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Wednesday, December 12, 2007 Rhiannon Tuesday, September 25, 2007 Guess what book I'm reading? Well, here's a clue in the form of a paraphrasing from yours truly: In the fall I would begin to turn the soil in preparation for planting my seeds. I didn't use a lot of seeds, just as many as I needed. Some people use way too many seeds, like the people that live in the village nearby. People have come to expect greater things from seeds in their lives, and often are disappointed. Achilles once asked of Petroclus that all he needed from his dear cousin were, "the fortitude of your friendship and a few seeds." So we must learn, too, that a man should not be judged by how many seeds he has, but by how well he uses the ones he has. I went on to plant my garden using about 536 seeds that I bought each for $0.02 1/4. Overall the net profit was $2.34, enough to last 3 months in the first year. You can never truly be found unless you have at one time lost yourself. Before I planted the seeds, I realized that the ground was not so hard as you might find on another farmer's lot, but rather soft like the shining reflection of the morning sun on the pond. Soft like the robin's sweet song in the morning hours, when I spent the most of the day's hours working. Also, I decided against using manure on the lot. Many farmers of nearby lots insist on using extensive manure. I chose not to use much manure. Manure, manure, manure. In the early years of our nation, many horses produced manure. I count the money I saved on manure to be $0.02 1/2. Okay maybe "manure" isn't repeated quite that often, but this is basically what I get from reading Thoreau's Walden. I find myself starting to zone out through all the details Thoreau so poetically describes, then suddenly awoken by some brilliantly profound sentence. Then back to zoning out for the next 2 or 3 pages full of more details. I think I understand why Thoreau is often quoted in excerpts, maybe his most famous, "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, to discover that I had not lived." (file under "brilliant passage".) However, I somehow feel a bit like I've earned getting to read these statements after going through page after page of detail about the birds nearby, the trees, and his money keeping. P.S. Okay for realz I'm almost ready to put this site on a .NET server somewhere. Just need to find some cool navigation arrows. Wednesday August 8, 2007  Friday February 9, 2007 "The more things change..." 15 years ago, in Feb 1992, I was: 11 years old, not quite 5' tall, in 6th grade and tried to get away with reading as little as I could in school. Today: I'm 26, 6'3 (which ISN'T 6'4 I know), in 21st grade, and read a lot more because a) it relaxes me, b) I'll get fired if I don't read at work, c) My pi gu (butt) is paying $1000 for a class so I'd better take it seriously. "The more they stay the same..." 15 years ago: Bush was president, we were at war with Iraq, and I spent most of my free time playing Super Mario Kart and Final Fantasy II on SNES Today: Bush is president, we are at war with Iraq, and I spend most of my free time playing Super Mario Kart and Final Fantasy III on DS Monday October 30 "...how you felt about your time here on earth." Gotta say my favorite movie this year has been "Walk The Line," the biopic of Johnny Cash (Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon as June Carter.) I've seen it a few times recently since it started being run on HBO and there's one scene that is just awesome. [Cash and his band at his audition with producer Sam Phillips at Sun Studios in Memphis, TN. The band has just finished singing a gospel song and Phillips has given a Simon Cowellesque "boring..." disapproval.] John - "What's wrong with the way I sing?" Sam Phillips - "I don't believe you." ....... Sam Phillips - "You know exactly what I'm telling you. We've already heard that song, a hundred times. Just like that, just like how you sang that." John - "You didn't let us bring it home." Sam Phillips - "Bring it home? Alright let's bring it home. If you was hit by a truck, and you were lying there in that gutter dying, and you had time to sing one song. Huh? One song people would remember before you're dirt, one song that would let God know how you felt about your time here on earth. One song that would sum you up. You're telling me that's the song you'd sing? That same Jimmy Davis tune we hear on the radio, all day. About your peace within, and how it's real and how you're gonna shout it. Or ... would you sing something different, something real, something you felt. Because I'm telling you right now, that's the kind of song people want to hear, that's the kind of song that truly saves people. It got nothing to do with believing in God, Mr. Cash. It has to do with believing in yourself." [John Cash and the Tennessee Three play Folsom