Balloonhead
This is one thing I too often get wrong. I'm generally an optimistic person. I'm not saying I think the world is a great place. It isn't. But I've come to believe, in all situations, by default, that I'll be able to deal with whatever difficulty gets tossed my way. I tend to keep my chin up and grin moronically at those around me, because the alternative is frowning moronically at those around me. And...
Tropes
In the summer of 1998, my best friend and I went to see the film City of Angels. We had each just turned 16, and were relishing the sudden ability on our parts to escape our parents' houses with borrowed vehicles. If we'd known better, I'm sure we would have chosen to see a better movie, but at the time, both of us were hopeless romantics. (Emphasis on "hopeless"; "romantic" is debatable.) I didn't care...
Non-Adventures in Dating
A couple of weeks ago, my roommate's fiancé was in town, visiting from North Carolina. I had met this girl previously, and if I had to guess, I'd say I didn't make a good first impression. It was a Friday night, I was still unemployed, and I was a few beers deep. I don't usually drink, so a few beers turns me into a certifiable idiot. Not that I need the beer to get to...
So What Now?
I live in California, near the coast, so the results of yesterday's election equate roughly to the apocalypse. At least, that's the sense I've derived from the people I've encountered today, at work and otherwise. I'm a little disappointed that both the House and Senate fell to Republicans, along with the presidency. In my limited experience, the political texture of Congress is far more important for its impact on day-to-day life than who's sitting in...
Patriarchy
I'd say that men and women are not on equal footing in our society. Men have the advantage. I know this from my own experiences, because I try to pay careful attention to the world around me, although admittedly my mind wanders more than I'd prefer. But how might I make this case to someone who asked me about it? How to argue the point? Here's my argument, which is a name: Elliot Rodger. I...
The Song of Songs
So I was walking down El Camino Real yesterday, which is the main stretch the runs through Silicon Valley, and I was watching people in their cars as they drove by. I find it fascinating how many Teslas there are on the road out here; I've never seen so many in any other part of the country. At some point, I glanced out at the road and caught at rather attractive woman alone in her...
End of Days
My favorite interview question: where do you live now? Recruiters ask this because they need to know if I'm willing or able to relocate to the city in which their office is located. I like this question because I can tell them honestly, "Nowhere. I live nowhere." Of course I go on to clarify what I mean by that, but not before letting a quick moment go by during which they can let their imaginations...
Adulting is Stupid
Being an adult is dumb. First off, I've become acutely aware that, since I'm currently searching very actively for a job, employers are venturing onto here and reading what I'm writing. That's made me remiss to be openly expressive on here, which defeats the entire purpose of this blog. This is one of the main reasons I stopped posting all the time. (The other reason being that whenever I go back and read something I've...
Then A Hero Comes Along...
A few weeks ago I spent some time in Sacramento. This is a city where you can turn your head to check your blind spot while driving, accidentally make eye contact with the person in the car next to you, and inadvertently find yourself engaged in an impromptu drag race with the other driver. This happened twice; I lost both times, largely because, in both cases, the other person was the only one racing. Now...
Data Science and Genomics
I've been reading a ton of technical books lately. The technical world at large, and in many ways now, the entire world at large, has an ever-burgeoning problem with volumes of data. As a society, we're producing more of it than ever before, in almost every domain and every industry. There's far more data than there are people who are capable of making sense of it. If you want to enter a technology field, and...