It smells like special drink

“He just won't get out of my mind....”

10 year-old Frankie DeVito talks with his mother Diana about his grandfather, Bill Steckman, who was among the victims at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

Interview recorded in Baldwin, NY, by StoryCorps®, date unknown.

Shared via AddThis.

Happy Holidays!

In honor of the holiday season, officially kicked off here in America with this past weekend's turkey-themed gorgefest, I bring you the rightfully famous puppycam:

heh

Get the latest news satire and funny videos at 236.com.

OMG AMERICA!

1.7 million people agree

Rachel Maddow is ridiculously appealing. It's not just that I usually agree with her, it's that she's very funny and completely adorable, to the point that, when I disagree with her, I don't mind at all. She's an adorable lesbian of the same Adorable Lesbian school of Ellen DeGeneres, as in funny and smart and appealing in a totally non-threatening way, like a very sweet-natured and well-informed Maine Coon cat or an exceptionally intelligent dancing rabbit from NIMH. Only, you know, they're human and, being to-the-bone hetero, I have no inclination to pet their heads or scratch them behind the ears. I happily share my kitchen or living room with them, especially Ms. Maddow, as often as I can. Well, not in person. That would require a lot more housecleaning than I feel entirely up to at this point in time.

Still, if I were a lesbian, I'd totally have a crush on Rachel Maddow. I mean, look at those eyes! I think I'd like to find the male version of Rachel Maddow, only taller and, you know, male. He'd probably be gay, though. Or married. Or just not that into me. Well, screw you, Universe! I'm going to watch The Rachel Maddow Show and drink hot apple cider or maybe spiked hot chocolate and learn things and be entertained. So there.

Anyway, her sexuality totally not mattering at all, I think, is totally wonderful thing, in that it's a teeny tiny sign that we might be evolving as a culture, and moving forward towards the promise of America: equality, sans asteriks.

Inadvertent Palin-related advertisement humor from Rolling Stone Magazine Online

The following image is from a screencap I made this morning while I was reading "The Truth About Sarah Palin" by Tim Dickinson from issue 1062 of Rolling Stone online.

Happy Birthday, SheepBoy!

...wherever in the 'web you are.

Happy Birthday, Master Halifax!

“How do you think you've changed?”

Grete Meerholz talks with her husband, Keith, about his escape from the World Trade Center's North Tower on September 11, 2001.

Recorded in New York, NY, by StoryCorps®.

Shared via AddThis

Speeches of Note from DNC `08

I'm sure I'll be adding to this as I find things. Or, maybe not. I do have a job.

Monday, 8/25/2008

• Caroline Kennedy (review here)


• Ted Kennedy (review here)


• Michelle Obama (review here)

Tuesday, 8/26/2008

• Gov. David Paterson
  I learned things from this speech. Very sad things.


• Dennis Kucinich
  Crazy, rabble-rousing-type speechifying. I still think he, with his belly-fire and ability to raise belly-fires, should have been keynote instead of the former governor of Virginia and current governor of lameness, Mark Warner.


• Hillary Clinton (review here)

Wednesday, 8/27/2008

• Bill Clinton (review here)


• John Kerry (review here)


• Beau Biden
  Increadibly good speech, moving without being treacley. And his step-mom seems like a truly lovely person.


• Joe Biden (review here)
  Make sure to watch his mom, who is adorably awesome as only an old Irish-American great-granny can be.

Thursday, 8/28/2008

• Al Gore (review here)


• Barack Obama (review here)

Non-Pols
Unfortunately, I can't find video of most of the non-politicians who spoke. They were often very moving, and they gave the best reasons why the Obama-Biden ticket is the one to support in the coming election.

Only a few, but…

• Maj. Tammy Duckworth


• Pam Cash-Roper (8/28)


• Barney Smith (8/28)
  The booing of his Republican past at the beginning of his speech was just plain rude.

I really wish I could find the machinist from the 25th, and the student caring for her disabled sister, the auto parts worker, the textile mill worker, the woman who lost the discrimination case in the Supreme Court, and the home health care worker from the 26th.

Music Which Was Good But Which Is Not Available

• Alehandro Escovar
  I can't find his awesome performance from the 26th. Possibly because I'm misspelling his name.

Music Which Was Not Entirely Awful (actually quite good) Which Is Available

• John Legend w/ properly miked Agape choir


• will.i.am & John Legend w/ improperly miked Agape choir (DNC: "D'oh!")


• Stevie Wonder & Take 6
  Holy cats, Take 6! I haven't seen them in forever!

Musicians Whose Performances Were Entirely Awful

• Melissa Etheridge


• Sheryl Crow

"Who?"

