Only two more weeks (and some change) until i'm headed to New York! I'm busy reading maps and googling for H&M locations and Apple stores with free internet access, so the minute i step out of the cab onto the streets of the Upper East Side (my surrogate home for 6 fleeting days) i can discard like yesterday’s fish papers all the stupid, confused tourist questions and slide right in with the “normal" newyorkers… at least until i stop mid-block to gawk at something taller than 30 stories and am assaulted by a thousand elbows.

I've been diligently scrolling about on a Google map and trying to memorize neighborhoods (Greenwich Village is between 14th St and Houston) and points of interest (the Flatiron is at the intersection of 5th and Broadway), but i get distracted every, oh, 5 seconds with something else, like subway tunnel construction, or the Beaux Arts architectural style, or the capacity of Yankee stadium (58000). Between Google and the Wikipedia, there is no stone i cannot turn upside its head. Apparently there’s like a whole chunk of the interweb dedicated to NYC (who knew?) chock full of goodies for me to seek out.

It’s also full of lies, outright lies! I submit this Craigslist posting to the court as Exhibit A. It’s an apartment in Hell’s Kitchen but that’s not the kitchen that concerns me… it’s the one in the apartment! Sure, it’s tiny, occupying less space than an armchair and small, matching ottoman. But this is probably only a 135 sq ft apartment, considering the rent and its proximity to the Amish Market (well Smear Joshua all over with jam a piece of bread, nawonce!) and there needs to be room left over for a small color television, a modest dresser, purposefully yet needlessly strewn-about clothing, a thin rattan sleeping mat, and one of those clickety typewriters with which to write the great American novel. Oh, and an empty bottle of cheap gin. On its side.

Look closely, however, and you'll see where the truth in advertising police have been sleeping on the job: “chef`s kitchen with new appliances". Ok, chef’s kitchen? I know a couple chefs, they would cut off their own ears with an improperly-sharpened fillet knife if that phrase reached their ears when describing a mini fridge, 18″ of counter space and a stove that my toaster could beat up. And those appliances are not new… the stove has knobs! Knobs, people! New appliances are shiny and have buttons, and generally possess more CPU horsepower than space shuttle Discovery. The kicker: “ample cupboard space". There are three. Three is not ample; three is several. Three is a few. Modest is 5-8, Plentiful is more than 10. Ample means a whole girl scout troup could play hide and seek in your apartment and no one would have to hide inside the dryer. “Ample cupboard space" does not fit in the back of a ford taurus station wagon. Have i made my point here?

Now I know after i've done such a nice job of selling this place to all of you, you're going to race to the phone and try to secure it for yourselves. That’s why i was crafty enough to delete the important contact details - this one’s all mine, baby! Now if i could just find my typewriter and a shoebox to pack all my kitchen things in, i'd be all ready to relocate for that fabulous job in a Chelsea design studio…

Technorati Tags: new york, craigslist

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I can see my breath this morning at the bus stop. There’s a distinct possibility that it’s actually fall. … Let it snow!

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"Without beaches we'd be Nebraska" - bus advertisement for coastal water quality

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So as i mentioned in my wireless post from the international district bus tunnel station, i rode the bus tunnel one last time before the eternal 2-year closure for some light rail project thingy that i don't remember voting for (that’s because it’s private - even tho it’s receiving public funding assistance - augh, let’s not start that). Anywho, i had a quiet lunch to myself of lobster bisque and Groove Armada and pondered Seattle’s mass transit future. Also, i bought that belt i needed. ;)

I found a map on the Sound Transit site that gave me a good laugh. Check it out. You'll notice there are 5 different train-type systems overlapping each other - light rail, full-scale rail, monorail (both vintage and proposed) and trolley car - and all trying to serve a different, niche need. Throw 1,183 buses into the mix along with 5 or 6 taxicabs, close 3rd avenue and parts of 5th to non-bus traffic, and it’s going to be a very confusing and inefficient two years. Of course the complexity will come down quite a bit if the SMP Green Line is never built, which is apparently how the mayor and city council would like to see things go. I live-blogged the council meeting a bit over on 2045 Seattle for all those who were likely still trying to install RealPlayer (it had never seemed useful before…). I think there were some council members who were genuinely saddened by the vote and the discussion around it, as they had at some point believed in the monorail project. Apparently the arguments presented outweighed their faith in the dream, however, as the council voted unanimously on a resolution that would withdraw city support for the SMP. As the council president said, the only power they really have over the project is their ability to grant permits for use of city right-of-way, and for zoning and construction, and that is the tool they will wield to hold back an elevated future. They are also asking the state legislature to wither the SMP’s funding source via a revocation of the previously voter-approved vehicle licensing addendum.

