smokerblog

Unclear on the Concept

I know it's an underfunded government agency, so it's not like they've got a lot of money to throw around on fancy-schmancy graphic design. And I know that people have been beating up on them pretty hard in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, so maybe I should cut FEMA some slack. But after seeing last night's Daily Show, I can't help but point out this graphic, still live on their website¹ as of this evening. Voila:

Not cool. Someone clearly needs to read up on their Tufte.

Why New Orleans Must Be Rebuilt

After struggling to absorb the enormity of the human toll in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, it wasn't until I read this article in The New York Review of Books that I understood the vital imprtance of the New Orleans as a city. And it has nothing to do with Mardi Gras.

The American political system was founded in Philadelphia, but the American nation was built on the vast farmlands that stretch from the Alleghenies to the Rockies. That farmland produced the wealth that funded American industrialization: it permitted the formation of a class of small landholders who, amazingly, could produce more than they could consume. They could sell their excess crops in the East and in Europe and save that money, which eventually became the founding capital of American industry.

But it was not the extraordinary land or the farmers and ranchers who alone set the process in motion. Rather, it was geography—the extraordinary system of rivers that flowed through the Midwest and allowed them to ship their surplus to the rest of the world. All of the rivers flowed into one —the Mississippi—and the Mississippi flowed to the ports in and around one city: New Orleans. It was in New Orleans that the barges from upstream were unloaded and their cargos stored, sold, and reloaded on oceangoing vessels. Until last Sunday, New Orleans was, in many ways, the pivot of the American economy.

Hurricanes will continue to assault the Gulf Coast and our best efforts will never guarantee the safety or lives of all coast dwellers. But people will return. The city is in a shambles, its population scattered, but in order for raw material to flow up the Mississippi and American-made goods to flow down, New Orleans must rise again.

Not My Idea

Last night, Kari asked me to buy a book that will haunt my Amazon recommendations list for years to come.

ScreensavRz

Over the years I've used various flavors of Apple Powerbooks at work and one of the things that had always bugged me was the way that the lcd screen would get all smudgy. I don't know if other laptop computers suffer from the same problem, but, when closed, fingergrease left on the keyboard of Powerbooks creates marks on the lcd screen that cannot be removed.

Enter Radtech's Notebook ScreensavRz. Don't let the cheesy name fool you, this is a cool product, the kind that makes you slap your forehead and wish that you had thought of it first. It's just a sheet of microfiber fabric helpfully cut to the dimensions of your Powerbook. Before closing the laptop, simply lay the fabric over the keyboard, and voilà, your screen stays clean.

Radtech has a bunch of other nifty-looking products, but none so brilliant in its combination of simplicity and functionality.

Evolution Schmevolution

I am officially the kazillionth blogger to link to the Daily Show's special coverage of the creation-evolution debate.

For one full week, "The Daily Show" goes in-depth, around, through and quite possibly under, one of the hottest hot-button issues facing our nation: evolution. It's the accepted theory on the origin of life by an overwhelming majority of the world's biologists, but maybe they're all wrong. What's so great about the scientific method anyway? "Evolution Schmevolution" will explore:

• What other theories are out there?
• Who's on the frontlines of this debate?
• Should your child's curriculum really be decided by experts in their respective fields?

(yay!)

As we pass each other on the stairs, Kari and I high-five each other. Me on my way down after getting a book, Kari on her way up to check her email after listening to her voicemail and shouting up to me:

"Our application is on a plane to China!"

Katrina

I've been extra-busy with work for the past couple of weeks, not bothering to follow the news, slow to catch up on my favorite blogs (even slower to write anything), and generally just too wrapped up in my own petty grievances to pay much attention to the Hurricane Katrina disaster.

Of course, I knew that the devastation was horrific, but the full impact didn't hit me until today when I started making the rounds of my favorite blogs. Linda has gone so far as to contemplate the consequences of anarchy, Seth's first post in, like, 3 months laments the destruction of an utterly unique American city, kottke has taken a break from posting anything at all over the weekend out of respect, and Kathleen has been scrutinizing many facets of the tragedy with great interest.

And when you're done reading this smokerblog blather, check out katrina.com where web designer Katrina Blankenship, faced with a flood of traffic after the storm, turned her site into a clearinghouse for information on the hurricane, including links to various relief organizations.

Showered

Last weekend, several of our friends put together a shower for Ben, inviting our Rochester-area friends and family to a reserved pavilion at Ellison Park. (This was one of the venues for the aforementioned laddder golf game.)

When the idea was first floated to us, we didn't know how to respond. We aren't 100% comfortable with being the center of attention, but it's hard to refuse such a gesture. So as plans got underway, we could see the peripheral activity of our friends conspiring together to organize the event, but we were still unprepared for the outpouring of support.

When we arrived, the pavilion was already nearly filled with our adult friends and family, while the younger nieces, nephews, and cousins (Ben's future playmates) had already started a wiffle-ball game on the lawn. Everything was terrific, our only disappointment was the short amount of time that we got to spend with people.

Of course we appreciated the great food and the carload+ of gifts, but much more than that, we felt blessed by the love and kindness of the people around us. The greatest gift we took home from the shower was the understanding that Ben, when he arrives, has so many great people to get to know.