Hannibal Buress

Hannibal Buress's comedy is as if the universe is truly made up of harmonic frequencies and he secretly discovered the source of one of those frequencies - the comedy one.  And now he's just strumming those strings and riding that harmonic wave all the way to the comedy bank.

Poem

Breath

Like a gift from the ocean

The waves rolling in, rolling out

Neti pot.

By A. Nomimas

 

" I wish I could bring Robert Moses back to life.

So I could repeatedly drown him in a bath tub."

                                 - A pedestrian on a NYC sidewalk

Possible gerrymandering solution (for Texas)

 "No Congressional district may be drawn so that it consists of more than one [or two] partial counties."

Microstation

Microstation is the TAB cola of the CAD world.

You think it's gone now but it pops up in random places.

胖胖的

I'm surpised not to find the following proposed anywhere:

The English word "Panda" coming from the word 胖胖的, shortened to 胖的.

Pan pan de => Pan da

I just like to imagine a person describing or giving a nickname to a Panda and overheard by a foreigner.  

Fermi's Paradox

Can one explanation for Fermi's paradox be the universe is expanding faster than life?  

A case where the "Swiss Cheese Theory" (*that some infinities are larger than others*) applies.

That other life will ALWAYS be just out of reach.

An alternative thought, not as absolute but in similar spirit:  

We are more likely to predict what extra-terrestrial life looks like than we are to meet it.

Just this once.

So Offenbach's name is used for bad puns.

Nerd Squared

Star Wars + Math

Dark Energy = m (ic)²

Cartesian Goodness

Cynicism inspired by American politics, Foxnews, The Heritage Foundation and other evil neo-conservative institutions.

Expansion is Existence

The universe is expanding exponentially.  The universe has to expand like that, otherwise it would not exist.  It really doesn't have a choice.  If the acceleration were slowing, it would mean the universe is reaching a certain "point" or value - even asymptotically.  And any point is arbitrary making existence "unsupportable."  Arbitrary cannot exist on its own.  There is no reason an arbitrary value should exist while another does not.

Even expanding at a specific rate is arbitrary.  It has to be accelerating at an un-pinnable/undefinable rate.  Anything that could be defined or defines the universe as arbitrary would cause it to cease existing. 

The Ramones

The Ramones are the most overrated underrated band in the history of music.

Bad Urban Design

American urban design is still putting the car[t] before the ho[u]se.

Enough with the envy!  Bring on the jealousy!

"______ will hurt the economy"

Those who say "________ will hurt the economy" are actually saying "________ will hurt MY economy."

Forget "hurting," economies are sprouting and DYING every second. This morning when I bought a coffee from the local coffee shop I started and ended an economy between me and the coffee shop.  You could say I "hurt" the economy of another coffee shop by not buying there but yet the macro-economy of coffee buying remains the same regardless of which shop I went to.

So, in the context of all this hurting, how does one define The Economy?  Where does one draw a circle around transactions and call it The Economy?  The Earth?  The USA?  The local coffee shop?

When the statement "________ will hurt the economy"  is used, it is being drawn by the speaker around his or her own interests, or the people funding their political campaign. 

Hypocrites are wise people.  Listen to them.

From the Department of "Being Like Frank Luntz Except Not Evil:"

Plain and simple just call them "Science Deniers."

Tango

There are two kinds of Tango dancers: those who love to Tango and those who love to dance.

4th Party

"4th Party" - A theoretical political party with a limited but targeted agenda focusing on amending the methods of representation of the United States of America at the federal level. 

It is said the "Founding Fathers" wanted to create a democratically elected representative government that was free of political parties and relied on the individual to have a direct say through said representation.  If this was the goal, it has miserably failed.  

Now that two parties dominate the federal and state governments they work at maintaining their control as much as working for the people.  

