Mini Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein is one of the great figures of human history, and I hope I did this miniature version justice. I'm getting better at painting tiny, tiny details such as eyes and facial hair. 
 

Fuel for Thought Control

Fuel for naught
Plots
Demands control
Finds
The means to restrict
Expressions of human compassion

 

Cadae Pie

Steam rises from
Pie
Wafting gently
Through
The kitchen window
Drawing crows and Little Jack Horner

The Looping Nightmare

I awoke at 3 am this morning with my heart pounding. I was enjoying a run-of-the-mill nightmare about fending off a horde of vampires when I realized I was re-entering a recurring death trap. 

Imagine a series of long hallways, dimly lit, each ending in a dead end that requires puzzle-solving to open a trap door to access the next hallway. In this particular iteration of the dream, Pete, Totty and I, along with Brad Pitt, my former colleague Lorinda from ATCO, and a young woman I've never met before, were gathered in hallway one. 

"Oh man, this again," I say to Pete. "Do you remember anything from last time?" 

As we speak, I realize that I, in fact, remember how to unlock the first two traps. Bond-like, I use some fishing line to release a catch on the first secret door, which slides aside to reveal a bookcase. I tug on one book on the second-highest shelf, and the bookshelf slides aside. We all cram, single file, down a narrow, pitch-black corridor, the bookshelf slamming shut behind us. I feel a metal pole jutting out of the wall, and I realize I don't remember how we bypassed this trap last time. 

"Does anyone remember how to do the pole..?" 

Mike steps up to handle it, everyone shuffling back and forth to make room, while Pete and I continue our conversation. 

"How many times have we done this?" I ask. 

"I'm not sure," Pete says. "You look around 50 now, and this all started back in university." 

"What's the farthest we've gotten?" 

"My memory isn't perfect, but I feel like Ticheler made it through nine or ten traps before he was dissolved in acid." 

I wince. "I'm sure he's looking forward to giving that one a try again." 

"Maybe we'll get that far this time," Pete shrugs. Mike has successfully managed the pole trick, and a door slides open to reveal a casual gaming lounge furnished with low couches and short tables, each with a board game on it - but no game matches any seen in the real world. 

The young woman I don't know approaches me. She's terrified. "I don't remember which games are harmless distractions and which can kill you if you make the wrong move." 

"I'm sorry...I don't remember either. At least none of these are mandatory." 

She nods, but she slides into one of the low couches anyway and starts playing a game that uses straws and coloured marbles. I suddenly remember that some of the marbles are coated in deadly contact poison, but my throat seizes up and I can't warn her. 

"This is the lowest-rated game on board game geek," Pete notes, and when I awaken I have a strong urge to look it up. 

She stays behind while Pete, Totty, and I join the large crowd gathering at the lounge's exit. As we push through the doors, we leave behind the near-blackness of the lounge and plunge into a brightly-lit series of institutional staircases. Hundreds of people are lined up, and we shuffle along. We know that once we make it down the staircases, we enter the deadliest part of the death maze. 

"Over and over again until we escape," I mutter. "It's the afterlife. Is it hell? Maybe Steve can tell us." 

"I don't think Steve's actually been through this yet," Mike says. 

"Lucky Steve." 

"Rob was compiling a video with all our clearest memories of how to get through the first few traps," Pete notes. 

"That's stuck in the real world, though," I reply. "Doesn't help us here." 

Mike takes a left turn down a staircase no one else is using, and Pete and I follow. We go down two flights, and to our surprise, we reach a large parking garage on the ground floor. The exit is open. 

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Mike says, arms outstretched. We dash into the open air. I pump my fists in delight. 

"YES! Has anything ever been this REAL?" I shout. "FUCK YOU, YOU BASTARDS!" I scream at the sky, jumping up and down. 

My joy is short-lived, though, because I wake up, and I realize the escape was not, in fact, real. It's 3 am and I wish I could just stay up. Because going back means another iteration, another opportunity to die horribly. I made it out this time, but it's the first time in hundreds of tries that doesn't end in blistering agony of one form or another. 

NOTE: I shared this dream with some friends, and Colin sent a chill down my spine by writing back: "The lowest-ranked game on board game geek is something called 'Passages and Purgatory.'" He really got me, then admitted he made it up. That prompted Mike to do the math...but that's Mike's story to tell. 

5,773 Films

Early last year, I saw my 4,000th movie and posted the number of films I'd screened by the decade of their release. I've now seen 5,773 films; here's an update to those numbers.

As before, the chart shows I try to watch films from across the decades, but that decades before the 1930s are underrepresented and decades after the 1970s are overrepresented.

Here's the breakdown of films seen per decade, from most to least represented. The number in brackets indicates whether or not a decade moved up or down the ranks or stayed the same since last time.

