| Orin and music |
[Feb. 1st, 2009|11:22 pm] |
Orin loves music. When he was about eight months old Noriko and I took him with us to the outskirts of an outdoor music festival along the beach. It was far enough away to not be very loud, but near enough to still feel the bass. I was worried that Orin might be afraid, but no. He laughed and squirmed in delight.
Lately he dances a lot.
Here's him dancing to "Paranoid" playing from the tiny little speaker on my cell phone.
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| re-inventing one. |
[Feb. 1st, 2009|11:13 pm] |
Taking a walk, and probably seeing a real estate poster with land advertised in so-many square meters made my thoughts wander around in math.
"Hmm. Small numbers squared get smaller. Big numbers squared get bigger. Wait! That means somewhere between the big numbers and the small numbers there's something that doesn't get bigger OR smaller! Wow, you can square it over and over and it never changes. I wonder what it is!"
"Oh, oh yeah." |
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| wonder if I got a changeling |
[Oct. 20th, 2008|10:55 am] |
Babies: part cute adorable little bundles of joy, part demon.
Actually he didn't sound nearly that scary, the little cell-phone mic just got distorted. |
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| grading student essays |
[Oct. 10th, 2008|09:11 am] |
One of the pleasures of my job is reading students' short compositions.
In any school, most of the students write by template. But there's always a few gems in the bunch. And I laugh at some of the mistakes but without spite, I think.
This was a simple "Which do you like better -- cats or dogs, and why?" Also you were supposed to write down a partner's opinion and respond to it.
A few quotes:
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Morishiga likes dogs because dogs are pretty and clever. I accept that dogs are clever, but cats are prettier than dogs. He said that cats are dotty.
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I like dogs better than cats. Because I hate cats. I think cats are dim. So cats aren't useful for people. Cats can only consume food.
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I like dogs better. In fact my favorite animals are foxes. Their ears are so cute. I hope to sleep with a lot of foxes.
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I was bitten by a big dog near my house when I was seven years old. So I think dogs are terrible! Ms Higaki said she can communicate with dogs. But I couldn't when I was seven years old. Dogs are terrible!
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He likes dogs better because dogs are smarter than cats and dogs can understand a human being's gestures. But I don't think every dog is so smart, because most dogs can do nothing without our discipline.
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I like cats because cats live freely. So I don't have to take a walk with them. I also think I want to live like cats.
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Mr. Sasaki says that he likes dogs because they can communicate with him. But dogs bark so loudly and I don't want them to understand me.
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I like dogs because I think I am enjoyed every day by dogs. |
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| pointless grumbling |
[Jun. 12th, 2008|04:01 pm] |
A few Marines are punished for tossing a puppy over a cliff.
the story according to CNN
compared to this:
A US military jury has acquitted a marine of charges that he helped cover up the killing of 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005.
according to BBC
Iraqi civilians just need to learn how to be cuter. |
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| Back to regularly scheduled programming |
[Dec. 7th, 2007|09:29 pm] |
Here is a gift bag, that I bought the other day. I was half asleep and buying a rice-ball from a convenience store on the way to work. As I was leaving, I thought to myself "Did I just see what I think I saw?"
What was that word written on it?
Yes, it's true. Somebody, in a moment of spite or silliness or ignorance chose the word "sewer" to decorate a gift bag. And nobody in the company, from the design department to the production department to the management, to the staff at the convenience store, thought "hmm, I wonder what that word means." When I bought the bag, I told the girl at the counter what it meant, and she seemed amused. |
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| (no subject) |
[Dec. 2nd, 2007|02:25 am] |
This is Orin. Unfortunately he still needs a Japanese name, so this might end up changing to fit with another name. We gave up on finding just one name that sounded good in both English and Japanese, and had pleasing kanji to go with it.
On Wednesday Noriko went to the doctor as usual, and they said "this baby is big -- over 9 pounds. We think it would be best to induce labor. If it gets any bigger it might be really hard to birth." I guess the way they do it, is to put a small ball in the woman's cervix, and that ball gradually expands. This happened Wednesday around 5pm.
