kuniform

This is in the building where i work. Our Christmas party was (is) tonight, in the building.

The Chicago Tribune has a great 4 part series on how why and where to buy, store and cook locally-grown sustainable food. Highly recommended. If you like cooking, please comment on any cool sites you use regularly, and what you like about them. I’ve got a list I’m compiling on del.icio.us.

A week and a half ago, my car was towed from what I considered a legal spot. Someone else considered it legal, too, given that someone else was parked there when I left. In any event, it is Chicago at the end of the month, when towers are really looking for victims. I paid my $300 in tickets and fees, and went on my way.

This morning I was walking into work, and I saw a city towtruck hauling away a car, license plate T58 6810, I believe. It was parked in a metered spot, and the meter had 11 minutes remaining on it. It made me curious, and I tried to fight the cynicism that told me he was just making a quota. Maybe this car had some outstanding tickets or something? There were none under the wipers, but maybe he has some kind of a record. In any event, it causes me to hate driving all the more, though I need to do so in order to drop off my daughter at daycare each morning. It is definitely causing me to consider a hybrid.

Last night I was invited to see a great play, called “In Times of War.” Here’s the Chicago Reader listing. It wasn’t the heavy handed treatment of current events that the title suggests. It was an intriguing and rich examination of society: our roles in power, ethnic, gender, nationalistic and economic relations. Well worth seeing. Congratulations to David Alan Moore, the writer, and Ann Filmer, the director.

Wow. Today began ugly, with a traffic altercation ending with me blowing a kiss to a cop (don’t ask). Then, walking to work, a huge street sign fell off a pole, nearly hitting me. Going up the escalator, the guy in front of me dropped his security badge, which promptly slid between the escalator’s steps and the side.

It made me wonder what the hell I was doing, going to work. Short of frogs raining or a plague of locusts, it was enough signs for me, pun intended. I was tracking through Max Design’s weekly reading list and came across Dave Pollard’s article on collaborative tools and their lack of adoption. The collaborative tools article was great, and Pollard is right. There is little adoption of them, despite their huge promise. This concerns me for two reasons: 1 selfish and 1 pragmatic. The selfish one: I am trying to develop a collaborative tool now, called revizit. The pragmatic: though corporations are probably the biggest beneficiaries, anything that improves human communication is desirable, especially if it improves human understanding or our ability to survive in harmony with our planet.

And on that note, it was with surprise that I found a ton of great environmental links on Pollard’s site, including his article “The Truth About Nature: How to Save the World.” At the same time I was reading this article, and pondering whether Christians or Moslems would ever be able to accept the idea that humans are not the preeminent form of life without relationship to nature, a great 30 minute PBS series entitled “design e2” was on TV. It talked about China, and how rapidly they are adopting environmental solutions (though they still have many issues, make no mistake about it). It ended on an interesting note… A nation believing in the Tao, of life in balance and backed by totalitarian will… does it have a chance to make a difference?

It makes me hopeful, because I think this land of rabid individualism, though fun, may not survive past its adolesence to mature and realize the need for such solutions. I am always hopeful this is not the case, but I live in Chicago, a city with fairly progressive environmental policies. Does the rest of the country have this will? Do our politicians? Maybe it’s time to get with Plato and the Republic, and use music to change it? Obviously, I’m beat, and tilting at windmills. G’night!

Cool! TimeOut Chicago has published a “Continuing Education Guide” highlighting educational opportunities for folks already in the workplace. Yay! They mention the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s continuing studies program.

Why ‘yay!’ you may ask? Because I’m designing and teaching several of the courses for the digital design curriculum, of course!