tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-39677282011-12-18T23:57:45.348-06:00todo es buenograham's blogGrahamnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1491100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-63818329930040284342011-12-17T10:02:00.002-06:002011-12-17T10:08:28.068-06:00Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-19820913712548416672011-04-17T01:22:00.002-05:002011-04-17T01:26:06.277-05:00say whati was at a small gathering tonight where the film “cat on a hot tin roof” was being shown. after the movie people were discussing newman’s other films. the hustler came up. sombody asked “was that in black and white?” “uh huh” i said. “no it’s not.” somebody across the room said. i didn’t know her; she almost sounded irritated, having to stop to correct me. later, somebody cleverly Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-49020671276785494432011-03-15T00:01:00.000-05:002011-03-15T00:02:54.042-05:00Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-53520230456597276142010-11-16T19:17:00.004-06:002010-11-16T20:09:53.317-06:00It's a dark November evening. I'm doing a 3AM-9AM shift later at the Lake Travis Testing Station. Seeing this cheered me up.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-51672931490076158552010-07-31T12:44:00.002-05:002010-07-31T13:33:30.835-05:00The Austin City Council recently decided to reject a 750k settlement for the shooting death of an African-American, eastside teenager, Nathaniel Sanders, by Austin police. I happened to see a local news piece of the council meeting, with aggrieved members of NAACP stomping out of the room, calling mayor a snake, etc. I proceeded to follow the shit storm online, reading news articles and the Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-16252127552243368722010-07-18T16:20:00.006-05:002010-07-18T17:38:45.327-05:00Having a long vacation weekend in Chicago. While flying out of Austin I got a good look at my neighborhood from the air, and the troubling impression of looking in on a terrarium I always inhabit but often forget. In this google satellite pic is a stretch of road running through an empty field north of the ARL building. I take that hairpin turn very fast in the Mini every morning, getting pretty Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-45203169493335080042010-02-04T00:45:00.001-06:002010-02-04T00:47:26.003-06:00Neat, videotaped MIT lectures are available for free on iTunes. I just watched a good lecture on computational science by Professor Gilbert Strang. Last night I sat on the couch watching The Matrix Revolutions, a stupid blockbuster starring Keanu Reeves, and tonight I watched an actual matrix, or a great professor explaining on a chalkboard how one works. This small irony seemed to say everythingGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-30396612091781455782010-01-30T08:10:00.005-06:002010-01-30T10:28:16.623-06:00Have been enjoying the hell out of my new Sony HDTV, particularly its ethernet port with connectivity to Internet video. Because there are also computer inputs this port initially seemed redundant, but there are neat advantages. For example, I was just watching a series of short films from the Sundance 2010 film festival on YouTube. I could do this via the computer, but the picture quality was Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-63819195377010673812010-01-26T22:33:00.002-06:002010-01-26T22:47:38.319-06:00Pretty good short story:things i want back from youObjectively, what could be worse than a recriminating ex. A person who rewards you for being open-minded and physically generous by harboring feelings and resentment beyond your worst worst-case calculations? Subjectively, am I not that same person? And in some weird way, don't a lot of us go through life brushing against people we hardly know asGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-613609454557610452009-11-08T17:21:00.001-06:002009-11-08T17:21:19.372-06:00feet, BeethovenSaw Miro Quartet perform Beethoven's Quartet in A minor, Op. 132 at the Blanton Art Museum this afternoon. The violist, John Largess, introduced the piece as having a breadth of emotions making it unlike anything composed before or since. The third movement in particular gives the sense of being taken into a story, where angst, confusion, and joy ebb and flow. There are rock Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-48057771287369421502009-09-27T23:17:00.003-05:002009-09-27T23:32:59.972-05:00Cooked kharu gos, lamb with spices, for friends Elizabeth and Kimberly. Afterwards we watched ken burns' the national parks on pbs. These things went together. Kharu gos, available in a NYT recipe, is a small wilderness of spices. Cardamom pods, cinnamon sticks, cloves, and chopped dried chiles are first sauteed in a pan. (Austin Whole Foods offers a serious selection of dried chiles). Then afterGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-82429795545342395712009-09-11T00:43:00.001-05:002009-09-11T00:44:32.655-05:00geeks are from marspro engineer had left his linksys wireless router running in unsecure mode with the ssid left set to the factory default "linksys." he wondered why his modem pulsed and danced with light all through the wee hours of the morning. finally a geek in a neighboring apt. put him out of his misery and renamed his ssid "Mars-2" and set the password to his personal liking, but left the Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-43670819983049800652009-08-21T20:48:00.009-05:002009-08-21T22:41:19.780-05:00In Park City, Utah. Visited Salt Lake City last night to see Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Driving west at dusk one emerges over dark side of mountain into sunbathed urban valley. Stunning to sit in massive conference center auditorium, awash in clean, expansive sounds of great choir. At rehearsals audience is sparse and allowed to come and go. I felt like a pilgrim entering room from where I had Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-70941120005569710392009-08-18T00:46:00.002-05:002009-08-18T01:54:43.106-05:00At the Lazy Lizard Hostel in Moab, Utah, binging on free wi-fi after a week of not touching a keyboard. My concerns lately have been along the lines of "do I need a bear canister for back country camping at Canyonlands NP?" Local store clerks say no. One said she slept out in the open with a bag of food next to her and nothing happened. At Rocky Mountain National Park they require you to rent a Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-64698040329385615772009-08-09T17:52:00.002-05:002009-08-09T17:57:32.464-05:00The weather man said on Friday that there would be a 3 (three) percent chance of rain, emphasizing how minimal the chances were. It's raining. I feel like I've won the lottery.