1843 lines
87 KiB
Plaintext
1843 lines
87 KiB
Plaintext
|
From sokay@cyclone.mitre.org Wed Mar 16 23:32:32 1994
|
||
|
|
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 94 23:37:36 EST
|
||
|
|
From: sokay@cyclone.mitre.org (Stephen J. Okay)
|
||
|
|
To: sokay@jumpy.acet.org
|
||
|
|
Content-Length: 89160
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
## ##### # # ## ##### # # # ####
|
||
|
|
# # # # ## ## # # # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
# # # # # ## # # # # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
###### ##### # # ###### # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # # ##### # ###### ###### ####
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
#### # # # ##### # # ##### ######
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # # # #####
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # ##### #
|
||
|
|
# # # # # # # # # # #
|
||
|
|
#### #### ###### # #### # # ######
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Number 6
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Part of the New Cruelty"
|
||
|
|
"....Which is really just a way of saying I'm lazy
|
||
|
|
and way overbooked"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
My SoapBox
|
||
|
|
Top 10 reasons why my zine is late: An excuse checklist for editors...
|
||
|
|
Short fiction/Poetry/Prose:
|
||
|
|
Godel, Escher, Boesch
|
||
|
|
Hannah
|
||
|
|
Bird
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Geek Culture:
|
||
|
|
The Caffiends dining guide: A source guide to caffeine, sugar and other
|
||
|
|
forms of hyperactivation.
|
||
|
|
Linux:Interview with Linus Torvalds
|
||
|
|
Interop Volunteering: Will network for T-shirts or food...
|
||
|
|
Music:
|
||
|
|
Jawbox*
|
||
|
|
Jawbreaker*
|
||
|
|
Pansy Division
|
||
|
|
Juliana Luecking
|
||
|
|
The Slackers
|
||
|
|
The PieTasters
|
||
|
|
The Checkered Cabs
|
||
|
|
MonoMen
|
||
|
|
Trenchmouth
|
||
|
|
Swirlies
|
||
|
|
Pennywise
|
||
|
|
Blue Meanies
|
||
|
|
SOAPBOX---------------------------------Soapbox-------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Okay, before we actually get down to it and I turn you little hooligans
|
||
|
|
loose on this issue I want to get a couple things across (he says, flashing
|
||
|
|
back to 9th grade, last day of school before summer starts):
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Administrivia:
|
||
|
|
Online readers: Since these seem to be getting longer and longer,
|
||
|
|
I've decided to try something here WRT an index of sorts.
|
||
|
|
The head of each article and or section is now keyed with a specific search
|
||
|
|
term to let you zip right there.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Keywords for this issue are:
|
||
|
|
SOAPBOX---this, basically
|
||
|
|
TONGUE ---more Eric Boesch insanity about his brief but bitter affair with
|
||
|
|
his tongue
|
||
|
|
HANNAH ---a cool story about one woman's work on Take Back The Night.
|
||
|
|
CAFFEINE ---The AC Caffeine (ab)user's guide. We do for sugar and caffeine
|
||
|
|
what we did to PopTarts in #5.
|
||
|
|
LINUX --- a brief interview with Linux Torvalds, creator of Linux.
|
||
|
|
INTEROP ---true tales from the soft underbelly of the computer trade show
|
||
|
|
world and how you can be become a t-shirt slut...
|
||
|
|
MUSIC ---Whats been spinning on the CD player and turntable while I put
|
||
|
|
this together...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
ObLateZineExcuse:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The whole problem we have here is focus. As in a complete lack of.
|
||
|
|
There's just so much cool shit out there that I want to do and
|
||
|
|
experience that a lot of times I forget to write about it until
|
||
|
|
long after its happened. I get distracted just walking downstairs
|
||
|
|
to get a glass of water, so its little wonder that this is nearly
|
||
|
|
a year late. I'm going to try to do better really...I promise..
|
||
|
|
This was supposed to be out last fall, but right after I got
|
||
|
|
back from SF, I got involved in a computer animation called
|
||
|
|
"The Jetdillo Project". About the time I had to give the
|
||
|
|
computer back for that, the EveCon 11 computer room got thrown
|
||
|
|
my direction and I put my hands up in a defensive move, and ended
|
||
|
|
up catching it. In between all this were a bunch of shows,
|
||
|
|
work, grad school applications and porfolios, and pretty soon I
|
||
|
|
realize its late Jan, working on Feb. and I hadn't done anything
|
||
|
|
with this since October.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
But I'm going to need to make some changes. First, I'm finally
|
||
|
|
looking for a staff. I admit it. I can't do it all by myself
|
||
|
|
as much as I'd like to. This is a prime example of what
|
||
|
|
happens when I try to.
|
||
|
|
Tell me about whats happening in your scene or your corner of
|
||
|
|
the net or why you want to write for AC or the idea you have
|
||
|
|
for this really cool column or something...HELP!
|
||
|
|
(please???)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The next one will be shorter and hopefully sooner than this one..
|
||
|
|
Some sections may disappear for an issue or be shortened in order
|
||
|
|
to facilitate this, like in this issue 'cause I kind of got tired
|
||
|
|
of waiting around for people to do stuff they said they'd do or
|
||
|
|
to finish stuff they started. I will also repeat the following
|
||
|
|
mantra to myself endlessly:"I will not keep 4 versions of this
|
||
|
|
on 6 different systems, I will not keep..."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Item #2: Moving on....
|
||
|
|
Well, ya know, this Sparc just isn't big enough for the both of us, so it
|
||
|
|
looks like its time for me to mosey. AC is looking for a new home. Things
|
||
|
|
have gotten such that I'm no longer comfortable to post or mail this from
|
||
|
|
inside the corp, so I need to find a new virtual home. Anybody out there
|
||
|
|
want to take in a bunch of armadillos? We're housebroken, don't eat much,
|
||
|
|
change our own newspapers, etc. etc. etc.....
|
||
|
|
As long as Paul continues in his quest to get his doctoral degree, the
|
||
|
|
uglymouse site will continue to be the FTP repository. Just look under
|
||
|
|
/pub/zines/Armadillo.Culture on etext.archive.umich.edu and there we'll be...
|
||
|
|
Hopefully by AC#7 we'll be safely ensconced in our new place...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
*BRIBE ALERT*:AC shirts to the first operations staff who will provide me
|
||
|
|
with a free interactive shell account where I can get mail and put together
|
||
|
|
this little abomination. I'll basically need to be able to login, telnet,
|
||
|
|
FTP, etc. Yeah, thats right, do it....yeah...vipw, yeah, thats it...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
-----------------------------Zine Excuse List--------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Here's something handy to use whenever people start asking you why you
|
||
|
|
haven't put out anything in the past 8 months...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
10. The {dog|cat|$PET} ate it...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
9. I got kidnapped by aliens and after cutting behind my ears and giving me
|
||
|
|
anal probes and other generally not nice things, they offered to drop me
|
||
|
|
off at the exact moment I left, but I said that even though I felt really
|
||
|
|
violated, I was short on material for my 'zine, so could I stick around a
|
||
|
|
couple months and do some interviews and well, here I am...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
8. The drummer of the Scenesters, who, are like, my favorite band,
|
||
|
|
spontaneously combusted at a show I was at and,like, I caught his
|
||
|
|
sticks in the conflagration. How was I supposed to know this would
|
||
|
|
end in my just getting back from a 4 month whirlwind tour with
|
||
|
|
them last night?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
7. I was too depressed/into my own ennui...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
6. Its a trendy thing to do when you're putting out a zine.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
5. The apology paragraph for the intro on why I was a couple weeks late
|
||
|
|
took a couple months to write.....sorry.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
4. Despite the appearance, I lead a totally boring life and it takes me
|
||
|
|
this long to come up with stuff other than cleaning my lint traps
|
||
|
|
to mention.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
3. Its a bizarre needfullness/S&M trip. I have to feel needed or like
|
||
|
|
I'm depriving somebody of something before I'll crank out an issue....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
2. I was asleep
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
1. Look I'm really late on getting this done but am totally stuck, if you
|
||
|
|
can send me contribs for this one I'd really appreciate it...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
TONGUE----------------------Godel, Escher, Boesch---------------------------
|
||
|
|
being the continued affair between Eric Boesch and his tongue.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
>From linus.mitre.org!linus!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.ed
|
||
|
|
u!cs.utexas.edu!newsfeed.rice.edu!uw-beaver!boesch Wed May 19 09:48:08 EDT 1993
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
We kiss. My tongue hugs me and ruffles my hair and offers to cut my
|
||
|
|
hair, and I ask if that is a good idea, me being blind and all, and he
|
||
|
|
replies in lingering strokes down my back, "Why would that matter? I am
|
||
|
|
blind too." He tells me I am beautiful, could he please cut my hair,
|
||
|
|
and I say, cut off all of my hair, Love. So my tongue cuts off all of
|
||
|
|
my hair and says he will plant roses in my eye sockets next Fall, and I
|
||
|
|
wonder if the professor at Repetitive Data Entry Institute will like the
|
||
|
|
roses and give us good grades so we can be millionaire computer programmers
|
||
|
|
at home in our spare time, and pet newts could perch on the thorns.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Then my tongue pushes through my sphincter, and I squeeze him with it
|
||
|
|
and with my lips, and everything is perfect. Everything is still
|
||
|
|
perfect when my tongue carries something out of my asshole and dumps it
|
||
|
|
in the kitchen, doors open and close, cabinets open and slam hollowly
|
||
|
|
shut, and a cup scrapes the bottom of the toilet reservior. But I know
|
||
|
|
dinner will be perfect, so I try for something less worrisome to worry
|
||
|
|
about.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
My tongue knows what I want to say. Does it know that when I wake up in
|
||
|
|
the afternoon I just stop myself from yelling, "How many of our
|
||
|
|
neighbors did you sleep with last night, you cheating bastard?" My
|
||
|
|
tongue heard the phone ring and smashed it, but does it hear the voice
|
||
|
|
that says, "He's trying to kill me, he's trying to kill me, he's trying
|
||
|
|
to kill me," as if the voice and me were really the same?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I could say, "Don't worry about the voices; they're just a phase in the
|
||
|
|
growth of our love." Then I could tell how women would answer the
|
||
|
|
telephone and hate me, and how later, I would imagine that women would
|
||
|
|
answer the telephone, and I would imagine them hating me, and just
|
||
|
|
before "If you would like to place a call please hang up and try again"
|
||
|
|
I would hear, "She's trying to kill me, she's trying to kill me." Then
|
||
|
|
I could tell how I could feel them sit in their living rooms and carve
|
||
|
|
the air with their fingernails and magically tear my brain apart. But
|
||
|
|
would my tongue feel that our love was nothing special to know that the
|
||
|
|
voices were not only for him? Would he love me better if I asked him to
|
||
|
|
ring the doorbells of the women's mansions, so that they would see my
|
||
|
|
naked and purring self cradled in the folds of my champion my tongue,
|
||
|
|
who would lash out and crush their foreheads so they would die knowing
|
||
|
|
they failed to keep me unhappy?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Or should I keep massaging my tongue between my lips and hope he
|
||
|
|
doesn't notice when I stifle a scream?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I must love my tongue completely so the women can see how happy I am
|
||
|
|
when I see them again. Besides, I promised to serve and honor my tongue
|
||
|
|
(and do a few thousand other things too) when my tongue put a ring of
|
||
|
|
coat hanger wire onto the ring finger of my left hand and brushed the
|
||
|
|
ring against my cheek and said we were married, and a few hours later
|
||
|
|
the hand was punching me in the nose and falling apart and smelling bad
|
||
|
|
until blood clogged my nostrils. So I pull my teeth back from my lips
|
||
|
|
to show how much I don't want to bite my tongue off, and I massage my
|
||
|
|
tongue with my lips. I hope my tongue likes how my head is shaking.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The dinner of oatmeal and meatloaf tastes funny. The oatmeal tastes
|
||
|
|
like flour and water with chunks of chewable vitamin C pill, and the
|
||
|
|
meatloaf tastes like shit but some of it seems too tough to be mine and
|
||
|
|
my tongue says it stepped outside to check the mail and that's all. I
|
||
|
|
believe with all my heart but my stomach wins out and the puke of our
|
||
|
|
love spills onto the carpet. I try to swallow it again even
|
||
|
|
before my tongue hits the back of the head and my nose hurts from my
|
||
|
|
love for my tongue but it's not enough so I hit my nose against the
|
||
|
|
carpet some more until my tongue hooks around my throat. And I'm
|
||
|
|
learning to love meatloaf and my tongue massages my head and we say
|
||
|
|
nothing and I'm happy for a while.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Before I have to start screaming, I ask my tongue, "What are you
|
||
|
|
thinkino he'll tell a long story about his wonderful plans for us
|
||
|
|
like he always does, or at least like he did a few times in a row a few
|
||
|
|
days ago.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
My tongue says, "I want you to bear my children."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
It stings where the tears loosen the clots in my eye sockets. Does he
|
||
|
|
know how much he hurts me when he says that? My tongue dabs the tears
|
||
|
|
away and pats my shoulders and says everything will be all right, we
|
||
|
|
will visit the adoption agency tomorrow and bring home a happy limbless
|
||
|
|
baby with a strong tongue. Then it's quiet and my tongue withdraws for
|
||
|
|
the night but I can't sleep while our little girl lies in a drawer at
|
||
|
|
the adoption agency. I imagine her gurgling and babbling and breathing
|
||
|
|
little baby breaths in the cabinet, and I imagine my tongue holding her
|
||
|
|
and feeding her and wiping her little bottom.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I notice I've been gurgling and babbling and making baby breath noises
|
||
|
|
so I stop but the baby breath noises continue and I can feel baby breath
|
||
|
|
against my shoulder and I feel the mattress shake but I didn't do it. I
|
||
|
|
don't think I would be sane to shake my tongue awake so we can pat our
|
||
|
|
baby, but maybe sane means something different when you're the Messiah.
