The University of Iowa called off sandbagging efforts today, as more rain fell and a coffer dam threatened to fail. Thousands of volunteers saved books from the Main Library.

From the Cedar Rapids Gazette, photos of a the latest storm over Iowa City:

Water, water everywhere. I called my Dad on his cell phone. He couldn’t talk long; he was busy filling sandbags to protect the municipal water plant.

“I think we’re going to postpone our trip,” I said.

“Why would you do that?” he asked.

Water levels are currently predicted to crest at 11 feet above flood stage in Iowa City on Tuesday, 4 1/2 feet higher than the flood of 1993.

When I explained to the nice Indian lady at United customer service why I had to cancel my flight, she said, “oh, it is because of monsoon?”

I explained that this is not what they call it in the state of Iowa, but close enough.

They say hockey guys talk dirty. Huh. Listen to Seattle Mariners’ manager John McLaren cuss up a blue streak.

On the hockey front, Congrats to Detroit, even though I was bound by blood to root for the Pens. I wore my Pens’ hat throughout the series, but that wasn’t good enough. The best team won, and it was a great series.

Pittsburgh is going to be a force to be reckoned with, and will have the cup in the next few years, just you wait.

Update, September 2009: This plugin has been rendered obsolete by changes to Oregon Reddit. If I find the time, I’ll try to update it.

I was browsing links over on Oregon Reddit this evening, and I noticed that Mike Vogel‘s got an Oregon Reddit button on his post. Now, I’ve had a “Share This” plugin on this blog for a while, but I don’t even use any of those social bookmarking sites.

I do use Oregon Reddit, though, so I thought I’d figure out how he did it. As best I can tell (and being too lazy to just send Mike an e-mail), it’s a hacked version of the WordPress plugin Reddit Button. So I grabbed that plugin and hacked it to work with OregonLive myself.

In addition to making it go to our regional Reddit, I also made it a little smarter about filling in both the URL and the title on the submission form (the original only sent the URL).

Now, I’ve hacked WordPress plenty for my personal use, and this seems to work. But I’ve never redistributed a plugin before. This is GPL 2, free, open source software; use it as you wish, redistribute, whatever, but don’t be surprised if something doesn’t work like it oughta.

If you’re interested in the reddit documentation that this WP plugin is based on, I found it both at the Oregon Reddit site, and the more readable main Reddit site.

The original author did a nice job making this configurable to use any of the three Reddit buttons, and control where on your blog the button appears, etc.

Download Oregon Reddit Button, make it better, and send me your edits! Leave me a note if you like it or have any suggestions.

Update, May 23: I’ve tweaked the formatting a little bit to make it behave a little nicer, at least with my style sheet. The archive linked above now contains version 1.0.1 with these minor tweaks.

Not too many surprises so far in the big races… Obama up by a healthy margin over Hills; Merkley looks like the winner going away, soon to be the Sacrificial Lamb against incumbent Gordon Smith for US Senate.

In the Portland races, it looks like Sam “The Tram” Adams has dispatched Sho Dozono without a runoff. The tally is currently 57.84% to 33.99%. Dozono’s campaign was tough to watch. I’m not thrilled about Adams, but I’ll take him over Dozono and thank my lucky stars there won’t be a runoff.

Nick Fish also looks to have avoided a runoff for council seat #2, with 61.79% to Jim Middaugh’s 21.31%.

Seat #1 has always been about second place, with Amanda Fritz expected to take a plurality (though hoping for an outright majority). Indeed, she’s got 43.41% now, with the rest of the field bunched up in the 9-12% range.

In second place, Charles Lewis has a narrow lead over John Branam and Jeff Bissonnette, with Mike Fahey and Chris Smith taking up the rear. (I called this race all wrong at the outset, predicting a Fritz-Smith runoff, but Smith hasn’t even garnered 10%. I feel bad for having been so tough on him.)

Here’s the field for seat #1 as of Multnomah County’s update #3 at 9:45:

           John Branam.  .  .      13,154   11.93
           Jeff Bissonnette .      12,934   11.73
           Chris Smith.  .  .      10,392    9.43
           Mike Fahey .  .  .      11,683   10.60
           Amanda Fritz  .  .      47,846   43.41
           Charles Lewis .  .      13,770   12.49
           WRITE-IN.  .  .  .         451     .41

I have no idea how many more ballots are left to count, so it’s hard to know if Branam or Bissonnette can close the vote gap to overtake Lewis.

Amanda will be meeting voters at the St. Johns Booksellers, 8622 N. Lombard tomorrow (Sunday) from 3:30 – 4:30 in the afternoon.

If you’re still undecided for Portland City Council seat #1, this is a great chance to come out and meet the only woman running for city office this election. Amanda is clearly the most qualified and experienced candidate in the field, and has garnered endorsements and support from the Oregonian, Willamette Week, Just Out, labor unions, community organizers, political leaders and Portland neighbors like me who are ready for a new, smart, independent voice in City Hall.

There’s still some serious funkiness at the parade. Love the old trucks (I moved to Oregon from Iowa in a ’63 Chevy Step Van).

As somebody who commuted six miles daily on a one-speed cruiser Frankenstein for several years (before I gave it away, I had changed every part, including the frame, except for the front wheel), I can much better handle the kind of clown who welds together some funky cool bikes than some other kinds of clowns I saw last weekend.

Plus it turns out we’ve got a zero degrees of separation going with some of these folks, so a big shout out to the creators and occupant of simply the best “float” in the St. Johns Parade, bar none.

I wish I had some better pictures of the bikes. Post links if you got ’em!

So there you have it… not all clowns are evil, people.

I had no idea Randy Leonard was a thespian. Then I saw this:

Randy Leonard’s Raw Interview from dalas verdugo on Vimeo.