Village People vs. Danielson

It's a rock 'em sock 'em evening of music options in Boston tonight. The big "shews" in my opinion -- the free Village People show at City Hall Plaza & Danielson at the Middle East Upstairs.

Ugh -- what a choice!

And we're flying off to Seattle tomorrow, so that adds another complication.

I'm leaning towards the Village People (I know, it's not all of the original members), since:

-- it's free
-- and it's earlier in the evening
-- and it's free!

Though maybe I could do both?...

Right Forward Solid Rocket Booster Video

I decided to wait until the Space Shuttle safely landed before posting this (so as not to jinx anything!) -- I took a peek at the NASA shuttle web site a few days ago to see what kind of stuff they had up for the current mission.

Amidst the standard launch highlights (and now landing highlights), I came upon an amazing video. It's the Right Forward Solid Rocket Booster Video from launch -- and it's a beautiful unedited 12 and a half minutes from a camera mounted on one of the boosters (looking "down"). [RealMedia link]


At the beginning, nothing much seems to happen, until after about 45 seconds, you notice the water jets start pumping below the shuttle. Soon enough it takes flight and there's some amazing shots of Florida quickly vanishing... but it really gets trippy when the boosters detach and go tumbling -- you see the shuttle flying off and the space/atmosphere horizon, before the booster begins it's fall back to earth.

The fall is stabilized by parachute and the latter part of the video is the approach to the ocean and splash down, with some great tangled parachute lines swirling in the water.

I recommend putting on some languid ambient music -- Fripp/Eno, Zero 7 or Bjork -- and watch this video in its entirety.

Now I need to go see what other gems NASA has on their site. It may come as no surprise I also enjoy watching the live "NASA" channel which I *do* get with my $8/month cable package!

Fox25 Interview Online

My talk with Bianca de la Garza that aired last night on Fox25 News at 10 is now available online at www.myfoxboston.com... if you can find it!

I was unsuccessful in finding a direct link -- it only seems to be a kind of "sidebar" link from the story "Tunnel Still Days Away From Opening."

Bianca and Me

Bianca de la Garza and Brian "the camera guy" came by to talk to me this evening about my experience of being first through the I-90 connector. I explained that feat in context with the other transportation pioneering feats. She was unaware of the larger concept and was very excited to learn about the other exploits in that (ongoing?) piece.

I had a hard time remembering all of the accomplishments!

The piece will air tonight -- Thursday -- on Fox 25 News at 10. I just noticed that Fox is doing some crazy redirects to some richer media pages -- so maybe a video version will be available on-line? I'll have the trusty VCR programmed!

Ledger interview

A Patriot Ledger reporter tracked me down (by phone, not in person, as Bianca did!) to talk about the tunnel tragedy earlier this week. I checked the Ledger on-line the next day, but my comments didn't seem to make it into their piece on the tragedy (which frankly made sense to me.)

But lo and behold, an entire article about my reactions has magically appeared. And they use the same photo from that day as in my previous post.

Steve Garfield pointed me to his edit of footage from that day. I'm still sitting on all of the raw tapes in the hopes of some day putting some sort of long form piece together -- when I get that big artist's grant, right?!

Bianca de la Garza Stopped By

There was a hand written note for me on my mailbox when I got home amidst the pouring rain tonight. It was from Fox25's Bianca de la Garza.

She wants to talk to me about the deadly Big Dig ceiling panel accident, since I was the first person to drive through that tunnel in January of 2003. I'm talking with her tomorrow afternoon. I'm impressed with that she did the leg work to track me down (and didn't send some intern... unless the note was forged!)

Tintin and I

PBS' series P.O.V. is premiering a documentary film about Tintin creator Hergé tomorrow night, Tintin and I. How come I just found about this? The web site has some nice bonus content, including some interviews with contemporary cartoonists about Hergé's influence. They should have talked to my good friend Jason Little!

I was reading Tintin before I could even read -- my Mom bought me and my siblings a batch of them while we were traveling through India in the summer of 1976. And we all got hooked.

I taught a Tintin class at Oberlin College's Experimental College in 1990. I personally consider Tintin to be a huge influence on my life, work, etc. -- he's the embodiment of a spirit of adventure! And he had a cute dog, to boot.

I still ponder why Tintin was never popular in the U.S. (as opposed to everywhere else on the globe). I call it the "World Cup Syndrome"!

Fire it Up!

I will be on a panel this afternoon at the Alliance for Community 2006 conference called Fire It Up: Web Based Media Technologies on Display, at the Park Plaza Hotel.

The organizers of this event are obviously not World Cup aficionados...