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-21104995349541782652009-08-06T00:11:00.006-05:002009-08-06T01:25:29.297-05:00I am affected by this news of the lonely programmer/blogger, Sodini, going of on a shooting/suicide rampage at his health club. I read his blog. I feel dirty, like there is some sort of guilt by association for which I must atone; I am a programmer, I keep a blog, I go to the gym a lot, and I am unhappily single right now. It does seem sometimes that "the system" of sexual courtship is a little Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-78075527340827510032009-08-04T00:08:00.005-05:002009-08-04T00:16:40.312-05:00Hide and No SeekWhen I was a camp counselor at the age of 20, I participated in a camp-wide hide-and-go-seek tournament which had a scoring system, hundreds of participants, and spread out over a few acres of forest. For the most part, the boys and young men alike hid themselves without expertise, mostly in small groups. I walked a hundred yards off a trail and crawled into the thickest patch of Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-50672959524624196352009-06-14T09:20:00.001-05:002009-06-14T09:22:38.105-05:00Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-25964863477831215522009-02-08T18:04:00.011-06:002009-02-09T00:28:23.666-06:00muerte a los baristasI recently watched Linklater's Slacker on DVD, along with a ten minute trailer for Viva Les Amis, a documentary that mourns the loss of a locally owned cafe that was replaced by Starbucks. Three Starbucks baristas are interviewed. None of them seems to know much about the former cafe, and their tepid mannerisms would seem to symbolize all that is troubling about Generation Y.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-63803871589457194762009-01-24T22:21:00.003-06:002009-01-24T22:56:44.417-06:00I'm wondering why the state department's warning about travel abroad in Mexico hasn't caused more public outrage. Israel recently invaded Gaza on the grounds that a developed nation has the right to protect its citizens by invading a neighboring state. We are no longer safe to travel in Mexico, millions of Mexican immigrants within our borders live in terror that their family members on the otherGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-84409828033574962982009-01-03T09:51:00.002-06:002009-01-03T09:55:14.717-06:00there's nothing worse than having seven minutes to eat a bowl of extremely hot oatmeal, and also drink a cup of good but very hot coffee, and also write a blog entry to mark the new year. it absolutely doesn't get worse than that.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-20050616765816571792008-12-21T21:25:00.002-06:002008-12-21T21:39:48.711-06:00it's extremely cold here in chicago. i'm staying at my mom's new condo which is at the top of a five story building. this morning i saw canadian geese fly overhead in a big hurry. the wind was blasting and they couldn't hold a V formation. i hope they made it to where they were going.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-57894477333689565382008-12-13T23:42:00.002-06:002008-12-14T00:36:43.770-06:00suitably freaked outi continued digging into my old possessions this evening, resulting in huge stacks of paper going out to the recycling bin, and several hundred pounds of books and other items stacked up, headed for goodwill tomorrow morning. i listened to cassette tapes of my old band, PG-13, and marveled at how good we sounded, then i listened to some other tapes of various bands i tried to Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-72483948063679180442008-12-09T21:17:00.003-06:002008-12-10T00:25:07.396-06:00fire salei put a bunch of stuff up for sale on craigslist. two people just came by and bought 1) my beer making kit and 2) my ceramic candle lantern. now that these things are gone i feel a strange sense of seller's remorse, a pity for the objects, as though they've been members of the family and wanted to stay, to remain useful to me. the truth is the ceramic lantern simply rattled when i walkedGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-5187469389349204592008-11-13T22:48:00.005-06:002008-12-10T00:25:47.719-06:00The sun came up today and it burned my blues away,The sun came up today and it burned my blues away,Go ahead if you have to leave meYou ain't coming back this time, hope that's fineGot my sunshine, I'll get by. -- Mojave 3, Got My SunshineThings haven't been going all that badly. Visited NYC for a long weekend, getting more acquainted with my little cousin Allison who lives in brooklyn and Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-51823150092735084542008-11-05T00:48:00.003-06:002008-11-05T01:09:52.357-06:00Just got home from watching the elections at Matt's. The electoral map simply fascinates me, how from the southern tip of Texas straight up to North Datoka voters went red, yet New Mexico and Colorado went blue, like some benign weather pattern. I canvassed for Obama in New Mexico in early October. Reported to an Albuquerque field office for four days helping push through about a hundred last Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-81648465335429031042008-10-28T21:12:00.002-05:002008-10-28T21:12:51.845-05:00Strange dreams lately. I could call them Charlie Kaufman dreams; as he said on Fresh Air recently he is amazed at how is dreams can have surprise endings. If the teller of the dream is also the listener, then why/how does the mind surprise itself?I'm vacuuming cobwebs, and the spiders right along with them. The spiders and some beetles gang up and form a living chain at the nozzle of the vacuum Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-3176457024314251892008-10-15T00:06:00.002-05:002008-10-15T00:07:52.491-05:00lay the cut rose brancheson the shelfwere you expectinglight workirrespective of universal causesthere was only a rosebushwith its own dramagrowing, blooming, then awaiting our cutas a hand in a glovecan you bear that muchwe proceed now to the gardenwhere carrots tug backwith grudging solicitudeand the feather blue skyis someone else's cropGrahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-14703061799048581692008-10-05T12:13:00.004-05:002008-10-05T13:23:29.279-05:00netflix, roe v. wade, avoiding a palini have watched ALL of The Wire DVDs, seasons 1-5. there have actually been moments where i looked at my livingroom ceiling and thanked God for a roof over my head, decent leftovers, and The Wire, delivered on time by netflix. now that i'm searching for new things to plug into my queue, i think the honeymoon is over. this morning it occurred to me that NetflixGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-79876799575726098632008-09-16T23:21:00.002-05:002008-09-16T23:42:35.107-05:00This weather is a godsend. I ran from Lamar Jr. High track to the corner of Far West Blvd. and Mesa in 25 minutes, and then without resting ran back to my house in under 54 minutes. Just this past Saturday, in the heat, I couldn't run more than half this route without walking.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-44952772632091281632008-08-16T11:49:00.000-05:002008-08-16T11:51:14.774-05:00Helllll YesFrom recent NYT Article:Hydration. It was long thought that caffeinated beverages were diuretics, but studies reviewed last year found that people who consumed drinks with up to 550 milligrams of caffeine produced no more urine than when drinking fluids free of caffeine. Above 575 milligrams, the drug was a diuretic.So even a Starbucks grande, with 330 milligrams of caffeine, will not Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-6979045662274580882008-08-09T11:17:00.004-05:002008-09-06T13:54:03.957-05:00Pop ArtContemporary artists I find interesting...Leo VillarealCool lights, fueling my escapist fantasies of doing similar commissioned work. BanskyBritish guerilla artist who doesn't make his real name or face known. He specializes in witty vandalism (arguably not vandalism) of drab public spaces in London, and produced a series of pastoral landscapes featuring modern accoutrements such as Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-85367782675422267832008-08-03T12:27:00.016-05:002008-12-08T19:11:18.650-06:00Famous and HotIf/when these women appear on television I will drop whatever I am doing.gillian anderson*I thought Dana Scully was dowdy and uninteresting, so it surprised me when she appeared in a BBC production of Bleak House, looking a lot more impressive. How exactly does an actress from Chicago, widely associated with space aliens and Fox, suddenly become a preeminent British television star?Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-75291440591214304052008-07-08T23:25:00.005-05:002008-12-08T19:11:18.740-06:00What would an electrical engineer's blog BE without a geeky reference to Anime? I was doing shivasana (the corpse pose, the customary yoga cool-down) this evening when I was reminded of the anime film The Princess Mononoke. Near film's end the creatures in the picture emerge from grassy hills, seemingly harmless and directionless, like ameboid Caspers, but they combined into into a huge, Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-78429517466765888612008-07-05T22:41:00.003-05:002008-08-03T22:41:14.144-05:00I got in my bike ride tonight. Stopped for an iced coffee at Epoch Coffee House on North Loop. The counter guy called me sweetheart. That was nice. I read a local music paper and saw that the uncle-figure to my old friend Amy, Steve Ullrich, released a new album produced by Brian Beattie. Austin seems to refuse becoming truly disconnected, no matter how hard one tries, or doesn't try. There is Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-2408630520289485962008-07-04T20:54:00.004-05:002008-07-05T22:41:47.737-05:00 I was thinking about riding my bike downtown to see fireworks, but I'm really groggy and tired, and I don't want to get hit by a car so I won't. I've been watching serious adult dramas from the late 80s the past few days, Ironweed with Jack Nicholas last night, and Dangerous Liasons today. Ironweed took some effort to keep watching. A depressed alcoholic (Nicholson) who accidentally dropped andGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-67801528343346351942008-06-23T13:23:00.003-05:002008-12-08T19:11:18.839-06:00say what you will, the dude knows how to dress.