2000-03-16 :: 06:11:28

the automatic gauze of your memories

[ This portion of the entry written on 03/10/00 ]

Soundtrack: Common [Sense], "Resurrection"; Monaco, "Music for Pleasure"

Dropping like flies?

"I appreciate the patience of each and all of you. For me, this case is of such importance that I refused to be drawn to a precipitate conclusion. I wanted the time to think about it and to study the pertinent material. Because weeks are still available before the end of the term, I do not apologize; I merely explain." - Justice Harry A. Blackmun

While this quote comes from material I have been studying (relatively speaking), it essentially speaks to my relationship with this diary [and perhaps, in a more expanded scope, my life], I suppose. I'll leave it at that.

I never really spoke about hip-hop the way that I wanted to in any earlier entries. I probably can't speak well to it since I only know so much seeing as how I just got into it this year, but it's been a big change for a formerly pure-rock kiddie. I know I have sung DJ Shadow's praises, but when it comes to MC's, it's Common for me (so far, at least). I saw him last year opening for Busta (who was, assuredly, busted - I easily fell asleep); Common blew me away. I hadn't heard him or heard of him, but when I heard "I Used to Love H.E.R." and he dropped the "What am I talking 'bout y'all? I'm talkin' about hip-hop!" line on me, my jaw dropped. Hearing this album was pretty much a revelation as to what hip-hop could be, lyrically speaking. I owe Adam some thanks for giving me pointers in the right direction, he's a true hip-hop head and an artist in his own right.

Even when Common boasts, I enjoy it - it's that good. I mean, come on: "I went against all odds and got a' even steven / Proceed to read and not believin' everything I'm readin' / But my brain was bleedin', needin' feedin', and exercise / I didn't seek the best of buys, it's a lie to textualize / I analyze where I rest my eyes / And chastise the best of guys with punchlines / I'm Nestle when it's Crunch-time." He just burns intelligence. Jeb and I stayed up late in the lab many a night on this stuff. Anyway, I find it refreshing that a rapper can bring some real realness to the table instead of huffing and Puffing about his guns and hos and money and drugs and ass backery.

Oh, nice. Brent liked his birthday gift, which I somehow managed to get out to him - in the midst of the chaos of the past two weeks - just three days late. I've been pretty horrible with birthdays this year. Forgot Yuki's, even with the Palm reminder.

brent: KICK ASS TSHIRT

brent: very cool thanks

jordan: yo

jordan: :)

brent: very tight

jordan: im really glad :)

I sent him a shirt from the Army Navy Store that read "When it absolutely, positively has to be destroyed overnight. US Marines." He's been looking for that for awhile, on the order of years... so that was a nice find. It's ridiculous how hard it is to find a good present for people, but you know, I'll save that angst for the holidays this year. Last time around I just avoided it by not getting presents for anyone. Haha, brilliant, I know. Note to self: be on the ball with presents.

So I not-so-subtly hinted at "the chaos of the past two weeks." It's been pretty wacked out, that's the truth. A roller coaster of seperation from - and reunion with - humanity that is either cresting a hill or plunging downward is the best way I can describe it.

Rewind:

Two weekends past, and shortly after my reflections on a situation (apparently it was a time of revelation for others, too), I ran into the girl in question at a party. You could call it ironic that we were both on the dance floor to the throbbing Britney beats of "Baby, One More Time," but you know, what did I care? I had a good time and the classic drunken dancefloor fall with a seamless recovery - "he's alright!" We smalltalked a bit when we ran into each other: yes, the CS project was killing me, yes the rest of the week had gone by blahblah yes well see you later. I haven't seen her since, but I am hopeful we'll mend fences (so to speak) in time. Eventually I left that party and crossed campus to go to the other party I was planning on attending; it had ended and I woke up the hosts that had since gone to sleep; I pretended I didn't know what time it was (2:40AM, oops). I think I played an "I don't care" card on that one.

The CS project in question was one of the large projects in my software engineering class, in which we write a small [graphical] pinball game. What it really was (since the graphics, physics of a "bounce" occurring, and audio were all in the support code) was designing and coding a finite state machine and parser. That essentially means two distinct things, the former being more interesting. An FSM is a part of the "magic theory land" of computer science of which Brent likes to make fun. Essentially, you have a set of states that the machine can be in, and depending on what state it is in and what event occurs, it produces a given outcome (an action, or multiple actions) and changes the state of the machine. We had to program something that could make an arbitrary FSM given the state transitions on the various events and the actions associated with each state.

