Marital Bliss through Animal Training

I read an article/interview in the Globe today called Treat each other like animals (here’s a link to a similar article in the New York Times if you don’t get that paper). This is an interesting and refreshingly simple approach that has a lot of merit. This isn’t old style animal training with a whip and chair nor is it a rolled up newspaper. Basically you reward preferred behaviour and ignore the bad. This is assuming, of course, that the bad isn’t so terrible that it is violent: that would probably require more complicated therapy to deal with.
This is aimed more at the common spousal argument. I like this a lot. It’s just the way I’d want to be treated if I’m being a jerk. After all, anger is hot and fleeting and things get said that I’d prefer not to recall. It’s much better left ignored than heightened through (even a justified) reaction. Things have a way, as we’re all told, of working out. And they do if given time.

Bored

It’s crazy.
Our modern world has so much to see, to do, to think.
Yet I still know (and loathe) boredom.
How is that possible?
Am I hardwired to need change?
My son, so much more privileged than I was,
came to me with a board game in hand, eyes a little sad,
“Dad, I’m bored.”
At first I damned genetics but then I thought
no. he’s wrong. I’m wrong.
We’re not bored with a myriad of world wide inputs.
We’re lonely.

–2008/03/30–

Learning the world

This is a science fiction novel by Ken MacLeod that I borrowed from the library. It is an excellent work of imagination combining realistic and well thought through science with alien encounter. I very much like the fact that the title of the book is taken from a blog in the story.
Highly recommended.

Smile and Wave

The band Smile and Wave, of which my daughter (Emily on voice and rhythm guitar) is a member, competed in a Battle of the Bands tonight at her high school. Other members are Dave Barrett (6 string electric bass), Alex Hart (drums) and Erwin Remigio (lead guitar). They did really well with their two songs Liar (written by Emily) and their cover of Stevie Nicks’ classic Edge of Seventeen.

I was impressed by the skill level that was evident in the other performers as well. In particular, there was one guy who played a very cool looking guitar that I was told he made himself for one song and played rocking bagpipes on another.
A very enjoyable evening all around!

Mistakes Made

That might be a good epitath for me. It applies. In fact I would say it is one of the pillars of my personal philosophy. You get nowhere without making mistakes and things that come naturally will eventually let you down. If you have a gift, great, but don’t expect it to blossom into genius or expertise if you don’t set about learning all the possible mistakes. I have my favourite quotation pinned to the wall where I work:

An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field.
-Niels Bohr

Ain’t that the truth! I listened to another TWiT podcast last night while I did dishes. Patrick Wilson, the drummer from Weezer, was a guest and he said some interesting things that apply to any creative work and really encouraged me. Here’s the paraphrased gist:

Stop worrying about technical details and just write a song. And then keep on writing more songs. Don’t obsess over one: you’ve made mistakes. Move on. That’s how you really improve your craft.

Amen!

Wiki

I recently heard a fascinating podcast on TWiT about Ward Cunningham who is the inventor of the Wiki. He is very interesting to listen to and is an excellent role model for programmers to look to, not only for the wiki but also for coming up with extreme or agile programming.
Cunningham’s basic idea was to provide a repository for ideas and solutions that were discovered during projects. It was a way for people to post those ideas which could be useful for other projects. Like canned wisdom.
The most famous wiki is Wikipedia which I use every day. There are many detractors to the wiki idea but it is hard to argue against such success. The idea of a web application that provides a knowledge base which can be read or added to quickly and easily is an almost utopian one, if it’s done correctly. Wikipedia has been able to be as successful as it has because it is so open. Our residue of available knowledge that keeps accumulating over time is what sets us apart from being merely a hairless ape. Our progress, fraught as it is with environmental and social problems, can be measured by how open that knowledge is. If open projects like the wiki and many others on the web continue then I think our future success is that much more possible. Closed, proprietary systems do not lead us forward.
If you don’t use a wiki at work or home I encourage you to try building one. There are many free systems available that just require a little effort and some spare space on a server to set up.

High in 1979

During the summer of 1979 I was involved in an environmental program for youth called the “Junior Conversationists Award Program”. I was sponsored to participate by my local Conservation Authority (the Grand River Conservation Authority). The ideal was to get teens between the ages of 16 and 21 to work on nature conservancy projects that really mattered. It was a great program for me: our group designed a self-guided nature trail at Hersey Lake in Timmins. I learned an incredible amount about conservation, writing, being part of a team and about myself. All while having a great time. Just the kind of program you want for youth.
During the initial 1 week introductory session at the Leslie M. Frost Natural Resources Centre (closed during Government cost cutting in 2004: it’s now a summer camp for kids) a funny thing happened to me. I was receiving weekly allergy injections at that time and I had brought the allergy serum with me. One of the counsellors drove me to a Doctor in Dorset who gave me the injection. However, they did it wrong and the serum was injected too shallow so I had a large bump on my arm for over a day. Somehow this made me very, very high for a few hours. I was driven back to the centre and instead of climbing the two sets of stairs to the 3rd floor I made it to ‘my’ room on the 2nd floor (which was, of course, the girl’s floor). I just sat on my bed completely out of my tree holding a towel I’d found on it and muttering to myself (I found that out later). The real occupant came into the room and asked what I thought I was doing. I stared at her and must have only partially realized what was going on since I stood up, handed her the towel, explaining “This isn’t my towel” and walked out. Somehow I made to my real room and slept for a couple of hours.
A bizarre occurence in a really great 7-week summer program, that is sadly no longer with us.

Printing your own book

Doing it yourself is liberating and sometimes the only way to get your work published. Why wait until after you’re too rich to care or too dead to mail your manuscript any more? Technology, that miracle cure for everything, has come up with the means to make printing books affordable in very small runs. Lulu is one enterprising company that will do this for you for a fairly reasonable fee if you’re willing to put some work into it (nothing is without difficulties). Other (often called) Vanity Presses are available too. Here are some I’ve looked at: Xlibris, dog ear Publishing, Author House and iUniverse. These companies will be happy to do more than just print your book. Some extras include: an ISBN, promotion through Amazon or Google or other publishers, colour, professional help editing and a trained artist to do your cover. Bottom line: everything costs and you should decide what it is you want and then shop around to see what you are going to get for your buck.
If you’ve edited your own work, know a reasonable amount about your word processing software and can come up with your own artwork the cheapest solution that I’ve seen so far is Lulu. No matter what you choose (unless you have money to burn) you will need to spend some time matching your software to the templates any of these company offers.

An example:

If you want to do it on the cheap without all the extras you can publish one copy of a book at Lulu.com. I looked at a 300 page, bound pocket paperback, fully B&W and 10.795 cm x 17.463 cm (4.25 in x 6.87 in). Their manufacturing cost: US$10.53. Of course, there’s likely to be some extras for tax and shipping but those would depend on what your final product is.
I did read an article in The Globe by Ivor Tossell where he used Lulu to get a 200 page paperback printed in a week for $12 + $20 courier.

So it’s all doable. What are you waiting for?

I know why I’m waiting. There’s that crucial lack of a final draft. That I have to do on my own and by the time I’m done maybe the barriers to self publishing will be even less!

Alleluiaholics

In the Roman Catholic rite the season of Lent is notable by the absence of the word “Alleluia” from services, even on Sunday masses. I find this a little odd since I was under the impression that Sundays are not part of Lent (Sundays don’t count in the 40 days of Lent anyway). It is interesting that the eastern rites do not ban Alleluia according to the Wikipedia article link above.
So anyway the point is that I miss that ancient word of praise during Lent and really like to let loose with it on Easter. It’s a great feeling. I used the term Alleluiaholic with family and friends yesterday to describe those, like myself, who enjoy the unbridled use of Alleluia that I was allowed both at the exquisitely candlelit Vigil last night and the Easter service today. I was drunk with alleluias. Don’t know if I invented it or not but it does fit for me and it was worth a few laughs.

Earth vs. the Flying Saucers

I had never seen this 1956 sci-fi film until last night after borrowing it from the library. If you know me well then you’d know I’m a great fan of sci-fi films and that I’ve seen a great deal of them. But after seeing this movie I know that my experience was lacking one of the great films of the genre. I watched the film in the original black and white and enjoyed it start to finish. The acting was sub-grade but it’s easy to overlook it when you see the wonderful special effects. This is a true science fiction film with interesting science and intriguing aliens. It is no space opera or drama using sci-fi to boost its ratings. The genius behind it is Ray Harryhausen. This man didn’t invent stop motion filming but almost did. He is nothing short of a prodigy when it came to building miniatures and his work on this film and others which you may have seen like Jason and the Argonauts (1963 with the unforgettable fight of the skeletons), the 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958), 20 Million Miles to Earth (1957) and It Came from Beneath the Sea (1955) were extremely memorable.
Highly recommended if you admire craftsmanship!