reading Orhan Pamuk

from his book the Black Book - Celal commenting on secret meanings

"Most people fail to see the inner essence of the things around them, simply because these things are right under their noses, while they pay great attention to the secondary properties of things that seem just beyond themk, simply because they find them in dark corners, on the edge of things, and therefore think them more obscure. This is why I never make open references to my true purpose in my columns. I mention it only in passing - hide it in a corner, as it were. But never in a particularly dark or secret corner; it's a game of hide-and-seek that any child could play. Whatever my readers happen to find in that corner they believe instantly - which is, after all, my ultimate aim. And this is the worst part: They pay no attention to the overt content of the piece, the things that are right under their noses; they ignore even the secret and accidental riddles it would take them only a little patience, an ounce of intellect, to solve - and as for the newspaper itself, it ends up gathering dust in a corner of its own."

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i found the first line interesting how people overlook the obvious and search for the secrets when perhaps the obvious has the power to provide more

by my calculation

if striking workers in vancouver are paid $50 per day they walk the picket line or $250 per week

newspapers indicate 5000 people are on strike

so, if %80 of them walk pickets each week that works out to 4000 people

4000 people x $250 per week x 6 weeks = 6 million dollars in strike pay OR a 1 million dollars a week

my question is how does CUPE accumulate this much money?

what is it about computers...

so, i've got this dell system that has a Pentium Celeron D 2.53 GHz processor with 512 MB RAM running XP Home that runs like a pig in drying mud

i haul out an old Pentium 3 700 MHz with 512 MB RAM running Windows 2000 and it performs better than the above system - less delay opening programs, playing video smoothly; unfortunately it isn't black but a bit of decorative play with colored sharpies should help

i just don't get how a system that is 5 years old runs better

my challenge now is to resist hucking out the new system - perhaps linux will run more smoothly

but it does go back to my feelings that computers shouldn't be discarded so quickly by people - just have to find a purpose for it

what people want

i started reading the audacity of hope by barack obama and in the prologue he talks about hitting the campaign trail for his run at senate and he writes about a common thread that noticed:

No blinding insights emerged from these months of conversation. If anything, what struck me was just how modest people's hopes were, and how much of what they believed seemed to hold constant across race, region, religion, and class. Most of them thought that anybody willing to work should be able to find a job that paid a living wage. They figured that people shouldn't have to file for bankruptcy because they got sick. They believed that every child should have a genuinely good education - that it shouldn't just be a bunch of talk - and that those same children should be able to go to college even if their parents weren't rich. They wanted to be safe, from criminals and from terrorists; they wanted clean air, clean water, and time with their kids. And when they got old, they wanted to be able to retire with some dignity and respect.

now these aren't unreasonable expectations - yet, somehow the richest nation in the world and the world's only superpower focuses on other priorities than keeping its citizens happy

why?

and if their government doesn't provide these things, why do they keep voting for them?

i don't have answers but questions like these make me continue to seek the answer and perhaps one day i'll understand politics and the true motivations of those in power - which undoubtedly involves having power and being able to influence the powerful - but until then, i'll just keep plugging away

misheard lyrics

so my son was listening to the mixed cd i had playing while going home

the song was van halen's why can't this be love

however, he heard it as why can't this be loud...

it puzzled him greatly why something couldn't be loud

methods of distraction

so, i take my son to visit my parents on the weekend so that i can get some time to wallow in misery as i suffer from my fever

my brother gets into a back and forth with my son

it's incredible how little children can bring someone down to their level, rather than adults making an effort to bring the children up to their level

just because children are little does not mean they are incapable of learning - actually, they're probably the best learning machines out there as they try so hard to understand the world around them and integrate themselves into the world of adults

or something like that