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This past Saturday I had the single worst public transportation experience of my life to date. Before the incident, I tended toward a certain transit elitism, and I would often look down upon those who cite fear of crime and assault as reasons not to ride the bus, tending to dismiss such critics as sheltered [...]
We live in a hyper-technological age in which information is cheap and ubiquitous. I am no Luddite, and I have benefited greatly from social media, but we must remember that both cheapness and ubiquity are traits indicative of poor quality. Not only do our Twitter-fried brains have 140-character attention spans, but I am convinced that [...]
Sarah and I are moving back to Seattle. Sarah has followed a great opportunity in Seattle, and is now working for the EPA Library. We’re heading back to the Emerald City in just 4 short days. This brief post is addressed to Canada: Canada, I’ll miss you. Staid competence never looked so good. While our [...]
One thing I’m keen to do in this blog is diversify people’s perceptions of the car-free life. It isn’t just for faux-European types living the bi-coastal liberal dream, or for crunchy urbanites who have forsaken our rural, pastoral, or forested landscapes in favor of the concrete and steel of the city. If my goal of [...]
I’ve tried to read The Brothers Karamazov (Братья Карамазовы) four times and failed. I’ve read the first 100 pages each time, and each time become distracted. As a person who wishes to be considered a member of the well-educated literati, this is most unfortunate. As one with formal studies in history and philosophy, an embarrassment. [...]
(1. I like living in a country freer than the USA. Canada’s banks actually make money, their currency is strong, gays can get married and no one cares, our (comprehensive!) health insurance is $100/month, and both the conservative Heritage Foundation and the United Nations rank Canada above the USA in key metrics of economic and [...]
I suppose I’ve always been prone to take things to extremes. As a junior in high school, following up on a bet from my girlfriend to eat Taco Bell every day for a week, I went on to do it for over a month. When recently I decided I needed to eat more vegetables, I [...]