I'm one of many very disappointed to see the monorail get shot down like this after so much hard work and struggle, and i don't think the voters of Seattle - who have passed via majority four different referendums supporting the monorail - will be pleased at the polls. I don't purport to know the details of the SMP’s funding debacle, nor will i try to assess their trustworthiness or fitness for the task at hand, but i do feel confident assuming that even despite their shortcomings they must have learned a great deal about monorails, mass transit, and Seattle’s chances of escaping gridlock hell and i hope that precious research doesn't die with the SMP’s bankroll. If anything is ever going to come of this city’s 7 zillion different transportation initiatives and if those plethora of tiny solutions to localized problems is ever going to organize and regroup as a consistent regional strategy, we at least need to be able to learn from our mistakes as a collective community and not keep starting from zero.

I'd like to see everything the Seattle Monorail Project has gathered, from environmental studies to financial statements to blueprints to swatches of seat fabrics, be made public and readily available so that all of us may be more well-informed the next time our one-track (pipe) dream shows up on the ballot. Because there will be a next time.

Technorati Tags: seattle, monorail, 2045 seattle

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Taking a ride uptown for lunch, using the bus tunnel one last time before it closes tonite for the next two years for a light-rail retrofit, relegating the buses to downtown surface streets in a migraine-inducing chaos. I was supposed to make this trip today with some coworkers but missed them because i was at my desk watching the live feed of the city council meeting where they withdrew city support for the monorail project. How ironic is that?

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A great night with two of my favorite people in the world. And a nice fall evening spent in the city, something i don't do nearly enough.

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Dad’s in town for work, so Danielle and i met him for drinks at Edgewater & dinner at Anthony’s, his treat! Great to see him on our own turf.

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So many good pictures on the web this week, i hardly feel bad that i still haven't posted mine from like two weeks ago. But let’s just skip right over that, shall we? No sense in dwelling on the past, or the impossible.

I'd like to jump right in with some current events. Brian, Katie, Charla, Joseph and i were just talking at lunch today about my totally hot LED belt buckle that i never wear cause i have yet to find a belt that looks right with it (the right combination of urban hipster fashionista and punk rock geek, preferably in black leather) and that reminded me of this little diddy, the NES Controller belt buckle that i would totally love, but probably also wouldn't wear, cause the less i attract eyes to the flab around my midsection, the better.

Sure, if you're a twentysomething in the city, a flashy belt buckle will make all your friends think you're cool, but how about a little something for the retired set, specifically the retired set that can afford to spend 300G’s on a pleasure craft? How do they impress their friends when wintering down in arizona? Why, by inviting guests up to the second floor of their motorhome, of course! Egads! Yes, that’s right folks, it’s fully equipped with a DVD home theatre, washer/dryer, two (count them! two!) air conditioners and a Caterpillar diesel engine pushing 860 ft/lbs of torque - hopefully that’s enough to move 41,000 lbs to a freeway speed. And in true James Bond fashion, the rooftop patio extends and retracts (sans the umbrellas, which must be - ugh - manually raised and lowered, something usually handled at home by the help) via fully automatic hydraulic actuators. Yes, it’s a softtop winnebago… except it’s the size of an aircraft carrier and built by Airstream. You know, if i was 60 and i could afford it, i would totally rock this baby all the way.

Oookay… enough of that consumerist madness. Let’s slow it down a bit, take a step back from the whizbang marketing, and pay attention to the people around us, here, right now. Let’s get a little artsy. I'm gonna go all Simon Hoegsberg on you… with a photo montage called The Thought Project. Basically, he walks up to people on the street and snaps their photo really-really close up, capturing their preoccupied, distant and/or detached expression with some interesting lighting effects and what is apparently a much nicer camera than any i have ever tactiley encountered. Then he jots down their answer to the question “what were you thinking just now, before i took your picture?" and attaches that to their image. I think most of them are in his home country of Denmark, and it must have been winter (or the lighting) because most of them look cold. Doesn't make them any less cool to look at, but would explain some of the red noses.

As long as we're venturing into foreign countries that may or may not be ridiculously cold at any given time of year, let’s talk about my favorite faraway freezerbox, Moscow. That most famous of soviet cities is apparently just packed to the gills with old junk waiting to be photographed, as evidenced by this latest gallery of nifty b/w images, appropriately posted at www.abandoned.ru. There’s a recurring theme here; most of the gallery sections have either “abandoned" or “unfinished" in the name, engendering a bleakness and economic collapse that i'm morbidly fascinated with as a (admittedly lackluster) photographer. I could look at these all day. If fact, that’s pretty much what i do, when i'm not playing Hamlet, the game or polaroidonizing photos for youz guyz.

