Beth's Contradictory Brain

Late Night Convo

One thing that would give the most insight into my brain and my relationship with Nerdstar would be if I could post just one audio file of a conversation we have just before falling asleep. But that would mean finding a way to record those conversations and then being tech savy enough to post an it on this site. (Which means it'll never happen.)

Last night I was all ranting about Buffy and how I think the end of this season is going to piss me off. I think they might be intending to set up a spinoff instead of coming up with a way to end this series in a fanstastic way. And if that spinoff in any way highlights Dawn I'm going to be seriously pissed. Not only should that character never have existed - did Buffy really need a little sister? I think NOT - but that character should have beed dead several times over!! I hate Dawn! I don't think any other character on any other show has annoyed me just by their mere presence the way this one has!

Then I went on about how it was interesting that the two shows I watched last night, Buffy and 24, both threw out their fearless leaders. Weird.

Which, of course, led to a rant about Hillary Clinton and how much I hate her and think she is Satan incarnate and how I just might not be able to stand SIX more years of her being around. I mean, it's not like she's got the balls to run in 2004 against Bush. So we'll have to wait until 2008 for her to get her ass kicked - hopefully by Condi Rice. And since I still had Buffy on my mind, I could only picture a bleak future where Hillary actually wins the presidency and how it would end up looking like any of the horrible apocalypse that never quite happens on Buffy. Imagine just after the swearing in Hillary revealing her true form - with horns and hoofs and such, and the sky turning dark and all the usual evil takes over the world fanfare. I'd put my money on that scenario.

What does Nerdstar have to say in these conversations you might be thinking - unless it's remarks about food, she's usually just laughing at me.

Good Reading

Lots of good reading out there today:

Jane Galt writing about "The Two Cultures, which is to say, the scientific culture and the literary one" and how they differ in their methods of forming a backup for their statements. (Or something like that.)

Robin Goodfellow (found via Instapundit) has two good posts. This one on a shift in political parties (which I can only hope comes to pass!) And this one with more on the sodomy laws.

The Dynamist has this post about equal protection and sodomy and gays is another good one. If you scroll down there are more great posts.

I'm not a disgusting freak

I think what's frustrating me these days with the remarks of straight people about gays is partly the tone of self-righteousness they take. As if only gay people do deviant things in our bedrooms or elsewhere. If the so-called "reality" shows about marriage aren't enough to prevent casting that first stone, I don't know what the hell would be!

But I was trying to think of another group of people that has been subjected to this kind of disgust and revulsion. The usual comparison is race, and the civil rights movement and such. I think it's actually much closer to the way people with mental illnesses have been treated throughout history. If I were still in college, that'd make a great paper! The psychiatric community might have declared homosexuality isn't a mental illness, but society at large still has it's doubts about that. The only other comparison I can think of is lepers. Maybe that's a holdover from the 80s, early 90s when AIDS was a bigger scare.

The other frustrating thing is that I'm not reading these things on sites of uninformed, illiterate, religous bigoted sites. But there is a definite underlying disgust factor among straight people regarding gays.

So, for my straight readers - how prevelant is the idea that homosexuality is disgusting among people you know?

And for my gay readers - is there a realistic way to change that perception? (Do you think it's a prevelant idea among people you know?)

Being Pissy

I read a hell of a lot of blogs every day. I read all of those over there listed as daily reads, travel around the Dykewrite rings, follow links on those pages, and then some. And it's frustrating as hell feeling like I don't fit in in this huge thing known as the blogsphere - which seems a pretty accurate reflection of my real world life as well. (Back to the whole conservative lesbian thing.)

And I'm getting pissed about reading along thru someone's posts and nodding along in agreement over 90% of their writing and learning about new topics and then running across crap like this:

Oh, of course, at the bottom of the story we get to the real issue of why nudity in public places is so important:

A Seattle Police spokeswoman could not be reached for
immediate comment. Local police generally have tolerated nudity
at adult events like Mardi Gras or Gay Pride festivities and
typically look the other way at the solstice parade, slated
this year for June 17. [emphasis added]
I keep hearing that homosexuals are just like other people. Right.

I followed a link from Instapundit to read that guy's stuff on money management. That was some pretty basic, good info. So this crap just seems petty to me. I'm not even sure I understand the point of the whole post... but his final line sums up his attitude loud and clear.

Then, over on another blog, Number 2 Pencil, about psychometricians and standardized testing, I come across a post called "Queering The Schools". You'll have to scroll down, her permalink didn't work. Now, I agree that parents should be the ones teaching kids about respect and kindness and such, but is it really so terrible an idea that gay kids might need a little protection and support?

