Wait, what is this madness? Me offering a strange new programming course? Yes. https://dabeaz.com/sicpminus.html
A new format and some new challenges. Bwahahahahaha!
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David Beazley
@dabeaz@mastodon.social
mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06Educator and musician living in Evanston, Illinois. I wrote some Python books, but you'll probably find me yapping on about bikes, trombones, dogs, and other random stuff here. Currently pursuing a MAT in Secondary Education with the hope of becoming a high school math teacher.
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Joined April 14, 2022
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Sure, you don't have to use cocaine, but all of your students are using cocaine. They'd probably be more engaged if you were a bit more culturally sensitive and also used cocaine.
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I saw Mary again today. As already noted, the homeless woman in the car has a name. Well, she also has a story which I got by asking "so what's your story?"
She then started with "I came her as a 7 month old baby with my mom escaping civil war in Sierra Leone" and it went from there for about the next half hour along with pictures and everything. Punctuated by a hug.
This was probably the most interesting conversation I've ever had in my whole life.
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I don't know how else to express it. If someone were to say something like "maybe you should try using memoization", that's something I could look up and I'd maybe I'd learn an interesting new programming concept. If someone says "maybe you try should try using Cocaine 5.3", I don't even...
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Wife: "You know, he's under no obligation to give her a can opener."
Me: "No, but he could be less of a prick."
Wife: "But he's out there with his little kids."
Me: "She didn't ask to eat a kid."
Kid: "You know, Dad has a good point there."
Me: "If cans had existed at the time of the old testament, I bet some kid would be doing their Bar Mitvah speech about loaning strangers a can opener."
Wife: "Ok, you can stop now."
Me: "Jesus would have lent an opener. And Gandhi."
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Mary rang the doorbell about 10:00pm last night wondering if we had a blanket she could borrow. I gave her a sleeping bag from a long past camping trip to keep and she seemed ecstatic before taking off again. Not entirely sure of her current status except that the car is still impounded and she said she "had a place" for now.
It wouldn't surprise me if AI companies were buying and destroying books without scanning them at all.
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In closing this whole affair, I think my main thought is that everyone deserves some empathy and dignity--including Mary, the woman who actually has a name, who's sleeping in her car on the block while trying to work some things out.
Maybe I could have done more. I don't know. What I do know is by the end, other people were calling her Mary (because I told them) and trying to help her out in small, but meaningful ways.
Too many people would turn a blind eye. I'm just not doing that.
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I should attach a can opener to a rope and affix it to the city light pole out in front of that guys house.
Saw a couple of construction workers decked out in their work gear (orange vest, work boots, hard hat) carrying their tools all while riding an e-scooter and smoking a cigarette. It was definitely a look.
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It's amazing how telling people about this last thing involving the blanket brings out a strong response in people.
Them: "How rude. What gall!"
Me: "Seems kind of vulnerable and brave."
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An update: Mary returned, distraught about her car being towed. Was sitting on the porch with a neighbor as my kid walked by with the dog (she called out and said "hi"). She had apparently spent the night somewhere near downtown Chicago.
This neighbor managed to make a connection with a local homeless aid group that sent someone over to chat and they found shelter for her over weekend at least.
So, the story continues....
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Anyways, I get a text from another neighbor this morning saying that he saw my oldest kid out front trying help the woman jump-start her car for about 20 minutes (not successful sadly).
The kid said she came up to house, rang doorbell, and he went out there to help her.
Pretty proud of that kid. Of course, we'd had a lot of discussion about the other neighbor refusing to loan her a can opener.
Still not sure how it ends. The car still needs to move to avoid a city tow.
Maybe it's different now, but I was literally taught nothing about teaching prior to or during the time I was a university professor. I kind of wonder if all those chickens are now going to come home to roost with AI.
I've been thinking about this a lot as I'm back in school working on a Masters in Teaching right now.
Note: this comment is more about the difficulty of the task and not David specifically (but his comment is an example of the conundrum).
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I saw Mary when I was out walking the dog just now. We had a great conversation about the car situation and how the neighbors have been so helpful. I told her about my trip to see my ailing mom in the hospital/rehab (the reason for my road trip).
My kid had mentioned something about school so I asked about that. She's going to one of the Chicago city colleges, hoping to transfer to a 4-year school. I said I was back in school myself.