A soda machine, for example, is an FSM. You put in coins, it slowly changes state to figure out when it reaches a "give the punk a can" state when you send it a "soda button pressed" event. Even this simple machine is relatively complex - it must decide A) how much change it has to go before it will give a can, and B) how much change to give back if you overshot the "required" amount (i.e. $1.00 in a $0.60 machine). In a pinball game, each little object has its own FSM. Hitting a bumper sends an "I got hit" event, which transitions the FSM from one state into another, and that new state has actions associated with it that must be performed (light up, sound a "ding!" tone, give 100 points, etc.). Sometimes you send an event to everything on the board (there's a new ball, so blank out all the previous ball's lit targets) and sometimes to just one object (i.e. a hit bumper). The parser reads in a board description from a file and created the appropriate board from it, which is displayed by the graphics end of the code - it's comparable to the HTML source of this entry and a web browser. The web browser parses the information in the HTML and then outputs a website as you see it in a pretty graphical format. And like the browser, the parser must inform the user when he sends a file to it that contains errors so that they can be fixed (and you must clean your program's memory management mess up, so to speak, before it quits).

While I am loathe to geek out in this (hahaha), that project literally absorbed the majority of my life for six days or so, that's why that is all there. From February 25^th to March 2^nd, I really can't remember days changing. Friday blurred into Thursday so quickly. It was a blend of 30 hour days and five hours of sleep in between them. I'd come back from the lab at noon and sleep until 5PM. It was a sad state of affairs; I was sad that I wasn't seeing people and instead was sitting in a giant feedback loop of headphone-pounding MP3's and keystrokes and code compilation. It is my fault for starting late, but with all of the personal junk that transpired, it was tough to get academics going... college is college, I guess. I started comparing life to an FSM (despite my belief that it couldn't be further from the truth), which was pretty lousy. When you sleep for less than five hours in the middle of a huge programming assignment, you start dreaming about it. When basting like a rotisserie chicken in the computer lab, yours thoughts just twist up, along with your lumbar and shoulders. Your ass hurts, you eat out of vending machines.

[out @ 4:15PM]

[returned @ 2:00AM]

In the middle of all of this, I went and saw Jeb's band jam at the campus bar. It was rad. Jeb played bass and Octave Cat, Danny played keyboards, John played drums, and Paul played turntables and drums. I only really know Jeb in that lineup, but I know Danny and John in passing. Paul mixed Isaac Stern and JFK's inaugural speech into the picture - I couldn't believe he had found two copies of those records to loop, but sure enough, he did. It was sloppy sometimes, but when they hit a groove it would just fall together, and then I couldn't keep a smile off my face. That was a nice way to end the week. Came back to the house, made some s'mores over the fire, played some [read: a lot of] Metal Gear Solid. I mentioned how video games may be accomplishing nothing, but MGS is a piece of art. It's unbelievably cinematic; I'm just sorry it's so short. Despite all of the anti-nuke propaganda, it's refreshing to see such a mature video game on the market done so well with a great story behind all of it. Hm, on the other hand, I have really been spending too much time on it, so maybe it's good that it's short. Heh. Alright. Somewhere in all of this, I got back to the keyboard after a Windows fatal error (yargh!).

So, computer science. Projects. I have this thing: when I am in the middle of a project that is sucking my life away, I don't shave. When I finish it, I have my mini-phoenix experience and get a new face. I keep the water running when I shave; when I'm all done, the shavings spiral down the drain and arrange themselves evenly on the enamel of the sink in a layer of black on white with a very defined edge. While it drains, the water surface is randomly broken by gurgles from the drain bubbling up. Whenever I watch this, I am amazed. I think of how far we are from approximating that with any kind of model or computer and how many physical actions and reactions are occurring for me to see that. To me, the shavings are like the pain of the project sliding away. When you shave after letting serious growth come in, the skin feels incredible. It's kind of a weird romanticizing, I will admit, but that's the way I see it.

I have made CS sound like the worst thing in the world to do. Oh well. It's got its high points, but I certainly would never want to be a code monkey for a living. I'm lucky, my hands haven't broken. Plenty of people in the department get tendonitis (I suspect that I have a very minor case, actually, but it inflames extremely rarely), and there are quite a few carpal victims about the place as well. My half-joke is that I want massage therapists for varsity coders, but seeing as how the CS department brings in so much cash for the school I can't say that wouldn't be a fair setup, in all honesty. What I also considered during this project is the fact that if the department gets a bunch of shitty incoming kids on any given year, it will severely screw the incoming classes of future years in a huge way since CS is so reliant on TA staffs of undergraduates. It's like the department is a circular excellence that has worked for a long time, but it's certainly got a chink in the armor.