There was a story on Lucianne the other day about sexually transmitted diseases and the great risk of them at gay pride events and such. Because, you know, events like Mardi Gras certainly don't increase anyone's risk of STDs.

Maybe I'm just being sensitive after all the Santorum crap. But it seems like for a bunch of open minded writers/bloggers, gays are usually an open target.

Tempting

Nerdstar and I have had XM Satelite Radio in her car for over a year now. I thought it was such a cool idea I bought stock in both XM and Sirius. (XM is finally picking up it's stock price, Sirius I doubt ever will.) I've been frustrated that it's so expensive and really has been only for cars. They're starting to manufacture more "mobile" units, but nothing great yet. But, today I found this XM component for the computer. Tempting, very tempting. I really don't like listening to radio and I get sick of listening to all my cds at work. This could be just the answer.

New Week

It's another hectic day at work today. I'm going to refrain from ranting about deadlines and idiots who can read, follow directions, or meet deadlines.

My weekend was pretty relaxing. Friday night I got to meet up with an old friend. That was really cool. Saturday I spent most of the day riding around on my motorcycle running a couple of errands and trying to decide just how badly I wanted a new motorcycle. I found one I liked and decided to try getting approved for a loan, but no luck. I didn't figure I'd get approved. About five years ago I just stopped paying about 12K in credit card debts. In about two more years I'll have a clean credit report. I could have Nerdstar co-sign with me if I really wanted a new bike, but I decided I can live without one. Mostly because I'm cheap. I hate spending lots of money - I can and I do sometimes, but it stresses me out. So instead of a new motorcycle, I'm going to see about getting mine painted.

Yesterday I didn't do much. I watched the Rangers finally beat the Yankees!! Then I watched more of season 2 of Buffy. So far I'm not impressed with the running commentaries. Marti Noxon was obnoxious!

Now that the work week has started I'm mostly just counting down till the weekend. My nephew turns 2 on the 3rd, so we're headed to Dallas this weekend to see him. I can't wait!!

One more about Santorum

Andrew writes today: Of course, the hostility directed toward the intimate lives of gay people by Senator Santorum affects me more deeply, because I am gay. How could it not? Being gay my whole life is a huge blessing but also, of course, a difficult path. To try and reconcile it with a faith that is deep but a Church that refuses to support the innermost longings of my body and soul is not easy either. To square it with a belief in individual freedom and limited government, when so many of my gay brethren have embraced a wounded rejection of all traditional authority, and backed a radical politics in its stead, is not exactly a cakewalk either. To attempt both, and then to see that people you admire or support can actually endorse criminalizing you for expressing physical love in private, or see no problem with others' saying so, or see adult gay love casually associated with the abuse of children and not notice, is so downright dispiriting it's enough to make you despair.

Exactly. I don't think straight people, even those who are accepting of homosexuality, can understand the sense of discrimination and sometimes persecution gays feel. Some try to equate racism and the civil rights movement with the gay position today. But it always comes up that race isn't a choice, sexuality is. I'm not getting into that arguement here. But I think that there is a prevailing feeling that homosexuality is a choice, and since you don't look different than me (unless you make a concerted effort), so why the hell can't you just keep your sexuality to yourself. If you'd just keep it to yourself you wouldn't have these problems.

As a white woman who doesn't look "gay" it's usually hard to explain to people that I know what discrimination feels like. And I thank God that I've lived in cities where it's no big deal to go out in public with my girlfriend. But that doesn't mean I don't pick up on people's curious at best or disapproving looks.

Then Santorum's remarks take that a step further - he wants to make us criminals. And none of this would be sparking the debate is has this week if there wasn't a significiant part of the population that agreed with his words.

Andrew goes on to say: Look, it's possible to tolerate differences of opinion within the Republican party over homosexuality. It's absolutely legitimate for some religious people to hold that gay sex is immoral, or to oppose marriage rights, and so on. I can happily live with that, and benefit from the dialogue. I defend their right to believe it and to say it. We can agree to disagree. But Santorum has gone far further than disagreement. He let it slip that he believes gays should be put in jail for our relationships. I'm sorry but that kind of statement is unacceptable, non-negotiable, intolerable. The Senator must withdraw it. I worry that the president means well but just doesn't get it. So let me put it another way: Senator Santorum believes that the vice-president's daughter should be made a criminal for her relationship. A criminal. Now do you see what I mean?

We hear so much about the separation of church and state when it comes to flags and the pledge and the dollar and prayers in schools. But I haven't heard it mentioned this week when it truly should be. Santorum's ideas are exactly what the separation of church and state is all about. It's about protecting people from the sort of persecution he's advocating.