I met Noriko at the hospital and she said "go on home, the doctor says that if this works, I should go into labor sometime tomorrow."
So before I left I said "If you go into labor, I'll never forgive you if you don't call me. I don't care if it's 2 or 3am."
Sure enough the phone rang around 2:30 am. Noriko had a strained voice, and said 'can you come? Probably it'll be a while though.'"
I got up, took a shower, grabbed a few things like a notebook and pen. I thought I'd write a log every ten minutes of what was happening. Then I hopped on my bike and went. Usually it takes me 15 minutes to ride my bike to the area where the clinic is, but it only took me ten minutes this time. From Noriko's call to arriving at the hospital was only about forty-five minutes. The doctor waved me into the birthing room, and said "You can see the head." "What?!" I thought. "Already?" Sure enough, down inside there was a black mass visible. After a few more pushes, the head looked like a head, and then shortly after shoulders, and then it slid right out. Sure enough it was a boy. He stretched his arms and legs out cautiously, as if he were waking up from a nap, and when he cried it didn't seem like grief, but more surprise, and the desire to try his lungs out for the first time. After briefly resting on Noriko's chest, he was wisked away to another room to be cleaned. He was crying the whole time, thinking "where am I? Where's my mommy?!" We were only allowed to see him briefly an hour later. The nurse said that he still can't maintain body temperature. Part of me wanted to grumble "goddammit if humans can give birth in caves, we should be fine in this warm hospital." But I didn't really feel like fighting the nurse over it.
From the time the water broke until birth, only three hours had passed. This was after hearing stories of labor lasting up to two days. The official time of birth is Thursday, November 29, 3:37 AM. 9 1/2 pounds.
Over the last couple days I've been spending most of my time at the hospital. Luckily I got Thursday and Friday off from work. Noriko's been recovering quickly. We've both been taking care of the baby. He does one of four things: cry, poop, nurse, or sleep. I know how I'll be spending my winter vacation. |
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| Nose Music! |
[Aug. 5th, 2007|06:23 pm] |
I made the most amazing discovery today!
If you take earbud-style headphones, stick them in your nose, and plug your ears, you can hear music!
Try it. I guarantee you'll be amazed. |
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| am I going crazy? |
[Jul. 12th, 2007|09:04 pm] |
According to the news, Al Qaeda is as strong as it was in 2001.
so, delta t = 6 years, or roughly 2130 days. roughly three million minutes.
Let q = the strength of Al Qaeda. delta q = 0. This despite hundreds of billions of dollars spent, thousands of American lives, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghanistani lives, six years of American-run concentration camps, and the most arrogant administration ever to dirty the halls of the White House.
But not one single editorial or news story is saying "maybe our approach is all wrong."
I'm half serious -- would someone be willing to give me a seed of optimism? |
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| corn |
[Jul. 7th, 2007|12:59 am] |
the top ear of corn was mine. The bottom one was Noriko's. Which of us likes corn better?
She eats it precicely, one row at a time. I've tried to do this myself but it doesn't look any different. She tells me "You don't eat it respectfully enough."
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| anecdotes from grade school |
[Jul. 4th, 2007|04:22 pm] |
From November 2006 to March 2007 I taught English at elementary schools. Recently Japan has decided that children should study English in grade school, but has left it up to each city to decide from which grade. The city I worked in, Chiba, decided to give one 45-minute lesson per week to fifth- and sixth-grade students.
What this meant for me, was that I had a weekly circuit of roughly five different schools. So for example, I went to the same school every Monday, and to a different school every Tuesday, and so on. I was only required to be at the school during the time I was teaching. So if my school had only two classes, I was done and free to go home after two hours. Occasionally I had two schools in the same day – morning classes in one school, then a quick trip by train to my afternoon school. I also often had un-scheduled days, where I might be sent as a substitute teacher to a school I’d never seen before. Or if there was nothing for me, it was a day off. Over the six months I probably had seven schools that I visited regularly, and maybe six other schools that I visited sporadically as a substitute.
