| | - 4 June 1997
- Twelve Perfect Squares and Twelve Almost Perfect Squares (The Latter Being Affected Slightly From the Northwest) Transmitted in Eight Gatherings of Three
(Perfect, Almost Perfect, Perfect) - I've said it before and I'll say it again: Another week, another boringconceptual piece. This one's Twelve Perfect Squares and Twelve AlmostPerfect Squares (The Latter Being Affected Slightly From the Northwest)Transmitted in Eight Gatherings of Three. And like most of these pieces,it looks horrible on a computer monitor and fine on paper and/or in the PDF version.
I don't think this boredom is so bad, and neither did Aldous Huxley. "Your true traveller finds boredom rather agreeable than painful.It is the symbol of his liberty--his excessive freedom. He accepts his boredom,when it comes, not merely philosophically, but almost with pleasure."
 - 5 June 1997
- Eric's Changes
- Eric the fisherman is beginning to annoy me. Actually, Eric is a retiredfisherman; he lives in a small city apartment with a doddering old cougar.
Eric is a kleptomaniac. When I visited him, I discovered a stolen rowingmachine is a locked closet. (It wasn't hard to find, he left it running.)I didn't report him, though, since in his current job as a subway inspectorhe's overlooked my "underpayment" of fares on several occasions. I was surprised to see that the cougar refused to sit on Eric's lap asit had always done in the past. There are some questions best left unasked. - 6 June 1997
- Big Blue Notes
- I like Garry Kasparov even though he let the human race down by losinga chess tournament to a machine. (It has not escaped my attention that themachine that beat him is a distant relative of the machine that I writewith, a machine that regularly beats me at chess too.)
The thing I like about Garry is that he can whine, snivel and rationalizebetter than any machine can. For example: IBM's total control of the site and the playing conditions underscoredthe vulnerability of the human player.My opponent was psychologically stable, undisturbed and unconcernedabout anything going on around it, and it made almost none of the typical computer-chesserrors. The decisive game of the [six game] match was Game 2, which lefta scar on my memory and prevented me from achieving my usual total concentrationin the following games.
- Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Way to go, Garry! At this rate, it will be quite some time before a machinecan beat a human when it comes to complaining. Or maybe not: that's whatused to be said about computers beating humans at chess. - 7 June 1997
- Digitally Clever
- I heard a speaker say "art and money have become digital."I thought that was terribly clever until I couldn't thing of anything thatwasn't digital in some way. We're all heading into the digital vortex, smilingand singing.
- 8 June 1997
- Irritainment
- A night club owner in Berlin is trying to carve out a new business nicheby offering "irritainment." I've been doing it for years, althoughwithout any attempts to make money from it. I've never been particularlygreedy, just knowing I've irritated someone is adequate remuneration.
- 9 June 1997
- To Die For
- A friend pointed out that the Heaven's Gate geeks who killed themselvesin order to catch a ride on a passing meteorite had a definite idea of theirnew interstellar mates' appearance. They published a slick illustrationof what appears to be an extra from a 1953 science fiction movie with thecaption "How a Member of the Kingdom of Heaven might appear."
On the other hand, who's to say the Heaven's Gate nerds aren't sittingaround with the space critters chugging beers, or whatever it is space crittersdrink? - 10 June 1997
- Dr. Pedanto, Pedantically
- I found this in my notes:
"Life begins when the story comes to an end."
- Pedanto As usual, I failed to note when or where I heard it. And, more to thepoint, I had no idea who Pedanto is. Or was. Was. It turns out that Dr. Pedanto was an assumed name of Reynardine,who was also known as Crabron. Reynardine was the eldest son of Reynardthe Fox. Reynard the Fox, in turn, was believed to be the creation of Hinreckvan Alckmer, the tutor of the Duke of Lorraine. And here things get evenmore confusing: The Dictionary of Phrase And Fable By E. Cobham Brewerfrom The New and Enlarged Edition of 1894 goes on to say "Thisname is generally supposed to be a pseudonym of Hermann Barkhusen, townclerk and book printer in Rostock. (1498.)" Does "this name"refer to Hinreck van Alckmer, Reynardine, Reynard the Fox, or someone else? My answer, as usual, is "Who cares?" Should I ever need touse the phrase, I'll claim it as my own. Almost no one will bother withthe confusing research, and even fewer will claim it's under copyright afterfive hundred years.
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©1997 David Glenn Rinehart
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