Out of Phase

There are days when it really seems that I live a life that's totally out of phase with the rest of the world! Thus, someday you find someone and think that the person is in the same phase as you, but suddenly, usually too late, you realize this person is in the exactly opposite phase, and then: destructive interference! You lose some sanity points, gain some scars and life goes on again...

Thank you, Entropy, for the Chaos and Madness in my life! (By the way, this was a sarcastic exclamation!)

Conumdrum I

One of the best compliments I could ever receive is: "You are Lovecraftianly insane". Of course, that does not mean I want to spend anytime whatsoever in a sanatorium. Thus, I have no plans either to make people believe I have to spend sometime in such a place. Therefore, there is a very high probability tending to 1 that I will never receive such a compliment.

How to solve such a conumdrum?

O Retorno, eu acho!

Bom, eu já tenho pensado em voltar a escrever aqui tem um tempo. Agora é uma boa hora. Eu estou escrevendo minha tese, que já deveria ter sido escrita a quase 2 anos, e é possível que voltar a escrever aqui me dê um pouco de inspiração, que anda faltando bastante na hora de escrever a tese, e ajude a melhorar meu traquejo com a língua.

Muita coisa ocorreu nos últimos 6 meses, desde meu último post, mas vamos deixá-las quietas no passado. Também, ando pensando em mudar o nome do blog. Acho que a fase do Xaos passou. Ainda estou pensando num novo nome, mas o endereço deve continuar o mesmo, por enquanto. O template já cansou também, mas eu não estou com tempo para mexer nisto. Depois que eu defender o doutorado, eu penso em refazê-lo! Na realidade, eu tenho que lembrar em como mexer nele, tem tanto tempo que eu mexi, que eu nem lembro mais em como editá-lo! O interessante é que mesmo sem escrever, meu blog manteve uma média de visitas de 170 por mês, não é muito, mas meu blog nunca foi mesmo muito popular. :P

Às vezes eu até tento escrever coisas no "twitter", mas nem sempre eu consigo me expressar bem com apenas 140 caracteres! Então, para as coisas que necessitam de um pouco mais de elaboração, continuarei utilizando o blog.

O Caos passou (nem tanto assim), mas a Insanidade continua!

Thermically Warm

This weekend was HOT, in the thermodynamical sense of the word. I'm almost melting right now, and its passed midnight!

I was thinking about the state o continuous confusion and chaos inside my mind today, and I realized something... It is time to bring some harmony to my mind, and to do that there is only one way... I have to transpose the confusion and chaos inside my mind to the "real" world. I need some peace of mind, and the world needs more chaos. That is not a menacing thing, though... Chaos has many faces, and some of them are not really that bad!

If someone observe some very unpredictable facts happening somewhere, I might be around... or maybe it is just the consequences of some of my yet to take actions. With some luck, my actions might just trigger the next Ice Age to start this year!

Today one sleeps, tomorrow another awakes!

This post was finished while hearing: The Perennial Sophia - Therion

The Future Mirror's Tale of an Undreamed Past?

I foresaw a future that is now in another one's past, and for me it seems lost... If lost, for how long? Maybe forever lost. But there is a future yet to happen, and that which this other foresees today could be the past of mine tomorrow... The lost will be found when no one seeks it anymore, or when you ask a Xaositect to find it for you. Know that Never is lost, when Forever is found. And when the future is not yet totally lost, where could it be retrieved?

There is still hope for the dreamer, when his life becomes his dream, and his dream becomes his life... This one should no be here, I know, but where? I also know the tale of the faerie who was afraid of a certain dragon, but now is not the time to tell this story. It, and everything else, shall be continued when that which may be lost, could be retrieved... Or when another one dreams the past of my future!

Strange but necessary...

I once saw the Mirror of Eyes, but It is now closed to me... What the Mirror showed me? A past that never was present, but was once a future... And Lo! Before the entrance to the Dreamland, the Mirror awaits for those who knows how to find it...

.sigh.

Hard Life to Live ends, while Summer in Berlin starts! The Eternal Idol Black Sabbath into Forever Young Alphaville... Now, all the desires of my Mind require a trip to the Dreaming, and there is my Mind's currently destination...

A Glass Desert

Sometimes I feel like I need to pass some time as a nomad in the desert. Total silence, darkness, the cold wind blowing, a starlit sky, during the night! I prefer not to think about the daylight time, without a stillsuit and no melange.

