Web Log Archive (December 12-December 25, 2004)
Saturday, December 25th, 2004 Gruesome!
Stop me if you've heard this: I surely don't know much but I know that Jesus wasn't born on Christmas Day. Then why is Christmas on December 25th, fergodsakes? Isn't He the reason for the season? Well...no. Ya see, long ago, before folks in the Northern Hemisphere had satellites and cable TV, it always took a few days (after the solstice on December 22nd) before everybody could be certain that the days were getting longer (again) and that the Sun was "coming back" from its "southern journey". And even though I wasn't around in those days to set everybody straight...trust me, it truly was a cause for rejoicing! The Christians in the early centuries A.D. musta figured (rather than go to the trouble of ginning up a whole new tradition of festivals and celebrations) that it would be easier to just sign on to ("hijack", if you will) something that was going on anyway!
Friday, December 24, 2004
We brandish our weakest qualities. No man who ever told me what a "straight-shooter" he is...was. This morning brings reports of a "surprise" visit by our War Secretary to Mosul to tell our kids over there how much "respect" he has for them...and that they "can win!". Now...in the unlikely event that you're not already fatally depressed about all this, then read Bob Herbert's latest piece.
"Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won't be the victim of needless suffering." don Miguel Ruiz
Got some holiday email greetings today from one of my favorite people, (a man I still prefer to call) Carlos Barreda. 'Charlie', as he now rather prefers to be addressed, is a monstrously talented person...someone whom I much admire. Here's a link to his new Web site.
Thursday, December 23, 2004
How about today's column by Maureen Dowd? Whew!
So...I was pushing a cart down the bottled water aisle at Safeway and, uh huh, they started playing yet another Yuletide favorite ("Christians Roasting On An Open Fire" or some such) and there was this lady ('bout my age, 28) bending over to snatch some Calistoga to whom (since I hadn't actually spoken to any non-cashiering adults in three or four days) I decided to remark, "They got no mercy with this Christmas music, eh?" "I like it", she replied pleasantly. "Well, YOU WOULD!", I bellowed (so as to be overheard among the frozen foods) as I twisted off the plastic cap on a 16 oz. bottle of Avian and poured it over her head! Then, before I could shoplift another pack of razor cartridges, I was forcefully escorted (by a couple a brawny baggers) through the automatic "out" doors and told to shop thereafter at Albertson's. The manager, summoned by now, yelled that, lucky fer my skinny white ass, that nice lady had declined to press criminal charges. "At least it wasn't a bottle of Diet Pepsi." she said.
Wednesday, December 22, 2004
So it's almost Christmas but what the hey! I can't complain...I just DO! I'm not alone this year: I have a dying cat with whom I can share special Holiday moments! Ya know it occurred to me this morning that I oughta stop being such a jerk and maybe try ta think about somebody besides myself fer a change. So I'm gonna look into one a them thar charity soup kitchen deals. Do ya think, if I made a donation, they'd let me slop some vagrants on the Big Day (before turning 'em back out in the cold)? It helps to be reminded that there are people more wretched than ourselves.
Tuesday, December 21, 2004 The
Shortest Day of the Year!
Sometimes I worry that I'll die too soon but more often I worry that I'll live too long.
Butt-Munch! Your tossed-off phrase yesterday about he "lacks confidence" is charming...guileless...pure...innocent! I like it!
How about this? Yesterday, for the first time, our Alfred E. acknowledged (however obliquely) what everyone else (who doesn't keep his head stuffed up his ass) has been saying all year: our invasion of Iraq has created an intractable mess. But then, ladling out more of the same gruel that he's been serving up all year, he went on to emphasize, "We must meet the objective, which is to help the Iraqis defend themselves..." Jon Stewart, in response to a virtually identical pronouncement made some months ago by an Administration policy-cheerleader, came back with, "But isn't that exactly what these insurgents are doing?"
