Michael Jay Lissner

More Details On Fire Last Night

2008-11-14T13:29:56-08:00

What Happened? Last night around midnight, we heard a crash…might have been more like a bang. I thought it sounded like a bucket of junk falling off a shelf. When we looked outside to see what the sound was, we saw a car on fire across the street. I immediately called 911 and reported it. I had a fire extinguisher, but they kindly urged me not to use it. Not sure if I would have if they hadn’t. At that point, the fire was pretty small by comparison to the video, so I’m not totally insane.

When we first saw the car, the fire was only ON the top of the back of the car, which is what leads me to believe that the fire came from the outside, and that the bang was the impact of the molotov cocktail. Within a few minutes, the flame from the outside of the car had penetrated the gasoline tank, and gas was pouring onto the ground forming a flaming puddle. I believe the large explosion seen in the video is the gas tank getting hot enough to explode. This in turn led to the power lines melting and falling in a dramatic fashion onto the nearby Honda.

After about another two minutes, the fire department arrived and quickly put out the fire. It was fortunate that they arrived when they did because there is a large tree over the car that could have easily spread the fire to the neighboring buildings.

After another hour or so, the fire was out in both cars (it spread to the one next to it), and the electrical wire was neutralized. The news team came, but I didn’t want to do an interview. Nevertheless though, I did give them my movie, and they tell me it aired on the 5-9 morning news.

Thoughts I’ve been living here for about 4 years now. The hood has some issues which I’ve put some effort into trying to fix. Since living here, I’ve seen a guy chase another with a knife, I’ve cleaned up about 6 hypodermic needles, I learned of a bullet hole in a neighbor’s window, and I’ve heard from my window a murder from about a block and a half away. Now I can add molotov cocktail to the list.

Some of these things I know about only because I’m involved in the neighborhood, and I can chalk up to things that most people would be blissfully ignorant of. Others, like the arson and the knife chase are hard to ignore.

I like living in Berkeley, and I like my living situation - good roommates, affordable rent, a nice house - but it’s times like today when I have to reflect on why I am living across the street from a drug dealer, and if it’s really safe and practical for me and for others. My usual policy is to mind my own business, and they’ll leave me alone, which is quite true, but still, exploding cars are hard to ignore.

For years I have been telling friends that it’s safe to come here, that their car will be OK, and not to worry, that I have been fine for years. I’m still fine, but I think it might be a harder sale these days. I just hope things get better, not worse.

Car Arson Across The Street From My House

2008-11-14T01:59:11-08:00

I’m guessing it was a Molotov cocktail. More details to come tomorrow.

Why Online Booksellers do so Damned Well

2008-09-13T09:31:19-07:00

Lately in Berkeley, a number of our independent bookstores have closed their doors for business. In every case, the rumor I’ve heard from the employees lays the blame squarely on online competition. I’m not entirely sure I buy the argument as the sole cause, but there probably is some truth to it.

This year, as I shopped for books and readers, I decided to keep my receipts and to total up the costs. In the end, my process for getting books was:

Buy them at the campus store
Look them up online
Curse
Buy them online
Receive them on my doorstep
Return the originals to the campus store

I feel a bad about this process, but on the other hand, before now I didn’t realize just how expensive the books are on campus. Take a look:

	On Campus	Online
Intellectual Foundations of Information Organization	$46	$37
Computer Science: An Overview	$96	$7
Introduction to Information Retrieval	$60	$43
Free Culture: The Nature and Future of Creativity	N/A	$10
The Wealth of Networks	N/A	$14
Readers	$137	N/A
Shipping	N/A	$10
Totals	$339	$121
Less N/A’s	$202	$87
Grand Total Spent:		$258

Pretty amazing. It would have cost me $115 more to get books on campus. And we wonder why online book stores do so well.

Crime in my hood in the last 90 days

2008-09-05T10:34:17-07:00

I did a little research today, and discovered some fun facts. Within one mile of my house, in the last 90 days there have been:

Arson: 1
Assault W/Deadly Wpn: 3
Barking Dog: 13
Burglary: 8
Burglary Auto: 54
Burglary-Com’l: 11
Burglary-Res’l: 49
Drunk In Public: 32
Grand Theft: 42
H & S Violation: 34
Homicide: 1
Loud Noise: 296
Malicious Damage: 32
Petty Theft: 96
Prostitution Activity: 33
Rape: 4
Robbery: 36
Stolen Vehicle: 59

Some of those are more striking than others. Like the four rapes, or the 59 stolen automobiles. Maybe the 3 assaults with deadly weapons. Or how about the nearly 300 noise complaints (in 90 days).

Jeesh.

Source: http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/ContentDisplay.aspx?id=7060

While Cleaning the Block

2008-07-19T15:27:04-07:00

I spent a couple hours cleaning my block today. Among the very special trash I picked up, I found not one, not two, but two and a half used hypodermic needles. Also of interest, one of my neighbors seems to have placed a box of 100 fresh, sterile needles outside their house.

I can’t help but wonder if that is a good way to do a needle exchange program. You throw it on the street. I put a whole box of them outside my fence on the sidewalk. Hmmm…

On the up side, picking up trash seems to be a great, high-profile way to build community. The trash around my house is so bad that I could definitely use help picking it up, and every time I or my girlfriend are out there, we seem to meet allies that want to fix up the neighborhood. I collected one guy’s info today, and she collected somebody else’s info last week. If we keep this up, we may build a nice set of contacts of all our neighbors. So that’s how meeting your neighbors works. Huh.

Lessons from the Street

2008-06-23T19:29:42-07:00

I’ve been more aware of the happenings in the street lately after one roommate had his car stolen, another had hers broken into (they took a bag of coins), and my car was front-ended a week or two ago. I’ve learned some valuable lessons just by watching what people are doing.

1. I have a mattress, and live in Berkeley. How do I get rid of it? Get a U-Haul. Go to Fairview St. Remove mattress from truck. Set it on the curb. Depart.

2. It’s noon on a Sunday, and I’ve finished my breakfast. How do I dispose of my beer bottle? First, find a storm drain in a gutter, preferably one with a metal grate. Smash the bottle, either with your foot or the grate. Using your foot, sweep the debris into the drain.

Seriously. This is what people do on my block. I just do not get it.