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I just got an email from Annie, and she included this beautiful quote from “The Little Prince”:

“You must be very patient,” replied the fox. “First you will sit down at a little distance from me-like that-in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me every day…..”

My mom says it’s like us….. Going closer to each other by meeting. And maybe she is right…..

Annie is an amazing kid. So thoughtful and wise. She also wanted me to write more about her on our website, so I thought I’d share her sweet message.

Good night.

-Jessica

I had such a lovely day today. I went in to Seoul to meet my friend Annie and her mom Sung Sook for lunch. Annie is 13 years old, and I met her at English Village in late September. We have been emailing regularly, and she comes to visit Adam and me almost once a week at the Village. Annie is almost finished with her winter break, so we wanted to hang out in Seoul before she went back to school.

We had such a nice time eating Italian food then shopping at the outdoor mall in Insadong. It was a beautiful day, and the shops had all kinds of beautiful and crafty wares. It was fun to window shop together. They taught me the Korean words for many things (but I forgot a lot of it already). “Chai-ba-sim-ni-da” is what you say when you leave a store and haven’t bought anything. It’s something like, “I enjoyed looking.”

Then Sung Sook brought us to a tea room that she had found online. It was wonderful. It was in a traditional Korean house built around a courtyard, where you take off your shoes outside the door. Annie laughs at me because I’m not good at taking off or putting on my shoes quickly– I take forever to tie my shoes. We sat for a few hours and drank 5 flavor tea and ate traditional rice cakes and sunflower seeds. While we sat and talked, we each colored in a mandala on a half-sheet of paper with colored pencils. Mandalas are geometric designs on a circle (like Adam’s tatoos) that can be focused on for meditation, and the way you color them is supposed to say something about your mind. Mine had a pretty tulip design that I colored with red, pink, brown, silver, gold and yellow. Annie’s looked like a sun, and Sung Sook’s looked like a stained glass window. I wonder what those say about us…

Outside in the courtyard was the Korean equivalent of horse shoes. We threw two-foot long sticks into a tall, narrow pot. It was harder than it looked! We had a fun time together. Although Sung Sook doesn’t speak much English, she understands almost everything, and I was glad to get to know her more. Annie is such a great kid, and great kids usually come from great parents.

We walked back through Insadong, filled up the last remaining space in our bellies with mandu (steamed dumplings) and roasted chestnuts. Then we got on the subway and parted ways. Thank you Annie and Sung Sook for such a lovely day!

Adam’s school quarter has begun again, and he had to spend the day at home getting rolling with his school work. I missed him, but it was fun to have a girls day out. I briefly caught him in Myeong Dong on my way home. He finished his last art class tonight, and now the group is out at the noribang (karaoke room) until late. Koreans are crazy about the noribang.

I think that’s all for now. I have a busy few days ahead at work, so to bed with me! We can’t wait to come home for a few weeks in February!

-Jessica

What do you know, I did think of something worth writing about…

Tonight I’m teaching my last art class of the twelve-week session. They really want me to do another round, but I’m not going to. Not now at least. I really enjoyed it and everyone seemed to get a lot out of the experience, but it’s time to hang up my hat for now. For one thing, the new semester at DePaul has started up, and I’m taking more than double the credits I took last semester. The real reason though, is that I’m still just not motivated to make paintings right now, and so I don’t have much juice to pass along.

I want to be painting, and I think I could even be really good at it, but I’m simply not driven to do at this point in time. I have tons of resistance around getting down to doing it, even though I always enjoy it when I do. (I do think some of those blocks will become unplugged as we continue through the Artist’s Way course. Hey, that’s something else I need to blog about some time soon!) I just have this massive fear of failure that paralyzes me there.

On the other hand, I have no resistance whatsoever related to my photography. I love shooting photos, and I don’t think twice about shooting something beautiful when I see it. So, for now that’s what I’m going to focus on doing. If I want to paint, I’ll paint, but I’m not going to make it something I ’should be doing’ anymore.

I love the immediacy of photography. I think it’s particularly good for an ADD brain like mine- it’s so instantaneous and stimulating that it’s virtually distraction-proof. I love the way I can play with light and enhance reality too. With a camera in hand, my senses are heightened. Walking around the city becomes a moving meditation on form and light and the narrative unfolding around me. And you get the most amazing little miracles sometimes- beautiful, delicate accidents of life that are just frozen in time.

So, like I said, I dig it. I’m going to try to be more intentional about it, and try to make some money doing it as well.

