⊕i never fully grasped how many people own dogs until being greeted by frenzied barking and floor skittering upon approaching what feels like literally every doorstep. it always takes a while for people to open their door too because there's always several seconds of struggle to restrain the dogs, or sometimes they give up and just crack the door open. my family never had any dogs growing up so i'm not really sure if this is normal, ⊕also, on at least one occasion we may have inadvertently opened a gate that let someone's dog escape and had to chase it down...is it just another one of those Endearing Dog Things that they absolutely freak out when strangers are at the door, or are most suburban dogs overly sheltered and/or poorly trained? would they maul me if the owners didn't secure them before opening the door? we saw signs like the one above at two consecutive houses and they look like the kind of thing you might pick up at hobby lobby or something, which seems to indicate that it's a very normal thing now... or maybe it's just a threatening new spin on "NO SOLICITING" signs...putting up christmas lights is one of the most seasonal businesses out there, you've got basically a month or so to squeeze in as many clients as you possibly can, and of course half of them want their lights put up on the exact same day (Dec. 1st). it's crunch time every day for a month or so, the home-service equivalent of tax season for accountants. this means 8 hour days minimum but frequently pushing 10 and sometimes even into the region of 12. really the only thing that stops us from pushing even further is the fact that it gets dark so early (though i've certainly been up my fair share of rooftops this year with nothing but my phone light) and my unwillingness to get up too absurdly early (before 8am). i wasn't sure at first if i'd be able to handle it but in fact it hasn't been an issue, often after even 10 hour shifts i feel like i could easily keep going as long as i've had plenty to eat and drink. part of it, i suppose, is that many generous breaks are built into the schedule in the form of travel between clients, which averages 20-30 minutes but sometimes run much longer depending on traffic conditions. i can't complain much about traffic because as long as it's between two jobs, we still get paid for that time spent sitting around in traffic. it does suck though when we finish of our last job of the day marooned far from home and in the wrong direction for traffic.

somehow i still feel like this shouldn't be possible, like i'm firing on all cylinders including some i didn't even know existed. i get home from those ten hour days and instead of immediately collapsing or browsing on my phone in a daze, i do some bookkeeping work, maybe some writing, or even reading. then, i'm even down to go out somewhere for dinner or off to the arcade for some dance games, one night i showed up to an outrageously-overpriced dancemaniax cab at 11:30pm and busted out my first-ever, not-even-close clear of gargoyle single 24, one of the hardest charts in the game. besides that i barely need sleep, i barely need food, i can just keep going all day long, it's like i'm in the midst of some kind of manic episode, maybe it's from suddenly receiving a heroic dose of vitamin d from that rooftop socal sun, maybe it's because i'm back to drinking coffee after quitting for 2 months. perhaps the model many have of their own energy as a gas tank with limited capacity gradually expended through the day is completely wrong, in truth you can violate physics and expend energy to create more energy, working all day leads to more productive writing than when i had nothing to do all day besides write. the model you choose to believe in may have a direct effect on your perception of energy, the gas-tank believers are limited only by their own ill-conceived mental model, trapped in a form of learned helplessness, while all along it's possible to push yourself beyond what you thought were your limits by memeing yourself into it alone. the only sign of any stress is that i have bizarre dreams every night of choking on light strands...

lately a lot of our jobs have been up north in the escondido region, a far outlying suburb barely within san diego's sphere of influence that's about a thirty minute drive on a good day. the main route to escondido, interstate 15, is heavily plied by commuters and as a result has the most bespoke highway set-up i've ever seen. sure, there's a minimum of six lanes going either direction throughout the entire 20+ mile corridor, but what's really special is what's sandwiched between them: an entirely separate highway-within-a-highway, 2 lanes in both directions. they're not just HOV lanes, they're "express lanes, or according to my research the technical term is "HOT" lanes: high-occupancy toll lanes. what this means is that they're like HOV lanes except that you can also pay to enter them, the rates are variable and displayed on signs throughout they highway, though on occasion they get so full that they go to HOV ONLY mode.⊕ according to their website the I-15 express lanes are "award-winning" and the concept is an "expressway-within-a-highway", which makes sense because along the corridor there are only a handful of opportunities to gain access, otherwise the express lanes are strictly separated from the highway around it by impassable concrete barricades and such, which gives it the feel of an exclusive VIP or first class section. some exits are even express lane only, spindly little one lane flyovers that go right to the center of the highway. that's not all, what impressed me the most actually was the reticulated barrier separating the two directions of traffic in the express lane, which can actually be MOVED by a vehicle called the "lane barrier machine". usually it can be found parked at either end of the express lanes, but on some exciting occasions the signs around the highway will display "LANE BARRIER MACHINE IN MOTION", and i strain to catch a glimpse of it. the default lane set-up is two lanes going north and two lanes going south, but during morning rush hour they move the barrier so that there's three lanes going south into the city, and vice versa in the evening. the one thing that concerns me about the express lanes is that i can't figure out how they're able tell how many people are riding in a car, and i continue to harbor a secret fear that somehow my car isn't being recognized as carrying multiple people and that back home envelopes with $400 fines have been piling up in the mail.

