VIDEO: Mustache Training

My mustache needs three things to grow strong:

1. Your Donations

2. Cheese

3. And Training…

Day 8: TWO New Projects to Fund – VT & Clean Energy

I just woke up in fair Fontainebleau (France) to the sound of bells chiming. To celebrate the end of Week 1 of the mustache growing season, I’ve picked two new school projects that you can contribute toward.

Day 8: Waking up Mustache in Fontainebleau

Please sponsor my ’stache today and help the 2nd grade kids in my home state of Vermont display their art or put your money behind students in Richmond, VA who want some hands on experience with clean energy.
My sponsors page (go here to donate!):
http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/viewChallenge.html?id=19596

As you know, Mustaches for Kids isn’t just a world-class charity event. It’s also a no holds barred, knock-down, drag-out mustache growing contest. Now that we’re in Week 2 of the growing season, I’m starting to look around and see how I’m measuring up to the competition.

Face-wise, I’m starting to feel pretty good about my chances. My whiskers are teeming at the lip. Every day my face gets a little more exciting.

Kiddie-sponsor-wise, I’m in desperate need of some Rogaine, however. Out of 51 San Francisco mustachelites, I am currently #26. OUCH!!!

Now, we all know I can take four more weeks of John McCain’s ridicule toward my face, but America’s children can’t take four more weeks of lackluster investment in their future. Help me turn the page on #26 and put my kids in the driver’s seat this year:

http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/leadershipboard.html?category=40

A word about the two new projects I’m supporting:

Support Future Clean Energy Inventors in Virginia

“My students need the Nasco Fuel Cell Experiment Kit and Manual, and 3 Nasco Photocell Testing Kits to allow my students to get hands-on experience with technologies that are available to help reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.”

Support 2nd Grade Art in Vermont!

“In donating for these bulletin boards you will allow my students to have colorful bulletin boards that display their work and where they can find more information about themes we are studying.”

Thanks for helping the kids!
Josh

JOSH’S 2008 MUSTACHE SPONSORS
$40 Santiago Requejo (Magnum P.I.)

MUSTACHES FOR KIDS DONATION LEVELS
“The Albert Einstein” – $250
“The Billy Dee Williams” – $200
“The Burt Reynolds” – $150
“The Al Sharpton” – $125
“The Borat” – $100
“The Dr. Phil” – $75
“The ‘My Name is Earl’” – $50
“The Magnum P.I.” (Tom Selleck!) – $25
“The Yosemite Sam” – $20
“The Lionel Ritchie” – $10
“The John Waters” – $5
“The Frida Kahlo” – Anything below $5

Globe-trotting Mustache & New Videos

My sister Heather and I are in the middle of a European tour. My mustache and the kids have their first sugar daddy of the season. My friend Julian and I were just featured in a hilarious article about Mustaches for Kids written in the Golden Gate Express (Please excuse the slightly obscene photo). I’ve been capturing some of these special moments in slideshow style musical videos now posted on Youtube (1. Queen’s Jewels, 2. Mustaches Intro Video, 3. Sumo Slopfest).

Santiago Requeno couldn’t be a part of this year’s San Francisco Mustaches for Kids as he now lives in Oregon, but that didn’t stop him from becoming my first mustache benefactor. Even though he is no longer able to grow with the group, he’s still an inspiration to all of us, growing in solidarity on our timetable from afar and donating to the cause. Santi just joined at the Magnum P.I. level ($25-50) with $40 in gifts to Donorschoose.org (the second $20 is on it’s way). I’m still looking for sponsor #2 for my mustache. Click here to be that person.

If you prefer, you can still sponsor the old fashioned way. Send a check to “Josh Lynch” at 630 Oak St San Francisco, CA and I’ll add it to my DonorsChoose.org contribution at the end of the growing season.
So, it’s nearing midnight in Fontainebleau and my sister Heather and I have just rounded out our fourth day in Europe. We’re out here visiting our grandfather and his wife Anita in Switzerland, my old friend Aaron and his new family in France, and a smidge of British royalty in London. It’s already been quite a journey.

