Author: Bobby Rockers

Then there was Nethack

I recently saw a post from someone who (after 7 years) had finally ascended in NetHack. Ascending in NetHack effectively means beating the game and if you think 7 years is entirely too long to play a game you haven’t beaten; then you haven’t ever played NetHack.  I have posted about NetHack previously and suffice to say that I haven’t (in my 6 year of playing) ever come even CLOSE to finishing the game.  So to keep all of you from ever ruining your perfectly sane existence I am going to list a number of reasons why NetHack is both THE game by which all other RPGs will be judged and why you should NEVER start playing it!

  • –NetHack is the most expansive game ever created.  This is partially a product of design.  Like Legos, the game is almost stupidly simple, but the byproduct of such simplicity is infinite expandability.  Which brings us to the second cause of NetHack’s depth… It has been in constant development for over 20 YEARS!  Rogue (the game NetHack was based on) was created in 1980.  The origins of NetHack actually  pre-date the personal computer!
  • –Developers * Time * Design = The DevTeam Think of Everything! (TDTTOE.)  This is not a joke.  You honestly have to play the game to really “get” how connected each piece of the game is.  My favorite example of this comes from GameSpy when NetHack was inducted into their video game hall of fame: Eat a floating eye corpse and you’ll get ESP, which will allow you to see enemies anywhere on the map, but only while blinded. To take advantage of it, you may want to drink a potion of blindness, or preferably, find and wear a blindfold. Of course, while blindfolded, even with ESP you won’t be able to see inanimate objects on the floor — when you find piles of items, your character will have to “feel” for them. Oh, and you won’t be able to read scrolls. Whoops! In that pile of items you just felt is a cockatrice corpse — fortunately you were wearing gloves, otherwise you would’ve been turned to stone just by touching it. But now, blind and protected, you can pick up the cockatrice corpse and use it to attack monsters — now your enemies will turn to stone when you strike them! Unfortunately, their inventory turns to stone as well. Hey, no problem — you’ve got a pick-axe, so you can chisel open their statues to yield a pile of rocks and any of their old possessions. Sadly, thanks to the blindfold, you can’t see a nearby pit and tumble inside. Too bad you were holding the cockatrice corpse — it landed on top of you and turned you to stone. Yet Another Stupid Death, and another reason to cry out in anguish because they think of everything!
  • –You get one life in NetHack.  ONE!  That is it. You can suspend the game but not save it.  The closest thing to continuity between games is that you often come across your ghost from previous games (in fact your grave will often have your old loot in it…  cursed, TDTTOE.)
  • –The game doesn’t care.  In fact is probably works directly against you.  For example, you simply don’t know how an object will effect a situation until you use it (or until you find some side effect that you can test to discover it.)  All objects (potions, scrolls, spell books, etc.) are named differently EVERY GAME.  And so until you figure out what a “pinkish gold” potion is THIS TIME, you don’t know what it will do.  Then, even if you know what an object is, that doesn’t mean you know if it is cursed or blessed.  The game not caring also means that things like alters (or specialized equipment) are not necessarily likely to be the same alignment as you.  Hell, the moon phase even effects the game… the REAL MOON PHASE!  Oh, and did I mention that the levels are auto-generated and so are NEVER the same.
  • –Games go on for DAYS but death always seems to happen suddenly.  So just as you really start to get your hopes up, you loose 3 days worth of work in an instant because you get bit by a ware-rat, turn into a rat, and get killed by a group of fire ants that wouldn’t have given you any trouble 10 seconds ago.
  • –You have to do everything intentionally!  Don’t (I repeat don’t) just go running into a group of enemies and start swinging.  Because the game it turn based you REALLY need to consider as many possibilities of what will happen when you do something.  You certainly cannot think of everything that could happen but you will live longer if you at least try.  Heck, you cannot even leave old/cursed/useless crap laying around because and enemy is likely to pick something up and attack you with it.  And if you haven’t played before you probably can count on dying the first 6 times just trying to figure out how you will keep from starving to death.
  • –The only friend you have the entire game is your dog… and even god will not help you if you get him killed.

