Categories
Glot

Writing of Dreaming

I had a dream last night, and I had to write it down. It’s sort of complicated. What was weird was it’s dream-within-a-dream recursion, a fake-world created entirely by those inhabiting it, who journey there from the real world, which itself may not be real. Or is it? Teasing logic like that permeated the whole thing, and I only barely understood it myself.

There was dinosaur wrestling. And pet tigers. I should speak about that. I dream things like that a lot. Rarely does it make sense, but it made a lot of sense last night. I wrote four pages this morning, and in the process I figured out how to write the story—I think. I’ve never written a choose-your-own-adventure story of any length, and I think I wrote the last one when I was four. I wouldn’t know where to start. I suppose I could start at the beginning.

It’s harder than it sounds.

Categories
Glot

Thanks Are In Order

I had a lovely birthday. Thanks, guys. You called me on a cold pier as the sun was setting. You called me as I was trying to navigate a radioactive abandoned Navy base. You wished me health, prosperity and success in your studies (even though I don’t have any studies… but thanks anyways). Some made me cake, and damned good cake at that, cake that wasn’t even choco-nutty-poke. Some of you even let me call into work sick with a “head cold,” whatever that is. Twenty-four. I don’t feel the need to look up the number on Wikipedia this year. Just wanted to say:

Thanks.

Categories
Glot

Gluttony and Chastity (in the Brain)

'Firefox Browser Tabs Contest' on FlickrHow many tabs do you have open? No, go check now.

How many of those are things that you’re going to read? Blogs, Wikipedia articles, things linked from friends, searches for places or people or events you heard about somewhere, information of every thinkable sort. There’s a lot of it to be had. When tabbed web browsing was first introduced in the MultiZilla extension for Mozilla browsers in April of 2001, the 21st-century web browser—both the program and the person using it—came of age. A web program that can only view a single website in a single window at a time is ideal for modem connections, who can’t handle much else. Well, tabbed browsing evolved for everyone with something better. Even Microsoft eventually figured that one out (right now we’re all glaring at you, IE7 users). I blame the epidemic of neglected tabs and… well, neglected tasks in this country on these developments. There’s now too much information out there for us to handle with ease. In the interests of full disclosure, I am very familiar with this tab/information overload. I suppose that’s why LifeHacker evolved.

Recently I stopped doing some of these things. Well, I stopped doing them for isolated 30-60 minute periods during my day. There’s a thing I discovered called I-Doser that I started experimenting with, and it’s a stimulating break from much of the stimulation. It’s based on binaural beats that are designed to affect the mind, so that you’re on drugs. Pretty much. You know, drugs? I’ve had some experience in the past working with binaural beats, starting with CoolEdit in 1998 and then Brainwave Generator in 2003. For those who don’t care about those last two factoids, they weren’t for you… they were to prove my cred to those in the know. To those not in the know, allow me to explain why this whole thing isn’t as stupid as it sounds.

It’s based on our lovely hominid brain structure. Two sides of the brain, each synced with the other; two sides receiving signals from the different sides of the body. They sync up with each other at regular intervals, depending on what state you’re in and how active your brain is. Solving math problems is Beta, pretty high at maybe 30-40 cycles/second. Normal operation might be between 15&20 Hertz. A light siesta would be Alpha about 11-8 Hz, and then—my favorite—Theta, where dreams and daydreams happen, ideally about 6-3.5 Hz, where the world slows down and external awareness nearly drops away. Then of course there’s Gamma, where external awareness does drop away and people like me tend to snore. It happens. The odd thing is that at any given time we have an eternally variable state, where all four co-exist. The brain’s internal communication is itself communicating on different levels. Weird that such a thing needs to be, no?

But back to the drugs, anyways. The idea behind brainwaves is simple and that is that if you can stimulate only one side of the brain (by stimulating one side of the body—like one ear, one eye) and signal the left and right at a specific pulse, eventually the brain can sync up and replicate the pulse. 6Hz dreamstate? Voilà, an enchanting 6Hz pattern. I-Doser takes this notion up a conceptual notch and presumes “well, if you could read a brain and see what kind of state it’s in, and then replicate that, couldn’t you essentially copy that state/mood/outlook/disposition from one brain to another? Well, let’s try it! And then sort-of maybe market it to teenagers as a substitute for recreational drugs.”

That last little bit is my own personal “disposition” on account of what I think of some of the descriptions on their webstore. Sure, I tried Peyote. I liked it. I maybe got some pleasant visuals and felt a bit out of it for the next hour, but possibly nothing that couldn’t be accomplished by a dose of lying quietly awake but with eyes closed, thinking intently of what kind of experience I was having. Who’s to say? Ultimately, that’s the reason this sort of thing is legal (and is going to stay legal, for the foreseeable future), is that the brain has a choice. You aren’t hypnotized, although it’s a little like it… one cannot make a hypnotized person do anything they have a moral objection to, nor to put themselves in bodily harm. Once something, like, say, Cocaine is inside you, your body pretty much has to deal with it till it’s processed. If I wanted to, I could take off the headphones any time. Or the browser too. Really.

