the overstory

The Overstory by Richard Powers is organized unlike any other book I can recall. Its like a series of short stories, that kind of grow together, around and among the trees. Its a series of related fables? Ovid's Metamorphoses is mentioned in here somewhere, and its at least part of the inspiration for this story, as much as global warming and deforestation is the implied warning or moral.

I don't recall reading anything by Richard Powers before, so I took a quick look, and this book apparently won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, so go figure. I enjoyed this book, but I'm not going to put it in my 'read this book'* category only because it was a little slow and disjointed for me. Its my guess that this won the Pulitzer because it is so different from other things I've read, and the structure of this book's story arc is like nothing else I've read. For me personally, being different as not the same as being entertaining, and that's why I read fiction. 

Lets be clear, was entertained, and I did enjoy this book, I'm just not weeping because I finished it, rapt with longing for more, and kicking down doors to find the next book by this author. Now, also to be clear, I don't feel that way about every book that makes it to the 'read this...' group, that's a high bar indeed, I just reserve that for books I'm recommending without reservation.

Powers writes fiction about science and technology, and it seems as though he is pretty well known for it. I'll keep my eye out and if I run into another that looks good I'll probably pick it up.

 

* The link to my 'read this book' tagged books can be found anytime by clicking on the appropriate tag on the tag cloud on the right-hand column on this page. Its under the heading: 'what i'm talking about'. You can use any of the other tags in the same way. They also show up at the bottom of every post, so if you're looking for something similar, I may have labeled it that way

 

started but...

I started these two books a few months ago, and just couldn't get through them. 

One of the reasons I keep this blog is because I pick up used books so often that its always a mixed bag; the books I find can be current or 50 years old, or whatever. Prior to keeping this blog I have found myself sitting down to read a newly acquired book only to discover that I've read it at some point in the past. The blog helps me with that in two ways: I can just look them up on my phone when I'm out and about, 'The Books' tab at the top of this page is a summary by author and title, and its really there for me, altho it is a handy way to find things, and there are links that take you to the reviews, if you need them. Second, I've found that writing about them helps me to remember them better. maybe that's why we had to do book reports in school... hmm

Recording books here that I didn't finish, is therefore especially important. I do NOT want to find myself re-purchasing and re-reading something I put down. 

To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara seemed like it was going to be similar to some other time malleable stories I've read recently, such as The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells, or Sea of Tranquility. It sort of was, but it just didn't measure up. Yanagihara has created an alternative universe for our world in which the history of the United States took a very different turn more than 100 years ago, and things that we still now argue about as too liberal became widely accepted in some placed, making the lives of those that have lived on the edged for society for so long, more welcome. Utopia, right! Nope. 

The story does take place over a number of.. generations? Eras? And we follow some of the same people? Generations? its not really clear, so... Any who, the past that could have been liberating and free, wasn't. The recent past, which could have been amazing, and non-stop party, wasn't so the future, right? That must be bright and sunny; a warm glow at the end of a long, hard slog.

Nope. Maybe it ended great, I'll never know. Too depressing, to inward looking, too caught up in itself. It almost seems that the author asked themselves, what if I had a chance to do it all over, in a world where thinsg were different, and then just convinced themselves that things will never get better, because no matter where you run, you always bring yourself with you. 

Welp. Go on ahead without me.

 

I've got a couple of Bill Bryson books in my list of recommendations on the right side of this page. These are the books that folks tell me about, and I put them here so I can find them if I'm out book hunting somewheres. Made in America is not one of the two Bryson titles in my list, but I figured it was worth a shot. I've read some similar books like Damp Squid, and some by Richard Lederer. 

Made in America reminded me of those works, and other books, but after I got about halfway through, it was just more of the same. This wasn't so much a story about the American breed of English, as it was an annotated list of words and phrases and how they differ from the English spoken in other countries. It was like Bryson just had his notes typed up, gave them the once over, and went to print. 

I want you to tell me a story, and if you think I just wasn't looking hard enough, I read half of it! You had your chance bro.

 

Q: Where are the links Phil? 

A: Why?

 

patriots logo - round 2

Proposed New Patriot's Logo, click for larger view

A few years ago, I suggested that it was time for the Patriots to update their logo. They've had it for about half of the life of the franchise, prior to the current, flying Elvis design they had Pat the Patriot, a guy in a three point stance waiting to pounce. Pat lasted for the for about 30 years, and flying Elvis has been at it for another 30+ years. In a 2021 article, the folks at Upper Hand did a researched article which ranked the NFL logos good to bad, based on how people feel about them, using a series of metrics based on 7 different sports sites. They aggregated the data and the Patriots, I was not surprised to see, was ranked 28 out of 32 for their logo.

Graphically, the Patriots logo stinks, and people don't like it. There are others, who just love tradition and don't want to see things change. To those folks, I say this: Washington Commanders. their logo stinks too, by the way. this isn't college ball.

So what's wrong with the Pat's logo? It doesn't hold up. Part of the problem is the team name. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to change that, but the teams that are named after a "person," simply have a harder time, unless that person has some kind of strong visual iconography attached to it. The Vikings, for example, have a little something to work with. The Raiders? Nope. What does a raider look like? The Buccaneers? myeh, sort of a privateer, which a semi-legal pirate, from the Caribbean, so... Florida Pirate-y? The 49ers? What, I guy with a shovel?

Updated Version of my 2019 Logo

 

And the Patriots: A patriotic person, of the New England variety. So a guy in a tricorn hat? Again, not a lot of helpful iconography. So my thought, in 2019, was to take inspiration from the Flying Elvis logo, which includes some red stripes or ribbons trailing from his tricorn, and the white star on his blue hat, which obviously represent the stripes on the flag, and boil that down to try and eliminate the person represented by the Patriot. I came up with something similar to this, which I have since tweaked to eliminate the odd shape I had in blue. Its much more flag, or pennant-like. But maybe too much so, and maybe too close to what the Pats currently have.

 

Proposed Patriot's Logo on a Blue Background

That's where I started, and after looking at the logos that did best according to the Upper Hand research, I decided to simplify further, and go with the letters NE for New England, similar to what San Francisco, Green Bay, and even Kansas City did, AND still use the flag iconography that's built into the current logo, and the Patriot name. I used some curves to graphically express forward motion, and to recall the shapes of a football. I ran the white stripes through the letter forms to accentuate the action, and they recall gridiron lines on the field. I used a variation of the wordmark I came up with in 2019, but I removed the additional blue outline from the star as it was too similar to the Cowboys Lone Star logo. Its bold, recognizable, and easy to stitch on a hat.

