Martin Arnold

(((Judy Garland as you've never seen her.)))

Lester Bangs

(((If you ask me who I would like to write like, I have to say, "Lester Bangs."
Link

"...I'll admit in front that I have a special affinity for things that don't quite fit into any given demarcated category, partly because I'm one of those perennial misfits myself by choice as well as fate or whatever. By profession, I am categorized as a rock critic. I'll accept that, especially since the whole notion that someone has a 'career' instead of just doing whatever you feel like doing at any given time has always amused me when it didn't make me wanna vomit. O.K., I'm a rock critic. I also write and record music. I write poetry, fiction, straight journalism, unstraight journalism, beatnik drivel, mortifying love letters, death threats to white jazz critics signed 'The Mau Maus of East Harlem,' and once a year my own obituary (latest entry: 'He was promising...'). The point is that I have no idea what kind of a writer I am, except that I do know that I'm good and lots of people read whatever it is I do, and I like it that way." (Lester Bangs, "An Instant Fan's Inspired Notes: You Gotta Listen," 1980)

"...I’m really schizophrenic about that, because on the one hand I would say, yes there is, there’s something inherently, even violent about it, it’s wild and raw and all this. On the other hand, the fact is that ‘Sugar Sugar’ is great Rock 'n' Roll, and there’s nothing rebellious about that at all. I mean that’s right from the belly and heart of capitalism..." (Lester Bangs in 1980 on the rebellious nature of rock 'n' roll. Taken from a 1980 interview)

"What this book demands from a reader is a willingness to accept that the best writer in America could write almost nothing but record reviews." (Greil Marcus, editor of the first Bangs anthology Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung, on the second anthology, Mainlines, Blood Feats and Bad Taste. Taken from the cover of the paperback original.)

"Look at it this way: there are many here among us for whom the life force is best represented by the livid twitching of one tortured nerve, or even a full-scale anxiety attack. I do not subscribe to this point of view 100%, but I understand it, have lived it. Thus the shriek, the caterwaul, the chainsaw gnarlgnashing, the yowl and the whizz that decapitates may be reheard by the adventurous or emotionally damaged as mellifluous bursts of unarguable affirmation." (Lester Bangs, "A Reasonable Guide to Horrible Noise", 1980)

"I'll probably never produce a masterpiece, but so what? I feel I have a Sound aborning, which is my own, and that Sound if erratic is still my greatest pride, because I would rather write like a dancer shaking my ass to boogaloo inside my head, and perhaps reach only readers who like to use books to shake their asses, than to be or write for the man cloistered in a closet somewhere reading Aeschylus while this stupefying world careens crazily past his waxy windows toward its last raving sooty feedback pirouette." (Lester Bangs, "A Quick Trip Through My Adolescence," 1968)

My favorite band

(((If you know Eric Unger and me, you know we love us some Souled American. We've seen them live in Chicago 3 times. This makes us very fortunate people.))
Link

CMYK Magazine

((((Pretty awesome design/marketing magazine))))
Link







And a nice contest/ portfolio social networking system for creative types)))
Link

Review of Ian Curtis biopic

((The review claims "Control" is better and less of an inside joke than "24 Hour Party People." I positively heart Joy Division.))))

"Control"

This picture about Joy Division's Ian Curtis is one of the most beautiful movies ever made about rock 'n' roll.

By Stephanie Zacharek Salon, October 10

Link to whole review

"If you're over 30 -- or even if you're not -- you know what happens next: You can't hang onto youth, but you can hang onto music, and so, at least in some small way, most of us do. The trick is to guard against blind nostalgia, to open yourself to the possibility that the music you loved when you were 20 can still mean something when you're 45. Perhaps it can mean even more.

Anton Corbijn's "Control" tells the story of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of the revered Manchester post-punk band Joy Division. Joy Division -- its other members were Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris -- made only two albums before Curtis killed himself in 1980, on the eve of the band's first U.S. tour. Before Curtis' death, Joy Division was virtually unknown in the United States, even though their following in the U.K. had been growing steadily. By the time most people stateside started paying attention to them, Curtis was gone. But both his story and the band's music -- darkly glittering songs that sounded majestic rather than self-indulgently world-weary -- were compelling enough to earn Joy Division a passionate following. The fact that the band's surviving members had regrouped as a very different band, New Order, made the saga even more magnetic."

The Complexity of Songs

(((Math studies pop music, or vice-versa.)))

Link

"The Complexity of Songs" was an article published by Donald Knuth, an example of an in-joke in computer science, namely, in computational complexity theory. The article capitalizes on the tendency of popular songs to evolve from long and content-rich ballads to highly repetitive texts with little or no meaningful content.

With a grain of truth, Knuth writes that "...our ancient ancestors invented the concept of refrain" to reduce the space complexity of songs, which becomes crucial when a large number of songs is to be committed to one's memory. Knuth's Lemma 1 states that if N is the length of a song, then the refrain decreases the song complexity to cN, where c < 1.

Knuth further demonstrates a way of producing songs with O(\sqrt N) complexity, an approach "...further improved by a Scottish farmer named O. McDonald" (priority disputed).

More ingenious approaches yield songs of complexity O(logN). Finally, progress during the twentieth century—stimulated by the fact that "the advent of modern drugs has led to demands for still less memory"—leads to the ultimate improvement: Arbitrarily long songs with space complexity O(1), e.g. for a song to be defined by the recurrence relation

S_0=\epsilon, S_k = V_kS_{k-1},\, k\ge 1,
Vk = 'That's the way,' U 'I like it,' U, for all k > 0
U = 'uh huh, uh huh'

Paul Sharits Flux film

((If you're epileptic, you may not want to watch this))

Bat for Lashes

(((Let's just sweeten the the somber nature of those last 2 articles articles with that cool Donnie Darko-ish video widna' trick bikes. Happy Hallow'en.)))

Seymour Hersh says we're probably going to invade Iran

(((President Bush is going to try to lame duck a New World Order in his last year.))

Link to entire article

Shifting Targets
The Administration’s plan for Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh October 8, 2007 New Yorker


"In a series of public statements in recent months, President Bush and members of his Administration have redefined the war in Iraq, to an increasing degree, as a strategic battle between the United States and Iran. “Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people,” Bush told the national convention of the American Legion in August. “The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased. . . . The Iranian regime must halt these actions. And, until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops.” He then concluded, to applause, “I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities.”

Interesting environmental article

(((Salon newsfeeds be stacking up on my doorstep. I don't even know if I like the writer's point or not. It criticizes James Howard Kunstler whom I once saw speak at Bennington. He's a crabby super-cynical fellow; a self-described "gonzo journalist for Rolling Stone in the 70's," and he thinks we should all live in upstate New York. He got up in my grill during the Q&A session.))
Link

Researching the Moneta Theater

((The Moneta theater's reopening its doors this Saturday and I just wrote a small press release on its history. I think I'm stuck on an alliteration kick. Here's what I wrote today, culled from microfiched newspapers. Will someone please edit it? Thanx.)))

"A nearly century-old Sweetwater institution is reopening its doors. (Insert lead paragraph)

In 1915, the census bureau announced that the U.S. population had reached 102 million. Columnist J.C. Jessen of the nationally-syndicated "Motion Picture News" boasted that everyday one in ten of those people attended movie theaters to witness a burgeoning new industry being born on the California coastline. D.W Griffith released the first cinema masterpiece, "Birth of a Nation," which President Woodrow Wilson described as "writing history with lightning." Hardly any town was without a nickelodeon palace located in its center. Sweetwater would be no exception.

In the February of that year Frank Johnston opened the Moneta Theater. Ads promising "photoplays that please" ran in the Sweetwater Telephone alongside ads for castor oil and grippe relief medicine. The theater was an almost immediate success--attendance doubled in the course of its first five months as young and old alike went see the very first romances, horrors, and westerns. "The variety of Comedies and Dramas, will pleasantly relieve tired nerves and better prepare children's minds for study," one ad promised. A 7 year-old debutante, "Little Miss Margaret Bradley," treated her entire Sweetwater primary school class to a "Matinee party" at the the Moneta with movies followed by ice cream at Childress's fountain parlor. The baseball league hosted benefit screenings of "The Rosary."

