doctoral candidate in rhetoric and scientific and technical communication
rant
water, water anywhere?
04 years ago
I’ve written numerous times about my irritation (to put it mildly) with aberrant water usage. Living in a city that has constant water restrictions, using a cistern (hauled water) for my own water usage in my home, and watching the lake volumes dwindle, I have very strong feelings about the ways we use (and waste) water.Wired Science recently aired a segment on the ways that Phoenix is being innovative in the use and management of water. The problem with the segment is that it ignores how much water Phoenix is using at the expense of the rest of the state. They have lush green lawns and burgeoning trees and beautiful flowers while the rest of the state is on restrictions, practices xeriscaping, and deals with the real issue of dryness leading to catastrophic forest fires and bark beetle infestations.
What really set me off, though, was this morning’s NPR segment on the drought in the southeastern U.S.
I understand it’s bad. I do. But the issues that they are dealing with are issues that we, in the west, have been dealing with for decades. Some of us have to haul water. Most of us have to go without lush green lawns and pretty flowers. Our lakes aren’t down just a few feet. Oh, no. They are down METERS. Some have dried up.
So when I hear of people drilling wells on their property just so they can irrigate those pristine lawns and keep those flowers blooming, I get angry. I get angry because they are taking water from a ground supply to do something unnecessary. They are taking water that may be able to help others with water necessities to keep up their unnecessary habits.
When we hear that water is the next oil, we should consider this carefully and look at the examples that people in Georgia are setting. The “haves” are drilling for water to make their lawns green. The “have-nots” are begging for water to be hauled in to their towns just to be able to drink and clean.
The war of water is not in the future. it’s now. And it’s time that we do something about it.
sleeping on the job
04 years ago
I was proselytizing zooomr during the early parts of the summer. I wrote about the amazing actions of some companies to assist the zooomr team in overcoming their upgrade emergencies. And I cheered them on when people were tearing them down. I was a zooomr evangelist – and excited about it.
But I’m not anymore. In fact, I’m feeling a bit shamefaced in urging you to go check it out. Remember when I quoted Thomas Hawk? He said,
It’s easy for people to take potshots at Zooomr when we are down. But we will be back up. We will get back online. And these growing pains will be a part of our history. But we will always remember the people who stood by us in our troubles and I think the support that they are giving us is something that you can’t understand because what they know that you may not is that we are doing this for them.
And I agreed with him. And they are back online. But the growing pains are still going on, nearly two months after they began.
Services are still not restored. The only way to see who has commented on my photos or favorited them is to actually go into EACH photo SEPARATELY and look.
The IPTC information is still not coming in totally. Sure, tags are coming in. But the titles, descriptions, and copyrights of my work are not being attached in zooomr. In fact, I have to set these with each upload that I do for each photo that I upload.
Not only that, but when I do create a description, it is not holding the HTML that I put in it.
These are all things that work pre-MarkIII.
Sets and Favorites JUST started working this week. And even then, they aren’t great. I don’t know who favorites my work without looking at each photo. The sets are limited in how you can create them.
The site REALLY needs good usability testing. The usability sucks. Really. I’m not just saying this. Others have said the same to me (and it probably doesn’t hurt that we’re all trained in usability, either).
They took commenting off of the zooomr blog because they wanted people to use the groups more. However, it’s hard to see groups in action. I see every single group in zooomr, whether I’m subscribed to it or not. I have to weed through to find my few groups. And I’ve never once had Thomas or Kristopher reply to me in either a group, the Zipline, or email. I don’t even know if they read what I have to say. Probably not.
To say I’m disappointed is an understatement.
I think, at this point, it has turned into a “hey, look at me” venture for Thomas and Kristopher and not a “lets create a wonderful online experience for our users.”
I don’t care that you’re at party schmoozing with other geeks. I don’t care that you’re attending a blog camp that has nothing to do with zooomr. What I do care about is that the site you set up functions and functions well.
I’ve been patient. Now I’m just annoyed.
telling
4 
Yesterday I wrote about a woman being branded by a group of people for calling CPS to protect children.
Today, I’m going to write about the way a female candidate is treated by a certain male journalist.
But first, confirm this for me. We are in the year 2007, right? And people keep saying we’ve reached the threshold of equality, right? I mean, I keep hearing younger people saying that we have complete equality between the sexes.
But…the disparity between us is still huge. Take, for instance, the election for President of the United States.
MediaMatters reports that on the Chris Matthews Show, this took place:
Asked by Time managing editor Richard Stengel, “What are you suggesting by asking does this diminish her as a commander in chief by being surrounded by women?,” Matthews replied: “No, the idea that it — well, let me just get historic. We’ve never had a woman commander in chief.”
Right…historic. Because everything should be based on what has happened in the past. As if going with the status quo — John Wayne and General Patton — has been so great for us.
What really gets me, though, is that people are actually discussing the fact that Clinton has other women surrounding her. That’s a bad thing? And then discussing their hair color. WTF?!?
