Techie stuff
It's been a busy few weeks since my last diary entry. Several new articles by me have appeared, including The Past, Present and Future of Web Services, part 2, in which I focus on 2002 and the future. Also appearing:
Also, I found where my XML.com articles are conventiently listed
Jeremy and I were doing some work today to make 4Suite CVS write-accessible to approved non-Fourthought developers. Unfortunately, Jeremy ended up doing just about all the work.
And all the stars are converging for me to do something to kick-start an XPath-NG project. I guess I'll have to request a few more hours a day from Chronos.
Artsie stuff
I've rented several good movies lately. First of all, Lagaan is great. The good-guy/bad-guy play is very cartoonish and the story-telling is just serviceable, but who needs masterly story telling when you have so much energy bouncing off the screen. This one is pure, saccharin e fun. Don't miss it. I followed the Bollywood theme through to My Monsoon Wedding which is more nuanced, if less engaging. It's still much better than anything Hollywood has put out lately, and I highly recommend it. Finally, I saw El Espinazo del Diablo (The Devil's Backbone) today. Oooh. I love living at the start of the 21st century. This movie feels like the very best of Hong Kong, Hollywood and Mexican filmmaking, all rolled into one of the most tightly spun ghost stories you've read or watched. I know I just love this movie, but as I think of it analytically, the discipline of the storytelling, acting and cinematography blows me away. Every aspect of it: every scene, every inflection, even the very music chosen by the characters has a solid place in immersing you in the story. I was also proud of how much of it I understood without needing subtitles. :-)
As for music, I finally got the new Orishas CD, Emigrante. I almost bought this in Barcelona in May and decided it was too expensive there. I regretted my thriftiness as soon as I got back to Colorado and couldn't find it anywhere. Then one day last week I'm browsing the Latin section at Best Buy and see about 20 copies. Anyway, as if anyone could doubt it, it rocks hard. These boys are bad. If Castro ever falls over, Cuba would do well to install Orishas as the triumvirate rulers. It's so well written, so well produced, just so well felt. Absolute Latin Hip Hop masterpiece. The first time I listened to it I re-played La vida pasa about six times. Orishas llego!
I also got the Heather Headley CD, the latest from Jurassic Five and India Arie, and the Brown Sugar soundtrack. It was a lucky batch, I guess, all are very good, and worth more than my cursory mention. Now I've gotta just make sure I didn't miss the new releases from The Roots, Cody Chestnut and Ms. Dynamite.