Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in tirno's LiveJournal:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Wednesday, January 11th, 2006
4:15 pm	Lists (for my own amusement) ( dances ) (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, December 28th, 2005
9:35 pm	a meme hmmm... I seem to have been tagged for a silly question type thing. This happens so rarely that I have to play along. Seven things you want to do before you die Attend an Irish music session, hopefully even contribute to one. Speak Breton with natives Form many deep friendships Find one or more members of the opposite sex with whom I fall in reciprocated love with (I no longer believe in eternal love and I'm fine with that) Have kids (no really. it would be shame to see my gene-pool go to waste. And I'd like to try my hand at being a parent) Tidy my room Figure out the musical difference between and an dro, a polka and a scottische Seven things that you do well Ski Procrastinate Hug Listen Write (ok, so maybe I don't, but I'm not too bad) Spell Troll (that's an outright lie - it would be a troll, but that would be a paradox) Seven things that you can't/don't know how to do Stop procrastinating Sing in tune Danse a waltz without feeling I'm not doing it right Tidy my room Talk to a member of the opposite sex with the confidence that makes her overlook the fact I'm no Brad Pitt Fly Touch my elbow with my nose (you can't either, I'll bet) Seven things you find attractive in the opposite sex Lips Stomach (I'll admit a penchant for flat stomachs) Geekicity Quick-wittedness Glasses Nipples A lack of grounding in "reality" Seven things you find attractive in the same sex Confidence Intelligence Geekicity A lack of grounding in "reality" Gah can't think of any more Seven things you often say I include teh internet typing as "say" teh (because I'm about 3 years behing in trends) teehee hmmmm monstre stylé argh ni (ok, that last list is not quite representative, it's enhanced reality) Seven crushes on celebrities On a girl with a really cute smile who lives in Montreux and used to go to CESSEV. Haven't seen her in about a year. Never talked to her. On a girl I know through ski racing. I can talk about weird languages with her. (shit, I hope she never reads this, I'd be so embarassed, she would recognize herself straight away :) On a girl who is a Glen of Guinness fan. (I think she knows and I have already been ridiculed for it. Whatever) On my iPod (it is teh sexy) On a girl from e2 (It's [princess therion] by the way. But it's only a very minor crush. So if you ever happen across this, Ceilidh, don't worry about it :D) On a couple more girls I never spoke to at school (CESSEV). Most of them probably smoke anyway. Pah! On pretty much any girl who exhibits some of the traits I find attractive - particularly glasses I'm now supposed to tag seven people. I tag anyone who reads this and feels like participating in a silly meme. Also my seven crushes. Haha! (Comment on this)
Friday, December 16th, 2005
10:08 pm	This is getting annoying... Ok, so err... /msg world would you mind stopping now, please? In summer 2003, Mum was diagnosed with and treated for breast cancer. She is a strong fighter and can be considered "on remission" at the moment. If tests are still clear in 3 years time, she will be considered cured in the sense of being statistically just as likely to catch cancer as anyone else in her age group. Skip to now: Dad has prostate cancer. This is a whole different animal. Apparently up to 80% of old people have it. Very few die from it - mostly because they die of something else beforehand. Dad has no intention of dying in the next 20 years (he's 80 now), so the treatment for prostate cancer (which consists mostly of letting it be - surgery is too likely to lead to metastasizing - and radio therapy - at some point in the vague future) is understandably vexing him most considerably. The adverts on the telly say "one in three" will have themselves or a close relative touched by cancer. I think it's more likely to be everyone... Both my parents live a very healthy lifestyle - have never smoked, are not hugely stressed, etc etc. In other words, only genetics and old age (for Dad) puts them in any risk category. Both Mum and Dad are being fairly calm about this latest scare. Dad is the type who would minimise the facts, seaking to protect me. Mum wouldn't do that. So I think we're all right about this. Except Dad. I don't think old age is something he expected to happen to him, let alone death. It won't happen to me either. I'm expecting a severe bout of depression to start whenever I start exhibiting signs that my body is not what it was. Hopefully that won't be for a few years yet. (Comment on this)
Thursday, December 15th, 2005
1:24 pm	Meme time Write 6 random facts about yourself, and then list the names of 5 people whom you in turn infect When eating tangerines, I almost always eat each section by chopping it in two with my teeth and then nibbling at the cells. I believe that I can be reasonably good at anything. I also believe that this is because I'm highly intelligent (according to my definition of intelligence, of course). I believe that the speed at which I picked up breton dances and am picking up tin whistle are proof of this. As of this morning, 3AM I am the proud owner of a "no place like 127.0.0.1" tshirt. I am always right (no really) I don't particularly like fennel or celeri. I miss having someone to curl up against at night Anyone who reads this. You can consider yourselves tagged. Or pretend you didn't read it. Whatever :D (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, December 13th, 2005
