Hard drive woes - happy ending

So, a couple of weeks ago, the 6 TB LaCie drive that I had my Plex library and my digitized cassettes of all of my school recordings died. I contacted LaCie/Seagate, and it turns out that the drive had three weeks left on its warranty. I had them send it to Bowling Green where we are spending the New Year with Jade's mother. I took my giant Time Machine backup drive, a 4x3 TB RAID 1 array from Other World Computing, with us to restore.

Once I got the new drive, it was tricky to figure out how to restore the data. It's not a boot drive, and all of the instructions for Time Machine say that you have to restore the system. Turns out the Time Machine backup is not actually restoreable as a system, for whatever reason. Does not show up in Migration Assistant. :(

I did find out that you can boot off of a Time Machine backup as a recovery partition, which is really quite handy if you have to install to a brand new drive in your machine. But I was still unable to restore a complete system.

I tried installing a new version of MacOS on the new drive, and then using Migration Assistant to restore from; same problem.

Was wondering if I was going to have to order a drive from BackBlaze, my iCloud backup. That would mean several more days lost, and given that we are traveling back to Texas soon, I was getting really frustrated.

I then looked at the file system of the Time Machine backup again. At the top level of the drive is a folder called "Backups.backupdb".

If you open this folder, you will see another folder for each computer that has backed up to this Time Machine backup:

If you open the correct machine folder, you get a list of backups.

The key is that last entry, "Latest". When you open that, you see your complete file system, organized by volume/drive.

Notice that the title of the folder is the date and time of the last backup, and indeed, matches the last entry before "Latest" in the list. "Latest" is what is called a "symbolic link". Basically, on the hard drive, it's a special file that points to another file. It is a symbolic link, because the file system sees it as a file at its lowest level. If you remove the symbolic link, the file/folder it points to sticks around.

The contents of the folder, however, are a combinations of files/folders, and what is called "hard links".

Each version of every file you own and have ever backed up to Time Machine is uniquely stored in your Time Machine backup the first time Time Machine sees it. Every time Time Machine backs up your drive, however, if it sees that your file has not changed, it creates a "hard link" to it. This kind of link creates multiple references to the same file. If you remove the file or a hard link to it, they all go away.

The upshot is that every single folder in that list represents the full contents of your file system as of the time the backup was taken.

OK, so once I remembered that, I did the following:

• Reformatted the new drive. Don't need a bootable system on it.
• Opened Terminal.
• Typed the following UNIX commands:

mkdir -p /Volumes/Bari/Users/
rsync --progress --partial -av /Volumes/Beethoven/Backups.backupdb/Syd\'s\ iMac/Latest/Bari/Users/jazzman /Volumes/Bari/Users/


Let's break that down.

"mkdir" is the Unix command for making folders (which in Unix are called "directories"). Adding "-p" to that command tells Unix to make all of the folders containing the final folder. "/Volumes/Bari" is the path to the drive I just formatted. This command then made "/Volumes/Bari/Users". The "-p" was not strictly necessary here.

"rsync" is the Unix utility which detects when files are newer and older than each other and copies them around. It's a poor man's Time Machine. Here are the options:

• "--progress" tells rsync to tell me what it's doing. It just sits there otherwise, and with a restore as long as this, it really helps psychologically to see something happening besides the blinky lights on the disks.
• "--partial" tells rsync that if this is interrupted for some reason (I stop it, power outage, etc.), to pick up where it left off. Since many of these files are large video files, losing all progress on a big file would cost a lot of time.
• "-av" tells rsync to use "archive mode" and to be "verbose". I would suggest you look up rsync via its man page or via Google to dig into the details of archive mode, but basically, it's copy all newer files, treating folders and links correctly. "verbose" means I want to see output. "--progress" also gives me a count of files left, and shows other stats while the copy is going.
• "/Volumes/Beethoven/Backups.backupdb/Syd\'s\ iMac/Latest/Bari/Users/jazzman" is the path I want to restore from. I have to quote the apostrophe and spaces in the path with backslashes because Unix command-line utilities treat those characters differently.
• "/Volumes/Bari/Users/" is the destination path. The "jazzman" folder listed above will be synced inside of this folder.

So, I set this going:

[syd@macsyd ~]$ rsync --progress --partial -av /Volumes/Beethoven/Backups.backupdb/Syd\'s\ iMac/Latest/Bari/Users/jazzman /Volumes/Bari/Users/
building file list ...
595775 files to consider
jazzman/
jazzman/Desktop/
jazzman/ISOs/
 
...

jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/logs/refs/heads/master
         175 100%    0.85kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505969, to-check=15/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/logs/refs/remotes/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/logs/refs/remotes/origin/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/logs/refs/remotes/origin/HEAD
         175 100%    0.85kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505970, to-check=12/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/objects/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/objects/info/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/objects/pack/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/objects/pack/pack-4c25d7ded28170de85a7e5179cf1f2964004290a.idx
        2836 100%   13.71kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505971, to-check=8/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/objects/pack/pack-4c25d7ded28170de85a7e5179cf1f2964004290a.pack
      187147 100%  887.19kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505972, to-check=7/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/heads/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/heads/master
          41 100%    0.19kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505973, to-check=4/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/remotes/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/remotes/origin/
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/remotes/origin/HEAD
          32 100%    0.15kB/s    0:00:00 (xfer#505974, to-check=1/595775)
jazzman/dev/sydvicious/trip/.git/refs/tags/

sent 2601869494866 bytes  received 11436104 bytes  42318360.71 bytes/sec
total size is 3644059082442  speedup is 1.40
 
I actually had to invoke this three times and stop the first two for various reasons. However, it did complete. It took 36 hours to restore 3.6 TB of data, but it's all there. When I get home, I can hook this back up to my iMac, and everything will be normal.

However, that Time Machine backup can't restore my system. That is worrisome, so I am going to have to nuke it and start over, let the backup finish several days later, and then see if I can restore a system with it. Nothing like having to perform a restore to find the problems with your backups.

Time for my annual baseball post-season history blast

I am fascinated by long-term success of baseball franchises. The fact that some teams go for decades without winning the championship is perplexing. Just intuitively, every team should win the World Series every 30 years, since there are 30 franchises. That does not happen.

I decided to create a "Championship Frustration" index to measure every World Series by. This is the total number of seasons that have been played by both teams not counting the season in question. So, the Frustration Index of the Chicago Cubs for 2016 is 2016 (current season) - 1908 (the last time they won) - 1 (not counting the current season) = 107. Still the all-time high... and it's not close. For the Texas Rangers, they started playing in 1961 (in Washington), so the index is 2016 - 1961 (or, really, we assume the year before the franchise started is the last win, 1960 - 1), or 55.

Here are the top-ten World Series sorted by "Championship Frustration":

1. 2005 - Chicago White Sox (won in 1917, FI 87) vs. Houston Astros (came into league in 1962, FI 43) = 130
2. 2004 - Boston Red Sox (won in 1918, FI 85) vs. St. Louis Cardinals (won in 1982, FI 21) = 106
3. 2010 - San Francisco Giants (won in 1954 while in New York, FI 55) vs. Texas Rangers (came into league in 1961 as Washington, FI 49) = 104
4. 1975 - Cincinnati Reds (won in 1940, FI 34) vs. Boston Red Sox (won in 1918, FI 56) = 90
5 (tie). 1980 - Philadelphia Phillies (had not won; series started 1903, FI 77) vs. Kansas City (came into league in 1968, FI 11) = 88
5 (tie). 2002 - Anaheim Angels (came into league in 1961, FI 41) vs. San Francisco Giants (won in 1954 while in New York, FI 47) = 88
7. 1986 - New York Mets (won in 1969, FI 16) vs. Boston Red Sox (win in 1918, FI 67) = 83
8. 1995 - Atlanta Braves (won in 1958 while in Milwaukee, FI 36) vs. Cleveland Indians (won in 1948, FI 46) = 82
9. 1972 - Oakland Athletics (won in 1930 while in Philadelphia, FI 41) vs. Cincinnati Reds (won in 1940, FI 31) = 72
10. 1987 - Minnesota Twins (won in 1924 while in Washington, FI 67) vs. St. Louis Cardinals (won in 1982, FI 4) = 66

So, let's look at the FI for all of the playoff teams:

National League:

Chicago Cubs (won in 1908) - 107
Washington Nationals (came into league in 1969 in Montreal) - 47
New York Mets (won in 1986) - 29
Los Angeles Dodgers (won in 1988) - 27
San Francisco Giants (won in 2014) - 1

American League:

Cleveland Indians (won in 1948) - 67
Texas Rangers (came into league in 1961 in Washingotn) - 55
Baltimore Orioles (won in 1983) - 32
Toronto Blue Jays (won in 1993) - 22
Boston Red Sox (won in 2013) - 2

So, if the Cubs go the World Series, if they play Cleveland, Texas or Baltimore, this will be World Series with the most frustrated fans. Without the Cubs, it won't be the most frustrating, but it has the great potential of making the top ten.