|
||
|
|
Maybe I should stop doubting voices and thoughts and just believe in
|
||
|
|
myself. So I turn over and there's nothing there, but the breath on my
|
||
|
|
shoulder is stronger now. I turn over again and there's still nothing
|
||
|
|
there. I still feel the breath but if I turn over one more time I'll
|
||
|
|
fall out of bed and my tongue will beat me up.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
So I lie there and feel the breath on my shoulder and my eye sockets
|
||
|
|
fill with tears behind my sealed eyelids. My eye sockets swell from the
|
||
|
|
dammed flood of tears, crushing my brain into a tiny molten speck at the
|
||
|
|
back of my skull. Before my eyelids can burst I open them and tears
|
||
|
|
trickle weakly down the sides of my face.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I flop away from the edge of the bed and then flop around, shake my
|
||
|
|
head, tense my stomach, and hum "wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up
|
||
|
|
wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up --"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
and my tongue stumbles around my mouth. I say, "We must make our home
|
||
|
|
ready for our baby our daughter is coming to visit we must have the
|
||
|
|
house neat for her the place is a mess we are not ready -- " but I only
|
||
|
|
hear quiet toneless gibberish. I catch my breath and scream "WHERE THE
|
||
|
|
HELL IS OUR BABY?" and my tongue pulls back down my throat, and I can
|
||
|
|
only wheeze and whine.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I try to catch my breath. Then I say, "Eehhhhhh." My tongue does
|
||
|
|
nothing. I flop my neck back and flip onto my stomach and chin myself
|
||
|
|
off the bed. My tongue hides as my dainty head hits the floor. I chin
|
||
|
|
over towards the door and reach the wall instead. I wobble over, tunk,
|
||
|
|
the bedroom door is closed. I say, "Beeehhhpeeehhhh," -- the pet name I
|
||
|
|
call my tongue because that's about all I can say.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Beehhhhpeeehhh--ehhh? Beeehhhpeeehhh--ehhh?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I wobble around so I'm perpendicular to the door. TUNK! I knock my
|
||
|
|
head against the bottom of the door. TUNch! Now there's a dent in the
|
||
|
|
door. My head hurts.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Just ten or twenty more hits and there might be hole big enough to fit
|
||
|
|
through, and then -- there's no time for making plans, I have to make a
|
||
|
|
hole.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tunch! I think my forehead's bleeding. Maybe there is time to
|
||
|
|
make plans. I'll make a hole big enough to fit through, and then --
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tunch! There's a splinter in my forehead. I'll make a hole in the door
|
||
|
|
and then I'll make a hole in the front door and then --
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tunch! I think the headache makes me think more clearly. I'll make a
|
||
|
|
hole in the door and then I'll make a hole in the front door and then
|
||
|
|
they won't give us a baby if we can't show what a happy family we'll be.
|
||
|
|
Relax, think happy thoughts, happy happy happy happy shut up happy happy
|
||
|
|
happy happy shut up shut dup shutshutshutlalalalalalalalalalalalalala --
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
How can I be happy in the morning when I have to sleep on the floor?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Beehhhhpeeehhh?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I picture Mom and Dad and the mortuary attendant, with their mouths open
|
||
|
|
and smiling. I imagine circling their tongues with a red crayon, and I
|
||
|
|
wait to fall asleep.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
HANNAH--------------Hannah, The Wire Chick-----------------------------------
|
||
|
|
From: Jenea Boshart <jboshart@husc.harvard.edu>
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Hannah --The Wire Chick
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I'm still not sure how it was that I got involved in this project.
|
||
|
|
I think it happened because my roommate D. was going through one of her
|
||
|
|
phases and thought it would be cool to get involved in the woman's
|
||
|
|
movement on campus, an involment we all knew would last two weeks, maybe
|
||
|
|
three, so we all just nodded our heads, said, "That's nice, D." and went
|
||
|
|
on with our business.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
'Cept her business somehow became my business, when she told me
|
||
|
|
they needed a sculpture, and I said, "Hell, why not?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
A month later, I'm attending meetings about our celebration of
|
||
|
|
Take Back the Night (a national celebration going under different names
|
||
|
|
which targets the issue of violence against women). And where is D.?
|
||
|
|
Dunno, but not at these meetings surely, her two weeks were long up.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
My initial understanding of the task: oh I'll help. It'd be FUN
|
||
|
|
to help. After all, I lack the experience to RUN the thing, to do the
|
||
|
|
thing myself. Sure I've done wire sculptures before, but they're small,
|
||
|
|
you know, never taller than a foot high, usually half that. And they were
|
||
|
|
talking about something as tall as me! And I'm tall! "Sure, I'll help."
|
||
|
|
"Alright, let's have a meeting."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
In the meeting somehow the pronouns got out of wack and what was
|
||
|
|
"us" became me and what was "we" became "I." My frantic fumblings with
|
||
|
|
needle-nose pliers and spools of silver-tone wire was apparently years of
|
||
|
|
experience beyond that of any of the other members of the Radcliffe Union
|
||
|
|
of Students, or RUS. (Notice how very close it is to ROUS, or Rodents Of
|
||
|
|
Unusual Size. But I digress.) And suddenly it was MY project . . . the
|
||
|
|
woman in charge of it all stopped asking, "what do we need" and started
|
||
|
|
asking "what do you need" and I was hooked . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Elation? The opportunity of my artistic life. After all, art is
|
||
|
|
something I am blatantly NOT pursuing, though I could, and here they were
|
||
|
|
offering an (almost) unlimited budget to try something new, something FULL
|
||
|
|
SIZE!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Not elation. Fear. Cold, hard, fear. I didn't feel up to the job.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
No matter! Full speed ahead!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Wednesday: Suddenly the celebration is in one week. I have no money in
|
||
|
|
the bank but they can't offer me an advance. "We'll see what we can do."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Thursday: "Which is nothing." No money and I don't have any. A friend
|
||
|
|
loans me $95 in cash. "What are you doing with that in your wallet?!"
|
||
|
|
I have to produce a sketch! A *proposal* that has to be approved by the
|
||
|
|
dean so that we can get a permit! Sounds a little too much like reality
|
||
|
|
to me.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friday: Off to Pearl, my favorite art supply store. I buy 16 spools of
|
||
|
|
armature wire, a step up in thickness to the stuff I usually use. I ride
|
||
|
|
the subway with an eight-foot pole and a 25 foot roll of chicken wire. I
|
||
|
|
discover to my dismay that it isn't a step up in stiffness, but it's too
|
||
|
|
late now to worry. I'll have to worry about support later. I'll just
|
||
|
|
call on my old major and treat it as a physics problem.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Saturday: Some progress is made, that is, her barest dimensions are
|
||
|
|
designed, and the very very beginnings are made. Scared to continue, I stop.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Sunday: I blatanly and with malice do not work on her.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Monday: I study for a Psych 1 midterm and blantanly and with malace do not
|
||
|
|
work on her.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tuesday: I blatanly and with malice do not work on her, although she's
|
||
|
|
due Wednesday. I call "she in charge" and say she won't be done until
|
||
|
|
Thursday.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Wednesday: I pull the first all nighter so that she will be done by
|
||
|
|
Thursday at 9:15 am. I take urk breaks and exclaim to loveweasl: "Never
|
||
|
|
by nine fifteen!" Over the course of the evening my fingertips go to
|
||
|
|
shreds. All over my hands and forearms are angry scratches. I don't want
|
||
|
|
to know what I'm scratching into my skin, but I do know that the wire
|
||
|
|
turns my fingers black. On the middle joint of my ring finger on my
|
||
|
|
hand is a h
|
||
|
|
uge blister from manipulating the pliers.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Thursday: Indeed she is not completed by nine fifteen, but I'm on a roll
|
||
|
|
and figure I could finish her by noon. "She in charge" suggests we
|
||
|
|
install her Friday, as it is raining anyway. I hear this news and fall
|
||
|
|
asleep for five hours. I spend the rest of the afternoon avoiding work on
|
||
|
|
her. I start up again at around nine pm. I proceed AGAIN to work
|
||
|
|
through the night. My wonderful friend E. spends most of it up with me.
|
||
|
|
My fingertips cannot take it anymore, and I carefully wrap each one in
|
||
|
|
athletic tape, along with my entire ring finger, where the blister is
|
||
|
|
rather excruciating, and my pointer which is rapidly approaching it. It
|
||
|
|
is delicious martyrdome.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friday: Six thirty I am finished. I write a quick blurb to include on the
|
||
|
|
base:
|
||
|
|
Hannah
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Jenea Boshart '95
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
THE WIRE IS EXTERMELY FRAGILE, PLEASE USE UTMOST CAUTION WHEN TYING RIBBON
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Each ribbon represents a woman who has been sexually abused. If you or
|
||
|
|
someone you know has been sexually abused, add a ribbon.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I fall asleep and am up by eight thirty when "she in charge" calls. I
|
||
|
|
finally get to answer "of course" to her question of "Is she finished?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Ah yes, DING DONG THE WITCH IS FINISHED!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And I hated her. Her head was a weird shape, if you asked me, and
|
||
|
|
a hundred other imperfections I don't have the heart to list. I felt that
|
||
|
|
she was the absolute low point of all my artistic creations.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
After the call I run around the place making sure I have anything
|
||
|
|
I am going to need to install her . . . pliers? Check. Extra wire?
|
||
|
|
Check. Blurb? Check. Pole? Check. Hannah? Check.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I grabbed that wire wench by the base of her spine and took off
|
||
|
|
down the street with her. Ah the looks I got! One woman standing by her
|
||
|
|
car spoke to her companion still in the car . . ."Hey! Look at this neat
|
||
|
|
thing!"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I sat for a good fifteen minutes in front of Widener Library where
|
||
|
|
she was to be installed. People strolling by gave the two of us pretty
|
||
|
|
odd looks. I'm not sure if it was interest over Hannah or the way that I
|
||
|
|
*looked* dead but wasn't.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
RUS people showed up, and we prepared to install her. A man came
|
||
|
|
over and asked us if we were from Hillel. No? Because Hillel is having a
|
||
|
|
Holocaust memorial on the steps of Widener all day long . . . We have a
|
||
|
|
permit . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The verdict? "She's beautiful!"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
One RUS woman, K., couldn't stop kissing her. "I just want to
|
||
|
|
kiss her!" She exclaimed and the next moment I looked over and she was
|
||
|
|
kissing her. "What beautiful breasts!" another cried. "And ass!"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
An ambassador was sent over to the Hillel people to see what they
|
||
|
|
thought of us installing her nearby.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tourists stopped us and asked if it was ok if they took pictures
|
||
|
|
of Hannah. At least one tourist video-taped us. Apparently, she was a
|
||
|
|
success.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Ok, so I'll suffer the witch to live. She's probably not all that
|
||
|
|
bad. . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I stuck around until my ego was inflated just enough. Yes, she's
|
||
|
|
good, she's not horrible, she's good, yes yes yes . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And then home. And sleep. Yes, sweeeeeeet sle e e
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
ee
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
p
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
48 hours. I was up for 48 hours, minus about a total of five or six
|
||
|
|
hours. Forty eight focusing only on one thing . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Hannah.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friday morning at last she was completed and at last she was installed,
|
||
|
|
and I was off my rocker. Out of my SKULL.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"You're off your gourd," E. says.