Somewhere in all of that (and after a five hour 11:30AM-4:30PM sleep), I interviewed for a Microsoft internship and then ran back to the house where Nick had cooked dinner (yay for Nick!). I ate that and ran down to Lupo's, because I was seeing The Smashing Pumpkins. They did a tiny show on 3/2 just after the new album release, and it was outstanding... I found a setlist on alt.music.smash-pumpkins:

First set:

Rock On [T. Rex], The Everlasting Gaze, Disarm, Blue Skies Bring Tears, I of the Mourning, Glass + the Ghost Children, I Am One, Wound, The Imploding Voice, Heavy Metal Machine, Glass' Theme

Second set (* = acoustic, Billy Corgan solo):

Speed Kills [Cover?]*, To Sheila*, Shame*, Drown*, Crush, Join Together [Cover?], Pale Scales [Cover?], Zero, Bullet With Butterfly Wings, Once In A Lifetime [Talking Heads], This Time, Tonight Tonight, Cherub Rock

Encore:

Never Say Never jam [Romeo Void], XYU, Dialogue w/ audience, Today [tease], Tristessa [tease], Rebel, Rebel [tease (David Bowie)], We Love You [Cover?]

When they opened with "Rock On," that was a great statement. They had a real theme of unity between them and the audience ("Join Together," in particular, celebrated that). The "We Love You" song at the end was beautiful; Billy kept singing "we love you" over and over, and finally it shifted to "we love us" briefly and then "do you love us?" and everyone was screaming like mad. I was watching from a balcony until the second set, when I obnoxiously pushed into the crowd on the right side to be about five people-rows back. To be among people after feeling like such an isolated lump was incredible. The pit was energetic but not obnoxious, sweaty and leaning on others I felt like I was human again. I enjoyed the Adore tour more musically since they totally rearranged the songs instead of just powering through them, but this was still cathartic in a special way.

Looking around, thinking about how this showy, dramatic band meant something to all of these people in some way made me think about how people interpret one another. Everybody likes to think they "get" a song, see its meaning. When songwriters said, "It means whatever it means to you," in an interview when asked what a song is about or means, I used to think that was bullshit. But now I see the validity of the statement. People on the net are discussing the meaning of the stuff on "MACHINA"; some say it's Billy lying and mindfucking (the concert had its mindfuck moments, to be sure), some say it's his emotions on his sleeve yet again, some say it's what Billy claims (that he is writing what we want to hear), etc. But I think I am finally okay with saying "if it means something to you, that's what it means [to you]," however touchy-feely that is. For all of their drama and all of Billy's bombast, the Pumpkins are a very human band with a very real chemistry. That, and James Iha is a very good dresser.

Sometimes Billy slid into lecture-mode during the show, discussing how we don't need rock, or an Internet revolution, or a Y2K revolution blahblahblah you can't make an album or concert too long blahblah. The Talking Heads cover was almost blasphemous with his rather liberally adapted and grandiosely melodramatic lyrics (I can't even remember one to give as an example). Speaking of covers, Billy made fun of the band ("We're our own fucking cover band... sorry... the real Pumpkins will be out shortly...") for their sloppy playing on "Blue Skies" and "The Imploding Voice" where James sort of noodled his guitar parts instead of making them scream album-style. He thanked us several times for letting them "practice" in front of us, and declared that "you've waited in those long lines to see a short set, but we're gonna make you listen to a lot of music, so... I'm sorry." The dialogue at the end of the show was hilarious, Billy had a lobster doll and a lawn flamingo with a boa (audience gifts) on it conversing about how to get James to come out and play a riff for us (call his name, of course). Out they came for one more, this after Billy apologizing: "We have no more wrists... this is not an equipment failure...". But The Pumpkins rocked, and when "Cherub Rock" wailed out from their guitars, I just had an amazing loss of everything but the moment.

