Ummm… ok, so I just saw this picture on another site, and went to find the link…
And, although I myself am now a lady of certain age and think it very bad taste to make fun of people’s looks, especially the somewhat aged and never-terribly-dishy… (glass houses, stones, and all that.)
Can anyone tell me when the heck Helen Thomas began to look like the Emperor Palpatine in drag?
Sorry for the sparse posting of late, and putting off the promised second half of the essay about why I am taking such mean-spirited pleasure in watching the Chosen One, the Fresh Prince of Chicago, metaphorically crash’n’burn right in front of a large and amused audience. Pity he appears to be taking the stock market, the auto industry, and a nice selection of old-line city newspapers along with him… oh, the old Stalinist saying about eggs and omelets may apply here. Where will this all end… it remains to be seen, as the TV reporters standing in front of a Significant Gummit Building always announce portentously, as they wrap up their brow-knittingly serious examination of whatever it is that they have just gotten two or three minutes of local news huffing and puffing about. Probably the serious and potential effect of Lint In Small Children’s Belly-Buttons! This Scourge, If Left Unattended And Without A Lot of Dollars Thrown At It… Think of the Cheeeeldren! (or possibly at the foundation run by the person whose generated news release was just lightly re-written for the news story itself)… Oh, I wouldn’t know about the current local TV news scourge-de-jour, I only watch local news when Downtown is under water, or in danger of being glazed over with ice. Of the national news scourge-de-jour, I have heard vaguely of the ruckus over a sweet little tot in… Florida, was it? Went missing, body searched for by volunteers, mother suspected, name-something-Anthony… no, I don’t watch national channels much either. And although I used to love the various NPR shows – even with their decided tilt… I just got fed up with them, too. When the Bush-bashing and the Obama adoration got to a certain level on Prairie Home Companion – and even on, god save us, Car Talk… well, that was it.
Even before the local public radio affiliate fired me and about fifteen other part-timers, last year… I was seriously considering asking if I could have back every pledge dollar I had ever contributed. I get most of my news from the internet, hopping from story to story, blog to blog, and if I want expert comment, there are another couple of blogs that I will go to, rather than open my local newspaper and consider the maunderings of whatever NY-Times retread or local lamoid who has been so dazzled with an offer of a local byline that they will condescend to dribble away for a couple of paragraphs. (All but TH Fehrenbach… I’d read him. Pity he doesn’t have a blog or something. Maybe he does. I’ll have to check. Nope, no website and no blog – only links to his columns for the newspaper … He’s our local Victor Davis Hansen, just not quite so prolific. By the last couple of columns, it doesn’t look like I am missing much, in having canceled my subscription over a particularly scurrilous cartoon by the on-tap cartoonist Branch, a couple of years ago. It was about the Haditha Marines, and I pulled the plug on the weekend edition within about three minutes of seeing it.)
So, there you go… a fair amount of worry about the way things are apparently headed, under the benign yet feckless aegis of the Affirmative Action President and his boatload of Chicago cronies. I got involved with the local effort to host a Tea Party in San Antonio, through another San Antonio milblogger, the Ranten Raven. Before you could say Jack Robinson, or some other interesting and prophetic phrase, I volunteered… what was it, they used to say, about never volunteering? Yeah… don’t. Too late, I’m in, coordinating news releases, writing speeches and coaching those who have committed to deliver them, coordinating volunteers to have expertise in doing all that, and who have interesting contacts in local media. With luck, and eventually, said local media persons may begin returning phone calls. For this Tea Party may be something big, something splendid and awesome. It’s getting a little frightening; at how fast it has grown – from a handful of people who came to the first planning meeting, to well over a hundred last night… and a hundred or so who were vocal, engaged, and willing to step forward…and to contribute funds. At my estimation, about half were political enthusiasts, who have many years experience in the fray, in support of their various causes – but the rest were new, unblooded and engaged, fresh and energized. So one of them was only a candidate running for city council – sensing the presence of a large body of potential voters, or at least, an audience, although it was definitely comic, watching the way that everyone sidled away from him at the end of the meeting, as he launched into his set speech. All props to paying attention to what is going on locally – but minus-points for not paying a whit of attention to what had been said for about an hour and something; which was, that we all were desperately unhappy with the current lot of our elected officials, albeit at a much higher level than that of city councilperson.
