oh yeah, i'm big time!

My blog is worth $564.54.
How much is your blog worth?

heh. well, maybe not.

any of you pipe smokers?

if so, and if you've not found it on your own, this is a drool-worthy site for pipes. nice selection of new, and a great selection of estate pipes (couple of dunhills listed that i'm lusting after. such as this one).

claude, i know you quit, so i apologize if this is cruel.

a few vacation shots

these were taken by perse. mine are mostly b&w film, and so still need to be developed. enjoy:

orient beach:


view from our villa:


at the butterfly farm:

here come the yankees?

that's the title of this article. sure, their hitters are dangerous. but the pitching is still spotty, and the hitting has been streaky. also, shouldn't "here come the yankees!" wait, um, untill they get over .500 ball? yes, they've got a 6 game win streak (3 wins against the pirates, hooray!). but, um, they're still 9 1/2 out, and still under .500. please.

back from vacation

and just in time for a 10AM meeting! oh boy.

vacation!

perse and i are off to sint maarten for a week for some much needed r&r. so, sadly, you'll be bereft of my wit, wisdom, stubborn refusal to properly employ the shift-key and consistent spelling errors.

enjoy your time working while we're lounging on the beach!

unintentional advertisement messages

this may or may not become a semi-regular feature. depends on my mood. anyway, onwards.

there seems to be a bunch of commericals out there, sending unintentional and somewhat negative messages about the product in question. i don't have a link to today's subject, but you very well may have seen it. it's a visa check card commerical, and features a kindly, yet ill zookeeper. since he is stricken by what seems to be a common cold, the zoo's elephant takes his card and picks up medicine, chicken soup and a blanket for him. then the elephant and a monkey nurse their beridden master back to health.

what's wrong here?

intended message: look how quick and convienent this card is! you don't even have to swipe it, cause of the smart chip!

unintended message: holy shit! anyone can use my card, since there is absolutely no ID verification! look how easy it'd be for someone to rob me blind!

now, it could be that i'm cynical, but the unintended message is the one that sticks in my head.

tonight's dinner menu

since i'm waiting for the potatoes to cook some, before i begin on the rest of the meal, i've decided to share what i'm making for dinner:

• roasted baby yukon gold potatoes
• fiddleheads, morels and chanterelles sauteed in butter w/shallots and sage
• ny strip w/welsh oak smoked sea salt

perse is in charge of dessert, which is fresh berries, shortcake and marscapone whipped cream.

this is beautiful

stop the abuse!

a new entry has been made into my personal lexicon of brutally abused words: organic. yes, organic. the entry was made official after reading another potter's quote (in the 500 Bowls book), who seemed to think that stone was "organic". newsflash to the world! organic is not a synonym for "natural". rock, for instance, cannot be organic. why? because it's not fucking carbon-based life, that's why. this word abuse irritates me, nearly as much as modification of "unique" does.

i blame organic farming for this. hippy bastards.

the news is on

and once again, on the subject of iraq 7 terrorism, the statement that "we fight them over there, so we don't have to fight them here" has been tossed out by our prez. i'm sure this has been mentioned before, but doesn't that just translate, directly, to "we don't care about iraqis, and would rather they die than any americans".

and people wonder why we're not universally loved.

the artist and the artisan

looking for a bit of inspiration, i've been, on and off, flipping through a book called 500 Bowls, to get ideas. the book consists mostly of photographs, with some technical details, as well as the potter's name. a few quotes from potters are scattered throughout. they range from the technical to the amusing (one guy's quote regarding a piece labeled "soup bowl" states it was "inspired by my love of soup". nice! i like the bowl too) through the overly autobiographical and into the absurdly pretentious (such as the quote accompanying a hideous bowl with a dirt brown interior and what looks like a mushroom plunked in the center: "Working with the theme of premature death, this work presents the golden egg of birth, death, and the gift of the near-death experience." er, no. it's just rather ugly).

however, i've noticed something interesting and, likely, telling about me. that is a very strong aversion to the non-functional pieces. very few of them are appealing to me. now, i know that taste is a matter of taste. yet, what i find most unappealing in them is the very lack of functionality. to me, much of the beauty of a ceramic piece, such as a bowl, stems from how well it is suited to performing its function. the lines of the bowl, the curve, the shape; all are more important than how it is glazed, or what sculptural bits have been stuck to it. it is, after all, a bowl; thus is should work like one.

these pieces that i'm turned off by also tend to be made by those who identify, not as potters or ever ceramicists, but as "ceramic artists". this, also, irks me. it harkens back to the old argument between the artist and the artisan. for whatever reason, people still seem to subscribe to the myth that something must be non-functional to be art. furthermore, that pure "art" is somehow of greater value. well, i think that's bullshit. art is not seperate from craft. it is an inherent part of it. it is what drives the craftsman to create works that are beautiful and useful. to remove that element of usefulness is to pull the heart out of the medium. form does not merely follow function. form is born of function. without it, form is twisted, ugly and dead.

i have no desire to be an artist. i do aspire to be an artisan, to be a good craftsman. i'd much rather my work be displayed on someone's table, than in any gallery.

as for the book, despite the minor irksome bits, there are some great bowls in it.

conspiracy?

curious...both games that the sox dropped to the yankees just happened to be the ones aired on espn...

scrap

The old trees open their leaves
palms up, to cup the sunlight
and cast a noon time twilight
round children at their rooted knees.

um, what the hell?

i'm not even sure how to respond to this. so i'll refer you first to firejoemorgan.com for the factual rebuttal.

it's a very, very odd article. seems like this guy is pissed that the yankees won? i don't know. pretty much everything he says is factually wrong. and, well, why the wakefield hate? just makes no sense. no sense at all.

richard schickel firmly believes you are stupid

this opinion piece is, i believe, a reaction to the current battle being waged (somewhere, out there) between professional book reviewers and blogging book reviewers. personally, i don't care about it. i don't generally review books on my page, though i read a fair amount. mostly, i haven't the time to bother. additionally, i know most people who read this blog. there is an understanding that, if i say such and such book is worth reading, then that is enough to warrant picking it up. but i wouldn't consider that a review. it's a recommendation. however, i digress.

what i take issue to is not even the statement that elitism is a good thing. i agree, to an exent. no, what i take issue with is this statement, tossed out there after listing orwell, edmund wilson and some 19th century frenchman as the pinacles of literary criticsm:

[...]all three wrote for intelligent readers who emerged from their reviews grateful to know more than they did when they started to read, grateful for their encounter with a serious and, indeed, superior, mind. We do not — maybe I ought to make that "should not" — read to confirm our own prejudices and stupidity.

I don't think it's impossible for bloggers to write intelligent reviews. I do think, however, that a simple "love" of reading (or movie-going or whatever) is an insufficient qualification for the job. That way often leads to cultishness (see the currently inflated reputations of Philip K. Dick or Cornell Woolrich, both easy reads for lazy, word-addicted minds).

yes folks, you have an inferior mind. even you "intelligent readers". mr. schickel thinks you cannot possibly read and understand and criticize literary works on your own. regardless of your intelligence. why? i'm guessing it's because you are not a writer. and even if you are, you're still alive. to be a proper critic you must first and foremost be dead. otherwise, you cannot possibly be taken seriously.

as for being "word-addicted", i'm sorry richard, but that is part of the craft of writing. if we are to take the words of writers more seriously, then philip k. dick's reputation is still under inflated. but, you know, he wrote sci-fi and took drugs. i've no idea who cornell woolrich is. so i'm guessing his reputation is not as overinflated as mr. schickel thinks. doesn't matter. schickel strikes me as the sort of pretentious git who equates inpenetrability with intelligence, and "serious" works as being all that is worthy of reading. but, mind you, you must be told what is worthy of your time by a "superior mind". such as, i'm guessing, mr. schickel. who writes for "time".

you'll all forgive me if i stick to trusting my own abilities and the recommendations of those whom i find trustworthy (such as keifus). being a pleb, i'd likely not even be able to understand cricism anyway

