Got a little black book with my Poems in.

So, this got forwarded to me via email today...

I'm voted Democrat because English has no place being the official language in America .

I'm voted Democrat because it's better to turn corn into fuel than it is to eat.

I'm voted Democrat because I'd rather pay $4 for a gallon of gas than allow drilling for oil off the coasts of America .

I'm voted Democrat because I think the government will do a better job of spending my money than I could.

I voted Democrat because when we pull out of Afghanistan and Iraq , I know the Islamic terrorists will stop trying to kill us because they'll think we're a good and decent country.

I voted Democrat because I believe people who can't tell us if it will rain in two or three days, can now tell us the polar ice caps will disappear in ten years if I don't start riding a bicycle, build a windmill or inflate my tires to proper levels.

I voted Democrat because it's alright to kill millions of babies as long as we keep violent, convicted murderers on death row alive.

I' voted Democrat because I believe businesses in America should not be allowed to make profits. Businesses should just break even and give the rest to the government so politicians and bureaucrats can redistribute the money the way they think it should be redistributed.

I voted Democrat because I believe guns, and not the people misusing them, are the cause of crimes and killings.

I voted Democrat because when someone with a weapon threatens my family or me, I know the government can respond faster through a call to 911 than I can with a gun in my hand.

I'm voted Democrat because oil companies' 5% profit on a gallon of gas are obscene, but government taxes of 18% on the same gallon of gas are just fine.

I voted Democrat because I believe three or four elitist liberals should rewrite the Constitution every few months to suit some fringe element that could never get their agenda past voters.

I I voted Democrat because illegal aliens are not criminals, and they are not sucking up resources through government aid, hospital services, education, or social services, but are just people trying to make a better life by coming to America illegally. We can't blame them for that, can we?

I' voted Democrat because now I can now marry whomever and whatever I want, so I've decided to marry my dog.

Spelling errors aside, I was tempted to respond with this, but I've restrained myself for the time being, in the interest of being invited to Christmas Dinner at some point in the future....

I don't think I've ever seen so many straw men outside of a cornfield....

How about these:

I voted republican because I believe that the biggest recession since World War II is actually helping the US economy.

I voted republican because I believe that 4 or 5 elitist conservatives should be able to rewrite the constitution every few years when they want to push through something that couldn't ever be approved as an amendment.

I voted republican because I believe that a president who was a cocaine addict and drunk driver is the best choice to have control over a nuclear weapon arsenal.

I voted republican because I believe that foreign citizens on American soil can be held without charges or trials for years just because somebody said they don't trust them.

I voted republican because I believe that a nation founded on the backs of hardworking immigrants doesn't need immigrant labor anymore, so we should lock our borders and keep everyone out now.

I voted republican because the best way to keep America strong is to threaten and bully any nations who disagree with us (France, I'm looking at you here!)

I voted republican because keeping citizens from knowing what's going on in the government that they elected is essential to maintaining a free and open society.

I voted republican because I think that deficit spending is really the only way to run a government. Paying for things as we go just isn't sustainable.

I voted republican because due process is just a fancy word, and doesn't actually mean we have to give people a fair trial. Trials where nobody except the prosecutor actually knows the charges are much more effective.

I voted republican because anyone who acts against federal agents should be seriously prosecuted (probably without due process, after being held without charges for several years). Unless that person is a member of the White House staff, in which case it's fine to conceal it as long as possible, and commute their sentence once they're actually convicted.

I voted republican because I know that expecting the Federal Emergency Management Agency to respond to the destruction of a major American city within a week of the disaster is unreasonable.

Feel free to suggest a few others...

Class night!

I'm taking CS 223A from Stanford Engineering everywhere, and i'm making my notes on class here. I'm watching class 2 tonight, here's part 1 of my notes

All joints can be reduced to two different types:
revolute - Twisting around one axis
prismatic - extending/contracting along one axis

Each joint offers 1 degree of freedom.

All varitions on joints can be reduced to a combination of these two types of joints:
Sphereical joint is just a combination of three revolute joints, providing 3 degrees of freedom.

Generalize coordinates:
For any rigid body, 6 coordinates are needed to describe it's position in space:x,y,z, rot z, rot y, rot x

Without the joints, a system of rigid bodies can be described using 6n parameters, where n is the number of rigid bodies which make up the system.
if there are n parts we need 6n parameters to describe bodies, 5n parameters to describe the position of it's joints, the overall system has 6n - 5n = n degrees of freedom.

Operational coordinates = task coordinates

End effector configuration parameters d= a set of parameters (x1, x2, x3, x4, ... ) which completely specifies the position and orientation of the end effector of a system.

