Introspection

My relatsionship with Christi had many problems. We had different methods of dealing with them and different ideas about what they were. What we were agreed upon was that June 2002 - the end of 2003 was a messy, bad time. My way of dealing with this was simply not to deal with it. I wanted to focus on loving each other and hope of the future. Christi wanted to directly address these lingering issues. Neither of us has especially good communication skills, so when she would try to address these problems, I would not get what she was talking about and be upset and not want to think about the bad past.

She, however, wouldn't let go of the past and so the past rose up and bit me at the start of winter break. I spent the winter break contemplating the past and patterns in our relationship that had not changed since we were 19 even though we had changed and the patterns weren't good then and had gotten less good over time. The past was a huge ocean, rising up and threatening to drown me. It was too big. I didn't understand what Christi was talking about and it hurt me. The way she said it hurt me, but I didn't tell her that. If only we would just focus on the bright and hopeful future, it would all go away and everything would be ok.

The magnitude of past hurts, when I couldn't ignore it anymore, was overwhelming. How christi tried to talk about it (and I resisted) hurt in a correspondingly overwhelming way. Not only was it huge and horrible, but she wouldn't let go of it. I couldn't see a way to let go of it without letting go of her. It was the only thing I could think of to do. Trying to talk about it would just hurt me further. It would hurt her. There was no point in drowning ourselves in an ocean of woe. I stopped talking to her to avoid having to talk about this. I was frustrated by her unwillingness to simply embrace my vision of a future disconnected from the last 2 years.

Today, Alvin told a story about a guy explaining his compositional style by writing the word Beethoven on a piece of paper. then he wrote "19th century." then he wrote "minimalism." He drew an arc from "Beethoven" to "minimalism," bypassing the 19th century and then wrote his own name next to "minimalism." It's a nice notion to think we can ignore the 19th century, and indeed we try, but it's foolish to assert that it hasn't changed and affected us as composers. Lou Harrison editted Ives, who took all of his ideas from the 19th century. I listen to Lou and get ideas from him. I come from a 19th century musical heritage which I cannot escape from.

But I wanted to escape from the last 2 years. I wanted to draw a line from returning from Europe in 2001 (full of ideas and enthusiasm) to the present. And maybe this composer in Alvin's anecdote could make a reasonable claim to being unscathed by the 19th century, but I couldn't make a similar claim about 2002. I didn't want to talk about the last couple years. I didn't want to think about them. But with Christi arriving and the sort of introspection one engages in around the New Year, I did think about them. It was a deep chasm from which there seemed to be no way to get out. I told Amy later, "how much can two people hurt each other before it's enough?"

So I stopped talking to Christi, but I couldn't stop thinking about her. I got back to school and thought, "I want to run away from home." but I already had. running away from home doesn't help. Problems have an uncanny way of following you. Trying to ignore things doesn't make them go away. focussing soley on the future is not a way to fix problems of any kind. My denial of the past was as useful to our relationship as Dubya trying to fix the deficit by setting up a lunar base. Both ideas are fueled by a sort of optomism, but a ludicrous way to deal with any sort of present problem. Both require a solid foundation that needs/needed repairs before it support such a project. My refusing to talk about the past or deal with it was like Dubya ignoring WMD stuff in the State of the Union. It must be addressed. (I must stop comparing myself to Bush!!)

I never told any of this to christi. It didn't fit in my world view of "if we just ignore this it will go away." It certainly didn't fit with fleeing tidal waves from the past. and it was a tidal wave. The past had been steadily collecting behind me, waiting for me to examine it. It's like the reading backlog I'm already generating in my Mystic Voices class. (alas) I cannot explain how overwhelmingly huge the unexamined past was or be less metaphorical in my description. What is true is that I needed/need space to deal with huge personal demons. I could not discuss them with Christi then. It looked like I would never be able to. Breaking up with Christi seemed like the most sensible option and the least painful for me and for her.

Obviously, breaking up with Christi and fleeing to Connecticut did not make these demons disappear. I took with me two carry on bags, one checked bag, and the maximum limmit of emotional baggage (one day in therapy and I'm already in cheesy metaphor land). And I've been examining the recent past. And suddenly many of the seemingly hurtful things that Christi said seem to make sense. Suddenly, it's clear that she was trying to slay some demons instead of having them creep up on us forever. That our 19 year old patterns didn't fit anymore. That we had to talk about the future not in vague, hopeful terms, but in the concrete and rooted in our experience. She also hurt my feelings. Neither of us is good at this communication thing. It's hard to do over the phone. She may not have hurt me on purpose.

I love her

So now what?

New Cell Phone

So apparently, it was not beating my cellphone against a pillar in Oakland that temporarily cured it of it's antenna woes (although that seemed to help). My pld phone existed on a different frequency than the new system in Connecticut. this explains why my reception was steadily degrading (as they changed the system) and why it would spring back to life in NYC and CA.

I have a new phone as of today that works on both the NY/CA frequency and the new CT frequency and it didn't cost me anything. The guy at the phone store assured me that my old phone would be sent to CA and sold as refurbished and not go into a landfill. He also gave me the name and phone number of a recording studio in Hartford that often needs bassists to sit in on pop/punk recording sessions. I also learned that the fancy new cell phone rings are actually mp3s. so my dream of composing cell phone rings is a bit odd then, since any song can already be a ring. I'm going to double check this last fact. But maybe I can play in a poppy punk band at least.

My personal ad is liove, but doesn't yet have a picture. So far, no replies. I'm feeling far less certain about things than I did earlier. My confusion and unhappiness is great. My tears flow freely. I went to the school shrink and cried a lot. She wants to see me for the next two weeks. she does a great concerned expression. It must be hard to listen to woes all day. I had dinner with some undergrads and said i had seen one of the shrinks and they all knew her. Everyone in Middletown is insane. The people in the mental hospital are insane. The people in the halfway houses are insane. the people in the grocery stores are insane. everyone connected to the university is insane. we're all damn crazy around around here. I want to go home. I kind of wish that I had never come.

On the other hand

If I had gone to gamelan, I probably would not have read Christi's blog and spent the evening crying.

Find me on yahoo

After 24 hours pass

I am a music grad student at Wesleyan and am new to Connecticut. I'm looking to meet someone for friendship or dating. I enjoy experimental music, radical leftism and long walks on the beach with my dog. I also like to read and program my computer. My friends say that I'm funny and a good bass player. I'm an idealist. I speak Esperanto. I'm looking for someone funny and kind who digs music.

aside from starting nearly every sentence with "I," how'd I do?

Personal Ad

Ok, so I'm thinking of doing it.

Nubile grad student seeks woman aged 23-50 for friendship, dating. I enjoy experimental music, radical leftism and long walks on the beach.

Apparently, I'm not "nubile" as I am not in a "marriageable condition." And I have virtually no idea what to say. Actually, I kind of like the second sentence.

Slacking

Apparently, I don't need to take Gamelan again and indeed, would not receive crtedit for it. I only need two semesters of ensemble and I've already got one of them. And Gamelan, from 8:00 - 10:00 pm, is my only thursday class. Therefore, I am about to drop out of it. I mean, I like gamelan, but it's my only thursday class.

Boston

Yesterday, Jess, Angela, and I went to Boston for a day trip. We left kind of late, which is fine with me because I was mostly into clubbing, but it disturbed Jess. She used to live in Cambridge, the suburb (?) of Boston which contains Harvard. She did not go to Harvard, but went to Brandeis (where she got her first masters), which she commuted to. She did her undergrad at Columbia. When in Connecticut, she likes to go to New Haven and hang around Yale. She clearly has an Ivy League fetish.

So we went and hung around her old haunts from her year in the area. She was intent on showing us everything cool. When some members of our group had to go to the bathroom, for example, she declared that she would take us to the public restroom voted "best place to pee" by a local free newspaper. (It was considerate, but I think the place voted "closest place to pee" might have been better suited to the occasion.)

My goal was to go hang around the gay district. Her goal was to take us to museums, but we left too late, so in liue of that, we went to the best coffee shops and bookshops in the area. She took us to a cafe called "the Other Side," which was very granola-crunchy and actually had really good beer. There is good beer on the East Coast! Hope returns to a cold, dark world.

We rode the MTA, but they kept raising the faire by a nickel, so we could never get off of it.

Ahem. We rode the MTA around and ate and drank coffee and visitted bookshops and esteemed restrooms and actually got a pretty good tour of Boston. It was kind of dark out and very very very cold. I was wearing two swearters, thermals, a ski jacket with a scarf inside and another scarf outside and a ski hat and the hood of the jacket and ski gloves and was feeling only a bit cold. Angela was suffering.

We went to a lesbian dance club at place called Club Hollywood Boston, that I found listed in a free weekly newspaper, but I dunno if it's the one giving out restroom awards. We showed up around 10:45 and left around 12:15, so thigs were pretty much just getting started as we left. This was because Jess wanted to park by Harvard and ride transit around, which was logical as she's new to having a car, etc. But like other transit systems that I can name, the trains stop running pretty early.

Anyway, I danced with Jess a few times which was fun. I realized that it was not going to help my goal of picking up chicks, as people would think I was with her. And furthermore, I'm much too shy to pick up chicks, they have to come for me. I know I'm awkward and not a great dancer and somehwhat (ok, very) nerdy looking, which is truth in advertising. But I also realize that there are women on earth looking for nerds. By which I mean that I'm much older than the last time I was single and I know I don't have to pretend to be something much hipper than I really am to get chicks. Not that I wouldn't mind being hipper. What am I trying to say? something about self-esteem, probably.

