Oh yeah? Well, my yang is more intense than your yin, so there!

Top: A fireplace and an ancient tablet with mysterious hieroglyphs on it. What message could they possibly hold?

Middle: When contemplating the meaning of the universe, it is well known that failure of this philosophical endeavor is somewhat likely, so a proper expression of resigned dissatisfaction is de rigueur.

Bottom: What lies at the end of the stairway? I descend slowly, my entire being suffused with anticipation and longing. In that very instant, I find myself immersed in the unbearable whiteness of being.

A year full of such sweet sorrow

This has been a year when a number of people (I mean, of course, the ones who held your hand and laughed with you, the ones who spent time with you speaking of things that were) suddenly were no more, suddenly, in fact, became things that were. Can't wait for it to end. :-)

Misconceptions surrounding rainy weather in Vancouver

Some years ago, I knew a guy named Rex. He was a really smart programmer, specializing in 3D animated computer graphics. We didn't really get along all that well, but I really admired the cool stuff he could do.

When I see raindrops on a Vancouver window, I am instantly reminded of 3D particle generators. And of Rex.

Maybe, after all is said and done, just maybe, from the perspective of smart people like Rex, I am a difficult person to get along with; what do you think?

Should I be steering clear of smart people? Or is it like the rain in Vancouver--only a problem when you deem it so?

At last, in rainy Vancouver, the clocks have surged past midnight to Christmas Day. I would like to wish the multitudes that kindly read my blog, a very happy Christmas!

Four successively more terrifying faces

When confronted with evidence that despite all his efforts to be a better person, the aggregate kindness quotient on a planetary scale showed scant improvement, his face not only turned a whiter shade of pale, it underwent a series of transformations, expressing his progressive disappointment.

It soon reached a point where he was no longer sure which of his four faces he liked the least...

The ghosts of Japanese fishermen

Today I was in Steveston Village, at the Tapenades restaurant, shown above.

Same village where it all began in 1888--the migration of Japanese fishermen from Wakayama prefecture in Japan.

I spoke at length with the ghosts of two fishermen lost in storms off Vancouver Island a hundred years ago. They seemed anxious for me to know that although the work was hard and dangerous, they never regretted making the move to Canada from Japan.


A couple of years ago I bought a whole king salmon directly from a fishing boat moored at the Steveston docks for the princely sum of $2 because it was the end of the day. These days the fishing boats are run by Vietnamese and other non-Japanese fishing teams. And there is no longer any salmon cannery.

You looking at me?

Still enjoying the free app Instagram on the iPhone, which lets me take a photograph in square format (as with the old 6x6 120 roll films), and apply a single filter to it, which gives it a retro look and feel.

In this case I used the Nashville filter, which includes the black border with orange text.

First person to see this photograph said, "Not too flattering is it?"

Now, surely, the only proper understanding of that assessment is that I must look better in real life! My Japanese Panasonic digital camera, the very latest model that I purchased in Japan last month, has a "beautification mode" that we are assured emphasizes one's natural beauty and somehow covers up for one's defects, should one have any defects to begin with, of course...what would the algorithm do if such compensation was unnecessary? All those years of research and development...how would the algorithm feel about that, I wonder.

Something...in the way she jams

Why is Bud Powell's Celia (the tune, not the daughter...) so engaging?

The only recording of this I have heard is in the Decca 4-disc set, and it has the characteristic Monk/Powell edginess, where you frequently feel that things are going to completely unravel any second now because they are just that little bit behind the beat and seem to be struggling to keep up, making for the most exhilarating ride ever...

Best video I could find on YouTube is this wonderful rendition by a Japanese lady Hiromi-san (based in the US, I believe), who delivers an on-the-brink performance just like Bud. Audio quality of this live recording is not the best, but this music is so wonderful that it really doesn't matter.

Healing piano: Megumi

For my other music, please see http://rufuslinmusic.com (includes music you can listen to for free).

