October 31, 2003

October 30, 2003

Taming the Panther Blues
Going on day four here of freezing drizzle and a sky that refuses to change its hex value (#666). If it were not for clocks, you wouldn't be able to tell if it was 8AM, noon, or 5PM. Yuck.

I spent all of yesterday installing Panther. Man, if the purpose of upgrading to OSUX Panther was to increase my daily distractions and to decrease my actual office productivity then by all means it has been a huge success.

Panther's new iChat A/V is super dope and is the most distracting thing ever. Talking to peeps all over the country for free with no money spent on long distance means good cheap conversation and, at least in this early adaption-brand-new-toy-stage, lots of non-billable hours.

Add to the distraction Panther's abysmal (aka broken) Font Book and its inability to play nicely with all third party font management software (Suitcase, Font Reserve) and you've got yourself an expensive long distance phone and no ability to access or activate fonts that you need for all your paying projects. I think Apple really blew it with this one. If you deal with more than 200 fonts on your machine I would heavily suggesting waiting till Apple fixes this mess before you upgrade.

Apple claimed here that Font Book was a solution for 'creative professionals' - a title I might claim if money is involved - but surely they were just kidding around, cause as far as I can tell Font Book just don't work.

As for good news. . .my U.S. Census form came in the mail today.

October 29, 2003

PunxforDean
Of all the 'Blank' for Dean sites and blogs out there now, this one is rising to the top as a personal favorite. The navigation buttons all rollover to studded bracelet strike-troughs. How punk is that? They even have posters for Goths for Dean, Rockabilies for Dean, and Skaters for Dean. Which raises the question in my mind, why is this all about identifying first the group of humans you belong to and then throwing that support behind Howard Dean? I suppose it's a good thing and will lead to a distributed way to talk about the Dean campaign and what he means for different folks and their specific agendas. For example the Foodies for Dean will no doubt be following closely and reporting on Howard Dean's school lunch program agenda. Personnaly, I'm going to hold out for the more esoteric endorsements: Fruit Jar Drinkers for Dean, Automatic Numbering Machine Enthusiasts for Dean, and Klaus Kinski Inspired Tantrum Throwers for Dean.

October 28, 2003

Kids Play Pong
A brief interchange in Electronic Monthly between some kids who were asked to play and evaluate an all time classic - PONG.

Tim: I would never pay to play something like this.

John: I'd sooner jump up and down on one foot. By the way, is this supposed to be tennis or Ping-Pong?

Becky: Ping-Pong.

Gordon: It doesn't even go over the net. It goes through it. I don't even think that thing in the middle is a net.

Tim: My line is so beating the heck out of your stupid line. Fear my pink line. You have no chance. I am the undisputed lord of virtual tennis. [Misses ball] Whoops.

John: Tim, how could you miss that? It was going like 1 m.p.h.

Sheldon: Hey, why does it say Sears on the controller?

Shake it Like a Polaroid. . .Picture
Yes. Yes. Ladies and Gentry, last night my life got served a double fudge banana split sunday with more Bridgeman wafer cookies than I could possibly manage to chew. You see, the Rachel's (a review) came to town and shook the rubble and plaster off the Theater De La Jeune Lune with their sonic chamber music. Life felt good. But ohhhh there was more. Matt Pond and Eve Miller were doing Guitar/Cello renditions of Matt Pond songs (try closer.mp3). If these two incredible musicians are coming to your town soon, make sure you don't miss it. As a bonus, Matt and Eve played the 'traditional' Hey Ya by a group called Outkast(!?!?). If you are familiar with this traditional song, when you hear it arranged for cello, you will begin giggling but by the time the haunting 'Shake it Like a Polaroid' collapses into a Matt Pond six string dirge, you wont be laughing anymore. In addition to all this sonic goodness, the show was opened by a master puppeteer who preformed elegant and subtle marionette activity. The world needs more marionettes! Huge props go out to the puppeteer for an old school dedication to mastery and craftsmanship.

October 27, 2003

Monday PSA
While some box it up into a funny little game, others like Brenda Jenkins show us that real issues like police brutality aren't something to be trivialized, especially when it's happening to her son.

"Bush is over there invading another country and I want to know who’s going to invade the U.S. and save all the Black people that’s getting beat down by the police all over the U.S.?”

That's a heavy quote. She's angry, and rightfully so, at the Whitehouse style stonewalling tactics the Minneapolis Police Department is taking in investigating her son, Philander Jenkins' claim of being sodomized by the Hennepin County Jail staff. Read the full story here. And then if you are so moved call a city council member and demand a full medical examination for Mr. Jenkins.

