It's Not Easy Being Green

I took my last Sunday drive on Saturday morning. I knew my car would sell this weekend, so I took some time to just drive around one last time. I specifically went looking at places I couldn't get easily on a bus or via the subway, such as Pacific Heights or anywhere on top of a hill.

I'm committed to living within the mass transportation system here. Doing this will save me $225/mth for a parking space in the building garage, plus other car-related costs.

I could only do this in San Francisco or New York. Even Chicago's mass transit systems isn't quite good enough to do without a car.

So, one day later, my bank account is a little more abundant and my carbon footprint has been reduced.

Against the influence of my worst vices, I guess that I'm green. I never wanted to be one of those people who were fanatical about the environment.

And I'm not one. If I can't figure out if something goes in the recycling barrel, I still throw it in the trash. In Kansas City, they could refuse to pick up the recycling if something wasn't just so.

I have no idea what the rules are here. Like if you forget to rinse a can, does it still go in the recycling? I thought that they can't use something that has food on it. Maybe that isn't the case anymore. I am not sure, so I stand there debating in which sack to throw the can or food container every time.

I always feel like that stereotypical Indian on the horse from the 1970's is passive-aggressively shedding a tear at me if I can't figure it out. He sheds those tears like a machine gun in my environmental nightmares, curse him. Being Indian only puts more of a burden - people think we aren't allowed to be careless with the environment like everybody else.

For a person with ADHD, it is pure hell sorting garbage, frozen with indecision. I stand over the various sacks over-thinking it and growing more irritated at being put into the place of feeling like an environmental baddie for not being clever enough to memorize upteen million rules for umpteen million pieces of trash.

It was so easy, in those halcyon days of yore when I just put everything into one bag. Now, it's just pure anxiety and frustration. To further drive up the stress, now for private homes, they threw in the green barrel for compost items.

It hasn't come to my apartment building yet, but I'm going to be even more flummoxed when it does. From watching the restaurants do it, it includes a lot of things that one wouldn't think go in it, like paper napkins.

But as of today, I am using less resources to live on the planet without a car. I guess that feels good.

I've worked out most of the problems. I'm going to try to make more trips to the store - just buying what I can carry up the hill easily. It will give me more exercise, I'm telling myself.

If my ADHD wins out, which it probably will, Safeway delivers groceries for $8. You order online and they deliver it within a two hour window on the day you choose.

If that doesn't work, I can rent ZipCars for $8 an hour to run errands. They are conveniently placed all over San Francisco.

Please, don't hate me because I'm green.

I'm probably hating myself more as I try to divine the will of the trash gods, cursing my indecision and angst.

Lyon Pride

I happened on the Lyon Street Stairs this weekend in Pacific Heights. What a beautiful thing - a city park that serves the function of scaling the high hills of the city.

The stairs, built in 1916, replace two steep blocks of Lyon Street. They provide a view of the Bay and the Palace of Fine Arts below their spectacular lookout.

There are more than 350 public staircases in San Francisco. They serve to link the public to areas that were too steep for roadways. They are also used by many as free stairmasters for cardio workouts.

The 288 stairs that comprise the four Lyon Street staircases are not the only stairs for this neighborhood. Walk a few steps down the street, to the 369 steps of the Baker Street Stairs. But it is not as pretty as Lyon Street.

The longest staircase is on Telegraph Hill in North Beach. The Filbert Street steps have 377 steps up the steep eastern face of the hill.

I believe that most of the Lyon Street landscaping was done with private funds, although it is maintained by the city. It emulates European gardens with parterres and planting beds.

This area of Pacific Heights is surrounded by beautiful mansions and abuts to the Presidio. The whole neighborhood was abloom this weekend from fruit trees to flowers.

Hidden San Francisco

The New York Times has an excellent article about the fantastic bars and restaurants hidden in San Francisco's alleys and lanes. It is part of San Francisco that many tourists don't know about, along with the public stairs around the city.

Fans of Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City already know about the lure of the fictional Barbary Lane. Tourists are often disappointed to find that there is no Barbary Lane.

It is believed that he modeled his fictional Russian Hill lane after Macondray Lane, a public street with private houses accessible only by wooden stairs.

Before you get too excited, be forewarned before you make the climb: there is no Number 28 Macondray Lane. 27 is as close as you can get. It doesn't look anything like the house in the adapted television mini-series.

Living there sounds good in theory, but there are no garages, no easy access for groceries or movers. I presume you have to haul your garbage and recyclables down the stairs, too.

And, forget being handicapped and getting up the stairs. This is wild country best left to the young and hearty.

Which is why, in Maupin's latest novel about the inhabitants of No. 28 Barbary Lane, they have all moved away from the stairs to inhabit the city in places more friendly to the aging and the aged.

I Am Full of It

A friend and I went to Cafe Gratitude today for the first time. You will recall that this was one of the most interesting places that I had never been.

It is a restaurant that specializes in live vegan where nothing is meat, poultry, fish or dairy and what there is isn't cooked. It is chocked full of New Age-y vegan fun.

I saw it on a cool local PBS show, Check, Please! Bay Area, where three people all go to each other's favorite restaurants in the Bay Area. The food was well-regarded, but they raved about the desserts and "milk" shakes.

We started out with the I Am Generous guacamole and salsa with live flax seed chips. Both were very good. We also had a side of the I Am Honoring nacho cheese dip, which was neither nacho nor cheese. It was good, but didn't taste at all like the real thing.

My friend had the I Am Graceful Indian bahraini, which consisted of vegetables with quinoa or rice and a spicy coconut sauce. He liked it once he found the spicy sauce buried on the bottom of the bowl. It was a big bowl, so he took some home.

I had the I Am Cheerful sun burger which was a veggie burger made of pumpkin seeds and walnuts, on a sunflower seed paste "bread" and the usual veggie toppings. It was an open face sandwich, so it was easier to eat with a knife and fork than try to pick it up. The burger did not taste like a beef burger at all, but was good. I'd probably order it again. The macadamia nut cheddar cheese I'd probably not do again. It was okay, but what a waste of macadamia nuts.

Where the restaurant shines is in its desserts. It is known for its milk shakes that are made from almond milk, instead of cream. We split a I Am Awakening Key Lime pie and the I Am Lovely fresh pear cobbler with the almond ice cream.

The Key Lime pie was great. I actually liked the macadamia-pecan crust better than the normal graham cracker crust.

The pear cobbler was so-so. The pears were too bland and being raw, had the wrong texture. It was okay, but I wouldn't do it again. The almond milk ice cream was wonderful, though. The tiny serving of it was insufficient, but it was free with the cobbler as a special, so I couldn't complain too much.

The portions are not generous, but both of us left full and satisfied. I had a laugh at the naming game that was on each table, where you choose a word from the spirit list and then the abundance list to make your new name. I've already forgotten mine, but it reminded me of a New Age drag queen name.

The "I Am" nomenclature must get annoying for the servers, but they are cheerful. My friend and I had fun listing all the "I Am's" that the restaurant failed to use on its menu on the way back to the car.

I have a couple of friends that I'll definitely take when they are in town. It is part of the adventure of San Francisco that is fun to share with friends and family.

Down in His Cups

I'd Sooner die than wear a University of Texas Longhorns t-shirt into a bar full of University of Oklahoma fans. If I did, I think I'd wear thick jeans with a protective cup.

In June 2007, Allen Becket, a 54 year-old church deacon, federal auditor, and a Sooner fan, got teste at 35 year-old Brian Thomas' choice of clothing at an Oklahoma City bar. He began taunting Thomas as soon as Thomas walked into the bar.

When Longhorn fan Thomas went to close out his bar tab, Becket grabbed Thomas' baby batter bowl. Two bar patrons tried to separate the men when Thomas felt something rip. Thomas looked down to see blood, a torn, ragged scrotum and found himself free-balling in an entirely new way.

Surgery, sixty stitches and a lot of pain later, Thomas displayed customary Texas testicular fortitude. His nad is no worse for the wear, although the Near-Steer Longhorn says that he still has scrotal pain.

Becket claims Thomas was the aggressor and that he was merely defending himself. Now the Teste Sooner is defending himself against a felony assault charge. Perhaps he should have claimed to be auditing Thomas' assets; it might have grabbed the judge's attention.

Why was Becket's strategy of first resort a ball grab? Are all church deacons so touchy, feely? Surely a black eye or broken rib comes before castration in the bar brawl manual, especially in homophobic Oklahoma.

What bar-going men everywhere want to know is what kind of shorts or pants Thomas was wearing that allowed Becket to put him in the illegal hold in the first place? No one wants to make the same mistake.

Regardless, bar patrons, down in their cups, were left shrinking from the cold reality. It does take balls to win a fight.

Assessing Zen

Larry Ellison, No. 12 on the Forbes Richest list and CEO of Oracle, asked the San Mateo County's Tax Assessor's office for a tax break for his $200,000,000.00 23 acre Woodside, CA estate.

Ellison modeled the estate after a 16th Century Japanese emperor's country compound. It is replete with a five acre lake, two waterfalls, and two bridges. The lush landscaping includes hundreds of trees.

The county estimated that it would take $167m to duplicate and valued it accordingly. But Ellison begged to differ. He felt that his home value had actually depreciated in the San Francisco Bay market where high end homes continue to go up in value despite the mortgage crisis.

He claimed that his new estate suffered from "significant functional obsolescence." It was over-improved and too costly to maintain. Ellison argued that there is a limited market for high-end homes and an even smaller market for 16th Century Japanese country estates.

The county agreed and sliced his valuation by $100m, bringing the valuation of the $200m estate to $67m. Ellison has saved $3m a year for the past three years that the tax assessment has been reduced. The hit to the local school district alone is $1.4m per year in lost revenue.

Way to consult the Oracle, Ellison! Refuse to fund the education of a poor Silicon Valley upper middle class and/or rich kid! That will help develop better math and science graduates to work at Oracle in the future.

Now, if one of his neighbors would put solar panels in the shadow of his trees, we might have some fun out of this.

Working That Apple Body Type

Apple, Inc. is reportedly working on a healthy lifestyle product that includes iTunes-like software, physiological sensors (such as heart-rate), a rewards tracker, and a group activities facilitator. AppleInsider is reporting on the patent. The system will integrate with iPods and the iPhone.

The software includes interview modules to quiz you on your eating, exercise, medical, social and career information, which it uses to create a custom workout plan for you. You can then use the software to track your workouts and progress.

The software also suggests a deck of workout cards from which a user can pull the cards with exercise that he or she wishes to do. The deck is presumably culled from exercises that the person can do based on his or her health and other factors .

The deck forms a workout list that then can be downloaded to your iPod or iPhone. Instructions for proper technique with diagrams are included for reference. You check off the exercises as you complete them. That is synchronized back to the computer software when you sync.

The sensors can be worn or potentially integrated into a headset. The iPod downloads the data to itself, then syncs the info back to the computer software.

The software also lets you upload your data to pit yourself against others online, such as is done now by the Nike-Apple running product. If that is not your thing, the software also includes a reward system.

The question is, if an apple body type means you get dementia in your 70's, do you really want an Apple iBody?

Shady Business in Sunnyvale

Have we come to such a state that haughty solar panel owners can put their tree-hugging neighbors permanently in the carbon footprint shade? Apparently we have and that state's name is California.

Today, light trumped oxygen as a court order was carried out against a convicted redwood tree in Silicon Valley. A tree service gave a poodle cut to about a third of the Sunnyale tree's branches below the tip of the redwood to allow light to penetrate to a neighbor's solar panels. See video of the poodle-cut tree here.

At issue is a California state law, the Solar Shade Control Act of 1978, that requires that trees be removed if they block more than 10% of the light reaching solar panels during peak sunshine hours. Trees that exist at the time of the solar panel installation are exempt, but new growth on existing trees is not grandfathered in.

Mark Vargas, who has a small backyard, decided to install solar panels seven years ago. He told his neighbor, Richard Treanor, that Treanor would need to cut down his existing redwood trees to allow the sunlight to reach his solar panels.

For reasons known only to Vargas, he didn't install his seventy thousand dollar solar panels on his two-story house roof. He installed them on his back porch roof. Had he installed the panels on his house roof, the trees would not appear to block the sunlight.

Treanor objected. His trees were there first. He and his wife felt that they shouldn't have to go to the expense and visual assault of removing their beautiful, established redwoods simply because their neighbor decided to go solar.

But the courts were the eventual arbiter of this neighborhood grudge match. The Treanors were convicted of the crime of shady business. The court didn't side with Vargas altogether. Only one of the trees were found to be a repeat offender and the court did not levy the $1000/day fine on the Treanors.

Today, the executioner gave a small reprieve by just trimming the offending branches of the tree, resulting in a strange poodle cut. Vargas is not satieted in his sap-lust. He wants all the trees cut down, not trimmed. He vows to continue his court fight to get them all chopped down.

After seeing the video of his small, deeply shaded backyard, one cannot help but think that he might have been motivated to go solar more to gain sunshine in his backyard than to save energy.

But if the legislature makes a mistake, it is only too willing to make amends. One state legislator is proposing an amendment that fully grandfathers existing trees, including new growth, into the solar panel law.

But nothing saves Vargas from the Bad Neighbor of the Decade Award. Sadly, he'll have to live with himself knowing that he has singlehandedly and ironically added to the carbon footprint of his solar panels by reducing oxygen generated by the redwood.

The Treanors, who drive a sensible Toyota Prius, point out that the trees absorb carbon dioxide, cool the surrounding air, and provide wildlife habitat. They are quick to say that they support solar energy, but feel that it could be implemented in a more rational way.

Vargas, not to be outdone, recently bought an irrational fully electric plug-in car. He said that it would take 2-3 acres of trees to outweigh the carbon savings from his solar panels.

He did not mention how many trees it would take to offset his fully electric car's energy requirements from coal-fired electric generating plants. It is doubtful that his car is at home charging during the day when the solar panels are baking electricity. Nor did he say what are his plans for long-distance trips for which his electric car are ill-suited.

Aside from Vargas' solar motive, another question unanswered by the media is whether the Treanors could sue Vargas for damage to their home value after he forced them to ruin the appearance of the tree, especially since it was required by his apparent negligent placement of the solar panels. The litigation fun could go on for years.

Perhaps neither party can see the forest for the trees. Likewise, the media doesn't seem to care what those that are truly affected by the court order think about the matter.

The affected redwood could not be reached for comment as it recovers from its multiple amputations. But, other redwoods were waving their branches to have a word.

One of the amputee's neighboring trees said, "It's not our fault that we have a wide stance. [The amputee] didn't even realize that he was tapping the fence."

Another angry redwood barked, "You can't hug a solar panel!"

A tree in a nearby yard declined to be identified by species, but begrudgingly agreed to be interviewed in shaded profile. It asked, "Look, I'm going out on a limb here, but can't we all just get along?"

The solar panels smugly refused to comment on the case, but did say breezily that they were, "above it all."

A man who lives down the street from the feuding fence jockeys shook his head about the whole debarkle. He said, "I'm going to buy a frickin' Tesla roadster and show both of these yahoos who's the man."

Where There Is Smoke...

Around 6 a.m. this morning, smoke was seen rising on the horizon over the San Pasqual Indian Reservation in Southern California.

Calls began coming into the fire emergency center for Escondido, CA (northeast of San Diego). The officials assured the callers not to worry.

The tribe set fire to the home on the reservation early this morning as part of their cultural practice of destroying a deceased person's home and possessions to free the person's spirit from his possessions and thus, this earth.

My tribe had a similar practice. When someone died, the possessions and home for the entire family were destroyed by fire. The tribe built a new home for the survivors and replaced all the possessions lost.

It served the religious purpose of freeing the soul from possessions and the earth, as well as serving as an official mourning period after which the dead were not spoken of again. It had the added benefit of destroying any infectious disease that might have caused the death.

Fire is a sacred purifying agent in many tribal cultures. Even along the Trail of Tears, my ancestors kept the sacred fire burning that had burned since time immemorial. Somewhere in the nation, it still burns for our people.

Although most things were destroyed by fire, some personal possessions went to the grave with the person. Jewelry or other personal effects were often buried with the person. Some of the Moundbuilder mounds contain buried remains of tribal persons of note who were buried with an enormous number of jewelry, pearls and other things. Not everyone was buried on that grand a scale of course. The picture above is of a shell gorget from this period.

I made my grandmother, mother and aunt a traditional engraved shell and pearl necklace based on Moundbuilder designs. Both my grandmother and my aunt were buried with theirs. They liked that there was something made by someone who loved them, which was theirs alone and to accompany their body into the grave.

It is a concept strange to those outside of Indian Country. The idea of burying valuable objects with the dead seemed shockingly wasteful to thrifty Yankees.

But perhaps it is not as shocking to non-Indians anymore. My stepmother and I did the same thing for my non-Indian father. He was buried with his wedding ring, a watch I'd given him and a toy John Deere tractor, because he loved that brand of tractor the best. Somehow it seemed a fitting way to say goodbye.

My mother hopes the shock never fully goes away. When she wears her necklace and people compliment her about it, she tells them with an ornery twinkle in her eye, "You know, it was made to be buried with me when I die." She enjoys the shocked expressions of people as she laughs and explains it to them.

I can't imagine the shock of the callers this morning to hear that a home was destroyed on purpose and as part of a mourning ritual. They must be shaking their heads still.

But somewhere a San Pasqual man's spirit is smiling and rising, freed from this earth and all of its cares and woes.

Time in a XBox

Simon Jansen is just the Kiwi geek to show us Americans what we could accomplish if only we didn't watch so much television. With the exception of one television show, he puts his time toward a more constructive use.

A fan of the BBC's Dr. Who science fiction program and of video games, Simon decided to combine his two loves. He built a TARDIS from scratch to house a MAME console on which to play video games. Being the ever-genial Kiwi, he documented how to create one on his website.

For those not in the know, Dr. Who travels through time and space in his TARDIS, which looks like a 1960's English Police Box. For those not in the know about police boxes, they were on street corners for Bobbies to pop in to call the station for backup (or to have a spot of tea, for all I know). They went the way of the phone booth as communication technology rendered them obsolete.

Dr. Who is a campy scifi series that attracted a cult following in the U.K. and to a lesser extent, displaced Trekies in the U.S. It appears that fandom extends to Her Majesty's other colonies, including New Zealand, where Mr. Jansen resides.

The original program ran from the 1963 through the 1989. A second, more hip and fun version started running in 2005. Although the first version's special effects were cheesy and low budget, the second version has a better effects and more well written stories. It is the longest running science fiction show in the world.

A reluctant geek, Mr. Jansen is quick to disclaim his rabid fanboy crown. He quickly disabuses his readers any notion that he dresses up and goes to conventions or anything so, well, geeky. He is explicit that his answering machine message does not say, "We are the Daleks! We are the superior beings! Please leave a message after the EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

Rather, Mr. Jansen says that he just enjoys the story lines and the shoddy special effects. I'd say a website with detailed construction instructions, photographs and, oh, I don't know, owning a TARDIS game machine begs to differ, Mr. Jansen. It begs to differ.

Tidal Wave Power - Activate!

San Francisco is considering harvesting electricity from Pacific Ocean waves and San Francisco Bay tidal currents. CNET has an interview with Mayor Newsom about the projects, which are undergoing study by the city.

Do the Right Thing

The Advocate has an interesting article on San Francisco Mayor, Gavin Newsom, this month. It covers the reason he decided to allow gay marriages on February 12, 2004.

He had just returned from George Bush's inauguration in which Bush included in his speech his party's spew about the "sanctity of marriage" and protection of America from "activist" judges.

He told his staff to find a way to allow gays and lesbians to marry. They initially thought that they would marry a few couples. No one expected 4,000 couples to line up to be married in the one month that same-sex marriage was allowed in San Francisco.

The California Supreme Court is now deciding the fallout of the San Francisco marriages and whether the prohibition of marrage for same-sex couples is constitutional. The City of San Francisco is one of the parties in the combined litigation.

