This is how my inauguration day started. I think it’s going to be a good day for photography.
Housekeeping
A little housekeeping news:
I had a blog that about 5 people read on a yearly basis. It was called, http://birth.ofthecool.com, I updated it every 2 months, and never told anybody about it. I’ve tried to be a little more active on this new blog and decided to collapse the old blog to the new blog.
All birth.ofthecool.com blog entries can be viewed here.
lights on the moto
Last month, I bought two 1100x PIAA lights for my motorcycle. My 07 sv650N has a single front headlight that has both high beam and low beam. The sun goes down so early these days that I ride home every day in the dark. I’ve been looking for a little more light to be more visible (so someone doesn’t hit me) and to see more things (so I don’t hit anything). I selected these halogen lights because that are very bright and have a wide spread, since most of my riding is in the city.
I had a couple of problems with installing the light, one foreseen, one unforeseen. I knew it would be a pain to mount the lights. There needed to be a bit of shock protection, clear sight, and sufficient separation in the lights. I bought a couple of electrical clamps and wrapped the mounting points with electrical tape.
So far they’ve been absolutely great. I’m able to see more and I feel like more people can see me, too. I really like having an annoyingly bright light. Maybe it’s my nature of being a younger brother?
Nothing to see, keep on walking
My friend John told me about this story …
Joshua Bell, one of the world’s best violinist stopped in a subway station in D.C. a year ago and played a concert on a $3.5 million dollar violin. So, you say, “I didn’t hear about that.” Yes, that’s true. Hardly anybody stopped to watch. It’s a fascinating 3 minute video to watch. The Washington Post recorded and gathered phone numbers from the 1,000 that passed. Later that day they called to see if they saw anything unusual. Again, only a couple people realized what they were watching.
It’s a fascinating human study. Do we only recognize good art if we’re told it’s good? I guess so.
My favorite part: There was one common demographic that wanted to stop and watch. The kids. Too bad their parents didn’t notice what they were seeing.
10 days left
I remember …
… 3 am, the first tuesday of November in 2000. Florida was called for Bush the second time, and declared the winner
… the next 30 days of recount madness. Lots of maneuvering and court decisions that I didn’t understand. I was a freshman in college, I knew it wasn’t going our way, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I wore a Nader pin on my backpack, but I voted for Gore.
… the summer of 2001. The news was so boring, except for one thing that stood out in my head. I remember hearing the warning about a possible terrorist attack in August 01.
… 9/11. My mom woke me up, I had just gotten a new job with Starbucks and stayed up late the night before playing video games (Mario 3, I believe). I didn’t know what to think. So, I decided to drive out to my parents house. For months, I kept on looking in the sky for airplanes and it caused me to rear end someone that fall. It didn’t make sense to me. The anthrax attacks, the war, the discrimination of non wasp’s; things felt like they were spiraling out of control.
… Colin Powell testifying at the UN. It was my Dad’s birthday, 2/5/03. I woke up that day and listened to it on the radio and it didn’t feel right.
… the start of the war. My sister and I made a couple of trips downtown that week to march through downtown and make noise. It didn’t make a difference.
… election night 2004. wtf?
… driving back from Montana with Andrea and hearing about Katrina in August 05. That gross negligence was criminal.
… 11/4/08. I ran up and down the streets in Seattle high fiving everyone. The next day I slept in and spent the whole day rewatching speeches and crying.
There are only 10 days left of this monster and his cronies.
They should be prosecuted and thrown in jail.
Snow, wtf?
seriously? it’s snowing again? I’ve spent the entire weekend on the couch watching football and working on the Preons website. I think I’m going to go outside today and go for a walk. in the snow.
Neither the wife, nor I, are OK with the snow, until winter 09-10.
In other news: Narcissism alert.
Upgrade
I just upgraded to wordpress 2.7 … It was actually pretty easy. I like the new interface so far.
1 year in 40 sec.
So, this is very cool.
One year in 40 seconds from Eirik Solheim on Vimeo.
Snowpacalypse ’08
My cats are completely freaked out by the snow. Zooey keeps on trying to swat at the white stuff through the window. I took him outside yesterday and he freaked out.
I’ve been firmy situated on the couch for the past 4 days…
• reading the prez-elect’s first book ‘dreams from my father’
• watching ‘it’s always sunny in Philadelphia’ on hulu. Hilarious … Kind of reminds me of ‘arrested development’, but a little more immature.
• west 5 has become the official bar of snowpacalypse 08
• Tweeting on the company account …
• Enjoying redhook’s winterhook brew and dogfish head’s 60 and 90 minute ipa’s.
• Teaching myself how to make the perfect omlette.
• Keeping tabs on the weather through the Cliff Mass weather blog.
• now … Watching the seahawks play in Seattle snow. It’s a fumblerama out there.
I kind of want it to warm up so I can start riding the bike again. I think it’ll be a couple more weeks.
What is Twitter?
In the past 6 months Twitter has become a major function of my job. We’ve had some incredible successes, all of which I’m very proud of and none of which I will repeat here. However, for the non-digital-native crew, this world is completely unknown, and in some cases scary. I’ve tried multiple approaches when someone asks me, “what is Twitter”. Recently, I’ve resorted to just chuckling, because I don’t know what else to say to make it ‘click’. Sometimes I want to reference the Supreme Court case with Larry Flynt that ends with, “you know it when you see it.” That’s kind of how Twitter is.
