Thursday, June 18, 2015
Inside Out and Back Again
PIXAR does it again with Inside Out. First I must warn you that this isn't a typical Disney movie, as the girl has both a mother and a father, and they're not divorced or dead. I know, I know. You must see it to believe it.
In this movie, we get the see all the emotions inside of our head. In rainbow color order, there's Anger, Joy, Disgust, Sadness, and Fear. At first, I was a little skeptical ... I mean voices in our heads? A whole control panel? Core memory islands? Could these concepts last a whole movie?
Well, they did it impressively. They held my attention the whole time. It was highly imaginative, colorful, funny, and emotional. Yeah -- emotional. I found myself looking back into my own memories, trying to remember ones that were long forgotten.
And did I forget to mention the beautiful animation? As usual, PIXAR did a good job.
I also enjoyed the music, which had a slight hint of retro 60's to go with the colorful animation.
I caught the 2D version, but I still noticed a lot of depth. The story held its own without the 3D, but I think this would be a good one to catch in 3D.
My recommendation: go see this one in the theater with your kids. It's lots of fun for the whole family. And don't forget to stay for the first couple of minutes of the end credits.
Friday, June 12, 2015
Jurassic World: As Good As the First
After an okay sequel and whatever that third movie was, Steven Spielberg actually pulled off a successful revisit to the island, and he spared no expense. With a budget of $150 million or more, Spielberg delivers an action-packed, exciting, and scary experience.
As you would expect, the plot is essentially the same as the first movie, only with more interesting characters, less cheesiness, cooler special effects. and a lot more extras: dinosaurs and people.
Despite the cliches and Hollywood formula, I actually enjoyed the ride. It's worth catching this one in the theater. It's as good, if not better than the first.
A quick warning, though. These dinosaurs are scarier, and some scenes are rather disturbing, so I would not take any smaller kids. I'm hoping for a couple of good nightmares, myself, tonight. We'll see.
Monday, June 1, 2015
What Me Lazy?
Am I lazy? Is that my problem?
As I was reading one of my fellow writer's blogs, I came across this post: Five Reasons you Won't Make it as a Writer by the funny author John Hartness (warning -- beware of hilarious f-bombs). He lists five different reasons writers fail, and they're all true, but is "lazy" the right word?
He says:
The first thing to realize is that if you're not writing, it's only because you DO NOT WANT to write. It's as simple as that. I'll be honest about myself. I write in spurts. When I'm at a writing high, I write like crazy. When I get tired of writing, I take a rest. It's like a big cycles of ups and downs. Of course, I think I would prefer a more steady habit of writing, but I'll take what I can.
The best way to de-lazy-fy yourself is to figure out what makes you NOT want to write, and attack that head on. You may come up with a list of excuses (ala John Hartness above), but I think to be most successful, you need to really look inside yourself and find that one true reason you're currently stuck.
I'll try to take a stab at several reasons one may stop writing (many of which I've suffered myself at one time or another) ...
As I was reading one of my fellow writer's blogs, I came across this post: Five Reasons you Won't Make it as a Writer by the funny author John Hartness (warning -- beware of hilarious f-bombs). He lists five different reasons writers fail, and they're all true, but is "lazy" the right word?
He says:
Stop whining about how much time you don’t have to write, or how much “real life” gets in the way, or how much time it takes to raise your kids, or work your job, and how you’re too tired after working all day, coming home, fixing dinner, feeding a family, cleaning up after dinner, bathing the little ankle-biters, getting them to bed and then performing your husbandly duties so your wife still loves you. Yeah, shut your cake hole.What he means to say is: "I don't want to hear your excuses. If you wish to make it in this industry, you need to write A LOT OF WORDS." While John doesn't want to hear your excuses (and I don't want to hear your excuses either), you still need to come to terms with yourself as to why you're really not writing -- and fix things.
The first thing to realize is that if you're not writing, it's only because you DO NOT WANT to write. It's as simple as that. I'll be honest about myself. I write in spurts. When I'm at a writing high, I write like crazy. When I get tired of writing, I take a rest. It's like a big cycles of ups and downs. Of course, I think I would prefer a more steady habit of writing, but I'll take what I can.
The best way to de-lazy-fy yourself is to figure out what makes you NOT want to write, and attack that head on. You may come up with a list of excuses (ala John Hartness above), but I think to be most successful, you need to really look inside yourself and find that one true reason you're currently stuck.
I'll try to take a stab at several reasons one may stop writing (many of which I've suffered myself at one time or another) ...
