Give Up Control
I’m on an airplane.
I hate airplanes. Have I told you that yet? If I haven’t, there you go. I hate airplanes.
I hear the stats about how flying is so much safer than driving. And I have a fear of heights, but it’s not the heights that gets me. What I hate is the lack of control. In a car I have control. Sure some one can hit me, but I still have a good bit of control. It’s my hands on the steering wheel and my foot on the gas pedal. That’s not the case in an airplane. I’m completely in someone else’s hands. My life is dependent upon a machine. God controls the weather that could force me to the ground.
All the while I can’t do anything but sit here and type on my computer.
So now it’s this idea of control that I want to talk about for a few seconds.
I’m flying to DC right now to attend CPAC where I’ll be speaking on a panel about web politics. Specifically, I’ll be talking about my web product Voter Fetch.
Some Fool Tried To Jack My Cash
Luckily I heard about this scam a few weeks back or I would have seriously sent my old friend some jack. This conversation occurred this morning on Facebook chat:
Chris
hey
8:04am
Wesley
what up man?
8:05am
Chris
not good
8:05am
Wesley
why?
8:06am
Chris
I’m stranded in London,England
8:07am
Wesley
that’s weird. how did that happen?
8:07am
What’s Up With PNN?
Good morning loyal PNN fans. By now you’re probably wondering why PNN has been down for a number of days. All we can do is apologize and beg for your forgiveness.
Now, if you’re a tech geek like us, and you really want to know why its been down, here’s your answer. PNN is run off a link sharing site called Delicious which can be found at www.delicious.com. You can see our page at www.delicious.com/ecgwesley.
To make a long story short, Delicious blocked our website because we use them too much. You’d think they would appreciate the business, but it doesn’t look like that’s the case. Anyway, below is the customer service reply we just received. Hopefully they’ll pay us some real attention soon so that we can start providing you links again.
Again, we apologize for the wrinkle in your daily routine.
EMAIL FROM DELICIOUS:
Hello ,
Thank you for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care. This message is to inform
you that your del.icio.us Customer Care inquiry will require additional
work before we can provide an answer. So please note that we are routing
your issue to a Technical Support Agent with specialized expertise, and
you can expect a response from us within the next 24 hours after
receiving this email.
Sincerely,
The Yahoo! Customer Care Team
**Please do not respond to this message as no one will receive it.
A Normal Tuesday
It was a busy day. Got up at 5:30. Worked from home for 2 hours. Worked in the office for 3 hours. SC Senate GOP Caucus meeting. State Senate Session. Web chat with Congressman Joe Wilson. York County legislative forum. Fundraiser for State Senator Shane Martin. York County Day reception. SCGOP fundraiser with NRSC Chairman Senator John Cornyn. Ruth’s Chris / Hilton legislative reception. Dinner with friends. About 3 more hours of work. Then bed time. Gotta wake up early to pack for CPAC.
That’s what a normal Tuesday looks like. Above is the 30 minute Ustream web chat we shot with Congressman Joe Wilson. Enjoy!
Go Where The People Are
Recently I’ve teamed up with three different people on three different projects to offer my advice to new politicos looking to launch aggressive web campaigns. It’s very difficult to organize so much into something so streamlined and organized. My thoughts are often all over the place because I’m used to thinking about a specific strategy and how to build tactics using various mediums, but while teaching a seminar a couple weeks ago, a young lady asked me “where should campaigns spend the most time and effort?”
It’s hard to think about just one medium and how it can singularly be used for success. That’s like asking how to win a football game with just a wide receiver and no backs.
Lately my thoughts have centered on Facebook. I love Twitter and YouTube and I have a renewed obsession with Google, but I always come back to Facebook. I think its because over the last few days I sat and watched my mother-in-law spend every free minute on the social network.
New Geek Links
It’s been a while since I’ve pushed out some good geek links. Luckily I was able to catch up on some reading this weekend. Here are a few good links I stumbled across.
Are you angry or scared?
People say the political mood is anger. I don’t believe that. I think most people are scared. They’re scared because they see the status of our economy. They’re scared because they see no answers and no leadership. And they’re scared because so many people are angry.
I believe that most people are scared, but that doesn’t mean that a lot of people aren’t angry. People think the mood is anger because the angry people are loud. They’re real loud. They’re spewing anger all of the television and all over the Internet, but they’re doing very little to help matters. They’re offering no solutions. They’re just talking about how much they hate everyone and everything.
That’s making the larger majority more scared. Can you blame them?
The world would be a better place if the angry people would offer ideas, but it seems they’d rather concentrate on emotion than solutions.
Life Ain’t Right Without Twitter
“I can’t believe I can’t get on Twitter today.” I actually just said that out loud. “Life ain’t right without Twitter,” my father-in-law responded. He’s right. Or at least that’s the way it feels.
I’m in the middle of the woods at my in-laws home. Ridgeville, South Carolina to be precise. They left Daniel Island recently, a home in the middle of everything cool, for a secluded home 30 minutes from anything. Their French style home now sits surrounded by the most beautiful snow many of us has ever seen in these here parts. It’s been 21 years since the South Carolina lowcountry has seen anything like this.
We haven’t had electricity in 12 hours. We can’t leave because trees now hang over the long driveway and we can’t get the neighborhood gate open. I’m not sure our little BMW could make it through the snow covering the driveway even if that wasn’t the case.
We have no water because the pump runs off electricity. We have a gas fireplace but the blower also runs off electricity. It’s getting cold. I have no Internet and as I write this word, I have 18 minutes of juice left in my macbook pro. I didn’t bring any magazines or books, but I do have a healthy stack of my mother-in-law’s Coastal Living and Southern Living magazines I could read.
You could say that I’m in paradise. We can cook with our gas-powered stove. We have a full supply of wine and beer. We don’t have a coffee maker, but we were able to heat water on the stove and make coffee the old fashion way. I have my wife, my dog, and some cool in-laws to hang out with. And we are so secluded that all we can see are white trees.
