I ordered a couple of day passes in order to use the bus to get to Clearwater Beach. I had found out it would be around an hour ride around the time I had written that first aforementioned post. But after I got everything set up in it’s little row and just needed to confirm time and places to be in order to catch the bus to and from the Beach?

The origin has no stops within the distance we consider. Please contact the information center.

It’s not a browser thing, it’s not a technical thing… It’s a failure of public service thing.

UPDATE: it woudl appear Route 63 — the Neilsen bus route that I was going to take as a first step to the beach, has been canceled. Though I can’t find official word that it has been.

Perfect weather and perfect to go out and do stuff in, right?

So I got the urge to get out and about the Bay area during this past week and – just to humor myself, I checked PSTA‘s web site in order to see if there was a bus route I coudl take to get elsewhere in the Tampa Bay metro area. And herein lies the mockery of mass transit options in Tampa Bay or poor use of tools that have been newly employed on local web sites.

So earlier in the week I wanted to go across county lines to downtown Tampa and meet up with a friend to hang out. Cynically, I already knew the chances of me finding anything were slim to none (means to get into the other county) or impossibly out-of-my-way… But I decided to humor myself and just go to the Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority’s website and see what I could find…

What jumped out right away on PSTA.net (besides horrid flash animation that serves absolutely no purpose, and stupid cartoon characters that seem to marginalize and mock riders and workers alike without really realizing it) was the list of 100x-300x buses. These three buses are all express buses between counties to serve the commuter set. I knew this before hand but I figured I would check out there schedules. Serendipity maybe and just hit paydirt without even trying and such…?

Yeah, right.

The 200x line is closest to where I live in North Pinellas – following that way-out-of-my-way motif of leaving from a softball field area at Drew Street and McMullen Booth intersection called the Eddie C. Moore Complex. I know the place and have passed it many times before while bumming rides off other people…

The Moore complex itself would amount to being a 15 to 20 minute bus trip… If I could find the damn thing in the PSTA trip planner to begin with. yup, the new automation that PSTA has implemented to make it easier to follow schedules and take advantage of them doesn’t even recognize the Eddie C. Moore complex park-and-ride.

That was a moot point anyway. Even if I could make it to said park-and-ride lot, the 200x route boasts a total of just five round trips all day — three in the early morning, two in the afternoon.

I realize it’s for commuters specifically but good god damn, this is a joke.

There is no other cross-bay option that I am aware of via public transit. While you can get to the Hillsborough County Line via Route 93 on PSTA, HART (Hillsborough Area Regional transit) doesn’t make it very clear where there map starts and ends.

So in that regard, anyone wanting to cross the county line is in a bind unless they drive on their own – which i don’t.

So that faded out of my memory and instead, while relaxing today I thought it would be cool to take the bus to Clearwater Beach — hey! it’s in county and shouldn’t take much extra time and effort to get there… So lets try the ole’ route map and give it a whirl huh…?

I flubbed around with that most of the afternoon and I found out that “Clearwater Beach” is not listed as a landmark. “Pier 60″ is not listed as a landmark. I kept trying combinations to find a route to Clearwater beach and kept being told that you couldn’t find that there is no bus.

Of course, that’s not the truth. the problem is the route map just doesn’t accurately define things.

I went back to the rout map tonight and found some interesting things — for example both Pinellas and Hillsborough county addresses and intersections are placed within the route finder. Of course you can’t get there from here but that’s already been touched on. What was also discovered is that every single PSTA bus stop is marked off on the map with a little widget. you just ahve to zoom in close enough to see things.

After discovering that, trying to plan my trip was a snap — just drag the map over to the exact location you want to venture to and presto… It’ll take an hour and 13 minutes to get from my neck of the woods to Clearwater Beach. That ain’t so bad. The reverse trip ain’t so bad either. Just less than an hour (barrign traffic incidents in both directions).

Just thinking about this sorta peeves me. It’s such a minor detail, usability. I don’t know if people at PSTA are truly aware that they are using jargon in trip planning in some instances — no one is looking for Stop #201 Mandalay Blvd. They’re looking for Clearwater Beach.

Of course there is also the problem of commute time that makes PSTA a hassle more than a help… 2 and a half hours or more from Palm Harbor to St. Petersburg, 3 hours from St. Petersburg to Tampa International Airport, etc.

Something’s gotta be done about this mess — because the impossiblity of getting there form here is why the roads are congested and people shun the bus.

Being the busy bee that I am and having other things to do online, I decided instead of keeping the site up and running, I took it down. All while saving the files.

Well, in a limited case I’m putting a definitive writing section back online. You can access it directly and you can also access it from the above menu by clicking WRITING.

Oh, and for the moment you can jump to the poems directly on the sidebar here on der Stonegauge’s main site. Some were never part of my collection on the old writings site and some were.

The latter film had enough of a hook to make me want to know what was going to happen next… It nagged at me. I didn’t care for the film as much as Prisoner of Azkaban when I first saw it because it ran so long and had so much going on… But it grew on me. Repeated watchings made me appreciate it more and the ending compelled me to return to Potter literature.

Cal it a Wrath of Khan/Empire Strikes Back negative closing and how it makes you ponder where the story goes from there. Goblet of Fire pulled it off (even if the film lacked the multiple side stories that J.K. Rowling worked into the book).

So I picked up Order of the Phoenix and read it through – finding Rowling’s narration exquisite and the story compelling just as I found the first book to be. While I’ve read about the new movie (due out this summer) through Entertainment Weekly and about which side stories are shelved (Ron playing quidditch, Dobby the house-elf making a return, etc) there is enough going on to keep you interested.

And after seeing the International trailer for the film — I’m dying to see this adaption:

And of course there are clowns, such as myself, who think past the immediate tragedy and how things are and will be framed by powers-that-be in the country.

Case in point, there was a compelling diary on Daily Kos that compares elected official responses at Columbine High Shcool and Virginia Tech. Of course you know the players just as well as I do: former Vice President Al Gore and president George W. Bush.

While there is some nitpicking (the President doesn’t name names of victims… not that they were open knowledge until the day unfolded), the one thing that stands out is the difference in eloquence and leadership in the speeches given. Two similar tragedies and two varying responses to the mourners and grieving communities.

That being said, there are still problems there…

Local businesses need to be reviewed and sometimes listings need to be removed. For instance, Jaguar Coffee has been gone from Palm Harbor for years upon years (how I miss Java Jungle — Jaguar Coffee’s predecessor) and yet their listing still exists. Same with the now-closed Palm Harbor Ale House as well as other businesses.

The Yahoo Local listings are very much an online social network of reviews and user driven content… But of course users have to be willing to get active on their own Yahoo Local area in order for the content to be accurate.

Yet, to those who actually believe Clinton was soft on terrorism or just plain didn’t do enough to fight terror — look at what Orrin Hatch, Trent Lott and others of the GOP were up to stopping President Clinton from having some of the very same issues that Congress now rubber-stamps for President Bush today.  That link and the following quote from CNN in July of 1996:

“We need to keep this country together right now. We need to focus on this terrorism issue,” Clinton said during a White House news conference.

But while the president pushed for quick legislation, Republican lawmakers hardened their stance against some of the proposed anti-terrorism measures.

Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Mississippi, doubted that the Senate would rush to action before they recess this weekend. The Senate needs to study all the options, he said, and trying to get it done in the next three days would be tough.

One key GOP senator was more critical, calling a proposed study of chemical markers in explosives “a phony issue.”

I wonder if old Orrin stood up and argued how the entire gels-and-liquids scare that has helped slow down the queue in airports for the last few weeks was phony… Or did he “wise up on the issue” where politicians who change stances today are known as flip-floppers?

But wait, it gets better.

Back in April of 1996 — the US House approved an anti-terror legislation that was severely watered down from what President Clinton had been proposing and the Senate had passed.  This was near the one-year anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing and several months prior to TWA Flight 800′s crash (along with the Centennial Park bombing at the Olympics in Atlanta):

Republicans were divided on whether the legislation would be effective.

“We have a measure that will give us a strong upper hand in the battle to prevent and punish domestic and international terrorism,” Senate Majority Leader and presumptive GOP presidential nominee Bob Dole said Wednesday.

But Sen. Don Nickles, R-Oklahoma, while praising the bill, said the country remains “very open” to terrorism. “Will it stop any acts of terrorism, domestic and international? No,” he said, adding, “We don’t want a police state.”

Some lawmakers took a more prudent view of the bill. “The balance between public safety and order and individual rights is always a difficult dilemma in a free society,” said Rep. Gerald Solomon, R-New York.

(emphasis added by me)

Now what’s my point in this and what constructive items can we take from it?

Ten years ago, there was a sensible conservatism out there that said individuals had rights, and it’s a thin line between individual rights and safety. The Republicans once knew that and they put the country’s civil liberties before the terrorism fight.

Now? Well, you should know…

The world didn’t change on 9-11 as the neoconservatives in control of the Republican party have worked very hard to make the country believe. It was our national courage that did. If you’re giving into your fear for the sake of safety and blaming all of this on the other guy in order to feel more secure at this very moment, you’re a coward and a fool who has become blinded from right-and-wrong with thanks to your party-of-choice in power.

It’s been a long, strange trip but in the 14 months I’ve been officially hostingSticks of Fire, it’s gone from blogspot hotspot to dot-com phenom. I knew at the time I approached Tommy about upgrading things that he had something great going on… Little did I know how much it would grow.

Tommy Duncan is probably the Bay area’s most unheralded media star. He gets invites to speak in various capacities (round table discussions, conferences, TV spots) and pretty much has Tampa covered with himself and his cast of supporting writers.

And now, Tommy has taken the next step by getting into a business alliance with Tampa Gold. When that officially kicks off, Tommy will be departing from my server space at Dreamhost and going to the land of far-far-away… Or on shared hosting package with Tampa Gold, take your pick.

I haven’t seen profit from hosting Tommy’s site and I haven’t requested payment for doing so. I never stuck in some personal reference (“Hosted by Dreamhost” etc) or anything like that… It made me feel good to be doing this.

But to just make a long story short, I want to wish my buddy well with his new venture and I hope it takes him where I couldn’t take him — to his rightful place at the to of local pop culture and beyond.

I was more than happy to see K-Mart leave with thanks to the K’s re-organization. The store had always given me a negative vibe every time I got near it. Bealls converted the store and things have been a lot more pleasant with thanks to this.

But the one addition that I liked most — The Den, a coffee house and bar — was notably missing when I ventured to Woodlands Square on Memorial Day weekend. The Den had been inside Woodlands Square for a few years and served a great espresso. Alas, they gave way to music and live bands (I was there for coffee and conversation — which was hurt by this) and it would seem that the Den went the way of the Dodo. The store was empty when I looked.

Of course, The Den isn’t the only store missing that shocked me. Sans Pizza was also gone. Sans — which is right next door to the movie theater — was busy all the time and popular without having to find a side attraction. My guess is that they were a victim of rent prices skyrocketing. Why? Oh, because Office Depot moved in a few doors down — making their location even hotter than it already was.

Yeah, that’s right folks. World War 3… Where the “Coalition of the Willing” are a bunch of weak willed countries that need to be paid off in order to support our efforts. Where our traditional allies have turned their backs because we’ve started military action in a country that did not call for action against it…

In all honesty, this is another Crusade. Maybe the last Crusade. George W. Bush — who is trying to project himself as an elite ruler — is King Richard, who marches into the Holy Lands in order to try to free them (or make it safe for US oil companies in this case). It’s all glory, it’s all bravado and all for his legacy and ego. Meanwhile, back at home, the nation is suffering in the King’s “abscence”. While Boy George focuses on winning his war everyone at home is being robbed … Not by Robin Hood either but the numerous Sheriff’s of Nottingham.

You realize that the country currently has it’s own three I’s? These aren’t principles that are guiding us but they are factors in our daily lives:

Inflation – you will not hear the Federal Reserve chairman talking about inflation, nor will you hear the Bush administration talk about how costs have skyrocketed over a short period of time. Everyone knows about gas prices, but real estate prices, durable goods, groceries, insurance premiums, medical care — everything is spiking for the common person. The federal governent is just concerned with the mega-ultra-large corporations in how they deal with this. Corporatiosn are going strong right now while workers wages are stagnent. It’s been almost a decade since minimum wage was increased in the United States and instead of promoting better treatment for employees, the Bush administration has worked vigilently to repeal work laws so corporations can profit and not be stradled by the costs of labor.

Intolerance – you reep what you sow and that is the case with the Dubai Port World deal and George Walker Bush signing off on the deal. Bush made Arab’s into the boogeyman of the 21st century with his rhetoric after 9-11. The propoganda coming out of the White House tied Iraq to 9-11 in order to justify the invasion of Iraq. People were scared and reacted to just that, signing off on the war because those damn Arabs attacked us first! (wwhich is a flat out lie and ignorant assumption by the citizens of the US)

So the Dubai Ports deal comes through and Bush has no problem with it — it’s a furtherment of his pro-big business agenda. Bill Clinton signs off on it and does what he can to help out behind the scenes (as Slick Willie has always been a proponent of Globalization — as is New York Times writer Paul Krugman). Everyone expects a free pass over this as that is how the country has operated since 9-11 (allowing Bush to get whatever he wanted)…

…Until the public learns about the deal.

Everyone cries foul — Republicans and Democrats alike. The Xenophobia of the Arab Boogeyman that Bush’s administration has so well played rears it’s ugly head. An Arab country in charge of US Ports?! An Arab country with ties to 9-11?!?

And yet, Krugman had a good point in a recent article which denounced this intolerance. The United States should be an active player in the global economy and we cannot run scared from a country in the middle east because of the ignorant and arrogant propoganda show that was put out by the Administration to further it’s agenda.

Of course I could go on about intolerance — everyone beign afraid of homosexuals, blacks and whites in the continued racial war of poverty, faux-Christians sullying Christian ideals and justifying hatred, violence and greed in His name, etc…

Isolationism – Go it alone, “with us or against us,” and the country trumping the world in matters of global politics (be it war, peace, treaties, signing off on elected officials in other countries or dispatchign elected officials in others)  The US has become largely islolated with thanks to it’s policies while being depedant and indebted to cheap foreign labor and despot oil suppliers.

I’ve got a laptop computer I basically can’t use not because it’s not in working order but because it doesn’t have the capablity to do what I need it to do and thus it makes the machine expendable. I’ve been looking for a way to move the laptop without losing a ton of money on the deal.

I looked on the Tampa Tribune‘s website and through their classified ads in an effort to look through the Laptop market and see if anyone was trying to purchase laptop computers in Tampa. I found www.tampanotebooks.com which is operated by Performance Computer Group. They’ve got a shop on Dale Maybry and they say that they buy used laptops – working or not.

I figured to call them up and see how much I could get for my machine… A phone call isn’t such a painful thing after all. Even if it is Voice Carry Over through the Florida Telecommunications Relay Service.

So I called up Performance Computer Group of Tampa — three ring slater a man picks up and the text that comes across my TDD phone reads thus:

“Uh, we don’t do any Relay calls. OK, thank you.”

*Click*

Some people don’t get what a Relay call is… It’s when someone deaf is calling you through a carry over service. It is not an excuse for you to treat a caller like a complete piece of shit. I’ve dealt with that from Bright House Customer Service and Capital One customer service as well. Usually I call back and get a representative that isn’t such a moron.

But in this case? The company just lost my business and came off like he was against the Relay system to begin with. “Why bother? Just some deaf clown trying to hassel me.”

If you’ve blamed them for staying in New Orleans or where they are — all the while being happy with how the Government has cut your taxes or happy that Corporations are racking up huge profits… you’re part of the problem…

You might have caught Kanye West tonight on NBC’s concert special to raise relief money for victim’s of Hurricane Katrina. If you missed it, Kanye said on air (before a hasty cut by NBC to Chris Tucker) “George W. Bush doesn’t care about black people.”

Though I can grasp Kanye’s sentiment and where he’s coming from, he’s shooting with the wrong gun by making this statement. The race card doesn’t have to come out as-so-much a more observant look at what is gone wrong with this country.

The weak / slow response to Hurricane Katrina (to put it simply) represents how the separation the President and most of the government from the people (both parties are guilty of this at current). There is the aristocratic class of businessmen and politicos, donors and blind supporters that get top-of-the-line treatment with focus on issues that are concerns of theirs (wedge issues that do not effect day to day life – Abortion, gay marriage, FCC decency standards, etc) while the issues that effect the general populous (being of any race, creed or color) get ignored. Infrastructure is falling apart in the US, schools are in atrocious conditions, health care and insurance are domineered by for-profit corporate interests that keeps people from protection and medical care they need. Poverty is on the rise (and has been the last 4 years) yet you are told a rosie economic picture from the government or talking head economists because the only thing that matters is the statistics or the investor class… Not the people working, not the pay rates of the blue collar class. Not the fact minimum wage has not been raised for 8 years. Just profit margins.

I don’t think it’s a black-and-white thing that Kanye said (and other African Americans are going to agree with) as-so-much a rich-vs-poor thing. Aristocrats-vs-commoners thing. Many of us commoners can’t even begin to comprehend how bad poverty is… You can hear it anyplace they talk about the tragedy that is New Orleans: “They should have gotten out! They should have gotten to Superdome, they should have… they should have…” We can assign blame but we can’t understand the logic. We can assign blame but we can’t grasp their lives. We can assign blame but many of us would take the same route in our suburban homes that these people did in their urban apartments and houses.

We truly don’t understand shit with regards to poverty and the plight of the working class if we’re going to keep allowing corporate interests and special interests to control the country with their interests at heart, not the interests of the citizens of the United States. I don’t believe Bush can grasp what the common person suffers. I could never believe John Kerry (or Hillary Clinton) would be able to comprehend it either, or Al Gore… It’s the same-old aristocrat class that is so out of touch with America that we suffer at their ineptitude.

In fact we’re dying because of their out-of-touch status.

Kanye’s blast at Bush is a blast at the fact the government has turned a blind eye on these people — and they’ll continue to do so from both parties unless we wise up and vote with our heads… We need leadership in this country, and we’re not going to get it from someone who doesn’t understand what it is to live among the people.

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 41% on Fuckedness

Link: The How Fucked by Bush You Are Test written by leelander on OkCupid Free Online Dating

Newsweek

But before you dance or roll your eyes at the news, take a look at part of the story:

Explaining that he had obtained last-minute “personal consent” from his source, Cooper was able to avoid a jail sentence for contempt of court.

Rove conscented being revealed?