READIN

Monday, June 13th, 2005

🦋 Wow, look at this!

I was googling around today and thought I would look for the sentence "I got a girl long and tall, sweet as she could be", which I believe is the first line of a Big Bill Broonzy song I was listening to last night and enjoying. No results... but!!! "long and tall" + "sweet as she could be" brings up only one result, and it is Michael Taft's Pre-War Blues Lyrics Concordance!!! This is huge! I haven't even begun looking at it yet but I'm completely psyched that such a thing should exist and be online.

Update: And here is a link to the front page of the concordance.

posted morning of June 13th, 2005: Respond
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Friday, June 10th, 2005

With regards to my most recent post -- The idea of writing poetry directed at a listener (who let's say for the sake of argument is me), asking him to consider a situation where he is talking to or watching somebody else and to try to imagine how he would react, or to suggest a possible reaction, seems pretty interesting to me, and like it might be a useful format to spend some time working on. Are there any good poets that use this format, that I could read up on?

posted afternoon of June 10th, 2005: Respond
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Wednesday, June 8th, 2005

🦋 Poetry blogging

Here is something I have never done: I am posting a poem which I wrote this afternoon.

Facets

So what about Jason,
Who throws up his hands in disgust
And cries, "I've been living a lie!"
As he flounces out of the room
To reclaim his truer self --
What are you his interlocutor
To make of this behavior?
Sit puzzled in his wake, pulling at your beard, mulling,
Muse: "Hmm, 'living a lie', I like the sound of that..."
Find a facet of your being in Bad Faith,
Some distorting mirror,
Imagine it cracked.

posted evening of June 8th, 2005: Respond
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Tuesday, May 31st, 2005

🦋 Lotsa Pictures

A bunch of new images for the READIN Family Album:

• A moment from Sylvia's dance class
• From the Families with Children from China Chinese Culture Day in Jersey City:
  • Me and Sylvia walkin' down the line
  • Sylvia riding on the dragon boat and meeting the monkey king
  • Looking for Shanghai
  • Sylvia dancing in her seat and again.
• Sylvia is learning to ride a bike! Although in these two pictures she is just using it as a platform to model her new hat.
• The clubhouse I built for Sylvia:
  • The plan I worked from;
  • A long view;
  • She begins her ascent;
  • At the top of the ladder;
  • comfortably ensconced.

posted evening of May 31st, 2005: Respond
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Sunday, May 29th, 2005

🦋 They abide and they endure

"Night of the Hunter" is the movie that I have had in mind ever since I saw it 6 or 7 years ago at the American Museum of the Moving Image, as the archtypal confidence-man movie -- I could never remember the name of the movie though, just that it had Robert Mitchum going down the Mississippi [incorrect -- the river is actually the Ohio] conning widows. Tonight we watched the movie on video tape and it took about 5 minutes for it all to come flooding back. What a fantastic film.

posted evening of May 29th, 2005: Respond
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Saturday, May 28th, 2005

🦋 The Vestibules

"Bulbous Bouffant" by the Vestibules has been one of my favorite things ever since I heard it on Greasy Kid Stuff last year. This evening I stopped by the group's home page and was pleased to see they have several video sketches available for free download (of which the funniest is probably Dry Cleaner, or Name Game), and a full album (Chest of Drawers 5.0) on sale for only US$3.

posted evening of May 28th, 2005: Respond

Thursday, May 26th, 2005

🦋 Project pix

Got my scanner working!

• Here is a picture of Sylvia's newly-repainted room, with cabinets installed.
• A front view of the little walnut shelf I installed in our bathroom.
• A detail of the depression I carved into the top of the shelf.

posted morning of May 26th, 2005: Respond
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Tuesday, May 24th, 2005

🦋 More Shareware

Does anyone know if Bazz Ltd., creators of Just! Webmail, are still around? I downloaded their product from a shareware site and like it, but their web site justwebmail.com doesn't seem to have much content on it. I am hoping to be able to license the product -- it would be a shame not to be able to use it.

Nevermind... I just found SquirrelMail, which seems more useful.

posted evening of May 24th, 2005: Respond

Sunday, May 22nd, 2005

🦋 Summer projects

A status update on my home improvement tasks for the summer.

Woodworking

• Sylvia's room is painted and lovely; I would post a picture of it if I could figure out how to make my scanner work again. (Update: Scanner working; here's the picture.)
• I finished building Sylvia's playhouse on Friday. Still needs to be sanded and weather-proofed.
• The garbage-can enclosure is pretty well-thought-out now and may commence actually getting built over Labor-day weekend. (Although the priority project for that weekend is cleaning the garage.)
• The small tool shed is still a thing of fantasy.

Patio

• Today I started raising the slate walkway up to driveway level, and got about 3/4 of the first section done, before the rains came. The work is going pretty quickly and coming out well.
• Next weekend, when I may-or-may-not start building the garbage enclosure, I also may-or-may-not start laying stone in the area where it is to go. I think I don't have enough bluestone to do this and would like to figure out if there's somewhere I can buy 20 or so square feet without having to buy a full pallette.
• If I might not have enough stone for the garbage enclosure base, I certainly don't have enough to extend the back patio. So that's on hold for now.

posted evening of May 22nd, 2005: Respond
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Friday, May 20th, 2005

🦋 Forgot to pay for my shareware

D'oh! I must say Selisoft's ActiveHTML (the product which is driving this blog) has a very effective way of reminding you when your free trial has expired. Okay, well all paid for and licensed now.

posted evening of May 20th, 2005: Respond

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