No, I haven't started listening to The Dashboard Confessional and stupid emo shit like that, but I sure look like someone that might.

I went to Wal-Mart up in Kent to check out some cheap frames, since mine broke and Lenscrafters's frames were too expensive... Wal-Mart has to be the cheapest optometry place ever.  Anyway, the lady measured my existing lens, typed them into the computer, and found a frame in stock that happened to fit my lenses perfectly... and for only 18 bucks!  Whoo!

It saved me enough money that I can finally go out and buy that new Sunny Day Real Estate album I've been craving....

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 08:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It appears that all in all, New Orleans made it. Supposedly, there's some pretty rough flooding and damages, but the storm surge never made it over the levee, and the main winds went further east. Part of The Superdome's roof was torn off, but the structure of the building made it. Surely there will be some fatalities and some problems, but really, I'm glad it wasn't worse. Every analyst that, yesterday, was preaching the doomsday, is now saying that New Orleans dodged a major bullet. I believe them on this one... the 'Big Easy' could have been the 'Big Dump' with all that could've happened. Katrina turned east and weakened slightly, just saving the city from it's worst.

Good.

Today was my first day in the department. It was... exciting... nervous but exciting. I taught my first Kent class, which was in a lecture hall. Of course, it was 1pm, so the kids were dead after lunch. Overall, I felt pretty comfortable up front. I guess I will see how many come back on Wednesday. Wednesday is when the content begins, and I hope I can come up with an hour's worth of materials.

Today was also my first class that I'm taking. It was with a guy named Milton Harvey, an older African man with a pretty thick accent. Believe me, I was a satisfied customer, because despite the fact that my ears are plugged with this cold and despite the fact that I really wasn't used to his accent, I felt like I learned more in that 50 minutes than in a whole semester of statistics at Ball State. For some reason, he could explain it so I could understand. Dr. Rahman just didn't, and it's nothing against him, it just didn't work.

I'm really sick of this cold. I've had it since I lived in Muncie(!). It's strikingly similar to 'the flu' I had this past spring, which seemed like a six week cold but the doctors said was the newest incarnation of the flu. I think I have it again, but it's about done. The problem right now isn't any form of discomfort... though I've had some rough headaches, and it isn't the snot, which I can deal with... it's settled into my ears which has made me deaf for all intents and purposes. I'm more deaf right now WITH my hearing aids than I normally am without them. I HATE IT because I'm trying to get to know people, and I have to ask 100 times what they said. I wonder if my hearing loss (combined with my obnoxious personality) isn't the reason I'm so socially terrified.

We had a scare with Rikki today. The past few days, she had been shedding literally handfuls of hair. She always sheds, but this was looking unhealthy. She would lay somewhere, get up, and the spot would be jet black. You would pet her, and your hand would be completely full. It was enough to concern both Amy and I, so Amy ended up taking her to the vet today while I was at work. It turns out that it was just her summer undercoat shedding. Something I hadn't thought about until I heard that was that each summer that I've had her, right before school, she always goes to the kennel because my parents and I (and Amy the last couple years) go on some sort of week to two week trip. At the kennel, she gets groomed as part of her stay, which every other year apparently did away with this undercoat. Luckily, Amy found a nice vet in Brimfield, and Rikki's visit was only about 30 dollars (including a needed rabies vaccine), which is VERY cheap for a vet. I'm just soooo relieved that she's okay. I've had Rikki longer than I've had Amy, and longer than I've had most of my furniture and possessions... almost five years, and she's only six. Rikki's retarded and has emotional issues, but I love her.

Tomorrow's agenda includes a mapping class, which I am looking forward to. It also includes a few hours in my office, which I hope to use to prep for my class and get a couple weeks ahead. I know the homework crunch is coming.

When it does, this blog will be more dormant than Devil's Tower. If you understand that lame excuse for a joke, go out and do something fun. You obviously have no life.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How old is Pat Sajak these days?  He has to be ancient.  Not Bob Barker ancient, but old none the less.  He's a strange looking little critter, too.

I just Googled it.  He'll be turning 59 in October.  Get this, he was one of the "Good Morning, Vietnam!" guys.  Not Adrian Cronauer, which is the one Robin Williams played, but he was still a morning disc jockey in 'Nam during the war and in Cronauer's tradition, yelled "Good Morning, Vietnam!" at the beginning of each show.  The wonders that are Google.

Tonight, Pat is my savior, at least for this half-hour block.  I'm at home alone, because Amy's at work, and I've got a little breathing room tonight in terms of my work.  I decided to relax, but after so many nights of so much work, I'm bored to death.

I turned on the television and found a Simpsons rerun.  Since I swear I've seen all of them about ten times apiece, it was one that I'd already seen, but good enough to waste my mind on for a bit.  Then, after the Simpsons, a rerun of That 70s Show came on.

What the fuck?

That 70s Show is good enough to be syndicated?  Since when?  I certainly think That 70s Show was one of the most overrated programs of the 1990s and 2000s.  I mean, the redhead is kinda cute, and seeing Tommy Chong is cool (how he's not dead yet, I'm not sure), but... why are they replaying episodes?  Is there nothing else to show?  And why did all of the characters end up getting decent careers?   I guess it's okay for a sitcom, but take out the 70s references and clothing and it'd be just another stupid formulaic sitcom.

Flipping through the channels, I found King of the Hill, which is definitely one of my recent favorites.  There are more geographic and cultural stereotypes portrayed in that show than any other.  Of course, it's obviously the geographic part that I dig, because Will & Grace has hundreds of homosexual stereotypes and its the worst show in the history of television.  Although Megan Mullaly is kind cute...

Can you tell I haven't gotten much time with Amy lately?  Right now we pass each other like ships in the night.

But I'm getting off-topic.  After King of the Hill (the episode where Hank gets a haircut from Bill on the base), guess what came on?  That 70s Show on another network.  Please!  That show isn't any good!  Well, I guess Friends was syndicated for a while, too... you know, six educated "attractive" white people living in a $15,000 a month apartment on minimum wage jobs while spending most of the time in a coffee house?  I'd MUCH rather watch old Newsradio episodes, which was probably the biggest underrated TV show of the 1990s.

So, Pat Sajak saved the day.  Flipped through the channels, found the Wheel of Fortune, and just watched some lady lose a 4Runner in the bonus round.  So sad.

Jeopardy! is coming on, now.  Ken Jennings saved this show.  I think a solid geographer could kick some pretty serious ass on Jeopardy, because geography is so broad in scope.  And who'd've thought that Frank Sinatra was from Hoboken, New Jersey?

I had my Global Economy exam today, and I think I did okay on it.  There might be some issues with the second essay, but the first essay I know I kicked ass on.  I could get an F on this (very unlikely) and I'll still be able to right the ship by the end of the semester since it's only worth 10 points.  I have a presentation to give in Geographic Thought next week over the philosophical biography of an academic.  I think I'll probably end up doing Susan Cutter, because she's in hazards and is prolific enough to find a good deal of information on.

The weather man says it's going to be 32 degrees tonight.  I like it.  Nothing like a light freeze to kill the bugs.  People up here say that snow starts in the next month.  I'm cool with that as long as Pedro keeps going.  He was missing out some today and running a little rough, so I might go out early tomorrow morning and check his connections.  I had to turn the crankshaft a couple times when I installed the drive belt, so he might just be off from what the distributor does.  I don't honestly know.  That's my problem with automobile engines -- I know the physics behind them and I know how they work, I just can't do much to fix them when they're broken.  It may even be that he's not used to the cold weather... we'll figure it out.  It can't be anything major... certainly nothing some adjustments couldn't fix.

