No mystery train
She said she sat next to the best person on the train today he just sat still and watched movies No hand bag, no accessories, no babbling on the cell phone and good hygiene She said she didn't even notice...
of what does the garden dream?: Hadspen Parabola redux
Back in September I entered a garden design to the Hadspen Parabola competition, and eventually was notified that my idea had made it to the second round of judging. Here, at last, are the finalists - as best as I could represent them from the pdf files and assorted documents now posted at the site. The entries varied from a typewritten page describing a redwood tree to an open source "wiki" that allowed anyone to design the garden. I was...
east river crossings
I beheld the Brooklyn Vixen of her unknown Bookworm glasses and G-strings Restless, struggling, cheating, striving Speaking through forked ring tongue From middle west's and warehouse districts with forever flirty 3am texts yet never feeling, it seems but one true...
reversal of season
A glimmering on the hilltop beyond the freeway is all that the morning can muster in the way of sunshine, and a ruby glow has begun to seep from the tangle of tree canopies, wisteria and grape vines. The neighbor's fig tree is shedding great flaps of yellow leaves upon the exhausted annuals below, and drips of rain cling to the ragged edges of the oak leaves outside my window. A bruised blue sky is puffed with storm clouds. A...
Broken gauge rising
Every sign of emptiness has a savory, fundamental inherent potential to fill nervous like cracked glass, red needle resting but reborn still in directionlessness a new beginning flutters gone like training wheels...
Like an Iranian transvestite heading towards the border
He comes in casual dress seems nice enough cynical, surly,sudden, arrogant, dogging every question like his nemesis on the bike outing at the ranch, with the cowboy hat and dungaree bulge So bomb the kindergartens near the palace it's Halloween...
To 10014
In the backyards of Peru I am sure they dance spin to multi colored drink and drums play strong It is full of 'dhat life, sandals and melons, till apocalypse, till curfew sleepy girls and guides who show you the...
a personal parabola
Well. As many long time readers of this blog are aware, there are often long pauses between thoughts at this space. This summer I was unusually preoccupied. With the inevitable months-long preparations for a wedding which finally took place on July 29. Which is sort of an excuse for not gardening or writing about it. BUT, something happened one morning a few days before the wedding, beginning with my reading an article by Alice Rawsthorn about a rather famous English...
wherever you've been
She dances in from a white east past, via the big lake, with that similar scorpion grin 15 minutes/ages late no matter, how long it's been... centuries or traffic passing rising signs seeking those eyes, that mind, just in time......
untitled too
When you leave free for fields of lilacs, grandmas, raspberries have mercy on these streets of tandoori, bebop, tequila they too were once like you...
catch phrases
There are those times you may go ahead and play with yourself but in those magical of times the Frisbee returns...
Weight loss
It's a drive in the clear Turnpike to the 5th exit She looks out the thin window Wetlands and Wendy's Joan says they have ice cream Fridays and TV weekends Her hands wave at turkey vultures Vincent reminds her...
ants save the planet
Reading Theodore Roosevelt's "The Winning of the West", one comes across this argument for the moral necessity of the American settlers' conquest of the territory long occupied by their human brethren: All men of sane and wholesome thought must dismiss with impatient contempt the plea that these continents should be reserved for the use of scattered savage tribes, whose life was but a few degrees less meaningless, squalid, and ferocious than that of the wild beasts with whom they...
untitled
I hear her loud and clear during a swim in the rain, so quiet after a treading embrace before this poem her accent whispers 'tiz so clear' a dark voice, after the storm, will sing of her breast stroke...
midsummer's moment
Away, away, from men and towns, To the wild wood and the downs-- To the silent wilderness Where the soul need not repress Its music lest it should not find An echo in another's mind, While the touch of Nature's art Harmonises heart to heart. I leave this notice on my door For each accustomed visitor:-- "I am gone into the fields To take what this sweet hour yields. Reflection, you may come to-morrow, Sit by the fireside with...
caged take out
Obviously we're no better off the foul cultures sad sight like the cage prison like counters of the spicy wing joint at night The starved armed robbers sway The moon spits hot sauce red as we exist scared and chicken...
