Flotsam

Yesterday I spent a couple of hours going through the drawers of my bedside table. It was a simple matter of emptying them on the bed and then making different piles: to throw away (divided by recycling status), to keep somewhere else and to place back. There were also subpiles, depending on the particular mood, and some later split or joined. Wedding invitations joining birthday cards that had split from postcards, only to join again at the end.

It all started because I was looking for a particular photo, or rather, a subclass of photo, photos of myself in the 80s that I would not mind giving away. But soon I was engrossed in the findings.

Although I cannot say I collect, because that would require an active search, I passively gather several sets of items, mainly by the simple method of putting them in a drawer rather than throwing them away. The main sets that appeared yesterday were:

• Glasses. After breaking a few dozens in my teens, at sixteen I suddenly stopped breaking them. As my prescription has not changed since 1991 (the 1991 prescription turned up as well), I keep all my glasses since then. Sometimes I even wear them, to break the mood. Those are back in place.
• Keyrings. I just cannot throw them away, so I have a lot of them. The survivors are those that break my pockets or are uncomfortable, as they are the ones that get put in a drawer rather than lost or broken.
• Restaurant cards. I like keeping a card of those places I have enjoyed. Unfortunately more than a few places lack cards, so they are not represented. As I had an empty business card folder, I found them a holder. There was also the mandatory trip through the memory lane as I placed each in its place, thinking back. There was worse to come.
• Electronics. There were two old mobile phones (with their chargers) and a portable 8 cm CD player. All now are waiting a trip to the home appliance recycling.
• Maps. In a similar way to the restaurant cards, I like to keep those maps I have used when visiting a city, or even a region. Usually folded in the wrong places, and a few torn to pieces, they still serve as memory anchors, with their markings and creases, for the time spent there. A proof, if mainly to myself, of the reality of the past memories. Some cities, visited often (London, Paris, Barcelone…) only have the latest map, as the memories themselves run into each other, making the map unreliable.
• Sex related. The condoms were expired, or close to expiration, so I threw all of them away. We haven’t used one since 2005. There is a viagra pill, unused from a set of four, also from 2005. Who knows, maybe I will find it a use before the end of the year. That has its own associations, strong ones.
• Photographs. Paper photographs, from the days before digital. I have never been a good photographer, mostly because I do not care much about the final result. So I have piles of bad photos, most of them now yellowed or faded, unworthy of a place in my single album, but that I cannot simply throw away. There were also a couple of sets that were not bad, but that I felt were well represented with an example in the album. One was my business trip to Japan, and if I find the energy I may well scan a few of them. The second were the happy photos of the summer of ’95, at Bordeaux. All those people I had lost contact with, which segues well with…
• Cards and letters. I had cleaned up my old letters several years ago, when I moved, as there were too many of them and they were usually too embarrassing to reread, or if the wrong person read them. I kept the postcards and the different brands of gift cards (Christmas, birthday, moving…) as they are supposed to be shown, so the content is usually subdued and neutral. They appear more collectible. In pre-email correspondence, unless you were much more obsessive than me, you did not make a copy of your own letters, so you ended up with a one-sided conversation, and the doubt of what I was writing to provoke those responses. So I got rid of them. There are a few letters, those few that I have received since 2003, even the embarrassing ones, because I find them more precious in these days of electronic communication, and maybe because it is still fresh in my mind how I replied to them. When I replied.
  Because the whole lot, apart from family, wife and very few friends, are messages from people I am no longer in contact with. Quite a few from those ’95 photos, made even more poignant by the association. Others, more recent and still lost to me. Because for each one where the correspondence had slowly petered out, there were three where I was sure I could point out I had killed it. Maybe it is selective memory, helped by seeing only one side, but it did not feel that way.

The whole experience, food, travels, images, people, forms a partial view of my life since I went to live on my own. The survivors, fragments of the whole, the flotsam left in the sand.

  ¶ 1:56 PM

  Volver

This one has become, as time passes, my favorite Gardel tango. And certainly there is something in the lyrics that call at those who have lived, and suffered. So when I was younger it probably was Yira, then Adios Muchachos, and now, Volver.

I would really like to communicate why the lyrics touch me so strongly, but I am bumbler when it comes to rhyme and meter, not to mention feelings, and even more so in a foreign language. If you want a version that can be sung, Jacob Lubliner has a decent version, even if I disagree in some important points with his translation. So I will do a prose translation, as it is the only one I feel capable of.

