Good Friday

A very long time ago, I wrote a song. The lyrics are from the point of view of Roman soldier who plays an integral role in crucifying Jesus. Some good friends helped bring it to life with their musical talents that remain far superior to mine.  As the band grew, and I left on good terms to finish my computer science degree, the song eventually fell off the set list. It was never officially recorded or released - that I know of, anyway.  Yet, I've always wanted to do something more with it. I feel like it still has some potential.

So, today, I have taken it upon myself to re-write the lyrics a little, give it a new title, and who knows, maybe eventually it will get some new life. After all, new life is what this weekend is all about...

-= Centurion =-

You came to me

Like so many had before

Doomed to die

The crowd still shouting, "crucify!"

Crowned in thorns

Your wounded visage caught my eye

And looking past the blood I saw the love

The love that crowns and crucifies

(chorus)

And now I come to you

I plead the blood

I shed by my own hand

Father God, forgive me,

I knew not what I did

You left my whip

Beaten one lash short of death

Sadistically

I stripped your clothes and drove the nails

Darkness fell

My face turned pale, my blood ran cold

For dying on that cross I saw the Son

"My God, what have I done?"

(chorus)

Now I come to you

I plead the blood

I shed by my own hand

Father God, forgive me

I know well what I do

You rose again

Like no one had before

Victorious

Over Hades' deepest grave

Redemption dawns

As you roll the stone away

Now looking in your face I see the light

And on my knees I pray..

(chorus)

Now I come to you

I plead the blood

I shed by my own hand

Father God, forgive me

I know now what I did

Not The End

Fighting with Your Eyes Closed

"Walk by faith, and not by sight." - 2 Corinthians 5:7

I had an interesting experience last week during my martial arts class. I've been struggling to teach my body the "wind" style footwork required for most of the techniques found at my level. It's completely different from what I learned before, or at least it feels that way. I'm used to moving from my hips, but wind moves from the shoulders. I'm used to 45-degree angles, but that's water - wind is more about circular motion while receiving energy.

 Morpheus

Sensei says my problem is that I think about it too much instead of just doing it. My body knows what to do, he says, but my brain keeps getting in the way. I picture Morpheus during Neo's introduction to in-Matrix combat telling him to "stop trying to hit me and just hit me!"

To prove his point, he told me to do the technique with my eyes closed - a technique that begins with me getting kicked in the stomach!  That's crazy-talk, right? But, I figure there's a reason he's a sensei and I'm a student, so I gave it a shot.

I had to rely completely on sensing the energy of my opponent and waiting to feel the first sensations of the incoming kick, and then receive and redirect that energy. I had to know where my opponent was just by feeling it, and defeat him by moving into the right position relative to his, applying the technique, and all of this without the benefit of sight.

I felt the beginning of the kick on my abdomen, and began to move through the dark... And you know what? It worked! Sensei even said that was the best implementation of that technique he'd ever seen me do! Not only was it possible, but it actually worked better with my eyes closed and out of the way.

Now, for perhaps the first time, I understand the scripture I quoted above. Sometimes, we just have to close our metaphorical eyes and do what we know is right in the face of a challenge, purely on faith. This doesn't mean we do nothing and wait for divine intervention, but rather that we trust in what we've learned from the divine and apply it without being distracted by fear and an over-zealous need to analyze or be in control. At least try it ... you will probably be surprised at the results.

Gunplay, Adrenaline, and Things to Come

Well, this week has certainly been interesting. I have somehow managed to pick up my third illness in two months - another sinus cold!  I hope this one will go away without the need for medical intervention, but it did cause me to miss my Thursday evening To-Shin Do class. Thankfully I was feeling well enough on Saturday to attend class that day.

Remember how I said in an earlier post that I was worried that "it just wouldn't be the same?" Well, I couldn't have been more right, and it seems like that's a good thing. As it turns out, the training I'm receiving now is more geared towards potential real-life self-defense situations than previously. This is natural since the instructor has worked in law enforcement and private security for decades. Now, please don't interpret this as a put-down to my former school. Those guys know what they're doing, too, and I'm grateful for the instruction I received there. In fact, it's a testament to their awesomeness that I'm doing as well as I am, starting at level 3 at this new place after 2 years off. It's just .. different, that's all.

