update or whatever

I've been in my new gig for travelocity for about six weeks now but haven't said too much about it - by which of course I've made no mention at all... In January, I quit working for infowars (sort of quit anyway - I still do the occasional banner ad for them and update their online store from time to time) and took a job working for travelocity about three weeks later. Of course at the instant I began the new job, my car capsized and left me scrambling for transportation. I didn't feel like relying on Sam's vehicle for my daily commute so I decided to take some of the money from my recently closed savings account and buy a gently used car. I settled on a Toyota Matrix and found one on craigslist that was in my price range and bought it after struggling to obtain the cash necessary from my own bank and ultimately having to temporarily borrow the money from my parents who were able to wire me the dough... Anyway so six weeks later, I'm comfortably stabilized in the blissful monotony of my new job editing photos for a really neat marketing project. Its low pressure and my work ceases to hover over me after I leave the office (unless I bring the office home by telecommuting which I have chosen to do once a week). After many frustrating emails I was able to tap into the company's internal myspacesque social networking site and get setup with a carpool of two other guys that live a few blocks from me in Denton. Ride sharing is awesome because under other circumstances falling asleep while driving during one's daily commute is generally frowned upon.

The Stuff of Nightmares

I've been reading a lot of gardening/small farm blogs lately to hopefully help fill in some gaps in my knowledge as we get closer and closer to the spring growing season. One of the blogs I've been reading, Garden Punks, turned me on to this great little short film called The Story of Stuff. It made me feel terrible. Not the most glowing of reviews for such a thing but I encourage you to watch it (download free from their website or check it out on Google video) because it really shines a light on what goes into all of those iPods and laptops and everything else that we buy.

It made me feel especially bad about working at a job that sells the very same sort of inexpensive electronic gadgetry with a built-in expiration date discussed in the documentary. It made me want to recommit myself to trying to not buy stuff as much as possible and to generally avoid stores that aren't second hand shops.

I mean I know this will be a challenge. Overcoming my own desires will be the most difficult obstacle. Surpassing my need for instant gratification and my tendency to connect new ideas and projects with a shopping list will be a real challenge. I'm about to start gardening again and I know that I will have to strain to rein in my tendency to buy a bunch of crap and tools that I might need to aid in my efforts (damn it, I really wanted that soil block maker). The truth is that we as a culture are raised to have this compulsion (I guess it is sort of what our entire economy is fundamentally based on) and it is going to be no easy thing to get over. In the past, one might have turned to a neighbor or a friend to borrow and share things like tools, baby, but I don't feel like I have such a resource. Certainly its not present enough to trump "buy it" on my general list of options. What a gargantuan task it seems like to undertake to reduce my consumption. What an even greater task it would be to convince the mass of people, who are unconcerned with the effects of their consumption, to stop buying so much junk. I just have to remember to be thoughtful and do what I can every day and not become driven to apathy by guilt because once in a while I do buy something that isn't completely sustainable.

file under futurism

So as my termination date for my previous job approaches I am trying to get more into / out of my soon-to-be-primary employment running various online outlets for a local entrepreneur who sells "home automation" equipment on the side. I've been doing this work from home until recently my employer decided to open a storefront and office and so now I am commuting like a sucker to the next DFW tendril-stop to work among shelves full of these gadgets. For the first time ever today though I actually handled some and brought them home to try out. I could not believe how excited I got about some wireless light switches and a couple of other gimmicks. I now fully understand why my employer is doing well enough to open a store - these gadgets are terribly amusing. Mind you, I feel fairly sure that I have a tendency toward these kinds of toys as they take their place in our bedroom among the remote-controlled ceiling fan and the Roomba robot vacuum.


For me these sorts of devices straddle the line between truly useful and pretty silly. I generally tend to be against so-called "time-saving devices" but I think what I like about stuff like the Roomba and these remote controlled lights is how it hearkens back to what the future looked like half a century ago. I mean sure we are all now suffering like mad at the havoc wreaked by the futuristic science of that era - post WWII industrial science was hard at work cramming plastics and synthetics and all manner of would-be pollutants down our (grand)parents' throats - but there is also something charming about the optimism of that predicted future.