random thoughts

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I used to read the blog of a person who was a wonderful photographer, but who loved to complain about pretty much everything.

One day she blogged 100 things she hated.

My first thought was "Only 100?  Piker!  I could come up with 1000 things I hate without taking a deep breath!"

My second thought was "What a waste of time -- writing it down, and, even more, reading a list like that!  And -- worse than a waste of time -- what a pointless pile of negative Stuff to put out there for random strangers to step in....."

I never went back to her blog after that post.

I thought about this, over the weekend, as I dealt with various things, and, well, let's just say that, when I think of things for which to be grateful, taking a shower and NOT being up to my ankles in scummy bathwater the whole time would be one of those things!

And --

"Sometimes you plunge and plunge and plunge (and plunge and plunge), until the plunger handle starts to give you splinters, and until you are thoroughly bored and frustrated.  And then, like magic, while you are sitting and forlornly watching nothing happen, the tub just drains."

I think there is probably a Life Lesson in there somewhere.

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I love watching the Westminster dog show on tv.  Three years ago I had the great good fortune to see it in person.  I went with a friend I've known well on line for many years, but had only spent one afternoon with before our intense five days in NYC.  We had a very good time, and I would love to go back to New York and see some of the million things we didn't have time for.

While thinking about that trip, and about watching the show on tv, I will say a rousing THANK YOU to Pedigree for pushing adoption of shelter dogs in their ads.  There are so many good dogs languishing in shelters.  Good Job, Pedigree, for focusing attention on that issue in such a positive way!

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Did you watch IBM's Watson take on the two best human Jeopardy contestants ever?

I thought that was very fun to watch. They showed Watson's top three choices for the answers (whether or not Watson rang in first). It was informative as to the thought process that Watson was using.....

Sometimes Watson was stumped by something that it seemed to me would be obvious for him, and other times he got things I didn't think he would know.

It was also amusing to watch Watson bet, when he hit the daily doubles. People bet in hundreds of dollars, but Watson's bets were always down to the dollar. "$4257, please, Alex."  It made me think of Mr. Spock......

A very impressive effort -- good job, IBM!

They say that one of the serious intents for this technology will be summarizing/synthesizing data. My daughter read that there are 50,000 articles published each year about neuroscience. No person can read that many articles, but Watson can............

(Scary to imagine how easily this ability could be twisted..................)

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For the last three years my daughter was in college, we went to Charlotte, NC, at just this time of year, for her last meet of the year. Charlotte showed us amazing warm weather, the last two of those years. We tossed our coats in the trunk of the rental car, and only got them back out at the airport on our way home.

It will be a long time before I don't start thinking we'd better get our tickets and hotel reservations for Charlotte, when January rolls around.........

It's nice to get a break from snow and ice, nice to walk around in shirt sleeves after months of nothing but winter coats, nice to see flowers blooming outdoors............

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