Even strict Catholics who believe homosexual sex is a grave sin nevertheless draw the Thomist distinction between sins and crimes. Just because something may be a sin doesn't mean it should mean jail. In fact, many things - especially in the private realm - fall into that category. But by arguing for the criminalization of gay sex, Santorum goes beyond even the traditional position and heads for a theocratic one. The more he seems to represent the face of the Republican party, the more fair-minded people will simply leave it, fear it, or vote against it. As they should.

I hope this issue doesn't get swept under the rug. I hope people within the Republican party will face this issue head on and come out with a clear inclusive message. I'm not sure at this point they realize just how many votes they can loose by letting this anti-gay sentiment stand.

Personally, I could never vote for Democrats. Now my other two choices, Libertarians and Republicans are sucking too.

So Proud

I'm so proud, my little blog is finally ready to be traded on Blogshares :-) It's starting out at $13.16 a share - which I'm sure will only go down from there! As for my portfolio - I'm selling what I have as long as they're worth more than I bought them for so that I can take more than the initial $500 cash into the live trading May 1.

Political Parties

I was saying to Nerdstar at dinner the other night that it pisses me off to no end to have to choose between a party that wants to take all of my money and give it to someone else and acts like a nanny (ie Bloomberg's smoking laws - which are spreading everywhere) and a party that wants to let me keep my money and succeed but just can't seem to get over wanting to set the morals for everyone.

I shouldn't have to choose between voting my pocket and voting my bedroom!

A true independent party needs to emerge that is based on limited government, individual rights, a free market and so on. Where is the person who can lead such a party?? Why are we all so locked into this two party system and then not even really participating in it? I guess the people who would make up a true independent party are too busy just living an independent life to get involved. But when you hear remarks like Senatorum's it should be a wake up call.

If you're still interested in just how evil Santorum is, The Light of Reason has more than enough reading for you to do.

Friday

I don't think I've mentioned recently how much I love riding my motorcycle! It's still the best way to start my day, by riding to work. And even if I were to never listen to Ani again, everytime I ride I have the line "i'll keep my hands warm in your pockets, you can use the engine blocks" in my head.

Nerdstar is on her way to Houston for the weekend. This isn't going to be a fun weekend for her because she's getting together with her aunts and uncles to work out family "what if" stuff that came about because of her grandfather's stroke.

My weekend will consist of watching some baseball (Rangers), basketball (Mavericks) and hockey (Stars) and then more of my Buffy second season dvds. I also have to go get my motorcycle inspected and tuned up. Other than that I just want to sleep!! This week at work has been frantic.

Gay Rant

For all of you who aren't home during the day, and forgot to set your vcr's and tivo's to record daytime tv's first lesbian kiss - well, I sucked it up and recorded it and watched it for you! Considering it was on a soap opera, and taking into account that means it'll be cheesy and melodramatic and such, it wasn't bad. At least the one lesbian is sure of herself and her sexuality.

The best lesbian scene on tv to me will always be the high school girls on Once and Again. It was so sweet and touching and honest.

But, what pissed me off about All My Children was this need networks have to put up all these dire warnings about adult content when there's going to be a lesbian (or gay I assume) kiss or plotline. I mean, come on, with all the adultry, murder, and other totally evil plotlines on daytime tv, we really need a special warning that two women are going to be fully clothed in a public place and kiss??

Which leads me to my rant about this current round of public hysteria (on both sides) prompted by Rick Santorum's comments.

I'd be MUCH more impressed with people who feel the need to defend the "institution of marriage" from all us wretched deginerates if the institution of marriage was something worth defending. If the divorce rate was less than 50%, if the rate of adultry wasn't probably even higher. If the rate of child abuse by those wonderful man/woman parents wasn't so damn high. I mean really now, can adding gay marriage and gay parents into this really make it worse?? NO So, get off your damn self righteous high horse and address reality for a minute. I'd also be impressed if these defenders of "the family" would just come clean about their true feelings and fears and prejudices. But if they can't even be honest, well, then there can't be a true public debate on the issues can there?

As Andrew Sullivan and Stanley Kurtz and others have written about, Santorum's remarks are being taken out of context. (Andrew has a fantastic and much more well stated point about all of this!)

But, what Santorum really intends is even more evil than what he's being accused of. In his statement, Santorum gives a number examples, all different, yet all cases in which he claims that the government has some legitimate interest in regulating sexuality. Sen. Santorum is obviously concerned that, if the Supreme Court rules that the state has no right to regulate sexuality in the case of sodomy, a court might someday deny the state the right to regulate even incest. Fine, he's welcome to his opinions. But as an elected representative he's going to be held accountable for those opinions.

Stanley Kurtz's article also goes on to talk about the media's part in this Santorum fiasco - it's definitely worth reading!

I think the next ten or twenty years will bring about real change regarding family and marriage. And I don't believe it will be in the direction people like Santorum want it to go. I think the laws and courts and public policy will have to move toward (and already are) protecting gays and lesbians in their relationships and parenting.

Happy Anniversary Baby!

It's been four years. Wow. And what a crazy four years it's been. We've lived in three places. I'm on my fouth job, and you, well, we've lost count! You're on your third car, I got a motorcycle. We started off with just my Silly cat, now we have Little Man and Ramen - just a small part of your third world special dream!

Thru it all I'm so glad I've had you around. You make me laugh. And you take care of me so much more than I deserve. I don't know what I'd do without my Nerdstar Snuggle Bunny. I love and appreciate you more than you know.

Upate: Awwwww.... I just got the most beautiful set of tulips and a little box of Godiva chocolates delivered to my office. My co-workers are so jealous :-)

Blogshares

I'm trying to figure out this Blogshares thing. I've registered and set up an account and bought a few blogs, but can't get it to find mine. Maybe tomorrow I'll get it all figured out.

Ok, I got it to at least acknowledge my site exists. That's a good start :-)

Breaking Even

I think the best part of Monday morning, especially after being away from most of the news and from my computer most of the weekend, is catching up on all the personal blogs I read. It's so nice that so many people accomodate my voyeur side :-)

This gambling trip played out just like so many of the others. We got to the casino about 10 pm Saturday and spent until 3 am losing the money we brought to gamble with. We got back to the hotel to find Ramen right in the middle of the king size bed. He looked up at us like "hey, how ya doin'?"

So, because Nerdstar refuses to leave a casino without at least winning her money back, we headed back over there about noon on Sunday. Thankfully, we ended up at another lucky craps table and won our money back.

We really need to do fewer trips with more money and more time to sleep and relax!!

Other than that not much new going on this week. I'm just trying to stay upright at work today until I can go home and take a nap!!

Weekend

In thirty more minutes this boring ass day at work will finally be done! Woohoo!

Nerdstar had to take both cats and the dog to the vet, I'm still waiting to hear how that went :-) Fortunately the dog is well behaved. The cats, well, we got a crate big enough to be able to throw them both in and then just shut the door.

Tonight we're having Rudy's bbq for dinner and then who knows. The weather is a little on the humid side, but nice. Maybe we'll ride the motorcycle to dinner and then go ride around.

Tomorrow she's dragging me to Louisiana to go gamble some more. Who I am to tell my girl no?

So if I don't post until Monday it's all good. You all should be out having fun anyway!!

Cards

This seems more than appropriate for the Easter weekend. Get Out of Hell Free cards.

(found on boingboing.)

Sleep Depravation

I found this cool study on BoingBoing.

Results:Chronic restriction of sleep periods to 4 h or 6 h per night over 14 consecutive days resulted in significant cumulative, dose-dependent deficits in cognitive performance on all tasks. Subjective sleepiness ratings showed an acute response to sleep restriction but only small further increases on subsequent days, and did not significantly differentiate the 6 h and 4 h conditions. Polysomnographic variables and d power in the non- REM sleep EEG—a putative marker of sleep homeostasis—displayed an acute response to sleep restriction with negligible further changes across the 14 restricted nights. Comparison of chronic sleep restriction to total sleep deprivation showed that the latter resulted in disproportionately large waking neurobehavioral and sleep d power responses relative to how much sleep was lost. A statistical model revealed that, regardless of the mode of sleep deprivation, lapses in behavioral alertness were nearlinearly related to the cumulative duration of wakefulness in excess of 15.84 h (s.e. 0.73 h).

Conclusions:Since chronic restriction of sleep to 6 h or less per night produced cognitive performance deficits equivalent to up to 2 nights of total sleep deprivation, it appears that even relatively moderate sleep restriction can seriously impair waking neurobehavioral functions in healthy adults. Sleepiness ratings suggest that subjects were largely unaware of these increasing cognitive deficits, which may explain why the impact of chronic sleep restriction on waking cognitive functions is often assumed to be benign. Physiological sleep responses to chronic restriction did not mirror waking neurobehavioral responses, but cumulative wakefulness in excess of a 15.84 h predicted performance lapses across all four experimental conditions. This suggests that sleep debt is perhaps best understood as resulting in additional wakefulness that has a neurobiological “cost” which accumulates over time. mail: vdongen@mail.med.upenn.edu.

