Quote from unknown poster on homophobia and its relation to sexual assult

"Oh and while being a straight man myself I've never understood the apparent belief that many straight men have that they are apparently irresistible to homosexuals and that given half a chance all gays would pounce on them and have their wicked way - I often suspect that this reflects their own attitudes towards women. I'm not sure that I find that a pleasant idea but it would go some way towards explaining the truly awful male on female sexual abuse statistics that US Forces seem to suffer from."

Quote from unknown poster on a military forum titled "The Gays won, There goes the military"

Invasive specie continues to cause massive ecological damage after nearly 500 years

By far the most destructive invasive species to North America has been the Western European Homo Sapiens.
Introduced between 1500 and 1600 by Spanish, German, and English settlers, this large hominid almost entirely eradicated the native breed of their own specie throughout the continent, and then went on to do absolutely massive destruction to nearly every aspect of the landscape with their natural instinct to modify their surroundings, ultimately affecting literally every ecological niche extending not only across the land but even well into the oceans on both coasts.

In order to restore the damage done by their introduction, a two part strategy may be most effective: a massive catch, spay/neuter and release program coupled with relaxed or even eliminated hunting restrictions.  This may take lots of time, but would surely be more cost effective and humane in the long run, compared with any attempt to directly euthanize the entire population.

7% of communication is words (not really though)

Just discovered what the ridiculous claim about non-verbal communication probably comes from - you know, where some corporate or academic class on effective communication claims that only 7% of a message is transmitted by the actual words (and the rest by tone and body language)?

This is of course just obviously false on the face of it: if it were true, we could communicate more effectively with someone who spoke a different language but was face-to-face with us than we could with someone who spoke the same language, but via chat (or a blog post).

But those numbers are very specific to just have been randomly made up...
Here's where they come from:
According to pychcology professor Albert Mehrabian:

When you first meet new people, their initial impression of you will be based 55% on your appearance and body-language, 38% on your style of speaking and only 7% on what you actually say.

Impression.
Now that actually makes sense! Not message. Not communication. Impression.

Furthermore, he was speaking specifically about communication about feelings, and the degree to which a person's non-verbal communication matched the verbal - as in, if a person says "I'm fine, really", but they look and sound upset, you are likely to not believe them.

In his own words, regarding this common misinterpretation of his work:

""Total Liking = 7% Verbal Liking + 38% Vocal Liking + 55% Facial Liking. Please note that this and other equations regarding relative importance of verbal and nonverbal messages were derived from experiments dealing with communications of feelings and attitudes (i.e., like–dislike). Unless a communicator is talking about their feelings or attitudes, these equations are not applicable."

Status message, part 2

• Nov 23, 2009

Status message, part 2

My last collection of status messages was way too long.
I wouldn't want to go through and click all those links.
But they were all very interesting!
For reals tho!

So I'm going to post the collections here a little more often.
Plus, then I don't have to write anything new.  Writing is hard.  And time consuming.
And it consumes a lot of calories, having to think so much.

Without further ado, the gmail status messages I have had between my last post and today (most recent at the top):

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



parkour class = most fun thing ever
http://www.sfparkour.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2639

THERE IS SO MUCH TO LEARN

my legend builds... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kirsten-dirksen/when-hackers-took-my-vide_b_356801.html

The brain uses about 20 percent of the calories that we eat.

finally scientific confirmation that men are jerks http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2009/11/12/men-are-far-more-likely-to-abandon-a-seriously-ill-spouse/

large SUVs may be illegal on your street. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/hey_wait_a_minute/2004/08/californias_suv_ban.html

I am not off the grid. More like I sip and nibble at the edges, while typical Americans gobble giant gluttonous globs of grid.

Incompetent people more self-confident than competent people.  This explains SO much http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Incompetent-People-Really-Have-No-Clue-Studies-2783375.php

The best predictor of whether someone voted for or against Prop 8 was how frequently a voter attended a place of worship.

culture=conformity

2 hours by car, or 12 min by BART - the choice is clear; you might accidentally touch a stranger on BART.
BART ridership up 50%.  San Mateo bridge traffic up 300%.  Americans make me sick.

"the only difference between the good guys and bad guys is who's paying the bills" - Jacob Aziza, problem solver.

http://trackersbay.com/outdoor-adventure.php

I am down to 35 inbox messages and 2 marked unread

removing a quarter million single occupant commuters sure makes for a smooth rush hour

I get a perversely intense joy from the bridge closure

http://www.progressiveboink.com/2012/4/21/2912173/calvinhobbes

I have normal cholesterol, glucose, and blood pressure levels

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2009/01/fiscal-therapy

week 2 of gym membership.  intensity level mixture of almost crying and almost throwing up.  I will be in the best shape of my life, assuming I survive it long enough.

I've been thinking about mortality lately. I've decided to spend the brief time I have here being awesome.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Chu

I am short, Black, and poor.  The three least attractive traits for single women, statistically.  I must be one hell of an amazing individual to have had the experiences I had dating this past year.

just because I agree with you once does not make you an idiot

The more charming a guy is, the less he respects her

not learning from your mistakes is the ultimate sign of living in the present

cats don't worry

"You don't make me feel guilty at all.  You inspire me."

white women are racist http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/your-race-affects-whether-people-write-you-back/

word hard, makes lots of money, die young: http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2009/09/death-declines-during-depressions
perhaps government should be looking for ways to extend the recession

My home; clean. In 3D. http://photosynth.net/view.aspx?cid=BFE455B7-3CC4-478C-9AD6-D51C2CF8393F

Vigilante coast guard turned pirates: robin hood or thug? http://blogs.mcclatchydc.com/files/oct-feat-pirates_36.indd.pdf  OR  http://www.fcaea.org/aid=276.phtml

http://parkingday.org/

It is a luxury of the economically comfortable to cater to irrational fears

Research has shown that cognitive behavioral therapy is just as effective as anti-depressants.  Without any medical side-effects.
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/journal.aspx?journalid=13
http://www.womensmentalhealth.org/posts/cognitive-therapy-versus-medication-in-the-treatment-of-depression/

"Green" too often today means "moderately less destructive version of something we don't need in the first place

Schools taking fingerprints of poor children before giving them lunch http://www.19actionnews.com/Global/story.asp?S=2885663

So much for "large heavy vehicles are safe" http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/17/a-2009-chevy-malibu-destroys-a-1959-bel-air-literally/

New anti-capitalist rate structure http://biodieselhauling.org/Rates.html

1500

"Good taste is the first refuge of the uncreative."

Health insurance companies make over $1 million per employee http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2009/performers/industries/bangbuck/employees.html

lest there was any doubt the real reason medicines cost so much:  the money is going to profits.  Also note that air travel is highly subsidized, and neither environmentally nor even financially sustainable: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2009/performers/industries/bangbuck/employees.html

Math, Geography, and Reading Tutor

teacher = hero

I worked with a guy who is 70 years old

I told him I could handle the work, but he insisted on helping

I said I hope I can still do this work at 70

I asked him the secret

he said, kind of quietly, "lots of sex"

Now accepting information, contacts, and donations regarding non-profits, grant writing, education, and libraries.

I am now officially a treasurer. 
Now I need to figure out what that actually means...

Free wood http://sfbay.craigslist.org/..eby/zip/1359697320.html

http://laughingsquid.com/never-go-to-work-by-they-might-be-giants/

http://community.feministing.com/2009/08/25/the-irony-of-anti-sex-positive-feminists-arguments/

Commuter dog http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2372125.ece

http://gubbinsexperiment.blogspot.com/2009/08/questioning-industrialization.html

THERE IS SO MUCH TO LEARN

• Nov 22, 2009

THERE IS SO MUCH TO LEARN

I have not been writing much lately.

Spending my time with work, and new friends, and classes.

Work remains fun, after 3 years of doing the same things (compare to a record of 10 months max at any one job for the rest of my life prior), easy enough to be good at it, challenging enough to stay interesting. 

Just the past few days involved somehow fitting about 10cubic yards of random stuff into the truck for the largest hauling run I've had so far, installing drywall in an attic furnace room so the building could pass fire inspection, and careful deconstuction of the walls holding in the old biodiesel tanks at the old biodiesel fuel station so the lumber could be reused.

But far more important and interesting is the classes.

Little by little I add to my stable of random skills.

Expert in nothing, but my goal is for everyone there is, I can do at least one thing moderately well that they don't do at all. 

Maybe there is someone who does a little carpentry and electronics soldering and computer software troubleshooting and lockpicking and sailing and shooting guns and bow and arrows and swordplay and bicycle repair and auto mechanics and unicycling and gardening.

Just in case, I'm taking muy thai and jui jitsu and I just took a seminar on making fire with natural materials, another on edible wild foods of the East Bay, and today one on tracking animals, and also took my first parkour class.  Judging by the skill level of my classmates, watching YouTube videos and practicing on my own at the playground and on random obstacles I find walking around the city has been more beneficial than I realized.

I feel more and more like a character from an action/adventure movie, where the hero somehow knows how to do everything. 

And yet what strikes me continually is how much I still don't know.  Not even counting all the stuff I am not interested in learning, but the skills I still want, if money was no object, would take a lifetime to learn.

And money is an object.

So one lifetime isn't enough.

I have had debt for a few years, collected over a cross country trip/move and major vehicle failure, months of unemployment,  going back to college, buying a newer larger trailer, and having to buy my ex out of said trailer when she moved out.

I am getting tantalizingly close to paying off the last of it.

I decided once I do, classes take priority one.  Jobs will be fit around them, not the other way around.  I'm looking to work about 20hrs per week.

I am saying this publicly so as to have some accountability.  If you hear me say I am working too much come next summer, remind me I said this.

Thanks

Good News

• Sep 22, 2009

Good News

A few days ago, coming home from work after dark, a neighbor came over to ask for a jump.
I took the alternator out of my truck, but the charger I use in its place has a quick charge / jump start option, so I brought that over.
While we waited for it another neighbor, someone new I had waved to but never met, came over to see if we needed any help.
Somehow we got onto the topics of being "green" and the recession.

The neighbor with the dead battery has been involved with a local semi-official flea market. The people running it are conscious of the fact that, along with being a way to make money, selling things second hand is also environmentally responsible. They are actively looking for ways to be more so, for example sourcing "plastic" bags made of plant materials. She had never heard of plastic island, but understood how it happened and the significance as soon as I described it.
The new neighbor talked about the house of cards credit schemes that led to our economic situation, about concentration of wealth, government and banks and the stock markets roles.
While I had plenty of my own to add, I found myself agreeing with nearly everything both of them said.



This in contrast to interactions with neighbors over the past couple years: the neighbor in the 10ft long trailer who blamed all the countries problems on "the liberals", the neighbor who couldn't see any possible reason to run bio-diesel instead of petrol when it costs more - even when I pointed out that even if he doesn't live long enough to see environmental harm affect his life his kids might, not to mention the narrowly avoided fist fight and the 3 year old who buried his dads meth needle.

Like I have written, its funny that global warming is the thing that finally got peoples attention - even though there isn't hard scientific evidence that human activity will change it in a significantly more dramatic way than the natural climate cycles already do - when we have known for many decades that our use of resources is totally unsustainable.
But whatever. Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons is better than not doing the right thing at all.

Now combined with economic changes, ideas I have been thinking about all my life are becoming more and more popular. What will life be like after the credit based economy has its debts called in, and we no longer have the capacity to exploit natural resources at an unsustainable level, (as is absolutely vital for the American way of life as we know it)?
Of course there were always others who imagined it coming someday, with varying levels of serious - movies like Six-String Samurai on the one end, cults and militias on the other.
But now I am finding it everywhere.
The Gubbins Experiment, a blog I read about a guy who has given up not only driving, but also accepting rides in any motor vehicle for a year, wrote his most pessimistic post ever. My boss, a small business owner with a contract with BART to run the BikeStation seemed to imply that the end of civilization as we know will happen within the next 20 years, and that it will hit dramatic and fast when it does. I met my most recent friend in part via (literal) dreams of a post-apocalyptic future.
And now, even here in the trailer park, people are thinking in global terms about sustainability and economics.