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-83837287736228180072008-03-16T12:45:00.006-05:002008-12-08T19:11:18.975-06:00Two hours and 2 million brain cells later...In my latest thrilling installment, I got around to finishing my bare wood filing cabinet. Briwax creates fumes that are so strong that the place where I bought the first can (used to finish the bookcase behind the cabinet) stopped selling it for fear of their customers' safety. As I worked I listened to a locally produced NPR interview with a man who Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-72664933463929286142008-02-17T20:33:00.004-06:002008-12-08T19:11:19.073-06:00Read about the Cobra condos in the newspaper. They have small, medium, large units, each with the same floor plan: a large, open rectangle with a glass-paneled garage door at each end. The doors do not lead to driveways, but to a small concrete sidwalk, and then lawn. I am not sure there is any aesthetic at work here other than what seems cool. I admit, if a sense of ennui creeps in, it would be Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-35750321914249825332007-12-31T00:10:00.001-06:002008-12-08T19:11:21.058-06:00"Plato gave so brilliant and impressive a defense of this common human feeling, that the doctrine of the reality of abstract objects has been known as the platonic theory of ideas ever since. Abstract Beauty, for example, is for Plato a perfectly definite individual being, of which the intellect is aware as of something additional to all the perishing beauties of the earth. "The true order of Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-61010198106080201272007-12-09T19:30:00.000-06:002008-12-08T19:11:21.277-06:00a cold front blew in around 3 pm and i had a pretty good run around town lake. about 6.6 miles without breathing hard.a cute blonde who looked to be about 39 asked me a silly question about how far apart the cones were spaced on the austin high running track, not wanting the distance but my opinion as to whether the cones divided the track equally in half. i gave her an encouraging smile and saidGrahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-28366394209935882612007-12-02T15:49:00.000-06:002007-12-02T15:51:40.838-06:00If it ever happens that the computer seems to be "too much," the worst thing to do is demonize it.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-50960950412170136002007-11-24T13:22:00.001-06:002007-11-24T13:58:16.596-06:00world enough, and timefor the past few days my job has been to check on Elizabeth's cat. i finished reading Lonesome Dove yesterday. worked on my entry to the austin chronicle short story competition. ate a 78704 cheeseburger from phil's icehouse yesterday afternoon, with a vanilla shake. lay in bed for a "short nap" and ended up going into such a deep sleep that i woke up four hours later, Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-33359071070768328832007-08-08T01:06:00.000-05:002008-12-08T19:11:21.544-06:00Ran the Santa Clara Pueblo 10k (June 30) in 49:45. A dirt road led us through the residential part of the pueblo (small adobe ranches, barking dogs, little gardens) and then out into a plain. Tall mountains on the horizon, cacti, grasses, live oak trees. I studied the depth of car tire tracks, trying to stay on the firmest parts of the road. The women's leader shadowed me for about four miles Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-89846783187433570952007-06-19T23:14:00.000-05:002007-06-20T20:13:41.215-05:00Saving LivesAt the Town Lake Trail this evening, in the stretching area under mopac, a man tapped me on the shoulder and handed me his cell phone. "Call an ambulance," he said. He almost dropped the phone before I could take it from him. A few people tried asking him what was wrong but he could hardly speak. His hands were purple and twisted and his jaw hung slack. He was covered in sweat. The Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-75746295402955191872007-06-06T06:35:00.000-05:002007-06-06T07:34:54.393-05:00Ran Round Rock Roadrunner Saturday. I placed high but did not meet goal. I blame 2 miles of woodchips and mud for the 12 second differential.Gearing up for a trip to New Mexico and San Francisco June 27-July 7.6/27 - Arrive AM in Albuquerque, pick up car6/28 - Astronomy Day at Los Alamos Lab ("We're the bomb.")6/29 - Healthy Heart, Mind and Soul 10k in Santa Clara Pueblo6/29 - Los Lobos at Taos Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-79767176820908513362007-04-28T16:35:00.000-05:002007-04-28T16:48:28.972-05:00Roundup Recap Governor Perry thanked the troops while standing beside a person in a chicken suit (Pilgrim's Pride frozen chicken was the main race sponsor), a horn blew, and before I had really woken up I found myself zig zagging through people in a mad rush down Congress Ave. Need to get better starting position next time.Ran it in 50:50, or at an 8:11 pace, which is 40 seconds better than a Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-38722608899211322572007-04-21T10:35:00.000-05:002007-04-21T11:16:17.653-05:00ran 11 miles today with the paul gonzales group. paul didn't make it today, though. i made a map of the route with the highlights.running in the texas roundup 10k next saturday.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-65111500874726263762007-04-08T00:19:00.000-05:002007-04-21T10:35:21.475-05:00Recipe: Indian FoodHere's a recipe which I think rivals anything you'd get at a typical Austin Indian resturant. It's so simple I thought I'd share.2 lbs. of central market ancho/coriander marinated chicken breastsolive oilyellow onionred peppercarrotsSlice chicken breasts into chunks.Saute chunks until cooked. (use a big pan)Remove chunks to bowl, leave some drippings in panpour sliced Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-58432813942428573112007-04-05T23:27:00.000-05:002007-04-05T23:31:37.682-05:00Town Lake, 6.7, 54:55, 8:12Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-55214896370091334532007-04-01T13:05:00.000-05:002008-12-08T19:11:21.726-06:00Ran the Capital 10k in 51:29, which seems just about right. Thanks to Julie and Matt for getting up early to meet me at the finish line (more photos).I've taken it easy this week. Matt and I attended a 12-hour cop marathon at the Alamo last night. Electra Glide in Blue, Police Story II, Sudden Impact, Freebie and the Bean, and the new movie by Simon Pegg/Edgar Wright, Hot Fuzz. There was a funny Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-63789073493111559962007-03-06T23:41:00.000-06:002008-12-08T19:11:21.947-06:00Ran the Mopac to I-35 loop on the trail (6.9 miles) in 58:57 or at 8:33 min/mile. The running group is really helping. I also bought some New Balance 1061s which are like velvet shock absorbers.The 10k is in less than 3 weeks. My goal is to break 50:00 minutes, or maintain an 8:05 min/mile pace.