Local v. Organic

Whenever I walk into a Safeway, Whole Foods, TJ's or through the farmers market, I always ask the same two questions: 1. Do I know where this food is coming from? 2. How was it produced? Depending on where I am, the answer ranges from being readily apparent (at the farmers market) to being a mystery that even a super sleuth of my caliber finds challenging (at TJ's...EVERYTHING is from Monrovia, CA!). For the record, I'm no super sleuth, I just wanted to say that word. As a result, I have come up with an equation to help determine the quality of the food I buy. It's a very complicated, Good Will Hunting inverse quadratic function of two important variables: origin (where the food is from) and production method (how the food is grown). Given the information that I have about these variables with respect to any food product, I simply assign values to each of the variables and plug them into my nifty iPhone app designed exclusively to calculate the "quality" of the food. Accordingly, I make my decision. Genius, right? I wish.

400 (or so) years ago, the equation would have been simple, because the "value," if you will, of both these variables was readily apparent. Most people lived near the source of their food. In fact, most people were the source of their food. No, not like that. What I mean is that many people grew their own food. Additionally, food production was a highly decentralized, democratic industry. Well, it wasn't really even an industry back then. People produced food for themselves, their neighbors, and for anyone who was willing to buy from them at market. The quaint little family farm, which is now all but lost, was exactly what farms actually looked like. Unfortunately while the public conception of what a farm looked like stayed stagnant, the reality of farming evolved into something drastically different. Think: (Innovation of Eli Whitney x Ubiquity of Google) ^ Size of Mt. Everest. All the while, the public is clueless about these changes because the image on the carton of milk still shows a slim Holstein chewing on some green grass by a stream with a red barn in the background.

Now, fast-forward to today because, frankly, I don't know enough about the history of food production to take you all the way from the Industrial Revolution to present day in a concise manner. Our food system today is not only highly industrialized, it is global in scale. This makes for a very difficult trip to the grocery store for someone who wants to find out anything about the food he buys other than what is on the label. So difficult, that when I walk into TJ's and pick up that unnecessarily gigantic box of basil (seriously, who uses that much basil?) to try to find out where its from, all I can see is "Packaged and distributed from Monrovia, CA." Now, given that it's basil, I can make fair assumptions as to the climate that it originated in, how far it might have had to travel, and so on...but really, I'm just guessing. What about the frozen processed foods? Or the canned foods?

Now, the choice is supposed to be easier at a place like Whole Foods, right? They claim to sell mostly organic products, support local farmers and artisans, and have a generally more knowledgeable staff than other chains. They even label the origin of a lot of their produce! But even here, where the answers are seemingly apparent, it's a potential minefield for consumers. Large-scale retailers like Whole Foods need large-scale suppliers. Thus, while that head of cabbage may be organic, it may have been produced using the same industrial-techniques of a large-scale conventional farm, discounted only by the use of organic pesticides instead of conventional pesticides. I'm not trying to knock Whole Foods, but I think its important to recognize that while Whole Foods has ingeniously found a way to compete in the existing food system, it is still part of the existing food system.

Which brings me to farmers markets. Depending on where you live, your experience with farmers markets may vary, but generally speaking the food sold here is, by definition, local. Phew, at least I don't have to worry about that one. The next question, which is a little hairier, is how it is produced. This is where the struggle occurs, and where I really began asking the two questions that are the crux of this post. Just because a farmer isn't certified organic, does that mean she doesn't practice organic agriculture? How do I know that the farm is actually organic, without going to see it myself? At this point, does it even matter if the food is produced organically or conventionally, given that I am getting it locally?

I've come to the conclusion that the debate over local versus organic, on balance, is won out by local. The further our food is from where we are, the more energy it takes to get it from there to here, in terms of natural resources and labor. Also, it just doesn't make sense for my avocado to come from Mexico, or tomato from Chile, or olive oil from Spain, especially when they are readily available locally for, at least, part of the year. So, until someone makes a fortune off my iPhone app idea, our decisions on where to get "quality" food may well be somewhat less perfect, but no less thoughtful...and that's a step in the right direction.

Pet sales banned in West Hollywood, raises interesting questions...

West Hollywood became the second city in the nation to officially ban the sale of cats and dogs when the city council unanimously approved a proposed ordinance to that effect on February 1. The city council has since then passed the proposed ordinance on February 16, and it will take effect next month. South Lake Tahoe was the first city to adopt such an ordinance last year.

The ordinance bans the sale of cats and dogs within city limits, exempting home breeders, municipal shelters, and private rescue groups. Currently, there aren't any pet stores selling dogs or cats in West Hollywood, so the ordinance is more of a preemptive strike as well as a model for other municipalities. While pet sales will be prohibited, stores will be allowed to offer shelter/rescue animals for adoption. The stated goal of the ordinance is to "address the inhumane conditions endured by animals in the puppy mill industry, which relies heavily on sales through retail pet stores for its profits."

