“The burgeoning of punctuational literacy in unlikely places."
Sure there's a lot going on. Pakistan is deciding its future, McCain had a questionable relationship with a woman who had questionable plastic surgery, Fidel Castro resigned (sorta), and Lindsay Lohan did a nude spread in a magazine.
But this is an entire article, at NYT standard length, about punctuation. You can't beat that.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
aaaaahh portland....
The only thing I like more than our fair town is the scorn and prejudice it evokes in the rest of the country. While the constant influx of kids from Wisconsin who heard about a liberal mecca with temperatures above freezing gets a little tiresome, the great image we convey to the outside world doesn't.
My previous favorite desription came from a man from Georgia who was in my cab recently. He told me that when he began to consider moving to Portland, his friends would get very concerned, and tell hium in the most serious voice they could muster "Portland! They don't even wear clothes in Portland! The streets are full of naked people!"
But today, I heard some other descriptions that took the organic vegan cake. They were from one of my favorite blogs, Bikesnob. Here's what the snob has to say about good old portland:
My previous favorite desription came from a man from Georgia who was in my cab recently. He told me that when he began to consider moving to Portland, his friends would get very concerned, and tell hium in the most serious voice they could muster "Portland! They don't even wear clothes in Portland! The streets are full of naked people!"
But today, I heard some other descriptions that took the organic vegan cake. They were from one of my favorite blogs, Bikesnob. Here's what the snob has to say about good old portland:
As a New Yorker my image of Portland is that it’s some kind of moist cycling paradise, and this was furthered by the handmade bike show coverage. Apparently, the streets are lined with custom bike builders, and you can get one made while you wait. Just pop in, place an order, go next-door and spend 15 minutes shopping for organic hemp underwear or whatever it is that people wear out there, and then come back and pick up your new frame. Between the emails I get and the articles I read it seems like Portland is a place where cyclists frolic in ample bike lanes, race cyclocross in dresses, and lock their exquisitely-crafted bikes not with chains and u-locks but with trust and love. Of course, I should be happy for them, but instead I catch myself wanting to bring them here so they can choke to death on some reality.Also funny was one of the reader's perception of portland:
And what’s with all those townies and commuter bikes? Sure, I’m all for the marriage of craftsmanship and practicality, but is there a city on Earth where you can actually leave a bike like that outside? And if so, is it Portland? I think any city benign enough to ride bikes like that in would eat me alive—with kindness. Here in New York we’ve learned not to grow attached to our bikes in the same way that the gazelles of the African savanna know not to get too attached to their young.
Portland is like the Rivendale of Middle Earth. Everything moves in slow motion while your Liv Tyler like barista hands you fresh coffee with soft, warm eyes.Oh, if only...
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Remembering Sheldon
Two days ago, Sheldon Brown died as the result of a heart attack that was related (I think) to his MS. If you are not familiar with Sheldon Brown, he was the proprietor of a website by the same name that is undoubtedly the biggest and best resource for cyclists on the web, despite its low-tech appearance. His page represents thousands of hours of work, all of it done not for money, but for the love of bicycles. A quick survey of some bike blogs and forums reveals his importance to the greater cycling community. Between bikesnob NYC, trackosaurus, bikeportland, the fixed gear forum, and bikeforums.net, there are over three hundred comments of fans and admirers. Probably people that never met him, but people like me who have visited his many pages dozens of times every time we ever had any sort of question about bikes.
He will definitely be missed.
He will definitely be missed.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Crapping Clorox
They say that smoking is the leading cause of loss of smell among people alive today. And while I'm not going to suggest that cab drivers smoke for this reason, it is at least a fortunate side effect.
Perhaps the first this I noticed, on the first night I drove, was the smell. You, people who ride in my cab, stink. A lot. You reek like cigarettes and nasty perfume and cologne (I won't use the cliche of "cheap perfume" because I have no idea what the difference is), but that's not what gets me. What gets me is the booze smell. At first, it was revolting. That sort of acrid sweet-and-sour smell that I once only associated with the homeless fills my cab every night. I have learned that anyone who is drunk has that smell. I have learned that I have probably had that smell more than I would ever care to know. I have learned that most people, if not all of them, have no idea that's what they smell like.
But on a grosser level, I have learned the intricacies of that smell. My nose is now like a poor man's breathalizer, activated every time someone hops in. I can tell before a fare ever opens their mouth how drunk they are, just by the concentration of that smell that comes weeping out of their pores, filling the small box of air that is my workspace. In my line of work, knowing how drunk someone is is an important thing. You know how much to trust what they tell you their address is, how worth your time it is to argue over how much money they gave you, or if a rolled down window is in order.
There are, of course, other smells, too. Like the frat guy that thought it was the height of humor that he flatulated in the cab, and then let me and his buddy find out the hard way. I rolled down all four windows in the cab, silently cursing him and knowing that I would have been laughing too if it was me that had done it.
And then there was the guy I picked up from his Interstate Ave. motel room at three in the morning and ferried to a prostitute's motel room up the street. He got in wearing stained sweatpants that I originally assumed were filled with his own feces, but then, pondering the stench for the twenty block ride, came to notice a distinct chemical odor to the air. Thus I started to wonder if, in fact, cooking meth smells like crapping Clorox. If anyone out there knows the answer, please let me know. Somehow, I am a little more comforted by the thought of a man cooking meth in his motel room and not changing before his date with his hooker than I am with the thought of a guy riding in my cab with a soiled diaper, sans diaper.
I think I need to start smoking again.
Perhaps the first this I noticed, on the first night I drove, was the smell. You, people who ride in my cab, stink. A lot. You reek like cigarettes and nasty perfume and cologne (I won't use the cliche of "cheap perfume" because I have no idea what the difference is), but that's not what gets me. What gets me is the booze smell. At first, it was revolting. That sort of acrid sweet-and-sour smell that I once only associated with the homeless fills my cab every night. I have learned that anyone who is drunk has that smell. I have learned that I have probably had that smell more than I would ever care to know. I have learned that most people, if not all of them, have no idea that's what they smell like.
But on a grosser level, I have learned the intricacies of that smell. My nose is now like a poor man's breathalizer, activated every time someone hops in. I can tell before a fare ever opens their mouth how drunk they are, just by the concentration of that smell that comes weeping out of their pores, filling the small box of air that is my workspace. In my line of work, knowing how drunk someone is is an important thing. You know how much to trust what they tell you their address is, how worth your time it is to argue over how much money they gave you, or if a rolled down window is in order.
There are, of course, other smells, too. Like the frat guy that thought it was the height of humor that he flatulated in the cab, and then let me and his buddy find out the hard way. I rolled down all four windows in the cab, silently cursing him and knowing that I would have been laughing too if it was me that had done it.
And then there was the guy I picked up from his Interstate Ave. motel room at three in the morning and ferried to a prostitute's motel room up the street. He got in wearing stained sweatpants that I originally assumed were filled with his own feces, but then, pondering the stench for the twenty block ride, came to notice a distinct chemical odor to the air. Thus I started to wonder if, in fact, cooking meth smells like crapping Clorox. If anyone out there knows the answer, please let me know. Somehow, I am a little more comforted by the thought of a man cooking meth in his motel room and not changing before his date with his hooker than I am with the thought of a guy riding in my cab with a soiled diaper, sans diaper.
I think I need to start smoking again.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
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