It's an Exciting World

Lap Kitties!

Today while working, Archer came and slept in my lap. Lana joined for a bit to get pets, but didn’t stick around nearly as long. Archer was there for an hour and a half, while Lana stopped by for 15 minutes or so. They are such good kitties!

I also put Lana on the leash today. She was going around the stairs, so not quite outside yet. She did really well and didn’t struggle against the leash too much after the first realization that it was on her and a bit of extra weight. She likes going under things, so I’m going to have to be wary of her for a bit. She even did well when I held her back from going further, and just came back to hang out around me. Archer is still slightly too small for the harness and can wriggle out of it easily. After I got back from turning in coins at the coinstar he had managed to get halfway out of the harness.

August 22, 2013 0

Open Face Chinese Poker

Last night Steph, Adam, Andrew, Lindsey and I played some open face chinese poker. This was fun, and we had to alternate who wasn’t in. There were a few hands where I had a really amazing hand that would fault by just the tiniest bit. It happened a good number of times, so I should probably be a bit more reserved, or at least have better backups in place.

I ended up 13 down, and steph was 21 up.

August 22, 2013 0

Squash with Nima and Caryn

Tuesday evening I played a really great round of squash with Nima and Caryn. When they are both there I can tend to beat them both, but when I got to Nima 1 on 1 he plays differently. He knows how to use my playing style against me, and didn’t do that when we were playing the 3 way squash. Caryn is really doing well for not playing as much as either of us. She has 2 more big things to start on before she is amazing; moving after hitting, and reading the other player. She is very good at placing the ball, and possibly better than either Nima or myself at it.

August 21, 2013 0

Breakfast at Izzy’s

Tuesday morning, the beautiful Steph and I walked to Izzy’s from my place for some breakfast. Izzy’s is a fantastic bagel shop, that I think is so amazing for their delicious varieties of cream cheese. We each got a bagel and split the sun-dried tomato cream cheese. I would love to do more breakfasts like this one in the future.

August 21, 2013 0

Argumentation: The Study of Effective Reasoning

I had a great time listening to this. It was in a very different direction than Your Deceptive Mind. This was about using the biases and heuristics, along with controlling the conversation. This had a lot more to do with situations where there isn’t Truth but only truth. What I mean by that is this deals with situations where there is uncertainty. It is a really interesting listen.

Audible Link

August 20, 2013 0

Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills

This was amazing. I got to hear a full explanation of something that I’ve been hearing about for years on Skeptic’s Guide from the host himself. Steven Novella is the man. I really like the way he explained the biases, heuristics, and logical fallacies. He does a good job of explaining how you can avoid the fallacies for yourself.

If there is one issue with the series it is that there is no good explanation on how to get other people to avoid these biases. I guess the point is to just introduce them to this series and have them learn for themselves.

Audible Link

August 20, 2013 0

Housewarming

I had people over for my housewarming on Monday. It turned out to be a little too warm. When I turned on 2 burners and had the oven going the little amount of airflow that I could get from the apartment just wasn’t enough and it started to heat up substantially. Steve was probably the most effected by it, but everyone felt a little warm to say the least.

I ended up having Jeremy B, Adam, Andrew, Amy, Adelaide, Tina, Amit, Candice, Brian, Nick, Steve, and Steve’s wife over. It was a very large crowd for the space and I could not have fit more people in than were already there. I was somewhat surprised by the turnout since only half of them said that they would be there.

We played some cards against humanity and open faced chinese poker. The games worked really well in the space, and with the crowd that was there. Everyone liked the kitties, and played with them using the laser pointer. I think things went as well as could be expected.

I cooked a baked mac ‘n’ cheese dish, that turned out really well. The bacon was super tasty in it. I think I’ll make it again and take it over to beachhead for dinner on Thursday. Jeremy brought over a cake, Amy brought over ice cream and root beer, Brian brought over some chips and dip, and Wit brought over some really tasty beer. Nick also brought over most of the Liquor that we had built up, I’m assuming once he finds a place he’ll want me to bring over some of the nicer stuff that he likes to his housewarming.

August 20, 2013 0

Kitties in Harnesses

I put the kitties in the harnesses and they don’t seem to mind it too much. Archer is still a little small for his, but it isn’t getting in his way badly. They are soooooo cute!

Steph and I played with them using the laser pointer, and they were moving incredibly quickly, even in the harnesses.

Video of Kitties

August 20, 2013 0

Umami and Japanese Candy with Steph

Sunday night Steph and I took a bike ride to Stanford. We saw the horses there and Steph petted a few of them. After that we went to Palo Alto and stopped by Rocket Fizz. I got some of the cream filled caramels that I like. I was able to get all the bottle caps from them, and it will go well with the other ones in my collection. I’m just about ready to make the table with them, and I expect it to be a nice table. I’m most likely going to do a rainbow pattern or random pattern. I had considered making it into a compilation, somewhat like pixel art, but that didn’t appeal to me too much.

We had dinner at Umami and it was really tasty. I got the Greenbird over fries and gravy. We got the fried pickles, which were surprisingly bad. I normally like fried pickles, but these were too much pickle and too little fried. Steph got the beat salad, and we shared some truffle fries.

After Umami we biked back to my place and Steph made some japanese candy that she found at Rocket Fizz. The candy was for a tiny japanese pizza, but it wasn’t the normal kind of japanese candy that actually tastes like the item. This tasted like sugar covered toffee, and not great toffee at that. Steph still enjoyed it despite the difficulty in eating it.