stigant

A friend of mine posted on his FB page last night: "Han Solo should not have to be frozen in carbonite and fed to the almighty Sarlack just because he didn't pay off Jabba the Hutt.  If you agree, post this as your FB status for the rest of the day."  For those of you who missed President Obama's speech on health care last night, the quote is a reference to his assertion that "in the United States of America, no one should go broke because they get sick. " Now, personally, I hate these kind of things (post this as your status if you agree), but I usually ignore them.  However, this one in particular irritated me.  And not just because it was poking fun at Obama and his health care reform.  Some might argue that it was in especially bad taste considering Obama's comments about those people who are spreading misinformation instead of coming up with something constructive to say.  Certainly the Han Solo quote is not adding anything to the discussion whether you interpret the quote to be in favor of Health Care (great, but so what?) or against it (you're not adding anything, you're getting in the way etc).  However, I don't really care about any of that.  What I care about is the fundamental misunderstanding about Han Solo's role in Star Wars and his relationshiop with Jabba the Hutt.  Solo's relationship to Jabba is not that of an insured person who suddenly finds himself without appropriate care, but rather more like the people who Obama mentioned later in his speech: "Now, even if we provide these affordable options, there may be those -- especially the young and the healthy -- who still want to take the risk and go without coverage."  I'm reminded of Jerry Seinfeld's ire when Tim Watly (played by Brian Cranston) converted from Catholicism to Judaism and started telling Jewish Jokes.  "And that offends you as a Jew?"  "It offends me as a Comedian".  I'm not offended as a health care reform fan, I'm offended as a Star Wars fan.

Han Solo was not unaware of the consequences of not paying off Jabba the Hutt as the "man from Illinois [who] lost his coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because his insurer found that he hadn't reported gallstones that he didn't even know about" was unaware that he (man from Illinois) was in jeopardy.  In ANH, Solo is confronted not once, but twice with the information that Jabba was upset at him:  first by Greedo in the cantina ("Jabba's put a bounty on your head so large every bounty hunter in the galaxy will be looking for you"), and later by Jabba himself in the hanger ("I'll put a bounty on your head so large...").  Later, in ESB, he tells Leia and General Rieekan "There's a price on my head.  If I don't pay off Jabba the Hutt, I'm a dead man"  All of these quotes show that Solo was fully aware of his situation and the consequences for not paying off Jabba.

Now, one could certainly make the case that Han was not to blame for the situtation in which he found himself.  It wasn't his fault that he had to "dump the shipment of spice at the first sign of Imperial ships": "Hey, even I get boarded sometimes."  However, even if we take Solo at his word here (a point I don't readily concede - his ship is "THE ship that made the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs" (emphasis mine), and not only fast, but maneauverable as well as evidenced by the escapes from Tatooine and Hoth, and his flight through the asteroid field and Lando's flight through the Death Star 2 in which the Falcon clearly outmaneauvers even very small ships in extremely cramped conditions), he was fully aware of the risks of working for Jabba as a smuggler.  One might further argue that he was pressed into service against his will.  This is certainly a possibility, but there is no supporting evidence of which I'm aware in the movies.  All the evidence in the movies points to Solo's willing participation as a smuggler.  He was good at it ("Han, why you're the best smuggler in the business. You're too valuable to fry") and, personally, I think he enjoyed it.
     
Han Solo was fully capable of paying off Jabba.  "I've got a charter now and I can pay you back, plus a little extra. I just need some more time."  This deal was subsequently accepted by Jabba.  Then, Solo proceeded to ferry Kenobi, Skywalker and their droids to the Alderaan system, for which he had been promised the sum of "17000, huh?"  Now, he was (momentarily) bilked of his fee as Alderaan had been destroyed before they reached it.  However, he then contracted to rescue Princess Leia:  "If you were to rescue her, the reward be worth... well more than you can imagine."  "I don't know, I can imagine a lot" "You'll get it".  We may safely assume that Solo can imagine at least 17000 which, we already know, would have been enough to pay off Jabba.  Did Solo receive payment?  Well, he received some payment as Luke later says "So you got your reward and you're just leaving then?"  "Yeah, I've got some old debts to pay off with this stuff".  So while the reward amount remains unspecified, we can clearly see that it was enough to satisfy Solo and pay off his debts.

