Travels and Other Places – Page 3

August Road Trip

So we finally settled on a five day zip around Lake Ontario. I had been thinking Lake Erie but I think the land of the weck and Wegmans needs further examination. I have to do some heavy negotiations to qualify for the garbage plate. Plenty of consideration of ales and lagers, however, with Finger Lake Beverages, Beers of the World and Premier Gourmet en route. But also a tacky-fest in Niagara Falls as well as a hike in Letchworth State Park, the most highly recommended destination from the western New Yorkers consulted.

Any other places I should visit in western New York?

Chitchattery Fridayesque

Another week is gone. It was a good one except for the Red Sox starting their August collapse a little early. In other sporting news, apparently there was a move to press gang the Chilean U20 soccer team for the Hudson Bay fleet last evening. And I play vintage base ball this weekend in another country. Who knew? Sunday sees me and the other member of the Kingston St. Lawrence Base Ball team taking on Sackets Harbor, NY in a game that will use rules somewhere between 1860 and 1875. Gary may even be seen tomorrow but we are still uncertain as to what the day will bring. I may, too, be in a canoe. What a wonderful week. Here is the linkfest:

Constitutional Update: Where is the balance of powers when one branch asserts autonomy?

Update: The Flea guides us to the new enemy – New Victorians.

I caught a good story from Reuters about a journalist embedded with Canadian Forces in Afghanistan.
I haven’t read any Harry Potter and boycott the movies due to the lack of claymation so I see not reason to give a hoot about spoilers and the release of a page or two early. Doesn’t there seems to be an over-enlistment of the authorities in the propping up of a franchise?
Are we entirely over 9/11? It appears that travel has hit a high but are we forgetful or confident. Americans are staying home we assume due to the dollar…but is that it? Why does no one come to Canada?

Americans are coming to Canada much less than they used to…”Canada needs to add more fun and adventure to its image,” the report, released by Deloitte and the tourism association, said. “We need the right product — the right active tours and adventure experiences. And most importantly, we need to promote them.”

Soon lighters will return.
It has been announced that a father and son team of metal detecting nerds hit the motherload with a Viking treasure trove being announced in England this week. Did you know that metal detection is really cool? That you can get a Bill Wyman model metal detector? I wish I metal detected.
Acquitted conduct. I was listening to CBC Ottawa last evening on the drive home and there was a “sentencing consultant” from the US being interviewed who said that Conrad Black faces the prospect of facts relating to the charges he was acquitted upon being still included in the sentencing on the charges he was found guilty. That makes no sense and I am sure, ten years past any criminal work, that it is entirely unknown in Canada. Wow. I actually feel a little bad for Connie this morning.

That is all for now. I wish I were in England where I could spend some time watching for ocean-going rubber floaty toys. I bet I’d meet up with Bill Wyman if I only spent more time doing things like that.

Thankfully, An End Of Something

A bit quietly, something ended the other day when Lessig packed it in, leaving the unproblem of intellectual property and digital media behind. Having beaten the drum and been a leader of the idea that copyright should not apply to expressions, much to the disgust of the creators of ideas who own and make money off of those expressions, we now find ourselves in a world where the proprietary interest has won out. The “mash-up” world of 2004 that Boingsters would have had us believe in never was just as the world of groceries bought via the internet promised in 1998 disappeared.

This is a wise decision as, in one way, nothing much as really changed from the effort while in another the world has largely moved on. Simon of Living in Dryden illustrates it all very neatly in this passage from a recent post:

About ten years ago, I went to a conference on web development. Everyone was talking about ‘disintermediation’ and how “brick and mortar stores” would get crushed. Consumers would be able to go straight to the manufacturer’s web site, or to a shopping web site of some kind, and order their products directly. All of the supply chains and middlemen (intermediaries) were going to vanish, leaving only producers of goods and their warehousing and delivery. Or something like that. That hasn’t really happened, except in a few categories of items where the Web turned out to be especially effective. Computer geeks, maybe because they heard this story enough times, often buy computer products online. It’s easy for an online bookstore to maintain the tremendous inventory some book buyers dream of, and for some reason a lot of people seem to like making travel reservations online. Even when it sort of works, though, this “disintermediation” is kind of perverse, sending goods all over the place from all over the place. Large online sellers, like Amazon, end up with hugely complicated supply chain management systems and warehouses all over to manage this process. Importers, wholesalers, and web site managers still act as ‘intermediaries’. Is it really that much less mediated than going to a store?

In January 2005 when Lessig was a bit more of a popular ideas man, I listened to him interviewed on NPR’s The Connection and took down some notes on the vision. He believed that under copyright the rules for content in text differed from that in film and music and image. The “next generation of blogs,” he said, will mix to create more powerful social commentary. Never.

