Someone has even done a mashup:
I'm not the only one who has noticed that the theme music to Star Trek Discovery is similar to that of Fringe. There are conversations on Reddit - see this Google search. Someone has even done a mashup:
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With every new version, Microsoft strives to add new frustrations for even the most experienced user. Like pretending to allow you to set (and more crucially, save) your preferences for all Excel workbooks, but not actually doing it.
Call me a weirdo, but I like R1C1 reference style. It makes sense. Why the hell does most of the world seem to want to label columns with letters? (Anyway, I don't have time to rant, so moving on...) Here's how to do it:
Hah! Foiled you again, Microsoft! I will have my preferences the way I want them! At least until I install the next latest version... When I first started using LaTeX back in 2009 (I think), there didn't seem to be many ways of controlling where floats end up. Yes, there was the list of adjustments you can make to the parameters (I can't remember where I found that), but either because I was short of time or wasn't too bothered about the exact placement, I went along with what the algorithm decided.
This time round, I needed to put a load of diagrams on one page, and wanted them to appear in specific places, rather than have to refer the reader to "Figure n" or whatever. In tex.stackexchange.com/questions/19766/how-to-control-the-position-of-floating-images I found a nice solution: \FloatBarrier. You need to use the placeins package, and write \FloatBarrier wherever you want to pin down the position of a float. Trouble was, the last picture was falling off the bottom of the page, even though there was plenty of room. The cause of this turned out to be the totalnumber parameter, which was set to 4 (so the fifth picture was ending up on page 2). Changing this to a higher number solved the issue. Here is a good description of how the parameters work: tex.stackexchange.com/questions/39017/how-to-influence-the-position-of-float-environments-like-figure-and-table-in-lat Windows Explorer was crashing with message 'Windows Explorer has stopped working' every time I tried the paste operation of copy/paste. I could only get it to work again by rolling back the latest bunch of windows updates. Google didn't help me find out which one was causing the problem, so I contacted Microsoft support. The consultant was very pleasant and keen to help, but they have a fixed procedure, which involves doing some sort of update reset, then applying all the updates again. Naturally, the problem reappeared when this was done, and MS didn't respond to my emails.
After a second rollback, the only thing to do to get my computer up to date with security patches, and possibly identify the patch that caused the problem, was to apply updates manually. This isn't the simple process it was years ago, so to save time in the future, I've made this note of the procedure. It's a pity that the more effort that MS puts into making Windows "easy to use", the difficulty of admin seems to go up exponentially. I don't often have brilliant ideas, so I thought I'd better share this one, which I think you will agree is wonderfully elegant.
The Problem Even with dark curtains, when the sun shines into my window in the morning, it sears my retinas, stabbing my poor little brain into migraine mode and spoiling my whole day. I can't afford to order blackout curtains or get blinds fitted (and anyway, they'd take up too much space, stopping me from using my window sill as a storage area). And I do want to be able to open the window for air, or look at the view when it's not too bright outside, so don't want to fill up the whole sill with storage. The Solution Something lightweight that lets very little light through, which I can put up and take down every day (or as needed). Cardboard is like that, and I happen to have a lot, as I get most of my footwear in RocketDog sales. (I won't bother with a link - somehow I don't think they'll want to use this blog post in their marketing material.) Oh, and I like boots, so just happen to have a couple of big cardboard boxes lying around. Only thing is, if you put a big sheet of cardboard up, it'll just fall over. You need it to have an unbendy structure. This is where I had the idea of taping boxes together and lids together, to make up large areas of cardboard, that can either balance on their own (as you can see with the boxes), or just prop up somewhere. The Genius Here's where I get really proud of myself. I know from experience that gaffer tape is really heavy and won't do for this purpose. But if I use masking tape, not only will it hold the cardboard box components together, but if I need to use them in the future as boxes again, I'll be able to take the tape off without tearing the boxes apart! Now all I need is to have the same brainwave to solve my boot and shoe storage difficulties - a project I've been wrestling with for a couple of years... I like Kvelertak. Today, Spotify recommended a band called Red Fang to me. (Not anything to do with Kvelertak - it was because I listened to Godflesh, who as far as I know, haven't used any owl-based artwork.)
But it got me thinking, is the presence of an owl among the pictures used by a band a predictor of my liking them? So I did an experiment: google owl pictures related to bands and see how many I like (enough to follow on Spotify or add to a playlist on YouTube or whatever) and how many I dislike (or just get bored with). The first set of search terms was
Including Red Fang and Kvelertak, I managed to get a sample size of 15. Here they are:
Only three of those went under the "like" category - not enough to justify any further analysis. It was interesting though, to note that two artistes (not included above) were Japanese jazz keyboardists, so although owls may be metal as f##k, but in Japan they're also quite jazzy. The problem: You're using MySQL's connector to access your MySQL DB using Python, and having read the documentation, are trying to work out why your very simple query isn't working: dbCursor.execute("SELECT das_description, das_pictureloc FROM dassie WHERE das_id = %s", dassieId) The error message talks about the format parameters, with argument 2 to map() needing to support iteration. Hmm, you had thought that because you were only passing one arg, you should pass it 'naked' and not in a tuple. Clearly that was wrong. So you write: dbCursor.execute("SELECT das_description, das_pictureloc FROM dassie WHERE das_id = %s", (dassieId)) and you get the same error message. OK, that can't have been it, so you faff about a bit more. And that's where you went wrong. Funnily enough, I was stuck until I found the answer here in the MySQLdb User's Guide. (And yes, I really do mean MySQLdb and not MySQL's own connector.) Here's the version that works: dbCursor.execute("SELECT das_description, das_pictureloc FROM dassie WHERE das_id = %s", (dassieId,)) To sum up, you need to insert your single value in a tuple with a second empty item, to prevent Python from treating the brackets around dassieId as ordinary grouping brackets and thus mentally undressing it.
