San Fran

i'm back from BikeBike in San Francisco.  For those of you out of the loop, BikeBike is a national (international if you count canada) conference of bike collectives.  I was one of 8 that went for Velocipede, the collective I help run here.  if you know nothing of velocipede, check out

www.velocipedebikeproject.org

anyway, it was a blast, maybe more later.  for now check out my pictures from the trip, the whole freakin city is one giant postcard.

BIKEBIKE!flickr

there's also a gallery of the critical mass and my visit to the California Academy of Sciences, so check them out too.

burn after reading

if you are looking for a movie about grown adults acting like children, this one is for you.  even if you aren't, it's still pretty darn funny, just know that it's completely carried by the performances.  it has to be, however, because the movie has no protagonist.  there is really no one to root for, so you have to be drawn in by sheer curiosity and entertainment.  there are people you might sympathize with more than others, but they are ALL idiots, and the things that they all strive for are either self absorbed, ultimately pointless, or both.  the only character in the movie who isn't cheating on, blackmailing, or killing someone else is a big-wig CIA head who calmly instructs his subordinate to "report back when... when... when it makes sense."

21

lately i've felt like, at 26, i'm learning how to be 21 again.  i'm doing much better this time around.

i had more profound things to say, but it keeps coming out as incoherent gibberish, so maybe i'll come back to this thought later.

angles

just in case you forgot, to find the angles of an isosceles triangle, first bisect the triangle into two right triangles, to find the first two angles (A), measure the new side of the triangle, then it's 

tan A = opposite side/adjacent side

if you don't remember what "tan" is it's tangent.  if you don't remember how to find the tangent, you aren't supposed to, you need a scientific calculator.

i had to re-learn all this last night to help a friend figure out what angles to cut some plywood to make a pyramid.  it was good for the brain but frustrating.

old people tattoos

so there are usually these 2 caveats when getting a tattoo. "this is something that is going to be on your body forever" and "it may very well look like crap when you are older."

while these are legitimate concerns, i was standing in line at the grocery store today and noticed that i kinda like old guys with tattoos.  there's just something about an old man in his flat-brimmed VFW hat, suspenders, and some gibberish on his arms that could have been a pin-up or a pirate ship, who knows now.

usually when we see someone older, or of any age, really, we tend to think of them only in terms of the age they are now.  we don't always remember that every old person was once as young, headstrong, and stupid as we are.  that's what i like about the old man tattoos, it reminds me that he wasn't born a crotchety 86 year old senior citizen, he was once young and rebellious too.

nothing really profound to take out of this, just a commentary.  *shrug*

i can see Russia!

"They're our next-door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska." -Sarah Palin-

this has been used to defend Palin's "foreign policy experience" by numerous republican politicians and pundits. it's always good to hear someone from the same side of the fence realize the stupidity of thing. you know... i can see the moon from my front porch, well i must be qualified to be an astronaut!

Nebraska Republican Sen Chuck Hagel says of the issue, "I think they ought to be just honest about it and stop the nonsense about, 'I look out my window and I see Russia and so therefore I know something about Russia. That kind of thing is insulting to the American people."

damn right.

best of baltimore: velocipede

pick up a city paper (if you are here in b-more) and read our feature article in this year's best of baltimore!  it's the first article in the paper.  here it is online.

http://citypaper.com/bob/story.asp?id=16320

chevy volt

so for those who don't know, GM has been working for a few years on what promises to be the first full production plug-in EV in america.  it's going to be american.  it's going to be fully electric.  it's going to be awesome... right?  well here's the concept they gave us a couple years ago...

low-slung, sexy, muscular curves... a real head turner, especially with those glass side panels.  now chevy has revealed the production version, due out in 2011...

what???  it's a chevy cobalt.  it's a boring, slack-jawed yawn of a sedan with all the virile life stripped out of it.  what happened?  presumably GM realized that they needed to take the "safe road" in order to sell enough of these to make it "cost effective"... but what the hell GM? you've been taking the "safe road" for years on everything but the corvette, and your company is quickly losing ground in your own damn country, which you once had a huge dominance over.

