There's a Badger in my Neighborhood

From Overheard in NY

For Your Comfort and Safety, Remember That Kids Are Pretty Literal

School social worker, to kindergartner on lap: So what happened right before you ran out of your classroom?
Kindergartner: I'm peeing.
Social worker: What do you mean, you're peeing?
Kindergartner: I'm peeing.
Social worker: [jumps up, displaying huge wet spot on her pants]
Kindergartner: I TOLD you I was peeing.

5130 Roxbury Road
Indianapolis, Indiana

Ethanol in Brazil

Dumb as We Wanna Be
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN/ NEW YORK TIMES
Published: September 20, 2006

São Paulo, Brazil
I asked Dr. José Goldemberg, secretary for the environment for São Paulo State and a pioneer of Brazil’s ethanol industry, the obvious question: Is the fact that the U.S. has imposed a 54-cents-a-gallon tariff to prevent Americans from importing sugar ethanol from Brazil “just stupid or really stupid.”

Thanks to pressure from Midwest farmers and agribusinesses, who want to protect the U.S. corn ethanol industry from competition from Brazilian sugar ethanol, we have imposed a stiff tariff to keep it out. We do this even though Brazilian sugar ethanol provides eight times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it, while American corn ethanol provides only 1.3 times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it. We do this even though sugar ethanol reduces greenhouses gases more than corn ethanol. And we do this even though sugar cane ethanol can easily be grown in poor tropical countries in Africa or the Caribbean, and could actually help alleviate their poverty.

Yes, you read all this right. We tax imported sugar ethanol, which could finance our poor friends, but we don’t tax imported crude oil, which definitely finances our rich enemies. We’d rather power anti-Americans with our energy purchases than promote antipoverty.

“It’s really stupid,” answered Dr. Goldemberg.

If I seem upset about this, I am. Development and environmental experts have long searched for environmentally sustainable ways to alleviate rural poverty — especially for people who live in places like Brazil, where there is a constant temptation to log the Amazon. Sure, ecotourism and rain forest soap are nice, but they never really scale. As a result, rural people in Brazil are always tempted go back to logging or farming sensitive areas.

Ethanol from sugar cane could be a scalable, sustainable alternative — if we are smart and get rid of silly tariffs, and if Brazil is smart and starts thinking right now about how to expand its sugar cane biofuel industry without harming the environment.

The good news is that sugar cane doesn’t require irrigation and can’t grow in much of the Amazon, because it is too wet. So if the Brazilian sugar industry does realize its plan to grow from 15 million to 25 million acres over the next few years, it need not threaten the Amazon.

However, sugar cane farms are located mostly in south-central Brazil, around São Paulo, and along the northeast coast, on land that was carved out of drier areas of the Atlantic rain forest, which has more different species of plants and animals per acre than the Amazon. Less than 7 percent of the total Atlantic rain forest remains — thanks to sugar, coffee, orange plantations and cattle grazing.

I flew in a helicopter over the region near São Paulo, and what I saw was not pretty: mansions being carved from forested hillsides near the city, rivers that have silted because of logging right down to the banks, and wide swaths of forest that have been cleared and will never return.

“It makes you weep,” said Gustavo Fonseca, my traveling companion, a Brazilian and the executive vice president of Conservation International. “What I see here is a totally human dominated system in which most of the biodiversity is gone.”

As demand for sugar ethanol rises — and that is a good thing for Brazil and the developing world, said Fonseca, “we have to make sure that the expansion is done in a planned way.”

Over the past five years, the Amazon has lost 7,700 square miles a year, most of it for cattle grazing, soybean farming and palm oil. A similar expansion for sugar ethanol could destroy the cerrado, the Brazilian savannah, another incredibly species-rich area, and the best place in Brazil to grow more sugar.

A proposal is floating around the Brazilian government for a major expansion of the sugar industry, far beyond even the industry’s plans. No wonder environmental activists are holding a conference in Germany this fall about the impact of biofuels. I could see some groups one day calling for an ethanol boycott — à la genetically modified foods — if they feel biofuels are raping the environment.

We have the tools to resolve these conflicts. We can map the lands that need protection for their biodiversity or the environmental benefits they provide rural communities. But sugar farmers, governments and environmentalists need to sit down early — like now — to identify those lands and commit the money needed to protect them. Otherwise, we will have a fight over every acre, and sugar ethanol will never realize its potential. That would be really, really stupid.

Fun at the lake

v

Some days I hate Masons

At lease ACL (http://www.aclfestival.com/lineup.aspx) is next weekend if I can get through the UT/OS game. Damn shit is going to be crazy this weekend.


I've been playing tennis again this week. It's only been 10 years since I picked up a racket

dog pile

if you look sharp, you will see that Pearl is at the bottom of this pile.










Look again

Stuyvesant Town for sale

This is a very distubing trend to me. No to mention the grants that were given to Met Life 50+ years ago. Why shouldn't they have to pay them back upon sale.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/30/nyregion/30stuyvesant.html

Dog Police - wolf, wolf, wolf

OMG Look what I found. I was in the shower of the motel 6 some 20 years ago when you and dad saw this and laughed about it for years. Now I've seen it and its just plain creepy. Odder still is they were from Texas. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0359hSerDeE

its past time

So as of now, it is past 6:06.06 on 6/6/06 in Jeruselum. We're all still here. I haven't seen the anti-christ yet, though the guy next to me has really thick nose hair. So, did we humans make it through another close call or did Fox News blow yet another story out of proportion?

Other humous reading on the subject

http://www.gambling911.com/060106Gnews.html

But why stop at 10:1, why not 100:1?

I brought in my first large job

We got the job and away we go.

the Pitch is tomorrow

the first version is off the shelf and is getting tweaked today. 8:00 tomorrow is the meeting. A lot of work still to be done.

test remote post

test text test

turtle in travis

notice the longhorn under his chin

Newest House V.1

A bike is born

After more than two years in construction the "chill" bike has made it out of the laboratory and into world. Thanks Molly for the modeling job.

Projects on the Coasts

Dog on Board

Yes, I know I posted this before, but I like the photo.
















Hi, Chris.... Hope you log in.

Politically Correct Police

I had no idea, but apparently it is not PC to use the term "gypped". After all these years, I've been degrading and insulting the gypsies in my midst, if there is such a thing.

So, I'm sorry, take me to the Hague. I owe the Gypsies a pound of flesh.

And while, I'm doing time for unnoticed crimes, go ahead and gouge my eyes out and shiv my ears, but please don’t let Jeff Skilling off without some kind of sentence.

Thing We Remember

I miss her. She’d call me “stampie”. We’d go shoe shopping and she loved riding around in my old truck as we cruised through Spanish Harlem “shooting rats”. She was the smartest I’ve known and loved dogs more than people. She wanted more than I had to give at the time and stalked me outside restaurants when I was with my co-workers. I wish we could talk more but her husband should come first and I am smart enough to know that (pretty damn obvious to most people (MOST PEOPLE)). I want to look at her “eye tattoo”.

I miss her. She could sail and was always a trooper. We went to Marti Gras and she is the only person I can imagine, that could have exposed themselves while still maintaining her poise and dignity. She was unconfident, which was something I though to be unbearable, now I know that is typical. I want to hold her hand. She had great hands.

I miss others and think about them sometimes but these are the ones that mattered and although, I’ve had to rebuild my life this last calendar year, these are the ones who matter. These are honorable women and the reason that I keep hope. Thank you.

As I’m listening to Noam speak, I am thrilled to be back in a thinking life. I’m making music. I’m designing more since my first 4 years in NYC. It’s ok, but I still need to learn balance. My timing is still all off. I’m not perfect, but things are ok. I’m working on three coasts again soon and may start island hoping in the next few months.

No worries of infidelity, no park benches, no caffeine, no smoking, no tumor and little stress. Things have been worse.

A Bifurcated Tale

Sun drawn, under the sky,
We dug in, after most all things

The brine of night and the butter knifes
Sang the grains of light.

Liberty, watched as the glass round
Your neck, caught our eyes

In all the angles and relations
There are so many emulations
Of our hobby and our hearts
Of our hobby and our hearts

In all the ways to be divided
It’s ideal that we collided
In our hobbies and our hearts
In our hobbies and our hearts

Lucinda and your summer hair,
all soft and bright

We walked along the avenue
of a 1000’s smiles

The feathered Wink of altitude
gave up our miles

On the path that we did find
It’s so lucky to have aligned
In our hobbies and our hearts
In our hobbies and our hearts

Sharp as a whisper in the dark
and never to be split apart
In our hobby and our hearts
In our hobby and our hearts

POTATO ON FIRE (circa spud)

Shackiness Afoot

Just feeling totally detached yet pissy today. So I'm just going to include some photos of people I love.