1:56 pm	Gavotte du bas Leon Time to start a record of breton dances I know, with short description that I (at least) can follow. Lemme see... Gavotte du Bas Leon is a fairly slow 3 and 4 gavotte with strong arm swings. It's the one where count 8 everyone is leaning forward on right leg looking down at the "well", with left leg extended backwards and where 3and4 is a backqward shuffle. Can be danced to tri martolod or to scoresheet I have on my computer somewhere. 1: place L foot at 45° angle to dance line; arms forward 2: place R foot in front/next to L at 90° angle to dance line; arms backward 3 and 4: going backwards to dance line, arms do expansive movment forward and then backwards 5: place R foot at 90° angle, in front of L foot; arms forward 6: place L foot at 45° angle; arms backward 7: place R foot in front of L foot at 45° 8: lean forwards, look to ground, weight on R, L touching ground. left leg is straight, arms are back. (Comment on this)
Saturday, November 12th, 2005
8:28 pm	Tin whistle recordings I've been errm... "teaching" myself tinwhistle for about two months now and a lot of stuff that seemed impossible at first is now almost easy (although the vast majority still seems unattainable). I'm teaching myself to pick up tunes by ear and when I see the sheetmusic for a double jig (6/8 time, mostly 1/8 notes with the occasional quarter thrown in), I now just see whether I enjoy the tune, rather than thinking "ow! how do I play a flow of 12 quavers in a row?!" Just to remind myself of what I am like now, I've made a whole bunch of recordings (prolly too many, I should only have done those that I can actually play... but whatever). Hopefully, next year, I'll be able to listen to them and it will give me a measure of how much I've improved. Only problem is, I should really get some feedback to see what big mistakes I should clear up - I think a lot of my tempo is a bit off and where I'm sloppy, I should maybe slow down and practice until I don't mess up. Oh yeah, mitigating circumstances, this is my new Clarke whistle which sound a lot better when being recorded, but I'm still not very experienced at the amount of air required - in particular, it gives less "feedback" than the Feadog, so I tend to use too much air and fall short of breath at points I'm not used to. Anyway, here are the tunes, a wide mix of stuff. Sheet music is linked for the curious (not that I always follow the dots or anything - which reminds me, I think any variations/ornamentation I'm doing now are more "whee, look what I can do". I do that when dancing as well - showoff at heart :D) The Connaughtman's Rambles. This jig is the only jig I can play at dancable speed - makes a nice circassian circle. Here, it's a little bit slower. I had a lot of trouble recording this one, what with wanting it to be perfect and running out of breath (I try to vary my breathing points, but here, I had to find a new place where I'm not used to putting a breath). sheetmusic The Knotted Cord. Ack, I seem to have called this the knotted chord... oh well. Got this by ear and by cheating from the brilliant teaching recording by Brian Owens. This reel is the second on the recording and is one of my favorite tunes. It has so many parts that I absolutely never get tired of hearing. The G2BGDGBG for instance, or the gorgeous last bar which makes me want to tear into the tune at twice the speed I'm able to.sheetmusic that is not necessarily vers similar Master Mc Dermott's Reel from the same recording as above. I haven't got it quite right yet. Sheet music bears little resemblance as usual St Patrick's An Dro I love the arrangement of this tune by Carlos Nuñez - I enjoy playing it, but it doesn't quite live up to expectations when listened to. No sheetmusic King of the Fairies I think I play this set dance more or less as a hornpipe. I like Alan Stivell's version of it. I had a lot of breathing trouble on this one, along with trouble playing the C# because my clarke is more slippery than the Feadog. sheetmusic, ordinary disclaimers apply Star of the County Down. I really like this song - gives me a chance to practice ornamentation and stuff. Can't be bothered to find sheet music. The Foggy Dew. Playing of this tune is strongly influenced by Glen of Guinness - excetp I don't go quite so fast. Can't be bothered to find sheet music. C'est en souhaitant bonsoir. I really love how this is played by a (defunct?) group called Koun. I think it's a ridée 6 temps, but not quite sure. Has a nice bombarde feel to it. Unable to find sheetmusic. Current Mood: chipper Current Music: silence (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, November 6th, 2005
3:29 pm	Bent whistle Ack. I sat on my tin whistle and it bent. It is now crooked :( I don't know whether it is still in tune or not as I am tone deaf to within a semi-tone/quarter-tone depending on the days... It's not like tin whistles are expensive or anything, but I'd gotten used to it, tweaked the fipple and everything. And it'll be a while before I'm back somewhere where they sell decent whistles. Current Mood: pissed off (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 22nd, 2005
