Category: web

A Golden Gate Mist

beauty is in the eye of the beholder and in some cases it is also in the eyes of the world. She cannot walk down the street without striking a change in men. But her power is not limited to the opposite sex, she can also foment desirous fears in women too. It is her museness.

———–

San Francisco is a like a dream in the wind. Tall buildings with ancient facades of the gold rush. Entering the city is like touching a butterfly. You can flutter all the way around its restaurants, business, scenic vistas, rabid parties, and simple natural people. Leave the environs and you have a wealth at your door. From the park at the Golden Gate bridge, to the towering sequoias. Touch the valleys for farms and wine. Head north for wet wild ruggedness. Head south for simple vistas and beach towns.

Ive lost all control of my sanity and connected with something primal

i feel speed and i want to go fast. I have this need and desire and its fast
I dont know where its going but i want to go there.

Why cant i tell where its going
i want to smoke and drink and carouse
maybe its sexual desire
i hope it is

no
i know it is
its this unbridled passion i keep thinking about
i want it
i need it

sex, love, desire
these are my words
i take you

where will we go
what will stop this shaking
questions damn you

i want answers
i want passion

all around is life
all around is me
i feel
i need
some passion

————————–

writing is an expression of the mind
when the mind is lost for words

i am a man of words
i can twist and turn words into situations
then the situation becomes mine

smiles

—————————

alive
i feel alive when the wind blows
the sun shines
and my heart beats

every moment is mine
i dont cherish the moments
nor do i relish

i live in them because i am alive

——————————-

money sex power
are on my mind
floating across the divide
between passion and consciousness

i cannot control them
i need them
they are mine

but they are just concepts
just desires
desires that simple men can achieve

love lust passion
are elusive to me
i want them in me
like a fire that burns

they are not concepts
they are feelings
i want them
simple men cannot achieve them

————————–

writing writing writing
more words
to quench my soul

i type and type
i i even say out loud each word i type

they come from within
mindless beings they are

unconsciously
subconsciously
they flitter about my brain
they nag me until i release them

words words
i turn you into words

—————————–

i sigh a deep sigh
the cold wind touches my skin
deeper and deeper i go

until the passion is calm
calmness is my only peace
my only moment to feel connected
to the rest of the thinking world

but thoughts are elusive and i dont like them
i want dreams and passion
its a cycle
that i cannot touch

only the words i write can connect
the only place where the peace and thinking
unite in me
until i have my peace
i so desire the peace

——————————-

freedom
passion
love
desire
speed
touch
need
sense
believe
dreams

i feel these all at once driving through my body
channeling through my blood
igniting me and inspiring me
i just may burn and crash
but only once all of them are achieved

———————————

somewhere out there is a cool
beautiful feeling
that touches my soul
ignites my spirit

she is constant
a floating mirage of desire
that consumes me until i touch her

but there is no way to quench
no desire to quench
only an everlasting desire to connect
and feel
and touch

she is my center
and my love
somewhere out there
she is alive and breathing

A short story about my dreams

sometimes i write when i dont want to. I sit down at my desk and think about how much i dont want to write. But i cant escape. the pen just grabs me. I let loose and away we go…

there are these drapes. Really, i dont even know what drapes are. They are just a memory that is forever coming to mind. My mom loved drapes. She used to hang them over bed at all times. white ones, cartoon ones, always drapes.

Yet everytime i dream these drapes come to mind. So it starts…

a window with drapes. great big flowing ones with white like satin look to them. you can touch but you cannot. one touch and they will wrap all around you. The wind it gusts but it doesnt want to. it just wants to move the drapes and touch my dream. The wind is tricky and needy always wanting to be in my dreams.

Now saying that these are my dreams is funny. They are mine in that i have them, but i cannot control them. I cannot effect them anymore than i can stop time. But i can do battle with them. If i make them come true then they are destroyed. The wind and my drapes must forever be changed. Any moment of stillness and the dreams stop. The wind gets angry. Life gets wrong.

So i look forward to the wind and its tricks. I remember the drapes and seek their silk. But then there is light. A sunset or a dawn, i dont know. But light is there, light enters. It touches the drapes and makes them glow. No glow is not right. Cloudy is right. The clouds also want to be in my dreams. The light trusts the clouds to get past the drapes and enter the room. But it cannot. So the wind tricks, the light trusts, and the clouds cloud. But still these are my dreams, but i cannot control them.

I am a slave to these dreams. I am tortured by them. I am riven with constant desire. I am unable to escape and feel peace. They always touch me and find me. I cannot let the drapes and the wind/clouds/light down. They need me. I need me.

