Social atmosphere

I’m sitting on the deck watching clouds pass by ..enjoying fresh morning air ..Don comes by and says hi ..he’s out collecting firewood ..I go for a walk and end up in the drum and dance circle at the park ..I take a break and sit down with Joan and Brian to enjoy some local ‘buds’ ~flash~ Joan and Brian are gone and I’m talking with a young lady I just met named Julie ..she asks me if I have any problems with ‘disclosure’ .. ‘all depends’ I say ..she tells me to let her know ..and I say OK ..she asks me if I’m Monika’s boyfriend ..I say no, and tell her I don’t know who Monika is ..she tells me that Kevin is Lynn’s boyfriend ..Mark wants her (Julie) to be his girlfriend ..but maybe she should be Josh’s girlfriend instead ..who do you want to be boyfriends with? ..or are you already Kimberley’s boyfriend ..I forget ..who are you again? ~flash~ I’m walking home singing a tune from the 60’s ..Mr. Tambourine Man.

Reading behavior

Reading is a process of activating ‘propositions’ in the networks of your mind ..at least that’s what modern-day reading theory says. Some of the propositions are pointed-to directly by the words on the page (text-based) ..others are not (network-based). The propositions not directly stated are arrived at through a collaboration between the reader and writer. They are ‘suggested’ by the writer ..and ‘inferred’ by the reader. Both text-based and network-based propositions are necessary to complete the underlying message. Right now I’m reading ‘Memoirs of a Geisha’ by Arthur Golden. Although he doesn’t directly mention the proposition ‘suffering stoically’ ..it kind of emerges when I read about the geisha Mameha-san ..whose beautiful young apprentice is being pursued by her own patrons now.

Looking for searchers

The U.S. Justice department is serving search engine providers with subpoenas to obtain user search records. So far, Yahoo and Microsoft have complied ..Google refuses. Government officials say they are only interested in detecting Internet ‘trends’ ..like what are the most frequently searched sites for Britney Spears ..or porn. If this is the case, they should be ‘contracting’ with Google for this type of information rather than serving them with ‘subpoenas’. That’s the way business is usually done between the U.S. government and private companies ..like Gallup for instance ..when they want demographic information. This would allow the search engine companies to provide the ‘trend’ information they are looking for without giving them the raw ‘query’ data that would violate privacy. It sounds to me like the Justice department is overstepping it’s bounds when they claim that the ‘Patriot Act’ entitles them to private industry records of this magnitude ..without an ongoing criminal investigation.

Deceptive advertising

I eat oatmeal fairly often ..the kind you get from the bins at the store. They’re called rolled oats and they taste ‘heartier’ than the ones you get in a box from Quaker Oats. However, I began to wonder if I was missing the health benefits of oatmeal because I wasn't eating the Quaker Oats brand. I checked the box and the contents were the same ..Quaker doesn’t add anything special. I wasn’t sure where these doubts were coming from ..until I listened closely to the Quaker Oats commercial on TV. Here’s what they say: “Doctors have proven that oatmeal reduces cholesterol ..and there’s no oatmeal like Quaker Oats ..remember, the one you grew up with as a child.” ~ Now, they don’t come right out and say that Quaker Oats is the only brand proven to reduce cholesterol ..but they sure enough imply it ..and that’s what I remembered.

Intelligent behavior

I believe there could be more dimensions in space than we ordinarily see ..in addition to hundreds ..perhaps thousands of universes ..that's a lot of space for a ‘creator’ to occupy. I don’t think scientists claim to know where people came from ..however, when they see phenomena occuring regularly enough in nature ..they feel compelled to document and investigate. Intelligent design doesn’t warrant this kind of attention because it is based on a classic fallacy in science called ‘anthropomorphism’. This means assigning our own characteristics to forces we don’t understand ..and intelligence is one of those characteristics. Given that there is so much we don’t know ..explaining it in terms of our own limited notion of ‘intelligence’ seems awfully egocentric ..like believing that the sun and planets revolve around the earth. In fact, we have a better understanding of how a star is born than how intelligent thought is formed.

Deck of cards

I stumble out of the bathroom and into the kitchen ..crashing into walls ..I have my morning bowl of yogurt and cereal ..and rush to the deck ..I get the patio furniture out because it rained yesterday ..and manage to crash on top of it ..the umbrella cushions my fall ..I sit down with my coffee, laptop and the morning newspaper and start to read when a northwesterly squall comes hurling down the canyon ..blowing away anything that’s not tied down ..the umbrella and chairs collapse like a house of cards ..I grab the laptop ..fall backwards into a planter ..curse the demons that are out to get me ..and quickly go inside before they take another whack at me.

