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Electric age

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 19:33:08 GMT

Can you guess what this vehicle

has in common with this vehicle?

The answer is that both run on electric power.

It isn't commonly known, but the electric engine was one of the first types used in horseless carriages, which later became known as automobiles. In fact, electric power enjoyed a brief period of popularity over the internal combustion engine in the early 20th century. It wasn't until the electric starter was developed that gasoline-powered vehicles were considered safer than pre-transistor era electronic technology. It's strange that a century later we should be confronted with the same decision.

I've been teetering for the last 6-8 months over converting my car to pure electric. It isn't for the economy so much, I barely drive my car except for sunny day trips to the beach with the top down. Since I live 3 blocks away, cost of fuel is pretty negligible. It isn't because I'm particularly ecological. I still can't figure out exactly which plastics go into recycling and which don't and I don't quite understand what constitutes compost if you don't have a yard. But it is a relatively clean and cheap power. It's a fuel that's readily available, as opposed hydrogen cells or nuclear power. And the technology just isn't efficient or reliable enough for solar yet, although sunlight would be an amazing solution in its organic simplicity.

It's more the strange allure of electric power, images from my youth of grainy films of tesla coils, mystical Frankenstein machines, that automaton from Metropolis who was named after the Norse goddess of the underworld, this kind of retro-futurist dream that is finally at the cusp of becoming reality. It's a technofetish, probably similar to what the folks at Venturi must have experienced when naming their $630,000 electric car.

Which brings to mind the cost. It's all good and fine to get moist over new technologies (in this case, not so new), but it's another thing entirely when you gotta feed the monkey. Despite what ecologists try to sell, electric power is not significantly cheaper than gas, based on my studies. A person does not buy a $100k Tesla because it's economical. It's a bit cleaner, but when you consider that 50% of electric power in this country is coal generated, it's not perfect. No, you do it out of love.

Or lust, as the case may be.

Bottom line, the performance of your electric vehicle in terms of speed, distance, convenience, and general sexiness is directly proportionate to the amount of money you put into it. Getting electric technology to perform on par with ICE (internal combustion engine) expectations is not cheap. With the current state of technology, at 100 thousand clams, the Tesla is a good value.

AC Propulsion, who designed the electric drivetrain for the Tesla and the Venturi Fetish will make a Scion run on a similar system for a mere $50,000. That does not include the car, which will run you another $15k if you don't provide your own. Suffice it to say that more than half the cost of an electric car is in the propulsion system.

Not everyone has that kind of coin to spend, which brings us into the realm of hobbyists, gearheads, and generally, nerds. These type of folks gut their cars and replace anything that moves or oozes toxic fluid or fumes with wires. And it's a pretty cool thing, the solutions they come up with and the things they create.

I'll give you the short rundown of the prevailing method currently used, or at least the one I like best. I'm sharing what I've learned so far. Keep in mind I've never taken a physics, engineering or advanced chemistry class in my life. The honors program at my school exempted me from these studies, instead propelling me towards humanities, linguistics, philosophy, semantics, and dead languages (like proper English). Useful stuff like that, which I'm glad I know, but the scientific pursuits have always had sort of an alchemical attraction to me. I learn a lot on my own, like if I have a question I find out the answer from books, but some areas end up being kind of spotty that way. My primitive intellect wouldn't understand things with alloys and compositions and things with molecular structures. So if you're a Poindexter and I'm wrong about something let me know. It isn't really my element or religion so I'm not gonna be insulted.

Essentially the principle is you choose a light car with a lot of storage capacity, preferably aerodynamic. You take out the engine, the exhaust system, the radiator, the clutch, air conditioning, and any exceptionally parasitic electronic parts that provide less value than the energy they suck from the battery. Then you throw in a whole bunch of batteries, connect that up to the accellerator and an electric motor that is essentially the same as what they've been using in elevators and forklifts for the last 50 years. You need a variety of gauges, controllers, fuses, circuit breakers, and connexions hooked up somewhere in between. Not that complicated, really. Certainly less so than a machine that moves around based on exploding a bunch of caustic materials, kind of scary when you think about it that way.

Now, let's take a look at the spectrum of what you can do, once armed with this knowledge. At the high end, you've got the Tesla. Runs like a regular car, except you plug it in instead of gassing it up, no oil change, smog testing, or shit like that obviously. It runs about 200 miles on a charge and tops out at over 125 mph. You drive it off the lot, ready to go. After the waiting list anyways. That costs you $100,000.

At the low end, you've got a $200 salvage yard Pinto with a few golf cart batteries. It has a range of 25 miles and a top speed of about the same number of miles per hour. That might cost you $3000, plus labor. You have to charge it like the Tesla, and also occasionally top off the lead batteries with distilled water and a turkey baster. So basically, any amount more that you put into it increases speed, distance, convenience or sexiness. That's a good amount of wiggle room. I've settled on spending about $15,000, which gives me a 50 mile range and a top speed of about 70mph, the ability to upgrade as battery technology improves without a complete replacement, and some other goodies. Good enough for an afternoon picnic or a trip to Berkeley and back in the surfmobile, which is all I really need.

