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| 01:28am 01/05/2010 | |||||||||||
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| Some of the Life Lessons... | |||
| 12:27am 29/03/2010 | |||
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...that I try to live by (I'm sure not 100% successfully ~ I'm only human and definitely not quite sane), ideally at least... (And I'm a programmer. We start counts with zero. :p) 0) "Very few people are truly unmitigated evil." There is a bit of good somewhere in most people one is likely to encounter, even if it is fairly miniscule, even though they may be a total jerk in many ways. I'm not saying you aren't totally justified in being angry with to even possibly profoundly hating people who hurt you or cause great harm in other ways, but this is a fairly good platform to start out with when encountering random people. 1) "Try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt." This does not mean being naive or unwary, this merely means ask yourself if you may be possibly be misunderstanding someone's actual intent. If people are not overtly showing hostility, it actually might mean none was intended. People do not always communicate very well, (Especially on the Internet!^^). They're only human. :p 2) "Don't take their word for it." Collecting information from other-people-A about other-people-B is quite valuable to helping figure out how to assess other-people-B. However, don't take what anyone* says about someone else as unalterable gospel. What they say is inevitably colored by their own experience, alliances, thought processes, et al. -- It may indeed be extremely reliable information, but look for your own further evidence as well.** 3) "Don't set your opinions in stone." Once you form an assessment of another person, particularly if it is a negative one, ALWAYS leave it open to revision. New information may come your way, and the picture may grow bigger. People are able to change - and your assessment should be able to change too. 4) "Think before you snub." Politeness is (99% of the time) paramount. Regardless of positive or negative assessments, it is best done to at least behave relatively cordially toward others in social situations (this includes online venues as well as face-to-face). Especially others who have not personally offended you yourself. (Or, if you can't bring yourself to be socially cordial, at least behave neutrally.) It is also not good form to base your behavior toward others on choosing sides in issues you are not a primary party of, even when you have a very clear concept of whose side you most likely support. (Example: unless you ARE Suchandsuch, "Soandso's bad relationship breakup with Suchandsuch" should not be a basis for you to behave impolite-to-nasty to Soandso, even if you happen to think Soandso was probably at fault (and maybe you even dislike Soandso.)) *(friend or foe of anyone, friend or foe of you, neutral 3rd party, etc. etc.) **What you say to others will be inevitably colored in the same manner too, and these others should also look for their own further evidence. Such is life. EDIT: Moving this post from 2006-03-29 to the top of my LJ. Because. |
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| Don't let this be your musical instrument! | ||||
| 12:57am 08/07/2009 | ||||
Here's the story: http://www.davecarrollmusic.com/story/u Professional musician Dave Carroll had his Taylor guitar destroyed by United Airlines' luggage monsters. They denied responsibility. Caroll promised to write and produce three songs about it and post them to YouTube. One down, two more to go. Not my usual listening fare, but I appreciate the sentiment and Dave Carroll’s commitment to getting his story heard. |
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| Petition in Support of Lt. Dan Choi - few hours left to sign | |||
| 07:57pm 29/06/2009 | |||
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You may have heard about this guy on the news. Just a few hours left to sign the petition, all who want to..... On Tuesday at 8 a.m., I will stand trial for speaking three truthful words: "I am gay." On Tuesday, I will face a panel of colonels who will decide whether or not to fire me -- to discharge me for "moral and professional dereliction" under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. On Tuesday, I will try to prove that it's not immoral to tell the truth. As an infantry officer, an Iraq combat veteran and a West Point graduate with a degree in Arabic, I refuse to lie to my commanders. I refuse to lie to my peers. I refuse to lie to my subordinates. My case requires that I provide personal testimony from people who can attest to my character. That's why several members of my military unit have written letters of support and offered to testify on my behalf. Now I need your help. ANYONE who believes the Army should not fire me can take a stand right now. I am bringing a statement of support to Tuesday's trial and I need you to add your signature to it. Will you support me by signing this statement before Tuesday? http://www.couragecampaign.org/SupportD Our armed forces are totally shooting themselves in the foot with this "Don't Ask / Don't Tell" farce. We NEED a lot more competent Arabic translators than we HAVE, and a lot have been lost to this dumbass idiotic homophobic policy. Forcing people to lie is the TRUE "moral and professional dereliction". |
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| Celebrity Death Day? | |||
| 04:47pm 25/06/2009 | |||
