beetimevine

News? Opinion? Lies?

2009-11-18T04:20:33Z

Some more political grumbling just to make myself feel better.

Here's an article from Fox News:
Japanese Mortified By Obama's Bow -- embarrassing an ally
Here's a quote:

ABC's Jake Tapper reports that at least one Japanese newspaper is not printing the picture of the president's mortifying bow because the Japanese are embarrassed by his behavior. A scholar of traditional Japan tells Mr. Tapper, "The bow… did not just display weakness in Red State terms, but evoked weakness in Japanese terms… The last thing the Japanese want or need is a weak-looking American president."

Fox News often claims that news and opinion are separate. I couldn't find a link to this in either news or opinion, but the url has it under "story".
The problem is with this article is that it's simply not true.

First, if you look at Tapper's article the scholar is unnamed, and described first as an "old friend." Also the expert doesn't know what he's talking about. Obama's bow was probably not perfect but not bad either. It was clear that he took the effort to practice it a bit.

Second, the newspaper which refused to carry a picture of the event because it was so embarrassing, is unnamed, and I can't find any evidence of this through usual online search. I also didn't find a single blog in Japanese which found the bow embarrassing or offensive. Trapper's article does mention Kyodo news, but their site isn't searchable, and they defer any queries to another news search engine. Their English version does indeed include a picture along with an article titled "Obama meets with Japanese emperor, empress over lunch" (I couldn't read the article without joining the website.)

Third, this story is making news in Japan only because American conservatives are trying to make an issue of it. Headlines read along the lines of "Obama's bow has repurcussions in American media" and "Bow called inappropriate by America's right wing." Several pages of Google News in Japanese revealed nothing but articles of this type.

So Fox New's "story" isn't news (as news it would have to be titled "Whitehouse Correspondent's Anonymous Old Friend Doesn't Like Obama's Bow.")
It's also mostly not "opinion." Only at the end does the writer offer his opinion: "Now he's embarrassed the U.S. and one of our allies all at the same time."

So what is it then? All that's left is "lies." Is this ok? Is it ok for a major media company to intentionally publish lies?

Orin and music

2009-02-01T14:38:07Z

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.

re-inventing one.

2009-02-01T14:21:29Z

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."

wonder if I got a changeling

2008-10-20T01:59:42Z

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.

grading student essays

2008-10-10T03:55:31Z

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:

-----
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.

----

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.

-----
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.

---

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!

---

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.
---

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.

--
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.

--

I like dogs because I think I am enjoyed every day by dogs.

pointless grumbling

2008-06-12T07:09:22Z

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.

They say the Devil is a charming man?

2008-01-10T08:08:24Z

After eight years of imagining Karl Rove as one of the Dark Lords, I was surprised to find what a light, warm writing style he has.

Why Hillary Won

Back to regularly scheduled programming

2007-12-07T12:37:46Z

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.

beetimevine @ 2007-12-02T02:25:00

2007-12-01T17:57:44Z

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.

Nose Music!

2007-08-05T09:24:56Z

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.

am I going crazy?

2007-07-12T12:17:18Z

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?

corn

2007-07-06T16:02:34Z

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."

anecdotes from grade school

2007-07-04T07:53:45Z

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.

PORNOGRAPHY
I was teaching phrases like "My father likes baseball" to a class of 5th-graders. In order to encourage students to raise their hand and say something, I also had a point system. If you volunteer something like "My sister likes Pokemon" you get one point. Any other student can then raise their hand and say "My brother likes Pokemon" for a point. But I especially tried to encourage students to come out with unusual hobbies. If a student starts with "My grandfather likes juggling," and nobody else can add to it, then that student gets three points. (Encouraging individuality is one of the ways that I try to bring about the collapse of Japan.) At this particular school students were being a bit shy so I also allowed students to start with themselves. (for example "I like baseball.”)

One girl, slightly tall for her age, raised her hand and said in a strong clear voice "I like pornography." She garbled the pronunciation of "pornography" a bit but it was unmistakable. Oh shit, I thought, how do I handle this gracefully? I wasn't about to say to a group of fifth-graders "OK! Who else likes pornography?" But I didn't want to embarrass the girl either. I gave a panicked glance to the homeroom teacher, who, thank God, understood my dilemna. He said "Porno Graffitti. It's a Japanese band." Flooded with relief I continued on with a big smile on my face "Who else likes Porno Graffitti?" Meanwhile the teacher went over to the girl, who could sense my stress, and whispered "I'll explain later."

