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Saturday, January 31, 2004
if i start trying to explain how close this is to being a spiritual manifesto, you'll assume i'm sitting here typing with a tinfoil hat on.
or maybe i should drop the pretense and break out the reynold's wrap.
Friday, January 30, 2004
on tuesday i spiked a fever at work but didn't realize it until i found myself puzzling over the word "indeed." i was
convinced it should have three e's, like "indeeed." i'd type it out that way, then decide no, that couldn't be right. three
e's? erase one e. start over. but it didn't look right with two e's either. indeeed. indeeed. after spinning through
this obsessive little hamster-wheel for a few minutes, i finally realized, "whoa. i'm messed up."
so i had the flu. i caught it from isaiah, gave it to lisa, and the two of us conducted the time-honored ritual of parenting
while deathly sick. the virus was bad - like "puke your guts out in a third-world country" bad - and it was made all the harder
with isaiah cutting a new tooth.
but enough whining. yeah it was hard but think about my mom dealing with her first four kids: at one hellish point, when
my older bro's and sis's were between the ages of 2-8, half had measels and the other half had chicken pox. then after a week,
the two halves swapped viruses and it started all over again.
and she handled it largely on her own. away from her own family. at the age of 26. all hail the ubermama.
so three days of flu and teething? no problem.
Tuesday, January 27, 2004
i threw tarot for a new client last night, then drove around in the dark snow storm listening to the golem-like oboes
come to life in "sorceror's apprentice" - a surprisingly wintry song, at least, in the cincinatti philharmonic version
anyway - lots of bells. then i shoveled our drive way and corner lot's sidewalks, a real workout. smoked a cigarette
with my neighbor mark, with whom i bought the duplex. snow-muted night. american spirits. then a cup of hot good earth
tea when i went inside.
i like to keep publication schilling to a mimum, but if you want to keep apprised of what i have in the pike,
look under "forthcoming" here on my website.
Monday, January 26, 2004
two years ago i was in nicaragua. it was a turning point in a variety of ways for me, that trip. two years ago today, we were
winding our way through a tour of fair trade and organic coffee farms, and we arrived late in the night in miraflor, a mountain
coffee farming community which, once the sun rose, i would find to be one of the most beautiful places on earth. but with
no generator the night we arrived, miraflor's community center was just a mysterious concrete building, floating in the dark.
i hooked up with the farmer, francisco, with whom i'd be staying the next few nights, and he led me through the pitch black
night along a muddy dirt road to his farm. i could see the nearest mountain peak high above, blotting out an astonishing spray
of stars. francisco had a flash light and i followed it, asking questions in my shitty spanish about his farm, the co-op,
his politics, etc. he considered himself a proud sandinista, and lamented that daniel ortega had just lost a presidential
bid for the third time. in miraflor, socialism was entrenched in the co-op farms, so he flashed a two at me (like a peace
sign), which indicated the second spot on the presidential ballot: sandinista. francisco had a succesful coffee farm, and
he was president of the coffee cooperative in miraflor. all of this was pretty heady for me, since my father had come to nica
a few years after the revolution in '79 and really wanted to believe in the sandinista movement - for various reasons, he
was somewhat disappointed. but i saw in francisco something of what jack was hoping to find: someone who worked hard for the
principles of socialism, someone for whom the ideals weren't abstract, academic, or even "political". here, socialism
was life.
at the point that i found myself on this nica trip, i was also recovering from a deep heartache. my wife and i had had a miscarriage
in the months before i'd left for nica, and it was a loss that really rattled us. all that hope and yearning and expectation
and wonder: poof. it's very hard to let go of all that and just "try again," as people were encouraging us to do.
anyway, i thought a lot about this, and my father, and family, and raising kids in a shitty world. would i, i wondered, walking
along that dark road. would i ever have a family? i asked francisco if he had kids. eight children he said. i laughed. i come
from a big family, too (i'm nine of nine). i asked the age range of his kids and he said they were 8 to 20 i think. then he
added, "i always say i have eight children though one died. that boy is always with me. he is my child always."
