Chris Vaughn’s blog

It's been a good little while since I posted one of these self-pics, but I thought I'd show everyone my new eyeglasses. Today, I got my first pair of Bifocals. Yeah, I'm getting old and my eyes know it.

I spent $300 dollars on two pair of glasses, today. I'm hoping that I won't need to get anymore for a good long time. I knew I needed to get new eyeglasses for some time now, but I didn't have the coin to shell out for a new pair. Today, I dug deep to get them. Well, here I am in my new specs.

Chris's New Peepers.

Well, today they had the annual Cinco de Mayo Parade in Pilsen here in Chicago. The Parade didn't seen to be as big as it has been in the recent past, and the crowds of spectators was visable smaller, but a good time was had by all. Despite all the news over the current health crisis of the H1N1 virus /"Swine Flu" pandemic that is spreading around the globe, people still came out to enjoy their heritage and their community. It was musical, colorful, and a very festive celebration. Viva La Vida!

One thing you can always say about life in Chicago is that there's always SOMETHING going on in the city. Chicago is a city of great cultural diversity, a grand mosaic of life dwells here in the city of big shoulders. I can always find something to point my camera at and shoot. Here are just a few glimpses of life here in the Windy City, from a Armenian protest against Turkey, a Illinois Worker's rally with the Governor of Illinois speaking, May Day Marches, and even a Polish Pride Parade. There's always something going on in the city.

Are you worried about a swine flu pandemic?

 

Biohazzard

(photo credit: Internet) 

Well, I gotta be honest...Yes, I'm worried about the Swine Flu. I'm watching the news reports on all the Channels about the spread of it around the World (it hasn't made it to Chicago yet, but I hear it's just a matter of time.) I get updates from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) on Twitter. And I'm investing in a large cache of hand sanitizer, too. Now, I don't thin k that folks will b e dropping dead from it, but I have noticed the raising death toll in Mexico from this unseen viral stalker. I just hope all this blows over soon, before I gotta try and get a Biohazzard Suit just for my daily commute on public transportation (and believe me when I say the buses and trains are just rolling germ incubators) .

Cheesburger1

Cheeseburger3

Hey, hey...last friday, I want to The Cheesburger Show Tweet-Up at the Sheffield Bar & Grill, It was an event sponsored by the Chicago Tribune to promote The Cheeseburger Show on CLTV, a local news station owned by the Tribune. It was also an event to bring users of the social networking site Twitter together to share conversation, food & drink. For the most part the crowd was young staffers from the Chicago Tribune, but there were a few folks (like me) who were there just to snag a free dinner. It was a well attended gathering, but the venue was a little too small for my taste.  The Cheeseburger Show goes around Chicagoland looking for the best Cheeseburger in the city, I wonder how I can get a job like that? I'll tell you this, the Cheeseburgers served at Sheffield's aren't half bad...Yummy!

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Cheeseburgertweet

What question do you ask when you really want to get to know someone better?

Well, it all starts with this...."What's your name?"

hello_my_name_is

(photo credit: Internet)

Can someone explain this to me? The County Board President  meets a Busboy at a local Steakhouse, hires him despite his criminal record for a $61,000 government job, then the Board President forces his own cousin to resign from her job at Chief Financial Officer for the county, because of her role in the scandal. Did I miss something? If Todd Stroger, the County Board President, hired Tony Cole, the ex-felon Busboy, for the job. Why did Donna Dunning, the County's Chief Financial Officer and Stroger's cousin, have to resign? Now, maybe I'm wrong here, but shouldn't Stroger be the one falling on his sword? Is he so much of a political coward that he would rather strong arm his own cousin (who probably shouldn't have been appointed by him to her job in the first place,) into quitting her almost $150,000 a year job. Well, she was repeatedly bailing Mr.Cole out of jail since his hiring into county government. What's up with that? Did Ms.Dunning have a "relationship" with the Busboy turned Human Resources Assistant? Wow, a college dropout, convicted felon , with no experience can get a $61,000 job in local government? God bless America! You really can't blame Mr.Cole for taking the job. If someone just offered you a new job paying you Three times what your were making busing tables wouldn't you take it?

Well, I have little doubt that Ms. Dunning will land another job, although I'm not sure what job she had before her cousin just dropped her in as the county's CFO. As for Mr.Cole, well there's always his old gig at the Steakhouse, I guess (if he can manage to stay out of jail, that is.) Now as for "The Toddster", we have an election coming up soon. I'm sure he's hoping for the best with that. Hey, you really gotta love local politics. 

