Housing dysfunction

So California SB50 is dead.  (Text of SB-50 Planning and zoning: housing development: incentives)

Housing is a third rail for California politicians and we have the dysfunctional housing market to prove it.

The issue is so divisive, that Russian disinformation campaigns are being developed to divide and paralyze us.  See this thread:

Don't be a hot head.  Think rationally.

Where are all the workers going to live?  Elsewhere is not an acceptable answer.

Workers of all income levels should be able to live close to their jobs.

This saves workers time that they can spend on themselves and their families.

This fosters resilience in the face of disasters.  If awful things happen, they can still get to their jobs or home to their families.

This reduces air pollution caused by commuters.

This reduces traffic congestion caused by commuters.

This reduces the urban heat island effect because cars and road surfaces are a major contributor to localized heating.

When people use active transportation (walking and bicycling), their health improves.  This saves our whole society health care costs.

If parents work near their children's schools, they can be more involved, which improves educational outcomes for all.

I can go on and on.

WE NEED TO BUILD MORE HOUSING NEAR EXISTING JOB CENTERS.

It is not fair or just to keep cramming more apartments in already-dense minority neighborhoods while other areas near jobs are zoned only for single family homes.

BTW, SB50 was killed by CA State Senator Anthony Portantino, a Democrat from La Canada Flintridge and chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

You may know La Canada Flintridge (LCF) as the home of Jet Propulsion Laboratory, but did you know that it is so expensive, that practically none of the scientists and engineers that work there can afford to live there?

Did you know that Senator Portantino's constituents emit about twice as much CO2 as residents in the dense core of Los Angeles?  Check out the CoolClimate Maps for the US and zoom in for Los Angeles.

A main reason why they are so wasteful is because of the low density and high cost creates a mismatch between jobs and housing.  Thus, everyone has to drive long distances into and out of LCF.  The Density Map makes this nauseatingly clear.

Now that I got this off my chest, I am off to bed. 

Play with the Density Map.  It's a fantastically information-rich data visualizer.

The CoolClimate Maps are also cool, but their maps have more modeling assumptions.  Those are just best-guess averages based upon average consumption based on geographical data and income.  They are generally true, but not gospel.

Play with them in conjunction with the Racial Dot Map of the US.

If you are not mad after you explore the data in these three maps, I don't know how to get through to you.

Gender wars of household chores

How did I miss The gender wars of household chores: a feminist comic.  It was published in the Guardian back in May!

In case you are wondering, Emma hits close to home x2.

2016 in books

2016 has been a rough year for me.  I really didn't know how to respond.  But, I recently read a book that helped me make sense of what I was observing.

So, I'm gathering my friends and family around me by throwing a party tonight for LA-area friends.  I need to get back to picking up clutter and cooking.

I'll quickly share my eclectic 2016 reading list on Goodreads.  I read to learn; I read to connect to other humans; I read for entertainment; I listen to audiobooks to help me fall asleep.

My thoughts about the book, What is Populism, by Jan-Werner Mueller:

This is a short book and should have been readable in one evening had the last election not freaked me out so much.

I had to put it down when too discomfited by PTSD from all the rhetoric that reminded me of living under Chang Kai Shek and martial law.

Even my 6 yo self could recognize the lies in our textbooks. I never expected to live in a post-truth United States.

Chapter 1 describes 'What is populism.' This is the scariest part for me, which brought up PTSD.

Chapter 2 explains 'How populists rule.' This scares me.

Chapter 3 gives some proscriptions for how to fight populists, from a scholar who has studied how populism waxes and wanes in regimes around the world. It gives me hope b/c some countries have defeated populists. But it is difficult as they change rules as soon as they are in charge to make it difficult. E.g. North Carolina voting changes and the Supreme Court that ruled that Lily Ledbetter couldn't file for discrimination because she didn't do so within 6 months of the wrong-doing, even while ruling her employers can withhold information and stall requests for info as long as they like. This is populism.

It's a difficult book, because of the emotional stuff. The language may be difficult for people who aren't used to academic treatises. But this book is essential reading for our times.

Bad Dad's thoughts on the same book:

With the election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States of America, What is Populism? is officially promoted from useful reading to essential reading. Jan-Werner Muller first defines populism both in terms of what it is and isn't - the defining feature of populism being a claim to represent a "real" citizenry that excludes elites and/or minorities. Another important feature is a derisive attitude towards the give and take of the political process and a rejection of the entire idea of political pluralism.