Unless we get the Giants vs. the Red Sox. Yawn.

Apple frustrations

So I have a beef with Apple and the way it works.

I find a problem with an Apple product. I get angry. But these things happen. Software is software, and there will be bugs.

When they are serious or annoying enough, I look for workarounds on the Web, and I usually find them. I find them all over the Apple Developer Forums. I find them in Mac or iPhone blogs. I find them on Twitter. I find many people who have these problems.

When I then mention them, I am told by (very nice and polite and friendly) friends who are Apple employees to file a bug. That Apple only notices when people outside of Apple files bugs.

That process is somewhat painful. It takes at least 15 minutes, and often much longer, to give enough detail to describe the bug effectively.

When the bug is filed, if Apple pays attention, I am asked to spend another amount of time, sometimes several hours, and freeze the state of my machine so that over the next few days or weeks, more probing questions about the state of whatever it is can be asked.

And then the bug is usually marked as a Duplicate. And the only visibility from this point forward is whether or not the bug that it duplicates is still open.

So. Why, as a paying customer, am I being asked to do free QA work for a bug that Apple already knows about?

I have it on good authority that the fact that a bug is filed from an outside person is given more weight that an bug filed inside of Apple. That authority is me; we certainly did that when I was there.

But I some other problems with this:

1. It marginalizes the Apple employees who do file bugs, or at least it marginalizes the QA work they already did. Apple people can find the bug much closer to when it is introduced that the general public. It could be months before any betas even ship out. It also gives a negative incentive for employees to file a bug on their own code; they are penalized for having the bug, and they never get to see it fixed until it becomes a public problem.

2. Why is it that the fact that the tech press, blogosphere, Twitter-sphere and forum audience are basically ignored on this? When I can literally find a dozen descriptions of the bug that are every bit as good as mine out in the wild, why do I have to file a bug for it to be paid attention to?

In its defense, Apple has a LOT of software, and has a relatively small engineering staff generating and maintaining it. That is what helps keep Apple as nimble as it is. But the attitude of "we'll fix it when the public complains enough in ways that we define (and are obtuse)" makes me insane.

My friends who are Apple employees, I am not mad at you. I am an Apple fanboy from wayback. I am a former employee. Thank your for your hard work.

I just wish this aspect of how Apple works would change.

Why F# is not the same as Gb

When a guitar string is plucked, a standing wave is set up, with a node of the wave on either end of the guitar. This is the fundamental note for the string of the guitar. The wavelength is twice the length of the guitar. The frequency is determined by the material of the string and the tension in the string. However, provided neither the tension of the string nor the length of the guitar changes, a given string will always sound at the same frequency when played open.

When a finger is placed lightly on the string halfway between the end points of the guitar and the string is plucked, a standing wave is set up with nodes at either end plus another in the middle. This wave has a wavelength that is the length of the guitar. When you halve the wavelength, all other factors being the same, the frequency is doubled. That is to say, the wavelength and frequency are inversely proportional. I won't go through the trigonometry of this, but basically, the wave is a sine wave, and the mathematical properties that go with a sine wave apply here also. Oh, and the note sounds an octave higher than the fundamental.

When a finger is placed lighty one third of the way between the ends of the guitar, and standing wave is set up also. It has nodes at the end points, and where the finger is placed. It also has one at the symetrically opposite position. Since the only wave that has a node where the finger is placed has a wavelength one-third of the fundamental wavelength, this is the standing wave that is set up in the string, which means that the other side also has a node. Since this wavelength is one-third of the length of the fundamental wave, the frequency is three times the frequency of the fundamental. The note that is produced is one octave and a perfect fifth higher than the fundamental.

This series keeps going. At one-fourth the distance, the note is two octaves higher. At one-fifth the distance, it is two octaves and a third, etc.

This applies not only to strings, but also woodwinds, brass and percussion. It also applies to resonance in any medium. The overtone series, as it is called, is also present with light waves.

So, if we look at this, we notice that the interval between the first and second harmonic in this series is a perfect fifth. Remember, the first harmonic is an octave higher than the fundamental, and the second harmonic is one octave plus a perfect fifth higher. If x is the frequency of the fundamental, then 2x is the frequency of the first harmonic and 3x is the frequency of the second harmonic. This means that the ratio of the frequencies of the first and second harmonics is 3x/2x, or 3/2, or that a note is a perfect fifth higher than another note if the frequency of the second note is 1.5 times the frequency of the first note.

If we then apply the cycle of fifths over and over again, we get the following sequence. Assume that we have a low C with a frequency of x Hz. Then we have:

Note Frequency
Fund. C x
1st 5th G 1.5 * x
2nd 5th D 1.5 * 1.5 * x
3rd 5th A 1.5 ^ 3 * x
4th 5th E 1.5 ^ 4 * x
5th 5th B 1.5 ^ 5 * x
6th 5th F#/Gb 1.5 ^ 6 * x
7th 5th C#/Db 1.5 ^ 7 * x
8th 5th G#/Ab 1.5 ^ 8 * x
9th 5th D#/Eb 1.5 ^ 9 * x
10th 5th A#/Bb 1.5 ^ 10 * x
11th 5th F 1.5 ^ 11 * x
12th 5th C 1.5 ^ 12 * x

This cycle of fifths covers seven octaves. A note is an octave higher than another note when the frequency is doubled, so given x above:

Fund. C x
1st 8va C 2x
2nd 8va C 4x
3rd 8va C 8x = 2 ^ 3 * x
4th 8va C 2 ^ 4 * x
5th 8va C 2 ^ 5 * x
6th 8va C 2 ^ 6 * x
7th 8va C 2 ^ 7 * x

Now, the highest C we have here we have derived by two different methods. Since is is theoretically the same note, they should be the same frequency. But they are not, since 1.5 ^ 12 <> 2 ^ 7.

This is the simplest case; it gets really messy when you are tuning a piano. Using the overtone series, a perfect fourth has a ratio of 4:3, a major third of 5:4, and minor third of 6:5, and a whole step of 8:7. Half-steps don't really fit. All of these do not propogate well when tuning. Tuning one key is fairly straightforward. Tune the fundamental and all of its octaves. Tune the fifth. Tune the fourth. Tune the major and minor third. Then use the existing notes with fourths, fifths and thirds to tune the rest of the notes. You will then have something which sounds great in the fundamental key, but terrible in non-closely related keys.

To solve this problem, the tempered scale was developed. Instead of the overtone series, the tempered scale is based on dividing the octaves into twelve equal pieces pitchwise. Each piece is then defined to be a half-step, and all of the notes are derived that way. This means that all of the intervals are just a hair flat, but the music can be played in any key and be equally out of tune.

Mathematically, we are mapping a linear set of pitches onto the logarithmic scale of frequency. Let's assume you have a pitch of freq. x. The octave is 2x. You need to find a linear mapping of this to the chromatic scale. So basically, we need to find a value y that when x is multiplied 12 times, the resulting value is 2x.

x*(y ^ 12) = 2*x

Divide by x

y ^ 12 = 2

y = 2 ^ (1/12)

So, to go up a half a step from a note with frequency x:
y = 2 ^ 1/12 * x

There are seven half steps in a fifth (C-C#, C#-D, D-D#, D#-E, E-F, F-F#, F#-G), so to get a note that is a fifth higher, we do the following:

Fund C x
1st C# 2 ^ 1/12 * x
2nd D 2 ^ 1/12 * 2 ^ 1/12 * x = 2 ^ 2/12 * x
3rd D# 2 ^ 3/12 * x
4th E 2 ^ 4/12 * x
5th F 2 ^ 5/12 * x
6th F# 2 ^ 6/12 * x
7th G 2 ^ 7/12 * x

So a note a fifth higher is 2 ^ 7/12 * x.