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-92086355366637434632007-02-07T00:14:00.000-06:002007-02-07T00:26:16.926-06:00I've become addicted to this site where people design, discuss, and produce T-Shirt designs. The insecure kid who felt his best in an Echo and the Bunnymen T has not really grown up; I can see myself wanting a horsey shirt...to run the 10k in.Ran mopac to congress and back tonight. 4.5 miles. 42:10. This is 20 seconds slower than I ran it two weeks ago, but I felt like I was running faster Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-33642329675291771942007-02-03T15:31:00.000-06:002008-12-08T19:11:22.087-06:00I've been preparing for the Capitol 10k which will happen March 25. I joined an "Intermediate/Advanced" running group that meets near the Austin American-Statesman building on Saturday mornings. The group leader, Paul Gonzalez, led a 6.5 mile run east to the Longhorn Dam this morning.I was prepared. On Thursday night I ran from my house to Mesa Blvd., and then took that to 2222. Once there, I Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-43825007167739827602007-01-01T12:34:00.000-06:002008-12-08T19:11:22.539-06:00With great reluctance, I put my 2006 "Warhol's Desserts" wall calendar into retirement. The introduction to the calendar says that in 1959 his dessert illustrations were included in a "delectable cookbook spoof called Wild Raspberries." It reminded me immediately of the Amy Sedaris book, I Like You, a bestselling cookbook spoof which Claire received for Christmas.You can see that Sedaris (or her Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-76300684431198650622006-12-03T08:46:00.000-06:002008-12-08T19:11:22.643-06:00Mysterious squeaking metal sound fixed. I climbed the attic ladder and sprayed WD-40 at the axle of the roof ventilator. There's no room to stand up there, so I reached and shot from a foot away while standing on the ladder. WD-40 rocks.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-60732719601008429512006-11-24T01:21:00.000-06:002006-11-24T12:47:54.906-06:00Randomly surfing the web, I found an interesting blog entry containing this quote:"If a person suppresses those very things that make his personality unique, if he blurs and dilutes those distinctions which mark him as different from all others, then in a sense he has marred the only gift it is truly in his power to give." --John GarlockI deleted a few recent blog entries, regardless.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-5094079943648298912006-11-12T16:05:00.000-06:002006-11-24T01:51:09.122-06:00Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1157326071792550972006-09-03T18:26:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:50.438-06:00The UT football crowd of about 100,000, in 100+ degree temperatures, generated a psychic hum that made me feel like part of a vast, spooked herd. A new scoreboard called "Godzillatron" allowed corporate logos to outblaze the sun. My head was, yes, adorned with an orange hat, sporting a silouette of none other than the white horned beast itself. I was a stranger in a strange land...OU Sucks!!!!Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1154322537576686042006-07-31T00:05:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:50.338-06:00i wandered into an antique store on burnet where a fresh shipment of mexican 50's movie posters had arrived. i also picked up my retro 50's chair from copenhagen saturday.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1150604955495334592006-06-17T23:27:00.000-05:002007-01-01T13:07:19.603-06:00Went to the "Rumble on Red River" tonight, a badly promoted, badly planned boxing event. You can sort of see the empty seats in the picture. All of the fights were mismatches. The best example of this was the last semi-main event pitting "King" James Johnson, Jr., against Billy David Thompson. The guys threw jabs for about 1.5 minutes, then Johnson connected a few times, and Thompson, intending Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1148829104650392262006-05-28T10:08:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:50.089-06:00I didn't think Fox could surprise me anymore, but they just aired a spot for the Competitive Enterprise Institute and their "We Call It Life" pro-CO2 ad campaign. CO2, it seems, is being unfairly maligned by the liberal establishment, and citizens must be mobilized to put an end to senate hearings that might result in CO2 being categorized as a pollutant. It's not a pollutant! This little girl Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1145499912090379672006-04-19T21:23:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.986-06:00Wild ThingStayed late at work today, but time is meaningless when you are wrapping up a problem. On Monday I was told that the software I've been working on for the last two months has to compile on older system software. (I was told to roll back my gcc version a notch.) Things broke. It was depressing. I got to work with a programmer I didn't know well who maintains the test computer running theGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1144286887888176932006-04-05T20:24:00.000-05:002007-01-01T13:23:18.997-06:00Today was my biannual bout with stomach flu, or food poisoning. I don't know which. It was painful and ran its course exactly like it has before. I ate cold pizza and fresh cocktail tomatoes. The last time I ate a cold pork chop and a peach. Learn from my stupidity. Heat up anything that is conventionally eaten hot, and rinse produce thoroughly. I wonder if pesticides have something to do with itGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1142583125978711802006-03-17T01:54:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:49.759-06:00In the thick of SXSW. Last night Claire and I saw Mogwai (left), Belle and Sebastian (below Mogwai). Tonight it was Morrissey and Goldfrapp. (My picture of Morrissey was so blurry there is no point posting it.) Goldfrapp was very cool. Early 80s disco with driving beats and heavily synthesized voices. "Crystalline voices" as their website puts it. I'm thinking glam-sex decadence is where it's at.