I'd heard of Gov. Sarah Palin, but that was from her fight against adding polar bears to the threatened species list. Most of my friends and family hadn't, though, so I sent the following to them today.

Nabbed the following quotes and photo from Wikipedia:

(EDIT 9/3/08: I'd meant to put in the links to the citation numbers in the quote, but the entry has been drastically changed since Friday. I can no longer find the citations in the entry. I also couldn't find the photo, which I provided today from the copy in the e-mail I sent.)

Palin is strongly opposed to abortion and supports capital punishment.[31] While running for Governor of Alaska, Palin supported the teaching of creationism alongside evolution in schools,[32] however, she noted she would not use "religion as a litmus test, or anybody's personal opinion on evolution or creationism" as criteria for selection to the school board.[32]

She opposes same-sex marriage, but she has stated that she has gay friends and is receptive to gay and lesbian concerns about discrimination.[11] While the previous administration did not implement same-sex benefits, Palin complied with an Alaskan state Supreme Court order and signed them into law.[33] She disagreed with the Supreme Court ruling[34] and supported a democratic advisory vote from the public on whether there should be a constitutional amendment on the matter.[35] Alaska was one of the first U.S. states to pass a constitutional ban on gay marriage, in 1998, along with Hawaii.[36] Palin has stated that she supported the 1998 constitutional amendment.[11]

[…]

Palin is considered to have similar policy positions to John McCain in most respects. One major exception is drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), which Palin strongly supports and McCain has opposed. Palin is expected to try to convince McCain to change his position on ANWR drilling.[57]

Obviously, McCain is hoping to get the PUMA* vote. Palin is a Republican. An anti-choice, pro-death penalty, pro-creationism-teaching, pro-ANWR-drilling, gay-marriage-banning Republican**. Not exactly the best substitute for Hillary Clinton, is she, unless you're a Republican.

This is a good move, as I really don't think many people are looking at policy anymore (if they ever were), except for the Republican base, who will be comforted by her very strong Christian-conservative leanings. She's a former beauty pageant winner, relatively young, from the West, and has the correct primary sexual characteristics for the PUMA crowd.

Oh, and she's white. West Virginian Democrats should like that.

I think the rabidly anti-Obama PUMAs are going to do to this election what Nader's "Bush, Gore, they're both the same" supporters did to the 2000 election.

Get ready for a McCain-Palin White House, world!

____________________________
* PUMA, in case one or two of you are unaware, stands for "Party Unity, My Ass!" Yes, that is class, my friends. Ms. Rodham-Clinton must be so very proud.
** She's also a life-long avid hunter, so she just might pull another Cheney and shoot someone in the face. Can't wait for that Colbert Report episode!

Year of the Earth Rat

新年快樂!

Remy dit, “Gung hay fat choy, mes amis!”

Why I can't discuss politics with anyone

I'm getting a little sick of this.

I understand there are a number of my friends with whom I cannot discuss politics as my position on the Bush White House is counter to theirs. This means discussion can't be rational. (Personally, I believe those who swear to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States are required thereafter to do so. But, hey.)

I also can't discuss the merits (or lack thereof) of the field of Republican candidates with Republicans as I'm not on the political right in my leanings, I know how scientific method works and how it applies to the theory of evolution, and I don't think Reagan was the greatest president ever. Fine.

Yet I can't even discuss the Democratic candidates with Democrats. Why? Because it's not about policy, it's not about platforms, it's not about past actions. It's about a black man of 46 running against a white Boomer woman.

If I point out that it's racist to vote for a person simply because they're black, I'm an asshole. If I point out it's misogynist to vote for a person simply because they're female, I'm an asshole. If I point out that insulting someone because of their age is retarded, I'm an asshole. If I point out that ranting diatribes against all comers who aren't of the exact mindset as the ranter don't actually make a positive argument for a candidate, I'm an asshole.

I'm tired of being dismissed just because I want to discuss the issues on the table, education, health care, the wars (there's one in Afghanistan, too), the environment, our nation's ability to react to natural and man-made disasters, our natonal debt, the economy, rather than the gender, age, race or personality of the candidates. I don't give a shit how much someone does or does not spend on their hair, their house, their car, their clothes. I don't give a shit if I'd want to have a beer with them, or if they're sexually attractive. I'm looking for a President of the United States, damn it, not an American Idol or a senior class president.

This is just another reason for me to hate humanity. People suck. Suck hard. All they do is reinforce my growing mysanthropic tendencies with their irrational jerkiness.

They'd do themselves no end of good to watch C-SPAN more and listen to news bites and pundits less.

