

Or would we?  Do any of the 3 people who read this believe in free will?  Please explain why you think this way.

Cheers.

Actual “Matt’s Life” update post!

Hey friends!

Welcome to an episode of Matt’s Life!

Actually I shouldn't write this post because I have homework.

Thank you for being a part of today’s episode of Matt’s Life!

23 October, 2008

Oh my god

How can I live without the gospel version of Правда о мечте? Spoiler: I can't.

12 October, 2008

Hi Molly

HI MOLLY!

Okay so anyway today I have mixed feelings about my life because I am starting to fall behind in my homework.  I am still on top of everything, but I am less on top of everything than I used to be, and am getting dangerously close to getting into a situation.

But I think I can make it right, so that's good.

That is my blog post for today!

Oh, and I am getting into typesetting.  Check back soon (in two months) and I will post a pdf file that is well-typeset.  Exciting!!

Lonely!

Lonely!

12 September, 2008

I like this way of looking at it

There is such a thing as a stupid question, and they are the easiest to answer.

04 August, 2008

Hey Molly!

Want to hang out on Wednesday?

Ellipses

The ellipsis, unlike the dash, should almost always have spaces on either side (and also in between periods if you aren't using a special ellipsis glyph—this . . . vs. this …).  The exception is with parentheses, dashes, and quotes.  Also, when quoting something that already has ellipses in it, you should enclose your ellipses in hard brackets like so: […].

If you leave out the end of a sentence, odd as it looks, you are to put your period a space away from the ellipsis … .  Here's how you start a sentence with an ellipsis.  … And here's the part you didn't leave out.

My own personal taste is that in both of those cases, you may as well put the ellipses in hard brackets, just so it looks more like a single entity, and not just four periods.

Slainte!

An important question of differences

What is the difference between having a good thick moustache, and being a superhero?

If I knew the answer to that, I wouldn't be here.

01 August, 2008

The hyphen, en dash, and em dash

So I just learned about the three types of dashes.  In handwriting, it was a sort of unwritten rule about the uses of short, medium, and long dashes.  But then typesetting came into being, and we now have different names for each dash.

The Hyphen

The hyphen is the shortest of the three and is way overused.  It has three functions.  In writing, it combines two words.  In math, it is the minus sign.  It also serves to join a series of numbers, like a phone number.  For example:

Risk-taker.
5-3=2
555-5555
Nineteenth- and twentieth-century.

You can find it on a qwerty keyboard between 0 and =.

The En Dash

The en dash is so named because it is typeset to the width of a lowercase n, longer than the hyphen.  It is designated for a range, but can also be used in place of a hyphen if there is already a hyphen present.  For example:

Non–risk-taker.
Pages 23–48.
July 29–August 12

On a mac, it is the same key as the hyphen, but press option.  On a pc, good luck.

The Em Dash

The em dash is the width of a capital M, about twice as long as the en dash.  It is similar to parentheses most of the time.  Think of it as an interruption.  It is also used in dialogue to indicate an actual interruption.  For example:

On the 12th—the day of the invasion—we will leave before dawn.

“Hey man, all I'm saying is—”
“I don't care what you're saying!”

On a mac, it is once again the hyphen key, but with shift-option.  Once again, on a pc, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Rules

Never put a space next to any kind of dash, with only one exception.  Look at the last hyphen example.  This is called a “hanging hyphen” and is totally cool.  Otherwise, never put spaces around dashes or hyphens.  People who do that are considered to be wrong.

If you are in a situation where you can only use hyphens, use a hyphen in place of an en dash, and use two hyphens in place of an em dash.

Education!

22 July, 2008

History of &

Did you know that & is from the Latin "et"?  The upper loop is a lower case e, all with the line going down and to the right.  The line going up and right used to always have a horizontal line at the tip.  This went out of fashion in the age of the typewriter, kind of like how $ used to have two lines.

So yeah, that makes me like & a lot more.  Incidentally, did you know that $ was born from US?  The U was written over the S, and people eventually stopped writing the bottom part of the U, making it two vertical lines.  Then that was too hard for typewriters, so it became one vertical line.

MAGIC

Also, Molly!

Molly gets back in a week!  Molly gets back in a week!  Molly gets back in a week!

Is it okay when people type "tixx" instead of "tickets"?

(no)

17 July, 2008

Heh.

I'll know that I am famous when I get junk messages advertising me naked.  So anyway I got Linux working on my mac.  It is an unofficial PowerPC release of Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron).  It is unofficial because Ubuntu stopped supporting PowerPC a while ago.  And, since I have a PowerPC computer, I don't have much of a choice there.  I'm glad though—I can use OS 9 programs on my mac, and mactels cannot do that.  I'm going to be very sad when I can't play the Fool's Errand anymore.

That's all I feel like writing about right now.

My newest junk message…

Subject:   :)
From: Current Brackeen

Hey,

Fuck beer! Got sexy girl?
Click here [link excluded because it is probably a virus made for idiots]

16 July, 2008

ugh

Why do spammers think that I want discounts on "w4tches"?  I mean, do they know anything?  At all?

14 July, 2008

Dual OSX-Linux project

I am tired of not having Linux and not knowing how to use Linux so I am going to get Linux and install it on my laptop.  This will be more than a little cumbersome, because I will have to back up everything, erase and partition the hard drive (I'll probably give Linux 20GB), clean install macosx, and then linux.

Right now I'm looking most favorably at Ubuntu, but also a little at Yellowdog and Gentoo.  This will take some research, because I don't want to fuck up my computer.

I'll keep you updated, I guess.

08 July, 2008

Alucard Coat

So the coat is almost finished, I am going to go in tomorrow to try it on to make sure she got it right before she stitches it back up.

Exciting!

Man I don't think I'm going to be able to not wear this coat a lot.

02 July, 2008

Junk mail

I keep getting a junk message with the subject "what a stupid face you have here lachancem". I am Matt LaChance and I approve this message.