But he did NOT pay off the debts.  Sure, he's to be commended for coming back to the rescue of Luke and the other rebels.  But why didn't he pay off his debts after that?  One might contend that he didn't have time or opportunity.  I contend that he had both.  After all, he drives "The fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy" (cf  Kessel system, 12 parsecs).  Furthermore, by the time he was encased in carbonite, many months, if not years, passed by.  The trips in the Falcon from Tatooine to Alderaan to Yavin can't have taken more than a day or two.  Moving the rebel base from Yavin's moon to the 6th planet of the Hoth system must have taken at least several months.  This is evidenced by the amount of time the evacuation from Hoth would have taken:  "Sir, it will take quite some time to evacuate the T47's"  "Well, just leave the heavy equipment, there's plenty of time to get the smaller modules on the transports".  Furthermore, plenty of time must have ellapsed between the destruction of the Death Star 1 and the Battle of Hoth since both Luke and Han, formerly not employed by the rebellion, had both attained the rank of Commander.  Also, clearly Han and Leia had developed a history ( "What's the matter, afraid I was going to leave without a kiss") and had had time to run into bounty hunters in OTHER systems ("The bounty hunter we ran in to on Ord Mandel changed my mind").  Clearly Han could have taken a couple of days off to pay off his old boss.  He certainly had time to pay off Jabba, but did he have opportunity?  Afterall, he was now a wanted man (by the Empire, if not by Jabba).  Could he have "just jaunted" over to Tatooine as I claim.  Yes, if for no other reason than his ship is extremely fast and maneauverable.  But add to that the disarray that the Empire was in after losing Death Star 1.  Immediately after receiving his rewards for destroying the Death Star, he could clearly have "janted" over to Tatooine to pay off Jabba.  But he didn't.

Why not?  I contend that there were several reasons for this negligance.  First, he recklessly spent the money.  His new lifestyle as a Rebel soldier and friend of the Princess afforded him a new luxury in life.  Examine his clothes in ANH and his clothes in ESB.  He has a marked improvement in style.  And why not try to dress a bit better, live a little bit outside his old means?  After all, he was trying to start a relationship with Leia.  Further, he has made numerous improvements to the Falcon (as evidenced by Chewbacca working on the ship at the beginning of ESB).  Or maybe he just thought he could continue to get away with it.  After all, he hadn't been caught by Jabba yet.  But whatever his reason for not paying off his debts, he did so in full knowlege of the consequences should he be caught.  In otherwords, Han Solo is more like those people, "who still want to take the risk and go without coverage ... even if we provide these affordable options -- especially the young and the healthy."  In fact Obama's concern is that those people who do the right thing will end up footing the bill for those who don't.  Isn't that what happened to Han Solo's friends?  After he's frozen in carbonite, they have to go save his sorry ass from Jabba.  In the process, they all almost have to share in his fate.  Thank goodness Luke took out a sizeable insurance policy by returning back to Yoda to complete his Jedi training.

Is there a valid analogy in the Star Wars movies for the "guy from Illinois" or perhaps the woman from Texas who "was about to get a double mastectomy when her insurance company canceled her policy because she forgot to declare a case of acne."  Sure, how about Luke?  Here's a guy who's minding his own business.  He's a productive (albeit whiny) member of society, moisture farming on the dryest planet in the Republic (on another planet, in a galaxy far far away from his own, he might have been Luke the Plumber).  Sure, he's got big plans to join the military or the rebellion ("I want to transfer my application to the Accademy THIS season"), but for the time being he's content to be an anonymous toiler in his uncle's fields and help look after his family and home.  Then BAM! He buys a couple of droids (who knew they were stolen), the Empire kills his family, burns his fields and home and chases him half way accross the galaxy.  Who asked for that?

( Solution )

( Solution )

After a while, the sudonians started to need bigger and bigger cities, eventually wanting to build Metropolises.  Spuck granted permission for this provided that the resulting grids follow the rules of Samurai Sudoku. n Unfortunatly, the only architect who was willing to spend the time to design a layout died of exhaustion shortly after his first success.  Here it is for posterity.

So it's like NYC... the 5 burroughs (Bronx, Queens, Manhatten, Brooklyn and Staten Island).  I guess the geography is probably a little off.  For the record, I don't recommend this puzzle at all.  It was a very tedious slog (although it IS solvable...).  I recommend you start by placing as many of the 9's as possible.  It's king of fun, though, in parts... I liked using the no-arrow rule accross boards.

Also, although you could deduce this just by looking at the arrows in the puzzle, it's possible to see from one burrough into another.  The upshot of this is that a 9-story building can now (possibly) have an arrow on it since it could conceivably see 9 buildings in a single direction.

Here are two more "Foggy Hidden Skyscraper Sudoku" puzzles.  I won't guarantee that the left (unfogged) grid isn't solvable by itself (unlike the first one I posted) but they're definitely quite difficult to do without the right (fog) grid.

I evidently left the solution to this one at home, and don't feel like solving it again.  I'll edit this post with the solution later.


( Solution )

Ok, here's another puzzle.  There's a story to go with it:

Long ago, on the planet Sudonia, the Sudonites were ruled by a vengeful, but infinitely logical god, Spuck.  Actually, unbenknownst to the Sudonians, Spuck was an avatar of an advanced alien race, the Valcons who had discovered Sudonia and taken over by pretending to be a god.  But to the Sudonians, it was all about the same.

Now, because Spuck was infinitely logical, he was exceptionally fond of solving sudoku puzzles and required of his followers (ie the Sudonians) that the puzzle and it's logical ideals permeate everything that they did, and every part of their culture.  As the Sudokians became more technologically advanced, they began to industrialize and build cities.  Spuck decreed that all cities must be 9 blocks by 9 blocks, each block containing one building which must be less than 9 stories, each row, column and three by three square must contain 1 building of each size (you get the idea), and then enough of the buildings must contain their height inscribed on the roof top so that when Spuck looked down from heaven (ie his space ship) he could logically deduce the heights of the rest of the buildings.  (The Valcons actually required this so that they could buzz the towns in their invisible hover-cars without having to worry about hitting a building).  This seemed a little bizarre to the Sudonians, but they went along with it.  Those architects who did not conform to Spuck's rules (especially the solvability one) were smited from heaven by lightning and never heard from again (I did mention his vengefulness).

