apple juice

I found this over at kottke.org. It is an amazing presentation given by Jill Bolte Taylor. She is a neuroanatomist who suffered a stroke, and with amazing insight, retells the experience.

We’re back on Comcast. The decision to go back was precipitated on the fact that Sonja bought me an AppleTV for my birthday. Very cool device. It deserves a whole blog post all by itself. But anyway, the thought of renting movies with this device is very tempting, until you begin to consider the length of time it’s going to take to actually download the movie at 167KB/sec. Qwest…seriously… need more speed!

So we’re back. Not without drama, of course. No, no. This is Qwest and Comcast we’re dealing with here.

I logged onto Comcast’s website to complete the deal. I thought I’d be able to get through this without speaking to anyone. I picked out the service, the self-install option, gave them my address information, etc.

I clicked the “Complete your order” button and found that I had been redirected to a live chat agent to complete the order. Uh-oh, real people.

It quickly became clear that this “live” chat agent did not receive any of the info I had meticulously filled out in the previous pages. Hrm.

It was also clear that the pricing information was different than what I had previously seen. And no, NO! I don’t want CableTV.

We mutually agreed that it might be easier for me to visit the local comcast store. Yes I know where it is. I don’t need you to look it up for me.

The next afternoon, I visited the store. Surprisingly, there were just two people in line before me. Not surprisingly, there were three times the number of employees as there were customers. It seemed that the majority of them were on break, popping popcorn, or both.

The woman in line tapped my shoulder, leaned in towards me and asked at an uncomfortably close distance, “will you hold my place in line?”

“Uh, sure,” I replied with trepidation.

When it was my turn in line, I explained the situation to the customer service agent. She listened patiently, told me that I was her last customer of the day, took my address and said, “I can offer you:

1. 6 months for $19.99
2. 6 months for $26.99
3. or – 12 months for $26.99″

Obviously, I had a number of questions:

• Is this a trick question? – No
• Is there a contract? – No
• What is the price after the special price? 47.99
  •  For all 3 options? – Yes

After doing some quick math, I tenuously replied,

“I think I’d be a fool not to take the 12 months for 26.99?”

“That’s what I’d do,” she said.

Feeling like I was on a hidden camera or something, I looked around. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She handed me the self-install kit, and asked me to sign on the dotted line.

“Thank you very much,” she said.

“Don’t you need me to pay?” I asked.

She shook her head, and I said something about something the chat agent said, or the website, I can’t remember anymore, that the self-install kit would be $29.99 plus $9.99 shipping and handling, or $19.99… I realized that I was mumbling to myself, and decided to leave.

Lucky for her, the woman who asked if I could hold her place in line had returned. No other customers had arrived. I always wonder how much I should work to defend the place of some stranger in a line at the Comcast store. Or the post office. Why are people always asking me to hold there place in line?

Left-Hand-Turn Elimination

It seems that sitting in the left lane, engine idling, waiting for oncoming traffic to clear so you can make a left-hand turn, is minutely wasteful — of time and peace of mind, for sure, but also of gas and therefore money. Not a ton of gas and money if we’re talking about just you and your Windstar, say, but immensely wasteful if we’re talking about more than 95,000 big square brown trucks delivering packages every day.

When can I get real time info about my route? With all of the exits and entrances that are being opened and closed on any given day around here, it’s a wonder I’m making it to work at all! 🙂

An incomplete list:

1. Catch up on Super Mario Galaxy
2. Search for a lost multi-tool
3. Do the laundry (colors first)
4. Eat some chips and salsa
5. Have some peppermint tea with honey
6. Listen to music
7. Let the dog curl up on your legs
8. Read the new Monocle
9. Try to clear out my newsreader

I’m up north, sitting in the cabin by the fire. It’s raining outside, and it’s one of those early fall nights where the cold is just beginning to seep into your bones. I just spent an hour reading/writing/sorting/filing some email. To some, this would be a useless waste of time, but there is a strange comfort I get from email.

I know that email is sooo last decade. I know that everyone gets too much email. It’s clear from my students that they regard email as nothing more than the worst instant messaging platform ever.

I have my blog, my facebook, my twitter, my flickr, my last.fm, and instant messaging. I can communicate effortlessly to a broad audience with any of these, and yet, they do not hold the same weight to me that email does.

I keep old emails. Lots and lots of old emails. I liken it to the way that people used to keep boxes of letters from loved ones. What will I pass on to my grandchildren some day when they want to look back at my correspondence?

I used to write longer emails. I would go so far to say that 10 years ago, I was putting a lot more thought into the words I sent people. Somewhere along the line, I would guess around the time that I graduated from college, my emails quality dropped considerably. After starting my current job, I’d say the email quality has dropped again, along with the quality of my blog posts. (Save this particular post, of course).

Is this a simple function of time? Am I just busier? Maybe there are less people I am concerned with keeping in contact with. Or maybe there is a greater congruence between the people I am with and the people I want to be with.

But, unfortunately, there are people I’d like to be with whom I neglect to send meaningful emails. (Or with whom I share meaningful phone calls, but I’d argue a well-written email is almost like Tivo for the phone) I worry that as my communication gets snipped into smaller and smaller parts, the potential audience also gets smaller and smaller. For example most of the people I know don’t read my twitter page. Do all my friends get a chance to see all the pictures I upload to flickr? Can I write something on this blog to start a conversation amongst my friends?

I don’t really know what the answer is to all my questions, but I think it’s clear I want to spend a bit more time writing.

Writing here on the blog, writing for work, and writing email. My english department friends will surely smack me around with the obvious stick, but practicing writing leads to clearer writing, and probably, clearer thinking. (By the way, is that a proper sentence?)

Maybe I’ll be able to work out the answers to some of my questions.

(sorry, this is rather incoherent)

I am bothered most by our failure to do what is necessary. Why does the United States spend just .93% of our GDP on infrastructure? According to the Strib, China spends 9%, Japan – 10%, India – 3.5%.

Why hasn’t the gas tax been raised in accordance with inflation?

Also from the Strib:

The inflation-adjusted purchasing power of the federal gas tax (18.4 cents per gallon) is less than half of what it was in the 1960s, and dropping. Hard-pressed state and local budgets are bearing an increasing share of the roadway maintenance load.

Do we need to do a better job of teaching everyone about debt and revenue? Pay now or pay later, we’re going to have to pay for things. This from a Letter to the Editor in the NY Times:

A 1989 study, which I commissioned for New York City’s transportation department, concluded that the city’s 840 bridges could be maintained in near pristine condition for $150 million annually. At the time, instead of conducting routine maintenance, we were spending $400 million a year to replace parts and even whole bridges.

Why haven’t we made necessary investments in transit? Ask yourselves this, transit opponents: What is a common feature of every major metropolitan city in the world? Reliable, safe, and efficient mass transit. Why is Minnesota struggling to fund transit initiatives while Denver is able to raise $1.8 billion dollars for transit?

Why are we spending tons of money on the 35W/62 reconstruction, and not including light rail? If you remember, it was a struggle to get the funding passed in the first place because Pawlenty didn’t want to pay for it.

Where’s the plan? Where’s the vision? Where’s the funding?

Do people outside the metro (or in the outer suburbs, even) realize that their objection to transit improvements affects them as well, whether or not they ride it? More people on transit means less people on roads and bridges.

I’d like to propose toll roads on every major highway in the state. And a gas tax increase. And whatever else is necessary to fund these services. Stop acting like you don’t need to pay for things. If Minnesota expects to be a place that attracts families and jobs and companies, spend what is necessary. If we value education, pay for it. If we want to be able to get around, we have to pay for it.

I don’t have the answers here. I wish I did. Actually, I wish our elected officials did. I wish we weren’t so anti-tax and anti-government. I don’t understand how privatization is the answer. I don’t even know what question you are asking when privatizing roads and transit is the answer. Maybe the question is, “What’s a really bad way to run public services? Privatization.”

Whew. The next post will be better. I promise.

In an attempt to increase the masculinity of potentially feminine clothing items I have become fond of, I have begun to refer to things as man-(item).

Man-pris (Capri pants for men)

Man-dals (overly strappy or leathery sandals)

The newest item is man-mocs. This one is tough however, because the moccasin, or it’s close cousin, the “penny-loafer” has been a staple of corporate-man in professional and casual settings for quite some time. It seems to have fallen out of favor with my peers, but I’m bringing it back. No socks, highwaters, and loafers. Summer comfort is written all over this outfit.