June 30, 2002

The World Cup is over and my feet are in bad shape. My insistence on traversing that last few weeks in a full flip flop fashion has left me nursing a couple bad sores dealt from the makers of cheap plastics. That, and the mosquitoes are on the attack. I can battle most of them but I'm at a horrible disadvantage at six foot four to get to the ones that take their meals on that one hallowed out indent right under the heel bone. Adding insult to injury, I have learned that my immune system isn't all that I thought it was; i have trouble moving the toxins out of my body, the results of which are too gruesome for these pages but lets just say that when the Mosquitoe giveth and taketh the scratch remains for at least a full agonizing week. So, to the ever expanding drug cabinet, I have now added a healthy supply of Flax Seed Oil. I guess it speeds things up, mellows out the lymphatic system, and, taken with the right amount of Duke Ellington on a hot hummer day, jump starts my pores into acting responsibly and more importantly empathetically.

The condition reminds me of Belize during the rainy season, when my feet collected a colony of sores that didn't heal for weeks. This was mostly due to the fact that you can't get anything to dry in the rainforest. My feet didn't even have a sporting chance at recovery until I was safely across the border and into the low-lands of a tepid Guatemala. In the tropics everything just rots and falls apart. Good times.

Belize was hot but not like this heat. Minnesota is the dramatic switch hitter of the National Weather League. I've spent all my money on high powered fans and beer. Window fans. Shotgun fans. Dual exhaust fans. I got 'em all and they are all strategically placed around me right now to produce what one Holmes model calls a "Blizzard". We spend Eight chilled months wishing for summer and the remainder praying for its demise. Huh? To make matters worse, my beer of choice for these impossible afternoons - Premium Lager, is now going to be discontinued as the Pigs Eye/Grain Belt plant is shutting its doors and closing down its taps. So now all I got is these damn fans and ehhh...errr...wine? Yeah well o.k. so my new favorite wine was discovered at Big Top Liquors the other day. The title of the wine is everything I've ever wanted to be but didn't have the guts or the talent to pull off. It's called Fat Bastard. It's a Shiraz from France and goes down smooth and with frankness, especially when served with pasta, salmon or with the good air you breath on a Sunday afternoon. I guess the title is a British term for a damn fine wine, a fact I will now wield mercilessly at all private and public engagements that offer silky elixirs with warm conversations, "Wow Sally. You've got yourself one hellava Fat Bastard there. What this country needs is a good medium-priced Fat Bastard, wouldn't you agree Donald?"

So we pass the time drinking wine, thinking about biking or skateboarding, Miles and Marley, reading the books we hustled from the Library. I love the library. But damn the library is getting to be a wicked place. I think Kelly's about had it with the Library. I'm always off on some wild goose chase to find a book that was checked out in 1977 and never returned or I find out that the book I want has 147 holds on it, which means it might be available sometime in the year 2007 if every one of those 147 people returns their copy. When I catch back up to Kelly she's in Fiction. She begins pointing out, a) the guy with the black beret who keeps following her from stack to stack saying, "oh, isn't it a coincidence that we keep winding up in the same section". No. It's no fucking coincidence. Back the fuck up you pervert. Go back to Florida, And, b) the guy who keeps agreeing ceaselessly with the voices in his head, "hhmm - yes, oh yes, hhmm, mmmhhmm, excuse me do you know where the best places to work in Oregon are? I'm really looking to work for the best place in Oregon...uh huh, oh-yes, mmmhhmm." And lets not forget about the middle aged men locked behind the doors of the "quiet room" talking on two cell phones at one time. Just what the hells going on in there? They are clearly not reading. I'm determined to ask next time.

I read Philip K. Dick's The Minority Report after being won over by the theatrical rendition last weekend. It's good stuff. I like Philip K. Dick because he's a science fiction writer that doesn't write science fiction and he doesn't write about the future. It all feels present.

I also enjoyed reading this interview with Chris Locke (I have his book on hold at the library). It put together a few of the missing pieces of a little puzzle I've been trying to put together now for the last Three years. Now if I can only find the others pieces.

June 28, 2002

Gnats.
Everywhere.
I am under siege.

Every bike commute this week is a galactic battle with a trillion tiny Cylon warriors determined to make my mouth the final frontier of the 2002 gnat dynasty. Worse yet, they are not alone. They move amongst planets - small puffy air based satellites that fall like soft hailstorms. They are the product of cottonwood trees. It comes in waves. My morning meteor shower navigation through the storm of cotton balls and gnat colonies is plenty work for the day.

This morning I saw the chalk drawing too. They live amongst us. People are telling each other in the most ancient codex available that the battle will be fought on all frontiers. They are the "sign" people and they support the digital world and spread the message with low tech weapons undetectable by traditional radar systems. Know your neighborhood. Learn to play THIS game. I know my airport is supported and accessible. I've seen it in the hieroglyphics just down the block.

Chuck D knew it. He lived and wrote about it. Caught the movement when it was still pushing people over just to see if they would fall. He's on a slightly more obscure path now but the adroit will still listen and see his motivation in casting rhymes in pine tar and the deep worn leather of a thousand pastimes. His next shit is forecasting the rise of a new baseball anthem. His relevance will be proven:

"If baseball comes to a halt, this summer or next spring or any time, here's a plan: We all get old-school boomboxes and stand outside the owners' offices holding them over our heads and blasting "Fight the Power," like John Cusack in "Say Anything," when he's trying to wear down Ione Skye and appeal to her better, truer, angels."

Just like Herbie can't forget about Miles, we can't forget about Chuck. Some of us owe him (and Miles) our lives.

Some days things seem so clear. Maybe it's the gnats. Maybe they whisper truisms and wisdom in my ears just before they're killed and wiped away by my giant and annoyed finger. That's the only explanation. Why do Mosquitoes buzz in your ear? It's cause your not fucking listening to what they are saying!

I think they told me that AIBO is the way. Man, I'm totally into these things. I know I slept on 'em and they are old news but damn I want one. Hell one? I want a whole flock, a gaggle, an army. If you aren't convinced, watch the movie "picnic" on the Japanese site and your shit will be looking to fill your house with 'em. Maybe you can find 'em at the humane society. The real headz have already programmed (or trained) theirs to take advantage of the Sony open code that allows you to program your metallic canine with the ability to slap you when you've worked on your D&D pewter figurines far too long (brian?).

I shouldn't even be thinking about these magnesium mutts. I should stay with what I know -- t-shirts and posters.

If you were as completely freaked as I was when SoMaFm disappeared from your itunes and was replaced by the silence of greed and the stealth styled murder of innovation. Then you must do something. After you've done all the irrational things like bike locked yourself to your powerbook and done a virtual sit-in on the RIAA site, do something boring like writing your senator and telling him (or hopefully her) that you buy all your music at giant mega stores for no less than $18.99 a pop and that you occationaly buy something new after you've been exposed to it on "the internet". They love to hear from you. I'm so glad my senator rocks.

June 27, 2002

Fear and Loathing at WorldCom a blog from a guy who works there and saw the madness come down.

June 26, 2002

Brazil wins. I am thrilled and not the least bit tired.

If your kids are doodling, building mammoth creations out of legos or tinker toys or putting on catwalk fashion shows for the whole neighborhood, then do what so many parents do and send 'em to camp. Design Camp. I wish this stuff was around when I was a young tyke with a crayon and a blank living room wall.

This summers series of design lectures at The Walker Art Museum looks like a promising one.

• July 09: Tony Dunne and Fiona Raby Dunne + Raby, London
  
  
• July 11: Elizabeth Diller, Diller + Scofidio, New York please note date switch with Dunne+Raby since our DIspatches June 02 email announcement
  
  
• July 16: Bruce Mau Bruce Mau Design, Toronto
  
  
• July 23: Hani Rashid Asymptote, New York
  
  
• July 30: Christian Hübler, Knowbotic Research, Zürich
  
  All lectures begin at 7pm in the Walker auditorium, Vineland Place, Minneapolis. Walker Box Office: 612 375 7622 http://www.walkerart.org/tickets booking online available from June 17
  
  

  June 25, 2002

  My landlord dropped by this morning just as Germany was driving in the final nail into the hearts of 67 Million Koreans. A bit early if you ask me. I was heavily drugged up on two pots of coffee, a half a box of golden grams and two Turkish crisps when he stumbled through my back door with a tub of plaster and a trowel. He looked frantic and determined to get to work. I was teetering on the verge of an athletic collapse in the 82nd minute of play. I threw him a crisp, muttered something to him about the possibility of my rent being hella late this coming month and then demanded that he fix the sprayer on my sink that Kelly broke as part of her weekly dismemberment plan of my possessions (first it was my mushroom lamp, then the mirror, my computer, and last - my sink sprayer). He mouthed a few words that were drowned out by the determined fans of Korea. Man that country is going to be horse for a week solid.
  