But this doesn't cure my shyness. The only stranger that I talked to, aside from telling someone that I was in line for the bathroom, was the coat check woman. And the bartender. Someone cute approached me and asked if I had dropped a sock, since there was one lying on the floor near me. I laughed. but I had to leave and spoke to her no more.

The dance club scene might not be the best place for me to cruise for chicks, but it is super-fun dancing with Jessica and I'd like to go again.

We got home around 3:00 am.

What happens next

Ok, so the HOA was vengeful. you can't do stuff without asking first. However, Ellen has been encouraged to work with the design review comittee (which includes an architect), to come up with a shorter version of the shack which is not nailed into the wall (big sticking point due to water penetration issues, which are really very minor, but you know . . .). Her plan, she told me, is to tear down the old shack and re-use the materials to construct the new one, which will keep her busy for a quite a while and hopefully will not fxck up her upcoming gig in Seattle.

Somebody on the HOA wrote an angry letter about the shack, condeming it and attacking me, saying that I had been asked to attend the meeting, but had refused. Indeed. I told everyone that I talked to that I would have loved to attend, but classes were starting. I'm sure that any other person in my compound would have skipped registration day and the first day of classes and bought a last minute new plane ticket, so I feel like quite a slacker. But there was this class I wanted to add, for which I had emailed the professor asking for approval, but she didn't write back. I felt like attending the first session was necessary to get the class. It was a hard choice for me, since the class isn't offered every year. Finally, my education won out, mostly because I didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars on a new ticket and also have to pay late fees. Sharon would not beleive this, but so far, I have avoided all late fees. I have not even asked the grad office for mellon balls, although they often have cookies out and actually, one time they did give me mellon balls, now that I think about it. this is the difference that a big endowment makes.

anyway, I didn't see this letter, since it went out after I left. But there have been many similar letters with neighbors denouncing each other during my time in that compound. I really like Berkeley. I live in nice area. I have neighbors that are actually very nice in social settings. Nevertheless, I'm very strongly thinking about selling after I finish with school. This would be after another 14 months at Wesleyan. a possible year in Germany after that (I hope) and maybe a PhD program, so not for a while. There's some sinister similarities between homeowners associations and Maoism. The denunciation thing. It's an exploitable part of human nature. I used to have a coworker at netscrape who said that the Stanford Prison Experiment showed that you didn't have to train people to be concentration camp gaurds, you could just get them to do it automatically (I'm so glad I'm out of the software buisiness). I think that Maoist denunciations work the same way. You can exploit people's natural tendencies to support your system. It's prolly easier than capitalism, since it doesn't require a gigantic media apparatus constructing rediculous myths and pounding people with them constantly.

I'm a good leftist. I want to beleive in a noble human character that would come out under a just economic system. People would farm in the mornings, code in the afternoons and write symphonies in the evenings, to paraphrase and mangle Marx. But there are people in the world (I'm no longer talking about my HOA, but more about political groups in Italy and the US) who are true beleivers in facism. There are people strongly dedicated to the other side. Some of these folks are paid by plutocrats. some of these folks are plutocrats. some are afraid of alien other. but there are some folks who just believe in facism. How do they get these ideas? How do you neutralize these ideas? How can you fight this tendency? Is it learned? Is it inborn? Is there some cultural meme that could be stamped out, thus leading to the utopian sisterhood of humans?

School

Anyway, this semester, I'm taking Mystic Voices, and undergraduate Medieval studies class that I didn't know if I would get in to, Alvin Lucier's composition seminar, a group tutorial in SuperCollider (taught by Ron Kuivila, my advisor), Colloqium, and Gamelan. Jessica told me that I have to take a different ensemble this semester and I can't keep taking the same one. If this is the case, then I'm going to take Anthony Braxton's ensemble, although I would need to ask him to waive the pre-req, which I think he would do. I plan to take his ensemble next fall, along with gamelan, and take fewer academic-type classes.

For the record, although I whine about back pain, I really like gamelan. The songs are groovy and the ensemble is low stress. We had our first meeting tonight. I played the gong, which is the most laid-back of all the instruments, since it only plays at the end of phrases that are 8, 16, 32, 64, or 128 notes long. Hypothetically, phrases could also be 256, 512, or 1024 notes long. There's a cutoff somplace, the longest phrases ever actually written, but I can't remeber if it is 256 or lower. I feel very ethnomusicologically-oriented when I play gamelan. Last semester, the ensemble was the grad student social club. this semester, there is a teem horde of undergrads and few grad students. There's me and a small group of PhD students, but I feel good about it.

I'm sort of half TA-ing Ron's Recording Culture class. I'm not officially assigned to the class and the last hour of it conflicts with the Mystic Voices class. Ron said this would be ok. There's a parking garage in Middletown that plays loud Baroque music year-round in an unsuccessful bid to drive away youths from a coffee shop located in the first floow of the building. In the warm months, the youth hang around the coffee shop anyway. In the cold months, nobody would sit outside and get snowed on to drink coffee, but they leave the music on anyway. The parking garage is music is highly irritating. Somehow, Ron convinced the parking garage owner that his Recording Culture class should be allowed to do an installation there for 24 hours, where they use the Muzak system. He's involved in curating a seperate event, called Rock's Roll, at a museum where composers submitted stuff that's supossed to be played on top of each other. Composer A's tracks play at the same time as Composer B's. Ron's starting off his class by having them mix the submitted stuff, including things that were not picked for the museum. The submissions include works by Maggi Payne and Brenda Hutchinson (I think The Star Strangled Banner is among them). Maggi's stuff sounds really cool. I haven't listened to all the submissions yet.

I do not know if semi-TAs get to do anything for the parking garage, I'll keep you posted. But personally, I think the owner should permanently cancell Muzak and let me install some SuperCollider patches. I could just stick a laptop in their PA system, which would not only be more economical than paying Muzak fees, but would also be much more interesting and just as likely to drive people away. I'm thinking about that thing I did a long time ago with virtual memory. I'm thinking about just intoned triads that might make people want to hurl themselves in front of trains. I'm thinking about fingernails on blackboard type sounds. Dubya talking backwards about terrorists.

I want to do more stuff with Dubya. I noticed a certain melodic quality when he said "In fact, what the terrorists have done is caused us to take an assesment of what's important." There's interesting pitch material lurking there. It's higher pitch than the rest of his speech. Insincere. Sing-songy, almost. I went to the WhiteHouse webpage and fired up AudioHijack and started capturing the State of the Union address. Only when he started tlaking about Hydrogen-powered cars, did I realize that I was grabbing the wrong year. If you can stand it, go listen to last year's address. The text is very, very similar to this year's. I didn't get as far as weapons of mass destruction before I quit listening. For some reason, they haven't posted this year's address. I heard a rumor that Democrats applauded when he said that the Patriot Act was set to expire this year (thank god), so maybe they're editting that out.

I don't know what I'll do for political audio-mangling if Dean wins in the fall. I guess I could use his Iowa roar thing.

So, except for Mondays, I have a much more relaxed schedule this term. I'm also only taking 4.25 units this semester, instead of 4.75. I might even have time to write music. I heard a rumor that Alvin will require us to write a string quartet. So I'll be in the library with the score to Ruth Crawford Seeger's String Quartet and the CD, trying to figure out how she did what she did.

Mood

Often hopeful (like right now), but with a tendency to slip in to anger or despair. In Berkeley, walking around often restored me to hope. Here, not so much. I'm speculating that it's the cold + people often don't bother shoveling their sidewalks, thus making the walks somewhat treacherous (what's with my neighbors? they pile trash in their yards. they don't shovel snow.). Also, in Berkeley, I felt a sense of belonging to a larger thing. I am a part of the universe, etc. Here, I feel rootless. I tell myself that I'm part of the universe, but I feel more like a Christmas tree, cut off from my roots and dragged to suburbia to eventually wind up being tipped over in the middle of the unshoveled sidewalk, next to garbage cans. I've got an appointment with Behavioral Health (aka: a shrink) on tuesday.

more

I ate halvah tonight, but the crushing pain of existence was only partially ameliorated. Had an annoying conversation with the housemate which has now been classified as a boundary for me. Feel very annoyed about the HOA descision and mad at myself for getting the night wrong. Need reassurance that I'm on the right track. There's a certain volitility to my outlook. Last night or the night before, had a long conversation with a some people about student mental health services. All the grad students are angsty. Jessica explained that people go to grad school when they don't know what to do with their life and want to put off real life for a while. I felt a strong sense of belonging and that I was in the right place at the right time. If only I had inner stability and could keep these perspectives instead of sliding away from them.

I miss Ellen a lot

arg

The homeowners meeting was last night. damnit. they voted that the shack must come down.

Why? Because we couldn't set a precident that people could do whatever they wanted with their backyards, now could we?

Ellen will prolly require assistance in tearing down the shack. If you want to help, I can put you in contact with her.

Now that's just weird

Handy guide to the Democratic primary candidates

Quick call for comments

The hoa is meeting tonight. i'm emailing a letter to the president this afternoon

Dear Members of the HOA,

This letter concerns the temporary structure in the backyard of Unit N. As implied, this structure is intended to be temporary. Ellen Fullman is occupying my unit while I am away for graduate school. I will graduate in May 2005 and dismantle the structure when I return. Ms. Fullman is an internationally known composer and the inventor of the Long String Instrument. When I offered her use of my unit, she said it was too short for her instrument and we came upon the idea of extending the instrument into the backyard.