"Most of us would rather risk catastrophe than read the directions." Mignon McLaughlin
Today's news from Iraq is stomach-turning-and-churning. Seems whenever I've talked to my genius son about Iraq, I've told him I remember the days of by-the-mid 60's when a sizeable fraction (approaching 1/2) of the public had come to believe that the Vietnam War, even if winnable, was not worth winning. And "not worth winning" IS already what we're talking about today...in Iraq. No serious person can any longer prognosticate an outcome which, for the United States especially, won't actually be worse than the status quo ante bellum. (In the Spirit of the Holidays, I'll here omit an egg-heady discussion about what Victory was/is supposed to look like...here, then, there or now.) But the most common reason given to continue, then as now...but more weakly now than then, was/is that by leaving "it would mean that all those kids got killed and injured for nothing!"
Monday, December 20, 2004
Prison, like war, is an oft-abused metaphor. It can simply mean always only doing what you have to do and never what you want to do. It was sometime after the Columbine "incident" that one news outlet referred to "The War On Teenage Violence"! Mercifully, today, an Internet search on this phrase returns nothing. So what'll you have? Death or life in prison?
Good news and sad news came in this morning's (e)mail. The good
news first: I heard from Chuck, an old band-mate and accomplished guitar
player/singer. He's dong real well, it seems, and living in a town I won't
name...although I WILL post a picture 
he sent me of the place because it's so pretty that I've now made it my
desktop 'wallpaper' (to use the Microsoft lingo).
The sad news is that his former wife, Gloria (remembered in yesterday's Blog and
whose birthday would have been today), has escaped her earthly bonds
within this past year. She was a most beautiful woman but, according to
Chuck, had been ill for some time.
Sunday, December 19, 2004
Happy Birthday, Gloria! (Or is it not 'til tomorrow?)
A few years ago I was part of a project to retrofit a bunch of
restrooms to conform to the standards of the Americans
With Disabilities Act. Ya know, the legislation that says in a public place
or a large privately-owned work facility you gotta be able to squeeze a
wheelchair into a toilet stall and you oughta be able to reach the soap and the
faucets and the towels even if you're a quadruple amputee (not funny...but you
gotta love all those "whaddya call" jokes about Bob in the water and
Phil in the ditch and Art on the wall and Matt on the doorstep). Oh...and there
have to be so many toilets for each gender. Lemme tell ya, the work wasn't
really as
exciting as it may sound when I write about it now!
But the reason I bring it up is 'cuz the consulting architect on that project (a
gay guy from San Francisco, good man!) would remark as to how today's instant communication
(especially email) brought with it new 'dangers' for a consultant. He said that,
in the "old days" (say, 1993), a client might snail mail or FAX him
some question or suggestion (with penciled sketches and markups) and that he
(the architect) would always have some time to think about the issue before
responding. But with email, there is always the opportunity (often coupled with the
expectation of the client) for him to respond immediately! And too often, that
quick response is not a thoughtful and well-reasoned one.
And so I got to thinking about how this situation applies, more generally, to exchanges
by email Many people respond hastily (because they can) to emails that might better be
answered after a ration of time has elapsed...for reflection.
Within any message biteful and brief,
Background is sure to be buried and lost.
Within any message comprehensive and clean,
What goes missing is impact...and thrust.
What's in-between?
Saturday, December 18, 2004
My mom died nineteen years ago this very day.
Yesterday, I cancelled my prescription to the paper newspaper. It will still
arrive for another month, however, 'cuz it's paid-up two months at a time. I'll
miss the Jumble but I can surely retrieve
all the bad news I want & need from the Internet. Hey...now I see I can even
retrieve the Jumble!
One week from today, it will be Christmas and one week from tomorrow, it will be
the day after and that will be cause for much celebration. I DO fear I am losing
the sense of humor that has accompanied me throughout life. Maybe in January,
I'll link up with it again.
Yesterday, I got a Christmas greeting from Hilka, a former neighbor (and a
Scorpio, like the "last one out", as Boogaloo used to
say) who is now ninety-four years old. She has outlived everyone she knew,
including her only daughter (who died at age forty) and her husband, who died
some twenty years ago...very suddenly. As she told the tale, he had driven her
to a doctor's follow-up visit (from surgery that cured her of colon cancer, no
less) and chose to wait in the car while she was examined. She came out from
that visit, upbeat from the doctor's encouraging words and began chatting to her
mate who, she recalls, appeared ready to back their car out of the parking space
for the ride home. She looked right, out the passenger window (checking for
obstructions) and was shortly aware of a 'stillness', shall we say. The car
wasn't moving...and neither was her husband. In the less-than-one-minute
interval between her returning to the car and her glance right...then left...her
companion of fifty-odd years had lapsed into unconsciousness and, by the time
medical help was summoned and on-the-scene, was past saving. A heart attack.
