9-15-06

Meriwether Lewis, of Lewis & Clark fame, committed suicide.

9-14-06

There is a strand of bacteria that resides in eggs and undercooked meat and is invisible to the eye. It causes miscarriages and sterility. Thankfully, only in women.

9-13-06

9-12-06

"To my mind it was like he was raking up diamonds in this very strange vegetable patch." -- Professor Gridley

Ahhhh, poetry teachers.

9-11-06

Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter, died last week. He was stabbed in the heart by a stingray.

9-10-06

Learn to Play Bridge. This program is simply amazing -- a must for anyone who wants to stop sucking. You will not BELIEVE the things you could possibly not know about bridge.

9-9-06

It took me almost half an hour to explain the rules for Caylus.

9-8-06

A roll of two threes is called a "hard six."

9-7-06

Gay bathhouses.

9-6-06

The first correct sorting algorithm was not selection sort. It wasn't even bubble sort. It was generate-and-test: arrange the numbers randomly and then see if they're sorted. And if my algorithms professor is to be believed, it took the computer science community five years to come up with this.

9-5-06

One third of the software written for the government is never used.

9-4-06

Older men have a higher chance of fathering autistic children.

9-3-06

Arrow Tag. Fun and simple.

===

xkcd. Not sure what it stands for, but it's funny. Don't be discouraged by the fruitcakiness of some of the entries, particularly the early ones -- discounting those, it's a solid comic.

9-2-06

"Märklin", which I'd always pronounced "MAR-klin," is actually pronounced "MARE-klin."

===

Our hallway still smells like Cinnabon-blueberry-cheese-flavored vomit.

9-1-06

King George III was not a native speaker of English. He was German.

8-31-06

The Hippocratic Oath forbids practitioners of medicine from using knives.

8-30-06

If you're a contestant on The Price is Right and make it into the second position of the Spin-Off, and the first contestant goes out, it is mathematically advantageous to take a second spin only if your first spin is 55 cents or lower. If you get a 60 or higher on your first spin, you hurt your odds of winning if you spin again.

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The 19th century philospher Charles S. Peirce spells "premises" with two S's.

8-29-06

Windows XP has over 40 million lines of code.

8-28-06

Chickpeas and garbanzo beans are the same thing.

8-27-06

I taught Kevin and Dave how to play Ra. We played a game and they BOTH beat me. I guess I must not be very good.

8-26-06

Oh no, I'm a libertarian after all. Dang quiz ratted me out.

===

Tsingtao beer is made by Germans.

8-25-06

I'm back at Case. My suite is right next to a conference room that has several tables and chairs perfect for board gaming.

One of the stools in the common room of our suite is missing.

I bought a 48-pack of regular size Snickers bars at Sam's Club and brought it with me to college. This was one of the smartest things I have ever done.

8-24-06

Carbonated water causes bone damage.

8-23-06

Dark Messiah demo. It's a long download and the demo is short, but the game is incredible.

8-22-06

You can import your blog into Facebook. I still need to play with this feature a little to see if it's any good or not.

[9-23-06 note: it sucks.]

8-21-06

David Bowie's daughter went to Wooster.

8-20-06

Mandy is not afraid of board games anymore.

8-19-06

My barber used to play professional fast-pitch softball.

8-18-06

I liked driving at night.

8-17-06

Smoking, on top of all its other evils, is also bad for your eyes.

8-16-06

Theorem of the Day. Props to Andy.

8-15-06

BoardGameGeek has over 80 thousand registered users!

8-14-06

If smoking is illegal in bowling alleys (see 7-30-06), then why does every single table have an ashtray? I'm beginning to think Steve lied to me.

8-13-06

Today is Fidel Castro's 80th birthday.

===

Woody Allen is a competent saxophone player.

8-12-06

Instead of fries, you can now get a salad, Baked Lays, chili, or one of several other things when you get your combo meal at Wendy's. I hate fries. I've been waiting for this all my life.

8-11-06

In two weeks there are fourteen nights, hence the term fortnight.

8-10-06

80% of skin damage occurs before the age of 18.

[Editor's note: this is another "fact" I got from Sarah, so go figure. She says one of her friends swears by it and as a result wears sunblock everywhere. Whether that means the fact is true or merely that Sarah has really stupid friends is a matter I haven't the energy to investigate at the moment.]

8-9-06

Old Spice changed their basic deodorant. It's green now (instead of blue) and doesn't smell nearly as pungent or foul. I hope my mom just got the wrong one or something. Life will never be the same without the harrowing stench of cinnamon horseradish smeared into my armpits every morning.

