Tag Archives: blogging

A mission statement

Speaking with Sijeka in London recently, for an upcoming podcast on the French elections, she mentioned opendemocracy.net. I was invited to write an entry for their blog “The Democratic Image”. And so I did, and as it turns out, I really enjoyed writing it and have been meaning to put these thoughts and facts into words, so go give it read please.

Here’s a quote, just for fun (its sad when you start quoting yourself)

It seems to me that despite all the potential that the internet and personal publishing in all its forms brings to the world, we are still in the primordial ooze stage of what could become a long media evolution.

A NJ Freak Winter

Tappy-Tap-Tap, the sounds of icey snow fill the air of ye old family home. I arrived here in the state of New Jersey several hours ago, around the same time as one of the year’s meanest ice storms I guess. Which somehow made the usually irritating and useless airport security checks and customs questions less annoying.

When I finally get the sleep I need and wake up focused and adjusted, I’ll write some about developments and corruption in the world of banana farming, vitamin supplements and lots of other fun stuff… part of sitting on a plane for 8 hours means reading many newspapers in more detail than maybe one usually does.

For now I’ll just mention a new blogging platform that makes blogging quite easy. No I mean.. even easier… which sounds redundant cause it is easier. Regardless, Tumblr is free and one of the easiest blogging tools I’ve seen since blogger. Not sure where the comments are, but everything else looks good and easy. Maybe it will be useful for those out there who wanted a blog but still felt like it wasn’t super simple enough yet.

Holiday Recommendations

Being that most of you are home with some days off, some with lots of time to kill, others with no time (like me!) as you’re forced to drive from place to place on some unspoken quest to see every one of your favorite family and friends within a 150 kilometer radius. I think tonight I’ll recommend some excellent content that has stood out for me lately:

One is a show I constantly recommend, Radio Open Source. The particular show that I really enjoyed was focusing on Gorbachev, Russia, and looking back, asking the question.. what happened and why are things in Russia the way they are. It is a really good discussion and actually attacks alot of opinions Ive long held about Russia and Putin.. Ive actually had to rethink things.. which is always good.

My next recommendation is a very different one from my usual focus. Madge Weinstein recently interviewed Rebecca also known as the Trannywreck from Trannywreck radio. She just had her gender re-assignment surgery to change her penis into a vagina. This interview is great, Rebecca really comes through (in my opinion) as a very calm, thoughtful, and interesting person.. with such a unique experience as a trans-person!

And finally today I want to point out my friends over at the Lounge Chicken. The blog rolls on and i got an email from Jesse recently about some noteworthy citizen journalism projects that are in the works. Hopefully I can get involved, but nevermind all that, first I recommend people read the blog.

I almost forgot, here’s a typically Portuguese gift on xmas, nevermind if you celebrate the holiday or not.. you need COD.

To Get My Groove Back

I’ve been a blogger for over 5 years. So you figure lots of things happen to me, my life, my general mood, and the obstacles I face, that don’t always come accross in text. (maybe audio.. and probably video!)

Despite the fact that I tell stories and give my personal opinions. I don’t always write “Im sad” and that sort of thing, both, because I don’t think it is important, and because I think there are bigger fish for me to fry on this site. (thats actually the same reason, i love how i can write in circles) But here’s a rare revelation… I’ve been on a down cycle lately.

That’s a wishy washy way to say I lost my inspiration.. my will to fight and write and plan and plot and whatever it is that I do as a fledgling personal media un-pire. There was sickness. There was aging. There was job loss. And somewhere in there all manner of emotional bad stuff. All of which made me question every single act of my daily life and my lofty goals.

I can tell you this now because I’m starting to return to what I think is.. good form. It will be a long road.. but step one begins Thursday:

In order to get my groove back, I will return (for a visit) to my roots.. my ancestry.. my other country and a large chunk of my family and friends: Portugal. Most importantly I will spend days with 2 people who together made an enormous difference and influence on my life and personality.. my grandparents.

You may have seen the videos in the past. I’ve been working on a modest audio and video archive of them and their stories.. to keep for future generations and for my own personal enjoyment. And yes… to share, sometimes, with the internets. So stay tuned, thursday I make that oh-so-familiar trip to Lisbon, and for two important weeks, I’ll be travelling on that road… towards getting my groove back. (no matter how corny and cliché it sounds).

