The Westerner

The Westerner, by Badger Clark

My fathers sleep on the sunrise plains,
    And each one sleeps alone.
Their trails may dim to the grass and rains,
    For I choose to make my own.
I lay proud claim to their blood and name, 
    But I lean on no dead kin;
My name is mine, for the praise or scorn,
And the world began when I was born
    And the world is mine to win.

They built high towns on their old log sills,
    Where the great, slow rivers gleamed,
But with new, live rock from the savage hills
    I'll build as they only dreamed.
The smoke scarce dies where the trail camp
        lies, 
    Till the rails glint down the pass;
The desert springs into fruit and wheat
And I lay the stones of a solid street
    Over yesterday's untrod grass.

I waste no thought on my neighbor's birth
    Or the way he makes his prayer.
I grant him a white man's room on earth
    If his game is only square.
While he plays it straight I'll call him mate; 
    If he cheats I drop him flat.
Old class and rank are a wornout lie,
For all clean men are as good as I, 
    And a king is only that.

I dream no dreams of a nurse-maid state 
    That will spoon me out my food.
A stout heart sings in the fray with fate 
    And the shock and sweat are good.
From noon to noon all the earthly boon 
    That I ask my God to spare
Is a little daily bread in store,
With the room to fight the strong for more, 
    And the weak shall get their share.

The sunrise plains are a tender haze
    And the sunset seas are gray,
But I stand here, where the bright skies blaze 
    Over me and the big today.
What good to me is a vague "maybe" 
    Or a mournful "might have been,"
For the sun wheels swift from morn to morn 
And the world began when I was born 
    And the world is mine to win.

My Review of Oracle PL/SQL Programming, 5th Edition

Originally submitted at O'Reilly

The definitive reference on PL/SQL, Oracle PL/SQL Programming, Fifth Edition, covers language fundamentals, advanced coding techniques, and best practices for using Oracle's powerful procedural language. Thoroughly updated for Oracle Database 11g Release 2, this edition reveals new ...

Oracle PL/SQL Programming, 5th Edition

Excellent Book. XML a Little Brief

By Fred from Baltimore on 9/11/2012

 

4out of 5

Pros: Concise, Well-written, Easy to understand, Accurate, Helpful examples

Best Uses: Intermediate, Expert

Describe Yourself: Developer

I was eager to have the 5th edition, providing coverage through Oracle Database 11g Release 2. I have learned a lot from the previous editions of this book.

I quickly went to the XML discussion on page 426. I was hoping for a deeper discussion of XMLType. I was glad to see that the deprecated extractvalue function wasn't used in the example.

(legalese)

Juggling Lessons: Distance Matters

I have been thinking for years that I could juggle because I could juggle 3 balls for 5, 6 or some number of tosses.
Then I started trying to juggle for 100 tosses consecutively.

I discovered that I can't juggle. I get to 20, occasionally I get to 30. I lot of days it takes me several tries to get to 20. I realize that to be able to juggle I need to be able to toss and catch and adapt to every toss. Every toss is different. Every catch is different. The shifting and adjusting and handling changes is what makes the ability to juggle.

How this is a model for so many other things in life! We think we can do something because we did it once or a dozen times. But the real measure is can we do it over and over consistently many, many, times.

The Rules of Precedence are a universal convention which tell us to apply operations in the following order:

1. Brackets 2. Powers and Roots 3. Multiplication and Division 4. Addition and Subtraction

Language IS Technology!

I hear people on the media complaining about how technology is changing our lives and distancing us from each other.  They have a point, at least 100,000 years late, because without language our experience of the primordial, God, is greater.  But language is what allows us to express our humanity beyond the range of touch and the present moment. 

I have acquaintances who I've mentioned this idea to.  One, a software executive, says she means technology in terms of physical machines and software.  Another, a spiritual teacher, who is worried about technology in the sense of automated machinery.  Technology, language, is so much a part of us that we no longer notice it.  I have heard people say "Well of course that is obvious, but not what I mean."

I want to use technology/language, not let it use me.  I try to hold primordial awareness simultaneously with the use of language.  

This is not a new idea:  

"The map is not the territory."  -- Alfred Korzybksi; 

"Language is the house of being."  -- Martin Heidegger;  

"[Human] Consciousness is conceptual"  -- Ayn Rand; 

"Remember yourself always and everywhere." -- G. I. Gurdjieff;

"And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field;"  -- King James Bible

Caution: Language allows of mechanizing the mind when the user becomes identified with its abstractions (words and symbols).  This may result in feelings of sadness, isolation, thoughts of suicide and other non-functional behaviors.    

Writing is thinking, at least conceptual thinking.

I started my blogging with the desire to clarify my thoughts.  Over time I drifted off course (law of Seven).

I became identified with the remarks of associates about the content of my blog and requests to post items to promote their goals (suggestibility).  The blog was no longer a tool for clarifying my own thoughts, and occasionally feelings.  I believed that I could still blog in the face of the feeling of resentment -- interesting, I'm ashamed to admit that I wasn't conscious of that feeling or the accompanying belief until just now, but it is clearly recorded in my memories (kundabuffer).

This is the pain of self-observation.  (I hesitate to say "remorse of conscience.")

The Moral Challenge of Advanced Technology

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/a-quarter-of-us-nuclear-plants-not-reporting-equipment-defects-report-finds/2011/03/24/ABHYa2RB_story.html?hpid=z2

I'm not surprised. And if the 28% that were "confused" were honest with themselves they woul know they are lying.

Admiral Rickover said words to the effect that a higher level of technology demands a higher level of morality.

We are seeing the weaknesses of human nature in action, the ability to deceive one's self to preserve one's own self-love and vanity. Living in imagination -- kundabuffer.