Like I said earlier, the old car is gone. Here’s the new one, a brand new Mazda RX8!

A few hours from now I’ll be trading in my 1995 Miata, which was new to me in 1997. I’ve been car shopping for a few months which is an interesting process in navigating websites, trying to understand features, having my emotions played on without facts, coming to grips with desires versus issues of sustainability and ecology, not to mention class and other issues from childhood around money, not to mention silly sales exchanges (if I hear “how can we earn your business?” again I’ll scream) and upsells (Lo-Jack anyone?).

But looking backwards is what this post is about. This car was the first thing I ever acquired that was so rich in meaning, because of it what it embodied and what it looked like and what it represented in my life.

It was the first car I ever bought that was a car of choice, not a car of necessity. I spent a long time agonizing over finding something that was right for me. I remember the decision being embedded in many other uncertainties in my personal and professional life at the time, and feeling like these things were all intertwined, and I would not be able to address any of them without addressing all of them.

The Miata is a wonderfully designed object. The experience of driving was like nothing I had ever experienced, super zippy, great handling, all facets of driving that are meaningless as words, but powerful as sensory experiences. I remember parking the car after I got it and looking backwards at it as I walked away, just stunned by the form. I remember looks from other people at stoplights (or the guy that rolled down his window in my first traffic jam and said “what COLOR is THAT?” as it was a weird blue-green when washed and shiny). I remember friends taking out to learn to drive stick-shift, and I remember others who rejected the choice as I was making it, telling me that (even though I was yet to turn 30) I was probably having a mid-life crisis.

This was a bold choice at the time, I think to some I may have been taking on a new and fake identity, but for me, the permission to choose something special, exotic, fast, racey, lifestyle-y, was the change – in fact, it wasn’t a change, it was opening up to something that was already there, something I was afraid of. That personal growth alienated me from others, but was widely welcomed by most.

I was never a “Miata guy.” I never named my car, I never modded my car, and of course as the years went by it began to resemble a comfortable sneaker, with dings and warts and all.

It’s tempting to write this filled with anthropomorphic language (as Chevron and Pixar would have us do), about my companion or friend, but it’s never been that, even in fun. It’s absolutely been about what I was able to go through at that stage of adulthood. The car itself didn’t change me, but I can see my life before the car and my life after the car as somewhat different eras, characterized by how I saw myself. The car was designed in such a way that it was the right choice for me at that point, and allowed me to make a statement about myself, to others, but also to myself.

This is hopefully not too maudlin or too confessional. I blog it here because it’s about a thing and the meaning of a thing, and of course, that meaning goes far beyond the thing itself.

Okay, one more picture

The New York Times reminds us that we don’t have to travel to exotic Asia to enjoy the thrill of discovering new cultures.

Then the Wal-Mart Jews arrived [in Bentonville, AR]

Recruited from around the country as workers for Wal-Mart or one of its suppliers, hundreds of which have opened offices near the retailer’s headquarters here, a growing number of Jewish families have become increasingly vocal proponents of religious neutrality in the county. They have asked school principals to rename Christmas vacation as winter break (many have) and lobbied the mayor’s office to put a menorah on the town square (it did).

Wal-Mart has transformed small towns across America, but perhaps its greatest impact has been on Bentonville, where the migration of executives from cities like New York, Boston and Atlanta has turned this sedate rural community into a teeming mini-metropolis populated by Hindus, Muslims and Jews.

It is the Jews of Benton County, however, who have asserted themselves most. Two years ago, they opened the county’s first synagogue and, ever since, its roughly 100 members have become eager spokesmen and women for a religion that remains a mystery to most people here.

When the synagogue celebrated its first bar mitzvah, the boy’s father – Scott Winchester, whose company sells propane tanks to Wal-Mart – invited two local radio D.J.’s, who broadcast the event across the county, even though, by their own admission, they had only a vague idea of what a bar mitzvah was.

“Jesus was Jewish,” one D.J. noted in a dispatch from the reception at a local hotel. The other remarked, “I love Seinfeld.”

Shortly after he moved to the area, Tom Douglass, a member of the synagogue who works in Wal-Mart’s logistics department, made a presentation about Hanukkah to his son’s kindergarten class. The lesson, complete with an explanation of how to play with a spinning dreidel and compete for chocolate coins, imported from New York, proved so popular that the school’s librarian taped it for future classes.

Then there is Ron Haberman, a doctor and synagogue member, who has introduced Jewish cuisine to the county. His new restaurant, Eat This, next door to a new 140,000-square-foot glass-enclosed Baptist church, serves knishes, matzo ball soup and latkes. To guide the uninitiated, the menu explains that it is pronounced “LOT-kuz.”

Not everyone is ordering the knishes, but Christians throughout Benton County are slowly learning the complexities of Jewish life. Gary Compton, the superintendent of schools in Bentonville and a member of a Methodist church in town, has learned not to schedule PTA meetings the night before Jewish holidays, which begin at sundown, and has encouraged the high school choir to incorporate Jewish songs into a largely Christian lineup.

“We need to get better at some things,” he said. “You just don’t go from being noninclusive to being inclusive overnight.”

Surrounded by Christian neighbors, Bible study groups, 100-foot-tall crucifixes and free copies of the book “The Truth About Mary Magdalene” left in the seating area of the Bentonville IHOP, the Jews of Benton County say they have become more observant in – and protective of – their faith than ever before.

Marcy Winchester, the mother of the synagogue’s first bar mitzvah, said, “You have to try harder to be Jewish down here.”

In some ways, this is no different than other periods of Jewish migration and immigration. It’s a little off-putting to read about cultural illiteracy in the US but of course it shouldn’t be too surprising. Still, there’s something about the New York tone of the article (where, of course, everyone is Jewish?) that I find irksome. I’m not sure how I feel about “Wal-Mart Jews” and “The Jews of Bentonville” – perhaps those are terms used by those folks, themselves, but in the context of the article, it’s just slightly mocking in a way that seems out of step with the rest of the article. Their tone is all over the place.

And this is a front page story! Cultural criss-cross! Wal-Mart! A chance to say “knishes” in the body of a piece! It’s gold, gold I tell ya!

Yesterday I received my copy of the new Swedish translation of Design: A Very Short Introduction (Design – en introduktion) by John Heskett. I can’t read Swedish, but this edition features two of my photographs from Hong Kong. Hooray!

I flipped through the book and found a photo captioned Amerikansk “strip mall” but is obviously taken in Canada, showing the Canadian McDonald’s logo, Tim Horton’s, Mark’s Work Wearhouse, and Canadian Tire. Hmm.

From its inception, I’ve been an active participant and support of the about, with & for

conference. I’m entirely not thrilled with this year’s topic

AWF 2006 – Responsible Design | The Value of Good Intention

Design can have the best of intentions but sometimes is trumped by business agendas. Does it have to be a balancing act, or can good intention fuel real innovation? From organic foods to the future of urban spaces, what role does responsibility play in how companies approach innovation and design?

The 2006 About, With and For conference will explore how user-centered design research can unveil the potential of responsible design.

I know this is hot stuff these days, but at least as of this writing (I can always change my mind, right?) I’m fed up with this whole save-the-world thing. I’m into the power of design (and many other tools of innovation, business, makin’ stuff, etc.) to cause big changes, but I’m not into the liberaller-than-thou imperative that seems to be issued to designers upon their entry to design school.

The Core77/BusinessWeek Design 2.0 event was almost 2 weeks ago. It was a fantastic experience, good networking, different presentations, good conversation.

Some links
the set crashing during my talk (and Niti’s take on it)
PeterMe’s writeup
LukeW’s writeup here and here
Nick Baum’s detailed notes here

steve brings down the house, originally uploaded by selfconstruct
The view from the stage

A ton of pictures at the Core77 Gallery

Podcasts are supposedly coming soon? (Update: here)

And what is up with the lame fact-checking at the SF Chronicle? “Core77, a New York design think tank, will bring its Design 2.0 conference, also centered on green design, to San Francisco on June 6.”

portigal.com moved to a new host yesterday. If you see any glitches in the site, definitely let me know.

Email seems to be a bit jammed up while things transfer over (if you’ve never moved a site, there’s a delay for the propogation of the new info that tells other Internet sites where to look to find me – they say as much as 48 hours), I’m getting some messages coming in, others not. If I mail myself, even, from my own address, it doesn’t come through.

I’m hoping, as usual, that it’s just delayed because of this, and not lost or stuck. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Update: I just found a heap of email sitting on my old ISP. I don’t know enough Linux to know where to look for the files (let alone how to read them) so I just kept poking around. Seems like some email is still being delivered there, and since it’s no longer officially portigal.com, I have to use an IP address to ftp into the site and poke in directories til I see a recent and large mail file. There were 89 messages, mostly spam, including one test message I sent 30 minutes ago. So there’s a still problem, but most stuff seems to be getting through here. Hmm. Glad I haven’t closed that account yet!

A follow-up to a previous entry (in which Half.com planned to remove my inventory from their system if I didn’t make a purchase, etc.), now Hilton is going to drop me from their loyalty program if I don’t stay there soon

As a member of Hilton HHonors, you are very important to us. That’s why we want to give you an opportunity to reactivate your HHonors account before it is closed and the HHonors points you’ve already earned are forfeited.

[pitch to sell me a credit card]

You may also keep your HHonors account open beyond September 01, 2006, by taking advantage of one of the following options:

[stay with them, buy something etc.]

If you do not take one of the actions above by September 01, 2006, your HHonors account will be closed and all accumulated points will be forfeited. Prior to your account closing, you may redeem your HHonors points for any eligible reward. After the points are redeemed, your account will be closed by the date above and all remaining points will be forfeited.

Forfeited? I think I stayed at a Hilton in December, and previously in October (I could be wrong, frankly I don’t differentiate between hotel brands too clearly, there’s other things to take up space in my brain), but now I’m to be forfeited? I wonder what trend in loyalty (as a business construct) is leading to this shedding of non-profitable customers, or even this threatening-with-expulsion mentality. I’m not sure what I’m costing Hilton. If I’m not an active customer, don’t target any promotions to me. But why dump me? Or, why threaten to dump me as a way to motivate me to become a better customer? There’s no carrot, only a stick.

At least, as I wrote in the previous entry, they are warning me. Starwood just dumped me without notice and caused all sorts of usability hassles when I tried to make a reservation using what I thought was an active membership number.

I’m going to try and move portigal.com over the next couple of days. It won’t affect this blog, but it might delay (or ulp worse) email during the transition. Let’s hope not. I’ve done this a couple of times but frankly can’t remember what happened before; I think stuff gets queued that doesn’t get easily delivered and eventually shows up.

Making the best of bad times

(Click picture to see it larger)

I’ve been posting some pictures from my 2002 trips to Tokyo

on flickr.