Newspaper Redux

Well, the other day I posted some off the cuff comments about newspapers. Admittedly, like most everything I do, the thinking was sporadic and lazy. However, thanks to my friend [don't know if he wants his name here even though no one actually reads this blog], I can offer a reasoned and knowledgeable response to my own daft commentary. My friend has spent any number of years in the newspaper industry (Does that disqualify his comments? I don't think so.) and knows a whole hell of a lot more about how it works than I do. I am impressed he took as much time to reply as he did. I guess I touched a nerve. Maybe it's a case of Public Perception (me) versus News Industry Knowledge (him). Either way, his response is excellent. But longish. I am posting a link for you to look at the response. I think it's too long to post here in toto. [Actually, I got a taste of how my students must feel--I always tell them that when my comments are longer than their essay they should be worried!]

Newspaper Comment Response

Forget Me Not Memorial Garden

The first of its kind, Memorial Pulping of America (MPA) has opened Forget Me Not Memorial Garden. They hope the test facility is one of many more to come. With concerns about global warming growing and the determination that cremation releases heavy metals into the atmosphere and standard burials involve toxic chemical use and vast amounts of inefficiently used land, the founders of MPA set out to rehabilitate the business of death and the ancient problem of what to do with our dead.

Moving beyond the "natural" burial concept, which forgoes the chemicals and sealed caskets, MPA has devised a method which allows the bodies of loved ones to essentially be pulped, processed, and bagged as fully compostable fertilizer in less time than a cremation or standard burial. The customer can then take a small bag of nutrient rich fertilizer home where plants of nearly any variety can be grown as an everlasting memorial to the dearly departed--with no adverse effects on the environment.

MPA admits that the greatest hurdle to success will be perceptual. Bix Ascof, lead founder of MPA, reports: "It's not as if we're throwing your loved one into a wood chipper or anything as crass as that. Yes, the body is pulped, but it is done in a very dignified way. It's the perfect way to show your commitment to a green future and honor your loved one in a single, simple, cost effective step."

SCI, the largest funeral home operator in the United States, has held up the opening of Forget Me Not Memorial Garden for over a year. It has tried a variety of attacks, everything from health and safety issues to a red herring attack using the stigma of Soylent Green. None of these tactics has been successful so they are now pinning their hopes on the aforementioned perception issues. They are confident that few people will be willing to subject the remains of loved ones to the process of pulping. Ascof points out that the process, however you view it, is no worse than that of cremation and you are left with a safe, useable product at the end of the process.

A separate facility is being built that will focus on pets that have passed on. This segment promises to be readily accepted. In an effort to display the results of their process, Ascof and MPA have partnered with the American Humane Society and has used pulped pet product fertilizer to feed and nurture a huge demonstration garden behind the Forget Me Not location. The second purpose of this garden is to show the wasted land use of a standard cemetery.

Ascof and company are confident that the pet service, due largely in part to the agreement with the American Humane Society, will be an almost certain success. The question remains on how quick the general populace will be to embrace this new technology for their own loved ones. "As global warming advances and resources become more and more scarce, the sense of this will be clear." In the end, simple economics may pave the way to Ascof's success. Land use and maintenance and the rising cost of materials used in coffins will make common burial an increasingly expensive endeavor. This is the future according to Bix Ascof, and he's counting on this future to help push what he sees as the only responsible way of caring for our dead.

Black and White and Dripping Red All Over

A lot of newspapers are in trouble right now. Some of the biggest papers are filing bankruptcy. Others are cutting back and laying off. One of the Detroit papers is talking of publishing a paper only three days a week.

What happened?

I think of it as the USATodayification Factor. Papers are becoming more and more generic. With the exception of a few really good columnists (who are available to read online), most newspapers are a generic mish mash of AP wire articles, sports scores, television and movie listings, etc. You find the exact same things in almost every newspaper you pick up. There is the thin selection of local and state issues, blandly reported according to police reports and whatever the "reporter" of the day has been fed. The days of asking questions, hard questions, and actually reporting are long gone. Yes, Virginia, Edward R. Murrow is dead.

The idea of true investigative journalism is practically a joke. The newspapers are mostly owned by the people who are supposed to be investigated. Reporters are generally lazy and simply repeat what they are told. They don't bother to check sources or, god forbid, facts. Do newspapers even have fact checking departments anymore? Probably not. They are all trying to compete with the 24-Hour news cycle, which is madness. True reporting, investigation, and, dare I say it, writing are not meant to be done in two minutes for immediate mass consumption and gratification. We, ahem, have blogging for that kind of thing.

What newspapers are beginning to find out, albeit too late, is that empty calories aren't all that satisfying. We can get the exact same content beamed to our cell phones and laptops in concise, predigested bits and continue to move in our mindless, habit-filled, rabbit warren lives. We don't need to sit down for an hour or so and enjoy our paper while we eat our healthful breakfasts. And we don't. We cram "news" down our throats the way we cram Starbucks and pastries down our throats. If newspapers wanted to be successful they'd print the news on frappelatteccino cups.

Yes, huge national stories can be broken by newspapers. It happens a lot. But then every other publication just jumps on the bandwagon and repeats the same crap ad nauseum. Local and state newspapers need to revive true investigative journalism locally. Let the people read the hard hitting and truly researched and investigated dirt about local and regional stories. Some of those stories will get picked up nationally. Great. But in the meantime, people are going to start reading the local paper again because it will be filled with the stuff you can't get on Google. Yet.

Harvest Restaurant, Tucson, AZ

I just got home from a very good but horribly overpriced dinner at Harvest Restaurant. The newest venture of a local restaurant group, it has a nice premise: Rely as much as possible on organic and locally produced foods and when it isn't possible, make sure it comes from a responsible source. I like the concept and that's why I wanted to eat there.

I was surprised to find a dearth of vegetarian offerings beyond a soup and a couple of salads. Apparently they've had a lot of comments regarding this and are going to add more vegetarian dishes. For now, they can make the fettucine without chicken sausage and chicken stock and they'll make up a vegetable dish for you. I opted for that option. I give them credit, they came out and asked what types of veggies I liked, etc.

What I received was good. It was very tasty. But, seriously, $19 for about 1/4 cup each of rice, kale, and mushrooms served on a smear of pear chutney? Seriously? That's ridiculous. There couldn't have been $3 worth of ingredients on that plate (and I'm being generous). What is that? It's over a 600% mark up. Ridiculous. Like I said, I liked the food but I won't be in any hurry to go back to pay $80 for $35 meal.

Criticism

I am not a great writer. I'm likely not even a consistently good writer. But I do write. As a writer, or would be writer, the one thing I have come to accept, though I'm sure no one ever gets to the point of liking it, is rejection. Rejection and criticism go hand in hand, part and parcel, as part of the writer's life. And, if the writer expects to continue writing, these also become part of his or her toolbox. Yes, criticism often hurts; sometimes it invokes, at least in the short term, a sense of anger. However, I for one have always been of the school of thought that if I don't know what's wrong with a piece of writing I can't fix it. Or perhaps make the next piece better than this one. Writers who reject criticism do so at their own risk. As I said, none of us like it, but we should strive to welcome it and grow from it.

I have long felt that the words, "This is wonderful. I wish I had written it," are some of the most useless words ever strung together. Sure, they feel good, but how do they help you grow as a writer? As a part-time writing instructor this is something with which I struggle. I know kids, especially today, expect nothing but praise. We have raised them on a steady diet of self-esteem boosting rhetoric. I think we're all paying for it, by the way, with a population of young adults who can't see themselves as anything but right, no matter what they do; nothing is ever their fault. Still, a steady diet of nothing but criticism isn't much good, either. Especially if it's not constructive criticism. "This sucks" doesn't help a writer improve anymore than "This is perfect." I have to force myself to remember this and to always address the strengths of an essay first. But the bulk of my comments have to do with how to improve the paper and the author's writing techniques. That's the whole point of education, isn't it? Improvement more than a feel-good-free-for-all.

I explain to my students that all of us have trouble finding the flaws in our own work. I know I do. I can find mistakes or flaws or stylistic errors in other people's writing all day long and easily gloss over even the most simplistic errors in my own. Part of this has to do with the writing process. We work on things and see them over and over and our brains know what is supposed to be there--so that's what they see. Our brains fix things on the fly. Missing words and common semantic issues go unnoticed. Most of us have seen the oft circulated e-mail where all of the letters (save the first and last) of the words are jumbled up yet we read the passage easily. This is the same principle. The brain is an amazing thing. This is why it is always a good idea to rely on outside readers to help proof our work. I have a nephew who is a writer and film maker. He often sends me his stories to proofread before he hands them in at school. He will be the first to tell you that I am a horrible nitpicker. He often comes back with, "Hey, that actually happened," or another explanation. But I'm about trying to bulletproof his stories. Just because something happened in real life doesn't mean it's going to fly in a story (and vice verse). If I question something, others will, too. Which brings me to an important aspect of criticism that every writer should be aware of.

If one person comments on something in your writing, listen and take it into consideration. If two people comment on something in your writing, listen closely and take it into consideration. If everyone comments on something in your writing, listen and act on it. However, in the end, you are the author and the piece is yours. You are the final judge, jury, and executioner (well, actually, most publishers are the executioners). The point is that we should not immediately reject criticism. If you are certain your piece of writing is perfect despite the criticism, you can be almost certain it is not. Always listen and seriously consider your critics' comments before you reject them out of hand.

I suppose you can take this too far. I haven't completed anything of length in fifteen years because I just think the things I have to do in a story that are mundane transitions seem too much like space fillers. I am not a poet. I have never considered myself a poet. But I write a fair amount of poetry. Some of it, I think, isn't half bad, either. I write poetry because I can usually finish a poem. My poems are generally short. I try to maintain, if not a strict adherence to a particular form, at least a stylistic consistency and metrical base. I often suspect my poems are too prosy, but I do pay attention to word choice and connotation. I believe these things are important, along with effective imagery. I work mostly on the literal situation and hope the figurative one happens. It's the figurative situation that determines whether a poem works or not. This is often why my criticism of other poems often seems too negative. I have a low patience threshold for poems that just use words to seem artsy. Or poets who think they need to phrase things in a seemingly lofty manner in order to seem "poetic." Word choice and connotation and the simple conveyance of meaning are the most important aspects of an effective poem. If you force a rhyme just to rhyme, it will only hurt the poem. If you sacrifice grammatical correctness for a rhyme or metrical adherence, you are sacrificing the whole beauty of the language and you will turn away a lot of readers. This last one is one of my biggest pet peeves and it is surprising how commonly it occurs.

