May 17, 2006

Flooding

I'm not in the habit of reporting news, and I think this might be interesting to, oh, maybe 5% of my readership. But still, it's freaking me out and it's my blog. I'm like one of those people who sees their friend's friend's uncle in a news photo and gets all excited.

So, you know that flooding in New England? It has put my high school (which I've blogged about here and here) under tons of water (photos of the gorgeous, Hogwarts-like campus are here). The library and a bunch of other buildings -- some very old, some not (and some, honestly, that were built in the 60s and that I wouldn't mind seeing swept away) -- underwater. All of the students were sent home, and they're talking about "structural damage," which is awful, considering how some of these buildings define the campus. Pictures of the flooded campus can be found at the Concord Monitor and the school site.

Update: More pictures.

Posted by csageday at 03:00 PM | Comments (0)

February 25, 2006

Ice Dancing = Horrendous Costumes and Jerry Springer-Style Commentary

Sorry for the sparse blog posting. It's not for lack of bloggable subjects -- I just don't have the time with my new schedule. I can't promise that it'll pick up, but I'll try not to let this completely fall apart.

Did anyone follow the various sagas in the winter Olympic figure skating events? We watched a good deal of the ice dancing, which seems to be an odd sport, but which we were admirably prepared for after watching the ridiculous (but addictive) 90s flick The Cutting Edge in fits and starts while it played 100 times on NBC over the previous weekend.

The Italian ice dancing couple gave the (exceedingly annoying) announcers something to gush about. The couple came out of retirement (the announcers says this with great seriousness: "they came OUT OF RETIREMENT to be here today") to compete in their home country (sob), and they skated, well, so-so the first time around, I thought. The judges thought they skated GREAT, though, and gave them a great score. This would suggest a little bit of Italian-style corruption, no? But what do I know about judging figure skating. The next night, if I'm remembering right, was the night of the DISASTER. The man -- the "weaker skater" (the announcers will also CRUSH less-than-perfect skaters at the first opportunity they see) DROPs his partner. He "can't get the job done", and she stumbles down from a lift. Italian diva that she is, she finishes the program and storms off, furious. The feud lasts all the way to the following day, when they're scheduled to skate the next program. The TV crews love the soap opera-style fight, filming them refusing to look at each other in the locker room, filming him sulking, filming her fuming (stand-off photos here). The announcers have great fun referring to her as "icy", "frosty" and waiting for things to "thaw". Finally, they skate out on the ice, still not speaking, and skate their program without any major mistakes. When it's over she gives him a hug and smiles. The announcers say something like "he's back in the big house" or whatever. Saga over.

Can you see how the stupid announcers would drive you nuts? We had to mute the sound during programs just so we could watch. The female announcer will disparage every skater, no matter how accomplished (these are the best in the world, no? Can we give them a break?). She'll say, "only a double" if anyone doesn't do a triple toe loop, and talk about a skater "reeeeally struggling here" when he/she seems just fine. When she's not doing that, she's making over-arching statements like "She's not just playing Juliet here. She IS Juliet." She said that in reference to the doomed-to-win-silver Sasha Cohen. What does that even mean? Is Sahsa dating someone from Russia? Is she suicidal? Ugh.

Back to the ice dancing, though. I was aghast at the parade of completely tasteless costumes we saw one night. It seemed like there was some kind of outlandish costume contest going on. I know there's a history here, because even in "The Cutting Edge" there are some questionably shiny, oddly-cut get ups. Solo figure skaters seem to have some fashion sense, but many ice dancing couples looked like they were dressed for Halloween. One American woman had on a mostly sheer outfit with little florets of white popping up all over her chest and arms. She looked diseased, like she might have eaten a poisonous mushroom and subsequently developed a violent fungus infection. Did nobody else realize this before she decided to wear the outfit in front of millions of people? Then, and I think this might have been the dueling Italian couple, there was a couple that looked like they had just climbed out of a swamp. They had green and brown ugly flowing things on. Another man's outfit had this completely pointless, long light blue piece of satiny fabric sewn to the back of an otherwise acceptable outfit. It matched his partner's dress -- maybe they had some fabric left over and decided to just sew it on? Ugh. There were a few decent, even nice and tasteful costumes, but for a while I had more fun making fun of the costumes than watching the skating, which doesn't seem quite right. I've just noticed an article on NBC's site about this same issue, so maybe someone will do the skaters a favor and tell them to stop designing their own costumes.

Update: Have the unitard-wearing skaters not realized that they all look like Seven of Nine?

