Here is another video of German lit geekiness. Werner Herzog is a well-known German filmmaker since the 60's that,--well, if you know him I don't need to explain this, and if you don't know him or his works, this won't be funny to you anyway.

This is What I Love About Mac Computing

I have to begin this post with a confession: I am an equal opportunity computer despisor. I think Macs and PCs can be equally annoying--just in completely different ways. For simplicity's sake, I stay with PCs just so I only have one type of annoyance to deal with. Recently, however, I had a discussion with a friend of mine that is whole-heartedly in the Mac camp. This video made me think of him and his love of the "simplicity" the Mac revolution has provided us.
It reminds me of a video I found some time ago that you can check out Here.
I just wish computer programmers and designers didn't assume they know better what I want than I do.

My good friend in Afganistan

This video maybe best explains my mixed emotions about getting out of the military. Joey and I went to Officer Basic Course together and I spent almost all of my free time with him, his wife, and his two boys. I was miserable at the time, since my wife had to stay home and work. As a result, I became very good friends with his family during my four months at Ft. Huachuca, Az. I honestly struggled in the Army. I am not the best around authority figures, the culture often runs counter to my family values, and the Army never fit into my long-term career goals. One of the things we used to joke about together were the "rules" that we developed while at OBC, one of which was, for example, "never confront a military situation with logic." or the Military corolary to Occam's razor: "given two possible solutions in a military situation, all things being equal, the most complcated, dificult to understand option will be the one chosen." Good memories.

Now Joey is in Bagram away from his family for Christmas, and I think pretty lonely. He is not your average soldier--although there are more like him than you would think. Joey is mild-mannered, never seems to raise his voice in anger, a loving father and husband, a democrat (and from Utah no less) and one of the most intelligent people I know. But he has put himself in harm's way and I did everything I could to stay out of it. A fellow ROTC cadet that we both knew, Bill Jacobsen, died a few years ago in Iraq when the mess hall he was eating in was attacked by a suicide bomber. I really appreciate the contrast of the music with the military equipment in the background. He is due home in March. I hope everything goes well and he returns safely.

More Anna-Sophie Mutter

Ok I just found this and I like it. Brings back memories. I had forgotten that Peter Schilling was German.

still alone, cool video

Looks like I still haven't been found, which makes my corner of the net a nice quiet backwater eddy in the cyberspace sea. Is it possible to be completely anonymous and obscure while posting thoughts for all to see? Blogging seems to me to be an expressly exhibitionist activity. Yet here I am, the proverbial falling tree in the woods that no one hears. Fine with me. I like my peace and quiet.

I found this video the other day. I will link to it since I can't seem to put it right in the entry



Looks like I figured it out after all. We had a brief culture thing in my class about Anne-Sophie Mutter, but I decided not to use it. A few days later I stumbled across this video on YouTube, and decided it was too good not to share with the students. It is a lot less dry than just reading about a musician. and since the music I usually bring into the class looks more like this:



It was a nice change up. I prefer the Culture with a capital "C" to the "c" culture anyway.