On a last note, too many people in this world think that criticism negates the possibility of liking something. Nothing could be further from the truth. I like a lot of things that aren't perfect. I like a lot of things that could be "fixed up" a bit. And I guarantee you I like a lot of things that I write or have written that are far from perfect and could really use a good critique. You can like something just fine and still be constructive about it. I like it, but I could like it a lot more if.... One of my favorite maxims is that no piece of writing is ever finished, it is only abandoned. That is, at some point, you have to publish it, let go and move on. It's a fact of life. I'd dare say you could find ways to improve almost everything that has ever been written if you wanted to take the time to do so. If you insist on making something perfect before you release it into the wild, you will never finish anything (trust me on this). So you should not be surprised by criticism; if anything, you should expect it. Plus, if someone takes the time to give you a critique it means one of two things: Either they are an instructor paid to do so and therefore have no choice, or they see enough promise in the piece to, in their view, help you improve it. Attempting to publish will help get you used to rejection. You'll never learn to like rejection, unless you're really sick that way. It doesn't even really get easier (though your reactions become less severe with time). But you do, on some level, come to accept it. In fact, you start hoping for personalized rejections because you start to realize that if someone takes the time to write you a personal note in addition to the form rejection you're at least on the right track. When you get a handwritten note on the rejection letter that says, "I really like this piece, it just isn't right for us at this time," it can be an ecstatic moment of hope.

So don't reject criticism. Don't hate the critic. Take criticism in hand and give it honest consideration. You don't have to blindly accept it--sometimes, often even, critics are just plain wrong. It would be a huge mistake, however, to blindly reject criticism without consideration. You will do yourself no favors by doing so and you will certainly not grow as a writer.

Open Letter to the Obama Administration

When it comes to auto industry bailout, I thought it was laughable when the CEOs claimed they would work for $1 a year during these tough times. It's laughable because I would work for $1 a year if I was going to be slipped a multi-million dollar bonus at the end of the year.

One idea that I haven't heard is that any of these companies, auto or banking, who get money as a "bailout" or a "rescue" ought to be required to operate as a non-profit organization until every dime is paid back to the taxpayers. And the administrators should have a salary cap of no more than $250,000 dollars. Believe me, as the vast majority of America can tell you, it's quite possible to live very comfortably on much less than $250,000.

Back to the auto industry, any money they are given is going to be frittered away. That's a given. These people do not know how to manage their companies. They spend millions of dollars trying to convince us we need Hummers and over-sized turbo-diesel 10-cylinder pickup trucks. We don't. And most of us don't want them. We want what Honda is offering. Sure, free market has its place, but when a company is operating on federal dollars, it kind of negates the free market argument. Any "rescue" of the auto makers should come with strict guidelines. A minimum of 10% electric vehicle production NOW is feasible. They can lie about it not being practical all they want but companies such as Phoenix Motor Cars proves they are wrong. In addition to that 10% electric, there should a minimum 50% hybrid/alternative energy vehicle requirement and CAFE standards of no less than 40MPG. These are not "out there" crazy ideas. They are doable in the very short term as long as the incentive is there. These companies have proven over and over again that they are not going to do these things unless they are forced to do them.

The Future of the American Environment

I have read that Raul Grijalva is being considered to head the Department of the Interior. As an Arizonan, I wholeheartedly support this position. I would also love to see Robert Kennedy in charge of the EPA. Our environment and national lands have been sorely neglected and generally up to the highest bidder for too long. There are a lot of policies that need to be reversed or enacted to protect our great land. We have to remember that America is more than an idea, it's a place. And we need to preserve that place for generations to come.

Dog Food

I was just reading the label on my dogs' food. It's not cheap stuff and it's all natural with no corn, wheat, soy, or gluten. It's well balanced, no fillers, all natural, so on and so forth. It appears to be healthier than my diet, generally. I'm thinking about experimenting. I might, at least for a day, eat only my Blue Buffalo fish and sweet potato dog food. I can't tomorrow because I have an already scheduled dinner plan. Maybe Sunday. I'll let you know how it goes.

A Christmas Poem, 2008

A Christmas Poem, 2008

Oh, Santa, dear Santa!
Anagram for Satan,
Silly Simpson dog.
Crumbly old bag of bones,
Viking Saint and Haitian port--
You roly poly chimney sweep,
You elfin bearded scamp.
Warm milk and cookies,
Bags of toys and coal,
Spread yourself thin this Christmas, sir--
The world needs some cheer:
Real or make believe.
Nostalgic thoughts of
Jolly fatman lapsitting
Prankster, gift-giver,
Fire-warmed and Love-toasted
Anticipation.
The best is yet to come.

----
Chris Kmotorka, 11/25/2008

Friends

Friends

I have friends and I can prove it.
Check out my Facebook profile--
There are names there
And what does it say?
Friends. Twenty-two of them!
And I have others, I swear.
Undocumented. Low tech.
But friends just the same.
I have friends, confirmed and rumored.
I have friends I know.
Some I think I know.
I have friends and
I don't have to prove a thing.

Chris Kmotorka, 11/21/08

El Tour de Tucson

Tomorrow is the first El Tour de Tucson that I won't be participating in since I started, what?, six years ago? I'm not sure, really. I need to figure out how to train for long rides given my new daycare schedule. It's a tough deal to juggle, especially when Joan and I are training for the P.F. Chang's Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon in January, too. Well, there's always the Tour de Phoenix and the Tour of the Tucson Mountains in April. All I can do now is shoot for those. Wish me luck.

