http://search.deviantart.com/?q=by:Iphian&section=today deviantART RSS for by:Iphian en-us Copyright 2009, deviantART.com Wed, 16 Dec 2009 14:40:33 PST deviantART.com http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://s.deviantart.com/minish/widgets/apple-touch-icon-precomposed.png http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/27933207/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/27933207/ Sat, 24 Oct 2009 00:40:27 PDT
Uruk is in it for the long haul! It'll be awhile though. Not sure who I'm typing to anymore, either--nobody reads this!

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/27364465/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/27364465/ Tue, 22 Sep 2009 19:33:40 PDT
Maybe.

Not a lot of time or drive for these things anymore, but I'll see what I can do.

Involves Fyooch McAvoy and his various adventures, or adventurous variants, or variable advents, or advantageous variety. Variety hour advanced?

So I'll be workin' on that.

Might take another crack at "Raisins" sometime... maybe....

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26888582/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26888582/ Sat, 29 Aug 2009 04:02:19 PDT
And so there.

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26831881/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26831881/ Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:50:53 PDT
]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26791875/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26791875/ Mon, 24 Aug 2009 08:50:01 PDT
]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26746605/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26746605/ Sat, 22 Aug 2009 01:58:40 PDT
Sorry, everybody!

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26662203/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26662203/ Tue, 18 Aug 2009 00:28:50 PDT
]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26641675/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26641675/ Mon, 17 Aug 2009 02:38:38 PDT
Florida, then Georgia, soon--tantalizingly soon. Just need the goddamn money. always the money.

My green tambourine! Listen when I plaaaaaaaaaaayyyy....

Pandora is playing this at me, which I'm okay with. It only plays what I like, so I must like it, right?

be sure to check out academicearth.org. It is the best.

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26402684/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/26402684/ Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:11:02 PDT
[link].

Also, check it out: [link] !
It's terrible!

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/24314009/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/24314009/ Sat, 18 Apr 2009 19:32:26 PDT
My thoughts are of long trips and the east coast and the wonderful woman waiting to see me.
My thoughts are of big changes and the slow progress of self-gratification.
My thoughts are of a Garden of Light and heads full of wine and music.
My thoughts are of women dancing and men laughing and the rich, thick air of a warm, moony evening.

]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/24245379/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/24245379/ Tue, 14 Apr 2009 19:00:42 PDT
]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/22543918/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/22543918/ Mon, 12 Jan 2009 13:39:40 PST
]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9592152/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9592152/ Thu, 03 Aug 2006 21:45:13 PDT
A while back (last summer) I was dicking around with my digital video cam and some quarters. As the spin speed of the quarters falls into harmonics with the frame capture rate of the camera, weird "rubber quarter" effects are produced. Waverly Films has a clip of the EXACT same footage I've got. Bastards.

Oh well, they're rich and I'm not. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9582852/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9582852/ Wed, 02 Aug 2006 23:36:38 PDT
It's 2006 now. The point at which "the Future" was supposed to have kicked in is overdue. I'm supposed to hover everywhere, and every action is supposed to have an "o-matic" machine to go with it. Wash-O-Matic. Debug-O-Matic. Walk-O-Matic.

This is a Fundamental. A Conservative, old-world look at the Future (now the Present.)

Unfortunately, a diabolical, greedy, Luddite, RADICAL cling to Oil is keeping it all down.

Where's my personal robot assistant?

Where's grandma's hoverchair?

I mean, robots have been around for a LONG time now, where's their mass-production and domestic integration?

Where's my flying car? Where's my ELECTRIC car?

It's like being cavemen, using clubs and things, but being able to SEE rifles and agriculture inside a glass case.

"Ug want wheel."

"UG CAN NO HAVE WHEEL. UG USE THOG'S PANTENTED BOOTS LIKE EVERYONE ELSE. GIVE THOG MORE ROCKS."

"Ug sad."

Also, fuck credit cards and paperwork. I think we should barter again. I'll trade you three fish for that there multi-phase voltage inversion module.

I think I'm going to buy a neon sign just to harvest the 15 KV transformer out of it.

I also want a wrist compass to go next to my watch.

------------------------------------

On the opposite side of this are things like:

Kitewings.

[link]

Powerisers.

[link]

Fluorescent light dimmers.

[link]

Fiber Optics

[link]


[link]

Asimo.

[link]

Love Sac.

[link]


The Love Sac is the only one of the above-mentioned products that has made any significant change to my lifestyle. (Fuck beds, chairs, and futons. All-in-one, and more cofortable than all of them.)

Where's my laser gun? Why can't my computer tell me the future? Why doesn't cold fusion work yet? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9506659/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9506659/ Wed, 26 Jul 2006 23:48:46 PDT
I need something with more range than tin whistles and recorders, but with the same carriable, semi-abusable quality. Ocarinas, maybe? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9442330/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9442330/ Thu, 20 Jul 2006 21:37:28 PDT and something about the flavor mix made a chickeny-type of taste. I put the pretzels away and dumped the root beer in the sink.

I wrote a poem and submitted it about an hour ago and it hasn't registered on my page yet. Oh well. A poems essence is really out there in the ether, right? Like looking through a window at part of the whole. A poem is just seeing the sofa in the full living room of life, right?