EDIT 5/24: in the interest of fairness, i do agree that not everyone's opinion or criticism is of equal value. what i dislike is the idea that being paid to do something instantly means one is better at it than others. for a prime example, read firejoemorgan.com. it's also a prime example of why those who have done some thing (such as played pro baseball) does not mean they are more capable of analysing or criticising that same thing. also, i think mr. schickel does not quite understand how sites that, say review books, come about. they are not written by people who set out to get a job as a reviewer and failed. they are written by people who started reviewing books for friends and acquaintences and then attracted a wider readership. it is not true that if someone is good enough to review a book, they'd have a job. for they may never have sought one. mostly, though, the suggestion that people who write online, as a hobby or diversion, are somehow less intelligent or capable simply because they are writing for free, is extraordinarily insulting. yes, there are a great many morons babbling away online (some may consider me to be one of them). however, there are also a great many highly intelligent people out there, sharing their thoughts as well.

mathematicians are idiots

i haven't read through this whole article yet. i probably won't, because i find the premise ridiculous and, frankly, irritating. however, it is useful (in the opening paragraphs) as an illustration of how brilliant people can be remarkably stupid. particularly game theorists.

here's the setup:

Lucy and Pete, returning from a remote Pacific island, find that the airline has damaged the identical antiques that each had purchased. An airline manager says that he is happy to compensate them but is handicapped by being clueless about the value of these strange objects. Simply asking the travelers for the price is hopeless, he figures, for they will inflate it.

Instead he devises a more complicated scheme. He asks each of them to write down the price of the antique as any dollar integer between 2 and 100 without conferring together. If both write the same number, he will take that to be the true price, and he will pay each of them that amount. But if they write different numbers, he will assume that the lower one is the actual price and that the person writing the higher number is cheating. In that case, he will pay both of them the lower number along with a bonus and a penalty--the person who wrote the lower number will get $2 more as a reward for honesty and the one who wrote the higher number will get $2 less as a punishment. For instance, if Lucy writes 46 and Pete writes 100, Lucy will get $48 and Pete will get $44.

What numbers will Lucy and Pete write? What number would you write?

if you've any sense, you're choosing $100. in know i am.

now, the startling conclusion!

Scenarios of this kind, in which one or more individuals have choices to make and will be rewarded according to those choices, are known as games by the people who study them (game theorists). I crafted this game, "Traveler's Dilemma, in 1994 with several objectives in mind: to contest the narrow view of rational behavior and cognitive processes taken by economists and many political scientists, to challenge the libertarian presumptions of traditional economics and to highlight a logical paradox of rationality.

Traveler's Dilemma (TD) achieves those goals because the game's logic dictates that 2 is the best option, yet most people pick 100 or a number close to 100--both those who have not thought through the logic and those who fully understand that they are deviating markedly from the "rational choice. Furthermore, players reap a greater reward by not adhering to reason in this way. Thus, there is something rational about choosing not to be rational when playing Traveler's Dilemma.

amazing! irrationality wins! er, not really. see, what these guys don't realize is they are basing their logic on the assumption that people are machines. they aren't. sure, mathematically, it may be logical to pick 2, because then you can't lose. but the most you are going to get is $4. yippie fuckin' skippy. a formula, or super math geek, might think in these terms, but generally, humans don't. hell, i don't even think vulcans would. it is far more rational to assume the other person is going to try to maximize their reward, not their odds of winning. sure, if you pick 100, instead of 2, you get nothing. but the other person only gets 4 bucks. you aren't out a hundred dollars. you're out four. in terms of risk, that's pretty damn low. so why bother to low ball it? i'd venture to guess that no statistically significant portion of people choose less than 50. why? it's in the premise for choosing this reward/punishment scenerio: people are going to inflate the value. if you are setting up a problem because you think the subjects are going to try to reap a higher monetary reward, what possible reason would you have to believe someone would choose 2 as an answer to the problem? well, that's covered:

To see why 2 is the logical choice, consider a plausible line of thought that Lucy might pursue: her first idea is that she should write the largest possible number, 100, which will earn her $100 if Pete is similarly greedy. (If the antique actually cost her much less than $100, she would now be happily thinking about the foolishness of the airline manager's scheme.)

Soon, however, it strikes her that if she wrote 99 instead, she would make a little more money, because in that case she would get $101. But surely this insight will also occur to Pete, and if both wrote 99, Lucy would get $99. If Pete wrote 99, then she could do better by writing 98, in which case she would get $100. Yet the same logic would lead Pete to choose 98 as well. In that case, she could deviate to 97 and earn $99. And so on. Continuing with this line of reasoning would take the travelers spiraling down to the smallest permissible number, namely, 2. It may seem highly implausible that Lucy would really go all the way down to 2 in this fashion. That does not matter (and is, in fact, the whole point)--this is where the logic leads us.

Game theorists commonly use this style of analysis, called backward induction. Backward induction predicts that each player will write 2 and that they will end up getting $2 each (a result that might explain why the airline manager has done so well in his corporate career). Virtually all models used by game theorists predict this outcome for TD--the two players earn $98 less than they would if they each naively chose 100 without thinking through the advantages of picking a smaller number.

read that last sentence again. now, think about what this man is saying. the logical conclusion leads to you netting $2, $98 less than naively choosing $100. this is most decidedly not an advantage. and yes, it seems highly implausible that someone would choose 2 because it is highly implausible. the disadvantages of low reward more than outweigh any advantage of choosing low.

anyway, i couldn't really read past that point. the model is flawed, because it is based upon the least important variable in the equation. you don't need a game like this to realize that human decision making is not guided by strict logic. what this says to me is not that it is irrational to defy strict logic, but that it is irrational to stick to it.

hey claude...

you know this guy?

New York Mets baseball fan Frank Martinez, 40, was ejected and then arrested at Shea Stadium in April after he allegedly shone a high-beam flashlight into the eyes of Atlanta Braves player Edgar Renteria during a game. A former neighbor, interviewed by the New York Post, said Martinez was once evicted from his apartment because he would commandeer the hallway after a Mets victory, and into the middle of the night, screaming "M! E! T! S!" as he paraded from one end to the other. [New York Post, 4-22-07] (swiped from news of the weird)

god bless baseball fans.

live by the knuckleball

die by the knuckleball.

damn.

EDIT 5/22: upon further review, those 12 LOB didn't help matters.

tea: now better than water

at least according to the brits. but you know, they would claim that, wouldn't they? i wonder if the east india company sponsored this report...

dear quadriceps

i'd like to apologize to you for what happened today. i know we've been walking that 3 mile loop for a few weeks now, and you haven't seemed to mind at all. in fact, you seemed to enjoy it. so, surely you can understand why i thought you'd agree it was time to see if we could run for one of those miles. yes, i know we haven't actually done any running, well, since we were on the track team in high school. but still, it seemed like the next logical step.

i was wrong. i see that now.

please forgive me. and, uh, let me stand up, too? please? i have to pee, and i don't want to wheel this chair to the bathroom...

falling victim to guilt week

well, they got me. the folks at WETA are in the midst of their spring pledge drive and, after listening to them beg for days, they got me. mind you, i don't mind donating money to public radio. let alone a station that i listen to for approximately 9-10 hours a day. also, they picked up the slack when WGMS switched formats from all classical to yet-another-classic-rock-station; themselves changing from talk radio to all classical. i greatly appreciate that and respect the risk. plus, i'm getting a nifty bag out of it (for whatever reason, i am constantly in search of the perfect bag. or backpack. luggage too.).

still, i feel manipulated and used. okay, not so much. mostly, i feel like complaining about it. especially because they'll get me again, next pledge drive.

bastards.

