GM is dead. long live GM.
June 1st, 2009So general motors went bankrupt today. It’s probably past time for them to reorganize and shed so much of the bloat that has distended the company over the years, but it’s kind of sad that some of the classic brands are on the chopping block (or have already been discontinued).
my first and only car was a GM car. It was a cherry red 1990 pontiac sunbird, that my parents surprised me with after I got my drivers license. Of course, living in the public-transportation-less suburbs at the time, the car was as much a gift from my working full-time parents to themselves, seeing that it was a fucking pain in the ass to get me home from school on most days given my participation in multiple after-school activities. That car took me through high school in rockland county, college in buffalo and law school in philadelphia before I moved to NYC and didn’t need (nor want) the responsibility of a car anymore. Then it passed to my brother for some period of time (his “spirited” driving churned through a few cars in his time), and then a few years ago, my dad traded it to a guy in exchange for a paint job on our barn up in the berkshires. As far as we’re aware, that guy is still driving it around. other than the color, it wasn’t a particularly exciting car, but I loved it all the same. It broke down incredibly infrequently, and (mysteriously) only when I was home from school so that my dad was available to deal with the problem. And said breakdowns usually involved something as simple as the battery dying YEARS after it’s expected life had run out. It was the last year that GM made cars out of steel instead of fiberglass, so driving through the snow in buffalo was a snap. That thing was heavy. Of course, my heavy doors (it was a 2-door) would be frozen shut every morning, so I have some not so fond memories of hurling my entire body against the door in the morning in order to unstick them and get to school. I never did learn that it might be a good idea to keep the defrosting solution somewhere other than inside the car.
Of course, I know why they killed pontiac. in reality, they were the same cars as chevrolets, but with a little less brand cache (except for the classic firebirds and GTOs). In fact, in college, my friend Vic had a chevy cavalier, in the exact same color as my pontiac, and we used to park them next to each other as a joke. because they were identical.
Still. it made me a little sad. Here’s hoping that GM can pull out of this bankruptcy leaner and more efficient. and, of course, that they start making cars that people want to buy again.
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tragedy in Kansas
May 31st, 2009today, one of the heroes of the pro-choice movement and women everywhere, Dr. George Tiller, was murdered in cold blood in the lobby of his church.
Dr. Tiller was on of three (three!) doctors in the entire country who performed late-term abortions. These are a miniscule percentage of the abortions performed, and are almost exclusively done for medical/health reasons. Now we’re down to two. In the entire nation.
Of course, this event has me reflecting on my days many years ago as a clinic escort in Buffalo, which was (at one point) the epicenter of anti-choice nutcases in America:
Side note: when I was in college, I did volunteer work for the Pro-Choice Network of Western New York, spending my Saturday mornings working as an escort at one of the local women’s clinics in town. On a regular basis, we received physical threats from protesters, and my “job” pretty much consisted of using my body as a shield so that women could get inside the clinic relatively unscathed. Right before I graduated, we got a new doctor, and I remember that others were worried because he had appeared on one of those internet “hit lists”, meaning that the clinic was going to have an even bigger profile. A year after I graduated, that doctor was shot dead in his kitchen in front of his family. I think I didn’t realize until that point just how dangerous standing up for my constitutional rights could be.
Tomorrow, I’m going to sit down and figure out which worthy organization is going to get some of my money.
Posted in crazy people, current events, feminism, politics and law | Comments (0)
the NY Times travel section is stalking me…
May 8th, 2009not really, but this is definitely weird.
A few years ago, I thought it was incredibly fortuitous timing that they published a travel article on spending the weekend in Paris mere days before I went to Paris. crazy, convenient coincidence, right?
But now it’s just getting creepy. I’m going to Philly next weekend for my 10-year law school reunion, and what do they publish this morning? Yep…36 hours in Philadelphia.
In all seriousness though, I’m not sure why they thought it was a good idea to encourage people to visit philadelphia in mid-may, which is the height of graduation/reunion frenzy. The few remaining hotels that aren’t booked solid are probably either incredibly sketchy or have super-exorbitant prices. But I’ll probably print out the ideas on the off-chance that I’ve got some downtime somewhere in my reunion-weekend schedule.
