Procrastination: a powerful thing

So, this weekend I was mostly focusing on copyediting a book for Subterranean Press. So of course I finished reading Sporting Chance, by Elizabeth Moon, The Get Fuzzy Experience, by Darby Conley, and also read all of the issues Laura had of the comics Girl Genius and Buck Dodgers, which are by Phil and Kaja Foglio and various other artists.

Saturday evening I took a substantial break and had burgers with atdt1991 and watched My Name is Modesty with him and Laura; it's a low budget picture "presented" by Quentin Tarantino, who is reportedly very interested in making a Modesty Blaise movie himself. This is one of only a couple movies of Modesty Blaise, who was one of my favorite comic strip characters when I was younger. The series of comics (and later, books) were authored by Peter O'Donnell, who retired from writing them in 2001. Neil Gaiman actually write a script treatment for O'Donnell's book I, Lucifer, but according to the wikipedia article O'Donnell has gone on record saying that he does not want to see more movies using the Blaise character. Neil tells me that O'Donnell is a very nice man who really was screwed (by the movie studios, I think? unclear. We didn't talk long about it. Neil had called me to get a phone number and had to go catch a plane.), but I think it sure would be nice to see more Modesty Blaise movies, especially if Tarantino got to produce one.

I also made a point of having lunch Saturday and Sunday with the_leewit, who is moving out of the house this week to move in with her mum in Chicago. We went to Yamoto for sushi and to the Parthenon for greek food. She also cooked a delicious dinner of pork chops and rice last night that we shared with shadowriderhope. I shall miss Laura for many reasons, but one of them is admitedly her cooking. Laura lead me through her bookshelves so as to loan me things before she packs them up, too, and I am now reading The Witches of Karres, by James H. Schmitz, the book that the_leewit takes her username from. I'll get a slow start on that, though, since I still have more editing to do. Also, tomorrow night we're having a block party for National Night Out, to try to help the neighbors get to know one another. As Neighborhood watch block captain, I've been organizing it. I hope people actually come.

Write-in campaign for Precinct Delegate

I am running for the most elementary elected position in the Democratic Party: Precinct Delegate. A precinct is not a very large territory. Ours is perhaps 15 city blocks, from about Pauline to Liberty, 5th St. to Stadium. It's Ward 5, Precinct 6, and two precinct delegates can be elected this year. Delegates will go to the state party convention to represent their precinct and also participate in other organizational and decision-making responsibilities throughout the year.

Unfortunately, I didn't make this decision until after the deadline to get on the Ballot. Hopefully I can get enough write-in votes in the primary to get the position anyway. My fellow candidate, Dennis Tokarski, is campaigning for both of us in the Eastern half of the precinct, and I'm campaigning for both of us in the Western half. Brendan has agreed to spend some time on Tuesday, August 8 at the Polls with a sign. I guess I should get one printed (Matt, can you design a sign for me? Just something simple like Write in Anne Murphy for Precinct Delegate, size to be held or put on a post in a lawn- I guess around 2 ft wide).

I've written up a simple sort of campaign statement and posted it at http://www.netmouse.com/annemurphy/

Dennis doesn't think it should take that many votes to make it, since not that many people vote in the primaries. There is another fellow on the ballot, who has the advantage of just having his name there. Niraj is a UAW lawyer and seems like a very nice fellow but he views it as a sort of maverick thing to try to change the state party platform and Dennis and I have change on our minds. So I hope people will vote for me. If you're not in my precinct, you can't, so don't worry about it. Just think good thoughts in my general direction next Tuesday. I mean, it couldn't hurt. :)