Seen in a hotel elevator:

Brooke’s response to this was to jump up and down suddenly, causing me to scream, give her a murderous glance, and remind her that if we got stuck in the elevator we would be in an enclosed space in which I could inlict pain on her.

In retrospect, I realize that she could easily take me in a smackdown. After all, she works out.

Photo mine; background image by Design Action

I went to an event called ¡Rini! ¡PRESENTE! last night. It was a showcase of activist materials featuring the graphic art of Rini Templeton, a woman who is firmly anchored near the top of my “people I’d like to meet, dead or alive” list.

Rini’s art is available for free use to anyone promoting causes in line with those she supported. I’ve used her awesome line drawings for flyers, brochures, posters, leaflets, and other materials ad infinitum while doing anti-racist organizing, health care advocacy, rape crisis work and Take Back the Night planning. Design Action (the way-coolest kids on the Oaktown graphic design block) has this to say about Rini’s art:

It’s almost impossible for anyone doing activism in the last 20 years not to have come across Rini’s work. And if like ourselves, you were always the one putting together the last minute flier, or designing the newsletter, or responsible for making the fund-raiser t-shirts, you will have been intimately familiar with her work.

So true. So very, very true. I have made many a leaflet totally on the fly that would have been bland and unremarkable without Rini’s eye-catching art. I think this contribution is often undervalued - it’s just as essential to have attractive and engaging materials when organizing for social change as it is when, say, selling overpriced shoes. Having images like these makes life so much easier when you’re trying to do ten things at once, as so often happens in community organizing.

Thank you, Rini. Your work has made an indelible mark on social justice work everywhere.

Check out Flickr for more photos from the event.

Here’s a clue as to what’s been occupying my time lately:

Another hint: I have a song called “Working in the Light of God” stuck in my head.

More in a few days when I sort through my (600!) photos.

My sister Molly and her husband Rony welcomed a daughter last week. Here she is with big sister Maya:

Photo Credit: Rony

Rachel Joy Jean-Mary
Friday, October 20, 2006
7 pounds, 11 ounces
21 inches

I’ll end with a quote my mom put in my own baby book, circa 1978:

Know ye what it is to be a child? It is to be something very different than the man of today. It is to have a spirit yet streaming from the waters of baptism; it is to believe in love, to believe in loveliness, to believe in belief; it is to be so little that the elves can reach to whisper in your ear; it is to turn pumpkins into coaches and mice into horses, lowness into loftiness, and nothing into everything; for each child has its fairy godmother in its soul.

Francis Thompson, “Shelley”

Welcome, Rachel.

And no time to post. As a placeholder, enjoy fun stencil art from the Mission:

More after my (very cool) 24/7 temp gig is up.

My new obsession is not in vain. Flickr chose the photo above as “interesting,” which means that it was one of 500 photos uploaded on October 19 that caught someone’s eye. Yeah, that’s a lot to sift through, and not many people will, but given that about 900,000 photos are uploaded to Flickr daily, I’m thrilled. Now only that, it qualifies for the Fav/View >= 5% group, meaning that at least 5% of the people who viewed it marked it as a favorite. So far, it’s batting 15 faves for 111 views and counting. Yay!

To check out the rest of my Flickr photos, click on the image in the sidebar.

Photo credit: Sanjay?

This is another post interesting only to my mom and maybe a couple of other people. However, I couldn’t resist.

According to this website, my Jungian personality type is:

ESTP - “Promotor”. Fiercely competitive. Entrepreneur. Often uses shock effect to get attention. Negotiator par excellence. 4.3% of total population.

I don’t know about this. I’m not competitive unless someone else gets competitive first, and would rather work at Kinko’s than start my own business. As far as shock effect, I guess I did have pink hair once upon a time (2001, see above). Other than that, though, I’m skeptical. The one point I will concede is that I am, in fact, a negotiator par excellence. Just ask my mom.

My favorite question from the test?

I am very wounded at the core.

I am happy to report I that the answer is a resounding “no.”