I was playing around with the access logs for this site and saw a curious spike in pageviews on April 11. A big spike. Ninety site visits instead of three or zero. Turns out the page those 90 people had come to visit was this one from 2004, which relates a story about a stump turtle. (That page is the top Google hit for that term.) Someone somewhere must have mentioned that phenomenon on that day.
Well, that was boring. Anyone know a joke?
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I thought I had more to say about the election, but today, after reading a lot of people writing what I wanted to say much better than I could, I decided not to. I'll just say this: I know Obama won't do all the things I want him to do. He's not, as was claimed, "the most liberal senator ever." But it feels like he'll work toward making our government care again for the people who need care. And that he'll work toward bringing the country together again, after many years of division. In fact, we might all be sick of each other after four or eight years of togetherness, ready for the Palin/Plumber ticket to divide us up again into Real America and the Unpatriotic Elites.
Okay, that's all.
PS: Check out this font: Obamabats, a dingbats typeface.
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I bought new shoes today. I got a phone call at work this afternoon from KR, who was perturbed that I hadn't returned any of the messages she'd left for me. I don't get a lot of calls at work so I don't check for the blinking phone light very often. They just called California and Florida for Obama and, therefore, the entire presidential race.
So she let me know with love that I should check my phone messages more often and that she had just deleted her store's entire inventory database. She drove home for her latest backup disc, then picked me up and we raced to the shop. Now John McCain is giving his concession speech. He's somehow quieted the crowd, which seemed at first to be on the verge of ugly. Sometimes it seems he's disgusted with these people who follow him around.
So, after restoring her inventory file, I stuck around the shop for the rest of the afternoon. We wandered down the street to visit some of the other shops, including Equita, where I bought my shoes. I'm wearing them as I wait for Obama's acceptance speech, which is likely to make a significant reduction in the misanthropy that's been rising in me over the past twenty or so years.
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Twas the night before the election and all through the house...
Got a message in my inbox this evening packed with some last-ditch efforts to plant fear about Barack Obama. Maybe you got it too. It's in the form of a letter to the senator. (You'll recognize it by its inventiveness with respect to grammar and punctuation.) I don't usually like talking and blogging about politics because, you know, I'm an ignoramus about such things. But I do have a computer with a browser that connects to the internets. So let's look at some of the things the message says...
First: The New York Times carried a story on Saturday, October 4, 2008, that proved you had a significantly closer relationship with Bill Ayers than what you previously admitted.
I found and read that article. It doesn't "prove" anything. Mainly it reports that the Republicans blew the relationship with Mr. Ayers out of proportion. And that Mr. Ayers has been an upstanding member of society for decades. Maybe the author is talking about this paragraph:
A review of records of the schools project and interviews with a dozen people who know both men, suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers, 63. But the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers, whom he has called "somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8."
Here's another: The Chicago Sun reported on May 8, 2008, that FBI records showed that you had a significantly closer relationship with Tony Rezko than what you previously admitted.
Maybe the author meant the Chicago Sun-Times? But I don't see any article on May 8 that mentions Rezko. I don't see a paper online called Chicago Sun, though there is a Chicago Sun Club, "Traveling group for nude recreation." But I don't think that's it. The Sun-Times had this headline on June 5: "Obama would not pardon Rezko if elected president."
Then I stopped reading. There's a lot of accusations in there but I can't seem to get too worked up about them. Maybe someone will go through the thing point by point, but by then the people who wrote it will have already frightened the people who are susceptible to that kind of thing. As for me, along with the other Obama supporters I know, I'm tired of being told to be afraid. We've had seven years of it and even with President Bush lying low these past several months we're still getting that fear message, now from Senator McCain and Governor Palin. Thank you, but I won't be having any of it.
You see why I don't write about this stuff? I lose interest so easily. See you at the polls.
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According to The Writer's Almanac, today is Jimmy Carter's birthday.
...Carter said he wanted to end what he called "the imperial presidency." He walked down Pennsylvania Avenue for his inauguration, often wore informal clothes at official appearances, and sold the presidential yacht. Jimmy Carter said, "A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It is a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity."
