everytime

Every time I think of something to blog on, by the time I get to the computer, I've forgotten what that thing was. I walk away from the computer and (fanfare) I remember... but too late (head donk). It's very sad.

So, I have been chewing cud on theories of space travel, based on what I know. The problem with vacuums is that there is a lack of matter within the vacuum. The problem with inertia is that it will keep going unless you can justify the change in force, whether it be an increase in momentum, acceleration or a change in displacement. Scoop, release. Scoop, release.

MAGNETS! Magnets are the best other possible form of propulsion in space. Everything is made up of the forces of attraction and repulsion. From atoms, to compounds, to people and cars to planets, stars and galaxies. Magnets. Attraction, repulsion and some form of propulsion. I guess combustion is still our best chance. Fuel cells would be great, but in order to move in space, you need to lose matter. I think. Get rid of matter in order to have sufficient force to propel you, so fuel cells would only be useful for maintaining some form of homeostasis/maintenance. I just need to think of a way to get these thoughts to congeal and fit into place as puzzle pieces. This requires more thought. Peanut butter and jam (who eats jelly in a sandwich? only those weird Americans on the other side of the world who have a different name and spelling for almost everything. They resist conformation and order all others to conform to their ideas - ok, generalisation, but that is what I have noticed in general, just... don't kill me, ok?).

(Btw, I have come to the realisation that Canadians are cool. I almost got pulped to a mush the day I likened them to their southern neighbours. Nope. Not doing that again. And I don't say this because I was almost turned into a smoothie. The whole world knows it anyway, so there's no need to justify. Again, I say, Canadians are cool.)

Besides my space travel theories... I have been thinking about the similarities between the tv shows, Bones and Castle. Can you imagine Brennan and Booth meeting Castle and Beckett? I can. Booth and Beckett sizing each other up. Who's the better cop? Castle hitting on Brennan and being amused by her blunt literalness. Who's the better writer? Hilarity.

Imagine they all had to solve a case together. Beckett and Booth would probably bicker a bit, but know without asking what the other is doing. Brennan trailing behind saying that she can use a gun and both Beckett and Booth telling her to stay behind, telling Castle to make sure she stays back. Castle contemplating the possibilities of the story behind the case, impressing Brennan who when she reads the bones, impresses him in turn. I don't know. The result would probably irritate me and highlight the similarities between the two shows.

Oh well. They're all still cool and they're all pretty good actors... I liked Nathan Fillion in Firefly and Serenity. Anyone else note how Brennan and Beckett both lost their mothers in a mystery murder? Brennan's kind of solved her story, Beckett's working on hers. Still. I'm glad they haven't revealed that gem yet. Makes things more interesting. Wonder if the two couples would be blunt enough to tell the other couple that they are obviously in love even if they're not together. Doubt it.

I even dreamed about the cross over the other night. Makes me seem like I'm a fanatic. Really, I'm not. I just don't want to study for my exam tomorrow, see? Anyway, it was a bit like how in the first episode of the most recent season of Castle (see, I don't keep track of numbers), where Beckett and Castle aimed guns at each other. All I dreamed was a scenario where I was stuck in the middle with all four aiming guns over my head and their partner to get at some villain beyond. Weird. I should not think about tv shows before going to bed.

When I write about ordinary things like my opinion... my English goes bad and reverts to my family's broken bad English. We do it on purpose at home. What is the world's English coming to? The surreality of a gorilla serving frozen jelly at a bar. The improbability of an elephant knocking at my front door. Why are people butchering the English language?

For fun. Phun. Pun.

One day, I will return to this post and delete it. The blatant expression of my thoughts is embarrassing. Have I ever said I sometimes wished I was an actor, just for the joy of all those stories and the chance to pretend I existed elsewhere?

Laterally did the sunflower sway
To the croc's windswept lay
When the butterfly realised its not May
And the pugs refused to pay.
Stuff it. Leave the rest for another day.

point estimates and standard deviations

If you could freeze a point in time, any point - it would be a point estimate as you would not possibly be able to find an exact point, seeing as time is a fast moving stream. It's like trying to pick out a certain molecule of water in a river. Almost impossible... unless it is a fixed point in time - as in a fixed event. Like Doctor Who says, some events cannot be changed, or you get a paradox. In that case, it would become a fixed point estimate.

Point estimates can be variable. It's annoying, because then the calculations get more complicated and you have to remember what all the little symbols stand for. The only problem is that point estimates are useful. For example a point estimate of 1945 would be World War 2, a more accurate point estimate of that would be the end of World War 2 - but that doesn't sum up the whole year, because...drumroll... tantatara: it's an estimation. You could also say it's the 'victory of the daleks' or possibly around the time where the boy asked 'are you my mummy?' Plenty more where that came from.