- It's not fun anymore. (Find a way to make it fun.)
- Day job stress really is getting to me. (Find a way to get better work/life balance and find a positive attitude so you can take advantage of any free time.)
- It's too noisy at home. (Maybe find another place to write, or write late at night or early in the morning when everyone else is asleep, or even learn to work in the noise.)
- No one is listening to me. (Just scream louder. Eventually they'll listen.)
- I'm a terrible writer. (Are you really? Sometimes when I think I've written terrible stuff, I'll go back a year later to read it again to find it isn't so bad. Besides, I'm learning more and more that people care more about what you say rather than how you say it.)
- My current project just isn't working. (Why isn't it working? Perhaps you need to set it aside and work on something else.)
- I'm so depressed. (I haven't quite figured out a solution to this. Though getting more sleep does seem to help the depression spell go away faster.)
- I have all these shows to watch on Netflix before they yank them away. (Setting limits is very important if you wish to get other productive work done. Besides, if the show gets yanked, there are other good shows to replace it.)
As for me, I'm coming out of one of the driest spells I've had in years. Yes ... I intentionally sacrificed everything else recently to pass one last stupid actuarial exam, but I did it. And now it's time to reboot my fiction writing. Who's with me? Who else has a hundred crazy ideas in your head ready to be written? Who's ready to let the words flow? Let's do this!
Sunday, May 24, 2015
The Google Earth Plane Game
Today I had some fun. I grabbed some pictures I had taken last week from my airplane window and thought, "Gee ... I wonder if I can find all of these on Google Earth." And wouldn't you know it? Using a little bit of math and a little pattern recognition, I found them all.
Step 1. Start with a picture that's easy to find, such as a large recognizable land formation. This one only took a couple of minutes to find.
Once you find that picture, you know which way the airplane window is facing. And if you have timestamps on your pictures, you can estimate how many miles there are between them. Just take the difference in minutes and multiply by 10.
For example, the picture above has a timestamp of 1:30:42. The picture I took before that has 1:24:25. That's a difference of 6 minutes, 17 seconds. Take the seconds, divide by 60 and add to the number of minutes to get 6.28. Then multiply by 10 to get 62.8 miles.
Once you have distance, you can estimate the direction of the airplane. They like to follow curvy paths (along great circles on the globe). So, if you start with the location of picture #1 and draw a line toward (or away from if going backwards) the destination point, and draw a line away from (or toward) the departure point, it will narrow down the location of your next picture. (You can check out my very last picture at the end to see the lines I drew.)
I was surprised how fast I found the next obscure picture ...
Then I used the same technique to quickly find pictures #3 through #14. Even the cloudy obscure circle-y ones were easy to find.
I challenge you to try the same game should you remember next time you're on a plane. Can you find your pictures? Have fun, and good luck!
Step 1. Start with a picture that's easy to find, such as a large recognizable land formation. This one only took a couple of minutes to find.
Once you find that picture, you know which way the airplane window is facing. And if you have timestamps on your pictures, you can estimate how many miles there are between them. Just take the difference in minutes and multiply by 10.
For example, the picture above has a timestamp of 1:30:42. The picture I took before that has 1:24:25. That's a difference of 6 minutes, 17 seconds. Take the seconds, divide by 60 and add to the number of minutes to get 6.28. Then multiply by 10 to get 62.8 miles.
Once you have distance, you can estimate the direction of the airplane. They like to follow curvy paths (along great circles on the globe). So, if you start with the location of picture #1 and draw a line toward (or away from if going backwards) the destination point, and draw a line away from (or toward) the departure point, it will narrow down the location of your next picture. (You can check out my very last picture at the end to see the lines I drew.)
I was surprised how fast I found the next obscure picture ...
I challenge you to try the same game should you remember next time you're on a plane. Can you find your pictures? Have fun, and good luck!
Thursday, May 21, 2015
Poltergeist: The Remake Lives On
Who doesn't love scary clowns? The remake of Poltergeist has plenty. It also contains many of the favorite scenes you may remember from the original -- only a little more on the freaky side and with a few plots holes filled in.
Did the original need a remake? I won't be a complainer, even though I saw the original at least twenty times and used to have many parts memorized. The cool trailer above gave me hope that the remake would be a good rendition, taking what worked and modernizing it for a newer generation. The final result did not disappoint me.
I enjoyed seeing everything with a different style and direction. It's a good story. The characters are likable and distinct. The acting is decent. The music is freaky. The 3-D effects are clear and the depth is exciting. The depiction of the other side is wonderful.
It's difficult to judge which version I liked better. It's hard to dethrone the love I have for the original, but I'll admit it was campy and full of plot holes. (Why again, in the original, did the family decide to stay in the house after the first incident? Funny!) The remake is a tighter ship, but lacks much of the magic. For example, the clown scene in the remake is freakier, but it is nowhere near as scary as it was in the original.
Those who haven't seen the original may not find this movie to be as scary as other recent horror movies, but I suspect that you may find it to be highly imaginative and cool.
And if you've seen the original, I strongly suggest catching this newer version in the theater in 3D. Enjoy the ride.
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Imitation Game is a Good Imitation
As a computer programmer and mathematician, I couldn't resist seeing this movie about a favorite idol, Alan Turing. As one of the pioneers who paved the way for modern-day computers, Alan helped to create a machine that would break the unbreakable German Enigma Code in The Imitation Game.
This very entertaining movie explores the mind of a genius, touching on practically all aspects one would expect in a story involving Mr. Turing. There are references to the "Imitation Game" itself -- a test to see if an intelligence is human or machine. We see to what lengths these guys went to keep the code breaking effort a secret. The movie also explores what it was like to be gay back when it used to be illegal.
The movie also successfully captures what I like to call a Eureka moment, which is that very moment when you solve a very difficult problem, the heavens open up, and you see everything. I've had these moments myself, and they are always pretty awesome.
However, there are a couple of small problems with the movie. The writers took it upon themselves to dumb everything down so the audience could have a better chance of understanding, and they changed a few facts to make the drama a little more exciting.
For example, Alan Turing wasn't such a Sherlock-like sociopath. In real life, he could get along with other geniuses, though he generally was socially inept otherwise. Also, in real life, his superiors treated him with respect. So, all that bit about wanting to fire him for building a stupid machine? It didn't happen, but it sure did make good drama.
Also, the big aha leading up to the Eureka moment is really Codebreaking 101. The trick they mentioned would have been the first things they tried. But this is okay, as what led to the Eureka moment in real life probably would have been over all our heads.
Further, the whole idea of "It's midnight and now the Nazi code is changed and so we all have to start over from scratch and get angry and toss our papers on the floor" doesn't really make sense. In real life, the code you were working on is still there, and there's no reason why you couldn't finish your work. Even though it would be too late to decode "current" Nazi messages, you would still learn things and see how to get faster. Guess what ... that's what happened in real life, too. They got to where they could solve it in two weeks, then one week, and finally the breakthrough to do it in minutes.
Lastly, a comment on the music: It took me a while to realize that most of the music imitates the sounds of the Turing machine. Cool.
Regardless of the inaccuracies, the movie does get a lot right. If you don't know anything about Alan Turing, I strongly suggest watching this movie and get a good introduction. You'll get lots of good drama, too.
Friday, March 13, 2015
The AdSense Experiment - One Year Later
A year ago, I started an experiment with AdSense. I let them put ads on my blog (and some YouTube videos), and they pay me according to how many clicks and views the ads get. Clicks get more money than views.
You can read my first four posts on this subject here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
After one year, I now report that on the most part, it has been a fun failure. This blog has earned me almost $6 over the past 12 months. Woot! Woot! The YouTube portion (which I started later) has also earned me about $6 for a total of $12.
In one respect, that's actually a lot of money, considering I didn't put forth any labor. But then again, if I consider it as payment for putting together blog posts and videos, it's not really that much money at all. I could earn a higher hourly rate working a minimum wage job.
Plus, I'm thinking more and more that the ads don't look good on my blog. They hardly seem to match the subject matter. And as I mentioned earlier, it's difficult to control which questionable ads to turn off. You can turn off certain categories, but often if I see a questionable ad, there's no good way to determine what it's category is, or to simply block that specific ad. (As if I click on the ad to get information, I get penalized.)
The exact amount of earnings is still confusing. If I click on the earnings report, it shows "estimated" earnings. But why can't it be exact? It gives me a sense that clicks aren't registering (technical problems), and/or AdSense decides to negate some earnings for whatever reason ... either way it seems that any error will resolve to benefit the company. And no matter how I look at the numbers, I can never get them to add up to my "current balance." What kind of money voodoo do they do?
When I did my taxes, I was technically supposed to report my earnings during the year even though I didn't receive a payment. But there were two problems:
#1) I had no way to get an exact amount from their website.