On White Background with Wordmark

firing point

Take a look at this book cover. Do you know who DIDN'T write this book?

That's right Tom Clancy didn't write this book. He "slipped the surly bonds of Earth" nearly 10 years ago. it means he's dead

So is this a "Tom Clancy Brand" book or something? Has anyone Penguin Random House come out and said what this is about? My wife bought this book, thinking it was written by Tom Clancy. The publishers must know that is going to be the case, and I'm sure they feel confident that adding the real author's name on there covers them in the legal department, but is that the right way to do business? Lying to customers? I don't think so. its not the smallest font on the cover I guess

For a while, books like this said something like "Tom Clancy's: super bad-ass character," which claimed some ownership, either of the story, or the characters, or something. When you look at the Tom Clancy page at Penguin Random House the 's books way outnumber the books Clancy actually wrote. Penguin Random House has them listed as books Tom Clancy "contributed to." That sounds a lot like the co-authorship attributed to James Patterson on approximately 30% of the books published in America, based on my extensive sarcastic research project. After reviewing 3 or 4 Wikpedia articles on Clancy, it looks like he started to work with co-authors a few years before he died. He also appears to have collaborated with Steve Pieczenik on the creation of the Op-Center and Net Force novel series, of which he wrote nothing. So he an Steve came up with these ideas, and then some authors got assigned to it like cub reporters in a publishing newsroom or something. 

Its like the Agribusiness of writing.

So I finished it. Jack Ryan Jr. is in the same vein as Son of Frankenstein, as far as I can see. They'd like to keep writing Jack Ryan stories but the haven't figured out how to disengage him from a normal human life span like they've managed to do with James Bond. So Jack Jr. does the same kind of word saving things his dad did, just not as well written.

If you're into the whole Tom Clancy brand, and you assume that the publishers are only working with authors who have Clancy's raw talent, and would otherwise be writing bestsellers on their own, if they weren't so interested in keeping Clancy's characters going, then you'll probably enjoy this. Mike Maden asked me to suspend disbelieve a few times too far.

I wouldn't bother. In fact I'd say we skip the book mill fake authors like the Clancy brand and James Patterson and anyone like them. We don't need publishers and marketing executives clogging up the bookshelves with curated crap and formulaic plot points designed to drive sales and make money. We want quality authors, working hard at what they do, and we want room for them on the shelves. 

Organic, farm-to-table writing, please.

boooooo

January 6, 2021

Boooo!

Boo on terrorism on your own front lawn, dressed up as patriotism.

Boo on violence as a vehicle to deliver your message.

Boo on disrupting the work of our elected officials, and maybe more importantly, the regular people that work as public servants for all of us everyday.

Boo on asking armed militia to stand down and stand-by, presumably to "stand-by" for a day like today.

Boo on lies and incitement to violence by a sitting president.

Boo on a halfhearted, recorded message from the president that led with more lies, and buried the most important part of the message, which is to disburse.

Boo on the obvious glee the president feels--and showed in his video message--at the unrest he incited, and fools himself into believing has spontaneously arose in the people. (It didn't)

Boo on the end of peaceful transition of the power of the presidency, created by the pettiness and insecurity of the president.

Boo on the toxic fusion of bottomless fear, dread, and ego that drives the president's actions.

Boo on thinking that you, personally, are more important than the office you hold, the people you serve, or the nation whose very freedoms allow you to achieve what you have thus far in life.

Boo on those foolish enough to follow fools no wiser than themselves.

Boo on those who allow themselves to believe it was their own idea to terrorize others.

Boo on those who allow themselves to believe that their protest is patriotic when it it is not peaceful.

There is no such thing as a violent protest. As soon as violence begins, protest is no longer possible. Once violence begins, or is even contemplated, protest is long longer possible. Once violence begins, you are a rioter, a terrorist, or an enemy combatant.

Boo on insurrection. yeah, thats you

Go home. 

And apologize to your family and your neighbors.

new patriots logo for 60 year anniversary

click on image to see large scale

The Patriots logo has changed a number of times over the years; but each of the two major logos has had about a 30 year run. Old logos never die though, you still see them, fans love them, and they remind us of the rich Patriots history.

So with that in mind, and the 60th anniversary of the Patriots coming up (1960 - 2020) we've got plenty of time to roll out a new logo. We can still using the Flying Elvis for the 2019 season, before he is retired to hang out with Pat Patriot, on T-shirts, banners, and beer cozies for all eternity.

So this is my entry into the running, which no one has announced, and most people don't care about. I've created this updated, and simplified version of the Patriots logo for a number of reasons. The current 'Flying Elvis' logo still tries to hang on to the image of Pat Patriot, by keeping the head of a man in a tricorn hat, but also tries to incorporate some flag imagery, which smacks of the failed Bicentennial attempt at a new logo that fans booed into oblivion in 1980 when it was unveiled. The current imagery of a flag, trailing behind and tapering down at the rear, gives a great sense of forward motion and patriotism. And the blue of the tricorn hat with the white star recalls the blue field of the flag. But Flying Elvis is a little corny, and he really doesn't recall Pat Patriot that well if his name is Elvis.

So I tried to simplify, keep what works, eliminate what doesn't, and clean up the graphics, making it even easier to put on shirts, helmets, and video screens. We've had Flying Elvis since 1993! What else happened in 1993? The World Wide Web was turned on at CERN so some geeks could share test data, President Boris Yeltsin was saluting the dying USSR with 9:00 AM vodka shots, and Mrs. Doubtfire was playing at the theater for $4 a ticket! You got a better idea?

LETS GO!

Take a look here for a history of the Patriots logos over the years, including the ones that didn't hang on nearly as long as some of the others.

Let me know what you think, and I'd love to see some other designs. Lets do this!

ideagraph

I'm probably not the first one to come up with something like this, but I did develop this without researching other things which may be similar, so it may need to be tweaked as I begin to test it out. I've done one test so far, mapping out a series of ideas and things to see where they fit. With a little fiddling, I was able to come up with results that seemed like a proof-of-concept this isn't exactly the scientific method at work here I'll probably post a version of that test run at some point but for now I wanted to post  the chart in the hope that it may be helpful to at least a fraction of the half-dozens of people that occasionally wander past this blog.