Then comes the scary part of this monograph, where Muller describes how populists rule. Populists start by controlling and purging the government bureaucracy (note the Trump transition team's requests for names of DOE climate scientists and State Department personnel working on women's rights issues). After decrying the corruption of the previous regime, populists are incredibly tolerant of their own corruption and don't seem to care when this corruption is pointed out (sound familiar?). Finally, populists change the rules of government so that their party is difficult to remove and their policies are difficult to change (are events in North Carolina a sign of what is to come in Washington?).

The third chapter is about how to talk to populists, and explains how those who want to protect political liberalism need to address the very real concerns that are causing populist movements to flourish. Many, including me, will feel that they are reading this chapter a bit late in the game.

Muller's monograph is very well researched, and has numerous examples from populist movements of both left and right (including countries such as Venezuela, Bolivia, Hungary, Poland, Russia and Turkey). Although its tone is very academic, the intelligent layperson should have no problem with this book - unless it totally freaks him or her out.

If you view his list of 2016 books read, you can see why I love him so and hate his housekeeping.

The river that binds us

I'm swamped with both family work and market work that demand much of my time and attention.  The story about how I named my blog explains why.

As I sat on an airplane, leaving the family that needs me, to the job that also needs me, I pondered the irony that a woman so concerned with climate change is sitting on an airplane, spewing CO2 into the stratosphere.

A window seat in an airplane between LAX and DEN is also a good time to reflect about the water cycle.

Our familial home is down there, as is DD's school and DH's lab.

Remember when our elementary school teachers told us that, if we could pour a cup of water on top of the Continental Divide, half could end up in the Atlantic Ocean and half would end up in the Pacific Ocean?

It turns out, that it is not quite so simple.

The Colorado River, originating west of the Continental Divide, used to drain into the Pacific Ocean. But it hasn't for decades, because all of the water was used and reused until it peters out in the inland deserts of California (to grow alfalfa to grow cows to feed people.)

Colorado Snowpack

The water evaporates off the ocean and eventually falls down as condensed water or ice in the mountains.  Imagine the amount of energy it takes to lift up that large a mass and move it that great a distance!

Somewhere over the Four Corners area.  Not sure if this is the Colorado River or a tributary.  

The melted snow seeps into the soil and seeps into rivulets, creeks, small tributary rivers and then eventually into the mighty* Colorado River.  More than half of Colorado River water flow begins as groundwater.

Beginning in 1957, with the opening of the Colorado-Big Thompson Project, trans-basin water diversions were moving water from the western side of the Continental Divide to the eastern side. Without this water, the massive population growth of the Colorado Front Range wouldn't have been possible.

Trans-basin water diversion map.

Want to learn more about Northern (Colorado) Water, the public agency that brings this water to millions?  Of course you do!

Visit the Northern Water Annual open house and conservation gardens fair next Saturday, May 21, 2016.   Walk this scale model of the Colorado-Big Thompson and Windy Gap projects that deliver *half* of the water used by the Northern Colorado member communities (including Boulder.)  It's awe-inspiring to think about the amount of work that it takes to bring this volume and mass of water across the harsh alpine environment.

My favorite part is this landscape sculpture, which allows me to walk the journey of my Colorado tap water from mountain-top through tunnels, pipelines, and reservoirs.  It makes the monumental intimate.

Landscape art that makes this huge engineering and social project intimate.

Read Your Colorado Water Blog write-up about this event for more details.  I went last year with some gardening enthusiast friends.  I geeked out over the water engineering while they geeked out over the gardening booths.

Many, many Front Range nurseries set up booths at the fair to sell Colorado native plants that are rarely sold at commercial nurseries.  It's one-stop shopping for people who grow native and low-water gardens.  Plants, education, ideas and support from Colorado Extension master gardeners.

Whether I am in Boulder, Colorado, or in Los Angeles, the two parts of my life depend on the mighty* Colorado River.

* Anything that can carve the Grand Canyon and all the minor canyons you see here deserves the adjective mighty.  Anything that can bind my torn heart also deserves the adjective mighty.

