The Ryde Blog

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget cuts could mean the closing of up to 220 state parks, among them the home of the world’s tallest tree and other attractions that draw millions of visitors. Schwarzenegger this week recommended eliminating $70 million in parks spending through June 30, 2010. An additional $143.4 million would be saved in the following fiscal year by keeping the parks closed.

via AP

photo: Jean Paul Molyneux

What can you do?

1. Sign the petition from the California State Parks Foundation

2. Donate to the California State Parks Foundation, the only non profit dedicated to advocating for the California State park system.

3. Learn more about the issues and the California state budget.

4. Spread the word!

via MyOrganicDay

OK, we realize that we are total flakes, but after quite a delay we have picked our Mustache March winner. JP was MIA so I had to do the picking. Our winner is Sebastian Lehmann! He did send in his entry a little late, but we had a general lack of participation so we’re making an exception and giving it to him. If you’ve got a problem with our bending of the rules go to our Flickr page, check out the other photos, and tell me that he shouldn’t win. He has by far the dirtiest mustache amung the small group of participants. We would like to salute those of you who did submit your upper lip to 30+ days without a shave. Sebastian wins a $25 gift Certificate for TheRyde.com as well as the respect of males (and some females) everywhere. Thanks Sebastian!

Today I looked in my desk drawer, saw a “Helix Geometry Template”, pulled out my sketchbook, found the opening for the “Protractor” section, and put pencil to paper. I figured I’d make a couple of shapes and see where it headed from there. Well… this is what I came up with. I thought it was kind of fun and I wanted to share it.

The other day I came across pretty cool site (called Supermarket) that sells products from independant designers. They have just about everything from t-shirts to furnature, cats stoops to coasters. Definitely worth checking out. The Roller Coasters are one of my favorite finds on there.

Wow, I totally forgot to let you all know that my shoe project colab with Simple has been released. Simple approached me a while back and asked me to work with them on the art for a new shoe. This is what we came up with. There are a couple of colorways for both men and women. You can buy them at Swell.com, SimpleShoes.com and at tons of other locations nation wide. You can also check out the latest projects that I’ve been working on at MattAllen.com

My location via a little map I whipped up. Just in case anyone did not have any idea where the central coast is.