Clicky-click to bigenate. Use at will, according to rules below please*

The IdeaGraph was born on a short walk I took at work the other day. I walked past a bus/camper parked in front of the Artisan's Asylum. This vehicle is some kind of mobile eye exam venture. I know this because I searched for what it was after seeing what I did. As I approached, looking up from a vantage point that was probably too close for maximum effect, I saw a bus painted mostly pale-peach, with a large, black graphic made of curving black lines, overlapping in a random way, forming a large tapered arc. What? I'm too close, so I looked again assuming it was something normally smaller than 8 feet long. Ah, an eyebrow. Yep, there's another one, down the other end. A little hard to see from where I was approaching. There is a spot that juts out when parked, fancy camper style, making the front end brow harder to see. I'm almost past it now, searching for what would have two big eyebrows, clearly a face graphic, no, a photo. There's the name, opto-blah,  whatever, but where are the eyes? Just eyebrows? No...

The eyes are the wheels! oh, I get it

Round, black, shiny hubcaps. yeah, sure, but...

Wait, the eyes are... dirty, sort of separated from the rest of the face by the wheel wells, the dark hollows are like the eye sockets in a skull, the eyes are detached, dangling, lumpy, dry, filthy, and wait... they're actually touching the street! In the gutter! Ground right in there, smooshed into the asphalt and the grit, flattening out the irises... bleeahck

Yeah, its kind of gross. Dumb. Not a good design. Not a good idea. The antithesis of eye health.

It probably started out as an interesting idea. That's how design works.But how do we know whether or not something that looks good on paper or a computer screen will work in reality. what if we tear off the eyelids, and scrub the eyes in the dirt. forever. yeah, lets try that Some things need to be mocked-up, prototyped, tested. But before we go to the trouble, we just need to think about things a little more before foisting them onto humanity.

IdeaGraph won't help you determine if your idea is worth realizing by plugging in some numbers, or cranking it through some algorithm, but it may help you to see where your idea lies in relation to other ideas. This is the reason I'm not including my own test mapping. Everyone has their own value system and the mapping skews toward what works for you. Disclaimer: In order to be useful for idea realization, you will need to think about the norms of the society upon which you be doing your foisting while mapping on IdeaGraph. So what does it do? It may just help to organize your thoughts.

How does it work? IdeaGraph helps organize ideas (and real things) by fitting them into an overall framework of their relative weights, and seeing how they compare to one another, with some Venn diagram aspects to it. The map has no real scale, and if you blow it up you can fit more into it. The more ideas you enter, the more helpful it becomes. Thinking about things that are real, as ideas rather than physical things is helpful when mapping. George Washington was definitely a real guy, but the idea of George Washington, or taxes, or music (regardless of whether you consider these things as worth it) will help you map.

An oval representing ALL IDEAS sits at the center of the graph. This oval shape represents every idea we have or can have, and its expanding over time. The ALL IDEAS oval is overlaid, Venn diagram-style, with a parabola representing GOOD, which grows upward, and is potentially infinite. The mirror of that, EVIL, is a parabola which extends downward, and is also potentially infinite. Think positive and negative on the y axis with Venn aspects.

GOOD and EVIL overlap in the center, creating a zone where things and ideas are both good and evil, again, Venn diagram-style, but with scale. The further ideas are located from the center, vertically, the more good or evil they are. Where they overlap, ideas are more meh, but the scale is still important.

There is also a scale from left to right. The further things are to the right on IdeaGraph, the more helpful they are, the further left, the less helpful (or more detrimental, depending on your viewpoint.) The line between MORE HELPFUL and LESS HELPFUL is not vertical. The higher ideas get on the vertical scale, the more the line (shown in red) slides to the left. The more evil things get, the more the line slides right. At the upper and lower limits, really good is always helpful, and really bad is never helpful. Even though the arrows are shown graphically, they are not overlays in the Venn diagram sense, its just a relative scale. Think positive and negative on the x axis.

Running vertically through GOOD and EVIL is a vague strip of weirdness. This band is a little murky and expands at the upper and lower limits, where it also becomes more vague. Unlike the line between more and less helpful, the weird band is an overlay of the GOOD and EVIL zones (Venn again) but its character changes; it doesn't have a fixed value. Its has some labels along the band to help you decide where things fall. For example, weird ideas on the low end of the GOOD scale are just ODD. The higher you go, the more lofty, and lower things get darker. Fee free to add your own intermediate labels to fine tune the scale.

Within ALL IDEAS is a smaller oval shape representing ACHIEVABLE IDEAS. These are the ideas that can be spun up into tangible things: buildings, books, movies, art, governments, nuclear bombs, etc. That means the oval ring of ALL IDEAS that sits outside ACHIEVABLE IDEAS contains the rest of our collective intangible ideas: greed, charity, despotism, faith, dragons, magic, Satan, etc.

Both the ALL and ACHIEVABLE ideas ovals extend left and right beyond the bounds of GOOD and EVIL. Some ideas and things are neither good nor evil, but we still need to decide if they are helpful or not. For example, I would argue that optimism exists outside the limits of good and evil, and as an intangible idea, it sits in the oval ring. Maybe it does; if so, does it fit on the left or the right?

The green circular area floating high at the center is labeled "Ideas worth considering." I put it here, on the good side of the scale, but overlapping the bad a little, spanning equally left and right, but a closer look at the red line shows that this zone is more helpful than not. This is where my value system indicates I should be looking. Yours may differ slightly. This zone has no hard limit; its more Vennish than Venn. This zone also extends outside what is achievable, with the hope that we can expand that oval.

Lastly is a red colored parabola, that makes up a very small portion of what is actually achievable. This is the "Ideas worth realizing" zone. This is where you want to be. It sits on the good side, but not too high, and extends to infinity on the right, toward helpful. The smallest bit of the parabola extends to the left, and the bottom just touches on bad, assuming that some ideas worth realizing may not always be extremely helpful, or without a darker side, but only at the very lowest scales. The red zone is also overlapped by the weirdness zone; some things worth doing may also be a little weird. This is where some art, comedy, and Shakespeare live. A blow-up of this zone, mapped with only real things may be helpful for graphing your ideas when they are close to fruition, to see if they fall in the red zone, or if they are just outside it (like scraping your eyeballs on the pavement) or way outside it (like Fat Man and Little Boy.)

Download it, print it out, fool around with it, and let me know if it works for you. And tell me where IdeaGraph and this blog post fit on IdeaGraph. I'm guessing a shorter post would probably move up and to the right, but I'm not sure if it makes it to the red zone! Based on my experience, mapping ideas can get pretty funny, pretty quickly.


* You are free to use the IdeaGraph for whatever you would like as long as you maintain the copyright information, the title, and the text referring to this blog. Also give credit to me, and link back here. If you decide to derive from the ideas and/or intellectual property manifest within IdeaGraph for profit, whether or not you've modified the graphics and text, then be a grownup and send me a fat check.**

** If you're unsure if this is the right course of action, plot it on the IdeaGraph without lying to yourself.*** And then send me the check.

