Hurricane Rita photo 18934 487 0 right The shelves at HEB almost entirely bare despite the fact that we re several hundred miles inland with no major bodies of water around photo To anyone not familiar with hurricane Rita as of this writing she is a category 4 hurricane anticipated to make landfall sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning September 23rd September 24th 2005 around the southeastern region of Texas After noticing how the general scenary of my town has changed in the past few days I just wanted to make a few notes as to what I have seen regarding the much feared hurricane I guess it s not a surprise that after the damage caused by hurricane Katrina people would be more than willing to evacuate from Galveston Houston and the surrounding cities For Austinites however the influx is showing strong My H E B Experience strong When I walked into H E B the local grocery store just the other day I can t say that I was entirely shocked but rather just annoyed at what I was seeing It looked as if people were preparing for the apocalypse or something equally as exciting Of course unlike the rest of the crowd my only intention was to purchase my usual groceries Imagine how much more annoyed I became when I found I couldn t get my Gatorade bread water and milk just to name a few As exciting as it was to see H E B in this state of complete chaos I was disappointed not being able to get the foods that I am accustomed to getting Yes one could call it selfishness given the recent state of things in the south central states but that wouldn t change the fact that I was still thirsty I think I was more so just annoyed that people felt the need to stock up as if they re going to be stranded for weeks to come Perhaps I am not the best person to make this call but it seems unlikely that Austin a city 200 miles inland would be devastated by a hurricane photo 18540 487 0 right Cars lined up to the street for gas in anticipation of the hurricane photo strong The Gas Rush strong Much like I have seen before when chaos strikes we first make sure that our cars are filled to the top I am still not entirely certain if this is because we fear the worst and think that we ll need to evacuate at moments notice or if it s just that we are all futures brokers at heart and predict the price will make a significant increase Whatever the case may be the local gas stations have been swamped and many have even managed to run out of gas

Momma s Funeral photo 18583 47 0 right Momma s casket in the funeral home ready to be interred photo Perhaps some would note it as slightly morbid that I would have a story regarding the death of my grandmother Catherine Kitty Ludlow but so long as I have everything else on this site I couldn t find much problem with it My grandmother Momma as she was called lived to a ripe old age Towards the end of her days she sadly suffered from Alzheimer s disease and though she had her good and bad days the symptoms seemed to be getting progressively worse Apparently in the last week or so of her life she had become upset with the fact that she could not remember my grandfather s death her husband only three months earlier I think it was probably a good time for her to go

The Swimming Classes In my senior year of high school 1996 and 1997 I had been selected by my computer science teacher to be one of 15 or so people on the school s first web team After I quit playing football about three quarters through the season I even formally had a class change so that I could program for the school rather than just sit around in the weight room One of the tasks that came with this building the school s website was to take digital pictures of the various teams and clubs across the school It might also be worth noting that this was the first time most of us had ever seen a digital camera It was a flat and boxy looking thing by Kodak that shot at a resolution of about 320x200 worse than the old flip phones I really have no idea how we never got caught doing this but my good friend David Spencer and I one day discovered that the doors to the school s Olympic swimming pool and diving well were not locked during our web period So of course one day we thought we d give it a go and brought our bathing suits and towels to school with us Of course we couldn t get dressed in the locker room and so just wound up changing in the pool area itself We spent the entire period diving off of the 3 meter board and when we were done dried off changed and headed to our lunch period We continued this for weeks without anyone ever saying a word about it

