Koda

日本語を勉強します。OMG! 名前は片仮名で書きました！

(I am studying Japanese. OMG! The name was written in Katakana!)

Yeah, I know it’s been a lot of fluff posts lately… I’m sorry, but I haven’t found the time to do (or write about) anything particularly interesting on the technical side. However, there are (and always will be) lots of interesting ramblings to share… so here’s some more.

Today I got to see the first video in my Japanese Culture class. It’s a neat little course, and so every other Friday I will be able to enjoy a bit more of this fascinating culture. The movie we watched today was pretty awesome… a samurai story exploring gender and social power and the ethics around them (in historic Japan). So anyway, it’s a real drawn out story about a Samurai’s son who is ordered to marry the lord’s mistress (who bore the lord a child), and they fall in love only to find that due to circumstances the lord wishes that he have her back. So of course, the father and son can’t let that happen. But long story short, we sit through 1:30 of pretty cerebral (and completely fight-free) tension, only to run out of time right before the real samurai style ass-kicking begins. You can look at the IMDB page… and yes, that movie poster seems to be showing the fight scene that will surely be bugging me all week.

This Firefox video seems fast on its way to becoming viral (omg! I used a buzz word!). But honestly, childish and poorly produced as it may be, I laughed. Hysterically. It’s kind of sad to see the anti-quicktime anti-firefox response these first contenders seem to have attracted… though it was also quite disappointing to see that the web designers had opted to use an open source unfriendly and hard to use quicktime embed instead of better distribution methods. But regardless, it’s quite silly to see some of the early adopters reacting in such a way that defaces the pages of some bravely uninvolved contest entrants. Surely there is a more mature way to express codec-induced anger than this.

Finally, if you like optical illusions, you’re in luck, because out of complete whim and amusement, here’s a feed for a more-than-daily updated blog dedicated solely to this purpose. There’s a lot of nice unique stuff there, and looking through them will certainly eat up at least 15 minutes of your time.

Yum. Mighty Optical Illusions

Good night.

Hmm, apologies for the lack of updates over the last week. It’s funny, while just a few weeks ago I felt I had to much to say, lately I simply haven’t had much to talk about. Been doing lots of art, design, and other things… but for some reason a lot of my usual desire to write about it hasn’t been there. So the blog’s been on the backburner for the last week or so.

Did some quick design work this evening for a friend over at HackersEntity… it was fun to just throw some ideas together quickly for a change. HackersEntity is an (ethical) source for hacking information and knowledge. We were shooting for a bit of an unconventional layout, with the navigational content at the bottom right, and nothing (for now) but a symbol at the usual top left. My idea behind this was to use the “newline symbol” as a logo/motif for the layout, as the newline could be considered as the classic character utilized by computer hackers. So, the newline up at the top left is supposed to uphold this design and point the reader down to where the real information lies. There’s not a lot of content up yet, though I’m sure there will be in the next couple of days. It’s a fun little unique layout, and I certainly had fun working on it.

School’s started up nice and busy-like, and I’m once again finding myself caught up with a good deal of homework and on-campus time. But hey, the days are getting brighter, the weather’s getting warmer - the end is within sight.

I decided to take a course on Existential Philosophy this term, and so far the readings have been suitably thought-provoking. Over the week I read “Waiting For Godot” and have been thinking about it - but the sad thing is that after the other assigned 2 pages or so of Camus, I must say that I found that Camus put forth similar ideas in a much more accessible and short manner (which is ironic considering Waiting For Godot is a play). The ideas are very interesting, and really fit with some of the things I’ve been thinking about (here and elsewhere).

However, the thing about this philosophy is, I guess I feel that any discussion I make of the ideas will come out missing the punchline of the material, and not making a lot of sense. It’s kind of strange for me to find myself thinking this, because at the same time I can see the silliness in my fear of not being able to discuss the concepts with the right level of “authority.” In light of this, I am tempted to post something about the topic now, but once again I find myself concerned about not getting it right in my currently sleepy state. Boy, what happened to that blind self-assurance I once knew and loved! I’ll let myself off the hook for now…

… One part of the course is to be writing weekly reflections/notes on the reading presented - and so I hope to post selections from those that I find most apropos. It is truly fascinating stuff, and I enjoy thinking about it… and I hope you might enjoy reading some rambling about it in the future, too.

Today I had my first Aikido class for at least 10 months. It was fantastic… just being back in a familiar dojo with my old sensei. Boy, it’s such a wonderful feeling to just be thrown around for a while and rolling - it’s about the closest feeling you can get to flying in my opinion. I was embarrasingly rusty, but after a little while (and some prodding by sensei) it was pretty easy to get flowing again. It’s so great to be back!

It’s also made me very tired, so this will be it for now. Good night!

This seems like deja vu.

It’s spring break, so theoretically I should be blasting through all of those wonderful things I put off until the end of the semester. Clean the room, send the emails, get out more. You know. Yet paradoxically, it seems that when I have more free time I get less free time things done. This happened before over the winter break. I suppose that when I shouldn’t be doing them, I pace myself better…

That is not to say that I’m not getting some interesting things done in the mean time. I’ve be You might notice some incremental aesthetic changes here and there. I’m busy tweaking! Also, I’ve got a Calculus II final coming up tomorrow, so there’s (supposedly) been some studying towards that. Wish me luck!

