In which I explain my Summer with a cartoon

Courtesy PhD Comics

That's pretty much how it went down this year, plus or minus some differences. Please don't let my supervisor know about this post...

He's so pointy it hurts...

So, they're coming out with a live-action "Transformers" movie in 2007. Okay, it's Transformers. I'm well aware. I loved them as a kid and I'm 24 now. I realize that. I told some friends that I'd go see it in theatres but I probably won't because I'm 24. Even though the this video clip of Optimus Prime wasn't too shabby. I mean, this picture of him seems very faithful to the cartoon:


So far so good. My question is this. How did we get a Megatron that goes from looking like this originally:
To this for the movie:

WTF?! So many thoughts going into my head...like the fact that it was designed by some 14 year-old fanboy with a hard-on for sharp, pointy things...or the fact that Megatron seem to have been based on tattoo designs...or the fact that Megatron seemed to have fallen one too many times into a skate sharpener...everything about this design seems to scream "EXTREME!!!" but in that overused, late '90s way.

Anyways, this has effectively ruined the movie. Oh well, I guess you really can't bring your childhood back...

Hat tip to The Superficial, The Comic Blog, and Comic Art Community for the story and the pictures

From the makers of "Attack of the Plush Tomato"...

...comes:

"Planes on a Snake"

Hat tip to Matt and Andria

Another piece of childhood down the drain

I remember days back when I was a kid when I would watch Street Cents, a half-hour commercial affairs TV show produced by the CBC that was targeted to kids and teens. And NO, I didn't watch it because of Jonathan Torrens...

While it wasn't groundbreaking, to me, it just seemed like a useful show to have around, like an encyclopedia. You never know when the product they test will actually help you decide on a purchase (Fave test: Nalgene water bottle. They had to drop a completely filled bottle off something like a 8 storey building for it to smash in half).

So it's with some sadness to hear that the CBC is cancelling the show because of dwindling youth audience. While I don't fault them for their decision, it's still sad to see a staple of MY CBC mythos disappearing.

Maybe they could turn it into a vlog or something. Something useful like this shouldn't just be dropped into the dustbin of cancelled shows...

Softwood Soft Ruling

Are these WTO rulings in favour of Canada over the softwood lumber dispute even worth anything anymore? In the past several years, almost 99% of stories I've read about rulings have gone in Canada's favour. Yet, the deal being brought to the table by the US is that they get to keep $1 billion in tariffs that they took illegally from us and we STILL have to impose duties on our own lumber, even though in NAFTA and WTO rulings, we were never in the wrong.

How effective can the WTO be if nations bound to their rules can just flagrantly disregards them?

We're Number One! (because no one's left)...

11 universities, including UofT, McMaster University and UBC, have opted out of the Maclean's Annual University Survey, citing flawed methodology on Maclean's part for their withdrawl.

While I really don't care either way, it really paves the way for Queen's to brag about the fact that we're #1 in the survey!

Oh wait, McGill's still around...

Update Aug. 24, 2006 7:49pm

Apparently, McGill WILL be number one because we're not even there anymore. It seems that Queen's has reviewed (*cough* followed the crowd *cough*) this issue and has decided to pulled out of the Maclean's survey. With most of the major universities out, looks like the yearly publication is likely as good as dead...

Work in a termite mound!

Via Treehugger

Did you ever wonder what it would be like to be a termite? Now you can!

A sprawl-ing post

I’m about a week late from responding to this post by Andrew Potter because I keep putting it off. It’s one of those rare opportunities where someone speaks of something that I’m interested in.

He points to an article in the Aug. 6 Sunday Times discussing the emerging resistance to ‘vertical sprawl’ in the US, where they tie-in the ideas of smart growth and infill development with ideas of dropping 70-storey towers in a low-rise residential neighbourhood. This is in response to a reader who believes“…that the solution to our economic and environmental problems was to have everyone living in ultra-dense 50-story towers, 10 000 people or so to a tower”. The same day, I read Joel Kotkin’s piece on the permanence of the suburban landscape in the US.

I don’t disagree with Andrew. I don’t think sprawl is inherently evil nor is density inherently moral. What I really disagree with is the content of the article. In it, they discuss residential groups who are opposed to high-rise development in infill projects in low-density neighbourhoods, which they call suburban sprawl. They tie it to infill development and smart growth principles, which they argue that in practice, particularly in working-class neighbourhoods, “means displacement and gentrification, often by redevelopment eminent domain”.

