Interplay - 3/31/2014

There is a beauty in the interplay of humans. Sometimes we call it teamwork, sometimes we call it dance, or performance. Whatever you call it, the complex interactions of different people doing different things, often in restricted spaces with limited resources, can be mesmerizing.

Of course, like all great things, if you do it well enough, nobody notices. I went to the symphony for the first time, not long ago. I look back at it and realize that the synchronization, the unity of performance fell completely beneath my notice. All I did was listen to the music. The fact that it took sixty or seventy people, all working together in precise and careful ways without anything to guide them except one person with a stick and some pieces of paper.

Oh yeah, and lots and lots and LOTS of practice. Both individually and as a group.

In order for this interplay to work, every individual has to know their part. And the parts of the people they are relying on, many of whom are relying on still other people, and so on, outward.

Put all of that together and you get something magical. You get precision drill teams, ballet companies, rocket launches, sports teams and the Hoover Dam.

There is a beauty and nobility to the human, alone. But the stunning accomplishments of groups go far beyond that. To be on such a team, that is a gift both given and received.

242

Too Much Too Fast Too Strong Too Soon - 3/30/2014

Lovecraft invented the idea that there were things that the human mind could not contain. That the mere apprehension of them would render someone incapable of rational thought thereafter. Whether physical things or creatures, or simply bits of knowledge, even individual words, he brought forth the idea that not only is man not paramount in the universe, not only is he insignificant, he is incapable of functioning on any number of higher levels that are commonplace.

And that is a pretty good description of horror. To be confronted not with something that is not understood, but which cannot be understood. The horror that fascinates us, such as the serial killer, is not in that a human is capable of such acts, but that there is no comprehensible reason for it. In order to defuse that horror, police procedurals and manhunt movies use psychology and simplifications of psychology to explain that certain events cause people to respond in certain ways.

But the simple fact is, there are things we don't understand and, in the end, can't understand. Science has its limits, so far, and the human mind is most adept at putting new things in terms of things already understood (hence the word analogy). But even without horror, there are things that most people simply can't encompass. There are mathematicians who claim to be able to visualize 4 or more-dimensional space, which is something I can't even figure out how to approach.

Scale is another one. There are 7 billion people in the world, roughly. In order to understand what that number means, we have to resort to a series of reductions and analogies that bring the numbers into something that a person can easily comprehend. There are on the order of 100 billion stars in the Milky Way, and about 100 billion galaxies in the universe. That means, assuming that the Milky Way is roughly average, that there are 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (that's 10 sextillion) stars in the universe. That's about a thousand times as many grains of sand as exist on all the beaches and deserts in the world (can't find a count that includes river/lake/ocean floors).

That means that, in order for there to be as many grains of sand on Earth beaches as there are stars in the observable universe, we would have to replicate the Earth, perfectly, 1,000 times.

Think about that one for a minute. If it doesn't tweak your gourd a little, you're not thinking hard enough.

411

Not Always a Paycheck - 3/29/2014

Sometimes I wonder how certain actors get involved in certain projects. Max von Sydow, for instance. In 1980, he appeared as Ming the Merciless in the camp classic Flash Gordon. A horrible, awful, wonderful movie that shouldn't have been able to get an actor of his caliber. Max also played the villain (Brewmeister Smith) in The Adventures of Bob & Doug McKenzie: Strange Brew. Also a wonderfully fun movie, but not something you would usually associate with a serious actor like von Sydow. He obviously enjoyed both roles enormously, though.

Of course, a lot of the time, the answer to the question is 'paycheck'. Even the mightiest actors need them, and will sometimes take roles that make no sense or are in truly worthless movies for that very reason. But not always.

The best example of that side of things that I know is Raúl Juliá. Somewhere back in the mists of video game history (I'm talking arcade games here, standup machines) there began a series known as Street Fighter. It was a fun series of games, involving unique characters battling each other one-on-one for points and glory. While just as iconic as Mortal Kombat, it is not quite as well known, but still has a large popularity.

And they turned it into a movie. A poorly-written, poorly produced, directed, shot, edited movie that failed to capture any of the fun of the game and makes the Mortal Kombat movie look like a tour-de-force. Except for the villain.

Raúl Juliá knew this was a bad movie when he signed up. But his kids were fans of the games, and he knew it was likely to be his last or near-to-last movie. So he goes into that horrible movie to play the villain M. Bison. And. Hams. It. Up. Chews scenery, goes over the top so far he goes over it a second time and basically is the only good thing about the movie.

He is obviously having fun, lots of it. And his kids get to go to school and say their dad is M. Bison. Don't believe me? Here's the movie.

That is how to be a dad, and to say goodbye. A salute to you, Raúl, that's the way it should be done.

375

OEDs Erogenous Zones - 3/28/2014

Okay, words I just plain like. Polemic. Diatribe. Tirade. Obfuscatory. Perverse. Sandwich (a really fun word if you say it slowly). Obstreperous. Cantankerous. Cuneiform. Bioaccumulative. Torpor. Saxophone. Tenor. Mortice. Adept. Sinister. Dextrous. Grandiloquent. Elegant. Quadriceps. Triceratops. Humus. Trichinosis. Streptococcus. Strident. Zip. Trepidatious. Somnolence. Strap. Ductile. Switcheroo. Fungicide. Frangible. Plasticity. Stipulate. Fornicate. Usability.

Twice. Thrice. Simulationist. Bandicoot. Xylophone. Zoographer. Sesquipedalian. Servitor. Lictor. Robust. Lush. Verdant. Discombobulate. Unicycle. Purgatory. Eloquent. Jazzy. Snip. Snap. Trope. Superlative. Vanquish. Languish. Language. Altruistic. Magnanimous. Oblivion. Abyssal. Crepuscular. Twilight. Dusk. Swindle. Swaddle. Fen. Opulent.

Zigzag. Wigwam. Okeefenokee. Klickitat. Unagi. Verisimilitude. Aspirant. Delegation. Microgravity. Suspension. Triangulation. Occidental. Fandom. Photosynthetic. Chemotropic. Alluvial. Gripping. Sandoval. Spontaneous. Effluvium. Peristalsis. Observatory. Planetarium. Telekinetic. Psychopharmaceutical. Proof.

