http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio my old blog akiste@mac.com 2006-03-20 12:20:58 -0500 hourly 1 2006-03-20 12:20:58 -0500 http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20040708130033/LHA20050823114221/index.html http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20040708130033/LHA20050823114221/index.html

Ugh...

Date Created: Aug 23, 2005, 11:42 AM

Don't you hate it when you post the lamest post ever, assuming that you'll post another one ASAP, but then you don't? And now some completely lame post about growing a beard has been up there for days? Wait...now this is the lamest post ever

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One day, when I'm all growed up....

Date Created: Aug 19, 2005, 10:47 AM

I gave up my attempt to grow a beard. (Yeah, stop laughing and pick yourself up off the floor.) You know those really geeky guys that live in their mother's basements, eating Freetos all day, playing XBox, who speak only in unintelligible computer jargon, and have those really patchy, nasty beards? Well, that was what I was looking like, except patchier. Glennalicious recently posted an informative and useful treatise on shaving. I hope one day to be able to put some of his knowledge to good use. That is, if I ever need to shave.

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Lake Michigan.

As Brian mentions in his blog, we traveled to the northern lower peninsula for a weekend away with friends. Sometimes, in discussing the "Big Lake" as Michiganders call it, with people who've never been there, it's pretty obvious that they're thinking it's some little pond that you can see across. When I mention the beaches, particularly to Californians, they roll their eyes, assuming I mean some tiny little patch of sand. The beaches up north aren't nearly the huge, sandy dunes of the lower part of the state. Instead, there are plenty of water-smoothed rocks to pick through. Many of these rocks aren't native, and traveled here from Canada thousands of years ago. Now, after their long trip, they wash up on short to rest. Only to be thrown back into the water by me. Here are a few of the pictures I took. What these pictures don't show is the huge numbers of shooting stars we saw while laying out on the beach on Friday night. Our friendly neighborhood astronomy professor told us that these were from the Pleiades meteor shower. (you can find more of these pictures on my flikr account, the link is on the left) Click any picture for a larger version.

Date Created: Aug 18, 2005, 10:06 AM

Brian says "Hi!" Either that or he's saying, "Get me a T&T! Liquor's flowin' like mud around here!"	Don't be such a stick in the mud!	Lake rocks, from the "basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops -- under the rocks are the words and some of the words are theirs." Norman Maclean
Sunset over Lake Michigan.	Whenever I see seagulls now, I can't help but yell, "Mine! Mine! Mine!"	Sunset over Lake Michigan.
"What would the world be, once bereft of wet and wildness? Let them be left, O let them be left, wildness and wet; Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet." - Gerard Manley Hopkins	Sunset over Lake Michigan.	Shale Shore, Lake Michigan
Beach rocks, catching some rays.	Flutter by, butterfly.	Friendly bug.
Scary bug!

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From the web...

Date Created: Aug 16, 2005, 10:47 AM

Two interesting articles, for your reading pleasure. A Chinese University has begun offering a class in homosexual studies. A thorough article examining the causes of homosexuality.

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Overreaction....

Date Created: Aug 11, 2005, 11:58 AM

(I used to teach high school, so stories about schools, and students, and teachers grab my attention. Feel free to skip this post if memories of high school give you hives, the willies, the heebee jeebees, or just crabs.) What is it about school administrators that makes them such ... well ... squares. (For lack of a better word?) Yes, there are a few decent school principals and superintendents out there but mostly they're just the exceptions that prove the rule. If there are ever exceptions to rules, the typical school administrator has one reaction: overreaction. I'm pretty sure it's genetic. Either that, or there's a class in Administrator School on how to blow things out of all reasonable proportion while sounding like a nerdier version of Ned Flanders and Principal Skinner's love child. What brought this on? Well, suppose you're a student at a high school, and the high school gives you a laptop computer. (First of all, they're obviously complete dopes for doing any such thing.) And the laptop has software that prevents you from doing much of anything useful such as downloading internet porn and chatting with your friends and buying Viagra on eBay. At the same time, the laptop allows school administrators to spy on your actions. Your reaction, like mine, would probably be to say, "Frak this! You can keep your laptop." But the district makes it mandatory that you use the laptop for school work. So now what do you do? I think the answer is obvious. If you're a teenager, you figure out how to crack the system. Because that's what teenagers do. (It's what I'd do too.) It's their job, and they do it well. And after 10,000 years of homo sapiens history, if adults haven't figured it out by now, the poor saps deserve whatever happens. I always figured that any time one of my students could outwit me, I pretty much deserved what was coming. (It rarely happened, and I earned a great deal of respect from the little ankle biters for being even more sneaky and conniving than they were.) Now imagine that the school administrators actually taped the administrator's password onto the back of each computer. Aren't you almost required to start playing around? So, now let's say that the bumbling Keystone-Kops in the school district's I.T. department actually figure out what's going on. (And here I can completely attest to the fact that I.T. people in the public schools are total loads. Anyone who actually knew anything about computers would find a job that paid significantly more than the 20K that school districts pay their I.T. people with crappy benefits.) So...what do you suppose the administration does? Now remember, the point is to overreact as much as possible. Suspension? Expulsion? Nah... come on... that's for amateurs. Obviously you charge the students with a felony. Yes, yes, yes ... the students should indeed be punished, no question. And the I.T. staff should probably be sacked, too. But what would be a reasonable punishment for the kids? Come on, smart reader, you're way ahead of me on this already aren't you?

]]> 2005-08-11 12:29:33 -0400 http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20040708130033/LHA20050809220817/index.html http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20040708130033/LHA20050809220817/index.html

Random thoughts on Penguins, Law Firms, and Bears...

Date Created: Aug 09, 2005, 10:38 PM

1) We saw March of the Penguins last night and it rocks. I've always loved penguins. The quiet dignity mixed with the complete silliness is endearing. The moment when the daddy penguin sings to his little baby penguin so they'll recognize each other when he returns was just too damn cute (and frakin' amazing.) If I could type in baby talk, I'd be doing it right now. The precarious balance between these birds and the land they live on, and they ocean they feed in is amazing. But they are only just barely adapted for the conditions in which they live. Think about it....the whole reason that they walk so far inland before they mate is because, come spring time, the ice will have melted to within a couple hundred feet of their mating grounds. If they had misjudged it by half a mile, they'd all be in the big drink. Or, they'd have to waddle with their chicks on their feet half a mile father inland. That's a pretty delicate balance. If there's a better argument against Intelligent Design (other than the existence of George W. Bush), I can't think of one. Evolution basically theorizes that a species is going to be just as adapted as it needs to be to its environment, but not much better. One would think that an Intelligent Designer would have designed penguins with solar cells, or retractable wings that actually help them fly, or wheels, or cannibalism, or something like that. 2) Considering that 9 months of their lives is involved in mating and caring for chicks, I now understand why all the penguins at the zoo just swam around and around and around in that big tank -- very fast. Even penguins have to work off sexual frustration, apparently. 3) Every day on the local NPR station, I have to hear an advertisement for a certain law firm. Now, I know that it's traditional to list the partners of the firm in the name. But really, in this case, I think something like "Legal Specialists, Inc." would have been better. The firm? "Harness, Dickey, and Pierce." The problem is that even in a different order: "Dickey, Pierce, and Harness" or "Pierce, Dickey, and Harness" it still sounds wrong. Only "Pierce, Harness, and Dickey" sounds even remotely OK, and that's still a stretch. 4) Watching people leave the theater after March of the Penguins was hilarious. It was like watching ... well ... it was like watching March of the Penguins. 5) As we left the theater, people were in line at the concession stand because 2001, which was playing in the other theater, was at intermission. All I could think of was Morgan Freeman saying something like, "And as one partner makes its long, silent journey for popcorn, the other is left to care for the seat. Soon, they will trade, and the seat will be cared for by the other partner...." 6) In a couple weeks, the penguins at the Michigan Theater will be replaced by bears. They're going to be showing a movie called "Grizzly Man," which sounded like a movie that would be very much fun indeed. Alas, it isn't that kind of movie. Instead, according to the theater's website the movie is "Director Werner Herzog’s devastating and heart-wrenching documentary about the life of Timothy Treadwell, an activist who thought he could live safely among the grizzly bears he studied in the Alaskan wilderness. Treadwell and his partner Amie Huguenard were eventually killed by one of the bears." Um. Well then. Not quite a cheery as happy, silly penguins, I guess. Rarely do the happy, silly penguins eat the filmmakers. (Though, thousands of starving and cold Emperor penguins attacking the parka wearing, meat-filled filmmakers would have made for a truly riveting scene.)

