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In this blog post I’d like to take a look at two lines from Green Day’s American Idiot. You can come along for the ride if you like.

Don’t want to be an American idiot,
One nation controlled by the media.

Now on the surface this is basically saying, “Man, Americans are dumb because they listen to whatever they are told on TV/radio etc.”

But there’s another level to what it’s saying which I think was totally unintentional. These lines also imply that anyone who listens to the song and is influenced by it is also an idiot. “One nation controlled by the media”? What media is more controlling—sorry, influential—than rock?

If it was intentional, then I have to commend the sense of irony inserted into the song. But on the other hand, how smart is it to insult your entire fan base? I really don’t see them as being capable of that kind of subtlety based on the fact that their previous albums have mostly expounded on such deep themes as the fact that nothing good is on television, what it feels like to get wasted, and how incredibly bored they are.

The more amusing implication of this line applies to the band itself. The following songs gripe on and on about the evils of Bush and his agenda. Well let me ask you one question, Mr. Billie. Where did you get these ideas? Could it be from the…. gasp media? No, of course not…. you came up with them by thinking really really hard about it. (coughcontrolledbythemediaserge) I’d like to posit a theory: one good indication that things are going well in a country is when the punk rockers are all complaining.

It doesn’t seem like it at first, but it appears that American Idiot is actually a very introspective song. “Don’t want to be an American idiot….” A little late for that, sorry.

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• I could care less: This phrase is usually used to express complete indifference. However, if you are totally without an opinion, you cannot in fact care less. You can’t care less than zero. So the phrase means the opposite of what it is usually used to express.
• Extra virgin olive oil: What exactly are we talking about here? “Not only is it 100% pure olives, but the olives didn’t even mess around a bit when they were teenagers.” Huh? It doesn’t make sense.

I’d like to end with a reminder that any time you are going to get rid of some of your clothes, you should keep that in mind the last time you wear them, because you can get them as dirty as you want without considering the consequences.

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A while ago I was musing about Blogger. I noticed something was different about them when they dropped the requirements for having a “Oh, look, Blogger is cool” button on your site. In addition, they are one of the only free Blog services that doesn’t let you pay for it if you want to. (LiveJournal offers paid accounts, and Xanga offers the worst of both worlds: advertising AND bugging you to get the ‘premium edition’)

So anyway, why doesn’t Google want money from bloggers? My theory: to them, what bloggers provide is worth more than money to them. Think about it—most free blog sites have to charge for their servers and bandwidth. Google is different; they have a huge pipe and the most powerful supercomputer known to man available to them.

So what does Google, whose stated goal is to organize the world’s information, need? Well, the one thing their supercomputers can’t provide—intelligence. Computers can’t determine the relationship between pages without help from humans. The fact that humans like providing this valuable information to Google is extremely convenient.

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Adobe Acrobat: it sucked in 1995, and it sucks in 2005. OK, Adobe, you did well with Photoshop, good job—but have you thought to quit while you’re ahead? You’re just making a fool of yourself with Acrobat. Seriously!

I mean, when Apple can come out with their program Preview that is a million times better than yours at viewing a file format that you invented I think it’s time to reconsider things.

….geez. And people say Linux programs have poor user interfaces. To date I’ve never seen a Linux desktop program with a worse interface than Adobe Acrobat.

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What do all these phrases have in common?

• Switched On
• Space Age Batchelor Pad
• Transient Random – Noise Bursts with Announcements
• Mars Audiac Quintet
• The Amorphous Body Study Center
• Refried Ectoplasm
• Emperor Tomato Ketchup
• Dots and Loops
• Aluminum Tunes
• Cobra and Phases Group Play Voltage in the Milky Night
• The First of the Microbe Hunters
• Sound-Dust
• Margerine Eclipse

First one to get it without Googling wins three points!

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Nothing to see here, move on.

Dang it!

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w00t—I am now a licensed driver. I got marks off for steering control on every single time except for one, but I still passed.

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My first Python program implements the simplex method of solving linear constraints equations.

Wheee…. Operations Research sucks, but Python can be fun.

Do I live a sad life?

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