While the ordinance will have the modest effect of withdrawing support of the puppy mill industry, it implicitly raises an interesting question about the cultural idiosyncrasy in America of treating pets as companions, while at the same time maintaining a multi-million (billion?) dollar industry and market in pets. On the one hand, our culture celebrates pets as though they are part of our families; even to the extreme that we have glorified beauty pageants for them, epitomized by the last week's Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. At the same time, pets are just commodities. They are bought and sold like bags of rice, traded across state lines, and even mass-produced in deplorable conditions in puppy mills and kitty factories. What accounts for this cultural schizophrenia with respect to pets, particularly cats and dogs?

We anthropomorphize animals to such an extent, just mentioning that maybe people shouldn't have pets in the first place would outrage just about anyone, including animal advocates. To me, it's odd that we accept it almost as a right, that people can have a pet. What is the purpose of a pet in modern times, other than to provide companionship? And do people have a right to companionship? Companionship surely does not mean the same thing today as it did hundreds or thousands of years ago. Companion animals served a purpose other than companionship in the past. Humans relied on animals as much as animals relied on humans. Perhaps a greater level of inter-species respect existed then. It seems to me that present-day domestic human-dog/human-cat interaction is nearly without reason. We don't need pets. We like pets. We like the dominance that comes with having someone obey us, like us, feed our selfish desire to have value. But we don't need pets. This is not to say that we shouldn't have companion animals, but just take a minute to reflect on the concept of buying and selling life merely as a means to satisfy a human desire for interaction, which, arguably, ought to be fulfilled by our own species.

The value in WeHo's ordinance is subtle, yet powerful; it exists. Tapping into the compassionate side of the public's two-face mindset towards companion animals, the law may begin to raise some self-awareness about the contradictory way we treat animals. Sometimes, it's hard to put two and two together. Hopefully, ordinances like this will begin to give pause to people to think about their choice of getting a pet, before the next time they go to Petco.

Future of livestock in Ohio uncertain

Last November, voters in Ohio passed a ballot initiative amending the state Constitution to create, for the first time, a Livestock Care Standards Board. The Board is to consist of 13 members, representing a "variety" of interests, as follows.

- The Director of Agriculture (Chairperson)
- One person representing family farmers
- One person knowledgeable about food safety
- Two members representing statewide organizations that represent farmers (essentially, Farm Bureau members)
- One licensed veterinarian
- The State Veterinarian
- Dean of the Agriculture Department at a college or university
- Two representatives of consumers
- One representative from a county humane society
- One family farmer appointed by the Speaker of the House, and
- One family farmer appointed by the President of the Senate

A couple of things to note right off the bat. First, neither the bill nor the enacting legislation define 'family farmer.' Given this ambiguity, the Board could potentially define it broadly to include farms technically owned by a family (i.e. Smith Family Farms) that nonetheless employ several hundred workers and raise hundreds to thousands of animals; hardly a family farm in the common understanding of the term. Alternatively, it may choose to simply operate without defining the term, thus leaving it to a future legal challenge and court interpretation, though it is unclear who would have standing to bring that kind of action.

Second, Ohio is an Ag state. This means that agricultural interests dominate state and local politics, the same as energy does is West Virginia and ranching interests in Montana. Potentially then, there are 12 out of the 13 seats on the Board that can be filled with Ag interests. The one that is least likely to be an Ag seat is the humane society representative. With that kind of majority, there is no reason not to expect that the Board will simply perpetuate the current policies in place regarding "livestock care."

Let's be clear, the current policies are not pretty. Ohio is a significant meat and dairy producing state in the country, with over 2.5 million animals in agriculture in the state. It is the 9th largest pork producing state in the country. Currently, standard industry practice (farming is "industrial" in nearly every sense of the word), includes the use of gestation/farrowing crates for pigs, battery cages for hens, and nearly constant milking for cows. Gestation crates are holding devices that restrict a sow's ability to move once impregnated, through gestation, and into birth. Farrowing crates, which follow, are also holding devices that restrict a sow's ability to move so that her piglets can constantly suckle her for milk. Battery cages are also holding pens for laying hens that are used on industrial farms across the state and country. They are incredibly confining for the hens, and are generally stacked 6-8 high, and the hens never leave the cages. Lastly, dairy cows are milked constantly and are artificially inseminated several times a year. See my previous post for some of the more egregious consequences of industrial dairies.

Fortunately, in the wake of Ohio's push to maintain the status quo organizations are gathering signatures for an initiative on this year's ballot that would at least limit the Livestock Care Board's seemingly unfettered discretion a little by creating minimum standards of care. These include:

- prohibiting any tethering device or confinement that wouldn't allow a veal calf, pregnant sow, or egg-laying hen to stand up, lie down, turn around freely and stretch its limbs,
- requiring "humane" slaughter (though this is ostensibly already embodied in the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act, a federal law),
- prohibiting strangulation as a form of euthanasia (see my post: Death on a Factory Farm), and
- prohibiting the transfer/sale of downer cows for human food supply.

Last time, Ohioans got it wrong. Hopefully this time, they won't.

Abuse at NY Dairy

Earlier this month, Mercy for Animals released a video (WARNING: disturbing footage) from an undercover investigation into the treatment of animals at New York state's largest dairy farm, Willet Dairy. The video is horrific and grotesque, from the conditions in which the cows live, to the manner in which they are treated. Some of the examples of abuse include:

- calves having their horns removed without anesthesia, where the worker places his fingers in the calf's eye to keep it still as the worker burns the calf's horns off,
- cows with severe wounds including prolapsed uteruses, untreated infections, swollen joints, all covered in manure,
- cows are shocked with metal prods as they are funneled into a truck from the pen, or vice versa, and
- cows have the ends of their tails "docked" without anesthesia.

