The Best From Playboy - Number Five

The Best From Playboy - Number Five
Various contributors, 1957-58, 1961-67 & 1969
Playboy Publishing (HMH Publishing Co.), US, 1971

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The Beauty and Lore of Coins, Currency and Medals

The Beauty and Lore of Coins, Currency and Medals
Elvira and Vladimir Clain-Stefanelli, 1974
photography by Lee Boltin
Riverwood Publishers Ltd., US, 1974

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It’s faint, but it is still positive. Looks like I’m...

It’s faint, but it is still positive. Looks like I’m doing the WFH thing for a couple more days. I am feeling better, but not 100% yet.

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My one-eyed editing assistant. #wfh #lifewithcats

My one-eyed editing assistant. #wfh #lifewithcats

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This is never not adorable: you only need to shade one side to...

This is never not adorable: you only need to shade one side to nap when you only have one eyeball.

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My tweets

• Wed, 19:41: Fractal Programming in Turbo Pascal Roger T. Stevens, 1990 M & T Publishing, US, 1990 5¼" disk intact https://t.co/n6PzrFl1r5 https://t.co/bG1ptcO6WR
• Wed, 19:41: Fractal Vision: Put Fractals to Work for You Dick Oliver, 1992 Sams Publishing, US, 1992 3½" disk and 3-D viewer intact https://t.co/DQkS5ByU9D https://t.co/lOEuN8ZgUQ
• Wed, 19:41: Dynamical systems and fractals Karl-Heinz Becker and Michael Dörfler, 1986 Translation by Ian Stewart Cambridge University Press, UK, 3rd English printing 1990 https://t.co/FvZYKJzJzz https://t.co/JDMMku7XIO
• Wed, 20:41: The Science of Fractal Images Michael F. Barnsley, Robert L. Devaney, Benoit B. Mandelbrot, Heinz-Otto Peitgen, Deitmar Saupe, and Richard F. Voss, with contributions by Yuval Fisher and Michael McGuire, 1988 Springer-Verlag, US, 1988 ex libris signature… https://t.co/jNLLNSi34N https://t.co/peQc3ezniZ
• Wed, 20:41: PHPEclipse: A User Guide Shu-Wai Chow, 2006 Packt Publishing Ltd., UK, January 2006 printed in US https://t.co/Yx1HJvL7UL https://t.co/irIABRoWgF
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The Joy of Sex: A Gourmet Guide to Love Making

The Joy of Sex: A Gourmet Guide to Love Making
editor: Alex Comfort, 1972
illustrators: Charles Raymond and Christopher Foss
A Fireside Book (Simon and Shuster), US, 10th reprint 1974

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More Joy of Sex: A Lovemaking Companion to The Joy of...

More Joy of Sex: A Lovemaking Companion to The Joy of Sex
editor: Alex Comfort, 1972
illustrators: Charles Raymond and Christopher Foss
A Fireside Book (Simon and Shuster), US, reprint 1974

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The Case for Mars

The Case for Mars
Robert Zubrin with Richard Wagner, 1996
Foreword by Arthur C. Clarke
Tochstone (Simon and Shuster), US, first paperback edition 1997

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Greece and Rome: Builders of Our World

Greece and Rome: Builders of Our World
Nation Geographic Society, 1968
Library discard. Spine broken, pages missing before index, loose pages throughout. Ex libris stamp inside front dust jacket: “Library Alexander Elementary School”

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Long Ago in the Old World

Long Ago in the Old World
Vincent H. Cassidy and John Van Duyn Southworth, 1969
Charles Merrit Canada, CA, 1969
School discard. Ex libris stamp on first leaf and edges: “Alexander School”
Marks and doodles throughout

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The Pageant of the Past

The Pageant of the Past
Dawn Cline Trueman and John H. Trueman, 1965
Ryerson Press, CA, 1965
School discard. Ex libris stamp on first leaf and edges: “Alexander School”
Marks and doodles throughout

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The Development of Western Civilization

The Development of Western Civilization
Part I: G. K. Tull, 1970
Part II: Nigel Heard, 1970
Copp Clark Publishing, CA, 1970
School discard. Ex libris stamp on first leaf and edges: “Alexander School”
Marks and doodles throughout

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Random things I found wedged in books today:

Random things I found wedged in books today:
Left: A couple more index cards in my first wife’s handwriting
Right: A dot-matrix print-out of an e-mail of a math assignment from January 21, 1994 from a math class I took in my “semester of random shit.” Because of some bureaucratic bullshit I had the course requirements for my Visual Arts B.A., but not enough credit-hours. So I had to take a semester of whatever basket-weaving I felt like to get enough credit-hours to graduate.

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I inherited this this old thing (over 50 years old, probably...

I inherited this this old thing (over 50 years old, probably close to 60) along with many other old tools from my dad when he died in 1993. And for the entirety of those 29 years it was broken. It had become covered in greasy gunk from languishing in the bottom various tool boxes in that time. I never threw it out because it was dad’s and when I was four years old I had a particular fascination with using it to put staples in bits of scrap vinyl — something to play with to keep me out of the way and out of trouble as I hung around in my dad’s upholstery shop. Last week, while I was sick, I passed some time cleaning it and repairing it. I ordered a box of the unusual staples it uses that arrived today, and now my old “toy” is working again.

