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The increasingly inaccurately-named blog of journalist and futurist Chris Taylor. Either the most sporadically brilliant amateur blog, the most brilliantly amateur sporadic blog, or the most amateur sporadic brilliance on the Web since 2001.
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Daily Blah FAQ
Who are you?
I'm the newly-appointed Future editor at Business 2.0 and the former San Francisco correspondent for Time Magazine.
Wow, so does this mean everything you write reflects Time Inc's opinion? Or do you perhaps have some sort of standard disclaimer to the effect that it doesn't?
Naturally, the opinions contained in this blog are not those of my employers. In fact, some opinions may be the polar opposite of my employers. Some may be the same, for all I know. Hey, it's not like I ask my employers their opinions about everything in the news, okay? Let's just say that if this were a Venn diagram with one circle marked "my opinions" and the other one marked "my employers' opinions", there would doubtless be some overlap. But neither I nor my employers are able to pinpoint exactly where that overlap is.
What is this Daily Blah thing?
An experiment for a column I wrote about blogging back in December 2001. All these years later, I haven't been able to kick the habit.
Do you write any other blogs, by chance? Could that have something to do with the fact that Daily Blah isn't always Daily?
Yes -- the Future Boy blog for Business 2.0. And yes. If you want true, editorially-mandated daily coverage from me, that's probably the best place to look.
Mister, you talk funny. Are you one of them furrners?
Why yes I am, as it happens. I was born, raised and educated in Great Britain. I've been living in the U.S. since 1996 and identify as British.
I say, old chap, you forgot the "u" in "colour."
No I didn't. I may identify as British, but I am also an American journalist writing for an American audience about mostly American issues. These two different sides of me are a constant source of tension. Nevertheless, Daily Blah will adhere to American English grammar and spelling.
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Daily Blah for... Friday, August 12, 2005
Hymn to the 1 California
What is the hardest thing to get used to when working in an office for the first time in five years? Not the workplace itself, which is very cushy (I have my own office, three computers and a view of the Bay). Not the people, whom I adore -- a merry band of smart, sardonic rebels who bring out my own inner smart sardonic rebel. Not the hours -- I don't need to be in before 10am most days. Not the pace, which at a monthly magazine is about four times more chill than that of a weekly like Time, which in turn is five times more relaxed than a daily newspaper. The hardest thing? Say it with me now: it's the commute, stupid.
I didn't think it was going to be such a problem. Then again, before last week, I'd never taken the 1 California. On paper, it seemed ideal. At its downtown end, California is one of the most romantic and well-photographed streets of San Francisco. You pass sweeping hills, trundling cable cars, world-famous hotels and Grace Cathedral. My new workplace is at the very end of California street, and my new house is one block from California street. Thus I would be taking the 1 California to One California, which is a direction even my pre-caffeinated brain can really get to grips with. I'd be leaving the fog belt and entering the sunshine every day, which is as good an incentive as any to go to work. I pictured a speedy steed full (but not too full) of spiffy-looking worker bees who could barely contain their smiles as the sun approached and maybe, just maybe, would break out in song.
At the climax of Lucky Jim, in one of the funniest scenes in literature, Kingsley Amis' hero has a matter of minutes to get to the train station and stop his girlfriend leaving for London -- and he ends up on history's slowest bus. The driver's dawdling behavior and the meditative shuffle of the old dears who amble aboard are described in excruciating detail. I've no idea if he ever visited San Francisco, but the elder Amis could have had no better inspiration than the 1 California.
By the time I get on, the bus is already filled to the brim with the creakiest and crankiest-looking Asian seniors I've ever seen. It makes me want to play Pulp's "Help the Aged" on the iPod every time I board. The morning voyage generally follows this pattern:
1) An interminably long stop while the mechanical steps lower and yet more seniors take tentative steps on or off, as if trying to decide which location suits them better. Oak trees have been known to take root faster. Then, just when the 1 California has lulled you into thinking it is a roadside retirement home rather than a vehicle ...
2) There is a sudden and dramatic lurch. Open containers of liquid go flying. Heads press against the back window. This, you think, is what it must be like to be aboard the Space Shuttle at launch. We must really be going someplace. The queasiness of my flattened stomach will be worth it, because I shall be dispatched to my destination in next to no time. Alas ...
3) Ten seconds later, on the next block, there is an equally dramatic deceleration. The whole sardine can of seniors slides forward, then has to shuffle back from the entrance as we start over again at 1).
Eventually comes the final wound -- just as the bus gets close to the really nice downtown bit of California, it takes a detour. Of course! There are too many lanes to the street at this stage; we're in danger of an on-time arrival. Instead, we take a gentle inch-by-inch tour of the most narrow streets of Chinatown, taking great pains not to scare the pigeons.
In iPod time (which, I'm now convinced, is the best measure for travel) the whole morning commute takes ten songs. Ten songs! I can get from here to San Jose in ten songs. The one day this week I drove and paid exorbitant downtown parking fees, it took three songs.
The other option, apart from slowly going insane, is to get out the door at a shockingly early 8am, take the last 1 California Express (which claims to take about four songs), go directly to the swanky downtown Equinox gym I joined yesterday, and start my day feeling really trim and virtuous.
Then again, is insanity really that bad an option?
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