“It makes a case with a certain demographic, and I noticed the picture on the front of The Washington Post the other day showed her with all these women and her crew, and did you notice, there was only one blonde out of about 15 women, so it sort of — I thought that was very telling.”
Women with needs, Matthews says. Yeah…because, really, we’re either needy, maladjusted women or supposed to be beautiful, barefoot, and in the kitchen waitin’ for our man. We’re not supposed to be ambitious, intelligent, or fraternizing with other ambitious, intelligent women. Cardinal sins, those are.
Be a good girl. Shut your mouth. Don’t try to work outside the box.
blessing and curse
05 years ago
I love snow. I really do. I like how the untouched snow blankets the earth and makes it appear pristine and beautiful.
Snow is glorious.
But it’s also a pain. Only because we have too many people moving here who have NEVER driven in snow.
I’ve been driving in snow my entire adult life. I know how to do it and how to do it well. Okay, well can be subjective, I suppose.
I don’t think people realize that when they are going 10mph down a highway because they don’t know how to drive in snow that it is just as dangerous as driving as if there were no road hazards.
I don’t think they understand that.
And what is this thing about driving as close as possible to one another, in single file lines, down a road? There are 2 lanes, people! Use them! Don’t make it dangerous for the rest of us simply because you don’t know how to drive in snow!
Sheesh.
On a cheerful note, we got our first snowfall last night. And it’s beautiful.
tasered at UCLA library
0
Who needs Abu Ghraib? We have our own militia here in the US who will torture students.
From the Daily Bruin Television:
Mostafa Tabatabainejad, a UCLA student, was repeatedly stunned with a Taser and then taken into custody when he did not exit the CLICC Lab in Powell Library in a timely manner. Community Service Officers had asked Tabatabainejad to leave after he failed to produce his BruinCard during a random check at around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday.
—
A six-minute video showed Tabatabainejad audibly screaming in pain as he was stunned several times with a Taser, each time for three to five seconds. He was told repeatedly to stand up and stop fighting, and was told that if he did not do so he would “get Tased again.”Tabatabainejad was also stunned with the Taser when he was already handcuffed, said Carlos Zaragoza, a third-year English and history student who witnessed the incident.
—
As Tabatabainejad was being dragged through the room by two officers, he repeated in a strained scream, “I’m not fighting you” and “I said I would leave.”
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Neither the video footage nor eyewitness accounts of the events confirmed that Tabatabainejad encouraged resistance, and he repeatedly told the officers he was not fighting and would leave.
—
The incident, which Zaragoza described as an example of “police brutality,” left many students disturbed.
I’m surprised this isn’t more public. More people should be saying something about this.
precarious
0
I stumbled across a few web sites recently that have the purpose of outing women that don’t fit the ideal female profile. One is a commercial site and one is a private site.
The private site, fat girlfriends is about one man’s issues with his wife’s weight. The person who wrote it admits that he encouraged her to eat and be comfortable. But then she bypassed his threshold and now he isn’t as fond of her. He outs her in public (and, nicely enough, conceals her face but shows her body in all of its glory – in bikinis, no less).
It all seems like he is really worried about this. However, the deeper into the site you go, the more it seems to ridicule women who have gained weight. BUT…he doesn’t talk about himself or if he has gained weight during the time. And he doesn’t show images of himself.
Then again, maybe it’s okay for a man to gain weight but not for his girlfriend/wife to do so.
Overcoming questionable hook-ups is something we should all be concerned about. I mean, it’s devastating, isn’t it, to have “dirty feelings caused by questionable hook-ups.” Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to just scrub away those dirty feelings?
Axe Snake Peel has a site geared toward encouraging men to do just this. They go so far as to define questionable hook-ups, to entice men into a secret society (ala Masons) and to shed the shame.
While there is some humor in the whole idea of a secret society, it’s not a very funny premise. It is implying that men can just scrub women away – if they don’t fit an ideal expectation.
I’m sure there are plenty of web sites out there that do this – either to women or men. These are just two that I came across recently and found distasteful. It’s not okay to ridicule either gender.
And definitely not okay to do it to make money.
election day
0
I have to say that I’m relieved that today is election day.
The political ads have been inordinately mean this year. They don’t tell the truth. They sensationalize the facts. The rhetoric is interesting but it is also dismaying.
On both sides.
Since I have TIVO, though, I really don’t see that many of the ads. I race by them, deciding to use my own judgment to elect my representatives or to choose the propositions I will support.
It’s the phone calls that bother me. Every day, all day long, the phone rings with pre-recorded messages urging me to protect my rights, to listen to famous people, and to believe that the world is doomed if I don’t rise up and do my duty to vote. Every day. Even Sundays.
I got home from vacation and was amazed that I had so many messages on my voice mail. It wasn’t until I started listening to them that I realized that only one was really for me. The rest were all political phone calls.
