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Losing Power

Sigh.

I am having power issues.  On so many levels.  First my poor mbp's power adapter has died a crappy cabley death right at the MBP.  Second, the power adapters that are presently installed in BIG are about 30W too wimpy.  Third, my personal power is at an all time low both in terms of fitness and overall schedule/health/attitude/confidence level.  I need to bring my A game if I'm going to convince a bunch of brazilians they need me instead of someone with 4 times my experience level.  I need to bring it and bring it hard.  Right now... I just feel like playing LoL.  I know this feeling, this is depression.  I'm not sure why; this next phase should be exciting.  Instead, I'm totally indifferent.  I was thinking about it tonight while watching the Perseids at Overlook park for 45 minutes before some stratus clouds rolled in and blocked a borderline breathtaking show.  What do I want to do now?  What do I want to be when I grow up?  Where do I want my career to go?  I keep jumping to little things but I can't help but feel I'm dancing around some greater ambition that no present opportunity is really going to tap.  Oh well... that's kind of what life is about... figuring out what makes us happy and pursuing that with every breath.  Hmmm, just writing this has given me a little bit of clarity.

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the block

believe me... i've not been updating as much as i hoped/wanted/dreamed... but here is another little nugget.  today i snatched reny's photo of charles' boat and i have to say... it's pretty damn good. i'm actually annoyed i don't have better pictures from my sailing escapades. of course... i have some spin photos but... in terms of charles' boat i have no idea why this one stupid picture is better than most of the other shit i've taken personally.  of course... photos of lake champlain bring back memories of past sails.................... the good starts and the bad, the time it was just me and anirban and the head sail wouldn't fly because the hanks were caught... the ezpz committee boat... but what i really wanted to write about was the time charles and I did a weekend race and the main sheet's block came undone. i thought i had caught the block but the boom flew way out into right center and charles went and snagged a pole to hold it down. I couldn't figure out how in the hell to reattach the boom to the block when charles handed me a squeeze wrench (edit soon i hope: correct tool name) and somehow i managed to fit the main block back into the traveler. It was really surreal... having mechanical problems of that simplicity and therefore that magnitude on a weekend sail. but we got through it. and took second. i crushed the sail trimming on that race and it showed.

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stuff

photos and updates to follow.  we're about to find out what kind of day this sunday is going to be. fruitful, delicious, friendly and good... or an absolute throw down.

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pogorelich

this literally changed everything. seriously. now i will grant you...  this artist doesn't look like the same goof who took the 4th international chopin competition by surprise with his ground breaking interpretation of the 2nd sonata in b minor... but make no mistake. This is chopin perfected... and that's not just my opinion.  Upon hearing this interpretation (I believe this is the vid from the actual competition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WL_I1z5OHe4 ) Martha Argerich, the most prominent authority on Chopin since Chopin himself, refused to participate further in the competition without giving this solo performance the recognition and respect it deserves.  Some say she did more by protesting the "official" ruling than she would've by simply voting for him. Either way, my main girl Margerich and I both know genius when we hear it and if this isn't genius then genius doesn't exist.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHZHy2B6MCc

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quick updates

thursday: luciano w dflizzle

friday: standard friday with some good nectarage

saturday: brewfest with awesome friends.  met my good friends Uncle Paul and Aunt Sue while out. Paul seemed surprised I'd choose to spend time with him while out with my other friends.  silly Paul. you are the man.

sunday: oakledge sunset. relaxation. cover letter. started reading prelude to foundation.

monday: cover letter cover letter cover letter cover letter cover letter cover letter.

tuesday: cleaning. finally made those two middle zetta jumps. analog study group w/ Jacob. tribe loses again to mariners. i hate it when the tribe loses.

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oh herro

Hi blog. I haz neglected you recently; it's not you it's me I swear.  

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Was watching aphro's stream and he was playing a bit of the dustforce soundtrack.  Toooooo good.

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Staring at the bow

Wednesday was another low key day keeping with this week's low key theme.  I did some more windsurfing rigging practice... thinking I'm getting the hang of it finally.  Then it was time for some big-boy sailing as I headed down to Shelburne Bay for race night.  The wind was fair but squirrelly and we felt comfortable shaking out the reef in the main and throwing up the 150.  As we were jockeying around before the start Chris and I encouraged Charles to be a bit more ballsy and, as we jockeyed for position to the line, ended up having the best start of the season.  It was so good that for the first time I was able to stare at the bow of the Wingdam as we made our way west across the lake to the mark.  

