It looks like...

It looks like ... it's going to be The Donald vs. The Hillary.  Oh, joy.

It's still possible that we could have a contested Republican convention, and the Republican-powers-that-be will pull Jeb out of whatever hole he fell into, or draft Ryan or Romney, or nominate Bozo the Clown.  I don't think that's very likely, though.  On the conservative (well, non-progressive, sort of, anyway) side it looks most likely that The Donald will be our choice.  Pardon me while I go vomit.  I wish there was a way to invest in European comedians, though...

It's also possible that The Hillary will be indicted or even charged in the email scandal.  I've no idea what would happen after that, though I suppose that depends largely on exactly when that happened.  If it happened before the Democratic convention, they could cobble up some sort of procedure to get another nominee – in that case, it seems most likely it would be Bernie.  If she was indicted sometime closer to the election, I'm not sure what the Democrats could do.  Can they change their nominee after selecting one at their convention?  I don't know what the rules are there.  And I wouldn't put it past her to just keep right on running, unless they actually hauled her away.  In any case, I think the most likely outcome here is that she is not indicted or charged, and she will be the Democratic nominee.

If it's The Donald vs. The Hillary, I won't be voting.  No way either one of them is getting my vote...

Paradise phone mystery...

Paradise phone mystery...  For the past two days we've been inundated with marketing phone calls.  We don't answer them; our Sentry 2 blocks them for us after a single ring.  I Google the numbers to see who it is calling us, and they've ranged from healthcare insurance marketers (including one particular company that's called us 12 times already!) to political pollsters to home appliance warranty scams.  Generally we've been getting just a few calls a week, but suddenly we're getting dozens each day.  Very annoying, even with the call blocking capability.

I'd love to know why we're suddenly being targeted by so many companies.  My suspicion is that some company has decided to sell our contact information to a popular marketing list...

No giraffes were injured in this production...

No giraffes were injured in this production...  Because it's an animation, silly!  I published a clip from this last year, but now the whole thing is on line.  You'll definitely want to full-screen this one.

Computer animation is getting to the point where it's actually challenging to detect that it's not real...

Out here in Paradise...

Out here in Paradise ... I have little doubt that nearly everyone would behave just as this homeless veteran does.  I wouldn't be nearly as confident just 12 miles away in Logan, and in San Diego I'd be must as dumbfounded as the creators of this video were...

With any luck at all...

With any luck at all ... you should now see a little “Amazon” link at right, toward the top.  If it's there, you can use it to shop on Amazon.  Anything you buy while you're there will send me a small referral payment – but won't cost you a penny more.  I'd sure appreciate your using that link to do your Amazon shopping – it will help me pay for the bandwidth used when you're reading my blog...

Update: reader Richard Clark noted that ad blockers were (potentially) blocking the logo I'd put up earlier (thanks, Richard!).  I've changed it now to a different technique that I hope avoids that issue...

The puppies are born!

The puppies are born!  The mom (Sissy) had nine puppies, starting yesterday midday and ending early this morning.  Mom's doing fine, and eight of the nine are in good shape; the last is wheezing a bit (still has fluid in the lungs).  Five girls, four boys.  One of these puppies will be ours, and possibly two (because this was an unexpectedly large litter, and we don't want our breeder to end up with a puppy that has no home).

Good doggie!

Good doggie!

What's the right thing to do...

What's the right thing to do ... with primitive indigenous cultures?  We've all heard the stories about the “Stone Age” people still living in places like South America or New Guinea.  Conventional wisdom is that we should carefully isolate such populations, and “allow” them to live as they always have.

This has always bothered me.  This policy, beloved by progressives everywhere, effectively condemns those populations to lives filled with pain and death that our medical prowess has long since banished.  If they break a leg, they may be crippled for life as we refuse to intervene.  The children of these cultures are deprived of an education that we consider to be the birthright of our children.  I could go on and on in this vein.  Why do we think this is the right thing to do?  I've never understood that.  How can “preserving” a culture be more important than welcoming these peoples to the advantages of modern civilization?  It seems cruel and horribly patronizing to me.