With respect to Billy's remark about tickets, the show was announced on the 29^th, tickets went on sale the next day at 11:00AM, and the day after was the concert. I had left the lab burned out at 8:30AM to get in line at the nearest Ticketbastard, but it turned out people from my house had camped out since 4:30AM and were already planning on getting me a ticket. Rock! I ran into CVS, noticed the new SI Swimsuit issue, bought it, and went back home to collapse - an indicator of my life's situation right now is that it's still sitting in the CVS bag under my bed. I haven't even looked at it yet, haha. I did notice that this gorgeous model Elsa is featured in it. Jeb and Byron and I were flipping through some fashion magazine at the Creperie and I'm pretty sure she's the model in this Jones New York ad by which we were all stunned. Her face is pretty flawless. You have to wonder how people like her are created.

I am tempted to upload this now, but there's a lot I need to finish here and proofread, so I am going to pause again and do the rest in the "morning." Nite.

[asleep @ 4:00AM]

[ This portion of the entry written on 03/16/00 ]

[continuing @ 3:30AM ]

Soundtrack: silence, hard disk fan humming

I made minimal editorial changes to the above section, so I don't think I'm cheating. This is my first multi-day spanned entry. Hm.

It's 3:30AM, and I'm disappointed in myself. I turned in my swilliest code yet for a project in software engineering. No special details, really, just time mismanagement and two days shot to playing Metal Gear. Quite an amazing ending; I am dying for Metal Gear Ghost Babel to come out, since I actually own a GameBoy Color. Rock. This was a partnered project, and I guess I feel shittier because I let her down by screwing up... we made a lot of mistakes, but I am hopeful that we learned so that our next project will go smoothly. Time to shave again.

Another thing that happens when I am inundated with work is that I eat out too much. There's a restaurant called Paragon here that I frequent. It has a rep for being the trashychic euro hangout, and that's pretty well deserved. The waitresses wear all-black and are generally really attractive and blonde, but it's not a requirement (the blonde part). There aren't many options for us when it comes to eating out, however, and Paragon has a great menu and surprisingly decent prices - so despite my lack of euro style, they know my face. When I finished Pinball I went out to dinner by myself and just enjoyed some sane time alone and silent with a good meal. They sat me at the bar and I watched a man of great excess (large firm gut, smoking, tanned leather jacket, ruddy face) pay for a Jack on the rocks with a $100 bill. He had the bartender keep the $94 in change on the bar and she put another shaker out for him before the first one was emptied. For my playwriting class we were supposed to conduct a "spying" exercise in which we took notes for an hour or so while eavesdropping on a person. I chose him and took notes down on bar napkins. It was really interesting; he wouldn't shut up about anything and kept talking about all these little snippets of people and their lives. It's strange to think that for me those lives all exist in about three sentences. Someone's existence was being put out in a second-degree offhand remark that managed to make its way to my ears... it's scary how many lives get reduced to that.

All of this dining took place after viewing The Shawshank Redemption for the first time in an auditorium. When I wasn't taking down notes on the excess man's conversation, I jotted down thoughts regarding the movie. Here is what the napkin reads:

• humans + humans - passion + word (bond) + hope
• men of dignity and mystery - humanity emotion
• phony men of religion vs. true judgement + purity
• power begetting corruption
• games and outgaming
• pressure and time
• guards - symbolism
• men of power + facades - one chink -> downfall
• birds that cannot be caged
• get busy living or get busy dying...
• untouchable inner beauty - music + hope (why not more harmonica?)
• - reconnection to people - detachment of work, code -> feedback loop of music and keystrokes and monitor response, compiler

I found the guards to be Kafka-esque; it reminded me of "In The Penal Colony," which I rather enjoyed. My grandmother is a big Kafka fan/authority... I should talk to her more about him. It would give me a conversation starter, at least. Anyway, I was really glad to finally see the movie and after a period of real human detachment, it came at a good time. In particular, I felt a recognition of the human power of choice, something else Metal Gear touches on, as does The Iron Giant (and, incidentally, my earlier discussion of FSM's). I like that concept of free will, it's reassuring. The Shawshank Redemption reminded me of the moment when I think about what I will say and then finally say "fuck it" and spit it out. Then the words have been given birth and do what they will, but at least you feel you put some effort into it. There is something in that moment where your brain is whirring along and deciding whether or not to do something (the proper word almost feels like "invokes") that is particularly pleasing.

