Pete Simon

Tumblin' On

2010-05-29T16:51:00.004-04:00

Dear Reader,

I'm trying out Tumblr's blogging system because it strikes a nice balance between blogging and tweeting: bleeting.

I hope you will visit my new digs at petesimon.tumblr.com -- or just wait a few months when I've failed to capture a Tumblr audience and come crawling back to blogspot.

- Pete

Existence

2010-05-17T22:54:00.000-04:00

Existence of...something, upon the brink of what a man believes. Standing there to stare into the void. Desiring so intensely to see a face that the eye may play tricks. Questions of whether anything really means anything, or if being alone means total isolation. Is he at peace with his own concept of death? Or does he feel the same ache to grapple with the unknown.

Contemplating purely singular existence is like staring into the sun, one cannot behold it directly without being harmed. A mind could go mad trying to balance notions of nothingness and an infinite being, just as the sense of injustice cannot be satisfied by any worldly means - ideas that can be considered but not grasped.

If the concept of God factors down to imagined kinship for our existential comfort, it remains wholly worthwhile. Pared down to the essential core, God could be proxy for our relationship with the idea of life's value, it spares us the madness of being unable to *know*. And if God exists, why not with benevolence? Maybe grant wishes? Better yet: control our destinies; control our world.

I've long believed in a concept of God that was necessary, not desireable; believed out of need, not want -- that seems more real, doesn't it? Such a being, by definition, would reside beyond my stunted perception so I could take comfort that something was out there.

I don't know if a sane mind could accept death if it meant blacking out and ceasing to exist. Balancing extremes is what a healthy brain does best, so nothing is so impossible if it keeps the feet planted while standing at the edge of the void.

No one writes anymore.

2010-04-19T22:16:00.008-04:00

You know what's better than a witty idea packed into a <140 character sentence? The same sentence followed by an elaborative paragraph for the time when the words don't speak for themselves, which is all the time.

I liked to joke about design on the internet and the turnoff that was a graph of text longer than a sentence. "No one reads anymore," I would state cynically. But the same joke doesn't sit so well today, instead I would say: "No one writes anymore."

Writing on the internet can be described in a word, 'curt'. People now write with the same shorthand abbreviations and literal stand-ins they formerly spared for texting, but texting, tweeting, commenting, (*sigh*) 'Like'ing, has steadily eroded the cultures stamina for writing. Instead of Blogging, people are Blurting; instead of spelling people are spurting out character sequences with cryptic meanings.

The result? Good Godson! Just look at Twitter, it's totally illegible. Gangly strands and clumps of characters that read like a corrupt text file. Honestly, a compact tweet requires more decoding than reading, and decoding is what good software is supposed to do FOR us.

I'm as guilty as anyone, I tweet more than most users I know, and the forgiving Lord knows I've written off his people as 'ppl'. And while I'm kneeling in this e-Confessional, I can tell you the 'ppl' message ultimately sucked.

Everyone who writes faces this problem. Saying more with less is considered artistic. When you hash out a good post, you want to tighten it down like a Mac Truck lug nut, so you twist paragraphs until they squeal upon the kerning, but you're still wondering if it's road-ready. People are going to be reading this, and their impatient, erratic gnat-minds will fly at the first participle that dangles lifelessly.

Or maybe the whole thing is beginning to feel like a Vaudeville act? The proverbial hook will emerge from behind the web page and yank you into browser history. You can suffer a few tomatoes to the face but will anyone allow the show to go on? You're a human being, not a deformed circus attraction! Fuck it. Apologies, Joseph Merrick.

I'm willing to bet 90% of bloggers who gave up saw twitter as the summation of what was wrong with their readership. Most probably migrated to twitter, traded in page hits for followers and never looked back.

The truth is, the Internet needs you to write like Fantasia needs Bastian. This is NeverEnding story is about you, but is slowly ceding to the Nothing (or 'Null' as it's referred to in computing).

Do you think people gave up on blogs? No, they gave up on writing them. Our world may be shrinking, but in doing so we are drawn closer together. This is the dawn of a new era, a fresh <P> tag for the fillin'!

Happy keying.

