I invented my first joke yesterday

It goes like this.

Q. What do you call a chess master's wife of 50 years?

A. A stalemate.

Trying to Make Money Selling Designs

Today I started an account with zazzle.com It is the same thing as CafePress.com where they will make T-shirts and coffee mugs with your design on it and then you earn a commission on the sale.

Here are the designs I've put up so far. I've started with t-shirts of emoticons. Seems to me like there might me some small niche interest in such designs, despite their simplicity.



make custom gifts at Zazzle

Speaking of Gay Marriage

I attended my first same sex marriage recently. My friends Abigail and Kat got married on June 13. I really enjoyed their wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony and a great party with excellent vegetarian food from Ipanema.

I offered to film the ceremony since I have the camcorder and tripod I've been using to film Council meetings from my City Council blog . My first wedding video.

I fully support the rights of adults to marry whomever they choose. This is guaranteed by the "Equal Protection" established by the 14th Amendment. I also believe gay marriage is protected by the First Amendment's protection of religion. If any church recognizes and performs a same-sex marriage that should be afforded the same benefits and legal rights as a marriage between a man and a woman.

I believe in Equality among citizens.

Harassing Phone Calls

Something I have to deal with occasionally is harassing phone calls. In the last couple of weeks I've gotten two calls from a guy who calls himself Chicago Mike. He called on March 31, 2009 and this morning at 1 am, Listen to April 12 call.

He's mad at me because I resisted his bullshit anti-gay petition and exposed him and his partner as private contractors hired by the Republican Party of Virginia. Read the story here. I first met Chicago Mike in August 2005.

This guy periodically calls or emails me random usually racist screeds. I don't feel particularly threatened by him but it does make me think he is mentally unbalanced.

My other blog, The Richmond Telegraph

I have been keeping pretty busy in my free time the last few days editing videos and writing reports of various Council meetings. I like how Blogger lets you back date entries. It allows me to fill in the backlog of stories that I don't have time to write immediately but eventually I can get to them. The blog is available at richmond-telegraph.blogspot.com or www.RichmondTelegraph.org

I'm Not Really a Blogger... Let Down by Obama

I don't have the drive or ego to keep at it.  Just looking briefly at my last few post on this, my "personal" blog felt more like a campaign blog.  Needless to say, Mr. Obama, now our President Obama, stole the show.  My campaign was ignored by the mass of American society.  I don't blame them.  Part of the blame goes to the political system itself, the organization that organizes the debates, and the media.   Just before the election my campaign website had received fewer than 600 visitors.  Today it registers 779 visitors since May 1, 2008.

I was sitting here waiting for my PS3 download new software. I started looking at a book G picked up for me, a Dover Edition of the political cartoons of Thomas Nast.  Then I started thinking about Obama's inauguration speech.  It was a big let down for me.  And I thought "I oughta blog about this and write the inauguration speech I wished I heard."  It is with that thought I began this entry.  Before I launch into it, I'd like to share a few bits of information with the reader.

I voted for Obama in November.  I voted for him in the Virginia Democratic Primary.  I saw him speak at the Richmond Colliseum on October 22.  And I participated in the spontaneous election night parade that marched from the Siegel Center to Old City Hall.  I've been looking forward to his presidency.  But today I was profoundly disappointed.  I know millions of Americans thought it was "great" but Obama's speech rung hollow for me.   

I'm also troubled by Obama's multiple homages to Lincoln -- swearing on the same Bible as Lincoln, recreating the whistle stop train route from Philadelphia to Washington, and partaking of an inauguration day luncheon similar to Lincoln's.  The President from Illinois.  You know, I just looked it up and Ronald Reagan is the only president born in Illinois.  Lincoln was born in Kentucky.  But these references to Lincoln are uncanny.  It is as though he is challenging fate or begging a Lincolnesque conclusion.  Lincoln is my favorite president too but as Emerson wrote, "Imitation is suicide."

I listened to the speech twice today.  The first time live and again about 4 1/2 hours later.  I listened to the speech reluctantly the second time but I was eager hear something I had missed or I hoped to hear something I wanted to hear.  I left work in a bad mood after having listened the speech a second time.   

Here is what I wish to have heard:

"Fellow Americans,

It is with grave seriousness that I address you all today.  The hand of time rests heavily upon me, I am aware of history's judgement;  with an open heart I faithfully hope to execute my duties to the best of my understanding and to your greater happiness and prosperity.  Together we will face many challenges.  In the midst of an economic crisis, two foreign wars, world poverty and an uncertain future ..."

I decided to abandon this post because it would take several hours to write a good speech and I don't want to.

But I will reclaim this space for personal blog entries.  I definitely see a need and have an interest in such a place.  I think it will be an irregular enterprise, but hopefully it will be informative of my personality and personal philosophy.  

Progress of a Snail.

I announced my U.S. Presidential campaign on May 1 to the internet without much fanfare or even notifying the media. It's now been 3 weeks and I still haven't notified the media. To date my youtube video has been viewed 52 times and my website has had 60 unique visitors. My campaign website and video are getting top 10 hits when you google "2008 write-in president."

I thought I might do my press release tonight but I was in a bad mood after today's Land Use, Housing and Transportation Committee (of Richmond City Council) which lasted from 3 - 7 pm. I just wanted to have "fun" and decompress so I called a couple of friends and hung out with them and watched TV. We watched "Outrageous TV Moments" and American Idol with the help of Tivo

Filming the video.

I filmed my youtube announcement video on April 30 and worked all evening and the next day on the video. It was a pretty tedious process-- first I had to convert the video from mpeg to dv (digital video) so I could edit it in iMovie -- that took over an hour. Then I had to sync the audio with the video. I had recorded the audio on a separate device. The audio was recorded mono and I had to convert it to stereo. Then when I saved the file in a 320x240 format -- it took 7 hours to render. The whole unedited video was over 16 minutes and weighed in at a lean 40 MB. However, I soon learned that youtube only has two limitations -- your movie may not be more than 1024 MB or longer than 10 minutes. So I uploaded the original unedited video to video.google.com. Then I edited a less than 10 minute version to upload to youtube. The editing is rough because I used Quicktime Pro to edit it and that is not such a great program to use for video editing. Oh well, it was fast and I hope I selected some good clips. Also there are some funny surprises in the complete unedited version. I'd like to invite citizens to make their own edits of the video and upload them to youtube. I'll post any favorites to my website.

I'm had a long day and I'm tired. So I'm going to call it a night.

Get involved in your government!