Martinicity

Johnny B Good Fun-Raiser

2008-04-23T21:10:00+00:00

Raffle Tickets

Please click above to support the rehabilitation of John “Chip” Cusack.

Last week I played four golf courses in Orlando with four of the Cusack brothers. But there was one Cusack brother missing. From the Raffle flyer:

Last September, John was taking a bike ride in his Northport neighborhood with his son when he fell off his bike and suffered a severe head trauma. He was airlifted to Stonybrook Hospital, had emergency brain surgery and began the long, painful process back.

You can follow John’s progress here:

caringbridge.org/visit/johncusack

And if you’d like to help out with a donation or a journal ad : johnnybgfunraiser.googlepages.com

Thanks for your support,

Mike Blake

BarCamp Orlando

2008-03-31T09:00:00+00:00

BarCamp Orlando is coming this weekend, Saturday and Sunday April 5th and 6th.

Hope to see you there!

Thoughts about my friends Brian Maguire and John Cusack

2007-12-13T17:54:00+00:00

In a freak accident back in September my friend John Cusack fell off a bicycle in Northport, NY and suffered a serious head injury. It’s been a very painful year for the Cusack family and friends. Obviously it saddened me deeply to learn that Brian Maguire suffered a similar injury.

Brian crashed on his motorcycle last Sunday night. Updates are available on Jim Abbott’s blog at The Orlando Sentinel, and There’s a Brian Maguire Relief Fund.

In John’s case, the waking up process was very gradual. After about a week in an induced coma similar to Brian’s, John began to show signs of life. The first sign of a functioning brain was the ability to blink when asked to blink. Slowly, day after day, there were subtle improvements. Response to stimuli, Open eyes tracking movement . At some point John was moved from a ventilator to a trachea. Then there was recognition of friends and family. Eventually there was movement of limbs and talking, (although talking is nearly impossible with the trachea.) . Now after a cranioplasty to restore his skull, John is scheduled to be moved to a Rehabilitation Center today where he will relearn basic muscle movements, and hopefully walk again.

The Cuscacks have set up a site here if you’d like to learn more. John Cusack .

With a brain injury, there is always hope. I pray that good news continues to break for both John and Brian, and however long it takes, I hope I can spend time with them again in this world.

Columbia City Paper and Free Speech

2007-10-23T06:46:00+00:00

Yesterday The South Carolina news station WLTX ran this news blurb about my brothers paper, Columbia Citypaper . It’s really not a big deal on the surface, some restaurant owner doesn’t want the paper there anymore because of the content of an ad. However what’s disconcerting is that the news station itself decides to blame the story on Columbia Citypaper. The first words of the story are “A Columbia newspaper is causing controversy …” Later in the story my brother Paul explains that he got a call a week ago asking him not to distribute the paper to that particular restaurant, and he was glad to comply.

WLTX Generates a controversy

A week later, after the issue has been easily resolved, WLTX makes this their top story. So who’s trying to cause controversy? WLTX is. And they have the audacity to start the story with “A Columbia newspaper is causing controversy ..” a blatant lie. The reporting gets more peculiar as they proceed to air what is a free add for the local restaurant. There is a couple seconds of Paul Blake saying they no longer deliver to that restaurant at the request of the owners. Then Paul does something interesting, and makes an intelligent point right in the middle of their fluff piece. He says “I just don’t think graphic language leads to any irresponsible behavior.”

Biased Flag Waving

The point of course goes ignored. What follows is a tirade about an “argument as american as the flag flying over the restaurant”, completely ignoring the point made by Paul, who happens to have a flag displayed in the window over his shoulder. Columbia Citypaper’s flag gets no mention though. The news station does take another dig at Columbia Citypaper by saying “Check our web site for a list of other sites that have banned the paper.” They fail to mention any of the reasons the other places have banned it. They also fail to mention their source, Columbia Citypaper which playfully publishes a list of establishments that ban them every week.

Speaking of Fuck

This particular ban was due to the use of foul language in an ad. David Heinemeier Hansson, the creator of the Rails web framework (which powers the Columbia Citypaper site) recently made a couple posts about colorful language. He point’s out that swearing at work boosts morale . This is far too interesting though for use on an evening tv news blurb.