Applying that to the circle of fifths:

1st C x
2nd G 2 ^ 7/12 * x
3rd D 2 ^ 7/12 * 2 ^ 7/12 * x = 2 * 14/12 * x
etc.
12th C 2 ^ 84/12 * x = 2 ^ 7 * x

and we have matched frequencies.

Fun with spreadsheets. Let's say that our fundamental is a C with a frequency of 100 MHz. The seven octaves mentioned above would be:

0 C 100
1 C 200
2 C 400
3 C 800
4 C 1600
5 C 3200
6 C 6400
7 C 12800

Now, let's show both cycle of fifths:

Note Untempered Tempered
C 100.0 100.0
G 150.0 149.8
D 225.0 224.5
A 337.5 336.4
E 506.3 504.0
B 759.4 755.1
F#/Gb 1139.1 1131.4
C#/Db 1708.6 1695.1
G#/Ab 2562.9 2539.8
D#/Eb 3844.3 3805.5
A#/Bb 5766.5 5701.8
F 8649.8 8543.0
C 12974.6 12800.0

The reason the overtone series is so important is that musical instruments are made to resonate at a fundamental frequecy. They also resonate on frequencies close to them in the overtone series. If you open the pedal on a piano, strike a note and dampen it with your finger, a whole lot of strings will resonate, especially the ones that are octaves lower than the note. The ones that are a fifth away will resonate less loudly, a fourth away, less loudly etc. This phenomena is present will all period resonance. As an experiment one night, go out to your car. Find a low frequency AM radio station and set the preset for it. Then tune to twice the frequency and set it. Switch back and forth. As long as there is not another station interfering, the station should come in loud and clear at twice the frequency; in other words, up an octave. The crystal is vibrating with harmonics.

Feel free to distribute this to whomever you like, but leave my name on it.

Syd Polk

Oldie but goodie - May 27, 1998

Warning - some four letter words. I found this in my mail today and thought I would reshare it 16 years later.... Enjoy!

So, Monday morning, Paul and I set out for what should have been a
routine drive from Dave and Valerie's house to Intergalactic Airport. I
mean, both of us grew up in Houston and have been to the Big Spaceport of
the North. How hard could it be? I guess 11 hours sleep in three days
probably contributed.

So we set out. Good tunes on the radio; good conversation. We got fast
plastic breakfast. We stopped for fuel. Unfortunately, this was closer to
Austin than Houston. I would have to fill up before returning the Mustang
to its rightful owner.

So we get to Houston in record time. Both of us marvel at all of the new
stuff out in the area where Paul used to live. I take the West Belt North
exit from I-10. This is the first time I have ever driven this toll
hyperspace bypass.

Before very long at all, we came upon the 45 exit. In my mind,
Intergalactic is thirty miles north of Bumfuck. Since this is Bumfuck, we
must go North! So I exit. We get to FM 1960 and I think, "Hmm. Should
have seen a sign by now." 1960 is not that far north though, and my
faithful sidekick informs me we are not nearly far enough north of
Bumfuck, so we keep going.

When we get to planet Conroe, we know we are hosed. By now, it is 10:45,
and I am supposed to blast off at 12:30. Hmm. We stop at a refueling
depot in Conroe just to get directions. One of the natives informs me
that Bumfuck doesn't exist anymore since the Beltway hyperspace bypass
has been built, and that we need to go back to FM 1960, turn left and the
airport will be on the left. "Y'all cain't miss ut", he drawled.

So we get back on the freeway. And we are flying. And a little concerned.
We are driving in bewilderment. How can it be that we, back in our native
system, got lost so close to the spaceport? We were ruminating about that
very thing, when a semi cut us off. We looked on the back of the truck,
and Lo, we received a vision. That round face, that pointy nose, that
party hat. Paul said, "Hi, Jack!" just before I was going to say, "It's
Jack!". I respond with "You're so fired!" and we break down in
irrational, nonsensical paroxysms of laughter. We know that we will be
allright now, but our journey will still test everything we have.

We get to the 1960 exit, and we turn left. There are 40 foot high trees
lining the highway; we can't see anything much less an airport. We find a
fork in the road. I see a sign which says left is 1960, right is 1960
business. I go left, thinking we are probably almost to 59. My dutiful
sidekick-navigator ("I thought I fired you!") informs me that he saw an
airport sign at the fork. Fortunately, there is a turn. So I turn. And I
turn in the direction I think Business 1960 goes. My bad. I was supposed
to go straight. So once again, I turn around and go left.

We go for a while, and we reach a road called "Will Clayton Parkway".
Aha! I recognize that road. "We are close! Real close!" I intone. The
formerly fired sidekick says, "Um, Syd, turn right". And I looked and
there it was: George W. Bush Intergalactic Spaceport! How could I miss
it? Did I tell you about the trees? Or the lack of sleep?

So I turn right into the airport. I follow the signs that says "Budget
Rental Car Return". By now I realize that I do not have time to fill the
tank with cheap gas, I am going to have to eat $3/gallon for half a tank.
Sigh. And I am now in overmileage territory for the convertable. The
Conroe detour has cost me 50 extra miles.

The signs take me onto JFK Blvd., and now we are leaving the airport. I
never see another Budget sign. I confer with Sidekick, and when we reach
the airport entrance, we decide we missed a sign so we go back in. After
exporing Terminal A's access roads, we once again pick up Budget Rental
Car Return signs. We pay close attention and we end up on JFK Blvd.
again. I guess we did not go down far enough.

This time when we get to the airport entrance, my sharp-eyed bespectecled
sidekick spots the blue sign that says Budget. I make the appropriate
U-turn, but have a brain freeze. I miss the entrance and attempt to go in
the exit. I am hosed; there is no way in, and I will have to go toward
the airport and U-turn twice. Faithful Sidekick says, "I am sorry, Syd",
and then starts shaking the car with his laughter. I realize how
ridiculous this is and join him.

So I exit the rental car driveway, make the two U-turns, and drive into
the correct driveway this time. The car is turned in, the bus takes us to
the terminal, and I reach the jetway just as they are pre-boarding.

I truly believe it is easiest to get lost in the place you grew up in.

So here is my theory. The IAH exit off of 45 was actually the Beltway 8
exit before they built the tollway. So being on the tollway, and exiting
to 45 north, we were already passed the sign that indicated where to go
for IAH. And since it was actually a little bit further on the Tollway
for the airport, there was no sign there. So they changed everything!

I did eventually stop and ask directions! I did! I did!

Sigh.

What a remarkable decade

So, the Giants have finally won there first San Francisco World Series. Congratulations! I just want to touch on what a remarkable decade of post-season baseball we have seen.

Let's rewind back to 2000. The Yankees had just beat the Mets for their 3rd series in a row, and 4th out of the previous 5 years. While the wild card format had allowed some teams to make the playoffs when they hadn't in a while, the post-season had been dominated by the Yankees, Cleveland, and Atlanta.

In 2001, Arizona went to the playoffs for the first time, won their first penant, and won their first World Series in their 5th season as a franchise.

In 2002, Anaheim won their first pennant and World Series in franchise history.

In 2003, the upstart Florida Marlins won their second World Series by beating the Yankees.

In 2004, Boston won their first World Series since 1918, after coming back from a 3-0 ALCS deficit, and trailing the Yankees in the 9th inning of game four.

In 2005, Houston won its first pennant in franchise history, but lost to the Chicago White Sox, who themselves had won their first penant since 1959 and first World Series since 1917.

In 2006, Detroit won their first pennant since 1984, although they lost to the Cardinals in the Series.

In 2007, the Colorado Rockies won their first pennant in their franchise history. They did lose to Boston in the Series.

In 2008, Milwaukee made the playoffs for the first time since 1982. They were overshadowed by Tampa Bay, who made their first playoffs, and won their first pennant in franchise history, before losing to Philadelphia, who won their first pennant 1993 and their first World Series since 1980.

2009 was relatively dull; all eight playoff teams had been in the playoffs at least once the previous 5 years.

In 2010, the San Francisco Giants won their first series since 1954, when they were in New York. They beat the Texas Rangers, who won their first franchise pennant, and were making their first playoff appearance since 1999.

