Blagomaphone

get your red hot stuff

2011-04-04T11:41:00.000-07:00

I'd like to index every item in my possession.

Graph it along axes, varied and descriptive.

Pretty pictures. Insightful information? Who knows.

pandora acts like it knows me

2011-03-21T15:11:00.001-07:00

Trip hop or funk roots are a good start. Make sure you've got some
meter complexity and intricate rhythms but keep that beat danceable.
Vocal samples, often with surreal or ambiguous lyrics, maybe a touch
of vinyl ambiance, can really seal the deal. Synth riffs, staccato and
otherwise, and synth-electric sonority are practically mandatory.
Subtle use of white noise can set up a trippy soundscape, backdropping
prevalent use of groove, if you're in the mood for it.

I guess at least now I have some words to throw at the question, "what
kind of music do you like?" aside from, "you know, square waves are
the best kind of wave."

Like I even know what unsyncopated ensemble rhythms are.

walk to work wednesdays

2011-03-17T10:18:00.001-07:00

I felt like not being on my bike yesterday, so I decided to walk to
work. It was about 1:20 each direction, but was really nice - I pretty
much never walk anymore. It's really easy; one foot in front of the
other, maybe breathe a little harder when you're going up a big hill.

I took my breakfast of fruit with me in my pockets and ate it on the
way. I got to feel out all the different ways my
feet/thighs/hips/back/shoulders can combine to balance a gait, and
which ones were sustainable/relaxing and didn't cause pain to my foot.
The city feels a lot more intimate on foot, when you have to make a
decision for every other pedestrian out there, whether to look away,
make eye contact, smile, say something, or whatever. There are so many
homeless people in san francisco, I mean holy cow. Next time I walk
I'll try to keep a count in my head of homeless vs
probably-has-a-home, but anecdotally it was a lot higher than I was
expecting.

I think I'll try to do it once a week. Commuting cross training, heh.

100 percent clean shirts

2011-02-24T23:05:00.001-08:00

they're everywhere!

2011-02-12T18:16:00.000-08:00

I guess it is 2011, I should stop caring about privacy. But following me home and sticking to my bedsheets, really?

papers I wish I could write

2011-02-07T15:31:00.001-08:00

(AKA, talk to me about these topics, I want to know more about them!)

Towards Less Rude Exobrain Usage
OR, Respect Your Elders, If You Know What's Good For You
(human computer interaction)

On Steady State Provably Optimal Dominion Strategies
(game theory)

Evaluating Potential Assistive Technologies for Sitting Like a Mountain
(human computer interaction, ergonomics)

A Comprehensive Survey of Past and Future Profession Longevity
(economics)

The Feasability of Digitally Archiving Every Known Species' DNA
(biology)

Creation of Long Carbon Nanotube Threads via Fractally Scaled Automation
(material science)

moving on

2011-02-07T09:02:00.001-08:00

Somehow I expected all the news this morning to be about the steelers
losing, because it was on my mind all night. But no, xkcd, dinosaur
comics, and bruce schneier et al did not even mention the game.
Reality, continuing apace...

lovetech

2011-01-29T03:30:00.001-08:00

http://www.lovetechsf.com/

Lovetech is the real deal. No it's better than that, it's the real
Louisana Purchase.

I, nerd

2011-01-28T17:38:00.000-08:00

Layla was chiding me last night for being in a science fiction book
club. I retorted, "When the singularity comes, you'll be the first
against the wall."

very successful weekend

2011-01-19T23:58:00.001-08:00

Lei out is a bang up tournament. Full of ethical choices, just like
good science fiction.

Also full of ultimate, for me. Apparently the lower impact of sand
(and awareness of pinky toes) goes a long way. Also my new physical
therapist (Noe Valley Physical Therapy) is the bomb. Erin's trying to
see if I can get in on her winter beach league team at Ocean beach, I
hope it works out.

thoughts for my physical therapist

2011-01-09T18:18:00.001-08:00

I've identified a couple barriers.

0. A hopeless part of me keeps floating the hypothesis that it just
hurts to stand on my heel because of something localized under there.
This is probably not worth considering though because if it's true
there's really nothing to be done. It's also contradicted regularly by
times when I can stand on it without tension and pain as long as I'm
very aware of hip/knee/toe/heel weight alignment.

1. If it's not localized it's systemic because it just isn't going
away by itself. I've identified a number of problem positions (which
result in immediate tension/pain) while sleeping and sitting and in
all kinds of movement transitions but they are sinkholes for my
unconscious body control to slip into. Full time body awareness feels
like a pipe dream at this point but it also at times feels like the
only viable option.

2. Full time body awareness would be the "maintain" portion of "peak
and maintain". In order to get out of the trap of the sinkholes, which
are often different from each other and I don't believe I've
identified them all yet, I need to be able to recognize it and apply a
direct stretch/exercise for that particular tightness. Shotgun
bombardment such as the stuff I'm doing during my 2-every-30 breaks
can be helpful but I'm aware that I can't keep motivation high for a
strict program of exercises which don't show at least some kind of
perceivable results quickly.

I feel like a jerk for needing to verbalize all this, but it helps my
time with my PT be productive if I get it out there ahead of time.

Chrome profiles on mac os x

2011-01-08T18:53:00.000-08:00

Sharing a mac between two people who are constantly signed into different accounts on websites? Don't do the sign-out sign-in dance. Try this shell script (chmod +x it to make it double clickable):

#!/bin/zsh

PROFILE_NAME="k2"
GOOGLE_CHROME="/Applications/Google Chrome.app/Contents/MacOS/Google Chrome"
USER_DIR="/Users/$USER/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/${PROFILE_NAME}"

RUNNING_PID=`ps aux | grep Chrome | grep udd-profile | grep ${PROFILE_NAME} | tr -s ' ' '%' | cut -d "%" -f 2`

if [[ -n `echo $RUNNING_PID` ]]; then
osascript -e "tell application \"System Events\" to set frontmost of (first process whose unix id is $RUNNING_PID) to true"
else
exec $GOOGLE_CHROME --enable-udd-profiles --user-data-dir=$USER_DIR &
fi

the fight continues

2011-01-07T14:02:00.001-08:00

In addition to stretches I've started doing low crawls, crabwalks,
lunges, sipping birds and caterpillers across my office during my
2-every-30 ergo breaks.

So far no one has commented. I'm thinking this is because on most of
the exercises I'm very low to the ground and they don't see me.

dream shards

2010-12-26T22:19:00.001-08:00

Quidditch match, some dude has a flapping pennywhistler. It spits out coins, and we dive through the grass to find the big ones.

"Do you have photos of you on the web? It's good to know you don't fear the advance of global technology, my las boyfriend was a real localizer."

Evolution-style zoo of crazy life forms. Crabs have razor sharp claws. People keep 6ft praying manti as pets next to them on double wide bicycles. A squito-bird finds the weakpoint on a well armored crab (the butt) and flies away with it.

christmas eve dream

2010-12-25T07:13:00.000-08:00

The auditorium at Jakarta International School is packed for the show. On stage, the director is killing it, and the audience admires his gusto. They've been sending flowers to him all night, which I've been collecting for him in my role as stage hand. The most recent song earns applause, cheering, more flowers, and a tiny kitten.

This kitten is so cute! I entertain him (and he me) while the show continues. But after a little while, the little guy's back leg gets gimpy. I can't hand over a broken kitty in congratulations for a good performance. Suddenly I notice the zippers running up and down the little kitty legs and little kitty belly. Thank goodness the donors had thought to have them installed. I unzip his leg, pull out the muscle. The little ball of fibers is dry, tough and knotty, but I massage it until it relaxes, and return it to the hind leg. Good as new!

All kittens should come with zippers.

Merry Christmas!

it's a conspiracy

2010-12-20T09:42:00.001-08:00

Pierogies for lunch at the pittsburgh google office today. And bins
full of peach gummies in the mini kitchens. I think it's a sign.

2011: breathe first

2010-12-20T07:43:00.001-08:00

I've noticed that I stop breathing regularly when I'm at my desk
working with the computer. It feels like the minimal amount of in/out
possible to keep me conscious. When I think about it I can keep the
breathing going through remembering that my body is initiating actions
on the computer like reaching out touch the mouse, or the keyboard,
and remembering that those actions require breath to lever the arm
over to the right location, etc. The default seems to be a focus on
the end action inside the virtual desktop of the computer, where
breathing doesn't seem necessary.

In addition to the 2-minute breaks every 30 minutes that feel like
they are helping a lot to remind me that I live my body stays in the
3D world even when my brain drifts off into the computer, some options
for fixing this might be:
. meditation/yoga retreat to be better at putting breathing first and
multitasking while still having focus on breath
. temporary tech props such as a breathing monitor that buzzes or
something when I'm not breathing as regularly as I should be. The
measuring mechansim seems the hard part - I don't want anything
attached to my face. Maybe a band with a stretch sensor could go
around my chest near my lungs.
. oscillating zoom level of the screen at my measured breathing rate
as a visual to remind me to breath constantly

it's on

2010-12-13T10:49:00.000-08:00

War is declared on chronic pain from desk working. Unlike some wars, this will have a well defined exit condition - no persistent systemic body pains.

A pain symptom is systemic if there was no injurious moment that caused it. It is persistent if it doesn't relieve itself on its own within 5 days.

Ergo breaks will be taken at the rate of 2 minutes per half hour. Stretching during ergo breaks could include lunges, wrists/shoulder/neck rotations, upward dog, and headstands, among others. Twice-weekly full yoga sessions are mandatory.

Pains not succumbing to this treatment will be allocated 10 minutes per day of specially targeted exercises. Pains not relenting after 1 week of specially targeted exercises will be submitted to independent auditors for analysis and recommendation.

If you haven't got your health, you haven't got anything.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUKO_Y6RqEk

nutcracker

2010-12-10T10:02:00.001-08:00

The Nutcracker is a way better show than I remember it. Of course the
last time I was 10 years old or something stupid like that.

