The Music Man

My boss asked me recently where I find my music. Up to that point, I hadn't really thought about it. I also hadn't realized that people look to me as some sort of musical resource. It was a good question. Where do I find my music?

Honestly? Everywhere. Radio, TV, the internet...it's mostly just a matter of being aware. And I am very aware of music--to the point of obsession, some would say. A friend of mine recently posted this comment on Facebook: "Ever have that fear that there's a really great song out there that you haven't heard?" Yes, I know that feeling. And I can come up with a lyric for just about any occasion. Okay, so I like music, and I have a lot. At least I'm not as bad as the guys in Hi-Fidelity. Not quite, anyway.

This is a great time to be an audiophile. You can find out the name of a band by doing a websearch using a snippet of a lyric. No more cluttering up your shelves with tapes & CDs; now the size of your collection is limited only by the size of your harddrive (I'll be seriously hurting for space when I get my USB turntable and start backing up Grampa's 78s).

So back to the original question: Where do I find my music?

Like I said, it's more a matter of being observant. For instance, right now I'm listening to Blackberry Smoke, a great southern rock band. I caught them on a local radio station. So I tried to find them on my music service, but due to remembering the name wrong, ended up discovering Black Stone Cherry, another great southern rock band. So I called the radio station, and they told me the correct name. Et voila! I now have both bands in my collection. (I also keep an eye--or an ear--on what my kids and their friends are into.)

I meant it when I said I find my new music just about anywhere. The aforementioned quote was in a post about Pandora. Pandora can help you find bands you may like based on your input of bands you do like. I've used it on and off for about four years now. Or turn on the captioning on your TV, and you'll usually get the title and artist of songs played during TV shows, movies, etc. The hardest part for me these days is remembering that snippet of lyric until I can get home to look it up.

One piece of advice to you budding music collectors out there: Never get rid of a single song once you have it. Chances are, you'll want to hear it again some day.

Some Thoughts on the Robinson Brothers

I've been filling in the gaps in my Black Crowes collection lately. They are, in my opinion, one of the most underrated bands making music today. My conclusion is supported by the fact that, while the Crowes fail to chart consistently (though they do chart), you can hear them on just about any rock radio station you turn to. Classic rock? They're there. Hard rock and metal? There too. Easy listening? Alternative? Yep. I don't listen much to country, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear them there.

So what accounts for the fact that while they aren't what one would consider an A-List band, they're so pervasive? I think it's their versatility. They aren't my favorite band in the world (I'd say in the top 5), but they would be my desert-island band, simply for the fact that they are the one band that it would take me a while to get sick of listening to.

Their songs cover a broad spectrum of musical styles. Sometimes you can hear a Stones influence, sometimes an Allman Brothers. There's a blues infusion, a touch of country, sometimes a latin or bluegrass undercurrent. They strike me as sort of the non-grunge equivalent of Pearl Jam. They are less cerebral than Vedder & crew, and more visceral. While I listen to Pearl Jam to make me think, I listen to the Crowes to make me feel. Some of my favorite tracks are Go Faster, Stop Kickin' My Heart Around, Nebakanezer, Black Moon Creeping, Thick N' Thin, and Locust Street.

The Crowes are also good to listen to contextually--that is, to listen to a large portion (or even all) of their catalog at once, to see how the songs compare and contrast, how their music evolves. How does the experimental sound of Amorica stand up against the more polished By Your Side? Is Chris Robinson at his best when his vocals are more improvisational, or more practiced?

I would recommend listening to the Crowes intentionally, not just when they come on whatever radio station you're listening to (and they will), and moving them out of "oh yeah, those guys" status. You're missing a lot of good music if you don't.

Updates

It's been awhile since I blogged. I blame Facebook, which I never thought I'd get into, but I've reconnected with some old friends, so it's worked out okay.

Now on to important stuff:

Two concert reviews. The first is Lacuna Coil, the second Clutch. Consider it a study in juxtaposition.

My buddy, Stormwater Bob, and I saw LC with three opening bands--Dommin, Seventh Void, and Kill Hannah. Dommin and Kill Hannah were entertaining merely for their absurdity. Dommin has got to be the most "emo" thing I have ever seen in my life. Black clothes, hair in their faces, and roses tied to EVERYTHING. At least they knew their place in the food chain, when the singer stated "We're supposed to get you guys warmed up for Lacuna Coil." Their CDs were $4. Their posters were free.

Seventh void was the bright spot in this parade of self-loathing. They sounded like a cross between Soundgarden, Skid Row, and Corrosion of Conformity. And they looked like they could've (and happily would've) removed and devoured the still-beating hearts of the guys in Dommin.

Kill Hannah...not real sure what to say here. Lasers attached to the guitar, the lead singer in luminous pink eye make-up. Their last two songs were okay.

Finally, Lacuna Coil came on. I'm still not positive I'm a fan. Sure, Christina Scabbia's easy to look at, but for one thing, they were too polished for a heavy metal band, and for another, they had several technical problems--bad luck when you're the headliner. It's like hair metal took that final step and stopped just looking like women.

All in all, the whole show was a little too emo for me, as evidenced by the fact that the only two covers played all night were Depeche Mode songs. I'm sure everybody in the pit went home afterwards and cut themselves while writing sad, insipid poetry about how they'll never amount to being a part of anything as wonderful as Dommin.

