I had a nice weekend, while inside. Temperatures stayed around 100 degrees F (40 degrees C) throughout the preceding week. Last Saturday afternoon (28 July) found me at the Scott Sifton campaign office working the phone bank for three hours. The other volunteers and I found the usual mix of undecided voters, a few going towards either primary candidate, and a few not wanting to participate. Overall, the campaign is feeling good heading into the primary election this Tuesday (7 August). More info at www.scottsifton.com.
It was sunny that Saturday; however, it was rainy the next day. Mind you, the rain was welcome after having gone about two months without it. however, it did cause difficulties while I was out canvassing for Senator Claire McCaskill's reelection campaign. The rain caused my canvass sheets to get wet and to stick together, making it difficult to separate the sheets and keep them dry while recording voter info on them. I had to call this off early, after visiting 20 houses (the goal was 50). The campaign staff was appreciative of the effort, though, and hope to have me back during the general election campaign. (The rain also caused cancellation of the sand volleyball outing the St. Louis Friends Meetup was to have had at New Ballwin Park that afternoon.)
The brief respite of Sunday gave way to a return of sunshine and heat on Monday 30 July). That night found me at the referee in-service clinic at Grand Glaize Branch, St. Louis County Library. It featured a video program from England on the right and wrong ways for referees to approach pre-game and post-game duties. The videos were rather entertaining and gave us plenty of food for thought. It won't be long until the fall season gets underway.
Tuesday morning was spent at the GO! Network workshop at St. Patrick Center, where we had a presentation on elevator speeches. That's those brief (up to 60 seconds) personal pitches you'd give to prospective employers and others who may be able to help your job search. I used this to fine-tune my elevator speech. After the general workshop, those of us on the communications committee had a meeting to discuss using social media to spread the word about GO! Network.
I was back at Sifton's headquarters Wednesday night (1 August) to work the phone bank again. I confirmed my availability for get out the vote efforts up to and on election day.
At home, I worked on a scale model that I should have ready by the September IPMS/Gateway meeting. It's a 1:72 model of the J-10, a new fighter plane for China's Peoples Liberation Army Air Force. I have the fuselage and wings joined together just now.
Also during the past few days, I touched base with my brother Doug about my visit to see him and his fiancee in Los Angeles later this month. I'm looking forward to this trip, as I'll visit some sights in LA and perhaps do a bit of networking while I'm there.
Tomorrow (Saturday, 4 August), I co-host this month's edition of Writer's Block from Naturally Autistic Radio, streamed through Blog Talk Radio. Tim Pylypiuk and I will discuss reading what you've written, with the two of us reading examples of our work. I hope you can tune in at 12 pm, Central Time (10 am, Pacific Time; 1800 hours GMT) for the show, or catch the archived edition. Details at www.naturallyautistic.com/radio-show/.
Later.
