mememiner brought to you by wallace winfrey

Teeth pulled.

Long story short: one tooth grew in sideways, bottom wisdom teeth were impacted for year, finally broke through and immediately started showing signs of surface decay. Meanwhile, part of the biting surface of my upper rearmost molar is pressed up against another tooth, started to decay, badly. Can't see the decay though, but a month ago I started to feel it. 1 week of awful tootaches later, I find myself at the oral surgeon getting three teeth extracted. Only problem is, I can only get local anesthetic. Doc was quite good and managed to extract the teeth without cutting them, but being awake during something like this sucked. Mouth has been sore ever since, but less so each day. Hurt really bad after infection developed in socket but antibiotics cleared it up.
At any rate, here's the teeth I got pulled. The one on the -right- left shows extensive decay. No, I'm not proud of this, but the tooth was screwed up to begin with (growing in sideways, etc.) and since my mouth is pretty crowded as is, one less non-functional tooth doesn't bother or embarrass me.

Quote of the day

"Art's the way to know what you don't."
- Azaroth, from Postsingular, by Rudy Rucker

Re: the personal stuff written on this blog

I was recently contacted by a good friend who did not like something I had written on this blog, and they were quite upset about it.
I thought it might be a good time to state why I even write this blog. It started out as an easier way to maintain the "home page" I've had more or less since 1994. I thought it would be a clearinghouse for cool ideas I ran across (hence the name "mememiner") but once I realized I didn't really care to participate as an author of blog content on the level of say, a bigger blog, it became more of a place for my personal thoughts.
From time to time I am quite intimate and open about my hopes and fears on this blog, and the reason I do not restrict postings to "friends" on my LJ site is because I am not afraid to share my innermost feelings, warts and all, from time to time to the small readership that frequents this site.
If anyone thinks that I write blog posts with the intent of achieving ulterior motives, nothing could be further from the truth. I am simply keeping a journal of private thoughts, publicly. While you may be privy to them, that does not give you the right to unfairly judge me or assume that they are a jumping-off point for criticism. Well, judge all you want, just don't expect to internalize any judgments you make as a result of reading something here.
Let me be clear: if you do not like what you read here, do not read here. It's pretty simple. Please don't expect me to change my behavior just because you developed a problem with something I wrote. I'm not writing for you, I'm writing for me.
And to the person who emailed me about the blog post, you are my friend and I admire and respect you, and I hope that you can move on, but I offer no apologies (except when I do, and not in this case).

The Repercussions of Honesty

When I was a kid, I used to tell a lot of really fantastically untrue stories. I won't go into them, but one of them involved my dad having fallen into a vat of peanut butter. What can I say, I was 8 when I was telling that story. The obvious reason I did this was because I was very insecure and desperately wanted people to like me, and figured they'd have more reasons to like me if I told crazy, funny stories. I also became quite good at deception, mostly as a survival tactic. I also became quite good at keeping my mouth shut when I saw Bad Things happening, especially when they happened to me. As a result, I spent the majority of the first twenty years being a deceptive, lying doormat. It was a pretty awful combination, all things said. You couldn't trust me, although you could walk all over me if you wanted. Both perceptions were usually picked up on pretty quickly.
Then, right around the time I turned 20, I had a life-changing event. The details of the life-changing event aren't worth going into now, but when it happened, I decided I would always be as honest as I could possibly be, and I also decided that I would never be a doormat again. Again, after I made this decision, both of these character attributes were usually picked up on pretty quickly by friends, co-workers and acquaintances.
It's easy to see now how that reaction was essentially a self-defense mechanism. I had to do something to protect my fragile psyche, and to be honest, it worked really well for me for a number of years. However, as of late it has become quite apparent that this approach to things is no longer giving me the results I want.
I was recently told that the reason people tend to stop wanting to be friends with me is because I have a big chip on my shoulder, and that at the smallest slight, I will fly off the handle and decide that whomever committed the slight is my enemy. While I don't think I've ever declared someone my enemy, I can definitely see where this perception comes from. Once slighted, I will often declare, loudly and vociferously, to whomever will listen, everything I honestly dislike or find lacking about that person. From my vantage point, the only possible reason someone could have for slighting me would be because they want to hurt me, they want to run me down into the ground, and as I explained, since I turned 20 I'm nobody's doormat.
While I might not be "stupid", if I'm honest I will say that I am sometimes a very slow learner, especially when it comes to social stuff. I think what I've kind of recently figured out is that a lot of the time, when we feel slighted, a lot of times it isn't personal. It's just the result of someone being selfish, or clueless, or callous, and that it's usually not about us at all.
My wife used to tell me she found my frankness "refreshing". I think it's been a long time since I heard that from her. The novelty of finding someone courageous enough to speak their mind, honestly and without restraint, wore off as the repercussions of such an approach made themselves more apparent. It's really unfortunate that my delegation as a pariah has rubbed off on her, too. The costs of marriage, I suppose.
I ran off someone very dear to me in the last few years because I had a big problem with a lifestyle choice they made (no, they didn't come out of the closet; they decided they were in love with someone I have zero respect for). I made myself somewhat of a pariah in my social scene by taking offense at some actions, which, while probably not directly aimed at me, were nonetheless offensive, not in the prude sense of the word, but more in the taking a general offense to. Those people are welcome to do anything they want of course, it's (still?) a free country, and it's probably a bigger testament to my insecurity than anything else that there was offense taken at all.
So, the result of all this is that I've managed to alienate a huge swath of folks in my social scene, and destroyed a really good friendship. I'm not quite so sure that the cost of all that has been worth it, to be "honest". At the time, I thought I was staying true to myself, and not being a doormat, but like many other things in my life, I swung too far in the opposite direction and played myself for the fool.
I don't know really how to rectify these things, but it seems that pointing that high-powered microscope at my own behavior is probably a good place to start. It's really depressing that I've managed to lose so much, and drive away so many friends, as a result of my own stubborn obtuseness. I wish there was a way to reverse course, to go back and keep my mouth shut but the damage has been done and I'll just have to man up and live with it.
Like Jeru said, "You're only a player cause you played yourself".
Updated 10/8/07 12:22:30 to remove whining

