Note: What you read on this page may or may not have any basis in truth. It may or may not reflect my world view at any given time, and I am as likely to deny any knowledge of what you read here as I am to espouse it. Read at your own risk; to believe is to perish.
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Hey babe, what's your shoe size? Mine's 11-1/2 Wide! |
Currently, my sister has only one dog running around the house. It's a reasonably normal Australian Shepherd dog she found wandering around the regional wilderness area next to a stables she used to work at. Her name is Kelly, and she mostly likes to eat and sleep. She's also rather big, and tends to get in the way. My sister bought a chew toy that is basically a pig twisted up like a towel being wrung out, and Kelly is completely terrified of it. Go figure.
We had another dog, Peaches, a pink poodle. A typical small dog, Peaches would make the pope want to kick him. Yes, him. Peaches was a guy. A true San Franciscan, Peaches was a pervert. He'd do anything that'd hold still long enough; he liked to run up, lick my leg, and run away. Oh yeah, he's scared of his own shadow. (Or would be, if he could see it.)
His one claim to fame (other than sexual perversion) is that he could pirrouette. My mom taught him to stand on his hind legs and spin around. She was always a big fan of ballet, and I guess this has something to do with that. (Thank God she didn't put a tutu on him!) Unfortunately, he passed away in January of 1998. (About a dozen times, actually.)
Personally, I prefer cats. I always wanted a tiger when I was growing up. Actually I had one. His name was Clyde, and he was, of course, stuffed. (He always filled up on junk food, so I could never get him to eat my siblings.) Nonetheless, he was real to me, and I used to ride him around the house all the time. Naturally, he's still with me. (As a side note, when I first encountered Calvin and Hobbes, I hated it, and thought it incredibly stupid. Then something clicked, and I realized Hobbes was a stuffed tiger and I loved it. Stuffed tigers are magic; they really do come alive like that.)
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We stopped at the flea market while spending a long weekend in the area. I had just recently gotten my customized license plates (INDY 1) for the rover, and I spotted at one of the tables, a bullwhip much like the one Indiana Jones carried in the movies. I called to Rachel and held it up for her to see, then asked the price. Deciding that it was more than I wanted to pay for a novelty, I set it back down on the table. As I turned away, the vendor called out to me, "Oh come on, she'll love it!"
We had a cat for one day when I was a kid. It promptly disappeared. We found it hours later, scrunched up in the corner behind the fridge. It was taken back to the pet shop. (Most of my family was allergic to cats, so I'm not really sure why we even tried, but I always felt a little miffed that I couldn't have a cat, but they could have a dog.) I once house-sat for a friend who had two cats. That's when I discovered that cat hair isn't attached to cats at all. It just sticks to them until they brush up against your clothes. Now I'm content to visit people with cats.
To drink, we had our choice of milk, juice or water; we never had soda in the house. Soda was something we got on special occasions when we went out to dinner, if we were really good. To this day, I'm still not a big soda drinker. If I do drink soda, it's usually either Diet (Why waste calories on something stupid?) 7-Up (Crisp and clean, no caffeine! Ah- hahaha-haa!) or root beer.
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I had Nigerian food once, and have been looking forward most of my life to the next time I get to try it. My sister, you see, is sort of an honorary Nigerian.
She was born in the middle of the night, and my parents rushed to the hospital as soon as my mom went into labor. They got there before the doctor, but it turns out they didn't really need him. He was, however, pretty much the best doctor they had, which was indeed fortunate.
You see, shortly after my folks got there, a young Nigerian couple showed up. Well things didn't go as smoothly for them as it did for my folks, and they ended up having serious complications. Luckily my mom's doctor was there, and was able to save the life of their baby. If it had not been for my sister being born, no one would have been around to help the Nigerian couple.
To show their gratitude for this lucky coincidence, they invited my whole family to the celebration they were having for their new child. And there, I tasted some of the best food I've ever enjoyed.
I'd love another opportunity to enjoy authentic Nigerian cuisine. If you know of a good restaurant (or feel like cooking), feel free to nominate it for my restaurant guide, or, just drop me a note.
Other favorite foods include Dim Sum, Burritos and Quesadillas, and a good hearty stew. I also like Meatloaf a lot, but I haven't taken the time to cook one recently. Chow Fun is even better than Chow Mein, but the noodles can be a pain to prepare.