i loved that family and i loved their politics and i loved how hard they worked in that beautiful mountain farm. i got to
meet francisco's children over the next two days and most were very cool boys and a couple beautiful daughters, one of whom
was pregnant (i teased francisco and called him "abuelito" [gramps] which i think he really liked). one night we
all jammed into their smokehouse of a kitchen and listened to francisco tell his story of the counter-revolution in the eighties,
when some farmers of this co-op went to join the "contras." he said how horrible it was to know that the "soldiers"
of the contras were killing their former neighbors. the kids surrounding their dad, faces lit by the branch on the stove,
rapt, some adding details - listening to a precious story of their family history
i came home feeling inspired by francisco and his perseverence, his giant family, and my heartache about the miscarriage felt
smaller, somehow, thinking about his sandinista brood, their ceaseless energy for the farm, the hundreds of pounds of organic
coffee constantly being carted off his farm. fecundity! life! work! socialism!
isaiah and i were playing on the floor of my study this morning and i told him, "you have more abuelos than anyone i've
ever known, little dude."
link
Saturday, January 24, 2004
earth uber alles!
excellent, comrade earthlings, most excellent indeed! our infestation of the red planet proceeds victoriously! soon we will plunder the sultanate of mars, enslave her royal family, and launch FTL space-torpedoes in persuit
of her generation ships! and then...
we make for the twenty-third dimension....
~
i'm tracking Opportunity's descent online. we have about an hour left, according to the freaks at JPL, and i can't enhale
info fast enough.
in which our hero gets damn lucky
weird night last night. dave hoffman-dachelet came over to my house to drop off the diaper bag i'd left in his car, and while
we were playing with the baby and dishing, lisa called from the bookstore, saying she had been offered two free tickets to
the timberwolves game. did i want them? i'm not as big a basketball fan as i am a football guy, but hell, bottom feeding is
an art where one simply does not pass up a free anything. so after lisa said she wanted a night with isaiah (she worked a
longer than normal week this week), i turned to david and asked if he wanted to go. he said "duh" and like that
we found ourselves roughly 15 away from kevin garnett, latrell sprewell, sam cassel, wally szerbiak, and the gang - all but
hanging out in the sideline huddles.
well, not just "like that." first i had to reactivate my car curse: battery in the new car died, so dave had to
get the tickets from lisa and then pick me up later at work.
these tickets were $185 each, so we were seated among the uber class last night - people willing to spend ten thousand on
two courtside season tickets and dress in reems of black leather for the sake of fox sports cameras. a well-coiffed, naturally
tanned, and meticulously (albeit boringly) styled crowd. into this stumbles dave and i: doofus dads looking like hippies or
immigrants or maybe hippie immigrants among the gliteratti.
the game seesawed back and forth, but the wolves won (yes, billups DID shove KG's hand away, dave!). then we went over to
dave's house to spritz with his kids, and his wife rachael joined us to talk late into the night about stuff like the interstitial
arts foundation and tor and good writing and good food and milling some meager grains of sf/f gossip and drinking the last
of their summit.
then dave, the patron saint of me, drove me back to my car and jumped it back to life.
it's sort of hard to keep my interest focused today. the itinerary looks a bit shabby after last night's spontaneous combustion.
link
Friday, January 23, 2004
continuity check
a) is wallace shawn playing joe lieberman just in the debates or will he play joe lieberman for the rest of
joe lieberman's political career?
b) brilliant strategist wes clark revealed last night that the US fought the taliban in iraq. wrong, yes, but perhaps
he's on to something: it would have been more efficient.
c) in the Two Towers, there's a rocky landscape directly before the Black Gate that sam, frodo, and gollum clamber through.
in RotK, this rugged terrain is suddenly a plain where the armies of gondor and mordor can clash.
d) the fair trade banana article is cooling on the rack, the mad cow article is almost ready to come out of the oven,
and the short story simmers merrily on the front burner.
e) isaiah cried yesterday when i left the room. object permanence. feh. now the poor little human is doomed to pay attention.
Thursday, January 22, 2004
isaiah plays peek-a-boo as of tuesday. before that, his object permanence hadn't quite gelled, so if you hid behind a sheet,
well, you had ceased to exist as far isaiah was concerned. now when you suddenly appear from behind the sheet, he gives his
long, one-syllable laugh of mild bemusement - until you do something really funny and then he loses his mind.
he's also discovered the cats. the overly sensitive cat, boutros, never hangs around him very long. she kind of watches the
kid over one shying shoulder, as if isaiah were a german shepard. but karintha lets him get close. isaiah likes to look at
her nose to whiskers and chuckle at her while she glares at him hatefully (and i can just see the evil little gears turning
in her brain: "if i were just 10 pounds heavier....and if you were all alone on the veldt....THEN we'd see who shits
in a box, you little meat bag....").