OLD BITCH
I hated going to only one school, Shiina Elementary. Especially for the last class of sixth graders, nothing I did worked. Sometimes it got just plain nasty. For example, for the “my family likes” lesson I drew a quick four-second picture of a woman's face on the board, and said "This is my mother." One of the students, I couldn't see who, shouted out "Kuso Baba!" Directly translated: "Shit old lady." Roughly similar in strength to "Old bitch!" This was a class of sixth graders. Twelve year old kids. Part of my job here, due to the psychological frailties of this timid little island, is taking rudeness gracefully. But this was a new level. The homeroom teacher said nothing. After a couple seconds of shocked silence I continued on. "My mother likes cats."
Unlike previous schools, absolutely nobody volunteered to start. To salvage the lesson I split the class into two teams -- if anyone from team A could start with "My (family member) likes (something)" and if nobody from team B could answer "My (family member) likes (the same thing)" then team A got one point. Still volunteers were scarce so I picked one girl who was talking and ignoring the lesson. She clearly didn't want to say anything, and I hate forcing students. But the regular teacher forced her. Clearly miserable she squeezed out something like "My brother likes fishing." It gained her a point for her team, but a joyless one.
Going home that day the vice-principal stopped me.
"Did you have a hard time in class?"
"Yeah. Usually I know how to handle rudeness, but this was new."
"Is that ok with you?"
A moment of confusion. Then I realized what he meant: "I don't care."
He wasn't talking about that. In fact he talked to the girl who was forced to speak in class. And the blame was on me.
"What will you do to make your lessons better?"
"Um, I guess I'll talk to the company for advice."
"Yes. You learn to be a good teacher."

For almost every other school, I usually went home after teaching with a happy glow. But at that particular school, I usually went home with a rotten feeling in my stomach and a cloud over my head. At most schools the smarter students hold the the most influence among their peers, and the teacher holds a good relationship with the students. But at that particular school and particularly the last class, the strongest students enjoyed derailing the lesson, so of course the other students followed suit. Their teacher didn’t seem to command much respect among his students either, so I really couldn’t rely on his help. So lessons in his class often just kinda failed, or limped to the finish-line. And of course after class the teacher came to me and explained where my lesson was bad. For example “going from ‘can you jump?’ to ‘can frogs jump?’ is too conceptually difficult for twelve-year old kids.” Eventually I gave up trying to defend myself and just shut my mouth and nodded my head, eager to get the hell out of there.

ZATO-ICHI
I was teaching basic directions like "Go straight, turn left, turn right." To teach this, I wanted to try a game that I had read about. The game goes something like this: divide the class into teams. Maybe six teams. Each team picks one student as their samurai. They then make "swords" from newspaper rolled into a staff. I figured three sheets would be strong enough to swing, but not strong enough to actually cause any harm. The samurai from each team then wear a blindfold and have to listen strictly to their teammates for directions. Their teammates decide whether to attack another team’s samurai, get out of the way, etc. When they get close enough to attack, the command was "Strike!" If they actually hit, the team got one kill
I tried it first at Shiina, the school I discussed above. It went ok. Of course the last class went the least well but it wasn't a failure either. After class the teacher approached me and said it was a bad idea to have students hitting each other, and I should make the target something like a ball in the middle of the room. I nodded my head and resolved to try it again at another school
So the following week I tried it at Shinjuku Elementary, one of my favorite schools. A bit nervous that my idea would be rejected because of the violence, I explained it to the teacher before class. She was in her fifties, a bit stern in manner but clearly loved by her students. She listened to my idea for the lesson with a concerned look on her face, and then spoke: "I don't think three sheets of newspaper is strong enough. You need four or five."
Grinning with delight, I suggested four.

I discovered a lucky accident in language for this lesson. In the middle of explaining it to the students I realized that the idea of blindfolded samurai was kind of stupid, and quickly tried to think of how could I justify it. Then I remembered the old long-running Japanese TV series Zato-Ichi, about a blind samurai. Beat Takashi also recently made a movie with the same character, which is how I knew about it. Even more luckily, "ichi" also means "one." So the teams became "Zato-One" "Zato-Two" etc. Aside from making the students more willing to be blindfolded, It also made them goof off less -- disrespectful behaviour would be like insulting Zato-Ichi himself!

One team chose a tall graceful girl named Asuka as their samurai. She complained about being chosen but went along with it. While she was making her sword I picked it up briefly – it was as thin and hard as you can roll four sheets of newspaper. After watching her move I knew why she had been picked -- she was clearly taking lessons in Kendo. Her feet were planted in the proper Kendo stance, her sword held firmly in front of her. She soon had her first kill too, and brought her newspaper sword down hard onto a boy's head with a loud "WHACK!" "Oh crap!" I thought, and went to see if the boy was ok. He clearly wanted to cry, but wouldn't let himself. Asking if he was ok, he nodded yes and sat down. There was a red mark on his forehead but luckily it didn't swell into a lump. I said to Asuka "Don't actually kill anybody!" She laughed and said ok, but her next victim got it pretty hard too.

CHRISTMAS
One thing I did for the Christmas lessons was to tell the students that the school had given me $1,000,000,000,000 to buy presents for them, so what did they want? Of course it was a chance to make the students practice "I want a ..." I also wrote some examples on the board for students to think about like "I want a bicycle," "I want a book," "I want a UFO" or "I want an island." Usually half the students picked something safe like book or video game. "I want money" was surprisingly common. A lot of the students made me laugh with outlandish requests. "I want London" was one of my favorites. Another student made the class laugh by teasing their teacher and saying "Mrs. Omura wants a boyfriend, right?" But one student left me speechless for a second when she said "I want a grandmother."

LOSING MY TEMPER
I made a big mistake during my first lesson at a new school. I had students make a circle and jumped randomly from student to student saying "My name is Devon" and shaking their hands. One student, sitting right next to the teacher, seemed eager to shake my hand so I picked him. He shook my hand forcefully and exaggeratedly, saying “nice to meet you” in a mocking voice. In a moment of irritation I gripped his hand firmly and pulled him toward the middle of the circle. Then I went on to another student. This stunned him. He just stayed there in the middle staring at me. So I said "go back." He did but looked crestfallen for the rest of the lesson. The homeroom teacher too had a stony expression on her face that could have been anger towards me or a message to the boy that she wouldn't comfort him The boy never really forgot this either, and looked at me balefully for several following weeks.

ANNUAL SALARY
For the last lesson of the year, I let the students ask whatever questions they wanted in English or Japanese. There were some interesting questions, and I wasn't always able to think fast enough to give good answers. One question that had me thinking was "What's the difference between Japanese TV and American TV?" (The best thing I could come up with at the moment, was that there's a wider range in intelligence level. Some programming makes me think "why can't American TV be this good?!" and some programs make me think "Good God, are there really people stupid enough to laugh at this?" In the States, programs aim mostly for the middle.)
The strangest question to me was "What's your annual salary?" If one student asked it, it'd hardly be noteworthy. But it was asked at least three times at three different schools. That eleven- and twelve- year old kids are thinking about annual salary completely amazed me. And they didn't say "How much money do you make," which is a phrasing you might expect from kids, but instead "What is your annual salary?" And each time the teacher responded strongly that it was a rude question. This drove home my precarious position here. As a teacher I don't make a lot. And things like respect and social position are tied closely to money. As the "old bitch" experience at Shiina also showed me, I'm at least as much clown as teacher, If the Chiba Board of Education decided that letting students throw tomatoes at the teacher while he danced around in his underwear would be a good way to let the students have fun while learning English, then that would become my job. As fun and interesting as this job can be, it would be disastrous to consider it a career.

ODD MOMENTS
There are a few moments that I still don’t understand.

