Geotagging

In which our Heroine freaks out her already dwindling readership. 

I’m sure that many of you right now are groaning about Tara’s weird paranoia/surveillance fixation.  I worry that I do it at my own detriment.  I do actually want most of you to stick with me and keep reading my blog, you know.   I’ll admit that I picture my mother-in-law going “What is she up to now?”  Well, today I put my successful blogging future at possible risk.  I plan to infuse all my readers with my paranoia.  Today I’ve included several quotes taken from a power-point that has been circulating around the military and from there to employees of the Municipality of Anchorage, which is how I got a hold of it.  Without further ado:

“In August of 2010, Adam Savage, of “MythBusters,” took a photo of his vehicle using his smartphone. He then posted the photo to his Twitter account including the phrase “off to work.” Since the photo was taken by his smartphone, the image contained metadata revealing the exact geographical location the photo was taken.  So by simply taking and posting a photo, Savage revealed the exact location of his home, the vehicle he drives and the time he leaves for work.”

The following was published in Wired Magazine in 2009: “I ran a little experiment. On a sunny Saturday, I spotted a woman in Golden Gate Park taking a photo with a 3G iPhone. Because iPhones embed geodata into photos that users upload to Flickr or Picasa, iPhone shots can be automatically placed on a map. At home I searched the Flickrmap, and score—a shot from today. I clicked through to the user’s photo stream and determined it was the woman I had seen earlier. After adjusting the settings so that only her shots appeared on the map, I saw a cluster of images in one location. Clicking on them revealed photos of an apartment interior—a bedroom, a kitchen, a filthy living room. Now I know where she lives.”

Just for effect, I’ve included the creepy photo from the slide presentation. 

If you are not completely creeped out by now, then I don’t understand you.  In a nutshell, the subject here is about something called Geotagging.  To elucidate: “Geotagging is the process of adding geographical identification to photographs, video, websites and SMS messages. It is the equivalent of adding a 10-digit grid coordinate to everything you post on the internet. Geotags are automatically embedded in pictures taken with smartphones.  Many people are unaware of the fact that the photos they take with their smartphones and load to the Internet have been geotagged.  Photos posted to photo sharing sites like Flickr and Picasa can also be tagged with location, but it is not an automatic function. 

Just to hammer it home I will add the fact that I have used various Flickr photos in things that I’ve done, both on this blog and in personal creative pursuits.  In one instance, I had only to type in the location of my home town by name, and someone’s personal shots popped up for my use.  At this point, Jon and I have been broke for enough years that I am basically the equivalent of a technological cretin (because we never buy the most up-to-date technology).  If I can do this much, then I suggest you let your imagination run wild and try to visualize what a real creep-master could do.   It’s not particularly good for the soul, but it does prove my point a little.

Launch: Paranoid Much?

In which our Heroine gazes back.  

For Christmas, Jon and I borrowed a friend’s computer video camera so we could skype with family.  I’m sorry to say that the skyping did not work, and now all we have is the little camera sitting a-straddle our computer monitor as the residue of our non-conversation. 

It kind of freaks me out. 

The socially-smart side of me would like to tell you all that my paranoia fixation is an intelligent fabrication meant to bring out frivolous discussion and smart-alecky conversation.  These are worthwhile reasons all on their own but the little eye-shaped lens staring at me right now is proving its point: I am a paranoid freak at heart.  I’m telling you, the little thing follows me around the room.  My eye is unnaturally drawn to it.  I find myself focusing in on it regularly, and trust me—the white wall over the top of my computer screen is not normally one of my eye-resting spaces. 

It’s pretty clear that I’ve been watching too many Pixar films.  I can easily imagine it sprouting legs and spidering off into corners unknown (where Russian/Iraqi spies lurk, obviously).  I can imagine its little round eye hole suddenly blinking at me.  I can even imagine it recording my life.  Not that there’s anything of a mystery left about me after all this blogging, but talk about freaky right? 

And so I launch a series of blog posts about surveillance and its accompanying freakiness.  You would think that all this supposed or imagined surveillance would implant me with a desire to perform well for the camera.  Instead, I find myself longing for insurrection and subversive behavior.  I can’t help it.  I have an over-active imagination. 

The Christmas Market: A Shopping for the Holidays Guide for the Paranoid

In which our Heroine discusses the Particulars of a Paranoid Shopping Experience. 

