I went out for supper (Ethiopian) with Phil and Badur… Definitely one of the nicer things about living in the city is having easy access not just to decent African food, but more importantly having decent access to the company of friends! We also talked about one of my crazier business ideas yet… One that is I think brilliant, but will go even further to stratify my love-hate relationship with the world (ie. people either really like what I'm about or totally despise it, without much in the middle).
As you can see, my desk setup is continuing to grow. There's still one computer to add, two more monitors, eight external drive enclosures to attach, and a few VCRs, mixers, and assorted devices. As a point of trivia, I can heat up frozen food faster by putting it between all the monitors than I can by using a microwave. Or something like that…
Yet another reason that I can't go back to Germany without facing arrest…
I just want to say that I have enormous personal respect for the piercers who are sending me BME/Risks photos (and explanations), including the photos of their own work when it goes wrong. One of the biggest problems in this industry is that too many cutting edge practitioners go to lengths to actually hide the things that go wrong from the public, and those few people that have come out about it tend to get ostracised and even threatened. It's bizarre, and, I believe ultimately self-desctructive.
But anyway, thank you to those piercers and body artists who are sending in their mistakes as well as their successes (and other people's mistakes too). It's because of you that we're able to learn, and ensure that we do as little repeating mistakes as possible. We're not alchemists working in secret. We have an ethical responsibility to share knowledge with each other. Anyway, thank you to those of you who are doing so (you know who you are). It may not seem like a big deal, but every gross-out picture goes a long way to helping someone live a happier life with their modifications.
My network is now up and running, at least in some sort of fetal state right now… I have to get one more desk before I can set up the rest of the computers — which I'm really looking forward to… When the other gear is in there will be approximately three terabytes of active drives in this room! And when you add up all the archived storage there is about double that.
For those trying to get in touch, I'm back online of course, and my old cellphone still works (but I'll be switching the number). Those of you who want/need it, send me an IM about the new land line number (don't assume I'll remember, it's not my strong point). I've just got to have my mail relay opened up to my new IP here, so my email is currently receiving but not sending.
And, wow, does Rogers digital cable television quality ever suck bad in comparison to Bell's satellite service… It's really overcompressed. Plus not having a PVR kind of blows once you've been psychologically “trained” to use one. So building some kind of PVR-PC unit is on my high to-do list… It'll be cool having all of my DVDs, music, TV shows, everything all transmitting across and archived on the network.
I'm just in the process of getting my network set up again… Tomorrow the rest of the gear arrives (the Avid editing bay, maybe a chair, etc.) but until then this is the view from my balcony. Not as nice as my view a few days ago, but still, all in all a nice view.