Lately, I’ve become rather hopelessly addicted to Last.fm and it’s internet radio service. It’s such a pleasure to see a service that give some serious attention to it’s Linux client, and does it in a very open-sourcy way. Unfortunately, my Internet connection can barely keep it up, but that doesn’t stop me from using it. I used to be a LAUNCHcast listener, but the bloat, annoyance of their service (audio ads!), and eventually a lack of interest drove me away. There’s one really way to keep listeners, and Last.fm got it: community.

Their site is what I would call an exemplary example of good web (and community) design. They do some really neat things with javascript and subtle flash. I flirted with posting one of their auto-generated profile images of my listening statistics over on the sidebar, but I don’t think they really belong there. It’s really great to see a legal music service that actually seems to have some life in it. The tag station system is also fantastic - now I can say I’ve truly experienced christian, german, and japanese hip-hop, and some other frighteningly funny subgenres of music.

My home though has been their “Piano Rock” station, which I was surprised to find myself enjoying a lot. Their service has been so effective that it’s motivated me to purchase some new CDs, which is something I haven’t done for quite some time. I wish the music industry would catch on that this is the way to go. The thing is, without cultivating a market for discovering music on the Internet, there will be no motivation from customers such as myself to have an interest in the media. I won’t be ripped off on DRM-infested downloads, and will buy the real thing if it’s worth it - but without knowing what I like, there is no “worth it.” Now all I have to do is wait for my Amazon order to arrive…

deviantART seems to be going in some funky directions in the mean time. I’m not sure whether to love them or hate them at this point… honestly it’s all been kind of funky since the two co-founders have gone. At this point, I feel I’m there for the fantastic people I’ve met and the free hosting - not much appreciation for the company or staff itself. This is kind of sad, as around this time last year things were quite different. There seems to be a real difference between the attitudes of the corporate/administor staff and the community/artist staff members - and I can’t say I like it. The fact that they always have to overcompensate for their changes is enough of a red flag. I’m also not sure I like the idea of their allusion to “professional portfolio” services… seems to me this will have to take away some of that kooky egalitarian atmosphere I’ve always loved.

In other news, the Orange project is nearing it’s March 24th movie premiere. If you have not heard of it, the Orange project goal is a professional quality open Blender movie. And they did it! They’ll be premiering it in Amsterdam in just a few short days. How exciting! Definitely a site to watch over the next few days.

Well, I told myself I’d sit down and write a 15 minute post, but this has become a bit of a long one. Ah well. It’s time to do a little more studying and sleep. I hope this has been at least a little bit interesting.

Isn’t it funny, how we can end up playing so many roles in our lives. How suddenly we’re exchanging places with people, taking the roles of people who once held them too. How one moment you’re someone for one person, and suddenly you’re someone completely different for another.

For some reason, lately I’m reaching to find a metaphor in things.

Every now and then, I cross paths with a person for a moment and then we go our separate ways. Some of these experiences feel like little vignettes, little pieces of something larger that I haven’t found yet. Who am I?

I’m that guy in the field, who for the life of him could not get his boomerang to return to him.
And every time he loses it, he has to return to it instead of it returning to him.

Sometimes in life I feel like I’m playing a character in a story. The character isn’t me, bit I accept it because it’s something I know I can become for the moment.

Stories aren’t always bad. Maybe you’ll be in mine some day.

… literally. Spring break has started with a bang… or rather a cough.

Expect some interesting things over the days to come.

However, right now, I must sleep.

Oh, and here’s a feed for a friday. Download Squad

Dreaming…

… is profound.

Music…

… is inexplicable.

Creativity…

… is unavoidable.

Joy…

… is never unattainable.

Sleep…

… is really really useful.

Today was spent mostly tweaking more fun CSS details, and around the house. I went to see Good Night, and Good Luck today - very interesting film. The quality of the acting and production was very good, and the message relevant and interesting. All about the importance (and the dissolution of) our media. A lot to think about.

Unfortunately a lot of the intricacies probably flew over my head, likely due to the CSS-induced lack of sleep from last night’s efforts. Definitely something I’d see again, to be able to catch those important details. The film was done all in black and white and really immersive - pretty arty. At first the lack of color started to annoy me, but I could see so much texture in the grayscale that I liked it after a while (and I knew it would stay that way).

Quick update on Compiz: after a few days of normal desktop use (art, internet, email), I have to say that I am still very satisfied with Compiz’s performance. Only a few minor crashes: every now and then gnome-window-manager dies, and window borders disappear - opening up gnome-terminal and starting it up again solves the problem. I haven’t seen Compiz on a whole do much mischeif. Idle performance is very good; the fans stay on the lowest speed on my desktop-replacement laptop/brick. It doesn’t seem to be eating a lot of memory, either. No surprises, other than the total bling of it all.

Good night, and good luck!