All Politics are Personal

It wasn't until I left a comment on Doghouse Reilly that I realized just how much this has been bugging the living shit out of me.

I work with a Bush supporter. She happens to be a dumb Bush supporter. (Among other things, she believes Bush is pro-choice.) That's not the issue.

She's excitable about anything that occurs in the political sphere and permeates the membrane of her misunderstanding. She comes over to my desk, correction, she races from one end of the building to the other to stand in front of my desk and fervidly yammer the latest rubbish she's heard on Fox.

Here's the beauty part. She behaves like a sullen, pissy child if you disagree with her.

The stinking nerve. Don't run over to my desk to tell me your husband's opinion of Susan Sarandon or pass on the latest misinformation about Kerry and act like a spoiled brat if I disagree with you.

And more to the point, don't pull this shit again and again. You may be a cross between a moron and a masocist, but I'm not and this idiocy was old the first time you did it.

I'm saddened to admit that no matter how important it is for America and America's future for Bush and the Bush administration to be out of office, the real reason I want Kerry to win is so I don't have to witness her G-spot victory orgasm in front of my desk.

I do promise to be the better woman. I won't rub her face in a Kerry victory.

Well, maybe a little face rubbing. But, not after the first week.

Promise.

John Ashcroft's Wet Dream

I'd like more information than is in this interview, and not knowing the fact-checking process makes me nervous. But if this is true, that a writer can be busted and her working life severely disrupted over doing basic research, that's some funky, scary, nasty shit.

Writer Raided For Doing Research

Courtesy of Res ipsa loquitur

Can you imagine having your voter registration challenged over nothing more than the ethnicity of your last name? Creepy.

Hispanic Voter Registrations Challenged in Georgia

Medusa in Barnstable

I stopped by the Barnstable General Store on my way home. It's a good thing I have a small car, the only space available was squeezed by a badly parked minivan. No biggie. I find what I'm looking for and wait in line to be rung up. I was tired and not paying attention to my fellow customers until the woman in front of me turned into a monster straight from the bowels of hell.

Her daughter wanted to purchase a couple of little books for (I think) her younger sister and had added them to the pile in front of the cashier. The cashier started ringing items up. I first knew something was wrong when I heard Mom screech "They cost how much!?" in the general direction of the cashier.

Then she turned to her daughter and proceeded to berate her for being an ungrateful, no-good-nik that didn't know the value of the dollar, and why the hell wasn't she buying these with her own money?. Lady. You're having a meltdown because your daughter's buying...books?

It was horrible.

I watched the daughter's expression become studiously neutral and her eyes look at nothing, least of all the specimen harranging her. She'd clearly heard it all a million times before and had long since figured that the shortest distance to peace and quiet was to tune Mom out.

I couldn't tune Mom out. I heard her tell her daughter that by letting others pick up the tab, she was "living in a dream world". Right, who ever heard of a parent paying for their child? "When I was your age, I had to buy my own clothes I didn't have money for anything else". And we all can see just how character-building that was.

The best part. I finally paid for my purchases and follow them out of the store. They're not walking very fast because Mom is still ripping into her child and she can't walk and yell at the same time. Remember the person who did the extremely shitty parking job that I had to park next to and I just barely squeezed my car into the spot? It's our friend, Harpy Mom. Her charm and abilities aren't just part of being a parent, they're part of all of her interactions! Lucky us.

At least we can get away from her. I cannot adequately express how sorry I feel for that girl. She's going to grow up, move as far away as possible, refuse to come home for the holidays and I bet Mom never even understands why.

Eclipse Tonight

Either the world is going to end or the Sox are going to win the World Series. You decide.

Viewer's Guide to the Eclipse

Now that's just funny

Bush Relatives for Kerry

Open Your Eyes

A friend is investigating the possibility of moving to Canada. She wants a safety net in case George W. Bush is in office for another four years and things get really funky.

Deep in my heart, I tend to believe that things are never really as bad as you think they're going to be. And, I scoff a bit at this. But I'd feel better if she wasn't the second of my friends to be investigating Canada and I'd feel better if she wasn't one of the smartest, level-headed common-sensed people that I know.

Dude, you're getting a draft!

They scare us all with threats of war. So we forget just how bad things are...Open your eyes see the lies right in front of ya. Open your eyes see the lies right in front of ya.....
--Lords of the New Church

Christ, I'd Weep Too

Al-Jazeera Airs Tape of Weeping Aid Worker

Horrible. We all know it's only a matter of time before we see this poor woman beheaded on video.

Latest knitting adventure

I've been trying to make cotton washcloths. I finally came to the conclusion that I'm not "learning the pattern", a euphemistic phrase for crying and carrying on while I figure new things out. I don't like knitting with cotton.

I don't like the way it feels or the way it hurts my hands while I knit with it. I don't care how many presents I could make or the fact that knitted dishcloths and facecloths are wonderfully durable. I'm going to make the one facecloth I signed on for, and I'm never touching cotton yarn again.

So there.

Overheard While Trying On Bras

Mother: Let's see how that one looks. Wow! You must be about to get your period any day now, those babies look like they're going to pop.

Daughter: Thanks for noticing.

My angst tastes like...

Black Licorice
Find your angst's flavor
Unique and difficult to place, your angst finds its source in something you keep hidden. You have something serious and possibly traumatic, but you try to hide it from everyone and just tell them to ignore you when you seem troubled, that everything's really OK. You might think that you have good reasons for not telling people, and some of them may in fact be true, but most likely a lifetime of keeping your secrets has led to a resolution fortified by rationalization that nobody else can shake simply because you never give them a chance. Ask yourself if it would really be that horrible to open up to others; nobody says you have to do it all at once, even. But you should at least try getting out of your shell a little. It's not healthy to internalize everything and conceal it. Anyway, if people really care for you, and they probably do, then they'll be loving and supportive regardless of any reason to the contrary.

Okay, that's just eerie.

I've always held back how I feel with people because I assume I won't be understood. This is something I know about myself and am trying to work on, but it's disconcerting to see it in black and white.

Offended By The Gregorian Calender

Some Fundamentalist Christians are offended because Halloween falls on a Sunday this year. "It's a day for the good Lord, not the devil."

Halloween is of the devil. Fair enough. It's somehow less devilish on a Saturday?

I think they should take it up with Pope Gregory. He got us all into this mess.

Blast From the Past

In one of my previous lifetimes, I worked as temp for Kelly Services. I was cleaning out my old papers when I found some of their old cheat sheets.

Kelly used to give these away to temps. If you were working on an unfamiliar program, you could refer to these and your employer for the day would be none the wiser that you'd never used Excel outside of a training program.

I know I used to have a bunch of Windows Guides, but I think I gave them away to a friend. So, all I still have are the Macintosh Guides. Microsoft Excel Version 2.2 and Microsoft Word 4.0.

Kinda takes you back, doesn't it?

Future Socks of America

Yarn purchased at the wool festival. The picture doesn't give a good impression of just how pretty the colors are, but you get an idea.

Wool Festival Update

I went to the wool festival sponsered by the Cape Cod Spinners Guild. I'd say that there were about ten or twelve spinners on the Dennis Village Green, all demonstrating their craft and a goodly number of gawkers like myself. What nice people! Once I got over my shyness and started talking to people, they were all very encouraging and friendly.

There were various offerings for sale, mostly hand-spun wool, knitted things and felted things, but also other items tossed in for a bit of variety. I bought three skeins (?) of wool that have already been rolled into balls. If I get ambitious, I'll post some pics.

The Cape Cod Spinners are apparently going to start meeting regularly. I'm going to stop by one of their meetings(after researching spinning wheels) and see if I can't try out a wheel or two. "Please mum, may I use your spinning wheel? Just for a moment?"

I love the idea of learning to spin, but the sensible side of me is sighing and saying that all I need is an expensive hobby that takes up precious room. Eh, maybe I'll figure something out. Maybe a spinning wheel will magically appear on my front door. And I'll wake up one day and find a new addition painlessly added to my house. It could happen.

Wool Festival - Dennis Village Green, October 2nd

23rd annual Wool Festival, sponsored by Cape Cod Spinners Guild
10 a.m.-4 p.m.
Dennis Village Green, Route 6A.

I hadn't heard about this at all when I saw the sign as I drove home today. I looked on the web and found an announcement buried in "Cape Week". Don't know when I'll be there, but I'll stop by some time tomorrow. Hopefully it's not just two booths and a single scared sheep.