ATL 11/5/07 - Decatur, night

My people - 1977-ish - gathered for a family photo in the front yard after an every-other-year-or-so-Beaverton-Oregon snowfall. Apparently so rare that not a single one of use could bother looking even vaguely in the direction of the camera."Phantom Fitness" photos and Downtown Decatur - Metropolites, what do you think of the Skyline and Krog Street pics for our fitness center?

MOVIE/ART/LOCAL/FRENCH/WEB/WEB NEWS

MOVIE NEWS - "Fred Claus" - instead of seeing Vince Vaughn fail at relationships ("Wedding Crashers", "Swingers", "The Breakup", "Psycho"), police work ("Starsky & Hutch", "The Cell", "Mr. & Mrs. Smith"), or just plain growing up ("Dodgeball", "Old School"), we now have the opportunity to see him fail at being Santa Claus. Goodie.

ART NEWS - Canstruction at Underground Atlanta, Nov 9-18. Presented by the AIA, local firms build structures from canned goods to benefit the Atlanta Community Food Bank. Three good things in my book - walking around the city, promoting architecture, and benefiting the needy.

Holiday in Lights at Centennial Olympic Park, Nov 10-Jan 6. Another good reason to head downtown; even though 2 weeks before Thanksgiving is a bit early to be jolly.

Metropolis Market Day, Nov 10, from 11:00 to 4:00 PM. 8th Street is closed down for a multi-condo "yard sale"...and photo exhibit! Get a jump start on your holiday spending and enjoy some window shopping on Peachtree. Proceeds raised and good donated go to support Transition House. (Okay, if Walmart can advertise Xmas on the day after Halloween, who am I to wait an extra 5 days...)

LOCAL NEWS - The Atlanta Botanical Garden is about to start construction on a lot of upgrades to this Midtown destination...only one of which is the 6-story parking garage (ajc). Even if you are against the construction of the deck, don't be disheartened; I have to believe that even though protests failed to stop it, neighborhood complaints did influence some of the greener additions to the overall project - the current 1-acre, 250 car ABG parking lot will become green space, the deck will catch rainwater for reuse in irrigation, and pedestrians in Piedmont Park won't have to share the road with cars arriving at the park via Park Drive.

Neighborhood protests against the parking deck didn't fail; they helped accomplish a better, greener compromise.

FRENCH NEWS -égalité - I had just filled out an online questionnaire requiring me to check my least favorite survey box - CAUSASIAN/WHITE. The fact that I want to be a hyphenated American notwithstanding (Western European-American!), I wondered if other countries had this system of categorization - African-Canadians or Pacific Islander-Japanese.

Then I read this quote online - "...being a French citizen means you’re not categorized as African French or Southeast Asian French or West Indian French; you’re just plain French. That’s the republican ideal, citizenship bestowing theoretical equality, belying the reality of racism. French schoolchildren are steeped in the concept of a single France. The law actually forbids taking a census according to ethnic or racial categories." -nyt-

Knock the French all you want, but that baseline of equality seems pretty nice.

WEB NEWS - I love this video that morphs from one female portrait to another, from Da Vinci to Picasso...

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ATL 10/29/07 - Soccer

More Happy Halloween..from 28 years ago...ma and pa as Li'l Abner and Daisy Mae.
Cutest girls in the world...

ART/MOVIE/FRENCH/LOCAL/NEIGHBORHOOD/WEB NEWS

ART NEWS - Decatur Wine Festival 2007 from 1-4 PM this Saturday, 11/3.

Actor's Express 'Cabaret Benefit' with ingenue Libby Whittemore.

MOVIE NEWS - The trailer for "One Missed Call", partly filmed across from us here at Metropolis - trailer. (Seems a little "Final Destination - AT&T" to me...)

FRENCH NEWS - A new book was published in the U.K. during the summer on the subject of bread in France; "Good Bread is Back". Having recently read "Paris in the Fifties", "Suite Francaise", and "The Story of French" this year, it seems like a good next read. It seems that into the 18th century, bread was a basic, carbohydrate staple in France, England, and Italy, until England supplanted flour with sugar and Italy exchanged bread for pasta. Thank goodness France hung onto the baguette.

