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September 30th, 2008
01:18 pm - לשנה טובה
If you can read this, Happy New Year!
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September 27th, 2008
03:53 pm
I survived the first big event of my 20th reunion weekend - the Homecoming football game and the after-game party at the Warehouse Cafe.
Whatever cliquishness there was in high school had vanished by the 10th reunion, and by now had been obliterated. I stayed at the game until the end, even though it was a blowout win for us, with a bunch of other football players who wanted to watch the whole game.
We took over and closed down the bar, and everyone had a good sense of affection for each other, even if we weren't in the same social groups, classes, or activities back then.
I'm looking forward to tonight - we have the Hard Rock Cafe in Pittsburgh rented out!
I met ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) hopita and *some* of her cats yesterday for coffee - the big ones didn't want to come out and see me. Opie, the old sick Siamese, was one of the friendlier ones.
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03:04 pm - Dubya to the Tee to the Eff.
The Pennsylvania Lottery's new mascots.
Get your mind out of the gutter! Those mascots are severed fingers, not what you're thinking!
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September 25th, 2008
03:53 pm - Welfare Queens are pikers compared to...
....Welfare Emperors.
I'm talking about the mental giants who decided that the American public should give away $700 billion to save Wall Street from their own moral hazard.
Undoubtedly there are people who have been, and are going to be, hurt by this economic crisis. That's why we established the FDIC back in the Depression, the last time the financial markets were this troubled.
But the FDIC is there to provide a soft landing to banks who've made bad decisions. If Washington Mutual or Wachovia goes under, the vast majority of the depositors (including myself - I'm a WaMu account holder) will be fully protected, and the employees will continue to get paychecks until the assets are taken over by another bank.
It isn't there to protect bankers from their own bad decisions, which is what Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is trying to do. If you package Alt-A and subprime loans as AAA paper and give the executives 8- and 9-figure bonuses, why the hell should we save you from your own behavior?
People complain and complain about welfare and call national health insurance "socialism", yet ignore the biggest giveaway to the wealthy in American history. Compared to the so-called "Welfare Queens", Wall Street and Paulson are Welfare Emperors making us their vassals.
The only good news - nobody thinks this is a good idea. The random crowd at O'Hare Airport I watched President Bush's speech with mocked him. At least two people I know who are conservative thought the idea was ridiculous, *without prompting from me, the political junkie*.
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September 24th, 2008
11:20 am - I'm off!
I'm off for Pittsburgh in a few minutes - this weekend is my 20th high school reunion. I haven't seen most of the people in 10 or even 20 years, and we have a good group on an ning page. We have the Hard Rock Cafe in Pittsburgh rented out for Saturday night, and it promises to be good...
Last night, I participated in a mock wedding, playing an obnoxious drinking and gambling relative of the bride. I based the character on the drunken brother in the Frantics' "Last Will and Temperment", Uncle Buck from the movie of the same name, and a stereotypical Pittsburgh Yinzer. I tell ya, it's HARD to stay in character, especially in an improv environment! Amy brought the house down with her imitation of Whitney Houston, especially since Ms. Junkie Houston's range is about three octaves above Amy's.
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/niaha/kitty/ankhappyg.gif) chipper
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September 20th, 2008
04:52 pm - The Candid Photo Meme....
( Read more... )
Nice bed hair, and bed sideburns, at 5 in the afternoon!
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September 16th, 2008
04:49 pm - Finished a workday - without caffeine!
I've been having trouble sleeping the past week or so, so Amy suggested I cut out the caffeine for a while.
I don't have any of the classic withdrawal symptoms (especially no killer headache or irritability); I just feel low-grade drowsiness, as if I had an hour less sleep than normal.
Of course, this is prior to my week in Pittsburgh (Sept. 24 - Oct. 1), which is likely to involve much alcohol consumption.
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September 15th, 2008
11:21 pm - Nom nom nom...
...Steve the crazy cat behind the cut. He's healthy and happy, if a very strange little cat.