So 7 years isn’t to long to finish a game that was basically designed to be an exercise it masochism.  I will be lucky if I am able to ascend sometime in the NEXT 7 years.  For those who are not detered may I recommend the Absolute Beginners Guide to NetHack.

Bookshelf Investing: A Drew Yates Re-post

Here is a repost of a Drew Yates article I found EXTREMELY useful. Unfortunately most of his old posts seem to be forever lost. It is an unfortunate fact that the great blog post I have read are hidden jems that must be dug for. I need to make a habit of copying them on occasion because, all to often, they disappear when their author looses interest and moves on. This is one of the useful top-10 lists I have read and I hope (that by saving it here) it will be useful for a long time to come.

On Books, Top 10 Rules For Investing In Bookshelves

Your bookshelf is like your knowledge portfolio. By investing in yourself, you can become a more interesting, intelligent, creative, and happier person while education improving your judgement and learning new skills. Here are my top ten points for managing your education by investing in your bookself.

1. Buy books for who you’d like to be, not who you are.

Why only buy books about what you already know? Don’t feel guilty about books you own that you haven’t read yet, don’t quite understand, or don’t quite fit your persona. Surround yourself with what you want to know. Achieve by osmosis.

2. You can’t know what you don’t know. Diversify!

Never underestimate the value of learning what you don’t know. Buy books in topics that have œno interest in. Maybe you are wrong. Inject some randomness in your life.

Excercise: Minute Compass

Try this: stand in the center of the bookstore with your back to the door and check your watch. Turn and face the direction your minute hand points. Buy and read one book in that direction.

3. Understand your investment profile

A book you bought but didn’t read is $20 lost. A book you read but didn’t like or learn from is $20 and maybe a few hours lost. A book you read and learned from is priceless. So: a calculated risk of $20, or never learning anything new? You can’t even begin to understand what you’re missing when you don’t know what you don’t know.

It’s much easier to start reading a book you have than a book you don’t have.

Unless you have urgent expenses, invest generously. This is true for all investments.

4. Give your favorite books away.

Ideas are like currency. They only have value when shared.

Real power today lies at society’s œinformation hubs. What better to demonstrate your informational worth than to give books? You can alway rebuy books if you need them. Don’t bother asking people to return your books. That’s tacky. Let them keep it as a token of your thoughtfulness, advice, and generosity. Maybe they will pass that book along to their friends with a shining review, too! That’s the ulitmate compliment.

Not: Used books are NOT GIFTS. Gifting something you are œdone with as is fantastically tacky and cheap. Besides, traditional gifts are more tokens of sacrifice and obligation than tokens of good-will and thoughtfulness. How else could you explain all those $10 gift certificates from your extended family and coworkers?

5. Buy books cheap, but don’t be cheap.

Investing in books are one of those rare opportunities where it pays to be a spontanious shopper. If you suddenly have the motivation to learn, don’t squander it to save five dollars! Naturally, don’t spend more than you have to. But like the morons who drive around town for the cheapest gas, it doesn’t pay to waste time to save a couple dollars. Well, actually it pays a couple dollars. Unless you’re 11, you probably could spend your time better.

Also, most good technical books can usually only be found new. Good technical books are kept as references, and people resell back books they don’t think they’ll use again. Also, most technical books have a shelf-life of only a few years. The only technical books at a value book store will probably be outdated and mediocre.

Cheap, readily available books, like classical literature, are usually at the library or internet for free, anyways.

6. Be Wary of Textbooks. Many Textbooks Suck.

Be suspecious of any book that marketed to undergraduates. If the publisher doesn’t take pride in their work and churns frivolous editions, why should you take pride in owning a copy? In my experience, most required engineering books are terrible. If you’re a computer science student, forget buying the textbook, just use the Internet.

Note: this varies per university. If you are savvy enough to judge books, you can often judge the quality of a university department by the quality of the required reading. Andrew in the comments also noted that many very specialized texts can only be found at universities.