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rain, rain, go away…
May 2nd, 2009
(what I’m anticipating for tomorrow, yet again…)
My allergies are happy that it’s finally raining and washing away some of the pollen that’s invaded the city over the last week (when I left my apartment last saturday morning, the trees were still bare. By yesterday, they were in full bloom thanks to the heat wave earlier this week). The rest of me, however? not so much…
I’m doing the 5 boro bike tour tomorrow, and it’s looking like it’s going to be a rehash of the MS ride from last fall, without the possibility that the sun will come out at some point during the day. Could get ugly.
I was going to try to find some biking rain gear for tomorrow, but if I can’t find anything good, I remembered that I bought a waterproof windbreaker that’s not particularly aerodynamic when I was down in Roatan in January, because it rained every day while I was there. So that’s a backup plan (a backup plan that could result in disaster if it’s windy, but still…a plan). Unlike the MS ride, where I not only didn’t wear rain gear, but I wore cotton leggings under my bike shorts because it was cold out, and they didn’t get dry the entire day. That’s a mistake I won’t be making again!
Posted in bitching, cycling, weather | Comments (0)
…and I take a (brief) nostalgia trip to elementary school…
April 25th, 2009The New York Times had an interesting article about the culture clash between different ethnic groups in Rockland County, and how it’s playing out on the school board in the East Ramapo School District. In particular, although the public school community is dominated by hispanics, african-americans, and asians, the board is dominated by orthodox jews, who actually send their children to private school.
What I found most interesting though, was that I grew up in this community. I attended most of elementary school in East Ramapo, and moved in the middle of the 6th grade. Reading the article, I kept wondering which school was being closed, but the article never mentions it (which is a bit odd, no?).
So I did a little internet digging, and discovered that…yep, my elementary school, Colton, is the one on the chopping block. I’d say that this was sad news, but at the same time…I had a horrible time in elementary school (at the hands of certain other students, who picked on me mercilessly, and one particular teacher, who…picked on me mercilessly for the two years I was stuck with her), and generally consider moving to a different school district to be one of the best things that ever happened to me…so there’s that.
It also reminded me of something that played out when I was really young. For kindergarten, i was actually in another elementary school (I can’t remember the name right now), but the school was “closed” and I was moved to colton for the first grade. I put “closed” in quotes, because, as I recall, that school was actually “given” to the orthodox community for a number of years and functioned as a yeshiva school for many years. I don’t remember too much detail (obviously), but I do remember walking the picket line with my mom. I think it got converted back to a public school when I was in college, but I always found it incredibly odd that a public school building was given over to a religious institution. Obviously I don’t know the details, and there was probably rent involved, but I also wonder if the reopening of that school lessened the need for colton.
Posted in current events, miscellaney, politics and law | Comments (0)
floyd bennett field - video
April 21st, 2009On Saturday, I rode with the brooklyn by bike crowd out to floyd bennett field. I’ve still got to organize my (very few) still photographs and put a map together, but here’s the video from the ride! (Best to watch in HQ):
Posted in cycling, movies, new york city | Comments (1)
backlash at the speed of…well…twitter
April 18th, 2009Ok, so I’m late to the twitter game - I started an account not too long ago, and…yeah, in a lot of ways a lot of it is kind of pointlessly entertaining, but I have to take real issue with crap like this. Not because it isn’t true in all circumstances, but because it reduces a service like twitter to its most useless part, and then assumes that everyone pointlessly uses it the same way. Sure, I follow some celebrities because I find them entertaining and whatnot, but I also follow several real friends and, quite frankly, I’ve made new real world friends thanks to twitter, in the very short amount of time i’ve been on the service. Here’s how that worked…
A few weeks back, I twittered something about cycling in NY. Someone who was looking for other NY cyclists found me and started following me. So I followed her back (hey, she posted good bike tips). So then…she organized a bike ride to coney island. Which I, at the very last minute, decided to participate in. I had a blast, met some great people, and made some new friends. who then proceeded to follow me (and vice versa) on twitter so that we could keep in touch easily. Today, we met up for another (yes, real life) bike ride out to red hook, and it was another blast (and heck, when a few people got stuck with a flat tire, we actually used twitter to try to find each other). So rather than the alienation that people seem to think is inevitable from each new social networking site, I spent the beautiful day today out of doors, on my bike, with 20 other like-minded people who I would have never in a million years met in any other way.
