everwas

a blog by Ian Kennedy

Category: Home

  • NYC Rat Czar

    NYC Rat Czar

    New York City has a rat problem. If you don’t think so, just watch the video below. It’s OK, I’ll wait.

    It’s not surprising really. Leave bags of hot, steaming food out all night on the sidewalk and pretty soon the critters will come out for a meal – and have babies.

    In response, the city has listed a job opening for a cabinet level post. The Director of Rodent Mitigation, a Rat Czar.

    What’s so amusing about this is that the Mayor is having a bit of fun within the confines of big city politics and had the Job Posting written up with a bit of flair designed to get a bit of media attention. And it worked.

    Here are my favorite bits (bolding is my own).

    The About This Job section opens with a bang:

    Do you have what it takes to do the impossible? A virulent vehemence for vermin?

    They then lean into the job title, full well knowing it’s not the most sexy but, hey, go with it.

    If so, your dream job awaits: New York’s Citywide Director of Rodent Mitigation.

    I think the PR folks that helped write the job description are still hurting from all the earned media from the Pizza Rat. I was in San Francisco and even I heard about the Pizza Rat.

    Despite their successful public engagement strategy and cheeky social media presence, rats are not our friends. . . Cunning, voracious, and prolific, New York City’s rats are legendary for their survival skills, but they don’t run this city – we do.

    That final line echos Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch’s October 17th speech in which she famously declared “but the rats don’t run the city, we do” which was spotted on signs at the NYC marathon and instantly became a TikTok meme and is even being monetized by the sanitation department.

    But back to the JD. Yadda, yadda, yadda, then they show they mean business.

    The ideal candidate is highly motivated and somewhat bloodthirsty, determined to look at all solutions from various angles, including improving operational efficiency, data collection, technology innovation, trash management, and wholesale slaughter.

    Then on to the qualifications. New York City resident, Bachelor’s Degree, experience in policy and urban planning, strong organizational skills and attention to detail, proficiency with Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint, team player, adapts well to change, then:

    Swashbuckling attitude, crafty humor, and general aura of badassery

    This was it. Only in NYC would you see this line in a government job posting. It’s not just be a bad ass, no – they spiffed it up a bit and wrote a “general aura of badassery” Damn – this is a city that will talk straight to you.

    Here you go, read it for yourself.

    Director-of-Rodent-Mitigation-38635Download

  • Izumi got a haircut!

    Where to you go when you want to get a super-short haircut after wearing it long for many years? You go to the person that has been perfecting the “pixie” haircut since the New Wave era, the guy with photos of Audrey Hepburn on the wall, the guy who owns the domain for cropsforgirls.com. Google “short haircut for women in NYC” and Crops for Girls Salon comes up as the first result. 30+ years in business, he’s even been written up in the NY Times.

    Michael’s salon is in the East Village, he only takes cash, and is seriously thinking of packing it in to join his sister out West but we’re happy we found him while he’s still here. What do you think?

    Before
    After

  • Photographing Fireworks

    For the past two years I’ve had the good fortune to live right next to the largest fireworks event in North America, the Macy’s July Fourth fireworks “Spectacular” on the East River between Manhattan and Queens.

    Last year I walked out on to the FDR highway which was blocked off to traffic both North and South from 42nd street. It wasn’t too crowded (probably because of the pandemic) so I was able to find a spot over-looking the river a few blocks north of the UN. I only had my iPhone with me but was still able to get some good shots as well as video.

    This year they only blocked the freeway South from 42nd so it was too crowded to stroll on to the highway so I decided to try my luck with an DSLR and take some photos instead. I have never been able to get decent photos of fireworks so I read up on it beforehand and found this helpful guide that was written specifically for Canon cameras (mine is a Rebel 5Ti) which was quite helpful.

    I used an 18-55 mm lens at around a 10-second shutter speed with a 2-second delay after pressing the shutter button. A tripod is key and you’ll need to practice timing when to press the shutter in order to get the full “starburst” effect. I also set the lens aperture to between f/10 to f/16 so the brightness of multiple bursts didn’t wash out the exposure.