Evil looking Good

I'm not sure why it took me so long to become a Buffy fan. Several years ago I read all of the books in Anne Rice's vampire series. They stunned me. I was a devout Christian when I first read them and was amazed at how the stories seemed to jive with my ideas of good and evil, God and Satan, redemption and so on. So I guess Buffy struck me as too "unserious" at first, maybe it was the high school setting. Now that I've got the first season on dvd, I'm really enjoying watching it.

But now that I'm watching the last few weeks of Angel, and the last couple of seasons of Buffy I'm completely impressed with how they're really showing the idea that the big EVIL will not show up as evil but will come dressed up as the very epitome of good and love and peace. Well, at least on Angel. And the completely evil preacher dude on Buffy this week was fantastic.

In both Rice's books and these two tv shows, the idea of redemption is played out over and over again. The idea for Rice seems to be that vampires rarely have a choice about being a vampire (at least her main dude Lestat didn't), and yet they are condemned as evil regardless.

I'm not sure I ever related to a character in a book as much as I did Lestat in Memnoch the Devil. His whole search, quest, question is for his own redemption - can he, evil as he is, be redeemed? In my struggles between my faith and my homosexuality, I felt just like Lestat.

And yet, when I watch Buffy, I so want to be the "chosen" one type. In all it's separateness, loneliness and all. I love watching the epic stories of good vs. evil, the end of the world, and all that.

Embeded Reporter

This article by an embeded reporter is great.

Barbara Ferguson, Arab News War Correspondent:

AT AN AIR BASE IN KUWAIT, 16 April 2003 — People are curious about being embedded in the Marines. This is my effort to set the record straight. Some readers suspect I was subjected to propaganda while living with these men and women. There was no propaganda campaign. If there had been, there would have been no embeds. Journalists wrote their own stories, and made their own interview requests and interviews. The Marines’ “PAOs” (public affairs officers) would set up the meetings, but not oversee them.

Why? Let me give you a few examples, all of which deal with generosity of spirit.

(found on Instapundit)

Sad but funny

A north Texas teenager joined his friends in the middle of the night to shoot frogs out of a potato gun. Yee-ha! The gun failed to go off. The kid looked down the barrel, whereupon the thing fired. The ballistic frog hit the kid in the face, breaking bones in his skull and permanently blinding him.

(Found on The Corner)

I don't know why stories like this that are, in fact, sad crack me up. Maybe it's that it was FROGS they were using.

UPDATE:
Here's a link to more of the story in the Ft. Worth paper. Reading the whole story doesn't strike me as being as funny, but some of the parental quotes are disturbing. I'll let you decide which ones.

Images and Debate

Let's see if I can tie a few ideas together.

While I was waiting to hear Andrew last night, I spent some time just hanging out on the UT campus watching all the people walk by. They all looked so serious and not very happy. Then there's all the various clothing styles, although when it came to footware half were in flip flops and half were in tennis shoes. So, I got to thinking again about how our exterior is supposed to in some way reflect our interior. Yet we all just end up trying to look like each other. Even when piercings and tattoos became popular again, it was just that, popular, and not a real statement of who we are as individuals. I always have to wonder how many other people are like me and feel like their outside doesn't represent their inside very well. Especially since we're all so guilty of judging books by covers.

Then, there was this big plywood construction that had little color posters saying "P0rn is Bad" and people were encouraged to write their thoughts on these big boards. Naturally, it was filled with all the usual lines from each side of this argument - either that p0rn degrades women blah blah blah, or p0rn is liberating blah blah blah.

Which brings me to the whole concept of blogging and communication and idea exchanges. There rarely seems to be any true discourse. People either stick with sites they agree with all the content on. Or, they go visit sites they completely disagree with, but instead of tyring to make valid arugments and bring up alternate views, it usually decays into name calling and such.

What ever happened to the true art of debate? Every once in a while I'll leave the channel on Crossfire or some such shoutfest and wonder why they can't make the program longer and more orderly and actually have a civilized debate. I know, no one would watch such a thing. So isn't that where blogs can take up the slack? There's been talk of group blogs, wouldn't it be fantastic if there really could be an ongoing debate of ideas between different ideologies - gay/straight, liberal/conservative and such on given blogs? I have seen a few efforts by the writers at National Review and the New Republic do something like this, but not very frequently or anything.

Hell, I'd just be happy with comments on this site :-)

Andrew Live

I was fortunate enough tonight to be able to go hear Andrew Sullivan give a short (too short) lecture on blogging at the University of Texas. Back on April 10 of last year part of my post was: "My absolute favorite (blogger) for quite a while now is Andrew Sullivan. It's so wonderful to find a rational, articulate, conservative but not overly so, religious in a good way, gay man online. There aren't too many people like that period, and to be able to read his mind every day is a breath of fresh air. " It's still true. His was one of the very first sites I started reading a couple of years ago, now.