I came by Paragon for takeout earlier this week and a waitress handed a note that a customer had left for her to the bartender (also female, though they are usually the only men working service besides the occasional host). The waitress laughed and said, "I have an admirer" or something. The bartender read the note and was prepared to hand it back. The waitress said, "No, throw it away," which the bartender did. Moments after the waitress left, I asked the bartender what it said. She recalled it reading: "It's nice to find a beautiful woman in a sea of superficiality. -Ryan [his phone number]." The bartender thought it was sweet; I made a remark about how you can't blame a guy for trying. I wonder what Ryan would say if he knew what her reaction was. Would he think she is part of the sea after all?

The other thing that was whacking my time last week was studying for my political science examination. The thing I resent about my software class is how drained it leaves me for everything else. My classes rule this semester. I've already mentioned my love for my polysci prof. My English teacher (she's a grad student) is great - totally understanding about late work, and really fun. Her boyfriend was in my fiction class last semester. The people in my playwriting class are smart without being pretentious; they write with sentiment, detail, and bite. She gives criticism gently and plenty of praise without showering it undeservedly. I have hated English here so far and I just realized today how much I value this class. Kris (our teacher) threw a party for us and had soda, Doritos, Peeps, Pixi-Stix, Jolly Rancher pops, and Ferraro Rocher truffles... and twisty straws, the kind that do loops and are really hard to suck because of it. I haven't had one of those since I was ten or something - talk about nostalgia! I was so psyched to have one again. Haha. Kris made a great statement to me about the English people here. She said something like "A lot of the grad students here think everything is really precious. And a lot of it is. But I'm here to try to tell you guys that not everything is so precious." I liked that a lot, and it made her having called my monologue exercise "precious" mean a lot to me. Because I'm so drained from coding half the time, I can't get as much out of playwriting and polysci as I would like. I hate that feeling.

Part of it is me. I simply do not get as much done per unit of time as a lot of others. I think this inefficiency is truly the root of the problem. I wish I had more sticktuitiveness, but it's a character flaw. Too easily distracted. But part of it is that the class is simply merciless. One project is done, the next assignment comes out on the previous one's due date. You never have a moment to breathe. Of course, what am I doing writing at 4AM? Telling myself I need to do something good for the soul. What an excuse.

What I have taken away from the polysci so far is the fluidity of the judicial system. "Nothing is absolute" seems to be the motto. It's kind of scary that it's such a flawed, political game. It's a very strange animal, but I find myself intrigued by it. I am pretty awed by the Supreme Court, in the midst of all of the nasty game playing they seem to be a worthy institution. Our TA gave us a pep talk that we shouldn't be discouraged by the revelations of the course but rather empowered by them. It's hard not to feel like our system is a total piece of shit after what we learn, though. I was surprised to find an analogy to law as art in one of the readings. I have felt that way since the first few days of the course. It seems like judicial rulings are like paintings. The judge does a few preliminary sketches, has a feeling in his or her gut of what he wants to do, but has to find out how to express that properly. Note-taking and further studies continue; the judge/artist takes notice of society and previous works and their influences when creating his piece. Eventually it must be readied for exhibition to the public, after which it cannot be touched. Not another sentence, word, or brushstroke. I used to want to be a lawyer. If I were to ever be involved in law now, however, I think I'd want to be a judge.

Jumping way back to shortly after the Smashing Pumpkins concert, the other thing that happened on the weekend of the 4^th was the LGBTA (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Alliance) dance. They throw really good dances - it should be an indication that they had a sellout even with $8 tickets for a campus event. Jeb's roommate from last year, Byron, was one of the DJ's. It was pretty damn good; the beats were slamming and I saw tons of people I hadn't seen in a long time. I also re-proved to myself that I can dance my ass off sober, which was a really amazing feeling when I finally got going. It was a different kind of trancey experience of its own. I decked out in a new black polyester French Connection buttondown, black khakis, and black loafers, all of which I was pleased to be able to find in my wardrobe. It was a lot of fun; I ran into neuro girl and we got beers at the campus bar and talked about how good SP was. I played it low-key, next time I think I have a decent in. This girl Rains lives above me and seems to have run into me before I have left for both the LGBTA dances this year and both times she was impressed with the outfit (last time I borrowed from Ken). She probably thinks I am gay. I often wonder how people perceive me, what they see in what I am wearing or saying or writing. How can you know your own external image? What kind of portrayed self does this diary create?

Alright, my fingers are actually losing it, despite my earlier claims to tendonitis being rare. I've had my hands on a keyboard for the majority of my days recently. Closing happy thoughts: new shoes, fences continuing to mend.