butter is better

David Bowie... acoustic... what's not to love?

2008-01-11T16:22:00.000-08:00

I'm particularly digging the version of Heroes from the 1996 Bridge School Benefit Concert, which you can see on YouTube. Listen to the bass--it's rockin'.

My appreciation for bass has been increased since I started playing it myself. Okay, I didn't really start playing bass (I wish!)--I only played it a few times. On Guitar Hero. That counts, right?

Just when you thought it was the end...

2007-12-23T10:39:00.001-08:00

Okay, so there was a time when "director's cut" meant that was the movie as supposedly envisioned by the mastermind behind it. Now, there's a "final cut" of Bladerunner. Supposedly remastered. Supposedly with new scenes. I'm going to see it, of course (how could I not?) but I have to wonder, will this really be the final one?

Farewell

2007-12-20T09:01:00.000-08:00

R.I.P Slinky the cat, a.k.a. "The Whacker"; 1992(?)-Dec 19 2007

I will always remember your bright, earnest eyes, your poor battered ears, and your ready purr. Your claws may have been sharp and your strike swift, but your heart was gold. Farewell, my furry friend. You will be dearly missed!

3:10 to Yuma

2007-11-01T09:02:00.000-07:00

And so passes another Halloween spent hiding from the kids. It's not that I'm against Halloween. I like Halloween. But we never seem able to get our stuff together. Rather than risk angry mobs of kids at our door demanding candy, we turn out all the lights and slip away.

This time we decided to see a movie, and selected 3:10 to Yuma. My choice. I sort of knew it wouldn't be your average Western, and indeed, it turned out not to be. Ebert has a descent review of it here, and I don't have a lot to add. It's a character piece--not a lot actually happens, and yet it's fraught with tension and drama. Christian Bale is an amazing actor, and plays off well against Russel Crow.

There were a few things that threatened to snap the illusion, but not enough to ruin the movie for me.

Geico Cabbage Patch Kid

2007-09-20T18:34:00.001-07:00

This is why I love commercials.

Gimme some pirate love, matey!

2007-09-19T10:20:00.000-07:00

That's right, it's that time of year again. So shake the dust off your pirate hat, get your eye-patch out of its drawer, and give some cpr to that parrot to revive it. Time to get your pirate on!

Argh!

New google maps feature brought to you by me!

2007-09-07T10:23:00.000-07:00

Well, I was at least one of the people that suggested it to them. I can take credit for it, right?

With the new google maps feature you can Customize your route

I pointed out to them in a long and detailed email that people like to take detours on their route or want to pass through or avoid a specific area (such as the MacArthur Maze, for my hood). So now you can drag your route to include a side trip or a route you want to take.

Yeah, I know. It's brilliant. Though really, Google, a little appreciation would be nice. So here's my next suggestion: "Dear Google, I think you should try to thank the visionaries whose ideas you use to increase the value of your stock. One share should be enough. Thanks!"

I miss Japan

2007-09-06T13:47:00.000-07:00

But the Japan I miss I can't return to-- it exists only in the jungle of my memories. What remains now is the right-angled, towering concrete of modern Japan. I miss the wild of Oba-chan's back yard, where Jane and I, dripping with sweat, would stalk spiders and stray cats. I miss listening with a mixture of laughter and awe as Oji-chan chanted his prayers, the incense heavy and woodsy in my nostrils. Of how he would throw the left over rice out the window and marvel at the birds as they swooped to catch the grains. We would go every night to the public baths and steep in water so hot I swore it scalded me every time. Later Jane and I would sit outside, the summer heat now feeling cool against our skin, and tease the giant koi in the pond outside with our toes.

Ghosts and spirits descended on us from the mountains, kodama lounged in the bows of the pine trees, and the red bean ice cream was sweet. I try to relieve this hunger for the past through my writing, and increasingly Japan has been sneaking in, one way or another. Is this what is meant by ethnicity?

On a slightly different note, but related, a couple weeks ago I observed the fourth anniversary of my mother's death. They lie when they say time heals pain. It does not. I sat quietly in the room where I had found her fallen and reflected. Did I do the right thing? I pulled the plug, now I have to live with the consequences. I think I did the right thing, but I will never know, for sure, and always there's that lingering hope, turned to dread now, that maybe, maybe she could have made it.

Oh, the responsibility!

2007-08-10T13:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, I screwed up again. I have lost a library book and now ow $44.95 in fines. This is why I can't trust myself with the responsibility. It's also disheartening--for this money, I could have bought 3-4 books on Amazon.

silly silly girl

2007-06-24T16:22:00.000-07:00

i can't stop thinking that this is my last (insert activity here) as a single person. it's silly because i know, practically speaking, not much will change. after all, it's not as if i've been flirting like crazy, or doing things without ryan that i wouldn't do with him. in fact, i'm secure in the knowledge that a week after our wedding, we'll be doing pretty much the same thing as what we were doing before getting married: taking our weekly walks to fourth street in berkeley to get our hoffman game bird chicken, going to the gym together on sunday morning, or poking around on my computer while he programs. these moments have become part of our life together, and i wouldn't give them up for the world.

and yet, there is that nostalgic feeling of yeah, this is our last weekend together as single people. much as i used to believe the whole marriage thing was a senseless piece of bureaucracy, an institution designed to exclude, and much as i've avoided deluding myself that either of us will magically change on marriage, i know, instinctively, that marriage means something huge, and that something huge will change between us.

we were trying to work this out as we took our walk together today. it's a hard thing to put into words. marriage, i suppose, marks an era of commitment, not that you don't have commitment when you date exclusively, and even live together, as we have done for the last year or so. but this commitment feel qualitatively different. this commitment is for real. because both of us believe, and intend, marriage to be until death do us part, and it's scary, too, to think we are intending to be together for more years than either of us have been alive. what does that say about a leap of faith? about trust?

what a rip!

2007-06-14T15:33:00.000-07:00

okay, this is the first time i've ever bought baseball tix, and i'm only doing it now because japanese relatives are coming to town. but man, what a rip off! first, there's the "convenience fee" of $3.00 per ticket for using the on-line system! And _then_ there's a $3.50 ordering processing fee, and *then* they wanted to charge $2.50 more if i wanted to print it at home on my computer,using my electricity, my ink, my paper. j.h.c! enough all ready!!! they charge us because they can, because we will pay extra for the convenience and efficiency of buying tix at home on line, and ka-ching! they can reel in the cash.

f*ckers.

me want eat ur brain!

2007-06-08T13:16:00.000-07:00

where does the time go? oh right, i've been idling away the hours playing the last stand, a browser game of surprising complexity, with good solid graphics and eerily realistic sound. the goal--you've survived some sort of apocalypse, you've barricaded yourself into a building, and now you have to make one last stand... against the zombies who want to eat your brains! if you can survive long enough, the u.s. army will come and rescue you, and the game is over.

you start out with a simple automatic, and you have to survive until dawn against the first wave of zombies, shooting them down. the grunts and cries of the zombies are accompanied by the satisfying squelch of dead flesh giving way to the bullets, and the death cries as the zombies squirt blood and collapse to the ground. okay, now you have 12 hours before nightfall, and you've got some options. you can divide up your time searching for survivors, who will help you shoot the zombies and can make your days more efficient, you can look for weapons--better than the little pea shooter you start off with, and you'd better spend some time fixing your barricade, because if that goes down, it's brain taco time.

okay, we all know that shotguns are the best weapon against zombies, but in this case, i found the reloading time aggravatingly slow, even with the powerful shot. normally, if you can escape or withdraw, this wouldn't be a problem, but in a game where you as stuck, it spells death pretty quickly. you actually get two weapons, a primary and a back up. i sadly put away the shotgun and chose, for my primary, a nice uzi, upgrading to an ak47 when it was available, with a chainsaw for a back up. sweet, blessed chainsaw! turn those mf-ers into meatloaf! it never runs out of gas. the only drawback is, of course, the lack of range, but when they're right in front of you tearing apart your barricade, you kind of want something mroe direct, anyway.

sadly, despite the hours i've logged on this game, i have yet to really figure out consistently how to aim. you move with the wasd keys, aim and fire with the mouse, but i couldn't get the hang of it.

to sleep, perchance to dream

2007-06-06T10:40:00.000-07:00

i am a cursedly light sleeper. the slightest noise, the slightest movement will wake me up. this is bad news for someone who has to share a double bed with three cats and a fidgety boyfriend in a transitional neighborhood. sometimes it's the neighbors down the street shouting at each other. sometimes it's just someone walking down the street talking too loudly on a cell phone. or the cats scratching at the door to be let out, or in, or just getting up to clean themselves. or the boyfriend flipping about. or the light from the neighbor's bathroom shining into our bedroom window through a crack in the curtains. i've tried eye masks and ear plugs--unfortunately, the sensation of them is enough to keep me awake, though i suppose if i kept it up long enough i'd get used to them.

i remember an old cartoon- can't remember if it was porky the pig or daffy duck, but anyway, he can't get any sleep because there's all sorts of disturbances, and gradually his eyes get more and more bloodshot and he becomes more and more insane. this is how i feel, insane with out sleep, disproportionately angry for it. the need to sleep reaches an almost painful desperation. i fantasize about a sound-proofed, completely dark with a comfortable bed where i can just sleep sleep sleep. it seems like forever since i've last slept well enough to wake up refreshed.

new strength

2007-05-30T11:24:00.000-07:00

after nearly five months of working out, i'm beginning to feel not slimmer, but stronger, at least. exercises i know would have tired me out earlier i can now do not with ease, but at least not with the painful struggling before. it's a great, empowering feeling, though i know i still have a long way to go. weight training is pretty gratifying, too, since it's so quantitative--i can definitely lift more than i could, say, a month ago or so. significantly more.

in other news, i don't understand freelance people who have no concept of doing business. they never return emails, don't deal with contracts, don't respond to phone calls. um... are you in this to make money or not?

and, amusingly, i was at the laundromat today when a woman started asking me the most basic questions about laundry. her: can i use liquid soap? won't it get all foamy? me: uh, no, i think it will be all right. it's designed to work in machines, after all. her: what do you use? me: powder her: what temperature should i use? me: it depends on what you're washing... and so forth. recent college grad, perhaps. or she just crawled out of a cave and had to do laundry for the first time!

rattling in my head

2007-05-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

for the last few days i've had beyonce's song irreplaceable stuck in my head. this happens to me periodically, where i have an odd song, far outside of the genre i usually listen to, that sticks with me for a while. last month it was gwen stefani's hollaback girl. but while gwen stefani's song i find toe-tap, hip gyration, and snap inducing, beyonce's song i've concluded is worth a second look.

despite her unsophisticated lyrics ("I could have another you in a minute/
matter fact he'll be here in a minute - baby" --the repetition of "minute" here really doesn't work for me), her song works because it's great music. She catches you with a great hook "to the left to the left", sung softly, almost sadly, makes you immediately think, what's to the left? ah-- "everything you own in a box to the left..." at that point the song picks up, and she sort of sing/ talks to the rhythm of someone shaking their finger or chicken-necking, both of which she does in her video as she chews out her man for cheating on her and leaving her.