So, if we can get the Cubs (1908), Indians (1948), Rangers (never/1961), Astros (never, 1962), and Nationals (never, 1969) a Series victory! Heck, let's get the Cubs (1945), Nationals (never, 1969), Mariners (never/1977), Pittsburgh (1979) or Brewers (1982) a pennant. And it's really time to get the Nationals (1981), Royals (1985), Pirates (1992), Blue Jays (1993), and Orioles (1997) back into the playoffs! If anything, this decade tells us that it is possible for any team to have success if they do it right.

I love rounds of playoffs. I wish their were 32 teams with eight divisions so we would no longer have second place teams going to the playoffs, but I will take the tradeoff.

The truth about Rhythm Changes

So, I play bari sax. In jazz bands, bari sax is considered a fundamental section instrument that occasionally an arranger remembers is actually a saxophone, so they will put a solo in every 20 or 30 charts or so, as in writing out the chord changes.

Those pieces are never based on I Got Rhythm, whose chord changes are so distinctive, they are called Rhythm Changes.

I am also a computer programmer, so I never have a chance to actually practice or work something up.

Inevitably at a gig, the leader of the band will call up a piece based on Rhythm Changes, announce that he is "opening it up", and point to me for the first solo.

My dirty little secret:

I don't know Rhythm Changes.

Oh, I know the bridge. It's not too bad (B7 for two bars, E7 for two more, A7 for two more, and D7 to close) (well, that's in Bb concert transposed for bari). But I have no clue about the other 24 bars of the piece. When I took Improv in high school, we went over it and I tried to follow the changes. But I did not memorize them.

And since they never write the changes in the bari part for those charts based on Rhythm Changes, I never, ever see them written out.

This bothered me, but not enough to sit down and practice (hey, I have a day job, two small children and two dogs. Sue me). I do, however, listen to a LOT of music, and I have a LOT of recordings of jazzers playing solos over rhythm changes.

Turns out most of them don't know the changes either, particularly if they don't play tenor sax or guitar.

So, what to do?

Here is what I do:

- I play the blues scale. If the key is G (which is the most common case for a bari player), play a G blues scale. Catch the D7 in the next-to-last bar if you want to sound extra-hip.
- Play the changes of the bridge. They are easy to memorize, the chords are around long enough to play something interesting, and you can really burn it up.

Works like a charm. And if you don't believe me, go get a recording of Duke Ellington's Battle Royale. That's what most of the cats actually do.

I fell better now that I have fessed up!

KTRU apparently dying

Heard about this at the same time as everybody else in the Rice community apparently heard about it:

http://www.media.rice.edu/media/NewsBot.asp?MODE=VIEW&ID=14643

Boy, my day is ruined. I understand the business reasons behind it, but it sucks.

Some general history can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KTRU

My first memories of KTRU were of the Jazz Show (running every Sunday from 1974 to present!). KUHF, the local NPR affilicate (and the buyer of KTRU now) was a jazz station, but they played a fairly narrow, safe range of jazz. I used to listed to KUHF in the hours when they weren't running All Things Considered and the like during the week, but on Sundays, I switched over to KTRU. As a budding jazz artist (never made it out of that stage!), KTRU blew my mind by playing Eric Dolphy, Brecker Brothers, John McGlaughlin, John Coltrane's post-bop music, and the really strange stuff of Carla Bley, Pharoah Sanders, Sun Ra, etc. While I did not like all of it (and still don't), it was great that I could turn on the radio to hear this stuff my teachers were telling me about at HSPVA.

When I went to Rice, my good friend Jeff Erickson was the Saturday 7-10 AM DJ. He talked to me about the radio, and I was irresistibly drawn to it. He took me to a staff meeting, and I was introduced to the jazz director. The show was going through a smooth jazz phase, but I immediately started playing stuff I liked. That spring, I was made Jazz Director. Alas, my first job was to let people go from the show who weren't even playing smooth jazz.

That summer, the person who had been slated to be the classical director decided to quit, so they gave me both shows. Well, summers are tough at college radio, and I had no DJs. I did 6 hours of classical on Saturdays, and 7.5 hours of jazz. Was a long summer!

At the time, Houston had no classical radio station. That changed in the fall, when KUHF switched its music format to classical instead of jazz. We decided to drop KTRU's classical show, but the jazz show became much more interesting. KTSU played some jazz, but once again, it was of the smooth jazz variety.

I convinced Kevin Long to come DJ for me that year. Together, we played a lot of modern jazz, as well as rebroadcasting Rice Jazz Band concerts (of which we were both members!). We started getting interesting records from the record companies again, as well as some ticket giveways.

The next year, I recruited Vince Kargatis as a DJ. We also had some fill-in work from Ann Marley. I am proud of the shows we put together; they were fun.

During all of this, I occasionally subbed for a regular DJ here and there. The playlist was a lot of stuff I had never heard of, and was not generally fond of (thanks, Ray Shea!), but there was some music in there which I really dug, that I would never have been exposed to otherwise.

Once Christmas, I was subbing for Jeff on Saturday, and was running the whole 7.5 hour show on Sunday. I arrived Saturday morning at 6:45, and the Rice Memorial Center was locked. However, there was a sign, and a long trunk of cables coming out of a window feeding to the vestibule of the Rice Chapel, where there was a hastily assembled studio with a portable turntable setup, and about 300-400 records. They were doing asbestos removal in the RMC, and never bothered to tell anybody, so the KTRU staff had about 30 minutes to set all of this up! They did not grab any jazz records, so on Sunday, I cycle through my entire collection of jazz records, which at the time, was about 12 discs. I repeated Giant Steps and Kind of Blue! It was freezing in there as well.

We were down the hall from Willy's Pub at that point in time. One time, I was in the pub, and they had the radio on. Ray Shea was in the pub as well. At that point, we only had 3 Public Service Announcements on the queue, and one of them was about testicular cancer screening and MD Anderson. We were all really tired of that one, as it came up once every 3 hours! So, the poor DJ was reading this, and Ray yelled out as loud as he could something like "F*&( that s*(&!", stormed to the radio, repeated the epithet on the air, and ripped the card off of its holder in mid-sentence. The DJ stammered something about "Well, uh, just call MD Anderson. Let's play some music!"

The radio was a wonderful experience, and I am sad that current and future Rice students won't get to participate in it. It was organic, eclectic, original, and a wealth of culture from slightly off-center. It reflected the student body well. I know it will be available online (at least for a while), but you know, getting that phone call from a lonely teenager asking you questions about the music, or an old teacher, or a musician visiting Houston putting in a request... Those are things that are gone forever.

How To Play Sax In a Salsa Band

Reposted from my home page.

[Warning: the following will have stereotypes in it. It is also based on a real life experience]

I: Finding a band

Or rather find a band leader. The best way is to start having your car worked on in immigrant neighborhoods. Make sure that you get your tires there, and your oil changed there. Leave your saxophone on the car seat, or wear your gig bag on your shoulder as you pay the clerk.

Eventually, you will have the following conversation:

"You play?"

[You think to yourself: No, I carry around this tenor for fun and exercise]

"Yeah, some"

"What instrument? Saxo?"

"Yes, I play saxophone."

"You play that big one?"

"You mean the baritone? Yes, I play baritone sax."

"Hey, man, I am starting up this salsa band, and I need somebody to play baritone. You want to play?"

"That might be fun. You're just starting out? You don't have any gigs?"

"No, man, just starting. We are getting together on Sunday. It would be bueno if you could make it to the rehearsal so we could hear you play."

"OK"

Little do you know what adventure awaits.

First of all, "I need somebody to play baritone" means "I need somebody to play baritone on one out 20 songs in our book, and the rest of the time I need other stuff." Be sure to pack a soprano sax, an alto, a tenor and a baritone. It is also essential that you pack a flute and a piccolo.

However, keep in mind that real salsa bands have flute players who have those wacky G treble flutes which are halfway between flute and piccolo. You will be blowing your chops out on all of those high C's and D's on a traditional C flute.

That rehearsal Sunday he mentioned? Well, it will be cancelled. He will call you at your house about the time the rehearsal starts. Since he never gave you directions, and you were told that he was not really reachable by phone, you were still at home, so it is no big deal. No, the rehearsal will be Wednesday night. By the way, could you bring a microphone?

The rehearsal on Wednesday is supposed to be at 8. About 6:30, he calls and tells you that rehearsal is in this furniture refinishing store in the Bay View/Hunter's Point district. Lovely.

Tip: Take all of your horns. Take a music stand. Take a mike. Take a mike stand. Take your stands for your horns. Take a pair of claves. Take a folding chair. Take sweaters, the shop will be cold.

Tip: The 8:00 start time is about 15 minutes before the band leader will leave from San Jose. He will get there at 9. His cousin, who owns the shop, will get there at 8:30. You will have to smile at him, as he speaks no English and you speak no Spanish.

Once everybody arrrives at 9:00 or so, then the real fun starts.

The band leader does not actually know that there are different size saxophones in different transpositions, except the baritone is bigger. He will give you random parts for saxophone, trumpet, trombone, flute, vibes, guitar... Some advice:

• Play trumpet parts on soprano sax.


• It does not matter which octave you play piano/vibes/guitar parts in; play it on flute.


• Play trombone parts on tenor sax. Learn the transposition. It is a good one to know. The trombone parts will be high and low, so playing it on bari or alto so that the transposition will be easy will cause you to go crazy with octaves.

The music itself will be basically unreadable. It will have been transcribed off of 70s records by the band leader's brother in Peru, and faxed to the band leader. It will not tell you which saxophone you are supposed to play; you will have to figure it out as the chart starts. You might not have a saxophone part, see above! If there is no chart at all, just watch the mayhem.

The first thing to do is to learn the basic form of a salsa chart:

• Introduction
  
• Verse (which may be repeated)
  
• Call and Reponse
  
• Mambo I
  
• Call and Response II
  
• Mambo II
  
• Call and Response III
  
• Coda
  

Of course, their are Spanish names for all of these, which you won't know or remember. So, the important thing is that the Call and Reponse sections are ad lib; they will go on a long time. You won't be playing during these, so you should play claves during that time. Be sure and get the basic clave right. Watch the timbales player to see whether he is doing a 2-3 or a 3-2 clave. (1)

Also, the bass player never plays on one. The piano player's mantoono will keep you on track, so pay attention to it.

At some point, the leader will indicate it is time to go on. At that point, you start at Mambo I. One of the best uses of the time during the Call and Response is to find where the mambos are.

This whole process repeats and you play Mambo II, and then again, except you play the song out.

Now, there will be fifteen or twenty minutes between songs. The percussion players will keep playing anyway; they never stop. They don't ever stop playing. They don't read music. They don't speak English. And the bongos, congos and timbales will just keep playing and playing and playing...

There will be kids running around the rehearsal, too. All of the musicians will bring their entire families.

The furniture warehouse will have fumes, and really won't have enough room, and will have no heat. The neighborhood won't be great.

However, once you get playing, it will be fun. Once you figure it out.

After the rehearsal, he will give you ten tapes with the recordings from the LPs. Of course, they are in different keys, and the number of repeats and mambos and stuff will be different. He does this for the percussion players. The tapes are basically useless for you since he keeps your music and there are no artists or titles listed for you to go out and buy more music of.

II. At the gig

Take earplugs. The sound man will be another cousin who drinks too much so your speakers will feedback and the entire band will be too loud.

The gig will start on time. Trust me. Get set up. The bandleader will blow in like a tornado along with the rest of the band, and somehow, they will all be set up in time.

The gig will start at midnight, and will go to four.

And you will get paid $500. The best paying gig you can get. Keep in mind, your band still basically sucks. If only you could make it on the real salsa circuit...

The rest of the horn section (who you will have never seen) will be dancing during the call and response. At this point, you will be the big dumb gringo who can't do a salsa step. Don't worry about that. It's ok, the only other white guy is the bass player, who does not have to dance.

III. After the gig

You will get about 10 gigs, and you will have innumerable five hour rehearsals. After this happens for a while, the band will fall apart. The bandleader is not organized enough to take it to the next level, and since he does not believe in substitutes, he has no backup personel when people move or quit or whatever...

You will get calls about once a year from him from then on, talking about grand schemes for putting together another band. You are polite and tell him that if he can actually get a full band together, you might be willing to try it again.

(c) 1999 Sydney R. Polk. All rights reserved. This article may not be reproduced in any form without the express written consent of Sydney R. Polk or his designated legal agent.

Syd and Paul's Excellent Adventure

I wrote this in May of 1998. Warning: there is some explicit language.

--------------------------------

So, Monday morning, Paul and I set out for what should have been a
routine drive from Dave and Valerie's house to Intergalactic Airport. I
mean, both of us grew up in Houston and have been to the Big Spaceport of
the North. How hard could it be? I guess 11 hours sleep in three days
probably contributed.

So we set out. Good tunes on the radio; good conversation. We got fast
plastic breakfast. We stopped for fuel. Unfortunately, this was closer to
Austin than Houston. I would have to fill up before returning the Mustang
to its rightful owner.

So we get to Houston in record time. Both of us marvel at all of the new
stuff out in the area where Paul used to live. I take the West Belt North
exit from I-10. This is the first time I have ever driven this toll
hyperspace bypass.

Before very long at all, we came upon the 45 exit. In my mind,
Intergalactic is thirty miles north of Bumfuck. Since this is Bumfuck, we
must go North! So I exit. We get to FM 1960 and I think, "Hmm. Should
have seen a sign by now." 1960 is not that far north though, and my
faithful sidekick informs me we are not nearly far enough north of
Bumfuck, so we keep going.

When we get to planet Conroe, we know we are hosed. By now, it is 10:45,
and I am supposed to blast off at 12:30. Hmm. We stop at a refueling
depot in Conroe just to get directions. One of the natives informs me
that Bumfuck doesn't exist anymore since the Beltway hyperspace bypass
has been built, and that we need to go back to FM 1960, turn left and the
airport will be on the left. "Y'all cain't miss ut", he drawled.

So we get back on the freeway. And we are flying. And a little concerned.
We are driving in bewilderment. How can it be that we, back in our native
system, got lost so close to the spaceport? We were ruminating about that
very thing, when a semi cut us off. We looked on the back of the truck,
and Lo, we received a vision. That round face, that pointy nose, that
party hat. Paul said, "Hi, Jack!" just before I was going to say, "It's
Jack!". I respond with "You're so fired!" and we break down in
irrational, nonsensical paroxysms of laughter. We know that we will be
allright now, but our journey will still test everything we have.

We get to the 1960 exit, and we turn left. There are 40 foot high trees
lining the highway; we can't see anything much less an airport. We find a
fork in the road. I see a sign which says left is 1960, right is 1960
business. I go left, thinking we are probably almost to 59. My dutiful
sidekick-navigator ("I thought I fired you!") informs me that he saw an
airport sign at the fork. Fortunately, there is a turn. So I turn. And I
turn in the direction I think Business 1960 goes. My bad. I was supposed
to go straight. So once again, I turn around and go left.

We go for a while, and we reach a road called "Will Clayton Parkway".
Aha! I recognize that road. "We are close! Real close!" I intone. The
formerly fired sidekick says, "Um, Syd, turn right". And I looked and
there it was: George W. Bush Intergalactic Spaceport! How could I miss
it? Did I tell you about the trees? Or the lack of sleep?

So I turn right into the airport. I follow the signs that says "Budget
Rental Car Return". By now I realize that I do not have time to fill the
tank with cheap gas, I am going to have to eat $3/gallon for half a tank.
Sigh. And I am now in overmileage territory for the convertable. The
Conroe detour has cost me 50 extra miles.

The signs take me onto JFK Blvd., and now we are leaving the airport. I
never see another Budget sign. I confer with Sidekick, and when we reach
the airport entrance, we decide we missed a sign so we go back in. After
exporing Terminal A's access roads, we once again pick up Budget Rental
Car Return signs. We pay close attention and we end up on JFK Blvd.
again. I guess we did not go down far enough.

This time when we get to the airport entrance, my sharp-eyed bespectecled
sidekick spots the blue sign that says Budget. I make the appropriate
U-turn, but have a brain freeze. I miss the entrance and attempt to go in
the exit. I am hosed; there is no way in, and I will have to go toward
the airport and U-turn twice. Faithful Sidekick says, "I am sorry, Syd",
and then starts shaking the car with his laughter. I realize how
ridiculous this is and join him.

