Pawprints From Space

Well I watched the debate last night between Senator Verbose and Caribou Barbie. They both did rather well all things considered and the drinking game was a complete bust. sigh! The interesting thing is the analysis that has followed. NPR did their fact checking and according to them Caribou Barbie was all spin and not on target with her claims about her own and McCain's record whereas Senator Verbose only exaggerated slightly here and there. Meanwhile Fox News has exactly the opposite opinion. Articles in the New Times agree with NPR and go on to say that 90% of Caribou Barbie's replies did not actually answer questions but merely gave out "talking points" with no substance, further "proving" that she is not ready to be VP let alone President should anything awful happen to McCain. And so it goes. Five weeks from the election and it is still anybody's guess as to what will/might happen. My score? Caribou Barbie got a B (mostly for effort and stage prese...

Oh this ought to be good. Amusing at least. Not that the VP candidates have EVER made a significant impact on the outcome of the election but what the heck... it is an election season (? is nearly 2 years a "season" ?) of historic firsts... The book club ladies had a cute idea. Let's have a drinking game as we watch the debate... every time Gov. Palin shakes her index finger/points in her attempt to make a point - take a drink. Every time Sen. Biden goes over his time limit in his attempt to answer the quesion - take a drink. We should all be good and drunk in about 15 minutes. This will be interesting given that the interviews Gov. Palin has given lately have not been very good. I give her points for at least looking as though she is trying but really... someone who has worked in television, made public appearaces as Miss Alaska, been on City Council, been Mayor and now Governor should be able to cope with the press. So far, she hasn't shown that she can. And Biden h...

Okay, I have been trying to get to my blog for over a week STUPID security program won't let me because STUPID web site's certificate isn't up to date. Or so I'm told. I question this because all of a sudden every web site I visit that requires a log in is supposedly having problems with their certificates. every. single. one. Coincidence? I think not. I have been wondering when did cute freckles become STUPID age spots? They look the same, they form the same way. But for some reason after age 30 they aren't freckles any more according to "them", the little brown specs are now STUPID age spots. I think not. Especially since they are the same spots that have been on my face since I was a child. New ones, maybe... old ones, not so much. Another case of STUPID society making women over 30 feel bad about themselves. I order quite a bit of plant material for my garden online. Normally there is no problem. STUPID company this time took my order in late June, cha...

Okay so there's this huge storm almost as big as Texas, heading for Texas and even though warned of "certain death" somewhere around 90,000 people decide to ride it out. Knowing that the emergency teams are not going to be able to get to them once the storm hits until after it is over. How dumb can you be? Even though the cost per barrel of crude continues to drop gas prices suddenly jump up by a minimum of 30 cents in fear of refinery shut downs due to Ike. Uh-huh and isn't it supposed to be that we don't feel the fluctuations at the pump for four to six months because it is a futures market? Supposed to and what is are apparently two different things. The economists etc say one thing (won't feel it right away) while the oil companies and the gas stations come right out and say nope, we're boosting prices in anticipation of problems. Which is the truth? Off-shore drilling, setting the environmental issues I have with that aside, is in trouble every time a...

Okay it is stupid to vote for someone "just because". Just because you are female and the candidate is female; just because you are Latino and that candidate is Latino; just because you are black and the candidate is black just because... well, you get my drift. So into the silliness and excitement of the out-of-touch vs. the "celebrity" comes Caribou Barbie. And people are ga-ga. Men 'cuz she's pretty and knows how to use a gun effectively (probably won't make you clean the fish either, she'll do it) and women because she's... a girl. Or at least that's the idea. We'll vote for her because she's a woman. We women like that you know, never mind the issues she's a girl... count us in. Oh. Come. On. She's been a beauty pageant princess, a sportscaster, a very small community mayor (one resident claims the city administrator actually did all the work), and briefly governor of a state with a relatively small population given its l...

Just finished reading a book. Good book. An excellent piece of literary journalism in fact. But now I am annoyed. The book was published in 1997. I want to know what happened to the child the book focuses on. Is she still alive? Is she still being cared for by her family? Did they have to hand her or to a care facility? Web searches thus far have only turned up info on the book, its author, various articles addressing the same topic including terms papers. The book is: The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down (A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors and the Collision of Two Cultures) by Anne Fadiman It is as I've said, an excellent book. Unfortunately it leaves you wanting to know the rest of the story. Wanting to learn more about the Hmong culture. You share so much of this family's pain and confusion that you want to follow-up on their lives. So it is frustrating but it also a testament to the author and the quality of the work.

Well yesterday the Governor came to open the Obama campaign's new Allen County office. An estimated 200 people showed up - so many that they had to move the speech making outside. Pretty impressive for a Republican stronghold. But that is the interesting thing. This county is staunchly Republican, has been since the mid-1930s. This is not a bad thing although it is a curious one. I often find it interesting when voting trends hang on for such a long period of time, but that's just me. Anyway, at the Obama rally in the spring there were easily 300 people, when the primary office opened it was flooded with people... now this turn out. Seems as though the Democrats are finally coming out of the woodwork. I lived here FOR EARS before I knew there was a Democratic Party Chairperson for this county. Heck, the Republicans even have an office that is staffed all year every year. The Democrats don't even have a consistent mailing address. Or if they do, I can't find it anywhere....

