Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Who Are You?
Sometimes I can loose sight of who I am.
I am not my job.
I am not my hobbies.
I am a father.
A husband.
A human being.
but that is still not who I am. Maybe someday I will figure it all out, but for now...
I'll just have to be me.
I am not my job.
I am not my hobbies.
I am a father.
A husband.
A human being.
but that is still not who I am. Maybe someday I will figure it all out, but for now...
I'll just have to be me.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Making connections
Recently I watched this video which is mostly uneventful but you can see the excitement of the artist when he listens to "some random guy"... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFjc1nOHwlc
what interests me the most about this is the randomness of the connection made between two artists (deadmau5) and (Chris James).
Here is the sound cloud link that Chris James Sent to deadmau5 http://soundcloud.com/chrisjamesofficial/deadmau5-theveldt-vocal-mix
Alone the instrumental track is somewhat interesting, it's calm, kind of sad or melancholic in nature, but also repetitive. The vocals compliment the instrumental track so much it evokes emotional feelings in me. Maybe it's because I also read the short story by Ray Bradbury (which can be found here http://www.veddma.com/veddma/Veldt.htm) and that as a parent I can relate to the story.
what interests me the most about this is the randomness of the connection made between two artists (deadmau5) and (Chris James).
Here is the sound cloud link that Chris James Sent to deadmau5 http://soundcloud.com/chrisjamesofficial/deadmau5-theveldt-vocal-mix
Alone the instrumental track is somewhat interesting, it's calm, kind of sad or melancholic in nature, but also repetitive. The vocals compliment the instrumental track so much it evokes emotional feelings in me. Maybe it's because I also read the short story by Ray Bradbury (which can be found here http://www.veddma.com/veddma/Veldt.htm) and that as a parent I can relate to the story.
Monday, March 19, 2012
The Veldt
A Short story by Ray Bradbury.
A musical interest I have composed a piece of music inspired by this short story, it's an interesting story and if you've never heard of it you should google it and do some more reading. To me music is about creating an emotion, a feeling that the audience might get while listening, or it can be about conveying an idea or thought
Happy life, full of machines all around the room.
look what they made, they made it for me, happy technology.
So in love with the way we are, here.
A Short story by Ray Bradbury.
A musical interest I have composed a piece of music inspired by this short story, it's an interesting story and if you've never heard of it you should google it and do some more reading. To me music is about creating an emotion, a feeling that the audience might get while listening, or it can be about conveying an idea or thought
Happy life, full of machines all around the room.
look what they made, they made it for me, happy technology.
So in love with the way we are, here.
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Climbing indoors and building some holds of my own.
I've been doing some indoor rock climbing lately and really enjoying the challenges both physically and mentally that present themselves while pursing this new(ish) hobby. One of the things that has intrigued me lately is the quality and types of holds that I haven encountered while climbing indoors.
Based on my limited experience I plan on making some climbing holds of my own first with some Resin based holds and foam shaped originals to give to my local gym. Its kind of an experiment to see if I can create something that route setters will find fun to use and possibly give them some options they might not have had while route setting previously.
If I'm not too lazy i'll try to take some pictures of different stages of the process to post here at a later date, for now I'm working in my mind and on paper conceptualizing some thoughts and ideas to start to shape this weekend hopefully.
later.
Based on my limited experience I plan on making some climbing holds of my own first with some Resin based holds and foam shaped originals to give to my local gym. Its kind of an experiment to see if I can create something that route setters will find fun to use and possibly give them some options they might not have had while route setting previously.
If I'm not too lazy i'll try to take some pictures of different stages of the process to post here at a later date, for now I'm working in my mind and on paper conceptualizing some thoughts and ideas to start to shape this weekend hopefully.
later.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Keeping life interesting
What is it that we strive for as human beings? People enjoy accomplishing things and being able to say, yeah I did that... but what lies behind that basic human instinct to push ourselves? Is it our competitive nature, the yearning for new adventures, or is it something more deeper then that?
recently I've picked up rock climbing at an indoor gym with my son, we go, do some climbs and I often think i'm pushing my son too much to climb harder grades then he believes he is capable of accomplishing. sometimes it's a struggle to get him to try a harder climb, i think his lack of interest in trying it is the sense of failure. we sometimes don't do things because we don't want to fail at it. Much like when you are young you don't ask out that girl because you don't think you have a chance, or that you don't want to get rejected. I believe the same thing happens in every other aspect of life, people don't try new or harder things because of the fear of failure.