If this is true, it is most awesome

Adam Baldwin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Baldwin has a role as a voice actor in the Xbox 360 game Halo 3. He voices a marine in the game. He is joined in this capacity by former Firefly colleagues Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk. The personality each of these actors are given in the game match those from their characters in Firefly. At several points in the game he is heard to shout "Have a taste of Vera!", a direct reference to his gun in the show. The line "sure would be nice if we had some grenades," from the movie Serenity, also appears.

Happy Thanksgiving Eve

Some of my relatives have pretensions about not watching the football games. Even when Abraham Lincoln, who first declared Thanksgiving a federal holiday, watched the football that day, only he called it the Civil War. What was he supposed to do, make conversation with Samuel P. Chase? That would have been cruel and inhuman, but then that's what Thanksgiving is all about.

-Steven Goldman on watching football on Thanksgiving

I always think I'm going to enjoy Thanksgiving more than I actually do. At least my family knows how to make a nice, yummy, juicy turkey, unlike, apparently, every other white person's family out there.

~ ~  ~  ~  ~  ~ ~
That said, I enjoy listening to the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra play Strauss's waltzes far more than I probably should. There're probably few sights stranger than me dancing waltzes and polkas in my office chair seat.

Accidental patterns

I read four books over the long weekend (we get Veteran's Day off here), and just finished a fifth this morning (finishing it off made me late to work).

For some reason, the books fell into the following two categories (excluding the third, which was read super-fast in order to remind me what the heck had happened previously in the series):

Books One and Two:
Magic Fair Maiden Rescues Knight
Young women treated by condescending yet otherwise intelligent, charming and handsome men as unable to cope with dangerous situation due to their being female wind up rescuing the condescending males through understanding and use of magic/magic rituals.

Books Four and Five:
Bad Husband Attempts To Be Good Father
Early-thirty-something father copes with failed relationship with still-loved ex-wife and attempts to establish/maintain relationship with child resulting from failed marriage while considering his place in his family (natural and/or adopted)/society.

They were all five of them fantasy novels, the first two for young adults, and the last three for adults. Please note that the young women of the first set wind up marrying/otherwise being with the formerly-vaguely-misogynist-now-enlightened men, as that's apparently how it needs to happen in this trope. I have to admit that, while it is an over-used ending, it's an immensely satisfying one.

My favorite is still the one from the Harry Potter series: Young man goes through spiritual refinement in order to become good father. I could go on about alchemy and the whole hero's journey turning out to be the transformation of an average boy into a good father, but I'm at work and you'd probably find it boring. Still, hooray for J.K. Rowling!

This accidental set of pairs leaves me wondering what I should read next, as it seems I should be careful into what themes/memes/tropes I now dip my brain. I should probably start doing some more heavy lifting (Umberto Eco or something), but I'm lazy and am in the mood for lighter fare.

Falling in love

I was charmed by Pushing Daisies from the start of the first episode.

I swooned when they actually used the copious musical theater talents of Ms. Kristen Chenoweth when, a couple of weeks ago, they had her sing "Hopelessly Devoted To You" to herself while (mostly) alone in the pie shop.

Last night while watching the beginning of this week's episode, it occured to me, idle thought, that the show's producers, writers and directors had a real opportunity what with Ms. Chenoweth's character visiting the character played by Ms. Ellen Greene, another musical theater talent (she was the original Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors and has one hell of a set of pipes).

I then got goosebumps when, near the half-hour mark, Chenoweth started paraphrasing lines from They Might Be Giant's "Birdhouse in Your Soul," which is one of my favorite songs by the geektastic duo from Brooklyn.

And finally, I absolutely fell in love with Pushing Daisies, little hearts dancing around morphing into one giant heart surrounding all, when they came back from commercial to Chenoweth and Greene singing a duet of an abbreviated version of "BiYS."

Hooray for ABC picking up the whole season. Hooray, hooray, hooray!

A quiz? Why?Because it's Calvin & Hobbes, that's why.

Your Score: A Bit Of Both

You are 40% Calvin and 60% Hobbes

Calvin & Hobbes, like a scruffy yin and yang, are in perfect balance within you. Like Calvin, you're weird, a bit insecure, and can be a trouble-maker. But like Hobbes, you're down to earth and sensitive. It's a risk to say it here, after just a ten question test, but I'll bet you're smarter than most. Both Calvin and Hobbes are crafty, clever characters, and any one made from equal parts of each is a force to be reckoned with.

Link: The Calvin Or Hobbes Test written by gwendolynbooks on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Brain exercises for charity

Angela posted the following on her Facebook:

Vocabulary Game That's For Charity

All -
I found this novel game as it serves both giver and the recipient. Learn new words and for each correct answer logged they will donate rice for it.

Play. Learn. Feed.

http://www.freerice.com/index.php

-Ang

Hooray for feeding your brain and other's bellies at the same time!