StefanClaypool.com

“I don’t give a fuck if they remember me at all.”
-Frank Zappa, July 1, 1983

Frank Zappa was the Mozart of the 20^th Century, and consistently pushed musical, intellectual, and philosophical boundaries over the span of his thirty-year professional career in a way that no other popular musician ever has. A genuine artist who approached his work with the same enthusiasm, dedication, and deep understanding of his field as the great masters, Zappa was in a constant state of reinvention and renewal, and redefined what was possible in modern music. His unique ability to break a style or genre down to its component parts and reassemble them in his own distinct fashion was the hallmark of a musical project that spanned more than sixty albums in his lifetime and many more since his death. More than any of his contemporaries, Zappa understood the nature of music, and used it to deliver messages larger and more complex that the simple mantras of love and happiness (and/or societal disenchantment) that dominated his era. He was also a staunch advocate of freedom and liberty, a shrewd businessman who by the time of his death owned every note that he had ever recorded, and a vocal defender of individual rights. In short, he was the leading intellectual force in popular music during his lifetime, and his legacy will only continue to grow with time.

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A lot of analysts seem to be giving Philadelphia’s Michael Leighton the edge over Chicago’s Antti Niemi. Many cite Leighton’s superior GAA (1.45 to Niemi’s 2.33) and save percentage (.948 to Niemi’s .921), and lone post-season loss as indications that he’ll emerge victorious in the series.

But those numbers aren’t nearly as strong as they appear at first blush. Keep in mind that Leighton has started only seven games this post-season. One playoff loss to Niemi’s four may look impressive, not when you remember that Niemi has played in more than twice as many games. Niemi has also faced a much higher level of competition than Leighton played against a Boston team that was torn apart by injuries. That made his job easier, especially when the Philadelphia defense was able to neutralize much of Boston’s remaining power and prevent quality chances.

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Some of you might be wondering why I changed the site’s look so radically this time around. It is a big departure from what I’ve been doing the last few years, when integrated Twitter feeds and ever-expanding sidebars ruled the roost. And I was pretty happy with the general feel of the site, down to the fancy typewriter graphic and stark black background. I liked it.

But I’ve been thinking a lot lately about minimalism, and the conclusion that I ultimately came to was that my site, though serviceable, was doing more than I wanted it to do. I want the focus of the site to be on the blog post, on the writing, and the best way to do that was to eliminate distractions and leave only that which matters. That’s what I’ve tried to do.

And with that comes the promise of more writing. Within the next couple of weeks I’ll start a new project here, in which I’ll be analyzing episode-by-episode the classic television series The Prisoner. So stay tuned!

I don’t know if I’ve ever blogged about Lost before, but with tonight’s finale looming, I feel like I should say something.

More than any other show, Lost has taken viewers on a substantive literary journey, from the opening frame to the cusp of the finale. Has it always been perfect? No. But it has always been interesting, and I have confidence that tonight’s episode will be, if nothing else, memorable.

I plan on rewatching the whole series some time soon. As I do, I’ll be blogging with my thoughts on each episode. But for tonight, I’ll be content to sit back and enjoy as it all comes to an end. Hope you all enjoy it too.

Update: It was perfect.

Congratulations to the Chicago Blackhawks for reaching the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time since 1992. They’ll face either the Philadelphia Flyers or the Montreal Canadiens.

My family moved to the Chicagoland area in 1999, right in the middle of what might best be termed a full-blown franchise collapse. Then-owner Bill Wirtz was bleeding the team dry, and every developing player was either immediately traded or lost in free agency. They made the playoffs in 2002, bowing out in five games against a superior St. Louis team – a squad coached by current Hawks generalissimo Joel Quennville – before returning once again to the basement of the Western conference.

My family had season tickets for a few years. We let them go because the team wasn’t worth watching. The revival of the organization from the top down over the last three years has been nothing short of amazing. I don’t want to go into it too deeply, because we’ve still got one series left to take, but needless to say, days like today make all of those years of struggling worth it.

Let’s go Hawks!

New day, new look. Trying for something a bit more minimalist. We’ll see how long it lasts.

It is no secret that I am an Apple nut. I am typing this post using the WordPress app on my iPad, which is connected via Bluetooth to an Apple wireless keyboard. I’ve posted before on why I think the iPad will change the future of computing. I believe that a closed computing system will eventually prove victorious in the so-called “mobile platform wars” because the percentage of the population that is not tech geeks (read: a big freaking majority) wants a device that works more than a device than can kind of do twenty million things. I’ve also made clear that I am not high on the Android platform.

Now, that said, the slate of products that Google unveiled yesterday, which included a new version of Android running Flash and a Google TV platform that integrates with cable boxes and some TVs, was mighty impressive – assuming that each of the things actually works outside of the demo. There have already been reports of Flash sucking battery and causing major heating issues on Android phones – not very welcome when your device is a handheld – and Internet TVs have never caught on in the past (although before the iPad, the same could be said about tablet computing). Nevertheless, some commentators are predicting that the upcoming release of Android 2.2 (“Froyo” – damn hippies and their strange dessert-related naming conventions), coupled with the Google TV, will be enough to suck the life out of Jobs’ baby and kick Apple back down the technology ladder.

I’ve been thinking about canceling my cable service. When I look at my consumption habits, I just don’t watch enough live TV to justify paying what I’m paying. If I can do it without paying a huge cancelation fee, I’ll get rid of it and then pay for a significantly faster internet connection – which will still be cheaper then the current bill. Then I’ll be a Netflix, iTunes, and Hulu kind of guy.

Which raises a larger point about communication and media in the 21st Century. I don’t want to blog at length right now, but I wonder if we’re not entering a period when services like cable will go by the wayside. Alternatives are certainly there, but just aren’t well-marketed and established. Furthermore, what is going to become of traditional communication devices like the telephone and more contemporary ones like SMS? I find myself using Twitter much more than text messages, and the allure of VOIP is powerful, even if the technology remains imperfect. Is that the wave of the future, or just a tool for a tech-geek minority? These are questions businesses are going to have to address at some point.

Oh, what a fool I was!

Having finished draft one of my novel, I thought I could go back and cruise to a second draft by making edits and adding to/subtracting from the whole. This has, after all, been my primary mode of writing to date. It is very rare for me to simply start over again, and I assumed that my old habits would carry me through this new adventure. Not so, it appears. As I have made my way through this second draft, it has become increasingly apparent that simple tweaks aren’t going to do the trick.

Think of it like an old code base: you can change bits of it, add to it, subtract from it, etc., but eventually you reach a point where if you want to move on, you have to simply take all the lessons you’ve learned and start from scratch, with a new code. And it’s hard to accept that, because you’ve put so much work into the first version, but if you want to get where you want to go, then you have to suck it up and do what the job demands, and that’s what I’m doing.

That’s not to say I’m abandoning what I’ve done. In fact, I’ve made tremendous progress on the story, the characters, the setting – really, every aspect of it – and I fully intend to finish telling this story. But to get it where I want it to be, I need to start from word one all over again. I know the story, I’ve got extensive notes, and I have my original manuscript to reference. Now it’s time to sit down with what I now know and write it again.

What I’m trying to say is that after trying to carve a second draft from a first, I have now decided to write a second draft. This is going to take time and it’s going to take energy, but having examined the options available to me, I feel it’s the best one left. My goal has always been to have something that I am personally happy with by December 31st, 2010. I think that this is the best way for me to achieve that goal.

So, here goes!

I am writing this post from one of those wonderful comfy chairs on the upper level of the Middlebury College Library. I’m going to be at Midd until Sunday afternoon. This is the first time I’ve been on campus since graduating nearly a year ago, and the torrent of emotions flowing through me is indescribable. I’m going to be updating this post over the course of the next serval days to properly chronicle the experience as it happens, but for now I’ll leave you with this: Middlebury College is my favorite place on Earth. I grew up here. I became an adult here. I had the happiest times of my life. And I will always be proud to call myself a Midd kid.