Motion picture opportunity

Google is building an enormous database of videoclips ..this is the first step to creating an online marketplace for buying and selling videos ..and eventually giving Hollywood a way to distribute movies over the Internet. They are hiring anyone with experience in the entertainment industry. The head of one division was an extra in a John Waters movie when she was a kid. Makes me wonder if I should have taken that job with Warner Bros in Burbank ..instead of moving to Santa Barbara.

Superstitious behavior

The natives living in the rainforest of Sumatra believe in the supernatural. For instance, they believe that tigers attack people to punish them for violating tribal law ..like committing adultery or hearsay. As superstitious as they may be ..they’re not a heck of a lot different than Evangelical Christians, like Pat Robertson, who believe that Ariel Sharon’s massive stroke was ‘divine punishment’ for withdrawing from the Gaza Strip last summer ..in violation of ‘biblical prophesy’. Now, to me ..that sounds not only superstitious ..but downright arrogant, self-righteous and dangerous ..like a terrorist who believes that Americans deserve to die in plane crashes for violating Islamic law.

Reading behavior

I keep losing my place in the paper ..I’m trying to get back to the article I was reading ..but can’t remember what it was about ..suddenly the fig trees of Fresno pop into my head ..and remind me that I was reading about the date farms of Baghdad ..now I see images of date trees lining the entrance to Newport Fashion Island ..like you were entering the grounds of the Taj Mahal ..or some desert kingdom in Saudi Arabia ..I never saw Lawrence of Arabia ..and I don’t really know if there are date trees at the entrance to the Taj Mahal ..so, I check Google ..and nope, they're cypress trees ..the fig trees are in the back ..what article was I reading again ..it says here that Spain has colonies in Morocco ..I didn't know that ..now I see images of Christopher Columbus ..because that’s how long they've been there ..what about the date farms in Baghdad? I don’t know about those either ..too many distractions.

Second Christmas

Last weekend was Christmas again ..my sister Nancy drove up from Orange County ..that was fun ..we exchanged gifts ..watched the Bob Dylan DVD she got me ..followed her itinerary ..and saw ‘Brokeback Mountain’ in the afternoon ..fine movie ..then had dinner at Rose’s Cafe ..and saw ‘Walk the Line’ in the evening ..excellent! I highly recommend both. The next day we walked the backstreets and alleyways of east side Santa Barbara ..admired the architecture ..listened to ‘Ranchero’ music ..and tried to figure out what’s going on ..one thing’s for sure ..single-family homes are becoming extinct ..food for condos ..I hope it doesn’t look like New York City someday. Anyway, one of my goals for 2006 is to finish decorating ..and Nancy has a talent for that ..so next we went to Z gallery ..where I got the decorative mirror that I had in mind ..shaped kind of like the sun ..and she picked out an awesome print by Klimt that’s going on my bedroom wall. Once you get started ..it sort of feeds on itself ..each thing calls for something else to go with it.

Drug behavior

Generally, I don’t think we get a good look at cause-and-effect relationships ..we rely mostly on second-hand information ..which is almost never correct when it comes to drug behavior. The natives of the San Blas islands are becoming cocaine addicts. According to Anthropologist Stanley Heckdon, this is due to unemployment since the transfer of the Panama Canal. I don’t think so. I think they’re unwitting victims of our misguided drug policies. The islands are fairly remote and cocaine was non-existent ..until it started washing up on the beach ..the result of 'dumping' by Colombian drug traffickers trying to avoid getting caught. Law enforcement is pushing the cocaine shipping lanes closer and closer to the islands ..where it inadvertently winds up in the hands (and the heads) of the Indians.

Reading behavior

Information pops into my head that has nothing to do with what I’m reading. My head is full of images of the Long Beach Marina ..totally unrelated to the news story in front of me. I have no clue how this happened ..so, I look back to see if there was a word ..a phrase ..anything that could have triggered such vivid recall ..and, sure enough, I find that my eyes had scanned the word ‘Pam’ ..the name of a college girlfriend who used to sail with me out of the Long Beach Marina.

Depth perception

I think Photoshop is improving my depth perception. It forces me to really ‘see’ what I’m doing ..in vivid detail ..which means I pick up on subtle cues that signal perspective. The houses on my street look 3-dimensional again ..the trees along my path are clear and magnified ..while things that are faint register as ‘farther away' ..like the islands off the coast.

First blog

..and what really cracked me up was when Lynn said: “..Ah ha, yah laa-dee-dah'ed in photoshoppe again, huh ?” Anyway, this picture is the one I ended up using on my 'seasons greetings' card this year ..I photo’chopped it ..I know it looks amateurish but I like it cuz it shows a child’s sense of wonder ..and a fresh way of looking at things ..and I’d like to get better at that ..and photoshop ..and table manners ..and lots and lots of other things this year. Yeah, right.