I don't know if it's because I'm getting older and my brain is fossilizing or if it's because there is just too much unresolved nonsense rattling around in it or if it's because I've finally reached that age where the things I always really wanted to do -- e.g. travel, write, take single-malt tours of Scotland -- increasingly seem more Important and Significant than the day to day of this career begun nearly thirty years ago that's fine as jobs go but was really only meant to pay some bills, but the end result is a signal inability (if not unwillingness) to focus on the work that needs doing and instead obsess on how cool it would be if they added cable and tower tours to the Golden Gate Bridge.
Another result may be the demise of this particular blog but not yet, not until I try comment verification to fight off the rising incidence of unsolicited ad-related comment spam, a strategem that unfortunately makes a weird sort of economic sense on an internet increasingly crawled by spider-like robots weaving their sticky ad-like webs to trap errant ad-clicks and thus generate income, penny by penny, for the nameless robotmasters who lurk in windowless spam-dens when they're not lurching through harsh Floridian rays to the strip clubs that form their only connection to living, breathing human beings, never caring that this connection consists of a velvet hand reaching under their overstuffed Hawaii shirts and lifting wads of cash as the price of a smile and an aromatic whiff of fake feminine hair and other fake feminine accoutrements; these overfed grease-faced greed-heads who have perverted the web's possibilities of communication into a mine of pointless penny-snatching click counts.
Apologies for the inconvenience but the readership has declined tremendously anyway (another sign of an impending need for decision as the decline is attributable, beyond Facebook, to a signal lack of compelling material and/or consistency) and so I will consider comment verification an experiment, see if it kills the Anonymouses and their useless links which annoy me even if no readers have noticed, see what other effects there are, and enter this winter season resolved to make changes of several different types in the life that pulses quite outside the bounds of this peripheral vanity and which indeed account for the distraction and ill focus alluded to at top.
Showing posts with label wha-a-atever. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wha-a-atever. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Saturday, November 21, 2009
What Am I Doing Today
I know you want to know. Forthwith: Randomity.
The weather is fantastic: Clear and bright and somewhere around 70F. Yesterday it rained. The outdoor life is good.
I'm listening to a Pandora mix whose last several songs were by Kevin Yost, Animals on Wheels, Infected Mushroom, Karsh Kale, cEvin Key, Shpongle, Lali Puna, Sasha, Enigma ... You ask? Electronica with an Indian flavor. I'm diggin' it.
The Big Game is happening sometime today. I won't bother. Not a regular football fan, and I didn't go to Cal, and I don't really care that much beyond GO BEARS!
I'm reading The Great Game by Peter Hopkirk. It is a fantastic book. A history of the struggle between the Russian and British Empires for domination of Central Asia and, ultimately, India. Hopkirk writes with such flair I find it a series of adventure stories I cannot put down. It's extremely topical, of course, Afghanistan being as central to the aims of the great powers now as it was then.
I'm often convinced that people who wish for an end to war are idealists who've never understood history, nor just what hangs in the balance in every conflict. Other times, I hope for the day health and security are spread more or less equally and war will not have to result from everyone protecting their own. This has to happen organically. Give it another millenium.
I'd as soon us out of Afghanistan anyway. Instead we should assist Pakistan in serving its own people, whether it really wants to or not. Undercut the appeal of the Taliban and fellow travelers, reduce the risk of those nukes going rogue, and leave the Afghans to their own devices. Fighting terrorism is just a pretext. Even with that, we don't need more troops. If we were to work effectively with the tribal leaders (which some Americans have done quite well) and make service in the Afghan army more attractive, the place would settle down well enough. Eventually.
I'm easily captivated. At any given time there are sure to be several mild infatuations in my universe. A girl smiled at me yesterday at work, a real smile, teeth and all, completely unbidden except that we've both been around for a few years and nodded in passing. She's young and tall and dark and luminous and my romantic side wonders if she's a Pashtun, distantly related to Roxana of Bactria.
Modern Balkh is one of those ancient hidden cities I'd love to visit, but it's in northern Afghanistan and that might have an impact on my life insurance rate.
I'm hesitating over placing my first Craigslist ad. My wife's father's father worked at the shipyards at Hunter's Point during the war, and was a woodworker all his life (as well as a musician), and we still have his old power tools taking up space in our garage. I need to sell them -- table saw, planer, sander, scroll saw. They are bolted to tables he built, as are the large electric motors that run the belts. We're talking old school tools here: Exposed belts and wheels turning fast. One false move and you lose a finger, or an errant small child a hand. Surely someone will want to drive out here and give me fifty bucks for the lot.
If not, what to do? We have too much stuff. Somehow the objects left by previous generations keep washing up here. None of it is particularly valuable nor especially worthless. But having it around has helped me to see how material possessions weigh down the spirit.
The weather is fantastic: Clear and bright and somewhere around 70F. Yesterday it rained. The outdoor life is good.
I'm listening to a Pandora mix whose last several songs were by Kevin Yost, Animals on Wheels, Infected Mushroom, Karsh Kale, cEvin Key, Shpongle, Lali Puna, Sasha, Enigma ... You ask? Electronica with an Indian flavor. I'm diggin' it.
The Big Game is happening sometime today. I won't bother. Not a regular football fan, and I didn't go to Cal, and I don't really care that much beyond GO BEARS!
I'm reading The Great Game by Peter Hopkirk. It is a fantastic book. A history of the struggle between the Russian and British Empires for domination of Central Asia and, ultimately, India. Hopkirk writes with such flair I find it a series of adventure stories I cannot put down. It's extremely topical, of course, Afghanistan being as central to the aims of the great powers now as it was then.
I'm often convinced that people who wish for an end to war are idealists who've never understood history, nor just what hangs in the balance in every conflict. Other times, I hope for the day health and security are spread more or less equally and war will not have to result from everyone protecting their own. This has to happen organically. Give it another millenium.