One of the arguments that the justices mentioned was whether the time is right to consider the question or whether gays and lesbians should be made to wait until the rest of the country catches up. Newsom's response is:

“When is the right time? There never is a right time. Mid-term congressional election? Not the right time -- we have a chance to take back the House. The next presidential election? Not the right time -- we have a chance to possibly win. It’s never the right time. We need to get over these stale arguments. If you believe in something, do it. And do it with conviction. And if you screw up, learn from it, admit your mistakes and failures, and move forward in a more thoughtful way.”

Newsom suffered political fall-out within his own party from his decision. Barack Obama asked him to throw fund raisers for him, but refused to be photographed with him in 2006 and again this election cycle. Other Democrats did much the same and worse following the 2004 marriages. Hillary Clinton is one of the few Democrats to have had pictures taken with Gavin Newsom.

It appears to gays and lesbians that Democrats think that they are fine for fund-raising, but they don't want to take any political risk where gay and lesbian issues are concerned. In demonstration of their lack of competence of gay and lesbian issues, they were shocked at the backlash from the LGBT community when the House passed a bill to extend the definition of hate crimes to include gays, lesbians and bisexuals, but not transgendered persons.

Barney Frank, the gay Congressman who sponsored the bill, felt that getting the vote through on 3 of the 4 groups was progress. It was politics over substance and the LGBT community knew it. There was no way the bill would get approved by the Senate nor signed by the President. It was a meaningless gesture and that was spoiled by Frank's and the Democratic majority's willingness to throw the transgender community to the wolves.

What the LGBT community understood was that it was another example of Democrats' political expediency by offering a meaningless bone to the community before a election fundraisers began. It would have been better to do nothing than to try to split the LGBT community's unity.

It is ironic that Republicans can stubbornly stand by their principles, at least on social issues, but Democrats continue to be moral cowards. Both Clinton and Obama do not support gay marriage equality for the LGBT community. They haven't the political cojones to deliver on what they profess to be one of the chief principles of their party: equality for minority groups.

Even as Obama talked about racial issues this past week, I couldn't overlook his moral cowardice on gay issues. It sounds hauntingly familiar to his fear of being photographed with Gavin Newsom.

Obama has never appeared at gay functions, so far as I can find. I can't think of a single photograph with him and any group of gay people. Instead, he sends his staff to talk to the gay community. He never addresses the community directly.

He claims to be supportive of gay rights. His campaign policies are perhaps a tad better than Clinton's. But is it just talk? With the Rev. Wright debate this past fortnight, gays and lesbians are reminded that most black churches have not been supportive of gays and lesbians, much less their rights.

In contrast, while Clinton doesn't support full gay marriage, she often appears with gay people and at gay functions. There isn't that nagging question of moral cowardice as with Obama, except on the gay marriage issue alone. She is politically expedient, but she has always been there to support gay rights in the Senate in every other respect. That is why gays and lesbians have continued to support Clinton over Obama even if we wished she had the cojones to support gay marriage.

All the more reason to enjoy the refreshing breeze from someone like Gavin Newsom who believes in doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do. How sad it is that it used to be the rule instead of the exception in the American polity.

Soul Surfing

It was a warm day in the gayborhood today, so a buddy and I headed to the beach. It ended up being a long walk from the parking area, but it was worth it.

It was sunny, breezy and 65 degrees at the ocean, but once I adjusted, I was in it for the long haul. I watched people, admired the Golden Gate Bridge.

Then I had the inspired idea of having me some Aretha. Soulful R&B and the beach go so well together. I couldn't stop tapping my feet in the sand.

We got there late, so people started clearing out around 4:00. We stayed until 5:30 and then wandered back to the car.

A nice drive through the Presidio and Marina district made the day complete.

Now I'm going to take a nap to sleep off the sunshine. I hope your day was as grand as mine.

Phone Tag

Roughly Drafted analyzes the iPhone's potential as a gaming device. Its hardware specs are superior to the competition. It has better graphics. It has the best OS. The accelerometer makes it a one-of-a-kind gaming device.

If only June would get her sooner!

All Apologies

I've enjoyed reading Andrew Sullivan through the years. He was an old-school conservative who didn't embrace the neocon ideology. I don't always agree with his conclusions, but I always enjoy his thoughtful reasoning.

Unlike other conservative writers, he posted an essay today on his blog fessing up to his own inadequacies concerning the Iraq War. What I Got Wrong About Iraq. He wrote it for Slate, the online magazine.
He writes that he committed four cardinal sins: Historical Narcissism, Narrow Moralism, Unconservatism, and Misreading Bush.

Historical Narcissism: Listening to criticism from the Left, he says that he filtered it through his Reaganite/Thatcherite historical filter and focused on the ideological arguments to the detriment of clear analysis of the true situation.

"I allowed myself to be distracted by an ideological battle when what was required was clear-eyed prudence."

Narrow Moralism: Having weighed the pros and cons of the Iraq War before it began, he felt that no matter what happened, it couldn't be wrong to remove an evil dictator from power.

"I became enamored of my own morality and this single moral act. And he was a monster, as we discovered. But what I failed to grasp is that war is also a monster, and that unless one weighs all the possibly evil consequences of an abstractly moral act, one hasn't really engaged in anything much but self-righteousness."

Unconservatism: Knowing the historical problems that the British had in running Iraq and of the Sunni-Shiite division, he dismissed history and his own conservative ideology. He bought the Administration story that Iraq was more secular and modern than most Middle Eastern countries.

"I greatly under-estimated them - and as someone who liked to think of myself as a conservative, I pathetically failed to appreciate how those divides never truly go away and certainly cannot be abolished by a Western magic wand. In that sense I was not conservative enough."

Misreading Bush: Although the Administration's execution of the war was fraught with incompetence, he believes war is often paired with incompetence. Instead, he feels it was misreading Bush's personal morality that was the most pertinent misread he made.

"I had no idea he was so complacent - even glib - about the evil that men with good intentions can enable. I truly did not believe that Bush would use 9/11 to tear up the Geneva Conventions. When I first heard of abuses at Gitmo, I dismissed them as enemy propaganda. I certainly never believed that a conservative would embrace torture as the central thrust of an anti-terror strategy, and lie about it, and scapegoat underlings for it...

"I certainly never believed that a war I supported for the sake of freedom would actually use as its central weapon the deepest antithesis of freedom - the destruction of human autonomy and dignity and will that is torture.

"To distort this by shredding the English language, by engaging in newspeak that I had long associated with totalitarian regimes, was a further insult. And for me, [it was] an epiphany about what American conservatism had come to mean."


I had a different experience from Mr. Sullivan in the early days of the war.

I remember a business dinner just after the war began, where someone asked me what I thought about the situation.

I thought about it and said, "As an American Indian, the Administration's rationale sounds uncomfortably like Manifest Destiny."

