character

"Being the kind of person your dog thinks you are."

bureaucracy

There's a certain attractiveness to bureaucracy. As in, once you get through it, you feel like you've accomplished something. When really, you've accomplished nothing. The red tape you had to go through makes where you are feel that much more... important?

Case in point. To get a government-issued ID card, you need to fill out a bunch of paperwork, undergo a background check, get your fingerprints and other biometric information taken and stored on the card, etc., etc. This process can take a long time. But once you get it, the card seems that much more valuable. When all it does is... um, identify you. Like any other card would. But if anyone could just step up to a camera, get a card printed in 30 seconds, and be done with it, the card would feel so much less valuable. Even if that card did the exact same thing.

There's no red tape separating me and Christ. No bureaucracy at all. It's freely given. Anyone can get it. There's no sense of exclusivity. And for some reason, that makes me value it less. It's really perverse if you think about it.

We're attracted to exclusivity. And in many cases, we create it ourselves. In a religious context, this might take the form of cults, secret rituals, etc?

prayer

Some time ago, I realized that I've developed this bad habit of keeping my eyes half open when I pray. And for awhile I thought nothing of it. But recently, I tried closing them. Completely. It helps. A lot.

scientology

The contempt with which many Christians (and really, most people) reference Scientology is eerily similar to that with which many atheists reference Christianity.

Don't get me wrong, I still think the idea of Xenu, etc., etc., is incredulous. In much the same way that most atheists view the resurrection with incredulity. I believe the term "zombie jesus" is tossed around a lot.

The only difference is, they're wrong! No really, they are. They as in the atheists. And Scientologists. And you know, if I stopped writing now, the above might be taken as a satire of the typical narrow-minded Christian. And it still might be taken as such. An inadvertant satire, if you will.

But I guess what I want to say is... you should never reject an idea out of hand? No matter how ridiculous it may seem at first glance; serious consideration at some point doesn't hurt. Because many great truths aren't iottmco (aha I just had to use this acronym).

** There are now Scientology commercials on Hulu :O

easy work

A lot of government jobs are on some sort of 9/40 schedule. You work 9 hours from Mon-Thurs, and 8 hours every other Friday. This still averages to 40 hours/week, but in reality, very few people work the full 9 hours Mon-Thurs. In fact, most people work fewer than 8. Where I work, a lot of people (especially the HR types) come in at 8am, have an hour lunch, and leave before 4pm.

So, every other weekend is a 3-day weekend; and this isn't counting government holidays, of which there are 10. Plus, you get your standard starting 2-3 weeks vacation time, and 2-3 weeks sick leave. This leaves very little time to actually work. And you wonder where your tax dollars are going...

Still, there are other jobs that have it better (in terms of time off). Community college teachers! No research, summers off, often < 8 hours of work per day, and a one year sabbatical every 7 years if you're tenured. Not bad...

fantasy novels

You read a novel. Say Game of Thrones. You're totally engrossed. You know dragons and prophesies are real, but the maestors (learned scholars) refuse to believe it. They gently counsel otherwise while ignoring all the obvious signs. You want to shake them and say, "you fools!"

Or, an example that more might appreciate. Harry Potter. Here, you mostly pity the muggles who don't know what's going on around them. But you let them do their thing.

We so easily accept these scenarios in books. In fact, I'd say most of us are captivated and drawn to them. But when it comes to real life, a lot of us are adamant in our unbelief. Why? Do we naturally long for fantastical plots that we know deep down cannot be true? Or are we just hypocrites?

democrat

In every election for the next four years, if I'm on the fence about a candidate, I'm defaulting to voting democrat. Simply because of what the republicans are doing right now.

grad school*

What's the point of going to school and taking classes if you end up forgetting the details of most of what you learn?

I think the answer isn't so much that:

learning these things, while not useful in and of itself, proves to a future employer that you are intelligent, hard-working, and capable

as much as:

learning these things gives you an idea of what's possible, so that when you come across future problems, you won't try to reinvent an inferior wheel; i.e. it gives you a catalogue of the state-of-the-art, which you can then reference for future googling purposes.

There are a bunch of examples of instances where:

1) a problem seems too complicated to have an elegant solution, but an elegant solution actually exists! (e.g. Kalman filtering) or

2) a problem seems so simple that a simple solution is implemented without much thought, when a more complex but much better solution exists. (e.g. string searching)

And so I find that what I've learned in grad school has thus far been incredibly useful, insomuch that I now know what to google, whereas before I might not have even bothered.

* this applies mostly to engineering, probably not so much to the liberal arts (but maybe?)