Smart Growth Principles, according to the State of Maryland, an early proponent, include the following:

· Mix land uses
· Take advantage of compact building design
· Create housing opportunities and choices
· Create walkable communities
· Foster distinctive, attractive communities with a strong sense of plan
· Preserve open space, farmland, natural beauty, and critical environmental areas
· Provide a variety of transportation options
· Strengthen and direct development to existing communities
· Make development decisions predictable, fair, and cost effective
· Encourage community and stakeholder collaboration in development decisions.

These principles are vague, but it also provides elbowroom to develop within the context of the site. Comparing this list to the arguments for and against Smart Growth in the article, it seems to me that neither the developers nor the opposition actually understand what Smart Growth means. I’m not even a full-fledged planner with any work experience and I can tell you that a bunch of 62-storey towers in a low-density neighbourhood is a stupid idea. I’ve had it drilled into my head that any development, especially infill, should always be integrated within the context of the immediate area and the surrounding neighbourhoods. According to Smart Growth, community and stakeholder collaboration would’ve immediately recognized the problem of such inconsistent development. The problem of gentrification is a genuine concern, and no one has a complete answer. But part of Smart Growth and good planning is that developments need to think long-term and consider all socio-economic groups. Having affordable housing and good community amenities in a development is a start towards ensuring that the working-class are LESS LIKELY to be driven out. It’s not the only tool we have, but one of many. But that doesn’t mean high-density can’t work. It just has to be done appropriately and in the right context. It’s not how densely you build it, but how you build it dense and why. Density in and of itself serves little purpose. It’s not that these people are opposed to ‘vertical sprawl’ per se, but merely poor planning.

I think the problem Andrew and I both have with this topic is that the loudest voices seem to be misusing the history of suburban development in order to impose morals and find conspiracies that isn’t there. The environmental consequences of suburban development are quite real (land consumption, surface run-off, etc.) whereas the social and economic ones are certainly still up for debate. Real or perceived, these are all unfortunately unintended ones. No one was brainwashed into moving to the suburbs. Advertising certainly has great powers of persuasion, but people knew full well what they were buying into.

The solution is not to ban all suburban development, since that seems unlikely and quite absurd. Kotkin argues, at least in the US, that the suburbs are here to stay. The future is about how to build better suburbs. And it’s not just the environmental or a socio-economic concern. It’s also a demographic one. Once the bulk of the baby-boomers start retiring, will they be willing to drive all the time to the grocery store, the theatres, etc.? This is where the principles of Smart Growth and New Urbanism may come in handy. It’s not a perfect solution, to be sure, but nothing is. And if this segment does hold the enormous economic influence that it's been touted to have, maybe their needs will direct us to the development that have been trying to implement; maybe the people who lead us out into low-density will once again lead us to where we need to go: more compact, environmentally sustainable, socio-economically equitable (in opportunity), and age-adaptable communities.

My brain has collapsed because of Britney Spears

How could that be, since she's in Alabama or Florida or somewhere and I'm in sunny Kingston?
Since I don't know how to clip the youtube video to this post, you'll just have to go to either link:

Youtube- Britney Spears acting very strange or stoned...

The Superficial- Britney Spears is very truly out of her mind...

Granted, making fun of celebrity intelligence is easier than well, Paris Hilton (!Zing!), but this certainly is a new low. I also recommend not watching it straight through, lest your eyes try to eat itself...

hat tip to Kate

Happy Wonderful Fun Time Post!

via Metafilter

"Deception, thy name is the Pentagon"

"It came from beneath the sea!!!"

I feel all warm and fuzzy after reading these...

A racket through and through.

Let's say I'm playing high-stakes poker with a couple of mobsters. I take most of their money but on the last hand I get caught dealing from the bottom of the deck. Now, at this point, they're... probably slightly miffed about what I've done. I'm likely going to be taken out back and shot. Instead, I plead with them a little, give them back their money and my money and they decide to let me leave with my life. I whine a bit more and they even agree to let me keep MY money.

Sounds ridiculous, right?

Well, so's AC Milan playing in Champions League.

Is it comfortable in here...or is it just me

I've been in Stauffer library a lot these last few months because I can't seem to hack out a decent draft of my thesis (which is another post altogether).