In support of these photographic aspirations, when we’re back in Nashville, I’ll be picking up a brand, spanking new Nikon D40 that I just ordered. I am SO stoked. I took my friend’s D70 for a spin last week and it rocked my world. SLRs have gotten so much more user friendly with the advent of digital, once again removing resistance from the process of making good art. Excellent. I took some great photos with it that I will be posting soon. (In the mean time you can see some of the fun shots I took in Fukuoka with my great little Canon SD550 on our Photos page.)

I’m off for now. Gotta catch the train in time to make it to art class…

-A.

Here’s a recent posting I made to a discussion in the Society and Technology class I’m taking right now at DePaul. Nothing highly novel here, just my thoughts on the future importance (and unimportance) of processing speeds.

Partly I’m posting this since I’ve been so dry lately on the blog front and figured it was time to say something. More coming soon, I promise.

Personally, I tend to agree with software developer and author Paul Graham that for personal computing and even a good deal of the business market, we will see an increasing move toward web-based applications. Paul goes so far as to say that in 5 or 10 years, most computers will be running not much more than a web browser on the local machine. He cites a number of advantages, among them that for the end user this model would be: “easier, cheaper, more mobile, more reliable, and often more powerful than desktop software.” On the back end there would be greater security, distributed backups, faster software development and easier update deployment. You can find his great essay (and others) by clicking here.

Using the Web 2.0 type applications currently available, one can email, calendar, archive and manipulate photos, manage projects, create and collaborate on documents and spreadsheets, read aggregated RSS feeds,and much, much more. Here’s a good idea of what is out there along these lines today.

OK, so what does all that have to do with this discussion? Well, I think that for the average computer user (with the exception of gamers that demand more and more power to run their virtual worlds), processor speeds will mean less and less in the next few years. Web applications do not depend on processor speed on the user side as much as they do bandwidth. Far more important to the end user will be processor miniaturization, but that is another discussion entirely.

However irrelevant speed will become to the average user, processor speed is still immensely important for professionals working with digital media production, and will continue to be so for a very long time. The only limit to the need for more powerful processors in those areas is the limit of human imagination and creativity, as far as I can tell. Artists will continue to push the envelope in terms of the definition and complexity they want to use in their films, music and art.

Also, as we rely more and more on information technology to make our world work on the large scale, processor speed will continue to be crucial for creating the infrastructure of the internet, banking systems, transport networks, medical facilities, telecommunications backbones and so on. A more connected world means more data. More data necessitates more power, plain and simple.

Overall, I don’t see the push for increased processor power to wane any time in the foreseeable future, though we should expect processor speed to decline as a key selling point for manufacturers in the next couple of years.

-A.

39-14 Bears win!  They’re going to the Superbowl!  Thanks for the call, Mom and Dad!

You probably know that we Lofbomms are not big sports fans.  We don’t watch any sports on tv, we don’t follow any teams, and we sure don’t play any sports (although I was okay at softball back in the day…).  But I am from Chicago, and I am the daughter of a football coach.  I’ve got the Chicago Bears in my blood.  I haven’t watched a Bears game in years, but I still love the Bears!

I remember when they won the Superbowl in 1985.  My parents took my brother and me out of school to see the parade downtown.  We stood on a bench to see the presentation of the rings in Daley Plaza.  The tickertape from the parade was ankle deep.  We had a record and a VHS video of the Superbowl Shuffle.  I would watch the video and listen to the record over and over.  “We’re not here to start no trouble, we’re just here to do the superbowl shuffle.  uh-huh.”  I love Chicago, and I love the Bears.

Today (actually, tomorrow over on the Western Hemisphere), the Bears will be playing in the playoffs, and if they win, THEY’RE GOING TO THE SUPERBOWL!

GO BEARS!

We can’t watch the game over here, but we’re with with you Chicagoans in spirit.

-Jessica

Apparently, there was an earthquake tonight.  We were at a wine, cheese, and chocolate party at our friend Jamie’s apartment in Ilsan.  It was the most massive spread of incredible food we have had since we arrived.  In addition to the above listed, there was fondue, fresh sashimi (fish), homemade kimbop, greek salad, hummus, chocolate covered tok, and blocks of incredible aged cheeses.  And you don’t understand the treat it is to have so many different kinds of cheese!  We just don’t have cheese in Korea.  A cheap block of cheese runs you around $6-7, so tonight was such a treat.

Oh, yeah.  So the earthquake.  Someone said they felt the floor shake.  I didn’t feel anything, but I was sitting up on the bed.  That was it.  Then we came home and there were three different emails that were sent around EV asking about the shaking that people felt, and one person researched and found that there was a 4.8 earthquake tonight.  I didn’t feel it!

So there’s the excitement for this evening.

