Economy of Plenty

Fred Pohl over his 60 year career has written many stories with crazy insights into politics, economics, and our beliefs. His novel "Jem" may be the most cynical indictment of consumerism ever written. He's still writing. I subscribe to his blog and he still occasionally skewers the hell out of the powers that be.

So when I was a kid, probably a teenager, I read his story "The Midas Plague". Here's a synopsis (from Wikipedia):

"The Midas Plague" (originally published in Galaxy in 1954). In this new world of cheap energy, robots are overproducing the commodities enjoyed by mankind. So now the "poor" are forced to spend their lives in frantic consumption, trying to keep up with the robots' extravagant production, so that the "rich" can live lives of simplicity. This story deals with the life of a man named Morey Fry, who marries a girl from a higher class. She is unused to a life of consumption and it wears at their marriage. Morey eventually hits on the idea of having the robots help him to consume his quotas. At first he fears punishment when he is discovered, but instead the Ration Board quickly implements his idea across the world.

Somehow, this always made sense to me. Robots make everything, there's plenty of everything for everybody, right? What does an economy like this look like?

At the start of the 20th century, the occupation that consumed the most manpower was farming. That is now handled by 1-2% of the population.

The industrial revolution created new classes of jobs -- or better, new species of jobs in the ecosystem that is the economy. People left the farm, but in recent decades those jobs have been transitioning to robots -- and there was just an article floating around about the new generation of robots that will take over pretty much all manufacturing jobs. Here's another one. Here's yet another one. Eventually there will be no physical jobs that robots can't do.

And white collar jobs are not immune to automation. In fact, probably most of the 8x productivity gains that the US economy has achieved in the last 50 years have come in white collar work thanks to computers.

So what jobs can't be automated out of existence? Not doctors. Not Foxconn slave girls. Not drivers. Not soldiers.

Maybe software development? Overall, the consensus seems to be that the machines aren't making too much progress at being able to program themselves.

I have for years now had hope that software could answer the question of how to create a growth economy that doesn't eat the world. Software is like language: it is generative. You can always add another clause to any sentence; you can always add another feature to any piece of software. So maybe, like Estonia, we start teaching first graders to code. A recent article on the Flynn effect in Scientific American suggests that the 3 points/decade IQ rise is primarily from improved abstract reasoning -- just what is needed for working with computer logic. (Sorry I can't link to the article, it's behind a pay wall.)

But, back to the original question. If robots can make everything, what does everybody do for a job? And if nobody has jobs, who can buy the stuff the robots make? We are currently in an Economy of Scarcity, which assumes that no one has anything and has to earn everything. But if the robots can make everything, why aren't we in an Economy of Plenty, which assumes that everyone has automatically earned everything they need to live, just by being born? Or, at least until age 21. Children do not choose to be born, nor do they get to choose their parents.

As mentioned above, in the last 50 years, productivity in the US has increased by a factor of 8. So are workers now working 1/8th as much? Are workers getting 8x the pay? I think we can safely answer, no and no. Instead, the haves have managed to keep it pretty much all for themselves. Corporations are doing just fine. Executives are doing just fine -- with US CEOs making ~200x what the average worker does -- 10x or so more than most of the other industrial democracies in the world. It's just the rest of us that have been left behind.

80 years ago, two renowned thinkers addressed this same issue. It is very sad to read their musings and see how far off they are -- or, maybe instead, to revisit these ideas, and see if we can do something with them.

First, "Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren", by John Maynard Keynes, 1930. "In the United States factory output per head was 40 per cent greater in 1925 than in 1919." [Twitter digest] He thought all this increased productivity would lead to utopia for all of us! What a socialist loser! Course Ayn Rand wasn't around then, he clearly didn't understand the importance of Job Creators. Other quotes:

Let us suppose that 100 yrs hence we are all of us, on the average, 8 times better off than we are now.

Three-hour shifts or a fifteen-hour week may put off the problem for a great while.

The love of money as a possession will be recognized for what it is, a somewhat disgusting morbidity.

All kinds of social customs and economic practices, affecting the distribution of wealth and of economic rewards and penalties, which we now maintain at all costs, however distasteful and unjust they may be in themselves, because they are tremendously useful in promoting the accumulation of capital, we shall then be free, at last, to discard.

Here is another overview of the Keynes paper by one of my favorite bloggers.

Here is another article revisiting Keynes, by an economics professor and a philosophy professor.This is adapted from the opening of their new book "How Much is Enough?: Money and the Good Life", which I will be reading before too long.

Second, "In Praise Of Idleness" , by Bertrand Russell, 1932. Also written at the start of the Great Depression. Many of the same thoughts as the Keynes, but the arguments are somethat more pointed. Here are some quotes:

Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth's surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first kind is unpleasant and ill paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid. The second kind is capable of indefinite extension: there are not only those who give orders, but those who give advice as to what orders should be given.

Throughout Europe, though not in America, there is a third class of men, more respected than either of the classes of workers. There are men who, through ownership of land, are able to make others pay for the privilege of being allowed to exist and to work.

The small surplus above bare necessaries was not left to those who produced it, but was appropriated by warriors and priests.

The conception of duty, speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own.

The war showed conclusively that, by the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world. If, at the end of the war, the scientific organization, which had been created in order to liberate men for fighting and munition work, had been preserved, and the hours of the week had been cut down to four, all would have been well. Instead of that the old chaos was restored, those whose work was demanded were made to work long hours, and the rest were left to starve as unemployed. Why? Because work is a duty, and a man should not receive wages in proportion to what he has produced, but in proportion to his virtue as exemplified by his industry.

This is the morality of the Slave State, applied in circumstances totally unlike those in which it arose. No wonder the result has been disastrous.

The idea that the poor should have leisure has always been shocking to the rich ... When I was a child, shortly after urban working men had acquired the vote, certain public holidays were established by law, to the great indignation of the upper classes. I remember hearing an old Duchess say: 'What do the poor want with holidays? They ought to work.'

Oddly enough, while they wish their sons to work so hard as to have no time to be civilized, they do not mind their wives and daughters having no work at all. the snobbish admiration of uselessness, which, in an aristocratic society, extends to both sexes, is, under a plutocracy, confined to women; this, however, does not make it any more in agreement with common sense.

In the past, there was a small leisure class and a larger working class. The leisure class enjoyed advantages for which there was no basis in social justice; this necessarily made it oppressive, limited its sympathies, and caused it to invent theories by which to justify its privileges.

But if we fix it?

Above all, there will be happiness and joy of life, instead of frayed nerves, weariness, and dyspepsia. The work exacted will be enough to make leisure delightful, but not enough to produce exhaustion.

Follow the link and read the whole thing. I have not read much of Russell, I think I will have to read more.

Ha ha, putting their Wikipedia links in, both were British nobles, Keynes a baron and Russell an earl. Well, their hearts were in the right place, regardless.

One thing that is mentioned in several of the papers and articles mentioned above is that the target should be something like Athenian Democracy. The existence of a slave class (which we are replacing with robots) enabled the (male) citizens of Athens to get involved in government, the arts, and all forms of creative activities. There are also multiple mentions of how our work, work, and more work has lead us to be passive consumers of culture, rather than active creators of culture.

So, what, am I a utopian? Yes, I am. We are increasingly heading towards a dystopia with income and wealth unequally distributed probably worse than in the time of kings and emperors. How do we fix it? I think We The People will have to take the bull by the horns and fix our government.

1. Figure out how to control the power of the corporations, the ultra-rich, and the military-industrial complex and all their lobbyists. Getting rid of Citizens United is a start. Online, open government should help too.
   
2. Reform the tax code such that all taxes on investments, particularly dividends and capital gains, are taxed at a minimum at the rate of wages. Why should income earned without any "sweat of your brow", for which you possibly have little or no time investment, be taxed less than labor, which costs you one minute per minute of your life?
   
3. If we decide that we can't get rid of economic parasites that extract wealth while adding no value, such as high frequency or program equity traders, then they should be taxed at a minimum of 50% -- you're just hacking the system, as pointed out by Mark Cuban, the rest of us will take at least half of your ill-gotten gains. Other companies in this category: insurance companies? Other?
   

I believe that the primary goal of the US government and of every government in the world should be simply: to maximize the outcome of every child born. What are the arguments against that? How can we go wrong if that is our goal? As opposed to now, when we have 15 million children in the US living in poverty without enough to eat.

The other thing we need to fix when we fix this is to also get out of a growth economy, before we completely eat the earth. We have to figure out how to grow at a rate that is sustainable and environmentally neutral. Germany is taking some real leadership actions re this. Here's an article. "Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell."

Coal Mining Robots -- RSN?

So, coal is still "Kentucky's ace in the hole". And I see "Friends of Coal" license plates everyday. And there was just an article today in the Lexington Herald-Leader, about how the EPA's forcing scrubbers to be installed on coal-burning power plants lead to a boom in coal mining in western Kentucky, where the coal has very high sulphur content.

Also, did you know, "Coal keeps the lights on"?

But, unfortunately, pregnant women are not allowed to eat fish caught in our beautiful lakes, and the rest of us are only supposed to eat them once a week, because of the hight mercury content in the fish from all our coal-fired power plants putting the mercury in our water.

Weird that recently, coal has been taking a beating, from natural gas. Fracking (and other new techniques?) have produced a great surplus of methane, and utility companies are flocking to the much less environmentally harmful fossil fuel.

But back to coal. The last (Massey?) mine disaster was maybe 29 deaths? All the bodies that were recovered were autopsied. 1/3 of them had black lung -- and these are miners in their 20's.

So, seriously, WTF, why are we still sending people down into these hellhole mines? Why aren't the miners sitting in air-conditioned offices, in comfy chairs, on the surface, operating telepresence robots? That technology is not available? Seems to me it should be totally doable. So WTF has the University of Kentucky been doing with the 10s-100s of millions of research dollars that it has for the coal industry? I guess saving miners lives is somehow way down towards the bottom of the priorities list.

Two Books

So I was trying to get the 2nd of these books read by yesterday to turn it in on time at the Lexington Free Public Library, but I wasn't going to make it. So I pulled up my LFPL bookmark in my browser and 30 seconds later had renewed them both for another month (I finished it today, they'll go back tomorrow).

Really nice tech at the LFPL site. Books I want to read that they don't have yet, I search for and then save the search and voila! a to-read list aka Saved Searches!

William Gibson and others have been recommending the Sandman Slim series, 4th book just released. All available as eBooks at LFPL, hell yeah!

So the 1st library book I read was "Time Travelers Never Die", by Jack McDevitt. The bulk of his work is astro-archeological SF -- exploring ruins of departed stellar civilizations, of which there may be many. This is totally not in that genre. I spent the first 1/3 of it trying to figure out what it was. Then read (later rather than sooner, not sure why) one of the cover blurbs that compared it to the all-time classic movie: "Bill and Ted's Fabulous Adventure". And realized, it was completely correct. This is "dumbass American twits get a time machine and become posers throughout history". Enjoyable, I guess, but, I don't really think I can recommend it. 2 stars.

