Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in thisc0rrosion's LiveJournal:

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Friday, November 20th, 2009
8:39 pm	Android 2 (Okay, writing posts on the phone is a headache until my typing speed gets good, so I'll just post from a real computer) First hours with Android: Started customizing, internet running, facebook & LJ connected, posted a photo, installed some apps from Market. Very satisfied, touch keyboard tough to get used to but autocorrect very good. Got my first phonecall, actually jumped a bit, nervously answered it. Next steps: install some of my sample apps, set up my commute-survival-kit (music and podcasts), research tethering and voip... Maybe dream up a real application to write for myself, now that I'm more "in touch" with the real use of Android. Ideas? (4 Comments |Comment on this)
8:23 pm	Android, finally Got my new phone. finally get to install the sample apps I've been writing. may need to write Lj app, this one i'm using isn't so hot. Phone is great, qwerty keyboard tough to get used to. I see why nasty Twitter caught on but no worries I will stay strong. (Comment on this)
Saturday, November 14th, 2009
1:22 pm	9 days, + stress My 9 days of being sick seem to be over. I got up and did some small jobs on the house, climbed around on the scaffolding a bit. That was nice. The shopkeeper lady downstairs seems to be the biggest threat to construction progress. Contractor is trying to work the city permit system to get started again, should have some news about the permits next week (that is, either it'll be solved or we're stuck with a months long delay). Shopkeeper lady really doesn't want to wait till next FUCKING week for answers, has been talking about calling the city to "ask questions about what's happening." This is the kind of thing that can cause more red tape and months of delays and tens of thousands of euros costs. So I'm TRYING to keep her happy and begging her to talk only to me and the contractor, let the contractor handle the "system". I seem to end up in this situation a lot, personally and professionally. Being a middleman between 2-4 parties with not the full picture, little control, trying to negotiate a solution. Trying to get them to talk directly with each other, but knowing that even they do things could skid radically off the tracks into dangerous territory. I fucking hate this, and need to figure out why I keep ending up here. I'd go for a loooong run to burn off stress, but don't really want to tax my just-recovered-system yet. Whiskey binge, ditto. Got a nice backrub from S. Maybe now a good cry and a good nap. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
4:10 pm	Doctorow, "Makers" I should withdraw most of my criticism about "Makers".  It continues to be a little manifesto about the nobility and advantage of opensource / community driven model (manifested in the physical world to make it fun for non-software-types).  However, after section one ended with a crash, the characters and their struggles became a lot more real. And I'm still enjoying it and being surprised by it. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, November 9th, 2009
10:39 pm	Turbulent Fucking Day (a.k.a. things NOT to do when you're sick) + Woke up early, felt okay, decided it was time to get back to work + Talked to spidertangle , the construction workers were hard at work, kicking ass and putting in windows! + Had a fun meeting.  Me and later my boss got to kick the ass of our hosting company, on a wide variety of subjects from SLA to bizarre billing practices to just never fucking answering questions straight.  I'd been arranging and looking forward to this for some time, the main reason I went to work despite possibly still being sick. - Realized I was losing my voice from all fun the ass-kicking. Guess I'm still sick. --- Got urgent phone calls from spidertangle and contractor at same time, interrupting the ass-kicking.  Contractor hadn't ACTUALLY arranged permits on the windows, had hoped to get them in before the city noticed.  He tends to cut corners like that, but an inspector wandered by on unrelated business.  Lots of fear at this point, not sure what'd happen.  At least the inspector let them fill in the two empty holes with windows, instead of plastic.  All work stops.  This could become the kind of bureaucratic nightmare that scares me away from starting ANYTHING in this country. - Totally lost voice, headed home.  ++ Got home, saw the two windows that were in. Airtight!!!! Warm!!!! Soundproof!!! Perfect!!!! + Heard from contractor, he has a plan to get the permits handled quickly, he'll stop by tonight to sign forms, and hopefully get on track without too many lost days. -- Shit. The windows, while opening in the middle like asked, actually have a POST down the middle.  In this city, with these stairs, almost everything is moved in and out through the windows.  We'll never get anything wider than 60 cm into or out of the house again!  This made for seriously stressful evening. + coco_keesses showed up to talk about some furniture she's designing for us. Luckily, she's an interior architect trained person, and pointed out a few things: 1) the window posts are actually big problem that we should fight over; 2) contractors here have insurance to hndle fuckups like this, so it shouldn't be too terrible; 3) we have "legal insurance" (a type of insurance here that provides a laywer if you need one) + The rest of our talk about furniture was good, though I was too distracted by window problems to properly pay attention. - Contractor still hasn't arrived, my voice is shot, I'm nervous as hell about talking to him about the posts. + Contractor arrives, immediately recognizes the problem with windows, will talk to the manufacturer about it. We fill out the needed forms for the city permits, night ends on optimistic note. He's no project manager, but I know he tries to put things right. Wrap up with some Robot Chicken and off to bed.  Whew. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, November 8th, 2009
12:55 pm	Things to do when you're sick, pt 2 Wake up your partner all night with your snoring Switch from watching Blakes 7 to random other suggestions from friends. Strangers with Candy, latest Venture Brothers, a bit of Babylon 5 review. Give up on Pynchon ("historiographical metafiction" is a bit much when sick) for Doctorow's "Makers". It's lighter in both physical and mental sense. A bit of guilty pleasure, I'm enjoying it but feel like I should be criticising for 'Ayn Rand'-style - the characters are all really just geekworld archetypes and their dialogue / plot-moves just feel like the idealized compilation of all the smart geek-forum wisdom out there. At least the characters are well fleshed out and it's fun and interesting, unlike Rand's terrible "Anthem". NOT go outside and enjoy the blue skies. Take a nap now. Then decide whether I'm well enough to go to spidertangle 's first concert with Contrast. This is a bad idea, but she's really excited about it, and I realized, strangely, that it's only from 5 - 6, so it wouldn't really disrupt my rest too much, right?  Right? (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, November 6th, 2009
5:29 pm	Things to do when you're sick Go on watching 1970s sci fi: "Blakes 7" - I took ilexcassine 's advice and jumped ahead into season 2, liked it more with Avan as captain. Since I have lots of couch time I'm just letting season 1 play through as I doze. Thomas Pynchon's "Against the Day" is way too big and heavy to read when you're fading off to sleep. And typical Pynchon, the story moves in strange ways that become very hard to follow when you're brain isn't at full strength.  I need something lighter, both in weight and subject matter.  Ayan Hirsi Ali's "Infidel" is my next up, don't think that'll work. Where's fluffy scifi when I need it? Get around to ordering new phone, HTC Hero with Android. Unfortunately brain is to scattered to play with the Android SDK , will need to do that when I'm better. Watch scaffolding go up around your house. Yay! The workmen came and put up scaffolding for my window replacement next week. Which is good, since it is starting to get really cold in the house. They were really fast, both sides done in less than 2 hours. Suggestions, anyone, for cute easy TV shows to watch? (17 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, November 5th, 2009
9:38 pm	The "D" Bands Continuing the iPod train journey The Damned: Ah. Phantasmagoria is perfect for strange train dreams.  Danger, the video link is pretty 80s in the bad way. This is better, but ain't on my iPod. Daniel Ash: Something about this album rubs me the wrong way. Like his use of samples is not nearly as original and cool as he thinks it is. On the other hand, the music itself is great, for instance the long writhing "Rattlesnake", where I can see the genius. The Danse Society: "It was a dark and stormy train ride", and this is the band for it. "Heaven is waiting" album hit the spot, the compilation album "Seduction" missed, maybe it lacked consistency. Darude: Bouncy. Forgot this whole album is fairly repetitive. Didn't sit well with the train ride. David Bowie:  What? I only have Earthling and Ziggy Stardust on this iPod? (Changesbowie doesn't count). Guess most of my bowie was on tape, so never made the jump to mp3. MUST fix that. Dead Can Dance: Yeah, this isn't quite as enjoyable as 10 years ago. I'm pretty sure there were better albums, not sure where they got to. Depeche Mode: "Violator" made it really hard to concentrate on studying on the train. Had me in a dream state the whole morning though Depeche Mode Tribute: a bunch of DM songs, redone by goth and electro bands. Cute but not brilliant. Diary of Dreams: Even without the Vin Diesel sampling (from Pitch Black), I'd still think I was listening to great dark rock by Vin Diesel. Does he know about this band? This concert video isn't bad, but doesn't really get moving until 0:55. Die Form: This gets better after having seen the concert. Strange electro latex concert. Not quite right on an iPod on the train though. Need heavy speakers and concert hall. Diorama: I really thought I was listening to Diary of Dreams again, and enjoyed it. Turns out, most of Diorama's early albums were produced by Diary of Dreams lead. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, November 1st, 2009
4:33 am	Halloween good. Beer foamy Halloween Good. Beer foamy. Bukowski weekend success. No photos, unless some random strangers / spanish tourists upload them. Still green from Frankenstein costume. (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, October 29th, 2009
12:49 am	Bukowski style Spent the last two months carefully not drinking. My health had been bad, plus I just wanted to challenge myself and change my patterns.  Refrained from light social drinking except on a few rare occasions (France! Wine!), and got comfortable drinking cokes when people offer beers around here. Health has slowly improved (in general), but can't say that energy levels and life-happiness are up.  So fuck it. There's three days in a row of excellent parties this weekend. I think I'll abandon the experiment for a weekend, and try to channel Bukowski instead.  "Drinking is an emotional thing. It joggles you out of the standardism of everyday life, out of everything being the same. It yanks you out of your body and your mind and throws you against the wall. ... It's like killing yourself, and then you're reborn."  Bukowski (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
10:00 pm	A Night Ride The country up north is filled with dark spaces, between trees and distant lights. You can't tell if you're looking across lakes, bays or farmland. The half-moon is tucked deeply behind clouds and doesn't give any help.  Occasional shimmers of light on water prove deceptive, might just be a canal before the field.  You keep riding, bundled against the cold, keeping an eye on the curving road instead of the trees flashing by. No one can see you, not a single self-conscious thought about how you look on your old dull motorcycle, it just hums and purrs and roars steady beneath you like it's happy to be on the road again.  Once in a while, you come across a bumbling slow car and get to fly by it, feeling your real speed.    You are taking it easy, but it's dark and you don't know these roads. You hope you don't make a stupid mistake so you can get home and tell your friends about this. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
7:38 pm	One last ride! I am going to take advantage of this unusually warm night, for one last ride before winter.  Bye! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 21st, 2009
10:23 pm	Eine Kleine TreinMuziek, The "C" Bands Discovered that some of the songs on my iPod don't actually play, just skip over. Probably in a format that iPod can't handle (for instance, free stuff downloaded from "The Caretaker" band, not sure what format they use) Caly McMurrow: Rhythmic and smooth. Really helps the miles ease by in a morning haze. Christian Death: Woah, Rozz Williams is a wakeup call after Caly. "Five more minuuutes... And we'll allll be deeeaadd!" Luckily it hit about the time my trainride was ending, and time to wake up anyway.  Why do I only have "The Iron Mask" on here? Must re-rip from other CDs. Clan of Xymox: Since I would normally dance to this, it got my legs pumping on the bicycle (I was off the train by this time). The Clash: This sets me into active, thinking mood on the train. Combichrist: Violent, rhythmic, norwegian industrial. Yeah okay, you can imagine the effect on my trainride. Good for studying a programming manual, not for sleeping. Concrete Blonde: Oh no, Bloodletting is all scratchy and crackly! Will need to re-rip from original CD. Everything else by this band is heaven. Listening brings good musings and strange dreams all the way through. The Cure: Similar to above, but gets me thinking about old days. Not surprising, this all comes from very formative teenage years. (Concrete Blonde always seems relevant to present-life, no matter when I'm listening) Cynic Guru: A single song, probably from a friend. Don't recognize it, but not bad stuff. (Comment on this)
Friday, October 9th, 2009
8:27 pm	House updated, still no pics I'm so lazy, never put up my pics. Scaffolding will come next week.  New window work will probably start the week after.  Just as it's getting cold, but better late than never.  (It's already been surprisingly cold in the house, because of our worthless leaky windows, so it can't get much worse when they tear them out) Roof work will also, hopefully, begin at the same time. This Saturday and Sunday, I'm going up top to dismantle the roof terrace and move all the planks to a neighbors roof for temporary storage.  Want to come and help? I'll provide beer... AFTER we're off the roof. (Comment on this)
8:11 pm	Train Music: The B bands Continuing my train and iPod odd-essy, patiently working through everything on my iPod on my hour-long commute. Balaam & the Angel: Classic sounding gothic rock. Okay for keeping the head busy while doing something else like reading or typing or falling asleep on train. I'd see them live if I got a chance. Banane Metalik: Man this french horrorpunk band was awesome live. But it was hard to listen to on a train ride, again, where I had to sit quietly and not break things. So I skipped ahead. Bauhaus: Good for keeping my head busy, or background music to my reading. When in the right mood really gives a boost. Actually too many albums on the iPod, had to skip ahead to avoid overload. Blitzen: Good and energizing on the train. Helped keep me awake. Blondie: This gives a mood boost when you're feeling a little low. Maybe because there's a lady with a sweet voice singing about how much she longs for you, for an entire album. Good for the ego, right? Butthole Surfers: This was better during the bicycle ride home than sitting on the train. (Comment on this)
8:02 pm	Train Music: The A bands Hej hej (as my swedish overlords say) After noticing the weird Shuffle patterns on my iPod, I decided to just go through and listen to all the music on my iPod, from beginning to end.  The train commute provides plenty of time for listening. 28 Days Later soundtrack: This creepy cool tense soundtrack energizes and adrenalizes like crazy. Makes it a bit hard to sit still on the train. Adam Ant: I was surprised by this. Blast from the past, and really sifts in to your unconscious, makes you feel randy and aberrant and cool all at same time, like a new-wave-era Londoner or New Yorker must feel, right? And the songs get stuck in your head for a long time. AFI: Decent hardcore punk band, but, well, but never quite hit me right and listening to the whole thing put it over the edge. Decided I needed to delete. Alex Chilton: What is this doing here? I got a few songs on a mix from a friend. Listened, didn't like. Delete. Alien Sex Fiend: Hmmm. Psychedelic alien punk rock really makes you feel dangerous and energetic in any situation except sitting on a long train ride. Then it just drags on, since you are stuck in a seat and can't dance around and break things. Had to skip a few albums to get to next band. Apoptygma Berzerk: Also, on a long commute, this pseudo-industrial just got tedious, had to jump ahead. Arab Strap: What is this? A few songs from a friend's mix.  This was great on the train. Rhythmic, slick, relaxing and cool. A definite keeper. (7 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009
10:21 pm	Blakes 7? After hearing about this show from slightly older or slightly more BBC connected sci-fi junkies over the years, I finally got my hands on Blakes 7 to give it a try.  Well, it's okay but not really grabbing me. I expected more humor or weirdness, maybe I just got all the best quotes on peoples sig lines.  There is some entertainment: similarities that show up in future shows (Lots of plot similarities with Farscape for instance), and during the entire pilot episode in the distopian big-brother city I couldn't stop thinking of Paranoia. Anyway, I'm six shows in and probably won't keep going. Unless someone can provide me with a compelling reason or spectacular episode I should be looking forward to? (it's rather funny how POORLY the Federation security guards fight. They can't even hold their own in a stand-up fight with the ships cowardly thief) (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, September 19th, 2009
9:09 am	My iPod is obsessed On an 8 hour train trip, My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult came up about one out of every 3 songs on the shuffle. That means I heard about 3 hours of satanic electronic disco. I have almost 3000 songs on the iPod. I can't possibly have 1000 MLTKK songs, so my iPod must be seriously obsessed.  Not that I'm complaining.  Sadly, there is not one single MLTKK video out there in the world. But i'll link this anyway. (Thankfully, Troy & Geert played some for me at Understroom last night, I didn't even need to ask!) (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, July 16th, 2009
5:46 pm	SMBC archives continue to entertain me. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, July 15th, 2009
10:47 pm	Bad dream Guess it's time to start writing dreams again. This one has stuck with me since last week. I was wandering around the top of a skyscraper with friends, looking at the clouds and blue skies. I saw some workers on the neighboring skyscraper, surprisingly working at the edge without scaffolding. How can they do it? Oh of course, because the skyscrapers are built inside a tower of water. (The dutch have these interlocking metal pillars, they use them to block an area off from the water and pump the water out while they do construction work. This was sort of the reverse, they were pumping water IN to a skyscraper-sized tower, somehow allowing the skyscraper to exist with less structural support) Okay, so I started walking across the water surface to the other skyscraper. I thought, wow, that's a lot of water down there. It'd be pretty bad to fall in there, a 50 story column of water enclosed by metal. And I did. I sank quickly. Much too quickly, carried down by some unknown weight that I couldn't shed. The light from the surface receded quickly, and I realized, "uh oh, I screwed up bad, no way out of this one." I woke on my back, deep pressure on my chest and gasping my last breath. (1 Comment |Comment on this)