Ugly, and I'm sure there's a nicer way of writing it (perhaps by creating an instance of some tuple class), but right now all I want to do is lie down in a darkened room... I spotted this creature in my bathroom today. I think it's a larder beetle larva, commonly known as a woolly bear. Noticing it up on the wall like that reminded me of when I discovered Dipsy, the woolly bear that spent a brief week with me at work, over ten years ago now. One morning, on getting up from my desk, I noticed something that looked just like this, up on the wall. (That wall was painted blue, but otherwise it was the same.) It looked like it might be organic, and given that I'd noticed insect casings that looked similar to this in the water boiler, I thought I'd collect it and see if it could be identified. (I was also curious about what "extras" we'd been having in our tea.) I put the seemingly inanimate object in an envelope and took it downstairs to show the people in the Food Hygiene department. Perhaps they'd know what it was. As we were looking at it, it suddenly began to move, crawling slowly over the paper! Clearly it was a larva of some kind, but we couldn't tell what, and given that this was a food company, I thought identifying the species would be of interest. I took it back upstairs and put it in a clear box, where it would be able to develop into whatever it was going to be. Having done some googling, I thought it was most likely to be a larder beetle larva (though a visit to the Natural History Museum would be necessary to verify that). They eat various bits of food stuff, so I gave it a couple of crumbs of bread. The larva wasn't very interested in this though. Maybe it was thirsty - I moistened a bit of paper towel with fruit juice and put that next to the crumbs. The creature pounced on it and drank greedily. And so it got the name Dipsy. Over the next days, I tried various tidbits of food, including cheese, and a bit of bacon from Alex my co-worker's sandwich. But it was interested in none of this. After a bit more reading, I thought maybe it was a museum beetle, and would like something a bit less processed. Perhaps a tag of skin from my finger - no interest. Or maybe blood. I put some on a bit of paper towel (like the fruit juice), but Dipsy wasn't interested. Nor did he prefer the dried version. I tried other random things - cake, tomato, lettuce, but rarely did he do anything more than give a brief nibble before giving up. Then one morning, when I went to check on him, his box was empty! Surely he couldn't have climbed out, though I did notice that sometimes the lid didn't quite close properly. The horrible thought occurred to me that an unpleasant man (who shall remain nameless) from the neighbouring office had come in and dealt with him the same was as he did with Homer the Blatella germanica. No, surely not - not even this man could be that nasty..? Perhaps it was just a practical joke, to see how I'd react. By the time Alex arrived, I'd convinced myself of this, and fully expected him to reach into his jacket pocket once he'd seen my distraught condition, and pull out a happy and safe little Dipsy. But it was not to be. And although I looked everywhere, there was no sign of our little office guest. Here's the poem I wrote in his memory. Sonnet for Dipsy A larder beetle larva once lived here
In his little box, so seemingly safe Until one day he chose to disappear Where has he gone, that tiny insect waif? Why did he leave his warm and cosy nest Where he was cared for, regularly fed Treated as a welcome, respected guest But seemingly wanting freedom instead When out of his pupa he'd arch and bend I wanted to set him loose in the wood So little Dipsy, my dear larval friend Could become a beetle and find life good Though one day on him we shall cease to dwell Wherever he is, I hope he fares well Yesterday evening when I made my bed (yes I'm that slovenly), I found a piece of Bluetack. I've got no idea where it came from, but I felt I ought to follow the example of Grunthos the Flatulent by writing a poem about it. Here is Grunthos' piece, Ode To A Small Lump Of Green Putty I Found In My Armpit One Midsummer Morning, as reproduced in the Hitchhiker Wiki: Putty. Putty. Putty. Ode to a Small Lump of Bluetack I Found in my Bed One Summer Evening
Bluetack. Bluetack. Bluetack. Blue Tack - Black Tuesday. Bledtack - Evening? Tulasummer - Blevening Ack! Discovery... WTF Bluetack?... Bed? Bed... Tack. Not even a particularly Clean piece of Bluetack. I stick it on the large lump of Whitetack on my shelf, and shall agree, That this Bluetack is nonetheless still sticky. What I mean is, can you freeze bananas and use them successfully after defrosting, in the same way as a fresh one? (If you're searching for use with recipes, move on - for me, life's too short to make puddings.) Here is a brief account of my experiments with freezing bananas in order to make use of the two-for-one offers you sometimes see in the shops. The criteria on which I'm judging success are as follows.
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