Occasionally Santa Cruz

An Early Fall in Santa Cruz?

2008-08-30T09:04:00.001-07:00

An Early Fall in Santa Cruz?
Originally uploaded by bhorn

The Japanese maple outside of Kerr Hall is already far along into its fall color display. Is an early fall on its way or is it just the dry year we have had so far?

DHS contractor threatens woman with arrest for wearing "lesbian.com" tee on federal property

2008-08-27T09:24:00.000-07:00

http://www.boingboing.net/2008/08/27/dhs-contractor-threa.html

For me, the biggest problem with the current administration is their continued insistence that the executive branch can enforce laws based on their own interpretations and basically make up their own laws.

This sets a bad precedent for the DHS, the TSA, police and private security guards who get the idea that they can make up rules or interpret them to suit their own beliefs and prejudices.

It is my own personal intention to obey the law to the best of my ability and I think this is the case for most people. But in order to do so we need to know clearly what the law is. Secret laws or laws that are vague or open to vague interpretations are unacceptable. They lead to ridiculous and blatant civil rights violations such as this.

Ned

2008-04-29T14:56:00.001-07:00

Ned
Originally uploaded by bhorn

Richard_Friedman

2008-04-29T14:55:00.005-07:00

Richard_Friedman
Originally uploaded by bhorn

Sean2

2008-04-29T14:55:00.003-07:00

Sean2
Originally uploaded by bhorn

GaryLease

2008-04-29T14:55:00.001-07:00

GaryLease
Originally uploaded by bhorn

UCSC Kresge reunion 2008

2008-04-29T14:53:00.001-07:00

sean_monaghan
Originally uploaded by bhorn

These old photos were at the 2008 Kresge reunion and brought back some good memories. Unfortunately I only had a little pocket camera and it was dark so these are probably the worst looking copies up on my flickr site.

Sean is now a bronze caster in Santa Cruz. I believe these were from Kresge day around 1983 or 1984.

Partial Albino Squirrel

2008-04-07T14:57:00.001-07:00

Partial Albino Squirrel
Originally uploaded by bhorn

For the past few years we have had one or two partially albino squirrels who live around the garage at UCSC. One of these days I'll need to remember to bring my good camera to get a photo. It is always too dark under the trees to get a good photo of such a fast moving critter with my point and shoot.

Santa Cruz Earthquake Memorial

2008-04-07T14:39:00.001-07:00

Santa Cruz Earthquake Memorial
Originally uploaded by bhorn

I was glad to see that three of the four paintings in the earthquake memorial in downtown Santa Cruz had been replaced as of a week or two ago but was saddened to see that one of them is already missing, possibly broken from the looks of it. I wish there was some way to make them more permanent. I assume the fourth one is of the cooperhouse right?

Cockney latin Joke

2008-03-17T14:56:00.000-07:00

A good friend of mine uses various Latin phrases as her online and away messages on iChat which has inspired me to use various quasi-Latin joke phrases that I have picked up over the years. Most of them are fairly obvious but the one I have been thinking of lately I haven't been able to find references to on the internet. I sure would like to find it, especially so I could spell the Latin words that make it up since its effect on people who read Latin ( I don't) is best if they are spelled properly.

It is an old joke that my mother used to tell which looks like Latin but is actually Cockney (or perhaps Yorkshire). It goes something like: "Ullo bile eres ago, fortibuses in ero. Ono bile themis trucks. See whatsinem peasor duks."

ClarkKentHall.JPG

2008-02-29T12:19:00.001-08:00

ClarkKentHall.JPG
Originally uploaded by bhorn

Normally I report graffiti as quickly as possible to keep our campus looking nice but sometimes there are items that are so subtle and well done I think they are an improvement.

KresgeApartmentWindow.JPG

2008-02-29T12:17:00.001-08:00

KresgeApartmentWindow.JPG
Originally uploaded by bhorn

Oh those wacky college students.

Think Before You Name Your Business

2008-02-29T11:06:00.000-08:00

Two new bank names that get me every time I see them. If you say them out loud they might give people ideas that the banks wouldn't want them to have.

The first one is Rabobank (rob-o-bank).

The second is Wachovia (watch over ya). Formerly World Savings.

Plum Pudding and Lebkuchen

2007-12-19T00:27:00.000-08:00

I just heard a couple of tidbits that I found interesting on a Food Channel show called : "The Secret Life Of... Christmas foods.

My family has always followed some of the English Christmas traditions that my mother remembered from her childhood. One of those is the traditional desert of Plum Pudding with a silver coin in it. The year we were in England when I was 9 (and I think a few years after that) we had a silver sixpence. Most other years we have had a dime, the American coin that is most similar to that.

In this show they mentioned that it is traditional to have not only a coin, but also a button, a ring and a thimble. The person who found the coin would have wealth, the person who found the ring would get married, the man who found the button would remain a bachelor, the woman who found the thimble would be a spinster.

They also talked about German lebkuchen, ginger cookies made with honey and pressed into wooden molds that have been made since at least the 13th century. Most of them have christian themes but some of them have pagan symbols. I was curious to see which pagan symbols they have but could not find any images on the web that looked likely.

collegewikis.com?

2007-12-13T16:14:00.000-08:00

Hmm,

Just got an email/spam from collegewikis.com claiming to have a wiki for UCSC which would be cool. But, you have to create an account and log in to see any of their content. This just seems to me to be directly opposite to the wiki concept of open information. So I didn't log in. But I do think it would be good for someone to create a open UCSC wiki.

LolBananaSlug

2007-12-07T09:15:00.000-08:00

Wen i wuz a UCSC stewdint a cow once got a bukkit stuk on his foot an wokked around famly howsing at 3am...

moar funny pictures

Digital SLR selection

2007-10-30T14:10:00.000-07:00

I have been wanting to buy a digital SLR for a long time now and finally broke down and bought one to take on our last vacation. I had been debating what brand and model to buy for several years and ended up with the Pentax d100Super .

