Shroedinger’s iNode

“current” is a symbolic link to a directory.

[root@server dir]# rm current/
rm: cannot remove directory `current/': Is a directory
[root@server dir]# rm -f current/
rm: cannot remove `current/': Not a directory
[root@server dir]#

.. wait, what?

Royksopp

I think I forgot music last week. I’ve been busy lately. Today? Double-dose of Royksopp, Norwegian elecronic-music duo (“It’s called electro, prick”) who never fail to captivate my ears and heart with their gentle, upbeat tunes that simultaneously bear a rich depth of sound and a simplicity that makes me reminisce about chiptunes.

By the way I fucking love chiptunes. I’m going to have to introduce you lot to Nullsleep. Or maybe I just did.

Royksopp – Happy Up here (link)

Royksopp – Remind Me (link)

The Airborne Toxic Event

I’m probably going to get lynched by someone, somewhere. Maybe. Maybe not.

I don’t really like this band. Their single that’s on the radio? Sounds like a chunk of what I listened to in the mid-to-late-nineties. It’s an uninteresting song that treads a well-worn path we haven’t left behind long enough to become fresh again. They are improved when acoustic with strings, but then they just sound like the Arcade Fire got a new lead singer and Owen Pallett stopped returning their calls.

But I’m likely alone here.

Friday Music Triple Stack: Futureheads, The Walkmen, and The (International) Noise Conspiracy

I’ve been derelict in my duties as a music-provider. These bands are all pretty big, and a bit old, but well. I feel like sharing them.

And yes, Futureheads got two songs. I like them that much.

Futureheads – Skip to the End (link)

Futureheads – Decent Days and Nights (link)

(Yes, two from Futureheads. I like them.)

Walkmen – The Rat (link)

The (International) Noise Conspiracy – Capitalism Stole My Virginity (link)

Coraline Review

Saw Coraline in 3D last night.

For the unfamiliar (how can you be, at this point?) Coraline is a story of a young girl dissatisfied with her parents, alone in a new town. And through a secret door, she finds the Other world, a perfect world of best meals, beautiful gardens, and constant games, strung together by her Other Mother. Except that this fantastic other world is a trap set to lure children away, for the Other Mother, the Beldam, to devour their lives and snatch their eyes.

If you like Henry Selick (Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach) you’ll like this. It’s very similar-but-not-same, visually, because he’s got a distinct style, though I see him pulling from the modern school of animation (which pulls from an almost-twenty-year-old pushing-boundaries school of animation) and integrating it with his style flawlessly.

Script is good. Voice acting is good. The story is well done and I feel stays very true to the book. My friends claimed it was scary, but I wasn’t that creeped out by it. They also claimed they wouldn’t take their children to it, but I would. It really wasn’t that frightening. Maybe at moments, but it’s okay for children to get scared once in awhile. Helps spinal development.

Now, I’m not entirely sold on the 3D concept. My friends were pretty stoked on it, but I’m not sure it impacted the movie-watching experience to the point that I’d insist people try to see it 3D. Still, the 3D tricks (things coming out at you) weren’t overused, and they weren’t used at poor moments, so the 3D definitely doesn’t detract at all. Simply a flavor choice, here.

In the end? Highly recommended. See and enjoy. Bring the kids.

Watchmen

I haven’t been doing my part. Time to fix it. Repeating viral marketing for Watchmen.

If Two Trains…

Graph from GraphJam

When I was young and confronted with this question (teachers have learned to stop calling on me when I raise my hand) I asked if the trains were on the same track.

“Well, if they are,” I said, “we shouldn’t be wasting time calculating this. We should be stopping the damn trains.”

We are raising a nation of children who, when confronted with an imminent train wreck and the wholesale slaughter of innocent passengers, instead of sorting out methods to relay the problem to the engineers, simply spend time calculating the when-and-where of impact, and how bad it will be.

Which explains reality television, if you think about it.