American Madness

At least that is what H.G. Wells thought, too bad he was a little off.

With a nice long warm weekend coming up, what better to do then break out your bike and go for a ride.

Not sure where to go, well then you should visit RideTheCity. RideTheCity is a website similar to MapQuest or HopStop, enter your location and your destination and it will draw up a route for you, you can even pick if you’d rather take the ‘Safest Route,’ the ‘Safe Route’ or the “Most Direct Route.” There are two main reason syou are going to want to use RideTheCity instead of, say, Google Maps “First, RTC excludes roads that aren’t meant for biking, like the BQE and the Queens Midtown tunnel. Second, RTC tries to locate routes that maximize the use of bike lanes and greenways.”

Pretty nifty, especially if you have ever ridden your bike in traffic.

Right now it is only for New York City, plus you need to cut them some slack because they are still in their Beta Release, so go, check it out, show them some love and enjoy your nice long weekend.

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Picture this-

Public Access TV meets Acid Trip (is that redundant?) meets Pee-Wees Playhouse meets Cooking Show and you start to get an idea of what to expect from Food Party.

As they explain it in the about section:

Food Party is a (would-be) TV cooking show with a spicy saigon kitchen-witch as your hostess, a cast of unruly puppets as culinary advisors, and a cavalcade of hip-hop/sports world celebrities as surprise dinner guests. Shot on location in a technicolor cardboard kitchen, each episode will instruct you on how to prepare wild gourmet multi-course meals with ingredients you probably have on hand in your kitchen already, such as pretzel rods, cheese puffs, eggs, sugar, secret ingredients, and pizza. After all, you never know who might show up for dinner.

Trust me, that doesn’t do it justice, just check out the trailer (above), the teaser (below) and then pop over to the website/blog to learn more. This is totally my type of cooking show! Read the rest of this entry »

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It’s that time of year again, tomorrow is the Fourth of July, meaning it is also time for Nathan’s Famous 4th of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest. As per usual it will be at Coney Island and airing on ESPN, both at Noon.

The contestants for this year are a line up of the usual suspects including Joey Chestnut (the reigning champ), Tim ‘Eater X’ Janus, Sonya ‘The Black Widow’ Thomas, Crazy Legs Conti, and Takeru ‘The Tsunami’ Kobayashi.

Now here is the scandal that is rocking the competitive eating world right now: To qualify for the competition you must win a regional qualifier (unless you are the reigning champ, Joey Chestnut got a bye). Despite his impressive 6 first place finishes (from 2001-2006) and his second place finish last year, Kobayashi has not actually participated in a contest since October and has not competed in any of the regional qualifiers for the event. Read the rest of this entry »

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Many people I know love coffee, they say that it is the ultimate drug for them, they drink their morning cup of joe and instantly feel happy, as the caffeine hits their system they feel like they could accomplish anything. As a tea drinker this isn’t something I get. It all just tastes kind of burnt to me, especially the Starbucks stuff (though, admittedly I haven’t tried their new blend). Anyway, I am aware that I am a huge majority, in fact I think I am the only one of my friends who does not drink coffee, apparently though people aren’t drinking nearly enough coffee, at least not from Starbucks.

Despite their inflated prices and push to be more then just a coffee shop, Starbucks is laying off 12,000 employees and closing the shutters on almost 600 stores. According to their press release this is part of their “Transformation Strategy” I guess that strategy would be to close stores so they are no longer a bloated mega-corporation that is losing too much money to properly function. The company had initially projected closing just 100 stores, but with the current economic climate and the company seemingly in a free-fall, 100 stores proved to be just a bit too optimistic and they are forced to shut down 600.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Today’s installment of art comes from Jerusalem and Seattle.

First up we have some older work by Desiree Palmen. Between 1999 and 2006 Palmen worked with fabrics and paint to make jumpsuits that camouflaged nicely with their surroundings (if you are standing in a certain place that is). For fans of William Gibson’s Neuromancer, the idea seems similar to the “Mimetic Polycarbon” jump suit worn by the Panther Moderns,* except these don’t change with their environment. The jumpsuits are all painted with some consideration given to the way the individual will stand (or sit) and have a realistic look to them. Makes me wonder what they look like in real life. It is interesting to see the jumpsuits mixed with some of the older parts of Jerusalem (like in “Old City Suit“). There is even text to some of the projects (located on the main page) that discusses some of the ideas behind them.

Next up** we have the work of Chris Jordan. His work is billed at “Photographic Arts,” which seems like a questionable name for a medium until you start to look at his pictures, and I mean really look at them. His most recent project is called “Running the Numbers” and spans from 2006 to 2008. Read the rest of this entry »

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Sen. Obama does not support requiring religious tests for recipients of aid nor using federal money to proselytize, according to a campaign fact sheet. He also only supports letting religious institutions hire and fire based on faith in the non-taxpayer funded portions of their activities, said a senior adviser to the campaign, who spoke on condition of anonymity to more freely describe the new policy.

- Obama to Make Call to Expand Bush’s Faith-Based Programs (AP)

What sophistry. The Federal government doesn’t give money to organizations that violate the law. Hiring and firing based on religious affiliation is against Federal law. If the organization takes Federal taxpayer money, it agrees to adhere to Federal law. Otherwise, don’t take the money.

Hey Obama: you’re not fooling anyone, so stop pandering.

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Living at home with your parents is a very powerful contraception.

- British politician David Willetts quoted in the NYTimes’ very interesting story on the declining birthrate of Europe.

I had some major problems with the article, because author Russell Shorto asserts that the U.S. birthrate is higher than Europe’s due to more equality in home tasks (Daddy Day Care), but ignores the fact that we’re really not having that many kids when exempting the Hispanic birth rate. He also really doesn’t take issue with the true economics of childbirth or related changes in family structure (i.e., the death of the extended family and the consumerist push for self-sufficiency). One of my friends is an Albanian who is expecting to have many children. Her family is more like a tribe in which her myriad relatives help each other out, meaning she’ll more or less — as I understand it — never have to pay for daycare. She and her husband aren’t facing a new mortgage, she’s moving in with his family. I wonder if we’ll head back to big clans now that the nuclear family has proven wasteful and decadent.

Shorto also doesn’t really explore intellect/education as a predictor (or non predictor) of average childbirth rates. I’d bet that more highly educated individuals tend to have fewer children so that they can pay for them all (especially when paying means paying for their higher education costs as well). Meanwhile, developed countries have lost manufacturing and the good jobs that go with it, affecting the other side of the educational gamut.

This wonderfully blasphemous Newsweek piece about how parenthood makes people miserable, has some decent stats on the rising cost of “you looked so damned sexy, I couldn’t hold back”: Read the rest of this entry »

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Oh crap. The integration has begun.

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This is kind of a sad one (2).

The remains of Hedviga Golik were found last month in her apartment in Croatia. According to reports she had made herself a cup of tea, sat down in her armchair to watch some tv, and must have passed away.

Having been born in 1924, there is nothign too surprising about all of this. In fact it isn’t much of a story until you start to get into the details. Golik was reported missing and was last seen by a neighbor… back in 1966. Although officially reported missing, apparently either no one ever did anything to try and locate her, or in their search for her the police did not enter her apartment.

Fast forward 42 years to May 2008 and the police and some bailiffs are busting down her door to try and help figure out who owns the apartment only to find Golik in her armchair dead now for as long as she had lived.

Besides a few cobwebs, her apartment appeared just as it had been in 1966, a virtual time capsule, with her cup of tea still on the table in front of her.

According to the authorities: “So far, we have no idea how it is possible that someone officially reported missing so long ago was not found before in the same apartment she used to live in.”

Okay, I thought I was done with this, until I did a search for a picture and found the CNN article, which isn’t exactly the same story.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Well, I guess it is technically for Thursday.

Starting tomorrow and running through October 13th, the city is getting 4 waterfalls. Olafur Eliasson’s “The New York City Waterfalls” has been installed around the city. Although organized by the City and the Public Art Fund, the project is totally funded from private supporters, corporations and other foundations, with no city funds being put towards it. Now on to the project itself

“The New York City Waterfalls” are 4 waterfalls that have been installed in various locations along the river. You’ll find them at at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge (in Brooklyn), Pier 35 (by the Manhattan Bridge), near the Brooklyn Heights Promenade (between Piers 4 & 5) and by Governors Island.

The waterfalls will be active between 7am and 10pm so if you travel along the bridges you may get a chance to see them during your daily commute. Otherwise you can venture out to see them in your free time.

the pictures from the ‘pre-dawn’ test look pretty stunning and it looks like this could be something incredible to check-out around the city this summer right around sunset.

The project is similar to one that Eliasson did in Austria in 2000 and Madrid in 2003, but on a much grander scale. You can learn more about him and his work here.

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