]]> 2005-08-09 22:38:06 -0400 http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20041115150506/LHA20050808091522/index.html http://homepage.mac.com/akiste/blogwavestudio/LH20041115150506/LHA20050808091522/index.html

I'm sorry Dave. I just can't do that.

Date Created: Aug 08, 2005, 09:15 AM

Last night we saw the 70 mm version of 2001: A Space Odyssey at the Michigan Theater. (The theater is having a summer classic film series.) It's amazing how well the special effects from 1968 still hold up. In fact, they look better than the DVD versions of Star Wars. (If you've got the Star Wars DVDs, you've no doubt noticed the little blue rectangles around all the space ships in the space scenes. Blech.) Unfortunately, the Michigan's 70 mm print wasn't in very good shape -- very scratched -- and it even broke about 5 minutes before the end of the movie. It broke right at the point where Dave has gone "Beyond the Infinite" to the Victorian Hotel Room at the End of the Universe. Of course, this film is a classic, and everything important that can be said about it has already been said. I think it must be pretty neato to have created something so full of immediately recognizable images. After the movie, nearly every conversation I overheard was, "What did it mean??" Arthur C. Clarke once said that "If you understand 2001 completely, we failed. We wanted to raise far more questions than we answered." I think the whole movie is just an illustration that, even if you're an alien culture powerful enough to manipulate human evolution, plant these monoliths around our solar system, and even travel past the speed of light, it doesn't mean you have any style. You'd think they'd be able to come up with better decor than that horrible baby blue Victorian hotel stuff?

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They kill children too, don't they?

Date Created: Aug 05, 2005, 10:48 AM

A report from the Sunday Herald describes how the US and UK are imprisoning, torturing, and perhaps raping children in Iraq. Yes, children. Boys and girls as young as 10 years old. This is what it has come to now. The United States of America is torturing children. Stories like this almost make me question my faith. And, I also almost find myself wishing that I believed in an Old Testement God -- a vengeful God who will cast the people who are committing these atrocities into the eternal fires of hell.

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"The Brothers Bishop" by Bart Yates

Date Created: Aug 01, 2005, 12:37 PM

The new book, The Brothers Bishop by Leave Myself Behind author Bart Yates is engaging in spite of its predictability. The book follows a week in the life of Nathan Bishop, school teacher and loner, whose routines and peace-and-quiet are disturbed by a vacation visit by his younger brother Tommy; Tommy's boyfriend-of-the-moment, Philip; Tommy's friend Camille; and her not-quite-so-straight husband Kyle. Tommy's visit brings up lots of old memories of their abusive father for Nathan, memories he certainly would rather forget. And, Tommy's devil-may-care attitude about everything doesn't make things any easier for Nathan. Add to that Kyle's unwelcome advances and Tommy's apparent interest in one of Nathan's high school students and you've got a time bomb waiting to go off. It does of course, and everything ends up going very, very badly. Then there's this whole archeological dig going on in Nathan's back yard. Huh? Yeah, really. I guess it's a "digging up the past" metaphor going on there. Totally unnecessary. This book is predictable. Really, I knew where it was all going almost from the beginning, though there were a couple little surprises here and there. The characters are written so according to type that you could almost write their dialogue for them. Almost. But the writing is good enough that I actually enjoyed reading this book in spite of these serious flaws. I would basically classify this book as a "beach read." (In this case, it was a campfire read for me.) Not a great book, but not too bad either.

