February 1, 2005

Domokun Email Signature

I have been Domokun fan for years, but only recently have I begun to see the domo meme take hold here in the US.

Don't know Domo. Here's his homepage.

Here's a domo sig I created for your email (use a monospaced font to see it):


        __________ 
       /           
     _/  O      O   
    / )  ________  | 
   | (| |////| | 
     | |        | | 
       |        | | 
      | |////| | 
      |      
      |            | | 
      |            (_) 
      |     ||     | 
      (_____)(_____) 
Domo is powerful!

...

I've been a fan of audioscrobbler for a few years, but only recently has the Mac plug-in been polished enough everyday use. Lately I just leave it on all the time. Interesting to see what you actually listen to all graphed out. Right now the sample is too small so it doesn't really accurately reflect my tastes, but over time it should get more and more precise as more and more songs are added. Pretty cool if you love music. And even nicer when coupled with last.fm
This is my page for the curious:
http://www.audioscrobbler.com/user/themexican/

February 1, 2005

Why I hate renting...

We live in a nice old townhouse circa 1831. It has been renovated in the past, but never horribly. But the worst architetural crimes are often cumulative, small nicks and tucks that eventually leave a buiding without it's architectural integrity...

A few weeks ago we complained about the cold (it's downright drafty). Instead of turning up the heat a notch our landaldy decided to replace the windows as the current ones are uninsulated. It didn't seem like a horrible idea at the time....then the windows arrived. Instead of nice period-appropriate wooden casings she is installing horrible steel framed unpaned windows... I feel the building's pain. This will leave me grumpy for months.

February 3, 2005

Minor mystery

Today I was surprised by a lady on a unicycle speeding down Atlantic Avenue and without thinking exclaimed, "holy mackerel". I don't think I've said that phrase since I was a kid... and then out of nowhere, there it was.

Occasionally I'll let out a "holy cow" or a "holy moly.""Holy smokes" isn't really my thing, but sometimes it will show up... much more occasionally, "holy frijole", but "holy mackerel" has been locked up for probably 30 years. What spurred it? Did I hear it somewhere,was it the fish shop I visited the other day, or is there something about fatherhood greasing the rusty wheels in my brain?

February 4, 2005

river of sleep

I was looking through some old journals this evening in an attempt to date photos I am scanning and ran into some pages I didn't remember writing.

Here's a bit that jumped out at me. It was written in a Tibetan guesthouse high on the plateau. The year was 1999:

4/30 - Last night I heard howling dogs, screaming hawks and a strange low moan that might have been human, but was not. From my high window, I could see the dark shadows of hawks circling overhead against a tremendous canopy of stars. In my dream I had seen lightning leaping across the sky. A bolt struck the moon and it fell, crashing with the sound of a falling chandelier. The broken pieces scattered in the soft earth flickering out with long angry hisses. My eyes adjust. Without the moon even more stars lit the sky, but they too began falling, one by one with whispered sighs until the world was inky black. A paralyzing fear overwhelmed me until, in this absolute night, swooped creatures bristling with electricity gliding out of reach on great gossamer wings. Looking, while comforting, hurt my eyes so I closed them and drifted quickly, silently away from this cold place and back into the warm river of sleep.

February 5, 2005

Raul Gutierrez on Google

Have you ever done a google search on yourself? For many years I was the only Raul Gutierrez that came up on searches, but that was when the internet was young. My first page went up in 1996 and my first real site in 1998. I just recently took those off line. Back then, pre-google, I was the only raul gutierrez in town. These days there are almost 200,000 results for Raul Gutierrez. The name is common throughout the latin world so it's surprising there aren't more. In Los Angeles alone the phone book has a whole page of us. In Mexico most big cities have multiple pages. There is a famous Raul Gutierrez soccer player, a Raul Gutierrez Philipino rapper, and Raul Gutierrez wanted by the DEA (I know this last one from bad experiences at customs. They always ask me "Have you ever been to Guadalajara?")

So to the results:

1. This site... The google index is always a bit out of date, but it points here. Glad to see of the many thousands of us in the world I'm number one, at least for now.