But wait, im scared, they are my dreams. I guard them. I trust them. I know them. I need them. I protect them and hold them and never let anyone touch them.

No

I have trusted and listened and made the dreams happy. Now it is my turn. I want something from you dreams. I want a bear. I want an Amy. I want to open the window and let a bear in.

She is crazy and mad and angry and wild and fearful, but i want her in. I want a bed. I want a team. I want a life with her. So please let her in. Please let me be happy. I do not ask for peace, i understand the ways of dreams. I accept the winds tricks, the lights trust, and the clouds cloud. But please let her in.

I will leave you know dreams. I will leave you be. I will leave you to think on this. I know you love me and i love you. We are a team but our team has grown. Goodbye dreams

Poems when i cry and im alone

I feel odd
my fingers shake
my heart quakes
i want to be warm but im cold
softness annoys me
fur delights me

fur is so tender
and sweet
i want to have a coat of fur
something that warms my soul
i want to run and be free
but i cant
im cold

her hair
her chin
my face
so cold

i want a blanket
that wraps my soul in her
i want her warmth
i want her soul

sometimes i wonder
where i can go
what i can do
how i can feel
i dont know
i just feel odd

——————

somewhere i go
to a place that no one knows
its cold and sad
and im all alone

i cry and weep
but it never stops
im still there
im still here

i dont care anymore
nothing hurts
nothing feels

my tender heart
feels crished
by tears

—————–

where does this sadness come from
i want an old man to tell me
i want the world to turn
i want peace on my brain

one tear, strokes my cheek
begetting more
and more
i dont know why i cry

i just know im alone
im here, im writing
im feeling
so deep

——————-

things i remember
before i forget

walking so fast
like a cheetah in the wind
water bottle, hat, an agitated mind
i remember
before i forget

i told you i love u
i grabbed ur hand
i wanted your heart
i seek
i romance
i need to remember
before i forget

drinks
we went for drinks
i remember our drinks
i cry
i never saw ur love
im lost

——————

where must i go
what must i do
how far must i go
to be with u

ur smell i touch
ur lips i taste
ur heart i melt
i dont know

their is fear
their is darkness
their is hope
their is…i dont know

the salt touches my lips
it enrages my soul
i dont want to feel this
i want to be free
i dont ever want to feel
but i do
i miss u

——————-

just a single tear
why do you haunt me

is it for love?
is it for want?
is it for hope and desire and sex and touch
please no more tears

i miss, i cry, i feel, and i dont want to
i just want u
i just need u

i must
i don
i cant
i wont

but i do

——————

where am i
im alone
im sad

im not fuzzy
im not simple
im not loved
but i am

i fear this love
it touches me
it scares me
but i just dont know

i make no sense
but sense it not to be made
of love and tears

i only want u
i only need u

——————–

a vision to quell these tears
ur blonde a rest on my leg
looking up at me
smiling

ur dancing, ur smiling, ur dress
ur voice
so much so little
i have none

alas tears leave me
haunt another man
take my sadness
take it to my soul
and ask

where is this heart
where must it go
why do i feel
so
sad

——————–

when i think
about how i acted
and how i felt
i seem so silly

i was crusading
i was against the world
i needed something
it was all about me

then there was you
i opened my eyes
and i saw
i wanted you
i knew you

you’re heart beats with mine
you’re mind thinks with mine
your body touches mine

im still so scared
im still so wrapped in myself
but i hope
i believe i can love u
i believe
im so silly

—————–

how do i know i can love u
i dont
i dont need to know anything
i just feel
i just know

i shed tears and i obsess
i feel it in me
i let the passion
wash over my sanity

there is nothing left of me
just feeling
and knowing
that i must have u

i must touch u
i must enwrap you in my arms
but more than must
i need

a need that feels
a need that desires
i feel i know i need

———————–

i dont want to write
i want to cry
i want

you
your beautiful
ur sunshine
ur my heart

Raging into the Future

this started as a update to my resume, but quickly descended into writers fever:

My Own Personal Mission Statement
Art
Back to Basics
Creativity
Eccentricity
Community
Money
Friends/Family/Love

With the goal of finding oneself I seek to expand beyond my thoughts. As if the walls surrounding me could provide safety and contentment, which they do. Money, security, and expertise are all that some dream of in their career. To me they are at once dreamy and stifling. I hunger for challenge and novelty. For the advancement of life through major changes and big events.

In my current state I have a great job with a great career in a great field. I am making a difference on a national and sometimes world stage. I have a retirement plan that pays me 20% of my salary. I have a large salary. I have a sense of job security and growth through modern innovative programs.