7. Ask Bookstore Employees for Advice

Most bookstore employees like books. Unfortunately, they are usually stuck playing the Warehouse Index game for impatient customers. Make your bookstore employees happy. Ask for their advice. They will know which books are well-liked and which are trash, and they might know which publishers print the best quality books. Ask employees which books they like. And then buy what they like. You might even make some interesting friends this way.

Side note: never harass retail employees. Be nice. Really, whatever your problem is, it’s almost guarunteed not be the fault of anyone around you can talk to. Worse, have you ever known an employee to make exceptions for a jerk? Rarely. If you have a problem with a store, complain with your wallet (or your blog ;) ), never to employees.

8. Throw away bad books.

You probably own some books that were disappointing or technical books that are outdated. Throw them away. There’s nothing to be learned by hording trash knowledge. In fact, make trashing books symbolic of your intellectual health. You can’t fill a full cup.

9. Non-fiction is usually a better investment

Non-fiction has an obligation (you hope) to be true. Most fiction, like movies, only mean to be entertaining, not to make you think. If you want to read fiction, avoid books you would expect to find at your grocery store. Also, most science fiction and fantasy books are rarely good œinvestments. Watch Star Wars, read Lord of the Rings, and be done with it.

10. If somebody recommends a book, STOP, note the title, and buy it immediately

Your investment will stagnate if you don’t do this. Make this a habit. Don’t try and rationalize this away. Shut up and do it. Somebody you respect has chosen to share very valuable knowledge with you and you have an obligation to due diligance. Even if you don’t like their recommendation, you have learned something important about the person who recommended it. To not do this, I think, is crude and insulting.

In fact, you should take notes whenever anyone is describing something they care about, whether it’s people they think you should know, books that they enjoy, or places they enjoy visiting. Not only is this flattering, but it’s honest and smart. What better way to prove your legitimate interest in somebody’s opinion than writing them down¦ and then backing your word with your wallet? Not even $20 in beer could be as well spent.

Note: don’t be obnoxious about taking notes. Just write down the author and title. People don’t want to feel like professors in casual conversation.

Albondigas Soup

Heather makes the best soups I have ever had.   My bragging has caused a number of people to ask for the recipes.  As I pull out the Heathers 900 year old hand written recipe cards, I will do my best to post my favorites.  Today’s soup selection in Albondigas Soup:

  • 1T Chop Fresh Cilantro
  • 1lb Ground Beef
  • 1/4 cup Rice
  • 1 Egg
  • 1t  Seasoned Salt
  • 1/4 cup Ice Water
  • 3 cans Chicken Broth
  • 1 can Diced Tomatoes
  • 1/4 cup Chopped Onion
  • 1 rib Celery Diced
  • 1 Carrot Diced
  • 1 Potato Diced
  • 1/4t Garlic Powder

In a medium bowl combine ground beef, rice, egg, cilantro, salt, an water; form into small meatballs.  In large saucepan, combine broth with vegetables and garlic powder.  Bring to boil; add meatballs.  Reduced heat; cover and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Serves 6-8.

God has given us a girl

Rachel Ellen was, joyously, welcomed into the world at 12:35am this morning. She weights 8 lbs 8 ounces. Both mother and baby are doing wonderfully! I have posted some pictures of Rachel taken just minutes after she was born.  The page is password protected so if you don’t know the password, just email me.

Thanks everyone for your prayers and support. God continues to be truely bless us.

Almost, but nothing like, a book review.

“Leadership and Self Deception: Getting Out of the Box” by The Arbinger Institute, falls into the leadership/management book category of “philosophy lite”.  It has been my experience that anyone who has had even casually exposure to some basic philosophical ideas is often amazed at how common those themes come up in business books.  This is not, at all, surprising as leadership and management is often focused directly at understanding ourselves, understanding others, and understanding the relationships between the two.  There are even a number of business authors who have effectively made a career out of simplifying and re-publishing the concepts of other notables like Kant, Heidegger, and Locke. “Leadership and Self Deception” barrows heavily from Martin Buber and with significant influence from Freud’s concept of resistance in its later chapters on “self-deception.”