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Campy Camping

Date Created: Aug 01, 2005, 12:22 PM

This weekend Brian and I and several friends went camping at a gay campground in Saugatuck, Michigan. First of all, yes, I know this wasn't real camping. This was car-camping. Real camping involves packing as little as possible, and generally includes taking your own toilet paper. Car-camping involves packing your car as full as possible with every possible battery powered convenience, and hoping someone else had room in their car for the keg. Car-camping with The Gays is even more involved. Here are a few of the things I observed this weekend: *No electricity? No problem! French press coffee every morning. *Since each campsite has more tiki torches than you can shake a stick at, flashlights are completely unnecessary. *An amazing chandelier hanging in a tree (in the section that had electricity) made entirely out of clear plastic forks knives and spoons (which accompanied the disco lights very nicely). *Dance music 24/7 from every campsite. *If you really want people to stare longingly at you at the pool, you don't need a sexy speedo. Just serve your husband a gin and tonic, poolside. *Every campsite has an alcohol/beer/wine selection that would put most bars to shame. And here, there's no such thing as "well." Everything is top shelf. *You never quite know who you'll be seeing at breakfast the next morning because the sleeping arrangements are rather um .... fluid, apparently. *On the picnic table at night: lanterns, marshmallows, graham crackers, chocolate squares, bug spray, lube, condoms. *Blowing up air mattresses is a spectator sport. *A survey of what people were reading one morning: gay fiction, historical fiction about Gettysberg, Historical nonfiction about Vietnam, Harry Potter, and UnZipped. *There's no sense in bringing many shirts when you're gay camping because every time you try to wear one, someone is trying to take it off you. *Huge, muscular men -- tiny, ratty dogs. *When about 100 nekkid men are swimming in a pool at night, and the water is a bit chilly, one discovers that indeed, all (well, most) men are created equal. Fortunately the refraction through the water can save one from embarrassment. *Unlike more restrained situations, when there's lots of friskiness going on elsewhere, the showers end up actually being used as showers. What I most appreciated about this weekend was that, apparently, everyone had decided to leave their attitudes at home for a few days. Every single person I talked to was friendly and down to earth, even if they looked like Greek Gods. I'm not sure if it was the atmosphere, or just the accumulation of gigantic amounts of citronella (etc.) inhaled over a 3 day period, but I wish every gay venue was that attitude-free.

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Take Me Out...

Date Created: Aug 01, 2005, 12:00 PM

Thursday night, Brian and I and some friends went to see the Performance Network's production of Take Me Out. Though not everyone in our group found it enjoyable, I did. This is a play about a big-shot, big-league baseball player, Darren, who surprises his team (and everyone else) by coming out. Shortly after, the team hires a new pitcher, Shane, an orphan from some place down South (he's not very specific). After Shane is hired he talks to the press and says some definitely politically incorrect things about his teammates which include several epithets. He's suspended for a few weeks, then allowed back on the team after making an apology. However, his reinstatement does not sit well with Darren. Eventually, Very Bad Things happen and the play spirals down to its conclusion. Additional characters include Kippy, the team intellectual and the play's narrator, and Mason, a convert to the game who is Darren's accountant (who, Ray Schultz plays to perfection ... nearly stealing the show.) The writing is tight and quick. The staging is efficient. The plot is interesting, though the "Worship of Baseball" thing gets annoying after a while (if you've seen the movie The Natural, you know what I'm talking about.) If this were a musical, I'd say every character got their song. In this case, I'd say every main character got their scene and played it well. I enjoyed that the writer, Richard Greenberg, did such a good job of shifting the point of view throughout the show. For example, when Shane is reinstated, Darren is strongly against it. In his argument with the team's manager about this situation, Darren reflects the same ignorance and insensitivity about Shane that Shane has shown about Darren. Nice twist, and it didn't seem forced to me at all. I'm not saying this is the best play I've ever seen, but it was pretty good, and I'd recommend seeing it. Oh, by the way, there's nekkid men in this play. Nekkid men showering. Just warning you.

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A modest proposal....

Date Created: Jul 28, 2005, 09:48 AM

I just read this story about a Methodist minister in Virginia (Virginia is for haters!) denying membership to a guy because he's an "unrepentant, practicing homosexual." This has caused quite a stir among Methodists, or at least quite a stir on this guy's blog. I realized after reading that article that this Reverend Johnson (a suspicious name, if you ask me) has somehow stumbled across the solution to all the fighting about homosexuality going on in so many different denominations. Hear me now, you Anglicans, and Methodists, and Presbyterians! I have found the solution to your problems. Yea, verily I say unto thee, I shall lead you out of the gay wilderness! The solution is so simple, I can't believe no one has thought of it before. You're really going to kick yourself for not thinking of this on your own. Oh well, I guess that's why I'm on this planet, to think of stuff for you all. No, no, no...don't thank me. I'm glad to do it. It is indeed an awesome responsibility to think for you all, but I'll manage somehow. I guess if I didn't have these brilliant ideas, no one would. So here's the deal. The problem with these churches isn't that there is some underlying disagreement about Biblical interpretation, and the nature of the authority of Scripture, blah, blah, blah. The real problem is that all these denominations are, in some way, democratic organizations. That means that any member (and every member) has some sort of say in the running of the church. The amount of this "democracy" differs from denomination to denomination, but it's there in all of them, waiting, like a blackhead, to erupt into a giant boulder of pus. See, once you let people in as members, then they have the same rights as any members, including the right to try to get ordained, try to get married, or try to get the draperies in the church changed from that terrible taupe color. Thus the solution, so unwittingly discovered by this Reverend Johnson guy, is simple: Don't let those people in! That's been the problem with these churches all along. It's been staring us in the face. They are letting in too many of the wrong people, if you know what I mean. (Oh, and I think you do.) If those people don't get in, then those people can't demand to be ordained, can't demand to be married, and can't demand better window treatments. I can see you nodding there, this is all starting to make sense isn't it? It seems that even the Papists, er...Catholics have figured this out. (By the way, I just love the little red frock Cardinal Ouellet is wearing...it really brings out the red in his eyes, don't you think?) And do you know why the Catholics have already figured this out? Because they aren't infected with that horrible "democracy" thing. Nope, no silly voting for them...they take all their directions from some guy in a dress. (Speaking of which, I'm pretty sure he's one of those people. That dress makes him look a little light in the loafers, if you know what I mean. Oh, and I think you do.) So what do we do about all of those people that we have, stupidly, already let in? I think the solution to this little dilemma is equally simple. According to Bread for the World (an organization that seems chock full of those people) more than 800 million people in the world go hungry. These people could be fed with an additional 13 billion dollars a year -- less than Americans spend on pet food. So here's the obvious solution: pet lovers should give all their pet food money to developing nations to end hunger. Duh. "Oh, but what about the pets?" you ask. "And how does that solve our problem with those people?" Please. I've already thought about that. We've got plenty of those people to feed to Spot, and Fido, and Mrs. Havisham.

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Mmmm..... tasty.

