Happy Easter

Tech About to Ruin the Last Great Race?

I know that I risk sending C into convulsions with this one, but the addition of GPS devices on 19 sleds in this year's Iditarod signals the final step into corporate whoredom for one of the world's last down-to-earth races. The Iditarod already made the decent into corporate sponsorship years ago, but the addition of GPS devices will give up the secrets of the course and the remaining subtleties of musher strategy during the run. Now techie-racers, backed by the likes of IAMS and Cabelas, will pour over the data and  compute the race rather than figure it out by trial and error. Sleds will begin to look like Nascar shells. Faceless 'atheletes' backed by Nike and loaded with 'data' will make technical runs, pushing aside the quirky characters that made this race an archaic gem of an event. The Bert's of this world are forced even further to the periphery, further marginalized by the uber-competitive junkie with no connection to the land who simply wants to win one more 'extreme' event by any means possible. This is just one more example of capitalism (the competitive desire to attract viewers for revenue raising) ruining the mystique of a great tradition. The privately funded local sleds have already disappeared for the most part; how long will local and intimate knowledge of the trail or the strategic arcana of the mushers remain a crucial element of the race? Oh well, at least these 'promoters' haven't discovered the Yukon Quest - yet! 

Ok, full disclosure: I have to admit it's good fun to watch the live tracking. (At least the Alaskans are still outrunning the Norwegian.)

http://race.ionearth.com/iditarod/

A Small Part of Our Beautiful World

I know that there are miserable struggles in every corner of this world, all deserving far more attention then the trash we hear about on the news every day, but I've had to deal a lot with this particular one in school this year and I don't think its ever a bad idea to keep the atrocities of war from falling into oblivion. The following are drawings and pictures made during and following the second chechen war.







The following website is well worth your time.http://exhibition.ipvnews.org/children_1.php

Officially "old" - A Nanny's Conversation 29 Feb 2008

Dude: "Hey man, how old are you?"

C: "What?"

Dude: "Like how old are you?"

C: "Why do you want to know?"

Dude: "Cause I wanna know how old I can be and still be cool."

C: "You'll never be this cool."

Most High, Omnipotent, Good Lord,

Thine be the praises, the glory, and the honor and every blessing.

To Thee alone, Most High, do they belong and no man is worthy to mention Thee. May Thou be praised, my Lord, for brother wind, and for the air and the cloudy and the clear weather and every weather, through which to all Thy creatures Thou gives sustenance May Thou be praised, my Lord, for our sister, mother earth,who sustains us and governs, and produces various fruits with colored flowers and green plants

May Thou be praised, my Lord, for those who forgive for the sake of Thy love, and endure infirmity and tribulation

Blessed those who endure them in peace,
because by Thee, Most High, will they be crowned.

 - St. Francis of Assisi

America closes the book on intelligence

"Apparently, even when students felt like talking they didn't know enough about their own disciplines to be worth talking to." http://www.salon.com/books/review/2008/02/15/susan_jacoby/index.html

The view from Ohio

I have just finished reading "The World is Flat" 3.0 (not that different from 2.0 and 1.0) and felt very moved by it. I have decided to vote Barak Obama also. The I read the Washinton Post this morning (on-line of course) and stumbled on to these articles. They point out the major dualities of my life. (I am very binary...on/off...1/0) I offer them to the world (tell you friends about Paddy so it grows again).


Ohio workers

Anti-Webism in America


An answer to Anti-Webism

I am going to try for a video post for Preident's day. Stay tuned!!! And spread the word about PaddyWop.

Gravel Eats Edwards for Breakfast

Alaska Calls

"Grizzly Bear" by John Burroughs

 

Home of the North Star,

I roam the night sky

as well as the north woods.

Nothing escapes me.

They have called me

Owner of the Earth,

Pride of the Woodland,

Forest Apple, Light Foot,

believing my strength flows

from a secret honey in my paws.

What they do not know

who worship me in fear

is the hunger:

the immensity of the search.

Wop

Edwards Bows out.....

John Edwards

An a tribute from Flogging Molly....