Some of the secret levels on Super Mario World are fucking HARD.

I miss my friends a LOT.

I find myself referring to that ethereal singularity that makes up everything as God when I talk philosophy with Christians, especially my family. It stops them from being so critical and lets the point of the discussion be the center of discussion.

I want to learn more math, music, and job skills. I'm going to Ivy Tech for Welding, I think. Easy money. That money will pay for Electronics school. And then Industrial Automation. IndyAuto. Race cars. Fuck that. Robots.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnn nnnnnnnndddddddd a giant bout of depression and insomnia sets in. I've been drinking a double espresso twice a day just to kill the headaches. Maybe I should stop. If the curse is the cure and the cure's what ails you, you should probably quit, right?

I think I have lice.

no new experiences lately... just work and heat. It's really starting to get to me. my life used to be all destiny and coincidence, and an involuntary journey of self-exploration. now it's just this dull whine, like when a capacitor's going bad or there's a mosquito in the room. I'm a dead man. My soul sleeps and doesn't see what the eyes want to show it.

No learning, no progress. I need a catalyst for change.

Or else it's my own fault. I am lazy. I have committed suicide in this way.

At least I'll know what it's like to be poor. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9347922/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9347922/ Tue, 11 Jul 2006 20:36:20 PDT -Colin Meloy of the Decemberists



I feel strongly about my writing materials. My pencils and pens, the paper I write on. Yesterday, I found a leather-bound journal book. BLANK! The word "JOURNAL" isn't written on the front, there's not an explanatory page at the beginning about what a journal is, it's just straight-up leather-bound LINED PAPER. That shouldn't be hard to find, but it IS. It really is. But I found one. Kickass.

Also, I found good pens. (The pens cost more than the journal!)


This means that most of my journal entries will be placed inside of that new dwelling, and then transcribed to Internetext here at DA. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9305209/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9305209/ Fri, 07 Jul 2006 18:59:33 PDT
They have a bottle of this stuff called "The Source," which ranks in at something like 1.5 million Scoville units. It's $100 for a one-ounce bottle. Craziness.

Also, my favorite Mead Composition notebooks are 50 cents at Target. Huzzah. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9266623/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9266623/ Tue, 04 Jul 2006 00:59:31 PDT
Real, true insomnia. Can't sleep. No coffee, no sugar, just pure no-sleepin-for-me.

I have to work tomorrow, too. Suck.

Insomnia is usually accompanied or followed by a brief attack of The Crazies. Where I say things I don't mean too, see stuff that isn't. Hear good music that nobody ever wrote playing in my head. Lose my balance and learn to write.

Words flow more easily. My head is clearer. It's clear the way a driveway is clear in September, right after you sweep the leaves off of it. It's gritty and hard, and there's still little flecks of junk in the cracks, but it's clearer now.

I can dictate and annunciate more fluenty, more accurately, more articulately and daintily, more like alcohol and less like paste.

"The young boy, his hare shorn and his glasses skewed, tumbled clumsily and eagerly through the posey-speckled meadow. He was chasing something intangible. He couldn't see it, but he knew it was there, laughing jovially and full of life, coursing through the wind the way that dandelion seeds do when a loving zephyr moves them from their home. It was Music, it was God, it was Love and Life and Joy, all if it there in that August breeze. It smelled of honey, vanilla, lilac and jasmine, it was graceful and green like a contented jaguar lazily loping through a willow's branches, barely obscured by the dangling curtain of dew-dropped leaves. There it was, right in front of the boy. The Meaning of Life, the Tao, and he caught it. He was it. Oneness with it all, to be the wind. To learn not to learn, to stop differentiating between yourself and the wind and the ground, to be a vacuum and a solid, to simply see and feel and taste without wondering why."

Insomnia. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9265016/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9265016/ Mon, 03 Jul 2006 20:57:06 PDT
I don't even see my friends anymore.

So then, what can I do?

Also, is the world changing, climatically? Does it matter? Am I doing this?

Too many coincidences. Exact change all the time lately. No extra money, never not enough. Exact damn change all the time.

Things on TV when I think they might be. Movies that I haven't seen in years suddenly appearing after I think about them.

Children playing "stay on the black tiles" in the store hopping in perfect synchrosy with the music and the beeping of the "system failure" warning light. It's toe-tapping, really.

Scared and greasy. My hair is getting too long again, and my hat is in Nevada somewhere. I'll bet it's been sun-bleached into a maroon color by now. May it adorn a deserving head.

I only own one functional pair of pants. The rest are torn and tattered, rough and ruined, dirty and destroyed. The ones I wear are slowly fading with patches and re-sewn seams.

Writing has been poor. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9225542/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9225542/ Thu, 29 Jun 2006 20:44:42 PDT
Sharks.
Bears.
Anacondas.
Gorillas.
Nobura's Jellyfish.
Venus Flytraps (not an animal anway, but oh well)
Crocodiles and Alligators
Killer Whales
Vultures
Manta Rays
(Dinosaurs, but they don't count.)
Really big, mean dogs
Big Cats (lions, tigers, ocelots, pumas, leopards, etc.)
Hissing Cockroaches and All Giant Bugs, Especially Those Huge Millipedes ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9204589/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9204589/ Tue, 27 Jun 2006 21:16:39 PDT
I also feel very strongly that I've made some very poor decisions in the past year or two.