This all ended with a fist-bump. Mary is cool.
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Me: "I talked to the woman in the car this morning as she was about to leave on her bike. She thought Mabel was cute."
Kid: "Well who wouldn't?"
Me: "I made a comment about avoiding rain and she said she was just heading to CTA and had an umbrella. She then checked her phone before taking off."
Kid: "Probably working in city."
Other kid: "Doesn't seem like a fent-fueled child eater."
Me: "I've now actually talked more with this woman than that can-opener denying neighbor."
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@mhoye@cosocial.ca I often wonder how often these people step back from their work, look at it, and legitimately say "I'm proud of that."
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She's not wrong about Mabel. Pretty damn cute after coming back from the groomer yesterday...
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I'm sad to say the car saga has apparently come to an end with the city towing Mary's car away while she and another neighbor looked on. That neighbor had been trying help her start her car again to no avail. He gave her some information on a local group that provides homeless assistance. I've been out of town.
I'm not really sure what's next for her and have no idea if I'll see her again or not.
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@GeePawHill@mastodon.social @robpike@hachyderm.io I share similar feelings. I don't feel like retiring, but I don't want anything to do with any of this. Maybe I did something that mattered to someone at one time, but who knows now?
Wonder how much sleep the kid managed to get after my recommendation of listening to a Mars Volta album.
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I don't really know if highway 20 counts as a "back road", but it's definitely a lot more chill than I-80. Overnighting in Fort Dodge--mainly so I can wake up and say "gotta get the hell out of Dodge."
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Meanwhile, my thoughts wander to pondering if this guy's large shaggy ball will leave a more enduring human legacy than all of software.
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@glyph I've seen enough movies to know that the whole thing will come crashing down due to a very tiny inconsequential unnoticed design flaw. You know, like an expired SSL certificate.
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"But helicopters are useful."
"Yes, I get it. Please go away."
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An update on the homeless woman in the car situation. I talked with the woman about street cleaning before I left town on Sunday ($75 ticket) and she chuckled and said "this car isn't going anywhere... broken." Ok.
The can opener refusing neighbor apparently called in an abandoned vehicle to the city so it got slapped with a warning ticket yesterday. Move it or get towed soon.
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I wonder if there's ever been an Autocorrectionville?
The year is 2026. I just finished observing a day in the life of 35 high school math classes taught by 34 different math teachers across 7 different high schools. Ask me anything.
I get that the water required to produce a hamburger is probably more than an AI query, but this neglects to account for the fact that the cow still wrote better code.
Not sure if it was by design, but almost every math teacher I observed today also coached sports. So, it was sort of like "BUELLER, WHAT'S THE VERTEX?!?!?!" for the whole period.
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@randomgeek@masto.hackers.town @GeePawHill@mastodon.social @robpike@hachyderm.io Definitely agree on the last 10-15 years. Honestly, I probably fell out of most of it about 10 years ago, but managed to carve out a little niche for myself doing some advanced CS topics for awhile. That's pretty much run it's course at this point though.
I loved the struggle of solving problems and challenging myself. Just not getting it with the current stuff. I dunno--maybe there's something there, but I don't care.
Based on the kid's report of puking, I'd say it was a resoundingly successful class field trip to "physics day" at Six Flags.
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@nedbat@hachyderm.io Oh! I didn't even notice that on my phone. Maybe it needs a bigger font?
Getting ready for a final day of HS observation. This has really been a very interesting thing to see.
A busy week of HS observation ahead. Today, it's a journey to a Chicago Public School.
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@ancoghlan@mastodon.social Perhaps it's "effective" in the sense that it's amplifying what developers were already doing.
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Found myself quietly sitting in the back, low-key observing an AP CompSci-A class today. A short summary of the 55 minutes...
"Work on the projects."
"I'm confused."
"You've got this!"
"This is coded in the dumbest way possible."
"I'm still confused."
"You're doing great!
"Why isn't anyone working?"
(some quiet looking over code. Concern builds....)
"Stop everything! I gave you all the wrong project."
Dismissal bell rings.
The vibes were off...
Rhinoceros!
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@prietschka @inthehands I've never had more fun than I did when I coded up a big thing using nothing but ed(1) over the holidays. A lot of typing, but also a lot of focused thinking.
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@maaikees I often now wonder if I ever did anything that actually mattered in tech at all.