I've never seen her bow while racing before.  It was an uplifting experience.  Unfortunately, our overaggression led to an ill-timed early tack that pulled us from first/second to the back of the pack.  Alas, despite the best start I think we've ever had while I've been on crew we were only able to come up with a second to last finish.

After the sail we hung out at the yacht club for awhile and parted ways.  The rest of the day was quiet... grabbed some wings from bdubs and came home and passed out.

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I suck at daily blogging.

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Sunset at Oakledge July 15, 2013.

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Vienna Teng continues to be the de facto artist of choice.  I find myself very polarized by her music... but this song is quickly becoming one of my favorites.  She performed this live, and I think I like that version better than this recording.  Regardless it's amazing.

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Useless

Over the past couple days I've been predominantly useless.  Sometimes that's ok, but I'm irritated with myself as the weather has been almost picture perfect (although a bit hot for my taste, I do live in VT after all), and I have a lot of important things to take care of right now.

Yesterday I woke up to my a call from my good friend Ramana.  He told me about a small job fair that the state was putting on, and that while looking around he had run into some of my old pll family.  After commiserating with him for a bit, I decided I should go check it out.  Like me, it turned out the event was completely useless.  I have to accept that there is nothing else in VT for me, at least from a career advancement perspective.  So I settled for reading a book on semiconductor physics at Oakledge state park and watching the sunset.  Picture to follow... It was a hot hazy humid day ergo not the best atmospheric conditions, but I love every sunset from that beautiful place.

Today was slightly more productive.  I acquired a ticket to the Burlington Brewfest, which I am told is quite the spectacle and have a number of friends attending.  I'm going Saturday night, with CJH, M&C, and some other friends.  It cost me an arm and a leg but seeing as this is my last summer in VT I might as well enjoy one of Burlington's summer traditions.  I then went and cashed my last two checks from IBM.  Looking over the dollar amounts, I did some quick math and realized IBM is trying to stiff me almost 7 grand!  Ridiculous!  As if they haven't done enough already.  Oh well, I wrote a message to my manager and he's promised to verify my concerns.  I hope that I will be paid that which is owed to me......

I spent this afternoon practicing riggin up my windsurfing gear.  I can't wait to get into the water, with just a little more work I think I'll be ready to start daily practice!

After dinner I went over to my friend Jacob's house.  We've started reviewing analog design fundamentals for technical interview questions.  We discussed some physics concepts for almost 3 hours, then I came back home.  On the way home I got a call from my good friend John.  I always enjoy our discussions, and I appreciate the fact he occasionally asks me for advice.  Usually, I'm the one begging for his counsel, so when I can return the favor and offer him some small insight it's a really great feeling. 

Time to wrap up a cover letter and call it a night!

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You Are Heading For A Land of Sunshine

I realized I failed to blog about daily activities yesterday... so... we're off to a rough start tumblr :).  It's probably best, if this is to become a daily ritual, to not beat myself up about missing entries or writing dailies late and just accept that sometimes life happens.  

Over the course of my time in VT I started this habit of getting chinese food on Sundays.  I don't know if you've looked at any fortune cookies recently, fair reader, but the things Confucius has been saying are anything but prophetic.  "You are an honest and generous person" is not really the insightful wisdom into the future I was hoping for.  So it was notable, when about 2 months ago I got the first fortune cookie with an actual fortune in ages, which read "You will soon change your line of work."  Strange I thought, as rumors had been swirling at the time about impending layoffs from my employer, IBM.  Even stranger was that when the day of the layoffs arrived I was in fact affected.  I'm sure I'll write more about that as time goes on, that's not really the point of today's entry.  The point of today's entry is that this little prophetic nugget of oracular wisdom was "You are heading for a land of sunshine."  Fascinating I thought, as moving to California is something I've seriously been considering as of late.

Other than that, today was a low key day.  After an extremely rough night, involving fun times that quickly tanked to a relative emotional minima, I needed to sleep in.  I think the most productive thing I did all day was start this blog.

And right now... I'm totally ok with that.

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I am literally obsessed with this song right now.  I've been a VT fan for awhile but the three songs she released from her new album really demonstrates her growth as an artist.  

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http://johncohn.org/

This dood is absolutely awesome and inspirational.

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Inception

Herro friends.  Trying out this microblogging thing for awhile... one of the most brilliant people I've ever met and had the privilege of working with blogs daily and he seems to really enjoy it.  I think it'll be extremely therapeutic to do something similar, but I want to try the tumblr format instead of long and sweeping entries that most blogs are comprised of.  So... lehgo!