Now the bright morning-star, Day’s harbinger,
Comes dancing from the East, and leads with her
The flowery May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.
Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire
Mirth, and youth, and warm desire!
Woods and groves are of thy dressing;
Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing.
Thus we salute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.
— John Milton, “Song on a May Morning”, 1660

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2012.05.08
• Wilde Roast (Map)

See you on the 8th!

"OVER the land is April,
Over my heart a rose;
Over the high, brown mountain
The sound of singing goes.
Say, love, do you hear me,
Hear my sonnets ring?
Over the high, brown mountain,
Love, do you hear me sing?

By highway, love, and byway
The snows succeed the rose.
Over the high, brown mountain
The wind of winter blows.
Say, love, do you hear me,
Hear my sonnets ring?
Over the high, brown mountain
I sound the song of spring,
I throw the flowers of spring.
Do you hear the song of spring?
Hear you the songs of spring?"
— Robert Louis Stevenson

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2012.04.10
• Chatterbox Cafe, Saint Paul, MN

Directions are here Google Maps if anyone needs them.

The cock is crowing,
The stream is flowing,
The small birds twitter,
The lake doth glitter,
The green field sleeps in the sun;
The oldest and youngest
Are at work with the strongest;
The cattle are grazing,
Their heads never raising;
There are forty feeding like one!

Like an army defeated
The snow hath retreated,
And now doth fare ill
On the top of the bare hill;
The Plowboy is whooping-anon-anon:
There’s joy in the mountains;
There’s life in the fountains;
Small clouds are sailing,
The rain is over and gone!

— William Wordsworth

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2012.03.13
• Wilde Roast (Map)

See you on the 13th!

Back to our normal schedule in March.

"Because the pleasure-bird whistles after the hot wires,
Shall the blind horse sing sweeter?
Convenient bird and beast lie lodged to suffer
The supper and knives of a mood.
In the sniffed and poured snow on the tip of the tongue of the year
That clouts the spittle like bubbles with broken rooms,
An enamoured man alone by the twigs of his eyes, two fires,
Camped in the drug-white shower of nerves and food,
Savours the lick of the times through a deadly wood of hair
In a wind that plucked a goose,
Nor ever, as the wild tongue breaks its tombs,
Rounds to look at the red, wagged root.
Because there stands, one story out of the bum city,
That frozen wife whose juices drift like a fixed sea
Secretly in statuary,
Shall I, struck on the hot and rocking street,
Not spin to stare at an old year
Toppling and burning in the muddle of towers and galleries
Like the mauled pictures of boys?
The salt person and blasted place
I furnish with the meat of a fable.
If the dead starve, their stomachs turn to tumble
An upright man in the antipodes
Or spray-based and rock-chested sea:
Over the past table I repeat this present grace."
— Dylan Thomas, January 1939

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2012.01.10
• Chatterbox Cafe, Saint Paul, MN

Directions are here Google Maps if anyone needs them.

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

— "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost

Reminder: Wilde Roast has moved. They are now in Riverplace (St. Anthony Main) in Picasa’s old space, a couple doors East of Kikugawa. Most places validate parking if you use the ramp immediately to the North (2nd and Bank). I figure we’ll try the new location once to see how it goes and wing it from there. I was down the road at the Aster Cafe Saturday Night and validated parking only cost me $1.

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2011.12.13
• Wilde Roast (Map)

See you on the 11th!

P.S.: (Yes, I used the same poem last year, it’s one of my favorites.)

One nit to pick. At the 2:44 mark, the comment from Ola Ahlvarsson is “A lot of companies saw what was gonna happen in the future”. That’s wrong. Companies saw nothing, companies have no such capacity. People saw possibilities. People took chances. People formed companies to provide structure and boundaries. People were right and wrong and close and adaptive and some caught the wave and some missed it and some were in a better position when the next wave came by.

The future, of which the Networked Society is only a part, is about us and the world in which we live. It is not about “corporate vision”.

“No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds–
November!”
— Thomas Hood

• Geek Gather
• 6:30pm
• Tuesday 2011.11.08
• Chatterbox Cafe, Saint Paul, MN

Directions are here Google Maps if anyone needs them.

See you Tuesday!

Do what now?

The airlines charge a hefty fee for the privilege of checking a bag ahead of time.  If you don’t check your bag and it doesn’t fit on the plane the airline has to gate-check the bag, which is free.  So the airline is providing an incentive for bringing big roller bags as carrion. (That’s how they pronounce it: “carrion baggage”).

Thing is, gate-checking takes more time and is more work for the gate and ground crews.  The goal, apparently, is to punish employees and annoy passengers, or to fine passengers $25 for not playing along. This is how airlines make money in the 21st century.

Either that, or it’s how the airline executives create entertainment for themselves.

The computer that synchronizes the timing of about 85% of the traffic lights in Minneapolis is almost 20 years old, and it got shut down by a freak power surge.  My guess is that it wasn’t the power surge that had it down for a week, it’s the fact that the system is too dang reliable.  I have only anecdotal evidence to go by, but chances are good that the boot drive had failed a while ago and no one noticed because they never reboot the thing.  It just keeps running.

Credit where it’s due:
Traffic light management is high on the list of liability risks should something go very wrong.

• Running an ancient system that works is sound policy.
• Having a backup plan that keeps the lights working safely when the computer is down is sound policy.
• Carefully planning for a replacement is also sound policy.