Echo and Bounce

Electronic book reader?

2010-01-24T23:17:00.003+11:00

I've just got back from a seven week stint in Australia and New Zealand. I left two books in Tasmania, but still managed to come back with eight books in my luggage. Books are big and heavy and I'm sick of carting them around the world watching them get damaged.

It's time for me to get an electronic book reader. I've resisted for a while because books are not only big and heavy, they are also wonderful and mysterious and almost sacred. Benny once told me that the physical book is the frame for the actual book, much like a bottle is the frame for wine. In both cases, the container has its own beauty, separate from but related to the thing inside that gladdens and warms the heart.

Also, I cannot abide DRM for books.

Which electronic book reader should I get? I would love to hear your recommendations. The single essential is that I must be able to load it with non-DRMed books in open formats (PDF, text, HTML).

Fantasy Quest

2009-12-10T11:16:00.000+11:00

Gene Wolfe's The Knight and The Wizard are both excellent. Likewise his Book of the New Sun cycle.

Quick update

2009-11-14T00:25:00.002+11:00

Life's going OK right now, but there's a lot of travel.

Just after settling into my flat in London, I've had to travel to Mooloolaba, which is in Queensland and is gorgeous. I've had a fun week here hacking with the Bazaar crew. Tomorrow morning I'm off to Dallas, Texas for a week and then back home to London.

After then, I'll be in London for two weeks before heading back to Tassie for Lizzie's wedding. I'll be there for three weeks. If you're going to be in Tassie between December 5th and Christmas, get in touch.

Then, I've got a choice. I've got a thing in New Zealand in mid-January, so I might actually stay in the Antipodes until then, or I might head back to London.

Still trying to figure out what my February plans are. It's a hard-knock life, eh?

Chess

2009-10-16T08:39:00.003+11:00

The flat hunt continues.

Meanwhile, I walked back from a late, greasy dinner to my studio in Kensington. I stopped at a café where people where smoking and laughing on the outdoor tables and went in to see if they had cannoli.

I've been here before. It's a charming little places with an atmosphere that promises much better coffee than you'll actually get. They do pizza, and the waitresses sound Italian, but they don't have any cannoli. I got a hot chocolate instead.

At the table by the window, two men are concentrating over a chess board. They both look in their fifties and divorced. They've brought their own digital chess clock, so they probably know what they're doing. Also, there's the look in their eyes. The board is everything to them. Thousands of possible futures are ticking through their inner vision: areas of play, possible weaknesses, exchanges that must be made. I've never been good at chess, but I miss that deep, all-encompassing concentration.

I didn't talk to them. I thought of hovering silently until I could at least see who was winning, but it was getting late and I don't think they would have liked it. I just took my hot chocolate and left, my thoughts scattering in hundred different directions.

Changes

2009-10-04T20:40:00.002+11:00

Right now, I'm sitting on my bed in a very small studio in Kensington. I've been living in this small studio with its single bed for two weeks now. This is my first home in London.

Some weeks ago, I'd been offered a promotion within Canonical. Circumstances made this a difficult decision, with me being forced to choose between two paths, each of which promising great good and little ill. I chose the promotion since it seemed the more interesting mistake to make, and so far I haven't regretted it. However, to follow the metaphor along its natural, bubbling course, the path has at times been a rocky one.

A day or two after that, my former flatmate and landlord asked me to leave his flat, since he wanted someone he could hang out with, and that he and I were from different worlds. Both he and I were aware that when I moved he said "I'm not looking for a friend", so this came as a shock to me.

This meant that I'd have to move to London sooner than I'd wanted to. I had wanted to stay in Sydney, go to Chris & Sam's wedding, have a last go at actually living there. There was also the Meeting: a week-long talk between all of the team leads on my product. Organizing the Meeting is very much at the core of my new position, I needed time to prepare, to research, to gather data and to talk to people. Moving so soon meant that my preparation time would be split between preparing the Meeting and relocating to another country.

