2020 Hindsight

Perhaps you feel like this?

You may wonder how I feel about this book?

They're coming to take me away!

No, tell us how you really feel, Susan!

Perhaps you feel like this? Maybe so and maybe not.

Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition: The Hut of Baba Yaga. Yep. that pretty much sums it up.

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After sleeping a few hours....

Okay, from the pit of despair, how about a look at those who are at the top of their game? That's always comforting!

J.K. Rowling interviewed in The Times (London)

Yet Rowling concentrates not on the fairytale but on what came immediately

before. The fact that she has been seriously depressed and desperately short of

money are defining factors for her. She is also aware that without that failed

marriage in 1993, there would be no Jessica and possibly no Harry. Life does not

come in a neat package, I say, and she pounces on this. "People do want life to

be neat. That is undoubtedly true. But you know the four great truths of Buddha:

the first one is 'Life is Suffering'. I love that. I LOVE THAT. Because I think YES.

Life is not supposed to be neat. And it's a comfort. It's a comfort to all of us who

have messed up. And then you find your way back, bizarrely. And I'm sure to

mess up again at some point - though, I hope, not on such a grand scale."

Nope. Not neat at all. (I will escape later today to the Getty, so it's not as bleak as all these screaming women make out. Well, almost.

Hours in a Day

In just 5 minutes of surfing to various weblogs, (okay, 10 minutes) I can find links to all manner of articles to read that'll occupy me for the next several hours.

Craig at Booknotes points to an article on our 29.8 hour day, then comments on the different pace in America as in Europe.

These days I'm working on a personal writing project, consisting of my own handwritten scrawls in a little spiral notebook. I work about an hour a day on it, and, more often than not, I've been taking my notebook and pen out to the poolside and writing there in the late afternoon sun. I suppose that I multitasked. I listened to the birds and I dangled my feet in the water while writing. It's so delicious!

YooZoo 's got some good links-- charisma, Making a Life/Making a Living.

Barista's got a link to an article on the challenges of Integrating Unix and MacOS environments.

Then there's Ellisongate as discussed by Dave, Dan, and various news outlets.

I think that, in light of all the things I *could* be reading on the web, I'll go and take a little walk.

Hey, all you Manila users! Wanna get a retrospective look at what you've been up to with your site this month? Check out your Topics list. (the URL takes this form: yoursitename.editthispage.com/discuss/topics) But do it today or tomorrow, cause on July 1, the list goes back to nothing!

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Somebody shoot me Uh oh, time to go over copyedits for another chapter. (this is not the poolside writing project mentioned above. No. This is The B.o.o.k. from Hell.) In addition to lots of whimpering, it's gonna take chocolate and whiskey and profuse foul language to get me through this process. What I want to do is to throw glass objects--hard--against solid surfaces, and listen to the crash-tinkle-tinkle.

This is the kind of stuff that makes me wonder why I choose to live. Really. It's utterly and completely depressing.

It starts with poorly implemented software that has to be explained. First, the writer (that's me) writes about it. It's kinda unclear. The co-author makes some notes about it, bounces back to writer. Writer sighs and tries again. Then tech-reviewer pokes holes in it. Writer re-writes section. It then goes to copy editor, who makes the following comment:

"Also, this entire discussion of time and frames per second and SMPTE time is kind of murky. Pls. take another look at this and the next couple of paragraphs to see if you can simplify and clarify the discussion."

Well-meaning stuff, that. The copy editor is being very reasonable. But I'm going ballistic. D'ya wanna know why it's murky? Huh? Huh? It's murky because the software Bryce counts frames beginning with 0, and renders a frame called zero. In real SMPTE time, there's no such thing as frame 0. it all starts with 00:00:00.01. But noooooo! Bryce counts and renders a frame 0. Everything is off by one. Yer damn right it's murky! And *my* explanation is murky because I'm trying to explain why everything is so fucked in Bryce the first place. Damn. (uh, no, this explanation will not find its way into the final text of the book. Sorry to disappoint, Martin)

They're coming to take me away, ha ha!

Writing, Publishing

There's been a little discussion about publishing--book publishing--taking place in the discussion group, in response to the whole Harry Potter phenomenon.

All right. I'll lay my cards on the table here. I wanna get away from writing computer books (aren't you surprised?). Software: shelf life = short. Effort = lots. That means pressure and revising every coupla years and watching the closing window and bleah.

If I write about some other topic that has a longer shelf life, then I get to explore something *new* rather than rehashing the same old stuff. Oops. Exception. Each revision of the software, the bugs are new and they show up in new places. gnash gnash. See what I mean?

But I digress.

Hmm. humans. shelf life: Long.

Yesterday Dave P. quoted someone who lived in the 17th century, whose statement is just as true in the days of ascii and email!!

So where is this all going to lead me? hmmm... don't know. The journey is the reward.

Why I write in this weblog:

• I can say something in a few short paragraphs and immediately publish it. (computer books = toil for long time before it sees the light of day)

• I do a little writing daily. Naturally some days are better than others. But the dailiness of it is important.

• I get to build a new audience. If you are reading this and you're not a Brycer, then I've succeeded at expanding my "audience" beyond people who use Bryce.

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Inspirations Recent true stories I have read in weblogs that have made me ponder and go hmmmmm....

Livin la vida loca? or a dream? The Doc Searls "No, it doesn't" story.

What is really important? Al's Gifts from Beyond story.

Watch today's sunset

Today's sunset is the latest sunset of the year, according to the Celestial Almanac. (guess that means that the sunrises have been getting later since the solstice last week, to compensate for the ever-later sunsets. Solstice was the day with the most daylight, sunrise to sunset.)

More discussion on the art of listening and writing in ascii. (these two links point to two different threads, both of which include speaking and listening) I'm really happy to see these threads develop, and to host conversations that other people are having with each other, in addition to having with me! :D (Oh man, I'm so tempted to say that Dave P and I are having a pithing contest! There! tempation succumbed to! hee!)

Mac Extensions Garret's query for mac extensions is producing some items that are worth looking into. Of course, I waxed eloquent about TypeIt4Me and how much I use it to work inside of Manila. : )

Oh, what a press run!! The new Harry Potter book will have an initial press run of 1.5 million copies! yow! yow! yow! Watch the royalty meter go cha-ching! And I'm not talkin' bout no queens, kings, princes or princesses! Joanne Rowling, you go grrl!! :D update Veronica pointed me to another news story that puts the press run at 3.8 million. My eyes have rolled into the back of my head. Amazon ranks the book as #1. That's a lotta sales to hold the #1 spot.

Rowling, whose childhood playmates were a brother and sister named Potter,

is a graduate of Exeter University. She says Harry Potter came ``fully

formed'' into her head in 1990, when she was on a train traveling from

Manchester to London. She wrote the names of the Hogwarts Houses on an

airsick bag when she was flying to Portugal in 1991 to teach English.

After marrying and divorcing a Portuguese television journalist, Rowling took

her baby daughter to Edinburgh, Scotland. Living in poverty, depressed and

skipping meals so her daughter could eat, Rowling completed the first Harry

Potter book on an old typewriter. But she was too poor to photo-copy the

manuscript, so she typed the entire book a second time.

Five years ago, Rowling was told by an agent that ``you won't make any

money writing children's books.'' In March, Forbes magazine estimated her

earnings at $40 million.

Let that be a lesson to all us boyz and grrls not to listen to discouraging things from agents!!!

(I've not read any of the books in the series. I think I need to talk to my niece about them; she has. I seem to remember her reading one of the books at Christmastime. Gee, and I was so thrilled that she was old enough to read The Phantom Tollbooth, which I gave her for Christmas (I inscribed it, I've been waiting all your life to give you this book." really.) Now I'm looking forward to giving her A Wrinkle In Time. Well, if you're a reader, you never can have too many books!)

Before the walls go on Garret points out an article on wiring your house with ethernet (thanks! I've gotta get around tuit!), and commeting on one obvious statement in the article, "Of course, the best way to physically network a home is to do it while the home is still under construction." I remember talking to my brother about how much it'd cost to get Cat-5 in his house when it was being built. "One thousand dollars to get cat-5 *all* throughout your house? DO IT!!!!" He, um, didn't. (perhaps I wasn't articulate enough?) Now he works for an internet startup. I refrained and didn't say, "I told you so." Had it been me, however.....

Dialog and the art of thinking together

Dialog and the art of thinking together , by William Isaacs. I started reading the book yesterday. I wish that I could write a 1 or 2 sentence summary of the contents so far. But in a way, I feel as though I'd be in the same position of the music composer, who, upon the completion of playing the composition, is asked, "I like it! But what does it mean?" and the composer answers by beginning at the beginning and playing through the composition again.

In other words, right now there aren't the right kinda words to "sum up." It's one of those books that have triggered lots of thoughts in response to the words on the page...recollections of dialogs that I've been in that have worked, or have not worked. Meetings that I've attended that seem to go nowhere, and others that have been productive. Relationships gone awry. Others that have blossomed. With so many personal recollections woven into the thread of words on the page, it's hard to separate out some kernel of content to describe.

But it's been worth the read. Oh, has it been worth the read (I'm not yet finished).

Mebbe I'll put a few excerpts here.

Listening "Listening not only to others but also to ourselves and our own reactions. Recently a manager in a program I was leading told me, 'You know, I have always prepared myself to speak. But I have never prepared myself to listen.'"

"Krishnamurti, the Indian philosopher, put the challenge this way:

I do not know if you have ever examined how you listen, it doesn't matter to what, whether to a bird, to the wind in the leaves, to the rushing waters, or how you listen in a dialog with yourself, to your conversation in various relationships with your intimate friends, your wife or husband. If we try to listen we find it extraoridinarily difficult, becaue we are always projecting our opinions and ideas, our prejudices, our background, our inclinations, our impulses; when they dominate, we hardly listen at all to what is being said. In that state there is no value at all. One listens and therefore learns, only in a state of attention, a state of silence, in which this whole background is in abeyance, is quiet; then, it seems to me, it is possible to communicate."

Respecting

At its core, the act of respect invites us to see others as legitimate. We may not like what they do or say or think, but we cannot day their legitimacy as beings. In Zulu, a South African language, the word Sawu bona is spoken when people greet one another and when they depart. It means "I see you." To the Zulus, being seen has more meaning than in Western cultures. It means that the person is in some real way brought more fully into existence by virtue of the fact that they are seen.

Suspending

To suspend is to change direction, to stop, step back, see things with new eyes. This is perhaps one of the deepest challenges human beings face--especially once they have staked out a position. It is difficult in part because we tend very quickly to identify what we say with who we are. We feel that when someone attacks our idea, they are attacking us. So to give up our idea is almost like commiting a kind of suicide. But nonnegotiable positions are like rocks in the stream of dialogue: They dam it up. One of the central processes for enabling us to enter into dialog is the practice of suspension, the art of loosening our grip and gaining perspective.

Voicing "Finding your voice in dialogue means learning to ask a simple question: What needs to be expressed now? To do this you need to know how to listen not only to you rinternal emotional reactions an dimpulses--or to the many images of how you think you shoujld behave--but to yourself."

Ralph Waldo Emerson:

A man shoujld learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his own thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.

Learning to find your voice, and speak from your voice: A musician who played his own music in between playing other people's music, on breaks from running seminars. He was asked about a piece of music he was playing. --Moon River. --No, before that. --Oh, that was some of my music. --You're wasting your time with Moon River. Who will play your music if you don't do it yourself?

[One of the author's PhD advisors, discussing the topic of the PhD] did not begin with my written proposal or the academic references that he thought I should follow. He simply asked, "What do you want to be known for?" He was asking me, What is my music? This cut through the fog and let me speak what I had made a forbidden subject for myself--what I truly cared most about. ...The answer for me lay in seeking to uncover the reasons human beings subvert their own intentions--why despite a lot of good intentions we have a world that is not what it might be--and proposing a way to overcome this pattern of thinking and interacting.

Swing Slut

All right, that's it. After last night's dance (been a while since I been to a dance) I think I'm a bona fide swing slut. That style of dancing is simply too much fun!

One of my partners told me about finding a web site that taught the shim sham, complete with video. I wonder if this is the one?

Listening in the dance Since one of the themes of the week is listening, here's how being a swing slut fits in with listening. In this kinda dancing, there's a leader and a follower. The person who's following (the woman) dances and listens to her partner. Not with the ear so much as with the body. There are subtle ways that the leader communicates what happens next--how his hand is on my back, how he leads the hand that he's holding. And I, as follower, give energy in both places of contact--the back and the other hand, so that he's got something to work with. If he moves my hand, my whole body goes with it.

After the first while or learning how to do swing dancing, to just get the basic steps down, I got to a point where I began to focus my attention on following. All of a sudden, the dance became more fun. Now granted, I need to know the moves, too... but the only cues that I get for what move comes next is the communication by my partner. Happy are those moments when I get through a new move solely by listening to my partner's lead.

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Garret posts some thoughts about driving across the U.S. and how to preserve community. I had posted a bit on this at the beginning of the month. I'll reiterate them here:

NPR Interview with Robert Putnam. "We don't have friends, we watch Friends" He's the author of a book called Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community.

In addition to the Bowling Alone site, which is more devoted to describing the problem, there's a site devoted to solutions and answers and what people are doing about it: Better Together

Listening...period!

Aaaah.... glorious summer days by the pool!

Actually, I think that going on and on for days on the topic of listening is, well.... a little too *out there* ; ) I mean, it goes against what listening is.

Dialog Be that as it may, I have borrowed (and have yet to really get into) a book loaned to me by a friend: Dialogue and the art of thinking together. Should be interesting. I'll share new thoughts as they come from reading.

Listening Courtesy of YooZoo, a link to an interview with one of my favorite authors, Madeleine L'Engle.

“I know my best work is unself-conscious. When I’m really writing,” she explains in a bedtime-story voice, “I’m listening, and I’m not in control. That’s when I finish and look back and say, ‘I wrote that?’”

...Some of the wonderful mysteries of art, L’Engle notes, are the surprises that follow when an artist “listens” to her work, when he or she is in touch with it. “Often, when we listen to the work, it takes us places we have no idea where we’re going. Surprises always follow,”

she suggests. “If we’re given a talent, you have to serve it. You don’t own it. You don’t control it. You don’t manipulate it. You can do that and be a best-seller if you want to. But ultimately it is a gift that is freely given and you have to serve your gift.”

hmmm... I guess there is still more to *say* about listening! ; )

Listening to Customers for corporation-wide web sites: GE's Management Methods are Put to the Web. [NY Times, free subscription required] Link from YooZoo

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Well, if you can read German, you can tell what Kai Krause is up to these days. (Der Spiegel) heh. Babelfish to the rescue. But "dock" is what comes of the word "Kai" --hee! And Krause translates "ruffle" Surreal stuff!

If ruffle of its monitor up-looks, it sees the Rhine, because of which towns are lined up,

deeply far under itself so and tiny, as if they belonged to a model course, framed from the hill

chains of the Westerwaldes. I think that's When Krause looks up from his monitor, he sees the Rhine.....

And at the end we coin/shape a

stamp as brand names on all products developed here drauf: ' A cool Piece OF Shit from the

byte castle '. "

Listening to Ascii

I was away in Santa Barbara in the last 24 hours; back now. (Rollerblading along the oceanfront there is always so pleasant!!)

