The Leopard ate my computer

I thought I didn’t have a horror story for this Halloween. Turns out I do; it’s called Leopard.

More specifically, it’s called Apple Macintosh OS 10.5 “Leopard.” Give me Microsoft Vista any day. I’ll even take Windows ME over this piece of…

(WARNING: LONG RAMBLE AHEAD. If you’re not into the vagaries of tech support, skip this post.)

Of course, I should have known better than to tempt fate by installing a new operating system on All Hallows’ Eve, but hey… The hype on Leopard was that all us Windows geeks would drop our jaws in amazement at the ease of installation and wondrous new features.

Well, my jaw is dropping, alright, but not exactly in amazement.

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Happy Halloweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!

OK, so the title of this blogpost is a double entendre–either I slipped on a squashed pumpkin and landed on the mouse, or I’ve been celebrating Halloween the entire week. I’ll leave you to decide which.

Usually I try to tell a scary story each All Hallows Eve (last year, for example, was the tale of the dead chicken ghosts), but even though I know of some really scary things (current US foreign policy, real estate market, and the condition of Rajah’s litterbox being three), I’m kinda tapped out for really spooky Halloween stories this year.

In fact, about the only thing really bugging me right now (aside from Rajah about the litterbox) is my usual candy anxiety. Come to think of it, that IS a horror story. There is an ideal world (probably in Iowa) where the amount of candy you buy exactly matches the number of trick or treat bags you’re required to fill.

That is not my world.

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Don’t lie to me

Forget “the check’s in the mail,” “we’ll finish your project tomorrow,” or “it’s not you, sweetheart, it’s me. I think maybe we need a break.” A neuroscientist thinks he’s cracked the lie detector problem.

The functional magnetic resonance imaging machine (fMRI), a tool that identifies brain activity while you’re doing stuff, apparently can also show when you’re lying. According to a story on NPR.com, Dr. Daniel Langleben of the University of Pennsylvania reasoned that, since ADD children have trouble lying, it might be possible to correlate the areas of the brain most often affected by ADD with truth or lies.

Turns out that lies happen when we’re tightly controlling our behavior, which is what ADD kids have trouble doing. And that the part of the brain that controls our behavior is in a different spot than the part we use to blurt out the truth. An fMRI that shows activity in the “controlling” section probably indicates untruthfulness to some degree, says Dr. Langleben.

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Glass book report

Was clearing (yet another) shelf for glassbooks, and wound up leafing through a few new (and old) friends:

First, the old friend. The library reorg was the result of a question Lani McGregor posed on warmglass.com, which caused me to pull out Boyce Lundstrom’s “Kiln Firing Glass: Glass Fusing Book One.” Published 25 years ago, I expected it to be outdated, and it was…but only in that it obviously doesn’t take into account new glass formulations, the commonplace use of kiln controllers, and suchlike.

What surprised the blazes out of me was, in fact, the leading edge nature of the book in other aspects, especially after all these years. The book is primarily about pushing the glass to do cool and artistic things…and details techniques and processes that are blithely being announced as “discoveries” and sometimes even potential patent opportunities today. Kinda humbling…and makes me want to get out the rest of my “old” library and see if the work for some of my glass experiments has already been done.

Oh well…seems as if there really isn’t anything new under the sun (or the kiln lid, for that matter.)

Speaking of old, my sister gave me a copy of a marvelous old book, A Short History of Glass, by Chloe Zerwick, for my birthday. Published by the Corning Museum of Glass. It’s simple, to the point, and utterly fascinating for glassists. (I believe it’s out of print but you can usually find it used.) Its cover has a picture of one of my favorite glassworks, the Corning Ewer, still one of the most beautiful examples of coldworking and form in existence.

Lark Publishing has a list that, from year to year, varies from nearly sublime to pure junk. As far as I’m concerned, though, their “500 objects” series is a winner, and I picked up their “500 Glass Objects” a couple of months ago. Impressive. I could wish that they’d (a) portrayed the work of 500 different artists instead of doubling or tripling up in places, (b) that they’d required some sort of artist’s statement for each piece and not just those airy, vapid little “my work signifies the thoughtful journey a woman takes to self-awareness,” blurbs and (c) that they’d spent a bit more money on production and not simply “perfect-bound” this as a paperback, because it’s worthy of more.

That said, they managed to find some great new artists for this book, and it was a treat to see their work. It was also fun to see friends (and artists I would love to be friends with) on these pages.

Interestingly, I stacked “500 Glass Objects” on top of “25 Years of New Glass Review,” when rearranging my library, and wound up comparing them side by side. The two have very different intent–500GO is obviously a coffee table book of mostly pretty things, and 25 Years is a serious retrospective of a highly respected yearly competition among artists who work in glass. It’s more expensively produced, has much better commentary on how the choices were made (as I would expect), and certainly the organization is better. Yet I was surprised at how well the “lightweight” volume compared to 25 Years…and in some cases the photography was light years better. (I might argue that some of the art was, too, but that’s just being catty.) Hmmm.

No Green Berries or Leaves: The Creative Journey of an Artist in Glass, is Paul Stankard’s biography, and it’s a fun and inspiring read. The glasswork is kinda subordinate to his life and like most self-published books (or at least this appears to be, apologies if not), it probably goes on a little too long about personal philosophies. I did find myself wishing Mr. Stankard would talk more about his creative choices and techniques.

However, he is just such a neat man that in the end I didn’t care and just enjoyed his journaling. I am a great re-reader (there are books in my library that are probably on their 500th reading) and I don’t think I’d reread this volume much…but I’m glad to have read it the first time.

Best for last: Seth Randal: Myth and Majesty. Seth Randal is a casting giant, as far as I’m concerned; his work is technically and spiritually gorgeous and his colors make me drool. I had seen this book on lists a few times and never got around to buying it. Now I’m glad I did.

He talks technique, he talks inspiration, he talks about design choices, he talks about his evolution as an artist. His work isn’t to everyone’s tastes–many “experts” I’ve talked with dismiss Randal as too representational and a kind of Art Nouveau copyist–but for me at least, his art works on many, many levels, not the least of which is his technical risk-taking.

About the only complaint I had about this book was that it was a bit TOO much Randal. I’d never seen more than a couple of Randal works together, and I have to admit that by the time I reached the last page, I felt Milky-Way’d. (My term for too much of a good thing–Milky Way bars are so sweet they hurt my teeth; I can’t stomach more than a bite of one.) The colors, the shapes, the photography (lots of black backgrounds) started to run together in a blitz of snakes, Egyptian noses and jewel-like glows. Perhaps the best way to study Randal is slowly, one or two works at a time.

The Glass Orchestra

Didn’t know whether to file this under glasswork or gadgetry, so I’m opting for both. The Glass Orchestra, in Toronto, plays exclusively on glass instruments, most of which the members design and fabricate themselves.

Think of it as musical water glasses, on steroids. They’ve got some MP3s on the site you can listen to, sound a bit like a cross between Windham Hill and Devo. Kinda fun.

Andina

• Website
• Area: Pearl district
• Price to fill up two people: About $75 (minus booze)

This one’s getting on the high side of reasonable, but I like Andina for location, for ambience, and for the food (Andean/Peruvian). Plus, the waitstaff is so enthusiastic about the food you just gotta try it, which is nice. It sure ain’t Tex-Mex, anyway.

If you’re not familiar with South American mountain cuisine, you’ll need to take a certain amount of the menu on faith. In any case, Andina refers to this as “nuovo Andean,” which I think means “I really like this quinoa stuff, but why don’t we try it with a little basil and seared ahi tuna?”

Although I’ve enjoyed the seafood, I’d suggest starting with the beef. Both times I’ve tried it, it’s been superb.

Tip: You can save a bundle on the dinner menu by opting for a couple of appetizers (ask your waiter what he recommends) and one of the salads instead of a main course.

Burgerville

• Website

• Area: All over Portland/Vancouver

• Cost for two to fill up: $12 or thereabouts

OK, secret shame. I rarely allow myself this place, but they have great burgers (Tillamook cheeseburger) made with local foodstuffs. Reasonably priced, better than the $35 hamburger I once room-serviced at the Marriott Marquis in Manhattan. (don’t ask) If I ever wanted to completely go nuts, I’d do a Tillamook cheeseburger, onion rings, and a strawberry shake.

However, you can do just fine with a slightly healthier combo: a TCB, side salad (very well done), and bottle of water. Burgervill also does seasonal items, such as raspberry shakes, sweet potato fries, etc. Most are worth at least trying (my Mom is a huge fan of the sweet potato fries).