Winter Tidying

Sometimes when a journey ends, you get a fever. I think that’s what I have. So not too many words today, but mostly recommendations. Oh and before I recommend other media, I should point out that I’ve resorted my blogroll which you can see on your left. Still organized in a bizarre way, but oh well, I have a strange thought process. Also, on the right hand frame, beneath my tip jar which always welcomes a few dollars, there’s a handy little google calender tool where you can see where I am or where I’m travelling to in the coming month. Not that I need the whole world to know everything, but it allows people like my moma in Jersey or my friend badhareday in Lisbon to know where I am just by checking the blog.

On to the important stuff. It is saturday, and as such, you should sit back and enjoy some very creative and entertaining media… like the latest episode of Bonjour America. Season two just began and Vinvin is actually naked in this episode, maybe that’s tempting for you.

My other recommendation is a text blog of a friend I haven’t spoken to in ages. But she is the very person who helped me get my most prized possesion and it doesn’t hurt that she is an insane writer. Insane in a good way.. go read Present Imperfect.

I have a post coming up on Sean Bell, he who was shot 50 times in NYC recently. It involves a personal memory as a journalist wandering the bronx several years ago… more will come later so maybe hold the comments on this topic.

Blogging and Friendship

Couldn’t sleep last night. And I don’t sleep much at night anymore since crossing over into the world of freelancing. A mix of too many things on my mind and too many concerns about what the future will hold and how life will be.

But last night there was one fundamental reason: my best friend.

We used to call each other “my heterosexual life partner” because ever since our first year of college up in North Jersey, that’s how it was. As we progressed through college we both found ourselves knee deep in the political science department, both admiring similar professors and strategically ending up in the same classes. It used to be my task to bring candy just in case the man needed a little boost during class. And as those years progressed, we always lived somewhere near each other.. on campus, off campus, never a dull moment with my boy D.

As college came to end we both went to europe for a semester. Him, interestingly enough to Amsterdam, and myself down in Aix-en-Provence. Naturally we visited each other and took turns showing our respective international student worlds. Not soon after we both finished our student life in New Jersey and the man ended up working for a very prominent human rights organization in DC. Myself I worked as a waiter in NYC, with aspirations of either being a freelancer for the then-still-alternative Voice or flat out taking off to live in Portugal. Portugal won that contest.

It was around that time, 2001/2002 that I launched this here blog. It was a place for my opinions on current events, as well as for telling personal stories… like this one. And underneath it all, it was the perfect way to continue the daily conversations and debates that D and I always had have. In a time when no one had heard of a blog and certainly not this one, he was there commenting… sometimes the only one.. and in my eyes the most important one anyway. Years went by.. and this blog changed.. I changed.. moved to Amsterdam.. and he also made big changes.. climbing the DC non governmental ladder (or thats how I saw it). Every year I’d go back to Jersey…. and he’d offer to pay my ticket for me to come down to DC and spend some days with him. And so it has been.. year after year.

But last night threw me off.. tho perhaps I should have been more aware of things. As lately I’ve been attacking those that celebrate the results of the recent US elections. I try very hard to stick to very strict expectations for the country of my birth, obviously you’ve noticed that I hate stopping to celebrate anything when in my eyes.. things are so disappointingly far behind where they could and should be. Somewhere in there I forgot some things.. most importantly my buddy who has been working very hard on a campaign in Virginia. Yesterday it was finally announced the candidate for which he had worked so hard for had won. And here I was, making my heavy statements, denouncing the entire outcome… I hadn’t (and should have) considered that in doing so I was insulting his hard work. It’s easy to insult strangers in vague sweeping statements, and I certainly do it, but last night I got to thinking about D and what Id been saying lately. Nevermind arguements and values and words… I was utterly depressed to read the angry and condemning words of the man I still think of as my partner in this life.

So here I sit in Brussels. Took the long train ride to come see family and feel loved… because I was hoping to find answers or at least clear my head. But I couldn’t NOT write these thoughts and these feelings. If you read the comments yesterday than you’ll see the statement that he won’t be reading this anymore. I don’t know if its a coincidence but he hasn’t responded to any emails either. While I can picture him yelling at me for writing this and being so dramatic… I’m willing to take that risk just to have this out there and stated.

Having already said too much Ill stop here. The point of this is not to make someone like me more than him, or justify anything Ive done. The point is for me to write how sad I am because I may have just alienated one of my oldest friends and a constant source of inspiration.