Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Japan



























I was in Japan, in 1997.  I am going back in August.  




Tuesday, April 19, 2011

The Potter, a poem by Pablo Neruda

Your whole body holds
a stemmed glass or gentle sweetness destined for me.

When I let my hand climb,
in each place I find a dove
that was looking for me, as if
my love,they made you of clay
for my very own potter's hands.

Your knees, your breasts,
your waist,
are missing in me, like in the hollow
of a thirsting earth
where they relinquished
a form,
and together
we are complete like one single river,
like one single grain of sand

Friday, April 8, 2011

The Dating Lesson 2

Well ... Faithful readers ... I am sure you all remember the dating lesson.  As the Old Bag said in the comments of that post, "She's out there" (I liberally paraphrase).  I just have to have to find that mythic woman. That wilderness savvy beer sipping goddess, river running ... sculpture lovin' babe. It's going to happen. 

But not tonight ... Tonight I sat at a bar in a swanky restaurant.  Waiting.  My date insisted on it actually.  I offered two very efficient, trendy and affordable alternatives. Su's Mongolian Barbeque and Ramen Dojo.  Neither is as swanky as Rok Bistro in Sunnyvale, however.  It's also mostly true, that you could not eat enough in Su's or Ramen Dojo to spend as much as any single item on the menu at Rok. 

"I really want to go to the Rok" ... So I made a reservation.  I am very punctual.  So I am early ... I go to the bookstore.  Cute gurl I met last time I was at that bookstore is not there, I pull some dusty travel journal out of the wood work.  I go across the street to the restaurant and I am still early ... and so there I was in the bar, waiting.   Forty minutes later my date calls from the grocery store, "I am buying food for my son. I have to take care of my son ... I'll be right there." 

Sure, I understand.  I return to waiting, and the battery on my phone dies ... pretty soon the bartender offers to buy me a drink ... feeling sorry for me.  Time flies when you're having fun.  After a while they inform me that if  I'd like to eat it would be good to order because they are starting to close the kitchen.  So I got to a table ordered a citrus salad and a sirloin medallion and ate.  The salad was quite good with spinach, some fresh friut and almonds, with a vinigarette.   Clean and simple and very effective. 

The Rok part of this comes from the service of the various cuts of meat basically raw on a slab of very hot stone ... you know ... rock.  The guest -- that would be only me by this point, then cuts the meat and grills it on the hot rock.  Sides were some large asparagus spears and mashed potatoes, which were pretty generic and unspecial.  Teo sauces for dipping were both grand, so the meat was the star of the show.  The sirloin was quite taasty, although at several points I had to use my poket knife to get through it. 

Over all, quite satisfying.  Unlike my date. 
I want to rant now about how having a son is not a reasonable justification for not being able to make a valuable assesment of one's own ability to arrive somewhere, or just calling to cancel. or saying, you know what ...I can't make it.  I am not going to do it.   Frankly, I knew better.  During our second date, she was 45 minutes late and only called when she had already arrived.  During our third date ...

Not going to do it. 

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Recent Letter to a Friend ...

I looked at the spam emails I've been getting from your yahoo email ... they are redirecting traffic to a waurez site, which is geek jargon for a hacker resource site. The site has the extension "ru.gg." The original source of the email appears to be another yahoo email, but the headers in the email may have all been faked, so there's not necessarily anything to go on.

It may be that they've just farmed your email off the web and are using it to generate spam. However, it may be more hostile. If your computer had spyware or other software installed on it as a result of you going to a link like the one being sent in your emails, your computer may be generating the emails. It's possible that your computer is infected with some sort of spyware, malware or virus. I am afraid to look at the link to see what it does ... because I may not be able to protect myself from it.

I did some searches and there's enough traffic on google that it pops up a shortcut to the "ru.gg virus" so that I am just going to guess that you have a virus.

If you have back ups of your data then -- don't worry about this too much -- but I would spend some time backng up data on your computer to cd's or dvd's Then, I recommend that you update your computer's Operating System (I am just going to guess that it's Vista, based on what I read about this on line). Get all of the recommended security patches -- and then set your computer up to automatic update, especially if you are online all the time. Then, update your McAfee and manually run a scan on your entire computer. They may be using a thing called a browser helper object to reinstall itself when you start your browser ... Let me know if you notice anything unusual about the browser ... like it keeps going to some other page when you set it to go to your normal home page. These are often hard to fix.  If the virus is a worm, it will be equaly hard to fix, and sometimes your applications can be affected too.  You might need help.

You should really "scream" at yahoo, because they should be willing to join the community of people in the world that are trying to prevent and intercede against hacking. Asking you to change your password is not going to prevent this kind of attack from succeeding. They should know that.

If you want me to help you try to fix this -- I can look at it.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

An Open Letter to the People of Egypt

This is what I recommend you tell your government, and I believe this should be the official US position:


When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,[72] that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

... and so on. 

Godspeed to you in your quest for liberty. 




Thursday, February 3, 2011

Rain (Rapa Nui)

... excerpt from  Rain (Rapa Nui) 

...
Bury your twin-burning breasts in my mouth,
and let your head of hair be a small night for me,
a darkness of wet pefume enveloping me.

