Monday, March 10, 2008

Crafty me & a computer-generated passive aggressive note

Firstly, I've had some data integrity trouble with the photos of the one thing I ever knitted, a coat for my first kid. So the bottoms of these photos are missing. Sorry. But here's my daughter pretending to be a ghost, and then peek-a-booing. This coat took a very long time to knit, because I had never knit anything before. It was arguably an unsuitable project for a beginner. Still, I enjoyed doing it & I love these photos.

Also, while I'm at it, I'll post the best painting I've ever done. I'm not much of an artist; I'm the artistic dunce of the family. But a couple fo days ago I got roped into joining in when my concubine & our daughters were painting, with this result:














Lastly, a passive-aggressive reply I got from the computer algebra package Mathematica a couple of days ago. I'm not sending this to Kerry, because I doubt it will be everyone's kind of thing, but maybe someone here will see the funny side. I had a system of equations I wanted to solve. These equations involved complex variables and their conjugates (that is, variables from the complex plane and their mirror images reflected through the real axis). I entered my equations into Mathematica which, like Maple (which I had tried first), was unable to solve them. But whereas Maple had just said "sorry, I can't solve your equations" or something like that, Mathematica tried to blame me:What I'd like is to know what all the solutions are, but I'll have to live on in ignorance. I did manage to find a couple of solutions by hand---though evidently, whatever I was doing, it wasn't really "algebra".

7 comments:

anglophile said...

Thanks for sharing, Troy! Your daughter is adorable! That coat is very cute, but I see how it took forever, being oversized, as well as fine-gauge. And all those stripes, it makes me shudder to think of all the ends you had to weave in. Or did you use the expedient of carrying the unused color up the side?

I like your painting as well. It is much better than I could execute.

Troy McClure said...

From memory, I think I just carried the unused colour up the side. It certainly took a long time; I first intended it to be ready before she was born, but she was five months I think when she first wore it.

lizardrinking said...

That's some hard work, Troy, on all 3 topics. I am reading Haruki Murakami's Hardboiled Wonderland at the Edge of the World, I wonder if you'd enjoy it. And your daughter is a sweetie.

Troy McClure said...

Rose, I searched the library catalogue. We've got a bunch of stuff by that guy, but most seems to be in Japanese. There's something called "Norwegian Wood" from 1949; I guess the Beatles named their tune after this? Anyhow, if it's not in the Uni library, apathy might be the deciding factor. It wouldn't be on the internet, would it?

lizardrinking said...

Readily available in English, Troy, your library should have it. I don't think Norweigan Wood is from 1949 as it was written in 1987

If you are to read him, don't start with that one - the Windup Bird Chronicles is very interesting, or the one I am reading.

Troy McClure said...

Evidently I misread. 1949 is the author's birth-year. I'll go over there & find something of his sometime soonish.

Anonymous said...

Hey Troy! So, you now have a blog! Sweet! I know, it's been a while since we've chatted, but I hardly comment on PAN anymore, cause Canthz_B was really pissing me off. Anyways, I've added you to my blogroll, I'll have to come back and check things out!
Mitsu