"And Another Thing..."

I was surprised when the BBC produced the Tertiary Phase, Quandary Phase and Quintessential Phase of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio program. The Primary and Secondary Phases, of course, being the original version of the Hitchhiker's Guide, first broadcast in England in 1978. I was surprised because the three new phases of the HHG radio program were recorded in 2003, 23 years after the completion of the Secondary Phase, and two years after the tragic death of Douglas Adams. But it seems Adams left some pretty explicit instructions on how to complete the radio program, always his favorite medium through with he brought the Guide to the world. He had scoped out scripts for most of the fits (episodes) and left little to interpretation.

In the spring 2001, just weeks before his fatal heart attack, I had the great pleasure of meeting Douglas Adams. He spoke at my college, the last stop on what was to be his last tour. Being a college of engineers and scientists, he talked a lot about technology and the way we interact with it. He was so excited, so enthusiastic, standing on stage half-pleading and half-commanding us to bring him his dream: a real, interactive Guide to everything. Adams helped create h2g2 back in 1999 as a community-generated encyclopedia of everything. An early wikipedia, h2g2 has a section for peer-edited factual entries, as well as one for unedited entries that are more creative and fun.

After his talk, I asked him why he came around to colleges like mine. His response was immediate: technology can be amazing, and if we're as excited about evolving and innovating it as he is, then it surely will be even more amazing.

Today I was surprised again. A friend of mine pointed me to this article on the BBC's website. A sixth Hitchhiker's book? Written by a different author? Adams had said many times that he was always slightly disappointed with how dark Mostly Harmless turned out. He had intended to end the book series on a bit more of an upbeat tone, as he did the radio program. But can another author fill those rather large shoes? (Adams was 6' 5" after all!)

Eoin Colfer is already a well-established author, and a Hitchhiker's fan. It will be interesting to see what hits the stands in October 2009.

The View Out My Window (Unchanged)

The ongoing saga of 130 Liberty took a frustrating turn recently. A little more than a year after careless smoking caused a deadly fire in the building outside my window, inspectors have found evidence of smoking and drinking still happening inside the building. It's almost inconceivable that this would be allowed to happen after last year's fire, but the sad truth is that no one is surprised.

The building has become the ugly giant in the neighborhood, standing for everything that is wrong with the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan. It is the very real testament to our inability to move on and rebuild. Yes, the World Trade Center itself has also been plagued by bureaucratic delays and ridiculous budget overruns. Yet it is progressing, even if slowly. Building 7 stands tall, having been open for two years now, even if it does sometimes disappear right into the sky as in this NYT picture. (That's my building on the right.)

The steel frame of Building 1, the Freedom Tower, is above street level, and rising fast. The foundations for Buildings 2, 3, 4 are nearing completion, and the memorial and transit hub are starting to be discernible from the piles of materials that surround them. You can see these looking down from the top of Building 7.

But there, in the middle of that picture, looming over the bustling construction site, is the old Deutsche Bank tower. Half demolished before last year's fire, it's sat there ever since, the real shame of Financial District. The real failure in the rehabilitation of Lower Manhattan. Hundreds of thousands of tourists flock to the area each year, and they look out at all the newness of the in-progress Trade Center, and right past the true open wound next door.

Mayor Bloomberg has begun to take notice, however, and mentioned the Deutsche Bank tower in a recent op-ed. He is calling for the Port Authority to turn over responsibility for the WTC to the city. (The Port Authority is a joint New York State and Jew Jersey authority, and not subject to city oversight.) He's also calling for the near-dissolution of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, who has been mis-managing the Deutsche Bank demolition for the last two years.

The LMDC would also turn over its responsibility for demolishing the Deutsche Bank building to the already existing Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, a city/state entity. This would help the LMCCC prevent the delays that inevitably result from too much bureaucracy, greatly enhancing the prospects for meeting a July 2009 deadline for full demolition of the building. To increase accountability, we will push the LMCCC to establish benchmarks for progress and issue monthly reports. The public has a right to know whether we are meeting our goals.

In the meantime, the men in hazard suits are still working, silhouetted in the windows across from mine. "No Smoking" signs have popped up all over the area. And someday, Lower Manhattan will pick the scab of the Deutsche Bank tower, clean out its only remaining open wound, and build a symbol of progress to replace the one of ineptitude.

Top photo: David W. Dunlap/The New York Times
Bottom photo: Uncredited/Gothamist.com

Population in Perspective

Since we're thinking about maps.

I often have a hard time explaining to my friends and family back in the Midwest just how many people live in this fair city. I've spent most of my life in small towns whose "downtown" areas consisted of two blocks of storefronts. So I was ambling along through the webs and found this map. It's a simple population of comparison, matching each borough of New York to the state whose population most closely matches it.


Yes, there as many people on my 14-mile long island as their are in the entire great state of Idaho. (And yes, what happens in Brooklyn, stays in Brooklyn.)

I find it fascinating to see this so plainly laid out. I see more people—and different people—each day than existed in either of the small Michigan towns in which I lived, or even both combined. When people talk about the "New York bad attitude" and how hard it is to get to know people here, I have to admit I'm not that surprised. Look at how many people we have in our lives daily. It's incomprehensible to think of getting to know an entire state—and any one of the five boroughs is no different. Add to this the 45 million tourists who come through each year, and is it really any wonder that most New Yorkers just can't deal with thinking about any more people? (Granted, we could all be a little nicer about it, but that applies across the planet and is just concentrated in cities.)

And if you really want food for thought, think about what this means about the way the electoral college is set up.

As an interesting aside, Manhattan and Idaho both suffer from confusion over the origin of their names. There are several possible origins for the word Manhattan, all deriving from the original "Manna hata" that Henry Hudson noted in his log book in 1609. Mannahata can be translated from the native Lenape tribe as "island of many hills." However, the Munsee dialect of the Lenape translates the word variously as manahachtanienk—meaning "general place of inebriation", manahatouh—"place where timber is procured for bows and arrows" or simply menatay—"island."

Idaho, meanwhile, is disputedly from the Shoshone term "ee-da-how," meaning variously "the sun comes from the mountains," "gem of the mountains," or "Behold! the sun coming down the mountain." But this may have been completely fabricated by a lobbyist named George Willing around the time the northwest part of the country was being carved into territories. However, a tribal chief of the native Coeur d'Alene Nation explains that in their language Idaho would be pronounced "Ah-d'Hoo." He translates the first syllable as a greeting and second as an expression of surprise, coming up with "Welcome, with open arms! We're just surprised that there are so many of you!"

That very phrase has been what New York has greeted newcomers with for four hundred years.

It's A Jungle Out There

Richard Florida, the pop economist, has released an intriguing new map of the U.S. that displays the relative ratios of men and women in cities. It seems that for men, the eastern half of the country is the place to find a match, while women should go west.


New York and its environs seem to be the absolute worst for women, with there being more than 200,000 more single women than single men. Sorry, ladies.

But wait, there's more! Brooklynite John Soma, who apparently truly does have all the time in the world, contends that the above map is misleading. Why? It ranges in age from 18 to 64--and ignores the trends across ages. His interactive map allows you to set an age range, and adjust for population. This gives a far more "fair" description of the singles scene across the U.S. Here is his map of the whole age range, 18 to 64:


NYC still doesn't look too good for women, and single men are still battling it out on the west coast. But once you adjust for population, it looks like this:


And here's where it gets interesting. As it turns out, it's not that are really so few single men in the east, it's just that there is a dearth of single older men. There are plenty—more than plenty—single young men in the east. If we narrow the age range, here's what we see (raw data on top, adjusted for population below):



It's raining men!

And if you're wondering why I'm blogging about this, it's because there's one dot on these maps that makes me laugh uncontrollably. Can you spot it? Do you see, way up north? Yes, it's my very own college town! A large population of young men, lost in the wilderness of the UP, trying in vain to become engineers under the delusion that it will impress all the women who are nowhere to be found!

Emily Creeps Me Out

I saw this in AdRants. (Yes, I'm trying to pay attention to the industry that supports me!) They point to this video that is currently flying around the web:



I'm not afraid to admit it, Emily creeps me out. She really is so life-like. Apparently, only after 1:30 mark is it actually the actress on screen. Before that her face is completely digital. Will actors and actresses become the next endangered species? Or will we see an overabundance of waiters and waitresses?

And all this in the wake of some other distressing ad-related news. Gawker reports that other ad companies are experimenting with face recognition software a la "Minority Report." Soon, the ads will know who you are, and create a life-like person to talk to you about what they're selling. I'm both amazed and afraid!