The car I'm using is 1974 Volkswagen Thing, convertible, British racing green. It's a direct descendant of the German Kubelwagen, which was the Hitler-era's version of the jeep. As a personnel carrier, it wasn't as suited to heavy terrain as the jeep (actually they used a predecessor, called the...heh...Willy), but the Kubelwagen was able to thrive in much harsher environments. This was a tremendous advantage in places like Stalingrad and the Sahara. Anyways, it ultimately became the Thing, or Trekker as it is known in Europe, used by NATO up until about 1983. Now they're considered sort of an oddity, they were only commercially available in the US for 3 years. Some think they're ugly, I love them. They're popular with surfers, as many air cooled VWs are, because they're cheap, easy to fix and modify, and can run forever with minimal maintenance. Parts are plentiful, relatively interchangeable with similar models, and available just about anywhere in the world. The VW Beetle is the most sold automobile model in world history, overshadowing the Model T. Beetles used so frequently in electric conversions as to have standardized kits for them now. The Thing shares about 90% of the same parts as the bug, and yet I've never seen an electric one. So I may be the first, which is kind of cool.

One of the first choices you have to make are batteries. What kind, how many. It depends on your budget, what kind of performance you want, and personal preference. There are lithium-ion and the like, commonly used in laptop computers. They are very expensive, (think the $50,000 Scion I mentioned earlier). Some kids at MIT are currently converting a 1976 Porsche with some 18 lithium batteries donated by Valence Technology. Total cost to you or I for that kind of power would run about $36k for the batteries alone. Not terribly viable on my budget.

Another option is NiCd, if you ever had rechargeable flashlight batteries from Radio Shack, you probably had these. You probably also know that they had a terrible battery life due to something called "charge memory". GM developed a really good one for an electric car they made in the 80's called the EV1. Never heard of it? That's because it was begrudgingly developed, and the project was shelved upon release. Maybe 40 of these cars exist now, and that beautiful NiCD technology disappeared. You can't buy it. Rumor is the rights now belong to some oil company. That's the occasionally cannibalistic power of free-market capitalism for you.

So, what you're left with is essentially lead acid batteries. Basically the same type you have powering your windshield wiper on your car. These suckers are heavy, coming in at 40-80 pounds EACH. And you need a bunch of them to power a car. The general rule of thumb is, more batteries = more distance; the more powerful the battery = more speed. The rest is up to you. I'm probably going to have a dozen (hopefully that doesn't require new shock absorbers) batteries, nasty Hawker deep cycle, absorbant glass mat military grade batteries. They use these things on tanks, and they run about $300 apiece.

Pair those with a WarP9 motor, Zilla 1k controller, Manzanita charger and some other stuff, puts me at the bleeding edge of the technology that's available to a normal human being. Even at that it won't win me any drag races or get me to Santa Cruz and back. But there's this thing about working on cars that's kind of fun, sunny days, Ramones playing on the radio, making weird exotic things that don't really exist in the collective consciousness yet, maybe even having a hand in shaping a better future...I dunno. I'm not really smart, I learn a lot from books and other people, more than any classroom. Mostly it's from just jumping in and doing things, making mistakes along the way. I've done a lot of research and I'm getting started, taking things apart, strategizing next steps. I think I can realistically get it done for next summer, but I really look forward to the process. I think it will be great.

Context over dogma

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 22:34:23 GMT

I'm not a big fan of BMW, although in recent years designs have begun to evolve. This is a concept car unveiled at the BMW Museum last week. There's something really sexy about replacing the steel exoskeleton with fabric skin stretched tightly over a carbon fiber frame that changes shape.

http://www.autoblog.com/2008/06/10/bmw-gina-light-visionary-model-revealed/

BMW GINA Light Visionary Model revealed

The BMW GINA Light Visionary Model that was seen via video being installed in the BMW Museum in Munich last week has finally been revealed, and the futuristic design study shows how BMW designers are thinking outside of the box when it comes to the materials that make up a car and also how the car relates to the driver.

GINA stands for "Geometry and Functions in 'N' Adaptations", which basically means that designers from both BMW and BMW Group DesignworksUSA were allowed to throw out the rulebook. This is most evident in the GINA Light Visionary Model's outer skin, which is made entirely out of textile fabric that's pulled taut around a frame of metal and carbon fiber wires. The skeleton of the car is controlled by electro-hydraulic devices and can actually move and change shape beneath the fabric skin. For instance, the headlights of the concept can be exposed or hidden by the car's skin just like blinking eyes, and the hood opens from the center as the fabric parts to expose the engine.

This idea extends to the interior, where BMW designers have made visible only those instruments that are required at a certain time, while the rest of the time the same fabric interior "blinks" them out of view. The car itself looks somewhat like a Z4 Roadster, though after viewing the extensive gallery of high-res images below, you'll be amazed how much the outer skin looks like normal sheetmetal. Until, that is, you see how the doors open. They lift up in a semi-scissor fashion and since there are no exposed hinges, the fabric artfully binds up as the door swings open.

While the design of the GINA Light Visionary Model is very Bangle-esque with concave and convex surfaces intermingling everywhere you look, it looks appropriate and natural here. The car is very much a concept, meant more to inspire BMW's own designers and engineers rather than excite the public, but now we're excited about shape-changing, fabric-covered cars, anyway.

Quote of the day

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 23:04:58 GMT

--> my jizz will blot out the sun

<-- ...then we shall fap in the shade

You know what makes Obama so cool

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 16:03:54 GMT

Not cool as in, hey he's really awesome.

