also, if you didn't respond to my curious-about-politics post, please do... regardless of political affiliation. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

On Tuesday, when the "Ophir Fire" (a confusing name to all locals, who consider it the Palermo fire) came crawling up to my doorstep, I thought, okay, we've had our disaster on the year. There was hardly any rain this winter, so the grass is short, this is a freak incident, fire season won't be bad.

Spending the last three days watching the Humboldt (again a different name to us nearby, Paradise) fire grow beyond imagination, spending half of Wednesday, all of Thursday, up until late this afternoon worried to death because I have friends in Paradise, and then because those friends couldn't get to their lovely dogs because of the evacuations and authorities arresting anyone going back in to the area, that had me freaking out. (The dogs are fine. My boyfriend is a hero, he called and called Animal Rescue until he got through and they went to pick the dogs up).

Today, working in a half-lit, barely-attended office... today, standing outside in the parking lot watching yet another fire, this one on Kelly Ridge, another fucking fire, I just wanted to cry.

I remember how scared I was during the Northridge earthquake. It's nothing compared to now. I was seven or eight then; my parents could fix everything. Now... I'm not sure anyone can fix this. I keep staring at the maps as they update. Google "Chico ER" and click the map links. You see all around the red and blue, below it, above it, to the sides? It's farmland. It's livestock fields. It's open, empty space filled with dry grass. I'm living in a tinderbox and it's going up like one and I'm scared to death for the people I know in Chico and Paradise and I'm damned scared that if the wind picks back up like Tuesday, if even the wind we've got now shifts directions, I'm scared to death of what's going to happen.

20% contained... 20k acres... my god.

(I know I must have at least one or two on my list; feel free to forward this to others. I want as many responses as I can get.)

*dusts journal off* Been a while, huh?

I have a question for you. This is an honest question, no sarcasm involved. It was sparked by a conversation with my boyfriend (Republican). I'll admit that while he's got a high base intelligence, his education is not what it could be and he is not the most articulate of people, hence why this is going on LJ.

I know a fair amount of Republicans (by which I mean people who identify with and seem to support the ideals of the party which currently calls itself Republican.) Now, I've tried to stay away from politics recently, because I'm flat sick of it, and besides which the guy I like dropped out ages ago.

Not a one of these people, some of whom are extremely smart folks, can answer my questions. Neither do the Republicans on television.

My question is, why? Okay, so Hilary is evil (another thing that no one will explain-- never why, just is) and Obama is inexperienced (which I'll grant, though it's not like it's his first day in politics either). So what makes the Republican candidates better? I'm willing to listen, but no one will talk. There's plenty of mud-slinging and blustering and nonsense words (that last can get pretty funny though), but no one will convince me. No one will tell me why-- except for reasons that are completely irrelevant. My boyfriend, for example, wants to vote for McCain, for no other reason than he spent six years in a POW camp. When I say, "Okay, yes, I also respect him for that, now what do you consider his qualifications as a president?" I get a blank look. The same has been true for other people.

My other question is, why are you a Republican? I don't understand how people can still follow the party. It's funny, my dad calls me a liberal (still don't understand why that word is supposed to be an insult). Really, if Republicans were still what I considered Republican, I would be one (my mom calls it "Goldwater Republican"). I'm extremely fiscally conservative, believe in small government with minimal governmental interference, as few taxes as can efficiently run the country, states rights (within, as now, an broader set of laws to maintain cohesiveness). I despise the way the current administration is throwing money around, quite frankly.

I'm about half and half on social issues; in some areas I'm very conservative, where in others I'm liberal. I think abortion should be legal. I think everyone should have access to education.

There's another question. WHY is education a 'liberal' thing? Isn't education good? Don't we want people in this country to know things? Shouldn't we know what's gone before, how to speak our own language*, you know, little things like that? Things most people don't seem to have ever learned, or promptly forgot if they did? So tell me, why is it 'liberal' to want education? Suppressing or preventing knowledge is a sign of tyranny, not the way of a free and civilized people.

*(that always cracks me up-- oh yes, it should be the official language, don't you dare make me press one for English, it's not like most of the languages native speakers can't use it for shit. When most of the people you meet who can use your own language properly grew up speaking another, it's time to be depressed.)



