Spirituality

"Spirituality is noticing what's going on around you."

Moses

Moses was a prince for a third of his life, a shepherd for a third of his life, and the leader of his people in the wilderness for a third of his life. We mostly hear about the last third, but he was 80 years old when he saw the burning bush. Most of us think of our lives as being over by then. I wonder how the prince/shepherd stages of his life formed him.

Future

A lot of what we today consider high art was either decoration, commissioned product, or crass entertainment at the time it was made. Which probably means that one day our decorations, commissioned products, and crass entertainment will be considered high art by future generations. All this is as it should be.

Fun

"The job of a supervisor is to make work fun for his crew."

Respect

Being kind to someone is not the same as respecting them. People can tell the difference.

Boots

So apparently magnetic astronaut boots could have made perpetual motion machines

http://www.cheniere.org/misc/astroboots.htm

I'm researching this more.

Band

I think playing in a band is good training for real life. Sometimes in life, like in live music, there are high-pressure situations when you don't know if you are good enough to perform what is asked of you. The only way to get through it is to (so to speak) throw a foot up on your monitor and let 'er rip and *know* you are going to nail it even if you *think* you might not be able to.

Alt

I wrote this about alt text in a message to a friend and I thought it was interesting:

Alt text is used as a substitute for an image (hence the abbreviation "alt" like "alternative"). Basically when someone is creating a webpage they can associate alt text with an image so if a user is running a browser that doesn't support images, or if they are blind and are using a browser that will read text out loud, there will be a description of the image instead of the image itself.

Tooltips (which I think is technically what xkcd and daisy owl use) were originally used as titles for images which would show up when a user placed the mouse cursor over an image.

The two types of text are coded differently in html. I don't know the exact syntax, but basically alt text uses the prefix "alt" before the body of the text, and tooltips use the prefix "title" before the text.

Differentiating between alt text and tooltips is made more difficult by the fact that Internet Explorer 7 and earlier had a bug which incorrectly displayed alt text as tooltips. This encouraged programmers to use the "alt" prefix instead of the "title" prefix when they wanted text to show up as a tooltip. IE 8 and Mozilla display things correctly.

Here are some good links to explain that:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=25537#c31
(read comment 31)

https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Mozilla_Web_Developer_FAQ#Why_doesn.e2.80.99t_Mozilla_display_my_alt_tooltips.3f

also the wikipedia article on "alt text" is good and has some good links, although you obviously couldn't cite it itself in a paper.

Fetish

The definition of a fetish is something without which you cannot be sexually aroused. Do we treat worship in Church like a fetish? Are there things we tell ourselves we cannot worship God without (traditional music, contemporary music, fancy building, plane building, electric guitars, organ, choir, high quality musicianship, gritty soulful musicians, standing and clapping, kneeling, etc.)?

Are there elements to a service which we truly shouldn't be able to worship God without?

Also, speaking of fetishes, do American men have a big breast fetish or a skinny people fetish? Theoretically wouldn't having one of those be just as bad as a foot fetish or something?

Danger

There is a lot of stuff that we think of as being very dangerous that is actually equally or less dangerous than driving on a two-lane highway. One false move and you're dead. I don't think we should be more scared when driving: I think we should be less scared to do "dangerous" stuff.

Anime

When I watch good anime I usually feel like I've been punched in the gut afterward.

Divorce

In America, songs about relationships are usually about failed relationships. I wonder whether this may have to do (either as a cause or as a result) with the proliferation of divorce.

Also, it's weird that songs about relationships are usually about failed relationships, but movies about relationships are usually about successful relationships.

Checkers

At work the other day a door to the dumpsters outside was left ajar (by the garbage men?) and a car whipped around the corner without looking and hit the door. This caused the door to hit a random passerby in the head fracturing his skull. I have no idea if he's OK or what. I'm becoming jaded because this sort of thing does not seem that strange to me anymore. Just another day at work. Also we were really busy because of the Renaissance Faire. And we were short 6 people.

Checkers/Rally's advertising slogans 1997-present:
1997-1999 "Fresh. Because we just made it."
1999-2000 "High performance Human Fuel"
2000-2008 "You gotta eat!"
2008-present "little place. BIG TASTE."

Until quite recently they were the only major fast food chain that refused to publish any sort of nutritional information. Now supposedly you can find it here [http://www.checkers.com/pdfs/nutrition.pdf] but I can't get the link to work.

Damn I love that place.

Play

Play where you are, not where people tell you to play.

Busting

"If customers see you busting your ass, they won't get angry even if they have to wait"

Truer than I would have thought initially.

Work

When you're out of school, work becomes more stressful but rest becomes more restful.

Fame

Lady Gaga's first album is great. Absolutely fantastic. But the drums have way too much compression, particularly on "Paparazzi" and "The Fame."

Venus in Furs

You know what book is great? Venus in Furs by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. Best exploration of the desire to be dominated I have yet encountered. Could have been written last year and would be just as relevant. It takes what we might label with euphemisms like 'unhealthy' or 'codependent' and exposes a yawning, horrific abyss.

Iron Maiden

I think Iron Maiden does an excellent job paying tribute to historical figures and events:

Aces High -- the Battle of Britain (see the music video)
Run the the Hills -- the plight of Native Americans
Tailgunner -- tailgunners in World War II
Sun and Steel -- Miyamoto Musashi, a 17th century Japanese samurai
Ganghis Khan -- Ganghis Khan
etc.

Also, literature:

The Trooper -- The Crimean War / "Charge of the Light Brigade" by Tennyson
Revelations -- G.K. Chesterton
To Tame a Land -- "Dune" by Frank Hurbert
Phantom of the Opera -- "The Phantom of the Opera" by Gaston Leroux
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner -- "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner" by Robert Heinlein
Moonchild -- "Liber Samekh" by Aleister Crowley
etc.

Here's a good website to research allusions Iron Maiden makes:
http://stason.org/TULARC/music-bands/iron-maiden/19-Song-And-Name-Origins-Iron-Maiden.html

I feel like Maiden is kind of like historical fiction in music form. Or maybe more accurately like a historical fiction graphic novel in music form.

Synths

When did Church music cease to be crushing and majestic? In the middle ages organs could be heard from miles away. It was one of the loudest sounds anyone would ever hear in their lives. Plus they would be in these buildings that were so ridiculously huge and beautiful they took over a hundred years to build. Now we meet in these understated modest buildings and try to make sure the music doesn't detract from the lyrics.

Why do you never hear synths that threaten to stop your heart? Why aren't there 4 minute guitar solos played through a wall of Marshall amps? There's nothing wrong with the music in Church right now, but it seems like we're missing out on a lot.

I wonder whether our understanding of God is effected. Do we make it harder to believe in God's power and goodness when our worship of Him is so small in scale and unambitious?

These are not rhetorical questions. There might be (and hopefully are) good reasons, but I just don't know them.