This is a partial list of the actions that are, according to the investigator, commonplace at the dairy. The last of the abuses mentioned above, known as "tail docking," is a practice common at dairies across the country. Recently in California, the Legislature passed and the Governor signed a bill into law banning the practice of "tail docking." California Penal Code §597n, already banning the practice of docking horse's tails, was amended to include cattle.

Following in California's footsteps, and on the heels of the recently released MFA video, Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal of New York Assembly District 67 proposed a similar bill banning the practice of tail docking.

The practice of tail docking is justified by proponents as necessary to preserve cleanliness of the cow's udder, higher quality milk production, and worker health. Though, according to several scientific, peer-reviewed journal articles (this is one of them), these justifications are unfounded. Still, approximately half of the 9 million cows raised for milk in the United States have their tails docked, according to a 2001 USDA survey. Approximately 1.2 million of those cows are raised in some 2152 California dairies, the nation's largest dairy producing state.

One of the reasons the welfare of cows has deteriorated is the dramatic consolidation of the dairy industry in the last 30 years. Small dairy farms (<30 cows), while representing nearly 30% of all producers in the country, account for a mere 1% of milk produced. In fact, the number of farms with less than 200 cows decreased by 30% in 6 years between 2000 and 2006. At the same time, the number of farms raising 2000+ cows doubled! In California, dairies with 500+ cows accounted for 88% of all dairy production in the state. For more statistics of the changes in the dairy industry, see the 2006 USDA study, here.

The treatment of animals raised in agriculture is an issue that is consciously and effectively hidden from the public. Given this latest video, with good reason. Nearly 10 billion animals are raised and slaughtered each year in the United States from human consumption. That is to say: we raise and kill for food the equivalent of almost one and a half times all human life on this planet, each year. Most of these animals are raised and/or slaughtered on large farms, run by major publicly traded corporations that treat these animals as commodities, reaching continuously to reach the highest efficiencies and economies of scale. As a result, the welfare of the animals is discarded in favor of lowering the bottom line further and further. The harsh eventuality of this industrialization of agriculture is now beginning to show itself, and stories like this one about Willet Dairy must compel us to react.

The silver lining here is the power that consumers hold in their pocket books. By choosing not to support large dairies where the majority of these animals are raised (and hence, abused), you will be taking a small step in the right direction. One small step may not be much, but two, three, four, 50, 100, 500, 1000, and more, eventually add up. Of course, choosing not to support dairies altogether would be a larger step, though not everyone is capable of doing that, including myself (for the time being). Thus, buying organic, rBGH-free milk, raised on small, local farms is a modest, yet valuable vote you can cast against cruelty to animals in agriculture.

Finding Purpose

This blog has been like a long-distance friendship for me. For the first few months, we keep up with each other just the same as before the distance inserted itself between us. Weekly posts, even daily posts are the norm. The hours of the day soon fill up with ordinary life and I start to feel the distance. I rationalize the uncharacteristic gap between contact as me just being busy. "I'm sure everyone is busy these days, anyway." Then one day, I wake up and realize that 3 silent months have gone by with no notice. That feeling has brought me back to this moment several times, and several times I have begun to write and have not finished.

This time is different. I lost track of what is, to me, the purpose of a blog. It started as a means of communication with family and friends out of necessity. Once that need was gone, I didn't replace that purpose with something else. Now, I have a purpose again.

The future of this blog will be devoted to any and all issues related to non-human animal welfare, animal rights, food, and the impossibly intricate connection between animals, nature, and humans.

keep it fresh...

Death on a Factory Farm

A couple days ago I finally found the energy to sit down and watch the HBO Documentary, Death on a Factory Farm, which originally aired on March 16, 2009. The film follows an undercover investigator with the alias "Pete," as he seeks to procure video and audio evidence of animal cruelty at the Wiles Hog Farm in Creston, Ohio. Tipped off by an employee at the farm, the Humane Farming Association hired Pete to gather enough evidence to allow the organization to file a complaint with local law enforcement and a lawsuit. Pete gets hired on the farm as a farm-hand and begins his surveillance. 

Over the course of six weeks, he obtains horrifying video evidence of animal cruelty to the animals on the farm by several employees, including the owners son, who runs the daily operations of the farm. From slamming piglets against the wall and dumping them in buckets, bleeding and still alive, to hanging downer sows with a chain using a forklift to raise them up and hold the squirming animals until they die, the Wiles Hog Farm is chock-full of the type of 'evidence' HFA wants for its prosecution. The film does a great job of limiting the graphic video of cruelty so that even a viewer who is unable or unwilling to watch such acts are able to sit through the entire film. This is important, because turning the movie off halfway would be a grave mistake.

The majority of the film is not video of animal cruelty, it is the story of the investigation and subsequent trial against the Wiles Hog Farm, giving the viewer insight into the way the farmers, the animal rights group, the community, and the law view the issues. Scenes from the actual trial give a real-life feel to the film where many documentaries fall short. The film is eye-opening (or closing, if you dont want to watch a piglet swung like a baseball bat against the wall) and provocative, in the way only a documentary of this kind can be.

