Jailbreaking

I have posted some stuff about jailbreaking over here: http://choraltech.blogspot.com/2011/08/jailbreaking.html

Smugmug is up to date

The photos on http://cantorman.smugmug.com are now caught up.  The mystifying tubes in Oklahoma are still cooling after that!

Skip a bit, brother

Let's see, where'd I leave off?  I had a lovely visit with friends Delia and Geoff on Friday, Aug 6.  This is in Charlottesville, VA, wherein also lies Monticello. ( Pictures on Facebook, and soon enough on Smugmug, but for a sneak preview look at the back of a nickel. )

Next day I had a fabulous steak dinner in Charleston, West Virginia.  ("Blue ridge mountains, Shenandoah River.")  I say of it what Kirk said of Alpha Centauri: "A beautiful place, you ought to see it sometime."  My waiter instructed me in the proper way to jailbreak an iPhone (jailbreakme.com) when he saw the iPad I carry around.

Speaking of skipping a bit, Brother, in Kentucky I caught up with friend Todd who is a Baptist minster there.  Last communication with Todd: 35 years ago, when we were both ten and growing up in Walnut Creek.  His dad got a job in Stone Mountain, GA, and so that relationship was put on hiatus for 3.5 decades.  Todd's memory is to mine like "Millions of Colors" is to CGA (16 colors for those of you who never heard of the 80's), so to say that we reminisced is not entirely accurate.  He reminisced, and I was in awe. I have had other experiences in my life of being presented with old memories from an external source.  Suddenly a bit of memory floods back.  Usually my sister is responsible.

Todd's word for my religious orientation was ecumenical although I think interfaith is better because my stuff incorporates ideas from many world religions besides Christianity.  I think ecumenical has a Christian specificity. In any case, he recommend a book by CS Lewis called "Mere Christianity" in which CS Lewis conducts a philosophical examination of Christianity and its place in the world.  I got it from Audible and have been listening as I drive from Arkansas to Oklahoma.  It's going to take a few listens with "rewind" close at hand.  It's very approachable, I just want to repeat certain points.  I don't agree with everything CS Lewis says but it's the first reasoned statement for the case for Christianity I've come across, and I'm impressed.  If you are the kind of person who must have brain food in addition to faith, I recommend this book.

A Traveller's Koan

How do you get the most out of the trip while still relaxing?

Photos

I am uploading photos to http://cantorman.smugmug.com for those who eschew Facebook.

Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address

I walked up to the Lincoln Memorial and read this inside it:

Fellow countrymen: At this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office, there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement, somewhat in detail, of a course to be pursued, seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured. 

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago, all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it-- all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war-- seeking to dissolve the Union, and divide effects, by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war; but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive; and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. And the war came. 

One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the Southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union, even by war; while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. 

Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes his aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered--that of neither has been answered fully.
The Almighty has his own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses! for it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through his appointed time, he now wills to remove, and that he gives to both North and South this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to him? Fondly do we hope--fervently do we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether." 

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations.

That's statesmanship.

NYC in a day

I did the Louvre in a day, too.  I also eat fast.  My savoring is of the intensity of the thing.

For NYC, it came down to:

• a peek at Grand Central Station
• Times Square
• American Eagle clothiers (you try walking in August heat in cargo pants.  I bought shorts)
• a very long walk in Central Park which will be most of my memories of NYC, including the Imagine mosaic memorial for John Lennon)
• a Broadway Show (Addams Family, the Musical, starring Bebe Neuwirth as the mysterious Morticia and Nathan Lane as the passionate Gomez, although the entire cast did a fabuolous job and each of them stole the show at some point, including the chorus [note to self: discover how to steal the show as a chorus member without interrupting the flow of the show - these guys were great at it)
• The Empire State Building (all the way up to the blimp deck on the 102nd floor)

Fashion

Fashion to New Yorkers seems as inherent as revolution is to Berkeley.  The women were all dressed in ways you just don't see in California.  Nice stuff.  I tried not to stare too much.  The only place I've seen better is Paris, where both sexes take it up a notch.  

Nice People

Sorry, New York - your rep for being assholes is lost to Boston.  A bus driver gave me a break when I needed one, a guy pulled me out of harm's way when I wasn't looking, people were friendly.  Reputation: undeserved.

Tomorrow

Washington, DC

On The Road Again

I'm on the road again. Let me explain.  No, there is too much.  Let me sum up.

Niagara Falls

Lots of water going over a cliff.  I forgot my passport so I had to look from the USA side.  From the Canadian side, it's lots of water going over a cliff, eh?  I brought the water with me: it rained all the way to Martha's Vineyard.  I still did it in a day.  At 61 mph (62 gets you hydroplaning), it was a long day.

Martha's Vineyard


How to encapsulate a week?    I am tanned, plied with fudge, and not unbitten by numerous mosquitos.  MV is an island with beaches, farmer's markets, farmers, artisans, and more college students with summer jobs then you can shake a stick at.  I think they're all there, in fact.  If yours is missing go look there.

I spent time with Hildreth's family and we had a visit from Madeleine.  They are just grand, in the 19th century sense of that word. And most of them are foodies.  I have yet to see my portion of the grocery bill, but hear me: It was worth it.  Quahog stew.  Lobster bisque.  A delicious whitefish I can't remember the name of.  My contribution was the numerous wines from Galena.  The Pinot was particularly nice, thanks Jane!

Harvard, MIT, Wellesley


Harvard has a yard, but all the interesting stuff doesn't happen there.  Here's a school that's so old it predates the subway that runs underneath it, and it pays said subway a considerable annual sum to get them to slow their trains as they go under the school.  Can you imagine being awakened in the middle of a lecture by a rumbling subterranean beast?  Inconceivable.

MIT has a hallway that is as long as several buildings put end to end, because that it what it does.  It is called the Infinite Hallway for that reason.  Haven't these people heard of finite approximations?

Wellesley looks like Hogwarts, except without the dragons.  There is a lake, though.

NYC


Walked through Central Park and had dinner at Table d'Hotes (Thanks, Delia!) which was veal parmigiano with risotto and spinach, followed by poached pears with raspberry ice gelato.

Jersey City


is where I am as I write this.  There's a shuttle to NYC so I don't have to drive through it again.  I could, but Paris was easier because the cars move fast.  Boston was easier because the cars move.  Rudely, but they move. In NYC, they just kinda stop.

Tomorrow


The Museum Mile