Writer's leftover special
Stuffed, biting into the same poets I cut into a cook book by Elkins and Ross.... Black cows Rail splitters Now I have a second wind.... Fruit Marlow Cold beef Josephine a second helping, more please..... Brady Black Bottom pie...
forest for the freaks
There are plenty characters all alike really planted in lines waving by but at the end the same How much different the old singer named Chicken for real Will Gamble, Angel of the hutch, Aqua Gorilla, Weeping willow willy too...
smelling like a rose
The rose obsession continues...until the last petal drops in my soon-to-be-a-memory spring garden. A friend invited me to join her on an expedition this last Saturday to El Cerrito where the annual "Celebration of Old Roses" event is held in the community center. I have heard about this event for years from fellow gardeners and rose enthusiasts and both me and Sally were expecting something rather grand. In reality, it looks like a neighborhood BBQ held at the community...
Borderline knowledge
it was a designer bag that flew by on her shoulder on a hot night the Mexicans huddled like animals in the back of a 16 wheeler for days Don't think of these things c'mon write poems of love but...
the dirt on roses
More has been written about them than any other flower, to the point of terminal cliche. The symbol of love and war and everything hunky dory, they have decorated the homes and objets de art and gardens of the rich and powerful, and the tiny dirt patches and chinaware of the most humble and obscure. There are more kinds and colors of roses than any other flower and more are being created - and lost to posterity - every day....
I may eye May
ply your hammock among the trees, settle your skin upon springy skein, relax your mind and drift back in centuries two, three, four where "...Cromwell could not cease In the inglorious arts of peace But through adventurous war Urged his active star..." and Andrew Marvell escaped prose'aic politics in his poetic Garden, though Society is all but rude To this delicious solitude. and no industrious bee was yet clichéd.... How well the skilful gardener drew of flowers and herbs...
Drop by Drop
“In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.” —Aeschylus I wish to Hell I didn’t know what he...
How honest WAS he?
“To the tune of” the stand-up comedian’s standard intonation. How honest WAS he? HE was so honest that when he got the “Bank Error in Your Favor” card in Monopoly, he paid the money back!...
Buried Alive in Water: Leave No Marks; Suffer No Penalties
This article in today’s Washington Post distills into one and half pages a straight-to-the-point legal history of Waterboarding, and plainspoken descriptions of the actual physical experience. It is worth more than all the other obtuse, vacillating, shallowly researched, tongue-tied, contortedly...
All Time's the Wrong Time
[My boldface] Vetoing health care for children. President Bush explained: “[W]ith federal revenues at an all-time high and the deficit declining, now is not the time to raise taxes.” It goes without saying that when federal revenues are low and...
Snack-Size Candy Bars
At this time of year, nutrition experts urge parents to remember that “snack-size” candy bars only that. There’s just not enough there in one bar for an entire meal....
The eerily missing word
Even if you slept through most of Social Studies in high school, the word “Extraterritoriality” was almost impossible to avoid. It was going to be on the test. Yet, in the weeks since the mass slaughter by Blackwater in Baghdad,...
Do these people even read what they write?
This was in a letter from my credit-card company: “So that you have no surprises, know that your APR’s, fees and other terms can change at any time.” —I guess they mean no surprising surprises....
Happy Rosh Hashana! L'Shana Tovah! Happy New Year!
May your name be inscribed for good in the Book of Life! I understand there is another New Year, celebrated on January 1, but I think we need all the New Years we can get. The Jews actually have two....
Terrorism and Appalling Taste
“After Mr. Qaddafi’s renunciation of terrorism and his agreement to end programs to develop unconventional weapons, the United States last year removed Libya from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.” NYT"> DKo: It was the “unconventional weapons” that really...
Deadline Approaches. Bush Unconcerned.
“President George W. Bush and his Democratic foes…fire the opening shots in a long-brewing clash likely to seal the fate of US war strategy….set[ting] the stage for Bush’s critical progress report,…due by September 15.” AFP DKo: So, why is Bush...
The Ticking Time Bomb
“They would put people naked for up to 40 days in cells where they were deprived of any kind of light.” “History Will Not Absolve Us,” Nat Hentoff, the Village Voice, August 28th, 2007 DKo: Why does it go on...
Concerning Vampires
From the promo for a play I’m going to see, “DRACULA,” Bram Stoker, “We think you’ll find it nothing less than epic…” I can believe it. There certainly must be something fundamental about the Vampire. There’s not much that competes...
Jump for Joy
I believe this song, “Jump for Joy,” is extremely obscure, and that’s amazing. I only happened to hear it, barely listening to an old a Sarah Vaughn record. I stopped short, “Did she just say that?” It’s a blithe and...
The Straitjacket of Socialism
It would be mighty convenient if everybody put the “Printer Friendly” button in the same place on their Web pages. But that’s exactly what the communists would do!...
Lawful Combatants, but not POWs
US changes status of 14 detainees, AP, 8/10/07 “…Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant Commander Chito Peppler said the proceedings….do not distinguish between lawful and unlawful combatants.” DKo: So, we took lawful combatants prisoner in the War in Afghanistan and they were not...
Etiquette Tip: Belated Birthday or Holiday Cards
Sometimes you just don’t manage to get all your cards out on time. Nevertheless, you don’t want to appear rude. So here’s an easy etiquette tip that solves the problem. Write at the top on the front of the card:...
Shiite Insurgents. Shiite Insurgents!
“Shiite Insurgents.” The Bush administration has been rolling this surprising combination out in recent weeks. I think we’ll be hearing more of it. For years, “Insurgents” has meant Sunnis, because they are trying to bring down the government. Shiite fighters,...
Seeing Strange Things
Every so often I like to just stop and click over to the Ames Room for a moment, because it really helps undermine my perspective on things. It gets my vote for the greatest of all optical illusions. The two...
FAQ in Windows Messenger Help: "Why can't my contacts see my music?"
One of the FAQs in the Windows Messenger Help is: “Why can’t my contacts see my music?” I think Microsoft was very gutsy even getting into this. Anyhow, this is the answer from Tech Support: “If some of your contacts...
"Tough" and "Harsh"
Bush alters rules for interrogations, AP, 7/20/07 The Supreme Court had ruled in June 2006 that trying detainees in military tribunals violated U.S. and international law, so Bush urged Congress to change the law. He also insisted that the law...
For Kirkuk Aficionados
An email yesterday triggered my continuing Kirkuk obsession. So… David, Has the major fight over Kirkuk begun? Ever since you wrote about it (was it two or three years ago?) that I’ve been waiting for the perfect storm to begin....
Who Will Control the Past?
Americans don’t like to admit that they have changed their minds. We convince ourselves that somehow or other, in some way or another, we have always thought what we are thinking now. The media are foremost enthusiasts of this fantasy,...
Let's Put a Lid on Prisoner Exchanges
I don’t get the point of why countries make prisoner exchanges. It must be a case of “The grass is always greener on the other side.” What makes them think they’re going to get a better class of prisoners out...
"One Nation, Under Me..."
Among comics/comix fans, Bill Keane’s “Family Circus” is considered so blandly inoffensive as to be beneath ridicule. But I can’t let Sunday’s strip pass without comment. It begins with the adorable tow-headed kid (Jeffy?) waking up and telling Mom, “Wow!...
One of the All-Time Great "Thought Experiments"
This must have come from Galileo, I guess. In any case, it is to show that heavy objects don’t fall faster than lighter objects. Imagine three identical bricks falling—at the same speed, obviously. Two of the bricks have adhesive on...
The limits of multitasking
I was running a search on a labeled group of messages (from a mailing list) in my mailbox, looking for just the unread ones, but I was also doing something else at the same time (actually two or three other things, drinking coffee, firing up a YouTube video, looking for...
Unescaped entities on the loose
So, I’m back from the Dead Symposium at UMass (I’ll post my slides soon), and Thanksgiving has come and gone, and I’m at the office now wrestling with my new MacBook Pro, trying to get everything possible onto it from my old G4 without breaking any of the new stuff....
What I've Been Wondering
Here’s what I’ve been wondering: You know the song “They Can’t Take That Away from Me,” written by George and Ira Gershwin and performed by just about everybody, from Frank Sinatra to Fred Astaire to Billie Holliday to Louis Armstrong?...
For public consumption
A few people have asked me about when they might be able to see the recording of my brown bag on the Yahoo Pattern Library and so I wanted to post a little update. This got delayed because of a cold that laid me up for all of last week,...
Slow blogging ahead, or behind?
Yeah, what she said: FringeHog: In Praise of Slow Blogging. Or is it a he? There’s no byline and several authors for the site. Whatever. Also, should I get an OLPC (one laptop per child) XO laptop in the buy one / donate one program? They look like they might...
My photos from Oaxaca
Well it took nearly forever, but I’ve finally got all my photos from my trip to Oaxaca posted to Flickr. I organized them into umpteen sets by event and then collected those all together into one master collection, linked from earlier in this sentence. The badge in this entry...
Some possible best practices for social design
Joshua Porter, who specializes in Social Web Design and with whom I've debated in the past around the perennially boring topic of "Information Architecture vs. Interaction Design, Which is the Best Discipline EVAR!?!?," has culled an interesting list of social design best practices from Google's documentation of its new "OpenSocial" API collection.
This Space on Strike
As has happened so often lately, I will not be writing today (except for this paragraph, and maybe one or two more). But today’s non-writing will be different: It will be conducted in solidarity with the striking Writers Guild of...
National sick-as-a-dog month
A friend asked me via twitter if I was doing National Blog Post Month as well as National Novel Writing Month, because apparently I had up to that point posted every day in November, but in fact I was not doing the former and am no longer doing the latter....
Bubbles, Blogging, Business Sites, etc.
I don't really blog anymore, so when I update here, I tend to cram a bunch of little things into one post so that my mom and the two other people who check this site regularly can get everything in...
Elizabeth Spiers
(in ElizabethSpiers.com)
What can I say about OpenSocial?
The blog world, along with my slice of the twitter world, is abuzz with attempts to understand, analyze, deconstruct, laud, and excoriate Google's new OpenSocial initiative.
Stumbling out of the gate
I’m feeling a bit under the weather, fighting off some kind of bug. That’s my first excuse. I woke up on time today after going to be really early last night. I was exhausted. I got up, put the coffee on, and sat down to fold some laundry. The cat...
Matt Leacock's Pandemic game poised to infect the world
Interview with Yahoo! principal interaction designer Matt Leacock about his forthcoming boardgame, Pandemic.
Ain't so smart
Marilyn v. Savant has the biggest brain on the planet and likes to sit on motorcycles. It’s a happy day for me when I can catch Marilyn vos Savant, supposedly the world’s smartest woman, in an error. For those...
but wait, there's more...In my day we had to write our web-blogs by hand in html 1.0, barefoot in the snow, uphill all the way, against the wind
I’ve discovered that it’s easy to remember the anniversary of your first blog post* if you’re as clever or random as I was and wrote it on your birthday. This then reminds me to crank out my yearly age-revealing, I’ve-been-blogging-since post. And this is a special one, too, for what...
Back from Oaxaca
Posting over low bandwidth. Consider this photo a down payment toward a great deal more imagery and tales to come. This is one of the many artworks, most with religious themes, decorating the hotel I stayed in my first night in Oaxaca, the Hostal de la Noria. UPDATE: (or...
Seen on 2nd Avenue this morning
Outside Dewey Academy, where all the tough kids go: A gangsta-looking kid in dreadlocks, walking down the street, openly and flagrantly...flossing. What?...
Enumerating social media patterns: a work in progress
At BarCamp Block earlier this year I led a discussion of social media design patterns. The slides I posted were really more just about patterns and how we deal with them at Yahoo! But the group exercise was to brainstorm a huge list of social media and social networking...
Movie title du jour
Today’s title is for a comedy set in the world of higher learning—maybe Harvard, or maybe Yale, which as the alma mater of George W. Bush is an easy target. It features the madcap hijinks of a couple of unsuccessful...
Going off the grid
Very late Tuesday night - in fact so late that it will really be very early Wednesday morning - I’m heading down to Oakland airport to hop on a Mexicana plane and fly to Guadalajara and then Mexico City and finally to Oaxaca. Yes, it’s the OAK to OAX run....
It's nearly that novel-writin' time of year again
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from doing National Novel Writing Month two years running now it’s that not only is it possible to write a (big chunk of a) novel in a month, but that - for me, at least - it’s nearly impossible to do it any...
Stanking up the gym
Got to work, checked some email, decided to stop dallying and head to the gym for 50 minutes on the stationary bike. Suddenly realized I'd forgotten to bring a change of gym clothes to work today, like I usually do.
Set the terms of the debate
TechPresident, a project of Personal Democracy Forum (which I used to write for), in cooperation with the New York Times and MSNBC, has launched a site called 10 Questions where anyone can suggest a question for the presidential candidates and anyone can vote the suggested questions up or down....
Brown bag accomplished
There is a cycle I go through in preparing for a public speaking gig. The UED (user experience design) brown bag series at Yahoo! is low key in a way. We do it in a medium-sized room with hookups to remote campuses, such as Santa Monica. It’s “all in the...
Do pattern libraries really work?
I wish I could have been at the recent Chicago IxDA Pattern Library conversation, a participatory discussion about using pattern libraries in practice.... Here are my thoughts on the reported conversation.