2k butterfly!
While bored of watching thesis typeset (aside: it now takes 3x5min passes to typeset… and almost as long when there’s an error :S), I went out for a mid-day swim. It turned into a 2k butterfly… about an hour (so a turtl’ish 3:00 pace). SCM pool made a big difference – I don’t think I can do it in a LCM pool. There were about 3 or 4 times when I was ready to throw in the towel, with the rhythm breaking down and arms not clearing the surface on the...
Read MoreMnemonic for Pi
Employer Joe always gave nice boys a choice: movies, five huge tough men, map of Arabian bakery, memo fax machine, thugs-packed Hawaiian office, or light pool bag. Yup. That, and the Shapely key, is all you need to know to learn pi to 42 decimal...
Read MoreScience, Lemons, and Press Releases
I don’t normally write about what I read on social networks, but this time I feel obliged. The same discovery titled “Functioning Synapse Created Using Carbon Nanotubes: Devices Might Be Used in Brain Prostheses or Synthetic Brains” has been showing up at multiple places, and the claims are substantial: Engineering researchers the University of Southern California have made a significant breakthrough in the use of nanotechnologies for the construction of a synthetic brain....
Read MoreMnemonics decoder
Converted the decoder from python into javascript – technically Coffeescript, which is dynamically compiled into JS in your browser (magic!) It’s very straight-forward once everything is properly setup – Jessica Allen has a cute guide on it. This is going to be useful moving forward converting the buncha python things to the browser. Can’t figure out how to integrate this into a WordPress page – another battle for another day. In the meantime,...
Read MoreHow NOT to swim distance butterfly?
Since promising Cindy to teach her how to swim a long and efficient butterfly, I’ve been watching swimmers of various fluency at my pool (not very hard – swimming fly attracts butterfly like daffodils :) ) as well as videos of exceptional swimmers like Misty Hyman and Mike Phelps online. I’ve since learnt that it’s a very hard stroke to diagnose sans footage… hats off to swimming coaches! Here’s two of the most common mistakes I’ve seen, and two...
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Jon is a chemist who also makes illustrations, plays the flute, swims, and has one too many curiosities. He was born and raised in Hong Kong before studying in Italy and Canada. Jon now teaches at the United World College in Hong Kong. 