Day 11: Richmond Marina Park to Richmond Ferry Point

Day 11:  Richmond Marina Park to Richmond Ferry Point

April 26th, 2017

8.83 miles in 4 hours 36 minutes

I went around in a circle today, as you can see on the first map below.  After I walked by the old Ford assembly plant in Richmond, I was talking to my Dad on the phone, and didn't realize I had gotten off the trail, and when I got back to it I turned left instead of right.  I was surprised to walk up on this Ford building twice.  The jokes on me, as I was talking to my Dad about asynchronous hardware and software, where going around in a circle (feedback) is the fundamental building block.

Richmond Ford Assembly Building

This morning I drove for Uber to get back to Richmond.  At first I goofed up, and even though I had set a destination to Richmond, I still had the delivery only signon so I wasn't going to get any rides.  And waiting for a string of deliveries to get me there wasn't going to happen at 6 AM.

I finally figured that out, signed in as a regular driver, and got a ride to EA Games in Redwood Shores.  I accepted that was a reasonable approximation of heading toward Richmond, but the next ride was a new Facebook engineer.  Facebook is at the west end of the Dumbarton Bridge (Day 5 and Day 6).  He kind of agreed with me about the oddity of the Facebook interview process, but he had dedicated his life to it and persevered and made his way into the housing crisis known as the Bay Area. 

But the Dumbarton was the wrong way, what the... oh I didn't turn the destination back on when I changed to regular driver signon.  I turn it on, cross the Dumbarton, and get a young black man taking his computer and luggage on the train to his brother in Fresno.

He was a software developer who had gone to high school in Palo Alto but his family had lost their home.  He was sour on the 1% that's for sure, but given the intelligence this man showed as we talked, I can't imagine there are too many other fellow grads at his school who program computers who aren't floating to the top.  It was a sincere realization of the opposite of privilege.  A confirmation that America isn't the America I thought it was, how it was sold to me.  Something that the election of Donald Trump did for me as well.

By the end of the trip he asked me how I felt about being white.  I said I thought it was a privilege, it gave me pass to more areas, like hotels I'm not staying in that let me lounge in their lobby on this trail.  He appreciated that I owned that.

Prologue:  I thought I'd focus this blog post on the fairly new Rosie The Riveter National Historical Park in Richmond, or on the Harvard schooled female Uber driver.  But the woman's story got stepped on by the black guy's story as I was writing, and then my battery ran out.  It did make me lighter on my feet not carrying this computer all day.

Rose The Riveter National Historic Park

Day 11 Part 1:  Richmond Marina Park to Watershed Nursery

The Watershed Nursery of Native Plants in Richmond

Day 11 Part 2:  Watershed Nursey to Richmond Ferry Point

Accounting: 

    Starting Balance                                       73.17

• Uber Earnings to Richmond                             (48.14)
• Uber Earnings from Richmond                           (17.41)
• Uber Eats Delivery                                     (5.90)

    Ending Balance                                        (11.51)

Kombucha of the Day -- Mimosa

Voice Notes:

It seems like 100 years ago everybody was involved in the development and expansion of our economy. Now it seems that only a small handful of elite programmers are in control of the evolution of our economy.

The promise of free software or libre software was somewhat compromised by its repackaging into VC friendly open source.

I gave a ride to a new Facebook engineer who is a chemical engineer who invested the necessary years to survive the application process.

He helped me see that Facebook and Google and and Apple have become like the new IBM's with their elite cadre of insiders who will control all of future industry.

When I got into the programming it was supposed to be a democratic opportunity available to all, not just those who can navigate the Bay Area marketplace.

And it really still is except for the marketing capability of large amounts of capital which does the opposite of leveling the playing field.

So now the American dream is to have something go viral without having to sell ownership of your venture to capital.

But just because the public has become aware of the possibility of viral success you still have to follow the money and see that the viral overseers still live in Hollywood or New York or the Bay Area.

A fundamental change in perspective that started to ignore these overseers would be very welcome.

The ability to pull up a public transit route home or in this case to my car is a great thing.

I do get bothered now and then that the Google boys get all the toys.

And don't get me started on Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. He should go visit the Aids Grove, read what it says, and have some respect.

This has to be maximum poppy week.

Why do I enjoy stumbling on the odd bits of Agrestic on the edge of the bay?

This part of Richmond looks like Tiburon East.

If I was lucky enough to be a billionaire I'd spend most my money trying to make life slacker for those who aren't billionaires. Guess that's why I'm not one.