Fiat Lux

Harry Truman famously said on learning that he had become President of the US, “I felt like the moon, the stars, and all the planets had fallen on me.”

Not that my new job is remotely comparable to becoming POTUS, but even so, I think I know how he felt.

I’m at the Adobe Community Summit this week, meeting scores of new faces and getting inundated with information. My new gig has gotten Twittered, blogged, and announced at the keynote. It’s enough to inflate anyone’s ego, but the sheer amount of new stuff that I have to assimilate is a good counterbalance.

I was more than a little nervous about starting this job, but everyone has been so warm and welcoming, all I feel now is excited to get going!

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It’s a lovely weekend, too nice for substantive blogging. Here’s a few quick notes though:

• I did a little playing around with Muxtape recently. Uploading songs is slower that I’d like, but other than that it’s a pretty pain-free process. The results are here.
• We’re all set for my Vassar class reunion next month. Thinking about how long it’s been since graduation makes me feel very old, but I’m psyched to be going back to one of the most lovely college campuses in the US.
• Obama has passed Clinton in committed superdelegates, as well as elected delegates.

And finally, a Tennessee Williams quote that’s been floating around my head this past day or so, after wrapping up my time at 4D:

People you’ve known in places do that: they go when you go. The earth seems to swallow them up, the walls absorb them like moisture, remain with you only as ghosts; their voices are echoes, fading but remembered.

The new gig starts Monday.

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Heading out with Scott to check out the show. Should be fun! I’ll post pix if I get any good ones.

UPDATED: We’re back. Had a great time, here’s a few highlights:

Adam Savage from Mythbusters, taking about his life of making things. I like the show but hearing Adam speak in person and show some of the many non-Mythbusters things he’s done increased my respect for him significantly.

What a cool guy! A true creative geek in the best possible sense of the word.

Those guys from YouTube did a live … performance(?) …. of their demented yet oh so cool pairings of Mentos & Diet Coke.

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Gas prices continue their journey upwards, but fortunately for me, my 60+ mile a day car commute will shortly be no more.

I’ve accepted a new job at a different company, and will be able to do my commute via CalTrain most days.

More details after I start on May 12th.

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We’re heading out early tomorrow AM for a quick Passover visit to NYC.

In the meantime, check out this recipe and video for Matzoh Lasagna.

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I’ve spent the last 2 days in New York, celebrating the wedding of a very old and dear friend. I got caught up with several people who knew me when I was still a shy, gangly teenager and discovered that another old friend now lives about 10 minutes away from my in-law’s house. Good times.

One thing that struck me in the middle of the reception was how infrequently I spend time in the company of people who are not part of the tech business, and how I really need to do more of it. Listening to writers and lawyers and doctors and teachers talk about LinkedIn, Skype, and MySpace was fascinating — of the three, Skype got the highest marks, for helping a grandmother video conference with her grandchild. MySpace got a universal thumbs-down. Only one person used it, and he couldn’t understand how anyone found “real” friends on it because all he got was invitations from porn spammers. The rest thought it was ugly and couldn’t see why anyone would want to have a profile there. People were interested to hear about LinkedIn, but only one person was on it and wasn’t too sure it was even useful.

All in all, it was a powerful reminder to me — what we in the Valley take for granted is barely on the radar screen of people outside the bubble. More of us should remember that.

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I haven’t played D&D since I was 15 or so, but I never threw my dice away. There’s a real visceral pleasure you get out of holding a handful of dice. Something to do with the colors, the way they click in your hand, and the sense of endless possibility.

Thanks, Gary. Rest well.

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Another year, another birthday. It’s nice to celebrate one on a weekend for a change. We slept in, then made our way up to the farmer’s market at the San Francisco Ferry Building and wandered the stalls in search of a few future dinner ingredients.

The Saturn also hit a milestone today as we drove back home — 90,000 miles. Unfortunately, gas prices are way over $3.50 a gallon at all but the cheapest off-brand gas stations. *sigh* With my long commute, this is Not Good At All. If, as predicted, gas goes over $4 a gallon this summer, I’m going to be spending about $200 a month just to drive to work. That sucks.

On a happier note, we finally got a Mac in the house. I picked up an old but serviceable Apple G4 for peanuts, and Scott’s been having fun tearing it apart and learning his way around OS X.

Gimi likes the Mac too. Or at least the monitor!

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Yesterday, a friend of ours e-mailed a link to a video of her new kitchen. I decided to send her back a video of our own kitchen. So I shot a quick video, uploaded it to YouTube, and sent out the link.

Then the weird thing happened. About 30 minutes after I uploaded the video, it disappeared off my YouTube account. Poof. Gone. No notice, no nothing. I have no idea why. The video is about 45 seconds of me talking as I walk through my kitchen; I didn’t add any music or graphics or do any editing at all, so there’s no possible copyright issues.

I don’t upload stuff to YouTube very often so maybe this is normal and I just don’t know it. Or maybe I’m the victim of some unfortunate glitch. Either way, it’s a little annoying.

At any rate, I signed up for a Vimeo account and re-uploaded the video there. If you’re really curious, you can see it (but I warn you, it’s kind of boring):

UPDATE 8:30PM: And now it’s back on YouTube. Go figure.

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Life’s funny sometimes. Earlier today, someone I thought was a nice person acted like a complete jerk and screwed over two people in the process (one of them being me). And then, this evening, someone that I barely know at all (but who seemed like a jerk on first impression) did something extremely generous and unselfish, and gave me something very valuable for no reason at all and asked nothing in return.

Karmic payback? Random chance? Who knows. We humans are great at pattern recognition, and we can see patterns where there aren’t any.

Either way, one thing is for sure. Today was a reminder to me — to judge people on what they do more than what they say.

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