simplerich strikes back

Sci-Fi - Modern Mythology

2012-05-04T14:22:00.000-05:00

I'm re-reading Dune. I really love that book. If you're not familiar with Frank Herbert's Dune, it's classic sci-fi from back in the Golden Age of sci-fi when Sci-Fi that was written could attract a cult following and even, sometimes, spawn an almost religious following that goes years into the future (That may be what cult following means so perhaps that's redundant. I'm no Frank Herbert).

Asimov's Foundation trilogy (First book was published in 1951 (It's the only series to ever win best sci- fi series of all time hugo award, beating out Lord of the Rings according to wikipedia)), Heinlein's Stranger In A Strange Land (1961), and Frank Herbert's Dune (1965) are the big three I think. To be fair I don't include Asimov's Foundation in there because I personally think it fits but because his idea of psycho-history is still around today in some form or another and it's generally agreed that it fits in. I don't believe it creates a modern mythology like the other two do, but there's no denying the impact of the trilogy on almost all subsequent writers. I, Robot the same way. The laws of robotics are almost accepted as real things today when robots are written about.

They just don't write sci-fi like these any more. I'm not saying that because they're classics. I'm saying that because while there is sci-fi out there that I really enjoy, The Vorkosigan series for example, the stories are now more about people than ideas. Dune & Stranger In a Strange Land created a mythology people liked, loved, and created worlds and did things with worlds and ideas that just aren't being done today that I've seen, and I read a lot of sci-fi. Or, maybe it's just those books hit me at the right time in my life where they made a big impression on me and I'm projecting their importance beyond what is real.

The closest I can think of today is The Matrix, the first movie. The rest of them try to live up to the promise of the first movies promise, but they don't. They're not as heroic. Maybe that's part of why I don't include Asimov's trilogy in the same league as Dune & Stranger, the heroism there is mostly done by a guy who is dead early on, Hari Seldon isn't all that heroic because he's dead to me. His ideas live on past him and guide the development of a civilization and since I've already said the stories were about ideas that supports the idea… but the missing component for me was the heroic nature of the myths created by Stranger's Valentine Michael Smith, and Dune's Paul "Maud'Dib" Atreides.

The ironic part (I hope I'm using his right) is I think both of these stories argue against following a leader and to think for yourself, make decisions yourself, and be responsible for your actions and their consequences… or at least aware of the consequences of your actions. I can't say either hits too hard on the idea of accepting the responsibility as much as they are to be aware of that responsibility. Perhaps that's why today these books aren't being written any more. We're not big on personal responsibility, or thinking for ourselves it seems. A deference to authority and a tendency to blame others, either for our shortcomings or luck for our successes seems to be more popular today than it was when these were written.

That was key in The Matrix as well when Neo had to choose which pill to take, he couldn't defer the decision or get someone else to make it for him. He had a distinct choice to make and only he could make it and after making that choice he had consequences and responsibilities to be dealt with and from the pill on in the movie the story is heroic, even the failings or times he floundered, those were heroic in that they were a result of actions he'd taken. There was no luck involved, just unfolding events following one another based on the actions and ideas of the mythological heroes the stories are about.

I love a good myth story and wish I could find some being written today. There's a certain amount of hope in a myth and I think we are in a time that could use a hopeful myth to guide, or inspire us to greatness.

*I don't link to Asimov's Foundation because I really don't enjoy reading him at all. His ideas made good stories, but I just don't think he's all that great a writer.

C'mon - I'm not THAT gay.

2012-05-01T17:55:00.000-05:00

“Look,” I told Ruthie now, “I don’t want to be that guy, okay? The gay guy. The token homosexual..."

Sprout by David Peck

So, I'm gay. I don't know if I've said that on the blog before or not but it's out there on the Internets somewhere. People in real life know too and oddly enough THEY'RE the ones that are bugging me. It's not that I'm being discriminated against or hassled or bullied. That doesn't happen. It certainly doesn't happen twice. *grin*
So, I meet someone for the first time and we know each other for a while and that's fine. Then a friend of mine comes up and says, within an hour, something about my being gay. It doesn't even really fit into the conversation so much as it's a comment. Maybe to show how hip they are that they know "a gay" or how OK with it they are or what. I've got no idea. But I know in at least two cases I've had the new person I met say to me later, "I didn't know you were gay, hadn't thought you were gay, and while it's OK(1) and all... it was just a little awkward to have that thrown out there like that so soon on meeting you." OK. That's not verbatim but it's the gist of what was said twice.
I'm not ashamed of who I am at all. It's not that I'm necessarily closeted, I'm not. But I don't think my sexuality is appropriate conversation when I'm just meeting someone, unless I'm trying to hook up with them (and I'm off the market so that's not really an issue either.) I think it's just rude. I'm not offended by it so much as I would rather that the new people I meet form an opinion of me that isn't based on who I love. I'm a little over being the token gay.
Among friends I'll make comments or jokes or observations that I wouldn't make among new people. But it's like that with a lot of things, not just my sexuality. I wouldn't talk about other people's private lives in the first hour I meet someone they've only just met. Private issues, like sexuality, politics, religion, prior criminal background, stance on drugs, etc... Those aren't really great topics for conversation when first meeting someone in my opinion.
So, if you know a gay, let them decide who and when to talk about it. It's their decision. Or rather, it's OUR decision.

"When I started writing about myself, I waited as long as I could before I told you I was gay, because once you reveal that, it seems like it’s all anyone can think about."

Sprout by David Peck

(1) I love how often ppl say "It's OK" or "It's your choice and that's OK" and they're really not meaning it in a bad way at all but it sounds hinky to my ears. a) I know it's OK and b) I'm pretty sure I didn't choose it.

America: What happened?

2012-04-30T20:23:00.000-05:00

We sell a carved wooden thing here for $9.99. Our cost for it is $2.24. We make $7.75 on it.

The people who sell it to us make something off of it. Let's assume our margin is higher just to make the math easier and assume it costs them $1.00 so they make $1.24 on each one they sell. I'm sure they pay far less than that but it'd be too depressing.

Here's the thing. The stupid thing is made in INDIA. It's a simple carved wooden thing. I could make one if I felt like it. (I don't. I'd cut all my fingers off.) But it's made in INDIA!!!

How is it cheaper to get the damned thing from India?

Some guy in India makes this thing and puts it in a big box. When the big box is full they put it on a truck and haul it to a warehouse where they're loaded into a shipping container which is then loaded into a ship and that ship hauls it from freaking India to the US. From there it goes on a train to a distribution center where it's loaded on a truck to go to a warehouse and from that warehouse it's split up and shipped to distributors who then sell it to us so we can sell it to other people for $10.

