Assorted Notes

I should still be asleep. Inexplicably woke up at 5am (out of a decent dream, i might add - sigh), spent two hours failing to drift back off, finally gave up; rolled out of bed and made coffee. What does one do this early in the morning (on a virtual Saturday, no less)? This reminds me of when this same thing happened during (i think) my senior year of college. I was so annoyed at the lost sleep that i refused to do anything useful; instead i sat around and watched Sailor Moon.

I lieu of dubbed anime (i prefer subtitles, hmmph!), i thought i'd catch up on some writing.

Spent yesterday walking around San Francisco with a group of friends (and new friends) - one of my coworkers led a "city hike" as he called it. We started in the Mission District and took a scenic route up to Twin Peaks. I really enjoyed finally getting a non-touristy view of the city, passing through various neighborhoods and spectacular viewpoints. It's way too easy to forget that i now live in the proximity of viewpoints like this:




It felt like a summer day, but apparently it was autumn on this street:


And a shot from Twin Peaks (we arrived right around sunset):


I'll post the rest of my photos on Facebook (probably later today).

The exercise itself felt great (we covered maybe 6-7 miles total) and also satisfied my recent craving for some quality outdoor time. We're so spoiled on the weather out here, there's no excuse for wasting it. Also provided much-needed motivation to start organizing group hikes again. I have a growing list of bay area trails i want to hit, and enough people in the group expressed interest in joining. Rock.

We ended up getting dinner at this ah-MAZing sandwich shop in the Castro called Ike's Place. (To those of you who live in the city, it's near 16th and Sanchez - go eat there, you will not be disappointed.) I went with a simple turkey and ham with brie and a touch of pesto, served hot on a whole wheat sub roll. Mmm, that sandwich was so good - i wish i was eating it right now.

...

Hmm, what else. I finally got my shredder this week and started tearing through the boxes of ancient bills and bank statements that i saved for no good reason. Last year i finally went paperless, at least as much as possible. E-statements from all of my banks, e-bills for everything supported. I started using online billpay years ago (greatest thing since sliced bread). I still get paper bills from a few of my utilities ("Looks like someone's living in the past! Contemporiiizzee, man!") as well as health insurance and other stuff, so i've established a 3-year retention policy for such rubbish. Everything for a given year gets dumped into an Amazon box; after 3 years the whole box gets introduced to my new friend:


(Feeeed me!)


Speaking of new, inanimate friends, i finally got around to building the data storage solution i've wanted for years:


The enclosure is the cute little D-Link DNS-321; it plugs right into my router so i can access it anywhere inside my network. I'm running 2 Terabytes of hard drives in a RAID-1 configuration (full redundancy, so if one drive crashes, all of my data is still preserved on the other). FINALLY, my data is safe - finally i can sleep at night, knowing that all of my irreplaceable photos, email, and journal entries will no longer eat it if my Seagate dies. Now my only threat is fire (my next step will be to stash an external drive in a safe-deposit box).

Ok, off to get some more coffee, then get some work done, and then hopefully be tired enough for a nap. Happy Sunday, everyone! T-minus 2 days!

Moby -- "Play" [Album Retrospective Series]

I listened to Moby's album "Play" today, and it got me thinking about how long it took me to warm up to his music. Indeed, it took a series of significant events which spanned a number of years. Anyone care to travel through time with me? *Wayne & Garth effects: diddly-ooh, diddly-ooh, diddly-ooh*



1999
"Play" hits the shelves; i'm unfamiliar with Moby and don't really notice.

2000
[East Lansing, MI] I see the video for "Natural Blues" on MTV and enjoy it (partly because the song is good, but also because i have a crush on Christina Ricci). But it's just a one-off; i'm not really inspired to go looking for more of his songs.

2001
[Champaign-Urbana, IL] "South Side" hits the airwaves. Another one-off for me; i like the song at first, but after approximately 1 skillion viewings of the video (back then i used to watch MTV in the mornings while getting ready for work) it plays out. I lose interest in the song (and Moby by extension).

2002-2004
I continue to be indifferent to Moby.

2005
Someone (i'm assuming Marc or Kurt) plays "Natural Blues" towards the end of a Thursday night swing dance. The lights are turned down, providing a nice-feeling atmosphere which fits the song perfectly. I dance the song with Tessa, and it is rich and mellow and awesome. It's one of those where you manage to really *connect* with your partner and the music and border on transcending reality. During the song, Tessa says to me "Dancing with you is like zen". This later leads my friends to refer to her as "Zen Girl". But i digress. Major points for "Natural Blues" (and Moby by extension).