It was wonderful to put a live voice and face to the words I read every day. He's absolutely charming. And he's still in my top 5 people I'd like to have dinner with sometime.

He mostly spoke about his background in journalism and how he got into blogging. He talked about the influence, especially politically, of the blogsphere. That's a topic I'd give anything to see a panel of Andrew, Glenn Reynolds, James Lileks, Druge, and the writers of The Corner really hash out for a couple of hours.

Oh well. I'm off to watch the Buffy episode I recorded.

Day By Day Cartoon

I should have linked to this cartoon strip a long time ago!
Day by Day by Chris Muir.

Masked Politician

Maybe Jesse Ventura should have tried this.
TOKYO (Reuters) - Who is that masked man? One of Japan's newest politicians.
A professional wrestler who fought his way to victory in local assembly elections under his ring name and wearing his trademark mask has vowed the mask will not leave his face even after he enters the staid halls of Japanese politics.

"This is my face," the wrestler -- known as "The Great Sasuke" -- was quoted by the Nikkan Sports newspaper as saying of his black and white full-face mask with bright scarlet streaks and golden wings by the eye holes.

(also found over on BoingBoing)

How cool!

May 3 is Free Comics Day. Who knew? (found over on BoingBoing)

Monday

It was nice to have a relaxing, quiet, uneventful weekend! At least for me anyway. I spent Saturday and Sunday afternoons while Nerdstar was at drill watching the first season of Buffy dvds. I love dvds!

Saturday night we went to dinner and then spent a couple of hours at Barnes and Noble reading books.

I am amazed and thrilled that those 7 POWs were found alive and well!! I can't begin to imagine why the Iraqi's not only didn't kill them, but apparently took decent (given the circumstances) care of them. And it's cool that once again it was local Iraqi's that showed other soldiers where the POWs were.

Now it's Monday and just another week at work.

Friday Night

It's about 9 pm and I'm waiting for Nerdstar to get back from Houston. Thru all of her efforts to get a job with the DEA, one of the agents in Houston called her this week to see if she was interested in doing some freelance translation work. It's close to two weeks of her regular job's pay for a day of work. Actually, she didn't have to be in Houston until 1, and then for break her took her to dinner. Not bad. I think it's totally cool and hope more opportunities like this come up!

This weekend she has reserves drill, since she's just about the only army reservist still in the country. I plan on sleeping very very late and then watching the first season of Buffy on dvd!

Honestly though, we'd both rather be back at a casino this weekend :-)

Unfortunately, it'll be a few weeks before we can head over to Louisiana and give them our money.

Life isn't too bad these days. There are lots of possibilities in the next two or three months. As always I wish I had a crystal ball.

Where you get your news

Now, maybe more than ever, it is important which media you're getting information from. This story about the information regarding the torture going on in Iraq that CNN journalists had and kept silent about is horrible in so many ways. Is this really the state of journalism today?

Funny Bunnies

You HAVE to go right now and see this cartoon!! Trust me!

History In My Lifetime

History seems to be happening all the time. I'm old enough to remember the Berlin Wall coming down, but I wasn't old enough at the time to really understand it's impact. Although I remember being absolutely terrified of an atomic bomb going off and obliterating everything, the Cold War and it's reality for the people suffering under Communism wasn't real to me.

Even the Challenger disaster didn't really register with me, although I was in high school.

So the first historical event to truly make an impact on me was 9/11.

And then there was yesterday. At work I was reading and hearing about the fall of SH's statue in Baghdad, but it wasn't until I got home from work and saw it all on tv that I couldn't hold back the tears.

I simply cannot imagine what it must be like to live your life in real terror and fear and then have the day come when those who terrorized you are no longer in power over you. I try to imagine it. I try to read as many stories of what the Iraqis are saying as I can.

I can't express how deeply I wish I were a braver person. If I were I'd be on a plane to Iraq to help in any way possible the rebuilding of that country. To help bring the internet and communication and education and just plain old fun to people who so desperately deserve it.

There are people out there who would say I'm just being an arrogant American. And while I probably am an arrogant American, I still believe that freedom is something everyone is this world should have.

I hope and pray the people of Iraq embrace freedom and don't let more thugs into power. I try to wrap my brain around all of the things required to start a new democracy, a new economy and everything else. Wow. The task of starting sort of from scratch, but not really. How do you hire policemen and set up laws when the people are so used to the police being the bad guys?

I've read a little about the rebuilding in Afghanistan. I saw a documentary on how they developed and established a new currency and such. I wish the media would do more stories about how well things are going over there, and even the problems they've had so we (the general public) would have a better idea of some of the things the future hold for Iraq.

Well - here's to a new day in Iraq.

Robots

Here are some pics of robots from the Robodex 2003 Fashion Show in Japan. I found this link over at BoingBoing - where all the cool stuff is! Every once in a while I'll read or watch something on tv about robots and AI. Most of what's in my head about such things is from the limited amount of sci fi I read years ago and all the typical movies. I think it would be ultra cool and very weird to have a robot to clean my house and such. I also think something like that will be very affordable for my kids.

I did see one documentary on AI recently where the people building and programming the robots really did interact with them as if they were human - and that weirded me out.

Lileks on the children's prison

Here's Lileks take on the children's prison in Iraq:

Allied troops liberated a children’s jail today.

A daisy chain of snakes biting their tales. Look up at the portrait hanging on the wall. Ask yourself what he wants. Bite harder.

I will never begin to understand truly evil people. It's hard enough wrapping my mind around the fact of their existence even with so much evidence throughout history.

Iraqi children freed from jail

In case you were still wondering why we're fighting a war in Iraq, here's just one damn good reason. Killing SH with one big bomb seems way too nice to me, but I'll take it if I have to.

Bleh

I played hookey from work today. Just didn't feel like being there. I've had this job for almost three years, and I go thru phases like this where I just can't get my butt out of bed and get there. Sometimes I feel like I'm caught in a stupid cycle with this job. But I've written about that crap before and won't bore you again.

All I can say is thank God moods aren't permanent.

I think our dog is turning into a cat. All he does is sleep all the time like they do. He even lays in the same sunny spots in the spare bedroom they do. We think he's hoping that eventually the cats will think he's one of them and play with him. Unfortunately, I don't think it's going to work.

That's it. That's all I've got today.

Monday

I guess the good thing about my Monday morning is that it isn't snowing. Then again, if it were actually snowing in Austin in April, I sure as hell wouldn't be at work. And I really don't want to be at work today. Today's one of those days I'm really feeling the need for change, but the job market sucks too much to achieve any change.

This weekend was just what I needed though. Friday Nerdstar was very nice and took my car for an oil change. Then when I got home she washed it, too! We went to the grocery store and then had Chinese food for dinner. I guess it is kinda silly to eat dinner at a restaurant with groceries in the car.

Saturday we got up and took the dog to the park. It's so fun to watch him run around with all the other dogs. There's a big creek he likes to run around in, but he won't swim in the deep parts. He almost had to swim though when he fell into deeper water! When we got home we grilled some steaks and watched basketball. Oh, and napped, naps are good!

Yesterday I took the money I brought back from Vegas and went clothes shopping. I hate clothes shopping! And that's all I'm saying about that. I did find some sorts and a couple of shirts. But these days I can't even find any fun shoes. Ugh. Last night was more basketball. (I'm only watching it all because the Longhorns were playing.) Man, the UT Longhorn women should have won!!

And now we're back to it being Monday.

Nice People

It's Friday afternoon and I only have three more hours of work. Thank God! I'm almost rested from last weekend, it'll be fanatstic to sleep late tomorrow.

This weekend is an about the town weekend. Groceries, laundry, new shoes, dog park, basketball, restuarants, those sorts of things.

The thing taking up most of my thoughts this week has been - where are all the nice people? I've written before about how I used to have some great friends and how they all fell by the wayside. I've written about being more of a misanthrope the last few years. But starting with watching all of the masses of people in Vegas last weekend, I noticed that not very many people look like nice people. And even in Vegas there weren't that many who looked like they were having a genuinely good time. (Being stupid ass drunk doesn't count.)

Is it just me? Do you ever look at a stranger and think, hey, they look like someone I'd like to be friends with? (Not someone you'd like to hook up with or date, but be friends with.)

Or how many people are even nice/polite to strangers anymore? That's something I try to be, even just saying "thanks" to employees at stores I go to, or opening doors for strangers, smiling and waving at little kids in stores.

I try not to be jaded, but it's hard sometimes.

Blog Anniversary

The other day I was checking all my links to make sure they work, and sure enough, I'd lost my Diaryland archives. I thought, no big deal. But fortunately I saved all those entries as a Word document. So, today at work I set up a new html page to put them in and made the link.

Tonight I got to transferring it and realized I started all this online stuff last April 2. Wow.