#2) They provided no tax earnings report for me. When I clicked on the link to take me to my tax reports, it said "Page not found," implying that there are no forms for me.
No tax report and no firm earnings amount meant no reporting earnings on my tax return. But don't worry, Uncle Sam. You'll get your taxes when I actually get paid.
At the beginning of 2015, I hit the magical $10 threshold. That was kind-of fun. I got something in the mail that contained some secret numbers for me to set up payment information. This meant two things:
#1) I can now get paid my earnings whenever I want them. If it hits $100, they'll automatically send me money. (Though I still have to tell them how to send it to me.)
#2) I now have access to the payment reports, which provide more concrete numbers. It shows how much payment actually got accrued to me. And it shows how much came from this blog, and how much came from YouTube. On a monthly basis, YouTube provides a slightly higher payout. If only I had access to this info when I filed my taxes!
What's up next? As soon as I finish my Justice novel and get it published, I'm planning on removing AdSense from my blog and replacing it with an ad to buy my book. Then I'll have something that actually matches my blog content, and something that will pay more with each click. I will still keep AdSense on my YouTube account, and the experiment will continue.
You can read my first four posts on this subject here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
After one year, I now report that on the most part, it has been a fun failure. This blog has earned me almost $6 over the past 12 months. Woot! Woot! The YouTube portion (which I started later) has also earned me about $6 for a total of $12.
In one respect, that's actually a lot of money, considering I didn't put forth any labor. But then again, if I consider it as payment for putting together blog posts and videos, it's not really that much money at all. I could earn a higher hourly rate working a minimum wage job.
Plus, I'm thinking more and more that the ads don't look good on my blog. They hardly seem to match the subject matter. And as I mentioned earlier, it's difficult to control which questionable ads to turn off. You can turn off certain categories, but often if I see a questionable ad, there's no good way to determine what it's category is, or to simply block that specific ad. (As if I click on the ad to get information, I get penalized.)
The exact amount of earnings is still confusing. If I click on the earnings report, it shows "estimated" earnings. But why can't it be exact? It gives me a sense that clicks aren't registering (technical problems), and/or AdSense decides to negate some earnings for whatever reason ... either way it seems that any error will resolve to benefit the company. And no matter how I look at the numbers, I can never get them to add up to my "current balance." What kind of money voodoo do they do?
When I did my taxes, I was technically supposed to report my earnings during the year even though I didn't receive a payment. But there were two problems:
#1) I had no way to get an exact amount from their website.
#2) They provided no tax earnings report for me. When I clicked on the link to take me to my tax reports, it said "Page not found," implying that there are no forms for me.
No tax report and no firm earnings amount meant no reporting earnings on my tax return. But don't worry, Uncle Sam. You'll get your taxes when I actually get paid.
At the beginning of 2015, I hit the magical $10 threshold. That was kind-of fun. I got something in the mail that contained some secret numbers for me to set up payment information. This meant two things:
#1) I can now get paid my earnings whenever I want them. If it hits $100, they'll automatically send me money. (Though I still have to tell them how to send it to me.)
#2) I now have access to the payment reports, which provide more concrete numbers. It shows how much payment actually got accrued to me. And it shows how much came from this blog, and how much came from YouTube. On a monthly basis, YouTube provides a slightly higher payout. If only I had access to this info when I filed my taxes!
What's up next? As soon as I finish my Justice novel and get it published, I'm planning on removing AdSense from my blog and replacing it with an ad to buy my book. Then I'll have something that actually matches my blog content, and something that will pay more with each click. I will still keep AdSense on my YouTube account, and the experiment will continue.
Thursday, March 12, 2015
Actuarial Speculative Fiction 2015 - The Stories
It's that time of every-other year when I give quick overviews of all the stories entered into the Actuarial Speculative Fiction contest. For this 11th event, sixteen stories were submitted, including my own.
As I mentioned before, you can find the stories here. Up till this coming Sunday, you can also vote for your three favorite stories, and the one with the most votes will get the reader's choice award.
After reading all the entries, I'm a little depressed, as the competition is pretty strong, and I don't think my entry is the best I've written, but then again, I'm always blind as to how good/bad my stories are.
I'll go ahead and get my story out of the way before presenting the other fifteen.
The First Actuary - Gog is a caveman who invents numbers and uses his intelligence to help his tribe survive and beat other tribes. But something's wrong. The numbers don't add up. Before Gog can figure out the answer, he first needs to learn what the problem is.
Now I will introduce my personal favorites, of which I will choose three when I vote tonight. These stories not only touch on actuarial topics, but they also have fun plots, and I think they're just cool.
If you only have time to read a couple, I recommend choosing from the following.
Proteus (Michael Anderson) - Tom Volker, an actuary, comes to realize his life is one big waste. That is, until a unique opportunity comes along with a company that manufactures super bio-suits that monitor one's health and provide extra strength.
Chance of Failure (Gregory A. Dreher) - Richard Diamond, while suspecting foul play, investigates John Smith, the Actuary, and his company, which produces nanotechnology that extends a person's life.
Life After Death (Ken Feng) - After Hubbard Scientific (affiliated with the Church of Scientology) introduces a radical technique of preserving brains after death and implanting them in robot-like containers, an actuary Ken decides to investigate the company.
The Cascade Model (Kevin C Jones) - One day, Antonio Echevarria is tapped by the Actuary General herself to oversee a very important model in relation to a major energy breakthrough. During his first day on the job, he's amazed to learn what really goes on behind the scenes, including seeing some very impressive complex models.
The Illustrious Career of Mister James Stephan, FSA (Steve Mathys) - Hoping to be inducted into the Humans Against Humanity Society, James Stephan presents his story of all the despicable acts he committed just to become chief actuary.
While not my favorites, the following stories are still enjoyable. They also have fun plots, but they don't jive so much with my personality. Chances are, you may find you like some of these better than my personal favorites. In fact, the ultimate winner usually comes from my batch of second-favorites.
Dangerous Knowing (Karissa Burgess) - An unnamed actuary infiltrates a high-security facility in an attempt to obtain evidence to expose a massive government cover up involving children vaccinations.
Global Health (Marilyn Dunstan) - In this near-farcical story, several Russians combine forces in a clever attempt to fleece the American actuary, Rufus, who is gathering information to form the best healthcare system. When you're done reading, you may start to wonder exactly how Obamacare came together.
For What It's Worth (Chris Fievoli) - After a lawyer loses another girlfriend to his job, he takes his friend's advice and tries out a new dating service ... run by actuaries.
The Ares Conjecture (Jerry Levy) - Peter Mir, who works for Predictive Global Conflicts, is tasked to get information from a retired actuary suffering from Alzheimer's. While models are predicting a major incident building in the Kishrabia region, Peter hopes to find a way to diffuse the situation. But what the retired actuary knows could change the world.
Closed Block (Ellen Torrance) - An unnamed protagonist writes in her diary as she starts a new job as President of a large insurance sub-sub-subsidiary covering North America. She's excited with the opportunity to increase profits and get a big bonus. However, she quickly learns that she's been shafted, and every idea she tries fails. That is until she finds a creative way to get those profits.
The Twenty-Three (Nate Worrell) - Tom, an actuary, thinks he's about to score with a hot chick, but he doesn't realize that he's about to be abducted by a famous group of terrorists called the Twenty-three, bent on stopping the practice of gene splicing.
This last group contains a few stories that dive heavily into actuarial topics, containing not much plot beyond the ideas being presented. As such, I predict that one would have to be an actuary to fully enjoy them. They are nevertheless all interesting reads.
Hotel Zukunft: The Future is Different (Craig DeAlmeida) - Arthur, the ZRO at Hotel Zukunft, must find a way to explain a 10% increase of holdbacks to his superiors so that they can make the right decisions to prepare for the future. This story is sprinkled with several different cool visions of the near future.
Two Improbable Suggestions (A. Haeworth Robertson) - Alex Morgan is an actuary who discovers an innovative new product to better calculate competitive cash surrender values on a life insurance policy. I noticed that this exact entry also appeared in the contest 4 years ago, so I just now copied-and-pasted my previous overview.
Virtual Insurance (Rodge) - Roger must find a way to price insurance that covers the contingency of losing productivity due to getting lost in Virtual Reality games. Even though I think this story is mainly for actuaries, I really enjoyed this one, finding it to be both intelligent and funny. Maybe it's because I really like video games.
Blockchain Insurance Company (Gennady Stolyarov II) - While an actuary, Euclid Jefferson, travels in a self-driving car, an automated system presents to him a new type of auto insurance with very innovative policy terms. This story provides a fun look into one possible future.
As I mentioned before, you can find the stories here. Up till this coming Sunday, you can also vote for your three favorite stories, and the one with the most votes will get the reader's choice award.
After reading all the entries, I'm a little depressed, as the competition is pretty strong, and I don't think my entry is the best I've written, but then again, I'm always blind as to how good/bad my stories are.
I'll go ahead and get my story out of the way before presenting the other fifteen.
The First Actuary - Gog is a caveman who invents numbers and uses his intelligence to help his tribe survive and beat other tribes. But something's wrong. The numbers don't add up. Before Gog can figure out the answer, he first needs to learn what the problem is.
Now I will introduce my personal favorites, of which I will choose three when I vote tonight. These stories not only touch on actuarial topics, but they also have fun plots, and I think they're just cool.
If you only have time to read a couple, I recommend choosing from the following.
Proteus (Michael Anderson) - Tom Volker, an actuary, comes to realize his life is one big waste. That is, until a unique opportunity comes along with a company that manufactures super bio-suits that monitor one's health and provide extra strength.
Chance of Failure (Gregory A. Dreher) - Richard Diamond, while suspecting foul play, investigates John Smith, the Actuary, and his company, which produces nanotechnology that extends a person's life.
Life After Death (Ken Feng) - After Hubbard Scientific (affiliated with the Church of Scientology) introduces a radical technique of preserving brains after death and implanting them in robot-like containers, an actuary Ken decides to investigate the company.
The Cascade Model (Kevin C Jones) - One day, Antonio Echevarria is tapped by the Actuary General herself to oversee a very important model in relation to a major energy breakthrough. During his first day on the job, he's amazed to learn what really goes on behind the scenes, including seeing some very impressive complex models.
The Illustrious Career of Mister James Stephan, FSA (Steve Mathys) - Hoping to be inducted into the Humans Against Humanity Society, James Stephan presents his story of all the despicable acts he committed just to become chief actuary.
While not my favorites, the following stories are still enjoyable. They also have fun plots, but they don't jive so much with my personality. Chances are, you may find you like some of these better than my personal favorites. In fact, the ultimate winner usually comes from my batch of second-favorites.
Dangerous Knowing (Karissa Burgess) - An unnamed actuary infiltrates a high-security facility in an attempt to obtain evidence to expose a massive government cover up involving children vaccinations.
Global Health (Marilyn Dunstan) - In this near-farcical story, several Russians combine forces in a clever attempt to fleece the American actuary, Rufus, who is gathering information to form the best healthcare system. When you're done reading, you may start to wonder exactly how Obamacare came together.
For What It's Worth (Chris Fievoli) - After a lawyer loses another girlfriend to his job, he takes his friend's advice and tries out a new dating service ... run by actuaries.
The Ares Conjecture (Jerry Levy) - Peter Mir, who works for Predictive Global Conflicts, is tasked to get information from a retired actuary suffering from Alzheimer's. While models are predicting a major incident building in the Kishrabia region, Peter hopes to find a way to diffuse the situation. But what the retired actuary knows could change the world.
Closed Block (Ellen Torrance) - An unnamed protagonist writes in her diary as she starts a new job as President of a large insurance sub-sub-subsidiary covering North America. She's excited with the opportunity to increase profits and get a big bonus. However, she quickly learns that she's been shafted, and every idea she tries fails. That is until she finds a creative way to get those profits.
The Twenty-Three (Nate Worrell) - Tom, an actuary, thinks he's about to score with a hot chick, but he doesn't realize that he's about to be abducted by a famous group of terrorists called the Twenty-three, bent on stopping the practice of gene splicing.
This last group contains a few stories that dive heavily into actuarial topics, containing not much plot beyond the ideas being presented. As such, I predict that one would have to be an actuary to fully enjoy them. They are nevertheless all interesting reads.
Hotel Zukunft: The Future is Different (Craig DeAlmeida) - Arthur, the ZRO at Hotel Zukunft, must find a way to explain a 10% increase of holdbacks to his superiors so that they can make the right decisions to prepare for the future. This story is sprinkled with several different cool visions of the near future.
Two Improbable Suggestions (A. Haeworth Robertson) - Alex Morgan is an actuary who discovers an innovative new product to better calculate competitive cash surrender values on a life insurance policy. I noticed that this exact entry also appeared in the contest 4 years ago, so I just now copied-and-pasted my previous overview.
Virtual Insurance (Rodge) - Roger must find a way to price insurance that covers the contingency of losing productivity due to getting lost in Virtual Reality games. Even though I think this story is mainly for actuaries, I really enjoyed this one, finding it to be both intelligent and funny. Maybe it's because I really like video games.
Blockchain Insurance Company (Gennady Stolyarov II) - While an actuary, Euclid Jefferson, travels in a self-driving car, an automated system presents to him a new type of auto insurance with very innovative policy terms. This story provides a fun look into one possible future.
Friday, February 27, 2015
Actuarial Fiction 2015
Wouldn't you know it? Actuaries are at it again -- predicting the future -- with fiction.
The Society of Actuaries puts on this event every odd year for actuaries to put forth their best effort in writing speculative fiction. This year, I am one of 16 participants, and you can read all the stories here.
If you're interested in what actuaries think of this world, check it out and read these entertaining stories. My own story looks to the past, way back, venturing to guess how the first actuary came into being.
Once you read all 16 stories, you can vote for your favorite three entries up until March 31 (look for the VOTE link at the linked website).
In another week or so, I'll present my mini-reviews of the other 15 stories.
Happy reading!
The Society of Actuaries puts on this event every odd year for actuaries to put forth their best effort in writing speculative fiction. This year, I am one of 16 participants, and you can read all the stories here.
If you're interested in what actuaries think of this world, check it out and read these entertaining stories. My own story looks to the past, way back, venturing to guess how the first actuary came into being.
Once you read all 16 stories, you can vote for your favorite three entries up until March 31 (look for the VOTE link at the linked website).
In another week or so, I'll present my mini-reviews of the other 15 stories.
Happy reading!
Friday, February 13, 2015
New Shows - Spring 2015
Here are three recent shows I've tried to watch around the first part of 2015.
The Librarians on TNT (Sundays @9PM) - This show has already finished its first season, but I was late catching up, as it began when I was deep in my exam studying. I've tried to catch up after the exam with mixed success. I caught seven of the ten episodes, and now I'm stuck on the eighth.
Before I continue with the review, let me stop to express my frustration with trying to catch shows on TNT. I get the impression that TNT doesn't get along with my cable provider, Time Warner. The cable On Demand feature only provided SD when it showed episodes. TNT's own online replay service requires a TV Provider login, and Time Warner is not on their list. So, if you missed this show, there's a good chance you're out of luck unless you pay $2 an episode somewhere. The same thing happened to me with "The Last Ship."
So, if someone from TNT happens to read this review, just know that I'm a customer who is actually trying to watch your shows, but since you're not providing enough opportunities like other channels do, chances are ... I'm going to lose interest. The best I can hope for is a marathon to catch the last three episodes of "Librarians" and the whole first season of "The Last Ship."
As for the show itself, I find it to be the perfect replacement for Warehouse 13. It's practically the same show. Instead of a warehouse full of "artifacts," it's a library full of "artifacts." Only these artifacts are magic, which is somewhat scientifically explained.
The show is funny, and keeps my interest while I watch, but on the most part there's nothing really exciting about it. It's just low-brain fun. Plus you get to see Noah Wylie play a funny crazy guy.
12 Monkeys on Syfy (Fridays @9PM) - I loved the movie. It's on my top ten list of favorite sci-fi shows.
The TV series is good, but different.
In both the movie and the TV series, James Cole is sent back in time in an attempt to stop a world-wide plague event from happening. Along the way, he picks up clues and meets several different baddies.
As I watched the first three episodes, I mistakenly tried to compare them to the movie, and I found myself disappointed. In the very first episode, Cole demonstrates a paradox by scratching the face of a watch, showing how the scratch on the younger watch shows up on the older watch, while at the same time destroying the rules of time travel set in the movie.
Then in the second episode, a new enemy is introduced who just didn't exist in the movie. He's a cool enemy, but seems to put a different meaning to "the Army of the 12 Monkeys." Also, the TV show spends a lot more time exploring the future world, in a way destroying some of the magic of Gilliam's original creation.
But then starting with the fourth episode, I decided to divorce the show from the movie, and all of a sudden, I found myself enjoying it a lot more. I then realized the show's strength. It's not trying to redo the movie. It's creating something new with the same material. If you decide to watch, I highly recommend throwing out everything you know about the movie, and just sit back and relax while this new show takes you back into time.
Better Call Saul on AMC (Mondays @10PM) - If you're a "Breaking Bad" fan, there's a high probability you'll love this show. I caught the first two episodes this past week, and found it to be some of the funniest junk I've ever seen.
Jimmy McGill is just your everyday low experience lawyer trying to start his own practice, but along the way he hits up against the most annoying roadblocks. He lives in a very small room in the back of a nail salon, where we see him moving furniture around just to get his squeaky bed out. Even Mike from "Breaking Bad" makes an appearance as the parking lot attendant who repeatedly tells Jimmy he doesn't have enough validation stickers.
Getting desperate for cash, Jimmy decides to set up a situation where potential clients would choose him to represent them. However, the situation goes terribly wrong with hilarious and frightening outcomes. As of the end of the second episode, the situation has yet to come to a close.
I highly recommend this show, even if you haven't seen "Breaking Bad." Unlike a TNT show, you can go online at amctv.com and catch these episodes for free for the next four weeks, and no login is required.
That's all I have for now. Looking ahead, I may check out the following shows:
Last Man on Earth (FOX - March 1)
Childhood's End (Syfy - coming soon)
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell (BBC-America - closer to summer)
Heroes Reboot (NBC - coming soon)
The Librarians on TNT (Sundays @9PM) - This show has already finished its first season, but I was late catching up, as it began when I was deep in my exam studying. I've tried to catch up after the exam with mixed success. I caught seven of the ten episodes, and now I'm stuck on the eighth.
Before I continue with the review, let me stop to express my frustration with trying to catch shows on TNT. I get the impression that TNT doesn't get along with my cable provider, Time Warner. The cable On Demand feature only provided SD when it showed episodes. TNT's own online replay service requires a TV Provider login, and Time Warner is not on their list. So, if you missed this show, there's a good chance you're out of luck unless you pay $2 an episode somewhere. The same thing happened to me with "The Last Ship."
So, if someone from TNT happens to read this review, just know that I'm a customer who is actually trying to watch your shows, but since you're not providing enough opportunities like other channels do, chances are ... I'm going to lose interest. The best I can hope for is a marathon to catch the last three episodes of "Librarians" and the whole first season of "The Last Ship."
As for the show itself, I find it to be the perfect replacement for Warehouse 13. It's practically the same show. Instead of a warehouse full of "artifacts," it's a library full of "artifacts." Only these artifacts are magic, which is somewhat scientifically explained.
The show is funny, and keeps my interest while I watch, but on the most part there's nothing really exciting about it. It's just low-brain fun. Plus you get to see Noah Wylie play a funny crazy guy.
12 Monkeys on Syfy (Fridays @9PM) - I loved the movie. It's on my top ten list of favorite sci-fi shows.
The TV series is good, but different.
In both the movie and the TV series, James Cole is sent back in time in an attempt to stop a world-wide plague event from happening. Along the way, he picks up clues and meets several different baddies.
As I watched the first three episodes, I mistakenly tried to compare them to the movie, and I found myself disappointed. In the very first episode, Cole demonstrates a paradox by scratching the face of a watch, showing how the scratch on the younger watch shows up on the older watch, while at the same time destroying the rules of time travel set in the movie.
Then in the second episode, a new enemy is introduced who just didn't exist in the movie. He's a cool enemy, but seems to put a different meaning to "the Army of the 12 Monkeys." Also, the TV show spends a lot more time exploring the future world, in a way destroying some of the magic of Gilliam's original creation.
But then starting with the fourth episode, I decided to divorce the show from the movie, and all of a sudden, I found myself enjoying it a lot more. I then realized the show's strength. It's not trying to redo the movie. It's creating something new with the same material. If you decide to watch, I highly recommend throwing out everything you know about the movie, and just sit back and relax while this new show takes you back into time.
Better Call Saul on AMC (Mondays @10PM) - If you're a "Breaking Bad" fan, there's a high probability you'll love this show. I caught the first two episodes this past week, and found it to be some of the funniest junk I've ever seen.
Jimmy McGill is just your everyday low experience lawyer trying to start his own practice, but along the way he hits up against the most annoying roadblocks. He lives in a very small room in the back of a nail salon, where we see him moving furniture around just to get his squeaky bed out. Even Mike from "Breaking Bad" makes an appearance as the parking lot attendant who repeatedly tells Jimmy he doesn't have enough validation stickers.
Getting desperate for cash, Jimmy decides to set up a situation where potential clients would choose him to represent them. However, the situation goes terribly wrong with hilarious and frightening outcomes. As of the end of the second episode, the situation has yet to come to a close.
I highly recommend this show, even if you haven't seen "Breaking Bad." Unlike a TNT show, you can go online at amctv.com and catch these episodes for free for the next four weeks, and no login is required.
That's all I have for now. Looking ahead, I may check out the following shows:
Last Man on Earth (FOX - March 1)
Childhood's End (Syfy - coming soon)
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell (BBC-America - closer to summer)
Heroes Reboot (NBC - coming soon)
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