For grade school students, English lessons are built around activities and games. The hope of Japan’s government is that if students’ first encounters with English are fun, they might not stress out so much in junior high and high school. For the teacher it means this: you can’t hide behind a book or a desk. You can’t threaten the students with tests. Your only weapon is your imagination and a sense of what kids find fun. You have the following guidelines: 1) The students must have fun. 2) Do not be ripped apart by a mob of blood-thirsty kids. 3) If they learn some English too, that would be nice. Their regular teacher is there to help but for the most part you’re on your own. Of course the company does have a set of pre-made lesson plans which are often useful. But they are also often not useful. In those cases it’s up to you to salvage the lesson, or scrap it and think of something on your own. If your carefully-prepared game or activity is failing before your eyes, it's up to you to fix it on the fly
Really it was great fun. Every day on the train to my school I felt like a soldier on a boat heading to the beaches of Normandy. But most days went well and I went home with a happy glow.
( here are a few anecdotes from this ) |
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| 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 |
[May. 3rd, 2007|12:51 am] |
Apparently some of the larger blogging and news websites have been suppressing this information because it helps unlock all HD-DVD/Blu-Ray disks so far. Not that blog websites care if you hack a dvd. but apparently they fear a lawsuit.
Digg.com tried to suppress any stories containing these numbers, but their own user base revolted. Caught between an angry mob of their own user base and the slobbering jaws of the Motion Picture Association of America's lawyers, they decided to brave the lawyers.
This news story can explain it better than I can.
I wonder if livejournal will notice this, or if they do, if anything will happen.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Probably the battle's already over and this test is pointless. But I'm curious. |
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| Kurt Vonnegut |
[Apr. 12th, 2007|04:08 pm] |
He died today. I hope he enjoyed his 84 years on Earth.
when I was in my teens, his novels were my introduction to black humor, science fiction and WWII history. In a few graceful gestures he could go from bitterly sad to wickedly funny. I imagine he could be called more of a spewing writer than a thinking writer, but I enjoyed his spewings.
I don't know if he did this his whole life, but he used to add a big sloppy asterisk to the end of his signature. When someone asked him what it was, he replied that it was a drawing of his asshole. |
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| thirteen years behind the times but still fun |
[Mar. 30th, 2007|11:53 pm] |
I've been playing with php and mysql lately, and thought I'd try this little experiment.
I'm using a database to count the number of times a button is clicked. Also, each time you click the button a random photo comes up. If you'd be willing to help me test it, go to the link below and click the button as many times as you want.
Also, the server is currently a laptop sitting on my floor so please excuse the suspicious url.
please look |
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| Expiration dates |
[Mar. 23rd, 2007|06:26 pm] |
It's good to know that I can enjoy this popcorn for the next 700 years.
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| flash sketchpad |
[Feb. 15th, 2007|03:22 pm] |
For a long time I thought it would be a cool flash project to make an online "sketch pad." Just a very simple drawing program. Anyone could doodle a picture and save it with a brief comment if they wanted.
It turns out someone else has done it beautifully.
http://butchu.chu.jp/
then click on the "Bbs" button.
There are about 1100 or so sketches so far. I added one -- #1046. |
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| more about rock music |
[Jan. 25th, 2007|11:36 pm] |
Lately I've been astounded by how good modern rock bands are. This really hit home when I downloaded and listened to some recently made (as in the last ten years) covers of old Black Sabbath songs. Back when I was fourteen or so I was a budding metal head, and listened to anything by Ozzy with wide-eyed amazement. That taste has faded way back but never disappeared completely.
So one cover is by Primus, of the song "NIB." Ozzy actually does the vocals. The other is "Paranoid," done by the band Megadeth. I don't remember what I was looking for, but I stumbled on these covers, and listened to them out of curiosity.