All along the way my whiskers have been sprouting out for the kids. When I wake up it will be Day 8 of Mustaches for Kids, a full week completed. My fledgling mustache has already swept through four countries in one week. Every day it comes across new risks and challenges.

Tonight my stache encountered it’s biggest obstacle yet – two-year old Lila Le Moigne-Nellis. Lila is the adorable daughter of Aaron and Marianne here in Fontainebleau and always points out men’s facial hair, but was quite shy around my pushbroom. As innocent as I try to make this thing, even at 1 week old, it can be pretty intimidating. I can only hope that the hesitations of children and adults alike about my face don’t keep them from sponsoring the ’stache. After all, as explained in last week’s intro video, it’s all for a real good cause this year – school project materials for students in high poverty areas requested by their teachers. You get to choose which project to donate to. Exciting things!

That’s all for now folks. Thanks for supporting the silly and the serious.

Love and videos,
Josh

I am naked (on the face)

Yesterday was Day 1 of our annual competitive growing season here at Mustaches for Kids San Francisco. Stache Bash 2008 will be at the Rickshaw stop on December 17th. That means that this year growers will have 5 weeks, not 4, to beef up those facial follicles. Watch out world!

In honor of growing season, I spent countless hours slaving over this new video:

This is my third year growing a mustache for the kids. As you’ll remember, I made it to the final round in 2006 before getting dumped under the pressure in round 2 last year. With 57 growers already and more on the way, my chances have already dipped this year. I can use all the help I can get.

My face on Day 2 of Mustaches for Kids 2008

One sure way to boost my chances in ‘08 is to sponsor my mustache early. Please visit my sponsor page and donate to our new charity. This year it’s Donors Choose, an organization that allows you to fund school projects for kids in poverty, requested by their teachers.

Here we go!

A Brighter Day Will Come

I started writing in my journal the afternoon after Election Night.

– You can see all of my photos from Gainesville here

I’m coming home. Right now I’m at the airport in Charlotte about to fly back to SF from Gainesville. Obama crushed McCain last night. We spent our last day driving between houses on dirt roads in Interlochen, FL. There were so many volunteers from the community that they decided to send us an hour East into the McCain friendly boonies for some “virgin doors” just under three hours before the polls would close. Determined to go out with a bang, we got in the car and drove.

We finally made it there just after 5:00pm after nearly getting stuck in the sand on an abandoned road. We struggled to find the right streets, canvassing doors that were five minutes drive apart until well past dark. We managed to talk to five people, four of whom had already voting or were on their way to the polls just then. All of them looked a bit threatened to see four strangers for Obama as the sun was going down and the election was nearly over.

We came across the 70-something year old daughter of a 96 year old Obama supporter named Helen at around 6:15pm. The sun had gone down at that point and the daughter was not about to get her bed-ridden mother up to drive to the polls. Hesitating for a second with the thought that we could lose Florida by one vote and would never forgive ourselves, we decided to do the right thing and go on to the next house.

Our last house was a 32 year old democrat named Michael who drove a car with an “Assholes drive Jap cars” bumper sticker. Given that it was well past dark at 6:40pm, his house was all dark except for a television, and we weren’t sure how friendly Michael would be to a group of four strangers in the dark driving a Japanese car, we decided to skip the last house and head back to Gainesville.

Back in Gainesville, we celebrated until 1am with Democrats and Obamanites. It started with a few last minute phone calls to Nevada at around 8pm. That only lasted a few minutes until we got the call from Obama higher-ups that we’d won Pennsylvania and could go party. For the next two hours people were still in disbelief that Obama had it locked up. Fearing a miracle McCain comeback, fraud, or even a Bush-induced national emergency discounting the election (Jason’s idea), we held on until the polls closed in California at 10pm and McCain came on stage in Phoenix to concede.

People crowded the streets of Gainesville in celebration. I got scores of phone calls and text messages all night..

“Looking good in fl! We got PA!!”

“Ohio!”

“Its all happening!”

