THAT'S ME!!! The biggest attraction in Austin is that you CAN just float along. People live there for ten years and it's like a day. Dallas is eating at my soul: you have to accomplish, produce, make tons of money and spend it...consume produce consume produce. I MISS AUSTIN!! (My mantra since hitting The Spring) I just want to relax! I'm the prime minister of the Shiftless Workshy Slackers Club, and I'm proud to say I was recently crowned The Laziest Woman In the World. Wheee! Slack On!

Slack on Aubrey!

So now I'm in peals of laughter and my co-workers think I'm even more of a nutty nutty nut-case than before! It's a good thing my boss is President Emeritus of the SWSC, otherwise I'd be in beeg trouble, spending so much time quaffing deep of the cup of life at The Spring! (he got tenure 20 yrs ago and has done nothing but play video poker--tho not, thank god, video STRIP poker--since) If I were in a real Dallas job, I'd be in jail for pulling out an uzi by now. I quit my residency, refused a second p st-doc, and now I want to do a clinical research job usually performed by nurses (I'm an MD)(obviously, from the residency comment)--can you say UNDERACHEIVER?!@?! But I'm not bitter, no, and you gotta believe my folks are proud and happy they supported me all the way through 24 years of schooling for this!

I belong to an Utne salon full of semi-slackers, so it's cool. We hang. It's kind of funny when we get into it with the one or two non-slackers, tho--they can't seem to grasp the concept that we don't WANT to rush our lives away. Have you ever noticed that time passes slower the less you do? I used to just lie on my bed in Austin--I lived in a converted 4-plex in Tarrytown; my apt was constructed in large part from the 2nd story screened-in porch, so I had great wraparound panoramic tree-house windows -and look at the tree branches swaying. Oh, no, seriously no drugs--I'm truly the only teetotaling nonsmoking non druggie who has this much fun! So that's really how I think of Austin: lying on my futon with a cool breeze blowing, listening to KUT and letting my mind float.

I like that last image. I'm going up in the observatory in my house and open the windows later (all 12 of them) and catch one of those fine Austin breezes. Tell those folks at Utne to come on by for a visit. We'd love to pump things up more here. I just got off the phone to Ted Kircher, running for Mayor. I told him to get on Sammy and Bob's show right away. They'll love him with his stand on Capital Metro and Light Rail, the host issues now. MOre on this in politics conf. later.

"There's a couple of other places I like. A few cities. I like London and Paris and Austin, Texas." -- Jerry Seinfeld

I wonder if he meant: London, Texas; Paris, Texas; and Austin, Texas;

Excellent point.

Anybody seen the movie "Paris, Texas" ? Hard to explain, but somehow reminded me for years of happier days...

Never saw Paris Tx but seeing a new post on this thread has reminded me to rewatch Slacker and the Robot Group tapes. Mike aka Cosmo

Have you been to the Robot Groups new HQ out on S Congress?

nope...and you?

Not yet, Mel's been trying to get me to go to one of the meetings. It's a pretty well equipped robot workshop.

Hey there Where is the new HQ? When are the meetings? I heard the Robot Group reformed from Paco @ FringeWare. Still remember going to Discovery Hall back in the late 80's - never ran into the Robot Group per se but did sit in on the computer groups attempts to get a DEC up and running. Mike aka cosmo

It's out on S Congress and I'm not sure what days, but they have workshops two evenings each week. No more Teds Greek. They order out now.

Hey yall Well, thought Id make a post to this page in the new century... Rereading the old posts reminds me of distant summer days and the desire to go back. Ride the bike to Zilker or goof off in the green belt. Just need to work the logistics out. Just slacking away in the Windy City.... Mike aka Cosmo

Y'all just need to check out the Polynesian paralysis which inflicts the local folks in Hawaii. No Paris here, but we have palm trees set just far enough apart to string a hammock and close enough to the house to yell for a cold beer. Does that qualify?

Y'all Hawaian's can slack wif the best of um!

Some have refined their technique of having beer and food reachable without moving from the Hammock that when they fly interisland, they have to purchase two seats to be able to sit down! I have seen it with my very eyes! Yup! some o' us be worl'- class slackers!

Oy, gotta get those logistics sorted but I spend so much time goofing off that I cant seem to get to the logistics. That and multiple interests distracting me in various directions. oh well still slacking in Chi town.....