If I were actually making money from my photography it might have been better to go with a Nikon or Canon, but since I currently have no plans to do that, the Pentax seemed a better choice. The choice of the Pentax seemed to be the one that would allow me to grow a small system for the lowest total cost possible.

The fact that the image stabilization is built into the body rather than the lenses allows me to use it with any lens, not just the expensive dedicated IS lenses that Nikon and Canon make. I know that each company is starting to come out with lower priced IS lenses and Sigma now has one but those are still at least $4-600. A lot of money for a gadget to support a hobby.

With the Pentax (as with the Sony/Minolta system) I can buy used lenses dirt cheap and use them with the built-in IS.

There are a few limitations to this that I discovered however. The main one is that the focus screen in the d100 does not make manual focusing very easy. This makes buying manual focus lenses an iffy proposition at this point since I can't be sure that I can keep them in focus all the time. Old manual focus lenses are often vastly cheaper than the new auto-focus versions of the same lenses. There are a few 3rd party focus screen manufacturers that make screens that should make manual focusing easier but they may affect auto-exposure a little and it is unclear whether they might interfere with auto-focus or IS.

Also, the older auto-focus lenses seem much noisier than new ones and some of them may be quite a bit heavier and larger than current lenses. Their coatings may not be as good with digital cameras either.

Still though, I think this will allow me to get the lenses that I want for a few hundred dollars rather than the few thousand that it would take with a Nikon or Canon.

Also, apparently the camera based IS systems should work better with the short to medium lenses that I favor as opposed to the lens based systems that work best with longer lenses. A 28mm f2 should allow me to take handheld photos in very low light. Just the sort of setup that I typically need on vacation for taking pictures inside of dimly lit museums, churches, etc. theoretically the limit should be 1/28th of a second for the lens by itself with the IS system adding about 2 stops for a minimum shutter speed of 1/7th of a second. At 800-3200 ISO this should allow me to shoot handheld in very dim places.

UCBotanicalGardenBH

2007-07-25T23:56:00.001-07:00

UCBotanicalGardenBH
Originally uploaded by bhorn

A few weekends ago we went to the UC Botanical Garden up at UC Berkeley for a talk and tour of the cycads in the garden. I was amazed at what a spectacular garden it is and would highly recommend a visit. We saw many other wonderful plants as well as cycads such as this one. What wild and wonderful prehistoric plants these are. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycad

This I believe

2007-07-25T23:30:00.000-07:00

Although I would prefer to have national leaders who are the most intelligent people that nyone can find for their jobs, even more important is that our leaders should be people who bring out the very best, the most noble ideals in all of us.

They should help us to feel that we should do what is right for all of the people of the world.

They should help us to trust people who are different from us rather than making us fearful and suspicious of them.

They should help us to get along better with each other and see that we have common ground with all people now matter how different they be from us.

Yes I know that it is a dangerous world out there and there are some people in the world who do not have the best intentions for their fellow beings, but I still believe that the vast majority of people in the world want the best for their fellow beings and will act to promote that if they are not put in untenable situations that make it difficult to do so.

Writings From My Mother's Notebook

2007-07-25T23:07:00.000-07:00

My father died about two months ago and since then several of my co-workers have died untimely deaths.

Many things have been roaming around in my the past few months and one of them is this passage that my father printed out for me a few years ago that he had found in my mother's notebook. It was dated 5/8/97, about 7 months before my mother passed away.

I still miss my mother and I definitely miss my father very much now. And I miss all of those friends and relatives who have gone before me. I am still very much in the midst of that but this does help at least a tiny bit and I think that it will help more as time goes on and the good times return.

"I used to think that you could never become/grow to be good at handling death. Each death gets harder to bear, not easier, and the pain and grief begins to extend to partings as well. But it now seems to me that that's precisely what being good at handling death is.

When my father died I was eleven, no one close to me had died. I cried and I knew that my life was changed forever. I had no knowledge of forever, or the rest of my life. Now, when someone I love dies, I feel the whole layer cake of grief, the heavy strata of emotions, and I know how long I will feel that loss. I also know that I don't need to be afraid that I will forget them, even though I may think of them less often. What this does is to --?--What does it do, huh? The pain is more exquisite now but I feel freer to grieve- less guilty about enjoying my life in between times of grief. "

PersimmonBlossoms

2007-06-04T17:07:00.001-07:00

PersimmonBlossoms
Originally uploaded by bhorn

These are persimmon blossoms from our tree. I probably wont make it out there to get a shot of them on the tree this year though.

Core Beliefs

2007-06-04T16:47:00.000-07:00

In order to understand my viewpoint on current national politics I think it is useful to know a few of my core beliefs.

1. From a moral standpoint, I believe that killing another human being is wrong whether the killing is state sanctioned or not. If I were in a situation where I had to kill another person or be killed myself would I have the courage not to kill? Maybe not. Hopefully I will never need to find out. However, most state sanctioned killing is premeditated and avoidable so I will never sanction or support it.

2. To quote Desmond Tutu: "Anything war can do, peace can do better". So there is also no reason to kill from a practical standpoint. Although we may achieve the money, land or power that we desire through war, the unintended consequences are always worse than the gains. All war and violence is avoidable. Whatever we need to accomplish we can always do through peaceful means.

3. I also believe that non-lethal violence against other humans is unnecessary. Other than defending yourself against someone who jumps out at you from a dark alley, most violence can be avoided. And I assume that if I knew more about aikido I could probably avoid that as well.

Sad News

2007-06-04T12:34:00.000-07:00

My father passed away a few weeks ago and I have not really been able to think about much else since then. He is a wonderful person and a very big part of my life and I miss him very much.