As for the Clutch concert, I'm still wrestling with whether or not NIN was better live. Because, up until that point, Nine Inch Nails was the best concert I'd seen.

Let's start with the openers:

Lionize. They are one HELL of a reggae band, considering there's only one person in the band that could possibly be of obvious Jamaican descent. The others looked like they had previously worked in a food storage warehouse somewhere in Ohio. But Stormwater Bob and I rotated their CDs in the player in his car for the rest of the trip.

Next came Baroness. The only two words spoken by anybody in the band came at the end of their set when the singer announced, "We're Baroness," as they walked offstage. The rest of the time was spent in a kind of stream-of-consciousness instrumental of angry, guitar-driven, wall-of-sound state. Good music to hate to. Odd mix of musicians though. The guitarist and bassist looked like members of White Lion, the singer and drummer from Phish.

And then Clutch came on. I've never seen so much energy feeding the audience at a show. The highlight of the night was watching Shirtless Guy go down after taking an elbow to the neck in the pit. Oh, and they dropped a crowd surfer on his head. And this was with less than a thousand people (our local club is not a big venue.) Apparently, Clutch fans (of which I now enumerate myself one) are loyal. And rabid.

Catching Up

Okay, so my early results of the Great Experiment are this: I got tired of not listening to specific stuff when I wanted. It does appear that the shuffle function of media player doesn't really assign a weight by play count. Oddly enough, the two bands that were played the most were the Beatles and Black Sabbath.



I'm trying to figure out why Michael Jackson's death has evoked such a sense of melancholy in me, as I was never really much of a fan. Sure I have Thriller, and I enjoy listening to it, but I was never rabid about owning every piece of music he'd ever released, like I occasionally get about other bands. One of the articles I read offered some clarity and insight into my sense of loss: Generation X is losing its icons. Maybe not its heroes, but the people who inspire nostalgia in Gen Xers. Boomers remember where they were when JFK was shot and listening to Sergeant Pepper for the first time. I remember listening to Thriller when I was a kid, and watching the premier of the video. I remember where I was when the shuttle blew up.



I look at the Boomers and realize that they were the generation that threw their opportunities away, in defiance of authority. Thanks to this, our generation never had any opportunities. We came from broken homes, or from uninvolved parents--parents who were still following the "if it feels good, do it" philosophy, often at the expense of proper parenting. Our generation has had to find ways to rediscover the values our parents never imparted to ensure we teach those to our children. We learned our lessons of love from romantic comedies, not from our "free love" elders. They had their Easy Rider and Peyton Place. We had The Breakfast Club and The Celestine Prophecies.



So hats off to Wacko Jacko. You were definitely iconographic of Gen X.

Grampa Art: R.I.P.

I found out this week that my grandfather died. It is a sad occasion. He was my last surviving blood-relative grandparent. (I have a grandmother left--my maternal grandfather's second wife. I barely remember his first wife, my actual grandmother. I was very young when she died, so I've always just accepted my step-grandma as my maternal grandmother. She is the coolest old lady ever anyway.) Art was also one of the few relatives on my dad's side of the family I liked. He always made time to take me fishing.

Art lived to the ripe old age of 96. You will be missed, gramps. For you practicing catholics out there, if you could say a few rosaries for him, it would be appreciated.

Step Banking

I offered to explain this concept in an earlier post. The idea of step banking does not apply only to arthritics; it may apply to anyone with bad feet, legs, etc. So I've been told.

Imagine, if you will, that you are allotted only so many pain-free walking steps each day. Say this number is 5,000 (this number is hypothetical and arbitrary, being used for the purpose of explanation; your "number" will be different based on the factors of your infirmity). You can walk that many steps in a day without having your feet (legs, etc.) hurt.

Now, if you do go past this allottment, this does not necessarily mean your feet will start hurting right there. What it tends to do, actually, is subtract from the amount of painless steps you can take the next day. To continue our illustration, say you walk 6,379 strides in a day. This means you will only get 3,621 steps the next day (Day 1: 5,000-6,379= -1,379, which is subtracted from your base total for the next day; Day 2: 5,000-1,379=3,621 treads you start the day with). You do not get those 1,379 footfalls back. If, that next day, you walk your usually allotted 5,000 paces, you will only get 2,242 steps the day after (Day 3: your adjusted base total of 3,621 carries over, because there was no opportunity to replenish your stock of footfalls. Thus, Day 2 works out as: 3,621-5,000= -1,379; Day 3: 3,621 carries over as base, which means 3,621-1,379=2,242. I know, it's complicated.)

So how do you replenish your stock of viable steps? By resting. To again hypothetically quantify, you could say that for every hour of rest, you get 200 steps back. If you rest for four hours, you get 800 painless footfalls returned. If you rest for eight, you get 1,600. If we apply this to our example:

Day 1: You walk 6,379 steps.
Day 2: You're allotment of steps for today would be 3,621 strides, but you rested for six hours for a gain of 1,200 strides returned to you. Therefore, you would have 4,821 pain-free treads alotted for today.