Sometimes I just don’t want to.

photo credit to Inju, casamanita and Drunken Monkey on Flickr

Categories
Stuff-n-Glot

Flowers and Trees

A long while back, way in April 2004, I made a school project to impress a girl. +20 Dork points.

Good news and bad news about the outcome: it totally worked, she and everyone present thought it was a masterpiece. Even better, afterwards she wanted to get the software I used. From me. Bow-chicka-wow. Bad news: when I met her in the library, I acted the total dork-azoid. Had it not been for the timely appearance of my good friend Emily, I am certain I would have tumbled headfirst-chairlast into a piece of abstract art. Bad abstract art. Thankfully, Emily also gave us the topic of couples with matching hair (she and her dood both sported Pepé le Pew styles at the time—neither knew of the other’s current look until they first met—aww). The nervous klutz-ass factor, despite the presence of awesome friends, and combined with the fact the software later might’ve got that girl a virus (oops)… all of them accounted for why I didn’t do so well that season.

But that’s alright. I later learned on some pseudo-date with her roommate that she was a massive sto-o-oner rivaling Tommy Chong. Some things aren’t meant to be. Now that is hearsay and if you’re reading this, business major Maria T., you do have a chance to defend yourself. What totally reasonable explanation can you think of that we shouldn’t have worked out, other than the fact I acted like a doofus (the bad kind)? Cause that doesn’t count.

At least I got a movie out of it. It is what those involved in online, remix and collage culture might call a “mashup,” and what my parents might call “pretty neat.” Normal people might call it “putting the sound from one thing with the video from something else.” Your pick. Samples include:

  • 1932 Disney classic (now public domain) “Flowers and Trees”
  • Air and Jean-Jacques Perry — Cosmic Bird
  • Malagena something mourning song
  • Secret Chiefs 3 — Dolorous Stroke
  • Joan Jett

That’s all I have to say on that. I didn’t get the girl, but I did get the A+. Go figure.

Categories
Glot-glot

Restructure

I just created a new category, “Smartglot,” for all the thought-piece writings that I tend to be proud about and that tend to be forgotten. Also, it gives me more of an excuse to write throwaway posts about junk that’s happening at the moment. Just saying. There’s also the semantic and also highly unimportant addition of the Stuff-n-Glot category, which is broken down into audio and video/pictures. I was also try to install a word-meter that will show the amount of words written since a certain date (no reason here given for such an addition) but that has yet to be worked out. Thanks, ProgressFly—how many fields do you want in your table, anyways? Why must I ask casual readers in SQL jargon? Wouldn’t it be better simply to ask on a proper forum?

As they say, Content is King. Maybe tomorrow I’ll actually have some of that. But really, who says that but douchebags? I’m not gonna say that. Come back tomorrow.

Categories
Glot

A Non-Novel Experience

I’m sad, because there’s not a chance in hell for me to accomplish something I wanted to do. Mostly we all know what that is, it being November 30th and all. Yeah. I don’t have a book, and so for the second year running I have failed at National Novel writing month. I don’t have even close to the 25,000 that I scaled back to. I have about an eighth of that. The question I kept being asked during November, and which I find myself asking even now, is why? Why do I want to write a book in the first place?

Well, I didn’t, dummy. That’s the whole point of putting it on a blog, is that it’s not a book. It’s just a steady output. It’s a constant stream of writing, that, while perhaps over-effluent at times and perhaps a tad indulgently repetitive, et cetera, et cetera, it’s writing. And I remember enjoying writing.

I remember that when I was in eighth grade I joined “Writer’s Circle.” It was a bunch of geeks who got together every Friday… in a circle… and read stuff they had written. It’s how I met one of my best friends, Lauren. It’s when I wrote my first full-length story, and where I got some of these weird ideas in my head that still stick around there even though they’ve never been justified—like that one shouldn’t repeat nouns, adjectives, or non-common verbs within a 1-page radius, and that the sentence structure should alternate. Like this. Short, long, short, long, personal, non-personal, object-based, perceptive, non-personal, personal, et cetera. Et cetera. Et cetera. And it’s where the very beginnings of what I now generally think of as “flair” started: little stylistic, randomly emergent oddities that occur as the writing turns in on itself. Like this one. It brought about my writer’s philosophy, so to speak.

