River of Gods, Ian McDonald

If there is one pet peeve I have with science fiction, it is the desire on the part of authors (or maybe their audiences) to deal with some earth shattering, universe crushing, paradigm shifting event.

I was just in the bookstore yesterday, chuckling to myself as the sales pitch on every book I picked up ended with something along the lines of "... the fate of the [universe|earth|humanity]."

At the end of most of these books, one is left wondering, well what exactly just happened, and why should I care.

River Gods suffers from this as well. But, mostly, reading it was a joyous return to the heady days of when I first picked up a William Gibson. It is a cyberpunk romp through a fascinating and complex India of the future, with artificial intelligences, rich and poor, religion and science, humans and post-humans all mixing it up. There are few fully evil or fully pure characters in the book, the character arcs are complex and the characters themselves mostly interesting.

Having not been to India, I can't say if it is as fascinating and complex as India is today, but its a worthy and engaging try. If the ending was a little bit of a let down, well endings almost always are.

300 seas of thunder commit hari kari

I came out of the movie 300 feeling more than a little nauseated. It was not because of the blood and guts -- the movie was so stylized that it was bloodless in an odd way. No, it was the intense undertone of the need and desire for war. It was all about staying the course. "Freedom is never free." One can only suppose that the Persian freakish barbarian hordes were stand ins for Al Qaeda, and the red blooded oh-so heterosexual Spartans (not boy loving Athenians) stand-ins for America and the West.

Frank Miller's original book was not so crass. It was just a good story, with some undertones (reason not freedom against superstition and slavery)

The movie's blatently NEOCON tone did, however, occasion me to read a little more about Sparta and to poke around at this legend a little more. The biggest surprise was why Sparta had this amazing military prowess. It turns out they lived their Spartan existence so that they could keep control over their serfs (called Helots). At an earlier time, Spartans had lived a more cultured, luxurious existence, but an uprising of helots had led them to say, "never again!". Spartans were Spartans by birth, a helot could not aspire to joining their ranks. So the Spartans military prowess came from non-stop trainining. Guess who did the rest of their work for them?

Spartans it turns out were also the ridiculed as boy lovers by other Greeks. Oldier soldiers took younger soldiers under their wings so to speak, and it was supposed that those relationships were not strictly martial.

The story of 300 is derived from the works of the historian Heroditus. Who knows how true to facts that was, but Miller embellished the reasons why Leonidas went forth with such a small force, and the movie embellished further, brining in the role of his wife, and added an extra traitor Greek.

But why did they stay and fight to the bitter end? Some historians suggest that 300 was all the Greeks thought they needed to defend the Hot Gates and that Leonidas death was essentially an embarrassed suicide.

Having just read a books on Japanese Admirals in WWII and the author Mishima, it struck me that the Spartans wish to die in glorious battle was much more along the lines of Samurai than American warriors.

Some American commander fighting in the Pacific once said, "Americans fight to live, the Japanese fight to die". American forces, in fact have a grand tradition of retreating to fight another day -- General Washington, and General MacArthur probably being the best examples.

The book Seas of Thunder, is a profile of 4 commanders in the Pacific theater of WWII--2 Japanese, 2 American--leading up to a sea battle off the Phillipines. It is an interesting examination of the warrior ethos, and the how the two cultures differed. Not that it is all so black and white (one Japanese admiral quietly went against the grain and refused to throw his men away, whereas one American captain seemed fully intent and giving it his all).

Had any decent American commander been in charge of the Spartans he would have defended the hot gates while he could, but once betrayed, move back, harrass the enemy, find another spot to fight from.

One might say that the Persion force much more resembled the American style of combat -- bringing overwhelming force to fight the enemy. Ye Olde Shock and Awe. I could even see Al Qaeda recruiters turning this one on its head with a unjudicious translation... the Persians look much more like America with its overwhelming might, and freaks and sexualized nature. Al Aqaedans a small force holding off the hordes of culture.

crisp

Today is one of those days that feels like god turned up the sharpness filter in photoshop. Everything stands out crisp and clear. The world, even the city with all its grit, looks marvelous.

Riding to work I watched a pigeon come in for a long landing gliding down from a construction tower its wings held high, buffeting here and there on the air, making minute adjustments to correct its course, a long descent down to the street -- it was a beautiful thing to behold on a day like today.

Van Morrison Live

Liz and I went to see Van Morrison last Friday night. The theater is a non-standard music venue up on Van Ness street, and was mostly standing only, expcept for seats up in the balconey.

http://flickr.com/photos/artolog/340312797/
I'm always amazed these days that concert venues bother to put up signs: "no cameras". How are they supposed to control that? and why, really, do they even bother?

We were down near the front off to one side, and it was easy to be annoyed by the awful stage setup. Everyone was set a good 10' back from the closest audience, and the front of stage was cluttered with lecterns and most annoyingly for us the organist, and some huge box that sat behind him. Of the 10 persons in the band (1 lead guitarist, 3 backup singers, 1 fiddler, 1 organist, 1 drummer, 3 other bass/guitarists), I could really only see 4 head to toe, and the heads of 3 others. At least the organist was lively.

And hey, it was music, so I didn't really need to see anything, right. As to Van Morrison, I mostly saw his head. He sang beautifully, dressed in a sharp little suit, a loosened bow tie, and a great pork-pie hat. (If he was a character in a Noir book it would read, "He looked his part, a small time gangster, the suit, the hat, and with a small and mean-looking mouth.")