I like Indian and Thai Curries; anything made with Coconut Milk makes me moist. And of course, who doesn't like Nan bread?
I like making pasta from scratch, although I tend to swear an awful lot when I do... It's not easy (although it is simple) but it's worth it. Of course, one would never consider extruding pasta, now would one!
These days, I eat a lot of chicken and vegetarian dishes, mainly because my girlfriend and my sister are both semi-veg (no red meat; fowl and seafood only.) Monday nights, however, are Melrose/Red Meat night. Rachel and Rita get together to watch Melrose Place and Dad and I eat steaks.
I definitely enjoy good beer and fine wine, but alas, I seem to be allergic to alcohol, and must be careful about how often or how much I drink. I'm not big on hard liquor, though I do enjoy strawberry margueritas, and there was a time when I drank screwdrivers that were far too strong, far too often and in far too great a quantity.
Since then, I've continued my interest in making music, assembling a diverse menagerie of instruments and gear. I enjoy mucking about with them, coming up with "music" that pleases me and playing along with my favorite songs. I doubt I will ever produce anything that anyone other than myself would be interested in hearing, but I enjoy it, and that's the really point.
I was at least 12 before I found out there was any kind of music besides classical and opera. We never heard anything else in the house, and at school we only heard classical or childrens music. Then one day, I came across something new at school. I was in Junior High during the Disco craze, and I found I liked this new stuff.
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Modern Music Concerts I've attended (in alphabetical order) |
Then I reached High School, and found out about Rock and Roll. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, ELO, The Tubes, and so on. My world was growing by leaps and bounds. I began hanging out with a mostly Japanese youth group where I was introduced to Soul. I found Chaka Khan, Rick James, and more.
Somewhere in there, I managed to fall in love with Olivia Newton-John. When I was in High School, she was the epitomy of what I considered female perfection. I still feel the same, but now she's been joined by a few others, including Reba McIntyre, Bonnie Raitt, Jennifer Connelly, and Rene Russo, to name a few. Of course, I have almost all of ONJ's albums, except for a few on LP and one or two of the rarer import CD's.
Towards the end of High School, I saw the light and discovered the Beatles. To this day, I recognize and pay homage to their holiness. Further religious research added Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler to the holy trinity.
| Tesseract Studios |
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Mind you, this did provoke some ridicule amongst my mostly die-hard rock and roll friends, but I had decided a long time ago that the more varied one's musical tastes, the greater the potential for pleasure. I must admit, however, that this new Young Country that the kids listen to today just isn't as good.
I remember exactly how it happened. We were coming back from Sacramento after thanksgiving dinner one year, and we stopped at the Holiday Inn in Emeryville for a bathroom break. I stayed in the van (the Blue Monster it was) and played with the radio. All of a sudden, I came across something incredible, unlike anything I'd heard before, yet sounding all the same like a cross between my classical roots and my new found variety. My mom came out, and I swore up and down that if she changed the station before I found out what it was, I'd kill myself.
It turned out to be Jean-Michel Jarre's Oxygene, and I was hooked. Many months and dollars later, I had quite a collection of space music, and Tower records had all my money. In addition to Jarre, I collected the works of Mannheim Steamroller, Ray Lynch, and many others.
Much of the music I have written is space music, inspired by whatever ethereal patches I came across in my synthesizers. More so than perhaps any other type of modern music, (except perhaps abstract neo-classical,) it is uniquely suited to the computer and synth method of composition. Then, the popularity of new age music began to die out, and I too moved on to a new favorite.
I had a brief affair with light rock, then got back into the saddle with classic rock. Then it was back to classical for a while, with Rossini, Vivaldi, Albinoni, Bocherinni, and Mozart, among others, taking top honors. I searched long and hard for Vivaldi's complete lute concertos, (which I first heard on Sesame Street,) and paid dearly when I found it, but it was worth it. The same was true of Rossini's Peches de ma vieullesse, and those two are still high up in the CD rotation list.