Things I should have kept, but didn't.

People that hate me now that didn't used to.

People that I value.

I pretty well dicked myself because I was too obsessed with some superficial bullshit to realize what my future was supposed to be.

FUCK.


Is it too late now? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9183553/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9183553/ Sun, 25 Jun 2006 22:14:30 PDT [link]

WHAT THE FUCK.

These are FAKE, right? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9003151/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/9003151/ Wed, 07 Jun 2006 20:26:51 PDT
We're stopping once in Chicago and again in Denver. That's too many planes. I'm scared shitless of flying. Stopping only once in Chicago on the way back.

Then, when I get back on Tuesday, there's a six-day stretch where I'll be in town, and then I go to Kansas City for the electronics contest. That runs from the 19th to the 24th.

Too much planes. I'm so scared of flying. I'd sooner die in a car accident than survive a plane crash.

I'm bringing books. (None of my friends are going... A stranger in a strange land, if you will.) ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8896680/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8896680/ Sat, 27 May 2006 21:16:00 PDT


Help me out, somebody: I need a good pen-name. For if I ever write something worth publishing.

How's "Oliver Forty" sound? Once, an administrator accidentally called me "Oliver," which was weird. Nobody there looked like me, and so far as I know, nobody named Oliver went to the school. A literary reference, perhaps?

The surname "Forty" I pulled from nowhere. I thought it sounded catchy, like George Orwell. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8838730/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8838730/ Sun, 21 May 2006 19:57:03 PDT
Of course, I'll admit to hoaxing it shortly after creating it. I'm not looking for trouble, just a laugh. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8811415/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8811415/ Thu, 18 May 2006 19:50:29 PDT
"Great Stuff" foam is the single best artistic medium there is, so there. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8792127/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8792127/ Tue, 16 May 2006 19:24:48 PDT
I just found about a million old cartoons that need to be scanned and uploaded. I NEED A SCANNER. NOW. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8791765/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8791765/ Tue, 16 May 2006 18:47:17 PDT
A character blip is a portrait of a character in a single moment of time. A writer's sketch. This blip is as much about the fat, greasy Jersey man as it is about Gary, but Gary is the focus. The foreground.

Also, built a tiny robot in ten minutes by hacking and taping together two servos. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8734017/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8734017/ Wed, 10 May 2006 19:25:33 PDT

"Fracas" is the best word. The singular best.


Fuck Star Wars Battlefront 2. On hard mode, that game is ridiculous. My gun doesn't work as well as the evil robot guns.


So summer's pretty much here, the subtropical rain that douses our Midwestern province is a blessing. It makes it green, makes me feel alive as the plants are.



Hm. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8723992/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8723992/ Tue, 09 May 2006 18:36:23 PDT
"I'm getting tired of these snakes."

It's like all the stupid humor of the internet went and balled itself up into a big wad of SLJ shooting some snakes. They can't be serious.

Ah, what should I do about stuff? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8644203/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8644203/ Mon, 01 May 2006 17:24:38 PDT
Sinewaves.

It's like my mind and spirit were out of phase. Now they're in phase again. I'm walking outside more. Smelling the air. Noticing the amazing existential fantasy of trees. Tress are the single best thing of anything. looking back, almost everything I've written that I liked had a tree in it. I'm very (what's the botanical term for tree?)-centric.

Oak is nice, so is poplar. Linden, too. So green.

Anyways, things to come:

Another namesake tale, simply titled "The Iphian." this time "Iphian" refers to a man from the city Iphia, so nothing big there. His name is Ansel Buren. I've dreamt up a religion for his nation and a creation myth. Also, the sun was supposed to have exploded, as predicted by both science and religion, fifty years ago at the start of the story. Global warming is a key theme. Hard to get out of my head with the nonstop hammering of this and other apocalyptic predictions of present day. Global warming has occured and there are tropical trees thriving next to dying desiduous pines. The rising action really starts with the main character sleeping on a park bench (another recurring theme with my characters!) between a pine and a palm. (Between a Pine and a Palm may be a better title...) (TREES AGAIN!)

So yeah, I'm gonna go take a nap below the old tree in my backyard. It's wet and lifey out there. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8553383/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8553383/ Sat, 22 Apr 2006 17:36:52 PDT
I took first place! I WIN! Now I have to board an airplane and go to Kansas City in June to compete there at Nationals.

Plus, now I have an assload of scholarships. Full-ride tuition for a year to Vicennes University if I want it. $2000 to Ivy Tech. I can do whatever I want now.

So hell yeah, life just got easier. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8493149/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8493149/ Sun, 16 Apr 2006 19:49:56 PDT
"Tales of Ordinary Madness,"
"Slouching Toward Nirvana,"
"Betting on the Muse," and
"Love is a Dog from Hell."

All of these are great, though some of the content in all four is questionable at best. Just some of it.

He's no Vonnegut, he's not. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8493148/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8493148/ Sun, 16 Apr 2006 19:46:08 PDT ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8472154/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8472154/ Fri, 14 Apr 2006 18:35:53 PDT
So I looked up the Fort Wayne City fire code.

