[ f e c k l e s s ]

Friday, January 28

I was sitting on the train yesterday, off to Castro Street after work to pick up some pictures at the camera place. The trains are crowded, the buses are worse. All the wealthy internet folks look stunned each day that they are making as much as they are but have stand huddled close to people, smelling their smells and hang onto a greasy metal pole that will give them the flu. It is the same look of simple grief they get when they arrive at their $675,000 two bedroom house on Dolores Street and there is a mentally ill homeless person defecating between two turbo VW Beetles.

This is actually from an article about web design fads (gleaned from camworld), but it does sort of sum up life in San Francisco these days . . .

 (4:35 PM | #)

So I'm going to City Hall! I'll be showing up for the hearing on the DNA Lounge's late-night permit. The SoMa club thing is really getting out of hand--Cat's Alley is having it's alcohol license suspended because of Bondage-A-Go-Go. (BAGG has already served as the excuse to shut down two clubs, so this is not a good sign.) Word on the street is that the offensive conditions included "exposed nipples and five counts of simulated sodomy." Er, what? I mean, this is just around the corner from the Hole in the Wall . . . .

For the viewers at home, Cat's is the closest club to my house--around 50 yards from my front door to it's back door. It also houses my favorite club night in the city: 1984. I'm beginning to take this club-kid persecution personally. (First they came for the rave clubs, and I didn't say much, because I'm not a raver . . . but then they came for the rock 'n roll clubs, and I got REALLY PISSED OFF.)

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Wednesday, January 26

A roundabout afternoon of browsing that started off as a search for a new P. G. Wodehouse quote (best so far: "You would not have liked Nietzsche, sir. He is fundamentally unsound," from Jeeves Takes Charge) led me to what is probably the best stage direction I've ever read, from Act I, Scene III of A Winter's Tale:

Exit, pursued by a bear.

It's beautiful. It's perfect. I'll treasure it forever. I'll put it in all my plays. In fact, it perfectly describes one of the misadventures of a certain spectacularly death-wishy friend from college and an ill-fated camping trip . . . .

 (4:57 PM | #)

Here's a Village Voice review of Delany's last two books. I like the picture of him--it looks like his beard has gotten even bigger and turned almost completely white. Cool.

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New Samuel Delany article on New York in 3000. At some point I'll put up all sorts of Delany resources and stuff. He's god, you know. Some day. Meantime, go here. From breaching the web, by way of the new blogger search engine.

 (11:47 AM | #)

Watching my company's stock go up and down. Whee! It's been loserville for so long that it's kind of nice . . .

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Etoys loses to Etoy. Yay!

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Tuesday, January 25

It's Burn's Night. Grab a glass of scotch and refer to poem on the left re: maligned Scottish dish. Thank you.

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Skiffy??

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Oh, and she also wrote a short story intended for a Sandman anthology. Tori Amos fans (mutter mutter lyrics mutter whining mutter mutter Morissey) take note.

 (2:15 PM | #)

Karawynn Long is very, very cool. I've wandered across her personal and professional sites before, and eventually figured out that she was the author of a certain short SF (or 'skiffy') story about Deaf culture that I read a long time ago. Calling fiction you like 'unforgettable' is normally a cliche, but I read so much and remember so poorly that for a single story to have stuck so firmly in my head-- so that every time I think about or hear about Deaf people or culture (which, admittedly, isn't that often) a little capsule version of it leaps into my forebrain--is pretty impressive.

I ought to go find a copy of the story somewhere and read it again. Anyway, unsurprisingly she's a bit of a web celebrity and web techie. Equally unsuprisingly, she lives in Seattle. Surprisingly, she hasn't written a whole lot since--it seems she's been working on a novel (based on the aforementioned story) for some time now. I hope she finishes it soon.

 (1:42 PM | #)

I miss snow.

 (11:44 AM | #)

So, yesterday some big pile of intergalactic angst hit me direct in the small of the back, just as we got home from work. Ugh. Ego was propped up somewhat by the careful application of some pizza and a light movie (movie courtesy of kozmo, a recent discovery that may mean the end of any pretense of social life on our part).

The movie helped a little, it was weaker than I remembered, but I'm a sucker for "and at the last second, the cast pulls together and puts on the performance of their lives" type stories. And Shakespeariana. But I'm wondering what the hell is the matter with me (other than the damn rain which only stopped this morning). Even a damn Mercedes Lackey novel was giving me the "what am I doing with my life" jeebies.

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Monday, January 24

Oh, btw, the knee feels better. Yay!

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Ryuichi Sakamoto has an online diary, from valerie.

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Sunday, January 23

Er, make that *now*.

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Friday, January 21

There is no better paragon of fecklessness than Bertie Wooster. With that in mind, we'll be having Bertie quotes out our snifters, starting now.

 (9:11 PM | #)

Stephen Fry on P.G. Wodehouse, from prolific.

Wherever lovers of Wodehouse cluster together, they fall into debate about whether it is the Jeeves stories or the Blandings stories that take the trophy as Wodehouse's greatest achievements. The group will, of course, dispel, muttering embarrassedly, for they know that such questions are as pointless as wondering whether God did a better job with the Alps or the Rockies. The question is bound to be asked, however, because each time you read another Blandings story, the sublime nature of that world is such as to make you gasp.

 (4:19 PM | #)

Oh. That's why. The next line is:

Everyone avoids me like a cyclone ranger

Cyclone ranger ---> Power ranger. Logical. I feel better now.

 (11:41 AM | #)

So I've got a certain 80's song about transforming into a person from a small island in Asia in my head, except that the line about "everyone around me is a total stranger" has somehow morphed into "everyone around me is a Power Ranger." I kind of like it better that way.

 (11:37 AM | #)

Oh, my good god dear lord. Ben hates me. I know this, because he keeps buying me drinks at 1984 until I'm all toasty. Which leads to sucky Friday mornings, I must say. Ow.

 (11:34 AM | #)

Thursday, January 20

I'm going to repost the first few non-bloggered entries here so they can be properly archived and stuff.

Apologies for the non-strict chronology.

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January 13th, 2000

We decided to sleep in an extra two hours today, on the grounds that we wanted to. This was a brilliant decision, as it involved:

1. extra sleep
2. eggs & bacon & coffee for breakfast
3. deciding to walk from Church & Market to Embarcadero (work) instead of taking Muni. Walking is good. Seeing the entertaining people between 7th and 5th is good. Fresh(ish) air is good.

Thus, a Thursday is made more tolerable.

Kitty manifesto!.

I want this book now.

January 12th, 2000

(from das_uberswank)

Also: I took a corner too fast coming back from lunch and whanged by knee against a huge, badly placed, marble flower pot. Now every time I bend my knee at anything but the exact right angle, it goes all OWOWOWOWOWO on me until a put everything back into place.

--james

January 10th, 2000

Peterme just (re)introduced me to Malcolm Gladwell, and Malcolm Gladwell introduced me to Lois Weisberg. (Note for Peter: Weisberg. Not Weinberg.)

Lois is a type -- a particularly rare and extraordinary type, but a type nonetheless. She's the type of person who seems to know everybody, and this type can be found in every walk of life. Someone I met at a wedding (actually, the wedding of the daughter of Lois's neighbors, the Newbergers) told me that if I ever went to Massapequa I should look up a woman named Marsha, because Marsha was the type of person who knew everybody. In Cambridge, Massachusetts, the word is that a tailor named Charlie Davidson knows everybody. In Houston, I'm told, there is an attorney named Harry Reasoner who knows everybody.

Gladwell thinks that these people run the world--or at least hold it together--and I think he's right. Unfortunately, I don't know anyone like that.

January 9th, 2000

Fecklessness is a state of mind. Fecklessness is a path not a goal. Fecklessness is doing the dishes when you really don't have to, just because you like doing dishes sometimes. Fecklessness is buying cheap fuzzy gray slippers at Payless. Come to think of it, fecklessness is fuzzy. Fecklessness is not necessarily gray, though. Fecklessness has nothing to do with 'slack' or 'slackers'. In fact, fecklessness has never seen Slackers. Fecklessness might be slouching around in a coffeeshop, but only if there's a really tasty mocha involved. No laptop will be present, not with fecklessness. Maybe a book, but more likely a magazine. Magazines are very feckless. Content without commitment. George one day, the Economist the next , (Fecklessness flirts with seriousness--but only because seriousness looks cute in glasses), maybe Joe, but not Joe in Starbucks. The Guardian in Starbucks. Because that's fecklessness.

Fecklessness is also mucking about with websites when you should be doing Java homework.

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 (8:06 PM | #)

Jamie Zawinski has apparently been in the process of buying the DNA Lounge for some time now. I was recently forwarded a note from him asking for support in keeping the DNA's late-night permit. I wrote a letter in support--I live a few blocks away, and I've been massively worried about losing nightclubs and venues in SoMa. It makes me happy to see other SoMa folks doing something about it. If you live or club in San Francisco and can make it, you should come to the hearing on Fenruary 2nd at City Hall. It'll be fun, really.

 (8:02 PM | #)

Wednesday, January 19

Your "favorite pop stars made into a tiny thing!" -- Minipops!

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Tuesday, January 18

I think I've got it now. More changes and stuff later, when I'm not supposed to be at work.

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Ok, what's up with this crazy indentation? Day 1, Part III.

 (11:44 AM | #)

Testing the blog thing with a shiny new template. Day 1, part II.

 (11:42 AM | #)

Testing the blog thing. Day 1.

 (11:32 AM | #)