'Tis the season

...to bake cookies with Melanie.








hmmmm...delicious.

By the Power of Grayskull

Well. That's it. I got my Degree. It's a Masters of Statistics.

I don't feel any different. Maybe it's one of those things that kind of sneaks up on you and you don't really realize you've passed one of life's milestones until you look back and say "hey, that was nifty." Like when I lost my virginity to a mechanical bull. Or like when Alex went back in time and brought technology to the Japanese to give them the edge over the allies in WWII. Luckily, the TimeCops caught him in the nick of time, and the allied forces won the day.
Do we have a clip from that?
....no?
....o.k. i thought we had a clip.

Small Victories by P.E.S.

Small Victories


I didn’t think of you yesterday.
A fact which makes me quite proud.
A small victory.
A step towards recovery from Eros’s poisoned arrow.
I didn’t think of the soft click
made by the worn metal latch
As you closed the door for the last time.
I didn’t think of the delirium
Created by your hands and searing lips
The madness and desperation with which our bodies merged.
I have been waiting for this day
The day I could write this poem.
Waiting for the macrophage of Forget to
gnaw away pieces of your tumorous love.
My patience has been rewarded,
And these words serve as a nepenthe.
A record of triumph.
A prayer made of dry grass


-PES

time frame

Well, I'm sorry to dissapoint all my Minnesota friends, but I won't be moving back as soon as I thought. I haven't been able to find a job and the stress of packing, moving, finding a job and an apartment seemed to daunting for the 2 and a half weeks I had left on my lease. So I renewed for 6 months.
I'm going to look for temporary jobs here while I keep looking for employment in MN.
Meanwhile I have a question to ask you all:

Some phrase popped into my head last night and I cannot remember the origins. Some girl was about to get into bed with some guy and he says to her, "Don't worry. I give you the 'no bone' guarantee."
I can't remember if this is an Olaf quote or a Red Wing High School quote. Can anyone help me out?

Peace,

SP

i'll give YOU a second derivative

In Stat773 we are working on different computational methods to solve integrals. Anyway, Chris Hans is lecturing away and at one point he starts to talk about stochastic processes and the like. I have never had a class in this material so I was more than a little lost. At one point I raise my hand and say:

"Are all Markov chains that have limiting distributions Ergodic by definition? ...I'm sorry, I have no idea what I just asked."

Which was funny to me and my classmates, and entirely genuine, I assure you. Perhaps I've been in school so long I can ask a fairly pertinent question without knowing what the hell I'm talking about.

ever after

"Cinderella's Diary" by Ron Koertge, from Fever. © Red Hen Press.
Reprinted without [sic] permission

Cinderella's Diary

I miss my stepmother. What a thing to say
but it's true. The prince is so boring: four
hours to dress and then the cheering throngs.
Again. The page who holds the door is cute
enough to eat. Where is he once Mr. Charming
kisses my forehead goodnight?

Every morning I gaze out a casement window
at the hunters, dark men with blood on their
boots who joke and mount, their black trousers
straining, rough beards, callused hands, selfish,
abrupt ...

Oh, dear diary—I am lost in ever after:
Those insufferable birds, someone in every
room with a lute, the queen calling me to look
at another painting of her son, this time
holding the transparent slipper I wish
I'd never seen.

so close, yet so far away

So, Julie Legler called me today and told me that the original applicant for the teaching position at St. Olaf has decided (against all odds) to take the position, thus usurping yours truly. She told me that they could guarantee me a spot for next fall... but I think I should forgo that invitation and start looking elsewhere for gainful employment. I mean, I would love to work at Olaf, but I also would love to be able to feed myself in the months interim. Ah well.
So, here's the rub. If any of you lovely Minnesotan people hear of a job befitting a Master of Statistics please let me know.
For points of clarification:
A Master of Statistics is not uniquely qualified to

1. wait tables
   
2. sell bodily fluids for money
   
3. dig ditches
   
4. be a live in nanny with a british accent and a scathing wit
   
5. design, build, or maintain weapons of mass destruction
   
6. breed show dogs
   

Thank you very much.

Farm Wife by R.S. Thomas

Hers is the clean apron, good for fire
Or lamp to embroider, as we talk slowly
In the long kitchen, while the white dough
Turns to pastry in the great oven,
Sweetly and surely as hay making
In a June meadow; hers are the hands,
Humble with milking, but still now
In her wide lap as though they heard
A quiet music, hers is the voice
That coaxes time back to the shadows
In the rooms corners.
O, hers is all
This strong body, the safe island
Where men may come, sons and lovers,
Daring the cold seas of her eyes.