Contrast it also to discussions I have had recently with some single issue activists, who I found by and large narrowly focused on not just one issue, but one side of one issue, unable or unwilling to consider other points of view, ignoring historical and current contexts that don't support a pre-determined conclusion, and offering more criticism than real solutions.

Maybe I had it wrong all along.

Maybe it is the general public, the random ordinary everyday people in whom our potential salvation rests.
That is the most encouraging possibility I have come across in many years.

Status Messages

• Aug 28, 2009

Status Messages

My Gmail-integrated-chat status message is sort of my version of twitter.  Character limited blurbs of what’s going on, interesting facts and quotes, links to various stuff.
For some reason there are still some people who don't use gmail as their primary personal email client.  So they don't get to see any of my status messages.
Not to worry!  I have been collecting them for about the past 10 months:


http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2008/11/green-dime

To pull a man out of the mud, a friend must set foot in that mud - Rabbi Nachman

"In my day, television was called 'books' "

Eat Drink and Be Merry, for tomorrow we die

if you can read this, thank a teacher


poor and happy

do you deserve to be a citizen? http://www.nbcnews.com/id/13442226/  or   http://usgovinfo.about.com/blinstst.htm

I want to cuddle her fucking brains out

I consider cuteness an unnecessary bonus.  Fucking jackpot, man.

Set Status Here

http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=51170

http://www.balkanbeatbox.com/

http://toomuchonline.org/

You feel the way you do right now because of the thoughts you are thinking at this moment

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/dec/15/world/fg-shoe15

No one can cut you off if you choose to slow down and let them in

http://www.jonentine.com/reviews/sf_examiner.htm

Dinosaur Rap

"I think presumptuousness and judgementalness are major traits of your personality"

Governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deducted from it. - Georg Hegel

Spare The Air Day, Tomorrow September 5

I can not think of any clever or informative status messages

1/3 of Americans did not vote.

"The impact to the environment, human health, and animal welfare would be enormous if everyone would just cut back on the amount of meat they eat. If 5 people are each vegetarian 20% of the time the impact is the same as 1 person 100% of the time." (stolen from a customer's status message)

Buy Nothing Day, this Friday.  X-mas is about compassion and humanity (and Jesus), not buying lots of crap

Geekfest - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A man is as young as (the woman) he feels

An enemy of socialism cannot write in our newspapers - but we don't deny it, and we don't go around proclaiming hypothetical freedom of the press where it doesn't exist, the way you people do - Fidel Castro (Playboy, 1967)

Lets allow love to kindle even when its a bad idea.  Maybe we end up burning the whole fucking house down and losing everything we own and having to sleep in the street.  Maybe.  I prefer the risk to curling up in the cold on the floor indoors because I'm too afraid to light the fireplace.

Bicycle!

Terror Experts Warn, Next 9/11 Could Fall on Different Date

One year left http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2013/01/one-more-year.html

http://www.utne.com/mind-body/Get-Radical-Get-Some-Rest-Vacation-Time-Off.aspx

They are starting to get desperate http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/01/14/us-usa-pilot-idUSTRE50D12320090114

The next President of the United Stateshttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQGy7QIsFa0GL5stCOQtYsdTlKkSt0eMbr46CpU3snAa_7XjGvt1RlBKhIiEjhWJUVSNZpRm5Ev9Am51kBxbePR7K0i_qQxzMhJevEXJOdcRo9hixNiCAIh6e_STlUWuJ51gz7EbiQ7PQ/s1600/barack-obama-beach-450x688.jpg

How much you can do depends on where you believe your limits are. You can do a lot more when you don't know that you can't

I work hard, and I play hard.  Wait, no... I don't work hard at all

if jerks like us would start driving cars like normal people, maybe we could have 70 degree winters every year

"It's good to be open minded, but not so much that your brains fall out"

http://www.whitehouse.gov/

Militant Agnostic - I don't know, *and you don't know either!*

I wonder if penguins feel inadequate for not being ok without a partner in life?

http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/ethics/

solution to credit crunch: don't live beyond your means

Goodnight

I never give compliments. I merely make statements and observations of truth

I'm _far_ more humble than you motherfucker

http://www.utne.com/Politics/Is-Poverty-the-Problem-Or-Is-Wealth.aspx

In order to make a solar panel or wind turbine, you have to mine for the iron ore to make the steel, and drill for oil to make the plastic parts

But I was young and foolish then...                ...          I feel old and foolish now

I had to work 5 whole hours today!
No one should ever work 5 hours in one day

Good morning

The island of Guernsey is less than 10 miles across, and nearly every adult owns a car.  http://gubbinsexperiment.blogspot.com/2009/02/what-to-do-about-parked-cars.html

Your lifestyle is excessive and unsustainable

A life not enjoyed is a life wasted

Work all day, party tonight, date tomorrow ;)

In a pure free market, if a comet is coming, everybody dies http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2012/03/global-warming-vs-fascism-or-why-nasa.html

$1/2 million cap on tax payer money to CEOs. Pobrecitos http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/fashion/08halfmill.html?_r=3&

"so... due to your heroic deeds fixing our wiring, my roommate has insisted that i go on another date with you"

Large truck + sharp turn off of freeway + gobs of rain + people braking suddenly up ahead for no apparent reason = hydroplaning + fishtailing + adrenaline + a nice little test of my reflexes

Everyone is pro-democracy until the people vote for a law they don't like.  Overturning prop 8 in court = fascism.

11:34.  Guess I'll get dressed.  Good lord I love being self-employed.

http://inequality.org/inequality-data-statistics/

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/everyday_economics/2006/10/how_the_web_prevents_rape.html

I don't play devil's advocate.  I mean, I'm not playing.  I really _am_ the devil's advocate.  Seriously.  The devil is totally awesome.  You should check him out sometime.

I discovered the jelly bean machine accepts pennies.  Uh oh.  So much for rationing...

