Around Adelaide

OK, now I'm more than a week behind, but here's a few images from Sunday (Nov. 30) and Monday (Dec. 1) in Adelaide. We really enjoyed the week we spent there.

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They had a number of interesting memorials and statues; here is one.

 

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We did some shopping at the Sunday Rundle Street Market.

 

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One of our favorite places to eat in Adelaide was Sushi Train and its sister establishment, Sushi Train Express.

 

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The South Australian Musuem had a quite nice collection, but it was interesting seeing them trying to reconcile their century and a half of collection history with modern standards of what is culturally appropriate.

 

Saturday Drive

Here are some pictures from our Saturday drive. As predicted previously, I'm hopelessly behind -- I've just gotten to posting the pictures just before we got to Adelaide, and we only have a day and a half left of our week here before heading back to Melbourne. Anyway, I think the highlight of the day was Naracoorte Caves National Park, an Australian fossil site and part of a World Heritage Site. We saw some animatronic reconstructions of prehistoric Australian mammals (I should post a video so you can hear the grunting) and toured a couple of caves. On the road, we took a look at a number of site affected by Australia's decade-long drought. We came across the first one by accident...we were looking for a resting point, and wondered what had happened to the lake promised on the sign.

 

 

 

Friday Night in Mt. Gambier

At the rate I'm going, I'm not going to catch up on our travels before we leave Australia. Here are some pictures from the place we stayed the second night of our drive from Melbourne to Adelaide. It's called Clarendon Chalets, and it's just outside Mt. Gambier. It was basically a little cottage on a farm. After we got in, we got some groceries, Christina made dinner and a fire (in my defense, I had done the day's driving), and we watched The African Queen.

 

 

 

 

Friday Drive

 

We took a picture at our B&B before hitting the road on Friday. We saw various natural rock formations off the Great Ocean Road.

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The Twelve Apostles.

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London Bridge, which became London Arch in 1990 when the part connecting to land collapsed.

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Bay of Islands.

At the Big Lobster

Jon at the Big Lobster
Originally uploaded by jongrantham

We haven't seen as many "big" objects this time through Australia, but this was one of them. This was on Saturday's drive to Adelaide. The Internet access in the lounge at the Adelaide Hilton is doled out in 15 minute chunks, but at some point we'll break down and spring for the in-room access. At that point, I'll post more pictures.

Thanksgiving in Australia

We had a quite non-traditional Thanksgiving (again). We drove out of Melbourne, visited the National Wool Museum in Geelong, picked up the Great Ocean Road where we saw some amazing deserted beaches, and ended up at our B&B where our host used a stick to keep a horny koala away from a mother trying to protect her cub.

 

 

 

 

Arriving in Melbourne

 

We got into Melbourne yesterday. We planned to burn most of the rest of our Marriott points for a couple of nights here to recover. That's quite a flight. After checking into our hotel, we walked to this espresso bar/pasta joint and had some of the best pasta I've had in quite some time.

Tomorrow we pick up the car and head out on the Great Ocean Road.

EuroQuest 2008

EuroQuest 2008
Originally uploaded by Eric E Haas

I didn't end up in too many pictures this year, but here I am playing Dominion, a game I was less than overwhelmed by.

Saying Goodbye to Teddy

I sit here a couple of hours after having Teddy put to sleep, and I can't come up with any good sentences. I have been crying a lot. I am very grateful for Christina, who has taken "Love Me, Love My Dog" to such awesome extremes. I don't know how I would have gotten through today without her. Also, I don't know how I would have gotten through the last twelve years of my life without Teddy.

He made it past 16 years, which is quite impressive for a dog of his size. I've been consoling myself looking at some pictures of him. Of course, most of these are of Teddy in his later years, after I got a digital camera. But it thrills me to remind myself of what spirit and energy he maintained throughout his entire life. I can only hope I make as impressive of an "old man" as he did.

 

 

 

Red state?

Despite the Obama win, some parts of North Carolina are as I remember.

The Android's Dungeon Endorses...

 

Four years ago, I gave you my endorsements. I'm here to repeat that feat.

President

Barack Obama. Top Three Reasons:

• The Courts. I saw a story that said that when Bush entered office, half of the federal judges were Republican appointees. Now it's something like two-thirds. That's getting way out of balance -- see the recent Supreme Court ruling that said that a woman who had been discriminated against could not receive back pay because her employer successfully hid from her the fact that she was being illegally underpaid.
  