They were delightful -- tight, energetic, fun. Feeling nostalgic I looked for the old originals, which I hadn't heard for a long time. To my amazement, having just listened to cover versions of the same songs, the original Black Sabbath versions sounded empty and flat. I felt like I was listening to a cover band's practice session. I listened again to the cover versions again, and a (probably obvious) realization hit me. Primus and Megadeth are far better musicians than Black Sabbath were. In both cases the drummer, guitarist, bassist are doing their own wild things, filling every available space with variation and ornamentation. but at the same time they're playing perfectly together. And on top of that, they sound like they're having more fun. The Black Sabbath versions, by comparison are boringly repetitive, sloppy, and feel kind of tired.
Both Primus' and Megadeth's members are probably early-mid 40's, and grew up listening to 70's rock. Here's a quick quote I found online by Megadeth's guitarist:
"When I was in my formative years as a guitarist, musician and all around rock dude, Black Sabbath was the gauge by which me and my friends measured the 'heaviness' of any music that came out. of course, there could be none heavier than Black Sabbath."
I don't think in either case the bands were trying to show off their skills. And both of these covers are very true to the original feel -- they don't try to reinterpret the song. Instead they seem to want to express the enthusiasm and glee that the original songs gave them. But the funny thing is, they express it better than the original song did, and far better than the original musicians could have. Even an Ozzy in his fifties sounds better than an Ozzy in his twenties.
Between Black Sabbath's version of NIB and Primus's version, 30 years passed -- 1970 to 2000. What was considered a "good rock band" in 1970 and a "good rock band" in 2000 has changed that much. |
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| Talking to rock stars |
[Oct. 17th, 2006|08:48 am] |
I went to the Sasquatch Music Festival this summer, a three-day festival at the Gorge in Washington. The location is beautiful–a naturally formed amphitheatre looking over the Columbia River, farmers’ fields, and barren rocky hills. A couple decades ago someone enterprising turned it into a music venue. I was mostly there for my girlfriend, who was curious about what an American style rock festival was like. And of course she wanted to see one of her favorite bands, Death Cab for Cutie. As for me, there was nobody I especially wanted to see. Tragically Hip was scheduled to appear, which sounded fun.
We arrived Saturday afternoon, and found a spot in the huge farmer’s field which was the campground. As soon as we stepped out of the car we encountered cow flops. The whole place was littered with them. The organizers netted $40 per night per car for the privilege of camping among cow pies.
The first part was fun. I went between the two small stages and heard bands I was totally unfamiliar with, but which bristled with energy. Beer was $8 per can. A micro-pizza was about the same price.
The weather was spectacular and worrisome. Large ominous clouds passed here and there making patterns of light and shadow across the hills. Occasionally lightening flashed between them. At about four in the afternoon a cluster of these clouds passed directly overhead and unloaded their cargo of ... ice. A field full of thousands of kids huddled under windbreakers and blankets while marble-sized hail pelted them. The band soon stopped and the only sound was hail and "Ouch!" "Ouch!" "Ouch!" from here and there in the audience.
Cold and wet, we returned to the car to warm up. Noriko was fine, but I was shivering. We took a nap in the warm car, and woke up when the bands had started back up. I thought Tragically Hip was cancelled but I learned later that we had simply missed them.
That night we listened to Ben Harper, which brought back memories of living in the Donovan Street Hippy House. But he was so tiny! A little brightly-lit person at the bottom of a steep hill. We went back to the campsite, and I stopped briefly to record frog-songs from a small pond along the way.
The next day we left the campground to avoid paying $40 for another night, and to get some real food. That evening was the main act we wanted to see: Death Cab for Cutie. Noriko adored them. We tried to translate some of their lyrics into Japanese, and my birthday teddy bear was given the name "Benjomin" after their lead singer Benjamin. (We spelled it with an "o" for the Japanese word "benjo" meaning outhouse.) By now, having heard them dozens of times, I knew most of their songs, and liked a few of them.