i, for one, am highly disappointed.  there was a time when i thought to myself "i'll stick out this environmental activist gig for a while, as long as i have a better paying job by the time the Volt comes out so i can be first in line."  now, i don't give a shit.  while i understand this might be better for GM's failing bottom line, i consider it another blundered misstep in the "green" movement.  eventually companies are going to need to REALLY figure out (which some are just now discovering) that being eco-friendly isn't going to sell and it's not going to become a part of the american market, much less the american psyche, until it become COOL.  until it is HIP and TRENDY.  being environmentally friendly has been PRACTICAL forever, and that hasn't got us anywhere.  until very recently, eco-friendliness was looked down upon and teased in mainstream america.  "hippie" was a derogatory word.

we are just now seeing this start to change.  it's becoming cool to recycle, to shop at whole foods, to compost, to go to farmers markets, to bike to work.  you know why we are so tied to our cars?  yeah it's because of suburban sprawl and the fact that america has more land than it knows what to do with, but it's because for the past 50 years cars have been fucking COOL.  and the faster, louder, and more powerful the car, the cooler it is.  and until it's cool to NOT drive gas guzzling behemoths, hybrids, EV's, and hydrogen cars are never really going to take root.  and that's the plain fact about america, and about human nature.  if GM had made the car in the first picture, 40 year old men would be lining up around the block to check it out.  now it's going to be 40 year old men reluctantly dragged there by their wives to find a "practical" solution to the fact that they want to live on former pristine farmland in rural PA, 60 miles from work and every other amenity.

tesla motors has just started delivery on their first roadsters.  

this is a BRAND NEW company putting out their FIRST car, and they have a waiting list, several years long, of people who have put down full payments on their new electric sports car.  imagine what a success this would be if it had been put out by a company that is already renowned in the american market, like GM.  it would be the next corvette.  it might still be, time will tell.  

for now i'll have to set my vehicular aspirations back on the tesla... so long volt.  i hardly knew ye.

anna's

hey, so while i appreciate the comments (really), i know at least 3 anna's, so if i could get a last initial or something that would be sweet

the simpsons movie

i love the Simpsons movie.  anyone who hasn't seen it should make a point to do so.  i hadn't seen it since it was in theaters, and along with its numerous other social commentary, it's bit on Alaska has obviously become more poignant with the nomination of Palin to GOP VP

"welcome to alaska; here's $1000."

"well it's about time!  what for?"

"we pay ever resident $1000 to allow the oil companies to ravage our state's natural beauty."

what is a blog for?

so in my last blog, i used it as a way to talk out situations in my life that i was confused, frustrated, or otherwise undecided about.  the problem with this is that i can't very well discuss certain things without revealing details that would further complicate the situation.  

for example (and this is just an example):  i am dating "katie."  i'm not sure if she's really right for me and i am debating whether or not to break up with her.  well i can't exactly write in my blog about it without her being able to come read it, then know i am thinking about breaking up with her.   oops.  there's always the situation where i've already told her everything that i would post in the blog, but then i don't exactly need to talk it out, now do i?  i've already done that.  besides, if i've told her my concerns, she's probably responded to them.  then i would be more likely to come discuss her responses and factor them into the situation.  i did things like that in my last blog.  it wasn't pretty.  people don't always want the things they tell you to then be revealed to everyone.

so that said, i have to decide what i want this blog to be.  is it going to be a place to debate situations in order to come to a conclusion, or will it have to be more of a place to come analyze situations already passed.  the later sounds less exciting, however might be the more feasible option.

of course this only applies to situations concerning other people in my life.  unfortunately that's where so much of my inner conflict resides.  guess we'll see what happens eh?

in other news, i have started to eat spinach on things.  those of you who know me well will understand how epic this is.

clean water action

for those who wonder what the organization i work for does, you should check out the website.

www.cleanwateraction.org

it just got overhauled and it's lookin good.

down, fido, down!

i've been going to yoga on what is becoming a more regular basis (up from the twice a year i used to... whether i needed it or not, right?).  i love yoga, not all the hippie third-eye oneness stuff but the physical aspects.  stretching, building muscle, relieving tension, all that good stuff.

 i do, however, hate downward facing dog with a passion.  it's probably one of the hardest positions for me because of my tight hamstrings, and yet it's probably the most common pose in every class i go to.  no matter what we do, it ends with chataronga to upward dog to downward dog, then just hang out there for a while.  it may be peaceful for others but it kicks my ass.  there are other positions that are also quite difficult for me, but i know if i get through that one set then we move on to something else, whereas with downward dog i just know it's coming back again and again.  i guess if i do it enough then i'll eventually get better eh?