After a few hundred years, however, the Sudonian city-architects began to get a little disgruntled with this arrangements.  They, or rather, a small minority of artistically inclined architects, felt that the requirements were stiffling their creativity, and besides, all those numbers on the top were hard to maintain.  So they prayed to Spuck and asked for a special dispensation, in the name of Art, to allow them to build a small number of towns using different rules.  Spuck relented and decreed that new cities could be built with arrows on the buildings which would indicate that the height of the building was the same as the number of other buildings "visible" from that building in that direction (ala the rules of Hidden Skyscraper Sudoku).  Of course, the heights of all buildings in the city would have to be deducable from the locations of the arrows.  This made the Sudonians happy, and they built several cities to these specifications (and those who didn't were fried, and their beautiful cities destroyed).

Now, all the Valcons buzzing the cities of Sudonia made for a lot of noise which disturbed the Sudonians in their logical meditations, and so they prayed to Spuck to make the noises stop.  But Spuck said "Lo, those noises are my displeasure with the ease of solving the puzzles that your cities pose for me.  If you would have them end, then you must create for me a more difficult puzzle."  Unfortunately, this was not possible as Spuck was infinitely logical (and anyway, the Valcons weren't going to give up their joy ridings). 

At about this time, a group of Sudonians decided to build a city near one of the coasts in a temperate climate, and commissioned the most famous city-architect of the day, Froyd Lightwank to design the layout of the buildings.  They implored him to try his best to create a puzzle which would put an end to Spuck's grumblings, and he promised them that he would do everything he could.  For many months Froyd toiled to create the ultimate HSS puzzle that would have only one solution but would be too difficult for even a god to solve.  And of course, he was doomed to failure.  He started to despair that he wouldn't be able to realize the city-founder's dreams of a peaceful metropolis.  But, one cool morning, while looking out over the bay, he had an epiphany.  He ran back to his office and drew up plans for the city.  The construction crews set to work immediately and created the following map (as viewed from above):

Everybody agreed that this was an exceptionally difficult HSS puzzle, and while nobody was able to solve it, they were assured by Froyd that there was in fact a solution, but even Spuck would be hard pressed to find it.  So they went ahead and built the city.

On a beautiful sunny day, as the last building was completed, the founders had a dedication ceremony to honor Froyd for his creation.  As the guests were dancing and enjoying their cakes, one humble little girl named Motria who was Froyd's favorite neice, rushed up to the mayor and Froyd and said:  "Um, Mr. Mayor, Uncle Froyd, I think that this city is doomed."  The mayor was shocked "Why, whatever do you mean, little girl?  The city is just fine.  Run along now and play with your friends, and leave the adults to worry about such things."  But Motria persisted.  "But I think there are at least two configurations that satisfy the arrow diagram.  In addition to the building configuration (which we can see from the side up here on the hill), I can switch these 4 buildings around (she pointed to a map indicating which buildings) creating another valid configuration."  Now that a solution to the puzzle was apparant, it was not difficult to find extra solutions to it which had eluded even the best HSS solvers until now.  The mayor was appalled.  By now, several other guests had started to gather around the three of them.  After Motria finished her explanation, everybody gasped, and, except the little girl, took several steps back from Froyd (afterall, while you wouldn't wish for your neighbor to be smited, you wouldn't want to be standing next to them when they were).

But Froyd smiled and said, "You're a very smart Motria, but I'm not worried."  And indeed, Froyd was still standing and not smited.  "Please, Motria (and anybody else who is worried), stay here on this hill tonight and tell me in the morning if you're not satisfied.  I'm tired, now, though, so I think I'll go get some rest."  And he walked down into the town and slept the sleep of the innocent.  The rest of the city, however, were still too worried to sleep in the town lest they be smited along with the buildings, and stayed on the hill all night.

Early the next morning, a bitter chill had set in over the night.  As the sun rose, the people of the town looked out over a very different city.  You see, a fog had rolled in, and covered the buildings up to a certain level.  As the fog rolled in, the arrows on top of the buildings began to change (they were automatically set to self-configure by measuring their vertical distance to the ground, and by viewing other buildings in each direction.  With the fog rolling in, they were getting different readings because their apparent heights were altered, and many buildings were completely concealed by the fog, thus changing the number of visible buildings).  When the fog had settled into a nice even level, the new map of the city looked like this:

Just then, Froyd appeared out of the fog with a big smile on his face.  Motria jumped up into her uncle's arms and said, "You're the smartest architect ever.  With the new map, I can deduce not only the height of the fog, but also the heights of the buildings perfectly."

Now, Spuck (or rather the Valcons) could see this also, but much to their horror, they realized also that they couldn't buzz the town because they would never see both maps at the same time, and thus never be able to correctly deduce the heights of the buildings.  The town was left in peace for many millenia, and Froyd and his neice (who grew up to be an even more successful architect than her uncle) are honored to this day as heroes.

Ok, so the rules:
The first grid is a standard Hidden Skyscraper Sudoku:
Fill in the grid with numbers 1-9 so that each row, column, and 3x3 square has 1 of each digit.  The arrows mean that the height of the building on that square correctly indicates the number of visible buildings in that direction.  A lack of an arrow on a square means that the height of that building INCORRECTLY indicates the number of visible buildings in that direction.

The second grid is a little different.
Let H be the height (in stories) of the fog.  Each square in the second grid is H less than the corresponding number in the first grid (or 0 if the building on that square is H stories or less, ie it is completely covered by the fog).  For example, if the fog was 3 stories thick, then all 4's in the original grid are 1's in the second grid, all 9's are now 6's, and 1's, 2's and 3's are 0's.

Again, an arrow in a square means that the height of that building ABOVE the fog correctly indicates the number of buildings which can be seen in that direction.  Any building that is completely covered in fog is not included in the counts.

A missing arrow indicates either that the building on that square is completely covered in fog, OR that the height above the fog does NOT accurately indicate the number of buildings visible (over the fog) in that direction.

( Solution )

Ok, I have one more that I was working on while working on puzzle #4, but I didn't think it would work out, so I wasn't going to post it.  However, I managed to solve it afterall.  I generated another random grid (like puzzle #1) so I won't claim any creativity in this puzzle, but it's a tough one (much fewer arrows), so I thought I'd post it anyway. 



( Solution )

Ok, one more and then I think I'm done with this format for a while.


On this one, I especially like the 6th column and I'm pretty sure you're going to have to use the no-arrow rule especially near the end.
( Solution )

Here's another Hidden Skyscraper Sudoku.  I think it's a bit easier than the other two, although that may be because I'm getting better at solving them.  It has a few more arrowed squares than either of the other ones, though, so I think that makes things a bit easier.

I learned an important (well, interesting, anyway) theorem while constructing this puzzle:  ( theorem )( solution )
Edit: There were two mistakes in this puzzle.  I've fixed them and re-solved the puzzle, and uploaded a corrected image.  Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Here's another Hidden Skyscraper.  Same rules as last time.  I generated the solution grid by hand this time, with skyscraper rules in mind.  I had to make a few tweaks to get to a unique solution, but I think it solves nicely.  It also uses a few deductions that the first one didn't, and makes (at least in my solve) more use of the no-arrow rule.
( Solution )

So the other day, I solved a new variety of sudoku: "Hidden Skyscraper".  I found it on one of the Indian Mock Sudoku championships.  (Password: DruhaCastMock10, problem 7).  Also very fun in that test is puzzle 8.  Anyway, I decided to try my hand at creating one of these puzzles.  Now, I used a computer to generate a random solution, removed all the numbers and then added in all the arrows that I could, so there's not much creativity in this puzzle, but I think it was quite fun to solve:



Rules:
Sudoku Restraint: Fill in the grid with the digits 1-9 such that each row, each column and each 3x3 box contains each digit once.
Skyscraper Restraint:  The grid represents a city and each box in the grid contains a building, and the number in the grid represents the height of that building.   If you stand on a particular square and look in one of the cardinal directions (NSEW), you will see some of the other buildings, taller buildings block shorter buildings.  If the number of buildings that you can see in a particular direction matches the height of the building on the square, then that square has an arrow pointing in that direction.  If not, then it doesn't.

I believe there is a unique solution:( Solution )

Let M1 and M2 be any two mathematicians.  Suppose that M1 poses a problem P to M2 and asks him to solve it for the general case P(n), and that M2 can easily demonstrate the truth of P(1), P(2) ... P(m), for some constant m>2.  Then M1 clearly knows a proof by induction of the general problem P(n).

Proof left as an exercise for the reader.

Corollary:  M1 is just mean for not sharing his proof with M2.

 So I don't post often at all (I think its been over a year) but this is something that I feel is important.

The US Government should get out of the debate over what constitutes a marriage.  The word "Marriage" is loaded by the religious connotations and traditions of too many people, and, as such, what constitutes a marriage should be left up to the various and individual religions which perform and endorse these unions.  If Judeo-Christians don't want to join two men or two women in marriage, then they don't have to.  If some other religion is ok with it, then great.  FLDS wants to allow a man to marry multiple women?  Great (provided that all participants in sexual relationships are consenting adults... notice that I used the terms "men" and "women" here to indicate this caveat).  I draw the line at endorsing sexual relationships (note that a marriage doesn't necessarily have to entail sex, but it seems to be the norm...) with non adult humans as they are the only beings on this planet known to be capable of the consent which is necessary for this type of relationship.  We have the right to opt out of any religion we don't like.  If the thought of two men or two women or one man and lots of women, or one woman and lots of men, or two cousins or whatever strikes you as icky, then for god's sake, don't subscribe to that religion.  What we can't opt out of, as citizens of this country, is the government which rules us.  The government of this country is built on the principle of separation of religion and state.  Why?  For precisely the reason that you and I, as reasonable people, can disagree about the tenents of particular religions.  But since we have to live together peacefully, we must agree to abide by the same governmental laws. Since marriage (and who should be allowed to marry) is fundamentally a religious question, it should not be up to the government to decide who can marry.

The government DOES worry about who is allowed to get married.  This is because several rights/priviliges are awarded to those people who are lucky enough to be allowed to get married.  These include, but are not limited to spousal privilege, inheritance laws, child-custody laws, medical insurance, power of attorney etc etc.  These questions are not about marriage (which most religions consider to be about reproduction) so much as legal protection.  They ARE fundamentally about 2 people (sorry all you polygamists, multiple parties complicate things a bit too much) forming legal agreements between them about eventualities that may come up in their lives and how those eventualities should be handled.  In the past, marriage was a great way to determine whether someone should be allowed to pull the plug on you when you're brain dead.  On the surface, its a great fit.  Who do you want to make these decisions?   Who do you want to inherit your stuff?  Who do you want to look after your kids?  Who do you want your company to provide medical insurance for? Usually the person with whom you've decided to spend the rest of your life.  And in the past, you were married to that person.  

But NOT ANYMORE.  Increasingly, heterosexual marriages end in divorce.  Increasingly, two men or two women want to enter into these same type of arrangements.  The government should not be in the business of telling me that I can't have this kind of arrangement with person x just because he happens to be a man.  There's nothing about him that makes him less qualified to raise my children than a woman.  There's nothing about him that makes him more of a burden on my company to provide him with medical insurrance because he's a man instead of a woman.  There's nothing about him that makes our relationship more or less stable than a heterosexual marriage.  An argument can be made (I do not subscribe to it) that two men are not (naturally) able to produce an offspring and therefore should not be married.  But this is a RELIGIOUS issue.  The government should not be in the business of telling me that I can't get married to someone with whom I can't or chose not to have a child.  

This is why I suggest that the government stop refering to people (ANY two people) as being "MARRIED."  This term serves a religious purpose.  It should not serve a legal purpose.  This opinion extends to all heterosexual marriages as well as all gay marriages and all polygomist marriages.  Henceforth, the word "MARRIAGE" and all its derivatives shall be expunged from the US Legal Code and, by extension, the legal codes of all the states and territories and all counties, cities, provinces, towns, hamlets etc etc.  It shall be replaced by "CIVIL UNION" or some other term that we can all agree means "A GROUP OF COMMONLY PRACTICED LEGAL AGREEMENTS WHICH CAN BE FORMED BETWEEN ANY TWO PEOPLE OF LEGAL AGE"  You may enter into a "civil union" with one and only one person at a time (for reasons of legal complications arising from entering into it with several people at once).  If you chose, coincidentally, to enter this agreement together on the same day that a man or woman or alien in a robe pronounces you man and wife or man and man, or woman and woman, or whatever, then that's great.  And if you chose to enter into this agreement absent any religious ceremony, then that's fine too.  But most importantly, the government MUST allow these arrangements between ANY two people because not to do so would constitute sexual (gender-based, not sexuality-based) discrimination.

This doesn't mean that MARRIAGE has to be meaningless.  Far from it.  First of all, what I think about marriage doesn't  have any bearing on what YOU think about marriage.  Its a religious matter.  The fact that you live next door to two men or two women doesn't make the love that you and your wife experience any less meaningful.  Nor does your love make the two men's love for each other any less meaningful.  What we (you and I) must agree on is that the government should not be dictating the terms of marriage. 

I downloaded the German Puzzle Championship test yesterday.  I was going to make myself wait until after finals to work through it, but I'm far too weak to do that.  I'm not keeping track of my time since I don't really care about speed.

Here is what I've done so far:
Skipped the sudoku (#1) - I don't really like sudoku, and this one looks like a plain-vanilla one (with 7 instead of 9 and an diagonal constraint).  I'll probably do it eventually.  When I really am bored.
#2 Battleships - tore through this one.  It takes a pretty hard battleships to stump me and you won't see that as a contest problem (since there are lots of other puzzles).  I've been doing the daily 4 pretty religiously at puzzelsport.
#3 Magnets - I'm really starting to like these.  I did the one on the practice test as well (and I've done a few others before).  There are some nice general theorems and lots of opportunities for local corallaries in all the instances I've done.  And its pretty much completely different from any other puzzle variety.  Anyway, I got through it pretty efficiently.  I had to do the upper left corner with brute force, but there were only two possibilities (placing one + or - determined everything else).  In hind sight, I probably could have reasoned it out rather than brute foreced it all the way, but I still would have had to try two possibilities (just not all the way)
#4 Tents - This puzzle is growing on me as well.  I may have to run the app that Simon Tatham has on his site more often to get a bit better at it.  But I managed to work into this one with some nice reasoning about the bottom two rows.  Interestingly, I didn't completely resolve those two rows until I was about 70% of the way through the rest of the puzzle.
#5 Number Maze - once I found a work in, I was able to get through this one with one minor hitch getting from 1->2->3.  I'd like to try some more of this puzzle type to see if I can find some general guidelines for solving.
#6 Pentomino Triplets - I've ruled out the X shape.  But I'm pretty much down to trial and error.  Perhaps I can rule out two more shapes and then finish quickly, but I've spent a lot of time and have nothing but a lot of combos to show for it.
#7 Dominos - I haven't done any of these in a while (Simon Tatham has a nice app).  I got about 10% done, ran through all the remaining dominos, didn't find anything else to do, so I made an educated guess which turned out to be right and led me home.    Not completely satisfying.
#8 Hexagonal Path - I haven't done any of these, and they're more difficult than regular fences.  I may head over to Erich Friedmanns site to practice on some easier ones (I think I remember him having some like this)
#9 Double Balance - I haven't found an in yet, and I don't want to just start running combos.  Usually on this type of puzzle you can solve a system of equations to at least divide the weights into two groups, but I can't find a system since the balances are independent.
#10 Jigsaw Puzzle - I'm still running combos.  I've managed to place one piece for sure, but other than that, I feel very computerish here.
#11 Hexagonal Islands - I made a mistake some where.  I vow with every ounce of my being that I will crack it eventually.  I'm too god at Nurikabe not to get this one.
#12 Cryptic Fences - I've seen a couple of variants of other puzzles that involve cryptic substitutions, and they've been very satisfying logically (ex: cryptic kakuro), though its a bit hard to find them to practice.  In this one, the substitution scheme fell pretty quickly, and then it was just solving a basic fences puzzle which I do pretty well at.
#13 Kropki - Another sudoku variant.  I won't ever solve this one.  I'm just not patient enough to deduce the theorems that I need.
#14 Crossword - Another one I won't ever do.
#15 Magic Arrows - there was one of these on the practice test (allowing reflections, though) that I enjoyed, but it was smaller and I found an in very quickly that led me to the answer directly.  I'm not sure whether to try this one or not.
#16 Skyscrapers - I'll admit to not liking this puzzle type.  And I'm not looking forward to a large instance.  4x4 and 5x5 usually give me enough of a challenge.  I don't need to go up to 7x7.
#17 Paint-it-Black Snakes - a nonogram variant.  I really liked this puzzle.  I found a good in in the bottom left corner, and most of it fell pretty directly from there.  I hope I can find more puzzles of this sort.  I've solved a bunch where you have to place the 12 pentominoes in the grid, and they're among my favorite puzzles of all time.  But I've only found them in one book, and I've finished them all :-(
#18 - Plus/Minus Kakuro - I loved the last one of these I did and this one didn't disappoint.  I thought I had messed up a number of times, but I saw the combo I had missed.  I even managed to use the bottle-neck technique in a couple of places (the other one I solved didn't require it).  I love that you have to be thinking all the way home on this variant.  There are very few automatic fill ins (for example, a (23,3) crossed with a (16,2) must be 9 in regular kakuro), but general Kakuro proficiency is still a must.
#19 Wordsearch - I've done a few of these.  I usually find that the missing letters are pretty obvious, but I'll give it a shot later.
#20 Arithemetics - I'll probably give this a shot later, though I won't be disappointed if I don't get to it.

Ok, so that gives me a total score thus far of 160 (I think) with possibly another 60 on puzzles that I'll do eventually. 

Update:
I finished the Hex-Islands (not too bad, I had to guess and correct a couple of times, but small indirect proofs are to be expected in this type of puzzle/contest) and the Skyscrapers (not as bad as I thought it would be.  I managed to place 4 or 5 of the 7's pretty quickly, did some basic indirect reasoning and generally made steady, if slow progress through it... perhaps I should find some more of these to work on.  The book I have with them seemed a lot more difficult.  I'd like to find some medium difficulty ones to work my way up to hard)

Update 2:
Finished the Double Balance and the Jigsaw puzzle.  
On the balance, I ended up running combinations, but starting in the right place made things easier.  I found 6 or so combos for the right side of the top beam.  Two of them were mathematically too heavy to balance the other side, 1 didn't have any balancing combos, 1 used 1, 2, and 3 (one of which is needed on the bottom right scale) and a 5th one I was able to rule out quickly based on the bottom scale.  That left one combination on the top (there was only one possibility to balance it on the left) and only 6 weights for the bottom, and the puzzle fell pretty quickly from there.
On the jigsaw puzzle, I finally saw an obvious deduction... piece G must be surrounded by smooth pieces, and there are only 1 or 2 for each position.  The right side piece prevents G from being in C2 or C3, so I was down to 2 possibilities for where G could go.  Guessed one and got it right after running a minimal number of additional combinations to put in the rest of the pieces.  Not completely satisfactory, but not as mindless as I thought it would be.

I haven't listened to the radio much in the last, oh 5-6 years as my radio in my car has been... disabled.  I think there's some sort of security measure that puts it into a locked state if it loses contact with the battery (to prevent theft of the radio).  I have the security code, but it doesn't seem to work.  Anyway, my primary radio listening time (ie commuting to/from work) has been missing for 5-6 years.  I was surprised and pleased to learn yesterday via Ad Critic that the Real Men of Genius line of commercial for Bud Light are still around and going strong.  In fact, evidently they have pretty much dominated the Clio awards for best radio spot for the last decade or so.  Here's one of my favorites from last year (of course, the text by itself doesn't really do it justice... but if you've ever heard one of these spots, you shouldn't have any problem humming along):

Bud Light Presents: Real Men of Genius.    (Real Men of Genius)
Today we salute you, Mr. Boneless Buffalo Wing Inventor  (Mr. Boneless Buffalo wing inventer)
How do you improve on a meat that is:
breaded
buttered
double fried
and dipped in blue cheese dressing?
Remove the only part that doesn't contain fat   (don't need no stinkin bone)
gone now is the race to eat the drumsticks first, leaving the wings for the other poor suckers   (hands off my drummies!)
is it wing? is it leg?  is it rear end?
Now every chunk is as identical as it is indistinguishable (hope I'm not eating rear-end)
So crack open a Bud Light, oh Boneless Wing Mastermind
because we don't have a bone to pick with you.   (Mr. Boneless Buffalo Wing Inventor) 


In other news:
Agility was canceled yesterday (grr) because of the rain over the last couple of days.  Sandy said we might be able to come on Thursday instead which will probably be good since Pawsitive will probably still be soaking.  I think we may try to go to an actual competition (to watch, though, not compete) either this weekend or next

I'm grading my Algebra II tests.  They're terrible.  But they were cumulative, so it will be a good wake up before the final.

Numb3rs was supposed to incorporate math into a crime drama on a weekly basis.  The first season was good, though I felt like there were a few math concepts that got used over and over.  They started out doing a good job of finding interesting concepts and illustrating them in innovative ways.  Plus, there was Sabrina Lloyd.  The second season, though, has been unwatchable.  The explanations have really waned.  Episodes focus on the characters and the crime more than using the math to solve the crime.  They replaced Sabrina Lloyd.   The woman mathematician is there only as eye candy.   And frankly, the writing is the worst writing of any crime drama on television.  I've stopped watching.

Stunt Junkies looked promising, but the physics is a little too 5000 ft high idea than I'd like.  I'm pretty sure the equations they flash on screen are probably accurate, but I get the feeling that they're doing everything by feel rather than by calculation.

Mythbusters is probably the most consistently good about math and science.  Granted, their "experiments" are not always scientific, and they occasionally jump to a conclusion that I don't think is entirely warranted by their results.  But they're always entertaining, and more often than not, I come away agreeing with them.  Plus, Kari is hot.

The CSI shows (other than Miami which, IMO is totally unwatchable) do a pretty good job with the science and math content.  Specifically, on Wednesday, CSI:NY had a cute scene where two of the CSI's where doing math on a board.  The cute girl from Montana comes in and asks what the heck they're doing.  "Rule of Sines" says one of them (I've always called it "Law of Sines").  Anyway, it was a nice moment, even if they didn't explain very well.  

But the show that I really like for science content is Bones.  I'm sure a lot of it is fabricated, but I really feel like they do a good job of imersing you in the technological process, and making you think its real.  And even if its not totally real, they do a good job portraying the philosophy of science (ie always question your assumptions etc).  Plus, the women are hot, the men are funny and the writing generally rocks.  Although, I'm a bit annoyed with Angela and the rich guy... too much PDA ich!

Went to Sandy's on Tuesday for agility.  There were only 3 of us in the class this week (Inara, Tucker, and Nick.  We were missing JZ and Axle - who's moms may be taking a break... I think they were getting frustrated with it and eachother, and TJ and Barney who I'm sure will be back).  We ran a new jump formation - 8 jumps in 2 rows of 4, but you have to traverse them in an M formation rather than a figure 8.  We did them with rear crosses first and then front crosses second.  When I walked the course, I was thinking that the front crosses would be easier even though they require more complicated footwork since Inara and I had been practicing them from the figure-8 formation from the previous week, and she responds to me better when I'm in front of her.  However, she surprised me, and handled the rear cross (using a kind of flip motion with my hand to get her to turn away from me after the even jumps) just fine.  In fact, the footwork was a little bit too complicated on the front cross run, and we (I) failed several times before finally getting it right.

Still having trouble with contacts on the A-frame when I run past the end.  She handles see-saws and dog-walks just fine, and you can tell she's trying to stop on the A-frame to get the 2-on-2-off contact, but she doesn't have time, and as Sandy pointed out, she needs to be thinking about it before she goes over the top.  We don't have anything at home that will help us train this.

Pawsitive was wet as usual on Thursday.  Though, in fairness, it rained everywhere.  We didn't have much time to practice on Wednesday, so hopefully this weekend will be a bit sunnier and we'll have some time to work on our patterns.  And weave polls.  (Ugh!)

My wife and I went to my cousin Jessica's wedding this past weekend.  It was quite beautiful.  The ceremony and reception were held at a country club in the mountains of North Carolina (about an hour outside of Asheville).  Our first plane (from Houston to Atlanta) was delayed about an hour, and we had to run to make our connection to Asheville.  Unfortunatly, our luggage didn't make the connection (more on that later).  We arrived in Asheville about 12:00, rented a car (with GPS!) and drove the hour or so to the country club.  We arrived about 1:30, borrowed a toothbrush from the front desk and went straight to bed.  The room was a bit cramped.  They had put 2 double beds in, one of which was pushed up against the exterior door  (the cabin consisted of several rooms off of a central living room area.  Several of my relatives were staying in the other rooms).  Also, the room had a noticable slant to it (about 10 degrees).  