• Foreign Policy. I actually think Obama would disappoint a lot of people who expect a ton of multilateralism. I think he'll listen to what other countries want, and then do what he thinks is best for America. But we need a President who will actually listen -- if we want other countries to listen to us.
  
• Taxes. The Bush tax cuts did not help the economy -- look at how much better things were under the higher Clinton tax rates in the 1990s. They did, however, succesfully redistribute wealth towards the wealthy and away from the wage-earner. As someone who earns an income (albeit a nice one), I'd like to see the American worker treated better by the tax code. The American capital-gains-earner has had his day.
  

Plus they gave us a cool yard sign.

Representative

Steny Hoyer. He continues to disappoint in a number of ways (bankrupcy bill, FISA, bailout), but his opponents are even worse.

Judge of Circuit Court/Judge of the Court of Special Appeals at Large

"I tend to think judges should stay in office unless they embarrass themselves significantly. In fact, I'm not sure we should be voting on them." That's what I said four years ago. I could not Google anything embarassing about these folks, so back to office they go.

Board of Education

Running unopposed, so I see no need to vote.

Constitutional Amendments

Question 1 is the early voting question. While I'm generally in favor of early voting, I think far too little attention has been drawn to the problem with absentee ballots. Namely, they undermine one of the main principles of our democracy -- the secret ballot. It's too easy to buy or coerce votes with absentee voting. Since this encourages both absentee and early voting, I'm going to have to vote no.

Question 2 is the slots question. I figure if you're going to take money from poor people to spend on schools, why not do it directly, instead of only picking on the poor people with gambling problems, and giving half their money to gambling companies? Gambling is fine for a trip to Vegas, but it doesn't belong as a neighborhood phenomenon. No.

Ballot Questions

These are at the county level. In the past, I've had trouble getting details on these (and hence voted no), but this year, someone on our town mailing list pointed me towards a useful page on the League of Women Voters web site. So here we go.

• Question A: More money for libraries. I really like libraries. Yes.
  
• Question B: More money for public safety. If public safety officials need new kitchens (among other things), someone is going to have to make an attempt to convince me. No.
  
• Question C: More money for county buildings. Homeless Shelter, Courthouse, Health and Human services...they've put some pretty important buildings on there. Yes.
  
• Question D: More money for roads. We need better roads around here. Yes.
  
• Question E: More money for community colleges. I'm probably being a snob here, but I don't see the return on investment to the community. No.
  
• Question F: Raise the phone tax from 8% to 11%. The people who want me to vote no have called me 3 times. Yes.
  
• Question G: Expand public notice for County Council legislation from 5 days to 10. Anything that helps us keep better track of the County Council has to be good. Yes.
  

E-commerce

People are living more of their lives online these days, and my family is not immune.


For example Christina has been working on Alas: Joyeria de Epoca -- 20th Century Epoch Jewels, "Specializing in North American Vintage and Flights of Fancy. Rare Vintage and Antique Costume, Estate, and Silver Jewelry. Coins."

She had been buying costume jewelry for her own use and found that she enjoyed it enough to start offering some items for resale.

I particularly like the logo, which comes from a picture Christina took on our trip to Puerto Rico last fall.


As long as I'm promoting relatives' web sites, my cousin Sara and her husband Marty operate Saramar Studios, where they feature stained glass, paintings, mosaic tables, jewelry and their own art. Check it out; they're really quite talented.

The Case of the Purloined Photograph

About a month ago, I was in Laurel, and I decided to do a little waymarking. One of the sites I visited was Laurel Tavern Donuts, which falls into the category "Independent Doughnut Shops."

Here you can see me behind the store with my bounty of donut holes held aloft in triumph.

Last week, I read a Washington Post blog item about Laurel Tavern Donuts' inclusion in a "Zippy the Pinhead" comic strip. I thought about posting an image of the comic strip to the waymark page, but I decided that it would be a potential copyright violation to do so. I figured, however, that "fair use" would allow me to clip out part of the strip for illustrative purposes.