Rarely do I see anyone else making those points.  I spotted one such case this morning...

On the Martian plateau...

On the Martian plateau ... is Curiosity.  What a view!

Weather radar picture...

Weather radar picture...  We're right where the precipitation turns from rain to snow...

Soup good. Soup my friend...

Soup good.  Soup my friend...  Debbie made a really nice soup for supper yesterday, accompanied by some dinner rolls made from frozen dough.  The soup was outstanding: a cheesy broth, laden with mushrooms, sausage, and veggies.  The rolls were good – not the best we've ever had, but perfectly decent dinner rolls...

Dang it!

Dang it!  More snow in Paradise (the photo is out our back window just now).  The temperature outside is 35°F; it just might stick for a while...

Happy pi day!

Happy pi day!  More about it here, and the first 100 digits in base 2, in case you didn't know them:

11.00100 10000 11111 10110 10101 00010 00100 00101 10100 01100 00100 01101 00110 00100 11000 11001 10001 01000 10111 00000

Another typically interesting post...

Another typically interesting post ... by Eric S. Raymond, this one on the link between autism and genius.  In it he makes an observation that immediately resonated with me: that high achievement (actually, “genius-level capabilities” is how he puts it) are enabled or promoted by not caring about social conventions (or, as he puts it much more colorfully, “not giving a shit about monkey social rituals”).  His thesis is that autistic people get this for free – it comes with the territory – and other high achievers have to learn how to do it.  The (unstated by him) corollary is that social convention is an enormous impediment to achievement.

Fascinating observation, and it rings very true to me...

The Mediterranean Sea was created...

The current Mediterranean Sea was created ... about five million years ago, when the Atlantic Ocean breached the natural dam at what is today the Straight of Gibraltar.  I'd read in the past that it took several centuries to fill up the Mediterranean Sea to match the Atlantic Ocean's level.  Now there's a new report that says it was filled in as little as a few months, and at most two years.  To do that, water flowed at rates of up to 300 km/hr (190 mph) through a 200 km (125 mile) long channel.  That would have been a spectacular sight!

Prime surprise...

Prime surprise...  I ran across this interesting article about a surprising property of sequential prime numbers.  But even more interesting to me is this piece in the article, which seems obviously wrong to me:

If Alice tosses a coin until she sees a head followed by a tail, and Bob tosses a coin until he sees two heads in a row, then on average, Alice will require four tosses while Bob will require six tosses (try this at home!), even though head-tail and head-head have an equal chance of appearing after two coin tosses.

Have any of my readers ever heard of this?  Search as I might, I've found no reference to anything suggesting unequal probability of head-tail versus head-head.  At the moment I'm assuming that the article's author just misunderstood something she heard...

This guy keeps surprising me...

This guy keeps surprising me...  John Oliver with an outstanding (and still very funny) piece on the Apple encryption debate...

Rain in Paradise!

Rain in Paradise!  It's pouring as I write this, and the weather radar shows lots more headed our way.  The forecast has significant precipitation between last night and this coming Thursday, alternating between snow and rain.  All of this is with temperatures above freezing, so presumably the “snow” will be more like slush, melting shortly after hitting the ground.

We drove up to Porcupine Reservoir yesterday morning.  It's just a few miles from our home, and is the source for our irrigation water.  It's filling up nicely, up several feet over the past couple of days.  This rain will aid in that, reassuring all the local farmers.  It will also ensure a very green spring for us – and hopefully a bumper crop of wildflowers in the mountains...

Nodules on Mars...

Nodules on Mars...  Curiosity is investigating...

Three thoughts...

Three thoughts...  Not in any particular order:

1. I wish we had more reporters like Megyn Kelly.  If we did, I might even watch television news on occasion.  
2. The response to this incident by both the Trump campaign and his lapdog media Breitbart is disgusting.  This isn't the first time we've seen this sort of thing in the U.S., but it's scary every time we do.  
3. Andrew Breitbart must be rolling in his grave at the actions of organization now using his name.

I hear knocking.  What could it be?  Why, it's the doom, at the front door...