link
i'm in a little "writing" dare with my friend greg. he's in the same boat with photography as i am with writing: tons of great ideas, but due to family and work and life, a
lack of time for execution. i've taken a break from the book to write as many short stories as i can in the next month (read:
a short story), meanwhile he'll lay out the groundwork for another photography essay/project thing, take some pictures
for it, etc. then we'll get together in a month and mock each other. he was going to start a day book online (that's greggese
for blog) to chart his progress, but i don't think he's done it yet. go over to his site, email him,
and tell him you demand daily updates on his progress. for the record, i'm about half-way done with my short story. so tell
him that and riddle him with shame.
thanks.
it was minus 30 when i got up to write early early early. i took the trash out while coffee was brewing and in one bitter
wind gust i got my skeleton chilled. two cups of coffee later, i was still shivering. now the morning is bright and crystal
clear, the sky is cobalt blue - and we're up to minus 17.
the stinking sun is broken.
Wednesday, January 21, 2004
meant to say this yesterday:
kerry? oh please. karl rove drinks the blood of 10 yankee intellectuals every morning with breakfast. if this continues,
"dukakis" will be a verb by labor day.
now that's enough of that.
in better news, lisa and i bought a car. fi-nal-ly. my car-karma has been supernaturally bad lately. after years of driving
with no tickets or accidents, since my birthday i've been a veritable villain of the dept of motor vehicles: a speeding
ticket; a frightening near accident on trecherous kettle-morraine roads; fender bender that wrecked our first car aka "loretta";
burned the clutch out on a loaner from dave. then weeks of no luck finding a decent used car. life feels like
a nerve-wracking tight-rope walk when you have a kid sans car so i can't tell you what a relief this is. please pray
to the used car god to leave me the fuck alone, ok?
last night, to celebrate our new mobility, we went out to eat at chiapas in our old neighborhood, nordeast minneapolis.
chiapas has the best mole in town - very chocolatey without being sweet. isaiah was well behaved, drooling on his wooden
mouse and flirting with the waitress. afterwards, we made a desperately needed run to target and did our part for the shitty
economy by filling the back of our escort wagon with giant value packs of paper towels and toilet paper, and new curtains
for the dining room.
in other late-breaking news, merry has a big gash on his head before he and pippin go into fangorn forest, and then the
wound is gone as soon as they meet treebeard. fyi.
Monday, January 19, 2004
so, i'm either...
or...
yeah. i'm that norma desmond / captain america kinda guy.
i got an email from noted writer luc reid the other day. he's up for the john w campbell award, too, and saw my name on the listing of eligible authors. "say, did you go to simon's rock?" he asked in his email, wondering
if i was the barth anderson whom he knew from "back then."
no. i'd never been to simon's rock. i'd never even heard of simon's rock. simon's rock? simon's rock? was this some forgotten
moment of my twenties, a road trip, a bizarre life-digression buried under an ocean of bad beer? no, clearly, this was
the other barth anderson's fell work at play. my fetch. a barth anderson so evil that his machinations would become ever more diabolical until he at last destroyed me.
luc confirmed my worst fears - he had mistaken me for the roaster barth anderson. but consider the "coincidences" at
work here: the other barth anderson and i both work in the organic world (he coffee; me everything else); we both live in
vaguely liberal northern towns (boston; minneapolis); we both have friends named greg! and weirdest of all, i understand his
step-sister used to work at the wedge, my co-op. clearly, he is my fetch.
true, a saner person would dismiss these truths as mere coincidences but i am not so weak a man. you see my dilemma.
luc is a nice guy and all, taking the time to say hello, but he probably doesn't understand that he's being used in an an
intricate, subtle, and malicious game of identity-chess, one that has been going well for me (i have claimed www.barthanderson.com for myself - ha HA!). but with this turn of events, who knows what dark spells my insidious fetch is sending through
luc's friendly little email?
