Join me as I talk to the organizers of the Second Annual Texas Wine & Song Festival in Austin, Texas. You can listen to the LIVE podcast on October 12, 2008 at 2 pm CST on BlogTalkRadio.
The Texas Wine & Song Festival will raise funds for the SIMS Foundation. Find out more about the wine and entertainment at this year’s festival. You are welcome to listen in or call during the show.
UPDATE
You can join me on the morning show here.
Join Shaine Mata on The Morning Show. It can be brilliant, it can be lame. What do you expect from a show in the morning? Talk about politics, life, news, or whatever. Today, let’s talk about BarCamp Austin.
Here’s Tom With the Weather has more.
Emma Williams, Managing Editor of Schmap, sent me a message on Flickr a while back asking if it would be OK to consider one of my photos for use on their site. The photo is to show some of the Barton Creek Greenbelt in Austin, Texas. I’m cool with that, so I agreed. Today, I read that it made the final cut. That’s cool for a cameraphone photo. I used my T-Mobile Dash phone to take that photo.
There have been some very interesting bills in committee today. I have really enjoyed listening to those that have been laid out before the committee. In my job at the committee, I have no input. Committees offices are generally apolitical. Our job, for the most part, is clerical. Due to hard deadlines and being subject to accepting bills from all members, there is no time or leeway to be political. As a committee clerk, you almost have to see bills as mere numbers. I say almost because clerks have to read the bills and write bill analyses. Otherwise, it’s a process that applies to all equally.
Depending on your preferences, if you want to work at the Capitol, you should consider your tolerance for politics. If politics is not your cup of tea, consider working in a clerical capacity. There are plenty of such jobs here early in the session. You can work for a committee, House Administration, or work on the House floor for the support functions like the Chief Clerk’s office, the Journal Clerk’s office, or some other similar clerical position. In these jobs, you are expected to be apolitical. Being overly friendly with House Members is frowned upon because these offices should not show favoritism.
If you are more politically minded, you should work directly for a House member. Keep in mind, you still need to be courteous to other offices and members. Even though you represent your rep and are an advocate for him or her, any Rep could ask to allow you to succeed OUTSIDE the House of Reps. You can favor your boss, but that does not give you license to be a jerk towards the others. Still, you can’t be blamed for playing favorites.
Keep in mind that working for a Rep does not automatically make you a part of the campaign. IF you choose to work for the campaign, it should be after work. If you are a die-hard political type, working the campaign is up your alley. In that capacity, only the boss can fire you and you are expected to highly advocate for your boss over the opposition.
So, you see, there are opportunities out there for different degrees of political interest. In my experience, I have the opportunity to see different parts of working for the House of Reps. I have also had the opportunity to talk to people in different job capacities. There are opportunities for people of most temperaments.
I had a fun weekend on a paddleboat on Friday evening, BarCamp on Saturday, and just vegging out today. Tomorrow, it’s back to work at the office. The filing deadline was Friday, so the serious work starts at the Capitol tomorrow. The House has a bill on the HPV vaccine scheduled. It’s a heated topic, so there may be plenty of debate on the floor. If the House goes long, then our committee hearing will start late. We are looking at a possibly long Tuesday. I’m going to get a light snack and then hit the hay.
I’ve been away from tech for a while. Mrs. Mata tells me that she has never seen me happier than when I worked with computers. Life and work got in the way and I wound up putting tech aside. I still have the instinct, but am lagging behind on what I could have been by now.
Yesterday, I went to BarCamp Austin II at the invitation of Jennifer Navarrete from the Morning Brewcast. I was not going to stay at BarCamp very long because I wanted to go on a bike ride in Johnson City. Once I was there, I could not leave.
I learned some things about what’s out there and where the tech culture has moved since I walked away years ago. WordPress seems to be where the community has moved for blogging. I was reluctant at first, but Erica O’Grady showed me a validation of my Blogger site and all kinds of errors popped up. Just to make it easier on myself, I decided to create this WordPress blog.
Something else I noted at BarCamp Austin was that the majority of the people present were using Macs rather than PCs. Even though PCs dominate the market, it says a lot when tech-savvy people prefer the computer in the minority. When the time comes for me to change laptops, which is soon, I’ll be going with a Mac. My current laptop can’t handle podcasts anymore. With each Windows update, it slows down more and more. I’m at the point where I can only use the laptop for doing online work. My laptop is has become a browsing appliance.
Shaine 
