Life in the Trenches

Most life is fundamentally based on chemical warfare.

Amen, Bro!

http://www.piyooshrai.com/2014/04/lessons-for-father-who-do-you-work-for.html

A Life is to be LIVED, not built or managed.

http://www.psmag.com/navigation/business-economics/leaning-out-sheryl-sandberg-women-career-work-78360/

and...

http://www.psmag.com/navigation/business-economics/will-ever-able-enjoy-shorter-work-week-78891/

Some of my favorite art is science

Stumbled upon this quick little post of a presentation by Jonathan Corum, Science Graphics Editor at the New York Times, entitled The Weight of Rain.

It's a beautifully succinct and touching overview of how he has struggled to create meaningful visualizations of science efforts such as the explorations of the Mars Curiosity Rover .....

or the Kepler Search for Habitable Planets survey.

Well worth the quick read.

Fecund Destruction

“It is almost banal to say so yet it needs to be stressed continually: all is creation, all is change, all is flux, all is metamorphosis."

 - Henry Miller

A Beautiful Visualization of Air Traffic Over Europe

This isn't just a wonderful visualization of something right over our heads all the time...so much so that we take it for granted, it's beautiful just as art:

http://nats.aero/blog/2014/03/europe-24-air-traffic-data-visualisation/

Holstee Manifesto

From the Holstee Manifesto...

"...Life is about the people you meet, and the things you create with them. So go out and start creating."

Seems Confusing To Call It the "Second First Friday Salon." Hmm?

I've decided I want to start an art club.  It turns out I'm not getting enough time sipping shiraz out of a paper cup and smoking a filterless cigarette that gently litters light grey ashes across my "Hades midnight" (black) organic cotton turtleneck.  Life is too short.

Ok, actually it's not really an art club, it's an artists' club.  Yep, I've been hitting the Seth Godin kool-aid again.

The idea, in it's beta version was released to the public during a delightful evening of beers, food, and conversation with two of the most genuine and admirable guys I know: Mike Proctor and Steve Hathaway.  The seed for that idea was planted by a lunch outing with my ex-boss and friend, Mark Swift just hours prior.  My brain-to-mouth turn-time is amazing, eh?  "Fuck it, Ship it!"

Initially, the idea was to form a monthly gathering of friends....just an assortment of the interesting, impressive, admirable, wickedly smart people that I've been blessed to have stumble on to my life's stage. Poor bastards!

You see, after returning from Mexico (and accentuated by our too-brief visit back to Oaxaca in January), Meredith and I have felt the withdrawal of no more fiestas de amigos. In Mexico we spent a good chunk of time in each month just hanging out with our friends - talking, making/enjoying music, drinking, laughing and saying God-only-knows-what to them in our half-assed Spanish.  Yet, here in the "Land of the Free, Home of the Brave" we have spent less time over seven months than we did there in any given month doing anything similar to those Mexican social gatherings. HELL, I spend more time in my fucking car in traffic each week than I do truly, actively "in" my friendships!!

Perhaps, I could see more of my friends (and they could see more of each other) if I made it a bit more "scheduled."  Nothing more formal than a happy-hour after work would at least be something...if not the first step towards something even more "real," and intimate, and meaningful.

Many years ago....ok, MANY, MANY years ago, my girlfriend and I started something similar.  Most of us were in our twenties and dispersing geographically across the metro area.  News was slow to make the rounds. Job changes and relationship changes could happen and once-close friends might found out only months later via some shared contact.

This wasn't just pre-Facebook. This was pre-(public)-Internet, BITCHES!!!!

We started the First Friday social club and convinced enough people to join us for cocktails and appetizers and, most importantly, conversation, on that designated evening each month.  We emphasized it wasn't a party or a dining event. It was a chance to catch up with a special group of people.....friends who had many years together.....friends who were now noticing that life was pulling them apart and the bonds would wither without some effort.

Eventually, we started rotating the location among the homes of the participants.  And it grew.  And, I believe, it became a meaningful event to all of us. Time marched on and more changes came and went just like the seasons.

So, I want to do it again.  I want to spend more time hearing the thoughts and laughter of the clever, funny people I know.  I want to see what happens when those who don't know each other make acquaintances. I want to share more of the nifty, amazing, awe-inspiring, silly, inspiring things I stumble across.  And I want my friends to do the same so we can determine if maybe these types of honest intimacy are the true jewels we ignore in the crazy-lust of consumerism that seems to be America. Thus, it's time for a new salon!

