Tuesday is often called “lobby day” in Albany, because tons of cars and buses converge on downtown with citizens eager to lobby their government. That’s their right, and it’s good that people are concerned about the workings of their government.
But what sucks is the traffic headaches that lobby day create. Heading into the city most days, except lobby day is never crowded. But when hundreds or maybe even thousands of additional cars converge on downtown, it’s nothing but a headache – even just riding the bus to work. When I drive to work, I always make sure to avoid taking the expressway to work on lobby day.
Traffic heading downtown on Tuesdays during the legislative session can be sluggish and annoying, even on the bus.
After going out to my parents for Sunday dinner, every two weeks, I like to wash my truck at the neighborhood car wash. This time it seemed to come out better without leaving a big “scratch” made out of wax on my truck. Not that’s a big deal, but the first time I saw it, I kind of freaked out, as my truck barely fits in the car wash as it is, especially with the cap on it. I think when I lift my truck, I won’t be able to use that car was, as my truck will be too high on its roof-line.
It looks like we made it to the second day of the week. Monday went fairly well, even if it was a long day. Today is a bright and sunny morning as we prepare for another potential snow storm on Thursday. I don’t really care, as I it’s a casual day on Thursday at work, and I don’t think it will impact my plans much at all.
Another bright sunny morning as we work our way through yet another week.
There is a lot that can be learned by that Zager and Evans song from the late 1960s. Are we going to become the destiny of the lyrics of that song, or will find ways to embrace our past and integrate it with modernity? Will everything we think, do, and act be defined by the pill that we took today? Prozac seems to be bringing us into that society today, and we can only imagine what further psychoactive drugs will do in the future.
It seems like before we know it we will be able to pick our kids from the bottom of long-glass tubes. We already have cloning and in vitro fertilization and the sciences of both are being perfected. 2525 is only 521 years away, and by then the technology certainly will mean we will not need a husband or wife. That is scary to see our words being defined as science fiction.
In 3535 or sooner we won’t need to do anything as we will have machines to do all of our work for us. Machines are already displacing blue collars, and when will it be that a computer will replace us in the future. The possibility is frightening: justice administered not by human but by computer.
The song ends suggesting that man has taken and taken and never given back anything in returns. That certainly reflects the model of man today, in which we continue to consume ridiculous amounts of earth’s natural resources without ever considering the consequences of our actions. Pretty scary, although I believe human nature will have to change as we see our resources being used up in increasing rates.
Today's blast from the past, a decade ago, looks at where an unchecked "technocratic" society can end up taking us.
Somewhat accidentally, I started adding hillshade and then rivers and waterbodies to the choropleth maps I was making up. I was shocked by the simple beauty, and how one could make a map much more attractive by adding these relatively minor and unimportant details to a map.
A little hillshade on a chorpleth map can sure make things a little prettier.
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