My mother passed away about ten years ago and although the pain has become less as the years have gone by I still miss her. When I see something particularly special I sometimes catch myself thinking: "oh, that is something Mom would like" and then feeling sad because I cannot share it with her. I have had a few moments like that with Dad in the last few weeks.

I really hope there is a life after death and that they are enjoying each other's company there. I look forward to seeing them again there 60 or 70 years from now.

XXB

Disney now allows gay weddings and commitment ceremonies

2007-04-25T14:18:00.000-07:00

Is it just market forces or social pressure that finally got Disney to do what is right and allow all people to participate in their "fairytale weddings" if they want to?

If what their spokesperson says is true: "This is consistent with our policy of creating a welcoming, respectful and inclusive environment for all of our guests.", I guess it is at least partially because they just want to do the right thing. Not the most important leap forward in equality but I guess even small steps are beneficial in moving us towards a world where all people are treated equally.

To Save The Planet, Parent Only Once

2007-04-18T12:40:00.000-07:00

This quote is from Terrence McKenna.

The idea is that if every person in the first world countries only had one child, their population would halve every twenty years. Since every person in first world uses many times the resources of people in the third world, reducing the number of children we have would drastically reduce our impact on the planet.

--BH

The Mystery Machine

2007-03-31T10:24:00.001-07:00

The Mystery Machine
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

I've seen this van around town before. Apparently the owner has a video store in Felton called Scoob's.

This is of course a reproduction of the van from Scooby Doo.

I was nuts about comics and cartoons when I was a kid and a teenager and many of my cultural references are from cartoons. There were some cartoons that were masterpieces and some that were just so-so. Some of them started out as masterpieces and years later degenerated into pap. The early Popeye cartoons for instance were much better than what came after for instance.

Scooby doo was rather odd in that it started out with some pretty good stuff the first season (I wouldn't necessarily say masterpiece level but fun and decent quality entertainment) but everything after that first season seemed like they just had one basic plot that they used over and over. What was amazing to me was that it went downhill so quickly (maybe it was the first two seasons that were good, I didn't follow it that closely).

I have not been able to get myself to watch all the way through either of the new Scooby Doo movies which is disappointing to me. I had high hopes that they would be an innovative kitsch fest like the Brady Bunch movies but something about the digital animation disturbs me and the whole feel of the movies just turns me off.

Oh Well.

Indian Paintbrush

2007-03-30T22:57:00.001-07:00

Indian Paintbrush
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

The Big Basin Skyline to the Sea trail that ends (or starts depending on your point of view) at highway 1 at Waddell Creek was marvelous today. It should be even better on April 22 when they have their wildflower festival. Hopefully they get good flowers this year although with the low rainfall they will probably not be as prolific as some years. Click here for the full flickr set.

Santa Cruz Public Art

2007-03-24T22:17:00.001-07:00

Former site of Bookshop Santa Cruz
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

This is the start of a Flickr set I am starting of public art in Santa Cruz, starting with a tour of Pacific Avenue and the streets immediately off of it. I'll add more locations as I get the chance. Here is a link to the set

Mission Inn

2007-03-18T15:42:00.001-07:00

Mission Inn
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

The Mission Inn in Riverside is a magical place. It was built over the course of decades in five or six different architectural styles (faux mission, orientale, etc.) It has hundreds of odd little corners and works of art from all over the world hidden in and around it.

I found this postcard of it, from the thirties I would guess, at the Santa Cruz antiques sale that happens downtown every so often.

The History of UCSC Chapter 19477, In All Its Naked Glory.

2007-03-14T22:47:00.000-07:00

A few years ago I had the privilege to work with, among other wonderful people, an awsome artist/technologist, Timothy Jordan on a dance telematica project called Lubricious Transfer.

Some months ago I discovered that Timothy has an excellent program on KZSC, the UCSC radio station. I usually only get to hear the last 10-15 minutes of it after I get off work. But Timothy mentioned to me a few weeks ago that, as I should have guessed, there is a podcast of it.

So I have been catching up on the rest of his shows during the past week or so and I just recently heard one episode called "the naked/transparent show". On it he had an interview with "the naked guy" who apparently used to ride around campus naked and once went to class that way (I thought there was also a "naked guy" at Berkeley at one point too).

Back when M.R.C. Greenwood was chancellor someone in my office said that she had made a statement that UCSC was no longer a clothing optional university. I had always assumed she made this statement as part of the never-ending campaign by UCSC administration to make UCSC seem a safe, boring conventional place that parents will feel comfortable sending their kids. But in the interview "the naked guy" said that he had asked Marcie specifically why she had made that decision and she said it was because she herself was too old to go naked anymore to which he replied that you are never too old to be naked.

I found that a fascinating thing for her to say even though I still believe that the main reason she did this was for PR, I think it is a fascinating comment on our society in general and on UCSC in particular that the people in charge feel that because they are uncomfortable with something for themselves, they should prohibit it for everyone else.

In the interview they also touched on various other instances of spontaneous nakeditity on the UCSC campus and I thought it would be amusing to recount my own personal memories of UCSC as a clothing optional university. I am sure that other alumni from my era (77 off and on through 83) or before can tell much more outrageous stories than I can but here is what I remember.

Of course most people at UCSC nowadays knows about the Porter run: the first rainy day of the season scores of students run naked from Porter across campus through other colleges and places. Sadly, I have read that the last few years the number of spectators has been greater than the actual participants. What a wonderful liberating thing that must have been the first few years it happened to be able to run free through all outdoors without clothing.

A few years running when we first moved to Kerr Hall we would see them running past the loading dock, usually near the end of the afternoon. A great joyous crowd of kids rambling up the street. I think they must have had drums or some other musical instruments with them. Someone working by the windows would usually pipe up with something like "oh, here come the naked people" and everyone would stop work for a moment to watch them go by. it was fun but not really any big deal. Just another quirky thing that made UCSC a great and wonderful place unlike any other in the world.