    • Tripod
    • 18 – 55 mm lens
    • Long shutter speed, at least 5 seconds
    • Set aperture to f/10 or above
    • Photos best early in the show, less smoke

    Also, your best shots will be early in the show when the sky is still clear. Later on in the show it’ll be too smoky to get decent clarity on the burst trails.

    It should go without saying to take as many photos as you can. These are just a subset of the 100+ that I took. As with all my photography experiments, it’s a numbers game. Out of many, you get a few that turn out decent enough to share.

  • Primary Election Day, NYC

    Today it’s primary election day to choose your party’s nominee for the Governor of New York. I’ll be voting for the Democratic nominee which comes down to a choice between three, incumbent Kathy Hochul, Tom Suozzi, and Jumaane Williams.

    I watched their last debate. While all three candidates have similar positions, it’s worth watching the debate to see how they air their differences. Towards the end, each candidate was asked a “Lightning Round” question to sum things up and try and get a sense of who each person was based on a personality-defining issue.

    Question, “What would your bagel be?

    Kathy Hochul – Cinnamon Raisin with “whatever sweet cream cheese they’ll put on it,  usually maple syrup”

    Tom Suozzi – Poppyseed with Tuna Fish

    Jumaane Williams – Lox, Cream Cheese, Onions and Capers

    Some other resources, if you’re still undecided:

  • On Losing

    On Losing

    So the Warriors won, again.

    More accurately, the Celtics lost. Tyler re-introduced the family to this year’s team and we watched them battle their way through the playoff. After they swept the Nets, we threw our support behind them fully as they took on Giannis and the Bucks and Jimmy Butler and the Heat and scraped and clawed there way to a spot in the Finals.

    An NBA Finals between the Oakland San Francisco Warriors and Boston Celtics was the perfect match up. Our old home vs. the new. To me the Warriors are like an Italian racing car – well-funded, perfectly tuned, and unstoppable. On the straights when everything is running smoothly there is no contest. Contrast that with this young Boston team, playing rough around the edges, adjusting to their opponents and squeaking out wins after having their backs pushed up against a wall. This young team fought their way through a tough East Coast division to take the regional title. To me, the Celtics were the sand that would get into the Warrior’s drive train, I really thought this young and scrappy 2022 Celtics team might have a chance.

    But they did not.

    After the Celtics pulled off one win at home and another in San Francisco, the Golden State machine re-calibrated itself and there was no stopping them. With the unstoppable efficiency of a Japanese Gundam, the threes rained down mercilessly.

    “They faced the Golden State Warriors in a rematch of the 1964 Finals, which the Celtics won in five games in an attempt to win their 18th championship and first since 2008. However the Celtics would lose in six games despite taking a 2-1 lead.” The Wikipedia summary of the post-season is brutal in its judgement.

    While it was the turnovers that ultimately caused Boston to lose, it was those uncontested threes from the Warriors that really hurt. Swish…Swish…Swish – they put microphones on the net so the sound comes through loud and clear on the broadcast. The sound of a basketball going in without hitting the rim is the most visceral sound for a basketball fan, it’s the sweet sound of victory for one, the dagger of defeat for the other.

    It was even more painful to be back in San Francisco, first at a San Francisco Giants game and then a second time, in a bar in downtown San Francisco. Everyone around me couldn’t figure out why I was pulling for the bad boys from Boston.

    The Giants won too
    Watching my team lose the Final

    Misery loves company so it only makes sense to finish with this excerpt from Bill Simmons recalling the defeat of his Celtics to LeBron James at the 2012 Eastern Conference Finals.

    I don’t know what happened. I just know the shots wouldn’t stop going in. After about the fifth dagger in a row (he made 10 straight), the crowd started groaning on every make — shades of Philly’s Andrew Toney ripping our hearts out 30 years ago. If you’ve ever been in the building for one of those games, you know there isn’t a deadlier sound. He single-handedly murdered one of the giddiest Celtics crowds I can remember. Thirty points in the first half. Thirty! All with that blank look on his face. It was like watching surveillance video of a serial killer coldly dismembering a body and sticking the parts in the fridge. Only we were right there.