I wonder if someday we will have a glass desert! It is somewhat distressful to think about the conditions that lead the sand in the desert to become glass, but that would be a sight to behold! Well, if there was any human left in the world to behold such a sight... Maybe cockroaches, scorpions, and flying jellyfishes...

Ok! I'm out of ideas... Synchronicity is almost over, and I want to sleep... Maybe tomorrow we will have a glass desert somewhere. While we don't have one, I will think about a sandy, or icy, or salty desert. Or just the silence, the darkness, coldness and stillness of the Void. (Without spice.)

Restart

This place needs a restart, and my life needs a boost...

I have posted this a long time ago, but I am feeling that I need to post this again. at least for me.

Litany Against Fear - Bene Gesserit

"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain."

Inhuman Working Conditions

Can anyone please quench the Sun? Or at least fix the AC Unit in the Astrophysics lab? It is simply impossible to work, melting inside the lab! I will have to strike until I have human working conditions again! All I wish is another Ice Age! Please? Anyone?

Games for the Future (?)

Here is the list of games that I have to buy and play in my near future:

• Grand Theft Auto IV (PS3)
  
• Mass Effect (PC)
• Bioshock (PC or PS3)
• Little Big Planet (PS3)
• Rock Band 2 (PS3)
• Fallout 3 (PS3 or PC)
• The Witcher (PC)
  

That is the list of games already released that I do not have. I still have to finish Assassin's Creed for my PS3, and I am kind of playing Spore for the PC too.

My first priority in that list is Fallout 3, and I guess I will give me that as a birthday present next month. :)

Of course, I will probably not be able to play all those games soon, as I have a PhD to finish, but I will use some of my almost ephemeral spare time to play something.

Actually, I also have a huge line of books to read, too...

Estagnação mental e um talvez qualquer

Um mês sem escrever aqui, e o mundo está acabando. Economia mundial em crise, na próxima terça começa a invasão alienígena, e meu doutorado estagnado. O LHC está parado, e parou antes da primeira colisão. Muito sem graça. Nenhum buraco-negro foi criado para destruir o planeta, agora só no início do ano que vem. Vamos ver se a economia colapsa de vez, e logo, porque aí não precisamos esperar mais 6 meses para o fim do mundo. Ou que esses aliens apareçam mesmo e cheguem pra criar Caos no planeta.

Como podem notar, estou perdendo a paciência pra chegada do Apocalipse! :P

Jogando Half-Life 2 - Episode 2, ainda lendo Grande Sertão: Veredas.

Amanhã tenho uma prova didática para professor substituto no CEFET. Salário baixo, três matérias da matemática (Cálculo I, Cálculo III e Equações Diferenciais A), pra começar semana que vem, dando de 3 a 4 aulas por dia. Resumindo, ou me mato preparando e dando aulas, ganhando quase nada, ou continuo meu doutorado. A escolha é meio óbvia. Acho que nem vou aparecer lá amanhã pra perder meu tempo. E teria que apresentar uma aula de uns 20 minutos sobre Séries de Taylor. Prefiro dar prioridade pro meu programa que não funciona, e esperar um cataclisma...

Está na hora do mundo ficar cyberpunk de verdade.

Another Day, Another Step

It is been another day, and in this special day, nothing special really happened. Actually, I saw in the news that Iran just tested some long range missiles that stroke their targets accurately. I also discovered that Russia's president is not Vladimir Putin anymore. The new President is Dmitry Medvedev (cool name), and he loves the classical Hard Rock from the 70s and 80s. This guy loves Rock'n'Roll and has nuclear weapons, in just one word, AWESOME! Vladimir Putin now is the prime minister of the Russia Union. I was a little bit outdated on that.

For a while (past few weeks), I thought my code was working fine, but then I found out some inconsistencies in my results, and since two weeks ago I have been then working on that. It is still not working as I expect, and every day it got more and more tedious to debug that. So, no new step here, so far...

One day, I am going to write so many bizarre things here, that I think I will make someone else insane just for read them... Not today, though. Today the only person insane here is me, or maybe someone else, who is already insane, and will read it in the next couple of hours.

I do not think I am the only person in the world who has strange thoughts about Reality. But every time I think about it, for whatever the reason, it seems I simply go more insane. Comprehension and Insanity are best friends in my point of view.