Rebels

Some Effects

Well its 9pm on a cold saturday night here in the Regenstein library, south side chicago. I'm farely certain other hogwarts grads are somewhere in the building, which is a strange feeling, I'll have you know. Nonetheless, this is the first moment in a long while that I've had to think, collect, and reflect. Theres been something nagging me since I've arrived at Uni, and I've wanted to run it by the pw crew: the loss of imagination.

I know there are some of us who have been gifted the ability to dream lucid dreams, some the ability to write creative verse, but there are some of us with no such innate imaginative outlet. For some of us the only imaginatinative outlet available is the 10 minutes betwee when we turn off the lights and fall asleep. I first realized something was going on when I went to a movie this fall, a Kirosawa actually, and quickly realized that I was close-reading the subtitles and analyzing the development of scene structure. This was a saturday night outing that my friends and I had planned, and nonetheless, I found myself analyzing. Partially pleased, partially disgusted, I watched the rest of the film wilfully denying myself the opportunity to analyze the movie, and instead watched it just as I've watched every other full-screen showing. This shift, from dyonesian to appollonian, in my creative life then extended to my own music playing, my reading for pleasure, my conversations with friends/family, and essentially every other aspect of my life. I realized that when I turned off the lights and layed in my bed at night I would think critically about everything that went on in my day, etc. I no longer drempt about what I would do if I was in "xyz" situation, what it would be like to be "xyz" person, instead I was making cold, calculated decisions.
I realize that this is my peter-panish realization of the way my brain will most likely function for the rest of my life, but it seems that theres no lack of correlation between my coming to university and my loss of imagination. Whether its a good thing or a bad thing, an intended consequence or an incidental one, I'm not sure. I do know that I never want to lose my imagination, whether it keeps me from being the most rational, reasoning person or not and this is no childish wish of mine. I really value imagination and I feel like you all do to, which makes me ask whether you think there is something going on in schools (even one so bent on promoting liberal arts, as this one in Hyde Park is) that is destroying imaginations, and whether it should/can be stopped.

best wishes,
njs

Still Here

Yes, I'm still here reading, but wondering why you're posting African masks. Have you been discovering more local culture in Price Georges County again?

A Mask from Africa

An artifact from an ancient African empire in what is now Nigeria.

A long lost relative......

My cousin Gail has informed us that our family may have had a relative who was a pirate for a time. She claims that a journal was found documenting his life and travels from the time he learned to read and write in the palace of the Doge of Venice. Rumor has it that his travels and exploits are being discovered in a blog called Cities.

Anybody reading this?

Is anybody concerned with the blog anymore?

Looking for a job

The WOP has been cut from the budget and is again looking for a job. 57 years old and still not able to remain quiet and think that the 13th ammendment really makes a difference. We are all slaves still. We all have a price. We all have a comfort level that makes us forget others misery. We all look in the mirror with blinders on and pretend that we like what we see. The pain of phonyness can be lived with. The pain of hunger cannot. One destroys our soul, the other destroys our body.

I am voting for John Edwards. Hillary is yesterday. Obama is nothing. My grandfather worked in a mill. My father worked in a mill. Hell, I worked in a mill. Only John Edwards understands that. Only John Edwards cares about that. One last thing....we have never had an Italian president either!!

And while I'm on the subject... I'd like to thank my fellow noord-trekkers (no, that's not a Star Trek reference!) and all of those who stopped by over the holidays, including an unexpected recent night out with the Duc which included watching the College Football championship game with That Guy (Tuesday was a bit rough I must say). It's great to have opportunity to meet up with you all. You guys truly make it all worth while and have helped alleviate some of my cynicism; you're high on the pro-list for remaining on the Death Star.

Day One on the Trail

I should probably provide a bit of narrative here, but with exam week approaching its tough to find enough time. I'll let the pics speak for themselves for the time being.

Our guides [above], Deton and Poncho - the real deal as bushmen go, but Betrand was certainly missed this year.

Harnessing the dogs at base-camp.

Poncho [below] cooks up some hashed browns and eggs for breakfast - after our first night's accommodation with ACDC and lady companion.

Back From the Great White North