Introducing the 4th Party platform: the two party system is detrimental to democracy while a no party system is unrealistic.  It is the goal of 4th party to reform the mechanisms of the federal government to ensure there are always 4 distinct parties participating at the federal level

4th Party also limits its goal to this single issue in order to be accessible to individuals of divergent opinions who agree on the need for such reform.  The 4th party platform is limited to the following three items:

1) An individual elected to a federal office may be re-elected to the same office only once consecutively.  An individual can return for election to the same office after not participating in at least one election cycle of said office every other cycle.

2) The President will be elected by popular national vote.  The individual receiving the highest vote will become President.  The individual second in rankings will become President of the Senate and a Senator-at-Large.  The individual third in ranking will become a Senator-at-Large.  Both Senators-at-Large will have full Senatorial powers for four year terms.  The Vice-President will continue to cast tie breaking votes.

3) The House of Representatives will be divided into four different groups by a method of voting.  A minimum of four Representatives will volunteer their names or be selected for the position of Speaker of the House or, if the list is greater than four, the House will vote until the top four most popular Representatives are .  The House will vote for one of the four to become Speaker of the House.  The remaining three will join a fourth Representative chosen by the Speaker to each take one of the "four corners" of the House.  The remaining Representatives will designate the "corner" of their choice to join.  Each "corner" will collectively have significant powers in proposing and/or passing legislation.

There is no such thing as 'bad art.'

There is only good art and art that is not good yet.

Red Hot Blues blues

Red Hot Blues blues

[red hot blooz blooz] noun
1. (used with a plural verb) the despondency acquired from opening a bag of Garden of Eatin' Red Hot Blues and then discovering the lack of the spicy red powder on nearly all the chips!

e.g. "I might as well have bought the regular flavor blue chips.... f' it"

The Dream of the 90s is alive in...

The dream of the 90s is alive in Uruguay.

  

Cogitamus ergo sum

To paraphrase David Eagleman.

Infinite v. Finite

Infinite vs Finite.  A free market with an infinite mindset versus a planet with finite resources.  Infinity versus Finity?  Is there a limit?

TMGT

Too Much of a Good Thing.

This maybe why architecture is doomed.  Even good architects get swept up in their superior quality and make too much of the same thing with complete disregard to scale.

Change

Change is inevitable.  Make it for good.

Immigration Reform

It would require 1) a constitutional amendment (yeah, I know.), 2) amnesty, permanent residency, or some similar status granted to all current undocumented residents with no criminal record. 3) and an NGO to register all current undocumented residents.

The amendment and amnesty would be a quid pro quo to get broad support.  Specifically, the 14th amendment would be further amended to no longer provide citizenship to "all persons born or naturalized in the United States," starting the moment the new amendment is passed, in exchange for an amnesty (or similar status) for all current residents violating current immigration law.

Since the current law gives citizenship to anyone born on US soil, eliminating that should give the "conservatives" something they like while the "liberals" should like the amnesty or residency status.

Considering the time frame required of constitutional amendments, an NGO would be charged with registering and creating a database of all current "undocumented migrants" up to a certain date.  After the passage of the amendment, those names would be submitted to U.S. government for amnesty.

*Sigh*

There was a time when designing was simply feeling the pencil's graphite softly crumble against the paper.

Excerpt from somewhere on the internet:
~~~~~~~~~~~~
"I work with heavy Rhino models a lot. I've noticed no significant slow down- I guess it depends how you bring it into Max though. After a lot of testing different formats etc, I use a Rhinoscript to export each layer as an obj file (highest geometry settings). I use a Maxscript to batch import all these into Max because I find it works best with "import as single mesh" ticked. Add an Edit Mesh and Auto Edge Visibility everything, add a Map Scaler OSM modifier set to 1m and it's all good to go. There's a couple of extra steps I do, but that's the basics, works great."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Post Traumatic Stress Injury (PTSI)

 PTSD. To label the wounded warriors as having a 'disorder' misses the target, I feel. Would it not really be more correct to call it “Post-Traumatic Stress Reaction” or “Post-Traumatic Stress Injury?”

 

I find it more fitting if we consider these developments of the last 12 years as more of an affliction thrust upon those who stood up to serve rather than an affliction for those who couldn't quite 'cut it'. To label these wounded warriors as having a disorder I think makes it seem that they are “in the wrong” when it is obvious that the real disorder was invading Iraq in the first place.

|| universes

I'm grateful to be in the same parallel universe as Christopher Walken but I wish I was in the one where, in addition, Jerry Bruckheimer and Michael Bay only produced documentaries.

Market Forces

Fear vs. Boredom

There really isn't much else to dynamics of the markets.  Fear of loss causes the drops and Boredom fuels the rise.  That's why talk of 'hurting' or 'destroying' economies is BS.  There will always be an economy of some sort as long as people have fear or get bored.

Architecture is Bliss

Forgive me for putting your mighty words on my web-log, Mr. Orwell, but I couldn't help but think of "architect" where you write "writer:"

"To suggest that a creative writer, in a time of conflict, must split his life into two compartments, may seem defeatist or frivolous: yet in practice I do not see what else he can do. To lock yourself up in an ivory tower is impossible and undesirable. To yield subjectively, not merely to a party machine, but even to a group ideology, is to destroy yourself as a writer. We feel this dilemma to be a painful one, because we see the need of engaging in politics while also seeing what a dirty, degrading business it is. And most of us still have a lingering belief that every choice, even every political choice, is between good and evil, and that if a thing is necessary it is also right. We should, I think, get rid of this belief, which belongs to the nursery. In politics one can never do more than decide which of two evils is the lesser, and there are some situations from which one can only escape by acting like a devil or a lunatic." ―

George Orwell, Writers and the Leviathan

The Four Corners of the Room

Since the one party (a.k.a. "two party" system) of the US is a problem, efforts to encourage diversity is a solution.  So here's the plan:  Instead of ignoring the existence of political parties on the Constitutional level, officially acknowledging a minimum of four so to at least double the ideological representation, and move beyond the 1 dimensional left - right spectrum.

In this 'rough draft' suggestion, House members would vote for four leaders of each "corner of the room."  Four camps. With some sort of quasi-run-off voting method, members would vote until only four designated representatives remained.  Those four would be the leaders of the four groups.  Certain powers bestowed on each leader and group would make it of valuable interest for participation in dividing into four groups based on ideology.

Non-Binding Anonymous Conscience Vote

A story from This American Life implied that there are several Republican House members that are secretly supporters of efforts to tackle Climate Change.....  What about a Non-Binding Anonymous Conscience Vote then?  Would it help move the issue forward if everyone voted their conscience on issue without fear of reprisal or commitment?

Preliminary Rules:

1) The House Minority Leader or official equivalent may call for a "Non-Binding Anonymous Conscience Vote" on any issue (a limited number of times).  The votes will be cast anonymously.

2) No House member may be allowed to indicate or convey in any manner how they voted.

Poetry for Urban Designers

Overpass

When in a hurry to a meeting I will never remember, were
the moments from lives just unparralleled, unforgetable:
The first time I heard your laugh.
The first time I saw your coat.
The first time I saw your scarf.
The first time I saw your face.
The first time I looked into your eyes.
The first time you smiled at me.
I will never know your name
but I do know the overpass
of where none of these moments will ever happen.

Trees

