Category: California

A true artist can sell his crack for $1 million

by philg

I hadn’t ever noticed this before, but on a recent visit to the de Young Museum in San Francisco, I noticed that they’d purchased Andy Goldsworthy’s crack for what was, no doubt, a significant sum:

Speaking of the museum, they acknowledge that they’re on someone else’s land:

Native Americans are welcome to return to their land for $20 per person, $30 for parking, and $35 for the special exhibit of 100-year-old work that “challenged gender norms”:

It was great to see the Pavia tapestries again (see Could robots weave better tapestries than humans ever have?), especially with the added bonus of Californians wearing their 3-cent surgical masks against an aerosol virus (one of them with the mask over a beard):

The museum reminds us that it is critical to consider the victimhood category of an artist (“women”, “of color”, and “LGBTQ+” are the choices):

Then they organize an activity centered around a sculpture by Louise Nevelson, who rejected and resisted being categorized as a “woman artist” (“I’m not a feminist. I’m an artist who happens to be a woman.”).

Here’s a work that Stéphane Breitwieser and Anne-Catherine Kleinklaus might have been able to steal and that would look great in any house:

I’ll cover the gift shop book selection in another post….

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Grafitti Drone countermeasures?

by philg

On a recent trip to San Francisco, a local friend took us to Andy Goldsworthy’s Spire in the Presidio:

We had just come from a parking lot where quite a few cars were virtuously marked:

Our friend said “What we need is a drone to paint the Spire sculpture in the Palestinian flag colors.”

Let’s suppose that residents of the U.S. with a lot of community spirit did build some drones that could paint the sides of building with huge messages such as “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free”, “#Resist”, and “Trump is a Nazi.” It is much easier to build a spray-painting drone than a scrubbing drone, I think. How could cities and building owners defend against virtuous painting drone owners/operators?

(Though moderately rich by average American standards and blessed with a garage at home, our friend who lives in SF drives a 22-year-old car for fear that anything nicer will attract thieves.)

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California vote counting vs. Florida post-hurricane power restoration

by philg

It’s five full days (about 120 hours) after the Election 2024 Nakba. The folks in California who say that they know how governments should operate have counted 72 percent of their presidential ballots (New York Times):

Let’s compare this to the numbers in Power restoration after Hurricane Milton. Recall that Milton was a Category 3 storm that hit Sarasota, St. Pete, and Tampa, knocking out power to 4 million “customers” (a household of 3 people would be just one customer). I didn’t stay organized to capture a number for how many were still out exactly five days after the hurricane made landfall, but four days afterward roughly 500,000 customers were still out, which means that more than 87 percent had been restored. Six days following landfall, roughly 190,000 customers were out from the original 4 million affected.

So.. Ron DeSantis-led Florida restored power after a Category 3 hurricane at a much faster pace than California has been able to count votes. (Florida also did count votes, but there aren’t any interesting statistics from that process because it took just a few hours.)

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More Newport Beach coast helicopter flight photos (and some masketology)

by philg

A few more photos of how the folks who say that they want to end economic inequality are living, from a Robinson R44 flight out of KSNA (Orange County Airport) up to Long Beach and then back down the coast to Dana Point before returning to refuel and then land (with a certain amount of fear and terror) on a rooftop adjacent to the airport.

I’d love to know what drugs the architect of the roof in the last photo was on!

If we ignore the water shortages, California does seem like a great place for golf. It doesn’t matter how cold the water is if the plan is to use the water only for decoration while trying to hit some balls:

Here are some folks who’ve probably figured out a way to avoid whatever new taxes Gavin Newsom might cook up (183 days/year in the Jackson, Wyoming house, for example?):

Unfortunate (termite treatment tent) and fortunate (personal oceanfront golf course?):

A lawn bowling court for communities of color?

Some hotels that could be turned into migrant shelters if Californians were willing to deliver on what they say are human rights:

Housing is a human right, but it’s also a human right to have a beach house and a yacht, which is why tax rates on California’s wealthy elites can’t be raised to pay for the housing that is supposedly a human right:

As in the previous post, the equipment used for the above photos is simple: Robinson R44, left front door removed, iPhone 14 Pro Max.

Let’s also have a look at some other photos from the trip. I saw three CyberTrucks in various parking lots in a 12-hour period:

For Californians to save the planet with these enormous vehicles will require the output of three continuously running steel mills.