But here's what gets me. She's essentially herself, both in the song and the video, a rich, successful woman empowered by her wealth and possessions. her ex has nothing but a small box of his stuff- everything else, she's bought for him ("And It's my mine name that is on that Jag/ So remove your bags let me call you a cab"). The point of the song is expressed in the chorus: "You must not know about me/ You must not know about me/ I can have another you by tomorrow/ So don't you ever for a second get to thinking you're irreplaceable."

right, there's the catch. even with all her wealth, even with her success and confidence, she still has to kick him out because he was cheating on her-- "So go ahead and get gone/ And call up on that chick and see if she is home/ Oops, I bet ya thought that I didn't know/ What did you think I was putting you out for?/Cause you was untrue/ Rolling her around in the car that I bought you." The Beatles had it right--money can't buy you love.

in the video, she acts as if she doesn't care, and in the last scene another man shows up at her door (at least, that's what i think happens... it's hard to tell because his back is to us and he's wearing a hat.)

but here's why the song, to me, has more depth, despite the video. There's a modulation in the last stanza ("Baby I wont shed a tear for you/ I won't lose a wink of sleep/ Cause the truth of the matter is/ Replacing you is so easy..."

and then the song launches into a coda of "to the left to the left", again, sung softly. the repetition makes it reflective, and this time, you're sure it has to be sad, and the repetition of the statement "Don't you ever for a second get to thinking you're irreplaceable..." becomes bitter and almost vengeful.

and i've given way more thought to this song, more than even beyonce herself, perhaps. can you tell i'm procrastinating?

too cute!

2007-05-23T17:14:00.000-07:00

okay, i am now officially addicted to the site icanhascheezburger.com

my recent favorite:
oh noes! (resistance is futile, lil' kitty!)

but this one just makes me laugh and laugh:
can i plz has dis shiny device?

don't know why, exactly. something about the serious look on the cat's face that i know too well.

windows

2007-05-23T09:24:00.000-07:00

while coming home on the bart train the other night ryan leaned in close and whispered in my ear, "you keep staring at people."

i averted my gaze, realizing i had been, in fact, rather intently focused on a woman with a tattoo of a witch on her neck. a moment later i realized that i had looked away from her only to study the slack-faced, sleeping teen-aged boy a few seats down.

i've always been a people watcher, and now that i don't get out of the house much these days i guess my watching has intensified. i love trying to figure people out from what they look like, as if their life histories, not just their emotions, are evident in the protrusion of their lips or the dip of their brows. what was that woman thinking that morning when she paired her somber black dress with a pair of bright red shoes? why did that man choose to gel his hair straight up like that, and what might it say about his attitude toward life?

the more i think about writing, too, the more i like to see what people are reading. i find myself craning my neck to catch a glimpse of their page, to see what the title is. it gladdens me to see people reading on the train, anything from michael crichton to malcom gladwell's blink. what sorts of people read these books, i wonder, and what sorts, someday, might read mine?

ah, grammar, and the horrors of high school

2007-05-17T07:54:00.000-07:00

walking down the streets of berkeley i passed a sign advertising "clairvoyant classes."
hmmm... don't you mean "clairvoyance classes"? or better yet, "classes in clairvoyance". psychics, apparently, can't intuit grammar.

i also walk past berkeley high almost every day to get to the ymca (i'm too cheap to park in the nearby lot or take a metered spot so i park for free in the 'hoods, which means a three or four block walk). but it means i have to move through hoards of hormone-crazed teens hanging out in front of their campus or accumulating in the park across the streets. i am amazed anyone, myself included, makes it through high school. i am at once charmed by the cute idiosyncrasies teens develop and think are cool (that belt you always wore, those boots you thought were just so you and original) and horrified by how advanced these kids seem to be. i cringe now to think about all the affectations i surely must have had at that age. and sadly, even at my age, that visceral, forever-scarred part of me whimpers under the assessing eyes of The Popular and The Hip, and thinks, i'm cool too! see my jeans? er wait, no, maybe my teeshirt? no no, not that either...

And then i remember that right, i'm beyond all that now. phew!

good bye and good riddance

2007-05-15T13:18:00.000-07:00

can i just say how happy i am that the gilmore girls series is finally finally over?? hopefully it won't under go the lazarus effect as seventh heaven did. i swear that show advertised its huge series finale... and then a few months later, oh look, a new episode.

2007-05-15T12:31:00.000-07:00

a week or so ago ryan and i made a big batch of oxtail soup. at the time, it was in the 80s, and we sat there sweating as we ate it wondering why the heck we had made so hearty a meal. well, now i know. i'm reheating it now, and it's going to be damn good as i sit here shivering in the freakin' 50 degree, fog enveloped weather.

no wonder the durn tomatoes never grow in my yard. no wonder my poor gardenia never flowers.

okay, clearly this is one of those posts i post to post just cause i don't know what to post and i haven't posted in a while. life has been suspended in a bit of a limbo right now. ryan and i are counting down to the big day. most of the stuff is in place. a few key features aren't, but stressing about them isn't going to do much good. i'm sort of looking for a job but not really, only if something sort of hits me upside the head. but the timing will be all off, since i'll have to arrange time off for the wedding and then time off again for the honeymoon. my writing has come to something a lull too, getting up the momentum to start revising and rewriting, toying with a few new projects, but with no clear direction.

in other words, i feel something like the fog must; suspended, hovering, waiting.

ain't no ordinary chicken

2007-05-02T10:22:00.000-07:00

last night we roasted up a chicken ryan picked up from the berkeley farmers' market. it was a little frightening, actually, because anatomically it was so unlike what i've come to expect of chickens. it barely had "breasts" (i really hate that term), and its legs were strong, muscular, long. i could almost picture the beast, proud and powerful, the sort of animal that would give you a run for your money. (who ever prepared the carcass also managed to pack three feet in, though i swear to you, there was no evidence of a third leg to go with it.) anyway, it was delicious, its legs darker than any chicken, duck, or goose leg i've ever seen. at $3.75 a pound it's not much more than the hoffman chicken sold at cafe rouge ($3.50), or rosie's organic chickens at berkeley bowl ($2.99, i think?)

at any rate, dealing with this thing made me remember a life-long dream of mine, to raise chickens. i really like chickens, not just to eat, but for companionship, too. they are unusual creatures and far more complex than most people bother to recognize. or maybe it makes people uncomfortable to think of the creatures that way since they are intended for eating. so the big question: if i do raise chickens would i be able to kill them? if not, i feel i shouldn't even eat meat. but i think i can do it, because i do believe there's a way to raise animals compassionately and lovingly, and still take their life for food.

i told my dream to ryan, who immediately said, yeah, maybe we could have a cow, too you know, for milk.

uh, no, no cow for me. too much flesh to deal with, and think about how much it would eat and shit! besides that, i don't want to deal with breeding it every year and the calves that would result. so i draw the line at chickens.

on being a school kid

2007-04-26T17:39:00.000-07:00

for the last month or so i've been volunteering at a berkeley public school as a classroom helper. i'm considering becoming a school teacher (come on, you get summers off!), but really i was curious to know what it was like in public schools. as a kid, i lucked out--i was able to attend private schools k-12, though i'm not sure how my parents finagled it.

some of what i'm seeing is inspiring. there are conscientious teachers, there are smart, earnest students, there is a city that really cares about their kids. unlike other school districts, berkeley unified is funded, except for the admin section (and don't quote me on this without doing your own research), on local city props, not state money. berkeley is the home of the edible schoolyard, thanks to alice waters, and has one of the highest number of volunteers out of the state school system.

but, of course, there's the days when the teacher is frustrated, because year after year it feels like trying to elevate cement. i was taken aback my first day in class at how he spoke to some of the students, disrespectfully. since then i've seen his good side, where he really strives to help these kids, and i understand some of his frustration, because some kids you could bonk on the head and they won't get it, and they won't even try. they've checked out, at least for now. he says sometimes he's seen remarkable turnarounds, when the kids come back to visit years later.

the biggest struggle for public schools seems to be huge disparity in kids' abilities. some kids can already read and write decently for their grade level. others probably shouldn't have graduated 2nd grade. it's heart breaking, and i see what the teachers have to do: do their best, and hope it's enough. to a certain extent, society is cutting their losses on the bottom-of-the-barrel kids. it hurts, but it's the reality. public school is their last stop.

i know oakland has it much, much rougher, and if i were really brave, i'd go volunteer there. i knew a woman who taught in oakland for two years before she felt her spirit was broken. she's an incredible activist, someone who tries so hard to work for her ideals, but she said it was too depressing. oakland, apparently, has very strict rules on what you teach and when. according to her, every oakland school must be on the same page of the same curriculum on the same day (again, don't quote me on this!). berkeley, at least, doesn't seem to matter how you teach, as long as you get the required material across.

ranting

2007-04-25T10:05:00.000-07:00

i hate cover letters, i hate having to find a job, i hate trying to couch every i've done in positive terms, i hate trying to sell myself, and i f*cking hate reducing everything i've done in my life to a few lines.

okay, i'm done.

subtle flaws

2007-04-13T09:28:00.000-07:00

How how how, oh Juliet Barker, can you write such an excellent book about Agincourt and not include a single bloody map???

Maybe it's me. I love maps. Have loved them since I was a kid. My sister and I used to draw maps of far away countries and countries that never were.

argh

2007-04-11T19:38:00.000-07:00

general frustration... sometimes i just feel like checking out, sometimes the bay area just pisses me off.

on the other hand, a really good friend, as i discovered today, is one you can nap with. i guess i really am a cat. except for my poikilothermic tendencies.

oy, what a night!

2007-04-10T11:18:00.000-07:00

Last night I woke up around 2 a.m. The night was still quiet, somewhere a kitty was snoozing away. Gradually I became aware of the distant sound of sirens approaching. A second later there's a terrible screech, the crash of metal on metal, and then a car zooming by. The sirens get louder, our bedroom lights up with red, blue, and white. Car doors slam and I hear an urgent voice: "Get out of the car! Get your hands in the air!"

They stopped whomever it was on the street just outside our house. We listened quietly to the scratch of their radios, their voices rising with the uneasy bravado of a crisis just avoided. I lay thinking for a long time how lucky we were to be in bed, holding each other close, only observers, and thank goodness the kitties were all inside, safe.

I thought about the last time I was woken up in the middle of the night to a loud bang. I was seventeen, and my mom and I rushed outside to find a giant boat of a station wagon in our driveway. My mom's little two door was punted ten feet ahead and had crashed into the fence. We called the police, they arrested the woman driver, who they told us was high as a kite. "She kept saying she was going on a trip," the officer said. "Yeah, I told her, you're on a trip all right."

It wasn't until the police had taken her away and prepared to impound the car when one of them spotted the boy crammed into the small space between the back seat and the passenger seat. I remember vaguely one of the officers gave him a snickers bar, but I'll never forget that wide-eyed face, not frightened, but wary.

truth in labeling

2007-04-09T18:58:00.000-07:00

okay, i don't care so much *what* you buy, be it organic, from chile, etc, so much as i care that you *know* what you are buying. i'm all about labeling. everything you buy should be labeled to death. apparently in europe you can look up the code on that little sticker on the produce you buy, see what farm its from, and what applications of pesticide/ fertilizer were used (okay, this is all anecdotal info from a guy i worked with. i've never actually tried it). this is the sort of thing i advocate for the u.s.

so in that spirit, i post this message from food and water watch regarding accuracy in labeling for irradiated food. not that i'm against irradiation (though actually i am), but let's not mince words--call it what it is.

