The Early Morning After

Dear Readers -- I can't guarantee that there won't be an imminent platform change over to Typepad, the land of the user-friendly customizable website, but until I lose my mind again, I (re-)give you the blog, mid-redesign. Please be kind as we go through our growing pains (read: learn the ways of the XML). They don't teach this sort of thing in political philosophy grad seminars!

MD & HT's Excellent Wedding Adventure: Mid-Atlantic Driving

Last weekend, HT and I embarked upon a trip to our friend MJP's wedding in rural Maryland. No combination of plane, train, and cab could get us to the event so we decided to rent a car, an easy proposition in theory but deceptively hard in practice. First, HT schemed that we could take a chinatown bus to Baltimore on Saturday, walk a mile along a highway and below a scary underpass dragging our suitcases behind us to arrive at the rental car location. We would then drive a half hour to the wedding and return the car the following day, drag our suitcases back to the bus depot and return home. Not the most convenient plan, but one that would work. However it turns out all car rental locations in Baltimore are closed on Sunday except at the airport. G-d said Sunday was the day of rest and Hertz was not about to interfere with his divine plan. Then HT proposes we go to Newark and get a car there. I share my experience of being quoted one price on Travelocity and then showing up at Newark airport with an NYC driver's license and being told the rate was significantly higher because of the dangers of city-driving... even though I was driving into pastoral upstate new york and not the wilds of Brooklyn. HT checks, this is true, and we contemplate our next move. When all seems lost HT comes up with a brilliant idea: Greyhound roundtrip ($20) to Philadelphia. An 8 block walk to Enterprise. A 2 and a half hour drive to Maryland. The trip to Philly is without incident despite the long line for the bus. We are separated for most of the trip but eventually my seatmate (a lovely older lady who enjoys mysteries) gets off and we are reunited. When we made the reservation, HT had said:

i had originally picked a compact car, as opposed to an economy one, because i think i have an apocalyptic/cognitive aversion to the notion of an econo car. it's the same price.

I say to her now, "You just know we're going to get upgraded to a PT Cruiser." This has happened to everyone I know. Did the rental car agencies buy all of these monstrosities after the trend ended and no one renewed their leases? We arrive at the Enterprise and after a long wait are told it's our lucky day. Our compact car is going to be upgraded FOR FREE to a lovely... PT Cruiser. Or for $10 more we can get a compact SUV or a Prius. HT and I look at each other and attempt to decide what kind of douche we really are: The sanctimonious, "environmentally-friendly brand" kind OR the soccer mom in training. "We'll take the Prius." The man behind the counter says "It's a really cool car. Very different. I'll have to teach you how to start it. So you're in town for the night -- where are you going to be going?" On the reservation it says we have unlimited mileage east of the Mississippi but I get nervous and blurt: "We're not really sure... depending on what happens we might stick around town or maybe head down to Maryland." He adds Maryland to the contract and takes us to the car. It takes him about five minutes to teach HT the process. The key fob IS the key and get shoved in a special slot. Then you hit the round power button. Then the rectangular park indicator. Then you slide the "shift lever" backward to put the car in drive and of course, forward to put it in reverse. Then the lever reverts to the neutral position. The car is absolutely silent throughout. I feel like I am in the future and half expect the car to begin levitating above the ground.We begin wooshing through the streets and onto the highway and three things quickly become apparent. 1.) We are driving through a Photoshopped image. The sky is too blue, the clouds too fluffy, and all the grass too green. The day is almost too perfect to be believed. 2.) We don't know how to work the car. It takes five minutes navigating the submenus of the control panel to get the AC on, and another five to get music playing. (See upcoming essay "Information Overload: The Prius Dashboard as Failure of 21st Century Warfare.") 3.) Mid-Atlantic Drivers suck. Or more accurately, Mid-Atlantic driving sucks. The lanes are poorly marked, making every toll plaza an exercise in frustration as drivers skip between rows trying to find the EZPASS lane. There are many exits on the left, so there is no clear lane for speeding. The left lane is as slow as the right and many drivers stick to the middle using cruise control, therefore becoming little roadblocks to the flow of traffic and sometimes two or three will end up abreast creating a temporary log jam. I began to feel like we were playing Frogger -- weaving in between hazards and finding the gaps that would get us to our goal. After passing by porn stores located across the street from Christian bookstores and huge sculptures of dragons, kings and castles, we arrived at the Forest Motel where we learned smoking rooms are not a thing of the past. To Be Continued...

This Week in Awkward: Photo Week

There are many things HT and I have in common: a love of red meat, an appreciation of a good ruin, and a hatred of... well, pretty much everything else. But one thing truly unites us: Both HT and I utterly lack depth perception. Pitching, hitting, catching, horseshoes -- these things are all lost on us. I believe this might be one reason for our love of photography. The world is already flat and out of focus for us, and a camera lets us find the third dimension with a low f-stop and narrow depth of field. Diopters make the world a little less fuzzy. Perhaps most importantly, cameras give us one more excuse to step outside the moment, pin it like a butterfly and analyze it later at our leisure. This week is devoted to our love of photography and the moving and still image: HT will discuss one of her favorite photographers from a critical theory perspective, and I'll be addressing another camera jockey from my more visceral perspective. Then HT and I will share our favorite image sources on the web and I'll be writing a love letter to my new camera. Oh, Nikon D40x I love you so. [ht adds: We've had a soft opening of sorts for a couple of weeks now, but with Photo Week, we'd like to officially introduce you to our Picasa slideshow (situated on the sidebar to the right). It's got photos of just about everything we've seen/eaten/smirked at since we started the blog. Enjoy!]

Tuesday Morning Scolding: Internet Explorer? Really?

Our Sitemeter account allows us to see not only how many people have been checking out the blog, but also, somewhat creepily, what operating system they're on, their monitor resolution (no joke!), and what web browser they use. This is a pie chart detailing browser share: Before I proceed I'll quickly point out that MD (currently still away on the west coast) is the techie in this blogging pair; I have a sub-layman level of understanding of computers and things like RAM and XML. That said, I'm a little confused as to why 44% of our readers are still using some form of Internet Explorer. (And also: what's Konqueror?!) Unless you've got a Mac and use Safari, there's really no reason why you shouldn't be looking at this blog right now on Firefox. Seriously. So much better. Get on that, people. I expect to see a radically different pie chart by week's end.

A Hot, Humid Roundup: Photoshopped Edition

MD is away at a wedding in Washington State, and I am languishing in the heat. There are some good posts in the works, but in the very humid meanwhile, I offer you a quick roundup of links related to recent posts. Tasty. The Red Hook ballfield vendors have been granted an extension to their current permits, which allows them to serve food at the park until the end of soccer season, October 28 (the Parks Department had threatened to yank the permits on Sept 7). But don't dillydally -- get on down there ASAP! MD and I are headed to the middle of Maryland for a wedding at the end of July; we'll be renting a car once we get to Baltimore -- any suggestions for Baltimore-and-environs good eats? We're almost definitely hitting a Five Guys Famous Burgers and Fries (yes, we know that there's one now open in the Bronx), and we might try to find a Sonic, so I can consume the potential likely travesty that is a Frito Pie Burrito. iPhone|Tech. Related to MD's musings on to-iPhone-or-not-to-iPhone, I recently stumbled upon two great pieces in the always wonderful Design Observer: What if Apple is Bad for Design?, and a link to a pre-iPhone-announcement blog posting about Treo-love. [update: and now, via Design Observer, this too: an 'interview' with Steve Jobs.] The quirk. Ever since I started this series of posts, friends have been emailing me about online goings-on that I should know about; one ex telephoned last Sunday, a bit out of the blue, to ask if I had read the Times' Styles section article on the craft fair (I had, and told him to read my mildly indignant post on having our trendspotting swiped by the Times). Most of the emailing has been related, however, to one Miranda July: had I read the NY Magazine piece from a few weeks ago (yes, and do not get me started and yes I also read this article too); did I see that Gawker has now joined the anti-July club (yes; thanks, RE); did I want to attend an after-party where she might be present (no; and I really don't think we'd magically get along, RZS). For someone who finds Ms. July emblematic of everything that is currently wrong with market forces, I find myself, via my posts, swept up in that very maelstrom of damaged+precious. The market needs my indignant thoughts in order for the quirk to get stronger (that which does not kill the quirk....), and so I'm wondering if I need to take a hiatus from public or private thoughts about how much I'd like to see this cultural phenomenon implode inside its own wide-eyed shell of flouncy tops and cute barrettes. Probably not. It's going to be a long, hot summer. I need something to motivate me, even if it requires looking at another picture of enough already Zooey Deschanel. Maybe I'll even cave in and hang out with Miranda. (ha!) Oh well; I guess The Market (aka Invisible Hand - man, that'd be a great wrestling name) wins this round.

