Nobody Knows Anything

You can calculate your real cost of car ownership. That is, the real cost just for you, that is. Not even the “to society” part.

Damn. We own our cars outright and that is still a lot of money we could save by not having them.

Months ago I told a doctor my usual quip, “Why does everyone say exercise gives you energy? It just makes me tired.” He sent me for bloodwork and determined my thyroid levels were low. I started on a thyroid regimen and felt better but not energetic. So he added a second medication.

And I felt really good.

Not manic good. I wasn’t bouncing off walls or awake twenty hours a day. But I was no longer falling asleep in the afternoons, dozing on the couch while the kids watched TV (waking me up every so often to put on a new show). I could take them out for the afternoon: the park, the fountain, somewhere.

In addition, I lost 30 pounds. Not bad, eh? I once told Tamar that I just didn’t believe that exercise + eating less would lead to weight loss, because it never seemed to work that way for me. But once I started taking the thyroid combination, BOOM! I started losing weight slowly and steadily. I went through my saved jeans at a fairly regular pace and was ecstatic the day I hadn’t done laundry and found that the size 8 jeans hanging in the closet fit me just fine. Not quite at the point where I could put on my Calvin Klein skirt. But I was definitely heading there.

I thought, This is how most people live their lives. They don’t feel run down all the time.

The effect seems to be wearing off, though. Just today I went for a run with Rob and Nina in the morning, then ran around getting the kids to their various activities. I came home and went upstairs to shower. But before I got in the shower I lay down on the bed “just for a moment.” You know how this story ends, right? I haven’t done that for, well, months. I had to force myself to get out of bed when I woke up at two hours, but even now I could go right back.

I don’t think I’m taking the kids to the park this afternoon. Maybe they’d be up for the backyard while I doze on the couch.

Of course, on top of everything else, I’m deeply worried about regaining the weight. Especially since I gave away all my bigger clothes.

I guess I need my blood levels looked at again. This tiredness is so discouraging sometimes.

A wonderful piece of street theater: a man threatens to jump off a ledge in front of a crowd of spectators… a ledge 4 feet off the ground. (Sadly, I can’t remember where I got this link from.)

Todd of CleverChimp has a great post today about his reactions to “An Inconvenient Truth” and the grave we’ve dug for ourselves on this planet. I had much the same reaction while watching the movie (which is one of the reason I haven’t written about it) — but it certainly helped me decide to be as bike-centric as possible from here on out.

Ten years ago I thought Sage’s online journal (note: Quirky Nomads is just the latest incarnation; there have been many) was the coolest thing ever, and since I was going off to grad school, I’d keep one to keep my friends up to date on everything I was doing. So I started one, modeled after hers. I went to grad school at USC, studying screenwriting. Then I graduated, wrote about some of the things I was doing after graduation. I took a break from writing online at the end of 2000 to 2002. And now I’m back. The voice has changed, the experience has changed, but it’s still fun.

A lot has happened in the past ten years, of course, most of which has probably been mentioned on this page.

We used to use Mozilla. Then Netscape. When Internet Explorer started up I said, “But Netscape has the market sewn up.” This is why I’m not in business forecasting. Now my husband is the manager of Safari. The Web: I’ll never escape.

We used to handcode our entries! For those of you who have no idea what that means, we did all the HTML ourselves. No Blogger! No Movable Type! Hell, even BBEdit didn’t do a lot back then. No, seriously, we did it all by hand. There was no other way to do it.

RSS? You jest. CSS was maybe just getting started (but not even then, I think).

Many of the online diarists knew one another! Or at least had exchanged emails. I remember when Open Pages — remember the Open Pages webring? Hahaha — passed one hundred members and I thought that was a lot.

I used to keep a list of diaries that had been going at least a year, because then people who were looking for a lot of content to read would have something to find. I can’t even imagine attempting anything like that now.

