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haineux's LiveJournal:
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| Friday, November 27th, 2009 | | 12:10 am |
Sad and Happy Thanksgiving.
The other day, we had to have a stray cat put to sleep. Not much choice in the matter, the thing was in terminal stages of feline AIDS, but I signed a consent paper, and then we stood there and petted him and tried as best as we could to make those last few minutes pleasant, while the sedative kicked in. My dad passed away after a long illness, but at least he got better enough to enjoy a final bite of life before he did. Bulleit Bourbon is on sale at the Safeway. It's very good stuff. I am thankful that my sister is doing well. She has a great daughter. They, and my mom, are at my uncle's in western Massachusetts for the traditional thanksgiving. My uncle stirs Manhattans up, in honor of some of the sainted aunts who used to have just one, once a year, on Thanksgiving. Last night I saw my old pal and her husband and two daughters. It was actually a bit humorous -- the kids are pretty wild, but that's pretty much to be expected for kids their age. It was enjoyable. I wish we had our own kid there too, but so far, not so much. I am thankful for friends nearby. We went by their house and brought some food, and some Manhattans. There are many friends I have, and I am extremely thankful for them. The women are all smarter than average and the men are all attractive. My life, I should have no complaints. My wife is superb. The cats are charming. The job is stable, and the house is pleasant. We have art on the walls, and I made some of it. We just got back from the Stanford Theatre, were we saw The Thin Man, and My Man Godfrey, and listened to their excellent organ. And I am making Suffering Bastards. | | Monday, November 9th, 2009 | | 11:13 pm |
| | 8:16 am |
| | Monday, November 2nd, 2009 | | 11:41 pm |
My father has passed away.
Several months ago, my father suddenly fell ill. He was 77, and had always had a weak heart, so it was not all that surprising how severely and suddenly he became sick. Due to the super-powers of the doctors of the Mass General Hospital, they figured out that his illness was a tick-borne infection similar to Lyme Disease, but different. ( He made enormous improvements, and then suddenly, on November 1, he died. I talk about the illness in more detail, and try to remember some of his life, in the cut. ) | | Monday, October 26th, 2009 | | 4:28 pm |
| | Saturday, October 24th, 2009 | | 1:07 pm |
| | Thursday, October 22nd, 2009 | | 4:31 pm |
| | Wednesday, October 21st, 2009 | | 1:06 am |
Magic Mouse Product Announcement Reactions
APPLE: We've shipped a new mouse that has lasers and multi-touch, just like Microsoft's demo last month, only for reals.
BLOGGER 1: It's not the tablet that we've been PROMISED for 800 YEARS!!! WAHH!!!
BLOGGER 2: Why doesn't it have the following 137 other ports? BUT DELL....
BLOGGER 3: This was exactly like what the rumors sites predicted. Except that they predicted that the mouse would recharge itself wirelessly, and didn't predict the multi-touch, laser part. YAWWWWNNNNN!!!!
BLOGGER 4: Everyone who likes these things is a mindless Appal Fanboi!!!!!! And Windows 7.5, which comes out sometime in the next decade, will have killer new features, just like that product mockup that MS leaked last year. | | Friday, October 16th, 2009 | | 3:27 pm |
Five New Macintosh Games I've Mostly Liked
"Games on a Mac?" Yes, really. These all have free demos. Little Space Duo is a puzzle-adventure that requires a small amount of eye-hand coordination, so I suck at it. But the puzzly bits are good -- you play two characters, a little girl, and a floating robot, who are stuck in a cargo hold of an alien ship, and must turn off all the power switches to get out. The robot, unfortunately, has no hands, and the little girl, unfortunately, cannot float, so they have to work together. Yeah, the drawings of the girl are a little wooden, but this is not much of an issue in the actual game. Return to Mysterious Island is a point and click adventure set on a Jules Verne-inspired desert island. Figure out how to make fire, cook food, and eat! Woo! The visuals are great. You click to move from spot to spot, and each spot is a 360 degree panorama including animation and directional stereo sound. There's an inventory system that allows you to combine items to make other items in a way that allows the combinations to be undone, so objects are frequently used more than once. The Secrets of Da Vinci is another title from the same publisher. The Three Musketeers is a top-down role playing adventure game featuring some pretty slick animations and easy-peasy minigames (tennis, poker) and a simple combat system to add to the excitement of spending hour after hour going from one end of Olde Paris to the other -- AND BACK. Also, people don't seem to mind when you walk into their houses and rifle through their crates and chests, but almost all of what you find is stinky old clothes, worth at most a franc or two at the market. I actually had a surprising amount of fun playing the demo, and hope to luck into getting it for cheaper than the $25 official purchase price. Machinarium is another point and click adventure, featuring robots in a world of junk. It's charming and hard. | | 3:01 pm |
Two quick notes about iPhone Apps that are pretty exciting
If you're a programmer, you probably already heard these, but they are interesting to non-programmers: 1) Apple announced that they would allow in-app purchasing in free apps.