Each of these things is a tool. How one chooses to use them is really dependent on the individual. People who trend towards loneliness and alienation may continue down that path, but it’s because they already had that propensity. twitter didn’t make them that way.
I’m a loner by nature. When I was a kid, I was often much happier in my room with my nose buried in a book. And many of my closest friends (who I do see as often as we are able to make plans) have kids and stuff going on which makes it a bit harder to drop everything and go get a drink (and they’re certainly not bike fanatics like me). A lot of the “burying in a book” mentality has perhaps transferred to electronic media, but at the same time, if that media didn’t exist, I would have most likely spent my day today by myself. Maybe I would have gone for a bike ride, by myself, but knowing myself better than that, I would have spent half the day vegging out on my couch before I thought to go outside and enjoy the sunny 77-degree day.
I’m sorry, but the catastrophic “[insert latest technology] is destroying all of our social skills and making us all [narcissists/nihilists/sociopaths]” has just got to stop.
Posted in bitching, technology | Comments (1)
things I did not know about youtube
April 9th, 2009so, as I mentioned the other day when I posted stuff from coney island, there was no sound on the video of our ride down there. In actuality, I had added a soundtrack from my iTunes library (Fatboy Slim’s “Build It Up, Tear It Down”), but not 3 seconds after the video got uploaded, I got a notice from youtube that my video may contain copyright-protected elements. So rather than tempt fate (and the RIAA), I removed the music and uploaded a slightly less interesting noiseless version. This morning, due to my “early waking” insomnia, I was checking out my video states, and, while looking at all the buttons, I noticed something called “audioswap”. so I checked it out. My original song choice wasn’t in there, but I found one that accompanied the video pretty well (appropriately titled “bicycle rider”), and I added it in. At the moment it’s still processing, but it should be good in a few minutes. Same link.
Posted in cycling, movies, new york city | Comments (0)
photos from coney island
April 7th, 2009In addition to the video I put together last night, I did also take some actual pictures during the stops on our ride. I included a few of these at the tail end of the video, but, due to the conversion process, the quality is not so good. Here they are in all of there originalness.
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coney island ride, 2009
April 6th, 2009This past Sunday, I decided to be adventurous and meet up with some folks that I had only previously “met” on Twitter. In particular, brooklyn by bike had organized a ride from grand army plaza to coney island, and since it was such a beautiful day, I decided to join her (and almost 20 other people) on the ride. It was great. I actually biked down from my apartment to grand army plaza before the official ride, so I had 10 miles down before we got started. I also decided to finally experiment with my “homemade” camera mount on my bike, which is essentially just one of those gorillapod tripods wrapped around my handlebars with my canon point and shoot attached. The footage ended up not being too bad, and once I sped it up so that you could see the entire trip in under 5 minutes (and turned the volume way down low so that your speakers aren’t destroyed by the overwhelming wind sounds and our sped up chipmunks-on-crack talking), it’s kind of fun to watch. I was going to set it to music, but youtube has gotten really good at spotting things that need licenses and, well, I’m not creating my own track, so it’s got little to no sound. There are also some still pictures at the end of the group. Enjoy!
UPDATE: new soundtrack added via youtube’s audioscan service. all legal and everything!
and, if anyone’s interested, here’s a map of my trip from the upper west side to coney island. I skipped mapping the trip back to prospect park, since we followed the same route down (having trouble embedding from google maps at the moment, so a static image will have to suffice). Red line was my solo ride to brooklyn, orange is the group ride down to the beach. And I would totally do this again!
Posted in cycling, good things, new york city, weather | Comments (1)
at least I got out of the house
March 30th, 2009Even though I don’t need to go in regularly anymore, I still use my office/phone/computer for the time being, largely as a resource to help me find another job. I’ve been trying to go in for a few hours a day, a few days a week, just because I can be more focused in the things I need to do while I’m there, without the distractions of home (TV, kitchen, bed, TV, etc.). Last week, due to some interview-related stuff, I didn’t get in as much as normal, and yesterday (sunday) I managed to not even change out of my pajamas for the entire day. So after the gym this morning, I decided it would be good to go in for the afternoon, buckle down, and get some stuff done. And also see people, which is always a nice perk since I like the people I work(ed) with.