FRENCH MOVIES - I liked, but didn't love, "Ratatouille" and I guess that makes me still not very French; they loved the movie to the tune of $60 million in ticket sales (more than "Titanic"). ...but there's still hope for me. If they can love a rat that much, maybe I still have a chance...

U.S. NEWS - Southern California is burning down and there's a party in the San Diego football stadium. It didn't take long for one media outlet to begin to draw a comparison between that evacuation center and the Superbowl during Katrina. They had the nerve to question the government's responses to the two disasters, but refused to speculate what differences there might have been between the attitudes/backgrounds of the different evacuees.

DROUGHT NEWS - Our illustrious Guv'ner Sonny was on NPR, making an impassioned plea to the Army Corps of Engineers to reduce the amount of water being released from Lake Lanier (needed to support endangered species and a power plant in the lower river). "I don't think anyone signing the Endangered Species legislation intended to take drinking water out of the mouths of Georgia babies..." Well rah-rah, Sonny, way to get inflammatory and point the finger away from you. It's not like this water issue snuck up on us and your developer/golfing buddies.

Of course, no one wants babies in Georgia to die of thirst, but I don't want to destroy an entire ecosystem, either, until we've tried shutting down a carwash or two...

...and grow some balls, by the way. You couldn't make an executive decision and set a mandate for reduced outdoor water use by businesses - you passed that buck on to the utilities themselves, forcing them to decide how they were going to lower water usage by 10%.

Why did we elect you?

LOCAL NEWS - 14th Street Construction. I don't know if anyone else got a letter about the October 18th meeting concerning gas and water main construction on 14th Street from Piedmont to Peachtree, but I emailed the contact person on the mailing and got a very quick response about the effects of the project. In a nutshell, during the month of November, 14th Street is one-way eastbound from Peachtree to Juniper and one-way westbound from Piedmont to Juniper.

You WON'T be able to travel all the way from Piedmont to Peachtree on 14th in either direction! NIGHTMARE!

NEIGHBORHOOD NEWS - Once upon a time, there was a beautiful house on Piedmont Avenue, next to the parking lot for Blake's and Outwrite Books (insert fairy joke here).

A well-intending man bought the house, wanting to - "poof" - magically turn the house into a restaurant.

But the mean ole stepsisters, the neighborhood association, didn't want the well-intending man to - "poof" - magically turn the house into a restaurant. "No off-street parking", they said.

So one day, since the house was NOT just right for a restaurant, the house disappeared completely. You see, while the well-intentioned man wasn't allowed to - "poof" - magically turn the house into a restaurant, he was allowed to - "poof" - turn the beautiful, old, historic house into an ugly, new, empty lot.

And there the lot sat, vacant, for many years.

Then one day, there appeared a another man who wanted to - "poof" - magically turn the ugly, empty lot into 6 townhomes. How can 6 town homes fit on a lot where there was once only 1 beautiful house?

Very carefully...and lots of rezoning...

What's going to happen to the beautiful house that became an ugly lot that wants to be six townhomes? We'll have to want and see what the ugly stepsisters say...

WEB NEWS - Just in case you still needed a Halloween costume... how about Larry Craig?

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ATL 10/22/07 - Metropolis, TA

Me and my little bro, October, 1977. Martha Stewart won't publish her landmark book "Entertaining" for 5 more years, but I've already got a leg up on over-the-top decorating by incorporating ping pong eyes and a potato nose in my jack-o-lantern. Once a dork, always a dork.
Views from Metropolis
Trees Atlanta / Beltline Project - Before and After

ART/LOCAL/DROUGHT/NEIGHBORHOOD/WEB NEWS

ART NEWS - Our own amazing local (and by "local", I mean like downstairs) pianist Jason Sherwin is playing at Vinyl, starting 7:00 PM, Wednesday, October 24th. Check it out!

Lance Bass at Outwrite, Thursday, 10/25. Learn from Lance - if you miss this, you'll be "Out of Sync".

Gershwin at ASO this weekend, 10/25, 26, 27. American in Paris...sigh.

Zap Mama at Variety Playhouse 10/26. International harmonies...something we need more of.

Dia de Muertos @ Atlanta History Center this Sunday, 5:00 PM. Honor your ancestors.

Oakland Cemetery nighttime tour, Oct 26-27, 7-11 pm. Bring your flashlight!

LOCAL NEWS - While the news is full of mortgage woes, the average price of a house in Fulton County, Georgia, is actually up 5% from last year to $258,000. Go Midtown!

DROPPED SLOGAN - "Opening Day" dropped as Atlanta changes pitch. -ajc- While I am against changing changing slogans "mid-stream" as it were, it's not like that "Opening Day" crap ever caught on. The next new slogan - "City Lights, Southern Nights" - is more than a little Glen Campbell, but better.

DROUGHT NEWS - It's raining! ...and it made the news on "Good Morning America". Dianne told us that even if we get the predicted 1.0 inch of rain, it's only enough water for 1 day in Atlanta. I question their math (surprise!). Our normal, annual rainfall is 50 inches and that gives us more than a 50-day water supply, so I'm thinking their calculations are a touch simplistic. Maybe the volume resulting from 1 inch of rain on the surface of Lake Lanier would be equivalent to a 1 day's supply without outdoor water restrictions, but that doesn't take into account the water falling upstream and coming down the 'Hooch into the lake, water going into the water table around the lake, and water going directly into the 'Hooch downstream of the lake, reducing the need for water release from the lake.

WATER USAGE - S. and I had a shower competition this week, but even before showering, it takes 1 gallon of water running into the tub before the hot water shows up (captured in a bucket to water the plants).

We ran the dishwasher on "NORMAL" and "ENERGY SAVER DRY", using 6 gal. To do the dishes in the sink, assuming you fill each sink about 2/3** (one for soapy water, rinse, then one for sterilizing water) would be 8+ gallons. The dishwasher conserves water...unless you save the sink water in a dishpan and use that to water plants.

Then we washed clothes...yikes!

The tally:

1.0 gal - Running water in shower to get hot water
1.6 gal - Flushing toilet
6.0 gal - Washing dishes in dishwasher on "Normal"
7.0 gal - Showering (S. - no fair...he has less to wash)
8.0 gal - Washing dishes in sink
10.0 gal - Showering (me - 6'3" is a lot to wash!)
18.0 gal - Washing clothes (small load)
40.0 gal - Washing clothes (ex. large load)

NEIGHBORHOOD NEWS - 14th Street Bridge update --> monster large, very cool graphic of the project! - pdf - It looks like:

1) New Ramp to 10th St Southbound - Traffic coming south on I-75 & I-85 will still exit onto the "Techwood" access road. You will stay right to ramp up to 14th, or pass under the new 14th Street bridge to ramp up to 10th. (Currently, you ramp up to 14th, wait at a light, and either turn onto 14th or continue through to 10th.)

2) New Ramp to 17th St Northbound - A new exit from I-75/85 Northbound, after the 14th Street Bridge, will merge with Williams Street and a reconfigured 16th street, to ramp up to a new intersection with 17th Street on the east side of the 17th St bridge.

BELTLINE PROJECT - I took "before and after" photographs chronicling this past Saturday's "First Beltline Project" - the clearing of a 1.7 mile section of kudzu, trash, and mud. -ajc- Every 22-mile public transportation project starts with a single step!

WEB NEWS - This big funny ha-ha <chad vader>

** MATH - ( 8" H x 14" W x 15" D at 231 cu. in. per gallon = 7.27 gallon capacity)

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ATL 10/15/07 - Fitness, v'ball

This week's scan goes back to 1966 - it's me at my height of cuteness, blondness, and precociousness. It's all downhill from here - like Britney turning 16. We are in my great-grandmother's backyard (in Bakersfield, CA?) - me, my namesake Uncle Dayne, his wife Aunt Agnes, Dayne's mom & my great grandmother Granny Clark, and my Mom. Gotta love that flip. How does she do it?

"What gives a girl
Power and punch?
Is it charm, is it poise?
No, it's hairspray!"