Gotta love the high-seed internet.  Thank you God, and thank you Nick.  I think I'm going to work on my mixtape tonight.  My patience with television is growing thin.

Click, and on with the music.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 07:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Two words for you: Fuck. NetZero.

I'm back on broadband, thank god.  It no longer takes five years to load a page!  Thanks to the long-term loan of this kick-ass DSL modem from Nick, I'm back on the web in style... or at least speed.

A lot of things have gone right this week.  I fixed Pedro, I got a refund for his alternator, I sold a couple of textbooks online, and I got this modem and got us back on broadband.  Just when I was getting ready to crow about all of this, part of my glasses frames snapped for absolutely no reason.  Seriously.  I was simply sitting on the couch, surfing the net (having just installed the new modem) and I heard a pop and my right lense fell on the keyboard.  Frustrating.  We tried to go to Lenscrafters, and of course, they can't be fixed (built-in obselescene makes more profit!) and the cheapest glasses frames they had were 90 bucks.  Hopefully it won't come down to that.

Last time I got glasses, it was at Lenscrafters after the much cheaper Walmart optical place tried to screw us by never delivering their product.  Something that was supposed to take an hour took more than two weeks.  We got our money back and went to Lenscrafters, but Lenscrafter's out of the budget for this time.  It looks like I'm going to have to go to Walmart, which is not not something I'm looking forward to.  Ugh.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 04:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just a few thoughts before I have to go to thought class tonight.... I need to rest from work for a few minutes.  With that in mind, my writing may suck and my thoughts may wander.

Last night, I spent a few hours working on Pedro and managed to install his brand-new Bosch Alternator, which kicks so much ass it makes me want to crap myself.  Really, though, this Bosch Alternator is far better than the piece of shit we got from Advance Auto Parts.  It went in fairly easily, and Pedro started once assembled without a hitch.  What more can you ask for?  And the best part?  NO RED LIGHT CAME ON AT ALL!!!!!!  I may have fixed this problem once and for all! 

Beyond that, I took back the old alternator to Advance (third RETURNED alternator in a month!) and got cash back, including the core that they had already given me back once, but they gave me again since I didn't get my shit done with their part.  This was nice, because I was expecting a major hassle and there was none.  I guess I'm used to dealing with Muncie's sorry excuse for customer service?

Well, that would be a hasty generalization which would soon be destroyed.  To celebrate the accomplishments, Amy and I went to Eat N' Park last night to get some grub.  That's how we always celebrate, I guess... we're not exactly exciting people.  Anyway, we got there and got some drinks and ordered food, then the waitress apparently died.  She promised us refills like six times and then disappeared from the face of the planet.  After 30 minutes of waiting and growing tired (this was at 10:00 pm, mind you), we gave up and left.  We went across the street to MiStake & Shake and got our food in like 10 minutes.  And it was sooooo gooooooood.

I'm really tired because the weather changed in the past couple days to being much cooler... then today we're about to get dumped on with some rain....  and my sinuses feel like they're about to explode.  It's been really hard getting my work done today because I can't convince my mind or my eyes to concentrate... too much sinus pressure.  I managed to get my readings and paper finished for thought class tonight.  I have a test in Global Economy tomorrow morning, which scares me a good bit.  I know it's all essay, and I have the questions, but I really don't know what to expect.  The class is 100% discussion, which is enjoyable but not conducive to hard-core note-taking.  I'm hoping that I don't have to come up with facts or figures off the top of my head.  The questions he provided don't seem terribly difficult, but this will be my first test as a doctoral student.  I'm scared to death.

I still haven't told anyone about the Kasperson Award in the department because I don't want to sound like a pompous ass.  I know they'll find out soon enough.

Dr. Lee, the department chair, sent a letter yesterday offering PhD students opportunities for teaching summer classes.  I put my name in the hat, but I know as the only new doctoral student on regular funding that I am at the bottom of the food chain.  Quite a few of the doctoral students should be graduating in May, though, so I don't know what that'll mean.  I hope I can get a summer class or two, because I don't want to take a "straight job."

I'm really hungry, too.  I've been here since about 8:30 am, and I haven't eaten today.  Wednesdays are like this when I forget to bring dinner (which is every week).  I usually don't have enough time between completion of my thought class work and the time that class starts to walk over to the places a couple blocks up and get food.

I'm wasting away!!!!!!

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight...

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 05:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Go ahead, call me a Romantic.

With a big 'R'.

What can I say?  There's just something about autumn that makes me happy.  Relief from the heat of summer?  Sure... I mean, I'm fat, and heat is no good for fat people.  But there's something more....

There's something about the crisp, dry air on an autumn night, with just a little breeze to ruffle the some leaves, and other leaves crunching under your feet.  The evenings are still long, but are growing shorter, providing beautiful sunsets and the perfect time to take a walk.  Suddenly, the nights have no bugs, and the air is cold enough for a jacket.  The colors of the sky are usually blue with the drier season, and the foliage gives us a gorgeous display of color.  The leaves do this before giving us an equally beautiful (if less colorful) show by whisking away in the wind.  One of the best parts of this season is that it changes every day, unlike the static and sticky summer months.

Even the simple view of a horizontal fog bank that's settled over a moonlit valley better than anything offered by spring.

There's something about the fact that winter will be coming soon, and everything alive is getting ready for that time.  The corn and beans will soon be out of the fields, reminding us of perhaps a burly friend who one day shaved his head.  On the other hand, some of us (as I'm trying to do this year) will grow a beard for warmth, and pull out our leather jackets.  That fresh corn will be in the grocery, reminding us for the moment we eat an ear that maybe the midwest really isn't that bad.  Autumn announces that soon to come is Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas.... playoff baseball, college basketball and the meat of the football season.... all times for friends and family.  Autumn announces the coming of winter and snow, which will paralyze the landscape in an another amazing display.

I'm most likely to go camping in the autumn, because there are fewer crowds and cooler temperatures.  It's the best time to camp, the best time to take photos, and the best time to snuggle with a loved one.  Weren't campfires just made for autumn?  Start one on a cold night, snuggle up with a loved one (or a stranger), and throw some ears of corn on it... You'll appreciate what I'm saying when you taste that ear of corn and impress your snuggler.  Maybe you'll even fall in love?

Autumn is the best time to fall in love!  I've only really fallen in love three times in my life, and each time has happened in the autumn.  The one time I was absolutely crushed, it came in the late summer.... luckily giving me autumn to recouperate.  I needed it.  Had it happened before the dirge of summer or the cloudiness of spring, I might not have survived.

Autumn is a season of beauty rivaled by no other except perhaps winter, and it'll only be here for a little while.  Autumn comes when we're back into the swing of school, and sometimes we have our heads too buried to notice.  I'll make sure I take a break to take it all in.  If I have time to do it, I know you'll have the time.  Enjoy it.

Go.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 11:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Me, dick.

I am apparently a winner of the Jeanne X. Kasperson Student Award for Hazards Research, Association of American Geographers, 2006.

Remember that research paper award I entered a few weeks back, thinking that my lowly research may help me win it?  Well, it did.  Now, something I have to explain is that I thought there were going to be five finalists and then a winner chosen from those finalists.  Well, it turns out that the five people are chosen as winners, and it also turns out that I am one of those.

What does this mean?  Well, it's definitely a nice honor to win a national paper contest, especially in the geography organization (AAG), even though I'm sure there couldn't have been that many entries.  It'll look good on my vita, which is something for which we academics constantly seek more stuff to list.  I'll probably get (another) certificate to hang on my wall.  I'll get to present my paper in a special session (read: bigger and at a time that's without competition from other sessions) at the national 2006 AAG Meeting in Chicago to an audience that will probably include all the hot-shots of the hazards research specialty, which is equal parts exciting and terrifying.  It'll earn me more instant street cred in the department, which is cool, but I have no idea who to tell if anyone -- I don't want so sound like I'm blowing my own horn. 