So I get into the office at about 12:30, to discover that there’s a giant flood. some sort of water tank cracked on the 27th floor, and caused hundreds of gallons of water to flood all the way down to 21. I’m on 25. So the first hour I was in was spent avoiding the leaky ceiling and putting out trash bins to keep the carpet outside my office from getting (more) wet.
Then, of course, I discovered that, due to the flooding, our internet node was completely trashed, so I (and my secretary) had no internet/email/network access. So…I went to lunch. When I got back an hour later, there was still no network access, so I went home for the day (stopping off for groceries on the way home).
All in all, that may have been the most unproductive 4 hours of my life. and I spent $4 on the bus there and back. According to a message I just got, the network is now back up, so we’ll try this again tomorrow…
Like I said though, at least it forced me to shower and leave the house. Plus, the schadenfreude. that was pretty enjoyable.
Posted in bitching, miscellaney | Comments (0)
the best interviewer working in TV
March 13th, 2009I know that Jon Stewart constantly repeats the refrain that he’s a fake newsperson, and that he shouldn’t be taken seriously, but I think that he’s the only one working in journalism today that’s willing to ask these questions. Going all the way back to Thomas Nast’s cartoons (or, quite frankly, the fool in King Lear), it’s often the “clown”, the comedian, the joker who is the only one who is willing to speak truth to power. It’s couched in humor, but one has to wonder why Stewart is the only one who is willing to dig deep on these issues, while the “real” journalists do nothing more than serve as mouthpieces for the industries/administrations that they cover. Oh, and I’d be surprised if the SEC didn’t begin to investigate Cramer for market manipulation based on those clips that were dug up where Cramer admits that he’s pumping stocks.
Full, uncensored interview clips of Part 1 (and please enjoy the schadenfreude of these clips being sponsored by Bank of America). Part 2 and Part 3 can be viewed at the Daily Show’s website (had problems with embedding).
Posted in crazy people, current events, television | Comments (0)
r.i.p.
March 8th, 2009well, Circuit City is officially dead. I think I’d be more upset about losing one of the major computer outlets in my neighborhood if they weren’t complete jerks every time I walked into one of their stores. And lest you think those two links contradict each other, please note that, in both cases, the salespeople were not interested in actually serving me, the customer, be it by answering my questions or by leaving me alone when I specifically point out that I’m just browsing.
The only thing that actually bothers me is that they literally just opened up a store in the old tower records location near lincoln center less than one year ago. Here’s hoping the space can find another (decent) tenant soon.
Posted in current events, shopping, technology | Comments (0)
how i’m keeping up with the financial crisis…
March 8th, 2009You might think that I’m all up on what’s going on with the economy. I mean, I work(ed) in corporate finance and everything. But the massiveness of what’s been going on has utterly confounded just about everyone I know. And no one knows what the hell a credit-default swap is. All in all, I’ve found that the guys over at NPR have really gone out of their way to make the entire thing understandable. Last week, they put together the third in their ongoing series of This American Life episodes on this crisis, bad bank. This is a follow up from the first episode, giant pool of money, and their first follow up, another frightening show about the economy. You can download the current episode for free, and the archived shows cost 95 cents to download, which is totally worth it.
In addition, the guys who put together these shows have a podcast that airs three days a week and a companion blog, planet money.
If you want a clearer understanding of what’s going on, I highly recommend all of these. Heck, the podcast guys got an interview with Geithner last week that’s been cited all over the interweb.
Posted in current events, good things | Comments (0)
roatan, honduras
February 26th, 2009I’m getting better. It has only taken me one month to sort through my photos and get them posted on the site. Pictures from my diving trip to Roatan are now available for viewing. In addition, I shot some underwater video on my camera, which I’m including here. The first part is just your general diving experience, getting to sound like darth vader. The remainder is from the dolphin dive that I had the opportunity to do. which was pretty awesome.
Posted in diving, movies, photos, travel | Comments (0)