How is it cheaper to buy it from India, do ALL that shipping, than to make it here in the US? I don't get that at all. I understand American workers want insurance and all sorts of benefits, but how is shipping from India cheaper than what someone here would do something for? I'm so irritated with American industry for going overseas. The skill involved in making these could be taught in half an hour to anybody over 18.
(I say that in case they have to use a knife, American kids aren't allowed near a meat slicer at a restaurant for fear they'll dismember themselves, meanwhile in Taiwan 10 year olds are sewing together shoes that last me so long I'm tired of looking at them and throw them away but they never wear out.)

There are days when I look at all the crap we've done to ourselves as a country in the name of profit and I think we SHOULD collapse as a civilization as a cautionary tale to other future generations. If a country produces nothing but becomes a country of only consumers then their future is a future frighteningly predicted by the animated film Wal-E. The only thing we're producing with any reliability these days is morbidly obese children with Type 2 Diabetes... the kind that USED to be called Adult Onset diabetes but had to be renamed because 8 year olds were getting it before their livers failed from it. If all we do is consume, how can we be surprised?

How is it child abuse to spank a kid but not child abuse when they're morbidly obese? Only one of those things actually kills the kid. Our laws need to be thrown out & start over and anybody who suggests a law or lawsuit that tries to hold someone ELSE responsible for an individual's actions should be shot immediately and the first person to shoot them gets a cash reward. I'm sick to death of the "not my fault" people.

Weekends...

2012-04-28T15:57:00.000-05:00

Weekends are different when the person I want to spend them with isn't here. I'm left by myself to figure out for myself what I want to do. I read in Elemental by Brigid Kemmerer, "Boring. Code word for lonely." The thing is I'm neither bored, nor lonely. I'm restless.
I've got things that I want to do.

I want to blog (obviously).
I want to read, (I'm currently reading Sprout by Dale Peck and enjoying it.).
I want to practice guitar, and have a bit today.(justinguitar.com is really nice.).
I also want to get in the car and drive, watching the front of my car eat the miles of road and crap the future it's just gobbled up into a paved and distant past that recedes, closer than it may appear, in my rear view mirror.

So many choices, and some of them are solitary ones obviously, that if I had company to do them with we wouldn't do them. But while I want to do all those things, doing them doesn't feel like I'm doing something. They're items that, for now, I'd rather were on a to-do list than were things I was actually doing. But I don't know what I want to do instead. So, I'm going to check them off as I do them. I'll still have that restless feeling of wanting to do something, but I'll also have a feeling of having done the things I wanted to do so that's something, right?

Hrm...

2012-04-24T18:00:00.000-05:00

Want to know what took me like 600 words over on my other site? "simplerich.com is parked."

Translation: This has become my primary blog for a variety of reasons.

I'd say more, but I'm going to play* guitar for a while and relax before dinner.

*Play here is a bit generous. I'm going to make noise with it.

Book Review: Wearing The Cape

2012-04-09T22:33:00.000-05:00

I've been on a Super-hero novel kick lately (Not graphic novel -- real book with words and paragraphs and everything!) and found this via amazon's "Readers who bought this also bought..." recommendation I believe. So, I bought Wearing The Cape by Marion G. Harmon and wasn't disappointed.

I'm not sure who the target audience is on this. Fortunately for me I was in the mood for flying capes busting up baddies and chucking cars and saving the day so that scooted me into the target audience camp regardless of what demographic it was aimed at. It didn't feel like it was aimed at a female audience (The protagonist was female.) but it didn't seem aimed at... you know. I don't know if there WAS or HAS to be a target demographic split on gender lines on this type of book. I wanted super-hero novel and it's what I got.

There's no real attempt at explaining the why of hero powers, they just happen, and I'm totally OK with that because it explains it as a whole bunch of people had it "just happen" to them at the same time and these "breakthroughs" became either heroes or villains... I liked the characters but while the main ones were well fleshed out the secondaries seemed almost too two dimensional sometimes. I know every character can't be filled out, especially in a cast as big as this one but I didn't really KNOW any of them except the leads.

The story was well done and one of the commenters commented about the pacing of the book. I don't know if it was pacing or characters, but there were times, toward the middle, where it was easy to put down and read something else (especially dangerous to us Kindle folk who have something else ready-to-hand lol) for a while. I didn't do it because I didn't like Wearing The Cape so much as because my interest in something else that I wasn't reading would rise higher than what I was actually reading... that being said I never stayed away for long.

The last quarter of the book I read at work and I tore through it. It was excellently written. The pacing was good. The story was good. The edge of the seat feeling was good. I'm not going to say what else was good but it was good. Go read it. You'll agree.

Some hay has been made about the age disparity between Atlas an Astra, but it didn't bug me. If it'd been tawdry or a little blue then I'd have had a problem with it, but these are super-heroes. They're noble. They don't do blue. I thought it was well handled and it didn't bug me.

If you're in the mood for super-hero fiction I recommend this one. I think it's a first novel and if I can come out with one as good as this I'll be well pleased.

Could I have a B# followed by an E# please?

2012-04-01T23:39:00.000-05:00

Today I learned why there is no B# or E#.

I'm playing some Rocksmith and trying to learn/teach myself to play guitar and the missing half-steps between the letters B & C and E & F have bugged me for weeks. Today I remembered to look it up.
The reason is... wait for it... wait for it...

Because.

Yup. That's right. It's just cuz. The notes are all a half step from each other, just those were named the way they were because the note-namers felt like it. They had to, kind of, because there's 12 notes in Western music and if they'd done the A, A#, B, B# thing they'd have wound up with A-F for notes and no G at all. Ab would have been the same as F# under the no-G notation.

The musical among you are saying, "Shut up Rich. That's obvious." But it wasn't obvious to me. I thought the letters were all whole steps from each other and couldn't figure out why I couldn't half-step between B-C and E-F. Would it create the brown note? Would I crap my pants if I ever managed to do it? Nope. They're just named wrong and it stuck. No biggie.

So, with a light heart, an enlightened head, and finger tips that are starting to callous finally, I go to bed. A great mystery solved.

If you're interested in learning guitar I heartily recommend JustinGuitar.com's Practical Music Theory.

Also, we went shooting today to celebrate a friend's birthday:

Neither of these are me, but the .22 in the foreground is mine.

Book Review: Shadows in Flight

2012-02-25T13:12:00.000-06:00

Shadows In Flight is the most recent of the Ender Series by Orson Scott Card. It is only available in hardcover so far and isn't available in digital format for many months yet as they try and milk the hardcover sales for all they're worth before going digital with it. Too bad really, but that's a topic for another post.

I read the book in one sitting. It's very thin and has lots of space between the lines on a page. It was more of a novella than a novel. That being said, it should probably have been a short story. Maybe a longish short-story.

I'm a big fan of the Ender series and Orson Scott Card in general but there was nothing to this story for me.