He seemed pretty chill the whole time, not really smiling, just singing, naming the song before he and the band performed it, but little else besides ( aside a quip about a banjo, "here's a song with a banjo. a banjo, why not?" he said). I always wish they would say more really.

I hardly recognized a song until the last few, Gloria, Brown Eyed Girl, and one other that escapes me. The crowd went wild then of course. But through the rest of it, you could see some folks soaking the whole thing up, singing to every song. It was a mostly 40s 50sh crowd I would say, but with a good sprinkling of everything else.

His song de resistance was a number he started with a saxophone, a bitter song about drink and women. It was the only one that his heart and voice seemed completely into, and I think the one that touched everyone there -- I heard others talking about it.

90 minutes no more, no less was what he played. The lights came up killing the chants for encores, and we filed out into the cold night.

Pogues Review

The Fillmore was packed several weeks ago, packed with anticipation and drink, the men and women who crowded near the stage looking ready to Mosh. The previous act had been a fast and furious punk, the leader singer had apparently wacked himself with the mike stand leaving a bloody gash on his forhead. The loudest chears though came whenever he said the Pogues are next. They left the stage to the roadies who wandered about the stage, aimlessly at times, gesturing at each other as if a guitar had been lost.

Chants of "pogues, pogues...", "shane, shane...", broke out sporadically, over the reggae music that was the odd choice of music between the acts. The gentleman next to us doublefisting some beers, speculated whether or not Shane McGowan, touring with the band for the first time in 17 years would actually make it, "if he doesn't I'm going to get up on stage and demand half our money back." "Of course," he added. "If I did that I'd probably get kicked out and missed the show."

The theater finally went dark, and the Clash's "Straight to Hell" started playing, bringing a roar from the crowd. The crowd and I happily sang along, but I kept thinking -- what an odd choice of song... a clash song about kids of american soldiers in vietnam? The crowd went nuts though when the Shane stepp--well lets say shambled-- out on to stage along with the rest of the Pogues. They launched into music and the crowd exploded into the air, into each other, and into joyous raucaus song. Liz and I faded backward a bit as the mosh pit gathered steam.

It took me a while to get back into it though. The band seemed to be casting their erstwhile leader glances to make sure he was still on stage and not yet fallen off. Shane for his part mumbled in between songs, barely intelligible. Someone placed a lit cigarette in his hands for him. Besides being awfully drunk, he seemed a little bored to be there. During one song's instrument solos, he stood playing with the mic, pushing it out further and further and letting it fall back towards him.

So I stood there letting the crowd and song wash around me and mused on the particular hell that these men must be in. The pogues would have never sold out this hall, nor been able to charge the price they did, nor had such a racuous audience without Shane, but what would Shane be without them, and here they all are playing music that was written 17 or more years ago (with a couple of exceptions of songs merely a decade old), and here they were with several hundred incredibly happy singing fans.

Eventually, the singing fans, and the songs themselves won me over with their sheer exuberance. It was Dirty Old Town that put me over the top, I hadn't expected that it would be anyone's favorite but me own, but clearly this was a song that a lot of people responded to!

They packed up for at the end, and filed off and the crowd began to chant for their return, with "Shane, Shane"s and "Pogues, Pogues", but finally settling into a back of the neck hair raising "Ole Ole Ole Ole" that finally brought the band back. People danced, sang, and whirled on and off, and the only thing you had to watch our for was turning your back on the mosh pit.

Happiness is the Direction of my Feet

It always amazes me that in just about any big city -- with the possible exception of new york city -- it doesn't take much to find an empty street.


Austin has been no different. It's not unsettling, it just sets me to wondering where all the people are. Possibly, today, Austinites were all inside blasting their air conditioning, wondering what that fool was doing wandering about outside. Mostly it has been the cats sprawled out on porches, dogs bounding around fenced yards, grackles grackling, bats flitting about, and squirrels eyeing me with half suspicion and half hope. There are people in cars of course, but people have been rare off the main drag.


I love the heat here, wrapping one up in a warm embrace. And wandering about while the fun sunk to the horizon through neighborhoods funky, grim and wealthy and wild, watching huge thunderheads in the distance filled me with a delicious pleasure.


On a whim, I hopped in my rental and took after the cloud, driving on back woods out south of austin in the general direction of san antonio. I nearly gave up in the small town (but historically important! little stagecoach stop) of Buda. I wandered about the shuttered shop fronts waving to the only two people enjoying the evening on their porch, but caught a glimse of flashes in the distance, so hopped back in the car again and drove off.


I went further and further out and turned a few times too many so that I was beginning to wonder whether I could find my way back, but the storm kept beckoning on, flashing in the distance, pulsing in the clouds, one massive forked stroke cutting across the sky.


Alas, I was pulled back from the hunt, by a phone call, and watched it fade into the distance, turned around happily chatting and singing with myself that at least I tried.


And now I go to the bed, with live music playing across the street. It sounds good and tempting, but that storm I will catch another night.

Like riding a bike

My Unreal skills came back to me at MacWorld. I happened by the Gaming Pavilion just as a tournie was being set up and I jumped on a computer. I felt I was doing well, better than I expected, shaking with excitement, nervousness, a little adrenalin boost as I blasted my way around the screen. I started to get hammered by the same person over and over, but somehow at the end, it popped up "you won!" Not bad for 16 people, but none of them must have been much good! No Princess styled rockets coming down the pipe.

Ah, brings me back to my short but happy days at Bizwerk.