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Nicholas D. Rosen's LiveJournal:
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| Saturday, May 17th, 2008 | | 1:27 pm |
We're Going to Kansas City
I've bought airplane tickets to Kansas City for the Georgist convention there in July. I can understand that they cost more money that air tickets did a few years ago; fuel is expensive. And I understand why the times aren't especially convenient. Kansas City isn't New York, and there aren't enough people going back and forth between it and DC for the airlines to run shuttle flights every hour. But why did I have the opportunity to save a little money by going many hundreds of miles out of my way, burning more jet fuel, and spending hours in an airport way off anything like a straight line from here to Kansas City?
Once I get there, I'll do Georgist Table Topics, as well as attend the panel discussions and such. Does anyone have any good topics to suggest? | | Friday, May 16th, 2008 | | 9:54 pm |
The Red Queen's Race
Cases have moved on to my amended dockets, and cases have moved off. I ended the week with five cases on, which is a reduction from last Friday. Today, I mostly worked on a new case, but when I'm done with that, I'll probably work on some of those amendments.
Also, my blue pen ran out of ink today, with very little warning. It went from fully functional, to faint, to nothing in the space of a few numerals. I use pens of different colors to write different kinds of information in my notebooks: Most writing is in black ink, with serial numbers of applications I'm working on in green, related applications and special flags in red, claim trees and the numbers of published patent applications in blue. I don't actually need blue ink, but it helps. | | Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 | | 10:12 pm |
Chuckling at My Own Wit
I had better give the standard disclaimers: I am not speaking for the Patent Office, I am not representing myself as an expert on patent law, and nothing I say here should be construed as advice on patent-related legal or business decisions.
Anyway, I was working on an amendment the other day, I looked at what I had written many months ago when arguing with the applicant over a previous iteration of the application, some months ago. I was amused by something I hadn't recalled writing, so I thought I'd remove the parts of the paragraph which might identify the case, and post the remainder here:
. . . It does not follow, however, that the claims of the instant application, as they are now phrased, properly define the patentable invention or inventions. By analogy, an inventor may deserve a patent for his brilliantly designed solar-electric-internal combustion-Stirling cycle hybrid vehicle, but if his claim merely recites a "four-wheeled vehicle using multiple power sources," it may be anticipated by a wagon stuck in the mud, wherein the formaer passengers got out to push from behind, while the horses continued pulling from the front. | | Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 | | 9:53 pm |
Postscript to a Weekend
I bought basil at the farmers' market this weekend, and made pesto. I opened a bottle of Teli, a dry white wine from Georgia, and found that it goes well with pesto. The usual toast: "To democracy in Georgia. And to democracy in Russia, may Vladimir Putin live to see it."
I had been hoping to restock my supply of jams when the farmers' market opened, but the man who sells them (his wife makes them) isn't coming this year. He is supposedly going to another market on Saturdays, but not the one half a dozen blocks from my apartment on Sundays. Ah, well.
I've been listening to a CD of Geminiani's music, which I got at the bookstore Saturday. I hadn't heard of him before that I remember, but he was a pupil of Corelli's and worthy of his teacher, it seems. | | Sunday, May 11th, 2008 | | 11:02 pm |
July/August Analog Let me recommend the July/August issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. David Palmer has a new novel, Tracking, serialized in there, with the first third of it published. He wrote Emergence thirty or so years ago, and then another book; Tracking is the sequel to Emergence. With talent like his, I wish he'd average more than one book per decade and a half. CArl Frederick's science fact article makes several references to Joseph Polchinski, who is not only an excellent physicist but a nice guy. I took Mathematical Methods of Physics with him at UT Austin more than twenty years ago. | | 4:58 pm |
| | Friday, May 9th, 2008 | | 10:45 pm |
The Red Queen's Race
My amended docket stands at eight counts. It's been higher at times this week, and should go lower once actions I've taken are counted -- but then, it will go up once amendments which applicant' have submitted are fully processed.
Mostly, I've been working on new cases this week. I finished one, and fully expect to finish another by Monday at noon. | | Thursday, May 8th, 2008 | | 11:07 pm |
London Election
"Red Ken" Livingston has lost his race to be re-elected as Mayor of London, which may be for the better. He has certainly expressed some views which I abhor.