What's the word for a male ballet performer? Ballerino? Ballero? Bro-erina?

At one point the main dude was resetting his location and he was the
only one on the stage. He walked away from the audience, a meditation
in perfection of tush. The old lady in front us perked up and raised
her binoculars. That's some hi-def butt straight to the cortex.

The set work was my favorite part. The scale change with 15ft presents
sliding onto stage and an impossibly tall xmas tree growing straight
out of the ground all at once, Inception-style, was just masterful.

national geographic documentary: inside North Korea

2010-12-08T10:23:00.001-08:00

Erin and I watched a National Geographic documentary on North Korea
last night, it was intense. Made in 2006, it had a lot of backstory,
along with new footage from a humanitarian doctor going into the
country for 10 days to perform 1000 cataract removal surgeries, to let
the blind see.

It was gut wrenching to watch the newly seeing people praise the Great
Leader for their restored sight, instead of the doctor. And the
lengths they went to... it was like the Great Leader was Jesus on
earth. Everyone being filmed seemed to be playing a game of how can we
credit him the most elaborately. It makes darwinian sense, when the
alternative for even minor slip-ups or being slow to praise the Leader
is prison camp for life, for you and your entire extended family.

It was sickening to see the reporter of the documentary ask leading
questions like "Can the Leader do anything wrong?" with such complete
disregard for the safety and well being of those she was interviewing.
Luckily they responded with incomprehension of the question.

hippies

2010-12-06T22:19:00.001-08:00

I was at a yoga class today (ok that admission must soften the
following rant) and the teacher was talking some crazy hippy shit.

She said whenever two beings are near each other, their energies begin
to intertwine. Here I am thinking about people in love or whatever,
but she takes it way more extreme. She gives an example of grandfather
clocks being in the same room together. "It's a principle of physics,"
she waffles. "It's called enchainment. Even if these two pendulums are
swinging out of sync to begin with, they'll slowly come into time with
each other."

Does that sound made up to you? Sure does to me. I think she meant entanglement but I don't think that has any bearing on grandfather clock pendulums.

It was still a really good class. I guess you don't need to know
physics to know about bodies in motion, ba dum ching.

an assignment

2010-12-06T11:42:00.000-08:00

I read a blog from a science fiction writer who is also an english teacher; he has his students write 1000 words a week in a journal (http://jimvanpelt.livejournal.com/300448.html), and I thought that might be an interesting experiement to try.

Or else I could just post one picture per week, right?

Well my only comment today is to congratulate all my friends. You've done an amazing job fitting in parties on practically every day of december, without a single overlap. 8 parties. Wow. I hope my liver survives.

burn it down!

2010-09-08T23:33:00.001-07:00

Lot of firsts this year. Saw the man burn, rode on an art car (the Death Star! Of which I still fail to find a good nighttime picture, so these ones of the daytime will have to do.)

Had a side project - being the Dalmatian Army and giving away pink spots and a bunch of gingerbread cookies shaped like dog bones that I baked.

Learned how to solder EL Wire from a sweet hacker space called Noisebridge, and glowed it up night after night. Built a cane from a wooden dowel and a crystal doorknob and turned it into an especially classy piece of glow. Next year I'll have to look into EL Tape since that was what I discovered I really wanted.

It's a recalibration more than anything. As long as I remember dealing with the dust and the heat and the cold and the fatigue and the everything breaking, I have a trump card against day to day annoyances. The memory will fade though, it's a good thing it's an annual occurrence.

It was the logistics that made me feel like a vet this year though. Packing down the camp into the back of the truck in under 90 minutes, so we could watch the man burn and then jet out of there before traffic slogged up, was epic. We originally put the walls of the yurt on upside down and then broke a slat taking them off to turn them over, but we put our spare slat on with no fuss and were on our way. Counted calories out like our water rations and made sure we had enough plus a little buffer, and came home with only a little extra. Dry ice in the cooler lasted all the days and made sure we didn't spend any hot ass-time in the ice-line that could've been spent chilling in the yurt or adventuring in the playa.

Everything I wrote last year still rings true with me, except being more expert at the preparation/cleandown kept stress levels low all around. Getting to stay longer gave me an impression of the "weekenders" and their impact on the place - the first time I saw any trash on the ground was friday evening, if that's anything to go by, and in any case a lot of theme camps had already closed up shop by saturday noon. I now strongly agree with Erin that Monday - Friday is the time to be there, after that I can take it or leave it.

Anyway, still can't wait for it to be on the moon. Or really, mars would be more traditional with the dust storms and all.

breaking down the barrier to entry

2010-06-05T13:23:00.001-07:00

I think I went to my first yoga class ever when I was in Sydney for a semester. At the time Kartini said prophetically that she was really happy to be there in my first steps of something that would be with me lifelong. But it didn't really stick until recently how important it is for me and this lanky ass body of mine.

As long as I can remember I've had back pain. In the 4th grade I had to stay home from school one day because I was having spasms so painful I couldn't walk or sit. I laid in a hot bath of water all day instead of studying my times tables. I didn't figure out a sleeping position that worked for me until about a year ago. With that and a 5 minute morning stretching regimen adopted from my dad, I've kept the worst pains at bay. But it's always loitering around at a low level. 0.5 on a scale of 10 maybe, but still there. Yoga makes it go away. And except for short stints on prescription painkillers for unrelated issues, it's about the only thing that does.

Still even after I realized that, it's hard to convince myself to go to a 1.5 hour class. It's just a lot of time and energy investment, no matter how good it makes me feel. The key to having a regular practice (and thus a more painfree life) for me has been doing shorter increments, 15 or 30 minutes, a few times a week. The impact on my body has been much greater than doing a long class once per week. To break into a 30 minute form though I needed to know how to do it by myself. Erin helped a lot, and so did this book called Ashtanga Yoga: The Practice Manual.

It lists out the poses you should do to get the biggest, most balanced, bang for your buck if you only have 15, 30, or 45 minutes to give to it. It also lists for each pose several alternatives if you aren't flexible or strong enough to do the full on yogic master version. It emphasizes the proscribed breathing that goes along with each pose and especially sun salutations, which have a magical way of heating up my body more thoroughly than a warmup jog, but only when done with the right breathing. After that the stretching poses actually feel like they're having a lasting impact. There's a quote in the book that hits home: 'poses without sun salutations are no poses at all.'

In order to stick with it I also needed to feel like was even vaguely competent at the basics. A few things helped me a lot there. First the morning stretching ritual that included hamstrings let me at least not feel like a lout in all the poses that require loose hamstrings. Second, I cheat on my downward dog pose by pulling my feet about 6-8 inches further in compared to plank pose. The smaller base width takes a lot of my body weight off my weak arms and shoulders and puts it on my legs, which are used to supporting it. Finally, both knowing and feeling comfortable doing easier versions of poses that are too difficult is clutch. Many yoga instructors I've been led by don't inform the class of the alternate versions, so the book was way helpful. Not making it a contest about who can stretch the furthest though, is up to you.

I think my muscles are finally starting to buy into the socialist agenda I've been trying to impose on them. Having tasted a sustainably painfree existence they will no longer tolerate anything less, and I've found that intolerance to be the best motivation for getting out my mat. Hooray for virtuous cycles!

bike safety

2010-05-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

I've heard from a lot of people lately that they would love to bike in the city but they're scared to do so, scared for an accident. Which is understandable, for a long time I've had the opinion that it's not a matter of 'if' but 'when' I'll be in an accident myself.

I feel very differently about driving safety though. I feel like if I abide by the rules of the road and check my blind spots and drive defensively I can make it through my whole life without ever having to file an accident report. And because of that I've recently changed my opinion about the likelihood of a bike accident as well.

Most people I've heard of getting in bike accidents, if you said they were in a car and doing what they were doing at the time of the accident, you would demand they hand in their driver's license. This is discounting the taxi that hit Ben Lawson and then drove away immediately by the way, that guy was just a dick. But in general it's stuff like, riding drunk, or riding with no hands, or riding too close behind the car/bike in front of you, or shooting the gap between cars.

Some people drive dangerously. Most people bike dangerously, because they're impatient, and there are more opportunities to do dangerous things. And peer pressure. When a bike in front of you cuts a red light because there's obviously no traffic coming the other way, you feel like a tool staying at the red light. I think it's also because people have a much better sense of how big they are on a bike. Of course I can fit through that tiny space oh wait I didn't expect that car door to open. And cars are required to have their hardware checked out once a year; bad brakes on bikes are an epidemic.

But these can all be overcome. When your brakes start to suck, fix them. Don't get sucked into the peer pressure, be patient and get there later and in one piece. Fuck Critical Mass. You can be safe and not a dick at the same time. Wear lights at night and slow down when it rains. Basic stuff really, and well worth it, because biking around freaking rules.

Of course I've just doomed myself by writing this post. If you've got any wood near you please knock on it for me.

nerd pranked

2010-05-23T13:54:00.000-07:00

Chateau Grand View continues to set the party bar high. After dancing till 3, naturally I had pop songs stuck in my head this morning, in particular OMG by Usher. Going to listen to it on grooveshark, somebody punked me with an audio file that wasn't actually the song, but instead was some dude saying "all you need to change the world is one good lie and a river of blood." Kind of morbid huh. Apparently it's from the Call of Duty 2 video game.

In other news Jamo's bachelor party was a raging success. Just good wholesome fun.

android's eye view

2010-03-03T23:26:00.000-08:00

Went on some business trips.

Loved ktopia more than ever.

Hung out with these hooligans.

2010: do what you want.

the newest nuisance

2009-11-25T12:17:00.001-08:00

Despite the bone jutting out of my heel where it shouldn't be, I'm still remarkably optimistic. The word is as long as the pain isn't too bad I should be able to play ultimate without additional danger of injury. I played Winter League last night and it felt so good to be on the field again after 2 months off. The heel started hurting more noticably in the second half and still hurts a lot this morning, but I feel like I can probably ice it into submission before next week's game if not the week after. Knock on wood, that's a pattern which should be just enough to keep me sane over the winter.