1980s: 722 films (no change)
1990s: 613 films (no change)
2010s: 604 films (up one) 
2000s: 599 films (down one)
1950s: 532 films (up two)
1970s: 526 films (down one)
1940s: 511 films (up one)
1930s: 472 films (up one)
1960s: 466 films (down three)
1890s: 275 films (up one)
1900s: 165 films (up two) 
1910s and 1920s (tie): 131 films each (no change and up two)
1880s: 16 (up one)
Undated: 8 (down one)
1870s: 2 (no change) 

Total: 5,773 films

The number of undated films has been cut in half, meaning The Movie Database is doing a better job of including release dates for even the more obscure films. And I've finally seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off!

I'm also getting closer to my goal of seeing at least 500 films from each decade, adding the 2000s, 2010s, 1970s, 1950s, and1940s. Of course, The 1870s and 1880s are frozen at 2 and 16 films, respectively, since that's all the films that were made in those decades, and I've seen them. (At least according to the database, which is subject to change as new discoveries are made.) 

Bindertoons #4

THE STORY BEHIND BINDERTOONS:
The truth is, I don't remember drawing these. But Mom and Dad asked Sean and me to clear some of our old stuff out of their basement, and my Math 30 binder was among the things we discarded. I drew one of these little people on each page of my notes, a couple of hundred of them. I didn't photograph them all, because frankly, my art is not that deathless. 

Bindertoons #2

4,000 Films

As of this evening, I have seen 4,000 films, or about 91 films per year since the age I was old enough to remember what I was watching. If I can see another 1,000 films before I turn 51, I can claim to have seen 1,000 films per decade on average...quite a stretch, unless I watch nothing but shorts for the next couple of years.

And now, for the first time ever on The Earliad, a pie chart! Click to embiggen.

The chart reveals that my attempt watch films from across the motion picture era is a qualified success, with no single decade absorbing more than 15% of my attention. However, the decades I've been around for (not counting my birth year, 1969) account for 60% of my viewing.

Here's a numerical breakdown of the films I've seen in each decade, counting down from top to bottom:

1980s: 597
1990s: 510
2000s: 451
2010s: 433
1970s: 405
1960s: 366
1950s: 361
1940s: 242
1930s: 182
1890s: 165
1910s: 96
1900s: 86
1920s: 78
Undated: 16 (These films have release dates, but the film database I'm using doesn't know them)
1880s: 10
1870s: 2
Total: 4000

And no, I still haven't seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off. 

That Day in Math Class

One day in high school - or perhaps it was junior high - during one of those rare moments when the teacher was out and we were free to talk, my friend Keith engaged me in conversation. He talked for a few minutes and I listened and nodded, and then I turned away, thinking of other things.

"Earl," Keith said. "EARL."

Startled, I returned my gaze to Keith.

"I wasn't finished talking."

I blushed beet red, as was my wont in those adolescent days, and nigh unto now I feel bad that I wasn't giving Keith the undivided attention he deserved. He usually had something intelligent and interesting to say, so the fault was entirely mine. I can't explain this bout of uncharacteristic rudeness, and it haunts me still. 

Dice of Doom Redux

I've been remiss in pointing out that Jeff Pitts once again defied the odds during a Dungeons & Dragons session on March 31. A twenty is the best possible die roll in the game under most circumstances, meting out maximum damage to demons and demigods alike. Even Sauron himself would quake at Jeff's prowess.

Back in January I reported that Jeff had rolled double twenties to slay his foes with astounding finesse. Mike calculated that the odds of rolling two twenties on two twenty-sided dice is 1 in 400, or once every forty sessions or so. But as if to show that statistics can often clump together rather than average out nicely, Jeff's dice-throwing finesse brought up double twenties about four years earlier than one might expect. We're heading into the fearsome Proving Grounds this Saturday night - here's hoping Jeff's luck will continue to be "on a roll."

Anxiety Dreams: Post-Secondary Edition

I'm sure that most people who attended a post-secondary institution have had anxiety dreams about missed classes, surprise final exams and so on. My school-themed anxiety dreams usually follow this pattern:


1) I'm in an exam room preparing to write my last final, when I suddenly realize that I missed a class in grade 7 or 8, nullifying all of my educational progress.

2) I return to junior high to start school over again from that point.

3) I slowly realize that I did, in fact, earn my bachelor's degree many years ago, and that the year must be (the current year), not 1991.

4) I realize that I'm dreaming, and I have a few moments of lucid dreaming before I awaken.

Last night's dream, however, took on a slightly different form. This time, I was in a fourth-year mathematics class, populated by my current crop of friends and coworkers. I was struggling to follow the teacher's lecture because even though I'd somehow gotten into her class, I hadn't taken a math course since high school, and even then I was a strictly above-average student. I wasn't nearly ready for calculus, or whatever she was describing.

Fortunately the dream's setting shifted to a bookstore, an environment far more appealling to me than math class. Here I discovered that Alberta Liberal MLA Kevin Taft was secretly the ghostwriter of a popular series of crime novels.

In just a few months it will have been twenty years since I graduated. Do these dreams ever go away? Or are they a symptom of impostor syndrome?