Cool as in he doesn't lose his nerve and randomly freak out when things get rough, like, ahem...other candidates.

Dude's as cool as a Shaolin monk. Which is a good trait for a president, who would have the ability to push the Shiny Red Button of Doom whenever he likes.

I have a theory as to why:

Dude smokes.

Which is a fucking awesome accomplishment in the neo-puritanical climate that is the 21st century, where everyone is so busy putting their noses in everyone elses business and wagging their fingers, that they have no time for introspection or self improvement, or anything resembling true critical thinking. Alas, it's the American way.

Mind you, he only admits to 3 Marlboros a day, which if you're a smoker or have lived with one, you know that probably translates to 8. It's still not that much, and he'll probably quit if elected like Eisenhower, who went from 4 packs a day to nothing, just before becoming president. Honestly, I don't know how you'd have time to smoke 4 packs of cigarettes a day, unless you never slept.

Which brings to mind some interesting, albeit trivial facts about smoking in the White House (heavily culled from random internets):

A cigarette burning from the end of a holder became the trademark for Franklin Roosevelt. He was the last president to be seen smoking cigarettes. This was back in 1945. Dude dealt with the Great Depression and the onset of WWII.

First Lady Grace Coolidge kept her habit a secret. Pat Nixon stopped smoking in public during her husband's congressional campaign of 1946. The ever-adventurous Eleanor Roosevelt began lighting up at White House gatherings however, claiming women had as much right to smoke in public as men (awesome!). Mamie Eisenhower, Jackie Kennedy, Betty Ford, and Nancy Reagan also smoked cigarettes. Helen Taft smoked in her youth, but quit shortly after her marriage as did Laura Bush.

Cigars aren't really smoking in my opinion, but the highly publicized stogie habit of Ulysses Grant earned him 10,000 cigars from various voters upon winning the presidency. He tried to sample at least one from each batch and gave the rest as gifts.

Benjamin Harrison regularly received token cigars from the people of his hometown in Indiana and often used them as handouts. William McKinley insisted on smoking Havana's, but stocked the less expensive White Owl brand for presentation to reporters and guests.

Teddy Roosevelt, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Jimmy Carter also enjoyed an occasional cigar, as did John Kennedy who insisted on Cuban tobacco.

And then there was Bill Clinton, heh.

Incidentally, in 1993, Hillary Rodham Clinton officially declared all areas of the White House smoke-free. Bitch. I mean, it just isn't a workplace, it's somebody's home. It just goes to show, you can be Ruler of the Free World but you still have to answer to the First Lady.

Obama Seals Democratic Nomination

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 23:47:58 GMT

Well, I guess it's down to Obama and that chipmunk dude now.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080603/ap_on_el_pr/primary_rdp

Review of Pringles' failed flavors

Fri, 30 May 2008 20:44:26 GMT

I have the metabolism of a bumblebee, and I'm constantly eating throughout the day.

This week, Walgreens had a $1 sale on all the experimental Pringles flavors that didn't sell very well. I thought I'd buy them even though I don't usually eat a lot of junk food. It sounded like a good idea at the time.

So here's a review that will help you decide if $1 is a good deal if you should happen to drop by Walgreens and are wondering if you should splurge on cheap crappy food:

Kickin' Cheddar - Anything with the word kickin' in the title automatically arouses suspicion in me. I dunno, they really didn't go out on a limb taking risks with this flavor. I guess it's spicier than their normal cheese flavor.
7/10

Screamin' Dill Pickle - zomgwtf. Who came up with this flavor and how did it get approved by the Pringles powers that be? This is awful. It tastes like...I'm not sure, some kind of dill flavored crap. It is bad. I hope someone got fired over this.
0/10

Pizza - Sounds like it would be okay. But it is not. I have eaten many strange pizzas in my live and this tastes like none of them. I guess it sort of tastes like how those pizza smelly stickers used to smell. Still, it's palatable. Better than screamin' dill pickle.
3/10

Spicy Guacamole - Why are there so many guacamole flavored chips now? Guacamole is good because it is something you dip chips into. There is nothing appealing about dried out guacamole made into a chip shape. Did I mention they're green? Why? Screamin' dill pickle isn't green. It just adds to the nastiness. Tastes better than pizza though.
4/10

Loaded Baked Potato - Okay. No food should EVER have the words Loaded and Potato together in the title. It sounds too much like poo to make me want to eat it. I really didn't want to buy this one, but I'm a completist. And therefore I am doomed to suffer for it. I can't begin to describe what this tastes like, I mean a potato chip that is flavored like potato shouldn't be that hard to do, and it's kind of postmodern if you think about it. Somehow they failed, miserably. Let me assure you this tastes like ass, and should be avoided at all costs.
-23,845.548/10

Blazin' Buffalo Wing - I was a little worried about a meat flavored potato chip, but this wasn't bad. Um...it's spicy, sort of. Doesn't really taste like chicken, or buffalo for that matter. But maybe I just don't notice the chicken flavor because everything tastes like chicken.
8/10

You know, I had this weird craving for junk food and bought all this random stuff.

I ate like 4 chips out of each can and the moment is definitely over now.

Maybe they should try selling it as health food or diet food, because I don't think I'm going to want any more junk food for a long time.

