A different look at theft

I love that I have friends who think out of the box.

Dear Sir or Madam who stole my bicycle wheel -m4m- -m4w- (By Lake Merritt)

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Date: 2009-07-21, 2:25PM PDT

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Dear Sir or Madam who stole my bicycle wheel,
I have a proposal.

For several days after you stole my 27” rear wheel from my mountain bike, you caused me a dilemma. All I could think of were two options.
1) Buy a new rear wheel – This hardly seemed worthwhile because my bike only cost $25 from Goodwill when I got it and a new back wheel/tire will cost two to three times that much.
2) Buy a used wheel from the Ashby Flea market – We all know this is where stolen wheels go to find new homes. (In fact, I have searched here for my wheel to no avail.) While this option is cheap ($10), it would feel like I am benefiting from someone else’s misfortune. (Probably because I would be benefiting from someone else’s misfortune).

But then I had a brilliant idea.

Rather than buying a new wheel or a used wheel stolen from someone else, why don’t you sell me back my own wheel. I can pay you the $10 you would have made and then I can save the time and stress of finding a new wheel. If it makes a difference, I could even pay you in alcohol or whatever drug habit you were trying to feed.

We can even meet on the same corner where you took my wheel and make it feel all natural. You can walk by and say, “Hey buddy, I notice that your bike seems to be missing a rear wheel. Well, it just so happens I have an extra rear wheel right here with me. Would you like it?” And I can say, “You’re right, kind sir. I am missing a rear wheel. That is very nice of you. It just so happens that I have $10 worth of alcohol, that I was going to use drown my sorrow about not having a bicycle wheel. But now that I have a bicycle wheel, I don’t need it. Why don’t you take it.” And then we can both feel good about ourselves.

Please let me know if this works for you.

Sincerely
Josh

• Location: By Lake Merritt
• it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

an article

Bay Area churches opened door to same-sex vows

Matthai Kuruvila, Chronicle Religion Writer

Sunday, June 15, 2008

MIA

I graduated almost a week ago. Since then I toured the Winchester Mystery house, ate at In n Out several times, went to Indian Rock, packed, ate at Fisherman's Wharf, drove up the coast, walked through a Redwood Grove, went wine tasting, hit the beach, toured Alcatraz, went to the horse races, hugged a lot of friends and moved to Texas. Tomorrow I have a job interview in Dallas and if that goes well will begin looking for a new place to live. Thus, I have been MIA online.

the mark of a friend

I now bear a mark of my dear friend, Abigail King Kaiser, for the rest of my life. She designed and gifted it to me today. She stood by me today, through a lot over the last two years and I have no doubt more than we can imagine in the future. This process has started me thinking a lot about commitment and about friendship. I'm not a big one for commitment, as the post office if no one else can tell you w/my fifteen+ addresses in the course of my 27 years. I don't always move far, sometimes within a mile. But, change is something I'm pretty good at. But, alas I've reached a point in life when commitments no longer come in 1, 2 or 4 year blocks. In many ways I couldn't be more excited. I have found some truly amazing forms to work within and develop a career. So, today I made a permanent commitment. An amazing work of art to mark a special friend, a special time of life and 2 images that are sacred to me-the dancer and the seahorse. I have been blessed with some really amazing people in my life and a lot of them in the years here in Berkeley. People that are heading down a similar road as me, personally and professionally. People that will understand when I'm not all about a mushy good-bye, but enjoying our time together now and looking forward to when our journeys join up again. Thanks for being on my journey.

The recorded history of the planet Earth!

"It was a full nine degrees hotter in Oakland than it has ever been on any May 15 in the recorded history of planet Earth, the weather service said." says the SFChronicle. I have been critiqued for writing papers that read like I cut and paste, but this article is a beauty in the area of lack of transitions. Its like it gets a little hot and we are only able to report in one-liners.

A Good Hot Day in California

State Supreme Court says same-sex couples have right to marry
In light of this news being all over town today and the celebration both across the bay and in our own hearts, I want with all my own heart to see the light at the end of this struggle. But what do we see? "Opponents Plot Their Strategy:Critics are confident that California voters will OK a constitutional amendment banning gays and lesbians from marrying." Though our mayor claims that what California does, the nation will follow, all I can do is hope and pray. Mostly I wonder about the infinite number of other issues that the government and tax dollars should be spent on then deciding whether or not people who love each other should be legally recognized as such. (That is not a statement to make light of the importance of equal rights for same-sex couples in any way, I do believe there are wrongs that must now be 'righted') I simply don't understand why the government (or the church for that matter) should have any say in who I am allowed to be in love with in the first place. As a dear friend would say, if we'd all just worry about taking care of ourselves and not so much about other's people's business we'd all be a lot better off. As the newscast I just watched reported, there are $21million of needed sidewalk repair in Oakland b/c people are tripping and falling but only $1million dollar budget to work on the problem. I will claim that it hurts a lot more to trip and fall on the concrete then to live, work and play next to a happily married same-sex couple.

The Art of Finals

I went to get a newspaper this morning because I received an email that I was on the second page today. Weird. I feel divided about this article, because the event was to be about the high school youth and I really would prefer that they have gotten the recognition and their pictures in the paper. We've been going to Berkeley Tech High School once a week for about two months. Talking to students and creating a project to do together. It was decided to have a memorial for their friends/family that have died by acts of violence. We decided that for our portion (as grad students) to paint five chairs each to commemorate contemporary Saints and Prophets. My dear friend and classmate, Abby, blogged about the event with images of her chairs too. Go to Facebook for more pictures.

The full article in the Oakland Tribune can be found here.

The other chairs I created are:

Frida Kahlo:

Cesar Chavez:

Oscar Romero:

Youth Violence:

and as seen in the newspaper, Matthew Shepard:

Gender Segregation

I sat in Starbucks (I know, why not the local coffee house? Well, Mom keeps sending me gift cards and I have no money, so if I am to consume caffeine on the weekend, then this is my option. And I'm honestly grateful for the gift cards.) So I sat in Starbucks for four hours today doing homework. I was surprising productive as there were no dishes to clean, internet to check, other books to read, people down the hall to talk to, etc. So, why am I writing about this seemingly plain day in capitalist mecca? I was seated at a table near the bathrooms. Two single unit restrooms, one marked women, the other men. I was intrigued to see how many people, regardless of age, were happy to use the 'other' gender's bathroom if theirs was occupied. Some immediately chose this option, others waited and either upon boredom or dire need (I didn't ask) went for the other door. I was pleased to see so much of my community willing to disregard basically pointless signage. I have to assume both stalls were the same (the women's was free when I needed to go and I settled to follow the arbitrary directions) because whoever went in, exited, apparently having taken care of their needs. So, I wonder why are the stalls even gender segregated? Is this just a hold over from the way its always been done? Is it a Berkeley anomaly for people to so freely use either bathroom?