It was a travelling story where (and I'm going to not spoil anything here so bear with my vagueness) some people are going from point A to points unknown and they squabble, then make up, then squabble some more. Occasionally the wise mentor one will say something pithy and then they go back to doing it some more. A Deus Ex Machina falls out of the sky and lands in their laps and what do you know? It pulls a House M.D. final 10 minutes trick on us and the book ends.

There wasn't any real tension in the book. There wasn't any sort of real story arc at all in the traditional sense. You know how a lot of Eurpean movies have that feel like you've come in on the middle of something, watched it for a while and then it ends and the credits roll? This book was like that. It's like we got the setup and the end without any real character development, other than long drawn out arguments to show the four differing view points in a wall of dialog that was tired and overdone, and after the set up instead of a dramatic ending, denouement, or climax we just cut that part of the story arc out and went to the resolution of the story.

It was altogether unsatisfying and I'm glad I borrowed the book and didn't pay for it. If you want to know what happens in it look for a wiki entry or check it out from the library but I can't recommend paying hardcover price for it. It's just not worth it which is too bad because I genuinely love this series, minus this book.)

I feel like OSC pulled a "midi-chloreans" on us with this book ret-conning previous books and, for me, wrecking some of the impact of previous novels in the series. I will choose to ignore this book, and may just stop reading the series all together and let it end on a high-note and not a boat-payment-making franchise-milking tone that this book had. It really left a bad taste in my mouth for the Ender-verse and for OSC as an exciting and original story teller.

New Computer Set-up

2012-02-10T20:01:00.000-06:00

It's been ages since I've done one of these because it's been ages since I got a new computer. I haven't needed one. The macbook did everything I needed it to do for years, and will continue to once I get the soup out of it. But, I couldn't do without a computer and Apple's decisions regarding entry level computers made them not an option so I went with a Sony Vaio.

First thing out of the box? Remove Norton and Adobe Reader. First thing. The software those company makes shouldn't be on any computer you care about. There are better alternatives out there
While those uninstalled I installed Google Chrome and removed all references to Internet Explorer from start menu and task bar.
Second thing was to install Dropbox to sync up all my work and personal files so I don't have to worry about moving those. I store them in the cloud and let dropbox sync the files across all my computers for me so I always have them regardless of which computer I am using.
Next came OpenOffice.org (I uninstalled the trialware Microsoft Office while downloading OO.o)
And then iTunes so I can get the iPod going again.
While iTunes was downloading I installed Microsoft Security Essentials as my firewall and anti-virus. It's free and rates right up there with anti-virus software.
As I write this the (literally) 48 Microsoft Updates are downloading and installing. It won't be fast, not as fast as customizing the computer the way I wanted it was, but it's essential.

So, I'm back in the PC world and I'm going to give it a go. The one thing I know I'm going to miss is the finder thing from the Mac. I really liked being able to hit APPLE-Space and then type part of a file name or word within a document and having that file open for me. I need to find an alternative for the PC.

Tsoupnami strikes Macbook!

2012-02-02T15:01:00.004-06:00

Chicken Soup for the Macbook

My power cord on the macbook finally gave up the ghost so I took it to the Genius' at the Apple Store and he said I needed a new one and he'd be happy to sell me one for $79.99. I said nyah. I'll get it at Best Buy because they didn't sell me one with a known problem and then look me in the eye and say "Probably a power surge, you're beyond warranty." So, I went to Best Buy and got it

Everything worked swimmingly...

Then I sat down to eat my Quiznos chicken noodle soup and when I took the lid off it the cup of soup slipped from my hand and sort of bounced off the desk and slopped about a quarter cup into the keyboard in a salty tsoupname if destruction.

I leapt to my feet, yanked the new power cord, powered it off flipped it upside down and beat it against the towel laying on the sink before blow drying it and setting it, still upside down, on the hotel's fan/ac/heater in the hopes that it will work for a little while at least to get stuff off it before the salty solution destroys it.

My only words as I saw the soup spillage and started tipping soup out of the keyboard, "Well that's unfortunate."

UPDATE:
Today it turned on and is running OK. I'm ripping things off of it onto a FAT32 partition now since my backups are all Mac backups and I'll be replacing this with a PC so I'll need to be able to get to my stuff. I don't know how long I have before the soup does me in, but I gotta get stuff off so that's what I'm doing before I turn it off and leave it off until it gets to the shop for a thorough cleaning.

Iowa Nice (CLEAN VERSION)

2012-01-03T06:34:00.000-06:00

What I like reflects WHO I like

2011-12-20T14:47:00.000-06:00

I've been thinking about this a lot lately and I think I figured out today what my problem is with some books. I love the Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold. I love David Eddings' Belgariad. I can't get through... That's not true, I could. I just don't want to, the Tad Williams Otherland books and I'm currently not enjoying the Song of Ice & Fire by George R. R. Martin. I can't think of a bigger contrast in book styles. Another series I enjoyed, in case I'm accused of not liking epic fantasy, is the Lord of the Rings. I liked that one.

I like good guys. I like honor. I like loyalty. I like friends who stand by their friends and are willing to do anything for them. I like when friends can trust each other and act on that trust even in their absence because they know their friends and family are honorable, reliable, and trust-worthy. I want to BE that person. I hope that I am. I hope that my friends recognize me as a reliable, trust-worthy, honorable person who will help them. I want the things I read to be like that. The books I enjoy have those kinds of people in them. I like to spend my time with those sorts of people. I like to surround myself with those sorts of people. I like to be friends with people I strive to be worthy of. I like my friends to want to be worthy of me. I don't want a relationship where either of us thinks the other is a skeevy back-stabbing, conniving S.O.B. I like idealists. I like people who strive for an ideal.

I don't mind if the people in the books have faults and insecurities. I don't mind if they're not perfect. I don't mean to imply I only read space-opera type things where everybody's perfect and bigger than life. I enjoy those too. The Lensmen series by E. E. "Doc" Smith is an excellent example of bigger than life heroes who are hyper-good, hyper-honorable, and who have no faults at all. I really like that series but it can't help but be pretty one-dimensional.

The Vorkosigan series, and another series I like is the Empire of Man series, AKA the Prince Roger series, by David Weber and John Ringo. Those characters have flaws but they strive to overcome them. They work to be worthy of each other and of an ideal. They work to improve themselves and those around them. They're trying for something great. David Weber's Honor Harrington has a female protagonist who tends towards space-opera levels of perfection (except for the two books in the middle where she's just beaten down for two books and I didn't enjoy them at all... there was nothing good happening in them, she just suffered and suffered losses and even her victories were painful. No fun to read... but I read them.). She's almost a little too perfect, too one-dimensional.

