Wasting time because there's none to waste

Some days I struggle with what to write here. It's a pointless struggle, but it's not for lack of content.

I have at least another 15 posts about my trip to Japan -- stories I feel I need to tell.  I have 5 more book reviews sitting in the hopper just waiting for me to turn quotes into content before I forget the book.  I have policy proposals for the new Congress to take up. There are events in Seattle to comment on, and pictures from scenic vistas around the state to share. There are auto upgrades to show, and there are garden stories to tell.

The problem is that that any of those posts may take an hour or more to write. Many evenings I just don't have an hour to work on a post.  I put one of those I've been meaning to write on hold so I can write something quick for now, and come back to the longer project later.  This way, I can do something in 15-20 minutes, instead of 60 minutes.

So I sit down at the keyboard and start working on that shorter post that I don't actually have an idea for yet, but I know it will be shorter because I just can't give the "bigger" post the attention it deserves.  I'll get to that when I have more time.

And yet in an attempt to save that 60 minutes, I'll instead spend 30-45 minutes trying to come up with a topic, then finally come up with one, and spend another 30-40 minutes writing it.

In other words, my time saving effort usually saves me a negative-ten minutes.

Two days later, I'll go through the same process again.

Sound familiar?

RIAA To Pursue Mixed Tapes

Ah, the Mix Tape.  It was an icon of 80s youth.

There were 2 kinds. The first kind we made off the radio.  I tried to keep a tape cued up, and the record function just a quick button away.  If I was paying attention, and the DJ didn't banter too much, I could collect all my favorite music without gambling on the invariably scratched 45 RPMs from the record store in the Green Acres Mall.

The second kind was the deliberate one. It was the one you made to collect your deep emotions.  You pulled it together from your radio dubs and your actual purchased tapes. It often involved cables strewn across the living room.  It could be the theme to a friendship or the overly flirtations, trying-to-hard, method of attempting to start a new relationship.

But as with all youthful indiscretions, these too, will come back to bite you. Old data doesn't go away.

Today (2010-04-01) I got my demand letter from the RIAA and I was served with a court order.

It seems that back in 1983 my mother bought me a pack of blank tapes with a credit card. Yes, the records apparently are still around from the THUNK-THUNK days of credit card processing.  From that receipt, they knew I had the tapes and tracked me down.  According to the letter:

You have or had blank audio tapes (Brand: Realistic; Length: 90 Minutes (45 minutes/side), Noise Reduction: Dolby B). 

Research shows that tape users such as yourself primarily use them to steal music from artists without paying for it.  Such users created "Party Mixes," "Road Tunes," "Mood Music," and "Mixed Tapes."

Further, interviews with other current and former New York residents known to be  associated with you have confirmed that you are a blatant large scale music pirate and at one point stole music such as:

1. The Russians are Liars (Z100 Morning Zoo parody)
2. Tarzan Boy (Baltimora)
3. When the Rain Begins to Fall (Jermain Jackson and Pia Zadora)
4. Hard Habit to Break (Chicago)
5. I Know You're Out There Somewhere (Moody Blues)
6. I Always Feel Like Somebody's Watching Me (Rockwell)
7. Just a Gigalo (David Lee Roth)
8. Patience (Guns 'N' Roses) (Illegal back yard performance)
9. Elvira (Oak Ridge Boys)
10. Toy Soldiers (Martika)
11. The Rain (Oran "Juice" Jones)
12. A View to A Kill (Duran Duran)
13. Glory of Love (Pete Cetera)

There is no statute of limitations on this craven theft, and we are pursuing this case to the fullest extent of the law. You are hereby notified that this investigation is ongoing. The accompanying court order prohibits you from destroying or damaging any audio recordings or  documentation related to this matter.

Investigators with the appropriate search warrants will arrive within the week to seize the appropriate evidence.

Thank you for your cooperation in this manner.

And it was signed by the appropriate people.  The accompanying court order did just that.

Two hours later I got a phone call from the attorney representing the RIAA.  He was in a conference room with the Federal Prosecutor for Intellectual Property Crimes in the Pacific Northwest.