Now here I feel I must pause to say that, although I understand that UCSC was more wild and crazy in the few years before I was a student there, other than a few things like the Porter run, it has really become quite socially conventional and staid in the past few years. It is not much different socially than any other university now albeit with a progressive bent.

I would also like to say that even when it was at its wildest, there was an incredible amount of truly high quality scholarship and learning that went on at UCSC. I remember in 1977, the wildest of the years that I attended UCSC, someone told me that 85% of the psychology majors at UCSC got into grad schools. Apparently that is a very high percentage compared to most schools.

And the students at UCSC have always predominantly been more interested in real learning rather than just getting a degree. There are always a few students who don't feel that way but the majority have always been here to learn.

So, back to the narrative:

When came back to UCSC as a staff member a year or two before MRC came on board, there were students, mostly involved in the campus AIDS awareness group, who would ride bikes around campus nude. I believe they gave out free condoms and I imagine AIDS prevention literature. Unfortunately the shot of a group of them saying goodby to a favored former chancellor ended up on the cutting room floor.

Working backwards in time, I know that the College V/Kresge meadow was still used then for nude sunbathing as it had been in my day. Again, it was never any big deal, just a comfortable place to lie out on a sunny day. I don't know if this still goes on but I assume not.

Jumping back to the beginning of my years at UCSC and working forward now, I remember the first day or two that I was at UCSC one of my housemates showed me a photo of his old housemates from the year before when he lived in the sextets (I was rather dissappointed when I found out they were named that because they housed six people). The had gotten together a few days before for a reunion dinner and had taken a group naked photo under the naked guy statue on the front of the Kresge Town Hall. I think He said it was taken about 2 in the morning.

Not too much later in the year, before halloween in any case, I walked up to the Idler Cafe, the student co-op cafe that was then next to the Town Hall. Just inside of the front door there was a counter with a clothes check girl and boy. They explained that it was "nude night at the Idler" that night. They took each person's clothes as they came in the door and gave them a claim ticket of some sort I guess (where would we have put a claim ticket though?).

Throughout the night there were a variety of games and activities. The only one I can remember was a game where one person passed an orange held under their chin to the person next to them.

As I was standing by the front counter a couple came in from one of the other colleges (Stevenson I think). Even at that time, most of the other colleges were relatively more conservative than Kresge. I remember having a conversation with the girl in the couple and finding it amusing that she was very careful not to look anywhere other than the eyes of the person she was talking to.

There was someone filming the evening who I think was working on a history of Kresge project. I remember he said that a copy of it would go in the Kresge College archives. I would love to see a copy of that film someday and see if I was really as skinny as I remember myself being.

Halloween of that year, the girlfriend of a friend of mine (who I think had been the clothes check girl and boy) dressed as a male flasher. Her costume was incredibly believable. Part of it was made of a bunch of stockings stuck into another stocking.

Unfortunately I was not aware that there was a hot tub at Kresge until they shut it down. I believe 1977-78 was the last year that it was open. It was upstairs in the building by the volleyball court, upstairs over what at that time was a weight room. I think I was told it was closed down because people splashed too much water on the floor and it leaked down into the room below but I think it was also because the preceptors whose apartments were next to it couldn't sleep with all the noise and naked revelers.

Other than the casual clothing optional attitude in many of the apartments at Kresge, most of the rest of the stories I have relate as well to the sexual climate at Kresge at that time which is a much larger topic and will have to wait for another time.

--Peace

An Occasional Santa Cruzan

What Am I Doing Up Here

2007-03-13T23:02:00.001-07:00

WhatAmIDoingUpHere.jpg
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

DeCinzo, the cartoonist all Santa Cruz loves to hate, had a field day with this one. He is obviously not a true Santa Cruzan, at least in spirit.

Like Wow Man

2007-03-13T23:01:00.001-07:00

LikeWowMan.jpg
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

This was on the opposite side of the next image. I think they go together very well.

UCSC Mascot

2007-03-13T22:50:00.001-07:00

UCSCMascot.jpg
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

The great banana slug, mascot of the cooperative UCSC.

Monterey Aquarium

2007-03-13T22:48:00.001-07:00

MontereyAquarium.jpg
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

One of my favorite pictures from our recent trip to the Monterey Aquarium.

Kuumbwa Jazz Center

2007-03-10T00:18:00.001-08:00

kuumbwa3
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

kuumbwa

2007-03-10T00:17:00.001-08:00

kuumbwa2
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

Swami Beyondananda and Fondle the Fear

2007-03-10T00:02:00.000-08:00

Just saw a great comedy show with Swami Beyondananda, Richard Stockton and Ralph Anybody at that great Santa Cruz institution, the Kuumbwa Jazz Center.

This is the third time I have seen the Swami and he is fantastic. Outrageously funny and quite enlightening and inspiring. One of my favorite lines from tonght was something to the effect of "God is watching the comedy channel and we are what is on it" . Hearing the Swami channeling Bullwinkle impersonating Frank Sinatra was hilarious.

Opening this evening was Ralph Anybody from Kpig, followed by Richard Stockton, author of the book: "fondle The Fear".

I thought all three were very funny.

digital vs film test

2007-03-09T11:09:00.001-08:00

blueflower.JPG
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

Taken with a Pentax s5z digital compact. Lets see how this look online compared to the sunflower scanned from a 4x5" transparency.

Sunflower

2007-03-07T22:57:00.001-08:00

Sunflower
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

A sunflower from our garden a few years ago. Original, 4x5" view camera, velvia transparency, 90mm lens. I am interested to see how it looks different from pictures from my digital compact camera once it has been optimized for the web.

Chaplin Quote

2007-03-07T16:53:00.001-08:00

ChaplinQuote.jpg
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

I have seen this stenciled on a few locations around UCSC the past few days.

Sea Lions With Party Hats

2007-03-06T17:26:00.001-08:00

SeaLionsWithPartyHats1.JPG
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

These sea lions are on the UCSC campus at the upper end of Thimann Lecture halls. I like this version much better than a few years ago when someone covered them in yellow paint (I suppose to make them look like banana slugs). I do think that we should have some statues of banana slugs on campus though.
Flickr Set

Quarry Cactus Garden

2007-03-06T17:21:00.001-08:00

QuarryCactusGarden
Originally uploaded by bhorn.

Here are the steps up to the garden. Most of the time when I am backstage at the quarry I am either focused on getting equipment up on stage or I am on my way to the back part of the quarry to go for a walk. But this time I happened to glance to the right just where the path to the back quarry starts and noticed these stone steps.
Flickr Set

UCSC expansion

2007-01-08T15:53:00.000-08:00

UCSC is proposing to increase its enrollment by about 25% in the next 10 years. I think the university should make a commitment to improve water conservation to the point where they can house that increased number of students without using any more water than we use now.

How much water do we really use on campus now? How much of it is used for landscaping? How much for food? Showers,dishwashing, research?

They should also commit to keep the number of vehicle trips the same. More buses, car share, innovative ways of connecting people to share rides.

And they should work with the town to house all of those people without impacting the existing housing market. I think high density mixed use housing, classroom and retail in the far west side by the old Lipton's and Wrigley's factories with very frequent shuttles from there to campus.

But do we really need to expand?

My understanding is that the increase in enrollment is caused by baby boom 2. By the time this constructin is done BB2 will be about over. Will we ever see that sort of increase in enrollment again or will the demand drop back down to where it is now?

Santa Cruz Beach Hill

2006-09-06T20:27:00.000-07:00

I love this old postcard I just received from. As much as I love the image on the front of downtown Santa Cruz as seen from Beach Hill with the old trolley barn on the corner of Sycamore in the foreground, the message on the back just fascinates me.

Mailed on August 14, 1908 from someone named Fred to a Walter Cox in San Jose it says:

"Say maybe you thing [sic] I don't miss you but I do. It is some lonesome down here all by my lonesome but I am getting lots of rest and a bath every day. It is colder here than it was when we were here last year."

Where do I begin? That phrase just kills me: "It is some lonesome down here all by my lonesome..." (!!!!) And "maybe you thing I don't miss you..." I don't know why that just sends me.

And of course this was from when people came to Santa Cruz specifically to take the waters.

Spoonerisms

2006-06-30T09:04:00.000-07:00

Walking down Mission Street to the bus I was behind three men, one of whom was carrying a 24 pack of beer at 8am. "He said he was taking a sow of violence but then at the meeting he got in a big yelling argument with Henry".

Kid Lore

2006-06-20T09:07:00.000-07:00

When I take the bus to work I usually pass a group of kids and parents waiting for the Davenport bus on Mission Street. Whenever a truck drives by the kids pull down on an imaginary cord in the air asking the truck drivers to blow their air horns.

We used to do this when I was a kid. Only on in 5-10 truck drivers responded then. These kids got replies from almost every truck.

What I want to know is, was this kid lore passed down from parent to child or from kid to kid? If it is from kid to kid, that means there is an unbroken line of kids from at least the 60s until now who passed this on. What other kid lore is passed on like this?

Do trucks still have cords to trigger their air horns or do they now all have buttons?

How can we maintain the best of the past in the face of progress?

2006-06-11T23:51:00.000-07:00

Something Rick Steves said in one of his books has been running through my head the past few weeks. He said that he looks for the towns in Europe which were once very prosperous and then went through a period of decline. During that decline, the people in those towns were not able to replace old buildings or remodel them significantly so those towns are the most unchanged from the way they were centuries ago.

Applying that idea to California, that is why so many Gold Country towns are so charming. They were incredibly wealthy a hundred years ago but that wealth went away and many of them have been without new sources of wealth since then so they are relatively unchanged compared to most towns in California.

It is important to watch out for the opposite of this. When a town starts becoming prosperous again, it is all to easy to quickly lose the best of what remains from the past.

Unfortunately this is what started to happen to Santa Cruz beginning in the sixties. The town started becoming more prosperous than it had in the past. Not very quickly, but consistently over the course of a few decades. Although I have not investigated it, I believe part of this new wealth came with the increased use of cars and the ease of travel this gave to day trippers who come to Santa Cruz from the Bay Area.

Part of it came from the University.

As that wealth came into town, some buildings were replaced with other buildings which allowed more profitable commerce. The galleria and the riverfront plaza probably allow for more efficient concentration of wealth than the chinatown area that used to be there.

As more people filled the town, the charming Carnegie library had to make room for the larger modern monolith that now serves us. The Hihn mansion had to make way for the now city hall that replaced it.

While the silicon boom was happening, the anticipation of millions to be made from courting lots of electronics companies downtown prompted the replacement of buildings like the Cooperhouse with the top-heavy monstrosities that now dominate downtown, full of probably underutilized office space.

Other small towns should be alert to this possibility when the start to become prosperous. It may be inevitable that some changes will happen to these towns, but if they are aware of it, perhaps they can mold it so they can keep as much of the good that exists from their town's past and meld it with the good of their future.

But where does this leave Santa Cruz?

Much of what was good from our past is gone but there are isolated fragments that still hang on. We need to cherish those fragments and find ways to incorporate them into the fabric of our evolving economy. We need to find ways to keep them profitable, for things which are profitable are more likely to survive.

