Hello Cruel World
by Gretchen Peters

It’s amazing to me how a song lyric can capture ones feeling better than one is able to express it.

I love this title track from Gretchen Peters new album. It’s a breath of hope and an admission that despite the hardships that life might deal, she is facing it on her own terms. This album feels like a continuation, or the next chapter after her 2007  album Burnt Toast & Offerings, which is also a fantastic album.

Woman On The Wheel is another song on this album not to miss. I won’t spoil the punchline for you by posting it here. You will have to go listen to it yourself.

Other favorite songs from this album: Saint Francis, The Matador, Dark Angel, Paradise Found…okay, I pretty much like them all. Another thing I like about Gretchen’s song are that they can be listened to on a deep level. There is plenty their to consume and process. But the songs are also wonderful as background music, when you just need something going in your ears. My only regret is that I can’t buy this album on vinyl.

Gretchen, allmusic.com lists you as a country singer. I would never call myself a “Country Western” fan. But if what you sing is country then, almost thou persuadest me to like country. Regardless…welcome back to my iPod. Hello again Gretchen.

I listened to Leonard Cohen‘s new Album, Old Ideas, in it’s entirety while walking my dog the other night. I was blown away, and came away with an incredible peaceful feeling.

Cohen has only gotten better with age. His voice is deeper and more pure than I have ever heard it. At age 77, he is a world treasure. And so, it’s obvious from this album that he sees that his time left here is limited.

My daily realization is that my time is limited too. The day you understand in your gut that some odd 4 score of years is not very long is a day you will always remember. Many of us will not even make it that far.

I ordered the LP of this album from Amazon. I was hoping that it came with digital downloads like many LP’s come with today. I was pleased to find that it came with the CD, for times when I am on the go. But the truth is that there is nothing like listening to music coming from a vinyl record. I can’t explain why, but I notice things I don’t notice while playing CD’s or listening to iTunes. Not to mention my love for album cover art. So when I really want to immerse myself in music, I put on an LP, put on my headphone and sink in deep.

My only complaint is that I am a slightly disappointed in the LP pressing. It’s slightly warped. I expected more for this 180g ‘audiophile’ pressing. It’s not bad enough to cause any problems…just disappointing.

The song Anyhow is perhaps my second favorite song on the album, after Going Home. I can’t get over how Cohen can weave words. I love all the song. The remaining 8 songs all tie for a close third place.

Whether these songs are Old Ideas or new thoughts, this album sure feels as comfortable as Going Home.

I picked up his book about the first of November. It took me a while to read it, there was a lot to process. For me, it’s not just a quick read like many books I consume. I had to take it in digestible doses.

In July 2011 Jobs told Walter Isaacson, His biographer:

“I know there will be a lot in your book I won’t like.” It was more a question than a statement, and when he stared at me for a response, I nodded, smiled and said I was sure that would be true. “That’s good,” he said.

Jobs had aspects of his personality that most would consider character flaws. I’m not sure I would characterize them that way. Personalities are complex things, and who is to say that the genius that was Steve Jobs would have been completely broken without those very “flaws”.

He is among the short list of people I truly admire. Why? The answer might surprise you. He was an enigma. He espoused Zen living, but created commercial products that’s people found hard to live without. He cared little for money, but was as shrewd of a business man as has ever lived. He was frequently callous but could just as easily break down in tears.

For a billionaire, he was unassuming. He had no security detail. He even kept the back door unlocked during the day. And while he was never able to live with the calm spirit and mind that his Zen beliefs taught, they were engendered in the products he envisioned and lead his companies to produce.

Steve, the world misses you. Now please go and make the afterlife more user friendly.

I don’t know where the sunbeams end
And the starlight begins
It’s all a mystery
And I don’t know how a man decides
What’s right for his own life
It’s all a mystery
‘Cause I’m a man, not a boy
And there are things you can’t avoid
You have to face them
When you’re not prepared to face them

Lyrics from Fight Test by The Flaming Lips

Do You Realize – that everyone you know someday will die -
And instead of saying all of your goodbyes -
Let them know you realize that life goes fast
It’s hard to make the good things last
You realize the sun doesn’t go down
It’s just an illusion caused by the world spinning round.

Lyrics from Do You Realilze?? by The Flaming Lips

Why do they think they can cast their cigarette refuse on the ground? Is it any different than if I were to eat a candy bar several times a day and casting the wrapper on the ground?

Why do we tolerate it?

I can’t imagine an event where you would find more parents and their teenage children having fun together.

I’ve never been much of a gamer. Not sure why. (Maybe more on that in another post.) But Minecraft is a game that captured my attention like few video games ever have. Back in April of this year, my brother told me about it. His boys had been playing it for awhile. I downloaded it and thought, “What’s the fuss about?” The game is written in Java, not the language of choice for most game designers. The graphics are low-tech, 8 bit looking, and the object of the game was not instantly obvious.

But the game grew on me quickly. Why? Because Minecraft is like life, it is what you make it. It doesn’t have one single objective and it has endless possibilities. The model for the game is somewhat unique. You don’t buy the game, you buy your character. Then, with your character you can play single player or log onto numerous servers where you can play multiplayer.

