Category Archives: Random Access

Random Access, the op-ed.

Drive, He Said (Part II)

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North Roosevelt Boulevard in Key Weird got a new traffic pattern last week, four days earlier than planned.

North Roosevelt BoulevardThe $41.5 million reconstruction of the 2.9 mile city street is a little more than halfway complete after 15 months of work and business owners continue to lose customers — meaning money. They’ve been pushing the Florida Department of Transportation to end to the work early. Based on FLDOT reports, the project is 66.3% complete after 544 days of construction that started on April 23 and is expected to culminate in September.

2014.

When 2014 rolls around, the 2.9-mile street will have a magnificent new seawall with a 20-foot-wide, landscaped promenade, alongside four lanes of traffic plus a center turn lane, and a six-foot sidewalk.

I’ve (tried to) drive North Roosevelt during this shutdown. A “difficult traffic mess” is an understatement. Reopening parts of the unfinished street should help businesses attract the customers who have avoided them for the last two years. And Fantasy Fest started Saturday.

The plans look good but I have a fundamental distrust of Florida’s road constructors.

This North Roosevelt tie up follows the almost-seven-year boondoggle on the 18-mile stretch, three years to lay sewers and repave Overseas Highway through Marathon, and more. The 18-mile stretch, that important artery that connects the Keys with the United States, was redesigned for safety. Particularly during hurricane evacuations. That’s probably why it gets closed pretty much every time there’s a fender bender. And Route 1 through Marathon is yet another choke point, right in the middle of the Keys. At least when they finished that project, there were still two lanes going each direction. And no traffic circles.

Y’all think we should throw the bums out of Washington. All of them. I agree but I reckon it’d be better to start with the DOT and work our way up.

 

Drive, He Said (Part I)

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Other than boredom it was a mostly uneventful trip.

Texting AreaI left North Puffin on Wednesday and rolled into South Puffin Saturday night. Spent a couple of nights in the Postel and even gunkholed around North Florida.

It was pretty much smooth sailing the entire trip, even around DC. I probably could have driven a brass band down Pennsylvania Avenue but I went out around the Beltway instead. From DC south, I traveled 25 or 30 miles at no more than 20 mph ever. Ycch. And then traffic cleared up. No rhyme. No reason. No explanation.

The cruise control on the truck went wonky after a gas stop. Its indicator light flickered on the dash and the cruise itself wouldn’t engage. I pulled over, rebooted, and Bb’s yer uncle.

Rebooting a truck just seems wrong.

Coke by pininfarinaThe pininfarina fountain Coke machine at the fast food joint blew me away. Coke says the Freestyle is a touch screen soda fountain introduced in 2009. It features over 125 different Coca-Cola drink products, and custom flavors. The machines are currently located in major Coca-Cola partners and retail locations as a part of a gradual and ongoing deployment. The cabinetry was indeed designed by pininfarina, via their Pininfarina Extra industrial and product design subsidiary. It uses microdispensing technology and the proprietary PurePour technology, both of which originally developed to deliver precise doses of drugs.

Huh.

Speaking of such things, I forgot to pack any water in any of the coolers. I’ve been drinking Pepsi™. A lot of Pepsi™.

I'm AliveI passed an older gent driving a car with the Ontario plate I’M ALIVE and my first thought was, what would the EMTs think?

I drove about 700 miles (694 but who’s counting) from the Postel and settled in a Motel 5 in Walterboro which is nowhere near Brennanboro or even Matthausboro. I couldn’t find the light switch (they forgot to leave one on) but they had left the air conditioning running full blast. Cold in that room.

Motel ShowerIn addition to the Tom Bodette commercials, that chain is famed for shower heads installed by dwarf plumbers standing on their knees. This one had had a renovation that included a new shower arm. Long. Curved. Downright amazing.

There was nothing on the schedule at Cape Canaveral. There’s a MAVEN launch (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN) on an Atlas V from Pad 41 on November 18. Anne and I may come back up for that launch if we can also hook up with a friend who lives in New Smyrna Beach.

The “blue routes” attract me; I like to poke around there whenever there’s time. I cut away from I95 to saunter through Palatka and Deland, simply because I’d never been to either.

Palatka. What a great sounding name. Palatka. It just rolls off the tongue. “I had a falafel in Palatka.” The county seat of Putnam County is a small town by all standards with about 10,000 residents. It’s home to St. Johns River State College and Ravine Gardens State Park and the Florida Azalea Festival and the Blue Crab Festival plus Victorian, Colonial Revival, Art Deco, Classical Revival, and Prairie School buildings.

DeLand is home to Florida’s oldest private college, Stetson University, as well as the Museum of Florida Art plus the wild persimmon trees that grow around the natural springs. I didn’t have to take the steamboat up the St. Johns River; I just drove .

Some how I missed all the festivals, the skydiving, and the Annual Dog Parade. Worth a trip back on a sunny day, I’m thinking.

