Yesterday I saw someone wearing this shirt:

Rules of T-Shirts:
1. References to popular TV shows are uncool. The more people like it, the lamer it is.
2. TV shows referenced should be cool shows. The Simpsons, Arrested Development, etc. CSI does not fit this category. Ironic references are fine, Airhawk, Dallas, Happy Days, etc. It won’t be long until CSI is in this category. You are not being prescient to get the shirt now, you are being weak.
3. New meanings for standard acronyms are not funny. They are lame.
4. Comments about other people’s intelligence are risky. No one can stand idiots. You are not special in this regard. However, just because you associate with idiots does not mean you are not one. In fact, it increases the odds that you are also an idiot. You would be better off advertising how much you enjoy hanging out with smart people.
5. Paying $27 for an uncool t-shirt is the final evidence proving that you are the idiot.

I can’t believe we’re going to Game 7. Unlike Games 3 and 4, where the Hawks played out of their head, the Celtics lost this one by choking in the clutch.

In a 5-minute stretch in the fourth quarter everything went wrong. They suddenly turned into a bunch of cowards. There was no offensive movement so the point guard would hold the ball waiting for something to happen. It wouldn’t. They’d dump the ball into Garnett. Garnett would make some nifty looking moves. But you could see he didn’t want to actually attack the basket or shoot, he always kicked it out. The Hawks got two steals by anticipating that pass and stealing it. Rondo slashes into the lane, jumps far above anyone else and looks to pass it instead of laying it in. Another steal. This went on for five minutes until they somehow found their cojones.

A minor helping of scorn for the refs. The double-technical on Cassell and Johnson should have only been on Johnson. Two of Pierce’s six fouls were completely wrong. In a tight game, these can make the difference.

Special scorn for Kevin Garnett. Holy cow, just take the ball in. Yes, there are some good blockers but not good enough to stop you. Get the fouls on them. Or wait to pass until they do commit themselves. You are a better player than they are, you’re the goto franchise player. You need to score, or at least sell the scoring act.

May 3rd is free comic book day. Find a store near you and support the lowbrow arts!

Suppose you had a piece of cake to divide up between two people. Each boy wants to get the biggest piece of course. Is there a fair way to make sure each gets half? Most of you probably know the classic answer. One boy cuts, the other chooses. That way the first boy is motivated to make a perfect cut. There are versions out there for multiple boys.

Have you ever tried this in real life? It quickly becomes clear that it is not particularly fair. Get a piece of cake and try to split it in half. It’s hard to do. It’s even harder if you are five years old without a lot of fine motor control. One piece will be significantly bigger than the other. The task of choosing which piece is bigger is much easier than making two equal halves. The second boy has a huge advantage. The unfairness moves to the level of choosing which boy gets assigned which role. Intelligent children will thus try to be the chooser rather than the divider. How do you decide who gets to be the chooser?

You could flip a coin. Flipping a coin is fair. But if you’re going to do that, why not have either of them slice the cake. Rather than flipping to decide roles, the winner of the coin flip gets to directly choose which slice they want. That’s a fair method, why complicate things with roles?

Applied math is hard.