Excerpt from The Moon and Sixpence (Maugham)

But one fact was made clear to me: people talk of beauty lightly, and having no feeling for words, they use that one carelessly, so that it loses its force; and the thing it stands for, sharing its name with a hundred trivial objects, is deprived of dignity. They call beautiful a dress, a dog, a sermon; and when they are face to face with Beauty cannot recognize it. The false emphasis with which they try to deck their worthless thoughts blunts their susceptibilities. Like the charlatan who counterfeits a spiritual force he has sometimes felt, they lose the power they have abused. But Stroeve, the unconquerable buffoon, had a love and an understanding of beauty which were as honest and sincere as was his own sincere and honest soul. It meant to him what God means to the believer, and when he saw it he was afraid.

this is the same reason i have always avoided using the word 'love' in any trivial way.

i've decided to take m. up on her offer to spend Easter at her parents' house. i just felt like getting out of the city and spending Easter with a family. happy Easter!

why wait until your dead to get your work in big name museums? i have to admit i admire the gumption it must take to pull something like this off.

well, we're in production. not without our fair share of hickups and hurdles, but big one is done. we dropped another minor patch tonight. but if you're considering a home equity loan, you can submit on online at Chase.

i'm heading to work in about an hour to do our production implementation. hopefully in about 6 hours (6am sunday) we'll be accepting external internet traffic to our site.

happy st patrick's day. have a guinness.

in the last two and a half months, i've made as much as did all last year. that is fairly amazing.

get em while theyre hot.

my thoughts were so loud i couldn't hear my mouth

-modest mouse

spam. i noticed that coffee has been the latest new craze for spammers.

i'm glad to see that st giles will be getting some tlc.

today was the first day in a long time i came home from work at a normal hour. i left the office at about 5:45pm. now, before you think i had a short day, i still had to work from about 7:30-9 once i got home. what was bizzare is that since i've been commuting home generally between 9pm-1am, i forgot what it's like to see so many people in the streets and on the subway in the evening. i started to feel as tho the subway was my personal transportation, not public transportation.

today was 11hrs at work, and the shortest day this week. the good news is that we did our final QA drop tonight. so, as long as no other major issues arise, things should be more reasonable. launch is scheduled for march 20.

i finally got a new phone (phone number and plan) this weekend. i stayed with cingular/at&t because they had the best plan and phones. with my corporate discount and all the other discounts and rebates, i was able to get the motorola v551 pretty much for free. it has all the same features as the razor, but in a different form factor. i have to say, the software and interface is not nearly as intuitive as my nokia, but overall i like it so far. if anyone has a good place to download free or cheap ringtones, let me know.

babies. it seems like everyone i know is expecting a baby. in the forefront is my sister, who is due in a about 3 weeks. and i just heard a couple i'm good friends with back home is expecting their second. there are a few more, but they're still not officially 'public' yet.

congratulations to all. i hope everyone continues to be happy and healthy.

they're filming something in front of arlenes grocery today. they've got a ton of equipment set up, and stanton street blocked off. didn't catch anyone i recognized tho.

went to sushi samba last night night to celebrate l's birthday. the food was excellent, as was the service and the company. after dinner, we headed to some russian/turkish baths. it was a closed private party, with a bunch of people that l knew. it was an interesting experience to say the least. overall another fine night out in new york.

mockery. brilliant mockery. and i think my favorite part was when deloitte came up in the google ads.

the gates. saturday i couldn't bring myself to go to work, since i was there until 9:30pm on friday. so i decided to check out the installation in the park. the jury is still out, but i have to say that it is much more interesting in person, something about the motion and the people.

here are a couple pictures i took: gates 1 gates 2

glimpse. a blog entry is nothing the smallest glimpse into a particular thought or event in a blogger's life. this medium of communication lends itself to all sorts of intrigue and potential connections to be made.

ah, i want to say something here but i'm too tired to form the thoughts in any cohesive manner. i worked 70 hrs this week and it's just too much. all the reasons i left this lifestyle the first time are coming back. there's just no balance.

two days of work, 33 hrs logged. qa drop on friday. swamped.

busted

the big story of this weekend is the snow. it seems to have stopped for the time being, but round two is supposed to start up soon until 2am. check out the city under snow from earthcam.com webcams.

accent. i would aggree; i think edinburgh has the best accent.

saw hotel rwanda last night with my roommate. it's had really great reviews, so we decided to get out of the apartment last night and check it out. it was a great film; but one of those that you don't want to be so bood b/c it's about something so awful. at least it wasn't the US that was made out to be the sole neglecter, but the entire UN that failed to intervene.

tsunami pictures. wow is all i can really say. i don't think i'd ever really be able to grasp the devistation.

i got a card from a friend i hadn't heard from in some time. a friend that encouraged me to pick up the quill and keep writing.

last night k and i went out to arlenes grocery and saw two pretty decent bands: T and Ancient Frontier. today the weather is not conducive to much other than sleeping and reading indoors. but tonight we're planning on checking out another of the music clubs nearby. probably luna and maybe mercury lounge.

visitors. for some reason, it seems everyone wants to visit in january. normally this wouldn't be a problem, but it happens to be a very busy time at work. but right now, k is visiting from germany. she was just in hawaii for several weeks visiting her sister, and is on her way back home.

subway ad of the day: the bahamas

and some pictures from the bbc.

year in review, from dave berry.

lucky day. despite an otherwise bad day at work, the vending machine gave me two cheddar sun chips for the price of one.

US Air delivered my bag tonight at about 10:30pm. They offer no way to check on the status other than their website for request, which I sent requests to 3 times:
Try #1 response:

Thank you for contacting US Airways about your baggage. We apologize that you have been without your luggage and we thank you for your patience. We have checked your file record and see that your luggage has arrived and scheduled for delivery.

The service handling your luggage normally delivers within 4 to 6 hours, however due to a larger volume of bags scheduled for delivery today, that window may be extended.

Try #2 response:

nothing

Try #3 response:

Thank you for contacting US Airways about your baggage. We apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced.

At this time, we are unable to respond to your e-mail. Please contact the Passenger Baggage Call Center at 1-800-371-4771 for further assistance.

We appreciate your continued support of US Airways.

And 54 hours after my arrival, my bag was delivered to my door. Note that the 800 number they provide does not allow you to speak to a person, and does not allow you to be put on hold and wait for a person, they simply disconnect you. So really there is no way to check the status of your bag. This has be be the worst customer support i've ever experienced.

I suggest others, and i know there were a lot of others, who experienced this, to write and ask for your money from US Air.

i have an over 50% luggage loss rate when flying usair. of course, i wasn't alone this holiday weekend. they lost my luggage both going to and returning from pittsburgh.

merry Christmas!

you know you've been working to long when you go to the vending machine because you are hungry, reach for your change, look at the coins in your hand, and think: i don't think this vending machine supports pennies.

i finished the davinci code last night. it was a pretty good book. he had to have done a lot of research...enough to make it believable for a novel. the end had a special surprise for me as i had been to the chapel outside of edinburgh it reference. it was cool to have an actual memory of many of the places in the book: paris, the louvre, london, rosslyn.

