Friday Novel Excerpt

I'm having some serious trouble describing the setting in one section of the excerpt I'm posting today. If anyone reads this and has trouble understanding what the parking lot looks like, let me know, and if you can picture it but have suggestions for better phrasing, please let me know.

Caveat: National Novel Writing Month requires 50K words in 30 days, so the writing is done very quickly and I don't read it over more than once. It may kind of suck, but hopefully there is a germ of something interesting in there that I can develop.

"So what's shakin', bacon?" Tina asked. It was a phrase Peter had used sometimes, in his goofy yet charming way.

James looked at her again, and she was shocked as tears welled up in his eyes.

He covered his face with his hands and put his head down, and Tina wasn't sure what to do.

"What's wrong, sweetie?" she asked. "Oh, honey, did I say something wrong?" She opened the glove box and pulled out a few tissues.

"Oh, Tina, I'm sorry," he said, "I was thinking about Peter today, and that's partly why I'm so out of it. I miss him so much."

Tina felt herself getting choked up.

"I know," she said, sitting back in her seat, handing James a tissue and taking one for herself - she started to wipe away her tears and then she remembered that she was wearing makeup, so she dabbed at the corners of her eyes.

"I guess," James said, "I guess that as we get closer to the wedding, I'm just missing him more and more. He should be here." His voice shook and he said "he should be my best man."

"I miss him, too" Tina said. "But I kind of feel like he's always with me, and at least part of that is because you're with me." She took his hand and he turned towards her. "Sometimes I feel like he brought us together."

She thought back to the funeral. She tried to stay at the wake, but she kept losing it. Her brother, her buddy, her protector, her role model, gone. Gone forever, in the blink of an eye. Because of the accident, there was a closed casket, and she kept looking over at the coffin, disbelieving that the smooth wooden box could possibly contain Peter. He was uncontainable, she thought, too big for that small box. She couldn't speak to anyone, she couldn't look at anyone, she felt like she couldn't breathe. The room was filled with relatives, all talking in hushed tones, a contrast to the funerals of her grandmothers, who lived to be very old women - there, the wake was truly a celebration of the lives of the deceased. It was different, Tina thought, when the person wasn't supposed to die for a long time yet.

She stepped out of the room, and felt herself starting to sob loudly again as she walked outside to get a breath of air.

It was a beautiful evening, which made Tina angry. The world should stop spinning, she thought. It should be hailing or raining or snowing, there should be hurricanes and tornadoes and earthquakes, because everyone should have to suffer. No one should be enjoying a nice walk after dinner today, she thought. Peter was dead. She looked over the parking lot. It was a large lot, absolutely filled with cars, with more cars lining the street, a testament to how loved Peter was. In the lot, the rows were divided by guardrails, so cars would drive into a space and have a guardrail facing them, and the row of cars opposite would have the same, so the guardrails were back to back, and the funeral home owners, in an effort, Tina supposed, to distract the clientele from the ugly metal of the guardrails, had planted flowers in the space where each guardrail backed in the other. It makes sense, she thought. That's what they do to the bodies in this place. They take the body, and try to mak e it look alive, to distract people from the fact that their loved one is dead.

She began sobbing again, and she felt a hand on her shoulder, and she didn't even bother to look at who it was, she just threw herself into the chest that belonged to the arm, and sobbed. How could she still have tears, she thought. She felt the arms tighten around here, and then she felt that the person holding her was sobbing, too, and they stood there together, holding each other up, sobbing because Peter was dead.

When she stopped sobbing (for the moment), she suddenly felt embarassed by her display.

"I'm sorry," she said, and she looked up into James' face. Tina knew James well, of course, Peter had brought him over for dinner a hundred times, and when she went to visit him at his apartment, James was usually there. They had played a few hands of poker over verboten alcoholic beverages long before she turned 21.

She didn't think for a moment what she must look like - days of alternating between sobbing and catatonic disbelief had left her looking more than a little disheveled and unkempt. And she didn't really notice that James looked just as bad, his eyes were swollen and red from crying.

"Jim," she started to say, and he leaned down and kissed her, and then she put her arms around him and he draped his head over his shoulder and they just held onto each other, trying to will Peter back to existance.

"I was kind of hoping he'd come back just to tell me to keep my hands off his sister," James choked out. His voice was distorted and strange, and Tina knew that it was his grief - it was coming out however hard he tried to hold it back. She knew because she was sounding the same today. "I'm sorry if I was forward."

Tina looked up at James and kissed him back. This was so strange, she thought. She never thought of James as anything other than Peter's best friend - he had always seemed asexual, really. But now she felt like she wanted to be with him, to have him hold her and kiss her and make her feel something other than what she was feeling, because she was in hell.

Feedback is appreciated.

Deja vu

We had a conference with Monkey's teacher this morning, and I heard a phrase that my mother heard when she went to conferences with my teacher: not performing to her full potential.

Monkey views school as time to hang out with her friends, and she really is bothered by those pesky teachers and assignments who interrupt her socializing.

In addition, she would rather not master her basic math facts.

Yep, she's her mother's daughter.

I'm on the list

Dear Bill O'Reilly,

I am a little slow to get back to you about this, but I've heard you're making a "naughty list", much like Santa Claus, that fat, red-suited guy who delivers presents on a Happy Holiday that occurs sometime next month...hmmm, what is the name of that Holiay again? It's hard to remember since so many religions, practiced by Americans who came to this great land from around the globe, much like your ancestors came here from Ireland, a land rich with religious heritage, both Pagan and Christian, have religious celebrations at this time of year.

Anyway, I was making my Happy Holiday list, and I realized that the thing that I really wanted this year was to be counted as an enemy of a mouthpiece of the right wing. I want to stand in opposition to a delicate flower who is so thin-skinned, he gets offended when retail clerks who have to deal with the great unwashed public (no matter who they worship) don't single out his deity of choice when they are forced to speak to him. I mean, really, Bill, the clerks don't even want to talk to you, you're lucky they do anything more than grunt at you.

But mostly, Bill, I want to join your enemies list because there's nothing I hate more than a thick Mick, a blowhard, a bully, who can dish it out but can't take it. We all know your secret, Bill - you're a coward. You are so tender and sensitive that you just can't handle life's rich pageant, so you lash out at those who make you feel scared, which is...well, just about everyone who isn't just like you.

So please do add me to your enemies list (seriously Bill: are you a 13 year old girl, or what?).

Happy Holidays!

maurinsky

Interesting meeting

I go to a lot of meetings in the course of fulfilling my job duties. I sit in the corner, take note of when the meeting is called to order, who makes motions, and seconds them, how the vote goes, abstentions, etc., and take notes.

Some of these meetings are mind-numbingly dull. I used to go to Housing meetings, and they were dull and depressing because we were talking about issues that have been around for 30+ years but no real solutions ever seem to be found.

But I go to one meeting every month that I love, and that is the meeting of Town Managers. These are the unelected people who make things work for a lot of municipalities. They don't have to be schmoozy like elected people, and they tend to be a whole lot smarter, in my experience.

So today we had this meeting, and there was discussion of budgets and sharing services (which the town managers can talk about as shared services, but which they have to find another name for when dealing with elected officials, like "Shared Assets" or some such nonsense), and then one of the TMs checked his little electronic doodad and announced that the CT Conference of Municipalities, after testing out the new voting machines that HAVA required, has asked the Sec. of State to toss out all the vendors and write up a whole new Request for Proposals. That should be an interesting story.

The other interesting thing was from the CT Coalition for Justice in Education Funding, which is having a press conference next Tuesday to announce their lawsuit against the state, currently going under the name CCJEF (pronounced see-Jeff, because you can't do anything in govt. without silly acronyms)...where was I? Ah, CCJEF vs. Rell. They are pushing to shift the way education is currently funded in CT, via property taxes, which results in inequitable and inadequate school funding, particularly in areas with the most high need students. They've got a lot in front of them, as one of their goals is to revamp the way school funding happens. I wish them luck!

Rollin' rollin' rollin', keep that blogroll rollin'

New to the blogroll:

If I Ran The Zoo - Tom Hilton
Expostulation - Misty
Praxxus - Praxxus

Friday Novel Blogging

I thought I would put up an excerpt from my National Novel Writing Month novel, Untitled, by maurinsky. I would love some feedback from anyone who checks it out. Just be aware, it's NaNoWriMo writing, in which you are asked to write 50,000 words in 30 days - this is a very rough draft.

James Conroy, Esquire, was distracted and scared, two sensaTions that had become constant companions in the past few weeks. He still appeared to be the same to his paralegal, to his fiancée, to the other attorneys at the firm, to his clients. But inside, there was a constant, low level of terror swimming underneath every thought. He felt like he was acting a role, like he was being filmed and his every acTion was accompanied by a Hitchcock inspired soundtrack that only he could hear. It was a fear he could sublimate, amygdalize…he would put it to the back of his mind while he went about his day, and he could eat lunch and meet with clients and laugh and joke, but then he would get a call from home or he would look at the picture on his desk, and the fear would come to the surface, unbidden and unwanted, and he would remember why he was so scared.

The wedding. He was getting married in less than a month.

