i have what can best be described as a complicated relationship with
inanimate objects

an irrational sentimental streak has long been
at odds with a sometimes insatiable technolust
and an expectation for my shit to keep up with my deadly combination of
carelessness and demanding lifestyle

i had a pile of old macs just because i hated the idea of throwing away useful things
even if they weren't the least bit useful to me

i still adore my old titanium powerbook
which never let me down
but i wanted its replacement
which did

i think it perfectly reasonable to set the timer on my slr
and toss it in a snowdrift
or to ask my car to ford a stream
or drive back from alabama with hardly any brakes

yet i cried real tears when i had to part ways with my van

harder lessons in life have put some of this in perspective over the years
moving enforced a culling of the precious junk
a busy schedule meant less time to spend making sure smiling yellow people were
well cared for

and through all of that there emerge only a few mechanical
parts of your life
that truly stand out

so even in his old age as i
think back on all the stuff we've been through
and shop for his replacement
while realizing how little i've done for him

i still thank my car for everything he's done for me

and know that this is just the way we are

Milestone

it has been some time since i've undertaken one
but sh1ft.org's photo projects are a good time
and a fine excuse to go out and try to take some interesting pictures

with the weather getting nicer and me getting
fractionally less swamped at work
and back on my bike
there's no better time to take a hack

and i do mean hack

at 26things

check back at the end of the month to see how it comes out

i bought a gamecube a few years ago for mario kart:double dash alone
it met my expectations
but only just
the depth of the gameplay just didn't measure up to the n64 version that hooked me
in the first place
the majority of the levels lacked the demented imagination of the prior version
and there were fewer shortcuts
wrong turns
and surprises

so even if we were to be measuring it by that alone
mario kart wii exceeds that mark by a significant margin
the courses are by turns vertiginous
dastardly
strange
and fraught with opportunities for your enemies
to fuck you up

the number of times i cuss out yoshi alone
should be enough to explain how much better it is

but the true sign of how awesome it is is that it's got me
sitting indian-style on the floor
three feet from the giant television
holding the steering wheel at arm's length
like maggie's toy at the beginning of the simpsons
twisting and leaning this way and that
and getting my ass kicked by eight-year-olds worldwide

went to the mall today

jessica
emily
and myself
are going to take

george w's economic stimulus package

and blow it all on hats

j_and_e.jpgme.jpg

 
 

a word to crackberry addicts

if i can use capital letters where required on my iphone
then you can use them on your beloved toys too

especially in email trails that wind up in front of outside eyes eventually

this probably seems hypocritical to readers of this increasingly
idiosyncratic
web page

but my two readers know that even in text messages
i tend to spell everything out fully and punctuate appropriately
for the sole reason that it just doesn't require that much
extra effort

capitalization is right out
still
mind you

but that's for my own personal use
no less

so just because you're important enough to have a device that
vibrates your pants
when you get an email
doesn't mean that your terse
sloppy
and frequently rude
missives
don't reflect badly on you

now is the time to say quite archly that the country should
eat its vegetables
and mean several related and useful things by it

the literal aspect of it is driven by the present rise in the cost of food
abetted by the fact that we pay people who grow it to turn it into something that
isn't food
what's worse
that something is fuel for that other insatiable american appetite
the automobile

of course ethanol is something of a white elephant as it is not efficient to produce
or very profitable if not for the rather hefty subsidies involved

who's to say if it's better than oil or not
come a time when we're out of oil it might be a good thing to be able to take corn
or switchgrass
and process it into fuel using cleaner energy

but the second half of this equation is the more figurative reading of
how to eat our vegetables
as a nation

right now
senators mccain and clinton
are both in favor of a so-called gas tax holiday
a reward for american consumers who have sacrificed so much

or to continue to abuse that metaphor
a thick slice of cake for the whiny kid
who pushed around the green beans on his plate
instead of eating them

whereas now is the best opportunity
when everyone's interests are aligned
to set the country to work on the apollo project-like
task of getting ourselves set to face the next century

instead of making it easier for everybody to limp along
and ignore the problem for another ten years

while carmakers and oil companies
continue to profit from our indolence
literal and figurative

we need someone with balls to grab the nation
by the scruff of its neck and say that it's time to change our habits
to maybe do without some stuff that we want and don't need
to say that sometimes doing great things is a hard thing for everybody and that
hard things require effort

effort
you may remember is something that requires work
as in it may create jobs
which are good

but doing hard things is not a way to get elected

getting elected is a short-term concern and that's why it's so tempting to promise short-term fixes

senator
don't let us leave the table until we're done

the tv was flipped to 'the big lebowski' on fuse

yet another music video channel all grown up and not showing videos
of course they mostly showed rubbish
but still

at any rate
it reminded me of something that was making the rounds at work this week

great movie rants illustrated solely with type


the story of the atheist soldier is fascinating and frightening to me

the man sounds as if his are reasonable and well-considered beliefs
and moreover are entirely in line with my own
and it's for that reason that the reaction to those beliefs is so worrisome

if one considers the military to be a microcosm of our country as a whole
then it merely reinforces the idea that's been heard on the tip of our leaders' tongues
unspoken but palpable
that it doesn't matter what your faith is as long as you have some

but that the lack thereof makes you a hollow person in their eyes
makes your motivations suspect
your decisions rooted in an uncertain place

like specialist hall i believe in plexiglas and steel and abs
and gravity and friction and seals and levers and pumps
screws and glue
electrons and fluids
these things exist and i can make them do stuff for me and for you
without intervention from any deity

i believe in human courage and ingenuity and that
good people will do good things for people
deserving and undeserving alike
but that you're a lot better off in the former category

but somehow by not believing in a ceiling cat
that's enough for some people in this country to somehow believe that this soldier's
good works alone are not sufficient enough a track record to say he's
a good dude

only some fictional good dude can confer that qualification

fortunately you can spend a lifetime in this country without
risk of being so judged
provided you live in a reasonably secular state and
travel in certain circles

but these people still vote

and they remind me that america has a vast capability to be stupid

so let's look forward to president mccain
but that's a rant for another day

i sit around

it's strange for it to feel like summer so early in the year
not so much because of the temperature as for the early onset of the
generalized ambience of it

the stench of the mill pond at work

the lazy and early commute home on a friday afternoon with the unspoken agreement that
nobody's really doing any hard work past noon

the windows flung open to let in the sound of the restless streets at night

in the case of bustling newton highlands this last can only mean one thing
if it's dark out and there's a chance i might try to catch up on sleep
then keyspan must surely be laying waste to the pavement outside

i feel like i should take a day off and unroll a sleeping bag on a desk in their office
and see to it that things are
put right

but i'd rather be playing wii tennis

whoa
via io9

i for one welcome our rapidly evolving
lizard overlords
and am glad that they are plant eaters

what if the t had money and gas prices were going sky high
and people were fleeing the suburbs
and we desperately needed better public transit
and it actually got built
[via universalhub]

then maybe nobody'd be giving the transit cops shit after a ball game
that's twice in a row now
last night after the complainer in question pointed out the obvious fact
that the reason there are outbound fares on the green line is solely to pay the salaries of
the greedy t employees wrangling red sox fans at fenway
the friendly t policeman decided that it was time to ask the gentleman how he'd feel if
he showed up at his day job and lectured him
it was pretty funny

he'll probably get in trouble for it

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