    You can’t imagine what this was like to witness in person. I know Michael Jordan had similarly astonishing games, and others, too, but not with stakes like that. This wasn’t just an elimination game. This was LeBron James’s entire career being put on trial … and it only took an hour for him to tell the jury, “Go home. I’m one of the best players ever. Stop picking me apart. Stop talking about the things I can’t do. Stop holding me to standards that have never been applied to any other NBA player. Stop blaming me for an admittedly dumb decision I never should have made. Stop saying I’m weak. Stop saying that I don’t want to win. Stop. Just … stop.”

    As a Celtics fan, I was devastated. As a basketball fan, I appreciated the performance for what it was. One of the greatest players ever was playing one of his greatest games ever. He swallowed up every other relevant story line. Needless to say, the Celtics couldn’t match him — especially Pierce, who’s worn down from four weeks of battling Andre Iguodala, Shane Battier and LeBron on one leg and appears to be running on fumes of his fumes’ fumes at this point. The fans were so shell-shocked that many (including me and my father) filed out with three minutes remaining, not because we were lousy fans, not to beat the traffic, but because we didn’t want to be there anymore. We wanted to get away from LeBron. He ruined what should have been a magical night. We never really had a chance to cheer, swing the game, rally our guys, anything. He pointed a remote control at us and pressed “MUTE.” It was like being in a car accident. LeBron James ran over 18,000 people.

    The Consequences of Caring

    Nothing but respect for the Warriors. Italian racing machine that they are, there is no doubt they were impressive. Painful as it was, they are an amazing team to watch. They are an experienced Finals team

    Check out this clip from The latest episode of the Draymond Green Show where Draymond explains why he thinks the Celtics will be back again.

    Draymond Green on the 2022 Celtics prospects for the future

    Time to reset. I’ll be rooting once again next year, for the Brooklyn Nets, then the Celtics. See you then.

  • NYC’s Dollar Bus Network

    NYC’s Dollar Bus Network

    Every vibrant city has its public transportation woes and homegrown hacks to resolve them.

    I experienced Mexico City’s Pesero buses when I was directed by a local to jump into passing VW Bus that took me where I wanted to go as long as I didn’t mind dropping off a few other people along the way. The Pesero system operated somewhere in between the over-crowded and inflexible bus system and extortionist taxis. It was the people’s transit system.

    When I lived in the Bay Area, the Casual Carpool system was a network of quasi-official commuter options that, while not funded by the government, are at least acknowledged because they serve a need that is not met by the existing Bay Area Rapid Transit commuter rail.

    Today I learned that New York has its Dollar Vans which act as a “shadow transit” network that fills a need for those that are not served by New York’s existing transit system. The long-rumored Interborough subway line that can get you from Queens to Brooklyn without going via Manhattan is still a twinkle in Gov. Kathy Hochul’s eye so, in the meantime, the Dollar Van network is your best bet.

    There’s an on-going struggle with the authorities as the network of Dollar Vans are not licensed, the taxi drivers hate them, and van drivers sometimes get harassed by the police. Despite all this, there is a need that is filled so that even when downed trees from Hurricane Sandy keeps the buses off the roads, the Dollar Vans will still be rolling to New Yorkers to work.

    Here’s a map of where the vans go. Click to get more details on each route on this piece by The New Yorker.

    New York’s Shadow Transit
  • What to do in Oahu?

    What to do in Oahu?

    A friend is headed off to Oahu in the Hawaiian Islands for a week and asked for a couple must-do activities while he’s there. I’ve visited the island several times and here’s my list:

    Rent a car for your stay. You’ll want to have a car to get around unless you’re staying at a place where you plan to spend lots of time by the pool or local beach. There’s lots to see around the island and the only practical way to get around is by car. Alternative to picking up your rental at the airport is to Uber or Lyft from the airport and arrange to borrow a car for a few days using the Turo app.