then, in a sheen of cold perspiration i woke in the yawning dark of night and realized that, wait now, perhaps i
am the fetch. what if the other barth anderson is the real barth anderson? i mean, think of it, i thought, as i paced the
icy floors of my dark and stormy living room. i wasn't even born with this name. for that matter i can't even be
sure i was really born at all - no memories remain of that crucial egress. after all, my first name was kirk barringer - it's
right there on the hospital birth record. natural father had it put on there, and when mom finally sobered up and shook off
the ether, she overruled him. i took my step-father's last name as a small child, so you see, some sinister malice could be
creating me for its own designs to destroy the other, true, and completely innocent barth anderson.
but a stiff cup of mud calmed me down as i watched the frigid minnesota sun rise, and my electric nerves finally ceased
sparking. for maybe i had it all wrong. maybe the coffee-roasting boston barth anderson and i are destined, instead, to join
forces in a DC/marvel match-up of unprecedented barthandersonian might and destroy the other other barth anderson.
yes. yes. i see the correct and more potent strategy now. it is at last time to extend an offer of alliance....to the
dark side.
or the light side, as the case may be.
Sunday, January 18, 2004
nica
an e-christmas card finally wound its way to me from mauricio gallup in managua. i stayed at his hostel, casa ave maria,
when i went to nica two years ago, and since leaving there, i've been getting father gallup's sermons mailed to me every
week (his sermons are archived here) and corresponded with him from time to time. father gallup is a socialist through-and-through who sees the bible as a historical
tract supporting and promoting leftist politics, so when lisa and i were considering the name isaiah, i wrote him to
ask for his take on the prophet. lisa came up with the name, and i loved the sound of it, but my impression of "isaiah" was
tainted from my prejudice against old testament prophets as fire-and-brimstone woe unto sinenrs, etc. isaiah's main significance
for the average christian, after all, is that he "predicted christ's coming." as it turns out, he also predicted "woe
unto israel", if its king didn't stop warring with far away nations instead of tending to the poor at home. gallup told me
"isaiah is a prophet of social justice. that's a good name for a young man in this time." that was last june when the dust
from the US invasion of iraq was still in the air and the war in afghanistan, still swirling. isaiah is also responsible for
the phrase "beating swords into ploughshares," and the hymn "down by the riverside" is taken from phrasings in his book.
close as i was to my step-father (a radical liberal methodist minister turned investigative reporter with
an agenda), a heady mix of leftism and christianity is tough for me to resist. and nicaragua, a land where "revolution" is
neither ancient history nor an overused word by radical wannabes, had it in spades.
here's the description of the card from father gallup (and your sunday school lesson this sunday morn): "For a Christmas
card from Casa Ave Maria, this photo of the fresco "Visitation" which is the mural in our patio, painted ten years ago by
the Grupo Artistico Contraste and Pable Danilo Tellez, in Managua. It depicts Maria the Theotokos and Isabel her prima, rejoicing
in their being pregnant with the Gospel Revolution. The Burning Babes, Jesús and Juan Bautista, dance in their wombs. They
are surrounded by twelve apostles, women who struggled (and some of them were martyred) in the Insurrection Evangelico in
Nicaragua in the seventies. Feliz Navidad, and Hasta La Victoria Siempre. With much love, GRANT IN MANAGUA."
meanwhile, it's -25 this morning in minneapolis. how lovely to remember sitting next to this mural at the casa's patio,
in the tropical steam of managua.
(crap. earthlink is being tempramental with me. i'll have to link the card itself later, i guess.)
Friday, January 16, 2004
michael moore on cnn
BLITZER: I assume if Lieberman for some reason were to get the nomination, you would support him, though, over Bush,
is that right?
MOORE: It would take a lot of medication, Wolf.
moore has endorsed clark.
warning: i'm going to tell you what's in your burger
back in 1997, while england's mad cow outbreak was in full bloom, the USDA reluctantly decided it was time to finally ban
the feeding of cattle brain and spinal tissue to cattle ("okaaay then, if we *must*...").
but they did NOT ban and still allow farmers to employ the following feeding practices:
blood and blood products (from cattle and other species)
gelatin (rendered from cattle)
fats, oils, grease, and tallow (from cattle)
poultry manure (?!)
human food waste (which may contain beef scraps)
mad cow is spread (among other ways) by feeding cattle bits to cattle, so with the above in mind, the World Health Organization
in geneva called the US beef industry a "ticking bomb." and with a long dormancy period, the mad cow explosion might
not go off for 2-8 more years. but it's hard to believe it won't explode at all.
for the record, the above feeding practices are not allowed in certified organic or grass-fed ranching. under sane ag stewardship,
organics and free-range production would become the model for a post-mad-cow, US beef industry.
pardon me as i must now laugh until i wet my pants.
