SwimFinsSF

Happy PRIDE! ;)

If ya live in San Francisco and believe in God then you’ve GOT to know he’s smilin on us.. Cuz, once again this year, the weather for Gay Pride weekend is AMAZING…. We went to a birthday party for my friend Andy last night then came home and went for a walk through the Castro with Stephen and Troy… It was a warm WONDERFUL evening in the city… Warm enough to walk around in shorts… And EVERYONE was out and about … The city is full of folks from around the country/world right now for gay pride and they were all out last night… There were people all over the place and lines for EVERYTHING… It was nuts – and great…

Today is no different… Bright.. warm.. sunny… and people are all over the place… I got up kinda early to get ready for the electricians who are working on the house… Then, while kevin was at the gym, I walked down to Peets to get my morning fix… Then wandered around t he ‘stro and went to brunch at Luna with Kevin…. Now we’re chilling at home (he’s walking that painter guy on TV … and antiques road show)… Gonna hit the Gym with Matt to get ready for our evening..

Later tonight we’re going over to Bill and Matt’s for Matt’s Birthday… Then on to ReUNION to… The castro will be teeming with people for Pink saturday but I’ve done that before… Tomorrow we’ll probably go to to the festival and then kevin is whispering about wanting to go to Fresh..

Anyway – just checkin in before we get in too much trouble! :):)

Happy PRIDE! :):)

Cause for Pride…

Over the past year I’ve struggled to find cause to be proud of our country and our actions. Don’t get me wrong – I still feel very lucky to live where I do and have the freedoms I have. But I’ve also been far less than proud of the behavior of our elected officials and our attitudes toward the rest of the world. Lately I’ve seen a trend toward infringing personal liberties and rights, both at home and abroad..

Well today I’m feeling thrilled and proud again:

Supreme Court strikes down Texas sodomy law

In a 6 to 3 vote today the supreme court has found that we have the same right to personal privacy and freedom as everyone else.. For me this case is HUGE and the overwhelming nature of the vote is even more monmumental. The supreme court of our country has found homosexuals have the same right to privacy guaranteed in the US Constitution as every other American. Its as simple as that.

The 3 usual suspects (Scalia, Rehnquist, and Thomas) with Scalia at the helm dissented but that was to be expected. The fact that the other 6 took a stand to protect individual liberties has me dancing in the halls:

The men “are entitled to respect for their private lives,” Kennedy wrote.

“The state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime,” he said.

(from Yahoo!)

This decision reminds me of the decision years ago overturning Colorado’s Amendment 2 and reminds that our system of checks and balances, while maddening sometimes, overall is a strong and very positive thing. The last lines of the Majority opinion delivered by Justice Kennedy on Amendment 2 were amazing:

We must conclude that Amendment 2 classifies homosexuals not to further a proper legislative end but to make them unequal to everyone else. This Colorado cannot do. A State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws. Amendment 2 violates the Equal Protection Clause, and the judgment of the Supreme Court of Colorado is affirmed.

Sometimes…. not always… but some times (and probably most of the time) our system works… and makes me VERY proud to be American – and Pride week in San Francisco couldn’t have been a better week for this to come down… You’d better believe there will be celebration in the streets!

Messanging Observations

I’ve been using the new iChat for a few days now and for the most part I’m loving it… However it has made me think more about how I use instant messaging and how I communicate with people…

I’ve found the voice part very impressive – the quality is outstanding and having a full duplex conversation rather than walkie talkie style conversations is very nice.. Talking with people a long ways away (like on the other coast) does show a noticeable lag so you have to be more deliberate about your conversations… its not the telephone but its gettin there …

The video is more problematic but I attribute that as much to my small DSL pipe that i’m talking to as anything – that and the fact that the person I’ve tried to use it with the most is also in NYC.. Kinda harsh circumstances to be throwin at the poor thing…

However I’ve also discovered that I there is still a very important place for good old fashioned text IMs… I’m a huge IM junkey – ask anyone.. I use it for work, for family, and for friends.. I find it a very nice way to communicate that is very inobtrusive to what i’m doing.. Someone can say somethign to me and i’ll get to it when its most convenient.. That may be immediately or it might be a little later when i’m done with a thought or a conversation… Everyone who IMs me knows not to be offended if I don’t respond right away – just means I’m busy – if its important they’ll call..