I don’t even listen to them anymore. I hear the beginnings of the ad and I hang up.
Ed Harris, I think you’re an amazing actor but I think that I understand the threats to a woman’s right to choose far more than you do. I don’t need you calling me, telling me that my rights and my freedoms are at stake.
Governor Napolitano, I admire you and will vote for you. You don’t have to call me.
Ellen Simon, you’re running against Renzi. Need I say more? Please don’t call again. You’ve already got my vote.
It’s great that I’m so popular (hah!). But really, it makes me want to turn my phone off and hide from them all.
opening day
0
It’s that time of the year. Today marks opening day for baseball season.
Those of you who have been following me over the years, know how much I love baseball. I think it’s in my blood. I have to like it. I spent years watching it with my dad, playing softball, watching it with my brothers, talking about it, thinking about it, and lamenting over the direction the players / owners / leagues take it in sometimes. And while I may worry about it, I always love it. It’s that unconditional love that you feel for those things that have been with you for so long that you wouldn’t know what to do if they weren’t in your life any longer.
It’s opening day for the sport I love the best.
And Barry Bonds is still in the game.
Bonds is perched on the precipice, about to break the great Hank Aaron’s record for most home runs. Why does this matter? It matters because Bonds cheated to do it. He took steroids to pump himself up because he had an ego problem and didn’t want to see Mark McGuire beat him to the record. McGuire, who fully admits to using steroids, was in the home run race. Bonds saw him getting there faster and decided that he needed help to beat him.
Cheaters shouldn’t win. Cheaters shouldn’t receive accolades for conquering a record that was made by an amazing athlete. Cheaters shouldn’t even be allowed to stay in the game.
Personally, I think Bonds should step up, be a man and admit that he used steroids. I also think that, should he surpass Aaron’s record, that he should not be given a place in the record books nor should he be put in the Hall of Fame.
The man may well be the best hitter we’ve ever seen. We’ll never know for sure, though, because he had to cheat in order to secure his place in history.
Frankly, that makes me sick. It makes me sad for the game of baseball…this beautiful, amazing game. He has ridiculed it. He has spit upon the thing he says he loves. He has mistreated it and the fans who love it more.
He needs to step away and leave records to those who deserve them.
Oh…and the Cubs are going to the World Series this year. Really.
invisible empire
0
“The government, which was designed for the people, has got into the hands of the bosses and their employers, the special interests. An invisible empire has been set up above the forms of democracy.”
~ Woodrow Wilson ~
I’m standing in front of the Capitol Building, talking to my brother on the phone. I’m complaining that I can’t get a good reflection in the reflecting pool because of the wind.
He says to me, “I heard on the news that Congress has only been in session 9 days since January.”
I think about that. Nine days. One day less than my vacation.
And they get paid what? $150,000 + a year. Of OUR money.
For what? To implement rascist immigration laws. To attack a woman’s body. To inact regulations that are aggressively against our civil and personal rights.
Nine days.
How would you like to do an ineffective job 9 days out of 90 and get paid a princely sum? I know I would.
I think that my time in D.C. really gave me a different perspective on how disconnected our congresspeople are from us. They have no clue what it’s like to be a normal citizen of the United States.
And really, it makes me question if we are given equal representation or if only those who have power and money are represented.
okay, so I’m…
0
…not perfect. Can you imagine? And I have more weight on my bones than I should have (but this is something I’m working on).
Last week, I had an ex tell me that I don’t always show myself in the most flattering light. He said that when I share photos of myself with other people online, I should only show those that flatter.
To me, though, that’s being dishonest. I don’t dress up each day and if you know me, that’s what you will find out. In fact, dressing up is a chore to me. You’ll find me in jeans and t-shirts or sweaters much more often than in high heels or hose/tights.
And you know, if a photograph shows me as overweight, well, that’s because I am. And if it’s not something someone likes, then I truly feel that they are missing out.
We place SO much emphasis on this outer shell of ours, that we forget to look inside. Does that person have a good heart? Can that person converse with me on the same level about similar things? Will that person have the same parenting style that I have? Does that person have similar philosophies that I have when it comes to how to live life?
Omigod. I have cellulite. Yeah, it’s unsightly but how often does anyone really see it? I mean, really?
Doesn’t my compassion count more than cellulite?
And you know what makes me laugh even more? Men who say they’ve dated larger women and don’t have a type but the minute they meet a larger woman, they say, “You’re larger than the women I typically date.”
Oh? But you told me that you’ve dated women who have outweighed me by 50 pounds. That’s interesting. Is it the height? Is it the big bones? What makes you think that I’m suddenly bigger than those women who outweighed me?
Grrr.
At least be honest about it. If you dont’ like larger women, say so from the beginning. If you have an issue with not feeling manly next to a larger woman, realize that it is your issue and not her issue and don’t put it back on her.
Those words sting. You have no idea how much they sting.