UPDATE: i quote, i say i quote, the guy on the radio. just now. "we're not trying to make you feel guilty. although that would help." caught!

thunder! lightning!

and just in time to coincide with my walk to the metro for pottery class! thanks weather gods!

i should have paid more attention in chemistry class

of late (that is, since i purchased it) i've been reading and re-reading john britt's The Complete Guide to High Fire Glazes: Glazing & Firing at Cone 10. truly a fascinating book. glazing has been one of the areas where i've not quite had a firm grasp of what was going on. part of this ignorance may stem from my status as a student: i have no control over what glazes are available to me for use, nor over the firing cycle. still, knowing more about glazing and firing is only going to help me improve my own work. hence the study.

probably the most important lesson i've gleaned from it so far is just how damned important glaze application is. again, it does depend on the glaze. however, it's very useful to know that i may not have gotten the results i expected because the glaze coat was too thin. or that my glaze may have crawled because i applied it a bit too thickly. additionally, knowing how the colorants, for instance, affect each other is going to help me gauge what glaze combinations may yield interesting results.

the downside is that, not having my own studio and kiln, i cannot try out some of the really fascinating glazes and techniques in the book. for example, since i cannot request a slow cooling to the glaze firing, i won't be able to get any macrocrystaline effects. at least, untill i'm at a point where i do have my own kiln. then i can really play.

anyway, even if you aren't actually making pottery, i'd recommend looking through this book. provided the craft itself interests you. at the very least, it will help you appreciate it all the more.

dear daveto

sorry.

okay, not really. but you have my sympathy.

and in further baseball news...

an idea whose time should not have come. yes folks, the baseball draft will finally be televised. aren't you excited? i'm not.

there is a reason why people care about the nfl and nba drafts, but not the mlb draft. that is, those fans will see the players drafted the next year (specially the high picks). whereas where one is drafted by an mlb club has little to no meaning, beyond signing bonuses. still not a guarantee of making the club, ever. and still means at least 2-3 years in the minors. even for high picks. that goes quadruple for pitchers.

baseball is arguably the most skill dependant of all the major american pro sports. talent, athleticism...both important. but one needs skill and needs to develop that skill. this is why there is rookie ball, a ball, aa ball and aaa ball. if you don't go through the instructional leagues, chances are slim you'll make it in the big leagues.

for example, if you can shoot a basketball well in high school and college, chances are high you'll still be able to shoot just as well in the nba (specially considering the emphasis they place on defense). whereas, say a pitcher can blow through high school and college with good heat. but if you never develop another pitch and just rely on the ablility to throw a 100 mph fastball, you will get shelled in the majors. and so on.

anyway, i'm certainly not going to watch it. i'm expecting not many others will either. likely i'm wrong, but you never know.

clemens signs with the darkside. again.

so, clemens decided to sign with the yanks. i find myself agreeing with the official line here: eh, oh well. would have been nice to have him back with the sox. no doubt. i don't think he'll be quite as effective in the AL as he was last year in the NL. but he'll likely get more wins. i'm thinking he's good for 10-12 wins and a era somewhere in the 3.50 to 4.25 range. based on his comments, i think he'd also got a "gentleman's agreement", if not an actual offer, of a non-pitching job once he actually calls it quits on the mound. whether as a coach or a special pitching consultant/advisor. the yanks still need more pitching though.

meanwhile, the sox still look damn good. the plus is that they even when they make mistakes, or remind us they are still human (such as okijima giving up his first inherited run), they are still winning. at least, more often than not. sweeps are nice. streaks are nice. but it's the consistent 2 out of 3's that will get you to october.

note to self

this is a reminder: refrain from taking new books to bed. stick with the old, famaliar friends. at least if you want to actually sleep.

p.s: also, that cappuchino probably didn't help matters.

disney is evil. and other thoughts

great. so, my internal work IM seems to have lost connectivity. we'll add that to list of today's frustrations. along with the fact that WID never deployed the latest version of our service to the INT box. oh, it went to QA and was released in production last week. but it's still not in INT. what the fuck? we'll tack on to that the request i just got for documentation on this service, so the people who took over maintainence of it (last fucking year) actually have some clue as to what it does.

this is on top of the frustration of not being able to test my own work. seems to be working in lower environments, using the same code. and it doesn't seem to be data driven, as, well, transactions that should hit well established error processing code (ie: none existant policies) aren't going through. i have no information at all as to what is going arwy. which is leading me to believe the transaction just isn't being run at all. bugger.

but what i really want to say is that disney is evil. not just in the usual "disney is evil" sense. they've gone beyond that. today, i saw a commercial for some show called "my friends tigger and pooh". apparently, this is a cgi cartoon about a little red-headed girl who solves crimes with tigger and winnie the pooh. seriously. what in the name of all that is holy is this crap? who thought this would be a good idea? i'm not even a big fan of pooh. but shit like this is just wrong.

disney: dedicating to rooting timeless classics in a very specific time! woo hoo!

i think it's time for a drink.

april is the cruellest month

for the yankees, at least. for a sox fan like myself, it's a beautiful, blissful month.

yeah, yeah...it's only april, as my friends who are yankees fans like to say. at least those still willing to discuss baseball. doesn't stop me from enjoying the fact that, currently, the red sox sit atop the AL east and have the best record in MLB (1/2 a game better than the mets). whereas the yankees are in the AL east cellar, and only two teams have a worse record: the royals and the nats.

it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. and i plan on enjoying it as much as i can, cause those fuckers are going to be tough to beat if they get any of their pitching back.

other sox notes:

• beckett is looking very, very good so far this season. actually trying to pitch, instead of just blow it past people.
• matsuzaka, right now, is reminding me of beckett last year: great stuff, comes unhinged for an inning each game. growing familiarity with tek and the coaching staff should help.
• just think...manny still hasn't started to hit yet...
• coco seems to be getting back to the sort player we saw a glimpse of last april. in his past 10 games, he's raised his BA 124 points. now, BA isn't that great a stat to measure performance, but it's what's available for me, as a tracked stat. plus, since coco doesn't walk much, that's what's mostly driving his OBP. which is still rather low. but rising. regardless, i like to see him getting back into a groove.

parting thought: the couch is large and empty, so why must the cat curl up on my fleece jacket?

i am now titled

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: His Most Serene Highness Lord Twiffer the Sage of Molton St Anywhere Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

alternatively:

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: His Exalted Highness Duke Twiffer the Charming of Hardy St Thomas Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

dear employees, we think you're stupid

looks like work is rolling out a new software release to the office i am technically attached too. and, as is typical, they want everyone to actually turn their machines off for the weekend. but was it really necessary to include this in the email?

You can power down your computer by using the following procedure:

1. Click "Start" in the lower left corner of your computer screen
   
2. Choose "Shut Down"
   
3. In the pull-down menu under “What do you want the computer to do?” make sure "Shut Down" is selected
   
4. Click "Okay"

This will sign you off and power down your computer.

i'm sorry, but that's sort of insulting. do they honestly think people don't turn off their machines because they don't know how? not due to laziness, or not wanting to have to wait for the damn thing to boot up in the morning? sheesh.

a possibly earth-like planet

discovered orbiting a red sun...krypton?

i may have been sick as a dog

and subsisting on dayquil today...but still, last night was fucking awesome.

murder most foul

i haven't written about the VT murders, because what else is there to say? personally, i don't understand why someone would do such a thing. perhaps there is no way to understand it. yet that doesn't stop people from trying. why? because, for some reason, we think if we understand why, then another, similar, future act can be prevented. unfortunately, even if we understand the motivation and reason behind such action, we can never prevent something like it from ever happening again. the price of being a free people is the risk of some taking advantage of that freedom.

after the fact, our human desire to discern patterns kicks into high gear. with hindsight, it becomes inevitable. here was a man who was highly anti-social. he'd stalked. he wrote twisted plays and stories. he'd been in counselling for a spell. apparently, he was a mean bastard. it all seems so obvious, doesn't it? why didn't anyone act prior to this?

the answer to that is simple: there are thousands, perhaps millions of people just like this who don't go on killing sprees. we cannot suspect or prosecute people for being extremely quiet. we cannot do so even for writing horrible things. i could write twisted stories if i wished. doesn't mean i'm describing what i want to, or plan to do (incidently, his plays do not include anyone being shot. killed, yes; shot, no). simply put, there is no sure way to predict whether someone is going to become a murderer, mass or otherwise.

what we forget when these things happen is just how rare they are. look at the numbers. if we consider something like a school shooting, we can assume we are dealing with an age range of about 15-24, likely male. using the 2005 census data, this is about 14% of the male population: approximately 19,778,495 people. if we had a mass murder from this demographic every day of the year, it would still only be about 0.002% of the demographic that were murdering bastards. that's 0.002% of a 14% slice of the total US population. applied to the total population, an exceedingly small percentage of people decide to go on shooting sprees.