Come spring I should be able to assess what I want for the summer and fall and if it'll include Classy ultimate... if the heel still isn't 100% by then I'm pretty sure I'll take the season off. It would be interesting to have summer weekends for traveling, and spending another season on the sidelines is just plain not appealing. Plus I remember hearing when I was a kid that men's athletic peak happens at age 27, so I'll be primed for a comeback following season. And who knows, if the custom orthotics I got casted for yesterday help out, maybe by then this will all just be another notch under my belt of potentially-debilitating injuries worked through.

So yeah while it's intimidating to hear a diagnosis of "weeks, months, a year, maybe more" before I'll be pain free again, that has a very different feel to it compared with the "might never play again" outlook I had for my knee for so long, and that has me looking at the silver linings.

the baying grows brighter

2009-10-02T19:28:00.000-07:00

I've started making a conscious effort of remembering my dreams more, and writing them as soon as I wake, because apparently improved recall is the first step towards increased frequency of lucid dreaming.

The dogs, rhinos and elephants had become resentful of how the humans were running the show. A small protest march sprung up, 200 strong, down a dusty road in the middle of a nowhere desert. I was allowed free pass among them for some reason, it occurs to me now perhaps I was wearing a citizen journalist badge and they were glad of the good press. 4 other humans stalked the formation about 50 yards away, their evil intent clear to any with a nose. Soon the four began tossing rocks picked from among the dirt, with truly impressive accuracy for such a distance. I blocked what ones would hit me with my strong forearms, watched calmly those others zinging past inches away. Unerringly I moved towards the offenders, determined to mete justice. When I came upon them I wrestled them, and besting the first 3 turned towards the last. She had a trick though, like the twins from Matrix Reloaded, of discorporating at the most inconvenient of times, melting through the ground when I reached to flip her. I woke before the battle ended, but I'm confident of my eventual victory. She was on the wrong side of history, that sorceress of my mind.

Oh also the Book of the New Sun is awesome.

well hello

2009-09-30T16:54:00.001-07:00

Today I realized that for the entire duration of my employment at
Google - 3 years and 6 weeks this past monday - I've been
misinterpreting their vacation policy. I thought that after you've
been at the company for 4 years you get 4 weeks of vacation, but in
fact it starts accruing at the 4-weeks-per-year rate starting after
you've been around for 3 years. So start a month and a half ago, I've
got an extra week per year to play with.

Hello extra week, I think we're going to be great friends.

question for the studied among you

2009-09-17T20:05:00.001-07:00

Do any of the romance languages disagree about the gender of particular nouns? Is "heart" masculine in spanish but feminine in french?

well it wasn't daft punk anyway

2009-09-09T00:39:00.001-07:00

"How was it?"
--everyone

Hot. It was more work than I thought it was going to be, and I didn't
even do a significant share of it! Erin shopped ahead of time and did
(is doing) the cleanup afterwards. Shopping/planning, practicing
setting up the yurt, packing way too much stuff and 3 bikes into a
pickup truck, unpacking, actually setting up the yurt and swinging
chair...so many hours of active problem solving had me oscillating
between feelings of manly competency and total despair that we'd ever
make it out alive.

And we even had her parent's house to layover at before and after, I
can't imagine what the poor saps do who go point-to-point without a
yard to lay everything out in before and after.

Overall though it was a really fun and I had a great time exploring
new environments with Erin, which was one of the big reasons I went.

"Was it a life changing experience?"
--coworker who said he'd been there about 12 years ago

Well not immediately. I came back and played an ultimate tournament,
and actually contributed, didn't feel slow or so tired caffeine
couldn't reach me. First day at work after the week off was frantic
catchup, natch, but just about average on the vacay mental
refresh-o-meter.

The feeling of surviving the elements though will probably influence
me in the years to come. I've always loved the feeling of an umbrella
in the rain, a warm coat keeping the snow out. The desert goggles and
face scarf round those out now, and I can see myself intentionally
seeking out other extreme environments (even cold ones) if the
opportunity arises, instead of shying away from them.

"What's the point of it?"
--Classy teammate

I think the most succinct, explicit purpose has been described as "an
experiment in community." Everyone is shiny with openness to new
people, ready to meet a stranger and spend with them 5 minutes, 5
days, or a lifetime. It's a feeling that I've only ever come by
elsewhere at college freshman orientations, certain ultimate frisbee
tournaments and the rare and spectacular house party. They create a
world pregnant with possibility. The gift economy and the
leave-no-trace ethic is impressively adhered to, which really brings
out my inner optimism for human nature.

Some of the praise should be tempered though as Erin points out, a
nontrivial amount of the atmosphere can be attributed to
self-selection by burners, for burners, and the economic pressure from
the ticket price and the cost of supplies to merely get there and
survive; it's not a cheap week. As awe-inspiring as it can be to get
50 thousand like minded people together, it's really only a drop in
the bucket of even the american population.

Proof-of-concept wise, it strikes true, but I'm not sure how well it
could sustain itself as a year-round society - if you'll excuse me for
the moment interpreting it as an experiment with a separate goal,
rather than as an end in itself. Could be easier or harder to sustain
in a less extreme environment, I couldn't really tell you. For some
reason I think it would work better on an entirely isolated space,
like a small moon or asteroid, to cultivate the sense of identity even
more strongly. BM 2110 is gonna be killer.

"Did you see lots of naked women?"
--my (female) tech lead, married with two infant children

Yes, and lots of naked men, and lots of butts hanging out everywhere.

Probably the funniest thing about this question is, this is the sum
total of the conversation she and I had about the event.

"Did you enjoy the pagan ritual?"
--Erin's parents' neighbor, a
gentleman barber who was in the navy during the Laotian Crisis.

Actually I didn't see the burning of the man since I came back to SF for a tournament on labor day weekend. I think I would have
enjoyed it though.

"Who was headlining?"
--Steven's friend I forgot his name

I guess I had been talking about how there are so many glowing mutant
vehicles with DJ platforms and roving dance floors, and given this guy
the wrong impression.

all universe, all the time

2009-08-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

The pools were wild at Chico. Classy came out firing at LA Metro, went up 7-1 at half and closed it out 13-7 for the feel good starter. We couldn't close the deal with Brass Monkey and then let Bidwell get too much of a lead on us late and couldn't come back, so we finished our pool 1-2. Bidwell beat Brass in a universe point game with a time-out-turnover in hardcap, and Metro sliced Bidwell into tiny pieces, so Metro and Brass were both 1-1 going into their own universe point bout. I've never seen a double-game-point determine whether you came out 1st or 4th in the pool, but that's how it was because if Metro won, they'd be 2-1 with the heads-up win against Bidwell, but if they lost they'd be 1-2 with the heads-up loss against us. They lost :D so Bidwell took the 1st place crossover with the heads-up win against Monkey.

Sunday every game we played went to universe point. First game against a team called merge we were down 5-11 in a game to 13, brought it back to 8-11 by the time the softcap went on. Then with score 9-11 and time running out, Hoffman and I said to Mike as he walked to a dead disc, "Mike you need to score before the hardcap goes on or the game is over." So he threw the 65 yard flick to DMo for the score 10 seconds before the hardcap horn sounded to make it 10-11, we got a fresh line on for the tie-up point, then another one for the universe point brawl that lasted 20 minutes into the next round, but eventually we won it after one of their girls turned the disc over with (another!) timeout call right on our endzone line. It seems so harsh to punish that mistake with a turnover, but I guess if they put the disc on the ground what else can you do?

Second game sunday against BAG, we led by 2-3 most of the time but right at the end they turned up their D and caught back up with us during some time when it was unclear whether the softcap was on or not. Brooke Ray caught the winning goal laying out with her arm through the legs of her defender who was standing face-guarding her, but got the disc stripped by her defender's legs, and her defender got pressured by her team into contesting the strip, after which they got the D and took it down the field on us. The next team we were scheduled to play had bailed, but we lined up a game to 7 with Bidwell almost as a warmdown. If only they knew our addiction to the DGP. We ended our time in Chico with a refreshing dip in the canal and a root beer shake from Big Al's Burger Barn (4.5 stars!).

Oh, and we almost died on the drive home! I managed to bump the key in the ignition with my gangly-ass knees on a very dark, crowded I-80 and kill the engine. My first, veteran, words were, "I just turned the car off, don't worry about it." I put the clutch in and tried to turn the key while still at about 60mph, only to achieve a scratching sound. After that attempt and with no ability to accelerate I put the flashers on and moved over through the 4 lanes of assholes blazing past, to the safety of stoppage on the shoulder. At first turning the key still only scratched, but on the third attempt the engine turned over and we were on our way again. Mike said afterward I could have left the key in the on position, put the clutch in and the car in an appropriate gear, then let the clutch out like I was engine breaking, and it should turn the car back on. Anybody tried that before? I'm going to, the first chance I get on a lonely SF hill, because apparently this car loves to skip out at speed...

I just need to admit that I want sugar in my tea

2009-08-06T17:22:00.000-07:00

Hear me, hear me.

Things I've eaten since I started consuming sugar and milk again:
chocolate cake
reese's pieces and peanut butter cups
gummy bears
peach gummy rings
swedish fish
baked peach with nilla wafers, caramel and whipped cream
doctor pepper
root beer
ice cream sandwich
oreo cookie dunked in milk
starbursts
twix
snickers
jelly bellies
tootsie pop
(plus probably lots of others I'm forgetting)

thiings I really want still:
root beer float
apple, pumpkin pie (ala mode? yes!)
ice cream in a cone, waffle and cheap
wendy's frosty
cream soda
(let me know about your favorites, maybe I'll add them to my list too!)

what does amazon think of you

2009-08-04T14:33:00.000-07:00

I was looking to get some new music today so I went to amazon to see what they recommend for me. When I logged in, they had a tag-cloud with categories of things I might want, some larger than others. Biggest for me were "Space Opera" and "Indie Rock," which I'm pretty happy with.

