Bermuda, briefly
Bermuda is a tiny speck of former vulcanism dusted with sand and fringed with coral reefs, isolated in the Atlantic ocean a thousand miles east of the Carolinas. I’m watching the sun set from the Pompano Beach Club, high on a cliff on Bermuda’s west coast as I write this. I’m listening to classical music on KUSC , thanks to the world wide web, and it cuts out from time to time, thanks to the resort’s rather creaky internet connection. I’m sipping a 12-year old Macallan.
Moments ago I tried to connect to one of the “stations” I’m training at Pandora, only to be politely but firmly told that my IP address had spilled the beans about my location on Bermuda and their lawyers regreted to inform me that their service is only available inside the United States.
The sun is disappearing behind some clouds slightly above the horizon.
After I made some inquiries last week at Pandora about why they don’t do classical music I received a remarkably detailed email from Etienne Handman, COO of the Music Genome Project. He described the theory and goals of the Project - the heart (DNA?, brains? foundation?) of Pandora. I sent him a skeptical response. I send everyone a skeptical response. Why do I do that?
The sun has emerged from beneath the clouds and is racing to the horizon. The rest of the sky, and the ocean below it, is gray.
I should have at least acknowledged what a remarkable thing is it to create personal radio stations, or I should say “radio stations” by proposing a musician and having it -Pandora - the Box, I suppose - play other music with what it guesses are the same “genes”. The listener dismisses some offerings, accepts others and trains it that way. I’ve created a “Moby” station; my wife has created a half dozen stations ranging from Celtic harp to Radiohead.
The sun has set. I toasted the last of the sun with the last of my Macallen.
Today we snorkeled from a boat chartered by the resort - it was excellent. Then, having not got our fill of boats we rented a battery-powered pontoon (I’ve been writing too much poetry - I almost spelled it “pantoum”) boat and tootled around the ocean near here. And then, after a hot sit on the beach, we decided we hadn’t had enough of snorkeling either and snorkeled some more around the rocky breakwaters here.
It’s 4 PM in Los Angeles. There’s a 2 vehicle accident south of Santa Monica. KUSC is about to play something by Bach conducted by Wolfgang Sawallisc. I’m about to have dinner at Ocean Grill, high over someplace in the middle of the Atlantic ocean.