WHAT THIS MEANS TO HUMANS: Currently, if you want to try a game without buying it, you have to find the "Lite" version and then download it for free, then, when the game is over, go back to the app store and pay for (and download) an entirely separate game. The new thing will be a game that's free, and when you hit the end of the demo, a dialog appears allowing you to purchase the rest of the game. Click once and you go back to playing, and your iTunes account pays the author. This is much simpler for users, and should mean that more people will end up buying the game. It also allows for a different kind of application, what I call, "Free Toolbox, Tools Extra." For instance, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) catbear's iPhone sketching app could be free, including basic paper and pencil tools. You might pay extra for color paint, canvas drawing surface, and an "automatic line tracer" tool to turn a picture you took into a simplified line drawing -- a "potion of instant drawing skills." 2) O'Reilly is publishing a book about how to make iPhone apps using programming stuff normally used by web applications.
Tech details: It boils down to programming in Javascript, with a handful of other tricks to gloss over the fact that the app is not absolutely the same as a regular app. (Almost all of the pain of Javascript comes from making one Javascript program run on 8 different web browsers, but iPhone has just one browser!) WHAT THIS MEANS TO PROGRAMMERS: You can make an app that completely circumvents the App Store. You can create a program that is pretty much a "real iPhone app." It can store itself, and its data, locally, and take over the whole screen, and get access to the special iPhone hardware. It won't be quite as slick-looking, but hey, it's actually easy and fun to program Javascript. WHAT THIS MEANS TO HUMANS: You might someday see websites that offer iPhone programs other than the Apple App store. Maybe some of these apps will be pretty good, but I bet most of them are made by hobbyists, and smell like it. But that's OK, it makes the programmers REALLY HAPPY. | | Sunday, October 4th, 2009 | | 10:57 pm |
Seed Bomb Season
American Meadows has their wildflower seed mix on sale for $17/lb, which is a huge discount. (Look for "Fall Maximum Wildflower Seed Mix") I take it this is a mix of all their leftovers from this year, so there will be many, many different kinds of plants in the mix. Some might not be native to the area, but those ones probably won't take hold. Seed bombs can be made by mixing 2 parts seeds, 3 parts compost, and then when that's mixed up good, mix with 5 parts powdered clay. (Yes, this is a bit tricky to obtain. Art supply stores have it, but might want you to buy a huge sack. I lucked out, and a friend was able to get me 10 lbs or so for almost-free.) Anyway, once you've got that mixed up, add just enough water to make a stiff batter that can be molded into balls. Make balls 1-2" in diameter and let them dry overnight. Put them in a sack, and when you find a vacant lot, toss in some seed bombs onto the dirt, hopefully 1 per square foot, but randomness is cool. The clay exterior keeps the birds and field rodents from eating the seeds up. When the rains hit, the clay will disintegrate and the seeds will be able to grow. Some won't survive, but some will, and the compost gives them a good head start. I'm going to bomb the bare dirt shoulders on the roads near the house. With any luck, I'll get them out before the rains. I'll try to remember to post how much volume a pound of seeds is, and just how much other stuff you need -- and how many bombs you end up with. | | Thursday, October 1st, 2009 | | 11:33 am |
I was not that interested, but
