Tribute to 24 years
I don't know totally yet what it's like to be 25, as I've only been 25 for about 11 hours now. I do know about my previous 24 years, though.

My earliest memory is of tying my shoes for the first time. No, you nerds, that wasn't last week. I don't remember how old I was, but I was pretty young.

I remember my dad teaching me how to ride my bike. The bike was this old blue banana seat thing. This one time right after I got the training wheels off, my ride was jogging along next to me while holding the back of the seat. I was pedaling along and he let me go. I ended up in a big ditch, crying and covered in mud. My dad felt bad, but I know he was also holding back the laughs.

I remember having to move every four years because my dad was in the Air Force. We moved from Ohio to Las Vegas when I was going into third grade.

I remember one time in third grade out in Vegas, it snowed. The teachers let us out of class to see the flakes because it snowed so rarely there. I remember thinking that it was nothing compared to what we got back in Ohio.

In Vegas, I remember big dust storms, wandering around in the desert catching lizards with my friends, swimming in our pool in the back yard, and going to three different elementary schools in four years because the area was so over-crowded.

I remember in third grade when the blackboard got blurry one day and I had to sit closer to see. The next week I had glasses.

I remember a trip to Mt. Zion National Park in Utah with my friend Carson and his family.

I remember my brother throwing me around the front yard while yelling, "Supergirl!"

I remember all the neighbors gathering together in the cul-de-sac for illegal 4th of July fireworks from California.

All of my report cards came in with good grades on them, and the majority also had notes from my teachers that all said something like this:

"H is very smart, she just has a tendency to talk too much during class."

One day in the 6th grade, the music teacher came around to the classrooms with all kinds of different looking instruments. It was our day to pick out what we wanted to play should we want to join the band class. My first thought was trumpet, but then I saw that everyone else was choosing that. Then I thought about the drums, but there weren't enough drums to go around, so some of the drummer kids had to play these dumb little drum pads. Then I saw the alto saxophone. Decision made.

I remember being the tomboy, being chosen first by the boys for anything sports-related. Then in fifth grade the boys didn't want to hang out with me much any more. I didn't understand until later.

Then we moved back to Ohio. I entered the 7th grade. I don't remember how we met, but that's the year I met one of my bestest friends to this day, Ashley.

I remember getting braces.

I remember how math suddenly became really difficult. I remember asking boys out and being constantly rejected. I remember loving art class and English class and learning to despise math.

I remember how our band class in middle school made Mrs. Sherman cry, and not because we played so beautifully.

Then there was high school. I remember band camps, marching band, drama club. I learned Spanish from this hilarious Cuban woman. Mr. Sferro was the advanced placement English teacher who loved the girls in his classes. Eek.

I'm still trying to block out my first kiss.

There were sleep-overs where we prank called the question hotline on the Tampax box.

I remember getting my braces off and switching to contacts instead of glasses.

I learned to drive a stick-shift. I was one point away from flunking my driver's license test because I was tested by the scariest DMV worker ever.

I backed into a car in my drive-way. I remember band trips to Disneyworld, where we'd get sunburnt, make lots of noise in our hotel rooms, and have to march in frickin' Florida in May while wearing our wool uniforms.

I remember my first true love who rejected me and didn't realize until about five years later when we met up in London and I told her. I remember the life-draining high school depression.

I remember my first job as a dishwasher/busser at the local restaurant.

Then there was college. I escaped to Ohio University and came out. I made lasting friends. I learned, got drunk, got threatened, fell in love, fell out of love, fell in love, fell out of love, learned to love and hate (but mostly love) wanted I wanted to do with my life.

I remember traveling to Venezuela and Cuba, meeting the woman of my dreams, studying abroad in Scotland, and learning to hate college during my last two quarters there.

I escaped to Maryland, then to Boston, slaved away and learned about everything in AmeriCorps. I covered 9-11 as a fresh young journalist.

I learned how much unemployment sucked.

I got married.

I'm skipping lots, so don't take anything personally if you've not been part of this massive list. Many of the folks who read this page know me personally, so please add things I've missed to the comments below. I'll probably add more as the day goes by.

Thanks to you all who've watched and help me get where where I am.