Ms. Fullman has performed around the United States and Europe. In 2001, in San Francisco, she premiered a 45 minute piece that she wrote for her instrument and the Kronos Quartet. She was recently featured in the cover story of MusicWorks magazine. I feel that her work is both important and incredible. Having use of the temporary structure enables her to continue this work while she stays in Berkeley.

We are willing to be flexible and to take any action that the HOA deems necessary, up to and including the immediate demolition of the structure. Should the HOA decide to allow the structure to stay up for the next 16 months, I am willing to assume all liability connected to the structure. I hope that given the temporary nature of the structure and the value of Ms. Fullman's work, the board decides to temporarily allow the structure to remain.

Thank you very much,
Celeste

I'm considering cutting the middle paragraph, because when we had our "open house" (which nobody came to), the flyer had a bio of Ellen on it. So should I remind them, or should I stop going on about it?

Moving Targets

Asking a 15 year old to write about "who am I" is silly, because by the time the teacher gets around to grading the paper, the kid will have changed entirely. People go through some periods of intense change. I was talking to my housemate last night about Saturn Returns and he, who is the same age as I am, told me about how lately, he's been his moodiest since the age of 16. "something's going on." we concluded.

So, there are some things I know about myself: I'm queer. I like music and programming and I'm good at both. Aside from that, instead of trying to pin myself down as a moving target, it would be more useful to have a goal state. So instead of "who am i," "who do I want to be?"

I would like to be the sort of person that my astrological sign says I should be. (what I love about California: it's ok to treat astrology with seriousness. anywhere in the country. just say you're form from california). I would like to have creative ideas and follow through with them. I would like to be smart. I would like to be kind and caring and thoughtful and mindful and mellow and grounded and calm and serene and an activist and ambitious and driven and relaxed.

some of these things conflict, but there's contexts for everything. also, i would like to be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

I met a woman during break who makes a list of what she wants to achieve in a year and then on the other side of the paper, she writes what she's willing to do to meet her goals. she carries the list with her and looks at it first thing in the morning and last thing at night. I'm not sure that I want to be that driven, though. But it does raise the question of how I reach my goal state of being both highly active and very calm. What would I put on the reverse side of my list?

I'm back east

I got home about 5 minutes after xena did. My goodness, I left my room a mess. I was extremely distressed when I left Middletown for my unexpected trip to California. But if I wasn't depressed already, the room would have done. I'm launching an excavation to find the floor and to let in some natural light. but it's also necessary for me to get my laptop on my airport network (yay) and otherwise goof around.

Who am I

When I was a sophmore in highschool, I was assigned to write a paper on the subject of "who am I." This is what occurs in catholic highschool religion classes. I wrote a paper telling the teacher to bug off, it was none of his buisiness. When I was a junior in highschool, I was assigned to write a personal statement which would be useful for college apps. I started it with "'I am gay.'" explaining that my previous year's paper should have started with that sentence. When I was a senior, I borrowed the phrase from Socrates that "the unexamined life is not worth living." In college, they quit making us write these papers.

Maybe that's why I have so little sense of self now. I was talking with Amy, former housemate, on the phone today and she asked who I was without Christi. I have no idea. So I'm giving up on self-loathing, because I'm not even sure who I'm mad at. I used to rant about how individuality is over emphasised in Amerikan culture. I still think this is true. "Rugged individualism" is a myth put forth by people who want to renig on the govt's role in the social contract. But maybe some individuation is a good thing.

I've had a very crappy couple of years. My mom died. My marriage broke up. I think that I can't live for other people. Other people are unreliable. They die or leave. I have to live for myself (whoever that is). This is, of course, tempered by the idea of community. There's a fine line here. I need to be self-reliant, and I need to be conscious of how my decisions affect other people.

My plan was to explain the aimlessness of my mid-twenties by explaining that I was "finding myself." Unfortunately, I wasn't looking hard enough. Jean says that by the time my Saturn Return is done (I've got one year left), I'll be an entirely different person than I was before, so I'm guessing it means that it's ok that my sense of self is somewhat confuddled.

My friends and neighbors that I've been talking to all tell me "hey you look good!" Like I've undergone some sort of change. And a positive one at that. I was thinking that I've finally met my goal of becomming mellow as fxck, but then someone told me that it was having short hair. Alas, still angsty. Not yet mellow.

Saw Autmn and Stephen and my dad tonight at a show at 21 Grand. It was groovy, especially the first tow acts I saw, most especially the second one. Beforehand, I played my new tunes for my dad. He heard the triad one and asked if I was going to see a shrink at school. I enjoy this reaction, actually. I want people who hear the piece to think of throwing themselves in front of trains. I want it to sound more melancholy. I want people who hear it to feel the crushing pain of existence bearing down on them from all sides. I want them to realize that in two short years they can lose the two people who are most important to them. That love doesn't conquer all. It doesn't conquer anything. Everything that they have faith and hope in will eventually crumble and come to naught and trying to stop it is like trying to stop the tide. I want listeners to taste their own mortality.

So far, I have not come upon exactly the right sound design to get these reactions.

when next I post, I'll be back on the east coast.

what if you gave an open house and nobody came?

I think I will now go knock on my neighbor's doors. We have the tie, but I feel uncomfortable not having a margin. And zero people have come over, even though a lot of guacamole was made.

Tonight

I will be going to a show at 21 Grand. I will be getting there around 8:00. If you wanna hang out, show up there and we can hang out. It will be groovy. I leave the next morning.

tomorrow night

saturday night is my last night in the free (warm) world before heading back to school. something should be arranged.

one vote short of a tie

talked to more neighbors yesterday. two units agreed to abstain. two more said they would be fine with the temporary structure remaining. so i just need one more vote. but i should have more to be on the safe side. and of course, everything could go terribly wrong at the meeting.

the two abstaining units, both owned by the same person, didn't want to side with me against the whole compound. they voted last night at a proxy meeting, so i can't go back to them and say they'd be in the majority if they sided with me.

i dunno if i can get the one more vote. i talked to all the mellow people first.

yesterday was the deadline for applications to the Bang on a Can summer session, which I guess I will not be attending. Dunno what I'll be doing this summer. I want to go to the Michigan Womyns Music Festival. And the Deep Listening Retreat. And I guess I'll get a job and write some tunes. Which coast will I be on? dunno. know nothing.

leaving here sunday morning. If you are an east coast reader and want to give me a ride from the hartford airport around 9:00 sunday night, contact me for details! You could get onion rings out of the deal!

anti-bush ad

http://www.hauntedmansion.info/bushin41point2.htm. funny.

Scitilopolitics

Here is the two channel version of Scitilopolitics. Best heard with headphones, as it's supossed to be a spacialized, 4 channel piece. Thi is the thing I did last semester with samples from Dubya and quotes from Jeffner Allen's book, Lesbian Philosophy: Explorations (Palo Alto: Institute of Lesbian Studies, 1987). More info about it was posted on my blog earlier: http://celesteh.blogspot.com/2003_12_14_celesteh_archive.html#107137905962361902. It is 11 minutes and 2 seconds long and is 9 megabytes of data. Recall that I just learned yesterday how to record the output of Supercollider. This peice is (like the triads recently posted) algorythmic, so this is just what happened when I ran the program this afternoon.

things that make me calm

• breathing
• eating
• beer
• cats
• conversation

feel like a human again

more

the hoa board president just came over and related concerns of people who are trying to sell their places and how the temporary structure might affect them. so we've got three yes votes and 11 probable nos. Ellen started talking about how she wouldn't have moved here. why didn't we talk to her before building the thing? i wasn't even around then, i was at school.

when my mom was sick, a group of people and I went to see Minority Report at the big megaplex theatre in Mountain View. It was a Tom Cruise movie with lots of action and random violence, although somewhat written by my favorite sci-fi author. I shook the whole time the movie was on, totally overwhelmed, and hoped that nobody would notice me shaking. Afterwards I panicked in the parking lot about whether my mom would take all of the toxic pills that my dad refused to put out of her reach.

i feel like that now.

I couldn't keep my mom safe. i couldn't make things work with christi. i can't garuntee that ellen won't be cast into fast food jobs. i can't cant cant do anything. cant do anything but sit here, tiwtiching, blog posting.

I think "i'm an asshole," but then i think it's been stressful lately, "this is not who i am." well, then who the hell am i? i am a failure in relationship. i am someone who lures people here with false promises of working space, then shows up unexpectedly, has a major crisis, acts like an ass, is unable to deliver the promised work space and is totally incabable of dealing with the stress. i can't go to the dmv without having to breathe deeply the whole time. but, hey, maybe this is not who i am. maybe there is a capable human lurking deep somewhere, maybe out for a holiday, maybe getting a bite for lunch, maybe hiding under the bed.

these woes aren't even that bad, not like mom swallowing a pile of god-knows-what in the middle of the night. (thank god she never got into the pills. i did not hysterically go insist in the middle of the night that something be done. i can't remember how this was resolved.) why can't i function?

today

Ellen told me the Halvah eases the crushing pain of existence. I think she may be right. I've been in the kind of mood lately where thoughts like "I'm an asshole" and "I am a bug splatted on the windshield of life" seem profound. So a short scene came to me on bart.

We walked into Mamounds. "You've been so glum lately," she said, brushing a wisp of her long dark hair from her face. She smiled encouragingly and her hands fluttered gracefully.
The woman behind the counter stared at us impatiently. "Can I help you?" she asked.
"What do you have that eases the crushing pain of life?" I asked.
"Halvah for $1.50" she indicated the display case on the counter.
"Can I have a chocolate one and a turkish coffee?" I asked.
"For here or to go?"
I shrugged at Jessica.
"For here." Jessica directed.