Carl Sandburg visits me in a Dream

I cried myself to sleep last night
And the ghost of Carl, he approached my window
I was hypnotized, I was asked To improvise
On the attitude, the regret of a thousand centuries of death

Even with the heart of terror and the superstitious wearer
I am riding all alone I am writing all alone

Even in my best condition, counting all the superstition
I am riding all alone I am running all alone

And we laughed at the beatitudes of a thousand lines
We were asked, at the attitudes, they reminded us of death

Even with the rest belated, everything is antiquated
Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart?

Even in his heart the Devil has to know the water level
Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart?

And I cried myself to sleep last night
For the Earth, and materials, they may sound just right to me

Even with the rest belated, everything is antiquated
Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart?

Even in his heart the Devil has to know the water level
Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart?

Birth of Cool

It’s trippy when your city becomes the grooviest places in the country for two weeks every year. All the podcasts, movie 'zines and interactive media that I plow through from LA/Seattle/NYC have been going nuts about this years SXSW for a month. And now, this past weekend the people started arriving in droves.

They're throwing their money around in our neighborhood bars/restaurants/record stores and boutiques in an effort to enjoy the Southwest during their strange little window of time. The students are away and it's almost like having adult swim in Bat City, USA.

All "hater" indie-kid crap aside, it should be fun. All the bands: the unsigned acts, the old acts looking for a new home, the secrete shows, the label parties, the fashions, the half dozen or so hot movies I'll get to see that aren’t out yet and don’t forget about the people. Oh, yes the beautiful and fabulous people who will draw me out of the house and keep me out of some of my favorite venues for the next solid week.

Even Pearl digs it.

a tribute page

They prefer to be called little people but the most of the world they are know as midgets and this is my tribute them.

umpa lumpa















Peter Dinklage - The Station Agent - btw he went to Benington '91





















Verne Troyer - mini - me
and his strange tale 1 and 2
















Billy Barty
















Tony Cox




















Gary Coleman - the catch phrase of the 80's


















Hervé Jean-Pierre Villechaize aka - Tattoo
read his bizarre story













The baseball stunt from the 30's
















and finally Morris Garage's Version

Big Doings in Greenpoint

Found these recently when I was looking at begining a new project in my old neighborhood in NYC. I don't know if any of you can make out what going on in these images but where the red mark hits the land is where the last of these pictures was taken. Try referencing the Citicorp building. The one with the large slanted top.

The Hills have Eyes

I've
http://www.eyesonthehills.com/

I’ve been watching trailers for this film for the past two days and I just can’t describe how completly stupid this film looks. Although, it’s a remake of the ’77 Wes Craven film which was also not so good but for god’s sake. There are very few things more retarded than radiation growth movies as a plot generating topic. However, this film has decided to bash New Mexico as well.

To that I can only say, that maybe New Mexico (with the exception of Santa Fe) may be spared from colonization from the new American urbanism for another 15 seconds.

On a more humorous note, my weekend was spent working a movie that was filmed in my house. It was fun and the people were very respectful, as well as attractive.

Also, there was no ricin in Moore-Hill and we are still safe…for now. Scare-mongers!!!

blogger jacking

To the untrained eye, it may have just appeared taht my blog was going its normal unfarrowed way, however for the past week - I've been locked out.

Finally back online, I will relish my freedom of speach more heartily.

Song of 27

Though I may be miles away from her,
with years that pass without a word,
I’ve never seen a moon so high,
her name hangs down from there tonight.

So put your little hand away.
I’ve seen such needy days before.
On nights light this, my hope returns,
though I may be miles away from her.

A locket just for good luck
& a pocket knife for long night,
& a sleepy little dreamer,
with still miles to go.

27 take me home,
& pore that last year down my throat.
The days will fade and the nights will burn,
though I may be miles away from her.

I see her in the doorway,
staring a hole right though it all,
the first of many fits, and the last one was
man, the last one was.

