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- November 29, 2004
Otto, by Duncan
November 29, 2004Read more
Duncan has a new camera, and he sent me this awesome shot of his cat Otto. I like the dour, slightly frowning expression and raised paw. It sort of reminds me of Hobbes when he’s in “stuffed animal” mode. The slightly sinister underlighting and angle is also reminiscent of Repo Man. Yet, Otto retains a fundamental cuteness as his birthright…behold, the power of furriness!
Photo by Duncan Hsu.
- November 27, 2004
West Coast Kitties
November 27, 2004Read more
I visited Leng & Lisa recently, and got to spend some time with their cats Tobey and Bon Bon. That’s Tobey up there. I can’t remember Bon Bon’s real name…Leng, help!
Tobey was a hard cat to know. He tolerated my presence and occassional petting.
Bon Bon, on the other hand, was a very persistent and vocal cat. I had several length conversations with him. “Meow”, I would say, and he would quickly respond with a “meow!” of his own! We could go back and forth, modulating our tones in response to the previous meow. His meow reminded me of an old jewish man from New York who’d spent a lot of time smoking and drinking martinis back in the 1940s.
Bon Bon is also very dog-like in that he liked to be roughhoused. You couldn’t pick him up because he doesn’t drop very well due to age and weight. He also had very interesting white wiskers that showed up in stark contrast to his face. He resembled a seal or walrus at times, beached on top of the bed meowing for attention.
- November 25, 2004
Salvation for Bananas
November 25, 2004Read more
I was at ActiveEdge during lunch the other day, when Diane discovered that her banana had been fatally bruised at the supermarket. The irresponsible fruit wranglers at Shaw’s had apparently used handling techniques that left no marks on the outer skin while doing massive internal damage, marring the inner fruit with scabbrous mushy brown spots. Diane ranted righteously for a few minutes, then consumed the remaining edible parts with an air of resignation.
It’s pure serendipity that I stumbled upon the BananaGuard on BoingBoing this Thanksgiving morning. A sturdy plastic shell keeps your banana safe from harm. It won’t protect your fruit from the nameless torturers in the back of the supermarket, but remember: vigillance starts at home! :-)
- November 25, 2004
- November 23, 2004
The Shape of Music
November 23, 2004Read moreJeff over at Scintus passes along yet another fascinating link regarding the structure of music. Special software reads a MIDI file (a form of digital music transcription) and draws arcs to connect repeated sections. Most music has repetition in some form, and it’s fascinating to see how classical, pop, and modern music have strikingly different patterns.
The visualization itself is graphically quite interesting, but I find myself wishing that I could also hear the accompanying passage, or see some additional color coding. It would also be interesting to assign mood colors to particular chords or ascending / descending progressions, but the visualization would probably look pretty chaotic. Another thing that bugs me about the visualization is how the height of the arc tends to perhaps overdramatize its role in the music, but still it’s pretty cool.