They laid out the situation for me.  Based on there assumptions of what I had (I, of course, said nothing), they explained the situation was particularly bad.  Not only had I recorded music off the radio, I kept that music for more than 20 years.  And I traveled out of state with it.  They were drafting an International Warrant in case I fled, and flagged my passport so I couldn't leave the country.

If convicted, I could face penalties of up to $150K per song, plus 5 years in prison for each song.  In other words, if I had everything in that list, and if those were the only songs I recorded off the radio as a kid in the 80s, and if they don't find more when they execute the warrant, I will have to pay $1.95 million  and serve 65 years in Federal Prison.

Or I could settle now.  For the low price of $10K I could pay all fines and avoid jail time.  Plus I would need to report everyone else I knew who had a made a mixed tape.

I said I would think about it.

I headed out for coffee, and thought about all this on my walk.  I got to the shop, and the soft tones of Cyndi Lauper's "True Colors" greeted my ears.

Great.  That's just what I wanted to hear now.

Then I made my next mistake.  I began singing under my breath

Show me a smile then
don't be unhappy, can't remember
when I last saw you laughing
if this world makes you crazy
and you've taken all you can bear
you call me up
because you know I'll be there 

BAM! My cell phone rings.  It's the RIAA lawyer again.  It seems they'd been following me.  The coffee shop had a license to play the music, but I didn't have a license to sing it -- to engage in a "Public Performance."  And they have it on surveillance.  Because I am such a recalcitrant thief, the settlement cost now jumps to $20K.

So right now, I'm dealing with all this.  I think I should probably get a lawyer, but I just can't bring myself to get that done yet.  What I really need now is to stop and get some fresh air.  Afterall, "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Oh, hang on a moment.  My phone's ringing.

It's the MPAA.



Related Posts: 
New times 
An Obituary 
New SeaTac Name 
Are you going to Scarbarough fare...

Copywriting the right way?

I saw this product at Macy's in downtown Seattle the other day.  It's a "Dual Event Timer" from the "Martha Stewart Collection."  I guess it's a neat idea.  It let's you have more than one timer in your kitchen, which is great when you want to time both the bagel bites in the oven, and the coffee steeping in the french press.  But I wasn't too keen on the name.  This is how my though process went:

"Dual event timer? That's stupid.  How pretenscious.  Is that because it's from the Martha Stewart collection?  They have to make it fancy?  That's just obnoxious.

It doens't need to be that fancy, people.  It's a simple product.  Just give it a simple name. Just call it the...

well....

Hmm.  What should the call it?

It's a kitchen timer.  Well, I guess you can use it outside the kitchen, too, so maybe there's no need for that word.  And 'dual kitchen' doesn't make sense anyway because most people only have one kitchen. But I guess it should mention that it support two different 'activities.'  Or maybe 'events' which may be simpler.

It's two timers in one, so the number two should be in the name.  Or the word 'Bi.' (Maybe not bi -- too controversial).  Or 'duo.'  That might work.  Or how about 'dual?'

So that's it.  Why didn't those stuck up writers just call it something simple like 'dual event timer' instead of 'dual eve...'

Oh.

I guess they did a good job afterall."

So after I managed to swallow my populist outrage, I had to admit to myself that the name they came up with was pretty good, and that copy writing is hard.

And that maybe, just maybe, thinking to myself in parenthetical expressions is over doing it just a little bit.

Poetry Day?

National Poetry Day in Britain came and went a few days ago;  I imagine it was celebrated in the US, too, though we didn't actually have Ticker Tape parades.

But I'm not a fan of Poetry.

Sure, I can respect it when it's well-done.  I'd like to think I can even differentiate well-written poems from poorly written ones.  And in College I took my own stab at writing the kind or whiny poetry that can only come from the heart of an overwrought and self-important 18 year old (after all, isn't that what college is for?).

In High School and College I had plenty of exposure to poetry through competitive Forensics.  And I wasn't bad at presenting poetry pieces.

And I like prose to have an element of the beauty of poetry and respect and love for the lyrical magic of the words.

And Dr. Seuss is awesome.

But I don't like poetry.  And it seems odd to say that.  It's not because I haven't seen it, or studied it, or spent months and years working with it.  I have.  And I still don't care for it.  I can't read it for leisure.  I don't seek it out.  When I come to blog posts that are primarily poems, I skim and move on. 

So while I don't want to offend poets, I'm going to have to shrug my shoulders at National Poetry Day. But I hope those of you of the stanza-cle bent had a great one.

Sideswiped by pure evil

Fan of Anthony Bourdain? Not a fan of Sandra Lee? Check out this awesome story of their recent encounter from a link The GF sent me.

The next morning, I'm still trying to reconstruct the exact progression, the details, like trying to remember the license plate of the truck that hit me. Only this wasn't any normal truck. This was far more terrifying and traumatic an event than being smashed by the grill of a Peterbilt, pulled up into the wheel well, dragged for a while, only to have my shredded remnants left by the side of the road, wondering, in my last moments of consciousness, "What the hell happened?" I'm pretty sure, judging by the vestigial ectoplasm on my jacket that I was sideswiped by pure evil.

...More

In addition to his strong food cred, Bourdain is also a great writer. The comments are also fantastic.

Sleep 10: Genes, sleep, and age-related disorders

(Thanks to LDK in STL for sending me this article)

I rolled back into my hotel room this evening at about 8:30, and by 9:00 my body simply demanded, "SLEEP!"

It's to be expected. After getting just 3 hours of sleep the night before, 5 hours the night before that, and 2 hours the night before that, it was bound to happen. So I set my alarm for a few hours, got up just after midnight, refreshed enough to once again start typing.

I don't adhere to those patterns every day, but my sleep routine is bizarre enough that the concept of Sleep itself is one I continue to find fascinating.

This article from the Record at Washington University in St Louis (a school known for producing brilliant astronomer/educators in the early-mid 90s) discusses research that identifies the mechanism linking the circadian rhythm to age-related disorders such as diabetes.

"Our study establishes a detailed scheme linking metabolism and aging to the circadian rhythm," said one of the lead authors, Shin-ichiro Imai, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of medicine and of developmental biology. "This opens the door to new avenues for treating age-related disorders and ways to restore a healthy daily circadian rhythm. It also could yield new interventions to alleviate metabolic disorders such as obesity and diabetes."

...More

It's an interesting idea. But now I face my scientific article conundrum. I have some problems with the article. It appears to make some assumptions that it doesn't justify. Perhaps the actually scientific study addresses these concerns, and the article writers simply drop them for the sake of brevity and simplicity. Unfortunately, those shortfalls lead me to question the credibility of the data, even though it may be sound.

Of course, bloggers drop further details as we comment on articles about scientific papers, leading to further bastardization of the material.

This phenomenon leads to a lot of bad science writing for mass consumption, and that can drown out the good science writing. Unfortunately, bad writing about science encourages people to question what may actually be sound scientific principles and studies.

Speculating even further (and contributing more to the problem myself) I wonder how much of the controversy surrounding human-made global climate change can be attributed to simply bad interpretation of actual scientific study. But that's a topic for another post.

In the meantime, I'm just going to go ahead and exacerbate the problem myself. It's much easier than providing an actual solution.

The article leads off by saying:

All animals, including humans, have an internal 24-hour clock or circadian rhythm that creates a daily oscillation of body temperature, brain activity, hormone production and metabolism.

...More

I may be nitpicking here, but that's not quite true. While there is a definite circadian rhythm that governs the body's wake/sleep cycle, it's not a 24-hour rhythm. It fluctuates and we routinely force it into a 24-hour cycle (through alarm clock, prime time TV schedules, and the general mechanisms of modern life).

Other studies have shown that the actual rhythm runs about 25-hours. Studies in Germany in the late 60/early 70s isolated people in underground bunkers, removing all artificial time cues (such as clocks) and natural time cues (such as the sun).

Over the course of the experiment, almost all of the people settled into a 25-hour cycle, gradually falling out of sync with above-ground dwellers on a standard 24-hour cycle. Interestingly, a small percentage of them developed a cycle that was closer to 48-hours, often staying awake and active for very long stretches of time. However, their body temperatures still fluctuated on cycle that was close to 25 hours.

...More

When left to my own devices, I seem to drift onto a 36 hour wake/sleep cycle, but that's just me.

The article that kicked off this post deals with the gene SIRT1:

SIRT1 influences glucose breakdown and production, cholesterol metabolism, fat burning, and insulin sensitivity. Increasing the activity of proteins related to SIRT1 extends the life span of yeast, worms and flies. SIRT1 is activated when calories are restricted below normal, which has been shown to extend the life spans of some laboratory animals until food becomes more readily available.

...More

In order for SIRT1 to work, it relies on a chemical called NAD.

In mice, the researchers found a daily oscillation of the metabolite NAD (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide), an important compound that is the body's way of exchanging energy and moving it where it's needed. Previously, scientists believed the amount of NAD in cells stayed fairly constant.

...More

While the chemical is a natural one produced by the human body, the name makes me wonder how smoking/tobacco consumption influences this process.

Regardless, the research in this article found that the body does not produce a consistent amount of NAD. Instead, the production is tied directly to the clock genes, and therefore subject to the wake/sleep cycle. At different points in the circadian cycle, the body produces more or less of it.

The researchers found that this NAD rhythm was linked to the daily rise and fall of the activity of "clock" genes, those that serve as the gears that run the body's internal clock. They discovered that the clock genes directly interact with a biochemical process that produces NAD.

NAD is required for SIRT1 to function, suggesting that SIRT1 activity increased and decreased along with NAD oscillation in the mice. Since SIRT1 is known to inhibit the clock genes, the cycle of its activity feeds back into the clock mechanism.

...More

In other words, the sleep cycle influences NAD production, which impacts the functioning of the SIRT1 genes, which in turn influences glucose and insulin production and cholesterol breakdown. It impacts things like aging, obesity, and diabetes.

And tying it all back to the beginning of the cycle, SIRT1 activity also impacts the clock genes and the circadian rhythm, which in turn impacts NAD production, and we are once again, off to the races.

So that's my contribution to bad science writing and likely my misinterpretation of data. Since this research was mainly about the mechanism involved, it may not provide actionable information. Follow-on research will be needed for that.

My speculation would be that this would be relevant to other studies which have demonstrated a link between obesity and lack of adequate sleep. It may provide further insight to the nature of the link and exactly what the cause/effect relationship is.

And perhaps it could lead to a deeper unstanding of or treatment for diabetes. Or perhaps even aging itself.

But for now, it's time to go to bed.

Typing blind

Last week , on a flight to Reno, I struggled to rewrite some paragraphs about processor performance. I stared at the screen for a while. I typed some. I reread my reference material. I typed some more. I deleted some. But mostly I stared at the screen and grew progressively more annoyed with myself. I was stuck. Everything I did write was just terrible. And the words were flowing like dry asphalt.

So I closed my eyes.

I discovered this writer's block technique on another flight 6 years earlier. I close my eyes and type.

When I type with my eyes closed, the thoughts come faster and clearer. Perhaps it's because I have less sensory input to distract me. Maybe because I can't see what I'm writing, I'm not tempted to edit it. Or it could be that I'm fully engaged in the writing itself, and that frees the words.

Regardless, I finished my coffee, closed my eyes and typed out the five best paragraphs I wrote that day. After several minutes of this I opened my eyes and discovered my coffee mug was missing. A few moments later a puzzled flight attendant brought it back with more coffee.

So I took that blind writing, (eyes open now) cut it down a little, and I was done.

Typing without seeing makes it easier for me to write when I get stuck. And I even make fewer typos when I do it. Next time you're stuck, give it a try. Maybe I'm not the only weird one this works for.

Grammar Girl Podcasts

I recently began listening to the Grammar Girl podcasts.

During these weekly 3 to 5 minute discussions she delves into the quirks of the English language to teach people to write more clearly. You can download her tips and lessons from iTunes or directly from her website.

If you prefer to read the lessons, you can also see the transcripts at her website.

Bad Translation

If you're going to spend the time and effort to build and market a product for the most popular game console of the year, spend couple bucks on some college intern pursuing an English degree.
(Click for a larger version)




This is my favorite line:

Please keep that no drying process by external heat equipment such as microwave oven etc.