( Read more... )
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September 11th, 2008
07:03 pm - They hate us for our freedom.
On today, September 11, we're reminded that we must be constantly vigilant for people who hate the American people's freedom.
They hate American society's secularism; the way that religion is not forced on people.
They hate American society's pluralism; the atheist, Jew, or member of a minority religion is not forced to publicly worship the dominant religion or conduct their own services out of sight for fear of offending the sensitive among them.
They hate American society's lack of censorship. Books, movies, radio, the Internet and television are disseminated regard to the most sensitive people in society - religious fundamentalists.
They hate the American system of public education. Students are taught (hopefully) without regard to religious creation myths and other religious shibboleths used to isolate believers from infidels.
They hate American science and medicine. They hate that people can have control of their bodies, whether it means choosing to have sex and not be sentenced to having a child because of their "sin", or that a medical procedure using blastocysts can be used to arrest diseases like Parkinson's syndrome. They also hate evolution; just as the earth still revolved around the sun (and not vice versa) after Galileo was put under house arrest, organisms will still evolve even as the Discovery Institute or other "intelligent design" advocates nitpick at Richard Lenski's E. coli evolution experiment, which has observed evolution in action in bacteria.
Yes, religious fundamentalists hate us for our freedom. Muslim religious fundamentalists flew airplanes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon seven years ago today. Christian religious fundamentalists plan to destroy American society in an even more insidious way - by subverting American science, education, and government, and even by putting one of their own into the office of the Vice-President.
You can put lipstick on a pig, but the fact of the matter is that Christian fundamentalists are more dangerous than Muslim fundamentalists, just not as spectacular.
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September 7th, 2008
01:19 am - Widmer Oktoberfest 2008
Fun, fun fun. Lots of beer, lots of dancing (including polkas, thanks to Those Darn Accordions!
Cut for pics...
( Read more... )
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September 2nd, 2008
10:34 am - Drip, drip, drip...
...that's not water going over the levees in New Orleans. That's the *next* story about how bad of a vice-presidential pick Sarah Palin is.
Turns out, she used the mayorship of Wasilla, Alaska to advance censorship. According to the latest story from Time Magazine, she called up the librarian of the Wasilla Library and asked her to ban books.
The librarian, quite naturally, was aghast. But Palin decided that "If you aren't with me, you're against me, and you hate Jesus." She tried to have the librarian fired, just like she fired the rest of the Wasilla executive officers, most likely to replace them with her Christofascist friends.
This nearly led to her being recalled.
Sarah Palin is a familiar sight, but not at this high of a level of politics. She's the suburban/rural buttinski, convinced that her view is right to the absolute exclusion of all others, and afraid that others might try to escape the controlled environment of a fundamentalist Christian area through education or self-improvement. I wrote about one of them previously, and am aghast that one of these fundamentalist know-it-alls has been chosen to compete for the second-highest office in the land.
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07:58 am - Steve/Buddy Update.
The little black cat has gone to the vet and has been neutered and his wounds drained and debrided. After a couple of (miserable) days at Brendan and Jill's, he's at our house in a large cage, which we let him out of for most of the time.
He's friendly, purring, and facerubbing, although he's meowing to get out, as he was an indoor-outdoor kitty.
The neighbor across the back yard identified him as his cat - he's paying for the vet care, and we'll give him back when he gets his second round of FELV/distemper shots.
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August 30th, 2008
07:27 pm - A wordless, deadly political ad.
Want to know what's at stake? A near-Category 5 hurricane is entering the Gulf of Mexico and predicted to hit near New Orleans.
Let's see what John McCain did the last time this happened:
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August 29th, 2008
02:30 pm - Sarah Palin - a September Callup.
John McCain selected Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his Vice-Presidential candidate today, trying to steal the thunder of both Barack Obama's very good speech last night and the impending landfall of Hurricane Gustav (predicted to make a direct hit on New Orleans as a Category 3 hurricane Monday evening).
