Thoughts of Thinking

Tina was saying she is fascinated by statistics, and I too have an interest in those, but it’s the underlying workings (mechanics – algorithms) of life, the universe, machinery, software and everything, that is extremely fascinating.

When I was in my late teens, my very first girl friend said that children think in pictures and adults think in words. I’m not sure how true this is, as I haven’t researched it. I didn’t like to say I thought in pictures as well as words, and I still do. In fact I think in a myriad of ways; pictures, feelings, shapes, and words of course. I don't seem to control which method comes to hand first, so don’t ask me specific questions about it, although I’m very interested in what happens in your head. It is possible that none of this is true, and the patterns are something to do with my current depression – but I am in remission, I think! LoL.

Getting back to the mechanics of logic, and there is nothing more pure than maths of course. I adore mathematics and maths problems, probably because the mechanics of solving maths problems is already mapped out for us. I wasn’t quite clever enough to cope with calculus, sadly to say. Basic programming was fun, and I eventually taught it in night classes for beginners, but I haven’t done it for ages, and I suppose I’ve lost interest in it. Do you watch Countdown? We used to until this Geof person took over, and now we don’t bother. What fascinates me there though, are the people that get those conundrums so quickly; not why are they so good, but rather why are some of us so bad. Intriguingly, if I have had a bad night with the maths, and I haven’t solved the number problems – that’s the night I’ll get the conundrum, and can even beat the contestants and Jay on those nights. On normal nights when I’m zipping through the maths, I’m minutes behind Jay and the contestants at the conundrums.

What actually started this train of thought was Tina, and her Flickr request. I went through all her pictures and nothing happened to the stats. So I decided to play with my Bob and Anna site. Neither is linked to the other so I experimented with the search - and yes, Anna found Bob, and Bob found Anna - BUT - as Anna I could see all Bob's pics, but as Bob, I got the -Anna has nothing for you - message. Considering both sites are open to the public, how does that happen.

What do you think of digital TV? I think it’s rubbish, and a lot of the blurb that’s being spat out to ‘assist’ people through the changes is rubbish too, and depending what point they are trying to make at the time, contradictory also. I know! – we couldn’t get the number of extra stations without going digital. Stuff your extra channels, I was happy with the 4 we had already.

BUT – I was in the kitchen Sunday washing up and tidying up the pans I’d used to cook dinner. Regular readers will know I just love Sundays – treating Jay by doing all the meals and cooking – and treating myself to those girlie jobs. So there I was, going through the channels to see if there was anything worth watching, and WOW – I came to the QVC channel and Estee Lauder was doing a make-up demonstration. Obviously, the presenter is trying to get us to buy her products, and you could too, there and then by just phoning in, and they’ll post you what ever you want. But it was just so fascinating watching an expert at work, explaining everything as she went – if only I had a photographic memory – and the results were fabulously subtle and beautiful; if I had been in the hobbies room with the spare VCR, I’d have recorded it all.

I do remember one thing she said – brown (eyeshadow) is the safe option, but it’s so boring, and doesn’t make your eyes light up. So that’s told me – LoL.