I had a cat. His name was ChinnChinn.

4:15 pm, August 29, 2007.

I have a cat. His name is ChinnChinn.

I have a cat. His name is ChinnChinn. And that doesn’t begin to tell the story.

I’m starting this now because any day now I’ll have to change the tense in the previous paragraph: I had a cat. His name was ChinnChinn.

Barring another miracle, of course.

Chinni is my feline Siamese companion. I’ve had cats and dogs, hamsters and snakes and preying mantises and spiders and fish (and once I almost had an alligator, but that’s another story). I’ve loved them and cried to see them go. But Chinni will be different.

For one thing, he really is a miracle cat, as my vets have said. Chinni was diagnosed with terminal colorectal cancer and given only a few weeks to live…about two and half years ago.

Every time we thought the balance had tipped, and Chinni was going out, he’d hop up on my desk, demand breakfast and a cuddle, and dash off to torment a peacock feather. The vets–who have made heroic efforts to keep Chinni well and happy–would shake their heads and say, “Whatever it is you’re doing, keep doing it.”

The past couple of weeks, though, it’s become obvious that the miracles are running dry. And something tells me that maybe it’s time.

Chinni’s always been an odd duck. He doesn’t look like a Siamese–he’s what’s called a lynx point, having stripes and ticking where most Siamese have dark brown. Yet what most people notice first is his voice–even for a Siamese, he has an amazing vocabulary. When I come home, he greets me at the door with a running commentary, pausing in places for me to respond and glaring if I don’t. I’ve no idea what he’s saying, but I interject appropriate comments until he’s satisfied and we head to the kitchen for his dinner.

Introduced to a new space, Chinni will test the acoustics bit by bit. He sits neatly upright, cocks his head and “ooowwwaaahhwaaahs,” listens for a moment, then slides a few inches to the right and tries again. When he’s in just the right spot, he cuts loose with a 15-minute caterwaul that rivals any Wagnerian opera.

Chinni’s lifelong fascination with singing into speakerphones and headsets made him famous with coworkers around the world. And his love of rolling like a kitten on sidewalks endured despite his disgust at discovering, one snowy DC winter, that melting snow makes his beloved concrete very, very wet.

He uses his front paws like hands for just about everything. We had a favorite game that he hasn’t been able to play much of late, cat hockey, in which I carefully set up obstacles at the edge of my desk. Chinni, one-pawed, would slapshot them to the ground. He was game to shove just about anything off, up to and including the telephone. My dad got an especial kick out of cat hockey; after he and Mom would visit, the floor around my desk would be littered with 20 or 30 pens, tape dispensers, etc.

Lots of small anecdotes I could tell, the kind that only another cat lover would appreciate: Chinni’s need to carry stuff like cherries and wrapped hard candies by its “handles” (see above). His preference for scooping cat food out of the bowl with his right paw and eating it “in paw.” The time he dropped a live mouse on my housemate’s pillow and was highly offended that he didn’t get it back. The time he startled the burglar.

Mostly what I’ll remember about Chinni, though, is his unfailing insouciance. He’s the only cat I’ve ever met with absolutely no guile or sneakiness. He just does what’s needed, with a great deal of panache, and trusts me to make it come out right. It’s as if the rules couldn’t possibly apply to him and, truly, he is so well-behaved that maybe they don’t. If he jumped up on the counter, he had a valid reason, and I usually wound up apologizing for scolding him.

In the nearly 18 years we’ve been together, as long as I’ve been home he’s never been more than 4-5 feet away. He’s seen me through some very rough times, moved with me as I climbed the professional ladder, and served as my sounding board for new concepts, dreaded conversations, and life-changing decisions.

Chinni’s diagnosis came too hard, too fast, at a time when I really was too busy to pay much attention to him. Had his disease progressed as predicted I would have lost him with a lot of unfinished business between us. Somehow things came together, I was able to slow down and enjoy our last few months…and say goodbye properly.

And in his unvarying Chinni way, he’s making a loving exit that we’re both nearly ready for. I want him to stay forever, I’ll always wish he were here beside me and I don’t quite know how I’m going to get through this, but I’ll be forever grateful that he’s graced my life and given me more time with him than I probably deserved.

Love you, my elegant little fellow. Take care.