If that's not enough Minnesota monday dogooding for you then drop by the AFSCME Local 3800 and donate to the University of Minnesota Clerical Hardship Fund. In a move towards transparency the Local 3800 has a negotiations weblog, and although it hasn't been updated in a while, it's a good source for folks interested in the details of final offers and last proposals.

October 24, 2003

Halloween Costumes
What to wear? What to wear? Every year the same dilemma. Picking the right costume demands your total focus. It's an exhausting process but really, it is the process that I like, more so then the actually product. This year the stakes for a good quality costume are raised, as I now live in a neighborhood infested with 'trick or treat' age children.

At first I wanted to go as an Org Chart, but felt it was too nerdy and conceptual. This costume would instantly ban me from the neighborhood and might just get me arrested. It was easier choosing a costume for my nemesis, 'mr cell phone'. He'll be going as Kenny from South Park, in homage to the brilliant send up that Matt and Trey did of Queer Eye for The Straight Guy and the whole 'metrosexual' fad. Brilliant. Good enough for my cell phone. So where does that leave me? I couldn't find any Paris Hilton costumes, but maybe that's cause she never wears any clothing. I kind of like the Aloha Gorilla. But it's not quite there. I would love to go as Sam Rockwell's portrayal of Chuck Barris from the movie Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, but I just don't have the proper number of ill-fitting hats to pull that one off. As a his and hers idea, I really like the Deluxe Colonial Man and Women outfit, this seems the most fitting considering our recent move. In the end I might have to go with the simpleness found in a creepy Colonel Major Mustache.

October 21, 2003

Dyslexic Type
I'm a dyslexic freak. This blog is a testament to that. Any frequent reader to these pages has no doubt winced a time or two at my feeble flirting with grammar. I try to remember, to quote from Stephen King's Everything is Eventual, that, "grammar is for the world as well as for school". However, when people told me I was dyslexic and that I could use that as an excuse for my sloppy editing habits, I immediately hopped aboard that train.

So, I'm not really sure how I feel about the folks at Read Regular, who claim they have devised a specific type face for the dyslexic community. Can this really be true? Can a typeface begin to solve such a complex medical condition, one that I try frequently to enflame by sniffing yellow Sharpies all day long. I guess it's possible. Perhaps downright hopeful. Maybe Typography hasn't yet really had its day in the sun. Soon people will be solving a lot more of the worlds problems through kerning and serifs. Maybe even this whole Middle East conflict could be resolved if for once the type someone used to draw up a peace accord was set in something so magnificent, so appropriate that the world leaders would succumb to its majesty and put pen to paper. Problem solved.

October 20, 2003

King Charlie and my Lawn-Salad
I've been putting off a horribly violent battle with several squadrons of Creeping Charlie that have in recent weeks gained a military focus on overcoming my lawn with all the Shock and Awe that its scalloped green leaves and running webs of ground roots can afford. Last week, I noticed that a new shipment of troops had arrived fresh from some R&R somewhere on the Northside, and if I didn't put down a Patton like plan soon that I was in danger of being egregiously outflanked and soon all would be lost to King Charlie.

Saturday, I took inventory of my stockpile of weapons and thought over all the possible instruments whose wrath I might employ upon the long stems of disorder and anarchy that were making lazy pirouettes up my walkway and laughing, yes laughing at my lack of preparedness. I read about the Boron method online, but the chemical mixture seemed too unstable and if I got the measurements just a bit wrong then I would be responsible for a lawn genocide. The thought of that much collateral damage on my shoulders was more than I could carry. A trusted advisor of mine, told my about RoundUp. But again the collateral damage and death of innocent plants that would come from using such a chemical, made for a quick classification of WMD and therefor not an option.

Exhausting all the possibilities of containment and control, I knew that I was faced with the long and laborious task of taking on King Charlie with my bare hands. One unit at a time if I had too. It would be a dual for the ages.

And thus the battle was fought. King Charlie put up a good one and even got assistance from other plants that had a thornier exterior and inflicted some good shots, but as Sunday night drew to a close and I stepped back to admire the pin-point accuracy of my thorough and 'smart' carnage. I was pleased and very happy.

But what to do with all the dead and wounded? Easy, make Creeping Charlie Tea.

October 17, 2003

Lumpy the Wookiee
Betchya didn't know Chewbacca had a kid, huh? Yup, that's him. His name is Lumpy. Chewbacca also has a loving wife, 'Malla', who can send him powerful thought waves anywhere in the Galaxie. These thought waves can even penetrate the walls of the Millennium Falcon and warn Chewie when something isn't right on the domestic scene, say like when Lumpy falls off a tree into the terrible swamp of the Nother World. Lumpy also has a grandfather, who, for reasons that should seem obvious to you, goes by the name 'Itchy'. You can read about the whole family in The Wookie Storybook.

