School V.3

School has begun again. I am beginning to get in the swing of things. This is the first semester I have had a steady job + school, so we’ll see how it goes. So far, so good. I actually like all of my classes (physics, structures, studio & arch. theory). Studio this semester is focused on House+Housing, and to give credit where credit is due, John Southern so far has impressed me as a studio coordinator. LA is a veritable architectural housing mecca and the world’s greatest lab for an architectural student. The first project is a great ease-back-into-studio / explore LA project. We have to go on a “House Hunt” in groups. Each group has 15 houses to find, photograph, sketch and study. We will then compile our findings and each create a book of sketches/photographs/essays. Today we made it to 6 of our houses. I had previously visited about half of them and had seen the rest in photographs. As an architecture student in 2006 it is kind of easy to discount Frank Lloyd Wright, I’m not sure why, it just seems it is. But holy fuck, seeing the Sturges house (the cantilevered one below) will smack that discount right out of your head. I haven’t scanned sketches yet, but here below are a few images. Architects (in order) are Frank Lloyd Wright, Lorcan O’Herlihy, Frank Gehry, John Lautner (not the original color), Antoine Predock and Eric Owen Moss.

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Idiot Bitch

Read the quote below to see how stupid Katherine Harris is. (Emphasis mine.)

U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris told a religious journal that separation of church and state is “a lie” and God and the nation’s founding fathers did not intend the country be “a nation of secular laws.”

TheRepublican candidate for U.S. Senate also said that if Christians are not elected, politicians will “legislate sin,” including abortion and gay marriage.

First of all, scroll down a few posts to read quotes from the founding fathers about how they really felt about the separation of church and state. Furthermore, some of the most brilliant and reasonable people I know are atheists and jews (I’m trying to think if I know any Muslims personally and I don’t think I do. Weird.) I dont think that religion has anything to do with your ability to write laws. I’m totally comfortable voting for a christian, but it is nowhere near the top of my list when I am sizing up a candidate.

Unfortunately for Katherine Harris, I am not one of those reasonable atheists I mentioned above, therefore I have to say, “Keep your fucking mouth shut you ugly dumb cunt.”

Peace.

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Radio Radio

I heard two funny things on the radio today, both during Jonesy’s Jukebox.

1.  Steve Jones was talking about how it makes him uncomfortable when people hold hands and pray before dinner in public places.  He said they should keep it at home, and then his guest, Mr. E of The Eels said, “Separation of Church and Steak.”  Clever and quick.

2.  There was a Netflix ad, and I don’t remember much of the setup but it had something to do with asking someone questions, like a verbal quiz.  The second question was, “What’s the difference between an orangutan?”

That’s all.

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Repost: An Excerpt

I spend a decent amount of time cleansing all of the comment spam leftover from Movable Type. I hope to never read the phrase ‘pokemon hentai” ever again. On the plus side, I get to re-read some of my wonderfulest old posts and laugh and laugh. Oh, how I laugh. So here is an excerpt from a post from last summer when I was driving from TX to CA. The post is too long but this little exchange actually made me laugh out loud.

Anyway. The night before I assaulted the automated gas pump I stayed in another Microtel. My love affair with the Microtel Brand Motel Chain has kind of cooled. This one, though it didn’t smell like cum, didn’t have a pool (yet). I am doing science-y things to see if the cum smell/pool, no cum smell/no pool is in anyway related. So far I have had mixed results though I did make a chlorine baby by accident. But back to my Microtel experience.

This Microtel was in Bellmont, AZ just outside of Flagstaff. The first problem was that the cute, younger-than-she-looked (I’ll get to this later maybe) told me the price was:

“$59.99 with AAA,” she said.

“What? It was ten dollars less in Tucumcari, NM [I actually said enn emm to try to sound hip like the young people who speak acronymically]” I expressed, trying to gain some points by knowing where every Microtel in the country is.

“Yeah. This is Flagstaff,” she said matter of factly.