I was uncomfortable with the ideological rationale being forced down the country's throat at the expense of rational analysis. Inherent in the idea of Manifest Destiny was the superiority of Christianity and Western political philosophy as compared to the perceived inferiority of American Indians, their religions and governments.

The American people by and large, were convinced of their superiority due to their Christianity and sought to stamp out what they felt were inferior peoples with inferior religions. Indians were denied religious freedom despite the U.S. protection of religion in its constitution.

We were being asked to trust the Administration without asking bothersome questions. No where in history can I recall a situation where people were told to blindly trust their leaders when it when it turned out well.

As Sullivan points out, the Administration's use of totalitarian tactics and rhetoric were very troubling to me, as well. Of course, totalitarian tactics were closely tied to the implementation of Manifest Destiny. People tend to skim over those moral issues where Indians are concerned. But we remember.

Had Sullivan recalled the worst of American military and civil atrocities against Indians, he might have been more troubled by the Administration earlier.

The failure of the President was due to his fundamentalist religious views. He feels that the end justifies the means in Iraq because he sees himself as a Christian and Iraq's religion and culture as inferior.

In his mind, God has sent American to save the Iraqi people. He just substituted "democracy" for "Christianity". It is the same hubris that was used to execute Manifest Destiny.

Bush failed to grasp the importance of the religious divides in Iraq because from the start, he didn't think Islam is a religion on par with his own. It was unimportant to him and to his administration's analysis.

It is the same religious certitude that goes with any fundamentalist religion, be it Christian, Jewish, Muslim or even atheism. Once convinced of divine right, otherwise good people will engage in no end of atrocities to further their ideology at the expense of their humanity.

It is ironic that fundamentalist religious zealots on both sides of the war have diminished both countries. It is an irony I'd prefer to do without, but here we are.

Bead Me Up Scotty

Devorah Sperber is a multimedia artist who has a thing for the original Star Trek series.

She beaded curtains to show McCoy, Kirk and Spock beaming into the gallery.

Not content with that, she also uses spools of thread to create Spock's portrait viewable by use of a small crystal globe.

But wait, there's more! She also uses chenille stems on MDF backing to illustrate scenes from the show.

She is showing her retro futuristic flair at a show entitled Mirror Universe at the Caren Golden Fine Art gallery at 539 W. 23rd ST in New York City. The show runs from March 20 to April 26, 2008.

As Spock would say, "Fascinating."

Sew What?

If you are like me, you never really troubled yourself on how a sewing machine worked, but here is an animated version of what happens with the threads. It's sew fascinating.

Don't be Flippant

David Pogue, one of the tech writers for the New York Times, loves the Flip Ultra Video camcorder. It's been out a year, but he just got around to trying it out and reviewing it.

He likes how it runs on AA batteries and is inexpensive at $119 to $179. See his review video here. It is available directly from the company or on Amazon.

The mini-cam is flippant about the "normal" camcorder specs.

It's snappy style makes it easy on the eyes. It's diminutive size makes it easy to carry in a backpack. It's 3 second start to record time makes it perfect for impromptu videos of the kids.

It doesn't require video tape or storage cards. It has flash memory built in sufficient for up to 60 minutes of video. Video is recorded in MPEG4 format.

When you are ready to transfer it to the computer, just flip the built-in USB male port up and plug it directly into your computer to rip the video to the included video editing software - no cables necessary. On Windows, the software will automatically start when you plug the mini-cam into your computer. On Macs, it doesn't start automatically.

There is a set LCD screen on the back, such as you find on digital cameras. It doesn't rotate or flip out like normal camcorders, but will work for the majority of situations just fine.

Battery life is estimated by the maker from 2.5 hours to 6.5 hours depending on type of AA batteries used.

The Flip records in low light and other light-challenged situations. Check it out. You might just find yourself flipping for the Flip Ultra Video.

Twinkie, Twinkie Little Star

For all those Hostess Twinkie fangirls out there, check it: You can now make them at home in the privacy of your own kitchen.

Think about it. No more prying eyes at the grocery store checkout. You can shut the curtains and eat as many as you want, warm from the oven.

And if the food guilt becomes too much to bear before your supply is depleted, we guys are happy to save the day. I'm just sayin'...

Urban Outfitters has the Twinkie baking kit for $26. The kit includes including a Hi-Temp spatula, baking pan, recipe book, Twinkie container and an icing injector bag with 5 icing tips.

You can make all the variations your heart desires. Alter fillings or be daring and make chocolate Twinkies, you adventurous devil, you.

You have to handwash the baking pan, but would you have it any other way for the object of your golden love affair?

Bad Apple

Google's corporate philosophy is, "Don't be evil." It treats its employees like kings and expects them to produce great products. It is the open concept that permeates most of Silicon Valley.

Yet, Apple, the biggest Comeback Kid in the Valley, plays by the old rules - secrecy, opacity, and near-hysterical proprietory protectionism. But it works for Apple.

Wired has a great article on how Apple implements the Old School philosophy and why it works for them.

Honestly, I don't think Apple is probably a place that I'd thrive, given Steve Jobs' reputation for shrieking at underlings. Who needs the stress?

But I accept that others thrive on such stress and Apple's success is undeniable. Its secretiveness has spawned websites dedicated to the Mac rumor mill. As a marketing strategy it has worked wonders.

Even I can't wait to watch Jobs' keynote addresses when Apple makes them available. Actually, I'm almost a fanboy, except that I maintain some objectivity. I remain objective about new products.

I knew the early music phone between Motorola and Apple sucked the minute the details about it were released. I knew the iPhone would be a success the first time I saw its details.

I still remain skeptical about the AppleTV until DVR capabilities are added. Recent patent office filings show Apple is at least considering adding the capabilities to its media device. With that addition, I'd definitely want one. I'm not sure why Apple didn't have DVR capabilities on the AppleTV from the beginning. But it admits it made mistakes and is working to correct them.

Better than almost any other company, the contemporary Apple knows how to cut its losses, or wait for the market to catch up to it while it learns from its mistakes and improves the products to a point that they are hits.

But Apple also knows how to take risks. It will try new products that leverage its specialty - combining sleek hardware with user-friendly user interfaces and software - knowing that it has a better than average chance to make it successful.

For instance, the iPod reportedly started out as the brainchild of Tony Fadell, an independent contractor and hardware expert. His idea was not just for the hardware, but for the tie-in to a music store that integrated with teh MP3 player.

He left his job to become an independent contractor. He then shopped his idea around the Valley. Everyone turned him down, except Apple. He sold the idea to Apple management and predicted that it would totally change Apple in ten year's time to be a music business instead of a hardware company.

Apple hired him, gave him the resources to complete his idea, polished the Apple with its usual secrecy. Apple contracted with PortalPlayer to create the device prototypes. There were a lot of obstacles and tight supervision by Jobs himself. There was a lot of consumer tests to perfect the design.