By the way, for those who have never watched much Sesame Street, the quality of musical talent featured on the show is incredible. Artists of all genres have appeared, often customizing their well known works for the show. Some of the ones I remember include Billy Joel, the Canadian Brass, Bobby McFerrin, and Ladysmith Black Mambazo. It's well worth watching, even if you already know how to read.
My latest craze, lasting about seven or eight years now, is Blues. Mix it with classic rock for a little variety, and you can keep me quiet for hours. Of course, B.B.King, Eric Clapton, John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, and Stevie Ray Vaughan are among my more mainstream favorites. The Rhino records Blues Masters series is great too. (And of course, my cousin, Johnny Nitro is awesome as well.)
I'm sure I have far too many favorites to mention, but some that come to mind include Feel Like Going Home, by the Notting Hillbillies, Lonnie Mack's Oreo Cookie Blues, Stevie Ray Vaughan's Lenny, Jumpin' At Shadows by Gary Moore, Gimme One Reason from Tracy Chapman, Eric Clapton's Cryin' and Wonderful Tonight, and so on. I could go on for hours. "While my guitar gently weeps" sums it up perfectly, I think.
I have a few soundtracks, but there are a lot more I'd like to get. The ones I do have are Stand by Me, Back to the Future, Xanadu (Olivia Newton-John and ELO), and Electric Dreams (with some fantastic synth composition by Georgio Moroder.) Mind you, Andrew Lloyd Webber hasn't got a talented bone in his body. I'm not a huge fan of musicals in general, but his are pure torture. I do like 1776, however, and the Music Man was pretty good.
I've also gotten into folk music lately, especially hobo songs about trains. My favorite is Utah Phillips, whose song Daddy, What's a Train? practically has me in tears every time I listen to it.
Somewhere in there, I went through my jazz phase, my big band phase, and even sampled a capella (though I'll leave that to my idiot brother, for the most part.) If you look through my CD collection, I doubt you'll really be able to make much sense of it at first. In addition to the major categories listed above, you'll find albums of surf music, hip-hop, and high-andean folk music, as well as even more off-the-wall stuff. Then, you'll realize that you're looking at the very eclectic collection of a musical gourmet -- someone who enjoys the very best of every type of music.
Well anyway, I always remembered that story, and wished I knew the name so I could read it again. When I got to Junior High, I got to be friends with the librarians (yes, I was one of those kids) and one day, I told them about this book. Well, they, being librarians and bound and determined to help anyone they met no matter what, called up my second grade teacher, explained the situation, and asked if she knew what the book was.
Of course, she did, and told them, and they even had it in the Aptos library. Surprisingly, my second grade teacher remembered me (I didn't think I was that bad!) as well as the book. For them what's interested, the book is The Thirteenth Floor by Eugene Ormandroyd. (I still remember the book, though I'm not 100% sure of the spelling of the author's last name.)
Another favorite author (perhaps even surpassing Heinlein in some respects) is James P. Hogan. He's best known for his Giants series. It was the first of those books that helped me figure out what I want to be when I grow up: a synthesist. One of my favorite books of his, however, is Code of the Lifemaker, wherein he describes logically and plausibly, how a race of intelligent machines evolve.
Other authors I like include Clifford Simak and Philip K. Dick, though they can be a bit dark for my tastes, and Gordon Dickson, when he's not doing fantasy nonsense. Same goes for Roger Zelazny, whose Doorways in the Sand is great, but the books he's know for are fantasies.
I don't know if it's a recent trend, or if it's been going on all along, but it seems you walk into a bookstore, and there is their "Science Fiction" section, loaded down with nothing but fantasy and the token Robert Heinlein book. Most fantasy isn't much better than trashy romance novels, except that most people admit that romance novels are trash. Even the local Barnes & Noble is guilty; they have a "Science Fiction book club" but every notice I've seen has said they'll be discussing a fantasy novel.
I'm not a big fan of non-fiction. Real life just isn't as exciting as the stories a good author can dream up. Too, real life rarely has a happy ending, and I don't read (or watch telly, or go to the movies) to be depressed. I read (or watch or go) to experience some of the excitement and happiness that is all too often missing from everyday life.
I do like references, however. I don't need to know everything, I just need to be able to look it up. (Which, by the way, is one of the reasons I'm such a big fan of the internet.) My (main) dictionary doubles as a lethal weapon.