8-8-06

I suck at Chinese Checkers. It is now the second item on my "Abstract strategy games I'm surprisingly bad at even though I'm good at chess and other such things" list, the other being Othello.

8-7-06

Female leg hair removal did not become a social norm until the Great Depression, when, too poor to afford real stockings, women shaved their legs and drew lines on them.

[Editor's note: Sarah absolutely swears she got this from a reputable source. But I still think it's a load of crap.]

8-6-06

Girls have a happy trail.

8-5-06

M. Night Shyamalan has completely lost it. His latest movie, "Lady in the Water," is downright apalling. When will people realize that he is a one-hit wonder whose one hit has been hit, and stop giving him money to abuse unwary theater-goers?

8-4-06

Moscow is the most expensive city in the world.

8-3-06

The GRE is nothing but reading comprehension, SAT-level math, and writing. Why did I waste $20 on a study book?

===

KGS is the place where most people go to play Go online. It's pretty cool and everybody has a ranking, so you know if you're about to fight a beginner or the grand master champion of the planet. It's also free.

===

I'm leaving for vacation at 8:00 AM tomorrow morning and will not return until very late on Saturday, August 12. I won't have internet access until then, but I'll write down what I learn every day and catch up on this blog when I get back.

8-2-06

A banana milkshake can still taste pretty good even if the banana in question is spongy and almost rotten.

8-1-06

Grinder's is a fine establishment, but don't get their BLT. It contains giant wads of not crispy bacon. Bacon on a BLT should come in strips, not wads, because wads are soft and repulsive.

The roast beef Grinder, however, I highly recommend.

7-31-06

The string used in tennis rackets is expensive.

7-30-06

Smoking in bowling alleys is illegal. People still do it anyway, though.

7-29-06

Graeter's originated in Cincinnati, not Columbus.

7-28-06

In the board game Life, there is a square that says, "Have tattoos surgically removed," which I always thought was bogus. It is indeed, however, possible to rid oneself of one's tattoos. The procedure is extremely expensive and makes the previously tattooed skin look disgusting.

7-27-06

Today I played Sheepshead for the first time. It's a fairly entertaining card game for five people. I don't know if I'd call it "The best card game on the face of the Earth," but then again, there isn't a whole lot else you can do with five people and a deck of cards.

===

In Sheepshead, as in other card games of German origin, tens are higher than kings. We just cheated and valued the king and ten normally. Not to offend the Germans out there or anything, but -- that's really stupid.

7-26-06

Score another point for Jeff: PartiallyClips.

===

Toothpaste has an expiration date.

7-25-06

We've been playing Ra incorrectly. The auction should only go around once. That would certainly make for much tenser decisions.

===

Goa kicks ass.

7-24-06

Many thanks to Jeff for showing me this blog. I recommend reading the first couple of entries to get a feel for what's going on, then going back to the beginning and reading the whole thing. Simply incredible.

7-23-06

Married to the Sea is a nifty comic. The creators live in Columbus.

7-22-06

"Awkward Antlers." If there's an awkward silence, you put antlers on your head and yell "Awkward Antlers!" Adam was kind enough to do a demonstration:



===

It hurts so much.

7-21-06

Box is slang for a woman's vagina.

7-20-06

Chocolate-covered pretzels are sickening. Salty and sweet do not mix.

7-19-06

venomous versus poisonous: something venomous will poison you by biting you. Something poisonous will poison you by you biting it.

My favorite book in second grade, Amazing Poisonous Animals, should actually have been called Amazing Venomous Animals.

7-18-06

A baseball cap will develop a permanent sweat band if you play tennis in it too many times before putting it in the laundry.

===

Jon Stewart's last name isn't really Stewart. It's Leibowitz.

===

Typewriter, perpetuity, proprietor, repertoire, and peppertree are all ten letters long, and all of them are spelled using just the top row of the keyboard. Yet since the dawn of time, there has been a fun fact circulating about the web that typewriter is THE LONGEST word you can spell with just the upper row. Considering it's TIED for the honor with four other words (and maybe others I wasn't clever enough to find), this nugget of ancient trivia simply isn't true.

7-17-06

Huge lats make you look ferocious.

7-16-06

"Bruce" is the official Anglicization of "Boris." And all this time I thought I ought to go by "Bob" (which makes no sense, since "Bob" is short for "Robert" and "Robert" has nothing to do with "Boris," but I like the name "Bob" anyway).

7-15-06

www.setgame.com

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Ordinarily I'm good at Set, but put eight people in one game and suddenly I suck.