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Why don't I get email like this? (I snagged this from IDblog.)
I’m a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight.
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If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you’re "exotic, different."
Grow up in Alaska eating mooseburgers, a quintessential American story.
—–
If your name is Barack you’re a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.
Name your kids Willow, Trig, and Track, you’re a maverick.
—–
Graduate from Harvard Law School and you are unstable.
Attend five different small colleges before graduating, you’re well grounded.
—–
If you spend three years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend eight years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate’s Health and Human Services committee, spend four years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran’s Affairs committees, you don’t have any real leadership experience.
If your total resume is: local weather girl, four years on the city council and six years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you’re qualified to become the country’s second-highest ranking executive.
—–
If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising two beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you’re not a real Christian.
If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you’re a Christian.
—–
If you teach responsible, age-appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.
If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option, in sex education in your state’s school system while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant, you’re very responsible.
—–
If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family’s values don’t represent America’s.
If your husband is nicknamed "First Dude," with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn’t register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.
—–
OK, much clearer now.
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Looking for ways to stimulate the economy with your check from the government? How I Spent My Stimulus is one place to look for ideas. I originally thought I'd just send the whole thing to the Democratic National Committee, but maybe some of these people have the right idea: spend it the way the government should have spent it in the first place - give it to groups that care for the homeless and the hungry.
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I found this, nearly completed, in my drafts. Hey! Free blog post!
I'll be avoiding the airline industry from now on as much as possible.
This decision has nothing to do with fear. I am not afraid of being blown up. I am not afraid of the terrorists. I refuse to be. I will not be terrorized. Say it with me now: If I am not terrorized then the terrorists have failed. Again: I will not be terrorized.
And I am not afraid of the airplane, in all of its metallic giantness, falling out of the sky. I have a college-level understanding of aerodynamics and I trust the rest of the physics.
Here is why I will no longer fly: it's a huge hassle. The airline industry is maybe the only one where, as prices go up, service goes down. Every time I buy a ticket online the process is longer and the prices are higher. There seem to be fewer and fewer direct flights to the places I want to go. Every time I go to the airport the obstacle course gets longer and more difficult. I get dropped at the curb (remember when our loved ones saw us off at the gate?). The security check-in has me empty my pockets, take off my belt and shoes, remove my watch and wedding ring, unpack my laptop from my carry-on bag, and now I guess I need to chug all my beverages and throw out my shampoo and eyeliner. Then once I'm past the security check I sit in an uncomfortable chair shoulder to shoulder with strangers on cellphones, all trying to talk louder than the CNN. I have to lug my bag around with me everywhere I go: to the bathroom, the overpriced fast food joint, the trash can. On the plane I am given the smallest bottle of water and bag of pretzels ever invented. And again I sit well inside my neighbor's personal space. And so on and so forth.
Maybe the only improvement in airplane flight from my first flight thirty years ago (remember Peoples Air?) is that cigarette smoking is now banned.
My point is that the airline industry seems to have forgotten that they are a service, and that we are paying for service. As long as I have an option that is more comfortable, and in which I have more control over my own actions, I will choose that one.
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In Washington DC about a month ago a guy busts into a small dinner party at someone's home, points a gun at a girl's head, and demands money. One of the adults invited him to have a glass of wine and some cheese. He enjoys these and asks for a hug and leaves. (Here's the link to the story.)
And here's the discussion at MetaFilter where they mention other similar stories.
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Apparently the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the kind people who spring new and bizarre restrictions on you in airports, will be selling advertisements on the bins you use to put your stuff through the x-ray machine.
Some folks think the perfect advertisers would be the organizations that fight to preserve our rights as human citizens. Organizations like EFF and ACLU. One guy has offered to help fund the ACLU advertising on those bins a list of your rights as a passenger as you pass through the TSA's hands.
Unfortunately, this commenter might be right: the bins might have to say, "You have the right to turn around and not get on the plane. You have no other rights"
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