*** If you are an evil person, IdeaGraph won't work for you, because everything you plot will be skewed down and left. Lying to yourself is as indivisible from evil as responsibility is indivisible from privilege.

barbershop libraries

From their InstaGram (without permission)

Today I heard a story about Barbershop Books on public radio. Barbershop Books is the brainchild of Alvin Irby, a ex-kindergarten teacher, and stand-up comedian, who decided to do something about encouraging--inspiring, even--black boys to read. In an interview, Irvy made a point about the reading that is assigned in schools, that has always bothered me, the negative storylines in books assigned to young people to read. My kids understood the formula, and made jokes about it, before they finished elementary school, which runs through grade 6 in my town. Here's how they described the books they read, year after year: victim of Nazis, victim of racism, or victim of Nazis AND racism.

Irvy summed it up this way (I'm paraphrasing) What are the role models black boys read about in school? Old, dead, black men who's stories don't touch their lives, and that they can't relate to. Irvy has curated a select list of 15 books that he installs on a shelf somewhere in a participating barbershop. Books like Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, and The Snowy Day.

These are books want to read, can relate to and are fun. The idea is to encourage reading, by making books available in a safe space. Irvy has chosen barbershops because they typically are home to men. Men interacting with one another in a comfortable, friendly, normal way. Young and old. Many of them father figures. Ingenious.

This is library.

Here's the mission, in their own words (used without permission):

"In an increasingly global and knowledge-based economy, poor reading skills among young black boys today will produce black men who are unprepared to compete in the workforce of tomorrow. Four key factors contribute to low reading proficiency among black boys: (1) limited access to engaging and age appropriate reading material; (2) lack of black men in black boys’ early reading experiences; (3) few culturally competent educators; and (4) schools that are unresponsive to black boys’ individual learning styles."

Visit Barbershop Books, and see for yourself. Kudos to Alvin Irby and Barbershop Books.

wyverns

I recently read Terry Pratchett's The World of Poo, which included a short segment about a wyvern, including an illustration. no, that's not it I've run into wyverns in my reading in the past, but it got me thinking: Wyverns are similar to dragons, but we don't see them often. They don't seem to be as well known a beast as a dragon. Until more recent times, wyverns were nearly interchangeable with their dragon cousins, in British heraldry, for example, but seem to have fallen out of favor. Perhaps as literacy has taken over for iconography, and heraldic symbolism has become less important, folks simply forgot about wyverns. But we haven't forgotten dragons. What is it about dragons that captures our imagination, more than wyverns?

Wyverns appear, to this observer, to be a much more likely anatomical form that their four-legged dragon counterparts. Wyverns have two legs and two wings, like a bird. Seems odd right? Dragons--western dragons anyway--have four legs, and two wings. Which seems to make more sense. 

A wyvern is built like this bird: two legs, and two wings

But when you compare these beasts to others in the animal world, its actually the dragon that's odd. Most animals have four limbs. A wyvern has four limbs too, but a dragon has six limbs: four legs and two wings. What else has that? Nothing, that's what. 

A dragon is built like nothing else: four legs, and two wings

Is there really nothing else built like a dragon? An insect perhaps? They have six legs, right? But flying insects have six legs and two or four wings, for total of eight or ten limbs!* And antennae, and exoskeletons, so... probably not a good archetype. 

Know what else does have four limbs plus two wings? Flying horses, griffins... and angels. Maybe it's because this anatomical form is so alien to us, is why we've chosen it for our most popular mythical creatures. 

And maybe that why most of us don't know what a wyvern is. Maybe it's oddness just isn't odd enough for us.

We need crazy, just as much as crazy needs us. Wyverns just aren't as crazy as they need to be.

* like octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish.

lions and lambs: revised

yeah, lamb skull. poor little guy.

Unfortunately, New England weather has not cooperated this year, and March, IS NOT, going out like a lamb. Nor did any of the days betwixt and between the proverbial lion and lamb, resemble any of the tamer animals, lovingly chosen to represent the normal damp, muddy, sunny, or breezy days of the Marches of yore.

Its was lions every day.

So I've revised the 'lion to lamb' calendar, so its a little closer to what we've had this year.





March 1 - Lion
March 2 - Lion
March 3 - Lion
March 4 - Lion
March 5 - Lion
March 6 - Lion
March 7 - Lion
March 8 - Lion
March 9 - Lion
March 10 - Lion
March 11 - Lion
March 12 - Lion
March 13 - Lion
March 14 - Lion. Blizzard. Nice.
March 15 - Lion
March 16 - Lion
March 17 - Lion
March 18 - Lion
March 19 - Lion
March 20 - Lion, with a first day of spring banner on. And snow.
March 21 - Lion
March 22 - Lion
March 23 - Lion
March 24 - Lion
March 25 - Lion
March 26 - Lion
March 27 - Lion
March 28 - Lion
March 29 - Lion
March 30 - Lion
March 31 - Lion, with a snow storm, that will last until tomorrow (April 1st!)

The March 31st lion is all fat and happy from devouring the poor little lamb, and it looks like it'll be around for a little while longer, just to kick our collective, freezing, behinds.

Cold? I took the average daily temperatures recorded in Boston for the month, and averaged those for the month of March. Know what I got? 34.29 degrees Fahrenheit.

Here's hoping for next year!

in like a lion...

Maybe you've seen the news. Maybe you live in New England like I do. If so, you, like me, are probably wondering; is it March? Doesn't seem like March. Doesn't seem like Spring pops in about three weeks. All I see is lions. Its like that old saying about what holds up the world.

Its lions, all the way down.

White Lion image: by Woxy, used without permission

So here's what I think: If March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb, the other days must also have animality. So we need a scale, so you can see how lionish or lambish we are on a particular day. This year, I got really close to changing the list so that its lion every day. or at least for the next two weeks or so But this is information--new knowledge--that you can use to plan your day, your week, your weekend, even the whole month!

What's the best day to wear your Velcro monkey tail to work?* What's the best part about goat?** Is there really dolphin in tuna?*** How're you going to know these things without the lion-to-lamb list?

Here's how it stacks up this year. yes, its the same every year, that's why we call it a tradition.

