Author: Josh Philip Ross

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[thanks]

I have a lot to be thankful for. I have a brilliant, beautiful, loving wife, a pleasant home with good friends living nearby, a job I love. My family is doing well. My sister is graduating from college this spring, and my brother, after a period of great personal struggle, is settling happily into college life. I’m thankful for the wealthy democracy I live in, and for the opportunities I had this year to participate in the political process, and for the end results of that process. I’m thankful for a thousand small things: brunch, autumn leaves, the left lane, thermostats, MP3s, well made shoes, wasabi peas, etc.

Life is good. Thank you to everyone who is a part of that for me.

And in honor of the holiday, as I tend to do every year, I will once again repost the fantastic material I gathered from my Korean students when this most American of holidays rolled around back in 2002.

Yesterday for reasons having nothing to do with Thanksgiving and everything to do with inept management, Jenny and I had middle school classes for which the lesson was not pages from a textbook, as usual, but “ACTIVITY.” When I asked our boss, Yu-jin, what the ACTIVITY was, she sort of laughed and said, “You make.” So among other things to fill the hour, Jenny and I decided to teach our kids about Thanksgiving and have them write what they are thankful for. It ain’t as good as eating turkey and stuffing, but reading the results was good fun, and here are the best of them.

In the category of family relations:

I’m thankful for mother.
I’m thankful for father.
I’m thankful for brother.
I’m thankful for sister.
I am thankful for my cousins
I’m thankful for uncle’s son here.
I’m thankful for my dog here.
I am thankful for my parents because they help me for grow up and they care of me.

In the category of the religious:

I’m thankful for GOD.
I am thankful that I can go to church
I’m thankful for God Almighty.
I am thankful for my zezus.

In the category of the undeniably useful:

I’m thankful for my pen.
I am thankful that I can buy things.
I’m thankful for oxygen.
I am thankful that I can walk
I am thankful that I can eat
I am thankful that I wear clothes.
I am thankful that I can speak Korean
I am thankful for house
I’m thanksful for my air
I am thankful that I can learn
I am thankful for weather forecast
I am thankful that I was born, I have family and I live in Korea.
I am thankful that I can take a shower.

In the category of things yummy:

I am thankful for foods.
I’m thankful for eat many food.
I’m thankful for I eat past food.
I’m thankful for chicken.
I’m thankful for pizza.
I’m thankful for ice-cream.
I’m thankful for cookies.

In the category of the (accidentally?) poetic:

I’m thankful for my favorite thing.
I’m thankful for my hate thing.
I’m thankful for moon
I thankful for my life
I thankful for earth.
I thankful for many scientist.
I’m thankful for HOT.
I’m thankful for many trees and many rivers.
I’m thankful for mountins.
I’m thankful for earth.
I’m thankful for windy.
I’m thankful for a red sky.

In the category of fun:

I’m thankful that have good time
I am thankful that I can see B.S.B.
I am thankful that I can watch TV.
I am thankful that I can play computer games
I am thankful that I can run.
I am thankful that read a books.
I am thankful that I talk with my friends
I am thankful that I can listen to music
I am thankful that I can play the piano.
I am thankful that I can go to the beach
I am thankful that I can swam in the ocean
I’m thankful for Christmas.
I’m thankful for my birthday.
I don’t thanful that I have to do my homework

In the category of things that warm a teacher’s heart:

I am thankful that I study English
I’m thankful for go to the academy.
I am thankful for that my teachers are give a knowledge
I am thankful that my English teacher are teach me.
I am thankful that I can study
I am thankful that I have to do my homework
I’m thankful for Josh teacher

And in the category of silly English, which reminds me how much work there is to do:

I am thankful that I can see anythings
I’m thankful for many money.
I’m thankful for born in 1990.
I’m thankful for my wear.
I’m thankful for car, because we ride a car, we go fast.
I’m thankful for shoes, because we don’t wear shoes, we hurt our feet
I’m thankfor for telephone, because we say hello for our freinds for telephone
I am thankful that pencil because write a English and Korean letter
Because I learned a lot with they.
Because I can see anything.
Because I learn at books.
I’m thankful for air, rice, head, eye, computer, clothe, money, my house, Korean, pencil, brother, glasses.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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[bi the way]

So a while back I mentioned that my high school friend Nicole Kristal was the co-author of a book on bisexuality, which is now available.

Well, today the book got a mention in the New York Post’s Page Six, their famous gossip feature. After a litany of bi or maybe-bi stars, they end with this choice quote from Nicole:

If you define bisexuality as having the impulse to try it even just once, then everybody is bisexual.

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[intellectual property]

I stumbled upon a fascinating artifact, on the Locust St. music blog, of all places: an open letter from Bill Gates, “General Partner, Micro-Soft,” written on February 3, 1976:

An Open Letter to Hobbyists

To me, the most critical thing in the hobby market right now is the lack of good software courses, books and software itself. Without good software and an owner who understands programming, a hobby computer is wasted. Will quality software be written for the hobby market?

Almost a year ago, Paul Allen and myself, expecting the hobby market to expand, hired Monte Davidoff and developed Altair BASIC. Though the initial work took only two months, the three of us have spent most of the last year documenting, improving and adding features to BASIC. Now we have 4K, 8K, EXTENDED, ROM and DISK BASIC. The value of the computer time we have used exceeds $40,000.

The feedback we have gotten from the hundreds of people who say they are using BASIC has all been positive. Two surprising things are apparent, however, 1) Most of these “users” never bought BASIC (less than 10% of all Altair owners have bought BASIC), and 2) The amount of royalties we have received from sales to hobbyists makes the time spent on Altair BASIC worth less than $2 an hour.

Why is this? As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software. Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid?

Is this fair? One thing you don’t do by stealing software is get back at MITS for some problem you may have had. MITS doesn’t make money selling software. The royalty paid to us, the manual, the tape and the overhead make it a break-even operation. One thing you do do is prevent good software from being written. Who can afford to do professional work for nothing? What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free? The fact is, no one besides us has invested a lot of money in hobby software. We have written 6800 BASIC, and are writing 8080 APL and 6800 APL, but there is very little incentive to make this software available to hobbyists. Most directly, the thing you do is theft.

What about the guys who re-sell Altair BASIC, aren’t they making money on hobby software? Yes, but those who have been reported to us may lose in the end. They are the ones who give hobbyists a bad name, and should be kicked out of any club meeting they show up at.

I would appreciate letters from any one who wants to pay up, or has a suggestion or comment. Just write to me at 1180 Alvarado SE, #114, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87108. Nothing would please me more than being able to hire ten programmers and deluge the hobby market with good software.

Bill Gates
General Partner, Micro-Soft

The more things change, the more they stay the same. I can’t find any great sourcing for this letter, but here’s a fuller version than what’s on the Locust St. site.

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[mortality]

I just received the startling and sad news that one of my high school classmates, Robert Paoli, has passed away.

I was never close to Rob. I remember him as a very big guy who played football and wore shorts all winter. In the years since I last saw him, he rose to captain of the volunteer firefighter corps in Marinwood — the fire department that would put out the grass fires that broke out on the hills around my Lucas Valley home every summer. He also went to Louisiana to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

In my memory, Rob was never unkind. His obituary makes it clear that he was loved by many. It’s a sad loss. He is survived by his wife and his five-year-old daughter. A trust fund has been set up for the family, and the information for donating is in the article.

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[critical confusion]

Okay, so what the hell is wrong with Sasha Frere-Jones?

I recognize that SFJ, the pop music critic for the New Yorker, is an anti-rockist, and not much of a rocker. His opinions on UK hip-hop have been revelatory, at least to me, alerting me to the thrilling music of M.I.A., Lady Sovereign and Lilly Allen. His efforts to expose the US to the London grime scene are to be applauded, even if I don’t quite share his passion for Dizzee Rascal.

But when it comes to rock, it’s like the man’s retarded. Back in June, this is what he had to say about Radiohead:

I seem to know about a hundred [Radiohead] fans, and they constantly urge me to give the band a chance. Until recently, I hadn’t seen much point in doing so.