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Women have smaller bladders than men.

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Kamchatka vodka, though it has the proper 40% alcohol by volume, is absolutely foul.

===

Beer turns bad if you chill it then let it get warm again.

===

You can word wrap in Notepad.

7-14-06

21% diluted vodka is absolutely foul.

7-13-06

Somebody left a giant bag of Chex Mix on my bed. I have a secret admirer!

7-12-06

"The internet is a series of tubes, which are arranged in a nebulous cloud." -- Christian

===

Christian: "What are we going to put inside these functions?"
Idiot student: "Constructors."

7-11-06

Cotton thongs are comfortable. Lace thongs are not.

7-10-06

Donald Knuth, one of the greatest computer scientists ever, the inventor of TeX, was a graduate of Case.

7-9-06

In a ping pong match to eleven points, the players should alternate serve every three points, not five.

7-8-06

Formaldehyde dissolves styrofoam.

7-7-06

Pizza tastes good with ranch sauce.

7-6-06

"So my mom's like, 'Can you turn that shit off so it'll stop beeping?', and I'm like, 'No mom, I'm not going to turn off your life support.'" -- camper

7-5-06

Some crayons are waxier than others.

7-4-06

"He who keeps standing ... is still in the same place." -- Arabic proverb

7-3-06

25-gesture Rock-Paper-Scissors.

7-2-06

According to the USTSA Official Foosball Rules, a shot that pops out of the goal is still considered good.

7-1-06

The most dangerous tree in the world is the manchineel tree of Central America. The sap from this tree causes painful blisters upon contact with the skin and potentially, if it gets into the eyes, blindness. Manchineel trees spawn a sweet-smelling fruit that tastes pretty good and will probably kill you.

6-30-06

"Live in a place and eat of its onions." -- Egyptian advice

"The cock that crows at an untimely hour must lose its head." -- Armenian proverb

Armenians have a sick freakin' sense of humor.

6-29-06

Quite a few of the campers are in love with Settlers of Catan. Today six of them played a game that lasted three hours and none of them complained. The game even commanded a small audience. The final score was 10-9-8-8-8-8.

6-28-06

If someone from another school tries to befriend you on Facebook, you can look at their profile before accepting the invitation.

6-27-06

"Big piles of meat are not fun." -- Christian, my computer game programming professor

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Experimental gameplay project. I haven't tried too many of them, but I do like this one.

6-26-06

Planarity was written by a Case student.

6-25-06

The campers arrived today. Half the kids in my class are WoW addicts. Another one has been playing Everquest for six years. Sigh...

6-24-06

You can insert assembly language into C++ code.

===

ABA games. Torus Trooper and Tumiki Fighters are pretty cool.

6-23-06

Ann Sathers, a restaurant in Chicago, makes amazing cinnamon rolls.

6-22-06

Gorilla glue. Like super glue, but even more super.

6-21-06

Sai, the weapon of my favorite Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, Raphael, are homonymic with the Greek letter psi -- which is also exactly what they look like.

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If you remove the letter 'e' from the word 'biotech,' you get 'biotch.'

6-20-06

In the game of Set, you can have up to twenty cards without a set.

===

I am legally blind.

[9-25-06 note: the kind lady who checks my eyes at Lenscrafters assured me that the second fact, which I got from Amanda, is not true. You're not legally blind until you're so freaking blind that even glasses thicker than Michael Moore won't help you.]

6-19-06

It is only in Ohio that you can avoid an eat-in tax by placing your order to go. In other states the tax applies regardless. In that case it's not really an "eat-in" tax but a food tax, which Ohio doesn't have.

6-18-06

The world record for a Jenga tower is 40 and 2/3 levels.

6-17-06

Everyone is familiar with the front of a Snickers bar: SNICKERS in blocky italic letters inscribed in a parallelogram. What I did not know is that the back side of a Snickers bar says SATISFIES in the same style. This must be new, because I've eaten many a Snickers bar following an abysmal evening at Leutner, and never seen it.

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A hot cashier recently began working at CVS. I think I made a very solid impression on her the first time I was there. First I fumbled about like an idiot for my CVS ExtraCare card because I couldn't get my pocket open. Then I couldn't get a five dollar bill to come out of my wallet. It snagged on some of the other bills; I yanked it and ten one-dollar bills spewed out all over the floor.

Today I saw the danger coming and took some precautionary measures. I prepared my CVS ExtraCare card and a five dollar bill miles before I approached the register. I paid for my goods and she gave me change. Things were looking good. But just as our exchange was about to conclude, I jumped the politeness gun and cut her off as she was wishing me a nice day. The conversation went like this:

Me: Thanksalot.
Hot Cashier: Have--
Me: Haveaniceday.
Hot Cashier: ... You too?

I am now determined to complete at least one transaction at CVS without making an ass of myself.

6-16-06

Sam's Club sells 72-pouch boxes of fruit snacks.

6-15-06

I didn't learn how to walk until I was one year and five months old. My startling incompetence could be seen at an early age.

===

The Russian chemist Dmitry Mendeleev is best known for his discovery of the periodic law, but the periodic table is only his second greatest contribution to mankind. As a graduate student, Mendeleev went on a quest to discover the perfect vodka. After one and a half years of (no doubt) grueling research, he concluded that the ideal vodka contains 38% alcohol by volume. We therefore have Mendeleev to thank for the tasty 40% vodka we see in stores today, and I think we can all agree that vodka plays a role of much greater importance in our lives than some stupid table with letters and numbers written on it.

While we're on the topic of vodka, let me add that the 21% nonsense you pick up at the drive-through is garbage, suitable only for mixed drinks or hitting people on the head with (preferably the ones who bought it).

6-14-06

You can construct a regular n-sided polygon with a compass and straightedge if and only if the prime factorization of n includes only 2's and distinct Fermat primes. A Fermat prime p is of the form p = 2^(2^t) + 1.

6-13-06

There is a card game called Hentacle. You can read a review here; some highlights follow:

"Hentacle is a fast paced game of, er, anime-tentacle-porn for 2 to 4 players. ... Truthfully, I see this game as being a very niche game, basically for fans of ... tentacle-porn."

"It takes an awful lot to offend me, and I happen to like anime. Truthfully, I've never seen any tentacle porn, but I have a passing familiarity with the genre."

"Special Cards can be played at any time, but there are only a few of them. Each girl has their own Special Card that can only be played on them. For example Chiaki, the Space Girl, has a card called 'It's In My Suit.'"

"Exclamation Cards are cards that can be played at any time, and are usually bad things, so you'll want to play them on your opponent. For instance, "Need A Break" forces a player to miss a turn, and "Performance Anxiety" cause[s] a player to discard their entire hand."

"The art is great! It is in anime/hentai style (naturally) and Mel Wong, the artist, did a great job capturing that vibe. Sure it's about tentacle creatures assaulting girls, but there's a lot of humor scattered throughout."

BoardGameGeek lists Hentacle as a "party game." I'll be sure to pull it out at my next family gathering right after Pictionary and Charades.

===

A third nipple is called a nubbin.

6-12-06

One of my classmates, Sean Santa, has a book coming out around August 1. It's called "Down and Out and" (I'm not sure if that's a really nifty title or a typo on his part) and it should be available on Amazon.

You may remember Sean as the computer guru who offered thoughtful advice such as "your megapixel output is corrupted" (see 4-4-06, below), but my favorite memory of him is from the fiction writing workshop last fall. In that class, everybody had to write a story and listen to his classmates critique it. Sean was the first person to speak during the very first story critique. "I didn't like your story," he said, "and I'll tell you WHY I didn't like it..." I think we all nearly crapped our pants.

6-11-06

Mr. Tatman shaved his moustache and looks years younger without it.

Graduation ceremonies suck, especially when the class president is a ditz the size of Montana. "Let's continue our vertical voyage, shoot for the stars and never settle for mediocrity." No, let's not. And let's not say "In conclusion..." but then continue spouting garbage for another ten minutes. Moreover: nobody cares about what your god damn DENTIST thinks, but if you're going to talk about it, don't include the fact that you saw him yesterday. It shows that you probably wrote the speech at 1:00 in the morning and don't have a [CHILDREN MAY BE READING THIS] clue.

6-10-06

Diesel pumps have wider nozzles than gas pumps so that people won't be able to fill their cars with diesel accidentally. In spite of this precaution, a friend of my parents successfully put diesel in his Honda, whereupon it drove for about ten meters and promptly died.

6-9-06

The Bexley High School drama director resigned last week for "personal and family reasons." But some people seem to think that the fact that he was arrested for having sex with hookers might have also had something to do with it. Read the full story here.

6-8-06

"Priapus is a god of fertility, protector of horticulture and viticulture. His statue, holding a wooden sickle in his hand, was used in the Roman gardens as scarecrow, and his enormous penis as a threat against thieves."

"... If I do seize you ... you shall be so stretched that you will think your anus never had any wrinkles."

Cradle of democracy my ass; the Greeks were screwed up. Read more here.