A Clarification, Two Reviews und Drei Wunschen

One Clarification.
Yesterday after pondering more about my sadness about Hussein's execution, I have decided I know where the bulk of the sadness comes from. And it's entirely selfish. I like warning. I need slightly longer foreshadowing at best. I need the cop to snicker about how he's retiring in a week, so when he gets shot at the top of act one, I'm not surprised. Hussein was convicted and sentenced a month ago, but we only learned of the imminence of his execution 12 hours prior to it. I'm an American. I'm used to people spending years on death row. Maybe that's what I'm umphed about: too short a notice. I couldn't find anything to wear.

Two Reviews. (I'll try to keep both brief.)

Honey and I took in The Holiday, yesterday afternoon. This movie should've been subtitled Where's Franzen's "The Corrections", because at some point I noticed that every scene that included books in the background, included that iconic spine or bookcover subtly placed to tickle the viewer's subconcious. That subliminal commercial aside, this film was a fun, forumulaic jaunt which still managed to seem new-ish. It asked Jack Black to tone his mania down (which he does palatably), Cameron Diaz to play a grown up (something she still needs help with) and Kate Winslet and Jude Law to do what they do best - namely play their default charming characters. Winslet fully invests herself into this performance and brings grace and honesty to a character a lesser actress (Kate Hudson, for instance) would have simply played as a mildly clumsy, less than lovable loser. Diaz plays somewhere between her Charlie's Angels ditz and her catty bride from Very Bad Things. Her performance is overall decent, but there are scenes where you can here the phone ringing when she opens her mouth. It makes me miss the years when she worked harder like she did in Things and The Last Supper. Nonetheless, her character was emotionally repressed enough that even in the few scenes where she checked out, it was believable. Casting Black as a film composer worked well, if for no other reason than we Jack Black fans would love to hear what Black would come up with for an honest-to-goodness film score one of these days. He played at a comfortable pace a la Shallow Hal, but less jokey and we got to see some of his nerdy "tenacity" in the Blockbuster video scene. Scroo-ba-doo-be-doo. Jude Law - sigh. What is there to say? He could play against a box of Cheerios and convince you he was desperately in love with it. His character was total emotional girl-porn: a suave, but slightly dangerous British hottie (hence Law); a book editor; a great father, and he's a widower. Characters like that pass GO and collect $200 from female moviegoers the instant they open their mouthes. I'm not really going to go into the plot because once you know the set up - two broken hearted women from across the Atlantic trade homes at Christmas and find love on the others' shores - you know the plot for the most part. What kept the script refreshing, though was Diaz's character's inability or personal refusal to completely reciprocate and the non-courtship of Black and Winslet. As romantic comedies go, this was one of the best I'd seen in a long time. There are scenes that will continue to replay in my head, so that's good. Honey and I enjoyed it so much, I think we'll buy it and add it to our Christmas Romance Movies list, which right now only includes Love Actually. I guess we'll need to broaden it. We're welcome to any suggestions.

Last night at home, we took in Why We Fight, the 2005 documentary exploration into the fulfillment of the military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us against in his departing speech from the Oval Office. It was incredible. Very well crafted. Immensely riveting. These days, I really try to pay attention to crafting of a story as well as to the information in documentaries. The film opens with a NY father describing the events of 9/11 and how they effected his family. We keep going back to him and we learn of his personal loss, his own time spent in VietNam, his support for Johnson and his feeling of betrayal after Tonken. His support for Bush and his feeling of betrayal after Bush admitted Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. He is Joe America. While writing this post, a friend called me and interrupted. We chatted, and without any knowledge that I had even heard of this movie, her husband yelled over from the passenger seat that I should check out a review he had written for this movie on his site. I LOVE little synchronous coincidences like that. Because he is far more eloquent than I am (I'm positive he wrote this in one draft), I'm going to suggest you read his review. It's a great review of a great documentary and the complex structure of war in modern America.

Und Drei Wunschen.
I learned the other day that the Germans have a tradition of stating wunschen, or futile wishes and curses at the end of the year. So here are mine for you:

1. May you forget to pay your bills for the rest of the year!
2. May you receive no mail for the rest of the year.
3. I hope you forget to take your vitamins for the rest of the year.

So that was my blind foray into another tradition. I won't do that for the rest of the year!

Party safely tonight, all! So long, 2006!

la mort d'un tyrant

Yeah, you probably know what I'm going to post about.

Unlike the apathy I feel about President Ford's passing, I feel something about Hussein's execution. I probably feel apathetic about Ford's because he left office when I was 6 months old and I have no memory of his leadership (yes, I have memory of Carter's). That, and the fact that the man has been in and out of the hospital on the brink of death for the last year, leaves me feeling a little more relieved for his own health. I do believe that death is a friend once you reach a certain level of sickness or elderliness. With Hussein, it's different.

I don't mourn his passing. He was a bloody tyrant, so I can't be sad that this human is off the planet. I am sad, though. What I mourn is the incompletion of justice. He still had at least one more trial coming. Why should the victims and surviving family members for whom that trial was to be held be denied the justice of a trial? Why should a trial be deliberately shoved aside like that? Even if he would've been found innocent at the second trial - which I sincerely doubt would've happened - he still would've been hanged for this one, so he'd be no less dead for his transgressions. (Though let's say that scenario had occurred: would the surviving families have felt justice was served by his death, even though he'd been found innocent at the second trial? Perhaps a topic for another post altogether: what is the nature of justice?) That Hussein was going to be executed was certain the moment he was discovered hiding in a pit three years ago. I trust though that Iraqis really wanted justice this time and not just revenge. Frankly, if his trial had been held in America, the case may be made that it was not a fair one, what with all the interruptions and lawyer shuffling. But it was probably far fairer than anything Iraqis had seen in a long damn time. I am sad because the second trial didn't go forward. I'm sad that those who'd weathered so much agony under his spiky fist didn't get to tell their stories in court.

Truthbeknown, I'm also sad because I really feel like he should've been tried at the Hague. He was a war criminal and a had committed crimes against humanity in between wars. If the West who started this current war and supposedly liberated Iraq (whatever the hell that means in their current mayhem) really wanted to hold him to the same standard as other war criminals, he should've been tried at the Hague. ... hmm. That reminds me: I was also sad when Milosevic died. Again, not because I doubt his guilt, but because his trial was never completed; human justice was never served. Though in his case, I gratified myself with the thought that "what goes around comes around." Kind of like with Kenneth Lay. ... yet another person for whom human justice was not carried through. He was found guilty, but it's my understanding that because he died before he went to jail, not only is he sort of expunged, his estate isn't subject to paying any recompense. (Which is barbecued bullshit in my opinion, but I should really read up on all the details of that kind of decision before I blow a gasket.) Maybe that's what irritates me most about Hussein's death: it came before full human justice was decided and if it had to be premature, it wasn't a case of karma taking him out.

I lost no one to his hand. Those who suffered under him are elated and for the relief they feel today, I am satisfied. I am not a fan of the death penalty but am overall generally ambivalent about it as a concept. If Saddam Hussein's death brings closure to a lot of people in Iraq, as proponents of the penalty claim it does (topic for another post, I'm sure), then I am glad for them. For those for whom his execution is justice denied, I am sad for them.

I guess the one good thing is this: An evil man is dead.

Faithful till the end

That is my goal for the last three days of the year: to faithfully post and browse each day. How's that for a resolution?

Christmas at my in-laws' was pretty good. To the left there is a picture of Babydog and her Pug cousin playing. They played in the middle of the living room, in front of the Christmas Tree the whole time we were unwrapping presents. Occasionally, they'd take it to the foyer or the kitchen, but mostly they enjoyed tussling in the center of everything. It irritated my brother-in-law who kept trying to break it up, but Honey and I quite liked it. They know where the pack is and where the fun is, so why should they not get their party on where we were getting our party on? Later they tussled under the dining room table where we were playing Texas Hold 'Em. It's hard to keep a poker face with grumbling fur tickling your feet.

In the meantime, I had a job interview yesterday afternoon. I was ambivalent going in and only slightly less so coming out.
THE PROS: seems like a relaxed environment; they prefer to pay freelance; it would be a slight raise with the prospect of more raises more quickly than with my current employer; though I'd start off in yet another admin-ish position (howl of pain), it seems they prefer to promote people on quickly to bigger and better things according tor their talents; as it is in my part of the city, my commute would probably be cut by 2/3 meaning I might actually be able to get home before 7PM on weeknights.
THE CONS: the position is kind of vaguely defined right now, though Honey thinks that's actually a pro; I know someone who freelanced with this company briefly and had a very negative taste in his mouth afterward, specifically because of the hostile attitude of one of the superiors - though I don't think I'd report to him; it's not the exact direction I want to go with my career - it's more of a side-exploration into another more bread-and-butter part of this industry for me; there may be no contract, the position would be indefinite and Molly, after three months in any position begins to get too comfortable.

