Posts from — January 2007

Well, shit. Molly Ivins, my favorite Texan, has died. Losing her third battle with breast cancer, one of our greatest bastions of clear thinking and best practitioners of humorous-while-pissed-off writing is no longer around to comment on the bullshit that politicians do.

I still remember reading one of Molly’s editorials in the Star-Ledger, back in New Jersey, a few months before the second Iraq War began. I was struck by how clearly she distilled the issues, and how humorously she did so. I followed her syndicated column, and read her excellent book Bushwhacked, a book you should all read. One of her rants from last May even garnered a post on my website, for what that’s worth. Read the book, read her columns. While you’re at it, watch the movie Bush’s Brain for some great interview clips from Molly about the Evildoer in Chief currently taking up space in the White House.

Molly was great. In the style of Jon Stewart, and in response to the political realities of the day, she kept you laughing, to keep you from crying. She will be sorely missed.

Reading some of the pieces she wrote in past years that related to her battle with cancer reminded me of my dad’s losing battle with cancer, and my attempts to write about and reflect on cancer as an attempt to cope with the experience. Molly’s writing on the topic is just so good, it’s inspiring. And then you realize she’s written her last column.

Rest easy, Molly. You fought a great fight. Several, in fact.

Now head on over to Creator’s Syndicate read her obit, and then read her work. All her latest syndicated stuff is there: Molly Ivins’ Syndication Page.

There’s also a little about Molly in each of these obits and tributes below, all worthy of a read. The last link there is to the piece Molly wrote about cancer a few years ago.

Read this.
Read this too
and this…
this…
this…
and definitely this.

I came across this very interesting art piece, by way of Kottke’s website. It upset me.

First of all, this guy is essentially ripping off Walker Evans. Walker did it better, far better, and he did it seventy friggin’ years ago. But there’s more to this story.

The Walker Evans photos from his 1938 project are really haunting because they were taken with a hidden camera; they capture the very souls of New Yorkers trying to endure the daily grind of city life. These Bill Sullivan photos are more in the “caught on camera” vein, which is a little more obvious — more supermarket tabloid work than photographic art, and it annoys me that this is being peddled as the latter.

But the really disturbing thing is that all the people in the Sullivan piece look either really tired, really pissed off, really harried, or some combination of the three (Except for the dude walking through the turnstile with a brand new pair of Skyway TuffWheels (and you can’t help but feel happy for that guy (where in the hell did he find those gems, anyway?))).

Those turnstile photos reminded me of my life as a New Jerseyite commuting to Manhattan every day, and my daily experiences ebbing and flowing amidst the many different kinds of wildlife calling New York City home. Honestly, in retrospect, I hated it, and these photos illustrate quite well the mood of the average New Yorker: the “what are you lookin’ at”, the “ugh”, the I can’t take much more of this”, the “why am I doing this”, the “there’s got to be something better”; the “go fuck yourself”.

Well, after a year and a half of living 2,000 miles from New York City, I can say that there is something better, and that I wouldn’t trade this for the world, despite all the goddamned snow.

Here it is, folks. The State of the Union Address. Sadly, this is a rather accurate depiction of what we’ve got going on in Washington.

Watch: “The REAL State of the Union Address”

A couple of weeks ago I posted an innocent little blurb about riding my bike in the snow to deliver some christmas presents to the post office. I included a picture of my beloved singlespeed “townie” bike that was used for the purpose. The thing is, the bike’s frame is whimsically called the “Il Pompino”. It’s made by a company in the U.K. called On-One, and it’s a great, bombproof bike frame, perfect for the task. Perhaps because the company is in the U.K. they don’t realize this, but the phrase “Il Pompino” means “blow job” in Italian. Eh, probably they do know.

I knew of this alternate meaning when I bought it, and I sometimes refer to my townie bike as the blowjob bike. It’s all fun and games until someone gets inundated with spam. See the thing is, ever since I posted that story I’ve been getting Italian porn spam, and Italian porn sites are even linking back to my story. I don’t know much Italian, but like Potter Stewart, I know porn when I see it, and I could see that some of the text of these spam emails was just dripping with hot, italian fellatio.

Yes, I clicked some of the links. Hot!

Anyway, here’s the thing: the only place that the word pompino shows up in the entire post is in the alt title of the image of my bike. The title of the image is “pompino-snow.jpg”. Now, I ask you: who among us has gotten a blow job while lying in the snow? Have we all forgotten the lessons of the infamous “Shrinkage Episode” from Seinfeld?

At any rate, regardless of where you get your freak on, I thought this was interesting, how a single word buried in a blog post could spark such an (admittedly automated) reaction from so many sites around the world. And I’m sure that after this post, my inbox is gonna be scorchin’ for the next few days…

It ain’t exactly “U.S. Marshals”.

Today, Boulder’s local paper ran a fairly well-reseached, honest piece of journalism, yet it reads like something out of The Onion. Ward, Colorado, you see, is in need of some new police. The town’s only state-certified lawman, Robert “Fuzzy Bob” Spratford, is retiring — leaving only two guys named Skinny Pete and Tiny to protect and serve.

Ward, Colorado is this quirky little semi-ghost town, a relic from the mining boom. Once the richest town in Colorado during the Gold Rush, it’s now populated with folks who thought even Boulder was too conservative and thus headed for the hills. Filled with anti-establishment types and a rather large collection of broken-down vehicles, Ward incorporated as a home-rule town and thus lives by its own rules, not necessarily those of Boulder County — hence the all-volunteer, all-hippie cop force.

I doubt Tommy Lee Jones would be cast to portray Fuzzy Bob Spratford; Willie Nelson’s a more likely candidate. After all, Willie’s already got the pony tail, and the truck that burns biodiesel.

Full Article: “Ward considers options as marshal steps down”

Repeat after me: “Maxxis Locust CX tires are the greatest thing since coldcuts.”

After the third friggin’ 12+” snowstorm in as many weeks, it was time to get the last of our Christmas packages mailed off since we could not deliver them in person, but today, Brenda had the car. So, with my packages loaded in my messenger bag and my tires pumped to 75psi, I slowly rolled out on the Skunk Creek Path, slipping a bit but generally biting into the slushy icy muck. By the time I was at Scott Carpenter Park, I was passing mountain bikers and plowing through the worst of it, recalling the salient message of my very first bicycle lesson from thirty-three years ago: the faster you go, the easier it is to stay upright.

I have now mentally mapped out every single turn (especially the off-camber ones) on the Boulder Creek Path, and have a new desire for disc brakes on my everyday bike, but overall today’s ride was one of the most enjoyable rides I’ve ever taken.

P.S.
I got more coldcuts. Pending a favorable second tasting, I will post a review.

OK, that’s quite enough already, with the fuckin’ snow. I get it. I live in Colorado. But the shit’s only useful in the mountains, which is apparently where half my office is headed today, to ski. I wouldn’t know, but hopefully by next weekend I will understand what this snow fever is all about. Right now, to me, all it is is a friggin’ nuisance.

After dropping Brenda off at the bus and our car off at the dealer to have the damage from last week’s snowstorm(s) repaired, I strapped on the gaiters and plodded through the snow to my office. Looks like we got 8-9” here already, and it’s supposed to snow most of the day again. It wouldn’t be so bad if Brenda didn’t have to be in Denver for the next three days.

Suddenly our fun little front wheel drive, low slung car ain’t so much fun anymore.