One Year Later

The search for John Galt continues, and now the DA's office wants to press homicide charges.

Meanwhile, there's increased activity inside the building, with crews visible in the windows until midnight six days a week. But it's still just as tall today as it was a year ago.

The long, continuing story here.

East Side, West Side, All Around the....Country

It's been a summer of quick little trips around the country. I'm always amazed at the little quirks of each little place. Especially in these times of big-box stores and generic chain stores, it's wonderful to see something unique to an area.

A while back I spent a wonderful day down in Point Pleasant Beach, NJ. Point Pleasant is fairly typical Jersey Shore beach town, with a long boardwalk lined with restaurants and shops. Further north along the boardwalk, these give way to houses large and small with cute, beach-appropriate names tacked over their doors. One of these is named "Seascape," but to everyone who's been to Point Pleasant, it's simply known as the "Sinatra House." Here, Ol' Blues Eyes plays from speakers built into the porch every day from 8am to 9pm. I found an archived NYT article with some more details. The house is owned by the Smith family, and although Mr. Smith may have passed on, the residents of Point Pleasant were glad to hear his family is continuing the tradition. This is my kind of place.

The following weekend, I spent a few days in Silicon Valley. Here again, the people who live in this area have an interesting quirk. There are shopping carts everywhere. Everywhere. This string of cities are neither as pedestrian friendly as New York nor as car-centric as Detroit. Most people have cars, and most use them every day to run errands. But many people walk to the grocery store. In New York, where everything, as they say, is bigger, people take little fold-up carts that they own to the little grocers to pack the little foodstuffs into their little refrigerators. But in the Valley, people seem to walk to the grocery stores, buy a shopping cart full of groceries, and then walk home with their groceries in the cart. They don't need a shopping cart, of course, so they leave it on the side of the road. At first I figured all these shopping carts along the roads were an indication of homelessness. But the carts outnumbered the homeless by far. The friend I stayed with told me that people just use them and leave them--and that he hadn't really noticed how many there were because they're simply always around.

The next weekend I went back down to Brevard, NC to see Lynn's opera. I didn't get much time to socialize with locals, as it was a very short trip. Still, in my three weekends in three parts of the country, it was nice to see first-hand that there still is quite a bit of diversity in behavior and ideas, if not in choice of fast-food eats.

Astronaut Ice Cream!

One of those staples of childhood museum trips was to stop off at the gift shop at the end of the day and get some astronaut ice cream. Crumbling freeze-dried goodness packed in a shiny foil wrapper. It was always one of the highlights of going to any museum, ranking just below the animatronic dinosaurs and just above the screen that would hold your shadow for several seconds after a light turned off. (Of course, it never came close to the planetarium.)

Today I find myself connecting through Houston on my way to California. Capitalizing on a certain NASA center somewhere in this town, there's a "Space Trader" gift shop here in my terminal. They have astronaut ice cream. I can't even remember the last I had any. So I bought some.

You're probably expecting me to say it doesn't taste as good as I remember. But you'd be wrong, it's delicious!

The Fighting White Squirrels of Brevard, North Carolina

I'm sitting in a quaint little coffee shop in the quaint little town of Brevard, NC. Yesterday, I flew out of Newark for the first time in five years. I've always avoided that airport, not just because of the obvious association with Jersey, but also because it seems so difficult to get to without a car. Or at the very least, expensive. But for this trip the only direct flight--not to mention cheapest by far--was out of Newark. My assumption of how difficult it would be to get there couldn't be more wrong. From my apartment it's only a walk of a few minutes to get to the WTC PATH train station. This train, for only $1.75, takes you all the way to Newark's Penn Station. From here you can take any number of trains one stop to Newark airport--and you will never have to wait more than a few minutes. The airport stop has a monorail that takes you right to the terminal of your choice. Sure, it sounds a little complicated since you are effectively taking three trains, but it was surprisingly easy. All told, it took me about fifty minutes to get from my front door to the security line at the airport. On a day with heavy traffic, that's equivalent to a taxi ride to LaGuardia, my usual airport of choice.