PS. It didn’t take long. Chinni went downhill fast the afternoon I posted this, I called the vet and set up an appointment to evaluate him…and she confirmed what we’d feared: the tumor was growing with a vengeance, he was in pain and weakening fast. Chinni died on August 29, 2007 at 4:15 pm, very peacefully and with his pain abated. He died in his favorite position–curled up in my arms, head resting on the crook of my elbow.

Rest gently, Chinni.

I don’t light up my life, it seems

So I haven’t made ANY glass, or molds, or models, or pretty much anything relating to glass for at least three weeks.

I wonder if you can get the glass DTs?

In part, it’s because I’m incredibly busy with dayjob stuff, something I said I was going to stop doing but nonetheless allowed to creep back in. My fault. And I’ve got relatives in town, houseguests coming, buddies needing help, interesting home fixup projects, etc., etc.

More significantly, though, the light fixtures in my studio decided for some quixotical reason to simultaneously fail. Maybe they giving a farewell salute to Gus, my aged (and now departed) washing machine (since they lived right next door to him). No matter, it’s tough to work in a darkened studio so I pretty much haven’t while I’ve been replacing the lights.

Replaced the fluorescent fixture in the ceiling over my storage cabinets twice (the first one was cheap, broke during installation, and I wised up and got a good one). Both times involved much gritting of teeth and swearing–that’s a tiny space for a 4-foot fixture, and an awkward, not-quite-standing-up position to work in.

Likewise, I replaced the 4-foot fluorescents in my old steel light table, hand-welded and jury-rigged 30 or 40 years ago. Took awhile to figure out the wiring scheme, finally gave up on it and simply rewired all four fixtures and the switch (in the process getting rid of the original blue painter’s tape holding some of the wiring together. Sheesh)

Then turned to the 70s globe fixture in the main ceiling area, decided to replace it with a curving track system and halogen spots. Turned out to be one of those fixtures that requires you to hold your tongue just right to snap everything into the right spot if you want the lights to actually work. (which it now does)

Installed an undercounter LED light over my glass scrap bins, will be installing some puck lights in the cabinet over the main cutting areas.

Lots of lights…and when I go into the studio, turn them all on….I still don’t like the lighting. The LED light is a glow, not a light, and practically useless. There’s not enough bright, white light on the worktable, I need some kind of pendant or something to bring good, strong task lighting where I work. And the new ceiling lights are now throwing studio corners into shadow.

Drat. But since my glassnerves are beginning to twitch, and I’ve got pieces piling up in my head that need to get down on glass, this’ll have to do for now.

Whole Foods

• Website 

• Area: All over Portland/Vancouver (I did the one in the Pearl)

• Price for two to fill up: $16-$20

The corporate organic grocery store, Whole Foods, is an old lunch standby for many people, and I’ll grab a bite there when I’m in the Pearl District and need to pick up some groceries, but I gotta say it doesn’t hold a candle to the deli counter at New Seasons.

Whole Foods gives short shrift to those who want to eat there–you’ll sit at a narrow, artistically curved counter on a hard wooden stool. Still, the soups are usually good, the bread isn’t bad (cornbread is better), and the salad bar is excellent. We stopped in for dinner (greens and pulled pork, which could use some work), and to pick up my favorite cheese, Wallace & Gromit’s Wensleydale.

Tip: If you need to be in the Pearl around Couch & 12th, head for the underground parking garage on the next block over. Whole Foods validates two hours’ worth of parking if you buy $10 worth of stuff, so you can get lunch for two and save on parking.

Swagat

• Restaurant website
• Location: Several in Oregon (I’ve tried the ones in Orenco Station, Beaverton and the Pearl)
• Price to fill up two people: About $50 for dinner

The Swagat chain is, sadly, probably one of the top 10 Indian restaurants in Portland. I say sadly because in other parts of the US, say, Washington DC, Manhattan, Silicon Valley, it wouldn’t make the top 50.

It’s not that the food is bad; it certainly isn’t. Nor that the service isn’t generally friendly; it mostly is (although they’re much nicer in the Pearl and Beaverton editions than Orenco Station). Prices are higher than I’d expect, but not entirely out of line.

I guess my reservation is that Swagat serves what I call Mall Indian–nothing you couldn’t pick up in the food court of your average-sized megamall. There’s the requisite hot pink tandoori chicken, slightly dry and chewy, the kinda gummy malai kofta, the leaden galub jamin. It’s all edible, it’ll give you a taste of India and if you opt for a mango lassi instead of a sweet, you’ll probably be perfectly happy.

What you won’t be is excited, enchanted or thrilled at the end of the meal. Yet that’s exactly what great Indian cooking, especially south Indian cooking, should do. If you’ve never tasted a perfect masala dosa, or chewed a skillfully made fresh paan, had a vegetable cutlet like somebody’s grandma makes it, you may not know the difference. Once you have, though, Mall Indian just won’t cut it anymore.

There are local places that come closer, Abhiruchi and India Grill being two of them. And I’m told Plainfield Mayur, which I haven’t tried yet, is probably tops.

Tip: If you’re in the mood for all-you-can-eat Mall Indian, hit up a Swagat buffet at lunchtime. It’s a pretty good value, especially if you like chicken.

Uh-oh. Domino.

OK, so I couldn’t pass this one up: Skype failed because Microsoft users did the equivalent of heading for the bathroom at SuperBowl halftime.

According to the Skype blog:

The disruption was triggered by a massive restart of our users’ computers across the globe within a very short timeframe as they re-booted after receiving a routine set of patches through Windows Update.

The high number of restarts affected Skype’s network resources. This caused a flood of log-in requests, which, combined with the lack of peer-to-peer network resources, prompted a chain reaction that had a critical impact.

So Microsoft sent out a patch through its update service, millions of users applied it and, when it said, “You must restart your computer now…” they did.

And a gazillion restarts pretty much ate the Skype network.

Hmmmm. Given the number of patches Microsoft has to send out these days…plain old telephone service is looking better and better.

A washing machine is also art

Remember the eulogy I wrote for Gus, my ex-washing machine? After posting it, I was informed that I missed a great chance to give him a second life as an artist (or at least a piece of art).

UK artist Milly Frances, whose Striking Glass gallery makes some of the coolest stained glass art I’ve seen in awhile (definitely take a look) wrote to tell me that a washing machine can also be a coffee table. And she sent the pics to prove it:

She’s named her new table Gus-ette (Gus would be thrilled to know he has a legacy). I never thought to take Gus apart, but that shiny stainless steel drum WOULD make a nice, modern statement, especially if you did what Milly did and added lots of marbles and a glass top:

Hmmm. This kinda reminds me of a favorite US cable show, Robot Rivals, where university students must use as many parts from a “common household object” as possible when building their competition robots. Milly used the glass door insert inside the drum, to hold the marbles…

Wow. I definitely missed a bet here. Thanks, Milly.

–cynthia

Spinning wikis

File this one under “Sad but why is anyone surprised?”: Spin doctors are taking Wikipedia for a spin. Several spins, in fact.

An article in the Independent reports that a CalTech student, Virgil Griffith, downloaded Wikipedia, the online reference for just about everything, and analyzed revision sequences and who made those revisions. The results are available at his website.

For those of you that haven’t visited Wikipedia, it’s an online encyclopedia with a twist–it’s a “wiki,” meaning that its audience is also its editor(s). You can add, edit, dispute and otherwise mess with the entries as you see fit. Two things prevent Wikipedia, most times, from turning into an online brawl: (1) Everyone can evaluate and comment on your edits and (2) Revisions (and revisioners) are tracked. There are moderators in the background monitoring all this activity and making final decisions (sometimes).

So Griffith’s analysis turns up a lot of corporate (and government) spin-doctoring. Exxon erased the part about not yet making full reparations for the Alaska oil spill. The NRA has replaced passages concerning gunfire deaths in the US with information on their work in wildlife conservation. And the Discovery Channel (oh, c’maaaaaan!) has deleted passages about their guerrilla marketing tactics.

Also on the list: The CIA, ACLU, the Mormon, Catholic and Christian Scientist churches, CalTech, Republican and Democratic parties, Electronic Freedom Foundation, Intel, Diebold, Microsoft, Walmart and many, many, many more.

Wired has posted a “most shameful Wikipedia edits” list that kinda reminds me of the infamous Heidi and her list of johns. Forbes, NPR, most of the major news services are doing stories (and if they’re smart, making this part of their investigative toolbox).

Of course, some of what comes up on WikiScanner aren’t necessarily spins. They’re intended to fix factual errors, provide updates, delete irrelevant pranks or fill in missing information.

Which brings up an interesting point: A lot of what Griffith is pointing out are pretty shameful examples of respinning history. But some may simply involve both sides of a story. Since Wikipedia is an open, contributor-based encyclopedia, what happens when two or more people believe that their version *is* the truth and the other side is absolutely, 100% wrong?

