all geared up
08222010
Sacha White, Vanilla Bicycles
I’ve fallen in love…and what better target for my affection?
A friend rolled her eyes at me, saying that I had become ‘one of those people,’ when she came upon my computer browser window filled with sites all dedicated towards bicycles. But why must it be that I have now fallen into a camp of bicyclists versus someone who has just found a fun way of getting around? Here in New York especially, we are a people who not only like to buy things, but also to buy into things, and I fully admit that my bike has been subject to a few upgrades that it could have done very well without. And it was this very attitude towards buying into a lifestyle in order to bike in the city that motivated my teammates and I for the YOXI competition to try to abate. Looking around at certain ’stylish’ commuters wearing rakish boating hats and sundresses or the groomed, business suit-clad man on a positively royal dutch cruiser, was appealing to me for a brief moment until rudely awakened by the angry traffic looming behind me and knowing the safety that came with wearing a bicycle helmet rather than a thin layer of straw wrapped with a bow.
Practical biking? NYT exploring the new IT trend
To Americans, this seems like the perfect fashion plate, but to Europeans this is simply a way of life in which a leisurely ride towards the coffee shop is slow and safe enough that riding without a helmet is actually OK. On the other hand, stateside, I have found myself on vigilant duty to try to navigate the streets without getting run over, which in all honesty for me, is half the reason why urban biking is so fun.
I was glad to find on The Sartorialist, despite his many beguiling photos of people riding stylishly on bikes without helmets, to read:
Instead of trying to copy the very chic Europeans bikers I think we (Americans) should do what we are good at - and that is Sporty/Tech.
I would love to see a sleek young lady in a little black jersey dressed tied-up on one leg, on an equally sleek black mountain bike wearing some kinda of silver reflective sash or form fitted vest (but really well-designed) and reflective wristbands, Raybans, and some sleek, form-fit mountain climbing shoes (those really tiny ones with the nubby soles) or even heels (like that lady I shot in Paris) and a cool racing helmet.
Imagine mixing Polo Sport with Comme Des Garçons - now that would look cool with really techy bike gear.
In defense of the fashion world encroaching onto bicycling territory, I would say that they have done much to get a lot more people onto bikes in the first place, which is no small feat. But if you must look good while riding your bike, surely there are other ways that don’t involve putting your brain trust at risk. Admittedly in the past, I have let vanity get in the way of safety, but does it really take a few near-fatal accidents to be convinced? I would much rather live to bike another day. In other words, wear what you want, find ways to adapt what you have, but know that you don’t need a lot to get on a bike and out on the road than a helmet, some lights and a good bell.
POSTED IN Blog, projects, writing | TAGS : bicycles
Ode to Swine Flu
10272009
A creative exercise in hypochondria…
There was a time within the past month, that I briefly believed I had succumbed to the grip of H1N1 influenza. Yes, i mean swine flu. Swine, let us be clear, is not a word to be taken lightly. Not only is it of the sort derived from pigs, but it is a term often associated with various disingenuous, contemptible characters. No wonder that people are panicking about the fact that they could be sharing something with this two-toed ungulate, stout bodied animal. Does it even matter that the department of health is not classifying this as a genuine pandemic? This outbreak will take on any Michael Crichton novel, hoof down. If ever there was a conspiracy theory, it would be this: that some rogue agency’s secret department of animal husbandry has decided that instead of going digital, it is going viral by spreading the good word through its release of their version of STDs on the population. Certainly this will garner the attention of any-would be passive audience and in comparison, anthrax is pixie dust.
At the very least, swine flu might be marginally better than mad cow disease in which one could find him or herself derelict and masticating on their left foot. H1N1 at least sounds medical, as in treatable. Bovine spongifrom encephalopathy, as mad cow disease is otherwise known, sounds as if your body will turn into a giant porous cleaning tool before its existence will be horribly and prematurely truncated.
So when the fever strikes, the chills, coughing, fatigue and headache symptoms emerge, is there nothing to do but to submit to the mercy of the forces-that-be? Yesterday, I found myself staring at my Purel hand-sanitizer as if it were the key to my survival. And yet, how can Purel be the panacea for this insanity. Just the other day I read in the New York Times about how students are forbidden to play beer pong because of a suspected outbreak; and that offices around the country will no longer have the requisite candy dish on their desks; and at various churches, wine will no longer be offered for the sacrimony of communion. This ladies and gentlemen is the new era and no amount of self-diagnosis and subsequent self-treatment from webMD will suffice.
What about adaptation of the species, you ask, to which I would reply, too empathetic, and too weak. Its foible is that we can not rely on future evolutions of the human race to be a substitute for our resistance. No we must take arms by insisting on house arrest and forced quarantine of suspected persons. I cherish my classmates, friends, neighbors, significant others as much any other citizen New Yorker, but when it comes to survival of the species, it is the weak who must be siphoned out like curd from whey. wheat from chaff. Furthermore, for the greater good, if you believe you might have fallen victim to this disease, it would be even better to practice self-imposed isolation. And if for whatever reason you think you might slip into dementia from the lack of human contact, do not worry, there is psychotherapy to help you keep things in perspective. And if beyond that, that still doesn’t work, there are drugs. But remember, have hope. This dastardly plague is but a moment in our humanity and the human race has managed to outlast the bubonic plague, nuclear detonation, and two terms of the Bush administration. So this too, shall pass.
