Props to my favorite black, Southern, Yankee lesbian techie

Let me just say that I love Pam Spaulding of Pam's House Blend and Pandagon.

"I'm black, I'm a lesbian, I'm in the South, and I have lived in the North. I represent different constituencies that aren't well-represented in the blogosphere," says Spaulding, an information technology specialist with Duke University Press.

I hadn't known much about her until my first blog meet-up where I met some dude named Bora, Coturnix, or some crazy thing like that, who first told me that she is one of my reality-based neighbors.

So, the other day, I'm over at one of the many campuses where I hold adjunct appointments to partake of one of the many forms of health care required for my aging body - while there, I pick up this high-profile university rag and who is gracing the back page (the side where the address labels get put for US Mail) but my esteemed, award-winning bloggy neighbor!

Spaulding started her blog in July 2004, she says, as her own "screaming into the void," a reaction to her dissatisfaction with American politics. However, while the blog focuses on political commentary, she also writes about herself, her partner Kate and their three dogs -- Tonka, Bailey and Chloe.

Her blog is done in her free time and is unrelated to her job at Duke Press, where she is the manager of the six-person Information Technology Department. A Duke Press employee since 1993, she serves on the Office of Institutional Equity Advisory Board and won the 2003 Duke University Employee Service Award for work with Old West Durham Neighborhood Association, Friends of South Ellerbe Creek and Partners Against Crime.

My only complaint with the article is that the author referred mistakenly to Kate as Pam's partner. Kate is Pam's wife, pure and simple, and as it should be.

It was after I had the good fortune to meet civil rights pioneer Stetson Kennedy earlier this year that I started getting a lot more aggressive about combatting the hate that is spewed toward people I care about deeply who are playing a pivotal role in my life, my family, and my fabulous reality-based community.

When I saw this great local advert that uses a powerful graphic to question the current misuse of religion to fuel hate in our communities, Pam was extremely cool to link to me and send some very nice readers my way.

So, congratulations, Pam - I'm honored to call you my neighbor.

NOTE ADDED IN PROOF: As a sometimes breast cancer researcher and father of a breast-fed baby, I direct you to some recent classic Pam that cites the hypocrisy of Hooters-worship and 700 reader protests to showing a baby and a breast in on the cover of Baby Talk magazine.