An epidemic?

Last week here in Orlando, FL , police arrested employees of The Orlando Weekly because of ads that paper publishes. I’m serious, They were arrested for publishing an ad. Now I’m concerned. Can this happen to anyone who works for a newspaper? Some writers like to imply that the US government is behind current attitudes towards the media. Stories like the one in Orlando make those arguments more plausible. When is it time to fight back, when you hear about any alleged rights violation? When someone you know has their right’s violated? Or do you wait until it’s a relative?

The Corrigan Reunion

2007-09-21T14:57:00+00:00

My family and I had a great weekend at the end of August in Cleveland Ohio. My Mom’s side of the family , The Corrigans, had a reunion at the North Chagrin Nature Center in Lake County, OH. This was the first time all seven of us have been together in about five years.

The Blakes are, from left to right, Conny, Brian, Michael, Richard, John, Paul, and Maureen.

Geeking Out in Orlando

2007-07-26T19:10:00+00:00

At some point in my childhood, one of my four younger siblings coined the phrase geeking out to call attention to someone was uncontrollably excited. If one of us started geeking out the rest of us would be quick to call them on it. The only known cure was to hurl the offender into a pile of freshly raked leaves, a snow bank, or a sprinkler.

Gregg Pollack, head of the Orlando Ruby User’s Group has now captured me geeking out in this video to promote BarCampOrlando.

Well I can’t deny it, I am very excited about attending BarCampOrlando. Come geek out with us at Taste on Sunday September 23rd and discover why Orlando is quickly becoming one of the top technology centers in the country. And no worries; there will be no leaves, sprinklers, and certainly no snow anywhere near Taste. Just a full bar, awesome food, and great presentations from some of the leading minds in Orlando (and me).

Quoc Van for Congress

2007-07-10T14:47:00+00:00

Quoc Van came to my house a few weeks ago. He’s an extremely bright guy, and is running for congress in the 8th Congressional District here in Florida. I’m not kidding you, I got the sense that I had just met the next Barack Obama.

Quoc needs signatures from 1% of registered voter’s here in the 8th district in order to appear on the ballot for the Democratic primary. I admire Quoc’s grass roots effort so I was happy to sign.

How can I help out?

The immediate goal is getting Quoc on the ballot. You can help out in three easy steps (if you live in Florida’s 8th congressional district):

Print out this petition.
Fill it out.

a. Put in “Quoc Van” on line 2 where it says name.
b. Check major candidate and put in “Democratic party” on line 3
c. Put in “U.S. House of Representative in the 8th congressional district of Florida on line four
d. Fill in your information in the boxes.
Mail the form to:

Quoc Van
1110 Butler Way
Sanford, Fl 32773

For more information on Quoc Van visit vanforcongress.com.

Macaluso Fasano Blake @ Uncle Lou's

2007-06-07T20:23:00+00:00

The Philanthropic Programmers

2007-05-22T21:16:00+00:00

Something fantastic is happening in the Ruby and Rails World.

Do unto others

Open source developers know from experience that what goes around comes around. Contributions to projects like Rails invariably come back to benefit everyone, including the contributor. The community is now thinking on a larger scale. Frameworks come and go, but love is timeless .

The Summer of Love

Whytheluckystiff is focusing his power on Hackety Hack an amazing application that teaches children programming. And it’s likely more zeitgeist than coincidence that a professor from MIT, where the generous open source license originated, has started the noble project called One Laptop per Child . Developers everywhere like Amy Hoy are giving back in order to share the passion.

Chad Fowler has challenged the entire community to harness our newfound passion to do great things. And the community has only just begun to respond. During RailsConf over $33,000 was raised for charity.

Witness the Transformation

Software evolves rapidly. Humanity seems to evolve at a slower pace, but if you watch carefully, with ruby colored glasses , you can see it happening.

The RailsEnvy Guys

2007-05-16T12:32:02+00:00

Gregg and Jason from our local Orlando Ruby Users Group have really outdone themselves, and created a series of four Mac vs. PC like ads just in time for RailsConf.