Free (From the) iPhone: Reviewing the Contents of My Heart

I think this is a question every young man faces at least once in his life: Should I skip my best friend's wedding in order to wait in line for an expensive piece of consumer electronics? I have answered variations on this question in the past (Do I skip my first sort-of-boyfriend's commitment ceremony to go to a free Death Cab show? Yes. Have I skipped holidays with close friends and family in an attempt to bone exes, friends with significant others, and douchebags who have been stringing me along? Every Thanksgiving since I moved to New York. Do I feel guilty about it? Sorta kinda.) and almost always done the wrong (i.e. socially unacceptable) thing. This is how I got here. Picture it: Monday June 11th 2007. All the neophiles, gadget freaks and mac obsessives are frothing at the mouth. It's the Apple World Wide Developers Conference and the question on everyone's mind -- when are we getting our iPhones? The keynote speech by Steve Jobs (the closest thing to an address from the pope for the mac faithful) is slow and uneventful. We get One More Thing. Apple's browser is now available for the PC. We snore. And then we get One Last Thing: The iPhone will be available June 29th at 6pm. The other iPhone news (lack of flash, lack of java, confirmation that 3rd generation wireless web will NOT be here) is disappointing and underwhelming but we have finally gotten the date this we will get this sexy little expected disappointment in our hot little hands. I sit and ponder this after having skipped lunch to watch live blog coverage of the event. As I am dutifully downloading Safari for my work computer, it occurs to me that I will be on an island off the coast of Seattle when it launches at my friend's rehearsal dinner. There isn't cell phone reception there, much less cell phone stores. I immediately IM HT with my predicament. What should I do? Should I arrive late, missing the dinner but securing the phone? Or should I finally stand up for a friend and deny my intense, burning technophile lust? HT points out that I have spent the last hour and a half complaining about how Apple has become more of marketing machine than a tech company, the way the Intel transition has made obvious how painfully slow their development is, and the many failings of the phone outlined above. I type "But HT, it's the iPHONE!!!" I proceed to IM FT who usually supports me in my desire to purchase the newest and shiniest electronics. He says "Could AH wait in line and buy one for you? Or is he coming to the wedding?" The thought has occurred to me, but I feel like it would be wrong to make my boyfriend take a ferry to the wedding late in order to be the first to have a toy I don't need and can't afford. As the last two weeks have passed more and more (mostly bad) details have appeared. Then we learned the battery life and screen were better than originally announced. Some reports surface that the onscreen keyboard sucks and you can't use songs as ringtones. Than we learn the plans are incredibly cheap. Somewhere in the middle of this, I realize I just don't care. My Treo is genius. I can write blog entries on it, check my email, and take phone calls. I've dropped it a thousand times and it keeps on ticking. And most of all, it doesn't make me feel guilty for being a bad friend. The second the wedding's over though, I'm skipping out on the reception and finding an internet connection, even if I have to swim to the mainland. How else will I read the first user reviews that are rolling in? [HT adds: There used to be a much shorter and more interesting iPhone video embedded above, but for whatever reason, it stopped streaming this morning. I've replaced it with a sadly dull tutorial on iPhone usage, until MD -- currently in Seattle -- returns and can replace it with something better. Apologies!]