And finally, the monetary part: I get my registration fees for the 2006 AAG meeting paid.  It doesn't seem like much, but that's $130 bucks that I was going to have to come up with.  Well, I still have to come up with it, and sooner than I thought ("Hey, Mom...") but it'll get it reimbursed by the Hazards Specialty Group ("...it's only a loan, I promise!").

I think I'm going to celebrate by fixing myself a cheeseburger.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rita's remnants are giving us a nice storm today.  It's supposed to last until this evening.  Luckily, it didn't end up doing to much to Texas and Louisiana, and mostly everything's in tact.  Somehow, the Feds were a lot more ready for this one, at least by appearances.  I suspect it's because there would have been something close to a revolution if they hadn't given that appearance.  Spin! Spin! Spin!

The government is too much of a self-sustaining system.  I'm starting to think that we have too large of a nation-state to allow a federal democratic republic to continue functioning.  People, unless they are famous or wealthy, have no chance of being heard, and therefore system has failed to live up to the promises it has made.  What would a better system be?  I have no answers.... perhaps a group of smaller nation-states?  Eventually, I would think, the system will run out of ways to placate the masses and the masses will seize control.  Television is why this nation still exists?  No, lots of guns and bombs also scare the masses away from power... cleverly disguised fascism.

Enough of that!  Fuck, Andy!  Go be an anarchist on someone else's dime, you stupid dick.

The dogs pooped in the house again.  Amy found it and trudged through it, but was late for work.  I was awarded the privilege of cleaning squished dog shit from the carpet.  They know better than this, and they were punished accordingly.

I'm hoping I can get one more trip to Kent and back out of Pedro before his battery dies.  Amy and I are going up to Euclid tomorrow after we're off work to get his part so that I can fix him once and for all.  I'm looking forward to checking this place out because it has a lot of bug stuff in-stock.  Could be a nice resource to have, and it could give us an excuse to leave town every now and again, if only for a couple hours.

We actually paid all of our bills this month.  Congratulations are in order.  Cheers!

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 08:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I had a dream last night for the second time.  Strangely, I guess you could call it a re-run.

In this dream, I did something decent enough in the world to end up hosting an episode of 'Saturday Night Live,' a TV show I honestly haven't seen in like three years.  It was a short episode, and afterwards I hoped into my car and drove home.  Apparently, they were filming only minutes from home.  Strangely, I found when I got home that none of my friends or family saw the episode, and my VCR had failed to record it.  No one believed that I actually hosted the show, and since I had no proof, they all called me a compulsive liar.  I insisted so greatly that I had hosted it that they all laughed at me and didn't talk to me anymore.

There are way too many meanings that can be inferred from that one, like I subconsciously don't think my work is appreciated or whatever.  Who knows?

I also found a box of CDs in the garage when I was trying to find a couple to download.  The bad thing was that about 25 of these CDs were broken, including three from The Retreads, two of which are harder to replace.  I've been talking to Mike and hoping that I can get new copies.  The other CDs I'll probably just download once I'm back on broadband.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I almost forgot to mention... last night after colloquium at the department, I joined the geography graduate students at Zephyr's in Kent.  Zephyr's, though I know little about it, feels like a scenester bar, with art on the walls and many tattooed people hanging about, they had PBR on tap(!!!) which was a very comfortable environment for me.    We all hung out in an open courtyard that's in a space behind the bar's building that was a storefront some time ago.  The weather was perfect for being outside, and it was just a good time.

At this socialization, I managed to be extremely relaxed and social with the other students, getting more information and tips about the program.  We spent nearly four hours drinking (fairly lightly) and discussing the program, various theories and readings, and just generally unwinding.  This is something that would have NEVER happened at Ball State, that's for sure.  I also would venture to say that I made some friends, as they didn't want me to leave (at 9:00, after arriving at 5:15), but I had to meet up with Amy after she got off work.  It was a good feeling, and one that I honestly haven't had in a long long time.

We went to Sam's Club tonight.  There's nothing quite like buying shit in enormous quantity, and certainly nothing is more American.  Amy's parents got us a membership there, and it rules.

Tomorrow is a Colts game on TV.  That makes me quite happy, even though I know it's going to be a while before we get one up here again.  Amy will be at work while it's on, which is just as well since she doesn't really watch football on TV and I'd rather hang out with her than watch it anyway.  This way, I get both.

I'm compiling songs for my mix tape still, but honestly, it's going slow.  Something I forgot when I got that idea (and still a good one, in my mind) is that I'm still on a dial-up for a few more days.  Luckily, Nick very generously sent me a new DSL modem, so with unspeakable numbers of thanks to him, we'll be back on broadband in a few days.

Sweet.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 01:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's a lazy Saturday afternoon, and Amy's at work.  At least we got to sleep in together today and go to breakfast, since she was off from Pet Guards today.  She's at the Avenue now, but she'll be off in about an hour.

I have a confession to make, though:  I am now a mass-murderer.  My Intro kids had their first exam yesterday, and the blood was on the walls by the time they were finished.  I didn't think it was that hard of an exam, but apparently they did.  The average score was a 67.  There was only one A.  It was a nearly perfect bell-shaped curve right around that 67.  Yuck.  I went ahead and curved it by 10 (I figure a 77% mean is fair enough).  Since so many of these kids are freshmen, I'm also going to give them a chance to make 10 points of extra credit by going to a cultural or educational event and writing a one page paper.  I think it's fair, especially since it takes at least one test to learn an instructor.  Hell, it may even be too generous, but so what?

We got our first full month's electric bill the other day.  $201.00.  Yep, "FUCK!!!!" is right.  It's a little more than we were expecting.  It'll be no real problem to cover it, but it just hurts right now.  In response, we've gone to open windows and a house of mostly darkness.  Honestly, it's how it should be anyway, but we live like lazy-assed Americans.  "Roughing it" is good for us, sometimes.

With our generally improving financial situation and a mutual weekend off coming in mid-October, Amy and I are looking at weekend getaway type things to help recharge our batteries.  We're considering Niagara Falls, which is about three and a half hours to the northeast, or camping at a state park near Wheeling, West Virginia, which is about an hour and a half.  More on this will come.

I bought Pedro a new battery yesterday because he died and I had to take him to work.  However, the new battery has not fixed the electrical problem, because apparently the alternator is still a piece of shit.  However, I did find a place through eBay up in Euclid, which is up by Cleveland and only about 45 minutes away, that has new Bosch alternators, which is like top-of-the-line for Beetles, always in stock.  I'm going to go ahead and go with the good one this time.  I'm getting really fucking tired of replacing Pedro's alternator again and again.

Yes, I really am watching Red Dawn.  Yes, it's as bad as you remember it.  There's nothing on... I've got a choice of this or college football from schools I don't give a shit about.  So, I'm watching Patrick Swayze.