So yeah, anybody happy with a new artist they've discovered lately? Let's do this the old school, ask on the blog way.

albatross

2009-08-03T23:54:00.001-07:00

Flying back from florida was about to suck until Erin's good luck aura saved the day.

We got off the train at ATL with 44 minutes before the flight departed, so the e-checkin terminals wouldn't give us a boarding pass. We went over to the GIANT line for assistance, and I was just hoping to not have to pay for new flights home. But Erin somehow attracted a service lady to the side of the line where we were standing desperately (like 25 people in line were flipping out inside that we were getting helped without waiting at all), and she booked us on an 8pm flight in place of the 1:25 flight that we "definitely" couldn't make it in time for.

So we went through security with our 8pm boarding passes and made it to the gate while zone 4 was boarding on the 1:25 flight. The people at the desk there got us boarding passes for seats nearby each other and we switched to sit next to each other. It was the most amazing airport story gone right I've ever been a part of.

hey, I know that masked man

2009-07-25T09:39:00.001-07:00

What airport am I at? Atlanta? What is a poster of Stu Snodgrass in a purple cape doing on the wall?

Definitely the hilight of this troubled journey so far.

very successful moving day

2009-07-16T11:07:00.001-07:00

I might even go so far as to call it wildly successful. After work and the walkthrough of the new place to spot existing damage, I went back to my old place. Broke down my bed, stuffed it in my car (in retrospect, I can't believe I just assumed it would fit, it was tight), hauled it across the mission and up to my new bedroom. It fits in the bay window!

Definitely need a new showerhead, the existing one barely dribbles... otherwise though, very excited about the new home.

rise and shine

2009-07-15T10:42:00.000-07:00

It's moving day!

Every day I wake up to this song as my alarm I think what a great way it is to enter the world.

In support of status messages

2009-07-11T20:37:00.001-07:00

I never found status messages (in chat, facebook, wherever) to really provide me that much usefulness until I realized that I could use them to passively alert my friends to activities where "the more the merrier" is true.

The last two times I tried it, it's worked out wonderfully, garnering a Ben R at Little Shamrock and hooking me up for dinner with Dmo. Seems silly to have taken so long to realize it, I know... please forgive me my luddite inclinations.

I am an engineer

2009-07-10T16:20:00.000-07:00

I videoconferenced with my manager today to talk about some stuff, and he opened with "Did you get a haircut?"

To which I responded, "Yeah I cut my hair sometimes."

Not facetiously or sarcastically or anything, just matter of fact. I didn't even think about how ridiculously socially inept it was as a response until just now, 45 minutes later.

business trip

2009-05-16T15:18:00.000-07:00

packing list:
passport
ninja pants
cleats
business socks

I arrived! Flights were fine, mostly slept. My host Ian was gracious enough to meet me at the train station and show me how to get to the office and my Google-issue housing before dinner. Tomorrow we go on a hike which will either be 3.5 hours or 7 hours long.

progressive thinking

2009-05-09T08:57:00.001-07:00

A sign at the co-op place where the wedding was in marin said, "unattended children will be given a shot of espresso and a free puppy."

promotion'd!

2009-05-05T20:52:00.001-07:00

Today I found out I got the promotion I applied for. Mo
responsibility, mo money... sadly no mo vacation days until next
summer though. But then it's 4 weeks! I can't wait.

Make sure drinks are on me the next time we're hanging out :D

k2 smoothie

2009-04-30T19:55:00.001-07:00

At the cafe right next to my shuttle stop, they have an item on their menu called the "k2 smoothie." They don't have any other smoothies named after mountains (or sports equipment), and it is exactly the smoothie I would make for you if you asked me to make you one (Fruit, honey, protein powder), so I can only assume it's named after me. I recently bought a blender and started producing these wonders, and yes, the homemade versions are just as good.

I can feel the closed timelike loop approaching where I go back and convince the cafe owners to have this smoothie and name it after me. I wonder if I've already run into my future self without realizing it.

doin sf right

2009-04-25T21:29:00.000-07:00

I realized the other day that I'm coming up this summer on living in the bay area for 3 years now, a significant chunk of how long I've lived anywhere at a stretch. Today was an sf day. I biked about 17 miles so far, with one or two more still planned for this evening's hijinks. Six of us Savage Cats rolled out across the Golden Gate Bridge, something I've wanted to do since I moved here. I thought, like many other touristy things, I would do it when some of my friends were in town. I'm glad it happened with a bunch of folks used to riding though, it was freakin hard, windy and hilly, I wouldn't recommend it as an experience for out of towners briefly in sf. The bridge is too big to take in for me, really, it just seems surreal, but it was sweet seeing kite surfers bounce along from so high above them. After clipsing the bridge and turning back around, we took in some Golden Gate Park disc golf. I eagled the 7th hole with a 45 yard flick, which was probably the coolest thing I've done all month, and then we ate some meatball subs at King Foot Subs on Divis at Haight, after which I needed to sit in my bed for a little bit to just be warm and soft and stationary.

In unrelated news, I'm kind of curious how much news my Mom gets about my life through facebook via my Dad, now that he and I are facebook friends. I sort of assume all of it, or at least as much as I'm willing to part with to facebook, but who knows. Mom if you want to chime in here, feel free :D

grr, argh.

2009-04-08T10:23:00.000-07:00

After a couple early episodes laying the groundwork, Dollhouse has been SOOO good lately. You can watch it on Hulu but they only keep the last 5 episodes around so if you want to start from the beginning (recommended) you'll probably need to download the first ones from iTunes.

I played two days of grass ultimate in a row at Davis this weekend. Skied my defender for the 13-10 winning goal in our last game sunday, great way to remember the weekend.

Turns out timely icing of my knee is way better than two days later icing. And it's enough, so all I need to do is keep the cold compresses handy. Aislinn is going to invent me a re-usable instant cold pack. Horray for useful degrees!

Yesterday I graduated from physical therapy and I officially only need to do it 3 times a week, forever. Only 4 more weeks to the hang-gliding reward though, if I keep it up.

I was doing my PT in the gym last week and the yoga teacher who does 5:30 tuesday classes recruited me. My arms are way weaker than my legs after all this PT (go figure) but it was right about my pace so I'm going to keep going. Also, free, and afterwards very easy to get delicious dinner (fried chicken with biscuits and gravy last night) makes this one a winner.

Finished reading the Watchmen novel. Which Watchmen character are you? I'm definitely Veidt.

I walked out of my apartment without my keys this morning. I went up to my roof and down the fire escape, wiggled through my bathroom window and fetched my keys, so that I wouldn't be totally locked out of my apartment when I came home tonight. Gotta remember that I put one of my plants that was on my bathroom windowsill out onto the fire escape because I couldn't reach anywhere to put it inside the bathroom.

I am 410 shared items in the hole on the Goog Reader, and I just don't care.

the knee chronicles ctd

2009-03-15T20:32:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to report my first tournament on grass in over a year was a raging success. I only ever felt my knee, in a minor non-persistent way, on a step or two during the first warm-up drills after the 15 minute breaks between games. Of which there were 6 in 9 hours. So I'm sore as, especially my calves, but mostly just giddy to be playing again. Shit goddamn, all this work to get back here was worth it.

I still have about a month more of PT 5 days a week because the last time I went to my therapist I had only just started running without my brace, and some of the exercises I had been assigned were still causing me to feel it a bit towards the end of them. So I asked for one more meeting, to have something to work towards and motivate me to finish out my PT.

An hour a day of laying on the ground lifting your leg in awkward ways and doing squats of various types is a pretty steep commitment, and I could tell that as soon as I was playing again *almost* symptom free I'd have a lot less motivation to keep it up. So I also made a deal with Nesta, because she has PT she needs to do too, that if we both do all of our assignments over the next two months, we can go hang gliding at the end of it. Mmmm, positive reinforcement. So far I'm one week in and already one of the days I only did it so that I could hang glide, so I know it was the right choice. My therapist says "maintenance mode" after I'm symptom free for a while is twice a week (for the rest of my life...), so I can see this type of bi-monthly positive reinforcement continuing on indefinitely too. Which won't be that bad I bet, cuz I'll get to do all those things on my list of things to do before I die, like shoot a gun, and drive a convertible down the coast on a road trip.

my achilles' heel

2009-03-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

I was telling Dmo for some reason the other day that giant flying bugs are my achilles' heel*. Just now the biggest bee I've ever seen wandered into my apartment. Let me clarify: the biggest, STUPIDEST bee I've ever seen.

I was asleep. At first, not knowing the size of the thing, based on the buzz and number of times I heard it throw itself against the window by the foot of my bed, I assumed it was a fly. For some reason I couldn't imagine a bee being that dumb. Ok I know it's not something you've ever experienced before, this whole invisible force field thing, but seriously, after the 10th or 11th time being physically turned back you'd think you'd try a different tactic.

But no, this ping-pong-ball-sized behemoth kept at it. When I saw the size of it I came awake pretty instantly. I evaluated my options. The bathroom window wasn't far from where the bee was currently bashing its stupid brain in, but I had no way to encourage it to go there apart from getting WAY too close to it for comfort. So I lay in bed watching its every move, hoping it would get tired and die, because it sure as hell didn't seem to be trying anything else except for throwing itself headlong into the same spot on the window over and over.

Then it flew towards me. I shrieked and threw the blankets over my head. I had been prepared for this eventuality and the rest of my body was covered already even though it was starting to get pretty hot in my apartment. Under my blanket, I listened to it hit the window right next to my bed once, and then, mercifully, the sound of the buzz droned away and got quieter until I couldn't hear it anymore. It must've found a window!