Volver

Yo adivino el parpadeo
de las luces que a lo lejos
van marcando mi retorno...
Son las mismas que alumbraron
con sus pálidos reflejos
hondas horas de dolor.
Y aunque no quise el regreso,
siempre se vuelve al primer amor.
La vieja calle donde el eco dijo
tuya es su vida, tuyo es su querer,
bajo el burlón mirar de las estrellas
que con indiferencia hoy me ven volver...

Volver... con la frente marchita,
las nieves del tiempo platearon mi sien...
Sentir... que es un soplo la vida,
que veinte años no es nada,
que febril la mirada,
errante en la sombra,
te busca y te nombra.
Vivir... con el alma aferrada
a un dulce recuerdo
que lloro otra vez...

Tengo miedo del encuentro
con el pasado que vuelve
a enfrentarse con mi vida...
Tengo miedo de las noches
que pobladas de recuerdos
encadenen mi soñar...
Pero el viajero que huye
tarde o temprano detiene su andar...
Y aunque el olvido, que todo destruye,
haya matado mi vieja ilusión,
guardo escondida una esperanza humilde
que es toda la fortuna de mi corazón.

Volver...

Return

I can almost see the blinking lights that in the distance signal my return
They are the same pale lights that reflected long painful hours
Although this return was unwanted, we always revisit our first love
The old street that echoed "Yours is my life, yours is my love" under the uncaring gaze of the stars that today see my return

To return… with a wilted forehead, the snow of time has silvered my temples
To feel… that life is just a breath, twenty years are like nothing, feverish my gaze, wandering in shadow, seeking and naming you.
To live… grasping with my soul a sweet memory that makes me weep again

I am afraid of the meeting with that past coming back to face my life
I am afraid of the nights peopled by memories that chain my dreams
But the fleeing traveller sooner or later stops his flight…
And even if oblivion, all-destroyer, has killed my old illusion, I keep hidden a humble hope, the whole fortune of my heart.  ¶ 4:13 PM

  Twittering

For two weeks I have been exploring Twitter. I have been trying different styles of use, although my streaks of exhibitionism and verbosity shine through.

The first realization is that 140 characters are not enough, so I end up blogging, about matters that does not lend themselves to short posts. The alternative are chained posts, so you develop the message through two or more posts, though it appears that most users do not use that trick, embracing instead the limitation of the medium.

The second surprise is that the fact that the posts are open to anyone (except for those locked, and more about it later) makes it easier to approach people, even people that I have not contacted in years, or follow people even if we did not part in friendly terms. Very quickly I start following people in two ways, those that I check by name and those that I follow in the standard Twitter way. The first ones are those that do not post much and that I will not reply to.

Then came the third surprise, the invasion of the bots. A pity, as that will probably kill the openness of the system, so people switch to locked accounts, closed only to their friends. If that goes on, it becomes a fast forum, or an easy instant messaging, rather than an open broadcasting as it is now. An interesting tool, but not the revolution that they are trying to sell us (and to use that awful new word), to monetize.

It is a great application for multitasking while working, as it requires little attention and does not impede focusing on other activities. That is, I think, its biggest charm for most users. That is also why it is much less active on week-ends, when people are busy living, as twitter does not really interfere with it. It is easy to let it go for a while. No worries of lost hours, lost productivity or staying up till the wee hours tied up to the computer.

That is not to say it does not take up time, but it is manageable. That however is also a problem, as it is difficult to get really involved in something quite shallow by design. Unless you go private, and then it blocks its other features.

In my case it is useful, because I have a lot of people I have a shallow interest in, and in the weird workings of their minds, but for many reasons I cannot go deeper with, mostly because I do not have any intimacy slots left.

After these two weeks I will keep on twitter, because I can rub hands with interesting people, and I hope that they keep me in their loop when they go private. I will have to stop answering to people that do not follow me, as I suspect that is impolite, however. But in general terms this is fun, and that is the point. No depth, lots of breadth, and a cheap feeling of connectiveness.  ¶ 9:47 PM

  Homage

There is a vignette blog that I particularly like called remote cards, that offers just that, small views of what someone sees, if that someone was gifted with sharp observation skills and an even sharper narrative control. The two authors offer two different approaches but share curiosity on those around them and interest in what they see, using narrative as a way to understand what they experience.

I particularly like the short nature of the pieces, so, as I also believe that imitation is the truest form of flattery, here is a card of mine.

