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The Presidential Memorial Commission is a group of San Francisco citizens, including ex-mayoral candidate Chicken John, who are submitting an ordinance initiative for the ballot in the November election in San Francisco to change the name of the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant to “George W Bush Sewage Plant”. Chicken is currently leading a signature drive in order to get the 15,000 signatures of registered voters required for the petition to add this to the ballot.
Here’s what Chicken sent to his mailing list yesterday:
OK. So today you get to live in the City of Art and Innovation. And by being a good citizen of San Francisco, I implore you to take action.
We have a ballot initiative that you will be able to vote on come November 2008.
We have put forth the following question to all San Fraciscans:
“Should the city and county of San Francisco reanme the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant?
If we’re lucky, it’ll be Proposition H.
Go here:
http://presidentialmemorial.wordpress.com/
Presidential Memorial Commission Signature Drive is now in full swing. Like 15,000 signatures are needed to make this happen. That’s 15,000 signatures of San Francisco residents who both live somewhere and are registered to vote AND know the address of where they are registered to vote and can remember how to sign their names because the Election Commission checks each and every signature.
So.
I need all of you (who live somewhere and are registered to vote) to sign. But that’s not enough. I need all of you (that’s ALL of you) to activate. I need a bunch of you to commit to collecting 50 signatures. It’s easy. In the next month you get 50 people you know to sign a ballot initiative form that takes 20 seconds. You know 50 people. Easy. Your work, your roomates, that party you’re going to… in no time at all you’ll be a functioning citizen of the City of Art and Innovation.
Write me an email, I’ll mail you a canvassers button and email you the PDF forms. Easy. But ya hafta do it.
After running for mayor, I can assure you this is a much better way to spend your time activating to local politics. And since we are not collecting a dime, the ethics commission can’t toy with us.
Just write me an email and tell me you wanna help get some signatures together. We’ve got like 1,200 so far. But likely 50% of them will be rejected.
This from the accurate and astute Fox News Network:
Virginia-born activist and ordained minister John Rinaldi, a co-sponsor of the petition who ran unsuccessfully for mayor last year under his nickname “Chicken John,” said the initiative would turn “every toilet in San Francisco into basically a shrine for George W. Bush and all his great achievements in his eight years as our commander in chief.”
Rinaldi — flush with pride about the idea — said renaming the plant is “the highest honor available to us.”
May the shitstorm begin!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
chicken
Chicken John
Showman
San Francisco, California
chickenjohn AT chickenjohn DOT com
More Coverage:
- Fox News
- Jackson West
- Curbed SF
- Huffington Post
- SFist
image via Jackson West
Last Friday, around 30 bicycle riders (and a few inline skaters) took to the freeways during rush hour, racing past cars stuck in traffic. According to one of the organizers from Crimanimal Mass, the aim was "to raise questions about the transportation infrastructure. In a city ruled by cars, why is it that you can get places faster on bikes?” LAist has photos of the hijinks. Link (Thanks, Zach Behrens!)
Visit Uncrate for the full post.
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail
in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2008 11:29 PM
Subject: in response to a mother's day post secret
the day before my grandmother died, she wrote her name and mine on a piece of paper. it makes me happy that she held on to that one memory even when others were gone.
i still have the piece of paper. reading that person's secret motivated me to go out and get it framed.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Friday, May 16, 2008 3:37 AM
Subject: mothers day secrets
My 4 year old is my very favorite person to hang out with. I love talking with her, learning about her, and doing things with her. She is cooler than anyone!
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 9:13 AM
Subject: stretch marks and motherhood
My first child is due on Wednesday and stretch marks appeared just this week. I could care less . . . I just want to meet my daughter!
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-----Email Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2008 11:36 PM
Subject: mom thinking you're mad
my mom once told me that if we ever got into a fight and something happened to one of us, that she knows I love her no matter what I said or did, and I should know the same
(she's sitting next to me as I type this... I love you mom!)
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 2:37 PM
Subject: Mom and cancer postcard.
My mom died of cancer when I was 17. I'm almost 24 now and I'm still angry and I'm still sad, but I'm finally having a good year. Kids like us are everywhere. We find each other. We help each other feel a little less alone.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 4:26
Subject: re: mothers day secrets.
