Psycho Metrics

My UK passport needs renewing.

My beloved niece, The Stevieniece, is getting married next summer and I must travel to Skeeter Pits, Saskatchewan, to help her on her journey into domestic blisters. The new rules say I can't just gad about crossing the border with only my green card¹ and a UK birth certificate, and that means renewing the passport I got in 1996.

Thing is, the UK has stampeded headlong into the biometric documentation business and requires all sorts of things be done that are awkward in the extreme if one does not happen to be in the UK when one is trying to comply with their bally rules.

The first awkward thing is the addition of a couple of hundred dollars to the cost, on account of the extra bureaucracy that must be set up to process my passport when I enter and leave the UK. Which I don't plan on doing this side of avian pig evolution day. I dunno about you, but I find coming up with a couple of hundred dollars on spec more than a little awkward, especially when it's for something so appallingly badly thought-out as these MK1 portable ID theft vehicles. It used to be that the terrorist would have to actually steal the document to abuse your credentials. Now all they have to do is scan them from close range. No doubt I shall be able to foil this dastardly plan by wrapping the passport in a aluminum foil wallet. Foiled by foil as it were. Of course, trying to get the ruddy thing in and out of this improvised Faraday cage so it can be used for what it is intended for will be a trial, but no sacrifice (on my part) is too great for Western Governments in the fight against global terrorism these days.

The second awkward thing is the sizing and pose for the pictures. It seems that in order for the computer chip to work properly, I cannot be photographed as I was for my last three passports, but must pose just so with my glasses off (to reduce glare). Great now I have to pull off my specs at every fbleeping passport check just so some fbleeping sorry-arsed computer system, well below the Star Trek state-of-the-art assumed by the shirt-for-brains politicians who specified the requirements of the system, can spend an eternity deciding what a human could in about a second: whether I look like me in the photo. Not only that, the instruction sheet demands the sizes of the face, head and so forth conform to (non-standard in the US) dimensions laid out in metric (again, non-standard in the US). If the fbleeping dimensions are so fbleeping critical (no less that 29mm chin to top of head, no more than 34mm for fbleeps sake), you'd think that there would be software available to scale the images properly. Not so, of course.

I spent about an hour with a very helpful but increasingly frustrated photographer at Sears as we attempted to get the scale of the photograph just right. The job was complicated because there was no provision for adding a ruler to the image displayed on the computer screen (good choice, anonymous software designer) and I didn't have a transparency of the required head size, just a PDF I found after about an hour of searching the labyrinthine UK Government websites. Sizing the photograph involved guessing, printing and comparing with a folded copy of the PDF.

It was all very irritating.

I wouldn't mind, but you have to figure that the bad guys already have equipment for ripping out the information on the biometric chips.

1. Which is neither green nor made of card↑

Weather Considered As A Metaphor For the American Condition

Why is is raining?

Why is it so cold even I am begining to consider wearing a jacket?

When the son of Osama Bin Laden has already said that the murderous pigfbleeper only uses disposable one-use cell phones, how is tapping my land-line sans warrant helping to catch him?

How are we ever going to be able to explain Guantanamo Bay to our grandchildren?

The Wheels Are Coming Off. Literally.

So today I turned from the main road into the mile-long (or so) drag past a school to Wyandanch rail station and was almost hit by a police cruiser pulling out from behind the doughnut shop on the corner. Who proceeded to bust my balls by driving at 25 in the 30 mph zone and 35 in the 40 mph one.

Since the cop was a typical NY driver he positioned himself on the crown of the road, making it easy for me to take up a better, more curbward position and show everyone piling up behind me who the culprit causing the obstruction was.

Good police work there. What a shame these bastions of the law weren't anywhere when the wheels were pulled off the white sedan now propped up on two cinderblocks¹ in the Wyandanch car park, having entered this wheelless configuration two nights ago. This being the third day in the last seven someone has removed the wheels from a vehicle in this car park without either the owners consent or the ever vigilant police doing anything to stop them. Well done there, officers of the local PD.

[Aside] Well done blogsot too. I've spent days trying to get the much vaunted picture upload to work but it keeps vomiting an error message so useless it could have been written by a Microsoft staffer. If you would like to see the car anyway, follow this link. If the link does not work, leave a comment to that effect and I'll see what else needs to be switched off or on.