After posting the above clip, I looked at both the waymark page (linked above) and the Washington Post blog page (also linked above). If you look carefully, you notice something. The pictures of Laurel Tavern Donuts are...identical. Down to the reflection in the glass door. (I would post the image here, but the irony of doing so in a post about copyright violations would be overwhelming. I'll resume violating copyrights in a future post.) I e-mailed the creator of the photo to ask if the Post had gotten his permission. They hadn't.

He's been trying to get in touch with someone at the Post to check on this. He hasn't heard back.

I think in the loosey-goosey world of blogging, lifting the picture would probably be considered OK (if perhaps of questionable legality) if the Post had credited the picture. But taking the picture and reposting it without permission...the Post should do better than that.

Republicans and Authenticity

I've heard a lot of comment about Sarah Palin's $150,000 wardrobe. A lot of it has to do with how much money this is compared to what the average American makes. A lot of it is about how it's a waste of campaign money. I haven't heard any commentary that gets to what I think is the real point: authenticity.

The GOP has been selling Sarah Palin as an authentic, down-to-earth hockey mom. Of course, a lot of people wonder if that's what we're looking for in a vice president. But the $150,000 wardrobe story shows that the GOP isn't even looking for that in a vice president. If party leaders had really thought, "You know who we need, someone really down-to-earth," they would have, at most, bought her the kind of stuff she was wearing already -- which I guarantee you was not Saks Fifth Avenue. Instead, they treated her like Eliza Doolittle.

You see this authenticity problem with "Joe the Plumber". He's not named Joe, he's not a plumber, if he made $250,000 a year he wouldn't be a typical plumber, the business he's thinking about buying (or maybe he's not) doesn't even make that amount of money... Would it have killed them to have found an actual plumber to use as an example? Apparently.

In this election, Democrats don't have a major authenticity problem. (Unlike with John Kerry or Al Gore.) They're not running a guy who's pretending to be Barry Obama from Chicago. His whole life story -- growing up in Hawaii (which Americans aren't sure is a real state) and Indonesia -- screams "exotic." And yet the Republicans are resorting to distorting it to make it seem even more "foreign". Why? Because Americans don't really dislike foreigners (see the governors of California and Michigan). Like Holden Caulfield, it's phonies that we can't stand.

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Another thought, as long as I'm discussing authenticity, Obama's background and things the media isn't quite getting right. The other day, I was watching the news. They were showing Obama ads that feature his mother and his grandparents. The commentators speculated that the ads were a way of making him seem whiter and "less threatening".



Really? Americans find a picture of a white woman and her black child less threatening? Maybe. If so, we've come a long way since this picture was taken. God bless America.

Happy Anniversary to Us

Nebula update

When I last posted about my Nebula novel reading two-and-a-half years ago, I had read 24 out of the 41 novels. As a reminder, the Nebula awards are awarded to science fiction authors annually by their fellow writers. I haven't been in the mood for much science fiction for the past couple of years, but lately I've gotten back into it. Since I read one book on my recent trip to France, I thought it was time to do an update.

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1969: The Left Hand of Darkness

I probably read this in 2006. This book falls into an interesting class of science fiction books -- they take place in a setting where interstellar travel exists, but it rare. Therefore, the book takes on an almost fantasy-world character, as it explores a different "Earth" -- in this case, one where inhabitants have no gender. The protagonist is an offworlder, sent to invite the planet's inhabitants into a galactic federation. Le Guin used this setting to explore gender in an interesting way. I can't say I loved this book, but I found it to be interesting and very well-written.

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1983: Startide Rising

Another 2006 read. This one is the second set in Brin's "Uplift" universe, where humans have "uplifted" chimps, dolphins and other creatures to sentience. It's an interesting concept, but I found the parts that were told from the dolphin's point of view to be a bit tiring to read.

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2005: Camouflage

Part of this story is about shape-shifting, immortal aliens who have been living among us. It's kind of interesting, but it really wasn't my cup of tea. It's not what I think of when I think "science fiction".

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2006: Seeker

Seeker is the book I read while in France. It's the third book in McDevitt's "Alex Benedict" series. The first book appeared in 1989 and was about Benedict unraveling a story about the galaxy's military history. He was doing it when he came across a puzzle his recently deceased uncle, an amateur archaeologist, was exploring. The next two books in the series have appeared in the past few years and are told from the point of view of Chase Kolpath, Benedict's assistant, and deal with his business as an antiquities dealer. The books shift from what I'd consider "military future history" to "mystery", as well as changing narrator. McDevitt's work remains very good, and the fact that the mysteries are about events of galactic importance (it's not as cheesy as my phrasing makes it sound) allows the exploration of interesting "big ideas" like immortality and the nature of man.