perspective does not diminish tragedy. but, in deciding how to respond to tragedy like this, we need to keep our perspective. everyday, nearly 20 million males between the ages of 15-24 decide not to walk into their classroom and start shooting people. law is a system, and systems need to be designed for normal functioning, not for abberations. an act such as the murders at VT is an abberration. the horror we feel in response to it shows just how rare a thing it is. indeed, what is surprising is that this sort of atrocity doesn't happen more often. we need to remember that. the proper response to acts such as this is grief, horror, shock. the proper response is personal, not legal.

understanding baseball analysts

or, any other sports analyst, for that matter. hell, this likely applies to political analysis too. or any sort of news coverage, come to think of it.

anyway, since i no longer live in-market for my favorite ballclub, i find myself watching baseball tonight (unless i manage to listen to the game online), to catch the results and highlights. last night, the "go-to-commercial" teaser spoke of daisuke "imploding" against toronto. this caused me concern. i don't like to hear of sox pitchers imploding, even figuratively. the recap comes on, the analysts discuss how daisuke (i should note here that i think the nickname he's been saddled with in the us, "Dice-K", is fucking stupid. his japanese nic, "Kaibutsu" [means "monster"], is much cooler) fell apart in the 4th inning, due to frustration at some calls that went unfavorably.

now, he did walk in a run in that inning. in fact, all of toronto's runs were scored that inning. but here's the thing: they only scored two runs. comparatively, yes, that was a bad inning. and the sox did lose (2-1, final score). but objectively, not all that bad. certainly not warranting the implications of catastrophe. here's his line for the game:

IP H R ER BB SO HR
6.0 3 2 2 3 10 0

in fact, his stats for the season so far are nearly identical to johan santana, except for w/l and daisuke having a better ERA.

what is most irritating about this sort of coverage (other than getting me riled up at 12:30 in the morning) is this. had the sox won, even by 1 run, these same analysts would have described his pitching in the 4th as "getting out of a tough jam". probably those exact words too. i suppose the doomsday intonations were designed to keep me tuned in, but i was gonna wait for the sox recap anyway. so instead, it just irked me.

in other news, my sympathies to my philadephia readers. the phillies are currently worse than the nats. i'm sorry.

imus fired

this was also to be expected. i don't have anything to add, other than i personally advocate firing all morning radio talkshow hosts. not because they are offensive, but because i've always hated the entire concept of morning talk shows on radio stations that i tune to for music. whomever thought that i might prefer to listen to a couple of idiots yammering, first thing in the morning, deserves an unpleasant afterlife.

vonnegut dies

well, he was 84, so i suppose it's to be expected. but that doesn't mean i have to be happy about it.

i'd like to think he's now comfortably reclining on tralfamadore.

wow, seattle kinda sucks

bottom of the 5th. we're up 11-1 and on the 3rd seattle pitcher already. i almost feel bad for 'em. the sox announcers are giving them the benefit of the doubt and laying some blame on the slew of snowed out games they've had. they're nicer than i am.

EDIT 4/12: except, apparently, when king felix is pitching. ouch.

Lost Idyll

first draft; very rough. loosely inspired by this discussion.

Lost Idyll

The tattered shreds of elephant
toes speak truths we seek
to keep unknown.

While Tennyson, in sorrow,
saw how nature lurked red,
in tooth and claw
he failed to notice
how ours hands remain
the bloodiest of all.

No savagery is noble;
our own least of all.
Yet God, mankind's cruelest
creation, convinces us
we're not beasts
but for the fall.

EDIT: lacking flow and poor transitions, particularly from the first to second stanzas. hmmm.

schilling back in form

much better game last night. papi's bat woke up for 2 homers (3rbi). schilling pitched a great game. padilla pitched well for texas too. got very hairy in the 8th and showed just why we like having papelbon in the pen to close.

bah. shut-out.

at least wake pitched well (6ip/3h/2r/1er/2bb/4k). the pen continues to be solid too. no offense today though. all in all a rather dull game, to be honest.

taverez is up for tomorrow's start. we'll see how he fares. hopefully better than he did in relief last season.

daisuke's debut

the pitching line: 7ip; 6h; 1r; 1er; 1bb; 10k

i'm taking this a good omen. the one run was on a homer, but i don't think that's much of a concern. papelbon gets his first save to preserve the 4-1 win for the sox.

all in all a very good game. the royals starter, greinke, was also impressive (7ip/8h/2r/1er/1bb/7k). well pitched game, though the royals had some fielding issues.

also, drew continues to play well and demonstrate that he is an improvement in right field. though he did have a strike-out, so i'm sure some numbskull in the boston press will jump on him for that.

Rest

fragment of thoughts on a drive home from a business trip. been kicking around since then.

Rest

Only ease comes easy
at the end of a long day.

Even that comes with the price
of long practice watching cats.

much better

ah, a 7-1 victory is much better. would have liked beckett to have gone an inning or two more, but it's early. no reason letting him wear himself out in april. plus, it does afford a look at the pen.

this afternoon is the debut of daisuke. looking forward to listening to the game. is it just me, or is baseball more exciting on the radio than on tv?

oh, as a humorous aside...the ever-observant folks at FJM noted that j.d. drew was getting slammed by an idiotic sportstalkradio guy for taking a walk with 2 outs and a man on in the first inning of the sox opener. so what did drew do in the first inning yesterday? rbi double. either he was listening or just has impeccable timing. i'll say this again, drew may not have the "hustle and drive" that trot nixon did (and mind you, i liked trot). but it's not because he doesn't care about winning. it's because he's a better ballplayer. the scrappy, dirt-dog players are such because they aren't as good as those who make it looke easy. that's part of the reason people like them. makes you think that if you worked hard enough, you too could play in the big leagues.

scoop of the year!

i cannot supress the cynical feeling that cnn reporters are filled with glee regarding their stroke of good fortune.

watching games on espn and why i hate it

reading FJM this morn reminded me why i hate watching games on espn. it's not just that, say, nesn, has a red sox bias. it's just that their announcers are better. much better. you actually get some insight into what's going on and why from the likes of jerry remy.

from jon miller you get the above link. 2 out, down by five, bottom of the eighth, 2 on, papi at the plate and miller thinks a home run will "kill the rally". idiot. having papi strikeout was much better for the rally. what, would you rather a bloop single? in any situation, at any point in a ball game, the single best result from an at bat is a homerun. i'm unsure how scoring 3 runs would "kill a rally". isn't a rally a late surge in scoring?

here's a list of things that would actually have killed the rally:

• striking out
• grounding out
• fly out
• caught foul ball
• a single to load the bases followed by manny making an out

notice how all those rally killing scenerios involve making an out? i must be crazy, thinking that scoring is actually a good thing. this lack of insight into the secrets of the game is obviously why i'm not cut out to call a baseball game.

dear gil meche...

i fucking hate you.

you look to be, and have performed in the past, as a perfect example of a "journeyman" starter. what business have you, then, in throwing like an actual ace? bastard.

of course, i didn't help that schilling pitched a stinker. against the royals! the god-damn royals!

thank god it's only april. meh.

eBook readers

this little review piqued my interest. mostly because it seems eBook readers still have not advanced to the stage that i think they should be at. which, actually, is rather disappointing, because it should be simple to accomplish. the reviewer touches on some very good points: books are already portable, so portablity of the device itself is not a major selling point. making the display read like actual print is a good thing, as long reading on a monitor is murder on the eyes. it also seems that sony is attempting to cram too much functionality into the device: there is no need to have a book reader play audio, for instance. multimedia devices are all the rage, yes, but somethings should be specialized. and the lack of being able to write in the margins is a severe oversight.

i don't quite agree on the value of eBook readers being the ability to reduce book clutter. frankly, i like having lots of books. i like having books lying about the the place. the value i see in eBook readers is for travellers and students. portability, but not of the device. instead, the ability to carry a great deal of content with you, where ever you go. for instance, even on just the hour long flight up to CT, for work or familial obligations, i'll stuff at least four books into my carry-on. it would be far more convienent to just be able to grab a reader. or, on an actual vacation, one wouldn't need to devote half a bag to books.

