Sorry to hear that Massachusetts is swimming in snow– I’d happily send up some of this heat if I could. I’ll bring some when I come back!

Have I mentioned recently how much I love travel? Last night, one of the hostel workers grabbed a bunch of alcohol and and told anyone who wandered by to come drink. I met a dozen new friends, talking late into the night, two of whom told me to stay at their houses when I next visit London and Germany.

I spent some time getting Santiago under my feet over the past two days. The city is peppered with parks, tripping over its trees, peddling in pedestrian bridges. And there are couples everywhere: smooching in the Metrored, or humping in the parques, or holding each other on the sidewalk– I can only guess what they do behind closed doors! Don’t these Chileans have any decency??? Not even in Verona have I seen such public affection. And I saw them everywhere drinking in the (ample) nightlife or just enjoying each others company.

A bar near my hostel in the student-heavy Barrio Brazil was blasting a Spanish version of the Pixies “Where is My Mind?”. Dogs share the streets, in couples as often as the humans. There are minimarts and convenience stands on every corner, and food (stands, holes in the wall, tables outside) everywhere. And the whole place is also rather… pungent.

Yesterday I hit up the Precolumbian Archeology Museum, which was having a temporary exhibit on Sexo y Poder y Muerte (sex, power, and death) in Moche society. So I got to look at little stone figurines engaging in all manner of positions.

Santiago’s other great love appears to be shopping. The city center is a maze of stores spilling into the sidewalks, . I went to my two favorite treasure troves of culture: the grocery store (very little readymade food; I had to try checking out three times as two of my three purchases needed little custom cost stickers) and the sex store (The biggest of the three I found had more dildos than I’ve ever seen in my life! Also in vogue appear to be underwear shaped into animal faces– I must get myself a pair.)

Today I’m headed to the culture-hyped port town Valparaíso. Pictures uploading…

Getting to South America was an uneventful trip, except for the beginning and the end. My 10:30 pm bus to New York City got in a little early, but I ended up wandering around for a bit finding the Metro and then taking more time changing my mind about how to best get to the airport. All said, I finally got to the terminal less than an hour before my flight. I asked the closest desk person for directions. “Where are you going?” “Panama city.” “I think they already said that flight was bording– when’s your flight?” “In less than an hour.” Her eyes got really wide, so I tried to act sheepish. She made a quick call, and then directed me. The woman called out to me as I approached. “You’re the last one! Get your bag up here before they kick me off.”

But it all worked. 22 hours of travel from Boston, and I touched down in Santiago. I was apparently the only flier from the US– no one else went to pay the “reciprocity fee” that Chile makes us pay because we make them pay it. The moment I came out of the baggage area, a nice man asked me where I was going. “I’m looking for an internet cafe.” He ushered me out, “Not possible here; you have to go to the city center”, and then over to the ATM when I said I didn’t have pesos yet. “Get 100.000 out.” (That’s about $200) I did. He held out his hand, “That’s for me, I help you.” Nooooo. I explained that I knew there was a bus that could take me to the city for $3. “The same, the same, that’s 60 (thousand) pesos.” Nooooo. More like 6. The bus I wanted drove by as he tried to usher me to the taxis. No, thanks. He tries another tact: “I help you. The tip is up to you.” I only had 20.000 peso notes. No, thanks.

Now I’m in a nice Internet Cafe in beautiful Santiago, Chile, a city which appears to love its food. From the plane, the area looked gorgeous: jagged sillouette mountains, cupping fog-hidden valleys. A river shone like a tangled ball of gold yarn toward the sea. Santiago is in a big flat valley, surrounded by fields, with the Andes never far away. I’ll post pictures after I take some. My couchsurf didn’t respond, so I’m headed to the Happy House Hostel.

stars_gone_nova mentioned needing a 2008 calendar. And I recently made a very simple half-sheet calendar that I carry around with me as a proxy for the detailed calendar I keep at home. It’s a replacement for the Harvard Book Store bookmark that served as my travel-calendar in 2007. It occurred to me that other people might want to use it, so here it is.