  I'm always the first stop on my landlords rounds. He's great. Really. No slum lord he. It's become a weekly ritual now. He stops by just as the coffee's piping hot and I got booty amounts of bagels, crisps or jelly rolls out on the counter. I was more polite before the world cup started. He obviously doesn't give a damn about soccer and can't wait to get on with his daily "projects". I guess the cracks in the plaster behind the tub have gotten to him as he's already got a fresh start on the fissure repair when I give him the red card and demand some bathroom time. Denver. I feel like i've been in Korea all morning watching the game. I'm exhausted already and now I've got to put on the other game face and try to pass as employee, friend, and creative upright citizen.
  
  He doesn't seem to mind the pause in his work. I can hear him going for his third donut. I wonder if he thinks about wheather Brazil's got what it takes to put away Turkey.

  
  

  June 24, 2002

  Today, special guest The Good Doctor F, takes over afrojet to offer his: "top tips for success / general strategies for excellence when completing court ordered community service (6:00 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. landscaping shift)"
  
  

  1. Be sure to get to the sign in desk by 5:55 a.m. in order to get a "good" orange safety vest; note that there are only two vests with reflective stripes and the others feature grease stains and body odor musk.
     
  2. Never take off your orange safety vest until 3:30 p.m.
     
  3. When assessing which city landscape employee to work with all day choose very carefully; there is no real true plan in this area - just dumb luck.
     
  4. If you work with Stan take care of any number two business in the bathroom just to the left of the desk before 6:00 a.m as the morning :15 break is a long way off.
     
  5. Do not rush! There is no need to hurry as 9 hours of landscaping in 85 degree weather affords plenty of chances to get work done.
     
  6. Do not mention any extra areas you might think need pruning, cutting, or raking.
     
  7. When cutting, make two sets of cuts: the first to generate a pile of greenery on the ground and the second to cut the plant material at the base / trunk. You use up more time and still look like you are working.
     
  8. Place your traffic cone arrays diagonally back from the edge of the truck when parked on roads and insist that the stobe light be engaged to warn oncoming speeders there are human targets ahead.
     
  9. Try not to focus on going down to the mall with a rapid-fire assault weapon and "wiping the slate clean" as you pick up all the different types of roadside garbage thrown from vehicles by the miserable mewling skin bags that are human beings.
     
  10. Whoa.
      
  11. Never carry more than one tool or leaf bucket at a time.
      
  12. If you have a tool, try to use it for the task at hand so it will be shown that you need to walk all the way back to the truck to get the correct tool. This all uses valuabel time.
      
  13. If you have to sit next to another rotund citizen "volunteer" named Earving from Guatemala, roll down the window to escape the foully inhuman blasts of gas he dispatches with a big smile, all the while yelling about how he wants a "fucking Chinese girlfriend because their fucking pussy is tight, man!"
      
  14. Watch the facial reaction of your devout Baptist crew leader as Earving delivers short, vicious rants in a pseudo-English language that may be from Star Wars; the only understandable words are every other one ("fucking")
      
  15. Do not volunteer for anything involving dead, brown, itchy juniper bushes.
      
  16. Do not wake Stan up or make any sudden movements in the truck if he falls asleep during either of the two daily :15 breaks.
      
      
  
  
  

  June 21, 2002

  I think I'm officially on Korean time now. Got up to watch the Brazil match somewhere in the 47th minute and passed out shortly after. Awoke again to sit slack jawed and comatose through the first half the US/Germany match. Somehow, on the day of all soccer matched, it was 7:15AM, and I was out of coffee. Denver.
  
  Well The boys in blue went down but not before giving Germany some good licks. It wont be long now till the kids who were watching these games grow up, get sweet scholarships and dominate all in their path. NCAA get ready to produce some strikers. The first thing we need to do is grow some taller players. There's no getting around the fact that everybody but the Koreans were able to take advantage of us in the air. Listen up parents - take the basketball out the hands of your height privileged youth and start working 'em on headers off the cross.
  
  After a dissapointing lose like the one today, I look forward to some inconspicuous consumption to take away the pain. My first choice would be the DJ Kremmy turntable by Karim Rashid. But after loosing so much money on today's Match, I think I will have to settle for something else. Also isn't Rashid German?
  
  Shit. Cheap shot. Sorry Karim, I take it back.
  
  On the cheaper side, I'll go with a time appropriate Pele T-shirt. I didn't know Pele was the official spokesperson for tang.
  