Now, with all that said, Saturday felt like my brain was going to explode due to information overload. Or was it sinus pressure?  Well .. maybe both. The highlight of the class, for me anyway, was the workshop we did on gun defense. I was able to play the role of a gun-wielding defender and an un-armed defender. In both cases, the idea is simply to not get shot, and therefore staying out from in front of the barrel is the main goal - for both people. In either situation, once the un-armed party decides to try to take the gun, it no longer really matters how it started - both are fighting for their lives at that point. It was pretty eye-opening for me in a few ways. First of all, I learned that if you're forced to use a gun to defend yourself, it's not a good idea to let your assailant get close enough to think he has a chance to take your gun from you .. and if he's already that close, you're better off just leaving your gun in your pocket and going hand-to-hand. It was also encouraging to find that I seem to have the skills and intuition to have a pretty reasonable chance at surviving a close-range encounter with a gun-wielding assailant, or an assailant trying to disarm me.

This was an experience unlike any I've had before .. even though I knew the guns we were training with were safe, I still felt quite a surge in adrenaline each time I had to defend myself. I had tried to put myself into the mindset at the time that all that mattered was not letting that thing be pointed at me no matter what, and that I really was fighting for my life. While I realize that there is no substitute for the real thing, I hope that were I ever to face the real thing, I would at least know that I know what to do to survive, and my training would kick in.

The other neat thing that happened in class was that my instructor told me I'd be ready to move up a belt rank soon. This is an especially big deal to me because I've been at the same rank now for 2 years. Just as a comparison, it look me about 2 years to go from a beginning white belt to where I am now. When it happens, my new belt will be solid green, and it will mean a lot to me, just because of all the struggles, internal and external, that I will have overcome to earn it. In fact, I will probably consider it one of my greater achievements over all.

Speakerphone Echo on the Samsung Fascinate

Some of you may recall a year or so ago when I released a hacked-up version of the Glitch kernel for CyanogenMod 7 on the Samsung Fascinate. In this kernel was my first of many successful shots at fixing that phone / ROM combination's abysmal in-call audio quality.  Some of you may also remember that the kernel I released made the phone unbearably loud.

Since then, I've released a few more patches, and they've found their way into most, if not all kernels for MTD ROMs for the Galaxy S line of products. The major improvement over that initial release is that the "boost levels" are configurable now.  Thanks to The Immortal JT1134, there is now on most ROMs a nice application to modify these parameters, allowing you to adjust them pretty much on-the-fly.

My In-Call Volume Settings
note the values for Speakerphone

One draw back, though, is that in some distributions, the default settings aren't ideal - especially when the Fascinate's speakerphone is used. This results in an unpleasant echo heard by the person on the other end of your conversation whenever they talk. I've posted to the forums dozens of times about this issue, yet it keeps coming up as a new question no-one can find the answer to.  Therefore, this post.

The speakerphone echo is caused by a combination of too high of a boost in the speakerphone call audio plus too high of a microphone gain in speakerphone mode. Both of these can be adjusted in a few places, but my preferred method is to use the Home Screen -> hit the menu button -> "System Settings" -> "Device Options" -> "In-Call Volume Controls" path.

Once you've got that open, adjust your "Speakerphone Volume" setting down to 1. Some people prefer 0. 2 will almost certainly cause echo. 3 will give you echo with severe distortion and probably melt your eardrums while causing a significant space-time anomaly in your fridge which will immediately consume all your beer, sending it back to 1955. You've been warned.

Next, adjust your speakerphone mic gain down some. I've found that 14 is a good value. Some may prefer slightly more or less. I've found that anything above 19 usually results in an echo. You'll just have to play with this one. If you have it above, say, 25, then you will almost certainly get some echo along with over-modulation, and the kernel will freak out and send an email to your parents and grandparents with your entire collection of nasty sheep porn attached. You've been warned.

Finally, make sure you hit OK, or all these settings will not be applied. They *should* stick after a reboot. Mine do.

Why We Learn to Fight

Continuing my new habit of posting about my To-Shin Do experiences, I'd just like to say that this week was pretty awesome, in no small part because I actually made it to TWO whole classes! Thursday and Saturday both saw me, this back-woods country boy turned nerdy ninja, hanging out in downtown Detroit learning a centuries-old martial tradition. Side-bar:  when I think of everything that had to happen throughout history and in my own life in order to make this possible .. it's crazy .. and pretty cool.

Anyway, the Thursday night class was mainly concentrated on testing, which is very different from the way I am used to testing. For one thing, it seems a lot more detailed and harder, and this is a good thing. This way, I don't run the risk of wearing a black belt someday yet not really being worthy of it (and worse, not knowing it). A twist of fate or someone's administrative screw-up forced us out of our usual facility and into the building's parking garage. This was made even more interesting by two things.