I guess my two big concerns are: is that one guy really a hostile guy and can I really promote pretty quickly? And the latter is as dependent on me as it is on them. I could make a point to make sure to make myself available to someone each day or week until someone put me in a position I'm wanting more. As well, I could accept the job on a 3 month basis, say, as a test run. As for the hostile guy, I've dealt with hostility before and there's always the possibility that he's just a jerk who feels the need to do some piss-testing and all I'd need to do is learn when to appease him and when to stand him down.

My current job ends in a couple of weeks. I guess I'm also holding out hope that some really great project will pop up with my current employer in the next few weeks for which they'd like to give me a new contract with a different position. My current employer is less on the bread-and-butter end of the business, but they're on the end I'm more personally interested in. When I get back to work Tuesday, I'll feel them out and let them know I have an offer I need to move one way or another on by Thursday.

Sorry to ramble on about my employment woes. ... If you've made it this far, why don't you ponder this? President Ford died Tuesday. I'm as apathetic to his passing as I was to his life. Does that make me a bad person, an unconcerned citizen? Talk amongst yourselves!

Feliz Navidad!

Glad tidings and joy to you, dear reader wherever you are! It's Christmas morn and the nephews are still asleep with 10 minutes to go until their "designated hour of unwrapping" so I thought I'd use this time to send a seasonal salutation to all in the blogosphere.

In the past week, I've felt Grinchier than usual. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I didn't go to church at all this advent. This is the first year EVER where I've not at minimum gone to a Christmas Eve service. I haven't sung "Joy to the World" with a throng, nor any other carol. That chips away at me some, I think. The other bit of Grinchiness is what it is every year - and probably has been since I was a teenager, and certainly since I reached adulthood: some rue at the focus on consumerism this holiday brings. But that's just the world we live in, so I guess I'd best deal with it. Luckily, in our household, we're not that wrapped up in that aspect: we get eachother and others gifts, but we don't go hog wild and we refuse to do so if/when we have children.

But this chilly, Christmas morn, following a night of restless sleep at my sister-in-law's house, with Honey in the kitchen preparing Dutch Babies, I am content. It's Christmas and the dogs are happy. The kitchen will soon smell of baking eggs and powdered sugar. And since I haven't had a chance to lift my voice with the hosts in a sanctuary this season, I will make a list of my favorite Christmas carols, both ecclesiastical and secular (in no particular order):

1. Angels We Have Heard on High
2. Merry Christmas from the Family
3. Joy to the World
4. O, Holy Night
5. All I Want for Christmas is You
6. Hark the Herald Angels Sing
7. Mary's Boy Child
8. O, Come All Ye Faithful - especially with a bunch of brass in the sanctuary: WOW!
9. O, Little Town of Bethlehem
10. It's Cold Outside

MERRY CHRISTMAS! May you all enjoy a blessed day in whatever tradition (religious or otherwise) uplifts you!

3 Things that did me good.

I haven't done a reflection on 3 items that warmed my ticker recently, so I thought I'd do one, today.

1. Auditioning by invite-only for a show I was really, really interested in. Having a great time at the audition, expecting at best a call-back. And then getting cast! Woohoo! I can't wait for the run, next Spring.

2. Having a blast at some friends' annual holiday party. Despite the guy who thought that by telling me he was straight at this mostly gay-attended party, that was some means of picking me up - I was probably somewhat entertained by his drunken awkwardness - I had a great time. (I will never understand why men assume that engaging in sociable conversation is actually "hitting on" a woman and not just enjoying a good conversation.) More than that, though, is the pleasure of knowing that Honey is not a jealous man and trusts I can stave off propositions on my own. (Though it helps I'm apparently oblivious to men making passes.) I gather some men are insecure - and he's not one of them. I also appreciate that when they talked, Honey was sympathetic to the guy's own awkwardness - he wasn't sure what to make of his first mostly gay-populated party. I really like that he can see people's vulnerabilities that I can't, often.

3. Finding hilarious parody stuff like this on YouTube. Damn, I love that website!

Behind the Curve

... in so many ways. This past week has been crazy. If you're visiting this site and wondering why i haven't commented on yours lately, it's because i've been verbally remiss. i've probably popped in and checked out your blog, but haven't had enough active brain cells to comment. for that, i apologize. in the meantime, here's a video on YouTube that apparently everyone else in the world has known about for months, but which i just discovered via a coworker, Wednesday. it makes me smile and makes my heart happy. i hope you like it!

(incidentally, i haven't figured out how to actually put youtube vids up on my blog, like some folks have. if you know how, please share. i feel like a luddite not knowing how to do this)

what i like about right now

listening to "the blood of eden" off the mix CD i made Honey many years ago when he was out of the country for a few months. it's such a warm, sexy, longing song - well, Peter Gabriel, what can you say? i rediscovered this CD about a week ago. i don't know where it had been hiding.

i made it one warm Spring afternoon at a friend's house; she had a CD burner. it was before everyone could just rip one of these things off on their PCs. i had an idea of which songs i wanted to include, but another of my friends was there making suggestions. he thought i should include something by Morcheeba, so i did. it's sexy, but not totally me - a little too british. eh, still okay. i mostly used CDs of other friends. most of my music was still on tape.

i wanted to give Honey a CD for his return of music that was passionate and echoed the ache i'd had for him in his absence, and probably the ache he had for me. (he did pine for me. within 6 months we were engaged.)

wow, i'm loving this. there's a lot of Dave Matthew's at the beginning of the CD - did i mention i was 22 when i made this? i forget how much i really do like DMB's innuendo laden croons. but after "blood of eden" i'm hearing U2's "love is blindness" and now something from dead can dance, very sweet and somnambulant quality.

i remember i made him another CD that i sent him while he was there that i sent him. i wanted to express my support (maybe even envy) for him and the assurance that i was waiting for him. so i opened it with the closing song from the movie Orlando, "coming" - a beautiful, soulful tune - and included Bill Wither's "ain't no sunshine", B-52s' "Roam", Foo Fighters' "walking after you." i don't know where that CD went. i'd love to find that one, again.

listening to this mix CD again, i feel 22 again. i can feel the carpet under my feet at my friend's house; the sense of security i felt at her house, the "at homeness." i can see the sunlight angling in from her backyard. i can feel the eager anticipation of graduation around the corner, of Honey's return, of my birthday, of setting out to be with him, of the coming century and the excitement of my own sheer youth. i haven't seen my friend in almost 5 years; i haven't had much e-mail contact with her in that time, either, but each time we return to that city and drive past her house, i feel warm and cozy. that city evokes warm feelings in me; i always feel at home there, like i've come home. safe. at-homeness.

this CD gives me at-homeness.

*painting found on www.herbleonhard.com; he apparently does paintings inspired by pop culture. not bad.

today's meandering musings

a little a la Clare's track

the bridge over the river this morning driving in to work - it looked a little like a Monet. (i think that's the artist) like the painting of the bridge at Giverny, except muddier and cold winter looking.

geese this winter. i like watching them fly together with their long necks stretched forward. i like hearing them honk to each other at night in their alien language and watching Babydog freak out at their shared tongue.

seeing the huge golden moon rise over the city and reflect in the river last night, on the drive home. knowing that these are the moments to save in my mental scrapbook.

Malone pines for her desert home

Before I begin my post in earnest, I would like to begin with praise for Daniel Craig, the new James Bond. Honey and I caught Casino Royale yesterday afternoon. I only went on the glowing recommendations of coworkers. I, too was skeptical of a blond Bond; moreover, I'm past tired of Bond's objectification of women. Must I really suffer through Denise Richards or Halle Berry stiff acting and cooing over some guy twice her age just to get to the intrigue and action? Casino did not disappoint - probably the best Bond I've ever seen; thanks in part to a screenplay cowritten by the writer of Crash - and Craig rocked my world! His performance wasn't the Bond archetype that we all know, love and yawn at. It was alert and in the moment. Best since Connery? Hell no: better than! Way to go Danny-boy! I can't wait to see the next offering.

Now, to the real point:
I had the dream again the other night. I don't know if I've ever blogged on it or not. I'm back in my hometown - not the city of my nativity, but where I spent puberty and adolescence - just visiting and I 'm happy to be there. These dreams are usually so vivid or so emotionally compelling that I convince myself that I am actually there. In the last year, I've wanted so badly for my presence there to be real that I pause, take in my surroundings and think to myself or outright proclaim: "this isn't a dream. I'm really here! I'm here! I'm not dreaming!" ... and of course I always am. On occasion, I've woken up actually sad or angry that it was a dream. In retrospect, the landscape of my town is rarely accurate: the temperature is too cool or the mountains too young, like the Rockies, not like the wizened old mounts that they are.