I flew into Greenville, SC; again, the cheapest option. From the air I could see that Greenville is booming. The lush green hilly countryside of this part of the country was everywhere marked by the vivid red-orange of freshly unearthed soil. There were roads every which way that curved "just so" to give the future subdivision that meandering feel. Each one wandered to some empty bulbous cul-de-sac where soon innumerable house will huddle around. The airport is still relatively small, so it was easy to find the very generous stranger Lynn had arranged to pick me up. He and I drove an hour and a half deep into the stunning Blue Mountains and finally into North Carolina and the little town of Brevard.

Brevard is a charming little place. The main street has all the little two-story shops you would expect of small town, but in that special small town feel it hits the mark with perfection. Strolling along, you'll find many little restaurants (most serving seafood, for reasons not abundantly clear this far from any major body of water). You'll find Hunters and Gatherers, a little kitsch shop with everything from antique furniture to bars of soap with plastic nuns in them (to was away the sins, of course). Kiwi gelato is across the street, so named for its owner who is the only resident in town native to New Zealand. Next door is the home-made chocolate shop. And so on down the street with cute little shops all the way. At the end of the street is the toy store. It was closed when I walked by last night so I had to content myself with peering in the windows. In one window is a large Lionell train display. This display had everything: the cute little shops of Brevard, the loading station for freight trains, a gondola going up a mountain, and a group of "Homies" break-dancing in a park pavilion. But the best part was when a trolley suddenly sprang to life and raced down the street revealing the most risqué car wash scene ever depicted in a train model town. Picture forthcoming.

Brevard is most famous for it's curious and elusive white squirrels. For reasons unknown, the seem to only inhabit this area, and it's quite the gimmick to capitalize on. Everywhere you can buy white squirrel shirts, mugs, cards, underwear, salt and pepper shakers, and so much more. My personal favorites are the unofficial mascot shirts for the local school. On these are a white squirrel with his dukes up, just above the boldly lettered "Fightin' White Squirrels." I was even fortunate enough to see a real live white squirrel this morning. Supposedly, that's good luck.

Yes! Michigan

I don't generally dwell on the state I've left behind. It was a great place to grow up, and is still a great place to visit. But every once in a while I like to check in and see how things are doing. And I couldn't help but notice this little piece of news coming from dear old Flint, courtesy of the Detroit Free Press.

Here are some of the highlights:

Flint residents now have to watch their butts because Police Chief David Dicks is on the lookout.

Dicks, who took over the department last month on an interim basis, announced that his officers would start arresting people wearing saggy pants that expose skivvies, boxer shorts or bare bottoms.

....

The crime, he says, is disorderly conduct or indecent exposure, both misdemeanors punishable by 93 days to a year in jail and/or fines up to $500.

Dicks, 41, broke down his interpretation of the laws as such: Pants pulled completely below the buttocks with underwear showing is disorderly conduct; saggy pants with skin of the buttocks showing is indecent exposure, and saggy pants, not completely below the buttocks, with underwear exposed results in a warning.

While nearly an hour's drive from Detroit, Flint is a pretty dangerous place—far more than Detroit itself. Is this a possible solution? It sort of reminds me of Guilianni's crackdown on drug dealing in New York by ramping up parking ticket enforcement. A bit of an out there idea, but it did have some success there. The article continues:

Flint's not the first city to take a look at policing the exposure of underwear. Pontiac, Auburn Hills, Atlanta and cities across the nation have debated the issue. But Dicks makes the assertion that wearing pants below the waist can give police probable cause to search saggers for other crimes, such as weapon and drug possession. He said because sagging is a crime, it presents probable cause for police to search saggers.

Pontiac and Auburn Hills are both suburbs between Detroit and Flint.

Dicks also scoffed at any suggestions that any enforcement unfairly targets black men and teens.

"This is not a black issue. This is an issue that's all walks of life," said Dicks, who is black. "Many people from different ethnic backgrounds and races are doing this fad."

But perhaps the best part of this article, and the true reason why the Detroit Free Press will always be dear to my heart, is the info-graphic they've created to help visualize this crime.Thanks for that, now I know. Yes! Michigan, the feeling truly is forever.

Wherein the Girl Scouts Thwart Andrew Once Again

I have a long history with the Girl Scouts and their cookies. Growing up, how many times did I wish it were socially acceptable to defect over from the Boy Scouts. Popcorn? Please. Those cookies!* And yet, throughout all the years of my Thin Mint- and Tagalong-enriched life I can never seem to find a Scout selling cookies. Never. To this very day, I've never bought my own cookies.