Terms to look up:
Direction cosines?
Rotation matrix

6 degrees of freedom is suffucient in 3 dimensions to place the end effector anywhere in the space
3 degrees of freedom is sufficient in 2 dimensions ( planar robot ) to place the end effector anywhere in the plane.
1 degree of freedom is suffucient in 1 dimension (linear? robot) to place the end effector anywhere in the plane.

joint coordinates map to joint space. Movement planning takes place in Joint space.

c-obstacles are plotted in the joint space for movement planning.

Operational coordinates map to operational space.

redundancy refers to adding extra joints such that the degrees of freedom of the robot exceeds the number of degrees of freedom necessary for the operational space.

degree of redundancy is the number of degrees of freedom by which it exceeds the dimensions requirements.

Forward kinematics will be covered next week.

How can we describe the position of a point in space?
point p is positioned relative to a reference point -

Coordinate frames:
revolute joints rotate the coordinate frames about the origin.
prismatic joints translate the coordinate frames along an axis.

How do we describe the coordinate frame (B) in relation to the absolute frame (A)?

Position P is a vector (^aX_b,^aY_b,^aZ<sub>b)

Rotation R is a rotation matrix

R =</sub>

r1,1	r1,2	r1,3
r2,1	r2,2	r2,3
r3,1	r3,2	r3,3

<sub>I've forgotten way too much stuff about Matrix mathematics.

Breaking now for Heroes. Back in an hour.</sub>

Haven't posted in forever, but I just had to share this one:


see Sarah Palin pictures

I started up a Freenet Node again just to fiddle around with the darknet. While it's unfortunate that most of what people will post to a truly Anonymous media is Porn, there's still some interesting things floating around in there.   It's unfortunate that most of it is 'psuedo-revolutionary' claptrap, and porn, but it's possible there's some islands of actual interesting content around.  I'll keep browsing for it.

I have to say, it's very strange sitting here coding for the Camarilla Approvals Database, while my computer randomly decides which audio files it's going to play for me. Several months ago, I ripped the audiobook of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" onto the computer, and I just moved from Mazzy Star's "Night in my Veins" to Doc Gonzo driving through Barstow, "Turn off that fucking music! My heart feels like a fucking Aligator!"

kellyfaerie and I have started a new MediaWiki project for the local Giovanni-only LARP that we've been attending... Check it out: The City of Promise

My Grandfather is in stable condition at Abbot Northwestern in Minneapolis.

So, BarCamp L.A. rocks. This is a shot from the personal unit tests talk. The concept behind Personal Unit Tests is to create a list of small goals you would like to do, such as:

1) Did I exercise 20 minutes today?
2) Did I close out at least 2 open bugs at work today?
3) Did I spend at least 30 minutes just talking to today?
4) Did I wash the car at least once in the last 7 days
5) Did I move at least $50 into my savings account in the last 2 weeks
etc...

Put together a list of about 20 or so of these, and every day, just give yourself a percentage score based off of these questions. Track your percentages, and adjust the unit tests based on actual experience. Say, you're constantly missing the car washing one, strech it out to 2 weeks, and see how well you can hit that goal. Then, once you've got 100% compliance, then start tightening up your requirements.

Anyhow, a fun little lifehack.

Tags: lifehack barcampla4

So... CFObjective was a rousing success. I've sort of half committed myself to a few goals for this year: to become more active in the ColdFusion community is one of them, and there's sort of the continual goal of improving our software development procedures at work. I have a series of sort of sub goals to this: become a recognizeable name among the names of ColdFusion Developers, and contribute in some meaningful way to an open source ColdFusion project. I think I made significant progress on both the "Improving work" and "becoming more recognizeable in the ColdFusion community" this weekend. Talking to Daryl Banttari, the Chief Architect of SeeFusion, I managed to resolve one major issue that we've been having at work, if only theoretically. And then on the "more recognizeable" front, I really got alot of face time with some of the big names in the ColdFusion development community over the last two days. If Hal Helms, Sean Corfield, Peter Farrell, Simeon Bateman, and Matt Woodward can hear my name and say "Adam Ness... That name sounds familiar" I figure i've made some significant progress in the arena of my chosen field. Now if I can just keep it up, refine my ideas, and gain the respect of some of my peers instead of just vague recognition, I'll further fulfil my goals.

I know this is goobing to folks who don't care, but hey, I can only ask how many of you cammies have a friends locked or otherwise post about the time you managed to get the NST's ear at some major convention. It's the same deal, these are people I respect, and their opinion means a lot to me.

Anyhow, have fun folks, I hope your weekend went as well as mine.

And on a personal notes, I want to extend my prayers to the folks from Tulsa I met this weekend. I know tornadoes a bit from living in Minnesota, and I hope that the destruction in Stillwater didn't affect you folks. And I wish a speedy recovery to all those in Stillwater.