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We know about Farrah Fawcett's tragic illness and passing (Hope she and Ryan did manage the 11th-hour wedding they apparently were trying for) and Michael Jackson's unexpected....whatever-it-was. However, I'm not buying the "Jeff Goldblum's death from falling off a set in New Zealand" AND! "Harrison Ford's death" (how?) rumors unless they actually show up somewhere ON THE REAL NEWS, and not a stray empty / error link ganked from Google. Twitter is a powerful way to spread information fast. However, it is also a great method of spreading spurious and unsubstantiated information too. EDIT: I'm definitely calling HOAX on the Jeff Goldblum story. It's pretty much word-for-word the exact same rumor (fall from a set on the Kauri cliffs, 60 ft, 4:30 AM, etc.) that was being passed around about Tom Hanks in 2006 (see these links at Snopes.com: http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/hoaxes/to http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/hoaxes/cl |
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| OH NO NOT AGAIN. | |||
| 03:37pm 03/06/2009 | |||
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A senior at my daughter's HS committed suicide last night on the train tracks, same spot where a junior killed himself last month. This was a very nice, creative and artistic girl whom Elder Daughter knew from stage tech crew, who came over to our house and played video games with Elder Daughter the day after we got baby Morwyn-puppy. We will never know all the circumstances of what was going on in her life, family, etc. but that highly-competitive top-ranked high school is a pressure-cooker, and SOMETHING IS SERIOUSLY WRONG. (And that is the school our Youngest is supposed to go into this fall - a prospect that, knowing her vulnerabilities, already was scaring the heck out of me.) The students got their yearbooks today. This girl will never see the encouraging note and photos her parents had paid to have printed in the back of the book* as they prepared to send her off to NYU and her future.... *(parent messages is one of the ways the yearbook raises money) ......Can't take this anymore. |
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| A response to the Prop 8 ruling: repost of a friend's post | ||||||||||||||||||
| 03:06pm 26/05/2009 | ||||||||||||||||||
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First They Came, Martin Niemöller
Edited to add: Friedrich Gustav Emil Martin Niemöller (14 January 1892 – 6 March 1984) was a prominent German anti-Nazi theologian and Lutheran pastor. He is best known as the author of the poem First they came.... For his opposition to the Nazis' state control of the churches, Niemöller was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps from 1937 to 1945. He narrowly escaped execution and survived imprisonment. After his imprisonment, he expressed his deep regret about not having done enough to help the victims of the Nazis. |
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| Love your kids, and let them know it. Please. | ||||
| 05:23pm 05/05/2009 | ||||
After the exam, though, the students received an announcement which puts a difficult exam into perspective as one of those ultimately more trivial things in life. A student in her Statistics class committed suicide at 8:30 this morning on the train tracks. I can only imagine how this is devastating his parents, and his younger sister who is a freshman at the same high school. Please, if you have kids - go hug them, tell them you love them, and let them know they CAN (and please SHOULD) come to you for support and help when there is a problem, because NO problem is EVER truly so big that one cannot find some way out, get past it to a day of brighter promise, and make up for things in some way in life. |
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| TAIKO CONCERT UPDATES!! | |||
| 01:15am 16/04/2009 | |||
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________________________________________ SATURDAY, APRIL 18: City of Emeryville Earth Day Celebration at Temescal Creek Park Our performance is at 12:30pm for 30 minutes. The park is cleverly concealed between 47th and 53rd (48th thru 52nd don't exist/go thru) just west of Adeline. There's a pedestrian entrance on 47th (between 1014 and 1018 47th) and an entrance at Adeline and 47th. ________________________________________ SUNDAY, APRIL 19: Morgan Hill Haru Matsuri Festival and Taiko Expo (Yes, I KNOW "matsuri" means "festival" - and "haru" means "spring". ^^ ) - Emeryville Taiko is playing at 3:30 PM. Look for me on the The festival is at 16450 Murphy Avenue in Morgan Hill. From the bay area, go south on Highway 101. Get off at E. Dunne Avenue and go east for two blocks. Turn right on Murphy; go about 1.5 blocks on Murphy and find a place to park along the road; there's no parking lot at the festival. ________________________________________ WEDNESDAY APRIL 22: Mills College (Rothwell Center/Student Union) The event runs from 7:00pm to 8:30pm. We will give a performance and also hold an informal class for the students and guests. (I honestly have no idea if this one is open to the public, but the other 3 events are.) ________________________________________ SUNDAY, APRIL 26: Cupertino Cherry Blossom Festival - Emeryville Taiko is playing at 3:45 PM in the Amphitheater (right before "closing remarks"). I'm playing in the same two songs, but in the stage left front group section on "Umi" this time (a different part). At Memorial Park on Stevens Creek Boulevard across from De Anza College in Cupertino. ....It would be awesome if any of you happen to find it convenient to drop by a festival or so for a day of fun and festivities... :) |
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| Behold The Power Of The Internet... | |||
| 08:49pm 12/04/2009 | |||