Growing up, we had a steady supply coming every cookie season through the typical mom's-coworker's-daughters channel. In college, it was the same, only through the mail up to me. Ever since moving to New York, though, they've been harder to come by. No one goes door to door here, and most grocery stores won't let them stand out front with a little table. The Girl Scouts have a Cookie Finder website, but every time I enter my zip code it says that cookie season for New York has ended. There's a place to put in your email address, but I've been on that mailing list for two years now, and have never gotten an email notice of cookie season.

Somehow, all these years, those Scouts have managed to elude me—which is surprising given that it's a fundraiser and I'm more than willing to contribute. So I've spent the last few years in the city pandering for delicious scraps from colleagues and coworkers who live in the suburbs, or getting lucky and calling home to Michigan when there happen to be some around my mom's house.

Tonight I happened upon a blog post of a friend of mine who has been involved with the Girl Scouts for many years. She quotes the following passage from a GS newsletter:

Try a Girl Scouts’ Thin Mint Blizzard at Dairy Queen
Are you craving Girl Scout Thin Mints – America’s favorite Girl Scout cookie? You’re in luck. Girl Scouts of the USA and International Dairy Queen have created a national partnership, including a Girl Scouts’ Thin Mint Blizzard, which will be the featured blizzard of the month for July.

Dairy Queen will also have a special “Dairy Queens’ Girl Scouts Appreciation Week” July 7-13, in which local Girl Scout service units and troops can host informational booths about Girl Scouts, the new Girl Scout Leadership Experience, camps, and all the other great Girl Scout programs and activities for all girls in kindergarten through grade 12.

Thin Mints and Dairy Queen? Could a better union ever be conceived? Naturally, I went immediately to Google to find the nearest DQ. Jersey City, of course. Funny how something 3.3 miles from my apartment can be so far away. Heck, my office is 4 miles away. But my office is in Manhattan, and Jersey City is in, well, Jersey. The Hudson is a far more effective barrier to those east of it than those west of it.

Still, July and August are busy travel months for me. In the next few weeks I'll be in North Carolina and California, and I'm hoping to head down to Baltimore or up to Boston as well. One thing's for certain, my eyes will be open along the way.

* I heartily support both the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts organizations. I mean no disrespect to either having been a Boy Scout myself. But really, popcorn? Come on guys.

"You Don't Know What You've Got, Until It's Gone"

How cliché is that?

It's been two weeks now that I've been living the life of a bachelor again. Not to fear, no big drama in my life. Lynn has been down in North Carolina preparing for an opera, and I've been living life as usual in this suddenly-just-a-little-too-big(-and-yet-still-small) apartment. Not that I mind a little time to myself, I don't, but I've been surprised by all the little things that show me she's not around.

It's kind of dusty. Lynn vacuums all the time. I can't think of how many times I'd sit down on the couch with a book, or a movie, and just about to enjoy some peace and quie—VRROOOOM. But now it's really quiet all the time, and there are little wisps of dust in the corner on the floor. Huh.

All her earrings are put away. At some point every evening, I turn off the living room lamps, put the empty cups in the sink (or at least near it), gather up Lynn's earrings off the coffee table and put them on her dresser on my way to bed. Now I turn off the lamps, put the cup away (I keep washing and re-using the same one), and walk to the bedroom feeling like I'm forgetting something. Where are they?

Ah, routine. I'm such a creature of habit, I like things to remain the way they are. Each day, I like counting on the fact that Louis (the doorman) always says "Ladies first" when we head to work, that our neighbor always says "Hey guys" when we pass her coming in from walking the dogs. Even the construction noise has become comfortably predictable—so long as it ends at a reasonable hour.

New routines are in order. Louis says "Hey guy" now, and the neighbor just says "Hey." I'm taking walks in the evening, eating dinner earlier. Mostly, I'm enjoying some time doing the things I haven't gotten around to doing lately. I'm reading more. And I'm working on projects for myself. I don't feel lonely much of the time, nor I do I feel content. It's a sort of nervous energy to do things that will make me feel better, and be better, when the apartment is filled with the noise and the earrings—but not the dust—that makes it home.

