22 september

ma was born this day in 1921 --- we wished her a happy birthday down there --- nice rain as i was leaving town, with a rainbow as i passed the airport --- tonight is the equinox and there's a full moon going on too

praise the lord

after all his marches and sermons denouncing gays, and he was diddling teenaged boys all the time --- another christianist hypocrite, or is that now officially a redundancy? --- son of a bitch ---

agreed

"Pie rawks balls. If everybody had a nice slice of pie every day, the world would be a better place."

mapping people

here is a fascinating series of maps of forty american cities based on the 2000 census, showing racial composition of the city with each dot representing 25 people

damn the republicans ---- again

actually we could damn a few democrats, too, but mostly it's the republicans --- i am so sick of our civil rights being used as a political football ---

7:52 a.m.

mornings are really pretty fine these days --- now if it just weren't 95 in the afternoon

reading

i've had the kindle for a little over two weeks now, and i gotta say that i really like it --- i'm reading a lot more of the times and the constitution, the latter of which i rarely read at all --- it is so much easier to skim the headlines, even if you don't get every single thing (ads!) that you get in the dead-tree version ---however, the kindle may have made my reading even more indiscriminate than it's always been --- e.g., normally i would not be inclined to think about reading sherman's memoirs of the civil war, since military history is not my thing, but there it was for 99 cents or something, so i downloaded it right after i did charles dickens and thomas hardy, the complete works of whom i acquired digitally for 2.99 each  --- sherman's memoirs turn out to be quite interesting, and he himself comes through as an extremely intelligent, well-educated, and civilized soul, that somehow the scraggly-ass photographs of him during the civil war don't quite convey ---   he was in california in  the late 1840s, just as the gold rush was getting underway, and his account of that is the best of the whole thing ---anyway, if you are a total pervert about reading the way i am, you probably need one --- no more lugging a book around and having to have both hands free to use it --- i can walk the dog and read now, should i choose to take my multi-tasking to that level --- amazon really need to work on their formatting and proofing, but i can trade some crappy formatting and some typos for the convenience

the tea party madness

too many people are seeing the tea partiers as advocates for reining in "out-of-control federal spending" --- that's not it at all ---- 

This isn't a debate about the size of government. It's a debate about whether the government, as we know it, should really exist. Any Republican who approaches their job as a legislator with the idea that their [the Tea Partiers]  ideas can help craft more balanced legislation is completely missing the point. This is Government Shutdown-politics, plain and simple.There's a kind of inexorable logic behind this kind of movement, and it doesn't allow for positive governance. It rejects the very idea that the Congress exists to identify problems and craft legislative solutions. The idea of compromise is completely rejected.

also, it would have been a little more believable if the tee party had started their thing while bush was spending us into oblivion with tax cuts for the rich and two unnecessary wars ---

take back america

godwin's law clearly governed there toward the end, but still outstanding, especially the hair

thnx andrew

the downward spiral

Over the last two decades, U.S. scientists and engineers have discovered or pioneered the science behind one blockbuster product after another — from flat-panel screens and robotics to the lithium batteries that run next-generation power tools and electric cars. . . . Yet in almost every case, production, jobs and most of the economic benefits that sprang from those breakthroughs have ended up overseas.

much of the research behind those discoveries has been funded by the gummint, i.e. me and you, but this is your free-enterprise system at work so i don't know why anyone would complain ---

a list

i like it when my lists look like this --- clean dog, reasonably clean house, restocked on roots and berries, wo' out tires (peeling tread wo' out) replaced, this, that, and the other add up to an unwasted weekend all in all, even if i've been too lazy to walk over to the arts festival, but that's mainly because the dog is not welcome there --- i'm generally ready for the upcoming week, which will include the fall equinox on wednesday, september 22, at 11:09 pm ---

more tomitronics

you may now view a short history of ebenezer here

callanwolde

it was a great night at callonwolde, benefiting homeless kitty cats and puppy dogs --- it is difficult to believe that forty years ago, the house sat vacant and homeless people were building fires on the floors --- however, i really really hate the way they have enclosed the wonderful colonnaded courtyard that was at the center of the house's u-shaped plan

yup

thnx doug

dog habits

the cocker spaniels were always underfoot whenever i was in the kitchen --- guinness finds it more convenient to observe from the comfort of the sofa

filtering the flood

Our culture worships attention. We assume that, when we’re faced with a really hard problem, the best response is to stay focused, to lavish the dilemma with deliberate thought. And so we order a triple espresso, or chug some Red Bull, or snort some Ritalin. The point of these chemicals is to sharpen the spotlight, to keep us fixated on the task at hand. But is this a good cognitive strategy? Is distractability always a bad thing?
. . .

People bemoan the infinite distractions of the web, the way we’re constantly being seduced by hyperlinks and unexpected search results and arcane Wikipedia entries. And yes, that’s all true – I just wasted 30 minutes, for instance, searching for that Kierkegaard quote. (I ended up on a Danish culture website, which led me to a photography collection of Danish modern furniture…) But the problem isn’t distractibility per se - the problem is distractibility coupled with a failure to curate our thoughts, to monitor the relevancy of whatever is loitering in working memory. Think of the internet like an epic cocktail party, filled with chattering 24/7 conversations. Our goal shouldn’t be to ignore everything beyond earshot – that would inhibit our creativity, and keep us trapped in a very narrow world. Instead, we should keep on searching for those smart voices, so that we can remix the right data inside our head.

sometime the internet can certainly give the feeling of "drowning in possibility," but personally i kinda like that side of it, most of the time ---

 

will fall ever get here?

spray on clothing?