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1137992367891337952006-01-22T22:55:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:49.669-06:00Home Sweet HomeTime alone at home can be such a delicious yet somehow incomplete thing. The Christmas holidays played themselves out, I got to see so many things, the west texas mountains, trendy chicago restaurants, a beautiful, real christmas tree in my mother's livingroom, my loved ones.I cooked carne guisada tonight, drank a few Sierra Nevada celebration ales, marked down at HEB because the Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1134705481991462882005-12-15T21:55:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:49.576-06:00I got a job, Engineering Scientist Associate, at UT. I'd probably be remiss to post the exact department on my blog. If you are one of the three people who reads this blog, and you want to know, please e-mail me and I'll tell you. Actually, two people already know, so Greg, if you want to know, e-mail me.I am excited about this. I was worried I'd get a job that would force me to forget most of Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1132282929250730412005-11-17T20:59:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:49.486-06:00On the difference between pushing and merely leaning in to something.I jog west, at a leisurely pace, by the Stevie Ray Vaughan statue. It's just after 7PM, dark, the trail is almost empty. Two guys pass me. The first one is thin and moving fast, the other looks like a butterball. I decide to keep pace with him, to see if he is really that fast or simply sprinting a 1 mile dash. We wind over Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1129699221229451102005-10-18T23:49:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.408-06:00My fingertips are burning. A few hours ago I was cooking with Morita peppers, which are simply roasted red jalapenos that you buy in a little celophane bag. They add a powerful, smoky aroma to stews. Lately I've been on a guisada kick but this might be my cue to try something else. Pain! I did the dishes, thinking it would wash off the hot but it simply aggravated it.Watched a very strange movie Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1128710297623754042005-10-07T13:20:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.316-06:00Robotic Fish."here lies the heart of the difference between grief as we imagine it and grief as it is...the unending absence that follows, the void, the very opposite of meaning, the relentless succesion moments during which we will confront the experience of meaninglessness itself."-- Joan Didion, The New York Times Magazine, September 25, 2005I recently read Susan Jacoby's Freethinkers, about Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1127192444280835352005-09-19T23:34:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.219-06:00a perk of my new gold's gym membership is a free personal training session. a trainer named chris analyzed my walk, posture, and squat, and concluded that I had overpronation of the shoulders, one leg longer than the other, and really tight (in a bad way) legs. He had me lay on the ground and proceeded to roll a foam rolling pin over the backs of my legs. a quick and painful way to stretch out Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1126585922906778682005-09-12T23:30:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.112-06:00Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1125488461085492952005-08-31T06:16:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:49.020-06:00Governor Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana has declared today a day of prayer. Wouldn't it have been nice for her to declare a "day of pragmatic thinking." Or "a day during which we perform our thoughtful contingency plan." Or even "a day of selfless behavior." But a day of PRAYER. As if the south needs that. We might as well have a press conference with Joyce Meyer, who seems to have more resources Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1125101669155531752005-08-26T19:13:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.936-06:00I had taken beautiful movie of Lobo settling into bed, but alas, SBC Yahoo! does not let me post it.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1125016387135687472005-08-25T19:23:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.844-06:00I've been summoned for jury duty! Something to finally blog about. People, grab your cutlery and tuck in that napkin, because I am going to be adjudicating.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1124758383498922712005-08-22T19:24:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.724-06:00The most coherent arguments I've heard in favor of staying the course in Iraq have been from Bill Kristol. He describes the aftermath of a pullout as follows:"Since Iraqi troops won't be as capable as American ones, the situation will deteriorate. Then the insurgency could become a full-fledged guerrilla war, inviting a civil war--and we would be faced with a choice between complete and Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1124602293806607302005-08-21T00:11:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.538-06:00Erin Collier, the Austin Chronicle's marketing director, was my guest today on Writing on the Air. She brought six or seven different jars/tubs of salsa for me to try, and a bag of chips. We agreed that she'd come on only this week, after I had posted a blurb in the Chron announcing I'd be playing readings from Billy Collins and Denise Levertov. So the show