2nd book, which I just finished today, was "Up Jim River", by Michael Flynn. The first novel of his I read was "Elfenheim", about space aliens stranded in a 12th century (or so) German village. Flynn is a very good writer. Next, I think I read his "The January Dancer" a few years ago. "Up Jim River" is the sequel to that. Hard to characterize these. Space opera, Star Wars in scope but all human, legendary human commonwealth of supernatural powers (nanotech AI) has passed, replaced by celtic League vs sinister mandarin Confederation. Main characters are basically mostly League FBI agents searching for various foo. Flynn writes well, these are very good reads. 4 stars.

I wonder if Romney/Ryan have a plan to privatize our public libraries? If it can put money into the pocket of someone who is not working for that money, probably so. It's a sacred trust, after all.

Only One Path At A Time

So I was out walking this morning and at one point started thinking about the route I was going to take biking this Sunday. When I snapped back to the here-and-now, I was disoriented and didn't know where I was. So this somewhat refines an earlier conclusion of mine: that our minds have only one set of circuits for following paths. Hence the confusion when you think about following a path while actually following a path. I think I blogged this before with regard to becoming disoriented while driving if you think about how to drive somewhere else (but I couldn't find it). This generalizes the conclusion to be independent of mode of travel, be it on foot, by bike, or by car.

Of course it could mean that I have only one set of path-following circuits. Maybe other people have more than one?

Music In

Reader polling has revealed that the favorite feature of this blog is the Music In topic. Acquisitions have down lately. Everything is rated back to the start of June, so 2 months worth. Also some exciting Music Out News.

• "Closing Time", by Tom Waits (1973). So Amazon says, Tom Waits, 2005, I think, I don't have that. Download, start listening. First song, "Ol' 55", I'm like, wait a minute, I know that song, it's an Eagles song?!?!? Why would Tom Waits cover that? So do some research, this is Tom Waits' first album, from 1973. The Eagles covered Tom Waits. If you do not have this album, I would highly recommend you get it. It's one of those fabulous 1st albums by a singer-songwriter who went on to a 40 year (and counting) career. His voice wasn't so gruff then. 4 stars.

  I was going to work up the 2nd song, "I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You", really nice guitar riff. I download the lyrics, 5 verses of 7 lines each -- lots of songs only have 2 verses. So I'll be doing this one from the book only, doubt I'll memorize all 5 verses. Altho, I have remembered all 5 verses of "Up On Cripple Creek" the last couple of times I did it (around the time of Levon Helm's death).

  Tom Waits just released this really ... nasty, creepy, dark ??? but compelling video. I've watched it several times.
  

• "The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than The Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do", Fiona Apple. Ms. Apple puts so much angst into her music, you cannot help but admire it. No standout catchy tunes tho. 3 stars.
  
• Walk The Moon, "Walk the Moon". A Cincinnati band. We all know what a sucker for pop I am, this somehow crosses the line from pop to commercial. Still, the tunes are not bad. 3 stars.
  
• "The Flaming Lips and Heady Fwends", Flaming Lips. These guys continue to pad their resume as the masters of odd orchestration / sounds / noises. Some of these collaborations really work, I particularly liked the ones with Nick Cave, and with Yoko Ono and the Plastic Ono Band. 3 stars.
  
• "New Beard City", New Beard. Hot damn, another great Brooklyn band! The 1st track opens with peppy pop, strings and hand-clapping orchestration, male and female vocals, then an 80s guitar harmony interlude, then a shredding solo, while the strings continue to build. 13 consistently good tracks. 4 stars.
  
• "Carry Me Back", Old Crow Medicine Show. Power folk / bluegrass, similar to their prior album, somehow it doesn't work as well for me. 3 stars.
  
• "Shrines", Purity Ring. A Montreal band, electronica/dance. Good female lead singer, nice grooves. 3 stars.
  
• "The Soul Sessions, Vol. 2", Joss Stone. Has Ms. Stone got this sh#t down or what? Interesting to see the covers she decided to do -- wait a minute, I thought only a few of these were covers, looks like they all are. I only recognized a few. Ms. Stone must be a real aficionado -- duh. 3 stars.
  

The Joss Stone has been here for ~10 days, nothing new since then, so, I am all caught up! All music rated and reviewed!

Re Music Out, after years without one, I've recently played 3 paying gigs with the Here For Party Band: the weekends before and after the 4th of July, and last weekend. A block party (cancelled due to a blown transformer in the heat wave, but, we still got paid, so it counts) and 2 private parties. I think that 4th of July is the time of biggest demand for musicians, even more so than New Year's.

The most recent gig was the most fun, lots of dancers for the last 1-1/2 hours. And the last hour, I was the only guitarist (the most excellent Lindsay Olive had to leave for another gig), and I played some feedback on "Wang Dang Doodle" that seemed to really work. A compressor, 2 fuzz tones and a wah-wah, you can definitely get some serious feedback, but totally under the control of the wah-wah and the whammy bar.

More Reading

I don't actually read all the time. I do work (which does involve reading technical articles and books). I exercise -- biked 43.6 miles this morning, temperature not bad at all, but my legs are talking to me. There are actually several other blog posts rolling around my noggin, but, want to take these two books back to the library, so they go to the top of the stack.

"Black Hills", by Dan Simmons. Simmons has written award-winning science fiction, fantasy, mystery and horror. Lately he has been doing kind of magical realism with a lots of historical fun facts. "The Terror" was a British Northwest Passage expedition stranded in the ice (with weird eskimo gods running around), blogged here. "Drood" was cults in the London of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins, who is the narrator (and author of "The Moonstone", considered the first detective novel).

This one is a young Native American who touches Custer right as he dies and who becomes infested with Custer's ghost. Several timelines, including one of Custer's, and the NA working on Mount Rushmore. I learned a lot about the Black Hills. In some ways tho, this novel seemed more straightforward than the prior two, which really kept you guessing as to what was going on. It also seemed a little shorter than it could have been (486 pages). There were a couple of threads, in particular that with the NA's wife, that seemed a little sketchy.

Still, Simmons cannot but produce a readable and enjoyable novel, which this is. I liked how he worked in a one sentence (anonymous) appearance by Richard Baedecker from "Phases of Gravity" (blogged here), and the Greek philosophy from "Ilium" and "Olympus". 4 stars.

"Eastern Standard Tribe", by Cory Doctorow (2004). I have been really enjoying his recent stuff, championing worker's rights for the digital. This story is more like a novella. The central character is reminiscent of Charles Stross's Manfred Manx -- every conversation winds up having several patentable ideas in it. It moves fast, a little sketchy, but great insight into modern tech. 4 stars.

Speaking of of Charles Stross, he and Doctorow are supposed to have a collaboration "The Rapture of the Nerds" out RSN. Definitely looking forward to that one.

Reading

Just got back from the library, picked up 4 books. A new Dan Simmons, woo-hoo! The prior time I was there I only got into the B's before I had 2 books to read. Those were:

• "Not Less Than Gods (The Company)", by Kage Baker. I think I've read most of Ms. Baker's Company stories. They're OK, semi-immortal superhero types are usually fun. This one is set in the 19th century, and kinds of twists itself around to get some steampunk thrown in. An OK read.
  
• "The Sunborn", by Gregory Benford (2006). A sequel to "The Martian Race", which I enjoyed. Surprised I missed this, I normally keep up with Benford. This is a good read, with interesting ideas about non-CHON-based life forms.
  

I finished these while we were on a 4 day trip to Philadelphia for the wedding of an old, good friend of my youngest. She and I performed "Our Love Is Here To Stay". After six weeks of practicing on an electric guitar, all that the band there had was flattops. So lots of flubs chasing the flattop around my belly, but Christie sang beautifully, and the song was rich in emotional content and was very well received. That song was the last written by George Gershwin before his death. It first was used in a "Goldwyn Follies" movie in 1938. But it then got recycled as the main love theme of "An American In Paris" in 1951.

So on the flight home it was back to ebooks on the iPad.

• "An Unexpected Twist", by Andy Borowitz. A whimsical short story about a near death experience that was a $0.99 kindle special. A quick and sweet read. He is very funny on Twitter (@BorowitzReport), and "The Borowitz Report" is a regular feature in Funny Times.
  
• "The ChristWire Handbook". Based on a web site that satirizes fundamentalist christians so well that people didn't realize that it was a satire. I read the first two chapters, very funny. Probably read more in the future. This would make a good bathroom book -- I guess at some point there will be cheap tablets on the back of every toilet?!?!? This kindle book was a father's day gift from my oldest daughter - thanks!
  
• "Religion for Atheists: A non-believers guide to the uses of religion", by Alain de Botton, who is a Swiss writer and philosopher living in Britain. I read the first chapter, disagreed with most of his premises and assumptions, and decided not to proceed further. I don't think we need religion for handling funerals, weddings or childbirth. I have been to totally non-religious versions of all of these and they work much better without having to artificially inject god into them. I did see a chapter named Community, and in raising our children without religion, I did miss the community that I had growing up, although we did have neighbors and the church of soccer. I will probably try the book again in the future. Also a gift from my oldest daughter.
  
• "In Her Name: Omnibus" by Michael R. Hicks. Apparently three novels, "Empire", "Confederation", and "Final Battle", published as one ebook. Looks like it was $5.99 and I probably bought it based on the recommendation of some other sci fi author I follow. I almost put it down after the first page due to bad sentence structure. But it was the only thing I had to read on the plane, so I kept on. Not too bad really, it keeps you turning its 700 pages. Epic space opera, human confederation vs blue female warrior race of a 100,000 year old empire. Almost fantasy in that their empress has powers that are basically godlike. Oh, and the race is sexually compatible with humans -- so the "Avatar" movie fans will be into the blue warrior chicks -- who have upper and lower fangs for the vampire fans! Unfortunately as well, I believe it is showing "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" effect -- it has rape scenes, which I'd just as soon not have in my comic books. The ending of the book was really bad tho. It was like "OK, long enough, we're outta here!" What should have been at least several pages explanation of what was going on was instead a couple of shortish paragraphs. I guess I will rate it a solid "meh".
  

Music Velocity

Time to catch up on Music In, which will be followed by a discussion of Music Velocity.

• "Slipstream", Bonnie Raitt. Man, what is not to like. She has such a fabulous voice. So many completely catchy guitar riffs. It's interesting, she does a cover of "Right Down The Line", by Gerry Rafferty. You really wonder how someone of her stature decides to do a cover. Like on Prince's "Emancipation" albums, where he covered "Betcha By Golly Wow!", "La-La(Means I Love You)", "One Of Us", and "I Can't Make U Love Me" -- the 1st covers he ever did (of course, he was trying to get out of his Sony? contract). Notice the Bonnie Raitt tune there -- but somehow I don't think her version had "U" in the title. We will revisit the covers issue later. 4 stars for "Slipstream", major props for Ms. Raitt.
  