|
||
|
|
"I haven't got a gourd," I whine.
|
||
|
|
"Yes you do," E. replies. "I've seen it,
|
||
|
|
and you're never on it!"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The focus had erased my ability to see anything from anyone else's
|
||
|
|
perspective . . . I was on automatic stimulus-response. My brain was
|
||
|
|
going for coherency at all costs . . . and the cost was my inability to
|
||
|
|
understand anything going on around me . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
It was a warm morning, and I am an enemy to the heat and was hating it.
|
||
|
|
Hannah was up at last and she looked cool. I needed sleep but I needed to
|
||
|
|
be told that she was ok, that she wasn't as heinous as I believed. On the
|
||
|
|
steps of the library nearby was set up a podium, and one by one people
|
||
|
|
were going up and reading names. Names were coming out of the speakers
|
||
|
|
and spreading across the Yard. It was Yom Hashoah, and the names were the
|
||
|
|
names of victims of the Holocaust.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
My brain on auto-record gave as much emotion to the event as a video
|
||
|
|
camera. "Well done, a beautiful tribute, and here comes a woman and shes
|
||
|
|
looking at Hannah . . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friend A. came over, "Want to read names for five minutes?" he asked, his
|
||
|
|
voice solemn. I blinked at him . . . this was not something I was
|
||
|
|
prepared for and my processing was on extra slow.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Blink. Blink. Blink.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Yeah, sure . . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
We walked over and the voice of the person preceding me floated gently
|
||
|
|
over our heads, reading name after name and I was flapping my jaw, trying
|
||
|
|
to tell A. that I had been up for 48 hours, could he believe it and and
|
||
|
|
and and and and
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Shhhhh . . ." A. said and maybe I realized the moment . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I read names and stumbled over the pronunciations and the wind put my hair
|
||
|
|
in my face and then I was done . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Walking back (to Hannah!) A. told me why it was that it was totally ironic
|
||
|
|
that I read just then but whatever it was it was beyond my understanding.
|
||
|
|
. . something about one of the names . . . A.'s roommate C. ran over and
|
||
|
|
hugged me, saying, "Thank you" and his face was sad and solemn and all I
|
||
|
|
could think to say was . . ."Cool shirt!" 'cause he was wearing a Take
|
||
|
|
Back the Night shirt, of course, and Hannah was for Take Back the Night
|
||
|
|
and look, there she is . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friend J. showed up, and congratulated me on Hannah . . .I urged her to
|
||
|
|
tie a ribbon . . . She was vaguely reluctant and part of my mind was
|
||
|
|
saying "Jenea she's tying that ribbon for herself, Jenea she was sexually
|
||
|
|
molested only about a week ago and Jenea this moment is bigger than your
|
||
|
|
art to her and Jenea . . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Won't you tie a ribbon, J.?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
At last I was at home and I was lying in my bed and I the forty eight
|
||
|
|
hours were over and at ast I w s goi to l e ee e
|
||
|
|
l a n s e e e e
|
||
|
|
g e ee e
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
e
|
||
|
|
p
|
||
|
|
.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
AT LAST I WILL BE HEARD my emotional memory insisted and my dreams were
|
||
|
|
her hostage . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I was in the Yard, looking up the steps of the library. Names were
|
||
|
|
emerging from enormous speakers, and there was J., weeping, with her arms
|
||
|
|
around one of the speakers. My voice narrating the dream noticed, "This
|
||
|
|
will seem funny later" but I tell you at the time . . . the pain of the
|
||
|
|
moment of the moment I couldn't feel before of that moment was on her face
|
||
|
|
and I ran up the steps and we stood there and E. was there too and the
|
||
|
|
three of us just stood there with our arms around each other and wept.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"There's so much pain in the world," L. had said earlier, standing near Hannah
|
||
|
|
and looking over to the Yom Hashoah memorial.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Later, when at last I'd had a few hours of sleep under my belt, I had to
|
||
|
|
go back to the art store and return the extra wire. I met my friend E. at
|
||
|
|
the library. It was only about four in the afternoon, and the day was
|
||
|
|
starting its descent. It was getting a bit colder, a bit windier, but it
|
||
|
|
was lovely.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Names were still being read and I was able to appreciate the memorial,
|
||
|
|
unlike earlier in my comatose state. The stone was cold beneath me and
|
||
|
|
the sun was warm above me and I just listened.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
E. showed up and we strolled off on our way to the subway. On the ground
|
||
|
|
near where Hannah had been I found the empty spool of purple ribbon.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Simple enough, the empty spool. "The ribbon was used up."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Yes, simple enough. Simple enough as every ribbon tied represented a
|
||
|
|
woman who was sexually abused. Simple enough to use up 25 yards in the
|
||
|
|
space of five hours.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Saturday urking instead of working as usual . . . Takin' data . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
a horrible pun "cuntzero" says "ollopA" as he was
|
||
|
|
nicking himself at that moment . . .
|
||
|
|
AH the context he says now reading this AH you were
|
||
|
|
offended in context and now I understand and now I
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
J. was mollested a week ago by the guy (the dick! the cock! the flaming
|
||
|
|
asshole!) she was dating. "I really like him," she had said days before,
|
||
|
|
her face glowing. Her First Time with everything, and there wasn't much
|
||
|
|
of anything but then
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
But then she doesn't know if it was normal and I had to put my arms around
|
||
|
|
her and say "No my sweet J., NO this isn't normal and no it isn't your
|
||
|
|
fault and NO it isn't going to go away sweet J." Then I had to hold her
|
||
|
|
as she called him and tried to tell him "I just don't want to see you
|
||
|
|
anymore" and he was telling her "but I've decided that wasn't me and can't
|
||
|
|
you forgive me . . ." At church the talk of forgiveness there made her
|
||
|
|
lose it and when she came home she was "operating under mild sedation."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
IT'S A COCK THING YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
well Hannah's an ovaries thing you wouldn't understand
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Would you tie a ribbon?" A. ("She in charge") asked of her male companion.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"There really [avoiding] isn't anything [avoiding the] on the base that
|
||
|
|
[avoiding the question] invites someone to tie [avoiding the issue] a
|
||
|
|
ribbon . . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Yes there is now go read it . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
He reads it and then says "Yes that's better . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"But would you feel comfortable tying a ribbon?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Ok," he says, and ties one, but never answered the question . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
J. ties a ribbon and it's for herself. I tie a ribbon and it's for J. and
|
||
|
|
for my old boyfriends little sister and for my friend's mother and for
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And for 25 yards.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friday night I'm babysitting a child . . . a tiny girl child of eight
|
||
|
|
months. She is sleeping when I get there and they have cable, so . . .
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
It seems it was an evening of rape . . . of child molestation. L.A. Law,
|
||
|
|
a woman is prosecuting her father now that memories of years of incest have
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"I like him, he's so nice, Jenea" J. told me, maybe the day before, maybe
|
||
|
|
the DAY when he
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
finally emmerged. He abused her older sister too who killed herself.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The final straw:
|
||
|
|
A commercial comes on . . . the camera is focused on a girl of perhaps
|
||
|
|
ten. She is stading looking into the camera, embarassed. The rest of the
|
||
|
|
screen is pure white. She doesn't know what to do with her arms, and she
|
||
|
|
wants to look away but she doesn't dare. One foot on one toe, swinging.
|
||
|
|
She is lanky, in the horrible long-legged awkwardness of early puberty.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"America is losing her daughters," the voice says. "Studies show that by
|
||
|
|
age nine, girls start to lose their self confidence, their optimism . .. "
|
||
|
|
and on . . .and the last line, "If there is a little girl you know between
|
||
|
|
the ages of nine and fifteen, take her to work with you on April 28.
|
||
|
|
America, take your daughters to work and show them . ."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
IMAGES Hannah and the empty spool and J. and LA LAW and "She deserved it"
|
||
|
|
and 70 cents on the dollar and big boobs on beer and my mom lying
|
||
|
|
paralysed as her first husband tried to find a gun so he could kill her
|
||
|
|
and my mom fighting off the advances of a co-worker and my mom making it
|
||
|
|
but only cause "she's a bitch with balls doncha know" and my coworker with
|
||
|
|
a daughter makin' what I made that summer and livin' on it and where's the
|
||
|
|
father and how many little girls like that one there already know the
|
||
|
|
facts of life 'cause daddy or uncle or daddy's friend or
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And my little sister only eleven years old, the SPIT and image of that
|
||
|
|
little girl on the screen, long legged colt with the whole future ahead of
|
||
|
|
her and
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And I just put my head down, and wept for her.
|
||
|
|
For Hannah, and her sisters.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
jenea
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
-----------------------------Geek Culture------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
CAFFEINE&SUGAR
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Live and Direct from Armadillo Labs, its the Armadillo Guide to Caffeine and
|
||
|
|
Other Sources of Hyperactivity !!!!
|
||
|
|
After the pop-tart thing last issue, I decided to do tribute to one of my
|
||
|
|
other favorite food sources:Caffeine!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
So, I locked the boys back in the lab, bolted the door and didn't let them
|
||
|
|
out until their hands were shaking at the same frequency the processor on
|
||
|
|
my Amiga is :)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And remember, we wouldn't subject you to anything we haven't already tried on
|
||
|
|
ourselves in every possible combination.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
Espresso Beans:
|
||
|
|
Concentrated antimatter as far as I'm concerned. Dark chocolate mocha stuff
|
||
|
|
overtop a real roasted coffee bean. Yow!,
|
||
|
|
just a handful of these was enough to send me SSTO.
|
||
|
|
Highly recommended for a quick burn, and the only thing known to induce a
|
||
|
|
caffeine headache into me.
|
||
|
|
You can get these at any of the bulk type candy places.
|
||
|
|
PS. since I wrote this a couple months ago, I've done a lot more field
|
||
|
|
research. There are currently about 4 different flavors out there, about
|
||
|
|
which I'll say the following:Skip the Holiday colored ones(i.e. red&green),
|
||
|
|
skip the milk chocolate. White is okay when you get tired of the straight
|
||
|
|
bittersweet stuff. Other than that stick with the original bittersweet
|
||
|
|
chocolate around the real bean.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Pocket Coffee: Warp Drive again. Dark semi-sweet chocolate w/ a liquid
|
||
|
|
espresso center. Cool!
|
||
|
|
Just one at a time was enough for me, although I seem to have gotten a bigger
|
||
|
|
kick from the Espresso beans. Availability is pretty limited as these things
|
||
|
|
are imported from Italy and I only know of two places around here to get
|
||
|
|
them. One of them is the Candy place on the bottom floor of Pentagon City
|
||
|
|
Mall in Arlington. Check the gourmet/import places around you...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Inca Cola:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Weird kind of pineapple-like, unplaceable tropic type tasting soda with mucho
|
||
|
|
caffeine. Kind of like if God had placed the blessed molecule inside mango or
|
||
|
|
pineapple and somebody juiced it then.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Jolt:Ostensibly(thats my new word :)
|
||
|
|
the caffeine king of sodas, I've found I have to be in the mood or right frame
|
||
|
|
of mind for this to work. 4:30 am at a con when I'm doing security,its great.
|
||
|
|
If I'm emptying one down my neck at Zig Zag or something and I'm chilled, I
|
||
|
|
usually end up falling asleep. Chats with nutritionally knowledgeable friends
|
||
|
|
leads me to believe that its a massive insulin flood from all the sugar that
|
||
|
|
does it...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Nitro Cola:
|
||
|
|
Heard about it, unable to locate. Supposed to be to caffeinated drinks what
|
||
|
|
the F-1 rocket engine was to launch vehicles(Somewhere around 1.2 million
|
||
|
|
pounds of thrust...). Obviously what we have here is a case of somebody
|
||
|
|
trying to out-Jolt Jolt, which, of course, is quite alright by me...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Dr. Pepper:
|
||
|
|
Nothing particularily spectacular about this one except that its the only
|
||
|
|
drink I've been able to find that has Polyethylene Glycol in it, which if
|
||
|
|
memory serves is something really nasty they use in treating or processing
|
||
|
|
plastics...Those wacky soft drink chemists, next thing you know, they'll
|
||
|
|
be trying to slip Aspartame in our drinks...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Nerds King Size Rainbow assortment:
|
||
|
|
Cool! One of my favorite sources of sucrose and ascorbic acid now comes in a
|
||
|
|
large box, with LARGE nerd chunks in a variety of heretofore unknown flavors
|
||
|
|
like pineapple, coconut, blueberry ,etc.
|
||
|
|
The downside is that the hole in the box is halfway down the side and is way
|
||
|
|
too big, s they tend to fall out and spill all over. Somebody needs a design
|
||
|
|
school refresher....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Milky Way Dark:
|
||
|
|
Again what we have here is another stellar attempt by the candy industry to
|
||
|
|
cross the sugar event horizon and collapse into a sucrose singularity.
|
||
|
|
Something about Dark chocolate just kicks me into overdrive and the extra
|
||
|
|
sweet center sort of serves as a secondary thruster....Ask anyone in FanTek
|
||
|
|
security how I ran up and down 20 flights of stairs twice and then went
|
||
|
|
looking for jogging partners after a couple of these...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Skittles:
|
||
|
|
Ahhh yes, the one and only....
|
||
|
|
If you haven't tried these you should. Fruity M&Ms is the best way to
|
||
|
|
describe them, and I still have yet to figure out why I sweat around my
|
||
|
|
face everytime I eat a pack of them...ever curious....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Fruity Dinosaurs:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Included only because its an in-joke and it will annoy the hell out of my
|
||
|
|
friend Eric Mason...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Meterva
|
||
|
|
the soda which has been made from the yerba mata plant, another plant
|
||
|
|
besides coffee plants thats high in natural caffeine.
|
||
|
|
Found around here in the Asian Market/Deli quarter of Arlington,
|
||
|
|
its up to you to find it elsewhere...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Cygnus Explosion
|
||
|
|
Herbal Energizer
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Slipped to me one night at ZigZag in lieu of the Soho I asked for. Save for
|
||
|
|
the carbonation, its kind like drinking a glucose IV. Weird, woody aftertaste
|
||
|
|
which I'm sure comes from the rosehips and other deciduous good-for-you stuff
|
||
|
|
thats present in trace amounts..
|
||
|
|
Maybe if I were totally dehydrated or going into a non-diabetic form of
|
||
|
|
insulin shock, otherwise I think I'll pass.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Zombie Dance:
|
||
|
|
A concoction whipped up @ Planet X, a vegan coffeehouse in College
|
||
|
|
Park Md., consisf equal parts Jolt, Blast(caffeine, Phenylalnine,
|
||
|
|
and other assorted amino acids) and Ginseng, topped with your choice of
|
||
|
|
Torani flavorings. I chose Passion Fruit. Kind of fruity,spicy,
|
||
|
|
that took hold pretty quick. Good solid boost with quicker than average
|
||
|
|
effectiveness IMHO, and a strong thrust throughout. This was interesting
|
||
|
|
given the side effects that Jolt usually has on me...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And when you've done everything on here all in one sitting just to prove
|
||
|
|
it can be done theres:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Hy and Zel's Pain reliever
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
One of the guys at Interop had this. Its basically 500 mg of Acetylsalicylic
|
||
|
|
Acid, Caffeine and Codeine. Live and direct from your favorite OTC vendor
|
||
|
|
in Quebec Canada. For when you really, really want your reaction-headache
|
||
|
|
to go away bad, but you still want to be awake through it all...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
LINUX-----------Linux:A brief interview with Linus Torvalds------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
From: torvalds@cs.Helsinki.FI (Linus Torvalds)
|
||
|
|
To: Stephen J. Okay:
|
||
|
|
Subject: Re: "Interview questions from AC" (Dec 9, 13:23):
|
||
|
|
>
|
||
|
|
> 1. Did you originally set out to write an OS, or did Linux start out as a
|
||
|
|
> totally different project and one day you found yourself with a kernel
|
||
|
|
> on your hands?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
It didn't start off as a kernel: it started off as just some general
|
||
|
|
fooling around with the more interesting features of the i386 processor.
|
||
|
|
I had been programming the 68k line before getting my i386 in early -91,
|
||
|
|
so I wanted to get aquainted with the PC hardware (I hadn't actually
|
||
|
|
used a IBM PC compatible before that, if you don't count some very
|
||
|
|
sporadic DOS access on the university machines).
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The obvious interesting features on the i386 is the protected mode
|
||
|
|
segmentation and paging code and the task-switching capabilities, so I
|
||
|
|
just started out doing a simple program that changes into 32-bit mode
|
||
|
|
and tests some of this. The first "program" I did was composed of two
|
||
|
|
tasks that wrote 'A' and 'B' respectively to the screen, and got
|
||
|
|
switched around by the timer interrupt (so that I got lots of A's and
|
||
|
|
B's messing up the screen). Not very practical, but it was enough to
|
||
|
|
get to know the hardware a bit.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 2. Has anybody approached you about commercial development of Linux?
|
||
|
|
> (outside of things like SLS or Yggdrasil distribution like efforts)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Not really. I have been in contact with different people who wanted to
|
||
|
|
make linux distributions, but it has never been a question of
|
||
|
|
commericalizing the kernel beyond that. There has been some talk about
|
||
|
|
making it easier for commercial companies to use the kernel (by allowing
|
||
|
|
loadable kernel modules etc), but that hasn't come to anything.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 3. How much of your life revolves around the net?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I spend about 2-4 hours a day answering mail and skimming through the
|
||
|
|
linux newsgroups, and I sometimes read some of the other newsgroups
|
||
|
|
(usually "silly" groups like alt.fan.warlord). I don't do IRC or muds,
|
||
|
|
but I guess I'd be rather unhappy without a good net connection.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 4. What do you think of the anonymization services like penet.fi?
|
||
|
|
> Do you think anonymous servers are a good thing?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I don't mind them: the groups I read don't usually need anonymous
|
||
|
|
services (although I do admit to reading alt.tasteless when I don't have
|
||
|
|
anything better to do, and posting anonymously on that is considered bad
|
||
|
|
form unless you have some truly hilarious story to tell and don't want
|
||
|
|
to be implicated). I'm rather neutral on the issue.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 4a. Over here everybody's been making a big deal about the commercialization
|
||
|
|
> of the net and there are now some local cable TV co's offering net
|
||
|
|
> connection in addition to regular services. Do you think the arrival
|
||
|
|
> of joe citizen on the net will be a good thing or bad thing for the
|
||
|
|
> current net community?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The S/N ratio will go down, but that's nothing new. It probably won't
|
||
|
|
matter too much for the technical groups (a few more newbie postings
|
||
|
|
aren't going to make for problems), and I doubt the talk groups are
|
||
|
|
going to suffer much. Network volume goes up, but the lines also get
|
||
|
|
higher bandwidth all the time. I'm not a network guru though, so asking
|
||
|
|
me is probably a waste of time :-)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 4b. There's also talk that the net(particularily USENET) will functionally
|
||
|
|
> collapse under its own weight unless some sort of control or policing
|
||
|
|
> is put into place. Do you agree or do we just need better filters and
|
||
|
|
> collators like xrn vs. rn. or Gopher/Mosaic vs. plain FTP?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I think it's partly self-limiting: good filters like a threading
|
||
|
|
newsreader (I personally wouldn't want to read news without trn) help
|
||
|
|
manage the flow of information a bit, but a group that has too high a
|
||
|
|
volume for people to handle will probably automatically have a kind of
|
||
|
|
"die-back", where people simply can't keep up and stop using it.
|
||
|
|
Filters will just make the point where this happens a bit higher.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I doubt that any real control would be a good thing: I enjoy the chaotic
|
||
|
|
nature of usenet, and it has worked this far despite recurring rumors
|
||
|
|
about "imminent death of usenet predicted, film at 11".
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 5. What do you do when you're not working on Linux?
|
||
|
|
> (And as a side question, how much are you still working on it?
|
||
|
|
> Is it still largely your project/product or has it been swept out
|
||
|
|
> from under you in the wave of net support & contribution?)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I have a cat that needs attention, and currently a girlfriend that needs
|
||
|
|
even more of that. I'm also active in the drunken revelries of the
|
||
|
|
student organizations at the university ("Spektrum" is the organization
|
||
|
|
for swedish-speaking students of math, physics, chemistry and computer
|
||
|
|
sciences), and play snooker about once a week (badly, but it's good fun
|
||
|
|
and nobody I play against is much better than I am). And I read
|
||
|
|
(thrillers, sci-fi, generally "trash" litterature) rather much.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Linux obviously takes a noticeable amount of my time: much of it is no
|
||
|
|
longer so much actual programming as generally just acting as the
|
||
|
|
organizer and all-round contact/support person.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 6. What comes to mind when someone says "Armadillo" to you? Have you ever
|
||
|
|
> seen one?(outside of a picture?)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I have probably seen one in a zoo sometime - I think it's a brown scaly
|
||
|
|
animal with a long nose and tongue that eats ants? Or am I completely
|
||
|
|
off? We don't have them over here, I'm afraid.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 7. Give me a brief description of the Linus Torvalds music collection....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Almost nonexistent. I don't even have a stereo, just a portable CD
|
||
|
|
player and at this time just one CD (Aerosmith) which I bought mostly
|
||
|
|
just to test the player.. I don't really listen to music, although it
|
||
|
|
happens that I put on the radio or MTV and have it as background noise
|
||
|
|
when I'm programming. I don't like rap music, but I can listen to just
|
||
|
|
about anything else ranging from classical to metal; I enjoy Aerosmith,
|
||
|
|
Queen, Pink Floyd etc.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
> 8. Cyberpunk: Funny or not funny?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Not funny.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Linus
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
VOLUNTEER---------------------Cyber-Volunteer Programs ------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
or
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I've noticed that a large portion of the geek culture articles I've done
|
||
|
|
in here have tended to be of the geek junket/geek mercenary type. This
|
||
|
|
is no exception and is probably one of the best I've come across yet.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
A number of trade shows/societal conferences are turning to volunteer
|
||
|
|
labor for help in setting up/running the technical ends of their
|
||
|
|
conferences/shows. The basic idea is offer free food, crash space,
|
||
|
|
caffeine,t-shirts and a ton of other stuff in return for busting your
|
||
|
|
butt for a few days in putting up the conference computer systems
|
||
|
|
and network. All you have to do is get there. Interop Company has one
|
||
|
|
and SIGgraph this year is also running a student volunteer program.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
There's some shit work, and occasionally long hours, but I felt that
|
||
|
|
was outweighed by the stuff I learned from it all and the people I
|
||
|
|
met and the connections I made when I did it. For those of you still
|
||
|
|
in school, this is a good way to pick up "real world" computer
|
||
|
|
training. They don't seem to be picky either about who applies
|
||
|
|
or what your depth of skill is. If you know enough to get your hands
|
||
|
|
on this, they'd be happy to hear from you it seems....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I did this last summer at Interop '93 in San Francisco. All I basically
|
||
|
|
had to do was convince work to cut me airfare and be willing to work
|
||
|
|
at least 8 hours once I got there for the duration of the conference.
|
||
|
|
In return, they crashed us, fed us, gave us passes to the conference,
|
||
|
|
t-shirts and a bunch of other stuff.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
This might seem kind of mercenary, but with the idea of spending 2 weeks
|
||
|
|
in San Francisco geeking out for pretty much free, well, how could I resist.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
After begging, pleading, haranguing and finally resorting to threats of turning
|
||
|
|
his dog over to a couple guys with middle names of "The", my boss relented
|
||
|
|
and gave me the tickets. So one morning in Late August, on only 3 hours
|
||
|
|
of sleep I found myself at the check in line behind Unrest at Dulles.
|
||
|
|
As per usual, I proceeded to try to interview them, but pretty much fucked it
|
||
|
|
up, not having kept up with them recently, I didn't really have any salient
|
||
|
|
questions to get them with, and they just sort of edged away after a few
|
||
|
|
fumbling minutes of my blurting out stuff, although this could have been
|
||
|
|
due to the fact that the ticket counter in front of them was now open and
|
||
|
|
they were next in line, Themselves going to play in L.A. and us headed
|
||
|
|
several hundred miles north of there.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
So we're on the plane and settling in when my friend Torin taps me on the
|
||
|
|
arm and opens his mouth to reveal a small white paper tab hanging off the
|
||
|
|
end of it. I knew exactly what it was, but didn't say anything. At least
|
||
|
|
not vocally. Instead I typed a plea to him not to throttle me and repeatedly
|
||
|
|
enlightening him that I did not have horns or breasts and that it was really
|
||
|
|
the plane that was capable of flying and not him. And he just wouldn't shut
|
||
|
|
up about it either, even after I pointed out that one of the attendroids
|
||
|
|
was in her jumpseat about 2 feet across from us. I had visions of both of
|
||
|
|
us getting busted or something and me getting grilled about it all 'cause
|
||
|
|
they'd figured he was incoherent or something when my chest starts beeping.
|
||
|
|
I flash him a look as to ask if he'd slipped something into the coke on my
|
||
|
|
tray when the attendroid had passed it over and he demurrs. Thats when I
|
||
|
|
remember it was my palmtop. I pull it out of my jacket, shut off the alarm
|
||
|
|
and zip it back up inside my jacket.
|
||
|
|
This totally freaks out the guy next to us. Here are two guys with laptops
|
||
|
|
linked to each other and then one reaches into the pocket
|
||
|
|
on his photog. vest and pulls out an HP95. I shut off the alarm and set it
|
||
|
|
to California time while our neighbor scrapes his jaw on the seatrest :)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The first couple days were pretty much manual labor type stuff. Unpacking
|
||
|
|
crates, running cable,pushing boxes, screwing rackmounted things into their
|
||
|
|
racks. A good part of this time was spent on a platform lift with a bunch
|
||
|
|
of union "boys" running cable from one end of the hall to the other..
|
||
|
|
This confirms and shatters a few myths I'd held about union labor.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Shatters in that all the guys with the exception of one were all really
|
||
|
|
active and actually worked and it was their bosses that were the real
|
||
|
|
assholes, haranguing them that it was 5:25 and what the heck were they
|
||
|
|
still doing up there working when they get off at 5:30.(Gee, I don't
|
||
|
|
know, maybe it's cause we're only 20 ft from the end of the run and we've
|
||
|
|
only got one cable to toss over the side before we've finished this whole
|
||
|
|
half of Moscone Center).
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Confirmed in that the rules are far more important than the job it seems
|
||
|
|
as we have to wait three hours one day for a guy to come over and unplug
|
||
|
|
our lift's batter from its charger so we can get to work.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Things settle into a predictable pattern from here on. Get up at the
|
||
|
|
not entirely ungodly, but still less than beatific hour of 7, douse
|
||
|
|
myself with water from the shower, strap on my skates and head outside.
|
||
|
|
Cross Sutter street, dodging the peds, slalom down Stockton, wave to
|
||
|
|
the Beefeater dude outside the Hyatt and terrorize the Aussie tourons
|
||
|
|
he's trying to help board their bus, hop over a homeless or two once I hit
|
||
|
|
Howard St and duck into Moscone Center.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Food is waiting there as usual. And there's tons of it as per usual.
|
||
|
|
If nothing else they want to make sure we're well fed, so theres a full
|
||
|
|
tray of bagels and donuts and stuff in the morning, more in the afternoon,
|
||
|
|
a catered lunch and if you don't like that there's vouchers for a deli
|
||
|
|
down the block and if you get bored of that you can go anywhere and
|
||
|
|
bill $15 of it to Interop. Torin and I make it a point a couple nights
|
||
|
|
in a row to order a bunch of extra stuff at the Deli and go hand it out
|
||
|
|
to the homeless people who are always hanging out on around the convention
|
||
|
|
center. Nobody else is going to use it, we're all too stuffed, so why not
|
||
|
|
them...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Saturday and Sunday are spent largely hanging over or perched
|
||
|
|
on the rafters of the North Hall in Moscone. With the ribs up
|
||
|
|
across the hall, the FDDI backbone gets strung across the back
|
||
|
|
wall of South Hall. This involves basically sitting a person in
|
||
|
|
eah of the arches that sweep up to the ceiling and passing them
|
||
|
|
a length or orange-insulated fiber and having everybody tug to
|
||
|
|
get it through. I'm at about the third arch from the end so I'm
|
||
|
|
pulling pretty much the entire weight of the cable myself. Its
|
||
|
|
a weird balacing act between pulling hard enough to get the
|
||
|
|
cable throuh, but also trying to maintain my balance on the
|
||
|
|
foot or two of cement that I'm currently squatting on.
|
||
|
|
There's a lull as some logistical shit is worked out, so I
|
||
|
|
take to climbing up my arch a little. Its one of those swooping
|
||
|
|
cement thingys that looks the the top 1/4 of an O where it starts
|
||
|
|
out steep and levels out the higher you go. Its painted, so its kind of
|
||
|
|
slippery, but there are enough bumps, holes, and irregularities in the
|
||
|
|
surface to get a purchase on and I climb up about 7 or 8 feet then
|
||
|
|
realize that I'm going to have to get down eventually and don't really
|
||
|
|
relish sliding down a slope that ends up being vertical at the end, so
|
||
|
|
I slide down on the rear of my sneakers which are pretty much smooth
|
||
|
|
and run into the wall a second or so later. Cool experience, but I wouldn't
|
||
|
|
want to do it twice in a row.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I am pretty much in geek heaven. After grabbing food, we pick up where we
|
||
|
|
left off the previous day and just get back to it with little or no
|
||
|
|
interference or oversight from anyone. Maybe a little direction or
|
||
|
|
goals at the start of the day, but we're left pretty much alone with our
|
||
|
|
group of people to put the net together. We know what we're doing, they
|
||
|
|
know we know and thats why they have us there so management stays the
|
||
|
|
hell out of the way pretty much and lets us do our thing.
|
||
|
|
Just me, the boxes, cables a bunch of net.friends and the chance to wrack
|
||
|
|
my brain from time to time. I spend most of the day with my head inside
|
||
|
|
a mobile pedestal learning how to do 110-punchblock and RJ45 connectors
|
||
|
|
and the finer points of fiber optic cable.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
After another 13 hours we all split for beers, caffeine, whatever
|
||
|
|
strangeness we're looking for.Torin's friend Harish,and I collect Torin
|
||
|
|
and head back to the hotel.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Again, I'm way too tired to do anything but get crashed right
|
||
|
|
away. There's an Artless show tonight that I'd like to go to and
|
||
|
|
is probably still going on, but I'm just too beat to even get up
|
||
|
|
let alone contemplate driving or anything. This is the one thing
|
||
|
|
I regret about the trip. I didn't get to a single show while I
|
||
|
|
was out there. I was too exhausted by the end of the day when we
|
||
|
|
were in SF and when we went out to Palo Alto I didn't have a car
|
||
|
|
anymore.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Later that night, I decide to try to skate down the middle of
|
||
|
|
Stockton Street right past the hotel. They say I'm insane, I know I'm
|
||
|
|
insane, but its 2:45 and there's nobody around and no cable cars running
|
||
|
|
this late and I've been wanting to do this since I got here so fuck it.
|
||
|
|
The hill is pitched at about a 30 degree angle and the only thing that
|
||
|
|
I can think of that will work is a really deep slalom.
|
||
|
|
I start one, get about 20 feet and realize how fast I'm going already
|
||
|
|
and brake hard,screeching all the way down the hill, wondering how the hell
|
||
|
|
those skate rats we saw Wednesday afternoon did it.
|
||
|
|
I shake my head, count my bones and go in to crash....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The next morning, I strap on my skates and start to weave my way past
|
||
|
|
the war memorial at Union Square, slaloming down the street when I hear
|
||
|
|
a *clap* behind me. I turn around and there's this guy in a 3 piece suit
|
||
|
|
who's just ollied his plank onto a bench right behind me. He pops off the
|
||
|
|
bench and slams onto the pavement almost even with me and proceeds to
|
||
|
|
do a series of 360's off and on the curbs and traffic islands and between
|
||
|
|
my side of the street and the other. I just crack up and almost run into
|
||
|
|
a cab. Its so cool. Its so SF.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"Hi, we're t-shirt sluts, we network for t-shirts, you wouldn't
|
||
|
|
have any to spare would you?"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The above answer become an oft-repeated phrase over the next 3 or 4
|
||
|
|
days now that that hall has been made droid-habitable. Safely
|
||
|
|
ensconced within their booth thats been set up virtually over
|
||
|
|
night and with only why their glossys ended up in Boise as
|
||
|
|
opposed to SFO where they should have to worry about now,
|
||
|
|
some of the vendors start unpacking their promos. Some are
|
||
|
|
cool, some are little more than blatant adds. The different tail
|
||
|
|
crews note who's got what and try to plug for getting some,
|
||
|
|
noting who's handing out, who will be later, and who just sort
|
||
|
|
of snorted at the question.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Its shameless but it seems that everybodys doing it. And its
|
||
|
|
all part of what makes a show like this work. Shirts are the
|
||
|
|
real currency of the show. If you want your tail up early or
|
||
|
|
a special conector made and don't feel like waiting forever,
|
||
|
|
a box of t-shirts left out at the side of your booth will
|
||
|
|
soon draw curious passersby who surprisingly enough just
|
||
|
|
HAPPENED to be in the neighborhood and just HAPPENED to
|
||
|
|
have what you need and oh by the way, 2XL if you have them
|
||
|
|
in that size.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
There is some selection to the feeding frenzy though. Some of
|
||
|
|
the volunteers ignore, pass up or turn down shirts that are
|
||
|
|
going around for various political or ethical reasons.
|
||
|
|
Quite a few pass on the Novell shirts because they're
|
||
|
|
sharing pillows with USL and therefore AT&T. And would
|
||
|
|
you really WANT to wear an MS-Windows shirt? And would
|
||
|
|
you further *ADMIT* to it?
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I snigger numerous times later that week while looking at
|
||
|
|
the suits who are forming 20-30 person lines just for a CHANCE
|
||
|
|
to win what I'm wearing on my back and fend off more than
|
||
|
|
a few cash offers for one of my Interop T's. I had to work
|
||
|
|
for these and they're mine and you were probably sipping your
|
||
|
|
sparkling water in first class when I was crimping BNC connectors
|
||
|
|
or fighting with a recalcitrant router to get this so there.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Then there's the button woman....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Shortly after the show started on Wednesday, bunches of the
|
||
|
|
volunteers started showing up at the lost techie burial grounds
|
||
|
|
with lots of diferent yellow buttons saying things like "When
|
||
|
|
cryptography is outlawed, only u6r67$%#$$#@@", "No
|
||
|
|
Trucks","Will network for t-shirts or food", "I know it sucks,
|
||
|
|
I fixed it at Interop" and others. Brief questioning of several
|
||
|
|
posessors of these buttons led us to a person who was to become
|
||
|
|
very popular over the next couple days, the button woman.
|
||
|
|
She worked for ClariNet, and their promo was custom buttons
|
||
|
|
with the words "ClariNet" in greyshaded 3pt type tiled on the
|
||
|
|
background of the paper, very tiny, very inconspicuous, you practically
|
||
|
|
have to use it as a monocle before you recognize it's their name thats
|
||
|
|
repeatedly printed across the background. And they say Anything you wanted
|
||
|
|
them to say. ANYTHING.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
It seems that one of the suit-to-tech adapters had started
|
||
|
|
going off, ragging on some of the techs and in general acting
|
||
|
|
none too bright. "We've replaced D's brains with Folgers
|
||
|
|
Crystals and nobody can tell the difference". Cute, but there
|
||
|
|
had to be a better way to make him see the error of his ways.
|
||
|
|
Somebody hits on the idea of getting the button woman to make up
|
||
|
|
buttons that have all different names of caffeine sources on
|
||
|
|
them and slipping D one that says "Folgers Crystals". But how
|
||
|
|
to get her to make around 20 buttons for us without totally
|
||
|
|
taking advantage of her services and possibly pissing off the
|
||
|
|
ClariNet people or her?
|
||
|
|
Then Torin finds out she can be plied with Chocolate......
|
||
|
|
Starting that evening they begin to appear: "Earl
|
||
|
|
Grey","Darjeeling","Mountain Dew", "Jolt", "Chocolate covered
|
||
|
|
Esperesso beans", and of course, "Folgers Crystals". The trap
|
||
|
|
is sprung on Friday afternoon. D is handed his button and
|
||
|
|
accepts, proudly pinning it on himself, totally clueless. A collective
|
||
|
|
snigger erupts across Moscone as the news spreads.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Friday comes and goes and promptly at 5, amidst cries of "Tear Down The Net!"
|
||
|
|
We do exactly just that. Inside 2 hours max, we have torn down all the tails
|
||
|
|
and peds and are packing and boxing stuff. Spock once said "As a matter of
|
||
|
|
cosmic history it is always easier to destroy than create". We've proven
|
||
|
|
this in our ability to reduce to components and cables 3 days work in
|
||
|
|
just a couple hours.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Torin wants to check out right away and get over to his friend Strata's
|
||
|
|
in Palo Alto. Since we're to be there for the next couple days he wants
|
||
|
|
to get an early start on it. So we check out and drop the keys off at the
|
||
|
|
front desk much to the bewilderment of the night clerk who gives us this
|
||
|
|
look like we must be on the run from the law to be checking out at 3am.
|
||
|
|
I hand him the keycards grinning that infamous shit-eating 'dillo grin
|
||
|
|
thats gotten me grilled by suspecting teachers and other authority figures
|
||
|
|
in the past and just walk.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
We get to Stratas about 4 or so and I'm totally wired again from lack
|
||
|
|
of sleep so I curl up with a Physical Review Letters I find over in the
|
||
|
|
corner and just start reading in the middle of her hallway.
|
||
|
|
Everybody's still up and nobody objects. I can tell this is going to be
|
||
|
|
a cool 3 or 4 days...
|
||
|
|
The true cool geekiness of the place is revealed to my eyes later after
|
||
|
|
the sun's come up and I can actually make out more than just the outlines
|
||
|
|
of the place. There are whiteboards everywhere for one thing. And where
|
||
|
|
there aren't whiteboards, there's newsprint and always a copious collection
|
||
|
|
of markers or pens next to them. The set in the main living area have
|
||
|
|
diagrams and pseudo-code for a MUD the denizens of the house are
|
||
|
|
working on, along with critical commentary. The bathroom seems to be
|
||
|
|
having this running discussion about cats and who's doing who in the
|
||
|
|
house and "If using your computer were like going to the grocery store...."
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I add my own inimitable remarks to most if not all of them.
|
||
|
|
The next couple days pass in a haze of just lounging around, playing
|
||
|
|
Sega, reading, or waiting for the phone line. As much as there's a line
|
||
|
|
for the bathroom, there's even more of one for the phone, with at least
|
||
|
|
3 of us having brought laptops and everyone wanting to get jacked and
|
||
|
|
check their mail or news. Conversation takes place in a blend of
|
||
|
|
English, UNIX, DCL and other languages with everybody running a TLA
|
||
|
|
filter. Its very cool in that it really keeps you on your toes mentally.
|
||
|
|
Its not that we're all trying to be more-geek-than-thou, its just
|
||
|
|
that we're about 8 people who are all on the same level pretty much
|
||
|
|
and it just seems to be a more efficient way of communicating. In fact
|
||
|
|
there's almost a thirst and blessed relief about the place for the fact
|
||
|
|
that we can all talk and not have to follow up everything we want to
|
||
|
|
say with 5 minutes of explanation.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Food consists of a mixture of sugar and real stuff with Lucky Charms and
|
||
|
|
Pizza forming the two biggest staples. And there are some serious
|
||
|
|
appetites here. We end up making a food run at least once a day.
|
||
|
|
And not just for a few things, but serious grocerage. A couple 24s of
|
||
|
|
Coke and Diet Coke, more poptarts, more popcorn, donuts, chips,cereal,
|
||
|
|
and since we've got a couple bucks left lets splurge on some fruit and
|
||
|
|
veggies...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Saturday I get Keith to go back to SF with me to pick up some parts
|
||
|
|
for my skates. He and I wander around Japantown, pop into a few bookstores
|
||
|
|
and I resist from spending mself any more into debt than I have, get
|
||
|
|
some Chinese dumplings and a couple skate wheels and an axle or two and
|
||
|
|
head back. Sunday I return to the skate shop, loiter for a few and then
|
||
|
|
strap on my skates and head over to Golden Gate Park. On weekends they
|
||
|
|
close the majority of the park to traffic and let anything human on
|
||
|
|
wheels take over. I'm leaving day after tomorrow so I definitely wanted
|
||
|
|
to check this out..
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
*EVERYBODY* is. If its human powered and its got wheels, its
|
||
|
|
there. Roller skates, Inlines, skateboards thrashing and doing stuff off
|
||
|
|
railings and statues in the park and rollerskis and snakeboards and
|
||
|
|
just a ton of people on a ton of wheels. I start grinding across this
|
||
|
|
set of stairs across the street from this museum and there's this girl
|
||
|
|
there watching me. She's sitting on this stone railing post and keeps
|
||
|
|
looking at me and out into space all at the same time. She looks just
|
||
|
|
like the girl on the beach in Barton Fink, both in looks and the way
|
||
|
|
she's sitting there. Its all too surreal so I of course have to go
|
||
|
|
up to her and say "Are you in pictures?" She turns over and looks at me
|
||
|
|
with this really bizarre stare that says she obviously hasn't seen the
|
||
|
|
movie and I go back to my curbing. I can't help it...life and art collide
|
||
|
|
and bleed into each other too much for me to even NOT consider saying
|
||
|
|
it. I can't resist a perfectly set up scene like this....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
(End note: Yes I did go to the Haight, but you've probably already been
|
||
|
|
there and so has everybody else's 'zine so I'm not going to waste your
|
||
|
|
time on stuff you've heard countless time before.)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Contacts:
|
||
|
|
Interop Company:
|
||
|
|
erose@interop.com
|
||
|
|
480 San Antonio Road
|
||
|
|
Mountain View, Ca. 94040-1219
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
SIGGRAPH 94 Student Volunteer Program
|
||
|
|
401 North Michigan Avenue
|
||
|
|
Chicago, IL 60611 USA
|
||
|
|
students.s94@siggraph.org
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
---------------------------Newsfroups----------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
alt.society.generation-x
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I still haven't made up my mind here..There's lots of boomer vs. X-er flaming
|
||
|
|
going on, lots of whining, but there's also some cool stuff. There is a good
|
||
|
|
number of users on here who are trying to fight through the flames and say
|
||
|
|
"We know everything's fucked up, so what are we going to do about it?"
|
||
|
|
As much as I hate to admit it, I feel vaguely at home here, mostly 'cause
|
||
|
|
I know the crowd. Recent threads have been running on doing the Suburban
|
||
|
|
Family Thing As an X-er, Who's X and who's not, Why MTV sucks, X philosophy
|
||
|
|
and books, etc. It worth at least a pass through to judge for yourself, but
|
||
|
|
the volume can be overwhelming.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
alt.drugs.caffeine
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Pretty much what you'd expect, although a lot more chemistry and science
|
||
|
|
stuff going on here than you might think. These people take their caffeine
|
||
|
|
in ALL forms very seriously. Lots of requests for the caffeine GIF,
|
||
|
|
but not as much screwing around or lame "Can somebody send me the FAQ"o
|
||
|
|
postings as you might expect from a single-subject group such as this..
|
||
|
|
I'll give it a claw up.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
alt.skate-board
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Grab your plank and throw on your baggies and hit the 'crete with this group.
|
||
|
|
A decent, high signal-to-noise group that has a small, but devoted readership
|
||
|
|
with lots of worthwhile articles. What surprised me most was the lack of
|
||
|
|
'tude on here. Every time somebody has tried to start a flame fest on here
|
||
|
|
it usually dies quickly, cycled out by a moderate but consistent flow of
|
||
|
|
articles on boards, who's skating for what team, scene reports, busts, etc.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
alt.geek
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Back again for the second issue, I have to plug these guys again
|
||
|
|
as a really cool geeky hangout. CAK, Bear, Dana and other geeks
|
||
|
|
are the perfect net.crowd to hang with if you're taste in convo
|
||
|
|
runs along the lines of whether the bit in TRON was truly a bit
|
||
|
|
(it had a quiescent state besides just simply YES or NO) ,
|
||
|
|
why there aren't all that many female geeks out there and how
|
||
|
|
to encourage them, first computer-use stories and other stuff.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
comp.graphics.algorithms
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Groups like this are USENET in micro. Lots of very useful stuff, much of it
|
||
|
|
esoteric and unfathomable to Joe User, but if you HAVE to have the absolute
|
||
|
|
best and up-to-the-second FFT or bump-mapping algorithm, this is the
|
||
|
|
place to ask. Lots more questions than answers as one might expect,
|
||
|
|
but poke around a bit and you'll find some cool stuff.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
dc.music
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Sort of local clearinghouse for info on the DC music scene ranging from
|
||
|
|
WolfTrap and K-Center type stuff to Jazz, Indie, Reggae, Indie & DIY shows.
|
||
|
|
Everybody shows up here basically. Low volume, mostly 'cause its really new
|
||
|
|
, but all it needs is a few good posters..
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Karma Lapel
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
This has got to be done by a fellow English Major or something. Actual real
|
||
|
|
literary criticism and reviews of stuff which go well beyond the usual
|
||
|
|
"It was a stone groove my man" or "totally rad" type comments you see in
|
||
|
|
'zines . But its not pretentious, much as the above desc may make it
|
||
|
|
sound. And they actually have someone who does real artwork for them too.
|
||
|
|
Cool!, made me want to start scribbling on the pages of #5 before I sent
|
||
|
|
it out, but I just wanted to get it done so I passed and settled for
|
||
|
|
doodling across the cover a little more. The fact that Heath, their
|
||
|
|
editor dude, gave AC a rather glowing review for #4 has of course,
|
||
|
|
nothing to do with the fact that I liked his a lot too.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Format:Hardcopy
|
||
|
|
Contact:
|
||
|
|
Net:hrow@casbah.acns.nwu.edu
|
||
|
|
Snail: Heath PO Box 5467
|
||
|
|
Evanston IL 60204-5267
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Wired
|
||
|
|
Wow, a slick-but-not-slick "new-edge"-zine thats about tech and the net
|
||
|
|
and new geek toys and other stuff, but which doesn't insist on casting
|
||
|
|
it all in the typical "cyberpunks are so ]<ool D00Dz" mold. Kind of like
|
||
|
|
Mondo, but with a brain. Yes, there is the obligatory VR-sex article,
|
||
|
|
yes there was the Logitech ad, but there's some pretty cool stuff in
|
||
|
|
here too. And they actually DIS a lot of the tech too as useless marketing
|
||
|
|
ploys, instead of praising it all from on high just because it comes in a
|
||
|
|
matte black box with chrome plastic edging. If Mondo is the "Vogue" or
|
||
|
|
"People" of hardcopy netmags, Wired is at least "US News&World Report".
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
ICS Information-Communication-Supply
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Interesting netzine with real, original, multipart short fiction
|
||
|
|
with a decided angle towards what I call "gaming fiction". As in
|
||
|
|
it sounds like these guys play a lot of RPGs. Which isn't bad,
|
||
|
|
just kind of predictable sometimes. There is also usually a couple
|
||
|
|
articles on the sociological or political aspects of the net as a
|
||
|
|
tutorial or two on using things like FTP, Gopher, WAIS, etc.
|
||
|
|
And unlike a lot of "cyberzines", they don't get in your face
|
||
|
|
or try to impress you with how jacked they are...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Format:Net
|
||
|
|
Contact:ORG_ZINE@WSC.COLORADO.EDU
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
William Wants a Doll
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
A Grrrrrlll 'zine thats not 'tudinal nor pissed at the "other half of
|
||
|
|
the world", but doesn't knuckle under either. And she's not as stuck up
|
||
|
|
about the net as a lot of punk 'zines either...
|
||
|
|
#2 came with some cheap earrings, articles on 25 things you can
|
||
|
|
do with a boy, a slacker's guide to Baltimore and other stuff...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
#3 has her interviewing her family members, an expose' on her summer
|
||
|
|
intership with Sassy and how she became the disillusioned youth
|
||
|
|
that she is today based on that corporate experience, stuff on
|
||
|
|
TeeVee Luv, etc. What really impressed me about this was the amount of
|
||
|
|
effort and attention that it Arielle puts in to each issue. In a
|
||
|
|
sea of cut-and-paste I'll-rip-the-balls-off-the-next-man-who-looks-at-me
|
||
|
|
GRRRL 'zines, WWAD stands out as a refreshing, different, more positive
|
||
|
|
expression of girl power. There are also clips from "Free To Be, You and Me",
|
||
|
|
a '70s kids book about breaking gender roles and uniqueness, which I remember
|
||
|
|
really liking a lot as a young 'dillo and which seems to form the core of
|
||
|
|
WWADs philosophy. Arielle seems to be aiming at the newly-adolescing as well
|
||
|
|
as college-age female while trying to reach guys too and manages to hit all
|
||
|
|
three pretty squarely.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Format:hardcopy
|
||
|
|
Contact:berg@brick.purchase.edu
|
||
|
|
or
|
||
|
|
Arielle Greenberg
|
||
|
|
105 Patton Blvd.
|
||
|
|
New Hyde Park, NY. 11040
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Tabula Rosa
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Flashback to your past and Saturday mornings spent on the floor watching
|
||
|
|
RoadRunner cartoons and Land of The Lost and "Those meddling kids" munching
|
||
|
|
Super Sugar Crisp or Froot Loops with this one. I'm not usually one for
|
||
|
|
childhood nostalgia stuff, but TR reminded me that one of childhoods
|
||
|
|
principle elements is sugar, so that cured a good chunk of that problem.