I haven't been back to my hometown, for all intents and purposes, for over 12 years. After I graduated high school, my family moved, I went off to college and the only times I returned were to pick up a friend en route somewhere else, and to scatter the ashes of my first dog. 48 hours total between the two trips in a dozen years doesn't feel like enough.

Sometimes I ask myself why I should care. It is a small town hundreds of miles from any city most outsiders might recognize, closer to Mexico than the nearest mall and I never completely felt like I fit in there. Most people scoff at places like that; and when folks never quite felt completely like they fit in, they write off that place and move on. I think I care for two reasons.

1. Unlike most people I know, I can't return to my hometown for a casual visit. My family no longer lives there, so I have no draw, and it's so remote that to get there would take two plane rides and a car ride that lasts longer than an Oscar-length movie. Because of this inconvenience and my absence from the place, I have no way of dealing with the ghosts of my youth. Honey can drive by his old high school anytime he visits his parents; he can see random old friends still in the area and old haunts for the same reason. I don't know what's up with the Pizza Hut where my friends and I used to hang out and where I had my first date. I don't know if the movie theater still has the John Travolta, Stayin' Alive poster from 1983 in the lobby. I lived in that town from ages 12 to 18, six very important years, which really help shape who one becomes. I feel unresolved a lot of times, not getting a chance to go back and just peek. And I'm terribly jealous of my brother and parents who return every year or two to visit friends. They report back on how much (or little) the place has changed and I feel like it's a kid growing up without me.

2. I long for the simplicity of that isolation, these days. The push and shove of metropolis life, of this part of the country can be overbearing. Elbow room, clean air and drinking water and inky night skies are a luxury anymore. I go in my dreams, maybe to reckon with ghosts and get away from the congestion here.

For almost ten years, when Honey and I started dating, I've been wanting to take him there. But we've never managed to go. My throbbing desire to get out there has only become palpable in the last 3 or 4 years. (Hmm. I wonder if that has anything to do with the war.) I know we'll go out for a visit sometime, but I joke that the only time we'll get a chance is when I die and Honey has to go scatter my ashes at the crook in the river where I want to settle. That would suck, because then I couldn't take him to my favorite places alive! Note to self: don't die at least until you can get Honey out there.

In this last dream I dreamt, Matt Dillon was waiting at a restaurant where I was eating in the old burg. Sounds strange, unless you also know that a neighboring town to my burg has become a mini-mecca for New York artists and the faddish richies who like to cling to the newest chi-chi art-spot. Why Matt Dillon, I don't really know, but that's incidental. As for the neighboring town: I am truly excited that in the last 5 or 6 years, there has been an arts injection into the area. Had there been a movement like that when I was a teen, I may have been less disaffected. (However, I'm sure all that stuff takes money, and I remember having to skip out of a community theatre show I really wanted to see because I had only half the $6 admission.)

What gives me pause though are the wealthy NY hangers-on who are jetting out to the middle of nowhere to visit these new spas that have cropped up in neighboring town and frankly probably my old burg. According to a magazine I read recently, published by a Manhattan retailer for the uber-rich, one of the new hotels to cater to the elite charges $425/night. In an area where the poverty rate is twice that the national average, the median income is rougly $25K and where "school choice" is not an issue because there is only one school to choose from in each town, that kind of stuff breaks my heart. While I'm sure it's good for some locals, I worry about the effect it has on the already depressed local economy. This is a part of the country where housing prices generally go at their own pace, but my family reports that in the last five years the prices have gone through the roof. When the NY Times first did a piece on neighboring town, within days, there were offers to buy property flooding in from the Northeast corridor. The new richies coming in might make it harder for the locals to buy in their own back yard. Additionally I worry that this rapid, specialized attention for neighboring town might balloon into the next Santa Fe. I love Santa Fe dearly - my family traveled Northern NM virtually every summer till I was 13 - but for all the excellence of its history and the art, both old and noveau, it has lost some of its soul to Hollywood and New York. I don't want to see this for neighboring town. I truly, truly hope that the community will continue to benefit from the newfound attention from the artworld (I do genuinely believe it has), I just also hope and pray that it doesn't become the next Park City or Santa Fe playground for the wealthy at the expense of local character. I feel kind of like that person whose friend finds fame: Do well! Benefit! Don't totally sell out, though!

The question still remains: Why Matt Dillon? Guess I'll have to sleep on it. Maybe he'll tour me through my old burg tonight and quell my fears for neighboring town.

Molly's Rambling Thanks

Today is Thanksgiving, and I'm sure I won't be the only one, but one of a gajillion blogger voices listing what they are thankful for. But I don't care, I'll begin anyway. Hopefully I'll have some more time this extended weekend to post and read more!

- I'm thankful that I finally have time for the first time in weeks to surf blogs and add a new post!

- I'm thankful that Honey is a great husband and a great friend. I'm thankful that we are friends, since I think friendship outweighs lust any day. I'm thankful we've still got lust!

- I'm thankful that Mom and Dad are available on Thanksgiving Eve to happily confer with me about a grammar question, and then help me solve it.

- I'm thankful, despite three close calls this year, Grandpa made it to his 88th birthday the other week. And that he's pretty keen, still, if going deaf. I'm also thankful that he is a man who has been totally at peace with death my whole life, if not his, so that when it does come he'll embrace it.

- I'm thankful my suegra arrived safely yesterday and that she pre-ordered the turkey.

- I'm thankful that my sister-in-law is in charge of the stuffing and pies.

- I'm thankful for last weekend's visit to dear friends and for seeing how their daughter is growing. Additionally, I'm thankful that today is said daughter's second birthday. She's so adorable. ... and calm - an attribute that makes her even more adorable!

- I'm thankful that Babydog and CootieCat like to snuggle me in bed in a kind of mommy sandwich on lazy mornings like today: dog on my lap, cat across my head.

- I'm thankful for past Thanksgivings some spent on picnics in the desert, eating cold cut turkey sandwiches in the car, visiting foreign cities and most with family still with us and family departed.

- I'm thankful that our friend serving in Iraq feels thankful. And I'm thankful she's serving.

- I'm thankful for the millions of unsung heroes who will never get a medal or a parade who work every day to make life better by reaching out to those in need, by reaching across to those who are emotionally isolated or collectively ostracized, by building bridges across social fissures and chasms and stitching the rips in the fabric of human history. They remind us that we are all part of the common family of God.

- I'm thankful for my job: that it is great, that the bulk of the project is over, that I've met great people working there and that it will (hopefully) lead to even more work when this project is completely ended for me.

- I'm thankful for my current health and my ambulatory ability.

- I'm thankful for finding organic beef raised near the town of my youth.

- I'm thankful for every person who has blessed me and grateful to those who have cursed me. It is easy to give thanks for the former group, but I thank the latter group because their mishaps or ill-will challenges me to learn how to forgive and see them as merely human, too. (I'm still learning those lessons!!)

- I'm thankful for who I am, where I am, when I am and how I am. I'm thankful for the present.

Wonderful Wednesday

I love it when my fears are dashed!
I don't know if last night's wins will cause drastic change, but I am so more than ready for this shift! ... maybe with the departure of Rummy, we see that they're already effective!

thoughts on election eve

First, of course some items a la Clare to clear a little fog and burden:

Uno - spending the weekend in a small town in upstate New York. I hadn't spent an overnight or downtime in a small town in so long I couldn't remember the exact last time that I had. (pretend that made sense, gramatically.) My favorite part? Upon stepping outside of our friend's dad's house late one night, I paused and turned to Honey and said, "do you hear that?" Our friend smiled and Honey and I exchanged satisfied looks, "Yeah," he said. It was the music of stillness. It sounded the way fine wine tastes.

Due - seeing our friends' marriages and feeling gratified that our friends delight in each other.

Tre - treating a friend to lunch, today.

Churchgal wrote a nice post about the Ted Haggard disgrace, today. I commented on the blog, but I'll tell you now, her sympathy for him is really moving, to me. Guffawing at his shame is easy and shallow (that's why we all do it), sorrowing for him is blessed.

Tomorrow is election day. Midterms. I do hope the Democrats take the House and the Senate would be nice, too. But that's just because I am a Democrat - well, mostly because I'm a Democrat. But my optimism is very cautious for a few reasons:

A) I don't feel like the Democrats have a clear, unified point of view which the nation at large can identify, unlike, say the Republicans' "Contract with America" in 1994.
B) I no longer underestimate the ability of the Dems to either screw it up in the end or lose a lead. Likewise, I don't overestimate the effectiveness of Bush machine attack strategies. Look at how they treated Max Cleland and John McCain - taking character assassination to new lows.
C) Living on the East Coast, the general energy among people I talk to is, "the Dems are going to take this one; maybe not a landslide, but certainly at least the House." Mmm. I dunno. You have to be careful you don't live in an echo chamber. In 1992, I lived in West Texas and was surrounded by Republicans, there were a few supporters of Clinton (most of whom went to our church, ironically) but by and large, we all thought Bush would win because that was local sentiment. We were wrong. In 2004, people around me thought Kerry cinched it. Nope. Living in conservative areas of the country, I've heard people look at nationwide polls that show a more liberal leaning in the response and say, "i don't know ANYONE who feels that way; who are THESE pollsters talking to?" and living in this more liberal region, i've heard people say the same about nationwide polls that show a more conservative response. We are a huge nation with varied opinions and limited interaction with people outside our own ideologies. I can't assume the Dems will bag this.

... but I hope I'm wrong.

Frankly, I don't know if a Democratic majority in either the House or Senate would make things "better" per se, but I do think it would at the very least create an environment that embraces dissent. We always say we want bipartisanship and I do think every so often we see shifts in political power to make sure one party doesn't control everything (as in 1994), so hopefully we'll see some bipartisan compensation tomorrow.

horribleness and happiness on Halloween

First with the horrible part, I suppose. A colleague of mine was injured in Afghanistan this weekend, by an improvised explosive device. He's got burns and sight and hearing problems right now, but he's alive and he'll heal and he's on his way back home. A soldier he was with, as I understand it, didn't make it. When I learned he was off to Afghanistan and the project he was working on, I was worried something like this might happen. I don't know him too well, but what I do know of him, he's a warm guy with a sense of humor and joie de vivre that I appreciate. This is why I hate war.

We have a friend stationed in Iraq at the moment, too. I haven't worried too much about her because I don't think she's seeing direct combat per se. But damn. I do worry about her mental health on her return; depending on what she's been exposed to, I suppose. Trauma like surviving an explosion, or battle or whatever, fundamentally changes you. I'm keeping both of them in my prayers as well as the family of the fallen soldier.

Now for the happiness (because that's what gets us through the day, right?):

Ein - I learned today we will be getting a full week off of work at Christmas. Whee! I'm sure it's unpaid, but a week off is a week off. I'll take it.

Zwei - Cute costumes tonight. We had a toddler Mad Hatter accompanied by a grown up Alice. A teenaged girl with a lime green spiderweb and plastic barbed wire around her neck. ("Are you a psychedelic spiderweb?" "No, I'm a dustbunny - and would you believe, some people keep barbed wire behind their couch?!") A ninja with vampire teeth. I kept trying to insist he was a vampire ninja, but he swore he wasn't. A quartet of 10-year-old girls: a witch, a devil, an angel and something else. A cat burglar.

Drei - Wonderfully friendly children. Some good friends trick or treated by our house tonight and brought with them a friend and her sons. I'd only ever met the boys once or twice before. They're 4 1/2 and 2 1/2 years old respectively. The girls as always were delightful - excited to find participation ribbons on Babydog's crate. The boys were just adorable. As they were all leaving to hit up more houses, the 2 year old (dressed in a Jiminy Cricket costume) flung his arms up for a hug. Then he stuck his tongue out and started humming. So I hugged him and picked him up under his arms and held him in front of my face. I copied his face and sound and the two of us were there, at arms length face to face, tongues protruding humming against eachother. I think he could've done that all night. It was awesome!

Good Things and East Coast Guilt.

1. Honey called in the new cell phone company to transfer over our old phone numbers onto the new carrier. I only heard his side of the conversation, but it sounded like he was making fast friends with the customer service guy, chatting about everything from our dog to how many children we expected to show up on our doorstep for Halloween!

2. Discovering one of my weekly recipe e-mails from Texas Monthly was for a Cream Filled Pumpkin Pie Roll. Mmm. We're hosting Thanksgiving at our house this year. Honey hates pumpkin flavored deserts, but I think I might try to make this anyway, as he will not be the only person at the table. Just thinking about it makes me all fuzzy with anticipation!

3. We're heading back over the mountain this morning so Babydog can do her second leg of her JHD trial. The last time we went to a herding trial/exhibition, it was all corgis; this time she's the only corgi in a sea of border collies and a few shelties. It's really only intimidating for me. HOWEVER, though she's not as disciplined as a lot of the border collies - and most of them are rural dogs anyway, so they have more room for practice than just a living room - in her part of the trial, she was still a lot better than some of the other dogs. (My chest puffs.) What can I say? I guess I'm a competitive American mommy.
I visited SonnjeaB's Friday post, today. It's interesting, her conundrum about volunteering and being a better person is not only somewhat personally familiar - I too sometimes have trouble reconciling my desire to make the world a better place and not really wanting to work the volunteer places I've sold myself on - but its familiarity seems to translate to another area of my life: the professional one. I think I'm only just now finding the general direction I want my career to take, but boy do I feel like I've been slow to the game.

In this part of the country people are defined by and happily define themselves by their employment or their achievements. (I may have blogged on this before.) If you're 5 years old, it's assumed you're a good reader. If you're 18, it's assumed you're applying to top tier schools and the state university is only your "safety." If you're 60, it's assumed you've made it to the top of your game, you still work-out and you've got a healthy retirement waiting with which you can travel the world in your twilight years. If you're out of college, it's assumed you're on your career track and you know what that is. So here I am, 30, just now starting up what I want to be doing and I feel like I'm perceived as a dilly dallyer, when really all it was was schlepping to pay the bills and sampling till I found the dish I liked. (And some days I think I might still want to switch the dish.) It's hard to be human in a part of the country that assumes over-acheivement on everything and everyone. (see #3 above!)

Revision to #3: I'm happy that Babydog gets a thrill from herding. It makes me happy to see her happy, even when she's over-eager!

Fastest. blog. ever.

The next 48 to 96 hours are going to be hectic, but for the most part exciting. As for today? I get a temporary promotion at work (hence the image) which may last through tomorrow. At work they're calling it "filling in" but I'm calling it a temporary promotion because what i'm learning while i'm filling in i can apply to my next job. and hopefully there'll be some eyes watching who are already thinking ahead to whom they want to fill upcoming positions with. Tonight? Another crunch-night adding onto my thesis. This weekend? Babydog's first herding competition. Sleep? Overrated!
Now to put on my shoes and hustle to my assignment!
ps. thanks to some police org in the UK for giving me an image that illustrates my day and uses a model who looks like she could be my sister ... or uncanny cousin.

Whoa - was this a Monday?

a la Clare, here are three things great about today:

1. I saw deer on the drive home this evening. They were grazing alongside the very heavily trafficked freeway in a field not even the size of a soccer pitch. There must've been 5 or 6 of them. Though it's sad urban sprawl forces them to come into the heavily populated areas to feed, I must say, seeing them brightened my day!

2. My commute home was fastest on record! It normally takes me 60 - 75 minutes to get home from my office each evening. (About 45 - 55 minutes on the inbound commute.) For some reason, tonight, there were absolutely no gum-ups on my ride home. I got home in 45 minutes! I couldn't believe my luck!

3. Discovering new blogs through the three beautiful things site. Clare, you're doing such a wonderful thing!

those which tickled me

1. hearing Babydog yelp with unfiltered joy as she chased the sheep this morning.
2. letting Honey choose the Halloween candy tonight at Target. "But I don't think the children will really like the dark chocolate Hershey's, babe." He smiles, "Exactly!" ... and he talked me into getting Babydog a costume even though he thinks they're stupid, just becuase he knows how much I'd kick myself if i'd've passed it up. yea, Honey!
3. replacing the previous owners' (henceforth to be known as the Dundies) kitchen nook overhead drab light with a prettier warmer one. it's fun: with each minor change, this house becomes more and more ours!

what made me happy this week

1. Driving the wooded highway this time of year into work, it just fuzzies my heart to watch the leaves turn. About half a mile from where the main road branches off to join the freeway, there's a big pocket of tall thin trees that have all turned a lucious yellow. I pass them on my left and they just make me smile. They make me think I'm in northern New Mexico. This week was grey, rainy and chilly. The turning trees, particularly that pocket, kept me happy inspite of the meteorlogical drear. It's like they drink in sunshine and radiate it for us when the sun doesn't care to grace us with his presence. How I'll miss those leaves when it's winter and we have no terrestrial sunlight!

2. The deadline for submitting my intent to graduate was yesterday at 5PM. HEAR THIS: I, "she who puts the 'Pro' in procrastination,"actually got the paperwork in like 20 hours ahead of time. This is major for me. If it's due at 5, my norm is to get it to you at 4:57. Yea, me!