Would that we might all so mercifully be gone at our appointed time.
OK. I just uploaded the Pro Tools mix I did last night of "Love
You Then". The mix itself is nothing to brag about, I know, but the
acoustic piano sound (toward the bass notes, at least) borders on acceptable!
The voices sound somewhat smoother than in the mixes from the ADAT, even though
I think they're set, maybe, 12% too low here. As always, the acoustic
rhythm-guitar playing is first-rate. The electric guitar parts are not as "inspired"
as those from the ADAT. I was too busy thinking about the technical aspects of
the recording. And it still calls out for harmonica! Maybe tonight.
I'll never forget the Blondie cartoon in
which Dagwood opens the door to an aggressive encyclopedia salesman. The guy
wouldn't take "no" for an answer and so, before long, he and Dagwood
are brawling in the front yard. Finally, the salesman relents...and leaves.
Then...as a disheveled
Dagwood walks back into the house, he greets Blondie with "He shouldn't
have given up so easy. I was just about to buy one!"
Friday, December 17, 2004
"Fatalism is the view that we are powerless to do anything other that what we actually do." Kinda cool, eh? Might as well relax then!
It is now 11:11 PM and I have spent every minute of the last
three hours working on a song in Pro Tools. I DID actually manage to produce my
first mix to CD but by now aural
fatigue has taken over and I can no longer form an opinion about what I'm
hearing. Tomorrow, assuming that it all doesn't sound actually shitty (and not
merely rough), I'll post it. Maybe I can get Charlie to listen to it. Ya never
know.
I well understand why ambitious people take extended and intensive courses to
learn this software. I've been at it now two weeks (?) and the more I learn the
more I realize how much I don't know! One very sweet feature is that it allows
one to mute ("clear") any parts of the audio tracks that contain no
music.
It was thirty two years ago tonight that me, Bing, Charlie and some others did a performance (maybe more like a rendition) of Bach's Coffee Cantata at the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley (back when it was still on San Pablo Avenue).
Thursday, December 16, 2004
Some say our President
has no sense of humor. I disagree. Yesterday he asked
that Iran and Syria not "meddle" in the affairs of Iraq.
I've heard some bad names in my time, but this one is terrible!
So I finally got the power steering pump dealie straightened out
and the Tortoise is fixed! I say the World of Tools
needs a term to distinguish types of open-end wrenches...one from
another. Everyone (who gives a bloody stool) seems to know
what the term "flare nut wrench" connotes.
But there is a variation of "flare nut wrench" which most reasonably should
and (at least in erudite company) IS referred to as an "open-end flare nut
wrench". Here is a picture: 
The left end
of this
item sports the traditional "flare nut wrench" design. But look
closely at the right end. That's what ought to be called an
"open-end flare nut wrench". See, the purpose of a garden-variety
flare nut wrench is to tighten a nut used to connect tubing (without 'rounding'
that six-sided nut). Therefore, a flare nut wrench is already, by definition, an
"open end" wrench. And for those occasions where a flare nut is not
readily accessible to the garden-variety wrench, the open-end flare nut wrench
will see service. And see, by contrast, the garden-variety open end (non-flare
nut) wrench 
has a rounded semi-circular interior
middle surface at its business end. If one is so unwise as to use this
type on a flare nut, then rounding is likely to occur...and that's a bad
thing.
Tonight, The Philadelphia Inquirer has announced that it will sponsor a Most Boring Blog contest for the upcoming holiday season. All I gotta do to enter is send 'em the URL. As always, the first prize is one week in Philadelphia (and the second prize is two weeks in Philadelphia).