So I exit the rental car driveway, make the two U-turns, and drive into
the correct driveway this time. The car is turned in, the bus takes us to
the terminal, and I reach the jetway just as they are pre-boarding.

I truly believe it is easiest to get lost in the place you grew up in.

So here is my theory. The IAH exit off of 45 was actually the Beltway 8
exit before they built the tollway. So being on the tollway, and exiting
to 45 north, we were already passed the sign that indicated where to go
for IAH. And since it was actually a little bit further on the Tollway
for the airport, there was no sign there. So they changed everything!

I did eventually stop and ask directions! I did! I did!

Sigh.

American League still better

As I was watching the All-Star game, I was struck once again by the difference in quality. For once, it wasn't the position players; the NL put a really good set of hitters on the field, and the defense was great (one error notwithstanding). No, it was the pitching, and in particular, the real relievers the AL had. Pabelbon-Nathan-Rivera is just not fair. Oh, and King Felix was the guy before them. Wow. Very impressive.

The National League is starting to catch up, but there are still way too many franchises clinging to slim mediocre wild card dreams. With the Dodgers coming into their own, maybe the rest of the league will be forced to grow up and build real teams with real farm systems, like the front-runners in the AL.

Proposition 13 caused the global economic crisis

OK, so before you dismiss this out of hand, hear me out.

Proposition 13 did a few things:

1. Immediately lowered property tax revenue by forcing valuations of property to 1% of cash value in 1978.
2. Establish that valuations of property could on increase by 2% per year unless there is an ownership change.
3. Any statewide or local tax measures have to have a 2/3 majority (since amended by another prop; education funds only require a 55% majority now).

I am not going to talk about the horrible consequences to education and local services due to this law. That is for another day. I am going to talk to the implications to the California housing market.

After 1978, there were strong incentives not to sell houses, as the property taxes were fairly frozen while the land values were shooting up. Local governments used eminent domain to shut down poor neighborhoods and turn them into big box retailers, or shopping malls, or whatever, which they could use to boost their tax revenue.

What this meant is that there was scarcity created in the housing inventory, which meant that prices went up. In addition, sprawl hit the urban areas, and the population spread out. At the same time, California had several rounds of economic boomtimes, with a huge influx of new population.

This population could not afford the houses. So, they started using creative loans to get into the housing market, or to upgrade their existing houses as they had families. This was actually a cycle, as the economy kept booming, and the real estate prices kept going up and up, traditional loans were impossible, and creative loans were the rule of the day.

These mortgages were precisely the ones that are the heart of the financial crisis.

I don't have exact stats, but I seem to remember a quote that 60-75% of the toxic mortgages were in California. And the environment that these mortgages were allowed to be created in was directly created by Proposition 13.

I am so glad to be in Texas now.

Giving up on iPod FM transmitters

I have a 2005 Corvette with the DVD Nav system. It has a CD player, and an AM/FM/XM Radio. I have been trying for years to use my iPod with it.

I am giving up. The FM antenna in the car is pretty bad anyway; I get static on very good stations that our other cars pick up fine. In both the Bay Area, and the Austin area, I can't find a station that sounds like anything at all.

Since there are no jacks or docking cables, I am out of luck. I could have used the cassette player if I had bought a 2004! That's what I do with one of our other cars, and my parents' cars as well.

I am not going to go pay somebody hundreds of dollars to install a jack, although I have seen instructions how to on the net.

So I give up. I did something else.

I took a bunch of CDs out to the car. Boy, they sound great! And I forgot how much fun listening to complete albums can be. Changing them is a bit of a pain, though. I can also burn them, and supposedly this unit can read mp3 CDs. So this is good enough, especially supplemented with radio and satellite.

Next car, though, I want real iPod integration.

More info from flyclear.com

Received this today in email:

Clear Member Update


Dear Sydney Polk,

In response to questions raised by our members, Clear would like to offer the following information:

Clear Lanes Are No Longer Available.

At 11:00 p.m. PST on June 22, 2009, Clear ceased operations. Clear's parent company, Verified Identity Pass, Inc., was unable to negotiate an agreement with its senior creditor to continue operations. Verified Identity Pass regrets that Clear will not be able to continue operations.

How is Clear securing personal information?

Clear stands by our commitment to protect our customer's personally identifiable information - including fingerprints, iris images, photos, names, addresses, credit card numbers and other personal information provided to us - and to keep the privacy promises that we have made. Information is secured in accordance with the Transportation Security Administration's Security, Privacy and Compliance Standards.

How is Clear securing any information at the airports?

Each hard disk at the airport, including the enrollment and verification kiosks, has now been wiped clean of all data and software. The triple wipe process we used automatically and completely overwrites the contents of the entire disk, including the operating system, the data and the file structure. This process also prevents or thoroughly hinders all known techniques of hard disk forensic analysis.

How is Clear securing any information in central databases and corporate systems?

Lockheed Martin is the lead systems integrator for Clear, and is currently working with Verified Identity Pass, Inc. to ensure an orderly shutdown as the program closes. As Verified Identity Pass, Inc. and the Transportation Security Administration work through this process, Lockheed Martin remains committed to protecting the privacy of individuals' personal information provided for the Clear Registered Traveler program. Lockheed's work will also remain consistent with the Transportation Security Administration's federal requirements and the enhanced security and privacy requirements of Verified Identity Pass, Inc.

The computers that Verified Identity Pass, Inc. assigned to its former corporate employees are being wiped using the same process described for computers at the airports.

Will personally identifiable information be sold?

The personally identifiable information that customers provided to Clear may not be used for any purpose other than a Registered Traveler program operated by a Transportation Security Administration authorized service provider. Any new service provider would need to maintain personally identifiable information in accordance with the Transportation Security Administration's privacy and security requirements for Registered Traveler programs. If the information is not used for a Registered Traveler program, it will be deleted.

How will members be notified when information is deleted?

Clear intends to notify members in a final email message when the information is deleted.

Who is monitoring this process?

Clear is communicating with TSA, airport and airline sponsors, and subcontractors, to ensure that the security of the information and systems is maintained throughout the closure process. Clear thanks these partners for their continuing cooperation and diligence.

How can I contact Clear?

Please visit our website, www.flyclear.com, for the latest updates. Clear's call center and customer support email service are no longer available.

Will I receive a refund for membership in Clear?

At the present time, Verified Identity Pass, Inc. cannot issue refunds due to the company's financial condition.

Has Verified Identity Pass, Inc. filed for bankruptcy?

At the present time, Verified Identity Pass has not commenced any proceedings under the United States Bankruptcy Code.


Clear Customer Service

Clear, 600 Third Avenue 10th Floor, New York, NY 10016
www.flyclear.com


<**40101A46868734**>

A couple of thoughts.

First of all, I do trust Lockheed-Martin and the TSA to do a decent job shutting down servers, securing data and wiping hard drives. Bruce Schneier in his blog (http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/06/clear_shuts_dow.html) talks about this and legal precedent about companies promising not to sell data and then selling it anyway when bankrupt. However, with the TSA involved, perhaps the parent company will uphold their word on this.

I would still like congressional or some sort of federal action to make sure, but I don't think it is likely to happen. What a mess.

I guess I just need to get to SFO earlier, particularly when flying United.

flyclear.com and privacy

I sent out various forms of this letter to various elected officials today.


Dear ,

I am writing because I am worried about an issue which just unfolded in the last 24 hours. I have a membership with flyclear.com. They are a business which was based on collecting a lot of private data, prescreening it with the TSA, and then offering the customer the ability to bypass most of the security lines at airports.

Last night, they ceased operations.

I am gravely concerned about my personal data that they have, which includes my social security number, fingerprints, and images of my eyes. I think that it is highly appropriate for the Department of Homeland Security or some other government entity to seize that data until a satisfactory resolution as to what to do with it is reached. There is grave danger of this data being sold commercially, or being stolen and sold to other governments or to terrorists.

This business already had one security breach in August of 2008; I am not convinced that in their efforts to appease their creditors that they won't do something stupid.

Thank you for your attention,



Sydney Polk

Watching from afar

I am in Kentucky visiting my wife's mother and working at home here. Watching Ike from afar is kind of surreal. It is just amazing the kind of information that is online now, but often, you want just a little more.

