Programming Uphill Both Ways

Posted on November 24, 2004 by ken

Those of us who believe that programming has gotten too easy with all these sissy icons and windows (yes, you know who you are) might be pleased at the release of Hercules, an emulator for IBM mainframes. For my first programming class in college, I programmed PL/I on punchcards on an IBM S/360, and who could ever forget buying the special orange cards you used for your JCL statements and using them over and over until the operator at the RJE* room got mad at you when the dog-eared cards jammed the card reader.

* Remote Job Entry, ie, the room where you waited 45 minutes for the greenbar printout informing you of a syntax error on the fourth line of your program.

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Protected: No Blogger Left Behind

Posted on November 24, 2004 by ken

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[Wolf Whistle]

Posted on November 21, 2004 by ken

Hope the opening, ahem, came off well.

This was a sign on a storefront on the main street of Amherst, MA, where rednoodlealien and I saw Bob Dylan on Saturday night. It was a good show, although I much prefer the acoustic shows he was doing a few years ago. This was full-bore rock&roll, with Dylan playing piano the whole night, and doing only his own songs — none of the blues and country covers he was doing for a while. He was unusually talkative although his vocals were mostly spit out and bitten off; he plays piano standing up but keeps his microphone at roughly sitting height, so he has to lean over to sing, and every line is therefore an effort to deliver. Sometimes very effective, sometimes not. But he did do “Every Grain of Sand” which I was thrilled to hear live. Otherwise, the best half of the show was from his latest album, which is encouraging.

Amherst was enjoyable enough, once we figured out the route from the campus to downtown. Even the train made a U-turn; between Springfield and Hartford, they pull the train into a disused station and reverse direction (the train has an engine at both ends). I cannot comprehend why this should be necessary and the Vermonter’s description on Amtrak’s site does not even mention it.

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Madman On Mars

Posted on November 18, 2004 by ken

Ray Bradbury’s thoroughly loopy column for the Journal today didn’t exactly increase my ever-dwindling interest in manned spaceflight. But it does raise the question of whether Kim Jong Il is taking down all his pictures because he’s planning a trip to Mars. Just imagine him and Ray, sailing the canals….

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Ooh, Pick Meme

Posted on November 18, 2004 by ken

My journal is called Riffs and Licks because it refers to both my musical and conversational styles, and because it’s somewhat suggestive.
My subtitle is nonexistent because it seemed superfluous.
My friends page is called Ken’s Friends because I never bothered to change it.
My username is steelbrassnwood because guitar strings are steel, harmonica reeds are brass, and both instruments are made (usually) out of wood. steelbrassplasticivorynickelteflonebonyovankolpearwoodandelectronics was too long.
My default userpic is a customized Marine Band harmonica resting on the strings of my Taylor 414 guitar because balancing the guitar on the harmonica was too difficult.

Via silvertide via curmudgeon via roadnotes.

Do your own

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Evolution Helps Creationists

Posted on November 17, 2004 by ken

Evolutionary historian Edward Larson says that natural selection favors evangelicals and other religious extremists, who tend to have large families, over the rest of us, who don’t:

But among white, middle-class Americans, religious people are having children at a much higher rate. More and more and more children percentage-wise than non-religious people. There’s a survival value in religious beliefs. They have a sense of purpose. They feel their mission in life is to multiply and be fruitful. The whole Darwinian concept — evolution — is on the side of evangelical Christians. They’re growing by any measure.

Apparently, unlike the god that most evangelicals espouse, evolution helps you even if you don’t believe in it.

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The Time When Reason Triumphed Over Unreason

Posted on November 15, 2004 by ken

Having just finished Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver, Confusion, and The System Of the World), I finally picked up James Gleick’s biography of Isaac Newton.

An argument for mandatory teaching of the calculus

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Bob Dylan: Still Legal

Posted on November 15, 2004 by ken

The Secret Service paid a visit to some high-school students who were planning to read aloud the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s “Masters Of War,” the final verse of which was construed by some students and parents as a threat to the President:

And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
‘Til I’m sure that you’re dead

Fortunately, the agents didn’t take the episode very seriously and concluded there was no threat to the President. This is reminiscent of a visit received by a Live Journal user who posted something inflammatory about Bush. It seems that the right wing has discovered how much trouble even a ridiculously innocuous accusation can cause.

The song was originally released in May, 1963, and within six months had been outpaced by events. Dylan sang it during the first Gulf War on the Grammy Awards telecast, unforgivably slurring the lyrics so badly that almost no one knew that he was making a statement. (At this same appearance he made an unforgettably bizarre acceptance speech after receiving the Lifetime Achievement award from Jack Nicholson.) I’ve been thinking about reviving Willie Dixon’s “Dead Presidents” (also released in 1963, and also drifting into obscurity after the JFK assassination) in my live show, but perhaps I should be careful?

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South Brunswick, Part II

Posted on November 9, 2004 by ken

Remember that pretty spot I photographed on my drive a few weeks ago? Guess
what I saw there this morning? Seems that it’s going to suffer the same
fate as all the nice spots where I grew up in Staten Island. After this
week I’ll probably go back to taking the train, so I probably won’t have
any further progress reports.

Picture103_09Nov04.jpg

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Magazine Covers We’ll Never See

Posted on November 8, 2004 by ken

Magazine Covers We'll Never See Perhaps this is the new “Coastal Edition” of Time magazine?

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