A Long Walk

A Long Walk

They're building a new outdoor mall down the road. Some of the stores are open, but a lot of it is still being built. It's a controversial project--the city put up a huge tax incentive and the voters narrowly approved. I was definitely in the dissenting minority. It's on a great corner that someone was going to want to build on even without all of the giveaways to Phoenix-based developer. All sorts of promises were broken and what was sold as an "upscale" shopping experience is your basic Walmart and Best Buy, Olive Garden crap. Which is what I tried to tell everyone they would be getting if they voted for it. But it's a done deal now. The thing is up and running. While I won't shop at the Walmart, I'll do business (and have) and many of the other stores because I can shop there by bicycle, etc., rather than driving halfway across town to go to the same stores. It's just a fact of life, now.

Anyway, I ordered up a CD for my daughter's birthday using the online order store pickup service at Best Buy. I'm sure there are reasons not to shop at (big box store) Best Buy, but they offer things I want at a good price close to home--and there are no "local" alternatives (if their were, that same CD would be $17 instead of $10). Anyway, JuJu and I decided to pull out the stroller and go for a long walk (4 miles each way) to Best Buy and back. Things went well. We walked down to the store--almost the entire way along a multi-use path, went in to the store, waited in a short line, purchased the CD, walked back to the path (with a short pause to let some front end loaders and trucks driving up the path go around us), stopped off to get the mail, and made it back to the house in two hours. That's pretty good time, really.

Julian slept most of the way there but was awake on the way home, enjoying the wind that was coming straight at us all the way home. I'll tell you one thing, a double stroller into the wind and uphill is definitely a form of resistance exercise! It was a good walk on a beautiful day and proof enough that given time and carryability, shopping at the new "mall" is possible by foot. How far is your "mall"? Where can you go by foot instead of driving? Even if everyone only made one such trip per week it would make a huge difference.

Election Day, November 4, 2008

Election Day, November 4, 2008

I want to feel hope.
I want to feel the blissful
Sense of renewal and
The Dawn of a New Age.
I want to know the firm embrace
Of collective accomplishment,
The comfort of a united nation.

I see the loosening of chains:
Real, imagined, metaphorical.
Centuries of oppression
Lifted like a veil by a simple count.
Like a magic trick: 1, 2, 3...you're free.
At least for the moment.
At least for the foreseeable future.

Tonight we shed our tears.
Tonight we feel the weight lifted.
We try to hide our schadenfreude:
Our victory is over more than
The small minded, the short sighted,
The angry few grinding down our foundation
To a rubble of division.

Our victory is over limits,
The barriers that held us back;
Barriers of fear and suppression.
Barriers we helped erect
In a moment of weakness and sorrow.
Tonight we have come together
To reclaim a vision and to swing a hammer.

So tonight, amidst the rubble,
I feel the hope and I see the renewal.
Half sheltered behind these broken walls
Of a decade of ruin, I feel it.
But it is cautious. It is guarded.
For it is newborn and vulnerable.
We must be vigilant for its survival.

-Chris Kmotorka

Election Day, Nov. 4, 2008: The 21st Century Begins Today

Where does one even begin? Tonight we made history. In many ways, the 21^st Century begins tomorrow morning. Tonight, by an overwhelming majority, Senator Barack Obama was elected to be the next President of the United States of America. After watching two much-desired Democratic Presidential hopefuls miss the mark in the last two elections to perhaps the worst President in the history of the United States, as much as I hoped for Obama’s win, there was plenty of trepidation and anxiety going into this election.

I fully supported Al Gore’s bid for the Presidency in 2000 but at the same time assumed it to be no contest. How could George W. Bush possibly beat the sitting Vice President of a successful two-term President? Many of us still view that election as having been stolen by a corrupt Republican majority. Nothing will convince us otherwise.

With the utter failure of the Bush Presidential first term, I wanted to make a change but didn’t think we could take it for granted. Those wounds were still fresh after four years and the entry into an essentially illegal war and other policy issues: requiring No Child Left Behind but not funding the program, talking of veterans’ issues and then pulling funding for them, talking of increasing PELL grants and other higher education incentives and then quietly pulling funding. It was a trend that received too little attention in the media.

The Kerry Campaign in 2004 was the first time I donated money to a political campaign. Being an initial Bob Graham supporter, once he left the race I immediately switched allegiance to the Kerry Campaign. This was at a time when Howard Dean was the Democratic darling and a lot of people thought I was making the wrong choice. But Kerry prevailed and became the Democratic nominee. That was the year of the Kerry Mobile. I drove a red mini-van at the time and simply plastered the back of it with different stickers, mostly self-made at the print shop I worked in at the time. There were plenty of slogans and propaganda. But money and stickers weren’t enough. In the end, Ohio and the election went to a Bush second term. It was a devastating blow that left me literally and visibly depressed for days afterward. All of our dire predictions about another term with George W. Bush would come true in spades.

At the Democratic convention in 2004 a young Senator from Illinois was the keynote speaker. He was amazing and received a lot of attention. I put his speech on CDs and handed out copies to people telling them, this is the future. This is the Democratic Party. I said at the time that I would not be at all surprised if he was picked to be Hillary Clinton’s VP pick in the 2008 election. Little did I know that he would end up entering the United States Senate and make a bid for the Presidency all on his own.

In the 2008 primaries I hitched myself to Joe Biden’s campaign. I donated money and tried to talk him up as being an excellent choice with vast foreign policy experience, a good environmental record, and so on. I marked my early ballot here in Arizona for Joe Biden and sent it in. Unfortunately, by the time the Arizona Primary came around Senator Biden was already out of the race. My vote really didn’t count for much, in the end. It was a lesson learned—in hectic primary seasons, hang on to your vote as long as you can.