Internet newsgroups used to be available only via newsreaders, and you had to get a feed from your provider. Now I think Google is the only place to get newsgroups. And because Google provides no way to ignore certain topics and posters, newsgroups are now completely useless. But that’s okay: everything else is available on the Web.

Despite the length of time since I first wrote it, Why Web Journals Suck is still relevant. I can barely believe it myself.

Over and over again there’s been the pattern of there being a group of very popular writers/bloggers. There are far more not-as-popular writers/bloggers out there who continually ask what they have to do to be one of the Kool Kids. I don’t know to become one of the high-trafficked sites — in fact, given the precipitous fall of my traffic, I’m sure I should just shut up — but here are some tips that I’ve seen work for people. (Note: all of these are not required, but you’ll need at least some.)

• Talk about sex.
• Post naked pictures.
• Have lots of fresh content. Post at least once a day, although it’s better to post even more frequently than that. That way, readers have to keep tuning in to see if you’ve got anything new.
• Have a topic you’re known for. Specialization of blogs has happened way more in the past five years, but having a theme, an area, is a good way to be known. Political blogs, art blogs, bicycle blogs… there is something out there for everyone.
• Write a sex blog and you’ll have more traffic than you know what to do with.
• Be an engaging writer. Sorry, can’t help you out with that one if you’re not already. But practice does, in fact, make perfect, so get writing.
• You can be a terrible writer if you have a sex blog. Just make sure you spell all the body parts right, so readers know what’s going in where.
• Have a point of view in your writing. Let people know where you stand on issues — not just political issues (although, as you get older, you realize everything is political, so the sooner you get involved, the better), but on movies, on music, on scenery you pass by every day.
• When your readers respond, engage them. (Yes, I know I fall down on this quite often.) The blogging format, with attached comments, makes this much easier. (We used to just get mail, you see.)
• Did I mention sex?

I haven’t tried video blogging and podcasting, but all the same rules apply there. Except those forms are even harder because you’ve got to have skills in more areas than just writing — video and audio need to be entertaining in and of themselves.

(Writing those tips reminds me of one of the funniest interchanges (from my point of view) I’ve ever had. In Why Web Journals Suck I wrote that you shouldn’t have a depressive journal — that is, every single damn entry shouldn’t be filled with doom and gloom because, frankly, no one cares and what you have to do is do something about the situation, not just wallow in it by writing about it. I got a letter from someone wanting to know why I was talking about her, because she was very popular, yadda yadda. You know the punchline, of course: I’d never heard of her. I had run across a couple of other depressive journals and that’s what had inspired me to write that, not this chick. Ah well.)

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Ten years ago I couldn’t imagine having kids.

Ten years ago I drove an Acura Integra. Shortly thereafter I got a Mercedes M-class SUV. A week before Simon was born we got rid of the Mercedes (oh happy day! calloo callay! what a PITA that thing was) and got a Honda Odyssey. I’d like to go down to nothing, but the Odyssey is way better than what I had.

Ten years ago I had dreams of having a gigantic house on a gigantic piece of land somewhere, because that’s what you do when you move up the food chain. These days, I can’t imagine anything I’d like less. There are definitely times I’m annoyed with the size of the house we currently have, although the location makes up for everything: we have neighbors! I can walk places!

Ten years ago I was pretty sure how my life was going to turn out. These days, I haven’t a clue: I can try to guide it, but for the most part I just try to enjoy.

What’s weirdest in looking back at some of my entries is reading something and thinking, “Did I write that?” I have no memory of doing some of these things, let alone writing about it. The writing seems very different from the way I write now, although I guess that is to be expected.

I have met some truly fabulous people in the past ten years as a result of writing my journal. I believe I have inspired a few journals/blogs as well, although I never kept track of which ones.

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Thank you for the wonderful words, Pooks!

You know, this morning I just realized that the tenth anniversary of my doing something in particular had came and went without my making a big deal about it….

I’m a little too freaked out about realizing this to actually write anything about it at the moment.

(Darin points out that this entry is just a little too cryptic — I started keeping an online journal 10 years ago. I’m rather astounded.)

