Author: Ben Clapton

I'm a violinist, teacher, composer and arranger from Ellenbrook, Western Australia. I love my family, coffee, AFL and running.

The Friendship Algorithm

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life
Friendship algorithm
Sheldon's Friendship Algorithm (Image by MnGyver via Flickr)

This topic suggestion, How many friends can a person have?, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

One of my favourite shows is The Big Bang Theory. In one episode, The Friendship Algorithm, Sheldon creates an algorithm that can help him create a new friend. You can watch the algorithm on YouTube (embedding disabled).

As part of this process, Sheldon befriends Barry Kripke and as such has to decide which of his friends he has to cut – Raj being the (un)lucky recipient. His reasoning (from memory, couldn’t find this part on YouTube) is that he can only maintain a particular number of friendships, and with the new friendship of Kripke, one friend must go. (This is obviously not an issue later when Sheldon befriends Amy Farrah Fowler).

While Sheldon’s process may be at the same time complicated and simplistic, it does has a basis in fact. There is a certain number of relationships that a person can sustain, and you’ve got different levels of relationships that will be maintained.

It’s kind of like the Google+ circles. You’ve got your close friends, the ones you share everything with. Then there are friends, and then acquaintances. You will obviously spend more time with your close friends than your friends, and more time with your friends than your acquaintances. All the same, you need to be able to spend some time with acquaintances to ensure that the relationship is there should you need to contact them for anything.

How many that number is I think depends on who you are. For Sheldon, it was 4(/5). According to Dunbar’s number, it’s 100 to 250. I haven’t really thought to count mine, but I’d guess I’m somewhere in the middle, probably leaning to the higher side.

Postaday2011 links

As we forgive those who sin against us

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith

This topic suggestion, Why is it so hard to forgive?, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

Father, forgive us, as we forgive those who have sinned against us.

Forgiveness is not always easy. At times, it feels more painful than the wound we suffered, to forgive the one that inflicted it. And yet, there is no peace without forgiveness. It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend, But I forgive you (Image from Flickr by bija1agape. Quote from Naj on Flickr)

A line that so many Christians will know so well, coming from the Lord’s Prayer. As with many aspects of Christianity, it can often be much harder to live this out than it is to say. As such, we often hold onto sin long after it has occurred.

For example, I held onto a sin against me for many years. After being bullied in year 11 and 12, I refused to go near the school for a couple of years. While the school itself had done nothing wrong – in fact it did everything it could to help me through the period – I held onto that sin, I held it against the school. Continue reading “As we forgive those who sin against us” →

My favourite road trip

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life
Middleton Beach at sunset
Middleton Beach at Sunset (Image via Wikipedia)

This prompt, Describe the longest road trip you’ve taken, is provided by Plinky. I’ve also been inspired by The Daily Post prompt, Planes, trains or automobiles? What is your favorite way to travel 500 miles?

My favourite road trip is to the Southern City of Albany. Albany is a wonderful town that my family have gone to a number of times. We love it down there for a number of reasons.

Firstly, my parents – my Dad particularly – are attracted because it was where Dad lived for a few years. His dad was the minister at the Albany Church of Christ, and he completed his High School there. So he knows the place really well, and there is part of that memory that draws them back.

Secondly, there are wineries around, and my parents love their wine. In earlier years, when I was still an alcohol drinker, we would take a day to go and visit all the different wineries that we liked. We especially liked wineries where we got to meet the wine maker, and form a relationship with them. For a while, my parents had a rule that they would only drink wine from wineries where they knew who made the wine. It’s not a bad rule, I think.

Albany is also a great place for relaxing. We enjoy finding a house that looks out over Princess Harbour, or even better Middleton Beach, as we’ll just sit where there’s a nice view, and read, sew, write, or whatever. It’s a wonderful place to do that, and even better when there’s a view.

Then there’s our usual haunts. We’ll go shopping up and down Duke St. We’ll visit St John’s Anglican where we’re tourist members (got a name badge and everything), and the Middleton Beach Cafe (which was disappointing the last time I was there, but I’ll throw that down to being a bad day). We’ll go visit the Valley of the Giants and walk around Denmark. If we’re feeling adventurous we might even walk from the bottom of Duke Street around the board walk to Middleton Beach. And we’ll probably visit the Whaling Station (for coffee only, don’t look around anymore) and definitely visit the Wind Farm.

So that’s my favourite road trip – the five-hour car ride to Albany. What’s your favourite road trip, and why?

Money Issues

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written:

“They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor;
their righteousness endures forever.”

Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!

2 Corinthians 9:6-15 Continue reading “Money Issues” →

The Wonders of Gas

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

This topic suggestion, Weekly Photo Challenge: Hot, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

I’ve just moved house, and I’m completely in love with it. We had in our last house an electric stove top and electric oven. We had both come from houses with Gas stove tops and ovens, so it took us a while to get used to how long electric took to heat up.