Evacuation is a hard thing to stomach, I guess. When everybody evacuated for Rita, people were stranded for dozens of hours on freeways in the heat with no food or gas, and nobody wanted to go through that again. The officials this time tried to keep people out of life-threatening danger off the road, but it looks like a lot of other people stayed. I can understand why, but I would have gone. You just can't take the chance.

It's a melancholy night watching this unfold. I think that this is going to turn out very badly for Galveston and the communities surround Galveston Bay.

Been a while...

...and I still don't have too much time.

In April, I was laid off from Lombardi in Austin. Went through a little bit of soul searching, but I think I recovered pretty well.

I set about to be professional about my job search. First of all, I had some friends help me with my resume, and they were vicious, er, very helpful. Actually, they were. Thanks very much to Jade, Andy, Richard and Danil.

I work now for a company in San Francisco doing QA on developer tools. One of my dearest friends works there now, and got me the interview. Thanks, Brian!

Working out of the house is cool, but it is not exactly what we had pictured. Since I am time shifted, all of my meeting happen in the afternoon, so Jade's plan of going swimming after putting the kids down for naps tends not to work very well, as I am usually tied to the phone.

Other than that it is great. Other than being distracted by being in front of my home computer all of time, with the temptations to putter rather than work...

Top 10 Michael Brecker Solos

This is just my opinion, of course, but of all the cuts I have that Michael Brecker laid down a solo, these are my favorites, offered without commentary:

Delta City Blues, Brecker, Michael, Two Blocks from the Edge
Some Skunk Funk, Brecker Brothers Band, The, Heavy Metal Bebop
El Niño, Brecker, Michael, Two Blocks from the Edge
My One and Only Love, Brecker, Michael, Michael Brecker
Renaissance Man, Brecker, Michael, Time Is of the Essence
Sponge, Brecker Brothers Band, The, Heavy Metal Bepop
African Skies, Brecker, Michael, Tales from the Hudson
The Impaler, Brecker, Michael, Two Blocks from the Edge
How Long Till the Sun, Brecker, Michael, Two Blocks from the Edge
Soul Intro - The Chicken, Pastorius, Jaco, The Birthday Concert
Timeline, Brecker, Michael, Time Is of the Essence
Not Ethiopia, Steps, Smokin' in the Pit
Impressions, Tyner, McCoy Trio, Infinity
Every Day I Thank You, Metheney, Pat, 80/81
Pools, Steps Ahead, Steps Ahead
Quartet #2, Corea, Chick, Three Quartets


Honorable Mention for non-jazz appearances:

Your Latest Trick, Dire Straits, Brothers in Arms
Pick Up the Pieces, Average White Band, Average White Band

Back from Kyiv

My trip to Kyiv was quite fun, although getting out was harrowing.

We (my boss and I) flew Austin-DFW-Frankfurt-Kyiv, which worked out well. I upgraded to business class, and it was great. I arrived in Europe able to function the rest of the day. This was my 6th trip to Europe, and the first time I was able to stay up past 5:30 local time when I got there. Being able to catch four hours of sleep was key here. American Airlines also provided Bose noise-canceling headphones, which work really well on airplanes.

We arrived, and our partners in Kyiv had contracted a driver to take us to our apartments. The car was about 10 years old and had been through a lot. The seats had been recovered with red tiger striped covers. Going through town to the apartments was fun; we drove by all of the new apartments in the suburbs, over a nice bridge, and then through downtown.

We had heard from multiple sources that hotels were overpriced and not very nice in Kyiv, and had apartments recommended to us. However, we were not encouraged when we got to the front door. The building was Soviet era, and there was a gray stone wall with a shabby wooden door that we were supposed to go through. We went in, and found out that only one apartment had been rented to us. We called the admin at the office, and were told that we could pick up the other key at 7.

The entry hall was concrete and smelled bad, and the elevator was downright frightening. It was about two by three feet, and the doors did not actually close all of the way. Scary. However, the apartment was very nice.

Went to the office and was shown around. Had dinner at Club Miami. Not the first restaurant that had an American theme; the food was pretty good.

Got back, and retrieved the key to the second apartment from the gostinitza. However, we did not know what floor the apartment was on, and there was no mapping from number to floor. With my fledgling Russian, I asked her "four? five? six?" while moving my hand up and down. She responded "Six", and we went to the sixth floor. When the elevator opened, it was pitch black. Only after I stepped forward did the motion-triggered light come on. Once again, however, the apartment itself was very nice. This was to be mine. No high speed Internet, but what can you do?

Slept well. Our hosts, Oleksey and Anton, would not let us navigate the city by ourselves, so Anton met us the next morning, and we all took the taxi to the office. Taxis are unregulated, so you have to negotiate with the driver, and they fleece foreigners regularly. However, the office negotiated our taxis, so we did not have this problem. That morning, we had introductions and meetings, and then went out to an American-themed steakhouse. However, on the way, we saw some kind of police action. It looked like a bunch of people were protesting a construction site with all kinds of sit-ins. The police were picking them up one at a time, and packing them into paddy wagons. Ukraine is sometimes disconcerting that way.

Worked in the afternoon. That evening, we walked with Oleksey down to yet another American themed restaurant near our apartment. Got to see some of the architecture at that point; it was a good night. The live band at the joint was doing a lot of eighties covers of Sting, Police, Gabriel, etc.

Saturday, we had the Java Users' Group meeting where my boss was giving his two talks (goodwill/recruiting gestures). The projector was dead, and the organization was hopeless, but they served beer while everybody waited. The talks started an hour late, but they were very well received.

That night, I had to do a server migration, and I needed high-speed Internet, so Matt and I swapped apartments.

Sunday, we got a city tour. At some point, I will post pictures to my website at www.baritoneconsulting.com. There are a lot of interesting landmarks in Kyiv. The coolest thing for me is tying Pictures at an Exhibition with Shevchenko, the national poet/artist of the Ukraine. The pictures that Mussoursky were writing about were by Shevchenko, and going by the Great Gate of Kyiv connected the dots for me. Wonderful sightseeing in this city.

That night, we actually had dinner at a modern Ukrainian restaurant. I found out, much to my surprise, that borshch is really really good.

Monday was a work day, but mid-afternoon, we took a tour of the Monastery of the Caves. It's a big place, and took most of the afternoon. Along the way, we saw the outdoor military museum, stuffed with Soviet arms. Cool in a creepy kind of way. That night, Matt and I were on our own for dinner. I went up to the apartment and found three people in it, a woman talking on her phone, and two men tearing up the bathroom.

The men did not speak to me. The woman knew about as much English as I knew Russian. Through pantomime and some fast lookups in my Russian dictionary, I managed to ask her to write down her cell phone number, and I texted it to Anton, who called her. Turns out, she was the apartment owner, and the two men were plumbers, and they were fixing a leak. They would be about another twenty minutes; I went out and shopped and found food.

The plan was supposed to leave Tuesday morning about 6:10. We had been told to get to the airport two hours early, so our driver picked us up about 3:30. Oy. Got to the airport, and the fun started.

There was no Kyiv-Frankfurt flight listed at all. It's as if it did not exist. The Lufthansa counter was closed. We were told we would have to talk to the people at the counter past the entry point, but we could not go to it because it was more than two hours ahead of the only outgoing Lufthansa flight, to Munich. Matt and I got on our Blackberries, and managed to get our flights rerouted to Kyiv-Munich-Frankfurt-Chicago-Austin.

However, it was electronic. We were the first in the boarding pass line, past the entry point, but they told us, "Could you place wait over here for a few minutes?" That few minutes turned into about 90, and during that time, we were aghast at just how bad this particular ticket line was. They only had two agents working, and with no electronic, curbside, advanced, or any previous checkins, every single person had to get a boarding pass from these devotchkas, and it was taking about five minutes per person. We were getting worried; our flight time was approaching, and the only other Lufthansa flight was 2:30 that afternoon.

Finally, a supervisor came along, and we flagged him down. He managed to get our tickets straightened out, and put us back in line. The person in front of me had luggage that was too heavy, and was getting ready to repack in front of us, when said supervisor overrode his devotchka and let the guy board. We basically got to the boarding area about five minutes before the doors opened.

Got to Munich and Frankfurt fine, and noticed that our original Frankfurt-DFW leg was still on the ground. We decided to hook back up with it, as we might get home earlier than the Chicago flight.