An experiment in fitness photography...a direction, at least, if not yet a final product.

...and on such a beautiful, fall day, what makes a day out in the sun complete? "Volly-bull!" No lie...our little volleyball session was happily interrupted by the "Red Bull Girl" who was walking around wearing a cooler backpack and handing out refreshing samples of the high energy drink. Just what you need before continuing your tough afternoon in the sand pits!

ART/LOCAL/PLANT/WORLD NEWS

ART NEWS - Jazz Night at the High and Eartha Kitt at Symphony Hall on Friday, 10/19.

L5P Halloween Parade at 5:00 on Saturday, 10/20. 2nd best parade in Atlanta!

'Wedding Singer' is at the Fabulous Fox Theatre from 10/16th to the 21st; just in case you forgot how fabulous the 80's were.

Piedmont Park has a party on the dock (7-11) on Thursday, 10/18. "A $20 donation gains you access to this trendy event, featuring an open bar..." (more info here, but I stopped reading after "open bar").

LOCAL NEWS - After months of threatening reminders and lots of rearranging dirt along the downtown connector, the new 14th Street bridge project is getting serious. Here are some of the links describing the phases of the project - all of which are rapidly getting to major pain-in-the-ass level - through March 2010. YIKES! -1- -2- -3-

PLANET NEWS / THE DROUGHT - S. and I are trying to quantify a baseline for water usage in our condo - average dishwasher & washing machine use, shower, etc. So far, we've measured the toilet flushes at 1.6 gallons each. We'll let you know more as we nail it down. If it's yellow, let it mellow!

WORLD NEWS - With climate change becoming harder and harder to ignore, the Japanese are doubly aware that they pledged to reduce their contribution to greenhouse gases by 6%, but they have actually gone up 7.8%. A recent children's book, is helping to make children more aware of conservation - "Mottainai Grandma", the grandma who preaches "don't waste".

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ATL 10/8/07 - Fall

JEFF NEWS - I loooooooove that mom's shoes not only match her Mary Tyler Moore pantsuit, but also the tulips (which I assume were the reason we all all crouching down in the backyard garden for this photo, circa 1979). My brother was always wearing that football jacket; I had one for the Miami Dolphins, and I assure you it was only because I liked turquoise and orange. I don't remember watching even one second of football growing up.

BOOK/ART/LOCAL/INTERGALACTIC NEWS

By the site counter on my blog, I can tell how each visitor arrived at my little webworld; via email, a link from another site, or by googling JEFFREY KEESEE DRUNK. What? I mean, really, who googles that? It's not like you have to search far and wide to find the real live version....

BOOK NEWS - I just heard about the book 'Economic Naturalist' on NPR and look forward to reading it soon. In it, the author poses and answers some pretty interesting questions about societal behavior, causing me to postulate on some of my own...

As long as there are jobs in the U.S. that illegal immigrants are willing to risk their lives to come here to get, why are we paying even one, single legal resident welfare?

As long as some states don't legalize execution, doesn't that the death penalty cruel & 'unusual' punishment in the states that do?

ART NEWS - Check out Echo Project north of Atlanta for 3-days of music and High Museum Impressionism exhibit for 125 years of painting.

Alliance Theater - Sleuth now until November 4th. A great caper/mystery tale and now is your chance to see the live production before the new version film comes out. The 1972 version starred Lawrence Olivier and Michael Caine as Milo. The soon-to-be-released remake also stars Michael Caine, this time with Jude Law as Milo.

The Candler Park Fall Fest is Oct 13-14.

Out on Film Fest is at Landmark Art Cinema Oct 11-18.

The Atlanta Botanical Garden celebrates October by serving beer until 10 PM on Thursdays.

LOCAL NEWS - If you are looking to sponsor someone during the Breast Cancer 3-Day walk, here's your gal!

This Saturday, October 13th, is the annual Trees Atlanta Tree Sale. This event raised $15,000 last year and continues to be a major source of funding for TA's neighborhood projects.

INTERGALACTIC NEWS - John (The Stomper) McLean's Birthday on October 14th!.

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