How much different would our town be today if the Hihn mansion still existed with a civic center built up around it? Or if the McHugh and Bianchi building were still in place (although I am skeptical it could have survived the quake) ?

What places do we need to preserve and how can we preserve them?

The Emeryville Image Show

2006-05-31T08:00:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I went to the Emeryville Image Show
(http://www.mpmpresents.com/index.html). Collectors of all sorts of images sell there.

I am thinking I might enjoy collecting old images and maybe having a small side business selling them. Much easier to store and ship than camera equipment. I was most taken by the stereoview I saw there. I'll post the few stereo cards I purchased when I get a chance. I didn't find any of Santa Cruz or Alum Rock Park which I was most looking for but I did get a nice stereoview of the first Cliff House and one of Half dome as well as some others.

Here are a few post cards I got there.

I don't know if this is the same pier that is in SC now but it looks to be in close to the same place.

Pacific Avenue in the teens or twenties.

Looking back the other direction on Pacific.

Next is the Cooper House. I would like to find a better picture of the whole thing but this should do for now.
(I really need to get a better blog host. For some reason Blogger wont let me put the text where I want it. Argh.)
Natural Bridges when there were still two bridges. I'm looking for a picture from the other side.

Lighthouse Point before they put in most of the fences.

Big Sur, Big Creek Reserve

2006-05-22T23:27:00.000-07:00

We spent the past weekend camping in Big Sur and walking in the Big Creek Reserve. Normally Big Creek is closed to the public but Saturday was the second annual open house. It looks like this will happen every first Saturday after Mother's day from here on out. I highly recommend it.

Here are a few photos from Big Creek. More are

available at:http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=sh9x23e.9psignei&x=1&y=faf6f3 and http://www.flickr.com/photos/56679160@N00/sets/72057594142901641/

Nina Paley's latest: Sita sings the Blues

2006-05-18T14:28:00.000-07:00

I first fell in love with Nina's work when she did a strip in a local tabloid called: "Nina's Adventures in Santa Cruz". Here is her latest. Pretty wild. Caution: Graphic cartoon violence in the second half. Watch out if you get upset seeing poor little cartoon characters eat it.

http://www.ninapaley.com/2006/05/fakin-it.html

Let Abbey Road Be

2006-05-14T11:31:00.000-07:00

Although I have always been a Beatles fanatic, I have never really realized how much a part of the lives of my generation they have been (even for the people who were not Beatles fans) until recently while I have been enjoying the performances that the White Album Ensemble has been giving of all of the albums the Beatles never performed live.

Last night we went to their performance of "Let Abbey Road Be". The last of those albums at the Rio. It was wonderful as all of these have been.

Sorry for the blurry snapshot but hopefully it gives a little sense of the feeling of the concert.

Ducky Derby

2006-05-01T15:23:00.000-07:00

A great charity event if you have kids.

I was told that originally they floated all these rubber ducks down a section of the San Lorenzo river by the beach but one year a surge pushed them all on shore so they now use this artificial stream in Harvey West.

Garfield Park Library

2006-05-01T15:12:00.000-07:00

The Garfield Park Library is one of a number of public buildings in Santa Cruz designed by William Weeks. I believe the sign said it was built in 1914.

This is exactly what I think a neighborhood library should be. Handsome and inviting from the outside, cozy on the inside. perfectly in scale with the westside "circles" neighborhood.

Under the tree in the lawn there is a plaque that we had never noticed before saying something like: "Stop here and say a prayer for peace." Donated by the local VFW chapter.(!)

Bay Mission Market Gone?

2006-05-01T10:58:00.000-07:00

The Bay Mission Market (at the corner of Bay and Mission of course) has long been a Santa Cruz fixture albeit a funky one. I remember a newspaper article about it when I was a student in the late seventies. The reporter had found products on their shelves from the early sixties containing cyclamates which had been banned 15-20 before.

I have wondered how it has stayed in business so long. the past few years it seems mostly to subsist on alcohol sales from the look of the ads that were in the window.

Walking by it to the bus stop this morning I saw this sign in the window. The insides are pretty much gutted.

I wonder if they are just remodeling, putting it up for lease or turning it into another type of business entirely. It has always seemed to me much too valuable a piece of real estate to let deteriorate the way it has. If it was a real grocery store it would be very convenient for UC students to pop down and buy groceries rather than heading all the way into town. I know there has been a shopper shuttle that goes down to Mission Safeway but this would be an easy straight shot down Bay via bus or car and would also be easier for newbies to find.

Turkeys in Santa Cruz?

2006-05-01T10:39:00.000-07:00

This is the first time I have ever seen a turkey in Santa Cruz. It was wandering aroung the parking spaces for the Chancellor's office at the top of the festival glen. We saw a bunch of wild turkeys up in Clearlake a few weeks ago. I wonder if the extra rain this year is providing more food for them and increasing their population?

Food Bin Way Out

2006-04-27T18:52:00.000-07:00

Food Bin Sign2 4272006

2006-04-27T18:51:00.000-07:00

Food Bin Sign1 4272006

2006-04-27T18:50:00.000-07:00

Sidewalk Signs

2006-04-27T18:43:00.000-07:00

I love this line that I found on the sidewalk on my way home the other day walking up Seaside. There were other chalk drawings on the walkway of one of the houses but this was the only thing on the sidewalk itself and the only one not in white chalk.

Santa Cruz Urban Archaeology Series #1

2006-04-24T13:06:00.000-07:00

Palm Drugs used to be on Mission Street at the end of Palm Street. I don't know if they went under because Longs opened next door to them or before longs went in. The building is now a video store but the paint is starting to peel off the side of the building where the old sign was so you can see the words: "Palm Drugs" underneath. Across the street is the recently remodeled Palm Center looking very spiffy.

