orthogonal.org

Riding in the rain

2011-10-08T00:00:00-07:00

Since the rainy season is upon us once again, I'm dusting off an old blurb about riding in the rain. If you aren't used to riding in the rain, here are a few things to remember:

Dress the part. Riding in the rain can be really enjoyable if you aren't too cold and wet.
Slow down.
Be smooth.
Give yourself some extra buffer space between you and other vehicles.
Avoid metal in the road: manhole covers, big steel plates, muni tracks, etc. They are very slippery.
Also watch out for the paint used for road markings. They can be much more slick than you expect. (Just ask my fibula.)
If you really must traverse some metal, cross it as close to 90 degrees as you can manage. Avoid turning, braking, or changing the throttle while you are on a slippery surface.
If you slide, don't do anything drastic. Don't chop the throttle or nail the brakes. Keep your cool. The bike will usually right itself.
Stay loose and relaxed.

What does "smooth" mean?

Riding smoothly means avoiding abrupt changes. As you apply the brakes or throttle, as you steer, every motion must be controlled and graceful. Anticipate and start your motions early. Jerky movements make it harder for your tires to grip the pavement and keep you upright. Remaining upright is more or less the name of the game.

Is this thing on?

2011-05-03T00:00:00-07:00

Just for giggles I decided to throw up a site at orthogonal.org, the domain I use for my primary email.

The work has been slow-going since I had the bright idea to learn a slew of technologies in the process: Jekyll, CSS3, SASS, Compass, and Blueprint. Given that I spend much of my professional life avoiding what we propellerheads call "the presentation layer," I thought a little recreational exploration of same might do me good, or at least keep me out of trouble.

Much work remains to make the site look good, but it seems to more or less function at this point. What better motivator to keep working than the knowledge that my friends and relations can see the site as it stands now?

Future tasks, in no particular order:

Done

Automated upload.
Proper 404 page.
less stupid flickr integration
HTML/Atom validation.
Posts excerpted on main page.
page footer with update/render info

Todo

sidebar post links
CSS validation
growl kvetch when i break something
Next-prev
Post list to sidebar
Consolidate Compass & Jekyll watchers.
Autotest integration.
Spend countless hours playing with the typography until I don't hate it.
Links to relevant sites.
Feedburner integration.
Separate atom feeds for updates and new content.
Modularize the layouts.
Consider moving layouts to HAML.
Smart quotes (via SmartyPants?)
Re-enable CSS compression.
Mobile friendly.
Look through old blog posts for content worth including.
yslow
query string cache fu
add last-modified date to posts
site search
ping google on deploy

That is all I have to say at this time.

Words that rock

2011-05-02T00:00:00-07:00

The following words rock:

Dirigible
Obstreperous
Petulant
Homunculus
Bindle

Rules of thumb

2008-02-28T00:00:00-08:00

Quoth Wikipedia:

A rule of thumb is a principle with broad application that is not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. It is an easily learned and easily applied procedure for approximately calculating or recalling some value, or for making some determination.

When the items you are cooking start to smell like food, they are nearly done.
If you apply your brakes on the highway and the cars around you aren't doing the same, you were likely driving too quickly or reacting too slowly.
The better the hotel, the lower the likelihood of free WiFi in the rooms.
When you think, "Hey, I'll add some more feeds to my feed reader," go check your todo list instead.
If there is a phone in the bathroom, you are probably in a very nice hotel.
If an establishment advertises flavored coffee, their coffee is bad.
If you are offered a glass of something bubbly while you wait but are not in an eating or drinking establishment, you are about to pay too much for whatever service is on offer.
When a portion of the interview is conducted in the bathroom, you've got the job.

Growl

2007-08-18T00:00:00-07:00

Growl fixes a gaping hole in MacOS X. Back in the OS 9 days (and at least as far back as OS 7), the Mac had something called the Notification Manager. OS X is better than its predecessors in almost every way, but the way OS X allows applications running in the background to notify the user that something has happened sucks compared to Notification Manager.

Growl will save you from that. Growl is a free, open source notification giblet for MacOS X. Lots of cool software supports Growl. Apple ought to hand the Growl developers a big pile of money and incorporate Growl into the OS.

If you have a modern Mac and you aren't running Growl, then go get it. I'll wait here.

Desert island discs

2007-07-05T00:00:00-07:00

Suppose you are about to be stranded on a desert island for a long time. You get to bring 10 albums (vinyl or CD) with you. What ten do you bring?

Here are mine

The Beastie Boys, "Paul's Boutique" - This is an incredible album with lots of subtle detail. I notice some new nuance every time I put it on.
John Coltrane, "John Coltrane Quintet" - Not my favorite 'Trane, but maybe the one I can repeat the most.
Steely Dan, "Gaucho" - Oh, to think I once equated this with elevator music! Sublime.
Aphex Twin, "Selected Ambient Works, vol 2" - "Rhubarb" gives me goosebumps.
The Beatles, "Abbey Road" - "Come Together" blew my little mind when I was 6 or 7. These days it's "Something" that comes to mind most often.
Yo Yo Ma, "Bach Solo Cello Concertos" - Exquisite. The Pablo Casals recording is supposed to be definitive, but I'll take this one.
Led Zeppelin, "Houses of the Holy" - So many powerful moments, from raucous rockers to darker than The Doors.
Wilco, "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" - Solid song writing and fucked-up production. Bumped Plastikman for this due to replay value.
Kraftwerk, "Computer World" - Made quite an impression on me just as my love of computers was burgeoning.
The Cult, "Beyond Good and Evil" - Their varied catalog made this a tough choice, but my list was short on hard rock, so here it is.