October 16, 2003

Corgan Curses Cubbies
My heart goes out to all Cubs fans everywhere. Everyone cried. Personally, I blame Billy Corgan's rendition of "Take Me Out to The Ballgame" for those last unproductive innings. For me this baseball post-season has an eerily similar vibe to the last go round of electoral politics - I can't seem to pick any winners. Like Walter Mondale just one year ago, both the Twins and Cubs got a stinging cane beating. It's odd, but I had the same pit in my stomach after watching that fan interfere with that catch that I had when I witnessed Rick Kahn's eulogy at the Wellstone memorial. It is times like those that I wonder if life is nothing but a few key crucial moments, decisions, choices, er. . . at bats, that you don't get to do over. Ha. There I go with the baseball metaphors again. You can't avoid them in October.

Enough of all that tho, let's just amuse ourselves to death with a bunch of stuff on the world wide web. Like the new Kozyndan book. Or how about this funny German commercial for anti-boredom.

A sneak peek into Panther (more: 1 2 3) reveals that some more intuitive window management is on the horizon. This will be a welcomed modification in my life. You see, I have developed some truly horrible window managing habits as of late. I guess those with a messy desk also have a messy desktop, Q.E.D. For increased clutter, I downloaded iResize, for easy drag and drop image resizing. It's very handy when I can locate it.

October 15, 2003

Feel the Wrath of the Windy City
All my limits and base proclivities for pacifism were flushed down the toilet, like this mornings coffee poop, when that god damn Cubs fan reached beyond his grasp and sent an earthquake of depression through the entire midwest last night. For those of you who have no idea what I'm writing about, I both envy you and want to poop on you. This game is ruining my October!

I find a little piece of sanctuary knowing that my lot as a "fan" isn't as bad as the guy they has to usher out of Wrigleyville last night cloak and dagger style. My guess is that right now the poor bastard is cowering very alone in some dark basement on the Northside of Chicago - his loved one's (if he has any left) are sympathetically trying to figure out how to to smuggle him across the city limits. The whole city of Chicago is after this guy. There are road blocks set up. The mayor has demanded blood be spilled. It's going to be an old fashion lynching and if they can do it before sundown then we can brush guilt aside and just call it a 'Sacrifice' - because there is one more game to be played.

October 13, 2003

Simulated Walnut Dash
I found this advertisement in the December, 1969 issue of Look Magazine. It's Don Knotts Discovers the Double Life of a Dodge Adventurer.

The State Fairground Blues
The misses got all kinds of excited about a never-before-seen-on-planet-earth huge sales extravaganza that she saw advertised on television. She knew that I had spent the previous week scouring the town unsuccessfully for new stereo speakers, so when she heard something like "20 to 80 percent off stereo speakers - this weekend only!!", it seemed like the planets were aligning for a speaker purchase. Friday night we were off to the State Fairgrounds to this mystery "Extravaganza" that advertises, "Most Attended General Merchandise Sales in the Nation!!!", to look for speakers and whatever other general merchandise we could get for those once in a lifetime prices.

Now the State Fairgrounds is just a fucked up place when the state fair isn't actually going on. It's like a little small town onto itself. Or more like one of those Hollywood towns they erect to shoot a movie - you kind of expect weird things to happen: Sean Penn to step out of the empty Kare 11 booth with guns blazing or a jazzman to come strolling up Main Street playing Chim Chim Cheree on his saxophone. In other parts, especially at night, it's simply every horror movie you saw from age eight to 18 rolled into one little Fairground.

After driving around that creepy place for awhile and having already stopped in at two wrong mega-sales in other barns on the Fairgrounds (the Wilson's leather outlet sale actually smelled very similar to the State Fair when it's in full operation), we found the Sale Extravaganza and happily paid our seven dollar entrance fee just to have the privilege of the deal. That my friends was our fourth mistake.

I can't even describe what was going on at this sales event but I'll try. It was either:

the Russian Mob, wearing four inch wide dollar sign necklaces emblazoned with 36 Karat Dimamondella stones selling Dell computers out of a highjacked truck while playing Dungeons & Dragons or,

it was an after party for the movie 2Fast 2Furious and someone had brought in a highjacked truck of CD's headed for the local area Kmarts or,

someone had discovered every piece of software nobody in the world uses anymore and was packaging it 4-for-1 with Samurai Swords, sci-fi meets Lord of the Rings 13 point daggers, and 8x10 jungle print rugs.

Get the picture? Yeah, neither did we. I did see a sweet piece of software tho called Cosmo's Virtual Makeover. And I did threaten the person who brought me to this "extravaganza" that this handy piece of software was going to find it's way into her Christmas stocking.

