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Originally uploaded by rolandthomas

Look at me! I’m so happy! I love my Mommy & Daddy — and they love me so much too!!

Winter 2008/2009 Pictures of Kenzie

- Roland

Just in time for Halloween, and it’s down right scary.

Your computer is going to read your mind!

http://www.learnenglish.org.uk/games/magic-gopher-central.swf

Well, the computer, of course, is not reading anyone’s mind.

There’s a neat trick in math where subtracting the sum of the digits of a two-digit number from itself always equals a multiple of 9.

So, for example if you have 43, then 43 – 7 = 36. Or 28-10=18, 57-12=45, 32-5=27, etc etc etc

Now look at the symbols in the game for 9, 18, 27, 36, 45, 54, 63, 72, 81, 90, 99. They’re all the same, ain’t they? All the other symbols are just filler to fool you.

Now that you know how it works (and Knowledge is Power, I always say) you can go and impress your friends.

There are lots of cute tricks with the number 9 — such as adding the two digits themselves in the multiples of 9 (i.e., 18, 27, 36, 45, 54, 63, 72, 81, 90) also equal to 9. And these multiples are palindromes (”mirror images”) of another multiple. So 45 is a palindrome of 54, 36 is a palindrome of 63, 81 is a palindrome of 18, etc.

These weird properties of 9 is the reason why the ancients thought 9 had mystical powers and associated it with the occult and witchcraft.

Blessed be!

Realtors say that the three most important words in real estate are “location, location and location”. But when a baby is along the way, they should really say “space, space, space”!

A year ago, in my very last post before I decided to restart the blog, I said that I was buying a new 3-bedroom condo in Clinton Hill.

Yeah, it’s a 3-bedroom, but it’s a tiny 3-bedroom. If you can believe that.

So… it’s time to start searching again — this time for a rental until we can decide when and what to buy (a house, a brownstone, a cozy Hobbit-hole).

And I’ll still sleep when I’m dead. {sigh}

Well, I had thought I would pick up the blog shortly after I moved last year. So many things happening, so many things changing. I always had the blog in the back of my mind, but wanted to wait for the right time. First, I always wanted to re-design the website. Then I wanted to change the scope and let relatives create their original posts (yes, a “family blog”). But you can’t wait. Because life doesn’t wait. You just have to jump in, start doing it, evolve and adapt as you go along.

The ‘mission’ of my blog remains the same — as a private/public place for me to express my thoughts on the intersections of science, philosophy, and technology. Because, as I see it, the way the world is these days, science and philosophy needs to become a more central and affirming part of our lives.

So here’s to SubatomicSoul v2.0.

Not only am working on project deadlines at work, but I’m in the processing of selling my co-op in Park Slope for a 3-bedroom condo in Clinton Hill. More details on that later. And in the middle of all that, planning for a two-week vacation to London/Paris/Brussels in mid-May.

Hopefully I’ll get around to doing the long-planned re-design of the website before I leave for vacation.

Sure. Ha.

I’ll sleep when I’m dead. {sigh}

It’s one thing to have deadlines and projects at work, and hundreds of pages of reading for school but on top of that I’ve been suffering from both tonsillitis and bronchitis.

So I’ve been forcing myself to go to work and stay dazed awake long enough. I’m taking penicillin for the tonsillitis which apparently is playing havoc with my immune system to get over the bronchitis.

I’ll say that my voice is much better than the croak it was a week ago but now I can’t stop this chest-wracking cough.

(Who the hell gets tonsillitis AND bronchitis, anyway? What have I done to offend thee, O God?)

I’ll try to post a little more before I pass out.