This is a film that needs to be widely screened. As the filmmakers point out, animal rights is like the present-day civil rights movement. Our collective ignorance about the way our meat is raised, treated, slaughtered, packaged, and sold is an unsustainable way of living. We get squeamish when we see animals mistreated, so we choose to ignore that it happens and continue to make choices that perpetuate the mistreatment. From hogs, chickens, and cows to salmon, tuna, and sharks, our unchecked appetite for meat and seafood, fueled by agricultural, oil and gas, and pharmaceutical industries, creates the perfect recipe for cruelty, the likes of which are described in Death on a Factory Farm.

Please let me know if you would like a copy of the film, I would be more than happy to give one to you.

keep it fresh...

- Neil

Refresh

Yesterday, I found myself re-reading some of the early posts on this blog and truly enjoying being reminded of the memories I blogged about. Today, I find myself re-energized about the idea of maintaining a place to store my thoughts and experiences so that I can one day re-read this post and remember the feelings and environment at this exact moment.

Ten weeks into the summer, I feel consistently overwhelmed with what lies ahead of me, to the point that I physically and mentally cannot relax, even on weekends. This is new. I have never had a problem dropping whatever was on my mind and taking half a day or a few hours to be mindless, and relaxed. In the past, television, music, video-games, sports, and sleep were some of the ways I was able to accomplish mindlessness. For whatever reason, video-games do not appeal to me anymore; I get bored. Television and music can distract me for a while, but I'm never fully disengaged from what is on my mind at the time and so I sit there staring at the tv, but thinking about work that I have to do. Sports and sleep, are still the best ways for me to escape, but I exercise much less than I did before (a result of more work/anxiety), and I resist sleeping because once I'm out, I'm out.

So, this feeling of dread that I just can't shake prevents me from feeling happy a lot of the time. I think it's important to distinguish contentment from happiness. To me, being content involves gratitude, perspective, and satisfaction (in that order). Happiness, on the other hand, can be temporary and involves one's state of being for a given time. Of course, it need not be temporary. For me, contentment is not something I struggle with so much, but happiness has been hard to find lately. I am going to try and list the issues that I find myself constantly wrestling with.

1. Confidence. I've been rattled over the past year or so. Silently and gradually, I've come to trust myself less and feel unsure in my decisions. It just crept up on me. What do I want to do now that I'm at this point in law school?
Sometimes I feel like I want to discontinue down this road and explore a lifestyle that would seemingly be completely different. I imagine moving to a farm, learning how to grow plants, food, raise animals, and becoming closer to the people that I live/work with, the land I live on, the Earth that sustains me. I know that a choice like that isn't one that would be popular with some of the people that I care about. I don't know that I want to give up the relationships I have and the lifestyle I have to do that (though I'm tired of living a city-life most of the time).
In the case I stay in law school, what kind of work do I want to do? I know the direct answer to that question, but putting that into practice is much more delicate and complex. How do I balance the advice I get from attorney's, counselors, and peers with my gut feeling? I tell myself that I want to go down a certain path, but I am afraid to take the first step. Firm v. Non-profit v. Government v. ????. Are there any other options? After working at a firm this summer, I know that I don't want that job. But do I participate in OCI anyway? How much time do I allocate to each of the commitments I've made to different organizations?

...Not all of these question's have discrete answers, but I know that at the root of this struggle is a lack of confidence in myself and my world view. I'm not sure that I'm right.

2. Discipline. 24 hours sure hasn't seemed like enough time lately. There are always a million things to do, right? I want to get to that day where there I have accomplished all my work and have tomorrow to look forward to because there is nothing that I have left over from today. Before I get there though, I've got to put up the art that has been sitting in my apartment for months, organize my desk in a way that I want to have it permanently, use the storage drawers that I recently bought for some of my files, update my filing system with paperwork, move my music from one computer to the other, fix some of the things that need fixing at the apartment, clean my car, fit the cleaning of the apartment into a schedule of some sort...the list only grows.

I guess most of my struggle is the general struggle of a particular human in a particular culture in a particular city at a particular stage with a particular world view.

Its ironic that sitting here for 30 minutes writing about my struggles has been very relaxing. I guess, that maybe shouldn't be so much of a surprise to me. Thank you. Im not sure who, but thank you. Now I'm off to cross off a few of those things on the list.

keep it fresh...

- Neil

The tipping point

It seems like every year for the past 3-4 years (that i can recall), I feel like the stakes just keep getting higher. From the War, to climate change, to the breakdown of our financial markets, to my own life there is less and less room for error and folly. This recent article by Thomas Friedman does a great job of explaining the very serious consequences of allowing ourselves to forget how important this time is.

It is a common feature of history that every generation believed itself to be the turning point of civilization or the "one." For example, talk to enough religious folks and you will find that we are in the End Times and all the global issues we face today are just signs of the beginning of the end. But, humor me for just a minute. What if all those generations were right? What if they all really were in the End Times, just not at the very, very end of it? What if the "end" is a two thousand year-long ending? What if we are getting closer to the actual end? December 21, 2012 ring a bell???

