California elections

I just realized that I'm going to be in Japan on the 7th. Need to get an absentee ballot ASAP.

inventions/technology

Nathan Myhrvold.


Emerging Technology Conference Special Report
Evangelizing for Invention
Former Microsoft CTO Nathan Myhrvold laments that companies and even academics devote so little to the direct pursuit of invention.
( Read more... )

classical haiku

"It's a foolishly long
night!" I say
in the long night

baka nagaki yo to môshitaru yonaga kana

Kobayashi Issa
1803

Books: U.I. Muhin "The murder of Stalin and Beria"

http://www.1953.ru/murder/muhin_st_0.htm

here we read:
Между тем Сталин действительно имел одну цель в жизни, но этой целью было счастье трудящегося человека. Для осуществления этой цели была нужна власть, но сама по себе она для Сталина ценности не представляла.

Indeed, Stalin had just one real goal in life, and this goal was the happines of the worker (working class). To achieve this goal he needed the power, but the power just by itself didn't represent any intrinsic value for him.

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No comment.

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Kobayashi Issa
katatsuburi soro-soro nobore fuji no yama

O summer snail, you climb but slowly, slowly to the top of Fuji translated by Sam Hamil

little snail inch by inch, climb Mount Fuji! translated by David.Lanoue