Homeless homes!

Austin has been developing individual housing for "chronically homeless" people.  It will soon be opening to allow them to move in.  There are small cottages and health care available to them on site...and a community garden! The residents will pay a small monthly rent and it will function as a way for them to get their lives back in order.

Teepees and cottages are available for homeless people.
 click photo for link to the KUT article about the village

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His house

This is awesome.  Not practical from an environmental preservation point of view, but really awesome.

This picture is from apartmenttherapy's story about the book,
if you click on the picture it will take you to a video.

An artist in Denmark had this book cut as a replicate of his house so you can flip through the pages and go through the house





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Male Breast Cancer Awareness Week

This week is male breast cancer awareness week (Oct 17-23).  We have talked about breast cancer on this blog, but rarely mentioned men.  So here is a trailer for a documentary about two men with breast cancer.




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Sexism

Click this image to see ads from UN Women on Behance

UN Women used real google searches to show how pervasive sexism is currently.

Click this image for story from AdWeek

How much do you spend?

Lately, my weekly grocery budget has been on my mind.  I realized that when I moved from Berkeley to Austin I was forced to increase my budget because there were not as many cheap fresh food options, and again when I moved further east (now I am in Florida), I have had to increase my budget.

I mentioned to one of my coworkers that I spend at the most about $30 on groceries for the week (not including eating out, which I don't do every week). He was very surprised that I could live on such a small budget, but I tend to eat a lot of cheap things (rice, beans, pasta) and make most food from scratch and from my garden (I made pesto last night with my own basil, yum!), so I also mostly buy fresh fruits and vegetables.

source

This is an interesting take on the cost of a weeks worth of groceries for families around the world. I was surprised by the small amounts many of them need, and also shocked by the huge amounts of food many people buy (how many 2-liter bottles of coke can you drink in a week?).  But mostly it was very interesting to compare the different types of foods that are purchased.  The commentary says that in Ecuador they eat guinea pig, and ice cream sundaes were invented in America (so it's a societal pressure that is making me love ice cream...I'm ok with that).  Further, the percentage of the purchase (space wise at least) that consists of beverages if pretty ridiculous; beer, soda, tequila.  The poorer families did not make beverage purchases.

I can't speak to the authenticity of the stories associated with each picture (they got the pictures from many different sources but seem to be able to comment about details of the individuals in the pictures), but it still made me think about what I'm buying and how much I'm spending.

Also, the website (http://likes.com/chrisnhr/what-a-week-of-groceries-looks-like-around-the-world?) has lots of ads and things that are pretty annoying, so just ignore that.

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Don't drink the blue liquid

Richard Neill asked a simple question on facebook to a maxipad company (Bodyform)...

Hi , as a man I must ask why you have lied to us for all these years . As a child I watched your advertisements with interest as to how at this wonderful time of the month that the female gets to enjoy so many things ,I felt a little jealous. I mean bike riding , rollercoasters, dancing, parachuting, why couldn't I get to enjoy this time of joy and 'blue water' and wings !! Dam my penis!! Then I got a girlfriend, was so happy and couldn't wait for this joyous adventurous time of the month to happen .....you lied !! There was no joy , no extreme sports , no blue water spilling over wings and no rocking soundtrack oh no no no. Instead I had to fight against every male urge I had to resist screaming wooaaahhhhh bodddyyyyyyfooorrrmmm bodyformed for youuuuuuu as my lady changed from the loving , gentle, normal skin coloured lady to the little girl from the exorcist with added venom and extra 360 degree head spin. Thanks for setting me up for a fall bodyform , you crafty bugger

 
This is how they responded
It has some very good information in it.  And is also hilarious.
 


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Passive Accident Speak

Lately, my urban planning/transportation enthusiast/etc personality has manifested as a bitter speaker against passive "accident" speak. A couple weeks ago, a woman was driving to work in a suburb of Chicago when she crashed her car into a building a died. The article stated "woman on her way to work dies when her car crashes into building" and in the actual text of the article it never mentioned that she was even driving, just that the car, somehow on it's own I guess, crashed into the building, maybe with the intent to murder her... I'm not really sure. However, today, I discovered a new low in passive accident writing when I saw this article title on the Chicago Tribune website:

In the Tribune's defense, the article itself was not quite as passive, but really "Man leans out car window, killed by parked car" ummm.... I'm not really sure how the parked car decided to kill the man, but, I guess so. Granted, I think the title would be a little long if it said something like "Man leans out car window and was dragged out of said car when driver got close to parked cars and he did not pull himself back in in time for him to hit a parked car on the side of the road" but.. it could have said "killed when hitting a parked car" or something a little bit more related to the fact that the parked car did NOTHING in this whole process, except be parked on the side of the road. Don't get me wrong, I hate parking, and cars kinda in general, but .... it irks me that the responsibility of this crash (not accident!) is placed on the parked car in this title.

And with that, I will end my bitter rant... for now.

R