VALENTINE DAY CELEBRATION: FRSC CAUTIONS MOTORISTS AGAINST EXCESSIVE SPEED, DRUNK DRIVING AND RECKLESSNESS ON THE ROAD.

NARHARI AND BHAGWAN PANDURANG/VITTHAL

Once a goldsmith by the name of Narhari lived in Pandharpur. He excelled in his craft. He had vowed not to look at Pandurang or visit his mandir ever, as he was a Shiva Bhakt.
One day, a wealthy merchant visited him.

He wanted a gold girdle studded with precious gems, to be made for Prabhu Vitthal. Narhari refused to make it as it was for Vitthal.
After many requests, he agreed to make the girdle but asked the merchant to bring the measurement from the mandir as he himself would not go there

The measurement was given n he made the girdle. When the girdle was put on Vitthal, it was loose. Narhari had to shorten it. Now the girdle became tight. So Narhari was forced to take measurement on his own. He had to go to the mandir but went blindfolded to avoid seeing Vitthal

In the Mandir, when blindfolded Narhari touched Vitthal, he felt as if he was touching Shiva with matted hair, the moon, snake in His neck and Trishul in His hand. Ecstatic with joy, he removed the blindfold to see Shiva but he found the murti of Vitthal with Rukmini there.

He realised the truth that there was no difference between Vitthal and Shiva. Narhari at once fell at the feet of Panduranga. He then took the measurement of the waist of Vitthal and this time the ornament fit the Murti perfectly.

Narayan Hari🙏🏻

So there's a class of puzzles called "river crossing puzzles" which involve having to cross a river on a boat/bridge containing some set of individuals/items with restrictions on which ones can be on the boat/left on each shore, right?

and the most common subclass of these problems is the one where you have 3 items/animals to cross with.
This is alternatively called the "fox, goose, and bag of beans" or "wolf, goat, and cabbage" puzzle.

the idea is that your boat can only carry one item at a time, but if you leave the wolf/fox unattended with the goat/goose, the wolf/fox will eat the goat/goose.
and similarly, the goose/goat will eat the beans/cabbage if left alone

so you have to set up a set of actions that never leaves either side of the river in one of the lose-states.

the solution to this variant being:
1. take the goat/goose over
2. return empty
3. take the wolf/fox over
4. return with the goat/goose
5. take the cabbage/beans over
6. return empty
7. take the goat/goose over

So I was talking to @gewt about Job: A Comedy of Justice and I came up with a theory that I think explains why Heinlein's late-period work is so kinda-terrible and why I still enjoy it so much

So Heinlein had always been very interesting in the short parts of his novels, like the little snippets inside chapters. He had a very fun writing style, and wrote some fun dialogue with fun characters, right?>
It probably comes from how much of his early stuff was short fiction

And I think what happened with a lot of his longer works is that he'd just start writing fun bits and hope it would end up going somewhere or having a bigger plot by the end. like eventually he'd figure out where this was going, then go back and rewrite it into a cohesive whole

and I'm sure he had editors that'd help this process. No editor would let you publish something as rambly and changing-gears-every-other-chapter as The Number Of The Beast, for example... unless you were God-King Of Science Fiction 1980s Robert Heinlein.

so basically I think what happened is that by the 80s (when he was in his seventies!!) he lost the drive to go back and rewrite and he was too Untouchable for editors to make him.

1 There's a chasm between an NLP technology that works well in the research lab and something that works for applications that real people use. This was eye-opening when I started my career, and every time I talk to an NLP engineer at @textio, it continues to strike me even now.

2 Research conditions are theoretical and/or idealized. A huge problem for so-called NLP or AI startups with highly credentialed academic founders is that they bring limited knowledge of what it takes to build real products outside the lab.

3 A product is ultimately a thing that people pay for - not just cool technology or user experience. But I’m not even talking about knowledge gaps in go-to-market work. I'm talking purely technical gaps: how you go from science project to performant + delightful user experience.

4 Most commoditized NLP packages solve well-understood problems in standard ways that sacrifice either precision or performance. In a research lab, this is not usually a hard trade-off; in general, no one is using what you make, so performance is less important than precision.

5 In software, when you’re making something for real people to use, these tradeoffs are a big deal. Especially if you’re asking those people to pay for what you’ve made (can’t get away from that pesky GTM thinking). They expect quality, which includes precision AND performance.