Tuesday, January 21, 2003
You know you're working too hard when you get up with the sun (about 7 AM or so) and you're still working hard at 2:15 AM, having taken only an hour break… I still have about two hours more to go, since when I start a video editing task I have to finish it as it dominates the machines until that point (and when I'm done it'll be late enough that I might as well do the newsfeed tasks as well).
I'm in a fair chunk of pain in part because of my wrist, but more because of using a low-rate TV as an editing monitor. Computer monitors are mostly out of my hearing range, but the whine of a TV is just inside my audible range and it drives me bonkers. I really hate the sound… Time to pop a few codeine pills (they're OTC up here, Mexico of the North), find something to drink, and build a menuing system.
Update, 3:30 AM – The DVD is completed editing and menuing, and it's almost completed muxing. I don't think I'm going to stay up for the burn. I'll double check it in about four hours when I get up.
Part of the reason I'm working hard now is because since I have a little Shannon (well, Rachel has absolutely forbidden me from naming him/her Shannon a la George Foreman) on the way, I want to work my ass off before that happens so that by the time I have “better” things to dedicate my time to I'll have solidified these revenue streams. Hopefully!
Also, like I said before, it's important to me to create projects like BMEvideo that will kick funds to IAM and other community investments in a relatively hands-off fashion. As you know I feel very strongly that since our product is OUR product (versus it being MY product), on a moral level anything it reaps must go back to the community that created it.
It's very cold out right now… I went back to the fire pit to move the BBQ chairs out of the way so we could plow the lane, but I discovered that since it has been warm as well as cold recently, they're all frozen to the ground! That said, I think they're probably enough out of the way to plow nonetheless.
The other problem with this cold-heat-cold-heat-cold thing is that under the snow is relatively smooth ice… Which does not make it easy to move if you weigh a lot and have big wide feet (I'm talking about the Jeep!).
Later tonight there's a show on TLC featuring myself, Lukas Zpira, Jerome, and others: “Skin Sculptors”. It's on tonight at 10 PM, and then again at 1 AM, and then it gets replayed this upcoming Saturday at 4 PM. Assuming the clips of IAM folks are short I'll capture them but if they're longer I legally probably shouldn't.
Skin Sculptors
Welcome to the shocking world of amateur plastic surgery, where a man has a healthy leg amputated and a woman alters her features to erase her identity. Patients risk arrest, tremendous pain and even death to achieve the body they desire.
I think the amputee they've interviewed may be Subtracting, but I don't really remember. I think Chad, Marty, and Phil might be in it as well — the TLC film crew shot Chad's suspension. They were also at the BME BBQ and the Toronto Tattoo convention if I remember right (was it August? September?). I got interviewed by a separate crew from Discovery that week too so maybe there's something else coming out as well.
It was a very long set of interviews and by the end of them I was really tired, so I have a fear that they'll edit me to make me say something other than what I said. I always have that fear though right before an interview, but in this one they asked me whether I thought that the procedures that Lukas, Steve, et al were doing were safe on a medical level (which obviously they aren't).
So I hope they don't take out the follow up statement that (a) those people are artists and as long as they aren't misrepresenting themselves they should be allowed to proceed, and (b) that people have a fundamental right to pursue body modification, since they should have total authority over their own bodies.
Saturday, January 18, 2003
Earlier today a couple of skinheads from the Netherlands submitted their “love” tattoos — large flaming white pride symbols on their backs with some runes underneath. Now, that's fairly typical, I've been getting more and more white power tattoos lately, and I expect to get more as we ramp up over the next twenty years into total race war.
But the part of the story that's funny is that about half an hour after sending it they sent me a second email asking me not to post it — they informed me, “after looking at all the other 'shit' like the piercings and gay-like piercings and photos we immediatly decided to not be on your site.”
And I thought people assuming piercings were a “gay thing” was a delusion of the past that we were long done with… Anyway, there's an 80 meg update (over 1000 images) uploading now. I figure it'll be active by midnight or so. When you see the covers change (thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you), it'll be there.
Saturday, January 18, 2003
Well, today I will try and do an image update using the new input engine. It's sort of an experiment, so I expect it won't be a full update since much of the time will be fine tuning those routines for efficiency.
I do have a funny correspondance with someone who'd written an “experience” called *~*My Cool Piercing*~*. I put experience in quotes because it was only a couple short paragraphs followed by “x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x” to trick the robots into thinking it was full length. Since it was effectively fake, it was of course denied.
PinkIzGr82311: u think i care wot u freaks think
FrankoDerb: Probably you do, yes, but you will pretend not to.
PinkIzGr82311: no, my story wiz good ur site is just crap, i mean male and female genital piercings r u perverts???
FrankoDerb: Yes, everyone here is a pervert. Best to stay away, or you may become a pervert too.
PinkIzGr82311: Your site is just disgusting, my story was better than nething u's could rite
FrankoDerb: Do I need to remind you that you didn't actually write a story, that you just went "x x x x x x x x x" to make 800 words?
Oh well.
In other news, the US Army is prepping for “block to block” urban combat. This type of combat would have a guaranteed outcome: heavy US casualties. The only “good” side to that is heavy US casualties might have the effect of ending the war early: the US population hates loosing troops. That said, it might well rally people behind the war too. Of course, to balance things out, the US is blocking aid to Iraq to help ensure high Iraqi civilian casualties.
Remember how Bush said that the war on Iraq could be avoided if Saddam let UN weapons inspectors in? Well, that didn't happen, did it? We've been told that UN inspectors finding no evidence is all the evidence they need for war. And remember how Bush said if Saddam stepped down and went into exile the war could be avoided? Not any more. The US has pretty much announced that short of surrendering its oil fields, nothing will stop this war. (Even the Vatican knows this is about theft of resources — international piracy).
The US public at this point does not support this war. Neither does much of the military, and pretty much every expert has decried it as a horrible idea… But still Bush plunges forward! And I thought democracy meant government by the people for the people. I guess we all got that one wrong.
As a final link, The Rise and Fall of Great Empires.