That's about all. It's not as clean and coherent as I would like, but it's been a long day, and there's a fire about five miles away with wind blowing strong towards my house, so I'm just a tad scattered.

My gratitude towards anyone who replies. I apologize if I sounded snarky anywhere in there; written word is a hard medium to get one's meaning across sometimes, and I do have a tendency to sound rather bratty if I don't watch myself closely. No offense is intended; I truly do want to hear answers to my questions.

Thanks.

-Sparrow

I have had 3 1/2, maybe closer to 4 hourse of sleep in the last 42. But the last four of them were spent eating pizza and listening to funny SCA stories (top reason why having dinner at a Constable's house, or at least that Constable's house, is great.)

must finish water and then pass out.

also, hallo you all.

Something a little old but interesting from OTF_wank on journalfen. I want to comment, but they're not allowing journal creation at the moment, oh well.

I may be a glorified file clerk, but I see (and have seen in other venues as well) abuse of the system every day. It's weird how some people don't get that helping people who need it isn't a bad thing, and others don't get that, HELL YES, the system damn well needs to be fixed because it's far too easy to abuse.

Anyway. Just slapping my tuppence up here since I can't comment there. Also, HI EVERYBODY I'M SORT OF VAGUELY BACK YAY!

(Only not really, because OMG GROWN UP LIFE LEAVES NO FREE TIME WHY WAS I NOT INFORMED?_

I've been reading back entries from my friendslist, getting caught up and all, and ran across a conversation about politics. Reading some of the comments in the post-- both the ones FROM and ABOUT "libertarians" make me feel the need to say this:

STUPID PEOPLE, PLEASE GET THE HELL AWAY FROM MY POLITICAL BELIEFS, YOU'RE MAKING THEM LOOK BAD. LIKE, REALLY, REALLY, REALLY BAD.

I wish there were more actual libertarians, instead of lots of stupid people who just don't want to pay taxes.

I GOT THE JOB I GOT THE JOB I GOT THE JOB!

Contingent, of course, upon the background check which is apparently required to be a government employee. I'm gonna be a petty beaurocrat, y'all!

I start on October 22.

AN INCOME! YAY!

I'm trying to do music for a friend for a bellydance contest... to which end, can anyone send me a copy of the Pussycat Dolls version of "Sway" in the next hour and a half?

I have an interview at the county tomorrow I might be getting a job SQUEE!

Television: Pushing Daisies is weird and fun, I'm glad all my shows are back on (except Doctor Who which apparently ends right as everything else starts, and wow, I know I'm way behind on everything since I can't download stuff [stupid dialup] but OMG Jack is...? OMG.)

( TMI )


( Also, Halo 3, yay! )


And also, I have the coolest boyfriend on the face of the planet. No particular reason for the statement, he just is.

Seriously, am I the only person who doesn't mind going the speed limit?

To the annoying guy in the very large gas-guzzling vehicle which, odds are, you probably don't require: I was going seventy. Seventy is in fact five miles above the speed limit. As I was going above the speed limit and you were alone in the car- ie, sans dying people or women in labor- and had no sirens, you don't get to go past me. No, waving your arms around and yelling at me when I glance in my rear-view mirror isn't going to help. Try the PG&E guy next to me. Also? Driving right next to one vehicle, nearly on the bumper of another, is not safe. There was a whole section of the driver handbook devoted to the subject. I can make allowences for the fact that when you learned to drive, there may not have actually been a handbook, but that still doesn't make you the ruler of the road. Driving is not based on seniority.

I have no desire whatsoever to go above seventy. I did it once, on a straight, empty back road, and that was enough. The speed limit is sixty-five. Everyone goes seventy or more on the freeway, yes, and guess what... it's called SPEEDING. Also? My car is not new. It's currently making funny noises and occasionally stalls at stops. I'm not going to go above seventy, unless an emergency requires it. I have this little quirk where I would prefer not to crash and die.

And see, if you hadn't waved your arms about all indignantly, I would have gone seventy on the two-lane portion as well, instead of sixty-five. I want you to know that I did that for the express purpose of annoying you (and from the way you hauled around me when it opened back up to four lanes, I think I did). It even made me only five minutes early to class, not ten.

