Author: Emre Girici

Collatz Conjecture

Collatz Conjucture is a cool and unsolved conjucture/problem named after the German mathematician, Lothar Collatz. It simply asks you pick up any integer n (n>=0). If it’s an even number, halve it, if it’s odd, multiply by 3 and add 1. Apply the same procedure to the resulting number. Conjecture claims that all numbers converge to 1 during this process.

For example, if you start with 7, you get the result of 7, 22, 11, 34, 17, 52, 26, 13, 40, 20, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1, 4, 2, 1, …. All results end up with the 4, 2, 1 loop. All the integers between 1 and 20·2^58 has been tested (with a very simple code piece) so far, and they all end up with the same result. Crazy mathematicians all around the world are still struggling to find a number violating this rule, and come to a theory or pattern, I guess.

Valentino Balboni

Balboni was the legendary test driver of the Italian car manufacturer Automobili Lamborghini SpA. He served for the Bolognese supercar company for 40 years and retired in 2009 due to Italian government work regulations.

He’s one of the living legends of Lamborghini: since 1973, he has tested all Lamborghini prototypes, and sampled most of the road cars produced, before they are delivered to the customers. Balboni has reportedly driven 80% of all Lamborghini cars ever built .

To pay tribute him, Lamborghini has given his name to the latest version of the Gallardo line-up: LP550-2 Valentino Balboni.

Now I think to myself, I will possibly never ever be able to drive a Lambo, just like 99.999999999% of the whole world population. And this man had been able drive 80% of all the cars ever built, over the last 40 years. That is a priceless privilege. But how might it feel? He should have gotten numb about other cars in the world. Maybe he’s never got jealous about his neighbor’s new Mercedes. He’s never had an interest at the car advertisements on newspapers, never got excited about what’s shown on that week’s Top Gear or Fifth Gear show… Anyway, it should be a great thing have your name labeled on a super car.

Hoover Dam Bypass

Hoover Dam, lying on the border between Nevada and Arizona, was the biggest hydro-electric power plant and the largest concrete structure of the world, when it was built on 1936. It was surpassed later on by several dams across the world.

Hoover Dam Bypass Project is simply a bridge on the Colorado River, which will span the Black Canyon and connect two sides of the dam. When completed in late 2010, it will be the largest concrete-arch bridge in the western hemisphere. Bridge will be 580 meters long, and 275 meters above the river.

The bridge will include a pedestrian walkway (hence, here comes a new bungee jumping spot).

Euro 2012

Euro 2012 qualifying draw is made a few hours ago, and we picked an interesting combination in Group A.

İşte 2012'deki rakiplerimiz

All 3 Turkic teams are in the same group, facing 3 Western European teams. Looks like a clash between the East and the West.

The obvious thing is, the big audience advantage that we have. Probably we’ll have the majority in Germany, Austria and Belgium aways. That means we’re playing all 10 games at home.

An important point to note: Armenia and Azerbaijan first fell in the same group. Due to the political conflict and respective UEFA procedures, the group was rearranged. That’s why we got Kazakhstan in our group, otherwise Armenia would be our opponent.

London Calling

When you visit London, it’s a tradition to mention “London Calling” or “London Baby!” via at least one social media (FB, twitter, blog, etc.). I always choose the good old The Clash masterpiece.

This city is behaving so friendly to me, or I’m very lucky. On both times I’ve been here, the weather was astonishingly nice, in spite of the terrible cold in Amsterdam.

Does it mean anything? Is it a divine intervention that asks me consider moving to this city? I don’t know, probably not.

Moleskine

I used to have a nice kind of handwriting when I was in high school. You know, practice makes better: I was supposed to write in order to study, at school, at home, anywhere. I had a passion to buy a better notebook, better pen, better eraser in order to enjoy writing.

Since I started to spend most of my life in front of a computer (which means, late high school – early university times), I lost the need, passion and talent to write. I couldn’t remember the last time I spent money for stationery. Till last week.

A tiny Moleskine lying on my desk

I bought one of those Moleskine notebooks. I know, it’s the latest “fashion”, might be (for some people) overrated and overpriced. But still, if it would help me to regain the passion and fun to write, it’s worth spending that money.

Nevertheless, here’s a funny critic about Moleskine and its fans: http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2009/02/24/122-moleskine-notebooks/

Hello world!

I guess this is my 3rd personal blog so far.

I’ve started blogging in 2005, when I was working as an intern in Germany. That was my first abroad experience, and I had a thrill to share my experiences with my family and friends back in Turkey. That was one of that good old MSN Spaces, one of the oldest blogging environments that I could remember. Then I gave a loong break, and started blogging on my blogspot account, in 2006.

Now I’ll make a new shot with WordPress, which stands out as being the most professional beside its predecessors.

I even paid for a domain this time (I should confess that I’m not that creative about domain name, don’t take it as narcissism :).

I decided to keep blogging in English from now on, and I’ll stick to this idea as much as I can. It’ll be a bit unusual to me, but I want this blog be readable by everyone.

Okay, let’s get started.

Ismail Don Vito

Birkac haftadir bu iki kadirsinas kisiligin sima benzerligini dusunerek gulme krizine tutuluyorum.

Bu arada, Ismail Turut’un yillar evvel Carkifelek’e katildigi bolumde, bolumu kazandiktan sonra hediye secmek icin hediye odasinda gittiginde, hediye olarak verilen yatagin ustune atlayip yataktan sekerek asagi dustugu bolumun Youtube videosunu filan goren bulan var midir acaba?