Just to give you a taste of what crossed my mind in my way back home... I was in the bus, almost leaving it, thinking about a myriad things... I was hearing trance music, and then the thought came into my mind: "What if God is this sound sample (2 or 3 seconds of the music playing in my Creative Zen)? No... What if God is that number 3 painted in that wall? Three is a perfect concept after all... Was it?"

This was just a small string of the whole train of thought that started in the same moment I left the lab today. And after that I just became a little more insane... There is no way back, anymore! But whatever, I just love it...

Just Another Misconceived Idea?

Have you ever had the feeling that due to some hidden process or reason, you are the cause of someone else's bad luck? Worse yet, someone you like very much!

It might be very presumptuous of me to think like that, but when everything seemed to have gone awry just after I became part of this someone's life, and, since that, nothing good seemed to have happened in this person's life, the idea does not seem so misconceived...

Yes! I am crazy, megalomaniac, arrogant, and maybe much more and worse than that... But, beyond that, I do not know what to do, and those feeling are just ripping my soul apart...

.sigh.

Maybe I am doing everything wrong, and it is really all my fault... Damn! May the Elder Gods enlighten me... (This time I swear I want enlightenment, not more confusion and insanity, if there is really a way to not have the whole package together...)

Strange Sightings

... and so it came to pass that I was inside the bus, going to the University, wondering about something already forgotten, and then over the window I saw it... There... Something that should not be there. Was that my mind playing a trick on me? Was it the true face of reality? Or just the hidden face of Insanity making an ephemeral appearance in my mind? I do not know...

I saw it inside a car that just passed by. For a glimpse of a moment I thought I have just seen something that should not be... I closed my eyes for a while, then blinked two or three times, and looked again... I was not mistaken. There was something very amiss driving that car. There seemed to be an aura of wrongness around that figure, something non-euclidean surrounding that thing... And just in the midst of that aura of insanity was the thing I can not even start to describe, even though I still can see that which should not be clearly in my mind...

That thing was driving the car. It was humanoid, but what else? No tentacles that I could see, though. But I saw it as something shaped by the hands of Entropy Itself... It was not only horrid, but also decayed as I have never seen before... A zombie of some sort driving a car!! How dead was that, I have no idea! Fortunately for me, the sighting was a very rapid one, but I can not take it out of my mind... Am I going insane or are there truly zombies amongst ourselves? And that aura surrounding it, what was it?

And the small green footprints, of a large humanoid beast I have seen in my way home, while I was crossing the Human Sciences Building (FAFICH)? Was that someone's doing, or another trick played by Reality on me?

And there was something else I cannot recall, maybe a selective amnesia to keep my mind from another trauma...

Shall I trust everything I see? Or are really things that are not true!? Or maybe too TRUE to be perceived by common eyes!? Things that the people's mind just filter to not shatter!? Why me??

It can only be The Cube!! I know... It is the Cube hunting me, even in my dreams... And I though I was free... The Cube's minions are after me, after so long, but who are they!? Can I escape? At least, I have not seen any of those Evil Squirrels anymore... It can also be The Rock, or maybe both!! I hope I am not doomed... I will run away... Where? I cannot tell yet, but I will be free from The Cube invisible clutches again... I swear I will!!

Or maybe Entropy is just showing me something... Something that I already know (?), but I have not seen yet...

Os Mil Metros

Finalmente, pela primeira vez, eu consegui nadar 1000m durante a aula de natação!! Fiquei até feliz hoje por causa disso!! \m/,

Tudo porque eu resolvi acompanhar, a menina que estava nadando na raia ao lado da minha. Eu comecei a nadar antes dela, e estava uns 50m na dianteira, e a menina chegou. Começou a nadar, foi nadando, e me alcançando. Quando eu estava nos 500m ela já estava nos mesmos 500m. Consegui por um tempo me manter no mesmo ritmo que ela, mas ela não se cansava, e acabou me passando! Por fim, ela nadou os mesmos 1000m que eu, mas quando ela terminou, eu estava a uma raia de distância. Eu não me importei nenhum pouco, e fiquei bem feliz de ter conseguido os 1000m!! No final, eu fiquei tão empolgado, que ao invés de fazer os últimos 25m na tranquilidade, eu usei minhas últimas forças, nadando "crawl" o mais rápido possível. Não preciso nem dizer, que sai da piscina com o coração quase saindo pela boca, e demorou algum tempo pra eu recuperar o fôlego.

