We Have a Winner

I just saw that McCain has conceded to Obama and they are awaiting Obama's speech. I can't say that I am surprised - I felt that Obama expressed a vision (and had the better oratorical skills) whereas McCain merely reacted. People in crisis are always more in favor of visionaries than those who merely react.

One thing I liked was that McCain's concession speech was classy, complementary, and heartfelt. It was one of the best speeches I have ever heard him make. I hope that Obama and McCain can work well with each other in the coming years. It might help heal some rifts.

Obama's victory speech reminded me a bit of some of Martin Luther King's speeches. It wasn't his best speech, but it was a good speech none the less. The problem with victory speeches is that you have to thank so many people - the loser doesn't have quite the same onus to thank the troops.

And best of all? The blasted telephone calls  and negative tv ads will stop!

Connections

A really odd  brain spasm here:

1. I read "High Maintenance Granola" which reminds me of
   
2. Lola Granola, a character in the comic strip Opus penned by
   
3. Berkeley Breathed who was managed on his high school paper by
   
4. Harvey Neville who I met and worked with in NYC
   

Thus my mind has linked "High Maintenance Granola" to NYC in 4 steps, probably all of them non-obvious to any rational observer. Does that mean I have officially lost my mind? No, don't answer that.

Frustration

Do you ever get frustrated by the inability to make your tools do what you want them to do? I do with some degree of regularity. Although I have spent a great part of my life developing software and programs, every once in a while I run into a program or tool that just will not do or let me do what I want it to do. (Or at the bare minimum will not let me do it the way I want to.)

In such a situation, I am left with few choices. I can create a new tool that does the task or behaves in the way I want it to. I can decide the niggling problem isn't worth any additional effort and let it go. I can spend hours beating my head against the monitor and keyboard trying different possible work-arounds. I can search using Google and the filtering skills of my inner frustrated librarian and hope to find a solution.

I have done most of those things attempting to get blogger to expand the comments on the main page like it does if you click on the the title of an article. Obviously, I could modify the underlying xml/html, but that defeats the goal of staying within the standard constraints of using blogger and not needing to do technical maintenance with each change by the blogger developers. I know what I desire is possible because I read various sites that do precisely what I desire. Most of them seem not to be blogspot and blogger based. Some examples include "The Spohrs are Multiplying ... ", "Cosmic Variance ", "The Observation Deck ", or even "Scribbit " which doesn't show the entry form but does expand the comments and is blogspot based.

I could understand not doing the expansion on a very popular site or one that drew many comments on each post. To misquote a former teacher, "That is not a problem with which I suffer." So I'll leave it at this: if you are using blogger and have succeeded in doing what I so desire without heavy modifications to your template, could you please point me in the correct direction? I am perfectly willing to limit the main page to just one post rather than the current weeks worth of posts at once if that is a needed change. Thanks.

Vote

Today's message is short and sweet. Remember that Tuesday is election day. So ...

If you have already voted, thank you!

If you haven't voted, you need to! Get going, we'll wait.

Youth

My wife and I were guests tonight at the annual 4-H award banquet. As always, it was good to see the leaders and youth. It is always nice to see young people doing things well and being honored for their hard work. More on this later ...

One of the pleasures of being mayor is the chance to meet and interact with some of the best youth to be found. This year was especially nice in that sense because the local community college played host to the state FFA (Future Farmers of America) convention and they were kind enough to invite me to appear before the assembled group and welcome them.  It was a great experience. 2000 bright and eager high school youth who were polite, well spoken, and passionate. Young leaders who could work a crowd better than I could ever hope to. And they listened to an old fogey like me even though their kick off dance and mixer started shortly after I spoke. The hormones were at a fever pitch. I happened to sit on the convention floor and overhear a couple of young men beside me who were laying out their plan for which young ladies to ask to dance just before my speech. It was really fun to overhear, but I have no desire to be that young and agonized about the opposite sex again. Getting a rousing round of applause from 2000 screaming kids and a few hundred other adults (whether deserved or not) is as close as I'll ever get to being a rock star. Highly recommended if you get the chance.

I also sit on the committee of a local Boy Scout troop and my wife is on the state board for the Girl Scouts . In addition, we as a city council run a youth commission to get feedback and input from the youth of the community in a way that also exposes them to local government and how it works. We've been very fortunate to have some real leaders emerge from the youth commission. We hope they will return to roles in our community when their college days are over. There have been some that stand out and make you want to see their future because you know they will do great things.

In addition, we have started a program called "If I were Mayor ..." in cooperation with CML (Colorado Municipal League) . It is an essay contest for students in 5th grade who write an essay addressing how they would explain/do various things if they were mayor. Each year it is a different aspect of local government. I convene a panel of myself, the city manager, and community citizens to read the essays and select the top three. We give scholarship prizes to the top three winners and certificates signed by me with the city seal to all who enter. In addition, we forward all the entries to the CML state wide contest. The four state wide winners are given scholarship grants and invited to the CML annual meeting. They are recognized and honored at an awards luncheon at the meeting. We were lucky enough to have one of our students win the CML contest last year.

What makes this all come full circle is that some of the 4-H award winners tonight were participants in the "If I were Mayor ..." contest, some of the 4-H winners were youth commission members, and some of the 4-H winners were Scouts and FFA members. The one thing in common with all these events and groups is great kids working hard to reach their goals. They have fun and enjoy the journey, but they work hard and accomplish goals. They are taking steps, preparing for their future, and giving back to the community at the same time. It is so inspiring to talk to the youth and see their enthusiasm, pride, and giving spirits. A completely different picture from the group you see when you visit a prison.

(And as an aside, it is really fun to visit the elementary schools and read to the kids in the early grades. The Mayor is a mythical figure to them, so you have to work hard to live up to their expectations. Although it is a bit disconcerting when the first graders are much more excited by being read to by {*gasp*} a fireman or policeman.)

Quiz for Today

1 minute, 25 seconds chained to a bunk bed with a velociraptor
Created by Bunk Beds.net

Now that we have that out of the way, how long could you survive? Take the quiz by clicking above and find out. You never know when you might be chained to a bunk bed with a velociraptor.

Bazaar

Today was the church bazaar where the women's group sells handicrafts and food in support of their programs. They also host a luncheon as part of the bazaar. Since I am neither of the female persuasion nor crafty, I get to help do the transporting, setting up and cleaning up. It's not bad. Besides, my mom and mother in law are both heavily involved and are crafty bakers that contribute handcrafts and baked goods to bazaar. You might say there is no escape. The good side is that you get to eat the trial versions before the bazaar!

It is interesting to see what is popular and sells each year. Some years it is Christmas crafts, some years it is home made candy, some years it is home baked pies and cakes. Every year the youth group nut sales are popular and the home made noodles are generally sold out within minutes of opening. (That's another reason for being a volunteer - you can sometimes get a bag of the home made noodles.) In recent years, the individual pies and other baked goods that can be frozen and are packaged for one or two people seem to have gotten popular.

Cleaning up is always fun. We (the gentle people of the cleanup crew) have to wait until the bazaar is winding down and then we begin to put up tables and chairs, collect and put things away, vacuum the church, and generally act like a glorified janitorial crew.  A certain number of the men that used to help with cleanup have gotten old enough and had enough physical problems that they no longer can do work that involves lifting, etc. The task that is the most tedious is vacuuming the seeming acres of carpet in the church. I kind of enjoy it - there is a certain satisfaction to turning a messy debris strewn area into a neat sea of carpet. I just wouldn't want to do it every day!

The bazaar and the activities surrounding it give a sense of continuity to life as well. This church is the same church that I attended as a youngster, the same church that my wife and I got married in, the same church that our son was baptized in, the same church that my wife and I re-affirmed our marriage vows on our 25th anniversary in, etc. Well not the same physical church since the original partially burned down shortly after we were married, but spiritually the same. There are very few things in modern life that have a permanence like that. And like the church, the bazaar seems to have a permanence as well. I can remember my grandmother participating in the bazaar. In fact, the first time I remember watching someone hand make noodles in a large quantity, it involved my grandmother and others either in the church or for the church.

And so life goes on year after year. Yet another advantage of living in a area where traditions still persist.

(Notice that NaBloPoMo has started - 30 posts in thirty days - prepare to be blogged to death!)