Clearlake

2006-04-18T00:37:00.000-07:00

My partner, R. , and I went up to Clearlake last weekend. Here are a few of the (as usual) zillions of pictures I took while we were up there.

Her band was supposed to play at an adoption party up there but it was cancelled because all the rain we have been getting has caused the lake to come up way above its usual level so the pier they were to play on and half the parking lot of the hotel were flooded.

So we got a nice 3 day vacation instead.

This first picture is of "Old Faithful" geyser in Calistoga on the way up there. I always assumed that there was only one "Old Faithful" but apparently it is a classification having to do with the regularity with which they erupt. As well as this one and the one in Yellowstone there is apparently one in New Zealand.

They have various goats, sheep and llamas there too...

Here is a poster of what the geyser looked lik in the 50's
The Buckingham country club in Soda Bay on Clearlake. Rather windy that day. I've always loved weeping willows. We had one in the first house we rented in northern California when I was two. Its branches hung down to the ground and I always wanted to hide under them to play but the older kids told me there were snakes under it. Usually I like ultra sharp photos but even though this one is a little soft from the wind and the gathering dusk, there is something about it that really appeals to me. The movement of the branches, the glowing impressionistic color of the tree and the grass.

We hiked around Clearlake State Park just outside of Soda Bay. As with many places around the lake, the park was rather flooded. Most of the camp sites were closed because they were under water. the Dorn nature trail was very nice with good views of the lake and the general area as well as beautiful details such as these moss covered rocks and various wildflowers.

I love this one with the miner's lettuce growing out of it.

You can see more of these pictures at: http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=sh9x23e.71cn1jey&x=0&y=-vw850o . Click on the button at the bottom right that says: "view photos without logging in" if you don't want to set up an account on Kodak's site. I'll post the rest of the good ones there when I get a chance.

The Cherry Blossoms are Back at McHenry

2006-04-11T13:27:00.000-07:00

The Cherry Blossoms are back.
But sadly some of the trees are gone to make room for the new library addition.

The Food Bin Sign, a Santa Cruz Icon

2006-04-11T12:38:00.000-07:00

The Food Bin and Herb Room are great stores. If you ate vegetarian you could probably buy everything you need from the Food Bin. Open late, 11pm I think. Been here for decades, a real Santa Cruz institution.

Their sign on Mission street is definitely an SC icon. This is not one of their greatest lines but it is representative. I'll put up more as I find them.

Kresge College Memories Part 2

2006-03-17T20:31:00.000-08:00

Here is a flickr set I am starting about Kresge. I'll add more as I go along.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/56679160@N00/sets/72057594084492705/

My first year at Kresge, 77-78, There were still many students seniors and juniors living on campus. The rents were cheap then and because of the low enrollment at UCSC in general, it was easy to get a spot on campus. When I came back in 81 after spending a few year at Foothill College and San Jose State, it was much harder to stay in on-campus housing your whole four years. This, combined with the fact that most of the people who founded Kresge had left and that the campus was involved in a major push to make its image more conservative, meant that there was little continuity and the students who came in later had very little connection to or understnding of the original goals of the college.

I myself had only a hazy understanding of it due to the factors I mentioned in part one of this story. Bateson had left Kresge the year before, only Michael Kahn was left of the prime movers and I think he was a little weary of the experiment.

Santa Cruz and San Jose memories

2006-03-07T22:40:00.000-08:00

My family moved from southern California to San Jose in 1962 when I was 2. I remember reading many years later that the population of San Jose at that time was 60,000. Quite a difference from the millions it is today. I remember looking down from Mount Hamilton sometime around then and seeing mostly trees covering the Santa Clara valley, prune plum trees on the west side of the valley and apricots on the east with a long narrow straight streets such as Alum Rock avenue cutting through them and the Bank of America building sticking up one of the few high spots that rose above the trees.

We would go on summer weekends occasionally to Santa Cruz to go to the beach and the boardwalk. I remember sitting in the shade under the band shell or under the boardwalk when it got too hot or wandering around the castle which was still at castle beach.

The boardwalk at that time had the Giant Dipper and Mad Mouse rollercoasters. I was too young or too short to go on them. I was always curious about what the Mad Mouse was like to ride. It was a cube shaped coaster and the cars did 90 degree turns when they came to the corners of the cube. It was replaced by a rather mild log flume ride before I every got a chance to ride it.

I think I mostly went on rides like the tilt-a-whirl, went in the fun house and played "skee-bowl". The fun house at that time had a giant slide, moving sidewalks, a rolling barrel you could walk through, a large disk that you sat on until centripetal force flung you off, and funhouse mirrors. Apparently the slide was built over what used to be an indoor pool.

I lusted after the big skee-bowl prizes such as the portable TV which took hundreds or thousands of tickets to win. I only ever saved up enough tickets to get the little toy prizes. The only one I remember was a miniature hurricane lamp about 3 inches high. I do wish I still had that one though.

I never got to go on the roller coasters when I was a kid but later on, when I went to college in Santa Cruz, I made it a personal ritual to go on the Giant Dipper about a dozen times in a row after my last final for each quarter.

The castle at castle beach was actually just a regular building made of stucco. Most of the times that we were there it was closed. I don't know what was in the rest of the building but the bottom floor had a snack bar and a recreation room with ping pong tables ad such.

Kresge College UCSC, Memories 1977-78 part 1

2006-03-04T11:50:00.000-08:00

I arrived at Kresge College in early October 1977. The first three or four days of classes it rained almost non-stop. I remember sitting in the Idler cafe (next to the Kresge Town Hall) reading and looking out at the redwoods in the rain.