Once Joe Biden was out of the running, I chose Barack Obama. A lot of my Democratic friends preferred Hillary Clinton, but I remembered Barack’s speech and admired him immensely. Now, as a matter of full disclosure, even in the beginning I admitted that my personal ideology and views on a lot of things were far closer to Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel, and Chris Dodd. But I’m also somewhat realistic and new none of them had much chance at this thing. I still admire Chris Dodd to no end. He is a man of integrity and has been the on the right side of so many social issues. He’s a great man to have in the Senate.

I sent my money to Barack Obama and tried to convince people he was the right choice. I again encouraged people to register to vote and to look into Barack’s positions. After a long and often bitter fight, Barack came out successful and received the nomination. I had a lurking hope that he would pick Joe Biden as his VP pick, but never expected it to happen. When it did I was very excited. Here we had what I believed to be the best of the field teaming up to go against John McCain. I was minimally hopeful.

As the campaign wore on for what many thought was a seemingly endless merry-go-round of attacks and blame, Barack Obama remained calmed and focused, unflappable. John McCain picked the horrendously underprepared and intellectually unremarkable Sarah Palin as his running mate. We assume he thought she would peel away the disenfranchised Hillary voters, but not surprisingly, John McCain underestimated the intelligence of women in America. Sarah Palin is anti-environment, anti-choice, an anti-science fundamentalist with no intellectual curiosity and an increasingly obvious lack of knowledge. McCain grew angry and bitter and launched a series of unfounded personal attacks against Barack Obama. The economy melted down and it was all essentially over. America was done with a Republican controlled government.

But enough of all that. They have just announced that Barack Obama is the President Elect of the United States of America. I don’t want to try and say anything for fear of choking up. I know it seems silly to be emotional about this. I don’t have the historical investment of some. However, I had envisioned a world with a dim future and this decision really does seem to bring about the hope that we have been promised by this election. There is a lot of work to be done and some challenges that will be extremely difficult to overcome, but at least we can start taking steps in the right direction.

I sat waiting for results with a sense of hesitant optimism. I was afraid to be too hopeful because I had seen elections ripped away from me before. And I was fully ready to accept the blame if Obama did not win. Yes, I contributed money to the campaign. Yes, I tried to convince people that he was the right answer (sometimes more belligerently than I should have). Yes, I posted to blogs and sent emails. But I did not go door to door. I did not go down and work the phone banks. I did not volunteer and give my time. Part of this is my insecurity and shyness among strangers. There are a lot of things I should do but don’t because of this character flaw. But the whole time I knew I should be doing these things. Yet, I did nothing. So I was ready and willing to accept the blame and the guilt. Fortunately, there were many thousands of people who were willing to volunteer their time and services and they pulled this off. My thanks go out to them.

History has been made. There is no way to emphasize that enough. There was a bigger voter turnout than any election since 1908—considering our nation is on the shy side of 240 years old, a hundred year stretch is a pretty big deal. Voter turnout among minorities was way up; some Latinos are actually claiming credit for Obama’s win! But it’s that notion of minority that is of such import here. We have elected the first African-American President of the United States of America. Slavery was officially abolished 145 years ago with the Emancipation Proclamation. Everyone knows, however, that slavery continued in a de facto manner for many years after that. And any real sense of racial equality has never truly arrived. Again, Obama’s election is historic if for no other reason than the color of his skin (which, wonderfully, actually seems to have been beside the point in the end). I hope there comes a day in the not too distant future when the first part of that sentence seems ridiculous. I don’t think that’s likely, but it’s something to hope for.

I cannot begin to imagine what Obama’s victory must mean to African-Americans. No matter how young, how old, how rich, how impoverished, educated, dressed, or how wide the social circle, each and every brown-skinned person in this country carries a stigma. They might not think about it on a regular basis, or consciously recognize it at all, but it is there. The sense of shared accomplishment and relief that must have come with this election must be nothing short of immense. There must be a sense of burdens being lifted. Shackles have been removed and the automatic sense of limitation no longer needs to be a birthright of African-Americans. I imagine a sense of freedom coming when you might have actually forgotten you were still imprisoned. I hope the feeling is as good or better than I imagine and I hope it lasts until the end.

I am writing this for my grandkids. Four more Presidential elections will come and go before they can vote for a presidential candidate. Will that election be as meaningful as this one? Will it capture the hearts and imaginations of not only our nation, but the world the way this one has? Only time will tell. I only hope that when that time comes it is a time of peace and prosperity and that “oil addiction” is something that has to be looked up in a history book (or something you go and ask grandpa about). I hope they look back at President Barack Obama as one of the historic greats (albeit within their lifetimes) and read about this day as the beginning of a great new era. Right now that is what we envision. Certainly many of us voted for Barack Obama because he is an intellectually curious, reasoned, even-tempered man with good ideas and positions that we see as directly beneficial in the foreseeable future; however, many of us also voted for him for the sake of our children and grandchildren. We are embracing the idea that decisions need to be made based on future generations, not our own short-sighted benefit. We’ve been living for the “now” far too long. It’s time to get back to being a forward looking, forward thinking nation. So, yes, in many ways tomorow marks the real beginning of the 21^st Century. Welcome to the future, Mr. President Elect Obama.