• "Underwater Sunshine (or What We Did On Our Summer Vacation)", Counting Crows. My youngest told me she no longer listens to Counting Crows. They did do that Shrek song after all -- and I for one completely quit listening to Phil Collins once he started shilling for Disney. But, I think that CC still has some authenticity, and some excellent guitarists. However, sometimes the lead singer Adam Duritz, starts doing talking and other stuff which tells me he's bored. He needs to get that shit reined in.

  Back to the topic of covers. They cover "Amie", Pure Prairie League, and "You Ain't Going Nowhere", The Byrds. I still have them in the Southern Rock genre, those are OK there, but, not totally compelling picks for covers??? BTW, I have like 4 of the 1st 6 Byrds albums on vinyl. Ripping those to MP3 is definitely on my stack.

  3 stars, 4 stars for "Like Teenage Gravity" and "The Ballad of El Goodo" -- which has banjo, yes!
  

• "Stars and Satellites", Trampled by Turtles. I think the genre for these guys, and Fleet Foxes, and Mumford and Sons, and OCMS, is "Power Folk". Enjoyable stuff, 3 stars.
  
• "In The Time Of Gods", Dar Williams. I have a fair bit of her earlier stuff, and I saw her live at Woodsongs. Good tunes, no real standouts, 3 stars.
  
• Butterfly Boucher, eponymous. I think my friend David gave me one of her early works. This is a nice effort. I thought maybe there would be 1-3 4 star tracks -- maybe the 1st track "5678!" -- but it wound up all being 3 stars.
  
• Delbert McClinton, "Keeper Of The Flame" (1979) and "Live From Austin" (1989). Both of these reminded me of Paul Butterfield "East-West" -- I heard that, I'm going "Damn -- that's half of Patty Butcher's material". There are several songs off of both these that are permanent parts of the repertoires of good players that I've played with. 3 star, with several 4 stars for the ones I've enjoyed playing. "Standin' On Shakey Ground" (the last hit of The Temptations in 1975) and "Givin' It Up For Your Love" are in my book.
  
• Norah Jones, "Little Broken Hearts". My first couple of listens to this were totally, "meh". But it really grew on me. Noteworthy is the creepy "Miriam", about murdering a female rival who messed with her man. I read an interview with her, she's saying "Oh, it was just a "murder somebody" song -- traditional" -- I don't know. Really comes across as some seriously bad feelings towards another female who f#cked her boyfriend. 4 stars.
  
• The Lumineers, eponymous. Another Power Folk band. I think some of my young friends are totally into these guys. Nice tunes, no standouts. 3 stars.
  
• Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, "Soul Time!". If I've said it once, I've said it 100 times, there's nothing as fun as playing in a funk band. Ms. Jones has played Lexington a couple times in the last few years and gotten rave reviews, and rightfully so. Man, does she open the can of funk. Totally kick-ass. 4 stars.
  
• Yes, "Fly From Here". So Amazon (still looking for an alternative) has this as a $5 special. I go for it. It is totally excellent. Totally Yes. But I'm like, it is ~50% evolved from 1970 Yes. Shouldn't it be like 400% evolved from 1970? Very interesting listening. Yes is definitely added to the list to be burned from vinyl. 3 stars.
  
• Ben Harper, "Diamonds On The Inside (2003). Another $5 Amazon special. I remember some of my kids liking Ben, and having a decent impression of him. Very nice collection of tunes, a variety of genres including reggae. 4 stars, except for a couple which are a little too raucous for my current years. Sad but true, heavy rockish doesn't work for me anymore. And Metal is Right Out.
  
• Monica Lionheart, "Indian Summer". Holy crap, another great new Brooklyn artist! IMHO, Brooklyn is indeed the coolest city in the USA. And my daughter Erica is now the proud owner of an apartment in Park Slope 2 block west of the Civil War Victory monument. (What? The Civil War is over? The North won?) This album has an excellent variety of orchestration. The hook was planted deep in the 1st track, "Air And Sea", which has a very nice, reverbed pedal steel track as the main ambience. 4 stars.
  
• John Mayer, "Born and Raised". He's a great guitarist, too bad he just seems to come across in his People Magazine personal life as such a dork. Maybe we'd work harder to ignore that, but then there's songs where he bemoans how hard his life as a multimillion celebrity is. Please. 3 stars.
  
• Regina Spektor, "What We Saw From The Cheap Seats". I have the rest of her work and I like it, but somehow, I was expecting that somehow she should mature somewhat as time passed. In particular, sometimes she does this teenager cutesy stuff in her vocals which I would say is becoming inappropriate, as she is now 32 YO. But, I guess it is still distinctive. 3 stars.
  

So, onto the topic of Music Velocity. We just reviewed music acquired from 4/10/12 to 5/29/12. So that's 49 days, 7 weeks, in which I ingested 15 albums, 173 tracks. Let's do the math! 2 new albums per week, 3.5 new tracks per day.

It seems at times like it's too much. It's like there is a river of music flowing through my mind. I am notorious for not particularly remembering new recent events of import. Maybe it's because the stream of music washes it all away.

Most of us resonate most strongly with the music of our puberty. I continued to acquire music for 8-9 years after that, before I in quick order had 4 kids and forgot about music pretty much for 25 years. I restarted with music in maybe 1997. Since then, it has come to fill my mind. But, I'm wondering if, it's too much so. So I'm trying to slow down on new music acquisition. But, come on, a new Brooklyn band? I've gots to be there!

Big Government Sucks!

In response to someone in a comment thread on a Tim O'Reilly post on Romney's clueless comments on public servants.

Big government sucks!

But, the only other option is letting the .01% and the corporations run everything. Welcome back to feudal times! And with AU, and the government big or little completely for sale, we're practically there already.

I'm a 1%'er, the ultra-rich have been good to me. F#ck them. My dad was a union man, I don't forget where I came from.

Like all those role-players who talk about living in the middle ages and practicing fencing and jousting. I'm sure my forebears from those times were serfs, for whom touching a weapon was punishable by death. Keep this in historical perspective. We're still trying to get rid of kings, dukes, nobles and opposition-crushing hereditary wealth.

True Life Nature Adventures

This morning I biked Keene Rd through Troy to Paul's Mill Rd. I came back in Delaney Ferry. 2h20m 30.2 miles. Overcast, a little breeze, not too hot.

On Keene Rd just before the Jessamine Co line, a mole ran into the road in front of me. At first I thought it was a leaf blowing, but it was a mole, around 2.5 inches long.

At the small pond (eutrophication experiment #1) on the left of Keene Rd just after Delaney Ferry splits off, a turtle was sunning itself on a rock in the middle of the pond. Not a snapper, shell maybe 10 inches long.

Just past Keene, I spooked a bunch of turkey buzzards feeding on a dead deer. 3-4 of them flew right in front of me, I'm like "Oh crap, I hope I don't hit one." They were full grown, 4-5 ft wingspan, probably weighed 20-30 pounds each. But I was on a slight uphill, probably doing below 10 mph, so I didn't get within 5 feet of one.

There was a man and a woman fishing in the creek that runs next to Paul's Mill Rd -- my map says that is the East Fork Clear Creek. Just past them were two swans swimming. I think the horse farm there on the left keeps the swans.

Yesterday I finished reading "The Drowned Cities", by Paolo Bacigalupi, on an ebook purchased from Carmichael's Book Store. He won some awards last year for "The Windup Girl". This one was short, 286 pages. Post-apocalyptic, or post global-warming ocean rise, survivor/refugee story. Child soldiers like in Africa now. Kind of an ensemble cast of characters, including a war machine "half-man", 400-500 pounds of human/tiger/dog/hyena/wolf hybrid bred for war -- a good character. The main "Drowned City" is Washington D.C. Strangely bothersome are images of warlords shelling the capitol building, etc. An OK read, 3 stars.

Oriole and Peacocks

Sounds like a fable, doesn't it?

I biked to Midway, back via Ft Springs. 34.5 miles, 2h50m. Beautiful morning, sunny and cool but windy.

I saw a baltimore oriole on US62 just south of Midway. Amazingly bright orange, he flew ahead of me down the road for a while.

I saw and heard the peacocks on Moores Mill Rd. I think they're at Elkview Farm, at the top of the hill up from the creek. No tail displays, but the chest feathers are such a brilliant iridescent blue. I was thinking, "This is the place with the peacocks, wonder if there are any ..." and then heard one call -- loud and distinctive, no mistaking it for anything else.

Finished my 2nd library book, "Surface Detail", by Iain M. Banks. It is a Culture novel, I think he's done about 6 or 7 of these. I love The Culture -- an advanced, "8th level", post-singularity galaxy-spanning pan-human civilization. Artificial intelligence is ubiquitous, in orbital and ship minds in particular. Wow, an extensive Wikipedia article -- "anarchist, socialist, and utopian". Most of the stories seem to deal with The Culture dealing with more primitive civilizations. My son loved the 2nd Culture novel "The Player of Games" (1988).

"Anarchist, socialist, and utopian" -- what's not to like? I mean seriously, how do conservatives see the future? Or are they too busy trying to reclaim the past to think about the future? Right now, this very moment, there is enough food to feed the entire world. But 20% of the world is starving because of politics. When are we going to quit letting the "haves" get away with saying "there's not enough to go around". They've been saying that for 6000 years, and it's a lie now more than ever.

New Yellow

I biked out to my friend Tim's house this morning, and got some new yellow highlighter on my bike maps -- roads I haven't biked before. I took Keene Rd to Keene, then south on 169 (new yellow) to Harrodsburg Rd and south to Barkley Woods subdivision. After visiting, I continued south and then came back Clear Creek, Woods, and Delaney Ferry. 2h18m, 27.1 miles. Hot.

Harrodsburg Rd was four-laned out that way last year. Jessamine has turned 3-4 miles of the old 2-lane into a bike trail. Nice!

Saw a meadowlark on 169. Phew, I guess. Hopefully not another sign of global warming.

Where have the Meadowlarks Gone?

Biked this morning from 9:07 to 11:03. 23.8 miles, Parkers Mill to Dedham to Ft. Springs-Pinkard through Little Texas, out Military Pike to Shannonwood, Dry Ridge to 33. Then south, back 169 to Shannonwood to McGee to James and back in Military Pike.

Right before I turned onto Dedham a hawk flew about 5 feet in front of my nose with 2-3 smaller birds on its tail. On Dedham, I heard crows making a racket and out of a tree busts another big hawk with 3 crows chasing it. I didn't have enough time to ID the hawks, but the 2nd one at least I think was a red-tail.

I saw a kingbird on a fence on Military Pike. It was the 1st one I'd seen in a while. That got me to thinking about other birds, and I realized, I don't think I've seen a meadowlark for several years.

They are easy to spot. Distinctive markings, short tail, helicopter flying style, very sweet, melodic song. They hang out in fields rather than trees. I used to see and hear them all the time, now I can't remember when the last time I saw or heard one was.