That’s because plenty hasn’t really happened. News media have taken on a form of inter-connection with consumers but the balance has not really altered. Blogs have not advanced beyond scrapbooks and on-line journals but also things like YouTube, MySpace and Facebook have made it easy to participate in on-line experience without adding much substantive content and certainly without any real collaboration. And no one is surprised now when deals are made to ensure rights holders interests are respects and thereby, rather than being an obstacle, used as a platform for further development. These things are good. There has been no disruptive revolution, no need to fire millions of grocery store clerks, truckers and shippers or artists. Subscriptions to local newspapers are up. There has been change and the good from digital media have enhanced what was. But no revolution.

Like most with strong firmly-held beliefs, Lessig worked hard, thought a lot of good thoughts but missed the point…as, to be fair, a lot of people did. Alarmingly, however, he now wants to rid us all of “corruption” which he seems to define this way:

In one of the handful of opportunities I had to watch Gore deliver his global warming Keynote, I recognized a link in the problem that he was describing and the work that I have been doing during this past decade. After talking about the basic inability of our political system to reckon the truth about global warming, Gore observed that this was really just part of a much bigger problem. That the real problem here was (what I will call a “corruption” of) the political process. That our government can’t understand basic facts when strong interests have an interest in its misunderstanding.

That form of corruption appears to be an effort to stomp out disagreeing with Lessig. Here we go again. Good luck on that one.

What The Heck Have I Done?

What indeed? I am chaperoning a trip fo grade three kids to the zoo. I thought my life would be chaperoning exempt. The zoo is 200 km or more to the east which means there is five hours in a bus involved. Not a yellow bus, God be praised, but I am told a comfy one. I am still bringing ear plugs. But I am not bringing mace or anything like that so I am being a proper parent.

For your reading and commenting pleasure today, while I endure the screams of eight year olds as I am encased with them in a small steel cage on wheels hurtling down the highway, please visit the Flea where you can see Ms. Hilton defended and accused, ignored for what she is and praised for what she is not – sometimes all by the same person. A sense of fashion collides with a grasp of the law – but no one has lost an eye yet.

Memorial Day Parade 2007, South Portland, Maine

Last weekend we got to watch the Memorial Day parade in South Portland Maine. Every town and village I’d guess ran a parade at about the same time and an air force refueling tanker flew overhead giving them each an overpass. When I bought waving flags, a lady told me to have a happy holiday but it was the slightest bit weird in that I didn’t know what background of cultural memory or emotion was exactly associated with the day. It was too happy for our Remembrance Day and far too sunny. I was good at flaggy wavey, however, so that was good.

Border News Update

Now that I know I am a hour or so away from the best ribs I have ever had, I am ever so much more sensitive to issues relating to crossing the border. Sad the news, then, comes that Canada and the US have arrived at an impasse as it relates to the rights of humans at the gates. There is the opinion of The Buffalo News:

The United States wanted to take fingerprints from some travelers who acted a little suspicious, specifically those who approached the border but, for whatever reason, decided not to cross. But Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms — which apparently does not treat changing one’s mind as evidence of terrorist intent — is held to forbid taking fingerprints from any person not charged with a crime.

Such presumption of innocence is apparently another thing that the U.S. administration considers “quaint.” And that’s really too bad, not only for those who respect the rule of law but also for those who make a living going back and forth across what used to be called the world’s longest unmilitarized border.

Nice to see that we are thought the Trus North Strong and Free to someone else but it begs the question – what if I want to give up some identification to get more security. I cross on average once every six weeks. Last week the NEXUS program expanded to all border waterways. NEXUS is a handy-dandy little card that both governments recognize and costs a little less than a full passport. But it is not fully rolled out and does not apply yet to land crossings in my part of the St. Lawrence Valley. Those Weslakians are keeping it all to themselves. Dastards.

Watertown Update

Interesting doings across the river in Watertown according to WWNY, though their choice of illustrating the story with a photo of half a Bulgarian nuclear reactor from 1968 is some what curious:

The Town of Watertown’s first two domes aren’t even off the drawing board yet, and already there is talk of a third dome. At a town board meeting Monday night, town supervisor Joel Bartlett disclosed that a group of private investors are considering a $25 million theme park in the town. The theme park would have its own dome.

News of the possible investment comes as Bartlett and other town officials consider whether the town should raise $10 milion to build two domes of its own. One dome would be the “event” dome, seating 6,000 people for sporting events, concerts and conventions. The other would be a smaller dome that would replace the town’s west side fire station. The cost is pegged at no more than $10 million, with the money coming from grants and taxes other than property taxes.

“It’s a big investment we’re asking folks to consider, and we want to do our ‘due diligence,'” Bartlett said. Town officials said a “board of managers” would ovedrsee the domes. The town board will get more details at its next meeting.

Good – no plan that the contractors to be chosen will be Uzblkinovokinov + Concretovi…though a glowing green blob on the horizon would certainly make finding it on the drive over easy enough. We like going over – as is obvious – but in winter a shorter hop is better than always putting six or eight hours of driving into a weekend so the prospect of new things to do so close is pretty nice. The expansion of Fort Drum is obviously creating an economic boom over in Jefferson County as the main drag seems to have had a new mall area pop up over the last few months.

