May 22, 2002

More of the same
There's a lot of times I sit down and wonder, where have the past two weeks of my life gone? Sure most of it was at work, and much of it seemed pretty unproductive. Like the times you take a week to solve a problem, since you need the first four and a half days to get up to speed with things. I think that's why I'm in engineering, not theoretical physics - it's really nice to have something tangible done at the end of the day (even though software is often considered an intangible).

What else have I managed to do lately? The usual of dinners, movies, and going hiking with friends. It's amazing when I think about it, a year ago I was leaving Toronto for Delhi: I can never quite grasp the immense range of conditions that humans live in. I think given another year, that third world itch will really start itching. I've started reading through my Morocco Lonely Planet guide. I'm also looking to read Wolfram's A New Kind of Science. Also tried helping out with Santee Bible Club, a monthly day camp for lower class kids in South San Jose. Interesting as it was, I don't think I'm particularly adept at dealing with kids.

May 6, 2002

Off the beaten path
Alviso Marina
This past week my manager, an ex-gambling junkie, passed me a book, Poker Nation, by Andy Bellin. As the title suggests, it's a book about poker - the game, the culture, the lifestyle. It goes over the play - nicknames for hands (like the 'San Francisco busboy' - a Queen and 3 (a queen with a trey, get it?)), the strategies, the math and the psychology. But it also goes through the subculture. The life of professional gamblers, mathematical idiot savants, are romanticised as much as they are revealed - gambling addicts unable to maintain real lives (or relationships). The excitement of the game is actually reduced to mechanical boredom when the game becomes a profession. For anyone who's ever loved Rounders or even God of Gamblers, this book is a great read.
The town of Drawbridge
It's also the first book that I've read just for fun since I've gotten here. Maybe that suggests I'm pretty much all settled in. I've gotten to exploring the local community. About fifteen minutes drive away from where I live is Alviso, called a town but really just a languishing neighborhood drifting into oblivion. Alviso was once home to a lively marina and cannery. As the south bay filled up with silt over the past half century, both have closed down, leaving an abandonned marina, with empty piers reaching out into the rushes, and large saltwater marshes. Levees containing the salt ponds are still useable as biking (or in my case, hiking) trails. The area is now a protected habitat, the cannery has now become the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory. Starting in the marina, I hiked about thre miles north. There, in the bay, was the town of Drawbridge.
Eerie...
Built at the start of the twentieth century, it's fallen into disuse, and now is closed to access. However, I made my way there along the Amtrak railway. Okay, so maybe I'm reliving the Stand By Me days I never had. And maybe a ghost town isn't half as exciting as a dead body, but the dive bombing seagulls and sandpipers sure were.
Look out for the train
Sandpipers
Ah, I can still hear their shrill cries as they swooped in from behind... (play Ride of the Valkyries) seeing their shadows flit across the ground as they dropped their payloads... watching with one close call after another, their ordinance crashing into the waves not five feet away with the signature ploink.
The horror... the horror...
Seagulls in formation