Okay. Fine. Not everyone has to like Radiohead. I would have been willing to let it pass — especially considering that the review was ultimately positive — except that this week, SFJ has chosen to go all jelly-kneed over Deftones, of all bands.

SFJ rightly puts Deftones in the nu metal camp, which also includes such wanky bands as Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit and Korn. (Apparently hip-hop spelling techniques are a hazard of the genre.) I dabbled in nu metal back when I was a metalhead, and I found it to be the musical equivalent of staying in your room to get high and jerk off: it sort of feels good even though it’s also sort of depressing, and even though it occasionally seems meaningful at the time, it leaves you with a hollow feeling of life wasted.

The thing is, of all the nu metal bands, Deftones sound the most like Radiohead (who could conceivably have been considered nu metal back when they were still a guitar band). First, check out the video for Minerva, by Deftones, from their fourth album, which SFJ calls “nearly perfect.” Wanky, right? But Chino Moreno’s voice somewhat resemble’s Thom Yorke’s, and the wall of heavy sound is a tool Radiohead also has in its arsenal.

Then check out the video for Radiohead’s Paranoid Android. (The point here is really the music, so just listen, don’t necessarily watch.) The song moves through moods and phases and episodes with precision, depth and clarity. Its odd noises are better, and so are its soaring melodies, its quiet bits, and just about everything else.

So what the hell is wrong with SFJ? I mean, freaking nu metal? It’s one thing to be an iconoclast, and certainly rock critics as a group are always in need of deflation. But Deftones is simply not that clever or deep or sonically interesting. The only thing I can think of that makes them worth the New Yorker’s page-space is the fact that they are not worthy, so that reviewing them anyway seems a little daring.

It isn’t. They’re just a mediocre band that sounds an awful lot like a number of other mediocre bands. SFJ has gotten away with praising a pet band of his in the New Yorker, but at the cost of revealing once and for all that he hasn’t the foggiest notion of what makes for good rock.

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[more great news]

Rummy is out!

Choice quote from Bush: “Actually, I thought we were gonna do fine yesterday. Shows what I know.” Indeed. “I thought we were gonna do fine” has been the approach of this administration — and of Donald Rumsfeld — throughout the protracted disaster that they wrought in Iraq.

Other great news: John Tester has won for Senate in Montana! That means that the Senate will be, at worst, split 50-50, with Cheney as the deciding vote. And so far, Webb is still the leader in Virginia.

Meanwhile, as Rummy is shown the door, let us remember all that was best about him: his poetry and his fighting techniques. Kung fu fighting, that is. His war-fighting techniques are horrible.

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[peace in nepal]

Fantastic news! After ten years and 13,000 deaths, Nepal’s civil war is over.

The leader of Nepal’s Maoist rebellion, Prachanda, today renounced the path of violence and agreed to dissolve his parallel government that operates across much of Nepal once a new constituent assembly and constitution are adopted.

In return, the rebels will become the second-largest party in the new assembly, which will decide the fate of the king by simple majority vote at its first meeting.

I sincerely hope that this is really, truly a new dawn for this lovely, welcoming, beautiful country.

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[victory]

As my cousin Louise put it, “It’s not an election, it is an intervention.”

It seems to have worked.

In October of 2001, just weeks after 9/11, Jenny and I left the country for 18 months. While we were away, the Patriot Act was passed, a plane crashed in Queens, a sniper terrorized the Mid-Atlantic states, mysterious parcels of anthrax appeared in the offices of the mainstream media and elsewhere, shoes in airports were rendered ominous, the specter of Iraqi WMDs was raised, the UN was pushed aside and a war was begun. Just days after our return home, the president stood under a “Mission Accomplished” sign.

The country we came home to in 2003 was a very uptight place — uptight in a 1950s way, though the threat we faced was much smaller than that posed by the Soviets, and the trauma we’d come through was also much smaller. In 2004, the ongoing war was invoked to keep Bush in power.

Now, though, the war has dragged on for another two years, and it has become clear that no one in charge has any notion of how to end it. Katrina, I think, was a tipping point: people saw that our government, given days of advance warning, couldn’t deliver food, clean water, electricity or medical care to thousands upon thousands of its own citizens in an emergency on its own soil, which raised doubts about how well they could deliver those things to millions of Iraqis in the midst of an ongoing war. Since then, things in Iraq have only gotten worse.