(data from jim riddle, secretary of the USDA's national organic standards board)
link
Thursday, January 15, 2004
well this explains the dorky names of "spirit" and "opportunity" for NASA's two mars missions.
and when my paranoia stops chattering like a manic spider monkey, and i stop wondering if the mars rover is really out
in the mohave somewhere, i can actually feel a tinge of seventh grader awe when i look at this.
Wednesday, January 14, 2004
retraction
to anne:
absolutely right. the last thing we want is our kids shuffling off their mortal skills.
link
Tuesday, January 13, 2004
iko (it's pronounced "eye-ko," by the by) has had a fever, off and on, since last friday. nothing too serious, just high
enough to spur a dull pissiness. today was the first day isaiah had the signature glint in his eyes again. now that he's feeling
better, he's doing this lunging maneuver that's frighteningly close to crawling. he's also steadying himself with
one hand and snatching at things. baby now has range. last night the little goblin was on the couch with me, a good
two feet away, but he went for my sandwich and knocked it off my plate. luckily his fine motor skills are still locking
in or baby would have had his first ham on rye.
tonight, i sang iko to sleep with the marching song of the wicked witch's soldiers from "Wizard of Oz." he especially
likes my barry white version it.
a few months ago, i received a copy of IRON DREAM by norman spinrad in the mail. it was from a woman in georgia, whose address i promptly
lost in the move (typical). getting a book with a blazing swastika on the cover was a little unsettling at first, but i loved
that book. totally, completely, thoroughly inventive: hitler as sf writer hack who comes to america after WWI and writes this
cheesey-ass diatribe on race purity loaded with genre lit's good v evil nonsense. spinrad even includes critical commentary
on hitler's work at the end. *kissing fingertips*. mwah! excellent.
so the mystery around the house has been "who the hell was this woman who sent me the perfect book?" last night lisa
was talking to lew (the relationships in both our families are pretty complex. ready for this one? lew is my wife's ex-step-father.
read no distance into those hyphens. we adore lew like...um...like an ex-step-father). anyway, at the end of the convo he
asks, "did barth ever get the spinrad book?" hey, cool, it was lew! but what about the woman from georgia?? "i ordered
it from ebay."
i am a product of another age. that didn't even occur to me.
"i figured barth would remember. we talked about that book after passover last year." well, lew, in that late-night ramble,
we also talked about the history of the banjo, old-timing versus bluegrass, corn mash, the st louis cardinals chances last
year, the touch that his son is getting on the sax, CA v french wine, the benefits of having gephardt as your district's representative,
the various eulogies given at a dear friend's recent funeral, bourbon, sonny rollins, oh, and yeah, spinrad.
so anyway. mystery solved. by the way, lew runs Vintage Vinyl in st louis, one of the best indie record stores in the
country. if you need to order music, go here.
Monday, January 12, 2004
Capricorn One II
i dunno. i guess i was expecting more from the JP freaking L. i mean, c'mon. wasn't this an art installment at the last Burning Man?
and doesn't this look like it should have a big hammer coming out the front, or a buzz saw, so it can destroy other garage-made robots?
and "Mars Exploration Rover Spirit" is lacking a little something. maybe the rover needs a catchy, robot-smackdown name:
nasazilla? the marsinator?
that, and a way wicked buzz-saw.
Sunday, January 11, 2004
too, too much coffee with greg today. drank a big fat latte at 3pm - should have known better. now i'm up late,
researching an article on madcow/BSE, vCJD, prions, british slaughter numbers in the nineties, dormancy periods.
anyway, i got an infuriating series of emails recently from a conservative relative, so, during a pause in all my
epidemic fun, i decided to go looking for some political ammo tonight - and found this:
"When the American public becomes more fully aware of the ambitious, messianic strategy behind U.S. foreign policy they
may come to realize that this design is a recipe for perpetual war and chronic domestic insecurity. They may also recall an
older American sense of limits and humility and realize that only great conceit could inspire a dream of armed world hegemony."