The Michigan Theater turned Parking Structure
(not my picture - found it on the web)

First, the parking garage used to be a very ornate old-time theater. The ceiling in particular consists of the remnants of what was once a grand cathedral-style piece of gilded-age architecture, but is now pocked with holes and crumbling, just like the rest of the place that wasn't converted into parking spaces. Littered about the ground were tiny bits of exploded "plaster bombs" that continue to fall randomly from the once majestic ceiling turned symbol of the sort of urban decay you can only find in the Motor City. It was almost surreal - I wish I had taken a picture - it was beautiful in a morbid sort of way, like ancient ruins of something great that has long since passed.

Second, we weren't the only ones using the parking lot that night. Aside from the birds and bats nesting in the ruins, it seems some local law students decided that would be a great place to have a kegger, blast loud music, and play some game that I'm unfamiliar with, so I'll just call it "throw the bean-bag into the hole in the target thingy." It reminded me of horseshoes, but without the large metal objects and therefore a lot less clanging. These folks were pleasant enough, and a few of them even wandered over to check us out - especially once the swords came out.

After class, we had to walk directly through the party in order to reach the exit, and one of the students who had obviously had a few beers stopped us and asked us a few questions. Of course, once he learned we were ninjas in training, he wanted to arrange a "fight" with one of his co-workers and asked us if we'd like to fight this guy. My friend and I answered with an immediate "No," and the guy then asked, "well, why are  you learning how to fight, then?"

I thought that was a great question, and it deserves an answer. Why DO we learn these fighting skills, if not to fight? There are a lot of answers, really. We practice the art as a way to learn about our minds and bodies, as a way to strengthen and improve our health, and things like that. But why learn combat skills when you can get those benefits from things like Yoga or working out at the gym?

The truth for me is that we learn to fight hoping we never need to. But, if we do, we will have the skills to protect the ones we love, the ones who can't fight for themselves, the innocent stranger, and even, to some extent, to protect the same enemy who would challenge us. That last part seems contradictory, but it's true - most of the techniques we learn are geared towards ending the fight without doing any permanent damage to the attacker. The winner of a fight is the guy that gets to go home in one piece afterwards, but even an aggressor who instigates a fight has a family to go home to at the end of the day, too .. so we learn how to avoid first, and if we have to, diffuse a violent situation with minimal damage to everyone. Sure, someone might end up with a broken arm or at least a bruised ego, but it actually takes a LOT to escalate a situation to the point that would require a ninja to permanently maim or kill. It's this aspect of compassion and giving precedence to non-violent solutions that I think makes this art special and so appealing to me personally.

After all that, I realize I still haven't talked about Saturday's class! I'll try to keep it short and simple this time.  Basically, it was awesome. We had our own room back, for one thing.  I also learned I had been doing my stomp kicks wrong for pretty much the entire time I've been doing this.  I should have known, really .. my kicks always felt awkward to me and seemed to land with not as much power as they should. But .. now that the error has been detected and corrected, holy crap! I feel like I really could kick down a wall, or send a guy twice my size flying across a room if I had to, and with LESS strength and effort than I had been trying to use before.

Ninja with Sword

I also had what is probably my most extensive lesson on swordsmanship ever. I learned what is basically one technique (there are literally thousands), but I feel like the guy teaching me really knew his stuff and conveyed it to me in a way I won't forget. I didn't notice how long the session lasted, but it felt like hours based on the amount of information I was absorbing and the amount of perspiration dripping into my eyes. We stopped when it felt like my brain was going to explode, and that's just one technique. I have a long, long way to go before I master even that one weapon, let alone the assortment of others for which the ninja are so infamous. But, that's why this is a life-long journey and not just a phase or something to be "in to" for a while. Anyone can take a few months of any martial art and learn a few basics, but to really learn and master even the smallest fraction of what they have to offer takes a lifetime. Think of how long it would take you to walk a thousand miles if you only took one or two steps per week because that was as fast as you could physically go.

That proverbial journey of a thousand miles which begins with a single step never actually ends, nor should it. Rather it becomes a way of life - a part of your that's inextricable from the rest, nurturing and growing your spirit, with each step giving you the strength and perseverance you'll need for the next.

The Infamous "We're Hosed" Incident

My first "real job" upon graduating college was, among other things, a lot of fun and more than a little educational. This was in 1997, which was probably one of the best years in history to have graduated with a 3.0 GPA and a BS degree in computer science. They were hiring programmers off the street back then! I'm not even kidding. I had an interview and accepted an offer to work as a contractor at General Motors before I even took my last final exam. This was the job that brought me from western New York to Michigan, and as far as life-shaping decisions go, this one was pretty big.