In the year when Americans and British rallied around the cry, "Remember the Lusitania," the Telephone would implore its readers in a single column blurb each edition to "Remember the Moneta."

I want life to be slow motion

(((The only thing cooler than a water balloon exploding in xtreme slo-motion, is one not exploding.)))

I heart Extreme slow motion

(((First person to create a TV channel that's just this stuff 24-hours-a-day will do quite well))

M.I.A- Bamboo Banga

(((The most danceable track since, "Hey ya?" Perhaps. The only difference: "Hey ya" couln't sustain the ballsout magnitude of its first 45 seconds. "Banmboo Banga" releases increasing steam for about 2 minutes to the point it just couldn't possibly get any better.)))

Weird Bennington Dream

(((I had a dream last night that my old Bennington professor David Slavitt held me down in his class gave me an elegant blue yakuza-style tattoo over my back.)))

((Now that I'm actually reading what I just wrote, it seems pretty weird. Whatever, are your dreams normal?)))

(((Slavitt was seriously the best writing instructor I ever had. A vicious editor. Apparently he ran for local office recently and wrote a book about it.)))
Link

"

What I like most is his on-the-money descriptions of local pols and personalities, and his unique take on the milieu of Cambridge and Somerville. Slavitt, writes honestly about his fears running for office: after all he is no spring chicken, he has an ongoing flirtation with prostrate cancer, and like anyone who has lived any length of time he has a few skeletons in his closet. Slavitt ruminates;

“ What if Toomey or Green goes to the library and looks into my literary career. The “Exhibitionist,” my pseudonymous potboiler of 1967, was widely attacked as a “dirty book,”…. Worse than that….there’s an elegant little joke that poet and small press publisher Robert Wallace put out in 1987: “ The Cock Book: A Child’s First Book of Pornography…” None of this puts me in the same league with Paris Hilton, but she is not running for office.”

(((Benningtonites: Did you ever have a dream at school where the entire campus was in a church-style lock-in inside a gymnasium? I know two other people who used to have that same dream.))))

Having the sex and drugs talk with your kids

((This reminds of a Joe Frank radio sketch))

Sex, drugs and my 15-year-old

When I had The Talk with my son, it didn't go quite the way Nancy Reagan drew it up.

By Gary Kamiya

"A few years ago, I took Zachary to a Steely Dan concert in Concord, Calif. He was a month shy of his 15th birthday and had just started high school. We had a fine old time, although as with all these dinosaur-band shows, it was humiliating to look around and see how bad we aging fans all looked. Toward the end of the show, lots of people crowded down into the first few rows and started dancing, and we did too. That was when the guy boogeying next to me offered me a very large joint.

I hesitated. I smoke dope on occasion, but I had never done it in front of Zach before. Was he old enough to handle it? Was it time to end this faintly hypocritical charade of "protecting" him from something I didn't think was dangerous or wrong? Yep. I accepted the joint and took an enormous hit. I glanced at Zachary. He was rocking happily away, but he definitely saw me. The Dan -- who, by a strange coincidence, derive their name from a stainless-steel dildo in a William S. Burroughs novel -- rocked on through another encore or two. The joint came around again and I took another major hit. The band finished their last song and left the stage, and we all began to file out, an inglorious army of balding men in shorts, Tevas and Costco Hawaiian shirts, and soccer moms losing the battle of the bulge.

By the time we had walked the mile or so to the car, I realized that I was extremely stoned. Which probably had something to do with at least part of the conversation that ensued.

"So, Zach," I said as I pulled out of the parking lot, "we should probably talk about drugs. Since you saw me smoke that joint back there."

Link to whole story

Some nice orgone accumulators for sale

(((I need to sit in one of these. Straight from Orgonon, Maine.)))
Link


See whats available now:
3 Ply ORAC
5 Ply ORAC
7 Ply ORAC
10 Ply ORAC
20 Ply ORAC
Orgone Accumulator KITS

Designed for an individual to sit inside, the orgone accumulator attracts energy from the outside atmosphere, concentrates it on the inside where it comes into contact with the users' energy field and the two fields luminate, creating an even stronger charge. The body easily absorbs this energy as it is the same bio-energy that permeates everything, giving life and vitality: what Wilhelm Reich, it's discoverer, called "orgone energy". Using an orgone energy accumulator will expand your energy field, increasing the amount of energy in all your cells and tissues and improve your immune system; it will melt away stress and impart a feeling of well-being.

The large, sit-in, life energy accumulators are made in an energetically clean environment and from natural, high-quality materials. Much time, care, knowledge, and attention goes into the making of every orgone accumulator.

YOU SHOULD KNOW: Please read the section "WHAT IS ORGONE ENERGY and Who Can Use an Orgone Accumulator" to learn about the restrictions on using an orgone accumulator. People with the following conditions should not use an orgone accumulator device, or only with careful monitoring by a health care professional:
chronic high blood pressure, arteriosclerosis, decompensated heart disease, brain tumors, skin inflammations, conjunctivitis, people who suffer from apoplectic attacks and people with ALS or MS should use caution.

Because orgone energy is "allergic" to strong electromagnetic fields and certain forms of radiation, orgone accumulators should also not be placed near operating CRT TVs, fluorescent lights, CRT computers, microwaves, x-ray equipment, electric heaters, sparking motors, strong fumes, radioactive smoke detectors and within 25 miles of a nuclear power plant. The new flatscreen TVs and computers do not seem to have the disturbing energy fields.

Orgone accumulating devices are for experimental use only.
They are not medical devices.
If you have a medical problem, please consult a health care professional.

NYC Gov hosts design an evacuation contest

(((Come on. Design something. Or study it.)))


Link
"Letter from OEM Commissioner


What if New York City were hit by a Category 3 Hurricane?

In New York City, over eight million people live on land that has 578 miles of waterfront. By 2030, the population is expected to reach nine million. At the same time, global climate change has put New York City at an increased risk for a severe coastal storm. In recent years, storms have become more intense, occur more frequently, and continue farther north than they have historically. The city would face many challenges during and after such a storm; one of the most difficult is the possibility that hundreds of thousands of people could lose their homes.

With financial support from the Rockefeller Foundation and in consultation with Architecture for Humanity-New York, the New York City Office of Emergency Management is sponsoring an open competition to generate solutions for post-disaster provisional housing. "What if New York City..." is a call for innovation and an opportunity for designers and policy-makers to collaborate on one of the biggest challenges facing densely settled urban areas after a disaster: how do we keep people safely and comfortably housed while reconstruction proceeds?

A jury of experts in the fields of architecture, design, urbanism, and government will choose ten entrants who will be awarded $10,000 each and technical support to develop their proposals into workable solutions. These solutions will provide support for New York's most vulnerable communities and be a precedent for dense urban areas all over the world.

This design competition will rely on a fictional but realistic New York City neighborhood devastated by a hypothetical Category 3 hurricane. How will residents resume their lives? How can they be provided safe, comfortable living space? How can this housing be quickly deployed and adapted to different site conditions? How can it be reused in subsequent emergencies, environmentally sustainable, and cost effective?

I invite you to dedicate your talents to meet these challenges, in hopes that together we can build a more resilient New York City.

Joseph F. Bruno, OEM Commissioner

jacuzzi on summit of Mont Blanc

(((This looks like a lot of fun)))

Link

Google adds Chicago to Streetview

(((There are no words to describe how I feel about this google app, right now. I'm impressed and hope dearly google isn't evil.)))
Link

Iranian policewomen

(((Way to go, ladies.)))

Now here's what they really do.

(((Render people to dust))

The dark truth about Blackwater

Outsourcing the war to private military contractors such as Blackwater has shattered the United States' moral authority and its ability to win wars like that in Iraq.