was a weird mix of Erin and I making Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1124221650050061802005-08-16T14:41:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.343-06:00Latest news. I have graduated. My freelancing clients have me documenting the second version of their rich site summary (RSS) reader, quicknews. Which Julie is familiar with, having written an excellent first book on the subject.Via RSS I learned that Wil Wheaton, ensign crusher from star trek next generation, has made a name for himself as a blogger and technical writer.He has a book "Just a Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1123215886704927092005-08-04T23:16:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.269-06:00Ugh. What a past few days. My night of three beers turned into a morning of acute stomach virus. Probably something I ate. I had no time to spare on the senior project so I worked through it. This morning Ryan and I demoed a successful sound-interactive light tile (see pic). I was honored to be a part of the experience, but getting home, seeing my picture, and still feeling unwell, I feel sort ofGrahamnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1123042852742754392005-08-02T22:59:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.155-06:00Sitting around here with Lobo, the abiding snooze-hound. Turner Classics is on. When they announce "a day of Shelly Winters" I get thrills dreaming about August 14th when I can sit on my ass and enjoy "a day of anyone who ever sat in front of a camera but who cares, i have earned my degree and am drinking a screwdriver." Actually, I'm drinking now. I came home to find Matt and Andrew Dickens Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1122663390228756842005-07-29T13:46:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:48.031-06:00This rocks. I got an A in telecommunications networks, my last lecture/exam course, and a B in Laplace Transforms (the 6 week course I agonized over taking at the start of the summer). I have no idea what's next, but I'm wrapping up in style.However, I have only 6 days in which to make my senior project presentable for the ECE open house. It's currently a C3P0 good heavens pile of crap. Trying toGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1119033682234886122005-06-17T13:39:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.842-06:00i want a boston terrier. it's the only motivation i have to move out of matt's house.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1118802195539157062005-06-14T21:22:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.754-06:00this kid is brilliant.notice how he answers both parts of the favorite word question with only one word.i don't know, i hope he stays in canada.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1118125227053466852005-06-07T00:30:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.590-06:00nothing's easyi just found out that a graduation requirement enacted in Fall 2004 requires me to take a technical elective in upper level math, astronomy, biology, or chemistry. i am faced with two options, A) take a third course this summer in fourier analysis that meets at 7AM, 5 days a week. or B) wait to take such a course in the fall and postpone graduation by five months. the first option Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1117987295204943832005-06-05T10:38:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.509-06:00first denial then acceptancethe only issue i have with star wars III is that it was a Frito-Lay retail display at HEB four weeks before it opened as a movie. sith settles like a 100 million dollar layer of nacho cheese on every other serial/saga/shootemup that came before it. we are creating so much stuff for our children to watch that eventually they will never be able to reach bottom. yet, we Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1117522651140923432005-05-31T01:57:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.414-06:00I am writing to say that George Lucas deserves canonization, beyond the usual Oscars fanfare for “lifetime achievment.” We should build a large bronze monument in his image. After all, he sustained a vision for 28 years. He created his own standards and put his evolution as a filmmaker out there for all to see. He made no apologies or conciliation to critics. When I was six years old, sitting Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1115778711964613232005-05-10T21:19:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.329-06:00studying for a final tomorrow, and for some reason i'm dwelling on the U.S. collective psyche. the poor little girls killed in zion, il. and Fox is making their usual circus out of it. i had a choice between the murders on fox and congressional happenings on CNN. I chose fox. i think the reason is that i am hoping for some sort of calamity. when 911 happened, it had the effect of leveling the Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1115581527564895812005-05-08T14:24:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.246-06:00sitting here in lab, waiting for a program called design vision to finish generating timing and area reports for my synchronous serial port (SSP). the tool takes about 5 minutes to run. so i'm done with part A. the goal of part B is to interface the SSP with a real-world commercial processor interface, called an ARM. doubt i'll have time to finish this.Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1114662719483004822005-04-27T23:26:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.129-06:00i have had a pleasant evening at school. the final 345L assignment calls for soldering components to a PCB board. i've been procrastinating on doing it, fearing a molten disaster, but after making a few ugly globs, i got it. you put the wire near the base of the pin, apply the soldering tip, and there is a puff of smoke and a nearly instantaneous transfer of the solder to the pin. it's easy, Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1113108573934696322005-04-09T23:49:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:47.020-06:00finally, finally, i finished the schematic of my ALU. impatience and panic started setting in today. i had earlier tested the comparator block successfully in isolation, the part that detects greater than, less than, equal, etc. around noon today i attempted to put it into the larger design. i was so fed up with the project that i lost any interest in the details, and for awhile i was speedingGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1112516340520406032005-04-03T03:13:00.000-05:002006-11-12T15:58:46.921-06:00i created my first latex document. when matt alden lectured about latex i thought it sounded like the greatest thing since sliced bread. when i was a technical writer my boss told me that a lack of version control (ability to track who changed what file, how, and when) was why i could never gain her feel acceptance or appreciation as a human being. well, i'm exaggerating, but our little Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1112345638071053762005-04-01T02:15:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.825-06:00my 379k lab partner, who was almost brought to tears a few weeks ago, rallied and produced a working wireless communications link. what this means is that bits leave the computer, enter the air, and return via another antenna (only a few feet away) in the exact same arrangement. i held one of the antennas. the flowchart bryan created to accomplish this looks like the map of a small city. once Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1111644890158493762005-03-23T23:54:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.751-06:00i woke up thinking about all of the hours I spent as a child doing things which helped prepare me for my midlife transition to electrical engineering. i used to be an expert when it came to delta drawing, i had vast libraries of artwork, from bleeding snowflakes to armadas of spaceships that wiggled in space and "exploded" (red fill). i could get to 99 on safari. as an aside, reader, explore Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1111047871177707372005-03-17T02:24:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.660-06:00Spring Break HellI'm a little freaked out by wireless digital communications right now. Supposed to be preparing for lab 5 and am still trying to do a post-mortem on lab 3. I realized I was in over my head and found a lab partner last week, but it feels like it is too late. He seems brilliant but was almost brought to tears when his LabView model of a QPSK system wouldn't run. I sat like a Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1109399478454489512005-02-25T23:38:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.577-06:00i dug through boxes to find an electronics part this evening and came across my textbooks from community college. fundamentals of financial accounting. college algebra. seeing them made me feel humble rather than humiliated; i am just an average guy. i used to feel that i was too good for those books. now i realize that the books are a part of me. some people go through life at a faster paceGrahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1109230863005585072005-02-24T01:25:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.501-06:00my life has become nonstop school. i feel as though i spend almost as much time carrying books around as I do reading them. slice the pie chart up and the largest wedge by far would be staring into the computer screen. not necessarily learning. in the case of my VHDL course, lining up the edges of metal traces and dealing with a crappy CAD interface. a lot of time sitting in lecture. Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1108101914163593052005-02-11T00:05:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.411-06:00a painful day ends in revelation. a prelab, due this evening, called for a printed circuit board (PCB) schematic and wiring diagram. rectangular blocks, each having between 16 and 56 pins on them, needed to be wired together such that synchronized memory reads could occur. my lab partner alex and i sat in the freezing computer lab at around 1 PM wracked with confusion. his first question to Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1105984905168937842005-01-17T13:01:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.318-06:00For weeks, sticky mousetraps have been empty behind our rat-infested oven. With the appliance guy coming over with a new oven I needed to move them out of the way. Holding and inspecting the trap (which had dust bunnies and dog hair clinging to it), I realized it required bait. I stuck a little wedge of parmesan in the middle and placed it on the floor in Lobo’s dogfood closet. The appliance Grahamnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1104917423916031992005-01-05T02:42:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.229-06:00finally getting somewhere with my idea for this year's braden essay contest. i am tempted to write about the interesting things i found on the web this evening, but somebody could stumble across these ideas and steal them. a 1/million chance of that happening, but why risk it.
came across another interesting science writer named philip ball. i would love to read his new book, but i've Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3967728.post-1103210924121653382004-12-16T08:09:00.000-06:002006-11-12T15:58:46.122-06:00i had an interesting dream that i needed to retake the 5th grade. i woke within the dream with only 5 minutes to get ready for school. because the elementary school was so close, i could run over there for my shower. i ran there in yesterday's clothes and found the locker room. i had forgotten to bring soap or shampoo. i found a tipped-over bottle of pert plus on a ledge. i scooped up some Grahamnoreply@blogger.com0