During a few conversations I’ve had over the past few months (which, with my current memory, probably means closer to “a year”) I’ve found myself saying, “I can’t wait until Simon’s at the same school as Sophia. Then I won’t have to use my car any more.” Because the school’s within walking distance, and the market is not too much further beyond that. We already walk downtown to go to various restaurants and stores.

A few months back I found myself saying, “Why wait? What would I have to do right now to use my car as little as possible?”

I’m just tired of driving. 90% of everywhere I go is within 5 miles of my home, and I sometimes feel like I’m starting and stopping, starting and stopping, circling for a space, starting and stopping… And after reading a few tomes like Asphalt Nation, Road To Ruin: An Introduction to Sprawl and How to Cure It, The High Cost of Free Parking, Divorce Your Car, and The Party’s Over: Oil, War, and the Fate of Industrial Societies, not to mention watching videos like Robert Newman’s History of Oil, I don’t exactly have blinders on to what I’m doing by driving everywhere.

The big reason I need the car? Kids. Taking Simon to preschool and picking him up. Going to the grocery store with them. Taking them to the park.

So one day I found myself wondering, “So how much would a pedicab be, anyhow?” Not that I’d really do it, of course. But wouldn’t it be fun to think about?

I found Bikes At Work, an American company that specializes in pedicabs and freight bikes. I also found Henry WorkCycles, a Dutch firm that has the coolest cycles — look at this bike and tell me you don’t want to grab a few kids and take them for a spin. But none of the bikes on these pages leaped off the page at me, or, more importantly, seemed like something I could really get into. Onto. Whatever.

Then I came across the Xtracycle. Ooo. Ooooooooo. I saw the possibilities of this immediately, particularly when running across pictures of the bike in use, such as Todd’s tale of “One Mom, Two Kids, Four Bags of Groceries.” I might not be able to use a bike for everything, but it sure looks like I could use it for quite a few more things than I do now.

And then something snapped, and I just went Bike Crazy. Lots of bike blogs (see List o’ Links). Books on bike mechanics, on bicycle history, on bicycle tours cross-country. Bike forums.

I haven’t gotten an Xtracycle yet — for whatever reason, the cash flow gods have not smiled benevolently on me since I first desired one, but as soon as they do, I am getting that puppy — but I have started riding my bike (a Trek 720 hybrid, 17″ frame). I rode it downtown to the post office and then to the park to drop off Sophia’s application for science summer camp. Emboldened by my success (and how much fun I had), I bought some grocery panniers and went to the market. It’s only a mile away, so driving there is more trouble than it’s worth, but it’s a teensy bit too far to walk. I can’t get very much in these two bags, but that’s okay: shouldn’t be buying that much anyhow, right?

(Of course, there is no bike rack at the local market — I use the Handicapped parking space’s sign. There is no bike rack at the Whole Foods either, which is of course the fault of the shopping center’s management but still.)

Yesterday I voted and then went to the market on my bike. Which meant riding up a steep hill in granny gear, and I made it. I was excessively proud of myself for the next five to seven minutes after that one.

Today I went completely nuts and bicycled to the gym. Which is 5 miles away, although it’s over completely flat ground.

Errr… wait a minute. Flat? Not so much, as it turned out. One of the great things about riding a bike (or running, for that matter) is that you experience your surroundings in a whole different way than you do if you’re in a car. I always know the names of streets and the layouts of the surrounding areas better than Darin does, because I’m out there doing it on foot. Today I learned that Highway 9 and Quito are actually really damn hilly, at least if you’re as out of shape as I apparently am. Bicycle-wise, at any rate. It’s amazing how many different muscles bicycling uses than running. Yowch.

It took me 30 minutes to go the 5 miles to the gym and 30 back, which I assume would get faster the better a rider I became. According to my fitness watch, I spent about 500 calories doing these 10 miles. Bicycle 10 miles a day, eat anything I want. And I’m having trouble signing up for this plan? I don’t think so.