So have the fields become subdivisions? Are they really gone, or is this just the general (increasing?) spottiness of (my) memory? Guess I'll keep more of an eye out for meadowlarks.

Music ... And Videos

Looks like this is April through mid-May. Then I got hit with an especially rich "100 Albums for $5" email from Amazon and bought 6 I think. So better get caught up some.

BTW, I posted to Google+ (mostly my geek friends) asking for a MP3 purchasing alternative to Amazon. Didn't particularly get any good alternatives.

• "Natives", by Bright Moments. This is the latest band of Lexington native and Dunbar graduate Kelly Pratt. Kelly is also in Beruit, and toured with Arcade Fire a couple of years ago. Really catchy grooves, and in one of their live videos you can see that the bass is coming from a tuba. Kind of the balkan pop like Beruit, but a little more catchy and brighter. 4 stars, and 5 stars for "Travelers", video here. Man you just keep waiting for that monster groove to come back around.
  
• Miike Snow, "Happy To You". 2nd album by this Swedish group. Catchy dance grooves, I thought about putting it in Electronica & Dance instead of Euro Pop. 3 stars.
  
• Idiot Glee, "HopHop EP" (2010). A local group, 4 songs recorded at Lexingon's HopHop studio. Doo-wap type tunes. Way too much reverb, 2 stars.
  
• Hospitality, eponymous. Surprisingly tasty stuff from yet another great Brooklyn band. Nice female vocals. 4 stars.
  
• fun. "Aim and Ignite" (2010). The first album of these guys, who got a great review last time. I love this peppy, poppy stuff. Vocals that sound like ELO or Queen. And, no, I'm not gay. 4 stars. This song messed with me. Here's the video for"All The Pretty Girls". My wife insightfully pointed out that it reminded her of the incredibly catchy "Come On Eileen" (video here, 1982).
  
• Tennis, "Cape Dory" (2011). First album by this husband and wife duo whose 2nd album was mentioned last time. Still gets "Girl Groups" classification -- again, I think that it's the reverb on the drums that gives it the Phil Spector sound. 4 stars.
  
• Rocket Juice & The Moon, eponymous. Brit-hop, with some contributions from Gorillaz members. Interesting how as the various parts of the empire come home, Brit-hop becomes world music. Good dance tracks. 3 stars.
  
• Of Monsters And Men, "My Head Is An Animal". Icelandic Euro Pop. The female vocalist really reminds me of someone else who's come out recently. Nice tunes, very listenable. 3 stars.
  

I stayed up til 1 last night and finished my 1st library book in a while: "Exultant", by Stephen Baxter. Very hard science fiction / military space opera. A fun read. But, should I feel bad about a book where humanity has spread like vermin through the galaxy, wiping out or assimilating other races as it went? A little too close to US history? Baxter is British tho.

eBooks at the LFPL

So I followed the instructions of the fine pamphlet I was given at the Beaumont branch of the Lexington Free Public Library. I went to www.lexpublib.org/elibrary and downloaded the OverDrive Media Console from the iTunes app store and put it on my iPhone and iPad. It has a Find Library function, and there was the Beaumont branch. Select it, all done!

They have a limited number of books per title to download. If one is available, you can add to your cart, otherwise you can put your name in the queue for a copy, or add it to your wish list. Most books seem to be available only for 7 day checkout.

They offer two flavors of downloads:

1. Kindle format books. When you pick one you are redirected to amazon to check-out. You must also go back to your Kindle page at amazon to return the book. So I think I will forgo this in favor of
   
2. Adobe EPUB format. These load directly into the OverDrive app, and you can return them from there. The app is pretty well integrated with the library when you want to look for more books. I did download a book and read it in this format. The reader is a little bit funky tho. When you swipe to the next page, rather than any kind of page turning animation, the new page just pops into place, but maybe looking like it is scrolling down a line. Odd that something like that is just a little annoying, but it is.
   

So the tech is decent, I would have to say the selection, not so much so. I searched for a few sci-fi authors I like, nothing. So in 10-at-a-time mode, I looked at the 451 titles they had listed in their top level browsing category "Science Fiction & Fantasy". It was pretty much completely fantasy. I don't remember a single sci-fi title. And the emphasis was on fantasy series I'd never heard of, most in 12 volumes or so. They had the whole Sookie Stackhouse series (Twilight). They did have "The Lord of the Rings" and "A Song of Fire and Ice" (A Game of Thrones) series. Interesting, 10 people waiting to read "A Game of Thrones", tails off pretty rapidly after the 1st one.

This kind of fits with what my friend Michael the bookstore owner told me: ebooks are being overwhelming adopted by genre (sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, western) readers who plow through far more titles than your average reader.

For my sample read, I chose "Side Jobs" by Jim Butcher, a collection of short stories set in The Dresden Files series. I had read the 1st of these "Storm Front" and liked it OK -- although there were some anti-science rants that seemed unnecessary to me -- but didn't follow up with the series. Stories were OK, I'm kind of digging urban fantasy as mindless reading -- but it looks like the series winds up getting into some serious christian mythology, with archangels and that murderous psychopath jehovah (god the father) getting involved.

I don't mind christian mythology, like in the movies "Constantine" or the "The Prophecy" series, but, man, I'm so tired of christians in general. We went to Campus Pub to see Ben Lacy Friday, got there 1 hour early, the trivia question is "Which is the only gospel that mentions the word "manger"?". KMN, fucking bible trivia in a bar? Where will it end?

R&R + T&T

Well, since it's been a while since I've had a paycheck, I decided to go the library this afternoon rather than go eshopping for ebooks. Hadn't been there for a while, the Lexington Public Library now has self-checkout. You just scan your card and the books yourself. I also got a pamphlet on their ebook lending, I'll see how that works.

Looking at books by two prolific authors -- Stephen Baxter and Iain M. Banks -- and I was having trouble remembering if I had read them or not. So got a couple and then checked this blog to see if I'd read them. Apparently not, yay! Although searching for Banks turns up a single reference to his work in general, and no specific titles. Need to do better blogging this stuff. I definitely need the external memory. There are some mystery writers I've kind of quit reading because I can't remember which of their stuff I have and haven't read.

Anticipating rain tomorrow, I biked today, Saturday: 28.3m, 2h20m. Browns Mill to Leestown, back Waizenberger Mill, Pisgah, and Military Pike. Nice day. Kind of felt like I was getting stronger at the end. Almost fell down a steep trail down to the creek when I stopped at Waizenberger Mill. I always stop there to check out the waterfall.

So, recent reading (R&R), from most recent back:

• "Japanese Fairy Tales", compiled by Yei Theodora Ozaki (1908). When we 1st got an iPad, I went into the Apple store and downloaded lots of free, out of copyright books. Nice that Apple makes them available. All the Oz books, some Kipling, Wind and the Willows, complete works of Shakespeare, and lots of books of mythology and legends. I ran out of reading material coming back from Jacksonville last week and pulled this up. Interesting stuff. Evil stepmothers appear to be a cross-cultural constant. Ditto for cannibalistic ogres. A few stories feature Ryn Jin, the dragon king under the sea, who was generally a pretty good guy unless you disrespect the power of the sea.
  
• "Year's Best SF 6", edited by David G. Hartwell (2000). I think my daughter Alexis got me this for solstice. Kind of interesting, 12 years old, but the stories all pretty good. I think I'd read only one before. I think this validates my building a stash of "Year's Best" collections in Florida -- good reading even when old.
  
• "Majesty's Offspring", by A. J. Vega. This was a free Kindle book. The A.I. kind of ruling humanity decides it wants to breed. Humanity decides, bad idea, and destroy it in a big war. Story set post war, with lovable, former navymen turned space pirates (arrgh). Ends in a complete and total cliff-hanger. I the 2nd one costs money, I will probably decline. 1 star.
  
• "Deep State" and "The Fourth Wall", by Walter Jon Williams. These are sequels to "This Is Not A Game", which I thought I'd blogged but can't find. Both very enjoyable reads, gaming nerds trying to help make the world a better place. 4 stars.
  
• "Liminal States", by Zack Parsons. I think this was recommended in a tweet by one of the SF writers I follow on Twitter. Harry Connolly, John Scalzi, Cory Doctorow, Charles Stross, and William Gibson get some lively exchanges going on Twitter. Anyway, this is a 1st novel, and it really, really covers a lot of ground. It goes from being a western to a 50's cheap detective mystery to a 21st century SF story. When I got to the end, my reaction was kind of like, "huh"? But you keep turning the 448 pages. 3 stars? BTW, the eBook format on this was bad. Like a file that had inconsistent hard and soft returns. Lots of bad white space and run on words. I emailed the author, he said he fwded on to the publisher -- nice!
  
• "The Magicians" and "The Magician King" by Lev Grossman. This started out looking like magical realism in Brooklyn, and I'm kind of like "Oh no, that never works". But then it becomes Harry Potter meets Chronicles of Narnia -- but for adults, dark and with sex and death. Pretty good reads, I guess. 3 stars.
  
• "Distrust That Particular Flavor", by William Gibson. A collection of his non-fictional essays. I think I'd read most of these before. I never believed in semiotics until Gibson explained it to me. He has definitely coined some bon mots -- wow, a web page just for these, nice! "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed." 4 stars.

  The other day I thought I came up with a good term for something I was working on -- something unique and cute. Quel dumbass, I didn't check it with The Google. When I finally got around to it, of course there were already several versions of my "original" idea out there. When will I learn? ;->
  

FSATFFMATVE

Double duty, the First Sunday After The First Full Moon After The Vernal Equinox is both a lunar and a solar fertility feast. So to celebrate, I will hard-boil some eggs and make some fine, fine egg salad and eat egg salad sandwiches. Yum!

And for all my Jewish readers and friends, happy Feast of the Murdered Children (aka passover).

This morning biked 1h21m 17.1 miles, top speed 32.2 mph. I went on and wore arm and leg warmers but probably could have done without them. I took Woods Ln south from Delaney Ferry to 169, then left and back through Keene. I've taken Woods Ln many times, but I think always in the past I've taken it in the opposite direction. Of course, the hills were worse this way ;->

It was worth it tho, because I saw a bluebird on Woods Ln. I think only the 3rd time I've seen one.

What is a Milkman?

So, I wonder what the min age is for not knowing what a milkman is? I think when I was growing up, I was fuzzy on what an iceman was. A job species in the economic ecology that is definitely on the endangered list.

I was thinking about milkman based on the fact that I now have three different versions of "My Very Good Friend The Milkman" in my iTunes:

1. Fats Waller, 1935. Genre is Early Jazz.
   
2. Eric Clapton, 2010, off of his latest album. Genre is Rock.
   
3. Paul McCartney, 2012, of the album of standards he just released. Genre is Pop
   

The Fats Waller version is, of course, the best.

So on to new music for the 1st 2 months of 2012.

• "For The Good Times", by The Little Willies -- Norah Jones country band. Very listenable. 3 stars, with 4 for the title track.
  