Not forever, but how about going technology free for one day? How about Sunday? I'm going to try it. I'll probably have to "ease" into it and decide what the heck I mean by "technology" before I'll have any success. Already I do not answer the phone after 8:00 p.m. on Sundays so I shouldn't have any trouble extending that to the whole day. I do have caller ID so if it's "important" I can pick up but the thing is when I stop answering at 8:00 I cut out the "what if it is important panic" caused by a ringing phone by simply turning off the ringer. Which of course means that caller ID will be worthless if I can't hear the thing ring. Hmmm... I have started to leave the computer alone but that's mostly because it is too nice outside and I just haven't gotten around to installing the wireless card so I can surf and chat outside instead of at the desk with the laptop. Okay so that I can do: no blogs, no email on Sunday. ...

Oh come on! The folks out there are saying that we need to stop "picking on" Senator Clinton over not admitting that she lost her bid for the nomination and give her more time to wind things down. That she needs a few days to "get her bearings" before we can expect her to concede to Senator Obama. Uh-huh. Poor dear might burst into tears or something eh? Please. If this Senator from New York were male no one would be saying that he needed a few days. They would be rightly annoyed that in the speech last night there was no concession. No acknowledgement that the good fight had been fought but the better candidate won. Nope. If a male candidate needed to get his "bearings" it would cast all sorts of aspersions on his manhood. You can not have it both ways people. You can't claim sexism when folks expect the candidate to act like a candidate and not a "girl" and then want a free pass to act like a girl once she has lost. You don't want sexis...

Just can't take it any more. Have to say something. A very simple something in regards to the Rev. Wright and all the attention and speculation thereunto: Enough Already! Clearly the man is really "out there". I mean come on, the US government developed AIDS (or at least has used it) as some sort of weapon against the black community? That negative remarks about the things he's had to say are not attacks on him personally but on the black church? He does realize that there is more than one denomination that makes up the so-called black church and it isn't all the sort of preaching he subscribes to... oh wait, maybe not. Anyone with half a brain is going to see the man is those Monty Python boys would say "a loony". Given that, and the denouncement from Obama over these shenanigans of late it is well passed time to stop giving this man the attention he apparently craves. To whit: stop talking about him. Stop making him and his comments an issue in the Pre...

I have been reading Benazir Bhutto's last book: Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West It is a thought provoking text made all the more poignant by her assassination. I do think however that her experiences are a bit off the normal track considering who her father was but... it is interesting to gain perspective on Islam from a person of that faith and a woman at that. Anyone who adores history as I do and particularly ancient history knows what a great civilization flurished in the Islamic world at one time. How it continued to flurish when Europe was lost in its Dark Ages. So it is a real tragedy that we now look on an Islamic world caught up in so much internal fighting (think Sunni v. Shia), tangled up in extremist rhetoric and so on. What was once great has been destroyed and the destruction began long ago. The book points to Western colonialism as the cause of the troubles of today's Islamic world. And while there is a lot of merit to that (I could go on forever ab...

So, where does time go? Is it a commodity? We can spend it and waste it as if it were currency. We can put it into something, we can take it to do something. We can watch it or ignore it. On its own it can fly or crawl. Does that mean it is a living thing? Time is an interesting concept. Man made so they tell us and yet we are slaves to our creation. How many clocks are in your home? Your office? How many watches do you own? How many electronic devices also include timekeeping of some sort? And that's another thing "time keeping" we've created devices that "keep" time. Some do it well and down to the last nanosecond, some not so well (sundials for example aren't too precise). Why do we pay so much attention to time? Why is is so important? Why are we so worried about running out of it? i know I am feeling a bit of pressure at this point in my life. Not because I am afraid to die eventually but that I have SO much I want to be able to do first, so much to...

So today I was supposed to drive an hour-ish to go to the Relay For Life Winter Training. This is usually a fun event where volunteers from all over this part of the state get together and share ideas, attend meetings etc. It is kind of like a convention. Not going. Apparently there was an ice storm in the city where they are having this thing last night and since I no longer have a 4-wheel drive vehicle I am not risking it. Now I know what you're thinking, and you're right. 4-wheel drive is not helpful on ice. But it is helpful when you slide off into the ditch in getting you back out of said ditch. My little bitty Honda can not do that. Plus is it white so if there is a snow storm in the midst of all this no one would even be able to see me in the ditch until spring! But seriously, the American Cancer Society is not going to cancel this thing. The people putting it on went down there yesterday and stayed overnight. They don't have to travel. And who the heck cares about t...