In Texas, owning 6 or more dildos is a felony.  If you own 5 or fewer, you are merely a hobbyist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaUl6x1YXpg

The net worth of America’s wealthiest 1 percent now exceeds the net worth of the entire bottom 90 percent. http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/assets/fy2010_new_era/Inheriting_a_Legacy1.pdf

I was doored on my skates today for the first time ever.

"There are worse things in life than getting your heart broken. It sucks but it's a good honest kind of hurt. Makes you more human"

Censorship at its best:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyJR7QlRhM4

I just got pulled over and given the breathalyzer for driving too slow!

Former BikeStation employee shot by Israeli military  http://www.insidebayarea.com/news/ci_11907109

$450million from tax payers directly to the personal accounts of those most directly responsible for the credit crises - including $6.5million to a single AIG executive: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/16/business/16aig.html?_r=1

I do enjoy my job, but I don't like having to do anything for hours every week.  I'd rather do other things with that time, like, you know, talking to my friends.  I guess I could charge them... but then I'd probably have fewer friends.

4.5 Million Americans are on unemployment (the most in 26 years); only 1/3 of the unemployed receive benefits

21.75 MPG in the 5500lb truck!!!!

The comments after the article are from the generally progressive readers of Mother Jones; we really are going to go the way of the yeast in a beer barrel - drowning in our own waste because we are incapable of not breeding: http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2009/03/tiniest-baby-booms-monster

"Because the typical farmers market is supplied by dozens of different farms, each transporting its crops in a separate van or truck ... locally grown produce might actually represent a larger carbon footprint than the same volume of produce purchased at a chain retailer, which gets its produce en masse, via large trucks." - http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2009/02/spoiled-organic-and-local-so-2008

"People are people, and I still love them (especially the women)"

"Big Brother is not only watching, he is recording it all for later.  And thanks to Congress, there’s not a damn thing we can do about it."

"Human kindness can be a renewable resource"
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1407952648?bctid=1657909722

"Prior to the 1980s, conservatives were fiscally conservative-  they were unwilling to spend more than they took in in taxes. But Reaganomics introduced the idea that virtually any tax cut would so stimulate growth that the government would end up taking in more revenue in the end. In fact, the traditional view was correct: if you cut taxes without cutting spending, you end up with a damaging deficit. Thus the Reagan tax cuts produced a big deficit; the Clinton tax increases produced a surplus; and the Bush tax cuts produced an even larger deficit. The fact that the American economy grew just as fast in the Clinton years as in the Reagan ones somehow didn't shake the conservative faith in tax cuts as the surefire key to growth." - Francis Fukuyama

screw mutant fruit

"With just 5% of the world's population, America holds nearly 25% of the world's reported prison population. Our prison population has quadrupled since 1984, and most of the increase comes from people being imprisoned for drug offenses--mostly minor and nonviolent."

Only 5 billion years until the sun expands and engulfs the Earth.
Make the most of them.

Gay animals even more common than we thought: http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_gay_animal_kingdom/

Infant male prairie voles (a normally monogamous specie) which are injected with a single dose of chemical which disrupts oxytocin fail to ever bond with a mate as adults.

29 to 68% of the offspring of monogamous bird species are the results of feathered infidelities.

She's like the character in a movie who comes into the lonely/forlorn/nerdy/hopeless protagonist's life all of a sudden, and complete turns his outlook around, changes his life permanently.

http://www.theonion.com/articles/how-are-corporations-going-green,7598/
Happy 4500millionth birthday, Earth

"In any case, I need another installment of the soap opera  that is Bakari's all natural biodiesel dating frenzy. The Bold and the Biodiesel? General Handyman?"

24mpg http://www.instructables.com/id/Vehicle-efficiency-upgrades/

1100sq ft RV for multimillionaire trailer trash
http://www.andersonmobileestates.com/

Ty, your comment provided me the motivation to actually write this: http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2013/03/gay-animals-social-sex-and.html

Total # of deaths from "swine" flu: 8                   
Total annual deaths from regular old human flu: 500,000               

"I have no idea why anyone went to the movie in the first place, let alone rent it." - Paul Haggis, writer/director of Crash, on its being Netflix's most rented video for the past 4 years

Average US passenger vehicle fuel economy peaked in 1987
http://uspolitics.about.com/od/energy/i/cafe_standards.htm

Yesterday I did some thing most unusual... Cleaned :)

War predates vertebrae http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mY9LNEJNrZs&feature=related

Females in more than 80 species eat their mates http://www.youtube.com/watch?..v=ELahVSsrmA8

Slavery predates vertebrae http://www.youtube.com/watch?..v=7jsX0_mwTX8&feature=related

% of Americans who believe in:                           ..   
Astrology - 40%
Creationism - 50%             
ESP - 60%                  
Magnetic Therapy - 70%

Bike-ari

lots of stuff to get rid of http://www.biodieselhauling.org/Salvage.html

me = tired


May is bike month.  Its not too late to sign up: http://www.youcanbikethere.com/user/register

Didn't meet my goal, but did better than last year 1:11:31 and am in MUCH less pain than last year! :)

"I saw your truck on 580 this morning as I was heading in to Instructables, and I thought, "I should check out that website."  Now, I'm reviewing entries in the efficiency contest, and here's your truck again!" - CEO of instructables.com

Bobby Joe Ebola and the Children MacNuggits reunion show!!! 

I think I have swine flu.  It is getting back at me for making fun of it on my blog.

Counter-protest http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2013/04/counter-protest-not-that-theres.html

"It would be zero emissions if it weren't for the tire smoke" http://www.commutercars.com/videos.html

*26.8 mpg* in a commercial truck!!!

"This is the reason your headaches didn't go away:  that's pronounced _analgesic_ not 'anal'gesic.  The pills go in your mouth."

Winner! http://www.instructables.com/contest/earthjustice/?show=WINNERS

The Obama Reality Show: http://www.hulu.com/the-obama-administration

conservative morality http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html

Walmart forces major manufactures to provide earth friendlier products, brings green to the lower classes http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/business/25walmart.html

In a nationwide survey of Americans, atheists were ranked lowest of all groups in terms of trustworthiness, sharing America's vision of society, and approval of who their children marry - lower than Muslims, recent immigrants, and homosexuals.

http://journey.totheendofthenight.com/oakland

The human side of evil http://www.hulu.com/watch/28343

"sometimes there's a third, even deeper level, and that one is the same as the top surface one.  Like with pie." http://www.hulu.com/watch/28343

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php/101-5-mpg-my-2003-ninja-250-a-8686.html

goodnight everybody.  I'll put that link back up tomorrow in case you missed it

I just ate food which I GREW MYSELF!!!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Etzs3Cc8pxI&feature=related

we parked 160 bikes at the first annual Uptown Unveiled festival

Haircut ordered by President of the United States http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-collections/229295/colbert-report-adventure-quest?current_video=230466

The richest dozen Americans hold roughly as much wealth as the entire lower 50% of the population

http://blog.okcupid.com/

http://www.cafepress.com/BioDH

Downieville!!!!!!!

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17372-gallery-domestic-robots-with-a-taste-for-flesh.html

Oakland has the nation's cleanest tap water.  Why are you still buying it in bottles?

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

A 7 year old told her mother that a boy in her class asked her to play doctor.  "Oh dear, what happened honey?" asked her nervous mother.
"Not much," said the little girl, "He made me wait 45 minutes, then double billed the insurance company."
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2009/07/cheese-eating-healthcare

She's so hot she's making me sexist.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JT5AQIlmM0I

I was probably the best dressed guy there.        
Imagine that!!!
ME!?!?!?!?!

I have $5 left in the bank.

"What happened?"             
"we grew up"                       
"but you're still playing it" 
"hmm... well... I guess _they_ grew up."

another instructables contest: http://www.instructables.com/id/Large-Self-Watering-Planter-made-from-recycled-mat/

Even I think other entries are better than mine... but vote for me anyway:

A "hands-free" cell phone contributes about as much to safer driving as a dashboard beverage holder contributes to safer drinking and driving.

NASCAR saving gas http://ecomodder.com/blog/dale-earnhardt-jr-hypermiles-to-victory-in-nascar-racing/

http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2009-07/computerized-rat-brain-spontaneously-develops-complex-patterns

Notice any similarities? http://tiny.cc/hp2009  and  http://tiny.cc/hp1955         Where does it stop?

Old-school Bakari-style rant-essay: http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2013/04/race-whites-still-winning.html

The number one killer of Americans under 40?  Car accidents.  Every time you get in a car, you may die.

people who should be natural allies against the elite, instead focusing on fighting each other: http://www.anarchistnews.org/?..q=node/8794

http://www.utne.com/Media/Tao-of-War-Photography.aspx

I do measure up to the myth though ;-)
http://www.salon.com/comics/..knig/2007/06/20/knig/index...html

Using a cellphone (even w/ handsfree) produces accident rate equal to DUI
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/19/technology/19distracted.html?_r=1

My ex says I like to talk, and don't spend enough time asking questions. I think that's probably a valid criticism.

The average new car has around 250 horsepower.  For comparison, my 2.5 ton truck which is capable of hauling another 3 tons at freeway speeds and up San Francisco hills has under 170 horsepower.

I just got home from singing Bohemian Rhapsody while wearing a bright blue sparkle shirt in Oakland's most famous gay bar and I wonder why people mistake me for gay

today marks 3 years of biodiesel powered hauling and delivery

Slow down http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2012/03/slow-down-my-philosophy-for-life-also.html
3 jobs, 4 truck problems repaired; long day - all finished now! :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs3n5LMNplE

BART strike Monday!! Which means no BikeStation either :( On the other hand, since traffic will be terrible, this is the perfect time to start riding your bike to work :)

Whole Foods CEO is campaigning against national healthcare http://www.alternet.org/story/141961/why_you_should_boycott_whole_foods        http://www.careerjournal.com/article/SB10001424052970204251404574342170072865070.html

Safeway, Lucky's, and Albertson's are unionized. Trader Joe's and Whole Foods aren't.

http://blog.thesilentnumber.me/2009/07/i-am-capitalized-and-you-are-not.html

Why does everyone think necrophilia is sick?  They didn't think it was sick beforehand.  When she was "alive"

Tap water standards are higher than bottle water standards, yet bottled water costs approx. 2000 times more. http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2009/07/bottled-waters-can-you-taste-difference San Fransisco and the East Bay have some of the nations cleanest tap water. 

"Of course, everyone - regardless of race and sex - will hit occasional bumps on the road. And everyone, white men included, has put out some sort of effort to get where they got. But when the folks on the smoother road go faster and further, let’s not pretend it’s because they’re better drivers."

http://blog.thesilentnumber.me/2008/02/top-7-reasons-to-learn-lojban.html

"Middle class people put a tremendous amount of focus on addressing issues of language and protocol, but addressing one’s racist conditioning is more about communication than language, more about self-awareness than protocol, more about humility than expertise." http://www.anarchistnews.org/?..q=node/9455

The future of transportation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?..v=hdJrUuoU53s

If you are going to be stopped more than 1 second, it takes more fuel to idle than to start http://www.iwilltry.org/b/projects/how-many-seconds-of-idling-is-equivalent-to-starting-your-engine/
Shut your engine at every red light.

People are like elephants.  Some of them are just jerks.

http://laughingsquid.com/never-go-to-work-by-they-might-be-giants/

Like with pie

• Jun 14, 2009

Like with pie

"Sometimes there's a third, even deeper level, and that one is the same as the top surface one.  Like with pie."

http://www.hulu.com/watch/28343/dr-horribles-sing-along-blog

For the guy he was referring to, it was accurate.  The layer beneath the surface was all fake.  He was just as shallow and vacuous inside as he seemed to be.

But the same went for the one who said it.  As Billy, he came across as sensitive, his diabolically evil personal a secret identity.  But the guy in the laundromat was behind and underneath Dr. Horrible all along.  Whatever is to come after that door closes can be attributed to that sensitivity.

I think we are all like that.