Jobs micromanaged the device and interface design. He wanted to play music within three clicks. He couldn't hear the music and had them make it louder (thanks to Steve's reported partial deafness, we all can hear our music sitting by jet engines).

He almost killed the entire project just before it went into production because the battery drained in three hours, even when off. When the energy usage issue was resolved, Apple bought a majority stake in PortalPlayer before the product was released.

When Apple released the product, it took time and further improvements to become the juggernaut it eventually became. With the addition of the iTunes Store in the second generation iPod, Fadell's vision came to fruition. The one-two punch of the hardware and software/music store is what ultimately hit the consumer's nerve.

Before Apple, loading an MP3 player was cumbersome and cludgy. Apple created iTunes to make ripping CDs easy and device loading effortless. When it completed iTunes with the iTunes store, Apple had created the Golden Path of Least Resistance for its end users.

In addition to the article on the iPod development, another article on the iPhone development process shows how the company polishes its Apples.

Apple reportedly shopped the iPhone around to all the major U.S. carriers. All balked at the demands that Apple made. Carriers enjoyed great power over hardware manufacturers and the software on the hardware prior to Apples entry into the market.

User interfaces on cellphones were proprietary and every one of them was distinctly user unfriendly. The thought seemed to be that users would wade through badly written manuals to discover how to use new features and services.

Then the carriers couldn't understand why users didn't widely adopt new technology the carriers offered, such as photo mail or internet access. No amount of marketing could change the rule of nature: people take the path of least resistance. If you don't build your product to be easy to use, the end user will resist the learning curve.

Apple offers easy to learn interfaces that are fairly consistent across new iterations. For instance, although the iPod clickwheel interface went through many iterations across the generations, once learned, the user didn't have to relearn very much to use each new one. It was always intuitive and required little effort. Apple provided the path of least resistance intentionally.

Likewise, even though the multitouch interface was a new one, it was easy to learn even without reading the manual. Apple provided commercials and tutorials that showed how easy it was to use. It wrapped its interface in its sleek contemporary minimalist hardware design. Apple did everything right that prior hardware manufacturers failed to do properly.

Apple knew it had a killer product. It demanded concessions from carriers in exchange for having its product on their network. Apple sought to change the economics and power paradigm of the wireless industry in the same way its iPod shook up the music industry.

Carriers probably didn't like the idea of opening their networks up to allow for visual voicemail. They probably balked at subscription payments to the manufacturer. They definitely didn't want Apple in the drivers seat.

Only one carrier took the risk and reaped the rewards - AT&T. It didn't have the best network footprint, nor the best data network, but it had the ability to take the risk and trusted Apple to provide a premium product.

In contrast, imagine how different Sprint's market standing would be if it had been the iPhone carrier. No other carrier stood to gain as much or lose as much. The iPhone, combined with Sprint's other problems, has nearly crippled the company as droves of customers left the company. The iPhone would have bought Sprint time to fix the other problems.

For better or for worse, Apple's iPhone has changed the wireless industry. Although some balk at buying the iPhone in Europe where deep discounting of handsets is king, more than a few people are ponying up the purchase price to get Apple's superior design and interface.

When the iPhone 2.0 is released in June, Apple is set to conquer the corporate wireless market, bringing yet more rewards to AT&T. The IT critics of the iPhone have almost all been converted as Apple delivered all of its wish list.

Even the iPhone's other critics, who wanted to be able to put software on the iPhone, have been largely silenced as iPhone 2.0 brings the ability to not only put software on the iPhone, but even market and sell it in an iTunes-like Apple store.

Of course, Apple knew it had the interface and technology to make it work, so it demanded some concessions of the software world. All programs had to be vetted by Apple to be included and no one is allowed to add programs outside of Apple's process (although jailbreaking doubtlessly will continue).

Wired's article points out that most Silicon Valley companies subscribe to a variation of Google's practice, treat employees well and good things will float to the top. Apple subscribes to the older draconian business philosophy but still succeeds. A company must select the business philosophy that works best for it.

Apple, like Jobs, is demanding, obstinate, secretive and doesn't necessarily have the best employee benefits. Trust of employees or suppliers will never be its second nature. But it usually delivers because everyone there knows they will all win if the product succeeds.

Finally, Steve Jobs gets results from his employees because he has high standards that he consistently employs, he expects the best from his employees and lets them know when he is disappointed, and he praises his employees when they succeed. He knows he has to praise as well as pummel.

The business lessons I have learned from Apple are:

1. Take risks that leverage your key strengths.
2. Work on a product until it meets it exceeds customer market expectations.
3. Don't be afraid to cut your losses on a product if it doesn't work.
4. Don't retreat from a market if you fail.
   
5. Learn from your mistakes.
6. Use your mistakes to make a better product.
7. User interface, user interface, user interface. (Golden Rule of Path of Least Resistance)
   
8. When a market reaches saturation, the only differential is design.
9. Design can only be effective if it is combined with a great user interface.
10. Demand concessions if you have the best product.
11. You can only pummel your employees for failure if you also praise them for success.

Although the last one doesn't quite fit my management style, I do take to heart that one can't provide superior manage if one doesn't expect superior performance and provide the tools and structure to allow employees to succeed or fail.

Tow the Liner

With sky high fuel prices spurring invention, shipping decided to go fly a kite.

A cargo ship saved 20% of its normal energy by using a large kite to help propel it across the ocean. Once larger kites are installed, the savings could be as much as $2000 a day in fuel cost savings.

Treehugger sails into the news pages with the test results, showing the past has much to offer the shipping industry.

Now, if they just hook up a wire, they can charge their batteries with the lightening strikes, too. Then they can qualify for that nifty tax rebate on hybrid vehicles.

Lollygoogler

One just can't help drooling at the prospect of working for Google when you see pictures of the corporate perks. One doesn't mind working long hours if you can grab a nap and get a brief respite from the demands of the workday.

Google installed these nap pods around its campus for its employees.

The manufacturer is Metronaps, who offers seminars in fatigue risk management. They sell them as productivity enhancement devices.

Now that is some good marketing mojo! If only they had thought of a tie-in to Apple, such as the iNap or iSomnopod or something, they would be rolling in dough.

Installing these has to improve employee morale and instill corporate loyalty. Buying a new whip for corporate discipline? Not so much, Mr. Burns.

Wagging the Dog

Dachshunds make me laugh. Something about their personalities and short legs tickles my funny bone.

But my mother's dachshund can play for hours on end. There is no such thing as too much play. Behold, the beauty of this custom robotic tennis ball cannon.



I don't know how long it would take to teach a dog to replace the ball in the cannon, but once done, you can sit back, sip your 'tini and snort alcohol out your nose when your dog makes you laugh.