At night, I dream that you and I are two plants,
that grew together, roots entwined,
and that you know the earth and the rain like my mouth,
since we are made of earth and rain.  Sometimes
I think that with death we will sleep below,
in the depths at the feet of the effigy, looking over
the Ocean which brought us here to build and make love.
...

Pablo Neruda   

Monday, November 29, 2010

Wista Setup

This is all the crap I carry around with my 4 x 5. 

Flash cable
Lens cloth
Polaroid back and film
Kodak TMax and EPP film in 4x5 ready loads. 
12 Sheets of Ilford Delta 100 in film, holders 
Kodak ready load back. 
Wista 6x9 cm roll film back. 
Shen Hoa 6x17 cm roll film back back 
Manfrotto 190CXPRO4 Carbon Fiber Tripod and short column
Vivitar SMS 30 flash 
FujiFilm 4x loupe
About 20 filters in 77mm and flat filters
Electric Kitchen timer
Blowy ball
Luna Pro F light meter
Wista DX-III with International and Graflex back
A variety of 120 roll film in black and white and color
Dark Cloth
4 lenses
Rodenstock 55mm Grandagon
Schnieder 90mm Angulon
Schneider 135mm Symmar-S MC  
Schnieder 210mm Symmar-S MC
Flarebuster
2 Shower caps
Clip-on Umbrella
2 cable releases
Adapters for the filters. 
Pen
Gnass Lens case
Gnass Film holder carrier  

I don't know what this whole setup weighs -- but  I think about 40 pounds. 

Monday, November 8, 2010

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Giants Win!

It was 1965 maybe ... the first time I thought the Giants might win the World Series.  We played wiffle ball on the street in front of the house and the neighborhood witch took our balls whenever she could.  We played hardball or "semi" in the sandlot at the end of the street, and we knew that Maury Wills could run and was one unbelievable fielder.  Golden Glove.  We knew Sandy Koufax pitched a perfect game against the cubs. and that the Dodgers were the team to beat.       

We'd watch the game when it was televised.

The giants fielded a team like this:
We knew the line-up by heart.  ... Alou, Fuentes, Mays, McCovey, Hart and so on.  We used to pick sides and one of us would have to be the hated Dodgers, and the other one got to be the giants.  And we would recite their line-ups while we hit.  If we happened to be Maury Wills on first we felt obligated to steal.  Sometimes we would switch hit for the lefties.  We played the game, we hit the ball, we knocked out windows, we rooted for the Giants.   

We all thought the Giants could do it that year, but we were denied.  My father said that Horace Stoneham thought that second would make more money -- so that's where the giants would be.   My father and Uncle Pat might take us to a game -- to the bleacher seats.   But my uncle Ralph -- He always had box seats.  First base line, behind the dugout.  He used to bring about a six pack of beer to the game in a long tube he slung over his shoulder.  He'd drink that and more ... ummm ... and then drive us home.

We cheered the Giants on year after year.   

I remember the night games at Candlestick.  The wind.  The cold.  The extra innings.  When the stadium was empty.  When it was full.  We followed the score and we watched.  And we waited.  For years.  

But I never remember winning the World Series till now. 

Sunday, October 31, 2010

My Excellent Hosts in China

August 3-13, 2010


I want to be sure to thank my host for this ten day trip. My friend Michelle, her friends and her family were gracious, most generous, accommodating, and delightful. For most of the entire ten days, she, or someone in her family, or one of her friends, was there to take me out, feed me, go sightseeing or shopping, or invite me into their home. Their efforts made this by far the best trip I have ever made to such a foreign place.


I can't say thank you enough.











Well ... Merry Christmas Already

Christmas this year will mark the 24th anniversary of my brother Michael killing himself.  Every year ... I say ...  Oh -- I should go volunteer at the suicide hot line.  Well -- I just offered.    

Friday, October 29, 2010

Body Tuning ... err ... Bow Tuning

SO -- Right before deer season this year, I bought a new bow, a Mission BX-1, in a 70 lb draw weight.  Many of you might have noticed, well, that I am not a very big guy.  I could pull a 70 lb. draw weight bow, once maybe.  The guys at Predators short strung it so I could pull it at about 50 pounds of draw.  Since I normally shoot a 50 lb recurve, this was manageable.  50 pounds of draw weight is enough to take down a deer certainly, but might have trouble with a bear or elk. 

Last week I had the shop set it up as it should be and we cranked the weight down to about 60 lbs.  This is a substantial increase.  I had to shoot it about a dozen times at the shop so it would settle in.  This was a challenge.  With a recurve if your body fails you can just pull till there's nothing left and shoot away.   With a compound bow, you have to get over the hump, or it's useless.   I had to rest more than once.

I've been going to the range every day and shooting about a dozen arrows. Every day I try to dial in the 20 yard pin on my sight.  Shoot three arrows, move the sight, shoot three arrows, adjust again.  It's hard enough to pull, so that each set of three shots isn't always accurate.  But I am getting stronger.  Today, it all came together.  I was able to shoot consistently for about 15 shots ... and looky; three bulls eyes at 20 yards.