I'd as soon us out of Afghanistan anyway. Instead we should assist Pakistan in serving its own people, whether it really wants to or not. Undercut the appeal of the Taliban and fellow travelers, reduce the risk of those nukes going rogue, and leave the Afghans to their own devices. Fighting terrorism is just a pretext. Even with that, we don't need more troops. If we were to work effectively with the tribal leaders (which some Americans have done quite well) and make service in the Afghan army more attractive, the place would settle down well enough. Eventually.
I'm easily captivated. At any given time there are sure to be several mild infatuations in my universe. A girl smiled at me yesterday at work, a real smile, teeth and all, completely unbidden except that we've both been around for a few years and nodded in passing. She's young and tall and dark and luminous and my romantic side wonders if she's a Pashtun, distantly related to Roxana of Bactria.
Modern Balkh is one of those ancient hidden cities I'd love to visit, but it's in northern Afghanistan and that might have an impact on my life insurance rate.
I'm hesitating over placing my first Craigslist ad. My wife's father's father worked at the shipyards at Hunter's Point during the war, and was a woodworker all his life (as well as a musician), and we still have his old power tools taking up space in our garage. I need to sell them -- table saw, planer, sander, scroll saw. They are bolted to tables he built, as are the large electric motors that run the belts. We're talking old school tools here: Exposed belts and wheels turning fast. One false move and you lose a finger, or an errant small child a hand. Surely someone will want to drive out here and give me fifty bucks for the lot.
If not, what to do? We have too much stuff. Somehow the objects left by previous generations keep washing up here. None of it is particularly valuable nor especially worthless. But having it around has helped me to see how material possessions weigh down the spirit.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Writing about Whining and Whining about Writing
Part I
Where have all the writers gone? Gone to Facebook, every one. I think they've given up on the social aspect, the groupthink. Remember the camaraderie we used to share? The wit? Gone. A writer hooking up into Facebook and all its games and article-sharing is like a mathematician on a daily dose of sloe gin. Was blogging not as bad? Was it a shot of caffeine, or just thin hot chocolate? It did provide a challenge. The challenge was to produce some quality every few days. Few ever met it. Most everyone seems to have given up.
A few still write. Away from the crowd, as perhaps it should be done. NaNo should be that way. I will go to coffee shop meetups because I need social interaction, to feel a part of things. But writing is essentially solitary.
I'm guessing the bloggers decided either they would ride the Facebook to nowhere or would just get their writing done and quit talking about it. I hope so. Writing is all I want to do when it comes to brain-work.
I want NaNoWriMo to start and the rest of the world to end.
Part II
Writing is all I want to do when it comes to brain-work. I falter at my job (or so it feels sometimes) because it requires studying technical stuff and collaboration with other people on technical stuff. But when I light the fires under my brain it doesn't lean that way. No, it wanders off in search of dreams to mold, and characters to build, and vibrant language. It's a daily chore to switch the train over onto the right track and chug it up to speed. Today, that didn't happen. All my train did was crawl out of the shed, take a slow turn around the yard, and idle at the back edge, leaking steam.
And it's no secret and I don't care who knows it. My old brain is just plain tired of trying to fit. That engine wants to get lifted out of the old iron frame that hauls freight around on rails and settle into something light and buoyant and start tracing words and music into the ripples of a trackless sea.
This is a bad attitude. I want my boys to get through college without any financial hitches and so crank away, crank away, crank away is what I need to do just like everyone else. Just like everyone else. It's funny: Part of me is still the youngest child who thinks he is special and unique and can get away with relative poverty because no one needs to depend on him. The major portion is of course a man engaged with the world in some productive way who knows we are all in the same boat together and thus holds the deliberately unproductive (this includes lazy and/or under-talented writers) in low esteem. This tension won't go away.
And yet, still I want NaNoWriMo to start and the rest of the world to end. Except for music. Music can stay. And food. Music and food and warm autumn sunsets. The rest of it, begone. Begone, I say! People with nice smiles can stay. Nice people, food, music, sunsets, and the sound of rain or of a distant train passing. All that can stay. But the rest of it: End! Begone. We gots writing to do, doesn't we?
Where have all the writers gone? Gone to Facebook, every one. I think they've given up on the social aspect, the groupthink. Remember the camaraderie we used to share? The wit? Gone. A writer hooking up into Facebook and all its games and article-sharing is like a mathematician on a daily dose of sloe gin. Was blogging not as bad? Was it a shot of caffeine, or just thin hot chocolate? It did provide a challenge. The challenge was to produce some quality every few days. Few ever met it. Most everyone seems to have given up.
A few still write. Away from the crowd, as perhaps it should be done. NaNo should be that way. I will go to coffee shop meetups because I need social interaction, to feel a part of things. But writing is essentially solitary.
I'm guessing the bloggers decided either they would ride the Facebook to nowhere or would just get their writing done and quit talking about it. I hope so. Writing is all I want to do when it comes to brain-work.
I want NaNoWriMo to start and the rest of the world to end.
Part II
Writing is all I want to do when it comes to brain-work. I falter at my job (or so it feels sometimes) because it requires studying technical stuff and collaboration with other people on technical stuff. But when I light the fires under my brain it doesn't lean that way. No, it wanders off in search of dreams to mold, and characters to build, and vibrant language. It's a daily chore to switch the train over onto the right track and chug it up to speed. Today, that didn't happen. All my train did was crawl out of the shed, take a slow turn around the yard, and idle at the back edge, leaking steam.
And it's no secret and I don't care who knows it. My old brain is just plain tired of trying to fit. That engine wants to get lifted out of the old iron frame that hauls freight around on rails and settle into something light and buoyant and start tracing words and music into the ripples of a trackless sea.
This is a bad attitude. I want my boys to get through college without any financial hitches and so crank away, crank away, crank away is what I need to do just like everyone else. Just like everyone else. It's funny: Part of me is still the youngest child who thinks he is special and unique and can get away with relative poverty because no one needs to depend on him. The major portion is of course a man engaged with the world in some productive way who knows we are all in the same boat together and thus holds the deliberately unproductive (this includes lazy and/or under-talented writers) in low esteem. This tension won't go away.
