…Does it get any better?

I didn’t read up on where they were giving this presentation, but its a decent analogy.

That being said, its damn fucking cool.

Doing some good again.

This is what our house would have been like if we were strong Evangelical Christians-

Thats right everybody, Reverend Horton Heat is coming back to Portland for more jager drinking, stand up bass playing, throat choking (personal experience, throat choking is not guaranteed for everyone) good time!!!
Its on a Tuesday, which sucks but they are touring with Nashville Pussy, which is awesome !!!!!!

Speak to your friends in Boston and Worcester (rob, gabe….) and they’ll tell you not to miss it. I am sure they are stopping in Boston, but you should still make the irresponsible and illogical decision to come to Portland on Tuesday November 11 to greet your jager-induced drunkeness with some salt air after the show!

Well, maybe not entirely, but this interesting article states that it probably had a hand in it.  Some of you science nerds out there probably knew this already.  But I found it interesting and that’s all that really matters.

So have you heard, the U.S is sending military personel (special forces units) to Georgia to deliver humanitarian aide (M16s) to Georgian civilians (soldiers out of uniform).

“President Bush also said U.S. Defense Robert Gates will oversee a “vigorous and ongoing” humanitarian mission to Georgia involving aircraft and Naval forces.” – CNN

I am soooo excited for WWIII. Anyone have a bomb shelter???

So this isn’t a link to an article, but rather a discussion topic. I was driving a bunch this weekend and sorta watching roads as I drove. It got me thinking of the “far fetched” idea that gets mention every few years of the turnpike authority wanting to use the air rights to the Masspike to open a monorail/train line.

While I cringe at the thought of them maintaining a train, it did get me thinking about the lack of quality intercity train travel in the US, and with gas prices, etc if there’s potential investment opportunities. (my planned cross country train trip added to my pondering)

So anyway, here is the thought. What would the socio-economic impact be on MA, if they ran a highspeed line (200+mph) from Boston to Worcester, and then on to Springfield? (no stops, or maybe 1 stop in between each of those cities). With speed up/slow down times, you could probably do the trip in 20-30 minutes from Worcester to Boston. With a station right in downtown, you could get from Worcester to park street faster than you could from riverside, BC or even Braintree. Suddenly Worcester would be a part of metro Boston in a sense and Springfield would be a long, but manageable commute into Boston.

Obviously it would be massively expensive to build and then would cost a bunch to maintain, but if you develop the property immediately around the stations and use the profits to offset the cost it might be more reasonable. The challenges I believe would be in A) running enough trains to support the volume and b) setting a price for the tickets that makes it appealing, but accessible, while remaining cost effective? Currently it costs about $10 to drive from Worcester to Boston in a decent car, and takes an hour plus. Would people pay $10/ride for a 20-30 minute trip into the city?

Obviously the MBTA would oppose the idea because they would think they’d lose ridership on the commuter rail, but the commuter rails new bread and butter could be the north/south service, and the people from framingham inward toward the city. They could save money on the fringe lines out past Worcester.

Obviously there are a billion other challenges I haven’t touched on, but I did think it was in interesting topic to discuss. I marvel at what Worcester could turn into with that sort of access. The benefits to WPI, etc. The work force shift, the real estate market, and on and on.

Discuss….

Who knew?

There is a major war breaking out between Georgia and South Ossetia, a separatist region, with Russia forces entering the conflict against Georgia, and the threat of a multi-national conflict that could even involve the US, as backers of a fully cohesive Georgia that includes South Ossetia as well as Abhazia, and all the US news can talk about is that affiar that John Edwards had. Fucking ridiculous!

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn just passed away. He was one of the greatest voices of dissent against the Russian Soviet regime out there. This is a true hero who made large personal sacrifices to stand for what is right and true. It is unfortunate that he didn’t renounce Putin as much as he should have…but you should check out who he is. Just in case you want to, here are some links:

Wikipedia
Google News

P.S. Yes, I know he had controversial views on Judaism, Russian democracy, and some other areas of Russia’s development and its role in the world…but that doesn’t take away from his role in bringing certain facts to light during his early life and his untethered pursuit of what he believed to be an important life’s work.