Patient pooches, premature pre-judgement, premonitory patterns, and pretty parks

A drop in the "validity bucket" of how good a dog she is:

I'll be home soon, dog-dog.  You wait there.  Good dog.

She waited for quite a while after I left for a run.  It makes me wonder what she does when we are both at work/school all day long...kind of makes one wish for the simple life.

More funny signs:

Lost in translation? No. Just ignorance on my part.  When in Rome...

Upon seeing this sign in Flushing (the other Chinatown of NYC), I immediately laughed and photographed it based on my ignorant assumption that something was lost in translation and that the RD was mistakingly added instead of ST (i.e. they meant to write fourty-first but exchanged the -st suffix with the -rd suffix we normally put on the number three).  Nothing like some close-minded stereotyping to make one fit right into the American culture (now there is some broad stereotyping for you).  When in Rome...  The funniest part of this story is that after sitting down to a great dinner of Malaysian fare with some friends we passed back by this sign and noted it to a new Chinese acquaintance of ours.  He corrected us.  The street sign is indicating Fourty-first Road (i.e. 41 RD).  Duely noted.

This randomly-generated pattern appeared on the coffee I brewed for my wife a couple of weeks ago.  I took it as a sign and proof that I brewed some extra love in to the mug for her.

That's a full-caf beating-heart drip to go.

It reminds me of the (in)famous jesus-toast story:

WWJD?  Probably break the bread and give it to someone in need.  Not moth-ball it indefinitely as undeniable proof of one's beliefs.  But who am I to judge.  I'm just sayin'.

Not my toast or my picture.

Lastly, I'll leave with a few snaps of a couple cool and wildly successful park installations in New York City (one old and one new).  As a landscape architecture student, I've learned about good and bad park design and, having studied both of these sites, I can say this: study famous landscape architecture until you're blue in the face - it's still not the same thing as experiencing the site in real life.

The water feature dominating the north wall of Paley Park.  This 'pocket park' was built on a tiny plot among the highrises on East 53rd Street in Manhattan in 1967.  Funded by the William S. Paley Foundation and built as a respite from the din of the city "for the people".  And respite it is.  You cannot hear a thing from the street (about 25m away) when sitting hear the fountain.

An axonometric drawing of Paley Park that I created for a project.  That would be the northern curb of East 53rd Street in the lower left portion of the drawing.  Axonometric drawings do look a little wierd, mostly due to the fact that they are scalable in all three axes.  In particular, this one looks anaemic since I opted to represent the honey locust (Gleditsia triacanthos var. inermis) trees as columns.  Gimme a break.  I generated this when I had only been a student in the MLA program for about 7 weeks and I hadn't yet learned how to draw trees.  And for the record, LAs can do a lot more than just drawing trees, which we can also do.  I probably shouldn't have to write this, but I'll do it anyway: © 2010 dg (that's me).

The High Line.  Raised railway going down the west side of Manhattan, abandoned in 1980 (according to good ol' Wiki), and recently (partly still under construction, I think) turned into a magnificant linear park (vision: two local residents and co-founders of Friends of the High Line, Joshua David and Robert Hammond, and designed by landscape architect, James Corner).

Notes from recent life

In my attempt to make these entries more graphic than textual (let's face it, we all prefer looking at the pictures any way!), here are a few vignettes from the past few weeks.

Another favourite brewing method: double espresso long. Yes, it's possible to overextract the beans and get all sorts of aweful tastes, but if one is careful and does it just right there is gaboons of crema and silky-rich espresso...mmmh.

This semester I have cut down on my coffee consumption completely unintentionally.  I was usually a two-a-day guy (morning-early afternoon) and that would bump up to three+ when the end-of-semester work began piling up.  Now it's mostly one-a-day (travel mug during the commute) and, once in a while on particularly draggy days, a second after lunch.  The results: I look forward to coffee even more now (if that were possible), I enjoy the taste more, and I probably sleep better.  Plus the whole financial thing.  Buying really good, locally-roasted, organic, fair trade beans is one frill I enjoy without guilt.  Planet Bean (the hometown roast) Ethiopian Yirgacheffe is the roast of choice for moi these days although I've also, fairly recently, enjoyed roasts from Birds & Beans (the roast of my new neighbourhood) and some Fog City blend roast that a friend recently brought back from Java Blend in Halifax.  Dee-lish!

A mechanical shop near our home advertising its services.  We go elsewhere.

 

 

Man's best friend guarding the Man-Shed. Good dog.

On a related Man-Shed-and-dog note, I now have the dog trained to follow me to the Man-Shed every time I go there to get something. My motivation: it's a good feeling to have your dog accompany you when you're working on something (fixing bikes, yard work, house repairs). Her motivation: he keeps TREATS in that little house!!! A little food motivation goes a long way with her.

Insightful documentary on urban design and the life of and in cities.

We saw Gary Hustwit's documentary Urbanized (2011) this past Tuesday and I thought it was pretty well done.  Some really nice footage and interviews -- I found the segment on Bogotá and the interview with its former mayor, Enrique Peñalosa, particularly entertaining. Living under the rule of Rob Ford certainly leaves something to be desired... Anyway, Urbanized gets my recommendation.  Next in the cue of films to see are Hustwit's first two installments in his "design trilogy": Helvetica (2007, this paragraph is in Helvetica as an homage) and Objectified (2009).

Finishing off with a short film of my own.  Appologies about the video quality (I shot this on my phone -- What can phones not do these days?) and the fact that it's shot sideways (I'm a video amateur).

Yes, I write about my dog.  Yes, I'm one of those people. And, yes, I do so because she is the best dog in the whole wide world.

daily brew

One of my very favourite things in life: the simple-in-its-complexity cup of coffee.  This is one department where quality reigns over quantity.

Dec. 9 -- French press paired with scientific manuscript preparation.

Dec. 10 -- My favourite (americano) paired with two of my other favourites (steel and wood).

mo-vin' on up in the world

On only Day 20 of my current Movember offering, my wife's cousin said I reminded her of none other than my childhood hero: Magnum P.I.

My hero: Good ol' Mag.

Movember offering: Day 20.

Ok, so I'm currently minus a few things:

   1. a sweet red Ferrari 308GTS
   2. a sweet Hawaiian shirt
   3. luscious flowing locks
   4. a best bud I can call "Higgey-baby"

Ok, so Mag didn't really call Higgins "Higgey-baby", I believe that was the chopper pilot, T.C., but if I were Mag, I would have called Higgins "Higgey-baby".

There you have it.  My only bone to pick with my childhood hero.