|
||
|
|
The other part was cured by also reminding me that the other major half
|
||
|
|
of it involves large amounts of being a little hellian whenever possible.
|
||
|
|
#1 had childhood breakfast stories in it, while #2 focused on family
|
||
|
|
vacations and field trip disasters, something else I could get into given
|
||
|
|
the number of 14 hour trips to Northern Mi. I endured as a kid....
|
||
|
|
Format:Hardcopy
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Contact:
|
||
|
|
Bill Roussel
|
||
|
|
PO Box 6
|
||
|
|
Ancramdale, NY. 12503
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Alien Relay
|
||
|
|
(#6 sent for review)
|
||
|
|
Yeah, I know, everybody does their reviews in Alpha order, but I do them in
|
||
|
|
the order in which they pop into my head. So there, Deal with it Pink Boy!
|
||
|
|
But I digress....
|
||
|
|
Lots of scanned in graphics and clip art with gothic and cyberpunk like
|
||
|
|
stories, poems and fugues pasver top of these images or over top
|
||
|
|
magnified copies of themselves. Most of the longer stuff is kind of cool
|
||
|
|
and I did like the one "interview" with a city sanitation worker a la
|
||
|
|
"Soylent Green". But AR seems to be suffering from a lack of self-esteem
|
||
|
|
of sorts. It spends too much time trying to look like others and trying to
|
||
|
|
to be a 'pro forma' gothic C-punk zine. This has possibilities if the
|
||
|
|
editor would let it be itself instead of everybody else...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Contact:
|
||
|
|
Jacob Pickard
|
||
|
|
2776 North Wiel Street,
|
||
|
|
Milwaukee WI. 53212
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Withering Snout:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The thing about this is that the parts that V. slams most about her
|
||
|
|
'zine are the parts I kind of liked the most. What can I say?---It appeals
|
||
|
|
to the smartass in me. I particularily liked the zine rating system she
|
||
|
|
devised which can be approximated as sort of like a narrative version of
|
||
|
|
the USENET Erland ratings system smashes into a top ten list taking them
|
||
|
|
both through a plate glass window into Phyllis Richmans lap....or something
|
||
|
|
like that... Also cool stuff is a thing on how *NOT* to get a summer job at
|
||
|
|
Matador records. Various scribblings and epithets hurled along the side
|
||
|
|
which make her sound like she could pass as Dr. Clayton Forrester's
|
||
|
|
alter-gender-ego. Take that as you wish "my little tatterdemalions.." :)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Format:Hardcopy
|
||
|
|
M. Vischmidt
|
||
|
|
90-11 35th Ave. #3N
|
||
|
|
Jackson Heights. NY 11372
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Chuck:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The 'zine that proclaims itself to be half chicken/half duck and certainly
|
||
|
|
all travails and adventure in the Northern Ca. suburbs. It reads kind of like
|
||
|
|
combat notes from suburban hell, which aside from sounding really cool I have
|
||
|
|
absolutely no clue what use or meaning that phrase has. But I digress again.
|
||
|
|
#1 had this cool Anarchy Man sticker inside it that I really liked a lot
|
||
|
|
but then somebody else liked it 'cause they ripped it from my car, along
|
||
|
|
with stuff on monster truck rallys and why to avoid them, why Chef's
|
||
|
|
Hat boxing is like sex, a pico-bio on Charles "Chuck" Mingus, King of
|
||
|
|
Cunnilingus, Occupational Poetry, and other stuff.
|
||
|
|
#2 is to be commended for its "Kitty Activity Corner" amongst other things
|
||
|
|
in which the author shows how your cat can become Totoro in just a couple
|
||
|
|
easy steps.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
$2 to:
|
||
|
|
CHUCK
|
||
|
|
Mike Woolridge
|
||
|
|
PO Box 6623
|
||
|
|
Concord, CA. 94524
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Derogatory References
|
||
|
|
(#76 sent for review)
|
||
|
|
I was kind of put off by the title of this when I first got it in that
|
||
|
|
it seemed a more than a little self-referential and I was right.
|
||
|
|
Basically a journal of literary, musical, and cinematic criticism and
|
||
|
|
philosophical opinion written in installments over the period July-Nov. '93
|
||
|
|
There is a significant chunk of stuff on the author's own journey through
|
||
|
|
substance abuse recovery and DR seems to be part of that recovery. For that
|
||
|
|
I will commend Mr. Hlavaty, but beyond that it seemed to degenerate into
|
||
|
|
art-critic type musings and I could picture a sort of John Houseman-like
|
||
|
|
character making commentary. The mental stuff surrounding recovering I could
|
||
|
|
have related to given my own psychotic period of a few years ago, but
|
||
|
|
as I just said, that was a couple years ago, so I could identify but
|
||
|
|
it didn't really take hold.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Format: Net<free> and Hardcopy<$1>
|
||
|
|
USnail:
|
||
|
|
Arthur D. Hlavaty
|
||
|
|
206 Valentine St.
|
||
|
|
Yonkers NY. 10704-1814.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Net:hlavaty@panix.com
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Epicenter Records:
|
||
|
|
If you go nowhere else in San Francisco, you *HAVE* to go here. Not really
|
||
|
|
so much a record store as it is a punk resource and community center, every
|
||
|
|
town should have a place like this. Occupying the upper floor of a rowhouse
|
||
|
|
in SF, Epicenter is home to a record store, two labels stuffed in around
|
||
|
|
the side, a grafitti wall which invites scribbling, an art space, a
|
||
|
|
mini-library and probably still has enough space left over to hold a small
|
||
|
|
show(does anybody knoe if they do this or not?). The art space had a women's
|
||
|
|
art exhibit in it when I was there, and the staff was pretty cool(they even
|
||
|
|
opened up the back and dug around for about 10 minutes to find me a shirt),
|
||
|
|
esp. the one female with many piercings who also happened to be a DC ex-pat.
|
||
|
|
Totally punk/indie/DIY, with not a Nirvana nor Pearl Jam CD to be seen
|
||
|
|
for miles. :) A well-stocked 'zine/book section to boot.
|
||
|
|
Location:
|
||
|
|
476 Valencia St. San Francisco, Ca.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Dharma Coffehouse
|
||
|
|
(University Dr. in Fairfax, right behind Planet Nova)
|
||
|
|
The coffeehouse craze has finally seeped into Fairfax with this place.
|
||
|
|
Its has the knack of being a scene and a coffeehouse without trying
|
||
|
|
to be forced about it like ZigZag or some of the others downtown.
|
||
|
|
Which isn't to say its totally free of pretention, but its not as
|
||
|
|
bad as it could be. In a place which is basically one big huge strip
|
||
|
|
mall that likes to pretend its a city, Dharma stands out as an island
|
||
|
|
of welcome Bohemia. Pick-up jam sessions, chess/card games, etc. abound.
|
||
|
|
Food & drink is pastries, biscotti, coffees and Italian Sodas and cheap.
|
||
|
|
Highly recommended is the half double decaffeinated half-caf with a
|
||
|
|
twist of lemon(Just kidding Heather :) ).
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The Black Cat
|
||
|
|
14th & S NW, D.C.
|
||
|
|
Wow!...you mean DC is actually OPENING a performance space instead of
|
||
|
|
just closing another one?---Whoa...heavy concept....
|
||
|
|
And not a bad place either. :)
|
||
|
|
*BIG* floor by DC standards and a nice sizable stage too along with pool,
|
||
|
|
a food place attached next door and bar along the side. I've been there
|
||
|
|
a couple times and its pretty cool. Bands that have played there in
|
||
|
|
recent months have been Tilt, WOD, The whole Simple Machines Working Holiday
|
||
|
|
thingy, Jawbreaker, Hoover, Trusty, Jawbox and others...
|
||
|
|
Its certainly no DC Space and not as big as say St. Stephen's, but it will
|
||
|
|
do and is a much preferred alternative to another show at the 9:30 club.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
---------------------------Music---------------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Shows:
|
||
|
|
Artless: Mykel Board is a maniac. Very cool, Anti-PC band with an
|
||
|
|
equally cool lyric book they were handing out at the GLOV
|
||
|
|
show. Surprisingly, given the pretensions some of the other
|
||
|
|
bands there, I'd have to say they were the most PUNK band there
|
||
|
|
of all.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Pansy Division:
|
||
|
|
Also at the GLOV benefit, SFs premiere queer punk band didn't do much
|
||
|
|
for me. I mean they were talented, but seemed to be a lot more straight
|
||
|
|
middle-of-the-road rock than anything resembling hardcore. Maybe it
|
||
|
|
was that it was the night before The March and the 'tude they were
|
||
|
|
wearing, but "Rock 'n' Roll Queer Bar" left me underwhelmed..
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Jawbreaker:
|
||
|
|
Totally awesome. They embody all the reasons I got into and
|
||
|
|
like punk. Very uplifting, energizing, solid power punk out of the
|
||
|
|
Bay Area. The rhythms and hooks and words, all get under my skin and tingle....
|
||
|
|
Some people say they are already or will soon be sellouts but I still like
|
||
|
|
them.
|
||
|
|
Bivouac ranks as one of 'dillos top 10 albums for '93.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Slackers
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Good, upbeat, more on the traditional side of ska with some jazz thrown
|
||
|
|
in and an occasional drum solo, The Slackers were probably my favorite
|
||
|
|
band at the DC Ska Fest '93. True to their name, they didn't have anything
|
||
|
|
out when I saw them although they were working on it. They were cool
|
||
|
|
enough to hang around with me for about an hour and talk about the New
|
||
|
|
York scene and how it pretty much sucks and how punk up there has devolved
|
||
|
|
into hip-hop mostly.(Hey, they said it not me..)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Juliana Luecking:"She's Good People"
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I've been a Juliana fan since her "So fuckin' perfec" days and loved
|
||
|
|
her spoken word stuff when she was here last spring, and liked "She's
|
||
|
|
Good People" a lot, even though being a straight white male, I didn't
|
||
|
|
get big chunks of it. Still I was cracking up over "Cleavage, Cleavage"
|
||
|
|
and "The Perfect Lesbian Bar" and "Trust Stevie" sounds like such a
|
||
|
|
cool party...
|
||
|
|
On Kill Rock Stars
|
||
|
|
120 NE State St. #418, Olympia Wa. 98501
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Groundwork:
|
||
|
|
Saw these guys in August at the Nocturne with Iconoclast. Native Nod was
|
||
|
|
supposed t have been there, but they broke up a couple days before...
|
||
|
|
Their "Living in Fear" single comes highly recommended as a good couple
|
||
|
|
tracks of pounding, pour-your-soul-on-the-floor liberative hardcore and
|
||
|
|
some neat anarchist anti-consumerism prose on the sleeve.
|
||
|
|
I talked to Brendan after the show and got his opinion on Angst.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Armadillo Culture : I've got a question for you...
|
||
|
|
Brendan:Okay....
|
||
|
|
AC:Would you say that Tucson is the Angst capital of the universe?
|
||
|
|
Brendan:Let me say this: Tucson is the shithead capital of the universe,
|
||
|
|
starting with us..
|
||
|
|
AC:Really?
|
||
|
|
Brendan:Yeah...its pretty bad..have you ever been there?
|
||
|
|
AC:Yeah, I was out there last summer visiting a friend, and the one thing
|
||
|
|
that I think really struck me about it was that it wouldn't be a good place
|
||
|
|
to walk around drunk 'cause you'd probably end up impaled on a cactus or
|
||
|
|
something...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Brendan:Oh yeah...definitely....definitely. I dunno, its okay...its okay,
|
||
|
|
its just got a lot of fake culture...fake people..
