So I'm a fan of Bill Simmons, a sportswriter for ESPN. He wrote an interesting article about the NBA and how it's being affected by the economic downturn, which I highly recommend.
I know I've been pretty negative about the economy, and I'm hopeful that things are on the upswing. I've seen data saying that we've passed through the worst... but I have my doubts. In my mind, the fundamental problem is that we continue to lend $$$ to people that can't repay the loan - be it home mortgages, cars, credit cards, or federal bailouts. And while those have slowed down, they certainly haven't stopped. In fact, it seems like certain people want those loans to increase back to previous, non-repayable rates.
Anyway, with the NBA the cliff note version of the article I linked above is this: that NBA contracts are huge, multi-million dollar contracts, which are completely separate from attendance and revenue streams. That is, the player gets payed for showing up, even if the stadium is empty. That's bad for the owners, because suddenly they're kicking out millions, but not making anything. After all, why kick out tons of money to go watch sports when you don't have money for groceries? Interesting to see what happens in the next couple of years...
Friday, February 27, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Teaching
So I've decided that there are as many ways to teach as there are people in the world. I don't think its any surprise to anyone reading this that most people generally annoy me, so I guess its really no surprise that most of their teaching styles annoy me as well. Between law school and church I feel like lately I've seen quite a variety of teachers, so here some descriptions of teachers that drive me crazy.
The Preacher
Gets up and tells everyone, in a loud voice and with much energy, how they know what's right and insinuate that everyone should be more like them.
The Used Car Salesman
You feel like slime after talking to them. Uses poor analogies, doesn't really pay attention to what the audience is saying, but really wants to get his point across.
The not-quite Spiritual Giant
Trying to be so spiritual that you fall asleep listening to their monotony. Jokes are prohibited here, as is any practicality.
The Bum
Didn't actually prepare the lesson, so you read out of the textbook/manual the entire time. Questions are generic, and you feel like you could have used your time better by staring at a wall.
Socrates
Rather than telling you how it is, they ask you questions to see if you already know how it is. Really great method, especially if you don't like to teach.
OK, so I wrote this after I just got done with a class where the professor drives me crazy, and my mood probably dictated the tone of this post. Still, his teaching style is the absolute worse I ever seen in a classroom. It's not uncommon for him to speak absolute rubish for 50 minutes straight without asking or answering any questions, and in some cases providing incorrect/misleading information. He drives me absolutely nuts. Just a complete waste of my time.
The Preacher
Gets up and tells everyone, in a loud voice and with much energy, how they know what's right and insinuate that everyone should be more like them.
The Used Car Salesman
You feel like slime after talking to them. Uses poor analogies, doesn't really pay attention to what the audience is saying, but really wants to get his point across.
The not-quite Spiritual Giant
Trying to be so spiritual that you fall asleep listening to their monotony. Jokes are prohibited here, as is any practicality.
The Bum
Didn't actually prepare the lesson, so you read out of the textbook/manual the entire time. Questions are generic, and you feel like you could have used your time better by staring at a wall.
Socrates
Rather than telling you how it is, they ask you questions to see if you already know how it is. Really great method, especially if you don't like to teach.
OK, so I wrote this after I just got done with a class where the professor drives me crazy, and my mood probably dictated the tone of this post. Still, his teaching style is the absolute worse I ever seen in a classroom. It's not uncommon for him to speak absolute rubish for 50 minutes straight without asking or answering any questions, and in some cases providing incorrect/misleading information. He drives me absolutely nuts. Just a complete waste of my time.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Harddrives
So I was beginning to ponder making a list of some of the cool but unknown websites I frequent, when I got distracted by the topic of harddrive destruction/wiping. I know most people just tune out to this sort of thing, but it's important - think Identity Theft. You throw away your computer, or sell it to someone, and somewhere on the drive is your social security number. Not good.
When I was in undergrad, a buddy of mine took a computer forensics class at BYU. Once a month, the professor would bring in a bunch of old hard drives and they'd have to put together a profile of the previous owner. Scary stuff.
One might think, "I deleted everything, I'm good, right?" Not necessarily. Here's a brief explanation of why not, complete with some neato drawings I made.
Computer harddrives are magnetic based, and record information basically as a One or a Zero. Like this:
When we delete something off our computer, we normally think the data completely erased, and gone back to the 'zero' level on the magnetic tape in the drive. But the truth is, it never gets completely back to zero. It's more like this:
Now, most people don't have the specialized software to recover data when it's in a partial state like this. Some people, like computer forensics guys, police departments, and the NSA can. Oh, and some crazy people too - maybe your neighbor that digs through your trash trying to steal stuff? I dunno.
