Moody Music, or Music for Mood?

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I was talking to my wife recently about music. She mentioned that she doesn’t like Nirvana, because it puts her in a dark mood. Discussions about the value of Kurt Cobain’s music notwithstanding, it’s impossible to deny that he could express his torturous depression impeccably in his music.

What really stuck with me in our discussion, however, was that music affects Donna’s mood, whereas I try to find music to match my mood. Music doesn’t really alter my mood, and I often have to search long and hard to appropriate music for any given mood.

Donna actually listens to some music to “pump her up” or do “relax” her. Is that common? Am I the oddball? When I’m feeling depressed, I’ll often listen to the Carpenters. When I’m feeling hopeless, I tend to tune into Nirvana. Energetic? 80’s Rock. (AC/DC, Def Leopard, Aerosmith) Nostalgic? 80’s Pop.

So how about you? Does mood dictate your music, or vice versa? I’m really curious…

What if C-A-T really spelled, Dog?

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OgreRemember the original Revenge of the Nerds? It was an absurd 80’s movie. Some may say cult classic, some might say lame — some might say both. Anyway, there’s one line in the end, when Ogre joins the nerds, in which a drug induced nerd says, “What if along with infinite bigness, is infinite smallness?”

That’s followed by Ogre’s famous line, which is also the title of this blog entry.

What IF infinite smallness does exist though? And what does infinite bigness really mean? You’d have to be a total tool (the 80s did have fun slang, no?) to deny the similarity between atomic structure and interstellar structure. Both are governed by distinct energy types, and both interact similarly in some regards, and drastically different in others.

Is atomic energy (or quantum energy if you’re particularly geeky) and gravitational energy just an “energy order of magnitude apart” ? That opens up a ton of other questions, the likes of which I ponder often.

Where does magnetic energy fit into the bill? Is there a quantum equivalent to dark matter? Since the larger scale energy (gravity) sparks change in the quantum world (fusion in a star anyone?), is there a larger magnitude of energy and existence in play that we can’t detect? Are there infinitely many?

I find it really odd that EVERYTHING scales up. Atomic energy states are absurdly quick, and yet a black hole takes millions of years to eat a star. Same with orbital speeds, my very rough estimates seem to place them on scale too.

And still my brain trudges on…

If space and time can be warped (gravity does this, I’m not talking the Enterprise or anthing), are the ideas regarding non-linear space travel possible? Since time is our adversary when it comes to interstellar travels, should we focus on a solution to the problem of our short lives? If so, what is the best way to do that? Cybernetics? Stasis? Near light-speed travel? Generational ships?

These are the things I ponder, and I’m gravely concerned that our next generation will care more about youtube videos and blogs like this than in actual learning and exploration. NASA is worried that 20 somethings really don’t care about another trip to the moon, or a manned mission to Mars. Are we raising a generation no longer inspired by Star Trek? Is the Friday night trip to Atlantis now our end goal instead of a reason to explore in real life? Have special effects gotten better than reality?

I hope not. I really hope not.

Space is really big

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AndromedaIt’s a little disheartening to think about the vastness of space, especially in contrast to the shortness of our lives. We talk about a “close” star being only 50 light years away — but holy cow. If my mother sent a message when I was born, I’d be dead before the congratulations ever got back from E.T.

Our 90ish years (and that’s only if I quit eating so much pizza) is such a small amount of time, that it’s a wonder any of us have bothered to discover the cosmos at all. It would be easy for a pessimist like myself to just forget about it. And yet, even I stare up at a billion year old picture of our universe every night, dreaming myself amongst the stars.