if you happen to be in "east county", there's an alternative to I-15: california state route 67, the secret rural back road connecting santee/lakeside/el cajon to poway up north. there is almost never any real traffic on it but there are other dangers to look out for, apparently that stretch of road is nicknamed "slaughterhouse alley". several extra conspicuous safety measures have been implemented, most visibly a line of yellow poles in the middle of the road separating the two directions of traffic, which you can tell must be a fairly recent addition because almost all of them are still intact and unblemished. another intervention is a big sign cosponsored by caltrans and CHP that says "DRIVE 55 ON 67", though in practice the true speed of the road based on most drivers is closer to 67. i strongly suspect that the vast majority of accidents are due to rural residents driving home from the city drunk, based off of faded older signs by the road that that read "ARRIVE ALIVE/DON'T DRINK AND DRIVE"...

though it may appear on the surface to be a bustling place filled with many buildings and residents, the so-called "city" of escondido is in fact the middle of nowhere, nothing real ever occurs there, spiritually it is as barren as the forlorn depths of the desert from which it sprang. it's deemed a "city" but lacks anything approximating a city center or identity, it's simply a sprawl of buildings residential and commercial of approximately homogenous density which at an arbitrary point stops falling under the purview of "escondido" and is instead the responsility of "san marcos" or "rancho bernardo". there is no real industry besides stores and restaurants, most of which are chains, and that's why anyone with anything approximating a "career" is forced to commute an hour south into san diego proper every morning. this, i believe, is baudrillard's "desert of the real", there is nothing real here (and it is also the desert). reality is torn to infinitesimal shreds at every intersection, gradually dissipates as it runs down the tendrils of hundreds of miles of sinuous suburban roads that span every developable square mile, and is finally dashed against countless cul-de-sacs and "DEAD END" "NO OUTLET" roads. the thing is, there's nothing sinister about it at all, it is all by design, this is the very point of the suburbs. from the start they were intended to be an escape from the chaos of the city and the crowds, a place for peace and quiet, so secluded, perhaps, that they are even safe from reality itself...

one day somewhere in the northern suburban wastelands around escondido, the highways are jammed so we're routed over the surface roads between two nearish jobs, and for almost an hour we travel through endless suburban and post-suburban developments that feel almost procedurally-generated, like a minecraft world. here's a single-family home biome, over there's another strip mall biome (always generated alongside the arterial road/"stroad" microbiome), in the distance there's an office park biome, and oh look right by the freeway, a relatively-rare "mall" structure has generated. in a way it's not too far from the underlying reality, the land really is divided into regions with underlying "code" that determines what develops, this is known as "zoning". it's possible to hit F3 and look up the biome for an area by consulting the zoning map, single family subdivisions are labelled RS-1-14 and strip mall is designated C-C-2, for example. the only difference is that the designations aren't entirely random, supposedly there are city planners who try to make everything as harmonious as possible, though it frequently feels like it might as well be random. as we make our way across the landscape, between different biomes and between different versions of the same biome, i wonder: in various media the journey through a seemingly-endless cityscape or concrete jungle has been depicted countless times, but when will we finally see a similar treatment of suburbia? perhaps this is to be my role...