This experiment was just something to try to walk further down that path. Like the fair-weather flagellant that I am, most likely I’ll come back next year with high hopes. I’ll do the same thing. I’ll make compromises and I might not meet them. Probably won’t. And I’ll make the same apologies to myself. I might start in October just to cheat, like some I know who actually made it… I’m looking at you, Miss 60,000. I’ll do it all over. I’m not that sad about it, anymore. Better to have dreams and not attain them then to not have dreams at all.

Categories
Glot

Nothing Works and Everything is Broken

It’s a favorite saying of mine:

Nothing works and everything’s broken.

Lost Keys The funny thing is, it’s one of those things that we may say because it sure feels like the truth, even if it isn’t true, and then it more or less happens. Let’s get to specifics, cause the specifics will allow me to vent. I have to fix all this stuff. My ladyfriend’s desktop computer is broken. The hard drive shorted out and I’ve been recovering data since. Her laptop has this funny thing where it’ll overheat if it’s not turned upside down or vented every once in a while. Both fans are ok, according to her uncle who bought the stooopid thing. My computer has a hard drive that randomly disconnects, every couple weeks or so, and must have its IDE cable detached then reattached. This involves opening the case and finding the particular drive. That’s always fun. Today, my iPod wouldn’t work. None of the programs was recognized as a “valid Win32 application.” And all that was caused by one file, one file that was improperly copied and so left an unfinished bit dangling off the end, causing Windows to ceaselessly, uselessly read the damned bit. Fucker.

Decorating SuppliesEnough techno-talk. What am I saying here?

You know, they always say people die in threes. Like, three famous scientists will all pass away within a couple of weeks, and maybe a couple months later three famous television personalities will die—one of a heart attack, one of old age, and one from a freak accident involving a blender and a foreign voltage outlet? These things seem to happen a lot. Of course, it’s probably just a perceptual fallacy. Human beings are pattern-seekers. It makes sense in our evolution that we should discover patterns in nature so we can predict and exploit them. Hence, the “laws” of physics. Dependable things those are. Trouble is we tend to seek patterns in everything, even those place where there are no patterns: like the letter pi. And then we go crazy.

Hopefully the computers are just circumstantially entropic. They are complicated systems. Complicated systems tend to gather more entropy as they have flaunted so far in becoming as complex as they are. Entropy: the Grim Reaper dressed like an accountant. And who likes an accountant, really? Not me.

Categories
Glot

Blue Hair Glot Post

Dyed hair is pretty awesome. Praise.
Hair dying is kind of difficult and somewhat annoying. Caveat.

Hair color, especially non-natural shades (like blue), has a certain effect on people that’s quite enjoyable, for me in particular—and so it’s totally worth it. Explanation.

Hair, hair like mine, seems to always be a subject people want to talk about. Don’t ask me why. I’m not a hair freak. It could be said, and has, that I am a hairy freak (but that is an altogether different subject). My roommate is a hairdresser. Sometimes, my roommate likes to ramble about my hair. How manageable it is, how no matter the length it seems to keep a definite shape, how thick it is despite my lack of a rigorous conditioning routine. It’s wavy. I never knew it was wavy until I grew it out as a teenager. This is, apparently, fascinating. Not just to her, but to everyone who wants to talk about my hair. Exposition.

Many ask why I did it. And this I say to them: I wanted to do it before I died. I’d never done it before. I think blue’s a good color on me. I was tired of looking the same. Brown wasn’t really my style. People thought I was weirder than I appeared and so I decided to run with the stereotype. San Francisco demands that if you live there, you have some sorta self-evident self-expression on your-self. That’s all. To be fair, about two people have asked. Reasoning.

I really like finding out people’s reactions. See, in my entire life I’ve never done anything to my hair more than pull it back with a hairband when it was long and I looked like Jesus. Sometimes, summers of my youth, my hair would lighten in the sun. Just the very tips of the front. Other than that, a pan-European brown is what I’ve lived with since before I can remember. My family is surprisingly cool with the bluish-greenish welter that is my head. I guess they were expecting something like this since I was a teenager. Late bloomer, I suppose. The reaction from strangers has been even better… Development.

“Like the hair.”
“Oh, thanks. My girlfriend did it. By putting my head in the toilet.”
“Man, that’s a great color. Matches the shirt.”
“Oh yeah! I knew there was a reason I wore clothes today.”
“Whoa dude, your hair is BLUE!”
“Oh my great… When did that… it must have been that Gypsy I cut off in traffic the other day!”
Examples.

(Note: I have never, nor will I ever, cut off a Gypsy. Not only because I admire their culture, music, and people, but also because that’s just a bad idea and if they wanted to those people could curse your ass for good and you’d have to rescue an orphan with HIVs from a burning building that also served as a detention center during WWII or something. Parenthetical statement.)