Posted by csageday at 02:08 AM | Comments (0)

February 24, 2006

Scary

This is appalling. Approved legislation that prescribes five years in jail for performing an abortion. Last I heard, the majority of Americans believe in a woman's right to choose. It's a personal, private right I hold dear -- why should a religious, vocal minority have a say over my reporductive rights? Why should teenagers be forced to have children they can't properly care for?

However, for whatever single-minded, short-sighted reason, half the country voted for a president who has no respect for these values (or, really, any human rights -- see this week's New Yorker article on U.S. torture policy). People I've spoken with who voted for Bush seem to think that the abortion rights issue wasn't at stake. What were they thinking? There's so much fear and ignorance in this country. People voted out of fear and now we have two conservative judges in the Supreme Court who won't find anything wrong with this backwards, damaging legislation.

Posted by csageday at 05:36 PM | Comments (0)

September 01, 2005

Clay and Katrina

Clay Hensley, of previous Gates swinging fame, ended up weathering out Katrina in the Sheraton hotel in New Orleans on Monday. As of Wednesday, he was still there awaiting evacuation. Word is that he's on his way to Dallas now (phew). He sent a couple of emails to coworkers about how he and other staff were doing (the trip was work-related) and agreed to let me post parts of them here (thanks Clay!). Everyone in his group is safe, although most likely going a little nuts from being cooped up for so long.

Note: The Sheraton is right near the Superdome -- here's a satellite photo.

Here is pair of satellite photos from before and after Katrina from the NYT.

Excerpts from Clay's Emails

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 12:02 PM

Electricity remains out, and the airport is closed, but those are minor inconveniences compared to the devastation that others -- elsewhere -- experienced.

[Our group was] unharmed by the storm. We all are very fortunate.

A few windows shattered within the hotel, and the ceiling of the 8th floor dining hall (where we all had had our lunch on Saturday during the training) collapsed and the bathtubs we all filled before the storm have become our water source. And the hotel has instituted a lockdown due to roving bands attempting to get into the hotel.

Despite this, the Sheraton has provided amazing shelter for us. I can only speak for myself, but I rarely felt endangered or even insecure; this is meant as braggadocio, but, instead, intended as a testament to competence of the staff here at the Sheraton. (I must admit that this is my third hurricane -- Hugo and Floyd were the others. Floyd frightened me.

After the storm subsided yesterday afternoon we were allowed to leave the 5th floor ballroom (deemed the safest shelter during the hurricane, and where we spent night and morning of the storm). We returned to our rooms via the stairwell (38+ floors for some of us. ;-)

But trust, I have no complaints. Everyone, especially our colleagues and the staff here at the Sheraton, have been truly remarkable.

Earlier today I witnessed the sun rise over the Mississippi River: a spectacular sight and, hopefully, the beginning of a better day.

Wednesday, August 31, 2005 7:46 AM

Email access just restored. We all remain in Crescent City, and, although a bit stir-crazy, are all fine. Hope my previous email didn't alarm you.

The flooding of the causeway after Pontchartrain's levee broke made it impossible to get buses in here. Buses already in the area are underwater and are not expected to be operational even after the floods recede.

The manager of the Sheraton, Dan King, has assured us that the hotel has provisions to last another week, so we are not worried about our health or our safety. Mr. King is attempting to get buses here from Texas -- anticipating the receding of the waters that are currently impeding access -- to deliver us all to the Baton Rougue airport, where planes are already flying out.

Civil unrest seems to have calmed, perhaps resulting from the hordes of police officers, equipped with VERY large firearms, lining Canal Street. No more sightings of roving bands of teenagers with VERY large, bulging Footlocker bags.

Although the City of New Orleans has lifted its curfew, the Sheraton has not. We remain under lockdown orders and have not been able to walk out of the hotel for the previous 20 hours. Ugh.
...
So, without any way to leave the hotel, and clear indications of some us experiencing loss of focus/ grip on reality (that would be me), several of us turned to card-playing for relief. Please note that I punished [2 coworkers] in a version Filippino poker with a Tagalog name whose spelling I am having difficulty recalling at 6:30 this morning. We played two dozen rounds (did I mention the stir-crazy aspect of this situation?)...the result: [Clay's department] -- 20; [4 other departments combined] -- 4.

Dawn is just now breaking here, and a crimson haze envelops the riverfront. The view is big, easy, etc...

Side note: Clay's been begging for a mention on the blog for months -- after one slightly tipsy discussion of how I can see the search queries people make I noticed 'clay hensley--lord of the dance' and 'clay "tubby" hensley' in the log (nice try). A first-hand account of the biggest hurricane this country has even seen, though -- kinda hard to ignore that one. Obviously, we're all extremely relieved to hear he's safe and on his way home (hopefully).

Update: Here's an interesting article on lessons learned from Katrina.

Posted by csageday at 09:10 AM | Comments (2)