Between afternoon and evening we again made the rounds of the different stages. One small stage had a charming woman singer, Laura Veirs performing. So we stayed in the sparse audience listening and praying for the rain to stay inside the clouds.
Just after she finished Noriko said "Hey, I think that guy over there is the guitarist for Death Cab." I looked, and there was a tall blond guy with a slightly pointed nose and stooped shoulders wearing a green jacket. He was smiling and talking to friends. A couple girls posed for a picture with him. One short thin girl with dirty-blond hair kept especially close to him, and was clearly the "girlfriend" of the situation. I tentatively asked Noriko if she wanted to say something to him. She said "Just maybe say I came from Japan to see them."
I didn’t want to plunge right in so I waited for a moment when he seemed less busy. He and the girlfriend drifted towards the main stage, and passed greetings with a couple people along the way.
After they settled down and stood on the edge of the crowd to watch the show I approached and said quietly "Excuse me...." The girlfriend gave me a disgusted look, moved closer to the guitarist, and turned her head away. The guitarist made no reaction. I said a bit louder "Excuse me!" and tried a third time. After the third time he turned just maybe one tenth of a turn away from me. He had a kind of tired expression on his face. I waved my hand in an "ah fuck it" gesture of disgust and walked back to Noriko saying "No good."
As it always happens with me, this slowly worked its way under my skin. I spent the rest of the day chewing on my embarrassment and thinking of things I could have said. "I don’t even like your damn band, but my girlfriend came from Japan to see you schmucks. Maybe someday I’ll pick up a used copy of your CD if I see it in the bargain bin."
Later, watching Matisyahu. In the middle of a song, he broke into a speech. It went something like "Everyone thinks musicians are up high out of their reach. But really we’re just people like you." To emphasize his point, he climbed off the stage and allowed himself to be surrounded by fans for about a minute while he sang. Then he got back up on his stage, with security efforts redoubled. Of course, having just been snubbed by a rock star, his words didn’t ring especially true to me.
I imagine rock stars spend their lives surrounded by hungry people. Even if it’s just someone who wants to say "Hey, I like your music," it’s still someone who wants something. And maybe it goes beyond that. It seems like some of the early groupies would try to grasp a handful of hair or tear a bit of shirt from their idol (maybe Elvis or maybe The Beatles) for a keepsake.
I actually have talked to a few of my favorite musicians. I met Kari Rieman, the violinist for Varttina, at a scandanavian music festival in Minneapolis. He taught me the melody to one of their songs, and later sent me sheet music for it. The three singers of Varttina signed my shirt and corrected about the only word I know of Finnish. John Fahey, who passed on a few years ago after a lifetime creating his own style of contemplative drifting finger-picking blues, came to Bellingham to play for a half-full bar. He exchanged a few words with me during the intermission. I said I liked his album "Requia," and he expressed a certain chagrin about the "experimental" side B. John Renbourn, the guitarist of Pentangle who helped to give birth to folk rock in the 1960’s, played for an audience of a couple hundred people in Bellingham. I passed him in the hall, and told him how much I enjoyed his playing. He smelled like whiskey which probably explained his jovial, relaxed presence on stage. I can’t deny the desire to talk to a musician whom you admire. And I can’t deny the strange pride that comes from exchanging a few words.
I don’t know what was going through the Death Cab guitarist’s mind. If I had to guess, I’d say he was tired of schmoozing, and just wanted to listen to music. I don’t think he was thinking "I’m too good to talk to you." At worst maybe "This person has nothing I want." If he had taken any pleasure in the snub he would have been more expressive about it. On the other hand, "How dare you approach us?" was written all over the girlfriend’s face. I sort of imagine her as a seagull protecting her bit of fish from the other seagulls.
After a few hours we made our way to the pit and listened to Death Cab’s hour-long set. They really do have nice warm friendly songs. Noriko looked exquisitely happy the whole time. We also stayed for a bit of Beck, before heading back for the car to leave. From the edge of the amphitheatre the stage and performers looked so small, and I wondered why so many people paid so much money to be there. |
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