Certain activities enact a penalty applied to your amount of steps. For instance, in my case, stairs would equal 1 1/2 footfalls each, and each tread taken on uneven ground would equal two steps on a flat surface. Standing in one place, for me, is also bad. Every minute of standing still eats into my allotted paces for the next day. To continue our example:

Day 1: You walk 6,379 steps.
Day 2: After resting for six hours, you are alotted 4,821 strides for today. You walk 3,000 on the floor in your office and home, but had to do some field work, and walked 1,500 paces in a grassy, gopher-ridden field. Those 1,500 footfalls in the field are equivalent to 3,000 normal steps. Instead of 4,500 strides used, you have thus taken, for the purposes of banking, 6,000 steps that day.
Day 3: You have 3,821 steps banked again for this day. If you had walked all your paces on day 2 on flat ground, you would have reset to your normal 5,000.

You cannot build up a reserve of possible treads for the next day by resting extra. You will always start out with 5,000. Also, when resting, the longer you are continuously off your feet, the more effective it is. If you rest for four hours, but do so by getting up every ten minutes, you will pretty much negate the effect.

Now, mind you, there are no actual numbers involved. But when you've had your affliction long enough, you'll know. You'll be able to tell exactly which footfall will start inhibiting your ability to move the next day. My advice at that point is go sit for a few.

More on the Great Experiment

I came across this interesting article while looking into the concept of randomness in playlists:

http://www.cnet.com.au/itunes-just-how-random-is-random-339274094.htm

My own experiment is much simpler--having cleared and repopulated my library, I'll be shuffling the playlist, consisting of all songs in my library, everyday for the next 30 days, and seeing what my playcounts look like at the end of that time.

The Great Experiment

Okay, so I've reset my playcount on my media player again, cleared my library and replaced all the files. So now we'll see if my shuffles are a little more random and not influenced by weighing the playcount to make it appear that I prefer certain songs more than others. (It shouldn't anyway, since I almost always have it on shuffle, meaning that the player has played those songs more than others all by itself.)

The goal here is to not hear the same songs over and over, to have a balanced shuffle, which seems to get more out of balance as days go by. Not that I actually think that there's some guy monitoring my playlist from Microsoft headquarters. I'm just attempting to understand what factors influence the frequency that a song appears in a shuffled playlist. I'll post my findings when I have some.

RAFAQ

After 10 years of living with rheumatoid arthritis, I have found that the most painful part is having to explain my condition over and over. I am thus providing this information preemptively, so that the next time someone asks me about my disease, I can simply direct them to this post.

I have decided to publish this in the format of an F.A.Q., so that one may scroll through information to find the answer to a specific question.

Bear in mind that these are my experiences with my disease. The following post is not to be used to provide any accurate medical information regarding RA. I've done some research on the subject, but I'm not a rheumatologist or even much of an expert. If your joints hurt, go see a doctor. Don't get your medical advice from a city planner. If you do, you're a moron.

Q. What do you have exactly?

A. I have a form of arthritis in the rheumatoid family of diseases. Specifically, I have a spondyloarthopy, in the form of ankylosing spondylitis. It is most likely psoriatic arthritis, although I have not developed psoriasis. I have enough to deal with, thank you very much.

Q. So what is a spondilly--a spoody--what you said you have?

A. It is an autoimmune disorder which, very basically, causes my white blood cells to attack healthy tissues, which is naughty. The "spondyl" in the aforementioned diseases means "spine," although (again thankfully) my spine has not been affected as much as it could have been with this disease. It instead went after my extremities, and my eyes.

Q. I'm confused. Do you have RA or not?

A. I do not have actual Rheumatoid Arthritis. I have a disease that's very closely related. Both are immune system disorders that mainly attack connective tissues. It's just easier to say "I have RA," because more people know what RA is, and saying "I have Ankylosing Spondylitis," only invites more questions, which I get tired of answering.

Q. Arthritis? I have that in my elbow.

A. Wrong kind of arthritis. Osteoarthritis is a degenerative condition affecting a single joint over time. It is caused by normal wear and tear of the cartilage in the joint, and is a common condition of aging. It has nothing to do with the immune system, and is not an aggressive disorder where anything is attacking anything else. If you really want to annoy an RA victim, say this to them.

Q. So what's it do?

A. Well, in my case, it's mostly attacked my synovial linings. Those are the membranes that separate one bone from another. It's also caused inflammation in my corneas.

Q. Hold on a sec. You can't get arthritis in your EYES.

A. With my type you can. Most forms of RA, if left untreated, will eventually become a systemic problem, meaning it moves into other tissues besides whatever you got in your joints. Eyes, mouth, liver, kidneys, all are fair game.

Q. You mean to tell me you're gonna get arthritis in your liver?

A. I could, theoretically, but probably not. The medications I take are extremely potent, and are meant to prevent the disease from going systemic.

Q. What kinds of medications?

A. Here's where I have to get all technical, and use a lot of acronyms. I take one TNF inhibitor, and one DMARD. TNF stands for Tumor Necrosis Factor, and it's one of the components of the autoimmune system that tells my white blood cells what to attack (only mine's messed up.) The TNF inhibitor, Remicade, costs in the neighborhood of $60,000 a year and I require a three-hour I.V. infusion to have it delivered, though they're trying to work that one back down to an hour or so.