And yet, still I want NaNoWriMo to start and the rest of the world to end. Except for music. Music can stay. And food. Music and food and warm autumn sunsets. The rest of it, begone. Begone, I say! People with nice smiles can stay. Nice people, food, music, sunsets, and the sound of rain or of a distant train passing. All that can stay. But the rest of it: End! Begone. We gots writing to do, doesn't we?
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Healthy Trend
I also call it the Facebook Effect.Social networking is all the rage now. Bloggers are getting their faux friendship fix on Facebook, and the blogs are drying up. Twitter is the big thing -- next year I'm hoping it will be last year's big thing -- such that idiot twittering congressmen made the news at the Inauguration, every celebrity has a flunky managing his tweet equity, and even news radio takes it as having a given value. Capital Public Radio (local NPR affiliate) ran a piece this morning about the attorney general or state comptroller or some such official, and closed their report by saying, "And, he tweets!"
Fuck.
(By tweet equity I mean something akin to brand equity. I take that as being self-explanatory.)
Fuck, again. Tell you what: I'm going to knock down all the cell phone towers and crash all the Wi-Fi networks just to watch you people squirm. Fair enough?
I guess the final straw for me is when bloggers blog about twittering. I mean, I understand using a fake interaction medium such as this to write about real stuff (family, writing, photography, life), or about unreal stuff (politics), or about virtual stuff (other blogs). But when we blog about tweeting or tweet about blogging the overload of fakeness, the confluence and merging of twin rivers of nothingness, it just kills me. Reminds me of that Dilbert cartoon when he was reading -- reading the manual for his new computer golf game -- reading a description of a pretend version of an activity that is almost a sport. I dunno. It's like drinking non-alcohol lite beer to me, only much worse.
So. I tried Twitter for a couple weeks and then killed my account. I do Facebook because it's easy and there are non-bloggers there and, like I said, it's the current place for our faux friendship fix. I blog less but not just because of Facebook, I really am online less, or I'm a lot less interactive anyway. I'm actually online a lot thanks to this crazy job.
Segue!
Crazy online job right now! I am out on the porch swing, in darkness save for the glow of the LCD screen. A headset blares into my right ear, attached to my cell phone, through which I reached a local number that patches me into a meeting taking place in several geographies. Microsoft® Office Live Meeting fills my screen with presentations and notes, and minutes being typed by a team lead in Bangalore, talking to folks in Shanghai and in California, on subject matters far beyond my ken. I'm here to absorb it, a bench player, except I don't get the game. They're talking software stuff. I grok software to an extent -- I got my fucking Master's in it -- but really I hate the shit and besides, this isn't about development or anything cool and creative. It's all about some very involved and extraordinarily boring coordination of drivers, fixes, patches, and the schedules for validation and release of same.
I'd almost rather live in poverty. The Padre seems happy enough.
(You know who I mean, or you don't.)
This whole online almost-friends thing started for me in Usenet. No, it started in dialing up local BBSs. No, online debates started there. Then moved to Usenet where I got to know real people, many of whom are truly the cat's pajamas. Friends, okay, but we never met. And then I found the interaction took way too much time and energy. Quit Usenet completely. Should say I've been backing out ever since but no, blogs had (still have) potential for some great creative expression and interaction. Some blogs express genius at that. Wanted for awhile to pull something genius off too, but the focus / energy aren't there. So, you get this. And posts and traffic are backing off. Like I said, a healthy trend.
There's a cat rubbing against my legs.
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Light
lying in bed, and I want to get up
but the view is so god damn nice
window, oak trees, fresh green leaves, morning sunshine
a squirrel rattles the inner branches
a tiny bird shakes a leaf
well fine but there's shit to do
breakfast
my annual clearing the driveway cracks of weeds
(I enjoy that)
my son's swim meet
(I enjoy that too)
(probably his last ever)
work on my costume so to speak
shovel chicken-shit-rich dirt from where the chicken coop used to be into the veg garden
wife's out of shower
tells me we have to go
(sigh)
but the view is so god damn nice
window, oak trees, fresh green leaves, morning sunshine
a squirrel rattles the inner branches
a tiny bird shakes a leaf
well fine but there's shit to do
breakfast
my annual clearing the driveway cracks of weeds
(I enjoy that)
my son's swim meet
(I enjoy that too)
(probably his last ever)
work on my costume so to speak
shovel chicken-shit-rich dirt from where the chicken coop used to be into the veg garden
wife's out of shower
tells me we have to go
(sigh)
Friday, April 17, 2009
Boom! Two Degrees!
John Madden is retiring. This is big news! Even bigger is that my father-in-law knew him in high school: grew up near the Cow Palace and was two years behind Madden at Jefferson Hi in Daly City. Their paths diverged.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Clockwatching
Why am I still at work? Because things need doing before the weekend starts.
A neat-o app called Zonetick keeps me apprised what time it is where all my coworker buddies are. It is telling me to go home.
If I could make time, I could write stuff all week long. Maybe it wouldn't be interesting. But who cares? Maybe it would.
No more to say. This was just sort of an AADD moment. I have a lot of those.
A neat-o app called Zonetick keeps me apprised what time it is where all my coworker buddies are. It is telling me to go home.If I could make time, I could write stuff all week long. Maybe it wouldn't be interesting. But who cares? Maybe it would.
No more to say. This was just sort of an AADD moment. I have a lot of those.