I got my truck smog checked and registered. It took a long dern time. And I figured out how to record audio on supercollider. The help file has a bug in it. and I wallowed in self loathing/pity for a while.

I talked to two of my neighbors about the temporary structure in the backyard. The Home Owners Association is meeting a week from today to decide if they will compell us to tear it down. Ellen was explaining to me this morning that if she loses the temporary structure, she'll lose her Seattle gig and be forced to take minimum wage jobs and live in a studio apartment and have a budget to buy a few pieces of drawing paper periodically and dabble in art on weekends.

Please light a candle dedicated to your diety of choice that the association decides to let it stay. their issues are twofold: 1. It didn't get pre-approval from the design review committee. (my defence: uh sorry. i wasn't here when it was built.) 2. It may cause water penetration (my defence: it's only going to stay up until may 2005. the possibility of structural damage in that time is remote. and i would of course be responcible for any repairs required as a result of it's being there temporarily.)

One neighbor was supportive. the other was on the board. she indicated that people have to face consequences for their errors. So because the review comittee was skipped, there is no way in hell that she would allow it to stay. also, it's important to keep art in perspective. it has it's place in life, but that is secondary to property values.

we're having an open house on saturday so people can see the temporary structure and get an idea of what things are about. of course, neither ellen nor i posses social skills in any significant degree. i fear it will be a disaster. i'm thinking of trying to pull in outside talent to pitch our case.

doom.

i don't have the energy for this. i have important self-loathing to do.

any suggestions from anyone would be extremely welcome.

New tune

This is a supercollider work in progress. i'm not sure what to do with it. Ellen says that it reminds her of train whistles. It makes me sleepy. Her too. so maybe it's just something to nap to. angsty yet soothing. 3-min-triads.mp3

Kucinich in the news

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/01/12/MNG57485GR1.DTL

I got email from his campaign a couple of days ago asking if I and others on his list would call people in Iowa. There was a link to click for a phone list and another link for a phone script. This guy is seriously grassroots. everything he does, he does with the support of people. Not plutocrats or mega corps, but dedicated people who rally to his message of peace and hope. It's rare that a politician gives a reason for hope. Rarely do they have the honesty. Nader's got it (hearing him speak is incredible) and Kucinich has got it.

Some dems hate Nader because it's easier to blame him than widespread election fraud. Those Nader-haters should love Kucinich because he can draw all the traitorous leftists back to the party. A huge number of people didn't bother to vote last cycle. Gore failed to sufficiently differentiate himself from Bush and many folks concluded that it didn't matter which of the two evils that they voted for. And, of course, voting for a third party would be "throwing away" a vote. Well, here's a guy that has a real difference who can bring back disaffected voters and who, as a major party guy, is not a throw-away vote.

Kucinich is the best hope for progressives and the best hope for the Democratic party and a real pacifist, the best hope for the world. We owe it to the world and future generations and to ourselves to at least try to get a progressive into office. Kucinich can win, more than Dean can win or any other dem can win. Kucinich is our best hope.

i feel crappy today

I want a picture of you

I only have a week left here in sunny California, and then I must return to the austere Northeast, which apparently is having a record-breaking cold snap. I would like it very much if all of my friends could give me a photograph of themselves looking at the camera and smiling. My plan is to thumbtack these to my wall, much as has been done with college dorm rooms since the photograph was invented.

If I don't see you in the next week, my mailing address is:
Celeste Hutchins
Music Department
Wesleyan University
Middletown, CT 06459

Xena did not run away

People who have called my cell phone have been alarmed at the message, which begins, "if you have found Xena . . .." This message is pre-emptive. One time, back when I owned a dog called Bear, he ran away from my parents while I was out of town and I got 231421 phone messages about him on my home machine and my worried parents got zero messages (but didn't contact me for some reason). So when I leave Xena with someone, I make sure that the number on her tag will actually get you some information about her. So my wife and I split and my pickup truck has expired registration, but at least my dog didn't run away.

It is true

that I cannot know the future and that a possibility exists that maybe one day Christi and I will reconcile, however, despite what you might imagine, it does not make me feel happier if you insist on making this point. I'm sorry if you're sad about things, but I really must insist that people cease telling me that.

thank you

hrm

i can't get my web page changes to upload to sourceforge. if you want to try the tutorial below, you will have to checkout the sourcecode and build the project yerself.

update

It's up now

Quick JJiCalc Tutorial

Launching JJiCalc

After you download the software to your computer, you can run it by double-clicking on JJiCalc.jar. Or, if you have a command prompt, you can type "java -jar JJiCalc.jar" .

Opening Files

Once the software is launched, click on the file menu and select open. A dialog box will come up listing files and directories on your computer. This box may look different from ones that you are used to. On OS X, the box will list files in the root directory. If you want to get to your home directory, click on the Users folder, then on your directory name. Go to the directory where you put the software. In the JJiCalc folder, there is a folder called tuning. Go there and open the file called old_grandad.jic

Eight tuning ratios will appear in the top of the tuning table. The title "Old Grandad" will appear in the title bar. (If you want to change the name, just type in the title field.) On the top right hand side of the application window are some buttons. One of them is called "Comments." If you click on comments, you can view the comments made about the scale.

Lattice

Click the button marked "Lattice" to see the tuning lattice for the scale. A new window will pop up, which shows ratios connected by lines. If you want to hear a tuning ratio, you can click on it in the lattice. Click on 3/2. The box around the ratio will turn gray and you should hear the sound of the ratio being played. If you don't hear anything and you've made sure that sounds are working on your computer, you may need to update your Java libraries, especially Swing.

If you click again on the ratio, it will stop playing. You can play any number of ratios at the same time as you would like. Click on 3/2, 5/4 and 1/1.

Pop-up Menus

You can also play ratios directly from the tuning table. If you have a multi-button mouse, right click on the numerator or denominator of one of the ratios. If you are on a macintosh with a single-button mouse, option click on the numerator or denominator. A pop-up menu will appear with the options "Enable Sound", "Freeze this Cell", and "Clear this Cell". To hear the ratio, select "Enable Sound." To stop hearing the ratio, right or control click again and select "Disable Sound."

Frozen cells can't be played. Also, they can't be cleared and will not be sorted. To freeze a cell, right or control click on the cell for the pop-up menu. To defrost a cell, do the same thing again, but select "Defrost this Cell". To erase the contents of a cell and remove a ratio from the table, select "Clear this Cell".

Cents, Hertz, Fret Position

In the middle of the bottom of the application, there is a section of buttons labelled "View As." Click the one labelled "ET +-Cents". This will calculate the closest Equally Tempered pitches, plus or minus the cents needed to get your tuning. In the gray boxes below each ratio, you should see a postive or negative number indicating the cents to add or subtract, with the closest ET pitch below that. The JJiCalc assumes that 1/1 is C0, so therefore 5/4 is E0 -13.7 cents.

To calculate Hertz, click the button marked Hertz in the "View As" section. 1/1 defaults to 440. If you would like to use a different base frequency, on the bottom right is a section called "base frequency." Type in what frequency you would like in the text area marked "1/1 freq". Then, click the button "Update Base". If you play the ratios, they will sound at the new frequencies. The displayed Hertz will not change, however, until you click the "Hertz" button again in the "View As" area.

If you click the button "fret pos", it will calculate fret positions for you. The top number is the integer part of the fret position and the bottom number is the decimal section. Below 3/2, there is 0. in the top box and 3333 in the bottom box. Thus, for a string 1 meter long, the fret position for 3/2 would be at 0.3333 meters.

You can change the string length by typing it in the text area labelled "Str. Len." and then clicking the button labelled "string len". This will cause your fret positions to recompute. There is a known bug: The recomputed numbers will be incorrect. After you change the String Length, click the "fret pos" button again to figure out the correct fret positions.

Adding New Ratios

Go to an empty table cell and (left) click in the numerator box. type 15 and then in the denominator box, type 16. This adds a 15/16 minor second. If you click the lattice button, you will see your new fraction in the lattice.

The JJiCalc automatically reduces your fractions for you. In another empty cell, enter in 32/30. As soon as you click off of the cell, it will reduce to 16/15. There is an option under the Configuration menu to turn this reduction off. This is a known bug: Your fractions will always reduce.

The Configuration Menu

One thing that works in the configuration menu is changing the wave form setting. You can hear your fractions played as sine waves, square waves or sawtooth waves.

Sorting

all of our tunings are in scale order except for the new one, 16/15. On the right is a button marked "Sort". Click it to but the ratios in order from smallest to largest.

All of the things in the gray boxes below the ratios will clear when you hit sort.

Saving

When you save your file, all of the data including the 1/1 frequency, the title, the comments, the ratios and the stuff written in the gray boxes below the ratios all get saved. Saving a tuning gives you the same kind of dialog box you got when you openned old_grandad.jic. If you type in the name of a file that already exists, a box will appear to ask if you're sure you want to overwrite the old file.

Other Formats

If you don't want to save anyhting but the title, the comments and the ratios (but not the stuff in the gray boxes), go to the File menu, then look in the Export submenu and select "Ratios only."

JJiCalc also supports the Scala file format. To save your tuning as a Scala file, select "Scala File" under the Export menu. There is a very large set of tunings in the Scala format that you can download from http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/doc/scales.zip. To open these tunings, select "Scala File" from the import menu. Not all Scala tunings are Just Intoned. If the Scala tuning that you open contains some non-just tunings, JJiCalc will approximate them as fractions.

Daily Affirmations

I am a part of the universe. I will take things as they come. I will look for opportunities. I will do my best.

Repeating that to myself is oddly calming. also, doggone it, people like me.