Trend analysis

Fri, 30 May 2008 18:38:04 GMT

I've been noticing that my LJ posts start out really angry about random things on Mondays and gradually become more positive about life as they get closer to Friday. Maybe I'm bipolar.

Um.

Here's a funny picture or something.

Uh, wut?

Wed, 28 May 2008 20:08:09 GMT

O's iPod has been broken for ages, you can't even read the display so you kind of have to guess where you're navigating to, which kind of sucks. So I bought her a new one this weekend and thought I'd put some music on there for her. I figured it would be a nice thing to do.

I don't have an iPod myself, but I've worked with a lot of music software in my time and figured it would be no problem.

Let me tell you, in my entire old-ass life I have never experienced a such a steaming piece of crap that was anywhere close to as bad as iTunes. And people actually use this. Like, a lot of them.

I'm dumbfounded. It's like a bunch of overpaid marketing executives and graphic designers sat down and decided to code a media manager during some drunken 45 minute lunchbreak, then proclaimed this to be the Standard and forced everyone in the free world to use it.

So, first. How do you sort this shit? I have like 1000 artists in my library. I'm not putting fucking star ratings on each of the 20,000 songs in my collection. No way.

Secondly, genre is rendered totally useless for the sole reason that musicians and any other dipshit originating the music have the ability to name the genre. Let's see, I'm looking at her music. There's goth, there's Gothic, there's gothic, there's alternative gothic, alternative folk gothic, alternative gothic folk. Who the fuck kind of self-possessed musician has the fucking gall to call their genre "unique"?!?! Don't let these people name their own genres. You wouldn't give a gun to a monkey. Half these people are degenerates and druggies that can't even spell.

And what is with all these buttons that have no label and you have to just guess what they do? And they're all interspersed around different pages, and some of them are super tiny, like 2 millimeter diameter buttons that don't even look like buttons, and they do totally random shit. God help you if you touch the wrong one. It's like playing a really lame version of Myst. Except if you fuck up it's like, whoops. There goes another half hour of my life.

Okay, and let's say I just bought a new CD and I just want to add_just_that_one_CD to the iPod. Why do I have to update the entire playlist? No, for the millionth time I do NOT want to resynch the entire iPod. What the fuck. Man, I just want nice little folders inside of folders that I can load into and choose from.

You know, as someone who occasionally plays music to a group of other people (albeit music I didn't necessarily make), I'm tempted by pressures from the artistic community to switch from PC to Mac. Well fuck you, Steve Jobs and your damn jeans and turtleneck. If iTunes is any indication of how your products operate you have officially unsold me from purchasing anything from your company that I would have to rely upon if I wanted to seem remotely competent to another human being. I'm gonna stick with my Alienware for awhile. There's nothing cool and artsy about doinking yourself in circles for hours on end, not unless you're naked and covered in mud like they do at the Art Institute.

I'm looking at MediaMonkey as a software alternative to iTunes, does anybody have another suggestion?

Weekend update

Fri, 23 May 2008 18:39:32 GMT

I'm taking the next five days off. It's gonna be great.

Die Maschinen is on Saturday.

Also. Happy B-day divia. Thees is for yoo:

Happy Friday All

Fri, 16 May 2008 15:54:48 GMT

I ain't gonna do shit this weekend. Can't wait.

Should I be flattered or repulsed?

Thu, 15 May 2008 15:23:12 GMT

What am I to think when my best friend comes over to watch his new favorite movie...and it turns out to be Shortbus?

Also. Some random little bird tried to have non-consensual sex with the back of my head this morning.

Er, repeatedly. I had to literally run away to avoid being further violated.

symptomatic bourgeoiserie

Tue, 13 May 2008 20:51:57 GMT

View Poll: #1187327

I was having a conversation with O the other day over brunch at the Park Chalet about restaurant culture. How some things just seem stupid and contrary to logic to me, but you quietly go along it because it's tradition and would ruffle too many feathers to force your point.

The obvious example of this is mandatory tipping. I don't see the point in tipping people for mediocre work, but I do it anyway because I don't want to seem like a cheap bastard. But that's kind of fucked if you think about it. Because you're perpetuating their mediocrity by subsidizing it and that goes against the ultimate objective of human existence if you are a proponent of evolution.

There are other things too. Like why is bread free? I don't mind paying for bread. It isn't free for the restaurant, it's just that there's this expectation that you don't pay for bread.

And why is it insulting to get your bill too early? I like it when a waiter pushes the tab, because that means I don't have to wait around to get their attention. It all just seems stupid and political to me.

Which brings me to the current conundrum.

I've always considered bringing your own bottle of wine to a restaurant to be among the most pretentious and despicable practices of the western world. I mean, would you bring your own food if they let you? And you'll notice that it's the real pricks of this world that do it. Well, that's what I thought until recently.

See, I had to make reservations for a group of friends at a pretty nice restaurant. O likes Pinot Noir and so we buy it all the time, she gets kind of excited over a really good one, so I thought I'd go to their website and take a look at what they had ahead of time.

Without trashing it, let's just say it's a pretty nice restaurant. But their wine selection was god awful. Not only that but I knew most of these wines and they are cheap trader joes crap. On top of that they charge $50 to $150 per bottle for that shit. That borders on insulting to me.

So the question is, do I man up and just shell out for the best crappy wine they have and not make waves, or do I bring my own and risk looking like a cock gobbler? This is keeping me up at night.