3. Keeping a secret from my dog: next week, she gets to go herding two whole days in a row! ... and with other dogs, too! I'm sure that'll be good subject for another post ... so long as I remember.

4. There's a local radio station that plays "old timey" popular music during the 7 o'clock hour on Saturday nights. It's a neat collection of scratchy recordings. Last night, I heard some song from the teens or 20s that I'm pretty sure was the inspiration to the theme song for "The Itchy and Scratchy Show." The tune was exactly the same up until the crescendo of their song. I laughed. If only the writers of the original melody had known that 80 or 90 years later someone would hear their tune and picture a cartoon cat and mouse beating each other with mallets!

in other news ...

I will be receiving a practice Spanish exam, as I have opted to test out of my language requirement for my degree. All it is is a translation test. Now all I have to do is be as good at Spanish as I was back in 1997 or 98 when I was easily 30%-40% fluent. um ... si tengo "stock" en Univision, es lo mismo que comprender la idioma con fluidesse, no? (See, Pissed Off? It's not just you who worries about exhibiting a mastery of a foreign language?)

The print deadline for a small monthly out of state paper for which I proofread has been pushed back till midweek. Everytime deadline is pushed, I'm always afraid it's because I'm not turning around the articles fast enough. But I think there are other factors at work here, because I have only received about 2/3 the normal amount of articles I usually get, so far, by this time of the month.

My parents are back in the city of my nativity this weekend for a conference. I'm somewhat jealous. I'd love to spend a day just to sniff out the old haunts of my youth. ... and to pick up some shredded beef barbecue sandwiches wrapped in too-thin butcher paper that you then eat in old school desks placed against the back walls of the joint. Seriously, my mouth is watering just thinking about it.

Molly's Movie Review: "Click" it off.

We rented Adam Sandler's latest mal-offering to the world of entertainment tonight, Click.

Let me recount for you the best part of the movie:
It's 25 minutes into the film. Sandler, having just learned his remote control has magical powers, confronts the wierd guy (Christopher Walken) who gave him the device. He suspects he's on some sort of prank reality show a la "Candid Camera." Michael, Sandler's character, supposes the country is having a chuckle at his expense. Walken, in his very flat Walken way says, "Nobody's laughing at you, Michael."

(now for the best part) Honey shouts, "YOU GOT THAT RIGHT!"

I think I laughed out loud in this film a total of 3 times. That includes my laughing at Honey's adlib. And seeing as how I live to laugh, that's saying a lot.

What could have and should have been a fun new twist on It's a Wonderful Life was instead coopted into tired, standard Sandler fare of animal sex jokes and supposed hilarity derived from hearing little kids say the word "shit." Add to that the never-stellar Kate Beckinsale (I'm sorry, how did she get through Serendipity and not convince me that she was in love with John Cusack? How can you not have chemistry with Cusack?), pepper it with completely hollow dialog and sautee it all up with the script that writes itself and what you've got is 108 minutes of schlock worthy of the Hallmark channel.

Click wasn't so bad that we clicked it off, obviously. But it was just short of that dubious distinction. There were some - maybe two or three - redeeming qualities. Sean Astin for one. After teaming with Sandler in 2004's 50 First Dates, I suspect he may be on the path to being his regular foil. But he's just a good actor, period. Henry Winkler and Julie Kavner as Sandler's parents were the other good qualities. But again, they're pretty solid actors. They're good bets no matter how crappy the show.

We considered watching Click in fast forward just so we could get to the resolution a little faster. However, that seemed like it would have been too surreal for a Monday night: watching a movie about controlling life in fast forward in fast forward. Wrap your mind around that one, Paduan! Honey noted that several times you thought it would end and it didn't. "It's like Lord of the Rings! Wrap it up, Peter Jackson!" he finally yelled about 15 minutes from the real ending and smack in the middle of the supposed second ending.

My advice to those out there looking to see this: don't. If you really want to see Sandler doing something good, try Spanglish or Punch Drunk Love. Or hell, even 50 First Dates had more heart than this tripe. Save your eyes and your time. Do a crossword puzzle.

... a quick note. I included in my last post, a photo of some trees ablaze with the colorful leaves of autumn found here on the East Coast. For the record, all I did was copy that image from a website after googling different phrases about autumn foliage and east coast. (I think it came from some Virginia tourism site.) I wasn't sure if y'all thought it was one of mine, originally. I apologize if I gave that impression.

Fall sneaking up on us

"I'm in the habit of being alone/ I try hard to break it/ But I can't on my own ... but man, I wish I had a hand to hold ..."

Honey is listening to Edie Brickell on his computer. I forgot about this song. I forget how great she is. She's good for this weather-turning season.

October is one of my favorite months here. September & October and April - July. April through July are my favorite months everywhere, but particularly here. But October is particularly great because of the foliage. That actually is my beautiful thing for the day. It's enough to carry me.

1. the first leaves of autumn being kicked up in little flurries by the wind and passing cars. I can't wait for the oranges to get deeper and bright, bright reds! I might alter my drive in just so I can get a better look at the leaves! They're like slow fireworks.

In the meantime, I remembered that JoeInVegas said on October 2, that one of the things he liked about the day was that it was cloudy, a rarity in Vegas. Then, last night, I was cruising YouTube and checked out a user I hadn't visited in a few weeks, LazyDork, and if you'll see when he arrives in Vegas at the end of the video, it's cloudy. Did he arrive on October 2nd?

OMGs, i love BSG! ... and more TV

so i've had lots of thoughts swarming around in my head the last few weeks that i'd love to blog on: the Pope's papa faux pas; Jack Straw's concern over full-body cloaking clothing; Mark Foley and though HYlarious as it is, the real non-event that it is as well ... and of course most recently, Mr. "Oh-so-Ronery's" test of a nuclear bomb somewhere north of the DMZ. However, i also haven't had a lot of time to post about these, so hopefully i'll get a chance to ponder and wonder a little later. in the meantime, i'm going to do today's triple rave about this season's crop of television shows (thanks to Clare):

1. BATTLESTAR GALACTICA - i've said it once and i'll say it again: the best damned show on television. if you're not already watching it, rent the first two seasons on DVD, get yourself caught up and then quake with wonder in front of your telelvision set. the way the writers keep the audience living in the complete moral ambiguity that is fear, war, hope, faith and life itself is absolutely awe-inspiring. (and does anyone think that Leoben pushed that little girl down the stairs or is it just Honey and me? it smells fishy! run, Starbuck, run!!)

2. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip - just finished watching an episode tonight. oh, Aaron Sorkin, how i missed you! The West Wing went nowhere when you left. but you ... you came back. you came back because you LOVE us! yea, Sorkin! (and as a side note, i'm totally excited for the premier of "30 Rock" tomorrow night. i adore Tina Fey and Honey is in love with her. we have high hopes!)

3. The Office - when i first saw the american take on this british import, i was unimpressed. Ricky Gervais slays me. but then it became good somewhere along the way and now it's completely great! you darling are keeping fresh and i love that about you. Michael Scott seems to be even more painfully awkward this season so far than he has been in the last two seasons. and it's awesome. but WTF? Jim flirting with the chick at his new office? damn those writers! how dare they toy with our affections like that? everyone knows that Pam and Jim are meant to be together. she bought new clothes for God's sake!

Three Things from the Last Week

I'm glad to read that a) Clare is getting some notoriety and b) she's cool with the blogosphere hitching onto her idea of positive reflection. So, in the vein of the latter - and because I'm beginning to believe it's good for the soul, let us commence:

1. Having Honey come with me to a friend's birthday party. I didn't think he'd make it and I think we both ended up having a great time. (Yummy Thai food, too!)

2. Getting word from the doctor's office that what we had both feared was not the case. It's the first time in months I've had anything resembling good news come from that office. I wanted to sing!

3. Preparing to have a friend or two over tonight to watch the season premier of Battlestar Galactica, season 3. (We each had Friday plans, so we had to wait till tonight.) I can't frackin' wait!

Seasons Change

I lent this book a few years back to a friend of mine with whom I have now unfortunately lost touch. Perhaps I'll get another copy and read it again, soon.

I read this book about three or four years ago. I liked it, but thought I would appreciate it more deeply when I was older.

I have reached a period where I suspect there are aspects of this novel which would resonate more loudly with me, now than they did a few years ago. The aspects and characters with which and with whom I suspect I would identify now are not the ones I suspected with which I would have identified when I first read this book a few year ago. But that's life, right?

... and all it took was a picture to remind me.

what i like about today

again, borrowing from Clare:

1. spotting a bunny in the garden of my neighbor; the one on the end unit.

2. Damien Rice. his music and finding his videos on YouTube. it never fails to take me to some past life i didn't know i had.

3. popping in on old neighbors on the way home from the library.

No doubt, mourning Annie contributes ...