Have a look around yourself as the season opener for the Wizards is now officially a Gen X at 40 sanctioned event:

The Watertown Wizards open the 2007 New York Collegiate Baseball League season on Friday, June 8th, at Alex T. Duffy Fairgrounds, against the Glens Falls Golden Eagles. Game time is 7:00 PM.

Glens Falls! Pttuie!!! At least we are not playing the Diamond Miners. More info on the Wizards here.

A Day In Watertown New York

Steve French

Regular readers will know that I take great joy in being able to pop over the border that is 35 minutes from my front door and nose around northern New York state. Today, we primarily went to go to the Thompson Park Zoo at Watertown, sitting on a hill behind the town and it was a great day to check out the bat house, the caribou, the bears as well as Steve French in the photograph above. All in humane outdoor fenced areas and all native species now or in the recent past. Turtles get as big billing as the fisher and wolves.

Before the zoo, however, the great revelation was out first visit to the new outlet of the Texas Roadhouse chain across from the Salmon Run Mall. Best ribs ever. I tell you now lie and I like ribs. They were smokey and sweet but most of all they were massively meaty. Culturally appropriate side dishes and craft beer were there, too. Yet the meat seems to be the main theme there as there was, in the foyer, a chilled glassed display of superbly cut steaks – including a 32 oz. ribeye about two inches thick. Frankly, if they can do a steak that big well, I would order one with four salads and all of us would share. There is something about NY state and beef. My best experience so far with a bit of steer was at Oswego, a Delmonico with blue cheese at King Arthur’s brewpub.

One curiosity of the day was the pavilion at the back of Thompson Park pictured below. An oval of stone and wood which seems to have forgotten its original purpose. What took place in the middle? Why would people sit around and stare into the oval’s center?

Friday Not Going Postal Chatfest

An interesting week for we and Canada Post. One day a package that hardly registered for weight within province was taken for posting and the clerk said “eight bucks.” “Eight bucks! Forget it. Give it to her next time we visit.” On another day, two packages with identical size and identical content were taken to Canada Post, one going to Philadelphia (ten hours drive, in another country) and one to Toronto (two hours drive, in my province.) The Toronto package cost a buck more. My world has turned upside-down.

Via John, I learned about Yorkshire forced indoor rhubarb. There used to be a show on PBS called The Victorian Garden and there was an entire episode about forcing houses where vegetables and fruits were grown and kept through the winter. I always wanted to live on pale homegrown foods.
Check out footnote nine on page six of this .pdf copy of a Canadian Senate Committee Report on border security. They want to allow us to bring back up to $2,000 bucks a day from the US including hooch, booze and other sippables. This is new information to me and changes my otherwise dim view of the legislative body. Imagine the right to pop over to Alex Bay for a 2-4 of Thousand Island Pale Ale. Imagine.
What has the Internet really done for us? I think it is fair to say that the idle magazine reader question is a valid concern. It has been a long time since I bought thirty bucks worth of magazines to go through on a Saturday morning. In fact, I cut back all magazine buying to just Sports Illustrated. I like pictures.
This is as important a transitional weekend as Labour Day. By the next one of these bullet points comes into being, there will be an NCAA champion crowned and the baseball season will be in full swing. The bulbs are popping up in the garden and if there is any drying out I may stick a shovel in the ground. I need to thing about seeds and which tomato to grown. Think Stokes and Vesey’s.

Not much today. These are the times of plenty. I am doing real things in real time. I have a real time life in many ways.

A Trip To The Snowy South

A few months to go yet.

A nice bomb down to the great state of Ithaca where we had diner at Moosewood with Gary and Maude as the greatest Charlie Brown snow in history fell outside. I wanted to sing “Hark the Herald” to loo-lo-loo-lo-looooo as roundheaded cartoon kids skated. We split a jug of draft Cascazilla which was entirely the right drink at the right time. The Ithaca Holiday Inn has solidified itself as the place to stay. We are down in Ithaca there a lot and others have thrown everything from the hallways that smell like a nursing home, to a “pool” that was about 15 by 22 feet, to that light that flashed all night, to the other pool with the green water and the sandbars forming naturally in the deep end. Go with the Holiday Inn. Room 265 works for kids if you are not in the Room 1000 bracket.

We ended up at State Diner on, no question appropriately, State Street and had a great breakfast. We often end up at Ithaca Bakery for breakfast where I have a bagel with sprouts, guack and a formed veggie patty so between that and Moosewood I have to make sure I balance my man-drum pretend-Ithacan with my townie pretend-Ithacan. State Diner can do that for me now. I eat corned beef hash and poached eggs but only on the road. This was a good one. Solid move on the toast as well with 3 slices per order and a light touch on the butter. But it was butter. Coffee is better at the Ithaca bakery but not by much. The staff are kind and helpful at both.

Next time, we hit the Shortstop Deli.