Some friends of mine have been the victims of unwanted sexual contact. Therefore, I am totally, 100% in support of putting Roman Polanski in prison. Above and beyond that support, there's a very logical argument. Polanski is guilty of the following: • giving a 13 year old girl champagne and quaaludes • raping her • sodomizing her Note that even at the time of the crime, an adult having sex with a minor is always considered rape, even if the minor was completely willing. However, there is no dispute that the minor did not consent. She yelled NO! cried, and begged to be released. How do we know this? The victim swore to these things happening, and Polanski did not dispute her testimony. Polanski also confessed. He is definitively guilty. Polanski also had an excellent lawyer at the time, who got Polanski a deal: minimal jail time in return for pleading guilty to a lesser charge. Instead of showing up and serving time, Polanski fled the country. In the ensuing decades, he has both downplayed the crime and flaunted the law. He fled to France, and France decided not to extradite him back to America. Therefore, Polanski is also indisputably guilty of fleeing justice, a crime punishable by prison time. Defendants who miss a court date -- even if it were impossible for them to appear -- are almost automatically convicted to serve time for doing so. There are a few mitigating factors: • Some people argue about the severity of the crime. Others want to point out that the victim has forgiven him and been compensated in a civil court. Perhaps most insanely, some claim Polanski has "suffered enough." Many of these people are celebrity friends of his.
This is all 100% bullshit.. Even though, back then, both the chance of conviction and the punishments for rape were less severe, Polanski still confessed.
His friends won't be even brought up in court, because if a defendant brings in character witnesses, the prosecution is allowed to bring in counter-witnesses, and these will include literally dozens of reporters who wrote that he said things like, "Everyone wants to fuck little girls. The judge wants to fuck little girls."[1] • Apparently, the way the "plea bargaining" system works, until the judge bangs the gavel at the end of the sentencing, any deal is tentative to the discretion of the judge. If the judge thinks the deal is not reasonable, he can ignore it.[2] There's some rumors going that Polanski might have heard that the judge wasn't going to honor the deal, and therefore was somehow justified in fleeing. This simply isn't a useful argument. If one is charged, one must show up. • Most disturbing, there have been allegations of the prosecutor influencing the judge. This seems unlikely to have happened -- usually prosecutors will scrupulously avoid being alone in the same room with a judge -- but given the fact that it's been in the papers, this is going to be the major issue of the new hearings. In any case, Polanski is still 100% guilty of fleeing justice. There is, in my naïve estimation, less than a zero percent chance of Polanski not going to prison for that. The original charges will not be overthrown, however. It's just a question of how long the judge decides to make the sentence. I doubt, extremely, that the judge will allow the usual "time served" or "1 hour, er, 1 day" celebrity sentence. Doing so might make it easier to get Polanski released on appeal, and I can't imagine a judge that stupid. Even if, like Al Capone, Roman Polanski gets locked up on a charge very different from the original crime he committed, away he will go, and some amount of justice will be served. [1] I am not sure if prosecution can use recordings of the defendant as evidence against the character of the defendant.