By P.W. Singer

Salon.com, Oct. 2, 2007

Photo: Chris Curry/The Virginian-Pilot/ZUMA Press

Blackwater USA Academy recruit Gregory Collier screams to team members during a drill at the Blackwater compound in Moyock, N.C., on Aug. 2, 2006.

Oct. 2, 2007 | WASHINGTON -- On Sept. 16, 2007, a convoy of Blackwater contractors guarding State Department employees entered a crowded square near the Mansour district in Baghdad, Iraq. But versions of what caused the ensuing bloodshed diverge. Employees from the firm claim they were attacked by gunmen and responded within the rules of engagement, fighting their way out of the square after one of their vehicles was disabled. Iraqi police and witnesses instead report that the contractors opened fire first, shooting at a small car driven by a couple with their child that did not get out of the convoy's way as traffic slowed. At some point in the 20-minute gunfight, Iraqi police and army forces stationed in watchtowers above the square also began firing. Other Iraqi security forces and Blackwater quick-reaction forces soon reportedly joined the battle. There are also reports that one Blackwater employee may even have pointed his weapon at his fellow contractors, in an effort to get them to cease firing.

Since then, the Iraqi and U.S. governments have launched separate investigations, likely ensuring that the differing versions of the story will never meet. The only thing agreed upon is the consequences: After a reported 20 Iraqi civilians were killed, including the couple and their child, who was subsequently burned to the mother's body after the car caught fire, the Iraqi government and populace exploded with anger."

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Private military firms -- ranging from well-established companies, such as Vinnell and MPRI, to start-ups, such as the British Aegis -- have played an even greater role in the post-invasion occupation. Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown and Root division, recently spun off into its own firm, currently runs the logistics backbone of the force, doing everything from running military mess halls to moving fuel and ammunition. Other firms are helping to train local forces, including the new Iraqi army and national police.

Then there are the firms such as Blackwater that have played armed roles within the battle space. These firms do everything from helping guard facilities and bases to escorting "high-value" individuals and convoys, arguably the most dangerous job in all of Iraq. Such firms are frequently described as "private security" or "bodyguards," but they are a far cry from rent-a-cops at a local mall, or bodyguards for Hollywood celebrities. They use military training and weaponry to carry out mission-critical functions that would have been done by soldiers in the past, in the midst of a combat zone against fellow combatants. In 2006, the director of the Private Security Company Association of Iraq estimated that just over 48,000 employees from 181 of such "private security companies" were working in Iraq."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"That is, there was no outcry whenever contractors were called up and deployed, or even killed. If the gradual death toll among American troops threatened to slowly wear down public support, contractor casualties were not counted in official death tolls and had no impact on these ratings. By one count, as of July 2007, more than 1,000 contractors have been killed in Iraq, and another 13,000 wounded. (Again, the data is patchy here, with the only reliable source being insurance claims made by contractors' employers and then reported to the U.S. Department of Labor.) Since the troop "surge" started in January 2007, these numbers have accelerated -- contractors have been killed at a rate of nine per week. These figures mean that the private military industry has suffered more losses in Iraq than the rest of the coalition of allied nations combined. The losses are also far more than any single U.S. Army division has experienced.

Hence, while private losses were just the "cost of doing business" for a firm in Iraq, they actually had an undisguised advantage to policymakers. The public usually didn't even hear about contractor losses, and when they did, they had far less blowback on our government. For all the discussion of contractors as a "private market solution," the true costs that they hope to save are almost always political in nature."

Link to whole story

Now this corporation might actually be evil

(((Well, hell, they have an anonymous-looking grey airship. That's kinda evil.))


Link

((A PR-friendly, adjective-laden description of mercenarism. They provide innovative turnkey solutions because they love freedom, peace, and democracy.)

Vision
To support security and peace, and freedom and democracy everywhere."

Mission
Blackwater is committed to supporting national and international security policies that protect those who are defenseless and provide a free voice for all. We dedicate ourselves to providing ethical, efficient, and effective turnkey solutions that positively impact the lives of those still caught in desperate times.

We further are committed to the foot soldiers; the men and women who daily stand on the frontlines of the global war on terror and say, “not today” and who believe in a peaceful future for their communities and nations. Whether they serve in uniform or out, we will provide them the very best in training and tactical support to ensure they are fully prepared to meet current and future global security challenges
"Innovation Begins with Experience

Blackwater Worldwide efficiently and effectively integrates a wide range of resources and core competencies to provide unique and timely solutions that exceed our customers’ stated needs and expectations.

We are guided by integrity, innovation, and a desire for a safer world. Blackwater Worldwide professionals leverage state-of-the-art training facilities, professional program management teams, and innovative manufacturing and production capabilities to deliver world-class, customer-driven solutions.

Our leadership and dedicated family of exceptional employees adheres to an essential of core corporate values- chief among these are integrity, innovation, excellence, respect, accountability, and teamwork."

About Us

"Blackwater was founded in 1997 from a clear vision developed from an understanding of the need for innovative, flexible training and operational solutions to support security and peace, and freedom and democracy everywhere."

"We are not simply a "private security company." We are a professional military, law enforcement, security, peacekeeping, and stability operations firm who provides turnkey solutions. We assist with the development of national and global security policies and military transformation plans. We can train, equip and deploy public safety and military professionals, build live-fire indoor/outdoor ranges, MOUT facilities and shoot houses, create ground and aviation operations and logistics support packages, develop and execute canine solutions for patrol and explosive detection, and can design and build facilities both domestically and in austere environments abroad."

"Blackwater lives its core values of excellence, efficiency, execution, and teamwork. In doing this, we have become the most responsive, cost-effective means of affecting the strategic balance in support of security and peace, and freedom and democracy everywhere."

Core Values

"Excellence: We strive to do not only our best, but to do the best that can be done in all situations and under all circumstances to protect the defenseless and provide a safe environment for all.

Efficiency: We will create the most value using the least amount of resources to achieve the greatest success.

Execution: The foundation of our success. We plan to execute, and execute our plan. Using innovation, flexibility, speed and agility, we will perform with moral courage and conviction and we will do so against all odds.

Teamwork: That which holds everything together. We pool our collective talents to find the optimal solution for our customers and for ourselves. One person can make a difference, but a lot of people make a lot of difference. We will harness the collective energy of Blackwater and direct it toward realizing our vision."


((I assume that by linking to them, I'll get at least one unique reader today. If this blog stops getting updated, it's because I've been "black-bagged." Call Human Rights Watch.)))

Is google actually turning evil?

(((It's 3 a.m. I woke up suddenly and can't sleep because I wondering if the corporation whose motto is "Don't be evil," is in fact, turning evil. Whatever, they sell ads--join the club of the freaking most of us. Not exactly Blackwater.)))

Will Google's Greed Ruin the Internet?
By Jeffrey Chester, The Nation
Posted on October 6, 2007, Printed on October 9, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/64214/

Should we be worried about Google? Ten years after the search engine was launched by two Stanford University graduate students, Google has become an empowering force and adopted behavior that has transformed the way we access news and information, shop for goods and services and -- increasingly -- how we engage in politics. Who would have imagined four years ago, that Google and its subsidiary YouTube would co-sponsor debates in which ordinary citizens could directly engage with presidential candidates?

Last week, Google's stock hit an all-time high, on the strength of reports that the company will earn more this year than the $10.6 billion it earned in 2006. But while Google has almost overnight become a trusted source of information for the technologically attuned, few have thought to question the extent to which its success poses threats to both our privacy and our aspirations for the positive potential of the Internet.

Google's dramatic growth is a reflection of its role as the most powerful player in the world of interactive marketing. Ninety-nine percent of Google's annual revenues (according to its 10K filing with the SEC) comes from selling targeted advertising on its search engine, which is driven by a massive consumer data collection system.

Google is far more than the digital incarnation of Madison Avenue in the twenty-first century. It is the engine driving us into a new communications era, in which interactive marketing will significantly shape our lives. The company is aggressively expanding its advertising role, building out a sales team poised to partner with the biggest brand advertisers on the planet. Google is pitching its souped-up interactive advertising system to global corporations so they can better blend marketing messaged into the news, information and entertainment we consume.

Google's message to Madison Avenue, as expressed at the OMMA Expo in New York this week is that its technology can leverage tremendous insights about global consumers of products and information, and can deliver the right interactive marketing messages to consumers at precisely the right moment. Ellen Naughton, Google's director of media platforms, urged advertisers to "fish where the fish are," a reference to the millions of viewers of online video, including YouTube. Naughton was particularly proud of "Green Tea Partay," a Google-sold video ad that has drawn more than 3 million viewers to date on YouTube. It's a cheeky video, in which Smirnoff Vodka marketing messages are subtly integrated into the insistent beat of an preppy California hip-hop routine.

Continue Reading

Photoblog: Huckleberry Bald

(((Went hiking up to Huckleberry Bald yesterday--5,000 ft high. Balds exist only in the Southern Appalachians and their origins are a mystery. I always heard Indian curse.)))

Link

"In the Appalachian Mountains of the eastern United States, balds are mountain summits or crests covered primarily by a thick layer of native grasses or shrubs occurring in areas where heavy forest growth would be expected.

Balds are found primarily in the Southern Appalachians, where the climate is too warm to support an alpine zone— upper areas where trees fail to grow due to short or non-existent growing seasons— even at the highest elevations.[1] The difference between a treeless summit, such as Mount Washington in New Hampshire, and a bald, such as Gregory Bald in the Great Smoky Mountains, is that a lack of trees is normal for the climatic conditions of the former (i.e., high elevation and colder latitude) but abnormal for the climatic conditions of the latter (high elevation, but warmer latitude). One notable example of what makes southern balds paradoxical can be found at Roan Mountain, where Roan High Knob (el. 6,285 ft/1,915 m) is coated with a dense spruce forest, whereas an adjacent summit, Round Bald (el. 5,826 ft/1,776 m), is almost entirely devoid of trees. Thus, despite having nearly identical climatic conditions (high elevation, warmer latitude), one summit is forested whereas the other is not.

Why some summits are bald and some are not is a mystery, although scientists have come up with several hypotheses (see below)"

Very Like a whale

(((Posted on BoingBoing today. This is an oil rig 900 meters under the ocean. Pretty boring. Then. . .))
Linkl

collective nouns

(((In the mildly amusing department: they have an entire discussion board of these on well.com. Couldn't you just imagine putting your high school English teacher in stitches with these pun bombs?)))

Link

"a banality of Republicans"

"a jitter of (cups of) coffee"

"A blast of dove hunters"

"A huddle of hamsters"

"A quarrel of chickens"

"A mess of neocons"

"A collective of liberals"

"A sprawl of cats"

"A swoon of movie stars"

"a banter of party-goers"

"a tracing of plagiarists"

"an exhaustion of vacuum cleaners"

"a gag of garbage"

"a buttload of underwear"

"a hyperbole of politicians"

0.9999. . . = 1?

(((I don't understand why this is and it hurts my brain.)))

Link

In mathematics, the recurring decimal 0.999… , which is also written as or , denotes a real number equal to 1. In other words, "0.999…" represents the same number as the symbol "1". The equality has long been accepted by professional mathematicians and taught in textbooks. Various proofs of this identity have been formulated with varying rigour, preferred development of the real numbers, background assumptions, historical context, and target audience."

New Band of Horses album

(((Band of Horses is not a particularly innovative or sublime band in my book, but certainly solid and capable rockers. "The Great Salt Lake" was probably my favorite song of 2006. They also just moved to South Carolina from Seattle. This makes me think there's something going on in S.C. I don't know about)))
Stephen M. Deusner, October 08, 2007
Pitchfork Media
Link

"Following the success of their debut Everything All the Time and the subsequent departure of founding member Mat Brooke, the remaining members of Band of Horses moved from Seattle to Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, and set to recording their follow-up, Cease to Begin, in Asheville. Thousands of land-locked miles from the Great Salt Lake, this cross-country change of scenery is subtly apparent: If Everything All the Time was a Pacific Northwest indie album with flourishes of country and Southern rock, then Cease to Begin reverses the equation. Putting a different regional spin on their tender-hearted indie rock, however, doesn't change up the sound too much-- the guitars still churn and crest majestically, Bridwell's vocals still echo with grandiose reverb-- but simply creates an atmosphere evocative of something like autumn in a small town."

Happy Birthday, Ohno-sensei

(((Kazuo Ohno, the Butoh dancer, turns 101 years old this month. Hopefully, Virginie Marchand will give him another sexy lap dance.)))

Glos Is

((((A literary, artistic, communicative happening in Brooklyn. I just talked to Mr. Daniel Grossman today and apparently things are starting to kick with the thing. Along with displaying the talents of many of my friends, they have one of my college short stories up (The Kenzaburo Oe-inspired "I Fear Gooks Metal), and hopefully will have some more soon--I still edit things I wrote in college. The story's 6 web pages long (I don't know why it couldn't just be one) and you have to click "Next" on the left side of the screen to continue reading. I still look for that link to be on the lower right of the text, but other than that, it's a great site.)))
Link


"If I had the language then, to add my own entry into the "The World of Knowledge" it would have said that the skin is spongy and changing, like a beach at high tide. The body is plastic. The sinews are cantaloupe. We grow ourselves up in fits and starts, and if an object draws too close while we grow, the skin will overtake it, carrying it into the thick layers, the way weeds grew over Grandmother's car after she quit driving--the chrome and cracked vinyl vanishing into the gradual layers of dirt and geology. The body expands, then shrinks, churning up the things absorbed in youth and coughing them up in later years. Thus, all history renders into sweat and defecation. We grow old, our shells harden; become a mixture of wax and stone. Silts clean their way in, dripping deep to the marrow, hollowing out tracks and blooming, years later, when uncovered by one attentive, young scientist."
____________________________________________________________

"In muffled darkness, I imagined a gookworm digging inside my leg with hooks, weaving a fibril sack in between bone and the cantaloupe stuff. My teacher had brought a cocoon into class and we passed it around so that each of us could press the delicate silk to our ears and hear the sound of what seemed like ancient baby teeth inside when we rattled it. Someday it would be a butterfly. Now the cocoon lay dormant in my own leg, inherited from my father, respiring slowly and clicking its new, wet mandibles. It would bide time for years to pass and for my body to grow tough and strange to myself; when I grew so far off the floor that my head would fear my feet. When so much would be asked of me, I would return home at the end of each day, sun-burned and aching, too wasted to do anything but fall half-asleep to the drone of the newsman just talking. It was my curse. Some terrible day, when I was pocked with hair and scars and my breath was like steel wool and rotten beef. On that day the gooks metal would chew its way towards daylight and emerge through the birthmark on my leg."

Panic Attack Day!!

(((Once a month or so, I have a gran mal' panic attack. I can't breathe. I get dizzy. I have a tremendous feeling of hopelessness and despair coupled with racing thoughts of death. Today is that day. Yay.)))

Link

The stifling, deathly heat of Chicago

(((Tragic)))

"Death, Havoc and Heat Mar Chicago Race
New York Times
By MONICA DAVEY
Published: October 8, 2007
Link

CHICAGO, Oct. 7 — As temperatures soared into the upper 80s, hundreds of runners in the Chicago marathon fell ill and at least one died on Sunday, prompting officials here to halt the annual race for the first time in its 30-year history.

As runners set off at 8 a.m., temperatures were in the 70s — warm for a fall day in Chicago but not unheard of — and organizers said they had anticipated a normal race day. But as the morning went on, temperatures kept rising, and calls began pouring in: Some runners were telephoning 911; others were flooding into the 15 aid stations along the course; still more were reporting that there was not enough water or Gatorade or even cups.

By 11:30 a.m., race officials, who were consulting with city fire officials, medical experts and the police, stopped the run, setting off waves of confusion and chaos in some parts of the course.