It would appear that the cause of a lot of this interest in the San Antonio Tea Party was the video that I posted previously. It wound up being aired on a national news program of which I know nothing, and excited the interest of a news commentator of whom I had to confess that I also had never heard of. Until this week, I thought Glenn Beck was a guitarist with one of the noisier rock bands… eh, maybe I should pay more attention to this sort of thing… except that I am a writer, and live a fairly cloistered life. I spend more of my time and energy in the 19th century than perhaps I ought to, in these times.
So, Tea Party on the 15th, somewhere in San Antonio. The committee is still working out the venue. But I’ll be there. God knows, I’ll probably be one of the speakers, too. The rule about speakers has been pretty firmly established by the committee. No politicians.
Absolutely no politicians. They will have to come and listen to us. For once.
One of the other volunteers helping to put together the San Antonio Tea Party on April 15th put together this awesome spot, for Youtube and other venues:
Just thought I would share: the project is growing by leaps and bounds: we have a planning committee meeting scheduled for Sunday afternoon.
Kevin Connors wrote a post a few years back extolling the virtues of radioparadise.com and I’ve been hooked ever since. Sure, Bill plays some tracks that leave you wondering WTF, but it’s more than balanced by the old but great ones, and the new little jewels that could only happen with a healthy indie recording industry.
For the most part Real Wife and Red Haired Girl try to ignore the fact that I have it playing through at least two computers pretty much non-stop, although they pretty much dislike the entire play list (they LOVE American Idol – ’nuff said).
Anyway, RP recently played a song – Dance The Night Away – by the Mavericks. I couldn’t get it out of my head, so I went looking for it and found this video on last.fm. The wife and daughter HATE it. I think it’s awesome – you be the judge.
I’m having one of those intermittent impulses to start stockpiling shelf-stable, dried and canned foods again. Not sure where it comes from, only that some of the generalized dark-gray cloud of gloom and doom that is lurking in the atmosphere may have just finished drizzling a mist of vague paranoia down onto Blondie and me. Or maybe it’s the ancestral memories of my grandmothers, no mean slouches in the food-prep and stash-away in case of a spectacularly bad winter or some unspecified disaster. They both of them lived through the Depression; when Grannie Dodie passed on, there was a couple of years worth of canned goods stashed in the garage, some of them so old the tops of the cans had gone dull-colored under a decade of dust. Grannie Jessie was raised on a Pennsylvania farm where they butchered a pig every fall, filled the root-cellar with potatoes, beets and carrots, and canned the results of their summer garden, in shelf after shelf groaning under the weight of mason jars, filled to the top with jewel-toned tomatoes, green beans, piccalilli and Concord grape jelly.
Save for the two years and some spent living in Utah, my own packing-the-larder-with-massive-stocks of food was pretty much modeled after Mom’s… which is to say, we didn’t, much. We generally had just enough on the shelves and in the fridge to last until the next go-round of grocery-shopping. Why not? The grocery store was always there, Dad’s paychecks were at least marginally generous, and regular; and Mom really didn’t care for canned foods, preferring the fresh and/or made from scratch variety. And we lived in California, for pete’s sake, the year-round fair weather and agricultural champion of the west. Generally the emergency food stash in Mom’s larder consisted of a couple of cans of tomato sauce, some canned Vienna sausages and an extra-large can of tuna. Maybe some dried pasta, and something exotic in a tiny can with foreign lettering on it, which someone gave to Mom and Dad as a Christmas present a couple of years previous which Mom was saving for a special occasion and which no one ever quite had the nerve to open, because if it was really vile, no one would want to eat it and then it would all go to waste. And if it turned out to be really, really good, then we wouldn’t be able to find or afford another can, so best just leave it safely on the back of the shelf.