Friday, March 06, 2009
Wingnut
I just realized that since
- There's no problem with gay marriage
- CCW (Concealed-Carry Weapons) permits should be issued to anyone who applies and meets the requirements
- Marijuana needs decriminalizing
- As does independent prostitution (i.e. non-pimp non-brothel)
- Illegal immigrants should be deported
- Illegal immigrants' medical bills should be reimbursed by their home countries
- Public school funding should be tripled
- Public school employees should be hired/fired/compensated on professional criteria rather than as though represented by some labor union
- Private school vouchers should be encouraged, based on models where they help the poor
- Rent control should be eliminated
- Capital gains taxes should be eliminated for anyone worth less than say $5M
- Any community can and should define areas where nudity is legal
Monday, February 23, 2009
That Was Close
Facebook has sucked a lot of the energy out of the blogs lately, and since it evens and leavens and homogenizes everyone it isn't nearly as interesting. In a weak desperate moment I started browsing misc.writing, where verbose idiocy reigns supreme and begs, begs for one to put foolish people into their places. But I already know what good that'll do so I backed out again. Geez. Looking for online interaction -- that's mighty pathetic. The obvious answer is to get off of this crap completely.
Well, except for posting pictures now and then, and random things that Must Be Said. It's the looking for interaction online that is simply nowheresville. Yup. That was close.
Well, except for posting pictures now and then, and random things that Must Be Said. It's the looking for interaction online that is simply nowheresville. Yup. That was close.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Monday, December 29, 2008
Solid Rubber for Outdoor Erection Work
So I'm shopping for solid insert tubes for my yard cart. Replacement non-pneumatic inner tubes that don't require air. Well, the tires are always going flat. I don't know, I use my yard cart in the yard and maybe it wasn't designed for that.
Took a lot of searching but I found me some. At a place called CupidsRabbit dot com.
Rabbit vibrators, condoms, constriction loops, erection aids, romance games, toys. Do I want to know why this place also sells solid non-pneumatic 26 x 2.125 inner tubes?
Actually, yes, but no, I'll go ahead and get my inner tubes from the medical supply place. Evidently, if I want inner tubes that can withstand a weed-filled yard, I need to get them from wheelchair supply. I guess if I want air-filled tires so my wheelchair rides nice and smooth, I have to go to garden cart supply for that.
What the hell is a rabbit vibrator?
Took a lot of searching but I found me some. At a place called CupidsRabbit dot com.
Rabbit vibrators, condoms, constriction loops, erection aids, romance games, toys. Do I want to know why this place also sells solid non-pneumatic 26 x 2.125 inner tubes?
Actually, yes, but no, I'll go ahead and get my inner tubes from the medical supply place. Evidently, if I want inner tubes that can withstand a weed-filled yard, I need to get them from wheelchair supply. I guess if I want air-filled tires so my wheelchair rides nice and smooth, I have to go to garden cart supply for that.
What the hell is a rabbit vibrator?
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Stuff to Post While I Gear Up To Write Some More
High keening and whining sounds from outside. I open the window. It's from down in the creek bed, along with yip yip yips and a rough dysphonius barking. The gang is passing through. I wonder what ever became of our beautiful cat Jet, Lucky's mother, who walked away one year. Used to see her hiding in the weeds now and then.
* * *
I was sitting comfortably in the men's room today when someone dashed into the next stall and made unhappy sounds while dumping about three buckets' worth of leftovers into the toilet. And then did it again. Didn't bother me at all. I am so glad I raised children.
* * *
One of my writing locations.
The table is my fave. It was my grandfather's typewriter table. He kept it out in his office when he was foreman on a farm during the Depression. Before the crash he was a newspaperman -- maybe that's where he got it, I don't know.
Zooming in on the nifty sticker a NaNoWriMo Municipal Liaison gave me ...
* * *
I was sitting comfortably in the men's room today when someone dashed into the next stall and made unhappy sounds while dumping about three buckets' worth of leftovers into the toilet. And then did it again. Didn't bother me at all. I am so glad I raised children.
* * *
One of my writing locations.
The table is my fave. It was my grandfather's typewriter table. He kept it out in his office when he was foreman on a farm during the Depression. Before the crash he was a newspaperman -- maybe that's where he got it, I don't know.
Zooming in on the nifty sticker a NaNoWriMo Municipal Liaison gave me ...
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
South Park Hip
Got it somewhere. I dunno. Oh, here: www.sp-studio.de/
I tried to make it look like me. I'm unimaginative like that. (I don't know where those earring-looking things came from. I do not have earrings.)
NaNo looms. People in the forums are all excited. I'm not. Attitude. Well, I haven't posted in over a week. Go figure.
Everywhere I go, "Yes on 8" posters, signs, bumper stickers. Depressing.
People say this election is defining somehow, extremely important. Know what? It isn't. Global events are moving beyond America's ability to direct them. This coming time of retraction will not in History's light be our finest hour. But it's necessary. Recharge, rediscover.
As much as I believe he's a con man, Mr. O will make a good President. A full-D government counter-balanced by a large and angry minority of neo-conservatives will make for interesting times, not much like we've seen before.
Enough politics. See how easy that happens?
Does anyone else miss Roy's blog?
Recently I went to the 60th birthday of the place where I had my first job. For three weeks after high school I was in weed abatement at SID. Drove ancient trucks atop narrow levees and bathed the sedge and dallasgrass in herbicides. Daydreamed the entire time about space colonies. I was seventeen. I'd had zero preparation for life and was fired after three weeks. Didn't get the work concept, basically.
But I have fond memories. My brother worked there too once, when he got out of high school. Our uncle worked there for years. Our cousin works there now. And our grandfather was the Secretary / General Manager in the '60s. Close as we'll ever come to a family business.
One of those places that built this state. Most simply put, SID manages the water coming down Cache Creek for the benefit of Solano County agriculture. Built the dam that in 1958 or so flooded out the town of Monticello and created Lake Berryessa. Good, constructive, community-type stuff. (Don't you love these obscure local references, given without links or description?)
Sometimes I have much fonder thoughts of organizations like that, than of the relentless scramble for consumer and corporate dollars that the business that employs me boils down to. But only sometimes. I'm not getting soft, really.
I tried to make it look like me. I'm unimaginative like that. (I don't know where those earring-looking things came from. I do not have earrings.)