March 1 - Lion: This one's a given. This year, its a white lion. And he weighs about 2 1/2 weeks.
March 2 - Tiger: Up to 11-feet, and nearly 700 pounds!
March 3 - Bear: Oh my! Black, Brown, but probably Polar. And hungry.
March 4 - Shark: Just remember Jaws 4.
March 5 - Wolf: The Timber variety. With the white, winter coat.
March 6 - Bull: One word: Pamplona.
March 7 - Moose: Brake for moose, it could save your life.
March 8 - Eagle: Don't leave your pets outside... or your children. Or your grammy... she weights like 42 pounds.
March 9 - Scorpion: Step on it before it steps on you.
March 10 - Dingo: No, its not a stray dog.
March 11 - Hawk: Not Riverhawk, that's UMass Lowell.
March 12 - Lynx: Its like a house cat. That kills and eats things. That weigh 42 pounds. Yeah, like Grammy.
March 13 - Bat: If you just get near one its a full rabies series. In your belly.
March 14 - Monkey: They pinch! With their feet! HBD Coleen! Maybe this should be Monkey Pi Day!****
March 15 - Snake: The Ides of March. Snakes are known for wisdom, and treachery.
March 16 - Ox: Hard working in a plodding kind of way.
March 17 - Elephant: Wise, big, powerful... gray.
March 18 - Raven: Nevermore.
March 19 - Stag: Power and compassion. Might make a good patronus.
March 20 - Crab: This one can sneak up on you. First day of spring!
March 21 - Goat: Stubborn and tough going.
March 22 - Horse: Strong and reliable.
March 23 - Pig: Smart but messy; wear your boots today.
March 24 - Dog: Friendly and good-natured; take a walk.
March 25 - Dolphin: Fun and wet; bring an umbrella.
March 26 - Rooster: Proud strutter. Crow at the sun! Wear your new socks!
March 27 - Turtle: Muddy, but adorable; boots again.
March 28 - Toad: They're not just for (witch's) breakfast anymore.
March 29 - Robin: The red breast is kind or orangey, no
March 30 - Rabbit: How can you be scared of rabbits? HBD Kelton!
March 31 - Lamb: Mmm... arrosticini. Smells like spring!

According to one source I read "This phrase has its origins with the constellations Leo, the Lion, and Aries, the ram or lamb. It has to do with the relative positions of these constellations in the sky at the beginning and end of the month." Yeah, Aries, the lamb, that must be it. Somebody is thinking too hard. I think the origins of something like this are pretty self-evident.

We have had over 8-feet of snow in Massachusetts this year. It snowed 2-inches yesterday (the first of March), and little today, and another storm is due beginning tomorrow night. And it hasn't been above freezing for more than a few days since January, so most of the snow that fell in late January, is still here.

Spring? Lambs? Yeah, I'm ready.


* Never.
** The shanks.  Chevon is delicious!
*** I don't know man! Focus! 
**** Pi Day is typically on 3/14, but this year its special, especially at about half-past nine: 3.14.15 9:27:54. That's pi to 9 decimal places, nerds!

the key

The Key, by Simon Toyne is the SECOND book in a trilogy. Why have I virtually yelled the word 'second'? Why, because I didn't know that this was the second in a trilogy before I read it. Because the publisher, or the cover artist, or someone, didn't think it was necessary to tell me that, somewhere convenient--like on the cover, on the title page... somewhere.

I'm reading along thinking, this is interesting, there seems to be a lot of backstory here, I guess Simon'll get to it at some point.

He did.

In book one. here's me making the church lady face

ANYways, Toyne does a pretty good job in this one. It trucks right along and the characters are pretty good, although you can see how they'll fulfill their preordained-action-adventure rolls from the moment you meet them. Not that I'm finding fault, we read the same stories over and over and we love them. Joseph Campbell, I'm looking at you... well, I'm looking in your direction, sort of

As I mentioned earlier, there is a fair amount of reference to the earlier story, which I now know is called Sanctus, (the third is called The Tower). Based on the references and this book, Ill probably look for the others, but probably not tomorrow. Toyne has developed a dark and occultish past for the church, with links to paganism and mysticism, that stretches back to the beginnings of mankind. Dark little tendrils of this past are still visible and active the church today, and Toyne weaves a interesting story based on the secrecy surrounding some aspects of the church, such as its archives, that others like Dan Brown have done before. These are the kinds of things that make reasonable people say hmm, and helps to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy a story like this.

Here's a tangent: If the church is opposed to mysticism and mythology, why are there dragons, and other mythical and mystical beasts and icons decorating Saint Peters at the Vatican? And if one of the commandments states that there is only one god, why is Saint Peters just lousy with statutes of Athena and other gods and goddesses? I'm not finding fault, I'm only pointing out that there is probably more room for discussion than hardliners would have us believe.

thanksmorrow

Thanksmorrow.

This is a term I made up just a few days ago when emailing my family about holiday gatherings. Thanksgiving Day was to be at the home of my brother- and sister-in-law, and the following day--the Friday after Thanksgiving--was to be at the home of another brother- and sister-in-law. None of us was going shopping. None of us was driving into the city. All of us were doing our best to avoid the crush of commercialism and retail gone mad that is the early morning hours of the day after Thanksgiving. Sounds like Thanksmorrow.

Black Friday.

Black Friday is a bad term. With bad connotations. Why would anyone willingly involve themselves in such a thing. Look at the company it keeps: Black Death (plague), Black Monday (worldwide stock market crash), Black Sunday (horror movie), Black Mamba (poisonous snake), Black and White (crummy television set, before beautiful color TV), Black Hole (from which no light, or happiness, can escape), Blackshirts (fascist terrorist Musolini group), Black Ops (non-sanction military operations). Well, you get the picture. Its not the word black, and its not the color black, its this particular use of the term to refer to things that aren't good, and that's where the term Black Friday comes from. The Philadelphia Police Department's description of the crowds and the traffic they had to look forward to on the day between Thanksgiving and the Army-Navy game on Saturday. 

Folks would drive into town after the holiday to shop, celebrate, have dinner, go out for drinks and get ready for game day. The Phily police were NOT being kind when they referred to the traffic jams, and the unruly hoards as Black Friday. It was simply a bad day on the job. This term was used in Phily by the police in the 50s and and became generally know to merchants and the general population in Phily around that time. Black Friday wasn't a term that was more generally used by the media to describe the crazed shopping crowds on a more national level until the 1980s, and again, with derision.  More recently, retailers have begun to reluctantly adopt the term, which they originally didn't like, for obvious reasons, and now they're using it to advertise. Its a kind of tongue in cheek, "wow, isn't this shopping thing nutty?" thing that they are stuck with, just like us. Like we're on the same side, looking in. But we're not. People get hurt on Black Friday. People die on Black Friday. *

In 2008 a man was trampled to death in the vestibule of a Walmart when 2000 people broke down the doors. 2009 the police are called to control pushing and shoving crowds at Walmart,  2010, Walmart is store is evacuated due to crowds pushing, 2011, a woman pepper sprays the crowd so she can get a Wii on sale at Walmart, and last year, 2012, two people shot to death arguing over a parking space at Walmart. SO this year, Walmart is refusing to be party to this again, and they're closing until Saturday right? No, they opened at 8:00 AM yesterday and they're advertising includes a big ol' Black Friday logo. They even have a Black Friday theme song you can use to get in the mood. I wonder if the lyrics mention Jdimytai Damour, the man who was trampled to death in 2008. He had been a Walmart employee for about a week when he was killed.