Evidentiary. Fiduciary. Climactic. Walk. Peninsula. Isthmus. Lanai. Palmetto. Barbacoa. Blastula. Severity. Lath. Limning. Illuminate. Deorbit. Sassafras. Salmonella. Fabric. Tintinnabulation. Evermore. Slattern. Correspond. Cochlear. Conch. Streak. Simple. Sunder. Talkative.

Loquacious. Leprechaun. Windermere. Subterfuge. Non-sequitur. Salivary. Lascivious. Generous. Obsequious. Escalation. Stereophonic. Audiology. Meritorious. Confabulation. Ecdysiast. Mendacious. Mendicant. Stray. Rouge. Terrarium. Flinty. Scabrous. Noodle.

Libation. Liberation. Celebratory. Manticore. Mercurial. Thunderous. Magnanimous. Furious. Sinful. Solitude. Marginal. Fascination. Nugatory. Millennium. Egocentric. Helium. Americium. Francophone. Tsarina. Empirical. Generalize. Municipality. Flexibility. Conductivity. Spectacular. Fey. Wild. Masticate. Vibrate. Theorize. Hypothesis. Syncretic. Epistolary. Fractious. Zygote. Arch.

200

Michael Don't Play 'Dat - 3/27/2014

I don't play favorites. I don't mean that I don't like and pay attention to certain people over others, I mean I don't really have favorite things.

Ask me what my “favorite” of something is ten times, and you're likely to get eight different answers. Favorite food? Lasagna, spaghetti, pizza, burgers, steak, fish'n'chips, yakisoba, egg rolls, mole, tacos, burritos, enchiladas...

Movies, music, artwork, websites, TV shows, genres, games, almost anything. There are usually a good dozen choices that make it to my “top three” in any category. And tomorrow, I'll have things in there that aren't there today.

It all comes down to mood, eventually, or something like mood. There's more to it than emotional state. I'm sure some of it has to do with bodily needs for certain vitamins, minerals and trace elements. Some of it also has to do with memory triggers (I like spaghetti more when I'm missing mom, or want comfort food).

The point is that I really don't understand the focused interest (or obsession) that people associate with 'favorites'. I don't even understand people who have a truly favorite thing to do or be. I love learning, and writing, and reading; walking, rain, sunsets, the ocean, mountains, trees, and ten thousand other things. How could I pick one, or even one group, and say that this thing is better than all other things?

There are a few exceptions, of course. Family first. That one I'll hold to forever. And there are some things I will always rate above other things (Velvet Underground beats Miley Cyrus, period). But of the things I do not dismiss, it's virtually impossible for me to say one is always better than the others.

283

Take My Card, Please - 3/26/2014

As far as I can tell, according to pop culture, I am not a man. Let me list the reasons.

1. I have asked for directions
2. I have read the instructions before trying to put it together
3. I can do laundry
4. I am not obsessed with sports
5. I am capable of listening to a human female
6. I have cried in public
7. I can admit when I am wrong
8. I am fully aware that women can do pretty much any damn thing they please
9. I am also not threatened by this fact
10. I can accept losing at something
11. When someone points out to me a flaw in my plans, I am more likely to reconsider my plans than enter into a state of denial
12. I know who Jane Austen, Jane Eyre and Jane Curtin are
13. Of the three, I really only like Jane Curtin, though
14. I have no idea who played second base for the '37 Mets
15. I had to look them up in Wikipedia to figure out that the Mets didn't exist until 1962
16. I loathe the Three Stooges
17. Also Will Ferrell
18. I would honestly rather have a deep discussion about life, science, art or emotions than hunt, fish, work on a car, write my name in the snow or learn how to spit for distance
19. The only time I have ever asked a woman to make me a sandwich, she was working in a restaurant
20. While I understand that the human reproductive cycle can cause emotional instability in some women at times, I do not automatically dismiss anything that a woman says with which I happen to disagree as “hormones”

290

Final Transmission - 3/25/2014

So I've had this bit running through my head for a while. Please read it in the classic, near deadpan voice of pilots in the movies reporting perfectly normal things.

“Tower, this is flight 244, cruising at 600 knots at 30 thousand. Bearing is 231, visibility is good, winds appear steady from the southwest. The new avionics appear to be good. Preparing to initiate high-G maneuvers for testing purposes.”

<five minutes later>

“Tower, reporting that high-G maneuvers proceeded successfully. During final Immelman, however, access panel 12-B sprung open. I would recommend at least two more fasteners be put in place. In addition, there appears to be a small fluid leak nearby, might want to upgrade the hoses.”

<two minutes later>

“Tower, reporting some sparking from the wires that have come away from access panel 12-B. Aaaaaannd it appears that the fluid leak is something flammable. Small flames at this point, yellowish-orange in color, so it's not fuel. Suggest we have someone check to see what that might be.”

“Tower, flames have reached my boots. Am activating fire suppression system 1.”

“Tower, no effect from fire suppression one except for some confetti and a note from some of the ground crew. Please tell them that I found it very funny, and would love to come to the party later, but that the donkey is really not necessary this time.”

“Tower, reporting now that the lower cuffs of my g-suit have caught fire. No significant retardation of combustion from the new material, so please note that for the logs. Looks like it's back to the drawing board on that one. As a positive note, however, the new air scrubbers are doing an excellent job of keeping the cockpit clear of smoke, so those should get a solid rating for this mission.”

“At this time, Tower, pilot would like to request authorization to eject. He would also like to state that he approves of the body shaving procedure required for the new g-suit. It does seem to be reducing the burn level, and there is definitely no smell of burnt hair as a distraction.”

“Tower, pilot reporting that the flames have reached my knees, and are approaching my groin. I am detaching catheter at this time to attempt fire suppression backup option uniform. Commencing urination now.”

“Reporting that fire suppression backup option uniform only partly successful. Urination has provided some protection to the groin area, but flames are now traveling up the legs of the g-suit. Getting some cross-chop, here. One moment, Tower, attempting to find stable flight path at 24,000.”

<one minute passes>

“Tower, this is flight 244. Flames have now reached my sleeves. Gloves appear to be resistant, so I have not yet lost control of the vehicle, but the pool of urine is beginning to evaporate. I estimate no more than eight minutes before my testicles catch fire.”

“On another positive note, Tower, my oxygen mask has not yet melted to my face, and continues to deliver breathable air. Hopefully that will assist me in providing observations until such time as ejection is authorized. Speaking of that, Tower, is there any update on that eject situation?”

