BilikFamily.com

Satire - This faux news item at BBSpot made me laugh:

Test Shows 99.99% of High School Seniors Can't Read Perl
Recent results from the standardized Perl Fluency Test showed that 99.99% of US high school seniors can't read Perl.  This disturbing statistic shows that American students are painfully unprepared for life after graduation.

"This shows that there is a real need for a Perl Monk in every classroom," said Perl Monk Kelly Adrity.  "We've got computers in every classroom, now we need our kids to be able to use them, and what better way to learn about computers than to learn how to read and write in Perl.  I'm glad the budget proposed by President Bush sets aside millions for Perl Monks.  America will lead the way in Perl literacy."

Gasp! The horror! How could we have so failed our children? Perhaps we can expand "no child left behind" to include proper perl instruction. Otherwise how will they compete in the future "global economy". (pulls tongue out of cheek...)

Perl fluency? Perl literacy?! I would venture to say 99% of high school seniors don't know what perl is (not that they should), let alone be able to read it. Some perl code (especially by perl uber-hackers) looks so much like random gibberish that it looks about the same when you encrypt it. <smirk> The satire article gives one such example. Luckily it is possible to write fairly clear perl code if you write with maintainability in mind. The situation is getting better than when I first started learning perl ~13 years ago.

OK, so it was a very geeky thing to write about. I just laughed because of my perl dabbling background. Humor me.

Snow - We had a snowy weekend. We went to the YMCA Saturday morning. After Michelle and I did a step class, I took the girls swimming and out for a bite of lunch. On the way home we dropped Abby off at a classroom friend's house. It snowed all afternoon and into the evening, keeping us trapped inside. By Sunday the snow stopped and temperatures warmed. We cleared off the snow, Claire had a friend over, and there was plenty of sledding to be had. I wrapped up the weekend by taking the girls out for dinner at Amigos Mexican Cantina, a relatively new Mexican restaurant here in Milford.

Milford - Just in case I need the data later, here is a profile of Milford statistics. Wow! For a town with ~14,000 people, 4000 are under 20! No wonder property taxes tend to be high! The school district is the second largest employer in the town! Milford must be full of those darn natalists!