It says that if it's not charcoal AND contained in a pit or grill, you can't do it without obtaining a permit from the fire department for every individual fire or else by getting special permission from the State, and then that special permission approved by the Fire Chief.

God damnit! All I want to do is make a place for small, controlled fires in MY OWN FUCKING BACK YARD. Nothing unreasonable. I'll even build it 30 feet from teh nearest tree.

I say do it anyway, honestly. Fuck that, y'know? It's a stupid rule. I understand why its there, and I understand it has to apply to everyone, but goddamnit, I want a fire in my backyard, fuck you, it's my backyard. It's my fire. I want my life to have backyard fires in it to cook hotdogs and marshmallows on. I want that. I do. I'm no belligerent dirtbag who's out to cause hell and break rules just to break them. I just want a fire in my backyard.

It's funny. If I asked my dad if I could build a fire in the back yard, he'd just say "Sure thing." I would build a pit, make a fire in it, and enjoy myself. That's all, the end. No disasterous housefire, no police or fire department involvement, no worry about breaking some stupid-ass rule.



If it's not Sudoku, it's fucking illegal somehow. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8462439/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8462439/ Thu, 13 Apr 2006 19:06:15 PDT

-----------------------------------------------------------



Robot's going good. Fully remote control with very little trouble. The caster wheel, though, sucks. Being made from a bicycle makes it a little wobbly. A lot wobbly. It shakes around like a bad shopping cart and falls off. I bought a decent caster today. Big beefy pneumatic tire fellow. 300 LB load capacity.

Next week will see work on the WHIFFLE BALL CANNON. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8431349/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8431349/ Mon, 10 Apr 2006 18:58:55 PDT ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8366348/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8366348/ Tue, 04 Apr 2006 18:00:54 PDT
"These are the words of him who has the sharp, double-edged sword. I know where you live..."

Funny, funny stuff.

I'ma finish reading Revelations, just for curiosity's sake.

Edit:

Further reading:


"Smoke rose from [the Abyss] like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. And out of the smoke locusts came down upon the earth and were given power..."

"The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces. Their hair was like women's hair, and their teeth were like lions' teeth. They had breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the thundering of many horses and chariots rushing ito battle. They had tails and stings like scorpions, and in their tails they had power..." <---Holy shit! Helicopters! ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8297790/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8297790/ Tue, 28 Mar 2006 18:14:59 PST
"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" flows perfectly to the tune of the Gilligan's Island theme song, making the Gilligan's Island theme song the most perfect poem in the English language. Overanalysis makes professors look like asses and ruins literature. Iambic pentameter is HIGHLY overrated.

"It is an ancient mariner
that stoppeth one of three..."

Eat shit, English.

------------------------------------------------------------

Wheels and drive system fixed onto 'bot chassis. I need some support brackets to hold more weight.

Worked on the switches today. Eight long, long lenghts of wire from each switch. Bright orange wire. Looks neat. Zip-tied it all together to make an eight-ply cord. I'm doing the second switch tomorrow, and then adding power. I'll be able to ride this beast tomorrow afternoon.

We're going to build a wiffle-ball launcher on top. It'll have a 180-degree yaw, possibly pitch, and some other cool stuff. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8257808/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8257808/ Fri, 24 Mar 2006 16:52:17 PST
I watched a special on Orang-Pendek the other night. Why no photos? Smells like bullshit. "I was so startled I dropped the camera." Now you're on TV. Way to go.

Footprints, hair, and credible scientists? Smells like not bullshit. how hard is it, though, to fake a footprint? And testing hair against ape hair? What if it was dog hair? You didn't test it against dog hair. Or cat hair. Or anything else except apes.

I'll just have to wait and see.

---------------------------------------------------

Robostuff:

Working on the switchboard now. Using a piece of hardboard to mount the switches and servos. Planning to build an absurdly strong, head-crushin' claw with a 30V worm-gear motor we found. Rock out.

I need L-brackets to mount the drive system.

Its gonna be fun. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8210664/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8210664/ Sun, 19 Mar 2006 19:30:19 PST
Things fit together like puzzle pieces. Wander off in the wrong direction on purpose and still end up where you need to be.

I was thinking about Scott and how I wonder what he's up to. K-PAX came on TV. The characters Prot and Scott are homologous, though the film character is a little cheesy. Obscure genius, next to impossible to understand most of the time.

Bukowski keeps popping up everywhere. Too many mentions. His books have basically been jumping off of shelves and into my field of view.

Robot-themed everything. Episode of the Simpsons where Homer makes Bart a battlebot on the same day I start building my robot and looking through old Battlebots tapes for design ideas. Transformers live-action movie.

God created the universe with lines and lines of code. Magic is the glitches. The decimals in the wrong place that throw little things out of whack.

Reading "A Confederacy of Dunces." Amazing. Crappy, amazing.

Strange music in my head. Whole symphonies of varied instruments thrumming their queer melodies, echoing in my skull. Angel trumpets and devil trombones.

The more I think about things, the more I learn, the less I remember how to function, it seems. I have trouble speaking more when I write or build more. I'm afraid that actually accomplishing anything large-scale will throw me off kilter entirely. Whacko, y'know?

Thinking about UFO's and ion wind and Venturi effect and saran wrap and balsa and 60-KV step-up transformers and superconductors and liquid nitrogen and foil and gyroscopes and that tiny motor some company made and Fibonacci spirals and Pi and Kafka and green paint and robots and magnets and multi-core processors and multi-core processor network supercomputers with fios and God Speed You Black Emperor and fishing line and plastic stir-sticks and parking meters and Vonnegut and acoustic waveforms and wave cancelling and gyro-electro-pneumatic wind compensation and neutral buyancy and military technology and Aspirin and kicking and screaming and bleeding and fighting and lemonade and the sun in July and the smell of grass and green salad with vinegrette and consciousness and plastics and super-massive atoms and stars and black holes and mixing them all up in a big dish and pouring out liquid amazement.


------------------------------------------------------------------

Robonews:

Drive system completed, but not attached. Had to buy some wheels from Harbor Freight Tools. Bike tires fucking suck. Also, trying to cut a perfect circle out of a piece of particle board with nothing but a scribe-line and a bent jigsaw and no clamps sucks. Taking a chunk out of the end of my thumb with some ceramic sucks. I need that thumb for hand-tightening bolts.

Tomorrow I worry about bubble-levels and switch systems.

Jay gets back tomorrow. His lazy ass can get to work on the manipulator. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8125464/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8125464/ Fri, 10 Mar 2006 20:56:06 PST

Myself and three other individuals are all working on a robot of my design. Today, we cut out a 33"X33" hexagon out of particle board. It's our initial mounting platform. This week, we worked on the castor wheel. On Monday we start working on mounting the gearboxes and attaching the primary wiring and switch systems. It's going to be a large remote-controlled jobby. Its wheels are all taken from bikes while the motors and gearbox are the result of laboriously tearing apart a "Power Wheels" jeep. Six four-volt batteries will power each motor, overdriving their normal operational parameters (though they test well up to 20 volts DC.) A three-by-three series-parallel connection will apply twelve volts and the parallel-aiding supply will give us more available power, extending battery life and adding a little torque.

The robot will feature differental steering at a set speed. Its load-carrying capacity ought to exceed around 300 lbs. The castor wheel is the chopped-off front steering system of a bicycle. We had to custom machine bearings for the wheels. (Bike tires are damned near impossible to mount to a gearbox. We'll have to custom machine some sort of mounting platform... Argh. Two of them.)

At any rate, it will have two wooden decks: one for the steering, power, and wiring, and the top for mounting the cool part of the robot: the arm or claw or cannon or whatever we're putting up there.

We have six servo-powering channels to work with, which is good. Servo-to-switch systems separate the power supply from the receiver. This prevents blowing out expensive parts. (The RC system [servos included] is worth $250 alone. The motors we're going to use for the 'bot parts are worth around $100 each, and we'll have at least four.)

We'll name and christen it eventually. Once we attach the top deck, I'll ride it around in the hallways, and weather permitting, the street outside.

3-10-06 ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8079209/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8079209/ Sun, 05 Mar 2006 22:30:56 PST
Think best late at night, still. I forget what happened during the day and I am thusly freed from anxieties that lie therein.

When nobody else is awake it's the same as being dead. Darkness and loneliness, free time and a quiet mind.

Cartoons are painkillers. The simpler the better. "Robot Chicken" is Thorazine. Hertzfeldt's "Rejected" is Morphine.

It's cold in here. I'm painting my room green. All of the white primer is on and the fumes give me headaches, plus the open window makes it cold. It's a convincing false illness.

I explained to someone the other day that the only way we can really make computers faster now is by networking them or else adding additional processors to solitary machines. The day after I explain this, I see a commercial for Pentium D dual-core processor. To D chips in one. Blam. My idea, you bastards. I've been mulling over that since the Pentium 4 came out. (They've probably had the dual-core processors since the 80's, though. Government technology.)

Upon further research, large corporations have access to quad-core processors and probably much more policoric technology. Zippy compers, them.

-FIOS: Crap for a Pentium 2. The internet loads faster than my poor computer can handle. See, while the cable and modem themselves can handle the data transfer rate, the computers that they deal with (both uploading and downloading) make up most of the determination for the rate at which data is transmitted and recieved. Fast as the slowest dog, see? I get Pentium 2 download speed no matter what. Even the 15-mbps wireless network adapters only seem to pull off 11 mbps with FIOS, so what's the point? Is it a coincidence that they waited to release dual-core processors until FIOS was more widely and readily available? Will we see a giant surge in computer technology like we did in the 90's? Where's my flying car and hologram TV?

Someone, somewhere, orcestrates our economy. Make it drop. Have a war. More docile people with some handy new manipulation laws when the smoke clears. Chuck in faster computers. Make 'em smile and look left while we pick their pockets and whisper subliminal instructions in their ears.

Zip, zip, zip. Bang bang bang.

Fuck.

And I thought word processing programs were amazing. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8020709/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8020709/ Mon, 27 Feb 2006 17:40:42 PST
Is it love, lack of love, loneliness, happiness, giddiness, or just what?