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear to be available commercially yet. But watch that dog's tail wag his body. Now that's a happy dog.

Spring Cleaning

If all the green beer you drank for St. Patrick's Day didn't unclutter your colon for you, then this might just be your last chance to get your intestines all spiffied up before summer salad season hits.

Cafe Gratitude, one of my favorite places that I've never been, is offering Adina's Urban Cleanse one last time to deal with your duodenum before April bacterial flowers bloom in your jejunum.

The San Rafael branch of the vegan eaterie is running its last event from March 24 -28, 2008. For a mere $650, you get to pick up a daily sack of goodies at the San Rafael branch of the restaurant each morning.

I missed the San Francisco run. Darn my luck!

The contents include morning wheat grass, organic live green juices, organic live imneral oups, coconut water and internal cleanse teas. In addition to these goodies, the program comes with a daily suppport team, daily educational classes and instruction on raw/live food preparation.

Adina Niemerow runs the event. You can check out more at her website.

If you don't have the bread, you can still go to your nearest Cafe Gratitude location and indulge your ileum in Our Daily Cleanse - only $39.50 for three drinks, a salad and spring rolls to help things move along.

If that doesn't float your boat, enjoy some other raw/live organic vegan fare, like the I Am Elated enchiladas or I Am Fabulous lasagna. No one has ever accused the owners of lacking afflatus despite the amount of fiber their dishes contain.

Be forewarned that consuming so much fresh produce may instigate acute loss of dignity later in the day. Depending on your social graces, you may become the office pariah before you can find a shower and clean Calvins.

(Social Tips: Most buses don't allow pets, so you can't divert attention to an adjacent dog. Instead, sniff the air and stare at the closest baby or young child with a distasteful gaze on the bus home. Or sit by an old man and lean away from him with strained politeness.)

But, hey, the fare at Cafe Gratitude is still worlds better for you than having the I Am Enflatulated frozen bean enchiladas you normally nuke for lunch.

Little British Invasion

How serendipitous my previous post turned out to be.

Matt Lucas and David Walliam, the talent behind the BBC's Little Britain, are coming to the US.

The comic duo will make an American version for HBO after finishing a Christmas special for the BBC. Matt Lucas mentioned on The Graham Norton Show, where he was a guest this week, that there is not a name for the HBO project yet.

They can't do the original British sketches on network television due to the censorship laws. Bubbles DeVere might be fined for her nudist tendencies, even if it is a fat suit and not real.

The HBO show will remake some favorite characters into the American paradigm, such as Vicki Pollard, the problem teenager who lives in the projects and speaks as incoherently as the choices she makes.

As for Florence and Emily, above, we can only hope that the two ladies will do their lady-like things somewhere in Middle America. Perhaps Iowa or Indiana?

Daffyd, the Only Gay in the Village, will now reside in the Deep South, instead of Wales. It is difficult imagining Alabama embracing his choice of latex clothing as easily as Wales did.

There is no word on a potential location for Maggie, the elderly bigot, right, who can't stomach those not of her liking. Perhaps she'd be most uncomfortable venting her spleen somewhere on the West Coast, but she'd play just as well in Peoria.

The genius of the show is taking its eccentic characters and juxtaposing the character's quirks against a particular region. It remains to be seen how well they will learn the American regional accents; the British regional accents were played to great effect in the original British version.

Thank you, HBO. I might become a subscriber just to watch this show when it airs. Unfortunately, there is no word when that will be.

Stormy Weather

U.S. airlines are required to install new navigation systems that will allow them to land safely in low lying clouds and fog by 2025.

The new system uses GPS and other electronic goodness to accurately chart the fastest route, saving fuel and time. The system exists today.

The airlines are dragging their heels because it costs money in equipment and training for the pilots. Some airlines are seeing the advantages in upgrading before the others, though.

Alaska Airlines is the first to fully implement the system. The system will be operational by the end of 2008 in all of its planes.

Chintzy Southwest Airlines plans to spend $125m over the next six years to install the equipment. Some planes will have the system operational by the end of 2008. Couldn't they implement it fully this year based on the money they saved by not inspecting their planes?

Virgin America JetBlue and United Airlines have also expressed interest in installing the equipment before 2025.

You'd think that the U.S. government could justify tax credits or something to implement the systems sooner based on improving congestion at busy airports. San Francisco should work with the FAA to force the airlines to implement the system long before 2025 for SFO.

We aren't called Fog City for nothing. Fog too often cuts SFO's normal 60 flights per hour to 30, especially during the touristy summer months. The more time a tourist circles SFO waiting to land, the less time they have to buy souvenirs at Chinatown or Fisherman's Wharf.

Naw, that would take money away from important customer hassling activities. We can't do something to improve customer satisfaction. It's not part of the airline business model.

Lollygagging

Oldsters everywhere can rejoice as the flavors of their parent's youth return with vengeance.

Lollyphile, a San Francisco confectioner, has opened shop with two unusually flavored lollipops.

Absinthe, for lovers of the liqueur, is the first flavor in the expected lime green shade. Absinthe tastes like licorice - the black kind, not the cherry ones.

The second flavor...wait for it...is maple bacon. Perhaps we've taken convenience food to its inevitable, gory conclusion.

But for those who care about such things, the maple bacon lolly is made with real, Vermont maple syrup, which I'm sure is humanely culled.

There are also real bits of sustainable, organic (it is San Francisco) cured bacon wrapped in mapley candy goodness. The website says that the salty bacon juxtaposed against the sweet maple syrup makes for a taste sensation.

Now this is what I'm talking about: Progress. A person can now satisfy his diabetic and heart-diseased cravings with one verboten candy, his transgression as neatly concealed as an easily disposed candy wrapper.

The lollys start at 4 for $10, but the prices go down the more you buy. The company plans to make and market other unexpected and unusual flavors. How long it can be until they come out with a castor oil flavored lolly?

Wait, they don't use free-range bacon? Can they do that in San Francisco? That kind of barbarity is usually reserved to Texas.

Goggle Search

As we get older, it is nice to know that technology has our back.

I remember that the best thing that happened for my mother was the advent of cellphones so she could use her landline to call her cellphone when she lost it, or vice verse.

For our generation, we'll have super duper goggles that will help us find our lost car keys and other objects. The University of Tokyo developed goggles that help you find objects and learn new to recognize new objects. The goggles tie into one's backpack computer (what, you don't have one?).

It also has application in finding hard to find flora and fauna in the forest, but let's be clear - it was probably developed by a women who grew weary of helping her husband or son find the ketchup in the fridge.

Male Pattern Blindness is a serious affliction. Now if they can make the goggles connect to our iPhones via Bluetooth, we'll be cooking with gas.

The Sound of Silence

For anyone waiting for the doors to close on an airplane or riding mass transit, it is a thing to be devoutly wished for - something to silence those annoying cell phone talkers.

