bummer

as most of you already know, john edwards has formally withdrawn from the race for the democratic presidential nomination. he was the only real democrat of the three front runners in my humble opinion and i, for one, was looking forward to voting for a candidate i actually respect, instead of the lesser of two evils, in the california primary on february 5th. so fuck it all to hell and back, and a big "pooh" to the national media whose reporting of edwards was so bad that there are still people who think clinton came in second in iowa.

i do not get what people find so inspiring about barack obama. he's a great orator and he has great rhetoric, but his actual proposals... they're not all that different than clinton's or edwards's are/were, they're just more conservative. i'm including links to some paul krugman op-eds that have influenced my opinion, and no, krugman isn't the only person i read and consider, it's just he makes so much darn sense! anyone (well, okay, some people) can give a good speech, but if barack thinks that his good intentions to change the tone in washington are going to make the partisan atmosphere go away, or make the insurance companies play any constructive role in providing universal health care, he's day dreaming into that fairy tale that bill clinton was talking about. then again, his health care plan doesn't actually provide for universal health care, so as it stands, he doesn't really seem to think it's important (this krugman op-ed, the mandate muddle, is quite good and i can't find anything else to link it to, so it's in-artfully inserted thus.)

that said, he's pro-choice, he was against the war, but i truly think he's in for a rude awakening about how he can change the tone by playing nice. republicans and right wingers don't play nice. that's how they've fucked this country up so much in seven short years. they will not go down without a fight, and a good old-fashioned, bare knuckles political battle is something that democrats seem to have forgotten how to do. where's lbj when we need him? he understood how to get legislation passed and it wasn't by playing nice all the time. if lbj had played nice there wouldn't be any civil rights act or voting rights act, and there certainly wouldn't have been the war on poverty. but who am i kidding? poverty is so passe these days anyway. if one brings up how the middle class and poor people are systematically screwed by the wealthy elites in this country, well, one is accused of waging class warfare, and that's just not done in polite society. but if you wage your class warfare silently, steathily, and with such subtlely that the vast majority of people don't even know it's happening, well, that's okay. in fact, it's not really class warfare when it's from the top down, it's just the way things are.

christ on a bike! i mean, really, how else does one respond to that shit?

i think hillary sucks, too. don't get me wrong... she and barack, republicans lite that they are, would be vastly better than even the most progressive of the republicans who are actually members of the republican party. i want to be excited at the prospect of getting to vote for black man or a woman who is a viable candidate for president, for the first time ever!!! or in my voting lifetime at least. but hillary and barack... they're raining on my parade. that said, me liking a candidate is, i am coming to fear, the kiss of death to their candidacy, so we may well end up with hillary or barack in the white house.

i'm just so tired of choosing between the lesser of two evils, because in the end, it's still choosing evil.

m.i.a.

wow... things have been busy and not in a lots going on that makes a good story way, just every day busy. been knitting a little, we went up to the san francisco saturday to have dinner with our friends wendi and john, which was just lovely. so nice to get a taste of civilization! we have some news on the pets front but i need to take some pictures before i go into that. it's all good, don't worry.

one of the most fun things that happened to me today was getting my anti-flag google alert and finding this really great video of justin, 2 and the night watchman (aka tom morello of rage against the machine, but acoustic solo) doing a cover of beds are burning at one of the big day out shows in australia. fucking great song, fucking great cover. there's also this one where billy bragg joins in, but unfortunately the video (sound and picture) isn't nearly as good as the first one.

goddammit!!!! i was just looking to see if there are any new comments to old posts and my daemon changed to a raccoon!!! from a tiger to a raccoon! fuck! i liked my tiger! fuck fuck and damn it all to hell! wah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

my daemon

okay, i realize i am outing myself as a huge fantasy geek, but i don't care and those of you who know me well know this about me already. drew and i are great fans of the his dark materials trilogy by philip pullman: the golden compass, the subtle knife, and the amber spyglass. if you have not read these books, do so. immediately. i cannot even begin to tell you what you are missing out on by not having read these books and entering the many magical worlds contained within their pages.

anyway, they made a movie out of the golden compass and it's quite good, we thoroughly enjoyed it. i was looking at my friend darcy's blog today and on the movie web site you can find out what your daemon is!!!! so here's mine, his name is callum, and i think he's just beautiful. :)



daemons are physical manifestations of your soul. we don't have them here in our world, but in the parallel world that lyra, the main character in the golden compass, lives in, people do. mine was chosen to reflect my personality, which came out as modest, sociable, shy, assertive and outgoing. you can take the quiz and get your own daemon, too. you can ask people to tell you what they think, and i guess if enough people disagree your daemon changes. in the book that's when your daemon settles but it's not based on what other people think of you, obviously. only children's daemons change form from one animal to another, depending on the person's mood and the situation. when they hit puberty, bam! then they stay in their one, ultimately true, form. thing thing is, i have always had a thing for tigers, i just love them, so i think i am going to be a control freak and not let anyone mess with my daemon, because i was so thrilled when it came up a tiger. and i like the name callum, too.

so... that's what i'm doing today. i hope you're doing something that's just as much fun. :)

happy happy to me

that's what my niece used to call "happy birthday" when she was quite small. it's my happy happy to me day today. wish i could say it's been great but to be honest, i'm going on my second night of not enough sleep (completely self-inflicted) and i've been a crab-ass extraordinaire. blah! the day has gotten better as it's progressed, thank goodness! i got a great rendition of "happy happy to me" on my cell phone all the way from holland from my brother & sister-in-law. sil even said "happy birthday" in dutch! and they included birthday wishes from their son, who, as it happens, is having his happy happy to me day today, although he's only two, so i've got a bit of a head start on him. what good taste the dear little guy showed when he arrived on my birthday. can't think of a better pressie than that! and we're going to dinner at the naglee park garage with my sister and brother-in-law tonight. love the garage - such yummy food! and on saturday drew is taking me to dinner at the fanciest restaurant in capitola-by-the-sea, shadowbrook. i told him i think i'm going to have to go get a new dress to go to dinner at a place called shadowbrook. doesn't it make you think of a sweeping antebellum plantation or english country manors?

all in all, it's shaping up to be a tasty birthday. so much for the three pounds i've lost...

a lovely weekend

sorry i haven't been blogging much lately, but there hasn't been a lot going on. this weekend i went to a knitting meetup and had a wonderful time! i've been to two so far, but this one was the best. they changed the location to kelly's french bakery, which is a simply lovely den of baked goods temptation at swift street courtyard. kelly's has a great patio and about twelve of us knitted and gabbed and had a great time, and i was so good - only a cup of tea! the other thing that makes the new location so great is that a yarn shop, the swift stitch, is two shops over from the bakery, so if you need to buy needles or some such supply, or simply want to go drool over the yarn like a pervert, you can do it! can't remember what i did saturday night (isn't that sad?) oh, wait, i must have done some knitting, because i realized i needed some double point needles. alas, i had none, and was stymied until the following day.

drew and i had a yummy lunch (thai - ummmm!) and then we hung out at kelly's again. i got my needles, and we hung out some more. i think we were there for like two or three hours, just knitting and reading and eating goodies (yes, i totally fell off the diet wagon with a little raspberry chocolate mousse thing, but it was little!) i eventually gave up knitting and read my book too, and drew managed to meet the only germans there (from munich, where he has lived before and quite likes.) eventually we had to go inside because it got cold and while it's a little noisier it's still nice. i hope next time we get to sit next to the stove... i guess it's gas, but it looks like a wood burning stove. all in all, very cozy. i suggested we have kelly's be a sunday tradition, and it's right near natural bridges park, and a few miles south of big basin, so we can take a hike and eat our goodies with abandon!