  I found that the good folks at United Bamboo have an interesting fashion sense of humor. Check out the spring collection, click on the number "2" and then rollover the number "32". Also, I swear one of those models is Reese Witherspoon.

  
  

  June 20, 2002

  A real hog belly of a morning ahead of me already I can tell. Some malicious bastard has installed an aviary of sorts right outside my bedroom window. This morning, as I lay fetal in a double pillow headphone grip trying like mad to drown out the chirps and ornery songs of my new natures alarm clock, i wonder what or who have i wronged to deserve this. What's the deal man? Are they mad? Are they talking to themselves or to other birds? Can the bird that emits the almost ultrasonic quick three chirps understand the one that coos like a lethargic rooster? Make it stop!
  
  I tried seeking refugee at Kelly's place the other night only to discover that her head case neighbor had installed not one but two wind chimes right outside our bedroom window. In a backyard already pock-marked by the gardening tendencies of a clueless and bored women, these new additions make me want to move right to a deed-regulated community, where the installation of shit like that would need to be cleared by a homogenous room of property owners who have no time for the wayward gardening antics and home improvement disasters of people who went into the closet door and never left Narnia.
  
  Well since I'm up now and there's no soccer on for almost 24 hours, I can now write that letter to NPR telling them to knock off the big corporate posturing and take the web for what it is. I encourage everyone else to do the same.
  
  I've been burning a healthy amount of music CD's lately and franticaly backing up all my data in case Germany invades us after we skunk 'em in tomorrows match. It has been said here before that the amount of design energy companies put into their Blank CD's is horribly lacking, that's why I'm psyched to get my hands on these wooden blanks. They are too damn sexy and with the Southdale library having as good a jazz selection as most stores here in town (I even found three Sun Ra records) I now have more money for the horse track.
  
  Did you read the one about the robot that couldn't take anymore crap from his nerdy designer/owner so he ran away.

  
  

  June 18, 2002

  
  
  Afternoon bike Commute: stopping at the museum.
  
  This mornings Korean v. Italy match and the events of the internation world at large are starting to spin together, form networks, and draw parallel lines where there's no good reason for there to be any. The Mexican's are heartbroken. Politicians run at the mouth and lay claims to victories that may or may not be theirs. It is evident in watching these matches that the rest of the world hates our guts. For every goal we score there's a billion people who contemplate their revenge. A sporting Imperialism that can be counted off in 90 minute battles and red cards. I fear for us all while watching the US march closer towards the final frontier of soccer.
  
  I've been checking the state departments website every hour for the last hour to see when they are going to release a recommendation that all Americans leave the country of Germany before fridays match.
  
  We really have no idea.
  
  The Germans have history and century old stories with this sport. This is the real deal. If you need further convincing, read Bill Buford's Among the Thugs. It's an eye-popping, sick look into the hooligans now dictating the direction right now. I think the Italian would have been slaughtered if they had taken it from the Koreans today. I don't blame them for losing.
  
  Sometime I bike home from Minneapolis rather late in the evening. Lately, as I make my final push towards home up Summit Avenue I've been noticing strange antics, lights and some jiggy hip hop "shake-you-rump" styling emitting from what was supposed to be an otherwise empty and abandoned governors mansion. I was always too tired to investigate but I was fully convinced our Governor was in there with a head full of crank entertaining Chinese dignitaries with some serious Eyes Wide Shut type of shit. But turns out it was only his 22 year old son throwing raves for underage high schools girls. It's all just too much to take right now.

  
  

  June 17, 2002

  Exhausted, broke, and almost blind. My devotion to the game is starting to put major strain on relationships, work and life. But we do what we do. It was a damn fine thing to stay up till the sun began to rise to see the US trounce the Mexicans. I'm just amazed that in a world where US embassy's are shut down because of the real fear of fanatical retaliation after a soccer match that Tiger Woods winning another round of golf can still be the number one sports story.
  
  My friend Elizabeth has pointed out how terrible it is that I continue to link book and media selections to the one -click union busters over at amazon.com, when a perfectly viable, friendly and unionized (ILWU local 5) book store exists at Powell's books. So as soon as I stop watching soccer and start reading again I will link those selections to Powell's and other employee friendly alterna-bookstores whenever possible.

  
  

  June 14, 2002

  
  
  Afternoon bike Commute: outrunning the storm.
  
  Fatigue sets in early this morning. The US scores in the 83rd minute and I've been up for 84. Of course, the first six minutes was hard to take. I only had a handful of Crunchberries in my gullet and no coffee when Poland stuffed two in the nets. When was the last time I woke up this early to watch sports? I can't remember. Breakfast at Wimbelton? No. I believe that still starts at a respectable hour, closer to brunch. My favorite part of today's match was the crowd reaction to Korea's goal against Portugal some 130 miles away in a different stadium. The crowd made more noise for that action than anything that happened in the US v. Poland game. International sports are SO much more interesting than our own national ones. L.A. Lakers? NBA titles? What a bore.
  
  In local sporting news, Wellstone still looks to out dribble and out score Norman Coleman for the US Senate. Now if only the damn Greens can find the right team to cheer for. A good article in The Nation spells out impending doom for Minnesota and the nation if the Greenies can't find the right pitch to play the game on.
  
  "Men are gaining real confidence from using cosmetics and toiletries" I love reading some good marketing demographic break downs and the Emap Report on Young Affluent Males 2002 is an honorable benchmark and the new mission statement for afrojet and all it subsidiaries. However, the report does mention that the one-dimensional macho hero is dead, which makes me nonsensically nostalgic for Rambo movies. I mean if Frodo Baggins and ultra-geeky Peter Parker/Spiderman are what's now "in", than I'm going to read some Hemingway and rent "Die Hard" this weekend.
  
  For what it's worth, I'm reading Opera, Sex, and Other Vital Matters. I found an excerpt from one of my favorite parts of the book: the philosophy of punctuation. Robinson breaks down the significance of discipline in writing and chastises people with sloppy punctuation. Something I hold very close to my heart, as I am one, of the worst -- punctuators! on the planet.!. I love it when he writes, "Appropriately, the disappearance of the question mark largely reflects the disappearance of questions". Jigga-huh?

  
  

  June 13, 2002

  Helluva nice article on Salon about file sharing and the real potential of mp3 swapping and CD burning and its ability to bring down the record industry. Stan Liebowitz, argues that it's possible that people will continue to buy CD's just because it's the most honest thing to do and people are generally pretty honest.
  
  My experience suggests the same. I love music and love FREE music but musicians need to get paid or else there ain't going to be any good music to listen to. Downloading music serves two purposes for me: filtering out garbage (I buy a lot less one-hit wonder CD's) and expanding my tastes by allowing me to find and listen to all kinds of new music (and genres) I wouldn't necessarily take a $16 chance with at the local record store. Internet radio offers the same filter/research potenltials. But the end result is always the same; I'm at the Record store plopping down my $16 for a shinny piece of plastic or engourged double-vinyl set, and at the end of the month I have many new CD's and no money for groceries. Q.E.D.
  
  I finally REALLY found the ultimate flip flop, just in time to sit around and watch world cup action and pirate music.
  
  Designers: a call for new Open Source OSX icons. Submit your own and customize what you got with what other people did and so forth.

  
  

  June 12, 2002

  
  
  Morning Bike Commute: Hula hoop vandalism!
  
  Well it's about time, and also far too late, but Earth First Activist Judi Bari finally got what's due yesterday when it was ruled that the FBI must pay 4.4 Million for their actions perpetrated against Bari and her husband Darryl Cherney. It's a great reminder of what savage crimes "The Shield" is capable of when trying to protect homeland security.
  
  At the DJ Shadow show this last weekend. Shadow Debuted to the Twin Cities Hip Hop Activist and Photographer Brian Cross' (a.k.a. B+) Video Documentary Short, Keepintime: Talking Drums, Whispering Vinyl. The currency of the film is Super Funky Beats. The film captures the musicians trading currency back and forth in a gritty intergeneration dialog of scratches, beat juggling and live drumming by the original jazz cats who recorded the beats on wax in the first place. The film goes way beyond tribute. Give me some more. More B+ photography: [1 & 2].

  
  

  June 10, 2002

  The word of the day is sobriquet, a word I discovered while playing the game Cranium yesterday. A word which I swear I had never seen used before or heard pronounced by anyone. As luck would have it, I started Jim Thompson's autobiography Bad Boy last night and ran into the word within the first 50 pages. It makes me wonder if I've read it before somewhere but always just skipped over it -- unable to deal with the fact that I didn't know what it meant.
  
  Candy of the day comes from Japan and it's Super Wasabi Peas. I'm also eating the ginger candy right now and it's the craziest combination of Asian spicy hot and sugar sweet goodness. It seems very wrong but it's actually quite addictive.
  
  Site design of the day comes from Sweden. I wish I could read it cause it looks dope.
  
  Wanted: have you seen this chimp?