But that's my thing. In my life I want to be someone people can trust and rely on. I want to help people. I want to be someone people want to be around and someone who people enjoy being around. I want to be worthy of the friends I choose. I want them to be worthy of me as well. The players in the Song of Ice and Fire aren't worthy of anybody. There are no heroes. They don't aspire to anything grander than survival by any means necessary... and that's not fun to read about. I feel like I'm dirtier after reading those books. There are a very few exceptions. I like Bran. But one person in a cast of 24 isn't enough to drag me through the Song of Fire & Ice books. Perhaps if all his chapters were chopped out and put together into a single book "Bran's Tale" I'd read that. Maybe Jon Snow's as well. He's likable. I don't care about anybody else in the series and actively dislike most of them.

So, I'm closing the one I'm reading and I'm not opening any more of them. There are plenty of books and stories out there that I'll enjoy that I don't feel like I have to make myself read. I don't get enough time to read to force myself to read things I don't enjoy. I'll go to it when I've read all the things I enjoy and want to read. Once that list is done then maybe I'll go back to the Song of Ice and Fire.

The upside to getting older

2011-12-11T09:19:00.001-06:00

I've got to say out front. I'm not a fan of getting older. Yes. There are advantages: cheaper insurance, much better self-confidence, and a little more patience than I had when I was younger. Those are all great, and go a long way towards peace of mind and general well-being. That said, I'm not a fan of getting older.

An advantage to getting older though that IS worth it is getting to be friends with my parents. Not just friendly, but the mental-age discrepancy and power imbalance of parent/child isn't there any more. I'm old enough now to remember my parents at my age. (If that makes sense to you, cool. If not, just move along. It's not a key thought, just an observation.) It's cool I think to be able to be friends with my parents. It doesn't mean they're perfect or did everything right or that we had a Brady life. It was pretty good and they did really good in my opinion. If I had kids I'd let 'em raise them and that's a compliment... the part where they would say "Hell no! We did our time! You having one just like you is one of our prayers answered!" is beside the point.

I'm just really glad to have both of them still there, and still together, and that they're the kind of people I would want to be friends with. Everybody's not that lucky and I lucked out and drew a good card when they were handing out parents. For that, I'm pretty thankful.

Kindle Fire & Amazon Customer Service

2011-12-07T21:23:00.001-06:00

So, my Kindle Fire developed a weird screen thing where the screen would shoot vertical lines through it and then go black. In the dark you could sometimes see it was half the blacker-than-black from between scanlines on a TV and the other half was a dark gray. But the screen wasn’t viewable. Just the slightest tweak, or holding it ONLY on the left side would fix the problem stutteringly. Then it would stay OK for a while. Other times it’d be touchy and seemed not willing to stay on at all. Still other times it would go a negative so white was black and black was white. blue was red, etc. It was a negative… you know what that is. It got worse over time. I didn’t have a lot of time so I didn’t do much with it.

Finally tonight I went through the steps on amazon to do a return and got a message saying, “Can’t just return this item punk! You gotta talk to someone in a foreign country who is awake this late.” or words to that effect. With great trepidation I called the 800 number and got someone whose name I didn’t understand but his name was NOT “Peggy” and he did NOT tell me I couldn’t turn my airline miles into cash.

It was a guy, with an accent yes, but he was super friendly. Very helpful and never once asked if I’d dropped it, thrown it across the room, left it in a car overnight when it was eleven-degrees outside, shipped it across the country twice in a shoe box or anything else that might cause problems. He simply apologized for the problem and asked where to ship the replacement item. I told him and while we were talking an e-mail showed up with a link to print a shipping label. When the new one arrives I’m to put the broken one in the box, hand it to any UPS driver or store and toddle off to enjoy the replacement item.

No muss. No fuss. Free 2 day shipping to me. They couldn’t have been nicer, more solicitous, helpful, cooperative, or excellent to deal with. Seriously. I can’t imagine anything he could have done to make the experience more pleasant.

To answer your unanswered question: Would I still recommend someone get a Kindle Fire? The answer is absolutely YES if you have wi-fi at your home or work. If you don’t have wi-fi it’d be a harder sell for me. But with the wi-fi I have available to me at home, work, and the coffee shop it’s as good as always on for me. I love it for Netflix, facebook, comics, and reading websites. I don’t love it for books because the battery doesn’t last 2 weeks like my Kindle Keyboard (Which I love a little more than is healthy I think.). But I like it for books at night when the lights are out and I don’t want to turn on a table lamp.

There’s a new hero in Gotham…

2011-11-23T22:38:00.001-06:00

DC Universe went free to play recently so I decided I could afford that. Free to play also means, in case you were wondering, free to download as well. Now, it’s a big game so be prepared to wait for it. Then once I got it (through Steam) and signed in there was another 3 Gig patch to get. Short description and screen shots follow. If you click the pictures I believe they’ll embiggen (Get larger.)

Character creation was pretty easy but I, and I’m not kidding here, I wasn’t real sure what I was doing. Fortunately most Massively Multiplayer Online Games (I’m leaving off the alleged “Role Playing” that people include in the name because honestly… it’s rarely included when they play.) the first few characters are typically throw away you don’t get too attached to as you figure things out. So, I went with a Batman/Robin type. Character. Here you can see me standing on the seal inside the Gotham City Police Department.

Since I was in Gotham I of course had to go and find the place where Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed. Here’s the fun part. I didn’t know there was a tour that would take me here. I found it by exploring. One of the great and horrible parts of MMOGs for me is my propensity to explore and try and find things. I found this and as soon as I saw the roses I knew what I was looking at. When I got close to them some sort of achievement or badge screen popped up but I wasn’t reading it. I was looking at the roses and feeling bad for the boy whose parents were gunned down in front of him at this very spot.

They weren’t kidding when they said Gotham needed help. The place was a wreck. There were super-villain henchmen running amok and the local police weren’t able to do much about them. The Scarecrow was releasing huge barrels of his poison gas into the air causing the fine citizens of Gotham to hallucinate and act out. They weren’t themselves we had to keep reminding ourselves as we tried to merely subdue them and help the doctors administer the antidote. Guarding the specialists in the haz-mat suits as they set up giant industrial air purifiers on the roof tops was not my favorite part of the night, but as you can see here. The air absolutely needs purifying.

The light of the full moon was cutting through the smoke by the time I was done for the night. Security zeppelins were starting to help locate hot spots to call in reinforcements. I called it a night when I got to level 7 and had to run back to Gotham Police Station. Here I am on the top of a building with a giant full moon behind me. I waited there for what felt like forever for the Zeppelin to get in the shot where I wanted it. It looks like a bug that the moon light is coming through my head but that’s not true. My eyes glow… probably with all my pent up power. Grrr…

It’s been a lot of fun so far. I already want to do these same parts again with a different character. I’m watching other people playing and seeing what they can do and I want to do it too. Yes, flying is one of those things I want to do. I’m not sure how replayable it would be long term but it was free so what do I care?

Also, I’m playing the game with an Xbox360 controller plugged into my laptop. It absolutely works well for that.

Google+ and me

2011-11-17T18:00:00.000-06:00

I’m not sure what to do with this place. I’ve got posts out there. I’ve got them here and on my main blog and there are readers both places but Google+, somewhere I haven’t been more than months I don’t think I have more readers and more interaction already than on both of my blogs combined.

I like the idea of my own blog, but the reality is I like interaction and readers and I have a LOT more of those, engaged readers, on Google+ than I have on either blog.

It’s the engagement of the readers that’s attracting me. Granted, I’m pretty careful about who I circle, and while over 2k people follow me I don’t follow that many at all. I’m just over 300 that I read, but I add more all the time, and sometimes remove people. There’s such a feeling of community, of conversation, of participation on Google+ I find I’ve spent far more time there than here.

I need to figure out what’s going to happen next obviously. Mirroring or merely importing those posts to here is a possibility but it seems like it’s diluting things. If you’re on Google+look me up. If you’re not… the conversation there is absolutely incredible.

In truth I'll probably mirror things here for a while. I predict there will be a thing at some point that means content posted here will show up over there in a stream of some sort. I'm not sure how it'll work or if it'll be google created or a third-party plugin. I look for that time to come.

In the meantime I'm going to bring something over here that I posted over there. It's sort of long, but I think I'm going to talk more about it over here... It's easier to have a series of posts over here than over there. The stream, the way it works, sweeps things away pretty quickly. Blogs are going to be better for serial posts I think than G+. But WOW at the interaction and back-and-forth comments etc. over there compared to either of my blogs. Unbelievable.

Kindle Fire -- Initial Impressions

2011-11-16T22:35:00.001-06:00

I've had the Kindle Fire for only a little while now and these observations are those made in playing with it for a couple hours, tops.

Initial Impression: It's heavy, MUCH heavier than either the Kindle2 or the Kindle Keyboard that I had. But it feels solid, well built. There are zero buttons for controlling the thing outside of the power button. I plugged it and it ran an update and knew my account. It arrived pre-set up with my account information. That was nice. It was ready to go within minutes of taking it out of the box.

Books
I was able to send a book to myself using the @kindle.com e-mail address through the Manage My Kindle pretty easily. I also was able to deposit home-brew copies of books into the books directory and they were there and as easy to read as if they'd been bought through Amazon. For reading getting to my books to use as an e-reader it was fine.

Music
The speakers are at the top, not the top facing me, but the very top, facing straight up. That didn't seem to bug me when it came to listening to music. There's enough separation for the stereo to be noticeable in stereo songs and it streamed stuff from my amazon cloud collection pretty easily. The player is nice and all the controls I needed were accessible without having to monkey around in menus.

Movies
I synced up my Netflix account with it and watched part of a Doctor Who episode and can see myself watching more without much difficulty. The case I got folds to give it a nice stand. It's playing right now while I type this. I put a copy of _Do You Want To Date My Avatar_ in .m4v and a copy of an mp4 on there as well, _Not Afraid_ by Eminem to see how those formats worked. They worked great, but they weren't immediately obvious where to find them. They're in the Gallery, and not in the Movies tab across the top.

Pictures
There's a built in Gallery for viewing photos and evidently videos added by USB. The drawback here is it doesn't show the name under the thumbnail and the thumbnails were pretty small for the videos. The playback is good though, very smooth. Viewing pictures was just like using the gallery in an android phone, just swipe past them. There's no "share" option showing up other than Evernote though and I'm not sure why I'd want to do that. (I had to add Evernote... without it the Share menu would be empty I assume.) There's no option to make the wallpaper one of your photos which is frustrating.

Apps
This is where things go weird for me.
This is an e-reader. This is *NOT* an iPad. If you think it's a cheap iPad you're going to want to send it back unopened. You will be disappointed. The App selection is VERY limited. Angry Birds worked great, relax. But so far there's no Dropbox support and no gmail support other than through the web browser (which was quick and clean and I used it for both gmail and google+ and it was fine.) I knew I wasn't getting a dumb tablet, but a smart e-reader, but I'd hoped for a gmail app. That was a thing I was really counting on using this for and it's not there yet.

Interface
I'm not a super-fan of the interface. The home screen has your four favorite (You pick what you want, it starts out with 4 by default, but they're easily changed) things to do. They can be books, songs, albums, apps, bookmarks, whatever. Then above your 4 favorites is this carousel they call it where everything you do is in order one behind the order going back in time. Looking at mine now I can see I Used the Gallery, Played 90 Seconds to Mars album "This is War", read some of Storm of Swords, used the Comixology App to read a comic, played Angry Birds, and then I see I was on Google+. I hate that. I want the home screen to be customizable, not a breadcrumb trail of what I've done. Across the top are the sections, Newstand, Books, Music, Video (but not videos you've added by USB cable, only ones you've bought or rented through amazon, digitally), Docs, Apps, Web.

Books I added by cable or e-mailing to the kindle don't show up under the books tab. They show up under the Docs tab. That's not terribly intuitive.

When watching Doctor Who on Netflix the volume control isn't easy to find. There's no reason to hide it and yet they have. That's a Netflix interface issue. Surely they'll fix it.

Overall. I'm very happy with my e-reader on steroids. I'm going to take it with tomorrow instead of my kindle keyboard and see how it goes. So far though I'm very happy with it.

I didn't talk about it requiring wi-fi to get anywhere as that's covered on the amazon site. I have it most places I go so that's not an issue for me. I'm curious to see how much of an issue the battery is.

More after I've had it for a while.

Thanks for making it this far.