I passed

So, i found out my results yesterday. My friend, Shari, and I had planned on going out to eat that evening (and I wasn't expecting my results until thursday) so we went out anyway to celebrate. We went to Don Pablo's and I drank a daqueri that had to be 100 fluid ounces. let's see if I can find a picture. no luck, though I find the correct spelling of daiquiri. Anyway, Shari tells Sean, our server, that it's my birthday. Being an honest Puck, I tell him it's not my birthday, but in fact I have just passed my master's examination. He says "hell, we'll sing for you anyway." So after our meal, which passed with much delightful conversation, they came out clapping and singing. I stumbled out of the booth, stood on a chair, and outstretched my arms. (because I just HATE being the center of attention). So they sing, Happy Masters to You and I get a round of applause. Much fun.
Anyway, I got home, made a bunch of phone calls and then someone walks in my front door. it's Jeremy, Joanne, and Michael, carrying a bunch of beers and visibly intoxicated (not Joanne, the DD). So they tell me they passed, I tell them I pass, I chug one of their beers and we go across the street to Damon's where we proceed to drink at an alarming rate (*editor's note: Peter was already more than a little intoxicated before going to Damon's). so i get home at i dunno, no later than 12:00am and....now's a good time to mention, i still feel a little drunk...so i was thinking about going to bed, but every time I closed my eyes I felt the world vacillate at an alarming rate. so i put in The Princess Bride and watched it. I ended up staying up 'til about 2 or 3, when I felt like I wasn't going to toss my proverbial cookies. and now I'm awake. it's nine a.m. EST and I'm still feeling a little tipsy. I guess I won't be riding my motorcycle into school today.
So, thank you to all who have wished me well, and for those who have wished me harm: TAKE THAT BITCHES!

your friend,
The Plug

Nos morituri

Well,

it went o.k.
I won't know the results until next Thursday. I know that I did better than last year, but whether or not it's enough to pass is beyond me.
Ugh, I need a vacation.

Thank you all so much for the well wishes and words of encouragement.
I'll let you know when I get the results.

Cheers,

SP

Long live the fighters!

In 9 hours it shall be finished.

Dynamic

T-Minus

6 days 23 hours 47 minutes 50 seconds.

second chance by Louis Mckee

In my dream I return
to the place I went
wrong, and given this
chance to change
things, I go on
down the way I went
before. Even in sleep
I know there is only one go—
and it went well
the first time. Where
it didn't- well, it will
be good to see her again.

Heat Vision and Jack

This has to be one of the sweetest things I've ever seen. My friend told me about this and said that it's a failed pilot. I'm not sure, it might just be a spoof (especially since it says this is episode 14). Either way, it's freaking hilarious. It's about 30 minutes long, just to warn you.

Enjoy.

The onus of waiting

34 days 21 hours 49 minutes 06 seconds.
This is when the world will end.

Well, actually no, this is not Donnie Darko. This is the countdown to Qualifier 1. Many of you have heard of Q1 or at least of other departments prelims and the like. This is the test to end all tests. This is the test that will shade the color of my existence from here 'til kingdom come. I have been studying all summer and have become slightly burned out. My buddy, Tison, and I have taken most of this week off and it seems like an eternity. I can feel the formulas leaking from my head. I know that I need to get back on the horse, but I am so regretting this chore. May the gods of Statistics grant me serenity.

Wedding!

I leave tomorrow to attend (and be an usher in) Annie Rissman and Andrew Pezalla's wedding. It is looking to be an absolutely fantastic time.
I love weddings. Everyone looks so good, and everyone is so happy. People dance, drink, and carouse to their heart's content.
Maybe I'll get married some day. Is everyone free next Thursday?

O.k. I'll get married next Thursday. Mr. Gubbins, you bring the beer. Fast Eddie, you bring the chips...and my bride.

drugged...

I am enjoying a rare moment of lucidity. You see, I hurt my back last Wednesday whilst playing softball. I could barely walk it hurt so much. So I went to the student health center and the nice doctor gave me muscle relaxants and tylenol-3 with codeine. together, the drugs knocked me flat on my back for the better part of four days. My back is feeling better now, though I'm still not 100%. And a pity that is, since softball playoffs start tonight. ah well.

that's the news from Columbus.

Safe journey spacefans, wherever you are.

Neverwhere

I just finished the novel Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. Lemme tell you, it was wonderful. At times it felt a bit...sloppy...but most of it was a ripping good read. Gaiman has a real gift for character writing. He also has an amazing ability to paint his fantastic worlds.

I first heard of Gaiman after watching the movie Mirrormask.



I watched this with Melissa and we both liked it so much we watched all the special features. it is there that we met neil in all his scruffy glory. he is best known for his Sandman graphic novels (i just ordered a couple off of amazon) and his handful of novels. he has received much praise from his peers and good reviews from the critics. anyway, if you're in the mood for a fun, exciting, and stunning novel or movie pick up mirrormask or neverwhere.

to blog or not to blog

Hey kids.

I don't really have anything to report, but it has been 10 days or so since my last entry. So here I am, filling the smallest corner of cyberspace with inane ramblings. so here's my question to you:
Would you rather have a lifesize bust of billy crystal tatooed on your chest, or have sex with a horse (you'd be on the receiving end).

next time you're at dinner with your in-laws this makes a great ice-breaker question.