I called my mom on mothers day, to tell her happy mothers day.
She asked me who I was.
My mom deleted my phone number when she found out I was gay.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2008 10:56PM
Subject: Mothers Day
After I read through all the Mothers Day secrets, I emailed the link to my mother. She called and we just finished sharing some of our family secrets over the phone. But here is one more I didn’t tell her.
I am going to surprise her with concert tickets.
Florida PostSecret Exhibit
Over 400 postcards are now on display at the Brevard Art Museum.
1463 Highland Ave | Melbourne, FL | 321-242-0737 | facebook event page
Here are some exhibit comments from when the exhibit was in Canada.
I flew from Calgary to see if my secret was here. It is. . .
I'm still shaking.
Weird - and an unsuitable display for this museum.
I've been here twice already. It's disgustingly comforting to know that people share my shocking secrets.
I held my breath for most of the time in the exhibit to keep from crying. I cried in the bathroom.
I parked in the no parking zone to come see PostSecret.
The PostSecret exhibition tour is directed by International Arts & Artists and will be on tour through 2010.
"Each of the PostSecret books gives you a window into the human soul. Sending in a post card is a cathartic experience. Laugh, cry and connect with insightful journeymen in the human experience. Read the books. Share them with friends. Subscribe to the blog."
-- Amazon Reviewer, Irish Eyes
All four PostSecret books are available at bookstores or Online.
PostSecret won four Webby Awards last week for Art and for Blogging.
Only through your participation are these awards, and this community, possible.
Thank you.
Salvador Dali appeared in several commercials during the 1960’s including Alka Seltzer, Lanvin and Braniff (with Whitey Ford).
Dali also made a hilarious appearance on the 1950’s television game show “What’s My Line?”, listing his occupation as “artist”.
The ability to withstand social pressure and remain calm in unusual situations requires balls. It requires having the intestinal fortitude to do things that push you outside of your comfort zone and that might result in negative social feedback. Years and years ago TD said something about Erik and Neil that I've always kept in mind. He said that Erik had a blindspot to negative social feedback. Meaning that he can't see when things are going bad. I noticed this when he picked up a stripper one night after she had told me she hated him. To this day still one of the most impressive things I've seen but he couldn't tell she didn't like him at first. Neil on the other hand has an extreme sensitivity to social pressure which is why all of his stuff is about reaching the " Hook point" as quickly as possible, and avoiding bad reactions. Seeing their conflicting blindspots explains partially why they are able to work so well together. What it doesn't address is most guys. Most guys are not going to be blind to negative social feedback and if they adopt Neil's belief that they should avoid negative feedback at all costs they're gonna stop going out in the first month. A phenomena that happens pretty frequently after "Fantasy Camp" style bootcamps without follow up.
The reason I bring this up is that not enough emphasis is placed on simply having balls. In putting yourself in a situation where you might fail and pushing it as far as you can. A lot of people would say I'm a pretty ballsy guy as I do really ridiculous things in set and escalate faster and harder than almost anyone else. To me it's not a big deal because I've accepted rejection as a part of the game. As my Pimp buddy Big Zee says " Being able to handle rejection makes you a man."
So how do you develop balls? By doing shit that makes you uncomfortable. The same way that girls have comfort thresholds, guys have comfort thresholds. A few years back telling a girl I just met to get that I was gonna do horribly dirty things to her would have freaked me out. So would stopping girls on the street or interrupting girls on their cell phones in a mall. Now I think those are normal approaches( I'm brought back to reality when students refuse to do them, but to me it's easy) But the point is you have to be able to bump your own comfort thresholds back. If you are terrified of talking to a strange woman go up say hi and leave. Do that 50 times and it will be MUCH less scary then push a little bit farther until you're getting kicked out of your favorite bar in Dallas for bringing another girl into the bathroom. A lot of the time just being ballsy and willing to try something out of the ordinary is enough.
Go out and develop your balls, do something everyday that makes you feel scared socially. The more you do it the easier it gets and then you'll develop actual confidence. Confidence is the result of pushing yourself and accomplishing goals. In the book Flow the author talks about how we are not having a peak experience unless we are pushing ourselves to our limit within a task that is accomplishable. That's why I love game because you can challenge yourself with a very achievable goal. But it takes balls to achieve it.
S