2. The home page of Raul Gutierrez Fu Shi Kempo Knife Fighting Master. With his slick hair and steely glare this Raul Gutierrez saves the world time and time again in his direct-to-video movies. I have tracked down a few videos and will give a full review when they arrive. I have yet to determine whether this guy is Spanish or Portugese, but I would kill to be in his Galleria de Honor along with Elvis (apparently a karate fan), Hanshi the great, and Jose Bana Sanchez. No I don't recognize the last two either... but you know...Respect.

3. Raul Gutierrez Fu Shi Kempo Knife Fighting Master also commands the number 3 spot. This time on a Japanese site with Great Grandmaster Thomas Mitose. There is a lovely image of Raul with some of his many trophies. How do you think he got all those trophy's back home to Spain (or Portugal or wherever)?

From the site: " Practitioners of Kosho-Ryu Kenpo believe that if one gives respect to another than this respect would be returned. Alternatively, individuals who do not show respect for others will receive no respect."

4. The information page for Raul Gutierrez Sanchez, Spanish astronomer. Not much of a homepage, just some basic information, but it seems he studies brown dwarfs. What is a Brown Dwarf you ask? Happily the page gives an answer: "A Brown Dwarf is a quasi-stellar object unable to fuse hydrogen in a stable manner." I'm glad to see that some of us are smart (this is not to say that Raul Gutierrez Fu Shi Kempo Knife Fighting Master is not smart. Stay cool man. Stay cool.)

5. Ok. This one is my favorite. Masseur Raul Gutierrez of Walnut Creek California specializes in "Energetic Massage." He learned his vocation from the founder of the "Body Electric School of Massage" and his special vocation is to "touch men on erotic-spiritual paths." All this for only eighty bucks. Dude, you better hope Raul Gutierrez Fu Shi Kempo Knife Fighting Master doesn't find out about this. He might be very angry at you for sullying our good name... then again he might find your "polarity energy balancing techniques" relaxing and exhilarating.

6. This is a page for a Raul Gutierrez who died in Vietnam. No date of death, rank, or anything else. I might have to do a bit of research on this one.

7. Me again. A link to my photosets on flickr.

8. A painting by cheesy bird painter Raul Gutierrez. This man torments me. He's been on google for years and for a brief period googled higher than me. His banal paintings of ducks and swamps rarely fail to bore and yet he still commands around $8,500 per painting.

9. Me again. It's a link to a program I wrote several years ago. But I took those pages down and the link is dead now, just more internet detritus.

10. Raul Gutierrez, the Panamanian environmentalist. A bit of research dug up this picture.

So not too bad all in all. A diverse mix. My fellow Rauls I wish you well.

February 5, 2005

Indian Summer in January

February 7, 2005

Boing Boinged.

Hey a flickr photo of me taken by my wife just got BoingBoinged. To be fair they could care less about me... it was on a story about the Millenium Park sculpture... Anyway, here I am jumping like a fool in front of the sculpture:

BoingBoing

Too bad Boing Boing doesn't link flickr thumbnails properly so they can be clicked through.

The original photo appeared on this blog back in August.

February 7, 2005

Circa 1975

Jenn's family. That's her with the red bow on the right. Funky pants. Her mom is holding her. She surrounded by aunts, cousins and her grandparents. Her dad is not pictured, I'm sure he was busy away at work.

February 8, 2005

Sirius Radio Review (a rant I'm afraid)

New York radio has never done it for me. In all my stints of living here I've listened to exactly one station, WFMU. And WFMU isn't even based here, it broadcasts out of Jersey City. LA had a couple of good stations, KCRW being the big gorilla of radio goodness. There were also several good college stations scattered about although I could only ever pick them up in the Valley.

Anyway, frustrated with local NY radio, in my general quest to make everything digital, and because of Jenn's desire to have music in the kitchen, I impulsively bought a Tivoli tabletop radio with Sirius satellite radio.

Spying the attractive Tivoli box, visiting friends instantly assume we are in radio nirvana, but it hasn't worked out that way.