“Exactly,” I said while thinking the French word Touché in my head in German.

She stared at me quizzically.

I stared back at her super-attractively.

“OK. Is this near here?” I replied while pointing to a local travel guide with an obviously photoshopped/airbrushed waterfall.

“No. I don’t think that exists,” she retorted.

“I didn’t tort first, so yours doesn’t count,” I was about to say.

It was then that I noticed that this girl was kind of cute for someone from Arizona and I automagically went into try to get laid mode.

“So, is there like anywhere to go out and get a drink around here?”

“Yeah, there is a bar right across the freeway.”

“Oh. Is it fun?”

“I wouldn’t know. I’m not old enough to drink.”

“Oh. Umm. I’m gonna go look at that waffle iron while you finish checking me in.”

So. I went to my room and found out the pool was under constuction, no HBO, no Comedy Central and I had gained an hour so it was 5fucking30PM. So I decided to sit around and do what it is that you do in Arizona:

Wish that you were in California.

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♥ LA.">I ♥ LA.

Most of the time. But there are little things. Things. Things that drive me completely fucking crazy. And it seems that they all happened to me today. For the record, I grew up in Texas with wide open spaces and fields and pastures and small towns. I couldn’t wait to get out. I was a cityboy before I had ever seen a city. Now I would kill to spend 10 minutes in a pasture. So I can’t help but compare some of the things I hate about LA to my home state of Texas.

Number 1. Parking. In Texas you may have to park kinda far away as parking lots are fucking gigantic, but you are never in danger of not being able to park at all. Like today at the Farmers Market. I needed fish and wanted to get lunch. But there were no spots available in the middle of a workday. None. I had to wait about 20 minutes to find a spot. That means that I had to waste 20 minutes of my 2 hours free validation just waiting. I didn’t plan on being in there more than 1 hour 40 minutes, but it just sucked that I had to think about it and have the little anxiety about not having any cash on me and getting caught at the parking tollbooth and not having the $2 to get out. Also today. I had to go to the post office in Hollywood. Because of my eBaying I am going to the PO everyday, but I usually go in Burbank which isn’t quite as bad. I pay the parking meter (umm, no parking lot at the fucking post office) which has a 30 minute maximum. That’s OK, that means that they are trying to keep those spots for Post Office Patrons only. The problem is that they only have 3 FUCKING windows open so you are bound to be in line for more than 30 minutes and you are checking your watch cellphone every 5 minutes because you don’t don’t don’t want any more parking tickets. In Texas you might hate being at the Post Office too, but you will never be in fear of it costing you $45 in expired meter tickets.

2. Don’t stand so close to me. New York is worse on this one, which is a big reason that I could never live there. And this guy at the Post Office kinda looked New Yorky. He was in line behind me and was really really close to me. The post office is big, it isn’t as though we ae stuffed in a train during rush hour. To make it worse, he was chewing gum loudly. To make it even worse, I could smell his gum. It wasn’t even freshbreathy gum like spearmint, it was like grape or cherry or someting. And the sound and the smell were making me want to turn around and say, “Look Bubble-icious, take 2 fucking steps backward and give me my fucking space” but I realized that 2 social faux pas (how in the fuck do you make faux pax plural?) don’t make a right. So I just gave him a dirty look instead.

Those were the highlights of my Los Angeles disgruntlement. I guess not super-major but just annoyances. And they aren’t enough to drive me out of a town I love. The love list is real real long. I think I just need a weekend house in the country. Question: Where do rich Angelenos buy weekend houses? Where is there open space, privacy and serenity within a few hours drive? I can’t think of any. Tell me. Now.

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Programs/Applications I Use

The following is a list of the programs I am using most at the moment. Some I rave about, some do the job OK’ly, and some are “eh”. The purpose is to possibly introduce you to a new program or two (granted, I won’t be introducing anyone to iTunes, but I have to include it because it is a program I use all the time, second only to Photoshop (which I certainly won’t be introducing anyone to but have included for the same reason) and to get your recommendations for alternative programs/apps for the ones that I am not totally thrilled with, or need advice/plugins.