NaNo looms. People in the forums are all excited. I'm not. Attitude. Well, I haven't posted in over a week. Go figure.
Everywhere I go, "Yes on 8" posters, signs, bumper stickers. Depressing.
People say this election is defining somehow, extremely important. Know what? It isn't. Global events are moving beyond America's ability to direct them. This coming time of retraction will not in History's light be our finest hour. But it's necessary. Recharge, rediscover.
As much as I believe he's a con man, Mr. O will make a good President. A full-D government counter-balanced by a large and angry minority of neo-conservatives will make for interesting times, not much like we've seen before.
Enough politics. See how easy that happens?
Does anyone else miss Roy's blog?
Recently I went to the 60th birthday of the place where I had my first job. For three weeks after high school I was in weed abatement at SID. Drove ancient trucks atop narrow levees and bathed the sedge and dallasgrass in herbicides. Daydreamed the entire time about space colonies. I was seventeen. I'd had zero preparation for life and was fired after three weeks. Didn't get the work concept, basically.
But I have fond memories. My brother worked there too once, when he got out of high school. Our uncle worked there for years. Our cousin works there now. And our grandfather was the Secretary / General Manager in the '60s. Close as we'll ever come to a family business.
One of those places that built this state. Most simply put, SID manages the water coming down Cache Creek for the benefit of Solano County agriculture. Built the dam that in 1958 or so flooded out the town of Monticello and created Lake Berryessa. Good, constructive, community-type stuff. (Don't you love these obscure local references, given without links or description?)
Sometimes I have much fonder thoughts of organizations like that, than of the relentless scramble for consumer and corporate dollars that the business that employs me boils down to. But only sometimes. I'm not getting soft, really.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Almost Like Magic
Had our weekly telecom with some gents in Taipei. One of them was commuting and didn’t put his phone on mute: I recognized the train sounds, the roaring wind of the tunnel, the clack of railcars, and especially that annoying high-pitched warning alarm when the doors are about to close. An unexpected and welcome memory.
Sometimes the reach of cellular networks is magical. I could almost smell again the chou doufu ("stinky tofu" -- that part not so welcome).
Sometimes the reach of cellular networks is magical. I could almost smell again the chou doufu ("stinky tofu" -- that part not so welcome).
Friday, October 10, 2008
Prior To Coffee
Are Russians really everywhere? I went to Wal-Mart this morning -- felt like getting a comb for my beard, it feels good -- and everyone working there had a Russian accent. Okay, or Ukrainian. At Burning Man I met a guy who had been kicked out of a club because he celebrated Ukrainian Independence Day with too much enthusiasm. I can't tell Ukrainians from Russians except by last name. But whichever, they're all over the office this morning too, moving boxes and relocating cubicles. I've remarked before that they run the Hertz franchise at PDX. Dominated our second-rate hotel in Chicago.
So what? Well, the news about immigrants is always in relation to Hispanics. But the immigrant community around here is Eastern European. Before that, it was Southeast Asian. The Hispanic community is well established. So well established, I honestly am irritated that our ballots are half in Spanish because frankly, if someone is motivated to vote, they should either pay to have the materials translated themselves, or the government should do it for everybody. Everybody. But I don't see voting materials being sent around in Russian and Farsi and Hmong. Do you?
I also got a memory card for my new camera. Replacing the one that drowned in the desert. Figured I need a pocket camera for upcoming adventures and general life documentation. Here's a picture from it.
Here's another from the ol' jobberoo, taken with my older camera.
Criminy, I have a digital camera that's seven years old! Anyway, as you can see, I have a strange job. Those paper-thin TV monitors they watched while eating breakfast in 2001 are old news. But otherwise, nothing's changed: Something is always going wrong. This whole getup exists because something went wrong. If things didn't go wrong I wouldn't have a job, or my group would be smaller and I'd have a different job, or something. Whatever. A job's a job. Beats the alternative, as my grandfather used to say about getting older.
* * *
Fun with stitching software and pretty mornings.
So what? Well, the news about immigrants is always in relation to Hispanics. But the immigrant community around here is Eastern European. Before that, it was Southeast Asian. The Hispanic community is well established. So well established, I honestly am irritated that our ballots are half in Spanish because frankly, if someone is motivated to vote, they should either pay to have the materials translated themselves, or the government should do it for everybody. Everybody. But I don't see voting materials being sent around in Russian and Farsi and Hmong. Do you?
I also got a memory card for my new camera. Replacing the one that drowned in the desert. Figured I need a pocket camera for upcoming adventures and general life documentation. Here's a picture from it.
Here's another from the ol' jobberoo, taken with my older camera.
Criminy, I have a digital camera that's seven years old! Anyway, as you can see, I have a strange job. Those paper-thin TV monitors they watched while eating breakfast in 2001 are old news. But otherwise, nothing's changed: Something is always going wrong. This whole getup exists because something went wrong. If things didn't go wrong I wouldn't have a job, or my group would be smaller and I'd have a different job, or something. Whatever. A job's a job. Beats the alternative, as my grandfather used to say about getting older.
* * *
Fun with stitching software and pretty mornings.
Tuesday, October 07, 2008
Don't Bother With #3
Tonight should sound the death knell for these contrived televised Presidential "debates". Was it a pointless exercise or what? Both teams have so thoroughly coached their players in how to avoid creating a candidacy-killing debate moment that there's nothing left for them to say. Repeat the same talking points, the half-truths, the semi-lies, say something good about yourself we all already know, and get the hell out without doing any unscripted damage. Gag. What the hell kind of way is this to choose the leader of the free world?
Do you ever feel like you fell through a wormhole and came out in an alternate universe where things are just sort of different and wrong? How else to explain this so-called choice? They're both good men, but one's a has-been and the other a not-yet and neither has an ounce of genuine charisma. Oh, don't start the Obama chant. He never did anything for me. I admire him but he's just another guy with talent and ambition. His opponent, much the same only a few election cycles late. Where the hell was John in 1996?