I can't wait until Amy gets home.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 07:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have to say, the last four weeks or so have been the most productive of my life. I've learned more, read more, been social more (even though it's online), spoken more and thought more than any time in my life. I'm loving it. I'm making some (I think) work acquaintances, which is also helping my social abilities. Mary, Jose, Aron, Niti... all good peeps. I've learned to be more critical of things, thanks to Jim Tyner. Jim is the prof that I have for thought class. I've always been too accepting of what the profs give us to read, and last week he encouraged us to tell him when something was full of shit. Yesterday in class, I went on a nice tirade about how an article was full of shit, and he praised me. Considering that I've been having a hard time reading what he thinks of me, it was enormously rewarding to me. I really respect the man, being the department's social theory guru, and having some really interesting perspectives, and to know I some things that he thought were good points made me happy. At the same time, I've managed to go a long time in my blog without any sort of personal update or note. Hrm. So, I'm taking a breath and relaxing for a bit to talk about my life. Part of the problem is that, with this kind of productivity, I haven't had a lot of time for a personal life. Add to that the fact that Amy works most of the time that I'm home, and I've really got very little to talk about. I don't even have my misadventures in Pedro's rear end to talk about. That sounded grosser than it needed to. Eh. Though, I guess Pedro is having a little trouble. He's acting up a little, and it's the electrical system again. Either the alternator is shot (AGAIN) or the battery is done-for. I'm actually leaning toward the latter, because upon jump-starting, he runs fine. If the alternator's out, I swear I'm going to go Ted Kaczynski on Advance Auto Parts. Well, not really... but I'm definitely going to get my cash back and buy a brand new alternator straight from Bosch. They will have had enough chances. I'm getting really tired of not seeing Amy, but we need her to be at work. It's understandable I guess, but I really haven't seen her much in about two weeks. We're both getting sick of it, but I suppose that's part of being young and struggling, never mind that part of the reason we're so poor is that I didn't enter the job market and cash in on my masters. I'm such a dick like that. I keep telling myself that after these three years, we won't have to do the crazy schedules anymore. I'll have a standard academic schedule, and I'll be making enough that she can afford to find something decent and with a good schedule. Well, at least we hope I'll make something. This is the 40th post to this blog... in just over a month. My old blog had a final total of like 98 posts in 10 months. It's much easier to get motivated to write when you know you have an audience. True, my writing in this blog may not be as earnest or personal as my old no-audience blog, but I enjoy sharing. Ooh! I forgot, I do have some news! I'm going to ELDAAG to present some of my research. ELDAAG is the East Lakes Division of the Association of American Geographers. It's a smaller, divisional conference of the same organization that I presented for last April in Denver. This conference is going to over in Bowling Green, near Toledo, and about 2.5 hours from here. I actually have to register by tomorrow to ensure that my paper will be on the program, but I'm going and I'm carpooling and staying with people from the department. Equally exciting and terrifying, from a social perspective... by any means, it should be a good time. I'm also hitting AAG 2006 in Chicago... which is the conference for which I entered a paper competition a couple weeks back. I heard yesterday that AAG 2007 is in San Francisco, which also makes me happy. I haven't been to San Francisco since 1996, and it's really an amazingly unique city, regardless of your opinions of hippie-shit or gay pride. It's definitely in the upper echelon of cool American cities, right along with Chicago, Miami, Vegas, Boston, Philly, Seattle, Tuscon, Austin, Portland, the old New Orleans, and Pittsburgh. I think I'm biased against New York because... I've never been there (shame) and frankly, it terrifies me. I'm sure it belongs on that list, just as I'm sure that Los Angeles doesn't. I've actually been to LA, and it sucks dick. Remember my requiem for New Orleans? Remember how basically what I wrote came true? It was disappointing that most of that city is gone, and beyond all the human reasons to be sad, it's disappointing because I never got to see it in its former glory. Well, now, Hurricane Rita, another Category 5 hurricane, is heading for Galveston, another great Gulf Coast city. I've only been to Galveston once, but it was one of the coolest cities I've ever been to. The Strand had some of the coolest architecture, the older houses were awesome, and the setting right on the Gulf is amazing. The Strand is like a toned-down South Beach, with 1890s architecture instead of 1930s. The houses were remnants of when Galveston was the largest and most profitable city in the state of Texas. I even wrote a paper about the 1900 hurricane that destroyed the city and killed 15,000 residents when I got back because I was so hungry for information about that place. It was in Galveston that I had an experience with quicksand (really, no joke) and Amy was convinced that I was going to lose my leg. After wading in the waves and playing in the water, we were walking back toward Seawall Street through the sand. I stepped on what looked like wet sand, and my foot was swallowed, nearly breaking my shin. Let me tell you, what they always say about quicksand is true: the more you struggle, the more is brings you in. Next thing I knew, my leg was sunk in most of the way up my thigh, with the other leg resting atop the sand in a quasi-sitting position. With patience, I pulled it straight out, somehow saving my sandal, too. Really, Galveston is a cool, toned down tourist town with a unique personality. I really enjoyed visiting there during my brief stop... and it was a town to which I was hoping to return. I'm getting really sick of hurricanes. But I'm certainly not one to talk! How do the Gulf Coast residents feel?

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 05:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's a joint review of two books I just read for my Global Economy class.  Note that this is not a serious (say, for publication in a journal) book review.

Harvey, David.  (2003)  The New Imperialism. Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press.  224 pp.  $22.00.

Smith, Neil.  (2004)  The Endgame Of Globalization.  New York: Routledge Press.  240 pp.  $24.95. 

In the geographic study of economic and geopolitical globalization, many look towards the Marxist voices for a critique of the process.  David Harvey led an influx of Marxist philosophies into the discipline in the 1970s as a critique of the positivist spatial scientists that dominated the decade before.  Neil Smith was a student of Harvey, a fact that becomes quickly evident while reading these books.

In The New Imperialism, Harvey began by rehashing many of the Marxist theories that gained him recognition in the 1970s.  He used a dialectic form of writing, ingraining his ideas of overaccumulation of goods, associated economic crises and the continued need for new markets to alleviate this problem of successful capitalism throughout the book.

He started the book with an indictment of the second Bush adminstration's motives for the second war in Iraq, describing the vitality of Middle Eastern oil control to world economic and geopolitical domination.  Although, as Harvey claimed, this was nothing new, and he provided a narrative of the influence of the United States on the region starting with the collusion of Nixon and the Saudis in the 1970s.  Once global economic domination was acheived, Harvey wrote, the U.S. maintained its dominant position through the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).  However, with the building strength of the European Union, the dominancy of the U.S. was threatened, causing the Bush administration to exercise its military superiority to seize the oil supply and keep the world in line with these imperialistic desires.

He then formulated a theory regarding what he called the "accumulation by dispossession," in which all humans are enslaved to capitalism because property (and hence money) are needed to survive.  People are given no choice but to buy into this system.  However, because of large foreign debts (more than one-third of the government's obligations) incurred for military operations to support global economic domination by the United States, Harvey noted that the very system in which all people are forced to participate is on the brink of collapse.

So certain is Harvey of this impending collapse that instead of offering a solution, he offered a way to soften the system's fall.  He proposed a "New New Deal" in which wealth is redistributed and states are redrawn, though even he gave little chance that his proposal would ever be embraced by those against the idea of a welfare state.

Smith has some remarkably similar conclusions to Harvey, which is expected given their relationship.  In The Endgame of Globalization, Smith traces the quest of the U.S. for global domination back even farther, to the Spanish-American War of 1898.  Smith noted that it was at this point that all possible new global markets had been opened at a time when the manufacturing production of the United States was nearing overaccumulation (too efficient of production creating too much supply) and was on the verge of collapse.  He follows the global ambitions of the U.S. through the assumption of Spanish territory, World War I and the League of Nations negotiations, World War II and the Marshall Plan, up to the first and second wars with Iraq.  

Also drawing from his individual earlier work, Smith applied the idea of spatial cohesion, the ability of a region to economically support an industry for profit, and how the regional aspects of this cohesion change constantly over space.  To Smith, the reason that firms are moving production and that global powers are constantly demanding free trade is this seeking of spatial cohesion that ensures the profitability of capitalist enterprise.  Mobility, he noted, is the trump card that capitalists will always hold over workers and which will always allow lower wages to be negotiated.  He claimed that globalization will continually create and destroy spatial cohesions about which the capitalists can move their business to increase profitability.