Deconstruction

I am a part of the universe. I belong in the world. I have a place. I am not alone.

I will take things as they come. I cannot control the future. I cannot know the future.

I will look for opportunities. I will acknowledge my present. I will act on thigns or let go of them. If I can change something, I can try to. If I can't change something, I can let go of it.

I will do my best.

comments?

I want to hear your jokes. I want to hear your breakup stories. post em to comments? tell me verbally? thank you much.

so much for resolutions

angsty angsty angsty

Life Goes On

So Jean gave me her MacWorld pass and so I went to the Moscone Center and spent about an hour wandering around. Uh yeah . . new computers? Um, I prolly should have looked at those. Still, I think it was a good introduction to macworld, I guess. I thought I had gone once before, but I was mistaken. It reminds me of the county fair, but more high-tech. Actually, since I used to go to the Santa Clara County Fair, it's probably the same amount high tech.

I talked ot the folks who make Audio Hijack and wanted to know why it doesn't capture sound from SuperCollider. This is actually a silly question, because SuperCollider is an audio programming language. If you want to capture the auio to disk, you can just write a little thingee to do it for you. But the help files on that aren't done yet and I was hoping for a faster solution. So I stood there and chatted for a minute, trying to recall what other oddball program that I run that I couldn't capture audio from?? I finally gave up trying to remember and wandered off. Only just now, as I tweak the source code, do I remember that I was thinking of the Java Just Intonation Calculator. Oh yeah. That thing I'm lead developer on.

Clearly I'm much spacier than I think I am.

Maybe you're wondering how I'm doing? Fine thank you. A bit distracted, I guess. somewhat sad. More relieved. Working to maintain optomism.

After I left MacWorld, thinking I must have seen all the exhibitions at least in passing (but that can't be true, because I didn't see digidesign or MOTU's booths, which must have been there), I barted around homewards, but got off at downtown Berkeley, so I could get pants and undies. Went to Ross Dress for Less because I am cheap. No pants I liked. But I nought the only 2 pair of small boxers in the whole store. (boxers or briefs? boxers. now you know.) they're kind of hideous. One is covered in patriotic patterns, the other is green plaid. there's nothing wrong with green plaid, except that it's really not a good color on me. mind you, this is not something i worry about because nobody sees my underwear.

And then as I was wlaking home, it occurred to me that I'm single now. Not only might my underwear be seen, but this might be a desirable occurance and one where it might not be best to be wearing patriotic patterns. oy! Ellen points out that there are chicks who go for the geeky thing. these chicks are clearly my only hope. (She didn't use the word "chicks")

Is it a little early to worry about dating again? Why, just because I've been broken up for less than 48 hours and have enough emotional baggage with me to charter my own airplane back to CT? So let me do a little public self-esteem building (in the spirit of blogs everywhere): what's not for chicks to dig? somewhat intelligent. kind of have my shit together (depending on how you define "shit"). Cute in a geeky sort of scrawny geek boy kind of way. (Is "scrawny geek boy" still employed as a catagory for describing people? should it be spelled "boi?") Have one or two pairs of nice underwear lurking someplace. ("lurking" might not be the best word for "in a laundry basket or drawer in connecticut.") Have musical skills.

I'm trying to create a mental picture of what I'm looking for in the big, scary world, but I think I don't want to post it, as posting it would cause me angst and thus would violate one of my new years resolutions. my goodness, the year has laready been so eventful.

I want to drink a lot of beer in a social setting. I want to crawl under my bed and hide. I want to get nekkid with geek chicks, but first I would need a lot of beer and then I might hide anyway.

FAQ

1. Really?

   Yep

2. Is there anything that I can do?

   I'd like to have tea with you, I'm sure. But you have to come here. Gimme a call.

3. do I have to take sides?

   No. please don't.

4. what about the house?

   I'll keep it, but I'm still going to be away at school for the next three semesters.

50% of Marriages end in divorce within the first two years

And it appears that same sex marriages are no exception. christi and I are through.

Grateful For

In the new year, I am grateful for my friends. I have some super-fabulous, wonderfully kind people in my life.

Geeking Out

Stupid System Tricks

What happens when you compile and install the GNU version of GCC on OS X? I got it to compile, but I'm scared to install it for fear of breaking xcode or something.

Backwards compatibility

Ellen is running OS 9 only. She doesn't dual boot. This is an entirely logical descision for a person who has a large base of installed software. Why should you run out and buy a new version of ProTools or Quark just because someone decreed that your operating system is passe? the corollary of this though, means getting new software is not possible.

It turns out that the Java Just Intonation Calculator (software useful for tuning the Long String Instrument) is not compatible with OS 9. This is because the versions of Java that Apple has released for OS 9 do not contain all of the features that I (and previous developers) chose to incorporate when writing the JJiCalc software. OS 9 doesn't ship with Swing. The version of Swing that you can download doesn't have the kind of audio support that's required. The JDK 1.1.8 contains now depreciated method names. It's an ugly world on os 9.

So I learned how to compile java backwards compatibly. (javac -target 1.1 foo.java) But, there's no way to run a jar file on os 9. If, in your code, you call Vector.get(int), well, that's a priblem. You need to use Vector.elementAt(int). You would need to, say, find and replace all the get methods and replace them with elementAt. You would need to find all of the Double.parseDouble(String) and replace them with Double.valueOf(String).doubleValue(). You would need to find an OS 9 compatible audio engine. You would need to all your text editting on Os X because Os 9 would not want to open your documents. Nor would javac on Os 9 want to compile them.

The solution would be ugly. you would have to use your osx box to cross-compile for os 9 to run the semi-native audio libraries. You would need to recall long-lost release engineering knowledge. you would be truly hacking.

so if anyone wants to run the Java Just Intonation Calculator on OS 9, contact me, I've got the binaries.

still a hacker. b00-yeah.

Looking Forward/Looking Backwards

Party Report

At the party were: Esperanto Ed & Sandy (who left before midnight), Sarah Dotie + cousin Kareem and Brother Bob (who had to leave before too late so Sarah could go relocate mating Salamnders to a new pool as part of an abatement program or something), and Polly and Paul. And Ellen and I, of course. It was a small group. I made a mountain of gaucamole. I told Ellen that Californians eat tons of gaucamole and that you couldn't make too much of it for a party. So last night, I ate a bunch of leftover gauc. Anyway, we chatted and ate food and totally missed the countdown. I looked at my watch at 12:02 and ordered Sarah to call popcorn to see it was after midnight. It was. So we toasted the New Year a bit late. One of my resolutions was better time management, alas. I started the New Year late, but at least it was under five minutes late.

We had several six packs of beer for the party. Of which four beers were consumed. Two by Ellen and two by me. Then I switched and had a glass of Compari + OJ, thus making me the heavist drinker at the party. It makes me nervous when I notice that I'm drinking more than everyone else, but fully half of the people there were non-drinkers and some folks who might normally drink were obstaining so they could go do things like interrupt salamander mating.

I thought it was oodles of fun. So did Ellen. She was impressed by the complete nerdiness of my social circle. Yes, I am a nerd. Most of my friends are nerds. I think she was worried that a bunch of really hip people were going to come over. Maybe I seem hip? That would be exciting. Do nerds suspect me of hipness?

I was very releived when Polly started talking about the decline of Santa Cruz. I had been concerned that it had always been uncool and for some reason I hadn't noticed before. But no, Polly verifies that Herland did used to be an extremely hip hangout and the Saturn was awesome, etc. She said that less than five years ago, scruz was colonized by valley yuppies. alas. woe for the world. The homoginization of amerika is spreading even to liberal enclaves.

after the party, I played Ellen some MP3s of Polly's flute playing. Ellen said it was the best, most interresting flute playing that she'd heard in her life. Earlier, she had been talking about how the flute was completely boring and I had argued that cool extended techniques existed. and indeed they do and Polly knows them.

A New Day, A New Year

Woke up early yesterday and full of energy and optimism. Had two cups of coffee and then felt even more energetic and optomistic. Thanks to the hard work of Ellen, I am now addicted to coffee. I woke up yesterday thinking, "If I get up now, I could have coffee!" I'm up to two cups in the morning. I think I will try to stay at that level. coffee makes me so awake and so smart and la la la. anyway.

We went to Half Moon Bay to try beachiness again. the sand there is a lovely yellow color. But it was cold, cold, cold, so I did not walk barefoot in the waves and ran up the beach a few times to keep my feet from getting wet. Ellen, however, got wet feet as she failed to successfully dodge the waves a few times. But she was laughing so much afterwards, I suspect it may have been somewhat on purpose.

the rains caused the streams that run to the ocean to swell. Torrents of muddy freshwater were rushing out to the sea. We walked down a sandy penninsula as deep, fast freshwater raced on our right and the ocean crashed to our left. I feel some sort of mystical connection to the earth and the sea when I'm surrounded by so much water. The ocean makes me feel like I'm part of something bigger than myself. I feel the presence of a mother earth when I feel the salt and hear the crashing waves. It was quite lovely

As we drove further up highway 1, I was reminded of a trip I took there in 2002 with my parents and Christi. Sometime after brain surgery, when my mother could communicate, she indicated that she wanted to go to a restaurant in Moss Landing called the Distillery. She liked fish and the restaurant is purported to be haunted. She loved ghost stories and haunting and so the Distillery was one of her favorite restaurants as far as I know. My dad and her ordered crab cakes. I remember being impressed about the discretion of the waiter. I was worried about things like that then. On the way there, we drove through the farms of Half Moon Bay. We passed the Christmas tree farms, the pumpkin farms and the horses. My mom used to ride and show horses. I had the idea that she might like to do horseback riding and was looking to get her into a program for adults with disabilities. I asked her if she was interesting in having a horse. She said, "oh yeah. Maybe someday. Not now." Her memory wasn't good. We told her she didn't have time left, but she couldn't remember or didn't want to. The word "someday" broke my heart. There was no someday. there is no someday.