Manuel Torres joined forces with scientists at Imperial College London to invent the spray, which forms a seamless fabric on contact with the body. . . . The spray consists of short fibres that are mixed into a solvent, allowing it to be sprayed from a can or high-pressure spray gun. The fibres are mixed with polymers that bind them together to form a fabric. The texture of the fabric can be varied by using wool, linen or acrylic fibres.

 watch the video

too much

colbert's may be the most inspired

vertigo

switch it to full-screen to watch --- what it doesn't do is explain exactly why these guys needed to get to the top of a 1768' antenna --- if you are afraid of high places, you might not enjoy it so well

"e shoppingus unum"

And the plot of pretty much every reality show is the same: ordinary middle American Joes with poor taste meet silver-tongued, fake-boobed Hollywood/New York shopping expert, who tells them what a shitty house they’ve been living in and what ugly shoes they’re wearing, and hands them a bunch of cash so that they can shop themselves back to superficial respectability. The public seems to have a limitless appetite for this awful stuff, which makes me wonder if it’s possible to clinically diagnose an entire country with depression.

i think it is --- i like matt

poor birmingham

Jefferson County is essentially the world’s worst credit card story. The local pols ran up massive bills to build a “Taj Mahal of sewer-treatment plants,” then saddled future voters with a blizzard-worth of rate hikes, punitive fees and late charges. Alabamans who should have paid $250 million for their new sewer system now owe over $3 billion, thanks to their corrupt politicians and the greedy carpetbagger banks who dragged these local hicks into deadly derivative deals.

banksters and ignorant politicians (the latter of which is not necessarily an oxymoron) are a lethal combination

not far from the equinox

signs of life

they've started work on the new arden's garden at p'tree place and crescent --- it will be good to have a little activity on that corner --- the cereal bowl should be announcing soon for the small storefront next door on p'tree place

emory roundabout

a great way to treat this intersection --- meanwhile, the city of atlanta has stupidly messed up all the great semi-roundabouts at va-highland and all through morningside, turning them into conventional stop-sign intersections

bringing home the bacon

the company that is managing the atlanta housing authority's juniper10th highrise for the elderly has apparently received recovery act money to renovate --- built in the early 1970s, it probably needs renovation --- without it, we would have many fewer walkers and wheelchairs on the sidewalks, which are a critical part of the ambience of midtown

spi club

it looks to be nearing completion, all bright white, stainless steel, and glass facing peachtree --- it actually encompasses three historic buildings, only one of which (the Touch of India building at the southeast corner of twelfth and peachtree) had any integirty as a piece of architectureby the time all this work started --- in fact the building was relatively unaltered, the last intact, early-twentieth-century commercial building remaining on peachtree in midtown, excepting the fine commercial row just south of the margaret mitchell house. which has been landmarked by the city and is, theoretically, there  for the duration ---

neighborhood activists have led us to expect murder and mayhem as soon as the club opens

fresh air on the way

last call for summer

a day of sad remembrance

we still don't understand all the ways in which that day changed us, mostly for the worse --- nearly three thousand people died that day, and hundreds of thousands in the wars that followed, leaving religious bigotry and general jingoism on the rise, privacy and personal freedom on the wane --- rather than being an awful footnote to our history, 9-11 has looked more and more like a crucial turning point, in the wrong direction --- and it didn't have to be that way --- that is the real sadness of it all

la playa de jacksonville

riling up the baptists

freedom from religion foundation will be throwing up 50 of these around atlanner --- gotta love it

g'morning

duval and all

a little bit too much time to think coming down this afternoon, but not a bad drive --- wierd little sundog as i was driving i-10 ---




jacksonville had its boom, complete with a couple of emptyish high-rise condos




jacksonville beach is very low key this time of year --- the mix of old and new reminds me a little of tybee ---





stuck my feet in the ocean this evening

"world's largest black gay pride cultural celebration"

my favorite was this kid, posing with everybody, including me and robert and guinness --- he and his friend who was taking the pictures are going to have quite the portfolio ---- i told robert that there is really no reason to go anywhere else for labor day, considering all that's been happening this weekend here

we also decided that it was a much better-dressed crowd than the big (mostly white) gay pride event

long sundown

lot of whooping and hollering on the streets tonight

new media

a large advantage to reading old-school newspapers on the kindle just dawned on me: there are no friggn ads!!! i'm sure they'll fix that sooner or later

dragon*con

as usual it was indescribable --- a huge crowd from luckie up p'tree to harris and down to p'tree ctr ave --- the marquis lobbies were a mess too









inadvertently i discovered that i can take videos wherein all but one color is rendered in black-and-white

more sky

not to belabor the point, but it has been beautiful today

question of the morning

why is there raw bacon strewn up the driveway behind the building?

oh what a beautiful morning

the sky is fantastic and it is so COOL!!!

manliness means never having to ask for directions

Men waste more than $3,000 in fuel costs because they refuse to ask for directions when lost, according to a British study released as motorists across the U.S. prepare to load up their cars for the long Labor Day weekend.

a quarter of us would drive around for a half hour before we would ask ---

errata

just when i think that the cat has somehow escaped from the thirteenth floor, i find him acting like a cat

a low of 60 on sunday morning? ---- yum

we're #1!!!

it can be a skeery thing walking in atlanner

and in new york, probably here, too, there are more pedestrian fatalities crossing with the light than crossing against the light