Recession Hiree

2010-04-17T13:43:00.005-04:00

"Now start bailing, please. :)"

Flash's orange vs. HTML5's unripe apple

2010-03-29T16:34:00.006-04:00

I've read one too many articles that mention Flash and HTML5 in the same sentence. I'm not sure where this comparison came from, I guess people may be noticing their browsers doing things that were once only possible with Flash, thereby concluding that Flash will fade like the floppy drive. Or maybe they saw a cool demo in Chrome that dismantled their conceptions of what was possible with JavaScript. But as history indicates, there's a long distance between possible and actual, and a deep well between them filled with years of non-standard browser innovations...

Flash back to the early, early days of the web-browser, when getting things to look the same was the least of a web developer's concerns. Using Wiz-Bang features of the most advanced browser (such as IE6) meant forgoing big compatibility and walking across security hazards. At that time, the value proposition of Flash was too good to ignore.

Web developers were used to making congressional-sized compromises to make pages work across browsers, so cutting-edge meant choosing one browser. The dreamscape of platform desirables was so opaque the road map for Flash versions was obvious, as it intended to quell those wants for a reliable common ground, and once achieved, raced forward to meet the demands of an exploding Flash development community. This was a group that had all but given up on communion between the browsers of mortal enemies.

There was a growing skepticism among web media developers that the browsers could offer the capability of a solid 3rd party plug-in embedded within a web page. Furthermore, it would take one hell of an UI to pull all the features together in a way accessible to both programmers and animators. Developers who wanted cool things to work were eager to embrace a solution that tackled *most* of what they needed: light-weight, vector animation, with audio, advanced scripting, that rendered the same across ALL BROWSERS.

In part because of availability (affordable at the college store) and because of the burning desire for the platform to succeed, Macromedia's Flash saw an explosion of talent which both legitimized it and pressured the company to cater to the growing ranks of adopters. Macromedia responded nimbly by ramping up the development of Flash possibly at the expense of their other products (Dreamweaver, Freehand, Fireworks).

The application that began as Future Splash, a vector animation tool for producing web-ready content, was soon leveraged as the end-all solution for media rich pages. Since there was no real alternative to Flash, developers began defaulting on Flash-driven pages, and the software's idealized reputation was tarnished. The lack screen-reader accessibility was never well addressed and there was a growing laziness, a sense of arrogance from the Flash community.

When HTML and Javascript improved enough, there began a large departure from and subsequent vilification of Flash for the dependent strain it placed Internet and her ideals of openness and accessibility. Despite the diffusion of interest, Flash continued to improve by offering solid 3D libraries, video streaming, by expanding into programmatic environments with Flex, and onto mobile devices with Air.

Now, at the crest of HTML 5.0, the new edition of the open-web format seems poised at last to occupy Flash's long-held stakeouts, yet Flash is stubbornly resilient, and spreading even faster with Android devices pledging support. Whatever Flash lacks in platform features it has more than accounted for with the vast pervasiveness of the platform and what it can accomplish in its most basic form.

It's possible that the Web Consortium will muscle together a solid media rich standard, but there are already signs that HTML5 isn't what we hope it would be, and when it is there will be legacy browsers to support.

But my intent here is not to dismiss the value of the new web standards. The point is that Flash is an orange to HTML5's apple. Where developers feel free to target a single browser on a single platform, they could just as well use the new standard to build out. But there's always going to be Flash, and the market is always going to have use for a platform that does less but works in more places. When a new plug-in comes along that can boast the vast platform support of flash, while sporting an Award-winning UI (like Flash's) that integrates with other Killer Apps such as Photoshop and Illustrator, and supports video, and offers advanced scripting w/ debugging, with some 3D tossed in for good measure -- that platform could surely claim the place of Flash. Until then, there will be web pages with embedded flash, and lots of them.

On the pending legislation for Health Care Reform

2010-03-20T17:39:00.008-04:00

I live in a state where health care is mandated. People must by from insurance companies or face a tax penalty. Without insurance, I paid this penalty when I filed my taxes this year. It bothered me, but I also understood the fee and accepted it because I comprehend how the uninsured burden the providers. If nothing else, I accept the responsibility of abiding the law.

The argument that passing some measure is better than none is persuasive. With history being the greatest indicator, health care legislation is hard pass. Passing anything breaks the ice, gets people to think more about what is, and hence, what could be. Laws deemed to be inadequate are more likely to be revisited than issues that have never manifested law.