• Writely - This is the newest application I am using on this list and perhaps the one I am most excited about at the moment. This represents all of the promises of Web 2.0 and all of the things that we can look forward to. It is currently finishing the moving process to Google, who purchased it a few months ago, and has just become available once again to new users. I am always looking for an alternative to Microsoft Office applications, and the fact that this is free and web-based make this alternative even sweeter. It stores your files online (which is a pro and a con, if the site happens to be down you are kinda screwed. In my line of work though I am never to reliant on a document file so it isn’t too much a worry for me) and saves in various file formats (pdf, html etc) and you can even post directly to your blog (definitely a plus for me, since wordpress doesn’t have a built in spellcheck [see below]).
  Stoked Factor: 95%. Totally Recommended.
• Gmail - Everyone uses Gmail, or at least everyone should. It doesn’t offer the most storage (anymore, but was the 1st to offer a ridiculously large amount) but the features/ease makes it far and away the best web based email application and my own personal Thunderbird killer (along with Google reader and Google Calendar). To me, the best thing about Gmail is its seamless integration into all of my other daily applications (firefox, greasemonkey, google homepage). But I do like labeling my mail, better than foldering it; it helps to be able to assign multiple labels to a single email. The only thing I didn’t like is that there wasn’t a “mark all read” button, though I think there is now, but I am not sure if that is a Google fix or a Greasemonkey script. I can’t remember. The only thing that I would like to add to Gmail is a better contact list. The current one is quick and easy, but I wish I could add phone numbers and addresses along with the name and email.
  Stoked Factor: 97%. An essential. And not to sound like a snob, but I kinda snicker at people with @yahoo or @hotmail email addresses.
• Google Desktop – This list is admittedly a little Google heavy, but Google is the driving force of the web right now. That being said, I am only lukewarm with Google Desktop. I like the sidebar on my desktop with a quick overview of Gmail, news, weather, webclips, but it doesn’t take me that long to open a browser and get all of that on my homepage. I also like the quick search of my desktop (even more since I added a plugin that organized all of my .dwg files) but I could certainly live..er, compute without it. Maybe I am not using it to its full functionality. This is one of the applications I really need your advice about.
  Stoked Factor: 50%. I could take it or leave it.
• Google Calendar – This is just a simple web-based calendar. The major plus is that when used with my customized Google Homepage I can see my Gmail, Schedule, Rss Feeds (see below) as soon as I get on the web. I do like the ease of task entry i.e. “Pick up CNC milled tabletop next Tuesday at 3″ directly from Google Homepage automatically inserts into my agenda. I am not sure if Google Calendar can sync with your Palm (since I don’t use one right now) the way Outlook does. Let me know if any of you use GC with Palm or Blackberry or anything.
  Stoked Factor: 65%. A good calendar, but I can’t get super excited about a calendar.
• Rhino – A really, really good 3D Modeling program. I woud say “The Best” but I don’t know Maya and I have seen some really incredible computer models built with it. Regardless, Rhino has made my architectural/design life much better. The ease of “drawing” in 3D compared with AutoCAD is astonishing. Snazzy little features like command line auto complete make it more friendly than other modeling programs. Used together with Flamingo and Bongo, it becomes a very capable rendering and animation program. The commands that I can’t live without are split, loft, make 2d drawing, sweep 2 rails..and a lot more that I can’t think of right now. The only thing I am not thrilled about is the difficulty of exporting to other programs. 2D to 2D Autocad works fine. Whenever I try to export a model to autocad I run into difficulties and I still haven;t found an easy way to get the model into 3D Studio. I know there is an export to 3DS function but the model comes in on a thousand different layers which makes applying materials a little too time consuming. I found a plugin for $350 that changes surfaces to objects (I think) and helps get the model into 3D Studio. While I am on this subject, lighting in Flamingo is pissing me off right now. It seems that whenever I turn the sun on all other lights turn off. For example, I have this openish outdoor canopy structure with a light in the middle. If the sun is off, the light shows up but everything else is dark. If the sun is on, it gets really dark under the canopy but everything else is fine. Do I need to create a daylight source? Does anyone know? Aside from these little things, I love this program. (Don’t even get me started on CNC/Rapid Prototyping output)
  Stoked Factor: 85%. I think Rhino is the best Computer Modeling program for architecture. AutoCAD is too limited and Maya is too daunting. Rhino is easy and powerful and right now the most important tool in my computer design toolbox. And relatively cheap.
• Wordpress – So far the best blogging application I have used. Free, easy to use, easy (ish) to install if you follow the instructions, easy to customize, tons of plugins.. it is like the developers took each and every good thing I have liked about Blogger, Movable Type and Typepad and put them into Wordpress. Except for a bloody spellcheck, and the plugin for a spellcheck seems to have been removed. I would have to say that my favorite feature/plugin is Akismet comment spam thing. Comment spam is the reason I decided to switch from MT to WP and so far Akismet has caught thousands of Spam(s?) and I couldn’t be fucking happier.
  Stoked Factor: 98%. If you blog and aren’t totally married to your blogging software, get Wordpress.

