calebism

Painting Stuff in St Petersburg, Near Tampa Bay, Florida

Riding The Express Train To Identi.ca  

Sometimes, fun stuff like this makes getting up on a hot Tampa Bay morning– featuring a tropical-fish-tank atmosphere, giant flying roaches and that more-of-the-same-for-five-more-months dread– worthwhile. This guy name-checks like a pro.
Somehow, I don’t think the train really stops at Identi.ca…

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Written by caleb

July 5th, 2008 at 11:31 am

King George’s Offenses  

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of t...Image via Wikipedia

You know, I really don’t want to be “that guy”, but if you examine the string of offenses allegedly committed by Ol’ King George in the middle of the following obscure document, some of them really have a strikingly contemporary ring. Maybe it’s just me. I’m just saying, is all. What should I pack for Gitmo, do you think?

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

— John Hancock

New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

Stolen from Troxler wholesale

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Written by caleb

July 4th, 2008 at 10:10 am

I’m Huge In Italy  

Inexplicably, I’ve got a three share in Italy. Or something like that. There are no doubt a lot of disappointed Googlers across the pond, but at least they are using Firefox. On Macs.

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Written by caleb

July 3rd, 2008 at 10:02 pm

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Identi.ca  

Time to pile on, brothers and sisters.  @calebism

Public timeline - Identi.ca

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Written by caleb

July 3rd, 2008 at 3:06 pm

Recycling Old Computers To Fight Isolation, Ignorance and Poverty  

Free Geek logo.

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When I was back in PDX 2000-2002, I used the wonderful FreeGeek outlet for bits of hardware I lacked. Naively, I assumed that every town had a program that recycled old computers, installed a free operating system (Linux) and put them back into the hands of people who couldn’t afford hardware and proprietary software. Clearly, I was wrong.
Goddamn, we need a FreeGeek “franchise” or something like it here in the Tampa Bay Area. The FreeGeek mission statement is:
FREE GEEK is a 501(c)(3) not for profit community organization that recycles used technology to provide computers, education, internet access and job skills training to those in need in exchange for community service.
Recycling, education, job skills, and internet access for the people who need it most! What could be better than that?

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Written by caleb

July 2nd, 2008 at 10:59 am

Sure, But when Do I Get Health Insurance?  

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Were I back home on the upper left coast, I probably wouldn’t often sit bolt upright at three am with the thought: WTF am I doing?
I’d have lots of validation every time I went to the dog park, the laundromat, got on the bus, went to the coffee house– there would be lots of me-s everywhere I looked.
What living here in the south has taught me is how to be alone and how to take care of the way I feel without any help.
There are plenty of exiles and refugees in the world, and I am one of the luckiest. I didn’t have to learn a new language, exactly, or worry about la migra, or get beaten up because I look different. So I have little to complain about. But that won’t stop me.

Not Being a Real Person: The #1 Self-Development Anti-Hack | The Growing Life | Alternative Productivity, Anti-Hacks for Living

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Written by caleb

June 30th, 2008 at 9:12 am

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Calebism’s Podcast List  

I have long since ceased to find it at all odd that I am the only one I know who listens to podcasts. I live in St Petersburg, Florida.

I’ve had the earbuds shoved in my ears since November of 2004 when the Daily Sourcecode, Dawn & Drew, Evil Genius Chronicles, Madge Weinstein, Geek News Central and the like were the choices. I started my own, Exdrunkalog, in December, which lasted until the following April. My attention was taken from it by my involvement in the late great “Area 51″ podcast, which dissolved in my estimation because the players refused to be “of” that tight little podcasting community in the earlies.

Anyway, I never quit listening, and I spend a lot of hours each day listening to the listed below. I learn a lot and it drowns out the demon voices. Podcasts are what I had been waiting for all my life– good radio.

Calebism’s Podcast List

    Astronomy.com Podcasts
    Bob Edwards Weekend
    Book Review- NY Times
    Buzz Out Loud from CNET
    CBC Radio_ The Best of Ideas
    CNET News.com daily tech news podcast
    Daily GizWiz
    Daily SearchCast
    Diggnation (Mp3)
    Ethicist
    FLOSS Weekly
    Fresh Ubuntu
    Fundamental Shift
    Gillmor Gang
    Going Linux
    Linux Action Show
    L33t Tech News
    Leo Laporte - The Tech Guy
    Linux Basement MP3 Feed
    Linux Journal
    Linux Learning Curve
    Linux Reality — MP3 (All Episodes)
    Mashable Conversations
    New Yorker_ Out Loud
    News.com Daily Podcast from CNET
    NPR_ Fresh Air
    NPR_ Science Friday Podcast
    On The Media
    PRI_ The Sound of Young America
    Real Time with Bill Maher
    Science Talk_ The Podcast of Scientific
    SEO Radio
    Skepticality - Science and Revolutionary
    Skeptoid_ Critical Analysis of Pop Pheno
    Slashdot Review - SDR News
    Slate Magazine Daily Podcast
    The Art Lab - Drupal School
    The Linux Install Podcast
    The Maniacal Rage Podcast
    The Real Deal from CNET
    The Rick Emerson Show_
    The Science Show
    The SEO Advisor -Search Engine Marketing
    The Skeptics’ Guide 5X5
    The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
    The Web 2.0 Show
    The WordPress Podcast
    this WEEK in TECH - MP3 Edition
    Urban Dharma
    Windows Weekly
    WNYC’s Brian Lehrer Show
    WNYC’s Leonard Lopate Show
    WNYC’s Radio Lab
    Zencast

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Written by caleb

June 28th, 2008 at 1:10 pm

Painting In Public At Interior Motives Gallery  

Well, that was fun. Now I can get back to painting goofy stuff on paper. I think I’ll do some cartooning; heatstroke make me whimsical. Did I mention it’s bloody hot here in St Petersburg?

calebism-st-petersburgcalebism-st-petersburgcalebism-st-petersburg

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Written by caleb

June 27th, 2008 at 10:49 am

How I Spent The Nineties– Check The Flannel  

Being a cool, hungover guy in front of the 2500 square foot apartment I shared for 250 bucks in 1993-1994 on around SE 15th and SE Belmont in Portland, OR.

Don’t do drugs, kids! Get high on Pendletons.

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Written by caleb

June 24th, 2008 at 12:41 pm

Rick Emerson Performs “Geek Like Me” With The Wonderstrucks  

Finally, Rick releases a video of his be-cello-d performance of his geek anthem in Portland.  Find Rick Emerson’s show on am 970 KCMD’s site, or his own site, or various other places. Live streaming and daily podcasts. Yes, I am too old to be a fanboy. I don’t care. I am a geek.

“Geek Like Me” (live)—The Wonderstrucks featuring The Portland Cello Project from Rick Emerson on Vimeo.

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Written by caleb

June 22nd, 2008 at 8:48 am

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