Are you connected? Are you on Facebook, MySpace, or Twitter? Heck, even Oprah just got a Twitter account on Friday. Are you blogging? Well, if you're reading this I guess the odds are that you're a Blogger. Have you been to Digg, Technorati, Wordpress? If not, what are you waiting for? I thought I'd take a moment out to write about a little mixer I went to last week.

Last week, I went to a Tweet-Up ( a Meet-Up for folks on Twitter.) It was held at the Morton's Steakhouse here in Chicago, It was a very nice gathering of Social Media networkers coming together over food & drink, and getting to meet the "real people" behind the avatars used on their respective Twitter icon. The Tweet-Up was organized by @MerrittPR, the Media Relations Director for Morton's. I had an opportunity to meet @TheLocalTourist, a rather popular Social Media maven in this town of ours, and other folks, too. Some old pros at this medium, some not. The food was good (Man, the mini-cheeseburgers were GREAT!), the conversation was good, but there was something that bother me about this little get-together. I was the ONLY black guy there, and only one of three other blacks in attendance. Now, this was no fault of our host. This event was open to all, which only made me ponder this situation even more. Just where were all the other people of color? Now, I know that black folks are on Twitter as much as anyone else, or are we? I know the there are sisters out there like http://twitter.com/2Serenity is ALWAYS chattering about music & culture. http://twitter.com/TheFabGiver & http://twitter.com/BootcampMommy are keep people informed about what's going on in the streets. You can always findout what's happing in Chicago from http://twitter.com/GossipChicago or from http://twitter.com/JessChicago. So, I'm puzzled as to why there aren't more folks of color at these gatherings. About two weeks ago, Social Media Club-Chicago had a mixer at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. I wonder how many people of color made it out to it, from what little feedback I got, not many. Now, we black folks cannot blame anyone for not including us in these meet-ups and gatherings, but if we don't start really participating in them, won't we be missing out on something?

I think that we should capitalize on EVERY opportunity to network. We have to do what we can to get our respective "Brands" known to the community at-large, too. I don't want us to miss out on all that the Brave New Frontier of Social Media has to offer. I'm gonna encourge two things here. 1. We need to get more proactive about attending these Tweet-Ups, Meet-Ups, etc. and 2. We need to start hosting a few of are own, too. We must always, ALWAYS, network amongst ourselves to explore the opportunities that we have among ourselves, too. Hey, it's a thought, but a very good one I think.

Where, when, and with whom was your very first kiss?

Promphoto

Well, this is an easy one. It was in Chicago, right after my high school prom in May of 1980. I got my first kiss from Rhonda Gladney, right next to the Adler Planetarium, overlooking Lake Michigan. She was wear Cherry flavored Lip Gloss, too. Yeah, I remember it like it was yesterday. (Yikes...it's been 29 years?! Really?)

What one thing, without fail, puts you in a bad mood?

There-are-no-stupid-questions-just-stupid-people

 Oh, I'd have to say that it's Stupid People, without a doubt. I don't care how good I'm feeling about life and all of God's little creatures, someone stupid can just knock the wind out of my sails. I don't mean folks that didn't score as high on the SAT as you, or never made it pass the gth grade (heck, they could be natural born Geniuses). I'm talking about people who revel in their ignorance. People whom take great pride in having closed-minds, narrow viewpoints, or celebrate their bad behavior. Oh, that's the stuff that gets under my skin.  No matter if it's some blowhard radio talkshow host who just bellows on and on about pinhead, sexist, myoptic, near-racist ideas to the cheers of his or her moronic listeners. Or the Ghetto Fabulous, fake nail wearing, hair-weave styling, Baby Phat sporting Queen who just called 911 because she couldn't get an order of chicken nuggets at the local McDonald's. I'm talking about that sorta of stupid.

If you are some ultra-conservative blond-haired Harridan yammering on about how you kept all your lights on burning bright to protest all those folks talking about saving the planet from global warming, or still making the case that we had to fight the Iraq War to stop them from using Weapons of Mass Destruction (Did we ever find any WMDs? No, because they didn't have any.) If you are some half-wit that thinks women bring sexually assault on themselves because their skirts are too short, their tops are too low, and heck, everyone knows when she says "No", she means "Yes". Then you my friend are the kind of truly stupid person that just gives me a headache.

Well, I got that out of my system.