Bad miscalculation. The DFW plane had a part failure, and was stuck waiting for the part to come in from Heathrow. They put us on the plane, and we were there for about three hours. Oy. One cool thing, however, is that we got to see the Airbus A380, which had made its first flight to New York and back the previous day, and was parked at the gate in Frankfurt.

We finally got off of the ground, but were informed that we were going to have to stop at JFK to get another crew, since the delays were going to cause them to go over their legally-alloted time.

At least it went smoothly from there. We landed in NY, got another crew and went on to Dallas. The flight attendant we had had then sat with us and joked and gabbed the entire way to Dallas. She was a hoot; part society-woman, ditzball, insightful, outgoing, kind of crazy.

Caught the last connection to Austin, and made it home. What a trip.

Я еду в Киеве!

So, later today, I am flying to Kyiv, Ukraine for work. It will be the first time visiting an Eastern European city, and I am looking forward to it. Unfortunately, I will not have much time to be a tourist; I have too much work to do.

Packing involves getting my laptop ready to work on its own. But, I can't carry my big-honking-hard-drive of tunes because I don't have the right power cord. Lovely. I think my adapters will work for the MacBook Pro and iPod, though. I hope so. Anyway, I am also packing my old Russian textbook, a phrasebook, a small dictionary, and the Baseball Prospectus, as I have to prepare my fantasy baseball draft. I am also packing the airplane power cord, an Airport Express, an Ethernet cable, and a USB cable (to recharge the Blackberry). Oh, and of course, the iPod and the Blackberry. I guess I need to take clothes, toiletries, and medicine. And I need my wallet, passport and itinerary. I am not taking any keys, however. My wife is picking me up at the airport on the other side, so that should be safe.

I hope that this turns out to be lots of fun; looking forward to it!

RIP Michael Brecker

I have not had access to good current events news, particularly of jazz, since we moved and had our second child. I just found on by reading the International Musicians union "Taps" section that Michael Brecker passed away. I immediately went to his website, http://www.michaelbrecker.com, and found out that the bone cancer that was diagnosed two years ago finally took him from us.

I fully believe that Brecker was as important and influential as Coltrane, and most of my peers in the jazz community who are my age would have trouble denying it. However, most of the pundits/critics older than me just hate his playing, and don't consider it much more than some misplaced talent.

You see, Brecker had some things going against him when it came to acceptance in the jazz community. His drug habit was a problem, but others have had drug habits. No, the two things that made some critics discount him was that he experimented with electronics and jazz rock in the 70s, and that he would appear as a sideman with just about anybody who would pay him.

For some reason, jazz snobs (I am thinking of a certain New Orleans trumpet player who also made a living as a classical trumpeter) seem to think that the only music you can play and stay pure is either "real" jazz (Louis Armstrong, swing, bepop, post-bop, West Coast Jazz) or classical. Playing avant-garde, electronic music, pop music, rap, hip-hop, reggae, or "smooth" jazz automatically invalidates the musician as a serious musician, as they could not imagine playing that music under any circumstances, and they think the musician is just out for a buck.

Bull pucky.

I personally love "real" jazz, but I also love a lot of other music. My favorites include Peter Gabriel, Celia Cruz, Sheryl Crow, Sting, Suzanne Vega, Bill Bruford, Magenta, Sabine Meyer, Asleep at the Wheel, The Beatles, Blood Sweat and Tears, Fairport Convention, Genesis, Pink Floyd, The Police, Santana, and Yes, among others. None of these are classical or "real" jazz musicians. I think that a well-rounded musician tries to listen to everything in music with an open mind. There are genres that I still don't like after years of trying (hip-hop, Indian classical, belly dance, as examples), but I will still try every once in a while.

I approach playing the same way. One of my biggest regrets is not playing guitar or piano, so that I could play in a rock and roll band. The guys on the streets working with their horns or violins or voices or whatever should not restrict what they play to stay "pure"; they play stuff that they like, and they play stuff to put food on the table.

The Brecker Brothers exploded on the scene in 1975 with their first album, The Brecker Brothers. This album went through my high school like wildfire. The live version, Heavy Metal Bebop, is simply amazing (aside from one stupid top 40ish cut). The solos are dazzling, the electronics are effective, and the rythm section just flat out rocks. I bought this album new on LP from the cutout bin at Cactus Records in 1980, and was completely and totally floored. This album, and a recording of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, were constantly playing at my house, much to my parents' chagrin!

When I was at Universiy of Miami the one year I was a music major, every sax player was listening to Brecker. I was no exception. Transcriptions were flying, but at that time, I had no hope of playing most of them (I could probably work them up now if I had time, but it would be tough). Brecker was simply the most technical saxophone player that ever lived, and I would be hard-pressed to find any other woodwind player who could compete with him. Maybe James Galway. Anyway, the head grad student sax player at UM, Ed Calle, broke it down for us poor underclassmen, and presented an analysis of Brecker's solos, firmly rooted in the playing of the 1960s John Coltrane solos. Brecker always played in three keys at once, the I, IV and V of whatever chord was going on. He also had complete mastery of the highest notes that a sax can play, the altisimmo register.

Early in his career, Brecker seemsed to lack a certain confidence in his composing and leading ability, and hid behind many musicians as the consumate side man. There is an apocryphal story that as Brecker was in rehab for his drug habit, he took a side date with jazz legend, McCoy Tyner. On this date, Tyner had Brecker play one of Coltrane's standards, Impressions, as well as some other tracks. (The album is called Infinity) Anyway, the story goes that Tyner told Brecker that he should get his act together and make albums as a leader, as he was ready to assume his place with the great ones in jazz. Soon after, Brecker's first album (Michael Brecker) came out. While it did not win the Critics' Poll in DownBeat, it certainly won the Readers' Poll.

I personally saw him play the following times: 1987 at Fitzgerald's in Houston, 1992 at the old Yoshi's in Oakland, 1995 at Kimball's East in Emeryville and at the old Yoshi's in Oakland, 2002 at Yoshi's in Jack London Square, and 2004 and 2005 at Cal Performances in Berkeley. All but the last were amazing concerts. The last, a thing called Directions in Music, I reviewed in this blog, and it was terrible.

Not knowing the man at all, I am not really broken up about his passing on an emotional level, but I am very sad that we are not ever going to hear anything new by him ever again.

If you have favorite musicians, and have a chance to see them live, GO DO IT! You never know when a car accident (Clifford Brown, Scott Lafaro), murder (Lee Morgan), cancer (Brecker), heart attack, suicide, drug overdose (Janice Joplin, Charlie Parker, Billie Holiday) will take them from us.

Support live music. It is essential.

I'm back, finally

Well, after a very long (nearly two year) hibernation, I am back. A lot has happened since June of 2005. My wife got pregnant again, and we decided to bag Silicon Valley and the nice job at Apple for Austin, TX (close to home!) and a kick-ass startup company.

My impressions of Austin are still not well-formed after nine months here. Our house in Steiner Ranch is pretty awesome. I have not been able to enjoy much in the way of Austin culture because we are just too darned busy with two children under the age of 2 and with the process of finishing moving into our house.

We did have a hell of a time getting into the house; one of my next blogs will be about that. I would have trouble recommending Taylor Woodrow in our neighborhood, River Heights Overlook, because of all of the issues.

Aside from that, the weather has been fantastic (except for the 3-day shutdown of the town from an ice storm in January. The snow was cool, and all...). The drive home is pretty. I like being this close to Lake Travis. Everything in Austin is much closer to everything else that I am used to; that is really cool.

I do, however, miss good Szechuan, Hunan, Dim-Sum, and Thai food. Of course, San Fransisco is the Asian food capital of America, so I am out of luck there.

I did appear with a community orchestra, the Balcones Community Orchestra. It's a local chamber orchestra, a training grounds for local string players. The winds are a necessary evil, I guess. Anyway, I played 3 nerve-wracking pieces on principal flute, including a big solo. It went well, I thought. The group is not great, which means my flute playing is not terribly out of place.

My wife is going nuts being at home all day, and not having the house "finished". Will be glad when that happens.

We will miss our Oakland A's season tickets, and it sucks having to drive 3 hours to get to major league baseball. However, I am close to my childhood team, the Astros. Too bad they aren't going to be very good this year.

More later as I have time.