Ken Shallenberg: Web Log E.K.N.Y. International  
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04/1/2003
Well, it's been a quiet week here in Lake Woebegone...oh wait, that's someone else.
It has actually been quite busy here. Let's catch up, shall we...
Last Thursday Eiko and I went to Manhattan to adopt a cat/kitten to help ease Osho's loneliness but the North Shore Animal League mobile adoption league van never showed up. We looked at some cats at the pet store in-house adoption center but they weren't allowing adoptions at that time. So on Friday we went out to the NSAL headquarters on Long Island, spent hours agonizing over the decision, and finally brought home a very cute and handsome 6 month old boy we named Yoshimi.
Then began the introductions between Osho and Yoshimi. What a nightmare! With Osho's hissing and Yoshimi's mewing we barely slept.
Fortunately now, after 3 days, things are going much better. I guess I will be in charge of the process, as Eiko is going back to work.

My (Ken's) Profile:

I am a Macintosh and Unix computer nut, web designer, certified Java, C, and C++ Programmer, Multimedia artist, Karate-do enthusiast, Musician and Composer. About 5 years ago I married a wonderful Japanese woman who has opened the world to me, sharing her love of travel with me and in general making my life better than I ever thought it could be. We have two cats, Chibikon and Osho. Osho and I have a constant battle over who gets to sit in the computer chair. (He usually wins).
You can see more about things I'm interested in here.
My résumé is here.

03/17/2003
I finally added a snazzy little JavaScript to the Riverdale Kenshikai Location page. I had thought of it a while ago, and looked around the web for something already written to use but didn't find anything. So I wrote it myself. Not a big deal but I am kind of proud of myself in that I pictured how it would work in my head and wrote a script that worked with no errors the first time. It's a good feeling. Speaking of Riverdale Kenshikai, tonight a student named Shane got his Black belt in the most difficult promotion I have ever seen. He is only 20, and has grown up, through some difficult circumstances, to be a rather extrordinary person. Plus he is a really good Karate-ka and is as strong as an ox. The pictures from his promotion will be up on the Riverdale Kenshikai soon. Congratulations Shane!

03/08/2003
I made chocolate souffles for Eiko last night. This was my third time making them and I got a little over confident and rushed things a bit. They came out okay; better than the first but not as good as the second. In my search for the ultimate chocolate experience I went to a artisanal chocolate maker near to us Jacques Torres and got his house blend bittersweet chocolate.
I have to say that, although his is quite good, Scharffen Berger is the best I have tried. Three times as expensive, but it is rich, intense, not too sweet, bitter with undertones of fruit. I need to compare it to some raw bittersweet chocolate from Belgium but I think it might hold up.
mmmmm, chocolate... recipe for souffles to come ... Chocolate Upside Down Souffles Makes 4 individual size souffles.
4 4-ounce ceramic souffle cups (We just happen to have them, I don't know why.)
3/4 stick of Butter plus some to grease the cups. (Use European butter, it's better)
1/6 cup of extra-fine sugar, plus 2 tablespoons
3 - 4 ounces of high quality bittersweet chocolate broken into small pieces, Scharffen Berger if you can get it.
3 large eggs, separated
an 1/16th of a teaspoon of cream of tartar
Whipped cream to serve

1) Preheat oven to 375 degrees, grease the cups and dust them with sugar to completely coat the inside. Set aside some where cool.
2) Melt 3/4 stick of butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat, remove from heat and add chocolate pieces. Stir until chocolate is melted and smooth. Set aside somewhere warmish.
3) Beat the egg yolks at a medium speed with a mixer, slowly adding 1/6th cup of sugar. Beat until thick and pale yellow, about 5-6 minutes. (They really will change color and consistancy, be patient)
4a) Pour in the chocolate-butter mix and mix at low speed just until blended.
4b) Set a kettle full of water on to boil at this point.
5a) In a clean, deep bowl, beat the egg whites, 1 teaspoon of sugar and the cream of tartar at a medium speed until combined, 10 seconds.
5b) Increase speed to medium-high and beat until frothy and no longer translucent, 1 1/2- 2 minutes.
5c) With the mixer running add 1 tablespoon of sugar slowly, continue beating until soft peaks form.
5d) With the mixer running add 1 more tablespoon of sugar slowly, continue beating about another 10 second until firm peaks form.
5e) Better that the peaks are to soft than overbeaten (whites look dry and granular when overbeaten)
6) Stir 1/4 of the egg whites into the chocolate. Very gently fold in the rest until just mixed. Spoon into the cups.
7) Set cups in a baking pan and pour in boiling water until 1 inch up the side of the cups.
8) Bake 10 - 15 minutes until top is firm and a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove pan from oven and cups from pan. Let sit for about 2 minutes.
9) Loosen the sides with a knife, turn cups upside down onto dessert plates and serve with whipped cream.
Oh...my...god...!

