April 9, 2021

2021.04.09
my mom noticed something interesting. She was born in 1947, I was born in 1974. I am now 47... and she is 74. All those 4s and 7s... I was trying to figure out if that's a wacky and well spotted coincidence, or what.

I figure the first interesting bit is her (2 digit) birthyear and mine being swaps - '47 and '74. For such swaps, there will always be a year where the parent and child's age is also a swap... and that year will be a multiple of 11, like 1900 + (11 * 11) = 2021. I'm trying to figure out if we get any more interesting because 7 + 4 = 11.


How comes it that a cripple does not offend us, but that a fool does? Because a cripple recognises that we walk straight, whereas a fool declares that it is we who are silly; if it were not so, we should feel pity and not anger.
Pascal

Sigh. I was trying to lean into the "forced minimalism" by mindfully enjoying having books, decorations, deskstuff packed, and things just bare. It's... not that great. Typing at a desk on a laptop sans big ol' monitor isn't so much fun.

All hail Katalin Kariko! She had to fight to get the system to put any support behind her ideas about how mRNA could teach the immune system to make its own medicine.