Category: bikes

11/04/13 01:18 - ID#58244

Help Buffalo Bike

So Buffalo is now a bronze level biking city, according to the League of American Cyclists (only took 17 years after our first Bike Plan in 1997 and 6 years after the most recent in 2008).

Although there's still a long way to go before we're really a bike-friendly city, I definitely notice an improvement in infrastructure and culture in the past few years. The most recent Census data says we have the 14th largest share of bike commuters in the country, and we've seen an 88.6% increase in bike commuters from 2011-2012 .

Unfortunately there are still too many bike and pedestrian accidents and not enough good infrastructure (43 deaths for Erie county in 2012). There aren't many east-west bike lanes in the city, and almost no lanes at all north of Delaware Park. There are too many roads still being constructed and reconstructed with only cars in mind, despite a completes streets law for the city and the state.

Some of this can be changed relatively soon! This week there is a chance for the public to air comments on the reconstruction of the 198/Scajacuada. The NYS Department of Transportation wants to essentially reconstruct it as is, instead of turning it into a connected, bike and pedestrian friendly boulevard that there should be. There will be a meeting at Olmsted School 67 at 7:15 on Tuesday for input on how this can be changed.

There is also currently an effort to put Parkside Avenue on a road diet, down from four lanes to two and a turning lane plus some bike lanes. This Wednesday at 5 will be a "park and bike-in" at Parkside and Russell.

Parkside Neighborhood residents and supporters are organizing a day of action, calling for motorists to park their cars on Parkside and join bicyclists and pedestrians to show support for safer streets and come to Sweetness 7 Café to sign a petition demanding that the city put Parkside on a Road Diet (taking out traffic lanes, adding turning lanes & bike lanes)."

These two projects would fit perfectly together and definitely help link more parts of the city together for bikes.

Permalink: Help_Buffalo_Bike.html
Words: 345
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/04/13 01:21

Category: drinking

11/03/13 09:47 - ID#58241

pink yo drank

(e:lilho) you need to drop your single soon. chambord will license the hell out of that

maybe one day Paul will be pinked.

Permalink: pink_yo_drank.html
Words: 27
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/04/13 07:42

Category: programming

11/03/13 09:21 - ID#58238

arduino nerdiness

so (e:Paul) got a few arduinos and a raspberry pi for his work projects. If you hadn't seen them before, they're basically small, embedded all-in-one computers that are designed to be low-power and expandable. The Arduino can only run compliled programs under 32k using very little pwoer, while the raspberry pi can run a full fleged version of Linux with expandable storage, using slightly more power.

Over the past couple of weeks, we've been playing around with them to get used to them and test out their capabilities. We were able to rig up an Arduino Uno to respond to a button press, and post a test post to the estrip website. The programming logic itself was pretty basic, but I am not experienced in web stuff and it took a lot to learn how to craft a good POST header. Paul definitely did though and we were able to work through it. I love nerding out with him, he knows so much.

I can see for larger projects working on the arduino might be frustrating because the storage is so limited, and there aren't tons of libraries available because of it. Also, doing anything object oriented is a pain because you have to go through all these steps to make every new class a library. The Arduino IDE isn't too great either. It's basically a text editor with no other features although you can use an external IDE like Netbeans or Eclipse if you set it up right. But for super simple projects like sensors or little displays, I can see a good use case.

Kind of looks dangerous...

I want to start playing with the raspberry pi and maybe some other sensors to see what projects we can do with some more power.

Permalink: arduino_nerdiness.html
Words: 297
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/03/13 09:37

Category: halloween

11/02/13 11:19 - ID#58233

holla-ween pics

pic dumppp

Permalink: holla_ween_pics.html
Words: 22
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/02/13 11:20

Category: halloween

11/02/13 11:06 - ID#58232

dbgb halloween

on Wednesday, (e:Paul), (e:terry), (e:xandra), the infamous (e:lilho) (who I met that night), went out to dbgb's for the "we're taking plowed" Halloween party. The music was kind of lame but the night was pretty fun.