We have our public personas, our secrets, our masks.  But our surface is actually a reflection of what is inside.  The in-between parts, the person that we tell ourselves we "really" are, the stuff of self-help books and therapy sessions, the things found in religion or meditation - like with pie, they are all just filling.

The very deepest level of all, it is made of the same stuff as the crust.

Bush Jr

May 14, 2009

Bush Jr.

I'll say one thing for Jr.

His press correspondents dinner was much much funnier than Obama's was.  He gets points for that.  I guess there was just so much more to make fun of about him, and he knew it, which, granted, is a very bad quality for the most powerful person on the planet to have.

But still.

I miss the days of making fun of the president.  It was enjoyable.  And it gave a good place for everyone to direct their anger.  Now who are we gonna be angry at?  We're going to have to go back to road rage, and as a bicyclist, motorcyclist, and hypermiler, that's extra bad news for me.  I realize now, too late, that I should have voted for McCain.  In the interest of amusement.  Sure, there is a slight chance we get universal health care within the next decade, but under Jr. we didn't need health care.
Because laughter is the best medicine.







(starts 2 minutes in)

On Becoming a Twit

• Apr 23, 2009

On Becoming a Twit

I notice a good number of people have set to follow me.
I have absolutely no intention of becoming a Twit.

I signed up to Twitter so I could follow other people.

Ok. I'll be honest. So I could learn more about one specific person. And I figured while I was here why not follow all of my friends?

The best way to learn of the various things going on in my life and mind would be my blog. I only update it once or twice a month, but when I do they are (usually) much more in depth, (or, to look at it another way - you have to read more than 140 characters, but I only write once or twice a month).
You can sign up for it using the little box in the corner, and it will email you when there is something new.
For short blips there is my Gmail-integrated-chat-status-message. Surely you are using gmail by now? Add me to your chat list and there you will get my random character limited thoughts and quotes and updates and such.

Excellence in the most unexpected of places

• Apr 17, 2009

Excellence in the most unexpected of places

Sometimes when I'm working at the bikestation I go up to the Walgreens just outside the BART for an orange juice.

One day I went up and the line was just ridiculous. They brought in a 2nd checker, but the line still kept growing faster...

And then this guy comes back from helping a customer, back to his checkstands.

Not a typo. Checkstands.
He unlocks two registers.

He calls someone up, scans the purchases and gives them the total. And then as that customer goes through their wallet for change or waits for the credit machine to process, he calls someone else up to his other register.
This guy is a joy and a wonder to watch. He makes it look smooth, almost effortless.
His co-workers were stressed, not smiling, barely speaking or looking at their customers, but he was right in his element, all smiles and politeness and eye contact. He could talk to the person at one register while processing the items on the other, with no signs of confusion or hesitation.
He did the work of two people, and make it look easier than it takes most people to do the work of one.

I worked as a cashier part-time when I went back to college, just before I started BioDiesel Hauling.
It wasn't the worst thing I've ever done, and I was decently good at it, to the point where if a manager wasn't handy I was the person my co-worker came to with questions. But it certainly wasn't much of a challenge. It never even occurred to me that being a checker was something it was even possible to excel at. I have been shown otherwise.

You know, in general I am not particularly in favor of maximizing potential, or doing one's best, I think the whole concept stems from a manipulative puritan work ethic imposed on the populace. But given that one has to be at work some set hours anyway, you may as well do a good job of it while you're there. So often I have seen just the opposite - people putting in as many hours as possible, but working slow and slacking off, as if they are somehow getting over on someone. I never thought much about cashiers one way or another, but here is one I admire.
This checker doesn't get paid twice as much, but he does his job beyond expectation, and seems to enjoy it a hell of a lot more than anyone else working there. The line disappeared. And if that weren't enough, now all the people who reads this blog (all 6 of them) will know that there is one very amazing checker at one particular Walgreens in downtown Berkeley.

trailer park vehicles

• Apr 2, 2009

trailer park vehicles

I'm not the only one here in the trailer park putting a lot of work into an old dented vehicle that looks kinda like a piece of crap by most people's standards.

Many a night I pass by the neighbors place as they weld and hammer out the damage from the last race.

They spend weeks, months, turning this thing into something capable of moving under its own power.
And then they take it out and smash it up all over again.

Best of all, it is designated as the official High Street Trailer Park car.  We have demolition derby representation.  Its kinda like our own sports team.

My Brain is in Overload

• Mar 25, 2009

My Brain is in Overload

Reality is mind-bogglingly complex.

Within the past hour I have written/spoken/read about: over-population, foodsustainability, relationships, work hours (I actually had to work 3days this week!  I don't understand how people put up with this every week),  late fees, and bike repairs.  The last two, ok, because I'm at work right now, but still, so many topics there are in the world, and each with so many levels.  I watched a videoabout dolphins that blow bubble rings and then swirl the bubble rings around and break them into smaller rings before finally popping them, and how other dolphins have been picking up the technique from those who know it.
Someone painted an AR-15assault rifle pink with a Hello Kitty.

My brain can't handle so much... everything.

I want to get in bed and cuddle and fall asleep feeling someone breathing next to me.

But instead I have to be at work another two hours.

A drawback of hypermileing

• Mar 9, 2009

A drawback of hypermileing

I've been driving around 50-55 on the freeway for the past few months, managed to get my '83 diesel f-250 work truck from a previous average of 15mpg, up to 19.5mpg (this is with various loads of furniture, boxes, dirt, appliances, etc in the back)

Last night on my way home, going 50mph, some cars merged very slow, and instead of accelerating to pass them, I slowed even more to let them in, but they were going SO slow I just moved to the left instead.

As I accelerated gently back up to speed I noticed a cop behind me, and just as I put on my signal to move back to the right, he moved to the right without signaling.
So I stayed where I was, and waited for him to pass on the right, still not having accelerated up to speed yet.

After a couple seconds, instead of passing, he pulled back in behind me.

And lit up the red and blues.


After answering a bunch of questions (last thing I ate was ice cream, 2 strawberries, and 2 almond cookies, I am not under the care of a doctor or dentist) I did a balance test, and when I passed that, took my first ever breathalyzer.