So what’s a 30+ year old man to do with himself? My only hope of travelling the cosmos will come from an amazing physicist here on earth discovering something “impossible”, or more likely an alien species gifting us interstellar magics. It’s quite a sad day when the more likely event is that of little green men coming to the rescue. Plus, in either event, *I* am really not a likely candidate for the free ride in a space car. I’m just a guy that wears a Spongebob t-shirt on the weekends…

Hmm, what are my choices? Freeze myself, in the hopes that in 1,000,000 years our descendants will just be aching to thaw out a Neanderthal like myself? Give up and drop some acid for a special “trip” of my own? (The answer there being “NO” of course…)

What I do is what mankind has always done — all that we can. I’ll keep reading science fiction books, watch on streaming TV when the space shuttle takes off, and prepare myself for huge philosophical debates when it turns out there is microscopic life on Mars. 🙂 I can only hope that our (by “our” I mean our generation) discoveries can help someday bring mankind to better and clearer understanding. And maybe, just maybe, evolve our collective intellect enough to handle an interstellar world. We can’t even handle an intercontinental one now…

Amish Paradise

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images.jpegThis year, my family stole a tradition from some friends of ours. Every year, the evening before Thanksgiving they eat cabbage soup, and spend the evening together in candlelight (ie, no lights). Then, the next morning, oatmeal is all they get for breakfast. The idea is that it will make them all very thankful for Thanksgiving.

We decided to do something similar. We actually started Wednesday morning, and spent the entire day without electricity. (OK, our furnace, freezer, fridge, well pump, etc. all take electricity, but we did our best. I even unscrewed the light bulb in the fridge) We prepared plain oatmeal for breakfast, and boiled cabbage for lunch and dinner. Not cabbage soup, just boiled cabbage.

The evening was the hardest, because my family has a bad habit of falling asleep to the television. With no electricity, it was a rough night, especially for the girls. We ended up singing some songs, and livingroom-camping together in the candlelight. It was pretty great.

The next morning, the girls were THRILLED when we cooked them a big breakfast. All day they’ve talked about “no electricity day” to whomever will listen. It’s been a great holiday!

Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers, and happy Thursday to everyone else!

Humble thanks for Thanksgiving

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tg.pngAbout 7 years ago, my family was in a very rough spot due to a car accident that turned our lives upside down. We were forced to go on welfare, my pregnant wife was forced to take a job bussing tables at a local restaurant, and we were the recipients of holiday food baskets, etc. It was a humbling time, but actually was a turning point in our lives. I think if it weren’t for that experience, we’d never have the faith we do today.

This year, due to some unexpected auto repairs, we’re in a similar situation. Our bills are paid, etc., but unfortunately, something as simple as Thanksgiving dinner would have been quite impossible to make fancy.

Last night, however, we had a heart-breakingly familiar Thanksgiving food basket delivered to our home. For the past 5 years or so, *we* are usually the family driving around delivering baskets, and this year, we received one. I wanted to refuse the gift — but it would have just been pride, because after all, we really didn’t have anything other than pantry staples for Thursday’s meal.

It occurs to me that when we are financially and socially secure, and when we aren’t (in our minds) needy of anything, we miss the boat when it comes to true thankfulness. While I don’t wish misfortune on anyone, I do wish everyone a humble, thankful holiday. It’s reminding my family who we are, who we aren’t, and who we want to be.

God bless.

My Vista Experience

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Well, I got a Windows Vista install DVD at a conference I was just at. I tried to install it, using MICROSOFT’s own Virtual PC on my Apple laptop. I did have to do some odd tweaking to get it to begin the install, but I thought I was on my way to Vista Preview Goodness.

I was wrong. The screenshot speaks for itself.

vista.png

Site updates

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I haven’t posted, I actually began fleshing out the site a little. There’s now an “About Me” link, along with an “About my Faith” link. I’m working on a better eyeball picture too. (I sorta like the creepy factor my eyeballs give the site…)

Stay tuned, I haven’t given up on the blog again!

Would you go to Hell for your kids?

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Pretty bold question, I know. Seriously though, almost any parent would *die* for their child without hesitation. A parent’s love transcends morality, responsibility, and do-gooding. The love a parent has for their child is indescribable, and is the only way we get a glimpse of the Lord’s love for us.