I know, you're probably thinking that I am just perpetuating the cycle, and maybe I am, but it's hard not to think of this time "a" tipping point at the very least, and "the" tipping point at the most. I don't think that the end of the world, in the physical sense, is ten of fifteen years away, but I do think that a foundational shift is occurring in human history that will determine how successive generations will live and view the world. 

Like the fashion world where trends reemerge every 20-30 years, so will humankind's worldview reemerge from some period in the past where we had not yet reached the End, hopefully.

A new chapter, again

I just moved to SF this week for law school! Its been a crazy mental transition, and Im finally feeling well settled and genuinely excited for whats coming up next in my life, namely law school. First and foremost though, I took some pictures of my new crib and I wanted to post em up here.

This is the entrance to the apartment. We are the bottom of a three unit building in the sunny Mission neighborhood of SF.

The entrance is a narrow hallway, which is a good representation of what the entire layout is like. Narrow and long with the rooms on either side of the hallway.

The living room.

My room from the doorway.

The other side of my room.

Among other things, I went to a little mixer last night put on by one of my fellow 1Ls. It was a chance for us to meet up informally before orientation. It was at Mr. Smiths, a club close to school and in the SoMa neighborhood. I'm not one to step out and meet people like that normally, but it was nice to see my fellow classmates and get to know about the people who will most likely go on to be colleagues and friends in the future. The club is a pretty nice spot with cheap and good drinks. I had, for the first time, a Basil Gimlet which is a variation of my favorite cocktail and it was delicious. The music was questionable; had me loving to hate it and hating to love it at times. Overall, a good night. It felt great to just walk out of the club, hop on BART, and be home in 15 minutes without having to even think about driving, parking, traffic, one time, or anything! Going out in SF is gonna be a lot of fun!

...keep it fresh

- Neil

It's not something I believe I can plan. I suppose that's because it cannot be tamed, cannot be controlled. As much as I may want it to happen to me, I don't know if it ever will. I live my life resisting the temptation to assume its occurrence at the same time trying not to be so arrogant as to question its existence. There have been a few times in my life when I thought I found it in another. Maybe I did. Life always seemed so much better in those days. But I always believed that once I found it, it would be permanent. That it would perpetuate infinitely. Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps it comes and goes as the seasons, though not with the same certainty. I wish it were certain. Life seems so lifeless without it.

This morning I woke up longing for it, like I have many times before, feeling such an excruciating yet pleasurable pain in some invisible space in the center of my body. Nothing I did could take away that feeling, and in a strange way I did not want the feeling to go away. I imagine it is this very pain that hurts so much when I am without it that feels so good when I am with it. For even pain turns to pleasure in its presence. In its absence though, there is much that can go wrong. Envy fills the void, the antithesis to it. Fleeting and unstable yet so comforting in the exact moment, it eats away at my sanity interrupting the positive flow of my energy. Doubt makes an appearance with all its conceit, its self-righteousness slowly evaporating any sense of certainty and hope. One must have it before it can be shared with others, or with another.

I have so much to give, and no one to give it to.
I have so much to give, and am looking for the one to give it to.
I have so much to give, and want so much for someone to give it to.

How to cheer up a sad iPod

A few months ago when I returned from my travels in Central America, the first time I tried to turn my iPod on it wouldn't work. It gave me the sad face! I had heard stories about the sad face and it being the final blow to ones iPod ensuring certain death. I tried rebooting my iPod, restoring it, I even tried giving it CPR but nothing seemed to work. After a month or two of being disappointed from such a terrible loss, my spirits were uplifted with the purchase of an iPhone! I thought, "Well, my iPod mini has a total capacity of 4GB and my iPhone itself has a total capacity of 8GB so addition by addition I dont need my stupid broken iPod anymore!" And with that, I chucked my iPod and all the accessories I had accumulated over time into a drawer which I never expected to check until the next spring cleaning date.

What a blow to little iPod mini's self esteem that must have been. No less than 3 months of solitary confinement would break the very soul of almost every other mp3 player there is. Yet the iPod mini is not just ANY mp3 player. Unbeknownst to little "miniPod for monsterPod", there was yet a sliver of life left in its resilient heart that would show its colors soon enough...

...For the past couple of weeks I have been getting things together to either take with me to my apartment in SF or pack away in storage for a while. I made my way to the drawer in which little iPod has been sleeping for so long and suddenly, I felt my heart drop. For all the miles I could not have run if not for my iPod, for all the canvassers I could not have ignored while walking up Bruinwalk, for all the songs I would have never listened to if not for the shuffling of its tiny-but-mighty 4GB library...

I couldn't just let it go from dark drawer to dark box, or worse. So I took it out one last time to see if I couldn't get it to work. Once again, I went to Apple to troubleshoot there for a while to no avail. Once again, it didn't work. It was then time to digg a little deeper. I searched the blogosphere for revival techniques and what I uncovered is nothing short of a conspiracy! Nearly all the websites suggested the same solution: BANG YOU iPOD ON THE GROUND. And then Lil' Jon appeared in my room and said, "WHAAAAT!?" to which I responded, "OOKAY!". And in an instant I took my iPod and tossed it across the room. It landed some 10 feet away from me on the carpet with a thud and rolled a couple feet further. Then it just lay there, on its stomach, motionless. As I walked over to pick it up the thought that I might have really killed it was front and center.