We got up the next morning and went shopping (on Delta's dime since they had lost our luggage).  We found a Walmart about 2 towns over and got some cheap slacks, golf shirts, and slacks to wear.  I also decided to "splurge" on one of those 5-blade razors that are popular now.  It even has a vibrating option that's supposed to stimulate your hair follicles or something.  I have to say, this is the best shave I've ever had.  Period.  Will be getting some more blades and replacing my current outmoded 3-blade razor.  The golf shirt I got was pretty nice, so I decided to keep it.  Delta has a policy that if you donate your emergency purchases to charity, they'll give you 100% of the cost back, but you only get 50% for anything you decide to keep.  The pants and the shoes weren't worth keeping.

The ceremony was held on the "Croquet Green" with a mountain and river backdrop.  It was literally a 10 second walk from our room.  My uncle Jon is a priest, so he was the officiant.  Jessica's older brothers walked her down the aisle.  The ceremony was pretty typical, other than that, although Uncle Jon kept telling them what their responses would be... I was wondering if they didn't have time to do a proper rehearsal.  Our luggage arrived just as the ceremony was ending, so we were able to grab some jackets (it was a bit colder than we were expecting) before heading over to the reception.  The reception had great food.  The roast beef was fantastic, and the bacon-wrapped scallops were also tasty.  There was a lack of seating (I think the resort had just opened up for its summer season that weekend, and they were still working out some bugs), but that was eventually remedied.  Got to spend a lot of time with my mother's side of the family.  All of my cousins (5) were there, including Joel who I haven't seen in about 10 years, and his wife Rachel, who I've never met.  

We had several hours of down time after the reception.  I spent much of it playing ping-pong with my cousin Chris's children Blakely and Christopher (I think that makes them second-cousins-once-removed).  I found out they have an English Springer Spaniel as well.  She's surely not as cute as Inara, but I'm sure she's a close second.   We had a lovely dinner (got to wear my suit... I look marvelous in that suit), attended a post-reception party (we were lucky to get there... I foolishly relied on the GPS unit instead of the written instructions and posters leading to the site) and then hit the sack.  Woke up the next morning, ate breakfast, and drove back to the airport.  No hitches at the airport, though the Delta rep (and I'm ashamed to admit, me too) miscalculated our reimbursment check, but I caught the mistake before everything was finalized.  Had a longish layover in Atlanta, and got home to the house about 5:00ish.  I spent most of the plane rides doing crosssums (kakuro) in my latest Dell magazine.  Its been a while since I've been stumped on that many problems (the last 3 are still incomplete).

Took Inara out to the yard to do a little agility (since we missed Friday and Saturday).  We got the figure 8 that we were doing in class Tuesday.  We're still at one inch on the weave polls.  And her contacts are flakey at best when I run past the end of the see-saw.  But as usual, she's minding me very well.  Though she does get a bit distracted by the neighbor's dog Coco.  (Interesting coincidence:  My cousin Mike's wife, Erica, who was at the wedding, is nicknamed Coco, and Chris's dog's name is Coco as well.  It was a bit weird keeping all that straight). 

As usual, I put off all the work I was supposed to do until the last minute.  I spent the evening writing a Precal test while Steph watched TV.  We've gotten engrossed in PBS's Bleak House which is showing for the next few Sundays on Masterpiece Theater.  I hate the camera angles (they're all jumpy, close in, partially obscured shots, as if you're a fly on the wall listening in) and cheesily ominous music, though.  It makes everything a lot more creepy than it would be if they had just shot everything from a normal angle.  And its Dickens.  You know that there's something sinister going on underneath the venear of civility, but everything is going to work out right in the end (says the guy who's never read Bleak House).  Surely the music is just over kill.

Anyway, back at work now.  Cranked out a quick test for my Algebra students over conic sections.  Its a bit simpler than the one I gave last year (we didn't cover conic intersections.  Also, I changed the bonus.  Previously, it was about showing that the equation of an ellipse matches the geometric definition.  It's a long slog of an algebraic proof that the kids never really understand or appreciate.  I've changed it to be about a parabola instead since that proof is still interesting, but much simpler).  Also, I added more emphasis on graphing inequalities.

One of my precal students brought in a bonus nurikabe this morning.  She got it right!  That makes me impressed.

So I've been freeloading off Nikoli's puzzle site (ie, I do the contest puzzles, but I don't pay for them).  I've decided that Heyawake is my least favorite puzzle type (even worse than Sudoku).  I find the constraints (specifically, the no straight line of white cells can extend over 3 boxes) difficult to use.  Looking forward to the next contest which is a Nurikabe (one of my favorite types).

Well, I've finally given in and started a blog.  And the first monumentally important thing that I want to tell the entire world is:  My left ear hurts.  

Thank you, that is all.