DTV Doomsday

I keep seeing these dark, dramatic, end of the world commercials about the switch from analog to digital television signals. The tone of these ads is that unless you take steps to make sure your television is capable of receiving a digital signal you world will end. All will be lost. Armageddon. Forget the terrifying thoughts of a potential McCain Presidency or the idea that Sarah Palin could be President. Those possibilities are silly in comparison. The only problem is that most of the commercials I see are on cable channels. They aren't on local network channels or Telemundo. They're on cable. Cable. If you're watching cable then your television is fine! Why the hell do they need ... holy shit: I'm watching Comedy Central while I write this and they are airing an ad--right this minute--featuring a local Fire Chief explaining that if you don't check to see if your television is cable ready (I"m fucking watching Comedy Central for chrissake) then your house will burn down and your pets will die because...hell, I have no idea why. The point is, as I started to say before, if you're watching cable then your damned television will work just fine. You can't watch these channels with rabbit ears. Who's the genius making these ad buys anyway? McCain's campaign strategists?

Directionally Challenged

I've always had issues with directions. I generally do OK out in the woods or wilderness or whatever. I have a good sense of where it is I need to go. But put me in a city, especially an unfamiliar one, and I'm useless, just lost. While I could probably do a passable job of placing the names of states on a map of the U.S., maybe not as well as a fifth grader, but passable, I still get screwed up when I think of where things are. For instance, probably because we took a trip there from Michigan when I was a kid, I still think of Salt Lake City as "way out west." That's just the way it is programmed in my head. If you were to ask me where Salt Lake City is, I'd say "out west." Of course, I know it's in Utah. And when pressed to think about it, I know that Utah is actually north of here. But I just looked at Google Maps and it still freaked me out that Salt Lake City is damn near due north of Tucson. Almost 800 miles due north. I still find that odd to think about.

David Letterman

I used to love David Letterman back in the day. Wouldn't miss him. But then, you know, as relationships sometimes do, we drifted apart. I have to say now, however, ever since Sen. John McCain screwed Dave over in order to do his Katie Couric interview, etc., and "rush back" to Washington to "fix" the economy (some 22 hours later, it turns out, and with no success, either)...

I LOVE DAVID LETTERMAN!!!

Nuke-YOU-ler Energy, The Real Silent Killer

John McCain has been calling for 40 new nuclear power plants. Obama, while less ambitious, certainly hasn't taken nuclear off the table. There's a two part question I'd like to ask of the candidates, one that neither has bothered to answer and, more likely, is able to.

First, explain to the American public the costs of subsidizing nuclear power and the nuclear industries in general. The current number is astronomical, what would it be to bring forty more plants online? The free ride currently in place protects the companies who build and operate nuclear facilities from prosecution or any other responsibility for accidents, toxic waste cleanups, or other malfeasance. So, even if the company is horrendously negligent in their actions, the taxpayers have to pay the price in ever way--economically, environmentally, and physically. As it stands there have been countless "accidents" that aren't publicized. The reason you don't hear about most of these is because they are at the front end of the process. There's no China Syndrome or Chernobyl or Three Mile Island action, it's just mining contamination of water sources, the atmosphere, and the land in general. Most of these go unnoticed because they are either in the desert or on an Indian reservation somewhere--places America doesn't bother to care about, in other words. Mine talings and waste storage facilities leak and fail on a regular basis. That is, the ones that were ever not expected to in the first place. Much of the four corners region is affected. The Rio Grande and other major rivers have all been contaminated. Nevada might as well be written off. Groundwater sources in many areas are chock full of radioactive isotopes--liquid carcinogens waiting for you to drink 'em up. Nobody wants a storage facility built anywhere near them, the NIMBY Syndrome, because they always fail. The one that was supposed to be fool proof for three hundred years? Failed in fourteen. And this waste is radioactive for thousands of years, not hundreds, not decades. The most likely place is the infamous Yucca Mountain site (of course, on Indian land). Guess what? Yucca Mountain is in the midst of an actively volcanic region sitting on several fault lines. Comforting. Very comforting. It's only a matter of time before the Colorado River is hopelessly contaminated, eliminating the supply of drinking water for much of Nevada, Arizona, parts of northern Mexico, etc. And that's with the stuff we already have.

So, aside from the cost in the form of subsidies and the inherent risks associated with mining and storage, what do we do about the waste? There is absolutely no such thing as waste free nuclear energy. Even if you never had to mine another gram of uranium. Even if you never had to take any more uranium to a processing plant for refining. Even if all you had to do was build the plants, fuel 'em up, and flip the switch, there will be waste to deal with. Radioactive waste. So-called "spent" fuel rods are highly radioactive and deadly. Even with the seemingly magical "reprocessing" that McCain refers to there is more than enough radioactive waste from a single power plant to kill every person on earth. Seriously. I'm not kidding about that. What are we supposed to do with the waste from forty more plants? If you think too many people are dying from cancer now, just wait. Within fifty years cancer rates will skyrocket and even the Government will have trouble blaming it on something other than exposure to radioactive materials. If you want to talk about a "Silent Killer," radiation more than fits the bill.

There is no such thing as safe nuclear power.

