Wednesday Mar 05, 2008
Yesterday I voted in the Texas primary at my polling place,
Round Rock High School, in the morning. The Democratic side
seemed busier than the Republican side (that's a switch!), but
didn't have lines at that time, around 9:30 a.m.
In the evening, I attended the caucus, or precinct convention,
at the same location. The caucus was supposed to start at 7:15
p.m. or shortly after the last voter voted, but we weren't let
in the building until 7:55. We all had to sign in and give our
presidential preference, and apparently had to have our
credentials verified, but I don't know if everyone got the
message on that. We had about 130 people show up, which is
impressive in what's been a heavily Republican district. I
recognized at least 4 of my neighbors there, and that was nice
to see. Sometime we Democrats feel a bit lost amongst our
conservative neighbors.
The Clinton campaign complained that at some precinct the Obama
supporters controlled the caucus packets, which are apparently
just the instructions and paperwork. In our case, the temporary
chair was a Clinton supporter. The first order of business
after calling the meeting to order and signing in was to elect a
permanent precinct convention chair and secretary. Two
candidates ran for chair, one an 18-year-old high school senior
supporting Obama, and another a 30-something Clinton supporter.
It was close, but the 18-year-old won 17-15. Someone then
nominated the Clinton supporter for vice chair, and we approved
that by acclamation.
After this, the chair announced the vote count. Obama won
around 59% to 41% or something close to that. We had 16
delegates to send to the county convention in Georgetown on
March 29, so Obama got 10 and Clinton got 6. I was in the Obama
camp and we had 10 volunteers to be delegates, and 4 of us,
including me, volunteered to be alternates.
I think the rules for all this are a bit weird. You can vote in
just the primary and the caucus, but not just in the caucus. I
suppose the idea is that the people who care about the party get
a second shot at voting. But I think Clinton has a point about
the caucuses excluding those who have to work that night or have
other duties. We have 12 hours to vote but we have to be at the
caucus at a specified time.
I enjoyed the experience, and kind of regret that I didn't raise
my hand to be a delegate to the county convention. Maybe
they'll call me as an alternate.
Tuesday Jan 22, 2008
My son Sam's Tiger Cub Scout den decided to take advantage of a
deal offered by UT (University of Texas) to get basketball
tickets for $6 per seat for the UT vs. Colorado men's basketball
game on Saturday 2007-01-19. We arrived a little bit late due
to slow restaurant service, and UT was already a ways behind and
it wasn't looking too good. At the half, UT was behind around
ten points, and we weren't too hopeful that they would win.
Coach Barnes must have lit a fire under his players during half
time, as they came out blazing in the second half and fairly
quickly caught up. The Horns were up close to ten points for a
while, but towards the end of the game they started to slip a
bit and Colorado was catching up. The Longhorns hung on to win
by two points. Quite an exciting game, particularly the second
half.
I'd never seen a basketball game in an arena, and I figured we'd
have nosebleed seats and wouldn't be able to see well. But I
realized when we got there that no one really had a bad seat,
and the view was pretty good.
We'll probably go again, particularly if we get a good deal on
tickets like this time. There's another opportunity coming up
for Cub Scouts to see the women's basketball team vs. Texas A
& M for $5 per seat next month.
Thursday Jan 11, 2007
My wife Karen and I had lunch yesterday at Alborz Persian
Cuisine. I've been dining at Alborz for a few years now,
and I really enjoy it. Persian cuisine is interesting, a bit
like Middle Eastern/Mediterranean and a bit like Indian food.
Alborz has a buffet for lunch and the buffet usually has several
types of rice, tabouli, salads, and lots of stew-type dishes.
At any rate, good as usual. There are other interesting
restaurants, food places and an interesting drum shop in the
area:
Monday Jan 08, 2007
Here in the Austin area, in addition to birds
falling out of the sky downtown, we are having the intrigue
of a race of speaker of the Texas House of Representatives. The
current speaker, Republican Tom Craddick, has been speaker for
four years, and many in the opposition, and some in the
majority, do not like his leadership style. A couple of other
Republicans and a Democrat entered the race to unseat him, and
it has now narrowed down to a race of Craddick and Jim Pitts,
with each claiming victory. The legislature opens tomorrow, and
it may be interesting to see what happens in this contest.
There are no rules for electing the speaker, and current debate
in the paper is whether the newly sworn in representatives will
elect to have a secret ballot or an open one. The problem with
an open ballot is retribution if you vote for the loser. The
problem with a secret ballot is that the public doesn't know for
whom their representatives voted.
Wednesday Jan 03, 2007
Yesterday evening I had a hill workout in the La Frontera area, so
after that I paid a visit to Wingstop in La Frontera
(okay, I know, after a workout I should eat healthy :)). I
tried 5 atomic hot wings and 5 original hot wings. I started
with one of the atomic wings, and that was certainly a shock!
If I do this again I'll work my way up by starting with an
original hot. Anyway, after a while my senses got used to the
heat and I was able to finish. I also had veggie sticks with
bleu cheese dressing and fries. Wingstop's fries are a bit
unusual, in that they have sugar on them! All in all, pretty
good, once I got beyond the shock of the first atomic wing.
One of these days I'll even remember to order some bourbon baked
beans, which certainly smell good, but I always forget to order
them.
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