Without getting into the book too much, let me just say that I really enjoyed it. It seems to me that a great number of “hard” philosophy types strongly reject these obvious attempts at watering it down; but the problem that in many cases it is the only they would ever get broad exposure.

People do not generally operate their daily lives from a position of depth. One may get such depth on specific subject matter that is of personal or professional interest; but most cannot do it for all subjects necessary to operate all aspects of life. This is even more true for subject material that is arguably second in complexity only to high-level math (just try reading “I and Thou” through the first time without saying, “huh??”).  These simplified models can, therefore, provide value in spaces where they would otherwise not get used.

Additionally, this kind of leadership book is its usefulness at providing real-world examples of the more esoteric philosophical concepts.  It is not unusual for philosophy to suffer the criticism that its theories are not directly applicable to real life.  Yet, the fact is they are referenced (if not directly) for use in two of the most real-world fields available, business and leadership.  I think it would behoove some professional intellectuals to view the applicability of their theories in places other than literature and the movies.

“Leadership and Self Deception” is a great book and possibly, for some previously unexposed, a life changing book. The ideas in it may not be ground breaking but they are worthy of modeling. It is because of all of these reasons that it is one of the few leadership books that I think should be on everyone’s book shelf.

The way things were

For the last six months or so almost every post on Vault has been a daily collection of micro-posts from my Twitter account.  Twitter is a micro-blogging utility that allows me to send 140 character posts to everyone who subscribes to me.  Think of it as broadcast text messaging.  While it has been a wonderful tool for quick brain dumps of information; it is worthless as a meaningful medium for presenting ideas.  Twitter is particularly useful when I am not in front of a computer because every smart phone in existence has a client for it.

Because of the limited usefulness of my tweets (what Twitter calls individual posts,)  I am changing the configuration to only post summaries weekly.  This should reduce the clutter on Vault.  Of course this will only really help if I increase the number of honest-to-god blog posts.

In other news, my wife and I are getting ready for the birth of our third child.  We are expecting sometime in the next couple weeks.  Work has been been amazingly good but causes me to be busier than I have ever been (partly explaining the lack of blog posts.)  The two weeks at home for the birth will be a welcome rest… or not.

On a side note let me post this link our Host Monster referral page.  I have always felt strongly about putting advertising on my private blog but HostMonster.com has been such a great web hosting service for us that I regularly recommend them to friends/family.  But because I have never posted the link I continually forget to use the referral (Vault gets $50 credit every time someone registers a domain through it) or I have trouble finding the referral when I do remember.  Now I can find it easily via the Vault search function.

To Dare Mighty Things

“The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.”

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

Sunday I ran the Tulsa Route 66 Half Marathon.  This particular distance is a huge milestone for me as it is tied for the longest distance I have ever run.  My Junior year of college I took a marathon training class where our final was the Derby Days Half Marathon.  It’s like everything before this was getting me back to “where I was” and everything after this Sunday is new.

Here was my training schedule for the half marathon:

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
Week 1 Run 3 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 3 Miles Run 5 Miles
Week 2 Run 3 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 3 Miles Run 6 Miles
Week 3 Run 3 Miles Run 5 Miles Run 3 Miles Run 8 Miles
Week 4 Run 3 Miles Run 5 Miles Run 3 Miles Run 10 Miles
Week 5 Run 4 Miles Run 5 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 11 Miles
Week 6 Run 4 Miles Run 6 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 12 Miles
Week 7 Run 4 Miles Run 5 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 9 Miles
Week 8 Run 4 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 4 Miles Run 8 Miles
Week 9 Run 3 Miles Run 3 Miles Walk 2 Miles Half Marathon

The Tulsa Route 66 Half Marathon was a wonderful event with the exception of the food tent and the beer shortage.  Instead of putting out dozens of church tables with post-run fruits, sweets, and carbs; they funneled all the zombified runners into a food tent that was basically designed to accommodate a  church picnic and NOT 3000 energy starved sweat factories.  The tent had two lines (unmarked of course), one for post-run food and one for pizza & hamburgers.  For those who don’t know pizza after 13.1 miles sounds about as good as eating your own sock.  It took me over 45 minutes to get into the tent and , by that time, I was more than happy to eat my own sock.  Finally, after getting out of the tent, we were informed that there was no beer left for the runners.