If Congress passes the bill, it will be a step forward. The measures will likely cost money we don't have, and there are certainly flaws and injustices in the bill that are unknown presently. We need to see the results, take a pulse, and amend, but there must be something to amend. Even a ham-handed, slanted, weak-tea effort. Maybe this bill is just that, but I believe it is better than that.

I have predicted (repeatedly) that this effort to reform health care would fail, and now it looks like it may pass. I hope it does pass, and will eat crow happily, belch raucously, then stand up full-bellied, and applaud the Democratic party for proving me and all skeptics wrong.

My plate is set, I've tucked in napkin into my collar, and I'm sitting impatiently for my Corvus cuisine.

Before too long

2010-03-01T23:04:00.002-05:00

Leave me before summer
When the heat wave comes and pulls
Beads of sweat from my cold face
Trickle down the paths of tears
Following new creases
But lingering upon same places
Then drop before too long

I lie in bed
Without you
Consumed by hateful tongues
That raze a molten heart
Whose bright coal fuels
A young fool's faith
Now smoldering up
In careless smoke
Above his life's loveless remains
Spitting sparks into the dark
That fade before too long

The Peach Tree

2010-02-22T22:01:00.001-05:00

The peach tree grows
Fair and fine
Bears flowers in the springtime
Past April, May, then early June
She stays patiently abloom
Deeper down her thick root reaches
Drawing water up and thru
Along spry branches to the tips
Carries drink for ripening lips
And when the harvest moon entreats
She yeilds her fruit:
Sweet summer peaches

Big Gulp

2010-02-21T12:08:00.005-05:00

"I know you like Diet Coke, Bobby, but I can't believe that you'll like it this much…"

He was shoving me forward in the dark. Hitting me in the back so I would stumble. Then he grabbed my collar so that I stopped short. He yanked my blindfold off and there it was: a sparkling oasis, pitch red, like molasses mixed with blood, fizzing with anger.

Frank owned a large pool and he had filled the whole damned thing.

"I did this for you," he spoke softly as I looked on in disbelief and wonder.

"It's ALL for you, Bobby. This will be your last drink with me, cousin."

His full weight hanging by my collar, he brought me down and I crashed on the cracked concrete poolside. I heard the spiky hiss of fresh carbonation. I saw my wild-eyed reflection; horrified with thirst. I saw Frank's silhouette too. "Drink!" he blurted as he stuck my whole skull beneath the foam kissed surface. I was sliding forward.

It looked like hell underneath, and the eyes burned to see it. All around my nose, my face, down my neck, a thousand tiny bee stings. Frank's hand gripped relentlessly at my color, dunking me deeper down. No use from my bound arms. My knees were pinned to the rim but slipping in.

"YOU DESERVE THIS, COUSIN!" Frank belted, and he punched his clenched fist forward so my whole body dropped like a stone into the bubbling dark.

I didn't deserve it, but I wanted it. I released my breath and let the sugar-free soda fill my lungs. I was even sucking it in. My consciousness inundated, I surrendered to my aspartame tomb.

My final thought was "God, I love Diet Coke."

Food of Kings

2010-02-18T11:46:00.000-05:00

…and myself, as I ate pineapple for dinner last night.

What I would do

2010-02-04T23:29:00.000-05:00

What I would do
To be alone with you right now
Nothing will suffice
I will sacrifice myself
So i can satisfy the greed
the want
I want my love to grow
Life is not enough
I am not enough

Show me where you are
descend my spiral stairs
my mindless dark despair
and you, my only star
Doors I find them closed
Rooms without windows
Stay hidden from everyone
Or anyone who cares

I share with you
My truest truth
I give to you
My only love
My ocean blue
My reddest blood

TORO

2010-02-02T22:50:00.001-05:00

Olay!

Frosty

2010-01-26T08:55:00.000-05:00

"I'll be back again some day…"

Tree in a fading memory

2010-01-19T22:22:00.000-05:00

On the edge of recollection, a vague image slides further into
obscurity; leaving the mind to wonder if that place and time were ever
real.

Grasshopper VS Ant

2010-01-18T23:23:00.001-05:00

G: "I have come to collect my share."
A: "Store up your own damn food, fatso!"

Burger FTW

2010-01-17T23:18:00.001-05:00

There is no food more awesome than a stacked burger. It is WIN on a bun.