• "All Hours", by Ivy (2011). I think they are getting a little tired of their format. 3 stars.
  
• "An Innocent Man", by Billy Joel (1983). I ripped this with the fine USB-out turntable given me by my children. The quality from this is surprisingly good. This was a family favorite as the kids were growing up, lots of dancing in the foyer in sock feet to these songs. I think too that "Leave A Tender Moment Alone" may be my wife and my "song" -- the only other contender I can think of is "Wonderful Tonight". That it came out after we'd been married 9 years I believe to be immaterial. 4 stars.
  
• "Duets" soundtrack (2000). We loved this movie, about competitive karaoke singers. Great ensemble cast with Gwyneth Paltrow and Paul Giamatti in particular acquitting themselves well with their singing. 3 stars with a couple of tracks 4 stars.
  
• "With A Twist...", by Todd Rundgren (1997). I've always been a big Todd Rundgren fan, and I've loved bossa nova since I first started playing guitar and was given an Antonio Carlos Jobim songbook by my first guitar teacher at age 15 or so. So an album of some of Todd's greatest hits done with bossa nova arrangements definitely gets me off. 4 stars.
  
• "Le Voyage Dans La Lune", by Air (French Band). So this is a new soundtrack written for the re-release of the colorized version of the 1902 Georges Méliès movie, known for its image of the moon with the shell/rocket stuck in its eye. (Méliès, BTW, is the topic of the recent Scorsese move "Hugo", one of those execrable Hollywood patting itself on the back movies -- "Movies are magic, and we make them! Hooray for us!") Listenable I guess, 3 stars.
  
• "Kisses On The Bottom", by Paul McCartney. Released on Valentine's Day and given to me as a gift by my lovely wife. McCartney covers 30s to 50s standards. I don't think his voice is really that suited to this material. 3 stars (maybe more like 2.5).
  
• "Paralytic Stalks", by Of Montreal. I don't like this as well as some of their earlier stuff. More neurotic than psychotic. 3 stars.
  
• "Young & Old", by Tennis. I think the best find of this batch. I put the genre as "Girl Groups". It's got kind of Phil Spector production value (reverb on the drums?). Very nice quality songs. 4 stars. This is their 2nd album, I'll have to check out the 1st. Wikipedia says it's a husband/wife duo. This was a $5.00 special from Amazon.
  
• "Where It Hits You", by Jim White. Quirky southernish tunes once again. I really like his stuff. My favorite was "My Brother's Keeper", about the death of an old friend who he hooked up with a "honky-tonk angel" who broke the friend's heart, after which he wouldn't leave the house and grew to 400 pounds. Started at 3 stars, ended at 4.
  
• "Obadiah", by Frazey Ford (2010). Mostly folky stuff with a variety of instruments. 3 stars.
  
• "Some Nights", by fun. These guys remind me of Of Montreal or Apples In Stereo -- vocal harmonies sounding like ELO are the main giveaway. This is also reminiscent of Queen and maybe BeeGees. Kind of a show tune / rock opera sound. 3 stars (maybe 3.5).
  
• "All Of Me", by Estelle. My favorite Brit-hopper does a take on "The Miseducation of Lauren Hill". So like Miseducation, you have to go through and mark all the spoken bits as 1 star. Some good tracks, 3 stars.
  
• "Something", by Chairlift. A Brooklyn duo. Edgy arrangements. I put in Chick Pop genre. 3 stars.
  
• "Break It Yourself", by Andrew Bird. Nothing really jumps out from this album. As usual a solid piece of work tho. 3 stars.
  

Suffered a shock Wednesday night. After playing at O'Neill's, which was pretty thin both crowd- and musician-wise, I stopped by Lynagh's, where I sometime play at the open mic Wednesday night. I wanted to talk to Jamie Green and tell him that I'd mentioned him to Ross Compton, whom I've been trying to get Jamie to hook up with re getting some tracks down.

Lynagh's was closed! The guy mopping up came and told me that they'd been real slow so they closed up early. Not a good sign, I worry about live music in Lexington.

And Now For Your Moment Of Zen

Took my 1st bike ride of the year this last Sunday morning. 1h15m 16.3 miles by Little Texas, back in via James and Delaney Ferry. Hills have somehow gotten steeper since last November, #TectonicActivity was tweeted.

I noticed, I really don't get much Zen going when I'm biking. My mind is always all over the place. Occasionally I will tell my mind to focus in and pay attention only to what is around us. But it never lasts long.

One of the coolest things that happens biking is when you get to smell woodsmoke. Millions of years of association of company, food, women flood your brain. Totally hard-wired, nice!

I've always felt like getting a massage I should be able to turn my brain off and just let it dwell in the sensation, but Zen not so much there either. Probably because it's too easy to get some napping in.

Playing music doesn't wind up being Zen either. Say for instance, I am just about done working up "Shaky Ground". One of the drummers at the jam told me that was one of his favorites, so I thought I'd work it up for him. I wind up playing the same lick over and over for the whole song, except for 3 bars on the 4 and 1 on the 5 for the solo. So for something like that, I practice the lick over and over until it is committed to muscle memory, and then start working on singing the lead over it. Interesting, I thought I was ready to do it tomorrow, but tried it tonight and the 2 brains required, 1 for the guitar lick and 1 for the vocals, refused to disengage for the 1st 4 measures of the vocals. So, need to practice a few times more, give the muscle memory a few more reps.

But the point is, it winds up being not very Zen. The only time I think I get Zen playing music is when I'm really clicking on a lead. But, at our jam, I really focus on playing rhythm guitar, singing, and leading the band, which involve enough components that it doesn't lend itself to getting into a Zen groove, and which often lead me to skip taking a lead.

I guess not surprisingly, the most Zen place I currently wind up going is when I get In The Zone writing code. I've been doing it as a full-time job for 40 years. When you get In The Zone, the beautiful, interconnected, white towers of logic out of which you build software become the whole of your existence. You are the logic and the logic is you.

So I guess that's why I still like coding. Getting In The Zone coding is by far my greatest current source of Zen.

A History Lesson

I have actually read a non-fiction book! Something to improve my mind!

I read "Natural Experiments of History", edited by Jared Diamond and James A. Robinson (2010).

I am a big fan of Diamond's, as noted in these earlier blog posts. In school, history was always my worst subject -- no logic, no point in memorizing dates. Diamond's work tries to tease out the "why" of history, and he is extremely good at it.

This book has 8 cases of comparing historical development that diverged from similar beginnings, and attempting to evaluate theories of why history diverged as it did. It was surprisingly topical politically in that several of the articles dealt in why different countries developed at different rates economically. In all of these, it turned out that the sooner feudal and old regime type systems were put aside and more modern democratic institutions were put in place, the more rapid the economic development.

The more you think about that, the more obvious it seems. When wealth and power are concentrated in the hands of a few, it festers there, as the primary interest of the privileged few is protecting the exclusivity of their wealth and power. In contrast, the more people can have a real chance to borrow money, build a business, better educate their children, etc, the faster an economy will develop and prosper.

So how can the 1% not realize this? I really think that the overall standard of living was improving to the point where they just didn't feel "rich enough". I mean really, someone practically a beggar can maybe buy a smartphone as good as that of the richest man in the world. Where is the justice in that? What about all his hard work? (or not if he inherited his wealth).

A New Record

Yesterday I scattered some safflower seed on the lower patio. In the afternoon, I counted 20 juncos feeding on that and the thistle seed fallen below the goldfinch feeders. A new record!

Music In

Man, how can I get so far behind on music in? I guess it's because with books, as soon as you finish it, you can normally review it. Whereas music you have to live with a while to give it a chance to sink in. Anyway, going back to October:

• "Biophilia", by Bjork. Ms. Guttmunsdottir, the world's greatest living composer, hits it out of the park again. Plus, lots of songs that express the wonder and awe of science, on topics like dark matter, evolution, viruses. 4 stars.
  
• "Ceremonials", by Florence + The Machine. Another very strong offering, although I like it a little less than her prior. 3 stars.
  
• "Realistic", by Ivy, 1995. I am such a sucker for sappy Europop (actually a NYC band with a French lead singer) like this. 4 stars.
  
• "Innervisions", by Stevie Wonder, 1973. $5.00 special from Amazon. The body of work that Stevie produced in the early 70's is completely excellent and represented a huge advance in pop and R&B music. 4 stars.
  
• "Highway 61 Revisited", by Bob Dylan, 1965. $5.00 special from Amazon. Set the wayback machine for 1965. Great stuff. 3 stars, 4 for "Highway 61 Revisited", and "Ballad of a Thin Man". "Because something is happening here, but you don't know what it is. Do you, Mister Jones?"
  
• "50 Words For Snow", by Kate Bush. Ethereal arrangements, haunting lyrics. 4 stars.
  
• "In The Clear", by Ivy. Filling out their discography. This 2005 effort sounds a little tired, maybe they're ready for a change. 3 stars, I think, still unrated. I still have to try their latest, which came out just last year.
  

The next 5 albums I got from the Rolling Stone Top 50 Albums of 2011. I think Josh at Azur pointed me at that. I thought about doing my own Top 10 list for 2011, but when I'm pulling from someone else's list, that seems like cheating. 4 of these I also gifted electronically to my NYC daughter for Solstice -- they should not take up too much space in her tiny Brooklyn apartment.

• "Thank You, Happy Birthday", by Cage The Elephant. A Bowling Green, KY band no less. Some of it is a little too punkish for me, but some great tunes. 3 stars.
  
• "So Beautiful Or So What", by Paul Simon. I'm not that big a Simon fan, but there were some great tunes here. A nice (short) instrumental too, you forget that this guy's been a pretty good guitarist for 50 years. 4 stars.
  
• "W H O K I L L", by Tune-Yards. Wow, that a vocal range Merrill Garbus has! And what catchy grooves! 4 stars.
  
• "Nine Types Of Light", by TV On The Radio. Nice tunes, very consistent. 3 stars.
  
• "Ritual Union", by Little Dragon. Swedish techno R&B. Makes sense to me. Killer grooves. 4 stars.
  

Finally, two albums downloaded as a result of watching "The Royal Tenenbaums" with my daughter Erica when she was home for solstice. Both oldies.

• "Chelsea Girl", by Nico, 1967. I think her first solo album after her Velvet Underground / Andy Warhol gig. Kind of the prototypical Europop/trash female lounge singer. Surprisingly good. 3 stars.
  
• "V.U.", by The Velvet Underground, 1985. That date is suspect, this was a compilation album, but a lot of the tracks don't appear to be anywhere else. Again, surprisingly good. "Stephanie Says" is the track in the movie. 3 stars.
  

That brings us into 2012. BTW, Happy New Year!

More Reading

After my last post, I had that nagging feeling I had forgotten something. And I had: "Postsingular", by Rudy Rucker. I missed it because the paperback had been on my shelf for a while, and so didn't show up in my Kindle downloads listing. I really feel like, given his normal subject matter and background (computer science professor and Louisville native), I should like his stuff, but, he is just not a very good writer. "Postsingular" winds up being "Jack and the Beanstalk" anchored in quantum mechanics??? I really can't recommend it. I still have a reissue of his Ware tetralogy, of which I think I have read the first two, "Software" and "Wetware", on my to-read shelf. That will definitely be saved for a rainy day.

More recently, I read "Twenty Palaces: A Prequel", by Harry Connolly. This is apparently the last book in this series -- I think I read on Connolly's blog or twitter feed that his publisher was not going to publish any more of these. Too bad, I have enjoyed them. The protagonist, an ex-con who works as a thug for a mystical society that ruthlessly wipes out magic users, is a great noir character, a cheap detective of the old school.

Finally, I read "The Quantum Thief", the first novel of Hannu Rajaniemi. I tweeted: "80s: Neuromancer; 90s: Snow Crash; 00s: Accelerando; 10s: The Quantum Thief." I was really impressed. Just when you think that visions of future computing, cyberspace, and virtual reality are totally passe, here comes a new vision that blows you away. Rataniemi jumps on the privacy issues that are now coming to the forefront in social media with both feet. Highly recommended.

I also yesterday bought my first ebooks from a local bookstore: Carmichael's, Louisville's Oldest Independent Bookstore, owned by my old friend Michael Boggs and his wife Carol Bosse. I knew Michael from the Louisville computing scene in the mid-80s. Had a very pleasant lunch with him a few Sundays ago. Anyway, he told me I could buy Google eBooks from their website, same price as Amazon. You download them to the IndieBound Reader app on the iPad or iPhone. The books in this app look more like real books in their page layout than either the Apple or Kindle readers. The only downside so far is that I can't figure out how to get books from within the app, I have to go to the Carmichael's website, purchase and download. They have told me that I can designate Carmichael's as my store within the app, and then work from within the app, but I haven't figured out how yet.

Meanwhile tho, I would rather give business to local bookstores than to sweatshop master Amazon. The people who work in their warehouses (there is a large one in Lexington) are all hired as temps, minimal benefits, get sick and you're fired. Definitely a workforce that needs to unionize.

I have loved the convenience of buying from Amazon, but if the low prices come as a result of worker abuse, I will take my business elsewhere (whenever possible). Now I need a good alternative for buying music.

Reading

Still just reading for escapism. Tags for the post are "fantasy", "science fiction" and "urban fantasy".

Tweeted on Oct 27th:

Just finished "A Dance With Dragons". 5000 pages down, an estimated 25,000 more to go :-(

This series is very good, but, I think he needs several authors helping him to finish this thing -- if indeed it is ever intended to be finished. So many characters, so many narratives.

I did read this in the iBook format rather than the Kindle format. Couldn't tell much difference.

Read two short-story collections, which I still buy in hardcopy and leave at the house in Florida. "Down These Strange Streets", edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois. An urban fantasy collection. The marquee author was a woman I have never heard of, who turns out to have written the novels that the HBO "True Blood" series is based on. Generally fairly enjoyable. Two stories had male homosexual partners as the primary characters. I normally enjoy a little gratuitous heterosexual sex in novels. I still pretty much get a "yuck" reaction from gratuitous male homosexual sex scenes. For pulp, genre fiction like this, I think that virtual sex scenes, where you can specify your orientation and get appropriate verbiage, would be good tech. Ha ha.

The other collection was my annual favorite "Year's Best Science Fiction", edited by Gardner Dozois. 28th edition, nothing really stood out at it often does.

Then back to Kindle books. I'm still of two minds about this. I guess you can loan them, I'll figure out how someday. Meanwhile, it's so damn convenient, and cheaper. I discussed it with my friend Michael who owns two bookstores in Louisville. He says that volume genre readers like me are accounting for the majority of Kindle sales. He seemed to think it's OK, that the volume that genre readers tend to consume makes it economically compelling.

So read on the iPad:

• "Boneshaker", by Cherie Priest. Steampunk and zombies in an alternate history Seattle. An entertaining read. I just saw where they are making a movie of it. 3 stars.
  
• "Reamde, A Novel", by Neal Stephenson. For the 1st 500 pages of this, it was like, didn't I just read this in Cory Doctorow's "For The Win"? But it brings in Islamic terrorists, which, frankly, I'm kind of sick of. But it is a good read. Stephenson's turns of phrase make me laugh out loud, annoying my wife. 4 stars.
  
• "The Children of the Sky", by Vernor Vinge. This is a long-awaited sequel to "A Fire On The Deep", which, with "A Deepness In The Sky", were totally great space operas 20 years ago. This one is a good read, but quite a bit less cosmic, more local politics and empire building. 3 stars.
  

Several more books queued on the iPad. Time to clear the magazine stack first.

Wow

Wow.

So there was a great crowd at O'Neill's tonight, they were still playing at 10:40 when I left, past the 10:30 quitting time, because they still had a good crowd. I signed up at 7:40 and was like 8th guitarist on the list. I did get to play my 1st song with Sherri McGee on drums, what fun! We did "Who Do You Love", Sherri really rocks out on that, she is so fun to play with. Then did "Crossroads" and "How Blues Can You Get" with a different drummer, they were OK.

So I went to Lynagh's, got there a little late, like 10:50. Jamie Greene, who runs the open mic there, says he could use me to play. Jamie is a fabulous musician. He plays Kaki King / Preston Reed style, left-handed, he is a genuine talent. He says he's got a group that will play after me who are annoying the hell out of him.

So I do "I Need To Know" by Delbert McClinton, 1st time ever. Flubbed a few times, but overall OK. Then "You Don't Know Me", my favorite Ray Charles song. Then someone said "let it rip" so I did "Rollin' and Tumblin'".

Then I started "Me and the Devil Blues", by Robert Johnson, played in a 1930's Robert Johnson style. Halfway through it, I hear noise behind me. The guitarist from the annoying group is tuning his guitar. Then he starts shredding in B with a fuzz tone on max distortion -- I'm playing in A. I stop, tell him I'm playing in A, and that he's welcome to play blues fills behind me. So I start up again, he plays masturbatory shredding with max fuzz over me. What an asshole! So I finish quickly, don't do my last song (Hard Times), and leave the stage. I finish my drink, and as I'm leaving, he's still just shredding away. I told him, "Man that was rude -- just rude". He follows me outside and says "I apologized twice -- I was trying to play with you." What an asshole. Jamie was very apologetic, said he was already thinking of banning them, now it was official.

I don't know. There's other old guys play there. It's mostly acoustic. I can appreciate young turks getting in the face of old farts. But, the total lack of musicianship was really, really offensive. And the total disrespect of Robert Johnson just adds to it.

BTW, here's a recording of Robert Johnson doing "Me and the Devil Blues". I really like the art someone has put to it.

Sherri and Keith Hubbard are playing tomorrow night at Skybar downtown. Keith said I was welcome to come sit in, so I'll put on a gigging shirt and take the Blues Junior and Black Beauty (Les Paul with all gold fittings) out and see how that goes. Never been to Skybar before, hopefully it will be fun. Keith said he's starting at 8, Sherri will get there around 9. When I played fill behind Bob Hopps solo on keys it went well, hopefully this will too.

I Didn't Know This Was Called A Pen

I actually had to read around 5 articles on squid anatomy via The Google before I found one that identified the clear, feather-like spine that supports the squid's mantle as the "pen". I guess it is an appropriate name.

I made spaghetti sauce with diced calimari (squid) instead of meatballs last night. Kroger sells California squid frozen in 3 pound boxes. I partially thawed the box and split it into 3 one-pound servings. (Separating the partialy thawed squid was greatly complicated by their tentacles have frozen together in tangled clumps.) I cooked one pound last night and refroze the other two.

Cleaning the squid is easy. The 1 pound of whole squid clean up to maybe 7 ounces of tentacles and diced mantle. Saute in olive oil with garlic, onion salt and pepper; add diced zucchini and canned mushrooms; then add your tomato sauce, sugar, oregano, basil, and bay leaves and simmer. Yum!

This "pen" was around 5 inches long.

The "pen" looks and feels completely artificial, like it's made of plastic. The part off the spine is completely clear, like stiff cellophane. It amazes me how much it looks like a feather.

It does smell like squid tho.

A Good Bird Day

This past Thursday at around 12:30, I getting ready to make my lunch and was looking out the back window. It was snowing fairly hard, although nothing stuck. There are the usual 5-6 goldfinches at the 2 feeders. And, on the ground, 6-8 juncos -- the advance scout had brought the whole gang!

And then, on the pear tree right in front of the window, a downy woodpecker came around working its way up the tree -- followed by what may have been a white-breasted nuthatch! I have seen these at the in-laws in Louisville but never here. This one was going up the tree, rather than down the tree head-first as nuthatches are known for. Didn't get to see it for long, but I think that is what it was. It was dark on top and white underneath, smaller and rounder than a junco. We have wrens around, but no wrens in the bird book have this coloration. I'll keep watching for it and hopefully can confirm the identification.

Meanwhile, at my wife's direction, Carlos cut the burning bush outside my office way down. And then my wife trimmed the hell out of my ficus. It is now around 1/3 of its former size. This tree was given to me by my employees at Renlar sometime in the early 90's. It has moved with me from job to job; it has been in at least 6 different offices. I have always said, "As grows the tree, so grows the software." I guess I'll have to watch and see how my software career goes ;->

In the meantime tho, I'm guessing that from here on the crazy cardinal will be leaving my screen alone. We'll see, I guess.

Almost A Rock Star

Aw man! Justin Wells got my slot for The Last Waltz doing "Mannish Boy". Justin is a monster, he is indeed more worthy. #AlmostARockStar

So once or twice a month after playing at O'Neill's on Wednesday night, I go into Lynagh's, where the Old Farts Blues Jam played for several years, and do 4-5 songs solo at their open mic. A couple of months ago, I was talking to Tim the bartender/drummer & vocalist about Levon Helm's recent (fabulous) work. Tim sez, "I get to channel Levon soon, at The Last Waltz recreation." Local musicians have been, for the last 6 years, around Thanksgiving, staging a recreation of The Band's Last Waltz, with different musicians taking the place of the all-star cast of the original Last Waltz.

Then Tim sez, "We try to get different people every year, you should do the Muddy Waters "Mannish Boy" number. Check back in November."

Hell yeah! So I was in there last week, and he tells me, he thinks they could use me. He took my number and told me he'd call me Friday after meeting with the organizers.

So no call came in, I went in there tonight. Turns out the posters were already printed, and Justin Wells is doing the Muddy Waters. Aw, so close.

Justin is the lead singer and guitar player for Fifth on the Floor, a very good local band who had a very successful regional tour earlier this year. I played behind Justin once at Lynagh's, playing lead fills on the Strat and singing harmony behind his flattop and lead vocals. He is a good guy, a real performing personality, and a great musician. He's a big guy, well over 6 ft, with the long haired and bearded mountain man look going on. His stage presence is totally kick-ass, he is way more worthy. Still, I would have loved to have played Buster's once. It is a really nice venue. probably Lexington's best music club.

Tim offered to put me on the sitting-in list, I declined, I'll hang out with my baby instead. He said, maybe next year I would have another shot, and could maybe do "Further On Up The Road", which was one of the first songs I started doing in my musical career revival. I also do "Who Do You Love" and "Up On Cripple Creek" from The Last Waltz.

Ha ha. It's fun for me, at my age, just go get to know and play with some of the good and great young musicians in Lexington. A rock star gig at Buster's would be completely icing on the cake.

The First Junco of Winter

Cleaned and refilled my safflower seed feeder at the back of the yard yesterday. Scattered some safflower below the feeders and on both patios for the juncos. They only like to feed from the ground.

Within an hour, there was a junco in the crabapple tree by the lower patio checking it out. But I didn't see him eat any. Normally they are in flocks of at least a half dozen birds. Maybe he was an advance scout.

Don't seem to see to many birds lately. The goldfinches are there year round, and the crazy male cardinal is still rattling my screen and trying to get at the ficus in my office. The people two doors down the street who had several cats moved recently, maybe that will help the bird numbers.

The Cooper's hawk is still around as well. I haven't seen her in my yard lately, but I've seen her around the neighborhood.

Yeouch

Thursday night I'm walking my dog Dexter. Just taking our 6 o'clock stroll around the block (Lyon Dr and Ft. Harrod). There's a rabbit in the back yard but he doesn't see it -- he is at this point pretty oblivious to critters unless they trip his motion detectors. So we're out front on the sidewalk, he's running, running, running in the easement -- blam! Right into the next door neighbor's brick mailbox. Yeouch! You could hear the thunk. But, he must have a pretty thick skull, he just kept on going.

I guess I'll have to add that to my list of stuff you got to watch.

The Kingfish

So watched an Austin City Limits that was 100% Randy Newman, solo at the piano. That got me thinking of his song "Kingfish", which was recently covered by Levon Helm on his excellent album "Electric Dirt". I love the lines:

Who took on the Standard Oil men and whipped their ass,
Just like he promised he'd do?
Ain't no Standard Oil men gonna run this state,
Gonna be run by little folks like me and you.

Kind of reminiscent of what Occupy Wall Street (#OWS) is all about, isn't it? Here in Kentucky, we could substitute "Massey Energy" for "Standard Oil".

So I looked up Huey Long, aka The Kingfish on Wikipedia. All in all, sounds like we could use him today.

He was a populist. His motto was "Every Man a King". I think his speaking style drew comparisons to Hitler, but his song is pretty damn catchy.

I like this one too. It reminds me of my wondering, how much do the ultra-rich really want? (Answer, all of it.)

Huey Long was a demagogue, which I thought pretty much meant "rabble-rouser". But here's the definition from google. Note particularly the second, older meaning:

1. A political leader who seeks support by appealing to popular desires and prejudices rather than by using rational argument.
   
2. (in ancient Greece and Rome) A leader or orator who espoused the cause of the common people.
   

So I wonder how long it took the old lizards to get "espousing the cause of the common people" redefined to be "rather than by using rational argument". Nice trick, that.

I think my impression of Huey Long from growing up was that he was tyrannical and dictatorial. I probably got that from seeing the movie "All the King's Men", with Broderick Crawford as the Huey Long inspired central character. But from the wikipedia article, it looks like FDR did a lot to portray Huey in that light when Huey decided to run against him.

Right now, I think the rabble are pretty much roused already. So the question is, can OWS harness that energy, that righteous anger at the appropriation of our democracy by big money and big business, via the internet and social media, to get some real change accomplished here? Or will it take someone like Huey?

Maybe in a second term, Obama could push for the things we need to fix this, like real campaign finance reform and a much fairer tax structure. But, even tho Barack is my BFF, from what we've seen so far, I doubt it.

Generative Grammars

So basically, all human languages are generative -- which means, there is no limit to the complexity of the statements that can be constructed. For example:

I saw the boy with the telescope who was watching the girl with the binoculars who was watching ... "

And, basically, this made our brains get big, but it is not hard tech.

I have written an interpreter and a compiler with a corresponding pcode machine, both of which are still in production and generating $millions of income. Both of them, it is so cool, when someone gives you logic 10s of times more complex than any you ever imagined, 100s of parentheses, and it just keeps pushing it up onto the stack, and then, it just works!

Not the Sharpest ..

I have been working full-time out of my home office since late June. The whole time there has been a very sporadic rattling of the screen in the window behind me. That window has a large burning bush in front of it. I assumed it was the wind blowing the burning bush against the screen -- although there would also sometimes be a bird chirping to accompany the rattling.

Inside that window in my office is the ficus that was originally given to me as a winter solstice present by my employees at Renlar, so sometime before 1995.

So a few days ago I finally looked around during the rattling and there is a male cardinal hanging on the screen. He looks like he really wants to get to that ficus -- not sure why. But he's been trying for 5 months now ?!?!?

Wind Advisory

From mid-morning to mid-afternoon. So didn't bike far. Out Keene Rd to Keene, back via 169 to 1967 to Military Pike and Parkers Mill. 22.1 miles, 1h40m, top speed 30.0 mph.

He Would Have Kicked Its Ass

Holy crap! Got home, turned on the back lights, let Dexter out. Looked out and saw ... a full grown possum 10 ft from the door. Got between them and ran the possum off into the bushes, thought Dexter was following me in, then into the bushes he goes! Possum got him on the nose. Finally got Dexter corralled and carried him in. Put some neosporin on Dexter's nose.

The last thing I need is my 16 YO dog fighting a possum -- although he has done some serious possum ass-kicking in his younger days. Phew -- thump, thump, thump. Definitely more excitement than I was expecting.

Borealis Maximus

So actually got some new yellow on my biking maps, and went the farthest north I have been. I took the Heritage Trail to Ironworks Pike, then east to Newtown Pike and north another 3-4 miles. Left (west) on Lemons Mill Rd. The northern maximum came at the intersection of Lemons Mill Rd and Lisle Rd (KY 1962 and 1963). Took Lisle back south to Georgetown Rd, then Ironworks to Yarnallton to Elkchester. 3h21m, 40.5 miles, top speed 31.5 mph.

The Heritage Trail is definitely one of the flattest routes I take around here. At the one hour mark I was just about to Ironworks Work and I had done 14.5 miles -- considerably above the 12-13 mph I normally average. Of course, I always get slower and slower the longer I ride.

Last week I spooked a female deer off the side of the road. This week I spooked a 6-point buck, just off Citation Blvd.

Music In

I feel like I've been doing better keeping up here -- except maybe for music in. Still need to figure out how to keep it from being quite so boring. Anyways, here's the Music In for August and September.

• "Cruisin with Ruben and the Jets", Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention (1968). One of the guys I play music with started talking about this, I offered to burn it for him. Turned out I didn't have it, and it's not available in MP3 form. So, I got out the vinyl and used the USB turntable my kids got me a few years ago. It worked a lot easier than the first time I tried, and the quality was surprisingly good. The Mothers basically created an alter ego and recorded an album of doo-wop songs. Great fun, 4 stars.

  They brought back lead singer Ray Collins for this. I talked to him, along with Ian Underwood, who had just joined, and Jimmie Carl Black, when I saw The Mothers in the spring of 1968 at Changes Unlimited, a hippie club on Hill Street in Louisville. Collins had a beautiful, silky lounge lizard type voice. I looked him up on Wikipedia. There is a link to an article about him in the Claremont CA (where he lives) local paper. It says he quit The Mothers after a few albums because he wanted to be a serious singer like Nat King Cole and didn't like all the satire and snarkiness, and that basically nothing he did since ever came to fruition. He was the one who invited Frank Zappa to join Soul Giants, which became The Mothers. Crazy.
  

• Ollabelle, "Neon Blue Bird". Levon Helm's daughter Amy is in this band. This album is really all over the place. I put it in as Southern Rock. 3 stars, 4 stars for "Lovin' In My Baby's Eyes", a Taj Mahal song I think I'd heard before, and "Wait For The Sun".
  
• St. Vincent, "Strange Mercy". I don't know that it is about her music that I like so well. Just thinking about, it kind of reminded me of how Radiohead seemed to suddenly realize, we can do whatever the hell we want -- we are in complete control. Annie Clark seems to mix such diverse styles and orchestration, with mostly sweet, emo lyrics. I'm a fan-boy. 4 stars.
  
• Sunset Hearts, "Haunted Cloud". A Portland Maine 8 piece super group put together with members of 3 other bands. My nephew Max is the most excellent drummer. Lots of 80's sound, Beach Boys, many influences. Very nice tunes, an excellent effort, 4 stars.
  
• The Boxer Rebellion, "The Cold Still". Very nice alternative mostly guitar sound. I don't think a weak song. 3 stars, 4 stars for "Step Out Of The Car".
  
• Beiirut, "The Rip Tide". Very listenable, very consistent with their earlier work. Featuring Kelley Pratt, a Dunbar grad and friend of Erica's on brass. They are playing in Lexington this Wednesday, if I weren't playing I might have gone to see them. 3 stars.
  
• Ivy, "Long Distance", 2001. I had really liked this groups earlier "ApartmentLife" and then kind of lost track of them. At first I thought, this is just too peppy and emo, but then, of course it grew on me. I am such a sucker for this stuff. 4 stars.
  
• 50 tracks of flamenco from my friend Patrick that my daughter Christie wanted for her wedding. What a great genre this is! We saw a movie recently that had a great flamenco performance, an older (50ish) woman singing and dancing. I'll have to track that down.
  

OK, thats through September, the October stuff still needs more listens. Maybe that's why I wind up getting behind on Music In, because anymore I have to listen to most things 5-10 times before they're sufficiently burned in.

Experimental Philosophy

Interesting article in November Scientific American. A more scientific approach to philosophy, asking hundreds of test subjects to answer various thought problems. One interesting example on relativistic morality: if the morally ambiguous choice is fairly "here and now", then people decide with common sense, emotion, and "folk morality". If the choice is placed relatively far in the future, that apparently causes the mind's more "abstract thinking" modules to kick in, and decisions become more logical and abstract, if somewhat less "human".

Also, people who are more open to new experiences (liberals?) tend to be more open to moral relativism. So maybe there's a genetically selected difference between us right-thinking liberals and those backwards-thinking, inbred conservatives.

Clifton

Way overdid it today. I'm thinking, "Biking weather over soon, let's go for it!" -- mistake. So went to Clifton, the only place I've found where you can get down to the Kentucky River and then get back up without having to walk the bike. The road back up (heading south) is a long, gradual incline. Here's a view from between Lower Clifton and Old Clifton Roads:

So went straight out Old Frankfort Pike to KY 1285. Crossed US 60 north of Versailles at the cylindrical water tower. By the Woodford Reserve Distillery, then left up a long, bad hill -- there are two more smaller ones before you start the downhill into Clifton. Back in through Versailles and Huntertown Rd. 48.9 miles, 4h10m, 3 stops, top speed 36.5 mph. And I am dead.