As it stands, and thanks largely to the gracious hospitality of my friends Andrew & Mary, I've arrived safely in London, navigated the Meeting and am almost ready to begin really looking for a permanent place to live. This weekend though, I'm resting, since I've been sprinting along the path for weeks.

English language books for the highly literate foreigner

2009-09-12T18:08:00.002+10:00

Months ago, I was perusing my friend Martin's bookshelf on a warm night in Buenos Aires. Martin's a native Spanish speaker and enjoys literature, so it ought not have been too surprising that he had "La Idiota" by Dostoyevsky on his shelf. All of his fiction was in Spanish, which surprised me because his English is excellent and there are many wonderful books in English.

All of this triggered a conversation and much thinking, which ended up in a list of files that sat on my desktop. Allow me now to share this list with you.

Here are the books that I would recommend to fluent but non-native English speaker to read in English.

Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck
Catcher in the Rye, J. D. Salinger
Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
Lolita, Vladimir Nabakov
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
Catch 22, Joseph Heller

There are others I could recommend, much of George Orwell and Mark Twain, perhaps some Raymond Chandler or Arthur Conan Doyle. But I think the books above are all excellent books, stylistically and otherwise.

Moving overseas

2009-09-02T14:11:00.002+10:00

I'm moving to London, and soon. I hate moving house. I've done it a lot and each time I do it I still hate it.

Here's what I'm aiming for:

move out of shared accommodation
ship some of my stuff to the UK
keep some of my stuff in luggage
sell or donate the rest of my stuff

I'd dearly love someone to manage all of this for me, and am willing to pay a premium for it. If not, well, I've done it before (except for the UK bit).

More info about the move later.

The early 19th century sentence

2009-08-24T18:08:00.002+10:00

Of it, Virginia Woolf says, "Jane Austen looked at it and laughed at it and devised a perfectly natural, shapely sentence proper for her own use and never departed from it."

Holiday reading

2009-08-24T16:27:00.003+10:00

Treason's Harbor, Patrick O'Brian
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf
Cat's Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut
Illness as Metaphor and AIDS and its Metaphors, Susan Sontag
Pnin, Vladimir Nabokov
The Far Side of the World, Patrick O'Brian
The Reverse of the Medal, Patrick O'Brian

A little bit now

2009-07-27T22:49:00.002+10:00

When one says that a thing is a "slippery slope", one is obliged to prove that there is a slope and that it is indeed slippery. Likewise, a thin edge of the wedge is only relevant if there is a substantial "wedge" attached to the thin edge, and if there is some motive force behind said wedge. One might also have to demonstrate that a part of the wedge isn't already in place, and that this is in fact a slightly fatter part of the wedge. In any case, once the wedge is fully driven in (or the end of the slope passed) some calamity ought to follow.

In either figure of speech, there are three components:

A small movement in a dangerous or negative direction (an implicit instability; the thin edge)
A near-unstoppable force in that same direction (lubricated gravity; the implicit hammer)
A highly dangerous or negative result (crashing at the bottom of the slope; splitting whatever the wedge is in)

It's well worth being conscious of each of these components when you use these metaphors. Some examples to consider, many of which are taken from actual arguments:

Mandatory Internet filtering
Allowing papists in the Royal Navy
Abandoning the Lord's Prayer in Parliament
Using the proprietary software present in the firmware of a hotel elevator
Giving money to a beggar
Nationalizing banks
Not shaving tomorrow

New GPG key

2009-07-13T11:51:00.001+10:00

I've published a new GPG key: 2048R/2A727997

Details available here: http://static.mumak.net/jml-key-transition-2009-07-13.txt

A letter I received

2009-07-08T23:50:00.002+10:00

Jonathan Lange, a 26yr old man presented to The Emergency Department of The Royal North Shore Hospital because he walked into a glass door and cut his neck this evening. He has a superficial lac to the L side of his neck. In our Department he was given ADT, and was discharged home.

