Soul Surfer

Mikey "Da Cat" Dora, Greg Knoll, Phil Edwards, Eddie Aikau. Names from the past. A time of soul searching and revolutionary thinking. Before there were concepts like Open Source, there was Mikey Dora. Who was Miklos Sandor Dora III?

First, Dora was no saint. He was egotistic, arrogant, opinionated, a rebel with a cause, and thought he was better at what he did than anyone else [sounds oddly familiar - ed.]. What he did was surf. This was California in the 50s. A time of Gidget movies where things were simple, or at least, appeared to be that way. But not for Dora. He could see the storm clouds gathering on the horizon and tried to get people to understand that the commercial individualism of the 50s could not, and should not last.

He exhibited this through his disdain of surfing contests. Dora said you were selling your soul for a few cheap trophies. Bits of glitter. That surfing was not about competition, but rather freedom. A freedom that is constrained by the arbitrary rules invented to judge a surf riding contest. He figured the waves were free, so why try to compete on them?

He backed up his views with some of the more classic surf moves of his time. In tune with the force of the wave. So the opposite of Dora on land (although if you dropped in on "his" wave, you would expect the tip of his board to soon make intimate contact with your anal area real soon now).

While the legend of Mickey Dora will live on, Dora died on Thursday, January 3rd, 2002. Da Cat, is no more.

Aloha!

Eddie Would Go

Since 1986, when it first began, the Quicksilver Eddie Aikau Big Wave Invitational has been held but four times due to small surf. Of course, small is a relative term. In order for the contest to be run, clean surf of at least 20 feet (~6m) must be rolling into famed Waimea Bay on the north shore of O'ahu. Yesterday, they were cresting at 30 feet (~9m). So the contest was run with only the best of the big wave surfers invited.

I'm running a little late this morning due to responding to emails so I will leave you with this from Philip Clarke:

You just might be a graduate student if...

 ...you can analyze the significance of appliances you cannot operate.
 ...your carrel is better decorated than your apartment.
 ...you have ever, as a folklore project, attempted to track the
    progress of your own joke across the Internet.
 ...you are startled to meet people who neither need nor want to read.
 ...you have ever brought a scholarly article to a bar.
 ...you rate coffee shops by the availability of outlets for your laptop.
 ...everything reminds you of something in your discipline.
 ...you have ever discussed academic matters at a sporting event.
 ...you have ever spent more than $50 on photocopying while
    researching a single paper.
 ...there is a microfilm reader in the library that you consider "yours."
 ...you actually have a preference between microfilm and microfiche.
 ...you can tell the time of day by looking at the traffic flow at
    the library.
 ...you look forward to summers because you're more productive
    without the distraction of classes.
 ...you regard ibuprofen as a vitamin.
 ...you consider all papers to be works in progress.
 ...professors don't really care when you turn in work anymore.
 ...you find the bibliographies of books more interesting than
    the actual text.
 ...you have given up trying to keep your books organized and are
    now just trying to keep them all in the same general area.
 ...you have accepted guilt as an inherent feature of relaxation.
 .. you reflexively start analyzing those greek letters before you
    realize that it's a sorority sweatshirt, not an equation.
....you find yourself explaining to children that you are in "20th
    grade".
....you start referring to stories like "Snow White et al."
....you frequently wonder how long you can live on pasta without getting
   scurvy
....you look forward to taking some time off to do laundry
....you have more photocopy cards than credit cards
....you wonder if APA style allows you to cite talking to yourself as
    "personal communication"

"Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused." - Aloha!

Top 10 Ways to Know if You are a Geek

10. When filling out your driver's license application you give your IP address.

9. You no longer ask prospective dates what their sign is, instead your line is "Hi, what's your URL?"

8. Instead of calling you to dinner, your spouse sends e-mail.

7. You're amazed to find out spam is a food.

6. You "ping" people to see if they're awake, "finger" them to find out how they are, and "AYT" them to make sure they're listening to you.

5. You search the Net endlessly hoping to win every silly free T-shirt contest.

4. You introduce your wife as "my lady@home.wife" and refer to your children as "client applications".

3. At social functions you introduce your husband as "my domain server".

2. After winning the office super bowl pool you blurt out, "I feel so colon-right parentheses!"

And the number one sign you are an Internet Geek:

1. Two Words: "Pizza's Here!"

Aloha!

Ansel Adams at 100

I've mentioned before about getting an Ansel Adams calendar. Well, SWMBO got me, for my birthday, the Ansel Adams at 100 exhibition catalog from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. The beautifully printed hard cover book documents the prints on exhibition at the museum through this weekend. While no book can catch all the shades of light caught by photographer Adams, it's as close as I'll ever get to owning so many (100) prints.

The book is available via their website or at Costco (which is where She got my copy at a *much* lower cost than list).

Thought for the Day

Leadership, as we have created it, leaves little room for mistakes, ignorance, or confusion, which means it has little room for humanity. Let go of the mask of perfection. The desire to be perfect or look perfect is the wish to be God. And that is a sin. - Peter Block in Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest

Aloha!

It's Friday!

Odd Jobs

I've had my resume on my site since almost from the very beginning of my presence on the Internet (six or seven years now, if you go back to my days with aloha.net). From that, I've probably gotten one credible response versus a bunch of spam.

Well, yesterday I got another real response. This one is in the defense field as an analyst. I think it would be an interesting position but unfortunately, I don't think I meet the minimum qualifications as they need someone with an engineering background. Oh well, at least it was nice break in the monotony.

Blinded by the Light

In local news, the Hawai'i Department of Transportation contracted with a private firm to provide speed enforcement services. The firm sends out unmarked vans that park along side of the road and use laser guns to measure your vehicle's speed. They also simultaneously take a picture of you and your car.

Now, there are a whole bunch of things we could talk about. Like how does the state set the speed limits? Do speed limits reduce the rate of crashes per mile driven (if they don't, is the only reason to have them is to generate income)? Is it appropriate to have a private firm surveilling you and then passing that information on to the state? Is it appropriate to have such a service in which there is no public hearing nor input as to how to run the program (since a private firm is providing the service)? Is it appropriate to have such a service provided by a for profit non-governmental entity who's only reason for being is to make money off of you?

All good questions, but the one I want to talk about is unintended consequences. The program runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That means they have them at night. And when they take your picture, they use a huge flash box with at least four flash tubes in it (it may be as many as six or more but I couldn't tell for sure). And worse yet, the box is open not only in the direction it is pointed, but also to the rear.

The consequence of lighting the scene this way is that drivers, in both directions of travel, are momentarily blinded by an intense flash of light. Now class, who can tell me what will happen if someone is driving a vehicle at 55 miles per hour, at night, and is suddenly blinded by an array of flash tubes? Yes, you there in the back with the fire red Ferrari jacket on. Correct-o-mundo, they can't see and crash into each other or any handy nearby obstacles.

I've said it before and I guess I'll have the unfortunate opportunity to say it again, it is incredibly ironic that the administration of this Democratic Party controlled state, will go down as the most autocratic, arrogant, imbecilic, and anti-democratic in the short history of our islands. Sigh.

Thought for the Day

There is little talk of self-management at the top levels of organization. This became clear when I saw the organization chart of a field sales group. There were fourteen sales people reporting to a district manager, eight district managers reported to an area manager, six district managers [area managers] reporting to a regional manager, and four regional managers reporting to a vice-president. The span of control at the top was one manager to four subordinates, the span of control at the bottom was one manager to fourteen subordinates. The question I asked was, "Why do people at the top need more supervision that those at the bottom?" - Peter Block in Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest

Have a Great Weekend Everyone - Aloha!