Funeral

The close family can be differentiated not only by the darker tone of the clothes, but by its thickness. In the beutiful May morning their winter jackets and trousers appear as a penitence, some kind of rejection of the fair weather in such an occasion. Though there is a mundane reason, dark clothes are for winter, and the summer clothes are always lighter and less formal. One of the grandchildren, a boy of ten, looks clearly uncomfortable in a dark blue woolen sweater, probably because it was the closest his mother could find to the expected mourning attire. The arrangement in the chapel resembles a wedding, with people on each aisle coming from one side or the other of the family, and a sprinkling of young people, friends of the elder grandchildren, standing because they are too shy to take a seat. Some of them have been messaged to come to the funeral after leaving home in the morning, so we have a few splashes of colour and bare flesh, contrasting the general grey and blue overtones, and much better suited for the bright coloured light playing in the white walls. Nobody seems sad, not even the closest family. All the tears were spent eight years earlier, when that modern bogeyman, Alzheimer, was first mentioned. The relief is like a palpable presence, seen in the unbowed heads, the shared smiles, the tone of the rote answers to the priest’s sayings. I long for the long walk among the tombs and the grave flowers till the burial spot.  ¶ 9:44 AM

  Several cases of you

This is the title of the compilation that I advanced the other day. It was made mostly for my own enjoyment, as I doubt many people will share all of my preferences, and it does not discover anything new about music or my own tastes, using well known and well established songs/artists. I already have received one order for a copy, but she is the one that proved me that synchronicity is possible, and we share many likes and dislikes besides the temporal connection. I am afraid that with the passage of time my tolerance for new music is reduced, while certain songs become established as part of my personal soundtrack, the one that is playing inside my head when there is no music around.

The beginning of the compilation came from a random check in iTunes for duplicates, and then wondering how similar, or dissimilar, the different covers were, and why I liked one, or both.

Tracks:

1. Sweet Dreams. The archetypical 80s song, or at least of the 80s I lived through (besides some Spanish music). It has such a strong memory load of youth (and the first sexual discoveries) that it hits me almost physically. I present both the Eurythmics and Marilyn Manson versions, as they fit my own vision of how I have aged from the clear eyed youth of the time, 1983.

2. Down Under. Although I heard this song first in English classes (and that made me like the lyrics), and it probably was the first reggae-influenced song I heard, it was not till a trans European Interrail trip (in 1990) that it got a place in my walkman, and now it is a song that makes me giggle with the chorus. It was not in the first draft, but Kathryn’s trip back down under brought it all back. Opposed to the Men at Work, I propose Pennywise speedy cover, a totally different take.

3. Heaven. In this case I found first the cover, and then, because I liked it, the original, twenty years old by then, as it somehow had escaped my attention when I was a David Byrne fanboy. Both Talking Heads and Esclarecidos are old favorites of mine, in different styles, and this song showcases them perfectly. As well, that place where nothing ever happens horrifies and fascinates me, in equal measure.

4. Volver. I like the tango, the oldest generally the better, and Volver has my favorite lyrics among all the classic ones. So when I watched Almodovar’s Volver, I was struck by the powerful version that Estrella Morente presents, the main reference for the film. I still prefer Gardel’s, but it is a close run.

5. Suzanne. I first heard this song in a Joan Baez cover, driving to the beach in the summer holidays, before I was ten. My mother loved it. When I learned enough English to puzzle out the words it left me still confused and fascinated. As other songs from those tapes that made the long trips bearable, it has become part of my mental landscape, including the ambiguously hopeful message. Unfortunately I have no copy of that cover, but I have the man himself, Leonard Cohen, singing it live, and Nina Simone making the song hers, as she usually did. And I cannot say no to Nina.

6. What a wonderful world. Another overused song, I know, but it is still all true, and it is good to remember the wonder as well as the bad parts. This was also the starting point for this work, as I had somehow transferred three times to iTunes (which means I have it in at least three different CDs) Louis Armstrong’s version. Unlike the other songs, the cover is quite similar to the original, but how could I pass on the opportunity to showcase a duo between Nick Cave and Shane McGowan? Besides being two of my favorite male singers, they add a particular feeling of sincerity when they sing about the wonder of the world.

7. A case of you. The source of the title, and I have already included two versions of it in a previous compilation. But the one person I asked about including it again told me that yes, she wanted cases and cases. So here there are not only two but three different versions. Although this compilation does not highlight it, I do have a weakness for women singing. And this song really lets them shine. In that internal soundtrack that I referred to it is the personal theme of the friend that wanted more cases, and that at least is a good enough reason for me. Between the two extremes of Joni Mitchell and Diana Krall I add Tori Amos, just because it really seems to me to be some kind of middle ground.   ¶ 4:19 PM

  Ratings

This is somethin that has annoyed me for a long time, but recent discussions on data distribution and statistics has given it, in a way, form.