Get the PDF or Visio Source.

I printed it on card stock. If you want one printed on card stock (and you’re willing to wait until early February), I’m happy to make it for you. I can also make smallish changes, if you want something differently sized, for example.

Behind the cut is the list of my favorite 500 songs as of now. Or as of some nebulous time over the past several months, since that’s how long it took me to put this together.

One of my 101/1001 goals is to either own or get directly from friends at least half of these songs. Why does it matter how I get them, since I already have the audio? Because bit quality matters, and getting the song in the context of the full CD matters, and if the artist is little-enough-known that my well-versed friends don’t have their music, they could probably use my money. So help me out! What of this can you lend me?

Or suggest more songs I might like! I don’t listen to radio or Pandora much, so I either get my music from my friends or from my grocery store (sad, but true). I’d rather it be from you’all.

These are songs for all of my moods. These are the songs I sing to when I’m alone (which I do loudly). I know that some of it isn’t good music. It’s just what I’ve run across, or thought to chase down, or was easy to download. I don’t exactly endorse this music– I’d only recommend a fraction of it– but I do enjoy it a lot. Maybe you will too. I will gladly pass on any of this (or all of it), just ask me.

My Top 500 Songs

I’d been waiting for the day to be right for me to talk to my neighbors about late-night party noise. And then today happened, and I realized we were here.

I visited all the houses around and rang all the doorbells. With one exception, the answer I got was “I didn’t hear a thing.” One neighbor said, “I would never have a problem with it. I’ve lived here for 30 years; I play my music loud; you guys have fun.” That’s what my neighborhood is good at. One person wants to come to a party. I think another is hiding a dead body in their apartment.

The exception was from the neighbors who called the cops the first time (not last time). They said the problem was people on the porch talking. That night, they talked to the porch-talkers, who quieted down, but an hour later it was just as bad, so they called the cops. They said that even when they came down to talk to the people on the porch, they couldn’t hear the noise of the party.

I collected email addresses, and distributed my contact information. The bottom-line, as far as I can tell, is everything’s cool, but there needs to be a new rule: keep it really down on the porch! I might place a limit on the number of people who can be out on the porch at a time too (any thoughts on that?).

My next Rocky party will be February sometime.

Diana’s New Year’s party was excellent as always. Endless good discussion, and some fond farewells and goodlucks. And more food than you can shake a crystallized fondue fountain at. There’s a beauty in never knowing when a Rocky party will hit its high. For me, it was after most people had left, with the phrase “moist pussy shit”, and the surrounding discussion such as only Rockies can have.

Below are my pictures from visiting my sister in Utah. My brother Terrence has discovered the apathy game, but he isn’t very good at it and tries too hard. I love my nieces! I hope they get out of Mormanland alive. But while there, at least they can appreciate the god-smackingly gorgeous Zion National Park. Serene [eldest niece] trekked a good trail without any help, despite Joe’s [my step-dad] over-bearing parentalism.

Joe, Serene, Jasmine	Mom, Terry, Jarrah, Joe	Jade	Terrence
Sandy Hollow	Sandy Hollow	Sandy Hollow	Sandy Hollow
Serene in Zion	Zion National Park	Bird in Zion	Along the Trail

This year’s holiday season has been the best in recent memory, and full to overflowing. But I’m glad it’s over, because the next six months are filling up fast.

My friends are truly incredible people. But as wonderful as you all are, I’ve never seen anything as beautiful as the swarming bacteria here. Talk about god-smacking…

Every year, I like to build a gift for the world. This year, it’s the Infinite Canvas, an online collaborative art project of infinite scope. It came out of a discussion between me and Tim R, and only scrapes the surface of what’s possible for such a medium. If you have Mozilla*, try it out:

http://www.existencia.org/canvas/

You’ll be dropped somewhere random on the Canvas where there’s already some drawing. Use the tools at the top to move around and zoom in or out (you can do any of these indefinitely). Then select a color and start drawing! Click the save icon at the top at any time to commit your drawing to the Canvas for others to discover.