Suspend all disbelief, Ye who enter here

Less than thirty-nine

Yes, I'm perfectly aware that it looks like the radiator grille of an old Studebaker, thank you.

In fact, as any CSI analyst given sufficient time and laboratory resources, including nitrogen-cooled supercomputers capable of winning at Jeopardy, will readily inform you, these are the steps leading to a cinema complex.

Which is where I went yesterday, as described in my previous post. Oh yes, there were doubters, a legion of them no less, who seemed unconvinced that I had really been to see Ms Jolie and Mr Depp. Let this be your uncontrovertible comeuppance, naysayers and infidels!

Zodiac signs visible from space (with extremely powerful optics)

Twelve moons sketched

This composite sketch shows the culprits behind the Zodiac Caper. It started out life as a series of sketches for acrylic paintings on 12 beechwood panels. Perhaps one day I will take the step of using that medium for these.

To be honest, that scorpion looks kind of iffy from an anatomical perspective... And it would be hardly surprising if one should remark that both Taurus and Leo look like deer in headlights... Well, if you'd like to see my completed acrylic paintings, most having to do with Japan, this is my art web site...

Today I went to see The Tourist, with Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie. Errr...that didn't quite come out right. In any case, I enjoyed the humor sprinkled throughout. And Angelina Jolie in a gown with her hair up sure looked a lot like Sophia Loren in her prime...

Photo manga

WHEREBY Rufus Lin didst, in the role of photographer, cause to materialize, with malice aforethought, a most peculiar comic comprising photographs rather than drawings, with text in Japanese, the entire work having been made available for public viewing at the following address (Japanese web page):

http://collection.rufuslin.com

Sonic pathways in the human brain

Yukari found it difficult to remember when it was that she first learned that she was quite unlike the others.

But then somebody switched the music from Utada Hikaru to Nakashima Mika and she suddenly recalled that it was this morning now, wasn't it?

Somewhere over there 向こうだったよ

Only the way forward makes any sense

While waiting for dinner to be ready, it occurs to me that I have become quite good at pretending not to be surprised by unexpected happenings.

And you? Do you always know how you truly feel about something?

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Healing Piano Music: Mayuko

I picked up the phone, the one connected to their workroom in the basement where they were doubtless preparing floral arrangements for a wedding dinner. She said she would be right up.

It was: a hotel across the street from mine, a memorable November day in Tokyo.

She spoke gently as she trained the supple stalks this way and that, recounting her days in England and how unbearably cold those days were.

She was a fluffy white cloud in an otherwise bitterly cold blue sky. I thought about her one day, having come back to Vancouver, and this improvised piano music came to be.

The garden at the Nezu Museum in Tokyo

Does completeness matter after all is said and done?

Stairway to Nowhere - a study in the absence of completeness

As a musician, artist and writer, building a meaningful corpus of work is an ongoing preoccupation.

Does this alarm you? Are you concerned that this not inconsiderable task may perhaps not be completed before my demise?

But you see, at every step on the road to completion, the completed work to date has intrinsic value that will not go away, irrespective of whether the entire corpus is ever finished.

If J S Bach had stopped at 47, yes, there would have been no closure, but certainly, the five-part C-sharp minor fugue in Book I would have lost none of its beauty.

Exactly Watson, why in fact was there no odor in the night time?

When I turned around, the skunk was there...

As the year drew to a close, skunks were everywhere. I had come to accept their presence as something inevitable--almost, in the grand scheme of things, dare I say, desirable... Yet somehow, I knew that this was the closest I would ever get to the real thing, and it made me strangely wistful. The very next hour, I was gone from that place, unlikely to return until the spring.

Beware of gifts carrying cosmic spores

Now at Oakridge Center food court studying the complex dynamics of table acquisition. A far less anxiety-inducing activity than the past hour's Christmas shopping for gifts to send to friends in Japan. Some of said gifts are hiding in a white plastic bag...


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

No, you are not in a maze of twisty passages, all alike.

Actually, only one of these houses is purple, but some unfathomable iPhone automatic color correction appears to have kicked in...