Therein lies my dilemma. See, we’re clearly told to love the Lord God Almighty with all our heart and soul (Deuteronomy 6:5). We are supposed to love God more than anyone or anything. In fact, we are to love our families second to our love for God. (Yes, I realize that loving our families is arguably a way to love The Father — but in a quite literal, non-theologically-complicated way, we are to love God more than anyone).

So, if we are to love Him more than our children (I know it sounds bad doesn’t it?), then we should not be willing to go to Hell for them. Going to Hell would eternally separate us from God, whom we love more than anything. So the obvious answer is no, a Christian should not be willing to do that. But I’m not sure I’m there, and I’m not sure the logic is sound.

There is another complication though. See, Christ, whom we are to model in our lives, did die for us (his children). If we are to be Christlike, then we should be willing to die and go to Hell for the sake of our children. The catch, of course, is that Christ rose from Hell on the third day — not so for us. So the real question is, does a willingness to face Hell in place of your children truly put God second, or is it putting yourself second to your child? I do see a real problem with sacrificing yourself, as a Christian, the temple of the Holy Spirit (it’s not ours to sacrifice, we belong to Him). Isn’t that what Christ did for us though?

I don’t know the complete answer to the question, other than that I am willing to suffer eternal damnation for my children. If that means that I love them more than I love God — then I have issues. If, however, it means that I love them more than I love myself, I might still have some issues (especially since I am a new creature, born again into Christ), but perhaps they’re not as bad as they might seem. And possibly, just possibly, the love I have for my children is that same sort of love that He had for us. It’s at least worth thinking about.

Good day everyone. 🙂

Day of Chaos, Part 2

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Here’s the long version of what happened Friday regarding the file server. If you’re not interested, by all means just ignore this. It’s for informational purposes only.

I was scheduled to work Thursday night 3rd shift. My plan was to apply security patches, run updates, scan hard drives, etc., on servers. Pretty much the stuff that can’t be done during the school day. Things were going well until about 2AM, when I tried to scan our file server (“Miss Piggy” for those interested in server names). I couldn’t get any response from the keyboard, and I also couldn’t log in via the network. Files were still being served, but for all intents and purposes, the server was locked up. Upon reboot, the computer wouldn’t even recognize there were hard drives at all.

The strange thing is that our file server is very high-end, and has built in alarms that are supposed to go off when there is a problem. If one of the hard drives fail, it sets off an alarm, and just keeps purring along thanks to it’s redundancy — however, in this case, the alarm was apparently non-functional. I have no idea how long it was serving files in “limp mode”, but after trying to repair it, it became quite clear that the RAID controller was completely shot.

It was now about 2:30AM, and I realized there was no way our file server would be ready for Friday morning. Even if a brand new server was in my lap, getting it installed and configured would not be possible in that amount of time. This is mainly because not only were all the user files gone, but the entire operating system was gone. So, my first item of business was to get our remaining servers/workstations at least partially functional. Believe it or not, MANY things rely on the availability of documents… So I spent the next hour and a half or so getting the windows server, macs, linux servers, etc, etc, to function without having the document server at all. I figured if we could have SDS, attendance, Internet, etc — it would be better than having nothing at all.

Then, at 4AM I started the process of rebuilding the file server. That’s where my over-paranoid backup practices finally paid off. :o) I also happened to have (again, paranoia) another RAID controller in a second server that I could transplant. Another good thing, and really the only “good” news in the whole story, is that I had brand new hard drives waiting to upgrade our file server’s storage space. This is NOT the way I wanted to upgrade the server, but I’m trying to focus on how nice it is to have it upgraded. :o)

The server finished restoring at 2:45PM Friday. It seemed absurd to put everything back online, so for the remainder of the day (and evening), I ran tests and scans on the server to make sure it was OK for Monday morning. Things finished just as the Varsity football game ended (I walked back and forth, so got to watch some of the game while the server was scanning), and I went home.

Thank you very much to those that sent supportive emails, etc. To be honest, as far as catastrophic hardware failures go — this repair couldn’t have gone any better. I do wish it would have happened on Saturday instead of Friday, but at least things are working on Monday. 🙂