    Activities

    View from Diamond Head

    Diamond Head Hike – If you’re staying in downtown Honolulu and can walk up to the the park, try to time it so you get to the entrance by 6am when the park opens so you can hike up in early morning shade, watch the sunrise from the peak, and head down as the inevitable crowds gather. Bring your cellphone with you so you can use the phone flashlight when you go through the tunnel at the top and then head down the backside stairs to avoid the crowds coming up. Bring water as always when hiking in Hawaii. There’s usually a food truck at the parking lot at the bottom where you can get an Acai Bowl for breakfast after your hike.

    Kayak on Kane’ohe Bay and enjoy a picnic on the sandbar at low tide. Check out the tide chart or ask which day during your stay is the best to do the kayaking so you hit the lowest tide and reserve with the local kayak rental Kama’aina Kids as soon as you can because spots fill up.

    View from Lanikai Pillbox

    Lanikai Pillbox Hike followed by a day at the beach. Pack a picnic and drive out in the morning and hike up to the pillboxes that look out over Kailua. Eat lunch and take in the view and enjoy the windward breezes. From that vantage point, scout out where the waves are and head back down to the car and grab your boogie boards and spend the afternoon on the beach. My favorite is Lanikai Beach. A little further away but also nice is Sherwood Beach, aka Waimanalo Bay

    Mānoa Falls

    Snorkeling in Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve – Rent snorkels and fins at any of the places downtown and grab a shuttle up to Hanauma Bay. The snorkeling here is amazing because its in a bay and the turtles are really tame (do not touch them though!). Because it’s a bay, the water is really calm so the water is super clear. Because its the best spot on the island to snorkel, you’ll need to purchase and reserve your spot ahead of time.

    Shangri La – If you’re feeling like taking in the Arts, there’s an incredible collection of Islamic art assembled by Doris Duke on display in her beautiful Oahu mansion. You need to book tickets in advance so look into it before you even arrive on island. Right off in front of the house is a natural swimming pool and a nice surf break that she enjoyed with her boyfriend, the great Duke Kahanamoku, olympic swimmer and founder of modern surfing.

    Mānoa Falls hike – drive up and park in the residential neighborhood near the trailhead and hike in to the falls. It’s a short hike but it can be muddy so bring sneakers that you can wash later. The waterfall is an oasis in the middle of the jungle. If you have swimming trunks on, you can go swimming to. If the jungle tea house looks familiar, it was used as set in the TV series, Lost.

    The Infamous Day – If you’re into history, the exhibit on the events that lead up to World War Two at Pearl Harbor are quite well done. It shows perspectives from both the US and Japanese side and has the draft of FDR’s infamy speech. While you’re there, you might as well take a launch out to the wreck of the Arizona where oil is still bubbling up to the surface from the sunken ship.

    Diving

    A whole post could be written about diving spots around the island. If you’re open water certified, I highly recommend heading out with a guide to Spitting Caves & China Wall, Shark’s Cove, and The Sea Tiger Wreck. If you’re a beginner, Koko Crater is a good one. Island Diver is a good outfit, Tyler worked with them one summer.

    China Wall

    Surfing

    If you already know how to surf, you know where to go get more information about the surf spots. If you don’t, definitely take a surfing lesson. The best place to learn is off of Waikiki Beach, the waves are consistent and mellow enough to get you started on a long board.

    If you’re into Stand Up Paddleboards, you can rent them and try the calm waters off of Ala Moana.

    Food

    Leonard’s at dawn

    After a morning swim or surf, be sure to stop by Leonards for their Masalas. If you’ve been on the water all day and are ravenous, the Loco Moco or Beef Cutlet with Gravy plate at the Rainbow Drive-In will set you right again.

    If you find yourself on the North Shore, be sure to stop by a Shrimp Truck and grab a plate of garlic shrimp. I always hit the Shrimp Shack.

    Shave Ice – do not leave the island w/o trying it. If you’re in the North Shore, Matsumoto is the place.

    KCC Farmer’s Market on Sundays to try out local food and also a good place to pick up gifts to bring home. Come hungry.

    La Mer – if you’re looking for a fancy meal (and are willing to drop some major cash) La Mer at the Halekulani is the place to go. Ask for a table overlooking the ocean at sunset.