12°F, bloody cold. scotland gets a bad rap, but it rarely gets this cold.

ironically, the subtalk subway ad of the day is for conair.

does this say anything about the western infuence in china?

tonight j and i went to arlene's grocery
and then i ate an altoid.

someone in my building was baking cookies when i got home. made me realize how close Christmas is. i'm looking forward to being home for a few days and relaxing.

nice digs in nyc for no rent...for a bird.

there are feelings, and then there are the actions taken because of those feelings. everyone has a different amount of time and thought that gets in between the two. some have very little, some have quite a bit. i think i tend to take way more than the average bear.

subway ad of the day: cingular...the entire car.

strongbad has upgraded to a laptop after his 'virus' incident.

went to ini ani for tea and to do some reading. it really does have a nice atmosphere. they have wireless access there, so i may be spending more time there w/ my laptop. some girl saw my pittsburgh glass center t-shirt and asked me if that is where i was from. turns out she's a pittsburgh native too. i finished reading Disgrace - a very well crafted book.

subway advertisement of the day: 5 cents/min long distance to mexico.

last night was my first trip to brooklyn. e, j, and i went to a party at e's girlfriend's place. the party was fun, met several cool people. and it was interesting to see what brooklyn was like. park slope, the neighborhood we were in, seemed pretty nice, and just a touch more laid back than manhattan. it probably wouldn't be a bad place to live as long as you were close enough to the subway.

what are your 43 things?

i just got back from my friend e.'s soccer game. he coaches a team of U-8's. his team is awesome; he's taught them well how to pass and keep the field open. at that age it is quite a feat, and the payoff is in the 8-0 games they win.

it was a great day to be out. clear and crisp, the sun shining, the wind bitter. people looked beautiful bundled in their coats, scarfs wrapped high, sun in their eyes.

this past tuesday, a friend from my edinburgh program who now lives in the city, called me up to check out a 'moth' event. it was a storyteller slam and the speakers were very entertaining.

subway advertisement of the day: don't throw litter on the tracks, they cause fire (courtesy of the mta).

subway ad update: your girlfriends, your network. UPN9. (tv station)

today was a blustery day in ny. it is especially bad right down at the tip of the island where i work. at lunch there was an 'umbrella graveyard' on the corner next to the garbage can. its was humorous how many there were.

went shopping today in midtown. it was, as expected, extremely crowded. but i successfully purchased appropriate winter outerwear.

subway ad: learn to speak english.

i've decided to do a daily (or nearly daily) subway advertisement post. today is the first, and is bud light and 411.

happy thanksgiving everyone.

j went out tonight to celebrate his birthday. we ended up at a hooka bar that is on my block. it was kinda cool for something different.

use firefox.

From 1984:

And in the general hardening of outlook that set in round about 1930, practices which had been long abandoned, in some cases for hundreds of years--imprisonment without trial, the use of war prisoners as slaves, public executions, torture to extract confessions, the use of hostages and the deportation of entire populations--not only became common again, but were tolerated and even defended by people who considered themselves enlightened and progressive.

In light of the state of the world today, reading this gave me a chilling feeling. Not that I feel as if the Patriot Act has taken away any of my day to day freedoms or is extrememly intrusive to my personal life, but without a significant opposition to raise questions and keep people thinking about the direction such decision can take us we could all end up under the surveillance of the Thought Police.

living new york. last night, i left around 9:15 to meet up at a friend's place. we didn't leave to go out until 12:30. today, i had the best strawberry and nutella crepe ever, then swung by the essex street market for some groceries. the market is like the traditional city market you'd expect--in a large warehouse, packed with all sorts of produce and products from all over, people of all ages, colors, shapes and sizes, numerous languages being spoken. today is only half over, and it's been great.

i noticed that i get the highest number of its on monday and tuesday. i guess people are bored at work when they first get back.

also, the majority of the hits are from people doing searches for pictures of bath, venice, london, etc.

earlier this week, coming into the office for work in the morning, i got onto the elevator with two other guys. they were talking business and obviously worked together. when they exited, there was no question that the one checked me out an gave me the 'i'm interested' look. i haven't experienced that since SF.

it's hard to believe how warm my apartment is. and we've kept the windows open and heat 'off' as much as possible.

a.v. got married this weekend and is now a.b. it was a really beautiful event--the weather, the couple, the venue (green gables restaurant). it was a smaller and more intimate wedding than the large family weddings that i'm accustomed to. i was 1 of 4 high school friends that a. invited, so i feel quite honored to have been a part of the special day.

the trip there was much longer than i expected. primarily due to the rain and an accident on 78 on my way there. but i also stopped in bethelem for dinner with e. and j. so, i left at around 4:45 from my cousin's, and got to the hotel around 12:45am--8 hours. i made the return trip in just under 5 hours.

i learned two things today. how to make particular pages in ms word landscaped (not the entire document). and what pojo stands for.

there is a certain aethetics associated with ugliness. or maybe its more an aethetics of decay, of dispair. whatever it is, new york might just be the ultimate in examples. what accentuates the whole thing is the contrast between that which is beautiful and that which is ugly right next to each other.

and just like that, bluelikethat.com is done. i first stumbled upon bluelikethat because i did a search for a poem by e.e.cummings. that was some three years ago.

its been a really busy week. right now i have some horrendous post nasal drip, i know you wanted to know that. in the event i haven't mentioned it yet, my client has a couple locations downtown. what is amazing is that on the one floor where one of our project teams sit, more than 25% of the space is vacant. this is prime office space in downtown nyc, and it boggles my mind.

there are some other random observations i'd like to make. like the guy in the subway station today, asleep, with his shoes off, and no socks. granted, it's generally pretty warm down there, but clean it is not. i love the wash and fold service in ny. i take my dirty laundry one day, pick it up the next washed and folded. and it's not much more than if i did it myself. factor in the convenience and it's no contest. the guy that runs the place i go to is quite nice (despite losing a pair of my pants, but he paid me for them). he remembers everything. but what is more amazing is the lenght of the hair that grows out of a mole on his cheek. it has to be at least 4 inches long.

have a good weekend. tomorrow i play come touch football w/ my old college roommate.

and if you need a little more election humor, try this.

and yes, i voted, absentee.

ryan has been witnessing some amazing wildlife down near antarctica. i saw some wild life myself, albeit a differ type, in union square when i was out seeing the grudge last night.

went to see stomp last night with t. who is in town for the weekend. it was a really great show. those performers have to be in incredible shape to do that every day.

and, on top of that, we got an extra hour of sleep last night.

the eclipse is starting, i'm going to go watch.

another case of a blogger getting fired from work because of their blog.

went to a comedy show last night. it was fun. there were about 6 or 7 comedians, and they ranged from hum-drum to almost rolling-on-the-floor laughing. it was at gotham comedy. not a bad little venue.

considering the outcome, i don't mind having missed the yankees game.

how did i not find the onion's election coverage earlier?

interesting article my alumni ebulletin this week. too bad i can't make it.

today it's rainy and gray and dark outside. in manhattan, you need lights at 10:30am on the streets between the vertical canyon walls on days like this. but it makes working not as bad when it's dreary outside. i'm content to sit here and design and drink my tea.

whirlwind weekend. i left work on friday at 3:45 and returned home at about 10:45pm tonight. in that time i traveled to WV and back. spent time with my immediate family and family friends i grew up with, plus their spouses, dogs, and in my sister's case, nephew. it was a great weekend despite the dismal weather. on saturday it rained, then hailed, then snowed. but that is par for the course when out two families get together. today was great and s & d & i got to take their dog sadie for a walk in the state park. it was just after peak leaf season there, but was still nice to be outside for a bit.

on another note, we all over ate and there was still leftovers.

exercise. last night i went running when i got home from work. not a long run, but enough to feel like i did something. when i got home and checked my email, i found that this guy from craigslist had emailed me back about playing volleyball. it was that night. so, i decided to go to that too. it was all the way up at 145st, but it was nice to get some court time in. i was exhausted by the time i got home. surprisingly, i'm not too sore, but my wrist hurts a bit.

i just finished my last book last night. today i found an unbelievable webpage that i can use to help me find my local neighborhood bookstore.

sleeping. this morning i went down to the cellar where the mail room is in order to see if some mail i had sent to the office had come in. after navigating the windowless labyrinth, i enter a room lined with desks, and stacked in the middle with what looked like old office equipment. at one of the desks, a rather rotund man sat, mouse in hand, sound alseep. in fact, he was snore. i felt bad about having to wake him, but it was 8:45, and he was at work after all. so i said "good morning!" much to his surprise. he was very helpful in trying to locate any mail of mine and repeatedly apologized for the disorganization as they renovated or relocated or some such nonsense.

since i can't receive packages at my apartment, i was hoping to be able to have them sent to my work address. after this little demonstration, i'm not so sure that's a good idea.

feels like fall outside. i need to start wearing a jacket.

it also looks like i'll be on a project within a day or so. only 2 days of unstaffed time. that didn't take long. initially there looks like a fair amount of work in chicago, and then it will be based primarily in ny.

in other news, i went running yesterday. my dress pants that i haven't worn in 2 years were fitting a bit snug yesterday, so i figured i should take advantage of the beautiful weather. i'm pathetically out of shape, but more motivation to keep at it. what i'd really like to find is a soccer or volleyball club.

So far training has been pretty straight forward. This is technically my third time through new hire orientation for this company, and not that much changes year to year. But the most random thing happened on my way home tonight. Out of all the subway trains, and all the cars in the city, I walked onto one with my roommate sitting right on it. Today is the first day at home this week, I'd spent the previous nights at my cousins which saved me a 2 hr commute. Cheers to them!

21 percent of the visitors to my site use macOS.

today was my first day back to work. typical overviews and administrative paperwork to be filled out. my cousin was kind enough to let me stay at their place for a few days to avoid the 2 hr commute from the city. more details later, for now i'm going to bed.

last night we celebrated evan's birthday. it was a good night, and nice that i was able to enjoy going out on a weeknight. starting monday i most likely will not be able to do that anymore. and maybe that's a good thing, because today was a little rough.

last night we celebrated evan's birthday. it was a good night, and nice that i was able to enjoy going out on a weeknight. starting monday i most likely will not be able to do that anymore. and maybe that's a good thing, because today was a little rough.

i met my cousin for lunch today, then checked out the statue of liberty. another good day.

new york. new city, here i am. i arrived today without much difficulty, save the 5:20am alarm. i even got settled into my sublet room here in the east village. my roommate has been very nice and helpful. in fact, i'm blogging from his g4 ibook, who knows, maybe i'll be swayed to the mac-side. anyway, things are going splendidly so far. i think i like it here.

relocation. i've been looking on craigslist.org for short term sublets. success eludes, but i figure it might be easier once i get into town.

pictures. i was able to finally put together some pictures from dave's wedding. it took me longer than expected to get them uploaded to blogger; they seem to have changed some kind of security settings that make command line FTP more difficult. anyway, enjoy.

check out icon war

got back from vacation on sunday. it was a good trip. went to the wineries in the finger lakes and learned a lot about wine, including the fact that i do like some white wines, just not chardonnay. also did some hiking in the adirondacks and saw my buddy get married. d & s couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day. best wishes to them.

pictures to follow.

i'm off for vacation this weekend thru labor day weekend. d will be getting married labor day weekend up in the adirondacks. it should be a good time.

a bear with taste...

now that i'm temporarily unemployed, i've been addicted to the olympics. it's been great to watch the culmination of years of hard work and training. it's inspiring to watch the people that are the very best at what they do.

new york. new job, new place, new york. i got an offer to work in nyc starting in late september and will most likely be accepting. more details as they become available.

blog has been neglected. busy with insurance companies, moving, work, and searching for work.

a little bipartisan humor. (thanks e, h)

they listen at google. gmail just announced an import untility for yahoo contacts.

i saw spider man 2 last night. it was a good flick, on par with the first one. i also noticed that michael chabon helped with the screen play. he also wrote 'the mysteries of pittsburgh' which i've read.