Honor Among Thieves

From today's Statesman:

University of Texas at San Antonio students wanted to draft an honor code that discouraged cheating and plagiarizing.

Unfortunately, it appears they copied another school's code without proper attribution.

The student in charge of drafting the code said it was an oversight, but cheating experts say it illustrates a sloppiness among Internet-era students who don't cite sources properly and think of their computers as cut-and-paste machines.

Akshay Thusu said he took over the project a month ago and inherited a draft from other students.

He said he discovered that a group of students attended a conference put on by Clemson's Center for Academic Integrity five years ago. Materials from the conference, which are used by many universities, were probably the main source of UT-San Antonio's code, Thusu said.

That's why parts of the draft match word-for-word the online version of Brigham Young University's code.

Brigham Young credited the Center for Academic Integrity, but UT-San Antonio didn't. That will change, said Thusu, who plans to submit a draft with proper citation to the Faculty Senate

.

Rule of Law

Indeed.

It appears that Mr Bush got one right and the supreme court overruled him. This is pretty close to a showstopper for me. Man.

Avoid Circuit City

I must have been Texan in a previous life. I can't believe how, on leaving Circuit City after a repulsively foul consumer experience, I mutterred in perfect Texan "That's alright (assaw rat). I'll take it out of their hide (attather had.)" Weird.

So herewith, delivery on my vow. I offer you a strong piece of advice to avoid Circuit City, which essentially will not accept returns of merchandise that does not function as advertised. I won't bore you with the details of my story. If you are foolishly tempted to enter the place, and you aren't within 300 miles of a Fry's, please just go to Best Buy or some small time place instead.

If you won't take my word for it check this story out. Corroboration here, there and everywhere. Treating staff with this sort of contempt apparently leads to staff that treats customers with comparable contempt. Don't let them take it out on you.

Blame Canada

I guess it's not funny anymore.

A Stray Thought for PyCon

So it turns out I actually end up believing that rules and regulations are a good thing, but really, it's just a stray thought, don't read too much into it:

So your brother's bound and gagged
And they chained him to a chair,
Won't you please come to Chicago
Just to sing.
In a land that's known as freedom,
How can such a thing be fair?
Won't you please come to Chicago
For the help that we can bring.

We can change the World.
Rearrange the World.
It's dying
to get better.

Politicians sit yourselves down,
There's nothing for you here.
Won't you please come to Chicago
For a ride.
Don't ask Jack to help you
Cause he'll turn the other ear.
Won't you please come to Chicago
Or else join the other side.

We can change / yes we can change the World.
Rearrange / rearrange the World.
It's dying / do you believe in justice?
It's dying / and if you believe in freedom.
It's dying / Let a man live his own life.
It's dying / Rules and regulations who needs them?
Open up the door.

Somehow people must be free,
I hope the day comes soon.
Won't you please come to Chicago,
To show your face.
From the bottom of the ocean
To the mountains of the Moon.
Won't you please come to Chicago
No one else can take your place.

We can change / yes we can change the World.
Rearrange / rearrange the World.
It's dying / If you believe in justice.
It's dying / and if you believe in freedom.
It's dying / Let a man live his own life.
It's dying / Rules and regulations, who needs them?
Open up the door.

OLPC grumble

Won't have one before PyCon for sure.

Dear Michael,

Please accept my apologies for the delay in receiving your XO laptop. Give
One Get One was such a phenomenal success that we over-taxed our order
processing, and payment systems. Demand exceeded supply.

Additional XO laptops are being built now, and will be delivered in April.

Sincerly,
Kutia
One Laptop Per Child
Donor Services


-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Tobis [mailto:mtobis@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, March 03, 2008 12:05 PM
To: Support

I have been in the following status for more than two weeks.

"Your donation is ready to be shipped and is in our shipping queue.
Please check back with us every few days for updates If you have
received this same response after several days (2 weeks or more)
please contact Donor Services to verify your shipping information."

I am pretty frustrated. Hoped to have mine in hand months ago.

Please ship to ...

Update: It finally arrived at the older shipping address, about two weeks before it would have been impossible for me to retrieve it from there. It was on my desk on my return from PyCon. All's well that ends well, I guess. Now the problem is figuring out what to do with it.

Acclimatized?

I've only been here a year now (this is the 1-year anniversary this week, now that I think of it) and I usually have on hand the following ingredients, probably still difficult to find in Canada. You could do most of it quite well in Chicago, though I never went this far there.