NaNoWriMo 2011 - The Beginning

2011-11-01T17:11:00.000-05:00

NaNoWriMo starts today. I probably won't post the whole thing on here but here's what's done so far.
"I'll fix it." Steve slammed the phone onto the table and then flipped it over to look at the screen and make sure he hadn't broken it like he had his last one. "I swear they're stupid on purpose!" He pushed himself away from the table and stalked into the living room leaving his family sitting at the table in silence.
His wife, Julie frowned down at her plate before sighing and taking a drink of water and looking to Sandy their sixteen year old daughter and asking, "How did you do on your English paper? Have you heard yet?"
"What?" Sandy looked across the old oak table at her younger brother, younger by minutes but those minutes count to older twins, "We're going to pretend that didn't just happen?"
"What didn't just happen?" her mom asked.
"Not only did he answer the phone at the table he got up and left. We can't do that! How is that even fair?" Sandy had lost her phone for a week only two days prior when she'd answered it at the table during dinner. The fact that it had been her brother who had pocket dialed her, entirely by accident he insisted didn't do anything to change her mom's mind about the punishment. She'd been a complete jerk in Sandy's opinion since she started watching all those Nanny 911 shows on TV.
“Don't start Sandy. He has to take calls from work. It's not like it's one of your little friends.”
Jim closed his eyes at the phrase “little friends.” He heard his sister's fork clatter against her plate.
“May I be excused. I've got homework to do.”
Jim opened his eyes and looked at his sister in surprise. Her lips were thin, and she stared at him, not looking at anything else in the room. He tried to smile back but he knew she wasn't seeing him. She was waiting for permission to leave and just beneath her frozen face was an explosion waiting to happen if it wasn't given.
His dad walked in then, took in the scene and said, quickly, hoping to be out before the explosion he could see building happened. “I have to run to the office. I'll be back shortly. I can't remote in, they upgraded the firewall and it's locked everybody out. You can update it remotely evidently but you can't get through to manage it once you do.” He talked his way across the room and out the door.
“Fine! Might as well.” His mom's voice was exasperated. “Just try and have a nice family dinner and off he goes to do God knows what with a computer and his family sits here waiting.” Nobody was listening though. Her litany of complaints had gotten longer lately and had become a sort of background noise they lived their lives surrounded by. Sandy left the table and went up to her room, stomping her way up the stairs as if she were trying to drive her heels through the floor. Jim finished his hot ham and cheese sandwich and stood up. Dinner obviously over. He cleared his and his sister's dishes, leaving his dad's unfinished plate sitting across from his mom.
It sat there accusingly as she stared at it, unmoving before she pushed herself to her feet and cleaned up after dinner, throwing the food away and loading the dishes in the dishwasher. She'd seen families on TV that had sit-down dinners. She'd grown up with sit-down dinners where the whole family gathered around and talked about their day. She'd wanted that. She'd been trying for that but she was doing something wrong because it kept not working. She stood with her hands on the edge of the sink and stared out into the spring evening. The sky was orange and pink. She started when she felt Jim's hands on her shoulders. “Thanks for supper. It was good.”
She turned around and he was smiling at her weakly.
She nodded. “Thank you.”
“Can I go to Josh's?” He asked her.
“Did you just compliment my cooking to get me to agree to go to Josh's house?”
“Did it work?” He asked still smiling.
“How're you getting there?” She asked.
“I'll take my bike. It's got gas.”
“I don't like you riding that thing after dark. They're dangerous enough in the day time.”
“Mom.” His voice was whiny and he knew it, “I'm an excellent rider. I'll wear my helmet. I'll stop at stop signs, even the dumb ones. I'll call when I get there and when I leave to come back.”
“OK. No racing, and no passengers.”
“Deal... and Mom?”
“What do you want?”
“Supper really was good.”
“Go. You're just being smooth.”
“I can't help it. I try but there's just so much charm it leaks out.” Jim said as he went through the door connecting the kitchen to the garage. He pulled on his riding jacket with it's kevlar armor built into the back and arms. His gloves were in his helmet and he pulled those on as well. He'd seen road rash from motorcycle accidents and would rather have too much protection than not enough even if what he was going to be riding was only a scooter.
When he hit the remote to open the garage door and walked his bike out with his helmet on already his sister was standing there waiting for him, wearing her helmet. “Take me to Chris' house.”
“You're grounded,” Jim pushed his face shield up and looked up at the open window over the garage's roof. “Did you jump off the roof?”
“Yeah. I know I'm grounded. Take me to Chris'. If you don't I'll just walk.”
“I thought you two broke up.” He was sure they'd broken up after an argument over whether or not he could decide who she hung out with. Chris was a controlling asshole and Jim didn't like him at all, and hadn't liked him since they'd been in 4th grade together and Chris had kissed his sister at a football game behind the concession stand.
“We're not going to date. I'm just going over to get some stuff I left over there. I'll be back before you and before Mom notices I'm gone.”
The black scooter, bounced and settled as she climbed on putting her hands on his shoulders. He started and left, turning right so he wouldn't pass in view of the front of the house. It was longer that way but if his mom saw him with a passenger, especially his grounded sister after sunset he'd be lucky to leave the house for a month. His parents were stricter than most and part of him knew he was only as grounded as he let them make him. But the idea of ignoring them seemed so foreign to him he couldn't believe it when he'd see his friends talk back to their parents or ignore them. Three blocks later he pulled to a stop in front of the brick ranch style house and his sister climbed off and handed him her helmet. “Thanks for the ride.”
“Be careful with him. He's an ass.”
“He just comes across that way. He's really not.”
“That's what ass means! It's how a person comes across. You either are an ass or you're not, and he's an ass.” He clipped her helmet to the back of the seat using a caribiner and a bungie cord. “Seriously. Be careful. Call if you need anything.”
“I'm on phone restriction remember?”
“Yeah you're not. There's either a pay-as-you-go phone in your pocket or you've started smoking and I don't think it's a pack of cigarettes. I'd smell it on you.”
“By mom. Quit worrying.”
He gave her the finger and a smile as she walked up the drive. When the door opened and she went inside he pulled away from the curb, an uneasy feeling in his stomach. As he came up to a four way stop and slowed down, half a block ahead of a truck, he looked, saw that he would make it as they slowed for the sign, and gave the bike gas. The truck didn't stop, or even slow down for the sign and blared it's horn as it passed within a foot of his rear tire. In his panic he gripped the right handle of the bike, the throttle, and the bike shot forward and up a driveway onto the sidewalk. If he had been a more experienced motorcyclist he would have released the throttle or squeezed the clutch. Instead he steered as best he could, riding the length of the block on the sidewalk before he dropped off the curb into the street, crossing the light traffic causing horns to blare and into the entrance to St. Paul's Cemetery where he hit a patch of gravel and dumped the bike. Finally he let go of the throttle and rolled across the grass, coming up short smacking his helmet on a headstone.
He lay there afraid to move, trying to tell without moving if anything were broken. Nothing felt broken but he wondered if he were in shock if he would know. He'd seen too many videos on youtube of ankles broken and feet pointing the wrong way or bones sticking out of legs to want to see that on himself. He opened his eyes slowly and saw, in the reflection of his helmet's face shield what looked like a tv screen, small, distant, and faint, his sister sitting on a bed talking to Josh. He couldn't hear them but he could see them, as he lay there watching wondering if he had brain damage causing a hallucination, the picture got bigger, filling the face shield completely, but still faint, as if reflected. He could see the night sky over his head, the dark blue of the sky in the fading light and the black of the tree branches over his head the dark blue of the sky in the fading light and the black of the tree branches over his head.
Sandy was angry. She'd done the thin-lipped look again. She stood up suddenly and crossed to the window, the window that Jim's point of view indicated he was watching through. When she looked down he could see that a car was backing out of the drive as a pick up truck, the one that had almost hit him pulled up beside the car. Two of Chris' friend's from school, Steve and Rob got out, laughing. He could see them laughing but couldn't hear anything. He looked back at Sandy and saw her pushing past Chris towards the door. He stepped towards the door, blocking it with his body so she couldn't open it.
His smile was phony, even through the reflection. Jill's anger wasn't though. Jim pushed himself up to a seated position and felt dizzy, the weird reflected vision was gone now and around him the cemetery seemed to sway back and forth in front of him. He couldn't see his bike and the sky overhead wasn't dark blue any more. It seemed more silver or gray like a fog was settling down on him. He rolled over and tried to push himself up on all fours to pull himself up using the headstone he had crashed against. He saw, coming out of the grass and ground wisps of fog coming up. The air was cooling fast. He pulled himself up and stood unsteadily looking for his bike. He was only a few blocks from Chris' house.
Two unsteady steps back the way he had come and he was overcome with vertigo. He reached out and put his hand on a tall headstone. He pulled his helmet off and dropped it on the ground. It crunched in the gravel. He looked down at it confused momentarily. In the face plate he saw another reflection, not his sister this time. It looked like his mom in the master bathroom and someone, how could he see through walls? How could he see any of this? Someone was coming in through the garage into the kitchen. He hadn't shut the garage as he'd left and she hadn't either. She was running a bath and someone was in the house. “MOM!” Jim's voice filled the silence. He turned, looking for the gate he had come through. The entrance to the cemetery was a wrought iron arch. He should be able to see it even in the fog. If he followed the gravel of the path he would get there. He looked at the faceplate again and the image was gone, showing just the silvery reflection of the thick fog he was walking through. The crunch of his feet in the gravel the only sound in the night except for the occasional wzzzzt of his sleeve moving against the body of the jacket. No sounds of traffic. Nothing but the muffled silence of the fog and his footsteps.