12:52 pm	Meeting people from the interweb roxors! I started writing this entry monday and I still don't seem to be anywhere near finishing it. So here's the first part ( 'tis somewhat long ) (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 15th, 2005
1:41 pm	Lost in Lyon I've taken up Breton dancing. More on that another time. On the way back last night, I had to take the metro because they were no more buses. This is something that I don't usually do as the closest metro stop to my flat is about 700m away and there are many buses that are a lot closer. I got lost. Fortunately, I had my towel. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, September 4th, 2005
2:57 pm	First days in Lyon Life is sometimes complicated :D, which is why the post is really a "part 1" more from me later. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, September 2nd, 2005
12:54 pm	Farewell Switzerland well... kinda. I'm off for 6 months - but only to nearby France. I'll be back sporadically - in the first few weeks regularly - so the only slight question is when I'll next be interneted. Hopefully tomorrow or sunday - depends how hard finding a wireless hotspot is :) Over and out (Comment on this)
Saturday, August 20th, 2005
5:53 pm	When it comes to user interface design and "what the end-user sees" design, particularly on the internet, I'm a miserable old so-and-so. I gripe about a number of things. Gratuitous use of animation, poor layouts, poor content, overloaded pages that you don't know where to click. Even livejournal pisses me off as I still don't know how to update my lj without passing through the homepage. I also gripe about anything that looks like shoddy programming, such as tabled designs, designs that don't take advantage of space, fixed width designs, bad/unreasonable behaviour. Mainly, yeah, I just gripe about the fact that if I were responsible for doing most things, they'd be done helluva lot better. In particular, in Switzerland, most websites suck (not as much as in France, where it seems that horrible overcrowded 50-clicks-and-yer-there websites are right up there with red wine and haute cuisine as highlights of indigenous culture). So, yeah, most websites suck. It pains me that they are shitty. It pains me that some eeeeeeeeeeedjut conned money out of someone to design a website that sucks more than a very sucky thing. Recently, I discovered a neato band (I talked about them a few weeks back, didn't I?). So we created a fansite: Charlotte toujours. From zero concept to release took us 5 days - off and on. We're now a further week down the line and have done some tweaking which I'm rather pleased with. It's professional, it looks reasonably ok (visual design is not my strong point...). And I'm really happy with what we've achieved because it proves that "hey!" we're not all piss and wind (or whatever the expression is) when it comes to complaining about shit websites. Just spent some of the past 3 days on the development testbed creating the niftiest multiple file upload UI I have ever seen. (well, ok, drag'n'drop upload with a java applet is cute - starting the upload while you're looking for other files would be neato too, but would take a few more days to do). Not only did we learn to use a cms system (well, ok, I still haven't got it figured out yet and the other two already knew a bit), but we created three new components, modified a 4th to behave like we wanted and the 5th is on its way. Which just about makes us brilliant and quite deserving of our high opinions of ourselves. I summary. I roxor. So do my friends. The End (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, August 7th, 2005
8:53 am	celtic music festival! Friday and Saturday there was the Irish Guinness Music Festival in Sion. Friday, I didn't go, so missed Carlos Nuñez (Jimmy Hendrix of the bagpipes, as they call him). Instead, I went to see Charlotte Parfois (yes, again) on a barge/boat on Lake Geneva. Amazing concert! Yesterday, I went to the Irish music festival. The lineup was Glen of Guinness, Four men and a Dog and The Dubliners (and some weird norwegian group; we went home two songs into their concert.) All three concerts were simply outstanding. Much dancing was done by all. There is something federating in Celtic music that is missing in other forms: you have to dance and you can do it either alone, in pairs or in large groups, all linked together. Glen did their usual concert - which was brilliant and much better than the last time we saw them, at which time they were rather pissed off by a bad sound check and lateness in schedule. I didn't know 4 men and a Dog before; for me it was the high point of the evening. Outstanding dance tunes that were just slightly marred by their desire to sing country balads every two or three songs. The dubliners were of course... wow! The dubliners! I mean wow! I have an LP of recordings in the 1960s by the Dubliners, for deity's sake! they did all the classics and I was just slightly disappointed by their not singing "Rocky Road to Dublin". Also, they're not noded! dammit! The sight of Barney mcKenna, 66 years of age, 43 year-long member of the band, playing his banjo with a hundred 20 year-olds chanting his name because he's just so amazing - he plays these complex finger-picking things where you just don't feel that his hands are moving fast enough to produce the sounds. Wow! So, next time: invite more girls to dance. It can't be that hard! I'll try my hand at it next weekend... maybe... Other than that, celtic music is ++. That is all. Oh yeah, I've got a flat in Lyon and I've sublet my current flat. More on the perils of subletting at a later date. (Comment on this)
