The Voices in Frank's Head

Okay - so technology has been used to accomplish some amazing things. Science put a man on the moon and it treats illnesses that just a few years ago would've been hopeless. We've learned to break the sound barrier and communicate with one another across the not-so-vast distance that has become cyberspace. But some technological advances just make me wonder what the heck the inventor was thinking. I can't believe it, but someone has actually managed to take the concept of wearable computing and used it to create shirts that enable their wearers to send "hugs" to one another remotely. With this shirt on , you would actually feel it if someone send you a "hug". The shirt itself is Bluetooth enabled. The orange ovals on the shirt are actuators where you would feel the warmth, pressure and heartbeat of the person who sent you this "hug." This idea seems both cute and scary at the same time. Now that we've reach this point, you know it's on...

I finished reading The Assassin's Gate: America in Iraq by George Packer over the weekend. It's an amazing book, written by a reporter who supported the War in Iraq. His writing his very compelling. I learned a lot about Iraq and America's involvement in region by reading this book. In fact, this is one of those books that I deliberately took my time reading - and read with a highlighter in hand. I highly recommend this book to everyone who wants to know anything about the War in Iraq.

Today is the three year annivesary of America's invasion of Iraq. That was the beginning of a war that everyone in Washington seemed confident would be over by August 2003, but now seems likely to drag on for several more years, end up costing the U.S. taxpayers more than $1 trillion and bring even more Americans home in a body bag. We continue to occupy Iraq, in spite of the fact that public opinion polls show that roughly 80% of Iraqis want us out of their country, under the claim that we're spreading democracy and freedom. ( I've always thought democracy means that the people decide what is going to happen; not foreign leaders.) In spite of that, the Republicans in Washington continue to argue that any change of course in Iraq is tantamount to treason and the Democrats are bubbling around like idiots, with no clue of what they want to do. There's an election this year and, for the first time in my life, I'm voting for nothing but the third-party candidates. The...

I published another article in Model D. This time it was about indie filmmaking in Detroit and entitled, "Making Movies in Motown." It featured interviews with several Detroit-area filmmakers and talked about why they are working in Detroit instead of any other city. You can read it on-line at http://modeldmedia.com/features/detroitfilm.aspx I will probably have another article published at Model D in a few weeks.

My friend, Jessica Marie Jones , sent this one to me via email. I laughed so hard that I knew I had to repost it here - along with my editorial comments in blue. Life in 2006 #1. You accidentally enter your password on the microwave. (Okay, I haven't done this one but I can imagine myself doing it if I was tired enough.) #2. You haven't played solitaire with real cards in years. (Bingo!) #3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers for your family of 3. (Nah, most of my family now has their cell phone as their only phone number.) #4. You e-mail the person who works at the desk next to you. (Been there, done that.) #5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that they don't have e-mail addresses. (Guilty as charged.) #6. You pull up in your own driveway and use your cell phone to see if anyone is home to help you carry in the groceries. (Yeppers. Cell phones have replaced honking the car horn.) #7. Every commercial on television has a ...

According to an article in this month's issue of Science , large animals such as humans would not have been able to evolve if it weren't for clay first appearing in the Earth during the Neoproterozoic Era (roughly one billion to 542 million years ago). Details about this are available at http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20060206/clay_pla.html?source=rss This is one more thing for me to think about when I see a work of pottery.

This blog is now 2 year's old and this is my 140th post to it. (70 posts per year - 1 or 2 per week - yeah, that sounds about right.) Anyway, I'm just glad that in those 2 years, no one has tried to collect on "Frank's Blog Guarantee."

Happy 197th birthday to President Abraham Lincoln. He was born this day in 1809 in what is now La Rue County, Kentucky. I don't know what the man's secret is. After all, he doesn't look a day over 56 in this recent photograph of him. ;-)

U.S. Olympic speed-skater Chad Hendrick has won a gold medal for the 500 meter skate. It's the first gold medal for the U.S. team this year. Here's hoping its the first of many. Congrats, Chad!

Dang, the past ten days or so have been beyond belief. Super Bowl XL was amazing. I'm thrilled that it went off without any serious hitches - beyond that one shooting that everyone seems to have already forgotten about and, of course, the nightmare that was the shuttle service. I was in downtown Detroit as the crews were setting up for Super Bowl and the Motown Winter Blast. It was so cool - yet so surreal - to see all of that happening in the middle of Woodward Avenue. Of course, the highlight for me for all things Super Bowl XL related was being on the field during the half time show. Me and the Rolling Stones. And thousands and thousands of fans. I felt kind of bad that they didn't allow any cameras onto the field. Standing on that field and just looking at all of that was happening around was amazing. Totally beyond belief. The only thing that could possibly top it was on Tuesday, when my documentary on the Book-Cadillac Hotel had its public premiere. The only thing bet...

CBS (parent company of the UPN television network) and TimeWarner (parent company of the WB) have announced that they will merge their respective networks into one, single television network that is aimed at the youth market to be called "CB". Since Detroit currently has both a UPN and a WB affiliate, this move will presumably leave one of them without any content to air. Personally, I really hope that whichever one of them is left "contentless" decides to fill the void with somekind of original programming. God knows TV needs somekind of originallity to it.

It's been on the air for seven great years and won a boat load of Emmys and Golden Globes; not to mention SAG and Writers' Guild Awards. It launched some amazing fan sites and kept Americans glued to their TV sets. It was one of the few prime time shows with the guts to broadcast live. More importantly, it made politics cool. But all good things come to an end. NBC has announced that The West Wing will come to an end after this season. It's a regretable fact of life that keeping a TV show on the air for more than five years is a daughting task; a challenge that the show has thrived on so far. The unfortunate passing of John Spencer last month did not make it any easier. The show will be missed.

I went into the Vinton Building on Woodward in downtown Detroit (just north of One Detroit Center) with one of the guys who is working on rehabbing this historic abandoned building into residential lofts. The Vinton is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, but has sat vacant for years now. Once upong a time, I used to crawl through all sort of abandoned buildings. Now, however, that I'm on the ugly side of 30 - it just isn't as much fun to try find my way into a boarded up buiding. However, when someone offers me the chance to walk right in the front door with no need to crawl through an open window or anything like that - I can't pass it up. Structurally, the Vinton is in great shape. There's one or two issues to deal with, but nothing major. Most of what they'll need to do will be because of its conversion from an office building to a residential property. It's currently a mess on the inside - but not that much more so than any other const...

Okay - one more post about my trip to Toronto and then I'll shut up about it. I promise. One of the things that I saw in Toronto was a monument to Canadian workers who had died on the job over the past centure. There are 100 plaques on this wall. Each of them represents a Canadian worker who died; one of them represents all of the workers who died that year. This plaque in particular struck me. First, cause I happened by the monument on the anniversay of this gentleman's death. Second, he died from asbestos - the same thing that killed my Dad. Finally, there's the fact that his given name was Frank - just like my Dad and I. It strange how I can feel a connection to a complete stranger, who was lived in a foreign country and who died before I even got out of diapers. R.I.P. Frank Sypher.

There were a couple of things on my trip to Toronto that simply cracked me up. So much so that I felt compelled to photograph them and share them with the entire world - or at least that portion of the world that reads this blog.I love the name of this store. They tell me that there's more them around. God, I wish we had one in Detroit. It would make much more sense for us to have one, seeing as how Detroit used to be a French territory. Toronto, however, was never a part of France. I don't care what they actually sell. I just want to be able to point to a store in downtown Detroit that has a sign saying, "fcuk." I don't really ask for that much, do I? I know. I know. Simple pleasures for simple minds. I also got a kick out of this recycling container. It criticises global warming, encourages you to recycle and has an adorable polar bear on it.Ya can't ask for much more than that. I also like it because, since it's a recycling container, there will be ...

My God, have I ever been neglectful of my blog! So, much has happened in the past couple of weeks that never got posted. Oh, well. I won't go into every detail about my trip to Toronto. I had once thought about chronicling all of the highlights in a series of posts, but two weeks later there doesn't seem like much of a point in that much. Anyway, my friend Dave Baschal and I went to Toronto for New Year's. It seemed much more interesting than anything that was going on in Detroit that day. We were there for three days and had a blast. The bars and nightlife in Toronto are top-notch. I hate to say this, but they're better than Detroit and pretty much make you forget about Chicago. (It's clearer, the folks are more polite, there's less crime, transit is better and American money goes 15% farther, which pretty much makes up for the higher taxes). They also have some really interest shopping. Plus, there's a lot of stuff in downtown Toronto that's connected...

I was lying in bed the other morning - kind of debating whether or not I actually wanted to get out of bed, but knowing full well that I had to and soon - when I noticed a strange light poking its way through my bedroom shades. It was rather bright and don't remember every seeing anything like this. I jumped out of bed to investigate it. There was actually a giant ball of fire in the sky near me. It turns out that it was this that they call "the Sun." Supposedly, it's been there all the time - behind all of those gray clouds that have been hanging over Michigan for weeks.

Ah, Christmas! That special, magical holiday! For me it meant a chance to spend some quality time with one of the adorable 3-year olds on the planet: my niece Giovanna. I didn't do much on Christmas itself, but I was at my brother Mike's for Christmas eve. (He is Giovanna's Dad). I still can't believe that I managed to get her to hold still long enough for a photo with her parents. Danielle (my sister-in-law), Giovanna and Mike. The photographer in me wishes that I closed the blinds behind them in that shot because the extra light from behind kind of washed them out. Oh, well - live and learn. Of course, after a snapped a couple of candid shots of the family - Giovanna actually grabbed my camera from me. She's only 3, but she managed to take this shot of my other brother, Mark. Not bad for a 3-year old. Talent clearly runs deep in the Nemecek clan.

Today is the Winter Soltice. The official beginning of winter. I spent at least some of it, walking around town and checking out some of the Christmas lights. It seemed like the most appropriate use of the longest night of the year.

U.S. District Judge John E. Jones ruled today that the requirement to teach intelligent design in high school biology classes in Dover, Pennsylvania was unconstitutional. Intelligent design, he said, was nothing more than theology and the Dover school board had lied about their intentions in order to get support for it. Frankly, I have to agree with him. The whole concept of science is based on a process. One starts with a hypothesis and then tests it through experimentation to either prove or disprove it. None of that has ever happened with intelligent design. The only thing that was really suprising was that it took the judge 139 pages to write his opinion .