KjM - on the web

Flash Fiction Friday

A writer - J. M. Strother, a member of the writer's forum I frequent (though not as frequently as I would like), suggested Fridays become the days for fostering fiction - flash fiction in particular.

The idea, as described here, #fictionfriday, is to post a 500-word or less story on your blog - and then Tweet the fact, including a link to the story and the #fictionfriday tag.

The purpose - to increase visibility. Never a bad thing.

The below lies somewhere between experimental and flash. Enjoy.

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Stupid, stupid, stupid...just stupid, that's what it is...I mean I didn't mean to...it's just that...she surprised me is all...she wasn't supposed to be there...and it wasn't deliberate...I didn't mean to rip her dress like that...she should have let me know she was coming back...look, I work hard, I keep her and her kid, it's not like it's even my own kid...I do right by them...it's not so much to ask...a little relaxation for myself, is it?...it was her screaming at me like that...if she didn't scream at me it wouldn't have happened...it wasn't my fault...why did she have to go screaming like that?...now she wants to move out, keep the kid away from me...I mean, it's just a dress...no real harm done...yeah...it was stupid of me...stupid of me to wear hers...I told her I wouldn't do it again...

Easy day

Good friends, all along the peninsula.

A friend-filled day today. Monica in the morning, or early afternoon. So, given she is a hairdresser, we both look our best. (Don't worry, it won't last).

We came back from the South Bay in the afternoon. We ate lunch down there, while our car was getting a much-needed wash. Lunch was at the Aroma cafe - the first place Dick and I almost met (a story for another time).

Then to Pacifica, on the Pacific(!) Ocean. Friends going back to the days of Harmony Software in San Mateo, or earlier yet to Syntex Pharmaceuticals just across from Xerox PARC, or even earlier yet to Apple Computers (as they were then) in Cupertino.

Not a quiet time. Rather more riotous than that, given the energy of the people involved. Great food, even if I took abuse for my aversion to olives. I suppose it wouldn't have happened if I had not loudly proclaimed said aversion. Ah but, as they say where I hail from, where'd be the fun in that?

Good people, good friends and quite an international grouping - and I learned that the Tagalog word for table is lamesa (which, in Spanish, would be la mesa - the table). It never harms to learn.

And, happy birthday Brendan

The Care and Feeding of Fountain Pens

Convenience is something at the heart of many efforts in this modern world of ours. I invoke it myself - for example in the convenience of carting around over 100 books on my Kindle. I'm never short of something to read.

Convenient, no?

Wireless networks - yes, the plural is needed, don't ask - running around the house because the printers - I know, another plural - need to be accessible by any of the computers - sigh - so no wires make things convenient.

Let's not talk about the wireless repeaters for remotes, nor wireless headphones either.

Modern technology makes many things convenient. In theory giving back time which we can put to good use. Or waste in an enjoyable and creative way.

In the midst of all this convenience is my fountain pen collection. Not actually in the midst, more standing apart from it. Were I to wish convenience I should have ballpoint pens, or rollerballs if I preferred a more "ink like" experience.

Fountain pens are not convenient. They run out of ink more frequently than the above-mentioned types of pens. Their nibs are more fragile. They need to be cleaned with some regularity or their ink delivery mechanism gets blocked.

But they are beautiful. They are functional works of art. They are personal, they actually shape themselves to your handwriting. The ritual of cleaning, inking, caring for them, has an appeal all of its own.

They. Slow. Me. Down.

And that, in the final analysis, is the best thing they do.

Sing - as if no one were listening

A long time ago - back in Dublin, Ireland - when I was a lot younger, and without doubt I'm afraid, a lot stupider, I worked with a young woman who was an excellent programmer. Her work was elegant.

What I found strange was her indifference to what she did for a living. I was, at the time, fascinated by computers (I know, it's hard to tell the difference from today, no?). Fascinated by the challenge of them. Fascinated by all there was to learn.

My work colleague, not so much. What she did was a job. Nothing more. "But", I would say - and my exasperation was, I regret, evident - "you're so good at this. How can you not want to (I didn't say this, such a tag line dates from much later - and not from me) be all you can be?"

How wrong can you get? She was very patient with me. Her work was exactly that for her, work. A means to an end. The end was living, and in particular for her, part of living was membership in the Goethe-Institut Choir in Dublin. She got to sing some of the world's most wonderful music, and in a couple of the world's most wonderful places.

A friend of ours is now doing the same. While she has a career dealing with the abstractness of data architecture, for balance she is a member of a choir here on the San Francisco peninsula.

There is creativity, and elegance when done correctly, to data architecture and to programming. But beauty is a different matter.

It is a truth that a life well spent leaves the world a little better, saner, more beautiful. For those of us whose lot it is to tend the machines, we need to look outside our work-a-day lives for such.

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And, speaking of beauty - Happy Birthday Lisa.

Bottle on a beach

A bottle made of shells on a beach made of pixels.

What a connected world it is in which we dwell. Billions of text messages flash from phone to phone, from mind to mind, in moments - each moment of the day.

Friends and relatives, those whom you friend at least, can keep up with your every move, every mood and even contribute scribbles on your very wall. A virtual wall, that is, so no damage done. So it is that Facebook keeps us in touch with one another.

With our tweets we cast thoughts (or tweets) out into the ocean of our followers, or re-tweet (remembering to include the RT prefix so others know of the forwarding) to forward those that catch our fancy.

I came across another communication mechanism recently. It differs from the above-mentioned mechanisms in one specific way. It is entirely unknown to whom many of your messages will be delivered.

Distant Shore is an application for the iPhone by the same people who created the Koi Pond application for the same device. While the Koi application is only for the pleasure of the iPhone owner, bringing the peace of a pond to the handheld device, Distant Shore establishes communication, of a sort between iPhone users.

The application shows a beach, endlessly stretching to the right and to the left. You, the user, "walk" (leaving bare footprints in the sand) along the beach looking for shells, or bottles. Five shells turn into an empty bottle in the your inventory. Of more interest are the bottles that may be found on the beach.

Such a bottle contains a message, written by another user of Distant Shore. There is no indication whence the message comes, nor when it was thrown into the ocean that laps against the beach. It's just a random message, written by someone with an iPhone, that washed up on your beach.

Your can write your own message, using the empty bottles you gain by finding five shells and then toss it into the ocean - to later wash up on someone else's beach.

The application also allows for replying directly to a message, thus establishing a more conventional style of message/response.

There is something oddly attractive about this. The graphics, to be expected of the people who wrote the Koi Pond application, are smooth and appealing. The idea itself, also appealing, though I don't see it becoming the next Twitter.