Camping with Mooses



MooseCamp
Originally uploaded by Laughing Squid.

Vancouver is a rad, beautiful town. The mountains beckon, but only from a distance this time. Moose Camp is day 1 of the great white north blogger geek-o-thon. Did some GETV interviews with the talented Sarah Pullman guest corresponding. This shot is Sarah interviewing Chris Pirillo and Ponzi of Gnomedex fame. Scott Beale always quick on the 5D.

A few self-promotional bits today: Le Monde 2 has an interview with Ryan and I about Webzine and the future of the Internet or whatever, like we know anything. No online version. If you’re in France, please pick up a copy for us. Also, Webzine 2005 named dropped in Annalee’s Techsploitation this week. Lastly, Xeni’s BoingBoing piece on Marc’s Dorkbot food hacking presentation features my grinning mug. It was that tasty!

Vancouver bound

Northern Voice 2006

I’m heading up to Vancouver for the Northern Voice blog conference this weekend. It’s web geeky-a-riffic, but with a funny accent, eh. I’ll be getting some GETV interviews and doing some vlogging for Netsquared. I’ve never been to Vancouver though it’s been on my short list for years. If you’re around, find me and say hi. And tell me what to check out.

BrainJams DC

Hey my DC peeps. This is a bit last minute, but if you’ve got the day free tomorrow you should check out the BrainJams collaboration geek pow-wow event happening Monday. It’s the brainchild of Chris Huere and Kristie Wells who have done two such event here in the SF Bay area. If you’ve got a project you need some geek help with or you’ve got mad geek skillz and are looking to help out on someone’s cool project, BrainJams DC is the place to make that a reality. It takes place at the DC Improv in downtown DC from 10am-5pm. If you can’t make the daytime shindig, catch up with the Jammers during happy hour at the Lucky Bar. Tell ’em I sent you.

Dorkbot, yummy stylie



Serving up desserts to 100+
Originally uploaded by ekai.

Another great Dorkbot at RX Gallery last night. Marc Powell, hacker chef and hacker hostel hotelier extraordinaire, showed us the science behind making taste buds dance. He followed up with an awesome dessert made from liquid nitrogen and purple gloves. That’s mad skillz. Pix I took.

Marc was followed by Jennifer Granick, a Stanford Internet lawyer, who described how Bush’s overstepping of authority on wiretapping is an unprecedented erosion of our democratic system. No surprise there. The comparison of democratic principles to Star Wars was amusing.

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Fish Boy Dreams



Fish Boy Dreams
Originally uploaded by ekai.

The SRL mayhem in Chinatown LA was a great little show, smaller than last year but just as scary, freaky and fun to work on as ever. The show titled “The Fish Boy’s Dream” ended in a nightmare for poor little Fish Boy as he was poked from a puking alligator above, tossed around like a floppy halibut by the shaker and finally seared from a fiery blast from the Boeing jet engine. Fish Boy lived a short humble life, but his spirit lives on in that stinky, fish water coated parking lot in Los Angeles’ Chinatown. Jack Nicholson would be proud.

I ran this sneaky soldier with Nina during the show, which performed admirably within it’s constraints. With the right pulsing movements on the remote control, Sneaky would inch forward slowly and zip backwards more quickly. Turning was out of the question, though with several tons of other fast moving machines dancing around, there really wasn’t anywhere to turn to. Sneaky survived the ordeal, though decapitated. He can be seen or bought along with his head and a couple of his brothers in the Fringe Exhibitions gallery until Feb 25th.

Here’s pix I took, mostly during setup. More links from the official SRL page, BoingBoing and Laughing Squid.

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Back home in DC for a spell



Comet deli
Originally uploaded by ekai.

Ah Washington, DC. I like that there’s no billboards or highrises and instead plenty of old school brick architecture. I don’t miss the smokey inside of bars, which may happily change soon as DC comes online with local anti-smoking regs. It was nice to meet new blogger friends. Shoutouts to Tony, Jamy, Shannon, Reya, Danielle and Rob, Michael, Celeste for dragging me to the Science Club.

I was dismayed to hear that the Comet deli & liquor store in Adams Morgan is closing its doors after being a neighborhood institution since the 1930’s. I used to go there for lunch at least a couple times a week when I worked at the Washington City Paper back in the mid-90’s. I remember ol’ white haired Sid, the proprietor of the place, ringing me up on the ancient massive analog cash register while imparting his unique acerbic whit. He passed away in March of this year and his widow Bernice just can’t carry the torch anymore.

The closing of Comet is bringing to light the larger issue of gentrification of the eclectic Adams Morgan neighborhood. It’s one of the most diverse, unique and independent neighborhoods in all of Washington, DC. The place is chock full of restaurants and boutiques run by refugees and ex-patriots of nations far from our shores. It really is the only place to go for Ethiopian food. As the bleak horizon filled with chain stores and neighborhood homogenization becomes ever closer, I’m reminded of the successful legislation that we’ve passed here in San Francisco to give neighborhoods the right to decide whether they want chain stores taking up space amongst them. I’m not sure how the local political winds would favor such a thing in DC, but I hope that some clueful neighborhood activists will take a page from San Francisco and try something similar. I’m sure most businesses and residents in Adams Morgan would support such a thing, if only the DC City Council can show the political will. I’d hate to see Adams Morgan go the way of Georgetown.