The joys of a common gmail account name

I often get misaddressed email sent to my gmail account. This is kind of strange, because "Silverman" is not a terribly common name, but there must be numerous people who just assume that the Mike, Maurice, Mark, Mindy, or Mel Silverman they are trying to reach must, of course, have msilverman as their gmail account name. These are not misaddressed or random spam attempts, or mailing lists...they are personal emails from random strangers.

As such I get a weird variety of misaddressed emails. Often they are real estate deals; I have heard lots of tips about great condos in Brooklyn and office space in Hoboken. A lot of the emails are academic; for months I kept getting plaintive emails about getting my feedback on a paper some professor was writing. The best in this vein was a letter addressed to "Professor Silverman" begging for an extension on an overdue term paper. Of course, I also get plenty of random family photos and "interpersonal" type emails...which always surprises me. I mean, it's one thing for a real estate agent to not know an email, but if you are writing "Cousin Mickey" don't you think you'd at least bother to look up his real email address?

None of these are as good as the email I got this past Spring from Lee MacPhail, director of Scouting for the Baltimore Orioles, containing the complete Orioles scouting organization plans for the 2009 season. Apparently, it hasn't helped, as the Orioles are mired in last place as of this writing.

When I receive one of these emails, and it looks important, I am polite and write the person to let them know they have the wrong man, although I have been tempted with some of the real estate folks to reply with something to the effect of "That property sounds awesome, put me down for it, I don't care what it costs!"

Please, everyone, check the email address of the person you are sending mail to, because it might not be who you expect!

Dave and I were on "The 10th Voice"

Dave and I were guest on the KKFI (Kansas City 90.1 FM) radio program "The 10th Voice" today. Ourselves, along with another couple from Lawrence talked about our relationship and our legal marriage, and how it has affected us. We think it turned out really nice. If you missed the show when it was on the air, you can listen here:

http://www.mikesilverman.com/kkfi_mike_dave.mp3

Full court press? Or media whoredom?

Dave sent our press release out to a few papers this morning. It feels weird (and self-aggrandizing) to do it (even though Dave actually hit the 'send' button). One could say this is a public statement of our relationship, but this isn't news (pardon the pun) to anyone who knows us, friends, family, co-workers, and so forth. I think Dave is right that by telling more people about what is really a legal formality will hopefully show the world (or at least a small part of it) that same-sex marriage is not a big deal or any kind of "threat." However, it still feels strange to have this mix of the public and private.

Actually writing the thing felt a little bit like writing a news story for the Onion, complete with the headline. The release was entitled "Lawrence gay couple expect to be first from Kansas to be legally married in California" which sounds much better then "Area sodomites mock God" which is probably how the Christian News Service will run the story.

Anyway, here's the actual release....

Lawrence residents Mike Silverman and Dave Greenbaum will be one the first same-sex couples from Kansas to get legally married in California, and most likely the first such couple from the state to be legally married anywhere in the United States after the pair receive a marriage license in San Francisco, California on at 8:15am on June 17th. Silverman and Greenbaum, who have been together for over twelve years and who had a Jewish ceremony recognizing their union nine years ago, decided to take this important legal step both to provide their relationship with the legal protections of a marriage license as well as make a statement in favor of of equality in Kansas.

California will begin granting marriage licenses equally to all couples on June 17th. Prior to this date, only Massachusetts offered same-sex couples marriage licenses, but these were primarily limited to residents of that state. Although the couple could have travelled abroad to get a marriage license, as American citizens it was important to them to get an American marriage certificate. According to Silverman and Greenbaum, Kansas should recognize their marriage. "When we travelled to California, that state recognized my drivers license issued by Kansas. We would hope that similarly, Kansas will recognize our marriage license" said Greenbaum. The couple realize the Kansas Constitution contains a provision refusing to recognize same-sex marriages, but this may run afoul of the United States Constitution's "full faith and credit" clause, which requires states to recognize other states' official actions.

In past years, the couple submitted testimony to the Kansas Senate in opposition to Kansas' anti-marriage amendment, and made it clear at the time that they intended to seek "any and all legal recognition of their relationship" as was written in their Ketubah, or Jewish marriage contract. This marriage license is the fulfillment of this commitment Silverman and Greenbaum made to each other nine years ago in Omaha, Nebraska at their wedding ceremony at the synagogue Temple Israel.

The couple travelled to California from Lawrence, the first city in the state with both a domestic partner registry and an inclusive antidiscrimination clause and from Kansas, a state founded in opposition to oppression and slavery. Silverman and Greenbaum, who proudly brought their University of Kansas attire with them to California, will provide a sharp contrast to infamous hate preacher Fred Phelps of Topeka, Kansas, who does not represent the true values of that state. "We wanted to show that we are proud to be from Kansas, and we hope that our home state one day soon will live up to its founding values and recognize marriage for all its citizens" said Silverman.

Silverman and Greenbaum are happy to make themselves available for interviews with media by calling (redacted) or emailing (redacted). They will also be blogging daily about their experience at www.mikesilverman.com.

Front and center?

Most of the news from California has indicated that most counties would begin same-sex marriage licensing as soon as possible -- on Monday June 16, at 5:01 PM. Some counties may do this, but San Francisco will not, except for the symbolic and a very cool wedding of two 80-something year old lesbians, who have lived through the worst and best that our county can be. They will be an awesome first couple representing equality after so many hard years.

The next morning, Tuesday the 7th is when licensing beings in earnest, and our appointment is for 8:15 AM, which is only 15 minutes after the office opens, so we will be among the first, which is pretty cool. In the mean time, Dave and I have been working on some kind of press release. I am not too keen on this idea. I mean, obviously, by its very definition, going to California is a political acts as well as a very personal one, but putting out a press release seems kind of crass, like we are just doing this for some kind of publicity. On the other hand, maybe it would help people back in Kansas put a personal face on what will be a national news event. Still, unless you last name is Baldwin or you have sold a million rap albums, generally you do not put out press releases for your weddings!

We'll probably do it, because if nothing else it is a teaching moment, as they say. All the same, really isn't the end goal a time when a same-sex marriage is only "newsworthy" to the couple's own friends and family and the marriage license as unremarkable as getting a parking permit?

Hello San Francisco

I arrived in the bay area today for my work conference. Dave won't be joining me til next weekend. One interesting thing I noticed was that there were a lot of ads in the various weekly free newspapers for companies providing services to same-sex couples getting married, from businesses like bed and breakfasts and photographers and other providing wedding services. This will definitely be a boon to the economy here (so Republicans should be in favor now, right?)

Tomorrow Steve Jobs announced the new iPhone, at least everyone is expecting him to. I'll be there watching his Steveness in person (or at least in the overflow room, as I do not plan to get up at 5:00 AM to wait in line!) Should be interesting...

The story so far

Dave and I are going to be getting married in California on June 17th. This will be a full legal marriage. It is not a domestic partnership, nor is it a civil union (we've collected both of those over the years already). Marriage is the end goal. More specifically, it is the the legal license. You see, Dave and I already have been married for over nine years. Our ceremony, back in 1999, was our wedding, in front of family, friends, and God. What we were going to do in California is getting the legal license to match the reality of our lives. It is an important step; we are citizens of America, after all, and government recognition of our union is important for all kinds of reasons most people never think about.

While we are getting married in California, under full faith and credit our marriage license should be valid anywhere in America, in spite of a (likely unconstitutional) law called "the defense of marriage act" which will hopefully be overturned someday. In the mean time, there are still some questions about the future status of unions like ours. You see, California is one of those strange states that allows any kook with a million bucks to put an initiative on the ballot to take away peoples' fundamental rights, and an amendment against same-sex marriage is on the ballot in November. But that is a matter for the future.

How did Dave and I get here? Well, the California Supreme Court announced their decision in mid-May. As soon as we heard about it, we knew we wanted to get married in California (Massachusetts, which also has same-sex marriage, doesn't allow out of state couples to get married, California does, which is why this is a bigger deal). By lucky coincidence, I was going to be in San Francisco already in mid-June for a work conference. We decided that I would try to stay over a few extra days and Dave would fly out and we would get married. In a flurry of afternoon activity, I made hotel reservations, and made an appointment to get a marriage license at San Francisco's city hall for June 16th, which appeared to be the day that same-sex marriage was actually going to be legal.

Of course, nothing turns out as easy as you expect. The court didn't set a date for their ruling to take effect, and furthermore, the actual bureaucratic instruments of marriage needed to be updated. New forms had to be created, and so forth, and it was all up in the air how long this would take. Finally, the "Christian" groups opposed to equal rights were petitioning the court to issue a stay of its own ruling, which might have caused further delays. In sum, nobody (including state officials) had any idea when people could get married.

In early June, several of these issues were resolved. The state health department decided that marriages would begin on June 17 and set about creating new forms and language. The Supreme Court then clarified the date that marriage would be legal by denying the request for a stay and setting 5 PM on Monday June 16th as the date when marriage could being. This presented a bit of a problem for us (and 43 other couples) who had originally made appointments for June 16. You see, the San Francisco city clerk's office would not allow us to reschedule our appointment for the next day, because all the slots on the 17th had already been filled weeks before.

The middle of June crept ever closer, and we still had no idea if we would be allowed to marry. Of course, the longer we waited, the more expensive flights and so forth became, as well as the more stressful it got to try to make contingency plans for what might turn out to be a last minute trip. Making things even more frustrating, the county clerk's office initially said that the June 16th couples would be accommodated on the 17th, then they changed their minds. Dave was even able to actually call and talk to the county clerk, and we were impressed that this overworked public servant actually took the time to talk to Dave. Her position was that as long as things were in the air implementation wise, that there wasn't much she could do, other the try to be fair to everyone. We gambled on the 16th, but the roulette wheel came up the 17th, so we lost.

Luckily, after the court rejected the stay attempt, the state health department officially declared that as of 5:01 PM on June 16th, same-sex marriage could begin in California. Meanwhile, the San Francisco mayors office worked with the clerks office to expands the resources for conducting marriages the first week, which opened up a large amount of extra slots. All of this happened very fast on Friday June 6th. Dave and I were literally checking the clerk's web site every half hour to see if new appointment slots would open up; all of our plans were in the air until this happened. It was very stressful, to say the least, because we really had to know for sure before dropping a couple grand on a trip to San Francisco (and Mike having to extend his work trip for several extra days).

But, it worked out. New time slots opened, and Dave got our original (invalid) appointment time switched to Tuesday the 17th. This mean that short of a meteor hitting California (the right-wings fantasy!) that we were going to get married on the 17th. So the date is on! Dave made his trip reservations and I changed mine.

Both of us are obviously excited, but it is also going to be stressful. I don't like being gone for such a long time (10 days!) for my work conference (Apple's Developer Conference for anyone interested), but it is also a busy time for me at work, with my team being at the end of a stressful and very busy software release. So I hate being gone during this time. And of course, Dave hates traveling in general. But, this is a once in a lifetime experience. When we had our religious ceremony 9 years ago, we filled out a Jewish marriage contract, called a Ketubah. In one of its clauses, we agreed to seek any legal recognition of our union that we could. And now, finally, we have that chance. Almost undoubtedly, we will be the first gay couple from the state of Kansas to be legally married. We are going to take our Kansas flag with us to SF, so we can show the world that real Kansas values are the same as they were during the Civil War era -- freedom for everybody and equal rights!

I know I haven't posted to this blog much this year, but I will try to keep a day by day diary here as the date approaches, so hopefully at least family and friends can keep up on things! Talk to you soon!

Random thoughts after six weeks

So Metroid for the Wii...not surprisingly, it turned out to be awesome. I am now sitting at 97% item gathering, and with just the final boss to beat. My 6-week odessey to beat this game hasn't been helped by a rather serious case of "wii-itis" which has actually bothered my wrists enough that not only did I have to stop playing for a couple weeks, but I wasn't even able to lift heavy objects without pain.

During September, I purchases a new Aluminum iMac, opting for the 34 inch model with the 2.8 ghz processor. I have upped the RAM to 3 GB, and so far I am very pleased with the system. It is beautiful and very fast; anecdotally, it feels faster then my old 2 ghz Mac Pro (which Dave inherited, after upping it to 4 GB of memory). The only down side of the experience came with the out-of-box: a large piece of dust was stuck between the glass and the screen itself, requiring a trip to the Apple store for them to remove the dust in some kind of clean room procedure.

I can't say enough good things about the newest John Fogerty album. It's his best work in decades and matches up to some of the Creedence stuff. Short, sweet songs that get stuck in your head in a good way. Speaking of music, I am eagerly looking forward to being in Chicago in two weeks for a special two-night Decemberists show; they are playing two shows over two nights, one consisting of long epic songs and the other of their short, poppy tunes. I feel smarter and more pretentious just thinking about it.

I almost never talk about sports here, which is just as well, but I am actually somewhat of a fan of the manly art of college football. I also grew up in Omaha, which has cused me with being a fan of the deteriorating Nebraska football team. Luckily, I escaped Nebraska and am now in Lawrence, where new football powerhouse Kansas is playing. Every computer user knows the importance of a good backup, right?

So one thing you may have noticed is that I do not write as much here when I get very busy or life sucks more then usual, and the past month has seen a lot of suckiness. Most immediately, our dog Tova has been very, very sick, with nasty bowel-related ailments that are not easily diagnosable, albeit similar to another mysterious monthlong illness she suffered back in June. She is currently on steroids which have brough her bowels under control but have their own bad side-effects, most notably they have made her morose and sluggish as well as causing her to urinate like a puppy (frequently and often in the house). Having a very sick dog is awful, emotionally draining, expensive, and depressing. Tova isn't a kid, but she's the closest we'll ever come, and it sucks all around.

Speaking of dogs, our two neighbors, each two houses down on either side have perfectly healthy dogs, and I know this because they leave them outside, unattended all day long (and all night long sometimes) where they bark and bark and bark. We've called the cops, which has been worthless. The next step, as we have been advised by Animal Control, is to log every time when the animals are barking, then after a while, they can be issued a ticket and the log can be used as evidence. I've never understood why someone would get a pet dog and then keep it outside...people who keeps animals outside in a city aren't pet owners, they are farmers, and the animals aren't pets, they are livestock!

I know what happened to the ninth planet

If you are looking the ninth planet in our solar system, I believe I found it the other day driving to Omaha, in the form a an asteroid-sized hunk of rock, thrown by a semi truck which made a nice, moon-crater like hole in my windshield. That is, the windshield of my brand-effing new car. I've been driving for, well, 18 years or so, and this is the first time I have been struck by anything larger then a pebble. Needless to say I am quite annoyed. About the only good news is that the windshield replacement folks can so their dirty work on site so I don't need to drive the car somewhere.

Meanwhile, if some alien is looking for their planet, it's on highway 75 just north of Nebraska City. Please beam it up.

Driveshaft

There are some advantages to driving a beat-up, hail-damaged old car like mine. Registration and insurance practically cost nothing. I have no anxiety about tight parking spaces or grocery store cart dings. I like how the thing drives and it fits me well like an old, ratty tennis shoe. However, the car is long out of warranty, and although I have taken good care of the mechanicals, various parts of the car are starting to show their age. And, like most American cars, various (overpriced -- in an age when you can get an iPod for $79, can a turn signal circuit board really cost $99?) electronic parts aren't holding together well either. As a side note, I don't use my car that heavily. I depend on it to get to and from work every day and around town, with the very rare drive into Kansas City (or even more rare) or Omaha, but I do not put many miles on the thing, perhaps about 6,000 a year (the US average is over 10,000).

Everybody I have talked to told me I should get rid of the old car and buy a new one. A new car would be nice, I mean, who would not enjoy the security and tactile enjoyment of a new vehicle. There is also an emotional logic that argues in favor of putting money into a new car rather then down a rathole with an older one (although keep in mind, a new car is not an "investment" either -- it depreciates by several thousand dollars the second you drive it off the lot).

Still, although I am not a gearhead or car enthusiast, new is new. The problem is that when you remove emotion and look at logic, it is usually significantly cheaper to keep driving the older car. When you look at the cost of a new car ($20,000 or more, paid over say four years), plus interest, increased insurance and taxes, it basically comes out to just under $600 per month. That much money can cover a lot of repairs! Of course, if it were costing near $600 per month to keep my old car on the road, I might as well get a new car for the other advantages that would bring, and becuase at nearly equal amounts, the inconvenience of having the old car in the shop frequently would outweigh any slim savings.

Through the Spock-like weighing of several factors (emotions, features, safety, inconvenience, financial security, etc.), we (well, Dave noodled out the higher math) calculated that a new car only makes sense if the monthly repair cost for the old one exceeds 60% of the price of a new one, which comes out to about $360 per month. Since, even with the repairs I need to do to my car now, I am not yet close to that figure, we've decided to keep my current car.

Of course, these calculations could change "down the road" (pun intended). If my old car becomes significantly less reliable, or a major system fails completely and very expensively (i.e. the engine or transmission) then the logic pointing me towards a new car would shift. However, for now, it clearly appears to be the best choice to keep driving my beater.

Is it better to be lucky or good?

So I got lucky and won a cool new cell phone in a drawing at my work.

The ironic part of the story is that when I called my wireless privider, (let's just say they are based in Overland Park, Kansas and have a name that ryhmes with "glint") to try to activate my shiny new toy, they can't help me because they have no record of the new phone's serial number, and as far as they are concerned, the phone can't even physically exist, even though I have the phone and the nice little yellow box it came in sitting on my desk in front of me.

I probably would have been better off if I had won a carrier pigeon.

Sure, I'd have to clean up bird shit, but as long as I remember to fill the dish with birdseed, at least the damn thing would work.

(and I could check e-mail with it too)

UPDATE: They said they were working on it and maybe I'll be able to use the phone by next week. If so, I will celebrate with a big meal made from my old phone.