It occurred to me that part of my emotional instability this weekend - I felt weepy - was not mere homesickness, or rue at my parents' aging, but a little bit of grief for a fallen hero. In any event, below is something I penned on my flight back home, tonight. Miss you, Ann! Thanks for rocking my world when I was a teenaged girl who needed a badass Texas woman to admire. You done good!
Okay, so I'm homesick. What can I say? Here I am 35,000 feet above Missouri or Kentucky maybe, about another 90 to 120 minutes left to go to the east coast and I've just finished browsing this month's copy of Texas Monthly. (I always try to snap a copy when I leave the Great State.) On my i-Pod shuffle, a rare three or four songs by Robert Earl Keen out of the past 5 or 6. One about an illegal immigrant, which I think I had heretofore not known. Robert Earl Keen always makes me miss West Texas. Couple that with the brief article on stargazing in the middle of nowhere where I used to live, and Keen's "Hard Amarillo Highway" (apparently covered by REK) and I sincerely miss West Texas. As my immediate family has moved to the eastern half of the state - as has most of my extended family - I no longer have a "reason" to visit, but I feel a pressing need. I feel the need to to gaze into those inky night skies, to experience the utter dryness again. It's been nearly a decade since I've experienced a dry summer, and a baker's dozen since I've known bone-dry, parched weather. I so long for that isolation right now - the isolation that maddened me as a teenager. It's funny how sometimes you need a million people crushing you and other times you need a million miles to breathe.

This past trip, too, however has made me glad to be where I am at the moment. Though I wish I were geographically closer to my and my hubby's extended family right now, I also really - today - appreciate where I am at the moment. I guess it helps to know we don't want to be here forever. But it also helps to know if we are, the world won't end. Maybe I'm finally heeding my own (self-enforced) prayer: "God, thank you for who I am, when I am, where I am ..." I suspect it's always good to be grateful for the present, becausee that's where we live, but it also helps to assuage anxiety over the future in the long run. Not to mention each day is a day closer to another where I am supposed to be and a nother day when I'll have the opportunity to do good. Each day is a constant becoming.

I seriously miss Texas, but it will always be my home and where my bones and dust will return. I have today - that's all I have - and each today is another opportunity to love and to achieve.

Wow, the thin air up here is awesome!

Niamh, you're spreading the word!

I'm very excited this morning. While in the shower, I pondered what 3 things of beauty I'd share, today. Then, I saw that Clare had left me a comment. Cool! My good friend Niamh must be proseltyzing for me across the pond from his Shropshirean hovel. Thanks, pal. (And thanks Clare for letting me hop onto your idea. I'll add you to my list of bloggies.)

Yesterday was Dad's suprise party, and I got to see some family whom I don't see often enough. As this is Texas, we went out for Mexican food. Mom and I had cabrito for the first time in years. (Huzzah!) And the cake was tres leches. Much like Mom's and very soppy. Mmm. Way better than the tres leches cake I had at the Cuban restaurant in Florida a few months back. I really missed Honey, though. I enjoy time with my family, but I enjoy it so much more when he's with us. It's cool, though. I'll just kiss him even more when I get home, tonight!

I have to get ready for church and for the airport after that, so I'll try to be brief with my three beautiful things.

1. Dad in the restaurant sombrero while the waitstaff serenaded him. He looked like a giant four year old. He blew out his candles well! :)

2. My cousins's daughter. She's so amiable and sweet. And her consonant cluster production at 22 months was really impressive. Likewise, her "r" sound is solid. As a linguistics student, I geek out on these things.

3. My cousin's basset hound. The floppy way she'd run to me when I called her. And the way she'd bray gently when I'd scratch around her ears. What a silly, happy dog!

Mental Dusting

I had just finished writing a long post once again bemoaning the White House and expressing befuddlement at the Middle East. But I felt that would be better for my personal journal, so I placed it there.

So, copying Clare, via JoeinVegas, I decided to list three things I find beautiful. It reminds me of a therapist I had once who had me keep lists of reliable sources of pleasure, so I could go back to those whenever the anxiety got too much. Life really is good, if you just stop and let it be.

1. Finding articles like this; that this guy is out there. If people feel like they need religious permission to enjoy sex with their spouse, then please, preach hot sex! Though I'm sure I'd disagree with his religious understanding a lot, especially seeing as how this guy hangs with the Robertsons and Fallwells and is a homophobic literalist, I have to appreciate his current campaign. It breaks my heart to think that there are people who have guilt during marital sex with their spouse whom presumably they love. Clearly his flock needs some shepherding. Keep it up!

2. Waking up in a bed not my own, but feeling just as safe and comfortable.

3. Knowing that puppagirl is probably sleeping next to Honey in my abscence this weekend.

Then

We tend to talk about it in the historical context in our household. But last night we talked about the more personal effects and memories.

The sunlight on his face in the bus on the ride in. What page he was on in his book. I was foolish enough to think I was going to finish mine - a book that had been confounding me for months - that day. (Of course I didn't know.) The sound of the phone ringing in the apartment building. The fear that the rising smoke, blowing directly toward my office was a threat. What a gorgeous day it was. How every woman who has wailed in confusion and sorrow after a male family member has been in the proximity of a blast flooded my soul - we were all together in one body screaming in different languages. The longest ride home of my life during which we stopped to pick up R's husband: "We don't know if Honey is alive, the least we can do is take care of the one we do know is." The friendliness of the bus driver who drove us in to the station. Where we sat on the bus: right side, a row or two in front of the back doors. The morning light on his face on the ride in. The building we were in front of when he looked up from his book to look at me. What a georgeous day it was. As we parted at the station and I told him, "I love you," and he merely smiled and waved as he walked on: how irritated I was at him. The poster in the train: the xylophonist in bare feet. My thoughts riding in: "Why is it we always wait for a disaster before we do anything?" The yellow blouse-grey skirt combination that I never wore again out of supserstition. How I was going to find a new dentist that morning, after my front desk shift. I hated that my department forced its lackeys to cover the front desk. The confused looks on people's faces in the lobby. I was going to go to an audition that night. How useless my cell phone was. The sound of a second boom. The sight through the rear windshield of black smoke rising in great billows. People driving politely for once. The lady who let us in, so I flashed her a peace sign - she looked very disconcerted; we must have, too. The guy walking down the street wearing a gas mask and no shirt, carrying a brief case. Comic relief. Voices on NPR speculating on who could've done this. The news across the radio of the 4th plane in PA. Were they all going to be falling out of the sky? The awkwardness when I finally got to the apartment and found honey alive - we shouldn't be here, in this universe in this time. Our bodies were in the same space, but our souls were jarred, floating a few feet off center of our bodies. We paced the apartment the remainder of the day, pausing occassionally to hug eachother. I cleaned, vaccumed mostly, like crazy. It was such a beautiful day. Phone calls when they started working. E-mails. The only machines in the sky were military. I cleaned like crazy. I developed a calm: goodness will prevail in the hearts of man. I was even happy. Calling in to the office to tell them I wouldn't return to work for the rest of the day because I felt "sick." (That I felt opressed enough by my employer to fake a sickness on the remainder of that day.) We couldn't eat for the rest of the day. (I vomited what little I had the next morning when it was clear it was not all a dream.) What we needed most from TV was more information. What we needed most from TV was a string of sitcoms.

It was such a gorgeous day.

Corruptibility

In an effort to get back into a daily writing routine, I'm going to jot something out this morning before I leave for work. Evidently, when I get home, I'm too zonked to want to do much more than eat, cruise the net and then sleep. Cruise E-bay: who am I kidding?

Anyway, yesterday I was listening to Marketplace on my drive out to meet my professor. I was only halfway listening, so you'll have to click on this link to find out how accurate what i'm about to tell you is. Here's what caught my ear: some sociologist/economist/somebody or other wanted to know how corrupt members of a generally corrupt society were. How do you measure that? On the micro level people always claim to be more morally upright than their governments. He decided to see how people abuse - or don't - diplomatic immunity. He tracked parking tickets of ambassadors and their staff to the UN. What he found was that over an 8 year period, ambassadors to places like Bangladesh and Chad and other countries that have poor human rights records and whom the international community generally agree are corrupt governments, there were thousands of outstanding parking tickets which went unpaid because of diplomatic immunity. However, in the whole of the Scandinavian countries - countries generally who have good human rights records, etc - he found a mere twelve, over 8 years. And most of those were from the guy from Finland. Damn Fins.

Granted, the biggest problem with that fun little exercise is that those individuals represent the corrupt governments, so we'd have to presume they are in fact corrupt individuals. It still doesn't tell us much about the regular folk on the ground. Though, if I were a betting person, I'd bet that many if not most of the people on the ground live corrupt lives as well, simply because that's what you have to do to stay alive. ... in other news, I heard on the radio yesterday - though not a news station, so I can't account for its accuracy - that 12% of the GDP of Mexico is from bribes. Way to go, my peeps. Keep up the embarassment for your American cousins.