Once as a substitute teacher I was washing my hands between classes, when a sixth-grade girl, one of the brightest of the students from the previous class came up to me. She smiled at me, put her hand on my waist. I smiled back, not sure what to say. Then she walked away. I don’t think it was flirtation – I think she was simply curious how skinny I was.
At Shinjyuku Elementary, I was walking down the hallway between classes. I walked by a girl I’d never seen before, maybe nine or ten years old. She stopped me and said wrapped her arms around my waist, saying “aitakatta!” At its weakest, this means “I wanted to meet you!” but often means “I missed you!” At its strongest it could be used to express “I love you.” I and asked her what her name was. She looked at me with confusion, with a trickle of green snot going down her face. I think she might have been a bit of a special-needs kid.
I had several classes where somewhat-challenged kids took part in the class. You might expect them to be ostracized and picked on. Surprisingly the opposite was true – the other kids seemed to take it upon themselves to encourage, and care for them. The beauty and depth of Japanese society occasionally appars in the most unpredictable ways.

PROMOTED
The school year in Japan ends in March and begins in April, On my last day at Shiina Elementary I had to go through a "Gratitude Ceremony" that was excruciatingly hollow. They had asked me to prepare a short speech for the students, so for weeks I ruminated on something simple and encouraging to express. For the fifth-grade students, who seemed to like me, I said simply “It was fun being your teacher. Good luck next year and be nice to your new teacher.” (By this time I knew I probably wouldn’t be asked back.) For the sixth-grade students, I said something like “Until now, English class has been just a game. When you start junior high, you will have homework and grades and tests. But if you continue to think of English as a game, you will succeed. If you know the rules only a little, you can communicate with roughly half of the world. With this game you can make friends, help people, and even defeat an opponent. Because the rules are complicated, the harder you study the better you can play the game.”

So I went to the Gratitude Ceremony. First I played a game with the entire student body, from 1st grade to 6th grade, roughly 200 students. Then I stumbled through my speech. Another teacher, A Japanese woman who was in charge of English for the 1st through 4th grade classes, also said a few words to her students. Then two of the students solemnly presented us with bouquets of flowers. Then I was told “Bye. You can leave now.” I wanted nothing more than to leave, but I had to wait at the office for the vice-principal to sign some paperwork.
Before leaving, I said to him "I hope to see you again." His eyes fell to the floor. As I was leaving I overheard him saying in "we don't really need a teacher who knows Japanese." At the train station I left my bouquet in a coin-op photo booth. I didn't want the fucking thing, and would have preferred shoving it in the trash. But I wondered what would happen if a teacher or student saw it.
Of course that school gave me poor reviews. But it helped me get promoted! Apparently the rest of my reviews were good. This was very very lucky - if even one other school had something negative to say, then I would have been seen as a teacher that “still has things to work on." And I did make a lot of mistakes but the overall impression was good, I guess. So instead of Shiina reflecting poorly on me, it highlighted my successes at other schools and reflected poorly on them. It still warms my heart to remember the guy in charge of scheduling at the office, telling me "They just don't get it. They're a bunch of hicks." In April I was placed in an academically-oriented high school, and given a pay raise.

09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0

2007-05-02T16:24:52Z

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.

Due to be published late November:

2007-04-30T02:49:17Z

A new permutation of the human genome.

I added some source material.

Kurt Vonnegut

2007-04-12T07:38:15Z

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.

thirteen years behind the times but still fun

2007-03-30T15:00:22Z

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

Expiration dates

2007-03-23T09:28:44Z

It's good to know that I can enjoy this popcorn for the next 700 years.

flash sketchpad

2007-02-15T06:29:30Z

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.

more about rock music

2007-01-25T14:43:44Z

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.

Talking to rock stars

2006-10-17T09:25:19Z

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.

Usually coffee perks you up...

2006-09-03T09:23:44Z

I suppose weird or downright silly English in Japan is a bit over-played. But now and then I see something that just can't be passed up.

flash

2006-08-27T14:13:21Z

I've been using my free time to study flash programming for the last week. Here are a couple crude silly examples.

http://www.metempiric.net/flash/kaokao2.html

http://www.metempiric.net/flash/petparade2.html
For the second one, I used an example from a book I've been studying, so the graphics aren't mine, just the code.

Quitting my job...