Art in Chelsea

What is a classic New York hipster thing to do on a Thursday evening? Why, cruise Chelsea for the art gallery openings, of course. Nowhere else can one walk down the street from building to build drinking cheap wine and taking in every kind of artistic medium imaginable. In the years I've lived here, I've actually never done this before tonight. All of these emerging artists have their work on display for free in these galleries, it's really quite the opportunity.

A friend of mine, whom I met back in the Viennese Opera Ball days is a photographer. He uses incredibly wide-angle lenses to capture panoramic images of New York. As quite the sucker for this city already, I think they're wonderful. He has many on his photography website, Luminous New York, and the corresponding blog, New York Panorama.

I hadn't heard from this friend lately (my fault, sadly), but I saw through Facebook of all things that he is showing some of his images in a gallery in Chelsea. The show is called INCANDESCENT and incorporates the work of three artists who are inspired by architecture and the human interaction with it. From the gallery's website:

All three of these artists deal with architecture and its relationship to anthropomorphism. Buildings may not look like human beings, but they mimic our consciousness in that they project light from within, or have some innate sensory rapport with the immediate natural environment.

When I showed up to the opening reception, I was greeted by a crowd of people already there enjoying the photographs and sculptures. I stopped by the refreshment table to get my obligatory plastic cup of cheap wine. It was wonderful to catch up with my friends (the photographer and his girlfriend both danced with me at the Viennese Ball), and wonderful to see them doing well and finding success.

And hey, if you find yourself in Chelsea, stop by 532 Gallery. It's worth the trip.

Clearfield, PA

Last weekend, Lynn and I took a whirlwind road-trip to Michigan and back for a wedding shower. We borrowed her parents car on Thursday night and parked it in the city so we could leave right after work on Friday.

Friday afternoon, we left New York around 3pm. Expecting a ten-hour drive, we hoped to get to the Detroit area by 1am. Then we'd have plenty of sleep before Lynn went to the 12:30 shower (I was to show up only at the end to say hello to the relatives and family friends). The first part of the drive was uneventful, we flew through Jersey into the wonderful (but long) stretch of I-80 through the Pennsylvania mountains.

About a third of the way across the state, and firmly in the middle of nowhere, we got a flat tire. The car we had borrowed was nice enough to have tire pressure sensors, so the light came on and we had plenty of time to get off the next exit before the tire deflated significantly. So, off we went down the ramp of exit 120 and into a small gas station.

Now, of all of the great state of Pennsylvania, there has been only one location that I've stopped while passing through. This particular exit of the interstate has a little local restaurant called the "Dutch Pantry" that has good food and nice service. This restaurant is the half-way point between Catskill, NY and Detroit, MI, and so is the place where my father always stops when driving back to Michigan to visit his family. So, having been on many of those drives myself, I've been there more than a few times. So it was only natural that our flat tire would leave us nowhere else but the exit with the Dutch Pantry, at the gas station right next door.

Having had a couple flat tires in the past (once I lost both back tires at the same time!), I knew I could change the tire and we could go as far as we could on the spare. Opening the trunk, we saw that we had a full-size spare tire and were delighted to think that in fifteen minutes or so we'd be back on our way to Michigan. So, I pulled out the jack while Lynn went to grab us some dinner. It didn't take me long, however, to discover that I was not going to get that flat tire off the car.

This particular brand of car has a special lug nut (one of the five) that requires a special key to get it off the wheel. We did not have this key. We turned the car inside out, but no key. So, we called AAA to ask them how we could get the key to get the tire off. They politely informed us that the car company does not release universal keys, so our only option was to take the car to a dealership. They were also kind enough to point out that the nearest dealership was 120 miles southwest of us in Pittsburgh.

By this point, the sun had set, and hours had passed.

Around 10pm, it looked like all hope was lost. A tow truck was on the way, but it could only take us to Pittsburgh. We had tried calling car rental companies to get us moving again, but on a Friday night they were all closed (and we were nowhere near an airport). So, the tow truck would take us to Pittsburgh, we would stay in a hotel, and when the dealership opened Saturday morning they would replace the tire. Then we would have to turn around and go home, since we would certainly miss the shower.

Hope arrived in the form of John, the driver of the tow truck. He looked at our locked lug nut, and offered the one thing we hadn't considered: to simply break it off. He hammered a larger nut over the locked nut and unscrewed it. After that, our full size spare tire was on and road-ready in a matter of minutes. John assured us this method would ruin the locked nut, but that didn't even happen--it was only slightly scratched.