Happy Wednesday

I love Lucy!

Again, I should be doing something productive ... Okay, I already primed the living room so that most of that horrible Robin's Egg Blue is gone, but I mean I should be doing something more productive this instant. Instead, I'm again checking up on my new habit, Lucy over on YouTube.

I found this video made in response to her "Growing Pains" post. Oh, how I wish I knew how to use a camera and cool editing software on my laptop (especially since I work around the damned equipment!), so I could post some cool encouraging post card for her! I would basically tell her what that one guy with the britty accent told her. (And this would go for VirginiaGal, too, since I know she's questioning her decisions and her path right now.) Own your decisions and trust that they are good ones and the ones that need to made right now, and that they will eventually pay off.

Brit guy is very right about "well, med school is right for her, but not for you [Lucy], that's not where your passion is ..." to paraphrase badly. I remember in the year or so after college graduation, many of my friends were going off to either coast to pursue acting full time. I, on the other hand, had moved to Oklahoma to live with my then boyfriend, now husband. After 4 or 5 years of studying acting, I was a little burned out on the craft and wanted a normal life. But I remember feeling guilty about it: I had an acting degree, shouldn't I necessarily be starving in LA or NYC? Everyone else was committing to their careers, shouldn't I be? But one of my cohorts who fled to Chicago to get her career moving helped me put it in perspective: our lives unfold at their own pace and this is where my life is now. Honey is who I want to be with regardless of career and at 24, I had him. We have to grab our opportunities when they're with us. For me, love entered my life before career. I'm 30 and I'm just now getting the whiff of the career path I think I want to pursue. For others - Lucy, for instance - career has presented itself first. Though I often envy people my age (and former classmates) who are further along in their respective careers than I am, I'm ultimately glad about the choice I made. This is my pace. This is my life. It will be good.

I can't help but note the similarity in Lucy's Hollywood life and VirginiaGal's Indian-American life. Both seem to be framed by unrealistic expectations: one determined by unhealthy body image and sexual appeasement by sleazy management types and the other by a community with aging, rigid social prescriptions. Ladies, don't sell out to cheap pressures and unattainable suppositions; you're both far too wonderful to fall prey to others' petty desires. Lucy and VirginiaGal your lives are beautiful and so are you: don't second guess your choices. What you do now, you do because you trust it will make you happier in the long run. I admire you both deeply and am a big fan!

... isn't it adorable how I write this as if someone other than my darling Niamh actually reads this? How goes it in Shropshire, btw, Niamh? How is the box turtle?

I'm rooting for her!

It's Thursday night. There are many things I should be doing right now. I should be doing laundry. I should be scanning e-bay looking for games for my thesis. I should be prowling the web looking for gaming geeks to help me with my thesis. I should be writing some deep post or other. And probably most of all, as it is 10 o'clock and I've not slept much this week, I should be going to bed!

What am I doing, though? I've been cruising YouTube. I was going to cruise looking for Battlestar Galactica fan videos, but I caught sight of a "popular video of the day" on the front page of YouTube and am now hooked. I've just spent the last hour with LUCYinLA. She's a 24 year old woman from Texas (woohoo!) who's trying to make it in Hollywood and decided to start her own video blog. I hope she does make it.

I was too much of a coward to try Hollywood or New York when I left school with a BFA in acting in hand. The older I get, I find the more risk averse I become. When I was 18, I would've been all about it - that's probably when I should have done it; forgone college for the coast - but at 23, I was too scared. At 30, I'm too old in film terms to try to launch from the West Coast, but I still suspect I could get something going out here - local voice overs, extras work, bit parts, etc. The thing about acting is: you become a product and you have to market yourself. I know people talk about that, but - and I see it now more than ever, actually working on a show - it's true.

I'm 5'3" blonde and am about 10 lbs heavier than my happy weight. I'm "cute mom," "awkward date," or "rugged pioneer woman" (think Amy Poehler or Jodi Foster, only with boobs and hips) pretty, but not leading lady or classically beautiful. If I wanted to be serious about acting, I'd have to drop at least 20 lbs, visit the salon on at least a monthly basis for all the hairstyling and coloring, facials and waxings and nail jobs. (How much does that add up to? $200-$300/month, maybe?) I'd have to update my headshots - another $1000 right there, and I'd have to get a better wardrobe, say maybe $200/month on new trendy clothes. And, like Lucy in the video suggests, that's all the cosmetic stuff, that doesn't even address the talent portion. I'd probably need to spend a few hundred bucks a quarter on workshops and classes to stay fresh. I'm one of the lowest-maintenance women I've ever known. All that up-keep is annoying to me. On top of that, I'm one of the cheapest, stingiest people I know: spending that amount of money terrifies me to the core, even if and when I have it. But the real truth of the matter is, even though I'm talented, even though I'm pretty - though not nearly as much of either as I was at 18 or 23 - I'm afraid of being laughed off the stage. It's so much safer to be a working shlub in an office who's abandoned her dreams.

I think that's why I like this girl. She's got the chutzpah I lost several years ago. And she still seems like such a down-to-earth person. I've known other actors who are indeed very nice, but have that "business" air to them. Like the ambition to succeed in show business colors their interactions with everyone. For instance, I have no sway in anything and never have, but I've known some whose niceness seems disingenuous, as if they don't want to insult me, just on the off-chance that I may ascend to some power sometime. Like politeness is an insurance policy and not just the standard. This girl, Lucy, puts off the vibe that she'd be nice to you because she likes you - she seems genuinely joyful. I admire her. I'm rooting for her. Watch her blogs. Go to her movies when they come out!

Let's the procrastination over with, shall we?

I put the "pro" in "procrastination."

It's true and it's one of my favorite phrases. If I haven't said it before on this blog, I'd be surprised.

(<- btw, i'm trying to get in the habit of crediting images I use. I don't know where this originated; it was the second hit on google images under "video game," but I apparently I pulled this off a site called Elk Turd. Go figure. I know nothing about the sites I get images from, so I claim no affiliations.)

This morning Honey and I were going to go to church to hear a minister we really like who doesn't preach much here anymore, and who's actually moving soon. However, when I woke up this morning to feed the dog, I felt like really didn't want to go, even though I'd been looking forward to it all week. And I realize it's because I had a late show last night and had my dessert first, yesterday. (... and because Honey and I haven't attended church regularly for almost two years. You know how it is when you fall out of habits - you get flabby and lazy.) What do I mean by that? I used Saturday as my down day.

Tomorrow morning I have a meeting with my advising professor. Honey and I decided late last month that I should go ahead and continue with school this semester. After having bought our first (gulp) house and getting into the groove of the new "holyshitareyoukidding?" mortgage payments, we figured I should go ahead and continue - I'm close enough to graduation that pushing though makes sense at this point. So this week, I contacted my prof and the graduates coordinator at school to double check where I was in my degree. Turns out I'm one credit further a long than I thought I was. I'm through with my in-class courses, now it's the independent study before my thesis. So tomorrow, I have to give him my thesis proposal. Cool. ... and my proposed bibliography. Holy caca!

I'm less worried about my proposal than my bibliography. I figure he'll probably nudge me if my proposal needs narrowing or more girth. I probably shouldn't be so worried about my bibliography, but I am. There isn't much written on my subject: video game gibberish. And I'm really not a gamer, so off the top of my head, I don't know many games (aside from The Sims and the ones I'm focusing on) that employ gibberish.

So, once the university libraries open today, I need to spend a couple of hours there. I wrote my proposal yesterday; since it's just an expanding on a paper I did a year and a half ago, which he liked and which he thought I should expand into a thesis, I didn't have to do too much retooling. What I'll be looking for are books and articles on syllable structures of certain languages, dictionaries that have vowel inventories and preferably ones that have consonant inventories as well. ... and even though the libraries don't open until noon, I know I like my weekends to be lazy and restful (imagine that), so I'm choosing to forgo church today so that I get my procrastination done with before noon.

Allow me dear few readers - and my darling, phantom, Niamh - to ask your indulgence. I need help picking some games to focus on. (psst, I'm also talking to you ... presuming you're back from Guatemala.) Any suggestions?