10 Things to Keep in Mind on Black Friday:

1.       You are under surveillance in every store you go into.  DO NOT MAKE EYE CONTACT with anyone.

2.       Every person you see is out to get you, even at 4 a.m.  That’s why all the items on your shopping list keeping getting snatched up just before you get to the isle. 

3.       Never look at the surveillance cameras stationed in the high corners of stores.  If you let the invisible “security guards” suspect that you know where they are, you will be probably be apprehended, or at least detained for a short while in some generic hallway you never knew existed before.

4.       While mall shopping, make sure you double back and traverse the whole length of the mall several times just to make sure that no one is following you. 

5.       If you selfishly take the time to try on a shirt that you spotted on a rack, please assume that there are tiny camouflaged cameras hidden in the light fixture above your head.

6.       All natural disasters wait to happen on the holidays or days when the unknowing public is out and about.  You should probably bring a life jacket, or at least a parachute. 

7.       The big man waiting at the door of Best Buy really works for the CIA as part of a specialized covert ops division.  Don’t let him hear your Russian/Afghani accent!  He will take you down.  The excessive fat on his torso conceals his guns.

8.       When you use your credit or debit card, you are immediately and automatically put “on the grid.”  Please understand that if you ever have to suddenly disappear from society, you are finished.  Toast.  Crispy, blackened toast. 

9.       If you had been wise enough to use cash instead of cards, you could have had the pleasure of carrying around hundreds of dollars on a cutpurse’s day of paradise.  AND you could have toted around numerous large bills—all of which hold a sophisticated tracking mechanism located just to the left of a former President’s trusting face.   

10.    Know that everything you buy gets scanned into a computer when you check out.  The government is clearly working with corporate giants to document every item you personally buy.  With this in mind, your only option is to buy a host of useless and irrelevant articles that you will never use or gift to anyone.  Don’t let this excessive and frivolous waste deter you from enjoying your Black Friday Shopping experience.  When I check other carts, I’m pretty sure everyone else is secretly doing it too. 

Metalhead

In which Our paranoid Heroine discovers that Cancer is really all about Marketing

“Its time to take a short break (from angels), but after these messages, we’ll be RIGHT BACK!” as said in best announcer voice.  There are some house-keeping items to take care of.  Yesterday I went to see my neurosurgeon, Dr. Bernard, also frequently deemed “brilliant” on this blog.  (In operas and musicals, main actors or actresses frequently have their own tune that accompanies them each time they enter the stage.  Think of the word brilliant as Dr. Bernard’s aria.) There is a reason he is dubbed as brilliant.  He knows things.  Things important beyond his specialty of neuro-surgery, and isn’t that saying something?  For awhile there, Jon and I thought about seeing a neuro-oncologist when we next flew out of state.  My chemo doctor recommended it because we had a few specialized questions.  Dr. Bernard is still open to giving us a referral, but I don’t know if we need it now because he knew the answers to all our questions. 

The most pressing question was whether pregnancy (not so much now, but later…) would enhance the growth of this kind of tumor.  The answer is no.  I may be paranoid usually (especially about nuclear facilities and commercialization), but this time I believe him.  My understanding is that some cancers are more directly linked with hormones: breast, ovarian, cervical, testicular, prostate, and in the brain, melingiomas (not my kind).  It makes sense, doesn’t it?  The studies on this are somewhat controversial, like so many things with cancer, but there is good evidence to suggest that these kinds of cancers particularly afflict the West. 

Why the West? Again, evidence suggests that all that processed food we’re eating is sending our hormones on un-amusing roller-coaster rides with cancer, diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease as the final big splash (no I did not say big Mac).  In my humble and cancerous opinion, these processed foods are around for the express purpose of supporting mega-companies.  They reel in the pound-adding dough, cushion their coffers, and then donate money to universities and institutes to do research on anything other than processed foods).  Have I mentioned yet that I’m paranoid? 

But conglomerates aside, Dr. Bernard asked me if I was eating a lot of fruit and vegetables.  I said I was actually thinking of going organic too.  To be truthful, paranoid me expected the currently doctor-approved line, “Oh, you can eat anything you want with cancer and you’ll be fine,” something I’d heard and read before, but didn’t necessarily believe.  Instead, my brilliant (angelic voices add to the aria) doctor smiled and said it was a great idea.  He asked if I’d heard of the raw food diet and suggested that taking red meat out of the diet might be an idea to consider too.  (The flesh is weak and hungry.  I’m not sure if I could manage that.)  I don’t know much about higher nutrition and cancer, but eating foods that are unhealthy when you already feel terrible is counter-intuitive, and taking out even one mode of control in this uncontrollable world of cancer seems hard.   Thank goodness my doctor is brilliant: I need a man I can agree with to be monitoring my health. 

Also interesting, I finally remembered to ask someone if I had a metal plate in my head from surgery—just in case I travel.  Everyone wants one more difficult thing to worry about in airports—especially us world travelers.  Yes, I can now boast a titanium plate complete with mesh and screws.  I must read Frankenstein soon.  I think I could really identify.  Maybe I’ll be carrying this book around with my specially-ordered “I have metal attached to my skull” card the next time I travel.  You know, the word lobotomy frequently flies into my head these days.  (As a reader, it is your responsibility after seeing word lobotomy to imagine hearing a loud gasp followed by the idea of horror, horror!)  

Internal commercial voice: “Hey, if you’re going to lose part of your brain, at least use a high-grade metal like Titanium® to cover the patch!!!”

A Paranoid Manifesto

In which our Lady completes Medical Questionnaires at the expense of Her Knowledge; or In which our Lady chooses the atom bomb over President Obama

You know all those clipboards with those annoying questions you have to answer when you go to the doctor’s office?  I have become adept at answering these.  Later, I also usually get a nurse taking my vitals and asking me more specific questions.  I used to pride myself on my excellent test-taking skills in school, but unfortunately (or rather fortunately) my case is unique enough that I can never seem to answer correctly.   I will admit that this stresses me out quite a bit.

“Do you have headaches?” asks perky, young nurse No. 1

“No, never.”

“Really?  Never?”

“Nope.”

Finally one I can answer correctly:

“Have you ever had night-sweats?”

“Yes.” But then quickly, “I’ve always been a hot sleeper.”  Disappointment shows on perky face. 

Next try: “Any arthritis, pain in joints?” 

“Yes, knees and hips.”

Feeling more confident now in my answering abilities, I made the grave mistake once of offering up knowledge I thought might be pertinent.  “Does it matter that I grew up very near a nuclear facility?” Apparently not.  There has never been any affirmative research to indicate this.  All I’m thinking at this point is “Where are the Fox Moulders of the world wielding a good X-file to prove my point when I need them?  Or:

“Dr. Did you know that there was a scare when I was in high school that buried nuclear waste was leaching into the ground water?”  Nothing was ever confirmed…  This is the same ground water system that quenches the thirst of most Idahoans, Utahans, Californians, Nevadans, and Arizonans. 

“Did you know that government officials used to regularly take samples from surrounding dairies to test at the facility.”  When questioned further about this, my mother merely stated that people used to trust the government back then.

“Did you know it was the first nuclear facility in the country?”

“Did you know that I am one of the few teens in the country that grew up knowing the name of space-ship crafting company Lockheed-Martin?”

“Did you know that there are a surprising number of people from my home town with cancer, old and young?”

“Did you know that the second E in INEEL for “environmental” wasn’t added until the mid- to late- nineties.”  This is probably not even the name now, it changes so often according to political climate. 

“Will the FBI come and hunt me down, now that I’ve put this up on my blog?”  Maybe, maybe not.  If I suddenly disappear, you'll know what happened.  I’ll have to perfect my imaginary, but consummate gun skills, Matrix-like bullet dodging, and my superb army-crawl (or the gazelle?) once again. 

On a tangent, I love paranoia media.  Farenheit 451, the X-files, The Traveler Series by John Twelve Hawkes.  They’re just so fun to read because of their intelligence, and then ridiculously easy to make fun of.  Besides, everyone needs a good imaginary enemy to blame their psychosis on.  Let us rise up and choose an enemy! I hereby choose nuclear facilities everywhere, and their over-paid, and perhaps under-honest employees.  Some people choose President Bush/Obama, the end of the world, technology, or even religion.  And then they attempt to solve it by voting differently, and/or getting more food storage.  Some even build underground bunkers.  I choose the atom bomb.  And then I will prove myself a hypocrite by continuing to live “on the grid,” using every ounce of my health insurance, and by allowing radiation therapy to occur on the right side of my head.