So what to do about it? There are a couple schools of thought.
1) Wipe the disk. Here's a discussion on how to do it. Basically the fastest way to do this is to fill the drive with meaningless data. This can be random data, as mentioned in the article, or just fill the ENTIRE drive with '1's (not mentioned in the article). While deleting doesn't get the physical data back to 'Zero', when you record data it does become a '1' (or close enough).
2) Destroy the disk. Definitely more fun. There some fun videos on how to do this with extreme prejudice. Environmentalists probably say that this is a waste of resources and hurts mother earth. But it's your stuff, and its your identity.
When I was in undergrad, a buddy of mine took a computer forensics class at BYU. Once a month, the professor would bring in a bunch of old hard drives and they'd have to put together a profile of the previous owner. Scary stuff.
One might think, "I deleted everything, I'm good, right?" Not necessarily. Here's a brief explanation of why not, complete with some neato drawings I made.
Computer harddrives are magnetic based, and record information basically as a One or a Zero. Like this:
When we delete something off our computer, we normally think the data completely erased, and gone back to the 'zero' level on the magnetic tape in the drive. But the truth is, it never gets completely back to zero. It's more like this:
Now, most people don't have the specialized software to recover data when it's in a partial state like this. Some people, like computer forensics guys, police departments, and the NSA can. Oh, and some crazy people too - maybe your neighbor that digs through your trash trying to steal stuff? I dunno. So what to do about it? There are a couple schools of thought.
1) Wipe the disk. Here's a discussion on how to do it. Basically the fastest way to do this is to fill the drive with meaningless data. This can be random data, as mentioned in the article, or just fill the ENTIRE drive with '1's (not mentioned in the article). While deleting doesn't get the physical data back to 'Zero', when you record data it does become a '1' (or close enough).
2) Destroy the disk. Definitely more fun. There some fun videos on how to do this with extreme prejudice. Environmentalists probably say that this is a waste of resources and hurts mother earth. But it's your stuff, and its your identity.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Weird Month
So I've had a weird month. Rather than write out all the reasons why, here are some short blurbs about the past couple weeks in my life.
- I almost got crushed by a garage door. No, really. It wasn't cool.
- I superglued my face, and got some in my hair
- I hit a bat in my truck. Impact was smaller than the horse I hit a few years ago.
- I was billed for something I returned over 2 months ago
- I made a pinewood derby car that had 7 wheels
- I wrote an excel macro in Visual Basic
- I drove in snow and ice, and had to scrape my car for 10 minutes
Friday, February 06, 2009
Home Cafe
I know everybody's interested in where I eat here in Lubbock, so in continuing on the theme today I went to Home Cafe for lunch. From the outside it looks just like a little Ma&Pa restaurant that will probably go out of business anytime soon.
Upon entering, I realized my mistake. The place has a old time Texas feel, replete with old black & white photographs and aging books. Every table is different, as are the chairs. And the food is pretty much made from scratch. I got the chicken fried chicken, which was delicious. This is definitely one spot in Lubbock that people should know about.
Oh, and no worries about it going out of business. At one point while we were there the line extended out the door.
Located at 34th & Gary in Lubbock.
Upon entering, I realized my mistake. The place has a old time Texas feel, replete with old black & white photographs and aging books. Every table is different, as are the chairs. And the food is pretty much made from scratch. I got the chicken fried chicken, which was delicious. This is definitely one spot in Lubbock that people should know about.
Oh, and no worries about it going out of business. At one point while we were there the line extended out the door.
Located at 34th & Gary in Lubbock.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Defensive Driving
So a few weeks ago I got a ticket. It was my first ticket in almost 5 years, so now I get to go to defensive driving. Frankly, I think it might be worth it to drive slow just so I don't have to endure going to defensive driving ever again.
However, I decided to take my course at defensive driving at Home Plate Diner so I could get a free Chicken Fried Steak dinner with it, and ice cream tonight when I go back for the second half.
But oh yeah, my teacher's freaky. I found some YouTube clips of him. Be scared.
However, I decided to take my course at defensive driving at Home Plate Diner so I could get a free Chicken Fried Steak dinner with it, and ice cream tonight when I go back for the second half.
But oh yeah, my teacher's freaky. I found some YouTube clips of him. Be scared.
Sunday, February 01, 2009
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