I picked it up, and turned it over. No sad face, no apple icon, nothing. I turned it on and to my amazement the little guy woke up!! Pretty much the happiest moment this month!







keep it fresh...like miniPod for monsterPod

- Neil

Who owns you?

I have heard, "It is very difficult for the poor to practice charity." Because one must have him/herself for one to share. You cannot share that which you do not have. Really, material things are not important in this post. It is things like respect, kindness, love that I am interested in. Why is it that we feel we must be given these very things before we can ourselves give back? You do not need someone else to give you respect before you are able to give respect yourself. Sit in a room, be loving. In our world, to practice love you need another being to share it with. No, share love with yourself. Fill an empty room with love, joy, thoughtfulness and see how the atmosphere in the room changes.

There are many things, material and immaterial, that we feel we own. We pay a price for a pair of jeans, or pay our time for a check at the end of the week, or pay with our experience for respect. We simply assume that we own, and thereby control, anything that we pay for or are given. Many of these things we have trouble sharing. Why is it that we do not share our money? The money, yes, is physically in your possession but if in your heart you want to give it to someone else but do not do so then who is in control and who is being controlled? Many times it is us who are possessed by the very things we "own." Free yourself from that which you think you own. Do not be held back by that which you have to give.

Americanaland

I visited the new mixed-use development in Glendale called Americana a couple days ago. From a bit of reading and what I have learned from people some of the goals of mixed-use development are to enhance accessibility, economize on resource consumption, and create a community; among other things I imagine. Though mixed-use is not in any way a new concept, LA has not used it as much as other cities. And I think Americana is a great first step towards integrating residential and commercial spaces hopefully moving away from our "Crash"-like disconnectedness.

But as with many things in LA, it strikes me as pretentious with a lot of fru-fru, if you know what I mean. Straight up, it looks like Disneyland's newest addition: Americanaland! It seems as though no real effort was made to make Americana part of Glendale. Instead the community of Americana is itself a micro-city within a city. With its Orange Express trolley that runs along the walkway lined with shops and restaurants and theaters (mind you, not essentials like grocerys, hardware, dry-cleaners), and past the giant gold statue of, most likely, some greek god straight out of Caesars Palace, around the mini-Bellagio fountains....I could go on. The manufactured "golden era" atmosphere is hardly nostalgic nor inviting to me and made me feel more uncomfortable than relaxed as one hopes to be in an outdoors area like that. One feels more pressure to take in all the sights as if visiting a theme park than to enjoy oneself and stroll through the "neighborhood." To be sure, there were definitely more people taking pictures than were shopping or enjoying an afternoon at the "park." I did find some pretty good deals at the J.Crew though and a business idea as a result of visiting another store, so the day was pretty fruitful after all.

In the future, hopefully I can incorporate more images into these posts to provides some visual stimulation as well.

keep it fresh...

- Neil

Business Casualty

Business. Busy-ness. The state of being busy, like happiness or blandness or strangeness. It's one of those words that is part of nearly every human being's vocabulary in whatever language one speaks. In the world I live almost anything can be a business. Almost everything is. At what point, though, do the highly esteemed precepts of business in our society go from being socially constructive to socially destructive?

I think American society and several others have already passed that point. Business as usual is, and has been, a destructive force to the society and environment in which we live. As a student at the free market capitalism-loving, Milton Friedman-worshiping, Communism-fearing department of Economics at UCLA, I was consistently fed the traditional 'maximize production-minimize costs-government stay the fuck out the way' formula. To be honest, in theory all of it sounds really good.

Then I took an Environmental Economics course and realized that business as usual (economics at UCLA) is in large part the reason why human-inhabited areas of the planet are a complete dump. Though Milton Friedman's main assertion was that free market policies were the best way to set free, politically and socially, a state under totalitarian or central control, I find it hard to believe that the United States is a politically and socially 'free' country. What Milton Friedman didn't bank on was the insatiable greed of humans. That thought is curious, because one of the first thing you learn in economics is the very concept of human greed. Essentially, economics is the study of how to curb human greed from threatening our survival. Hence the morbid fear of monopolies, oligopolies, and the Prisoners' Dilemma.

Though I clearly haven't refined my thoughts in this post yet, my point is that capitalism as it stands is a dangerous force. It has given dominance to those countries that have adopted its ways, but a truly inequitable world has been created as a result. And the scary part is that the countries which are sowing the seed of their economic future today (China, Korea, India, Brazil, South Africa...) are pursuing the same ends that the early-industrial countries did. Eventually these countries will reach a peak like the US and some European countries and then what? For all the dislike of America around the world, there are few countries (are there any?) that have the fortitude to break away from following its lead into an unsustainable future.

...keep it fresh

- neil

Memories

Do you trust your memory? Is what you remember to have happened two years ago on July 4th or graduation night from high school or your first date really what happened? What about that argument you had with your friend, your parents, your boy/girlfriend?...