If a genius fell in a forest but no one was around to hear, was he really a genius?

Be nice and always bring a book.

Into The Least Crowded Space

'Into the least crowded space.'  Why is that a basic universal law of nature?

UNDER-EMPLOYMENT

Under-employment... Isn't that really the GREAT PROMISE of technology?  Isn't that what we WANT?

The useful Mormon

It's nothing if not entertaining to watch evangelical Republicans find euphemisms for not supporting Mitt Romney. From "Romney Care" to "Flip-Flopper" to "Too Rich???" Evangelicals cannot allow a Mormon to become president because to them it would legitimize the religion and much worse make it a step closer to becoming considered a "true" sect of Christianity.

If Romney were not a Mormon he would have won the nomination by now and possibly even the 2008 nomination last time. All his other flaws would have been doctored and justified by the NeoCon media machine.

Never start a rock set with a 6/8.

Plastistan

They call it the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" but I think "Plastistan" would be a better name to use in an advocacy/publicity campaign.

Wang Shu

Are you optimistic?

I asked that question of the great architect Wang Shu today.

He said no.

I couldn't think of a better question to ask someone from the center of a world. I would not have been surprised by either answer. His presentation was amazing. He was happy to share his vision, sincerity, background, and work with everyone. Together they told a clear story that confirmed what I previously could only gather from various anecdotes about the recent history of China. He is a man with such foresight that he left architecture in 1989, after finishing an 80 story building, after seeing what kind of future that meant. Only returning to architecture after many years of philosophy to question what it truly means to be an architect. He made the presentation with such warm and avuncular humor that to hear him say he is optimistic would have been just as believable. If there was a benefit to his answer, it saved me the time of asking my follow up questions. 

Orbit Pollution

It's inevitable. Man's destiny is to discover new frontiers to leave crap around.

Dumbest ideas

1. Automatic transmission motorcycles

2. Automatic seat-belts

3. Putting gelatin in yogurt

4. The little pocket in a pocket in men's pants

5. Reviving the button fly.

6. Slow closing lid trash cans.

6. GE's refrigerator water/ice dispenser button

Graffiti

I came back to this thought recently because of noticing the variety in quality of graffiti and its effect on the urban landscape AND vice versa. Graffiti is not necessarily a negative or positive value but a multiplier.

It reflects and magnifies the urban landscape and its qualities, good or bad, for better or worse. And even in the worst cases, graffiti simply calls attention to where urban design has been neglected or abused.

The Pyramids, Giza, Egypt

And the greatest work of modern architecture is (drumroll)... the Great Pyramid of Giza.

Striking, minimalist in form, sustainable at 5000+ years and counting.

We've been trying to design the next closest thing without really admitting it.

The Sweet Spot

For me, making a successful film is when exactly half the audience is explaining the movie to the other half on the way out of the theater.

Craigslist

Craigslist is being so blatantly abused. Craig, what about this?:

1. Keep posts simple.
a. Block use of large fancy images.
b. Block the manipulation of html like text and background colors.

Essentially make a simple template that doesn't vary greatly between posts, just gives the pertinent information. Short, succinct, and fair.

Block Development

I would like to see a hypothetical outcome of a law making it impossible for one person or developer to own adjacent properties in a city block. Would we get the classical beauty of old cities with alternating variety of modern and/or classical designs?

'Ground Transportation' at Newark

On my return flight to the US of A, I made a stop in NYC. I went via Newark airport. From previous experience I knew that the NJT rail line into Manhattan was a convenient one. But had I not known that from before, I would have ended up seeing buses as my only option to get to NYC. 

The reason for that is because at the exit of Newark International, where you see the sign for 'Ground Transportation' the arrow points to the right - THE EXACT OPPOSITE DIRECTION of the rail line station to Manhattan which has no sign at that juncture. The bus ride costs $5 more than the train and is far less comfortable. Does NJ Transit know people get funneled away to the private bus and limo services like that?

[Update: Looking at the generic comments that this post collected, there is obviously money to be made by hiding the comfort of NJ Transit's smooth rail ride straight into Penn Station and duping people into paying more for a bumpy bus ride.]

Tovo Signs