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
This day dawned in a thick fog. Yesterday's efforts to replace
the power steering pump on the blue Tortoise were, well...let us simply say that
all did not go smoothly. I've got a couple of shop manuals for this '89 and such
books invariably provide a numbered (though not detailed) procedure that one is
supposed to follow if one is dumb or poor or cheap enough to be doing his own
wrench-turning. [I qualify on all three counts.]
KC's happy, however. 
He tells me the car is more comfortable to sleep on when it's not moving.
Step One in both manuals is to disconnect the battery and this I was able
to do in a timely fashion with the tin snips that I always remember to carry in
my back pocket. [If you carry 'em in your front pocket then
research shows you're twice as likely to stab yourself with 'em (by accident)
when you go to sit down.] Anyway...within half an hour I was able to snip
through both battery wires! OK. I haven't peeked yet (don't wanna spoil
the surprise) but I DO find myself wondering how the manuals are gonna tell me
to reconnect these wires at the end of the procedure. Lotsa times these books'll
say something like "installation is the reverse of removal." Yeah,
right.
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
Hey! For those of you considering capital crime as a means of personal advancement, I suggest that you peruse page 12 of today's flyswatter. I mean, sure...it sounds like a lotta fun, but...
Patrice has sent me a very highbrow joke and one day, I'm sure, I'll understand it. ;-( )
My Blog time must be shortened today by yet another automotive
project. Yesterday afternoon, as I went to restart my blue Ford Tortoise after picking
up Maggie, the GD power steering pump 
froze up in place and wouldn't even let the engine turn over. Fortunately, I
have a parts car in the driveway.
Monday, December 13, 2004
This is the kind of (unexpectedly) warm morning that makes me glad I'm not dead, even though I didn't sleep well last night. It was one-a-those, ya know, yer sleepin' real deep and you wake up to pee and yer mind boots up and then...you might as well stay up even though it's only 4:00 AM! There was more than one reason why I couldn't quiet my small brain but the only one I'll write about is how excited I am to be learning this Pro Tools direct-to-disk recording system. Yesterday, for the first time, I started "getting it". I realize this is shop talk and of little interest to most people...but tough! Among its virtues, Pro Tools can save up to sixteen (of the last) takes of (or "on") a given track. In "tape recording", things were never like that. If you wanted to save a track ('cuz maybe you'd never get another one as good), then you'd have to move your inputs to a new track...and there was always a real-world limit to that: say eight or sixteen or twenty-four for all the instruments. The sound quality is remarkable. There are no moving parts to break, overheat or whine into the room. No need to be plugging-in and unplugging-in noisy wires. No turning noisy knobs and no sliding noisy faders. No need either for splicing tape, razor blades and the "whoops!" to which such crude procedures are a party. When I compare this to how it all was in my salad days (when pro studio multi-track recording time was at least $80 per hour (and so there was no "experimenting")), well...I just lie awake in the dark and marvel at how lucky I am to be here in the oughties!
Sunday, December 12, 2004
We do not take offense when others offer criticism of us that we know is baseless. We only take offense when others offer such criticism that we ourselves suspect has a basis. Example: when someone calls me short, fat and stupid...I am not alarmed. :-)
There was an article in this morning's poor-man's-toilet-paper that, at first, I decided not to read. I mean, I've already got enough stuff to be worked up (and worried) about, OK? But just to get even madder...I read it! It recounts an interview with a UC Berkeley law professor (emeritus). This old trout is a supporter of the (ugh) "Intelligent Design" alternative to Darwinism. This "alternative" reminds me of my '81 Chevy (an NRV in the driveway). I mean, no one seems to be able to tell me why the GD thing will not develop more than about 12" of vacuum at idle! I mean, every f'n thing on it is new, by Jesus! But, in the absence of answers, am I to conclude that there is no earthly reason for why the vehicle is the way it is? Anyway...this professor dude, evidently, likes the idea that, when we can't figure something out, we oughta just throw up our fins and say, "God musta done it!" One particularly inept analogy proffered by this ex-prof is this: "You don't produce the front page of The Chronicle by taking Scrabble letters in a cup and spilling them out on this table." Fortunately, people much smarter than I stand ready to defend Mr. Darwin.