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interested?

computation/computing

why am i secretary of the guild of assassins?
the basic aim is 'to kill people in a totally harmless way'... i decided to become secretary so that i could play with their website... my favourite weapon is a battleaxe because it is so unsubtle that if i kill someone with it i must be doing ok... this activity has no serious aspect.

why run?
it's something i can do with next to no effort, yet keeps me at a sensible level of fitness... at the moment i'm not doing much racing, this may change. i run 5-10 miles a day, and my preferred type of race is cross-country: the muddier and hillier the better... if i have to do track i try to find 10k races.

why am i learning aikido?
martial arts in general fascinate me because of the way they combine dance-like grace with focused power and a deep understanding of how the body is put together... i like to understand the vessel that's carrying my brain around... i picked aikido because it concentrates more on correct movements and less on power, although with correct movements power follows, and to gain 'maximum' power correct movement is necessary. at the moment i'm not doing any training, don't how long this will last.
 
why computation?
it's always 'a good thing' to know your betters... kasparov (world #1 chess player) was beaten by a computer (he reckons he was playing a human!.. he also claimed, on another occasion, while playing a human over the net, that he was actually playing a computer)... the latest apple desktop has been classified as a supercomputer; i imagine the pc aren't far behind... computers continue to get faster and smaller... what could be more interesting than studying something that in all likelihood will make humans as effectively redundant as birds, and yet at the same time has the potential to free intelligent humans to use their meagre skills to more creative and productive ends?
so far the main computer related things that have caught my attention are related to web page design and programming (mainly asp). i also want to learn how to build and run networks.

what was wrong with engineering?
engineering was almost entirely maths. however it was not of the interesting variety (proofs, why and how questions... like in most of the computation course)... it was almost entirely the application of formulae to do 'sums' (what questions)... this is not to say it wasn't hard (it was), but it wasn't the most riveting of occupations.

why do you go climbing?
i have been systematically removing my fears... vertigo was next, after that i'll have to sort out my fear of snakes.

why the clothes and the hair?
england is far too dull and puritanical a place... in the 'good old days' the acropolis was painted in garish reds, blues, greens, etc... all churches were painted brightly and many had pretty sainted glass... unfortunately cromwell and his wreckers destroyed large amounts of sainted glass, white washed churches and put an ethic of dullness into 'the' english psyche which has survived to today... i am showing people it doesn't have to be that way, in the hope that it will inspire the world to go pretty again.

why ban smoking?
i don't want to stink of someone else's crap, i don't want a sore throat, i don't want irritated eyes, i don't want lung cancer... not so long ago it was normal for people to shit in the street; that disgusting, antisocial and unhygienic habit has been all but stopped... i consider smoking to be in many ways worse.
of course i am quite happy for those stupid enough to kill themselves to do so... their health is of no concern to me... what i care about is them inflicting their filthy habit on me... why should i have to suffer some antisocial twit pumping crap in my face?

why learn japanese?
learning languages is something i've always enjoyed... to me it is a logic puzzle... why that language has to be japanese is down to a fixation while i was younger on all things japanese... arts, writing, martial arts, cars (one of my earlier plans was to design cars), landscape...