[2] I am not sure exactly what happens next in such cases -- whether the judge simply announces a different sentence, or the whole court case goes back to the "How does the defendant plead?" stage. Not that it matters. | | Sunday, September 27th, 2009 | | 7:34 pm |
Sweeping up the sand
Venerable Ngawang Chojor and Lama Paljor spent the last three days at the San Jose Museum of Modern Art, downtown, constructing a sand painting. Jen and I were able to attend the deconstruction ceremony. First we prayed for all sentient beings to be helped by this action, then the monks cut and swept up the sand. Some of the sand was dumped in the nearby Guadelupe River, and some was passed out to the onlookers, including many children. Seven more pictures in the set at Flickr. EDIT: I apologize to the people I stood in front of. There must be many more, better pictures around. Also, if you want some of the sand, contact me. | | Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009 | | 11:58 am |
The medium is the mass.age
More so than it ever was before. I wonder how many listeners recognize the sound of the rotary phone being dialed, or the LP surface noise. | | Sunday, September 20th, 2009 | | 2:37 pm |
Opera in the Ball Park
28,000 opera fans watched a live simulcast of Verdi's Il Trovatore in AT&T Park, San Francisco. Four more pictures and comments at flickr. | | Thursday, September 17th, 2009 | | 12:20 am |
A suitable Manhattan
The Manhattan cocktail is one of the six great perfections of the cocktail world, one of the Mother Sauces of the sauced, if you will. It requires four basic ingredients: - Whiskey (traditionally, Rye)
- Vermouth (traditionally, sweet)
- Bitters
- A cherry
Like a Mother Sauce, though, there are myriad variations. My favorite fancy bar drink, the Bob Tail Nag from Absinthe Bar in San Francisco, is a Manhattan made with a peculiar italian digestif wine instead of the vermouth, and mint "bitters." Most Manhattans you get today will be made with Bourbon, because most bars simply don't stock Rye. And the Rob Roy cocktail, made with Scotch, is a notably excellent variant. In any case, here's the Manhattan I have decided that is the House Version of Record. Naturally, it will require a bit of work to make. Most specifically, it will require the acquisition of 190 proof Everclear grain alcohol (or equivalent), and fresh cherries. Pit the cherries, put them in a jar, and add Everclear to cover. Steep for 3 days or more. What you end up with is a cherry liqueur at about, oh, 140 proof, and a cherry with a most delightful "hot" flavor provided by the alcohol alone. Prepare a serving glass with a bar spoon of cherry liqueur and a cherry. Run a piece of orange rind around the rim of the glass. Now, in a tall mixing glass full of ice, add one dash of bitters and a bar spoon of the cherry liqueur. I find Angostura bitters a little harsh, and prefer Fee Brothers' regular bitters. Also add one dash of Fee Brothers Mint Bitters. This is basically an alcohol solution of mint flavor, with no actual bitterness to it, so if you can't get that brand, add a drop or two of peppermint extract, or peppermit schnapps, or just skip it. The flavor effect is subliminal. Next, add 1 ounce of sweet vermouth. A doctor of my acquaintance assures me that an ideal sweet vermouth can be made by combining Noilly-Pratt and Martini And Rossi Cinzano in equal measure. I happened to have only the Martini and Rossi, and that was still OK. Stir a bit, until the outside of the glass gets cold. Last add one ounce of Woodford Reserve bourbon (required for its pronounced flavor of oak), and one ounce of rye whiskey (I used Jim Beam Rye, which is the best inexpensive rye around). If you are lucky enough to obtain Fee Brother's Whisky Barrel Aged Bitters, you can use that and just the rye. Stir well, and strain into the serving glass, and then spray some of the zest oil from some orange rind onto the surface of the drink. If you want to be a show-off, you can shoot the oil through the flame of a lit match. Then discard the orange rind and the match, but not in the drink. Now sit down and watch Mad Men, or Sex in the City, or even Star Trek TNG. As I am told, there is no illness that this drink cannot improve. | | Tuesday, September 15th, 2009 | | 5:51 pm |
| | Monday, September 14th, 2009 | | 7:01 pm |
| | Monday, September 7th, 2009 | | 10:08 pm |
Four lines from the Diamond-Cutter Sutra
A star, a visual aberration, a flame of a lamp,
An illusion, a drop of dew, or a bubble,
A dream, a flash of lightning, a cloud,
See all conditioned things as such!
And, to answer the obvious question, the title refers to a cutting implement which is made of unbreakable material (eg. diamond). Some people use the term "adamantine," which always reminds me of the Pop-Punk rocker.
An alternate translation of the sanskrit title (Vajracchedika Prajnaparamita Sutra) could also be "A Bolt of Lightning which Cuts Through Illusion, a Concise Instructional Scripture for the Perfection of Wisdom." | | Tuesday, September 1st, 2009 | | 12:49 pm |
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