Foi ótimo, e vou tentar acompanhar outras pessoas mais vezes, pra superar meus limites. E quem sabe um dia, eu não acabo deixando essa mesma menina pra trás, respirando espuma. :P

Só pra constar, na minha 1a. aula de natação este ano, eu nadei 500m, e parei por causa de uma mega cãimbra... Finalmente, consegui dobrar a distância! =D

A Small Insight

The answers and the understanding that I seek is clearer today than it was yesterday... There is beauty even in things that look dreary and hopeless... I have seen it... Can you?

...and the quest continues...

Dust in the Wind

Religion is something interesting. Religious people look at things in a way that does not contradict their beliefs, but instead strengthen their religion, and in this way an every day fact gives them strength. Faith is a source of strength, and makes everything a little bit easier, even when it seems the Multiverse is conspiring against you, and nothing seems to work right. Usually religions are meant to be soothing and to give people hope, even in their darkest hour.

Today I was walking towards my building in the University, and I was thinking about my own religion. The Doomguard, the followers of Entropy. It is a weird religion I admit, and most people might think I am totally insane just to follow such a non-standard concept, and then call this a religion... Anyway, I was walking, hearing music in my MP3 player, wondering, and then, as an omen, it started to play a music called "Dust in the Wind" from a band called "Kansas". And while that happened, I saw for the first time the world in the eyes of a Doomguard. I will not even dare to describe what I saw here, as I do not want to scare you. It was not something soothing, nor gave me any hope, but it was beautiful in a way. And that made me think about life as it is today, not only mine, but everyone's.

In the end, there will be nothing, not even dust, much less wind... So why? We are nothing but tools of destruction, even not knowing. People build and care, but it decays. People create, and time destroys. Life was born, just to die.

All I am now is Confusion, Insanity, Chaos and Conflict... And there is where I have found "Peace" for now, but the search continues... What do I seek? Understanding...



DUST IN THE WIND
By KANSAS

I close my eyes, only for a moment, and the moment's gone
All my dreams, pass before my eyes, a curiosity
Dust in the wind, all they are is dust in the wind

Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea
All we do, crumbles to the ground though we refuse to see
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind.
Oh________________

Don't hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky
It slips away, all your money won't another minute buy

Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Dust in the wind, everything is dust in the wind (everything is dust in the wind)

Exposição Star Wars Brasil

Este texto já devia ter sido escrito a mais tempo, mas tempo para o Blog anda meio escasso, como pode ser notado. Eu estive na exposição Star Wars Brasil, que ainda está ocorrendo em São Paulo, da última vez que estive lá, a pouco menos de um mês. Estava extremamente empolgado, já que é a primeira vez que coisas originais, utilizadas nos filmes, vieram ao Brasil. Não nego meu lado nerd, e sou totalmente viciado em Star Wars. Desde que fiquei sabendo da vinda da exposição ao Brasil, no final do ano passado, quando ainda estava nos EUA, já comecei a fazer planos de visitá-la em SP.

Cheguei no Ibirapuera em torno das 10h da manhã, e como nunca tinha ido ao local anteriormente, demorei um pouco pra encontrar o local onde a exposição estava sendo realizada. Estava com medo de encontrar uma fila enorme na entrada do local. Cheguei a bilheteria, tinha algumas mães com filhos, e um sujeito vestido de Stormtrooper, fazendo poses e tirando foto com os pirralhos. Bem vazio. Paguei os R$30,00 no ingresso, e fui feliz, me dirigindo a entrada. Não tinha fila alguma, e acabei me sentindo com sorte por causa disso.

Entrei, tirei a máquina fotográfica, e comecei a olhar detalhe por detalhe, tirando fotos de tudo que me interessava. Algumas miniaturas de naves, várias roupas utilizadas nos filmes, muitos storyboards, posters, vídeos. Havia também Stormtroopers, Jedis e Leias andando por lá. Fui andando, tirando fotos, lendo informações que eu já estava cansado de saber, desviando de meninos pequenos, e fugindo dos Stormtroopers. Passou pouco menos de 1h, quando de repente, eu percebi que tinha chegado ao final da exposição. Tinha visto tudo em menos de 1h!!