At a time in my life when I had no career, no money, and desperately sought direction. Washington DC provided me with that. It gave me something more to. Comfort in myself. Time to be. A chance to enjoy the benefits of a charmed life. I have enjoyed my charmed life, but at the same time realized that it’s not for me.

I need the charm but also realize that it is something I can easily attain. No more do I feel the insecurity of worth or achievement. Instead I feel the drive and need to explore myself and how I fit in the world around me. I feel a chance before me to go beyond the simply great. I feel a chance to explore the depths of genius and brilliance. And in the words of the composer Lukas Foss “I want to go all the way”.

Life changes.
Hearts grow.
Minds crave.
Growth and change comes with every passing moment and as I recognize my moment I feel the intense desire to burst forward into the future.

SXSW Fury

South by Southwest is a furious frenzy of frenetic and frantic freaks of the future (i.e internet geeks).

The festival is so large it will consume u alive. It took me three days just to get it down. But it’s also an institution, a somewhat passé one at that. Nearly everyone u meet flashes u a gang sign telling u how many times they’ve been here. And, they do it with a combo of pride/ego/I’ve seen it all.

As a SWirgin I could care less. There is so much pure unbridled joy, pureness, and passion it’s catchy. With a little luck u can find the future in NUI (natural user interface). A whole lot of passion with @garyvee, @kathysierra, and the ‘be awesome’ meme. Or, some sustainability, art, film, and creativity.

On the other hand, I was pretty fulfilled to hear some talk of boredom with ‘social media’. You know that rush to do something cause it’s cool, like the need to hang out with the cool kids in high school.

For every tool I pick-up I actually use it, and not to be the first to use or to add their widget. But, to get some family videos online or to get closer to long lost friends. Sometimes the utility of these true innovations get lost in the ‘first adopter’ crowd.

Andy Warhol definitely had no idea that our fifteen minutes of fame would come through getting a hundred twttr followers.

Ok, nuff of my diatribe now on to my favorites of the conf and I’m out:

– universal design – great panel led by James Craig of apple who effortlessly unwinds a story of how desgining for those with disabilities is leading to true the breakthroughs of tomorrow.

– GPS – big money. Google is getting involved, phone makers are in, chips are super cheap. Think location based ads, friend awareness, parents tracking kids, basically everything around us will have a little blinking GPS beacon.

– Facebook connect/design – what is with Facebook and SXSW? Making up for last year maybe, but they did rawk this one. Their new homepage look pushes them forward into new markets and fbook connect simultaneously supports those new markets.

– Friends – these events are 10x better with friends (@sengseng, @immunity) and growing that circle is choice.

– Twttr trends, oauth – twttr rocks the body that rocks the party. Being ubiqitous and building on that through a slick new trends interface (including hash tags as links). Then announcing, quietly, OAuth to solve all those pesky password problems…dominators.

– Online identity – building one, safeguarding it, monetizing it.

– Amdrew Mager, Andy Carvin – my heroes of the conference, foe their solid performances, quality content, and real personalities.

– Security/protection/finance/privacy

– Freefury – free in the 21st century means we are the ultimate customer. We pay through time, not through good coupon deals. Our ADD allows us to be fickle and companies will do whatever to keep us coming back (every fickle day). Why? B/c they want ad dollars, a large user base to run promos against, and enough peeps to support a ‘premium service’.

– Females – chix rock, but have inferiority complexes in tech. Watch out men because girls will soon take your place, the old boy network is going the way of be dodo (thankfully!)

– Millions of iPhones – good gosh, Apple in the house. Was SXSW ready for 3/4 of the populace to needs two wifi connections (lappy, phone). Apparently not and neither was AT&T as their 3G laggdom brought everything to a screeching halt.

– Big money – what recession, the tech sector doesn’t care. Attendance was down a little, but the money was still free flowing. Every major and minor player is throwing an open bar party with food and shwag galore. Does anyone else agree with me that tech is carrying many cities during this recession?

Finally, a concise line that hits home:

Unstructured careers driven by passion

P.S. This is a walkblog, my first too, wrote it while walking to @wholefoods.

Steve

SXSW Interactive Warmup

There seems to be a few events each year that go a bit overboard. One where no matter where you are in the social media swim you hear about it. Right now we are building up to that with SXSW in Austin, TX.

This mega conference has been building up lots of steam as each year passes. From the music to the movies to the internet, it can interest nearly everyone. It is long too, as It starts on March 13 on a Friday afternoon and doesn’t end until 10 days later on March 22.

For my part, I am going for personal an work. Since both of are in the internet business, I can’t wait to launch into the conference frenzy. I must say that conferences by internet and social media geeks is like no other I have been to. There are so many back channels, methods of communication, product releases, start-ups, and money being tossed around it can make you lose all sense of normalcy.

