| Canberra |
[06 Feb 2009|06:54pm] |
So I've just spent the last two weeks at the ANU Logic & Learning Summer School in Canberra, Australia. Before I make any comments on the course or the city, I'd just like to say that it got to 39.5 degrees C here today (103.1F), which basically sums up most of the experience. I like it warm, but I'm not built for these temperatures.
The summer school was excellent. I learned about lots of different logical systems and got to hear about some reasonably deep theoretical results in each. It was a valuable experience, overall. Plus I met some cool people here, which is always nice when you travel.
Canberra is a weird city. It's practically vacant most of the time. You walk around at any time of the day or night and there are very few cars on the streets, and very few people anywhere to be found. Keep in mind there are over 300,000 people living here. We went out looking for live music in Canberra a number of times during the two weeks, and it was a total wash out. I'm certain I've accidentally stumbled into more live music in many smaller towns, but I was actively looking here! Zany.
The ANU campus is very nice though.
There was a visit to the NASA Deep Space Communications Centre in Canberra. That was fun-ish, although disappointingly light on science content relevant to the fact that they have a 70m dish. It was basically just a NASA exhibit, and I've been to the NASA Ames visitor centre, and I watched NASA TV once, so there wasn't a lot new there. Oh well.
That same excursion involved going to the Tidbinbilla nature reserve. That was pleasant, although trudging through the bush on an enforced march in 38 degree heat leaves something to be desired. Also, I managed to screw up my knee at some point in the first two days I was here, so the walking didn't help. It ended up being a bit like if you visited wherever Bambi lives. A huge bush fire came through there in 2003 and killed most of the animals. So imagine if every woodland creature in ever disney movie died in a fire, rather than just Bambi's mother. It was kinda like "We used to have more koalas here, but they all died". "There used to be some kangaroos here, but they died in the fire..." and so on. Our guide was great though. She should totally get her own show and replace the Crocodile Hunter as the newest Aussie nature show host.
Australian nature is also kinda weird. I'd been to Sydney before, where you don't see a lot of nature. There are ants here that are the size of rats and will eat your face if you get close to them. I may be exaggerating, but it's something close to the truth. Australia also has every variety of poisonous animal known to man, all of which are willing to kill you.
That's just about enough to capture my Canberra experience.
Also, the new Dynamo Go album will be out in the next couple months. I posted a video about it on the brand-spanking new Dynamo Go youtube channel, because we are really special and clever like that:
http://www.youtube.com/user/dynamogomusic
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| Gian's Election Day Eve Prayer |
[07 Nov 2008|08:17pm] |
I'm an atheist, but right now seems to be an appropriate time to start praying:
Dear Lord,
On the eve of the 2008 New Zealand General Election,
Please look favourably upon the parties that have bought us nine years of consistent economic prosperity
and who have improved the lot of so many who are disadvantaged in this world,
and who actually have more than two braincells.
And please, please don't let Roger Douglas into Parliament. He is a very bad man and will almost certainly kill kittens.
Love,
Gian
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| Travels |
[02 Nov 2008|04:58pm] |
So, Rocky and I have got our tickets to the UK bought and paid for. We leave New Zealand for London on the 27th of May. At this point the plan is to spend 6 months in Europe, followed by three months in the US (primarily limited by the reluctance of the US immigration authorities to recognise same-sex releationships). I've applied for internships at Microsoft Research Cambridge, and Google. I almostmaybeprobably have an internship lined up for the time I'm in the US in a really cool programming languages lab.
I'm still looking around for various other places I would like to try to visit, if any of my first choices fall through. IBM Research Zurich appeals to me, so I might try to put together an application there.
It's all pretty exciting really.
For nerdy types who read this, check out The Ur Programming Language Family, which you can probably think of in very simple terms as Ruby on Rails on steroids, but which is also appealing at a much deeper theoretical level, insofar as that it was not slapped together piecemeal by retards. God I hate Ruby.
Also, I'd appreciate recommendations from any CS-types as to places I should consider applying for internships, or even just places that might be worth trying to arrange visits with. I do formal methods and programming languages stuff, mostly.
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| Download Sad Again |
[29 Oct 2008|04:30pm] |
Because I'm in a good mood, you can download a track from our EP:
Sad Again MP3
I'm currently working on the new Dynamo Go album, but I'm waiting for the rest of the EPs to sell before I release the whole EP for free.
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| Flyiiinnggg away |
[23 Oct 2008|12:13am] |
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So, Rocky and I booked our flights to London for May 27th 2009. That's pretty exciting. I'm applying for internships at various places in the UK and US, so we'll see how that goes.
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[07 Oct 2008|03:44pm] |
I filled in my absentee ballot for the US election today and mailed it.
I'll give you a hint: I voted "No" on Proposition 8.
