Origins: The Hassinger Street Anomaly

I was transmuting the observation of computer guru Alan Kay in his 1984 essay on computer programming, where he wrote, "the gene's way to get a cat to catch mice is to program the cat to play -- and let the mice teach the rest."  That pretty much describes learning in general.  Throw in a couple of beers, and you have a wonderful description of how adult humans learn.

The beers are for dulling the steep pain of the learning curve as well as supplying an enthusiasm beyond that which actually has a reason to exist.  Anyway, the question at hand was, if kids and dumb-looking adults knew how to use iMovie (the "easy" video software that came with my computer), how cum I didn't?  Well, of course, it may have been because I had never tried learning how to work it.  Time to bust out some beers.

That describes the origin of the following, the video in which I learned some iMovie buttons as well as the "mounting to YouTube" ritual.  I would like to call it something "beyond that which is known to man; a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity; the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition; something lying between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge."  But I can't.  Because that's the Twilight Zone.  Which I watched as a kid and is a place I still inhabit.  Apparently.

The interesting thing is that the Hassinger Street Anomaly actually does exist.  I walked past it again this very afternoon.  There is an open area in front that creates an inadvertent mini-park for the neighborhood moms and their semi-ambulatory kids.  Anyway... this is how we live in Makiki...

-- H. Doug Matsuoka

30 August 2010

Makiki, Honolulu

"You just like the way her voice sounds." Teresia Teaiwa and Sia Figiel -- Terenesia reissued

CD cover (click to enlarge)

I was on the phone with my ex-wife one night in 1999, explaining the project I was working on with Richard Hamasaki (aka red flea) and poets Teresia Teaiwa and Sia Figiel.  I played her a rough mix of Teaiwa's "Recognition" thinking she would understand that this project was more than the just the recording of a poet's recitation.  With a certain cold disdain she responded: "You just like the way her voice sounds." 

The ever so esoteric "virtual fleality" digitally reissued

Chapbook/CD cover (click to enlarge)

Recorded, mixed, mastered, and produced over a long period of successive alternate Saturdays in 1995 and 1996, "virtual fleality" was released in 1996.  The original (and only) run of 300 CDs, each with a handmade 28 page chapbook, is long gone.  It is hereby officially reissued in digital form for distribution to the literary and musical denizens of this new era.  Virtual fleality is available at the iTunes Store, Amazon, etc.  What is virtual fleality?  

Hi, it's me

I wonder if anyone goes back and reads the very first post of a blog.  You think? I may track down the first posts of the blogs I follow just to see what they were like.  In fact, that may be an interesting entry in itself.

Before I post this entry, I'll delete all the test entries I made in the past few days.  You have to test your blog by emailing in posts, posting pics etc. to see how things look.  It's made for some goofy posts -- you had to have been there.  The digital realm is a fluid one, and unlike a medieval manuscript, this blog will no doubt undergo vast changes in appearance and content over night.  I can change the content of any post on my blog any time I want.  That doesn't seem right for something chronologically based, but that's how it is.

I will be leaving the entry "Ganesha" as the first official post.  It really deserves to be The First Post.

I'm hoping this blog will develop into something useful beyond itself.  It should exist as a node in the network as well as a gathering point and launching point.  Hmmm, a bit abstract but you'll see as we go along.

There are a number of posts that will appear these coming days that will allow me to introduce myself -- so you can get an idea of where all this is coming from -- but I also mention that this is most definitely coming from a place.  Buddha counseled not to consider any place your permanent abode, but this blog is currently emanating from the 11th floor condo where I live in the Makiki district of Honolulu.  I'll have much to say about my neighborhood in the the posts to come.

I have tons of pics just like this (click to enlarge)

I love the view and every morning I look outside and take the same damned picture.  But more to say later. 

Talk to you again soon.

Doug

P.S.  This blog is DougNote on twitter.  I couldn't find a Twitter gadget that looked okay.

Ganesha

(click pic to enlarge)

My brother dropped by and gave me this metal sculpture just the other day.  It's from a shop in San Francisco that now occupies the place my grandfather Atow Matsuoka had his shop before losing it in that fire sale of Japanese property during World War II.  I put Ganesha on my desk and the next day I started the earnest slogging required to light up a new blog.  It's the numbing labor of the set up with its formatting and tweaking, email from/to, moderation rules and all that pain-in-the-ass stuff that keeps you from starting.  Once you start going it ain't so bad.  In fact, once you start going it's hard to stop for the night and go to sleep.

Anyway, I just looked this up at Wikipedia: "Ganesha is widely revered as the Remover of Obstacles and more generally as Lord of Beginnings and Lord of Obstacles... He is honoured at the beginning of rituals and ceremonies and invoked as Patron of Letters during writing sessions."

Yup!

Link to Wikipedia entry for "Ganesha"