I respect people who stick strongly by their beliefs. This respect comes only if you're also willing to be challenged on them and if you're willing to engage in good and civil conversation about them.

When I first read about the controversy over the removal of the Ten Commandments plaque from that Alabama judicial building, I thought, "Oh boy, here we go again." Everyone knew that it would only be a short time before swarms of religious fundies would be gathering to scream and bicker and pray in public.

I don't agree with having the Ten Commandments in any public (read government) building. I know that statement could open up a whole other can of worms regarding conversations about why then do we have "In God We Trust" on all of our money and why we swear on a Bible when testifying in court. Those are tough arguments about which I'm not sure how I feel just yet. How would you go about challenging or changing something so ingrained like that?

But I digress. I saw these swarms of Christians holding vigil in front of that justice building in Alabama and kept thnking, "What is with these people? This is separation of church and state. And come on, it's a big granite tablet in a court building, aren't there other more important things people should be holding vigil over?" I was angry at first, automatically grouping these people with other so-called "Christians" who waste their time doing horrible things like picketing AIDS funerals or yelling hate-filled rhetoric at gays. Yet more thought over this issue has helped me see the different sides.

This is an important issue to these folks. They might see this as another part of our society today losing its values. Sure, we might all disagree on what values Americans should hold true today, but we should at least have respect for others' views on the topic.

While I still believe that these folks' time could be better spent helping out those who are really in need of assistance -- whether it be the homeless or teaching people to read, etc... - why shouldn't they stand up for something they really believe in? And I also imagine that many of these folks probably do spend some quality time helping out those in need. I don't support of any of these people if they turn their vigil into hatred or violence, but I've seen nothing like that so far. The only pictures I've seen from the scene show them praying on the steps in front of the building or giving speeches on the issue.

So vigil and pray away, folks. If you believe in the cause, then go for it. I won't be there to support you on the issue, but I support you in speaking up for what you believe.

Sweet! "I feel for you" is on the radio right now. Everybody do the robot!

Chaka--Chaka--Chaka--Chaka
Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan

Chaka Khan, let me rock you
Let me rock you, Chaka Khan
Let me rock you, that's all I wanna do
Chaka Khan, let me rock you
Let me rock you, Chaka Khan
Let me rock you, 'cause I feel for you
Chaka Khan, won't you tell me what you wanna do
Do you feel for me the way I feel for you
Chaka Khan, let me tell you what I wanna do
I wanna love you, wanna hug you, wanna squeeze you too
Let me take you in my arms
Let me fill you with my charms, Chaka
Cuz you know that I'm the one to keep you warm, Chaka
I'll make it more than just a physical dream
I wanna rock you, Chaka baby, cuz you make me wanna scream
Let me rock you -- rock you

I feel for you
I think I love you
Chaka-Khan!!!

Well, I've been slow about posting today because I took today off work. One of the nice things about my company is that they give you your birthday off -- and you can take your birthday "day off" anytime during the week of your birthday. So I'm giving myself two four-day weeks in a row. I would have taken my birthday off -- it's Friday -- and given myself a four-day weekend, except that they are strict about my taking days off around the end of the month. That's when billing closes and final sales are due. Blah.

I had a nice weekend. The ol' improv troupe had a show Friday night. Man, it really didn't go well at all. First off, the performance space was hotter than a fat man in a sauna. Second, our publicity person didn't do that great of a job getting the word out about the show, so we had about 10 people there. That's not so horrible (although we have been pulling in many more in the past), but they always sit in the back rows and leave the front ones empty. It's like they're in church or something -- no one sits in the front rows.

And third, we just didn't perform that well at all. The show started off very slowly, not too many laughs, and the audience wasn't even responding to the funny stuff all that well either. There were a few parts where we actually could hear the crickets chirping outside because the audience was making no noise at all. Great. Only other thing we needed to make that better was to have a tumbleweed blow through. We did have some funny moments, but overall it didn't go so great.

Saturday I cleaned and we had some friends over to watch "The Original Kings of Comedy," a movie that I love and now own on DVD.