While not as dark of a prognosis economically as Harvey's, Smith offered an outlook that was indeed otherwise grim.  He painted a picture in the U.S.-centered globalism will fail like past attempts.  In the struggle to acheive and maintain dominance economically, military power would be constantly used to ensure that weaker economic states fail to gain spatial cohesions that allow independence from their dominators.  Over time, Smith claimed, this would result in a great deal of bloodshed and death over economic power.

Both Harvey and Smith made eloquent and well-constructed arguments in economic terms for the conditions that they foresee.  However, a major problem I have with Harvey and his Marxist disciples is this: they are constantly speaking out against the evils of capitalism, yet their world view is absolutely biased by the same systems.  To Harvey, Smith and others of this vein, money is the only factor that influences human decision-making.  Of these two, only Harvey (and only late in his book, in passing) mentions that decisions can be influenced by cultural ideas and religious values as well.  Can someone possibly believe that George W. Bush is only influenced by money and not, say, his domestic approval ratings nor the distortion of the Christian faith to which he subscribes?

The irony of these two authors is several-fold.  First, Harvey came into the geographic spotlight as a reaction to the quantitative spatial scientists.  These spatial scientists were indicted by those critiquing the paradigm (including Harvey) as oversimplifying humans into a normative generalized mass.  In these books, Harvey and Smith are both guilty of doing that very sin, assuming that all humans and all policy makers are economically calculating in all decisions, which is an idea I cannot accept.  Secondly, the fact that these authors each assume all humans to be so economically minded reveals that they are truly biased by the very capitalist system which they seek to correct with Marxist ideas.  Only in capitalist societies, and only to the most frugal within those societies, is the role of finance in decision-making even close to approaching the importance given by both Smith and Harvey.

Something that each of these authors (and all geographers alike) should have learned by this point is that no single approach will explain any economic, political or cultural condition in which the human race finds itself.  Only by fusing together these various subdisciplinary approaches to a more holistic view of human geography will we ever truly near understanding of human actions.  That these two authors are two of the most cited and most popular in the discipline today is truly disappointing.  By failing to consider these other human factors, the authors do nothing but construct a straw man that even a lowly doctoral student like myself can quickly torch.

Are these decent books?  Yes, they both give good information about globalization and give good ideas from a strictly economic perspective.  Really, they should be on your reading list as a citizen of the world, though I'll warn you that each gets fairly dense in theory.  Should these be used to entirely inform one about the dangers of globalization?  They'd give someone a good start, but they should certainly be tempered with views coming from political and cultural approaches.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 04:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Really, I think I summed up my thoughts in my subject.

Hippies get uber-excited every time I drive around Kent in Pedro.  I realize that the Volkswagen Beetle has symbolism for others beyond what I see it as.  For me, he is extremely practical, with a very low car payment, excellent gas mileage, cheap insurance, and is (relatively speaking) easier and cheaper to fix.  The economic size of a bug doesn't come at the cost of comfort to a large person, which is what I am.  And additionally, he is a more unique car than, say, a 1990s Chevy Cavalier.

I do love my little car, and I do think that peace is a great and noble idea... but do you have to jump up and down screaming peace and giving me the two fingered salute whenever I drive by?

I guess it's nice to be recognized for something... and it's better to get peace signs that flippings of the bird, I suppose.

Just a thought.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 11:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Luckily, this blog will be far more interesting to most of my regular readership.

Pedro is still running, and running well.  He took his first day trip to Kent today to drive me to school, and he's performing as well as any bug I've driven.  The trip to Kent is a decent one of about 25 minutes, and after three weeks, the drive is already pretty boring.  By the time I go in each morning, the news in done on NPR and there's little that I actually will actively listen to on the radio.  For some reason, I get pretty tired of the 18th reincarnation of Pearl Jam, or the 34th version of Metallica.  Today, though, I was listening to the Akron "Urban" station, cranking 2Pac and other such characters I didn't recognize from my beetle.  You should have seen people's faces... It was almost as culturally confusing as when you eat at a Chinese restaurant in Jamaica that's staffed by Haitians and Mexicans and hear American country music on the speakers.

(Momentary sidebar: the Kent State NPR, WKSU, is a very good station, of which I particularly enjoy the night music mixes... and they advertise themselves as "Classical and other smart stuff," just elitist and academic enough to give a nice smug characterization of NPR.)

The stereo in Pedro is a piece of shit tape deck that has decent enough sound.  However, this brings the dilemma that I don't own any tapes any more.  None.  I've gone nearly 100 percent digital, while my CDs and LPs collect dust in the closet.   And instead of searching through my stash and finding a CD that's probably scratched up, I just burn one whenever I want an album for the Impala.  How wasteful and American is that?

The point to this rambling is this: I'm going to take on the creation of some mix tapes for Pedro. I'm thinking I'm going to start with about three of them to fill this void that happens during the drive.  Being that Pedro is a retro car, two of them will have retro-esque themes.  And yes, I'm looking for your suggestions.  Basically, if you suggest something I don't already hate, I'm putting it on.

Theme One: "Pedro is a New Car"  This tape will include only music released before 1977, which is the year Pedro was born.  CHANGED: This tape can now include anything from the 1970s or very late 1960s.  as to get an idea what was happening in the music world when Pedro was new, but not the stereotypical hippie stuff associated with bugs.

Theme Two: "What Andy Listened to the Last Time he Drove a Bug"   This tape will include the stuff that I used to listen to in high school when I drove my dad's old bug, Herb.  This will be personally retrospective, I guess... almost autobiographically significant.  Interests at the time included (don't laugh, many of these are still with me): Sublime, Smashing Pumpkins, Soundgarden, Weezer, Blur, Oasis, Green Day, Nine Inch Nails, Rancid, The Toasters, Goldfinger, Johnny Socko, The Retreads, NOFX, Presidents of the United States of America, some other random ska and punk, Rage Against the Machine, Ramones, Buzzcocks, Pavement, Iggy and the Stooges.  All of these bands were on the soundtrack to a movie I wrote my senior year.  There's still a script around somewhere, but I haven't seen it in years.  I've been told that I could sell the script... but I think people who've said that were lying.  Ha!  I used to want to make movies!  What the fuck was I thinking back then?

Theme Three: "The Goodwill Tape: Gently Used High-Quality Shit Deposited Here"  This is for the quality shit from my friends that you're just sure I've never heard before, which is a wide category.  If you really like a song and you don't think I've heard it, put it here. 

I know I've got at least eight subscribed readers and this blog somehow averages about 45 page views a day right now, so I know people are making it here.  Suggest some shit!  Put it in the comments to this post!  It doesn't have to be obscure or terribly relevant.... Once I get some suggestions, I'll download the relevant tracks and put them together, and post the playlists for shits and giggles.

I'm counting on you, Soldier.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 02:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been using my television and my marvelous dial-up connection to keep track of sports today.  It's great to think about something every now and again that doesn't include geography, Volkswagens and personal things.  Sometimes, I think that sports is my alternate reality the same way that others are into celebrities or soap operas or professional wrestling.

None of my friends have ever really been into sports.  I'm not sure why I've never had very many sports friends, but I never have.  Amy's not terribly into sports either, so when I actually want to talk sports, there's no one.  So, I blog it.  Feel free to comment, because I need some sports-talk. 

Beware, this entry will make me look unintelligent and drunken... at least I know I'm not the latter.  If you don't like it, skip the entry and move on.