Deep breath. Thanksmorrow. Deep breath. Thanksmorrow.

I've used that ugly Friday term for this day too often in this post. Christmas, Hanukkah, the holiday season in general, is about giving, about spending time with the people you love. It can't be the best way to show your kids how much you love them by kidney punching some lady in K-Mart to buy them a video game. For me, I'll continue to stay away from the shopping this weekend, and get what I need on some other day.

Yesterday, after all, was Thanksmorrow, the day after Thanksgiving. A day to get together with family in an even more relaxed fashion, eat left overs, tell stories, eat more left overs, and spend time with each other. There's no cooking, less cleaning, and even more fun.

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksmorrow, and I hope you will always have a wonderful Thanksmorrow, with family and friends. Every year.


* Black Friday does not come from the positive, retailers-going-from-the-red-into-the-black, lets all celebrate a positive thing together bullpucky you see on some self-serving sites.

splendid suns

Khaled Hosseini made a name for himself with The Kite Runner, in 2003. His followup of life in Afghanistan is A Thousand Splendid Suns, published in 2007. Hosseini was lauded for his debut novel, I think, because of his intimate view of life. Not only is he telling stories of a country that we in the West don't understand, but he tells them in a way that help us to understand what it is to be there, to live there. Hosseini isn't trying to explain what it Afghanistan is, and how it may be different from the places his readers live in or know, but rather, how Afghanistan as a place shapes the people and their history, right down to how they live their lives in their own homes, and even in the hearts. By doing this, Hosseini encourages us to examine how our own places form and shape our lives and our dreams.

What also impressed me about A Thousand Splendid Suns is even though Khaled Hosseini reports in excruciating detail, how difficult women's lives are and have been in Afghanistan, he writes this story from a woman's point of view; a few women, in fact. Splendid Suns follows the lives of these women through the upheaval of the last few decades: from the Soviet occupation, to their expulsion (with American aid to warlords), to civil war between the American-armed warlords and the dissolution of civilized life in large portions of the country, to the eventual wholesale decay of society, which allowed the rise of the Taliban to fill the void, and their eventual harboring of Al Qaeda. Finally, the introduction of American and Allied troops, post September 11, to remove the Taliban and dismantle Al Qaeda (read: kill).

What struck me most is Hosseini's portrayal of the utter hopelessness of the captivity, servitude, and general loathing suffered by women at the hands of men in Afghanistan during the civil strife, and especially the time of Taliban rule, who didn't just turn a blind eye to this but encouraged and indeed mandated it. But it wasn't just that; it was that even amidst this horrific culture of inequality and disdain for women, women continued to have hope. Against an overwhelming crush of oppression and abuse that lasted decades, and in some some places, I am sure, still goes on, women bear up, and refuse to be conquered in spirit. No matter how much their oppressors shoveled at them, they refused to be overcome. And in some small ways, even managed to sometimes shovel back.

Khaled Hosseini has created a modern day heroine story, that left me with my heart in my throat in many instances. It is an enraged clamor in the quiet night of complacency. A story of outrage, laced with beauty, that can--and perhaps has, in spirit--ignite the passion of a people. It is also a reminder to us, who were force fed the stories of American-Allied involvement, what our interventions can mean to the people who suffer both during, and the sometimes worse, vacuous aftermath of our policy of self-interest.

Hosseini has no trouble reminding us of what we may have forgotten: we custom-built these problems ourselves. We fabricated the very environments that later spawned our worst fears and nightmares, and in many cases traded our own feelings of safety and security for that of others. Its a reminder that when we make these decisions to intervene, they have long-lasting implications, that if not seen through to their end, when swallowed in the clamor of 'getting-out-while-we-still-can', they will come back to haunt us. And begs the question: what will come of our recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, in 20 or 30 years, and will we remember then our hand in its genesis.

Read this book.

ebook library?

Lovers of traditional bound books go on about the look, feel, even the aroma of books. The very physicality of them is both pleasing and comforting to traditionalists. But the difference between books and eBooks goes beyond their look, feel and reader interface.

Image: Ed Stein, Rocky Mountain News. Used without permission.

Once a text is unbound, its clearly easier to search, modify, transport, quote, reference, and store; which all seems great for consumer side buy-in. And the buy-in has been tremendous. In early March this year, a Harris Poll found that nearly three in ten Americans (28%) uses an eReader such as the iPad, Kindle or Nook. Up from about 15% the summer before. Yeah, roughly double in about 6 months.

In her recent article for Library Journal, Andromeda Yelton brought up some interesting points about the differences between ebooks and analog, or paper books. you see, right off the bat, I avoided saying 'real' books At issue are the electronic strings attached to these digital texts--strings that lead back to the seller, the publisher, the library... and beyond that, who knows, maybe even the government. She states: "In fact, under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986, the government does not even need a warrant to seize data in the cloud." I just type it, I didn't independently check to see if its true

One of the article's Yelton cites is Alexandra Alter's Wall Street Journal piece; "Your E-Book Is Reading You" That just sounds creepy, but try this on for size. In the first paragraph, Alter drops this one on us, just to get our attention:

"Nearly 18,000 Kindle readers have highlighted the same line from the second [Hunger Games Trilogy] book in the series: "Because sometimes things happen to people and they're not equipped to deal with them."

How does Amazon or Barnes and Noble know these things?

Because your Kindle or Nook told them. But you've already agreed to let them.* I'm pretty sure my books aren't talking to anyone

Non-fiction gets read a little at a time, whereas fiction books are read straight through. Didn't like a book and gave up on it? They know that too, and where you stopped. And don't highlight or bookmark anything if it may embarrass you, 'cause they're keeping track of that too. what if I was doing research? are they copying marginal notes people make? ugh

Interesting, right? But maybe more important is the lack of library in the ebook equation. That's library as an idea I'm talking about now. Library as a repository of ideas, a storehouse of knowledge. I know what you're thinking, electronic data is easier to keep, maintain, access, search, add meta-data to, sure, I hear you, but that's not what's going on with ebooks right now. They just sit out there in the cloud, and libraries--public or private--just have access to them.