Prison Blues.] Sam Phillips had a way of pushing buttons huh? Cash recorded at Sun studios around the same time Elvis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbinson, and Jerry Lee Lewis did. U2 recorded there later in their "Rattle and Hum" sessions. Monday October 23 A lot of questions... few answers. I'd have to say this entry is titled mainly after my excitement/nervousness over where "Lost" is headed this season. It has been my favorite show the past two years. At first, I simply loved the premise: the survival story of airplane passengers on a remote island (filmed on Oahu.) Very Lord of the Fliesesque. I grew to really like the characters and the mysteries of the island. The polar bears, invisible beasts (much like Lord of the Flies,) the hatch. This alone is enough to keep me hooked for the entire run of the show. I mean, I love this survival stuff. But towards the end of last season, so many of the early questions: the purpose of the others, the Dharma initiative, etc. were BARELY answered, if at all, and often just replaced with more questions. This is cool with me. I like shows that don't pretend to know the answers (a la Forrest Gump explaining life is somewhere between the "set destiny" ideas of lieu. Dan and the "make your own fate" ideas of his mother.) But yeah it can also be annoying. Especially when you try to convince your friends how great it is, yet have to agree that it could be going nowhere. Don't let me down, J.J. So if there weren't enough questions already, I bought the Nowhere Man DVD set. This is one of my favorite shows ever. It was canceled after 1 season. It's main character was a man who took a photograph, in South America, of something so secret that his identity had to be completely stripped by "them" (like the movie "the Net".) So who is "them"? Well I can't spoil it here because the show was cancelled before that was resolved. And I busted out my Doors album (sorry THE Doors) "Waiting for the Sun." One of my favorite albums of all time. Anyone who plays chord type piano (I never learned to play real piano) will love this album. So this pseudo retro-Jim Morrison phase I had (maybe really more a Ray Manzarek phase) led me to read "A Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley, who also wrote "The Doors of Perception." Hence the name of the band. This book also asks many questions. It describes a future utopia of controlled human births and subconsciously conditioned children, rigid castes of society, a drug as the solution to all problems, and completely liberal sexual activities. This book was written in the 30's. I suppose it did predict some parts of the 60's. This future citizens living in the utopia are "civilized" and those who live outside are "savages." These savages believe in monogamy, reality, and deism. No drugs to escape. A great quote from the savage, John: "But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.....I'm claiming the right to be unhappy." Kinda like the big Matrix question: which pill to take. And that's one more question. But there is at least one answer: my friend Adrian Pei getting married to Jenny Long. This was my first wedding where I knew the groom. Adrian had his stuff together that day. Prepared some great vows. Congrats to them. Saturday May 13 Surprise Humor... Wee.... if there's a Webby award for "Site with the most static content" I think I have a good shot at winning it. Anyways, just wanted to get something together to page things up a bit until I can find a free hosting site with some real power. In the meantime here are some pretty unexpectedly sarcastic comments: Pushing my brain to try to enjoy some more epic historical stories like "The Iliad." Gotta love these descriptions of death. Homer:Megas killed Pedaeus, Antenor's son, a bastard boy but lovely Theano nursed him with close, loving care like her own children, just to please her husband. Closing, Meges gave him some close attention too- the famous spearman struck behind his skull, just at the neck-cord, the razor spear slicing straight up through the jaws, cutting away the tongue- he sank in the dust, teeth clenching the cold bronze Speaking of Troy, a conversation between Dr. Pulaski and Data in Star Trek: TNG, probably the TV show I've wasted the second most amount of time in my life on. Data has lost at the game of strategem and is suffering android breakdown from his shock of losing to a human. He whines until Counselor Troi, trying to console him, gives up and leaves. Dr. Pulaski enters. Pulaski: Oh, the mighty Achilles is sulking in his tent after his defeat. Well that may have worked for Troi but it won't work for me. And the show I've wasted the most amount of time on. Jeopardy. Trebek greets the returning champion who has won $1200 the previous day. Trebek: Whoa! We really had to increase our security around the studio after yesterday's HUGE win! Gotta love Trebek. |