“It was a tough call,” Carey Pinkowski, the marathon’s longtime director, said Sunday night. “It’s my responsibility to make a decision on people’s health and on public safety. All the indications were that it was only going to get worse.”

More than 300 people were picked up by ambulances along the course, many of them suffering from nausea, heart palpitations and dizziness from the stifling heat, fire officials said. Forty-nine were hospitalized for their illnesses, race officials said, and the rest were treated at race-sponsored aid stations and a medical tent.

“I had no faculties whatsoever,” said Dawn Dowell, who was among the injured, having blacked out at Mile 19. Ms. Dowell, 37, of suburban Wheaton, said she could not provide her address or phone numbers in the minutes after she awoke with an emergency medical technician attaching an IV bag to her arm. Ms. Dowell, who spent two hours in a hospital, said she was running her first marathon.

In the 18th mile, a 35-year-old man collapsed. He was later pronounced dead. The Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office identified him as Chad Schieber, 35, of Midland, Mich.

As runners began falling ill on the course, city authorities sought help from suburban fire departments in case they ran out of ambulances. Fire hydrants were opened, creating an enormous spray along a downtown street. Fifteen city buses, air-conditioned to the coolest levels, were sent out as aid stations."

The enriching downbeat noise of Chicago

((((Good Stuff House is the name of a rather anonymous sushi restaurant in the Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. It's also the name of a really amazing collaboration between Scott Tuma of Souled American and the Matt Christensen and Mike Weiss of Zelienople. You can listen to some free tracks here, but you have to be really cool like me to own their album. Seriously, I had to beg their bassist personally.))))

Still can't read "Howl" on the radio.

(((At what point in global history, can we look back and say with certainty, "Well, censorship was totally justified in that situation?" I wish this station would be a little more radical in their treatment of it.)))

From Boing-Boing

Public radio station in NYC won't air "Howl" for fear of the FCC

Posted by Cory Doctorow, October 7, 2007 4:19 AM | permalink

"The FCC's war on dirty words is having a chilling effect -- even WBAI Pacifica, the radical radio station in NYC, is scared of airing Allen Ginsberg's magnificent poem, Howl. "Why, 50 years later after a judge ruled that children could read this poem, people are afraid the courts will say that their ears shouldn't hear it," said Ron Collins, a constitutional law instructor and First Amendment advocate who is leading a small group of authors, broadcasters and free-speech advocates pushing to broadcast the poem eventually. "Yet they can go on the Internet and see far, far worse things."

Another irony: WBAI, the Pacifica Foundation station in New York that plans to post "Howl" online, is the same station that took on the FCC more than 30 years ago over the right to air George Carlin's comedy routine featuring the "seven dirty words." The challenge led to a 1978 Supreme Court decision governing what naughty words can be broadcast and when.

Pacifica's attorney for FCC issues, John Crigler, thinks airing "Howl" would be "a great test case" in the current environment. But he understands why WBAI won't broadcast "Howl," even between the hours of 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., the hours the FCC has cordoned off for rougher language.

WBAI program director Bernard White fears that the FCC will fine the station $325,000 for every one of Ginsberg's dirty-word bombs. If each Pacifica station that aired the poem - and possibly repeated it - were to be fined for airing "Howl," it could mean millions of dollars in fines."

Copperhead in the pool

(((I spent the entire summer swimming and wadefishing Citico Creek. Didn't see a single snake. I finally go swimming in a backyard swimming pool and a dang copperhead nearly lands on my shoulder. He was dead coz' of the chlorine, tho.
Good thing. They are more aggressive than the timbler rattler. While rarely fatal, their bites can cause a considerable amount of pain and necrosis if left untreated.))))

Dylan Thomas wants you to visit. . .

"Llanfairpwllgwyngyll (long form Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch), also spelt Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll and commonly known as Llanfair PG or Llanfairpwll, is a village and community on the island of Anglesey in Wales, situated on the Menai Strait next to Menai Bridge and across the strait from Bangor."

Link

The beauty industry wants you to feel ugly.

((((A nice pair of viral ads put out by the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty which I hope catches on. I'm usually opposed to clever, well-done advertising, but inevitably for the reasons being exposed in these videos.)))

Produced by Illegal Advertising agency.


Produced by Ogilvy agency


(((Girls who drink lots of water, get enough sleep, stay somewhat active, eat healthily, and wash their faces are always hotties in my book.)))

The original Proust Questionnaire

(((Early 20th century French intellectuals thought questionnaires were pretty cool. So you don't have to feel lame when you post one up on myspace))))

"The young Marcel was asked to fill out questionnaires at two social events: one when he was 13, another when he was 20. Proust did not invent this party game; he is simply the most extraordinary person to respond to them. At the birthday party of Antoinette Felix-Faure, the 13-year-old Marcel was asked to answer the following questions in the birthday book, and here's what he said:

• What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
  
  To be separated from Mama
• Where would you like to live?
  
  In the country of the Ideal, or, rather, of my ideal
• What is your idea of earthly happiness?
  
  To live in contact with those I love, with the beauties of nature, with a quantity of books and music, and to have, within easy distance, a French theater
• To what faults do you feel most indulgent?
  
  To a life deprived of the works of genius
• Who are your favorite heroes of fiction?
  
  Those of romance and poetry, those who are the expression of an ideal rather than an imitation of the real
• Who are your favorite characters in history?
  
  A mixture of Socrates, Pericles, Mahomet, Pliny the Younger and Augustin Thierry
• Who are your favorite heroines in real life?
  
  A woman of genius leading an ordinary life
• Who are your favorite heroines of fiction?
  
  Those who are more than women without ceasing to be womanly; everything that is tender, poetic, pure and in every way beautiful
• Your favorite painter?
  
  Meissonier
• Your favorite musician?
  
  Mozart
• The quality you most admire in a man?
  
  Intelligence, moral sense
• The quality you most admire in a woman?
  
  Gentleness, naturalness, intelligence
• Your favorite virtue?
  
  All virtues that are not limited to a sect: the universal virtues
• Your favorite occupation?
  
  Reading, dreaming, and writing verse
• Who would you have liked to be?
  
  Since the question does not arise, I prefer not to answer it. All the same, I should very much have liked to be Pliny the Younger.

Seven years after the first questionnaire, Proust was asked, at another social event, to fill out another; the questions are much the same, but the answers somewhat different, indicative of his traits at 20:

• Your most marked characteristic?
  
  A craving to be loved, or, to be more precise, to be caressed and spoiled rather than to be admired
• The quality you most like in a man?
  
  Feminine charm
• The quality you most like in a woman?
  
  A man's virtues, and frankness in friendship
• What do you most value in your friends?
  
  Tenderness - provided they possess a physical charm which makes their tenderness worth having
• What is your principle defect?
  
  Lack of understanding; weakness of will
• What is your favorite occupation?
  
  Loving
• What is your dream of happiness?
  
  Not, I fear, a very elevated one. I really haven't the courage to say what it is, and if I did I should probably destroy it by the mere fact of putting it into words.
• What to your mind would be the greatest of misfortunes?
  
  Never to have known my mother or my grandmother
• What would you like to be?
  
  Myself - as those whom I admire would like me to be
• In what country would you like to live?
  
  One where certain things that I want would be realized - and where feelings of tenderness would always be reciprocated. [Proust's underlining]
• What is your favorite color?
  
  Beauty lies not in colors but in thier harmony
• What is your favorite flower?
  
  Hers - but apart from that, all
• What is your favorite bird?
  
  The swallow
• Who are your favorite prose writers?
  
  At the moment, Anatole France and Pierre Loti
• Who are your favoite poets?
  
  Baudelaire and Alfred de Vigny
• Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
  
  Hamlet
• Who are your favorite heroines of fiction?
  
  Phedre (crossed out) Berenice
• Who are your favorite composers?
  
  Beethoven, Wagner, Shuhmann
• Who are your favorite painters?
  
  Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt
• Who are your heroes in real life?
  
  Monsieur Darlu, Monsieur Boutroux (professors)
• Who are your favorite heroines of history?
  