2006-04-29T18:21:59Z

Yesterday was my last day as a teacher for "Hearts Kids English," at least for a while. was only the teacher at that school for one month, so I was still feeling out the students. One little boy, Daiki, maybe six years old, became an enemy almost instantly. On the first day I ended up actually dragging him out of the classroom. Last week when I announced that I was leaving, he said something like "Well then I won!" Five years old! Amazing bravery.
But anyway, yesterday he was mild and nice. Never would have guessed.

Last September, when my feelings about Japan were at a low point, I started thinking about quiting in the spring. I formed the idea of spending a few months in Idaho at my mom's house. While my girlfriend studied English at the little college there I could brush up on my outdated computer skills and try to find a professional job.

But now I'm surprised how much I ended up enjoying this job. When I first started it was tough. I completely lost my voice in the second week -- it was probably the first time I had to speak loudly often and every day. When I called in sick, my boss at the time said "Sorry, we need you." "Well how am I supposed to teach pronunciation when I can barely speak?" "Whisper." And I'm still stunned at how ballsy and rude little kids can be. I've been called the equivalent of "weird piece of shit" by a six-year old. That one part of the job, being directly dissed by little kids, is tough! More than you'd think. You find yourself stifling the urge to chuck the kid out the window. And losing your temper never helps -- the kids end up being afraid of you or hating you and quitting.

But since then, nearly three years ago, this job has really grown on me. I get to have conversations like this:
"Do you like cookies?"
"Yes!"
"Do you like spider cookies?"
"No!"

And at odd times my pockets might contain UNO cards, suction-cup ninja throwing stars, dice, or fake money -- all tools of the trade.
But sometimes it still really sucks. My last class at my Thursday school, where I've been teaching for about seven months, was awful. The kids were ignoring me, making sarcastic comments, refusing to participate, climbing on the window sill. And the school owner was watching.

Another reason it's harder to quit -- I didn't know that I had a reputation in the company as a good teacher. In my last time at my Thursday school, where one class of kids was openly disrespectful and lethargic, and the school owner was watching, I was thinking "Well here's a disgraceful and unpleasant way to leave the school." After the class I even kind of apologized, saying something like "I seem to have lost the respect of this class -- sorry. I'm not usually this bad." She surprised my by saying "No I think you're a good teacher. You're always thinking of new and interesting ways to teach." I guess I was also highly recommended to them. My fragile ego eats that kind of stuff up.

I'll probably have one more day of work next Saturday, at my biggest and hardest school, to introduce the new teacher. It's the only school where I've been the teacher during my entire 2 1/2 years. When I first started it was awful -- some classes had ten students, most of them hyperactive, and was completely out of control. But especially in the last year and a half, it's become a really nice place to teach. And I'm mostly liked at that school, something oddly hard to give up.

Also, I feel oddly protective of my students. Some of them, that I first saw when they were three or four, nervous and timid, are now confident and surprisingly able six-year olds. Some of them were hyperactive seven-year olds but are now ten, fully thinking, smart and self-controlled. I want to say to the new teacher "If you screw this up, I'll come after you!"
But I can't be possessive. I'm sure the new teacher will be fine, My part in their growth was probably smaller than I like to think, and the students can only benefit from another person's approach. Ultimately I'll miss them more than they'll miss me. (Unless the next teacher sucks. In which case I'll have somebody rough him up.)

Anyway I'll be landing in Seattle on May 18th around 8am.

Which brings me to a question.

Um..

Would anybody in Seattle be willing to let me and my girlfriend stay for one or two days? We don't need much -- any basement closet or pile of rags would do for a place to sleep. And we don't need to be picked up at the airport. We'd be glad to bring you the Japanese item of your choice, as long as we can carry it and get it through customs.

255 character blog

2006-02-21T15:11:31Z

a few months ago I tried to make a little journal that I could post to from my cellphone. It mostly works but for some reason when I use my phone the text is all capital letters.

Because I'm fundamentally stingy I limited the input to 255 characters. But in a way I'm glad I did -- it keeps the entries succinct.

If anyone else wants to try reading or posting to it, from a computer or cellphone or whatever, feel free. Keep in mind it's bare-bones.
To post:
http://www.metempiric.net/postblog.html
To read:
http://www.metempiric.net/readblog.php