Notch, the alias for Markus Perrson, is the man behind the game. He’s an indie game designer from Sweden, not associated with the major game companies. With more than than 17 million registered users and over 4 million people that have bought the game. At roughly $20 a pop, that makes him a multimillionaire. You do the math.

He started a company, Mojang. And now has a team of talented people working on Minecraft, as well as two additional games, Cobalt and Scrolls.

The game was in beta since December of last year until it’s launch at Minecon. Notch used an interesting concept to promote and improve the game. He sold accounts at a discount during the beta stage, to encourage the community to grow and embrace the game. Since it was beta, problems in the game could be blamed on bugs and unfinished mechanics. The advantage of this model is that early adopters had a steady stream of new features to continually explore. Watching the game play improve and mature over the space of a couple of years is one of the things that drew interest in the game.

Game Play

So, what can you do in Minecraft? I’ve already said that what I like about Minecraft is that it’s like life, it’s what you make of it. But that is very nonspecific. That doesn’t answer the question. A better answer would be that Minecraft is a sandbox game. It’s open ended and limited only by one’s imagination.

The premise of the game is that you come to life, with nothing in your possession except a full health and hunger bar in a flat world made up of different types of one meter square blocks. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to not just survive the night when monsters (called mobs) come out, but to thrive by mining, building, and doing the things you might do in the real world. Collecting and utilizing various resources is an important part of the game. For example: the first thing that most people do when they spawn into the world is to “punch a tree”, which will score you logs that can be crafted into planks, stick, swords, axes and so on.

Minecraft offers something for nearly everyone. Some people like mining. There is nothing quite like finding a diamond block for the first time. Some people like to build. It’s possible to build anything for dumpy shacks to jaw dropping castles. For the sake of brevity here is a list of verbs that show some of the things you can do in Minecraft: mine, build, plant, harvest, fight, walk, run, swim, smelt, craft, fall, die, fly, kill, eat, dig, jump, punch, clip, ride, row, sink, chop, hoe, sleep, play, break, bury, throw, gather, sneak, open, close, dye, make, grow, hide, find, shoot…

Modding

Here is one of the keys to the success of the game…modding…or creating modifications. Since Minecraft was written in Java, I was dubious about whether it could really be a serious game. But the fact that it was written in Java gave it one huge advantage that I didn’t realize at the time. It could be modded more easily than ‘traditional’ games. Modders (people that create mods) with just a little programming experience under there belt, and the help a very supportive community, can change the game in nearly any way that they can imagine. For example: if you are not satisfied with a limited number of animals provided by the vanilla game (cows, pigs, sheep, wolves, chickens, squid), install Mo’ Creatures, and now you have foxes, bears, cats, sharks, dolphins, birds…the list goes on.

It’s up to the user to decide what he wants his world to be like. He can mix and match mods to his hearts content. And if he is ever bored, go looking for another mod to fill the gap in his world. Installing mods can sometimes be a little bit of a headache, but those problems are getting better too. Hopefully it won’t be long before mods are officially supported and can be loaded and unloaded within the game. Until then, there is a very supportive community that can help.

Multiplayer

One more sweat spot of the game is Survival multiplayer mode (SMP). Join a Minecraft server and interact with your friends or with people all over the world. If meeting new people is your thing, there are a multitude of Minecraft servers out there to join. If you are more comfortable playing with just a few select friends, create a server yourself. It’s relatively easy.

For my birthday this year, I had a Minecraft birthday party. My Family, my brother and some of his kids and a couple of friends all gathered together in my virtual house in Minecraft. Samantha, my daughter crafted a Minecraft cake out of sugar, wheat, milk and coco beans. We all gathered around the cake, that occupied a place of honor in the middle of the table. We all jumped around the room, on the table, on the cake, typing frantically.

And then suddenly the cake was gone. My brother asked, “Who ate the cake! I didn’t get any!” Suddenly everyone one else was echoing his words. “I didn’t get any either” I would like to note here that to consume a cake in Minecraft all you had to do it click on it and a 5th of the cake disappears and you received a little nourishment to you health bar. Sarah, my lovely wife, not knowing these small details of the game, clicked on it multiple times. It’s a fun story and a wonderful memory about how I had a Minecraft birthday and Sarah ate all the cake.

But there is so much more to community play on Minecraft than jumping around and eating cake. Adventure awaits those who like to explore. And the safety in numbers helps when fighting mobs. Building is more rewarding when done as a team effort. Even the dark side of humanity can come out when people are dishonest, jealous or just mean. All of this can lead to situations for teach and learning.

The Ender

There is so much to learn and do in Minecraft. I’ve only broken the surface in this post. It’s a long way down to bedrock. (That’s a  Minecraft metaphor).

The game even has an end…sort of. After making your way to “The End”, a special real filled with Endermen, you must slay the Ender Dragon, which opens a portal back your own land.

What then? The game isn’t over. It’s never really over. It’s only the beginning. Go punch a tree.

We have a new member of the family, Drake the Bearded Dragon. He is quite a character, and eats like there is no tomorrow. He also has an unusual sleeping pattern. He like to stand up in the corner, lean against the glass and go to sleep. I’ve never seen anything like it. The first night he did it we were worried that he was dying or something because he just stood there all night without moving.

Here are some pictures of him sleeping. See what I mean? Have you ever seen anything so strange?