I am hungry.

Bent Nail

2010-01-13T22:43:00.000-05:00

Oh, the Humanity!

Humidifrogger

2010-01-12T22:16:00.002-05:00

This is essentially what our humidifier looks like:

…soo awesome!

Penguin Anxiety

2010-01-11T22:51:00.001-05:00

"If only I wasn't Oreo colored, the orcas love Oreos…"

Pair of Cherries

2010-01-09T23:45:00.001-05:00

"This stem cannot protect you forever."

Cold Man Winter

2010-01-08T23:37:00.001-05:00

The unofficial spokesman for New England.

Colors should be more frigid :/

Gollumween

2010-01-07T23:09:00.001-05:00

…He asked this at every house on the block.

Rebirth

2010-01-05T23:28:00.001-05:00

I love the New Year. I love rebirth, it's my favorite concept; the
idea that a person can decide in an arbatrary moment to change his
life, and actualize that change -- the concept is very beautiful, and
important to me.

This year I reaffirm another held notion: the beginner's mind of zen.
Beginner's mind is to see the world anew. The challenge of seeing old
things from a new perspective is essential to the process of rebirth.

These ideas need not be so outlandish. You need simply believe in the
idea you can change something about yourself, and see all obstacles in
the path of change with the beginner's mind. Release your prejudice
and preconcepts about the way you are and how you achieve change.

A positive mind a believes change is possible; patience and confidence
makes it happen.

T.I. Minus Two Words

2010-01-04T21:09:00.003-05:00

The silliness I put up with from friends, when one claimed that rap-star T.I. was a talent to be reckoned with, I thought, Okay, lets take a look at the track that put T.I. on the map, and remove from his arsenal a mere two words: day, and way. What happens to that hit song, should he suffer a tiny verbal handicap… [cue music]

Hey, never mind what haters say
~~Ignore 'em 'til they fade away~~
Amazin' they ungrateful
~~After all the game I gave away~~

…Uh oh. That's only 4 lines into the song and we're already looking at two REPEATED uses of the word 'away'. What's that? The word is away not way? Considering that the TWO words we're taking out of play both rhyme, I think it is awfully fair to exclude variations on what Day, and what Way. We're already dealing with a very, Verrrry remedial set of blocks. Please, T.I., continue your serenade…

~~Safe to say I paved the way~~
~~For you cats to get paid today~~
~~You still be wastin' days away~~
~~Now had I never saved the day~~

Things are getting ugly fast. Not only did the handicap of TWO WORDS disable the entire second verse, there was a 3^rd occurrence of Tip's favorite word, away. At this point things are so bleak we can only hope T.I. has a rabbit stashed away for a magical comeback.

Consider them my protégé
Homage I think they should pay
Instead of bein' gracious
~~They violate in a major way~~

D'oh! The tragedy here is that we're finally starting to see some words that are neither day nor way -- until T.I. lands on back in his safe zone to conclude the verse, which kinda kills the buzz away. Should we continue? I can hardly bare it…

I never been a hater
~~Still I love 'em in a crazy way~~
Some say they sold the yay'
~~And know they couldn't get work on Labor Day~~

It ain't that black and white
It has an area the shade of gray
~~I'm Westside anyway~~
~~Even if I left today and stayed away~~

~~Some move away to make a way~~
Not move away 'cause they afraid
I brought back to the hood
~~And all you ever did was take away~~

I pray for patience but they
~~Make me wanna melt they face away~~
Like I once made 'em spray
~~Now I could make 'em put the K's away~~

Been thuggin' all my life
Can't say I don't deserve to take a break
You'd rather see me catch a case
~~And watch my future fade away~~

Oh! The brutality!

Mercifully, Rihanna steps in to provide some variation, while the cut-man patches up Tip's bloodied maw from a fisticuffs battle of blathering vowels. If T.I. was a boxer, his coach might be advising him to use his left fist as well as his right.

T.I. cannot, for his life, stay away from that word, he craves it like a fiend, he scrounges over and over the same dead soldiers, desperate for one more hit of dirt.

Hell, I'm starting to feel sorry for the guy, and maybe the rules have been too hard on our struggling artist? Maybe if we were to help him out a little? overdub some different lines where T.I. starts to fall back on his standby? LETS DO IT!

Hey, never mind what haters say
Ignore 'em cuz they ain't got game!
Amazin' they ungrateful
After all the games they saw me play!!

Safe to say I paved the way (let it slide…)
For you cats to get paid today
You still be wastin' all yo cash?
Now had I never saved the day

(Hey, was every line supposed to rhyme? No? Good.)

Consider them my protégé (Nice one, Tip!)
Homage I think they should pay
Instead of bein' gracious
They violate my sovereignt-ay!! (that was awesome)

I never been a hater
Still I love 'em like they famil-ay
Some say they sold the yay'
And know they couldn't get work on Labor Day

It ain't that black and white
It has an area the shade of gray
I'm Westside -- yo!
Even if I left today and stayed --with Jay…(just go with it)

Some move from here and start to fade
Not move [BLEEP] 'cause they afraid
I brought back to the hood
And all you ever did was take and TAKE

I pray for patience but they
Make me wanna melt they face --uh…well, face worked
Like I once made 'em spray
Now I could make 'em put the K's in place!

Been thuggin' all my life
Can't say I don't deserve to take a break
You'd rather see me catch a case
And watch my future fade to Graaaaay!

YAY! WE DID IT! WE MADE IT THROUGH THE WHOLE FIRST VERSE WITHOUT USING 'AWAY'! Holy shit that was easy; that was pathetically easy.

Now, in fairness, the second verse of the song is able to mostly avoid using the word, in fact it is probably 1000x better than the first verse, which leads me to believe he hired a ghostwriter halfway through the song, which in turn makes me wonder if there is money in such ghost writing, and/or any rappers out there with some loose Bling-Bling that want to sound Hot(ter), just holla atcha boy!

The Greatest War of All: Part II - Why Lost Sucks.

2010-01-03T20:28:00.003-05:00

Judging from the temporal leaps in the storyline, the writers of Lost are no fans of history, which is why they are destined to re-enact the age old battles of Science Vs. Mysticism.

From the very first episode there was a clear problem: some kind of monster was lurking at the edges of the known island, but there were also several science-types on-board the fated airliner.

Conveniently, everything wrong with Lost's meat-grinder approach to blending Science with Mysticism is observable with the laughtacular smoke monster; a premise which contorts painfully as viewers straddle the growing chasm of credulity in the joylessly non-linear storyline.

At first, the smoke monster seems to appear as some form of nightmare, characters who behold it seem unchanged, and discuss it in the vague terms of poor recollection. Later, it stoops in for the role of a light/dark and otherwise threatening ambiance that is easily thwarted by a tall growth of trees, or running away. But later still, the monster becomes some sort of character witness, a hand of fate issuing judgment over the very hearts of men, upon finding them guilty it proceeds to smash them against rocks and trees and drag back them into one of several holes the ground -- like reverse Wak-a-Mole.

"Aha!" concludes a reasonable member of the audience. "This mystical being must be some age old inhabitant of the island that is beyond the realm of scientific expla--wait...what's that? A sonic fence? What does it have to do with anything? Why is the monster restrained by a sonic fence?! Screw this."

Before Smokey with the natural order of things, there's another caveat, we see it summoned by some Mystic ritual of a hand entering a dirty pool of water.

Rest assured, there is a bigger idea behind Smokey, but it's not under control of the writers of Lost. Fools that they are, they created an island battlefield with an unholy alliance of Mystic and Scientific properties. It didn't take three seasons for these forces to tear the show apart. When the story introduced us to the smoke monster, it was well within the plausible limitation of a Mythical island, but the foibles of The Others had to involve advanced science because it's cool. Thus the writers and viewers are stuck with a character, Smokey, who must obey both masters.

THIS is the reason Lost sucks: the show's creators tried to obey two masters, Science and Mysticism. As Mysticism enjoys (presently) the upper hand, the island theme is increasingly one of Mystical legend. With the finale of Season 5, the Mystics have every strategic advantage over the hapless Scientists, who resemble increasingly the ragtag members of a Hippie Science Commune seen on the show, and resemble less and less the competent doctor Jack.

It's going to be a bloodbath. Science will be crucified on that island, and every virtuous believe will play the role of a fool before the day is done.

What the creators of Lost failed to understand is that they were invoking a war far older than any myth employed by the script; they were throwing their characters, their island, their audience, and themselves in the midst of the Greatest War of All.