Case in point: two days ago I brought a pack of instant miso soup that I had purchased from PCC grocery. They are a co-op that I grew up on when i was a kid. I love shopping there, the food is delicious, the people are always great, and it reminds me of being a kid. Anyways, I brought the miso soup to work, and made it as an afternoon snack. It turned out to be completely horrible, undrinkable bad. I’m not a complainer, generally. I usually respond to bad food by not returning to a restaurant, rather than sending food back. On my twitter account I said that my miso soup was really bad, and was disappointed. I was only hoping to get some sympathy from my wife and friends on Twitter. It turns out PCC has a twitter account, they saw my tweet and responded to me directly. It made me feel really good. They should never be afraid of losing my business, but the connection they made is important.
The Twitter account that I run for my company has grown to over 18k, and I’m disappointed that I can’t respond in kind to everyone this same way. I try, but there aren’t enough hours in the day.
I guess the point of this is post is a question … what is the best way that you’ve explained it, in 2 sentences to non-digital-natives. I get blank stares with the standard answers. I have some ideas in my head, and I think about it often … but I’m still missing that golden bullet.
PR is 98% of it
I love YouTube. It gives me old Miles Davis interviews with awkward msm wannabe anchors.
“Don’t tell ‘em nothin, let ‘em guess. … What’s he gonna do next?”
Gumbel, “You like the Mystery”
“They like it, I’m cool.”
Miles with Bryant Gumbel:
I’ve read more books about Miles Davis than anybody else. His Autobiography at least twice, end to end. This Book about Kind of Blue. This Book about his later years. This Book, a biography written from an outsiders perspective.
His autobiography is my favorite. Not because it was the most insightful, or because it taught me how to play like him, but because it was the most entertaining. His relentless pursuit for the love of music. His seemingly dark underbelly and rage; the opaque nature and sheer humanity that came through in the tenderness of his playing. Once I discovered Miles Davis, I stopped caring about playing music as technical as I could (perhaps, to my detriment), and started thinking more about ‘the sound.’ Timbre’s, moods, and personalities of sounds are what I think about these days.
The late Roy Cummings told me once about a friend that highlighed every Motherfucker that he writes in his book. The whole book turned out highlighter green. He manages to find a way to use the word as an adjective, noun, and verb.
Miles Davis has meant a lot to me, it’s really neat to see interviews with him.
Fifty Years of Popular songs in single sentences
Another genius piece from McSweeney’s
The hack that would have ruined the internet
This 26 year old discovered a hack that would have destroyed the internet. It’s a fascinating read, even my wife was interested in it when I started telling her about it.
His path started with trying to get free wifi at Starbucks.
He remembered that he had gotten into Starbucks’ locked network using the domain name system, or DNS. When someone types google .com into a browser, DNS has a list of exactly where Google’s servers are and directs the traffic to them. It’s like directory assistance for the Internet. At Starbucks, the port for the low-bandwidth DNS connection—port 53—was left open to route customers to the Pay for Starbucks Wi-Fi Web page. So, rather than pay, Kaminsky used port 53 to access the open DNS connection and get online. It was free but super-slow, and his friends mocked him mercilessly.
It’s a good read. Check it out.
my new favorite band: MGMT
Initially, without listening to MGMT, I brushed them off as a noun/verb - digit band (ala, SUM-41, blink-182, etc). I noticed that their album was still ranked pretty high in the iTunes store a couple of weeks ago, I bought it. I’m really glad I did. Turns out, it’s a really good band. The tracks fall into the danceable category with lyrics that are decent.
Oracular Spectacular was produced with by Dave Fridmann, the Flaming Lips’ producer. It is very apparent. The album made complete sense after I discovered.* The feel of the album reminds me very much of the Lips. The ways that he creates space and timbres in the music gives it buoyancy and life. Crisp, interesting, and permeable sounds dominate the landscape. He seems to do this by bouncing ostinato style sounds between the left and right speakers, as well as using it for call-response type lines in other instrumental sections. It turns it into definite headphone material.
This one is worth picking up.
8/10
* I love my iPhone and buying music on iTunes, but it sure does suck that you can’t look at linear note like you used it. I know apple will solve this sooner than later… but it’s still too bad.
Moto-cycling
I’ve been the proud owner of a 2007 Suzuki sv650 for almost 6 months. The winter months are upon me and I’ve been looking for ways to improve the ride when it gets cold and dark by making myself warmer and more visible. My first major upgrade to the bike was a couple of months ago. I installed a givi windscreen, and that has helped tremendously lately. I’m forced to duck down a little when it gets cold, but it pushes the air over me. The next step is going to be better lighting. My SV650 is the naked version, sans the sport fairings and sport lighting. The aesthetic appeals to me, as does the riding position. Unfortunately, the front headlight contains both the high and low beam, this concerns me, as I would like be slightly more visible (read: annoying) to other drivers. I turn on the high beam when the traffic is heavy and it’s dark out. I think I’ve settled on placing 2 aux PIAA lamps up front, low to the ground. I still need to investigate mounting methods and make sure the electrical system can handle them.
next:
- heated grips
- Corbin seat
- luggage