I went as a slutty farmer to go along with the slutty nerd, and the gay nerd.

Permalink: dbgb_halloween.html
Words: 62
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/02/13 11:06

Category: programming

11/02/13 05:17 - ID#58229

Hello World from the Arduino

This is being posted from the Arduinooo, (e:Paul) is awesome!

Permalink: Hello_World_from_the_Arduino.html
Words: 11
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 11/02/13 05:17

Category: drugs

10/29/13 12:02 - ID#58203

NyQuiling

It hits you hard after a long day.

Permalink: NyQuiling.html
Words: 9
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 10/29/13 12:02

Category: politics

10/28/13 11:40 - ID#58202

Delaware North Extortion

So Delaware North and Uniland want to knock down the serviceable and occupied Delaware Court building at Delaware and Chippewa to build a new headquarters/hotel. I could almost understand this being done with completely private money, even though I sympathize with the preservation argument. There are plenty of vacant lots even a block or two away that I'm sure Uniland could leverage a good deal out of.

(Although I still don't understand why the collapsed Erie Fright House was rejected by the preservation board to be relocated for condos - it's now being left to rot with no further use. Did developer Savarino not grease the right palms on the preservation board?)

But now Delaware North is demanding tax breaks to fill a $10 million dollar gap in the project budget, plus Uniland is looking for $5 million more from the Empire State Development Corporation. Allegedly, they need a new HQ here otherwise they'll head to their Boston or California offices - because I'm sure they'll save so much in operating costs by moving there. So they need $10 million for a *potential* of 65 new jobs? Oh, and we'll have a half vacant Key Center to go along with an empty HSBC Tower (also being emptied by subsidies - . Why should we pay to shuffle the deck between offices? What does anyone gain out of this, besides the developers that get picked as winners?

This is corporate extortion, and I'm absolutely sick of it. Every company seems to play this game now, because no politician wants to even think of having a company HQ leave on their watch.

I call any claims of job growth and relocation a bluff. If you need to look to nearby examples, this happened in Ohio with American Greetings getting $93.5 million for a new headquarters, before laying off 300 workers. Same thing with Diebold and their $55 million Ohio tax break.

Permalink: Delaware_North_Extortion.html
Words: 312
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 10/28/13 11:43

Category: partt

10/28/13 12:45 - ID#58197

Strange Party

While we were at craving on Friday, (e:Paul) got a text from a number he didn't know inviting him to a Halloween party that night. he managed to get more details about the party and we invited (e:Mike) and (e:libertad) along in case we were about to get murdered.

We got home and quickly threw together costumes from whatever we could find in the closet. Terry was a farmer, Paul was a costume box slash Indian bling bear, and apparently I was the green lantern in an skanky-tight costume.

Next we met up at Mike and Dave's since they lived right around the block from the party. It was sort of awkward at first because we still had no idea who Paul allegedly knew there, until he came to the party after us. It turned out to be someone we met months ago at sky bar for Mike's bday. A

Actually it still was awkward after that but there was tons of booze and delicious pudding shots, which is all you need, right?.

First attempt at a costume before Paul decided it was too cold

Peacock Mike and the bling bear

Hegla and the farmer

Helga, the farmer and our connection to this party

Helga Pataki and me, uh uh

Permalink: Strange_Party.html
Words: 220
Location: Buffalo, NY
Last Modified: 10/28/13 12:53

Category: food

10/28/13 12:36 - ID#58196

Restaurant Week at Craving

Friday night after helping (e:paul) prime the bathroom a little, paul, (e:terry) and I headed out to restaurant week at Craving. I got the handkerchief pasta, which was arugula pesto, asparagus, mushroom and Parmesan, and house salad with fried polenta.

Everything was amazing but definitely on the greasy side. That's okay since I was super hungry. It was way more than I like to spend at $20.13 for restaurant week, but I guess getting the salad and pasta individually would have been way more than that normally.