timwheatley.org

Sheila and I were walking down Michigan Avenue today when we came upon a man wearing a Sandwich Board. In big, bold letters it said: “Cancel this Election”

I was curious, so as we continued to get closer I read the rest of the text and it said that Presidential Candidates currently in the race for the White House need to be D.N.A. tested, to confirm they are American.

So I laughed and as we carried on walking, I explained to Sheila why I had laughed…

Only someone born in the United States can be eligible for the position of President, and D.N.A. proves absolutely nothing about whether someone is an American or not.

The city of Chicago has a large Polish community, many will marry and have kids with other Polish-Americans, their D.N.A. would read as 100% Eastern-European, but many of them are now third or fourth generation American citizens, born and bred.

The stupidity of this man was very clear for me to see, it’s obvious his rationale of using D.N.A. to test whether someone is American is obviously flawed in every aspect, it is also obvious that this man’s agenda is regarding the race of the candidates… Now who could he be referring to?

I just hope many of the Americans who have the right to vote, who also walked by that man today, are educated and intelligent enough to realize how uneducated and stupid that man is, and how he is out there with an agenda to do damage to a man purely based on his race.

Rest of the world: Time to cross your fingers…

With pictures of Barack Obama being dressed in a turban circulating the media at the moment, I feel I have to mention something…

The turban is not Muslim wear. In fact that his father is from Kenya, the photo was taken in Kenya - and that the dress he was wearing - was tribal wear.

The turban is mostly worn by (I believe) Sikh males. America has quite a few people who are under-educated and who will see this as one of Obama’s ‘links’ to terrorism. I wonder why the renewed media frenzy is happening right now? Maybe we should ask Hillary.

So, now that I’ve said that, let’s not forget to mention that every world leader wears non-western dress when visiting non-western locations. Search Google for the name of anyone and the words “silly hat” - you’ll see some interesting images!

Just for the sake of levelling the playing field, here’s a photo of Hillary wearing something non-western - and *shock* - is Hillary a ‘commie’!?

Snow? Chicago has had 88 Million Cubic Yards - so far!

I was thinking today about some of the things that have led me to be who I am, where I am and what I do: It all comes down to my parents.

Just talking about what I do: I work for a software development company. So, how did my parents affect me to form what I do for work?

Well, my fondest memories growing up are ones where my parents played a computer game with me. I remember on the Commodore Vic-20, my parents joining in and playing a text-based adventure game with me. I remember on the Amiga and perhaps the PC, my parents playing the Monkey Island adventures with me.

What I think this did, is gave me attention, something kids obviously need. I don’t have fond memories of playing those games by myself, alone, I remember and have fond thoughts about my mum and dad being there with me. Additionally, my parents often watched motorsport with me, they often woke me up at 3am so I could watch the races in Japan or Australia… How interesting is that?

I believe just those few hours my parents spent with me, formed my love of computers, my love of ‘gaming’, helped with my love of motorsport and eventually, they led me to be working on what I am today.

This then made me think about my little brothers. Although I don’t think they share their gaming with my parents, they did have chance to share it with me. I feel guilty really not being there for them anymore, but I’m glad that they might have memories where I was, even if I was just in the room at the time. I’m really pleased that at an age where most kids didn’t have a computer I was able to provide them with upgrades from my old computers while I was attempting to keep the newest and latest in my own machines.

I sometimes wonder if people know just what an effect they have on those around them…

The other day Hillary said: “Obama brings words, not actions.”

Hillary, I hate to break it to you, but you’re bringing more words than he is and yours are all about putting the man down. You spend all your time saying how everyone else is bad and not a word on how you would do it differently. The only way you seem to think you can win now is by making Obama look bad… Why aren’t you busy trying to make yourself look good?

To me? You just seem a little too bitchy. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve nothing against strong women… It’s just that you seem more like a bitchy man! Listening to your speeches right now, it’s like being on the guest list for a Gay Wedding and you’re the skinny one with perfect skin who just got left at the Alter…

The other day you accused Obama of plagiarizing another politicians speeches, I had to laugh upon finding out that the person who said those words first is a close friend of Obama and is campaigning for him - even after Obama ’stole his words’ he seems to still like him a lot, so maybe it wasn’t as big a deal as you would like it to be. Infact both Obama and Patrick (original speaker) merely shrugged it off, Patrick actually extending his support for Obama once again in the process…

You know, in this world where every word is scrutinized, perhaps Obama shouldn’t have used someone else’s words. But the fact is, Patrick was also using someone else’s words. Does anyone still remember the original “I have a dream”? - I don’t think it was by Patrick…

The photo below should be visible on Schmap’s Chicago Guide soon.

Soldier Field

This advert. was on during the Superbowl, it gets Sheila in hysterics every time…

We got our biometrics appointment for 28th February. So that’s when (for the second time) I’ll have my fingerprints, photo and (I think) retina information taken…

I went to the Chicago Auto Show yesterday. Like last year I ran the simulator at the State Farm stand and got fastest time. Fastest time of the day wins an iPod, so hopefully after we left nobody will have beaten my time…

The times on the board were a bit better this year than last, last year I set fastest time by around 2 seconds (over a 30 second lap), this year I set a faster time (30.07) but was only faster than the current leader by 0.6s.

So hopefully we’ll get a phone call telling us we won another iPod Shuffle.

It took one and a half months last time for us to get our reciepts back for the forms we filed, this time it took exactly seven days. So, now we wait…