otherwise, nothing is new. the stupid car needed fixed and cost a grand to do so (ouch!) but we did get a cool rental car. don't laugh too much, but it was a kia rondo; we sheepishly admitted to one another we liked it right about the same time. i'd never even heard of a kia rondo but man, it was a really nice car! well, we called it a var, as drew was insisting it was a mini-van, and i was insisting a car. according to kelley blue book it's a micro-mini-van... thus var it is. anyway, we loved it! so much so it's on our short list of cars to consider when we buy a new one sometime this spring, and wouldn't it be hilarious for the happily childless people to own some sort of mini-van? we thought so. then again, we're both pretty easily amused. keep a rondo in mind next time you have to rent a var - you just might like it!

still can't believe it myself

just in case i haven't talked or emailed to some of you in while, i thought it was high time i come out of the closet - about loving ultimate fighting. it's soooooo cool! i LOVE it!! i still can't believe i am so into it. this is even more surprising than my dear friend lb becoming a football maniac, and i was pretty surprised when that happened.

that said, did anyone else watch the pay per view of the georges st. pierre/matt hughes fight? we did and it was great! gsp kicked matt hughes' holier-than-thou ass, which you can see happening in the picture. matt hughes is really annoying but one has to give him his due, he's a really fantastic fighter and beating him in the second round (of five) and dominating the whole fight like gsp did is no small accomplishment. not only was hughes beaten, but at his own game, too... gsp completely out-wrestled one of the best wrestlers in mixed martial arts today. and (does this feel like a ginsu knife commercial? "but wait, there's more!") i got to watch gsp prance around practically naked which is always a plus; the boy is seriously smoking hot. he also seems like a pretty genuine and down to earth person, which i realize also outs me as a freedom hater, seeing as how his first language is french, but i've hated freedom for a long time now, so i can handle a bit more. the lack of a link to matt hughes' web site wasn't an oversight, it was on purpose, just in case you were wondering.

the other big fight of the night was the chuck liddell/wanderlei silva fight. silva has fought in the pride league, in japan, one of their best fighters; this was one of his first ufc fights. liddell won the fight, but silva really made him work for it, and drew says it wasn't a fight that was utilizing silva's style (i.e. explosive) to its fullest. i am by no means an expert on mixed martial arts, but i am enjoying learning. it was nice to finally see a liddell fight, too, as he's the one who got me interested in ultimate fighting. when anti-flag played on jimmy kimmel live , chuck liddell was one of the guests. we didn't know it at the time because we were on the other side of the stage, but chuck came out to hear them play and justin said after they finished the first song he looked to that side and chuck put his fist over his heart and gave it a friendly shake in his direction. after the flag got back on the road we went back to our hotel and watched the show, and i at least was curious about chuck liddell after hearing justin's story (drew was already an aficionado, so he was curious too, just not like me, being clueless and all.) apparently he was an accounting major in college! it was so funny! he seemed like a pretty cool guy, and he'd given anti-flag the ultimate fighter version of a high five, so i was intrigued. and thus my odyssey into the world of mixed martial arts began...

the new year

happy new year! it's 2008! a new year, new start, new beginnings! if that's all true why have i managed to waste an inordinate amount of time today just futzing around? i've got stuff to do, it's just not as riveting as the new york times (which isn't, really.) i guess old habits die hard?

well, i've decided to use the illusory fresh start and clean slate of the new year for some resolutions. i normally don't make new year's resolutions, but drastic times call for drastic measures. :) i am renewing my commitment to being physically fit. i have allowed myself to get disgracefully fat and out of shape and i just can't stand it anymore. i can chalk up the first ten pounds as happy-just-got-married fat, but beyond that it's just not cool. i refuse to buy any more fat clothes, and could i ever use a shopping trip or two for some new threads! but i am not getting any until i fit into all my stuff that's too small just now, which will be like getting a whole bunch of new clothes, and at the right price. the next time i put on a bikini (i started buying bikinis exclusively in my late twenties) i will NOT feel embarrassed! i was up at a friend's place near yosemite this past summer and i felt like a beached whale in my suit as we all sat around the frigid swimming hole, dangling our feet and chatting. i am just not up for another round of such humiliation.

to that end i've come up with a plan! first off, i am going to keep my lunchtime workout routine simple. monday, wednesday and friday i will do cardio; tuesday and thursday i will do weights. i tried taking a few classes last quarter and it really made it more of a pain to go to the gym, and trying to do some cardio and some weights each time just left me feeling rushed and like i wasn't doing a good job with any of it, and then i got sick and that was that for the year. i also plan to get in at least one full work out (cardio & weights) on the weekend, and if i cancel one of my weekday workouts to go to lunch with someone then i'll shoot for two on the weekend. i need to give myself some wiggle room to go out to lunch once in a while. i am also cutting out sweets until i lose this weight and that is very hard for me! i can cut out the booze so easily... if i'm not drinking it i don't miss it, but the sweets! i am so addicted to sugar! i am using honey in my oatmeal, but i have to use something in oatmeal otherwise it tastes like crap, and that's coming from someone who likes oatmeal. i figure honey is better than brown sugar. the only refined sugar i will be eating will be in my morning tea, one and a half teaspoons. i have tried other sweeteners for my tea and there's nothing that works like sugar. i'm not going to use artificial carcinogens, either. if i get cancer i'm going to get it the old fashioned way. and last but not least, i have gotten myself a fitness buddy. i subscribed to SELF magazine, which i love, and i found someone on the fitness forum to be my fitness buddy. never mind that she lives in dallas, it's already working! i got to malley (scu's fitness center) today and found out it's closed until tomorrow. i started thinking about where to go read my book when i realized that i'd have to tell my buddy that i skipped working out, and for such a lame reason, too. so i changed my shoes and took a very brisk walk for an hour. according to the SELF web site, that walk burned 268 calories, and i got to enjoy the lovely weather. woo hoo for me and double woo hoo for my buddy keeping me honest! and then there are the usual things, like getting enough sleep, making sure to stay in touch with my awesome friends, playing more with my pets, and making time to practice an attitude of gratitude. let's face it - i live in america, i'm white, i have a masters degree, thanks to drew we own about twenty computers of one sort or another, and we've both got well paying jobs, which makes us better off than 99% of the world's population. i am always grateful for that fact, as fucked up as this country is, i'm still better off than so many others.

i guess the gratitude rant is a good segue way into getting philosophical... pondering the last year, thinking about the events that have taken place and decide if they have meaning or if this crazy little life is just a random crap shoot. i generally choose between those two choices depending on my mood, so of course the answer fluctuates wildly. after making a move across the country that i didn't want to make, leaving behind my family and friends and the prospect of buying a reasonably priced house, not to mention having a fantastic job with the united steelworkers' political dept dangled in front of me mere weeks before leaving, i can honestly say that my husband still rocks my world. i guess that is the difference between being married to the right person versus being married to a bozo. he's starting to feel better and that makes it worth it, and we really do have a lot of fun together, even if it involves watching too much t.v. i still feel generally friendless since my friends here all live in civilization (i.e. san francisco, oakland and marin) and i live seventy odd miles south, but we'll be moving closer over the summer; i can hack it for eight more months. i really do like my job at scu and i am excited at the prospect of applying to be a resident minister (cross your fingers and say a prayer for me, please!), and our kitties and doggie are well and sweet and the beach is a ten minute walk away, although i don't get down there as much as i should. whenever i'm at the beach nothing seems as bad as it might in another setting.

so i guess all in all that 2007, while a completely tough bitch of a year, was also a good year when measured by the things that really count in life: love, family, friends and laughter. i don't know if i'll ever be rich in ducats, but i am certainly rich in love - the one thing money can't buy.