Okay, today's NFL action:

Bears 38, Lions 6- Where the fuck did the Bears come from here?  Either the Bears are better than everyone thought, or the Lions are awful.  I'm going with the latter.  The Bears can't be that good, because remember last year's game against the Colts?  The Colts scored like 49 points (no biggie for last year) but held the Bears to like a touchdown.  The Bears, I bet, will improve as the year goes on and end up something like 8-8 or 7-9.  The Lions?  They will continue to suck just like they have ever since Barry Sanders retired.  The Lions are a team that other teams see on their schedule and salivate.  It'll be even worse when their pansy domed-asses have to play outside in the winter.  Six wins is about it for them.

Bengals 37, Vikings 8-  I feel so glad for the city of Cincinnati.  After like 15 years of shitty football, the Bengals have finally gotten decent.  The last couple years, the Bengals were 8-8, and this year I think they're taking the next step.  I actually watched this game today, and they're a solid (though young and nervous) team.  They just destroyed the Vikings in every aspect of the game, and they did it despite 18 penalties.  If they get those penalties down, they'll definitely be a force.  Ten wins isn't out of the question by any means.  This game reminded me of the Spanish-American War of 1898.  The old fading power (the Vikings) had the living shit kicked out of them by a rising new power (the Bengals).  I think the Bengals are for real this year.  Playoffs at least, and maybe a win or two once they're there.  They're a few years away from the big game, though.  As for the Vikings?  That was some of the shittiest football I've seen since I watched a Ball State game, and Culpepper looks clueless, like he's peaked.  They'll be lucky to get to 7-9... 5-11 is more like it.

Titans 25, Ravens 10- Both of these teams are shitholes.  The Titans never start doing well until Steve McNair loses a limb in his annual severe injury that he'll play through... but I don't think he can carry this team.  He might actually disembowel himself to get out playing this year.  They'll probably end up going about 5-11 or 6-10.  The Ravens... why do they keep using Kyle fucking Boller?  Who the fuck is that jackass?  Get rid of him, and put in a decent quarterback.  The defense can't do it all, and it looks to me like the defense it getting old.  They're in deep shit, and they'll be lucky to get seven wins.

Eagles 42, 49ers 3- This was no surprise to me.  Even though the Eagles looked like shit last week against the Falcons, I think they're probably one of the top two teams in the NFC.  Donovan McNabb and Terrell Owens definitely have some on-field chemistry, and their defense is pretty good.  Beating the piss out of the 49ers, though, doesn't mean shit, as I'm almost sure that both Kent State and Ball State could beat them.  Eagles will end up 12-4, the 49ers will continue to embarrass the Montana-Young-Rice legacy by going 3-13.

Buccaneers 19, Bills 3- Yawn.  Shitty teams, shitty game.  These teams are pieces of shit and I really think they should do the rest of the league a favor and take the rest of the year off.  The Buccaneers are a long way from their Super Bowl a few years ago because their defense went in the toilet under Gruden.  They may get 8 wins in the exceptionally weak NFC, but they'll be abused in the playoffs if they make it there.  The Bills have sucked for years and years, and this one will be worse.  But no matter, they've sold out every game for the past 500 years in the largest stadium (and second-smallest market) in the league, so winning isn't a priority.  They'll go about 3-13.

Panthers 27, Patriots 17-  Dah-ha-ha-ha-HA-HA-HA-HA-HAAA!  Fuck you and your stanky asses, New England!  The loss of the coordinators is making Belichick look like a horse's ass.  Brady will finally be exposed as a worthless cake eater.  The Patriots looked slow and off-balance, hopefully they'll stay that way until the Colts beat them in the playoffs.  The Panthers... where did they come from today?  After looking as hapless as a sexually-assaulted manequin last week against the Saints, this week they looked like the Pats last year.  Pats are looking to go 10-6 or 11-5.  Panthers are a wildcard, though I'm thinking 9-7 or 10-6.

Steelers 27, Texans 7- Steelers are looking solid like last year.  Texans are looking shitty like last year.  This was no surprise.  Steelers will take a step down from last year and go 12-4.  Texans?  Better luck next year.

Rams 17, Cardinals 12- Boy, those analysts that picked the Cards to go far are looking like morons!  These guys still suck.  The Rams?  Boring.  I was hoping that the Cardinals would finally do something, because the people of Arizona deserve more.  You know what?  Fuck both of these teams.  They aren't going to make much of a difference anyway.

Seahawks 21, Falcons 18- Michael Vick is exciting, but he takes too much into his own hands.  No man can beat an entire other team.  Vick would be the closest to being able to do that, but he can't.  The Seahawks always win at home but turn into giant pussies on the road.  Falcons may end up 10-6, then get their asses handed to them in the playoffs.  I smell a rat in Seattle.  I get this vibe from their games that they're a bunch of softies, and I don't see them getting anywhere this year.  6-10 or 7-9 at best.

Broncos 20, Chargers 17- I'd rather watch my dogs chew on each other in the living room than watch these assholes try to play football.  The Broncos are up for a fall, because no team quarterbacked by Jake Plummer will ever be worth a rat's dick.  The Chargers?  They were overrated last year by their bad schedule, and they're set for a fall as well.  Broncos will be 6-10, Chargers may make 9-7.

Browns 26, Packerts 24- Packers must refer to being ass-packers, because these guys are terrible.  Favre needs to retire because he's as old as my grandmother.  The Browns are also terrible, but they're all I ever hear about up here.  People interviewed on TV actually think they're going to make the playoffs this year!  They won't, and neither will the Packers.

Jets blah blah Dolphins blah blah- Blah blah blah... They both suck, Pennington's always broken and Ricky Williams smokes too much weed.  Another two teams that just need to leave the league for the year.

and finally...

Colts 10, Jaguars 3-  The Colts' defense, for the second straight week, held the ground and kept the other team's score down.  As for the offense?  Peyton Manning had his one-every-three-years-against-a-team-not-the-Patriots bad day, and the Colts were playing a defense specifically designed to beat them.  No really, I'm serious... the Jags coaches realized that the road to the playoffs in the AFC South (as well as the road out of the playoffs) goes through Indianapolis, and they built the defense accordingly.  Last year, it was close, this year it was close.  So, Peyton has a bad day against a defense designed to beat him and the Colts still win, hrm.... So far, the Colts also hold homefield advantage throughout the playoffs over New England (I know, I know... only week two).  If the Colts can keep winning, keep that advantage and play the AFC Championship Game in the Hoosier (yes, I said that) Dome, then I think they're going to make it to the Super Bowl.  Next week, the Colts play the Browns, who are a bunch of pole-smokers, at home.  Two pieces of good news are found here: I get to see the game on television, and the Colts will welcome Romeo Crennel and company to the real NFL... similar to what the Bengals did in week one.  The score will be something ridiculous, like 89-3.  The Browns defense is easier to score on than your mother.  Season predictions.... Colts 14-2 (especially if the defense keeps this up), Jaguars 10-6.

Tomorrow night's games

Saints AT Giants- Yes, I wrote it that way.  Supposed to be a home game for the displaced Saints, but it's being played in New York.  That's the most heartless, money-grubbing decision the league could have made for that game.  Hopefully, the Saints will through it back in the league's face and laugh.  Prediction: Saints 21-17.

The other one?  Eh, who cares?

 

And a quick baseball note...

Indians won, Yankees lost.  That means the Tribe is up a game and a half for the Wild Card.  If things hold up, it'll be Boston-Cleveland and Chicago-Oakland in the playoffs.  The Indians are hot, so I could see them beat the Red Sox, and they're the only team I could see beating them.  Oakland will beat the slumping White Sox.  If the Tribe can make it into the playoffs, they're good enough to get to the series.  And they're young!  How exciting for Cleveland people.

In the NL, look for the Braves, Cardinals, Astros and Padres to make it in.  Astros will come up atop the shit heap because of their pitching, though I was surprised they didn't add... oh, I don't know... an entire roster of bats before the trade deadline.  Their lineup is awful.  Doesn't matter though... the Braves will beat the Astros and the Cards will beat the Padres.  Probably looking at Cards/Indians or Cards/Sox in the series.  Either way, I'm looking forward to playoff baseball, and if the Yankees get in, I will cheer heartily against them.  I always do.

That's probably enough for now.  The weekend is over, and it's time to get the mind off of the alternate reality and back to the geography.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 12:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, as a band-aid until I figure out what to do with SBC, I've gotten NetZero "HiSpeed," which should really be sued for false advertising.  I've got a free month of this shit, and I haven't yet figured out why anyone would actually pay for it.  It took me most of 10 minutes to successfully check my e-mail, though the word 'successfully' is, in this case, a relative term.

I guess this happens when you've been on broadband since 1998.  That's the year my parents got their cable modem as part of a beta-testing thing.  After that, it was the uncapped speeds of dorm ethernet (with unregulated Napster... those were the days!), and apartment living with various incarnations of cable modems and DSL lines.

Of course, that means I've been paying anywhere from $30 to $50 a month for the past five years.  That means, I've put somewhere between $1800 and $3000 into accessing the internet over that time.  It's a scary thought, isn't it?  That's more than the average income of someone from sub-Saharan Africa was over that time. There are a lot of things you could buy with that much money.

And damned if I'm not going to find some way this week to continue the financial idiocy and live in the culture of American excess, paying at least $35.00 a month for something as absolutely intangible as internet access.  I could get the same thing, essentially, for $9.95 a month from a dial-up provider, but I'd rather toss another $25.00 per for speed.

Beyond that, why do I need this fast internet access?

Because I'm from a generation that's bored with television... because I have research and homework to do online constantly... because I need the ability to stay in contact with my email address and hence my students... because Amy loves to shop on ebay... because I need the social stimulation myspace.com provides because I'm finally trying to emerge from my shell... because I need to read things from back home to feel more at home... because I need to continue downloading music to compile the best collection ever seen... because I can "watch" the Colts games on espn.com... because... because... BECAUSE...

I don't. 

None of this will impact my ability to breathe, or live until tomorrow.  Sure, I need the research and emailing capabilities for my job, but I can go in to McGilvrey to do that, or suffer with the dial-up.

Internet access has, for me, been transformed from a luxury into a psychological necessity.  I must have it, so badly, that I am currently connected though dial-up, something I haven't done in nearly eight years, so that I can have some half-assed representation of internet access.

Some would call this an addiction... it's like I've gone from mainlining heroin to chewing caffeine pills for a substitute.

Sometime this week, I will have the fast internet again.  I will be able to check sports scores instantly, and send emails to my students without hassle.  I will be able to upload updates to my course website, and let Amy do her ebaying.  I will be able to pay bills without stamps, and read newspapers without subscriptions.

Perhaps this is the difference between the internet and illicit drugs: while both are perhaps equally addictive, the internet is an enabler, while drugs are a disabler.  Either way, I will crunch down my metaphorical caffeine pills for the next few days and then line up to take it in the ass from some broadband ISP.

Until then?

Welcome back to 1997.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, Pedro is back among the living.

FUCKIN' A?!?!?!?!

Strangely, I still haven't done anything wrong with my work on him.  This time, a ratty exposed wire was shorting on the distributor.  Of course, I couldn't find that myself, I had to use the help of Kelly, our landlord who's likle nicest guy ever, is far cooler than us and customizes motorcycles for a living.  But, I dealt with that.  He laughs at my inability to do anything mechanical, but he's nice enough to help us out of a jam when we need it.

I fixed that wire, and he started right up.  I did some finishing touches and adjustments today, and he's baaaaaaaaaack.  I've probably put 50 miles on him, and he's running better than he ever has since we bought him at the beginning of July.

Amy's at work... go figure.  She's putting in some hours at the Avenue tonight, which is good because we need the cash as always.  What about me?  I'm.... sitting in the Atmospheric Sciences Lab in McGilvrey, getting on the internet.  Why?  Our DSL modem died for good last night, and it won't even power up.  When I called, SBC informed me that rental modems are given to the customers on the first anniversary of service, which was about two weeks ago.  Of course, this is also the day that the warranty ended, meaning if I want a new modem, I have to purchase one.  Absolute bullshit.  We'll obviously be getting our internet with someone else.  There's a Verizon office down the road, and maybe they'll be friendlier.  They certainly can't be any worse.  Time Warner would probably also be better than SBC, though it's more expensive.  I have to do something because I have too much work to do online to finish while I'm at work.  Of course, being a work expense, it comes off our taxes every February anyway...

I've been considering killing our house phone simply to spite SBC.  Fuck them.  We never use our land line.  We've got cells that are on a family plan with Amy's parents, and my parents are with the same company, so all that calling is free.  And really, no one calls us besides our parents anyway, because we're not terribly socially active.

Certainly, my accomplishments with Pedro made me proud.  It only took me two months of working on him on and off to make him run and drive decently. 

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 07:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I must be killing people in my sleep on odd-numbered nights, and housing the homeless in my sleep on the others.  It's been a mixed bag the last couple of days.

We got an extra quesadilla at Taco Bell last night.

I went to a seminar today and found that I had copied and studied the wrong articles.  Seems we were going to cover post-colonialism while I had poured over three long dry articles on discourse of space.

Rikki went to a pet store with us and didn't try to kill anyone.

My iBook's power supply (the fourth one I've had in two years!) died.

Amy got a new job that she loves, and we're making money.

I've seen Amy exactly four waking hours since she started the second job on Tuesday.

I convinced Pedro to start....
...but when I push on the gas, he dies.

I convinced our poor old digital camera to work and took some pictures...
...but most of them came out really blurry and useless.

I found someone to borrow a textbook from to make copies since I couldn't really afford it...
...and managed to jam the department's photocopier by pressing start.

I'm not out of luck for a laptop, since I've got Amy's Dell...
...but it won't access the internet in McGilvrey.

I finally found out how my benefits package works...
...but also found out that I'm going to be uninsured until January because I couldn't front $500 bucks to start my policy (which would be reimbursed, but the deadline for sign-up was yesterday).

Isn't it weird?  Good things, not-so-good things, nothing catastrophic and nothing world-shaking.

Overall?  It's just odd.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 05:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today, I submitted an abstract of a paper I'm working on to the Hazards Specialty Group of the AAG (Association of American Geographers).  It's based on the research I did for my masters thesis.  I submitted this abstract for the Jeanne X. Kasperson Student Paper Award in Hazards.  If I'm a finalist, I get to present my paper at an evening session of the 2006 AAG Meeting in Chicago (which means a very large audience) and I get my registration fees paid.  I went to the AAG meeting last year in Denver and presented, and it was a blast.  I'm not sure what I'll get if I win, but I don't consider that a very likely possibility anyway.  Hell, I had nothing to lose, and now I've got a 900-word abstract for my research the next time a call for papers comes out.

And, from now on, I'm putting quoted things and other cut-and-paste jobs in my blog in a dark blue color and in Times New Roman.  Makes it easier to differentiate, though this is definitely my work and not the work of others.