If you want my run information you can check out my stats page, look at the overall half marathon finishers stats page, or see a picture of me on the website.

The race felt pretty good.  It was cold at the beginning but by mile three I was warmed up.  The last mile I started cramping because I hadn’t use the bathroom in a couple hours (hydration is good, over-hydration… not so much.)  There were only a few hills and they were at the very end of the race.

My workout distances were well space and I really didn’t suffer from any injuries.  A new pair of shoes helped significantly with my bruised tendon but I am glad I got them a month ago because it took my calves a couple weeks to get used to the new shoes.  I have realized that I need to do some kind of race every couple months because I had a noticeable motivation problem after about 7-8 weeks.  I expect my next “goal‘ to be 21-22 weeks out, so it will be really important to stay motivated.

Heaven v. Hell

Here is my superficial philosophy cross-connect for the week.  I found this on Susan Stepney’s website.  She is a a Professor of Computer Science at the University of York in the UK.

Heaven:

  • The police are British
  • The cooks are French
  • The engineers are German
  • The administrators are Swiss
  • The lovers are Italian

Hell:

  • The police are German
  • The cooks are British
  • The engineers are Italian
  • The administrators are French
  • The lovers are Swiss

Now I am going to explain this entirely wrong (go ahead Roger, take my head off) but the Greeks had an idea that everything that existed, did so for a specific purpose.  And that the highest virtue in nature was to pursue that calling unto its utter perfection.  Doing so was, quite literally, “Good.”  Doing something counter to ones natural purpose was “Bad.”

It is amazing how subtle the difference between good and bad are.

Random Excerpts from “Just Courage”

Some notes from the book “Just Courage: God’s Great Expedition for the Restless Christian” by Gary A. Haugen:

“The sin of injustice is defined in the Bible as the abuse of power – abusing power by taking from others the good things that God intended for them, namely, their life, liberty, dignity, or the fruits of their love or their labor.  In other words, when a stronger person abuses his or her power by taking from a weaker person what God alone has given the weaker person -…”

-Gary Haugen

“Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker”

-Proverbs 14:31 NRSV

In-justice is a particularly egregious evil because the sufferer (the weaker person who is being acted on) isn’t suffering because of a random unfairness, an uncontrollable act of nature or bad luck; but because of the very intentional abuse and oppression of a stronger person.

“(caring for the poor of Africa…) is not a matter of charity; it’s a matter of justice”

-Bono

“…we can give all manner of goods and services to the poor, but if we do not restrain the hands of the bullies from taking it away, we will be disappointed in the long-term outcome of our efforts.”

-Gary Haugen

Justice consists not in being neutral between right and wrong, but in finding out the right and upholding it, wherever found, against the wrong.

-Theodore Roosevelt

Violence is just different. Violence is intentional. Violence is scary. And violence causes deep scars.

-Gary Haugen

Those who prey upon the poor are not brave. They only prey upon the poor when they think they can… Most fundamentally the predators (the instigators of injustice) are afraid of the truth.

-Gary Haugen

Justice is the aura of God. It is something every human understands, even from the time they are small children, but something that doesn’t exist as part of “the world.” In a universe that has absolutely no concept of fairness; every being on this planet, regardless of race, creed, or belief, screams out for justice. Those that pursue it are considered the greatest examples of mankind. Those who die for it are considered martyrs and saints. And those who stand in opposition to it will forever be judged on the wrong side of history.

“Ultimately we can choose to be safe or brave.  We cannot be both.”

-Gary Haugen

I May have forgotten to mention

“The reason grandparents and grandchildren get along so well is that they have a common enemy.”

–Sam Levenson

My beautiful wife and I will be having another child in early March. Thankfully all my previous children look like her and with God’s grace this child will be so fortunate. We are in the process of picking names, so if anyone has some suggestions (especially for boys names) feel free to post a comment.

I am Catholic and as such live by the rule of “whoever dies with the most kids win.”   So far, I am off to a good start!