Americans like to think of ourselves as good, and we like to have fun. The war is no good and no fun. I hope that America lightens up again in the coming years — that we give up the illusion of perpetual war and recognize the basic reality that we are in fact living in peace, albeit a peace that requires constant vigilance (and when has that not been the case?). The war in Iraq is a disaster that should be ended, while the War on Terror is an amalgam of military, law enforcement and diplomatic efforts that should be much better coordinated and shifted away from their emphasis on brutality.

I want peace. I want it and I think our country should strive for it. I’m hoping that at long last, this point of view will no longer be labeled traitorous.

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[in other news]

I know, I know. Elections. Elections, elections, elections. But buried under all the hoopla, we’re missing the real news: Britney and Kevin are getting divorced.

I know. I’m in shock too. But somehow I’ll pull through. Let’s just hope our liberal media aren’t so obsessed with a major election that they let this important story fall through the cracks.

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[for what it’s worth]

Here’s how I intend to vote tomorrow.

Governor: Eliot Spitzer (D)
Spitzer was a strong, creative attorney general for the State of New York, holding corporations accountable for their malfeasance. He was fortunate to inherit a well-run office from his predecessor, Rudolph Giuliani — good fortune that will not be repeated upon his arrival in the Governor’s Mansion in Albany. Nevertheless, his demonstrated competence and the grim state of New York politics combine to make Spitzer the obvious choice.

Lieutenant-Governor: David Paterson (D)
Okay, I’ll admit it: I’m a yellow-dog Dem this year. But why vote for a lieutenant-governor who will hamstring your choice of governor?

Comptroller: Alan Hevesi (D)
In this season of accountability, it pains me to say that I’ll be voting for a candidate I know to be corrupt (Hevesi had the state pay to chauffeur his wife around for years). Here’s my admittedly twisted logic: Hevesi is likely to be forced to resign after the election, at which time he’ll be replaced by an appointed Democrat, whereas electing his opponent, Chris Callaghan, means having a Republican in office for the next four years. And even if Hevesi does stay put, see my endorsement for lieutenant-governor.

Attorney General: Andrew Cuomo (D)
Another no-brainer. Cuomo leaves much to be desired, but the alternative is a Republican attorney general, and I really, really, really don’t want a Republican setting the priorities for law enforcement in New York.

Senator: Hillary Clinton (D)
I genuinely like Hillary Clinton as a Senator. She’s worked hard to serve her constituents and to build bridges to Republican leaders Upstate. I see no reason not to send her back to the Senate, where I hope she will serve with similar focus and competence for another six years.

Congress (11th District): Yvette Clarke (D)
I voted for Yassky in the primary, but Clarke is the Democratic candidate, we need a Democratic Congress in this country, and besides, she’s going to win by a ridiculous margin anyway. Who else would I vote for? The Freedom Party candidate?

State Senate (25th District): Ken Diamondstone (Working Families)
Diamondstone lost his primary bid against veteran State Senator Martin Connor, but as with Joe Lieberman in Connecticut, Diamondstone has a second chance. Diamondstone opposes the Atlantic Yards project, while Connor does not. More importantly, Connor is part of the stasis in Albany that has made our state governance so abysmal, while Diamondstone would be a fresh voice. From what I can tell, Diamondstone has already given up, but his name is still on the ballot, so I’m going to pull the trigger for him, just like I did in September.

State Assembly (52nd District): Joan L. Millman (D)
Woof! Woof! Heeeere, yellow dog! Have a tasty vote! Enjoy a delicious assembly seat! Good yellow doggie!

State Supreme Court Justices: Abstain
For 80 years, New York has had a corrupt system in which parties nominate judicial candidates at show-conventions, giving voters essentially no choice. This year, for example, we have two candidates to choose from and two votes to hand out. What this has to do with democracy is anyone’s guess, but the party nomination system was recently ruled unconstitutional, so let’s hope we have some competitive judicial elections in the future.

Civil Court Judge (1st District): Abstain
In this case, it’s one candidate for one slot. Ick. See above.