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I was reminded of this counting rhyme the other day when it popped up in a book that I was reading. The protagonist used it to decide which one of the three canned dinners to eat. It seems a reasonable way of choosing among three or more equally attractive, or repugnant, choices. For two choices a simple coin flip would do. And yet, there is nothing random about the outcome of a counting rhyme. It is completely determined by the choice of the first item we count. Because the counting goes on for a while, we get a perception of randomness, and it seems like it's the chance that governs it. It probably has to do with our innate psychological perceptions and our ability to hold only about seven items in our short-term memory. It is doubtful that counting rhymes that are shorter than seven words would ever be popular.

It is quite reasonable to imagine, that many events in our lives that require holding eight or more facts at the same time in our mind, would appear equally random. It would be a fallacy to assume randomness of events only based on our limited perception capacity.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 04:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

My favorite coffee shop, Borders Cafe in Champaign, will be closing these days. It will be replaced by 'Seattle's Best'. I spent many fun hours there, and it will be somewhat sad to see it go. Since I enjoyed their coffee products often enough, I also partook of their frequent-user program. Basically, I had a little punch card and I would get a free drink when the card got filled up, which would be after ten drinks. It may not seem like a big thing, many American shops have a similar program, but in most other places it would be unheard of. People would just find a way of scamming the system and in the long run the program would have to be scrapped.

Now comes even better part. Since the new cafe will no longer accept Borders punch cards, I was able to redeem the punch cards regardless of the number of points I earned. So I got two free drinks, one with five points, and the other one with only three (I had two cards). This again is a good business practice: it rewards the loyal customers even through the transitional times, and garners the good will towards the new establishment. It's a small thing, but it adds to an overall quality of life I think.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 01:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

are greatly exaggerated. Due to the Brazilian invasion, Orkut has become a predominantly Portuguese speaking social network. Brazilians are friendly people and they like making new friends all the time. However, since I don't really speak Portuguese, communication can be a problem for some of the non-English speakers. Which doesn't prevent them from trying. I suspect some of them use online dictionaries and translation tools, which leads to some pretty comic outcomes. The one scrap that I got today beats them all by far. It reads as follows:

Good evening dead Bojan
thank for the eulogy..

You cannot make stuff like this up.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 07:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

who needs Winter. Today was supposed to be the first day of Spring, but we woke up to a full Winter experience. We had the first snow storm in more than a month, maybe even two months. For a few weeks days were getting longer, warmer and sunnier, but that all turned around today. I got to use Sharmin's new snow-shovel for the first time. At least it wasn't a waste of a purchase. Man, I really need the nice weather to come already and stay.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 10:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A couple of years ago Sharmin and I were visiting our friend Wayne in Chicago. Wayne is an avid photographer, and like all true lovers of that art he looks down on digital cameras. However, my little digital camera has come in handy over the years, as anyone browsing these pages will notice. I am not too concerned with the artistic value of my photographs, I just go for convenience and quantity.

During our visit to Chicago I took a lot of pictures of the place. Among them was a collection of pictures of the sculpture called "Bubble". I took these in sequence at the approximately same eye-level with some amount of overlap between them. My intention was to combine them later on in Photoshop and create a single panoramic picture. As it's often the case, I got busy later on and I never got around it. Until now. I discovered that Photoshop CS2 has an automated way of combining pictures. All I had to do was open the individual files in the right order, press a few buttons, and voila, it was all done for me. You can click on the icon in the upper left corner to see the final product. It's not the best, but still pretty impressive for a small digital camera and no use of tripod.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 11:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

LEGO building blocks have always been my passion, ever since a relative (don't remember who any more) bought me the first boxed set when I was a kid. I oftentimes credit them for my creative imagination that has served me well in my professional venues. Now that I am all grown up and stuff, I haven't had much chance to play with them, but on an occasion I would buy a small set that would serve as a decoration on my work desk. Recently, with all the attention that Denmark has been getting in the news, buying Danish products suddenly became a political decision. This was as good of an excuse as any for me to go and buy myself another LEGO toy. Which I finally did today. Now "Uplink" the robo-walker is gracing my work area. As if I needed any more junk to put there.

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 09:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Many years ago, when the wars of former Yugoslavia were at their peak, an Italian newspaper ran a crossword puzzle that had "il capo di barbari" (the head of the Barbarians) as one of its entries. The solution to this question was Slobodan Milošević, the head of Serbia/rump Yugoslavia at the time. It was just one of many unkindly epithets that this evil man acquired during his infamous reign, the Butcher of the Balkans being another one that comes immediately to mind. It is hard to underestimate the sheer extent of evil that was released under him, and he is directly responsible for the worst incidents of genocide in Europe since the World War II. For the last few years he was detained at The Haage where he was undergoing a trial at the International War Crimes Tribunal. Unfortunately, he passed away yesterday and he will not be around for the conclusion of that trial. His death brings to a close an era, but he had done will be felt for at least another generation.

My brother reminded me of a joke that seems particularly relevant today:

When Milošević died he went to the Pearly Gates. There he was met by Sain Peter who asked him: "what are you doing here?" "So where am I supposed to go?", replied Milošević. "To Hell, of course." said St. Peter. A few days later a column of demons and devils, carrying their belongings in backpacks, shows up at the Pearly Gates. St. Peter also asks them what were they doing there, to which they reply "We are refugees".

Posted by Bojan Tunguz at 01:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)