Quando eu gastei os R$30,00, eu imaginei que ia passar pelo menos 4 horas lá dentro, isso se andasse depressa, e foi exatamente o contrário! Depois de perceber que já tinha chegado ao final, resolvi voltar, e ler tudo, e ver todos os vídeos, já que não tinha visto nenhum, e ficar olhando detalhes. Em menos de 2h já tinha feito tudo isso, e estava com a sensação de que aquilo não valeu nem metade do dinheiro que eu tinha pago. Eu vi coisas bem legais lá, a que chama mais atenção com certeza é a réplica de um Imperial Star Destroyer, gigante, com todos os detalhes, e que eu queria roubar de qualquer jeito pra colocar no teto do meu quarto! A fantasia do Boba Fett, com todos os detalhes, em tamanho real também me impressionou. Outras coisas legais: as fantasias de Chewbacca, R2D2 e C3PO originais dos filmes, e os diversos sabres de luz, também originais, utilizados nos filmes. As outras coisas foram legais, mas eu esperava ver coisas mais interessantes. Várias réplicas de naves, mas minúsculas. Modelos em tamanho real de uma speeder bike, e do speeder utilizado por Obi-Wan e Anakin na perseguição em Coruscant no episódio II. Réplica um pouco maior da Millenium Falcon. Várias coisas secundárias, como vários dos vestidos utilizados pela Pádme, um boneco de uma raça esdrúxula que aparece no Episódio III, roupas de Jedis, todas estas, coisas que em outras circunstâncias não fariam muita falta. E algumas maquetes de cenários. Não vou reclamar das coisas que não fariam a menor falta, já que se não as tivesse, ao invés de 2h pra ver tudo duas vezes, eu teria gasto 10 minutos! :P

Depois de todo o alarde feito em cima dessa exposição, eu não imaginava que era uma coisa minúscula. A maior parte das coisas que estavam a mostra eram legais, mas eram muito poucas. E o preço do ingresso está super-faturado, e não vale de jeito nenhum, a não ser que você utilize sua carteira de estudante e pague meia entrada. Como não renovei a minha carteira de estudante a tempo tive que pagar a entrada inteira. (Bah!!)

Se você for fã, vá com dinheiro sobrando, porque no saída da exposição tem a lojinha com um monte de coisas legais pra se comprar, e a tentação é muito grande, e, infelizmente, tudo é muito caro. No final, acabei comprando uma caneca e uma camisa, após juntar toda minha força de vontade para resistir, e não comprar uma réplica da Millenium Falcon.

Trip to São Paulo

This past weekend I had a fast trip to São Paulo. A friend of mine married last Saturday, and I decided to use the trip to visit the Star Wars Exposition that is happening in the city.

I took the bus last Friday at 23:45. The trip was uneventful. I was in the windows seat, but no one was sitting by my side, so I was quite confortable. Before leaving home, my mom was telling me to take a coat with me, but for me it was just too warm to even think about using a coat, so I just ignored her advice. But during the trip I regretted that... I don't know what crosses the mind of these bus companies, when they decide that a comfortable temperature inside the bus during the trip is something around 16 or 17 Celsius or even below that. I was very tired, for the first time in my life I thought that I could sleep in a bus trip, but that cold made it impossible for me. I just felt the cold all night long, nothing that would kill me, but enough to trouble my sleep. I am not sure if I gauge the temperature properly, but it was below a comfortable temperature threshold, that in my opinion is around 20 degrees Celsius, not only below, but far below that. For a while I was praying for the AC to break... The best moments were when the bus stopped in the road and they turned the AC off.

I arrived in SP, and the heat was on again. Not as warm as Belo Horizonte, but uncomfortable too. I took the subway to go to the hotel, and when I arrived at the hotel it was around 9:30 in the morning. Needless to say that I could not check in, and I had to wait until noon to go to my room. I decided to leave my bag at the hotel - they charged me a small fee, of course - and then explore the region to find a way to the Ibirapuera Park, where the Star Wars Exposition is still being held. I asked around for a while, and then found my way to the Park and to the exposition. I will talk about this Exposition in another post, but I will just say that 2h after I arrived there, I was leaving to the hotel again.

I had to ask for how to go to the hotel again, but I found my way. When I arrived there it was around 13:30, and I could proceed with my check-in, and after a while I had the keys to my room.