03/02/2003
Eiko got a last minute 3 day trip today so I am staying up late again programming and working on the Bronxs Arts Ensemble website.
I have been using DreamWeaver more, since everyone seems to use it. It's actually quite handy for site maintenance but not so much for actual design/redesign. The search and replace is very slow.
The combo of iCab for Mac and BBEdit works works very well for me.

03/01/2003
Happy March everyone! Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of Winter. It has been a long cold one and I, for one, will not miss it when it is gone. I made the blogging Script a little easier to use, and made one for Eiko so we should update more regularly

02/26/2003
Spent a lot of time working on the Bronxs Arts Ensemble website. They are a new client that is right up my alley, a non-profit classical music organization. There is a lot of work to do, but it's fun to make things look and work better.

02/25/2003
It's actually about 2:30am on 2/26 and I'm just trying out some new AppleScript techniques. More later...
Wow! Cool! I just wrote an AppleScript that uploads my weblog for me. It needs more testing, and it should open the page for me and automatically upload it for me when I save the changes.
And then what will I do?...

Same thing I do every night Pinky, Try to Take Over the World!!

05/04/2002
I've added some more JavaScript to the site, note the navigation roll-overs. I also wasn't happy with the way the CSS was rendered for my résumé in Netscape, so I wrote a script to redirect the user to the old version if it detects they are using Netscape.
Eiko has returned to work and is flying today for the first time in about 7 months, I hope she remembers how to do all the stuff she has to do.
Well, I don't have a wacky web site or a recipe for you today but I will clue you into the BBC radio 2 Real Audio internet radio site. Radio 2 is a good mix of fairly high quality pop music mixed with amusing chatter. The BBC has several other stations featuring classical music, spoken word etc. and they are all of high quality (they did a good version of The Lord of the Rings as a radio play) but mostly I listen to Radio 2 as I program.

04/10/2002
The search for the perfect position continues, as well as the continuation of skills polishing. The New York Times said that right now is the worst time in history for programmers. I don't know about that, I think programmers in the 18th century must have had a tough time of it as well.
Well, in deference to the advice of a great leader of that time- “Let them eat cake!”
Grandma's Chocolate Cake:
1 cup of shortening or butter
2 cups fine baking sugar
Whip together until fluffy
Add in
4 large eggs one at a time, beating well each time
stir in 2 teaspoons of vanilla

Stir 1/8th cup of vineger into almost a cup of evaporated milk
Let it sit to sour the milk while you sift together:
2 1/2 cups of all purpose flour (not baking flour!)
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
Disolve 3/4 cup of high quality unsweetened baking chocolate in 1 cup of boiling water
Then add milk to the chocolate mix and beat the dry ingredients and chocolate mix into the butter mix. Bake at 350 in a 9 x 13 cake pan for 30 min or until the center springs back and a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Top with a dusting of confectioners suger or cocoa.
Then get back to work!