There are lotsa responses from yesterday's posting on the limits of ascii.

Mira wants to continue musing on this topic!

Seth talks of both hit counts and the number of links to our site from others' sites.

Al describes how, using ascii, to show that you were listening. "In ascii...you have to wait until the message is over, then show that you were engaged. How? Hmmm, by picking up the main points and responding to them, showing that you took the time to read and understand rather than just skim and respond?" The art of responding in ascii is not so different from written (snail-mail) correspondence. (Heh! He also jokes about face-to-face listening..... and based on his description of "What I can do", I believe that Al has tons of experience in the face to face variety!)

Veronica responds further to the theme of handwritten correspondence. She asks, How are ascii symbols different from handwritten symbols? ..and then goes on to compare Hallmark cards versus e-cards.

I already agree with Al's assessment that a written response that pays attention to the contents of the original note does, in fact, convey "listening." Inherent in my temptation to toss off a pithy phrase is that yes, I am seeking to find a way to address the content of the original piece of writing.

And yes, I've thought about hit counts a lot, too. --both in terms of their significance as well as whatever strategies I might employ to get more page hits. ; ) Page counts translate to: "I am heard! You're paying attention. I'm significant."

In response to the difference between an ascii-letter and a hand-written letter, there are two different time frames involved. In days of yore (that's *my* days of yore) I used to be quite a snail-mail correspondent. In fact, my desire to travel and write is that the mail I'd send from trips was one of the easiest and most satisfying forms of writing that I've done. Both email and snail mail take time to do, and time to receive and read. But snail mail always takes longer to arrive than email (certain notable technical snafus excepted).

I'd like to say some things about time and attention and intention and consumption, but at the moment, I'm afraid that it all may come out sounding gag-me! trite.

Uh oh

Can you live without email? Seems I'm gonna discover the answer to that question. My email app has been acting up in the last day and I just watched it display the following message about the emails that I just downloaded:

This message has been permanently deleted.

Sigh.

Later: I just changed the email app's preferences to leave messages on the server for a couple of days. So this won't happen again.

Roadkill and Houston drivers Garret gives another report from the road, headin' toward home. "I need a vacation."

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The art of writing a weblog Mira muses on what makes a weblog writer feel exposed: lack of immediate feedback. For the last month, I've had this internal side-dialog with myself over the merits (or lack thereof) of communication in ascii. Listening sucks in ascii. How do you listen? How do you express listening? Is it like the sound of one hand clapping? I read an email recently--a friend described all manner of feelings and circumstances surrounding a visit to a dying relative. The email was very moving. My jaw dropped, my eyes watered. I shook my head, overwhelmed by what this person experienced and the way it was expressed. How...using ascii....can a person express that kind of listening in a reply?

The things that connote human rapport face to face-- a sympathetic expression, eye contact, nodding. The listener is *there* with the speaker, communicating it in so many different intangible ways. Think about one of the electronic mailing list's bugaboos--the email that says "Me too!" Is it fluff? A waste of bandwidth? A sign of idiocy? Or a way to indicate listening in ascii?

I've found myself, in the situations where I want to write someone and say, "I'm listening, I heard you!", tempted to write pithy comments--the nice little humorous aside tossed off. That's grandstanding, not listening. It doesn't match the response I felt inside of me when I read that email. Hal Ranger's grandmother said, "There are two kinds of people, those that listen, and those that wait to talk." ascii tends to turn a person into the second type of listener.

And I wonder what of emails that arrived today and then went bye-bye are stories or messages that I really wanted to listen to? What just got lost? What if one of those emails happened to be a legally-binding digitally signed document? Hmmmmm.....

Well, my musings on ascii go farther afield than weblog writing. But the lack of immediate feedback is a great drawback of ascii in general.

....I may revisit this topic again.

laterWas out n about all day after posting this. But I did see the good responses from Mira, Al and Seth. But sleep beckons!

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A Quote: Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing.

-- Clive James