After a well deserved shower - after an 8h trip, and then after more than one hour walking under the scorching Sun - I decided to leave and look for a place to lunch. I found a place, an excellent one, the food was tasty, and it was a self-service. After I weighted my plate, and the woman there said me the price, I was stunned for some seconds... It was one of the most expensive self-services I have been in my life. I had to take a deep breath, then I paid for the food, and ate... At least, the food was delicious... I got back to the hotel and took a nap.

My company to the wedding were two sisters. One of them was a long time friend, and they came from Brasília. They arrived at the hotel around 19:30. And the wedding was at 21h. We went to the wedding - it deserves another post - after that to the party, and then we got back to the hotel.

Sunday was a very straightforward day. I wake up, took my breakfast, packed my stuff, checked-out. I said goodbye to my two friends, got to the bus terminal to take a bus back to Belo Horizonte. The trip was during the afternoon, uneventful, but this time the AC was in a more moderate temperature. It was possible to take naps from time to time.
I arrived back home at 23h, and that was it.

During the this trip I had ideas for some posts, three of them concerning this trip, and others were just random ideas. More on that in the next days...

P.S.: Always take into consideration your mom's advice when she says you will need a coat or an umbrella... :P

Sobre Torneiras

Alguns dias atrás eu estava observando alguns detalhes aqui em casa, quando uma coisa me chamou a atenção. Durante minha estadia nos EUA, meus pais resolveram reformar partes da casa, e quando eu voltei, encontrei meu quarto totalmente reformado, além de reformas em um dos banheiros, e pequenas mudanças do lado de fora da casa. O detalhe que me chamou a atenção, apesar de já fazer parte da casa antes, mas que depois da reforma acabou me deixando bastante intrigado, foram as torneiras.

A maior parte dos chuveiros e pias aqui em casa possuem pares de torneiras, e sempre uma com algum sinal de cor azul, e a outra de cor vermelha, o que supostamente indicaria água quente e água fria, não nesta ordem. Desde que eu moro nesta casa, o que faz MUITO tempo, nunca houve água quente nas torneiras das pias, e nem água fria nos chuveiros (apenas quando os chuveiros queimavam, ou o disjuntor desarmava, ou no caso do chuveiro desligado), portanto as duas torneiras nunca foram necessárias. E eu sempre imaginei, que os pares de torneiras um dia se tornariam totalmente funcionais, com a instalação de um suposto aquecedor (elétrico, ou solar, ou nuclear, ou gravitacional,ou positrônico, ou a gás, ou transdimensional, ou de anti-matéria, etc...). O fato é que o aquecedor nunca fez questão de dar as caras aqui em casa, e nem foi ao menos procurado, pelo menos não nos últimos 27 anos.

Ao notar a reforma do banheiro, e constatar uma translação e rotação na posição da pia, e consequentemente a mudança das torneiras do lugar. E o mesmo acontecendo com o chuveiro, e suas torneiras, conclui que houvera a mudança no sistema de encanamentos do suposto recinto. Mas o que me intrigou foi que os pares de torneiras ainda continuam presentes... Eu não acho que vá haver a instalação de nenhum aquecedor aqui em casa nas próximas décadas. Mas mesmo assim, as torneiras "azul" e "vermelha" foram mantidas. O mais estranho é que ao abrir a segunda torneira, não há o menor sinal de fluxo de água... Fico imaginando se a torneira não estaria ligada a um pedaço de cano isolado dentro da parede, entre dois pontos aleatórios, sem cruzar nenhuma conexão de água. Antes da reforma, pelo menos costumava sair água, mesmo que de maneira inconstante, das torneiras secundárias, agora não há nem fluxo de ar...

Esse não é um problema apenas da minha casa. Já vi várias casas com pares de torneiras, que deveriam ser de água quente, e de água fria, mas que no fim das contas não possuiam nenhuma funcionalidade além da redundância, e às vezes nem isto, sendo apenas um detalhe estético. Um gasto inútil de recursos monetários na minha opinião. Vou tentar descobrir a funcionalidade dessas torneiras com meus pais, afinal eles devem ter feito isso por algum motivo sinistro, desconhecido pela minha mente...