To wrap things up, let’s turn the microscope back on ourselves and check out some melancholic images of an America turned upside down by WWII, posted by all 280 million of us via our taxdollars at the American Memory gallery. The great images are saddled with a particularly ungainly interface that is difficult to read contrast-wise and sends you thru way too many clicks to find the full size images. If you're using Firefox like a good American (remember, only communists use IE!) and you've installed Greasemonkey like Uncle Sam told you to, then you can use this clever script to update the American Memory site to 2005 standards, whilst leaving the photo trip down memory lane (or, at least, dad’s or grampa’s memory lane) intact. And what could be more American than that?

Technorati Tags: photography, moscow, hoegsberg, airstream, nintendo, wwii

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Sitting down at home for a scrumptious dinner of leftover “steak lovers" pizza from dominoes, which is neither loveable nor steak (even with the 2-dollar double-steak option, now with real beef flavor!), and was the last time i'll order something that sounds weird just because i have a coupon for it. Thankfully the chianti that i'm washing it down with has a pretty good flavor in the scope of under-seven-dollar wines. I actually opened the bottle last night, in anticipation of Danielle coming up to check out the new Sims expansion pack that showed up in the mail, plus my knee hurt from something i apparently did to it saturday - probably climbing in or out of Sean’s boat while out on the lake with him, Julia and her Russian posse, which was a great time as always. As i sat down last night to backup the old game files to a dvd (our Sims data directory is 3.4GB!) and install the game to be all ready for Danielle’s call that she was coming over, i waffled between taking eight ibupofen tablets or opening the wine, and with that new corkscrew from Mom and Dad opening the wine was waaaay faster than rummaging through my work bag for some of the good, name-brand advil with the candy coating. So i went for the wine… more fun to consume than the pills, anyway. On a side note, has anyone else noticed how Advil-brand ibuprofen has a candy coating? Where generic ones are all chalky, the real things taste, well, pretty good. Pills that taste like candy… that’s just good business sense right there.

When Danielle decided to shop for a cocktail dress instead of come over, the wine was already open and the game was all ready to play, so i poured another glass and took Sims Nightlife for a test drive. Half a bottle of chianti later, i felt less guilty about playing the game (which she purchased and had shipped to my house, where our gaming computer is, btw) without her and more upset with myself for ordering that stupid steak pizza just because it was 9.99 when some leftover pizza that could not pass for dogfood was sounding really good.

So tonight i'm reliving the same dining experience, except that the pizza (if one can call it that) is perhaps slightly less pungent a day later, only because it has excreted all of its smell directly into the plastic lining of my refridgerator where the millions of tiny stink particles will make nests, bear offspring and populate my olefactory glands for months to come with every trip into their electrically-chilled domain. I used a fork this time, though… no sense contaminating my fingers with the stuff. I have to go to work tomorrow, after all, and i'm never going to be able to ask that barista out if my hands smell like feet.

It was a fantastic sunny day, the kind that must be cherished before the great rains come and perpetually wash over the city until june sometime. I followed Clint most of the way across the city just because it was so nice to be out driving topless one last time, and took a scenic tour around West Seattle for old time’s sake (and for gas) and wandered home along the viaduct, taking extra care to make lots of noise in the Battery St tunnel before they tear it down and screw up downtown driving in unimaginably horrendous ways. We had a small meet-and-greet in mill creek today, hosting a random assortment of Nissans, Hondas, Acuras (that’s for you, Eric), a couple Subarus, some electro-hoppin' low-slung Lincolns and a Chevy truck on hydraulics that drove out of the lot on three wheels (on purpose). I brought my camera, but didn't even crack the velcro on the bag - i guess i'm burned out taking pictures at car events for this season, just like i'm burned out on weekly detailing for every show and have attended the last two without even washing my car. I'm down to some quick-detailer across the rear bumper where the exhaust dust collects, and a swipe through the dish on the wheels, and i'm ready to be done. Yes, i'm a slacker… but i still received several compliments on how great my paint looked today, and i just smiled and said “thank you" - both for the compliment and to those crazy germans at Klasse for such an incredible wax. Should i mention that i didn't even buff it? Should i let on that i haven't washed the car since practically August? Nah… let them think i have it together… i've got an image to maintain.

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Guys wearing sandals should not paint their toenails.

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