I like my blue hair. Conclusion.
Wide-Eyed Not Surprise

Categories
Glot

These Are the Graffiti in My Neighborhood

Mission District, San Francisco (by Soaked In Sin)It’s hard to write about one’s urge to make graffiti and do it in a non-incriminating manner. So what the hell; I won’t.

It calls to me. I have a roll of sticker labels, and a neighborhood crawling with/calling for graffiti. Funny story, there. Lynae tells me this: there’s a guy, one guy, who, after getting off his work in the afternoon, drives around the Mission noting all the graffiti he sees. He then gives his list to a Graffiti Task Force Officer (or whatever they’re called), whom I shall henceforth refer to as GTFO. This GTFO takes the list, looks up each property owner, and tapes up the neighborhood equivalent of a Cease and Desist letter to their building. The guy who drives around has gotten so popular there’s even graffiti of him (pictured at right). Going into Surgery on the Streets (by Orin Optiglot)Nice touch, huh?

Here’s another funny thing: the definition of graffiti, as stated on the GTFO letter, is that it’s non-consensual. Without consent of the property owner, that which is painted, affixed, engraved, assembled, or sautéed in garlic butter with minced figs and within the public viewpoint is considered graffiti. It then becomes the responsibility of the property owner to get rid of it within 30 days. Here’s an odd observation, property owners: why not just say yes? If graffiti is stuff on your stuff without permission, give permission for your stuff. No more paint to buy—and no more frustration when the damned things got more scrawl on it the next morning. I’m just saying.

I’m just saying that if more stuff starts showing up that actually comments on the existing graffiti, don’t be surprised. If you’re not part of the problem you’re part of the solution. Or something.

By the way, anybody besides my dad even notice that I haven’t really come close to my goal of 25,000 words this month? Anyone?

Categories
Glot

A Review of the Marin Headlands

Sure, they’re in Marin. That’s kind of a strike against them from the perspective of a cool young San Franciscan irked by Bridge-and-Tunnel infiltration into my own neighborhood, like Medjool. But what the hell, if they’re invading I might as well invade them back. No hard feelings.

It’s not so far a drive. You go through a little gorge and then a littler tunnel, a ONE WAY tunnel which has a 5-minute wait (or so the sign says… more like three, so hold your horns). Then you emerge into the oddest micro-community this this side of the Golden Gate. Well, the oddest I can dredge from recent memory anyways. Deers rest on front lawns, children’s swings hang from ancient branches, and all the houses are identical military-issue shape, size, and color. Past that you will of course miss your turnoff down McCollough Road to do the scenic route and end up at the Visitor’s Center. Nice place, but not sure I’d wanna live there. It was here I realized they’d converted an old Army church; I’d been here before, in this exact same building. But when I was in it before it was on old Fort Ord, and it was totally abandoned. Can’t say which I liked more. Like the idea, though.

Then we got on with the part we came for… back down McCollough Road and onward to some awesome views and more old things. Views were good. Old things coulda been better. Open ’em up, people! They’re not as dangerous as the building inspectors tell you they are. It’s just a little rust. And a little shrapnel. Unexploded ordinance? Is there unexploded ordinance? You might wanna take care of that. I hear there’s a couple leftover nuclear missile silos somewhere around here, and that’s acceptable. Just chuck all the bad stuff in there and light the whole thing. Or, at the very least, let grownups like me sign a waiver or something saying “I promise not to sue the National Park Service if I can’t find my left arm after exploring your park, etc. etc.” I can deal with that. It’s an annoyance having everything… well, most everything locked up. Didja know that the trail to Point Bonita lighthouse is closed a lotta the time? Yup. Big sign saying “Trail Closed” and a wide open trail just beyond it. Doesn’t matter. There’s more stuff to see.

Like the Marin Headlands hostel! Woo! I didn’t really see it; I just drove by. It looks lovely though. There’s lots of deer, of which there are lots. No, seriously—they outnumber you. Do not anger them, for they are legion. Hanging around bends and cliffs in some places are a couple lovely picnic areas overlooking a cornucopia of San Francisco skyline. However, the beach was calling. Moreso, sunset was calling since we didn’t actually drive in until after 1:00pm. Nice beach, not crowded but well-endowed with beachgoers, plenty of parking and plenty clean. Can’t really say as we didn’t go out as far as Bird Island. Did you know that birds poop there? Well they do. And I suppose they’d make for some pretty good pictures, but I was too busy taking pictures of someone trying to do cartwheels in the fine sand:


The Best Worst Cartwheel Ever from Orin Zebest on Vimeo.

Then I made a zen garden:

Zen Garden on Flickr

It was a nice day. A nice anniversi-day. Yes, today marks one year that I’ve known Ms. Lynae Straw, lady-friend of mine. Maybe talk about that later.