But there've been times earlier in the summer when the A/C was on and I was actually cold. But today, amidst Kingston's heat alert and request to ease the load on our electricity grid, I'm finding Stauffer's temperatures to be quite comfortable. Why is this happening? I can see only two explanations for this:

1) Queen's actually took the request to heart and have upped the thermostat in the library.

2) They're renovating part of the 1st floor to make way for a new cafe and in doing so, they were tossing out a lot of construction material out the window and as I was walking by, the blast of A/C escaping out the window could literally knock you to the ground. Therefore, the second possibility is that all the cold is escaping through that one outlet.

I hope it's the former and I doubt the latter (mainly because I can't see that much cold air escaping from that one area especially when the main entrance is thoroughly opened all the time). But then my question is this: No one's complained that it's too warm in the library. So why isn't THIS temperature the norm so that less energy is used? Is the cooler temperatures to preserve the old materials? But if that's the case, shouldn't that kind of material be in a special climate controlled room anyhow?

LOL's not bad for me after all...

A few days after my post on the NY Times' article on abbreviating every word, this article came out today about how instant messaging (IM) HAS NOT affected the grammar of today's youths.

phew...it sure is a relief to read this. Because once grammar goes, they'll start listening to that hippity-hop music and wearing baggy pants and then it's over...

Gentrification

Hat tip to the Accordion Guy:

Obvi. that's just ridic. and exces.

via kottke.

The Internet, via the email and instant messaging (IM), has been a leader in the great bastardization of the English language. And yes, it's not a new thing since it's a continually evolving language and others have tried to tenderize it before (Remember Ebonics, anyone?).

Now, my friends have used short-forms such as 'convos' for conversation and 'whatevs' for whatever and I generally roll my eyes at them.

But this girl's use of abbreviations and shortcuts is just ridiculous and excessive.

I'm sitting here and writing this and it doesn't seem like I have a point to make, much like the article. The author doesn't chastise nor condone her sister's way of speaking. I'm just curious as to what the point of abbreviating everything is? It's not like it saves that much more time by not saying the remaining variables. Is it clever for clever's sake?

I'm also not lamenting over the downfall of the english language since you have to know the full word to understand the abbreviation. Besides, I can't see a functional english language being fully distilled into five letter, monosyllabic arrangements and there'd be enough english majors left in the world who'll smack people down trying to use the Ling in any formal basis.

Anyways, if anyone catches me talking like that, I give you permission to Rochambeau me, and you can go first.

Oh, the guilt

It's not that I find blogging a chore, but I definitely feel guilty both when I haven't posted something of substance in adequate frequency and when I feel like I'm procrastinating WHEN I am posting something of substance. I just can't win. Oh well, here're some nuggets, for those still interested in reading:
First, Ken Jennings (yes, that Ken Jennings from Jeopardy) writes an obviously satirical post about how Jeopardy should be improved. Anyone who reads it will agree with me that he is quite obviously sarcastic and not at all serious. What's interesting is that Michael Starr of the New York Post took it seriously and publishes it, which gets picked up by AP! Ken of course takes it in stride, but someone really needs to buy Mr. Starr a clue (for $400, Alex...).

Number two, thanks to his infamous stunt in the World Cup final, Zinedine Zidane's name has now been verbed.

Finally, here are three very interesting posts by Declan on transit and the Stats Canada report about commuting times. Part 1 briefly talks about the report, the major thing being car travel and transit times are up (except in Vancouver) and transit times are higher than automobile travel times. Part 2 deals with why that might be and how traffic demand works in big cities. As an urban planner to be, I am ashamed that I can't answer his question to my own satisfaction mainly because I've read very little on traffic issues. What he says makes sense to me but I can't say for sure and frankly it's going to make me procrastinate for an hour or so trying to find an academic paper that confirms this. Finally, part 3's a doozy. It's funny and at the same time a bit sad. He rebuts a Margaret Wente column with this issue and it's funny because Wente's column is JUST TERRIBLY WRITTEN AND ARGUED. It's sad because a fair number of Globe readers will have read it and a percentage of that group will agree with her erroneous statements and will in no way help to bring better transit to Toronto. Let's hope that these people will read Declan's rebuttal...

1 red paperclip = 1 house

As many mainstream media outlets had been following this story, Kyle MacDonald's been slowly bartering things from his one red paperclip to his goal of his own home. His goal has been reached. As of July 7th, 2006, he's traded a spot in a movie to the town of Kipling, Saskatchewan for a house on 503 Main Street.

An Inconvenient Truth

Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" is interesting and good in a variety of ways.

His arguments and presentation of facts about global warming isn't new, though compelling. For someone who have studied the science of climate change, he or she would find this film a little light. Rather, it is a good primer for those who are skeptical or know nothing of the situation. His solutions, also, aren't new or provoking. But that's the point. The solutions and technologies are out there. It's a question of whether people will accept the responsibility of our actions and the necessary change in the way we live.

The visuals, are like most good visuals, stunning. Like the works of Ed Burtynsky, you can't help but feel a little shock and disappointed by the massive change humanity is causing, particularly the difference in glacier sizes around the world.

And while most of the film is Al Gore "giving" his presentation (the one he's delivered in thousands of places across the world) to a small audience, it is also partly a documentary into his life and his fascination with the issue throughout his political career, from being in committees in Congress to his stint as VP and through to his presidential bid and its aftermath. Not only does this prevent the film from being a 90 minute slideshow presentation, it provides a glimpse into a man who could be raking in $50,000 fees giving speeches about his political career, but insteads decides to travel around the world talking about ice cores and global ocean currents and carbon dioxide emissions.

It is the loss in 2000 that spurred him to return to his lecture on climate change. And it seems as though the title has two meanings, one for the audience and one for him. In that, while for us, the inconvenient truth is of course, the way we live is impacting the Earth and our own future severely, for him, it's that perhaps he was never meant to be the President of the United States. While one might argue that he would wield more political clout as the President to affect change, it's interesting whether he would have been bogged down by the responsibilities to his country and to the office to be truly effective.

Instead, his responsibility is now to the world at large, and he has given the scientific community something else: A face and a voice. Perhaps this is his niche, his role: to be the Paul Revere of climate change, to warn us of the dangers ahead.

He seems suited because he straddles both the scientific and political community. He understands the language of the scientists. But having served in politics, he is a much better and more recognized orator than any scientist could be. In doing so, he could deliver the message, like the film, with effectiveness, using both scientific studies, but also with a little bit of humour (his presentation includes a clip from Matt Groening's Futurama about global warming) and visuals to cement his argument. Besides, with all due respect, I doubt most people would be able to pick out NASA scientist James Hansen (one of the biggest voices about climate change in the scientific community) from a line-up. It was a little annoying, though, during the film when he'd drop names like Carl Sagan as if he was a bowling buddy. But conversely, his connections with so many climate change scientists just shows how much attention the scientific community is paying to him.

I don't, however, share Gore's optimism. The people who should see this will probably not because it wouldn't interest them. And that's the problem. The people who would see this move have or will change their behaviour. The rest don't see it affecting their lives. But by the time that it does affect their lives and the clamour for change finally happens, it'll be too late. It seems that as much as we don't want to be told what to do, we need government to force this change upon us. Humans rarely change behaviour unless they are forced to. And either we can force the rest of the citizens to change now through our laws, or we can let the resulting consequences from global warming do it for us. That too is an inconvenient truth

Playing catch-up

This post from Treehugger just gives me an excuse to berate Queen's about how much catch-up they have to do on the sustainability front. Basically, it's a story about University of Calgary's initiative to provide free bikes for students to travel around campus. And while we have the Yellow Bike Action here in Kingston, it's a community group effort, not the university. The bike program itself is part of a broader Sustainability Initiative.

Now, having done research on campus sustainability, we already knew that UBC and UVic were ahead of us in this category, not to mention many US universities. UofC pulling ahead just goes to show how hesitant Queen's is to change. A student position was finally created by the AMS to study and possibly coordinate sustainability efforts, and that was with much teeth-pulling from my friend Anjali Helferty.

The problem isn't that there isn't enough students willing to be involved. The problem is the lack of support from the Administration. And while Campus Planning can say that they've all these great projects in progress, there's no one to market them. There's no broad strategy to coordinate efforts. Queen's is planning to build this great LEED-certified building, but buildings won't create sustainability. A shift in mentality does. A change in how Queen's operate does. Now, Anjali deserves all the praise for her work, but until the administration is willing to put money behind creating a real sustainability officer within the administration structure and give it real power, Queen's will continue to fall behind with its piecemeal projects even as it's trying to catch up with the 21st century.

It's so easy too. It already has most of its students living in less than elegant housing in close proximity to the campus. Take advantage of that. You have engineers who construct an elaborate set piece for their formal. You have a show like "From the Ground Up", where professional contractors and subcontractors oversee youths building and renovating homes. Why not do a similar thing, except have the university pay the pros to oversee student volunteers who build a house or two over the summer. In exchange, they learn extra skills, they get to live there for a year rent-free and now Queen's has new housing to rent to other students. Incorporate some simple environmental design like strawbale walls, solar orientation, and efficient appliances, and you have a sustainable house. Obviously, it's not so clear-cut and there'd be some legal issues to deal with. But this is me coming up with an idea at 1:21 AM. Imagine someone who's paid to come up with these ideas and make them work...?

That's what we need. Or we won't even get to where U of C is.

my dealers...of music

I don't know what brought this about, but most of you may already know of the bands of which I'm about to speak, so bare with me.

My music collection is probably defined as "alt-rock indie" (with a smattering of other genres) at best and "mainstream bandwagon indie-hopping" at worst. However, my favourites are due solely to the friends around me who either dragged me to a concert or lent me their CD to listen to and of course, I was blown away by what I was hearing. So this post is for them. In no particular order of favourites:

Mike Rate: he was a master's student in my lab when I was doing my undergrad thesis. To kill the many hours of driving, he brought along a well-honed collection of CDs of the hard-rock, punk persuasion. He re-introduced me to Queens of the Stone Age and Less than Jake. Less than Jake's "Anthem" was probably not the best ska-punk CD in people's minds by far. I don't know what it was, but I could listen to that CD over and over and over...and I did. It also spurred me back on to the punk train, to look up good ol' bands like the Ramones, the Clash and the contemporary ones like NoFX and Bad Religion. I had actually listened to QOTSA's "Songs for the Deaf" one time at Future Shop but couldn't get into it. It took listening to Mike's CD for 2 months straight to get me hooked. 65 minutes of damaging guitar hooks and Dave Grohl's drumming deliciousness was an energizer during the hellishness that was coring in the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia.

Wesley Fok: Ahh, Wesley, proud owner of Chrominance and Angels Twenty. He dragged me to the Merchant one late May evening and blew me away with Joel Plaskett's onstage presence... So much rock-goodness, drunken bass guitaring and catchy lyrics that should be and usually are cliches, but when he sings it, they just sound so original. Each of the Joel Plaskett Emergency's records sound different from the last one, but you can hear the progresssion and the, I don't know, earnestness, I guess. Though Wesley doesn't enjoy him as much anymore, and his song "Nowhere with You" is now schilling for Zeller's, I would still drop everything and catch him in concert, no matter what town he and I might be at the same time.

Christina Cheung: Christina gave me a few mp3s from the Decemberists "Castaways and Cutouts" and I was immediately hooked. They were unlike a lot of bands I was listening to at the time because a lot of their songs were ballads of olde. Stories about legionnaires, chamisoles, countess and courtesans using guitars and accordions and a bevy of other instruments. And that's their schtick and they're good at their schtick. They are so much fun and their stories are always so catchy. They're like a good Pulitzer-prize winning novel, but for my ears! Their new album is coming out soon and I'm ever so excited. "Castaways and Cutouts" and "Picaresque" are equally good.

Wade Guyitt and Christine Lee: I had low, low expectations for the Final Fantasy concert. Especially when the opening acts were beyond weird and uninteresting. When Final Fantasy finally started, it ended up being one guy and a violin. Good thing that one guy happened to be Owen Pallett, who has not only been on the Vinyl Cafe but also collaborated on Arcade Fire's superb "Funeral". He was absolutely brilliant onstage, and if you don't believe me now, would you believe me then? Judgment's still out on his newest record, "He Poos Clouds", though.

My music collection would be so much worse if it wasn't for these people. And I thank them. But I was thinking. Where do they hear the next brilliant band from? I mean, I'm clearly 4 or 5 steps from the source (of "good music"), but they're definitely a few steps closer. Does it even matter that it takes me this many steps to discover a new, great band? Or does this have to do with the personal sense of "discovery" and "ownership," of knowing a great band before everyone else? Still, I'm curious how (and really it's just) Wesley and Christina keep tab with the burgeoning music scene, even though some of their recent recommendations haven't hit me the same way as the others...? I mean, I know where pot dealers usually get their merchandise, where do Wesley and Christina get theirs?