An exciting new project caught my eye recently. The description from the site reads:

Wolfram|Alpha’s long-term goal is to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone. We aim to collect and curate all objective data; implement every known model, method, and algorithm; and make it possible to compute whatever can be computed about anything. Our goal is to build on the achievements of science and other systematizations of knowledge to provide…

I am shocked that I haven’t been able to find a few minutes to add a few thoughts to the site. The past couple months have been somewhat demanding. These challenges are nothing compared to what I am capable of handling but they certainly consume the most precious gift I am given – my time. Creating something new with a virtual team in five time zones is not easy but is nothing compared to the lifelong efforts of individuals who create the truly remarkable…

Our kindergarten teacher once told my mother that she thought I was a “մտավոր հետամնաց (mentally lagging)”. Couple weeks later we were given small paragraphs to learn for a performance. I brought home the handwritten piece of paper so my mother could teach me what I had to say. She instead corrected seven or eight grammatical and spelling errors with red ink and asked me to take it back to the teacher…

Last Saturday night we were at an interesting and special concert. Despite all of the efforts of the organizers to advertise to the local Armenian communities, only about sixty to seventy people came and most of them seemed non-Armenian. I was very disappointed in the Armenian turnout but was very happy that my beautiful wife did not let me miss it. Ara Sarkissian had done a fantastic job organizing the folk-jazz ensemble…

In many cases, I find it very helpful to start fresh from a clean slate. My mother’s strict rules of neatness and cleanliness, or my father’s requirements for order in everything, or some genetic switch someplace on either or both sides of the family tree have resulted in what my wife calls a clear case of OCD. As expected, I am convinced that this need for order is not a disorder (she thought “auditory” as she finished reading that)…