October 10, 2003

Skeleton's and Skeletors
Target's upcoming designs for Halloween 2003 are totally kick ass and actually a wee bit creepy. The patterns, the typography, the scary princess girl mask, all of it rocks. Target is like the Missy Elliot of retail design right now. They can't be stopped.

I got an email reminding me that my cousin afropunk was in town. He's a distant relative of afro-dite.

Did you see Skeletor's reaction to Schwarzenegger being elected the next governor of California.

From The Believer's Idea Share, I really like this idea:

"Someone should invent a kind of food that is designed to be mixed and heated in an hour or two by the friction generated by your pants’ pockets."

October 08, 2003

Ladybug Invasion
Seriously. It's not funny. My entire domicile is under attack from the Asian Lady Beetle. It's like Hitchcock's 'The Birds' only smaller and silent. The house, the yard, the air space between my garage and the back door, all look like I went Hyper-Halloween crazy. It looks like I bought 10 cans of orange spray paint at Michaels craft store and in a drunken fit painted everything.

After dressing in battle armor yesterday, I triumphantly cranked on the water and unleashed the hose on them all. This only seemed to irritated them. Then they breached my first line of defense and the little buggers started crawling under my shirt and nesting in my hair. I went nuts. The Asian Lady Beetle doesn't bite and can't harm you in any way but their resilience and sheer numbers are enough to drive you mad. All yard work has come to a grinding halt until these little orange torture devils die off or migrate south. Until then, I am a prisoner in my own home.

October 07, 2003

The New Responsibility
Another fine tour of Portland, Oregon has come to a close. Thanks to everyone for making it a blast. I feel I'm going to need this entire week to recover. Super congratulations to Liz and Dave on their wedding. And yes, if more people had a wedding party in a skate-park with good DJ music the world would be a whole lot brighter place. As for my skateboarding powers. . .there wasn't much. I sprained my wrist on my first trick. Sweet. Now, I have to go contemplate mowing the lawn, which stands a full six inches taller than anyone else's lawn. I fear my acceptance into the neighborhood association is very slim right now. The mowing bit is all part of my 'New Responsibility' plan, an attempt to right all the bad and carry forth with lofty grown up goals that scoff at all signs of regressive activities. It's a bold proclamation of clean living and clean gutters. The sun will shine on me today!

October 02, 2003

Husker Du in Print
For Husker fans, peep this compilation of Husker Du Magazine Articles. The whole thing captures some 'great' prose about one of the 'best' bands of all time. Stuff like:

"Wow. I had heard that this was a great band, but of course that can never prepare one when the band is this great."

Plaster Falling Around My Head
I just realized that it's been almost ten years since I have been able to listen to music as loud as I want to. A product of living in apartments and duplexes for way too long. Let me just tell you that music doesn't sound right unless the windows are shaking violently.

October 01, 2003

In The Quiet Hours of Minneapolis
It's going to be a long, deeply distressing couple of weeks if yesterdays Twins victory is any indication of what's to come. . .

Ahh. . . but what a fine victory it was. The look on the Yankees players faces gave me a great warm satisfaction. And that catch!?! Shannon Stewart I could kiss you. Now I just need to figure out how I'm going to listen/watch the game Thursday night as I'm cruising at 2000 feet on my way to Portland. I did not time that right at all.

The Papa M show was great. In a surprise bonus, Paz (formerly of Zwan and A Perfect Circle) was there supporting Pajo with some extremely active bass playing. She also played some mean picking banjo and rocked the entire concert on her tippy toes for some strange reason. While killing some time before the show, I wondered into Border's books and happily discovered that they have a CD listening system in place where you can grab any CD off the shelf, scan it and listen to one minute snippets of every song. This proved rather addictive. I could have done that all night but I had some books I wanted to find. I've been obsessing as of late over books that detail some of the lost and forgotten architecture of Twin Cities and greater Minnesota. Picking up Lost Twin Cities at the library a few weeks ago started it all. The book details some of the great architectural sites that were built around the turn of the last century and profiles the architect (if they can figure out who it was) who designed them. They also give the street address of where the building used to sit, which sends your mind on a journey around town comparing what used to be and what now is. Inevitably, this sort of thing gets rather depressing, as you realize that all these amazing buildings built from Southern Minnesota limestone and crafted with great care and patience have all been blown away and are now parking garages and strip malls. Another good addition to this line of reading is the book The Quiet Hours. It's a black and white snap book of industrial complexes and storefronts taken in the wee hours of the morning. There is a great picture of the kosher deli that my brother lives above on Randolph Ave. My favorite picture is of the Grain Belt Brewery. The photo is haunting. The book also features an appropriate essay from Bill Holm.