⊕How Shall Ye Know the Prophet of Suburbia? They Shall Come Bearing a Costco Anywhere Visa® Card by Citi With the Mark: the Last Four Digits in Holy Quadruplicate. (disclosure: long $COST)one thing i've noticed is that if any client offers you water they will always get you a kirkland signature bottled water from the fridge in the garage. i also spot many costco products i recognize from the shelves in those same garages. over the past 30 years costco has firmly established itself as the backbone of suburban civilization, i thought my home costco was way too busy all the time but by far the most congested costco visit of my life was dropping in at around 11:30 am on a weekday in chula vista, even though every cash register was in use the line to check out stretched across half the warehouse. luckily, we'd only stopped in for a quick bite at the food court. as we headed back to the car, my friend complained that i had parked so far away, and i exclaimed "did you SEE how crowded it was in there???", to which a lady getting into her car empty-handed nearby responded: "yeah, and i gave up!". protip: everyone seems to think that the best time to go to costco is around when they open at 10am, but in fact that is pretty much the worst time. the best time is actually about an hour before closing, around 7 or 8. it also seems that the only place where a FasTrak transponder for automatically paying highway tools can be purchased retail is at costco (of course)...

although we have been spending what feels like the majority of the time on the road, occasionally we do still get a chance to get up on a rooftop. they tend to be neglected since they're difficult-to-reach and out-of-sight, so we frequently discover traces of decoration work from previous years - abandoned plastic clips that disintegrate to the touch from being exposed to the elements too long, rusted nails or hooks, twin fang scars on surfaces from staples, and sometimes staples can still be found holding on by a single tine. it's a reminder that there are many other ways to put up lights besides the methods we use, which don't usually leave a trace. our standard is using white plastic "tuff clips" (us patent #something) which snap on to gutters and under roof tiles, which only leave a trace if you happen to leave a couple behind. on one house we did the owner had lights put up every year for decades and the eaves were so thickly carpeted in old rusted staples that there wasn't space for any more, like those spikes they use to keep pigeons off things in cities. one time, though, we went to put lights back up on someone's house and discovered one of our extension cords that must have been left up there for an entire year. occasionally we discover ancient artifacts abandoned by other types of house workers - extra roof tiles, rusted pliers, a screwdriver, nails, screws, one of those sealant squeezer things.

to be honest i haven't even been up on the roof too mcuh lately because we've been wrapping so many trees - olive trees, jacarandas, and of course california's signature christmas decoration - the palm wrap. wrapping trees with many branches is an intellectual exercise, you have to plan ahead, devise your strategy for connecting the strands together while covering every branch equally. palm trees easier because there's only one big trunk to worry about, though they present other challenges - height and much more slippery bark. i'm proud of my tight staple-light tree wrapping technique, but most palm trees bark offers so little friction that i frequently cave and staple profusely just in case, because a slip can be disastrous, sometimes pulling down and undoing fifteen minutes of work. concerns about doing harm to the tree with gratuitous stapling are assuaged by clear evidence of years worth of trunk abuse for the sake of wrapping lights - old rusted staples, nails, and sometimes even deep-seated screws can be found embedded in the trunk of almost every palm we've worked on.

⊕saw this in someone's front yard on the walk overlooming over la mesa is one particularly prominent mountain, cowles mountain. it's the tallest peak near the center of this post's header image, and it's also in one of the photos in the my prior post. unlike most of the hills around the san diego area, it's completely dark at night, there aren't any lights from houses along the slopes, though occasionally you can spot pinpricks of light from descending night hikers. one day while driving back to our accomodations i noticed that the trailhead was relatively close, so i decided to climb it one day. that day came on our one day off during the week, which we had spent lazing around, a welcome change-of-pace considering we usually spent all day driving around the whole county. on a whim in the late afternoon i said "wanna go hike up that mountain". within ten minutes we had set off, navigating several blocks of city streets before arriving at the trailhead, and then proceeding to ascend at an absolute breakneck pace, passing maybe 30 people in front of us on the trail, reaching the summit in under an hour from when we'd left the doorstep. i attribute this astonishing physical feat entirely to the conditioning i've received from playing way too many dance games. at the peak, i learned from a plaque that it's in fact the highest point within the city of san diego. looking out at the view, it occurred to me that this was the apex, there was no rooftop view that could be more comprehensive than this, in a way this was san diego's highest rooftop.