embracing apparent contradictions, diversity and change
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Ever since Skud’s 2009 OSCON talk I’ve been meaning to check out DreamWidth, and now I finally am. My account there is kallistixf, and at least for the time being I’ll move some of my more personal posts there and keep Liminal States focused on social networks, diversity, innovation, software engineering, security, and politics. I think that’s enough topics, don’t you?
Here’s some excerpts from my Hiiii (waves)! post there:
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Olli Wisdom was good, Mad Maxx was better, and Saturnia, Witchdokta, Michael Liu, Sausee and of course Spook all rocked. It wasn’t real crowded so the density on the dancefloor was perfect all night long. My glow-in-the-dark nails got rave reviews and my brand new pink Golas proved quite comfortable for dancing. Yay!
The first time we saw Olli was at the DNA Lounge in January 2004 and I’ve probably listened to that set 100 times since then. Last August’s Five years later reflects on my path since then … a lot’s happened in the last fifteen months and now my world is Tales from the Net and diversity and innovation, all a natural evolution of what I learned and experienced back then and the goddesses I’ve been hanging with ever since.
A conversation on Facebook reminded me of another psytrance party in 2004, Halloween weekend at Somarts, and the Dia de los Muertos exhibit there. When I went back and read my journal, I remembered that we had gone out three times that weekend: (((thump))) at Barnevald, Somarts, and then dinner at Ma Tante Sumi and hangin’ in the hood. Those were the days….
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Our last real vacation had been in June 2007, also on the Big Island of Hawaii. Just a few weeks before we left Microsoft had told me that they planned to lay me off (although they didn’t give notice for three months) so I was somewhat stressed. Since then, well, by the end of 2007 I was too exhausted to go anywhere. 2008 was an activism year and I put my life on hold for CFP, Get FISA Right, and Voter Suppression Wiki. We had planned to climb Mount Kilimanjaro at the beginning of 2009, but didn’t manage to train for it and were busy with the remodeling so didn’t actually go anywhere. And then there was CFP. By last summer Qworky was in high gear: we decided to postpone our September vacation because we at a critical point if we were boing to get funding by the end of the year. Then didn’t go anywhere in January vacation because engineering was on a role and we needed to build on the momentum in order to ship and close funding. Then there was all the stuff related to my transitioning to an advisors role at Qworky — and CFP.
So by the time we got to Waikoloa on Hawaii at the end of June we were really really ready for a vacation.
It was great: sunsets, snorkeling, malasadas and Waimea tomotaos, driving around in a convertible listening to mix CDs, fireworks on the 4th, seeing John Keawe over dinner at Bamboo in Hawi, ziplining, being on a boat … what’s not to like? And I slept eight hours a night for the first time since 2003. Yay! Hmm, do you think the lack of stress might have something to do with it?
It’s another Geomagnetic.tv party, this time at the Gingerbread House — which is open for business again, apparently having gotten its permits in order. San Francisco’s “War on Fun” has even gotten coverage in Reason magazine; as Lois Beckett asks in SF Weekly, is it enforcement or harrassment? Hopefully it’ll all be copacetic tonight …
April 11, 1986, was our first date. I had no idea what it would turn into. Lucky me!
🙂
Happy Virtual Anniversary!
It’s been a beautiful and relaxing week in San Francisco. We had a great time at Death Guild’s 17th Anniversary, and things are going great with Qworky. Tonight, on the first night of spring, our friends at Kismet World Wide are having a launch party for their iPhone app WasteNot tonight, and later on perhaps there will be (properly-permitted) dancing and adventure.
Walking in Buena Vista park earlier this weekend, looking out over the city, I was thinking about how lucky I was to be here and share my life with so many great people. The next thing I knew, I was writing a haiku on my iPhone. After a bit more tweaking, here it is …
Relaxing spring sun,
Enjoying sweet memories
Of friends old and new
Life is good 🙂
So tonight, and the rest of the weekend, I’ll be choosing desire over fear, trusting my intuition, trying not to analyze things too much, falling through the limitations of intelligence into pure and simple creativity, and bringing inner ecstasy back into my consciousness. And hopefully that’ll set the rhythm up for the entire year — and decade.
— A blue moon and an embarrassement of riches, December 31 2009
Good advice indeed, if I do say so myself! Six weeks later, looking forward to Psybertribe’s Warmth (and Dutch!!!!!) and then a dinner tomorrow with Deborah at Delfina, it’s a good time to take stock. How am I doing so far on my new year’s resolution to have more art, beauty, and fun in my life?
Not bad at all. Â And the trend is definitely positive 🙂
So my appreciation to the goddesses and muses I am so lucky to know. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the art, beauty,and fun you bring to my life. I hope you’re having a wonderful weekend and your year is off to as good a start as mine is.
And to the anomaly I worship … will you be my Valentine?
This’ll be the first time we’ve been to Seattle’s psytrance monthly HOTwired since it moved to Waid’s a couple of months ago.
Aminata and Osiris Indriya, Lara, Blue Spectral Monkey … and it goes to 4 a.m.
w00t!
Time to dance!!!!!
As the sample Olli Wisdom started his set with phrased it, “To infinity – and beyond!” [At the set’s climax] a song built around the guitar part from Dire Straits “Money for Nothing” (with a minor change in the only lyric: “I want my LSD”) had the whole crowd playing air guitar.
“You gotta be able to ask yourself … hey man, is this a dream?”
When Olli played a song with a sample “Let’s all travel at the speed of light!”, it seemed remarkably plausible.
— January 10, 2004; posted on e-luminatus
Wow, that was a long time ago.
Listening to that night’s (((thump))) on my iPod takes me back to the frame of mind I was in, just starting out on an amazing journey from a technologist at Microsoft Research to a writer/strategist/activist workingon Qworky, Computers Freedom and Privacy, diversity.
“Fight for me!”
— a privacy-loving Facebook friend, wishing me luck at the conference
Here’s our opportunity to realize the promise of the Net that was so present in 1990s when CFP started.
— Deborah Pierce on the CFP blog
The program for this year’s Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference is outstanding even by CFP’s high standards. The mix of technology, legal, policy, and activism perspectives is particularly strong this year, and with the new administration and Washington DC location there’s significant involvement by government employees for the first time since the 1990s. As well as CFP regulars like Jennifer Grannick, Jim Harper, Ed Felten, Nicky Ozer, Alessandro Acquisti, Stewart Baker, and Lillie Coney, speakers incude first-timers like Marcy Wheeler, Dori Maynard, Paul Ekman, Shireen Mitchell, Rebecca Mackinnon, Nancy Scola, and Ari Melber. Don’t take my word for it — check out the program and prepare to be impressed.
Best of all, with streaming video, the #cfp09 Twitter backchannel ,* live-blogging, and a community wiki, the conference will be more accessible onine than every before.   Kudos to Katy Nelson of the ACLU and Robert Guerra of Freedom House for taking the lead with the video streaming, and to all the volunteers of the online visibility team for all the great work on the blog, Twitter, and Facebook. The online schedule has details, we’ll do our best to keep the web site updated regularly, and the Twitter feed will be best way to keep up what’s going on.
Last week’s Psylebration, rescheduled after permitting problems, debuted the cool new Sera Phi Healing Center. Tonight, it’s Rastaliens — psychedelic trance from Switzerland!