Sunday had the lovely wife preaching at a nearby church. Then we went on a long walk around town because the weather was so beautiful. On Sundays the city closes down Memorial Drive right along the Charles River so people can bike and roller-blade and whatever in the street. And we sat along the river and watched everyone go by, including numerous roller-bladers who should not have been wearing spandex. There was this one guy we ended up calling "The Lemon Wonder." He was wearing these really bright yellow short shorts, a tight tank top that was another shade of "screamingly bright" yellow, and then this horrible other shade of yellow on his headband, which was holding back this long scraggly hair. And he was on roller-blades. And he was showing off every time he went past us, spinning around and trying to do the splits and such. Much giggling ensued, let me tell you.

I've actually been fairly productive here on my day off. While I have not yet put on any tight yellow clothing of my own and gone roller-blading, I did escort Amy to work downtown in this huge office building where she's been temping. Then I just took care of some other chores -- everything from rolling all the change I'd accumulated in my change cup to getting a new battery for my watch to picking up our TripTik from AAA for our trip to Portland, Maine, this weekend.

And then tomorrow it's back to work.

Wow, talk about some controversy.

Eesh. I hope people aren't seeing him as their savior and messiah. It's a good thing God has a sense of humor.

Letters

If any of you know me, and some of you do, then you are not aware that I receive many emails asking me for advice and answers to tough questions. If you don't know me, then you are not aware of either my receiving these emails or the fact that those people who do know me are not aware of the emails as well. I am familiar with me, so I am aware that I receive these emails -- just as I am also aware that there are people out there who know me but don't know about the emails, and there are people out there who don't know me and don't know about the emails or the people who know me but aren't aware of the emails.

And who cares if you do or do not know me, that first paragraph probably just made your head explode.

In any case, I do try to answer these questions to the best of my ability, and should any questions be out of my range, I do not hesitate to contact the experts for assistance. And by "experts," I mean me.

For example, young Billy from Ontario wrote me with the following query:
--------------------
Dear H,
Does love really make the world go 'round?

your friend,
Billy
-------------------
Dear Billy,
No.

your friend,
H
-------------------

Here's another inquiry from a delightful reader:
------------------
Dear H,
I am in quite a predicament. I recently found out that my son is counterfeiting money in our basement! The feds don't know yet, and I am scared. Should I turn him in myself, or just throw out the fake money and machines and give him a stern lecture?

cash money n hoes?
Rhonda
-------------------
Dear Rhonda,
I say turn the little bastard in to the feds. But before you do, hide all the fake money except for a few bills. Let the little guy go to jail. When he and all the feds are gone, take out that huge pile of money and roll around in it. Then sleep on it. I mean really, how many people can say that they sleep on a huge pile of money each night? Well, how many people besides me?

showering with $20s,
H
-------------------
Dear H,
What does "subcutaneous" mean? Could you use it in a sentence?

splelchck,
Rick
-----------------
Dear Rick,
Well Rick, let's take that word apart and discover its roots together. "Sub" means under, so the word must relate to being underwater in a long tube-like structure. "Cu" is what they say in the movies, so now we're up to a submarine in the movies. "Ta" reminds me of that movie "Nell" where Jodie Foster grows up alone in the woods and just keeps saying "Tay in da weein," so now we're up to a submarine getting its underwater movie cues from a woodland hermit who doesn't speak English well. "Ne" is a part of your body. "Ous" sounds like a nice big group of people.

Let's put it all together now, Rick. "Subcutaneous" obviously relates to a big group of people on a submarine who forget their lines during the movie shoot because Nell just kicked them in the knee for making fun of her manner of speaking. Seems pretty obvious to me.

Now let's use it in a sentence.
"Hey, would you look at that subcutaneous?"

Hope that helps Rick!

tay in da weeein,
H
-------------------

How about one more email for the road?
-------------------
Dear H,
Are you aware that if you don't stop stalking me, I will take you to court?

leave me alone,
Jane
-------------------
Dear Jane,
How delightful! I look forward to the opportunity to meet you in person!

see you tonight,
H
------------------

That's all for this installment. I'll try to post more as I receive them.

After digging through some old files last night, I found a few short stories I wrote when I was high school. I'll post them. Here's one.

George

Goerge always tried to fit in with the rest of us, but there was just something different about him.

We always tried to welcome him in and accept him. We slapped his back to show our approval when he tried to dance with us -- even though he always just ended up rolling around on the floor. What else were we supposed to slap?