The wiki has a way of handling this…if you know how. If you don’t, you read something, you assume Wikipedia “thinks” it’s the truth…and you “fix” it. Even Wikipedia isn’t immune; when an entry on Wikiscanner mentioned that Griffith was a Wikipedia employee (he’s not), a Wikipedia manager changed it…and caught all kinds of flack from readers and the press for not following standard procedure.

Personally, revising a Wikepedia entry to push a little more corporate spin down Webbish throats doesn’t surprise me at all. But it seems like a great way to draw attention to exactly what you wanted to cover up.

I guess here’s the bottom line: Post stuff on the Web as if the whole world is in your office, watching you do it.

Because they are. These days on the Internet, EVERYbody knows you’re a dog.*

______________
*OK, OK, for those of you that lived offline in the 90s, there was a wonderful cartoon in the New Yorker that showed two dogs in front of a computer. The caption read “On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.” It’s still one of my favorites, however untrue it may be.

VoIP blues

OK, so I’m canceling my Vonage subscription today. I wish my parents could cancel THEIR VoIP service and get some reliable phone lines. And if what I’m seeing about Skype is any indication, I won’t be the only one going back to landlines and mobile phones.

Don’t get me wrong–I see all the advantages of VoIP service and I know millions have it and love it. I figured I would, too. But frankly, it’s just too daggone much work for what’s become a baseline service in this country.

Not that I use the house phone all that much. I realized that my mobile had become my primary line about nine months ago, when I picked up my landline phone and couldn’t get a dial tone. It had been out for two days–someone had hit the neighborhood box and my connection had been severed by the shifting metal cover–but I hadn’t noticed.

Once I called (on my mobile), the phone company came out and fixed it. Within an hour. Decided to replace the system a bit early, given the damage and so–surprise–I got FIOS in the bargain.

A client showed me all the great features of his Vonage phone–voicemail comes to your e-mail inbox, you get all these different conference and transfer features–and I eventually signed up. My intent was to eventually drop my landline entirely.

A few months later I have made zero outgoing calls and received five, all wrong numbers. Vonage can’t figure out the problem, and they’ve lost interest in trying.

I’m sure that there are a LOT of advantages to having VoIP. It’s certainly cheaper. But should I really have to work this hard JUST TO USE THE PHONE?

My parents have VoIP, too. In fact, they’ve had two different VoIP services. Both give crummy sound quality. Sometimes the phone cuts off in mid-conversation. With the first vendor (Comcast) they got all kinds of interference on the line, including radio and cell phone conversations with people they’d never met. Weird noises. Crazy echos.

The phone router sits next to the Internet router, and they both use Ethernet. It’s dark under Dad’s desk–get the wrong router when you’re plugging something in, and there goes your phone service. Mom’s mobile is in my speed dial as a backup for WHEN, not if, their VoIP goes out.

Interestingly, where they are they don’t have a choice–new subdivision, it’s all VoIP, from what they tell me. In my opinion, a bad choice.

Now Skype has been out about 36 hours. (
Newsflash: Skype just announced that it’s back up.) I’m willing to bet it’s because their software doesn’t scale and….it’s a bloody phone. Basic service. We cut ‘em some slack because they’re mostly free but still…

So, as far as I’m concerned, VoIP is a great backup phone service. It won’t be my primary service until they get the bugs worked out a bit more.

Stichter: Uncomfortable art

For me, there is comfortable art, art that supports me, makes me smile or sigh wistfully, doesn’t get in the way but is there when you need it.

There is inspiring art, that makes me take a deep breath, hear a thousand bugles blowing reveille, energizes me and stays top of mind no matter what I do.

Then there is competitive art, work that I would do if I were good enough (and had the idea first), work that makes my own creativity flow and blossom and branch into new avenues. (Curiously enough, avenues that may have nothing to do with the work that inspired them. Go figure.)

And then there is UNcomfortable art, the stuff that is so bloody good, and so evocative and so compelling that I marvel at it again and again…but is so unsettling that it’s almost obscene.

I’ll put Beth Cavener Stichter’s work in that category. Stichter’s not a glass artist; she works in clay. She’s not abstract or functional but very, very representational. And that, in a nutshell, is the problem (or the glory) of her work.

[Read more]

Next Page »