New SeaTac Name

From the Seattle News:

NAME CHANGE CONTROVERSIAL
By Olaf Priol

Port of Seattle officials held a six and a half hour contentious community meeting in Tukwilla on Friday night.

Supporters and opponents of the proposed name change turned out in drives to voice their opinion. Port Commissioners promised to listen to every person and every comment before ending the meeting.

The proposal concerns the long awaited name change of the Seatac airport to Seabeltac. The estimates the total cost of the name change to be $79 million.

"It's about damn time," said longtime Bellevue resident Ken Adams. "Bellevue is now the hot area of the Puget Sound. We're growing. We're close to Microsoft. We've got the most money. And we are the paragon of style bring some semblance of neatness to the area and bringing Seattle out of that Grunge era. It's about time we were recognized.

"After all, it's not Tacoma resident buying those first class tickets and traveling to Europe. Why shouldn't we be part of the airport name."

"It's Seatac because it was Seattle and Tacoma who built this airport. Bellevue didn't pay for it. If they want to go back to 1937 and pay for the airport back then, fine. But I don't see them doing that unless Adams has a stylish, expensive time machine he hasn't told us about yet," said Greg Master, 27, of Tacoma.

...

Local Salmon Safe chairwoman, Mist Roslin, explained her organizations objections to the name change. "They'll be changing the signs!" exhorted Ms. Roslin. "That means more ink and the ink in those signs is a known carcinogen. Plus the port will pull down all the old Seatac signs and replace them with Seabeltac Signs, right in the middle of spawning season. We can't allow this to happen. Thousand of salmon will die to protect the Bellevue ego. Leave the name alone. If the Port goes through with this murderous plan, we will be forced to take legal action. "

...

The FAA has yet to weigh in on the name change plans, though they are likely to object to the proposed change in airport code from SEA to SBT. SBT is already the airport code for Tri-Cities Airport, near Santa Barbara, CA.

...

City officials in the City of Seatac were surprised when asked for comment. The Port had neglected to notify them of the plan to change the airport name and the requirement that they change their city name, as well.

Book Review 09: Want to See What I Wrote?

I picked up Lee Gutkind’s “The Art of Creative Non-Fiction” because I though it might help me write better here. I don’t think it will. It’s less focused on the personal essay, and more focused on the long-form quasi-journalistic essay.

The author is a college professor, and I wonder if he wrote this book to use it as the text for his classes. It may be more effective that way. As a stand alone text it’s lacking.

The book is 200 pages long. The first 67 pages is a basic introduction to creative non-fiction. The next 62 pages are about the process. The final 81 pages are the appendices, and are mainly samples.

To be fair, my view seems to be in the minortiy. The reviews on Amazon have been much more positive and it currently has a rating of 4.5 stars.

Section 1: The Creative Part

Traditional journalists learn early in their education that creativity or imagination in newspapers and magazines are basically disallowed. Reporters with any real literary talent will have it squeezed out of them by stubborn and insensitive editors. Disillusioned they will write secretly at night (becoming closet poets or novelists), or they leave the profession to chase their muse or some other dream.
Page 10

This is the most interesting phrase in the section. There is little value in most of the first third of the book. If you pick up the book, save yourself a couple hours and skip these pages.
The author includes an inordinate amount of his own samples. To make a point about creative non-fiction, he simply copies and pastes content he already published in other articles and books.

There are thousands of sources he could have drawn from for his examples, but he keeps going back to his own work. I’m not sure if it’s arrogance that keeps him using his own material, or if it’s a way to double-up on the royalties. It hurts his credibility.

Even if he sourced other content for the chapter, it would still be too much. There are too many samples, and they are too long. Rather than telling us more about creative non-fiction, or telling us how to do it, he just shows what he and other people have done.

And while there’s definitely value in that, if I wanted to just read examples of creative non-fiction, I’d actually pick up one of the 40 issues of the Atlantic Monthly that have been sitting on my floor for years waiting for a reader.

When not focusing on samples, he does include some practical advice for the writer. He covers ways to improve your writing.