POSTED IN writing | TAGS : writing
uncle oracle
10272008
Whenever I think of Marshall McLuhan I can’t help but also think of his cameo in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall in which he suddenly appears to backup Allen’s character, who is critiquing the man standing behind him as someone who does not truly understand McLuhan’s theories. And while quoting McLuhan at parties might have its certain advantages because it makes you sound both smart and a prick at the same time, there is something to be said about the fact that you can still quote McLuhan at a party and actually still be relevant. Considering that he wrote Understanding Media at a time when the television was just beginning to emerge and years before the internet revolution, it was truly amazing for McLuhan to foresee the coming of the “global village” and the consequences of technology on our society, namely the impacts of the extensions of man.
The main premise of his book is the seminal statement “the medium is the message.” Here we are to understand that it is the impacts of technology–the environment that is changed by the emergence of any new innovation–that is and of itself the medium and the message, not the technology itself. Ghe content of technology is not necessarily a message that you and i might read as if we read a book. but it is a content that carries a message of change. He uses the example of the electric light bulb as a prime example in which while a light bulb’s content is not something you can read, but its message is actually the fact that it has now affected the way in which we work, play, and live. Our sense of time and scale has changed because we now have the ability to do continue our activities in once dark places and moments in time.
Whether or not is it is any less important to understand media in today’s society as opposed to a little over 50 years ago, is not all-together clear. what is clear is how much we have progressed towards this new sense of immediate urgency and environment in which we are now constantly changing based on new technologies. I am consumed like most people, with the rush of daily work, living, and projects that fill a never-ending void but all with very apparent deadlines. It has been surmised that technology and media will one day completely fix these time pressures on our behalf. Through the introduction of instantaneous communication (e-mail, video conferencing, etc.), the work force is now free to continue at a pace that is no longer governed by physical limitations but as an indefatigable machine that produces at a continuous, unfailing rate. No wonder that devices like the PDA and other electronic calendars are some of the most popular items on the market today. Our culture has been bred to beat time; whereas, the only way how is to fulfill a seeemingly infinite number of tasks in a very finite amount of time. McLuhan writes, “Ours is a brand—new world of allatonceness. ‘Time’ has ceased, ‘space’ has vanished. We now live in a global village…a simultaneous happening.”
With the advent of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace, people are able to communicate in a way that was never before available. Friends and colleagues long fallen out of touch, now keep tabs on each other with the click of a button rather than with time-consuming conversations. But as I wonder about the ease in which communication has been facilitated, I also question the times this week I have sent colleagues e-mails or instant messages rather than have walked over to their desk or called to deliver my message in person. The myth being perpetuated by the belief that this immediate, instantaneous solution is more efficient and therefore better than doing things in a non-instantaneous or inferior manner. When it comes to electronic communication, waiting is perceived as a downfall; and while we are at the mercy of various bandwidth support and download times, we forget to see that it could be our contribution as innovators and designers to emphasize the importance of human interaction.
And as we try to navigate our way through an increasingly convoluted environment, I find that the most valuable contributions to great ideas and projects are not necessarily solutions to complex technologies, but of our contributions as complex individuals. Ultimately, we experience life emotionally. These feelings can be intangible, volatile, and perhaps even unreasonable, but they drive us to coexist in a world of greater pursuits. We would not believe that we live in a world where our interactions are transmitted purely through hidden synapses and silent, transmission waves. Our thoughts, complicated and undefinable, require a more vast and delicate handling. so as we continue to hurtle towards a future defined by our technological extensions, we must remember what it is that we are extending–our thoughts, emotions, memories–these are the messages of who we are as humans.
POSTED IN Blog, technology, writing | TAGS : Communications, marshall mcluhan
atchinson, topeka and the santa fe
04072008
little known fact is that santa fe was actually the first capital of north america, claimed by Spanish conquistadors in the early 1600s. like most cities of its day, its history was strife with violence in the struggle for independence. more common knowledge would be the relocation of thousands of native americans to inhospitable reservations under the incongruous indian appropriations act nearly two centuries later. but the fact didn’t occur to me as i boarded the southwest chief train bound for los angeles. nor did it occur to me when i overhear the woman behind me remark that the train was late because someone threw themselves onto the tracks. bet you it was one of those native americans. they’re always getting drunk and wandering over to the tracks to commit suicide. not that i’m judging, but that’s just how it is, she says.
just how it is. and if i ever felt like i was standing on the rails watching a train come barreling towards me in the middle of muggy august in broad daylight, than i probably couldn’t say what it was that i felt than exactly. only that i found myself staring hard at the lightening storms and the sun set as the train rumbled past the rio grande; than the red cliffs of new mexico; through arizona’s canyon diablo; past the south rim of the grand canyon; and than its final climb through the cajon pass over the san bernadino mountains before it will reach the sea. and there i sat, between an aged cowboy and a disaffected boyscout, thinking how funny it all was as i took it in, drinking mediocre-five-dollar red wine and wondering where i fit in between the two, but glad to think that there was a future waiting for me–out of all things–at the end of the line.
