This post is in response to “Kinni” who commented on my review of the latest Bridget Jones’s movie.

“Kinni” asks the following question.

So why did I stay to see the end of this really horrible movie? (Why do I almost always read a dreadful book all the way to the end? I’ve tackled this topic once before, but perhaps I didn’t delve deep enough into it.)

Here are some reasons why I stayed in the theater for this horrible movie.

I didn’t have anything else to do. I am only counting the things I had an actual opportunity to do and felt sufficiently motivated to actually consider. At that moment it was either a movie or a nap. A movie seemed like it might be a more entertaintaining option.

I was thinking of you, the blog audience. I knew you would appreciate my insights later. No sacrifice is too great, no movie too horrible, if only I can blog about it later.

I didn’t really think the movie could get much worse. So since I knew it was bad, and it probably wasn’t going to get any better, as least my hopes aren’t going to be dashed.

I paid the money. I had invested $4.75 in seeing this movie, by golly I was going to get everything the movie had to offer me. Unfortunately, it was only a nickels worth of entertainment in the end.

It’s possible that the movie could have redeemed itself by the end. You always have to posess hope; it might have gotten better by the end, it was mathematically possible.

Early in the movie I started thinking about what the movie meant in terms of exploring the notion of “human awkwardness”. While the plot, the script, the acting were all sub-par, there were some interesting ideas contained in the movie. Unfortunately, it was only 15 minutes or so of good ideas.

Staying until the end is a funny notion. I have often described to people the difference between the feeling of investing in a stock long or for the long term and buying or selling options. When you go long on a stock, you can always fool yourself that it will come back someday. You can convince yourself that short of bankruptcy and delisting, someday you be back “in the money” again.

This isn’t the case when buying and selling options. Once you hit the date where the option contract expires, there is no fooling yourself. Either you made money, or you lost money. When you are “in the money” on an options position, I find myself very conservative about additional risk. It’s more like a case of “I made my money, now let’s get out while the getting is good.”

Shorting stocks feels similar too, because you have to imagine paying out money if the stock price is going up and you have buy the stock back when you are out of the money. In shorting, you actually have to actively managed being wrong. If you don’t , with nearly infinite downside, you could theoretically bankrupt yourself. You’re not going to do that, but you can think about it that way. (I’ve heard shorting described as unleashing “infinite risk” upon oneself. I have never yet seen a stock proceed to infinity. Until the day arrives when a stock reaches an infinite price, I suggest that the risk is high, and you have to have the time to pay attention to your short positions.)

Isn’t a significant part of life all about hope? Someday we all hope that life will get better. Almost all of us stay to the end, hoping it will get better. I for one plan on staying in my seat until the last credit rolls and the staff starts to clean out the theater.

I’ve always wanted to understand why windows chooses either to copy or to move a file when the icon of the file is dragged around. Finally someone in a position to know explains how it works.

Who do I make so many errors in my grammar and speling when I type up a blog entry?

Is it because I am a looser?

At work, I’ve been forced to switch from UNIX mail to Exchange. They didn’t force me to switch mail clients, but to be a good corporate citizen I made the switch to Outlook. This allowed me to engage in shared calendaring with my far flung co-workers.

It didn’t take long for me to notice that if you accept a meeting as “Tentative” people act a little funny. People call and ask why am I “tentative”, and ask if a different time slot would be better. One time someone even called me to figure out why someone else had accepted a meeting tentatively.

So what’s wrong with tentative? I work in a knowledge based profession, where the difference between super productive and not productive is greater than 10x. As I’ve mentioned before, context switches aren’t free for programmers. If I’m in the groove, I’m better off finishing the bits I am working on than going to most meetings. People should guard their time jealously if we are to get our mountain of tasks accomplished. ( See also Tyranny of Email )

The reason people don’t like the response “Tentative” is they are afraid they aren’t really so important. You might just drop their meeting for a more interesting or more important meeting. It’s like being penciled in to someone’s appointment book. They aren’t really serious enough to use a pen, because well something better might come up. I admit I wouldn’t like it if everyone responded as “tentative” when I send a meeting notice. When I host a meeting I do try and make sure I don’t invite people who don’t need to attend and I try and ensure my meetings contain both content and a little humor. I usually I don’t get any tentative responses.

So I have decided, unless I am an “optional attendee” for a meeting, I’ll just say yes or no to the meeting request. However, if I’m “Optional” you are very likely to get a “Tentative” in response unless there are cookies being served. If you’ve marked me as “Optional” it probably means you won’t take it personally if I’m “Tentative.”

So what does this tedious discussion of Exchange and Outlook have to do with life, the universe, and everything?