Just as musicians practice their instruments every day, actors rehearse, basketball players shoot hoops, boxers do road work and spar – writers write.
Page 58

Of course, that’s a point that should also have been hammered home earlier on, along with:

Focus also dictates what not to write about.
Page 64

Section 2: The Non-Fiction Part

In the second section of the book (page 67 thru 129), he tells us some important things. If you start reading at about page 67, you’ll be in good shape. Gutkind gets to the essence of the genre here. Rather than talking vaguely about scenes and just throwing in samples of the genre, he should have just made this point earlier – and then explored it.

The creative aspect of the creative nonfiction experience should be utilized to make the teaching element – the nonfiction part of the product – more provocative.
Page 69

Gutkind also points out that writers need to subvert their egos to the needs of their editors, publishers, and audiences.

The second reason Creative Nonfiction and most other journals and magazines reject essays is their authors’ lack of attention to the mission of the genre, which is to gather and present information, to teach readers about a person, place, idea, or situation.
Page 70

If your work is regularly rejected with form letters, you may not necessarily judge yourself to be a poor writer, but it is fair to say that you may not yet be good enough to deserve the attention of a harried editor, pressed for time. It is a signal for you to heed.
Page 82

The strongest section of the book is Chapter 8 – Think Globally, Act Locally. It’s about choosing a topic. He covers both strategic ways to find new material, and tactical day-to-day ways authors can keep their creative pumps primed.

Suddenly I was struck by both the clarity and the irony of the situation: I had travelled halfway around the world to find a story that involved intense human drama and contained universal ideas and issues, when one of the most incredible stories in the history of medicine was evolving in my own back yard.
Page 77

Gutkind also offers the same lesson every English teacher I ever had offered – Good Writers are Good Readers.

Remember that the foundation of the writing life is reading: We read the best writers to understand how far we must reach toward excellence and how hard we must try. We read what is being written in our field today to keep up with our competition and to keep current on the subjects that appeal to us.
Page 92

To get the most out of this book, read:

• Chapter 8
• Rest of Section 2
• Appendix 3
• Appendix 1
• Appendix 4
• Section 1

Or just stop after Section 2.

How do you start writing

It's not important what you write. It's important that you write.

That's one of the main lessons I learned in high school. In my senior year, Mr. Vellucci, my English teacher emphasized the importance of writing. The best way to get past writer's block and begin writing, was just to begin writing. About what did not matter. Just start writing and edit later.

This thought also occurs in Robert Pirsig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". One of the English professor's students gets stumped in a writing class. The professor tells the student to just start writing, but the student says they can't come up with anything to write about. The professor points out the window to a brick building, and then points to an ordinary brick in the building. The professor then tells the student to write about that brick, and, when finished, to write about the brick next to it.

One thing that also came out of Mr Vellucci's class (though it could have been another) was that whenever writing a paper or an essay, the first thing I should do when I begin editing was to simply delete my first paragraph. Regardless of what was in it, deleting that paragraph would be a good idea. Naturally, I was arrogant enough to think I could always write a good first paragraph, but I was wrong. Invariably, my writing was always better when I deleted the first paragraph. The first was was really nothing more than a warm up. In the later paragraphs was when I actually started communicating ideas.

Today, this still comes in to play. At work I produce various proposals, training documents, and presentations. I will often get stuck, however. When I am trying to manage multiple projects and competing deadlines, it is very easy to get stuck trying to do it right and end up with nothing to show for it.

The trick is take one project at a time and just start writing the content for it.

The most powerful force in the universe, besides compound interest, is the power of editing.

Editing gives me the freedom to not worry about doing it right in the first draft. I can produce material that is boring, poorly structured, unoriginal, ugly, confusing, or just wrong. Then I have something to work with. I can fix the problems and improve on it. Once I start on something with the expectation that I will edit it, then it doesn't matter if I get it right at first.

However, once I start on this process, without the pressure of trying to be perfect, then magic starts to happen. Ideas come to me. Words begin to flow. I am free-er to try different things and experiment. The trick is to just get started.

The important thing is not what you write.
The important thing is that you write.