To further enhance this unpleasant experience, I've been forced to go to a yuppie website to confirm the etiquette of bringing your own wine. I am too ashamed to tell you where this information comes from, but I will pass the information on so you don't have to go there yourself:

"The first rule is: You brought it, you drink it. You can't send it back if it doesn't taste right; that's your bad because you stored it improperly.

Another rule I follow is if the waiter or sommelier expresses a lot of interest in your bottle it is proper to offer him or her a sip or a full glass. This is sometimes refused, but the gesture is always appreciated. In these circles, professionals are challenged to stay informed, and the more they taste, especially of rare or off-the–beaten path wines, the more they know.

Occasionally they will take that glass into the kitchen to enjoy after their shift or to share with other wait staff who would love the opportunity to taste something special. It always pays to be gracious.

Another rule is you don't just bring your own wine to save money. It would be pretty tacky to show up with a bottle of Kendall-Jackson or Yellowtail Chardonnay.

You bring your own wine because it's a special occasion or you have a special bottle that coordinates beautifully with the restaurant's cuisine. For example, for your anniversary dinner you might be bringing a bottle of vintage Champagne that matches one you enjoyed on your wedding night. Or you might be bringing a bottle of vintage Bordeaux to a French restaurant that has a limited wine list.

You wouldn't want to bring a Bordeaux to a French restaurant that has a fantastic wine list _ that is unless you have a particular vintage that the restaurant doesn't have on its list. You're smart to call ahead and check.

Bring your wine in an appropriate bag. No paper sacks or rubber neon green totes. How will they look on that satin-covered chair at the Ritz? There are many handsome wine carriers out there; check them out.

Don't bring your own stemware without asking the restaurant if that's OK. Do you expect them to rinse the glasses for you? Besides, most good restaurants already have the best Riedel. If not, they'll have an approximate equivalent: Spiegelau. Is it really worth annoying your waiter to have your own stems?

Finally, make sure you add a little extra to the tip when you bring your own wine because the waiter still has to open it and pour it for you as if you had bought one of theirs. It's no less work for him or her, so treat your server kindly."

Great. I think I'm gonna go buy a floral duvet now.

-edit to add- sorry mechagojira. I can't figure out how to append a poll onto an existing entry, so just started fresh. Please repost with your vote.

Boring money stuff

Mon, 12 May 2008 16:38:29 GMT

I've been renting for the last year or so and I got to thinking I'd like to buy a home again.

Not that I'd like to buy, actually. Honestly I've really been enjoying renting--no repairs to do, no taxes, no asswipe ownership partners, no bookkeeping, no worries about property values, no gargantuan mortgage. I could leave next month if I want. You get this weird feeling of freedom when you're renting.

It's more that I feel obligated to buy. Everybody tells you that you're throwing your money away on rent, that you're making your landlord rich. Especially old people and people who like to pretend that they're financially savvy. Mostly, I suspect, it's just one of those kinds of conventional thought that nobody bothers to question. So I sat down and crunched the numbers.

I was surprised, and a little pissed off at being preached to for so long.

Let me start off by saying that I welcome any input as long as it is substantiated by real numbers and not just kneejerk bandwagon theory. I would really like to be wrong about this.

I think that home equity is a rotten investment.

1.) It's illiquid, in fact it's a monumental pain in the ass to buy or sell real estate.

2.) You sink a ton of money into one house in one neighborhood in one city in the world, which is about as un-diversified as you can possibly be, and runs contrary to any rational form of investment wisdom. As a result, your equity value is either bouncing all over the map like the last decade, or like stuffing money into the most expensive mattress in the world, like the decade before.

3.) In order to get anything that might resemble a predictable return on equity, you have to stay invested for aeons. Well, at least 10 years. So now we're in the arena of long-term investments, which I think stock is better in that it doubles every 7 years. You can get lucky with property, but historically you're looking at more like 10 to 12 years to double. I don't invest in luck.

4.) Finally, the fucking Tax Board actually RAISES your property taxes based on a completely arbitrary assumption of what they think your home has appreciated at. It pisses me off and makes absolutely no sense.

So there's the tax benefit, right? Fuck that shit. Look at this:

-You buy a $500,000 home, you put $100,000 down and you borrow $400,000. That's fucking expensive and it buys you shit around here. But the numbers are round at least. Here are your options for what a half million buys you:

a.) a single family residence. In the boondocks, or the ghetto. Your choice.

b.) a condo. Pay another $300 a month for an HOA that doesn't do anything except complain about the color of your curtains as visible from the street if you reeeeaally look hard. Those dues supposedly go to pay for repairs, but that's bullshit. They send you an additional assessment bill for that. Nothing like paying rent on top of a mortgage, but hey. At least you don't have to pull weeds.

c.) a TIC. Assuming you can find one. You've got a 1% chance of your new partners not being assholes. Either way, it's like being married without the sex. It takes forever to get anything done and if you don't hate them already, you will end up hating them after 4 years guaranteed. And have fun selling your place. Banks and lawyers do not understand TIC's.

Let's get down to numbers. Let's assume you don't have the curse of HOA dues. Here are your annual costs:

Mortgage (at $2300/mo.) - $27,600
Insurance - $1,000
Property Taxes - $5,000
Improvements - $2,000

Total - $35,600

Thirty-five grand to live someplace. Not a great place, just a place. What. the. fuck. Your deduction, at a 37.3% combined federal and state tax bracket works out to be $13,350.