Putting two and two together

So, I saw this news article today: Breast implants linked with suicide in study, which goes on to state:

Women who get cosmetic breast implants are nearly three times as likely to commit suicide as other women, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday.
The study, published in the Annals of Plastic Surgery, reinforces several others that have shown women who have breast enlargements have higher suicide risks.

Reading this, I immediately thought of Angela Devi. Here's a picture of her:

(img taken from her Wikipedia entry, not from my "personal stash", you perv)
This adult model took her own life in 2006:

Angela S. Dhingra (aka "Angela Devi"), 30 years of age, hanged
herself at the 7498 E. Christmas Cholla Dr. property that she had
occupied since January of this year. Her body was discovered by the
Scottsdale Police at approximately 10:15 A.M. The last known time
anyone spoke with her was the night before.

(From: http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=717242)
Let's see, implants, adult modeling, suicide? Not quite the glamorous life some would have us to believe.

A Fascinating Story I Plan On Telling Sometime Soon

So, the month of July, 2007 was a very interesting one for me. Did you know that posting snarky, vaguely indirect criticisms of generalized problems with today's electronic music on a mailing list can lead to an unhinged nutjob threatening you and your family? Did you know that making snarky, indirect comments on mailing lists and your blog about how local techno promoters show a lack of diversity in their musical offerings can get you branded as a pariah, a "hater" and worse? Did you know that some local electronic music promoters consider snarky mailing list posts to be more threatening and distasteful than someone making threats of violence against someone and their family? It's true!
A good friend (?) of mine *almost* had me convinced that *I* was the problem, and I spent a fair amount of time beating myself up over it. Fortunately, I came to my senses about all this nonsense and have started to develop some fairly lucid thoughts about the whole sordid affair, which I plan on detailing on this blog soon. One thing's for sure, there's a whole lot more to life than worrying about your position in the local, temporary pecking order of big fish in little ponds.
(If you're reading this, and thinking that it's a lot of shop-talk and inside baseball stuff, you're right.)

The new Fantastic Four movie

Jalen and I went and saw "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" today. A couple thoughts...
For one, it wasn't as awful as I had been made out to believe. The Silver Surfer, as portrayed through his spoken dialogue, came off as fairly accurate to the spirit of the original comic book character. This was a pleasant surprise.
Secondly, people should not expect the FF movies to take themselves too seriously. Obviously this franchise is going to be a little tongue-in-cheek, and given that our expectations were set along this trajectory in the first movie, complaining about the goofy moments in movie reviews is neither illuminating or relevant.
Thirdly, I'm sorry, I don't get the hype about Jessica Alba. She looks terrible as a blonde, and she's on the generic side of exotic brunette IRL. Big deal.
Finally, I'm really disappointed that they failed to show Galactus. He's one of the coolest-looking characters in the Marvel Universe, and yet in this movie, he's portrayed, more or less, as a menacing cloud/tornado thing. Weak. I realize the screenwriters would have felt the need to develop the characterization a bit more if they actually showed him in his giant humanoid form, but I have to say, a real bummer.
Jalen thought it was TOTALLY AWESOME. Then again, he LOVED the Ghost Rider movie too. Talk about a screenplay that makes absolutely no sense.

The mountains aren’t always sweet.

If you had told me on Saturday, when it was like 70-75 Fahrenheit here at our house in the mountains, and I had my sandals on, that, on Tuesday, I would be shoveling the 20+ inches of snow off the stairs and pulling my wife's Explorer out of a ditch, well, I wouldn't have believed it.
Also, the cable internet connection, which was down for most of the day Friday, has been down since 2:00pm MST. Also, the power grid here in the canyon went down maybe 10-15 times in about 90 minutes. I think my UPS is fucked at this point.
Some days, living in the mountains really sucks. I've been up here for eight years now, and I think I've had my fill. It's beautiful and peaceful and all, but now that we've got two kids and no family backup, it's becoming an increasingly insurmountable challenge just to make our lives work.
Sigh.

Most unfortunate comic book cover ever

(Thanks to Bubblegumfink)

Reflecting on “the scene” in 2006

Had a funny experience today. I got a call from a woman, Christy Harris, whom I once shared VJ duties with at a Communikey show. Well, she was VJing and I made visuals for the Freq Modif set. I've also borrowed a screen from her before. At any rate, she called up to ask if I had a video mixer and/or projector she could borrow for tonight. Unfortunately, my video mixer bit the dust a few months ago when it suddenly decided to stop working. I explained that my video mixer was on the blitz and that I no longer had a projector. She was also kind enough to ask if was doing video anywhere tonight. Of course, since it's 10:00pm MST and I'm writing a blog entry, the answer was no, I'm not doing video anywhere tonight.
It was an interesting question that really brought 2006 into, if you'll pardon the pun, "focus" for me. I put a not-insignificant amount of energy in 2005 trying to develop and build my skills as a visual artist. In addition to assembling the requisite hardware, I also began collecting clips like mad, spent money on VJ software and went out of my way to ask people to keep me in mind if they ever needed someone to do visuals.
In January, I saw the guys from Mother Earth Sound System at the last techno party I would attend in Boulder, and they mentioned that they would like for me to do visuals at the Full Moons the upcoming summer. It was the last time I talked to any of them. They never bothered to follow-up with an email or phone call. Not only did they not call or email, nobody, except for my good friend Erik, asked me to play or spin anywhere in all of 2006. I think this is the first year that something like that happened. It's worth mentioning that when I did spin at Erik's party, I DJed a set of ambient black metal, but that's a different story.
I'm not really sure what happened, but it seemed like 2006 was the year I gave up on the scene, or it gave up on me, or maybe it was a mutual parting of the ways. Nobody seemed to really care if I was involved in their parties or not, nobody really thought I had anything to offer them.
I did stop going to Boulder functions. In fact, I can name on one hand the number of times I went out for music this year:
1. The fore-mentioned CommuniKey party in January.
2. Fanny, Xanopticon, Abelcain and Duran Duran Duran (along with CDatakill) in May.
3. Unearthly Trance in September.
4. Celtic Frost in November.
5. Doormouse & CDatakill in December.
I guess if you're not going out, people don't really remember you. 2005 would have likely been a bust too, but in 2005 I did several shows with N., and that got me out in the community. Unfortunately, I'm not friends with N. anymore, much less doing shows with him.
The fact is, seeing him with J. makes me sick. Seeing him alone and knowing he's with J. makes me sick. I have never, in my entire life, been more disappointed and disgusted with a close friend as I was with N. The way he screwed over his long-time partner was just indefensible. The fact that he did it for J., one of Boulder's most pretentious, selfish and more reprehensible wanna-be aging hipster flake-a-zoids, is the proverbial icing on the cake. Essentially, after I found out about their affair, I was very direct to him in emails until he finally told me he was writing me off completely, and never wanted to speak to me again. I'm OK with that. I spoke what I perceived to be truth to a boy who didn't want to hear or think about the ugly, hurtful side of his actions, and he decided that rather than engage in dialogue, he'd rather just withdraw from our friendship. We did run across one another in McGuckin's last summer, and he said something like "Hey. What's Up." I just rolled my eyes to the ceiling and kept walking. I wanted to scream at him that he was a fucking scumbag, but I had other things on my mind. He knows how I feel anyway.
I suppose it's sad that the possibility of seeing an ex-best-friend out would deter me from going out, but in many ways, my relationship with N. was one of my few anchors in the scene. When I did shows with him, or went out, or talked about/played/made music with him, I felt connected. I felt like, here's my good friend, and he totally understands what I see in music. I didn't just lose a friend, I lost one of my main allies in the so-called scene.
Boulder's scene is about as whack as it gets anyway. The powers-that-be are bringing out the same ole played-out bullshit minimal techno and IDMish techno that went in and out of vogue in 2003. Maybe if they were asking me to do visuals or spin or be involved, I'd be more generous in my assessment, but as is, I just see people with lots of attitude about something that's the only thing they have going in their lives. I guess if my life was that monochromatic, I'd be protective of it too.
I'm grateful that my life is not monochromatic. I have an amazing family, and a new son, and wonderful companion animals, and one of the best jobs in the world. For me, electronic music isn't just a scene, it's a literal living. I make my living, enough to afford a nice house and nice things and take care of my family, in the electronic music industry. Not too many people involved in parties or producing or DJing can say that.
That being said, having gone an entire year and only being asked once to participate in something, well, I guess it hurts and makes me a little sad. I love this music and I love(d) this scene. It might surprise some people to know that I still DJ. Lately I've been spinning every day. It might surprise some people to know that I still collect music like a madman, and still work on producing my own music.
What's really ironic is that I feel like I'm at the top of my game, yet I might as well as not exist as far as the Colorado "rave scene" is concerned. I know that part of it is that the scene itself is dwindling, but I imagine that the number of DJs, producers and VJs is not. I also know that most of my involvement with the so-called scene was me getting out there and doing stuff myself -- producing my own shows, or with like-minded folks.
Honestly though, it mostly feels like nobody really gives two shits. Nobody thinks of enough of what I do as a producer, DJ or VJ to bother asking me to play at their parties (with above-noted exception). That, in isolation, makes me fairly sad. However, not living in a vacuum, I cannot allow myself to be too out of sorts over it. After all, I have a sweet life, even if I'm not being asked to help out or play at parties anymore.
I do hope that this situation changes in 2007.
Oh, and I have a million other things to write about, but this has been on my mind for a while. Hopefully I'll get around to posting more about the other stuff later on. I know this post sucks, but I felt compelled to write one more thing before the end of the year. Colorado electronic music scene -- thanks for nothing in 2006.
Happy New Year!

What H.P. Lovecraft was afraid of…

I realize that most other blog posts that link to this all-too-short examination of personal fave H.P. Lovecraft in the New York Review of Books are quoting this paragraph, but it really is one of the best things ever written about Howard:

He was also frightened of invertebrates, marine life in general, temperatures below freezing, fat people, people of other races, race-mixing, slums, percussion instruments, caves, cellars, old age, great expanses of time, monumental architecture, non-Euclidean geometry, deserts, oceans, rats, dogs, the New England countryside, New York City, fungi and molds, viscous substances, medical experiments, dreams, brittle textures, gelatinous textures, the color gray, plant life of diverse sorts, memory lapses, old books, heredity, mists, gases, whistling, whispering—the things that did not frighten him would probably make a shorter list.

The article essentially makes the case that Lovecraft was the penultimate nerd, to which all of us who have been fans of his over the years answer with a resounding "Well, DUH!"
Much like Rick Moranis' character in Ghostbusters, only hardcore nerds can open up gates to otherworldly realms as expansive and horrifying as Lovecraft's. The extroverted and socially popular couldn't be counted on to catch a glimpse of eldritch horrors or understand the inherent creepiness of non-Euclidean geometry if the fate of the world depended upon it.

Josh Marshall has written one of the most moving things I’ve read in a long time…

...about his father, and you can read it here.

Cat discovers toilet

Three minute video of a cat flushing a toilet
No more, no less.
(Link via Metafilter)

Note to LiveJournal Users

The posts that appear in my LiveJournal entries are actually generated from a LiveJournal posting plugin on my Movable Type blog, http://mememiner.com.
I originally set this up cause I figured I'd get more comments on LiveJournal than out on my lonesome, and for whatever reason, this hasn't been the case. In fact, I got more comments when it wasn't on LiveJournal than when it was.
Add to the fact that I'm unable to restrict posting, except to exclusively LiveJournal users, and the fact that I'll never be able to get the mememiner LJ name as it's already been set up as a feed of mememiner.com (yeah, it makes no sense to me either), and that I doubt the plugin will work with MT 3, which I've been wanting to upgrade to, and I come to the conclusion that it really doesn't make much sense for me to continue posting journal entries here. I don't post often enough to my blog to generate any kind of comments anyway, I guess it's kind of a moot point.
At any rate, this will be my last post to LiveJournal, unless somebody can give me a really good reason as to why I should stick around. Also, "so I can continue reading it here" isn't a good enough excuse. If you're really interested (which I, in fact, know you are NOT), you can go to my main site and read my stupid, poorly-thought-out, inane ramblings there instead.
Thanks for the memories!

Penny Lane is in my ears, and in my eyes…

So yesterday, a veritable Boulder icon, the coffeehouse Penny Lane, closed after 24 years. Isadore Million, the owner, had failed to re-negotiate the lease with the owner (this is a nice way of saying the owner doubled the rent and demanded some outrageous insurance coverage). Now, I'm sure it will be occupied by yet another soulless national chain of some sort, perhaps a Starbucks even. The de-freakification of Boulder is complete. It's now just like any other American city with it's interchangeable shops and strips of mall-dom, except with a bit more dramatic views to the west.
I lived right around the corner from Penny Lane for a year, and used to go there every day for my morning (and sometimes, afternoon) coffee. It stood out in contrast to the rest of the neighborhood, one of the few places freaky people could still gather. I'm proud to say that many a meeting was initiated at Penny Lane that would later migrate down to my room on Pine Street to listen to jungle records and have a puff or two.
The last time I was there to get coffee was a couple months ago. I wanted to go before they closed, but didn't think I could deal with the heavy vibes there last night. Best not to force it anyway. That place will always live on in my heart as my favorite coffeehouse ever.

snarg(framina);

interesting flash music thing

Bears!

The uncommonly wet weather we've seen on the Front Range this year has resulted in lush, green mountains that one normally associates with the Pacific Northwest.
It also seems to have resulted in an abundance of bear food, as we've seen bears on our property 5 times since late April.
Our friends Ted & Caroline came to visit this last weekend, and when they went up to their car on Saturday morning, were suprised to see bear prints all over their truck. I guess they had left some food in the truck the night before.
Yesterday afternoon, we saw a small black bear in our backyard. I managed to get a couple shots of him, here's one:

Lileks is a classless piece of shit

Yesterday the world lost a veritable colossus of literature, and today a veritable flea, James Lileks, has this to say:

It was all bile and spittle at the end, and it was hard to read the work without smelling the dank sweat of someone consumed by confusion, anger, sudden drunken certainties and the horrible fear that when he sat down to write, he could only muster a pale parody of someone else’s satirical version of his infamous middle period.

Presumably Lileks was reading different ESPN Page 2 columns than I, and many of my friends were, because right after 9/11, Thompson really seemed to have a solid grasp on what was happening, much more than anyone else. It seemed to me that the dark day that changed everything (mostly to the favor of the right-wing in this country) had sharpened Thompson's focus to a razor-edge sharpness, and he was writing like he hadn't in years.
I'm guessing Thompson's decidedly non-insane viewpoints on the meta-meaning of 9/11 is what caused Lileks to slander this great man today. If there's one thing Lileks can't stand, it's someone straying from the party line on 9/11.
It's really too bad that the world did not wake up to the news that James Lileks had put a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger yesterday. Of course, outside of the bile and spittle that froths from the mouths of the right-wing blogs, who would know or care?
James Lileks, you are a classless piece of shit who cannot even honor the dead for a single day. I'd say you should be ashamed of yourself, but only honorable men can feel shame. You are not a man. You are a pale parody of someone else's satirical version of a man, even in your best moments. You should be sterilized so that your seed can no longer poison this world of ours.

Unsubbing to Wonkette

Today I deleted my RSS feed to Wonkette, when I realized that I had been right-clicking on her feed in FeedDemon and selecting "Mark Channel As Read" without even bothering to glance at the headlines for about a month solid now.
I 'spose she was funny at first, but the schtick didn't last. I've never been a fan of gossip columns to begin with, and gossip columns about think tank personnel, bloggers and political figures is even less interesting than Hollywood celebrities (go figure).
I had high hopes for her at first, seeing as she was alumnus for one of the best web sites of all time, suck.com, but it just didn't pan out. I'm thinking her talents are poorly-served by having to cover such ugly, personally uninteresting people.