Reddit AMA in r Austin div class pageImage a href http www reddit com r Austin comments 23vis1 im_running_for_state_representative_in_district img src http www ludlow2014 com themes Default images Blog reddit_austin_640 jpg alt reddit_austin_640 class alignright size full wp image 293 a div In an effort to begin getting the word of my campaign out on social media I decided to reach out to the Reddit community today Specifically I was only intending to reach the a href http www reddit com r austin r Austin a subreddit but the conversation seems to have spread far beyond what I anticipated I posted a link to my website around 11 45am with the following Reddit title em a href http www reddit com r Austin comments 23vis1 im_running_for_state_representative_in_district I m running for State Representative in District 46 east Austin north of 7th I m pro pot pro gay pro open internet oppose the TSA and oppose the NSA Here s my website a em Soon after posting the link I left my office for lunch A few messages trickled in while I was eating and I quickly answered them Twenty or so minutes past that and something started happening that I would have never expected a full blown AMA organically developed I ve always wanted to participate in an AMA and having now completed one can definitely say I enjoyed the process I had the opportunity to personally converse with more than 600 people Thankfully I am a pretty fast typist a href http www 10fastfingers com 10fastfingers a puts me at 117 WPM because it was the only way I could provide ongoing and thorough answers to all of the questions pouring in When it was all said and done I had answered more than 400 questions had more than 20 people offer to volunteer themselves to the campaign drove almost 5 000 people to the campaign website and even raised several hundred dollars The AMA is currently the a href http www reddit com r Austin top sort top t all count 25 after t3_1lsh2g 29th highest post in r Austin of all time a

New Homes strong 23rd July 2003 strong New Homes I would like to appologize for the lack of updates in the past 4 or 5 days It seems that finding places to live moving into these places and meeting lots of new people has taken the majority of the day The rest is left to sleeping which does remember consume about 1 3 of your life Both Tisa and I have found our own places and they are quite nice Tisa is living with 3 other girls whom all seem wonderful and have made adjusting for her very easy I have had the same bit of luck and am living with 1 guy and 2 girls whom are fantastic Everyone seems incredibly nice and highly inquisitive about our lives in the United States It is rewarding to be able to set some of the misconceived notions about the country straight this seems especially true about guns While everyone knows that the United States has some strange gun policies Kiwis tend to believe that we all walk around armed If you would like our home addresses please feel free to email us and we can send them to you Otherwise feel free simply to send mail to our postal address listed on the home page I will get some pictures of our homes and flatmates online as soon as possible Photo Gallery Updates Sorry it took so long to get Queenstown online a href http www austinsmoke com modules php set_albumName album36 amp op modload amp name gallery amp file index amp include view_album php Queenstown a

Helicopter Ride from Kaikoura photo 1910 280 0 right The helicopter sitting on the pad waiting to go photo Today started off a little rough as the whale watching tours were cancelled due to bad weather This is the second time Tisa and I have tried unsuccessfully to go whale watching in Kaikoura only to have the weather turn sour on us Determined to do it anyways strong Sean and I took a helicopter strong first time for both of us and went whale watching We were told that there would only be a 50 chance of actually seeing whales given the conditions so Tisa decided not to go with us While we did infact see a Sperm Whale even with the bad weather the fun part of the trip for both Sean and I was the helicopter ride If you have never ridden in one I would strongly suggest trying it Perhaps in my efforts to conquer the world I will learn to fly a helicopter someday I ll certainly take more rides in them After our Kaikoura experience we headed up to Picton and caught the InterIslander Ferry across The weather was still pretty bad and it was an enjoyably rough Cook Straight Experience Our friend Leah picked us up at the Ferry Depot and she and her family have been kind enough to put us up in the home for the evening

Press Release Spanish Billboard in Manor TX PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE SPANISH BILLBOARD IN MANOR TX MANOR TX August 11 2014 The Kevin Ludlow for TX House 46 campaign has installed a third campaign billboard in Manor TX just east of Old Kimbro Road on US290 The new billboard speaks directly to Spanish speaking voters It reads Viva Viaje Trabaje Yo apoyo fronteras abiertas The phrases translate to Live Travel Work I support open borders The massive 14 x 48 lit advertisement leaves no confusion about Ludlow s position on immigration The response on social networking outlets has been overwhelmingly positive Since its installation last week people have been reaching out from all around the country Ludlow states I want Spanish speaking Texans to know that I will stand with them and address this issue without any political rhetoric It s high time we stop blaming immigrants for the broken economic policies the two parties have left us with The advertisement is one of very few political billboards in the Austin metro area and has the distinction of being the only one presented entirely in Spanish According to 2010 census data House district 46 is 47 2 Hispanic The campaign s first billboard is visible on IH35 northbound at US290 It reads Drug Reform LGBT equality Civil Liberties three of Ludlow s campaign platform issues A second billboard in June read Support Net Neutrality Ludlow is running an enthusiastically active race against a Democrat incumbent who has held office for over 19 years Ludlow says We re working as hard as we can to show Texas that the two party system is coming to an end twenty years in office is far too long for any politician Kevin Ludlow is the 2014 Libertarian candidate for the Texas House of Representatives in District 46 He holds a mathematics degree from the University of Texas is a small business owner a community leader and a published author For information upcoming events and campaign tour dates please contact our campaign coordinator Tara Vancil at 512 284 5501 or email Ms Vancil at tara b vancil gmail com