  
  

  June 07, 2002

  I'm having a great time with the new Mozilla browser. Simple. Powerful. Love the search capabilities. I can't wait to update my power book to OSX and get my Mozilla creeping all over it.
  
  I found the documentary on Road-Side Shines tantamount to discovering a perfect diamond in the mines of doc-cinema. Thanks to the G-man for the Deliriousla link. Lots of great urban stories and architectures for building livable communities. I've been thinking a lot lately about the grid vs. non-grid forms of development as I've looked at neighborhoods to live in both in the city and in the first ring suburbs. I'm very pro-grid right now. The grid system has really shown its true colors to me in my morning bike commutes from Uptown to Downtown. Without the grid system of development I think this journey would become an epic struggle in futility. One of the benefits of the grid system is that it allows me to take multiple routes home, which is great when traffic backs up on any one street I'm able to just hop over to another parallel street and avoid the pack of steel and wheels. I also find it's nice just to mix up the route to see new things. G-Chei gave me Suburban Nation which also preaches the pro's of the grid system. This book will make your stomach turn as you read about the development practices and the laws passed to fuel the sprawl mentality of some of the most criminal design practices ever. If ever there was a need for a Jakob Nielson, it was when people were building suburbs. I mean who wants to skate in the suburbs. Boring.
  
  Speaking of skating, I can't decide whether I want to drop the $19.95 for the pay-per-view King of Skate.
  
  Be down at the Third Lair Skate park Sunday Afternoon to see the "REAL Skateboards team". Nate Jones and Cairo Foster will be there as will my camera.

  
  

  June 06, 2002

  Hell Yes!! You can't keep a good man down. I am happy to be blogging again and rocking the Powerbook proudly. I don't know how it happened but when I put it all back together with the new power/sound card, and pushed the power button, the damn thing actually started. Score one for the people. As my friend Ivan put it - I now OWN my computer - and it don't own me. Now I have more time now to contemplate World Cup splash page designs, grab new wallpaper, ponder my next shirt purchase, and dedicate my life to finding the perfect pair of flip flops.
  
  Interplanetary Designer Extraordinaire Brian Kriederman touched down long enough to peep the potentials and lecture the lemming on his new groundbreaking "Beyond Nano-funk Structural Proteomics". He left us with his earthbound portfolio - subsonique. K. usually doesn't do design work for humans or earthcentric schemas, but for a limited time, if you can catch him and pay for his return rocket fuel you might get some of the best damn graphics out of the deal.
  
  I'm looking for a nice cabin retreat in the upper north woods of Minnesota for a July getaway. If anyone has any recommendation, please drop me a line.

  
  

  June 05, 2002

  
  
  Afrojet is experiencing technical difficulties.
  
  Yup that's afrojet there; a work in progress. It's on life support awaiting a new DC power input/sound card. And until she's back up and running at full power my reports from the front lines will be less frequent. If all goes well the transplant piece will arrive in the next 24 hours. If I'm able to put all the pieces back together we should be tearing it up again real soon.
  
  The misses tripped over the power supply this weekend, completely tearing out the entire power supply, rendering the deck pretty much useless. We brought it into the Apple store to see what they could do, but they insisted that the part that was broken was connected to the logic board and any further repairs would run us up into the $800 dollar range. I thanked him and walked out. As a side note, I was very disappointed that the Apple store didn't carry the new XServer - at least a floor model, something to gawk at.
  
  Anyway, when I left the apple store I decided to see if I couldn't repair the damage myself. I figured I had nothing to loose. When I took everything apart I found that the power input is in fact _NOT_ connected to the logic board and is attached to a small, much less expensive sound card. This was a great discovery, only trouble now was getting someone to sell me a replacement sound card. Multiple inquiries to Apple Support and Repair, left me angry and frustrated as they continued to tell me that the damn thing was attached to the logic board and I would have to send it in for repair. "But Damn it, I'm looking right at this fucking thing and it's definitely NOT attached to the fucking logic board."
  
  "Well I'm sorry sir, your just going to have to send it in and have us take a look at it"...and...
  
  "no we wont sell you that part." Basically telling me to fuck off for trying to fix this myself and they strongly encourage people not to do that because then they don't get to charge you a ton of money for repairs. Say what you want about the shadiness of Microsoft, but don't think for two seconds that Apple is somehow a more righteous company. Think Different, my ass.
  
  So long story short, I had to go to the black-market to track down the card. I think I might just hang out here in the back alleys for awhile...stay tuned.