November 29, 2003
The first time
So I hurried with the curry (it was certainly the weather for it today) and went outside to brave the short journey to the Sablo Kafé. A little tail wind pushing me towards Avenue du Parc, where I hopped on the bus and got off at Saint-Zotique. I ought to remember never to take this route again; it was frightening being that part of town alone on an icy night in the unforgiving wind, slip-sliding on the sidewalk between graveyards of trucks and soulless industrial buildings, with only a roaring car in a garage revealing any sign of life. Much relieved at hitting Little Italy, I found the Sablo Kafé, a cozy little place, without difficulty. After waiting for the place to fill up (and fill up it certainly did) KooStark began playing perhaps around 9, beginning with a lovely atmospheric track called "Bitter". AJ's fear of a technical problem did surface, but it certainly didn't phase the audience one bit. A short set of 6 tracks (or was it 7?) was a tasteful hors d'oeurve — I'm hanging out for more! Mesmerising rhythm, great sound. AJ, when's the CD coming? (No photos, sorry. Stupidly, I left my camera at home.) Posted by sniffles at 11:00 PM | Comments (2)

November 26, 2003
Full house

Whilst researching the history of playing cards in connection to do with a design I'm working on (otherwise known as covering my artistic ass), I found this:

The earliest authentic references to playing-cards in Europe date from 1377, but, despite their long history, it is only in recent decades that clues about their origins have begun to be understood. Cards must have been invented in China, where paper was invented. Even today some of the packs used in China have suits of coins and strings of coins - which Mah Jong players know as circles and bamboos (i.e. sticks). Cards entered Europe from the Islamic empire, where cups and swords were added as suit-symbols, as well as (non-figurative) court cards. It was in Europe that these were replaced by representations of courtly human beings: kings and their attendants - knights (on horseback) and foot-servants. To this day, packs of Italian playing-cards do not have queens - nor do packs in Spain, Germany and Switzerland (among others). There is evidence that Islamic cards also entered Spain, but it now seems likely that the modern cards which we call Spanish originated in France, ousting the early Arab-influenced designs.

Come to think of it, I can almost see some similarities between poker and mahjong — the traditional, complex game where four people play around a square table, not the computer game where you remove pairing tiles from the pyramid thing.

Question of the day: which is more complicated — cricket or mahjong?

Posted by sniffles at 04:46 PM | Comments (4)

November 23, 2003
Radio silence

 

Posted by sniffles at 10:14 AM | Comments (10)

November 20, 2003
Fallen leaves

He appeared in the garden of my dreams, and not surprisingly, he began to help me clear the fallen leaves, bundling together bunches of dead and dying plants in preparation for the winter. He was that kind of person.

And finally, he summoned the courage to speak. "Should I be thankful?"

I looked up at him. It occurred to me then that what had happened doesn't matter anymore.

He bent down for yet another bag of leaves. "All the others, they seem genuinely thankful. I keep thinking I should be too."

"Well ..." I began. "Are you?"

Posted by sniffles at 10:10 AM | Comments (1)

November 18, 2003
Stairway to electronic heaven

Grey, nondescript. The morning refuses to be more than a mere background to today's existence and the sun denies accountability for today's daylight.

Up near the top of the world, I slip silently into the office. My new daily challenge is for André not to notice me when I come in. So far, it hasn't worked; he hears the swish of my coat when I take it off. Perhaps tomorrow, I will remove it before reaching the door.

Down in the labyrinth I encounter Ed a second time in two days, though I nearly walked straight past him due to the little cloud in my head.

These days there seem little time for everything. My bookpile is cross-breeding far too fast for me to read. Tales in my head stamping their feet and rattling their cage demanding release, and have taken to haunting my dreams.

In the corridors, ghosts whisper contradictory warnings, waiting for rain.

Posted by sniffles at 12:25 PM | Comments (4)

November 16, 2003
Coffee Ballad #4

Fresh Antipasto: Coffee Ballad #4.

Posted by sniffles at 10:24 PM | Comments (3)

November 12, 2003
Art, biscuits, TV.

Under a day of rain, in a letter, he wrote:

[...] as soon you think about self-creativity there's the equation of having to work for a living. When you do art, you do it because you like it, not because it's necessary. But as soon as you do it, you can't eat anymore, because nobody wants to buy art. It's a very difficult question.

The book I'm reading has a few interesting passages, not all them. I suspect the artist to masturbate a bit sometimes ... "Ye souiiiii oune artiste" ...

Under a day of grey, fine drizzle drawing dotted lines on dusty windows, I replied:

I think it is because nobody thinks art is really necessary in the modern world. The modern world is about utility and efficiency. There is a point too that 'individual' art only began to exist very late, in the late 18th (19th?) century. Before that, art had a purpose — you have court musicians, you have commissioned art for public spaces. For the peasants, you have bards and storytellers. These occupations don't exist in the same way anymore. Artists these days also want to make money from art — in the past, people live for art.

Do you think television killed art?

Maybe with the growth of the 'individual artist' there also comes a certain elevation of the the cult status of being an artist. The word 'artist' carries a lot more symbolism these days precisely because it is not seen as a real profession with a real purpose. Therefore, maybe saying it comes with a kind of pride.