Beverages:

• corn-syrup-free Coke imported from Mexico
• iced tea
• Shiner Bock beer
• proper top-shelf margarita fixin's, i.e., good tequila, triple sec,
• fresh limes (ten for a dollar in season)

Condiments:

• proper barbeque sauce
• red salsa
• pico de gallo (marinated vegetables with tomato, for tacos)
• green salsa
• escabeche (hot pickled onions and carrots)
• ground ancho chile (dark red, smoky, mild)
• ground guajillo chiles (red, spicy)
• ground chipotle chiles (red, smoky and tangy)
• ground jalapeno (green, hot)
• if there's company I will spring for some queso, which resembles Velveeta until you taste it (served hot in a crock pot)
  
• mole' sauce
• mexican sour cream

Vegetables:

• green chiles, preferably Hatch, anaheim acceptable
• (also poblano and serrano green chiles on occasion)
• tomatillos (a.k.a. "Mexican green tomatoes", close relative of the tomato but has a paperlike husk)
• I always have onions, regular peppers, on hand. sometimes mushrooms, zucchini and celery

Tortillas:

• fresh corn tortillas, coarse grind, strong preference for El Milagro brand
• fresh flour tortillas, strong preference for lard-free house-made from Central Market
• if there's company I will spring for some tortilla chips for the queso

Nuts:

• pecans are essentially free in Texas, though they do require some work to shell them. Real Mexicans put ground nuts in everything. Not so much the Texans, who save them for sweets and chop them. Either way, roast em in a cast iron pan for a few minutes as soon as they are out of their shells. Watch carefully and stir constantly. Don't burn 'em.
  

Protein:

• I don't eat beef except when in a restaurant and essentially forced to as a social obligation, this happens in Texas. Also non-beef at rural restaurants is usually unpalatable compared to the barbecue or the burgers.
  
• I mostly get quality fish, shrimp (very cheap! $5/lb.), chicken, pork, or non-beef sausage at Central Market and grill it and refrigerate it, then throw it in a stew when dinner comes around
• I always have some low-fat refried pintos available from cans. Served with every meal including breakfast
• Mexican chorizo is nice for breakfast, I found a turkey based one at H.E.B.

===========

Prepping ingredients weekly:

• roast and freeze some chiles. When frozen, peel and seed them, chop
• and refrigerate.
• grill some meats
• boil some shrimp
• cut up some peppers and onions and sautee slowly in garlic and salt

Typical breakfast:

• Heat and crumble chorizo (NB, Spanish chorizo is not the same stuff), and scramble into an egg with some chopped roasted green chiles
• Heat up a flour tortilla in a cast iron pan. Wrap around the scramble.
• Serve with reheated refried beans.

Typical lunch:

• Microwave a grilled sausage.
  
• Heat up a flour tortilla in a cast iron pan.
  
• Wrap, add good barbecue sauce.
  
• Serve with salad

Typical dinner:

• chop grilled meat, some sauteed vegetables, and a sauce, add spices to taste and cook long enough to blend spices
• offer rice and refried beans
• Optionally sour cream, and pico could be available, depending on the filling. Grated cheese and shredded lettuce possible if you're leaning more Tex than Mex.
• for company, start with a tortilla soup

Recipes? We don't need no steenking recipes.

OK, here's a tortilla soup recipe:
http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/002087tortilla_soup.php

Tex and Mex both tend to excessive sweetness with their desserts though I'll enjoy a tres leches or a chess pie on occasion. When we don't have company we settle for a square of chocolate. If the occasion calls for dessert and we don't have time to bake something I will pick up something at Dolce Vita on Duval Street. Not really thematically unified but yummm!

We are also close enough to Lousiana to make a difference. Between all the good food and the lousy walking and bicycling, it's really a treacherous place for the likes of me.

It's striking how differently I have treated my kitchen since coming down here, though. If I ever go back to Canada I will need a tortilla press of my own.

Urgent Information Regarding Mortgage Holder!

I must be in a low IQ zipcode.

Apparently buying a house in a middle-class neighborhood in America these days makes you a target for various scam artists intimating that they are your lender or your government. I have here the six offers from this week:

===

1) "It has been brought to our attention that you are not yet participating in the Mortgage Cancellation Program to which you are entitled". (OK, at least it looks optional. This is an assume-your-mortgage-in-case-of-death offer. If I ever plan to off myself I will certainly look them up.)

2) Attention: Time Sensitive Material. Complete and Return.

LENDER: Supreme Lending
Michael Tobis
address....

(This is an offer of life and disability insurance)

3) Important Notice to Michael Tobis. Please Complete and Return.

Travis County.

(life and disability. AT least they said "please". This one is especially creepy because it seems to claim to be from the county.)

4) IMPORTANT NOTICE from Mortgage Protection Services. Complete and Return.

