Jeff Harrell at Shape of Days is posting a great set of very personal, insightful travel essays from his vacation/voyage through the Florida Keys. Here they are in order:

• Arrivals
• Stopover
• Provisioning
• Departure
• Anchorage

My copy of FCP 5 finally arrived on Wednesday but I haven’t had a chance to open the box yet. It weighs twice as much as Noemi does (and doesn’t smile at all). I’ve gotten a few reports of minor changes to FXScript rendering resulting in small, apparently aspect-related distortions, but no one has complained that Joe’s Filters stopped working. So that’s good. I’m looking forward to getting under the hood and seeing what’s changed.

My parents are in town this weekend with my brother Ben, to see their newest granddaughter and enjoy a long-overdue vacation. I’ll be playing tour guide for most of the weekend, and I’m psychologically preparing myself for not getting much any work done over the next few days.

Times Square was beautiful tonight.

You are the only one person I know that will remove every plank of wood off of a ship to see when it would sink. And then happy beyond belief when you figure it out.

–Bruce, via IM.

At some point today I stumbled across a link to an article about an archaeologist claiming he’d located the Ark of the Covenant, Kabbalist Blesses Jones: Now’s the Time to Find Holy Lost Ark. Well that’s cool.

The archaeologist, Vendyl Jones is hard to pin down. Apparently the inspiration for Indiana Jones, I found plenty of links about him on conspiracy sites, right next to UFOs and the Illuminati, including a much cited story about him having three kidneys? But I kept reading because the story is long, well told and fascinating.

The center of this story lies in the contents of the Copper Scroll, one of the Dead Sea Scrolls which Vendyl has been studying for some 30 years. Though some think the whole scroll is a hoax, many believe it contains an inventory of the treasures of the First Temple, hidden away to keep them safe from the Romans. Vendyl’s story of piecing together the information in the scroll makes for very interesting reading.

The story of the Blue Aura reminded me that I once found that exact phenomenon at the bottom of a parking garage in Pasadena. There was a small hole between concrete slabs which was open for six or seven stories to the sky. At the right time of day, pure blue light would stream down. I went back several times and have never forgotten the quality of that light.

Further poking around in Vendyl’s site lead me to the story of Haym Salomon, a key figure in the American Revolution, who was Jewish, and whom I’d never heard about before. I got there reading a Jones essay titled “A Real National Treasure” in his foundation’s self published Researcher Newspaper (pdf link, page 9). The bulk of that essay was a fascinating Kabbalist breakdown of the symbolism in the Great Seal of the United States, based on the possibly erroneous belief that Haym Salomon designed the seal (The US Department of State’s official Great Seal pdf booklet doesn’t mention Haym Salomon at all). Usually the seal is explored via the symbolism of the Freemasons. According to the often dubious Wikipedia entry on Haym Solomon, he might or might not have also had a hand in crafting the US Constitution. I’m not sure how much to believe here, but the anti-Semetic conspiracy fringe seems to believe Salomon is responsible for all sorts of things. Those people would be funny if they weren’t so frightening.

I’m not sure what to make of Vendyl Jones, he seems like the sort of character who is either prophetically correct or consumed by madness. I don’t think anyone’s eyeballs will melt from their skulls if does find it, but discovering the actual Ark from the First Temple with a clearly described historical lineage would have a significant impact on the course of world events and all followers of Judiasm, Christianity and Islam.

Crazy stuff, fun to think about.

A Hamburger Today is a new burger-centric site that seems initially focused on NYC burgers. Something I know a bit about. Their initial reviews tend towards the current superstars* of the NYC burger scene, Shake Shack, Corner Bistro and Burger Joint behind the curtain at the Le Parker Meridien hotel, as well as a few lesser known places like Island Burger, Lucky burger and the unfortunately flailing Blue 9.

I’m looking forward to reading their takes on some other places like Peter Luger, Westville or The Burger Joint (the new slider place on Third Ave and 20th) as well as any attempt to rate burgers at any of the million NYC diner/lunch counters, the 3rd Avenue Joe Juniors being my neighborhood favorite.

* I grew up in California, Super Star was a semi-intentional pun.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden
The New York (Bronx) Botanical Garden

The New York Botanical Garden was founded by the the Torrey Botanical Club and Nathaniel Lord and Elizabeth Britton in 1891, though the history seems to be in dispute. The garden was primarily a scientific and educational catalog, “a place of agreeable public resort” was its secondary purpose. The Torrey Botanical Club also contributed to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s Herbarium in 1897.

But I still have no idea why one is Botanical and the other Botanic.

I like to be on time, but the court seem to have built in a significant amount of time for people who aren’t. Roll call on day two wasn’t for 20 minutes after the set time. Men are overwhelmingly worse at arriving on time. Day one started with a insanely banal 30 minute Important Video with Ed Bradley! and Dianne Sawyer! filmed at least 10 years ago. I remembered this video from my third-previous jury call, probably 1995 or 96, the one where I read all 576 pages of Hesse’s Magister Ludi: The Glass Bead Game and was dismissed from a jury because I thought I’d met the defendant’s husband at a gallery opening in Orange County sometime around 1990. That was also the time I got to spend all of my wait time in a room at 60 Centre St., which is a far more inspired and inspiring building than the utilitarian box-world of 110 Centre St. 60 Centre is the building where they film Law & Order’s courtroom scenes.

The best day to be called seems to be Thursday. I’ve lucked into a Thursday call my last two summonses. Nothing ever seems to happen on Fridays and twice they’ve let the entire pool go home after two days. There were somewhere around four jury pools called on Thursday, none on Friday. We all sat around until 12:50pm, at which point they let everyone go with credit for two full days served and at least two years before our next summons.

If at all possible, get a seat in the main room. In the side rooms, you need to stand and go to the door every time there’s a call. In the main room, all I needed to do was take out my earphones for a minute whenever they spoke on the microphone. Far less disruptive. There were plugs along the wall, I was on time so I grabbed one up front.

The bathrooms are unpleasant, so I tried to drink as little as possible. One very strong coffee with sugar on my way out of the house held me until lunch. Chinatown is right behind the courts, and it would be a shame to eat anywhere else when that close. On Thursday I went to my favorite hole-in-the-ground Vietnamese place (it’s in a basement) for a light curry over rice, shrimp summer rolls and a Cafe su da (the strongest, best iced coffee I’ve ever had). All were excellent, I skipped the Phö because I was trying to keep liquid intake at a minimum.

When leaving the courthouse, always take the stairs if you are able. The elevators are overcrowded and slow. I’m fast, but without trying I made it down three floors before the elevator had finished loading (there’s a tv monitor showing elevator locations).

Don’t bring a cellphone with a camera. Security will make you check it at the front desk and the line to retrieve those phones looked to be a longer wait than my subway ride and walk home. I heard people complaining about the camera ban (people are always complaining, especially at jury duty), but that rule was in place long before cell phones had cameras.