-American Conservative Magazine
Saturday, January 10, 2004
in bush's america, government isn't for our common good or for nurturing the common wealth of ordinary citizens. a strong
federal government is inherently and obviously evil, and even far-left "liberal" presidentlial candidates can't articulate
how government could possibly exist to protect us from the corrosive self-interest and uber-wealth of corporate america.
consequently, government has devolved into a tool for fighting wars and planetary exploration.
link
this reads like a passage from an alan deniro "star wars" novel:
(from e-bay)"This Jar Jar Binks is really neat! When you press his right hand, he tells the time. When you press his
left hand he has all kinds of alien things to say as he vibrates! He has an additional button that makes him talk even more
and vibrate on his forearm. All parts work perfect! He is 23" tall and has a plush body with vinyl head and feet. He is in
very good condition, only a couple of small scuffs. Please feel free to email with any questions. Jar Jar comes from a smoke
free home."
Friday, January 9, 2004
we're getting fair trade bananas soon at my co-op. i'm really stoked about this, since bananas have been a staple of fair
trade in europe, where in countries like switzerland, france, and norway, one in five bananas are traded fairly. generally,
fair trade is growing anywhere from 25-100+% in certain Eu countries, but it has yet to really catch on with anything but
coffee in the US.
the really cool thing about this deal is that the fair trade bananas will come from the same ecuadorian banana collective
from whom we've bought our organic nanners for years. it's a conscientious group who got certified organic very early on,
and now they want to show that their labor practices are solid-gold, too, by getting fair trade certified.
in this case, fair trade means that not only is a higher price charged (to cover higher worker wages), but a premium of $1.75
per box goes to the labor collective representing the farm's workers. this democratically elected group administers that money
for special projects, i.e., kindergartens for workers' children, clinics for kids and women, training for workers, etc., whatever
the workers decide to do with it.
without this, life is pretty grave for the central american plantation worker. no clinics (let alone "health care")
in an industry where pesticide poisoning and cutting accidents are rampant. child labor (the president of ecuador's own plantation
is under international investigation). and in ecuador, the living wage is considered to be about US$288 per month. but the
average plantation worker makes US$117 per month.
fair trade is not a panacea, but it's a big step in the right direction. now if only american shoppers would consider paying
a little more for their domestic food, we'd be gettin' somewheres.
(attn spec fic writers: please work the catchy phrase "ecuadorian banana collective" into all future short stories.
thank you.)
link
Thursday, January 8, 2004
conversation on the #2 bus
black guy: i'm 900 years old.
latino guy: 900, huh?
black guy: yes sir. and i'm drunk.
latino guy: lucky man.
black guy: and i'm swedish.
latino guy: swedish huh? you don't look swedish.
black guy: i'm a black swede. ya ya.
latino guy: (laughs, warming to the black guy)
black guy: that's what we swedes say. ya ya!
latino guy: ya ya!
black guy: are you swedish?
latino guy: ya sure, you betcha. i'm a mexican swede.
black guy: you betcha! (to the bus driver) i gotta stop at the liquor store.
goth-girl busdriver: i know, i know. you think i don't know that?
black guy: honey, you're looking good like a white girl should.
latino guy: dude, swedes don't talk like that.
black guy: honey, you gonna give me a kiss?
goth-girl busdriver: no not today. (pulls over for his stop). there ya go.
black guy: i got a white woman at the liquor store who'll kiss me.
goth-girl busdriver: tell her i feel sorry for her. see ya later.
black guy: ok, you wait here. i gotta run to the liquor store.
goth-girl busdriver: i'll see ya on the return trip.
black guy: no, just wait here for me, woman. i'll be quick.
goth-girl busdriver: gotta go. see ya in twenty minutes.
black guy: kiss me?
goth-girl busdriver: no way. your breath? no way.
black guy: here i go! miller high life! miller high life! here i go!
(bus commences)
latino guy: (to busdriver) boyfriend of yours?
goth-girl busdriver: all day. up and down franklyn its like that with him. all day.
Tuesday, January 6, 2004
why don't the iraqis have power yet? after gulf war 1, apparently power was restored in months. why is it taking so long
to get baghdad back on its feet?
some answers from Occupation Watch: (KBR = the subsidiary of halliburton charged with getting iraq's oil industry up and running.)
"With Iraq’s oil refineries still awaiting rehabilitation, Iraq cannot refine enough crude oil to meet domestic consumption.
The US is instead exporting Iraq’s crude oil and employing KBR under a no-bid cost-plus-fixed fee contract to import gasoline
from neighboring Turkey and Kuwait.