NaNoWriMo 2011 Here I Come!

2011-10-30T21:18:00.000-05:00

Smell that? It's the smell of fear... not of Halloween's ghosts and goblins... not of people realizing that Christmas is fast upon them... not of those who woke with a start wondering if this is the weekend they're supposed to fall back... but of hopeful writers all over the world realizing that November is almost here and with it the annual mad dash to 50,000 words that they, we, can say comprise our novel for 2011.

NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. It's about racing to finish something. It's about writers who say, "One day..." and then that day never comes. It's about trying to do something you never thought you could do. It's about figuring out that one of the biggest obstacles we, as creative people, face is ourselves.

We find the time. We make the time. We prioritize like we've never done before. We plan while walking, while parking, while raking or cooking. We eat, drink, and breath this project in an almost obsessive way. And, if we stick to it, we finish something. It might not be good. Hell, it probably isn't good, but that's not the point really is it? We finish something we have, in the past, not even started because we weren't ready, were too busy, didn't have time for... blah blah blah. The power of NaNoWriMo is, for me, the confidence it gives to me that even if I'm not writing The Great American Novel I am able to write something that long. I'm able to find the time. I'm able to prioritize. I'm able to write through the writer's block or the dry spell or the headache and bad mood. I'm able to do it if I really want to.

Out there are a whole lot of people who are today looking at their computers, their notes & outlines, their blank notes & outlines, their stack of "how to write" books that they never quite got past Chapter One. In most of them is the kind of excitement they used to feel a few days before Christmas. That nervous energy that's building is making them smile for no reason as they stare out the window and can't wait for November 1st when they can sit down and write.

It's an exciting time. I'm really looking forward to it.

(This was originally posted over on Google+)

Take a minute...

2011-10-19T21:53:00.000-05:00

Today a friend of mine who's been in jail for a while., over a year (and he gets out soon), called me. I've been writing him once or twice a week since he went in. We weren't all that close before. We knew each other. I felt bad that he was in jail (prison really). I don't mean he didn't warrant jail, just that he's not a criminal, just stupid and jail's not going to fix stupid.

Today he called and that meant something to me because it's 10 bucks for him to call... when you make like 75c a day that's a lot of days to work to make a phone call. He wanted to call because he wanted to say thank you for writing him. He had friends on the outside who wouldn't write him when he wrote them, hadn't written ever, or anything. And he felt like they'd just dropped him. (His initial crime was drinking and driving, then eluding. He got out on probation and got into a fight and put 3 ppl in the hospital before the fourth got him down... they had to rebuild his face... he's an excellent fighter... but that is a violation of probation. So, he got in trouble but they didn't revoke... a week later drunk driving and THAT was a revocation.) The people who dropped him were his friends, and ppl he hung out with and weren't negatively impacted by the things he did so it's not like they weren't talking to them because he'd killed their uncle.

"You don't know what it's like in here. You've never been locked up. You're out of touch with everything. Shit happens without you. You're frozen in time and you can't do anything. You don't forget what people look like. You remember what they used to look like but the rest of the world went on without you... they don't look like that any more. They're going on with their lives and you're stuck in a hole and it's like you're dead. You write letters and you might as well throw them down a hole. It's hard. It's the hardest part of being in here is being forgotten." His mom writes, sends money and visits him often (She works for me and I make sure she has time and money to visit, send money, and all that.) "It really means a lot to me that you keep me connected to the outside, that you've never been here. You don't know, but you're trying to help and that means a lot to me. I can't say how much I look forward to your letters." He wasn't quite teary but his voice was choked with emotion as he thanked me for writing, and for writing him this week when I was telling him my hopes for him when he got out, and how I looked forward to his trying to succeed and how I wanted him to know there were people out here looking forward to seeing him again... I told him about the gay kid that killed himself earlier this week that I read about on Google+ and how I worried about people because sometimes I worried about me but I'd always been lucky, people had always been there for me to provide an ear to listen or a supportive word, even when they didn't know they were doing it and I wanted him to know that I would be there for him... and if he got to be too high maintenance (He's got adult ADD and is manic sometimes) I wanted him to know that I'd have time to listen to him if he needed somebody to talk to.

We don't know very many people in common so my letters are about things I'm doing, things going on in town, and I ask about him and what he's doing. I find things online that I think might be interesting and send them to him... I don't know what it's like to be where he is.

But I do know what it's like to feel cut off from people... to feel alone... to wonder if anybody gives a damn about you and those aren't good feelings. So, I write. I write because most people aren't alone as they think they are but most of us don't tell people enough that they're important to us.

Maybe you don't know somebody in jail, but maybe you know somebody who you think might feel alone, or cut off from people or who is going through something real or imagined that is hard for them. Send them a letter, just a quick line saying you were thinking about them. Tell them a funny story. Send them an article, not a link, that you think they might be interested in. It's little things like that. Little human touches that mean the most. And they're mostly free, they don't cost a lot, just your time. But it means a lot to them... and one day, maybe it'll mean a lot to you too.