Nonesuch

I liked Knotmuch Farm on the south side of Nonesuch.

I quit biking to Nonesuch, which is much closer to the Kentucky River in western Woodford County than I would have thought, a few years ago. Funny how time managed to erase the memory of how bad those hills are. At least I came from the north rather the south. From the south, just past Clover Bottom Baptist Church and south of Nonesuch, there is a nasty hill. Steep for 1/2 mile, you think you're done, you turn a corner and there's another 250 yards up. It is one of only two hills (the other is Fords Mill just north of Nonesuch) in my biking paths that I have to stand up to make it up. Riding the brakes, I did 36.4 mph coming down that hill (from the north). If my death wish were a little stronger, I think I could easily have hit 45 mph coming down that hill.

So I took Delaney Ferry to Mortonsville, then went south through Nonesuch to KY 33, then back in Keene Rd. 3h4m, 35.8 miles, top speed 36.4mph, 2 stops.

I am on page 897 of 1491 (in the iBook on iPad) into "A Dance with Dragons", book 5 of "A Game of Thrones". I remember once positing something to the effect that a book must have a minimum of 100 pages per narrative thread. I think if you apply that to this series, you will wind up needing a few million pages. So many characters. The fifth book is actually book 4b, with the fourth book being book 4a. Still a good read, but, it's almost like a book is the wrong technology for this much content. Not sure what the right tech would be.

Reaching the end of grilling season, made my baby mixed vegetables and salmon on the grill. For the shitake bacon effect, you have to cook the shitakes 15 minutes by themselves. Half way through, the Cooper's Hawk came swooping over the house and wound up somewhere in the trees of the neighbor to the left's backyard. It is such a rush when that big bird comes flying through our airspace.

Loki was Odin's Blood Brother

Beautiful weather. I was afraid it was going to be too sunny this morning, but it wasn't. Biked to Highbridge Park, then took a long-cut back: north on KY 1268 then south on US 68 to KY 33, then back 33 and Keene Rd. 3h20m, 43.1 miles, top speed 34.3 mph. A nice long stop at the park, which has a beautiful scenic overlook over the junction of the Dix and Kentucky Rivers.

That is such a pretty little park, and pretty much empty every time I have been there. My wife and I have picniced there, very nice.

I read the latest Steven Gould "7th Sigma" in Kindle format on the iPad. Very enjoyable, it reminded me of his first novel "Jumper". It really makes you remember and feel how much you would have enjoyed the book when you were 14. Teenage protagonist who is a master of aikido rather than a teleporter. Relaxing to read.

Then started the latest "Game of Thrones" book "A Dance of Dragons". 300 pages into 1500, I think we've been reintroduced to the characters of interest, maybe some stuff will start happening soon.

I had been buying all ebooks on amazon in Kindle format because they seemed to be consistently cheaper. This one (and the others in the series) not so -- same price in iTunes and amazon. So I figured I'd try the Apple version. Seems slightly inferior in that it didn't show up on my iPhone until I synced, whereas the Kindle books are there from the getgo. I think Apple is supposed to be fixing that soon.

Speaking of adolescent entertainment, "X-Men First Class" was very enjoyable, "Thor" not so much so. "Thor" just didn't work. I think it was because I am such a fan of Norse mythology, and have been for > 40 years. The relationship between Thor, Odin, and Loki is complex and an important theme in Norse mythology, and completely unlike what was represented in the movie. Of course, I'll have to watch it again to see if it gets any better.

Music out, a better crowd at the Wednesday night jam. My brother Mark and his wife Carrie came from Leitchfield, on their anniversary no less. He says they enjoyed it. I played and sang well.

Currently watching the 1994 miniseries of Stephen King's "The Stand" with my wife. Many young actors who later went on to successful careers. But, it reminds me how much I don't like Stephen King's stuff. Totally predictable, kind of preachy, blech.

Damn, I'm way behind on Music In. Plus have to sort out from what I had to reload after my C: drive crashed 9/2. We'll save that for another post.

Unknown Bird

Maybe overdid it a little today. Took a long cut -- Parkers Mill to Ft Springs-Pinkard to Old Versailles to Rosalie to Bosworth to Elkchester to Redd instead of Van Meeter to Elkchester to Redd -- to Old Frankfort. Then Paynes Depot to Waizenberger Mill through Midway to Spring Hill Station. Then KY 1685 back to Old Frankfort to Pisgah Pike to Military. 41.9 miles, 3h29m, 1 stop, max speed 33 mph. I thought about taking 1685 across US 60 north of Versailles, then coming back through Versailles from the north-west. Glad I didn't, pooped enough as is.

Saw what I think was a new bird I think west of Midway. It was a small hawk (smaller than 2 crows sitting near it on a fence), stripes across its tail, and a light head. I think this might have been a sharp-shinned hawk, which looks like a cooper's hawk but is smaller.

Bill O'Reilly was interviewed in parade magazine today. Talked about Lincoln, and, if he were around today, he'd be a Republican: "I don't think he wanted a social welfare system. I think he wanted people to be self-reliant ..."

Quel bull. I will reproduce again this Lincoln quote that I like a lot. It sounds to me like Lincoln believed in "social justice". Try to get a modern republican to say those words without their head exploding.

It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, “You toil and work and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.” No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.

–Abraham Lincoln, Seventh and Last Joint Debate with Steven Douglas, held at Alton, Illinois, Oct. 15, 1858.

I became aware of this quote because it is in Copland's "Lincoln Portrait", at around the 10:50 point. I have the Philadelphia Orchestra version with Adlai Stevenson narrating. Here it is with what sounds like James Earl Jones narrating. The quote is at around 10:05.

Jammin'

So played 6 straight tonight. Drippin' sweat when done. Somehow most of the audience decided to leave during this period. Somewhat discouraging. But I'm figuring it was just they had alarms set for 10:00 pm, of course, not that I sucked. I had my good friend and most excellent guitarist Ron Northrip behind me for the 1st three, and my good friend and most excellent guitarist King William (Allen) on the 2nd guitar for the 2nd three. I played:

1. "I Got Loaded", the Tab Benoit version. Struggled somewhat.
   
2. "Who Do You Love". Hadn't done this for a while, worked well. A good jam.
   
3. "Roadhouse Blues". Fuzzy (Steve) the harp player called it. It's fun to play and sing, but there is for some reason some serious anti-Doors sentiment at the jam.
   
4. "Stuff You Gotta Watch" (Muddy Waters, recently covered by Levon Helm) for the second time. Not too bad, the band seems to like it.
   
5. "I'm Ready", another Muddy Waters song, that I had been attributing incorrectly to Buddy Guy. Worked well.
   
6. "Rollin' and Tumblin'". A cross between the Cream and the Jeff Beck/Imogen Heap versions. This is the favorite of my friend Ron of the songs I do. He was on keys for it. Erik Shields the drummer calls this song, he likes it, I am honored, he is such a completely solid musician. It is a workout. If I'm not sweating when I start this song, I am when I finish.
   

My lead playing was mediocre. Need to practice more playing the faster stuff with an open right hand. I have been practicing more lately. I skip leads on any songs that really needs the rhythm guitar to carry the song, like "Rollin' and Tumblin'". Plus, in general, I think that there are too many solos in the jam format.

Allen the drummer was really kicking it tonight. It was (our alpha guitarist) Lindsay Olive's birthday (58), they played some of his jazzy compositions at the end, with the 2nd guitarist being our beta guitarist David Ponder. Really well done. David says he's going to come out more.

Widdershins

So this past Sunday, I biked a route that I have done many times before, but for the first time in the opposite direction. I went straight out Delaney Ferry. Then, south on KY 33 to Cummings Ferry to Pauls Mill to KY 33 south of Troy, which I have always done the other way. Then back in Keene Rd. 2h24m 30.1 miles. The stretch on KY 33 seemed less steep than coming the other way. And Pauls Mill near KY 33 I have often thought was odd, in that it looks flat but you pick up speed. Coming the other way, it is definitely a hill -- duh.

On Pauls Mill, I think I saw a red-bellied woodpecker, which would be a new one. It has a red mohawk.

Mist

Biked north this morning, Van Meter to Redd to Paynes Depot, west on Moore's Mill towards Equus Run vineyard, but then north again on Cane Run over I-64 to Ironworks Pike. Back in Yarnallton to Spurr past the prisons, then Greendale to Alexandria and home through the baseball park. 3h0m, 37.3 miles, 2 stops, top speed 34.2 mph. I had checked the radar before I left and it looked like I might get rained on towards the end, but I figured, what the hey? I did get misted on the last 1/2 hour or so. But neither the roads or my brakes got particularly wet, so it was kind of nice.

I saw a good sized red-tailed hawk on Greendale.

I finished reading "The Name of the Wind", by Patrick Rothfuss. An OK read I guess, but clearly part 1 of a 2000 page novel. The hero is telling his life story over 3 days, day 1 is done at no particular stopping point, so clearly this volume must be over. None of the characters seem very self aware, which seems kind of annoying. The protagonist is only supposed to be 15-17 years old (which you forget because he has so many superpowers) so I guess that's his excuse.

Went from there straight into "Circle of Enemies", the 3rd Twenty Palaces novel by Harry Connolly. Supernatural noir cheap detective fare, definitely popcorn for the mind. Reading science fiction, I feel like it's not totally escapist, that you do get new concepts, and real glimpses at possible futures. Fantasy, no such excuses. It is strictly escapist. I think that the 6 months I recently finished of working two jobs and working 7 days a week has left me fried to the point where escapism is mostly what I'm up for. Maybe I'll read something worthwhile -- maybe even non-fiction! -- before I retire in 3-4 years, maybe not.

I also finished the 2nd novel by Lauren Beukes, "Zoo City". Kind of more noir and magical realism than cyberpunk. A very good read.

Got "Thor" to watch on the Apple TV tonight, woo-hoo! Hard to believe Kenneth Branagh directed that. iTunes recently had his excellent mystery "Dead Again" (1991) on sale for $4.99, so we purchased and watched it. Great movie.

I've played OK at the jam the last few weeks. Had a good new drummer, Ken Baker, behind me last week. Called "Summertime Blues", "Rollin and Tumblin", and "All Along the Watchtower". Then got to do 3 more playing lead guitar behind someone else. I ducked out of there early, hit Lynagh's. Talking to Tim the bartender/drummer/singer about Levon Helm's recent work, he mentioned how he gets to channel Levon when they recreate "The Last Waltz", which some great local musicians have been doing for 6-7 years now around Thanksgiving. He said they try to get new people every year, and suggested I could maybe do the Muddy Waters "Mannish Boy" number!!! Holy crap, I'm not worthy! But, we'll see what happens.