According to Amazon, the Kindle 3 holds about 4 gig, which translates to about 3500 books, but if you start getting close to 1000, the performance starts to suffer. Sounds like a lot, but I've owned more books than that in my life, and I'm sure my public library is holding something like 100,000 volumes; and none of them is an ebook.

Barbara Fister who writes the Library Babel Fish blog on Inside Higher Ed, explains the problem with not having your data on hand this way: "materials that were publicly available in a pre-web state tended to evade notice; web access is wonderful, but it exposes things." And exposure makes folks nervous, and nervous folks tend to block access. When libraries had all of their material sitting on the shelves, your access, as a patron of the library, was limited only to the operating hours of the library building. I know: its so... analog. And the internet is always open, right?

Wrong. In fact, Fister's titled her blog entry: "The Library Vanishes - Again."

Relying on the internet, the Cloud, or some other off-site-and-out-of-your-control server farm to store your data is not what public libraries are traditionally built on. Preservation of data is also a hallmark of public library service. And how do you preserve data that you don't physically have?

In a blog post last Monday at the newly formed Digital Public Library of America, Carly Boxer summarizes the issue this way: "what happens if our desire to access digital records outlives the financial viability of the company storing them?" In fact, her piece is driven by fears which arose in the wake of superstorm Sandy, citing this horrifying example: the Eyebeam Center for Art and Technology in New York, which stores digital artworks, was flooded during Hurricane Sandy, and much of their digital archive was damaged and is now undergoing an emergency preservation and restoration process.

Its a little clunky, and definitely old-fashioned, but the way libraries have traditionally stored and preserved hard copies helped to defend against this type of threat. But library buildings are like any other building and they can also be flooded, burned, and knocked down, but the beauty in the system is redundancy. Lots of little libraries have similar holdings, and if one library is damaged, many, if not all of the materials reside elsewhere. That, and it takes a lot longer for a book to reach a point when it can't be read any longer. Not so with digital files. Anyone still have their resume from 1995 stored on a floppy disk?

The bottom line is: we're stuck with books; at least some of them. Even if old, out-of-print materials are scanned and digitized, any book or other printed document that has any historic interest or value will still need to be preserved. Its just the way we do.

So I am just a hold out? An older guy who still remembers the look and feel of books from my younger days? A sentimentalist? Yeah, I guess so. And I understand that I (along with folks like me) am not going to stop the influx of eReaders and other digital text advances. Frankly, I don't want to. I just think the jury is out on how we're storing, distributing, and using these technologies. Libraries, thankfully, have our interests at heart, and are helping to lead the charge.

I want to get lost in a book. I love how a good story take us away from where we are, and help us to see things in new and interesting ways. And I don't think John Green is alone in saying: “A novel is a conversation between a reader and a writer.” That's certainly the way I feel about it too, and I'm not ready to have some big tech company or publisher eavesdropping on that conversation, taking notes, and using that information to sell me things.

Feels like a need a shower. that's still private, right? ...amazon?

Update: Check out this chart which provides some info on who's keeping track of your eReading habits and how, thanks to Cindy Cohn and Parker Higgins over at Electronic Frontier Foundation.

* Section 4(a) of the Nook Terms of Use: "Privacy. You agree that we may use, collect and share information in accordance with our Privacy Policy. Without limitation, we will collect, use and/or disclose information regarding you and your use of your NOOK and the Service in order to: (i) provide the Service to you; (ii) permit you to engage in activities that you initiate through the Service, such as purchasing Digital Content and reviewing products; and (iii) analyze, operate, support, maintain and improve your NOOK or the Service. We reserve the right to make changes to our Privacy Policy at any time" 

library material

Its not yours... its ours.

Soon, the question may not be so much about how we catalog, access, store and generally treat library materials, the question may be a much simpler one: what library materials?

It is true that information that was once contained only in books is becoming more and more digitized, resulting in the very material-ness of information slowing fading into the past. But the time when all of the physical items that we store in, and lend out of our libraries, evaporates into memory, is not here yet.

In the meantime, we have library materials. Analog, baby. But its not just books anymore, and I'm sure we all know that, but what seems to have escaped us as a public-library-using society, is that even though the materials have changed, the way we use them has not.

But it should.

Books, frankly, can take a beating. On the surface, books seem pretty delicate. They're made of paper (generally) and other natural materials, easily ripped, folded, or marked up. They are susceptible to broken bindings, lost pages, water damage, rot, and even flames. But walk into your local library and you'll easily find volumes that are 30, 50, even 100 years old. Standing in stodgy defiance of our notions of their delicacy, they are still readable, and as fully functional as the day they were added to the collection. What differs today, is the more modern technologies used to deliver library content. These newer materials are certainly new-fangled and very techie, but seldom are they as durable as a 50-year-old book.

Books are easy: You can drop a book on the coffee table, throw it in your bag, read it at the beach, even set it on the sand. Try that with a DVD. Or a Kindle. Good luck! I'm not complaining about these new technologies, I love them! actually, I don't love ereaders. * I just wish they worked when I take them home from my library. But they don't work, because they've been damaged by careless handling.

Did you get a little of that popcorn grease on the book you took out of the library? Or did you drop it on the floor in the dark, and then kick it? While this may be a problem if everyone does it to library books, the truth is, if it does happen now and again, we can still all read and enjoy that book. Not so with a DVD, CD and maybe even an eReader. You need to be MORE careful with these materials, because unlike our old (old!) friend, the book, info-tech delivery systems are typically delicate.

You like to eat a bag of Cheetos, or a bucket of KFC while watching a movie? Have at it. But wash your hands before smearing up the DVD. Grease will wash off, but it also attracts dust and dirt, which can scratch, and scratches don't wash off. And that's bad.

you may be confusing DVDs with hockey pucks.
hint: hockey pucks are black.

And don't think you can just set a disk down, just for a second, on your coffee table, which is really, really clean! Because it isn't, and you won't, and it it will get ruined, and you know it will. Can't find the box it came in? Put it back in your player, put down your Funyuns and find it. This level of responsibility is what you agreed to when you borrowed this material from the library. Its an implied contract that you've made with the library and all of its users (us!) So do your job.

Here's some advice from the Kindle Fire User's Manual:

"...glass could break if the device is dropped or receives a substantial impact. If the glass breaks, chips, or cracks, stop using your Kindle Fire and do not touch or attempt to remove the damaged glass."