This being my third go round at internet/social media revelry, I am determined to take it easy. I’m gonna attend some choice sessions, talk to some fun folk, and then soak in the learning. In the past, it is just go-go-go. This year I want to take it back a notch. Not sure if this is possible.

Especially as SXSW Interactive where there over 180 sessions…during the day! Not to mention all of the other events throughout the evening and night. This is going to be sensory overload and especially since this is my first SXSW, making me a SWirgin. I think I have a few cards up my sleeve to help me out here.

First, I have been pre-thinking about what I want to learn. Most of my top themes relate to web design and new tools. Although, some relate to mobility, best practices in production, and a few “hot new things”. Having this list in mind should help me to sift through the multitude.

Second, the echo chamber is in full effect. Not that I’m saying its a bad thing, in fact I value the echo chamber. Just not when I’m flying so far to learn. In Austin, I am looking to learn and so I will skip all the also-ran, heard it all before presentations (marketing in new media, how to establish your brand, just what is new media).

Third, hey if you hang around long enough you can figure out who the cool kids are. In this case, I’m talking about the  brilliant, always engaging, knock your socks off folks. Check out my short list below for some of them.

Fourth, and final, I am a pro. I am really. I am rolling in with an MacBook Air, an iPhone tweaked for the conference, light weight backpack with necessary dongles and such, and finally a smart mentality. The mobility of the MBA and iPhone is essential for tight spaces, long days, and maximum efficiency. The smart mentality means skipping the bad food, stupid handouts, and even worse middle-of-the-hall sales pitch. It is essential to leave yourself enough energy for the night-time in your new city and avoiding the death by vendor attack.

That’s it, time to get some rest before my early flight, but first here are some hot tips:

Links

SXSW Interactice – list of sessions

SXSW Scheduling tool

Alltop SXSW news

Recommended Sessions

Change v2 – Lawrence Lessig

Obama has awoken a once in a century passion for reform. What will it take to make it work? What would “work” mean?

Using GPS & Location to Enhance Social Networking – Panel (twttr, brightkite, garmin…)

First there were social networks, and then there were location-based social networks, and now GPS and navigation-enhanced mobile social networks. This panel will explore how these emerging platforms integrate with existing social networks (facebook, twitter, etc), leverage GPS navigation functionality, and take location-aware social networking to the next level.

Buzz Out Loud Podcast Taping – Natali, Tom, and Jason

Buzz Out Loud is CNET’s premiere daily podcast hosted by Natali Del Conte, Tom Merritt, and Jason Howell. They cover all the tech news with their own and their audience’s takes on what it all means, often with hilarity ensuing. They’ll cover the top SXSW stories with special guests. If you want to understand what’s happening in the tech world, especially at SXSW, you need to listen to Buzz Out Loud.

iPhone Tweakage

At the conference this year, I am going to be testing out all that the iPhone can offer. To include the WordPress iPhone app for live blogging. Photos uploaded on-the-spot. Twitter streaming SMS to my phone. Google Alerts and Yahoo listservs to my gmail inbox. Hopefully, a whole lot of location based community building for meet-ups, spontaneous get togethers, and a little where the heck is everyone (not sure how this will work out…). Just wish I could record some vids on the phone…

Obama CIO – Vivek Kundra – LiveBlog

“Couple of things we want to do to embark on a technology revolution in America”

That’s his opening line as he launches into a comparison of previous revolutions. The industrial and agricultural. Each one allowed us to move faster, shrink the world, and increase our efficiencies.

“A lot of people say the federal government can’t lead, I reject that idea”

Another solid speech as Vivek, a notorious short speech giver, builds up. Hands down he’ll be done in 30mins…

Transparency changes the definition of a citizen. We the people, can participate and should, he references the executive transparency memo and recovery.org. To accomplish he defines his core principles:

1. Transparent platform, use this as the foundation for making this happen. He references the human genome project and satelites for GPS

2. Participatory. Opening up each agency to the public for participation.

3. Lowering costs of government operations. Why does it cost goverment more and why can’t government use modern tools?

Answers are cloud computing and opening up consumer technology.

He then moves on to fundamentals like targeted initiatives, not just tech for tech sake. Focusing on outcomes not proccesses. Developing an ecosystem of participation with citizens and buy in across the agencies.

QA: How do we send you good ideas?

Kundra: I plan to have sat or sun round table sessions. Anyone can attend and I’ll soon pass out my email for direct contact.

“Its going to be tough, it’s not going to be easy, and it’s not going to happen overnight.”