I even tried to do the decent thing and report this vehicle two nights ago. The operator asked if I was the owner. When I said no they blew me off and hung up. To appreciate the irony of this to the fullest, you need to be aware of the anti-terrorism mantra being disseminated via tannoy on the subways and LIRR (and no doubt Metro North too): If you see something, say something.

Being a (basically) law-abiding person, wanting to do my bit to thwart the evil f***ers who exist only to hate and destroy and having lived through my youth in terrorist-targeted UK cities, I've done quite a bit of seeing and saying of late. Some examples of seeing and saying to other commuters and the results follow:

1. Guy bolts from subway car just as doors close. No train on the opposite platform. I say to the people sitting in the seats he just left "Did he leave anything under his seat?" I ask. Blank looks. I repeat, more forcefully "Did he leave anything under his seat?" and get only scowls and "nutcase" body language back. I take a deep breath and say very slowly "Did the guy who just left the car in a manner that prevented anyone following him leave anything under his seat? The seat you are sitting on? Anything that might go 'Bang!'?" That provokes them to look. Oh yeah, New Yorkers are on the ball all right
2. A guy boards the LIRR train, waits until everyone is seated, leaves his briefcase in the entry plenum of the car and starts to walk to the other end. A fellow commuter points out the bag to me. I stand up and loudly² yell "Who owns this briefcase?" Blank looks from the crowd and the guy owns up and says he is going to the bathroom. "Take it with you!" I insist. Crowd begins to mutter about my mental capacity, guy says he will be back soon. "Take it with you" I insist. "If it explodes, it is going to take you with it first!" At this point the crowd "gets it" and changes sides. Oh yeah, vigilance is our watchword
3. I am about to disembark from the LIRR train at Wyandanch when I notice a bag on a bench seat with an electric cord running from its insides to the power socket under the seat³, no-one in attendance. I turn to the young lady in the seat rank next to it. "Did you see who left this bag?" I ask. I get a blank look. "Did you see who left this bag here?" I ask again. "What's it to you?" she responds. "Does it bother you?" "No" I reply as the doors opened, "But it might bother you why someone would leave a bag with a hidden device in it, and it might bother you what sort of device needs power and the absence of the person who brought it aboard." I step off before she can react. Oh yeah. Eyes on the prize, no question.

That's just for starters. Then we have the official response. Like the time I saw a guy inside one of the news vendor stores in Penn Station with a camera and telephoto lens. He was pointing it at various people (and I would have thought that the guys browsing the porn racks would have objected at this point but they didn't) but every so often he would turn and sight through the register counters at the ticketing area of the station itself. I couldn't tell if he was shooting since today's cameras have all-but silent mechanisms, but even so it was a bit suspicious to me. Add to that his "Mediterranean" or "Middle Eastern" complexion and looks (I admit to profiling a bit here) and my hackles were, rightly or wrongly, up.

I left the premises and looked about but couldn't see a single cop or national guardsman (or guardswoman), normally thick on the ground but that night invisible, so I made a beeline for the MTA police office. There I attempted to report the suspicious activity, only to be told "Well, technically speaking you are allowed to take photographs in the station now". Seldom has my flabber been so completely ghasted. I looked at officer dimwit and said "Well, you guys are saying If you see something, say something and I've just seen something that, were I back in London, would have me phoning the police. I no longer use this station, so I won't be here when the ticket area is bombed." and I left. Oh yeah, highly trained in anti terrorist measures these guys.

1: UK breezeblocks
2: I truly had no idea just how well my voice carried until that incident. Je suis un foghorn when needs must
3: Used to power cleaning equipment like vacuum cleaners, power washers and so forth

Extra! Extra! Read All Abaht It!

In breaking news yesterday the NYPD started a radiation sweep to determine background levels for some purpose probably having to do with the war on terror. They found a park in Staten Island which had very high levels of radium contamination hitherto unsuspected¹, left over from some dumping operation (Staten Island is essentially one big landfill which explains why their periodic threats to secede from NYC are treated with humour instead of the vicious reprisals such lack of loyalty demand).

Speaking for myself I find great comfort in finally being able to breathe easier knowing as I now do that were a 'dirty bomb' to go off in NYC, chances are no-one would be able to tell the difference.

Of course, this represents the most awful PR disaster for Mayor Bloomberg. If he had been on the ball and in the know, he could have tipped off the President years ago and the search for WMD could have come up with a result which didn't require all that mucking about in Johnny Arabland. The troops could have been sent to La Guardia for a fraction of the cost of a trip to Bagdhad, and could have taken in a performance of "Phantom" before their triumphant return home to Washington DC bearing "Mission Accomplished" pennants.

To those who object to the jocular comparison of a legendarily run-down, cratered, un-navigable, war-torn flea-infested pestilential stench-hole with a hub of international travel I say "Well, I don't suppose Baghdad is very nice now either".

1: except by the fire department who apparently knew all along but weren't telling anyone not wearing big yellow rubber boots according to the rather confused report I saw last night.²
2: This, more than anything, highlights the importance of having good relations with your fire department. Be nice to your firemen, lest they hide all the really good radium contaminated waste. Words to live by.

Dancing in New York - The Mumbai Knee-Jerk

On Wednesday, in a bizarre "ramping up" of "security", two State Troopers were standing outside the Wyandanch LIRR Station-house. They made no move to board the train, nor was there any visble police presence on the train during my ride to Brooklyn. Where I was bag-checked¹, presumably because word is out that I have a less-than-stellar view of the LIRR sometimes. Wednesday evening we had terrific thunderstorms, and to celebrate the LIRR first rescheduled my train to another track² then drove it into a dead section of track³ filled with other stranded trains at the Queens/Nassau County border, reinforcing my high opinion of the competence of the dispatchers. We backed out to Queens Village in surprisingly short order⁴ and were able to switch tracks, pick up speed and drive back into the thunderstorm (which was travelling East) in time for a good soaking as we walked to our cars.

Thursday, there was one State Trooper standing halfway down the platform. He also made no move to board the train and there were no badges or uniforms in evidence other than the usual LIRR ones. The LIRR was not hampered by bad weather all day, and was thus forced to deliver me relatively on-time both to work and to my home again afterwards. Well done LIRR. The bag-swipe station was still in action, but I was allowed to pass through the turnstile to the subway sans chemically wiped bag.

Today (Friday) there was a State Trooper sitting in a cruiser parked fifty feet from the eastermost end of the platform on the other side of the road. The LIRR performed flawlessly. The bag-check was there, but I was not asked to hand over my bag.

I have no idea whether terrorists are in actual fact targetting the LIRR. I expect they have all been frightened off by federal pokings into my bank accounts and phone call logs, but I have to say that were I in fact a desperate fellow, determined to blow up the LIRR with my luggage, one State Trooper seated so far away he/she couldn't possibly see me on the platform at the station-house end wouldn't be much of a deterrent.

For the record, I firmly believe that the only way to deal with a campaign of urban terrorism is enhanced vigillance from the urbanites themselves. If I were to level a complaint about the State and Federal responses to the terrorists it would be the lackluster attempts at public information dissemination. No prime-time TV ads telling people what to look for and what to do in the event of a suspicious package coming into their perception. As an ex-pat Englishman I know the power of such commercials. All the ex-pats here complain that drivers in NY don't dip/dim their headlights. What they often forget is that the only reason they have good habits in that area is the ads that ran from the 60's through the 80's with the "Dip, Don't Dazzle" slogan. Were proper informational/indoctrinational materials broadcast into the prime viewing of people in NY I am certain that it would be money well spent compared to the millions that are beinmg thrown around now trying for a technological quick-fix - something I am certain will never be practical.

1: A chemical wipe was swabbed around me zips. It was dead embarrasing.
2: It isn't the re-tracking that bothers everyone, It is the rather annoying fact that every time it happens the 6:04 Ronkonkoma train is not assigned a track until the 6:07 Babylon one is safely in dock. This pattern of passenger abuse is also de rigeur at Penn Station. All the important people (such as LIRR CEOs and so forth) live on the south shore apparently.
3: It happens. Lightning trips breakers or causes deadfalls that block the track. But why oh why do they continue to run trains into a blocked section? Do the dispatchers really believe that if they load the track enough the problem will suddenly self-correct? Are they, in fact, morons? I know which I'm betting on.
4: SOP is to sit for 10-20 minutes, then announce that we are in a dead section and that the railroad is deciding whether to have us wait or reverse out to the nearest switch and change tracks, wait ten more minutes, make the announcement again, wait ten minutes, announce and immediately pull forward and continue the journey. Two minutes into this progress, announce that we are now moving. This is know as the "Well, Duh" school of public information.