“I freakin love u all! Let’s lock in NC now!”

“Mad love”

“Here i am barack you like a hurricane!”

“Yes. We. Can.”

“This is amazing.”

“! ! ! Obama”

“Si se puede!”

My experiences in Gainesville were remarkable. I will never forget the electricity you could see in people. Our approach was so simple – make phone calls, knock on doors. But it was the context that was so extraordinary. Despite all the polls showing Obama up for weeks, nobody fully believed it. We worked every hour, every minute, and every second of the day for this election, as Barack asked us to do. An hour after the polls closed in Florida, the team was calling voters in Nevada to ask them to go vote. Right up until the moment that John McCain stepped on the stage and conceded victory, we held our breath. Now, here it is, two days later and I still can’t believe it.

The victory, however is bitter sweet. First of all, Obama inherits a broken country. So many lives have been ruined or lost around the world at the hand of our current president. That can never be undone. Further, expectations are so high, it will take incredible dedication from all of us, tremendous skill, and a lot of luck for Obama to succeed in his first term.

Finally, and most importantly, Election Night was not all positive. In Arizona, Florida, and yes, California, a majority of voters erased the rights of millions of Americans by passing constitutional bans on gay marriage. The fight is not over in California as legal and popular challenges heat up to Prop 8. However, a moral victory has been won for the opponents of same-sex marriage and I can’t help but feel guilt and remorse for choosing to come to Florida instead of fighting in my own state against this tragic ballot measure.

What gives me hope for Prop 8 and so many of the injustices that litter our political system at the moment, is that which made Obama’s win possible. I am hopeful because today is a new day in our country. We have proven that the politics of possibility can defeat the politics of division and fear. My hope is that the end of the old politics is upon us and that Dr. King’s words are now coming to bear, that the arc of the moral universe is long, but that it bends toward justice.

Biden and Banana Spiders

I gotta show you some of these pictures. Florida and canvassing for Obama can be mighty intriguing visual experiences.

This was one of our volunteers favorite Obama picture, so I decided to shoot it

Sylvia's house is home base for canvassing. This is one of her two greyhound-mix dogs taking a load off.

You don't find trucks tricked out this hard core in San Francisco.

Sometimes the sun goes down before I can finish canvassing the neighborhood

This Obama fan touted his McCain campaign platform oil rig helmet to everyone who would listen including the local news

On stage, Biden knocked the "mavericks" as nothing but sidekicks, touted his wife with the chant "Jill, baby, Jill", and ended with a rousing "Go Get 'em Gators!" for the crowd

The Ground Game

My days in Gainesville consist of making phone calls and knocking on doors. We have long lists of people who’ve been identified (through months of voter registration efforts) as likely Obama supporters.

When I call them or they answer their door I ask if they are an Obama supporter first. If they’re not, I thank them for their time and go on my way. Sometimes if someone is truly undecided volunteers will spend a little time talking about why we support Barack Obama. Usually, however, they don’t want to talk very long if they’re not voting blue.

After that I ask if they’ve voted yet. Because of early voting, a lot of our base has already voted here in Gainesville. If they have, I ask if they can spare a few hours to volunteer like I’m doing in the final days. If they haven’t voted, I remind them where their polling place is, ask when they will be voting, and ask if they need a ride to the polls. That’s it. Pretty simple.

In a typical three-hour canvassing shift I might knock on 70 doors, talk to 20 people, find out that 8 have moved, 4 have already voted, 6 commit to vote but haven’t yet, 2 are McCain supporters, and get 3 people to agree to volunteer.

Of course, there’s a lot of other things that happen beyond the basics of door knocking and phone calling. In the office we might be interrupted by a truckload of new materials that we have to unload, a delivery of tasty mac n cheese dinner for all the volunteers, or news that Joe and Jill Biden are coming to town in two days and we need to shift gears. At any given moment, we might be entering data, organizing “walk packets” for the next day’s canvass, or calling volunteers to confirm their shifts. Sometimes it’s exciting. Most of the time it’s not so glamorous. Never, however, does it fail to feel important.