In an area where everyone goes 75, why would anyone drive slow unless they were drunk?

I told him I drive slow in order to save gas (and I was going particularly slow while I waited for him to pass - I didn't point out that he hadn't used his turn signal).
He said that I was going 20 under the limit.
I wasn't sure how pointing out that the "limit" was a MAXIMUM limit, not a minimum, would be taken, so I was just mostly quiet and agreeable.

No ticket. 
I actually found the whole ordeal rather amusing, but I hope this doesn't become a pattern.

200 Watts

• Feb 28, 2009

200 Watts

$62 worth of new music + 200 Watts of self-powered sub-woofer behind the seat = early hearing loss.
This knowledge in no way modifies my behavior.
I am no better than a smoker.

Flamboyant introvert

• Feb 23, 2009

Flamboyant introvert

I feel like I want to write, but I don't have a topic.

Actually, that's not true. I have several: adoption, consciousness, short-term dating/serial monogamy, and I doubt I'll ever be satiated of ranting about the injustice of a system that allows unrestricted accumulation of wealth across generations.

But as much as I feel like writing, I even more don't feel like writing about any of that stuff.

So I guess this will be more diary entry than essay.



I talked to a customer a couple days ago, a slightly crazy guy who I've worked with many times, get into heated debates with on the way to his storage space. He was shocked to learn that I make personal stuff public this way - (that reminds me, that's another topic I've been meaning to write about for about 1/4 of forever). He also questioned why I might think anyone would care.
I learned yesterday that someone I had never met or heard of found my website after I drove by in the truck, somehow came across the blog, had even commented once. A friend of a friend. There are 5 times as many views of the blog as my actual business website (even though the business site counter counts every refresh as a new view, but the blog counter doesn't).
I really don't know why. Why are you reading this right now?

Anyway...

I have been mentioning periodically for a while now how overwhelming it all is.
I feel tired, but I am still just as much in awe. I don't feel like I am ever going to be able to take all of this for granted.
I mean ALL of it.
That water falls from the sky periodically. That sex works the way it does. That music can affect me so much. How many people there are. That we are apparently on this giant liquid filled rock hurtling through the vast expansive of nothingness around a giant burning fireball of hydrogen and heavy elements it creates by being, basically, a constantly exploding nuclear bomb held together by the sheer weight of itself. The very fact that matter exists seems unbelievable to me.
I am running a business? What the hell is that? I never had a girlfriend throughout grade school, high school, college. I was not exactly an outcast, but I was far from popular. All my life I was the little skinny guy, the weird guy. Invited to parties for sheer entertainment value. And now I look back on a couple recent experiences and wonder if maybe she was in it as much out of lust as anything, and given how I felt, its like I was used for my body. Me? WTF? Mind you, I'm not complaining. It just seems so unrealistic.

This has been fun. No question. Some of my favorite people I met through the dating process. I have no regrets. I have learned a whole lot about life, people, relationships, even myself. I feel almost no connection to my life from as little as a year ago.
But there was something I really liked about having only ever had sex with two people. Something I liked about only having had one partner and planning to keep it that way. I liked being settled. It wasn't an ideal relationship, but my feeling of loyalty made up the difference, and there was also a lot of genuine good. I'm happy to have been released from that responsibility, but I would like for my next serious relationship to be my last.
Obviously I don't think there is anything immoral or unhealthy about promiscuity, but it just doesn't feel natural to me. Before I had experienced it I never understood the appeal. And honestly, now that I have, I still don't.

I wonder if I will end up abandoning my principal. (I will forgive myself if I do, because I don't really believe in principal. Any principal that doesn't make specific individuals happier in the real life is an invalid principal).
I am not much interested in chemistry. I am not much interested in looks or sexual compatibility. True, I didn't know what I was missing, and finding it was incredibly intense, overwhelming as I have not felt since... well, actually, ever.
And I still say I want - no, I need - a best friend first. I need someone I respect and admire. Someone who can point out the errors in my arguments, who makes me think of things in a brand new way. I need someone I have fun with, and who I feel safe with.
If, having found those in someone who also wants something stable and lasting, if she happens to be hot or we happen to like the same things in the bedroom (or living room and kitchen and occasionally outside), that's gravy. Mind-Bogglingly Delicious Gravy, but gravy all-the-same, and totally unnecessary.

The thing is, I don't know that my intellect, no matter how consistent or insistent, is capable of over-ruling my heart.
I can guide in-love, but I can't control it. I'm a surfer, or maybe a tobogganer, mostly at the mercy of gravity, but I can go a little to the left, a little to the right. And, if I so choose, I can resist - the only possible outcome of which is a dramatic crash.
I know how to make it more intense if I want to. I can focus on one person to keep someone else from getting too entrenched in my heart. But in the end, whatever I do, with certain people, certain circumstances, it's gonna happen.
And mind you, I'm fine with that. Its a big part of what makes life worth living.
The thing is that once I get in, it blinds me. I know that its going to. I even know its happening in real time. And yet I fully believe.
So if it happens and its reciprocal - that's when the problem could come in. Because I won't be able to be objective about it. I won't have any conscious choice at that point. I am bent to the will of in-love.

On my side, however, is that those same things which are important to me in principal, intellectual compatibility, friendship, shared values, enjoying each other, are actually what makes me fall hardest.
On my side too is that the passion can develop with the right person even if it isn't there from the beginning. I think this is something too few people realize in our tissue-paper-significant-other society of ours. This isn't to say I think it could develop for anyone, arranged marriage style, but if the core elements of compatibility are there it can be just as intense, just as real, even if there wasn't that initial attraction. Everyone I say this too looks at me as though I were crazy. Why would you get involved with someone in the first place if you weren't initially attracted? I suppose it figures, since in the end it all stems from the reproduction drive. Somehow actually liking a person for who they are seems a lot more romantic and meaningful to me.

