It’s April Fool’s Day

It’s April Fool’s Day, so the web is full of hoaxes. I think Google wins, both in terms of how funny their gags are and for sheer quantity. I’m not going to post them all here and instead let you browse around the various Google tools to find for yourself. I’m still looking myself.

A couple of my favorite sites have posted some fun lists of pranks. They’re on my del.icio.us page, which I’ll also update as the day goes on. Work is slow as two members of my team are out sick, so I should have plenty of time to monitor this extremely important situation.

I’m especially going to keep an eye on Slashdot during the day; they usually come up with some good stuff.

Edit: If you’re into any of the various Blizzard universes, you might be interested in these:

• Bard
• Molten Core on Atari
• Tauren in Starcraft II

IT professionals

There is an IT-related conference going on in the building where I work right now, and it is chock full of IT stereotypes. I don’t mean what follows to be in any way rude. These are simply some observations I’ve made. The building right now is swarming with:

• Dweeby guys: thick glasses and pants hiked way above their waists and ankles (“Where’s the flood, buddy,” I’m tempted to ask), revealing white socks worn with loafers;
• Fat guys: big meaty fingers (how do they type with those?) and enormous asses from sitting all day. They waddle when they walk, as if unused to the act of walking;
• Asians.

It’s hard to not laugh when I see a combination of these types. Today on my way into the building, for example, I saw a fat Asian with thick glasses heading towards the conference. Now, I am not saying that all Asians are IT professionals, or that fat is only a characteristic of people working at computers all day. I am only saying that these are common stereotypes of the IT profession, and this conference is doing much to strengthen these stereotypes. Oh, and I’ve seen about about one woman at the conference.

The Sugar Packet Dilemma

I love coffee, but only after significant doctoring. That is, I add quite a bit of sugar and cream. For me, the draw of the taste of coffee is the combination of bitter and sweet. I’m not a big fan of plain old bitter foods, and I can’t understand why anyone would be. However, I prefer darker, more bitter brews over light brews because I also don’t drink coffee just to enjoy something sweet. The bitter flavor has to be there to accent the sweet. Choosing a dark roast ensures that this flavor endures no matter what is added. Thus, my favorite coffee beverage is nice dark French roast with lots of sugar and cream, which leads to a sweet beverage with a bitter finish.

When I make coffee for myself at home, adding sugar is easy; I have a big spoon and a big sugar bowl. When I order coffee at a store, I run into what I have dubbed the “Sugar Packet Dilemma”. The Dilemma is caused by my desire to add a lot of sugar to my coffee but being forced to do so from inconveniently small packets. To solve the Dilemma, I have been researching the best number of sugar packets to open at once. If too few are chosen, then I can spend several minutes adding sugar to my coffee, which is inefficient. As I increase the number of packets being opened at once, the chances increase of a poor opening rip, that being a rip which opens some packets too close to where the sugar lies while opening some too close to the top. This is also inefficient: sugar is wasted and multiple attempts must be made to open partially or poorly opened packets. The hypothesis I tested over the last few weeks is that there exists an ideal number of packets, such that all packets open easily yet as few additions of sugar to my coffee are made as possible.

After extensive research on the subject, I discovered that the number is five. I can easily open five packets of sugar and dump the sugar into my coffee without spilling much sugar and without errant tears in the packets. Opening five packets at once also allows me to add ten packets of sugar to a large coffee in only two moves. While fewer packets may suffice for a smaller cup or a lighter brew, ten is the minimum for a dark roast.

Just in case you wanted to know.