Photo of the Day: Autumn in Portland. Taken along NW First Avenue near the Saturday Market area, Nov. 14, '04.

Photo of the Day: For the Oct. 1 Photo of the Day, I posted a pic of Cathedral Rock I took along Oak Creek, mentioning it was the most phohtographed site in the state. This pic is Cathedral Rock from the other side, the Sedona side. Note the little bungalow in the forground under construction. To get an idea of its scale, note the man standing on the roof to the right of the planetarium. Taken Sept. 2004.

Photo of the Day: From my rock photos web site, Blues maven Susan Tedeschi. I got this shot July, 2003, at the Waterfront Blues Festival, Portland, OR.

Photo of the Day: The first significant snow of the season hit the high Cascades this past week. Taken on the Mount Hood National Forest, Nov. 20, 04.

Playing poll, er, pool

Well, the community voted this month to pass a bond levy for a community swimming pool and created a board of directors to run the pool district. I got elected to the board. It was unanimous for me. No one else was running for the position I was. Some of the other board positions had opposition, but for some reason I did not. This isn't the first time I've run for office. The good folks of this town elected me mayor back in the Gay 90s.

Now comes the real work: creating the pool and formulating the district.

Most entities entering into a major capital construction project have been around a while, 10, 20, 50 years or longer. The five of us haven't even been sworn in yet. Although the voters did pass construction bond approval and created the pool district--which means taxes will be levied to run the operations and management of the pool district--the county treasurer's office tells me the taxes won't begin to be levied until Jan. 1, and we will not be able to access those funds until Nov. of next year.

As a result, we find ourselves with no money and a plethora of public entity requirements with which we must comply, including advertising our public meetings. We have no staff. We need an attorney to assist us in finding a reputable bond attorney in order to begin pulling the bond sale together. Each month we go without letting the bonds for construction we are losing approximately $38,000 in possible interest accrual.

Getting the bond dollars will help significantly because we'll be able to hire a project manager and an architect. Those 2 should be able to begin the work of developing drawings and timelines, site preperation, etc.

But it's the other side, the operations and management that causes me concern. We have no office, no meeting room, no office equipment, no computers, no postage, nothing except our good intentions, and you know what they pave.

So stick around, dear blog reader, as I from time to time post the latest episode in the now on-going saga: It'll All Come Out In The Wash, or How to Build a Pool Without Getting Soaked, (IACOITW, for short).

Now, where'd I put that bath towel....?

Photo of the Day: Taken along the Willamette River, Portland, OR, October 2005.

Photo of the Day: Krog St. underpass, Atlanta, GA, Oct. 28, 2004. I understand several rap and hip-hop videos have been shot here. (As always, you can click on any of the photos on my page to view the fullsized version.)

Photo of the Day: Fall fly fishing on the Deschutes River. Nov. 7, 2004.

Photo of the Day: Haight Street, San Francisco, CA, Dec. 31, '03. That chick's got really long legs. Wonder what the rest of her looks like.

Dandelion whine

Mulla Nasrudin, the Sufi wise man and fool, decided to start a flower garden.

He prepared the soil and planted the seeds of many beautiful flowers. But when they came up, his garden was filled not just with his chosen flowers but also overrun by dandelions.

He sought out advice from gardeners all over and tried every method known to get rid of them but to no avail.

Finally he walked all the way to the capital to speak to the royal gardener at the sheik’s palace. The wise old man had counseled many gardeners before and suggested a variety of remedies to expel the dandelions but Mulla had tried them all.

They sat together in silence for some time and finally the gardener looked at Nasrudin and said "Well, then I suggest you learn to love them."

Photo of the Day: This is a photo of the first light of the morning sun hitting the top of Mt. Jefferson; taken 11/07/04 on the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Reservation.

Soul food

Whatever attitudes we habitually use toward ourselves, we will use on others, and whatever attitutdes we habitually use on others, we will use on ourselves.

The situation is comparable to our serving food to ourselves and to other people from the same bowl. Everyone ends up eating the same thing.

We must examine carefully what we are dishing out.

The Wisdom of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. Even a superficial look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. Without persistent effort, time itself becomes an ally of the insurgent and primitive forces of irrational emotionalism and social destruction. This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.

A big 'Thank You' and a tiny URL

Just a huge thanks to JA Becker who correctly identified the length of the URL as the issue that caused my right hand column to go to the bottom of the page. I used tinyurl.com to remedy that.

For those of you who aren't familiar with that site, it creates a permanent, non-broken url to use for any web page. It's especially useful for extra long URLs, such as the one I was using.

Again, thanks to Ms. or Mr. Becker.

What the...???

Huh?

I posted the one below about Fear and Political Preferences, and then all of a sudden all the stuff that's in the right hand column went from the top of the page to the bottom of the page. Do any of you out there know enough about bloggerspot to tell me how to fix that? To get all that stuff back up to the top again?

Thanks in advance if you do....

Photo of the Day: Grist Mill, Stone Mountain Park, Stone Mountain GA. Oct. 26, '04

Fear of Death and Political

Quoting a couple points about the study from Science Daily:

"Fatal Attraction: A New Study Suggests A Relationship Between Fear Of Death And Political Preferences"

".. reminders of death increase the need for psychological security and therefore the appeal of leaders who emphasize the greatness of the nation and a heroic victory over evil. ..

"For their current research, the scientists asked students to think about their own death or a control topic and then read campaign statements of three hypothetical political candidates, each with a different leadership style: "charismatic" (i.e. those emphasizing greatness of the nation and a heroic victory over evil, as described above), task-oriented or relationship-oriented. Following a reminder of death, there was almost an 800 percent increase in votes for the charismatic leader, but no increase for the two other candidates."

".. mortality salience leads people toward individuals, groups, and actions that can help enhance their self-esteem. People want to identify with special, great things, and charismatic leaders typically offer the promise of just that."

"What can voters do to ensure that they make choices in a rational way, based on political qualifications and the positions of the candidates? They may need to monitor efforts by candidates to capitalize on fear mongering and make a greater effort to vote with their heads, rather than with their hearts, and be aware of how concerns about death affect human behavior."

The full story can be found at:

http://tinyurl.com/7x4ey

Photo of the Day: I was in this cafe in Atlanta last week and went into the men's room that had the round mirror completely surrounded with a round flourescent bulb. The effect was so startling for someone who wore glasses that I immediately got my camera out of my day pack and snapped this self portrait.

Photo of the Day: Since it's the day before election day (thank goodness!), I thought I'd post this photo of some street theater I captured last week in downtown Atlanta. Two actors, wearing masks of the Prez and VP, were roving all over the streets that day. That's a quart of oil in W's left hand. Oct. 29, 04.