And when George joined us in our music room to add to our singing, we didn't act like we minded when, as usual, he started his uncontrollable drooling. We just always brought our rain gear and sat at somewhat of a distance. What else were we supposed to do, duck continuously?

George always bragged about his amazing ability to play the piano with his tongue. We simply smiled and believed him, not wanting him to really show us. Hey, would you want a slimy piano?

It was just that one day when he decided to go bungee jumping with us. That pushed Bobby past his limit.

"GEORGE!" Bobby screamed. "You have no freakin' limbs? How are you gonna jump when the cord is supposed to be tied to your ankles?"

George looked at his body, and his eyes grew very large.

"I don't have any limbs?!" George gasped.

George always tried to fit in with the rest of us, but there was just something different about him.

----------

I can see some rewrites of that already, things that could make it a little better. Yet overall it isn't too bad, I guess. Certainly matches my warped mind in those days. Reminds me of the roots of my warped-ness, if you will. Actually, also kinda reminds me of this really odd book called Creepy Susie, by Angus Oblong. It's this book of hilarious twisted children's stories with funny pictures. A definite must-read, his stories blow mine away.

Why the frick does everything break on Mondays? Does technology in my office gather together on the weekends and plot out who will go when Monday morning? Why do our computers and printers hate me so much? WHAT HAVE I DONE?!

And why does my coworker need to constantly burn popcorn in here? Is it that hard to make it without torching the bag and making the whole office stink? I don't think there's a 'BURN THE WHOLE MUTHAF*CKIN BAG' button on the microwave, but she seems to find that setting. Does her palm pilot have this as a schedule:

8am - Get to work
8:15am - work
8:30am - work
8:45am - work
9am - BURN A WHOLE DAMN BAG OF POPCORN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
9:15am - work
9:30am - work

And dammit, the comments on my blog aren't working either. Document Root is who does them, and their website isn't even coming up. Might be time to switch hosts.

In other news, when it's a Monday morning and things are breaking and the office smells like it was recently on fire and coworkers are asking stupid questions, a good place to waste an extraordinary amount of time is Friendster.

Well, I was having a good day until my computer crashed right in the middle of a nice long post I had just written. I'll try to rewrite it. Sigh.

Ah, power outages. Sure, it was in NYC, but since our company headquarters is in NYC, so are all our servers and such. Way to plan ahead! That meant in our Boston office Thursday afternoon and all day Friday, we had no email, no internet access and no access to several other important software programs we use all the time. Needless to say, Friday at work was extremely boring. But it did give me a chance to get a few other things done that I'd never had time to do before.

I called one of my friends in NYC and asked where he was when the lights went out. He lives in Brooklyn and got caught on the upper west side. So his walk home took 3.5 hours, which he said included several stops at bars along the way home. If I had to walk that far home I probably would've drank along the way, too.

Anyway, Friday a group of friends and I went to a comedy show. It was a strange venue, as the comedy club was actually the top floor of a nightclub. The place would turn into a trendy club as soon as the last comedian got off the stage. But all the comedians were funny except for one poor guy. He just couldn't get the audience to laugh at anything. I give him props just for trying, as I know it takes guts to get up there in the first place, but man, he just didn't develop his jokes very well. It was one short pointless and unfunny joke after another. He did manage a few laughs here and there, but it was pretty bad. Poor guy. But overall, the night was good.

On Saturday the wife and I went to lovely Singing Beach in Manchester-by-the-sea. I do enjoy living in New England. We're only two hours away from great mountains, less than a half-hour away from nice beaches, and we live right in a major city. It's a good deal. It's also a big change from where I grew up in flat and fairly boring Ohio. I guess I just didn't know what I was missing. Well, I did, but then I just continued crumbling potato chips for a casserole and making jello salads. Good old Midwest.

So we hung out on the beach, which is called Singing Beach because of the weird noise the sand makes when you walk on it. It screams. No, the sand actually makes a noise similar to the noise corduroy pants make when you walk. Kinda cool. And we sat on the beach and watched the waves and swam and watch seagulls attack people who let their guard down while eating big sandwiches. I never thought a seagull could fly while carrying a huge sub sandwich, but I was wrong.