the funny thing is even when we expect the worse and do fail there is always a sense of success when we try at those things, for example while climbing on Sunday we've climbed a bunch of 5.9 routes successfully and failed at some 5.10 routes that are just out of our technical know how and ability right now. But there is a 5.8 climb at the gym we go to that appears daunting, two good overhanging ledges. This route isn't technically difficult, however it is mentally and physically demanding to be able to get over these two overhangs. I gave it a go myself and almost got above the second overhang but yet failed. After my go at it, I convinced my son to give it a go and he did better then he expected and even had a look of satisfaction on his face that he accomplished something. That feeling of accomplishment is great, it will lead him to believe that he CAN do it and give it another try the next time that we go.
recently I've picked up rock climbing at an indoor gym with my son, we go, do some climbs and I often think i'm pushing my son too much to climb harder grades then he believes he is capable of accomplishing. sometimes it's a struggle to get him to try a harder climb, i think his lack of interest in trying it is the sense of failure. we sometimes don't do things because we don't want to fail at it. Much like when you are young you don't ask out that girl because you don't think you have a chance, or that you don't want to get rejected. I believe the same thing happens in every other aspect of life, people don't try new or harder things because of the fear of failure.
the funny thing is even when we expect the worse and do fail there is always a sense of success when we try at those things, for example while climbing on Sunday we've climbed a bunch of 5.9 routes successfully and failed at some 5.10 routes that are just out of our technical know how and ability right now. But there is a 5.8 climb at the gym we go to that appears daunting, two good overhanging ledges. This route isn't technically difficult, however it is mentally and physically demanding to be able to get over these two overhangs. I gave it a go myself and almost got above the second overhang but yet failed. After my go at it, I convinced my son to give it a go and he did better then he expected and even had a look of satisfaction on his face that he accomplished something. That feeling of accomplishment is great, it will lead him to believe that he CAN do it and give it another try the next time that we go.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
procrastination
sometimes I disgust myself with my own laziness. I hate procrastinating.
If only we could wage a war against poverty, then there would be LOTS of money thrown to it's cause.
according to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead-war-on-terror-costs_n_856390.html the US has spent 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror from 9/11/2001 till the death of Osama Bin Laden.
the current US population is around 307 million.
based on these numbers alone we have spent 4,169 dollars per person in the US on the war on Terror. what would happen if we gave the 1.27 trillion dollars spent on the war to people living in poverty.
according to wikipedia the current percentage of the US population living in poverty is 15% that is a bit more then 46,000,000 million people living under the poverty level in the US alone!
those numbers are STAGGERING! so if we hadn't spent the 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror we could have instead given that money to people living in poverty almost 28,000 dollars per person. What would that amount mean to an individual living in poverty? what would it mean to you?
So where did that money come from in the first place? The answer to that question is not clear cut, but some research will show that it came from taxes being paid, existing federal programs being cut of funds it used to get, and the list goes on.
What other money is the federal government spending on "wars"? we also have the war on drugs that is an active, ongoing, on NON-winnable war. according to http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock we spent over 15 billion dollars on this war in the year 2010 alone! if we look at money spent on it from when this war was started we have spent untold amounts. These efforts began over 3 decades ago!
here is a basic timeline on the war on Drugs http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/
Just thoughts i've had this morning.
If only we could wage a war against poverty, then there would be LOTS of money thrown to it's cause.
according to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead-war-on-terror-costs_n_856390.html the US has spent 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror from 9/11/2001 till the death of Osama Bin Laden.
the current US population is around 307 million.
based on these numbers alone we have spent 4,169 dollars per person in the US on the war on Terror. what would happen if we gave the 1.27 trillion dollars spent on the war to people living in poverty.
according to wikipedia the current percentage of the US population living in poverty is 15% that is a bit more then 46,000,000 million people living under the poverty level in the US alone!
those numbers are STAGGERING! so if we hadn't spent the 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror we could have instead given that money to people living in poverty almost 28,000 dollars per person. What would that amount mean to an individual living in poverty? what would it mean to you?
So where did that money come from in the first place? The answer to that question is not clear cut, but some research will show that it came from taxes being paid, existing federal programs being cut of funds it used to get, and the list goes on.
What other money is the federal government spending on "wars"? we also have the war on drugs that is an active, ongoing, on NON-winnable war. according to http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock we spent over 15 billion dollars on this war in the year 2010 alone! if we look at money spent on it from when this war was started we have spent untold amounts. These efforts began over 3 decades ago!
here is a basic timeline on the war on Drugs http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/
Just thoughts i've had this morning.
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