During our orientation weekend the architect who designed Kresge spoke to our class (this must have been Charles Moore, http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/moorekresge/kresge.html ). [Apparently this was more likely Bill Turnbull, see: http://www.well.com/~abs/Cyb/4.669211660910299067185320382047/c3m_0311.txt for some very interesting commentary on Kresge from the years just before I got there. I just found this link a few days ago.] He said that the original inspiration for Kresge was a small Mediterranean village. The exterior walls were to be covered with wood shingles and the street down the middle was to be cobblestone. there were fountains distributed throughout the college, connected by a small stream that flowed from one end of the school to the other.

But during the construction of the college the Kresge foundation said that it was costing too much money so the shingles and cobblestones were replaced with stucco and asphalt. I don't know if the project was over budget or what but we students always assumed that they were just cheap. This fit into our idea of the Kresge foundation since Kresge is the "K" in Kmart, home of the blue light special.

The fountains were turned off during the water shortage of the early 70s. One or two of them at the bottom of the college have been turned back on from time to time but the one at the top of the college has been removed. It was in the center of the courtyard between the Town Hall and the cafe with wooden benches around it and a wooden cover that could be put over it when it was not in use. It was replaced with a very nice bronze plaque made by Kresge alum and Santa Cruz bronze artist Sean Monaghan (sp?).

The architect said that he had gotten quite a bit of flak for the design of the "suites", one of the three types of apartments at Kresge. the suites originally had 8 bedrooms surrounding a large central bathroom with two toilet stalls, a large shower enclosure with two shower heads and a larger main part of the room with sinks and mirrors.

Since the only other rooms were bedrooms (mostly singles of fairly modest size), the bathrooms ended up being the place the students would congregate. Moore attributed the fact that the bathroom was so huge and central to the fact that he had grown up during the anal retentive 1950s which had somehow subconciously influenced his design.

Two of the single rooms in each of the suites have since been converted to a kitchen and a living room but the bathrooms still end up being natural gathering spots. When I was a student there, one of the key pieces of furniture in the apartments was large foam chairs, basically a 6' cube of foam with a notch cut out of it and tucked in and a cloth cover over it. These were some of the most comfortable chairs I have ever sat in and each one held two people comfortably if they liked cuddling up. In at least on of the suites the students moved these chairs into the bathroom which became a very comfortable place to hang out. The one suite I remember which was set up this was had white sheets coveering the walls with a "light organ" with colored lights which would change in time to the music on their stereo.

The other main piece of furniture were "palasets" (sp?). These were 70's Danish modern plastic cubes about 16" on a side. Some were cupboards with doors, some open shelves. They could be stacked and connected in any combination to make bed frames, desks, etc. I think I made a bed loft of mine and put my desk below it. Oh yes, there were also wooden desks and chairs, some of which I have seen for sale from UC surplus recently for $5 apiece. They were quite nice, well built oak desks that seemed to stand up to anything.

The other two types of apartments were "flats" with two twin rooms , a large living room and a kitchen nook and the "Sextets", multi-level apartments without any walls except for the bathroom. I believe they were called sextets because they held six students but given the culture of Kresge at that time I always imagined it had to do with sexual experimentation. One of my first year roommates said he got an invitation to an orgy in the sextets in his mailbox. He looked in on it and said that it wasn't really very interesting.

The first year that I was at Kresge I lived in R-6, in the top left suite. Later on I was in a suite in R-8 which was called "The Zoo" because the lower level was a long row of rooms with sliding glass doors right on the street so people would always look in as they walked by. . At that time all of the buildings had names. R-9 or 10 was called "bittersuite". R-3 was "the corner of the college" It was specifically designated as an internationally oriented building and a social hub. The sextets were just the sextets. I wish I could remember what the rest of them were. If anyone does, please post.

[Along with the above mentioned link to the article on The Well by Scrivener, I also have just found a number of articles in the Special Collections section of the McHenry library about the early years at Kresge. Apparently I got there in 1977 just as the original experiment of Kresge was in its last throws of dying (or being killed depending on who you ask) several of the main reasons that I went to UCSC had vanished a few years before or were just ending unbeknownst to me. I had often wondered why Kresge and UCSC were so different from the way I thought they would be and am only finding out the more interesting reasons for this right now. ]

Santa Cruz Conference Center

2006-03-03T23:30:00.000-08:00

Last year Santa Cruz decided not to build a conference center out by the wharf amidst rather heated debate about the trade-offs we would make in order to have this presumed money maker. Over the years the residents of Santa Cruz have rejected other money makers because of the ways they would affect the environment and the quality of life here. We have avoided having heavy industry or large developments on the coast.

But there are always trade-offs for everything. If we choose not to have industry here we must either choose to find the money for the public amenities we want elsewhere or do without. In the past I think we have avoided these choices because the cost of living in Santa Cruz was relatively cheap, the California economy was booming and the people who chose to live in Santa Cruz were by and large willing to do withouth certain public services in return for the protection of open space.

Over the past 20 years the population of Santa Cruz has been changing. Many of the people who went to college here chose to stay and have now grown up and are raising families of their own. I believe there are also more people who originally lived over the hill who figure that since the were commuting an hour to work anyway, they might as well raise their families in a beautiful place on the coast. The people who could afford to move here were relatively wealthy and this combined with the number of people already in town who want to buy homes, the landlocked nature of SC and the restrictive nature of our building laws has sent the cost of housing through the roof.

Both of those populations are raising families and so their perceptions of what public services are important is changing. They want to make sure we have the best schools, parks, etc.

In other places like Lafayette and Orinda, the residents have chosen to keep industry out and pay very high local taxes to pay for the services they want. Less wealthy communities make the trade-off and court one industry or another. If the residents of Santa Cruz county choose towards higher local taxes and fees I believe we will even further reduce the diversity of this areaby forcing out even more of the artists and other people of modest income.

But if we do decide to fund the services we want/need by inviting in particular industries, what industries will have the least impact on our environment and our way of life? What blend of industries will be best for the Santa Cruz we want to create for tomorrow?