When he had proposed to Tina, he was absolutely sincere in his belief that he was ready to share the rest of his life with her. And when he started to feel apprehensive about his approaching nupZials, he iniZially blew it off as simple jitters. When the feelings started to rise, when he started to dread even looking at Tina’s face, let along talking about seating arrangements or gift registries, when he started feeling like a man approaching the gallows, he picked his mother up for lunch to talk to her.

“Mom, I don’t know if I can get married,” he said. “I’m beginning to think I’ve made a huge mistake.”

His mother tapped him on the arm, in mock outrage. “Bite your tongue, Jamie,” she said. “Tina is a lovely girl and you are so good together.”

“I know,” James said, “and it’s not that I don’t love her, because I do, but,” he paused, considering what he would say next. “Maybe I’m just not the marrying type.”

“Most men aren’t, honey, at least not before they get hitched,” she replied. “It’s scary. Men are told their whole lives to go out and conquer, and you get so many mixed messages about,” she lowered her voice and spelled out, “S-E-X.” She continued in her regular voice. “But marriage is a good thing, Jamie. You have someone to be your partner to help you through everything life can throw at it you, and believe me, life will throw things at you.” She sighed and examined her fork. James knew she was thinking of his father.

“But mom, I am not feeling normal scared. I’m feeling like this is the worst thing I’ve ever done scared. And maybe it isn’t fair to Tina to marry her when I feel like this.”

“Jamie, honey, your father, God rest his soul, got more and more scared as the day of our wedding came closer and closer”, she said, stopping to take a bite of her Cobb salad. “It’s cold feet, sweetie, and once you say ‘I do’ and go to the recepTion, you’ll see your beautiful bride, and see the beautiful life you’re going to have together, and realize that you did the right thing.”

“I don’t know, mom,” he said, “I feel like maybe I’m trying to tell myself to put the brakes on.”

“Jamie,” his mother said, looking at him tenderly, “I’m telling you, you are going through something completely normal.”

“Normal,” he thought to himself as he sat in his office. “This is definitely not normal.”

He picked up the picture on his desk. It was from a vacaTion Tina and James had taken last summer, a week spent in Cape Cod at her uncle’s summer cottage. They looked like the ideal couple – they were on the beach, and the warm orange light suggested that it was nearly sunset. Tina was wearing a white maillot style bathing suit, setting off her beautiful tan, and silky dark brown hair, and Jamie was standing behind her, holding her close to his bare chest, pale next to her skin. He looked good, strong and fit. He remembered that last summer, he was running with Tina every morning, and would go to the fitness center at the condo complex three or four times a week to lift weights. He didn’t have washer board abs, and he wasn’t overly bulky, but he looked strong and manly. His light brown hair was windblown, but looked deliberately designed. He was smiling into the camera, but he could see the expression in his eyes, the distance. He wasn’t ent irely there.

He loved this picture, he knew, not because of the happy memories of the vacaTion (although there were happy memories from the vacaTion), and not because he looked good in the picture (although he did, as he noted with a certain amount of pride), or because Tina looked good in the picture (although she looked stunning.) He loved the picture because of what he saw in Tina's face, in her expression, in the way she tilted her head, in the way she held her body. He saw Peter.

How Blue Was My Valley

I figured it would take a while to tally the votes from my local election, so I waited until lunchtime to check my local paper. Here is the quote that greeted me:

Every Democratic candidate for the boards of Directors and Education was elected Tuesday in a victory whose scale surprised members of both parties.

The news isn't good across the board - several of the exurban towns east of us have switched from Democrat to Republican, a changeover that seems to happen every 12-15 years or so (the town I grew up in was hugely Republican - I believe my parents were the only people in the entire town who had Jimmy Carter signs on their lawn in 1979 - but now it's strongly Democratic).

I think there are a couple of reasons why some of these towns have gone red, none of them having anything to do with the national Republican party except as it applies to their fanatacism for tax cuts. These were towns that had very low taxes as recently as 10 years ago, and then the wealthy folks started buying land and building their $800,000 dream homes, and demanding that they build new schools, and, you know, we love the country and all, but where is the public sewer? Can't we widen that road? What do you mean we have to take our garbage to the dump ourselves?

Anyway, as the rich people turn their country retreat into the annoying suburb they escaped from, the taxes go up. And up. And up and up and up. My parents have seen their taxes increase almost 60% in just the last 5 years. So the Republicans brush off the old canard: lower taxes, cut spending! (even though many of the people who have demanded all the new services are Republicans who make enough money to benefit from the Bush tax cuts.)

Anyway, I'm hoping that with the way the taxes have been going up, we will soon have a state-wide referendum on having the state government provide education funding. Property taxes fund municipal governments (with aid, of course, from the state and the federal government), and the disparity between urban, suburban and rural/exurban towns educational quality is largely fueled by the disparity in the tax base. We still have Sheff vs. O'Neill to deal with, as well - there are a great many schools that are 99% white, and those tend to be the higher performing schools in the more expensive towns, towns where the median home price is over $300,000.00.

I am feeling slightly optimistic about the future, though. I guess it could be more accurately termed as feeling less pessimistic, but that's something, anyway.

A question

Do you think it says something about me that the character I am most relating to in my National Novel Writing Month novel is the closeted gay male who is about to get married? My story just gets awesome every time I write him. Otherwise, it kind of sucks.

I think what it says about me is this: as happily married as I am most of the time, and as grateful I am for how my choices led me to where I am now most of the time, I have a certain amount of regret for the road not traveled: for giving up my time to grow and become my own person to that adorable little baby who applied for a job today and to the guy who still makes my heart pound when I see him.

Credit cards and cable channels

I just read this post over at Kevin Drum's. Unlike some lefties, I like Kevin Drum, although he has the most toxic comments section left of Freeperville (which is why I won't read his comments section unless I'm looking for a fight.) He's slightly clueless about the way other people live, I think, safely ensconced in the OC as he is (although Tart and Chemist don't seem at all clueless, so maybe I'm just giving Drum a break.)

But credit cards and cable channels as the foundation of a new push for the Democratic party? When how many millions of Americans don't have health insurance? Maybe it's just because I'm a member of the Working Poor Class, but the ideas Kevin is so enthusiastic about seem irrelevant at best. I mean, credit card debt is a problem, and I would like to see the usurial practices of credit card companies ended post-haste, but when you're having trouble putting food on your table, I think credit card debt takes a back seat. And if you think about it, credit card debt is, at least in part, a *symptom* of the economic difficulties of living life as working poor or lower on the economic ladder.

Things I've put on a credit card during times of severe economic stress (such as winter, when we had a $400+ gas heating bill every month): Monkey's lunch money; Sio's test fees for SAT IIs; oil change for our one car; bus pass (which does get reimbursed by my employer, but I didn't have the cash to pay for it). I don't see any big screen TVs or fabulous vacations* in there. I don't like putting things on the card, because I don't like to buy things unless I have the money to pay for it now.

Between John and I, we have one credit card. We pay it off every month.

As far as cable channels go, I don't think it's even worth discussing. Talk about a low priority.

Voting Day

Here in Connecticut, our children, who are largely too young to vote, have the day off, while us working stiffs, who would like to vote, have to go to work. I guess they really do like to discourage the act of voting.

I haven't voted yet, and I briefly was dismayed that I would have to vote after work, but then it hit me - this is a local election, where the choices will have the most impact on our day to day lives, so no one will be voting. I will report back if I have to wait in a line...if I can recover from the shock, that is.

Awww. My sister loves me.

Her tribute to me, with pictures!

Picture 1: Mom, dad, and Uncle Jack
Picture 2: big sister and me with my giant head
Picture 3: Aunt Maureen, Aunt Theresa and me
Picture 4: Me and big sis on the living room steps
Picture 5: Cousins Kevin, Brian, me, Aunt Bernadette, big sister, and I think that's my uncle John in the background, but I'm not sure.
Picture 6: 2 kids I don't remember, but I can guarantee you they are Irish-American, me hiking up my skirt, cousin Brian, cousin Kevin, and my favorite big sister. I think we were at an AOH Hall somewhere on Long Island.

A long time ago, on this very day

A carpenter and a very pious woman had a child.

People came to see the child, and exclaim: "look at the size of that head!" and "She looks just like her grandfather!" and "What a cute little boy...oh, that's a girl?"

And the child grew, and turned into a precocious, know-it-all, teacher's pet. People noticed the child and called her Holy (generally in the following context: "she's a holy terror, isn't she?" and "Holy shit, does she ever stop talking?")

I am part of a family where no one likes to acknowledge their birthdays. My mother likes to pretend she can't remember when her birthday is, let alone how old she is. But when it comes to birthdays, I'm like a 5 year old. I like to tell people it's my birthday*, I like them to acknowledge it, and I love getting presents, too. I think it's because I'm generally insecure, so I like to give people the opportunity to let me know they care about me and remember that I exist.

*When I was a child, I was notorious for telling people that it was my birthday, even on days that were not my birthday, just to get attention and possibly, gifties. Apparently, I have not entirely outgrown that inclination, although I only admit to one birthday a year now.

Just when I think I'm out, they pull me back in

Senate Democrats show a spine.