I have put air inna bike tahrs, beer inna mug, and the iPod inna plastic bag. Orf to the beach.

 

The New Godwin

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Wikipedia tells us:

Godwin’s law (also known as Godwin’s Rule of Nazi Analogies or Godwin’s Law of Nazi Analogies is an assertion made by Mike Godwin in 1990 that has become an Internet adage. It states: “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.” In other words, Godwin said that, given enough time, in any online discussion — regardless of topic or scope — someone inevitably makes a comparison to Hitler or the Nazis.

Although in one of its early forms Godwin’s law referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions, the law is now often applied to any threaded online discussion, such as forums, chat rooms and blog comment threads, and has been invoked for the inappropriate use of Nazi analogies in articles or speeches. The law is sometimes invoked, as a rule, to mark the end of a discussion when a Nazi analogy is made, with the writer who made the analogy being considered to have lost the argument.

In 2012, “Godwin’s Law” became an entry in the third edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

So there I was, dreaming about moving to Copenhagen with a hot chick, when someone interrupted my fantasy to talk about ObamaCare. As an expert on the subject, I weighed in with a carefully thought out and crafted argument.

“ObamaCare sucks,” I wrote. I backed that up with facts and figures drawn from the NYTimes, the Washington Post, and Reuters as well as my own calculations.

“Oh, no it doesn’t,” my opponents responded. They backed up their rejoinder with arguments about Bush, regurgitated Senate press releases, hype, and personal attacks.

I fear I called them on the inconsistency.

“I don’t understand why the Republicans hate it,” Ashley Proctor wondered. She’s a social engineer in Madison, Wisconsin.

“It’s simple,” Jon Friar said. He has a PhD in Economics and works in a think tank. “They hate it because a BLACK DEMOCRATIC LIBERAL got it passed.

“It’s true,” he continued. “Google “N*gger President” and see how many hits you get.”

About half of all Americans hate it because a BLACK DEMOCRATIC LIBERAL got it passed?

Horse puckey.

I took Mr. Friar up on his suggestion. Darned few hits. There were about 30,700 results in 0.36 seconds for his phrase, a few less or about 26,400 results in 0.29 seconds for the phrase with the “i” in it. I figured that wasn’t enough, so I removed the quotes. At least that turned up about 3,070,000 results in 0.31 seconds for both words no matter where they appear in the piece. Three million. Not too shabby, right Mr. Friar?

Two observations are worth noting:
1. Many of those searches turned up posters blaming conservatives (and teens) for using the N word, not posts calling Mr. Obama one; and
2. A search on just President Obama got about 1,730,000,000 results. One point seven billion.

It seems the Googlers looking for straight news about Mr. Obama outnumber the racists at least 500:1.

With a hat tip to Mike Godwin, As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of blaming opposition to Obama on his race approaches 1.

I have casually observed that the race card is never played before three strong, data-driven arguments refute a liberal position and that it rarely takes more than seven.

The race card is as offensive as the Hitler card. In fact, I see the race card as the new Hitler card, played by the “yeah, well, he said” side about they time they realize they’re losing the data-driven discussions of current Administration policies.

Doesn’t anyone else find it disquieting that the very same people who demand we rename the Washington Redskins for the “obvious racial bias” in the team name keep reminding us that Mr. Obama is a black democratic liberal?

Democrats then: “the cost of insurance will go down by $2,500 per family per year.”
Democrats now: “It’s OK if premiums double for average people.”

And

Democrats now: “Americans are behind us!”
A Quinnipiac poll released October 1 showed that voters oppose Obamacare 47-45%. [Worth noting in the poll is that, while almost half of American voters oppose Obamacare, a lot more are opposed Congress’ antics cutting off funding for it or shutting down government. This is a debacle no one can win, least of all the American public.]

 

Good Cop, Good Cop

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Did I ever tell you the story of the night I spent in jail? And did you know I do not drink coffee, ever?

My folks were heavy coffee drinkers but I never liked the taste as a kid. We spent one rainy afternoon on the boat on the Chesapeake, sitting at the dinette playing cards, my folks with coffee in their tall Aladdin™ tumblers and me with Pepsi™ in mine. The tumblers were all red. You know what comes next, right? Yeppers, I grabbed the wrong one and took a healthy chug. Even the Pepsi™ didn’t kill it. I do not drink coffee to this day.

Just to get away from all the battery acid at home, I went to college in Hoboken and ended up just six blocks from a Maxwell House coffee plant. I love the smell but still can’t stand the taste.

Back to jail.

My first car was Triumph TR-3A which got me through senior year in high school and my freshman year in college. I might still have it if my roommates hadn’t decided to float test it in the Hudson.

Enter Thunder Bug.

My beautifully restored 1950 Volkswagen Beetle had 27 coats of hand rubbed ember firemist paint (a 1967 Cadillac lacquer), hand stitched leatherette seats, and a 140-horsepower Corvair engine under the sleek, vented hood that exceeded the original body lines by no more than six inches. It had the split rear window and “semaphore” turn signals that flopped out of the B-pillars. It was occasionally persnickety.

Thunder Bug.

A few Volkswagens were imported into the United States in 1949 by Ben Pon, but they didn’t gain much popularity. In 1950, Volkswagen Beetles started arriving into Dublin packed in crates in what was termed “completely knocked down” form, ready to be assembled.

First Beetle off the BoatDespite the 33 horsepower engine, the Beetle was designed for “sustained high speeds” on the Autobahn. Assuming 72.2 mph is considered fast.

I always wanted more. 140HP was about right. Thunder Bug could, um, break the speed limit anywhere. Even on the Autobahn.

The American deluxe Beetles got hydraulic brakes in 1952, and lost their semaphores in 1955. Mine had mechanical brakes and semaphores.

I’ve pretty much always been a gearhead which is a good thing since most of my cars have required a certain amount of wrenching. Even Thunder Bug. Maybe especially Thunder Bug.

One dark and stormy Sunday night (Really. It was November. Near freezing. Pouring rain. Bitter.) I was on my way back to school when Thunder Bug coughed twice and died on the four-lane 202 in Somerville, New Jersey. I coasted to the side of the road and popped the hood. Did I mention it was pouring? I had no flashlight so I was feeling around the engine compartment for something that felt familiar when my world lit up. It was so bright, I thought the stadium next door had blown up except there was no stadium next door.

It was a Somerville cop. Patrol car with high beams and twin million candlepower spots.

To set the scene, I was a college kid with a hot rod. I was probably unkempt. I was definitely unshaven. I was absolutely soaked. It was about 1969. College kids and authorities didn’t mix well.

He was smart enough to stay in his car where it was warm and dry. I wandered back and we spoke through his slightly lowered window. I ‘splained what had happened. He volunteered to stay and “light the scene” for me while I troubleshot the car.

I spent the next half hour alternating between his (warm, dry) passenger seat and tracing wires and fuel lines in the (cold, wet) work space under the hood. We determined it was a dead fuel pump.

“You can’t leave it here on the road overnight,” he said.

“Nope.”

“There’s a car parts store right over there. If you think we can push it into the lot, you can leave it there.”

Did you notice the “we”? He helped get the car down into the parking lot.

“I can’t let you stay here,” he said. “Do you have any place to go?” Only later did I realize he was afraid for my health if I had slept in the car, not worried about my transiency. I told him I was on my way to school and had neither family nor friends in Somerville.

“I guess I’ll have to put you up then. Get in.”

So we rode back to the police station. He got me a couple of blankets and showed me the closet where they keep the cots. The closet had, um, bars. And a door that locked from the outside.

Fortunately, I got a single.

They didn’t lock the door.

And they gave me an extra pillow to go with the extra blanket.

Still, I didn’t sleep well. I had to keep kicking the door to make sure it was unlatched.

Reveille came early Monday morning. As my night watch rescuer was going off duty, he brought me in a take-out cup of black coffee. I hate good coffee and this was cop coffee. Best drink I’ve ever had. I drank it all down. And then he took me back to Thunder Bug. The rain had stopped.

Good cops they grow in Somerville, NJ. Good cops, indeed.

Next up, my ride in a New York City paddy wagon…

 

Half Staffed

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The shutdown has hit backcountry guides in the Florida Keys. The National Park Service told charter guides that they cannot take clients fishing in Florida Bay until the Feds return to work. That puts the prime fishing between the southern tip of the mainland to the Keys — more than 1,100 square miles — off limits until further notice.

US Flag -- Mayday at Half StaffThe shutdown has hit veterans who demanded access to the World War II Memorial following the government shutdown Tuesday. The site is one of several hosting protests. Park rangers erected barricades and police tape to block veterans and other visitors. Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R-TX) confronted a ranger for keeping visitors out. “The Park Service should be ashamed of themselves.” (Say what? The park rangers didn’t shut down the government. Mr. Neugebauer and his 534 Congress Critters did.)

The shutdown has hit Vermont’s Billings Farm and Museum of Woodstock in the wallet, too. The Billings Farm and Museum is the gateway to Vermont’s rural heritage and a working dairy farm but it is also right across the road from the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park.

“It’s a national disgrace,” a visitor from London said. “You don’t get government shutdowns in Germany, in China, or other civilized places. It’s a disgrace. What does [your] government normally do that makes it safe to walk” around there?

The shutdown has not hit the U.S. Congress who appear to be on vacation. Again.

Even Mark Halperin, the senior political analyst at Time Magazine, acknowledged that the Demorats’ strategy depends not on the facts but on the mainstream media blaming Repuglicans for the shutdown.

Determined to jettison the Constitution, this Administration and this Congress don’t know how prescient the Founding Fathers were. After all, if the framers in that hot, sticky, Philadelphia hall had hewed a little more closely to our British cousins, we would have already had the No Confidence vote and recall election.