(no subject)
i also made a pledge to my favorite radio station ever, allclassical 89.9, something i meant to do last year...
anyway, i call and make the pledge, give the lady on the phone my info, etc. Her final question was, "do you have any comments about the station?" So I said, "Uhh... well, I really enjoy it when Edmund Stone does the morning show." She started laughing and said, "Oh, you're not alone on that one. He is charming, isn't he." we both laughed (hence the laughing), and then conversed for a bit longer about how wonderful edmund stone is. seriously, he is.
and! i read a paper (in the sunshine on the front lawn... oh the lawn will be soggy again soon, so i have to -- not soak it up? -- while i can) about the inverse kinematics solution of this particular 5 degree of freedom robot arm. the solution sure didn't use groebner bases -- at least not as far as i can tell. some of the references in the paper look interesting... hoorah! i still don't know why a 5 degree of freedom robot arm is so useful. maybe because it's on a mobile platform... but that doesn't give it a genuine extra degree of freedom... does it? hmm.