The most expensive space in the mostly-empty office building where I was working is rented by a divorce litigator:

CVS in Irvine has to keep the deodorant locked up:

At SNA on the way back to Florida, I found a Follower of Science wearing an N95 mask over a full beard, an always-delightful scene, albeit contrary to the 3M instructions:

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Vuichard no bueno for escaping vortex ring state

by philg

Less that two years ago, I wrote about how Robinson Helicopter was promoting the Vuichard technique for escaping from vortex ring state (see R.I.P. Frank Robinson (and a few notes from the safety course that he loved)). While doing recurrent training in Irvine, California at Helistream, I learned that Robinson has reverted to the previously standard technique.

What’s less than ideal about Vuichard, which results in recovery with remarkably little altitude loss? “Every other helicopter emergency procedure involves lowering collective,” responded my instructor, “so the Vuichard technique becomes an exception that is going to be tough to execute in a real-world emergency where you’re startled. Also, what if you’re settling with power because you don’t have enough power and you misidentify a vortex ring state? Then adding collective via Vuichard will immediately lead to blade stall.”

He explained that there have been at least a couple of fatal accidents during training in which the necessary counterintuitive heroism wasn’t summoned for the Vuichard technique. Thus, the new school is back to the old school.

(I have never personally gotten into vortex ring state (sometimes called “settling with power”) other than during my work as a flight instructor or while a student myself. It can be avoided by being careful during steep approaches, especially with respect to not doing a downwind steep approach.)

In addition to practicing emergencies, we managed to get in some flying up and down the coast. Here are a few snapshots.

An Nvidia branch office receptionist’s new weekend boat:

An oil platform off Long Beach cleverly disguised, when viewed from the water, as an island encircled by palm trees:

Where your tax dollars went to die (a U.S. Navy littoral combat ship)

A Tesla charging facility:

The Balboa Pier:

What your (3rd or 4th) house might look like if you and all of your friends and neighbors xpressed a passionate commitment to reducing economic inequality:

(All of the above photos were taken with an iPhone 14 Pro Max after removing the left front door of the helicopter.)

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California represented by a former pimp at the Olympics

by philg

NBC:

A portion of the closing ceremony is dedicated to the host city handover from Paris to Los Angeles, in which Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo will give the Olympic flag to Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. … The [Olympics closing] ceremony will feature prominent performers representing California, a nod to the next host city. Rapper Snoop Dogg — who has become a fixture of this year’s Games — will play a role in the handover segment.

(Prejudice against women is so severe all over the world that the handover is from one mayor who identifies as a “woman” to another mayor who identifies as a “woman”?)

I’m a big fan of Snoop Dogg’s performance in Starsky & Hutch, but it seems that he has a colorful past.

From Rolling Stone, “Snoop Lion Opens Up About His Pimp Past”:

When Snoop Dogg called himself a “pimp” back in 2003, he wasn’t joking. “I put an organization together,” the rapper-turned Rasta artist Snoop Lion tells contributing editor Jonah Weiner in the new issue of Rolling Stone. “I did a Playboy tour, and I had a bus follow me with ten bitches on it. I could fire a bitch, fuck a bitch, get a new ho: It was my program. City to city, titty to titty, hotel room to hotel room, athlete to athlete, entertainer to entertainer.”

Unlike most pimps, Snoop says he let his women keep the money. “I’d act like I’d take the money from the bitch, but I’d let her have it,” he says. “It was never about the money; it was about the fascination of being a pimp . . . As a kid I dreamed of being a pimp, I dreamed of having cars and clothes and bitches to match. I said, ‘Fuck it – I’m finna do it.’”

The above statements get bowdlerized in OregonLive:

The rapper-turned-Rasta artist formerly known as Snoop Dogg tells Rolling Stone he fulfilled a life’s ambition by becoming a pimp — yes, literally — a decade ago.

“I’d act like I’d take the money from the (prostitute), but I’d let her have it,” he says. “It was never about the money; it was about the fascination of being a pimp. … As a kid I dreamed of being a pimp.”

It’s an interesting reflection of current American social mores that Snoop Dogg’s involvement in the world’s oldest profession didn’t motivated Los Angeles officials to find a somewhat less colorful representative.

Readers: What were your favorite Olympics sports/moments this year and what should we watch on Peacock Premium Plus before we cancel the subscription that we started a couple of weeks ago? Our kids so far have enjoyed rugby, equestrian eventing (running horses through the country), breaking, synchronized diving, BMX, volleyball, tennis (Djokovic!), table tennis, and the transition from swimming to biking in the triathlon.

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Housing is a human right, but California’s homeless will soon lose their tents

by philg

Exactly one year ago, I proposed an Oshkosh to San Francisco Tent Truck that would help those experiencing homelessness in a state where everyone with political power agrees that housing is a human right.

This year, Gavin Newsom has issued an executive order encouraging California cities to clear homeless encampments. It is unclear where unhoused Californians will go. The order merely suggests “Contacting of service providers to request outreach services for persons experiencing homelessness at the encampment.” That’s not a guarantee of shelter, certainly. CNN:

Michael Weinstein, president of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, the parent organization of the Housing is a Human Right initiative, accused Newsom of “criminalizing poverty” and “doubling down on failed policies.”

“Governor Newsom, where do you expect people to go? This is a shameful moment in California history,” Weinstein said in a statement Thursday.

Jennifer Friedenbach, executive director of the Coalition on Homelessness in San Francisco, called Newsom’s executive order “a punch in the gut.”

She said there are already thousands of people on a waitlist for housing, and all shelter beds in San Francisco are already full. Roughly 8,000 people are homeless every night in the city, which has 3,300 occupied shelter beds, Friedenbach told CNN.

The actual order:

Some Oshkosh tenting action…

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Pizza Hut vs. Welfare State

by philg

“Calif. fast-food chains slash workers as $20-an-hour minimum wage looms” (New York Post):

Michael Ojeda, a Pizza Hut driver for eight years in Ontario, Calif., received one of the notes from Pizza Hut franchisee Southern California Pizza in December telling him that his last day of work would be in February.

Southern California Pizza — which operates 224 Pizza Huts in the greater Los Angeles area — offered $400 in severance if Ojeda stayed through February, according to The Journal.

But Ojeda, who told the outlet that he made hundreds of dollars a week in wages and tips as a delivery driver, decided to claim unemployment instead.

“Pizza Hut was my career for nearly a decade and with little to no notice it was taken away,” said 29-year-old Ojeda, who was supporting his mother and partner on his Pizza Hut delivery wages.

Even if you don’t depend on Pizza Hut to maintain your BMI, there is much of interest in the above. The restaurant was out-competed for Mr. Ojeda’s time and effort by the Welfare State. Also, in the Department of American Family Disintegration, Mr. Ojeda is not supporting an intact mom and dad, but he’s instead supporting his mom and a sex partner who isn’t his biological father. (Though maybe it is instead a 2SLGBTQQIA+ love story? The “partner” could be Mr. Ojeda’s same-gender partner and not the mom’s partner.)

The article reminds us of the importance of connections in a planned economy:

Panera Bread, however, was ruled exempt from the $20-an-hour minimum wage hike by Gov. Gavin Newsom after the billionaire owner of several of the chain’s locations donated to his campaign, according to a report.

Related:

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People who say that border walls are immoral and ineffective stack up shipping containers and razor wire

by philg

“Border walls don’t make us safer or stronger, says political scientist” (berkeley.edu, 2019): “[the partial border fence between the U.S. and Mexico is] not actually keeping immigrants out, but it has magnified the cost and peril for migrants on the one hand and created an enormous illegal smuggling industry on the other.”

Fast forward to January 2024 and the university-owned People’s Park in Berkeley, California, formerly a home for the unhoused, became home to a border wall of shipping containers and razor wire, with guards posted at all four corners. A photo from March 2024:

“UC Berkeley adds razor wire to part of People’s Park shipping container wall” (Berkeleyside, Janary 11, 2024):

UC Berkeley spokesperson Kyle Gibson said the “security wire” was installed on portions of the wall near buildings on the west side of the property, and would not fully encircle the site. Officials were concerned someone could scale those buildings, then have an easier time getting on top of the barrier that was constructed last week, Gibson said.

“It’s meant to prevent people from being able to easily climb on top of the containers,” he said. “It’s purely there for safety and security.”

The 160 double-stacked shipping containers, some of which have also been outfitted with security cameras and lights, are meant to secure the open space through construction of a 1,100-bed student and supportive housing complex now before the state Supreme Court.

In other words, the unhoused are making way for paying customers.

What are all the marks on the containers you might ask? Apparently, the containers were richly plastered in pro-Hamas signage until just a few days before I was there.

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Housing Justice in Berkeley, California

by philg

Here’s a photo of an unhoused person sleeping next to a classic Volkswagen Microbus used to advertise the availability, for those with money, of sparkling new apartments:

Housing is a human right, say the folks who live in the Bay Area, but somehow they never reduce their personal consumption in order to build housing for the unhoused.

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