Someday, I want an actual library in my house -- you know, a room where every inch of wall space is taken up by bookshelves, from floor to ceiling. With big comfy chairs and lots of excellent spot lighting (leaving deep shadows elsewhere so the characters from the books can seep out and inhabit the rest of the room.) The only difference from a traditional library would be the addition of a high powered computer terminal for research.
If I stay in my parent's house, I know exactly which room to convert to a library -- which would mean that removing the closet to remodel the bathroom would be okay. See how it all works out? Now, if only I had the money to remodel everything...
I have lots of computer related books, of course; that's what I do for a living. Manuals, books on programming languages, histories, and so on, they take up a fair bit of shelf space. (Or more correctly, at the moment, storage space.)
The Princess Bride is full of great quotes. "As you wish" is one I use an awful lot. You have to watch the movie, however, (and pay attention) to understand the real meaning. Other movies you ought to have seen by now include The Last Starfighter ("It's gonna be a sparklin' day, sparklin!") with a wonderful performance by Robert Preston, Amazon Women on the Moon (if you don't know who Don "no soul" Simmons is, you haven't lived!), and The Seven Faces of Dr. Lao, starring the incredible Tony Randall.
You should also have seen Labyrinth ("piece of cake") with David Bowie, Jennifer Connolly (still the best hair in show business) and various Muppets. Repo Man is another one, with Emilio Estevez, among others. Of course, you've seen all the Indiana Jones and Lethal Weapon movies, two series of movies wherein the third was as good as the first. Likewise, Grumpier Old Men was as funny as Grumpy Old Men, but whereas Die Hard was really good, Die Hard 2 was adequate and Die Hard 3 was really stupid.
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One of my favorites (and, therefore, one of yours too) is Xanadu, starring Olivia Newton-John and Gene Kelly. ONJ and ELO did a fantastic soundtrack, and Gene Kelly even got to dance. On top of all that, the story was enjoyable and upbeat. I first saw it at a restaurant called Little Willie's in Pollock Pines. At the time, they had fantastic Pizza and the food and family atmosphere made the movie all that much more enjoyable.
Of the more recent movies I've seen, The Birdcage was definitely a hoot. Nathan Lane, of course, stole the show as Albert, but pretty much everyone was wonderful. (Did you know that the actress who played the fiancee (Calista Flockhart) now does an excellent job as TV's Ally McBeal?)
Forrest Gump was overhyped, but managed to shine through the hype (and, in so doing, expose the media for their shallowness.) It also featured an amazing soundtrack. Twister wasn't bad the first time, at the Coronet, really loud, but watching it the third time at home it loses something.
Drop Dead Fred ("No Panties!") is a wonderfully hilarious comedy that reminds us that no matter what, we can (and should) always rely on ourselves. I walked out of the theatre after seeing Jumanji wishing I had had a game like that when I was growing up. (Heck, I wish I had a game like that now!)
In & Out was wonderful, with Kevin Kline turning in his usual great performance. Tom Selleck also did a bang-up job, although he just doesn't look right without his moustache. Debbie Reynolds did a great job as the mother dealing with the rumours about her son's sexuality.
Of course, you'd expect that from her; you might remember her as a young songstress in Singing in the Rain. Yep, that was her! She was also fantastic in the surprisingly excellent Mother, directed by Albert Brooks. I walked into Mother thinking it would be, at best, amusing, but I walked out thinking Brooks is a genius.
Kevin Kline, of course, being best known for his role in Monty Python's Flying Circus, colaborated with his fellow circus mates and Jamie Lee Curtis in A Fish Called Wanda and the even funnier Fierce Creatures. Curtis (yes, she's Tony Curtis's little girl) also did a great job in True Lies, with Arnold Schwarzenneger and Tom Arnold. (I mention Tom Arnold only because he actually did a half decent job of pretending to be an actor in that movie.)
Tom Arnold was also in Nine Months, Hugh Grant's amusing journey to fatherhood (starring a much funnier Robin Williams) and in a little known flop called Undercover Blues. This movie, about a husband and wife team of superspies, vacationing with their newborn, had loads of potential, especially in the interaction between Dennis Quaid as Jeff Blue and Stanley Tucci playing "Morty" ("My name is Muerte; it means Death.")