Ooooo... yeah, you're done. Oh, and don't leave it where it could get hot or cold, like in your car. Because its not a book, and when you do, you could ruin it.

And its not yours... its ours.

* I might love eReaders; I don't know, I've never used one.

seven samurai

I just watched Seven Samurai (Shichinin no samurai), directed by Akira Kurosawa. Classic, 1954 black and white drama of good guys vs. the bad guys... against overwhelming odds.

I didn't really stop to think about what a carefully--and patiently--constructed film this is, until the intermission reel ran about halfway through and I thought, hasn't it been over an hour? A little more actually, was the answer; this epic is 3 hours, 27 minutes. And what's so wonderful about that? I think its actually what The Lord of the Rings movies were missing: quiet time.

In contrast to the LOTR books, the movies--even though they're of similar length as the Seven Samurai--seem to be non-stop action. So much action, that there isn't time for the mind to rest and consider the tensions, the characters, and the other subtleties that make up a well constructed narrative.

Kurosawa takes his time building his story and his characters, so that when the final battle scenes come, we go into the battle with full knowledge of who these people are, how they feel and what drives them. But the final battle scene is not the only action in the film, there is a balance of drama, character building, conversation, humor and action throughout, along with some very nice camera shots along the way.

There are three scenes focused on women, for example, that not only work as contrast to the general masculinity of this picture, but are so subtle, and yet so powerful. Two of them don't even have any dialog, yet Kurosawa and his actresses bring these scenes to life and the story pours from the screen, wordlessly. Breathtaking.

I had heard that Seven Samurai was a classic, but I'm not enough of a film buff to fully understand its place in film history, which is apparently pretty high falutin'. Seven Samurai shows up on some serious ten best films of all time lists. Seven Samurai was the basis of the 1960 American film, The Magnificent Seven.

And before we close, a little praise, and some apropos ranting:

Thanks to my local public library for having such a great DVD collection! And thanks to everyone who either: didn't take this movie out because its old, or sub-titled, OR did take it out and had sense enough not to manhandle the disk.

I mean, who scratches a borrowed disk? Especially a library disk, that belongs to all of us? Y'all need a lesson in implied social contractual obligations. You know, how your rights to borrow a DVD from the library are inextricably* bound to your obligations to treat said DVD (book, map, magazine, et al) with respect, even reverence. yeah, i said it

You know what? I think the care and treatment of library materials warrants its own post.

Peace. Oh, and see this movie. Like, now.

* Unavoidably, inescapably, indissolubly, indivisibly, ineluctably... bound!

soapbox

Is this light waiting for you?

But, you aren't waiting for it, are you? Nope, you're already gone.

That's okay, I know you're in a hurry. You know what? I'm not in a hurry, I'll wait.

You know who you are: as soon as you wander (or speed walk) to the corner, you press the big, shiny button on the light post for the walk light, so you can cross the street. But 4 seconds later, the two visible cars within a half-mile have gone by, and you boogie across the street and on your way. No problem. Mission accomplished. Pressin' buttons, and gettin' things done.

60 seconds later, I come along in my car--I know, I'm a bad person for driving the 5 miles to work every day--and what do I find but a red light. No problem, I'm a patient driver, red lights happen all the time. But then the walk light comes on... it stops traffic in both directions... all of us carbound folk look around for the lil' ol' lady we're expecting to see, waiting to cross the road... but, where are you?

You're gone!

Maybe its a pet peeve. Maybe I'm the only one who notices this, and everyone else is happy to wait, or just doesn't notice. Maybe.

If, on the other hand, this scenario seems familiar to you, or even, dare I say it, you've pressed that button without a second thought, then maybe you should read on. And if by chance, this happens to you when you're driving AND you also press the walk light button without thinking (And I know you do) then by all means, read on, and perhaps bookmark this page for future reading whilst performing self-flagellation.

Before we get started, let me just say that there is a fine line between a rant and respectful, social commentary. I'm pretty sure that line runs right through here somewheres.

Pressing the walk light is an implied contract, between you and the people around you. See? BOOM, I just came right out and said my thing. I'll explain later. We live in a world that is populated, dear friends, with other people. People who care about the world they live in, just as you do. America especially, is an experiment in freedom, and we Americans revel in our freedom. And we can do whatever we want in America, right?

Not really. And that, is where I believe the problem lies. I know careless walk light pressage is a small issue, but what better, than an insignificant issue to test the American ideals of freedom and liberty. Y'all remember this little diddy, right?

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. - Thomas Jefferson

That's from the Declaration of Independence. Life and liberty, baby. Our rights! Sweet. Life we got, but this liberty thing is a little trickier. Jefferson explains liberty this way:

Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual. - Thomas Jefferson

So its not a whatever-you-feel-like-it kind of deal. Your liberty is limited, and so is mine, by the equal rights of others. Its not the law that prevents you from pressing the walk light when you don't need it. Or, heaven forfend, allowing your kid to smack it over and over and over again, while you wait for the bus! for real yo, seen it. And this one too. check it out. Or--and this one makes my skin ccraawwwl--purposefully pressing the walk light with the express intent of slowing and or stopping rush hour traffic so that you can wave ELECT ME FOR... (Mayor, city councilor, or whatever) signs at the folks sitting in their cars, trying to get home. It boggles the mind! Who's going to vote for the chump that made their commute last an extra 10 minutes?

So how does all this highfalutin talk relate to walk lights? Like so: when you press the button to call for the walk light, you're making an implied contract with the people around you, regardless of whether they are standing next to you, or are in a car down the road that you can't even see. Just because you can't see me, don't know me, or are just in a hurry and hedging your bets, that doesn't mean its okay to hit that button to stop traffic for you if you have no intention of using it. You have a social responsibility to the rest of us, to think about someone other than yourself.

And that's the trick right? If you're using the light to get across the street, then I'm right there with you brother. Press away. Cross at liberty and pursue your freedom! But if you're planning on just crossing the street as soon as you get a break in the traffic, why press the walk light? In most cases, the walk light won't even activate until the next light cycle. What that means is: its not going to come on until the light turns red anyway, so if the light is going to stop traffic, you'll have plenty of time to get across the road then, so just wait for the traffic light.

And pressing the walk light won't make the lights turn red any quicker either. that's a take away message right there homey Any more than pressing the call button for an elevator 19 times will make it travel any faster, or skip over other floors, in its efforts to get to you and your trembling, button jonesing fingers.

So whats the right thing to do? Its simple; be careful with other people's time, and expect them to be careful with yours.