Let the baby have his bottle

Now that we know who the next SCOTUS nominee is, there has been an argument cropping up at various points on the blogosphere, an argument Digby noticed in his comments, and this argument was picked up by Dark Syde in a recommended diary over at Daily Kos.

I suggest that anyone who thinks this is a viable, winning strategy should take a look at the party in power, and how they got there. The Republican party does not cede any issues to the Democrats. Ever. The motherfuckers on the right stand up and fight for everything they believe in, no matter how ridiculous, misguided and dangerous it is for the country.

I suspect that there are those on the left who simply don't want to suffer the pain of another loss, and let's face it, without the support of that nearly extinct species, the moderate Republican elected official, we are going to lose this - Alito will be confirmed. But all this strategy would do is push this fight onto another generation, who will have to once again gain ground we currently hold.

It won't happen overnight, the theft of women's rights to own their own bodies. We're already seeing the incremental losses: the pharmacists who are being allowed to not do their jobs just so they can feel morally superior; the rape victim who has a prescription for emergency contraception but can't get it filled; the young women in Oklahoma who not only do not have access to an abortion nearby, but who cannot get assistance from any adult without having that adult risk jail time for helping.

I keep hearing this phrase "keep our powder dry". What the fuck are we keeping it dry for? What issue will motivate the Democrats to stand up for the people who reliably vote for them?

Giving in is not an option. I think Dark Syde and Tom Joad are living in a fantasyland if they think that overturning Roe v. Wade will finally motivate moderate Republicans to action. These people stand up for themselves so infrequently they might as well be Democrats.

Lysistrata

I'm thinking that pro-choice women should take heed of our Greek sistren, and start denying men our bodies until our right to have autonomy over them is written in diamond. Of course, it wouldn't work, because the right-wing assholes would still be getting their biannual procreative ejaculation with their submissive wives, or maybe they would just buy Kass's theory that some women are meant to be wives and mothers, others are meant to be playthings for men, who are apparently able to be both fathers and sluts.

Gah, I'm really pissed off tonight.

Just like Christmas

You may have noticed that I have not been posting anything about what some bloggers are calling "Fitzmas", i.e., the possible indictments of one or more members of the Bush administration for their role in outing Valerie Plame.

I'm actually surprised by how excited many bloggers are about this story. I mean, I get the excitement about someone from the administration finally being made accountable for something. But the level of anticipation is so high, the denouement can only and inevitably be disappointment. Just like real Christmas.

She works hard for the money

I was reading a post over at Half Changed World that was in response to this post at Bumblebee Sweet Potato regarding waitressing.

This got me thinking about all the jobs I've held over the years. Here's the list:

Babysitter - from the time I was 11 until I was 16, and occasionally beyond that.
Meat Wrapper - my first real job. This was at Stop & Shop, in the room behind the meat cases. The meat cutters would place the cuts of meat on the styrofoam trays, I would wrap them in cellophane. I got paid slightly more than the average starting employee because I was in a dangerous environment (all those saws). I loved the job during the summer - the room was about 35 degrees all year.
Sales Associate - at a factory outlet store. I arranged clothes in size order, buttoned coats in the coat room, helped people with shoes...truly, the most boring job I've ever had. The boss loved me, though, and was really pissed when I quit just before Christmas.
Video Store Clerk - I confess, I loved this job even though there were several negative things about it. The store had 4 owners - 2 silent partners who I never even met, one guy who did not have the risk taking temperament that one needs when one owns a small business; and one who put his money up just so he could preview the porn movies. The nervous nellie boss hired his nephew, who stole money and accused me of being the thief, so I got fired...but I made a big scene first, which felt great.
Camp Counselor - I always wanted to go to camp when I was a kid, so when my friend Julie asked me if I wanted to work at her camp, I jumped at the chance. This was really a life changing job for me, since I was away from my family and for the first time ever, living with some structure. I loved working there.
Waitress/Sandwich Maker - In a little deli/restaurant. The guy who hired me was fun to work with - during slow times, we would sit and do crossword puzzles together. But he sold the business to a bitch on wheels, who fired me after I told her I was pregnant.
Certified Nurse's Aide - I kind of regret this one. I loved the job, and the residents at the nursing home loved me, but I was so sick when I was pregnant with Sio that I couldn't take the smells of the place - as soon as I walked in the door I would start puking. And after I worked so hard to get the certification, it was a disappointment.
Silk Screener - for a printing company. I lasted about a month at this job. A combination of morning sickness (aka progesterone poisoning) and sexual harassment drove me from this job. The bosses younger brother was looking for a green card, and he was constantly pushing me to go out with him - even though I was already married. Jerk.
Cashier - I did this for the remainder of my pregnancy with Sio. I worked during the day, with a bunch of nice older women. The job was easy, and everyone was nice, so I liked it.
Classified Ad Rep - my first job after Sio was born, which I started when she was about a year old. I learned how to type in high school, so when I saw an ad looking for someone with typing skills, I brushed up on them and applied. I got the job and I did great there. I almost immediately became the top salesperson, I got along great with all the people working there, and I enjoyed the work. I did it at one paper for two years, then I moved to a much bigger paper (and much bigger paycheck) doing the same thing. The second paper sucked - I had a horrible boss, and I ended up losing the job after two years there because I had to take a bunch of time off for Sio - she kept having asthma attacks and I kept getting called to pick her up from school.

I was then out of work for about a year, utterly depressed. I did take a few small jobs - stocking shelves at night at a pharmacy, waitressing, delivering the paper - but I quit all of them in short order.

Then a friend of mine from the second paper called and said they were hiring Customer Service Reps at her company. I got a job and started working for the cable company. After working there two months, I won a skills challenge and they sent me to Disneyworld for the semi-finals. The following year, I won the semi-finals and went to Las Vegas. I was promoted to a supervisory position. I got pregnant with Monkey. I stayed home with Monkey for 4 months, then went back. I got promoted again, to a new position (Broadband Coordinator) in a new department. It was stressful, and I worked my ass off, but so rewarding. Got the greatest boss in the history of the world, who I love more than I love my own father. Got my second job, as alto section leader for a church choir somewhere during this time. Of course, life working the way that it does, my job was relocated out of state, and despite the {sarcasm} generous {/sarcasm} relocation allowance of $300, I didn't follow the job.

Because our wonderful boss insisted upon it, we were given a year's notice that our jobs were going out of state, which is why I had time to find another job as a secretary, which is where I am now. I don't love my job, but I have a better attitude now than I did the first two years I worked here. It helps that my perfect boss and I had a confrontation over the fact that she was holding me to impossible standards that no one else in the office had to meet (essentially, she expected me to always be perfect) and since then, she's been mindful that I am a mere human being and cannot always do everything perfectly.

So how about you? What jobs have you held?

If they can't be Red, at least they're Sox

Congratulations to the Chicago White Sox for beating the Astros in the World Series. I love any team that beats the crap out of any team from Texas.

Watch it jiggle

I just can't help but wonder how Jello San Francisco would survive a major earthquake. I bet the jiggling would be hypnotic.

That takes some of the edge off my worries for the future

A young environmentalist is on a mission to make sure people's tires are at the correct pressure, for maximum fuel efficiency.

I think he's moved beyond disgruntled

The Chemist has a post that borders on revolutionary this morning. Lots of food for thought there.

The joys of parenting

Up until Sio was born, I was pretty sure I didn't want to ever have children. I have a younger brother and two younger sisters, and I remembered their infancies as being an uninterrupted stretch of screaming, puking, and stinky diapers. I remembered their toddler years as those years where I had to make sure the little buggers didn't fall down the stairs, and couldn't leave anything I owned out in the open or within 4 feet of the floor, and even stinkier diapers. The rest of the years blended together into whining, uncompensated babysitting, not being allowed to do things that would cause the next one down the line to have a temper tantrum, having to give things to the "baby", etc. I just didn't really like kids that much.

Then I got knocked up, and luckily, I discovered that when a child comes from my uterus, they are inherently superior to all other children, at least from my perspective. Parenting can be hard - I hate punishing my kids, for example, because my parents were always so harsh, and I don't know if my natural punishment inclinations are recalibrated at a harsher level because of that.

But there are some special joys in being a parent. I experienced two of them this weekend.

1. Sio discovered Edgar Allen Poe. Poe and I had a mad love affair when I was 12 years old. I read every word the man published, including all his literary criticism. When your kids find something on their own that you love...you know how you feel an instant camaraderie towards someone who likes the same band as you? You know your kid is cool when they fall in love with something that you fell in love with, without any intervention or introduction from you.

She keeps reading me sections aloud, entranced by the poetic perfection of Poe's language.

2. Monkey sent some Republican candidates packing. Some of the local Dumbos who are running for the Board of Directors were canvassing in our neighborhood. Monkey answered the door, and told them that we don't vote for Republicans because Republicans care more about money than they care about people. Then she told them she doesn't like George Bush, and she doesn't trust people who support George Bush. That might be something she heard from me.

Sadly, this is more than I make in real life

My blog is worth $39,517.80.
How much is your blog worth?

randomania

I went for a long walk at lunch today. As I was walking near the Hartford Civic Center (or, more accurately, what remains of the Hartford Civic Center), a guy made an attempt to pick me up. He was several steps up the ladder from the last guy who tried to pick me up, who was a heroin addict - this guy was a construction worker on his lunch, and he made no effort to hide his wedding ring as he chatted me up. Still, it was almost flattering to have a man who appeared to have his own teeth make the attempt.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I have tickets to see the Coast Guard Band Masters of Swing tonight. I kind of don't want to go, though. I think I'm just feeling generally anti-social.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I have nearly enough credits to get an Associate's Degree, so I was invited to a Transfer Meeting for students with GPAs of 3.5 and above. The meeting was with the President of my community college and several faculty members, and they were pushing us to reach for the stars when it comes to transferring. One young woman in the meeting was skeptical that any community college students ever transfer into Ivy League schools, but the Pres and the faculty insisted that it happens every year. I made an appointment with an advisor to talk about what I should do next. I may end up changing my major to just a general Liberal Arts, because some of the required classes for music majors are only offered during the day, and I have to work so I can pay for school (and the house, and the car, and food, and for healthcare, etc.)

Damn, I'm a great parent

I just got a call from Sio's gym teacher. Sio is no athlete - in addition to having asthma, she is sort of generally undercoordinated. She's not a klutz or anything, but she doesn't pick up physical activities easily, and she's not inherently physically graceful. She's your classic bookworm, albeit without the glasses. (She's more an ultra-feminine, hourglass figured, stunningly beautiful bookworm.)

Anyway, her gym teacher called for the express purpose of telling me what a delightful child Sio is. Mrs. M. said even though Sio has asthma, she never uses that as an excuse to get out of class, that she always works as hard as she can in class, and that she is just a lovely human being. Mrs. M. said she doesn't get to make these calls very often, and she wanted to thank me for raising such a lovely child.

This wouldn't surprise anyone who knows Sio. I know she is special to me, she's my firstborn child. But she is special to lots of people. She walks down the hallway at school and smiles and says hello to everyone. She is kind to everyone. She is generous with her time, always offering to help people. And she never brags about it, or does it for self-aggrandizement - it's just how she's always been.

So even though I feel chest-burstingly proud of her, I can't really claim the full credit. Sio was born a sparkling ray of sunshine, and I don't think she'll ever change.

Separated at birth part deux

Larry C. Johnson at No Quarter has reported the following:

Had lunch today with a person who has a direct tie to one of the folks facing indictment in the Plame affair. There are 22 files that Fitzgerald is looking at for potential indictment . These include Stephen Hadley, Karl Rove, Lewis Libby, Dick Cheney, and Mary Matalin (there are others of course). Hadley has told friends he expects to be indicted. No wonder folks are nervous at the White House.

emphasis mine.

Whenever I see Stephen Hadley, I can't help but think of his twin, Nathan Thurm:


Indicted? I knew that. Did you think I didn't know that?

Now they're just playing with us

File this under "too good to possibly be true."

I aim to misbehave

You scored as Capt. Mal Reynolds. The Captain. You are the captain of the ship, so the crew are your responsibility. You just want to do the job, get paid and keep flying. Why is that always so hard? Capt. Mal Reynolds 81% Zoe Alleyne Washburne 75% Hoban 'Wash' Washburne 75% Kaylee Frye 69% Simon Tam 63% River Tam 50% Shepherd Derrial Book 44% Jayne Cobb 38% The Operative 38% Inara Serra 25% Which Serenity character are you? created with QuizFarm.com

Hat tip to The Green Knight

Real Life gives me a time out

I've been reading so many great things that I want to comment on, like this and this.

Unfortunately, after 9 straight days of rain, we discovered a few inches of water in our basement, so I've been busy with cleaning up from that. And I have a few other things going on, like school and my two jobs, and figuring out exactly how much in debt I am so I can try to get out of it, and working on a few other painful things that I would much rather avoid, but can't. So I'm going to be quiet for a while, and then I may take November off while I work on my National Novel Writing Month novel, although I may not. I'll probably still comment on other blogs from time to time, but LW will be pretty quiet. I think. Oftentimes as soon as I announce things are going to be quiet around here, all hell breaks loose (hopefully, this time it will involve the words "Rove indicted".)

I gotta go now or I'll miss my bus.

Battered and Bruised

Upper right arm. Lower left arm. Left shoulder. Right thigh. Left wrist. On my back, at the bottom of my ribcase. I've got huge bruises in each of these locations, and I cannot remember doing anything to get them. Maybe I've been sleepwalking.

Margaret Thatcher hates freedom

A friend of mine pointed me to Tina Brown's column about Harriet Miers in the Washington Post, which contained this gem about Margaret Thatcher's opinion of the Iraq debacle (Iraqle?):

The former chairman of the Arts Council of Great Britain, Lord Palumbo, who lunched with Mrs. T six months ago, told me recently what she said when he asked her if, given the intelligence at the time, she would have made the decision to invade Iraq. "I was a scientist before I was a politician, Peter," she told him carefully. "And as a scientist I know you need facts, evidence and proof -- and then you check, recheck and check again. The fact was that there were no facts, there was no evidence, and there was no proof. As a politician the most serious decision you can take is to commit your armed services to war from which they may not return."

She must be a pinko commie or sumpin.

Coming Out Day

Today is National Coming Out Day, and since I read about it at Pam's House Blend, I assumed that the guy standing behind me in line for bus passes was celebrating. He was wearing blue jeans and a jean jacket with gay pride buttons and patches all over it.

The credit card machine wasn't moving, so I turned and asked him if he was celebrating Coming Out day. He said, "what?", so I asked him again. He said "I didn't know it was coming out day, I dress like this all the time! Honey," he said, "I've been out since I was 13, and my mom knew long before that."

We chatted for a while longer, and I said something about how I believe in equality for all people, so I hoped that our Civil Union law would become a gay marriage law at some point, except it sounded all pompous and serious, and quite frankly, I'm not happy with how my end of the conversation went, although he was delightful.

I'm a fucking bitch

I was at my SIL's house yesterday, and my brother-in-law, who was also raised Irish Catholic, with a brutal father and a neglectful mother, and he even had to sell crap (did I tell my sock story yet?) - we have a lot in common, my BIL and I - and anyway, he was telling us how it takes a lot of effort to light his fuse, but once lit, it explodes in no time. That is my temper exactly. It takes a lot for me to get angry, but when I do, I am a raging psycho.

Well, today was one of those days. I can't even get into everything that set me off, because I feel slightly foolish about getting so ridiculously pissed off over something that, in retrospect, seems like such a small deal. But I lost my shit today, and I ended up having to apologize to every single person who lives in this house. I am my father's daughter, and I'm not too proud of that.

Better than Big Box Office

You know, I love Serenity, and I hope it does better at the Box Office this weekend, but this is almost the bestest gift I ever could have gotten, and if he actually gets indicted, or {tremble} goes to the pokey, I will not even care if Serenity never comes out on DVD*.

*Not entirely true, but still - Rove going down would be sweet.

Stop reading the comics and this is what happens

I was a devoted reader of the comics page when I was a child. We would get the paper early in the morning, and while we were eating breakfast, I would pull out the designated "entertainment" section of the paper (sometimes known as Entertainment; also seen as Life, Living, and now they've run out of all ideas and just call it by the date), fold open the last two pages, and read every single comic. Even Gil Thorpe and Mary Worth and Apartment 3-G. I even would read the comics that were listed in the Classified section (in my youth, those were Marmaduke, The Family Circus and Ziggy.)

The golden years for me were when the paper ran Bloom County, The Far Side, and Calvin and Hobbes. Even when Berkeley Breathed ended Bloom County, we still got Outland every Sunday.

I stopped reading the comics regularly after Watterson stopped drawing Calvin and Hobbes and Larson stopped drawing The Far Side. I'd pick them up every now and then, but the love was gone.

Yesterday afternoon, I noticed Monkey reading the comics, and she said "Mom, I don't get this one." I went over to see which one she didn't get, and horror of horrors, it was Mallard Fillmore. Mallard Fucking Fillmore, in my paper. I am outraged, and I immediately sent a letter of protest* to the paper. I haven't received any reply yet.

OTOH, Sio got a letter from Senator Bill Frist yesterday. She wrote to complain about those who are trying to get intelligent design added to the science curriculum. I'll have to share his letter with you guys later, because Sio brought it to school to share with her Bio teacher. Oh, the bullshittery!

*My complaint was not directed toward the political slant of the strip (although clearly I disagree emphatically with that slant), but over the fact that it isn't funny.

If you were wondering

You're probably asking yourself, "Why isn't maurinsky opining on the great topics of the day? Where are her observations on Tom DeLay's indictments? How does she feel about Harriet Miers? When will we know what maurinsky thinks about Judith Miller? Will she ever stop talking about that damn movie?"

I'm here to answer your questions, oh dear reader(s).

Maurinsky is tired, oh so tired. The only night of the work week that isn't booked through December is Friday. She is also burnt out on politics, and does not feel that she has anything to contribute that isn't already being said, and more eloquently, elsewhere.

In addition, Maurinsky's oldest is in college search mode, and we're going to visit several schools over the next few weekends.

And Maurinsky's going to make a promise to you, dear reader(s): this will be the last time she uses third person in a blog post about herself on Laughing Wild.

Congrats, L & L!

Yesterday, my co-worker L took advantage of the new Civil Union law in CT and got herself hitched to her partner of many years. Or, as L my co-worker says, they got "civilized".

Big Damn Movie Review

I've been mulling over Serenity for several days now. I saw the movie at a preview screening in June, and I'm afraid I was still feeling a little too "squee!" at seeing the Big Damn Heroes together on the big screen to analyze the movie at all. I saw it Friday night, and I was so emotional over several of the events that happen in the movie that I couldn't really cast a critical eye. The third time I saw it, I was pulling an Amelie and turning around to see how everyone else in the theater was reacting to the story.

I think I actually need to see the movie a few more times before I can distill my thoughts into a review. It's hard for me to be objective, because I love the characters, I love the ship, I love the whole Firefly 'verse, and while I know they aren't perfect, I'm not ready to criticize yet.

There was a moment towards the end of the movie, where things seemed hopeless. I didn't see actors who might have to play dead - I saw the vulnerable genius/psychic River, terrified when her brother is hit, but finding the strength to take care of him; I saw the mercenary Jayne, a man who, motivated by fear, has made himself tougher and stronger, but realizing that he might be at his Waterloo, resolves to keep fighting; I saw a young doctor suddenly lost without his medical bag, realizing there is no way to retrieve it.

Here we were, watching a movie where the captain of a space ship dresses like an extra on Bonanza. It's a 'verse where there are shotguns, horses, and guns that shoot out a pulse beam that knocks you out without killing you. And it felt so real to me because Joss Whedon knows how to pull me in, and he lucked out and got a bunch of actors together who were perfect, so I wasn't thinking how cute that Sean Maher is, or how hot Nathan Fillion looks when he wakes up (well, maybe for a moment...); I was looking at Captain Malcolm Reynolds, who lost his faith when he was on the losing side of a war that he hasn't really finished fighting yet; I see Dr. Simon Tam, who gave up his life to save his sister's.

Yeah, I think it's safe to say that I'm not ready to be critical yet. I won't promise that this movie is the next Star Wars, because I've never seen Star Wars and I don't want to lie to you. I can't tell you that this is the greatest movie ever made, because there are movies that surpass it artistically, plotwise, actingwise, etc. But I will tell you that the movie is damn good, that it provides tons of action, some very scary moments, some big laughs at just the right times, and if you see the movie, I might even get a sequel, which will let me spend more time with this crew that I love.

Loki's review is here.

A beautiful day

Early fall days in Connecticut don't get much nicer than it was today. 60's, sunny and to top it all off, today was the first day of the Civil Union law. I hope that this will end up being just a first step on the road to full equality for gay couples.

I am a huge geeky dork

You Can't Take The Sky From Me

In slightly less than 12 hours, I will be in the movie theater with my huge geeky dork of a husband, and probably about 100 other borderline insane fanboys and girls, to watch Joss Whedon's Serenity. I'm starting to get twitchy with anticipation, and I've already seen the Big Damn Movie!

Reading, Watching, Listening

Reading

Two days ago, I started reading In Cold Blood, because I wanted to be familiar with it before I check out the movie Capote. I recently read that Capote's goal was two-fold - to write a true crime novel and to argue against the death penalty. I haven't finished the book yet, but thus far, I haven't seen any anti-death penalty proselytizing, although Capote is so deft a writer that perhaps it is subtly implied. His first goal is met masterfully, however.

Up next, I will be reading Adam & Eve's Diary, found and translated by Mark Twain. And Sio is trying to convince me to read Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, which was the textbook for her AP World History class last year.

Watching

Because of school and choir, and because I canceled most of our cable, I haven't been watching much television. But we signed up for Netflix and I've been re-watching I, Claudius. Loki and I are also gearing up to see Serenity this weekend. He's getting together a group of his college friends to go to a midnight showing on Friday at midnight, we're seeing it with his sister and her husband on Friday evening, and we'll probably see it one more time this coming weekend. Is this entirely insane? I don't think so, I feel so personally invested in the film, and I so want it to do well, because I'm not ready for this to be the last story with these characters.

Listening

I am completely OCD when it comes to music - I listen to the same artist, the same CD, the same song, over and over and over again. Ben Folds Five and Ben Folds' solo CDs have been on constant rotation at my house. I listen to Rufus Wainwright as I surf the web late at night. I recently added a CD of David Bowie songs my sister burned for me. And Monkey likes to hear The Talking Heads when we're in the car (and I'm totally willing to oblige; More Songs About Buildings and Food may be one of my all-time favorite CDs. I'm thinking about getting something by The Decemberists on The Chemist's recommendation. I picked up a Kings of Leon CD, but haven't listened to it yet, and I've still got that Le Tigre CD that I haven't listened to.

So what about you? What are you reading, watching, and/or listening to?

Bush's $3000 Bike

I know, it's a lot of money for a bicycle, but if you look carefully, you'll see it has some key equipment that Bush really needs.

Shorter Tony Blankley

We must destroy America to save America from America's enemies!

Alternative Shorter Tony Blankley:

America's enemies want to destroy her, but they can't if we do it first!

Halfway there

I was just checking over the list of the Top 100 Banned Books, and I've read almost half of them (47 out of 100). Although I don't think you can actually read Sex by Madonna, it's more of a looking at type of book, and yes, of all the books that are on that list, that is the one that most deeply shames me. Well, that and the Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty series, which makes me wonder why Monsieur deSade has fallen so out of favor, because everything that was in the Sleeping Beauty books was written by deSade first.

(I'm not even a little bit into BDSM in real life, but I like reading about it sometimes.)

Loki's reached the end of his rope

My husband's outrage-o-meter has reached a new high.

I don't know where Loki is planning to live, though. Me and the girls are registered foreign born nationals of Ireland, so we could live anywhere in Europe (if we aren't pragmatic and don't care whether we have jobs or places to live or food to eat, anyway), but Loki is all American. How does one become an expatriate?

Barbie was right

Math *is* hard.

I only got a 75 on the test, which was disappointing, because I thought I did better. I have a few bones to pick with the teacher. First of all, she only gave partial credit for three questions about what property was demonstrated by the question - because I only wrote commutative or associative or distributive, and didn't include the operation. However, the question asked us for the property, not the operation, so I think I should get full credit for those questions.

Also, it was only by chance I found out that that particular section was worth 12 points. The teacher took one point off each question for not listing the operation, but instead of taking off 3 points, she took off 6 points from my test. I only discovered this when I overheard someone else ask the teacher why she got 6 points for the section when the person who sat next to her, who had the exact same answers, got 9 points.

So I'm going to go to class early on Wednesday and point out that the questions asked for the property only - the problem itself told us the operation. And I'm going to ask that on the next test, we are told how much each question is worth, so we can tell on our own whether it was graded correctly.

That was the post that was

Via Shakespeare's Sister

The name of my 23rd post was Everything's Okay.

The 5th sentence was: Monkey got out of the car to hang with him, but she locked all the doors so no one could take her stuffed animals.

I'm not sure if that is at all representative of the nature of this blog, but there it is.

Instructions:

1. Go into your archive.
2. Find your 23rd post (or closest to).
3. Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.

Passed on to whomever wants to do it.

A Sunday Sermon on Reason

Go read Driftglass.

Civil Union, Table for Two? Right this way, please

Gay Marriage? I'm sorry, you're not on the list.

There is good news and sort of bad news for gay folks who are thinking about coming to Connecticut*.

The good news?

"Civil unions performed in other states are entitled to full faith and credit in Connecticut..." said Attorney General Richard Blumenthal

The (sort of) bad news:

Out-of-state same-sex marriages have no legal force and effect here," Blumenthal wrote in a legal opinion requested by the state's Department of Public Health, which administers marriage licenses.

I say this is only sort of bad news because if you have a same-sex marriage, that means you live in a state where (even if only temporarily), sanity has prevailed and you are living with the full rights and privileges that all of us are supposed to have. So why would you want to leave?

The other part of the sort-of bad is that I think this sets a precedent, in the first state that approved civil unions via the legislature, of a "separate but equal" status for gay people who just want to pair bond, already. Civil Union yes, Gay Marriage, no.

*If you are thinking of coming to CT, you should come right now because we are having California weather. Nice and cool at night, perfect for sleeping (which is what we do in CT at night, because unless it's Thursday, Friday or Saturday, everything is dead by 8pm) and warm and sunny during the day. You can't stay at my house, though, because I haven't done much cleaning recently and we don't have a spare bed.

Firefly Friday

Just a quick reminder that a really excellent episode of Firefly is airing on the Sci-Fi Network at 7pm EST, tonight.

On a related note, Josh Marshall has a special offer going on for Talking Points Memo readers: you can see an advance screening of the Firefly movie, Serenity.

flotsam and jetsam

I think I did a pretty good job on the test last night. I know for a fact that I got three wrong - I never learned how to do prime factorization, and our textbook, which I paid $84 hard earned dollars for, sucks mightily, so even though I studied the chapter summary, as directed by the teacher, I didn't see anything about how to do prime factorization. (I did, however, see that the list of prime numbers excluded 5 and 7. Nice going, editors of the what might be the worst math book ever published!)

Lots of stuff on my mind today, but I'm having trouble putting anything together. On my moms list, we're discussing the sad state of science in America, particularly as it relates to evolution vs. intelligent design. We're also discussing the poorly written NYT articles about the Ivy League "Future Stay At Home Mothers" Club, and I think we are in agreement that although the topic provides much food for thought, but there was little more than a mouthful of crap in this article.

At home, we're talking about the plan to land another man on the moon, which has Loki excited even though he said he doesn't trust the Bush administration to do anything correctly, and he assumes that this is just another step towards the militarization of space. He just can't help it, the idea of space travel makes him giddy.

Sio is talking about college. She went to a presentation by MIT earlier this week, and she came home gushing. In October, she's going to presentations for Yale and CalTech. And we're going to try to visit WPI and RIT within the next two months. She didn't get cast in the fall show, but she was tapped to write the script for the drama club's float in the Homecoming Parade*

Monkey is showing a huge amount of progress on the school front. I think my math class is helping her, actually, since she and I can do our homework together. She also is proving to have some serious creative writing skills - the teacher gives them writing prompts a couple of times a week and asks the kids to write a paragraph based on the prompt. Monkey's paragraph about being in the desert gave me the chills - there was an underlying tension in the paragraph that impressed me.

*I went to a regional high school in a rural community, and there was no football, and therefore no homecoming. But homecoming is a big deal in our town. The high school has a parade, and each grade and several clubs compete for the best float. The best float is not merely something that looks good - at the grandstand, every club does a skit or a dance or something special. The winning club/class gets either $500 or $1000. The Drama Club has built in advantages: kids who are comfortable performing, really excellent costumes, and set building skills that blow away the competition. (Last year, they had a set that looked like a regular building, but when they got to the grandstand, the building opened up into a lab set. After the experiment went horribly wrong, from the middle of the set exploded into a 20 foot high monster, handled by student puppeteers. It was awesome; they lost because they went over the time limit by 3 seconds.)

This year, the theme of the Homecoming Parade is something about Books or Stories, so the Drama Club is doing Harry Potter. Sio wrote a 3 minute long skit that combines highlights of all 6 books, using The Compleat Works of William Shakespeare, Abridged as her guideline.

Browncoats

Last Saturday, we were at my brother-in-law's birthday party, and Loki, me, Loki's sister Sue and her husband, (who I'll call Stinky, because he was smoking cigars all day), were trying to hook Loki's dad into the show Firefly, so we watched the pilot episode, "Serenity".

If you've seen it, the opening seen is a battle taking place in Serenity Valley. Our heroes, the Independents, are having a tough time fighting the Alliance. They are waiting for reinforcements, because they are badly outnumbered and outgunned. Sgt. Malcolm Reynolds isn't worried, though. He tells one of his charges that they are going to survive because they are too pretty for God to let them die. Just about then, they hear some ships flying in overhead. Sgt. Reynolds tells the young private he's talking to "Hear that? Those are our angels."

But they aren't angels. They are reinforcements for The Alliance. The leadership of the Independence is surrendering Serenity Valley, they say the battle is too hot for them.

At the end of that scene there is a beautiful and terribly sad shot. Sgt. Malcolm Reynolds stands up and sees the huge show of force The Alliance, and he stands there, despairing, losing his faith. We see the young private get shot and blown backwards, a hail of fire directed towards the small group of Independents. And still, Sgt. Reynolds stands there.

That scene captures what it feels like to be a progressive, liberal Democrat.

More quiet from me

I may be quiet for the next couple of days. I have a math test on Wednesday, and because I have a New Attitude(TM), I am planning to study for the test. In class tonight, we were reviewing the concepts we've already learned as well as learning about fractions (have I mentioned that I am retarded in math?). Every time I was confused (and believe me, it happened often - I swear, I have dyscalculia, my brain starts to swim when I'm looking at numbers and I can't keep track of what I'm doing), instead of looking out the window, like I did when I was in high school, I raised my hand and asked the question, no matter how stupid it sounded.

The one question that didn't get answered was my question about how the test was going to be graded. I wanted to know if we would get partial credit for displaying we understood the concept, even if we made a mathematical mistake. Unfortunately, I asked the question after the class ended, and there was so much going on I didn't get an answer. I may actually pull out Monkey's multiplication flash cards to bone up on my multiplication tables, because that is how lacking in confidence I am.

Avast, ye scurvy bastards!

Aarrrgh!

This cheesy picture, btw, was taken at the Pirate Museum in Salem, MA. The museum is pretty lame, but I had to admit, I had the metaphorical shit scared out of me by one pirate who I thought was just a mannequin, until he lunged at me.

I told Loki that today was Talk Like A Pirate Day, so he quoted his favorite line said by a pirate in film: Put the kettle on!

I know, I've been quiet

All the usual excuses: sick, burnt out, tired, busy, etc. After having allergies kick my ass all summer, I'm beginning to wonder if I will ever breath through my nose again. I am hopeful that it will happen, although it may have to be through the liberal application of various pharmaceuticals.

In addition, I seem to have done something horrible to my right shoulder. I think it's some sort of pulled muscle, because it does feel a little better when I stretch it out.

Ridiculousness

We've got this theatrical event going on in Washington right now. Roberts sits there non-answering questions, Senators are straining to decipher some meaning from his non-answers, everyone is admitting that Roberts will win the appointment and the whole thing is really just ridiculous.

I mean, if Roberts isn't entirely upfront and honest, it's not like they can recall him from the Supreme Court, right? Clearly it is in his best interest to avoid committing to any positions. And if he did commit to an opinion, if the same sort of issue came in front of the court again, he could just plead that the facts of the case were different than the question he was asked during the Confirmation hearings. The whole process is flawed.

I don't think Roberts should be appointed. I know we've had judges on the Supreme Court with less experience, but they also had a public record that a Committee could assess. In Roberts, we've got a candidate with a limited public record. All we know about him is from work he did as a lawyer. He's made no stunning legal decisions from the bench. There is nothing in his career to distinguish him as an exceptional mind, and his association with the Reagan administration should give all Democrats on the committee pause.

Intelligent Design In CT

Last night, I went to Open House at Sio's school. They hand you a schedule and a map, and you get 10 minutes in each classroom.

When we hit Sio's AP Bio class, Loki asked the teacher about intelligent design. She said: "We address ID on the first day of class. I explain to the students that ID is not science and so we will not be discussing it in my classroom. I think that's all any AP Bio student needs to know about the subject."

Loki and I were pleased.

Taking Responsibility

The story is faux serious (IOW, it would be serious if it wasn't an act), but the URL is pure hilarity.

Post stolen shamelessly from my sister

You can get yours here. (All proceeds for Katrina victims)

via Growabrain

Smoke over Belfast

This news sucks.

Three nights of rioting in Belfast.

My father was pro-IRA, as were most of his drinking buddies. They would pass the hat to raise money for NORAID, which was essentially the Irish-American fundraising arm of the IRA. In the late 80s and early 90's, though, my father and his friends changed their tune. Long before 9/11, my father was disgusted with the IRA's tactics of intimidation, terror and violence.

After Clinton was elected, things turned around in NI. My dad would always get a little antsy during marching season, when the Protestant loyalists would march through the Catholic enclaves. It was heartbreaking to see Catholic school children mocked by adult Orangemen as they attempted to go to school. But it seemed like the violence had ended.

So this news is really depressing.

Good question

Shakespeare's Sister asked a good question today:

So what's the Dems' best move in exploiting Bush's catastrophic incompetence and freefall in support? Give him enough rope? Start calling for his impeachment? What do you think the Dems ought to be doing right now?

My answer:

I think the Democrats need to hammer home that the response to Katrina was not a *mistake*, but the natural result of Republican policies:

-cutting funding for improving and "arming" the levees because the money had to go to Iraq instead
-having a significant percentage of the National Guard, which is supposed to respond to this kind of catastrophic event, in Iraq
-the social Darwinism favored by the Republicans - it's literally "sink or swim" when applied to their reaction to LA.
-focusing on pet partisan issues instead of actually working on solving the problems that affect all Americans
-Economic policies that both add more poverty and hurt those who are poor.

The call for impeachment, if it comes, must come from a groundswell of people, and not from our elected officials.

My main point is that, like the Iraq debacle, the disgraceful response to Katrina is not a mistake or an error in judgement - it is exactly what this administration planned for. If only because they didn't plan for anything better. This is the response we can expect from a Republican administration in the event of a catastrophe. And they've learned at least one valuable lesson: next time there is a catastrophe, the press must be controlled immediately. If the press hadn't responded so quickly, we would not know how bad it was/is in New Orleans.

Remembering 9/11

I didn't write anything about 9/11 yesterday because it was a beautiful day and I took the girls to the Hebron Harvest Fair, where we had lime rickeys, Thai food, and the best doughnuts money can buy.

But I wanted to write about it, so I went to my Mom's list (the one on which I was recently called a racist by someone who has since apologized) and checked back to 9/11/2001, to see what I wrote then.

Here's one response I wrote...not sure what the person I was responding to wrote:

You know, the scientists on the space station could see the smoke
billowing, but there is something else you *can't* see when you're
orbiting the planet - you can't see the borders between lands. Like
it or not, we all share this world and we are all obligated to care
for it, and IMO, we are all obligated to care for each other.
Sometimes, American actions indicate a short-sightedness about the
world - sometimes it seems as if we think we are the only people on
this planet, and only our needs are important. I know that most of us
don't personally feel this - look at how American people rally into
action when there is an earthquake or some other disaster. But our
policies must sometimes sting like a smack in the face to the rest of
the world. This doesn't mean I think we deserve an atrocity like what
happened yesterday.

I also wrote this, under a post called "Interesting Change of Timeline":

Last night before GWB spoke, the timeline on CNN said that at 9:49am,
the FAA grounded all flights. After he spoke, the timeline changed to
show the FAA grounded flights at 10:30am - the only significance I
can see is that if the FAA did ground flights at 9:49, then they
would have been on the lookout for other flights - like the one that
hit the Pentagon - maybe this is more like Pearl Harbor than at first
realized.

I wrote this on 9/14/01:

I am feeling so out of step with everyone in regards
to how we should react. We are going to kill innocent
civilians too. Is it wrong to do so or not? Is it only
right when we do it?

And this just a couple of hours later:

I realize that almost everyone disagrees with me. I
want those responsible brought to justice, just like
everyone else. I disagree that we need to get involved
in a full scale war to do so. I will just have to
stand as a voice of dissent.

Here is a response to another post, with some of their text included:

> > HOWEVER, I don't think that this is the week to do
> that. "Give peace a
> chance" is NOT the mood of - not just this country -
> but the *world* right
> now. I'd like to think that as people are allowed to
> move naturally through
> the stages of grieving, including anger, that reason
> will prevail and enable
> us to make smart and effective decisions about how
> we proceed so that this
> doesn't happen.

****, I wish this were true, but we've already moved
past a point where our leadership is making smart and
effective decisions - listen to the language -- it's
all about war. I fear our leaderships response will
lead to a horrible outcome. I hope against hope that
calmer heads prevail. But I doubt it.

On 9/16/01, I wrote this:

I myself am contemplating putting a bumper sticker on my car:
Justice, Not Retaliation.

As I was scanning through these old posts, I also found a link that no longer works. It was to a website of pictures from around the world, people who were sharing our grief after 9/11. The Bush administration and all the scoundrels therein put an end to that world.

3 events, 2 parents, 1 car, same time

Tonight, there are 3 events on our calendar

1. Parent Information night at Monkey's School
2. Informational meeting for students and parents who are considering Yale University
3. My math class

Each one of these events starts at 7pm. We have one car. Loki worked last night, so he's unconscious right now, so even though there are two parents, realistically speaking there is just me. I am loathe to skip class, because 20% of my grade is attendance and participation. But we've already missed one big school event because of school.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet.

UPDATE: Sio realized she put the Yale info meeting on the wrong date on the calendar, so I went to math class, Sio went to Parent Information Night, and Loki and Monkey stayed home and read more of The Green Pearl

Everyone buckle up

Sio got her driver's permit today, so we can now take her out for driving lessons (legally, unlike her first driving experience, when her less than entirely sober father and uncle had her drive them up the Berlin Turnpike. In a 5 speed. When she was a smidge over 15 years old.)

I'm using the royal we in the first sentence. I am well known for being a laid back, easygoing sort of person in real life, but get me in an automobile, and I become a massive control freak. In the passenger seat, I am literally a bitch on wheels.

Loki wants to teach her to drive, but considering his record (he's been to driver retraining *5* times because of his inability to observe posted speed limits and/or red lights and/or stop signs), I'm aiming towards signing her up for driving lessons.

I took private driving lessons when I was in high school just for the insurance discount. My teacher was slimy - he wore polyester shirts buttoned halfway up, and several gold chains around his neck, and he reeked of Aqua Velva. He seemed like the kind of guy who would make a pass, but I wasn't the kind of girl who ever received passes (I was very boyish, and my mohawk was surely off-putting to some).

Anyway, Sio and I spent a healthy chunk of our morning at the DMV, which is always a beautiful place for people watching. We saw a very good looking young man, a guy who looked a lot like Sam Rockwell, and a poor kid with an unbelievably overbearing mother (the officer who was taking her son out for his driving test had to speak harshly to her to get her to realize that she was not going to be allowed to go on the test with her baby).

How can I keep from singing?*

Our summer break from choir ended last night. We had a great rehearsal, and I impressed myself with my ever improving sight-reading skills. But the greatest news was that this year, for our Pops concert, we are finally going to pay homage to the most brilliant lyricist since Cole Porter, and my favorite contemporary showtune composer, Stephen Sondheim. Now I will have to work carefully and try to gently persuade the choir director that the song "A Little Priest" from Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street will absolutely be appropriate and that the audience will love it. Even though it's a celebration of cannabalism.

*this is the title of an Appalachian hymn. My favorite arrangement of it was arranged by Sio's chorus teacher.

Like a slap in the face

I've been a member of an e-mail list of moms for 10 years now. There are people on there from around the world, of all kinds of political persuasions and education levels and economic backgrounds. We've had our ups and downs, our flame wars, and people who couldn't stand a debate left, often to just sign back up again after a month or two.

Everyone on the list knows that I am a liberal, and that I will loudly and proudly stand up to defend liberal principles when they are challenged. Everyone knows how I feel about George W. Bush.

Today, we were discussing Katrina, and someone forwarded Tom Friedman's recent column Osama and Katrina (shorter version: Gaw-aw-lly, Mr. Bush shore did look tuff on 9/11! Garsh, I'm naive.)

I pulled out Friedman's statement about how he felt that George Bush was the right man for going after Osama bin Laden, and stated how something that added to my heartbreak on 9/11 was that I knew Bush was president and he was going to fuck it up.

I then said perhaps I was a little too biased, since I hated Dubya from the first moment I saw his smirking face and heard his phony Texas accent.

And one of the moms, who is ordinarily a lovely person, but definitely under the hypnotic sway of the right-wing, called me a racist.

I have never been called a racist before, and even though it goes without saying that she was 1. way out of line, 2. wrong and 3. how the fuck does criticism of Bush equal any kind of racism, particularly since I'm white and from Connecticut, just like Bush, it hit me like a slap in the face. That's the worst thing anyone has ever called me.

Ain't that the truth

Sometimes they get it right

hat tip to Burb Rocking, who tips the hat to Planet Dan

Separated at Birth

The Bush Response team is winning the war on the public's perception of their response to Katrina

Here's a Blog of Notice on the Blogger main page. Here's the first paragrahp of his response to Michael Moore:

Dear Mr. Moore,My name is Josh Norman. I am a reporter with the SunHerald of Biloxi, Mississippi. Last Sunday and Monday, I was in Biloxi when the eye of Hurricane Katrina passed over my head as a category 4.It was terrifying.Immediately after the storm, I went out and reported on the disaster. I met families destroyed, saw neighborhoods reduced to their concrete foundations, smelled death and dispair and heard the disbelief roll off of everyone's toungue. Disaster, perhaps, is therefore not strong enough of a word.What will be a disaster is a divided and bickering nation.

I understand what Mr. Norman is saying, but boy howdy do I disagree with him that Michael Moore is the problem here.

My comment:

By the time Karl Rove is done manning the PR campaign for Bush, the hurricane will have been caused by the 9th ward.

Geez, how many get out of jail free cards does Bush get? He's not the only person to blame, for sure - more could have been done for the people of NO prior to the storm, but he was eating cake and pretend strumming a guitar with a freaking presidential seal on it while people were drowning. He set the tone for the entire rescue effort: we'll get to it when we're done raising money for fellow Republicans.

The aftermath of Katrina is being treated like a trial balloon for privatization of emergency response. This response is what we can expect in a future under the Republican party - except they've learned some valuable lessons: keep the media out, make sure there are scary stories about the people who are left behind so everyone will think they deserve to die. FEMA will become the agency that manages the media's access to emergency response.

I don't give a shit about Michael Moore, but Jesus Christ, don't let Bush get away with doing nothing in response to a crisis!

I really don't give a shit about Michael Moore. I suppose it's his job to be a media gadfly and poke, poke, poke at the Republicans. Whatever. The criminal negligence of the Bush administration in the aftermath of Katrina could not possibly involve Michael Moore less.

Mr. Norman is getting a lot of positive, anti-Democratic responses to his post. Right now, I'm almost as pissed off at the Democrats as I am at the Republicans, but there is a better and a worse, and right now, Bush's evil shitbag of a handler, Karl Rove, is managing the PR and actually convincing people that the problem here is criticizing the Bush administration response...while at the same time smearing and sliming the locals and the victims.

