I bought a breathalyzer earlier in the week. It arrived yesterday and good thing. I purchased it because I am sick of my friends driving drunk. It happens at least once a week and no matter what you say to them they insist they are sober. I believe drunk driving is a plague on our society. Yesterday my friend was trying to leave after a night of heavy drinking. After arguing with him I brought out the breathalyzer for its first trial. It worked, seeing the flashing red number made him think twice about driving. I am glad I invested in one, even happier with the price I got on it. It was a $150 unit that I found for $81 and free shipping. It really pays to contact the manufacturer. The most importaint thing I have to watch for is that people don't use it for games. Nothing would piss me off more than people sitting around and seeing who can get drunk and blow higher.

Good for Brandon. His blog got a little attention in the media. The Observer-Eccentric interviewed Brandon about his photo-essay. Not only was the article framed around, him but they used his photos in the paper. Check out his blog. http://roorings.blogspot.com/

I decided to do my photo essay on the roundabouts that are going to be installed soon in the Bloomfield-Farmington area. I did some research online and found the intersections that were being considered for the roundabout project. Surprisingly the Free Press was my most helpful source. I was unable to find all seven locations, MDOT only had four listed. A problem from the start was that none of the projects had been started. Because of this I was unable to capture any construction in progress. I decided to visit these locations and get pictures of the intersections and surrounding areas. Once I got going I realized the pictures I would be able to take would not show the viewer much. From the ground I was only able to capture the road, street signs and traffic lights. I balanced this by mixing in satellite photos from Google Earth. I edited these photos by marking the positions where the pictures were taken. I as well gave an approximation of the area captured in the photo. I thought this would help to put the seeming random picture into context. When I went to the intersection I tried to get photos from all corners of the intersections. However, some came out better than others and I did not use all of them. The one thing I learned was people are much more conscious of pedestrians in Ann Arbor than in Farmington. I almost got hit three times navigating the 14, Northwestern, and Orchard Lake intersection. I was being conscious and waited for a walk sign, the drivers seemed to simply be oblivious. This is why I don’t think roundabout will work. Most drivers are unaware of how to navigate in unusual situations. These roundabouts will cause a large amount of problems for new and inexperienced drivers. Tuesday my friend David reminded me he had a roundabout in his neighborhood. I went and checked it out. It was indeed a roundabout, just on a very small scale. This concerned me because Dave said all the neighbors have problems with drivers going the wrong way or simply blowing through the stop signs. The photo essay did not come out as flashy as I would have liked, however, it does provides a good foundation for the argumentative paper which I will do on the same topic.

When most of us think of roundabout this is the images that comes to mind. This is the Arch de Triumph, probably the most famous roundabout in the world. Until now runabouts have been a foreign presence to most of us. There are a few scattered around the state, but now they are coming to the Bloomfield and Farmington area. Roundabout are used to control intersection traffic by collecting traffic into a constant flowing circle. Statistically there are less accidents in a roundabout and it cuts down on wasted fuel by keeping traffic moving.

In this area there is a plan to install up to seven roundabouts. As of now two have been approved for construction. One will be installed at 14 Mile and Drake and another at 14, Northwestern, and Orchard Lake.

14 Mile and Drake Road.

This satellite photo gives a better perspective of the intersection.
The red buildings have significance in the roundabout project. When developed the city shafted the property owner and would not give him a permit to sell them as commercial properties.
The owner got the city back by building useless properties. When the city had to buy the land for the roundabout project the prices got driven up significantly.

14 Mile, Orchard Lake, Northwestern Highway
This is the only roundabout that I think will actually be useful. Here three main roads intersect and it is rather confusing. There are are five traffic lights here that will be removed and replaced with yield signs.


The next three pictures were taken from the central island. This chunk of land is perfect for a roundabout because it is un-devolopable for business and is currently owned by the city.


On the north-west corner there is a small wetland preserve. This reserve will be destroyed in the building process. It's not a very large area, only around 200' by 100'. Still it provides nice scenery and home to natural life.

12 Mile and Orchard Lake RoadThis is one of the most dangerous intersections in the state. There are a lot of accidents here and MDOT hopes a roundabout will cut down on incidents.
There are businesses on every corner. The building process will obstruct and slow business until the completion of the project.

15 Mile and Drake Road

I don't think a roundabout would be useful here. The traffic flow is not that intense and a traffic light seems to work fine. The building process will probably cause more harm and frustration than good.
Since these satellite photos were taken there has been significant development in the surrounding areas.

The final picture is a roundabout that is located in my friends neighborhood. This is particularly concerning because of the neglect for the roundabout-rules. Its marked one way around with three stop signs. People do not follow these rules and go both ways around the island. Even worse I am told people rarely even yield to the stop signs.

I decided to do my photo paper on the roundabouts going into our area in the next few years. I thought I would start with the cross streets where the roundabouts are going to be built. I went out and took pictures over the weekend. They came out horrible. I was standing next to the intersections and tryed to take pictures that captured the entire intersection. Most my pictures just look like cars driving on the road. To fix this problem I am going to work in images from GoogleEarth. Still it's going to be difficult to capture good pictures on my own. I could perhaps try to get on top of a building or find some way of getting a better perspective of the road. Any ideas would be helpful...