  • A very New York story

    A very New York story

    Last week a drama unfolded in public that can only be described as one of those uniquely New York moments. Someone lifted someone else’s magazine from the pile of mail on the ground floor of a walk-up apartment. This is something that I am sure happens all the time in cities around the world yet, due to the concentration here of people unafraid to speak their mind and media professionals willing to pay attention, a tenement-level spat exploded into an event followed by thousands. All thanks to the performative platform that is social media.

    It all started with a note from Kareem in apartment 2L.

    Which escalated after a response was scrawled under the note.

    Flames had been fanned. 326 comments and 5,508 likes (as of this writing) on the post above and already large swaths of the city are now tuning in, looking on. Debates take place in hallways all over New York, private chat groups between friends and family and company Slack threads buzz with side conversations on who was in the right and who was in the wrong. What to do if your neighbor plays their stereo too loudly. We’ve all been there. Was this action justified to get their attention? But is stealing the latest issue of New York Magazine warranted? An audience formed, people took sides. We all tuned in to the Instagram account famous for curating signs found around New York city to get the updates.

    Then we get this:

    A very New York message

    Right off the bat, an “alright buddy” set the tone inviting the perp to have a face-to-face conversation rather than “holding my magazine hostage.” New Yorkers hate the passive aggressive. If you have a beef with someone, just come out and say it. Talk it out. Things take a dark turn though when the demand is coldly set to return the magazine by 7pm “or else the deal if off.”

    The response:

    The light blue marker and cursive handwriting style are disarming but this response is quite literally a throw down, pushing back on the ownership of the magazine and setting the power dynamic squarely back to the person literally holding the final word. “I will return your magazine when I finish reading it.” acknowledges that they do not own magazine but they are going to hang on to it, regardless.

    “I’m on the edge of my seat” comments @charmpants on Instagram.

    Working thru his feelings, Kareem posts something on a neighborhood blog, TAKEN: HOW A MISSING MAGAZINE TURNED ME INTO LIAM NEESON … AND AN INSTAGRAM ANTI-HERO

    Someone in the apartment tears down all the signs and tapes them up on Kareem’s door and scrawls “Enough with the signs you morons!”

    To which Kareem responds apologetically:

    $20 for an issue of the New York Magazine is a generous offer as the newsstand price is $6.99. This post is clearly performative. Kareem is playing to the crowd, trying to get people in the apartment (and greater NY) on his side so that the whole thing can be over and done with. But to those of us following the debate online, we are all curious as to why the note looks so huge as it appears to cover half the door. Others point out it must be posted on a mirror across the hall, otherwise the $20 bill would be the size of a dish towel.

    The backstory indicates Kareem has asked the landlord to review the video tapes to see who might have stolen the magazine.

    More updates from Williamsburg. Now “Manegment (sic)” is posting signs of fines about signs. We recognize Kareem’s writing asking for clarification. You can see he is calculating the potential risks and cost of his very public appeal to his neighbors. More importantly to the Instagram public, this post clarifies the relationship of the door and mirror question raised earlier.

    In the comments, the madding crowd screams, “Release the tapes!”

    Blue Marker is upset that the notes are getting so much attention on the internet and asks Kareem to stop then drops the bomb, “I am sorry but I do not have your magazine.”

    The crowd collectively loses it. Mayhem.

    The city came out in full-throated support of Kareem in his time of loss. The cover story of the New York Magazine was an excerpt from an upcoming biography of New York’s very own Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. We all want to read that story – we are proud of our own.

    Casa Magazines offers a free issue if Kareem wants to stop by their West Village store. Someone from New York Magazine who lives nearby takes a copy over and drops it off. We are all Kareem, just looking for some good reading material.

    The final installment was posted yesterday. Unless, of course, Netflix picks it up and turns it into a three-part mini-series. Turns out that upon review of the video tape, the landlord discovers that the magazine was not taken by anyone who lived in the building after all but by a previous resident.

    Kareem apologized.

    The city took a collective breath. All is well that ends well. We all learned to drop our suspicious gaze and give our neighbors the benefit of the doubt. Kareem now has two issues of this month’s New York Magazine and offers one up to anyone who might want to read it. New York Magazine’s real estate section even reached out and published an interview with Kareem and did their own Instagram bit.