Kind Regards, etc.

Emphasis mine.

And yes, I'm fine.

And Back Again

2009-07-07T10:53:00.002+10:00

Annie Hall
Kramer vs Kramer
Legendary Assassin
Chicago
Unforgiven

Travel News

2009-06-28T18:06:00.003+10:00

Just the facts:

Went Business class from Singapore to London.
Read Breakfast at Tiffany's
Read Persuasion
Watched Layer Cake
Watched The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
Richard Burton has (had?) an awesome voice
Watched JCVD
Watched Milk
Train, Plane, Plane, Train, Train, Train, Taxi
Currently bound for Birmingham

First Ever Birmingham

2009-06-27T11:40:00.003+10:00

I'm off to the first Birmingham ever. Birmingham, UK is the first place in the world to be Birmingham in all of history.

I'm there for EuroPython, where I'll be speaking and participating in a Bazaar sprint. Should be back in Sydney next Sunday.

Quester's Tidings

2009-06-26T19:28:00.002+10:00

After dispatching my missive on the ethereal winds, I must confess I had little hope. Although my faith in my readers is incalculable, my wanderings have taken me far, and I had begun to believe that I had seen all that has been given to mortal eye to see, and that my readers would be merely recounting tales already well known to me.

But sing a new song, O doubting heart! Through a variety of means -- some humble, some ingenious -- you dear readers have sent word of old books for which the dust of age only strengthens the potency of the enchantments within, like some secret wine. I've heard of other books too, newer perhaps, their charms accordingly more fallible but perhaps not more feeble.

Two books were commended to me, and two names without books commended also. That the numbering of the books matched the numbering of the names seemed auspicious to me. Of the books, the first is called "The Book of the New Sun" as written by Gene Wolfe; the second hight "The Gift" by Alison Croggan, an author from my own country. My hopes for the first are high, for the second, low. Though a prophet is seldom honored in his own town, my bigoted heart says an author is perhaps too honored in her own country.

Two names without books were given. Though there are books to the names, the names were given to me without books and without books they shall be passed on. The names are Charles de Lint and George Macdonald. The second name was given to me by someone who has not read any of my missives, but who has certainly read me.

I have found some of these tomes, and in due course I shall venture into them. Even when all are read and gone, my quest will not be over. Your help, dear reader, is needed now more than ever. I await your reply with eagerness and indeed, hope.

I am etc.,

The Platonic Form

2009-06-26T10:59:00.001+10:00

Table service
Good, consistent coffee
Wireless access
Power points
Proximity

Advance Australia Fair, part 2

2009-06-25T09:24:00.001+10:00

The Australian national anthem is called Advance Australia Fair. The anthem has two verses, Advance Australia Fair has six or three depending on who you ask. In almost every state and sporting occasion, only one verse is sung.

There are some occasions where singing both verses is required. No one likes those.

This is about the second verse of the anthem. I've already commented on the first verse.

Beneath our radiant Southern Cross

The Southern Cross is a constellation that features on the Australian flag and on the sky in the Southern hemisphere. And the Kiwi flag. It's not really our Southern cross, since I'm pretty sure you can see it in
South Africa and the Falkland Islands. That said, it is beautiful, and it does radiate.

We'll toil with hearts and hands;

We'll work together and we'll like it.

To make this Commonwealth of ours renowned of all the lands;

To make Australia famous. We achieved fame domestically quite some time ago, so now our anthem's ambition is to make it famous elsewhere. "Of all the lands" either means that Australia ought to be the most famous country in the world or that Australia ought to be famous in every single other country. I think we're doing pretty well at this, to be honest.

For those who've come across the seas

Either:

everyone in Australia apart from the Aboriginals, who probably walked

British people

those whom we would now call immigrants

We've boundless plains to share;: You can stay in the middle of the desert.
With courage let us all combine: Sadly, not like Voltron. More like a Soviet farming collective, or an army, or a football team.
To Advance Australia fair: See previous post.
In joyful strains then let us sing: Explained in previous post. I'd like to point out that no one sings in "strains" any more, and that I've filled out tax returns that are more poetically evocative.
Advance Australia fair: A tad repetitve, no?