• Google Reader – I read about 85-100 blogs/news sites per day.  Probably more than your average person, but probably less than some web junkies.  If I were to click-click-click from site to site it would take me all day just to get my daily info.  RSS is old news by now, but until now I hadn’t found a reader that I was totally impressed with.  I had previously had all my feeds sent to Thunderbird but then my Thunderbird got some bugs and began to annoy the shit out of me and I decided to fwd everything to my Gmail and scrap Thunderbird.  But where to read all of my feeds?  Google to the rescue again.  Once you learn all of the keystroke shortcuts and “starring” and “labeling” Google Reader is very effective and productive.  Once again my favorite thing is that I can put GR on my custom Google Homepage and have everything in front of me as soon as I open Firefox.  Seriously, aside from eBay and my bank accounts, almost everything I need from the web is right in front of me on one page.  Note:  There isn’t a “Mark All Read” button which can be really annoying if you decide you don’t care to read blogs for a couple of days (esp. if you subscribe to feeds like Boing Boing, Huff Po, Defamer, MAKE etc.. that post 100’s of times per day) you will find 1000’s of unread items in your Reader.  But with Firefox and Greasemonkey (of course) there is an Auto-Read script that fixes all that.
  Stoked Factor:  100% with that Greasemonkey script addition.
  
• Firefox – The best web browser I have ever used. Period. Some of the features I totally love: open all bookmarks in a folder in tabs, tabbed browsing, highlight+rightclick+”search web for” in a new tab, and best of all, Greasemonkey (see below). The fact that Firefox is open source has enabled many developers to produce add-ons and scripts that make browsing the web the way it should be, and gives us far more control over the way we browse. It just so happens that Firefox is a sponsored link of mine and you can get it for yourself from my site, but I recommend it whether you get it from me or not.
  Stoked Factor: 100%. Get it. It is the best. I promise.
• Greasemonkey – Greasemonkey is a Firefox add-on that enables scripts to entirely change the way you see websites and how they work. (I know nothing about how these things actually work, so please forgive any inaccuracies in my descriptions) What I do know is that I needed some sort of “Auto-Read” or “Mark All Read” for Google Reader and voila! there is a script for that. You can get scripts that strip ads from all sites, that override CSS, that do just about anything. The most helpful scripts (and seemingly most plentiful) are for Gmail. Another great thing is that it’s invisible; you install it, then install scripts (w/ one click) and it goes to work with no other attention form you.
  Stoked Factor: 80%. Great application. When there are tens of thousands of scripts written, it will be essential.
• NoClone – The thing I love about the internet is that “you need something done, you do a Google search, you download the program, and the thing gets done”. I was going through my files to begin putting my portfolio together when I saw that I had 40,000 files to sift through. I assumed that there were many duplicates because I work on at least 3 different computers at the same time + 150 gig external hard drive. So I got NoClone and it read all the file (not just names, it goes into the actual makeup of the file and compares the data and tells you which ones it want to delete. Then you push a button and it is done. Now 40,000 files is cut down to 15,000. Much more manageable. I also used it on my iTunes folder and got rid of over 2000 duplicate mp3’s. Word.
  Stoked Factor: 100%. I rarely pay for little programs like this, but the $30-ish I spent on this saved me an insane amount of man hours and was well worth it.
  
• Accuchef – I’m not sold on this one and I need some recommendations. I am currently using the trial version of this program, but I am not sure I will pay for the full version when the trial is up. Accuchef works. It stores your recipes. It scales ingredients by serving size. It builds shopping lists. It allows you to input ingredients and will tell you what you can make. It totally works. But. The interface looks dated, real dated. There are some little quirks that are completely annoying, like it saying “Hello” and “Goodbye” when I startup and shut down, which I am sure I could change, but it just shouldn’t do that in the first place. I want: web-based recipe management software that allows multiple users to upload and share recipes and has all of the things I said Accuchef has, with a user-friendly interface. Does anyone know if this exists?
  Stoked Factor: 40%. Not sold on thisone.
• Other programs that I use and recommend, the short version. Photoshop, Illustrator, iTunes, AutoCAD. Everyone knows everything about these and there is probably nothing helpful I an add to what you know. Except for that AutoCAD 2007 seems to have added many of the Rhino things that I raved about above, so maybe isn’t as handcuffing as previous versions.
  

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Good Ol’ Fashioned American Atheism

(Most (if not all) of the facts/statistics/quotes reproduced here are via David Galbraith)

Percentage of Americans who identified themseves as ‘church members’:

1776: 17%
1990: 62%

The percentages for Great Britain are almost exactly identical, only in reverse. It’s 10% now and 70% during Victorian Britain.

I have never thought about it before until I read it stated by Galbraith, “It is possible that Christianity in America today is a form of nationalism rather than spiritualism, rather like Victorian Britain.”

And finally some quotes by our very Atheist sounding founding fathers:

“God is an essence we know nothing of, until this awful blasphemy is got rid of, there will never be any liberal science in the world.”
John Adams US President 1797 – 1801

“The clergy believe that any power confided in me will be exerted in opposition to their schemes – and they believe rightly.”
Thomas Jefferson US President 1801 – 1809

“I have seldom met an intelligent person whose views were not narrowed and distorted by religion.”
James Buchanan US President 1857 – 1861

“My earlier views on the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation have become clearer and stronger with advancing years.”
Abraham Lincoln US President 1861 – 1865

This isn’t really surprising, knowing that America was founded upon the philosophies of the French Enlightenment, but it goes against everything that most of the country now believes.

God can be so confusing.

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Keywords From The Past Week Of My Life

computer+trouble
boring+architecture
morrissey
cookware+shopping
mtv
mike+jones
tiresome+eBaying
back+fucking+ache
new+gym
missed+birthday
dice+game+gone+bad
nicotine+patch
freelance+teaching
autocad+scripting
hollywood+hills+living+room+freestyle+battle
summer+almost+gone
where+does+the+time+go
why+does+the+time+go
no+one+can+hold+a+candle+to+you

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A Boy, His Dog And His Smiths Shirt, the Boys Shirt Not The Dogs

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Come Armageddon Come

The President of Iran has a blog. I started to read it and realized there was no mention of Lindsay Lohan in any of the posts, so, obviously I got bored and stopped reading. There is a mention of the wedding bells looming for Nick (peace be upon him) and Vanessa though, so he does get points for that.

I wonder if he is into link trading? I could get some serious traffic and Google Ad Revenue with a link from a world leader who is so hot right now.

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