Well I suppose I should tear myself away from that exciting new reality show currently airing on several networks at once: the 2008 Presidential Race. I admit it, I'm addicted. Not that I have been voting in Presidential elections for eons but seriously when is the last time it was this much - dare I say it? - fun? Here we are with Super Tuesday behind us and we still have a race, nay a dogfight, ahead on the Democratic side and the Huckster isn't bowing out yet on the Republican side. Heck, we could go all the way to the convention for a change and actually have it be a convention and not (sorry to borrow your phrase Huck but it is appropo) a corronation. Not that I want decisions to be made in the back room by the so-called super delegates and the party officials but wouldn't it be cool to be a delegate and actually have passionate discussions with other delegates? Damn! I wanna be a delegate!! This would be fun!!! Okay I work for people who are so Republican they ooze re...

Okay. I watched the debate wherein "the boys" presumably "ganged up on" poor little Hillary. Not the way I saw it go down at all. Ms. Clinton and her hubby had been bashing Mr. Obama for some time prior to and to a lessor degree during the debate. Mr. Edwards simply came to Mr. Obama's defense. How is defending someone suddenly "ganging up on" the original offender? Once again, thanks to the media spin (and I'm not anti-media I used to work in the media) has made this exchange all about something it wasn't. The "boys" weren't ganging up on the "girl" to "pick on her" or some other lame schoolyard comparison. Ms. Clinton's camp had been out of line and she got called on it. End of story. But now the media is telling anyone who will listen (i.e. women voters) that the "boys" don't want a "girl" in their clubhouse so they are "picking on her". The reasoning being that if women...

Happy New Year (for those who don't speak Japanese and I only barely do)! My resolution? To blog more often. Today's rant: Home Depot and the Ceiling Fan Two years ago I bought a ceiling fan with light kit for the kitchen. It was a Hampton Bay which I have since learned is a company that Home Depot owns. Well just after Christmas the glass shade fell to the floor and shattered. So we'll just get a new one right? Wrong! The store doesn't carry them, the Hampton Bay AND Home Depot web sites do not have them. No lighting store in town has them. Lowe's and Menard's do not have shades that size (of course it is an odd size). Customer service at Home Depot took weeks to reply, asked for the UPC etc. which I gave them and then referred me to someone else. Found a shade online from another company but it has been two weeks now and nothing. Called. It is on backorder with no expected date of delivery posted. I am not buying a new fan - it as too much trouble to get this ...

Here we go again. A brave woman, who knew the kind of daily danger she was in and yet placed her life in God's hands, has been assassinated. I don't profess to know everything about her or her politics but Benazir Bhutto seemed (on the surface at least) to be committed to democracy in Pakistan. And so she was killed. They had tried before and failed, this time they were successful. What is odd is how convenient it is for the establishment. Gosh! Now Musharraf doesn't have to loosen his grip on the country. He can claim an emergency, tighten his hold, retain his position as military leader and so on. Hmmm .... sounds like a win-win for him. Reports are saying that the additional security Bhutto had been asking for from Musharraf was never supplied. That the investigation into the earlier suicide bomber attack was not what it should have been and that she couldn't get body armor because she'd have to get written permission from the Musharraf government in order to pu...

That's "Happy New Year" for the non-Japanese speaking among you. Okay a few days early but who knows when I'll have a chance to get back online. The computer needs to hit the shop (keyboard troubles) and goodness only knows how long that will take. Christmas may have been merry but it wasn't white. It was actually something like 40 degrees which for Ohio in late December is odd. I'm told it was 50 in St Louis so I suppose it could always be... more odd. Speaking of "odd", if you have not checked out Jeff Dunham and his crazy act on Comedy Central you owe it to yourself to go to JeffDunham .com and see the insanity for yourself, or at least rent "Arguing With Myself" or "Spark of Insanity" his two Comedy Central specials. The guy is funny. He also has a MySpace page with the hysterical "Dead Terrorist" rendition of Jingle Bombs on it. Start the new year with a giggle and check it out. If you are looking for new year re...

Okay, who stole November? When did it get to be December and why is that month now half over? Christmas?!!? I'm still mentally dealing with Thanksgiving!! Nevertheless, it 'tis the holiday season and people are being even more stupid than usual. Parking lots have turned into "bumper car" rides at the county fair only more expensive since you don't need insurance on the bumper cars and you are supposed to crash into each other on that ride. Stores are filled with screaming over-tired children, rude adults, snappy salesclerks (thanks to the aforementioned screaming children and rude adults), prices that were marked up before being marked down, teenagers who need to be slapped just on principle in most cases and for some strange reason now that there are more people in the stores the managers have decided it is a GOOD idea to cram extra racks and displays into the middle of the aisles. While I am in awe of the religious significance of the season the commercial that ...

Okay so I started Weight Watchers on November 1st. Doing the online points tracking because the meetings here do not fit with my schedule . Have a friend in Chicago who is doing it too so we're "diet buddies" long distance. The funny thing is I put in how much I wanted to lose and the site told me how many points per day to have (based on height and weight and being in an office job). So far the number of points have not changed what I eat. Seems I've been eating just about that all along. Only have to cut out the snacks. Doesn't seem right somehow. The thing that really irks me though is the cost. For only three months online it is $65 and you don't get thing like the eating out guide or the slide rule thingy to calculate points by hand. If people need help (and most Americans do) why do they have to charge so much? A full blown membership is over $400 a year. About the same as belonging to the YMCA so if you add the two together (which you should) you're...