"Last week, an official Pentagon investigation revealed that KBR is charging the US government more than twice what others
are paying for imported gasoline. What was left unsaid, however, is the conflict of interest inherent in hiring KBR for both
the oil infrastructure reconstruction and the oil importation. If Iraq’s pipelines and refineries were suddenly fully functional
and Iraq is able to produce all the oil it needs, it would be the end of KBR’s lucrative oil-importing business."
"Halliburton got its contract to rebuild Iraq's dilapidated oil industry as an outgrowth of a contract with the Army
to provide emergency logistical help for situations such as the Iraq war. The Army Corps of Engineers opened the oil rebuilding
process to competitive bidding earlier last year and was preparing to award up to $2 billion in replacement contracts.
"Those contracts still will be awarded for rebuilding Iraq's oil industry, but will no longer include oil imports,
the corps said.
"Richard J. Connelly, director of the support center, said the existing contract would remain in place for now, so
that fuel deliveries will not be interrupted."
the bush team is so deft, so quick with their lies and sleight of hand, you almost have to admire the predatory skill
of it.
Tuesday, January 6, 2004
whoa
from JPL:
"All the hard work paid off January 3 when navigators hit their target at the top of the martian atmosphere to within
about 200 meters (660 feet), setting a new standard for navigation accuracy for all future interplanetary missions."
Monday, January 5, 2004
telegram
the kid is cutting a tooth. stop. all writing has stopped. stop. sleeping has stopped too. stop. when will the screaming stop?
stop.
much heart-felt thanks to strange horizons for sending me a check post-haste after buying my story. stop. we're poor and you
rock. stop. you can't, you won't, and you don't stop. stop.
the word stop has stopped making sense to me. stop. what a wierd-ass word. stop. stop. stop. stop. stop. stop. stop.
link
dive! dive!!
you can feel it: as a city, minneapolis is going down. we're at minus seven. down, down. last night, it was minus
ten, and with wind chill, right now at 9am, it's minus eighteen. the whole city goes under when it gets this cold, a retreat
into homes and deep inside our skulls. movie theaters and shopping malls and whole nighborhoods: down, down, down like a massive
soviet sub beneath arctic ice. hardly any one on the streets today. very little rush hour traffic. perhaps we need exploration
rovers to survey the alien minnesotan landscape for those of us in the submariner crew, waiting below the ice.
we're hoping for a high above zero today. see you on saturday, when the cold spell might snap, and my city can come up
for air.
Sunday, January 4, 2004
i was an apollo mission kid. i'd stay home from school to watch splashdowns, and i remember seeing one on a color screen
for the first time (the ocean is so BLUE in color, i remember thinking).
i was also a mars viking lander kid. NASA had a 1-800# you could call to get updates on the lander, and i'd call 4 or
5 times a day, getting the same recording about the soil samples taken that day on its robotic arm, and feeling really plugged
in. and i was. it was the closest thing to the internet at the time, i'd guess.
Thursday, January 1, 2004
for christmas presents to our family this year, my mom collected and bound a number of my father's articles from
his tenure as a reporter for my home town paper, The West Bend News. he wrote for The News back in the seventies when small
town papers had news rooms, editorial boards, a local publisher, 4-6 reporters with actual "beats" that could cover the news
generated in a town of 16,000, and inches of copy outnumbering ad inches. a more civilized age, altogether.
anyway, she gathered some of his feature stories together, and it's so great to have his words in my head again. the
man had soul and he loved to write. i'll pull some of his work for future blog posts, but one comment about writing really
jumped out at me in his article about turning fifty, back in 1979. here, jack is talking about not longing for his youth in
old age:
"For me, the feeling crystallizes around my writing. Six years ago when I started at The News, I measured my success
by how much I wrote each day. Today what I say is more important than how often I say it."
it was cool to read this. i'm at that point myself, where i don't bother with daily word counts or pushing myself to
write a certain number of pages per day. a kid changes those expectations, so now i try to write something
i'm honestly proud of every day, in whatever time i can steal. but i'll admit, though, i've been lamenting not having more
time - the new book is flowing well, i'm jazzed, i got the fever, and if i had more hours for writing -- well, you know
the drill.
so it was kind of nice to know that jack had grown to strive for quality in his writing, at a similar point in his
life (i'm just 11 skinny years away from 50, after all), and that the quantity diminished in importance. makes me feel
like i'm on the right track.
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