For years, the irradiation industry has had a problem convincing consumers to buy irradiated food. The industry solution? Don't tell them it's irradiated.

Right now, food treated with ionizing radiation must be labeled as "Treated with irradiation" or "Treated by radiation." The irradiation industry wants to label these foods as "electronically pasteurized" or "cold pasteurized," which is misleading.

In 2002, Congress passed the Farm Bill that contained several provisions designed to weaken the rules for how irradiated food are labeled, allowing the word "pasteurized" to be used. Now, the FDA is considering a rule that would allow the use of the term "pasteurized" on some types of irradiated food and not require any labeling on others.

Tell the FDA not to weaken the rules for labeling irradiated food!

Thank you,
Audrey Hill
Food & Water Watch

help! stuck in an endless loop

2007-04-09T09:33:00.000-07:00

For the last three days I've been listening to the same bloody songs over and over again, first with a little Jethro Tull and Dylan mixed in, but gradually the list was boiled down to two: Fleetwood Mac's Second Hand News and Grateful Dead's Standing on the Moon, which strikes me as a deeply patriotic song though I don't quite know why considering its global perspective (the reference to Old Glory, perhaps? or the mention of good ol' 'Frisco.)

Anyway, I like these songs. I really do, and when I listen to them I like to close my eyes and sing along (which doesn't leave a lot of time for anything else). But really, enough is enough. It's time to move on! But I want to hear those songs, just one more time...

skating away on the thin ice of a new day

2007-04-07T18:04:00.000-07:00

on my third beer here this rainy saturday, struggling to hash out a battle for my book without really being sure of what tactics to use (surprise! i'm not a military strategist) and beginning to feel very sentimental.

what are we to make of our memories? the first time i listened this jethro tull song i was in my first year of college in far away vermont. it was deep winter, our small dormitory in the middle of a snow-drenched field, surrounded by snow-draped cypresses. i think back on those times with wonder. the brightness of the snow now seems impossible, the cold invigorating me into a rebirth. somehow i want to go back to that, but the vermont that i knew, the long, crunching walks through the sugar maples, the quiet of an icy lake, and the moments spent sending tendrils of cigarette smoke into the bracing air are all gone. not just gone, they never truly existed, but are lodged somewhere in the synapses of my brains. false reflexes, imagined pleasures.

but surely, surely they must mean something? i did not live these moments for nothing, did not feel that passion, the heat and joy of life in the cold for no purpose. perhaps it's my mistake for seeking meaning in the humdrum of existence, but i refuse to let them dissipate into time. sometimes i think that when we die we must go back to these foggy depths.

Skating away on the thin ice of a new day

Meanwhile back in the year One --- when you belonged to no-one ---
you didn't stand a chance son, if your pants were undone.
`Cause you were bred for humanity and sold to society ---
one day you'll wake up in the Present Day ---
a million generations removed from expectations
of being who you really want to be.

Skating away ---
skating away ---
skating away on the thin ice of the New Day.

So as you push off from the shore,
won't you turn your head once more --- and make your peace with everyone?
For those who choose to stay,
will live just one more day ---
to do the things they should have done.
And as you cross the wilderness, spinning in your emptiness:
you feel you have to pray.
Looking for a sign
that the Universal Mind (!) has written you into the Passion Play.

Skating away on the thin ice of the New Day.

And as you cross the circle line, the ice-wall creaks behind ---
you're a rabbit on the run.
And the silver splinters fly in the corner of your eye ---
shining in the setting sun.
Well, do you ever get the feeling that the story's
too damn real and in the present tense?
Or that everybody's on the stage, and it seems like
you're the only person sitting in the audience?

Skating away on the thin ice of the New Day.

client-powered gym is a reality!

2007-04-04T22:43:00.001-07:00

Gym powered by clients in Hong Kong. The gym, funnily enough, is called the California Fitness Gym. Hah.

And, apparently, it's not really cost effective. Oh well.

client-powered gym is a reality!

2007-04-04T22:43:00.000-07:00

Gym powered by clients in Hong Kong.

yay! apparently, it's not really cost effective.

a little more meat please

2007-03-28T10:54:00.000-07:00

Please understand, Niman Ranch, I'm not afraid of a little fat and all, but recently when I buy your bacon I can't help but think, gosh, could I have just a little meat with that fat?

I don't remember it always being this way, and the batch I bought Monday was the worst--I estimate over 90% fat. I'm glad the pigs are fat and healthy and all but really, after the fat melts away in my skillet, there's not a lot to bite into.

must. write. cover letter!

2007-03-27T09:27:00.000-07:00

(yeah, yeah, i'm applying for a job.)

okay, who doesn't hate writing cover letters? it's one of those things that must be done, right? i guess i've had pretty good luck in the past - probably got about 90% of the jobs i applied for... but here's the thing, i only apply for jobs that i really really want, and then put all my energy into them. consequently, i think i might close off a lot of opportunities. i also probably underestimate my worth and experience, and not aim for high enough jobs.

to battle!

2007-03-26T12:46:00.000-07:00

i had strange dreams about my cats - during the night, in real life, my cats were wanting in and out of the house. i got up several times during the night to oblige them, but finally, irritated and annoyed, i lay in bed with my eyes determinedly closed, to try to fall back asleep before the dreadful alarm.

one cat was scratching and banging at the door with such insistence it filtered into my half-awake state, and i dreamed i was defending a house besieged by cats, and i had to plan out a strategy for a counter attack. i imagined unleashing my troops, creating a feint to draw out the fiendish beasts, and finish them off with a swift blow of the calvary.

i guess this serves me right for staying up late reading about famous battle tactics and for having inconsiderate cats, though little can be done about the latter.

looking forward to this.

2007-03-24T12:08:00.000-07:00

i loved talladega nights. it wasn't necessarily the rolling-on-the-floor laughing (as elicited by the Arrested Development episode "Mr. F", which remains, in my mind, the most brilliant moment in television), but there was something fun and charming about it. so now i'm soooo looking forward to blades of glory. sorry, but it looks awesome. i can't wait!

comedies are generally a hard sell for me, second only to romance on my list of movies to avoid (and don't even get me started on that most heinous of all genres, the romantic comedy). the last movies i really remember laughing at were from grade school - space balls, naked gun. later in life i loved trigger happy t.v. (okay, maybe because the first time i watched it i was pretty drunk on champaign), Arrested Development, Are you being served, absolutely fabulous, and, of course, the daily show, though we don't get cable any more. the occasional movies include zoolander, a funny thing happened on the way to the forum, and.... can't think of anything else right at this moment. surprisingly, i never got into monty python that much, though it was worth a chuckle or two, surprising, because it seems just the sort of thing i'd like.

and i spin my wheels again

2007-03-23T13:48:00.000-07:00

every time i go to the gym i am struck by the irony of it all. here am i, expending energy to expend energy because i expend energy because i don't want to expend energy.

huh?

right. here it is again: i use the electrically-generated resistance on the exercise equipment at the gym to expend excess energy (i.e. all the crap that i've eaten), but i only have to do this because i drive a car rather than walk or bicycle.

see the irony? i think about this all the time with each turn on the elliptical exerciser. we're blind to the connection between biological energy and chemical energy, though the laws of thermodynamics state they have to be related, and if you go back far enough they are - where do fossil fuels come from again? oh right, fossils.

and then i think about this great mass of sweating bodies, working desperately to expend all their energy so it doesn't build up and become potential energy (i.e. fat), and i think, what a shame. someday i'll build a gym to harness all that energy, all those legs pumping and wheels turning. at the very least, i should be able to harness enough of the resistance generated to sustain the resistance people want to exercise.

i heard a rumor once of a bed that can generate electricity while you, you know, make love. it makes sense - the springs act as oscillators and you should be able to generate a few volts. sadly, i've not been able to confirm this device. but it makes you wonder - we're always looking at the big picture - we've got to build a nuclear reactor to produce enough electricity for millions. but the little things can add up - a few volts there, a few volts here, and pretty soon, you're off the grid. and what an aphrodisiac? come on, baby, we need to make some energy so we can cook dinner. heh heh.

i've often joked to ryan about rigging up a stationary bicycle to generate electricity while he exercises. i wish i were more savvy with electronics, otherwise, i'd be tempted to try.

ringing ears

2007-03-16T14:03:00.000-07:00

i've had a disturbing ringing in the ears for the last two days. i keep telling myself that it's because i'm stuffed up with this dangnabbit cold, but ever since i read an article about tinnitus (most shockingly a man committed suicide because he couldn't get rid of the incessant ringing) i've been especially cautious about my ears. for that reason, i rarely wear headphones (a leading cause of tinnitus).

well, on the plane ride back, i tried to take a decongestant to clear my sinuses. but it didn't work, because my ear freaking hurt coming during the descent. i kept trying to blow my nose or flex my jaw to alleviate the pressure but i wasn't successful. then, suddenly, a loud squeak in my ear. i've had this before when i've blown my nose. but it was louder than it had been before. and now this infernal ringing... so i hope its not a permanent rupture in my eardrum.

japan

2007-03-15T09:07:00.000-07:00

products like these are why japan is so much cooler than the u.s.... it's called a joba, and it's a fake horse, essentially a saddle with stirrups, which you ride, in your home, for exercise. this particular model advertises "advanced 3-D virtual reality technology imitates horseback riding experience and helps to build physical strength and endurance." how freakin' awesome is that?

on t.v. in japan there was a "news special" on toilets with new features that make it easier to clean. and i kid you not, they went to people's houses to interview women who had these new toilets. whoa.

all in all, it's good to be back, though i miss all these strange things. that and the food.

mmm... the food...

like the fairy tales

2007-03-06T15:43:00.000-08:00

there's nothing like a good old-fashioned, cinderella-style house cleaning to clear the mind. that's right, i'm talking full-on bucket-and-rags, hands-and-knees scrubbing.

on another note, i'm leaving for japan. tomorrow. gulp. i'm only staying for a week and will be mostly with my aunt and uncle in the 'burbs of tokyo, possibly visiting my two cousins who recently had babies (babies, yay!). (okay, maybe the cleaning fumes have gotten into my head instead of clarity).

this trip comes with perfect timing. nostalgia has been poking at me recently. i'm sad ryan won't be able to join me. i want to share it all with him, the sight of crows against a cloudy sky, clothes sticking to skin in the muggy heat, the smell of rain in the city, all of the things that remind me of japan.

virago

2007-03-04T12:56:00.000-08:00

this made me a little sad... virago, which means "a loud-voiced, ill-tempered, scolding woman; a shrew" once meant "a woman of strength or spirit, a woman of heroic acts." (definitions taken from Dictionary.com).

The root, or course, is the Latin, "vir", meaning "man".

new blog started

2007-02-28T10:06:00.000-08:00

okay, i probably have a problem. i realize that (and why oh why does blogger think "okay" is misspelled? the spelling is the latest convention in the ap style guide).

Finding the Words. the blog is dedicated to writing, both the craft and art of it (as in how to) and my personal experiences and frustrations. topics include style issues, "how to", over coming writer's block, and hopefully, the publishing market.

it's a bit geeky, i admit, but i wanted a venue where i could post these things undiluted with other thoughts. the rest of the stuff (though increasingly i'm wondering what else is there) will be posted here.

serenity and goodbye lenin!