Yesterday, Ellen and I drove past the distillery and stopped at a second beach a bit north of there. We looked at the sandy cliffs and more water rushing to finally again meet the ocean. I thought of the future. There is no someday. There is no control of fate. Take things as they come. Look for opportunities. Do my best. I might die tomorrow as my life rushes back towards the sea and the earth, but I cannot know. this is a kind of optimism. I will do my best. I will accept things as they happen. I will change what I can. I will accept what I cannot change. I am a part of the universe and I belong to the world.

Jean's ritual

We came back to the East Bay and went to Jean's New Year Ritual. there I discovered that my attempts at serentiy and new age hippy-dippy spirituality do not extend to political discussions. I cannot change some people's minds, but damnit, I'll try anyway. someone there thought that Kucinich was a Nader-like spoiler who must be stopped. For the record, Nader did not lose Gore's election. Gore lost it. Because he's as uncompelling as Gray Davis and because of massive voting fraud in Florida and probably other states with electronic ballotting systems, the same systems that are now all over the country. Made by Diebold, the completely partison republican voting machine company who does not release their source code and runs our elections for profit.

Simply, I would not have voted for Gore. I will not vote for anyone that wants to throw queer or poor folks or people of color or the third world to the wolves to protect corporate profits. The excuse cited is that a progressive would be unacceptable to middle america. but let's pause for a minute and think of the massive role that corporate money plays in campaigns. Are candidates that think the country ought to be run for the benfit of the people rather than profits really unacceptable to middle america or are they unacceptable to the plutocrats that pay for campaigns? Kucinich has major labor support. the majority of americans agree with his platform. If you think that that you can't vote you're conscience because it will lose, then you've already lost. there's no hope. You might was well go to work for Haliburton.

Jean's ritual consists of list making. this year it was three lists. This ritual is a prayer more than it is making resolutions. the first list is things you want to leave behind in the passing year. I listed angst, procrastination and war. The second list is things you want to draw to yourself in the new year. I listed self-reliance, confidence, widsom, knowledge and skills. The third list is new this year and it is things that you are grateful for. Jean says that if she focusses on what she's grateful for, she feels better about the world.

Jean passed out envelopes, which we self addressed and then sealed in our lists of things to draw in and things we're grateful for. In the middle of next December, she will stamp the envelopes and mail them to us. For the list of things to leave behind, we went out to a small fire pit in the back yard and burned the lists. In years past, there's been singing at this point, but this year there was only a little singing by a few people. I am guilty of non-participation. Jean asked me to hum the MIDI thingee I posted to my blog in mid-December, but I couldn't remember it. I had forgotten about the pice, thinking it wasn't worth working on.

For the last few months, I've been noticing a dearth of music. My stereo was mostly silent in Middletown and I noticed most other people's were as well. I was thinking this was because I was at music school. We spend all day studying music and listening to pieces to analyze them and write papers or whatever and so don't put on background music. But now I'm wondering if this is everywhere. Have people stopped wanting to sing? If we don't have music in our lives, if we don't listen, if we don't sing, how can we live? How can we resist evil? How can we fight for good? How can we remember what is beautiful? How can we call for justice if we cannot sing?

So I'm adding a resolution to sing more. My voice is out of practice. Some Californians may recall my willingness to start singing at the drop of a hat, but lately, I've been more restrained. This restaint is not a good thing. (well, moderation is a good thing.)

One of the things that I like Ellen is that she sings. she sings to the cats. She sings to me. We should all sing to each other.

I saw Danica at the ritual. I asked what pronoun to use and the reply was "they." It makes me feel silly to use it, but silliness is a good thing. they seemed very together and happy. I hope to see them again while I'm in town.

We came home from the ritual and I played the MIDI file that Jean liked for Ellen. Ellen liked it too. So I'll work on it when I get back to my desktop computer where my notation software lives.

comments appear to be working again.

Stupid Google Tricks

Right now, when you type Long String Instrument into Google, the number one search result is not Ellen Fullman, yet it should be. Let us all take a moment to add a link to our blogs or some web page someplace for Long String Instrument that links to the correct result.

In the New Year

Increased self-suffiency, emotional robustness, groundedness, better time management (esp regarding homework), more laughter, more smiles, more gigs, serenity

Comments are broken. But they're hosted by a site that has no ads and demands no money or anything from anyone. Someone has chosen to provide them out of the goodness of her (or his) heart.

In with the new

New Years Eve Party 411

I am posting this from my shiny new laptop! oooh!

I'm downloading the new xcode developer kit. It's abbout 600 megabytes. Then I can do a nice SuperCollider update. the version of SuperCollider that I brought home on my pocket disk seems to kind of work. Perhpas there is just a bug in my program. It will play samples of Dubya (aka "asswhistle." Who came up with that?) saying things about terrorism, but it crashes when I try to play samples of someone talking about "we must take seriously the idea of an organized violent uprising of women against men." I need to send a working version of this project to the author of that phrase and it would be nice if it didn't crash on her part, especially since her part is the best part.

feedback requested

Christi's brother built a green-housey kind of thing in the backyard of my Berkeley residence. Since then, several problems have emerged including lack of insulation, a leaky roof and most importantly, the ire of the Home Owners Association. Apparently, it had to be pre-approved by a Deisgn Review Comittee, a step I completely forgot about. We don't own our backyard. It is an "exclusive use common area" under control of the neighborhood association. According to the CCNRs, they get to review any major changes to the backyard and even have the right to enter to pull weeds. The HOA is meeting on January 20th to deicde if they are going to require that the structure be torn down. Ed, my next door neighbor came over to look at it today and said that since it was obviously temporary, that they could probably be persuaded to let it stand. We told him about Ellen's exploits as a composer and he seemed impressed and said he thought that it would prolly be ok and I should write a letter explaining things to the HOA. Any feedback on the firts draft would be appreciated. I don't have much experience in the ways of small governing comittees.

Dear Members of the HOA,

This letter concerns the temporary structure in the backyard of Unit N. First, I would like to apologize for neglecting to get pre-approval from the Design Review Committee.

This structure is intended to be temporary. Ellen Fullman is occupying my unit while I am away for graduate school. I will graduate in May 2005 and dismantle the structure when I return. Ms. Fullman is an internationally known composer and the inventor of the Long String Instrument. When I offered her use of my unit, she said it was too short for her instrument and we came upon the idea of extending the instrument into the backyard.

Ms. Fullman has performed around the United States and Europe. In 2001, in San Francisco, she premiered a 45 minute piece that she wrote for her instrument and the Kronos Quartet. She was recently featured in the cover story of MusicWorks magazine. I feel that her work is both important and incredible. Having use of the temporary structure enables her to continue this work while she stays in Berkeley.

We are willing to be flexible and to take steps to mitigate possible water penetration issues. I hope that given the temporary nature of the structure and the value of Ms. Fullman's work, that the board decides to temporarily allow the structure to remain.

Thank you very much,
Celeste

Has Santa Cruz changed or have I?

I swear that once upon a time the beaches there were really nice. Herland cafe and bookshop was a hip hangout. The Saturn Cafe had good food (it was the first place I aver had chai . . .). It was a really queer-firendly town. Crawling with lesbians.

I haven't been to scruz regularly for ten years. I used to date a Santa Cruz girl. I would go nearly every week down to Capitola. I told my parents that I was participating in all night movie marathons at a friend's house, but I was really going out to see this girl. Then, she dumped me and I went away to college. This was a smart move on her part as I was a complete asshole at the time.

Anyway, getting back to the present tense, or at least the recently past tense, when Ellen wanted to know where was a nifty place to go to the beach, I said that Santa Cruz was a hip little town with a nice beach. So yesterday, we hopped in the car and drove down a looong stretch of 880/17 to get to the beach. We hopped out at the Boardwalk. Ok, the boardwalk is not cool and never has been, but we walked down the beach aways and saw sea lions. The sea lions were pretty cool. the long dock near the boardwalk has pieces of it close to the water that sea lions were napping on and barking at each other.

the beach was grayish. Noise pollution from the boardwalk floated down it. I walked barefoot and let the frgid water run over my feet.

then we went to the downtown. Full of chain stores. I went to the Santa Cruz Dyke March a few years back. It was a small and fun affair. It included street theater, chanting, partial nudity and a brief protest outside of the Barnes and Noble store. It was the first chain store on the main street. Some subterfuge had been involved in it's getting there. Some community members were outraged. those outraged people clearly lost that battle and maybe left town, i dunno. Baby gap. Urban outfitters. etc etc etc.

So we went to herland to get a cup of coffee or some hummus or whatever. It's not a cafe anymore. It's a bookstore only. They had to move down the street from their old location. the person behind the counter was a baby boomer goddess-worshipping type. The store was playing really bad out of tune folk music. the books were all published by Naiad press. Lame lame lame. I got a copy of the latest Dykes to Watch Out For book. The woman behind the counter said, "Since you're planning to go out to lunch, are you sure that you don't want a bag?"

Closetted? In Santa Cruz? What's happened to the world? I've been whining that people on the East Coast aren't out. But this is California. This is Santa Cruz, which in 1993 or 1994 was reported by the San Jose Mercury News to be 25% lesbian/bisexual/LUG. (The first place I ever saw the word LUG (Lesbian Until Graduation) was in that article.) Did the whole world change when I wasn't paying attention?