|
||
|
|
AC: Kind of like they think its a happenin' place but it really isn't?
|
||
|
|
Brendan:Well, you see Tucson is just like this massive vortex, this massive
|
||
|
|
hole. Once you've been there for about two years, you're doomed. There's
|
||
|
|
no escape. It just sucks in things, people, and they never leave. It'll
|
||
|
|
get everything someday...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
AC:Oh no!...she's been there for about 4 or so. She just graduated from U of
|
||
|
|
A.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Brendan:God, I'm sorry man....she's doomed. <grins> Just like us,
|
||
|
|
we're doomed too. There's just no escape.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Albums/Tapes/CDs/punch tape (joke :) )
|
||
|
|
The Monomen:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Crunchy, crashy, noise surf rock, The Monomen remind me kind of a less
|
||
|
|
polished Pixies minus Francis' lungs. Given largely instrumental tracks
|
||
|
|
with simple but catchy surf garage riffs and threads, The Monomen are
|
||
|
|
the kind of music you crank out of your car and full volume and jam to
|
||
|
|
at the stoplight without caring who's watching. Two claws up!
|
||
|
|
On Estrus Records, POB 2125 Bellingham, Wa. 98227
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The Dambuilders: Candyguts
|
||
|
|
These guys put me in that interesting position of recognizing a talented
|
||
|
|
band but nevertheless not liking them. Clear, plucky indie-pop guitar
|
||
|
|
rhythms with a violin tagging along close behind and some good pop
|
||
|
|
lines make this a well done single, but I'm going to contest the default
|
||
|
|
Indie-L assertion that the DamBuilders are totally the shit. I think its
|
||
|
|
that its too soft, mellow, muted for my tastes and that violin is almost
|
||
|
|
screechy in parts...sorry
|
||
|
|
On Salient
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The Swirlies: Brokedick Car
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Okay, laugh, point fingers, kick me out of whatever punk "boyz club" you
|
||
|
|
want, but I have to admit that I have a true weakness for a female-led
|
||
|
|
indie rock "lala" type music .
|
||
|
|
They're hard to pin down musically. Thoughts of the Pastels, Superchunk,
|
||
|
|
Magnetic Fields, and My Bloody Valentine all float through my head when
|
||
|
|
I try to describe these guys to people. On this particular offering we
|
||
|
|
have 5 tracks(although one is a slightly funkified, electrified mix of
|
||
|
|
a previous track). Seana's voice is especially good on the first cut,
|
||
|
|
"The wrong tube", and the 2nd track "Labrea" provides a kind of weird
|
||
|
|
impressionistic instrumental departure from the typical indie fuzz pop
|
||
|
|
that characterizes the rest of the album and the "House of Pancake" mix
|
||
|
|
of "pankcake Cleaner" stuck in my head for days. Overall, its like hard
|
||
|
|
candy stuck on a tooth. You know its not good for you to have it sitting
|
||
|
|
there but it tastes too good to not just dissolve it and savor it by
|
||
|
|
running your tongue over it.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Pennywise: Unknown Road
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Some kind of cool (dare I say the word) mersh-punk, sounding a lot like
|
||
|
|
Bad Religion and meaning to and being quite good at it too. I mostly think
|
||
|
|
its that Toronto thing 'cause there's something here that makes them
|
||
|
|
not a total BR ripoff but kind of their own sound too. It would be hard
|
||
|
|
for Pennywise to miss commercial success with this. They have just enough
|
||
|
|
of the formula mixed in there with themselves in there to make it work...
|
||
|
|
On Epitaph.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Trenchmouth:"Construction of New Action:First there was movement"
|
||
|
|
JazzPunkFunk thats got a deep groove you can move, skank or head-bob to,
|
||
|
|
usually all in one song, Trenchmouth mixes percussive attacks and
|
||
|
|
top-of-the-lungs vocals with bouncy, funky,jazzy, spirally music.
|
||
|
|
Particular favorites are "Oxygen Gum", "History" and "Siberia".
|
||
|
|
On Skene!
|
||
|
|
PO Box 4522 Saint Paul, MN. 55104
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The PieTasters:
|
||
|
|
I will chalk my semi-dis of them last issue up to bad karma and having
|
||
|
|
seen them play in only a couple rather lame venues in Fairfax.
|
||
|
|
When placed in the appropriate clime/club however, they are quite cool.
|
||
|
|
The were great with the Pickles this summer, brought the house as well as
|
||
|
|
the DCFD down at the DC ska fest in August, and were pretty tight the couple
|
||
|
|
times I saw them this fall. A local Va. band, they place a sort of rock ska,
|
||
|
|
fast paced, given to long horn and drum solos which tend to detonate into
|
||
|
|
the full force of a ten-piece ska band skankin' it out at maximum volume.
|
||
|
|
CD out now called simply "The Pietasters" as well as a previous tape called
|
||
|
|
"All you can eat". This plus their earlier 7" "Ska-rumptious" make a cool
|
||
|
|
meal...
|
||
|
|
On Slugtone!
|
||
|
|
3323 Wessynton Way
|
||
|
|
Alexandria, Va. 22309
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Checkered Cabs
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Probably *THE* best "traditional" local ska band around, these guys are
|
||
|
|
a show not to be missed, playing a lot of Specials/Madness/Selecter-influenced
|
||
|
|
early '80s type ska. They tend to play a lot with either the Pietasters
|
||
|
|
and Skunks and seem to frequent 15 minutes mostly but I've also seen them
|
||
|
|
at the 9:30. I like their cover of "Carry Go Bring Come" especially.
|
||
|
|
Unfortunately, they're slacks and don't have anything out yet.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Operation Ivy Compilation CD
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
If you don't have any Ska in your collection or any CDs period, you should
|
||
|
|
own this. Its that good. Really. 27 tracks of just about everything OpIV
|
||
|
|
put out on one CD makes for some of the best punk/ska music I've ever heard.
|
||
|
|
Totally cool guitar work with heavy drums and ardent, desperate, impassioned
|
||
|
|
screamed vocals makes you just want to break out and start pogo-ing or
|
||
|
|
slamming or doing whatever wherever you are.
|
||
|
|
Put this down and go write to:
|
||
|
|
Lookout Records PO BOX 11374 Berkeley Ca 94701
|
||
|
|
to get a copy.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Simple Machines ---The Machines 1990-1993
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
"The Machines" is a collection of the 7 original 7" comps that SM put
|
||
|
|
out from 1990-1993 as part of its "Simple Machines" collection.
|
||
|
|
Everbody is here. Geek, Autoclave, Nation of Ulysses, Circus Lupus,
|
||
|
|
Juliana Luecking, Bricks and even a few bands that are still around like
|
||
|
|
Tsunami, Superchunk, Velocity Girl and Jawbox. As the singles are layed
|
||
|
|
out in chrono order, the disc serves not only as a collection, but also
|
||
|
|
as a chronology of sorts as to what was going on in the DC indie
|
||
|
|
scene at that point. If you missed some or all of these when they came
|
||
|
|
out on vinyl a couple years ago, here's your chance to redeem yourself.
|
||
|
|
Simple Machines
|
||
|
|
po Box 10290 Arlington, Va. 22210-1290
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Blue Meanies: Pave the World
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
What ska, jazz, hardcore,pirate drinking songs, and standup
|
||
|
|
comedy have to do with each other can be best described by whats on this
|
||
|
|
6-track CD from The Blue Meanines. A mixture of ska,punk,funk, parody and
|
||
|
|
general goofing off make this one to put right next to my Pickles and
|
||
|
|
Raymond and Peter CD. On NO!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Raymond And Peter:Shut Up Little Man!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And speaking of which, we have the two golden boys themselves.
|
||
|
|
Raymond and Peter are(were, Raymond is dead) two welfare cases in SF who
|
||
|
|
loved to hate each other as evinced in large block letters, underlined,
|
||
|
|
asterisked, and boldfaced in glowing neon on this CD, which consists of
|
||
|
|
their harangues, monologues, threats, epithets and calling of plagues
|
||
|
|
down upon each other.
|
||
|
|
"Shut Up Little Man" is 36 tracks of their antics including such gems as
|
||
|
|
"The Crucifixion of Dinner", "Toenails", & "Queers always giggle falsely"
|
||
|
|
Its hard not to feel somewhat guilty about totally getting off on such hate
|
||
|
|
and obvious suffering, but on the other hand its also hard not to admire true
|
||
|
|
true artists who excel in their craft.
|
||
|
|
Available as tape, comic, CD or even Macintosh screensaver from:
|
||
|
|
Tedium House
|
||
|
|
POB 424762 San Francisco Ca.94142
|
||
|
|
Include SASE
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
--------------------------Roll Credits!!-------------------------------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Look, its done okay?
|
||
|
|
Over, fini, terminus, end, EOF, EOI, NO CARRIER, ABEND, Connection closed
|
||
|
|
by foreign host, outta here, 86, casper, GET IT!?!?!?!???!!!!!!
|
||
|
|
I'm out of here. I'm going to go print this out, take it over to Kinkos
|
||
|
|
and get it duped for the hardcopy issues and then go grab myself a double
|
||
|
|
quintuple Mocha with an espresso bean chaser at Dharma. I deserve it....
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
And while I'm there, if you hang out over in the back corner, you might catch
|
||
|
|
me whispering the following:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Eric Boesch did the tongue angst piece.
|
||
|
|
Jenea Boshert did the "Hannah" story (jboshart@husc.harvard.edu)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Thanks to:
|
||
|
|
Linus Torvalds for doing the Linux interview
|
||
|
|
Brendan for taking a few to do the Groundwork interview with me...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
AC Staff Pro-tem:
|
||
|
|
Lije : Editing and Format Bitch
|
||
|
|
Eric Mills: Minister of Groovelocity and Pranks as well as assistant editing.
|
||
|
|
(emills@mason1.gmu.edu)
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
I did the 'zine/newsgroup/music reviews and also the Caffeine/Sugar thing as
|
||
|
|
well as the CyberVolunteers article.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
------------------Submissions,Dominations, and other family fun-------------
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Submissions: yes, have some. Send me stuff, pretty much anything really.
|
||
|
|
reviews, letters, opinion stuff, high-weirdness-by-mail type stuff, art,
|
||
|
|
shows you saw, scene reports, etc. I'll send you back a copy of the past
|
||
|
|
couple ones I've done including the one I put yours in.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Send to:
|
||
|
|
USnail:
|
||
|
|
Armadillo Culture
|
||
|
|
2857 Foxmill Rd. Herndon, Va. 22071
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Net:
|
||
|
|
sokay@cyclone.mitre.org
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
If you're at a show in DC or thereabouts and you see a guy with long
|
||
|
|
brown hair wearing a photographer's vest(has about 20 pockets on it)
|
||
|
|
glasses(and possibly an AC t-shirt), thats probably me. Come up
|
||
|
|
and say hi, I don't bite.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
FTP sites:
|
||
|
|
etext.archive.umich.edu
|
||
|
|
This is an anonymous FTP site.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
GIFS: I am experimenting with scanning in photos I've taken at some
|
||
|
|
shows. the fruits of this effort have been uploaded to the FTP site.
|
||
|
|
The GIF of this issue's cover is there also. If you do not have FTP
|
||
|
|
access, mail me and I'll get them to you, but *PLEASE* try to get them
|
||
|
|
via FTP/Mosaic/Gopher/WAIS.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Shirts:
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Its true!...now you can have your very own AC T-shirt,
|
||
|
|
lovingly silkscreened onto a 100% cotton shirt. They're
|
||
|
|
hip, they're happenin' and they're pretty damn cheap too!
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
The design is an armadillo surrounded by various 'zines, flyers,
|
||
|
|
45s, empty caffeine units,pop tarts,etc. hacking on his terminal
|
||
|
|
and the words "Armadillo Culture" across the top. The back has
|
||
|
|
the 'Cool Tunes, Fast Compilers, Cheap Caffeine" slogan on it.
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
$8 covers the cost of the shirt and my getting it back to you..
|
||
|
|
And don't forget to give me your size either...
|
||
|
|
|
||
|
|
Wing your cash or checks(made out to Steve Okay)
|
||
|
|
to:
|
||
|
|
Armadillo Headquarters
|
||
|
|
2857 Foxmill Rd. Herndon, Va. 22071
|
||
|
|
Attn:The Toiling Masses in our sweatshop
|
||
|
|
|