To be honest, I prefer the Seekers song.

Advance Australia Fair, part 1

2009-06-22T09:24:00.003+10:00

Recently, I've been disappointed to notice myself becoming more patriotic. I don't know if this is a result of aging, or a consequence of frequent international travel. I don't know whether I should do anything about it, nor even what I would do if I wanted to change.

The patriotic fever reached its rabid peak the other day when my rational self caught the other part singing Australia's national anthem. I stopped immediately, of course, but the damage had been done. Perhaps the moment of insanity had be triggered by a conversation I had with a friend about immigration and just who we should let into the country. We disagreed.

Since then, my mind has been wandering. I've been thinking about a New Australian who desires to indoctrinate themselves our national values, and how they might approach the national anthem, "Advance Australia Fair".

To help them along, and maybe to go some way toward resolving the disagreement with my friend, I've decided to go through the Australian national anthem right here, on this blog, line by line.

It's rather a pompous song, written in a mode of "poetic" English that has never been idiomatic and never had any currency among actual poets. Even with my new-found nascent patriotism, I can't bring myself to actually like it.

Here it is:

Australians all let us rejoice,

Be happy Australians!

For we are young and free;

Because our country was founded relatively recently and we have many political freedoms, such as being allowed by our government to watch almost any film and read almost any book.

We've golden soil

Literally, "we have yellow dirt". Either means that Australia is full of the mineral gold, or that our soil is rich. The latter would imply that Australia is an agriculturally prosperous country, and I believe is the sense of the phrase. Note that Australia is the second driest continent in the world, after Antarctica.

and wealth for toil;

If you work hard in Australia, you'll get rich.

Our home is girt by sea;

"Girt" is a rare word for "surrounded". A girdle girts. "Girth" is a mostly disused word meaning "circumference". If a thing follows the circumference of another thing, the first thing can be said to "gird" the second thing. The second thing is "girt by" the first thing. If it spoke plainly, this line would say that Australia is one or more islands.

The logic up to this point is that Australians should be happy since we're rich, happy, free, young, economically just and ... a bunch of islands. New Zealand, Madagascar, Japan, Great Britain, Iceland and Tonga have never considered this a particular reason for rejoicing. I'm not exactly sure why Australia does.

Our land abounds in nature's gifts

Our country is full of things we didn't put there.

Of beauty rich and rare;

The natural things in our country have a rich beauty, as opposed to a minimalistic beauty, and there are few other things as beautiful as the natural things in Australia. Of course, Australia abounds in them, so they can't be that rare.

Let history's page in every stage, advance Australia fair

Every time anyone writes about stuff that happened, it should promote the cause of the Australian nation, which is beautiful.

In joyful strains then let us sing

Let's sing happy melodies. The composer of the anthem interpreted this metaphorically.

"Advance Australia Fair"

"Australia Fair" isn't a reference to the White Australia policy (I think), but rather a tired "poetic" way of saying "Australia the Beautiful". My unsubstantiated hunch is that "America the Beautiful" was already taken, and that it's much easier to rhyme with "fair" than "beautiful".

Unfortunately, I have no idea what it means.

To advance Australia is a nebulous concept, no matter how often we insist that it's beautiful. It means literally "move Australia forward", but that doesn't really illuminate the author's intent. It can't mean move Australia forward spatially: that would be impossible to achieve and to define, no matter how full of zeal one was. It probably doesn't mean forward technologically either, since none of the other lyrics acknowledge technology's existence. It's not morally either, since the author seems to think we've already arrived. It's probably either wealth or political influence, but that's only speculation.

There you have it. Nothing that bad, but nothing that good either. Mostly it's just a meaningless ditty to bang out too slowly and too sincerely at sporting events.

