Sunday, February 27, 2005
Why I drive a Volvo
My car is a 1983 Volvo 244. In Volvo's numbering scheme the first digit is the model, the 2nd digit is the number of cylinders and the 3rd digit is the number of doors. The 242 is a two-door, the 244 is a 4-door and the 245 is a wagon. The fifth door is in the way back. About 1985 Volvo dropped the 3rd digit and just called all their 200 series models with 4-cylinder engines the "240". This is about the same time they stopped making the two-doors.
I like to work on cars, and have a plan in life, that we'll only buy cars we can afford with cash. Gadgets break, and every car I have had with electric windows has had trouble with the electric windows, so I have found that the easiest old cars to own are cars without gadgets. My volvo has crank windows, no A/C, no sunroof, no seatwarmers. I like it like that. There is no safer car with less gadgets that I can buy with cash. My goal is to get my whole family eventually driving Volvos.
My family has had trouble with car accidents. If you go look at crashtest.com, they rate every car made in the last 25 years for safety. Volvo is the only car that is safe all models all years. There was an article online that said from 1990 to 1995 no one in America died while driving a Volvo 240. Sounds like my kind of car.
My theory is that the meaning of life can be summed up in one phrase, "don't make the same mistake twice." Or if you are a fan of the Who, "Won't get Fooled Again." I don't believe that I will live forever, but one goal is that a car accident is not going to do me in.
I like to work on cars, and have a plan in life, that we'll only buy cars we can afford with cash. Gadgets break, and every car I have had with electric windows has had trouble with the electric windows, so I have found that the easiest old cars to own are cars without gadgets. My volvo has crank windows, no A/C, no sunroof, no seatwarmers. I like it like that. There is no safer car with less gadgets that I can buy with cash. My goal is to get my whole family eventually driving Volvos.
My family has had trouble with car accidents. If you go look at crashtest.com, they rate every car made in the last 25 years for safety. Volvo is the only car that is safe all models all years. There was an article online that said from 1990 to 1995 no one in America died while driving a Volvo 240. Sounds like my kind of car.
My theory is that the meaning of life can be summed up in one phrase, "don't make the same mistake twice." Or if you are a fan of the Who, "Won't get Fooled Again." I don't believe that I will live forever, but one goal is that a car accident is not going to do me in.
Saturday, February 05, 2005
What Cyberpunk Means to Me
I like reading science fiction. I am not as into sci-fi movies and I am really not into sci-fi tv shows. The Matrix and Star Wars are great movies though.
I got into sci-fi during the summer of 1987 working at North Commons Pool in North Minneapolis. The shifts there were something like an hour on, a half hour off all summer. During the off time there wasn't always anyone I wanted to talk to but there wasn't really time to go anywhere and if I took a nap I would be groggy for the next shift. I believe the first sci fi book I read that summer was the Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov. Once they get their tentacles into you it's off to the races. I read most of Asimov's books that summer, then Heinlein, then Arthur C. Clarke. Then enough of every author I could find to the point of either: I'd read all his books, or I had read enough of his books that I wasn't into reading any more. I believe there may be some good sci fi author whose books I haven't read, but I am pretty sure he is not a major author who has won any Hugo or Nebula awards. I know all those guys. But then every few years a new guy comes out and has a new style and then I need to go find all his books and read them all.
Around 1991 that guy was Orson Scott Card. His Ender books totally rock. Some of his other books are fantasy. I hate fantasy. I read the Lord of the Rings books and decided most other fantasy seemed to be derivative of that. Frank Herbert is an example of an author whose books I have read enough of to know that I don't need to read the rest. They are ok, but I am done with him. Same with David Brin.
Around 1994 the new guy I found was William Gibson. I would say that William Gibson is the father of cyberpunk. What cyberpunk means to me: near future, hi tech stuff, guns, sex, drugs, software, the rise of multinational corporation-states, the emergence of Asia. I go crazy for it now. Here are my top 5 cyberpunk books:
1) Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson
The Led Zeppelin of cyberpunk, the Pulp Fiction of cyberpunk, the 2004 Red Sox of cyberpunk, just the best there is or ever will be. The main character's name is Hiro Protagonist.
2) Idoru by William Gibson
In the Neuromancer books, Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive Gibson introduced his great characters and storylines which usually include a machine that thinks it is a person, or some kind of recluse which is actually a computer. In this book he adds rock stars and Japan. I was instantly hooked.
