Noise
After spending hours staring at ISO noise and massaging it out of pictures, all I see when I close my eyes is noise blossoming into pebbles in an imperfect darkness.
Marc Wiesner’s SimpleBlog
After spending hours staring at ISO noise and massaging it out of pictures, all I see when I close my eyes is noise blossoming into pebbles in an imperfect darkness.
Since Mike’s started using a bike on his commute to work, I thought it’d be nice if he had a smooth ride (and he was talking about a road bike anyway). So I resolved to finish working on that old 10-speed road-bike that’s been sitting against our patio wall. In the middle of re-greasing the rear hub assembly, Mike shouts over to me asking if I’d like to go donate blood with him. I figure sure, why not? I’ve got enough time before my class that I can finish working on the bike when we get home.
So we swing over to the blood bank. The usual questions on my military service since 1977 (from a nice lady who was a marathon cyclist) and they had me up on the chair waiting. I’m just hanging out so look over at Mike in the next chair grimacing. Turns the lady drawing from him put the needle in too deep, skewered the vein, and found muscle (ouch!). My lady, on the other hand, was the picture of deftness. A nurse for seven years, she knew what she was doing ^_^ . Didn’t feel a thing when she pulled the needle out. Then the usual instructions on no exercise or heavy lifting for 24hrs, drink plenty of fluids…blah blah blah.
Get home, finish working on my bike, and cycle over to class only marginally late. Hehe…wasn’t until I was half way to class I realized I was drinking coffee before I left (something that dehydrates was probably not the fluid they were talking about). Cycle back home, relax for a while, then start one dinner for myself, Mike, and Mom (flipping around an iron pan filled with potatoes, onions, and sauce for 30 min can’t possibly be heavy lifting, right?). And after diner a nice bike ride around SCU with Lisa (hardly exercise, I promise ^_^ ).
My buddy Preston and I took a drive up to the City of Ten-thousand Buddhas today. It was a really nice drive up with weather varying from sunny to downpour and interesting cities to drive through. The Buddhist community consists of schools, monks and nuns’ residences (segregated, of course), meditation hall, restaurant, and a few other buildings such as administration and guest housing. The area is a renovated mental hospital ^^
Around the community were peacocks wandering around (even saw a rooster) and laypeople interacting with devotees. The space is open to the surrounding neighborhood. Thanks to Preston’s fine timing we were able to join the monks and nuns for their once daily meal in the vegetarian mess. After we (gluttons that we are) went to the vegetarian restaurant (Jyun Kang) that operates in the community. We ordered two dishes, an appetizer, and three bowls of rice. Following Preston’s three helpings at the mess, I was left to cope with eating most of the food at the restaurant myself. It was sooo good but there was soooo much to go through. By the point I was done I was a hard breath away from spilling over. As good as my mouth felt, my stomach hurt ^^
After lunch we headed over to the meditation hall where we found some monks and laypeople chanting and performing walking meditation. A very friendly nun greeted Preston and myself, gave us books so we could read along with the program and told us when to bow. Very friendly, like all of the monks and nuns I’ve had the privilage of knowing ^_^ .
[cpg_imagethumb:24,peacock_03.jpg]
Click on the peckock to link to the photos I’ve currently got up for the trip (note…I may add more later when I’ve got more time to process them)
This evening…Franks and my plan to go play pool at Benson was cut short by the fact that Benson was closed…kinda. We WERE able to actually open the door, walk around the abandoned (yet still lit, thanks SCU) building….fun times.
What a night. Evening started when us Manchester Boys finally got started to San Francisco’s Sake Lab where we were gonna try to meet up with Fi and friends. We found the "and friends" (had a friendly moment with Wes ^_-) but must have lost Fi to some other (hopefully still enjoyable) part of the city.
The Lab was an interesting place. Almost entirely asian crowd, creative sushi that seemed reasonably priced to me. Speaker quality could have been better though and the partitioning of the space between restaurant, bar, and dance floor made the already small-ish area cramped, especially around the dance floor. Drinks were prohibitively expensive.
After the Lab, while we were waiting way too long for the garage to find our car, the idea descended upon us that with the night still early we could head over to Jackson Rancheria. For a little gambling distraction. I spent most of the two-and-a-half hours that the drive east took slipping in and out of consciousness in the back seat. Though I seem to remember being taken up to an ATM and withdrawing $300 that never made its way to my wallet when the closest bank to the casino was a Bank of the West branch (ha!).
Frank, who’d been riding the lower end of stims for most of the night spent the early morning hours sleeping in the car. I had a fun time keeping Mike company at the blackjack table and got to spend some time practicing rolling a coin on my fist when Mike got a fifty-cent piece from a blackjack. We had some ups, some downs, some free juice and coffee, some interesting sidelong glances. Met some interesting people. Well…not so much met as noticed and commented on. People to whom we would gave nicknames such as Georgia, Farv, Shorty, and Dickies.
Frank did the good duty of driving back to Santa Clara (a good thing too since I was only awake by the grace of caffeine and Mike was just exhausted) and we’ve started our mornings all on warped internal clocks.
Hopefully with more fun to come this spring break ^_^
^___^
First morning of spring break. A sweet coffee, vegan blueberry bran-muffin, book (American Gods), and music (sporting Bobby Darin, Eve 6, and points in between). It’s not a virgin beach with a hut, a hammock, and a sunglasses crowned smile, but it might be the next best thing.
Back to reading.
Peace and Love, all
I’m done with finals..first thing I did was roll my shoulders, lean my head way back, and breath as a free man ^^
Only plans for tonight are to relax at home and…nope, that’s it..relax ^___^
Had a great moment walking into my last final. It was one of those "I love being able to do what I do and do it well" moments brought on by reflecting on the fact that I had two papers to hand in and two finals to take today and all the same met up with some of the gang in PA to celebrate Lisa’s 21st.
Oh yeah…super fun.
I was sitting at a table at Garden City yesterday. A new dealer came to sit down and something seemed off about the way she was dealing. Backwards, I realized. She’d spread the flop backwards. Then I noticed the watch on her right hand and realized she was a fellow lefty.
I was playing this morning and the guy three seats to my right was an SCU alum. Finance major. I asked him how far he thought his degree was getting him. His replay was that it’s working about as well as a degree from San Jose State would.
Oh well.
Due dates:
Saturday - present senior thesis - 15 minutes plus Q&A
Monday - Final (HIST 12 Western Civ)
Wednesday - Two papers (my polished senior thesis and a 10-pager from Ancient Greece) and a Final (Ancient Greece)
Well it was bound to happen sooner or later. At about 6:30 this evening a pickup truck making a right turn onto Stevens Creek just before 280 bumped into me. I’M FINE. Bike’s fine, cell phone’s fine. I’m fine. Even had Mike check me out after I got home; certified fracture-less ^^ .
It was a dark intersection, the guy was looking too far left to see me, by the time his eyes were in front of him again so was I, evading left since I saw him pulling out when he shouldn’t have been. My right arm pushed off against his hood, I didn’t fall, the only thing to hit the ground was my cell phone and my feet.
He got out of his truck, gave me his business card and offered to pay for any damages, which were minimal.
Only thing that I walked away with, in addition to the card, was a neat story and the ability to say I was hit by a truck ^_^ .
On a more cheerful note, Mike and I made a bunch of money playing Texas Hold’em this afternoon at Garden City. I found out how great it is to be listening to my MP3 player and not the other players when I’m playing cards. My last hand I bled four other players who went to the river against my constant betting and pocket aces.
Got to meet Preston for lunch and will be getting together with some of the Old Guard for a friendly little home game.
Yep….a fun day and an interesting night with more to look foreword to.
Before the actual post, a little note on the updates to this blog. After hearing that my side-bar was a bit cluttered and made navigation difficult, I’ve installed little plug-in that lets users with java hide the contents of a Category. I may refine the method of interaction later when I’ve got more time (but probably today so I can procrastinate my thesis).
Almost lost part of my finger a few minutes ago while I was preparing a yam dish. I was dividing a slice that was a bit too thick for its own good and my knife took a short-cut off the side and started to slice through the flesh of my right index-finger. Fortunately I wasn’t going too hard against the yam and, though I cut through a couple layers of skin, nothing deep enough to bleed.
With all the time I’ve spent working on cars, bikes, and computers I’ve had my fair share of punctures, scrapes, burns, electric shocks, and lacerations. Add cooking injuries to that list. It shook me a bit, though, because all of the other injuries were general on the hand or arm; parts of the body that are a bit more robust. My finger, though? Goodness..what if I lost the poor little guy?
For that, I shall take a moment to appreciate my right index finger:
Thanks you, right index finger.
Okay….so I was getting really ancy this evening. A little stir crazy, you know? And although Frank and I are going hiking tomorrow (anyone interested in coming along for a hopefully strenuous hike or going half way for something easier let me know) I decided to go out for a ride, get some fresh air, explore the world….usual.
Went down Newhall and down Saratoga to Lion’s Market on Saratoga and 280. Good ride. Only took about an hour and I got lot of soy stuff ^_^ .
We’ve started a new puzzle…a German castle that Lisa visited. This puzzle will be pwned!
Need to make a trip to the hardware store for a 2.5mm hex so I can finally get my handle bars properly aligned and then it’s to the trails with Frank.
Bad Behavior has blocked 980 access attempts in the last 7 days.