| On the WWI Memorial |
| as carved in 1918 |
| "These have dared bear the torches of sacrifice and service. Their bodies return to dust by their work liveth for evermore. Let us strive on to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace amongst ourselves and with all nations."
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| Chili Ninja |
| River City Studio's Chili Cookoff |
I won the trophy: a beaded ladle!
Connerly-Allen Chili
Brown:
1.25 pounds of ground chuck
1/2 of a large, white onion, diced
1/4 green pepper, chopped
salt
Drain grease.
Add:
1 can Brooks Medium Hot Chili Beans--MUST be Brooks.
1 can tomato soup-- not diluted
1 can tomato sauce (not tomato paste)
1 can (the soup or bean can rinsed out) tomato juice
Salt, pepper, chili powder, crushed red pepper, and Louisiana hot sauce to taste. Don't be shy.
Cook up a batch of large elbow macaroni.
Bring chili to boil for 10 minutes, then simmer as long as needed.
As it simmers, it will need more liquid, add more tomato juice
Put the macaroni in the bowl first with the chili on top, aka "Cincinnati style"
For buffet-style serving, pre-cook macaroni noodles a little underdone, then mix them into the crock pot.
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| 4 Years of Yes We Can |
| only 44 years after I Have A Dream |
From Lessig back in February:
"But there's one more crucial way in which Barack Obama can inspire, distinct from how Hillary Clinton could ever hope to inspire, and that's the inspiration he would offer towards peace. We in this country need to acknowledge to the world a certain mistake that most of us understand we made. At the height of insanity, after this extraordinary and horrible bombing, of our own citizens on our own territory, we were led into war by a president who didn't care to pay attention to the facts.
This was the biggest political blunder, perhaps ever, that an American president engaged. It was extraordinarily destructive – destructive to us and to them. If we're going to find peace here, then that peace will only come if we can signal our own change. A change that they understand is a change in who we are, a change that they can see.
So I want you to shut your eyes and imagine what it will seem like to a young man in Iraq or in Iran, who wakes up on January 21st, 2009, and sees the picture of this man as the president of the United States. A man who opposed the war at the beginning, a man who worked his way up from almost nothing, a man who came from a mother and a father of mixed cultures and mixed societies, who came from a broken home to overcome all of that to become the leader in his class, at the Harvard Law Review, and an extraordinary success as a politician. How can they see us when they see us as having chosen this man as our president?
There can be no clearer way that we could say, that we could say that the United States could say, that we have changed, than by electing this man. There is no way we could more clearly move on toward peace than this. He represents the very best of who we are, the best of character, of integrity and ideals. And someone who opposed the war from the start.
So Julie Cohen, here is my request: I agree with you nothing could be more important than this election and this candidate; but nothing could be more important also than solving this impossible war; not just by bringing the troops home, but also by enabling the peace. By enabling that peace, by beginning a process of forgiveness and of hope. That is the great hope that this new generation, represented in this leader, Barack Obama, gives us. And gives the world."
Today, Lessig's words come true:
""Americans overcame the racial divide and elected Obama because they wanted the real thing: a candidate who spoke from the bottom of his heart," said Terumi Hino, a photographer and painter in Tokyo. "I think this means the United States can go back to being admired as the country of dreams." "
I am so proud to be an American.
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| Digital voting was down |
| shame I didn't. |
| The touch-screen voting booth was down in my precinct. I didn't get to video my vote. But the paper ballot reader was also jammed. Great way to start the day, KC Ward 1, precinct 2. After getting there 30 minutes before the polling station opened, it still took 30 minutes to cast my vote, mostly due to the confusion when nobody's votes could be tallied. There was so much confusion in that room and so many people, it would have been easy to grab two ballots and turn them both in. I almost did.
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| Protect Your Vote |
Electronic voting machines have already been caught flipping votes in 4 states. http://buzzfeed.com/peggy/vote-flipping-caught-on-tape. It could happen to yours too.
We've all got these great cell phones these days. Most of us can capture video on them too.
Put these together? You get VideoYourVote, a YouTube project that was conceived as a documentary experiment, but I feel will be even more influential if we catch and save our flipped votes.
So when you go into the booth, if its a digital voting machine, break out your digital video device and pit tech vs tech. Save your Vote, Save the World.
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| A surrender of sorts |
As you can see, my blog now pulls back posts, regardless of how long its been since I've posted. This is the official surrender of the Two Week Posting Rule. Not that this blog is going to die, I've just come to the realization that I express my digital self differently now than I used to. Now its all mostly Twitter, Facebook, and Forums.
http://twitter.com/mildweed
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=506686835
I carved pumpkins today.
I am teaching an improv class at Kansas City Art Institute tomorrow.
Life is good :)
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| Overload |
| My blog has been reduced to tweets |
| I can't handle 3 political headline generators. War, Economy, Election.
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