-The Plug

born to be wild

Well, I finally went down to the BMV and took the skills test on my motorcycle. I passed and I now have a motorcycle endorsement on my license!!! For those of you who don't know about the process, all you have to do is pass a written test to get your motorcycle permit. This permit lasts one calendar year and has three restrictions
1) no riding at night
2) no riding with passengers
3) no riding on congested freeways

Having done all of these things anyway, I guess I'm not going to experience anything new, but darn if I don't feel great right now.



Another thing, I want to thank all my Minnesota friends for the amazing time I had last week.
Special props go out to:
Mr. & Mrs. Fast Eddie, Mr. & Mrs. Gubbins, Brother, and the incomparable Natalia (pictured below with yours truly)




Super profundo on the early eve of your day!

Truth, Justice, and the American way.

So I've been watching a lot of superhero related material. Justice League of America, Superman Returns, Superman the Animated Series, etc... so I would like to ask all of you:

If you could be a new superhero what would you call yourself and what would be your superpower.

Example: I would be called Young Nasty Man and my power would be to kill a yak from 200 yards away with mind bullets (that's telekinesis, Andy).

Example: I would be called Gamma Man and my power would be to make any object I touch become invisible.

You can also describe how you attained your power.

Example: I accidently gargled nuclear waste mixed with baking soda.
Example: I was born caesarean section.
Example: The earth's yellow sun makes me invulnerable.
Example: I was born of the union of Zeus, king of gods, and an ill-tempered banana slug.

a funny thing happened on the way to PT

So I ride my motorcycle to physical therapy. Physical therapy is located in the Wilce Student Health center. Think of it as a clinic serving the medical needs of OSU students. It's tucked away in an alley, so I figure I can park my bike wherever. I pull into the alley, and then begin to turn around. What I didn't notice, however, is that part of the street nearest an opposing building had an incredibly warped section.So I turned hard, bounced on the brick, hit the brake (to keep from smashing into the building) and promptly fell over (to my left). No big deal, as I was going roughly 5 mph. I fell over with the bike, cut up my leg a little, and scratched up the underside of my right leg...or so I thought.
I pulled the bike up, parked it, and walked into the health center. I looked at the back of my leg and thought "that looks pretty scratched up, but no big deal." Then I thought, "hmmmm...that actually burns a little bit." the adrenaline begins to leave my bloodstream and I realize that I didn't scratch my leg, I burned the ever living crap out of it. My leg must have fallen against the engine.
So the check in lady sees me looking at my leg and says "are you o.k.?" I say "Um...I think I need a little help." So she points me into the appointment nurse office wherein I say "Wassup. (or something to that effect) I need some first aid. Do you guys have a kit around here?"
The lady looks at me and says "You need to see a doctor before I can give you first aid. Let me see if there's an appointment."
At this point my leg is starting to heat up. Stay cool, I think.
Luckily my usual doctor, Doctor Colgate (who kicks major ass) was avaiable.
"have a seat in the waiting room" says she.
"my leg hurts" says I.
"he'll be with you shortly."

So I sit...and wait...and now my leg feels like someone is rubbing out cigarettes on it. My hands start to shake and I start to sweat. A nurse calls my name. salvation. she brings me in back.
"step on the scale" says she.
"my leg really hurts" says I.
"185 pounds" says she.
She brings me to her desk, sits me down and asks "What seems to be the problem?"
I look at her. I look at the blistering flesh on the back of my leg. I look at her.
"Um...the second degree burns on the back of my leg?"
"O.k. what would you rank your pain on a scale of 1 to 10"
"Um...it's hard to say. Let me show you. Do you have a cigarette?"
Takes my temperature.
"96.5..."
"Yeah, that could be because I'm going into shock because of the second degree-"
"Please have a seat in the waiting room and the doctor will see you shortly."


so I wait.
pain. much pain.


Dr. Colgate (who is my hero) brings me into his office.
"Hey, Peter."
"Hi, Dr. Colgate."
"What's the problem?"
I show him the back of my leg.
"Oh, goodness, hop up on the table." He calls in a nurse.
me: "My leg hurts."
Dr. C:"it looks like you have first and second degree burns here."
me: "yeah, and I weigh 185 pounds. I should really stop eating at McDonalds."

long story short, they clean me up, bandage my leg and send me off.
it feels better with the bandage, but it still hurts. the bike is fine, though the sideview is now loose. ah well.

this made me smile

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNF_P281Uu4


Oh the places you'll go.

motorcycle

So it's about time I showed y'all some pictures of Alice, my 1972 Honda CB350. She's beautiful isn't she?

What would you say?

On a cool Autumn night, you are gazing up at the sky when a being suddenly appears and asks, "What can I do to make you believe that I am God?" What is your answer?

sometimes popups can be fun!

