Be Somebody Way Cool – Call for Guest-Posters

So here’s a question for you: If you could be anything, anything at all, what would you be? An astronaut? President? Professional Athlete? Pop Music Star? Nobel Laureate?

That’s nice. But let me set you straight: you are never ever going to be any of those things. Because the people who are going to be those things are busy training or studying or practicing or glad-handing or whatever; they’re not killing time reading some weird tangent-strewn blog about plants and bikes.

But here’s something wonderful you can be: Me* for a day. Or more specifically, A Watching the World Wake Up Guest-Poster.

*pic right = actual photo of me, from my new employer’s company directory. My new employer has an online directory with photos of everyone. I’m not sure why they do this. What if I look up someone’s phone number, and they’re so scary-looking or something that I change my mind and don’t call them? Another odd thing: most employees have photos like mine- they were told to sit down and have their photo taken by a company photographer. But some people have photos that were clearly taken outside of work, like in a park, or on the beach or what-not. I swear, a few look like the person was out knocking back a few cocktails at the time. Anyway, I’m thinking of resubmitting another photo, probably this one.

But none of that is why I posted the photo. I posted it because it’s another great photo of my awesome beard, albeit in a professional context. I really like this photo. I feel that it says: I am a trustworthy all-round good guy from whom you should purchase IT research services.

The week of April 4 I’ll be on vacation in some Spanish-speaking locale without online access. Now last year when we vacationed in Costa Rica, I set up a series of auto-posts- namely the Fantastically Exciting and Amazing Blue Piñon series- to edutain you while I was away. But this year, as regular readers know, I’m phenomenally busy at work, and have absolutely zero bandwidth to produce absentee-posts. So, I have 2* options:

1) Let the blog go dark for a week, probably longer (because I have to travel for work as soon as I return from vacation.)

2) Someone (preferably more than one) guest-posts.

*I guess a 3^rd option is I could just fill the days with helmet-cam filler. Which reminds me, I have an awesome idea for a new reality TV show: I wear my helmet-cam all the time.

To be a guest-poster, you just have to write a post. The requirements are:

1) The overall theme is somehow related to the natural world. But since you can tangent* at any time, you can really go off on pretty much anything you want.

*Which is, of course the most fun part of this whole project. Well, that and doing the Awesome Graphics.

2) I have to not be embarrassed to imagine my mother reading it. (Because she will*.)

*She reads this blog diligently, ever since another family member- let’s call her “my sister Elizabeth”- clued her into its existence. She sends me long comments by email, correcting my Greek grammar and things like that. One time when I posted something about my first wife and then showed it crossed out, she emailed me in a panic and said, “You know readers can still see what you said about [FIRST WIFE’S NAME]??”

3) You have to send me the post by end of day Saturday April 3*, so that I can format and set it up for auto-post.

*And you cannot flake. If you say you’re doing it, you need to follow through. I have this thing about people flaking…

Posts don’t need to have pics or graphics*, but if you’d like to include some, that’s great. Tangential ruminations, half-baked theories, observations and/or anecdotes are of course welcome and encouraged. Don’t worry about the formatting; I’ll take care of it.

*And if you get me your post early enough, and it inspires me and I’m feeling especially helpful, I just might whip up an Awesome Graphic for you.

OK that’s it. Be me for a day. It’s way cool. If you’d like to guest-post, email me at either my real address (which a number of readers already have) or at adventureREMOVECAPSbotanist@yahoo.com (removing the caps) and give me some idea of the topic.

Not interested in guest-posting? OK, well thanks for reading, and here’s a nice clip from riding frozen singletrack yesterday at dawn above downtown SLC.

Man, I love the helmet-cam. I video my rides every morning and then watch them at work while I’m stuck on conference calls. Isn’t that cool? It’s like 2 rides every day. I am telling you- way cool to be me.