More details to follow.  In the meantime, Id love to hear your thoughts on starting, conducting or nurturing the growth of a salon? Care to join us?

Mexican (duh!) Fireworks - Dias de San Felipe del Agua

So the last week our town of San Felipe has been having one of its bigger celebrations.  The highlight of this week is the night with fireworks.  Every Mexican celebration has explosions (e.g. firecrackers, pop-bottle rockets, flash-bang mortars) but these are fireworks that are colorful.

Besides the carnival in the town square (with rides for kids and games such as "toss the ring on the bottle"), there are bands on the bandstand with couples dancing in the streets, and food & drink stands.  But mainly it's everybody getting together in the town square watching people and talking with friends and neighbors...and a heavy dose of passing around mezcal bottles....though not as much as during the winter celebrations it seemed.

We joined our neighbors in the square a bit after 7:30 pm and passed the time playing, eating, drinking and talking.  We were hoping they'd start the fireworks around midnight and we'd be home by 1am.  We ended up getting home around 4am.

Here are some videos from different celebrations years ago to give you an idea of what we watched once the fireworks started.

Around 1am they started the "dancing with the bulls and angels."  The crowd gathers around and people take turns putting these handmade contraptions on their heads.  The sparks fly everywhere, sometimes burning items shoot off into the crowd (as we are all gathered right around the "performance area"), and all the bulls and angels include whistles and explosions in addition to the colored sparkles.  In this video the crowd is nowhere as pressed in as last night. In addition, there was usually at least two figurines dancing while zero to six helpers danced with and taunted the "bulls" (as you'll see some do in this video). The bull & angel dancing went on here last night way too long.  Maybe 50-60 of these as we waited for the grand finale: El Castillo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flmQBL6pliQ

This next video really doesn't do justice to seeing a castillo going off. It starts with more "bull dancing" and the castillo fires up at around 1:58min. The whole thing is on a tower maybe thirty to forty feet high with the crowd gathered around its base as close as they dare with all the falling sparks. For us that means they are maybe six to ten feet from it.  Kids on their parents' shoulders, babies sleeping against their mother's bosom, town drunks sleeping against a lamp-post base all right up in the mix of it all. As always in Mexico, there is zero concern for personal safety...life is short and God will decide if yours should be shorter (or completed sans eye or limb).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2QpL7iEh5E

Gilbert Construction's New Web Site

My cousin's residential remodeling business has a new Web site. Check it out. Gilbert Construction & Remodeling = www.GilbertRemodel.com

When to use a Long Cage vs Short Cage Derailleur? Ask Speedub.Nate

Time to buy a new rear derailler (yes, derailler. I speak English, not French - i.e. "derailleur"). Stoopid rock! Wait, mountains are made of rock. Ok, stupid loose rock with a bad attitude. So do I need a long, medium or short cage Derailler? Well no better answer to that question than the one posted by Speedub.Nate on MTBR.com http://forums.mtbr.com/drivetrain-shifters-derailleurs-cranks/when-use-long-cage-vs-short-cage-derailleur-205890.html You da man, Speedub.Nate!

It's a small world after all. It's a small world after all. It's a small, small world.

But it seems to have taken a hell of a lot to get only part way across said globe.  Yes, my family and I have finally made it to our new home in San Felipe del Agua, Oaxaca, Mexico
(i.e. http://maps.google.com/maps?q=5+al+paraque+comunal,+san+felipe+del+agua,+oaxaca,+mexico&hl=en&sll=17.113487,-96.71019&sspn=0.005875,0.009634&vpsrc=0&t=h&z=16 ). 

My wife and son are doing the American-in-Mexico blog thang (which some say is soooo cliche and passe) so I'll leave it to them to fill in the background and details on what the hell we are doing here:

      http://OaxacaBraeden.BlogSpot.com/
      http://MexicoMeredith.BlogSpot.com/ 

Been trying to get up to speed on base things here (e.g. buying food, getting around a city of 250K with no car, learning basic Spanish phrases (e.g. ¿el baño, por favor? ).  More pointless drivel (but with a focus on Mexico and such) from yours truly in the days to come.

Scroll the Office 2007 Word Ribbon

Doh! I just realized you can scroll through the Office 2007 ribbon's tabs by putting your cursor anywhere in the ribbon and rolling your mousewheel. Cool!

Discovering bacteria’s amazing communication system (Bonnie Bassler)