With a perfectly fine tire on the car, we were back on the road again. After a long night, we pulled into my mom's driveway around 4:30am. It was more than worth it. The shower was lovely (well, at least what I saw of it), and it was great to see family and friends even if only briefly. All too early Sunday morning, we were heading east again--but with a car full of presents.

Now the car has no locking lug nuts at all, only plain ones that can be easily removed by the wrench in the trunk.

What Next?

Several of my coworkers have seen and enjoyed having the business card robot around. They've started donating their own business cards right and left. As of today, here are the cards I now have to play with.

....and there's yet another box that didn't make it into that picture. Each box contains around 500 cards. The entire figure from the last post is only 432 cards.

What to build next?

Busy at Work

I don't really fiddle when there are slow times at work. Strangely, I fiddle more when it's very busy. When I'm really on a roll, getting lots done with still more to do, I get a kind of excess of energy. There are inevitably times when I'm waiting on something or someone, and my OCD tendencies take over. So it was in the last couple of weeks, when I've been busier than ever, I also fiddled in the downtime and came up with this:

He's a little over four feet tall (the magazine is for scale), and is comprised of about 432 out-of-date business cards (mine and a coworker's). No glue, no tape, just the cards. The secret? Click here.

Another coworker has given me a box of her cards, too. If things stay as busy as they have been, there might be a puppy in the window soon.

Spring is in the Air

So much time since the last post. Things get busy, and the old blog gets neglected. I suppose it's a good thing, though, to prioritize life over updates.

After the last post, Lynn and I traveled to Raleigh, NC to Mu Beta Psi's National Convention. It was fantastic as always to see old friends, meet new ones, and celebrate together the diversity and history of our organization. I had the distinct privilege of signing and presenting the charter for our newest chapter at Rutgers University. I was also thrilled to be re-elected as National President for another year. There's a lot I hope to accomplish in the coming year.


Then began a string of performances. Lynn performed at the culmination of a class she had taken in preparing opera roles. We both went to see our friend Marjorie perform stand-up. We went to Princeton, NJ to see another friend sing. Then Marjorie took us with her to see Bill Cosby perform in Connecticut. He was hilarious. He came on stage in sweat pants and a sweatshirt, sat down on a chair and just started talking. It was as much a conversation as it was a performance.

We've also kicked wedding planning into high gear. In a couple of weekends, we've set out the save-the-date cards, invitations, menu, table linens, floor plan, cake, florist, rehearsal dinner venue, and singers for the ceremony. It seems as if every time we make a host of decisions about the wedding, that there cannot possibly be any more decisions to make—but there are always more.


More recently, we were besieged by the Pope in his recent visit to NYC. Last Sunday morning, he visited the Trade Center site to offer a prayer and a blessing. The ramp down to the site, and the gate that allows trucks from the street to access it, is right in front of our building. (That's our building at the top of the ramp in this picture.) So, in order to protect the Pope, they set up a bullet-proof tent in front of our main entrance in which the Pope could move from his motorcade car to the Popemobile. Then he rode the Popemobile down the ramp to the spot where he prayed. All this time, we were not allowed to use the door to our building. Lynn and I decided to sleep in, and wait it out, rather than try and go anywhere. The Secret Service sent around a memo to everyone in our building to please keep our windows closed, for fear of sniper fire. But it was such a beautiful day, we left them open. Our windows didn't have the vantage point for anything of the sort anyway.

There have been many beautiful days here lately. Spring is definitely here, and as the trees bloom and skies clear, I remember one of the many reasons I love this city so much.

Science For Sale

A good friend sent me this sad, sad link. It seems the British government no longer feels their radio astronomy program is worth having around. They have decided to essentially cut all of the funding for the program that operates the e-Merlin network of radio telescopes.

Some enterprising eBay users have decided to capitalize on their government's unwanted leftovers, and have put several of the radio telescopes up for auction. The Lovell Telescope at the Jodrell Bank Observatory has been pivotal in the history of radio astronomy. The Lovell has been used to measure and the distances to Venus and the Moon. With this telescope, astronomers discovered the 21cm Hydrogen emission line, the first OH emissions of masers, and were able to confirm the existence of pulsars. Since then it has contributed to research on gravitational lensing and quasars as part of the Merlin network.