I was watching some daily show clips and I got an ad with this link:

http://www.shaveeverywhere.com/index.html

and then check out the music video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpEsNrYEssw&search=bodygroom

I was intrigued. I went. I laughed.
Kudos to norelco for finding a way to market a product which many deem taboo.
Who knows, the next time you see me I may have gained an optical inch.

-SP

t-minus two weeks

One more week of class, a couple finals, and then it's a much deserved ten day break before summer classes start.

For now, Jen and Erik are driving to Columbus to visit yours truly!!!

You gotta love those kids.

Mama said there'd be days like this...

Word up, my homies?

I had a bad day. You know what cheers me up when I'm having a bad day? The Justice League of America.

I don't know...even the Justice League are having a difficult time pulling me up from this mood.
Tell you what. Why don't you post your favorite "pick me up" song so that I can make a feel good playlist for myself.
Thank you in advance.

Twenty-Five

Hey kids.

Well, it's official. I'm 25 years old. I'd like to give a shout out to Karen Grumstrup, my biological mother. I'd also like to give a shout out to Mark Sprangers, my biological father. Without those two people I may have never existed. Finally, I'd like to give some props to Alex. Without his amazing show of self-restraint, I would have been killed in numerous gruesome (yet creative) ways.

Peace out, y'all.

-The Plug

Petrus

also best website ever

http://www.peepresearch.org/index.html

I know that easter was three days ago, but can't we all still enjoy watching Peeps dissolve in Phenol?

Cheers,

SP

best website ever

Dudes,

My friend Bernhard (a.k.a. The German) sent me this from Deutschland.

http://peter.sprangers.youaremighty.com/

Sooo cool.

Happy Easter!!!

What better way to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ than by doing statistics while wearing bunny ears.

Wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?

Maybe I'm overestimating my blog's popularity...but I was expecting a lot more than two Fibonacci poems! Thanks to the creative individuals who posted. I'm guessing the second one was Johnsoep@stolaf.edu?

Anyway, please post more!!!!

I love you all.

Fibs

Check this out!
http://gottabook.blogspot.com/2006/04/more-fibbery.html

Poetry based on the Fibonacci sequence? Can you think of anything that would excite me more? No.

For those of you not familiar with old Fibonacci, he is most famous for a recursive arithmetic sequence that was inspired by rabbit breeding (i kid you not). You set the first value=0 and the second value =1 then any number in the sequence is defined as the sum of the previous two values in the sequence (i.e. recursively defined). so it goes
0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...
you can also set the first two values to 1 and 1 and it'll work out the same way (obviously). So here's what I want, I want you all to write poems and post them here. they must be of the form
1 syllable
1 syllable
2 syllables
3 syllables
5 syllables
8 syllables

like a haiku, only different.

The fibonacci sequence is truly a remarkable thing because it shows up a lot in naturally occuring phenomena. For instance, If we take the ratio of two successive numbers in Fibonacci's series, and we divide each by the number before it, the sequence converges to the golden ratio, Phi=1.618034. The spines around a pineapple follow the Fibonacci sequence as do the seeds in a sunflower. Pretty cool if you ask me.

so here's my contribution:

math
poems
so hot
so sexy
build the foundation
of transcendent joyous rapture

o.k. you guys can do better. post away!!!!

you gotta love the PEPY kids

On Cambodia

These are a few of the children of the PEPY school. These are the faces I will never forget. These are the individuals who now have the chance to receive an education thanks to the efforts of my friends Greta and Daniela.
For the past 4 or 5 months I have been helping these women by maintaining their website (www.pepy.org). I have been doing this as a favor for Greta and, honestly, while working on the projects that came down the pike, I never really thought about what the PEPY Ride was doing. In my defense, it's difficult to think of a school in a place you have never been and mentally picture the children of a race you have never seen. But when the opportunity arose for me to visit this foreign land, I jumped at the chance.

Here are some pictures:



The walkway to the temple of Angkor Wat.

---

Preah Neak Pean

---

Preah Khan

---

Beng Mealea


Our unofficial guide through Beng Mealea

---

These are a few of my 200+ photos. These were all from the three days we spent "templing" outside of Siem Reap. The last night I spent in Cambodia I went to a traditional Khmer wedding. Actually, it was the third and last day of a traditional Khmer wedding. The third day is dedicated to eating, drinking, dancing, and drinking. I didn't take my camera with but I'm trying to get some pictures that Kristian (one of the PEPY Riders) took. The hostess of our guesthouse (http://www.earthwalkers.no/) was invited to the wedding and was instructed to bring all her western friends along. The bride and groom got a real kick out of the 12 or so white people who came to the wedding. In our group there were Norwegians, Canadians, Americans, and a Briton. Initially, we drew many furtive glances, but by the end of the night, strangers were walking up to our table to play their drinking games with us. And if the Norwegians I met in Cambodia were in any way representative of the general population of Norway, then it is truly a blessed land...and my next vacation will be to Oslo.

I'll leave it as this for now. In my next post I hope to write something about the Khmer (cambodian) people and my experiences with them as a whole.

Thanks for reading.

tongue tied

I've sat down several times to start writing about my trip...but my words fail me. I don't even know where to begin. Cambodia has touched me so deeply. The people I met and the places I visited. My time with Greta and meeting the other members of the PEPY Ride...
I'll sit down tonight and try to work something out...and least start somewhere. Maybe I should try to break it into smaller, more manageable pieces like the venerable Andrew Olaf.

Sorry to keep you all in suspense.

stateside...

I'm back. I'll be posting soon.

-SP

Consistently Sexy

Click on the image to get a larger version.

What you see before you is a display of the astonishing (yet true) mathematical statistical prowess of one Peter E. Spangers.

Love from Ohio,

Peter

What do Kurt Vonnegut and Mila Jovovich have in common?

It was pretty amazing to see the master (Kurt Vonnegut) in the flesh. It's difficult to describe him...or even what I thought of him. his oddly rhetorical and oftentimes flippant style of discourse was a little disconcerting. I feel like he didn't say anything of substance for the hour or so that he sat and chewed the proverbial fat.
He made more than few comments along the lines of "George Bush is really dumb." which made the crowd cheer wildly, but left me feeling a little cheated. I mean, that's hardly insightful and it certainly isn't constructive. When asked what we can do to make a difference he said, and I'm paraphrasing here, that it doesn't really matter since the end of the world is neigh. I'm not sure if he was being prosaic for some effect...but if so, it was lost on me.
So...it was good to see and hear him in person, but I think he may be reaching the end of his public appearance lifespan.

Also a bit disappointing was the movie Ultraviolet starring Mila Jovovich. Let me begin by explaining that there are few movies I have ever watched during which I repeatedly say to myself "Dear God, let this be over." And this is coming from the guy who thinks Starship Troopers was a brilliantly wrought film (I'm looking at you, Martinson). Ultraviolet was plagued with horrid characters, cheap and unsuccessful attempts at emotionality, and a palpable desperation to make the movie seem epic. To all moviemakers out there, please, PLEASE do not play gentle music and shoot soft focus close ups and assume we're going to be crying our eyes out...especially when in the last scene, our heroine shoves a broken samurai sword blade through a man's forehead (after killing nearly 100 of his closest friends). Also, this does NOT constitute good dialogue:

Bad Guy:
You got hemophage blood on me. Oh, it's on.

(10 to 30 second dramatic pause)

Mila Jovovich:
Yeah
(10 to 30 second dramatic pause)
it is.



And this is one of more florid dialogues. It upsets me because virtually anyone, ANYONE, I know can write dialogue better than this. Stick Falconer, Nelson, and me in a room with nothing more than two 1 pound bags of skittles and a word processor and we're going to generate something that eclipses this garbage!

*sigh*


-The Plug

ohmygodohmygodohmygod

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is coming to OSU!!!!
http://www.osu.edu/features/2006/vonnegut/

For those of you not familiar with his work...you are utterly insane. He's one of the greatest authors I've ever read. His most famous work, Slaughterhouse Five, starts with the utterly provocative line: "All this happened, more or less." It's a quasi-autobiographical portrait of a man who has lost chronological perspective. One of the key events in the story is Vonnegut's recollection of the fire bombing of a German city called Dresden during WWII. For those of you who think the Allied forces were models of righteous valor, think again. The allies were involved in numerous acts of terrorism against the German peoples, most (if not all) of which are, of course, never taught in high school history.
Do a google search for bombing of dresden or the like and you'll see what I mean.

Anyway, I'm abso-freaking-lutely thrilled that he's coming to OSU. The last time I saw him was on the Daily Show about a month ago. he was looking quite aged, but he seemed as quick witted as ever.

Another note:
Vonnegut called WWII: "The world's second unsucessful attempt to commit suicide."
you gotta love that.


Leave a note and tell me your favorite Vonnegut novel!

a very mexican birthday

I'm heading out to celebrate my friend Victor's birthday. We're going to El Vaquero (spanish for The Vaquero) for dinner.
Victor is a really great guy. A real stand-up character. We're going to a Mexican restaurant because Victor IS Mexican....well, he was born in Wisconsin but both of his parents are from Mexico City, so he's ethnically Mexican. Anyway....

Um...

here's a picture of a dancing eggplant.

frickin' frickers

I just made up a post with pictures and insightful comments on the state of the world...but then I hit the back button instead of "hide preview" and it was lost. utterly lost. Damn you Gibbs free energy!!!

I'll try to reconstruct the aforementioned post. Until then, this is all you get. Take it or leave it.

Love always,

The Plug

Hi.

Not much to report.
I took my mathematical statistics midterm today. It went pretty well. I'm 95% confident that I passed.

Yeah. That's it.

what?

What do you people want from me????

