I don't really have any reason to be in a bad mood, exactly. Just this morning, from the point of waking, everything has pissed me off.

Fortunately, the sun has come out, it's 66 degrees outside, the grass is growing, and I drove around at lunch with my windows down and the stereo up. It's hard to have One Of Those Days when it's so nice outside.

Mar 28 2003 0 comments

You may be asking yourself, "self, do you know why Derek hasn't updated his 'blog much in the last 7 weeks?"

Well, it's because my parents have been living in my living-room, pending the purchase of a house. My father got a job here, his home-town, forcing their sudden move from Wyoming to North Dakota on mess around with apartments or hotels, they stayed with me & Des until they could get a top-notch residence lined up.

How has that prevented me from updating 11111001111 in a more timely manner? It's mostly because we're doing stuff all the time, and so I have less time to putz around online. Like that film project I mentioned, everything I've got going on has been slowed down. I did manage to write a Backwash column in there, but most of my writing time has been taken up by family-things.

My parents found a house, they close on it Monday, and they move in the end of next week. Not only that, but they're inheriting the previous owners' pool table. Rock!

For those of you who'd rather I write inane, filler comments just so that there's regular updates, go read The Brunching Shuttlecock's Apathetic Online Journal Entry Generator. Or, read their Daredevil review (I saw it last night, it's not that bad), or read Lore's ratings of fortune telling, simply because he used the word 'Oneiromancy.'

Mar 26 2003 0 comments

Daily Condition:

on shortwave: VOA Music Mix, 15580/17895kHz. Their theme is a Joe Satriani tune -- gear!

my condition: watching angry clouds approach. Maybe rain, maybe snow, but no fun either way.

Mar 16 2003 0 comments

>> >> >> me i should
>> >> >> >wear this outfit once a week because it makes me look

Mar 13 2003 0 comments

Around a week ago, as I left work, I noticed something shiny on top of the dumpster. The little magpie that I am, I grabbed it and headed to my car.

When I got home, I opened the canister and found a 16mm film, a silent black-and-white movie.

I dashed back to the dumpster, to beat the garbage truck, and found twelve other reels in the trash.

Over the weekend I bought a projector and some film editing/repair equipment, and last night we watched a few reels.

The building I work in used to belong to the AOUW, now Pioner Mutual, which has since been sold off to some Illinois company. A storage space was being cleaned out, and a bunch of 'junk' ended up in the dumpster. So, these films are primarily related to the AOUW, but they're more than that: there's footage of picnics, of parades, of buildings, of technology. The movies are full of cars, fashion, architecture and history, and I'm so happy I was there to save them from the sanitary landfill's grasp.

As you can imagine from my other 'found art'ish websites, these movies, and their contents, will be online soon. It's going to be a big project, probably hours of footage, but I'll love doing it. My intention is to digitize it at DVD quality, for reproduction & archiving, and work down to internet quality from there. Watch this space for more info.

Mar 11 2003 1 comment

I listen to Radio Marti quite a bit, taking in foreign music and distant news, but I don't understand any spanish.

Well, there's one word -- a word that appears often in the lyrics of the songs: corazon. Out of the unintelligble jumble, the static, and the tune, pops this word, it's use applying more to love than anatomy. If I only knew one word of english, I wonder how our radio would sound...

Mar 5 2003 3 comments

Never underestimate the ability of children to understand books: a 4th Grade class in Brooklawn PA has been reading Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, and the kids love it. Parents and educators alike lament kids being raised by television, but offer little alternatives. While books don't necessarily promote such great ideals either (I hope the PA teacher doesn't follow up with Naked Lunch), it's destructive to assume that kids can't take a long book, read it for a couple weeks, and get something out of it. Destiny is getting to the point where she can follow a storyline even with breaks between readings, so I've been keeping a mental list of what she should start on...

Mar 5 2003 0 comments

Daily Condition:

on shortwave: English to Africa from Voice of America, 21675kHz

my condition: tired, up too late working on homework