My first paper was on the game Pirates! I compared the foreign language gibberish to the actual phonetic inventories and syllable structures of the languages they were supposed to be mocking. (Incidentally, their English gibberish was excellent; their Spanish gibberish was crap.) I chose that game because Honey was playing it like crazy at the time. Now, I need more games which utilize gibberish to stand for actual languages. I suppose I could use The Sims and compare Simlish to English if I had to, but when I was researching Pirates!, I came across a few articles which claimed the programmers of The Sims based the gibberish on Navajo. So it sounds like they wanted Simlish NOT to sound like English. ... of course I suppose I could lay Simlish against English and Navajo and see what I find. Hmm. ... moving on: for the purpose of the proposal, I figured I could also focus on Civilization and Colonization. We have the former at home, and while it is dialogue light, the characters who do speak (gibberish) are from specific cultures with specific languages. The latter however is old and frankly I don't know if it employs gibberish at all. I'm assuming it does, but ... quien sabe?

Anyway, that's my Sunday. Off to the library, later, to develop a bibliography and to cruise the web searching for gamer sites that can tell me what games employ gibberish to mimick existing languages. WISH ME LUCK!

So, a rabbi is frail and dying, see ...

... and as he's on his deathbed, he begins his final conversation with God in this life. He asks God all the questions he's ever wanted answered before he passes. The ailing rabbi and God have frank discussions. Finally, the rabbi asks God what not only he, but everyone else in the world wants to know: "God, (cough, cough) will there ever be (wheeze, wheeze) peace in the Middle East?"
God pauses - mostly for effect, becuase y'know it's God and he can do that; he digs the theatrics - and parts his lips, "Yes, my son," he begins, "but not in MY lifetime!"

That's the joke as told to a group who'd come to hear the Ambassador from the Palestinian Authority speak a few weeks ago. My dad was there and said it happened to be on the same day that hezbollah had first kidnapped the Israeli soldiers. The ambassador had just learned of it as well and chose not to comment on it as he didn't know much more than the rest of us. I don't know anything else of the speech; Dad just shared that joke with me after we'd both been lamenting the bullshit that's going on out there.
I can only think that there are certain cultures during certain times that prefer violeny chaos over peaceful stability. I'm no historian, but I think, despite man's propensity for constant war, we can look at varying times in Europe's history where certain countries or cultures seemed to only know how to kill and plunder themselves and others. I know some Native American tribes were considered more warring than others, Apaches, for instance. (Blah, blah European slant; yes, I know, but come on! Hundreds of tribes in the US pre-Euro invasion and I'm supposed to think that all of them always got along and not one of them was known as the asshole tribe?) That's really the only way I can get my head around this crap. I can only suspect that that's the deal with the modern Middle East. They only know how to blow things up and make life shitty.

Granted, I do believe that the majority of folks in Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, etc genuinely want to go about their lives and let their neighbors go about their lives without any "make mad go boom." However, their leadership, whether elected, appointed or passed down through the ages, certainly down lead them that direction. And as such, they only know how to live as oppressors, oppressed and generally unhappy.

Looking at this conflict, I'm so angry at Israel. The response to the kidnappings has been completely out of proportion. For as warmongering as Spanky is, I can never imagine him bombing the fuck out of Chihuahua and Coahuila because some border agents or National Guardsmen were kidnapped and killed by rogue members of a Mexican militia. The world community wouldn't stand for it. And the world community is not standing for it this time with Israel - except of course for Condi and Co. By the way, could someone explain to me why we can't have an immediate cease-fire AND a plan for long-lasting peace? What am I missing here? I am completely sympathetic with Israel's desire to be rid of Hezbollah once and for all, but give me a break! Shelling the snot out of a country and killing their folks 12 times over does not make friends and frankly drives those who merely hated you politically into the arms of those who want your complete destruction from the face of the Earth.

There are many things that confound me about the entire Middle East:
* Why did Lebanon allow Hezbollah to have a political voice in the country in the first place, and why did they not disarm them? Lebanon was flourishing as a burgeoning moderate (read not miserable) mid-east country. Get the crack heads out! That's like not only giving the KKK seats in your legislature, it's saying they can keep their shot guns and hemp ropes.
* Why must their be only a Palestinian state or only an Israeli state? Whatever happened to a representative government for all the land's residents? Certainly there must be local voices saying as much, but neither the PLO nor Israel has ever paid them any heed. They only want their own separate governorships.
* Why are countries in the Middle East - excepting maybe Jordan and Lebanon - so convinced that theocracies are the way to go? Firstly, has anyone ever been happy under a theocracy? Not really. Secondly, if God is so great and your religion so superior, then trust that your people will agree and pursue it in their own hearts and in their own daily lives and that that will make your country a moral place. Ruling by religion denigrates God by slapping his name on your own agenda and denigrates religion by fusing it with that agenda and not making it optional.
* Why does killing your neighbors make sense? An Israeli official I heard on the BBC this week claimed that even if Israel ceded to all the demands of its neighbors and Hezbollah regarding land and political rights, the countries and parties surrounding Israel would not be happy until Israel is destroyed. I agree with him on that. I do believe there is a deep anti-semitsm among the political and corporate leadership in the Middle East that simply wants to see all Jews forever out of the Middle East. However, how does disenfranchising those who loathe you in your own house and bombing those who loathe you in the neighbor's house make you any safer? It doesn't. You can never kill everybody, and those who survive, unfortunately - because few humans are actually in touch with divinity of reconciliation and forgiveness (God knows i'm not) - usually just grow more hateful of you and anyone like you.
* How do you move from opressed to oppressor? It almost goes without saying that the Holocaust, because of its systematic, mechanical, pseudo-scientific execution, was probably the grossest crime against humanity in the 20th century. So if you've been ghettoized and marginalized and de-humanified, why do you want to impose that on others? It's not only beyond compassion, it's beyond logic.

I've been writing for over an hour now and I just want to get my Saturday started. I understand to some extent the US general support of Israel, but not the unflinching, absolute support that the current administration has and certainly others have had. I truly do not understand the Middle East. I don't understand why these countries feel like they must be theocracies - don't they get it that there are minorities in their midst who, when strictly denied legitimate modes of expression, devolve into terrorists? And I don't understand why those countries don't crack down on their own terrorist organizations. For all the big bad Americans and nasty Israelies Hezbollah, al Quaeda, Islamic Jihad and those other militant creeps have killed, with their explosions, they've also taken down a lot of their own civilians who were just trying to get to work or take vacation. Why don't the locals see these groups as menaces and act against them?

The only reason I can think of is that there are certain cultures during certain periods of time who only know how to kill and fight and frankly only want to. Everyone probably knows a person who is really only content when there is something bad going on in his or her life, or when he or she can instigate some conflict within the family or group of friends. That's the modern Middle East: so entrenched in grudgery and chaos that it wouldn't know how to be happy with a lasting cooperative stability.

The Repulsive Allure of Greg Kinnear

True story: Not twenty minutes ago, Honey and I just finished watching The Matador. Just now, I was just surfing the web looking for images of Greg Kinnear and my husband, peeking over my shoulder says, "Who the hell is that guy?"

Here's the deal. I don't know what to make of Greg Kinnear. I never seek out movies he's in, but I'm always somehow pleasantly surprised to find that he's in a movie I've happened to rent. (I'm not sure that I've ever seen him on the big silver.) When I see his name flash up on the credits, my first impulse is, "oh shit, this is gonna suck." But invariably he's up and it's okay. He surpasses my expectations.

Greg Kinnear could pretty much never be a leading man, but he's the best middle-class white "everyman" Hollywood has. He's better at it than Tom Hanks - there, I said it - but as far as I'm concerned, could never carry a movie by himself. Granted, it was tried with Auto Focus, and from what I know it didn't really fly. And I suspect it wasn't because people weren't terribly interested in the porn habits of the actor from Hogan's Heroes - though, yeah, you can't deny that kind of anipathy - so much as it was because the lead in the film was our darling, Greg. He's just too damned good as the dry toast nice guy, the world's best second fiddle, a man born to be a foil. Where some actors are chameleons, like my beloved Cate, Greg Kinnear is more like water: he takes the shape of whatever container he's put in, but he's still water, whether a raging ocean or a morning dew drop. Kind of like Bill Pullman. ... y'know: that guy.

I think that's why I'm so torn about him. Part of me wants to hate him for his non-leading-manishness, for his "middle class white guy" in every film tendency. But the other part of me is really quite impressed by how well he commits to his everyman characters. I have yet to see Tom Hanks, America's favorite Everyman, commit the way Greg Kinnear has.

I have to give him props for making Auto Focus, though. I have to give props to any actor who challenges the pigeonhole the industry has given him or her. (With the exception of Julia Roberts. She should have never attempted Mary Reilly. Sorry, doll. Stay away from accent pieces.) I can't remember if I want to see that movie, though: I seem to remember a Fresh Air interview with Kinnear about that movie that creeped me out. It almost doesn't matter. If I rent it, I know I'll be secretly chastising myself for renting a Greg Kinnear movie, and once I watch it, I'll probably be pleasantly surprised by his performance. Oh, the dilemma!