    “This sort of petty neighborly drama is what keeps New York alive,”

    But note Kareem’s final message and invitation.

    It did make me realize I’ve lived here for 6 years and don’t really know any of you . . . so if anyone would like to have coffee with me, just knock or leave a sign on my door.

  • Wordle

    Wordle

    The online game of Wordle has been online since November last year but it broke into popular view in January when the yellow and green chicklet pictograms started showing up in people’s social media timelines.

    The game is elegant in its simplicity.

    Wordle refreshingly lacks any viral loops (players are limited to a single game each day) and there is no flashing banner ads or login requirement. Wordle is an old school, web 1.0 mobile web site that sets a cookie to see if you’re a new user or returning user, that’s it.

    Most people learned about Wordle from a Jan. 3rd NYT article, Wordle is a Love Story that profiled the creator of the game, Josh Wardle. Here we learn that Josh created Wordle for his partner and that Ms. Shah helped narrow down the list of words. We also learned that Josh was an Product Manager for Reddit and was also behind two other popular “collaborative social experiments,” The Button and Place.

    We also learn about Wordle’s counter-intuitive viral success.

    The breakthrough, he said, was limiting players to one game per day. That enforced a sense of scarcity … which leaves people wanting more

    Wordle is a love story

    The colored grids that have blossomed all across social media were inspired by players that were manually sharing their results using manually constructed grids using emoji (BuzzFeed digs into a group of New Zealanders who were part of this). Wardle built a way to automate the creation and sharing of the results but, again, chose to remove the normal elements that are “table stakes” on a mobile game,

    If he were optimizing the game to gain as many players as possible, he would have included a link at the end of the tweet that the tool generates, he said. But after looking into it, he said it would have looked “trashy” and not as visually compelling, and he liked the grid’s mysterious air, which he felt piqued people’s interest.

    Wordle is a love story

    The result of this manufactured scarcity and mystery has been that the game exploded into the zeitgeist.

    It also resulted in people rushing to the iOS app store and pay for an 5-year old game called Wordle!. Touchingly, Steven Cravotta, the developer, contacted Josh and the two worked out a charity to donate the proceeds.

    Since then, there have been hundreds of posts going into the best “start words” (I like this Wired piece). As an ultimate badge of honor, Google even added an easter egg when you search for “wordle” on the site.

    Searching for “Wordle” on Google changes the Google logo to a Wordle design.
    byu/MakaPakaUK inwordle

    Due to the open nature of the site, there are several spin-offs including (credit to @waxpancake, the /r/wordle subreddit, and #wordle on SmartNews Slack for this list)

    • Absurdle – “adversarial” as the word changes on each line
    • Cladder – rapid guess three-letter words
    • Crosswordle – like wordle but backwards
    • Custom Wordle – confound your friends
    • Framed – five frames to guess the movie
    • Fraudle – when you just want to cheat
    • Heardle – name that tune wordle
    • Hello Wordl – configurable
    • Horsle – like wordle but the word is horse
    • Letterle – one letter, you have a 1 in 26 chance
    • Mathler – wordle using math equations
    • NSFWordle – just what you think it is
    • Poeltl – wordle for basketball players
    • Primel – instead of words, prime numbers
    • Queerdle – the self-proclaimed yassificaiton of the original
    • Semantle – guess the word based on semantic clues.
    • Sweardle – guess the four-letter swear word
    • Wordle Together – competitive? You can race against someone.
    • Wordle.ja – in 日本語
    • Duo Lingo put together a list of Wordle sites in other languages.
    • Worldle – guess the country

    There are also a number of sites & services that have sprung up to make the Wordle experience more interesting.

    • @WordleStats will let you know how your results stack up against everyone sharing their results on Twitter.
    • Townscaper will take your results and turn them into a weird, stylized building.
    • Worldle Archive lets you go back and play every Wordle since launch.
    • Worldle Helper is a python script that will help narrow the possible solution
    • WordleBot for Slack – add a Wordle leaderboard to Slack

    Finally, if you want to mute Wordle results on your Twitter feed? Someone wrote about that too.

    Update: