End of Silence

Two days until the election that’ll include a rubber stamp for our current mayor and other things that don’t generally garner too much attention like school board and city council seats. There’s also 7 city charter amendment propositions. 1, 2 and 6 appear to be the most hotly contested. My gut feel would be to vote yes for all of them, but 1 and 2 seem to be getting some opposition from places you wouldn’t expect.

• News8Austin has a little more info on 1 and 2.
• Here’s some in-depth on Prop 1.
• Here’s what the Chronicle has to say. (They’re divided on 1 and 2 as well, so they’re no help.)
• The Statesman weighs in.

As M.J.L. posted, make sure you’re going to the right polling place. She also linked the League of Women Voters Guide for this election.

I looked out my window this morning when I arrived at work and this is what I saw. The back side of our building is a nice little hideaway from the street. They’re either enjoying an illicit donut away from prying eyes or my web browsing habits have finally done me in.

While I’m on the subject, I had unsatisfactory exchange with another gaggle o’ cops a couple of weeks ago. A van had been abandoned in the driveway of my son’s school for at least a week. I’d been meaning to call 311 and report it and on that particular morning, I noticed a group of 4 cop cars around a dump truck a block or so down the road from the school.

Figuring that’d be easier than calling it in, I walked over to tell them about it. I walked up to two of the cops who were talking to each other, but weren’t involved with the dump truck. I introduced myself, said that my son went to the school next door and that there was an abandoned van in the driveway. In fact, one of the windows had been broken out in the last day or so. I could see the one cop’s eyes glaze over as I talked to him. He told me they’d check it out and the other cop mentioned that he’d seen the van. I walked back to my car and waited a few minutes to see what would happen. I watched as each cop left without stopping to do anything about the van. Is it possible that they all got called out on another call? All four of them? How many cops does it take to make a traffic stop on a dump truck anyway? They didn’t look very busy when I walked up to them.

I ended up calling 311 to report it. I got a call back a couple of hours later from another unit who was having trouble finding the driveway. Gee, if one of the other guys had taken 5 minutes to deal with it when I’d asked, it would’ve been easier.

My wife and I haven’t been able to call in or out on our cell phones for most of the afternoon and evening. The last incoming call I got was at 3:11. Tech support says there’s something wrong, but can’t say what or when it’ll be fixed. On top of that, of course, our home phone is also out because of last night’s storm. I think the power going on and off fried the telephone adapter for our VOIP service. This’ll be the second one we’ve had to replace if I ever get cell phone service back long enough to call tech support and order one.

Isn’t technology awesome?

One of the drawbacks to living on the most heavily travelled path between the airport and downtown…

I got stuck for a good 5-10 minutes at Burleson and Ben White this evening waiting for at least 20 motorcycle cops with lights flashing and another 10-20 cars travelling westbound, I’m assuming from Bergstrom. I’m guessing it’s a VIP in town for WCIT (note the green light and the big black suburban)?

This has happened to me a few times before, most notably the time I got stuck in the same spot with my infant son while Clinton’s motorcade passed on the way to Guero’s or something. The Boy was already cranky and sitting motionless for 10-15 minutes didn’t help.

At least we get free wi-fi out of it this time.