some kind of hero

so it's inevitable that you are going to wonder where the name comes from.  it's something i've tossed around for a while.  not quite as long as wearyourtruth, but a while.  i took a class in college  entitled "intro to contemporary music."  part of the curriculum was composing original music on a midi keyboard program.  i came up with s.k.o.h. as a "name" for those projects.  i've long had aspirations of being a musician, but i don't have enough stick-to-itiveness to overcome my lack of natural talent.  

i was telling my friend theresa last night that i tried to learn the guitar, but my fingers could take learning the guitar or rock climbing, not both.  now that i'm off climbing for a while, it would make sense to pick it back up again, but ultimately i've learned that the only things i really become good at are the things that are enjoyable as a journey and not just a destination.  when i was teaching myself how to build/maintain bicycles, i enjoyed the whole process, even early on when i didn't know a damn thing.  rock climbing was the same way, and, most recently, trials riding.  the same cannot be said for music.  i can't stand sucking at playing an instrument, it is no fun for me at all.

why this discrepancy?  who knows.  it's one of those things that will come to me on a random occasion in a random location and then i'll come home and write about it in a blog.  stay tuned, i suppose.

anyway, i don't have much to say about what 'some kind of hero' means.  i'll just leave it at an accurate example of how i often relay myself to others.  half self-depreciating, half self-aggrandizing.  we'll see if i ever live up to the truth of the name.

nothing in common

i do my best thinking in the shower.  don't really know why, probably has to do with the isolation... no distractions.  if only there was a way to blog in the shower.  things never come out as well the second time around.

that said, i've had several people recently, and numerous people since i moved to baltimore, who seem to have no interest in getting to know me or spending any time with me because we "just don't have that much in common."  this has frustrated me for a while, and i had yet to put my finger on exactly why this bothered me so much.  truth is, moving to baltimore from lubbock was a choice i made to grow, to learn, to expand myself as a person.  i have met so many interesting people here who have lived very different lives than my own, and they fascinate me.  

i recently met someone who has scars all up and down her legs.  she initially told me she got them from mowing the lawn in a bikini and hitting some buried barbed wire.  she later told me they were from when she was extremely depressed and was mutilating her body.  now, and this is not meant to belittle the sadness of such a history, but i find that SO intriguing.  not only am i blown away by that sort of experience in someone's life, but also someone who comes up with such a crazy story to cover for it.

i have another friend who, among other things, strips at the hustler club for extra money.  she continually fascinates me with the words she says and the things she does.  i just want to pick her brain apart and understand how she ticks.  my sentiments seem to rarely be shared, however.  while i find myself drawn to those unlike myself, i seem to continually find people who are drawn to those more like themselves.  so much for an "open-minded" liberalism.  "oh, you're from texas and think that jesus guy was on to something... i'd rather just not have anything to do with you."

but "open-minded" liberalism is a whole 'nother conversation.

2 new reasons to love ben folds

"son look at all the people in this restaurant

what do you think they weigh?

and out the window to the parking lot

at their SUVs taking all of the space

they give no fuck

they talk as loud as they want

they give no fuck

just as long as there is enough for them"

"smile

like you've got nothing to prove

no matter what you might do

there's always someone out there cooler than you

i know that it's hard to believe

but there are people you meet

they're into something that is too big to be

expressed through their clothes

and they'll put up with all the poses you'll throw

and you won't even know

that they're not sizing you up

they know your mom fucked you up

or maybe let you watch too much tv

but they'll still look in your eyes

to find the human inside

you know, there's always something in there to see

beneath the veneer

not everybody made the list this year

have a beer...

make me feel tiny if it makes you feel tall

but there's always someone cooler than you

yeah, you're the shit but you won't be here for long

oh there's always someone cooler than you"

welcome

i've successfully failed at 2 other blogs/journals in my life, so maybe the 3rd time is a charm.  in the past my reasonings have been in the "i'm an open book, see?" realm.  thoughts about "truth" and "honesty."  at 26 i know we all distort the truth, not in a malicious way, but the mere fact that we can only reiterate our own perception of the truth, not truth itself.

i also don't feel like revealing every damn thing about myself, so i'm not going to.   i stumbled across my last blog, 4 years old now, and i realize that part of trying this out again is to gain perspective on my own life... probably now much more than in the past.  i realized a lot of things about myself have changed, but i also noticed many things are the same, some of which are almost sad to realize i haven't moved forward on.  you might get more about that later.  for the moment you just get an introduction, so enjoy.  there is no such thing as an uninteresting person, only another person uninterested.