Dopp Juice Archive

I’m thankful that I can still pull out my New Hampshire plaid shirt and rock the farmer-girl look when green beans and sweet potatoes are hitting the table.

I’m thankful that two years ago, I spent my first Thanksgiving in San Francisco roaming the streets alone, seeing the holiday from a completely different perspective. I’m equally thankful that this year, I’ve had more turkey dinner invitations than I could say “yes” to. Much to my surprise, I’m attending four of them (one of which is being described online in mouth-watering detail). I’m thankful that this means I’ve made friends in this city, many of whom I’ve started calling “family.”

I’m thankful that my family of origin is healthy and safe and doing well. My mother, a minister, doesn’t have to work today. Neither does my step-father, a business owner. All five of their children are off in different cities sharing thanksgiving meals without them, and they are home, quiet, feeling immensely thankful to be home for once, and to be able to be quiet.

I lost a grandfather this year –a big man of few words who always carved the Thanksgiving turkey when I was growing up. I remember his large, calloused carpenter hands. They built things for us. They carried us. They were rocks.

I still have five living grandparents. Five. I have a lot to be thankful for. And somewhere in New Hampshire, there is an 8-year-old girl who thinks her Cousin Sarah is the most exciting person in the whole entire world, and I take that responsibility very seriously.

I’m thankful that I found the tech industry (or maybe that the tech industry found me). I spend every day in awe that there is a community and an economy that values all of my skills, embraces my independent style, and pays me well enough to live in this (expensive) beautiful fairytale land of a city. I accepted a position at a new firm yesterday. My gratitude and excitement are uncontainable.

And I’m thankful I didn’t wake up this morning with a Surfer Dude next to me. And I’m hopeful that if he figures out how to spell my last name and decides to google me, he’ll forgive me for my recounted perspective on our evening.

Please remember the pilgrims today, and vow to be much more sincere and respectful than our country’s origins teach us to be.

Cheers!

I usually try to keep my love life out of the public blogosphere, but this story just needs to be told. I have a date tomorrow night with a guy who is six feet tall and looks like a surfer dude. He enjoys talking about movies, society, philosophy, and politics, and is looking for someone mature and responsible. Sometimes he can get bored easily. Sometimes he smokes. He’s white, he’s college educated, and his religious beliefs are “Other.”

I also know his first name and his age, and that’s about it. We’re meeting at 7pm at a bar in San Francisco. And no, a friend didn’t set us up… unless you want to call CrazyBlindDate.com a “friend”…

CrazyBlindDate.com was started by the folks who brought us OkCupid — the free social networking / test-taking / dating site that’s given the pay sites like Match.com and eHarmony a run for their money. And so far, I’m impressed.

The premise is simple: you tell them a few things about yourself, who you’re looking to meet, where you’re willing to travel, and when you’re willing to do that. Meanwhile, other people are on the site doing the same thing. The Internet Brain lines you up, makes a match where requirements coincide, and asks both parties to confirm the date after showing basic information about the other person. This includes very blurry pictures of each other, as a teaser. Once you say yes, you’re committed to it.

Thirty minutes before the date, they open a phone relay so that you can send text messages to each other via CrazyBlindDate’s central number (you don’t actually get to see the other person’s phone number). This helps with the “spotting each other in a crowded bar” issue. Once you find each other, you’re on your own. Then, after the date, you provide feedback for each other on the site. This helps in coordinating and verifying future crazy blind dates.

Blind dates are inherently sketchy-sounding. Blind dates without mutual friends involved, even more so. That’s why I’m excited about this site: they’re taking something that has massive screw-up potential, and handling it well.

My favorite thing about the site is that it stays focused. When you get there, they don’t start by asking for your login info; they start by asking what city you’d like to go on a date in (sorry — it’s only active for Austin, Boston, NYC, and SF Bay right now). They then walk you through a full dating wizard, convince you that yes, this really could work, and get you emotionally invested in the process. THEN, at the end, after you’ve already checked your schedule to make sure you can have a date tomorrow night, they suggest signing up to actually make it happen. It’s clean, friendly, American-buddy-style language that sets an encouraging tone and asserts some basic etiquette. There’s nothing extraneous thrown in to distract. Not even any ads. And the service is free.

Since the site is pretty new, it’s not overrun with a massive dating pool yet, and finding specific kinds of people at specific times can be hard. I didn’t specify age, gender, or any other personal details. I also set my region to cover most of San Francisco, and I listed wide time slots. That seemed to do it.

What does Surfer Dude know about me? He knows that I have a shaved head, I like to talk about technology and poetry, I’m really just testing out this website, and I’m not planning on sleeping with him (let’s just get that out of the way now!).

The rest will come out over a beer tomorrow night.

Don’t worry, I’ll tell you all about it.

Kathy Sierra, one of the keynote speakers at SXSWi this year, is hiding in her home with the doors locked right now, cancelling events and fearing for her life. She’s been receiving rape and death threats from anonymous trolls in the blogosphere.

She writes…

‘Do not put these people on a pedestal. Do not let them get away with calling this “social commentary”, “protected speech”, or simply “criticism”. I would never be for censoring speech–these people can say all the misogynistic, vile, tasteless things they like–but we must preserve that line where words and images become threats of violence. Freedom of speech–however distasteful and rude the speech may be, is crucial. But when those words contain threats of harm or death, they can destroy a life.’

Read her post and pass it on. As danah boyd points out, we need to stand up in social solidarity. This is our community. We have a responsibility to protect our space and send a message: this kind of behavior is NOT okay.