I started writing before work. I just came home. Stopped at my ex-wife's place on the way home. It was our first time alone together for anything besides legal paperwork since the divorce. I caught her up on my experiences dating. She seemed genuinely interested, and it didn't feel in the slightest awkward. It was almost as if she were my friend, instead of my "ex". I feel really happy about that, really encouraged. It has felt like she was very uncomfortable with me until today, and I got the impression she was sure I was uncomfortable despite my assurances that I wasn't. Of course I know - I knew all along - that what had to change for us to ever have a friendship was that I had to let go of the "possibility", let go of any romantic thought or desires. This happened for me a long time ago, but given how strongly I felt before, and for how long, given how dramatic and sudden the shift was, it seems pretty reasonable for her to have been suspicious of it.
I am happy that we might someday be comfortable with being in regular contact because, even though I would never want to be in the sort of relationship with her that we once had, there were a lot of legitimate reasons I got involved with her in the first place, it is hard for me to find people who I feel as compatible with, and it is a lot of my life to give up entirely. I want to keep the baby, though it was really good to drain the dirty bathwater. This may not be meant to be, who knows, but at least the experience opened up a part of me that allowed me to miss her, and even though its an unpleasant feeling, it feels right that I would.

I went for 28 years never feeling more than the most superficial type of connection to anyone aside from whoever I was in-love with at the time. I don't even know what "connection" is supposed to mean exactly. It doesn't seem to have to be mutual. It isn't correlated with lust. Sometimes I can feel it quite strongly even while knowing it will be fleeting. I don't understand it, can't articulate it. But something has been opened up inside me, something stemming from the divorce, learning about attachment disorders, dating for the first time and all of the specific experiences I've had, something has opened and I feel these connections, people feel so special and important to me and I feel I want to get to know a few certain people better, I want to share with them, and I want to feel close - even if there's little or no chance of a romantic relationship building from it. My favorite part of dating, I think, is the friendships that began that way.

Still, a part of me is very tired. I want to be settled. I want to be thinking about planning for the future, for children. I don't want to actually be planning yet, but to be able to be thinking about it with somebody.
I realize that I am a-typical, but I just can't understand how people prioritize anything else over love. What point is there in success with no one to share it with? This is a rhetorical question. I know I will never understand the answer, no matter how thoroughly or eloquently it is described.
The trick is in finding someone who feels the same way as I do. Not an impossible task, but that person also has to challenge me - I don't mean to sound arrogant (and I know I do anyway, and I apologize) - but I don't find that often. There is SO MUCH for me to learn. I just need the right sort of stimulus.
I always thought I had been extremely lucky in finding someone with whom things worked - not always perfectly, but well enough that it lasted longer than anyone else I know of my generation - so young. It was suggested that maybe it wasn't so rare, but just that I hadn't been looking once I found it.
Now that I have been looking, I can say the same thing with more confidence.
A great many people are wary of using the internet as a tool to meet people.
I can't imagine wanting to date someone you meet at a bar, a party, the market, where you mainly just know what they look like. I suspect it goes back to the chemistry/compatibility thing again. You can only gauge the spark in person, with expressions and tone and touch. I can read the words written by hundreds of women and narrow it down, people I might very well have been attracted to in real life (and would therefor have been more willing to overlook certain differences). Narrow down from hundreds and hundreds of people down to a dozen dates. People I knew I had some fundamentals in common with, who sparked interest enough to actually meet. And then only a few that really felt significant in one sense or another. And then none that really worked out as potential LTRs for one reason or another. There are just so many factors working against it, so many ways for it to not work.

I have decided to embrace dependence. I think the idea of independence being something desirable goes hand in hand with the value of freedom. Our economic structure is dependent on a populous which believes that freedom is inherently valuable.
As a customer who has lived in a very different culture pointed out, you don't have freedom if you are connected to other people. If you live with an extended family, know your neighbors, and everyone is directly dependent on everyone else, you have to consider the consequences of your every decision for everyone around you.
Freedom is contrary to community. Independence is contrary to human connection.
What he was talking about was the same as what I was talking about, only applied to family and community instead of romantic relationships.
Besides, no one is independent. We are a social specie. We are only able to survive because we are able to work together. We have made comfortable lives for ourselves using technology which requires specialization which makes us ever more dependent on one another. I said this wouldn't be another social discourse essay - but this is all very personal. Relationships with other people are more than ways to get food and shelter, more than a security net or means of reproduction. I feel, always have felt, like I am supposed to be one-half of a couple. A lot of people seem to believe there is something wrong with that. Of course I am dependent. I think its normal and healthy. In the absence of a life partner I have developed friendships that feel more meaningful than I have had in a long time. I am still not happy being single. I strongly doubt I ever would be.

I remain, as always, optimistic. I have no evidence on my side, but it has been my experience that life works out ok in the end. (I suppose in the end we die, so...)
When you are most desperately out of money, with no idea what you are going to do, that's when you win a new car. It couldn't happen any other way. Malomar is obnoxious sometimes, but he takes care of us. Or of me at least. So I will find what I'm looking for. There may be many more trials ahead, more experiences to have first, and it won't be easy. Fortunately I live in the Bay Area, and there are a lot of amazing people here. This has gotten much longer than I intended. I'm gonna stop writing, and go check on my online dating account.

Fair Trade

• Feb 5, 2009

Fair Trade

I was reading some recently about drug trade.

Tons of cocaine produced in South America, shipped to West Africa, sold
in Europe, supporting war lords, organized crime, and government
corruption in all of its stops.  Investigation or opposition leads to
murder.

In Guinea-Bissau the police are virtually powerless because the military itself smuggles drugs.

It got me thinking - there should be someone to certify fair-trade cocaine.

It would be organic.  The farmers who grew the coca would make a decent living.  And no one would be allowed to murder journalists and retain the fair-trade label.

But as I formulated this idea, I ran into some potential problems.

Then I realized, there is a much simpler solution, and one which is even more sustainable.
Meth!

Meth can easily be produced locally.  Since coca doesn't grow in this climate, it has to be shipped across continents, which, just like with non-local produce, has enormous externalized costs.  They make meth right here in Pinole and El Sobrante, even closer to home than the fruit at the Farmer's Market.

So there you are.  Smoke meth.  Do it for social justice.  Do it for the planet.