I am writing about all those places in the web where you are asked to, or supposed to rate something. The ones I see more often are Amazon, imdb and Goodreads, mostly because those are places I use frequently (and I spend money at movies and books, of course). Amazon ratings have been broken a long time, between some intransigent fans and some clumsy attempts at viral marketing and harnessing the word of mouth comments, but I used to have some hope for other sites not directly linked with a sale. Then the problem becomes the people themselves or, rather, my own expectations of them.

I know I am being optimistic, but I really hoped that people's ratings would fit the typical data distributions, though I could not really predict what shape they would take. I focused on Goodreads data of readers with many ratings, as I felt that large statistical pools would smooth out the tendencies and that would discard the limited fans and the marketing bots, by focusing on people with over five hundred books.

Goodreads ratings are from 1 to 5, and they are slightly no´-linearly skewed, as 1 is bad, 2 is Ok, 3 is good, 4 is very good and 5 is amazing. Or that is how they present the numbers. I think the skewing is correct, as there is a pre-selection in the books that we read, so there are better chances of reading a book you like than one you dislike, whether it is through recommendations, author-following or simple word of mouth. So the average point is "like". Or should be, if you are someone who reads hundreds of books.

Although I had not done it deliberately my average rating is where I think it should be, 3.0, and the shape is a symmetrical Gaussian curve. There is a reason why it is called the "normal" distribution, after all.

When I checked other posters, or even the ratings of different authors, most people had rating averages quite higher, and curiously clustered (for people with hundreds of ratings) in two main zones. Most people had averages between 3.4 and 3.5, which is also where most "average books" are, and a significant amount had averages around 3.9. I was encouraged in that several people must rate as I do, as the third cluster of averages was around 3.0. Unsurprisingly, those people had symmetrical distributions.

So, why there are other main rating distributions?

The 3.4 people curve resembles (tricky with only five points) either a Poisson distribution or a hedged Gaussian (one with a hard limit). What I would expect if instead of the skewed Goodreads values you use straight linear ones, such as they are used in Amazon, so 1 is very bad, 2 is bad, 3 is average, 4 is good and 5 is very good. So my 3 is their 4, their 5 is the sum of my 4 and 5, and my 2 becomes their 3. I know it makes me appear smug, but I think they do not read the ratings. Or, considering they are the majority, the ratings as presented are not clear.

There is a small subset that does have 3 as the most frequent value, but they have few or no lower ratings. maybe it is because they are not comfortable giving low ratings, or they follow the maxim that if you cannot say something good, say nothing. I cannot say, but at least their ratings tend to be more in line with my own.

The high rating people are also of two main types. Ones whose most frequent rating is 5, and others who just do not use ratings of 1 and 2. The first ones are weird, because I cannot see how you can say you have read 200 amazing books, for instance. Unless you say that to improve the ratings... The others may be an extreme case of not saying bad things, or listing only books you like, or perhaps that they start many books but do not hesitate to drop the ones they do not like.

The best solution, in the end, it is to ignore the average values, because averages are dull, and instead follow the tastes of one you know that is close to your own. And pick a few out of character books from time to time. You may be surprisingly surprised, or at least you will have a more rounded out reading experience when you know how bad a book can be.  ¶ 10:37 AM

  Uncertain

A recent course I attended dealt with the ways to estimate uncertainty, the range of values that the will include the real value around an actual measurement. So, if a thermometer gives me a value of 21.2 celsius and its standard uncertainty is considered to be 0.5ºC, I know that 95% of the time (that is the standard uncertainty cut-off, though some use either 66 or 99%) the real value will be between 20.7 and 21.7 degrees. It is a very important magnitude, unfortunately underestimated by most people in Science, and usually ignored outside of it. Engineers replace it with tolerance, so that as long as the uncertainty is lower than the tolerance, they are happy to ignore it.

In measurements its estimation is quite straightforward in simple systems, but in complex systems (anything that involves a human at some step) usually it is better to determine its maximum value empirically. Because in science you have to always assume the worst case for uncertainty values, and it is uncertainty what indicates how many significant numbers can you give in a measurement. I already knew the basics, but it is surprising that the practical ways to estimate bias, accuracy and precision are not so widespread.