At a stretch, you could say that it summarizes something of the Australian spirit. We're generally pretty happy and relaxed, united by being in a pretty good country and we're lousy at poetry.

It's still better than God Save The Queen.

Next post, next verse.

My Quest

2009-06-20T12:06:00.002+10:00

Dear Reader,

When I wrote to you some weeks ago, I alluded to my quest and promised to tell you of it in my next post. You have certainly noticed that I have not kept my word, and I nurse only the bitter hope that the pain of yet another broken promise has become dull, now that you are accustomed to my small betrayals. Please allow me now to tell you of my quest, however belatedly, and I beg that you keep the doors of your heart open when I ask for your help.

My quest, you might say, is for magic. Not the devilish magic of dark ritual nor yet the uncanny transcendence of Eastern sage, but rather that magic that was called "sub-creation" by one of its masters. Plainly, I mean that I seek books of Fantasy.

Perhaps you might laugh now and say "It is so easy, Jonathan! Why do you call such a trifling task a quest?". Yet I crave a moment's indulgence wherein I can make my difficulties plain. If you must laugh, let your laughter be contained within and for my sake present a solemn exterior as I tell you my story.

I have read hundreds of books. Although I've not kept track, the number might well pass into the thousands. Many of those books have been books of fantasy. I have always loved them, and despite the numerous social stigma attached to them, I love them even today.

The full tale of my readings would be far too long for this missive. Suffice it to say that after falling deep into Tolkien, I read whatever I could find, no matter how poor it was. As I grew older, my tastes matured and I began to demand more of the books I read. It has thus become harder to find books of fantasy that I actually enjoy reading. Further, since I've read so many books already, the pool from which to draw them grows ever shallower.

Dear, dear reader, I must find books of magic that I have not read that are not awful. Well-written books with rich, full characters and deep forests of imagination. My own resources are failing me and I must turn to you for help. Where are these books? I must have them now!

I apologize for the length of this post. In my defense, I can so only that my quest has been longer. Please do not let me fail now.

Yours etc.,

Reading

2009-06-19T18:30:00.002+10:00

My reading this month so far:

HMS Surprise, Patrick O'Brian
Mauritius Command, Patrick O'Brian
Smiley's People, John Le Carré
Zen in the Art of Archery, Eugen Herrigel
Three Hearts and Three Lions, Poul Anderson

I love O'Brian's books: they make me want to write. Smiley is perfectly characterized.

Awkward

2009-06-15T09:17:00.002+10:00

I recently finished reading Chris Guillebeau's "279 Days to Overnight Success". It's all about how to succeed as a professional blogger. You might want to read it too, since it's quite interesting.

It does, however have this unfortunate section where Guillebeau tries to describe Havi Brooks' work on The Fluent Self. The purpose of her blog is hard to grasp at first, he laments. Convinced that there was something there, he visits Brooks' blog again and again, until at last he shouts his euraka:

I finally "got" it: Havi helps people rewrite their bad patterns and turn them into good ones.

Crystal clear.

Returned from the book shop

2009-06-04T20:49:00.002+10:00

Just got back from Kinokuniya, carrying:

Marvel 1602, Neil Gaiman
Persuasion, Jane Austen
Breakfast at Tiffany's, Truman Capote
Mauritius Command, Patrick O'Brian
Smiley's People, John Le Carre
HMS Surprise, Patrick O'Brian
The Wave in the Mind, Ursula K. Le Guin

I dipped into Le Guin's essays on the train -- so good! I'm looking forward to enjoying them and the rest of the books over the next few weeks.

Next up, I'll tell you about my Quest and how you can help me.

Art and Science

2009-05-17T10:40:00.002+10:00

Presentation Zen posts about a TED talk that I look forward to watching, Mae Jemison: the arts and science are not separate.

Who knows, maybe someday people will stop talking about that left-brain / right-brain crap.