3) Remix by Jon Courteny Grimwood
This book features a gun with artificial intelligence. It actually talks to the guy shooting it. Pretty cool.
4) Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan
Amazingly my wife bought me this book that I nearly bought for myself the same day. In this version of the future, bodies die but people live on in other bodies, there is a chip inside people's head which contains "them", their memories and personality and it can be moved from one person to another and backed up on disk and so a sort of imortality is possible. And of course there is plenty of futuristic weaponry, drugs and sex and the setting is the best city in the world for cyberpunk or anything else, San Francisco.
5) The Bohr Maker by Linda Nagata
This book delves into what could be possible with genetic engineering. A "Maker" is a virus-type thing which can change a person's looks, their genetic makeup. The Bohr maker is a maker which can make more makers. Pretty cool.
So there it is. If anyone has any books they want to reccomend, that would be great. I get the feeling that the sci fi community is actually a little tired of the cyberpunk genre. But not me. Kinda like classic rock, if there is some new band like Jet that sounds like Aerosmith and ACDC and Queen but they do it all in a good way, I am not going to dog them for not being original. No one lives in a vacuum, except Nikko, anyway.
I got into sci-fi during the summer of 1987 working at North Commons Pool in North Minneapolis. The shifts there were something like an hour on, a half hour off all summer. During the off time there wasn't always anyone I wanted to talk to but there wasn't really time to go anywhere and if I took a nap I would be groggy for the next shift. I believe the first sci fi book I read that summer was the Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov. Once they get their tentacles into you it's off to the races. I read most of Asimov's books that summer, then Heinlein, then Arthur C. Clarke. Then enough of every author I could find to the point of either: I'd read all his books, or I had read enough of his books that I wasn't into reading any more. I believe there may be some good sci fi author whose books I haven't read, but I am pretty sure he is not a major author who has won any Hugo or Nebula awards. I know all those guys. But then every few years a new guy comes out and has a new style and then I need to go find all his books and read them all.
Around 1991 that guy was Orson Scott Card. His Ender books totally rock. Some of his other books are fantasy. I hate fantasy. I read the Lord of the Rings books and decided most other fantasy seemed to be derivative of that. Frank Herbert is an example of an author whose books I have read enough of to know that I don't need to read the rest. They are ok, but I am done with him. Same with David Brin.
Around 1994 the new guy I found was William Gibson. I would say that William Gibson is the father of cyberpunk. What cyberpunk means to me: near future, hi tech stuff, guns, sex, drugs, software, the rise of multinational corporation-states, the emergence of Asia. I go crazy for it now. Here are my top 5 cyberpunk books:
1) Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson
The Led Zeppelin of cyberpunk, the Pulp Fiction of cyberpunk, the 2004 Red Sox of cyberpunk, just the best there is or ever will be. The main character's name is Hiro Protagonist.
2) Idoru by William Gibson
In the Neuromancer books, Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive Gibson introduced his great characters and storylines which usually include a machine that thinks it is a person, or some kind of recluse which is actually a computer. In this book he adds rock stars and Japan. I was instantly hooked.
3) Remix by Jon Courteny Grimwood
This book features a gun with artificial intelligence. It actually talks to the guy shooting it. Pretty cool.
4) Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan
Amazingly my wife bought me this book that I nearly bought for myself the same day. In this version of the future, bodies die but people live on in other bodies, there is a chip inside people's head which contains "them", their memories and personality and it can be moved from one person to another and backed up on disk and so a sort of imortality is possible. And of course there is plenty of futuristic weaponry, drugs and sex and the setting is the best city in the world for cyberpunk or anything else, San Francisco.
5) The Bohr Maker by Linda Nagata
This book delves into what could be possible with genetic engineering. A "Maker" is a virus-type thing which can change a person's looks, their genetic makeup. The Bohr maker is a maker which can make more makers. Pretty cool.
So there it is. If anyone has any books they want to reccomend, that would be great. I get the feeling that the sci fi community is actually a little tired of the cyberpunk genre. But not me. Kinda like classic rock, if there is some new band like Jet that sounds like Aerosmith and ACDC and Queen but they do it all in a good way, I am not going to dog them for not being original. No one lives in a vacuum, except Nikko, anyway.