the best use though, i think is for students. this is why a noting feature is essential (beyond just typical desire to annotate for pleasure). imagine being able to have all your text books on a reader. not having to spend 60 bucks on a 5 pound staple reference, that has to be replaced every year or two to keep current. light, portable, updatable and, frankly, cheaper for the content.

really, all you need is a good screen, removable memory and a stylus driven interface, with perhaps a corner thumb button to flip the pages. it's not so hard to figure out, is it?

public service announcement

please be advised that, with the advent of spring and the fact that the sox open the season vs. royals tonight, the subject of posts on this blog will increasingly be related to baseball.

closer issue closed

papelbon heads back to the bullpen. i think he would have made a good starter, and likely have been more valuable as a starter. but i have to say, i liked the feeling last year: seeing him head to the mound and thinking "good, we've won this one". he says he wants to be the next rivera. i hope so.

the government wants to be your mom and dad

in reading an article on our brave government's continuing crusade to protect kids from the "dangers" of porn being dealt another slap back, i came across this little quote:

"It is not reasonable for the government to expect all parents to shoulder the burden to cut off every possible source of adult content for their children, rather than the government's addressing the problem at its source," a government attorney, Peter D. Keisler, argued in a post-trial brief.

it might be just me, but i find this statement extremely disturbing. essentially, this lawyer is saying it is not reasonable to expect parents to be, well, parents. i'll grant him that it is unreasonable to expect to cut a kid (particularly a dertermined one) off from all access to "adult content", regardless of whether one is a parent or a government agency. particularly as the internet is not the only place to find it (just typically the most convienent). but what disturbs me is the underlying message here: it's the government's job to protect "our children". this is a wrong and, frankly, dangerous idea. it's a parent's job to protect and raise their kids. that means, if one doesn't think there is any harm in, say, your 16 year old looking at porn, then the government doesn't have the right to tell you there is.

repeat after me: it is not the place of the government to be a parent. got that? good.

a little spring training humor

for fans of baseball and anime, courtesy of the onion.

yo, lentenstuffe

i'll certainly abide by your wishes, perplexed as i am by them. would you like me to de-link as well?

if you'd let me know how i offended thee, i'd appreciate it, though you've certainly no obligation to do so.

the weather

i know i'm now farther south than i used to be. still, isn't it a bit early for a thunderstorm? thundersnow would be fine (mostly because it's cool, in an eerie sort of way), but i'm not quite ready for a thunderstorm.

ah well. back to dealing with discrepancies.

the news remains behind the times

dear god, why are people being paid to write stuff like this? all of you nice people who read my blog...did you know that you aren't supposed to be out here, posting on the web? you're too old and it's unnatural for you. oh, likely for me too, since i turned 30 last june.

dear ill-informed human interest story writers: inhibition is not necessarily a factor of age. nor of generation. moreover, even if this were a subject worthy of an article, it was worthy, oh, 5, 10 years ago.

please repeat until it is knocked into your head: not every teen has a myspace page/live journal/blog. not every human has an iPod. not every human like text messages on their cell phone (not every human has a cell phone). not every adult is afraid of the internet.

stop writing this crap. it's irritating.

the first signs of spring

are, of course, spring training. first sox split-squad game is thursday. hooray! baseball!

i'm a happy boy.

more excercises in poor legislation

i may have posted about this elsewhere, before. or i just thought about writing this post. in anycase, i'm writing it now. forgive the lack of links; i don't feel like looking this stuff up again.

seems that some rep. in brooklyn wants to propose a bill making it illegal to cross the street while listening to an iPod. stop laughing, he was serious. why? it seems the reasoning behind this madness is that 3 people in brooklyn were killed crossing the street while listening to iPods, between september 2006 and january 2007. one even, apparently, did not heed the warning cries of onlookers, as the volume was apparently too loud.

this is a horrible, stupid idea. why, one might ask? it could save lives! the problem is, well, there are many problems with this sort of law. the first is, it is not the government's business to save people from their own stupidity. certainly not in a free country. freedom means you are free to make your own errors in judgement, even if they get you killed. but that opinion aside, 3 pedestrian deaths in approximately 4 months is, well, insignificant. i know, i know, every fucking life is precious, yadda, yadda. thing is, there are about 8 million people living in new york. the number of pedestrian deaths last year was, if i remember correctly, 252. and that was low. still, it works out to almost 5 people being run over every week. yet on the basis of 3 of those deaths, new legislation is called for, to fine a specific action that rarely increases the odds of someone getting killed? if you believe the hype, everysingleperson on the planet has an iPod by now. that only 3 of the teeming mass have gotten hit by cars in the pedestrian friendly streets of brooklyn is a minor miracle.

let's say this does get passed into law. how is it enforcable? do the earphones have to be out, or just the music off? how does one tell, if the later? if the problem is people not being able to hear oncoming traffic, should we also fine the deaf for crossing the street? why did we never have this problem with walkmans? and so on.

this sort of bill faces the same problems as those that ban cell phone use while driving. that is, they rely on anecdotal evidence and miss the point anyway. the root problem is that when a human performs a potentially dangerous activity (such as driving, or crossing a city street) whilst distracted by some other activity (such as talking on a phone, listening to music, talking to another person, eating, searching pockets for loose change, etc.) the chances of getting killed increase. what is causing the distraction is not relevant. the point is they are distracted. focusing on specific distractions might look, politically, like one is actually doing something "for the people". but really all one is doing is furthering one's career and furthering the gap twixt law and reason.

EDIT: hehe...keif, this is exactly what i'm talking about (well, in my comments, at least).

idle thoughts

amazon just sent me a recommendation for a book i already own. does this indicate their recommendation system is fairly accurate? i dunno. frankly, i tend to only use them when i have a specific book i want to purchase (usually from the scientific american book reviews). but i am a sucker for geology books, so perhaps amazon does know me well. not that it matters. i far prefer wandering the stacks at used book stores.

on a completely different topic, a new dollar coin is going into circulation. with it, the accompanying voice of doom, noting that people don't want a dollar coin, people won't use a dollar coin, look at how the others have failed, and so on. bullshit. people, even those polled and saying they do care, don't really care. the problems with getting people to use dollar coins is you can't fucking get them anywhere. last time they tried this, the only place i ever recieved a dollar coin in change was from the subway pass machines in NYC. you want people to use the coin? make them available. you want people to use a dollar coin over the paper bill? remove the fucking paper from circulation. this is one of those situations where the government shouldn't listen to the people on the matter. if dollar coins will save the government money, then switch to them. that people might "like" the bill marginally more really isn't a good reason to keep them. it's the same sort of mentality that has prevented a switch to the metric system.

get rid of the penny too, while you're at it. i hate those things.

why i cannot work in customer service

this article, sent me by my friend and yours, the elusive Please_Panic, sums it up nicely. simply put, i don't deal well with such blatant stupidity. read this again:

Atlantic Theatres in Atlantic Beach, Florida, received a complaint from a woman who'd seen the advertised title as she drove past with her niece. She said that it had made her niece ask her what a vagina was.

The theatre's Bryce Pfanenstiel commented: 'I'm on the phone and asked “What did you tell her?” She's like, “I'm offended I had to answer the question.”'

i'm sorry, but what sort of people are these? she had to explain to HER NIECE what a vagina is? shouldn't her niece already know? how does this woman stand the existence of commericals for yeast infection medications?

anyway, if i was in charge of this theater, i would have succumbed to the massive public pressure of one complaint as well. except, i would have changed the marquee to read either "The Cunt Monologues" or "The Twat Monologues". just to drive home the old proverb "be careful what you wish for".

also, "hoohaa" makes me think of that movie where the guy who isn't deniro plays a blind guy that says "hoo-aaaahhh" all the time.

