Just some random notes
There follow three random, unrelated things that I have recently found noteworthy in my life (or, at least, felt like babbling about):
The End of Cerebus (Part II)
In March 2004, on time and as anticipated for the preceding twenty-some-odd years, Cerebus came to an end. Over this last weekend, some 17 months after it's conclusion, I finished reading it.
"What took you so damn long? It's just a comic book!"
Well, let me tell you. See, for as long as I can remember, whenever I get new comics, I order and read them from worst to best. Put the drek on top, save the good stuff for later. I could probably count on one hand the comics that I've been so eager to read that they got moved to the top of the pile in defiance of this rule. So this was part of the problem. Cerebus was very near the bottom. I don't read a whole lot. Some nights, one or two comics before going to bed; other nights, nothing. I've never been much of a reader. And since I've been getting up around 5am on weekdays, I don't like staying up late reading. So when Cerebus ended last year, I had about a dozen issues of it sitting at the bottom of my pile. And most weeks, I'd get through my new comics, and no further, before the next week's came in. So those Cerebuses just sat there, sometimes untouched for literally months at a time. Sometimes, I'd finish off 2 or 3 issues in a reading spurt of a week or two.
"A week or two?!? How long does it take to you read a comic book?"
Normally, about 20 minutes. I'm a slow reader, and I enjoy the art. But Cerebus... is different. There's lots of small typey stuff. The second-to-last story line was not a comic book in the traditional sense. It was, rather, lots and lots of small typey stuff. Specifically, it was Cerebus's personal interpretation of the Torah (as dictated to Woody Allen). And a rather odd interpretation it was. See, according to Cerebus (and, apparently, Dave Sim), God made the universe, and all these other spirits, including YWHW (pronounced "YooHWHoo"), which is not, in fact, another name for God, but instead a separate entity, which is sort of this diluted feminist... oh, nevermind. Trying to explain Dave Sim in less than an hour is just futile. Suffice it to say, it was the Torah, with lots of odd commentary thrown in. Well, not all the Torah, of course. But enough to fill up 8 or so 20 page comic books (with frequent illustrations) with very small type. I must say, while I generally enjoy Dave Sim's prose, this was rather mind-numbing, and I seriously doubt I'll ever read it again, but it needed to be read once.
Anyway, after the 20 pages of "comic" (or whatever), there are generally another 20 pages at the back of additional small typey stuff. Essays, interviews, letters, etc. For example, for the last two years of the book, the back half was taken up by:
"Islam, My Islam" At some point, Dave Sim found God. His faith is a combination of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and... his own personal philosophies. This essay (which, without bothering to check, must've run somewhere between 50 & 100 pages) was a history of the Islamic faith, the middle-east, and an analysis of the current political and social climate in that region.
"Why Canada Slept" was his dissection of the socialist feminist Canadian government and their cowardice at not aiding the United States in our post-9/11 War on Terror (this is his take on the situation, btw, not mine).
"Getting Riel" was an interview with Chester Brown about his comic biography of Louis Riel.
And there were also lots of letters and other miscellaneous writings and rants.
Sorry, I'm rambling. My point was, Cerebus took me a loooonnngg time to read, and since it was constantly being buried by newer comics, I just wasn't getting to it. But after all this time since its conclusion, and and additional 15 years of reading it, I finally finished Cerebus. So now I can finally get to the few things that I deemed so good that they were actually placed below Cerebus in my stack.
Back to School
I am considering returning to grad school in a year to get a PhD in computer science. I'd like to improve my job prospects in academia, and I also just like being in school. This is still a ways off, though, so we'll see what happens. In the mean time, however, I'm taking a class! Cal State Long Beach, which is only 10 minutes from work (which is only 10 minutes from home) makes it very easy to take a few classes without actually enrolling. So this semester, I'm taking an Assembly Language Programming course. It doesn't look very hard, and I'm sure I could learn the stuff on my own, but I wanted to get my feet wet in a real CS course, and this seemed like a good place to start. I must say, though, after being out of school for 8 years, and teaching for 4 of those, sitting in a class with a bunch of 20 year olds and listening to a lecture is more than a little odd. And trying not to smirk when he explained why there are 2^8 possible ways that you can set the bits in a byte was... not easy :-) Being in a real class again made me very happy, though, and I knew right away that this is what I want to be doing.
The Puerto Rico Expansion
On Monday night, I got the opportunity to play the new Puerto Rico expansion with jmpava, neonelephant, and regisman. It was a lot of fun and I look forward to playing it again. And if reliable strategies were hard to nail down in the original, they seem nearly impossible with the expansion, given the rules for how to include the new buildings. But (for those familiar with the original) to give you an idea of how different the game can be, regisman won by 8 points, and his only producing plantations were one corn and one sugar, and he got only 8 VPs from shipping. That's just not right....
