September, 18, 2005 archives

today i took pictures along main street in downtown los angeles to complete my trilogy of historic core photo sets.

i like this shot of the caltrans building because it shows both the best and worst of the building — the giant “100” street number is really striking, and the parking entrance and concrete face at street level is representative of the completely lame relationship the building has to two-thirds of the street around it.

if you pay close attention, you will notice that there is a gap of about half a block on the east side of main street between fifth and sixth streets. it’s a parking lot, but it is also a popular area for people to loiter about. i had a couple of people yelling at me as i was taking the pictures of the buildings leading up to that area, and a guy who came across the street to tell me i couldn’t take pictures because it was an invasion of privacy. (which is pretty laughable, but i figured there was little point in antagonizing anyone further.)

by the time i got back to that area to shoot the other side of the street, a couple of los angeles police department officers had come along to roust everyone who was loitering there.

it will be interesting to see what happens to that little half-block area in the next year. the santa fe lofts, pacific electric lofts, and more developments are all less than a block from there, and it sounds like there is some development planned around fifth and main, too. (maybe in this interesting little building?)

you can’t tell from the mockups of the lapd parking structure where it is going. judging by the map in the notice of preparation of draft environmental impact report for the police headquarters facility plan, it will fill these three lots (oops: four or five). i’m not sure what the plans for this empty lot are, but it doesn’t appear to be part of the parking structure and maintenance bay.

a clash of kings by george r.r. martin is much like a game of thrones was, with an intercut story of court intrigue. i think it suffers a bit from middle-novel syndrome: it doesn’t really doesn’t have many complete stories of its own. but it is a good middle novel — it pushes forward on all the major plots in the series so far, does a good job of backfilling more of the backstory and details about the world, and introduces some interesting new characters and twists.

it is even more graphic than the first novel. so for novels that feature a lot of younger characters, it’s not entirely suitable for younger readers. a previous reader had helpfully underlined a couple of salacious bits in the library’s copy of the book.

doc searls has sometimes explained how he blogs as just answering emails in public.

it has come up in some recent conversations with people i know that they keep up with what i’m up to by reading this site. (which, it frightens me to say, is probably pretty effective. there’s not much that goes on behind the curtains here.)

in conversation, i ask few questions and give short answers. i wonder if blogging has become a sort of conversational crutch for me. by blogging about something, i don’t have to talk about it.

or maybe by blogging about something, i figure out a good answer for the questions that nobody needs to ask because they’ve already read the answer.