She did! For serious! Looky here:
Michelle Obama wants you to register to vote.
Missouri's deadline to register in order to be eligible to vote in this year's presidential election is October 8th.
Are you registered to vote under your current name at your current address? Are you currently listed on the rolls as an active voter?
Even if you currently think you are registered, you may not be. If you haven't voted in the last two local elections, your registration may have been listed as inactive.
If you're not sure whether your current voter registration is up to date, please contact your local Board of Elections to check before you miss the registration deadline.
St. Louis County Board of Elections
St. Louis City Board of Elections
Kansas City Board of Elections
Jackson County Board of Elections
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Friday, September 19, 2008
InterPLAY St. Louis
I'll be moderating a panel on search engine optimization and traffic building for bloggers tonight at InterPLAY St. Louis in the University City Loop. Speaking on my panel will be two local SEO experts, Will Hanke and Ellen Gooch. The panel begins at 5 p.m. tonight, and will be held at Screenz on Delmar.
I would be ever so pleased if you could join me.
We'll be discussing the basics of SEO, explaining why bloggers need to care about SEO, giving tips on easy ways to optimize your own site, and teaching ways to protect yourself from content thieves who want to use your work to make ad revenue.
Tomorrow I'll also be speaking on panels about internet ethics and netroots politics. A list of panels is available here.
I would be ever so pleased if you could join me.
We'll be discussing the basics of SEO, explaining why bloggers need to care about SEO, giving tips on easy ways to optimize your own site, and teaching ways to protect yourself from content thieves who want to use your work to make ad revenue.
Tomorrow I'll also be speaking on panels about internet ethics and netroots politics. A list of panels is available here.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Ike Isn't Finished Yet
Flooding from Ike:
This is not Texas.
This is not Louisiana.
This is Florissant, Missouri, just north of St. Louis.
This is two miles from my house.
This is not Texas.
This is not Louisiana.
This is Florissant, Missouri, just north of St. Louis.
This is two miles from my house.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
September 12th
It was just as well that my morning class had been canceled; no one seemed to be paying much attention in their classes that day. In fact many students and a few professors had taken the day off, some, to participate in the campus blood drive; others, I imagine, were in shock.
I myself had felt it best to go to school. At that time, I was living on the 13th floor of a high rise apartment building in the heart of a major U.S. city. No one knew, on September 12th, whether there were plans to attack other buildings. The university campus felt safer than home.
At a loss for what to do with myself over the next few hours until my next class, I wandered toward the student center. I had a vague notion I might try to give blood. Back then I had very low blood pressure and I was also terrified of needles, so I was one of those people who passed out cold nearly every time I had my blood drawn. But being Type O, so I was always being asked to give blood. I resolved to do it this time.
It seemed the thing to do, that day. It seemed the only thing most people could think of to do.
I'd seen so many flags on my trip in to school that morning. Flags on houses. Flags on t-shirts. Flags taped up in gas station windows, and draped over restaurant awnings, and flapping from the antennas of cars. For the first time in my life I felt guilty for not owning any patriotic clothing. Normally I wasn't into that sort of thing. I thought people who wore flags all of the time were posers. I wore a lot of black, myself. I was twenty.
As soon as I got to the student center, I could tell the line for the blood drive was much too long for me to join. I'd never make to to my next class in time if I waited in it. I felt simultaneously guilty and relieved. It would have been sort of embarrassing to faint in front of so many people. But still. But still. I decided I would try to come back later, after class.
I wandered around the student center, looking for someone I knew, someone to talk to about something mind-numbingly ordinary, like today's menu at the cafeteria, so I could push from my mind endlessly looping miniature television images of people jumping purposefully to their deaths to escape the pain of flames.
I didn't see anyone I knew. So I wandered in circles, and tried not to think of burning people, and worried. And I didn't just worry about my high rise apartment.
I worried about my old high school friend Fahd, an American Muslim whose parents were immigrants. He had taken me to the prom senior year; I was the first girl he'd ever danced with. I worried about my friend Ayesha, whose mother had once smiled as she told me the children in her pediatric practice called her Mother Mary because she wore a scarf over her hair.
I worried about my Hindi teacher, an Indian Muslim woman with pale skin who loved to argue in a friendly way with the Hindu girls in my class over which religion had done more to advance feminism in India, Hinduism or Islam. I worried about my friend Hamenaz, a visiting college student from Iran, who liked to read Rumi's poetry with me.
Where were these friends of mine today? Were they safe? Were people harassing them? I had heard already that some mosques had received threats. I had heard that people who looked "Arab" were being racially profiled by the authorities, stopped by angry crowds on the street.
As I wandered in circles through the student center, trying to clear my head, a young woman standing behind a table reached out and took my arm without a word. I didn't know her.
I looked up at the sign above the table. It said Muslim Student Association.
"Here," she said. "Please take one."
Her eyes were earnest, searching. She pressed this into my hand:
The table was full of pins. How had they made these so quickly? Someone must have stayed up all night.
"We want peace," she said.
"I know. I know you do. I know." I meant it. It was all I could say.