Runners up

Musik, Back in Black, Praise the Fallen, Axis: Bold as Love.

Why I ride

2005-05-05T00:00:00-07:00

The other day I was having a drink with a few coworkers and one asked incredulously, “You had a major accident and you still ride?” Indeed I do. Today marks two years since my accident and I thought it a good time to reflect on why I ride.

First and formost is not much reason at all: I ride because I am drawn to it. I’m not really sure what put that initial urge into my head. It simpy appeared one day.

That urge likely would have come to naught but for my pal Justin voicing a similar urge. “I’ve been thinking about getting a motorcycle,” said he with a tentative note in his voice. He was clearly expecting to be shot down. Instead he got an unexpected “Me too, actually.” “Let’s do it!” said he.

By late August of 2001 I’d aquired the various safety gear, taken an introductory riding class, and was starting to look at ads for used bikes. I was paralyzed by the options. Then the September 11 attacks happened and one of many thoughts I had that day was that I could have been blown up, ending my life without ever having ridden. I resolved to stop figuring out what was ideal and simply buy the first motorcycle I found which didn’t suck. This prompted my neighbor Dan to point out that I was the first person he’d ever met whose fear of death caused him to start riding a motorcycle.

On my earliest rides, I kept thinking to myself, “Wow, I’m really doing it. I’m really riding a motorcycle.” That has ebbed over time, but hasn’t completely gone away. It happens to me more after a brief hiatus from riding, and is always accompanied by “This is great. Why on Earth did I ever stop doing this?”

Once I started riding, I found that I liked the sense of connection to my surroundings that a bike gives. Robert Pirsig describes it well:

In a car you’re always in a compartment, and because you’re used to it you don’t realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You’re a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame.

On a cycle the frame is gone. You’re completely in contact with it all. You’re in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming. That concrete whizzing by five inches below your foot is the real thing, the same stuff you walk on, it’s right there, so blurred you can’t focus on it, yet you can put your foot down and touch it anytime, and the whole thing, the whole experience, is never removed from immediate consciousness.

Some of that connection is because the rider has no physical separation from the surroundings. Some of it is simply due to presence of mind. It takes a whole lot more skill to operate a motorcycle than to operate a car, and the cost of a mistake is a whole lot higher, so motorcyclists had better be attentive.

...which leads me to another reason I ride. Fear. “Aren’t you afraid?” my Aunt Madeleine asked. Of course I am. The day I stop being afraid and start approaching riding in a cavaleer way, it will be time for me to stop riding. The fear of crashing keeps me doing the things that make me safer.

In addition to inducing mindfulness, fear has it’s own value. While I don’t enjoy bowel-loosening terror, I do enjoy facing up to my fears and overcoming them. I see so many people whose llves are stifled and dominated by fear. Arguably we all are at one time or another. I am convinced that regularly spending some time owning my fear and facing up to it makes me a stronger person in the rest of my life.

Aside from all that metaphysical claptrap, there are some perfectly good nuts-and-bolts reasons I enjoy riding.

Riding is a physical skill which I can spend many years developing. No matter how good I manage to get, there will always be more to achieve. I am going to keep right on practicing, reading, and taking classes for as long as I can ride. As any musician, or knitter, or baseball player will tell you, investing in that sort of ongoing refinement can be very satisfying.
Riding is also a mental and perceptual skill I can develop. After reading Keith Code’s books I began working on using my peripheral vision, and learning to look farther ahead, consciously adjusting my breadth and range of awareness. Not only does this let me spot trouble sooner-- giving me time to plan and react --it's just plain neat to see my senses improve.
Parking in a crowded city is easy on a motorcycle. Wherever I go on a bike, there is nearly always a nook in which to park. On those rare occasions when I actually have to pay for parking, it costs a whole lot less.
Motorcycles have all sorts of geek appeal. We geeks love any complex subject with lots of rich detail. Motorcycles fill the bill quite nicely.

Not only are riders more connected to their surroundings than drivers, we are more physically connected to the act of operating our vehicles. In a car I turn the wheel. To turn my bike I lean it over, my body leaning with it. Applying the brakes, I tighen my midsection and try to loosen my arms, so as not to disturb the steering as the rear of the bike lifts a bit and my body is pushed forward by inertia.

One day a coworker said to me, seemingly out of nowhere, “you must have ridden in today.” How on earth had she guessed? “Because there is a spring in your step,” said she. I hadn’t been aware of it before, but she was certainly right. Riding in puts me in a much better mood than making the same trip by car.

I suspect the cause is a combination of the attention demanded by riding and the sheer enjoyment of it. Somehow the effects of the ride linger well into my day. It turns out I am not alone. Studies show that taken as a group, we motorcyclists arrive at work more relaxed, alert, and attentive than our four-wheeled colleagues.

Pulling up in front of the office, or anywhere else, I park and dismount feeling satisfied. I have a giddy sense of having accomplished something, at least in my own head. Each ride is a gift, and I am quite thankful for every one.