This very slighly coherent message brought to you by the fact that the whole thing was kind of hilarious.

Also, the world at large (specifically the portion which drives): Turning lanes are not passing lanes, I am pretty sure it's not legal to use them as such, please stop it now. Kthxbye.

I'm dancing at a restaurant this Friday (blarg it seemed so far away when I agreed to do it- now I am all flustered, eek!) and would like to dance to something I haven't danced to ten billion times before. To that end, does anyone have tracks from Bride & Prejudice that they'd be willing to share with me?

Thanks muchly.

Now I scurry back to my cd-making.

The boy.

You can poke at him if you want, but BE NICE, you lot. :D

Dude, LJ. Shit went down while I was away. I'm like ten pages back in my fifty-posts-per-page flist, my no communities filter, and I still haven't found the start of it. I'm gonna hafta collar someone today and get an explanation.

(Why does stuff always happen when I'm not paying attention!?)

I'm browsing a thread in wow_ladies about how and why the members picked their favorite class and race in WoW, and someone commented that they were nearly always a rogue (and mentioned NWN in the process). Of course, I had to respond to that, since WoW is the first game where I've been anything but a rogue. I blame Eddings. Prince Kheldard pretty much set me on thieves for life-- guh, I love Silk.

Someone further on mentioned that they liked gnomes out of a fond memory of D&D games, where itty races get a dex bonus.

Oh, I miss Thorn. There is nothing better than a hyperactive, alcoholic halfling rogue with a feat that gives a hide in shadows bonus. That was the best game ever. "I hide in shadows. *roll... an eight* Oh, well, plus my bonus-- I succeed. I stab the guy. *roll some high number* ...aaaand pretty much decapitate him. *turn, turn, turn...* I hide in shadows. *roll high* You could not see me with infrared goggles. Stab!"

Seriously, every combat in the game. Hide, stab, hide, stab, hide, stab, win! Which was good, 'cause I had a penchant for getting us in trouble... whoops.... (though I also had a penchant for good saves. Why, a baby dragon has the rest of my group near-dead? Well, I'll just whip off that magic flame-y arrow that I won in that contest a while back which I had tied to my head for... well, because I'm Thorn and I'm weird, tie one of my bottles of alchemist's fire to it, and shoot it at the baby dragon. *insert five minutes of blank silence before the GM says he'll allow it* Aaaaand the baby dragon goes kablooey. Yay!)

I miss playing D&D. I want to try being something other than a rogue. Gasp, shock.

Well. Back to dishes, le sigh.

It went in today for a tuneup and to fix the leak that's... somewhere in my engine (the radiator, maybe? I was very confused by the whole conversation. Thank goodness my dad was having it and not me.)

Anyway. It's apparently falling to bits all over the place. Engine, wheels, even wipers (that part, I knew.) I like to think that it was on the verge of exploding as I drove merrily down the highway, but probably it was just going to sputter and die and leave a poor, stranded sparrow out in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway. I need a new car, which means I need a better job, only there are no better jobs right now. Stupid life. At least my parents are willing to help me buy one, as long as I pay them back... I'm slogging through a site called 'Kelly Blue Book' right know in the hopes of figuring out what I should get. Cars are confusing.

Ah, well... poor Blue. He wasn't going to last forever.

...why is it that I can leave LJ for months and hardly even think about it except to wonder what you guys are up to, but as soon as I come back and make one post I can't stop posting every five minutes? Argh.


P.S. In other news, you are now looking at- well, at the post of, anyway- a heavy fighter. Ignore the fact that I'm just learning how to swing a sword correctly. I'm still gonna be kick-ass. ...someday.

I haven't been on eljay in a month. I'm getting drawn back in...

Anyhows, I popped onto oneword</i> today. I like timed writing; it keeps you honest, I think.

Today's word was avoid
The world avoids. People avoid. I know I do; I'm a study in avoidance. I can duck away from anything uncomfortable, slip away from confrontation and strife. Most of the time. It just slides over and away...

We all do that. Humanity avoids. We don't look, we don't see, we don't care.

Arg. There's this website that I can't remember the name of. I know it's popular. It's hosted photomanips, reviews, stuff like that. I have the vague feeling that it's S-something P-something, but I don't remember.

