Archive for November, 2005

I’m home after a mostly wasted day of someone trying to teach me how to do something I’ve been doing for thirteen years; in other words, the meeting I went to yesterday was largely redundant and unnecessary and so we left after the first two hours. Even the instructor appeared embarassed after if became clear that she had been completely misinformed about the purpose of the training session. I really felt badly for her. But it was a day out of the office, out of the city, and unfortunately without much sleep. But that I can make up.

Elsewhere I was pointed to this article talking about the perceived advantages to brick and mortar bookstores versus their internet counterparts. Among those quoted is David Sedaris (note ironic Amazon link) who notes that he’s never purchased a book online. I guess that such social problems don’t matter to the average author, but the fact is that people don’t read. I can rattle off a list of dozens of people I’ve met over the last year who could not be bothered to read any book that did not come from the impulse aisle at Wal Mart. This is bad. We don’t need more obstacles to finding and reading good books. And even though the article doesn’t directly state that there’s something “wrong” with buying books online, it certainly dances around it.

At my job I’m constantly crowing about “removing barriers to access”, which really just means “don’t keep people from getting to your stuff because you have some particular notion about how they should get it”. Authors seem to revel in this antiquarian notion of themselves, writing manuscripts in longhand and having panic attacks at the notion of being made to use computers. This is all well and good, but creating any sort of art means embracing a variety of channels through which you can connect with an audience. I don’t think it cheapens my reading experience to buy a book from an online reseller, certainly not any more than it would to buy it from a big box bookseller with a built-in coffee shop.

In other news there’s a strategy to win the war in Iraq now. That’s good, because we only invaded like three years ago. I’m glad someone’s thought of something.

Can you tell I need sleep dear readers? I promise to be less curmudgeonly in my next post.

I’ll be in Browns Summit, NC and Morganton, NC tonight and tomorrow for a training session required by a free lance client. It’s a long story, but suffice it to say that this is not what I meant when I said I wanted to spend the next year traveling. However a trip is a trip and I’m getting paid. So I’m sure I can find something to post about on my return.

Ladies and gents I give you Park Slope. Or perhaps Billburg? Lincoln Park? Maybe even Côte-des-Neiges. And what about the other Capitol Hill?

So I’m in about day seven of intentionally not shaving. I hate shaving anyway, always have. Just lately I’ve decided it might be cool to have a beard for a few weeks, just to see what all the fuss is about. I have to say that for the first time in my life this looks like something I’m doing on purpose. Usually I just look like a dude you’d see buying jerky and a case of motor oil at the auto parts store, getting into an ‘86 Mustang. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just that being spottily scruffy is Not Cool.
Oddly though, it’s sort of blonde in places. I have really dark hair (well, what of it isn’t going gray anyway.) Worst of all it itches. A lot. All the time. I’m guessing this goes away?
I tried googling ‘my itchy beard’. That yielded, well, anecdotal stuff that wasn’t helpful. So I’ll probably give up in a few days and wash it all down the sink. But until then I must say I’m enjoying my newfound rugged good looks.

Geez. Have I been wearing out Illinois. One song in particular has me pegged lately, aptly titled Chicago. I guess for years and years I thought there was beauty in staying, and now I’m seeing the beauty of leaving things behind; or going somewhere new long enough to get a comfortable taste and moving onto the next dish. I like that more.

I’m thankful for a lot today. I guess I feel some obligation to say it even though I’m not bowled over by the notion of this holiday. I mean we got a long great with the natives for about fifteen minutes until we gave them all small pox. Woo hoo. Do you mind darkmeat? But I digress.

Even though they’re nuts it’s still good to have my family together in one place. We seem to “get” each other, and I know a lot of families simply don’t. I’m wonderfully thankful for the friends I have–scattered through the lower 48 though they may be. I’m thankful for opportunity, and the gifts I’ve been given. One thing making it so easy to throw a dart at a map when deciding on my move this time is my ability to do a lot of different things with a tiny bit of skill. I may not be an expert at many but I can fake it. It makes life a much more portable activity when you can art direct, or write code, or play music. I can’t ever forget how nice it is to live life that way.

Is everything perfect? Nope. There are some loose ends I would love to tie up, and soon; there are a lot of undone things (or poorly done things needing correction) but such is life. If we’re lucky we get another go around and we make it right. I’ve barely begun to live and that feels great.

I guess I’m most thankful that I’ve made it to another November, with a new year around the corner humming with possibility; I don’t know where I’ll be in two months and it feels wonderful.

From bldgblog:

“Plans are afoot to take advantage of “the Mersey’s vast renewable energy potential by constructing a tidal power fence which, according to initial estimates, could generate up to 2,000 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 15 per cent of the North-west’s electricity requirements. The Mersey offers more tidal power potential than virtually any other river in Europe, by virtue of its 10-metre tidal range and strong currents which are a by-product of its shape and its position on England’s windy North-west coast.”

An interesting story, but most importantly it’s accompanied by several beautiful architectural drawings like the one above. I’ve always been fascinated by these types of renderings because their lines are so strong and the colors are so skewed. It always gave me secret pleasure that a field that exists on numerical accuracy and precision essentially had impressionists doing its renderings.

“Herculean and abstract concrete structures humming with hydroelectric power. Submerge ten of these things in the Mersey… and England just got a whole lot brighter.”

It’s a big (weird) trend in geek circles right now to go out and plunk down a lot of money for the latest tech goodies, take them home, unpack them and disassemble them. Then put pics of the whole grisly operation up on flickr. And what’s the hottest gadget to come down the pike in the last three days? Why, the Xbox 360 of course. And it’s already been dissected.

Seems like good stuff inside even if it does crash like Lindsay Lohan in her “Saturday” Mercedes.

I was looking at a box of old game systems the other day–Segas, two old NES’s–and thinking how closed that hardware was back then. Sega was much closer than Nintendo and always was (they were the first to build a console with its own real OS), but the 360 has USB ports, a standard ATA hard drive; all in all it’s essentially just a purpose-built, hot-rodded Mac with a boot loader instead of a full kernel.

Still you’ve gotta respect these guys who drop $1000 on something that they turn around and risk blowing out from static just for our amusement.

“I like guys who’ve never been there that criticize us who’ve been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don’t like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done,” Murtha said.

Preach it, brother.

Q:So Nick, what made you toss your camera up into the air knowing that you might not catch it and it would shatter into a million pieces, rendering you unable to take photos until such time as the camera could be replaced?

A: Um, art?

(Photos tagged “cameratoss” at Flickr)