First the satellite radio sound quality is poor--probably worse than normal radio. This is, I'm sure, a consequence of living in a city with lots of tall buildings, but even with a clear view of the sky... not so good. (normal radio on the Tivoli sounds great).

The second issue I have is the whole concept Sirius is built on, namely mainstream narrowcasting. There are 184 channels each one very specifically focused on a certain type of music. So for example, there are 6 jazz channels, each dedicated to a different type of jazz, but each is basically a "greatest hits" channel. None delves deep. And many of the DJs are just record spinners who just read label info and put on records almost at random. My idea of a jazz dj is some former beatnik who lives in a house whose foundation is crumbling from the weight of the records it bears, a guy who gets furious when you make a mistake identifying a session drummer on Bill Evans live show... a guy who wants to share what he knows because he loves and breaths the music.

Ditto for the punk DJ, ditto for the old time country DJ, etcetera. Wait. Sirius has no pure punk channel. Nor does it have a real classic country channel (it has something called the roadhouse prone to playing 70's crap. Where's my Tex Ritter, Hank Snow, and Jimmie Rodgers? How about some Collins kids.) How about playing music that music buffs actually get excited about?

Sirius has it all wrong. They are taking the same approach that Clear Channel used to destroy commercial radio, except they have more bandwidth available and are making each channel more specific. There is logic to this, but ultimately this strategy will always lose out to the ipod. The ipod is the ultimate narrowcast, it's only the music you already love, commercial free delivered whenever you want it.

How does satellite radio compete against this? By offering real DJs in the mode of the late John Peel. People who are fearless musical explorers with a taste for the unordinary. A good DJ brings you into his world, if he is happy, he plays happy songs, if he's sad he'll play an hour of music that will break your heart, if it's raining he might play a couple of rain songs. He doesn't stick to one genre or time period. He just plays the next song that needs to be played because it feels right. That's radio that excites and draws people in, not this mindless polite stuff they are now broadcasting from too many channels.

Sirius also has commercials (for Sirius!). The shame.

February 9, 2005

3:00am thoughts

Spending so much time holding a 2 month old child I start losing perspective on the world of the large and find myself looking at full grown people astounded by their size.

In the uncatalogued recesses of my brain I dredge up unformed memories of childhood--of the perspective from the floor, of mysterious language, and of being carried to bed. Perhaps these passing thoughts aren't memories at all but only misplaced empathy. Either way it makes my understanding of the boy and his processes slightly less opaque.
. . .
2 Months old as of yesterday. 15+ pounds and almost 26 inches long. He's already comfortably in clothes for 9-12 month olds. The boy is gaining on us.
. . .
me (& my mom of course) at roughly the same age:

February 10, 2005

about that time

Y A W N.

do you feel like yawning?

not even just a little bit?

ha!

YAWN. yawn. zzzzz

February 10, 2005

milestones

A momentous day in the life of every New Yorker, a first subway ride:


February 11, 2005

empire

February 12, 2005

the gates

Love it or hate it, The Gates project seemed to put almost everyone in the park in a good mood.



February 14, 2005

TV light

February 15, 2005

valentine's day

Gingerbread cookies AND a ukulele. My wife knows me all too well. I hope everyone else out there had as nice a day as we had here.

February 16, 2005

baby don't do it

Little by little I'm getting a sense of our boy's musical tastes. Every morning while his mom is still asleep we hang out upstairs and listen to some tunes while we play on the floor. At 10 weeks he registers instant joy or distain for songs... Happily itunes makes switching tracks easy.

He definitely enjoys classic country, smiling through Tex Ritter and Karl Denver. Hank Williams is a fav, although (worryingly) he seems to prefer the really dark songs like Ramblin' Man and Lost Highway to peppier numbers like Jambalya.

He is indifferent to 'difficult' jazz. Mingus in particular seems to annoy him. But Donald Byrd & early John Coletrane put him in a good mood right away.

Almost any 80's rock elicits a frown. Big 70's bands like Led Zeppelin are also a no go.

The kid likes funk. The funkier the better. I throw on Mothership by George Clinton and he lights right up. He smiles through Don Julian's version of Shorty the Pimp and by the time we get to Lynn Collins singing Baby Don't Do It he is practically laughing.

