fractalnavel

so, y'know, the relations all change in a non-euclidean geometry, so maybe there is a geometry in which those circles do coincide, and i have no idea how this affects the shape or consistency of deserts. ...

... ok, i'll shut up now.

so i get to work early today, shy a few hours sleep.  i start drawing diagrams relating to my last post on the manager's whiteboard, in between all the other discussions.

yeah, i tell everyone that it's pi day. i think i'm being humored.  and i don't really care.

it occurs to me to go to a local bakery in search of a square pi.  i use that as an excuse to get lunch.  or was it the other way around ?  in any case, there are no squared pi's in sight.  oh well.  so i get a bailey's irish cream pie instead.   ok, so that makes no sense.  did you read the part about lost sleep ??

the bakery lady (approaching her 70's?) looks at me strange when i ask for square pi's, and i explain that it's pi day.  you'd think a bakery would be up on things like that.  well, a geeky bakery, anyway.

the pi was very good, by the way, even if it did soften into pudding a bit. 

they didn't teach us about that part in geometry class.

i haven''t been sleeping well lately, i dunno why.  the first few days of the ski trip were phenomenal, but since then, well ...

so i woke at 3am today, head spinning with work, life - and pi day.  oh, geek, thy name is... ok, i'm no drama queen / king.  but still...

anyway, it had to do with squared pi's (π ?  cool! use "π"), and the relations between circles and squares with various dimensions.

1: if you center a circle of radius one (area π) on a square of area π, the area of the clipped square corners equals the area of the clipped circle arcs.  no, i didn't calculate this area.

2: but are the square / circle intersections the corners of a regular octagon ?  no. a regular octagon formed in such a way has a circle of radius (π ^ 1/2) * (3 - 2 ^ 3/2 + 1/4) ^ 1/2 = 1.15... .  bummer. 

3: ok, so then, how about a circle intersecting a square in such a way that it trisects the sides ?  what's that radius ?  turns out that's yet another different circle.   you work it out.  ends up with a radius of approximately 0.95...

really annoying, this stuff.  in a perfect universe, these would all be the same circle.  close, but no cigar / banana / whatever.

got me thinking about the area of the sectors clipped by the (irregular) octagon in case (1), inside the corners clipped by the circle.  i would like to see some slice of π re-emerge from all this.  nope, haven't worked this one out yet either.

yeah, nothing particularly "interesting" here, but mildly entertaining nonetheless.

yeah, ok i admit it - i just wanted to use the word "nonetheless" ;-)

... more or less.  did my usual ranting thing at work today, but it seems i am more able to channel that passion / frustration into constructive stuff, combined with perhaps a but more balanced treatment of whatever topic is at hand.

yeah, ok, that's a bit optimistic ;-)  but, although i did not get a lot of programming per se done, a lot of planning and decisions were made for the final stretch, and i got another batch of knowledge and tools transferred to folks there.

that's the ongoing battle.  it's not so much the customers of IT that are the issue (although that is sometimes significant), but IT itself getting in its own way.

so much cool stuff on the web today to build community and increase visibility.  and i haven't even really looked for it; it's just stuff i just keep bumping into by accident.  for example, ran into someone's sig image in a forum that was doing something cool, rotating through the title of his last few blog posts.  turns out to be a feedburner.com thing.  here, like this:

that only took a minute or two, i swear.  less than 100 seconds.

anyway, it seems my constant harassing does seem to eventually take hold, seeding thoughts, words and actions in others, who in turn do the same, and so on.  but it's so slow.  dammit.