I just stumbled across a photo of myself on the internet that was taken during a very dark time in my life. It was taken in 2002, during my stay at the Coyote Rock rehabilitation facility. If I remember correctly, I was about 14 inches tall at this point. This was my rock bottom. I distinctly remember the doctor bending over and handing me this tiny, baby fish, and demanding that I lick the algae off its gills for sustenance. I, of course, refused. I was as headstrong as I was beautiful. And I was so close to my goal of 10 inches and 15 pounds that I could taste it. I wasn’t going to let anyone stand in my way… even if they could pick me up by pinching the scruff of my neck between their thumb and forefinger.

According to the “Washington Post,” John McCain is making “significant gains” in Michigan, and the battleground states of Colorado, Minnesota and Wisconsin. They’re calling the race in Michigan a “statistical dead heat.”

So, we’ve got our work cut out for us here… We need to start taking to the streets, talking about the economy, and reminding people that a vote for McCain won’t bring about positive change and create jobs… It’s not exactly a surprise, but this new polling data has also shown that the dominant concern of Michigan voters is the economy. Six in ten respondents in the sate said that the economy was the single most important thing they’d be basing their vote on.

The good news is, the Obama campaign is moving into the state in a big way this week. The official launch of their state headquarters was this afternoon, and over 1,300 people showed up, compared to the 200 on hand for the opening of the McCain office. And, Obama will be opening offices across Michigan this week… The grand opening of the Ann Arbor field office is this Saturday, and you’re all invited. The office is at 300 W. Liberty, and the party starts at 11:00 AM.

Oh, and you probably won’t get it in time for the party, but, if you act fast, you can get a free Obama button from MoveOn by clicking here… Of course, it will get you on the MoveOn solicitation list, but that’s a small price to pay for such a beautiful, shiny button.

[This post was brought to you by the power sucking highway signs of Ypsilanti, your friendly neighborhood oxytocin dealer, and Patriots for the Imprisonment of Karl Rove.]

It’s now been made public that Ann Arbor SPARK has walked away from negotiations over Ypsi’s Smith Furniture building. It seems as though they couldn’t come to terms with the building’s owner. So, they’re looking to locate their SPARK East business incubator elsewhere. Word is they’re talking to Eric and Karen Maurer about the building on the South side of Michigan Avenue, between Bombadil’s and TC’s. Our hope is that the parties can come to terms quickly, so that the facility can open before 2009. (The building, as I understand it, still needs quite a bit of work.)

The Maurers have put a lot of time and effort into their downtown properties these past several years, and, in my opinion, they deserve the stability that a 5-year lease with a relatively stable entity like SPARK would give them. I didn’t post about it here, but I was pulling for them from the beginning. In general, I think it’s a good thing when, all other things being equal, hard-working developers win out over real estate speculators who, it would seem, bought inexpensive buildings years ago in Ypsi with no intention of improving them, waiting for the day when gentrification came and they could sell for several times what they paid. One doesn’t like to see that kind of behavior rewarded.

Of course, the really important thing isn’t where the Ypsibator lands, but that it lands somewhere. While I’d like to see the Maurers rewarded for their hard work and investment in Ypsi’s downtown, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if they didn’t get it. (Spark is talking with at least one other landlord.) As I understand it, the Maurers now operate over 100 rental units, and business is brisk. The really important thing for Ypsi, and I think that they’d agree, is that SPARK signs a lease somewhere along the Michigan Avenue corridor and starts putting down roots in the community.

[Photo by Susan Cybulski]

Fortunately, a lot of people really enjoyed themselves quite a bit.

I want to conduct an experiment and I’m looking for a business owner in either Ypsilnati or Ann Arbor that might be willing to help me.

I’ve been doing this site for about 6 years now, and, other than the Amazon links on the side, I’ve never run an ad for anything that I wasn’t involved in myself. I’m thinking, however, that I might want to try accepting ads for local businesses. And, the first step, at least as I see it, is to see whether or not there’s really any value to be derived for a restaurant or retailer in doing so.

OK, here’s the background… The audience for this site has been growing tremendously this past year, and it looks as though we’re outgrowing the Hamtramck server we’re presently on. So, I’m going to have to move the site to a larger hosting company, and that means more in the way of monthly fees. So, I had this idea… What if I were to do something like run a coupon a month for a local business willing to offer a good deal for MM.com readers? I don’t know what I’d charge – maybe $100 for a month – and, in return, they’d either get a small coupon on the front page, or a link to a coupon at the bottom of every post during that month, saying something like, “This post was brought to you by the 99-dollar Casket Store, where MM.com readers Save in the Grave.”

And, if we take in more than we spend on hosting, I can do things for the site, like buy a new camera, or maybe even build a little studio in the basement with a ‘green screen’ so that I can make movies of myself flying around Ypsilanti on a magic carpet (or magic coffin, if the 99-dollar Casket Store wants to underwrite it).