The fourth book comes out next month, and I'm looking forward to reading that, as well as other, non-Benedict books by McDevitt.

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2007: The Yiddish Policemen's Union

This book gives me a weird sense of pride for a number of reasons. One, I read it before it was nominated for a Nebula, so I didn't need that to know it was going to be a good book. Two, a Pulitzer-prize-winning author like Chabon decided to dabble in science fiction. Three, my fellow science fiction aficionados recognized this as the year's best novel (it won both the Nebula and the Hugo) even though it was written by an "outsider".

This book was really, really good. It takes place in an alternate history version of Alaska, where Jewish refugees were settled after World War II, instead of in Israel. But they were only allowed to stay for 50 years, and now they have to leave. Oh, yeah, and it's a murder mystery. And incredibly weird combination of ingredients, but Chabon not only makes it work, but elevates it to literature, not just "pulp fiction". Not only did this deserve the Nebula, it makes it clear that some of the other works on the list don't belong in the same category.

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So I go from having read 24 out of 41 to 29 out of 44. I actually picked up some of the other ones in this time period, but I didn't make it all the way through them. That's not a good sign, but I'll try again at some point. I am also going to take a look at the runners up for more ideas about good books to read.

To make it easier on myself to keep track, here is the complete list of Nebula novels I've read as of October 2008:

1. 1965: Dune, Frank Herbert
2. 1969: The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
3. 1970: Ringworld, Larry Niven
4. 1973: Rendevous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
5. 1974: The Dispossessed, Ursula K. Le Guin
6. 1975: The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
7. 1977: Gateway, Frederik Pohl
8. 1980: Timescape, Gregory Benford
9. 1983: Startide Rising, David Brin
10. 1984: Neuromancer, William Gibson
11. 1985: Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
12. 1986: Speaker for the Dead, Orson Scott Card
13. 1988: Falling Free, Lois McMaster Bujold
14. 1992: Doomsday Book, Connie Willis
15. 1993: Red Mars, Kim Stanley Robinson
16. 1994: Moving Mars, Greg Bear
17. 1995: The Terminal Experiment, Michael J. Sawyer
18. 1996: Slow River, Nicola Griffith
19. 1997: The Moon and the Sun, Vonda N. McIntyre
20. 1998: Forever Peace, Joe Haldeman
21. 1999: Parable of the Talents, Octavia Butler
22. 2000: Darwin's Radio, Greg Bear
23. 2001: The Quantum Rose, Catherine Asaro
24. 2002: American Gods, Neil Gaiman
25. 2003: The Speed of Dark, Elizabeth Moon
26. 2004: Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold
27. 2005: Camouflage, Joe Haldeman
28. 2006: Seeker, Jack McDevitt
29. 2007: The Yiddish Policeman's Union, Michael Chabon

[Note: Since my last Nebula update, Blogger has introduced the "labels" feature; this has allowed me to gather all of the updates here.]

Fast Trains

 

That's 199 mph, if you can't read the GPS receiver.

European Countries

Well, I'm back in the States, so it's time to visit my countries visited map. I may have more interesting things to say about Holland later, but right now I'm jetlagged. So it's easier just to update the map. Rather than a medium-small hole where Holland is, my map of Europe now has a small hole for Luxembourg. I actually have no clear plans for visiting any more of these countries. The conference I go to in Europe in the spring is going to be in Germany and France the next two years. Hmm...in 2010, it'll be in Nice, which is a 23 minute car trip from Monaco. So there is that.

Redesign

This won't affect those of you who subscribe via e-mail, but I've redesigned my blog page. I was initially looking for a way to get my Twitter updates to post in the sidebar.

Unfortunately, one of the disadvantages of having such a long-lived blog is that at any given moment, I'm probably using an outdated template. So I grabbed a "modern" template, made a bunch of changes to it to conform to the Android's Dungeon style manual (e.g., changing the background to "pseudoprime blue") and set it loose. I'll probably fix a few more things in the next few weeks. Let me know if anything looks wrong to you.