-Jessica

This is the beautiful Felicia that we sponsor. Isn’t she gorgeous? She is holding the box of gifts that we sent for her just a few weeks ago! We sent her some warm clothes for Christmas and a few other little gifts, and it is so exciting to see her holding them! The bag on top has more new clothes that the school director bought for her with our sponsor money. It is so exciting to see that we actually can reach out and help this little girl. Felicia is 9 years old, and she lives in a boarding school/ orphanage in Moldova, the poorest country in Europe. She has parents and a sister, but she lives at the school because they are poor.

We found out about Felicia and began to sponsor her one year ago when my company, EMI Christian Music Group partnered with the wonderful organization, Sweet Sleep for our Christmas charity. Sweet Sleep takes service teams to Moldova several times per year to build a transitional home for kids “graduating” from the orphanage, Sweet Sleep arranges sponsorships for kids like Felicia who we can email regularly and send packages to, and they employ young boys who have graduated from the orphanage to build new beds for these kids who have been sleeping in filthy and broken beds from the 1950s. Part of our sponsor money goes to create a “nest-egg” account that Felicia can use when she graduates to help her get started on her feet.

I was just SO excited to get this beautiful picture in our email tonight! It feels good to reach out and try to do good for someone, but then to see that it’s really getting to her! It’s wonderful. I wish so much for Felicia. There are many others like her, if you are looking for another way to reach out.

Info about Moldova from Sweet Sleep’s website:

The Republic of Moldova declared its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. It is located between the Ukraine and Romania. In 2002, the population of Moldova was estimated to be 4,439,502. Moldova is plagued with a daunting cycle of poverty and corruption which severely affects the country’s orphan population. Over 80% of the population lives on less than $1.00 (U.S.) a day.

The statistics which face these children are horrid. There are an estimated 12,000 orphans living in this third-world country. They are released from their orphanages once they have completed the ninth grade and are typically 16-17 years old. With little to no resources, these teenagers have no place to call home. According to statistics, 10% will commit suicide within the first year of being forced out of the orphanage; 70% of the females will become prostitutes or be forcibly be sold into sex slavery; and 70% of males will either find themselves imprisoned due to desperate attempts to survive or will join the mafia as they seek a new “family”.

And we’re helping one!

-Jessica

I have found in the last few months that I actually like teaching. I like kids. I didn’t like baby sitting when I was young, but I’m really comfortable in the class room. I may have gained a lot from my mom by osmosis.

I’ve been working in the Mommy & Me program for a month now, and it’s a lot of fun. A few times each week, I get to teach six 2-3 year olds with their moms. It’s the only program in the ODP where we get to see the same students week-to-week, and I’m starting to get to know some of them.

Today I was co-teaching with Allison in the Nature Kids class, and we were talking about animals that live on land. After about an hour of class, Allison had the kids seated and read a book about different kinds of cats. I went to the back of the room and painted my face to look like a lion. When she finished the story, Allison told the kids, “There’s a lion in our classroom!” I playfully jumped forward and gave my best roar. They gasped and cheered. One little girl cried. (It’s funny what makes kids cry. Earlier, one little boy was chewing on the tail of a stuffed animal, and across the room, another boy pointed at the boy with the tail in his mouth and started freaking out crying and crawling onto his mother’s lap.)

Then we made a little craft with lions on popsicle sticks with googlie eyes. While the kids were working on the craft with their moms, I went around and painted their faces so we had a bunch of little lions running around. We finished by singing “one little, two little, three little lions…”

Class was finished at 4:00, and it’s now midnight. I’m still a lion. It’s funny how face paint can really make your evening. I went to dance class with my friends on campus, and it was especially fun because I was a lion. I made eggs and potatoes for dinner, and chopping vegetables was especially fun as a lion. Blogging is even more fun with face paint. Laundry, too.

You should try it.

:). That’s all I’ve got. Good night.
-Jessica

I don’t understand spam.  It used to at least make sense.  Spammers used to be very direct in trying to sell you something or get you to click on some naughty link.  But now I’ve been getting spam comments on my music website– almost a new spam comment a day– and they’re not advertising anything.  Unless it’s something subliminal, or maybe it’s tracking something.  Or something.  I don’t understand.

Around Christmas, there was a spam comment talking about how December 25 isn’t the actual day that Jesus was born and that in many countries December 26 is boxing day.  Yeah, okay.  That’s fine.  But what does that have to do with my music?  Nothing.  Then, I have had a string of new comments saying that I have a very interesting site, my site is “impeccable”, they learned much new information from my site, etc.  My site is a template, folks.  It’s nice, but it’s nothing special.  If you comment on my music site, can you say something like, “great music, Jessica” or “can’t wait to see you in February”?  I don’t understand.  I’m sure these are random spams, but why?  What is their malicious intent?  It’s so annoying, and I can’t tell what they can gain from it.  Can anyone shed some light on this?
-Jessica