  Cleopatra
• What are your favorite names?
  I only have one at a time
• What is it you most dislike?
  
  My own worst qualities
• What historical figures do you most despise?
  
  I am not sufficiently educated to say
• What event in military history do you most admire?
  
  My own enlistment as a volunteer!
• What reform do you most admire?
  
  (no response)
• What natural gift would you most like to possess?
  
  Will power and irresistible charm
• How would you like to die?
  
  A better man than I am, and much beloved
• What is your present state of mind?
  
  Annoyance at having to think about myself in order to answer these questions
• To what faults do you feel most indulgent?
  
  Those that I understand
• What is your motto?
• I prefer not to say, for fear it might bring me bad luck.

Link

Grand Text Auto

((((Blogs are the yesterday's next big thing. However, many of the popular, long-standing ones seem mired in techno-geekiness and left/right "blogosphere" punditry as a sort of knee-jerk backlash to the antique blandness of mainstream media. That's my opinion for this particular minute.)))

EXHIBITION: Grand Text Auto

LOCATION: The Beall Center for Art and Technology, UC Irvine

OPENING RECEPTION: October 4th, 6:30pm-9:00pm, Beall Center

SYMPOSIUM: October 5th, 1:00-5:00pm, Studio Art Bldg. 712, Room 160, UC Irvine

PERFORMANCE: October 5th, 6:00-8:00pm, Winifred Smith Hall, UC Irvine

GENERAL CONTACT: (949) 824-4339 or http://beallcenter.uci.edu

OVERVIEW

Many blogs have become books - from The Baghdad Blog to Belle de Jour. But Grand Text Auto is the first blog ever to become a gallery exhibition. It opens October 4th and runs through December 15th at UC Irvine's Beall Center for Art and Technology. The exhibition features the work of Grand Text Auto members Noah Wardrip-Fruin, Mary Flanagan, Michael Mateas, Andrew Stern, Nick Montfort, Scott Rettberg, and their collaborators.

Grand Text Auto is a blog about the potential of digital media, from literary websites to experimental computer games. At the exhibition, the blog members will put these ideas into practice, showing a variety of cutting edge works. Some use the latest in artificial intelligence technology, such as Mateas and Stern's interactive drama Façade -- of which The New York Times says, "This is the future of video games." The Beall exhibition will feature the first public showing of a life-sized "augmented reality" version of Façade, created in collaboration with Georgia Tech's GVU Center. Virtual reality is also on display, as with Wardrip-Fruin's collaborative work Screen, a literary game played with 3D text -- never seen before outside of a research lab and presented with support from UC San Diego's Center for Research in Computing and the Arts.

On the other hand, some works in the exhibition use decidedly do-it-yourself techniques, such as Montfort and Rettberg's Implementation, an experimental novel distributed around the world on mailing labels. Others are quirky, such as Flanagan's [giantJoystick], a replica Atari 2600 joystick so large that two people must work together to play (this has its North American debut at the Beall show).

In addition to the gallery show, the members of Grand Text Auto are working together with the Beall Center to present a live symposium and performance evening, both on October 5th. The afternoon symposium (1-5 p.m.) will discuss the power of collaborative blogging, new directions for computer games, and the place of language in digital media. The evening performance (6-8 p.m.) will feature the disturbing and humorous interactive cinema experience Terminal Time (which automatically creates outrageously biased documentaries of the past millennium) and a live performance of the award-winning hypertext novel The Unknown (which tells the tale of a rollicking cross-country book tour). Parking for these events is available in the Student Parking structure at the corner of Campus Drive and West Peltason.

Online, Grand Text Auto (http://grandtextauto.org) is a blog with more than 200,000 visitors a month, collectively authored by six artists and scholars. Offline, Grand Text Auto members have been shown in major art museums, been written about in leading national periodicals, and shipped games that have met wide acclaim and sold millions of copies. The Grand Text Auto exhibition is the first time that these artists will show their work together. Delve into Grand Text Auto's digital depths October 4 - December 15, 2007 (closed November 22-26) and witness the live debut of blog-meets-reality.

Link

A Literary Nightmare

(((Mark Twain wrote this really cool story, "A Literary Nightmare," about the hideously catchy syncopation of ad jingles (what I have anthropologically labeled the "Poo-Poo Sound"--more on that later). 130 years later, Jason Mraz, Kelly Clarkson, and TGIF baby-back rib commercials own the day and apparently we love it.)))

"Ah, Mark, it was a ruinous investment that I made in those heartless
rhymes. They have ridden me like a nightmare, day and night, hour after
hour, to this very moment. Since I saw you I have suffered the torments
of the lost. Saturday evening I had a sudden call, by telegraph, and
took the night train for Boston. The occasion was the death of a valued
old friend who had requested that I should preach his funeral sermon.
I took my seat in the cars and set myself to framing the discourse. But
I never got beyond the opening paragraph; for then the train started and
the car-wheels began their 'clack, clack-clack-clack-clack! clack-clack!
--clack-clack-clack!' and right away those odious rhymes fitted
themselves to that accompaniment. For an hour I sat there and set a
syllable of those rhymes to every separate and distinct clack the
car-wheels made. Why, I was as fagged out, then, as if I had been
chopping wood all day. My skull was splitting with headache. It seemed
to me that I must go mad if I sat there any longer; so I undressed and
went to bed. I stretched myself out in my berth, and--well, you know
what the result was. The thing went right along, just the same.
'Clack-clack clack, a blue trip slip, clack-clack-clack, for an eight
cent fare; clack-clack-clack, a buff trip slip, clack clack-clack, for a
six-cent fare, and so on, and so on, and so on punch in the presence of
the passenjare!' Sleep? Not a single wink! I was almost a lunatic when
I got to Boston. Don't ask me about the funeral. I did the best I
could, but every solemn individual sentence was meshed and tangled and
woven in and out with 'Punch, brothers, punch with care, punch in the
presence of the passenjare.' And the most distressing thing was that my
delivery dropped into the undulating rhythm of those pulsing rhymes, and
I could actually catch absent-minded people nodding time to the swing of
it with their stupid heads. And, Mark, you may believe it or not, but
before I got through the entire assemblage were placidly bobbing their
heads in solemn unison, mourners, undertaker, and all."

Link ((Beware of a pop-up ad on this link))

Well, I did leave my legacy.

(((Still, going strong I hear! As I recall, there was only 3 of us when we started it. And the only public relations we had was scamming the Student Life xerox code.)))

"Bennington Free Press
Founded in the spring of 2003, the Bennington Free Press is a fast-growing student newspaper distributed throughout the College community. Over the past few years, the BFP has grown from a photocopied 8.5"x11" newsletter to a full-fledged tabloid-sized newspaper with a circulation of over 1,000. Its volunteer student staff has grown from 4 to 12 students, and in 2005 it acquired a newsroom on the second floor of Commons. Believing that a student newspaper is as crucial to a college community as is the formation of a strong student government, the BFP provides a wealth of information from a student perspective and provides experience for students who are interested in writing, editing, photography, publishing, advertising and public relations."

Link

Happy Birthday, Bennington!!

((((The old grand dame' turns 75 today and gets $20 million to support its groundbeaking "Democracy Project" curriculum initiative. Whatever happened to the fledgling, loose cannon "School of the Dumb Rich" I attended in the early 2000's? We ate ice cream everyday and did jello shots in costume. I bet the current students probably have to attend classes and everything. The only "lord" I knew there was Emilee. Democracy seems so, I dunno, well-rounded. I'm going to have to counter-donate $20 for the study of Anarcho-Primitivism.))))

"Bennington Receives $20 Million Gift from Robert & Susan Borden ’69: Single Largest Gift in the College’s History

Robert and Susan Paris Borden ’69 have made an historic $20 million gift to Bennington College.

“We are inspired to make this gift for a number of reasons—to honor the College’s 75 years of educational innovation, to celebrate President Coleman’s 20 years of transforming, spirited leadership, and to support Bennington’s next great pioneering initiative,” said Bob and Susan Borden, an alumna and College trustee, on the announcement of their gift.

Bennington is developing a new curricular program that will bring an undergraduate education into the heart of the most urgent public problems facing societies throughout the globe. The College plans to locate, throughout its curriculum, courses and experiences that will enable all of its students, regardless of their academic interests or vocational plans, to become committed to and capable of addressing the most urgent issues of our time.

“For the foreseeable future, generations of young people will inherit an unequal, unstable, and unsustainable world,” Mr. and Mrs. Borden continued. “The danger to democracy is that, without a new kind of college education, too many citizens may feel increasingly powerless, overwhelmed by the magnitude and complexities of urgent, real-world problems.”

“Our aim,” according to President Elizabeth Coleman “is to harness the intellectual power, passion, and boldness of our students and faculty and apply these resources to pressing world problems. In regaining the lively and generative association between citizenship and education—once understood to be the cornerstone of American democracy—we also intend to bring a new and renewed intensity and depth to liberal education. The Borden’s remarkable generosity makes such dreams possible.”

Lord Holme of Cheltenham, (Richard Holme), Member of the British House of Lords, and chairman of GlobeScan and of Bennington College’s International Advisory Council, explained, “Bennington is unique in its ground-breaking approach to and delivery of higher education over the past 75 years. There can be no more important business in education than widening and developing the international perspectives of the brightest and best of young Americans. Whether we like it or not, we are all nowadays citizens of the larger world."

“This extraordinary gift represents an unprecedented moment in Bennington’s history. The College had planned to announce its intention of raising $75 million by the end of Bennington’s 75th anniversary year. Now with the splendid generosity of Bob and Susan Borden, we’ve already far exceeded that objective, enabling the trustees to raise their goal to $100 million,” said Deborah Wadsworth, Chairman of the Board."

Link

Hipster Olympics

(((I think this is funny. I think the whole "hipster" humor is pretty barbed and funny. Does that make me "unhip?" Wait, I don't care.))))



(((The best part about no longer living in a city is that you don't have worry about being one in the first place.)))

My family as Simpsons.

(((((Back one more time by popular demand. My fam-fam.))))

I've been in a secret clubhouse.

(((Exclusive pics of a secret clubhouse. Isaac and Nicole watch TV, serve food, and read mail at their clubhouse. Tinker and I at Houston Park))))

Law enforcement technology at its trippiest

((Can I selectively choose to not pay taxes for stuff like this? Didn't think so.))





Virtual reality machine gives police hallucinations
TOM ALEX
REGISTER STAFF WRITER

March 22, 2006



Des Moines Police Officer Paul Tieszen stepped onto a city bus and into a world he's only heard about.

"Things flash out of nowhere. Small voices saying, 'Go get your medication.' The bus driver is talking to you normally and all of a sudden he starts calling you 'Your Highness.' Then he becomes part of the hallucination," says Tieszen. "It's a whole busload of children, then it changes to a busload of adults. There's a nurse involved. You see normal things and then all of a sudden someone pulls up next to you and says, 'Get off the bus.' "

The bus wasn't real, but the officer's reactions were. And he quickly got a glimpse of what it's like to suffer from a severe mental illness.

Tieszen's window into the world of hallucinations was provided by a high-tech virtual reality mask that police use to better understand the mentally ill people they come in contact with.

"You are in the role of the individual on the bus," he said, trying to describe the experience. "You are seeing what is in the mind of someone who is like that."

The device is called a virtual hallucination machine. It was introduced to police by Teresa Bomhoff, president of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill of Greater Des Moines.

She said the mask was created by a Belgian pharmaceutical company to give mental health providers, police and the public an idea of what it's like to experience hallucinations.

"We want people to get a more empathetic understanding of what people with hallucinations are experiencing," she said."



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Slint

(((Next time these guys reunite, will someone please kill me if I don't go see them.))))

Don't tase me bro!

Coen Brothers direct Cormac adaptation

(((The 18-year-old version of me has briefly been given control over reality))

"No Country for Old Men"
by Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

"No Country for Old Men,' Joel and Ethan Coen's adapatation of Cormac McCarthy's novel -- which plays the New York Film Festival this Sunday and will open in theaters elsewhere later this fall -- is a parched meditation on this changed West, an oblique thriller in which an enigmatic bad guy (played by Javier Bardem) stalks rumpled, dusty-booted cowboy Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), who has stumbled upon and made off with a suitcase full of cash that also contains a hidden transponder that alerts the villain to his every move."

Link

See, I knew science would solve global warming!

(((Sometimes I read something in the science section of the newspaper which I'm sure will be screaming on the cover of every news outlet. Usually these things just end up being a small blurb in "Harper's "Findings." Alan Jackson needs to start writing songs about things like this so it remains in our cultural memory.)))

"I am creating artificial life, declares US gene pioneer

• Ed Pilkington in New York
• The Guardian
• Saturday October 6 2007

"Craig Venter, the controversial DNA researcher involved in the race to decipher the human genetic code, has built a synthetic chromosome out of laboratory chemicals and is poised to announce the creation of the first new artificial life form on Earth.

"Pat Mooney, director of a Canadian bioethics organisation, ETC group, said the move was an enormous challenge to society to debate the risks involved. "Governments, and society in general, is way behind the ball. This is a wake-up call - what does it mean to create new life forms in a test-tube?"

He said Mr Venter was creating a "chassis on which you could build almost anything. It could be a contribution to humanity such as new drugs or a huge threat to humanity such as bio-weapons".

Mr Venter believes designer genomes have enormous positive potential if properly regulated. In the long-term, he hopes they could lead to alternative energy sources previously unthinkable. Bacteria could be created, he speculates, that could help mop up excessive carbon dioxide, thus contributing to the solution to global warming, or produce fuels such as butane or propane made entirely from sugar."

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Manhattanhenge

(((I did not know this.)))

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David Foster Wallace edits Best American Essays 2007

(((This is what an 'editor' for one of those essay compendiae does, I guess. I've never read Wallace , so I don't understand his very particular style. Must read "Infinite Jest." Or Balzac. Rachel Van Pelt clued me in on this thing.))))

"There’s a rather more concrete problem with the cover’s
word ‘editor,’ and it may be the real reason why these editorial introductions
are the least appealing candy in the box. The Best American Essays 2007’s
pieces are arranged alphabetically, by author, and they’re essentially reprints
from magazines and journals; whatever (light) copyediting they receive is
done in-house by Houghton Mifflin. So what the cover calls your editor isn’t
really doing any editing. My real function is best described by an epithet that
may, in future years, sum up 2006 with the same grim efficiency that terms
like ‘Peace with Honor,’ ‘Iran-Contra,’ ‘Florida Recount,’ and ‘Shock and Awe’
now comprise and evoke other years. What your editor really is here is: the
Decider.
Being the Decider for a Best American anthology is part honor
and part service, with ‘service’ here not as in ‘public service’ but rather as
in ‘service industry.’ That is, in return for some pay and intangible assets, I
am acting as an evaluative filter, winnowing a very large field of possibilities
down to a manageable, absorbable Best for your delectation. Thinking about
this kind of Decidering (2) is interesting in all kinds of different ways; (3) but
the general point is that professional filtering/winnowing is a type of service
that we citizens and consumers now depend on more and more, and in ever-
increasing ways, as the quantity of available information and products and art
and opinions and choices and all the complications and ramifications thereof
expands at roughly the rate of Moore’s Law.
The immediate point, on the other hand, is obvious. Unless you
are both a shut-in and independently wealthy, there is no way you can sit
there and read all the contents of all the 2006 issues of all the hundreds of
U.S. periodicals that publish literary nonfiction. So you subcontract this job —
not to me directly, but to a publishing company whom you trust (for whatever
reasons) to then subsubcontract the job to someone whom they trust (or
more like believe you’ll trust [for whatever reasons]) not to be insane or
capricious or overtly ‘biased’ in his Decidering."


