“If you could jump in a time machine and go back to 1983 and say to somebody in the intelligence community, ‘You know one day there will be this grand electronic database of names, and it will show who everyone is connected to and what their hobbies are and where they’re going today, and where they’ve been, and it’s going to be called the Facebook,’ they would have asked ‘When did the Russians win the war and when did this kind of system come into place?’” – Shane Harris
I’m almost 100% sure it was meant as a parody, but it got me thinking about our wasteful car culture. Cool automobiles are nothing new, and the desire to show off our wheels is as American as apple pie and waterboarding. But doesn’t that just encourage us to drive more than necessary, in order to flaunt our automobile in public? I think so.
Perhaps it is time to deliberately tone down our desire for “awesomeness” when it comes to these carbon-spewing machines. It certainly does little to promote mass transit. A plain car is a fine car, when used sparingly. We can channel our desire for stylishness into more positive and Earth-friendly enterprises such as, say, the cut, color, and finish of reusable cloth shopping bags. Imagine the delightful swirl of colors and patterns in public if the creative energy that goes into auto designs were properly re-focused!
Spring is right around the corner – well, that is if you believe the liberal “scientists” – and I though it would fun for everyone to show support for Mother Earth in a creative way. As for me, I’m going to replace my monitor with a single compact fluorescent bulb! Namaste, rsfckers.
If you believe the media reports here and here, the President will, within a 24 hour span, announce his endorsement of 1) elimination of NASA’s Constellation program designed to return humans to the Moon, and 2) a high-speed rail line between Tampa and Orlando.
Constellation’s Ares I booster is designed right here in Huntsalulu. NASA people here have a lot invested in it. But it is an extremely flawed system, and NASA Marshall Space Flight Center’s irrational stubbornness may have just cost them a lot more than just the Ares I. We’ll see.
I anticipate a lot of whining about Obama’s lack of support. And maybe rumors of retaliation against the recently party-switching congressman Parker Griffith. That would be quite juicy for political junkies to consider. But it’s more than just that. Government space projects have always been infused with pork and politics, and I’m quite sure the calculations have already been made by the Obama Administration.
NASA centers in Texas and Alabama and Florida stand to be affected by this policy shift. Texas can be written off in the next election, Alabama barely even recognizes Obama as a citizen, but Florida? Ah, we’ll toss them a high speed rail line to Disney World to make them feel better. You can complain, but this stuff goes on all the time, no matter who’s in power in DC.
If you throw up a dodgy effort such as Constellation, you are just asking to get whacked politically. Few people outside of Building 4200 believed this dubious test flight was useful or persuasive:
The staging event at 2:25 looked for all the world like an Estes model rocket flight from childhood. I kept looking for the rubber band tying the stages together. Whatever. Buzz Aldrin, who knows slightly more about the topic, called the test a fake. In any case, the non-functional upper stage was designed mostly to resemble pretty Power Point pictures that they believe make politicians swoon.
Those days are long gone, it’s just that NASA is the last to figure it out. Obama’s plans call for outsourcing of smaller launch vehicles to have NASA concentrate on a Saturn-class heavy lifter for future projects. Mañana. People can spin it any way they want. All I know is that a lot of taxpayer money has been burned through with little to show for it. And that young space scientists should probably learn Russian, or Chinese, or Hindi.
On the plus side, local NASA surplus auction sales are gonna be suh-weet.
I’m decoupling from the Lowe Mill / Flying Monkey Arts community, a remarkable institution that has sprung up in technology-oriented Huntsville, Alabama. I’ve been associated with them since 2007 and they have influenced me in unexpected ways. The people have motivated me to improve as a photographer, and see like an artist. They’ve inspired me to do things I never would have considered before, so how can I not be grateful for that?
As for fearless and outrageous Crash Boom Bang Theatre, I know I’ll miss them the most and I miss them hard already.
But as the notorious Facebook relationship page says, “It’s complicated.” I’m sure I wore out my extended welcome with certain key members of the community a while ago, and I admit the feeling is mutual. If you want details on my defects, you’ll have to talk with them. I’m taking a brief break from putting myself down. Meanwhile, I’ll just haul off and say that the Mill/Monkey heirarchy has an insularity and a constant need for self-congratulation that is very off-putting, and these qualities alienate people who would otherwise love to be a part of this adventure.
I also let my life revolve around that place way too long, yet I never did figure out the code. The social dynamics of Lowe Mill resemble high school, a time when I made the usual adolescent mistakes and learned from them. I have no interest in making those same mistakes again decades later. And the actuarial tables say I’d better get a move on if I’m going to make new and more interesting mistakes to learn from.
So there. I’ve seen the old building before renovation as a hulking death trap. I’ve seen it grow into a fantastic convergence of creative people that can bring out abilities one never knew existed. But now, I must see it receding in the rear view mirror.
“My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals,” Bauer told a Greenville-area crowd. “You know why? Because they breed.
“You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that. And so what you’ve got to do is you’ve got to curtail that type of behavior. They don’t know any better.”
Being a very subjective list of my favorite photos from the Monkey in 2009. If you don’t appear here, it’s no reflection upon you. Capice? So right.
Posy Peep Show: Rosy Profane and Clementine Anytime.
Hurray For The Riff Raff, multitasking.
There is no other photo on my hard drive that captures the weirdness of Purgatory Lounge as much as this one. LEGAL DISCLAIMER: DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. OR ANYWHERE.
Sometimes I imagine that people ask me all the time, why do you take so many performance shots from the side? Here's why. Zydepunks in IR.
This is from a rehearsal for Crash Boom Bang's Spaghettification. Needs no explanation. Does it? Does it?
Anna Wood's intensity comes through in this infrared image from Purgatory Lounge. One question: How did wild zebras get horseshoes?
Three letters: BFF. Three more letters: WTF?
This morning glory obviously works the night shift, with the full Moon backlight and all.
Purgatory Lounge rehearsal.
Crash Boom Bang BBQ. I know I'm a loner by nature and probably as weird as the day is long, but this was the closest thing to a tribe I ever had. Thanks to all of you for letting me stick a large metal object in your faces in 2009.
To say that Parker Griffith is a douchebag would be a terrible insult to the innovative and hard-working product development team at Massengill. But his party-switching announcement today is really no surprise from here. In fact, look for south Alabama’s Bobby Bright to be the next to switch. The conversion of the national GOP to a Southern White People’s party is still right on track.
For the first time since the Yankee occupation and plunder, a.k.a., Reconstruction, the 5th congressional district of Alabama has a Republican. This district has always voted with its hands in the national taxpayers’ pockets, and so they were happy with well-positioned conservative Democrats who brought home federal pork even as the rest of the region turned bright crimson in their politics as well as professional – I mean – college football.
Griffith might have made a tactical error for he is now set to be challenged by several hardline GOP candidates in the 2010 primary, including Huntsville’s Mo Brooks, whose anti-Messican rhetoric has made him a rising star in the district. Still, I’m glad he’s found his home, and maybe those meanie local talk show hosts won’t pick on him any more.
Mary Huff, Rick Miller of Southern Culture on the Skids.
The DSC F-828 Mojo Eye camera is locked in by Sony’s firmware to a shutter speed limit of 1/30 second in the infamous “NightShot” mode. This makes IR handheld shots difficult except at wide angle, filter or no filter. I usually carry around a humble walking stick monopod to give me a fighting chance at a still performance shot. But not all venues allow anything that looks professional in the door. And bringing a big stick in a place with 3 separate bars is out of the question.
My backup plan, finding someone who appears to be passed out drunk and stabilizing the camera on a shoulder, carries its own set of risks.