In mulling over the human dynamics of my computer mediated exchanges, I realized that to my close friends and family I don’t want to use pencil when I mark you in my book and I don’t want you to mark me in with pencil. I want you to know whatever is important to you is being written down in indelible ink. If I have to change something for some reason later, I’ll make a mess of my metaphorical appointment book trying to scratch out our previous appointment. The mess in my book will remind me of how important you are.

Do the same for me will you?

I work with a group of very sharp software engineers. They are all well educated with years of college and a fair number with post-graduate degrees. They are well acquainted with math and can think about a math problems in ways that most people can’t. My co-workers see the humor in things like an error code like “OxDECAFBAD”. While there are a fair number among them who are on the shy or somewhat inarticulate side; all of them, if pressed could explain a fair amount about the topic of probability. Additionally they could explain in great detail how buying a lottery tickets is more like burning one dollar bills at your local quicky mart for fun than it is a sound investment.

Yet these same people still buy lottery tickets. My co-workers are not innumerate or mathematically inept.

OK, so I confess I buy the occasional ticket too.

So why do we buy the occasional ticket?

I don’t think it’s because of the slick marketing campaigns. I don’t think they are interested in the fractional amount of money that reaches the state treasury.

I think it’s all about being happy. Happy, you say, how could one be happy about throwing money away?

It’s all about the moment. There is a moment everyone has when purchasing a lottery ticket. You allow yourself the luxury of imaging life without an financial barriers. Maybe you fantasize about lying on a beach being served cool drinks maybe you imagine quitting your job, maybe you imagine writing the novel you’ve always wanted to write.

Whatever or whomever you dream about, for one instant you can imagine attaining it.

It’s a glimpse of the best possible thing or at least what you imagine it to be.

The next morning you check your paper, you lose again, and you go on with your day. Perhaps it’s a day of “quiet desperation” or perhaps you are utterly fulfilled in your life, confidently riding astride of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Who knows which category you fall into? I for one vacillate from day to day. But for one instant your level of fulfillment didn’t really matter, you weren’t there, for an instance you touched the transcendent place where nothing mattered but the one thing, that was most important to you, and that one thing was finally within reach.

So is that moment worth a buck?

Some days being able to dream the impossible dream, and allowing yourself that one small luxury is worth a buck.

In fact this last phrase is probably the core of most deity bound religions. Dreaming about an entity that could set things right, it’s worth a small bit of money and observance just in the case it could all be true.

I like to watch an afternoon matinee while the kids are sleeping on Saturday or Sunday afternoon. Sometimes this leads me to choose movies based on show time rather than artistic considerations.

Today the movie was “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason“. Nothing I had read made me think I would like this movie. But given my limited choices it didn’t seem like it could be that awful.

The move was indeed awful. Here is a list of some of the more annoying things about the movie.

• The main character talking and looking at the audience.
• Cutesy graphics during the movie.
• A plot that with absolutely no surprise.
• Hugh Grant, need I say more.
• Women in the audience gasping when Hugh Grant kissed Renée Zellweger.
• A sound track which was so sappy I was in utter disbelief.
• An annoying heroine.
• Unbelievable supporting characters.

So was there anything I liked? Well I like British accents. That was nice. I don’t know if they were real, but at least it didn’t sound like I was in Minnesota.

I think the movie could be re-cut into a 10-15 minute short, which would be an essay on awkwardness. That’s part of the human condition. We all have had a moment, where we feel as awkward as Bridget, I suppose. That would leave and awful lot of the movie on the cutting room floor.

I’m going to have to watch at least two proper submarine movies to cleanse myself from this awful movie.

A Collection of Internet related quotations.

I was looking for the authorship of the following quote.

Super cool election map. I love really good visualizations.

[Courtesy of Ole]

A few days ago, Monica in her eloquent fashion made me aware of the case of one Theo Van Gogh (yes, he is the great grand-son of the famous one). Here are some accounts of his murder: 1, 2, 3.

Today, Primate Brow Flash pointed me the video, entitled Submission that Theo had made. I had to see it, as it appears that he died for making this film. The film was beautiful and heart rending, especially in the context of his murder.

Theo by all accounts I have read wasn’t all that kind in his words to Jews or Christians either. People had complained about him and what he said. This is no excuse.

I don’t care if you like him or his movie, but killing a person simply for their free expression of speech is reprehensible. If you can’t persuade someone with your own words, maybe you have lousy ideas.

I want no rest for any person that pursues their religion with this kind of fervor. I want them to be brought to justice. This goes for Islamic fundamentalists as well as any other religion like that would use violence to enforce their edicts. The same goes for the folks burning down islamic schools in Amsterdam.

Every statement is a kind of question, and every question is a kind of statement.