On the other hand, this means that the Vice Chair of London Transit, David Wetzel, is also going to be out of a job, and looking for a new one, not necessarily in Britain, he's announced. He's a Georgist who has delighted us by his presence at several North American Georgist conventions. | | 11:05 pm |
Article on Vegetarianism This author from Slate doesn't speak for me about everything, but I do think people might find his piece worth perusing. | | Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 | | 10:24 pm |
My Weekend
At the bookstore Saturday, I bought a CD of a number of Mozart's shorter and earlier symphonies. These aren't his best work, but in his early teens or before, he was composing music that would have been a lesser man's masterpieces. It's humbling to think that, as Tom Lehrer put it, "When Mozart was my age, he was dead already."
Sunday, I went to the farmers' market. I got some good apples (Goldrush) and a few tomatoes. I saw that basil and arugula were available; next week, I'll plan on pesto, and maybe some salads with arugula.
Sunday evening, I went out to dinner with an attractive redhead. Sad to say, I don't think that this is the start of a beautiful friendship; she listens to rock, watches a lot of television, and doesn't read for fun. | | Tuesday, May 6th, 2008 | | 10:16 pm |
Thankyou, Whatever Your Name Is
Remember that evening Toastmaster's event Thusday? I took a cab home, and after reaching my apartment, I realized I had left my backpack in the cab. I wasn't sure what cab I had taken, except that it wasn't a Red Top or Yellow Top. I called one possible company, and was told that it couldn't have been them, because they didn't do pickups in Arlington. I went downstairs, looked around, and didn't see a cab, but I explained the situation to the security guard.
Later, she came up to my apartment with the backpack. I really owe the cabbie for taking the trouble to return it, but I wasn't there to pay him for his extra trip, and I don't know how to get in touch. Anyway, thankyou, whatever your name is. | | Monday, May 5th, 2008 | | 9:52 pm |
Evidence for the Benefits of the Property Tax Do you (understandably) dislike paying property tax? Have you read a bunch of editorials on how the property tax is a regressive, unfair tax, a cruel burden on senior citizens on fixed incomes, and an obsolete holdover from olden times when real estate was what chiefly mattered, but due to be replaced by more modern sales and income taxes? (Back when I lived in Centre County, Pennsylvania, the Seedy Tea ( Centre Daily Times) kept running editorials like that.) Well, my friend LVTFan has something for you to read. | | Friday, May 2nd, 2008 | | 9:30 pm |
The Red Queen's Race
After some turnover, I'm back at seven cases on my combined amended dockets. That should go down by one when something I've worked on gets counted, and up by several when amendments which applicants have submitted get processed. I'm working on a new case now, and after that, well, there's always something more to do. | | Thursday, May 1st, 2008 | | 10:50 pm |
Toastmasters Stuff Patent Office Toastmasters celebrated its 39th birthday today; it was founded on May 1, 1969. We had a special meeting, attended by several people who had honed their communications skills in Toastmasters, and gone on to high-level positions, e.g., on the Board of Patent Appeals an Interferences. As well as a speech, Table Topics, and a little club business, with Table Topics involving (in part) getting some of these distinguished personages to say what Toastmasters had done for them, we put on a spread: melon pieces and other fruit, vegetables, soft drinks, cookies and muffins. I was responsible for the cookies and muffins; on my way to Whole Foods that morning, I passed the office of the Herald Examiner. Am I the only one who hears an imp saying, "Valdemar Patent Office?" Later, I took an hour's annual leave so that I could leave work early -- well, earlier than usual -- and go the Division A Toastmasters contest. Our woman from Patent Office Toastmasters who had won the Area 17 evaluation contest didn't win the Division-level evaluation contest, and of course I came in last in the Area-level contest. Still, I got to hear a bunch of people who could speak well, and I was drafted as a judge (for the International Speaking Contest, but not for the evaluation contest, since someone from my own club was competing. | | Sunday, April 27th, 2008 | | 10:36 pm |
The Priest and the Professor
I wasn't there, but this is a story I've heard from my mother about my father, an atheist professor of philosophy, and a friend of his, a French Jesuit priest. My father responded to the priest's efforts to persuade him to believe, "If there's a God, surely He understands that someone like me can't believe this stuff."
To which the priest said, "See? That's real faith." | | 4:32 pm |
Passage
I've devoured Lois McMaster Bujold's latest book this weekend; that's The Sharing Knife: Passage, in the unlikely event that theres anyone reading my blog who doesn't know. It's fully up to Herself's usual standards, and cover art by Julie Bell is worth feasting the eyes on, too. Our heroes from the previous two volumes find themselves on a long trip down river, like and unlike the river trade of early 19th century America (emphasis on the early, because they use the current and oars, no steam engines). Various things happen, and the adventures can be exciting, but it isn't for the adventures as such that people read Bujold. It's the people, the way they feel and interact, their heroic virtues, their faults and foibles. WEll done! | | Friday, April 25th, 2008 | | 10:44 pm |
The Red Queen's Race
There's been more turnover this week, but at the end, I'm left with seven amended cases on my amended case dockets. I turned in a PCT (Patent Cooperation TReaty) case yesterday, and I reached the point of 99% completion of a new U.S. case before quitting this evening. Then I stopped off at the bookstore, and bought a copy of Lois McMaster Bujold's The Sharing Knife: Passage (Volume III).
There is more to life than the Red Queen's race, after all. | | Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008 | | 9:58 pm |
More on the Alexander James Adams CD's
Now that I've listedned to them through, I have a few more comments. The Caat and the Fiddle, the (almost) completely instrumental CD, didn't seem to have anything new on it. If you've collected all the earlierHeather Alexander albums, you've heard what's there.
Balance of Nature turned out well; I liked it better than WinterTide. Some of the songs were quite good, and several referred to earlier Heather Alexander songs; for example, "He of the Sidhe" is a sequel to "Faerie Queen." "Royal Grump Song" was amusing, and "Troll in Valhalla" struck me as being the kind of thing I wouldn't particularly like, except that I did like it. "Farewell, Farewell" would be a beautiful song of its kind if I could take it as fiction, or as based on an incident in the singer's life that most of her audience wouldn't know about. The trouble is, I hear it as directed to Heather/James's ex-husband, which doesn't strike me as quite seemly. I don't know just what happened between them, or what his faults are, but I could imagine a man being bitter if his wife decides she's a man trapped in a woman's body, and wants to have the mistake corrected by drugs and surgery, ending the marriage.
It's one thing if an escapee from a bad marriage composes a song taking her grossly abusive ex to task, but this kind of break-up doesn't seem to call for public airing of dirty laundry, certainly not by the one who changed sex. But how much do I really know of what happened? Sigh. | | Sunday, April 20th, 2008 | | 5:41 pm |
Ethanol Subsidies and Mandates
Here's a letter which I just emailed to my Congressman and Senators:
The time has come to put a stop to the ethanol boondoggle. Congress has required a certain percentage -- set to increase -- of motor vehicle fuel to be ethanol, with increasingly painful consequences. Because corn is being turned into ethanol and burned, less is available for feeding people, directly or as food for chickens, hogs, etc. Also, more land is planted in corn, leaving less to be used for wheat, soybeans, etc. This is contributing to rising food prices, and people going hungry in poor countries.
Despite these appalling consequences, mandating and subsidizing the use of ethanol might be justified if it contributed to energy independence, the prevention of global warming, or other worthwhile goals, but it accomplishes very little. It takes diesel fuel, fertilizer, etc., to grow the corn, so burning ethanol instead of gasoline in our cars actually saves very little petroleum. Cutting down forest to plant corn or other crops for ethanol releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, so we're further contributing to global warming.
Sir, I am not anti-ethanol. If someone can find a way to make ethanol from corn, sugar cane, switchgrass, algae, or something else so that it meets the market test, and the ethanol can actually be sold for more than the costs of making it (including charges for pollution), then he should be free to do so.
But we should not subsidize the production of ethanol, nor mandate the use of ethanol which cannot be produced at a profit. I therefore respectfully request that you work to repeal the ethanol mandate in the "energy bill" currently in effect, and oppose subsidies and mandates for ethanol and other biofuels. | | Saturday, April 19th, 2008 | | 5:59 pm |
Telemarketing Crooks
I got a call a few hours ago, with an automated voice telling me that their records showed that the warranty on my vehicle would expire soon, and that I could press 1 to be connected to a customer service representative.
I pressed 1, and once "Carter" had introduced himself, I said, "I found your message a little surprising, since I don't even own a car. Do your records have me confused with someone else, or do -- " But by that time, the line had gone dead. |
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