a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
sfz's comments
activity:
sfz  ·  3815 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Is your city on this list? Should it be? ---Top 100 Best Places to Live | Livability

Yup, #44 (Santa Monica). Beautiful and fun place to live, close to the ocean and a lot of great city life, but you pay for it as the cost of living is pretty high. But search for "90403" on https://www.crimereports.com/ and you'll notice that there's this bubble of safety surrounding Santa Monica where very little crime happens in comparison to the rest of Los Angeles, yet you can take a short trip to any other parts of the city easily if you want.

sfz  ·  3816 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are you reading now? Is it any good?

Rereading Neuromancer (yes, it's very good, the first "cyberpunk" novel, uniquely pungent and direct writing style). Going to try to get through the whole trilogy this time.

sfz  ·  3816 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are you reading now? Is it any good?

Crime and Punishment is one of my favorite books (and I also started off my reading ventures as a sci-fi only kid). I tried Karamazov but couldn't really get into it even though I heard it's great. It felt too much like a soap opera to me. So if it's not your thing, I'd still give Dostoevsky a chance with C&P.

sfz  ·  3816 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are you reading now? Is it any good?

I just started re-reading the series after getting through the last released book A Dance With Dragons (ADWD) a few months ago. While I have some issue with how GRRM writes stylistically, I am amazed at his brilliance in weaving plot, position, power, and deep realistic characters together flawlessly. What truly convinces me of his genius on my reread is just how early on he foreshadows and sets things up with little current or historic details or off hand comments that can be read in multiple ways once you know where things are going. I'm sure there are things that's he foreshadowed in the first book that haven't even happened yet as of ADWD. I'm very much looking forward to the last two books.

sfz  ·  3823 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What Happens When You Die? Your Thoughts On The Afterlife

This, though it's interesting to note that all of the matter and energy that makes up you has been around since the beginning of the Universe in various forms and will be around until its end.

sfz  ·  3827 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Shostakovich String Quartet No. 8 in C Minor (II)

Nice call. One of my favorites.

Personally I think the rendition you posted is a little slow and dry though. Here's one of my favorite performances of it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5ohobcKb8&t=296

sfz  ·  3828 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Any suggestions for similar music to Godspeed You! Black Emperor

This Google search should help you.

(In case you get didn't get the cool "Music albums frequently mentioned on the web" scroller that I got, it mentions Godspeed You! Black Emperor in the first spot, followed by Sigur Rós, Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, and others)

In addition to that I'll add Broken Social Scene (not post-rock, but fellow Canadians, and great music, check out the album You Forgot It In People), ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead (more post-hardcore than post-rock, but Source Tags & Codes is a fantastic album) and Deerhoof (way more out there, not for everybody, but Apple O' is a classic if you give it a chance)

Cheers, and enjoy your adventure!

sfz  ·  3828 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The Daily Dot - Rapper explains why Jay-Z is 'The Wire,' Nas is 'Breaking Bad'

He almost got it right, Snoop Dogg is obviously Weeds.

sfz  ·  3829 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What kind of instrument do you play, and why?

Piano. The pathos that you can create through Beethoven and the Russians is unparalleled. You can't get the same emotion and complexity out of other solo instruments as you can out of a piano, except for maybe a cello.

sfz  ·  3830 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are the plugins/extensions everyone should use for their browsers?

Web dev here. Only been using this plugin for a short time but wanted to say that it's very effective at letting you know which sites are consuming information about you and whether you want to allow them to do that.

sfz  ·  3830 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are your favorite lesser-known televised comedies and dramas?

Portlandia. Dunno why no one mentioned it, too obvious? I think it's hilarious.

As for drama, other David Simon shows (he wrote The Wire) are pretty great too... Generation Kill, Treme.

sfz  ·  3830 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: How much would you pay to keep your pet alive?

We have a cat with FIV. We didn't know he had FIV when we got him and by the time we found out he was already family. For the most part he is healthy and active, but at times when he gets sick he gets very sick. Recently, he had to stay in the veterinary hospital for about a week, in total the treatments and stay cost over $2,000. He has since recovered and is back to his healthy state. He's a character and we love him dearly. It hurts to spend that much money, but fortunately we make enough income to be able to get by. I don't have an answer to your question, as I know there is a limit to how much I would spend... fortunately we haven't come to that point yet. But I don't mind spending money to guard my heart even if it means I can't get a new car or a big screen TV.

sfz  ·  3830 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Proposed Extensions to the Booleans

And, of course... truthy.

sfz  ·  3830 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: You favorite websites on the web?

Disclaimer: I'm a programmer, but the second section is for anyone...

https://news.ycombinator.com/news -- #programming #startups

http://dailyjs.com/ -- #programming #javascript

https://github.com/ -- #programming

http://stackoverflow.com/ -- #programming

-----

https://www.coursera.org/ -- #education #learning

http://www.theavantgardediaries.com/ -- #art

http://pitchfork.com/ -- #music

-----

Also, a couple Tumblrs I like:

http://devopsreactions.tumblr.com/ -- #programming #devops

http://anonymousmutekittenssociety.tumblr.com/ -- #cyberpunk