May 2010
1 post
My new Blog
I may someday try to figure out how to port this stuff over, but I’m not posting here anymore (I don’t think) in lieu of posting more personal stuff about my life in southern Africa at http://gyoung2.blogspot.com.
Garrett
April 2010
2 posts
2 tags
Bluegrass Rap
This is an awesome bluegrass version of Blu Cantrell’s Hit ‘Em Up Style. I meant to post it several months ago, but it’s timeless. This song reminds me of high school, I think.
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Book Recommendation: Let The Great World Spin
Let the Great World Spin by Collum McCann My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is the first book I’ve read in 2010 that I would recommend to almost anyone who asks. Colum McCann integrates the lives of characters from all walks of life in New York in a way that captures the essence of the city and left me wanting to read more.
The writing and style of the book often follow the same themes he...
March 2010
12 posts
4 tags
A Plastic Bag's Search for Meaning -- Werner...
“They Told me It’s out there, the Pacific Vortex, Paradise. … “No one needs me here anymore, not even my maker.”
Combined with stunning imagery, Werner Herzog’s emotional, sometimes chilling voiceover of a plastic bag’s search for meaning focuses on very human themes and immortality. Thought provoking and interesting to watch, I assure you that watching...
Help Me Name My Blog
Okay, I need help from the 7 to 10 people who read this thing. Now that the number of clicks reaches double digits (!) for some posts, this blog deserves a title that doesn’t suck.
I’m hopelessly uncreative when it comes to titling, so that’s where you come in. Got any ideas? Credit in the “About This Blog” to the most helpful/winning suggestion.
-Garrett
...
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Infographic: Yemen On the Brink
The Atlantic once again demonstrates its prowess with graphical display of information, this time on the subject of the conflicts and challenges facing Yemen.
Here’s a larger version that you can actually read, sorry I can’t figure out how to get Tumblr to do that natively. From the accompanying Text:
At the heart of all these problems is Yemen’s looming economic collapse. Already...
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The US Population, Comfortably in New Hampshire
A cool way of thinking about the population of the United States. Too bad it snows in New Hampshire 5 months a year, so no one would actually want to live there.
Originally created by Shane Keaney for a good.is competition.
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The Future is a Game, Ctd.
Carnegie Mellon professor Jessie Schell recently predicted that we’d soon be earning virtual points for “achieving” things in our daily life. To paraphrase one example, he suggests we’ll get messages from our toothbrush like: “Congratulations, you brushed your teeth for three minutes this morning, you get 50 points.”
Schell argues that these kinds of...
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Book Review: 21 Dog Years
21 Dog Years : Doing Time @ Amazon.com by Mike Daisey My rating: 3 of 5 stars After seeing Mike Daisey’s The Last Cargo Cult — a monologue about his travels to Vanuatu at the Woolly Mammoth theater — I was really excited about this book. In the show he presents a nuanced view of capitalism and western culture, raising provocative questions about “value” and...
1 tag
Men Should Date Older Women
At least, that’s according to the guys who run OKCupid. And they should know.
Through their oktrends blog, the geniuses behind the online dating Website present slices of the awesome amount of raw data they have at their disposal about what works and what doesn’t in the dating world.
This post, which is long but worth a good read, provides detailed analysis of male/female dating and...
The Future Is a Game
Really interesting commentary from Carnegie Mellon Professor Jesse Schell on the convergence/divergence of technology and life. Main Hypothesis: Everything we do in the future will be tracked by technology and reward us with “experience points” that we can use to compete with friends, redeem at the store, and generally feel good (or bad) about.
Watch the whole thing, it’s...
February 2010
1 post
2 tags
January 2010
7 posts
3 tags
Does Renting Make Sense?
The Get Rich Slowly blog today has a post questioning the conventional wisdom about home ownership that’s worth a read. As I think about some of the major urban challenges this country faces, it’s clear that the “rootedness” that home-ownership fosters has some significant downsides to weigh against the benefits.
In many major cities (Detroit comes to mind) if people were...
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Book Review: The Logic of Life
The Logic of Life by Tim Harford My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Of all the pop economics books I’ve read (at least 3!) in the last few years, this is my current favorite. Asserting that people act rationally — conventional economic wisdom for 300 years — is unconventional again, and this book does a nice job of putting that in some perspective.
It’s most notable for its...
Infrastructure Breakdowns
File this picture from yesterday’s major water-main break in DC’s Dupont Circle neighborhood in the “Critical Infrastructure Investment Required” category:
Coincedentally timed with the arrival of February’s Atlantic containing this reminder from James Fallows:
“Stephen Flynn points out that the physical infrastructure of big East Coast cities was mainly...
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Best Place on Earth, Ctd.
“I played outdoor hockey in St. Hilaire, and won many, many Stanley Cups out there.”
- Bruno Gervais, now of the New York Islanders, on the beauty of Pond Hockey.
A full-length documentary on pond hockey that I can’t stop watching is here.
Our local version, from Turkey Pond in Concord, is here: http://twitpic.com/vbvgt
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Corporate Euphemism Watch
I loved this quote from the National Federation of Independent Business on Hilda Solis’ focus on enforcing labor laws with fines and other sanctions (my emphasis):
“Our members are concerned that the department is shifting its focus from compliance assistance back to more of the ‘gotcha’ or aggressive enforcement first approach.”
- Karen Harned, executive director...
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“The schools, if any, where they were educated can now be located and shut down....”
– Surf and Turmoil - What’s Not to Love About ‘Jersey Shore’? - NYTimes.com
December 2009
2 posts
2 tags
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Governed by A General and Universal Physical Fear
On the topic of Nobel acceptance speeches, here’s William Faulkner, accepting his Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950:
Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only the question: When will I be blown up?
More applicable today than ever. Combined with such a simple...
November 2009
3 posts
1 tag
City Council Cuts School Budget, Confused when... →
Even though this story is about teachers unions, it’s the DC City Council that is most confusing. They cut the school district’s budget after the 2009 budget had been approved, and then held hearings for 18 hours after the cuts resulted in teachers losing their jobs.
Huh.
On a separate note, maybe a topic to flesh out at another time, unions fascinate and confuse me. They...
The Jobless Rate for People Like You -... →
Really interesting. The difference between white and non-white is pretty stark.
August 2009
1 post
3 tags
"If Everyone's Cheating, No One's Cheating"
Michael Gee hits my thoughts on steroids in sports pretty much spot on, and adds a theory about the proper discount in baseball’s PED era:
Several years ago, I came up with an unscientific but satisfactory method of accounting for PEDs at election time. I discount a player’s stats from the Steroid Era (roughly 19993-2004), by approximately 20 percent as raw numbers. The...
July 2009
9 posts
3 tags
AIG and the Financial Crisis
It continues to surprise me how little attention was paid to the warning signs leading up to the financial crisis.
This Vanity Fair piece explains a lot about AIG, AIG Financial Products and its role in the crisis. The whole thing’s worth a read, but this bit particularly caught my attention:
In June 2004 the Fed began to contract the money supply, and interest rates rose. In a...
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Riding for Borat
David Roth clears up a lot of my lingering questions about Lance Armstrong’s strange Kazakh racing team in his explainer in TNR. I didn’t realize the team is famous for questionable practices even within a sport littered with questionable practices:
“Astana rose from the ashes of the risibly corrupt Liberty Seguros Cycling Team, which disbanded in 2006 when manager Manolo...
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WatchFood, Inc. I still can’t decide if I liked it or not. Thoughts?
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The Real Cost of Fuel: >$5.61 for the US Military
Three new (to me) things for a Friday afternoon courtesy of The Atlantic: First, the “Fully Burdened Cost of Fuel” calcuation idea seems like it could have the potential to significantly change how the military thinks about fuel use — which may have good follow-on effects for everyday people, as well. It seems like a Nudge-like idea to me, but I should confess that I...
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WatchThe Century Ride Route — I hope we make it.
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Metro Safety Overview →
A really well-done look at the various systems that are supposed to prevent a Metro crash. The term “deferred maintenance” is one that appears far too often in references to Metro. I suppose it’s too often true for my car, as well.
June 2009
1 post
April 2009
1 post
December 2008
1 post
November 2008
1 post
October 2008
5 posts
The Closing Argument
Tired of casting about for a single convincing negative message, McCain stuffs all his talking point into 25 seconds.
In Arizona.
I’m calling for John McCain and the RNC because Barack Obama is so dangerously inexperienced, his running mate Joe Biden just said, he invites a major international crisis that he will be unprepared to handle alone. If Democrats win full control of government, they...
WatchThat Joe McCain, he’s such a grumpy old man when he calls 911 to complain about traffic.
Joe McCain Allegedly Calls 911 to Complain About Traffic|ABC 7 News
Talking Points Memo | Race to the Bottom →
The key takeaway: We’re approaching the point where any tactics the campaign(s) introduce will not be uncovered until after election day. At that point, they won’t matter anymore.
Yikes →
Hang on to your hats indeed:
“Worse, Palin’s routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric’s questions for her “less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media.” At that, Palin supporters turned on...
September 2008
3 posts
2 tags
Who has more responsibility, community organizer,...
The anti-community organizer talking points at tonight’s RNC speeches were striking. Is that the line of attack that leads to the White House?
So open question: Who had more responsibility, the community organizer, or the mayor?
Food for thought: A short list of “Community Organizers”