I have this unusually miserable habit of second-guessing my memory's accuracy. It is not something I voluntarily do because I enjoy it, it is because there are periods of my life that I just can't remember. Therefore I have a hard time trusting whether some of the things I remember are really what happened and if they are in fact my own first-hand memories. For instance, I moved to India when I was 7 years old and lived there for three years. I know that. Because it happened. And I remember selected specific events throughout the time I lived there, but if you asked me to describe a typical 24-hour day in the life of 8 or 9 or even 10 year-old Neil I could hardly get past 3pm (which is when I got out of school). Not only is my memory sparse, but some of what I do know about my childhood isn't even my own first-hand memory. Home videos and accounts from family members make up a significant amount of what I know about my past. To the point where I'm not sure if I actually remember where I slept every night or I know it because I'm told where I did.

Everyone has been through that moment in life with friends, family, or complete strangers that feels so surreal in its awkwardness, greatness, or warmth and we all say, "I'm never forget this moment, this day, this feeling." Well, I've forgotten some of those moments. I know that because in my memory I can see myself saying that line, but in an empty black space, and I can't paint a picture of my surroundings or my feelings or who I was with. It saddens me to think that I am losing those moments in the past that felt so unforgettable in the present. More than losing single moments though, I feel like I can't account for whole periods of time in my life. Not just temporally, but periods defined by relationships, schooling, or travel.

My inspiration for writing about this, you might be wondering, was going through some old photos and greeting cards that I have kept in my wildly unorganized top dresser drawer. Looking at those things triggered emotions about some of the relationships I've had with people that I don't feel right off the bat when I think about them today. In other words, my gut emotion when I am reminded of some of the relationships that have faded away or ended is so different (sometimes) to what I feel when I start digging into some of the "things" I have that remind me of those people.

I guess its great to have a computer which doesn't have a faulty memory system like I do. I truly will never forget that I wrote this because it will perpetuate in 60gb of hard drive and the seemingly unlimited world of cyberspace for all time!

More on the computerization of our lives later.

keep it fresh...

- Neil

Mix Meister

So my moms 50th birthday is coming up and we have decided to throw her a party in celebration. At first we wanted to throw her a surprise birthday party but knowing our mom, we decided it would be better if she knew about it and helped plan it instead. So, as per her wishes, we are having a dance party because she loves to dance. When it came down to logistics, we figured that getting a DJ for a couple of hours to play some music we liked and some we didn't wasn't good enough, so I was put in charge of music. The restaurant that we are having the party at has a system already with 2 CD players, so the only option was to play CD's or hook up an iPod.

Well, what we were giving up in not getting a DJ is her/his ability to mix music smoothly which is the most important element for a successful dance party. So in the absence of a real DJ, I had to integrate the 'DJ' into the CD.

I've always been interested in DJing and mixing music and have tried my hands at turntabling as well as countless computer DJ programs to be my very own "bedroom DJ." Most interfaces of computer DJ programs have turntables in them that are overly sensitive to the movement of the mouse as its control. Add to that the complex EQ controls and it was very easy for me to get discouraged. Enter Mix Meister Studio.

More than a DJ program, this is music editing software so the controls are different. For mixing it is alot easier to cut, fade, and mix songs together. I've been gathering all the songs that my mom wants us to play (mostly 70s, 80s, bhangra, and hindi film) and adding a little flavor of my own to the mix and its coming along great. It is so much fun! Yesterday, I spent nearly 6 hours mixing music and for the rest of the evening I had that ringing in my ears like when you come back from a concert. Anyway, I have one week to finish this mix and then I can start on mixes that I've always wanted to put together. If anyone has a request, let me know a genre and a few core songs and I'll put together the rest of the mix.

...keep it fresh

- Neil

How do you pick yourself up?

Everyone has their own way of managing their energy. I'm not talking about physical energy, I'm talking about your overall vibe and the way you feel about you, your surroundings, and your place right at this moment in time. I haven't ever kept track of it on a daily or even weekly basis, but I feel like my energy goes up and down in cycles. For a week or so I might feel lethargic and lazy when I wake up in the morning and carry on like that for the rest of the day. It really feels terrible. Especially when I've got stuff to do like wash my car or go to the bank or make a phone call, and I just put it off all day even when I know I will regret not doing any of those things before I go to bed. I wake up the next morning with the burden of what I didn't do yesterday plus what I need to accomplish today...and like that the stress on my energy compounds. Now, I don't know how well I explained this feeling but I know that in some capacity everyone gets it at times. Personally, the best way for me to raise my energy level is by exercising or going outside and taking a walk. Just today, in fact, I was able to come out of a funk when I exercised earlier in the morning. I also believe that some of my habits or lifestyle characteristics perpetuate this negative energy. For one, I hate the fact that I have gotten used to waking up late again. Not that I was ever an early-riser, but before about two months ago I was waking up at a reasonable time for about a year. Now, I get up no earlier than 8:30 and usually around 9:30 feeling just as tired as before I went to bed. Waking up early itself isn't the answer, its the mindset I wake up with that helps me maintain my energy through the day. Anyway, I feel like I'm rambling so this will end here.

...keep it fresh

- Neil

Democratic Debate

So I'm watching the debate between Hillary and Barack right now. Why is it that they spend the first 30 minutes talking about individual and personal issues? First they talk about Barack's recent comments in California about "frustrated and bitter" people "clinging to religion and guns." Then they go on about the Reverend Wright situation. Not until 45 minutes into the debate do they start talking substance. And the first two voter video questions were useless. The first was about Hillary not portraying her Bosnia visit accurately and the second about why Barack Obama doesn't at times wear a flag pin. What, if anything, does this have to do with what each of these candidates will do as president?