After the beach, we just drove down the coast through Beverly and Salem and Lynn and then Revere, and then back into Boston. It's a beautiful drive, I recommend it.

Saturday night we watched one of my favorite movies, Wonder Boys.

Sunday, I was a heathen and stayed home from church while Amy went. I cleaned and read. I go through reading phases where I can read three books in a week, and then I won't be able to finish a book for a month. This week I read The Rum Diary by one of my favorite authors, Hunter S. Thompson. It's a great book. I also just finished Going After Cacciato, which I just picked up on a whim. I love books about war, for some odd reason. I have a slew of books about WWII and the Vietnam War. Many are fiction but more of them are those Combat books where soldiers who served in the war tell their own stories. It just fascinates me and I'm not sure why.

Also on Sunday, the wife and I planned what we're doing for our one year wedding anniversary, which is on August 31st. Yes, we had a big gay wedding last year and it was awesome. And since the anniversary hits on Labor Day weekend, we're off to Portland, Maine. I've been in New England for three years now and I've still not been to Maine. Been to the other NE states, but not Maine. So it's time. We'll tour the town and then go see a Portland Seadogs game (their minor league baseball team). It's nice when tickets to a baseball game cost only $7.00, and not the trillion dollar Red Sox games. Minor league baseball is its own thing, very fun and very different, I think.

And that's my weekend. Life is just that exciting.

"Are you being sarcastic?"
"I don't even know any more."

(points if you know what show that's from).

Nah, I am in a good mood. We have a improv show this Friday, my birthday is next week, I'm going to Maine, then later in Sept. I'm going back to Ohio (hey - o -where'd ya go O-hi-o) for a visit with the fam. So things are okay right now. Plus Amy will soon be able to officially start looking for a pastor job. She has her masters, now she just has to wait for this final big ordination meeting with the big-wigs where they have to give her the green light to circulate her profile and find a job. Ah, church politics.

And that's that. May this post not be deleted.

To that blaster worm going around the internet now, I have this to say,

SUCK IT!

That damn thing, while fortunately not infecting any of our computers at work yet, still had me going about the office installing patches and service packs (not only do I play an Office Manager on TV, but also I'm the systems administrator). Yet the worm did at least make me grateful for several things:

1) Our ancient computers here at work are just that: wrought with ancient operating systems that this worm was fortunately not targeting. We only had five computers that I had to update with patches, and not 20.

2) I normally hate the operating system on my laptop at home. It is Windows Millennium, and it is crap. But again, the worm was not targeting Windows Me, so I didn't have to freak out about my home computer.

Okay, that was just two things, maybe that doesn't constitute the "several things" identifier. Whatever.

Hey, how about some internet worm haiku?

Oh internet worm
wreaking havoc all over,
you can kiss my ass

You exploit a hole
that Microsoft left open
Microsoft sucks ass

How many haikus
can I use the word "ass" in?
Ass ass ass ass ass

Mr. Bill Gates, please
spend your billions making your
damn hardware work well!

Feel free to add your own haikus to the comments. But be careful, it's addictive.

This morning as I was getting ready for work, I took a second after putting on my work clothes to ask my loving wife how I looked. She responded,

"You look like you work at Target."

Hey, dammit, if a red shirt with khakis is good enough for Target, then it's good enough for my office.

I mean, if I took that comment correctly and all.

Okay, none of you had any good movie ideas. At least that's what I'm assuming by the lack of comments for my last post. And so because of you all I watched two of the year's crappiest movies.

Alright, it wasn't your fault or mine...I didn't actually pick out the movies for my Saturday night moviefest. I left the decision up to my friends who were nice enough to have me over and feed me while the wife was out of town. I shouldn't complain, they fed me meatloaf and then cake.

But well, yeah, I can complain about the movies. They rented The Guru and Final Destination 2.

The Guru was a creative idea and had a little potential, but then it decided to drag on during many unfunny parts. The ending was okay, especially the subplot that gets revealed at the end (hell, the movie isn't great, but I won't spoil it for you in case you feel like wasting almost 2 hours of your life). I was also pleased at first to see the Samir character (Ajay Naidu) from Office Space in it, but his character was only half as funny as he was in Office Space.

So, I say don't waste your time on that one.

As for Final Destination 2...wow. Suckfest 2k3, that one was. Again, the premise is semi-interesting, but there were so many plot-holes that it just came out as a jumbled mess. It was like a string of gory scenes strung together by the flimsy plot. And man, did they have a bunch of teen boys in charge of the gory scenes. Every chance they got (and there were many), they made sure people were splattered, smashed, gored, sliced in half, squished, impaled, diced, etc...(read that like a Waffle House omelette menu) You get the picture.

I like scary movies, but I like scary movies more if they rely mostly on what you can't see rather than on making sure you see every innard get blown out of someone's body. There was one scene in this flick where a kid gets squished by a huge pane of glass. I swear they had a huge human-shaped balloon full of red liquid for that scene.

So, I also say don't waste your time on that one.

I did rent my own movies on Sunday. I got Goodfellas, which I really enjoyed. I also rented Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood because I just read the book. It wasn't that great. They changed the book a lot, and it also dragged in many parts. Oh, and I also got Platoon from the library on Saturday afternoon. What a heart-wrenching movie. I thought it was excellent and beautifully made.

So, I guess I was 2 for 5 on my movie weekend...which is much better than the batting averages for the Red Sox in the game I went to on Friday night (they lost, it was a pathetic game).

Well, yesterday had a first: I helped make a beer run for my office. We have a guy who's last day is today, so we decided that rather than go out after work, we'd bring the bar to our office.

I do enjoy my job most of the time, but it's when I get the random fun requests that I really enjoy it. Our GM comes up to my desk at 4pm and says, "I'm going to need help getting some beer." Hey, who's going to pass up an offer like that?

So we went down to the local liquor store and got a few six packs. And then we all drank in the office. Maybe it doesn't sounds that cool, but it felt that way. Our previous GM never would have allowed that one. Hell, we usually just celebrate birthdays and going-aways with an ice cream cake (not to knock the ice cream cakes, they rule). But to finish off a little of my work while drinking a beer, and then to just sit around with our small office and chat while drinking away was really nice.

We'll call it team-building.

In other news, I'm off to the Red Sox game tonight. I am going by myself, which is kind of weird, but who cares? It's a Sox game! The wife got me the ticket for free while she was at work. Someone there had an extra and was giving it away. So, I'll be in the right field bleachers tonight with my glove and rain poncho. I'm hoping it won't rain, but it has been like living in Florida this week. The humidity is unbearable and it's been raining all week.

Also, I'm off to a friend's house tomorrow night to watch some movies, and we can't decide what to rent. If anyone has some recommendations, go ahead and post a comment. I like all kinds of genres. Let's see what you guys and gals and dream up for ideas.

Hasta la vista, special interests

Holy geez, Arnold has decided to put his name on the California ballot.

I'm sure someone's made all of these jokes already, but I must also get them out of my system. I love this paragraph:

Vowing to "bring California back to what it once was," Schwarzenegger, 56, said on NBC's "The Tonight Show" Wednesday that he's running on a platform to battle special interests and "clean house" in Sacramento.

And this quote is also priceless:
"This man (Gray Davis) has to go," he said. "I will go to Sacramento, and I will clean house," Schwarzenegger said.

I just immediately pictured Arnold kicking the door of Davis' office open and shooting the place up, then throwing Davis into a heating vent. Then someone would ask, "Where did the governor go?" and Arnold would answer in his wonderful accent,

"He had to let off some steam."

That's actually from one of his action films. He's had so many good lines over the years. I love his line from his movie Commando where he drops some guy off a cliff and a woman asks him, "Where did the bad guy go?" and Arnold answers,

"I had to let him go."

Come on! California needs some ass-kickin' like that. His campaign commercials should show him reaching out to the people of California who are running from a mutant robot Gray Davis, and Arnold should say,

"Come with me if you want to live."

I love Arnold. When I was a kid, I had this big carboard cut-out of him from the movie Raw Deal, and he was holding this shotgun and wearing his dark glasses. I also had a big framed photo of Arnold riding on his Harley in the Terminator movie.

The only thing is, I don't know much about Arnold's politics. I do know he is a conservative, which could be scary because I hope he's not a crazy conservative who will be chasing down the gay Californians on a Harley Davidson with a sawed-off shotgun -- and by "sawed-off shotgun" I mean horrible laws that restrict and take away civil rights.

And well, it is only a recall vote, so I don't know how much of a chance Arnold has at getting elected this time around. We shall see. Maybe if he doesn't win, someone in the future will send back another Arnold to help him get elected. Sweet, two Arnolds.

Tag this, baby

I was perusing Craigslist's Boston page today when I stumbled upon this entry.

What a great idea! Boston's Longfellow Bridge is gorgeous and I had long wondered about those stains that were on it for years. They kind of looked like fireworks, so I wasn't sure if it was a city-planned thing. But after reading that craigslist post, I found out it was actually graffiti. They did clean off the graffiti, but like the post says, it took the city ages to do it.

So I contacted the poster to ask how I could help out with all this new graffiti that's been showing up. Turns out, he's already received loads of responses from people wanting to help out. I think that's great, because it's too bad that some businesses and city departments just let the graffiti build up. It reminds me of the "broken window" effect I read about in the book The Tipping Point, which I strongly recommend reading.

Anyway, the broken window effect -- if you just let graffiti happen without cleaning it up right away, more will appear. Marc (the name of the poster) even wrote about that in the editorial he sent the Boston Globe -- but the paper unfortunately didn't print his letter. He did send it to me, so here it is for you all to enjoy:

******
The Boston Globe
To the editor:

Hooray for the Charles River Conservancy in pressing the case for cleaning the Charles River Bridges, but the July 26 article on graffiti made no mention of a new and greater visual obtrusion: the graffiti on the Charles River retaining wall. These large tags--unavoidable by boaters or the 70,000 daily motorists on Memorial Drive--first appeared on the wall by the Double Tree Hotel earlier this summer. Nothing has been done to remove the vandalism and--surprise!--the number of tags on the embankment has grown.

Acting promptly is the best approach to dealing with graffiti. This is the lesson I learned when I worked for the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority as it tackled what was considered an implacable plague of graffiti on New York subways. The approach was to have a "rabbit team" to remove any new graffiti tag on every overhauled car in the system on the day the tag appeared. It worked. By a) denying the taggers a permanent easel to show off their work, and b) showing that the agency cared about the look of their trains, the graffiti stopped. After an initial period of activity, the rabbit team put itself out of business. The reputation of the transit agency skyrocketed and the transit authority president, David Gunn, could have been elected mayor for life.

There is a political lesson here too for the Department of Conservation and Recreation. By waiting more than a year to clean the paint splatter vandalism from the Longfellow Bridge, DCR's predecessor agency, the Metropolitan District Commission, certainly didn't help its cause against a governor who wanted to reorganize it out of existence. Now the DCR has a new chance to show that it can care for its assets. Cleaning the embankment shouldn't take a year, and it doesn't need a million dollars. A boat, some staff, and a hundred dollars in graffiti remover would finish the job in an afternoon.

Sincerely,
Marc Warner
Cambridge
******

So, I won't be able to help out this Saturday because Marc says he's already reached a "critical mass" of volunteers. But I told him to keep me posted on any upcoming clean-ups he has.

This graffiti is similar to people who litter. I have said things to people who blatantly litter in front of me, only to be answered with a string of obscenities and choice hand gestures. But I still feel like I should say something. People just don't realize what a big deal it is to throw your fast food bag out on the street or to be dropping your cigarette butts all over the place. If no one says anything, then they'll just keep doing it.

Right, whatever, even though I say something people keep doing it -- and they even get to brighten their days by cussing out some skinny chick who likes keeping the planet all pretty n stuff. But I will keep saying things to litterbugs!

(Btw, that link I just sent you to, the efreak one, is the archives for an old website I wrote for. My handle was "rev." It's chock full of goodness from me and many other hilarious and brilliant writers -- some of whom now reside at the new version of Efreak.)

My funniest paragraph for the day -- straight from an email from my friend Greg:

"Dude, I love being called crackwhore. That fucking rocks. Hey. I was at a wedding this weekend. In a moment of surging pride, I realized I had ALREADY fooled around with each of the Bridesmaids. How cool is that?"

I have the weirdest friends, and I frickin' love that.

Today is one of those days where you can almost understand why some employees shoot all their coworkers.