2007-02-26T09:41:00.000-08:00

serenity: disappointing (the movie, that is).

i think my expectations were too high. i'm a huge buffy and firefly fan, but the movie fell lackluster and tired. it had been long enough since i saw the series that i was really looking forward to joining up with the crew again, but most of the characters fell flat. wash, jayne, kaylee, inara, even zoe, really, get very little face time, though they were such an integral part of the series. mal, as a character, and the mystery of river and simon was not enough to command my sympathies for the most part and elicited only a marginal amount of interest. the plot was largely predictable.

i am reminded he wrote alien ressurection, possibly the worst movie in the series (yes, i actually liked the third one, so there).

goodbye, lenin! i was all set not to like this movie. in fact, i even had my laptop open while ryan watched it. but i was surprised - the mix of humor, desperation, and sadness really work, at least, on this viewer.

stephen king: drawing of the three

2007-02-23T17:18:00.000-08:00

what happens when you mix a fist full of dollars with... okay, i don't know. ursula le guin, maybe. well, you get stephen king's dark tower series.

just finished king's the drawing of the three, the second of 7(?). the first is the gunslinger. and damn, i have to hand him my hat: king knows how to tell a story. he makes it a page turner with just enough suspense, but not too much that it feels contrived (like dan brown's da vinci code and george r.r. martin's song of fire and ice series can).

that this is king's first, and perhaps dearest story is obvious: the story is lovingly rendered. i'm not a fan of his horror (i read "it" a while ago; the book did nothing for my innate distrust of clowns) but had read another of his fantasy novels, the eyes of the dragon, many many years ago. few have ever heard of it, but it certainly captured my imagination, enough to want to read the dark tower series.

king moves fluidly between his characters' point of views, never once leaving the reader with vertigo, proving (and giving me hope) that the damn "rules" that almost every book on writing warn you against breaking should, in fact, be broken.

the other thing i've noticed about the first two dark tower series and eyes of the dragon, is how everything falls into place with a near audible click. he's sown his seeds early in the book and by the end of it, he's cashing it all in, leaving just enough to keep the reader going. there's a feeling of completeness that satisfies, especially when we must contend with a world that seems to throw stuff at us with no meaning and no warning. it's nice to believe that things happen for a reason, that there is "ka" (gunslinger-speech for something like destiny). in other words, he wields not only the power of a good story teller, but also the power of a good story. hard to do both, i'm rapidly realizing.

all in all, very cool. i'm a bit nervous about the other 5 books. three books is about all i can take in a series. but for now, this reader is sold, lock, stock, and smoking barrel.

small victories

2007-02-23T16:24:00.000-08:00

after all my efforts, i got on the scale and weighed myself. and lost a grand total of (drumroll please!)....
1 pound.

1 pound? is that all? *tap*tap* is this thing broken? i must have sweated at least 1 lb. i could cut off my hair and probably lose a pound. i know, i know, these things happen over time, i've probably gained muscle which is heavier than fat, etc, etc. still, one secretly hopes. just as one writes because one "loves writing and would do it anyway, and being published doesn't matter" but really it does matter, and one always, always hopes.

speaking of writing (and i so often do) i've been working hard to do as countless writing books and seasoned (and non) writers have advised: finish that first draft! the problem is, i feel so intent on finish it that the writing and characters so often feel flat. and as i'm writing a scene i'll know it's not quite right. and sure, i can and will fix it later, but so often, once a chapter is written, i have a hard time reworking it. not because i'm so in love with it i can't bear to cut a word (i've learned to murder my babies) but because it becomes difficult for me to see what's wrong. i have an instinct to let things stay the way they are, rather than changing them for the better. this is true elsewhere in my life as well. so i wonder, is the first draft really so valuable? yes, it's necessary to write it to see where it goes, especially for a chaotic non-outliner like me, but i wonder how much potential is lost in the process?

the alternative is to write as donna tartt wrote the secret history (incidentally one of my all-time favorite books), as reported in poets & writers magazine, to lay one word at a time and not move on until each sentence is perfect. and it shows - the work flows nearly flawlessly. but i think if i did that, it would drive me mad. or i would not finish. it did, after all, take her nearly 10 years to write her first book.

a happy medium? i'm sure one exists. i'm struggling because i'm at the steep part of the learning curve ("oh crap, i probably should have kept notes of all the minor characters i've introduced - now i have to go back and find them all'), but it's time that's precious - it takes so bloody long to figure out how to do things. and i want to finish this book this year, dammit.

why am i so verbose today? dorothea brande has a rememdy for writer's block in her precious book on becoming a writer - you deny yourself any interaction with words, whether in speaking, writing, or reading. by the end of it you will be dying to write. i just came back from the gym, time spent away from the keyboard and the world of my characters. though i read, i feel the words wanting to spill out of me.

perhaps i should pump some of this energy into my book now.

i am tired, and a little looney.

2007-02-22T18:43:00.000-08:00

inside and out. i've been going to the gym regularly for the last two weeks, every day for the last three weeks. it's a difficult habit to get into; you kind of just have to bite the bullet every day and go. but yesterday i had to take a break - i was just too tired. and today, i forced myself to go, but again, very tired. i always feel good afterwards, and then about an hour later i realize crap. i don't want to get up.

i've also been a bit tired on the writing front. i've been writing about 1000 words every day now for... well, i've lost track of how long. pretty much since january, officially anyway, though i started long before that. last fall, maybe. now, whatever muscles/ neurons i use to write are tired, too.

in a way it's a good feeling. only by working until we are tired can we build up our stamina. at least, that's my theory, and i'm sticking to it, dammit. but i think over all, it's a good tired. of course, i caught myself singing at the grocery store today, which in itself wouldn't have been so bad. i sing to myself all the time. but on this particular ocassion i was singing the theme to the old Tiny Toon Adventures cartoon:

we're tiny, we're toony, we're all a little looney...

um, yeah. i got a lot of stares on that one before i clued in.

to live like a cat

2007-02-22T09:31:00.000-08:00

having spent many hours now at home with my cats, this is my analysis of how they spend their day:

70% sleeping
10% grooming themselves
15% staring at eachother or out the window, or just out into space (fellow cat owners will recognized that blank, unfocused look)
2% using the litter box or eating
1% frisking about
2% wanting to go in or out the door.

over all, not such a bad life style.

not so innocuous

2007-02-21T15:09:00.000-08:00

is any one else disturbed by the fact that the obnoxiously cute happy feet penguins have been appropriated by roche, a pharmaceuticals company? right now, the penguins are primarily used to advertise for roche's web site, flufacts.com. but i'm worried about the precedent it's setting. junk food and cigarettes are all heavily marketed towards kids. are we going to market pharmaceuticals to them, too?

office despot indeed

2007-02-20T11:51:00.000-08:00

i went to the local office depot store to buy packing tape. they had just one kind on the shelf suitable for my purposes: a roll of "clear duct tape" selling for over $7. you've got to be kidding me. it wasn't even one of those ginormo-rolls. it was a regular sized, 800 inch roll or some such.

so i went to walgreens, where they had more kinds of packing tape than I cared to count. Suffice it to say, it was more than two. The cheapest: $2.99. approved by the usps for mailing. sounds perfect for me.

too many

2007-02-18T12:23:00.000-08:00

the worst part about being so tied up in writing this durn book for so long is that i've been dying to explore some of the other story ideas popping around in my head. i knew this would happen - i have a short attention span for reading books, so it's only natural that i'd have short attention span for writing them, too. but i must stay focused! at least finish the first draft, or i'll never be done with it.

Renault's The King Must Die

2007-02-17T17:47:00.000-08:00

Just finished Mary Renault's historical fantasy The King Must Die. I say historical fantasy because it is rooted in history, and in fact Renault did a hefty amount of research of Ancient Greece for this novel (according to Amazon and Wikipedia) but it's a retelling of the myth of Theseus, hence the fantasy.

But what a retelling it is. I will say the best parts of the book are the very first chapter and the very last. She starts off describing the sacrifice of a great white stallion, told though the eyes of a four-year-old Theseus. "It was a good clean killing..." she writes. "...Yet, even now, I still remember. How he reared up like a tower, feeling his death, dragging the men like children; the scarlet cleft in the white throat, the rank hot smell; the ruin of beauty, the fall of strength, the ebb of valor; and the grief, the burning pity as he sank upon his knees and laid his brighthead in the dust. That blood seemed to tear the soul out of mybreast, as if my own heart had shed it."

By the end of it I was trembling.

Renault's Theseus is at once an asshole, a cocky youth, and a man striving to be a just and honorable leader. But above all else, he is believable. And I don't know how she does it, but her prose so vividly conveys the sense of the time that you are certain this is indeed how people must have thought and spoken in those days. Most notably I was impressed by how fluidly and naturally she weaves in humanities ties with the gods. I am inspired, and deepy awed, by her writing.

So, too, am I struck by her imaginative power in creating a world of which only fragments remain. Included in those relicts are the ruins of Knossos and the ancient Labyrinth of Messara, which she mentions in her author's notes. For those who know and love the myth, there's a certain thrill in experiencing her rendition of myth into a believable reality.

At times, though, she's a bit too subtle for me. Especially when it comes to the subject of sex she writes with an exceptionally light touch and I'm left wondering, did they, or didn't they? There were several passages where I was sure something profound had passed but it went clear over my head.

At any rate, her book as a power that lingers on the mind. I'll be reading this one's sequel, The Bull from the Sea, next.

This book also made me rethink writing in the first person, which I had previously dismissed. Too often the "I" in books feel too weakly characterized - I felt this most recently in Kostova's The Historian. The third person allows for a more robust protagonist. Not so with The King Must Die. Reading this was almost like being possessed by another person, so strong were his thoughts and emotions.

A fact I did not know about Mary Renault, who was born in England in 1905 and died in 1983: She and her life-long partner Jullie Mullard went to live in South Africa, a place more tolerant to gays. South Africa? Really? Apparently she participated in anti-apartheid demonstrations.

the twilight princess

2007-02-13T10:36:00.000-08:00

"i think it's the best game ever," jane said, her voice hushed.

i rolled my eyes. "oh come on. better than ocarina of time?"

she nodded.

after spending the last two days playing legends of zelda: the twilight princess, i have to agree. it really is the best game. ever. period. the opening music chokes me up. but it also makes me worried - this game has the feel of the game to end all games. after this, what can follow?

the genius of this game falls on two things; the story line and the visual effects. it is breathtakingly beautiful, and the story heartwrenching. admittedly it pushes all the right buttons for me: the battle to save the world against all odds, sacrifice, a hero and heroine who are tragically cursed, and of course, horses, swords, and elves. nitendo has got everything right on this game, combining all the best elements from the previous games. some moments are even lord of the rings inspired - there's a scene taken almost directly from the two towers (when the wargs come over the hill to attack theoden's men on the way to helm's deep) and saruman's smithy - you get to fly through it - it's pretty damn cool. some of the ruins and buildings are similarly lord of the rings inspired. fans of ico will recognize some elements as well (the twilight shadows). and there's a somberness to the story and gameplay that gives each exhilirating victory an element of melancholy. you are forever reminded this is a world in trouble, where you remain only one step ahead of the evil forces at work. you are but link, an elf with a valiant heart caught up in the struggle.

and the game is long... i've been playing just about 50 hours now and still not done. maybe 3/4 of the way though. and there is still so much to do and explore. the puzzles are baffling, the bosses not too difficult, but they require strategy. as each level passes, i think, okay, that's it, it's winding down from here. but no, it just keeps getting better and better. so far i've flown, canoed, smote my enemy from horseback, walked upside down with magnetic boots, and ran around as a wolf in a world trapped in twilight.

the process reminds me that truely, the journey is what matters. the story is simple: save zelda. but along the way, your heart will be captured by link and the inhabitants of the enchanted land, hyrule. the game pulls on powerful mythology that runs deep in the veins.

as i approach the end, though, i get increasingly teary eyed. there's an epic feeling to this game - nintendo held nothing back. so it makes me worry... is this the end?

if only my mind were like a web browser...