Outright Arizona Podcast Guest Appearance div class pageImage a href http www blogtalkradio com outrightaz 2014 07 12 outright arizona episode 54 kevin ludlow for tx 46 house img src http www ludlow2014 com themes Default images Blog OutrightLibertarians_640x480 jpg alt LibertariansWorkingForYou_640x480 class alignright size full wp image 280 a br The Outright Arizona podcast with host Mike Shipley br The complete episode can be a href http www blogtalkradio com outrightaz 2014 07 12 outright arizona episode 54 kevin ludlow for tx 46 house found here a div While serving as a delegate at the Libertarian Party National Convention I had the pleasure of being introduced to Mike Shipley from Phoenix Arizona I was immediately intrigued at the organization he chairs In 1998 an organization was founded called a href http www outrightusa org Outright Libertarians a The organization works to present the Libertarian Party and candidates to the LGBTQ community They also work to monitor the Libertarian Party s continued support of the LGBTQ community and equality in general Mike is the current chair of the organization and also founded and runs the Arizona chapter He asked me if I would like an opportunity to discuss my campaign with his listeners Of course a href http www blogtalkradio com outrightaz 2014 07 12 outright arizona episode 54 kevin ludlow for tx 46 house I jumped at the idea a I was especially excited to be a guest since promoting LGBTQ equality within the State of Texas is one of my primary platform goals We spent the first part of the show discussing the LGBTQ community in Austin and then in Texas as a whole We also spent some time talking about my opponent and the difference between being reactionary towards the LGBTQ community versus being truly proactive she has been the former I am interested in the latter After a short break we came back and discussed ending the so called war on drugs as well as my position on removing the TSA from Texas

We Can Do It First Print div class pageImage a href http nomadbar com sitev2 img src http www ludlow2014 com themes Default images Blog WeCanDoIt_640x480 jpg alt We Can Do It class alignright size full wp image 280 a br Minutes after receiving the first print of Lady Liberty exclaiming We Can Do It div This afternoon I had the pleasure of speaking to a fairly sizable group of candidates Wedged between Robert Butler and Kurt Hildebrand I spoke on the topic of Reddit and other social media platforms a href http www reddit com r Austin comments 23vis1 im_running_for_state_representative_in_district Reddit played a vital role a in kick starting my campaign I want other candidates to know what a powerful resource it can be Following the meeting the Kurt Hildebrand offered to donate the original print of the new Lady Liberty logo to anyone who was willing to commit to Gold donor status with the party With all of the help I ve been getting from people this race I wanted to make sure I gave something back Moreover as a lover and collector of art I thought this would make a great addition to my political wall I had the former chair of LPTexas Pat Dixon and the current chair Kurt Hildebrand both autograph it for me If you d like to get a copy of this print they re available at the a href https www lptexas org we can do it posters Libertarian Party of Texas website a

Canvassing East Austin div class pageImage img src http www ludlow2014 com themes Default images Blog June23rd_Canvassing_640x480 jpg alt June23rd_Canvassing_640x480 class alignright size full wp image 283 br Canvassing East Austin with some of our new campaign volunteers From left to right Fox Buchele David Coon Eric Guerra Kevin Ludlow Tara Vancil div With the large amount of volunteers we have out on the campaign trail it s not uncommon for us to go out canvassing several times per week Today my volunteer coordinator Tara Vancil managed to organize some of our newer volunteers We spent a few hours canvassing East Austin To date we have canvassed between 6 000 and 7 000 homes within the district we have no intention of slowing down between now and November 4th Generally speaking we ve had very positive reactions to the campaign flyers and have received countless emails phone calls and even more volunteers from the process I am definitely looking forward to continuing our canvassing efforts throughout all of District 46 Our goal is to reach every potential voter at least once