DMARD stands for Disease-Modifying Anti-Rheumatic Drug. My particular brand is Imuron, which is an immunosuppressant. It's supposed to keep my white blood cell count to a reasonable level so it doesn't build up a resistance to the Remicade, and go easy on my liver.

Q. Sounds difficult to manage.

A. It can be. When I was suffering the chronic inflammation of my corneas, my eye doctor, on the advice of another rhuematologist she'd consulted (who had never examined me), added an extra DMARD (Plaquenil) to my cocktail (Remicade & methotrexate), which gave my chemical hepatitis--a medically-induced inflammation of my liver. Other meds have given me anemia or dipped my white cell count to dangerous levels. When I was taking Enbrel (a less-intense TNF inhibitor), I got sick all the time.

Q. Holy Crap! How come you have to take such powerful meds?

A. My arthritis has been especially aggressive for the type it is. Your results may be different. Okay, here's the medication progression, as I've come to understand it (prepare for more acronyms):

• NSAIDs (Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs): These are your least potent meds. Many are available over the counter. You know them as Advil and Tylenol. Aspirin, acetaminophen, ibuprofen, naproxen. They also come in prescription strengths, and some, like Torbidol (an injection) and Celebrex are ONLY available by prescription.


• SAIDs (Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs): As the name suggests, these are steroids. They are usually given as a supplemental medication, for when you need a little boost in your fight against inflammation. They aren't usually used long-term (although they can be) because they're pretty nasty characters. These include Prednisone (my personal favorite), cortisone (an injection given at the site--not so fun if the site is an ankle), and Solumedrol, which I take with my Remicade--not for inflammation, but because I had an allergic reaction the first time I had Remicade, and the Solumedrol prevents this.


• DMARDs: Congratulations, you've moved out of suppression of inflammation and into prevention! These meds are usually some sort of immunosuppressant, the idea being that less white cells means less damage. Plaqenuil, sulfasalazine, and methotrexate are some common ones.


• TNF inhibitors: A branch of the DMARDs. Essentially, they give the immune system something to do so it doesn't get bored and go about vandalizing healthy tissue. These are the big guns.
  

Q. Wait a minute--you said "damage"?

A. Yes, unfortunately. Due to the aggression of my disease and the stresses placed on my joints in its early stages, my arthritis has destroyed one wrist, one index finger knuckle, and both feet (see illustration), all of which have been fused. My eyesight has also been worsened significantly.

Q. Nice Photoshop job.

A. No, that's my real foot.

Q. Oh noes! I'm related to you! Am I or my offspring gonna get this?

A. Probably not, but you can never rule anything out. Without getting too technical, I will say that there is a genetic component to this, but the gene in question only affects your predisposition to contracting autoimmune disorders. That being said, these disorders do seem to run in my family. My aunt had full-blown RA, my father has Polyarteritis Nodosa, which I believe affects the blood vessels, and my daughter has the juvenile version of my particular disease, although hers is nowhere near as bad as mine, and in most cases, women go into remission once they hit their twenties.

Q. What's it feel like?

A. Ever twisted your ankle? Jammed your finger real good? Sprained your shoulder? It feels a lot like that.

The inflammation moves from joint to joint. Usually if I have a flare up in a joint, it goes away by the next day. Occasionally inflammation settles into an area to do some long-term damage, hence my fusion surgeries. Oddly enough, the first flare-up I ever had was in my left thumb. While using a high-powered drill, the bit grabbed the material I was drilling and jerked my hand. I thought it had wrenched my thumb. But the pain travelled into my wrist after that. Within a couple of months my wrist was unusable.

Q. That's horrible! How bad can it get?

A. At the time I developed the disease, I was working as a welder in a manufacturing plant. The physical stress placed on my joints played a large part in the rapid progression of my disease. I was soon pretty much unable to continue my duties as a welder. I spent the next nine months with inadequate insurance coverage.

During this period, I lost forty pounds. My jaw was inflamed to the point that it made eating painful. My ribs flared, and made it difficult to breathe. I couldn't walk without the aid of a cane. (As one physical therapist put it, I was doing the "old man shuffle.") Once I had reacquired insurance, the nurse practitioner who was treating me called me a train wreck.

So now I have a screw in my right index finger (nearly fainted when I saw the x-rays for the first time), an eight-inch long plate in my left wrist (the orthopedist removed the end of my ulna to fill in the gaps in the wrist bones--never look at your surgery orders if you don't want to see items like "Stryker Bone Saw" listed,) five screws and five staples in my right foot and five screws and six staples in my left (they had to break that one to make it look like a foot again). For the feet, the took bone grafts from my hips to fill in the holes. Oddly enough, my hips hurt more than my feet after the surgeries. It took more than a year to repair me, as they had to fix the hands before the feet so I could use crutches, and they had to do the feet one at a time obviously.

That's the worst I've ever been. I know plenty of arthritics who've had it worse.

Q. What are your limitations?

A. I can't bend my finger, I can't bend my wrist or twist it while holding something for very long, I can't put weight on the balls of my feet, my feet don't bend sideways (lateral flexion), I can't make that stupid heart thing with my hands (thank god, 'cause it looks absolutely ridiculous), I can't take Tylenol (liver thing), and I can't stand for very long or walk very far (I'll explain the concept of "step banking" in another post.) Individual occasional flare-ups may limit other activities. The week before Remicade I can't get sick or they postpone it (which hurts), and for a few weeks after I'm more susceptible to infection, so I shouldn't be around those with any illnesses. The further I get from Remicade, the more resistant to infection I am, but I'm still more likely to get sick than most.

That's about everything I get asked regularly. If you have any other questions, pick on somebody else.

Blog Import

Just a quick note--since I wasn't posting to my other blog as much, I imported it to this one.

How to Start a Riot

Here's another one of those situations they don't teach you about in Planning school: I have been invited to give a lecture at the local middle school about planning and zoning.

I wasn't aware that people outside of civic government even knew about planners. I always thought the general public assumed that development just happened. I know I did. Planners were always a secret, reclusive bunch, hidden away from the public, never spoken of. Not in the cool Area-51 we're-vampires-masquerading-as-teenagers way. More in the manner of the uncle who thinks he's Dorothy Parker being locked in the attic. But apparently the public has found out about us, and now they're teaching kids how to resent the Man early in life.

Here's how I expect it to go:

Me: "...so you see, kids, once you've verified that any nonconforming lots have not been made more nonconforming, you pass the boundary line adjustment to engineering for their review."

Kids: "Why do you hate chickens?"

My plan is to present municipal administration in the absolute most boring terms, in hopes of putting the children to sleep before they can set anything on fire. I can't imagine why this teacher is hosting my presentation. It must be part of the "Bureaucrats You'll Grow to Hate" section. He's probably bringing in the IRS auditor next week.

I'm just having problems imagining that this can go well at all. Being a planner myself, I know that when I'm at a conference, listening to a presentation on planning, I'm secretly praying for some interruptive force--pirates, volcanic eruption, dinosaur attack--to save me. Once the conference invitations arrive, planners start calling around asking if there are any openings for jury duty. So you see my dilemma. Except for those times in my work life when I have to assure people that Wal-Mart is not paving their burial plots or have someone yell at me for not letting them break the law, my job is fairly dull.

Me: "...so you see how a career in planning can be exciting and fun. But only when you're taking people's beloved pets away from them."

Kids: "Corporate lackey! Down with Wal-Mart!"

Can't wait to be a beacon of inspiration.

Tour de Force

Recently, our Administrative Specialist asked the Deputy Public Works Director to take her on a tour of our local waste water treatment plant (WWTP). I myself have been on three such tours and I can say without hesitation that if you're ever offered the opportunity to meander through a treatment plant, don't. Run away. If you're in an office, jump through a window. You'll be better off in the hospital, trust me.

They fool you, these WWTP operators. You walk in to the lobby or front office, and you see these banks of computers and fancy controls and buttons and lights and such and it all looks very Star-Trekky. Cool, you think. High tech is good. Then your guide will explain the process of water treatment to you. He'll use terms like "effluent" and "bio-solids" and "gray water". Nobody has a larger arsenal of euphemisms than a treatment guy.

After that, you'll leave the fancy room with the blinking lights and the pleasant-sounding terms. You'll go through a set of double doors.

The nightmare begins.

Your brain will do this: "...crapcrapcrapcrapcrapcrapcrap..." You'll be led past conveyor belts with "bio-solids" whizzing by at high speeds. He tells you its on its way to a centrifuge or other similar machine where the "fluids" are extracted from the "solids". (...crapcrapcrapcrapcrap...) Then your mind will attempt to find coping mechanisms for the horror you're witnessing:
"...it'sjustdirtit'sjustdirtit'sjustdirt..." "!!!LOOKAWAYLOOKAWAY!!!" but your NOSE WON'T LET IT. The smell is like wearing a Honey Bucket on your head. You feel the need to shower, and you would strip naked right there on the tour if it meant you could. Because the image of that conveyor belt will be all you see when you close your eyes. All of that "bio-mass" travelling at high speed, probably aerosoling nicely, and most of it isn't yours.

Then he'll take you out of the Room of Nightmares and show you nice big cement ponds and tanks and explain how the by-product is used as fertilizer and here's the wetland we've created and aren't we bloody environmental. You'll barely remember this portion of the tour later. You will be, in fact, ruined. Damaged. Irrevocably corrupted, because now you know where it all goes. You've had to think about it. And you've seen it. He will still be using his fancy terms, and every time he does, you will want to yell at him, "Just say 'poo'!" The euphemisms will have no effect anymore. The only thing that would have ANY effect at that point would be removing your brain from your head and setting fire to it.

After my first tour, we were brought back to the room with all the pretty lights and computers, and he offered us some glasses of water. Water treated right there at that very plant. I might have drank some, but all I could see in my head when I looked at that glass was the conveyor belt.

I noticed he didn't drink any.

To Mr. Covert-Big-Brother-Keylogger Guy

What's with all the Jill Sobule lately?

Phun Phone Photos,and Choose Your Nickname Carefully

This is the planter out in front of the city hall where I work. We have been joking about these since they were installed last fall, but once the dirt went in, I guess the temptation was just too great.

I call him Jerry. I don't know why.

