I got an email from a fellow Arlingtonian with some video of Alewife in the rain; he’d seen my post about Alewife leaking. It’s a cell phone video so the quality isn’t that great, but the subject matter is pretty clear.
Is that column supposed to be spurting water? I can just hear Dan Grabauskas now: “If you see something, say something!” Dan, I say that Alewife is a dump.
October was a month of breathless financial reporting. Â There was a lot to be breathless about – the markets were crazy, day after day after day. Â I know that every editor told every reporter “Explain why this is happening!” It was what the readers wanted, and hell, it might even land a Pulitzer if you got it right.
What happened was that everyone who had an axe to grind brought it out for sharpening. Â Depending on who you talked to, the problem was:
Each one of those explanations left me unsatisfied.  The arguments were all made by the usual suspects, making the usual, predictable arguments.  “Sure, that might be part of the problem,” I said to myself, “but that’s too glib and leaves too much unexplained.”
So far, I think that Michael Lewis is closest to the real truth. Â We’ll see if history agrees.
Alewife station is such a dump. Â Every time it rains the lobby is littered with bowls, small trash barrels, and giant, rolling trash barrels, each centered under a leak. Â Most of them are overflowing.
I confess that I drove to Alewife today, rather than bike – the heavy rain turned me into a wuss. Â At 9AM, the only parking spots are on the roof, and I parked there.
Returning this evening, I found that not only was the escalator to the roof out of order, but so was the the escalator the fourth floor. Â Flooding, I presume. Â So, I took the stairs. Â And had to slosh my way up the stairs, stepping through running water sluicing down each step.
What a dump.
UPDATE: A video of Alewife leaking.
I started Twitter the way many people do: by mocking it. Â “Why would anyone want to know what I’m having for breakfast?” Â After enough positive reviews, I figured what’s the harm in giving it a try? Â I tried. It moved from “try” to an interesting experiment to a real medium. Â I have more regular Twitter readers than I do blog readers. Â I have more Facebook readers, but they get my Twitter feed, so that point is kind of moot. Â If I want to say something, and I want to be heard, Twitter is my biggest megaphone – and people listen.
Today was a new threshold – Twitter gave me information that no one else could. Â
Over the weekend, my iPhone dropped off the net.  No text messages, no emails, no voicemail, no phone calls.  (Note the order there.  My “phone” is rarely used for phone calls.)  I was pretty sure the phone was fine, and confirmed that by traveling around.  I know my house wasn’t the problem because I’d been using it lots at home.  AT&T’s support was unavailable.  I entered a support request on an awful form, one that had a required field for “problems with your phone” even though my phone had no problems.  Still no response on that, 48 hours later.  At times I marvel that I willingly give a company $500/year for such crappy service.
I also tweeted: “Having all sorts of problems with my cell signal. AT&T appears to be having equipment problems in Arlington/Lexington.” Â It was a message in a bottle. Â I didn’t expect an answer. Â Really, I was just posting to a few hundred friends in case they were wondering why I wasn’t returning their call.
Lo and behold, I got a reply.  I have no idea who this guy is.  Apparently he lives less than a mile away from me.  But he knew my problem, and he knew  why I was having the problem: “@dunster I saw your Arlington/AT&T related Tweet. The tower on Route 2 near Dow Ave is fuct. They’ve been working on it all weekend.”  Here’s this guy I don’t know, but he can see my problem and see the cause of the solution – and he can share the information in a meaningful way, and the world can see the answer.
This is a powerful network effect.Â
Obama is going to be President. Â That’s a big historical milestone for our country, and I’m glad I could witness it. Â On a more tactical level, I can’t say that I’m excited about it. Â Passing union-supported card-check legislation? Â Writing blank checks to failing car companies? I’m not jumping for joy. Â I will admit it beats the likely alternative – McCain would be worse. Â “Best alternative” and “good choice” are very different in this case, I fear.
Obama wasn’t the big story for me. Â The biggest question this November was the decision to ban gay marriage in California. Â 52% of the state voted to prohibit gay marriage. Â They should be ashamed of themselves. Â For whatever reason, devoted gay couples can’t make health care decisions for each other, can’t make property decisions, and can’t fill out wills like straight couples can. Â It’s just nuts.
I’d like to point out two other state questions: