i’m probably not the only one who’s noticed that postings to the main part of this site have slowed down a bit lately.
<p>it seems to me that part of this is that people have been discovering and utilizing the diaries more and more.</p>
<p>this isn’t a bad thing, but i thought i’d try to take a moment to clarify what my original intentions were for the different sections. i loathe playing dictator so please don’t take this as a mandate; just suggestions. </p>
<p>in my eyes, the diaries are a place to post things that are probably only interesting to people who specifically care about you and are curious what you’re up to. i added the section because i wanted somewhere to post mundane stuff without cluttering the front page.</p>
<p>anything that may be interesting to a wider audience or is likely to spark a good discussion should go on the front page where it will get seen by more people with less effort. eg, jP’s recent <a href="node.pl?nid=3576">analog</a> post and tuck’s ongoing series on martial arts and mental states and their relationship are the kinds of things that i would envision going on the front page. </p>
<p>it’s a fuzzy distinction sometimes. the acid test i’ve been using is that something goes to the front-page if i can really give it any topical keywords other than ‘the uneventful life of anders’. </p>
<p>just knowing that people are using the site, posting things and reading is enough to warm my insides, so don’t feel bad if you prefer to keep stuff off in your diary. </p>
<p>i find the intricacies of how online communities like this grow and evolve and interact with the tools infinitely fascinating. so i’m curious: how does the feature-set and design of the tools that thraxil provides influence how we interact with and communicate with each other? how do you think the thraxil community has reacted to and changed with the addition of new features like diaries, bookmarks, images, keywords, or threaded comments?</p>
the big head honcho of all the different new media / learning initiatives at Columbia is leaving to go be president of Arizona State. so tonight we had a big fancy dinner to say goodbye. really expensive catering, excellent food and an open bar.
<p>afterwards one of my coworkers mentioned that he was going to a bar on 105th and columbus ave called ‘ding dong’ that he said was a punk bar and invited a few of us to come along. so we did and sure enough, a mere two blocks from my apartment is a little hole-in-the-wall type place (although it’s actually fairly spacious on the inside) that plays punk rock, and has walls covered with graffiti and U.K. Subs, Exploited, and Motörhead posters. </p>
<p>so i’m ecstatic about the discovery but i must hang my head in shame for living here so long and never noticing it (to be fair, it isn’t exactly very distinctive from the outside).</p>
<p>friday night we somehow ended up at a biker bar downtown drinking with a bunch of russians (lani’s russian housemate and his friends from princeton came into the city for a bachelor’s party). </p>
<p>on saturday, in a rare showing of ambition, lani and i didn’t sleep in all day (our usual weekend activity). instead we actually went out to see the <a href="http://www.whitney.org/exhibition/biennial.shtml">Whitney’s Biennial show</a>. then we wandered around st. mark’s place for a while. after dinner, we watched Mulholland Dr. then went out for a drink with julintip.</p>
<p>today, we again made it out of the apartment for dim sum and bubble tea with julintip, adam and some of adam’s friends.</p>
i accumulate change like no one i know. every night i come home and dump out a big handful of change that’s accumulated in my pockets. i’m not really sure where it all comes from.
<p>over about the last year, this has built up to about half a cubic foot of change that i’ve dumped in a box in my apartment. last night i had a slight <span class="caps">OCD</span> moment and decided to sort and count it. i simply didn’t have the time or energy to completely sort it though so i settled for just seperating out the quarters (the only coin with any practical value whatsoever as far as i’m concerned) and counting those.</p>
<p>$100.50 </p>
<p>just in quarters. i was pretty impressed.</p>
<p>while that was kind of entertaining, i’m really looking forward to the day when we can use digital cash and smartcards for everything instead of having to deal with heavy and inconvenient coins.</p>
<p>flossing: good</p>
<p>take care of your teeth, folks. </p>
<p>i spent about two years nursing a pepsi bottle (2+ litres/day) and not brushing and flossing often enough. about a year ago, i lost a couple fillings and noticed some cavities forming. demonstrating at least partial intelligence, i quit caffeine entirely (thereby curbing my pepsi habit) and started brushing and flossing much more religiously. demonstrating that it was only <em>partial</em> intelligence, i didn’t go see a dentist immediately. </p>
<p>i think quitting the pepsi and taking more vigorous care of my teeth halted or at least slowed the spread. unfortunately, plenty of damage was already done. </p>
<p>i finally made it into the dentist today to get them looked at. the results: well… he says my <em>gums</em> look healthy…</p>
<p>my teeth have some issues though. next wednesday i go in for my first root canal. joy. some cavities to take care of too but they’ll probably wait until after i upgrade my dental plan so i don’t have to pay for them out of pocket.</p>
<p>to top it off, i’m still due to get my wisdom teeth out.</p>
i basically spent the weekend catching up on sleep and watching movies.
<p>on friday night, i finally watched <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Title?0166924">Mulholland Dr.</a>, the new(est) david lynch movie. lynch is my favorite director and i’m ashamed that it took me this long to get around to seeing this one. pure genius. i’m really glad that i bought the <span class="caps">DVD</span> instead of just renting it because i’m going to have to watch it about 10 more times before i’ll have any clue about what went on. <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Name?Watts,+Naomi">Naomi Watts</a> really impressed me and i had no clue until after i poked around on imdb that she was Jet Girl in <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Title?0114614">Tank Girl</a>, one of my all-time favorites.</p>
<p>on saturday it was <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Title?0078788">Apocalypse Now (Redux)</a>. the extra footage makes it much longer and slower in some spots but definately improves the overall experience. </p>
<p>sunday afternoon i somehow got sucked into some action movie with Dolph Lundgren fighting insane, genetically altered escaped prisoners in some post-earthquake/apocalypse desert world. i don’t even remember what it was called and, honestly, the less remembered, the better.</p>
<p>finally, last night i watched <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Title?0171804">Boys Don’t Cry</a> because it was on TV and i hadn’t seen it before. powerful movie. love that cheerful ending.</p>
there was a huge linden tree in my grandmother’s yard in connecticut. the trunk was at least 5 feet in diameter and it had stood there longer than anyone could remember.
<p>everytime we visit, my grandmother points out the linden tree and how old it is and how close it is to the house and how it’s bound to fall down any day now and dear god don’t we hope it falls away from the house. i always look at this huge, sturdy looking tree and figure that it’s pretty solid and won’t fall down and grandma’s just worrying over nothing.</p>
<p>well, it fell down last friday. away from the house thankfully.</p>
<p>i should go visit again soon so i can see what it looks like. the tree was such a big part of the landscape that i can’t imagine the house without it towering over everything.</p>
the default template now validates as xhtml 1.0. the validator doesn’t like some of the characters in the posts themselves so the site won’t actually validate at the moment, but the template is clean.
<p>i’ve only got mozilla to test with so let me know if IE screws something up now.</p>
right now i’ve got the worse case of hiccups ever. i’m dead tired but i can’t go to sleep because i’m hiccuping and it won’t go away. this is so strange.