2007-01-31T08:41:00.000-08:00

the i could use the "back" feature to recover lost thoughts. such brilliant thoughts, so fleeting. sigh.

speechless...

2007-01-30T09:55:00.000-08:00

images from the hubble... astounding. it almost looks like a sea with jelly fish creatures. makes me want to try my hand at sci fi.

a question of stirrups

2007-01-22T16:56:00.000-08:00

i watched the first episode of hbo's rome the other day. it's no gladiator (they should ave just bought all the costumes) but it was good enough that i'd watch it again (but why or why do they all speak in brittish accents??), the characters engaging enough (thought cicero is not quite as i pictured him). but then i saw it.. stirrups. that's right. romans didn't use stirrups. okay, i understand for the actors' safety why you might want to use stirrups, certainly for the action scenes (gladiator did) but i thought the least they could do is not use them in casual scenes (as gladiator did not).

a minor thing, yes, but it led me to wonder, what fudging is acceptable in a historical piece? i was struggling with this while reading david anthony durham's pride of carthage. he takes quite a few liberties, which he freely admits to. it's an interpretation of historical events, he says, and he tinkered with the time line of events to make it conform to a narrative. most ostensibly, he condensed the appx 15 years hannibal spent in italy to a mere 5... i suppose to keep the threads of romance alive. but this really bothered me because it's a major fact. if you can't keep to the major facts, maybe you should be writing fiction, and not historical fiction. why? because people who read historical fiction expect accuracy. i don't want someone to think hannibal only spent 5 years in italy. besides which, once one fact is off, all the other facts become suspicious.

historical fiction should stay true to the facts. i realize with history, this is a little sketchy. but i think with good research you can come up with the facts that most scholars agree on. contested facts you can interpret, or offer your own interpretation, staying, of course, within the spirit of the characters and times. motive and personality is where the fun of historical fiction comes in. how will the author construct a hannibal that makes him do what he does? i think the author is also free to tweak motives because all of it is conjecture, even if you go to original sources. i think it's perfectly acceptable to ascribe ideas to people not historical. for instance, hannibal decides on a strategy, but maybe he got it from one of his generals not recorded in the history books. finally, bonus points for incorporating quotes attributed to the individual in question.

a bit nervous...

2007-01-08T19:12:00.000-08:00

about the upcoming movie hannibal the conqueror, directed by and starring, of all people, vin diesel. on the other hand the sceenplay is by david franzoni, of gladiator, one of the best movies ever made, imho. the hannibal movie's based on a book by canadian poet ross leckie, which i haven't read, but checked out. looks a bit weak. but a good screenplay writer can take any thin novel and make it good..

but vin diesel? as hannibal? i'm tired of cookie cutter heros. i don't want another brad pitt achilles, a colin ferrell alexander (it makes my skin crawl just to remember that). or a mel gibson braveheart. i'm afraid vin diesel will be just that, modern icon of "manliness" transposed into the classical world. same characters, different scene. the only movie of vin's i ever liked was pitch black, a film where he says little and mostly just plays the silent creepy convict who shoots things. very effective part for him. but this, i do not want in hannibal.

so you see why i'm nervous?

cover songs

2007-01-08T13:17:00.000-08:00

every once in a while i'm reminded of how good a cover of a song can be. most covers are a woeful rehashing of the original that leaves you wanting to rage at the artist, why the heck did you even bother? it sounds exactly the same (i'm thinking of the black crowes's lucy in the sky with diamonds) or is such a vapid rendition (smash mouth does neil diamond/ the monkee's i'm a believer) that it's not worth the energy required to play the damn thing. but a good cover song has the power to completely transform the original. the new artist will take it and own it, not just singing it in their own voice but giving it the unique twist that only they can give it. why else would one cover a song?

the first time i discovered this potential i was 14, and my sister had just brought home an album titled "red hot + blue: a tribute to cole porter." "sit down," she said, "you have to listen to this." i looked at her dubiously. yeah, i knew cole porter. my dad played cole porter on the piano. we had dusty vinyl full of cole porter. i'd even sung cole porter. sure, i liked it, but come on, as cover songs? porter's appeal was the same to me as fred astaire's: urbane, slick, and charmingly obsolete. but an older sister's opinion means everything to the younger, and so i sat and listened.

i think my jaw must have hit the ground. the sophisticated wistfulness of "night and day" becomes untempered lust in u2's expert rejiggering. the song seemed to have been written just for them. who better to sing "don't fence me in" than david byrne, for whom the lyrics seem to hold special meaning? kd lang lends the power of her voice to a more conservative version of "so in love," and manages to own the song anyway. and erasure singing the songs of "too darn hot": "i'd like to sleep with my lover tonight... but it's too darn hot..." took on a new, poignant meaning (the album was part of an aids benefit). you can listen to song samplers of the cd from amazon.

few cover songs have since astonished me as much as those. i'm older now, more critical, harder to impress. but cover songs still hold special appeal. well done versions tantilize you with the memory of what the original song was - the same lyrics, the familiar chord winding throug out - but evoke an entirely different mood. Good covers, i'll contend, are harder to pull off than good original songs. so i'm constantly on the prowl for new covers. here are some of my favorites. i'd love to hear some of your favorites.

yesterday i discovered an excellent cover of the cure's "a forest", done by french pop band nouvelle vague ("new wave"), transporting us from the northeastern, cold, conifer forest of the original right into the heat of a lush, tropical rainforest. you can listen to it, as well as some of their other songs (an intriguing version of echo and the bunnymen's killing moon) on their official site.

tom wait's version of heigh ho reminds us, surely, this is what dwarves must sound like.

i'm enthralled by brasilian artist seu jorge's covers of david bowie - played with an acoustic guitar and translated into portuguese, and popularized by the movie the life aquatic with steve zissou. when i first heard them i didn't recognize bowie's beloved notes. but once you catch on, it's simply awe inspiring to listen to him meld and translate the sound of several electric guitars, pianos, whatever in the original into a single, acoustic guitar. another convincing bowie cover: m ward's let's dance (links to artist): a winding, reflective tune. think swaying slowly in a faded floral patterned dress, sunlight through the dusty air from the tall windows of an abandoned house.

two versions of prince's purple rain desmonstate just how original a cover can be in the hands of a daring, imaginative artist. i'm damn impressed by classical guitarist benjamin verdery's rendering of prince's "purple rain" (sorry, couldn't find the link, but it's available on itunes)(also, can this properly be called a cover if it doesn't have the lyrics? i on't know.) the version by a swedish artist stina nordestam (links to artist) is nearly its opposite, evoking smeared lipstick, cigarettes, rainy days, and too much whiskey. neither of them, of course, anything like the original.

johnny cash did a number of covers, the best of which are u2's "one" and depeche mode's "personal jesus"" (many mistakenly assume the cash is the original).

madeleine peyroux (georgia-born, but lived in paris for 10 years) does an intoxicating version of dylan's "you're gonna make me lonesome when you go", which could easily stand on its own merits. her voice is a perfect foil to dylan's, light where his is rough, but she manages to convey the intensity of emotion, the keeness of need, almost as well as dylan himself, while keeping true to the rueful tone of the song while making it all her own. you can hear her version on amazon.

i also love ricki lee jone's kick-ass version of rebel rebel (links to amazon), claiming that song for grrls everywhere.

both covers of "in my time of dying", by bob dylan and martin gore, are very cool. the original, by led zepplin, i have yet to hear.

cake gives gloria gaynor's "i will survive" a cynical bite. i have a special place in my heart for ewan mcgregor's "your song", as sung in the movie moulin rouge. there's nothing too fresh about siouxsie and the banshee's "this wheel's on fire" (original by dylan), but she brings a sassiness to it that i like.

other covers, while originals, are just disasters. tori amos-does-nirvana falls into this category. it fits all my criteria for a good cover song, but i find her treatment of it melodramatic. the whole point of nirvana, to me, was deeply disturbed lyrics sung with complete abandon. sinead o'connor does a good job with nirvana's "all apologies" however. maybe i just love her voice.

if i were queen...

2006-12-21T17:26:00.000-08:00

edict #5331: any company that lets you sign up for an automatically renewing, annually charged service on line, that company shall be required to provide a way to terminate said service ON LINE.

kostova's the historian

2006-12-03T22:26:00.000-08:00

with much anticipation i began reading elizabeth kostova's the historian. i'd heard quite a bit of buzz about the book. i was hoping for a chilling tale of horror and suspense, but akmost half way through now, I'm pushing on only by dint of sheer will. there's a compelling story in there somewhere, between long conversations spent at cafes (which kostova does not bother to edit for us), over-described journeys across europe, and the convenient arrival of a new character. at one point, she tries to juggle three nested stories, and the book becomes as ridiculous as a recent simpson's episode, where lisa tells marge, homer, and bart a story about mr. burns telling her a story about moe telling him a story about a treasure. in the book it's hard enough trying to keep track of the three different "i's", and the style between the three narrators is so similar it's really impossible to tell who is speaking without looking for external clues in the text. character depth and development become lost in the jumpy narrative and in kostova's eagerness to unwind the plot. like brown in writing the da vinci code, she relies on cliff hangers to create suspense and danger.

but the book has some strong points, the largest of which is the fascinating details of vlad tepes's life and some of the tension between the ottoman empire and wallachia. and it does take you on a sweeping tour of europe, at times reading almost like a guide book. it's one of those stories which it almost hurts me to read, as i am forced to speculate how good it could have been.

the book exemplifies the danger of the "i" p.o.v., which i was warned against in one of my writing books (can't recall which one, at the moment). it's much too easy to fall into "i did this, i did that". i can't help but compare to tartt's book the secret history, a rivetting tale also written in the first person. tartt manages to take less scary material and bring it to life with suspense and intrigue.
she succeeds where kostova does not because she takes you by the hand, knows just when to paint in broad strokes or zero in to sharp detail. from the get go she seizes control of the story, and hence you, the reader, drives you relentlessly towards the conclusion of the book. never once does it get out of her hand. with kostova, i get the feeling the story leaked away from her, even as she hastened to contain the spill.

messiah season has started!

