#SFHellscape
2024-04-26T19:56:02.589100
Leet Numbers
I just watched the Numberphile video about Apocalyptic Numbers. An apocalyptic number is a power of two whose decimal representation contains the digits "666". I nodded along: of course, Christian folks would get interested about numbers that contain "666". But then I thought about it some more and wondered: Why would those Christian people care about powers of two so much? If you're going to look for "666" in some numbers, why not Fibonacci numbers or powers of three or what-have-you?
Who should care about powers of two? Computer programmers, that's who. But not all computer programmers are Christian; not all care about 666.
I think we should instead focus on Leet numbers, powers of two that contain "1337". Yes, I just made up the term "Leet numbers," but I'm sticking to it.
The first Leet number is 2394 = 40347654345107946713373737062547060536401653012956617387979052445947619094013143666088208645002153616185987062074179584.
The first Eleet number (containing "31337") is 2454 = 46517678354918840995156723704832290198633047083988355858015372747560914439257467092876227245680868195888801382801035387746214504231337984.
Now that that's settled, I guess I should come up with 15 minutes' worth of things to say about that and then get in touch with the Computerphile people to make a video.
2024-04-20T18:48:35.949518
I heard the city wasn't doing anything for 4/20 this year, so I was surprised to see folks setting up some tables at Robin Williams meadow (a.k.a. the meadow at the base of "Hippie Hill") this morning. Looks like Volo Sports is putting on a kickball tournament. I guess the park folks counterprogrammed an event to deflect the weed-o-philes.
[updated to add:]
I went back to the meadow around noon and noted:
The meadow was mostly empty; nobody playing kickball, some folks playing volleyball. Hippie Hill had about as many people as you'd expect on a sunny day. The helicopters [which had been hovering overhead ~an hour earlier] are gone. It might seem chill until you wonder: Why does that knot of park rangers look so tense? Why is a pair of motorcycle cops riding around the path?
I got a burrito from that food truck (the line was really short!) and came back home.
2024-04-20T20:10:33.977837
| Don't give pees a chance! | Edgy, makes you think |
|---|---|
| Pee nevermore | Much more threatening than intended (I hope) |
2024-04-19T14:09:13.814285
Munzee Daily Stroll
The Munzee play-while-walking-around-with-your-phone game has a cool new RandoNautica-like feature. I want to blog about it, but before I dive in I want to start with:
When you use the Find Nearby Wishing Well button, it might plunk a wishing well onto the map right where you are. E.g. I, sitting in my apartment and wondering "What does this button do?" pressed the button and now there's a wishing well at my apartment building. I wish I'd been somewhere else when I pressed that button. My apartment is next to a steep hillside with poison oak; that's not a great place for a wishing well, as it turns out. The wishing well is visible to other Munzee players; now anyone looking at the Munzee map in my neighborhood can see that icon and say "I bet you a dollar that a Munzee player lives in that building."
To me, this public visibility is a little disconcerting. If I had a stalker and if that stalker knew I played Munzee, it would be quite alarming. Either way, if I'd understood I could summon a wishing well by trying to "find" one, I would have walked a couple of blocks downhill before I pressed that button.
Munzee is a play-while-walking-around-with-your-phone game. Sorta like you do in Pokémon Go, you play the game while walking around and looking at a map on your phone. To "move" in the game, you gotta move in real life. Players can tag interesting spots on the map; go to those spots and "check in" to get points and advance in the game. Unlike Pokémon Go, players can also tag interesting spots in real life by sticking QR code stickers to them; you can see those on the map, go there, find the sticker, and scan it to "check in", get points, and advance.
Also unlike Pokémon Go, you can't just keep checking into the same place once every five minutes. Depending on what type of place it is, maybe you can just check in once per day. This might mean that you're asking the Munzee app "Where else shall I walk today?" and Munzee says "I dunno, man; you already went everywhere in the neighborhood." But now it has a Randonautica-like function: you press a button, the app chooses a random nearby spot on the map and dares you to go there and check in. If you succeed, it chooses another nearby point on the map and challenges you to go there.
This is a nice workaround for the I-already-went-everywhere-in-my-neighborhood-today problem. I bet it's also a good fix for the I-am-the-only-person-in-my-neighborhood-with-this-app problem. When I started playing this game, there was plenty for me to do: I live in San Francisco, surrounded by many many tech nerds who already downloaded the game and started tagging interesting spots on the map. Thus, there were already places for me to check in. I bet a potential-player who lives in a sparse sprawling suburb has a different experience: maybe the nearest player is a fifteen-minute drive away. Maybe they open up the map and there's nothing to do. Maybe they get discouraged and never even start playing. Thus when their next-door neighboor tries the app a week later, there's still nothing interesting on the map in that neighborhood… It's nice that the first Munzee player in a neighborhood now has something to do.
2024-04-18T18:14:22.119182
I enjoyed the gimmick of today's Puzzmo crossword (which ?might? be the same as today's AVCX crossword?).