I'm a Tovo supporter... but... I can't get over those signs. Is it just me or does that ovoid shape look like the Pork logo?

It's always too easy to criticize and I'm no stranger to the pitfalls of attempting novel graphic design. Maybe it's successful in the category of getting any attention is good attention. Maybe it's even a winning idea. It's eye catching, right?

Or hell, maybe the fella who designed her sign is the same one working for the Pork Council and he just got his project files mixed up. That would explain this:

Is Healthcare A Right?

This seems to be the pivotal question for the healthcare debate today which is dumb.

I DON'T believe universal healthcare is a right, I just think it's a GOOD IDEA.

The whole point of insurance is to have as large a population as possible participating so as to blunt the impact of a tragedy to any one individual. What could be a larger population than all of the United States?

Moreover I would ask: Isn't making a profit on the failing health of others immoral? Especially in a gambling format?

A universal healthcare system would not only save lives it would save some souls as well.

Tariffs

Tariffs define national borders. Stopping global homogenization would require cancelling all "free" trade agreements and implementing a universal 5% import tariff on all products from all foreign states. Other countries should do likewise.

Energy Economy

At some point we will switch from a growth economy to an energy economy, willingly or not.

150%

When it comes to production design, you have to give 150% because you never know which third the director is going to leave out.

From imperfection, diversity.  From diversity, life.

It's the ENERGY, Stupid!

Color is contrast. Art is contrast. Art is color. No it's not.

Why Are the Democrats So Dumb? (Sadly, A Multi-Part Series)

Looking back to the 2004.  How could the Democrats miss an easy opportunity to finally give the previous generations a Vietnam veteran for president by picking a running mate who was also a Vietnam veteran?  The GOP scum machine successfully used John Kerry's veteran experience against him but had BOTH the Pres/VP candidates been Vietnam veterans just the mere contrast of two veterans running against two draft dodgers would have been too difficult to ignore.  Whoever decided John Edwards was the best pick.... ???....

Economics

The Definition of Economics:

Economics is the study of all the middlemen between the sun and the food on your table.

The Corporate Hinge

There are SEVEN simple machines now!!!

We all know the six simple machines as defined in the classical era. I just discovered the existence of a seventh. I was trying to repair my trash can with mechanical top and foot lever. What I found was amazing: the hinge broke because it was a thinned out piece of plastic attached to two struts. That is, the plastic was thinned out at the middle so it could bend. That's it. It acts as a hinge. Bending thin plastic is how I used to intentionally break pieces of model kits off the sprues. I can do nothing but salute the inventors of this new machine, the Seventh Simple, designed to work until it breaks!! Awe!

Why Are the Democrats So Dumb? (Sadly, A Multi-Part Series)

ANWR
According to USGS estimates the Artic National Wildlife Refuge contains no more than 16 billion barrels of oil. The United States consumes 21 million barrels per day. That means at best ANWR can provide America's need for two years. The Democrats should talk about a 100 year oil plan. Any idiot can accept that we'll be needing oil 100, 200, even 500 years from now. So if neo-cons are really fiscally responsible conservatives, shouldn't ANWR be America's PIGGY BANK? "If you think things are bad now what will the future hold?" we should ask. One day oil will be worth $500 a barrel. That's the time to break the piggy.

Single Payer

If the Democratic presidential candidates are going to run on a platform with a national health care system they should go with "Single Payer." Not necessarily because it may be the best of the various national systems but because it would be the easiest to sell, politically.

- Single Payer just sounds streamlined and efficient. Something the lowest common denominator can comprehend.

- I'm not an expert but I think Single Payer would end the custom of getting health insurance through employers. I think this could be sold as fewer things employers and employees have to worry about.

- This is also the system employed by Canada. It doesn't seem so scary if the quiet neighbor to the north isn't complaining.

My Favorite Female Vocalists

Chet Baker
Getty Lee
Jay Kay
Cheb Mami
Chris Denny
Alice Cooper

Erfolgfreudeneidhaßschuld

Erfolgfreudeneidhaßschuld

The opposite of Schadefruede.

(Success-joy-envy-hate-guilt)

But what is the "opposite" of German?

- Those Who Can't Write

I like to read myself write.

Ok, I'll admit it.  Sometimes I just like to read myself write.