03/21/2002
Well I did it! I finished my Unix Programming Certificate! (Thanks, Mom!) It was a lot of work but I learned a lot overcoming difficulties and translating code from the RedHat i386 linux at school to my Suse PowerPC system. The course could also be called a Java Programming Certificate which is great for me since, as the Java Developers Journal says Mac OS X and Java are a perfect marriage.
My daily affirmation:
I'm smart enough, I'm good enough and gosh darn it, I know java!
Somebody hire me!! The course in review:
Intro to Programming w/C++ and Intro to Unix
Java I (applet programming) and Intermediate Unix (perl)
Java II (servlet programming) and Oracle Database (SQL and PL/SQL)
Java III (Enterprise JavaBeans) and Application Practicum (Building a J2ee application)
From here I need to get either my Linux system or a Mac OSX system on the internet so I can show off my Server-side java skills. I am also continuing to polish my HTML skills-learning more CSS, adding to my java script skills, reviewing my SQL and I may take an advanced C++ class.
Enough nerd talk, Todays wacky site is RealUltimatePower about ninjas! ROFLMAO!

02/28/2002
Last day of February - argh! Where does the time go! Today I woke up and opened up the curtains and it was snowing big, beautiful, fluffy snow flakes. It was very pretty and I felt inspired so I went to work on my java programming! What, don't I go to work on my java programming every day you ask? Of course I do, but today I made a little animation for the cats page, go check it out.
In addition to the EJBs and trying to get jBoss working (I need to get the documentation) I'm going back over more basic java stuff and servlets/jsps.
I think I will start instituting a required non-computing section cause even if that is all I do, it's pretty boring to read about. So check this site out, insane people who worship space alien messiahs are so much more fun! Read around, it will make you dizzy, and when you think you can't take any more- find and listen to the music they say will change the world- I dare you!

02/20/2002
I thought this would be an auspicious day to update the page. Using the 24 hour clock, today at 8:02pm it is 20:02 02/20/2002 a nice palindrome. In honor of that fact I will stay away from Computer studies news.
The other day I made a good Basil-Cream sauce to put on squid-ink pasta:
Saute for 5 minutes in 1.5 Tbsp Butter-
2-3 shallots - peeled and minced
1 clove garlic - peeled and minced
Chop 1.5 cups of fresh Basil and 1/4 cup of parsley with 3/4 of a cup of white wine in a blender
Add to the shallots along with:
2 Tbsp of grated Parmesian
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1 Tbsp lemon juice
Salt and Pepper
Cook over medium heat until reduced by half.Yummy!

2/11/02
Jeez, I've got to do better than updating once every 2 months!
Well, in class we are learning about Enterprise JavaBeans which are designed to make systems in which a client program, often just a java server page (a web page with java commands in it), communicates with a company's existing information system (usually a database).
The EJBs handle the communicating (yes, it is pretty geeky to get excited about these things, thanks for asking!)
I've got to figure out how to get the open source jBoss EJB server to talk to the open souce mySQL that I am using, although I think that it may be that I have to switch to using Postgresql because MySQL 3.2x doesn't do transactions properly.
Other than that not much is going on, I'm looking forward to Chinese New Years and having a yummy dinner even though Eiko says she won't go. She's angry because we bought a bootleg copy of the Lord of the Rings in ChinaTown and not only could you not see the movie, but it also broke our VCR. (How's that for Instant Karma) Well, they still cook good food so it's hard to stay mad at them.

12/28/01
Venice was fun, but cold and the first day was drizzly/freezing rain.
The first night we had a very good dinner at a place called Donna Onesta but the second night we went to a restaurant in the Piazza San Marco area that sucked! We had to walk out without eating our food, and go find another place. We ended up at Trattoria Da Bruno which was okay and not to pricy but nothing special.
The church at San Marco was incredible and made the whole trip worth it, but alot of Venice is very touristy and you really have to get off the beaten path to enjoy it.

I just finished the 3rd cycle of my programming classes, Java Servlets and Server Pages and Oracle database. The servlet class project was prety cool and I learned a lot but it took a lot of work as I had to get my Linux System working, then learn how to install the latest Java Development Kit, Tomcat server, and MySQL and the JDBC-MySQLdriver before I could do the project, so I was behind the class most of the time. Finally got the project working and now I have to figure out how to share it with the world.