In our new place, we’ve got a gas stove top (but still an electric oven) which makes cooking so much easier.

Having gas means we’ve also got a funky Gas Heater. This is so much better and easier than our old wood fired heater, which while it was romantic took quite a while to heat up the room. Now that we’ve got this Gas Heater, we can quickly heat the room and feel the effects almost immediately. It’s brilliant.

Not a very in-depth post, but I am rather excited about this (perhaps too excited about this)

Postaday2011 links

Can a camera capture a moment in time?

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith
This camera shot captures a beautiful moment in time, the spray most likely never being exactly like that ever again.

This topic suggestion, Can a camera truly capture a moment in time?, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

Despite being a fantastic question, with many philosophical possibilities and questions, I had to write on this topic, because it was suggested by Leonard Nimoy, who for those who don’t know is most famous for his work in my favourite show – Star Trek – as Mr Spock, who tweeted:

http://twitter.com/#!/LeonardNimoy/status/1150300359

Now, I think this is more kind of getting into the realm of philosophy and I’m not really a philosopher, but I’ll give it a try.

The pure joy in this persons face as their birthday cake is brought out is captured here in this moment of time

I think that a camera can capture a moment in time, even though it cannot capture itself. Why? Because a moment in time I think doesn’t have to be a 360° 4-dimensional representation. A camera has the ability to capture incredible moments in time that sometimes can truly reflect a beautiful moment in time.

Postaday2011 links

When being busy breeds lazyness

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

This topic suggestion, Are you too lazy, or too busy?, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

I like to be busy. I like to fill my day up with lots of stuff. I like to have a number of projects on the go – which is why I probably like working three different jobs as opposed to only one. If I’m only working on one thing, I get itchy, and need to find something new to work on as well.

However, being busy has its drawbacks. I often find that I can fill my day with so much that I don’t have any time to do the things I enjoy. Or don’t have any time to just relax. Or even to do the things that make a home run. When I’m too busy, the unimportant things tend to fall off my radar, and I just forget to do them. This often results in a kitchen full of dirty dishes, and I’m eating my breakfast out of a salad bowl with a serving spoon. I kid – I generally will wash a dish and spoon when it gets to that stage.

Finding the balance of being busy enough to keep me working at my best, but still finding time to do the things that I enjoy, or the little things that need to get done is often a very fine line.

Learn to Overshoot, then bring it back

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Feature, Life

I played a round of Golf a little while ago with a couple of mates. We’re all not very good, but we’re trying. Sometimes very trying. As we were going, I observed some of my friends shots. The issue I saw was that they were afraid of going too far, or thought that their shots would go longer than they actually do. What happened as a result was that they would constantly have very weak shots that didn’t go very far. Continue reading “Learn to Overshoot, then bring it back” →

Random Acts of Kindness

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life
The cover of Daena's 365 days of kindness… journal.

Today I’m putting the focus on my friend’s blog, 365 Days of Kindness. Daena is an incredible young lady, and one of my close friends. Last year, she started Project 25, encouraging people to do random acts of kindness.

This year, she decided to expand, and challenge herself to do a random good deed every day for a year. She’s writing them down in a journal, and slowly uploading them to her blog. She’s a bit behind (having only recently uploaded the ones for January), however it is a fantastic project, and a wonderful challenge.

We find this mentioned in the gospels of Jesus.

“Teacher, which command in God’s Law is the most important?” Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. But there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from them.”

Matthew 22:36-40 (MSG)

The second commandment that Jesus lists here – love others as you love yourself – is just what Daena is practicing here, Loving others, whoever they may be, as she loves herself. Wouldn’t the world be an amazing place if we all followed Daena’s lead and looked for ways to show love to others?

You shut your goddamn carbon-taxin’ mouth (via Heathen Scripture (temp))

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

Great post(/rant) about the stupidity of the protests about the carbon tax over $10/week – $520 a year – for someone who earns $110,000/year. 0.42727% of their annual income. $10 out of their $2000 weekly pay check. I don’t earn $2000 in a month, but if needed, I’d find the $10/week to pay this tax.

There is some swear words in here, so if you don’t appreciate them, you might not appreciate this post. But if you can get past that, it is very much well worth the read.

(This is a temp site due to too many people trying to read my old one. The classic http://www.HeathenScripture.com will be back up soon.) _______________________________________________ Three days on from Julia Gillard’s policy announcement, and the most striking characteristic of the carbon tax debate is just how closely it resembles a dozen retards trying to fuck a doorknob. The only apparent solution is a massive airdrop of Xanax into our reservoirs, … Read More

via Heathen Scripture (temp)