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Noah Flower's LiveJournal:
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| Tuesday, June 13th, 2006 | | 8:58 pm |
Headed to the playa!
Got my ticket. I'm going. It was an impulse buy, really. I'd been waffling for quite some time, following a period of not wanting to go at all. But then I realized that quite a few people that I like are going, and then yesterday I had lunch with the guy who created the Colossus last year and the Temple of Gravity the year before that. We got along famously -- he's another young, smart, entrepreneurial spirit -- and I came back to the office filled with certainty that the playa was the place for me to be this summer. All kinds of questions in my head now. Who'll end up coming? I wonder if I could camp with False Profit? What kind of costumery could I put together? How many newbies can I rope in? (I think some people from capoeira might come.) What parts of the playa can I explore this year that I've left as yet untouched? (Now *there's* an interesting list...) | | Friday, January 13th, 2006 | | 10:10 am |
a thrill runs up my spine head swirls with warmth mind fills with happiness music is the perfect drug | | Friday, November 25th, 2005 | | 2:43 pm |
Ahh, Thanksgiving weekend
Four days off. There's something just beautifully, terrible /wrong/ about taking off more days in a week than you spend working. I can't say I'm usually overworking, so it's not like it's a huge break from the norm, but I'm usually a pretty busy guy around the office, fully occupied with the project at hand. But recently I've been almost idle, frequently finishing every last shred of work assigned to me. That's just not supposed to happen; the notion of being "done" never even entered my mind over the last year or so. It's sort of like writing a thesis. But now the project really is genuinely over, there's nothing in the pipeline for the moment, and I'm free as a bird. Now I'm sitting here in Santa Rosa, taking a few minutes on free cafe WiFi to write a post, lapping up the sunshine and clear skies and fall leaves and gentle pace of the wandering crowd here in the city center. I've got tonight, tomorrow and all the next day to kick it in Fort Bragg with my dad. Halle-fuckin'-lujah. :) | | Saturday, November 5th, 2005 | | 11:53 pm |
Jarhead
I just came back from watching "Jarhead" with a friend. (We were going to see "Good night, and good luck," about the journalist who stood up to McCarthy, but he got stuck in traffic.) I didn't think it was going to be all that good, since the wisdom of the crowds who populate metacritic and rottentomatoes said that it was only so-so. But it turned out to be a very interesting view into the psychology of a soldier. I've been learning about how military force gets deployed at a high level, since part of this project on China and Russia requires understanding the nature of hard power, but "Jarhead" really drove home what it's like to be in the position of someone on the ground. I'd seen other war movies -- Private Ryan, Apocalypse, Platoon. They all had profound things to say about the nature of warfare, but this one showed me what it would be like for /me/ to be going to war in Iraq right now. (One of the secondary characters is literally a Dartmouth classics major.) | | 8:27 am |
Cory Doctorow
Has anyone else picked up Cory Doctorow's novels? I just started "Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town" last night. I was feeling pretty tired, not interested in reading anything serious -- and three hours later, I was feeling the same way, but still awake and many pages into the book. Not bad for a (legit) free download. | | Friday, November 4th, 2005 | | 7:17 am |
Biking
Oh, I forgot to mention: I went to a sweet little spot in the Sierras called Downieville last weekend. And OH MY GOD are the biking trails awesome. Quite seriously the best mountain biking I've ever done. Photos are up here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/noahflower04/ | | 7:15 am |
Hello again
Out of curiosity... who's reading? It's been awhile since I've posted here. Work's been keeping me busy, but I flipped through everyone else's LJ page just recently and realized how much I miss y'all. Brief overview of what I've been up to: neat projects at the office, mountain biking & running, learning to cook properly, reading up on a sh'load of semi-work-related stuff, finding new music, checking out the city and occasionally going out dancing. (I really have no trouble filling my time out here; the city's very good for finding stuff to do.) The ebb and flow of work has been particularly erratic of late. For a short while, I actually had very little to do. I went looking for interesting conferences for my team to attend, and generally felt relaxed (and a little unmotivated). Then I suddenly had five projects on my plate, all for different people, with different timeframes and priorities. (My typtical work is for one person, on one project, so this was a bit of a new challenge.) Today, I finally come off of a pretty intense spate of work that's been consuming literally *every waking hour* since Monday. We had a couple big important meetings this week, which is really the only time that I end up working longer than my usual ~9hrs/day. I've still got a lot to work on my one remaining task, but then it'll be taken care of. All that aside, what's mostly on my mind right now are the screaming protests I hear from my legs every time I try to walk. I was mighty happy to have time to get outside and move last night, so I decided to see if I could run about five miles. The run was great--I climbed Potrero Hill, got some great views of downtown--but I missed a turn in the route and ended up widening it out to seven and a half. Well, I just can't run that far yet--not on pavement. I ran until my hips and knees just couldn't take it, and then the last mile and a bit was walking. And I'm pretty sure my joints won't quit complaining until tomorrow. Time to switch back to biking for a bit :) Current Mood: awakeCurrent Music: Massive Attack | | Monday, July 18th, 2005 | | 8:24 pm |
w00t!
<geekgasm> My desktop is resurrected! I had no idea what was wrong with it... it'd been acting a little funny, then Windows just bluescreened one day. I tried reinstalling, but setup kept claiming this one file was corrupt. I tried an earlier version of Windows. It gave me the same message... on the SAME file. I got a new harddrive. Setup got a little further -- then when the computer was supposed to reboot and keep installing Windows, it just turned off. And wouldn't turn on. Power switch was totally dead. The last thing I'd seen the computer say was some vague error message about its CPU, soooo... I got a new one. It arrived Friday. I was happy to see it arrive, but promptly forgot about its existence when the workday was over and left it on my desk. Now it's installed. AND IT WORKS. The story gets better. I had to go grab a new driver for my video card, and I noticed that the 20 meg file downloaded remarkably fast. I went to a couple download sites, and lo and behold, my cable connection is giving me 8 megabit download and 768 kbps upload! I am SO stoked. </geekgasm> | | Saturday, June 25th, 2005 | | 12:25 am |
The Last Samurai
What a wonderful meditation on bushido and the ancient Japanese ways versus the invasion of Western forces. What a great story of a man discovering real meaning where he was missing a set of values he could believe in. A great film? Not by any stretch. But a great experience. Now, I want to learn how to swordfight. :-) | | Monday, June 20th, 2005 | | 12:38 am |
| | 12:13 am |
What a world
In case you've been hiding under a rock recently, I just had a glance through the Times headlines from the last two or three weeks and I'm constantly amazed at what's going on in the world these days. Russia has finally convicted the one oil tycoon that could run a decent company, essentially for the crime of becoming a political threat to Putin in a country where the man at the top means everything. (It's no coincidence that his term ends right after the next election.) Bolivia is in utter turmoil, its president offering to resign for the second time, because the common folk are feeling ripped off by foreign energy companies. There have been over 800 protests, with an expressly anti-globalization agenda. We finally got to meet "Deep Throat," though personally I found it rather anti-climactic. The French and the Dutch both rejected the proposed EU constitution, which was to be a major step towards solidifying Europe as a single entity. The dispute is not looking temporary, since a recent summit broke down in anger and shame with Britain and France unwilling to pay more towards the Union in order to hold it together. Nobody's claiming that the EU is going to break down anytime soon, but it's a major setback, indicative of the deep rift between the desire to preserve the European socialist model and the urgent need to liberalize markets and promote free trade. The Bush administration, not surprisingly, continues to make an ass of itself around the world: telling Africa that free trade and democracy will solve all their problems and criticizing China on the one thing that it really, really can't stand hearing about: political freedom. (It's terribly important--but telling that to the Chinese does nothing but insullt them. That's not a good idea.) But the politicians aren't all bad: in the first vote of the year on the Patriot Act, the House pushed back against Bush and denied that intelligence officers should be able to access library records. No guarantee that Bush won't get what he wants, but it's heartening to see that 238 of the 425 representatives were concerned enough about civil liberties to make it hard for the administration to keep its Big Brother powers on the books without change. Finally, and depressingly, the five-year case against Big Tobacco has been gutted: what was going to be $130 billion in penalties levied on the tobacco industry has been deflated down to a paltry $10 billion. Following the Times' slant, it sounds like there's strong evidence for political (read: monetary) motivation behind the decision. With this administration, that's a slant I'm highly inclined to believe. What a world. In Fight Club, Tyler complains that Gen Xers have had no great war to give shape to their character. I tell you, all you have to do is pick up the paper: there are plenty of wars out there, with fighting on multiple fronts. It's a little easier to ignore--there's very little patriotic propaganda and no shortages of goods--but the issues are no less pressing. | | Friday, June 17th, 2005 | | 12:06 pm |
| | Thursday, June 16th, 2005 | | 11:05 pm |
Snaps to un-birthdays and making new friends.
A little tipsy. (Yes, I still rode my longboard home.) Fully justified for the sake of an exuberant evening. I'd been feeling oddly down; slow; just not my normal self. Buying a slick new pair of shoes, getting signed up for CityCarShare, meeting up with a bunch of Matt's buddies and downing a couple margaritas solved all that in a jiffy. Now I know a jazz musician by the name of Tom, who's just as granola as I am and loves music and drinking to boot. (We'll see how he ranks on the other scales of cool-ness, but it's a good start.) Will this weekend contain backpacking in Yosemite? Still unclear. Depends on whether I decide to go see Miyazaki's "Nausicaa" on Sunday afternoon. My guess is that Nausicaa will win out, along with biking on Saturday morning (gotta take those new wheels for a real road test) and shopping w/my little bro (sis?). Some cooking had better make it in there, too, or else this nasty habit of eating out is going to persist. All these things mitigate against heading for the hills, but I must admit the pull is powerful. Another time, perhaps. (Next weekend... tha' river in a hardshell. Aww, yeah.) :-) | | Friday, June 10th, 2005 | | 9:15 am |
awesome photos!
My friend Lisa has finally, after a long time waiting, gotten her portfolio online. She refuses to be called an artist, but I think these shots are solid proof to the contrary. Check it out: http://lisawiseman.com/ | | 7:07 am |
| | Thursday, June 9th, 2005 | | 11:20 pm |
Feeling so much better.
For some reason, I was in a low-level funk all day. Until the end of the workday, when the new intern invited me to have dinner with all of her fellow interns from Wellesley. Chatting up a table full of girls is just so rejuvenating ;) The funk sorta came back for the rest of the evening, in the form of a blank listlessness as I moved boxes of old stuff from my dad's place in Larkspur back to my room in the city. But then I ended up talking with three friends in a row -- this guy Randy who I met recently, my friend Liza and my buddy Sean -- which has left my spirits miles higher. Nothing like the good old feeling of companionship to turn a blue heart back to red. | | Wednesday, June 8th, 2005 | | 5:14 pm |
I have a bike again!
At least, I will when I can make it to the shop. First I heard that they couldn't find one for me, since it's so popular. Then they told me that they found one, through a dealer that's a friend of theirs. Then I hear it's going to take two weeks. And today, it arrives! HOORAY! :-) | | Friday, June 3rd, 2005 | | 6:53 pm |
Interesting bits of news.
The appointment of Paul Wolfowitz to head the World Bank may not have been an entirely bad idea. He's listening to the (markedly liberal) staff, annoying conservatives by reneging on hopes for a switch to grants and generally failing to plant Shrubbery. It's amazing to me that someone of his ideological bent would consider it important to launch a charm offensive--I'm very glad to hear that he's at least rhetorically committed to targeting Africa. His job won't be easy, of course, bu that's only because he'll actually be trying to get something done. Three cheers for independent-mindedness in politics, and here's hoping he's sincere. If anyone still thinks that the EU will become a major geopolitical force, the stewardess will be coming by shortly to collect your trampled hopes in a moment. Now that the EU constitution been rejected by France and the Netherlands, it's hard to imagine a way that the union will manage to ascend as many had hoped. They'll still have a passel of economies united under a shared currency, along with an awful lot of shared policy, but the critical matters of gaining a president, new members and all manner of other improvements have been sidelined for the time being. It appears that the hopes of the leadership for a tighter union were vastly ahead of popular acceptance, a fear that has remained in the back of my mind for some time but has been continually assuaged by the gradual acceptance of new legislation and new (poor) members. I'm not ultimately that surprised, since popular attitudes take years to shift, but I'd thought until now that the European political soul was made of softer, more collaborative stuff than the recent referendums admit. It makes me sad to see the Economist asking whether we're going to see a resurgence of European "national egoism" -- selfishness is the very last thing we need in a world full of problems that require massive international cooperation, and I've taken great pleasure these last years considering Europe a shining counterexample to American unilateral swaggering. Human nature is such a sly bitch. You think you've got its nasty tendencies curbed with the latest high-tech medication, only to turn around and see that same ugly snarl creeping back into its expression. The biotech industry is still a serious money-loser, the dumping-grounds for $6.4 billion last year alone and $45 billion in total since 1970. I'd never looke into the economics of the sector as a whole, and it's amazing to me that people continue to pour the kind of cash into such a large hole. (I share their optimism, but for chrissake, if I had control of $6.4 billion I sure wouldn't put it into such a high-risk area!) Interstingly, Monitor has had a major client in Genentech, one of the industry's big winners. | | Wednesday, June 1st, 2005 | | 8:44 pm |
hoo-ray...
I just have to express, in brief, how happy I am: this is my first business trip ever, it's pretty high-stakes, and it's going well. There were several ways that today's meeting could have gone wrong--none of them happened. The research I edited for a month straight turned out looking good and everyone likes it, both the client and the chairman of Monitor. I was a little intimidated to meet the guy, but he turned out to be the affable-but-brilliant college professor type, very easygoing. I got to talk over dinner with a guy who's a top DoD analyst, a guy who puts together briefings for Senate committees and knows the head of prominent think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, and got tips on where to look for good PhD programs in international relations (along with recommendations to focus on Asia or the Middle East). The next two days are going to be cake... and then it's time to kick back with my siblings Eric and Nina for the weekend :) | | 8:26 pm |
Runnning is fun :)
Just came back from a 20-minute run. Dodged trees, dodged cars, commandeered the grassy median and explored new terrain. Did the same thing yesterday. Now on to the pushups and crunches. This exercise thing is pretty cool... swear to god it gets me high. (Yeah, endorphins!) I gotta keep this up. |
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