Sleep Spent

The weather was absolutely beautiful today! Here’s what I ended up doing:

1. Meet up with Flickr people, most of which I’d only known virtually, at Alamo Square.
2. Joined some friends at the El Rio in the Mission where I learned how to merengue and salsa. So much fun!
3. Headed up to see Once, part of the SF International Film Festival. It was beyond excellent.

Yes, I know, New York or any other big city has film festivals and such. But it’s days like this when I’m extra-special-happy that I moved from the South Bay to the city by the bay.

I made a bet tonight with Rob, a friend I met through Aram Kudurshian. He is from Canada, and we were talking about gay marriage there. I asserted that it would be at least 20 years before gay marriage was legal in the US at a federal level. (Canada did it piecemeal as well, with some provinces recognizing it and others not, before there was a federal allowance several years ago.) Rob disagreed, and said that it would be legal in the US within 5 years.

This strikes me as incredibly unrealistic. Sure, the Neocons are on the wane, politically. But I am not expecting gay marriage to be part of a party plank or a presidential race for at least another 8-12 years. The culture warriors are very entrenched and skilled movers, by now. They’re not going to give up. And 36%, isn’t going to change overnight. To be frank, I think a lot of people are going to have to die and be replaced by young people who haven’t been brainwashed.

So here was the bet:

“On 19 April 2012, gay marriage will be legal in the United States either by (a) passage of a bill in the Congress that is subsequently signed by the president, or (b) a Supreme Court decision that may or may not have been fully implemented yet.” If this is true, I will buy Rob dinner at Chou Chou. If not, he’ll buy dinner for me.

I must say, I certainly hope he’s right and I’m proven to be an un-Pollyanna. But with Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito on the Court, I don’t think he’s getting any help that way.

Only time will tell.

Head on over to this site and check out what California will look like with a 2 meter sea level rise. I was actually surprised that San Francisco proper wasn’t more directly affected by that level of an increase—I had expected more than some parts of the Embarcadero and SFO to be inundated.

Also of note is this article on how rising sea levels will affect the region (transit and the new Mission Bay building boom, in particular) as well as this one on the really scary long-term picture of what changing weather patterns mean for an over-devloped, under-protected and heavily aquaduct-dependent California.

I recognized the yellow brick arches of the Gloucester Road tube station immediately. This is a really cool art installation, and is much cooler than what was there before (ads).

OMG, this site addictive. You have been warned. When you have 12 hours to kill, go check out my lists.

No, I didn’t create this. But it’s awesome.

I’ve been taking pictures like a madman here. Some of the best from the weekend are available on my Flickr page.

I’m at McNerney’s Stockton headquarters here. I’m in charge of people reporting in their GOTV numbers for about 18 precincts across Stockton. It’s 5:50 here and we’re sending out as many people as we can to walk precincts.

We have a whole passel of election protection lawyers here; they’ve been fielding calls all day, though I’m not sure how many actual problems they’re running into. Here’s hoping it’s not many.

People are starting to call! GTG.

I’ve been here since 7. It’s nearly 11. I’ve been doing 10 things at once all morning; this is fantastic! :-) I’ve taken a whole bunch of photos with my bad ass new camera. Teresa (sorta campaign manager) and Erica (sorta volunteer manager) are running around doing the same.

I’m having so much fun! I’ve been printing labels, making precinct walking packets, fielding phone calls... just generally being useful.

Looks like McNerney is “up” (w/in MoE) in the latest polling, so the environment here is feverish. We had a crap load of people show up at 9, but they’ve mostly all gone out precinct walking now.

It’s pretty inclement outside, but that hasn’t dampened the enthusiasm, or reduced the number of volunteers: we were expecting 80, and we’ve had more than that (though I’m not sure how much more).

Pombo better be shaking in his boots. Or, actually, I’d prefer some smug over-confidence at this point.

Go McNerney!

I started feeling awful on the drive back from Stockton Sunday night. It hurt to swallow and to talk. I had been fine a couple of hours earlier. I thought it was TMJ, because I hadn’t been wearing my nightguard.

On Monday, I didn’t go straight to a doctor, but everything had gotten worse. I couldn’t swallow anything, which was really messy, and I couldn’t talk. I still thought it was TMJ.

When the symptoms hadn’t improved on Tuesday, I went into UCSF’s urgent care clinic. There I was diagnosed with the classic symptoms of strep throat and prescribed penicillin and lots of ibuprofin.

And today I’m definitely feeling better. I ate some scrambled eggs this morning, the first solid meal I’ve had since Sunday, and the swelling seems to be going down bit by bit. I can swallow again!

Tomorrow I think I’ll be back to work, though probably from home.

It looks like I’ll be over this just in time for the weekend, when I return to Stockton to help in the final GOTV push.