Monkey Wrenched

An offhand comment contained in an email from a friend I haven't seen in many, many years prompted me to pick up a copy of The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey at the local library yesterday. I've heard of this book over the years, but never read the darn thing. Well, now's the time. I get the feeling it's kind of a fiction-gonzo comedy-adventure with a message blaring, "Keep the bulldozers out of the desert, goddamit!", all written with the author's deep love of the desert threading throughout, but we'll see. I mean, I have to read it before I describe it, right?

Ann Japenga, who mentioned in the email how she enjoyed Ed Abbey's fiction, is a damn good writer herself. A recent article of hers in the LAT can be found here. I urge you to seek out other examples of her excellent work.

Year 10,055 Anno Domini

Headline: Earth Weary of Being Calm, Somber, Playful; Kills Self

Alpha Centauri citizens expressed tepid condolences. A typical response: "I'm kinda sad they're gone. But at least they gave us the iPod, and oh yeah, Pez candy dispensers. Uh, Earth was the blue planet, right?"

Oh Shut Up

There is so much going on. How does a regular citizen, like you or me, marshal the time and resources to figure everything out? We rely on our leaders to herd us through these exceptionally bizarre times, but I'm uncomfortable with the way events are playing out. To use a more figurative alliteration: "I'm pretty pissed off."

And you know what? This type of thinking goes against my ingrained, no, not ingrained, but call it a self-implanted philosophy that we, that is, the human race, will prevail. Meaning, we will eventually find our calm and somber yet playful place in the cosmos and be comfortable with it. Geez, pretty newworldy. I'll shut up now.

The obvious question is, what are you/I going to do about it?

But I'll tell you, it's hard not to get pissed off.

Electric Red

I mentioned a couple of days ago that "an electric red sunset had beamed itself upon the city..." Well, I didn't have my Nikon with me at that particular time, but the shot shown above (taken across the street from my domicile last year) pretty much sums up the splendid redishness I'm talking about.

Those are gigantic cargo ship cranes in the background. The foreground? Just some bloke playing around with his parasail on the beach, catching gusts of the strong onshore winds.

No, It's Not a Scud

So we're at brunch on Sunday with our friends Chuck and Dawn, and, as is wont to happen when dining on crab legs and champagne, naturally the subject of missle launches comes up. If you live in Southern California, it's very probable that about a month ago (Sept. 22) you saw a quite spectacular evening sky show brought to you by the good folks at Vandenberg Air Force Base. Check out the great photos at Fred Bruenjes' site here.

And for a schedule of upcoming launches and viewing opportunities, click this link, which includes a lot of good info about Vandenberg.

Incidentally, I'll leave to others the task of pondering the rationale and implications of launching missles carrying classified Air Force satellites. My take is, the more hardware we chuck into space, the better.

Post Pokerum Depression

So it's Saturday night, the weather's changed, an electric red sunset has beamed itself upon the city, night has fallen, and my wife has her buddies (Robin, Julie, and Tracey) over here playing poker. That is, poker in the broadest sense of the word: they play the weirdest, most confuzzled games, with, say, jacks and threes being wild, but only if there happens to be a red, electric sunset.

I'd join in but a) I don't want to be a 5th wheel in her regular girlfriends par-tay, b) my poker skills, shall we say, lack polish, and c) I have to get up at 4:30 am tomorrow so I can join another group of friends and ride my bike in the Long Beach marathon. Bikers start the course at 6am, the real runners start at 7:30. (I don't run, it's not in my contract, but I can handle the fairly wimpy 26 miles on a bike).

I sincerely hope my wife wins a few bucks, if only to help defray the cost of all the goddam relief efforts we've donated to this year. Oh, did I say "goddam"? I meant "worthy".

Really Small Private Parts

In a move thought to be the first for a major corporation, IBM has revised its equal opportunity policy to include protection of the genetic privacy of its employees . In an email sent to employees today, IBM's Chairman and CEO Samuel J. Palmisano stated,

"...It has been IBM's long-standing policy not to discriminate against people because of their heritage or who they are. A person's genetic makeup may be the most fundamental expression of both. So, we are taking this step today because it is the right thing to do -- for the sake of the innovation that lies just over the horizon, and because it is entirely consistent with our values and with who we are as a company."

This is an extremely forward thinking policy. (Thanks, KK).

And it will help preclude the nefarious use of genetic data to influence hiring decisions. Imagine this scenario: You're interviewing for a programming job, and the prospective employer stealthily scans the details of your DNA. He notes that you have a genetic propensity for acute schizophrenia. He looks at you and says, "I'm sorry, but I can't give you a job as a programmer. Would you like to work in Management?"

OK, bad example.

Link to IBM gene privacy story here.

Kids and the Internet

Do you allow your little kids access to the internet?

I find the article at Orion particularly interesting, which in part says,

"There is a profound difference between learning from the world and learning about it. Any young reader can find a surfeit of information about worms on the Internet. But the computer can only teach the student about worms, and only through abstract symbols—images and text cast on a two-dimensional screen. Contrast that with the way children come to know worms by hands-on experience—by digging in the soil, watching the worm retreat into its hole, and of course feeling it wiggle in the hand. There is the delight of discovery, the dirt under the fingernails, an initial squeamishness followed by a sense of pride at overcoming it. This is what can infuse knowledge with reverence, taking it beyond simple ingestion and manipulation of symbols. And it is reverence in learning that inspires responsibility to the world, the basis of belonging. So I had to wonder why the teacher from the Charlotte's Web video asked children to create animated computer pictures of spiders. Had she considered bringing terrariums into the room so students could watch real spiders fluidly spinning real webs? Sadly, I suspect not..."

Here's the full article.

Disclosure: I don't have kids, but you do.

So, What's a Spindizzy?

The spindizzy, also known as a Dillon-Wagoner gravitron polarity generator, is essentially an antigravity device capable of negating the gravitational effect exerted on an object regardless of the size of its mass. That is, it will suspend an apple in midair after its fall from a tree. Or a piano. Or the World Trade Center. (We still have a World Trade Center here in Long Beach, though it probably won't fall from a tree. But you get the picture). Or even George Bush's hubris. We're talking immense.

The creation of James Blish, who described its effects in his Cities in Flight series of novels, it is a device that struck a major *whoa* chord in my sensorium when I first read about it. And I still think spindizzy is one of the coolest nouns I've ever encountered.

Still Preparing For That Emergency. No, Really

A few weeks ago I wrote about the need for us to get off our butts and get our own neighborhood emergency planning act together, including having a disaster preparedness kit on hand. Guess who's still twiddling his thumbs? OK, OK, I feel utterly bathed in shame.

So this topic resurfaces last night during dinner, when Barb's friend Nicole Brodeur described her recent shopping foray (no doubt prompted by this blog) to gather emergency supplies. Hey, she doesn't just talk about this stuff, she does it! Nicole happens to write an engaging local column for The Seattle Times, and you can read about her shopping experience here.

As her son and I wolfed down the pepperoni pizza, Nicole mentioned a cool find at the Fred Meyer where she shopped: Wolfgang Puck self-heating lattes. Press a button on the can, and you've got hot coffee in about six minutes. Who said chemistry and thermodynamics were boring subjects? Not me.