Isso me faz lembrar do primeiro problema técnico que eu tive que resolver quando cheguei aos EEUU. Não sabia como a torneira do hotel funcionava, e fiquei um tempo tentando descobrir como fazer pra que a água brotasse daquele aparato, que na época, parecia alienígena. Alguns minutos de ponderações depois, acabei descobrindo o segredo. Não existem pares de torneiras lá, e na mesma torneira vc consegue regular o fluxo de água quente e fria, e deixar a água na temperatura mais confortável para o indivíduo. Ao se girar a torneira da esquerda para direita, ou vice-versa, você seleciona se quer a água mais fria ou mais quente (na maioria dos casos), e para controlar o fluxo de água desejado, você deve levantar ou abaixar a torneira. Todas elas parecem alavancas com dois graus de liberdade. Eu demorei alguns minutos girando as torneiras-alavancas de um lado pro outro, me perguntando se por acaso a água do meu quarto não havia acabado, e quase indo reclamar na recepção do hotel. Mas, felizmente, descobri o segundo grau de liberdade da torneira-alavanca antes de passar vergonha na recepção. :P

Após minha mudança para o primeiro apartamento, tive outro problema com torneiras. A torneira-alavanca da pia da cozinha ficava pingando. E todo dia, eu tinha que descobrir a posição exata que ou fazia a água parar de vazar, ou pelo menos minimizava a taxa de pingos por unidade de tempo. Claro, tal ponto de mínimo variava aleatariamente e após cada uso do aparato. Ou seja, após lavar as vasilhas, havia um divergente negativo de minutos, durante o processo de busca pelo elusivo ponto de mínimo.

Finalmente, quando mudei pra segunda casa, outro problema com torneiras. Desta vez com a torneira-alavanca do chuveiro-banheira. Ao invés de dois graus de liberdade, essa só tinha um grau de liberdade. Nos primeiros momentos, eu fiquei tentanto girar a alavanca de um lado pro outro sem sucesso, ela nem se mexia. Tanto o fluxo de água, quanto a temperatura da água eram controlados apenas por um grau de liberdade. Você puxava a torneira para cima, e a água começava a jorrar, e se você levantasse mais a água ficava mais quente, e se abaixasse a água ficava mais fria. Além disso tinha uma trava, que dependendo da posição fazia a água ou sair pela torneira para encher a banheira, ou então sair pelo chuveiro. Parecia óbvio, mas foram alguns minutos até o momento de elucidação sobre o funcionamento do sistema torneira-alavanca-trava-banheira-chuveiro. Orgulho-me de ter conseguido, sem ter necessitado de ajuda de ninguém, ou em outras palavras, sem ter passado vergonha. :P

Se você leitor, algum dia resolver visitar os EUA, já sabe como as torneiras funcionam por lá, e se você estiver com sede, e a pessoa pegar um copo e enchê-lo com água da torneira e te oferecer, não se assuste, é assim que funciona na maioria das vezes, e ninguém morre com cólera...

P.S.: O último texto foi o número (6 x 6 x 6).

Random Swimming and Playing...

Life in Brasil is almost as before I left the country last year. I am back to the swimming classes, and how I missed that while I was in the US. Every muscle of my body is in pain at this very moment, but I love this kind of pain... Yesterday I swam 450 m, and just before the end of the class I had a cramp. I was barely able to walk after that, I had to stop and the stretch my calfs until the pain passed... Today I swam 650 m, and no cramps, but I was dead after the class. It is just the beginning...

Sometimes I feel a void inside of me, and I don't know why I feel like that, because there is really no reason for it to be like that.

I am almost beating Rock Band, playing the guitar, in the hard mode, and I even started to play some songs in the expert mode. I am stuck in "Enter Sandman" by Metallica at this time. Each time I play this game, I have the feeling that I really should start playing something like electric guitars or bass.

Finally, the weather seems to be getting cooler.

I am having this crazy idea about letting my hair grow again to the point of a green-power hair, as I am green and not black. I hope this idea leaves my mind soon...

I did not forget about "The Day to Talk Like a Physicist", it was two weeks ago, but as I do not care about this temporal conventions, I still have time to talk like a physicist and post something about it in the near or far future... It all depends on my inspiration.

And, yes, I am back...

What is in my jukebox right now!? Superbeast by Rob Zombie...

I need to go home, and maybe find a new cell phone for me... I am back using my pre-cambrian communication device... Maybe another day, or yesterday in another life, but not today in this life... The music is over, so the post is done...