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[06 Oct 2008|03:34pm] |
I have seen three of the worst movies known to man in the last few days:
The Andromeda Strain - This is a two-part mini-series remake of the campy 1971 classic. It's truly dreadful, in a sort of predictable way. They introduce things and the camera kinda lingers on them, and you just know it's going to be an issue later! Oh, and they get chased by dying grass. True story. Despite all this, it was actually watchable in the same way that "The Core" is. 3/5.
The Mist - Yet another Steven King abortion. Lots of people behaving in willfully stupid ways, supposedly to represent how people get in hopeless situations. However, they are so self-conscious about it that they have a character who actually explains the motivations of the other characters before he is devoured by a giant spider. Almost entirely unwatchable, as 99% of the movie takes place in a supermarket with a Greek chorus that appears to be growing and shrinking from there being 10 people in the supermarket to there being 200, despite the doors being barracaded. 2/5.
The Happening - A recent thriller from the king of big-budget shit - M. Knight Shamalamalamalamalamalamayan. "Eco-thriller" is seriously the worst genre ever. It's like The Day After Tomorrow meets An inconvenient truth meets Signs. And they actually end up cowering in a basement, just like in every other M. Knight Shamalamalamalamalamalamayan movie. Oh, and they keep ominously cutting to stock footage of trees swaying. Believe it or not, there is no way to make trees and plants seem threatening, especially not when it's Mark Wahlberg running from communicating deadly rapidly-evolving trees. Unfortunately, they don't seem to understand that mutation only happens between generations, especially on that scale. The gaping scientific implausibilities are only compounded by the fact that the protagonist is a science teacher. Oh, and it was full of terrible post-9/11 bullshit. You know how some movies get tarred with the "post-9/11 bullshit" brush? This movie was proud of the fact. They were waving their post-9/11 freak flag high. Seriously. Absolute shit. -2147483648/5.
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[11 Sep 2008|01:13am] |
People from Canterbury take note! I am playing in your locale on Thursday 18th of September.
Also, I just watched Endgame. It wins my award for worst movie ever made. Seriously. It starts off well, but just grinds to a crashing, cheesy, incongruous ending which leaves the viewer confused and bewildered. I mean, seriously, what the fuck? It's like they decided to sit down and make the worst movie they could. And they succeeded.
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[18 Aug 2008|06:10pm] |
This is one of the funniest sites I've seen in a long time:
Photo Cliches
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| Lyttelton! |
[16 Aug 2008|12:33pm] |
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I'm gonna be playing a solo show down in Lyttelton at the Wunderbar with Lindon Puffin on Thursday the 18th of September. It's gonna be rad.
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[02 Jul 2008|02:52pm] |
Come along. It'll be awesome.
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[19 Apr 2008|11:55pm] |
In 5 minutes I will no longer be a teenager, the 20th of April being my 20th birthday. Scary thought. I wonder if things will feel different?
Edit: Apparently not.
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[27 Feb 2008|04:42pm] |
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Dynamo Go - New Bed Science debuted at a stunning #218 in the New Zealand RadioScope Airplay charts, before slipping out of sight. How much do we rock?
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| New Bed Science |
[24 Jan 2008|08:13pm] |
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Here is the finished version of New Bed Science, from the new Dynamo Go EP. You can buy a copy on Amplifier, or you can go listen to a crappy version on Myspace for free.
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[16 Jan 2008|04:02pm] |
Go vote for us on KiwiFM - just type in "Dynamo Go - New Bed Science" to the voting box and I'll love you forever.
http://www.kiwifm.co.nz/
That is all.
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[28 Dec 2007|10:28pm] |
A bunch of people are doing end-of-year wrap-up posts. I'm not going to bore you with the details of my life. Fuck, I'm not even going to bore myself with the details of my life.
I will, however, take this opportunity to post a quick list of my favourite albums of 2007:
In ascending order:
3) Manic Street Preachers - Send Away The Tigers. This is a lovely album from a very angsty band. As usual, the lead single peaked somewhere in the NZ charts, slipped away, and was never seen again. Oh well. The rest of the album is actually very good.
2) Lindon Puffin - Show Pony. This is a great album! It's what Neil Finn would be doing if he weren't busy flogging dead Crowded House horses. It's beautifully melodic pop and tonally one of the most consistent albums I've ever had the pleasure of hearing.
1) New Pornographers - Challengers. The best album of 2007. It has a few weak moments, but the good songs on it are so brilliantly clever and catchy so as to carry the whole thing. You need to listen to this album at least a couple times.
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[24 Nov 2007|12:56pm] |
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I am currently shirtless and eating cookies for breakfast. Internet, you want to be me.
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[20 Nov 2007|04:12pm] |
This being one of my sporadic posting frenzies, I guess I should detail the current state of Dynamo Go!
We're recording a new EP. There are just a few more instruments to overdub and a little bit more mixing to do and then there should be a finished product. I'm hoping to have it done in the next month. I want to get some lathe-cut vinyl made of this EP.
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