October, 14, 2005 archives

salon’s audiofile has imogen heap’s “hide and seek” as a free download. speak for yourself, her solo album, will finally be released here on november 1.

she’ll also be playing at hotel cafe on october 26.

next friday between noon and 2pm, there will be a “public safety appreciation barbecue” at pershing square. i can’t imagine a safer time to visit pershing square. (not that it is ever particularly unsafe.)

it sounds like a $2 donation may be required, with proceeds going to the los angeles firemen’s relief association.

steven spielberg has signed up to do three games with electronic arts. no word on whether that includes a steven spielberg’s director’s chair sequel. the smart money is on no.

here is one of the in-game movies. here’s another. this audio is from a recording session for preliminary versions of the game.

continuing an annual tradition:

• george w. and laura bush: 9.9%
• richard and lynne cheney: 17.5%
• jim winstead jr.: 15.6% (or 17.7% if you include donated property)

the amount that the cheneys gave comes from the press release, since the filing at the tax history project doesn’t include their schedule a.

i can’t say enough good things about my accountant. it’s fun to sit there as he plays with numbers and my refund grows.

“friendship is a very taxing and arduous form of leisure activity.” — mortimer adler

bowling alone: the collapse and revival of american community by robert d. putnam is a look at the decline of social capital in american culture over the last few decades. it is information-dense, but thought provoking.

i can’t help but feel to be an example of the sort of disconnectedness and disengagement that putnam writes about, but i think i am getting better at fighting against it. bettertogether is a project headed up by putnam, and this list of 150 ways to build social capital would make a fine todo list. and i’m even already doing some of them, like volunteering at the library (#75).

a small irony is that staying in on a friday night to finish the book isn’t a particularly social thing to do.

madadayo is akira kurosawa’s final film, about a professor who retires once he decides he can live on the income from his writing, and his former students who honor him with a birthday party each year where he proclaims “madadayo! (not yet!)” when they ask “mahda-kai? (are you ready?)”

there are a few particularly brilliant sequences in the film, but one of the things that really grabbed me was one of the first shots, when the professor walks into his classroom and there is a cloud of smoke hanging in the air.

it is a deliberately paced film, and i’m sure not for everyone, but i really enjoyed it.

this story has one of the most brilliant quotes i’ve ever seen in a news article: “It didn’t happen overnight. You don’t take a drug and go ‘Mmm, rabbits’.”

there’s an interesting little note in this story about the deal the bonaventure hotel owners are trying to cut with the city because they’re afraid the new convention center hotel being subsidized by the city may cut into their business — the bonaventure itself was subsidized. goose, gander, etc.

and as eric surmised, it appears all of the bonaventure’s saber rattling on this is to get leverage to do a partial conversion to condominiums.

in film pitch speak, heyletsgo.com is friendster meets upcoming.org meets evite. social networking built around activity planning. another web 2.0 beta site.

this may be the site for you, if you’re not like me and “the most important information in my daily life is, simply, what are my friends doing?”

it may also be the site for you if you know you want to go to some event and want to find a friend-of-a-friend to go with.

the site, inasmuch as i’ve poked around, seems very well done. but as you might have guessed, i just don’t see myself being a regular user. it models a sort of social dynamic that i just don’t feel any resonance with.

drop me a line if you want an invite.

after having lunch at the cuban place on spring street (go support them being open on saturdays!), shannon and i checked out apartments in metro 417, also known as the subway terminal building. we were shown a two-bedroom apartment which wasn’t terribly exciting, but then saw two one-bedroom apartments on the 8th floor that were both pretty cool. one had a bit of a view of pershing square, and obviously was good for afternoon light, and one had a view over angel’s knoll park, and was good for morning light. we also got to see the rooftop deck (with hot tub) and second-floor lounge, screening room, and exercise room.

the prices are high, but the apartments (and amenities) are quite nice.

i went up to hollywood to see serenity at the arclight only to find it wasn’t playing. bastards. i almost went to see wallace & gromit: the curse of the were-rabbit instead, but the next showtime wasn’t for almost two hours.

so i got sucked into amoeba records instead. the damage:

• songs for young lovers & swing easy by frank sinatra
• ego tripping at the gates of hell by the flaming lips
• northern star by groove armada
• the antidote by morcheeba
• palookavilla by fatboy slim

i also finally got some reasonable placemats for my kitchen table. next thing you know, i’ll get some dirt and gravel and actually plant the herbs in the portable herb garden in the center of the kitchen table. or maybe that will take another few years.