EDIT: al pacino. why i cannot ever remember his name is just a mystery. plus, the movie is "scent of a woman" and that revalation about "hoohaa" just put a whole new, and dirty, spin on that film.

hey august

(and mszilla, but you are likely already aware of this)

check it out: expansion pack for oblivion. i'm filled with geeky anticipation, cause it looks fucking cool.

the radio business sucks

i'd forgotten that WGMS got bought out. WGMS is, er, was the classical music station i streamed during the day. not the best, but it was the local one. so i listened. no more.

about 20 minutes ago, it suddenly became a crappy classic rock station. i hate this. i can deal with stations changing ownership and thus format. but why the hell do they have to change the format in the middle of the fucking day? i'll never understand this. what if i listened in the car, and suddenly the station is playing different music on the afternoon commute than it was on the morning drive? it's confusing and rude.

anyway, fuck you new owners, for putting yet another classic rock station on the air. bastards. i'm back to streaming from king FM. so what if i get the weather and news from seattle? at least i get good music.

hey, it actually snowed!

not much, mind you. about an inch and half. but it still makes me happy, even if it's unlikely to last past today. now it actually looks like winter outside my window.

looks a wet snow too. perfect for snowballs...

another perk of telecommuting

i can make fresh scones in the afternoon, when the mood strikes.

i fucking hate comcast

dear fucking god, how can one company be this fucking incompetent? not only have they just now, finally, cancelled my service in connecticut (that was supposed to be shut off in august, mind you). not only have they just now, finally, refunded the money they've been stealing from me since then. but to top it off, they fucking charged me for an un-returned converter box. brain-addled incompetent assholes.

see, i wouldn't mind that charge, except that i returned the fucking box. problem is, i returned it in maryland. and god forbid any of the local offices communicate. at all.

so, i call the customer service number and am informed that get this resolved i have to fax their billing department my receipt. why, i ask, do i have to fax your company my copy of the receipt you gave me? don't you have that information? i think i melted the poor dimwit's brain with that. see, she couldn't help me, because it was the national help line. uh, what? there is no central customer database for your company?

useless, useless, useless people. in all the times i've called, i've spoken to just one competent person. it's fucking ridiculous.

it's gerald ford's fault...sorta

normally, i'm not one to speak ill of the dead, let alone blame them for anything. today's production issue, however, is entirely gerald ford's fault.

why? because he died. near a holiday. and they had his "national day of mourning" yesterday. thus, the stock market treated yesterday as a holiday. right after a holiday. after a weekend. this is a problem, because it wasn't an offical holiday, and therefore not in the holiday table that a certain bit of code i once wrote references to see if prices exist for any variable funds on a particular date.

last friday is the most recent date that has prices. were yesterday listed as a holiday in the table, the code would loop back to friday. since it wasn't, we error out.

how then, is this ford's fault, instead of the fault of whomever is supposed to update the holiday table? because he decided to die at year-end. when all the year-end financial processing jobs are running. so no one was was about to change tables in the middle of that, lest it screw up something.

damn you gerald ford! even from beyond the grave, you strike at me!

EDIT: 12/5 as claude notes, it's actually nixon's fault. or spiro agnew's.

my apologies

for turning on word verification. i hate it (mostly because it's a bit buggy), but the spam bots have found me. so there it is.

happy new year

joy. back at work. where's my coffee?

it's, well, not amazing...interesting, how quickly accustomed one gets to not working when you take a week off. though i think it's not so much the having to work that is undesirable, as it is having to turn the alarm clock back on. that just sucks; i hate those things.

anyway, hope the holidays were enjoyed by all.

snack

mmm...tea, toast, cloth-bound cheddar, stilton and salami.

yum.

smoke

of all the ways i ingest tobacco, i must confess that a well-packed pipe is my favorite. tastier and more relaxing. and though i work from home, and thus can puff away all day, it's still more soothing to light up once the work day is done.

as it is for today. debugging is done, for the time being, code is checked into source control and the batch jobs on the mainframe aren't going to be finished till late, and so can wait till the morrow to be checked and have the output processed.

the bowl is packed, the sparks have lit into flame, the smoke curls up from the briar and from the curl of my lip. now all that is left is to relax and wait for my lovely perse to get home. and perhaps think about what to make for dinner.

ah, who am i kidding? i'm going to play oblivion till she gets home. then i'll think about dinner.

White Collar Blues

another rough draft.

White Collar Blues

Weary. Oh not
with the bone-ache
of working men,
that day-end drain
and strain on all
sinew and tendon
and limbs longing
for langorous ease.

Weary. Of thought
neverending, never
slowing, ever
racing around
the hamster-wheel
of the forebrain
while always, only
wishing for the
magic-zen-eraser
clarity of glass,
empty. Blank.

And glass, full.
Whisky.

...

edit: 12/12. see. told ya i'd work in hamsters. [grin]

a giant christmas-time peeve

we're deep in the heart of the "holiday" season now, and once more, amongst the garland and tinsel and silver bells a twinkling, my biggest christmas-time peeve rears it's ugly head.

betcha ya wanna know what it is, doncha? no?

fine, well, i'm going to tell you anyway.

it's the use of "scrooge" as a noun. not so much that scrooge has become a noun; that's a terribly common sort of thing in english, and one of the ways the tongue evolves. no, it's the meaning that irks me. we've all used it this way, likely myself included. but it still bothers me when "scrooge" is used to indicate someone who dislikes the christmas season, or is generally miserly, miserable and misanthropic. why? because any semi-sentient being who has read "a christmas carol", or seen one of the many stage and/or film adaptations (muppet version included) should know the point of the story is the fucking redemption of ebenezer's soul. the book ends with scrooge being remembered as a man who knew how to keep christmas. yet, all we seem to have retained in our collective, cultural memory is "bah, humbug!". why is that? do we just not, as a people, honestly believe in redemption? or is the name just too evocative of miserliness? it certainly has the right sound for it.

regardless, it irks me. for if nothing else, it says something about reading comprehension.

baseball writing: anti-intellectualism and conservatism

i've been reading a good deal of the posts on fire joe morgan (damn you bacon!) lately, and it got me to thinking about american anti-intellectualism. how (or perhaps, why?), you may ask? it's very simple.

baseball, while no longer the most popular sport in the good ol' us of a, has long maintained the myth that it is the thinking man's sport (as well as being the national past-time). this is highly debatable. yet the perception (less vaild, i think, in the era of fantasy sports) is that baseball has always been the most statisically obsessed (major american is and will be implied) sport. most people who at least causually follow the sport know about batting average, rbi's, era, home runs. in the context of this, efforts in the past decade or so have rachetted up to develop improved statistics to evaluate players and their impact on the team's chances of winning.

enter the backlash. for, while baseball may be staticially obsessive, it is also an extraordinarily conservative sport. no modern player can ever be considered superior to someone who played in the golden days (say, the 20's). the older players "knew how to play the game" and didn't cheat like they do these days (only cause they didn't know about steriods. oh, black sox anyone?). and while statistics are good, these new fangled stats aren't. let us also not forget intangibles. ah, glorious intangibles!. the old stats were good enough (for moses!) then, so they are good enough now. the biggest knock though, is they have been developed by "nerds" who never played baseball professionally and thus cannot really understand the game (this comes often from former ballplayers turned analysts).

why does this attitude exist? partly because, like news in general, sports reporting and "analysis" has become all about TV ratings. so, if you use information readily availible to the public, where is your job security? you need an angle. that angle has become the idea that stats, particularly newly developed stats, cannot be the sole basis for player evaluation. nevermind that no one has ever claimed that they are anything other than an objective toolset to be used amongst a variety of criteria. they can't tell you about a player's heart and grit, damn it!

ah, heart and grit. we're tying ball back into the mythos of the american "self-made" man here. this, i believe, is where the anti-intellectualism of american society is best reflected. we worship the self-made man. the kind of person who suffered through hardship and succeeded when all others thought he'd fail; getting by not on skill or talent, but on grit and determination. we love the sort of guy who doesn't go to college, but winds up a millionare businessman (likely because of natural talent and skill, plus some luck, but no matter).