Well, one thing we can do is forget choosing based on their economic plans. Nobody knows what the hell to do. All they can argue about is in just what way to lower taxes. It seems that in economics as well as in foreign policy the Democrats have shifted right to a greater degree than the Republicans have shifted left, though the Repubs have borrowed a few Dem plays such as leaning more towards universal health care and gay rights than we would have thought possible. Well, it's what the people want, more or less.
Now I can't even remember what they talked about. Oh yeah, John McCain looked into Vladimir Putin's eyes and saw three letters. I keep wondering how many voters these days have any idea what those three letters mean. Wouldn't you have to be over thirty five to even remember the KGB? Much less care? He may as well have reminisced about staring down Huns in their long coats and Pickelhauben.
Tom Brokaw is a cranky old geezer.
Do you ever feel like you fell through a wormhole and came out in an alternate universe where things are just sort of different and wrong? How else to explain this so-called choice? They're both good men, but one's a has-been and the other a not-yet and neither has an ounce of genuine charisma. Oh, don't start the Obama chant. He never did anything for me. I admire him but he's just another guy with talent and ambition. His opponent, much the same only a few election cycles late. Where the hell was John in 1996?
Well, one thing we can do is forget choosing based on their economic plans. Nobody knows what the hell to do. All they can argue about is in just what way to lower taxes. It seems that in economics as well as in foreign policy the Democrats have shifted right to a greater degree than the Republicans have shifted left, though the Repubs have borrowed a few Dem plays such as leaning more towards universal health care and gay rights than we would have thought possible. Well, it's what the people want, more or less.
Now I can't even remember what they talked about. Oh yeah, John McCain looked into Vladimir Putin's eyes and saw three letters. I keep wondering how many voters these days have any idea what those three letters mean. Wouldn't you have to be over thirty five to even remember the KGB? Much less care? He may as well have reminisced about staring down Huns in their long coats and Pickelhauben.
Tom Brokaw is a cranky old geezer.
Sunday, October 05, 2008
Sunday Sweep-out
So much sadness.
“Don’t you want to play with me anymore?”
No. You’re a video camera we bought in 1989. You broke when Sk8r dropped you in, I dunno, 2000. You were so much better than your replacement, better features, better quality. But you didn’t work anymore. Been in a box ever since.
No. You’re a cable box a friend of mine reprogrammed in 1993 so it would get the Playboy Channel. But after a few years the cable company sent a signal you couldn’t deal with and you didn’t work anymore. Been in a box ever since.
No. You’re a cell phone from the ‘90s. You’re a friggin’ brick with buttons. Been in a box-- Wait, you’re hella retro. Children in future years will be amused and amazed at your girth. Yes, you can stay.
A three-foot stack of stereo receivers with blown output amps or noisy balance controls, long-obsolete VHS video recorders, the CD player I bought my then-girlfriend now-wife in 1985, a VHS-C camera my dad passed down, and – OMG! – a pair of EPI speakers I bought off a chemist at the refinery I worked at in 1980.
Still alive, watching me sadly.
“Is it really time to go?”
“Yes, I think so. Don’t be scared.” I try to smile.
How do we manage to keep so much … stuff?
There’s an impulse. “It still works.” “It was cool once.” This stuff looks so … not broken. And yet. Does it really do us any good to keep it? Does it?
Got a scanner here: an ISA bus card with a little doodad that hooks onto the carriage of an Epson line printer. When it was made, Reagan was still president, and it’s been obsolete since Clinton’s first term at the very latest. Ridiculous.
So it’ll all go. Call some ewaste recycler or other to come pick it up. Lighten the load. It’s all good. So why does it almost make me sad? Something weird about unfulfilled potential? A need to use things until they are literally driven into the ground? Or did I see one too many stupid animations about cute robots and talking toasters abandoned like unwanted orphans when their families move away, and some stupid part of my brain wants to save everybody, even the inanimate? No matter. Out! Don’t be scared! Git!
But first, some cannibalism. I did have fun taking the old video camera apart. I wanted the lenses. Yes, fun! A screwdriver is all you need. Now the bits are in a box, and those lenses, well, they're still good. I’ll think of something.
“Don’t you want to play with me anymore?”
No. You’re a video camera we bought in 1989. You broke when Sk8r dropped you in, I dunno, 2000. You were so much better than your replacement, better features, better quality. But you didn’t work anymore. Been in a box ever since.
No. You’re a cable box a friend of mine reprogrammed in 1993 so it would get the Playboy Channel. But after a few years the cable company sent a signal you couldn’t deal with and you didn’t work anymore. Been in a box ever since.
No. You’re a cell phone from the ‘90s. You’re a friggin’ brick with buttons. Been in a box-- Wait, you’re hella retro. Children in future years will be amused and amazed at your girth. Yes, you can stay.
A three-foot stack of stereo receivers with blown output amps or noisy balance controls, long-obsolete VHS video recorders, the CD player I bought my then-girlfriend now-wife in 1985, a VHS-C camera my dad passed down, and – OMG! – a pair of EPI speakers I bought off a chemist at the refinery I worked at in 1980.
Still alive, watching me sadly.
“Is it really time to go?”
“Yes, I think so. Don’t be scared.” I try to smile.
How do we manage to keep so much … stuff?
There’s an impulse. “It still works.” “It was cool once.” This stuff looks so … not broken. And yet. Does it really do us any good to keep it? Does it?
Got a scanner here: an ISA bus card with a little doodad that hooks onto the carriage of an Epson line printer. When it was made, Reagan was still president, and it’s been obsolete since Clinton’s first term at the very latest. Ridiculous.
So it’ll all go. Call some ewaste recycler or other to come pick it up. Lighten the load. It’s all good. So why does it almost make me sad? Something weird about unfulfilled potential? A need to use things until they are literally driven into the ground? Or did I see one too many stupid animations about cute robots and talking toasters abandoned like unwanted orphans when their families move away, and some stupid part of my brain wants to save everybody, even the inanimate? No matter. Out! Don’t be scared! Git!