Lender:
Supreme Lending
To Borrower:
Mr. & Mrs. Michael Tobis
[address]

(Cleverly dressed up to look like it's FROM the lender. Of course, they sold me off to Wells Fargo inside a week. Maybe the U of T thinks I'm marginal but the banks think I'm golden...)

5) Attention: Time Sensitive Material. Complete and Return.

Lender: Supreme Lending
Record Date: 01/22/2008 (huh?)
Loan Amount: [amount]

6) Notice of Interest Overpayment

(This one is the best. Apparently if you pay off your loan early you will pay less interest! Who knew? Anyway these people will kindly collect payments biweekly and pay your mortgage down monthly for a modest fee.)

====

I wonder how many people fill out everything marked "Complete and Return" and end up with twenty life insurance policies...

Ethical Society, Unitarianism, Trinitarianism

Irene and I have applied to join the Ethical Society, which is sort of an engineers' religion.

"Deed before creed" is the motto; what we believe is less important to us than our actions and their consequences in the world.

...each of those religions, these value systems, have two principles they share in common: tzedakah and tikkun olam, and the two principles started with monotheism and the Jews. Tzedakah means generally that we must treat each other as brother and sister. We should show one another respect and dignity because we are like things; we are human beings in a world that has nothing else like us, and we ought to treat each other with love, charity, use your own words. And the second principle is, "Well, what do you do with this relationship?" Well, we don't know exactly how we got here and why we are here, etc. etc.; that's for minds larger than our own. But we do know that we are like kinds, and we should work together to make this as good an experience as possible: tikkun olam -"let us repair the universe." Now, Islam believes that, and Buddhism that has no god believes it. Every Ethical Humanist I ever met believes it. Those two principles: We're supposed to love one another and we're supposed to work together to make the experience better. That's all the religion you need, really, to make a success of this planet...

-Mario Cuomo

That said, today's meeting was all about comparing the ethical society to other comparable groups. It's sort of droll to consider myself an apostate Unitarian. Garrison Keillor has many jokes about Unitarians but I only remember this one. Forgive me if you;ve heard it before.

"Did you hear about the Jehovah's Witness who converted to Unitarianism? He went around the neighborhood ringing doorbells for no particular reason." I myself have written a Unitarian hymn. It's called "To Whom It May Concern". What I like about the ethicists is that they don't feel compelled to pretend to be protestants during their meetings. The superficial resemblance to a protestant service does nothing at all for me.

The discussion of the history of Unitarianism showed that it arose as an alternative to Trinitarianism. We also discussed atheism and agnosticism and the fine distinctions between them. Most of us feel that agreeing on what you disbelieve is almost as bad as agreeing on what you pretend to believe as an organizing model for a community.

When it comes to Trinitarianism, though, agnostic doesn't begin to capture my philosophical response. I simply don't get it. I have never had the slightes clue who the Holy Ghost was supposed to be. Everyone I've asked has failed to come up with a coherent answer. I am certainly Unitarian as opposed to atheistic or agnostic, myself. I can't begin to express an opinion on the Trinity though. It simply baffles me who the third guy is. I am not so much atheistic or agnostic when it comes to the trinity as baffled. Call me an acomprehensive.

I've been hearing this stuff all my life and I just don't get it. Somehow polytheism is heresy unless the number of gods is three? Three shall be the number of gods, not two nor four? Five is right out? I'm still waiting for something to wrap my head around. I sort of understand the savior thing though it doesn't ring true for me but I just don't get it about the ghost.

Anyway I am down with the unity of the universe, and perfectly comfortable with calling it God and taking an attitude of deep gratitude to that God for what seems to me the astonishing miracle of life.

The only reason I'm a Unitarian apostate is because the services are silly.

Good night and God bless.

Grownups in Government

A valentine widget seen on GOP.com .

Would it be too much to ask for some grownups to run the country?

From WIRED:

Unlike traditional Valentine's messages, the GOP-grams are perhaps better sent to people you dislike. The Valentine site launched Monday without a privacy policy. After an inquiry by Wired.com on Wednesday, the RNC added a link to the GOP.com privacy policy, which allows it to share any information it collects with "like-minded" organizations "committed to the principles or candidates of the Republican party." How romantic.

Yiddish Radio Project

Better late than never. Here.

Hmm, it doesn't actually rock. It does sort of swing in a schmaltzdikke sort of a way.

Related resources here. So click, why don't you? Go. Click, click.

Numeracy

In a comment on "In It", Hank R points to a very interesting observation by Greg Palast.

It starts with the observation that the number of millionaires in the US is comparable to the number of poor children, and then compares the benefits offerred to each class by the Bush administration.

Read it.

This is why we need numeracy. Fear of big numbers prevents people from thinking clearly.