I'm tired of point estimates. However my title mentions standard deviations, so let's talk a little about standard deviations and why the TARDIS has so much trouble pinpointing certain points in time. I can tell you straight up that it's the fault of variance and the standard deviation. Possibly the standard error as well. Yep, all their fault. You see, the Doctor wants to travel to a certain point in time, but because time is always in flux, always moving and has so so so so so so many variables, it's not surprising that the TARDIS sometimes accidentally misses some. Sometimes the ones it misses are the important ones when it does the calculations, so that it makes an error. Technically, it's still correct yet inaccurate, it just might be a few seconds, minutes, hours, days, years off, but it still gets there (although not always in the specified location - that might be because of the standard errors and deviations in it's Earth GPS).

Now if the Doctor specified he wanted to travel to a certain time with a standard deviation of ummm... say one, and a minimal standard error of uh, one, the TARDIS would get him as close to that point in time as it could within those specifications, because you gotta allow for error. Ask any engineer. Ask any rocket scientist. You aim to get the error as small and miniscule as possible, but the error is always still there. Imagine that. You can never be correct. You can only be nearly right.

I suppose that would apply to the Destiny in Stargate Universe too.

Now, factor space into the time complex and you get a complicated mix. Space and time are 2 separate dimensions and are treated as such; however, they are also intricately linked. The people on Destiny must be glad that they don't have to deal with this birds' nest of knotty hair. Good thing Doctor Who is a Timelord that can solve those multiple stories of mathematics in his Timelord-y brain, otherwise he'd forever be turning up at the wrong places in the wrong time and the TARDIS would never get it right. Although, I have to say, he does still make mistakes. Often. Then again, he's only a Timelord. He can't help it.

The standard deviations and errors would act as overlapping targets pointing to a specific place in a specific time, painting the area within which the TARDIS is most likely to land. Interesting. It's like that game in neopets where you have those parachuting bugs that try to land on red and white targets of varying sizes. There is room for error, but your aim is to hit the bullseye.

Have I mentioned that the latest series of Doctor Who is mildly somewhat much more scary than I anticipated? The classic series never really scared me, just cos, you know tin foil and plastic bags...great props that leave plenty of 'scope for imagination'. Note the sarcasm. The last two series of Doctor Who were reasonable. Suitably crazy and nonsensical, yet with great character moments. The current Doctor Who... well, as the 10th Doc said, when he first took over, he's 'still cooking'. Has the 11th Doctor said that? Can't remember. The Weeping Angels were freaky - but twas all good, especially considering the props are so much more realistic than the classical series. Love the accents. Gotta love the accents - bar Captain Jack Harkness. I find him more annoying than anything else. Grins too much. But if he didn't do all those 'cutesy' grins, he wouldn't be him, so I'll forgive him for not being able to help himself.

Stargate Universe on the other hand is starting to pique my interest a bit more than it did in the first half of the seaon. It started off on a flat plane, but since then, it's gained more 'wholeness' or '3-D-ness' (for lack of a better word). It's a good one for character study. Telling the story from a different perspective to what most people are used to. It's good. Saves us from getting bored of the same 'same ole, same old'. Much more interesting in the second half of the season, what with more conflicts and waving arms going 'aaaargh!'.

Anyway, I gotta get back to working out my point estimates, stomping on standard deviations, tugging t-tails, probing for values of p and digging out effect sizes before sampling whiskers from the boxes of my meta-analyses. Why, oh why statistics? Why? I can't even do long division. What am I doing trying to work out what the confidence interval means in both the fixed and variable plots and whether the null hypothesis is indeed null? Tell the numbers to be kind to my uncomprehending cerebrum, please. I'm not River from Firefly, nor Sam Carter from SG-1, nor Rodney McKay and I'm definitely no Eli. I don't play computer games. Were I to have the brain of a Timelord... actually, rather not. Those Timelord-Human metacrises aren't worth it. Look what happened to poor Donna Noble.
Well... back to the lists. Can't be late or so-and-so will strip the wax from my ears (if I don't get there first).

space

Once in the space
The visitor found porridge
But the porridge was sour
Like the yellow tamarind

Just so you know
This isn't a real poem
I'm just writing like this
For the fun of being low.

Anyway...
The yellow tamarind
Ate a orange cluster of dry figs
That had mashed a cake of dates
To a sweet pizza smithereen.

But this is going no where,
so just for you information
The pizza got eaten by a dog
or was it a hog?
I'm not sure.
It could have been either.