It seems to come to me best when I'm feeling either euphoric or dismal, but never in the grey areas. That grey land is where most of my contemporaries seem to live, all of them whose minds are closed doors on buildings without windows, their inhabitants refusing to peek out or let others peer in. It's very sad. In that house whose windows are eyes, whose roof is hair or a hat or baldness, who lives their? Why do they close their shutters and refuse to see the beauty or ugliness that lies without, or let others see the beauty or ugliness that lies within? They allow their peers only to see their physical substance and their contrivention. The vinyl siding, but never the wallpaper.

Mostly what makes me write seems to be a feeling of coming unglued. A loss of that fear of social awkwardness, a lack of care whether the person to my left or right finds psychological, sociological, spiritual, philosophical, or poetic babble to be somewhat upsetting or bizarre.

Matt Bennett is getting published. Good for him, and good luck. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8004593/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/8004593/ Sun, 26 Feb 2006 00:57:03 PST
I wrote some more of "Another Dollar."

I hope the "aari's glasses" mood comes back sometime soon. That's a nice mood to be in. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7946256/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7946256/ Sun, 19 Feb 2006 18:53:42 PST
Plus, hey! I got my first ever robot working! Hooray!

Thus far, he features a chainmail skirt, three-quart stainless steel upside-down mixing bowl body with antenna protruding from the top, two 5" wheels at forty-five degree angles, and orange plastic frame. Hoo-rah.

I still have two servo channels to play with. I could add some type of cannon or maybe an arm of some type. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7910191/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7910191/ Wed, 15 Feb 2006 19:23:48 PST
He sits on this thing for two weeks before he gives it to me. There's a ten-day deadline to get these in!

So after that, I forget all about the thing and don't send it in for another couple of weeks.

Today he got a notice stating that I sent it in late. Shit.

Looks like I might have to go to jail or something.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Thoreau, where are you now? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7744979/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7744979/ Sun, 29 Jan 2006 19:10:05 PST
Disorganized crap. McDonald's was better organized and run than East of Chicago.

Honestly. For the first forty-five minutes of work, I was the only person in the building actually clocked on and doing anything. I was waiting three tables while my manager (the only manager/kitchen personnel in the store) ate a sub in the dining room. I wait my tables, check their drinks and whatnot. I stopped to talk to some friends who were there. My manager, five minutes after she clocks back in, comes into the dining room and says to me "Couldn't you be doing SOMETHING?"

Unacceptable. I finished my tables, clocked out, and left. No more.

This degree of incompetence isn't restricted to rare occurrences, either. It's every day. Fuck that.

So I'ma try for a job at Science Central. That would pretty much rule. If they won't hire me, Higher Grounds probably will. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7597708/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7597708/ Sat, 14 Jan 2006 00:00:24 PST
The glass is always empty. Sometime's it's just a really wet cup. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7439180/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7439180/ Wed, 28 Dec 2005 11:03:43 PST ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7340912/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7340912/ Sat, 17 Dec 2005 22:25:48 PST
Things about it that sucked:

1. THREE HOURS LONG. No reason for this movie to drag like that. LotR was different.

2. First hour involved Jack Black acting very badly. He's a comedian. I can't take him seriously. He wasn't right for the role at all.

3. I don't buy that the island had no pirhanas.

4. The biology inaccuracies. (Carly, you'd be better at this gripe than I would.)

5. CHEESE!

6. It wasn't "Chronicles of Narnia."


"The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" fucking ruled. The witch was supposed to fight Peter with the Black Knife, though, not some two-swords crap. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7241085/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7241085/ Tue, 06 Dec 2005 18:18:06 PST
This confirms for me a little thing I've been pondering (and should not have been): you CAN write a good story with no conclusion. Just a little character portrait. Look at this person, these people. Here is where they live, this is who they are. The end. I love it. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7179988/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/7179988/ Tue, 29 Nov 2005 19:18:47 PST
See, my head went all hyper-idealist there for a while and I got really deep into muppets and cartooning. I like muppets and cartooning.

For the past week/week-and-a-half, though, I've been having crying spells, I've been twitching a lot, and I'm paranoid about damned everything. Seriously. The trails that airplanes leave give me the shivers.

Conspiracy theories keep hitting me as though they were f'real news (are they?) and I keep wanting to talk to people about them but they just get weirded out.

At any rate, I'm feeling sick, scared, and miserably depressed again, which means I can write again. Hooray?

I'm management at my job now. Closing supervisor. Now I get to clean fucking everything at the end of the night AND count all the money that my boss gets! Yay! I work five nights a week, closing every one. I usually get home at around one o'clock AM. Every night. Add that to school (8-3), and my job is 4-12, and that's a fifteen-hour day. Every day. I'm feelin' a little burned out.

Ever hear of "Behold a Pale Horse" by William Something-or-other-whats-his-name? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6886862/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6886862/ Thu, 27 Oct 2005 22:32:33 PDT
One is the amazing, inspiring, humanizing Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

The other is the amazing, inspiring, humanizing Jim Henson.

To me, they represent the same sentiment, but from opposite poles. Vonnegut says "Life is no way to treat an animal. Not even a mouse."

Henson says "It's a good life, enjoy it."

To both, my gut says yes. I only with that these two media heroes had corresponded.

