Monthly Archive for December, 2005

Book Review

Published on December 25, 2005 in Uncategorized. 5 Comments


I just fiished Michael Cunningham’s A Home at the End of the World. It wasn’t the best book I’ve read in recent memory, but it was quite good. I have been reading it religiously since I’ve been home, catching a few pages here and there: in bed, on the john, et cetera. It’s compelling enough for those places.

The book is about finding your way into your own present. It’s about the futures we try to live in but never exactly find, and the circumstances we find ourselves when we realize which aspects of our lives are not a dream. It’s also about love between men and men and love between men and women. It portrays relationships that don’t fit well inside accepted notions of “family”. It is about mothers as monsters and protectors and about women reinventing themselves at sixty. It is about the relationship between children and their parents.

It’s a well written novel, with characters that feel real and speak with convincing voices. There are moments of poignant reality and episodes of astonishing spectacle.

However, it’s somewhat plodding, without much movement in plot. The characters change dramatically, but their lives, in the end, are unimpressive. It is not a Michael Chriton novel by any stretch of the imagination. But if you are in the mood to ponder the banality and sacrifice of genuine human relationships, it is just the ticket.

Thanksgiving Toast

Published on December 21, 2005 in Favorites. 0 Comments

On Thanksgiving day I was driving my grandmother to my aunt’s house for the big dinner. In the car she said “I hope somebody mentions Grosspapi today.” Grosspapi is my grandfather who died this spring.

Right as dinner was starting, my Aunt asked who was going to say grace. She always does this, so I could’ve predicted it, but I didn’t. We don’t say grace before meals in my family. When I was a kid we would hold hands and all say together “how nice it is to sit and eat with friends.” But we don’t do that anymore.

So when my Aunt looked at me and asked if I would say grace I was kind of dumbfounded. I hadn’t thought about it at all. I sat there blankly for a minute, trying to think of something to say. I almost launched into saying something about what I was thankful for, but someone got impatient and suggested we just start eating without saying grace. The moment passed. Crisis averted. But later on I felt guilty: I had an opportunity to talk about Grosspapi, like Gramma asked, but I passed it up. I wasn’t ready for it.

I’ve thought about this a few times since then, feeling a little guilty every time. I’m not a terribly attentive grandson. I just tend to forget things. I think I’m a reasonably attentive friend, but I have an out of sight/out of mind issue. I just don’t see my grandmother that often, and I only think to write her letters every couple of months, often at the wrong moment.

I’m getting on a tangent. The reason I started writing this is because I thought of my Thanksgiving toast, about a month after Thanksgiving. It’d go like this:

I am thankful to be with my family after such a long time.
And though I’m sad Grosspapi is not here, I am thankful for everything he taught me.
And I’m thankful that he taught those same things to all of you, and that I can see so much of him reflected in you.
And I’m thankful for this delicious food. So let’s eat.

Uhh

Published on December 20, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

What is Google, like, a mutual fund now?

What’s unsaid

Published on December 20, 2005 in Uncategorized. 1 Comment

I’m sitting in a dusty room in my bed reading Michael Cunningham. There are suitcases at the foot of the bed and a chair, awkwardly positioned. Stacked on the chair are an upturned ottoman, some coats and a laundry basket.

It’s amazing all of the things good writers can cram into seemingly innocuous sentences.

I believed then it was the heart of New York City. I believe it to this day.

The narrator (Bobby) believed something a long time ago, and he’s given it some consideration and he still believes it, and he has a bunch of reasons for that. In fact, the conviction is probably stronger. It’s so internalized he doesn’t think of himself as believing it. But all of that is unsaid.

Jonathan paid for them all with a credit card.

Cunningham mentions the credit card so you remember that Bobby is a country bumpkin and the use of a credit card is a novelty to him. Again, he doesn’t say it directly, he just highlights it implicity.

More decor than the entire state of Maine,” Jonathan added

Jonathan knows something about Maine. He’s sort of an easterner now. He’s no longer a one-state Ohio boy. Also, he is a columnist, and says the kind of things that people only say when they are trying to come up with something witty.

Sometimes we say things like this by accident. Telling questions. Freudian slips. But often our language is laborious and plain. It’s hard to write well. Knowing how to keep things implicit is an art.

I would love to be able to do this in my personal statements. How do you list accomplishments so that they sound impressive but accurate? How do you describe your projects and simultaneously tell your reader that you are excited and knowledgeable? Writing a personal statement is all about injecting your good qualities into your words so that you get them across without saying them outright.

Becuase you can’t just say “I’m hot shit”.

Grunge Design

Published on December 18, 2005 in Uncategorized. 1 Comment

Many web sites, print ads and other graphic artifacts (not to mention clothes) are using a kind of worn-out graphic style that is sometimes called grunge design. Here’s a random example. Today I came across a tutorial for generating that wicked worn look in Photoshop. Here’s what I was able to do with the American Bogwalking Association logo:

Original:

bogwalking.gif

Grunge:

bogwalking.gif

Just realized

Published on December 18, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

There are a lot of things in this world that make me feel attractive.

This shirt is not one of them.

New Portfolio

Published on December 18, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Since I am applying to Ph.D. programs I have been working on updating my portfolio to be nicer, more current and more informative. So far I’ve created a mockup of a new visual style and layout, and wrote up some of the work I have been doing with Yvonne:

portfolio-mockup.jpg

Portfolio mockup

Now I just have to implement it in HTML, write all the copy and create all the images.

Update: Here is a mockup for the index page.

portfolio-index-mockup.jpg

Mockup of the index page for my new portfolio

More Adventurous

Published on December 18, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

If anyone out there is still stressing about life, love, or work, listen here. It’s that song I mentioned. Still hitting the spot.

Code Monkey At Work

Published on December 17, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

I just happened across a mention of some work I did a long time ago. What a blast from the past…

In 2002, Nat Friedman, a free software hacker who co-founded Ximian (now owned by Novell) and someone I admire, posted on his blog how much he liked the movie Amelie. I had recently bought an Amelie postcard on eBay to send as a gift to a friend, but the eBay seller, who was apparently trying to get rid of excess inventory, sent me several. I sent one of these extra postcards to Nat, with a note of thanks for all the cool software he had contributed to and given away for free. In response he sent me some swag: a Ximian t-shirt, and a plush monkey called Rupert, Ximian’s mascot.

A college student with too much time on his hands, I decided to make a movie out of it, and “Code Monkey At Work” was born, and achieved minor celebrity. Click the image below to watch the original video.

Rupert-in-code-monkey-at-work.png
Watch the video

Revelations 24:7

Published on December 17, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

My salad has been tasting funny all week.

I washed my lettuce really thoroughly today.

I think it was pesticide.