10/28/01
Buddy, can ya spare a dime? Well, after promising in September that "no matter what" I had a job for at least a year, my boss told me that they have to "let me go" as of Nov. 1st. Crap. Those terrorists had better walk the other way if they see me coming 'cause they are just about gettin' on my last nerve.
At least now I will have more time to concentrate on my studies, programming and finding a new job. I have expanded my Résumé to include some sample of programs I have written for download. More than anything I want to program for Mac OS X, the coolest operating system on the planet(see below).
Java 2 (servlets and Java Server Pages) and Oracle Database classes are going okay. I found out how to install the Jacarta Tomcat Java Server on my Mac, which is cool, unfortunately Oracle won't go on the Mac so I'll install Oracle7 on my old Windows Box and play with FileMaker Pro on the Mac. (Seriously, if anyone knows of a job for a Programmer/Artist/Administrator or a Japanese/English bilingual business professional, send an email!).

10/8/01
I guess it's been a while since I've had any free time. I've just completed the second module of classes, Java I (applications and applets) and Intermediate UNIX. I like Java because of the organic way that it approaches modeling a problem. I dislike it because all the prewriten code hides the workings from me. I tend to want to know what is going on behind the scenes but I think that as I learn the language I will get a sense of what is going on or perhaps I will stop caring and worry more about the macro level.
The Unix class was less than successful due to a lack of planning and communication by the college. I did manage to teach myself some perl, which is a pretty cool language. It's basic structure is quite easy to grasp, lots of the problems of C are simplified and you can start writing useful code within a day's study. It does have an annoying flexibility of syntax that can make trying to read someone elses code really hard. (there seems to be a streak of elitism in the unix world that makes obfustication a virtue).

5/06/01
I'm deep in the C++ and Unix classes now. The C++ has also an HTML component which gives me the excuse to do this update
The course I am taking is UNIX-based internet programming, Studying UNIX and C++, Java, SQL, running for 15 months.
So far it's quite challenging and time consuming - about 30 hours a week of home work. But I've learned to use stuff I was clueless about a few weeks ago - telnet, irc, vi, etc. So that's cool.
I've got to do some website project so I will be changing the look of this section around soon to use frames. Commercial sites use 'em even if they are ugly and unreliable, so we do what the almighty buck tells us to do :-(

Some links to things I'm interested in:
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Computers:
I am such a Mac nut that if I had to use MS Windows all the time, I would not choose to make a career in computing! My motivation in programming is to let people know how inspiring computers can be when the programming gets out of your way. Macs are elegent tools that allow you to do creative work your way.
I think that it is the attention to detail, both in the operating system and the hardware, that both consciously and unconsciously inspires you, whether you are doing some artistic work, or programming, to do your best work. Now that I have done some serious programming on the Linux system, I appreciate it even more and am really excited to get started working on Mac OS X.

Karate:
My experience training in Seido Karate has been great, maybe even life-changing. My thoughts about martial arts training could use a seperate page but I don't have time to go into it at this time (I am also reticent, as it is something that you have to experience for yourself, and find out what it means to you.)
For me, one of the best parts is being down on the floor, trying to squeeze out that last push-up, the one you "knew" you couldn't do, having the sensei come over to give you encouragement by pushing down on your back, trying to remember how to count backwards in japanese and then jumping up and having the presence of mind and control to respond respectfully to the sensei and enthusiastically accept the next challenge.
I found a great teacher and a great style that emphasizes the things that I find interesting; sincere action and disciplined concentration. I have seen sites on the web, and heard teachers who say that all that "eastern zen mumbo-jumbo" is bull and Karate is just hitting your opponent. I would like to tell beginners that it doesn't have to be, just keep looking for a good, sincere teacher.
Unfortunately, I have not found very many good martial arts sites.

Buddhism:
I have been interested in Buddhism since my father introduced me to the books of Suzuki (The Three Pillars of Zen) and others. I think that the most direct experience of "mu-shin" - "no-mind" I have had was in Karate class and not in sitting meditation.

Music:
The more twelve-tone the better! Much more on this later :-)
Favorite composers:
chronologically; Dufay, Josquin, Ockeghem, Di Lasso, Bach (that's a given), Haydn, Beethoven (another given), Webern, Monk, Babbitt, Carter, Shallenberg, Gaburo, Ferneyhough

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