Date Created: Jul 25, 2005, 10:52 AM

So, Depp's "Chocolate Factory" was indeed tasty. (Yeah ... eeeewww. Does Reuters not hire editors?!?) There was a lot to love in this movie: the sets, the costumes, the story, the characters, Depp's performance, and the music. All these sugary ingredients piled on each other like a sweet confect.... Oh hell, I can't write like that, plus the metaphor is giving me a sugar high and making my teeth hurt. How about this? This certainly isn't your father's Willy! (hee hee) Depp's performance is less maniacally wacky than Wilder's but more socially inept. Basically Depp-as-Wonka is a guy who loves chocolate and hates bratty kids. I can relate. Forget what you've seen in the commercials; Depp's performance is creepy but not Michael Jackson creepy. There are plenty of treats for geeks in this movie as well. For example, Charlie's dad works in a toothpaste factory, which makes "Smilex" toothpaste. Those who are geeky enough to remember Burton's "Batman" might remember that Smilex is the chemical that the Joker uses to poison Gotham. Subtle homages to the original movie abound ... including a reporter with horns sticking out of his head. (In the original movie, there's a reporter standing in front of some antlers, so it looks like he has horns ... in this one he's standing in front of a pair of speakers, and it again looks like he has horns ... OK, I'm a geek.) The entire opening credit sequence is bascially a copy of the Edward Scissorhands cookie-factory sequence. The music isn't as singable or catchy as the original, but it's much more varied in style and equally amusing. The Oompa-Loompa choreography also pays homage to the original movie, but also includes such things as a giant chocolate choreographed swimming scene a-la Esther Williams. And I like the fact that, after each kid gets disposed of, the other kids start to realize something suspicious is going on. The movie is definitely quotable (ie. "I like grapes!") Thus, I predict the phrase "I don't care" will be the hip new phrase of the next week. Or perhaps, "Everything here is eatable. I'm eatable, but that my children is called cannibalism and it is frowned upon in most societies."

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Intimidation...

Date Created: Jul 21, 2005, 09:20 AM

Let's say you're a Republican representative from the state of Texas with close ties to the oil industry. And let's say that you've decided that all those scientists talking about global warming could put a slight dent in your wallet (yeah right, as if). What would you do? The answer, according to Rep. Joe Barton a mouth-breathing Republican from Texas, is obvious: Investigate the scientists. Take a look at his responses to his fellow Republicans. This guy is a real peach. To paraphrase Jeff Foxworthy, "if even other Republicans think you're a nutcase, then you might be a redneck." On the surface, I have no problem with elected officials examining the scientific conclusions funded by public dollars. (However, I was under the impression that was what the NIH, the NSF, and other government agencies were for.) The real issue here is how, exactly, does a wacko like Barton propose to evaluate the scientific merit of the research of Drs. Mann, Bradley, and Hughes? I'm not saying that he's too stupid to understand the science but assessing the scientific merit of this work should be more than simply saying, "Duh...um...I don't like your fancy scientific idears." I'm not sure I understand the point of this probe anyway. Haven't we already found out that the White House simply changes the conclusions of scientific reports that it doesn't agree with?

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Art Fair...

Date Created: Jul 19, 2005, 09:19 AM

The only thing more common than stupid copper bugs on a sharp stick during Art Fair in Ann Arbor is Ann Arbor-ites complaining about Art Fair. [cue Rod Serling voice] Picture if you will, a small midwestern town. Population: 114000 people. Population during the summer: 50 people. Suddenly, and seemingly without warning, ravenous hoards of nearly half a million stroller-pushing, matching-Hawaiian-shirt-wearing, slack-jawed, suburbanites descend upon this town, like a Biblical locust swarm. They are searching for just the right macramé wall hanging to match their paisly Barcalounger. And, they don't care if they trample you, slam their stroller into your ankles, or put your eye out with a giant copper bug on a sharp stick. Nothing is more important to them than one more bird house made from old licence plates. They must have one more piece of pottery from that little booth that makes obje d' arte that look like they were stolen straight from the set of LA Law. You have just entered.....The Art Fair Zone [cue creepy Twilight Zone music] There are actually 4 Art Fairs in Ann Arbor during "Art Fair." They take up most of the downtown and campus areas, and while I'm sure they're good for the downtown businesses, the rest of us hate them. For those of us that work in the downtown, or campus areas, they're just a gigantic headache. Too many people, too many dogs, too many strollers, too many damn copper bugs mounted on sharp sticks. By the numbers: Number of art fairs: 4 Number of visitors: 0.5 million Number of "artists": thousands Number of artists: one or two Number of damn copper bugs on sharp sticks: 25,000 Number of puncture wounds from damn copper bugs on sharp sticks: 52,000 Number of major thunderstorms: at least 1 Number of tons of garbage collected: does that count the "art"? As the saying goes: "Art Fair: It ain't art, and it ain't fair." If anyone can do me a favor and contact Amnesty International to get me air-lifted out of here for the next few days, I'd appreciate it.

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