What these recent excursions have proved to me is not just that I could switch to the bike for lots of things, but it would be practical. I could take Simon to school the three days a week he goes. I could do the food shopping. Okay, I’d need the car to take the kids to the Rosicrucian Museum, but hey — how many times a week do we go there? (Answer: way far less often than they want to go, that’s for sure. I’m not sure why they like it so much, but they do.) And if I don’t have to spend $60 a week to fill up? Just so much the better.

Now if only our car insurance bill hadn’t crossed our doorstep this morning ($2000, hello — Irony, thou art heartless, wench). Somehow I’ve got to figure out a way to budget in the Xtracycle.

Via the Accidental Hedonist, we have the Bellagio fountains re-enacted by 500 Mentos dropped in 200 liters of Diet Coke.

I love the Web.

Anyone who gave this movie over one star, come over here so I can slap you with my leather driving gloves.

What’s wrong with this movie? Just about everything, starting with the story: a drug manufacturer has come up with a “cure” for the mutant X gene that will turn mutants into normal humans, and they’re going to make it available to any mutant who wants it. The bad guy, Magneto (Sir Ian McKellan), doesn’t believe for a second that use of this medicine is going to be voluntary — this means war, so he bands together a bunch of mutants to destroy the source of the cure. Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), Storm (Halle Berry), Beast (Kelsey Grammer), and some other X-Men want to stop him.

Anybody see the problem with this?

You have a major story problem when your bad guy is right.

The story of this movie asks us to believe not just in an alternate world, where mutants exist, but an alternate humanity, where they’d be allowed to exist one minute more than necessary. We’re supposed to equate this anti-mutant feeling with run-of-the-mill prejudice, but y’know, most despised minorities can’t, as the President says, move cities with their minds.

Okay, beyond the story, we have the script problems. Such as the big set piece in Act 3, which is heavily featured in the trailer, but which I won’t spoil. Sure, it’s big, and sure, it’s cool, but it doesn’t make any freakin’ sense. This is the best way for Magneto to achieve his aims? Wouldn’t it be better to launch his invasion stealthily, stop the anti-mutant cure, and then do the big production number? Or at least consider this beforehand?

And then, beyond that, we have the most amazingly horrible dialogue in recent cinematic history. Film students should be forced to study this movie as an exercise in trite, on-the-nose dialogue. I leaned over to Darin and said, “They couldn’t have afforded a dialogue pass on the script?” Just to, y’know, liven it up a little?

And the way everything is suddenly hunky-dory and sweetness and light at the end? I haven’t felt that disgusted at the wrap-up to a movie since we were supposed to believe that everything was all right at the end of A Clear and Present Danger because Harrison Ford was testifying to Congress. After the gigantic battle in Act 3, anyone would ever trust a mutant again? Idon’tthinkso.

Seriously awful stuff. Avoid.

By popular demand (okay, so there was my running bud Rob, and Otto, and mail from reader Richard just this morning…but if that isn’t a quorum I don’t know what is) I have returned a list of my current reading links to the sidebar.

To be technical, what actually happened was I exported a list of my links in OPML, which Rob took and used to write a Ruby script that would generate an HTML version of the list. So I guess you could say Rob has returned my list of links to the sidebar.

Be forewarned, however: since I only read stuff with RSS feeds now (which is why I have eight frackin’ million blogs now), I only have their RSS URLs. You should be able to find the original blog easily enough, however. The RSS feed thing is also why I let my Blogrolling subscription lapse. Which is why we have this homebrewed list instead of the automatic one Blogrolling provided pretty well.

No, I don’t really read all of these blogs every day. Some I haven’t read for a great long while. My current obsession is all things bicycle, which is why I have about forty thousand bicycle blogs. (A really interesting one to read is the complete archives of Oil Is For Sissies, about a grad student who starts out bike commuting to his university, and morphs into a hardcore anti-oil bicycle shop owner.)