Congrats
Congrats to my friend James Garner on his new family addition, a brand new daughter.
Add comment September 6th, 2007
Labor Day hurrah and The Junto
Jody and I went down to our former home, Austin, Texas, to visit friends and take a little mini-vacation. We stayed downtown, which was crazy and loud due to the holiday festivities and the Longhorn season opener. We got to see some good old friends: Sarah and Breen, and Phillip, as well as some new friends. I got to visit with one of my friends Keith who took time out of his landscape toiling to have a snack at Starbucks. I tried to sign him on to the idea of a club inspired by Ben Franklin’s Junto. It would be good to get a few smart people together to accomplish some truly great things.
Add comment September 6th, 2007
Birthdays
Jody and I had dinner with my uncle Stan for his birthday last night. He is someone I have learned a lot from and is always pleasant company. Many happy returns.
Add comment July 31st, 2007
Congrats
My good friend Jon took a job at another company. It is a significant upgrade as he’ll now be a developer working in billing systems and tools. I love to see people enjoying success in their careers.
Add comment May 25th, 2007
Game credits
One good thing about having worked in the game industry is that you get credited in the game packaging, etc. View my credits here at Moby Games (City of Hereos) and here (Lineage II). I should also have credit for The Sims Online, Ultima Online (as GM Pigpen), and Motor City Online, which are other games I have worked on.
Add comment May 10th, 2007
Being the top “Sivori”
I’m not the only one trying to Google well. The WSJ had an article recently where they described how many parents are choosing names that will be easily found via search engines. (See: You’re a Nobody Unless Your Name Googles Well) Back when people lived in small communities, everyone knew you. They knew your family, where you lived, nearly everything about you. Go to small rural communities and it is still this way.
With the Internet, everyone is connected, but identity is more diffuse. Names that once carried context (family names) now signal nothing except your ethnic heritage. In the connected world we now live in, you have access to more people and must therefore be easily found and investigated. Where once people would ask your friends and neighbors about you, now they must search the Internet for your residue.
Add comment May 10th, 2007
There can be only one - part 2
In my quixotic quest to be the top Google result for “Sivori”, this site is now top. Who knows how long it will last? It definitely helps to have the word Sivori in the url.
Add comment October 3rd, 2006
Camillo Sivori as Paganini’s pupil
From Ingolf Turban’s liner notes:
“…So were there any sort of lessons given in the years between 1822 and 1824? Not really, as Camillo Sivori later remembered, describing Paganini as the “worst teacher the world has ever seen”. Rude language, sarcasm and mockery were on the agenda for Sivori, after Paganini had asked the boy to sight-read his own untidy composition which Sivori naturally failed to accomplish. Paganini “grabbed the violin like a lion would grab a lamb and played the etude again without a glance at the sheet music.”
Add comment September 6th, 2006
On the banks of the Red River in Shreveport
We’re actually standing on the side of the river where the land there is called Bossier City, not Shreveport. Shreveport is on the other side of the river. Bossier and Shreve were two of the big guys who brought civilization to the area.
The town was founded in 1836 by the Shreve Town Company, a development corporation established to start a town at the meeting point of the Red River and the Texas Trail. The Red River was cleared and made newly navigable by Captain Henry Miller Shreve, who commanded the United States Army Corps of Engineers. An 180-mile (289 km) long raft of debris had previously clogged passage by Shreve’s riverboat, the Heliopolis, that was specially designed to remove river debris. In his honor, the company and the village of Shreve Town were named. On March 20, 1839, the town was incorporated as “Shreveport,” and in 1871 it became a city.
Add comment July 8th, 2006