Data Thinking Before Data Crunching

Years ago, I was a data analyst and subject matter expert.  Now that Data Scientist is the job description du jour, I rebranded myself.

Rebranding really works.  My online resumes generated a lot more views, though I remained substantively the same person, with the same skills, education and experience.

Lemmings.

Anyway, my pet peeve is how fixated interviewers are about how much data you've crunched, instead of how well you did it.

I really, really, really like my job as a data specialist and educator.  In case you wonder why a forty-something married mother would move away from her family for a job that barely pays enough to run a second household and fly home, I thought I would show you a sample of my work.

I posted my slides and notes for a recent talk, Data Thinking Before Data Crunching, given to a mixed audience of students, working software developers and scientists-data providers.

I help people use data optimally with the (IMHO) most pressing big data use case facing the world--weather and climate.

It's a good thing that the computer-based work (and my management) allows me to work from my LA home part of the time.

Four Candidates

I bought this slightly sheer deep Prussian blue and black rayon/lycra jersey to make a self-lined dress for myself. But, DD exclaimed that it was fantastic and claimed it for herself. I am an indulgent mother. (I got the ~5 yard piece at SAS Fabrics by the pound so I may be able to get dresses for both of us out of it if I use another fabric for the lining.)

DD and her team are heading to the California State Academic Decathlon Championships again.  The 2016 schedule is not up yet, but you can look at the 2015 competition schedule.  The on-line schedule does not mention the Saturday night dance for competitors.

Suppose you were making a dress for a 15-year-old to wear to the dance (and in her regular wardrobe.)  What do you think she'd like?  And would be age-appropriate?

If you go to the AcaDec site, you can learn about how AcaDec started in CA (actually, LA).  If you took the top 100 teams in the nation, a majority would be from CA--mostly SoCal.  So now, only 2 teams from each state get to go to the National Championships.  Rhode Island sent 2 of their 3 teams to nationals last year.  But, CA also sent 2 out of their hundreds of teams.

The season for most kids in CA ends on Saturday night.  They worked hard and want to let off steam with other nerds.  I want my kid to have a nice new outfit for that.

I have a heavy post coming up about the Oscars and fairness.  The situation infuriates me, but I'm still carefully thinking through what I want to say and how to support it.

In the mean time, please help me select a pattern for DD's dress.

1. McCalls 5974 (faux wrap)
2. Simplicity 1018 (might not be appropriate for such l/w knit)
3. Simplicity 1102 (cold shoulder, shorter length, raise neckline)
4. Simplicity 1653 (faux wrap)

BTW, did you catch the NPR story (might have ran on Weekend Edition or All Things Considered on Feb 6, 2016) about DD's all-girl AcaDec team? AcaDec is dominated by boys. But, this year, all 9 of her school's A-team members are girls. Actually, all 9 of the B-team are also girls. The teacher selected the 18 highest-scoring students and they all happened to be girls.

DD thought beforehand about what she should say for radio and gave a great sound-bite.

UPDATE: 1102 it is!  Cold shoulder, knee length, raised neckline.

She also said that the dance last year was gross and she is going to hang around the hotel with her friends instead.  Whew!  This relieves the deadline pressure.

First 2016 Make

And in the LA sewing room!

I did a whole lotta clean-up and rethreaded the 25 yo serger before I could make these two pillowcases.

There are a whole lotta shoulds like taking blog pictures in daylight and pre-shrinking fabric.  But, life and time is short.  I won't be in LA again during daylight hours for several weeks so this is the only available photo.

I didn't have time to prewash the fabric either.  Therefore, the pillowcases are slightly over-sized, but should shrink to fit in the wash.  I should also buy her new pillows because these are clearly beaten-down.

Regular readers of this blog may have glimpsed DD's blue hair.  She selected blue because everyone else has pink or purple hair; she wanted to be different.  But, if she had been paying attention to my dye experiments, she would have known that blue and green are the toughest colors to keep on the fiber (her hair).

Blue dye came off on her clothes, towels and sheets.  Rather than get upset about it, I decided to make her blue pillowcases.

I purchased both fabrics at Momen+ during their annual after-xmas clearance sale.  The store opened at 10AM and I got there at 11.  2/3 of the clearance fabrics were already sold out by then.  People started lining up at 9:30 AM.

DD loves the anime fabric.  I knew she would as soon as I saw it on the shelf.  I also knew exactly how I was going to use it.

The Harley Quinn reveal

Time to get sewing

The Harley Quinn inspiration picture that DD showed me.

A bit tight for a teen, but looks like a fun costume.

The least disgusting costume I could find RTW on the internet.

But only available in Australia for > $100 and with a warning that the fabric is sheer and requires a full-body flesh-toned body stocking.

Sigh.  Why are RTW Halloween costumes for women so slutty?

Difference between men's and women's costumes.

The costume is done, mailed off to LA, and tried on for size. It fits! More pix and construction deets after she's debuted the costume.

Truly a Bad Mom

Every now and then, I am reminded that I am truly a bad mom.

Exhibit n+1: Iris slept in a closet on her recent visit.

Embarrassing evidence.

The bed that I ordered for her had not been delivered. The sectional that I ordered for the living room was also enroute, but not here. She had the option of sleeping on the sofabed in the open-plan living room, where she would have been awoken by parents making coffee and breakfast; or putting the sofabed mattress on the floor in her east-facing bedroom, which doesn't have window coverings yet. What a dilemma for a night-owl teen.

Hiding the evidence.

She looked at the closet and asked, "Can I sleep in the closet like Harry Potter?"

We pulled out the sleeping bag and two yoga mats. (The 2" camp mattress is in LA, not Boulder.) The bed was a bit firmer than she liked, but this was her preferred alternative.

Fathers' Day Hike

I'm told that restaurants are busy on Mothers' Day and trailhead parking lots are jammed on Fathers' Day.  We discovered that the truism is--true.

We started relatively early, but still encountered a full parking lot at the top.  Add the 1.0 miles we needed to walk from parking to the trailhead to the mileage to Upper Copeland Falls.

Mythic Creatures

Bad Dad and Iris are here for Spring Break.  Our year of the dragon baby wanted to see the Mythic Creatures exhibit at the Denver Museum of Science and Nature (formerly the Museum of Natural History).

I managed to find needlework there.

Bye for now!

Memories of wetter years

While researching another water and climate post, I reread my March posts from wetter years past.  I loved going down memory lane and remembering showing little Iris our beloved California.

March 2005, she loved pink.

Death Valley after receiving three times it's average annual rainfall.

• Testing Blogger photo
• The sixth photo
• Death Valley 2006
• Unseasonable Lushness
• That Ridiculously Resilient Ridge in (non)action!
• Reliving storms past

Influences

Sometimes, I shake my head in wonder about how Iris comes up with stuff.

Take our outing to the Denver Art Museum during their visit. I asked her to pretend to be a piece of art while I took a picture. She immediately stuck out her tongue to match the protrusions behind her.

Bad Dad says that she takes after me.  I'm skeptical about that.  But, I scrolled through the photographs of their visit and saw a picture of me imitating the flatirons behind us.

He also snuck a picture of me.  I love the dog photobomb.

What a difference a week makes.  The trails were snow-free and nearly dry during Presidents' Day weekend.  A week later, we have over a foot of snow on the ground.  (Officially, Boulder got ~15" over 3 days, but my neighborhood gets more than average.)

More Jason Rogenes artwork made from trash at DAM.

Don't miss the incredible watercolors of William Mathews on view now at DAM.  Does this portrait remind you of

this portrait?

The horizon line, the buildings in the background, the Jackson Pollock-like depiction of grass...

And then Leah posted a picture of one of Luke Haynes' quilts on view at quiltcon.

The purple shadows of the cow portrait also remind me of the Matisse and Friends fauvism show that recently closed at DAM.

BTW, Iris is wearing Kwik Sew 3476 in the top photo. As you can see, they fit.

Can you tell that I have been spending a lot of time looking at artwork for paint color inspiration?

Step away from that calico

because, if you listen to your tween when she selects a cool calico print, and you make her a dress, it can end up too stiff and never worn.

Burda 8511 Front

Burda 8511 Back

The fabric was on sale. The zip came from my stash of 25 cent zips from SAS. I have already used Burda 8511 successfully for myself many times. This took me about $5 and an afternoon. Lesson learned.

I photographed it only to document it so I can put it in the out bag.  Hopefully, someone else's princess will be less finicky about stiff fabric.  I couldn't get a photograph of her in it (several years ago, when I made it).

She threw a hissy fit recently about trying on clothes that had been made or purchased expressly for her to her specifications because she didn't want to be interrupted.

I think she will not be getting mom-mades for a while until she behaves more charmingly.  I think it is time for mommy to step away and let her purchase her own clothes with her own money.

These are not Hammer pants

Iris requested winter-weight knit pants in dark go-with-everything colors.  I dutifully bought some gorgeous black cotton/lycra stretch fleece.  Because I was tired of seeing her wear leggings everywhere, I tried to steer her to some looser-fitting pants.  She told me she likes pockets; the top one has them.

Vogue 1417 Donna Karan

Simplicity 2061 Learn to Sew

She called them Hammer pants. No, they aren't. If they were Hammer pants, they would have a dropped crotch.

Hammer and PSY in Hammer pants

Besides, it is too late. I already cut and sewed the pants using the slimmer Simplicity 2061. To make them slimmer still, I cut one size down from her measurement size.

I photographed them side by side with leggings made from her TNT Kwik Sew 3476.  The crotch depths are similar, but the leggings sit higher--nearly to the waist--while Simplicity 2061 sits 1.5" below the waist.

Kwik Sew 3476

I also repaired a torn section of her blue denim skirt.  I am not sure if I previously blogged about them, but it is also made from recycled shirts and a small length of lightweight denim.  I made it to replace this outgrown skirt.

In 2015, Iris got 3 things, to my 0. She'd better be appreciative.

2014 Wrap-up

I would like to post a wrap-up of my 2014 sewing and knitting activity. Unfortunately, this post doesn't contain any pictures of my makes. Most of them remain unblogged.

However, my spreadsheet says that I completed 37 items in 2014, including a sweater I started in 2010. Sadly, that sweater looks awful on me. Happily, it looks great on a beloved friend. Perhaps she will allow me to post a picture of her modeling it some day.

• 37 items
• 13 for me
• 10 for Iris
• 10 Home Dec
• 4 for others
• oops, forgot the 5 tie-dyed onesies 

January and August 2014 saw bursts of sewing activity.  Iris needed clothes, stat, and her mommy delivered.  It looks like January 2015 will also be about filling holes in Iris' wardrobe.

The big news (and cause of low sewing productivity) in 2014 is that I moved away from my family for a full-time job.  I haven't worked full-time since motherhood so this would have been a big transition even without the move.

In December 2013, I interviewed three times for a research position in Palo Alto.  Palo Alto to LA is a doable weekly commute and I was prepared to do it.

Surprisingly, I did not hear from that research lab for months.  Instead, I spotted a job posting in Boulder in a department and institution that I respect greatly.

It happened very quickly.  I applied.  I interviewed.  I got the job.  I moved to Boulder.  Palo Alto called just days after I moved to Boulder.  No, I wasn't available; I lost interest in them.

Bad Dad and I were married in Boulder.  I received my PhD and he postdoc'd here.  We have many friends in Boulder.  We had always dreamed of having condos in both Colorado and one of the California major cities (SF/LA/SD) and dividing our time between them once Iris moved away for college.

This job just accelerated the schedule somewhat.

I telecommute about 1 out of every 3 weeks so that Iris can remain with Bad Dad in California to finish high school.  They also visit me in Boulder.

Boulder is the epicenter for atmospheric science in the US.  Redondo Beach is the epicenter for the development of certain types of satellites.  It's not surprising that a two-PhD family would make their life among these two places.  There are more tragedies in life than having to split your time between the communities of Redondo Beach and Boulder.  The ocean and the mountains.  Rocket scientists are thick on the ground in both communities.

You've heard of selfish sewing?  What do you think of claiming this spot for my sewing space?  Creative play deserves an inspirational view, right?

This view is a short walk to Elfriede's Fine Fabrics (and JA's) and the Boulder Creek path. Velosewer, it is time to plan your sewing/biking/hiking retreat.

Merry Christmas

After a whirlwind week at AGU's Fall Meeting, I am spending a week with family in San Francisco.

San Francisco's civic center was lit up for Christmas.

Rather than do the same old tourist stuff, our family opted to visit San Francisco's water supply.

It's a great way to catch up and get some exercise, too.

I highly recommend this trail!

Yes, this sits on the famous San Andreas Fault.