Joel Reyes Noche

According to Wikipedia, Tony DeZuniga "was the first Filipino comic book artist whose work was accepted by American publishers, paving the way for many other Filipino artists to do break into the international comic book industry."  He passed away yesterday.

Last year my sister bought a print (shown on the left) by DeZuniga (the initials "adz" are on the lower right) and gave it to me as a gift.  The print is signed (but not numbered) and the paper size is 13 inches by 19 inches.  (I made some minor edits to the edges of the picture.)

The print is apparently a pinup (on page 57) from Savage Sword of Conan #59.  (The picture on the right was taken from here.)

I bought a copy of the PC version of Plants vs. Zombies last May 10, 2010.  A newer version had added features such as Zombatars but I didn't want to upload it because it had replaced the Thriller-inspired Dancing Zombie with a disco-dancing one.  A few weeks ago, I had to reformat my hard disk and I had to say goodbye to the old Dancing Zombie.

(The description for Dancing Zombie seems to be an homage to the disclaimer shown at the end of the closing credits of the Thriller music video:  "Any similarity to actual events or characters living, dead, (or undead) is purely coincidental.")

When I was a child, I would read 1970s issues of Scientific American that my father bought and I would see advertisements for Hewlett-Packard calculators.  They were quite unusual; they used reverse Polish notation and some of them, like the HP-12C, had a horizontal layout.  It was one of my childhood dreams to own one someday.

In 1972, Hewlett-Packard released the world's first scientific pocket calculator, the HP-35 (which got its name because it had 35 keys).  In 2007, Hewlett-Packard celebrated the 35th anniversary of the HP-35 by releasing the HP 35s.  (I got the picture on the left from here.)

Last 2008, my friend Gilbert gave me an HP 35s.  It came with a carrying case and two CD-ROMs:  a user's guide and a video with the title "The HP Calculator Story 1972-2007."  What I like most about the HP 35s is its retro look and its sloped-front keys (you have to press them to fully appreciate them).  Another nice thing about it is that its two batteries can be replaced one at a time without erasing the calculator's memory.

More information about the HP 35s can be found in this datasheet and this user guide.  HP also makes an HP 35s emulator for Windows.

Around nine years ago, I read a 1951 paper entitled "A Scrutiny of the Abstract."  Its abstract was

The behavior of editors is discussed.  What should be covered by an abstract is considered.  The importance of the abstract is described.  Dictionary definitions of abstracts are quoted.  At the conclusion a revised abstract is presented.

I thought it was pretty good... until I read the paper and found out why it was a terrible abstract.  The author then presented a much better abstract:

The abstract is of utmost importance, for it is read by 10 to 500 times more people than hear or read the entire article.  It should not be a mere recital of the subject covered, replete with such expressions as "is discussed" and "is described."  It should be a condensation of the essential qualities of the paper.

This paper has greatly affected the way I write.

I just found out that the author created a revised version of the paper in 1966.

When I was a child, I could not understand why people liked Jackson Pollock's paintings.  It was only when I read Richard Taylor's Order in Pollock’s Chaos in the December 2002 Scientific American did I understand.  Taylor cites a paper he coauthored in Nature; its abstract starts: "Scientific objectivity proves to be an essential tool for determining the fundamental content of the abstract paintings produced by Jackson Pollock in the late 1940s."  It turns out that Pollock's paintings have fractal properties.  It was through mathematics that I was able to see the beauty in Pollock's paintings.

The painting above is Pollock's 1952 Blue Poles, which is featured prominently in Taylor's article.  (I got the picture from here, where controversy about who really did the painting is discussed.)  It was bought in 1973 for US$2 million by the Australian Government and caused quite a scandal at the time.  In 2006, it was estimated to be worth between $100 million and $150 million.

I didn't have much interest in farm machinery until I saw these two John Deere tractors by Siku. The one above is a John Deere 8630RT track tractor. (I got the picture from here.) The one below is a John Deere 9560R tractor with dual tires. (I got the picture from here.) Perhaps Siku will make some triple tire models in the future.

I got the first picture from here and the second picture from here.  The second picture is more recent, so the correct dates are February 24-26, 2012.

Two stones with baybayin writing found in Rizal Elementary School in Ticao Island, Masbate have been attracting a lot of attention lately.  (I got the picture of the larger stone from here.)  Tito Genova Valiente, the officer-in-charge of the Institute of Bikol History and Culture at the Ateneo de Naga University, has written a few articles about them in the Business Mirror.  I encourage you to read the one published in July 20, 2011 and the other published in February 11, 2012 to learn more about the stones.

The First Philippine Conference on the "Baybayin" Stones of Ticao, Masbate was held in Monreal, Masbate on August 5-6, 2011 (the conference proceedings can be found here), and the Second Batong Ticao/Ticao Stone Conference was held in Ateneo de Naga University last February 11, 2012.

The Department of Mathematics of the Ateneo de Naga University (AdNU) (with the help of the College of Education, the Graduate School, and C&E Publishing, Inc.) held the 2012 Bicol Mathematics Conference last February 4, 2012 at AdNU.  It was very well attended with around 120 participants (with a few from as far away as Sorsogon).

This is the fourth Bicol Mathematics Conference; the earlier conferences were held in 2008, 2009, and 2010.  Aside from an invited speaker from outside AdNU, the paper presenters so far have been AdNU faculty.  Perhaps in the future there can be more speakers from other universities in Bicol.

I presented a talk entitled Periodic Billiard Paths in Triangles, which was a short survey of some of the more easily understood results in dynamical billiards.

If you collect diecast scale models, you need to look at Siku. I got a Siku Super Item No. 1854 as a gift a few years ago. It's at a scale of 1:87 (H0 scale) and has a lot of play value. The truck's tipper tilts and its tailgate opens; the flatbed trailer is articulated and its ramp is movable; the compact excavator's rubber caterpillar tracks work and its blade and ripper are height-adjustable.

Rustan's department store used to carry the Siku brand, but now it seems that it no longer does.

Doug Zongker, a software engineer from Google, published a paper in the Annals of Improbable Research (vol. 12, no. 5, Sept/Oct 2006), presented it during the 2007 American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting, and presented it again at the 2007 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremonies.  A video of his talk is available here.  (The PowerPoint slides are available here.)

(Warning:  If you've never presented a scientific paper in a conference before, you're most likely not going to appreciate Zongker's talk.)

Yesterday I gave two talks to the faculty of the Department of Mathematics as well as some interested students. The first was about Dijkstra's Generalization of the Pythagorean Theorem. The second was about Mediants, Farey Sequences, Stern-Brocot Sequences, and Simpson's Paradox.  I've attached to this blog entry slides for both talks.

Click here to read the media release.

Click on the leftmost image to see a copy of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures under Ground from Project Gutenberg.