RezBlog

The event I wait all year for is underway. I first started watching the Tour de France when I was in Seattle in 94. Darrell introduced me to it. I became a full fledged fan in 99, the year that Lance won his first one. I was so pumped that an Austinite whom I had seen face to face won. We had a huge victory parade for him in 99. I was so proud for him and for our city.
A big reason I admire Lance is becuase he knows he can only win with the support of his team. Two days ago he won the Team Time Trial much to his delight. Here is a quote from cyclingnews:
"Ever since I was a Junior, the TTT was the event I did. It's always been my favourite event because it's a team event. My first (major) experience in cycling was the (1989) Jr. World Championships TTT in Moscow. At the time, it was an amazing event for me...very hard, but also an event that was very special. If you put together the four strongest guys in the world, they don't always win. And that, to me, is something special. You could put together four guys who are less strong, but if they work well together, they took the proper pulls, they did much better. And that always struck me as something unique in cycling."

Wednesday, June 09, 2004

Books: McSweeney's Comics Issue

I love comics - or graphic novels as they are now referred to. I grew up reading Tin Tin and Asterix. One of my best birthday presents was the complete collection of Tin Tin from my brother.
Well, McSweeney's new
McSweeney's Issue 13 is a comics spectacular. This quaterly "magazine/journal" is Dave Eggers' baby, him of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius fame. I had not been inclined to buy previous issues, even though the books were so well bound and the paper was so nice. The writing was a bit to avant and banal for me.
Ah, this is a wonderful issue - all these great comics in such a nice book.
Also really nice are the Drawn & Quarterly anthologies. I have two of them. Big books, lucious color on very nice paper. Reminds me of the Tin Tin's I read and re-read as a kid.

Thursday, June 03, 2004

Music / Technology: Music Plasma

Darrell sent me a link to the Music Plasma site. Enter the name of a band/artist and it gives you other similar bands/artists that you would enjoy. It worked pretty well. But the site needs improvement - there is no easy way to scroll around. I had found two other tools similar to this back in Feb.

Friday, May 28, 2004

Music: Soundtrack for a Road trip

Diane and I drove up to Dallas for Anju & Brad's wedding last weekend. We left in the afternoon and returned the same night: a lot of driving for one day. But the tunes and conversation made it a great trip. Here is what we listened to:
Coldplay - Parachutes: I had forgotten what a wonderful album this was. More mellower than their follow-up Rush of Blood to the Head. Chris Martin's vocals get under your skin.
New Order - Get Ready: Ah, all time favorite band. Their latest cd from 2002. Back into good form. First heard it when I was driving up from San Diego to LA with my cousin Parisa.
Verve - Storm in Heaven: I have written about this album before. It was 2AM when this was on - perfect soundtrack for driving through the bleak landscape around Waco - swirling guitars.
Underworld - A Hundred Days Off: Another one of my fave bands. I have written about this album too before.
Stereolab - Dots & Loops: Top 5 band. This was the first album I heard of theirs (thanks Darrell). Great place to start if you have not heard this band.
Dandy Warhols - Welcome to the Monkey House: I heard them first at the Austin City Limits music festival last year. What a great live show. I went straight to the Waterloo Records tent and bought two of their cds. This one has a very 80s new wave flavor.

Friday, May 07, 2004

Art (Photos): Subhankar Banerjee

My friend Clint sent me a link to Banerjee's photos after he saw my Deep Eddy photos. I am flattered. Here are some of Banerjee's photos from the Arctic Refuge Series. I remember reading about him in the NY Times - I think there was some controversy over the captions that went along with the photos in a Smithsonian exhibit.

Friday, April 30, 2004

Music: Live Music this week

On Tuesday I saw Stereolab at La Zona Rosa. What a great show! I love their music - not sure what to call it - avant-rock? And they did an amazing job of performing it live. Latetia Sadier, the lead singer, has such presence. Stereolab is definitely on my Top 5 list of best bands. And this show confirmed it. Also, La Zona is definitely one of the best places in town for live shows. They also get some great bands there.
Last night I saw Blonde Redhead. Opening for them was Secret Machines from Austin. Both were pretty good. It was at Emo's which I had never been to before. Good venue. Tickets were so inexpensive. I am seeing Zykos there next week. They are opening for TV on the Radio. I discovered Zykos, a local Austin band, when I was streaming tunes from Epitonic a couple weeks ago. Right after work I went to Waterloo and picked up their cd. They have a great sound, a bit unpolished, but great potential. I am looking forward to seeing them live.

Tuesday, April 27, 2004

Technology: Gmail

Just signed up for Gmail. It will be interesting to see if it is any improvement over my yahoo account. Using web mail is so much more cumbersome that using Groupwise or Outlook. I hope gmail will be an improvement.

Monday, April 26, 2004

Music: Record Stores

I go to Waterloo Records (or Video) at least once a week. The best thing about it is that you can listen to any cd they have in stock and they have a 10 day exchange policy. Waterloo is as Austin fixture.
Yesterday, I found another record store: 33 Records CDs on Guadalupe north of UT. Not a wide collection of stuff, but a focus on indie stuff - a lot of which I have been listening to lately.

Art (Photos): Deep Eddy Photo Blog is up

I got my Deep Eddy Photo Blog up and running about two weeks ago. I am using My Expressions - a blogging tool built by and for visual artists. It is pretty inexpensive. Not super easy to use, but it is good enough.

Friday, April 16, 2004

Zeitgeist: Mouse Potato

I heard this word mentioned a couple weeks ago to describe people who surf the web a lot: mouse potato. That's me! I rarely watch TV, but web-stuff - I can spend hours skipping from one site to the next.

Monday, April 05, 2004

Technology: Cool Tools For Change

I attended this very engaging and interesting seminar last Friday and learned about all these useful and no/low cost open source tools that non-profits can use to enhance their web presence and improve how they operate. A lot of the things I learned can be applied to my current work on the Intranet Redesign Project. We will experiment with some of these open source Content Management Systems as an alternative to the $1/2 million cost of one from a traditional vendor.
This seminar was organized by students at the UT LBJ School of Public Affairs. Here is their website: CommunityNetworking.org
I am so pumped. I love learning new things and especially love learning about tools that democratize technology.

Thursday, April 01, 2004

Technology: Gmail announced

I love google. Today they announched that they are launching an email service: gmail. Here is an article. Can't wait to try and use it.

Wednesday, October 13, 2004

Monday, October 04, 2004

Wednesday, September 22, 2004

Monday, September 20, 2004

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

Friday, August 20, 2004

Wednesday, August 18, 2004

Friday, July 09, 2004