Announcing the 10th Pecha Kucha night in Providence! (And the first PK night of 2010.)

The theme, courtesy of Shae Ramirez, is: nothing is impossible.

Pecha Kucha is a monthly format for sharing ideas, in which presenters are allotted 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide. Put simply: 6 minutes and 40 seconds of adult-style show & tell. It began in Tokyo in 2003, has since spread to 256 cities worldwide, and it landed in Providence this past March.

***Doors open at 19:20, presentations start at 20:20, and shmoozing goes down throughout.***

Blue State’s new Thursday lecture series starts tomorrow (competing with transit advocates’ celebration of the new funding RIPTA is going to get), returns next week, competing with Green Drinks, and will continue to conflict with other environmentally-concerned happenings all summer long. Seriously, environmentalists, we’ve talked about this before: Pull it together already and stop holding all of your events on Thursday evenings!

(Beth — what’s “Latte” supposed to be a hokey homophone for? “Lotta?”) The speakers are all wonderful, and you get free coffee:

We are proud to announce the “A Latte Green Lecture Series” at 300 Thayer Street in Providence. Starting Thursday 7.8.09, this exciting series has some of the best environmental minds in the state talking about the work they are doing in their respective fields. Lectures will start at 7:30PM with a discussion to follow. We are running a buy one- get one free brewed drink special for these lectures so bring a friend!

Thanks,

-Alex Payson

A LATTE GREEN Lecture Schedule
Join Us Thursdays 7:30 to 8:30pm. At 300 Thayer Street, Providence, RI

July 9th SAVE THE BAY

· Jonathan Stone- Executive Director will be speaking on the future of the Bay, environmental challenges, and Save the Bay’s evolving mission.

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Yes, they still exist. But I think it’s only a matter of time. I will try to be brief and fair regarding my recent phone problem. My phone first went out on Tuesday July 2nd, but I didn’t think to act on it because the message callers were getting was “. . . phone service is out in the area” which was not at all true, unless by ‘area’ they meant ‘couch’. So that message was not helpful. I finally caught on and went to register the problem at the Cox website to arrange a service appointment which you can not do.

So I blogged about how annoying that was and was contacted shortly via email by the public relations director. But most people don’t have blogs so that’s not fair. The technician came 90 minutes later than promised of course, but — attention efficiency coordinator — every time he had to call his office, he had to wait through the long recorded message! How many times a day does he have to hear about the new Will Ferrell movie on Starz? Ultimately the line was restored (Monday July 6th) and the public relations director emailed to apologize for my inconvenience and said a few movie vouchers would be in the mail for my troubles.

Okaaaay, but I had to make one more call today to get my next bill adjusted down for the loss of service — why didn’t you take care of that? (Having said that, that call was quick and painless. Give Christine a raise.) So, to the Cox Retention Coordinator, you have some work to do. There’s real competition now.

The second edition of Providence Pecha Kucha arrives tomorrow:

Announcing the 2nd Pecha Kucha night in Providence! April 22nd is Earth Day. The theme (fittingly) is green, and the venue (also fittingly) is the sustainably designed 28 Wolcott Space. Shmoozing at 7p, presentations at 8p, and shmoozing throughout.

And what the hell is this all about?

Each presenter is allowed 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds each - giving 6 minutes 40 seconds of fame before the next presenter is up. This keeps presentations concise, the interest level up, and gives more people the chance to show.

Bitching about Rhode Island drivers is nothing new. If I let every infraction bother me, I’d have higher blood pressure than a bomb defuser with chronic hiccups. But the blocking of intersections digs at me. Yes, I get that you should be able to drive when your light is green. Unfortunately, that’s not always possible. I too wish Ye Olde Providence’s civil engineers and urban planners had the foresight to avoid intersections 20 yards apart, but we gotta work with what we have. So how do so many Rhode Islanders (this goes for all ages, genders, commercial vehicles, school and city buses, state plates, civilians and police alike) fail to realize, when the cars ahead of them aren’t moving, that pulling into the intersection will only block all crossways traffic once their light quickly and inevitably turns red?

