Why, God why?

Why do people have to get my site when they search about:

• FuturesMap


• "Burt Reynolds" and Maaco


• Breakdancing classes in Boston?

Random thoughts: Holiday edition

Ten more observations for this Sunday evening:

• During this holiday week, working without an alarm, I got about nine hours of sleep a night. This is really not encouraging, especially considering I typically only get about six hours a night.
  
• Dune is not nearly so inventive as critics would have you believe, provided you know even a rudimentary amount of Arabic.
  
• The Patriots--I just have to say, "Could you please stop threatening us with coronaries?" When five out of your last six wins are by a touchdown or less, you're starting to scare your fans.
  
• After seeing what J. J. Abrams's conception of New Haven is on Alias, I'm convinced he must have been a Cantab.
  
• Alias also gets the award for most Webernesque soundtrack of any show in television history.
  
• After this past week, I'm starting to wonder if there aren't a few pods sitting about my parents' attic.
  
• I used to find the PDQ Bach's concept of a "bargain countertenor" humorous. Now I'm afraid that I might actually become one.
  
• I wouldn't mind having evening minutes start at 7 pm, but I do mind having to sign a new two-year agreement to get them.
  
• Fog and rain aren't my biggest fear when driving on the highway on messy days--blowback spray from the tires is. And don't get me started on driving in snow.
  
• Anybody who can make a turkey that provides enough food for one dinner, without leftovers, would make a killing--at least in my book.
  

Deadlines, deadlines

Days until invited conference paper is due: < 68
Days until my thesis is due to my advisors: 113
Days until my thesis is due to my committee: 129
Days until invited journal paper is due: 129
Days until my next recital: 129
Days until commencement: 184

Number of papers I need to write between now and the time my thesis is due: >= 3
Number of conferences I will be attending: >= 2

Days until my nervous breakdown: ???

I don't think my parents will be seeing much of me after this week before the end of March.

Habeas citation!

I've already had a pair of papers published; I've now just learned that my papers have been cited--by someone not in my group!

Now all I need is about a dozen more to get a faculty job. . . .

Am I too loud?

To my surprise, the Chamber Chorus concert I sang in last week was reviewed by MIT's student newspaper, The Tech. My solo contribution was described as follows:

Ahmed E. Ismail G, baritone, resonated deep into the auditorium and was a brilliant contrast to the softer voice of the preceding soloist.

What the reviewer neglected to mention that I was situated a good fifteen feet back on the platform from the other soloists, perhaps to counteract the same difference the reviewer highlighted. It looks like I need to be more careful when working with other singers in the same program. . . .

Must-see TV?

The hotel bar in which I'm currently dealing with three days' worth of junk spam (and occasionally useful e-mails) is currently showing the final match between X3D Fritz and Garry Kasparov. I'm not quite sure what to make of it. For the most part, I'm watching ESPN2 demonstrate talk about chess moves and positions. Although I have to admit, I don't understand what's the point of using the 3D glasses to see the match.

Caveat emptor

So, while at my conference, I try to get some wireless internet access--so that I don't have to deal with 500 e-mails when I return to town after a week. However, the hotel I'm staying at doesn't offer it; being a budget hotel in downtown San Francisco, I apparently should be thankful that the walls have paint. The main conference hotel does offer wireless access--however, it costs about $6 per day. So, seeing that the Starbucks next door to the conference site offers T-mobile wireless access, I figured it would be worth a try. Firing up my browser, I see an option to "try" wireless access for 10 cents per minute. So far, so good.

Proceeding to the account registration page, I quickly fill everything out, check the "opt-out" boxes, and do a quick scan of the terms of service. It's then that I notice the fine print that T-Mobile hopes nobody sees: the 10 cents per minute is valid only after 60 minutes of time, for which you're charged $6, whether or not you actually use the full 60 minutes. So, not only is there no rollover, you're being charged every time you login. I don't care what reality you choose to live in (although one can probably make a convincing argument that living in San Francisco is not, in fact, living in reality), $6 per e-mail check-in is absolutely ludicrous. I think what I'll probably end up doing is getting internet access on Tuesday and on Thursday (the two days I'll spend most of the day at the conference), and hoping for the best in the interim.

Who cares?

Contrary to what Pandagon suggests, the most important comment in this article about the 30-hour Senate anti-filibuster filibuster isn't the final comment, it's the one before it: "Who cares about judicial appointments?"

The fact that so many "average" Americans--the ones who will probably decide if Emperor Bush will keep his crown for four more years--don't realize how big control of the judiciary is to the right is, without a doubt, one of the more frightening realities of contemporary politics.

When the Democrats have been in office, the primary quality sought in the judiciary has been even-handedness--and hence the tendency to appoint from the center-left to center-right of the ideological spectrum. The right tends to appoint conservative ideologues, as is clearly seen from the nominees that have been going through in the last few years.

The main problem is that judges are appointed for life, while congress and the president are re-elected every few years. Thus, if you can keep control of one branch of government--say, the judiciary--for decades at a time, it makes it much easier to maintain control, so long as pesky problems such as incapacitation and death do not rear their ugly heads.

On the road again

Alas, no updates recently, or for a while, as I'll be out west in lovely San Francisco for the next week or so.

Updates as wireless access and comments worth making warrant.

How the not-so-mighty have fallen

In the last few days, I have seen a flurry of Maaco commercials starring that noted thespian, Burt Reynolds. For an actor who has starred in over 100 TV series, movies, and feature films, the fact that in the last six years his only accomplishments of note are Boogie Nights and a voice credit in Grand Theft Auto, it's a fairly sad end to a fairly average Hollywood career.

Gag orders

In the White House and don't like the questions you're getting from your opposition?

Simple solution: muzzle questions by making them go through committee chairmen who are on your side. No more questions, but it'll set a lovely precedent for when the shoe's on the other foot.

Indifference

So yesterday was Election Day. While I understand that it's my civic responsibility to vote, I didn't really find sufficient justification for me to take the extra time out of my schedule to go and actually do it this year.

Part of the problem is that Cambridge's government has an indirect mayoral election: an instant runoff voting scheme is used to elect councillors, none of whom have campaigned this year with sufficient zeal that I felt compelled to vote for them.

In addition, the other major issue--rent control--was something I could see being problematic either way. The pros are obvious--students like me don't have to absorb 15-20 percent rent increases each year. The cons are equally obvious--since rates are controlled by law, there isn't much incentive on the part of landlords and property managers to invest much in their properties, since their return on investment won't be much, if anything. So, I didn't know which way to vote on that issue, and thus, I stayed out of this election.

It of course goes without saying that next year's election is far more important, and especially as I will in all likelihood be casting my ballot in a state where the race might be in dispute, I will do my level best to cast a ballot.

Don't burst my bubble

Sometimes you have to laugh, because otherwise you'd have to cry.

How much more heartache before we realize what a mess we're making of the whole situation in Iraq?

Ahime!

No, I haven't forgotten how to spell my own name. "Ahime!" is an Italian exclamation--it roughly works out to somewhere between "Ay carumba" and "Woe is me!"

In this particular case, I'm grumbling because never before has the invention of a "Diction Stick"--with optional bayonet attachment [TM]--seemed so useful.

The chorus in which I'm singing is working on Monteverdi's Lagrime d'amante. One of the words that keeps coming up in the text is "quel," meaning "that" or "which." Now in Italian, the pronunciation of quel should be [kwel]. A lot of people, however, are trying to sing [kel], which is the correct way to sing it--in French. Last year, when we tried to sing Martin's Ode à la musique--in French--people kept trying to sing [kel] as [kwel]. I can't win.

Inbox fun

The tactics get stranger and stranger. What makes me think I want to open an attachment, when I receive six copies of the same attachment in under an hour? Particularly when they're from someone I don't know, and the e-mail subject is "Re[2]: our private photos iuoiwwww."

Just a hunch, but maybe, just maybe, it's a virus. . . .

The pity of war

Anybody who thinks modern warfare is entirely impersonal should have a look at this summary of the responses of family members and friends of the thirty-three soldiers who died in Iraq last month.

Although I doubt this will get to President "I don't read the papers" Bush.

Hitting the nail

Anybody who thought that reconstruction in Iraq was going to be a cakewalk should read this New York Times Magazine piece on why things have gone so horribly wrong.