The End of Cerebus (Part II)
In March 2004, on time and as anticipated for the preceding twenty-some-odd years, Cerebus came to an end. Over this last weekend, some 17 months after it's conclusion, I finished reading it.
"What took you so damn long? It's just a comic book!"
Well, let me tell you. See, for as long as I can remember, whenever I get new comics, I order and read them from worst to best. Put the drek on top, save the good stuff for later. I could probably count on one hand the comics that I've been so eager to read that they got moved to the top of the pile in defiance of this rule. So this was part of the problem. Cerebus was very near the bottom. I don't read a whole lot. Some nights, one or two comics before going to bed; other nights, nothing. I've never been much of a reader. And since I've been getting up around 5am on weekdays, I don't like staying up late reading. So when Cerebus ended last year, I had about a dozen issues of it sitting at the bottom of my pile. And most weeks, I'd get through my new comics, and no further, before the next week's came in. So those Cerebuses just sat there, sometimes untouched for literally months at a time. Sometimes, I'd finish off 2 or 3 issues in a reading spurt of a week or two.
"A week or two?!? How long does it take to you read a comic book?"
Normally, about 20 minutes. I'm a slow reader, and I enjoy the art. But Cerebus... is different. There's lots of small typey stuff. The second-to-last story line was not a comic book in the traditional sense. It was, rather, lots and lots of small typey stuff. Specifically, it was Cerebus's personal interpretation of the Torah (as dictated to Woody Allen). And a rather odd interpretation it was. See, according to Cerebus (and, apparently, Dave Sim), God made the universe, and all these other spirits, including YWHW (pronounced "YooHWHoo"), which is not, in fact, another name for God, but instead a separate entity, which is sort of this diluted feminist... oh, nevermind. Trying to explain Dave Sim in less than an hour is just futile. Suffice it to say, it was the Torah, with lots of odd commentary thrown in. Well, not all the Torah, of course. But enough to fill up 8 or so 20 page comic books (with frequent illustrations) with very small type. I must say, while I generally enjoy Dave Sim's prose, this was rather mind-numbing, and I seriously doubt I'll ever read it again, but it needed to be read once.
Anyway, after the 20 pages of "comic" (or whatever), there are generally another 20 pages at the back of additional small typey stuff. Essays, interviews, letters, etc. For example, for the last two years of the book, the back half was taken up by:
"Islam, My Islam" At some point, Dave Sim found God. His faith is a combination of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and... his own personal philosophies. This essay (which, without bothering to check, must've run somewhere between 50 & 100 pages) was a history of the Islamic faith, the middle-east, and an analysis of the current political and social climate in that region.
"Why Canada Slept" was his dissection of the socialist feminist Canadian government and their cowardice at not aiding the United States in our post-9/11 War on Terror (this is his take on the situation, btw, not mine).
"Getting Riel" was an interview with Chester Brown about his comic biography of Louis Riel.
And there were also lots of letters and other miscellaneous writings and rants.
Sorry, I'm rambling. My point was, Cerebus took me a loooonnngg time to read, and since it was constantly being buried by newer comics, I just wasn't getting to it. But after all this time since its conclusion, and and additional 15 years of reading it, I finally finished Cerebus. So now I can finally get to the few things that I deemed so good that they were actually placed below Cerebus in my stack.
Back to School
I am considering returning to grad school in a year to get a PhD in computer science. I'd like to improve my job prospects in academia, and I also just like being in school. This is still a ways off, though, so we'll see what happens. In the mean time, however, I'm taking a class! Cal State Long Beach, which is only 10 minutes from work (which is only 10 minutes from home) makes it very easy to take a few classes without actually enrolling. So this semester, I'm taking an Assembly Language Programming course. It doesn't look very hard, and I'm sure I could learn the stuff on my own, but I wanted to get my feet wet in a real CS course, and this seemed like a good place to start. I must say, though, after being out of school for 8 years, and teaching for 4 of those, sitting in a class with a bunch of 20 year olds and listening to a lecture is more than a little odd. And trying not to smirk when he explained why there are 2^8 possible ways that you can set the bits in a byte was... not easy :-) Being in a real class again made me very happy, though, and I knew right away that this is what I want to be doing.
The Puerto Rico Expansion
On Monday night, I got the opportunity to play the new Puerto Rico expansion with jmpava, neonelephant, and regisman. It was a lot of fun and I look forward to playing it again. And if reliable strategies were hard to nail down in the original, they seem nearly impossible with the expansion, given the rules for how to include the new buildings. But (for those familiar with the original) to give you an idea of how different the game can be, regisman won by 8 points, and his only producing plantations were one corn and one sugar, and he got only 8 VPs from shipping. That's just not right....