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Using Advanced Algebra

Using Advanced Algebra
Kenneth J. Travers, Leroy C. Dalton, Vincent F. Brunner, and Alan R. Taylor, 1977
Doubleday Canada Ltd., CA, 1977 re-issue
“school discard” (in quotes because fact is I just never returned it.) Stamp on first leaf “Cowichan Senior Secondary School / 2652 James St. / Duncan, B.C. V9L 2X2” and handwritten “Michael Barrick / Div 21”. Marks noting assignments, working, and comments throughout in several different pens and pencils in various people’s handwriting from multiple years of use.

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Algebra and Trigonometry

Algebra and Trigonometry
David Cohen, 1986
West Publishing Company, US, second edition 1989

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The Math Workshop: Elementary Functions

The Math Workshop: Elementary Functions
Deborah Hughes-Hallett, 1980
W. W. Norton and Company, US, 1980
sellers stamp and marks on first leaf: “Quad Books - SFU”

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Calculus

Calculus
James Stewart, 1987
Brooks/Cole Publishing, US, second edition 1991
ex libris name on second leaf: “Michael René Barrick 739-2175” with cutout on first leaf to show name

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Introduction to the Practice of Statistics

Introduction to the Practice of Statistics
David S. Moore and George P. McCabe, 1993
W. H. Freeman and Company, US, second edition 1993
Scratched out ex libris name inside front cover. Marks, mostly highlighting, throughout.

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Applied Mechanics

Applied Mechanics
R. C. Stephens and J. J. Ward, 1957
Cleaver-Hume Press Ltd., UK, 3rd printing with revisions 1960
ex libris name inside front cover: “Colin Winter ONC Mech / 211NO15”

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Fractal Programming in Turbo Pascal

Fractal Programming in Turbo Pascal
Roger T. Stevens, 1990
M & T Publishing, US, 1990
5¼" disk intact

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Fractal Vision: Put Fractals to Work for You

Fractal Vision: Put Fractals to Work for You
Dick Oliver, 1992
Sams Publishing, US, 1992
3½" disk and 3-D viewer intact

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Dynamical systems and fractals

Dynamical systems and fractals
Karl-Heinz Becker and Michael Dörfler, 1986
Translation by Ian Stewart
Cambridge University Press, UK, 3rd English printing 1990

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The Science of Fractal Images

The Science of Fractal Images
Michael F. Barnsley, Robert L. Devaney, Benoit B. Mandelbrot, Heinz-Otto Peitgen, Deitmar Saupe, and Richard F. Voss, with contributions by Yuval Fisher and Michael McGuire, 1988
Springer-Verlag, US, 1988
ex libris signature with note on first leaf: “Michael René Barrick / (25th birthday present from Dad. 1992)”

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Baba Yaga's Worm Soup

It crossed my mind this morning that a strong contributing factor in the distrust of modern medicine stems from the longstanding lack of family doctors. Doctors at clinics don't have the time to get to know their patients and it makes nuanced diagnosis next to impossible. Diagnosing problems in complex dynamical systems is difficult. Problems almost never exist in isolation and the deep understanding of what interactions may be at play can only be developed over time. But for the most part doctors are only given the time for "What's the problem?", "OK. You have disease X, cure Y usually works for that." But working with an incomplete picture it's really easy to be wrong. The patient goes back, often to a different doctor, "Cure Y didn't work", "OK, then. Let's try cure Z" and maybe it is rinse and repeat. Going to a doctor at a walk-in clinic is not very different than being walked through some script of common problems and solutions from a tech support call-centre. And just like tier-1 tech support, you end up with an impression that they don't have a clue what's wrong and aren't listening. If it isn't a cookie-cutter problem tier-1 support is just an annoying series of hoops to get through to get to tier-2, usually the point where people say something along the lines of, "Oh, thank God. Finally someone that's listening and knows what they are doing." That's the family doctor. And with medicine, that's where you should be starting. Getting referred by a walk-in clinic doctor to a specialist is often useless because the clinic doctor may well have focused in on the wrong problem or the wrong part of a larger problem and you're then faced with the hyper-focus of someone with a "when all you have is a hammer, every problem is a nail" approach. You have to start with a good generalist that has the time to have listened, has asked the right questions, and has gotten a good grip on the whole problem. So now that you have been through the tier-1 walk-in clinic doctor and jumped right to a tier-3 specialist who is barking up the wrong tree, it's natural to come to the conclusion that all doctors are idiots. And in some backward country without universal healthcare that conclusion is exacerbated by the idea that these "idiot" doctors are just charging you for nothing and in it to keep you sick and milk you for cash. And when someone has come to that conclusion and has no knowledge of how statistical analysis works, how large-scale studies are done, how drugs are developed, etc. it's not hard to see how the extrapolation happens that all of modern medicine is just a scam and that one is better off with horse pills, reality show hosts, and your babushka-wearing Baba Yaga great aunt's worm-soup recipe.
Source: https://www.mbarrick.com/blog/220721/baba-yagas-worm-soup

PHPEclipse: A User Guide

PHPEclipse: A User Guide
Shu-Wai Chow, 2006
Packt Publishing Ltd., UK, January 2006
printed in US

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