Adjusted total - $22,250

Divide that by 12. That works out to $1854 per month. Now go on craiglist and compare what $1850 in rent gets you versus a $500,000 property and the difference is astounding.

Maybe I'm missing something but until I'm convinced otherwise, the next time some condescending old cooter tells me I'm throwing my money away, I'm going to kick him squa in the nuts.

So I guess my point is, for all of my friends who rent--don't feel like a miserable failure for it. Renting is not a bad deal and property ownership is not all it's cracked up to be. It isn't what you have, it's what you do with it that matters in the end.

Dood.

Wed, 20 Feb 2008 20:46:02 GMT

Mysterious Creatures Found in Antarctica

Awesome.

In other news, I need more help today.

Lunar eclipse is tonight, and the moon will be full and red, like a big monkey-butt in the sky. And supposedly if you see a ring around the moon, you die.

So I'm going to test this theory tonight and I need recommendations for a nice restaurant in SF that has a rooftop patio.

My default location is Cheesecake Factory, but I'm a little concerned about visibility to the East-South East because of the layout of the restaurant. Any recommendations?

EDIT: Any restaurant with a rooftop patio that isn't Medjool. I'm not above rubbing elbows with tourists and the bourgeouisie, but I'm not a mook. Thanks!

Assistance?

Fri, 15 Feb 2008 18:59:09 GMT

I was given a very nice 6-foot snake whip from Madame/Mr. S for Valentine's day.

I could use some lessons and more than a bit of practice before I am able to do anything practical with it.

Surely at least one of you out there must know where to refer me.

I like charts

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 20:20:25 GMT

These ones tell a little story.

Give it some thought when you do your taxes this year.

And also when you vote.

Abolish the IRS.

Today's Rant: Coffee

Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:35:00 GMT

I'm pissed off today. Not because I had to come into the office at 5:30am, that I can deal with like a man. But because there are no fucking cafes open at this god forsaken hour. You know it's a god forsaken hour because even homeless people aren't up and wandering around. Only slaves like me that get conned into hitting the grindstone early.

But even the absence of cafes wouldn't be so bad except that the only hot coffee alternative available to me is 7-11. I had a feeling their coffee would be bad but I've had some bad coffee in my life. This, by far, ranked at the lowest.

It used to be Starbucks, not because Starbucks is some big corporate megalith or some hippie shit like that, but because their coffee genuinely sucks ass. I know some people out there like it, but I can't understand why unless you take some kind of perverse pleasure in an aftertaste that I can only describe as vaguely reminiscent of how I imagine a combination of rotting fish and stale urine must taste like.

Starbucks sacred place at the bottom of coffees was recently supplanted by McDonalds. I ventured there on recommendation of Cramer. You know, that cokehead asswipe from Mad Money. It's hard to imagine coffee sucking worse than Starbucks, but McDonalds has succeeded. Don't buy into the whole advertising propaganda, this is the kind of coffee that gives you bad coffee breath. I'm talking bad coffee breath like my goddamned guidance counsellor in high school. Nasty. I do not want any aspect of my life to resemble that man, least of all my breath. It's partially due to his efforts that I'm working so damned early today. No, don't do what you dream, that will never make money. Do what everybody else does and lead a meaningless existence, that's the ticket. Bastard. I'd rather drink the octogenarian-piss-fishgut-hot-milkshake that Starbucks serves up. It isn't the first time that fuckwad stockjockey Cramer has fucked up on a recommendation, I guess. I'll just add it to the list. Booyah.

The only thing McDonalds has over Starbucks is that I don't have to stand in line behind a dozen yuppie-asses talking on cellphones, ordering grande half-decaf skinny mocha lattes with vanilla torani and whipped cream and then paying for their $3 cup of coffee with a credit card. You fucks. You work in the financial district, there are 3 ATM machines within a block of you. Maybe if you ordered simpler coffee and not that pansy ass crap that takes 20 minutes to prepare you wouldn't have to lay on your horn everytime there's a 3 second pause in traffic. Fuckers. I will go off the deep end some hot day and baloney all of your cars.

But I digress. I staggered into 7-11 at o'dark thirty in the morning for coffee. I chose the Pacific 7 blend because I figured that they would at least put some effort into a coffee blend that they were bold enough to name after their company. I was wrong. Dead wrong. This coffee tastes like, to borrow a colloquialism from Angry Nintendo Nerd, eating out the ass of a dead, roadkill skunk. I could write an epic poem about how bad this coffee is, in fact, I'm caffeinated enough now to start on it:

7-11, your coffee sucks the big one,
I have to go to work early, which isn't fun.
Being up this early is already a curse,
Your coffee made my bad life worse.
Coffee is just made of beans, and it's sad
That you can make something so simple so bad.
My cursed fate seems seal'd ere I think about when
I'll work early some day and must drink it again.
7-11, your coffee sucks,
You fucked up, fucking fucker fucks.

Does anyone know

Tue, 29 Jan 2008 21:27:41 GMT

...how to write, "I spit in your food" in Italian?

I've been cooking a lot lately and I want to get an apron.

