How to keep a Programmer busy ...for about 2 minutes...

I can ALMOST see it...

Today's Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal comic (SMBC-Comics.com) depicts a bunch of nerds (what is a group of us called, exactly?) trying to employ the "pinhole trick" of reducing the direction of incoming light to remove the need for focusing to look at their own noses, which, typically, are too close to be successfully focused by the eye.

Actually, this works... or would work, if it weren't for the thickness of the fingers. In the various contortions that are depicted in the comic strip, the fingers block the view of the nose. That is why they keep trying different contortions.

However, I found that if you use two hands, you can actually do it. Take the pointer finger of the opposite hand and, with it pointing downward, tucked tight to the bridge of your nose, use its fingernail against the thumb and pointer from the hand on the same side as the eye being used to look at your nose.

Squeeze your fingertips together to allow just a small point of light to pass through, and use your other fingers to shield light from outside of this hole. Now adjust the pinhole so that you're looking at the end of your nose. If you are doing it right, you'll be able to see the end of your nose, in focus. (In my case, I can see several short, very light-colored hairs... What do you see?)

Oh, it also helps if you can get some extra light on your nose. I suggest close proximity to a lamp or other light.

XKCD to the tune of Modern Major General?

Today's XKCD ( http://xkcd.com/731/ ) had the following alt text: 

"Telescopes and bathyscapes and

sonar probes of Scottish lakes,

Tacoma Narrows bridge collapse

explained with abstract phase-space maps,

some x-ray slides, a music score,

Minard's Napoleonic war:

the most exciting new frontier is charting what's already here."

...Which seems a bit lyrical... 

Seems to me like it's intended to be sung to the tune of Gilbert and Sullivan, "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General" (from Pirates of Pinzance). I must admit, however, that at first I was thinking "A few of my favorite things". Modern Major General fits better, tho.