2024-04-15T14:45:12.996896
#SFHellscape
![pole to which is affixed decorated birdhouses and signs. One sign says 37 degrees, 43 minutes, 47.6832 seconds N 122 degrees 27 minutes 53.6292 seconds [implied West] Mt Davidson Manor. We need to know this. Another sign says Birdville's #1 Realtor, Paul 415-902-8969. Another sign says Now boarding SFO to Florence Italy, direct](https://lahosken.san-francisco.ca.us/importable/2024/mt-davidson-manor.jpg)
2024-04-15T01:24:17.702531
I just noticed: if you're in the parking garage for that little shopping center across the street from the San Francisco DMV, the exit door looks out at a fnnch rubber duck mural across the street.
2024-04-11T16:52:04.389376
Book Report: The Puzzler
It's a survey of puzzles: word puzzles, logic puzzles, physical puzzles, jigsaw—you get the idea. I'm not really in the target demographic for a survey; I already knew most of this stuff from, y'know, participating in puzzle events for the past not-quite-twenty years. Sure, the author has a unique set of opinions; but I've encountered most of those opinions piecemeal while talking with other puzzle nerds for the past not-quite-twenty years. So why did I read this targeted-elsewhere book? OK, remember back in 2020 I helped run the MIT Mystery Hunt, including a pancake Pictionary event, and one of the participants had a TV crew with him? That participant was the book's author, A.J. Jacobs. I don't know a ton about him, but apparently he roped some TV outfit into covering some of his more eye-catching book research. It turns out he's kind of a big deal. You remember some years back, some guy spent a year trying to follow all the rules of the bible? Same guy. So: kinda famous.
I'm quite grateful that he attended the 2020 MIT Mystery Hunt. He didn't say a ton about it; that's appropriate, since he was aiming for a survey of the whole world of puzzling and was writing a book carry-able without help from a forklift. Why am I grateful? Because he was willing to work on that puzzle that used surgery videos as puzzle data. A lot of folks couldn't bring themselves to look at that puzzle; I certainly couldn't. I remember making sure that its videos were hooked up correctly by peeking at them between my fingers… hoo boy. Jacobs was willing to work on that puzzle; and when he chose a sample MIT Mystery Hunt puzzle to include in his book, he chose "Bobcat" by the same author (but much less disturbing).
So the author dove in deep to the world of the MIT Mystery Hunt, participating, solving puzzles… and then wrote a little about it for this book. It kinda makes you wonder what ended up "on the cutting room floor." And that sums up what I thought about other sections of the book. He has a chapter about chess puzzles. Wow, he interviewed Garry Frickin' Kasparov for his chapter about chess problems… uhm, but while I bet it was an interesting conversation, not a lot of it made it into the book. (Or maybe most of the interview made it into the book except for the part where hypothetically Kasparov said "I have a bus to catch, I can give you five minutes"?) Uhm, it's cool that someone wants to write a breezy, readable survey of puzzling aimed at the layperson; it's cool that someone writing about chess problems talked to Kasparov; it's just kinda jarring that they're the same book, I guess?
I was mulling this over while talking with someone who recently read The Dawn of Everything, a book which compares how various cultures solved various problems historically. And that book is 700 pages, and it's a lot. And maybe it would have been a kindness to readers to pick one problem that various cultures solved various ways and write one much shorter book about that problem. Or maybe if there had been an editor who was willing to lay down the law and say "This book is all very well, but â…” of it has got to go." So, like, I get it that if this guy wants to write a book that appeals to his large existing audience, he's gotta keep it short, keep it breezy.
I guess I'm just so accustomed to mass-audience books being kinda sloppy, it's jarring to see something so rigorous and yet targeted to mass-audience.
2024-04-03T00:29:11.020839
It is #EnigMarch, and each day the excellent EnigMarch people post a prompt word; then puzzle nerds try to design puzzles around that word. (Today's word is sequel).
So it would be good to know some sequels:
Gremlins 2: The N e w â’·a t c h
Legally Blonde 2: â—¯_ _, _ _ _ _ _ & _ _ _ _ _ _
Miss Congeniality 2: _ _ _â—¯_ & _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
The Princess Diaries 2: _ _ _â—¯_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Home Alone 2: _ _ _ _ in _ _ _ _ _ _â—¯
Anchorman 2: The _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _â—¯_ _ _ _
The Lego Movie 2: The _ _ _ _â—¯_ _ _ _ _
The circled letters spell a seven-letter wor thingy that should
suggest a two eight-letter-word answer.
No hints for this one, sorry. The closest thing I could give to a hint is: know lots of movies.
Solution, rot13'd:
o / Terzyvaf 2: / Gur arj ongpu e / Yrtnyyl Oybaqr 2: / erq, juvgr & oybaqr r / Zvff Pbatravnyvgl 2: / nezrq & snohybhf n / Gur Cevaprff Qvnevrf 2: / eblny ratntrzrag x / Ubzr Nybar 2: / ybfg va arj lbex v / Napubezna 2: / Gur yrtraq pbagvahrf a / Gur Yrtb Zbivr 2: / Gur frpbaq cneg
Gur shyy gvgyr bs Oernxva' 2 vf, bs pbhefr, Oernxva 2: Ryrpgevp Obbtnybb
2024-03-31T01:00:40.567822