So check your lock and close your eyes.
When you wake up I’ll be alright.
Never tell them where it hurts
& keep you bullet safe inside.

The wind has wept and the sky has slurred
& we slept through the sunrise too
& I’m dreaming still, of who we were.
Though, I may be miles away from her.

Mexico Pre-Valentines Day

Terracing the street, in boxes of transparent cellophane, these temporary pharos strut across my little Mexican plaza. The plastic skins, decorated with hearts, roses and ribbons sugar the gift boxes to "los novios". Each, its own tribute to both its future recipient and the small stuffed object at the core of this shrine: a fuzzy red puppy dog, pink heart or desperate teddy bear.

I imagine the little ones ripping into these perfect boxes in search of the love of their fathers and mothers. I imagine the grandparents who give these elaborate bobbles as their own present and those who send them on behalf of parents absent or gone. I imagine the jealousy of those who must watch in want of the box that will never come. I imagine the saving of the young man being doled out in hopes these new feeling of his will be returned. I imagine and I am sad for all of them.

Trying to Remember to Post

A new year! I will try to post more frequently now that the horror of 2005 is done and away. And so, my next building. Take a look. And to answer your first question, the colors are not representative of anthing yet.

My Morning Jacket

I needed it most, when I was eighteen.
But now that im older, I don't need many things.
Just someone to hold, that's what you give me.
When dark touches your skull baby,
Aw babe you can drop that on me.
So I say lord, all the heavens you've made,
Cant hold back the ghosts that haunt my baby and me.
Oh cant ye hold em back, form comin on in,
To a lovely woman, that jus wans her mind back again.
I cannot crumble, what you want this to be.
Or bring peace of mind, if it aint there to see.
Aw if you don't know yourself, how could you ever know me.
But to have and to hold you, yeah that's the way its gotta be.

Bad Holiday for Celebrity Deaths

First him,



















now this..



















The chemically dependant are dropping like flies.

Puppy Injured, No hound to release.

As A Remembrance: 12/12/05,

To all those I was hoping to be in contact with today for various reasons: I will talk to you later.

I am at the animal hospital. Pearl charged a dog and broke free the fence at the Red River house and ran full steam into a car. I will be at the hospital for the next few hours at least or as long as it takes.

Initial reports are good. She was limping and loosing hair due to the shock. She had a small abrasion on her right back foot and a large scratch on her shoulder. She had blood in her mouth and that is the worst of it right now.

I will keep you posted as to the status and please be patient with my replies.


-and later-

I think my little girl is alright. The vet gave her back to me with the same black tread mark across her shoulder, very sore, slightly sluggish puppy who is a little drugged-up. She has no broken bones and they don't think her internals have any damage. She's clearly very shaken up and keeps trembling. The patient is currently snoring loudly at my feet. I still have her blood on my close and I'm sure I was freaking out when I took her to the Vet.

On a weird note, the Vet and her speech impaired assisted did say ask me what about my blood type.

"A-Positive", I told them, "but why do you need to know that?"
Well, after a few hmms and a gaggle of haws and even a longer time staring at the floor, the bald stammering Vets assistant yelped at me, " we tested Pearl and found out that she is expecting a litter of Muppies".

My jaw dropped. I asked the Vet and her slack jawed assistant, "What on gods earth is a 'Muppy'?"

The 50-somthing grey haired granola Vet lady explained to me, "A muppy is a man-puppy". She went on to describe that "Some man, a HUman, has been having sex with your dog and has gotten her pregnant. The only thing we know is that his blood type is type-O".

Then, she kinda stepped back and glared at me. And as one of her eyebrows arched and the corner of her mouth began to curl she grunted " it ain't right to have sex with an DOG".

I quickly paid Pearl's bill cash and left before they got their pitchforks out and chased me down the street with the rest of the angry villagers.

So, I need to have a difficult conversation with Mark tonight.

Thank you all for your concern about Pearl. For those of you whom have not met her she would like to say "thank you". For those who know her well, she asked me to tell you, "woof, woof woof, gurgle, gurgle wheeeh".

Last minute gift Ideas

Anyone want to go in halvies and open a studio with me?

http://austin.craigslist.org/msg/108942788.html

Good press for Architects

long time no post

The Ice Storm of '05.