I pinned PEACE to my backpack, and walked slowly off to class.
I keep the pin near my writing desk, now. I look at it almost every day. It helps me to remember that so many of us in this world wanted peace, on September 12th.
I myself had felt it best to go to school. At that time, I was living on the 13th floor of a high rise apartment building in the heart of a major U.S. city. No one knew, on September 12th, whether there were plans to attack other buildings. The university campus felt safer than home.
At a loss for what to do with myself over the next few hours until my next class, I wandered toward the student center. I had a vague notion I might try to give blood. Back then I had very low blood pressure and I was also terrified of needles, so I was one of those people who passed out cold nearly every time I had my blood drawn. But being Type O, so I was always being asked to give blood. I resolved to do it this time.
It seemed the thing to do, that day. It seemed the only thing most people could think of to do.
I'd seen so many flags on my trip in to school that morning. Flags on houses. Flags on t-shirts. Flags taped up in gas station windows, and draped over restaurant awnings, and flapping from the antennas of cars. For the first time in my life I felt guilty for not owning any patriotic clothing. Normally I wasn't into that sort of thing. I thought people who wore flags all of the time were posers. I wore a lot of black, myself. I was twenty.
As soon as I got to the student center, I could tell the line for the blood drive was much too long for me to join. I'd never make to to my next class in time if I waited in it. I felt simultaneously guilty and relieved. It would have been sort of embarrassing to faint in front of so many people. But still. But still. I decided I would try to come back later, after class.
I wandered around the student center, looking for someone I knew, someone to talk to about something mind-numbingly ordinary, like today's menu at the cafeteria, so I could push from my mind endlessly looping miniature television images of people jumping purposefully to their deaths to escape the pain of flames.
I didn't see anyone I knew. So I wandered in circles, and tried not to think of burning people, and worried. And I didn't just worry about my high rise apartment.
I worried about my old high school friend Fahd, an American Muslim whose parents were immigrants. He had taken me to the prom senior year; I was the first girl he'd ever danced with. I worried about my friend Ayesha, whose mother had once smiled as she told me the children in her pediatric practice called her Mother Mary because she wore a scarf over her hair.
I worried about my Hindi teacher, an Indian Muslim woman with pale skin who loved to argue in a friendly way with the Hindu girls in my class over which religion had done more to advance feminism in India, Hinduism or Islam. I worried about my friend Hamenaz, a visiting college student from Iran, who liked to read Rumi's poetry with me.
Where were these friends of mine today? Were they safe? Were people harassing them? I had heard already that some mosques had received threats. I had heard that people who looked "Arab" were being racially profiled by the authorities, stopped by angry crowds on the street.
As I wandered in circles through the student center, trying to clear my head, a young woman standing behind a table reached out and took my arm without a word. I didn't know her.
I looked up at the sign above the table. It said Muslim Student Association.
"Here," she said. "Please take one."
Her eyes were earnest, searching. She pressed this into my hand:
The table was full of pins. How had they made these so quickly? Someone must have stayed up all night.
"We want peace," she said.
"I know. I know you do. I know." I meant it. It was all I could say.
I pinned PEACE to my backpack, and walked slowly off to class.
I keep the pin near my writing desk, now. I look at it almost every day. It helps me to remember that so many of us in this world wanted peace, on September 12th.
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Big Boy
Today I took you to your first day of part-time preschool.
You were nervous before we went. You asked me if the teacher would get mad at you if you couldn't do some of the same things the other children there could. You asked me what would happen if you didn't make any friends.
The teacher will be nice, I said. She'll understand that you're young, and you're still learning things. No one will care that you can't do some things that most of the other kids in your class can do, because there are so many other things you can do better than most kids your age can. Everyone has different strengths. You're good at some things and not so good at others, just like everyone else.
And of course you'll make friends.
The truth you'll know one day, all too soon, is that I didn't know these things— that your teacher would be understanding when you had problems, that the children in school would not tease you for being different, that you would make new friends— for sure. My certainty was a lie. I'm sorry.
But my hope was true.
When we got to your classroom, you ran right in, without even hugging me goodbye.
And when you came home, you came bursting with stories of a kind, understanding teacher, and new friends.
Good job, Big Boy.
Happy first day of school.
You were nervous before we went. You asked me if the teacher would get mad at you if you couldn't do some of the same things the other children there could. You asked me what would happen if you didn't make any friends.
The teacher will be nice, I said. She'll understand that you're young, and you're still learning things. No one will care that you can't do some things that most of the other kids in your class can do, because there are so many other things you can do better than most kids your age can. Everyone has different strengths. You're good at some things and not so good at others, just like everyone else.
And of course you'll make friends.
The truth you'll know one day, all too soon, is that I didn't know these things— that your teacher would be understanding when you had problems, that the children in school would not tease you for being different, that you would make new friends— for sure. My certainty was a lie. I'm sorry.
But my hope was true.
When we got to your classroom, you ran right in, without even hugging me goodbye.
And when you came home, you came bursting with stories of a kind, understanding teacher, and new friends.
Good job, Big Boy.
Happy first day of school.
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