Unfortunately, the whole thing (with a barely acceptable plot to begin with) dies miserably because of Kathleen Turner who is probably the worst actress on any screen, anywhere. (Don't believe me? Try V.I. Warshawski or Serial Mom.)
| Things I Collect |
Along with Tucci, it will star Aidan Quinn, (Desperately Seeking Susan, Stakeout, and Benny & Joon,) Oliver Platt (Beethoven, The Three Musketeers, and A Time to Kill,) and Isabella Rossellini (Death Becomes Her, Cousins).
Robin Williams has been in about a zillion movies: Flubber (the remake -- so-so), Jack (kinda sad, but he was great), Jumanji (great movie), Mrs. Doubtfire (a great job), Hook (You know that's what Peter Pan would be like when he grew up), Awakenings (not my kind of movie, but I loved it anyway), The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (who else could play the King of the Moon?), and more. Plus, he's a Land Rover Owner.
Anything with Danny Kaye or the Marx Brothers is, of course, great. Also, check out John Turturo's Brain Donors, a recent film based on A Night at the Opera. Not exactly the Marx Brothers, but a respectable tribute, with the added bonus of some great animation and a stirring, jailcell rendition of The Lion Sleeps Tonight.
Cary Grant was absolutely hilarious as the bumbling professor, sentenced to marry Miss Swallow in Bringing up Baby when running into Kathryn Hepburn (and her leopard) not only turns his whole world upside down, but sideways and backwards and every other which way you can think of. Cary Grant is again sidesplittingly funny in Mr. Blandings Builds his Dreamhouse as an up and coming ad man who decides to trade life in a cramped New York City apartment for dream house in the country. (You should definitely see this movie before buying a house; it's really like that!) Tom Hanks and Shelly Long remade it as The Money Pit, but it just wasn't as funny.
Tom Hanks has done some incredible work (and been rightly recognized for it!) but I knew he would 'way back in the days of Bosom Buddies, a great sitcom. Big, although really a sad and intelligent movie, was a triumph -- few others have played the child-in-a-grownup-body as well. You're pretty much safe with any Tom Hanks movie, except for The Burbs -- even Tom Hanks couldn't save that one!
Mel Gibson is another actor who seems to be able to do no wrong. He was wonderful in the Lethal Weapon movies, did a great job as Maverick, and -- somewhat surpisingly perhaps -- was incredible as Hamlet. Speaking of Hamlet, someone recently pointed out to me that Strange Brew was in fact, at least partially, a retelling of Hamlet! And you thought Bob and Doug were illiterate!
I first saw Sidney Poitier in Uptown Saturday Night, which I thought was a rather grown-up movie to be showing junior high school kids, but I certainly didn't complain! Later, I caught him in other movies as well, such as In the heat of the Night, and To Sir, with Love -- probably the granddaddy of all teacher-turns-around-tough-kids movies.
More recently, Morgan Freeman did a great job as a principal of last resort in Lean on Me. He was also incredible in Driving Miss Daisy and countless other classics. To me, however, he'll always be Easy Reader, the man responsible for my love of reading. To this day, I cannot pass a sign without reading the entire thing. You couldn't get much cooler.
Sneakers is basically about my ideal job. Unfortunately, I don't have much of the training needed to do it. (It's far more difficult to commit a crime without damaging anything or anyone than to be able to do it without worrying about such things.) Still, I can dream... (and often do.)
Christopher Lloyd is another actor that is always excellent. Whether he's playing the eccentric Doc Brown in the Back to the Future movies, the crazed toon in Roger Rabbit, or just about anything else, he's great.
My French accent is pretty good, if I do say so myself, once I get into it, although I'm a bit rusty since I haven't spoken much French since my Mom passed away in January '96.
Still, American English is my native tongue, and Lord knows I use it. (Some might say abuse it, but we ignore people like that.) I've been known to expound for hours on end about subjects ranging from politics to religion to Land Rovers to the proper way to eat Potstickers (lotsa hot sauce!). Heck, what do you think I'm doing here?