Necropolis

Thu, 17 Jan 2008 00:23:14 GMT

Had to go to a dj spot last night in Sacramento after work with Shatter. I texted him to confirm:

3PM

>Makita< we on for sacto
>Shatter< yeah, come over so I don't have to get your ass
>Makita< when should I get there?
>Shatter< don't have teh car right now, txt you when i get it

6:30PM

>Shatter< in the car come over whenever
>Makita< I just got home. Is 8/8:30 too late?
>Shatter< that's a bit late. it takes 2 hrs to get there
>Makita< okay. I'll pick up food on the way and cancel fap time. be there soon

7PM

I get to Shatter's place. We watch some cartoons and load up the gear. His sweetie is trying to figure out how to fix Mac and Cheese (doesn't cook), which is kind of cute. He tells her, "you need more water in there." She says, I put in six cups, just like the instructions said." He tells her that you don't have to follow the instructions for Mac and Cheese exactly and she gives him a funny look. I explain that the Mac and Cheese code is more like, er...guidelines. Like with pirates. And she laughs.

They do their Desi and Lucy kissing bit and I jump in the car. It's two hours of Rotterdam Terror Corps playing at volume, interrupted only by a stop amid some vast stretch mall for my first KFC wrap thingy, three cans of Monster energy and a pack of cigarettes. The wind is cold and blowing like hell.

We get to Necropolis, it was a fun night. There were a couple bands before we went on. I drank a few beers and mainly tried to avoid the grouchy old alcoholic who kept complaining about everything, the music, all these damned kids in black. It's funny, you meet some young people like that too. You can see the young person in that old guy, I could see that old person in some kids. We played some music, shook some hands, and left.

Home by four. Up for work by six. You have to shock the system occasionally with sleep deprivation. It shakes the lethargy out of the body. Although I'm feeling a little spidery, I'm not tired.

We got a little lost on the way to Necropolis that night. Turns out there was a big UFO sighting in Texas, it might have been us. I didn't think we were that lost. Sorry guys.

Wisdom from the Christian Kama Sutra

Tue, 15 Jan 2008 17:26:49 GMT

From 100 Greatest Quotes from fundamentalist christian chat rooms, respectfully submitted by tjcrowley:

"When two guy's have sex they can only penetrate eachother through the crack which I think is disgusting because of all the crap that's in there. They both must face the same direction and thus one guy's twig and berries will be projecting from the two. Because no man has a vagina they can't become one flesh when having normal sex.

Women don't have Jimmy and his two buddies hanging around so they can't naturally penetrate eachother and become one flesh.

Oral with dudes can't be natural because the legs will be poking out from different directions as will the ladies if they participate in oral sex.

Oral with the opposite sex still isn't natural because you still have the leg issue and often someone is further down if they are not on top of eachother.

Anal with opposites is still excluded from natural sex because once again your are sticking your think in a crap hole and a womans tits are usually projecting outward.

When the Bible is speaking of becoming one flesh it literally means that there is nothing sticking out in the clear and that the man and woman are facing eachother. Face to Face."

--Just remember kids, sex is only okay between a man and a woman who are married to each other, or at least between blood relations. And you also have to accept the Lord Jesus Christ into your heart and ask forgiveness for all your sins, and get baptised too, I think, or all the Missionary position sex in the world isn't going to do a damned thing to save your sorry ass soul.

I can't wait until Jack Chick comes out with the illustrated version.

My weekend in Napa with O

Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:33:06 GMT

Well, time has passed and a new year has come. I don't feel the need to be as secretive about aspects of my life as I have been for the last few months. I've been out of touch with a lot of people, without much in the way of explanation, and now is just as well a time as any to start sharing all these extraordinary things that destiny has thrown at me lately, that have kept me from my normal social routine, instead of just saying I've been busy.

O and I had been planning a trip to Napa for the last couple of months. We talked about it over countless drinks after work at Harlot, and on weekend mornings on the floor over breakfast with Cohen playing on the stereo, we settled on dates, planned, made reservations, and on Friday the day finally arrived for us to go. We packed a couple of days worth of clothes and various sundries, a few lengths of soft black nylon rope. We climbed into a royal grey mini named Moseley and rode out, bound for wine country, cigarettes and Nick Cave on the CD player.

We checked in at 9pm at Maison Fleurie,

a small, French provincial style bed and breakfast in Yountville. We had a room in the top floor of the bakery house, with a jetted tub and private patio overlooking the garden, pool and fountain. We unpacked, headed down to the main house to get a glass of sherry before taking a long bath and going to bed.

I woke up at 7am, put on a black and white striped shirt and dark pants and snuck off to the market. I bought a couple bottles of wine, wineglasses, four kinds of cheese, green grapes, bread, crackers, plates and utensils. By the time I returned at 8, O was up and getting dressed. We had breakfast in the main room, I put the groceries into a knapsack and we jumped on a pair of bicycles and rode through the countryside.

Our first stop was Monticello,

a vineyard named and designed after the estate owned by my favorite president, Thomas Jefferson. The owners were nice, and were glad to see their first visitors would be a young couple on bicycles. The wine was good, and we bought a bottle of Merlot. We had the place to ourselves for about 45 minutes, until a white limousine pulled up and a swarm of young girls poured out. We got back on our bicycles because O didn't like, as she put it, "all those goddamned debutantes constantly checking out my boyfriend."

From there we rode to Clos du Val,

which I believe is owned by Stag's Leap. It's done in a French style and I thought it would be nice with our morning ride, with its olive trees and pétanque field. We were short for time, so had a quick tasting and rode back to the inn.

Our destination for the day would take us about 15 miles north, near Calistoga. We drove, because, although she was optomistic about taking the trip by bicycle, I was concerned about how optomistic she would be for the gruelling ride back. It's a place that doesn't seem to be on any of the winery maps, that I stumbled on during my research. It's called Castello di Amorosa.

I was kind of expecting something small and hokey, sort of a disneyland version of a castle...but let me tell you, not only is this place authentic (i.e. using brick and stone reclaimed from castles in Italy), but it's also HUGE.

Taken from the info desk propaganda: This 14 year project, which just opened in April 2007, has evolved to include over 121,000 square feet. 107 rooms, 8,000 tons of hand-squared stones, 8 levels (4 above ground and 4 below), 900 feet of caves, a great hall with a 500 year old fireplace and two-story Italian frescoes, a drawbridge, dungeon and torture chamber, stables, midieval church, a lake, and arguably the single most impressive wine barrel room in the U.S., constructed with ancient Roman cross-vaulted ceilings.

The youtube video below includes this massive courtyard. We're coming next time with foils and masks to see if they'll let us fence there:

The tour took two hours, and didn't cover about half of the castle. There were a hundred rooms, doorways, passages that were cordoned off that were ideal for sneaking off to have illicit...well, you get the idea. The wine was decent and the winery there was just astounding. After the tour, sex, and being completely smashed from the 15 wines we tasted afterwards, we went back to the car and got the picnic items, laid out a blanket, and tried to wear down the effects of endorphins combined with the massive quantities of alcohol we'd consumed throughout the day, with bread and fruit and cheese. A couple hours later, I could see straight and managed to drive us back to the hotel.

By the way, I took none of these pictures. They are all stolen from the intarweb because I am many things, but I'm not a picture-taker.

The next morning we got up and had breakfast, lounged on the patio for awhile with coffee and wine, checked out of the hotel, and drove off to Beringer.

Well, it was Beringer. I don't have much more to say about it. Then we went to Dean and Deluca, bought more cheeses, bread, a couple jars of olives, some black cherry flavored vodka, pomegranite liqueur. I got a white apron, I've been wanting one because I've been cooking a lot lately.

We went back to Castello di Amorosa because we wanted to buy a momento from the shop there, this old leather wine carrying case. Then we turned around and drove to Mondavi.

Mondavi's wine is okay. I wasn't drinking as much that day because we were driving everywhere. Between the two of us we bought about a half dozen cookbooks, including the French Laundry cookbook, which I'd been wanting for awhile. The folks at Mondavi are really nice and let you walk around the grounds while you're tasting which is great if you want to have a cigarette. Most places force you to stay parked at the bar the whole time. I know all about the whole thing about smoking and taste buds, the fact is that it detracts from the experience for me if I have to wait until the whole thing is over.

We had enough energy for one more winery, and so I thought we'd end with champagne, or at least the California version of it, along with some snacks at Domaine Chandon.

Domaine Chandon looks a bit like an airport, as far as the building is concerned, but the bar is modern and nice, and the grounds are just beautiful. We had cheese and olives and salad, watched the sun start to set over gardens and pools filled with herons before heading home.

Memoria in Aeterna

Thu, 27 Dec 2007 16:23:38 GMT

"You can imprison a man, but not an idea. You can exile a man, but not an idea. You can kill a man, but not an idea."

- Benazir Bhutto

6/21/1953 - 12/27/2007

Nymphaea caerulea

Fri, 14 Dec 2007 18:23:43 GMT

Sorry to everyone who speculated that I had dropped off the face of the earth. I've been flaky and absent for the last few weeks. Just wanted to drop in and say that I'm doing just fine and that I miss you all. I'll try to appear a little less intermittently to check in but can't make any promises at this point. I'm going back to the land of the lotus eaters now.

Pyrophorus noctilucus

Fri, 23 Nov 2007 19:12:54 GMT

1.) I think I delivered large shipment of raw materials to the rumor mill the other night. It will be interesting to see the finished product that comes out the other end.

2.) Thanks to Devin for a great Thanksgiving party and for introducing me to flaming absinthe shots.

Synapsis

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 17:14:19 GMT

-Tarantino's Death Proof is possibly the coolest movie I have ever seen. I was up until 3am last night just so I could watch it over again.

-Last night was the first night I've had dinner at home in a week and could finally eat the leftovers that have been piling up in the refrigerator. Over the last several days I have been out to:

Filipino

French

Sushi (2x)

Italian

Thai

-In the midst of exhibitions and conversations I either conveniently avoided, or just haven't had in many years, I seem to be getting yanked back into the world of fashion. It got me searching around in old storage, I dredged up some footage of a fashion show from a decade ago. It was a weird experience seeing it again, kind of gut wrenching at the things I did wrong and didn't know better, and the things I don't like anymore, but inspiring in regards to thinking about the things I would do differently now.

-Stow Lake is the most beautiful place when you are on a rowboat and the fog hangs thick over the water.

-Finally learning to play the bagpipes.

-Riding a swingset at nighttime in the park, laughing like children. And sharing a Scorpion bowl during the Disneyland monsoons at Tonga.

-Harsh Chinese cigarettes with coffee, alone at sunrise.