What is killing art?

Posted by sniffles at 02:18 PM | Comments (10)

November 11, 2003
Red orange

The cold air stung my skin and seeped through all my defences, invading all, pervading all, and I felt featureless, anonymously wrapped up in a coat, a scarf, a blue hat that made me a temporary Tibetan doll. An empty canister of a being, two eyes peering out at the world.

I watched the moon, the moon watched me. I thought of you. The shadowed moon and I walked together, being now familiar with each other, 'round the corners of the non-winding streets into the heart of the city, where the buildings huddle together to keep warm.

Numerous people wandered in the night searching for certain amusements, a bunch of girls from Boston asked me for the nearest open liquor store; it was a lively night. The moon thought so too, winking beneath her temporary gown of darkness, amused by their ignorance of her beauty, that they were unaware of her guise.

I looked at the moon and the moon looked at me. I thought of you. She thought of you too. All the while, the city lights and the stars blinked shyly at each other across the vast, lonely expanse.

Elsewhere your empty rooms pine for you. You, the only one with whom I am completely at rest and perpetually in motion, all at the same time.

Posted by sniffles at 08:29 AM | Comments (1)

November 10, 2003
The semantic of creative innovations

So I brought up the "Shirky shitting the Semantic Web" article with Joe, being aware of our somewhat differing opinions on the issue.

So Joe said, "There are really 3 things here: RDF/XML the syntax, RDF the data model, and The SemWeb as a vision. Find problems with any one of the three and most of the time the response [from SemWeb people] is, no don't look at that part, what I'm really talking about is (fill in the blank with one of the other two pieces)."

And he's right of course. The problem is, there exists differing parts to the Semantic Web vision, and it's easy to get them mixed up where they in fact are separate issues. Take for example, you can very well talk about the Atom model as separate from its syndication format; you can argue about the usefulness of actually having an Atom model, without necessarily discussing about which XML tags a feedreader should handle.

For some reason, this separation is beyond those who continually argue about the Semantic Web. In part, it has to do with SemWeb evangelists — perhaps, forced into a position whereby they have to justify what they do, they oversimplify the model for those who expect to understand it as fast as one flicks a lightswitch. Hell, I don't claim to understand the full vision, but it doesn't take much to see though cheap shots like Clay Shirky's — by the way, it'd sure help his Web server stats, wouldn't it? Honestly, tell me that back in 1927 when Philo T. Farnsworth demonstrated the transmission of an electrical image by bouncing electrons around in a tube, everyone understood what he was really doing, and that they could foresee the impact his strange invention would have.

Tim Bray has written a most wise commentary in response. It's early days. The need for something more effective than what we've got exists. What the words "Semantic Web" conjure now might be quite different later, given a little time.

The "humans-will-never-use-this" argument can go straight into the trash can. If the cathode ray tube was never invented, did you think you would be going home to watch TV?

Posted by sniffles at 04:43 PM | Comments (1)

November 06, 2003
Lips
Typical question to me lately, "So how are you doing?" Typical answer from me lately, "Busy." Busy? I'm moving on to 40-hour working weeks and I'm not sure if my body knows how to get used to it. At least, not so soon after the end of daylight savings. That, on top of my usual commitments — for which I'm trying to stay disciplined so that I don't spend more than a given number of hours on various causes I've volunteered for — and trying to keep some energy (sanity!) for other things like read, write, and uh, eat. Yet whilst my body moans and complains, I'm probably at my most alive. The more tired you are, the more human you feel. Stands to reason, doesn't it? Last night's YULBlog was a heap of fun. We met Nika, Quân, Alexandre, Caroline, Hoedic, John and Kerry, amongst the regulars. A debunking of astrology, a speculation on the relationship between taosim and existensialism (on my part), stories relating to rings (not LOTR), movies, cats, homes, parties, travel, how home is where the heart is, how art history is more interesting than computer science, how guns should be deprecated in place of blogs. One blog post for every bullet. Bang. There. Posted by sniffles at 11:37 AM | Comments (3)

November 04, 2003
American stop?

It's snowing outside. Fine, white, young virgin snow swirling in the wind. I'm in a new office, in a new building sitting on top of an impressive labyrinth of underground passages. Montreal is a place of many secrets.

Tipping the contents of a sugar packet into my coffee at the cafe, a tall blond woman walked up and began speak to another, presumably a colleague.

"I got a good ticket last night."

The other woman mumbled something I couldn't hear.

"It was 'Stop Sign'".

"Stop Sign"? Is that some musical or theatre production I didn't know about?

The other woman mumbled something else I couldn't hear. The blond woman was beginning to look somewhat exasperated. "It was because I did an American stop."

Oh. She meant she'd committed a traffic offence — not sure how I thought it was a musical!

So, can someone tell me, what is an "American stop"? How's that different from, say, a Canadian stop?

Posted by sniffles at 08:55 AM | Comments (8)

November 02, 2003
Handspeak

Fresh antipasto: Coffee Ballad #3 and Untitled.

Posted by sniffles at 11:57 AM | Comments (2)