But I couldn't be sure. My sense of hearing was not acute enough under the blanket to even tell what direction it had gone, just that it had flown a length of time without hitting anything and then I stopped being able to hear it. It could still be in the apartment somewhere, biding its time, waiting for me to pull my wang out and go pee before buzzing its dumb buzz right back into my most private world again!

So I got out of bed. I found a book and a mostly spent roll of paper towels for defense, and I started poking stuff in my room to see if a freaky jurassic-era insect would fly out of it at me. My fridge's compressor clicked on, and I unplugged it; no way I was going to let it have that aural camouflage. My bed and the bathroom seemed clear. As idiotic as this bee was, I just couldn't imagine it would make it into the bathroom and not find its way out the 6 inches of open window, so I felt comfortable enough to take my morning poo.

But the bee wasn't gone. By dumb luck though it was on the other side of my apartment at the kitchen window. At this point I knew I had made a grave error in judgement about the poo being safe, because the kitchen window is open just as far as the bathroom window and yet the bee, flying at it from a good distance away, somehow missed the giant section of open air and instead went straight for the pane. I promised myself I would never over-estimate this bee again.

I watched it from my bed for a while considering what options I had now. I dared not leave the apartment, to come back full of fear that it could still be lurking here, or start cooking something so close to where the bee was dancing its senseless dance. But soon enough I would need to eat, or perish in defeat of this small winged beast.

I opted for the rather safe "throw some ear plugs at it" tactic. I hoped that it would get distracted by the bombardment enough to realize that its freedom was only a foot away below it, without putting me directly in harm's way. This tactic did not work. I threw three ear plugs, all of them striking the window within a couple inches of the bee, but it went on unperturbed. Two bounced harmlessly into my sink, while the third actually tumbled through a misalignment in the window panes and down to the ground outside. This is how dumb this bee was: an inanimate object beat it to the punch.

My next tactic was inspired by the honeysticks sitting in my kitchen. I grabbed one, and was prepared to bite down and leave some bait at the open section of the window. Maybe the bee had some ability to sense and move towards honey. This seemed reasonable enough to me to warrant getting a lot closer to it than I wanted to get. But, wonder of wonders, right as I was about to effect this strategy, the bee managed to accidentally fall through the same misalignment of panes the ear plug had gone through earlier. I cheered for it, and it flew off. Knock on wood, my trials with this bee appear to be over.

None of this would've happened I'm sure, if I had just woken up early to go eat bacon and mango sausage at Mary's this morning, but I guess it's just the cosmic price I had to pay, to sleep in on the saturday of St. Patrick's day.

*Dmo's response was that his achilles' heel is bullets.

saturday

2009-03-08T23:41:00.000-07:00

sun
roof
bare feet
sunglasses
folding chair
Consider Phlebas
honeysticks from noe
sunchips and bottled water
jambox on calvin harris genius mode
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

and, as of sunday, things that my knee can do again:
. play ultimate on grass
. get low, low, low, low, low, low, low.

what word am I thinking of?

2009-03-03T23:07:00.000-08:00

Justified
Ratified
Embodied
Consecrated
Verified
Exonerated

These are not it. This is killing me.

I am more excited about this backpack than I reasonably should be.

2009-02-27T09:00:00.000-08:00

I think I was in 6th grade or so the last time I got a new backpack. I went with my mom to the store, and she suggested the slick, expensive LLBean bag. With my budding financial sensibilities I said to my mother, "Mom I don't need such an expensive one, why not get a cheaper one?" To which my mom replied, "Because you'll have this bag for the next 10 years."

And I did. 13 years, actually, if I'm remembering the year I got it correctly. Every textbook I had from that point on passed through its gentle pouch. Countless small possessions became covered with the tiny black plastic pellets that the bag somehow had an endless supply of. I burnt a little cauterized hole in the top of it with a sparkler on July 4th one year in Michigan. I lost it at my first of 7 (or was it 8?) Pada Mosh tournaments with my wallet, cell phone, and a disc inside, and had it returned to the Tournament Director missing only the disc (isn't that just the way with frisbee players?).

But over christmas this year I was a bit rough with one of the zippers and the bag became a uni-zip. Not the end of its life by any means, it came with me dutifully on every other trip I've gone on this year. But I heeded the warning, nay, request, of my backpack to move onto greener pastures. I loaded up the LLBean website, hoping to find the exact same model (yeah right!) but settling for one that looked very promising.

I made the transfer this morning, eschewing the google issue laptop-backpack because this new one has a laptop flap too, amongst its many folds. It's so much lighter! It makes me think I've forgotten something, but everything is there, tucked safely away. The waist straps that I had to cut off my old bag because they were too annoying, on this model now have a handy hide-away fold that provides lumbar support! This is definitely the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Unlike many other loved possessions in my life, I never named my backpack, it was always just Backpack. Why would I? There was only ever one. It would be like calling my mom by her first name.

Backpack is dead! Long live Backpack!

I made up a word

2009-02-26T19:23:00.000-08:00

I think I just coined an original word that will most definitely come into common usage and probably get entered into Websters at some point. I just did a google search for it and found no results. So you heard it hear first, folks.

blagoraphobe: n. Someone who is generally afraid of the world wide blagowebs. Clinically self-diagnosed by having seen 10 or fewer of the 99 things on this list.

this is for my records you don't have to read it twice

2009-02-24T19:44:00.000-08:00

Ye old Clipper St house blog had a post from Carmina today that Goog Reader cached but apparently she withdrew. Why the retraction, Carmina?

I went to the blogger admin interface for the blog trying to see if there was a record of it still there, but apparently no. Anyway, while I was there I saw a post I made that included some dreams I had in May last year. And because I'm OCD I must enter them here and tag them with the dreams label. My future self demands it.

I went to visit Jaffar in the desert, where there was a motorcycle race course. One of the obstacles in the course was an enormous piece of wood, like made by aliens or the work of slaves for generations enormous. Jaffar had the corner apartment with a view, and when we were inside I could see that it wasn't actually a single piece of wood but rather a million tiny logs held together by elastic cords. There were hollows inside that we slung through, but we had to be very very qwiet because his parents were asleep in the next hollow over.

I went to a Burger King for the Mother's Day special, but they must've mixed up my order because I just got a regular double cheeseburger. "That cheeseburger is poisoning America" Crank tells me matter-of-factly. At that point I saw next door a McDonalds with a big sign for their Mother's Day special, which was an eleventy-patty burger. We went over but couldn't get in because the doors were blocked by waffle fries from floor to ceiling.

we have a number one contender, at least

2009-02-22T23:16:00.000-08:00

A very ambitious February has made a great early run at Month of the Year. Let's recap what's happened so far:

. Steelers win the super bowl.

. I travel 4 weekends in a row subjecting myself to some SERIOUS drinking (it's 2009, not messing around tines), but also get runs in 3-4 days a week and do 90% of the PT for my knee, and do not get sick.

. I snowboard again for the first time in 13 months, without reinjury.

. I discover the optimal sleeping position for my body. It's called the "Roadkill Flamingo." Lay on your back with a pillow propping up your midback and two propping up your shoulders and head, with one leg bent out so the flat of your foot touches your other knee. During the night, alternate legs being tucked and which side to rest your head on, to taste. Requires a very soft bed (Sleep Number 15-20, for those of you playing along at home). On average 4 days a week I will wake up in exactly the position I fell asleep in, with absolutely no back pain. My unconscious self has started getting cocky; dominant pre-alarm thoughts if the dawn pulls me out of my drowse are typically along the lines of "what, Day, that's all you got? bring it."

. Jenna and I figure out that you can dodge the worst of the sunday-night-leaving-tahoe traffic by taking Donner Pass (not nearly as sketchy as it sounds), so we get back to SF in time to catch a good 6 seconds of our friends visiting from Pittsburgh for the weekend, and see Best Actor, Actress, and Picture awards on the telly (Yeah Sean Penn!)

I'm Knocking on wood here a little since there are still 6 days left. Also, the still-being-planned July/August Europe Trip will hopefully give any month a run for its money. But so far, it seems like the only downside is that tofuman.com (tofu that tastes like humans, for the cannibal trying to cut back) is already parked, and when it comes down to it, that just isn't so bad.

eureka

2009-02-06T14:27:00.000-08:00

I think I finally know what kind of chair I want to sit in. It would be kind of like a wobble board, to keep my muscle tension balanced symmetrically across my body. However, a balance board's immediate feedback would be too quick. I want to sit on a Wii Fit board (padded, clearly) that has some custom algorithms to detect when my weight has been distributed asymmetrically for too long. Then it would have the ability to slowly tilt the board slightly to force me to shift my weight back to being symmetrical again.

Ok, now since I thought of it, it must already exist right? Cuz I want one.

be steel my heart

2009-02-02T10:26:00.000-08:00

(title shamelessly stolen from Jessica's status message)

I had to refresh my memory this morning of what happened in the game last night. I remembered good things happened when it looked like all was lost, but that was about it. Yeah Santonio!!! I can't wait for the DVD.

musculofictional conditioning, I call it

2009-01-28T21:12:00.000-08:00

I used my accumulated credits on audible.com three days ago to download 6 joint Hugo and Nebula award winners: The Forever War, Forever Peace, Ringworld, Paladin of Souls, American Gods, and Startide Rising.

I started arbitrarily with The Forever War and finished it today. With an hour each way on the bus and one in the middle of the day during physical therapy (I can apparently, usually, keep count of seconds held and how many exercises I've done while still absorbing verbal information) it went pretty quickly. If I keep the pace up on weekdays I'll finish the other 5 stories in about two months.

My secret hope is that the hour of PT I spend each day listening to science fiction will become irreversibly entwined with my neuromuscular development, and any time spent listening to SF later in life will result in stronger glutes and quads regardless of what I'm physically doing during the listening. Of course I'll probably need to have some Gibson or Heinlein soothing my ears any time I hit the gym for it to be effective, but that's a price I'm willing to pay.

insta-karma is a bitch

2009-01-26T21:02:00.000-08:00

I put my bike on the rack and, still wearing my helmet, got on the bus. A guy I know looked at me with a grin and started to say, "Are you going to wear that helmet all the way..." only he didn't finish his sentence, because he banged his head on the overhead compartment as he sat down. "I bet you wish you were wearing one too, huh?" He just smiled and rubbed his head.

and in other news...

2009-01-21T19:14:00.000-08:00

I finally figured out how to get the metal racks back into my oven. They were upside down.

i would like to see infrared

2009-01-15T23:03:00.001-08:00

i'm not sure why i was thinking about it, but people would really freak out if you tried to prevent them from having children. nowhere in any constitution that i know of is the right to procreation enumerated. china limits you to 1 kid, but that isn't zero kids. and it definitely isn't zero kids for some, some kids for others.

because that is eugenics, right, and eugenics is evil. it's playing god. and i can get behind that judgement. who is anyone to tell you that you don't have the right to exist, that you don't have the right to prove your fitness and reproduce so your spawn may tackle the challenges you left unfinished? in the collective societal sense, here.

so then what's the difference between eugenics and genetic modification? that's playing god. but in a positive way. like eugenics is clubbing nancy kerrigan, and genetics is getting a personal trainer to kick your ass so you're better. or maybe it's more like taking steroids, which has some risk too. but they're kind of frowned upon, as in illegal, i think. so why isn't genemod illegal? just because we don't know how to that much yet?

come to think of it, why are steroids illegal? maybe it's because they're harmful but there is incentive to do them so society feels it has to protect you from hurting yourself. but genemod is different, at least if you're thinking of doing it to an unborn child. that child didn't have any choice. i think tech should only exist to give consenting adults genemods, and not otherwise. unless there's some compelling need to improve humanity in a hurry of course, like if a race of super cockroaches from mars started to invade the planet. but that seems unlikely.

all systems are go

2009-01-10T19:59:00.001-08:00

I played several hours of beach ultimate today and so far my knee is feeling really good. Also, playing beach on jan 10 a short bike ride away from home is sweet as.

who knew?

2008-12-28T22:40:00.000-08:00

I just want to point out that a post I made in Feb 2006 references a slashdot article about political blogging, and the tag quote there is from Obama saying how much he likes the medium.

Really, I should've seen Obama's ascendence coming, the writing was clearly on the wall. Still waiting for that 14 year old to take over the world though.

on the nature of being

2008-12-28T21:11:00.000-08:00

I've barely made it through 2 chapters of Brian Greene's The Fabric of the Cosmos (a christmas present from my brother-in-law's mother with whom I had the pleasure of sharing this christmas) and it's already got me waxing philosophical. In particular I was thinking about another story, sci fi classic The Nine Billion Names of God.

Read it (it's short).

Okay let's continue rambling here.

I read this story, I'm sure, when I was about 12 some summer at the cabin. It left me sort of ....uneasy, in a way I have a hard time expressing still.

Science fiction takes the world we know and twists an interesting part, to see what noise it makes. In Nine Billion Names, Clarke supposes there is a knowable, communicable, highest purpose in the universe. I think it's that premise that unsettles me. Probably because, if there is such a thing, I feel I ought to know it, and be communicating it. Is it a fault in myself that I can't fully get behind the religion of my fathers? Should I be trying on others to see if they fit?

I believe, to at least some extent, in fate and predestination. Because of a few very memorable, very sweet moments, where I've felt that intelligent volitional choices were being made that determined my perceptions, but those choices were not being made by me. And because of the overwhelming presence of synchronicity in my life, when I care to consider it. But maybe I'm attributing that last symptom to the wrong cause.

I can make my hiccups stop just by thinking about it. But if I get distracted during, it doesn't go so well and the hiccups come back.

I believe that God speaks to me through pain and joy. A corollary is that evolution is the purest expression of God's voice in this world. If that means I believe in intelligent design, so be it.

So yeah I don't know, what do you guys think?

mmm running

2008-12-11T14:47:00.000-08:00

Well it wasn't just like my dreams where I'm practically flying while dodging bad guys, but my knee felt good enough today that I decided to test it out on the treadmill for 10 minutes. Felt good during and still feels good now, I iced it afterwards just to be safe.

My cautious optimism is now being upgraded to 'guarded.'

this is the coolest thing I've ever seen

2008-12-10T10:13:00.000-08:00

I can't even explain to you how happy I am that this exists: http://change.gov/openforquestions.

Google Moderator is the external version of an app that we use to pick the questions we want presenters to answer at Google events like Tech Talks and all-company/all-department meetings. And now we, you, I get to use it with the President-elect of the United States. Today is a great day.

yay, physical therapy!

2008-12-08T20:41:00.001-08:00

Nothing to show on my MRI except the expected scarring on my PCL from the sprain in february. She said that will probably never go away but can be mitigated with a brace, definitely no need for any surgery, prescribed me an anti-inflammatory for the pain in the front of my knee and sent me back to PT for 8 weeks.

I can't say I'm excited to hear that I apparently just failed to rehabilitate myself correctly the first time but rationally I know it's better than hearing many of the alternatives, so I'll get over it.

I asked the pharmacy consult if it was ok to drink while on the anti-inflammatory and he said, "Yeah no problem. In fact maybe you should have a couple, could help you relax." Heh, ktopia 2008: doctor's orders.

rays and resonance

2008-12-03T14:12:00.001-08:00

I saw an orthopedic surgeon today. Based on the xray, my testimony and her poking and prodding, she says I basically "have a good knee" and should be able to play again, but because it's been since february she scheduled me for an MRI (this saturday) to double check. If nothing surprising shows up there it sounded like she'd be referring me to a trainer of some variety to guide me while I build my confidence in my knee back up at whatever pace it'll allow.

I'm kind of hoping something will show up on the MRI to vindicate how long this has been taking for me, but if not then I guess I'll just try to forget about the last 9 months and keep moving forward. The medical assistant promised to get me back in after the MRI before I leave for christmas, so at least the waiting-without-knowing time will be limited.

turkey day in p-town

2008-12-01T19:22:00.000-08:00

"That's so expensive!"
"Whatever, charge it to the bailout."
-Brenden

The Alchemy of Stone was awfully repetitive. I hope it's not the best example of steampunk out there, I had such high hopes for that (sub)genre based on the sweetness of its name. I stopped trying to force my way through it and borrowed The Time Traveler's Wife from Meghan, which was excellent. While I was reading in vegas, headphones on, a drunk guy who had been swearing loudly about delays attempted to commiserate with me. I pulled my headphones off and tried to wrest control of my mind away from Buddy Rich and Clare DeTamble, but failed and just stared dumbly at the drunkard. "Read your book. Read your book." he told me. Later airline workers approached the guy after he had been slapping his armrest and swearing some more. They asked him if he had been drinking, and when he slurred, "a little" they told him he would be rebooked on a morning flight because there was an FAA rule against flying in his condition. Did he have a place to stay? No. He could stay in the airport overnight if he liked.

"Which one of your pumpkin ales tastes the most like pumpkin pie?"
-Diana

My youngest brother, a sophomore in highschool, sent 8000 txt messages last month. Assuming he slept only 7 hours a night, that's one txt every sixteen and a half waking minutes. When does he find time to update his facebook status, is what I want to know.

wash'n'fold

2008-11-18T17:27:00.000-08:00

After Jamo discovered Wash'N Fold I had to give it a try. It was going well. I'd proclaim to others, once you go Wash'N Fold, you don't go back. That is, until they lost my clothes.

Apparently the one nearest my house does their Wash'N'N Foldin in the public washers and dryers. So any random blowhard can steal your pink elephant underwear. Should you have such an item.

When I got my bag home this morning and opened it up, I discovered the contents were not mine. When I took it back and asked the lady why she put my clothes in the wrong bag, she said she knew all her customers and would never put my clothes in their bags (I'm a new customer, she hasn't acquainted herself with my dainties yet) so someone must've stolen my clothes and put her laundry ticket for my clothes onto a different dryer.

All but two of my work-acceptable shirts was in the load, and all but two pairs of underwear. I held up the pants and saw they were about a 40-32. I'm a 32-34, I would need like 6 belts to make that work. The lady offered me a hundred bucks for all my clothes. I tried to estimate at the cost, but mostly felt sentimental for the Classy jersey, the blue collared CK longsleeve my mom bought me in highschool.

...And then she remembered that somebody had left their clothes in the dryer over the weekend. When I looked they were mine. They were damp and smelly, but she's washing them again and I'll pick them up tomorrow morning, God willing. I took a couple spare pairs of underwear just in case.

Then I stepped in dog poop getting out of my car after getting to work late, had to throw away my sandals. The rest of the day has been unremarkable.

president obama

2008-11-05T01:14:00.000-08:00

It's pretty amazing, I don't think I've ever seen my demographic get behind something like this. Except, you know, when it's drinking, like for Bay to Breakers. The city has the same feel tonight that it did on halloween, or the Red Bull soapbox derby. Cars honking and people screaming nonstop on Market, random blocks closed off by popo for packed dance parties. Street cleaners out and about mopping it all up, fireworks.

I am so, so relieved that there weren't electoral hijinks. No attacks, didn't see any disenfranchisement reports, some people got rain on their ballots and lots had to wait in long lines. McCain concedes with what I think was his best speech ever. It's given me back some faith in the process.

The first thing I want to see is the program Obama has talked about, trading unarmed civil service for college money/loans. And if I'm eligible.

photorama

2008-09-18T20:45:00.000-07:00

I don't sync my iphone very often. I found some photos on it that I like though.

Chris Grant-o-meal

This is drew after we put him inside a sleeping bag and asked him to do the worm for us. It made sense at the time, I think.

what color would they be?

2008-08-26T09:39:00.000-07:00

A group of us went in for the surgery, me and three other girls. Hospital smocks on, we stood around the operating table waiting for the surgeon. "You'll have to go one at a time" they tell us. I get on the table and close my eyes. The surgeon comes over with a fork. "Is it going to hurt?" "Yes, but only until they're completely removed." I feel four stabbing points on my right eyelid. The pressure increases but then stops. "I can't break through. I'll need to numb you up and go through the roof of your mouth." I suggest leaving my eyes open, but he's already getting the syringe with the anesthesia ready. There's a chance it will just be dark forever. The other girls look scared and when the metal numb reminds me of the dentist I've had enough too. "Actually god gave me pretty good ones."

Two of the girls bug out with me but the third looks determined. "Will I be able to move my eyebrows after?" She asks. Yes. She put some makeup on and I watched to see if her eyebrows moved. They didn't. I would probably go through with it if I couldn't move my eyebrows. The extra colors would be nice too, UV, infrared. I hope it works out for her.

team bonding

2008-08-13T18:48:00.000-07:00

the intertubes for dummies

2008-08-07T11:25:00.000-07:00

Before I get into a crash course about webweb, my top 5 Guilty Pleasures movies (movies that you love but when you tell people that they go "oh, come on!"):

The Devil Wears Prada
Mean Girls
Demolition Man
Deja Vu
Legally Blonde

Now, this is recap for most of you, but for the dinosaurs out there, listen up, this stuff is our culture now. Pretty soon you won't be able to converse with us if you don't keep up, because everything we say will be derivative, referential comments to these originals. Feel free to add any of the million things I missed in the comments.

Powerthirst
Powerthirst 2
End of the world
I CAN HAS CHEEZ BURGER (cute pictures of cats with grammatically incorrect captions, aka "LOL cats")
Om nom nom nom (one of the derivative tangents of lolcats)
Fail Blog
Strong Bad Emails
Teen Girl Squad (a cartoon drawn by Strong Bad)

score!

2008-07-31T16:42:00.000-07:00

Last week I saw a guy at lunch at the goog reading the 25th Annual Year's Best, and I went online to buy it. I didn't see it within the first 25 seconds of my search but I *did* see a copy of the 14th annual on sale through goog checkout for one (1) dollar. It's for real, in my hot little hands right now, stamped second-hand by Mid-Continent Public Library in Raytown MO. The future of 1997, here I come!

philip k dick

2008-07-29T23:30:00.000-07:00

you know how a good writer's style will have an infectious effect on your mental patterns? When I read tom robbins, for example I always feel like an incredibly verbose hippy. Well I'm in the middle of A Scanner Darkly, whose main character is an undercover cop worried that he's going insane from so much time with his junkie friends. It's making me feel like Charlie from Flowers for Algernon on his downward slide. I know there's something wrong but I can never keep my finger on it, and I sure as hell don't know how to stop it.

overheard on a sideline

2008-07-28T20:24:00.000-07:00

(discussing Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation, a scene-by-scene remake created by 12-year-olds in 1989)

frisbee hippy: ...they're all grown up now and tour around with it every couple years. It's on Beta, if you ever get a chance to see it you should.

other frisbee hippy: Beta? Is that like Youtube?

frisbee hippy: no, it's like Betamax.

wonder who's in the body boxes

2008-07-28T13:18:00.000-07:00

There was a wedding at the cabin, everyone was dressed formally and they all got their nice clothes very muddy and were very happy about it. I went exploring in the basement, and found it had turned into a crypt of some kind, housing maybe 20 or 30 upright sarcophagai of different, bright, colors. There was no room to walk so I crawled on their tops and they wobbled beneath me. When I reached the wall I realized it was made of metal, and on fire. Luckily I had some spare change in my pocket, so for each tile along the wall I melded a cool nickel or quarter into it, to absorb the heat and put out the fire. When I had gone all the way around 3 walls, I saw that there was an opening into a larger treasure trove, full of old Vinyl LPs and CDs, what must've been a hip music store. I picked up a guitar with very loose strings that couldn't possibly have been in tune, but every time I strummed it the most beautiful music came out.

space junk

2008-07-26T23:39:00.000-07:00

did anybody else see that thing that fell from the sky tonight around, I don't know, 9:30? It was brighter and slower than any shooting star and definitely heading straight down to the horizon.

I can't wait til new years.

smells like burning

2008-07-24T15:14:00.000-07:00

I'm going to go with more painful than a root canal, but probably less painful than childbirth, if only because it was much shorter.

More reports as they come once the uh, smoke clears, so to speak.

the dark knight

2008-07-20T03:07:00.000-07:00

Kills major characters, check. Brings up the question of how much power is too much power for mortal men to possess, check. Line between good and bad kind of blurry, check. Badass fighting scenes and (lots of) stuff blows up, check.

I think the only thing Serenity has on The Dark Knight is that Serenity calms down enough at times to be knee-slappingly funny. So it stays at number one. But I'm open to argument.

For Joss Whedon fans

2008-07-17T11:17:00.000-07:00

I shared this on my reader, but for any lurkers not close with me there, you really can't miss this super villian musical in three acts. Acts 3 goes up thursday I hear.

http://www.drhorrible.com/act_I.html
http://www.drhorrible.com/act_II.html

your turbinates, they are huge

2008-07-14T20:47:00.000-07:00

That's what she said. Heh.

So I'm wondering why it's taking my knee so long to heal and my doctor suggests maybe I'm having trouble getting enough oxygen while I'm sleeping because I've got a boomerang nose deviated septum.

Down I go to the ENT (Ear Nose Throat) doctor. He pries open my nostrils and says, no, actually the deviation isn't that bad but my, your turbinates, aren't they something. Turbinates are like balloons that regulate airflow through the sinuses. And mine are big freakin balloons. At first he just proscribes me nasonex, but that doesn't seem to have any affect. Then I went to get a CAT scan and it turns out my turbinates are so big they are barely letting any air through at all. This pretty much matches my experience for as long as I can remember.

We're still waiting on the results of the allergy test, but he says regardless of the outcome I'll want to do something to bring down the size of these monsters. Apparently the procedure involved is to stick a metal thing into my nose which will send microwaves in to attack these malignant concha. There will be local anasthetic but I'll still feel something, he says. Most people feel fine. One woman (of the ...40 people he's done this procedure to) said it was more painful than childbirth.

I'm excited. It's scheduled for next thursday.

I will get back at you somehow, subconscious.

2008-07-11T18:33:00.000-07:00

For the last two nights in a row I've dreamt that I could run. Cruel, cruel dreams.

linux: full of win

2008-07-01T10:53:00.000-07:00

sudo strings /dev/mem | grep -C 30 "my long bunch of unsaved text"

Yes, that command searches through the contents of your computer's memory looking for that thing you wish you had saved to disk but didn't, because it's probably still stored in RAM.

I bet it would work on your mac too.

brits

2008-06-05T17:00:00.000-07:00

An image that's been on my mind a lot recently.

politico

2008-06-04T10:34:00.000-07:00

I was walking downtown last night with a couple friends and a homeless guy filtering through recyclables turned towards us with a shit-eating grin on his face. "Obama's got it!" he said, "he got it." We laughed and said back, "Yeah!" It was perhaps the best interaction I've ever had with a homeless dude in SF.

I caught the tail end of Hillary's speech before catching my bus home yesterday. "Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, I'm not making any decisions tonight." I saw on the ticker the total delegate count. Obama had 2119, just one more than the required 2118 for the nomination.

I'd bet some cold hard cash that more than one super delegate approached Obama weeks ago and said, we want to declare for you, and he said, now just hang on, wait til the moment's right. The right moment being the end of the primary, when the newsbyte can be, "Primaries over, Obama reaches delegate tipping-point." cnn.com doesn't have a prominent delegate count up anymore, just a bunch of articles terming Obama the presumptive nominee. Shrewd.

Now, Hillary, she knows she just got check-mated, so why not concede? I think she wants the VP spot. So she holds out the threat. Super delegates can change their mind. The convention hasn't happened yet, presumptive is still, presumptive. Do you know which super delegate likes PB&J on rye bread with a little foot-rub before going to bed? Hillary does. And she's crazy. She'll do it. Put the super delegate down, Hillary, I think some fire just came out the side of your mouth. Do you need a cool glass of water, maybe a Tums or seven? The vice presidency, sure, take it!

And the nomination goes to: Hypnotoad!

lions and tigers and pods, oh my.

2008-04-24T14:02:00.000-07:00

For those of you who liked Singularity's Ring, here's another pod fic that I really liked:
http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/originals/originals_archive/abraham2/abraham21.html

If the page is slow to load, add this line to your /etc/hosts file, I guess their adserver is timing out:

127.0.0.1 a.as-us.falkag.net

What, you're running Windows? Try an adblocker or something. Or another OS.

this time with feeling

2008-04-14T20:49:00.000-07:00

Maxim tells me Joss Whedon is going back to Fox. Apparently they promise to air the episodes in the right order this time.

That interview is from before the writers' strike so I'm not sure when the show will actually air. The premise sounds exactly like a short story by Mary Rosenblum (no up-to-date web presence, tsk tsk) called Home Movies. I can lend you the Asimov's issue I read it in if you end up liking the show. Rosenblum's story was a bit heavy on the transparent romantic idealism, but the adventure was a good one.

patrick swazi: crocodile hunter

2008-04-10T07:31:00.000-07:00

Opening credits: Patrick Swazi swimming underwater in the ocean. You can't see the surface, but he isn't so far down because there's plenty of light in the water. The Title credit floats into view in front of Swazi: "Three Dukes: A Tribute." A little later Swazi swims through the title, dispersing it.

Scene 1: Caskets everywhere. Yellow caskets. "They're biodegradable" says Swazi. Indeed, in the lush river valley where the caskets have been the longest, they have degraded into solid masses. "Sometimes they line up. We use the fault lines as entry points for medical teams." He demonstrates by pushing mounds of biomass apart along a fault line. Inside is a victorian home, echoing the sounds of a polite dinner party. We enter.

Scene 2: Hiding behind marble columns, we spy on the dinner party. Fortunately, our attire is appropriate, so when we are spotted, we blend into the conversation. A woman's conversation with Swazi becomes quite animated. She begins to yell. "Every time I get close to you, you reset me!"

Scene 3: Swazi is making out with a porpoise. The surf laps against them. Swazi has a fat, enthusiastic sidekick. It is his job to line up aquatic animals to smooch Swazi. "There's a power in it" the sidekick says. "Worlds are created." The next animal he has lined up is an alligator. It snaps wildly, but the fat sidekick sits down on its head, clamping the jaws closed. Swazi and the porpoise finish up, and it flops back into the sea. He looks at the alligator dubiously. I do not envy him.

oh the web we weave

2008-04-04T18:07:00.000-07:00

I had a delightful email exchange today with Aekta and Ethan, started by Aekta's question of whether we have a tournament on June 7-8.

Aekta:

Please respond only in Morse Code or Ig-pay Atin-lay; we must keep the ruskies off our trail!

Thanks,
.-.-.--.-

Ethan:

.-.-.--.-,
As-ay far-ay as-ay I-ay ow-nay, e-way ont-day ave-hay any-ay ournaments-tay at-they eekend-way, and-ay I-ay ont-day ee-say any-ay on-ay e-they UPA....ay ebsite-way at-they e-way ould-way ant-way ooo-tay o-gay ooo-tay.
don't start a fire if you can't stand the heat!
-Ethan

Aekta:

.--. /.-.././.-/.../. // .. // ../-./...-/./-./-/./-.. // ..-./../.-./. ///

Ethan:

UGxlYXNlLiBGaXJlIGludmVudGVkIG1
lISBBbmQgcHVuY3R1YXRpb24hIExp
a2UgdGhlIGV4Y2xhbWF0aW9uIHBva
W50IQ0KLUV0aGFuIQ0KDQooSSBob
3BlIGsyIGlzIG5vdCB3YXN0aW5nIGh
pcyB0aW1lIHdpdGggdGhpcykNCg==
(http://tinyurl.com/5jsyl)

Me (with email attachment):

(http://mozaiq.org/decrypt/)

Aekta:

BYOXO !!!

Ethan:

deal? I'll show you deal!!
(glad to see you were foolish enough to join us k2)

00100110001000110011000100110
11000110001001110110111010101
01000000101011001001100010001
10011000100110111001100000011
10110010101000100110001000110
01100100011000100110011001110
11001010100010011000100011001
10001001110000011011000111011
00100110001000110011000100110
11100110000001110110101010101
01101001001011011010100101010
10010011000100011001100010011
01100011100100111011001011010
10010100010011000100011001100
01001110000011000100111011010
01010001001100010001100110001
00110110001110000011101100100
11000100011001100010011011100
11000100111011010100110010011
00010001100110001001101100011
10010011101101111001011001010
11100110111010001101000011010
01011100110110100101110011011
00001011101000110111101110100
01100001011011000110110001111
00101100110011000010110101101
10010101110011011101000111001
00110100101101110011001110010
11100010111000101110011000100
11011110110111101111001011000
01001001100010001100110001001
10111001100000011101100100110
00100011001100010011011100110
00000111011001001100010001100
11100000110010001100010011100
00011101100100110001000110011
00010011100000110001001110110
11010010110000101101101011101
00011010000110010101110111011
00001011011000111001001110101
01110011001010100100000000110
10100110010011010100010101000
10001100110100011010100110111
00011001001101000001100110011
01000010101001000000010100110
11001100110100001110011011010
000011001001101000

Aekta:

69 5c 27 6c 6c 20 66 61 6b 65 20 79 6f 75 72 20 73 74 72 69 6e 67 20 61 6e 79 64 61 79 2e 2e 2e 69 20 61 6d 20 74 68 65 20 67 72 65 61 74 20 77 68 69 74 65 20 73 68 61 72 6b 20 74 68 61 74 20 64 65 73 74 72 6f 79 73 20 79 6f 75 72 20 77 61 6c 72 75 73

i-hay 2-kay!

Me (with mp3 email attachment):

(http://kresmoi.googlepages.com/cryptic.html)

...That was the last message so far. I wonder if they'll take the bait.

the long haul

2008-03-28T19:28:00.000-07:00

I read a wonderful story today, by Greg Egan. It's called "Riding the Crocodile" (Available for free online!). It begins "In their ten thousand, three hundred and ninth year of marriage, Leila and Jasim began contemplating death." and moves on to compose many mind-bendingly brilliant strategems and provocative mysteries. I had the delightful feeling midway through that I had no idea where he was going with it, but I liked it, I liked it a lot. Some authors write more than one short story in the same milieu; I sincerely hope there is more to come from Greg Egan in this universe, and I will no doubt explore his other works regardless of their venue.

Speaking of long term viewpoints, if you haven't been to longbets.org you should go. I know I sometimes say things like, "x will happen within our lifetime." If you strongly disagree, you should now tell me to put up or shut up. One bet I would take: "At least one human alive in the year 2000 will still be alive in 2150."

The other day I learned of a sub-genre of sci-fi called "Mundane Sci-fi". I would say it's actually a sub-sub-genre, of Hard Sci-fi. Hard Sci-fi has the pre-requisit that the currently accepted theories of physics are not broken. For example, faster-than-light travel breaks Relativity, so anything which includes that isn't Hard SF. ("Riding the crocodile is Hard SF, btw) Mundane SF goes a step further and discounts tropes that are *unlikely* to occur. Under its mandate, all of these oft-visited concepts are illegal: psi, nanobots, aliens, computer consciousness, profitable space travel, immortality, mind uploading, teleportation, or time travel.

I have to say, I like where your head is at, Mundane SF, but I disagree with what you define as unlikely. Take mind-uploading. Give it a million years...you really don't think humans will figure a way to leave our corporal existence behind and try some other mechanism of riding the entropy trails through time?

I guess Mundane SF also has some tendency towards "relevancy to today" which would make it more than just a sub-sub-genre and more of a "movement"...but I'll leave that for later analysis once I've digested more of it.

word of the day

2008-03-26T09:28:00.000-07:00

...is Mamihlapinatapai.

See also the common resolution thereof, Nose Game.

My name is Kevin, and I'm a 25.

2008-03-22T12:53:00.000-07:00

"Is the Sleep Number bed everything you hoped and dreamed it would be?"
"Why, yes, now that you mention it."

Normally I can tell how long I've been in bed because of how much pain my back is in. This morning when I woke up I had no idea what time it was, because I wasn't in any pain.

The only thing that's vaguely disquieting is the way everyone asks you what your number is. For some reason, I feel like it's personal information, like a lady's age and weight, or your salary - I'll tell you, but at least apologize for asking! Kids these days...

Later today I'm going to an Improv Everywhere scene in a park near my house. At 4:15 someone is going to shriek "GODZILLA!!" and everyone in on it will run away screaming. I can't wait.

I <3 MoS

2008-03-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

I just got the 2006 and 2008 Ministry of Sound Annual box sets. 114 new dance songs to work and live to. It's like a breath of fresh air. I can't believe how long I have been without.

hello, I love you. Your name is J.R.

2008-03-04T09:07:00.000-08:00

Yesterday there was an unexpected opening at the physical therapist, I had to get up there by 3. I zoomed up 101 (thanks Zhi!) dropped the car off near our house and legged it to bart. Made it down the stairs just in time to slip inside the closing doors of a train going in the right direction. There's nothing quite like that to make you feel like you live in a city. I knew the stop was Montgomery but that was it, til I google mapped it on J.R. To be fair, I asked some receptionists in nearby buildings and they had no clue what I was looking for.

Today I had to call them back and schedule a next appointment but forgot the number. On the google search results page there is an entry with a phone number listed in the snippet. J.R. turns it into a link. When I click it, I started the call. The receptionist on the other end answered before I had a chance to get over the shock of how easy it was.

I can tell this is going to be the start of a beautiful relationship.

I'm down for whatever

2008-03-03T11:31:00.000-08:00

A drink I tried this morning in lieu of an actual iced-tea:

Pour some honey into a cup, enough so that it covers the bottom of the cup. Add some hot water and swirl, til the honey mostly dissolves into the water. Now drop in a tea bag, Stash lemon ginger, and continue to swirl. After the water has cooled and darkened from the tea, add some cold, lemon flavored carbonated water.

It was ok. I probably won't make it again.

mercedes lackey says so

2008-03-01T00:02:00.001-08:00

I have discovered that among the short, curly black hair on my belly there is a single stark white one. It is about 4 inches long, and is located about 2 inches to the right of my belly button. I think it means I'm magic.

it was row 6 actually

2008-02-26T23:14:00.000-08:00

As the plane accelerated towards take off, an overhead luggage bin popped open. None of the stewardesses made a move to get up and close it - the plane was shaking a lot and would lift off at any minute. I reached up and tried to close it, adjusted my seat belt, and without leaving my seat banged it shut. I looked around to spattered rounds of applause, and the stewardess came on the speaker to say, "our hero in row eight."

I slept the rest of the flight, quite peacefully. Come to think of it, it was a better nap than most of my downtime has been recently. I'm told I grumbled "fuck 'em, just fuck 'em" early monday morning. A bit ago was a dream about Brenden making crabs fight on a beach; one of them bit my foot, causing a leg spasm in real life that woke me up and had me yelling out in pain for several seconds (I hurt my knee playing ultimate a couple weeks ago and it's on a very slow path to recovery). Last night I leapt from bed and challenged my space heater to a duel when it clicked on in the middle of the night. I'm slowly being won over to the idea of visiting the Select Comfort facility in Daly City and finding out what my Sleep Number is...