what causes this? my opinion is that intelligence is a method of creating an elite class. that is, it falls prey to the twisted interpretation of "all men are created equal". this phrase should rightly mean that we all start with the same chance. not that everyone is equal, in the end. those who are more intelligent often are more successful (not always, naturally, but that's a different discussion). those who are gifted thusly do not have the struggle of the common man, and this creates a sense of inequality that must be stiffled. moreover, we, as a nation, seem to still suffer the lingering effects of puritanical conservativism. intellectuals challenge the status quo, and for conservatism, that's a no no. the old ways are the best, don't try to change them. let experience be the yardstick. and so on.

had more to say, but work has distracted me. any comments are welcome though. plus, read that blog, even if it's just for the humor value.

post turkey-day thoughts

leftovers are dangerous. this, i learned in rather embarassing fashion last night. perse had very kindly made me a turkey & cheddar sandwich, which i unfortunately faild to finish. why, you may ask? turkey is delicious, even as leftovers from the great feast day. some might argue that thanksgiving leftovers is the real joy of the holiday. usually, i would chime in with agreement.

not today though. all because i scraped my lip on the toast enveloping said delectable turkey (and cheddar!). yes, you heard me. i injured myself with toast.

what this means in respect to my manhood, or even in regard to my status as a compentent member of the human race is, at this time, unclear. it could be argued that, well, lips are sensitive and (mine, at least) prone to chapping. if a bit of wind can injure your lips, well why not hardened bread as well? people cut themselves on paper all the time and no one (well, mostly no one) thinks less of them.

still, i cannot shake this feeling of deep, dark, horrific shame. i mean, it's toast! how could i hurt myself with toast? what sort of graceless creature could do such a thing? yet i find the answer is: me.

oh yeah, christmas carols are everywhere now. was going to write more on this, but i've got to go cut some eyeholes in a paper bag...

Gulf Coast

rough draft

Gulf Coast

The wind in the palm leaves
whispers of rain. Not just
of imminence, nor only of memory.
But all: a song of deep green
longing for days where grey
washes blue from the skies.

With rustling fronds they speak
of shaping clouds and conspire,
with rooted will, to seed
them with the idea of water.

Barefooted, listening, basking
in the yellowed blaze; I sink
my toes beneath the moist
flesh of the earth
and am inclined to agree.

Muyil

Muyil

The jungle has eaten the city.
Only roots are left behind,
crossed with pathless trails all
leading beyond this shore.
This slim sandy green spit, stretched
into a dock over cleared blue.

These planks, rough-hewn, uneven
move under my feet. They feel
grey, bleached by sun and time.
I walked past time to get here:
crumbling in places, grown tall
in others, stumbling into now.
This spot where time stills
into a salted breeze
playing the marsh reeds

I long to dip my toes
and wonder if night brings mist.

Tournesol

Tournesol

The dewed cool of the morn and I,
with my fingernails
under the dirt, sowed them as children.

Months long have I exhaled small clouds,
whispers of water;
held the sun still to shine them.

And now.

Walk slow in the shade between
the rows and let them
bend yellow heads low, to kiss you.

Structure

Structure

In Sunday school, they taught
me with allegory. How the wise
men built homes upon the rise
and ridge of solid rock;
how the foolish staked their claim
below, and on the plain
made treacherous homes.
The shifting silt and sand
was unfit for those who thought
beyond having water close at hand.

So, the story sings
that stony perch is where
our soul should sit. Firm
on the rock where the Word
was first writ.

I learned something, though
not the lesson they sought.

Sand was stone, stone will
be sand and sand again
will return to rock.

Orogeny

Orogeny

They were mountains, once,
jagged with the arrogance
of youth. Then time came
with wind and water: ice, rain
wore the striving peaks
to smoothed hills, rounded,
hoar with winter, ground
still finer still into silt,
soil, sand, dust, dirt.
All return as Adam, bound
by rivers, went back to clay
and in the sea's abyss they lay.
For the ocean owns us all.

Snowfall and Moonlight

Snowfall and Moonlight

Most others keep inside, nights like this.
We know the secret though, to staying warm.
So these nights seem made for us alone.

A night like this, the first you woke me.
You'd been dreaming of the daylong storm,
heavy flakes piling thick on branches groaning

the weight in the wind, like at this midnight.
Waking you padded soft to the windowpane,
unveiled the moon as you wiped away your breath

and, like this night, roused me from sleep.
Eyes alight, your smile begged our footsteps
be first to fall upon the fresh snowfall.

In this moonlight on snowfall, at midnight
again, I follow you across shadow trees
the world glinted sapphire as your eyes.

We melted angels into the snow, a night like this.

Jack O'Lantern

Jack O'Lantern

through the hollowed
shelled out hull
the knife-blade slashes,
cleaves the skull

sideways rends a
terrible grin
flashing cross the
wrinkled skin

cat-slit glinting
eyes afright
with flickering, eerie
shadowed light

jack beheaded
waits alone
as ghoulish welcome
to your home.

In the Morning

In the Morning

Dawn reminds me I forgot
to close the blinds.
Slipping out of bed a
warm steel grip grasps my
wrist, attached to half-dozing,
questioning eyes, a
mischievious grin peeking
out beneath the sheets.

In my defense
I only wished to make
blueberry pancakes.

still you insist on
convincing me brunch is
far the better meal.
slowly our debating
builds in tempo, finds a
rhythm of point and counter
till we reach a mutually
satisfactory conclusion
that breakfast can wait.

Ghost Hands

ghost hands

beneath your words
lies a quiver my ears
alone are tuned to.

your ache is mine,
not a pain alone.

across the miles
my ghost hands slip
into your breast,
cradle, caress, hold
your heart together.

let me stand a
shield, absorb
the buffeting blows.
i do not bruise;
my bones refuse
to break; my skin
a cloth to soak
time and tears away.

First Snow

First Snow

Even when you expect it, it's still a surprise.
Snow clouds never hold the same warning pain
as storms that make the summer skies cry.

Walking through memories in Central Park.
The growing wind unwinds your scarf;
my fingertips graze your neck as I wrap it again.
We kissed on that bench, under that tree
and everywhere between. A spring day,
the first our hands met.

Fresh snowflakes land in your lowered lashes.
You stick out your tongue with childish delight
to catch another, your lips still warm
as a spring day past.

dream

dream

sleep deep wrapped warm
blanketed in dreams
long desires tasted.

exhale.

the fire burns low
in the hearth. from
the ashes i rise
phoenix-like bared
skin and soul before
your eyes striding
across the room to
open the box you
kept hid from pandora.

inhale.

low vibrations your
breath'd voice floats
between locked eyes
speaking a vision;
land greened twined
with blued seas, waves
unmatched power pull
on the shores swell
break through stone
walls helpless to resist
the spring-tide. rhythm.

exhale.

wake to memory. touch.
sense kept alive, light
in fingertipped skin.

Cold Front

Cold Front

Just after sunrise you can see the line.
Straight smooth stratus clouds
riding over the lower layer:
dark rolling nimbus, edges torn, tattered
by the battering breath of the north wind.
A widening blue cuts the sky, clearing.

Perhaps it will rain again today.
They said it might return. Even now
the road is still dark with wet.

Later this week I'll lean, sore-armed,
on a well used rake, pulling cold air in,
silently cursing the stubboness of oak trees.

For now I walk,
an unneeded scarf kept to my throat
by the soon bitter wind. A change.
They say tonight it may snow.

Coffee Break

coffee break

smudge-grey skies,
the kind that blend
and blur concrete
lines, cast over
my footsteps on
puddle-pocked sidewalks.
a light drizzle, whispering
of just passed rain
still waiting around
the corner, mists
my breath, mingled with
caffiene steam floating
from my clasped cup.
phantoms both, just as
your step beside my
stride; your held
hand in my pocket.
i turn my collar up
against the wind and
walk into november.

Untitled 2

Early morning brings
the whispering
of your breath upon my neck

I collect this peace
as memory
to face the days between us.

Early morning finds,
still lingering,
your fingers twined in mine.

Untitled

In the early morning, I
suspect my socks are blue.
Still, I will not wake you,
for I love to watch you
smile at your dreams.

