John Ratcliff's Weblog

I just received my first every payment from Google AdSense. I have been informed, back channel, that according to the contract that I clicked on rapidly without ever reading when I signed up in the first place that I am not supposed to publicly disclose the exact amount of money I receive from this service. I've been signed up for well over six months and today received my first deposit . I cannot actually tell you what the exchange rate is between Google AdSense points and any other currency but, let me assure you, that it is indeed enough money to purchase a number of six packs of beer. As previously promised, I will provide a detailed list and commentary about these delicious beers in a future post. It's an interesting co-incidence that just a day after I cancelled my Google AdWords advertising campaign I received these funds. My Gooogle Adwords campaign ran for about a month and cost me around $500. I received many clicks (not coincidentally around 500) and about 5 very ...

I'm suffering from OCD; but in a good way I suppose. My trip to Europe is still ten days away, but you wouldn't know it by the level of anxiety I am feeling. I'm so concerned about making sure that I 'see everything' and don't 'forget anything I might need', that it is already becoming a consuming thought. I've been to Paris three times before; once on vacation and twice on a business trip yet, still, with all of that, there are many things I should have seen that I missed. This time, I am taking my daughter for her first ever trip to Paris and I want to be absolutely certain she experiences as much as possible. The second half of our trip is in Rome and, frankly, other than the obvious (the Vatican and the Roman ruins; i.e. Pantheon and Colloseum) I'm not sure what all there is to see. On my previous trips to Paris I have wasted inordinate amounts of time wandering aimlessly trying to find something that I had no clue how to get there. Paris a c...

So, just what is up with me these days? I suppose it is about time I made a little update just so that I don't forget what I did now that I have nearly forgotten already. Let's see, starting with this weekend and going backwards. Yesterday was Father's Day and I really didn't do anything special. We went to visit my wife's father in Waterloo, Illinois. We had a nice meal and I got to watch a pretty exciting Cardinals baseball game. I took the boat out in the morning and, once again, in the evening. I did receive phone calls from my children who are away from home and it was nice to hear from them. My own father played a round of golf and had a nice day on his end. The main reason I have been so busy that I couldn't post is because I am working on a deadline for a book chapter submission. I developed an algorithm to auto-generate navigable space meshes for AI characters many years ago. I have used the algorithm now in four separate game engines and I am really...

I love summer TV. Right now I have two two tuner Tivo systems and whenever a new season starts (spring, summer or fall), I pretty much check out anything the networks are throwing against the wall. When all of your favorite shows like 'Lost' and 'The Office' go off of the air you have to lower your standards and start dumpster diving to find something new to watch. In the past few years the networks have moved away from showing re-runs during the summer and now offer new programming specifically targeting the lowered expectations of summer couch potatoes. My favorite summer show is 'So You Think You Can Dance' . I've been watching it since the first season and it is beginning to grow into a tremendous showcase for talented dancers and choreographers. What I like most about the program is how well it displays the range of dance performance and how powerful this art form can be. I used to have season tickets to 'Dance Saint Louis' and it was my favor...

Crusader88 was kind enough to respond to my most recent post. Sadly, he never answered my question but at least he took the time to express his views. To be fair, I will include his comment here verbatim. It's not the kind of post a person can really respond to point by point but I will try to hit the hot spots. Mostly he just states what he believes and, well, that is his right. I continue to be amazed as to how absolutely certain about everything this young man seems to be. I'm 46 years old and I'm not particularily certain about much of anything. Of course, then again, I endured a steady diet of ontological shock from Robert Anton Wilson for a number of years so I am fortunate to have a fairly fluid reality labyrinth. Crusader88 wrote the following comment: First of all, I would like to apologize for calling Freemasonry a "vile entity". My, my, I forgot the Golden Rule. Nonetheless, your lengthy post on Masonry (and several other subjects) has not changed my vi...

(A photograph of a small minuscule part of God.) What follows is going to be a theologically themed post. If you are looking for photographs of scantily clad women , scantily clad pirates , grown men wearing aprons , or hot moms you will have to wait for another day. My rhetorical question for this evening is, "How many Gods (plural) created the Universe?" As I said in the title, this is not a trick question. The answer, generally speaking, is either one or zero. To the atheist it is zero, and to the theist / deist it is one. To the pantheist , which I happen to be myself, the answer is also 'one'. It's not really all that difficult when you think about it. Almost everyone, literally just about everyone except insane people and a few guys on acid, believe we live in a Universe. Moreover the vast majority of the worlds population claims to believe in a single God that created the Universe. (Sorry atheists, you are still largely in the minority, keep trying...) So...

There is a rapidly swirling game of blog tag happening today. It contains a viral meme targeting the topic of inspirational books. While it might be best to ignore this seemingly childish game of tag, I have come to the conclusion that it entirely boils down to whether or not you believe it will produce a blog post that inspires or educates. I was tagged by the Widow's Son over at the Burning Taper , but if not him it could just as easily have been someone else. My biggest challenge is coming up with a list of only three books. Throughout my life I have read voraciously. This reached its highest point while I was in middle school and early on in high school. I read books every single day during summer vacation. During one summer I dedicated myself to read every single book in the 'Junior Reader' section of the public library. I largely succeeded. Even at the very young age of 12 I was reading every book on science that I could find. The bulk of my reading was on science fic...

Just a quick recap of my trip. I drove all of the way to Fort Benning, Georgia on Thursday. The trip was uneventful except that I hit rush hour traffic in Atlanta which was particularly un-fun. I had a GPS for the trip and it was really helpful. When I pulled out of my driveway in the morning at 8:30am it indicated that I would arrive at 8:04pm (eastern). This turned out to be like playing a video game and trying to beat the clock. I did learn, what we have already all been told, is that speeding does not really get you anywhere a whole lot faster. If the speed limit is 70mph and you are travelling at roughly 15mph over the speed limit, you have to drive a long way at that speed just to knock a single minute off of your arrival time. Meanwhile, every time you pull over to a rest stop, gas up, or hit traffic congestion, you 'lose' minutes at a rapid pace. Before I hit Atlanta I was almost thirty minutes 'ahead of schedule' due to cruise control and a constant effort to s...