“Life is too short to write long things.” — Stanislaw J. Lec
I have been procrastinating on an idea of writing a short book about procrastination for just over a month now.
Vitruvian Stained (“Lumo” Vitruviano)
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, a pioneer of the hospice care movement, said
‘People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.’
Ten to talk about in hushed tones
Featuring rectangles from the following works:
Mona Lisa (Leonardo da Vinci, 1517)
The Scream (Edvard Munch, 1893)
The Starry Night (Vincent van Gogh, 1889)
The Last Supper (Leonardo da Vinci, 1498)
Girl with a Pearl Earring (Johannes Vermeer, 1665)
The Creation of Adam (Michelangelo, 1512)
The Persistence of Memory (Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, 1931)
A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (Georges Seurat, 1886)
The Great Wave off Kanagawa (Hokusai, 1832)
Guernica (Pablo Picasso, 1937)
Social media procrastination die
For indecisive procrastinators, yesterday I created this papercraft social media die:
If you were to use an online tool to randomly choose a social media website to go to, you would save time. But procrastination is not about saving time. Using this manual tool makes your procrastination more effective. First you need to step away from the computer, roll the die (perhaps several times), then manually go to the social media website. Each step provides an opportunity for distraction and further procrastination.
Features logos for:
- Tumblr
- Google+
- YouTube
3 dominates π
This work attempts to show the significance of the starting digits of pi. [If you download the SVG file and zoom in hundreds of times you can see all nine of the circles]. Over short distances, it is the 3 that dominates.
C = π2r
So for a small circle you can roughly approximate the relationship between the circumference and the diameter (2r) as three. You will be wrong, but only .14159265359… wrong. Round it to 3.1 and you are less wrong (.04159265359… wrong).
Pi is irrational, not like a two year old having a tantrum, but in the mathematical sense where it cannot be represented by a ratio (fraction) because it has a infinite non-repeating decimal expansion. With infinite digits after the decimal point, the best we can do is approximate pi to the number of digits we know. [Currently pi to about 12 trillion digits has been calculated].
For calculating the distances and sizes of far off galaxies, the decimals of pi take on more significance and more precise estimates of pi are needed.
So how much pi is necessary? In Scientific American’s blog: How Much Pi Do You Need?, the answer is 32 significant digits for use with the fundamental constants of the universe and 15 or 16 for everyday things like space station and GPS navigation.
Happy pi day!
Peaces of pie
To celebrate pi day (3.14.15), I have created a couple of pie related images – Peaces of pie and 3 dominates π.
Later today I will make a lemon meringue pie.
Happy pi day!
Fifteen Hastings
Continuing the Land of Confusion collection, here is Fifteen Hastings, dedicated to my sister and her family who currently live in one of the Hastings.
Thirty Seven Woodvilles
I grew up in the town of Woodville, in New Zealand where my ancestors were some of the first settlers. They had emigrated from County Tipperary in Ireland where there is also a Woodville.
My Woodville is a junction town, and there are many road signs around the North Island of New Zealand pointing to it. My father would often say that all roads lead to Woodville. With at least thirty seven places named Woodville globally he has a good chance of being correct.
Shop open
Prints of 40 Most Mentioned are now available from our Society6 shop in various formats including framed and canvas prints, stationery cards, and phone/tablet/laptop skins.
Making of 40 Most Mentioned
Acquiring the 40 famous paintings for 40 Most Mentioned was the hard part. Slicing and splicing was simple.
Creation of 40 Most Mentioned – Mona Lisa is based on Visitors of Louvre in front of Mona Lisa by Edal Anton Lefterov, available at http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mona-lisa_in_the_Louvre.jpg, and is likewise licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Disclaimer: No physical paintings were harmed in the production of 40 Most Mentioned. The Mona Lisa was intact when I visited the Louvre in July 2013. If any of the paintings have been stolen or damaged, it wasn’t me.