We walked through the yuppied throngs amidst the chain stores towards the Saturn Cafe. I was feeling discouraged. A piece of my youth is gone forever. Or was it always lame and I hadn't noticed because I was young and breaking so many rules by going down there?

The Saturn Cafe was recently in the news for responding to the French Fries/Freedom Fires debacle by renaming their fried "Impeach Bush Fries." Alas, now the menu just says "Fries." And they're not very good. The only hint of the activism and queerness that I thought still lurked in scruz was a manifesto on Saturn's bathroom doors about how they were fighting against binary gender divisions by making their bathrooms officially non gendered. If only thier food was still good.

Ellen was a good sport. She said that it was a good learning experience and she's glad we went all the way down there to find out she doesn't need to go back.

Alas. either the town has completely changed or I have. Or maybe both of us. Everything in the world is different. The girl I dated isn't even a girl anymore.

More Fun

Last night I rode BART to Milbrae to go meet Polly for dinner. Milbrae is, of course, one of the new BART stops out in the penninsula and it's the last one on the line. It's also a Caltrains station, which could make getting to the south bay via transit much easier, although it is an hour long ride just to there. I like the new stations because they have art in them and no ads.

Polly, darling of the flute community, seems to be doing well. I used to play bass in her backup band and we played at the National Flute Association convention in Vegas last August. August may not be the best time to go to Vegas, but the flutists loved her. Anyway, she has a new bassist now (alas!) and is playing some gigs. We went out for Thai food and got caught up and discussed Liturgical Drama. Seriously. I also learned that KDFC (your radio concert hall), the Bay Area's lone classical station, gets all of its CDs through the indie network. So if you're on an indie label, you better have a distributor with their own indies. This sounds confusing because an "indie label" is a record company not owned by the big five record companies. But, people who are "indies" and work for the "indie network" are so-called independent folks that funnel payola from the big five to radio stations. Recall that payolla, paying a radio station for playing your record, is illegal. So many record companies have found independant contractors who give stuff to radio stations and who get stuff from record companies when those stations play the record company's songs. The indy pockets the difference. However, the indie network has largely been purchased by Clear Channel, so how this is different than payola is completely unclear. anyway, this is part of the reason that commercial radio sucks.

So anyhow, after Thai food, Polly and I went and met Paul at Starbucks and talked more. It was groovy.

Finally, I rode BART back to the East Bay and got picked up by Ellen. The night was still somewhat young, so we went to the White Horse and did some drinking and dancing. We cavorted (this is Polly's mom's word for having illicit fun, but any claim of illicitness would be overstated).

Who is this Ellen of whom you speak?

She is the person living in casaninja while Christi and I are away becoming educated. Ellen Fullman is the inventor of the Long String Instrument. There are plans to install it in the first floor of casaninja. Many pieces are in place, but no strings yet! Technical issues are still being worked out, alas.

She played her newest CD, Ellen's Songbook, for me. It's coming out soon on Choose Records, but they don't seem to be listing it yet. It's awesome. All the pieces are songs except for one instrumental piece. She does the singing. All the songs are catchy and smart. The production is really slick. College radio stardom is clearly in her future. The songs remind me of the Magnetic Fields, because they are pop, but so much more is going on than in your average pop songs. Many of the songs are tuned in just intonation. Her singing voice is very similar to her talking voice: pretty and "real". She spent time studying Indian singing and it comes through in some of the songs. Of course, the Long String Instrument is present and percussion and even cheesy 90's techno sounds on the second to last song. It's just cool.

Stuff

Wedding Photos are finally online. These pictures taken last August by the staff of London, Ontario's Crystal Wedding Chapel. Note that we weren't lying about getting Elvis to sing.

Only one person has written to say that she'll be coming to my New Years Eve shindig. Are the rest of you (are there more of you?) just silent? I won't be buying much beer, I guess. (No, it's not in danger of being cancelled. Many of Ellen's friends are coming.)

Christmas

Ellen and I went down to San Jose for xmas with my family. She went willingly, god bless her. Ellen is really nifty.

We went to Brother Bob's house. Also in attendance were: my brother Paul, my Uncle Chuck, friends of my late mother: Bunny and Seymore, my Dad (Ed) and my Dad's um friend Danielle.

I hardly talked to my uncle. He's doing some car racing this year, but not much and I don't know when. Talked to my brother some. He's not dating anybody, gave up his consulting buisiness due to a shortage of clients. He re-wried the electricity on his house.

Bunny and Seymore report (ok, mostly Bunny reporting) that they're not well and that they haven't done anything fun lately and have no hobbies. Seymore has a wound on his foot, which is healing. Bunny says I look so much like my mother and went on at length how angelic my mom looked on her deathbed.

the assertion of an angelic appearance is true. The progression of her ilness was such that worries and pain ceased. not that I enjoy being reminded of such things. Nor are the holidays entirely stress-free to start out with.

My dad smiled a lot. More than I've seen him smile for maybe . . . ever. He told several amusing stories about when he was in the army. Ellen said, "I like your dad. He's really cool. He smiles a lot." It was pretty cool to see him seem so happy.

Brother Bob says he attended three funerals in the last week. Distressed, but otherwise doing well, I guess. He seemed happy to have everyone over and made outstandingly good food.

the person with whom I spoke most was Danielle, who I had never met before. She is a former "Volunteer of the Year" with the Women's Philharmonic. She goes to the SF symphony regularly with my Dad. My Dad has season tickets. She is also Yoyo Ma's Masseuse, something she talked about at length, relating how she sent tapes of farm animal sounds to his children. And in what circumstances the farm animal sounds were listened to. If you need the dirt on farm animal sounds in the Ma household, she's got it.

she's a new music fan, which is certainly a good thing. the world needs more fans of new music. Especially ones that buy CDs. I got her a CD of Meredith Monk and was worried that she would already have it, but she wasn't familiar with Monk, so I was safe.

She also talked for a long long time about how her deceased husband was a Southern Baptist minister and how fundamentalists are spiritually awesome, even if polically bad. She's a catholic and a fundie. She doesn't like progressive churches because in those churches god is like Santa Claus: always good. She helped out with Billy Graham's crusade and helped organize three of his local stops. I asked her, "what does spirituality mean if it's working for evil?"

My brother stood up suddenly. My dad asked him why he was standing up. My brother said, "it's 9:00."

Danielle considered the evidence against Graham and conceeded that he was indeed working for evil. She then started talking about the bad way the Southern Baptists treated women and started talking a lot about how some women in the 70's were so committed to feminism that they actually came out as lesbians but, even though they tried, they just couldn't bring themselves to . . .

My Dad stood up. It's a bit after 9:00.

I said. "Indeed. some people are bisexual and some people are not." And thought, "I can't beleive I just said 'bisexual' in front of my Dad.'"

Danielle started explaining that queer issues (she didn't say "queer" she said "homosexual" as some would-be liberals are wont to do) were even more important to her than women's issues with the Baptists.

I stood up, explaining that while I did tend to run later than the rest of my family, it was time for the 9:00 standing.

She went on further to me about women who just couldn't bring them selves to. First talking to me (when I suddenly got very interested in the pomegranites that were out around Bro Bob's house) and then at length to Ellen who very politely nodded.

Ellen is so cool

And so, Danielle seems very nice and certainly has interesting things to say. Plus she's a maseusse and my Dad seems happy, which is very good. I'm happy to see him smile so much.

New years eve party!

see below

More FAQ

5. Do you miss Christi?

   Yes, terribly

6. Can we have dinner?

   Absolutely, but I am on public transit only for a while, so this impacts my ability to get around. My scedule is pretty wide open as yet.

7. Isn't your truck here?

   Yes, but I tried to switch the registration from my dad to me before I left for school and there was a problem, so I need to go to the DMV to sort it out. Also, since it's co-registered to Christi and I, if it turns out the CA domestic partnership laws go into effect Jan 1st, then there is an advantage to be gained by waiting till then.

8. Am I invited to your new years eve party?

   Yes

9. Where is it?

   At my berkeley address

10. Should I RSVP?

    It would be easier to figure out how many consumables to stockpile if you call or email ahead of time. Or if you don't want to rsvp (just in case you're waiting to see if Hugh Hefner calls at the last minute), you can come anyway and byob.

11. Should I get you a Christmas gift?

    No.

New Years Eve Party

At casaninja. Please call or email if you think you'll be by, so victuals can be purchased in sufficient quantities.

FAQ

1. Are you in California now?

   Yes, I am staying in Berkeley. I will be here until January 18th

2. How can I reach you?

   You can call me at my home phone number in Berkeley. You could also try calling my cell phone: 860-301-2508. My cell phone was broken and I grabbed it when I left to come here, with the idea that I might be able to disassmble it and repair it, or trade it in for a phone that takes pictures or something. the picture thing was causing gear lust. I didn't even grab my charger.

   well, I was standing outside the Oakland airport waiting for my ride, when I suddenly became frustrated with my phone and started beating it savagely. It returned to life. So I have a working phone (that also acts as voicemail), but no way to charge it. so if you also have a Nokia and want to hang out with me, perhaps I could make some use of your charger while we hang out?

3. Er... ok. so, how was your flight?

   United Airlines is charging for food on the airplane! If you want a sandwich, you better have a ten bucks. What's more, all of the food options have meat in them. Contrast this with AirFrance, which serves good food (that would be good even off of an airplane) and wine. Plus the steward types on airfrance are much more polite and unlike United, do not give you the silent treatment. On the other hand, one of the people in my row (on United) started berating the steward about how crappy the inflight movie (Seabiscuit) was, as if he could do anything about it.