Bang My Whimper

Bang my Whimper

Soft, loud or silently mouthed
the circle still completes.
And as the world shudders,
implodes in contracting
convulsions, shatters and ends,
the beginning thrusts itself
forth, again. Slow, swift,
the rhythm of life returns,
the circle still completes.

At the Beach

At the Beach

Barefoot and bareheaded you
wander up, over and down the dunes
wondering where the wind
hid your loose-brimmed straw hat.

The warmth you feel caressing
your shoulders and lingering
where your hair bares your neck
is not late August sunshine.

Following your footsteps
feeling the same grass blades,
sand grains beneath my feet
I know I've found my paradise.

Something so simple as skin.

And the Heart Grows Fonder

And the Heart Grows Fonder

Absence sleeps in the middle
of a bed too large for one,
huddled under two blankets more
than needed. With light,
I can fill darkened rooms;
with smoke I can still
rapid blood; with drink
I can quench all thirst
but this. No skin will
sate but the touch of you.

But look, the moon
tonight has left me too,
and being absent, is becoming new.

After Dinner

After Dinner

You open yourself as
uncorked wine, pour out
that subtle, supple, sensual
secret stuff inside; passion
bottled fluid, flowing, enfolding
the shrunken space between
us. Two tongues linger, languorous
wrapping together, tasting
words.

I lay drunk with you.

thoughts on shapes

i'm looking at a (more accurately, the) demitasse cup i made earlier this year. it was an afterthought, as far as creation goes. just a way to use up clay left over on the wheelhead from throwing teapot spouts. yet it came out well, and now i drink coffee from it most mornings. this, naturally, means i need to make more (having only one). not only for my own use, but i need to practice throwing off the stack (or hump, depending on who you ask).

so, an examination of the shape is in order. how to improve it. two flaws in the existing piece: the foot and the handle. as far as the cup itself, the size is near perfect, as is the weight. the foot, however, is about a quarter inch too wide. as for the handle, it's too large and has consequently is a shape more fitting a larger cup.

i think about shapes often. bowls, plates, cups, pitchers, etc.. the taper of a bowl edge, whether it should be steep and narrow or wide and shallow. what uses are best suited by what shapes? where should a handle go? all of these things are important in the design of a piece. whether i think about them because of my love of pottery, or i love pottery because i think of these things is unclear. likely a mixture. no matter. i still find it important. so much so, that i'll pick up nearly every piece of dinnerware or vase, etc. in a housewares store.

shape defines not only look and use, but how a thing should feel in the hand. feel and fit. this is what i'm striving for: something that feels like a part of your hand. to accomplish this, what is essential to keep in mind is how you hold things. cups, for instance, are round for two reasons: the first is that wheel-thrown ceramics and blown glass produce round shapes. yet, those shapes are easy to alter (i square off bowls often). the second it the natural curve of our hands. this makes round shapes more pleasing to hold. try it yourself. i'm certain you'll agree. even with a handle on a cup or mug, we still often want to hold the actual cup. i know i'm not the only one who will wrap his hands around a mug, fingers slipped through the handle.

with a cup for a hot beverage though, handles are essential. after all, burns suck. so, back to my demitasse cup. because it's small and light (only should hold about 2oz.) i find i can only comfortably fit one finger through the handle. herein lies the flaw. the shape is better suited to accomadate two fingers, though scaled down a bit. i hold it, though, with one through the handle and one directly under it, supporting. however, the curve is not well designed for this. what i need to do, then, is create the handle with this method of holding it in mind. this will allow my natural inclination as to how to hold it feel, well, natural. the next step in my learning of this craft: how to alter the basic forms to suit function.

pulling handles

i've noticed my handles tend to skew to the left. now, considering that i'm right-handed, this isn't a problem so far as function goes. actually a bit more comfortable, as they conform to the curve of my fingers. aesthetically, though, this is bothersome. mostly because i'm unsure why. i'll have to ask in class this week. not sure if it's something in my pulling technique or when i attach the handle to the cup. something do to with shrinkage? likely not, because it seems fairly consistant. so i'm guessing it's my technique.

going to play with copper oxide this week too. didn't put the iron oxide on my ginko leaf impressions thickly enough last round, so they don't show through the glaze. but, light matte blue accent on the shaner clear is a very nice combonation. will likely try that again. should have two pieces finished this week; my first use of the shino glazes. need to find which of the available glazes is a good green. not as many earth tones available to me at this new place, but i'll find stuff the i like. eventually.

feels good to be back in tune with the wheel. took a little bit, but i feel i'm back at the level i was before moving. practice, practice. going to try my hand at tea pots again after turkey day. they're a pain, but i like the challenge.

buncha poems

these have been kicking around on my hard drive. you may have read some of them. thought about giving each a seperate post, but, well, i'm lazy. enjoy (or don't):

EDIT: 11/17 apparently, i should break these up. so i shall.

[poof! they're gone!]

how come this never happens to me?

now that's some special sauce. apparently, two cops in NM got pot on their burgers. this is not a topping option i've noticed at any burger king around here. maybe you have to ask for it?

but i didn't inhale!

remember that bullshit line from clinton? sure you didn't inhale bill, we believe you.

well, sad to say, bill's line is far more believable than this bullshit: Evangelical leader says he bought meth but 'never used it'. this is laughably stupid. it's one thing to claim that you just pretended to inhale when someone passed you a joint at a party, to look "cool". we know it's bullshit, but there is at least a scant bit of plausibility to the lie.

this, however...i mean, come the fuck on. who buys drugs and then throws them away? was he just curious as to what meth looked like? got enough of a high from the illicit thrill of buying meth? was going to smoke it (crap, do you smoke meth? i stay away from this sort of thing) but then had a change of heart? bought it for a friend?

really. i mean, when you get caught, fess up. people will forgive fucking up; they are less inclined to forgive blatant lies about fucking up.

yet another work rant

can you sense a trend?

okay...so you want to have your name and address fields to be variable length. fine. that's nice, and thanks for putting a delimiter in there for me. however, you stupid fuckwits, if you then put the data into a fixed length table, you have done NOTHING but make coding more complex.

look at this shit:

* THE FOLLOWING IS THE NAME AND ADDRESS FIELD. IT IS VARIABLE
* LENGTH, WITH A MAXIMUM OF 25 CHARACTERS FOR THE NAME AND
* A MAXIMUM OF 5 LINES OF ADDRESS AND A 5-DIGIT ZIP CODE
* THE FIRST 4 LINES OF ADDRESS MAY HAVE A MAXIMUM OF 25 CHARACTER
* EACH, AND THE FIFTH A MAXIMUM OF 20 CHARACTERS. THE LAST
* CHARACTER OF THE NAME AND EACH ADDRESS LINE IS FOLLOWED BY AN
* ASTERISK. THE LAST NAME IS FIRST AND IS
* ITSELF FOLLOWED BY AN ASTERISK.
10 NAME-ADDR-AREA.
20 NAME-ADDRESS-X PIC X OCCURS 156 TIMES.

fine, fine. but, you see, if you want a variable length table in cobol, you need to write: OCCURS 1 TO 156 TIMES DEPENDING ON NAME-ADDR-AREA-LEN. or somthing akin to that. otherwise, you have a fixed length table. such as above. in which case, you'd have been better off just defining the fucking field names so i could do simple moves, instead of having to write a routine to unstring the fucking name from the address. more over, if you and moving variable length data into fixed fields, there is no point. a variable table takes up the maximum defined size in memory when you run the program. you aren't saving any space in working memory. you certainly aren't saving space in the database. the only time variable length tables are useful in cobol is when you have a variable length OUTPUT. otherwise, it's just a pain in the ass.

i hate these morons.

stupid fucktards

so, i just got off the phone with comcast. why? because they were still billing me for service in CT. i moved to MD in the middle of august. i cancelled my service. they were supposed to turn it off.

why did they not turn it off? because, apparently, i wasn't home. of course i wasn't home, i'd moved to a different fucking state. in fact, i told this to the person i scheduled the service cancellation with, when i asked i could return the cable box in maryland. and mentioned that I WASN'T GOING TO BE THERE BECAUSE I WAS MOVING OUT OF STATE.

fucking morons.