“Affirmative, Tower, roger that ejection is not authorized at this time. Please note that my helmet temperature is rising, communication may not be possible much longer.”

“Ah, Tower, this is 244, please note that fire suppression backup option shitmypants has been accomplished, with minimal effect. Also please note that controls have failed and that's a pretty big mountain approaching, Tower. I'd like to sign off at this time and say a big fuck you to that ejection authorization denial, Tower, and have a nice day.”

<transmission ends>

612

Idle Randomness - 3/24/2014

So, just some meandering, wandering thoughts tonight.

Just came up with a great phrase: Your skin is just the switchboard the world uses to tell you what's going on.

Had two good conversations online last night (one personal, one professional). Hoping they both continue. Interesting people out there.

Been doing lots and lots of writing lately. This blog, Beat by Beat Serials (new post for Singers due tonight), a project at work, planning an audition of sorts. Feels good.

Speaking of feeling good, thanks to Leanne, Todd and Dad for taking me along on the beach trip last week. I feel much better than I had been for a long time. Relaxation at the beach with family (plus naps) seems to be quite the revitalizer. Who'd a thunk?

And now, Pinky and the Brain are doing a time travel episode. If they repeat the speech about paradoxes that show up in WAY too many such stories, I will travel to wherever Steven Spielberg currently lives and glue strands of uncooked spaghetti to his security fence until they collapse under the weight.

But enough of trivialities such as Steven Spielberg and his spaghettification. I'd really rather discuss the exact nature and shape of Orson Welles' jowls, paying special attention to their radical change from The Third Man until his appearance in The Muppet Movie. Any takers?

226

The Other Side - 3/23/2014

So, the other side of open-source. The first problem is fragmentation. There are currently several hundred (thousand?) distributions of Linux, all ultimately linked back to Linus Torvalds' original code, but developed along different lines, with different emphases and design decisions. Getting a particular piece of software to work on one of them can result in some minor or major difficulties.

The second comes into play right there. There are no official support centers for any but the largest of the Linux distros (Red Hat, Debian, etc...). Trying to find an answer to a question about how a particular Firefox add-in works on Crunch! (crunchbang), for instance, can involve lengthy searches amongst the various communities, forums and mailing lists for advice. While these communities are robust, and will often have the answers you need, sometimes they won't.

The third weakness of open-source is part and parcel with its greatest strength. If you want a particular modification made or tool added to an open-source product, you can do it yourself. Or find someone to do so. But if that kind of coding isn't your specialty, or if you can't find someone interested in writing it for you, you're pretty much out of luck. On the other hand, Microsoft isn't going to add a feature for you either, so this may not be much of a drawback.

In the end, I like open-source products. The ones I have used have been stable, feature-rich and generally less of a hassle than the pay-for-license versions. In some cases, there are features that are significantly better-implemented in the open-source product than in the original. GIMP, for instance, seems to handle transparency much better than Photoshop (although that may be my inexperience with Photoshop, I admit).

So the next time you're looking for a way to do something on your computer, check out www.osalt.com and see if there might be a way you can do so without dropping a bundle on major software.

326

Clean Little Secret - 3/22/2014

So it occurs to me that I've been hiding something a bit. I am not writing this blog in the Blogspot editor, nor am I using Microsoft Office. I am, instead, using LibreOffice, which is an offshoot of the OpenOffice (descended from StarOffice) project.

LibreOffice is, like it's relatives, an open-source suite of programs designed to accomplish the primary tasks that MS Office does. There is Writer, Calc, Base, Draw and Impress that I'm at all familiar with. They are all Windows compatible (as well as Mac and Linux), and free for use, even for modification if you have a bent in that direction (although there are rules about distributing modified versions under the same name).

If you're not familiar with open-source programming, it is a movement which holds that the code that one uses on one's computer should be openly shared for a variety of reasons. The simplest is transparency. By making the source code (the human-legible files from which the executable program is compiled) available publicly, it makes it effectively impossible for distributors of programs to hide malicious or questionable code in their distributions.

Second, it allows people other than those who 'own' the original code to make full use of it. There are aspects of both the Windows and Mac operating systems that are only known to Microsoft and Apple, which gives them a huge advantage in developing software to run on those platforms.

By releasing the full, complete code for software or operating systems, the community that makes use of it has the opportunity to improve it in ways that users and developers actually want, instead of being told “this is where you want to go today”. If a coder or user wants features changed, added or removed, it is matter of finding someone who will do so, rather than changing one's own operations to fit the way that one megalithic manufacturer has decided will be implemented.

There are lots of other open-source programs out there. I am a big fan of GIMP and Inkscape, which are analogous to Photoshop and Illustrator, for the Adobe crowd. Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird and their other projects are all open-source to one degree or another.

If you'd like to see what's out there in terms of low-to-no-cost, transparent, community developed software, go check out www.osalt.com, which is a central search site discussing both closed-source (traditional) and open-source software. It's a great little site, and has directed me to some real gems.

Tomorrow: the problems with open-source software.

416

Death by Stupidity - 3/21/2014

So, squad-mates. They are an increasing part of RPG/Action/Shooter games, and an extension of the soldiers and squads found in RTS games since the beginning. Relying on them to do their jobs and support you is key in all of these games, and being able to predict their responses to changes in the battlefield situation is necessary.

The problem is, they're morons.

Literally. Their reactions are based on a limited assessment that their programming allows them to make. It is based on what you would consider a trivial subset of the information available even at a casual glance to the player. This very limited data is run through a set of very simple decision making algorithms to result in an action taken by the squad-mate/NPC.

Enemy AI has developed well over the years, in part because it has an extremely simple task. Kill the player. Not necessarily easy, but Enemy AI doesn't have to worry about long-term issues like ammunition, survival of as many of its own units as possible, or nearly anything strategic. Only the tactical.

Squad-mate AI, however, has to focus not only on accomplishing the mission of taking out all of the enemies, but on survivability. Cover, ammunition, risk vs. reward and many other factors come into play.

As an example of how a well-written squad AI can fail, take a particular mission in Mass Effect 2. I don't remember the name of the mission, but it's a long slog through foggy canyons with monsters leaping out of the mists at you. At one point, this becomes crucial, because your two squad-mates. always (and I do mean always) respond to the creatures coming out of the fog by seeking cover. The nearest cover in one location is about a hundred meters or so behind you (as a reference, that's about the longest distance you'll see on a battlefield anywhere in the game).

So, you're settling in for a relatively quick pounding of these Klixen (I believe that's the alien in question), which aren't terribly tough for a three-person crew to bring down. But two of your crew are running for cover instead of standing their ground. It makes the fight much more difficult, especially since you probably won't figure out what happened until later.

Another game I am playing right now allows you to pick up fellow gang members (Saints Row the Third) and bring them along on some of the impromptu missions that arise from time to time. Since there are penalties for dying, and the mission will continue to escalate long after you have completed the required tasks, it is often a good idea to run once those requirements are dealt with.

There is no way to tell your squad-mates. ('homies', in this game) that this is what you want them to do. Therefore, they keep reacting purely on their own, immediate situation and getting themselves killed, despite the fact that you are trying to retreat.

A final example is from an old game, Dune 2000, an RTS by Westwood Studios. A very good game, mind you, but with the same glaring flaw.

There are plenty of times in that game where you set soldiers (squishy ones) to guard a certain area. What you want to be able to say is “only worry about other soldiers; if it's tanks or aircraft, don't engage, and scatter if you are engaged”. What happens is that those soldiers insist on attacking whatever comes into view, even if they have no chance of making any kind of a dent in the thing.

There's a notch in one of the maps. A place where there is a road below, usually thrumming with enemy tanks. A small path, accessible only to other foot soldiers, allows access to the plateau on which your base is built. What I wanted to tell my guys a thousand times was to pay no attention to the tanks, just kill any soldiers that come up that particular little chunk of ground and kill them, so they don't blow up the central base with explosives and lose me the battle. It took incredible micromanagement to keep them from running down onto the road below and under the treads of the tanks.

So to the designers out there, I recommend that you start building squad-mate and unit AI that can either understand more complex orders, or has some vague sense of a survival instinct. If I tell the Light Brigade to go charging into the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I expect them to. But if I tell them to just watch the on-ramp to the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I don't want to hear them rumbling up into the cannon two minutes later because 'guard' apparently means 'charge'.

794

Someplace to Go - 3/20/2014

Today I watched the sun set over the ocean. A hot pink neon ball of flame sinking and disappearing behind chunks of clouds. Not blood-red, but pink, warm and inviting and the reason we all find those lights so enticing. A good night that means just that. Have a good night, and I'll see you in the morning.

And now the stars. The sky is clear, here, and the light pollution at almost a minimum. As my eyes adjusted, I could see more and more of them, twinkling with air currents, their light years or centuries or millennia old. I begin to understand, when I see the sky in true darkness, just why we tell so many stories about them.

To think that most of those stars are at least as large as our sun, and some massively larger, and so far away that the fastest thing in the universe can't travel the distance quickly. Some of those lights sent their photons out before Rome was born, when they were not even yet Etruscans. Some of them sent their light out before even man began planting seeds, when language and fire were our greatest technologies.

And long after the last human has breathed whatever we will breathe by then, they will continue. Not only the stars as they are now, but the stars that will be born in later cycles, the ones that now are only the beginnings of swirls of gas accreting into discs and spheres. Generations of stars will be born only after we are done, only after our tiny existence is written in full across whatever parts of the cosmos we choose to visit.

So let's go out there, and see the beginnings of children whose birth will take the next million years. There are few things I can think of more worthy of exploration than everywhere.

310

Ocean - 3/19/2014

So why does the ocean call us back? We left it so long ago, when we were only fish. How has that memory propagated itself down all those eons? Through age after age, we remember something of our beginnings in the green soup, and feel the urge to go back there.

It is in the sound that we hear when the waves are close. It is in that smell, which exists only where sea and land come together, that tiny fragment of Earth known as shore. It is in the sight of the waves rising and falling, moving in and out with the tides.

It is in the knowing that the depths hold mystery and wonder. It is in knowing that the darkness of the sea is different than the darkness of nights on land. To go to places the sun has never touched and never will. To go to places where the heat and blood of the Earth is what sustains and creates life. To go to places where the rules are different, where giants swim and where life literally floats all around you.

That pull is in us, the plasma in our veins nearly identical to seawater. Our genes remember, our bones, skin and hearts. All that pulling, put under the name of Ocean, of Neptune, of Sea.

We all will walk there again, somehow, pulled in molecules to its embrace, or the few who will as humans descend into it and see why Atlantis was the least of the wonders of the sea.

256

Why We Run - 3/18/2014

Ladies, I'm going to tell you a secret (some of you guys, too). Men are afraid of commitment.

That's not the secret, the secret is why, and this is critical for understanding the way that people in the world around you behave in terms of commitment to another person.

For a woman, the core meaning of commitment is “I will bear your children”. You may or may not intend to actually have children, but that is the essence of commitment from a woman's point of view. It is a fundamentally positive statement, and ultimately something that a person is supposed to want to do in order to continue our own line of genes.

For a man, the core meaning of commitment is “I will die for you”. You've heard this in a thousand power ballads, good and bad, and probably consider it a truly romantic notion. Here's what it actually means.

When I'm walking you home one night, and a six-foot meth head on his third day of binging comes out of the alley with a bloody knife, I'm supposed to die slowly enough to give you a good chance of getting away. Not only sacrifice my life for you, without hesitation, but make sure that I do so in a manner which is effective at keeping you alive.

That's what commitment is to a man. It is the statement that you as the person to whom we are committing are literally more important than we are. That your life is worth our pain and suffering, our own personal deaths.

So remember that the next time you accuse a man of being afraid of commitment. At its heart, it is an entirely understandable fear, and overcoming it is a major step in every man's life.

295

The Rules of Creative People - 3/17/2014

A friend of mine once again posted something on Facebook which inspires me to write. It was a collection of 10 things that are common to creative people. Most of them I agree with fully. However, there's one that I think deserves discussion.

Specifically, that creative people hate the rules. I don't think that's true. I think we are more sensitive to arbitrary, unnecessary and obstructive rules, and hate those.

Make me wear a tie to work? I hate that rule. It doesn't affect my ability to do my job, and makes me uncomfortable. How is that a valid rule?

But tell me that I am expected to put the bills into my till sorted out by denomination, and that makes sense. That's a rule that makes it easier to do my job and is based on the necessities of my job.

Because that's what artists do. We look for the rules that exist independently of our opinions or expectations. Photographers who use film learn early on that you really, utterly cannot expose that film to light after it has been used if you want the picture to come out. Painters learn that this brush technique results in this visual effect, which can be combined in certain ways with other techniques to create an effect on the audience.

And yes, we ultimately want to break all of those rules. But it doesn't mean we hate the ones that make sense, only that we do not see them as things that should restrict or obstruct us from accomplishing those works that are in our heads. Picasso is famous for cubism, which did things with the laws of perspective that I still don't really understand.

But he learned the rules first. Picasso's early works look much more classical in style and technique. He learned what rules others had discovered and developed so that, when he chose to move beyond them, he could do so on firm ground, and create those paintings that he truly wanted.

So if the artist in your office seems cranky over a particular rule, you might want to consider that it may be an unnecessary, arbitrary rule that needs to be changed.

Or they may simply be short of coffee.

372

Falling From the Sky - 3/16/2014

There are jewels in the trees outside. Just enough wind to be called blowing. It's dark and it's sweet and the world is just the way I like it.

I remember reading really old science fiction (well, from the 30's to the 50's), when Venus was a popular setting. It was always this jungle world, with endless rainfall and green. Dozens of times I remember reading soldiers and scientist's assistant's grumbling about the rain and what it did to equipment. All of this before we found out what kind of rain really falls on Venus.

I'd like to see the monsoons sometime. Even knowing that they cause devastation at times, that people lose their lives in them, I'd like to be there, in India or nearby, when those monstrous rains come. To see that renewal, that magic, the source of life expressed so clearly, that I would like to see.

I want to build a house where the storms come. A house designed solely for the purpose of being rolled over by hurricanes and typhoons. To be a place from which one can view the incoming rain and storms across ocean waters. To be a place which balances between the safety of a human home and the casual, callous power of wind and water.

The sunlight falls, the water rises, and then the water falls. The simplest of cycles, that gives us the shapes of clouds, the wash of raindrops, the peal of thunder and the bolt of lightning. Magic from simplicity.

252

A Modest Bitterness - 3/15/2014

I've seen a lot of things lately that I don't understand. Lots of things online, both recent and historical, that go on and on about the terrible failures of man. Our cruelties, stupidities, selfishness and crimes. They repeatedly display humanity as an utterly amoral species without redeeming features. Or, more commonly, some subset of humanity.

To those who say these things I say I agree, and want to follow your logic to its inevitable, legitimate conclusion. Because humanity (and all of its subsets, one way or another) is irredeemably awful, vicious, vile, disgusting, evil and heartless, I propose that we take the obvious next step.

The '70s saw the movement called Zero Population Growth, aimed at reducing the expansion of the numbers of the human race to zero, so that we could stabilize and work to improve ourselves and our planet. My suggestion is that we remove one word from that policy.

I now propose the Zero Population policy. Its intent is to eliminate the irretrievably damaging and useless human race from the planet Earth. Citizens will be asked to work on a grass-roots level to take themselves and their families out of the ecosystem on a permanent basis. Centers for learning about the various processes that will result in this removal will be made available, although most of us seem to be pretty much naturals at that kind of thing (since humanity is really nothing more than a trumped-up killer ape).

So go to your supermarkets and purchase lots of drain cleaner. Make use of all of those nice bang-making devices so many of us own. Find tall buildings and bridges. Find out how fast your car can really move before aiming it at the concrete wall.

Here's to the end of the human race. We slaughtered and destroyed, we did lots of damage, and lots of us got a great deal of enjoyment pointing out all of our flaws without mercy, compassion or justice. Which is, after all, the most human of mind sets.

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The Limits of My Traverse - 3/14/2014

Each beat

every rest

a cut in the stone

a million steps around

left here

on the tumbled ground

no name yet written

upon its faces

I sweat

dripping in a heat

not born of the day

The chisel slips

scars my crosshatched hand

leaves the hammer lost

in a needing of the blow

This stone is mine

its crater

the limits of my traverse

its fragments

flung far into the mist

to bring me an echo

of the world outside.

2^6 Posts - Where I Belong - 3/13/2014

People talk sometimes about whether stories are believable. Believable is not the key point of fiction, it is self-consistency (unless the lack of self-consistency is, itself, part of the story). Self-consistency says that if magic requires the use of words and gestures, then all magic must be explained in terms of the use of those words and gestures. Exceptions may exist, but those exceptions must be recognized in-universe as being such.

This is, in fact, usually one of the main points of anything that is called 'genre fiction'. A genre can be defined as a set of acceptable breaks from reality which can occur in a story. In fantasy, it is magic and its attendant tropes. In horror, it is monsters and other physical representations of evil and fear. Some science fiction is built around a particular kind of self-consistent change or assumption about reality.

It is one thing that authors of 'speculative' fiction (which encompasses all three) discuss and work at. The author must know these rules and be able to extrapolate from reality plus that interpretation in order to arrive at a believable, self-consistent set of possibilities. Where possible, these extrapolations should otherwise follow known aspects of reality as the reader will know it.

And it's not just variations on the laws of physics that science fiction explores, but variations on the ways in which human minds and societies work. Even explorations of what a non-human mind might be like. This is often referred to as 'soft' science fiction, since it is based in psychology, anthropology and sociology instead of hard sciences like mathematics, physics and chemistry.

To me, though, 'soft' science fiction is becoming the most interesting to write. People have already examined a myriad of ways that physics and technology can be modified to create new kinds of worlds. I find myself more interested in questions like “what would it be like to be truly and utterly alone in the universe?” or “in what ways does a physical sense of identity affect one's internal sense of identity?”. Those of you who read my other blog may recognize Nemo and Fog as looking at these questions (among others).

To hardcore readers of science fiction, it will come as no surprise that my favorite authors, in the long-term, are Philip K. Dick, Alfred Bester, Theodore Sturgeon and William Gibson. All were (or are) far more concerned with character, society and the impacts of technology upon humankind than writers of hard science fiction ever were.

Art is the exploration of that which is human. That includes fear, fantasy, science and identity. Put all those together and you get 'speculative' fiction. It's where I belong.

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Subtle but Significant - 3/12/2014

There are words that come in pairs, and people tend to use them interchangeably. Very often, if one examines these words, there are shades between them. The two that clarify this kind of relationship to me are the words complex and complicated.

Complex carries, to me, a positive sense. A sense of many different components or aspects working together well. Watches are (or at least were), complex. Ecosystems, good novels, good arguments even good relationships are complex.

But complicated things are those wherein those many different components or aspects do not work well together. Bureaucracies are complicated (usually on purpose). Bad novels, bad games and bad court cases are complicated instead of complex.

Listen to which of those words people use when communicating, and you'll learn something important about whether they think something is good or bad. In fact, this kind of word choice can tell you a lot of things, and comes up more than people realize. Listening to that word choice is crucial to understanding what people really mean. It will tell you a great deal about what the person is thinking underneath what they're saying.

And it's sad that this is the case. People are more likely to be complicated than complex, I suppose, but wouldn't it be nice if one didn't have to analyze them in order to achieve basic understanding?

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All the Same, but Different - 3/11/2014

There's an interesting statistic I came across once, regarding the effectiveness of psychotherapy techniques. The study compared the success rates of three different schools of therapeutic technique to see which one was most effective. Success was defined, if I recall, by the patient declaring that it had significantly improved their lives.

The schools in question were Freudian, Jungian and Adlerian psychology. Three very different views of the human mind, and three very different approaches to resolving issues. What the study found was that the most successful form of therapy was... any of them.

In fact, the school of psychology doesn't really seem to matter at all, in and of itself. All three schools (indeed most forms of therapy), are focused on getting the patient to talk about their issues. The manner in which the therapist helps the patient interpret their own statements and seek resolution or improvement appears to be something where Freud works for Alice, Jung works for Pat, and Chris finds that Adler suits best.

For me, it's cognitive behavioral therapy, which is focused on listening to oneself and changing thought patterns which are leading to negative emotional states and behaviors. Other people find other interpretations useful.

But they all focus on getting people to talk about their issues. This, I think, is one of the original functions of the shaman. One could come talk to the holy person and discuss issues because the shaman isn't, in that moment, a member of the tribe, but someone speaking for the gods. And while the gods may judge, they already know everything you've ever done or thought, so there can be no new judgment in speaking to them.

Some people have called psychologists the techno-priests of the twentieth century, giving them a derogatory air of people quoting random words of magic without any real concern for the health of their patients. And certainly some have been like that, taking advantage of wounded people who sought only healing and recovery.

But most therapists, no matter what school or style they teach, are focused on getting their patients or students or supplicants to understand themselves better. To open up inwardly, if not outwardly. To examine their own lives, their own minds and hearts, to see themselves and the world more clearly.

They don't take pain away, they don't medicate it away (the good ones don't, at least), and they don't do anything that people haven't done in one form or another since time immemorial. But now they do it better, with a clearer idea of where the mind stops and the brain begins, and what the true patterns of perception and healing are.

It is that which separates a therapist who does good for their patients, and one who sells snake-oil.

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A Counterpoint - 3/10/2014

A lady I know on Facebook posted today about the power of positive thinking. And I do agree with her. Thinking in positive, upbeat terms about the world does help. It helps you live a stronger, happier life.

But there are those of us for whom those dark, negative thoughts aren't optional. There are those of us for whom that thread of seeing the negative side of the world and commenting on it is part of who and what we are.

I am such a person. When presented with a positive situation, I will, reflexively, find the dark cloud that goes with the silver lining. This is not something I choose, this is not something I can avoid or let go of. It is part of my perspective, part of the way that I see the universe. It is as much a part of who I am as is my humor, my words, my name.

If you deal with such a person, if there is someone you know who will always find the darkness in the brightest, sweetest lights, remember that for some of us, there is no other choice. It does not mean we don't see and appreciate the good things. It does not mean that we want to tear down the joys you feel. It simply means that this is part of what we see in life. Part of our perspective and understanding is the darkness of loss, failure and disaster.

Ironically, many of us also tend to see the brightness in those losses, failures and disasters just as well as we see the black streaks running through life. For me, at least, it is simply, always, seeing the other side of the coin, good or bad, and saying what I see.

If one can choose one's thoughts, one should choose bright and beautiful ones. But not all of us can do so. So think this bright and beautiful thought about me and those like me. That we continue. That we, despite our seeming obsession with the darkness, walk on, and do find light amongst our shadows.

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Standards Impossible - 3/9/2014

So Jennie Breeden posted a great comic tonight on The Devil's Panties about impossible physical images that the media puts up for both men and women to aspire to. She makes a good point, and I'm going to riff off on the part of it that has bothered me for a long time.

First, yes, the physical models that women are told to try to be are not only unrealistic, they are hurtful and wrongful. Ladies, be who you are, as healthy as you feel comfortable being, and forget what's on the billboards and movie screens.

But the things that I see in media relating to men are different. It's far less about what we look like and much more about who we are and what we should be. In TV and many, many movies, we are presented as stupid, unaware, selfish, foolish, incompetent, insensitive, incapable, moronic and laughable. The triumph of any given episode of a sitcom is almost invariably the main male character having the epiphany that the women in his life are right, he's an idiot, and he needs to do what they tell him.

I'm a male person, and that's what I grew up on.

The flip side is James Bond. Also known as Jason Bourne, Sherlock Holmes, House, Dexter, Walter White and a thousand others. All competent or super-competent in some way, at the cost of doing or being horrible in some way. James Bond is a womanizer destined to die alone in some ugly place. Jason Bourne is hyper competent at almost everything, but being in his vicinity is practically a guarantee of being killed. Sherlock Holmes (the Cumberbatch version), is a self-admitted sociopath, incapable of empathy and good only for solving crimes. House is the most brilliant doctor on the planet, apparently, but also a drug addict and a vile human being. Dexter and Walter White are criminals, good only at destroying the people around them and society itself.

Occasionally, the media gives us a male who is not built along these lines, just as it occasionally gives women positive models (Camryn Manheim in The Practice is a good example). But they are few and far between.

And what it comes down to is that the media makes its money by giving us something that they tell us we want. If it's something that pushes us down, then they can be the ones to pull us back up. If we live our lives based on what the media tells us we should want or be, then we sacrifice what it is that we should be, what we can be, what can bring us satisfaction and a good life.

So tell the media that it's very nice that the pretty people have jobs, enjoy the movies for what they are, and don't tell yourself that living up (or down) to those images and characters is a good idea.

