2011 — 14 February: Monday

Valentine's Day?¹ If the motorway noise is any guide, the world and his wife is already up and at 'em. Considering it's only 06:46 or so I feel quite sorry for the couple. Still, at least it's not raining. Now, where's all my car-hire paperwork? I may be saying goodbye to the delicious Prius later today. Indeed, I may even be driving it down to Fareham on that same motorway...

Say what?

Having just popped this...

... into my pre-order shopping basket — Heinlein being a hero of mine, and the years up until 1948 being much the most interesting (I suspect) of his long life — I'm amused to see that Amazon promptly suggested I should also consider Jonathan Steinberg's forthcoming "Bismarck: a life". That gentleman was one of my father-in-law's heroes and I still have on the "to be culled" pile a much earlier German-language biography that Christa liberated from his study.

I have chums...

... who, from time to time, send me links to the daily horrorshow that is the Daily Mail. I've now found the perfect answer, and have captured one of the results. Click the pic to generate your own:

That will teach me to browse the comments to Charlie Brooker's column.

It's 08:03 and I feel in need of some breakfast. And the sun is shining. [Pause] This strikes me as a disgrace. I shall continue to avoid pubs. (Not difficult.)

Turing is as Turing does

A worthwhile and entertainingly informative read. Source and snippet:

In May 1989, Mark Humphrys, a 21-year-old University College Dublin undergraduate, put online an Eliza-style program he'd written, called "MGonz," and left the building for the day...

Humphrys's twist on the Eliza paradigm was to abandon the therapist persona for that of an abusive jerk; when it lacked any clear cue for what to say, MGonz fell back not on therapy clichés like "How does that make you feel?" but on things like "You are obviously an asshole," or "Ah type something interesting or shut up." It's a stroke of genius because, as becomes painfully clear from reading the MGonz transcripts, argument is stateless — that is, unanchored from all context, a kind of Markov chain of riposte, meta-riposte, meta-meta-riposte. Each remark after the first is only about the previous remark. If a program can induce us to sink to this level, of course it can pass the Turing Test.

Brian Christian in the Atlantic

I await news of my car repair. I hate waiting... [Pause] Well, it's undergoing a final quality control check. I should get a phone call "in a little while". Then if I drive the Prius down to the Fort Wallington (or "Fault" Wallington, according to the insurance company) Industrial Estate down in Fareham...

... I can exchange vehicles and drive home in my Yaris. A nice day for it. Meanwhile, the care-home has just called. Dear Mama needs fresh supplies of clothing if you please. I shall delve into one of Christa's wardrobes² and see what I can come up with. Hellfire. I can see this turning into a busy day of hassle. And it's only 09:50, too. Good job I'm retired.

A little while...

... turned into a couple of hours, but the Yaris is now ready. So, a quick bite of lunch, a quick trip to the care-home with a care-parcel, and then I'm off down to Fareham. It's 12:13 and counting. [Pause] 14:36 and all done and dusted. All I have to do now is nip out again to give the Yaris a drink and pick up some supplies. I have to say, the Yaris and the Prius are vastly different driving experiences³... I could be seriously tempted.

Back...

... just ahead of the hail. And having spent (for the first time ever) just over £45 and yet not quite filled the tank. Amazing. The stuff was only about 90p per litre when I first started driving :-)

Browsing Microsoft's "unofficial official blog" (here) brought me to this tasty T-shirt:

There was another...

... postal morsel shivering on my doormat when I drove the Yaris back...

... I only hope it will prove more entertaining than the nonsense I've just tuned away from on BBC Radio 4. Faith schools? Gawd help us. Do me a favour!

Timeless simplicity

I've been idly browsing through my copy of John Lane's book. It kicks off with the little story here, though I note this has leaked out onto the Interweb thingy:

Time for my evening meal, methinks. Fish, perhaps?

Ench by Ench?

Some of the art here is unreasonably beautiful.

Footnotes

¹  "Bah, humbug" strikes me as an appropriately Dickensian response :-)
²  To everybody who told me I should clear these out... it's a good job I didn't, isn't it?
³  The regenerative braking, for example. I found the light touch needed to slow the Prius did nothing at all to slow the Yaris. Nor does the Yaris surge forward in quite the way that the Prius did. And the gear changing on the Yaris now seems clunky when contrasted with the CVT drive train of the Prius. All in all, it's probably just as well I had a 20 mile motorway run back to help get me used to the Yaris again. Next time, too, I will make quite sure the previous driver hasn't shifted the seat, nudged the mirrors, and shut the air vents before I drive off rather than discovering this en route.