Today is going to be fun... It's 12:40 p.m. on Thursday and all my friends are drunk. Some how my group of friends came to the realization that St. Patty's day is about going through your daily routine drunk. While this may be the case with many college students I feel its a stretch. Since the holiday falls on a Saturday and everyone would be krunk* anyways, Erick decided to designate Thursday as observed St. Patty's Day. They picked up a keg of green beer this morning and started drinking at 9am. My girlfriend started at 10 after her exam. I could be opposed because I don't get to participate. Being I attend a commuter campus the drinking during school doesn't accommodate well. Either way we all know what St. Patty's Day is about... Honoring this man...

Today the topic of discussion is graffiti. Personal I have mixed feelings on the issue. I think it's utter destruction of property, but at the same time it's very intriguing. There are many reasons why people will tag something. Often it only serves the purpose of impressing friends, you can see this in pointless messages and sloppy tags. Often there are professional street artists. These people are getting a message across or trying to have their art reach the public. This can simply be seen in artistic ability and strong outlining. I searched FLICKR, one of those photo websites, in attempts to find some relevant street-art. There were three photos that immediately stirred interest. The first is of a wall on a playground. This was probably a mural because of its grandness and appropriateness. I thought the color scheme was fun and if anything there is an uplifting message. The second was a very creative poster. I'm not even going to explain it, look for yourself. The final image I selected was confusing. I understand it, just not the artists motivation behind it. As far as tagging people and items in a photo I think most peers of mine would understand it. Facebook has taught us so much...

I have no idea what I want to do this photo essay on. I asked my friend Zach and he thought I should document my St. Patties day. It fits the concept of in the local neighborhood, but I don't want it to be just pictures of my friends drinking. Perhaps if I kept it tasteful and tried to tell a story of the night. Better yet, i'll get a new idea... Just as soon as it hits me. It's still a possibility to cover the issue of new roundabouts in West Bloomfield. Being none have been built I would be limited in possible photography. It would be interesting to try and photo shop the area to predict how the roundabouts would work. I think it would be more beneficial to save that topic for the argumentative paper. Still looking for the idea.

So I quit smoking... Needless to say I have been rather moody. Its day 5*, I don't know exactly. All I know is I have been an asshole. I got really sick of my girlfriend telling me all the risks involved with smoking. If they cured cancer tomorrow I would light up in a second. I think that's how the future will be. As soon as cancer gets a simple cure people will start smoking like the French. If AIDS was cure I could guarantee there would be a huge rise in promiscuous sex. I have such good decision making skills.

Free Press

When searching local issues the economy is still the greatest factor. Personally, I really enjoy reading the prep. sports articles. I played for three teams in high school and it's nice to be able to follow them online. The Free press does a good job of telling the news pretty unbiased. However, it's not uncommon to find interjections of personal opinions or assumptions. This isn't a totally bad thing when dealing with the local news. Assumptions are usually in the form of predicting impacts or the population's stance on the issue. Example being the article on roundabouts being added in West Bloomfield. In the next few years there is going to be seven added within ten miles of my house. This scares me. I know how to drive a roundabout, it's really not that hard. It's the other drivers that worry me. Teenage Bloomfield drivers in mommy's Lexus, who struggle with normal driving conditions will not be able to comprehend the circular chaos. When they first get installed there will be a lot of accidents - which will take a very long time to clear, halting traffic. The Free Press really focuses on the topic's impact on the community. The articles are not simply telling a story, but why you should care as a citizen. This presents a human factor. The paper doesn't over use the human factor, which is good, but it does have a place in the paper. I think I am going about the roundabouts, simply because of the relevance to my community. In the next five years they will become so common place it will be impossible to navigate West Bloomfield without having to deal with one. The only reason this would be a problem is because the paper is going to be based on pictures. No construction has started yet so it would be rather difficult to find relivent pictures. If this idea doesn't work out I may want to explore somthing dealing with urban devolopement. Anything that would provide me the chance to go out and take some pictures.

Best Buy Adventure

I have absolutely nothing to write about, so I am going to tell my avid readers about my venture to Best Buy. Richard had to go to a meeting so I went in to return his PSP for him. He broke it last week; probably looking at Internet porn. Regardless he did not have a product replacement plan for it. So I decided I would try use mine and get Richie's replaced. Disappointing, it did not go as well as planed. The lady at the counter asked for my phone number and I gave her mine, not remembering my girlfriend bought me the PSP for my birthday. After looking through my dad's purchases and seeing over twenty PSP units she was confused not to find a single replacement plan. I then remembered, spoke up, and gave her my girlfriend's phone number. Success. All was going well until the lady, for some reason, decieded to check the PSP's serial number. Botched. When my PSP broke and I traded it in, it was no questions asked. Just took a look at it and gave me a new one. However, the trip was not a waste. I got some new paper work and a phone number to replace the PSP. We are going to try tomorrow at a different Best Buy. (Feeling Guilty)

Response to Free Press

News about the economy seems to comprise the largest chunk on freep.com. The top two stories being Comerica's relocation to Dallas and breaking news on DiamlerChrylser. It's good to finally catch a glimpse of good news coming from the motor companies. The Grant case is still in the news. It will probably still get face time for another two weeks to come. Overall I dislike the Free Press. I find online news is much better at BBC America. For international BBC is the way to go. No need to respond.