Kermit the Frog, I think, could be good friends with Kilgore Trout. Their archonic positions in the works of their respective creators make them almost the same. Whereas Kermit is wise but frivolously jubilant, Trout is wise but melancholically cynical. Their underlying ideas of life, however, carry an irrepressable congruency.

What would kermit say in his deathbed, I wonder? I think he would grin, give a gulpish "Hm." and say "Cheer up, everyone." With that, he would smile, slowly close his eyes, and fade away into death.

Henson seemed always to have possessed a strong character. He's the guy that helps you move a couch instead of watching the World Series.

Vonnegut seems to be the guy that did what he had to do to scrape along.

Where, in their utterly different lives, did they run across the same philosophical foundation? It's easy to see why they express it in such different ways, but not so easy to see why they express the same thing. Vonnegut pokes at God much more than Henson ever would, though.


Just something I've been thinking about. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6860099/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6860099/ Mon, 24 Oct 2005 23:16:26 PDT
Peace is the ability to forget that there is strife in the world, and that by being at peace you are willfully ignoring it. To be happy is to ignorant, but to be willfully ignorant is to be selfish. To be willfully ignorant of your own selfishness is peace, because when you break it down you'll never be perfect. You can toil and toil your whole life away, trying to feed the hungry, house the homeles, and heal the sick, and in they end you'll only wish you did more. You'll die with a grimace, knowing that you're not as helpful as you could have been.

So instead, I revel in my putrid decision to disacknowledge, for a few moments, that horrible rainstorms have devastated the southern coast of the nation in which I was conceived, born, raised, and dissented, sip my nectar and listen to the peaceful pluckings of a man with a six-string acoustic guitar, breath the night in deep, pretend I'm in that green place, where my hill is, and smile. There's no avian flu here, no hurricanes, no gas shortage, no war, no government, no tax. There's only sound, darkness and the sweet chill of apricot nectar while my fingers rhythmically click away a manifesto that will be read by very few, though it is open to an audience of millions. Heh.

In five hours' time, the sun will rise, and I with it. With the money I earn by facilitating mass gluttony, I'll buy a hot blackcurrant tea for me and a Chai for Jess, munch on the bread she made for me, and smile at her with my eyes closed. She, in turn, will gently squeeze my knee and rest her head on my shoulder. We sip our drinks for a bit, then we enter our quadracycled steel pod and expel poisons into the air so that we can save time getting to a worthless, dried-out educational facility.

"The SRI's" are a new concoction of our bunk educators. They are a reading level indicator, and the average goal for a Senior is somewhere near 12-1300 points. In my English class, one person scored a 1400. He was the first done, and they hailed him as a genius. Five minutes later, my 1900 yielded similar results. I wish they hadn't. I wish that I wasn't so conceited as to bother passing. I know I can read. I know I can read better than most people can. I only wish I didn't feel good when I prove it in front of a class of people that can't. Narcissus was an abbot by comparison.

That king from the recent Burger King commercials? That's me. Plasticine, fake. A glorious facade that advertises only the greasy product of underpaid hard labor. The commercials ARE clever, though.

What happened to glory? ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6823204/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6823204/ Thu, 20 Oct 2005 21:32:09 PDT
Also, I picked up Iron and Wine's "Our Endless Numbered Days" today. It's very nice. (Didn't they cover Postal Service's "Such Great Heights?")

Bought this giant pumpkin... Gonna light it up all electro-style. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6787731/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6787731/ Sun, 16 Oct 2005 23:55:40 PDT
-Learning Panflute
-Possibly starting a sort of folk band (NO 'normal' instrumentation such as classic drum sets, electric guitars, electric bass, etc.)
-Working on "Astronaut" [retitle "Captain Aaron?"]
-Still trying to build an analog Theremin (gotta call Pembleton about some vacuum tubes...


-----------------------------


My life has BECOME the satire I would write, if only I could:

I thought I worked my ass off at my job every day because if my coworkers and I didn't, the store would go under and my boss would be ruined. It turns out that he has a $40-per-hour job at GM and his wife pulls in good money as well. The store is, in his own words, "just a hobby." I bust my ass every day to furnish a rich man's boredom. It's not even as though I work for an idyllic hero of a man; on the contrary: he's an idiot! He can barely run the store and it's only through the 2nd in command, Lindy, that anything gets done. When I wanted to try management as a hobby, I played Sim City.

Honda, the enormous japanese company, has the frame for my scooter on backorder. That's like the McDonald's corporation running out of buns.

I keep hearing and seeing the stupidest media tidbits: on the radio, this sniglet:: (says a girl on some rare disease awareness ad)"I wanted to cry, but the disease gave me PLASTIC EYES!"

The TV, this one:: (says a sportscaster)"I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I'm kidding because most of these people know where I live."

I had an arguement with a girl in History regarding braces. She was making fun of a guy's long, sharpened nails, so I told her that it may be a cosmetic thing, like her braces. She argued that her braces were cosmetic. I aske if she needed them for a medical reason, and she said no. "I have to have them because I work as a model, and models need pretty teeth." I told her that the very penultimate definition of "cosmetic" was embedded in her sentence, and she still argued. "Not it ain't!" she shouted. "Nuh-uh!" "Teacher!" she yelled. "Teacher, is braces cosmetic?" He told her that they weren't always, but usually were. "See!" she yelled at me, with a snap of her fingers, "They isn't cosmetic. You stupid."

Rather than argue, I just tipped my desk over and sat the rest of the class out on my side. It's hard to write that way; the paper keeps falling.

I took a pre-test for some type of technical certification at Anthis on Friday. It had five parts, spanning Mathematics to Business Writing. I scored a 100% on all five parts, and found several grammatical errors in the "Language Comprehension" portion. It was hard to tell when the questions were tricks and when they were just poorly written. It was an audio test, so all the while you're thinking of your answer, the stupid woman's voice in your ear yells the other answers. Eventually I disconnected the headphones and just read the damned questions. Apparently, the test was geared toward the average business manager and technical trade worker. If that's really the case, I think I'll just blow my brains out now and save my future self the trouble. How can the working world have such low academic standards and still function? Where's my flying car?

It's like banging my head against a brick wall while a line of imbeciles file past into a bottomless pit, each of them in turn saying "Why are you hitting your head, stupid? Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh hhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

----------------------------------------------------------------


"Aari's Glasses" is due for an update. It exists in my head in the same place that music does. The sound of pipes reminds of the place where Aari and her brother live, of the elders and the trees, of the dark, rich earth and the tonal greens and Irish rains... In my heart, there's a gree field. I have a house there, on a small hill. It's small, only about twelve feet in diameter. It's made of stone chinked with clay. The sticks and straw that make the roof drip with rain, and my bed of animal skins is warm and soft. I have a horse. He is my friend. My two sons there are learning to play music. One is a marvelous lutest, the other plays the pipe, like his father. There's always a light fog. Once and again, a neighbor from a league off to the West visits on horseback to show me a curious stone he's found or a new song he's made, or to tell me of his wedding plans to a pretty red-headed girl. We'll talk and laugh, watching my sons teach each other the songs they've learned, watching our horses ruminate and feeding them carrots. I lean on my plow, the handle breaks, and we laugh as I lift my muddied body from the ground. He claps me on the shoulder, exchanges his funny stone... ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6621401/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6621401/ Tue, 27 Sep 2005 23:48:43 PDT
At any rate, here's what's coming:

-"The Psychosomatica pt. 1"
-"The Psychosomatica pt. 2"
-"Astronaut"


'Psychosomatica,' at its completion, will be a collection of short stories about some people and the way they feel. The first one is about a kid who's got a lot of stress issues and doesn't handle it well, and thus physically dissolves in desk during history class.

The second is about a suburban girl who becomes so incredibly bored that she just floats away. (Or rather she's pulled upward by forces unknown)

'Astronaut' is the story of Aaron Riebert, a delinquent to the age of nineteen who joins the airforce, shapes up, and goes out for Astronaut training. Throughout the story, various characters will be profiled, exposing their hopes and dreams and what they've done towards achieving them. Aaron's dream, his hope, is the total debasement of the concept of hopes, dreams, and goals by way of achieving what very few can and deserving absolutely none of it. Essentially, he wants to be the jackass at the top who doesn't deserve to be there. The guy who has everything handed to him. Aaron does this, and he has a way of manipulating scenarios to work to his favor.


---------------


I bought Gary Jules' "Trading Snakeoil for Wolf Tickets" today. I have yet to find a better album to write to. An album full of peace topped off by the amazing "Mad World." It's great.

--------------

Excerpt from "Astronaut"



Aaron Riebert?”
The receptionist looked down her nose at the people in the waiting room. Her sweeping gaze settled on a tall, broad-shouldered man with brown, short-cut hair and an Air Force flight jacket.
“That’s me,” he answered, standing out of the creaky plastic chair.
She propped her clipboard on her hip and gestured to the open door behind her.
“Room three, second door on the right.”
She smiled thinly and secretly reveled in the scent of his aftershave wafting over her. She caught herself drawing little hearts next to his name and hastily scribbled them from their existence on her pad of paper.
Aaron, to those that knew him, was a man of confidence, charm, and dependability. To the receptionist, he was an idol. He had been in and out of the doctor’s office quite a bit, as his astronaut training required it. She started wearing a nametag and perfume, trying to get him to notice her. Every time, though, he just brushed past and went purposefully to his specified room. She would go home every night and wish that he were there, talking while she brushed her teeth, breathing slowly beneath the sheets. Every night she would open her curtains and stare up at the stars, thinking that she could gain him if she only had their allure. If she could make him float weightless, if she could have the depth of space, if she could twinkle like ten thousand pinholes in a black sheet.
And every night she would sigh deeply, close her eyes, and drift into a lonely sleep. ]]> ~Iphian http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6515625/ http://Iphian.deviantart.com/journal/6515625/ Thu, 15 Sep 2005 20:36:34 PDT
"On this date [September 13th] in 1939, what flew for the first time?"

My answer:

"On the thirteenth of September, 1939, the state of Illinois flew for the first time. With a terrifying, horrible grinding noise it lifted its bulk from the earth and took several sweeping passes over southern Canada. Startled Canadians took it to be a sign of the Apocalypse. It wasn't.
It stayed airborn for three hours and nineteen minutes. Its descent was closely observed, noted, and studied by baffled scientists and theologans."


We get the test grade tomorrow. ]]> ~Iphian