On the bus

The ladies on my bus are angry. They believe that George W. Bush and the whole administration want to kill the poor black folks in New Orleans so their friends can make money buying up the property of the dead and building hotels and vacation properties. They are outraged that the Bush administration is trying to blame the people who didn't leave for causing their own problems. They don't believe there have been any rapes or gangs shooting at rescue workers. They believe that the Bush administration took advantage of the flood to rid themselves of a population they don't like. And the ladies on the bus believe that this is how a whole lot of white people feel about black people - they feel that they are seeing how White America really feels about black people.

And you know, I really can't say anything to argue with them. Some of that is tinfoil hattish, but I certainly couldn't argue that the Bush administration showed that poor black folks have any value. When the rebuilding happens, it's going to be Bush administration cronies who get the contracts to do the work.

The rotten apple doesn't fall far from the tree

Barbara Bush is an appalling, heartless bitch. (scroll down to Barbara Bush-Audio).

Shorter Powerline

Here's your shit sandwich. Aren't you going to thank me for making you lunch?

Of all the stupid tax cut ideas the floated, this is the latest

Here in CT, gas prices are creeping ever closer to $4.00 gallon, and people are starting to get worried, not just about how much its costing to fill their cars, but how they are going to manage heating their homes this winter. With oil refineries in LA going offline for who knows how long, prices are not going to be decreasing anytime soon.

I'm just a lowly secretary, but I had a great idea: what a perfect time to encourage people to use mass transit! It would give people an opportunity to conserve and sacrifice in a time of crisis, something that I think a lot of people need, so they don't feel so helpless and detached. I suggested to a transportation planner that right now, Governor Rell should be giving some more money to CT Transit and Rideshare, and ask them to add more bus routes from the capitol to the suburbs. Ask people to give up their cars for a workday or two. Conserve our resources.

But our Connecticut government is instead looking to either cap gas prices at the pump or, in a move sure to win the moderate Rell some accolades from her more right-wing brethren and sistren, is thinking about using the opportunity to temporarily get rid of the gas tax! Yes, let's band together in a crisis to find ways to *encourage* consumption of a finite resource.

Answers to last week's quiz and a countdown

1. How wonderfully eccentric while at the same time being a complete waste of our time.
Answer: Mystery Men

2. You know, they tell ya to never hit a man with a closed fist but it is, on occasion, hilarious.
Answer: Firefly - score one for Christiana

3. Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live.
Answer: Oscar Wilde - I think that is one for the Tart.

4. You know, I wish my parents played Mozart when I slept because half the time I don't even know what the heck anyone's talking about!
Answer: The Incredibles - one point to John Howard, author of the hottest blog on the internets

5. I don't need none of yo' tired ass country club, ya freak bitch!
Answer: Arrested Development - the line was uttered by Franklin, Gob's puppet.

6. She can't act, she can't sing, she can't dance. A triple threat.
Answer: Singin' In The Rain - said by Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly) about Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen - who interestingly enough dubbed Debbie Reynold's singing voice for the movie in which Debbie Reynold's character dubs Hagen's characters voice when talkies become the hot new thing.)

7. Your Majesty, you're like a big jam doughnut with cream on the top.
Answer: this was my trick answer, as the line was uttered by Oscar Wilde (as portrayed by Graham Chapman) in a sketch on Monty Python's Flying Circus

8. My ox is broken!
Answer: from The Amazing Race, Season 5. That line just cracks me up.

9. America had often been discovered before Columbus, but it had always been hushed up.
Answer: Oscar Wilde

10. They had this look in their eyes, totally animal. I think they were young Republicans.
Answer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the movie, which was funny, because Joss Whedon wrote it, but pretty badly directed by someone who wasn't Joss Whedon.)

Also: tonight is Firefly Friday - the SciFi network is airing reruns of the killed-before-its-time series, at 7pm this evening. And that reminds me that it is only 27 days until the movie based on the series, Serenity, is released, and if you love me, like me, are moderately fond of me or merely wish me no ill, you will help make sure this movie has big Box Office on opening weekend so I can get sequels. Remember: it's all about me.

Just a little corporate reshuffling/ and a rant

I was just over at Political Animal, and Kevin Drum had a nice post up showing what's been going on with FEMA.

2001: FEMA designates a major hurricane hitting New Orleans as one of the three "likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing this country."


December 2002: After less than two years at FEMA, Allbaugh announces he is leaving to start up a consulting firm that advises companies seeking to do business in Iraq. He is succeeded by his deputy, Michael Brown, who, like Allbaugh, has no previous experience in disaster management.


March 2003: FEMA is downgraded from a cabinet level position and folded into the Department of Homeland Security. Its mission is refocused on fighting acts of terrorism.

Darned if that doesn't look like every corporate reshuffle I've ever survived. This is corporate thinking at work, and as is nearly always the case with corporate thinking, the guys at the bottom get the shaft, while the CEOs move on to better positions and leave their sycophantic buttboys to maintain the status quo. Or maybe even do a little more reshuffling, renaming, lots of meetings, a shitload of jargon about new paradigms and proactivity and campaign launching, but really, it's just a bunch of usually white guys who sign pieces of paper but never do a fucking lick of actual work in their lives, just trying to make the stock prices go up, and the worker bees who lose their livelihoods so all the little Hunter Hilton III's and Genevieve Waldorf's can go to the same pre-school Mumsy and Daddums attended are just a bonus - we lowered the payroll by a million dollars, the shareholders will be ever so pleased!

This is what we get with a corporate administration in the White House. Talentless hacks who were born into the right kind of family and went to the right kind of schools and manage to convince people that they are getting the job done.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another thought that occurred to me this evening is that NOLA is like Africa right now - people are donating, people are looking for a way to help, but we can see from the eyewitness reports, the pictures on the news that no help seems to be reaching the people who need it. Every time I read stories about what is happening in Africa, I immediately look for how I can help, who can I send a few dollars to...and I inevitably hear that there is almost no point, because the aid doesn't get to the people who need it. I was reading about tourists who scraped together $25K to hire buses, but the buses were commandeered by the military. People in NOLA are told to go to the Convention Center for help, but there is a scene right out of freaking Bosch waiting for them - how could these people not lose hope? Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter - isn't that what the door to hell says?

All the comfortable wingers in their New York apartments and D.C. townhouses and Dallas mansions are surely tut-tutting the acts of those who are left behind in NOLA - "looters should be shot on sight!" They lack both the imagination and the empathy to put themselves in the shoes of these people, because they want to believe that they are better than that, that they are above such depravity.

If I had no food, no water, no electricity, no car, no means of escape, I'd be the first one to throw the garbage can through the window of the 7-11. I'd feel guilty about it, because I was raised Catholic, but I have children, and I want them to survive. The people who are clutching their pearls about looters...these are people who get itchy if the server takes too long delivering their drinks to the table.

If Peggy Noonan or Jonah Goldberg were at the Convention Center, they'd be pushing elderly infirm people and starving children out of the way if a truck carrying water swung by. If they were trapped in their dwelling with no resources, they would be looting left and right, and then after they were rescued, they would probably write a book about how their courageous actions helped them survive the disaster.

Right now, for the people in New Orleans, it looks like a sucker bet to do as you're told and then help will be on the way. Yeah, there are actual evil people who are taking advantage of the human misery, but most of these people are just average folks who have the distinct disadvantage of being born black and poor, and they are trying to survive. They are fighting for their lives, and anyone who says they would be different, that they would just wait patiently without a complaint until the cavalry rode in is either a sucker or a liar.

WTF

I've been reading a few news reports on the situation in NOLA, and I'm starting to feel a horrible combination of panic, furious rage, helplessness, and a healthy amount of WTF!?!

Over at Americablogthere are a couple of posts up about Health & Human Services and DOJ departments sending an e-mail out yesterday to push the Yay! War! March. I can understand everyone's fury over this, but I would be very surprised if the Director of HHS sat down yesterday and composed this e-mail and sent it out. I'm guessing that this e-mail was pre-scheduled to go out at the end of August, and in the wake of the NO crisis, no one stopped it. I am not going to get upset about this.

However, as I'm reading about suicides and rapes in the Superdome, and armed civilians surrounding police, and people shooting at aid workers - so much so that FEMA pulled out to protect their workers, I'm mostly left with WTF!?!

I'm actually feeling slightly worse than I did on 9/11. On 9/11, we had a crisis, and the people of New York responded with astonishing grace. Leaders emerged amongst the firemen and the cops and the people working in the WTC and people on the ground. If Bush hadn't been president, I think I would have felt better about my nation and my species than I ever had at any time in my life. (The fact that Bush was at the helm made me very concerned, and I think history has proven my concern to be well-founded.)

But here, I'm just feeling incredibly hopeless, and I'm not even in NOLA - I cannot even imagine the hell those people are going through.

I was reading TBOGG's post about Bush's speech, and how the Cornerites were displaying a lack of faith in their dear leader for a moment, but they seemed to be talking themselves out of it, hoping that as the water recedes, so to will the chaos and they can then pretend that George W. Bush, resolute leader, did everything right, everything a leader should do when there is a crisis. But we should not forget his detached, lackluster, inhuman response to this tragedy. And we should not forget the political decisions that were made by this administration and Congress that kneecapped the preparedness of this city, that essentially allowed this to happen.