Senate Resolution 636: McCain's Cynical Trickery

There are new ads out urging voters to call and urge Sen. Barack Obama to stand up and support Senate resolution 636. What a crock of shit. This cynical piece of fluff is the brainchild of Sen. Joe "I'm In The Closet, Don't Bother Me" Lieberman and Sen. John "You Can't Question Me, I'm a Former P.O.W.!" McCain. And what does this landmark waste of time accomplish? It "acknowledges" the "success" of the almighty SURGE (that's an energy drink, isn't it?). Oh, yeah, and, um, while we're at it, let's add in a very special "thanks to the troops." The whole thing is a cynical, disgusting ploy to try and force Sen. Obama to "admit" that the surge has worked--which is only true in John McCain's head. Sure, the surge accomplished some military points, as even Obama admits; however, the purpose, or "goal" of the surge was to effect political stability and resolution between the various Iraqi factions. Mission not accomplished. McCain, who hasn't bothered to show up for work the last several months and has missed at least one truly important vote on alternative energy (it literally lost by one vote), had someone who can still actually function mentally--albeit in an evil fashion--come up with this idiocy as yet another unfair attack on Barack Obama. The Republican/Repugnant 527 group "Vets for Freedom" group are responsible for this horse shit. (How any intelligent vet could vote for a man who has done nothing but work against veterans is a never ending mystery to me. But these aren't intelligent vets, these are "Vets for Freedom." Yeah. Right.) How does it work? Well, if Obama doesn't vote for it or doesn't show up for the vote McCain and Dumbfuck, er, I mean Lieberman, will start howling that Obama hates the troops, doesn't appreciate the troops, is unpatriotic, and doesn't believe we should thank the troops for their service. How do these evil douche bags get away with this shit? It pisses me off to no end.

Oracle By Bike

I decided to turn a recent training ride into more of a mini-tour; I took photos, checked out the sights, did some geocaching, and had a generally good time. I was surprised by how many roadside "memorials" there are out there. This is essentially a 30 mile stretch of road, and as you can see, there are quite a few. There are also a couple of photos of a dead coyote with his tongue hanging out. You never saw that in The Roadrunner, did you? The other thing is the coyote gourds. I used to see all kinds of them along the way here. This time around I was surprised to only find one little patch with three ruined gourds in it. I did find a pretty nice patch on the other side of the road coming back, though. I grabbed four nice ones. The idea is to dry them out and then decorate them. I have brought them home before for the same purpose but Joan keeps throwing them away on me! Here are my pics from my "tour":

WE Campaign Ad, "Free US" / Electric Cars

The folks over at We can solve it, the people who run the "We" campaign (of which I am a member) have a new ad out. [You can view it here]. It's called Free US. It kind of bugs me, though. It basically asks the government to act as a methadone clinic and do it all for us. It fails to really put the onus on us. Sure, it says "we demand," but we're not petulant children. Come on. If we really want change we have to actually start taking the steps. Conserve. Use alternative forms of transportation (public transit, walking, biking, etc.). Put our money where our mouths are and buy the most efficient vehicles available. Etc., etc. We can't just whine for the government to take responsibility for us and make everything A-OK. It just isn't going to happen. It hasn't yet. We've known this day was coming and we did nothing. We went blissfully along our way expecting the government to take care of it for us. Well, that doesn't happen. Washington has proven that over and over again. Their idea is to drill, drill, drill--supposedly in addition to developing the alternative energy sources they claim aren't yet ready for prime time. But all they will do if we allow this path is drill, drill, drill until there isn't anything left. And then they'll think about developing those alternatives they've been paying lip service to.

A good example is the electric car. According to Washington and Detroit, the technology isn't there yet. The batteries don't work. So on and so forth. Never mind that we had them once and they worked great. That doesn't count. All the people who drove them and loved them? Delusional. Mistaken. Washington, under the Bush administration, has been funneling money into Detroit for "research and development." Only problem is, there were no strings attached. They didn't actually have to produce anything beyond vaporware (i.e., Chevy Dolt...er...I mean Volt). Never mind that a company like Phoenix Motor Cars is already producing electric cars that are currently available and rated at over one hundred miles on a charge (two and a half what Chevy is promising from the I'llbelieveitwhenIseeit Volt). They go from 0-60 in 10 seconds, too. These aren't little tin cans, either. They're nice cars.

So what's Detroit's problem? I don't suppose it's something that rhymes with effin OIL. Hell, they can't even get their heads around higher CAFE standards, how do we expect them to actually do something good for America? There was a time, back before America stopped holding itself up to a higher standard, when this wouldn't have happened. At one point Detroit would have freaked if they knew foreign auto makers were producing better cars with higher mileage. They would have put out a car that outdid all of them. But those days are gone. Now they just whine and ask the government to increase import tariffs on foreign automakers and they cling to big trucks and SUVs because they can still be competitive there.

Why doesn't someone go into Detroit and say, "Look, people, fuck the Big Three. You have plenty of empty factories. You have plenty of unemployed auto workers. You have the skills and the know-how. Here's what we can do for you. Let's build some cars." Couple that with a government that's more inclined to support real alternatives rather than the status quo of the Big Three and Big Oil and it could be one hell of a revolution.

Vote accordingly.

More Culinary Adventures

Before I left on vacation we cleaned out the pantry and came across a lifetime supply of rice paper spring roll wrappers. Well, again, on the plane, I had a brainstorm. Peanut butter and jelly spring rolls! Well, I came home and decided I should give them a whirl.

I mixed my Laura Scudder's natural crunchy peanut butter with some homemade plum jam (courtesy my friend Ken!) and dropped it into the moistened wrappers, folded them up, and voila! Peanut butter and jelly spring rolls.

And they were delicious.

Contemporary Modern Art

Part One, Defined.

I just spent a few days in La Jolla, California. While wandering the streets of La Jolla with my wife, we ventured into a handful of galleries. Many of these galleries proclaim themselves to be purveyors of fine Contemporary Modern Art. I started wondering exactly what this moniker actually meant. In the process I've decided on a sure fire way to identify if a piece of "art" is contemporary modern art or not. This method may not guarantee you will identify all art that is professionally labeled as "modern," but it will guarantee you that any art you personally identify as "modern" is, in fact, truly contemporary modern art.

If you are looking at a piece of "art" and the first thought in your head, the first words from your lips, are: What the F? You, my friend, are gazing upon Contemporary Modern Art of the highest order!