Anyway, it’s just an idea at this point. I was just thinking that, if I did want to go that route, I should probably first see whether or not you cheap assholes in the audience would ever use coupons, or respond to ads. (I suspect most of my readers live in people’s garages, stealing bandwidth, and eating vermin.) So, I’d be looking for a restaurant owner, bar operator or retailer in the Ypsi-Arbor area willing to 1) make a decent offer to MM.com readers, 2) provide a decent looking web-ready image, and 3) share all the resulting data concerning redemption with me. (Assuming that multiple businesses want to participate, I’ll take the one making the more attractive offer in their coupon.)

Ok, let the “you’re an f’ing sell-out” shit storm begin.

Clementine used the word “famous” at the dinner table tonight. When I asked her what “famous” meant, she said “happy.” I shot a worried look at Linette, who was seated across the table from me. I was about to say something, when Clementine added the following: “…and that all of your bones come out.”

Seems like a pretty good definition of fame, doesn’t it?

As some of you know, one of the new things that Linette and I had at the Shadow Art Fair was a hand-painted limited edition poster that I made on the subject of Drew Barrymore and the film she’s making here in Ypsi. I sold quite a few of them, which was cool, but, more importantly – and I hadn’t considered this when I thought the idea up - it made a lot of people stop and talk with me about Barrymore and her film who probably wouldn’t have otherwise. Among those who stopped were a few members of the Detroit Derby Girls.

It seems as thought “Whip It!”, the derby-themed movie that Barrymore is shooting here, isn’t so popular with everyone on the roller derby circuit. I suppose some of that could be expected, as producers have selected some Detroit Derby Girls to be a part of the production, and not others, but my sense is that it goes a bit deeper than that. The women I talked with seemed sincere when they said that they felt as though the movie could be “bad” for their sport.

Having read the script, two of these women felt as though the film “could” do contemporary roller derby a disservice. I didn’t press either of them for a lot of detail, but the sense that I got was that roller derby was portrayed in the film as something along the lines of professional wrestling, which, if you’ve gone to see a game recently, couldn’t be further from the truth. I went and saw the Detroit Derby Girls last year, and I was impressed by their athleticism and the seriousness with which they competed. I don’t know what I was expecting going in, but I didn’t think that it would be as – well – legitimate. Sure, the girls had funny names – like Black Eyed Skeez and Honey Suckit - and the refs wore outrageous costumes, but it was, when you stripped everything else away, real. The women were really competing. And, from what I hear, that’s not so much the case in “Whip It,” which presents modern roller derby as more campy. This isn’t an exact quote, but one of the women told me that they were afraid that the movie might set the roller derby movement, which in its current form is all about DIY female empowerment, back 30 years.

And, apparently, the casting choices made by the producers didn’t help erase any fears the derby girls might have had after reading the script. It sounds like the producers didn’t always take the best competitors we had here in Detroit to be a part of the project. They didn’t take, for instance, the athletic, full-figured women who excel at the sport. Instead, they took the smaller, more “attractive” Derby Girls to be on screen.

I think the moral of the story, if there is one, is that it sucks when Hollywood tries to make your sub-culture mass market-friendly. (I’m sure that, one day, there will be a movie about small-town bloggers, and we’ll all be portrayed as attractive, outgoing and whippet-thin.)

I should also mention that, across the board, I’ve only heard wonderful things about Ms. Barrymore. I talked with over half a dozen people on Saturday who had been in contact with her, and they all said that she was “the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being” they’d ever known in their lives… And, I should add, it wasn’t as though the derby girls I spoke with were completely against the project. They acknowledged that it was cool that the project landed here instead of in Austin. They just felt as though it was kind of a mixed blessing in that it had created rifts within their organization, and because it might hurt the public perception of their sport.

Oh, and I also sold one of my mock-hysterical “Keep Drew Barrymore Out of Ypsilanti… Our Salvation Will Not Be Found in Roller Derby” posters to a woman from LA who was in the area, shooting another film. I can’t remember the name of her project, but apparently it’s an indie with a hot up-and-coming female lead, playing an art student at UM. So, keep your eyes peeled – my poster may show up on a dorm room wall.

And, if you haven’t been to see the Detroit Derby Girls in action, I’d suggest taking in a match. (Do they call them matches?) It’s good fun for the whole family… Or, at least Clementine loved it.

I was going to post video of Gore’s appearance on “Meet the Press” this morning, but then I happened across this footage of Gore speaking in Austin, Texas yesterday at the Netroots Nation convention, and I thought that it was quite a bit more interesting and inspiring. Hopefully, you’ll agree.

[If you haven’t yet signed up to be on the mailing list for Gore’s “We Can Solve It” campaign, you can do so here.]

update: It’s probably also worth noting that it was 39 years ago today that Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. They said that couldn’t be done too, but, as it turns out, it was. And, I might add, it was fucking cool.

Clementine asked Linette to cut her hair this weekend, and Linette did. She cut a few inches off, making it pretty much shoulder-length. Afterward, Clementine said that she liked it. Then, she said, “Maybe Jill will like me now that I have hair like Sue.”

Linette and I knew that there would be things like this to deal with one day - we were just hoping that we’d have a few more years to bolster her confidence and prepare her for the sad reality of life, which is that most people suck, and far too many get off on making others feel badly about themselves.