The beginning of April and a new chapter

First off, friday nights Laker game was sick! That had to be one of the dopest games of the season and I was lucky enough to be in the building! I cant wait for the playoffs to start, this is likely to be one of the most exciting post-seasons of the decade. M-V-P! M-V-P! M-V-P!

Two weeks ago I visited two law schools I was interested in; UC Hastings and UC Davis, it seems I cant escape the UC system for my education. My dad was going to drive up with me because he needed to go to Reno after we were done looking at schools, and so I asked my mom to come with us as well so they both could visit the schools with me and help me make my decision of where to go to law school. So it turned out that all three of us left on Wednesday for a mini college tour. We stopped in Davis first. My first impression of Davis was mildly interested at best. The town is quaint and college-townish with a wholesome community and mom-and-pop shops lining the streets. Of course my parents were thrilled to think that I might be in a "safe" neighborhood for school since I would be so far from home. I got a chance to sit in on a Property class the next day with a current 1L student. The sound of the laptop keys was deafening! Every student save 3 or 4 had a laptop in front of them typing every word that came out of the professors mouth. There wasn't too much class participation in the class but the 50 minutes went by fast enough. I took a walk around the law school area of campus afterwards and found the campus to be really beautiful, but knew that coming to school there I wouldn't be able to enjoy the campus like an undergrad.

Well, the next day I went to Hastings and found that its campus comprises two buildings in the Tenderloin District of San Francisco. The tenderloin is a neighborhood in transition similar to the outskirts of Downtown LA. In San Francisco, unlike LA, communities overlap physical boundaries so two streets down from school the change in scenery is fairly dramatic. We stayed in a pretty dingy drive-in motel the first night within two blocks of school and got to see first-hand the "diversity" of the neighborhood. To say my parents were dreaming of me going to Davis is an understatement. On the other hand, I was totally feeling the vibe of San Francisco. I walk down one street dressed in some jeans and a hoody and I fit right in. Then, I cross the street and I look like I came fresh out the gutta compared to the people walking on the sidewalk. You just cant judge people by what they look like in the City (and everywhere else), you never know who you're looking at until you get to know them. The way people react to each other there is just so different.

Anyway, about the school...

I got to sit in on a Criminal Procedures class, which by its very nature is very much more interesting than Property. Nevertheless the class was more lively and only about 60% of the class was on Facebook compared to almost everyone at Davis. I pretty much made up my mind by the end of the day that I wanted to be at Hastings. Looking back at my perception of Hastings back in August-September last year when I was getting ready to apply to schools I didnt think much of the school and applied to the school solely because it is a decent law school in California. Now, after visiting it and meeting with several current students my vision of the school is very different. I am genuinely excited to be going there and realize that the school is itself a great institution that can and will provide me with a stimulating education and access to a variety of professional options once I graduate. So, I'm definitely looking forward to going up north this fall.

Well, I was gonna write more but I'm watching the last Laker game of the season so I'll come back later..

...keep it fresh

- Neil

On the open road

In a couple weeks I have driven some 3000 miles up and down the west coast, and next week im headed up to the bay area again. I have been wanting to take a road trip up to the bay for a few months now for pleasure, but all these trips have been work/school related. The trip next week is also for law school.

Driving up the I-5 is a wonderful experience, if you can stay awake. Since the rains over winter, much of the land flanking the highway is green and alive. The trees look healthy, even as they are subjected to napalm-like strikes of pesticide from planes flying above. On my first trip I made it as far as San Francisco for an interview over the course of the weekend. Man, the City is such a charming place. I think I would love it up there if I had to live there for a while.

The next time I drove up I went all the way to Portland, Oregon. So it was deja vu all the way up to Sacramento. From there on I got to see California like I had never seen it before. I had my road map open on the passenger seat and at one point I knew I was approaching Mt. Shasta but I still couldn't see it. According to the map it should have been right in front of my face. I stop in the town of Mt. Shasta to have lunch and the fog begins to lift. So I get back on the road and all of a sudden I look up in front of me and see it. Have you ever seen a natural wonder so awesome that it gave you the chills? That was the feeling, I got so nervous for some reason as if the power of the mountain scared me to my bones. Its the kind of feeling I get when I look down into the Grand Canyon or feel an earthquake. It was amazing.

Then, driving back was just as pretty. It was late at night on a full moon. The moon was sitting low in the sky, shining but sort of glazed over with orange like it was drunk. The silhouette of Mt. Shasta become sharper as the moon moved behind it. At one point, the moon was fully hidden behind the mountain and shone its light creating an aura of light around the mountain that looked magical. After a few minutes the moon peeked out from one side and then fully came out again leaving the dark mountaintop behind. What a sight! And to think, if I didnt decided to drive down that night I would not have witnessed that.

That didn't really make up for the rest of the 15 hour trip that was pretty boring overall, though. Remind me next time not to decide to drive up that far by myself again. Thats all.

...keep it fresh

- Neil