MikeMikeMike... I was worried about you dashing across the pond, herniating over a boatanchor then winding coils with more loops than the population of China... Now I find you are doing some first class slackin' Cross you off my worry list! *whew*

No need to worry - always been a slacker at heart even if my actions prove otherwise (curently typing while watching data packet streams zip across the laptop which is precariously balanced on the couch -trying to make heads or tails over the cryptic message structure....) Even from back in my Austin daze, tried to balance between being a techno goof (and not the 120bpm techno in this case) and still pay the rent. I sometimes ponder becoming a Zen Lunatic (per Keroac's Dharma Bums) but am way to engrossed in science and engineering. One thing I do notice in the silly work-a-day world is that there is a lot of technical work being done strictly for the $$. Does not seem like that work is very fun because its WORK and not technical play. One day I might figure out that balance - until then, I keep making small incremental steps towards understanding and not understanding and accepting.

Getting paid for doing what you love to do and would do anyway is the secret. Not too many doing that anymore, it seems. If you do figure out that balance, you can make millions explaining to others how you did it - but that would be WORK! Imagining you watching streaming packet bursts. good luck. The racket over SW is terrible. Hope it is good stuff they are sending (usually "me and my house and the dog" kinda pix as I remember.) Nah, not a Dharma Bum or a Zen anything. Your mind is far too active and needs better outlets than that. Keep up the slacking and the hunt for "The Balance."

Balance in chaos I wonder sometimes if that is just the default mode and go with it. After a crazy assed cross country drive between Austin to Dallas and back again, I get a bit perplexed - the whole place has really changed.... The drive started out simple enuf listening to Wagner then moving on to early 80's era Rush then finally to industrial sledgehammer pounding KMFDM Watching clouds of bats take flight from the Congress river bridge and wandering around the UT campus at night to then catch 8 1/2 Souvenirs at the Cactus Cafe. More driving still with philosophical banter, visits, more driving then ending up back here. Another good time to observe and then get back to all the techie projects waiting in the wings. Mike

Wow, Mike... Amazing how eclectic your tastes in music are! You are a not a bad writer, either. It must be all that atmosphere they have in Texas that makes one turn philosophical... I love the Wagner stuff...

Yea, my music tastes jump around quite a bit. Going thru the records and CD's of my past kinda outline phases and moods - mostly top 40 rock during high school then various shades of 60's psychedelia and experimental space rock as well as art-concept prog rock bands during college years. Then indie, folkie, Reggae, and punk/industrial during the Austin phase, then college radio, weird electronic ambient and 120+ bpm techno up to now. All this with smatherings of the previous musical objects thrown in as the CD player dictates. NOW, you know why I keep wanting to start up a pirate station! Been going through my pondering phase as of late which explains the ramblings but am getting re-focused back to the electronic projects which provide the anchor. de Mike p.s. the CA trip sounded way cool

Slacker, California style: Head for the High Sierra. Grazing at the local eateries on the way yielded BBQ of unexcelled flavor and tenderness and cost (very reasonable). Snow stilll beneath the enormous trees... viewed from the back seat of a Ford Probe with the snacks at my command. The entire trip was awesome...and way KEWL (as the natives here say.

I had a great time years ago on my visit to Grass Valley and Nevada City in the California Sierras. It's a great place to go hiking and exploring and there are a lot of attractions in these little towns.

Never made it up to far northern California - did get to tool around Marin county several times and admire the redwoods there. Big thrill also was down south in Silly Valley - drove around Stanford and got to drive over SLAC and see the big SETI dish. geek out de Mike

Awesome, Mike! Love that SETI software... Never got to Berkeley but I have been to Greenbank (W.Va.) and Jodrell Bank (Manchester, England) Didja got to Muir Woods? Had a really neat experience there I should post in Geo...

Summerfest today! I'm on my way. http://www.repeater.org I've been to Muir Woods and to the nearby Zen Center. And Mt. Tam.

Enjoy! Been up Mr Daiblo, too. No Zen center...

Got to drive around Mt. Tam - I was in the passenger seat and all I could remember was looking down past the railing at Redwoods where you could not see where the trunk ended. More thrilling than any roller coaster. Also went to Stinson beach to touch the Pacific.

Ah! Went to Half Moon Bay to touch Sir Walter Drake's water. Well, at least the same pacific he touched.