2006-11-30T11:41:00.000-08:00

every year for about 3 hours at a time i suspend my doubts and become a devout christian. the vehicle of my faith is handel's oratorio, messiah. probably handel's most famous work, i will contend it is also one of the most briliant and powerful pieces of music ever written. legend has it handel wept while the music flowed through him onto his score. When he wrote it he was indebted, depressed, desperate, but he believed, as i do, that divine inspiration guided his hand through the notes.

it's become something of a tradition for me to listen to messiah every christmas, starting the day after thanksgiving. to me, it epitomizes the beauty of all the positive aspects of that religion through the retelling ot jesus's life, in verses taken from the king james bible. but i am sad to say that after 27 years, my most treasured tribute to handel, the annual sing-it-yourself messiah put on by the san francisco conservatory of music ended last year. smaller versions of the event abound, but pale compared to the majesty of over 1,000 spectators rising to their feet in the davies symphony hall to join their voices in the chorus glory to god in the highest. it doesn't take a pious heart to be moved to tears.

this year, i shall have to content myself with sitting patiently in the audience, watching and listening to the piece unfold on stage. please forgive me, though, if i hum along to a snatch or two here and there.

i hate harry potter

2006-11-28T22:40:00.000-08:00

i know. it's almost a sin. especially for someone who likes fantasy. i went through a period of curiosity - cool, i thought, the series so many people have been raving about. i picked up the first book. meh, thought i. well, maybe the second book was better. they are easy to read, after all, and i borrowed them from people to avoid shelling out the $8 or whatever for the paperback edition. again, meh. i continued on to read the 3rd, by this point mystified by the amount of acclaim the books were getting. now, i've slogged through 5. i experienced a brief flicker of interest with book 3, though that quickly faded.

the thing is, i just don't get it. i suppose i'm happy that kids are reading these books, that fantasy fiction has experienced a flowering, etc etc. but i can't get past the fact that the books are just so poorly written. the prose is completely flat, the pacing atrocious, but worse of all, the characters are cardboard. i don't think i could create a more insipid character than draco malfoy. and by the fifth book, harry was swinging out of control, doing things and acting in ways that i couldn't understand because there was no flow or sense to his development. he was putty in rowling's hands, doing exactly what she wanted, when it was convenient and required for her to move the plot along. okay, now harry has to be mad at hermione. now he has to be apologetic. the effect: he just doesn't make any sense.

it makes me cringe to think there is a whole group of kids growing up thinking this is the greatest stuff around. it makes me want to vomit when people compare rowling to tolkien. but worse than that, it makes me very very depressed, since it seems success as a writer has very little to do with talent or skill. but maybe i should take comfort in that. after all, who am i to presume i have either of those things?

nanowrimo 2006

2006-11-27T11:26:00.000-08:00

yay me! i finished today, at 50900-ish words. i told ryan in a way it felt anti-climatic. not having a job is part of it. but i also remember feeling so euphoric the first time (2002?) that i finished. i swear, i was on 7th heaven, couldn't stop smiling. now, yeah, i'm happy, yeah, i feel accomplished. but that's about it.

my story has some potential. there are bits i really like. a lot of it is crap. but nanowrimo for me is like novel seeding. you get it all out, follow a story line even if it doens't feel quite right. but i've also noticed that starting stories is easy for me. i have so many scenes and characters running through my head. it's taking up the story, crafting it, and keeping it going that's the most difficult. i have such vague ideas about what my story is about. "i want to write a story about the fight against good and evil, and how the characters come to terms with the fact god is within, not something external." okay, great, but how do i make that into a story that's fun to read?

for the nerds

2006-11-17T18:17:00.000-08:00

this periodic table, from popular sci magazine, is pretty freakin' cool.

books books books

2006-11-09T08:59:00.000-08:00

i need help. i'm addicted to purchasing books. odd, isn't it? it's not to reading them. more than half of the books on my shelves are unread. i purchase books when i want them, thinking i'll read them "someday". well, sure enough, someday never comes around. sadly, amazon.com goes far to facilitate my addiction. a trait i share with karl rove, according to newsweek, anyway.

i tried to put a moratorium on new books, telling myself, i shall read the ones i have before i order more. but sure enough, i catch myself surfing around on amazon digging up new books to order. what can i do? i know it's hereditary - my dad had the same problem. i remember my mom getting so angry with him when he would go out ad spend $100 on new books when we couldn't even pay the electricity bill. my dad was a powerful reader, though - i suspect he read all his books. i just have the purchasing addiction. my sister, on the other hand, is the reader. how does it happen that i just have one half of that? it doesn't seem fair somehow.

anyway, my dad was fery strict about books. he would get mad at us if we put them on the floor, saying we should show respect to them. i think he'd be appalled now at my library. i have books chaotically arranged pretty much anywhere, under the bed, stuffed into my nightstand, lodged behind the bookshelves. someday i'll have to purge all of them, decide which ones to read and which ones not to read. i guess while i still have them all i can at least pretend i'm a well read intellectual.

throw it all away!

2006-10-10T09:34:00.000-07:00

i reread some of the early chapters of my book and i was pretty tempted to throw it all away, in one dramatic sweep into the trash can. i take solace in the fact that i'm not the only writer to have felt this way. the task of rewriting feels overwhelming. all the plot threads that i left behind because i wans't quite sure about them, well, it's not time to deal with them, weave them into the fabric or just pull them out. all i can think is how long and how painful writing it the first time was - how can i possibly rewrite it now? i knew this day would come, but now that it's here, the reckoning seems much mroe than i'd anticipated.

so i've lost a little hope, and a lot of courage. i'm not going to give up. i've come too far for that. but i do feel as if i've bitten off way more than i can chew, and rather than swallow it, i'm just going to choke on it all. i don't want to compromise on my novel, but i'm so exhausted, i'm not sure i have what it takes anymore to get it up to snuff. maybe i'll let it sit and age for another 5-10 years.

so you think you know your geography?

2006-10-07T15:09:00.000-07:00

i came across this game, the ultimate geography quiz. you're given a city name and a country, and you have to pinpoint it on the map. you can pit your wits against another person, if you dare.

geosense.

because there are no rivers, and only the largest lakes visible, it can be really tricky to pinpoint cities in some of the amorphous countries. like salt lake city.

i got to within 40 km accuracy. not bad, i guess. the game points out how woefully ignorant of all the countries in africa or those of the former ussr.

i miss latin

2006-10-06T10:52:00.000-07:00

yes, i studied it for five years. yes, it's a dead language. no, i don't consider it a waste of time.

with my knowledge of latin i can:
1. hold a coversation with the pope, with minor changes
2. exorcise demons
3. read the aeneid

i love latin. the language is really unlike any other, even the other "romance" languages. the key to understanding and appreciating it lies in the declension. the nouns and adjectives have a different ending, specific to its role in the sentence. if its the subject it has one ending, another if it is the object or possessive - this is like english and other language pronouns, but latin also has the dative and ablative cases, indicated movement or reference to the noun, taking the place of prepositions. the result: you can scramble words around, allowing for that glorious iambic pentameter. by placing words next to each other, too, you can imply a relationship, though the adjective would technically refer to another noun. i wish i could come up with an example. i'll try to find one.

anyway, i've noticed that my study in latin affects the way i write. there are certain grammatical patterns that i've picked up and deploy. i put down a sentence and it just feels latin, the formality, the placement of the words. again, the lack of example is making my case weak here, but i'm not so good at providing on demand.

suffice it to say, the study of any language, even a dead one, is never a waste of time.

cool free games

2006-10-04T11:01:00.000-07:00

okay, since i'm unemployed, i play games to amuse myself. also since i'm unemployed (an just 'cus i'm a penny pincher in general) i don't want to fork out a alot of dough for games.

fortunately for me, there's a wealth of free games out there! the ones i like best are browser based.

anyway, here's one of my favorites:

Psychiatrie fur misshandelte kuscheltiere.
Don't worry, there's an English translation for the game: Asylum for Abused Stuffed Animals.

This game just stole my heart. I still think about it, though it's been a good two or three weeks since I've played it. You're a psychiatrist in training, filling in for the doctor while he is on a trip, at the mental institute for mishandled stuffed animals. You're job is to rehabilitate them, by recommending treatment and slowly coaxing the past out of each of four stuffed animals, using a combination of dream therapy, drugs, play therapy, and other options. It is simply quite adorable and also poignant. I was amazed too, by the complexity that went into it, both in thought and in execution.

Bottom line: You will never look at stuffed animals the same way again.

too big for their britches?

2006-10-04T10:00:00.000-07:00

i've noticed google's been having problems lately with their service. the chat on gmail is frequently unavailable, at least once or twice a day now, and i've been getting more server errors when i try to log into my gmail. furthermore, on sites that use google ad sense, the loading of the ads can be prohibitively slow... it's made me give up on a couple sites because the ads were taking forever to load.

i guess i can't complain too much - after all, it's all free. but it's frustrating, too. perhaps they need to invest in more hardware and infrastructure.

my darlings

2006-09-29T08:58:00.000-07:00

"I cannot stress this enough," my professor said. Thin and wirey, with a crest of wild grey hair, she could command our attention with a lifted eyebrow or a narrow-eyed glance. "This is the most important thing you will ever learn." She dropped her voice low.

We leaned in close. This, The Secret of Writing, was what we were all here to learn.

"You must be ruthless and 'murder your darlings.'" She'd said the last words so deliciously, as if savoring every syllable, then peeled her lips back into a grin.

I thought she was crazy then. Now I'm beginning to realize how right she was. Her words aren't unique - she was quoting some famous author. Since that time I've come across those words again. When writing, we become so in love with our prose, a well crafted scene or a clever turn of words, that we fail to stay true to the bigger picture of the story. I've caught myself doing this over and over again as I rewrite my novel. I frequently find myself hemming and hawing - but, but, I love this scene, where the character does this, and it's just perfect! Then I realize it breaks the pace, it doesn't quite fit, the character's actions don't really make sense in the greater scheme of things.

I can't quite get myself to delete it, so I cheat. I make a copy of it and stick it in a folder. I can always go back to it, I tell myself. I can always copy and paste the scene or phrase in later, when it might be appropriate. I've discovered I seldom do so, however, almost always prefering the revision to the original.

Another excellent piece of writing advice handed down to me from one of my favorite editors, from his editor before him. It's the same advice a mother would give to her daughter before her big debut: put on all your jewelry, then start removing them, one by one. when you think you have just the right amount of jewelry, go back to the mirror, take a good long look, and remove one more piece.

I admit, I lay description, analogy, and metaphor on thick. Probably too much. I'd like to tone it down, so that's what I'm working on now, going through my prose, picking out the stuff that works, the stuff that doesn't, and the stuff that even though it does, is just too much. It's painful, because ultimately, writing is such a display of ego. And as my characters develop and adopt egos of their own, I discover my professor wasn't exaggerating - it really is like murder.

reasons

2006-09-25T18:51:00.000-07:00

browsing through row upon row of new fiction, i am drawn by alluring covers - a sillouhette of a woman's face, lips parted, another black and white picture of a woman bent over to wash her hair with a hose. i wonder, how can my book compete? what can i hope to offer the reader that these sexy, evocative, and soulful titles can't?

maybe it doesn't matter. i know now why i want to write. i want to create magic, to transport the reader to a world of my imagining. this is also why, try as i might, i can't get away from fantasy fiction. i've tried writing down "straight" story lines, but i can't help it. fantasy weaves its way in. i might as well embrace it.

commercial wars

2006-09-22T11:18:00.000-07:00

there's nothing a day-time t.v. addict such as myself enjoys more than a juicy commercial war. there are, of course, the stupid, blatant ones ("better than the other leading brand!"). but the jewels are the clever, witty ones. most recently, the geico-ais war. geico's mascot is the gecko (why he speaks with a brittish accent, i have no idea). recently, ais (auto insurance specialists) ran an ad with the tagline, "a more evolved choice," indicating their web site offers advanced options for "those with opposable thumbs." they show a picture of a gecko eating the aflac duck and a moose (elk? deer? not sure whose maskot that is).

Geico's response: so easy even the caveman can do it. i absolutely love their commercial. a caveman dressed in jeans and a hip sweatshirt is at an airport on one of those moving walkways. he passes a number of billboards, including geico's, depicting a caveman in front of a computer. the camera stops on the the image, and a moment later, the caveman comes walking back, takes a second look at the billboard, nods, and smiles.

paced to norwegian electonic-pop band röyksopp's remind me, the commercial comes off cool, collected, and clever.

temper-pedic mattress

2006-09-14T10:58:00.000-07:00

i'm intriged... i hate my mattress. i hate mattresses in general. they wear out too quickly, they aren't exactly enviromental, and, well, i can never afford the really comfortable ones. partly because of all the commercials, i'm intrigued by the temper-pedic, the form-fitting foam. my last experience with a foam pillow was negative - it stank so badly of chemicals i had to get rid of it. the temper-pedic looks pretty comfortable.

but i have to ask... how is it for sex? its not somethign they address in the commercials, obviously, but if you're sinking into the foam... well, you can probably figure out what i'm getting at.

there's a new judge in town...

2006-09-14T09:10:00.000-07:00

this season they've messed with some of my court t.v. shows, to which i've become addicted. i don't know why, exactly. many of the cases are repetitive (come on, how many land-lord tenant cases, or "it was a loan, not a gift" cases have i heard?) but i still enjoy watching them. much of it depends on the judge, of course, and the qualities they bring to the show. their interaction with the bailiff, too, is important to the success of the show.

the newest addition is judge maria lopez, former massachusetts supreme court justice who resigned after her conduct in a child molestation case was questioned. with a sultry, husky voice and a hot temper, i can see how she might be a perfect fit for t.v. i see her as judge marilyn milian (of the people's court) taken one step further. lopez is from cuba, milian is from puerto rico. both have brown hair, are in their late 40s/ early 50s, and are tough women. i like milian better - she doens't have a chip on her shoulder like lopez seems to (lopez can be overly aggressive, as if she feel she needs to play the role of the latina judge she's been give), whereas milian seems more compassionate, wittier, and more insightful. of all the judges, i'm most confident in milian's ability to get to the truth, whereas with the others, sometimes i wonder.

judge mathis is "one of the people". he was a juvenile delinquent, but decided to change his life around when his mother developed cancer and he had to help take care of her. he likes to tease people, making fun of them, because ultimately, it's true, coming to t.v. to solve your legal problems is a big joke. i get the feeling he experiences the success of his show with a certain amount of wryness. he also likes to say it like it is, cutting through the crap: "a person who takes a lot of crack is a crack head. what, you think i should mince words or clean it up?" he banters about with doyle, a towring, kind of goofy looking, young red-headed sheriff, who seems almost the perfect foil for mathis's hard hitting cracks. in one episode, the defendent is a hypnotherapist who claims to have made a woman in her thirties experience her first orgasm. "oh i've done that too," jokes doyle with his goofy grin (coming from anyone else it would have been crass). mathis is probably the most entertaining of the lot, and out of all of them, he makes me laugh. he puts people on the spot, helping them realize the stupidity of their ways by joking with them or teasing them, instead of lecturing them, something most of the other judges revel in.

milian, too, has a young bailiff, douglas, a tall, black man who's usually very quiet but will occassionally break into a quick grin.

judge joe brown (of texas justice) is much more of a gentleman. i get the feeling that he's a hard core republican, though he takes issues of people's sometimes bizzare and shocking alternative lifestyles gracefully in stride. he's not as interesting to watch, though he has a certain dignity. not surprisingly, he usually has a female bailiff. it used to be "miss holly", a short-haired blond in her thirties. this season it's someone new - dark haired, thin lipped - and i don't know her name (yet).

i don't like judge judy - she's a witch! she's quick to judge people and is very disdainful and snooty. occassionally she impresses me, but over all, i find myself talking back to her. "well, you dismissed his entire testimony withot even letting him finish!" or, "no, his testimony does make sense, you just didn't pay attention to what he was trying to tell you!" watching her frequently makes me either sad, because i don't see justice meted out, or just annoyed at her grating manner.

there's also judge alex, who is so incredibly boring i don't even bother with him. and "an eye for an eye", which is a little more creative - people undergo some sort of embarrasement or discomfort to make up for what they have done, rather than receiving a monetary settlement. for instance, two ladies who accused the other's cat of peeing on their car's upholstry, when neither's case could be proven, were ordered to go througha car wash together... in the end they had a good laugh through their shared misery and their friendship was restored.

judge hatchett can be fun - she's very compassionate, and her big motto is "think of the children!" she frequently sends kids out of the courtroom so they don't have to experience the unpleasantries that testimony can frequently result in. she used to be a family court judge, hearing custody, divorce hearings, or cases of parent vs. child, but since then she's expanded into all kinds of small claims.

then, of course, there's divorce court, which used to be heard by judge mabeleane ephram, but i think she has her own show now, and its lynn toler, who has a spicy attitude just like ephram had, but there's something about toler that i like better. she seems warmer, and is willing to depricate herself to make a point. in a case where a man wanted to leave his wife because she had gained 140 pounds, toler offered an anecdote: one day she was getting out of her car when she happened to look down at her thigh and noticed how big it was. she asked her husband, "honey, have i always been this big?" and her husband told her with a kiss and a smile, "you were big when i met you and you're bigger now, but i still love you." her point, the husband seeing weaknesses in his wife when he should have been looking for the weakness inside himself.

as you might imagine, i could happily watch court t.v. all day. of course, the first show, judge maria lopez, doesn's start until 10 am. but with the reintroduction of perry mason, one of my favorite shows since i was a girl, my 9-10 am block is set! i think ive probably seen most of them, at this point, but i still like watching them. and yes, i know they're fiction!

kitties

2006-09-09T17:08:00.000-07:00

much as i like to complain about them, i adore my kitties. there are few things more heartwarming and adorable as a bundle of sleeping cats.

must. be. productive!!

2006-09-07T09:22:00.000-07:00

or not.

i have to say, the episode entitled "Mr. F" in season 3 of Arrested Development (nicknamed "AD" in our household)is one of the most brilliant moments in t.v. and comedy. it had me literally holding my sides with laughter, not just on the first watching, but on the second as well (and alcohol was only involved in one of the viewings). i admit when i started watching the season i was a little dissappointed - it was slow to get off the ground. but i remember now that's the genius of the show. it takes a while to set itself up and then *kaching*! it cashes in all the jokes. Mr F was one of those payoff episodes. theres so much double meaning and so many puns that aren't cliche, but are so artfully executed. the whole bit with the japanese business men and tiny town was just pure gold (this part, of course, is why i loved the episode so much).

that's all. too bad it's canceled. sigh. well, genius is frequently misudnerstood in its time!

wino.... er, wineaux

2006-08-31T10:23:00.000-07:00

in other news, the east bay express has introduced a column on wine. they've tried to coin the term wineaux, to describe people who have decent taste don't want to spend a lot of money. i guess we'll see if it sticks. being a spendthrift myself, i hem and haw over any bottle more than $10. yes, some more expensive bottles are better, but frankly, i don't want to spend that much on wine.

the column also seeks wines that are readily available (did you know costco is now the #1 wine cellar?) including at albertson's, safeway, and bev mo. i'm dissappointed they didn't at least mention oddlots - after all, it's a local paper, and at oddlots, virtually every bottle is around $10 or less. that, and the fact that they called 2-$ chuck drinkable brings a little suspicion to my mind. cheap as it is, i do not really consider that wine worth the $2!

time to pimp fall

2006-08-31T08:42:00.000-07:00

i felt the whisper of fall last week as i was walking in the berkeley hills. today, i'm sure of it - fall is here. i wonder what triggers the knowledge - is the light just oblique enough for me to sense? or perhaps it's that heat in the air, twinged with a cool breeze. i can almost taste the pumpkin lying orange in the golden fields.

and, of course, there are the stores, already pimping fall. ryan often laments this. they lure us in with halloween. once you buy into that, of course you ahve to continue with thanksgiving, then christmas, then new years. it even drags on to valentine's day. now, ive noticed more general, harvest themed decorations in the stores already. when will it end? i'm surprised hallmark hasnt devised some "happy harvest!" cards that we're all supposed to send out! harumph.

i do celebrate the autumn equinox, however, with a special feast. i forget what i did last year... probably nothing, since i was in school in santa cruz. this year will be something special, if i can manage it!

I remember you

2006-08-26T07:35:00.000-07:00

"God never calls us to do what we are capable of doing on our own. He calls us to do the impossible."
~ TMP, March 1946 - August 26, 2003

crack!

2006-08-23T09:38:00.000-07:00

i think i experienced something of a breakthrough in yoga the other day. i'd been suffering from a tightness in the upper vertebrae of my back (something i inherited from my father). there's one stretch that we do where we lean forward, interlace our fingers, and bring our arms over our heads. well, i could only move mine a few inches above my back without experience a great deal of resistence. i kept at it, and then a few days ago, i tried it, and crack! i could feel my back crack, four times in a row. when i straightened i felt taller, the tightness was gone.

sadly, back cracking is addictive. though it's still much looser than it was, i feel i have to crack it every day now for it to feel right. but damn, it feels good!

a little help here, universe!

2006-08-22T09:57:00.000-07:00

a few crucial things have fallen apart for me recently, nothing serious or dire, but things i've relied upon more than i at first realized. i've cast out my fishing lines for more opportunities, but they've come back empty, the lures untouched. i suppose lulls in life are to be expected, but it's frustrating, when you feel as if you're putting the energy out there and it's just dissapating into thin air.

back and to the left, back and to the left, back...

2006-08-21T10:14:00.000-07:00

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Scienists cite new evidence to challenge the "single bullet theory" in the assassination of JFK, according to Betsy Mason's article in the Contra Costa Times.

trouble with time

2006-08-18T12:26:00.000-07:00

i swear the space time continuum is bubbling and warping around me... last night i made popovers, set the timer to bake according to the recipe i've used time and time again. well, they were nearly burned well before the time passed on my timer (and yes, i set both the oven temp and timer correctly).

now, today, time. is. so. f-ing. slow!

ryan tate, anglophile

2006-08-17T18:51:00.000-07:00

a witty commentary from ryan tate on his new favorite paper, the financial times (at least, the weekend edition).

i love it when all my mussels open

2006-08-16T08:56:00.000-07:00

yesterday i made one of ryan's and my favorite dishes - pasta with mussels and white wine with parsley and garlic. it's such a simple dish, but i love the aroma that wafts into your face when you open the lid of the pan and take in that delicious ocean smell. and last night, perfectly, every singld mussel had opened.

2006-08-15T17:04:00.000-07:00

i'm sorry, i absolutely love the new milk commercials featuring the aliens and Da Iry. corny, i know, but it never fails to get a chuckle out of me.

on the other hand, the ford? gm? commercial where the man is singing some terrible song on a light up stage is just so pathetic (i'm not even going to try to find an on line version of that). leave it up to jetta, who recognize their market tends towards young and hip, to burst out of the pack with their startling crash commercials. I personally don't like these commercials - the last thing we need is sensationalization of ads - but i do appreciate their shock value.

not sure breakfast helps

2006-08-11T10:31:00.000-07:00

having heard, ad nauseum, that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, i've made it a point to eat some before i leave the house. usually cereal and fruit or yogurt and granola and fruit.

i'm not sure it really helps. in fact, i think it makes me even hungrier. the cereal i eat is whole grain, hippie cereal, so i don't think it's a blood sugar spike issue. but not it's 10:30, i ate about 2 hours ago, and i'm so famished i feel as if i could eat my fist!

at least two more hours until lunch... sigh...

harumph

2006-08-10T14:23:00.000-07:00

i thought macs were supposed to be more stable than pcs. well, this is the second os-x mac to crash on me.

okay, mac bashing will end now. i promise.

lessons learned

2006-08-09T16:08:00.000-07:00

1. i do much better with deadlines. in fact, i'm almost worthless without them.

2. i really do not like macs. sorry, mac loving friends (you know who you are!)

see, high energy physics are good for something

2006-08-08T13:41:00.000-07:00

here's a neat project from slac (oh, sorry, did i go all acronym? it's the stanford linear accelerator): the stanford synchotron radiation lab is using x-ray beams to decipher archimedes's ancient writings.

apparently, archimedes's works had been vandalized:

In the 10th century, an anonymous scribe copied Archimedes' treatises in the original Greek onto the parchment. But three centuries later, a monk "palimpsested" the parchment: he scraped away the Archimedes text, cut the pages in half, turned them sideways, and copied Greek Orthodox prayers onto the recycled pages. Adding further injury, forgers in the early 20th century painted religious imagery on several pages in an attempt to elevate the manuscript’s value. The result was the near obliteration of Archimedes' work, except for the faintest traces of ink still embedded in the parchment.

inheritance

2006-08-07T09:39:00.000-07:00

my father was a fanatic about clean fingernails. he'd inspect them at dinner time and if they weren't clean enough, he'd send us back to the bathroom. i remember one time he pinned me down by the sink and took a nail brush to my nails, scrubing them to his satisfaction. clean fingernails commanded respect. dirty fingernails signaled a degenerate personality.

consequently, i'm super concious of my nails. the thing is, they get dirty so quickly. i usually clip them very short to avoid having the white parts get dirty or stained. i remember one time i used fresh tumeric for a recipe and was so ashamed of my nails i kept my hands in my pocket or my fingers tucked in whenever i could.

i guess i'd be a good candidate for a french manicure, if i could tolerate someone else fiddling with my nails (to me that's almost as bad as squeaking styrofoam). today, i'm wishing i'd given them a good scrub before i left the house. or trimmed them a little more. but a good nail brush is hard to find. my dad used boar bristles, but he had some sort of heirloom. boar bristles aren't so common any more - at least i've not managed to find one. most modern nail brushes are too soft or too stiff.

hopelessness

2006-08-06T17:01:00.000-07:00

people tell me everything will be okay but i just can't see it. day after day, it's such a struggle, putting words together, putting the little steps together to form life. i've heard it a thousand times before, take it one step at a time, focus on just the next thing that needs to happen. but if we lose sight of the whole, what then? there's got to be something to work towards,right? something whole and worthy and good and not just a composite of all the little things day to day that we struggle to do. somehow i thought when i turned thirty i would be okay. but there's no guarantee of anything. there's no guarantee anything, ever, will be okay. when i should be reaching out i find myself simply retreating further and further away.

focus, focus

2006-08-03T11:39:00.000-07:00

(obviously, i'm having problems today)

i sincerely believe anything is possible if we focus. focus is both a product of and an aggregator of will power (creating a positive feedback loop). the more will power we have, the stronger it is, the more we can exert that will power onto the world (through prayer, magic, whatever you choose to call it) and affect events.

but it all comes down to focus. i've got to learn how to discipline my mind. exercise is good for that. so is yoga. and meditation.

save yourselves!

2006-08-03T09:36:00.000-07:00

normally, i'm not a doomsayer. i didn't stockpile duct tape and plastic or whatever we were supposed to have. we've only recently started a collection of "apocalypse food." but a recent conference, summarized in oakland tribune article, concerns me. regardless of the chances of bird flu arriving in the unites states (and depending on who you talk to its either a remote possibility or a sure thing) the take home message is the same: we are on our own. the goverment will not help us. and after the disaster in new orleans, i'm not sure we would want their assistance.

i'm not advocating panic or paranoia. i'm still skeptical as to whether the virus will be a problem or not. but it's a matter of analyzing the costs and benefits. though the chances might be slim, the outcome could be pretty devastating, preparation is a minimal investment, so better to be safe than sorry.

...

2006-08-01T14:10:00.001-07:00

"and every day you gaze upon the sunset
with such love and intensity
it's almost...it's almost as if
if you could only crack the code
then you'd finally understand what this all means

but if you could...do you think you would
trade in all the pain and suffering?
ah, but then you'd miss
the beauty of the light upon this earth
and the sweetness of the leaving."

~ Jane Siberry

diction

2006-07-27T14:02:00.000-07:00

Pippin: "I didn't think it would end this way..."

Gandalf: "End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...One that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass... And then you see it."

Pippin: "What? Gandalf? ...See what?"

Gandalf: "White shores...and beyond... the far green country under a swift sunrise."

Pippin: "Well, that isn't so bad."

Gandalf: "No...No it isn't."

Excerpted from the movie but the crucial phrases, of course, are all Tolkien's.

I've become extremely conscious of word choices recently. A good thing, I assure you. For example, in the previous sentence, is "extremely" necessary? Does it add anything? i think the answer is no. it adds an element of degree, but not much else. I'm learning a few well-chosen adjectives or just the right verb bring writing to life. And there's a certain art to passing on your meaning with as few words as possible, laying each one down with deliberate and precise meaning. Of course, one must balance leanness with rhythm and pacing, and sometimes that extra adjective just makes the sentence flow right - without it, the phrase would seem stilted and incomplete. I think most writers would agree grace should trump any grammatical rule.

Tolkien's phrases send shivers down my spine. In such few words, he evokes powerful emotion and imagery. How long did he sit and ponder his choices, trying diffent combinations until they rang true? Here's the original passage from the book:

And it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise.

Grey to silver is a clever transition. Nearly the same colors, but each carries unique connotations. "Was rolled back" - passive voice, which we're taught - ad nauseum - to avoid, but deliberate here, implying events beyond Frodo's control (and again, for grace. Can you imagine rewriting this into active tense?). "White shores" is just beautiful. One could argue "far" is redundant. After all, if it's beyond, wouldn't it be far? But "far green country" is more graceful than simply "green country", and we realize here that "far" might convey more than just physical distance, but spiritual, too. And finally, "swift", the adjective that brings motion to the entire sentence.

(okay, better go back to work...)

six feet under

2006-07-27T09:17:00.000-07:00

what is it about this show that just leaves you feeling empty inside? after we watch an episode, ryan and i just sit on the couch in silence, trying to reabsorb life. i started watching in the third season and got hooked. it's not that much better than a soap opera, but the characters are more real and quirkier and the storytelling compelling and creative. we stopped cable after season 4, so for the last year we've been hanging, desperately avoiding all spoilers. now, finally ,we've started watching the last season.

its strange that the show can be so addictive and yet so annoying at the same time. i swing from muttering in disgust and disdain at the characters and their stupidy, to clutching the couch cushions, thinking, oh no, poor nate!

at the same time, it makes me so happy for my relationship. i mean, heck, the people in the show are _dys_functional. by watching them do everything wrong, it shows me how we are doing everything, well, not completely right, but at least better than they are. the emptiness comes from witnessing people in relationships not act out of love and respect but out of resentment, fear, and anger.

if i were sony, i'd be pissed

2006-07-21T11:07:00.000-07:00

popular science magazine titled sony's new e-reader "an ipod for your books".

at any rate, it's pretty interesting technology, though it can't compare to having a magazine or book to flip through on bart (which is something i'm getting used to now that i'm a working stiff!).

this is life?

2006-06-30T07:46:00.000-07:00

so this is the 9-5 club i've been scrambling to join. while i was in school, i could think of nothing better than having a manageable, predictable work schedule, no homework hanging over my head, no hours until infinity. but now... well, the grass really is greener on the other side of the fence.

where's the time for life? in the mornings, by the time i get up, get ready for work, it's time to go. in the evenings, i come home, unwind for an hour or two (or more likely do chores and errands, like cleaning the house, shopping for dinner, etc). then i make dinner, and by the time we eat and clean up, look at the time! it's 10 p.m.! off to bed (we're both 30 or over now, after all), maybe to read or write for an hour or so, and then, that's it.

that's it?? and then on the weekends, we try to squeeze in the stuff we couldn't do during the week. more shopping for groceries, catching up on sleep, gardening, all the miscellaneous tasks.

the only way i can find to get more time is to sleep less (difficult to do) or make the days longer (impossible to do).

at least with school, i had one day off. of course, that was filled with stuff to do, or if i wasn't doing my homework, i was certainly stressing about it!

borrowed time

2006-06-05T21:06:00.000-07:00

there are times when i want nothing more than to move out of this house. the windows that i put in with an ex trap me inside, yielding only dusty, cobweb strewn glimpses of the world outside. The walls crawling with mold and the leaking roof remind me i'm living beyond my means in a house i can't afford to keep. i've spent too long on borrowed time, letting the house depreciate little by little with deferred maintenance.

my sister says the house is a leash that binds me with responsibility. the rooms are packed with stuff that's not mine, but left here over the years by the residents that have come and gone. i've never decorated, never fully made this place mine.

now my hand might soon by forced. my sister doesn't want to keep the house, and while i'm conflicted, i don't feel i have the right to convince her otherwise. part of me aches like muscles stiff with stillness. at last, i think, i will be free. i'm itching to start a life with my dearest love.

but then my eye travels along the redwood fence, now silvered, that i built using only hand tools (i was too scared of the power tools to use them) and my mind lingers on the kitty graveyard on the side of the house, which holds the cats that have lived her as long as i have and i think of the cats living now, who know no other home.

the roses are in bloom now, i see. Lascivious and voluptuous things, their thorny stems sagging with the weight of their pendulous blossoms. I clip some and bring them inside, where their heady scent penetrates the room, and i remember how my mother would lean up on tiptoe with her slight frame, close her eyes, and smell them.

"oh annie," she would say. "don't they smell wonderful?"

how can i give up those roses? how i can i ever entrust them another's care?

argh

2006-06-04T17:48:00.000-07:00

how do i write something when i have absolutely no idea on how to write it? they always say, go with your instinct, what's interesting about something. well, i do think it's interesting, but there's nothing that new - my article is about a blogger. come one, people have been blogging for a while. true, this guy is interesting, but how do i convey that without dipping too far into touchy feely, definitely non-newsy writing?