And of course, who can forget its time served in the SETI program?

The huge yellow somethings went unnoticed at Goonhilly, they passed over Cape Canaveral without a blip, Woomera and Jodrell Bank looked straight through them—which was a pity because it was exactly the sort of thing they'd been looking for all these years
—Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

It's disheartening to hear that other countries are slowly dismantling their astronomy research base. The US has been cutting funding for years, most notably with NASA focusing more on engineering projects than on research. Isn't it interesting how the most publicly appealing of sciences can be the first to the chopping block?

But perhaps the most ironic part of this story? The eBay listing has not yet been shut down!

John Galt Speaks from the Shadows

Today, the New York Times published this new article, providing more information and expanding upon yesterday's article. Apparently, John Galt has released a statement in response to the fines.

Galt, in a statement, rejected the accusations and vowed to defend itself. The company contended that the government agencies overseeing the site often issued conflicting directives that resulted in massive slowdowns and cost overruns.

"Every detail of the work was scrutinized, criticized and finally approved before it could be done," the statement said. "It is inconceivable that these agencies, including OSHA, whose trained inspectors were present at the site on a daily basis, could not detect, or were oblivious to the alleged 'serious and willful' violations that supposedly existed prior to the fire."

The statement said that if government regulators, including OSHA, failed to discover the alleged violations before the fire, they should be the ones charged with failing to do their duty.

But unlike Bovis, who is one of the largest contractors around the city, Galt has no named spokesperson, and no contact person for the press. From where did this statement originate? Who wrote it? Who will take responsibility?

On a more positive note, the Environmental Protection Agency has approved the new plan for demolishing the rest of the building, and so work can resume. There's still no sign of anything moving out my window--and no sign of the new subcontractor on the work site--but everyone is still happily repeating the expectation of finishing the job by the end of the year.

The Search For John Galt

Still wondering just who is John Galt?

So are federal regulators from the US Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Today OSHA announced that it has cited the general contractor Bovis Lend Lease, and the mysterious subcontractor John Galt for numerous health and safety violations relating to the dismantling of the Deutsche Bank building at 130 Liberty Street. The citations mainly dealt with violations that led to deaths of two firefighters in the August fire.

Among the citations are:

• Failing to inspect and maintain firefighting equipment to ensure that the standpipe system was operational, and that sufficient water supply and water pressure were available for firefighting.
• Obstructed emergency exit access (including sealed emergency stairwells, emergency stairwells blocked by construction and unlighted stairwells).
• Inadequate emergency escape procedures.
• Unmarked exits.
• Lack of fire extinguishers, emergency alarm procedures and fire cutoffs.
• Failing to develop and follow a fire protection program.
• Smoking permitted in work areas.
• Temporary structures inside the building made of combustible materials.
• Scaffolds erected too close to power lines.
• Unprotected sides and edges of work areas, unprotected floor openings, missing or broken guardrails and missing stair rails.
• Exposed live electrical parts, electric panel boards in wet locations and other electrical hazards.

The New York Times article had some interesting information on the fines:

OSHA cited the two contractors for a total of $464,500 in proposed fines. They issued three willful and 22 serious citations to Galt, carrying fines of $271,500 and 2 willful and 17 serious citations to Bovis, with $193,000 in fines.

The agency defines a willful violation as one committed "with plain indifference to or intentional disregard for employee safety and health." A serious citation, according to the agency, is one in which "death or serious physical harm is likely to result from a hazard about which the employer knew or should have known."

The article mentions one anonymous executive from the equally-anonymous John Galt company who is upset over the fines. He claims that some of the citations are for things that regulators ordered the company to do (like sealing off the stairwells which had asbestos in the walls). But there is a very ominous, yet familiar, line: "A spokesman for the Galt company, which is no longer operating, could not be reached for comment..." No longer operating. I wonder just who was served with these citations, and who will be paying them.

Meanwhile, Bovis and their new subcontractor LVI Environmental Services still claim that 130 Liberty will be completely dismantled by the end of this year. There are still 26 floors remaining.

Is life imitating art, John Galt? Are you exposing our absurdly bureaucratic procedures and government regulations to rebuild humanity—or destroy it? Are our skyscrapers today's substitute for Rand's steel mills and copper mines? I haven't finished the book yet, so I've yet to learn the answer.