I’m one of those aggravating jackasses that won’t drive through a green light if there’s nowhere to go. I’ve been in the other people’s shoes too often, waiting for a green light only to be unable to go anywhere because my path is blocked. Judging from the leaning on horns and screaming of obscenities, my refusing to drive into the most clogged of intersections is inexcusable behavior. Fine, I’m a bitch. But I’m a damn sight better than the guy in the baby blue pickup piled high with unsecured construction debris who, when I wouldn’t enter a non-moving intersection this morning, forced oncoming traffic off the road so he could pass me on the left, drive through a now-red light, and securely block the path of the people on the cross street—all while holding the quintessential cup of Dunk in one hand and a cell phone in the other. I’m sure he’s someone’s hero, though.

*OK, the title is a copout. So is using the Dose to vent. I promise the editors I won’t make a habit of it.

Citing as inspiration the ravings of aggrieved hedge fund veep, tv “journalist,” and self-proclaimed everyman Rick Santelli, a bunch of Republico-”populist” types are going to be rallying at the State House on Tax Day.

These jokers are claiming the mantle of the silent majority, as they oppose a stimulus plan that a large majority of Americans supported.  As Pat points out, these guys surely would have been Torries circa the late 1700s. We’d add that it’s hard to cry taxation without representation if your board of directors includes the governor’s wife.

The people of Portland aren’t really paying attention to the inauguration, because their dreamy new mayor admitted to having sex with an eighteen-year old in 2005.  That’s right, a fully consenting adult male agreed to have sex with another fully consenting adult male four years ago (!!!!), and now people are calling for the mayor to be kicked out of office because Sam Adams (the mayor) didn’t want the whole world to know who he was sleeping with.

I’m opposed to people leaving office because they cheat on their spouses, and I’m opposed to people leaving office because they’re secretly gay, but since Adams is openly gay and not married then what the hell is the big deal, people?

The crazies are already coming out of the woodwork on this one.  In the Oregonian, Tom Kilian writes:

Adams is a predator, a manipulator, a con artist and a liar. How do we know the boy wasn’t 17 when the relationship started and then it becomes a criminal matter?

Here’s hoping that Adams stays in office for more than three weeks, and that people can finally get over the fact that the sex lives of their elected officials are not any of their damn business.

Sure, there was some mention of a shiny ball dropping a few miles away, but the real story last night was the ‘mericans* and The Figgs ringing in the new year in Brooklyn, NY.  The Trash Bar (named for the trash can displayed at the front of the stage?) featured a friendly bear of a bouncer, old license plates, free tater tots, a G. W. Bush action figure, and comfy plush carseats.  Live music was in the back room, accessed through a little tunnel sort of like the one at the Paradise, except instead of glowing blacklights you got sketchy peep-show curtains.  Since the tunnel was dark, you just followed the sound. When your teeth vibrated, you knew you’d arrived.  (More after the jump, plus additional photos in side blog.) more »

Now that the holidays are over and the weather is frightful, or at least blah, I’m reading again.  And it was hard not to pick up a book tagged, “What did Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and my sister have in common? They were all my friends, and they died” paired with the synopsis, “This story of death, life, love, and rock & roll defies genre conventions while paying tribute to the classic time travel tales that came before it.”

Jacob LaCivita’s Timely Persuasion takes “Quantum Leap” one step further.  Its protagonist’s wild ride to save his sister’s life without ruining everything references things most Dosers will like: the importance of libraries; Britpop; sci fi; movies like Being John Malkovich and Wayne’s World; a Nirvana concert at Fitchburg State University I attended in high school; and of course what all Rhode Islanders love best: local mentions of Providence, including a specific show or two at Lupo’s.  What’s not to love?
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A brief acknowledgment thereof, in honor of our psychotic and numbers-obsessed friend Howard, who’s in a room somewhere with 10 other people, eating 11 donuts, reading the Treaty of Versailles right about now…

Per my post below, for those of you who watch less basic cable than I do: