As old as my dad was

My father died at the age of 51 on March 7, 1978. I was born on his birthday, December 14, in the year of 1957.

I have now lived longer than my father did.

Melvin Monroe Phillips, I think of you often, and I thank you for being the wonderful father and husband that you were.

cp

RNC Monday Funride

(bunch o' FLICKR pix here)

Typical holiday Monday. Slept in, did some laundry, and headed out for a quiet bike ride in the neighborhood.

Lollygagged in Merriam Park, cruised Summit Ave., through some alleys and neighborhoods, stopped at Mississippi Market for a snack from the deli; and had a pleasant conversation with a woman from Boston who had been downtown for the authorized family-friendly protest parade. Curiosity got the best of me and I decided to see what was happening in convention city. Through Irvine Park, then along the river. Listened to several Steve Earle tunes (from across the Mississippi -- the Take Back Labor Day event); it sounded great from there. Stopped at Black Dog Cafe to take in the Poster Offensive exhibit, chilled out at Mears Park, and decided to loop around downtown to feel out the convention vibe.

I missed out on the actual event, but happened upon the post-confrontation arrest process at 9th Street and Jackson. There is plenty of good coverage from all of the major media by folks who know what they're doing and have some fancy cameras, but I thought I'd share what I shot with my trusty 5-year-old Canon Sure Shot S400. Pretty grainy when you've got 3.1 mpx and shitty digital zoom, but here's what I got on Flickr.

And a couple of shots here. Below, Democracy Now producer Nicole Salazar on the way to a shuttle van. Evidentally another producer, Sharif Abdel Kouddous, and DN host Amy Goodman were arrested also. 

I'm not sure who the gentleman below is. I think he represents, in some way, the Democracy now journalists. He was quite agitated and very vocal with the arresting officers.

Interesting to observe, but the heat got a bit tiring and I thought I'd enjoy the convenience of a neighborhood bar. Bummer, even the Gopher Bar decided to close down for the day. 

Found this bit of craziness on Wabasha St. Check out the pix on this website; looks like this crazy dude gets around and customizes his message for the event of the moment (there seem to be some common themes, though). 

Checked out the site of the True Blue Minnesota scene near the Cathedral and headed toward home. After all that excitement, I stopped by the Muddy Pig to wind down with a pint of Bell's, then pedaled to the Macalester area to order take-out from Shish and have a beer at Coffee News Cafe.

Good bike ride today.

Parkers' Cabin

Spent a pleasant couple of days and evenings at Jamie Parker's cabin this weekend. Maybe more to post here, and there will be some pix on Flickr, but for now I just wanted to toss this in here before I wrapped up Monday's post.

More to come

States I Have Visited

Found this site that generates a map of "states I have visited" like this:

WHY? am i here?

Ran into my friends Tim and Jennifer yesterday at lunch -- that was cool to see them. Afterwards I looked up the webesite of their new venture, and from there ended up at twitter.

Oh, no ... another distraction. I'd heard about it but consciously resisted even checking it out. I can't say I'm hooked on it (I'm actually a pretty private person, and don't need to share my every thought or movement), but I'm enough of a geek to check it out. So now I thought I'd better just dive in and actually do this ... a personal blog. Why not. I mean, it's not enought that I already have the requisite myspace page; a couple of web pages ... neither one with an ounce of worthy content (this is where the "professional" content might go / this is where the personal stuff would go / this is my hobby business -- The Aarow Rubber Stamp Company -- yesss, two As at the first); oh, yeah, I have a "homepage" on mac.com / oh, yeah ... I just set up a Facebook account because of the twitter curiosity;

The closest thing to any worthy content is the music that I've been doing with my pal Jamie Parker. Pretty casual/amateur, but lots of fun: our official “band” website. OR on myspace ... and ... an actual updated blog (well, for the two weeks were"on tour"): makereadymusic.blogspot.com.

Holy shit ... do I need more crap to deal with? I've got dishes to do.

Oh, I think I've got a virb page. And AIM is craigleephillips@mac.com. I've got an account on something that starts with an "o", but don't remember what that was.

Funny thing about all this crap is that I don't really use any of it much and probably won't keep any of it updated. Who knows, I might surprise myself. I should really just xerox a zine instead.

Am I already here?

I was going to star a blog today. But then I realized that I already did that last week. It must be an awesome blog.