The real problem of such a course, and the real examples that we tried, is the way you look at numbers anywhere. because you start adding an estimate (high unless you know well the origin of the data) of the uncertainty in them, and become a cynic very quickly. Such as the budget for a building, or the infection data for AH1N1 (or, more positively, its mortality rates when adjusted with the uncertain infection data). Makes me nostalgic for the golden s-f era technocratic societies, till I remember how actual technocracies really work. So instead it makes me shun the news, as the disinformation outweighs the real information.  ¶ 10:45 AM

  Music, more and less

The last compilation I mailed out, with the unimaginative name Last, has received the best comments among the listeners of all my music sets. Which does not mean much, by the way, considering the number of people involved. So although I will keep my vow to myself and it will still be the Last one sent unasked, I still will burn compilations. If only to take to the car and maybe mail out a couple of copies.

The success of Last is due, I think, to the fact that it is a directed work, with a message and an underlying common thread linking the pieces and the same melancholical tone, rather than just music I like or music other people will like. It also took quite a long time and many permutations to reach the final form, including different versions of songs that end up there.

As for why I insist on physical objects, it is for legal reasons, and my own respect for the law, even if it is a foolish one. Where I am, compilation CDs have the same status as the old tape recordings, so you can share them as long as you do not make money out of it. The SGAE, Sociedad General de Autores Españoles, Spanish General Society of Authors, gets money out of the sales of blank CDs and any equipment capable of burning to balance out this use, so it is the legal option. Offering the same for download however is a totally different picture. Anyway, money is fortunately not a concern, and I prefer the physical object as a finished work, in its definite form, while the electronic form is for me a "work in progress", still malleable, mutable.

These reflections come because I am finishing a self-indulgent compilation, one that I know will be of limited interest to others, but there is already an interested reader. I will present it when it is finished (a way to get a cheap, "filler", blog post as well), but in the meantime, if any of you want a copy of any of my compilations, write to me. The only requirement is that you will have to give me an address and possibly an explanation for why you want it. Curiosity is one of my constant traits.  ¶ 9:26 AM

  Addiction

There is a reason for my almost disappeareance the last month. In fact there are several, but one accounts for over 80% of my free time, and justifies why I only read two books in April. Game addiction.

April looked good for leisure activities. Easter and a long week-end, as well as a course in Madrid, with no other business travelling and all the quality audits and concerns over till June. I had the public defence of my Ph. D. student, but besides attending to a couple of essays of his presentation, the main work, the book, was already finished. As one of the jury members complained to me, "it is the bloody The Pillars of the Earth". I read it twice, and some chapters underwent five rewrites, so I know very well how long it is, thanks.

Anyway, there were no work deadlines (there is an article that I should write, but it has no deadline yet), we had decided we would stay home at Easter, to rest and cook, so I allowed myself the luxury of starting a computer game, Fallout 3. I thought I could afford to get lost in it for a while. I was almost right.

As the number indicates, it is the third installment in a series, though it comes much later and with many changes over the original games. The main change, and what pushes it, for me, from a mild drug into the hardcore realm, is that instead of an isometric third person view you get a first person view, without forgetting the changes in CGI in the intervening fifteen years.

Fallout is a post-apocalyptic series, and one intended for mature audiences with some sense of humour, black preferred. Players face quite harsh choices, and besides telling of past atrocities it allows the player to engage in his/her own, if desired.

The clincher is the setting, a ruined Washington DC (and portions of the surrounding states), so you can feel the degree of destruction more acutely when seeing a partially rubbled monument than some random shacks in a desert. Seeing the Lincoln Monument turned into a Slaver outpost makes it a more emotional than meeting them in the wilderness.

So far I have clocked over 150 hours in less than thirty days, but the fact that I did finish a couple of books this week end and I am finding again the time for blogging means that I am finally over the addiction. Most of the time has not been spent following the game quest but just travelling around, seeing the sights, exploring different places. Listening to the radio, though the excellent big band playlist gets a bit old after all the repetitions. I feel like relapsing. Just one more stroll through the ruins...

Another draw is how your actions do have consequences (although by now I suspect I have exhausted the variety of interactions of the place), in my case getting random people giving me small gifts and thanking my character for his heroism, while groups of bad guys ambush me from time to time. Fun, if repetitive.

This addictive cycle is the reason I only get involved with a game when I can afford it. A book, no matter how dense, will be over in less than ten-fifteen hours, usually much less. But an open ended game like this can hook me for weeks.

So if I ignored you, behaved as a bad correspondent, or just plainly faded from view for a while, such as this blog, now you know why. And it may yet happen again, depending on what additional content appears.  ¶ 5:44 PM