Yesterday I had lunch with Adil, Ed, and pretty much the rest of my old work colleagues in EDA. It was really nice to see everyone and a pleasant surprise that pretty much everyone wanted to see me. After everyone else left Adil and I had a chat and I got to meet his kids, which was quite nice. Adil, don’t forget to send me that picture!

(click to see in Google Earth)

As promised (or threatened) I did the long loop of Breakneck Ridge after lunch. I did it in the afternoon, so it was a lot hotter and a lot harder than last week. I ran into lots of people this time. Most of them asked me for advice or how far it was going to be to the turn off. I suppose I looked like I knew what I was doing. I had this conversation several times: “Are you from around here?” “I used to be. I used to live in Beacon.”

Upwise it is like the last Breakneck Ridge hike except for more up after the saddle where you turn off for the short loop, and a more gradual descent. It is also about a mile longer. I feel like I left this hike as unfinished business when I left Beacon a year and a half ago. I’d hiked it a million times, but I left in a state where I wasn’t really up to hiking it anymore. Now that I’ve come back and hiked it again I feel a lot better about it.

After the hike I met up with my friends at Boscobel for As You Like It. I was disappointed that I missed Richard III, because it is one of my favourites, but As You Like It was really funny and definitely worth it. They presented it using a Western theme that accentuated the humour. Joe said it was his favourite Boscobel Shakespeare yet. I’m not sure that I would go that far, but it was quite good. If you are ever in the Hudson Valley during the summer I highly recommend seeing one of the plays that they are presenting that year. They usually do two plays each summer, they present them outside at Boscobel, where there is a lovely view of the Hudson.

...and with that, my Hudson Valley adventure draws to a close, as I head back to New York City, and prepare for my next big adventure in New Mexico.

I have a recording of an old radio show wherein they referred to the Prime Minister as the Prime Monster. Would that make a regular minister a Monster of Lesser Degree?

(people are dumb)

The education minister was on TV last night ranting that (some) students were being taught to analyse Big Brother rather than the “classics” like Shakespeare and shit. Now, I don’t watch “reality” television because I think it’s trashy, and I’ve never seen Big Brother, but based on my analysis of other “reality” television it must be trashy, and I actually like Shakespeare. However, I have to say that I disagree with the esteemed Lesser Monster of Education. I think it is probably more important for our next generation to be able to dissect modern culture and hopefully help them see through the marketing and the hype.

Advertising is lame.

Two lame things about LiveJournal that vaguely annoy me, but not enough to make me stop using the service:

1. When I click onto a bookmark to a friend group filter when I’m not logged in, I get this annoying VERBOTEN! kind of message and then a link to where I can log in. First of all this is poor design, the message should just ask for my username and password, second the text for the link is simply “here”. It’s really bad form to tell your users to click “here” as apposed to saying “visit my photography website” or what have you. Also, once I have actually logged on it doesn’t automatically take me to where I wanted to be in the first place! I have to click on my bookmark again!
2. Before selling out to SixApart, “Brad” and the LJ team “promised” never to have advertising. Since the sale, they have added free accounts with extra features that include advertising. Not surprisingly, the web page that proves them to be liars has been removed from the LJ website. I don’t think it’s lame that they did this^[1], I think it is lame that they quietly removed the statement that they would never do this without any explanation. Maybe they are worried about a lawsuit.

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1. you can still sign up for a no advertising free account, although I think this is no longer the default

Tonight, I took the train into the city and saw Macbeth. It is a modernization, where the players are Melbourne gang members. It was the most innovative production of Macbeth I think I've ever seen. I have never, for example, seen Macbeth seduced quite so literally by the weird sisters. Good stuff, but bloody. If you like Shakespeare and you don't mind a little blood and guts, you'll be missing out if you don't see it.

phone woke me up. reporter daily star. "it's three o'clock morning" i moaned. parts of speach difficult. photographer. desire photographs taken. for interview. vaguely remember reporter from yesterday. mitch gitman. acknowledge affirmative. roll out of bed. stagger bathroom, drench self healing power of hot water. My eyes begin to see objects a little more distinctly and my memory is coming back on line. Yesterday a reporter had interviewed me about the Dorm network "ResComp" or as I like to refer to it "ResInComp." I turn the water off and start to towel off. I had directed him in the direction of an acquaintance Fydor and my friend Tyler, because they were like minded Internet Dorm Dwellers. Mitch had just called me up to ask if they could photograph me using the Internet.

I wonder why he called me up this early as I walk back into my room, when I notice that it is awfully bright in my room for 3:00am. I squint at my alarm clock and hit it with a clenched fist. It changes to 8:14am, which I assume means it is actually 8:04am, since I always set the thing ten minutes fast.

(Read more...)

The only thing worse than taking the 1:20am out of grand central is missing the 1:20am out of grand central, because there aint another train until six or something. So Kathy's friend Sally came to New York and they decided to have dinner and see a show, and I got invited along with a random allotment of other people.

"So anyone we know gonna be there aside from Nam?" I asked Kathy on the way to dinner where we were meeting Sally and the rest of the crew.

She explained that Sally was going to be there, and Sally's ex-girlfriend and the girl Sally was dating now... I felt like asking if there were going to be any strait women there, but that might be rude. Dinner was excellent. Two of our random crew with was a couple of blond Swedish women working for part of a company which did not get bought out by The Company. They were both spoken for, but I enjoyed chatting with them about different cultures and different places anyway.

Then we went to The Donkey Show, which was essentially Mid Summer Night's Dream without the high-falutin' Shakespeare-speak set in a disco... only the audience dances in the disco with the actors. Oberon's gal was completely naked from the waist up except for two strategically placed butterflies, if you take my meaning. There were equally scantily clad men in the production as well, for those of you who prefer that. The cast mingled in character with us as we waited to get in. I highly recommend it if you like fun and don't enjoy things that aren't fun.

After the show the disco continued and I kept dancing with my friends until at 12:45am, when I decided to make a dash and catch the last train. I wish I could have stayed longer, because the thumping of the music and the dance floor was calling me. I said my goodbyes and hailed a cab. As I write this I am on the train to Croton-Harmon stoping which stops at all local stops. Switch to the Poughkeepsie there, which gets me to Beacon and home at something like three in the morning. I am going to be soooo tired tomorrow.