I love this to pieces :)

2011-10-13T19:46:00.002-05:00

Today I was 17 again for a little while.

2011-10-09T22:20:00.000-05:00

Once upon a time I went to High School in Germany and when I graduated and left I didn't think I'd ever see those people again. Not because I didn't want to, just because we were from all over the place and meeting back at our high school in a different country from where we were going to go to colleges or get jobs seemed like a really big challenge to me.

Today I got to go have lunch with a friend of mine from back then and it was awesome. Sometimes I miss the feeling of growing up in a town where you went to school with everyone around you. I wonder what that's like for you to know everyone and all the people they've dated on and on... it seems like a romantic small-town idea to me. I know people like that. I'm not like that. Seeing +Eric Coffman was full of awesome sauce. It was more special, the meeting, as he was going somewhere else we met up for lunch and a walk of the Iowa State Capitol grounds while we talked and that made it special, rare, and poignant... a fleeting connection to a past I wouldn't trade for anything.

Blogger Recommendation: Rosa Say

2011-10-03T20:03:00.000-05:00

Back to work after a week of vacation and I think, I know, I could have done with another week and still not wanted to go back. Mostly that's because the weather is absolutely beautiful right now and I don't want to be inside because I know Old Man Winter is shuffling his way this direction.

If any of you manage anything/anybody I want to recommend a friend of mine, a super nice lady from Hawaii Rosa Say. As the economy does what it's doing and seems to steadily ignore what we want it to do Rosa's post are encouraging. (When I say nice in this context I mean that as a compliment. She's been encouraging and friendly to people all over the Internet and takes time from what I know is a busy schedule to encourage people whether she'll ever meet them or not. This is a hugely good character trait in my book.)

http://talkingstory.org/2011/10/3-job-options-of-merit/

I am in favor of encouragement in the face of adversity for a couple reasons.

1) If looking down the barrel of a bad situation being defeatist or negative won't help at all. Just the opposite, hope, optimism, and mutual encouragement can make the going smoother even if they don't address the problem at hand. Attitude is everything.
b) Sometimes weathering bad times isn't a function of anything we do at all... sometimes big giant things happen to us, hurricanes for example, that we can't really do anything about and we just have to wait for it to go away and there are times when being open to new ideas, optimistic, and encouraging foster and create an atmosphere where the community going through it all comes out the other side stronger because of the relationships or ideas formed during the hardship. It may be that sitting around a campfire in the devastation of a tornado brings up conversations that "When this is over we should..." and those things, those building blocks actually come to pass.
iii) Encouraging small behavioral changes, things we CAN do helps build things in areas we can change. I can't personally impact the nation's economy. What I can do is help my employees with savings and maybe with opportunities to increase their pay with sales incentives and bonus programs. I can't help everybody, but I can help those I can help and just because it doesn't stem the tide it does start a ripple that can add to other ripples and maybe that will be enough to change things... or at least moderate things a bit.

There are a lot of opportunities out there to tear people down for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it's just fun to be an ass. I've met people who sincerely believe that by bullying or threatening they can help a situation. Can all situations be dealt with by applying a healthy dose of Pollyanna-juice? Not all, not all the time. But I can't think of a situation where being a jerk was more helpful than being supportive or helpful or encouraging. Maybe it's time to start a random act of kindness campaign if nothing else.

Take a minute, go check out Rosa's blog and http://talkingstory.org/2011/10/3-job-options-of-merit/ think of what you can do to help the situation of yourself AND someone else.

My conversations are mine... or should be

2011-09-25T12:27:00.000-05:00

Facebook has had a lot of press lately about their changes and that's great. There's no such thing as bad press and all that. I've used Facebook to reconnect with friends from all different times in my life from grade school through high school and previous jobs. It's been really nice to get to know those people again.
I work in retail. I sometimes talk about my work. I sometimes talk about how my day went. I sometimes say things I don't want all my customers, employees, or my co-workers to know. I have always kept my facebook pretty locked down so only my friends could see things. I don't friend employees even if they ask, and if they ask me why I explain that I keep online-me separate from worker-me. I would have real life conversations by private message about my privacy concerns and how I don't want to talk about certain things about work or where I work or with whom I work to be out in the wild. My work's online policy didn't used to exist for the first 16 years I was with the company and I was very careful to not step on any toes... then it came into existence and is, I think, draconian in the extreme. But my choices are abide by it or quit. The thing is, things I've already said are out there, and some may be in violation of the new policy. No problem a) they're in the past and predate the policy and b) my status updates etc are friends only... and I don't friend ppl at work who don't know my policy about talking about work.
Then facebook made a change that makes in unusable for me.
If one of my friends comments on one of my friends only posts it's no longer friends only. Now any of their friends can read the post and comment on it... from anywhere in time on facebook.
Translation: I have no privacy settings that mean anything. Everything I have ever done and will ever do on facebook is potentially public whether I chose for it to be or not or whether I want it to be or not. Things I said to select groups of people that were formerly assumed to be the equivalent of a whisper in a restaurant, if they reply on facebook now would be a stentorian yell that the entire restaurant could hear and not just their reply, but my comment as well.
I'm not comfortable with that.
I carefully monitor and maintain my online identity to be in conformity with what I want it to be or maybe even need it to be in regards to customers, clients, employers, co-workers. If I can't control it I won't use it. I can't use it. It's not safe for me to. No, I'm not being overly dramatic.
So, I've closed my facebook account. Will I open it again in the future? I don't know. Right now the risks to me and my real life aren't worth the virtual fun I got out of it. That's too bad. I'll miss those people.

* Zombie Rich by +byron rempel and it was animated by +Dunken K. Bliths. I found both of them on Google+.

So what do you think?

2011-09-18T22:56:00.001-05:00

Two doors down there is a shed with a light on the apex of the roof. At night it's a picture, seriously perfect picture... even with a crappy camera like mine I think it would do well... good fore and background.

BUT (and you knew there had to be one right?)

There's a street light at 10 o'clock that I can't figure out a way to get out of the frame and the light from it would take the picture from "Wooooooo..." to "Oh yah, a shed." Now, I know shooting the street light out is probably bad. (I could leave off probably but it's for ART right? lol I keed. I keed.)

So, should I just shrug and not take it or take it and photoshop the light out of it? I ask this because it's no longer a picture if I start monkeying with it is it? I mean yanking a big honking light pole and light out of it is pretty much changing it a lot right?

Or is that OK? Is post processing assumed in just about any picture any more and I'm a naive dumbaxx for assuming all those great shots I see here are really that great in the raw?

Opinions? Thoughts? (No. I'm not going to shoot out the street light. That would be one of those "bad things" I keep reading about in the paper.

(For an example of some pictures I've taken check out my flickr page. They're not all great, but there are some good ones in there. One day I need to make an album of the ones I think are my best.)