2002-04-02
3:05 p.m.
Take 2
Life in my little part of the world is good today. April in Texas is nice, ok when it's not raining, which it's not today. In less than an hour I'm out of this place called work and headed home to walk our new dog, Ramen (yes named after ramen noodles. My chinese girlfriend is a noodlehead!). After having only lived with cats in the past, it's fun to see just how easy it is to make a dog happy!
The cats on the other hand are not at all happy. My cat, Silly, still hasn't forgiven me for either my girlfriend moving in three years ago OR bringing home another kitten, Little Man, two years ago. She's still talking to me, which is good after the dog's been there for a week.
I hate to start off as a woman writing about her pets when there are so many other topics - the state of the world, television shows, other websites. Guess I'll get to it all in good time.

That was my very boring first entry. (well, ok, the very first one was a test post.)

Can't say I've gotten more interesting, but I do enjoy keeping this blog going. It seems like a lot of time has passed since that first entry, but mostly my life is the same, and for that I'm grateful.

Cool or Creepy?

Tiny molecular daggers that latch onto fibres stab and destroy microbes have been created, meaning "killer clothes" may soon be available. Anti-fungal socks could take on athlete's foot while, on a more serious note, military uniforms could kill anthrax.

Read the whole story, it's fascinating. Found on BoingBoing.

Most Boring Blog

While I know I can be boring sometimes - I've got nothing on this one. It's truly hilarious!

Hodgepodge

I was so nice to just be a slug on my sofa and watch tv last night. Although, it was kinda weird to go back and forth between "I love the 80's" on VH1 and the breaking news of the rescued POW on Fox. I graduated high school in '86, and it's just so hard to believe that was almost 20 years ago. I can't say those were the good ole days, not that they were bad, but life is better now.

My eyes tear up everytime I think about PFC Lynch and her being rescued. If Nerdstar had been called up to go over to Iraq, she might have a similar job since they both do supply. I can't imagine ten days in an Iraqi hospital after being shot and having both legs and an arm broken. It'll be fascinating to hear why she was in a hospital and not just killed.

It's also amazing to me that bravery and heroism never die out.

Poor Ramen seemed so sad yesterday when I got home from work. Normally he lays by the sofa while I watch tv, or occasionally chases the cats around or runs outside to bark at who knows what. But yesterday he just stayed in the bedroom by the bed. Nerdstar had picked him up from the kennel yesterday morning. We just can't figure out if he's sad because we were gone too long, or because he had to come home from having fun at the kennel. Where's the pet psychic when you need her?

Whew

The trip to Vegas was so exhausting I'm almost glad to be back at my desk where it's quiet and sorta relaxing. I can't remember another four days I slept so little or walked so much. That's Vegas for ya.

Can I just say I don't understand the way people act when they're traveling. I swear I don't know how some of them manage to get out their front door and to the airport, much less plan and go on a vacation. Mingling with them are the people who think they own the world and every line should part like the Red Sea so they don't have to wait like mere mortals.

Other than winning back the money we'd been losing (details to follow) the best part of being in Vegas was the near complete detachment from reality. Four days of not thinking about work or the war (except to check the news in the mornings to make sure the whole world hadn't been blown up) was just what I needed.

The immutable law of gambling where Nerdstar and I are concerned is that you must spend all of your days slowly but surely loosing money only to spend all night your last night winning it back. Except for the $40 that turned into $200 playing roulette, every time we were at a blackjack or craps table we'd lose. But I guess it's fortunate that Nerdstar is a stubborn addict and can't be dragged away from a casino until she gets lucky.

Sunday night was really the highlight of the trip. Friday was played a little, ate a little, watched some basketball and lost half our gambling money! Saturday we walked and walked and walked and watched a little basketball. Sunday night at our blackjack table were a couple of British guys, one of them is a rugby player. They were fun to get to know. We tried to teach them craps, but no luck. It took a while but between blackjack and roulette I finally called it quits on gambling for this trip. I had enough cash to help get the dog out of the kennel, take a taxi to the hotel and then to the airport, and get some breakfast before the flight. But Nerdstar was relentless. About 1 am she finds a craps table she likes and takes her last $40 and plays. Forty-five minutes into it she's doing ok and the table seems to be on a roll (no pun intended). So I borrow $20 in chips from her and the guy hits the point right off. Ok, nice start for a change.

An hour later that same guy is STILL rolling and everyone at that table walks away with about ten times as much money as they started with. For some of them they went from 2 or 3 hundred to 3 or 4 thousand - in an hour! I went from $20 to $400 - winning back the amount I'd started with Friday morning. Which is why we're addicts - you just never know when that incredible roll is going to come around.

Watching March Madness in Vegas was fun. It's great to watch a game on huge screens with fans of both teams yelling and clapping. Especially when UT kicks everyone's butt!! Go Longhorns!!

But, it's nice to be home, nice that at least our pets missed us.

We have to go back to Vegas in September, Nerdstar's sister is getting married there. I just took the money I won and set it aside to play with again then.