You can save a location on the Canvas with the value at the bottom of the page. Use this value by putting it back in the text box and clicking “Go!” (or just save the resulting URL).

Play around with it. Tell me what features you’d like to see, and I’ll add them to my list!

* Currently, I don’t support any browser other than Mozilla (I’ve only tested it on my copy, and I know it doesn’t work in IE). If the “Status” never changes to “Done”, it’s probably broken for you. Tell me, so I can fix it– and include what browser you’re using. Thanks!

My family is spending Christmas in Utah with my sister this year. Much as I love my sister, I had to be guilt-tripped into going to Mormanland. It could be the last Christmas we spend together for a while.

I flew to Las Vegas Sunday evening. I didn’t reserve the shuttle to Utah, so it didn’t come. So I went to the Greyhound station, found out when the next bus was the next morning, and trekked to the local hostel (Greyhound station attendee: “you mean, like a halfway house?”). On the way, I got to talking to a nice guy who offered me grass, or bitches, or whatever I wanted. I said I appreciated the offer, but not tonight. He then briefly begged for money, then threatened to have me beat up by some guys we were approaching (a clear bluff), then begged some more. Riiiiight. I met him again on the way back, 6 hours later– same deal.

I love my family. My parents got me Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar: Understanding Philosophy Through Jokes. The jokes aren’t exactly thigh-slappers, but it’s fun. My favorite line so far: “Is that an aspirin you’re taking, Bob, or an atypical elephant?”

Next semester, I’m teaching my last seminar at MIT, and you should join in!

The Coming Years: An Exploration of the Future

What will the world be like in 20 years, or in a hundred years? In this seminar, we will draw upon several disciplines (including anthropology, system dynamics, and fiction) to illuminate the possible future developments in science and technology, culture and lifestyles, and dominant paradigms and societies. The scope of the class will range from the effects of the internet over the next decade, to the worldwide political changes we can expect in the next century, to the feats of engineering that might emerge in the coming millennium.

It’s a reading/discussion/modeling/project class, and it’s going to be a *blast*! Pass the word! More information at http://www.existencia.org/future/. If you aren’t an MIT student, tell me and I’ll put you on my list.

Plus, I’m going to teach a three-part lecture series on “How to Stage a Revolution” some time in March! It’s inspired by a seminar of that name taught this last semester, which apparently failed to give any practical advice on the question in question. My lectures will concentrate on cutting-edge technologies and methodologies for producing rapid culture-wide change, as well as suggestions and ethical considerations on what changes to push. Tell me now if you want to know when that’s being scheduled.

Aaaand I’m giving a short talk at MathWorks (Makers of MATLAB) tomorrow about vocal technologies in Rock Band!

I want to apologize to everyone who got kicked out of my party when the police came. I feel particular bad about not making it clear to the cops that the vast majority of people there were in no shape to drive. I hope everyone got home safe.

I love hosting parties, and I like them to be big, and good, and *loud*. I plan my parties a month in advance, and having the cops visit is not on the agenda.

I’m going to talk to all my neighbors within earshot. After apologizing for the noise, I’m going to say, “So, I have these late Saturday night parties every couple months. How can I make sure they don’t disturb you? Here’s my cellphone number.” I might even warn the cops that there’s a late-night party, but that the neighbors all know about it.

I’ll tell you’all how it goes. I want this to be the last cop-visitation, but not the last loud party.

Also, by my next party, my apartment should have a fully finished kitchen for the first time in a decade! Woo-hoo!

[Edit: Talked to landlord (who lives on the third floor) and two neighbors– no one even noticed the noise. My landlord even wondered if the party was canceled because it was so quiet.]