How to explain Los Angeles

I went out the other night to a friend's birthday dinner at a nearby mall. When I went into the underground parking garage, this sign was resting on the ticket dispensing machine. I had to dig through my backpack after I took the ticket to find my camera, hoping the barrier wouldn't drop. The sign says "'Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.' - Ralph Waldo Emerson." It looks like it was simply run off their printer and stuck in a cheap lucite stand. Do they rotate the epigrams? Is this why they call themselves _Modern_ Parking Inc?

Live free and splat

The third of today's rants comes from my favorite crazy libertarian state, New Hampshire, with a quote from one of the anti-seatbelt law lawmakers: "When people get in their car in the morning and put on their seatbelt, they'll think 'I'm no longer free.'" (NPR Morning Edition)

When children are present

Another piece of vagueness that I drive past every day is a sign restricting the speed limit "When children are present." Well, it's a school. Children are present from 8-4 or something like that. What if there are evening programs? Is there summer school? How can I know these things.

After a web search, I found that I wasn't the only one with this kind of question. Here's what the California driver's handbook says:

Within 500 feet of a school while children are outside or crossing the street, the speed limit is 25 mph, unless otherwise posted. Also, if the school ground has no fence and children are outside, never drive faster than 25 mph. Always drive more carefully near schools, playgrounds, parks, and residential areas because children may suddenly dart into the street.

I think that means unless students are going to or from the school, I can go the regular speed limit. Most cars don't slow down and I expect to be creamed if I do.

p.s. I wanted to use the word "vaguery" but neither miriam webster or the OED would approve.

"i quoted quotes from osama bin laden"

i turned on the radio to the distinctive voice and phrasing of our national village idiot. naturally i turned it off immediately.

my mental dialog during a first date

(you = perfectly nice prospective from online dating who i drove a long way to see. she suggested we meet at barnes and noble at the mall. ok, the nicest mall ever, but still, the mall (The Grove if you must know). )

wow, you're young-acting. you act younger than all the 23 year olds i work around.

you're out of your 20s and living on someone's couch?

hmm, that putting yourself down thing is pretty unappealing. guess i don't have to wonder how light hearted the self-deprecation in your emails was.

[she apologizes for her appearance]

well, if you wanted me to have a different impression, you could have set up a meeting for a different day.

[we're looking at a fountain and at how the shape of the water droplets change. i record a movie of it, and show her the last picture i took, one of bonden]

her: you have a dog?

mental me: uh, yeah. note for your future dating success: make an effort to remember the few pieces of information you have about someone you're having a convo with. especially if it's something that seems to be relevant to you (i infer from her tone).

Fatigue per calorie

Today I thought of a new metric by which to analyze exercise: fatigue per calorie. People who exercise to help them sleep might look for a higher fatigue per calorie. I aim for a low fatigue per calorie workout, so I can work out in the morning and not be exhausted during the work day.


I took a new route biking with Bonden today. I tried going north and east - ultimately I'd like to be able to bike to the dog park, which is in that direction. My normal route is more directly east through a quiet residential area without much traffic. Today's route was 4 miles, half on multi-lane streets with stoplights. I spent the whole ride watching for dogs, cars and narrow spaces and keeping an eye on the fatigue level of the dog. I realize that this might be the worst fatigue per calorie workout - I'm barely sweaty, but I'm beat. Even riding our usual route is pretty tiring. I think the treadmill has the minimum fatigue per calorie rating. Sorry beast. Dog park for you.

One thing that irked and amused me was the placement of signs around highway entrances. On two corners, huge highway signs were placed not only in the middle of the sidewalk, but on a corner so one could not use the cut-away to ride up onto the sidewalk (or for more virtuous causes). On the other hand, the car obsession of the region is good for me - there are very few people on the sidewalk, so when we do ride on the sidewalk, we're not menacing too many people.

A mouthful of a dog description

According to this page, the color of little bear's coat is black sable, it has the blanket-back pattern and the length is indicated by calling him plush-coated. There is apparently also some interesting genetics behind it. Interestingly, the same genes are used to identify mice when we're trying to make a mouse that is missing a particular gene.

If a narrative is going to be as clumsy as that,

...can't it have some guns?

from Clive James' "Blood on the Borders," New Yorker Magazine, 4/9/2007

Bonden has a shadow

Chase, the blur on the left, loves to stalk Bonden. Bonden chases the ball, Chase chases Bonden.

just desserts

(for some reason the table gets pushed down in the entry, a plot no doubt. just scroll down for the entry)

desperately hopeless situation	US public education	Bush's prosecution of the war in iraq
proposed solution	quantification of achievement: "accountability"	quantification of achievement: "accountability"
group doing the proposing	president	congress
measurement goal	adequate yearly progress	benchmarks (progress with militias, oil revenues, minorities, elections)
unstated belief	if they really wanted to teach those kids, they would	he's a dangerous idiot - how can we limit the damage?
program  name	no child left behind	no president left behind

My other vehicle is...

unmanned.

I saw this bumper sticker on campus, naturally.

There's some fantastic feminist commentary to be made, but I'm just not coming up with it.

My favorite tax day tradition

I love that some local post offices stay open until midnight on tax day.Cops were blocking off neighborhood streets, All traffic was funnelled in one direction down the street past tents of postal workers holding bins for the passing cars to toss their tax envelopes in.

awesome tv

too bad i'm trying to unclutter...


...because this is seriously cute.


(found on craigslist, url will expire soon)

Obsolete

Do you remember the Sugar Hill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" from 1979?

i got a color tv so i can see
  the knicks play basketball

When was the last time you thought about a black and white TV (except those of you who watched the Academy Awards during a blackout)?

Mish-mosh linux

When you've installed Ubuntu, then Kubuntu, then Xbuntu, then back to Kubuntu, you get errors (like "cdrecord has no permission to open the device") trying to burn an ISO file to a CD. The solution?

gksu k3b

Thank you Internet/Easter Bunny

Seriously brilliant

This is from the delightful, occasionally uncomfortable xkcd, "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math and language."

Warm and dead

She's not dead until she's warm and dead.

This phrase was on Grey's Anatomy this week. It's one of my favorite medical sayings.

Crazy Puple Lady quiz

The woman with a purple wool poncho was walking a small dog with a purple poncho!

It's like I've moved back to Seattle or something.

things to do in pasadena with a dog

i rode my bike this morning while the dog ran alongside. i saw several things.

one: a small woman having an argument with a tall man. she had him backed up against a car and i heard him meekly defending himself as i went by.

two: a different woman talking to a man who was lying in the trunk of her car.

three: a disaster waiting to happen - a woman forgot something in her car, so she left her dog and kid on the sidewalk while she went back to the car. the kid was under two, in a huge stroller. the medium sized dog had its leash looped over the handle of the stroller. i wasn't sure she had seen us, and i was envisioning the dog chasing after us, pulling the stroller over, etc. luckily this didn't happen.

Quiz: How well do you know your blogger?

This morning I was driving back home from the dog park. About a mile from the dog park I saw a woman in a bright purple wool poncho. She had a small-ish dog with her on a leash. Guess what else about the scene (something I haven't mentioned) made it blog-worthy.