But first, some cannibalism. I did have fun taking the old video camera apart. I wanted the lenses. Yes, fun! A screwdriver is all you need. Now the bits are in a box, and those lenses, well, they're still good. I’ll think of something.
Saturday, October 04, 2008
Randombly
So I want the Cubs to come back and beat the Dodgers and I want that real bad. I also want the Red Sox to beat the Angels. Why do you care? Cuz I'm a California boy and you think I'd want it the other way round. But no! You wrong!
The weather turned. Last weekend I could smell it in the air. It was still in the nineties as we walked around Denio's, but there was a hint of a chill, not a real chill, but a sort of fragrance of winter, tickling the olfactory nerves. Maybe I sensed the arctic winds begin to stir in their homes far north. Anyway, it's actually cloudy today, and there was a sprinkle of rain last night. Wonder of wonders!
I find it almost impossible to write these days. All right, I find it almost impossible to concentrate and do anything. Fortunately I have a job so frantic with reactive multitasking that for any given project I'm not getting anywhere on I have at least five others to blame for it. I'm an old hand at playing that game but yes, you must accomplish something eventually.
Denio's was a trip. Rows and rows of junk being hoarded and maybe occasionally sold by rows and rows of sad sacks from Mexico and Oklahoma and Taiwan whose stories I wish I knew ... but I'm not the interviewer type. The place was so overwhelmed with ratty furniture and lawnmower engine parts it reminded me of my garage. Kind of gave me an idea: Maybe I really could get rid of some of my own crap. Are there really people who want twenty-five year old stereo equipment?
I'm reading L.A. Confidential and I think Ellroy's writing is destroying my mind.
I wrote this to cleanse some of the political hackery I indulge in, which, if you are aware of my thoughts at all, is another sign that I'm going crazy. I will be so glad when the next Prez gets sworn in and we can start worrying about the damage he will do for real.
So I grew a beard.
The weather turned. Last weekend I could smell it in the air. It was still in the nineties as we walked around Denio's, but there was a hint of a chill, not a real chill, but a sort of fragrance of winter, tickling the olfactory nerves. Maybe I sensed the arctic winds begin to stir in their homes far north. Anyway, it's actually cloudy today, and there was a sprinkle of rain last night. Wonder of wonders!
I find it almost impossible to write these days. All right, I find it almost impossible to concentrate and do anything. Fortunately I have a job so frantic with reactive multitasking that for any given project I'm not getting anywhere on I have at least five others to blame for it. I'm an old hand at playing that game but yes, you must accomplish something eventually.
Denio's was a trip. Rows and rows of junk being hoarded and maybe occasionally sold by rows and rows of sad sacks from Mexico and Oklahoma and Taiwan whose stories I wish I knew ... but I'm not the interviewer type. The place was so overwhelmed with ratty furniture and lawnmower engine parts it reminded me of my garage. Kind of gave me an idea: Maybe I really could get rid of some of my own crap. Are there really people who want twenty-five year old stereo equipment?
I'm reading L.A. Confidential and I think Ellroy's writing is destroying my mind.
I wrote this to cleanse some of the political hackery I indulge in, which, if you are aware of my thoughts at all, is another sign that I'm going crazy. I will be so glad when the next Prez gets sworn in and we can start worrying about the damage he will do for real.
So I grew a beard.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Random Brain Dump and Link
In comments somewhere Joe says, "Ignore the pundits, Don. Just try FactCheck.org." Good advice. I looked and they were critical of both campaigns. That's what I wanted to see.
Seems to me you can find criticism of one side or of the other. But when the criticism seems one-sided -- if I get a sense that the critic came to it with a set agenda -- I quickly lose interest.
I don't mean punditry needs to try and give equal time. That's nonsense. Only that they are serving truth first and not a particular party. If from their point of view that results in supporting a particular party, that's fine. I just like to get a sense that a little critical thinking is involved, and that inconvenient truths aren't being swept aside.
Part of me really wants to be won over by Obama. I keep looking for that definitive moment or reason. I refuse to care about race, this thing that every one is talking about how no one is talking about. I refuse to pretend "fresh" and "new" really apply and that I'd care if they did. I refuse in other words to be irrational, to get caught up in these messianic feelings. I want a smart and energetic person in charge who looks at problems from several angles and develops solutions that are not strongly tied to a particular party or power base. Obama has the potential for this. To a lesser extent, so does McCain, whom I decided as long ago as January was the best of a bad lot.
But this nascent desire and impulse to mistrust mere feeling leaves me sensitive somehow to Obama missteps. This morning NPR interviewed his economic advisor and the guy came off as comically partisan, placing the blame for the current turmoil on eight years, specifically, of mismanagement. Bah. The truth is far more complex and required the full collusion of both parties and not just the current Prez but that guy who was President for most of the 90s too. So I maintain my doubts.
Besides, stripping it all away, O's experience as a manager pretty much breaks down to leading a Presidential campaign. This isn't much less than W's, granted, and O is a shitload smarter. But. I dunno.
I guess all the Repub-hating and Dem-bashing has left me with the feeling that people are way too wrought up over this thing and to hell with them all. This race really is no different than the other fifty plus we've had. Events in 2009 will render any previous experience and most inherent judgment moot. So what the hell.
Random pointless note: Of the four principals, Biden has the best speaking voice and Palin the worst. I liked listening to her at first -- that no-nonsense Midwestern twang. But hers is an accent that wears thin quickly. Gah. Indeed, it is when the spousal unit is at her most annoying (as every spousal unit must get periodically) that I hear remnants of Kansas in her voice. And she never even lived there. Gah, again.
Regional snobbery at its best.
Seems to me you can find criticism of one side or of the other. But when the criticism seems one-sided -- if I get a sense that the critic came to it with a set agenda -- I quickly lose interest.
I don't mean punditry needs to try and give equal time. That's nonsense. Only that they are serving truth first and not a particular party. If from their point of view that results in supporting a particular party, that's fine. I just like to get a sense that a little critical thinking is involved, and that inconvenient truths aren't being swept aside.
Part of me really wants to be won over by Obama. I keep looking for that definitive moment or reason. I refuse to care about race, this thing that every one is talking about how no one is talking about. I refuse to pretend "fresh" and "new" really apply and that I'd care if they did. I refuse in other words to be irrational, to get caught up in these messianic feelings. I want a smart and energetic person in charge who looks at problems from several angles and develops solutions that are not strongly tied to a particular party or power base. Obama has the potential for this. To a lesser extent, so does McCain, whom I decided as long ago as January was the best of a bad lot.
But this nascent desire and impulse to mistrust mere feeling leaves me sensitive somehow to Obama missteps. This morning NPR interviewed his economic advisor and the guy came off as comically partisan, placing the blame for the current turmoil on eight years, specifically, of mismanagement. Bah. The truth is far more complex and required the full collusion of both parties and not just the current Prez but that guy who was President for most of the 90s too. So I maintain my doubts.
Besides, stripping it all away, O's experience as a manager pretty much breaks down to leading a Presidential campaign. This isn't much less than W's, granted, and O is a shitload smarter. But. I dunno.
I guess all the Repub-hating and Dem-bashing has left me with the feeling that people are way too wrought up over this thing and to hell with them all. This race really is no different than the other fifty plus we've had. Events in 2009 will render any previous experience and most inherent judgment moot. So what the hell.
Random pointless note: Of the four principals, Biden has the best speaking voice and Palin the worst. I liked listening to her at first -- that no-nonsense Midwestern twang. But hers is an accent that wears thin quickly. Gah. Indeed, it is when the spousal unit is at her most annoying (as every spousal unit must get periodically) that I hear remnants of Kansas in her voice. And she never even lived there. Gah, again.
Regional snobbery at its best.
Monday, September 15, 2008
I Know
I need to write more, a lot more, about Burning Man. I just can't seem to string two hours together to do it. I look forward to the challenge of communicating some impressions. It was an amazing experience. Not transformative, unfortunately. Maybe next time.
TMI: Evidently something I ate today really liked me. It wouldn't leave without a struggle.
I have a habit of defending certain strongly disliked conservatives. I hope this doesn't put off my more liberal friends. It happens because a) over the past decade and a half it has become crystal clear that the lovely human trait of bigotry respects no ideological boundaries and I am especially disappointed that so many self-described liberals have become so very bigoted, and b) of the more ridiculous opinions I usually only see the liberal side. If someone would point me to something worth ridiculing that was said of Obama/Biden I would be grateful for the chance to test my impartiality. Note the proviso "worth ridiculing". There are plenty of right wing sites I've literally zero time for. Both wings, really.
My father went home from the convalescent hospital today. Yay! He hadn't been home for four months. Continues on a slow and steady mend. I must say, getting old isn't for the weak.
Yes, more and more I want universal health care. Used to take a Darwinistic approach to society, heavily influenced by an Objectivist friend and my general (and well-founded) distrust of government programs. But apart from the alleged injustice of wealth (and health) disparity, the overall society and its individuals will do better, I think, if resources aren't squandered taking care of people only in their extremity and meanwhile denying them the health to be productive. Similar to how the South flourished with the end of Jim Crow, so the world should flourish if the inability to pay for treatment is removed as an obstacle to health and productivity.
While we're at it, marijuana should be legalized and gay marriage made an uncontroversial element among the many ways human adults bond together. And that probably about exhausts my cred as a liberal. Otherwise, I'm one of the few people who still admits the world would actually be a worse and more dangerous place if we had not interfered with Iraq when we did. Yes, shitloads of mistakes and so on, but I look at the big picture.
Oh, I'm a big supporter of public schools too. We ought to quintuple the funding. And disband the unions. And require parental involvement. And promote on capability. And fix the curriculum to be interesting and relevant. Easy peasy!
Now I'm rambling so that's enough. What did I start this poast about? I forget.
TMI: Evidently something I ate today really liked me. It wouldn't leave without a struggle.
I have a habit of defending certain strongly disliked conservatives. I hope this doesn't put off my more liberal friends. It happens because a) over the past decade and a half it has become crystal clear that the lovely human trait of bigotry respects no ideological boundaries and I am especially disappointed that so many self-described liberals have become so very bigoted, and b) of the more ridiculous opinions I usually only see the liberal side. If someone would point me to something worth ridiculing that was said of Obama/Biden I would be grateful for the chance to test my impartiality. Note the proviso "worth ridiculing". There are plenty of right wing sites I've literally zero time for. Both wings, really.
My father went home from the convalescent hospital today. Yay! He hadn't been home for four months. Continues on a slow and steady mend. I must say, getting old isn't for the weak.
Yes, more and more I want universal health care. Used to take a Darwinistic approach to society, heavily influenced by an Objectivist friend and my general (and well-founded) distrust of government programs. But apart from the alleged injustice of wealth (and health) disparity, the overall society and its individuals will do better, I think, if resources aren't squandered taking care of people only in their extremity and meanwhile denying them the health to be productive. Similar to how the South flourished with the end of Jim Crow, so the world should flourish if the inability to pay for treatment is removed as an obstacle to health and productivity.
While we're at it, marijuana should be legalized and gay marriage made an uncontroversial element among the many ways human adults bond together. And that probably about exhausts my cred as a liberal. Otherwise, I'm one of the few people who still admits the world would actually be a worse and more dangerous place if we had not interfered with Iraq when we did. Yes, shitloads of mistakes and so on, but I look at the big picture.
Oh, I'm a big supporter of public schools too. We ought to quintuple the funding. And disband the unions. And require parental involvement. And promote on capability. And fix the curriculum to be interesting and relevant. Easy peasy!
Now I'm rambling so that's enough. What did I start this poast about? I forget.