The voice and video part of the new iChat doesn’t allow for that – people can’t leave a message for you to respond to – you have to react immediately similar to a telephone… That doesn’t mean they wont have their uses – when i’m having a detailed conversation with someone I often pick up the phone and call cuz typing that much is irritating. Now i can just click the talk button.. Or if I wanna check in on someone in my family the video part will be way cool…

They all have their place and i’m gonna enjoy trying them – but in this case I think the new technology just enhances the old – doesn’t replace it… There’s still a place for old IMs

“Good morning”

“Hey – what was that bug number?”

“You ready to drive home?”

“Wanna go to a movie tonight?”

“What was your flight number?”

Just some thoughts…

Conference observations

Spend the day at the Developer’s Conference today and had a couple of observations:

– Our new iSight and the new iChat AV? Very cool… The Audio Quality is VERY good and full duplex – just like a phone.. Did notice some noticable lags when talking to Clayton in NYC but with people close by it was FANTASTIC… Gotta figure out where to put my mic and speakers so people can hear me and not hear the ratta tat tat of my keyboard..

– Some of the geeks need to learn manners ( and I consider myself a geek so that wasn’t a slam – kinda like a gay boy callin another a fag! 😉 )… Its one thing to cheer during a presentation but to hiss when you don’t like something is really damn rude… People worked hard on this stuff – if you don’t like it suck it up and then give constructive feedback that they can use to improve things.. The silly thing (and this is where I get super geeky) was that it was a bunch of MPW fans in the back booing the new Project Builder… C’mon people… get a grip.. and some manners..

– The new Moscone is very nice… Very well set up for a conference like this… Big tree up the center is… well.. umm… interesting…

– Final Cut Pro session on the first day was in a TINY room and was packed to the hilt… I LOVE that… Granted it was largely the demo we gave for the 4 at 4 shows – but they still seemed to love it…

– Food needs some work… First of all – get over the ‘geek food’ thing.. I know this show is known for Jolt Cola, Gummy Bears, and other such crap.. But some of us don’t want to spend a week eatin that shit.. I showed up and saw tables full of krispy kreems and cringed… And there wasn’t much – even of that…

– I FLIPPIN LOVE that they’re havin it in San Francisco this year… Makes SO much more sense.. And San Jose is SUCH a drag..

Ok.. Thats it… Just yammerin… and playin with iChat..

See… SUCH a geek! :):)

WWDC and Coffee

So I’m spending the morning trapped in a coffee shop because the electricians are upgrading the meters in our building to code and installing a few extra breakers in our house… And for some fool reason they want to turn the power off… hmmmmppppfffff… You’d think that a professional could do all that stuff with the power on so I could keep workin from my office… ah well… (just kidding)…

This afternoon I’m headin over to our developers conference to commune with the ‘puter types… I’m skipping the keynote cuz I’ve heard / seen most of the stuff already (but don’t bother asking)… This afternoon is when the topic specific sessions start and thats the stuff I’m interested in.. not to mention this is the first time that they’ve had the Pro Video Apps at the developer conference which is pretty cool…

Anyway… back to work.. just checkin in… if I get inspired later you’ll hear more from me…

(ever notice how AWFUL my spelling is – even WITH the built in spell checkier? :):) )

Word Association

I say … and you think … ?

1. Tumbler:: Gymnast
2. Recital :: Violin
3. Reform:: Skool
4. Nipple:: Piercing
5. Jackal:: Hyena
6. Mailtruck:: Mailman
7. Merchendise:: Retail
8. Comma:: Colon
9. Erotica:: Madonna
10. Ferment:: Wine

(From Unconscious Mutterings)