Island of Noise

Fly silly seabird
No dreams can possess you
No voices can blame you
For sun on your wings
My gentle relations
Have names they must call me
For loving the freedom
Of all flying things
My dreams with the seagulls fly
Out of reach out of cry

I came to the city
And lived like old Crusoe
On an island of noise
In a cobblestone sea
And the beaches were concrete
And the stars paid a light bill
And the blossoms hung false
On their store window trees
My dreams with the seagulls fly
Out of reach out of cry

Out of the city
And down to the seaside
To sun on my shoulders
And wind in my hair
But sandcastles crumble
And hunger is human
And humans are hungry
For worlds they can't share
My dreams with the seagulls fly
Out of reach out of cry

I call to a seagull
Who dives to the waters
And catches his silver-fine
Dinner alone
Crying where are the footprints
That danced on these beaches
And the hands that cast wishes
That sunk like a stone
My dreams with the seagulls fly
Out of reach Out of cry

JM (1968)

Exercise Plan

I was bemoaning the fact that I can't hire someone to exercise for me.

The ideal would be a temporary mind swap. My contractor would go to the gym in my body and exercise for me, and I'd be in his body reading a book. Afterward, I'd be healthier and he'd be smarter.

Woot!

In It was linked directly from the lead RealClimate story yesterday, and a nice one it is indeed. Nice to know Ray is getting so much attention, and a bit daunting to know I am.

Ray linked to my Bambi vs Godzilla posting, which is really just a quote from David Mamet.

No Shortcut to Freedom

OK, it's painfully sappy in that pedestrian folksinger way, but true enough just the same:

Chorus:
One blue sky above us
One ocean lapping all our shore
One earth so green and round
Who could ask for more

And because I love you
I'll give it one more try
To show my rainbow race
It's too soon to die.

1.
Some folks want to be like an ostrich,
Bury their heads in the sand.
Some hope that plastic dreams
Can unclench all those greedy hands.

2.
Some hope to take the easy way:
Poisons, bombs. They think we need 'em.
Don't you know you can't kill all the unbelievers?
There's no shortcut to freedom.

(Repeat chorus)

3.
Go tell all the little children.
Tell all the mothers and fathers too.
Now's our last chance to learn to share
What's been given to me and you.

(Repeat chorus one and a half times)

- PS (1967)

Yinglish

The most realistic glossary of Yiddish words commonly used in English that I have seen is under your nose in this clicky thing, what, you never saw a computer before?

Homage a M Cohen

So in honor of the explicitly Cohenesque recent discovery in my old diaries, I thought it would be churlish to pass up the opportunity to go see a Leonard Cohen tribute concert this weekend.

Irene and I and friend Linda accordingly trucked ourselves out to beautiful downtown Marble Falls (a fairly remote town but it has a nice downtown, a bit tarted up for the tourist trade which has its plusses and minuses) where we took in a marvelous show put on by the astonishing (and amazingly eclectic) group Strings Attached. It was among the best concert experiences of my life. They managed not only to present the poetry but to make a musically coherent and varied experience out of, let's face it, LC's perpetual droning. Amusingly it was a flawless performance except for bobbling the lyrics of the one hit song, you know the one, the one with the garbage and the flowers.

I also enjoyed the random reference to cooolllld snoooowy Monntreal in the stage patter; you could almost hear the shivering. It was T-shirt weather in Central Texas yesterday.

They were brilliant. Watch out especially for the astonishing young vocalist Molly Venter.

Some of us (names are embargoed) were reduced to tears at various points during the show. I am eagerly awaiting release of the recording of the very performance we attended.

I am now a Will Taylor/Strings Attached fan for life. (They also have done a Led Zepellin tribute! A Paul Simon tribute is coming up and I can hardly wait for it.)

Austin really lives up to its billing as the music capital of the world and I find it a great joy and privilege to live here.

Hallelujah

Now I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew her
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

You say I took the name in vain
I don't even know the name
But if I did, well really, what's it to you?
There's a blaze of light
In every word
It doesn't matter which you heard
The holy or the broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though
It all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

-my homeboy, LC of course

On Moving South

Be flexible! cries the pragmatist within me - why can't you write your diary on this steno notebook passed through an iron grill of a half-closed drugstore on Christmas night, a Saturday, this fuckless bicentennial year.

Be poetic! cries my muse, wondering at the instant add water and stir summer into which I have suddenly been propelled, writing weak poetry or is it strong prose propped up against a garbage bin under the shade of a street lamp flooded palm tree.

Be with me! cries my disease, but she whom it addresses cannot hear.

Be still! cries the December summer wind.

- mt, Christmas 1976, Gainesville FL