Good news for me

CBC has an article about a study that says firstborn children tend to be smarter. I find it encouraging ... though the article says its nothing genetic, so if my little brothers decide to call a mob hit on me, whoever's left of them will be the eldest, and thus get the benefits ... hmm, not so encouraging.

Federal Election news (only slightly out of season) [UPDATED]

The Green party in Fredericton is nominating its candidate for the next federal election tonight. This interests me in a few ways. The first is that what the Greens have revealed of their platform so far looks interesting (although the mess they're making on execution is dampening my enthusiasm somewhat). The second is, if they wait until the school year for an election, I'll get the option of voting for this candidate. And, finally, one of the candidates, Tony Myatt, was one of my professors last year, and would be a good choice for it - he has some good ideas. UPDATE: Prof. Myatt didn't get the nomination - there was a prof from STU who won by a significant margin

Trios, Triads, and Neapolitan Ice Cream

Today's blog post is brought to you by the number three, and the letters 'U', 'S', and 'B'. (Hmm ... haven't thought of Sesame Street in a while ... I wonder if they still do that ...) Anyway, my point is, there should only be three kinds of USB connectors. I mean, there are so many kinds of USB cables, it nearly completely defeats the purpose of the "universal" bus. I say that IEEE or someone should limit it to three. The first would be the standard USB connector, the one that's on the PC end of those myriad specialized cables. That one's a no-brainer. The second would be the more rounded connector that is in use on most USB printers. The flat type makes it largely redundant, but its already somewhat of a standard (my point here), and is easier to plug in when you can't see the port (as in the back of many printers). The third would be the single type of USB miniplug. There only needs to be one, and that should work in every digital camera, MP3 player, ect. It would make things easier for everyone, and there's too many types as is. Any objections?

Racism is Illogical

Well, I've been working my summer away for my hometown's Recreation Department. So far, there's been a lot of painting. Part of the painting job has been painting over graffiti, which is rather annoying, because it should be unnecessary, and I just painted that wall two weeks ago. What made me wonder though, was the message on the graffiti. The one I painted over said "Stop Atlantica" (Atlantica being a cross-border trade conference) - I saw another through its paint patch job that said "Racism is illogical". There are similar graffiti messages in other spots. So, why would our vandal put "Stop Atlantica" - this is the message of a socialist activist. There is no one in town that can do a single thing to stop Atlantica. For the racism message, well, its a small town - there are maybe 2 or 3 dozen non-white people in the entire town - racism is basically a non-issue. So, our vandal has a social conscience (or at least, his messages do), yet the messages have no audience. Why put them there then? Its the wrong forum - its fruitless, futile. So why? I can only suppose that our vandal is looking to justify his vandalism. When town workers paint over his messages, he can internally condemn them for being racist pigs, or horrible capitalists, hurting the poor (or so the socialists will say). Instead, the town workers are merely anti-graffiti. Anti-racism messages are a good thing. Just not on the pool walls. ... Anyway, this has been random, but I didn't have much better to do at work then attempt to psycho-analyze the person who was giving me more unnecessary work.