A Complete Tech 2 Kit

Back then, I was working on a vehicle diagnostic tool called the Tech 2. It was a small (for its time) hand-held embedded computing device that could connect to any GM vehicle's communications bus, read, analyze, and store diagnostic information in real time, as well as reprogram all of the on-board computers. We frequently tested the tool's ability to test and modify a given vehicle's fuel-to-air mixture, and detect when a sensor had gone bad (or we'd just disconnected its power), for examples.

My assignment was with the team that developed and maintained the core operating system for this tool. Our code was the first bit of code that ran in the system, bringing it from power-up to functional, and providing all the real-time scheduling and communications protocols for the rest of the more vehicle-specific stuff. It was pretty challenging stuff for a newbie fresh out of college, but I ran with it and enjoyed it a lot.

One of the challenges we faced was that we basically had a 10MB flash "hard drive" that we could only access 1MB at a time, and that flash drive was filling up fast.  Mind you, there was no file system, so we addressed the flash directly by address and used a card page register to pick which 1MB we wanted to see at any given time.  This made for some .. interesting .. code constructs, and made it necessary to copy certain  parts of the software into RAM at boot time - things like the OS's API layer, which was contained on the flash drive at an addressed specified in a look-up table that started at address 0.  You still with me?  Good.

I had written the code that would locate this API code and transfer it from the flash drive into it's designated spot in the RAM during the tool's boot-up sequence.  In the name of defensive coding, I had written a block of code to detect the absence of this file and react accordingly - by disabling all interrupts and entering an infinite loop after printing an error message in the center of the screen. My downfall was having the error message read, simply, "WE'RE HOSED."  I figured it was ok, though .. the API binary was an integral part of every release .. surely this error message would NEVER be displayed, right?  Right??

Wrong.  In fact, during the very next release cycle, the CDs that were shipped to every registered GM dealership in the WORLD were pressed without including that particular file.  As soon as a few dealers updated their Tech 2s with the new software, the calls started pouring in from around the world - Australia, South Africa, Sweden, and all over the USA, to name a few.  Everyone wanted to know what the heck does this "we're hosed" message mean, and why had their expensive diagnostic tool become nothing more than an expensive paperweight with a display proclaiming this ambiguous message to the entire world?

Needless to say, I was mortified. We quickly rushed a new release into production that not only replaced "we're hosed" with a more appropriate error message, but also made sure the API binary was included this time.  As far as I know, the more appropriate error message was never seen .. which is a good thing.

The moral of the story?  When you're coding error messages, never ever assume they won't be seen, because if you make that assumption even once, chances are that's the one time you'll be ... hosed.

Continuing the Journey

A few weeks ago, I wrote about re-starting my To-Shin Do training. I thought that perhaps a good way to stay motivated and keep up with my training would be to blog about it here.  So, if you keep an eye on this particular topic, you'll hopefully see an update now and then.  It's not meant to be a "brag-reel," even though it might sound like one .. it's just a way to get my thoughts out and maybe hold myself accountable.  And hey, if it manages to get one of my devoted readers interested in martial arts, that would be a nice bonus.

Anyway, the journey got off to a rough start. I was not actually able to start until last Thursday, a week after I had planned.  Tonight, I won't be attending class because I've got the Martian Death Flu or something. I hope I feel even slightly better by Saturday so I can go to class that day. Sometimes I wonder if the universe enjoys screwing with me like that when I commit to doing something that's going to be challenging anyway.

The one class I have attended so far, though, was really good!  I got a good work-out, managed to not get hurt, and even learned a few things. I was actually surprised at how much of the stuff my body just remembered to do, even though I hadn't thought about it for a couple years. We concentrated on various ways of applying a choke-hold, and getting out of one.  I was once again reminded that as physical as this art is, it is still mostly mental.  Let me explain.

As is usually the case when I'm learning something new, I screwed up the first few times I tried the technique. It felt difficult, un-natural, and ineffective. However, once my instructor pointed out what I was doing wrong and my mind was able to apprehend the science behind it and allow me to correct the mistakes, I was surprised at how physically easy it actually was!  The real challenge was not having the physical strength to brute-force something - in fact, using my strength with incorrect body positioning and alignment proved difficult and futile. The hard part was comprehending in my mind what was actually happening and how to respond to it. Once that part clicked, the technique itself became easy, natural, and yes .. very effective.