4. Okaaaayyyy. So why aren't you in France anyway?

   Christi has 60 hours of class per week + homework. apparently, she got somewhat behind when I was there before for just a few days. she called me up and said, "I love you dearly, but you can't come for a month. I have a week off around Christmas, can you come then?"

   Alas, it was too late to do anything to my tickets, so, in order to avoid derailing christi's educational experience, i have come home instead. also, I really wanted to see you.

Not Safe for Work

http://www.bramdaman.com/nokia.html

Things i love about Christi

• She's smart
• She's funny
• She's talented
• She's beautiful

dates

i'll be in california from dec 20 - jan 18

book deals

The top thing on blogger.com right now is people getting book deals based on their blogs. This, of course, causes me to become starry-eyed. Would Random House be interrested in the ramblings of a neurotic grad student who hasn't changed her sheets since October? Then I remembered that I only post tired Marxist political rants and papers written for classes.

(I wear pajams. it's not that bad. i've been busy. Like you've never done it.)

All of you California folks who were hoping to see me over my winter break (ok, i know "all" is perhaps an exagerating term. "hey you one person" then) are in luck. See you soon.

Elephant sounds on the web

• http://www.nhm.ac.uk/interactive/sounds/no_flash.html#
• http://www.npr.org/programs/re/archivesdate/2002/nov/index.html
• http://www.birds.cornell.edu/brp/elephant/
• http://www.tintagel.net/resources/Multimedia/Audio/Animals/
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/mammals/up_close/elephant_index.shtml
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/reallywild/wildtunes/picpops/5.shtml
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/reallywild/wildfile/wildfile_asian_elephant.shtml
• http://elephant.elehost.com/Multimedia_Page/Sounds/sounds.html
• http://www.elephantvoices.org/
• http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Byte/8867/animals/Elephant.wav
• http://simplythebest.net/sounds/other_formats/AIFF/sound_effects_AIFF/animals_aiff.html
• http://members.tripod.com/~drphilgood/GIFs-BAMA_elephants.html
• http://www.doghause.com/sounds.html
• http://www.3dcafe.com/asp/soundsanimals1.asp

flight info?

hrm, i cannot find any confirmation email about my winter flights. i must have deleted them by accident. i wonder what airline I'm suppossed to be on.

Insomnia + notation software =

Et sonnera le baffroy de la ville sans cesser durant l'assault

clearly editting is required.

Lou Harrison biography

There exists a biography of Lou Harrison, which was written during his lifetime. It makes him out to be something of a saint, but this is perfectly alright because everyone makes him out to be something of a saint, and with good reason. the biography has an extremely good articles about his tuning systems and how he built gamelans and stuff. when I did my presentation on La Koro sutro, I borrowed the biography because I knew it would contain information on the tuning system of the piece and indeed, it did, which I then used in my report.

Well, at the beginning of the semester, i was assigned to read the biography and report back on it. The teacher told us that when responding to an author's viewpoint about a work, we should "take them on." So my report was about the weakest areas of the biography instead of the strongest areas. apparently, I misunderstood what it meant to "take them on." but, despite being somewhat off-track, this was ok and I got to educate my fellow grad students on Esperanto.

The teacher of the seminar just sent me email saying that he'd talked to Lou's biographer about what I said about Esperanto and she wants my notes.

pretty cool, if you ask me.

Let it snow!

So it snowed last week some time. I think I posted about this. It was very exciting when it happened, but then it started turning to slush and was a lot less endearing. I was told that the best time to make a snowperson is when it's kind of warm, but I had a bit too much stuff to do. then thursday, it rained and all the now went away, for which i was glad.

Had a final concert wed night (which a lot more people would have attended had there been any pre-concert publicity), then a presentation on La Koro sutro on thursday evening. the three most important things about that piece are just intonation, limitted pitch material in the gamelan and other instruments, modality and drones. I guess that's four things. alas. I was concerned that i would get off track and start talking about musical instruments in the time of Joan of Arc, but I did not. It worked out well in that I ran out of time just as I ran out of things to say. Aaron said it was a good presentation. then friday, I emailed in my joan of arc paper. There was a massive campus-wide toner shortage. So I gave up trying to find a printer.

Spent most of yesterday sleeping, but also went to the African Drumming and Dance concert, in which Aaron was playing, as he was the drum TA. It was a groovy concert. Woke up today in the afternoon (*yawn*) and snow was coming down like crazy. While slush is a bummer, snow is really pretty. So I went out and shoveled some of the driveway. then went out later and got a saucer sled and went sledding with Aaron and his gf Zoe. We came in when it started to sleet. Little sharp chuncks of ice fall from the sky when it sleets. but a saucer sled makes excellent head protection. Made my first snow angel. There's a hill (called Foss Hill) that overlooks the school baseball field. It's a prime sledding spot.

An internet search reveals that there is a musical instrument museum at Yale. Of course, they won't have any 15th century clairons, but I want to go see it. Angela is still in town. Aaron is leaving tonight after Dan St. Clair's concert. Dan was the CA for the course I TAed. (CAs are undergrad TAs, fwiw) He's doing installations. They're super cool. He's doing grad-level work and consequently, has the respect of the grad composers. I dunno when Dan is leaving. Most everyone is gone already and those that aren't are leaving very soon.

No more pencils, etc. Maybe I'll get a chance to make a snow person.

Scitilopolitics

Celeste Hutchins
Music 222
Final Project Notes

Scitilopolitics

Program notes:

Researchers have discovered that if they take the syllables of a word and play them backwards, but in the correct order, people will be unable to hear the reversal. This piece explores how backwards things have to be, before you can hear it.

The male voice is George Bush. The female voice is Jessica Feldman reading text from Jeffner Allen, Lesbian Philosophy: Explorations (Palo Alto: Institute of Lesbian Studies, 1987)

Essay:

I wanted to write something that could only be done with a computer, so granular synthesis seemed link an obvious choice. My friend posted about the syllable reversing thing in his blog several weeks ago, so I thought I should try that. I decided to use Bush, because everything he says is so very backwards. I searched CNN.com for aiff files of Bush speaking and only found two good ones. One was him speaking about the ABM treaty, but my wife just wrote a piece using that one (also premiering 8:00 p.m. Dec 10th, but in Paris), and didn't want me to use it. The other one is the one I am using, where he gives a speech about terrorism and destroying American culture. One of the students in MUSC 220 used the same audio clip for a different sort of tape project. I had been thinking about the subtext of the speech since hearing that project and about how to make Bush's real message - his desire to destroy pop culture - clear. Repeated listening, which this piece contains, helps get people hear the real message behind the seeming non-sequiturs of the presidential speech. To make it clearer, I splatter key phrases, using the same reversal algorithm, out to any one of the 4 speakers. As the piece progresses, I add additional sound-bites, from the ABM treaty speech and from press conferences where Bush talks more about foreign policy.

After Bush winds down, I launch the contrary text from Allen's book. I run the algorithm in the opposite direction, because I take the opposite view of the words. Allen also talks about violence, terrorism and victimhood, but unlike Bush, everything she says is true and real. Her words are ultimately empowering to her reader, giving her readers freedom instead of taking it away. Her viewpoint is equally extremist, but exists in reaction to the sort of evil that Bush proposes.

Also, I find that listening to Bush talk about destroying culture for 5 minutes makes me very tense and Jessica's soothing voice talking about women uprising against men is an antidote to Bush's evil rhetoric.

Technical:

I put the splattering in a routine, because I found it hard to fight my impulse to send out bushisms in all directions as key words popped up. The texture was always too dense. and I thought it would better to not necessarily have the highlighted text match what was just said. Doing a computer implementation was much easier than teaching myself to play the piece. The Allen quotes at the end are still manually triggered, as it's easier to manually put them in the right spot than to get the computer to do it.

I always have an instinct to generalize software that I've written so it could take any audio files and do the same piece, or make it very general so it could do a number of related pieces. This is not always a good instinct, although the reversing routine might come in useful. It is already stand-alone. The maxTimesThroughLoop variable may not be useful going in reverse. Would you want your loop to start from the largest possible grain and run N times? Or start from N loops from the smallest possible grain? My instinct is that the second case would be more useful, but the first case is what would happen currently.

The weighted averages of buf2 in the splatter routine are kludgy. While the splattering code works, I wouldn't want to invite it to dinner parties. The three while loops are especially awful. If I want to do more with this piece, I would fix the splattering. But for now, it works. My old boss used to say, "worse is better," as in, it was better to release something that worked than work forever to make the most pristine thing in the world. You could fix it later. He also used to go through and remove comments from code, saying that the code itself was truth and comments were distorting, so I don't think he always gave the best advice on programming. If someone took out the comment around figuring out what number should reside in timesthroughLoop, for example, I would be hopelessly confused.

postmortem - blog comments

The concert was sparsely attended. only around 4 spectators came. my piece crashed right near the end of the George Bush section, so the radical feminist text was not played at all. Ron, the prof, said that Ashcroft had gotten in my computer. I was using a different computer than i had used to test and develop (and compile the intrepretter on) the piece, and i think that may have been a factor. so i'm going to get a laptop this week. as a student, i won't have to pay for it for a long time. i think i can pay it off over a year with an interest free loan.

and christi did Working Girl instead of the ABM tresty piece, perhaps due to a shortage of elephant samples. I will be going to the library on monday to return my interlibrary loan books, so if i take my brain with me, i'll check out some elephant tapes.