[The names of all children other than Clementine have been changed so as not to focus too much public scorn on the parents of the new mean girl, who has introduced the concept of the clique to a classroom of little girls who had, up until that point, played fairly nicely with one another.]

The conversation we began with our two Ward 3 candidates for Ypsi City Council the other day on the subject of Water Street has evolved, in the comments section, into a discussion on waste in the current City budget. I thought that it probably deserved it’s own thread. Here, in hopes that it’ll get everyone caught up, are some of the highlights thus far in chronological order.

Assuming both Rod and Pete are still with us, I was thinking that it would be interesting to have their thoughts on this. With that in mind, here’s my second question to the candidates: Is there waste in the City’s budget? If so, what is it? Please be specific.

OK, now here are the highlights that I promised.

WONDERING (to Mayor Paul Schreiber): Why are police and fire always the first items you suggest will be cut? Why don’t you consider cutting less essential services that wouldn’t have such an immediate impact on residential lives?

PAUL SCHREIBER: …I didn’t mean to imply that police and fire should be cut first. I listed the services that the city provides in the order of spending. Police protection accounts for about $5 million and fire protection accounts for about $3 million out of a $14 million budget.

City council went through a very long and deliberative process to determine the budget priorities and cuts. The budget process started with city council goal-setting sessions on 12/8/2007, 12/15/2007, 1/12/2008, and 1/26/2008. The city council goals and objectives were passed by city council on February 5, 2008 (see pages 5 through 11). These directions to the city manager created the FYE2009/2010 budget that was passed on June 3, 2008 (pages 5 through 7).

WONDERING: You say you didn’t mean to imply that police and fire should be cut first. So I looked at the links to see what city council goals and objectives actually are. The action strategy to reduce costs is itemized in your link. Number one - cut police services. Number two - cut fire services. Council vote was six yes, zero no, 1 absent. Feb. 5, 2008. I don’t think you really want to cut the budget. Your actions show that you really want to increase taxes another 10% so that you aren’t “forced” to cut police and fire. But what’s not on the table is cutting the waste out of the budget. Too bad for the taxpayers.

DIRTGRAIN: “But what’s not on the table is cutting the waste out of the budget.”

With such accusations should come specifics. Please show us the waste, as I’m not quite sure to what you are referring.

Why does the Mayor want to maintain the waste in the budget? Corruption? Inside deals? What? That might also help us understand your accusation.

WONDERING: City hall is a bureaucracy and everybody wants to keep their piece of the pie. Employees want their salary to increase faster than the rate of inflation, departments spend every dime that is budgeted so that they can claim they need more next year, etc. A good city council/mayor looks at each line item and determines what is essential and what can be reduced to maintain essential services and limit the effects of budget cuts so that they have as small as impact as possible.

The current council wants more money than they currently have. Hence, they advocated for an income tax. Since that failed, they have determined to make the necessary budget cuts in the most necessary and visible services: police and fire. If the cuts have a negative impact on city residents, people will complain, and they will say “I told you so". Then, they will schedule another millage or income tax vote. If the residents are suffering from the decrease in services, they will be more likely to vote an increase in the taxes. The goal is to increase revenue rather than reduce the cost of doing city business.

I’ve not made any suggestion of corruption or inside deals. But I do think the city council/mayor/city manager show a lack of concern for the financial struggles of many residents, especially those with young children. Most family incomes do not rise as fast as city taxes and fees. Other costs, such as gas and food bills, are also rising at a faster rate than family incomes.

What is very apparent to anyone who looks at the overall budget, is that the City spends more money to provide services than other municipalities of similar size and population. How is it that other communities can provide services at far lower costs? How are they able to control costs to a far greater degree than Ypsi? What are they doing that Ypsi could emulate? Why doesn’t the city’s action plan set clear goals to seek alternative, less costly ways to operate city government?

Instead, residents are told there is no waste, the budget is bare to the bones, and Water Street payments are no problem because it’s only an additional 10% of the entire city budget. Let’s cut police and fire and see how quickly the residents change their minds about higher taxes. It was reported that their intention is to make the cuts as visible as possible.

Ol’ E CROSS: Wondering. Sorry to get involved, but that was just silly. Dirtgrain asked for specifics, you offer more ambiguous assertions? What would you cut? Specifically.

STEVE PIERCE: …You say that all that is left to cut is police and fire. I am not advocating any cuts, but I think it bears noting: Police and Fire service costs about $7.5 million a year. The overall budget for the City is right around $16 million. So there is $8.5 million in annual spending not related to police and fire…

DIRTGRAIN (with what I perceive to be a bit of sarcasm): …So, $8.5 million in waste. It helps when we get more specific. Let’s cut that $8.5 million then..

BRACKACHE: Why on earth CAN’T somebody just post such a list? Everyone’s been asking for it. Just go down the list of expenditures, write down some preliminary ideas of what to cut (doesn’t have to be exhaustive yet), grow a pair, and post the damn thing…

I’d welcome anyone’s thoughts on this, but I’m particularly interested to know what Pete and Rod think about it… Is there waste in the City’s budget? And, if so, what is it? Please be specific.