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Now Amazon is claiming it was all just a "glitch", eh? I have a lovely bridge to sell you in Brooklyn, if you believe that one... ;] EDIT: It wasn't really about "adult" publications. To partially quote someone from another link: Porn star Ron Jeremy's raunchy autobiography is still ranked. ..... Heather Has Two Mommies is de-ranked. This is no glitch. |
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| Because I think censorship is evil, I offer you this Google-bombing link: | |||
| 05:14pm 12/04/2009 | |||
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Amazon Rank More about this, from the LA Times And from those who started this Amazon claims they are reducing access to "adult" content, whereas in reality this basically targets LGBTQ books, including YA books and even biographies, while leaving plenty of Het adult fiction sales ranks intact. (Note: "sales rank" normally shows up in "product details", and helps with searches.) |
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| Quick review - film: "Watchmen" | |||
| 02:26am 12/04/2009 | |||
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A-. Missing all the cool extra bits from the comic that provide thematic support. Mostly can't be helped, I suppose, due to the differences in storytelling media. However, IMO characters appearances and costumes are more attractive than the versions originally drawn in the comic, and it really enhances the story to see well-done action / fight scenes - definitely adds to the plausibility of these characters as superpower-less but nonetheless well-trained and competent "superheroes". |
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| Taiko Concert Announcements | |||
| 02:08am 09/04/2009 | |||
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Sunday, April 19: Morgan Hill Haru Matsuri Festival and Taiko Expo (Yes, I KNOW "matsuri" means "festival" - and "haru" means "spring". ^^ ) - Emeryville Taiko is playing (time as yet unknown), dunno what time yet. Look for me in back row Odaiko on "Masaru" and & Josuke on "Umi Matsuri". Sunday, April 26: Cupertino Cherry Blossom Festival - Emeryville Taiko is playing at 3:45 PM in the Amphitheater (right before "closing remarks"). I'm playing in the same two songs, but in a different group section on "Umi" this time. We're also playing for some East Bay Earth Day street festival noonish on Saturday April 18 (I don't have the particulars yet), and at Mills College for some other event on Wednesday April 22 in the evening (don't know if the last one is public.) |
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| To Iowa, add Vermont's veto override! | |||
| 02:26pm 07/04/2009 | |||
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http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/0 I guess while the Mormons in Utah were pouring tons of $$$$$$$ into California to turn our lovely state into a bastion of discrimination that strips away civil rights, they were failing to pay attention to what was going on behind them in the rest of the country... I can hear the song in my mind: "We shall overcome." |
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| Writer's Block: Controversial Interrogation Techniques | ||||
| 10:14pm 05/04/2009 | ||||
And here's where we separate out those who hold to a higher ethical and moral standard (and will be judged accordingly; by other nations, by history, etc.) from those who think it's "OK" to stoop the the level of gross barbarism because "others do it". America used to have a fairly stellar reputation in the world as a nation with ideals of fairness and decency worth striving for, a nation even opponents respected; thanks to more recent events in history it is now often considered on a par with butchers. Regardless of that, torture (let's call it what it IS, not some euphemistic phrase) does NOT WORK. People will say anything under duress - whatever they think will satisfy the torturers to make the torture stop. Truth, lies, fantasies, wishful thinking, a mix of all of the above, anything. Evidence gained thereby is simply not reliable. Torture exists for the purpose of allowing angry people and sadists to hurt others for the sake of their own psychological motives; "information gathering" is really at that point merely an excuse. |
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| CAN ANYONE HELP FOSTER ANIMALS IN DANGER? | |||
| 05:02pm 02/03/2009 | |||
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(Please pass it on) Saw this notice today at my vet's office: A high-kill shelter that does not want to be named is moving to a new facility in mid-March, and to "avoid transferring any diseases" plans to put down ALL its current dogs (about 100) and cats (about 50) before the move. The Butte Humane Society of Chico is scrambling to find foster homes to temporarily take in animals. http://www.buttehumane.org/page/help-ne |
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| The Closet Linguist is, as usual, a curmudgeon.... | |||
| 01:24am 30/01/2009 | |||
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NOTE: This is NOT directed at anyone on my LJ Friendslist. YOU are all bright and articulate people. :) I have been reading "comments" posted to news stories online, as well as the news stories themselves, and I have become thoroughly disgusted with how horribly uneducated the American public (especially today's online "journalists"!!!) seem to be. My former (public!!) HS Journalism teacher, Mr. John Reque, an impeccable man of very high standards, would give them all an automatic "F" for FAIL, frankly. N/K; every now and then I consider getting a further degree in Linguistics. I am by no means perfect at expressing myself in the English Language (or others). At least I attempt to do a decent job, though I have some odd blinders (like "e" vs. "a" in ~ent/~ant, etc.) Which makes me wonder: would studying Linguistics, or even simply English, just make me even MORE frustrated with online commentary? And I DON'T mean general typos (we all make those), but clear language errors, most of which should have been nipped in the bud by Elementary School graduation. Today's particular recurrent bone of contention is, once again, that barbaric bastardization of a misconceived "prepositional phrase" written as "would of". GODSDAMNIT!!!! It's "would have"!! It contracts to "would've"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's a future conditional verb phrase!! No prepositions!! Among other recent noticeable items (I'm tired, or I'd post more of 'em): "lan line" in place of "land line" (AKA a telephone system connected via actual wires that run across the land.) *Wants to beat people upside the head with my Elementary School English textbooks* |
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| Will people PLEASE stop being PC and start being descriptively accurate to find missing children?? | |||
| 06:03pm 13/01/2009 | |||
There's a 13-year-old girl missing in Georgia: From http://www.wsbtv.com/news/18471941/deta "DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. -- DeKalb County police said Tuesday they hope the public will be able to help locate a 13-year-old girl who has been missing since December 10. Andrea Lois Key, 13, was last seen at her house on Audubon Drive in December. According to detectives, she had been communicating online with an unknown man. Since Key’s disappearance, officers have reached out to family, friends and acquaintances, DeKalb police said. Police said they have exhausted all leads and they hope the public can help. Key was last seen wearing a red shirt and dark blue jeans. She is described as a black female, 4 feet 10 inches tall, 100 pounds with black hair and brown eyes. Anyone with information about Key should contact the DeKalb County Police Department’s Special Victim’s Unit at (770) 724-7710." .....Perhaps one or both of her parents self-identify as black, and therefore she may too, BUT: The child in the photo actually LOOKS like she could also very likely be: a) Egyptian or other Middle Eastern, b) Pakistani or Indian, c) Latina or Central/South American, d) Some sort of racial mix. Without any other information, "one of the above" would be my initial guess as to her background, if I saw a child who looked like that photo. This additional descriptive information SHOULD have been mentioned in the story, to help people be on the lookout for her. Only describing her as "black" is too vague, and might not lead someone actually seeing Andrea to think of her as the missing child they might have heard about. |
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| Decision needed ASAP! Please assist! | |||
| 04:05pm 30/12/2008 | |||
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Richard is joining the Silicon Valley Open Studio (http://svos.org) program and needs to decide which one of the following pictures should be used for the printed mapguide. All 3 will be on their website. The "Flying Egret" with calligraphy will be used as a business card sized ad so that's also covered. Please vote ASAP as he has to make the decision tonight. The choices are "Road To Heaven" (vertical panoramic with steps toward a torii gate), "The Sound of Life, Taiko," and "Winged Goddess." (Click images to see larger) Poll #1323023 Open Studio Print Submission Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All Which picture would look best for the printed map guide? |
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25 (61.0%)
| Please email AG Jerry Brown! - Monday he decides whether CA Supreme CT will review Prop 8 lawsuits! | |||
| 01:35am 17/11/2008 | |||
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-- so I hear. (ESPECIALLY FOR YOU EARLY RISERS, but try anyway regardless...) http://ag.ca.gov/contact/complaint_ Here's the email text suggested over at Join The Impact: Attorney General Brown, I Request your support of the lawsuits against Prop 8 and recommend that the California Supreme Court hear and review the current filed lawsuits against Prop 8, please allow us the opportunity for equal protection under the law. Here's my email text: Attorney General Brown: I request that you please support the lawsuits against Prop 8, and also recommend that the California Supreme Court hear and review the current filed lawsuits against Prop 8. I am heterosexually married, but I beg that you please allow my gay and lesbian family and friends the opportunity for equal protection under the law as I am automatically entitled to by an orientation that is essentially an accident of birth. As an American citizen, I am shocked and appalled that a simple majority vote can be possibly allowed to alter the constitution of the state of California to deprive a segment of law-abiding citizens of their equal civil rights. Such an egregious decision should NEVER be up to a "tyranny of the majority", which is effectively "mob rule". Even my local library bond required a 2/3 vote! An American constitution true to the spirit this nation was founded upon is supposed to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority. Segregation and the interracial marriage ban would have been upheld in their day by "majority vote" - to the great detriment of the wise principles laid out by our nation's founders, as well as my own marriage, which is interracial. Thank you, [myname] |
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Karisu-Dilandau-sama | カリスディラントゥ様 |
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Accomplices Karisu TMI Misdeeds ImageCraft PhotoStudio |
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