Since I just took off in a jet, I had the thought, in much the same way, most airplane crashes--for the passengers aboard anyway--almost always qualify as Contemporary Modern Art. Given the right situations we can go through life finding Contemporary Modern Art almost anywhere. Keep your eyes open for examples of this fine "found art" form. Anytime you catch yourself saying, or even thinking, "What the F?" just remember that you are in the presence of art.

Part Two, Nothing.

There's a big expanse of nothing. Lots of them, actually. Expanses. Of nothing. We never notice them, though, so we don't even realize they are there--be it in the comfort of our climate-controlled automobiles or sitting and sipping a cocktail in the pressurized cabin of a jet. Our every need is met and there is no challenge or hardship in travel. Maybe there should be. There certainly used to be. All of those homesteaders, miners, and pioneers could not stop off at the nearest exit, pull in to the Fast Foodplex Plus and grab a Starbucks and a triple cheeseburger with fries. Many of them never even made it due to disease, lack of water, even starvation or predation by other people. Imagine how much more we would appreciate our San Diego beach adventures if first we had to run a gauntlet of danger and duress, making our way of our own accord across hundreds of miles of open desert and rugged mountainous passes.

Looking down from 30,000 feet, club soda in hand and a book propped on my drop-down tray table, I see an odd strip of farmland. There in the deserts of western Arizona, large green circles spread out along the landscape in a swath of controlled lushness. Crops are grown in round fields to accomodate rotational sprinklers that pump water and turn in slow, lazy circles, creating unnaturally green dots across the desert. Some of these big green alien pies have a piece cut out, be it a sprinkler arm that goes back and forth in a three-hundred and forty degree arc, just short of a full circle, or some other unknown reason. Without irrigation nothing of use could grow here. Each lush green circle is an artifice. And that's the odd thing.

These "farms" stretch out for many, many miles in a narrow line that follows, presumeably, the Central Arizona Project (CAP), the water supply system that snakes over three-hundred miles across the state delivering Colorado river water to the farms and ever-growing cities of Arizona. You see these circles of varying shades of green and reddish tones, some brilliant green, some dull and nearly earthtone, stretching out. It's vastly long. But it's not wide.

As I said, this strip of farming circles goes for what seems hundreds of miles--it's so hard to judge distance from 30,000 feet in the air--but it can't be more than a quarter of a mile wide. I'd be surprised if it's that wide. And at the edges, this artificial greenery simply melts away and dissolves into rocky, rugged desert. The edges are literally fuzzy and indistinct. You look down upon this thing, this snaking spine of circular farmland; you see the narrowness of it, the crumbling edges being nibbled away by the voracious appetite of the awaiting desert; you look down and you say to yourself, "What the F?" Arizona's version of Contemporary Modern Art.

Agua en El Aeropuerto

Airport water is never all that good. I don't really have all that much to say about it, just that it's, as I've said, never all that good. You can buy bottled water. That all tastes the same. Or, rather, doesn't taste the same, if you get my drift. But I steer clear of bottled water. If my life was at stake, sure, give me an effin Fiji Aquafina, Poland Springs, Arrowhead Springs, I don't care. Just give me some water. But I've yet to be in that situation so I try not to buy bottled water.

What I do is bring an empty water bottle through security. I have yet to have anyone even bat an eye at this (though I was blocked from bringing an empty, see through, open water bottle into a minor league ball park--but that's another story). I then fill the bottle up at the drinking fountain before boarding the plan. This works very well and it's a lot better than buying bottled water. Cheaper, too.

But, no matter how different water supplies may be, airport water generally tastes the same--bad. Like old well water. I don't know if well water actually changes flavor as it sits and ages, but I have to say that this is the only way I can imagine describing the taste of airport water. But I still drink it. It gives me one more thing to look forward to as I travel--the taste of water home-filtered and ready to be drunk by a thirsty guy like me.

Petco Park, San Diego

We went to Petco Park last night to watch the Arizona Diamondbacks play the San Diego Padres. Unfortunately, the Friars managed to break their streak and beat us--but that's almost to be expected because we were at the game!


That said, it's a really nice park. An outdoor stadium near the water, right at the "foot" of the Gaslamp District, the park is well-situated and very nicely arranged. It is supposedly set up with the seating in "neighborhoods."








They have even incorporated a warehouse into the design--whether or not this was an actual warehouse at one time or simply a design feature (which I suspect it is), it makes for a nice look. It hearkens back to the old stadiums which always seemed to be tucked into industrial warehouse districts.





Like most modern ball parks, Petco has an excellent concession system. You can get everything from a $6 slice of pizza (yes, slice of pizza, no more than 5" wide) to a $9 beer. I'm not kidding. This is a standard cheap disposable plastic cup of beer--what? 12 ounces? Miller Genuine Draft. You can practically buy a twelve pack for that kind of money. I actually ended up with a bargain, sort of. I grabbed a veggie burger--a veggie burger! At a ball park!--for $6. It didn't come with fries or anything but it was a decent burger of decent size and quality at a, surprise! surprise!, decent price.

But, all in all, Petco is a really nice park and a great place to watch a game. You can't beat the weather, the location, any of it. Sure, it would have been great if the DBacks won the game while we were there, but we hardly expect them to win when we're at a game. Yes, they were three games in the lead in the NL West. Yes, they had just trounced San Diego when they played them at home. Yes, San Diego had been on a bit of a losing streak. You'd think the DBacks would win as a matter of course. Ha! All bets are off when we're in the house.