2006
Rosana and Drew use "Run On" in their intro to blues class. I quickly fall in love with the song (i'd managed to go this entire time without hearing it). More points for Moby - enough to draft a bid for me to break down and buy the cd.

I tell the "Run On" story to Melissa while we're at Za's for dinner. By coincidence, there's another Moby song playing at that very moment - a lovely mellow tune which Melissa recognizes as either "Porcelain" or "Everloving" (she couldn't remember which). She gives me a copy of both songs; "Porcelain" was the one playing at Za's and i quickly fall for that one too.

Critical mass achieved, i finally buy Moby's album "Play" on February 24th, 2006. At first i only really liked about half of the songs, but the rest have been growing on me ever since.

2008 In Review

I'm not sure how to summarize what 2008 was for me. A lot of things happened; good times and bad; personal progress & accomplishments offset by setbacks and failure. Perhaps it was a year of laying groundwork - calibrating my attitude, gathering tools, identifying what i need to do. Settling into a new town, trying things & seeing what works. Trying to heal & rebuild my life.

Time seems to pass more quickly with each day, yet i feel like 2008 was a long year.

...

The Good:

- Made some new friends, reconnected with old ones. Special thanks to Facebook for faciliating a lot of this (read "saving my social life").

- Finally started to build an online presence, mostly with Facebook, Twitter, and my blog.

- Live music is one of my passions, so it's pretty awesome to be able to catch so many of my bands when they come through San Francisco (as opposed to the 3-4 hour drive to Chicago from Champaign). Before i moved here, i was able to hit about 4 shows per year. In 2008 i attended 18 (more on that in an upcoming post).

- Started up made progress on a personal project.

- Started following news, current events, and politics to the point where i no longer feel clueless. Huge thanks to NPR for keeping me in the loop, especially KQED's Forum.

- The Floor of Dreams Lindy Exchange, back home in Champaign-Urbana. One of the best weekends i've ever had, at a time when i desperately needed the boost. After wondering if i'd lost swing dancing forever (more on that below), it was it was a relief to find that it was still possible for dancing to be good. To *feel* good. And having so many wonderful friends welcome me home with open arms just elevated the experience into the realms of overwhelming.

- Speaking of overwhelming, it was wonderful to reconnect with and strengthen ties with some close family friends and their kids over holiday break. Not only did my mom and i host dinner on Christmas as planned, but i ended up spending 6 days straight with some or all of them. 3 families, 7 kids total ranging from 4 to 12 years old; i've known them almost from when they were born - they're growing up fast! Hanging out with my little friends reminded me what life is about. Photos on Facebook.


The Bad:

- The thing which i've struggled to come to terms which but is still on my mind most of the time. I don't want to talk about it, and i'm sure you guys are tired of hearing it. Thus, i'll leave it at that.

- Lost the time & place for swing dancing. FDLX notwithstanding, i did not dance at all in 2008. I did check out a few local swing dance scenes after moving here, but i found myself not enjoying them much so i slowly stopped going. I considered the depressing possibility that i was just done with dance, but FDLX strenuously disproved that. I must revisit this issue in 2009.


The Ugly:

- Made good progress with diet & exercise, but then hit a wall and eventually regressed to being a lazy fatass.

- Managed to stop watching tv entirely for most of the year, but then went on like a month-long bender with the Olympics, Netflix, and whatever crap i could find on broadcast. Back to the old pattern of wasting hours every night watching useless stuff. Need to re-establish a balance - just follow the few shows i actually care about (Fringe, Heroes, Lost, How I Met Your Mother), and free up the remaining time for useful stuff.

- Started rock climbing; took a class at Planet Granite, got into a nice climbing routine, making noticable improvements, and had a nice synergy with my (then) workout routine. Then my belay partner ditched me; went through a couple of flakey belay partners before finally giving up.

...

I'm working on a goal package for 2009 which i may or may not post here. I'm trying to address all of the Bad and Ugly items above, but i'm also trying hard to make my goals realistic, and to prioritize so i can actually make things happen without failing halfiway through or regressing a few months later. Stay tuned.