Friday, July 22nd, 2005
8:44 pm	I seem to be telling everyone individually. I'll kill two (maybe even three) birds with one stone here: I passed my exams! Only my 6-month master's project to do and I'll have a master's degree in computer science. Yay! (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, July 10th, 2005
3:34 pm	Concerts last night During the past week, it has been the Festival de la Cité in Lausanne. It's also been the Montreux Jazz Festival. I've been to the latter for 4 or 5 evenings and will probably go for another 3 or 4 - only to the free part though - damn expensive business. Anyway. My point is that last night I went to the Festival de la Cité instead. It's around 9 stages around the cathedral and the surrounding streets, all free. And the three groups we saw were way better than anything we've seen at the jazz festival. First, my newfound love, Nørn, is an a capella trio. All three girls are almost certainly classically formed, which shows both in their gorgeous voices and their presence on stage. The one with the highest voice is so damn cute too... What they sing are norse-mythology-kalevala-sounding songs in what is a language invented by one of the singers. Not a "real" language, unfortunately, as it doesn't seem to have a consistent morphology or lexicum, although intra-song morphology seems mostly constant and relates alternatively to germanic, finno-ugric and celtic - the latter being the exception. I now have their CD. Absolutely gorgeous. But seeing them live is awe-inspiring - or do I mean awe-inducing? I alternated between a big grin, being on edge and being pissed off by the bloke in front of me who kept shifting from one leg to the other every few minutes. I should point out at this point that this is one of the rare groups who come close to the sort of music I would make if I could sing ; although much celtic stuff would be at the other end of the spectrum. What can I say? I have strange tastes. Next up, we went to see a reggae band called Inna Crisis. I met their lead singer a few months ago in the Lausanne Metro. He had a really strong mancunian accent, so I practiced my accent detection on him and went to check whether I'd got it right. We talked about language, accents and all the usual stuff people get caught up in when they have the bad luck to be accosted by me. He said he was in a band and that I should come to one of their concerts. Unfortunately, I didn't get to speak to him after the concert, but it is definitely one of the best reggaes I've heard in ages. Strong brass section, clever guitar playing and the guy sings rather well. Last, and the reason we went to Lausanne yesterday and not Montreux, Charlotte Parfois is a band made up of 3 of the members of Glen of Guinness. Glen's drummer is Charlotte Parfois' lead singer/acoustic guitarist/keyboard-player/various jingly percussion-player; Glen's violin-player becomes drummer; and Glen's banjo/guitar-player becomes guitar/banjo/strange flat fretless stringed instrument-player. A further two who both play lead-guitar/bass, depending on the song, complete the band. They sing amazingly funny songs in French, about such universal themes as masturbation, sex, not being able to get it up during sex. Songs include, translated: "Tonight, I'm cheating on your wife" - difficult but possible, apparently - "When I'm handsome, I'll be a singer"; and choruses include: "et les filles mettent a nu les garçons trop bourrus et ca les gene, et les filles mettent a nu les garçons trop bourrus et poil au ..." and "caresse moi les parties génitales (2x) tu verras ce n'est pas du métal, caresse moi les parties génitales". But seriously, the songs are just wonderfully crafted and do include other themes, such as political criticism and an ode to one's dentist. A must see! That's it for me on music. Good times... (Comment on this)
Thursday, July 7th, 2005
4:14 pm	why people tend to get pissed when you tell them you'll pray for them. (16:10:42) Tirn0: many people who rush to saying "I'll pray for you" seem to do it for 2 bad reasons (and this overwhelmes the one good reason: I can't do anything for you, so I'm doing the only thing I can) (16:11:23) Tirn0: 1) I am arrogant enought to think that my god and my intervention towards my god is going to make a difference (16:12:48) Tirn0: 2) I'm more concerned with my inability to do anything for you than with doing something for you. I'm going to say "I'll pray for you". This will absolve my guilt at being impotent and make my day a lot better, even if it does nothing for you (Comment on this)
Saturday, June 25th, 2005
10:04 am	did I ever mention that I don't update this thing? Well, I've decided to update it on this occasion. Just your normal "Woah I had the best night ever" bullshit. Of the four of you who read this, 50% of you are probably terminal pessimists and will be put off by the yay-ness of this entry (feel free to disregard) and the other two will probably find out what I did on AIM. Whatever... So, yesterday evening, was the Bex Rock music festival. Gilles persuaded me into going because we got nice cheap tickets (about half the rate they were selling at) and there were supposed to be a couple of nice bands. The lineup is such, by order of appearance: Root'Secours (reggae) Sens Unik (fusion-type awful shit) Los Tres Puntos (ska) Slipknot (awful-shit and very loud) Jeronimo (dunno) Asian Dub Foundation (ditto) Riff Raff (still don't know) So, I knew that slipknot would be featuring and, that as such, the crowd would be full of angsty slipknot-tshirt bearing teenagers. And yeah, it was. But by god were there a lot of them! Just, wow! There was also a pretty much ongoing thunderstorm from 19h till 22h and we were figuring that it would be a good exercise in eugenics if ligntening were to strike. So Root'Secours was very average. Sens Unik, as expected, was horrible. Los Tres Puntos was ok, although it doesn't rate very high on the list of ska bands that I've seen. We had a ball, danced and were stupid. Yay. Also I got to see my first emo stereotype at a concert. Picture a bunch of geeks skanking their little hearts out, a few lost slipknot fans trying to pogo and then, lost in the crowd, in the front row, a cute Avril Lavigne lookalike who isn't moving For a couple of songs, she may just have twitched her head a bit. Teehee. (So) next up, slipknot. Worst. Music. Ever? And loud. 300m away from the stage, it was too loud for me (even though there was only one set of amps). Fortunately, we knew there was a celtic night in a nearby village. (So) Gilles, three girls who were with us a I set off to find out what it was all about. (We'd been figuring that attendance would be low since everyone and his mother's dog would be at slipknot - wrong,eh). This is when the night actually starts getting good. The sound levels made conversation actually audible. I actually invited girls to dance (two waltzes and a polka - the first waltz should have been a Mazurka, but neither of us knew how to dance anyway). We also did a variety of breton dancing. Something which was a Gavotte des montagnes but which was danced exactly like Elodie taught me the kost er hoet, a dance fisel, some an dro and a branle of somewhere or other. Also, as expected, the crowd there was somewhat more to our liking. Nice cute geek girls (the slipknot fans may have been in that category, but it was hard to tell beneath the black uniform and heavy makeup). Festou noz are definitely for me. Off to see Glen of Guinness this evening. And hopefully try out our new dancing skills. (Also,) very interesting: Of the three girls who were with us, one of them is a friend of Gilles and the other two are friends of hers (and of Gilles as well, prolly, by extension - Gilles?). I'd met at least two of them once before - but at a concert, in one of those situations where the music is too loud and I become conversation impaired. The point being that I didn't know them. And that we spend three hours together at the Bex Rock and three more at the Fest Noz. Now we get to the interesting part: dancing with them at the Fest Noz and watching how they chose to dance there (you could either sit everything out - as most of the crowd did - jump around like a maniac - link arms and try to perform some kind of approximation of a dance - jump around like a non-maniac, etc) was *way* more enlightening than watching them interact and skank at the Bex Rock. Also the opportunity to dance with them was of similar interest. And fun. So, in summary: Festou Noz are good for having a ball, learning some new dances, meeting cute girls and learning about their character through watching them. Additionnally, yours truly can actually talk to people because the noise isn't too loud. Yay! At this point, you're wondering what I learnt about the girls we were with. I don't think I rate very high on their scale of "not an idiot". Mainly because I seem to have never missed an opportunity to take a cheap jab - I take cheap jabs at people, they're not supposed to remember them for the next 3 months dammit! So I can be errr... honest, without losing too many further points. I left the Bex Rock thinking one of them cute, one of them not so cute and the third a bit immature. I finished out the evening with a much higher estime of all three - especially the one I thought a bit immature. She is obviously quite bright, rather funny and just shy. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, June 17th, 2005
3:39 pm	Master's project found Hah! squee, folderol! Unless something goes terribly wrong at the last minute, I'll be doing my master's project in Lyon on a subject in relation with CSCW. Yay! That is all. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, May 27th, 2005
10:53 am	meme From Siobhan. 1. Reply and I’ll write something about you. 2. I will then tell you what song/movie/book/play reminds me of you. 3. I will say something that only makes sense to you and me. 4. I will tell you my first memory of you. 5. I will tell you what animal/flower/color/something else you remind me of. 6. I’ll then tell you something that I’ve always wondered about you. 7. Then post this in your own journal... (optional ;)) p.s. I never update here. I now have a blog residing at blog.tirno.com where I will never update either... (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 6th, 2005
5:57 pm	Teh photoz Well, finding pictures of me is not easy. So, google: My name is Gregory Dyke/Tirno/themanwho and this is me: (1 Comment |Comment on this)