I don't even want to go to the website. I just want to find out what it is. You know how it goes, something gets in your head and you can't quite remember and then it just nags at you until you figure it out.

So. Yes.

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

I have apparently, in the last two months (since I was previously measured February 15th, at a doctor's office), grown an inch. I am now five foot, five and one half inches.

So I might get to five-six after all. Just as I was getting to like the idea of being short, too. It figures.

In other news: fried french toast is the most sinfully delicious food ever.

Thank you, that is all.

Just outta curiousity, those've you who've watched it... can you guess who my favorite character was? Not Hughes, as much as I loved him.

Someone please please PLEASE tell me something comes after Conqueror of Shamballa? That wasn't nearly good enough to end the series. I mean, it was okay, and it tied up some questions (if rather unsatisfactorally), but I want MORE. More, in Amestris, preferably. They didn't even give a last look at the military folk-- I want to know if Mustang ended up Fuhrer, or what? And other stuff!

I love this series SO MUCH. I have seriously NEVER liked anime, but FMA is just about the most fantastic series I've ever watched-- animated OR live-action. I actually kind of preferred the beginning and the early middle. The end was good, but... it was the end! No more! Sadness.

I loved the homonculi- all but Envy and Pride. I didn't like Pride at all, and I started out liking Envy, but that only lasted a few eps. Don't remember exactly when I started disliking him-- probably around episode 24. Sniff, sniff. Poor Hughes. Lust, though, was fun-- and Gluttony- and Wrath. Sloth was okay. And I adored Greed. I'd've been a-okay being one of Greed's followers. The guy was just cool. And so were his chimeras. Marta and the dog-guy especially.

Hmm, now for the military: Mustang's whole group rocked. The underlings were adorable, poor Havok losing all his girls to the Colonel. Hawkeye was cool and just a little scary, Hughes was OMG THE BEST EVER. Armstrong, entertaining if... weird... and the two who guarded the Elrics were nice. Maria something- I forget. Sciescka was okay. Shou Tucker-- I liked him to start with, but then, I guess you're supposed to. I kind of figured out the chimera thing pretty quick, though, and the Nina thing. I'm good at guessing what's going to happen... which isn't always a good thing :( poor Nina... Tucker was kind of interesting post-Lab Five stuff (speaking of which-- Barry the soulled-armor Chopper? Beautiful. Completely hilarious.)

Didn't like Archer much-- didn't like most of the rest of the military folk much, although the phrase 'dog of the military' makes the writerly side of me squeal in glee. It just a wonderfully cool phrase. I did like-- don't hate me for this-- Kimblee. Evil, scary, nihlistic sociopath? Yep. Twisted, wicked, utterly fascinating character? Also a great big yep.

Elric brothers... gotta love them, of course. I actually didn't like Al as much post-armor. Maybe it was the memory thing. Then, that kind of goes with a lot of the other problems I had with the movie, so never mind. Al was great as a hulking suit of armor, completely sweet and darling and lovable and I just want to give him a great big hug. Imagine those sharp edges'd hurt a bit, though. And Ed- heh. What can you possibly say about Ed? The character was so well done. So complex... such a child, such a grown-up, sad and furious and just gorgeously mixed-up. Towards the end, when he comes back from his mom's graves, with the remains... perfect Ed moment.

Who else is there? Hohenhiem was... interesting. Kinda nifty in some ways. Dante was just creepy. Loved Izumi-- was that one guy her younger brother, or something? He seemed it. Scar-- just, guh. Love him for the same reasons as Ed-- so wonderfully fucked-up. Rose, eh. Winry... had her moments, but mostly eh. Gracia was cool. The Elric-impersonaters... mildly interesting. Most of the Ishbalans just kind of annoyed me. Actually, the majority of townspeople in FMA annoyed me, no matter where they were from. Leor, Youswell, whatever.

Anyway. I wish I hadn't given the first half of the DVDs back. I want to watch it again. I could watch what I have, but then I'd be starting from Hughe's murder, and no fucking way, man. I'm not watching that again. At least not without fortification. And a lot of tissues.

La! Back to fanfiction and fanart. There's this mouthwatering picture of Maes pinning Roy to a wall-- must find that again... (and just like I'm not in to anime-- I'm not even that in to slash! ...but those two, guh.)