I think we can safely assume that just like the Pirates around this time of year, he's packing it in. He got his reward for years of loyal service in the military, House, and Senate with his Presidential nomination, just like Bob Dole did in 1996.
Palin isn't going to win the Republicans the White House. What McCain did offer her is the political equivalent of a September callup in baseball.
Minor league baseball seasons end the first week of September, so major league teams call up players to the big league club during September to give them experience in the big leagues and see how they'll do against major-league competition when the team has already been eliminated from the pennant race.
A player who performs well during a September callup might make the big league club the next year.
So it is with Palin. She has little experience in politics; just one term as a city council member for the town of Wasilla, Alaska, and nearly 2 years as governor of Alaska. But she does have promise; she's known as not being part of the atrociously corrupt Alaska Republican gang, and may be a force in Republican politics in the future.
Why not give her a chance to prove herself on a national stage when Obama has the momentum of a runaway freight train? If she doesn't embarrass herself, the Republicans have a potential candidate in 2012 or 2016, or a Senatorial candidate who can send and receive Internets without trouble.
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12:55 am
Pass it on.
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August 27th, 2008
04:47 pm - Stray cat update..
We caught Steve the Stray Cat Sunday afternoon. He has been chilling at Brendan and Jill's over the weekend, and we took him in to the vet this morning for neutering, rabies shot, FELV and FIV testing, and care for an abscess he has on his face from fighting and a wound he got trying to escape from the cage.
We'll pick him up tomorrow morning.
I don't think we can keep him in our place, so he *may* be going up for adoption soon.
In other news, Tropical Storm Gustav is likely to hit the Gulf Coast Monday, the first day of the Republican National Convention. Gee, you think G-d is giving those people a little reminder of one of the biggest fuckups in American history - Brownie's Heckuva Job after Katrina?
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August 18th, 2008
01:24 pm - Totally out of the blue...
...who would you have as panelist on the Match Game if it were held today?
Think - B-list celebrities - and there have to be dueling female/male personalities on the top row (like Bret Somers and Charles Nelson Reilly), and a storyteller on the bottom row (like Fannie Flagg).
And...GO!
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August 17th, 2008
01:53 pm - Say what you will....
...but a small amount of unhealthy food is good sometimes.
Namely, a couple of donuts from Voodoo Doughnut - I had an Ol' Dirty Bastard (donut next to the cock & balls donut on the website) and a small cake donut with vanilla frosting and nuts. Nom nom nom, and I'm good for several hours....
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August 16th, 2008
01:36 pm - A good piece of meta-reporting...
... by ESPN's Richard Lapchick on the efforts of Red China to dictate the coverage of the Olympics and protest surrounding the Communist government's human rights violations.
I feel *very* guilty even taking peeks at the coverage - China does bald-facedly what the neocons running the U.S. government would like to do. But this is a good antidote, and hopefully English-reading people interested in the Olympics will use this article to connect this year's Beijing Olympics with Hitler's Berlin Olympics of 1936.
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August 15th, 2008
06:57 pm - Pittsburgh's Dr. Frist.
Even people with advanced degrees can be lacking in common sense.
Take, for example, Dr. Daniel Iracki.
Despite being a doctor, and probably well-versed in conditions that are the result of evolution, like Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus , he insisted on fighting against the International Baccalaureate program in the Upper St. Clair schools while a member of their school board, claiming it "..violates Judeo-Christian values, is anti-American and has ties to Marxism."
Fortunately for the students and parents, he resigned from the school board today. Of course, he had to give a parting shot, saying that the decision to keep the program shows a bias of reason over faith.
I would rather have a doctor treating me have a bias of reason over faith than the opposite. I would rather have a doctor treating my condition with drugs, surgery, therapy, or lifestyle modification than tell me I'm not praying hard enough. But that's just me - I tend to think my physical ailments are because of infection, mechanical breakdown, or chemical imbalance, not that I'm possessed by demons or cursed by deities.
Oh, and evolution has been proven in peer-reviewed studies that can be duplicated. Repeat, evolution has been proven. End of story.
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