Link

Catharine Maloney

(((((I'm going to write a children's book about the shock of seeing your parents naked, and Catharine Maloney's going to illustrate it because she sees the world in a way which the world might want to be seen. Seriously, she once did this project where she took pictures of all the popular girls she went to high school with, and it was so canny.))))


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Parking lots suck

(((We can't get anything done in downtown Madisonville because everyone wants to make the whole place a parking lot. Civic grandeur at work.))

We paved paradise: So why can't we find any place to park? Because parking is one of the biggest boondoggles -- and environmental disasters -- in our country.

By Katharine Mieszkowski, Slate

No matter how much land we pave for our idle cars, it always seems as if there isn't enough. That's America. We're all about speed and convenience. We don't want to walk more than two blocks, if that. So we remain wedded to our cars, responsible for "high CO2 emissions, urban sprawl, increased congestion and gas usage, and even hypertension and obesity," says Amelie Davis, a Purdue graduate student who worked on the study. Despite all the environmental evils blamed on the car and its enablers -- General Motors, the Department of Transportation, Porsche, Robert Moses, suburban developers -- parking has slipped under the radar. Yet much of America's urban sprawl, its geography of nowhere, stems from the need to provide places for our cars to chill.

(((Did James Howard Kunstler's "Geography of Nowhere" really enter the unattributable vernacular?))))

"Wonder why the mall parking lot is half empty most of the time? Developers build parking lots to accommodate shoppers on the busiest shopping day of the year -- the day after Thanksgiving -- so that shoppers need never, ever park on the street. Similarly, the church parking lot is designed to accommodate Christmas and Easter services. So a whole lot of land gets paved over that doesn't have to be, transportation planners argue."

"Parking lots also contribute to the "urban heat island effect." The steel, concrete and blacktops of buildings, roads and parking lots absorb solar heat during the day, making urban areas typically 2 to 5 degrees hotter than the surrounding countryside. "This is most apparent at nighttime, when the surrounding area is cooler, and the urban area starts radiating all this heat from the urban structures," explains Dev Niyogi, an assistant professor at Purdue, who is the Indiana state climatologist.

The urban heat island effect can be so dramatic that it changes the weather. One Indianapolis study found that thunderstorms that reach the city often split in two, going around it, and merging again into one storm after the urban area. "The urban heat island is not simply a temperature issue. It could affect our water availability," says Niyogi."

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Free education ya'll

(((((177 Berkeley grad science courses free and available online. Study them, for Al Qaeda is surely doing the same.)))

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Revolution in Jesusland

((((They're blogging right now from a superchurch in Atlanta, GA. I bet "creation care" becomes a buzzword in 2008.)))

"This blog is a plea to the progressive movement, to take another look and get to know the diverse and complex world of evangelical Christianity in its own terms. Here you’ll find interviews, commentary, analysis and other dispatches from all over “Jesusland.” This tour will explore everything from the workings of the local church, to the evangelicals’ vibrant, decentralized national leadership training infrastructure to theological questions such as, “How in the world DO they read the Bible literally?” and “Do they really think I’m going to hell?”

There are two really big reasons to come along on this tour:

First, progressives will never achieve their goals as long as they are hostile toward and ignorant about the faith of 100 million of their own people who are born again Christians.

Second (and we know how difficult this is to believe) there is an incredibly large and beautiful social movement exploding among evangelicals right now that stands for nearly all of the same causes and goals that secular progressives do. Those goals include: eliminating poverty, saving the environment, promoting justice and equality along racial, gender and class lines and for immigrants—and even separation of church and state.

By learning to work together with “progressive” evangelicals, secular progressives will stand a better chance of achieving their goals and also learn an enormous amount from these remarkable people and their organizations that will help secular progressives strengthen their own movement."

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Tennessee man shoots himself in front of city council

Barbershop owner commits suicide after rezoning application rejected. Last Updated: Friday, October 5, 2007 | 8:23 AM ET

CBC News

"A distraught barbershop owner killed himself in front of a city council meeting Thursday after members voted down a proposal to rezone his property, according to witnesses.

After the 5-7 vote in Clarksville, Tenn., on Thursday night, Ronald (Bo) Ward walked toward the council and said, "Y'all have put me under…. I'm out of here."

He then shot himself in the head with a small handgun."

((((You know that creative writing assignment where everyone writes about an article they clipped out of their hometown newspaper? Small town kids really do well on that.))))
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Bottom-biting bug

((((The Japanese do 'strange' very, very well. This is bound to be a very viral video)))

I need to find me a meganiche

(((I'll be damned surprised if I ever get "niched.")))))
Wired 14.11
Tiny Slice, Big Market
by Clay Shirky

"Now that more than a billion people have access to the Web, there is no longer a trade-off between size and specificity. The basic math is simple: A tiny piece of an immense pie is huge. A decade ago, reaching one-tenth of 1 percent of Web users amounted to 36,000 people, a number that compared favorably with the circulation of, say, the daily newspaper in Bridgewater, New Jersey. Back then, reaching a million users required a decidedly mainstream offering (Amazon.com and MSN come to mind). Now, getting niche can be the path to getting big; one-tenth of 1 percent of today's Web audience is a million people. Forget Bridgewater – the Net is chockablock with special-interest sites and services you've never heard of but whose user base exceeds the print circulation of The Washington Post."

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Unsung hero of the American West

Liver-Eating Johnson

"One story is that Johnson was ambushed by a group of Blackfoot warriors in the dead of winter on a foray to visit his Flathead kin, a trip that would have been over five hundred miles. The Blackfoot plan was to sell him to the Crow, his mortal enemies, for a handsome price. He was stripped to the waist, tied with leather thongs and put in a teepee with an inexperienced guard outside. Johnson managed to chew through the straps, then knocked out his young guard with a two-finger jab between the eyes, took his knife and scalped him, then quickly cut off one of his legs. He made his escape into the woods, and survived on the Blackfoot's leg until he reached the cabin of Del Gue, his trapping partner, more dead than alive, a journey of about two hundred miles."

((((Whenever people criticize the accuracy of Wikipedia, remember that much of our pre-20th century history's just stories people heard))))
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Bloody Bubbly Creek of Bridgeport

(((The Hog Butcher of the World is literally polluted by blood)))

"Bubbly Creek is the nickname given to the South Fork of the Chicago River's South Branch, which is noted for its pollution.

Originally a wetland, during the 19th century channels were dredged to increase the rate of flow into the river and dry out the area. The South Fork became an open sewer for the Chicago stockyards, especially the Union Stock Yards. Meatpackers used fat (as lard), hides and flesh (as meat), but blood and entrails usually found their way into the nearest river.^[1] The creek received so much blood and offal that it began to bubble methane and hydrogen sulfide gas from the products of decomposition.^[2]. Two heavily polluted streams that joined to create the south fork were filled in, and their courses can still be seen today in the configuration of streets and rail lines in the area. By the 1990s the only living metazoans in the creek were huge numbers of bloodworms feeding on the estimated two meters of rotting blood in the bed of the hypoxic creek^[3].

The creek has remained toxic to the present day; as late as 1950, a resident remembers the air being "rancid". Some wildlife and vegetation has returned in recent decades, and the area has been increasingly occupied by residential development such as Bridgeport Village. Areas near the creek have been designated for recreational uses including parks, and developers and the city agreed on a 60-foot setback to allow for remediation."

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Flarf

"My name is Morton Hurley and I maintain this site as a means of preserving and promoting the art of poetry developed from spam messages."

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Documentary on the poet Charles Olson

"Polis Is This' wrestles with the six foot eight inch 275lb colossus of poetry, Charles Olson, in the squared circle of understanding. Through never before seen footage and interviews actor John Malkovich leads an all-star unit in a search and explore mission."

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"  An American
is a complex of occasions,
themselves a geometry
of spatial nature.

 I have this sense,
that I am one
with my skin

  Plus this--plus this
that forever the geography
which leans in
on me I compel
backwards I compel Gloucester
to yield, to
change


 Polis
is this"

((((I have Eric Unger to thank for this link and knowledge of this man)))