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I Thought I Was Out! - 3/8/2014

So, I did it. Again. I missed it, I admit. More than I'd like to. There just isn't anything better out there. Not yet. There will be, someday, but not yet. Shepard called, and I answered.

Once again, I have installed Mass Effect.

When the sound started up, the sort of electronic sigh that hits when the splash screen comes up, I grinned, just a little. It was like coming home after a long vacation. Away was good, back is better.

Walking back onto the Normandy, I can almost smell the “this is not leather” seats. I remember the layout of the ship, the conversations that start the game. Hearing Admiral Hackett (Lance Henriksen) and Captain Anderson (Keith David) discussing whether Shepard should be submitted as a Spectre candidate made me smile wide. And I still remember every enemy in the first mission. squee.

And I'm playing my favorite class for the first episode: Infiltrator. Sniper rifles, pistols, electronics and decryption. Nothing else is necessary in this one.

So far, I've just picked up Ashley, and am about to discover Nihlus' body. Then the long series of runs from the Citadel all the way to Ilos.

I'm even looking forward to the Mako (aka the Chunderbus).

Talk to you all later, after I shoot a whole bunch of Geth.

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That's Fronkensteen - 3/7/2014

So, I'm writing this early, and from work, because I've got some plans later tonight.  The plan was to go see Young Frankenstein at a theater on Burnside, but they pulled Young Frankenstein.  Stripes is the replacement, which is nearly as good, but I was really hoping to get a few Bluchers in this evening.

(sound of crickets)

Guess that only works in the movie.

Anyway, if you’re not familiar with Young Frankenstein, I cannot recommend enough that you make the effort to see it.  Mel Brooks with his best cast and at the height of his powers doing a spoof of a monster movie genre that is largely forgotten now.  Utterly wonderful and hilarious.

And if you’re not familiar with Mel Brooks in general, be sure to see the following entries:

·         History of the World, Part I

·         Blazing Saddles (his most famous)

·         Silent Movie (his overlooked masterpiece)

·         High Anxiety (spoof of Hitchcock, not his best but enjoyable)

·         Spaceballs (spoof of Star Wars, the last of his great films, in my opinion)

Except for Spaceballs, expect to see lots of Marty Feldman, Gene Wilder, Mel Brooks (himself!), Madeline Kahn, Kenneth Mars and a host of others.  These are some of the funniest, sharpest movies ever made.  Don’t miss out.

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P.S. I’ll go back and put links in where appropriate later.

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Twenty Pixels can Kill You - 3/6/2014

There's a lesson I learned from a game that could have been very good. It was called Legend of Faerghail. Built along the lines of The Bard's Tale series, it had, as I remember, a good plot, good mechanics, and a reasonable degree of balance and variety. All in all, it should have been a fun game.

However, there was a decision made involving about twenty pixels that killed it.

In games of this style, most of the screen is taken up by informational displays. Lists of party members, active spells, a box for textual descriptions of areas, events and conversations. The remaining quarter to third of the screen is taken up by a first-person view of the world in which the player's party is traveling.

Both the Wizardry and Ultima series featured this view, and Bard's Tale capitalized on it quite well. But there was a subtle change when Legend of Faerghail picked it up. In that first-person view in the first three series, there was a bit of peripheral vision. Specifically, one could see the last few pixels of the walls on either side when in a dungeon. It didn't seem like much information until I tried playing Faerghail, which eliminated this peripheral vision.

Trying to map a dungeon became virtually impossible. Random monster encounters were generated randomly, and appeared based on a likelihood per keyclick (say, turning one's facing to the left by 90 degrees). The probability was high enough that in difficult dungeons, one was encountering monsters every three to five clicks.

After combat, the first thing the player would need to do was orient themselves, because mapping absolutely requires knowing which direction you are facing. Given the way things were set up, you were very likely to encounter another fight before you had completed the orientation process. Resulting in a game-breaking frustration, as much of it was oriented on exploring and completing some pretty good-sized dungeons.

So what was the lesson here? Interface. This was an otherwise good game killed by a seemingly minor decision in the design of the manner in which the player interacted with the game.

And I've seen it in software, hardware and general design over and over again since.

The iPod® didn't get popular because it let you play music easily anywhere you wanted to, it got popular because the interface was sufficiently intuitive for a sufficiently large number of people to find it comfortable right off the bat.

Very often, an otherwise useful device or system will fail not because it doesn't do what is needed, but because a less effective system is easier to use. This is the basic struggle that Linux faces, in its attempt to bridge the worlds of the user-friendly and the user-supportive.

And it's an important struggle. For a long time, the question was one of form over function. In other words, which was more important. Like many other A versus B arguments, the actual answer is one somewhere on a spectrum between the two named endpoints. If it doesn't do anything, then it really doesn't matter how pretty or easy-to-use it is (Art communicates, so it does do something, smartass). If it does something, but is impossible to use, what value could it have?

Finding that balance point, the point somewhere between the uselessly beautiful and the incomprehensibly effective, is the secret of good design, good craft, and the creation of successful systems of every kind.

Remember that the next time you're designing something. And read Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think for an examination of this basic idea in terms of web design (it's an excellent book).

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Dada Isn't Either - 3/5/2014

The Mona Lisa is not Art. It is art, but it's not Art. What's the difference? Am I just babbling and making artificial distinctions of some kind? Am I saying that the most famous painting in the world isn't the masterpiece everyone says it is? Have I finally disappeared up my own asshole into an alternate universe of pontificatory utopianism?

In reverse order, no, no, no and that's what I'll be getting to right now.

Art is not a physical object, nor is it a performance, nor a book, nor a score, nor any of the things that people commonly refer to as works of Art. Art is a moment, a moment of discovery, of creativity and enlightenment. Art happens inside the human mind and heart.

It is then channeled through the hands, the voice, the body into a work that the rest of the world can view. And at that point, it is art. art is the residue of that moment. It is what is left over when Art has passed. What we see on the walls, on the stage or on the page is the effect that Art has upon the world. It is the communication that carries the meaning of that which was discovered, created or illuminated.

My stories are not Art, but I know the moment of Art when I write them.

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Stream of Consciousness Minus the Beaver's Dam - 3/4/2014

Well, it's eleven o'clock and I have got to go to bed soon. So this is going to be a stream of consciousness thing, rather than anything planned or planed or even sanded nicely so that it can take a varnish finish. Or lacquer, I suppose, but lacquer is really only for wood, not words, even though wood and word are spelled similarly to each other.