Tip: Plan a trip to Bullseye Resource Center around lunchtime, and you can come out on Powell, make a right and almost immediate left, and there’s a Burgerville drive-in. No wonder my glass bill is so high!

Hot for words

I am, as most of my friends and family wearily acknowledge, hung up on words. I use ‘em for a living, sometimes make ‘em up for a living. (The Oxford English Dictionary, for example, credits me with having invented the word “submarining.” I didn’t, but I’m tickled that they think so.)

I’ve been trying to get people to see etymology as a fun thing to do on a rainy afternoon. Uphill battle. Most people think that folks who read the dictionary are pretty much prim, dry sticks.

Lifeless. No fun.

Meet Marina the philologist.

‘Nuff said.

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*Which, in its purest form and contrary to popular opinion, does not DEFINE words. Instead, the English dictionaries trace word origin and usage. In other languages, a dictionary does define (and regulate) word usage and pronunciation, French being a notable example.

Night of the Living Interface

OK, so I’m always complaining about lousy interfaces, lousy customer experiences, lousy user experience. The high tech world is great if you were born with a mouse in one hand and keyboard in the other, but if you weren’t, it’s a pretty sad place.

What is a right-click? What is a rollover? How do you tell a non-computing relative over the phone how to diagnose a dead wireless connection? What do you say when you tell her to “click on the icon that says “My Network Places,” and she says, “Everything just turned orange?”

The current GUI interfaces, Windows or Mac, are intuitive because we’ve been TAUGHT that way. If you look at them through the eyes of a non-user, they’re pretty damn incomprehensible.

I got a taste of this last year when I “returned” to Mac, i.e., I added a MacBook Pro to my stable of Windows and Linux machines. I could see the functionality but the interface nearly drove me nuts. It was enough like Windows to almost make sense, but different enough that for months I downloaded to the desktop and dragged stuff into the right folder later because I couldn’t figure out how to actually download it to the folder in the first place. Periodically I would return to my Windows computers with relief. Even today there are things I do on Windows because, while I’m sure you can do it on a Mac, I don’t have time to figure it out.

And I ain’t stupid. I’ve been doing this stuff for years. In my bewilderment with the “much, much friendlier” Mac, I suddenly realized just how lost people must be when, say, a Web interface enters their worldview for the first time.

In the high-tech world we are a nation of nerds, speaking to ourselves. In effect, we’re holding everyone’s information hostage, and the ransom is learning the language, the customs…the interface. The interface is the great big lock on the front door of the library, and the only way to get the key is to become a nerd yourself. Kinda like “Night of the Living Dead.”

Lots of friendly interface projects through the years have failed. A few more are probably still incubating in the lab (there was one I played with in the mid-90s, a sensory system you could use for data mining that literally let you feel patterns in the data). The one I’m interested in now is Microsoft’s Surface.

Played with it a bit, read a bit about it. In essence, the computer screen is a big touch-table surface, and you use gestures to make things happen. You can type if you need to, but mostly you just gesture. Think HP’s recent laptop commercials, or Tom Cruise with his air screens in the movie Minority Report.

Of course Surface is a lot more than just the, er, surface. The idea, ultimately, is that it becomes the final piece in the connection puzzle between devices, computers and infoservers. Where scifi would have you pay at the register by slapping your wrist on the reader (to read the embedded credit chip), Surface suggests that all you need to do is put your PDA on the table and authorize a charge. The table does the rest. (BTW, they were doing this in 1998 in Scandinavia–the mobile phone system had literally become the medium of exchange, so there are strong precedents for this.)

So far it passes the mondo coolity test, certainly. I’m thinking 3D design applications that let me build into the table and–maybe with the add-on holographic projection system–on top of it. I could hook that baby up to a 3D printer and–snap–cut about a million steps out of building casting investments.

More mundanely, company I’m working with does RFID and sensor tracking for the transportation industry. Truck arrives at depot, trailer makes connection with a Surface and instantly reports the load, condition and transfer instructions to the warehouse. Or consolidates a driver’s multiple fuel cards and discounts into a single credit line he can access by slapping his PDA on the table at a truck stop. (And what I wouldn’t give for a tool that would track my expenses and mileage FOR me….)

But will it provide a really useful non-nerd interface for the piece of the world that doesn’t live by mouse and keyboard? Now THAT’s an interesting question, and right now I don’t have the answer. Would love to find out, though.

Life in the slow (glass) lane… (fast-de-verre)

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