Ambient heard our silent pleas. The Audeo is its product to plug the pieholes of loud talkers everywhere. It is a neckband that intercepts speech signals between the brain and the larynx and creates speech.

In the case of cell phones, the person can simply think about what she wants to say and the device will push the speech to the phone so those around her cannot hear the words being spoken, but the person receiving the call can.



The device was developed to help the disabled communicate. But I can hardly wait to see people wearing their Audeo turtleneck and walking down the street in silence as they talk on the phone.

The Meaning of Life, the Universe and Everything

~42~

That is the Answer, if you were asking, "What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything?"

But since Douglas Adams published the Answer in his popular set of books, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, readers and fans have wondered why 42? A BBC article rounds up the popular theories.

Which begs the question, can't one simply be happy to know the Answer without having to question it further?

If you have the Answer, perhaps your time is better spent contemplating more pressing questions, such as, "What will I have for lunch?" or "Is that lint in my naval?"

Duck, Duck, Goose (Down Pillow)!

The annual Flash Mob Pillow Fight was held in Justin Herman Plaza in San Francisco on Valentine's Day as the clock on the Ferry Building struck 6 p.m.



Push the video to 1:25 to see the mayhem ensue.

I'm afraid I was asleep on the job this year. Next year, I'll have a pillow on the ready.

It's Kind of a Big Wheel Thing

Be there or be square, my friend. On March 23, 2008, the 8th annual BYOBW (Bring Your Own Big Wheel) race will head down the Crookedest Street in San Francisco.



If you thought, "Lombard Street", you'd be wrong. Well, sure, in past years it was there, but this year, at the behest of the police, it moved to the less well-known but much-more-crooked Vermont Street at 20th on Potrero Hill.

The annual race, created by Jon Brumit in 2000, has grown to over 50 participants and has become a fast Easter tradition for San Francisco. It's all downhill from here.

The question on everyone's lips: Will Stewie Griffin, professional Big Wheel racer, be a no-show again this year?

It Vanished Into Thin Air!

Apple's MacBook Air has even more problems facing it than TSA persecution.

Newsweek tech reporter, Steven Levy, lost the loaner MacBook Air that Apple supplied for him to review in his column. He searched everywhere but to no avail.

He changed his passwords on various websites in case the laptop was stolen. But he doesn't think that it was.

Instead, his working theory is that his neat-freak of a wife threw it out with the Sunday paper and magazines that were on the coffee table with the computer.

She neatly disputed his theory as so much hot Air.

"I Don't Get No Respect"

Rodney Dangerfield doppelgänger, Karl Rove, was paid $40,000.00 to speak at the University of Iowa. Sounds like a perfect location for his neo-conservative spew, but the students dared to taunt him!

At one point, Rove was heckled into making a rare admission. "You got a chance to ask your questions later and make your stupid statements, let me make mine."

In response to another heckler who brought to Rove's attention that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann's granted Rove the title as Worst Person Ever, Rove reminisced about his authoritarian heroes, "Yea, worse than Hitler, worse than Stalin, worse than Mao and worse than the person who introduced aluminum baseball bats."

How ironic that the message the Worst Person Ever delivered went unreported. Only the heckling was of interest.

Near the end, an audience member asked, "Can we have our $40,000.00 back?" Rove shot back, "No, you can't."

If only we could get the last 7 years back.

Dust! Anybody? No? Dust!

Marjorie Dawes is one of those people you love to hate. We've all been trapped in a meeting somewhere with someone like her.

She is a character on BBC America's Little Britain. She runs the local "Fat Fighters" chapter with an iron grip and acid tongue.



I always laugh with its cast of flawed and eccentric characters. There is Daffyd, the Only Gay in the Village who refuses to acknowledge other gays; Maggie, the hate-spewing Golden Girl of the Conservative Party who puts the "I" in "bigot"; and Emily Howard and Florence, who are just like two ladies doing lady-like things, but they aren't.

Bubbles Devere, the zoftig and perpetually unpaid patron of a spa is always good for it; Kenny Craig, the stage hypnotist who thinks he is better skilled than he is; and many more make for a fun evening's viewing.

If you find yourself an almost-lady, wishing you had lady-like things to do, but find yourself with a free evening, check out Little Britain to see how they laugh across the pond.

If you are a guy then, "Look into my eyes, look into my eyes, the eyes, the eyes, not around the eyes, don't look around my eyes, look into my eyes, you're under. You'll watch Little Britain and love it. 3-2-1, You're back in the room."

Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Apples of War!

The TSA was befuddled. It was supposed to be a computer, but there weren't any ports in the back. The x-ray revealed that there was no hard drive. What kind of heinous son-of-al Qaeda was this?

The TSA was on the job, my friend. They did not intend to let this MacBook Air wreak its sleek industrial design on the unsuspecting flying public.

No sir, the TSA does not care one iota for this rapidly developing "technology" that "benefits" humanity at the expense of flying safety. They don't care for it one bit. Not one of them has an iPhone for quick internet research for a reason, mister!

They have given Apple notice that they are not going to take its "technology" lying down before, when someone dared cross their path with the Apple iPod accelerometer in his Nike running shoes when going through security.

Apparently, the media has failed us again by failing to mention that terrorists are now deploying industrial-designer terror devices with the Apple logo shining on the front cover. (New al Qaeda wordy ad slogan: "We're going to kill you American devils, but be assured that we'll send you to hell with style and industrial élan!")

The poor Apple early adopter paid the ultimate price, above and beyond the SSD option price tag. He missed his flight while the TSA drones tried to figure out what danger the MacBook Air's Solid-State-Drive (SSD) posed to flight safety.

Mind you, one young TSA agent knew exactly what it was and told the others. They didn't believe his voodoo talk. Never mind that a paltry 64GB SSD doesn't present a threat to a business meeting let alone a flight.

The decidedly unhip TSA drones made the detainee start it up and prove it was a computer by running a program. Disappointed, they eventually let him pass.

On a similar note, according to the TSA blog, it turns out that San Francisco International Airport (SFO) and other local TSA offices "reign of terror" has ended thanks to consumer complaints and inquiries to the national website. The local offices were making passengers take all electronics and cords out of their bags all on their own initiative.

The national office found that local TSA offices just wanted to see every Blackberry, PDA , digital camera and all their cords and chargers despite the fact that federal regulations didn't require it and that it created a significant delay to the lines. The national office ended the practice within the week.

I was surprised recently at SFO with the order to empty all electronics, cords and chargers into trays on a recent trip. It added a half an hour to the already tedious wait in line as all the surprised passengers tried to quickly comply. It also took me about 10 trays by the time I fully unpacked my carry-on and computer bag.

Well done, SFO TSA! You really know how to put the "ass" in "hassle"!