Lots of things are similar to each other. The problem with classification schemes isn't trying to decide the difference between a tree and a tiger, but between two very similar trees, especially when some people say that one isn't really quite a tree, it's more like a very large bush with a single trunk. Which would make it some sort of shrubbery, I suppose, which means Roger has to drop by and say 'Ni' for everyone, even though Roger the Shrubber never said 'Ni', nor did any of Arthur's knights say the other phrase that the Knights Who Until Recently Said Ni said later on, when they were asking Arthur to cut down the largest tree in the forest with a herring.

And yes, this is the kind of thought pattern that I deal with all the time, although I don't usually write it down, random associations like this percolate and bubble and cloud their way through my head all the time.

Of course, it would help if I could type telekinetically.

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A Letter on Your Birthday, Mom - 3/3/2014

Dear Mom,

Happy birthday. It's been over a year since you died. We all still miss you, very much. We celebrated last night with a nice movie/dinner at Leanne's, and raised a toast to you.

We're all doing more or less okay. Dad's still taking it hard, of course, but that's completely understandable. He's doing better in the new place, and has met some good people there, people you'd like. He's also become something of a Facebook fanatic, if you can believe that. My father, the butterfly.

Leanne and Todd are holding together, healing as best they can. Smudge and Leeloo are helping a lot, I think. So are the regular times we all get together.

You'd have liked Christmas, it was a good one, despite the fact that the most important participant wasn't there. Leanne helped me put together a special gift. Hawaiian shirts (and a dress for Leanne) with a rainbow embroidered over the left breast and your name embroidered in the same rainbow colors just beneath. It's our way of bringing you back to Christmas and other family times, and something I think would make you very happy.

I don't know if there's anything beyond this life, but whether there is or not, you're still here with us, in all the memories we have, and the ones we don't remember we have. Even now, I can see the touched smile you'd be giving me over this letter, and I love it.

Love you always, Mom.

Michael

Something I Learned From Watching My Parents, and Others - 3/2/2014

“Strength is not the ability to dominate. Strength is the ability to be free from domination.”

-Michael Sasser

That's a line I came up with a number of years ago. It struck me then, as it does now, as something that too many people misunderstand.

Being strong is not standing over someone, commanding and demanding of them. Strength is not the ability to make a large change. Strength is the ability to retain a sense of choice in all circumstances.

Those who feel that the best way to stand tall (who, in fact, feel that tall is the best way to feel) is to do so on the backs of others, to raise oneself in a zero-sum game by lowering those around them, are not strong. They are too weak to stand cleanly and alone, they are too weak to see other people as anything but a threat. They are too weak to see other people as people.

Strength is the person who supports, who builds, who saves. Strength is the person who hears the just command and follows it. Strength is the person who hears the unjust command and refuses.

Strength is not the person who imposes their will, but also is not the one who surrenders their will to another. Strength is the person who sees and accepts reality and truth as best they can and stands in that place. They do not demand that others stand there, nor do they turn others away who truly want to stand there.

Strength is the point at which a person is able to base their actions and decisions on what they perceive to be the best, whether it is the best for themselves, for others, or for everyone.

Be strong. Bend, do not break, and stand firmly rooted in who you are and what you know to be right. Do not seek to control others, seek to help them find their true strength.

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Orcs, Altars and Halflings with Lightning Spells - 3/1/2014

So, gaming today. AD&D 1^st edition with lots of house rules (no class/race/level restrictions, monsters with levels, all the basics). Awesome time.

For those of you that missed it, it was Sascha, Alex (the Expendable), The Friar, Purple Tiger, Durrun and the new Halfling Magic-User, Mitt (to be the Mighty). Also, Guido's body was there, in desperate need of, well, being alive.

In the room where last time we took out the Golem-maker, we found a book that just felt really evil (and this is the thief who thought this, so you know it had to be true). We also found a secret panel in the altar that seems to lead to an extra-dimensional space of some kind. We elected not to explore, what with two members of the party off to the afterlife.

So, on our way back to Durroken to get Guido resurrected, we ran into a very tough bunch of orcs, which resulted in a spirited exchange of views with the points being made carried on the points of arrows, daggers and a magic missile spell. Turns out that little Mitt the Magic-User is hell on wheels with the stabby stuff. Which is good, because the fighter-types were failing miserably at their jobs (Glenn had three fumbles, two of them in a row, it was not pretty. The rest of us fared little better).

Once we got to Durroken, I had the marvelously novel experience that my character was respected in the realm, well treated, and we had no real difficulties in getting people to listen to us. Found out that the Golem-maker is apparently apprenticed to the supposedly dead mage Zegondo (disappearing mages in AD&D are known as liches, and they are very much of the badassedness).

So, after some interesting experiences in town (including watching Durrun get blasted across the room by a halfling named Jimmy) we are ready to head off to see what we can find inside an altar that's trying to do an imitation of the TARDIS.

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Why is it Midnight? - 2/28/2014

Almost midnight. Somehow a special hour, although it exists only on a clock. There is a midpoint between sunset and sunrise, but it doesn't fall at a particular hour every night. I'm sure there are tables on the internet to say when those times are, but I'm not really interested in looking it up.

Why do we insist that moments like this fall on our kind of schedule? The night has a moment when it is halfway over. We choose to claim that that moment is when both hands are pointing at the twelve on our clocks. The actual definition of midnight is when the place you are standing on is directly opposite that point on the earth where the sun is at its highest point in the sky.

That means that midnight is a great circle marching across the globe, halfway between the two terminators (dawn and sunset). There is a point each night when this great circle passes over you, and part of you is in the night and part in the morning. Midnight travels at 1000 miles an hour, give or take, depending on your altitude.

And so, if you think about it, does every second of every day. Breaking time into zones, large areas where every clock reads the same, is as artificial as it gets. If time is measured relative to midnight, dawn, noon and sunset, then every line drawn from North to South Poles is at a slightly different time of day.

And we are the only animals that really worry about anything like this. Seasons matter to birds, butterflies and rabbits. Salmon need to know when to leave for the spawning grounds, bears need to know when to start hibernating, but not an animal out there, mayflies included, need to know whether it's 3:14pm or not.

On the other hand, birds, bears and mayflies don't do much in the way of major structural engineering, so maybe there is something to the idea of keeping time the way we do.

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