There has been quite the kerfuffle lately at work about chickens. The municipality I work for allows chickens within city limits under certain conditions, but it appears the whole town has gone chicken-crazy. I've had several people call asking about keeping chickens, and also found some poultry being kept without the proper permits. All of this chicken enforcement led to a few of my coworkers calling me "The Chickenhawk." This piqued my curiosity as to exactly what type of bird a chickenhawk is, so I wiki'd it.

Always choose you nicknames very carefully: Not a Chickenhawk

Phun Phone Photos

Here are a couple of images that I got in the course of my duties:


How's that college education workin' out for ya?

Always make sure when you throw away your emu that you hide it under a mattress. Wouldn't want the disposal company to refuse it.

Hey, You Got Weasels on Your Face

Sometimes I wonder if there isn't more AI built into our computers than we're led to believe. Case in point: Windows Media Player.

For two days in a row now, when I select "Shuffle List Now", it's put Weird Al Yankovic's Albuquerque at the top. The first thing I get in the morning is eleven minutes of Werid Al ranting maniacally to music. That suggests to me that maybe my media player likes Weird Al.

And if I just hit "Play Shuffled", it seems to go through moods. Which, of course, are completely opposite to mine. If I'm in the mood for some Alter Bridge or Black Stone Cherry, it'll play Norah Jones and Harry Connick, Jr. If I want Beatles or ELO, it's serving up Disturbed and Black Label Society (although I will say it tends to lean toward the Harry Connick sound).

I've tried resetting my play counts to see if that affects it. It doesn't. Nothing seems to. My media player just appears to feel like listening to certain music. So either my computer has moods, or some Microsoft tech guy is sitting at his workstation, monitoring my every keystroke, and going, "Nah...I don't like the Black Crowes. Let's put on some Shawn Colvin." I figure it's only a matter of time until music I don't remember buying starts showing up in my library ("Wait--when did I get Air Supply's Greatest Hits?").

If you're reading this, covert-big-brother-keylogger guy, knock it off with all the Joan Baez crap and let me listen to my Buckcherry when I want.

Credit Where...

Just a quick post to say thanks to Neil for the header photo.

What's the Word for "Fear of Networking"?

I'm behind the times again. It's due to my paranoia, my cynicism, my conspiracy-theory hobby. I've worked hard these many web-based years to keep my personal information off the internet. Mostly it's been to keep my high-school reunion committee from finding me (in the hopes that they'll think I'm dead and give up.)

This means that I have not joined any social networking sites. No Facebook, no Myspace, and defintely no Twitter (I have no delusions of self-importance that would cause me to think that anyone would be captivated by my every thought in 140 characters or less.) Which of course, means I'm behind again. The closest I come to social networking is that greatest of all chat rooms, World of Warcraft. And that goes beyond mere chat, as you have to kill and pillage and return to questgivers with a backpack full of body parts.

I recently decided, however, to attempt Myspace, but only so I can follow my favorite music artists. Look for the page with the balding, middle-aged administrator guy who's unhealthily obsessed with pirates. That'll be my page.

Nothing to Write Home About

It's been quiet aboard ship lately. Not much interesting happening. Just mostly procedural stuff, shifting cabin assignments and such. We seem to have sailed into administrative doldrums. And while I enjoy these quiet times, they don't make for good reading, which is why I'm starting a second blog to just keep writing. Find it here: http://last10miles.blogspot.com/

Ten

I've been enjoying my work blog, but since I don't always have enough stuff going on to make a decent post, and since I have other thoughts I'd like to share, I decided to start a companion blog. Don't expect me to adopt any personae for this. I just might occasionally have something I feel I need to express.

For instance:

I just purchased Pearl Jam's Ten remix. I bought the version with the remixed/bonus tracks, and I gotta say, I like it. The differences from the original tracks are subtle, but they are there. Most noticeable is the fact that all the reverb is gone.

I always felt like Ten didn't fit somehow with Pearl Jam's other albums. Now it does. Now they have a comprehensive body of work. It shows definitively that PJ was never a metal band, just a good rock & roll outfit.

So I listened to Let It Be...Naked again. I read up on it. Naked is how the Beatles (with the possible exception of Lennon) wanted that album to sound. Thanks, Sir Paul, for fixing it.

Both of these albums show the raw performing power of these bands. They didn't need all the layering, the overdubbing, the technological trickery to make this music sound good. I recommend giving both a listen.

Death Threats and Suicide Watches

The reason I started this blog was to possibly show that Municipal Planning wasn't so boring that accountants said, "Well at least I'm not doing that."  These past couple weeks have certainly gone a long way toward proving my point.

Let me just state that, even though I am quartermaster for a crew of cutthroats as bloodthirsty as any, I don't enjoy an excess of drama and adventure in my life.  I would have made a great hobbit.  No adventure, and lots of meals--that's me.  So I was shocked to learn that the da of one of our Plank-holders--a Plank-Holder who has built a cabin with blatant disregards of the Articles--called up just about everyone who would listen and threatened them with hideous medieval tortures.  The most aggravating part is that hideous medieval tortures are my job.  The son has gone into hiding, but we figure he must still be aboard, as someone keeps scrawling ominous messages ("Keep out!  This means you!  Avast!  Go back, for the path you take will lead to certain DOOOM!!")  for us every time we take some action against him, such as marooning his stowaways or barricading his cabins.

As if that weren't enough, another crewman has been stockpiling rats as pets, and when we told him he can't keep that much vermin in his bunk (last thing we need is an outbreak of plague), he went on about how ever since his wife was lost at sea, the rats are all he has to remember her by.  Bear in mind, there hasn't been some transgression on this ship that wasn't accompanied by a similar heart-rending tale, but if we let him keep his rats, everyone will wants more rats, and the next thing you know, somebody's contracted the Black Death.

We are already embattled by another crewman and his excessive rat problem; unfortunately, as we are a privateer operating under another's colors, this case is being decided by the local magistrate sometime next month.  It would be sooner, but there are always a lot of pirates operating without a Letter, and those scalawags' hangings take precedence.

Response to the Carpenter Mate

It's a pirate ship.  If we have anything, It's bottles.

Note to the Carpenter's Mate

We have plenty o' bottles for ye and your messages! Rum bottles, wine bottles, you name it...

Listen Up, Ye Mongrels!

Ahoy me hearties! Quatermaster's log, Stardate...crud...never really got how to calculate Stardate.

It's been very busy on the ship, lately. Lest you think my job is merely punishing the blaggards who try to shirk the Articles, I also last week helped explain to the Markholders why exactly we wanted to expand certain crew quarters beyond their current capacity. We were denied, but we asked.

And now on to the scuttlebutt that's actually interesting.

No floggings yet, but we have alerted those crew that they will have to relocate to other cabins.

One of the crew was keeping pigeons in his bunk, which is not allowed in close quarters. They have all since mysteriously disappeared. It's best not to ask where they've gone; I'm just glad they are.

Moving closer toward some sort of penal action is the crewman who set up his bunk too close to another. I am waiting to hear his justification, but he has been avoiding me. Lashes (or the threat thereof) might loosen his tongue a little.

I am also waiting on proof that two of the crew are pooling their shares and therefore should not be separated, as their quarters are getting a little crowded. We recently decided that if crewmen can provide proper justification and are pooling their shares for some common purpose, we would allow them to continue bunking together, as that way they can keep an eye on their communal horde. They are, after all, pirates, and would end up accusing each other of all sorts of untrustworthiness if separated, and I don't like risking gunfire on the ship if it's uncalled for.

Always remember, Plank Holders, to keep track of how many crew cabins you're allowed to build in your part of the ship. If you've only got enough room for four cabins, don't try to sneak in a fifth between the ribs. And make sure the crew bunking there don't harbor stowaways. That's a floggable offense. One Plank'er's just finding that out right about...oh...now. I expect he'll be banging on my door soon.

Also make sure you keep track of who's in your quarters, lest you go through unnecessary stress trying to explain why certain crew show up in cabin assignments when they're not supposed to be there.

That brings me current. I shall sign off now, as I soon need to take my turn walking the bridge and inspecting our fine vessel.

Bureaucracy and the Pursuit of Justice

You'd think it would be an easy thing to flog somebody. This is what's wrong with pirate society today. You take out the cat-o'nine-tails, tie the offending crewman to the mast, or whatever whipping post have ye, and you smack 'em with the cat a few times.

The problem is, nobody likes a whipping. If you resort to one, crewmen get nervous that it's going to become a regular thing. This is what separates us from, say, the Royal Navy. In the Royal Navy, they whip ye for slurping your soup or calling the Commandant names. Aboard a privateer's ship, you can call the Captain whatever you want (just don't mention his mother). But you get out the tails, and everybody starts thinking oh, it's THAT kind of ship now. Hence, there are procedures to follow.

So a flogging is not an easy solution, but it is an effective one. Crewmen become very compliant with a healthy and--this is important--warranted application of lashings.

As you may have guessed, we received approval from the barrister. So now the Carpenter's Mate in charge of cabin safety is scrutinizing the articles, to solidify our case against the Plank Owner described in previous entries. Hopefully, sometime this week, the cat will come out of the bag. I'll keep you posted.

Adrift on a Makeshift Friday

It is my last day at sea this week, and I am waiting. I await word from the barrister as to whether or not there shall be a flogging today. I await the Bilge Master so that we may tour the ship on our various rounds. I await word from the captain on our proceedings to increase the number of bunks in a particular cabin. I sip my coffee and pour over my articles, my logs and charts, and wait.

Just bring the damn ship to port already. I have leeches waiting for me.

...Besides, I Like My Left Hand

I don't do crocodiles. Crocodiles are considered weaponry. Go talk to the Gunner's Mates.

Dead Lines

Actually, there is one interesting situation a-brewin' this week. To give ye a little background:


I alerted our Carpenter Master to the fact that one of our plank owners had converted part of the hold into a cabin with no one's notice, and had a group of the pressed crew living there. So the Master gave the plank'er until today to seek the proper permissions or dismantle his makeshift quarters.


I thus find myself hovering like a carrion bird, waiting for my turn at the carcass (nice pirate-y metaphor, that). It appeared as though there were too many of said pressed crew stuffed into one tiny little cargo bay. At this point it becomes an issue for the quartermaster, but the plank'er wouldn't allow us access, and the blaggards all pretended to speak Portuguese, so I had no idea how many needed reassignment to regular quarters. The barrister representing our Marque-Holders said threatening a flogging at this point might give the plank'er cause to spread rumors of mutiny and dissent through the rest of the crew, so I wait for the Carpenter Master to resolve his issues and in the course of his actions suss out how many are quartered illegally.

We shall see what tomorrow brings. My lash hand is twitchy.

Slow & Short

It figures. I decide to start logging my adventures, and I hit a slow week. No just a slow week, but a short one. I'm only aboard ship three days this week, as on Friday I have to go in for my monthly leeching. Because of this, I am hard-pressed to complete my duties before I take my leave. I have to prepare the ship for expansion. We need to make room for more water stores. I also have to oversee the remodelling of quarters to make room for more crew. There is much dissent amongst my shipmates over this particular project, and some question over whether it will be allowed under our current Letter.

I also have the dubious chore of informing one of the crew that he's keeping too many pet rats in his bunk and must get rid of half of them, as it's disturbing his cabinmates. These are never enjoyable orders to give, but hey, even on a privateer's rig, we have Articles of Conduct to uphold.

Proof of Concept

I just returned from a discussion with our stormwater guy, in which he stated that the head of the wastewater treatment plant should be the Bilgemaster and he more of a 1st Bilgemate; however, I would see the WWTP supervisor as being in charge of making sure the heads were cleared. So, stormwater guy shall remain at this time the Bilgemaster. But I'll let him have a pet rat.

Bartholomew's Articles of Municipal Planning

Before I put the model through its paces, I believe it's important to set a few guidelines for the practical application of the model:

• Though I plan on trying to use proper nautical terminology, for now I'm steering clear of using actual pirate vernacular, since I think it would detract from the message itself.
• I am assuming the title of "quartermaster" for myself. There is some debate as to the role of the quartermaster on a privateering vessel. I will be using the commonly accepted definition, which is that the quartermaster oversaw the day-to-day operation of the vessel, which corresponds nicely with the role of a current planner. The captain handled the plotting of their exploits, and was in full control of the vessel during battle, but left the carrying out of non-combat operations to the quartermaster so that he could resume plotting. The quartermaster also meted out discipline and officiated during duels, which I think is an effective simile for my code enforcement duties.
• The term Marque-holder will refer to the city council and/or the mayor. The part of governor will be played by the city supervisor. My captain will obviously be my planning director. The Masters and Mates are the others employed in city administration. Plank-owners will be the representative stakeholders: developers, property mangers, etc. Everyone else is crew.
• As on a real pirate ship, no crew member is anymore important than another, and has no less voice than any other; some just have specialized skills or rights of ownership that allow them more control over certain aspects of the running of the ship.

So now our example:

This morning, I met with a plank owner. He had converted a portion of his holdings in the ship to extended crew quarters, but had failed to paint a picture of a topless mermaid on the wall to help soothe those bunking there, thus doing his part to alleviate thoughts of mutiny in the general crew. Until he paints this mural, the Carpenter Master is keeping a portion of his shares of swag. We discussed the particulars: how big the mural had to be, what colors he should use, how heavily endowed to make the mermaid, etc. The compromise we reached was that I would tell the Carpenter Master to hold a portion of his shares until we could reach port and our errant plank holder could purchase the necessary paint.

You see how the analogy works? If not, email me and I'll explain the metaphor. Or you could just use your imagination and enjoy the story.

It's an Analogy, Obviously.

When is a community like a pirate ship? When you are in need of an analogy to protect the sensitive and occasionally confidential nature of your work, and your knowledge of the United Federation of Planets is rather weak.

Not that I'm really expecting anyone other than my immediate family to be interested in a blog describing the goings-on in a municipal planning office. Most people would consider it only slightly more interesting than, say, Adventures in Accounting. But honestly, I often find myself boggled by the happenings I end up involved in as my city's current-planning official. Thus, I felt the need to share, to provide perspective, to deflect blame. However, as I have previously stated, I deemed it necessary to change the names to protect the innocent (and occasionally the guilty.)

So I started casting around for a suitable analogy. Given my dilletante's knowledge of piratical lore, this was one of the first models I attempted, and I believe I can make it fit. First, though, I should explain the basic mechanics of the analogy.

1. Technically, the particulars of my employment are not analogous to a pirate ship per se. They are metaphorically closer to a privateering enterprise, as one could look upon the City Council as the holder of our Letter of Marque, giving us our mandate and providing us legal protections when our actions drift into the murky territory of protecting the health, safety and welfare of the general community at the potential infringement of someone's personal benefit.
2. The city administraion, our department's chain of command, and the community as a whole can be compared to the commaders and crew of a ship. We have carpenters, gunners, navigators, various masters and mates, plank owners, and nameless masses pressed into service. For instance, our storm water guy would be akin to the crew member in charge of making sure nobody dumps blige into our water stores. And a notice of violation is simply another form of flogging.
3. I have a pronounced limp, and my planning director, recovering from laser eye surgery, has an eyepatch.

Tomorrow we shall see how well this analogy works when applied to a real-life planning scenario.