Without further ado:

Tornadoes and Mobile Homes in the Southeastern United States:
The Geographic Data of a Stereotype

 

Andrew Shears
Kent State University

 

An idea often held in the mainstream society in the United States is a phenomenon of common occurrence between tornadoes and mobile home residences.  There are a number of possible explanations as to the origin and continuance of this perception, including the focus of media coverage, a socio-economic bias against those living in mobile homes, or a true coincidence of time and space between mobile homes and tornado events.  The possible existent geographic relationships between these two variables are explored in regionally in the southeastern United States, using data encompassing 1970-2000.

In terms of assessing hazardousness, mobile home residents are extremely vulnerable to tornadic activity.  Dow (1999) defined vulnerability as “the differential susceptibility of ecosystems, households or social groups to losses, expressed as a function of exposure, resistance and resilience.”  Mobile homes residents have a very unfavorable combination of these factors that causes a very high vulnerability to disasters, especially tornadoes.

The ability to withstand the impacts of a hazardous event and continue functioning normally, the resistance of mobile homes against the strong winds of a tornado event is low because of the difference in construction techniques.  In the development of a scale for tornado categorization, Fujita (1971) noted that mobile homes are destroyed by winds as low as approximately 110 miles per hour, the equivalent of the F1 level.  Additionally, Fujita found that permanent site-built frame houses, on the other hand, were damaged by tornado winds between 156-206 miles per hour (F3 level) and destroyed by winds over 207 miles per hour (F4 level).  The results of McDonald and Mehnert (1989), Wakimoto and Black (1994), and Schmidlin et al. (2002) all confirmed that mobile homes are less able to resist the impacts of tornado winds.

While the resistance of mobile homes to strong winds is poor, the ability of the residents to return to full forward momentum after a disaster, called resilience, is nearly non-existent.  Mobile homes residents tend to be less affluent because the price of an average new site-built home is nearly four times that of a new mobile home (U.S. Census Bureau, 2004).  Hurley (2001) noted that the financial situations of mobile homes are similar to automobiles.  Compared to site-built homes, they are unfavorably treated financially as personal property, with mortgages and insurance policies representing those of automobiles.  Also like automobiles, the mobile homes depreciate in value over time, essentially trapping the residents to their mobile homes.  The lack of resources, disappearing capital and unfavorable insurance terms mean that returning to normalcy is far more difficult for mobile home residents.

Exposure, the final factor to calculating the vulnerability of mobile homes, is the least explored.  From an aspatial perspective, lower F-scale tornadoes happen more frequently than stronger tornadoes.  Because less wind speed is necessary to destroy mobile homes, it can be stated that winds capable of destroying mobile homes occur more often.  Belles and Smart (2002) found that regionally, the southeastern United States has a high density of both mobile homes and tornadoes and suggested that this regional coincidence may explain the stereotype.  However, the study lacked spatial resolution sufficient to make further generalizations.

In order to refine this spatial resolution and to search for explanations of the stereotypes of mobile homes and tornadoes, the southeastern United States was chosen for an in-depth study.  A database of historical tornado events was compiled for F2 and above tornadoes in the southeastern United States including 1970-2000.  Densities of tornado events during this period were calculated via an overlay analysis of counties and census tracts.  Housing data from the 2000 United States Census was used to record densities of mobile homes for both county and census tract units.  The densities of the variables in each unit were then compared statistically to explore whether mobile homes, as of 2000, were located in areas that were climatologically prone to tornado events.

 

 

Works Cited:

 

Belles, Jim and Rondah Smart.  2002.  Tornado Risk in the Southeast United States. Presented at the Southeast Severe Storms Symposium, Starkville, MS, February 15- 17, 2002.

 

Dow, Kirstin.  1999.  The Extraordinary and the Everyday in Explanations in Vulnerability to an Oil Spill.  Geographical Review 89: 75-93.

 

Fujita, T. T.  1971. Proposed characterization of tornadoes and hurricanes by area and intensity.  Chicago, IL: University of Chicago, SMRP Research Paper 91, 42 pp.

 

Hurley, Andrew.  2001.  Diners, Bowling Alleys and Trailer Parks: Chasing the American Dream in Postwar Consumer Culture.  New York, NY: Basic Books.  409 pp.

 

McDonald, James R. and J.F. Mehnart.  1989.  Review of Standard Practice for Wind-Resistant Manufactured Housing.  Journal of Aerospace Engineering 2: 88-96.

 

Schmidlin, Thomas, Barbara Hammer, Paul King, Yuichi Ono, L. Scott Miller and Gregory Thumann.  2002.  Unsafe at Any (Wind) Speed?: Testing the Stability of Motor Vehicles in Severe Winds.  Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 1821-1830.

 

U.S. Census Bureau.  2004.  2000 Census Summary File 3 [online].  Generated by Andrew Shears, using American FactFinder, 2004 [cited 1 October 2004].  Available from the World Wide Web: (http://factfinder.census.gov/).

 

Wakimoto, Roger M. and Peter G. Black.  1994.  Damage Survey of Hurricane Andrew and its Relationship to the Eyewall.  Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 75 (1994): 189-200.

 

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 06:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think Michael Moore is a needed voice in this neo-conservative political climate we currently live in. I think that, if some liberals would remove their thumbs from their asses, a new politically liberal movement could exploit the governmental failures with Katrina and take hold the same way the neo-cons did after 9/11.

Would we be better off? Who knows.

Either way, I pulled this from the bulletin board and an old friend Amney. I think it has some valid points and messages. Sometimes, Michael Moore is full of shit, as is every politically oriented fucker. Bowling for Columbine wasn't full of shit. This letter isn't either.

To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:

On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows?

That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America.

Are we safer now than before 9/11? When you learn that behind the horse show runner, the ..2 and ..3 men in charge of emergency preparedness have zero experience in emergency preparedness, do you think we are safer?

When you look at Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, a man with little experience in national security, do you feel secure?

When men who never served in the military and have never seen young men die in battle send our young people off to war, do you think they know how to conduct a war? Do they know what it means to have your legs blown off for a threat that was never there?

Do you really believe that turning over important government services to private corporations has resulted in better services for the people?

Why do you hate our federal government so much? You have voted for politicians for the past 25 years whose main goal has been to de-fund the federal government. Do you think that cutting federal programs like FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers has been good or bad for America? GOOD OR BAD?

With the nation's debt at an all-time high, do you think tax cuts for the rich are still a good idea? Will you give yours back so hundreds of thousands of homeless in New Orleans can have a home?

Do you believe in Jesus? Really? Didn't he say that we would be judged by how we treat the least among us? Hurricane Katrina came in and blew off the facade that we were a nation with liberty and justice for all. The wind howled and the water rose and what was revealed was that the poor in America shall be left to suffer and die while the President of the United States fiddles and tells them to eat cake.

That's not a joke. The day the hurricane hit and the levees broke, Mr. Bush, John McCain and their rich pals were stuffing themselves with cake. A full day after the levees broke (the same levees whose repair funding he had cut), Mr. Bush was playing a guitar some country singer gave him. All this while New Orleans sank under water.

It would take ANOTHER day before the President would do a flyover in his jumbo jet, peeking out the widow at the misery 2500 feet below him as he flew back to his second home in DC. It would then be TWO MORE DAYS before a trickle of federal aid and troops would arrive. This was no seven minutes in a sitting trance while children read "My Pet Goat" to him. This was FOUR DAYS of doing nothing other than saying "Brownie (FEMA director Michael Brown), you're doing a heck of a job!"

My Republican friends, does it bother you that we are the laughing stock of the world?

And on this sacred day of remembrance, do you think we honor or shame those who died on 9/11/01? If we learned nothing and find ourselves today every bit as vulnerable and unprepared as we were on that bright sunny morning, then did the 3,000 die in vain?

Our vulnerability is not just about dealing with terrorists or natural disaste