February 17, 2005

circles

The house is silent. Everyone is hard asleep. In these quiet interludes I slip downstairs noiselessly just to make sure everything is ok.

Often I'll stand still in the dark listening to the breathing and let my mind wander for a moment in large lazy circles. Sometimes I slide over to the crib and make sure our son is tucked in properly. He never is these days, having become adept at breaking free from his swaddle so I do my best to get him covered up again. Then I will retreat back to work until the sleep is overwhelming and my head fuzzy. Then again I venture down this time into a sleepy embrace.

I don't know what I will think about in the long lonely years of old age, and I'm sure that there will be countless cups of bitterness to swallow between now and then, but I imagine that sometimes I will come back to those moments when I am standing in dark listening to the soft breath of my wife and child awash in full sweetness of things.

...

February 19, 2005

yabp (yet another baby picture)

Before coming here Magda and my dad went to the park to check out The Gates. They were apparently filmed by NBC and were featured prominently on the NBC Nightly News.

February 19, 2005

morning walk

morningwalk

February 20, 2005

way too late to be awake

February 20, 2005

Duke of Uke

With my new ukulele my great hope is that I can learn a few songs and be 1/10 as cool as the Duke of Uke. Make sure to listen to his cover of Anarchy in the UK.

February 21, 2005

6 months

We have been back in NY almost 6 months now. It feels like much longer (but in a good way). Rain is falling on the snow and everything is mushy. This was the view from the stoop last night:

....
Here is a picture from 6 months and a few days ago when the world was greener.


It's in that little park in the East Village on Houston St.

February 22, 2005

rules to live by

In the margins of a book I never finished reading I listed a manifesto of sorts, 100 rules to live by. The date was March 18, 1992. I won't bore you with all 100, but many years later the list would pretty much the same although the order would be somewhat different. Here are the top 10 by my 25 year old self.

1. Travel someplace that scares you.

2. Paint your walls even if it's not allowed. White is for sanitariums and prisons.... unless you are one of those people really really into white. Then explore the color white, there are endless shades.

3. Have mysterious projects.

4. Keep a journal. Write some of what you did...ie the facts of your life, but more importantly write how you experienced it.

5. Take more pictures than you think you need to. You're already older than you were a moment ago.

6. Vary your route. The most interesting stuff is around the corner.

7. Keep secrets (but on quiet nights after many years tell the person you love).

8. Don't worry about traffic.

9. Zero your debt.

10. There is more tragedy in the world than you know, but there is also more beauty. Do not ignore tragedy. Accept it, but accept joy with equal intensity.

February 23, 2005

busy

My dad and Magda left for Spain today. They'll be gone a few months. We'll miss them.

Jenn and the baby on the R.

February 23, 2005

brooklyn bridge reverse

February 24, 2005

1927

On the left, my grandmother Olivia Aurora. She was 13.
In the middle my great grandfather Jose Dolores. On the right my grandfather Rodolfo. My grandfather was 18 and tired of being a cowboy. During this year, as he had since he was 12, he would ride cattle to Monterrey with his brothers. In Monterrey they would be paid in gold and each of the brothers would hide coins to protect against robbery.

After Christmas this year he left for New York City by bus starting from Roma (now Rome) Texas.

In New York he would enjoy two exciting years which he would talk about for the rest of his life. After he left in 1929 he never returned.

February 24, 2005

photoblogs

Inspiring photoblogs/portfolio sites I've run across recently:
Stephanie Sinclair
Noah K, Everyday
Overshadowed
Komsomolskaya
114th
snapscot
Slower
Rion
photobooth directory
shannon fagan
travis ruse

And some great flickr sets:
locaburg
marcelo thomas
only alive
whileseated
snapatorium
swatt
cherry vega

February 25, 2005

Valley of the Gods



If you enjoyed that one, you should probably check out this one too.

February 27, 2005

a collection of video stills:

from my cross country trip last summer:

February 27, 2005

around town

amongst strangers on the train:

ada (on left) & raul. due the same day. born a week apart in the same hospital:

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