I generally don't swear much (cooking big meals and working on computer hardware excepted), not because of some arbitrary sense of propriety, but rather because traditional swear words have become so common as to have lost their potency. On the other hand, watch people's head whip around when you spit out a forceful "fiddlesticks!".
| Stuff I've Done |
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Although I really don't care for promotional buttons, for some reason I had a business in high school making them. A friend (cohort?) and I bought a set of button making machines and supplies from a friend of my mother's who ran the west coast operation of one of the largest button making companies in the country.
We then hired a college kid who was studying art to write all the names of which we could think calligraphally, bought some red heart stickers, and made up "I [heart] [name]" buttons on demand. We also made some buttons for various clubs, and even got an order for one of the sports teams at Chico state.
Our biggest venture, however, had to be when we copied the logo for the US Festival, drove down to San Bernadino, and made buttons in the back of the car all weekend. At least I did. Everyone else went to the concert. Of course, it was thoroughly illegal, (copyright infringement, aka bootlegging,) and we eventually got busted.
Luckily, all that happened was our entire stock of US Festival buttons were confiscated. We actually lost money on that trip, but it was one of those memorable adventures one runs into on the way to adulthood.
In the early 80's, I was working for a company that imported picture frames and such, and had a few products of their own (most notably, Goo-Goo dolls, a climbing fireman toy, and bendable pens.) I was the system manager, with a little programming and a lot of data entry thrown in.
It was pretty neat, my first real position of responsibility. The system was a CompuPro 8/16 running M/PM. We had 5 or 6 terminals, each of which could handle a couple of independent sessions. The CPU was a Godbout 80286/8085 dual processor board, pretty high-tech for the time, and very fast, even with multiple users.
Unfortunately, the owners of the company decided to skip the country rather than meet the payroll, so after a couple of months of not being paid, we the employees travelled en masse to the labor board (or something like that) to file a complaint. We then headed for the unemployment lines.
| Organizations I've Worked For/With |
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I started out working 8 hours a week, writing checks and doing some data entry and bookkeeping-type stuff. Pretty soon, however, I found myself there 8 hours a day.
Well, I hate writing, and since they had an excellent accounting package, I inquired why they didn't produce computer- printed checks? The answer seemed to be because no one had ever had the time to figure out how to set it up. Well, it seemed to me that I could get it set up in less time than it took to write out one week's worth of checks by hand, so I did it.
I began learning about the minicomputers they had (HP 3000 Series III and 42) and soon found myself doing as much operations as bookkeeping, and eventually wound up as the system manager. I then started in learning the 4th generation programming language they used (Cognos' Powerhouse) and put myself to work on various in-house programming projects.
As PC's began replacing terminals, I began learning the ins and outs of PC hardware and MS-DOS. I played with an early version of Windows, and even played around with a Macintosh. I put together my first PC of my own, including miscellaneous clone parts from no-name dealers and mail-order companies, and a used 20MB ST-225 hard drive I bought from one of the other Noesis people for $225.
Noesis had a major impact on my life. It was where I was introduced to the HP 3000, Powerhouse, and PC's. I learned a lot from the people there, both about the computer industry and about life itself. It was a small company, and the people were definitely unique.
Bob, the president, was fond of hats. Definitely a character, he was as likely to sit on the floor during a meeting as a chair. An avid runner, he had a shower installed for employees to use after jogging. He was, however, a man who knew how to take care of his people. He had the company provide sodas and calistoga water, and just about any occasion was cause to order huge trays of chinese food.
Sylvia, the woman I originally started working for, had a habit of throwing pencils at Ralph when she got upset; Ralph didn't seem to mind. Leo was a stereotypical super-programmer: working long hours into the night, sporting a beard, and keeping a tie in a drawer for those rare client meetings.
Bill was a great manager; he once told me that programming was the only job where you could lean back in your chair, stare at the ceiling, and everyone would think you're working hard. Jeff was known as one of the best in the business. He was a fixture at the Cognos user group meetings, and everyone knew he was the one to hit with the tough questions.
At some point, I decided I wanted to move more into programming. Unfortunately, Noesis didn't have any need for more programmers at that time. Bob told me to call his friend Pat to see if she needed anyone. I did, and thus began my life with Benson Software.
Although I only worked for Benson Software for three years as an employee, I've been working with Pat and the gang ever since. I learned a lot there too, again about the computer industry, business, and life in general.