1. If you vehemently believe that the rest of the world hates you and is out to screw you over, than the converse is probably true, in reality.

2. The negative traits you notice most vocally in other people, and with the most particular revulsion, are most likely the ones that you exhibit yourself.

3. The Pixies get better the louder they are played. If there was a stereo that could be infinitely loud, than they would approach infinite awesomeness.

The arbitrary post-a-day quota I’ve imposed upon myself leads to some odd self-judgement. If I don’t step outside of routine task-solving or blank consumption within a given 24 hours, does this mean that I have failed? If I don’t extrapolate my morning oatmeal or evening ice-cream into a judgement on the human condition, should I feel guilty?

It reminds me of a subway ad I used to see all the time for a school of “applied philosophy.” It seemed to imply that there is a lesson-planned way of escaping what it called “habitual existence.” As opposed to “occasional existence?” I do like the idea that through philosophy I might be able to escape existing altogether, but I’m not sure that’s what they meant. In any case, if I go a day without introspection, I’m going to feel guilty, but I probably shouldn’t. Case in point.

W. 110th Street, Leawood, KS: Wooden Slats with nylon ropes, blue and white striped upholstered valence, double-hung, view of the driveway.

Jones College, Rice University, Houston: blue-tinted film over single-pane, overlooking courtyard under construction.

W 119th Street, Leawood KS: Some odd plastic/fabric hybrid shade, milky white, blocking a golf course.

North Blvd, Houston: Homemade muslin curtains, tea-dyed with tiny brown spots, vinyl with snap-in muntins, parking lot beyond.

37a Bedford, NY: none. flaking overpainted wooden frame with fan. brick courtyard.

Rue Taylor, Paris: fraying yellowed gauzy grandma-drapes, ancient full-height windows, third floor, rainsoaked asphalt.

Beethoven Street, Los Angeles: vertical blinds hidden by gold drapes with a red pattern that is sometimes flower shapes, sometimes intersecting circles. guava and limes, ferns and flowers and chainlink beyond.

First off, Katy needed a quick portrait taken today, and I think I did a fabulous job:

Afterwards, we went to our new favorite beach, where Katy took this picture. Yes, our favorite beach is at the end of the LAX runway. Planes take off at predictable intervals: 2 1/2 minutes when it’s not busy and around every 20 seconds when it is. Due to the magnetic effect of Manhattan and Venice Beaches (and the near-constant rumble), this little stretch gets very few visits, and that suits me just fine. Jetwash and wave action make a remarkably meditative sound combination, and watching steel float is sublime in a complementary way to endless saltwater and powdered seashell. Add in the distantly visible power plant, and a parade of barges and sailboats, and this it’s like being in the jaws of some industrial recreative machine.

The White Album (esp. Back in the USSR) = my parent’s old basement, with Mexican tile that was cool to the touch with rough grouting that tore at your feet.

Mid-Period REM = the upper half of my white laminate stereo cabinet in my old house. Acrid smell. Middle School.

Soul Coughing = My high school Volvo. At night.

First two Modest Mouse albums = my freshman year dorm’s lofted bed.

Gang of Four = KTRU. 2am. Looking out the tiny window while eating a granola bar.

Allman Brothers = Katy’s car, long road trips in the Western U.S.

Any This American Life Episode = any delicate model work involving tweezers. Overcaffeination.

Belle and Sebastien = See above

Built To Spill, Perfect from Now On = Dodge Neon, pine forest smell, windows open.

Neutral Milk Hotel = sublet apartment in Houston, neighbor would play Two Headed Boy at 2am on the piano and trumpet.

Johnny Cash = pretty much anywhere post-freshman year of college.

Velvet Underground = NYC (obvious but true)

Otis Redding = the kitchen in my current home.

I could go on but I think you get the point.

So I’ve eaten my cake, had my song, and now the next day it’s time to reflect, right? My own personal New Year. I’m supposed to start paddling to Sweden. So to speak.

For this one I’m taking a raincheck. This year, aging is a constant process with no milestones. One cannot celebrate the incremental. One can only enjoy it.

Like most people that aren’t angling for a dictatorship or corner office (or both, as I suppose the former would provide the latter), my first reaction to learning a person’s age is to compare my position in life to theirs. Thus, when I discover that White Teeth was published when Zadie Smith when she was 25, brief existential panic ensues, but when I find out that Ira Glass was born in 1959 I calm back down. I sometimes think that I chose my profession because early fame is nearly nonexistent; architects are like novelists, “young” until 40. Actually, I prefer to think of architects as more like ninjas– plenty of young hotshots, but nobody can beat the sensei (at least not without a long backstory and a longer showdown). And, many of us are bald, and we wear lots of black.

My new book on infrastructure tells an easy way to discern between AC and DC high power lines:

“DC transmission lines sound quite different from AC ones. They click and crackle rather than buzz; the DC line sounds just like a Geiger counter. And when you walk under the conductors, the pace of the clicking accelerates, as if you were radioactive.”

Forget cancer, or sterility, or even the pervasive hum. Our grid is watching us.

So, if old novels and movies are to be trusted, in the time of our greatest generation people only drank two things: whisky and black coffee. I unfortunately can’t remember back to a time when my psyche hadn’t been aquafina’d— after fuzzy mornings, sore throats and headaches, and more than a few hangovers that combined all three, any ailment that strikes must first be treated through an immediate water infusion. It’s the modern equivalent of swinging a dead cat or butchering a goat over the local shrine. Beer and coffee are bad primarily for their water-depletion effects, not for any kind of liver damage or addictive qualities they might contain. I don’t even drink any more. I hydrate. I have special containers that are not cups for storing water to drink, at work.

I feel that I am not alone in this. But if our grandparents got such a great collective nickname only drinking things that were brown and damaging, what are we achieving through a proper ion balance? Better skin?

There isn’t really a good way of ending this post without an apology (of course water is good for you) or an absurdity (going on a diet that consists solely of hydrogenated oils thickened with refined sugar.) So I’m just going to fade out, imbibing equal quantities of my liquid trifecta: coffee, whiskey, and water. With any luck I’ll look just like Walter Cronkite in a few years.

Our house, like many in Southern California, features a gas floor heater. It’s a metal box of flame that heats and draws air in from beneath the house. At full blast it creates a small, hot, dry wind in the hallway outside of our bedroom.

Unlike a forced-air system, there is no return. Our heater is gently pressurizing our home, pushing warm gusts out the cracks around our windows and doors and making the water boil a tiny bit faster. A microclimate, complete with artificial light and sound, as our house hurtles through the cold silent dark.