I guess I do have another piece of news:
I'm going to Cambodia for spring break. That'll be cool.

w00t!

-SP

Alligators in fishbowls of liquor

Hi.

We (and by we I mean I) just got back from the bars (and by bars I mean bar). We drank multicolored liquors out of fishbowls. we got to keep the alligators floating in the fishbowls. the bar is called the Ugly Tuna Saloona. fun name.
I called Falconer. Falconer, lemme know what you thought of my voicemail.

Um....i think that's it. they didn't play the electric slide even though I asked the DJ and he nodded appreciatively.

Jessica's friend Elizabeth was here from Washington, DC. which reminds me...why did they name a state Washington. Now we always have to say "Washington state...." that's a real drag. why couldn't they have picked some other name. I mean, it's not like it's too hard to name a state. Anyone can name one. Just call it...like...new something. New York...or New Jersey. As long as there's an old one you can have a new one. who's with me?????

also, let me go on the record that I, too, am against human-animal hybrids.

Unless you can make a sexy woman look like a jungle cat. Like...oh...i don't know...CHEETARA!!!!. Lemme find a picture for you guys...




sooooo hot










she was my first love, you know.

39 hours and counting....

I need sleep. The fact is undeniable. The evidence is irrefragable. The want is inconceivable.

But still I have unfinished work...and miles to go before I sleep and miles to go before I sleep.

-SP

The disillusionment of 6 O'Clock

FATHER LAWRENCE
Young son, it argues a distemper'd head so soon to
bid good marrow to thy bed: or if not so, then
here I hit it right, our Romeo hath not seen his bed
tonight.

ROMEO
The last is true; the sweeter rest was mine.


Ahhh, what sweeter rest than spending the night finding complete sufficient statistics and grading 135 homeworks?
What tenuous threads of sanity remain as rosy fingered dawn pulls itself over the horizon? We shall see...

Good morrow to all.

-SP

Intelligent Design Revisited

Ole was gone for a month and I think his comment was consumed by the vicious Jabberwocky that is time. here was his reply to my post on Intelligent Design. It's so good I wanted you all to get a chance to see it.

Ole said...

Sorry. Coming to this a little late...no one may ever even find it!

Oh well.

I agree that faith (and here I speak not generically but of what I
would refer to as my religious faith) necessarily involves
irrationality and intangibility, but my experience of it is not as a
state of persistent or willful ignorance, of grasping on to a set of
tenets in the face of all logic to the contrary. (Though I do not deny
that it is this way for many)

Instead, I find faith a far more complex mixture of the rational and
the irrational, of the tangible and the intangible. It is a means of
making sense of the world that tries to feel beyond what it is we see,
hear, taste, touch and smell but a means that should NEVER ignore what
we sense.

For me, faith is s tension between feeling and being felt, grasping
and being grasped, holding and being held. Never is it merely a willed
act--something one undertakes as a personal project. As in "I will
have faith!" It is undertaken in community, as people (not person).
And because its matrix is the relationships between people, it does
not fall victim to 'god-of-the-gaps' reduction, because the capacity
for human interrelationship within and between communities (given our
extraordinary individual uniqueness) seems quite endless.

Unless of course we all came into existence a few minutes ago--or
that we are all merely figments of pete's imagination...
-----------------------------------------------------

I think I subscribe to the "we are all part of Pete's imagination" school of thought.

Thanks for the comment, Ole. As always, your insights are valued like rain on Arrakis.

Hidden advertising

Well, it's back to the grindstone. I have a quiz tomorrow in my mathematical statistics course. I have an odd sense of calm about it. As though I am a gladiator, resigned to his fate. "Nos morituri te salutamus!" they would call out to Caesar.

Anyway, check out this (personal) lubricant add. It's beautiful...and subtle. Look closely.

Beautiful Friends

My weekend with Jen and Erik was...quite remarkable. We had some beautiful weather which was conducive to walking, tossing the disc, and lounging. We witnessed a heated argument about fair trade coffee between two employees of a local java-hut called Brennen's. We saw the epitome of "condemned building" and were scared away by creepy noises coming from behind a closed door. We then ate at a local mafia run restaurant wherein the owner/cook exposed himself to our entire party.
This morning we ate at Jack and Benny's, and then the lovebirds flew my proverbial coop.

Here's a candid pic of the two on the beautiful OSU oval.



Thanks for coming down, guys!

Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream?

I dreamt last night...

I was a detective working with my partner on a mysterious murder. A young black woman was abducted in broad daylight while walking from a barbershop to her high school gymnasium. The two buildings are less than 400 meters apart. For the duration of the case we were staying at someone's house in town, I think it was John Goodman, but I could be wrong. I think he was a cross between John Goodman and my dad.
One night I fall asleep at this man's house and I have a dream. That's right, in my dream I fall asleep and have a dream. When I wake up, my partner is doing Tai Chi in the living room. I ask him how he can wake up so early and he tells me no matter how early I wake up he'll always be awake before me. So as he's doing his Tai Chi he asks me about my dream.
I tell him that in this dream, a woman stands behind a table whereupon sits a giant, frosted cake. Her face is painted like a Geisha and she's holding a giant knife. My perspective is something like the camera on a cooking show. The woman then sticks the knife into the very edge of the cake and proceeds to peel off the frosting on the edge of the cake like it was an orange peel. The cake underneath is a deep yellow-orange color. She says something which implies it was my idea to remove the frosting because I want a piece of cake with no frosting. After she peels away all the frosting she plunges her face into the top of the cake. She lifts her head and I can see that her makeup is running down her face. The cake is absolutely ruined, smashed into little pieces. She reaches into the pile of cake and pulls out a flat, smooth crystal heart that's about 5 inches tall. Within this heart is etched (probably with lasers) the two masks that represent theater (the smiling mask and the frowning mask).
And then I woke up (from my dream within a dream). I told my partner this story and he asked me for more detail, implying that this dream had some great importance to our case.
I told him I couldn't remember anything else and then I woke up (for real).


Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream.
-E.A. POE

A visitation from Ann Arbor

Erik and Jen are coming down for the weekend!!!

I love visits from friends. It makes a week of studying, meetings, and teaching go that much faster.
Our agenda:

1. Play Cranium while drunk
2. Eat at Cafe Bella
3. Go to the bars and hit on underclassmen

and that's all I have so far.

Good morning Spacefans, wherever you are.

Self-Improvement

Just before she flew off like a swan
to her wealthy parents' summer home,
Bruce's college girlfriend asked him
to improve his expertise at oral sex,
and offered him some technical advice:

Use nothing but his tonguetip
to flick the light switch in his room
on and off a hundred times a day
until he grew fluent at the nuances
of force and latitude.

Imagine him at practice every evening,
more inspired than he ever was at algebra,
beads of sweat sprouting on his brow,
thinking, thirty-seven, thirty-eight,
seeing, in the tunnel vision of his mind's eye,
the quadratic equation of her climax
yield to the logic
of his simple math.

Maybe he unscrewed
the bulb from his apartment ceiling
so that passersby would not believe
a giant firefly was pulsing
its electric abdomen in 13 B.

Maybe, as he stood
two inches from the wall,
in darkness, fogging the old plaster
with his breath, he visualized the future
as a mansion standing on the shore
that he was rowing to
with his tongue's exhausted oar.

Of course, the girlfriend dumped him:
met someone, apres-ski, who,
using nothing but his nose
could identify the vintage of a Cabernet.

Sometimes we are asked
to get good at something we have
no talent for,
or we excel at something we will never
have the opportunity to prove.

Often we ask ourselves
to make absolute sense
out of what just happens,
and in this way, what we are practicing

is suffering,
which everybody practices,
but strangely few of us
grow graceful in.

The climaxes of suffering are complex,
costly, beautiful, but secret.
Bruce never played the light switch again.

So the avenues we walk down,
full of bodies wearing faces,
are full of hidden talent:
enough to make pianos moan,
sidewalks split,
streetlights deliriously flicker.


-- Tony Hoagland

Everything Ends

It's over. I finished the final season, Season 5, of Six Feet Under.
The last episode ended with a montage set to the song "Breathe me" by Sia. Wether it was the music or the montage or a combination of the two, I'm not sure...but whatever it was, it absolutely devastated me. Not many works of fiction have affected me that deeply. Yeah, good show.

-SP

of mice and mollusks

Today was a good day.

For an interesting debate on the ethical implications of intent vs. result, check out the Falconers' blog:
http://alexanderica.blogspot.com/

For an incredibly funny flash cartoon check out
http://www.ultimateshowdown.org/

Other than that, I've got nothing.
May the universe support you in all your best intentions.

-Sprocketplug

A debt of gratitude...

O.k. here's the deal. I owe Erik Johnson a huge debt of gratitude for introducing me to Radiohead. I don't know where I'd be right now without their musical genius. So, Erik, I publicly (well, kind of publicly) thank you. You are like a golden god unto my musical awareness.

Also, in honor of Dr. MLK Jr. Day, we all ought to be nice to one another.

"I just want to do God's will. And he's allowed me to go to the mountain. And I've looked over, and I've seen the Promised Land! I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land."

-Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Friday the 13th

It's dark, stormy and I'm going out to the bar with Dan and a bunch of the firsties. Who knows, maybe I'll find enlightenment along the way. At the very least I hope to find a little alcohol to soak my troubled psyche.

Egesegedre.

intelligently design this, buddy.

I was reading an article that was posted on Slashdot.org yesterday. The article stated that scientists have discovered the mechanisms by which a honey bee flies. No big deal, you say. Well, probably not, but the article pointed out that one argument used by proponents of intelligent design is "Science can't be that good, it can't even explain how bees fly."
I really don't like this type of reasoning. This is called God of the Gaps...or something like that. That is, God's will/plan/presence can be seen in the unexplained phenomenon we encounter. Before we had a theory of gravitational attraction, people may have believed "this ball falls toward to the earth, because God wills it." Or "birds fly because god wills it." Now we have complex theories of gravitation and fluid dynamics that rely on natural law to explain these phenomena. Does that mean God somehow shrunk after the discovery of these laws/theories?
One of the first days of my intro psychology class at st. olaf I asked Dr. Huff, "Does a complete understanding of the functions of the brain preclude the existence of a soul." He had an articulate response that I don't remember verbatim, but he talked about God in the gaps and how it is folly to force God into those crevacies.
Doesn't faith exist without validation and vindication? Isn't part of the definition of faith a strong belief that needs not be supported with rational or tangible evidence?

Help me out here.

we remember thee, zion

I'm listening to Don McLean's "Babylon."

By the waters
The waters
Of Babylon.

We lay down and wept
And wept
For thee Zion.

We remember thee
Remember thee
Remember thee, Zion.

I remember the first time I heard this song. I was probably 12 or 13 and I bought the Don McLean cd for the title track "American Pie." I listened to that track and that track alone for about a week. Later, I put the cd into my stereo as I was going to bed and I let it run through the rest of the tracks. As I was drifting off to sleep this track started...and it broke my heart. It was so hauntingly beautiful. It makes me ache as if I lost something I never had. Like remembering a grief that was never yours. May we all find the courage to lay down and weep.

Macworld!!!

Steve Jobs starts his keynote address at 9:00am Pacific time, that's 12:00pm Eastern for those of us in Ohio.

This is like Christmas for all the mac fanatics out there. What will Papa Steve bring us this year?

everyone hail to the pumpkin song

This was the christmas for figurines. Falconer sent me this totally trippy Avenging Unicorn set and my brother sent me a wicked cool The Nightmare Before Christmas set. Here are some pictures of the TNBC set:

Off to the theater

Greetings from Castle Spreagle.

James and I are fixin' to go out to eat and then catch a showing of "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe." I'm excited to see the film.

um...yeah...sorry I don't have any stories about prostitutes or zany misadventures in downtown columbus.

Ave atque vale!

Beta Zed here I come!

Oh, hells yes warp engines!!!!

With wings on his feet

James is coming to visit!!!!!!
He'll arrive today, at 8:30pm Eastern Time. This will mark the second occassion that James has blessed me (and Ohio) with his presence. What a guy!
Leave a comment for James and let him know how amazing he is...or send a cash donation to:

Give James a New BMW
c/o Peter Sprangers
555 Harley Drive #1
Columbus, OH 43202

Oh, and good luck to Andy who will be spending the rest of January in South Africa! You gotta love that kid.

-SP

mathematical immortality

Looks like Missouri University have found the next largest Mersenne prime.

"The number that the team found is 9.1 million digits long. It is a
Mersenne prime known as M30402457 -- that's 2 to the 30,402,457th
power minus 1."

I called them last week with the number 17, but they said they were looking for something a little larger. Guess they weren't kidding.
[[[update 01-05-06: n.b. 17 is not a Mersenne prime.]]]

Also, I have just beaten Final Fantasy VII.
The victory is bittersweet. My heart swells with pride to know that I, Corwin, have defeated the evil Sephiroth and saved the planet from a horrible destruction. But what shall I do now? For what goal shall I focus my attentions and near limitless power? Will there ever be a more worthy adversary than the god-like Sephiroth? Truth be told, I leveled up pretty intensely before the final battle and that poor shmuck only took two attacks before dropping like an inebriated freshman. He was all "I'm going to cast my Supernova Summon and do 5,000 points of damage." and I was all "I eat Supernovae for breakfast, you ninny." and then he was all "Oh, crap." and I was all Omnislash!!!! slice, whack, skewer, chop, slash, THWACK. And down he fell like the aforementioned underclassman. Long live the fighters!

Is all that we see or seem...

Last night I dreamt that Mikaela and I were US government trained assassins, sent to kill Pol Pot at the height of the Khmer Rouge's dominance. Through cunning and ruthless tactics, we completed our mission and escaped on a supersonic jet airliner.


In an unrelated note, I watched "Eternal Sunshine..." this weekend (hence the inspiration for the title of my blog) and I truly believe that Charlie Kaufman is one of the greatest screenwriters of all time. That film was written from a place of such wisdom and honesty. I feel like the entire film is an offering.

Hesitation...one-love

Lynne and I agree, blogs are an odd thing.
What does one write in a blog? Do I tell you the details of my day? Do you care about those details? Do I use this as a sounding board for my deepest thoughts and darkest desires? How personal can one get on a blog?
So, I hesitate to start down this slippery slope of blogdom.
But the fact remains, I came here. I signed up for a blog. I was sent for. We'll see how this develops.