Besides, at the Redwood House, we did have a vegetable garden, and a range of olive trees, and Hilltop House was planted all around with orange and lemon trees, so in the case of a grand economic meltdown, as a last resort, we would have had olives and oranges and lemons, by the bag… anyway, the long and short of it is, that I never felt the least interest or impulse to stash away mass quantities of relatively imperishable food until that period when I was assigned to Hill AFB, Utah—where, for a variety of reasons, this was a cultural and religious imperative, to the point where most old-style suburban houses came ready-stocked with a couple of fruit-bearing trees and a vegetable plot, along with the seasonal water-system to irrigate same. My own rental house in South Ogden came equipped with a root-cellar, lots of larder-space, a bearing cherry tree and a hedge of insanely prolific apricot trees… some of the best of them were intensely succulent; it was as if someone, thirty years before had walked the fence-line planting apricot trees, and so ever since the lawn along that side of the yard was mined with moldering fruit and mounds of apricot stones. There were so damned many apricots, and I did my best, I really did, but I haven’t been able to bear the smell of a dried apricot ever since. All the ordinary grocery stores stocked lavish quantities and varieties of canning supplies, and restaurant-sized bags of flour and sugar, and other staples… so it was as if there was something in the water. I eventually bought a deep-freezer, and an electric dehydrator, for reasons that I cannot very well articulate. It just seemed like a very good idea, at the time.
And so, now it seems like a good idea again. Maybe the various experts in disaster preparedness, dinning advice into my ears over the last couple of years – after Katrina, after floods, fires, riots and diverse other disasters – have finally achieved a degree of success with me … or there is something about these times, and reading about all those people who- through forethought, were comfortably equipped to ride out disasters. I just have the feeling that I ought to start doing this. Have enough food on hand at all times, stocks of things that I just cannot live without, like tea and jam for bread, and the means to cook food, if there should there be a power interruption that lasts for weeks. I ought not to be depending on a local grocery store, if we run short in a day or so. I ought to have sufficient a stash – for days, weeks and even months. I ought to have a garden again, for more than just ornament, and something in the larder- more than just the usual couple of cans of tomatoes, the half-used packet of Japanese-panko dried bread-crumbs, and the various bug-proof glass jars with about half a cup of dried beans in the bottom, lentils ditto.
So, this Friday, Blondie and I were checking out Sam’s Club and making a list. I can’t, with all my other financial obligations, say that I spent a bomb, on everything that we looked at… but I invested in a 8-pack case of canned tomatoes, a quart each of olive oil and honey, a brick of cheddar cheese – which, alas, tastes nothing as good as the Department of Ag surplus cheddar, which used to be sold at the military commissaries at like, about 50 cents a pound and made the most totally awesome mac-and-cheese imaginable. We made notes about the costs of 25 and 50-pound bags of rice, and beans… and the costs of another propane bottle… I just can’t get away from the feeling that I ought to be doing something more. I bought a bunch of 2-inch pots of tomatoes and pepper plants a couple of weeks ago; they were on sale, at a very good price at the Humongous Big-Ass Grocery chain, a week ago. We planted them, last weekend, the tomatoes in pots, and the peppers in the ground… but I can’t escape the feeling that I ought to be doing more, that I can squeeze some more edible plants into the sun-warmed spots in the garden…
I have read that letting potatoes sprout, and then cutting them up, with a sprout in each piece, that they grow very well… and that fava beans will grow in a heap of gravel.
Spring is here, and with the usual promise of a new season. Its just that those promises are all of vague and threatening things. Thus to work, this weekend. In the garden, and on other projects.
Ok, so in the main, I’m kinda torn. Watching the Fresh Prince of Chicago and his administration melt down is pretty amusing, in a sick, sadistic sort of way; I wake up in the morning, and turn on the computer now, and wonder if the State Department has gifted the Turkish Prime Minister with a bobble-headed Mohammed, or presented President Sarcozy of France with a fine selected case of box-wine and a tastefully gift-wrapped tube of deodorant. Seriously, after the cut-rate Box ‘o Movies to Gordon Brown – in the wrong format yet – I don’t think I would be all that surprised to read of the above official gifts being dispensed by the administration of the guy who was supposed to make the whole world like us again, after that uncouth Cowboy Bush. That’s the trouble with being surreal and humorous in these dark times – just when you had thought up something that you assumed was impossibly, comically far over the top – there it is, all over the headlines. The serious headlines, not at the Onion, or Iowahawk.
I have to admit that seeing all the ecstatically worshipping minions of the main-stream press who drank the hopey-changy Kool-Aid all these months ago, waking up with an ‘omigawd, what did I do last night’ hangover… That’s also kind of fun, too. In a grimly amusing, ‘didn’t I warn you not to trim your short’n’curlies with the weed-whacker’ sort of way. Hey, I will get my jollies where I can, and “I told you so” is one of life’s great unsung pleasures. Watching the major media organs collapse like a dirigible with a slow leak is also no end amusing, especially when it happens to be those very same organs who kept banging on about Governor Sarah Palin’s inexperience, as compared to the Anointed One’s sanctified role as a ‘community organizer’. Live by taking political sides – perish from the same. Thanks. My only regret is that in future, I may not have anything packing materiel for stuff to be mailed out of state. A couple of sheets of newsprint were always good for that.
I said, all these months ago, that Barak Obama was an attractive, empty suit, with a pleasant voice, a puppet of Chicago machine politics, with no discernible bad record – and what did you – or 52% of the electorate, or whatever percent actually did vote for him – have to go and do, but elect him, just because he was so cute, with the year-round-dark-tan, glamorous and exotic background and (insert fangirly squeal here) besides, he made such cool-sounding speeches! So now, here he is in office, the ultimate Affirmative-Action candidate/American Idol fave – stuck in a hideously exposed position, under the pitiless lights, with no possible way to vote ‘present’ and go on doing what he seems always to have done – which is to move on. Having had some experience in the real world, I’ve see his like before; the favored golden candidate, one of those charming and ambitious fast-burners who go all the way up, glad-handing and using all the way, and never staying long enough in any position to actually do the job. They generally leave before the damage they have done becomes evident. As the old saying goes, they leave the stink behind them. Alas, this time, he is stuck, like a treed cat, up on top of the highest telephone pole in the land, with no graceful way to come down.
So that’s the thing – I would be amused, save for all the damage that was done, getting him up there, and all the damage that will be done, when he comes down. (To be continued.)
(Note – re-posted to allow comments. There is a bug in our system which dislikes apostrophes in the titles of posts.)
This past weekend I was letting Red Haired Girl know that I was not happy that she could not find time in her busy social schedule to do the chores that we had asked her to do. After listening to various and sundry excuses such as “some of the clothes in the washing machine AREN’T EVEN MINE or, it’s not MY fault that the stupid dog got the gum from my jacket” (which was left in the kitchen where the allegedly stupid dog is fenced in our absence), etc., I erupted in exasperation, telling her that I expect those kinds of excuses from the President of the United States, not from a fifteen year old.
That sound you hear is me banging my head on the table.
Well, I finally got around to taking down the PJ Media ads… why the heck should they soak up ad space on this blog? At this point, about all I want to promote is my own darned books, thank you. I will attempt to further tweak the sidebar to that effect, utilizing my own somewhat less than totally mad HTML skilz…
As you were.
(Gomer Pyle voice): As you were what?
Never mind.
You can make the Dog play dead.
Bang! Dead Dog.
You can make the Dog stay dead.
All the way dead.
With bacon on her muzzle.
I said all the way dead.
But good luck keeping her from rolling her eyes and drooling when she’s playing dead with bacon draped across her muzzle.
Cross posted to Space For Commerce.
In Last Week’s Episode ..
Congress wrote into a bill that allowed AIG to pay bonus money. President Obama signed the bill into law.
Congress and the President got on their moral high-horse and said how awful it was that AIG followed the letter of the law.
Congress is passing a bill that taxes those bonus monies at 90%.
Which is prohibited by the Constitution.
Regardless of how you feel about the specific matter – does anyone think that de-facto changing our tax policy from progressive to confiscatory is a good idea?
Links ..
They told me that when Bush was President ..
Dodd Fesses Up: Admits AIG Bonus Amendment Added at Behest of Obama Administration
Cross posted to Space For Commerce.
No, not the writing one – that is as liberating and as enjoyable today as it was when first I sat down to scribble the first couple of chapters of what would become “To Truckee’s Trail”, and even earlier, when I first began to write for this blog, back in the high middle ages of the blogosphere, some seven years ago. (My, how time flies when having fun, et cetera…)
I don’t hate the various freelance author-wrangling/editing gigs that I have, through the good offices of one part-time source of employment, the tiny boutique subsidy publisher, or learning the various ins and outs of the small-book-subsidy press. Neither do I hate wrangling the world’s tallest ADHD child – the real estate agent who specializes in Texas ranch properties, who must simply adore tap-dancing on the edge of economic ruin, since he finds himself out there doing it so frequently. No, I view these jobs with considerable affection. The only thing the least little bit wrong with them is that they are not a reliable, steady source of income.
Which brings me to the one job which does indeed provide reliably constant hours and a resulting and reliably steady income stream – and which I hate with a passion, the phone-bank job with a certain large corporation which shall remain nameless, doing hotel-resort reservations for a large nation-wide chain which shall also remain nameless.
That is the job that I hate with such a desperate passion that in future not only will I try to avoid driving past the building where the phone bank is located – but I have taken a vow to never even darken the doors of the hotel-resort chain involved, or set a toe in the city where the properties that I specialize in is situated. I find everything to do with it is loathsome, from the little half-cubicles in the large glass-walled room where a fifty to a hundred of us sit, to the constant racket of voices saying basically the same thing, over and over. “How may I assist you with that? Can you verify…I have requested for you a deluxe room with a king-sized bed… your confirmation number is… thank you for choosing…”
I hate the sound of the beep in my headset when a call comes through, the automated male voice telling me which property the caller wants to make a reservation for. I hate the antiquated, insanely complicated DOS-based system that was so cutting-edge twenty-five years ago, with it’s million quirks, peculiarities, obscure abbreviations and having to manually enter just about every necessary bit of information when a more up-to-date revision would have that data auto-populate. I hate having every single call listened to and recorded, and timed to the second. I hate being dinged for taking too long with a caller – and dinged again for not cross-selling another property or service or gourmet restaurant, when doing so would increase the call-time.
I hate the dress-code – casual office attire, but no jeans permitted – even though we are doing phone work, and not direct, face to face sales. I hate the fact that we can no longer bring a book to the floor and read between calls when it slows. I hate the fact that the only two computers that we might use for personal business on our rigidly scheduled breaks are the slowest and nastiest in the whole building and one of them doesn’t connect on-line any more. I hate having to wear an employee badge on a stupid lanyard around my neck whenever I am in the building. I hate the callers who mumble, who hold a cell-phone away from their mouth, or are calling from an area with rotten connections – who then berate me because I can’t hear half of what they are saying.
I don’t hate the supervisors – who, to give them credit – do their best to ameliorate the rotten conditions and circumstances of the job as much as possible. I’ve been working there now since July, and many of them now know me by name. Most employees only last a maximum of six months – of the lot I trained with, I only see one other working in the cubicles. The rest are gone. And I am pretty sure that I will be gone also, at some point in the near future. The only questions remaining, are how soon can I afford to quit – in these shaky economic times a regular paying job is not something you abandon. I have no wish to napalm that bridge until I get to it. Secondly, will I plan a graceful and professional exit and leave with two weeks notice, or will I suddenly just be pushed too far one day? There are days when I can see myself melting down, tossing my badge at the floor supervisor and leaving abruptly in the middle of the shift, perhaps after a set-to with a particularly unreasonable caller. I don’t usually do nuclear meltdowns – but in the case of this job I might be pushed into making an exception.
Yes, I hate this job – but now I do feel better.
Oh, and every sale of a copy of the Trilogy moves me just a little bit closer to the graceful and professional exit. Thanks.
|
You Are Peanut Butter Sandwiches / Do-si-dos |
 You are easy going and naturally happy. You don’t need a lot to make you smile. You genuinely care about people and are a great friend. You’re always doing your best to make the world a better place. Even though there isn’t an immature bone in your body, you still are like a big kid sometimes. |
