Category: Writing

OOOOWWWWW
2005-05-13— Posted by: allegra

Renting a replacement projector would cost $175 minimum… on the plus side, I have the car and I still love my spouse. Going off half cocked again….

Disturbing a what?
2005-05-13— Posted by: allegra

WAILUKU, Hawaii — The state has evicted a Maui woman from a lava tube she has lived in for the last three years. Karen Mayfield, 50, has pleaded innocent to three misdemeanor charges for illegal camping, disturbing a geological feature and littering. Her trial is scheduled to start May 31.

pOp, remember “Unauthorized use of public waters?”

This is all very Kafkaesque.

Buffy meets jeopardy
2005-05-13— Posted by: allegra

I am experiencing transports of fidgetiness, annoyance and the obscuring “death will not release me” miasma that accompanies the prospect of housework. I went and got the projector off Mike after we ate pho last night, and billy be damned if it was working fine at 9:30 pm and then ONLY projected in black and white when it was turned back on again after we had turned it off to shuffle things around. It isn’t the cabling; it’s in the projector itself, because the “I am here” screen comes up in vivid colour. However it will ONLY project in B&W which means that it’s a damned good thing I’ve got the afternoon off because I will be spending the entire afternoon getting another projector rather than cleaning the house. Oh darn. Then I find out that my beloved spouse, may the Lord bless and keep him, is flying this afternoon and leaving me carless to accomplish all this, oh, and he’ll be coming back late. (“What do you want from me? I hung the screen up for you…”)

In the face of the heat death of the universe, the collapse of civilization and the imminent arrival of “the Big One” which will shove most of Richmond under water, big loss, this is a trivial matter and I am sure that a peaceful solution will be found.

she was cute when she was young
2005-05-13— Posted by: allegra

thetyee.ca
2005-05-12— Posted by: allegra

Found some interesting political commentary on the BC election at the abovecited address, from my former church cohort Don Hauka, and of COURSE had to add to it. I think my best line out of my comment was that this was an election where ‘ignorance and apathy appear to have fallen asleep on each other some metres from the finish line.’ There was also a simply stunning thread on castrated sheep. Go to Election Central at the site and read the whole thing, it’s pretty funny, and the election coverage is the best I’ve found (although gosh, we’re close to the day now aren’t we? It’s less than a week away!).

According to one of my correspondents, in Qualicum, there was an all candidates’ meeting. Except, as per standard in this election, the Liberal didn’t show. No unscripted performances, please! So the Marijuana Party candidate fixed the optics of this situation by parking a bong (this is a, uh, water pipe for ‘legal smoking mixtures’) in front of the seat that otherwise would have been occupied by the Liberal. Without further comment, the meeting continued. I wish to God I’d been there, I’d have been taking pictures, when I wasn’t flailing around with hysterics.

vanity press
2005-05-12— Posted by: allegra

http://www.fontifier.com/

For $9 US you can make your handwriting into a font. I’m tempted.

yum yum
2005-05-11— Posted by: allegra

http://www.ewg.org/reports/rocketlettuce/

enough sleep
2005-05-11— Posted by: allegra

Tom U brought me tea all the way from Darjeeling. I went on the internet because I couldn’t believe that the name of it was for real (tippy? Flowery?), and discovered that it was, no word of a lie, the BEST Darjeeling Orange Pekoe. Given Tom U’s perfectionism, which is, palimpsest-wise, a large part of what makes him both so annoying and so charming, I don’t suppose he’d hand carrying anything BUT the best back from India. I like the fluorescent orange label though.

The tea I haven’t actually drunk any of yet.

Pictured, and this pic is copyright Terry Moore and don’t you forget it, is Tambi the magnificent. She’s, uh, picking up a friend. Yeah, that’s right. For any Dunnett or Buffy fans reading this, picture a comic novel where the personalities, dialogue and situations are as heartstoppingly good, and then go there – Terry Moore’s Strangers in Paradise. I will loan the digests out if I have to, but the kids and John hate it when I let em out of the house. Only thing that I’ve seen that comes close is Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and that’s kind of a special case, being the best holocaust memorial ever. Okay, I’m prejudiced. But it’s damned good and I can’t recommend it enough, and I thank Alan the Microserf for exposing me to it – as I bless Mike M for upending me head first in SIP.

The ****ing computer has been occupying much of my personal buffer space of late; this morning it casually announced that it was making 17 Windows updates, which crashed halfway through when, alas, there was no more space on D drive. I scraped a bunch of mold, ah, files, off the drive and the updates merrily proceeded, but every five minutes it anxiously reminds me to restart my computer.

Katie visited the sick yesterday. Her buddy Maria was clobbered in a car accident – I believe I mentioned it back in February – and she’s long since out of the coma and in rehab now, still in hospital. She’s expected to make a good recovery.

Hope to see the Bordello Brothers at the Cottage on Thursday. Other folks may dislike the venue but the food rocks large.

dogs in space
2005-05-10— Posted by: allegra

http://www.alejandro.ch/downloads/flyingfriend.wmv

I can’t claim the dog wasn’t hurt… but I read body language, and something tells me (like the presence of a fixed cockpit camera) that this wasn’t his ‘first time’. If you can’t find it here, google the file name. It’s definitely worth seeing.

store wars
2005-05-10— Posted by: allegra

As a general rule, I don’t send links to commercials. However, this one is quite amusing. Watch Cuke Skywalker… oh, just go there. http://www.storewars.org/flash/index.html

Steven Spielberg is reputed to have wept at a screening of the last Star Wars movie. I wonder if the reported reason “I was so moved” is accurate. “Thank God it’s over” strikes me as potentially being more accurate.

Yes, master
2005-05-10— Posted by: allegra

Ah, my internets are running again, thanks to the tall and toned Keith. And Mike. And Jeff. I freaking need an army of tech supporters.

Pic is from the CBC website, it’s a picture of Gilles Duceppe and Stephen Harper. Is it just me, or does Stephen Manboobs Harper seem to have mucho mojo over Gilles Duceppe? Or are Gilles’ Duceppe’s eyes rolling back in his head because, in the haze of putrescine, he’s forgotten the English for “Your breath could knock a buzzard off a garbage truck?” Email your speculations to me.

Yesterday, Keith got his “Yes, you are a voter” card in the mail. There are now four registered voters in this household and you bet your ass we’re voting in the next election, however many of them our duly elected troughers are going to schedule.

I ate pan fried oysters for breakfast, and you didn’t.

One of my coworkers TICKLED me yesterday. I hadn’t been tickled in so long I just about catapulted outta my chair.

Another one of my coworkers whispered to me in a meeting yesterday, “Must… control… fist… of death!” To which my response was “Must … control…. girlish giggle” which under the circumstances was a lot more accurate. I didn’t want to pound anybody yesterday. I am filled with lovingkindness.

Okay, I’m not filled with lovingkindness, but I understand that it’s a great thing to be filled with, like lemon custard.

At the risk of being politically incorrect, I was reading an article in one of the major US dailies, online, and a popup screen said Skunk, Chronic, Schwag. Then it showed a picture of a chopped green substance. Looked sort of like fines herbes, fresh. With alfalfa sprouts mixed in. Then it said something about marijuana. And I felt sad for the children of the US; the antidrug people don’t even put pix of real drugs in the antidrug ads. So if kids see these ads, instead of being filled with the notion they should quit smokin dat chronic blunt yall, they will be thinking that adults are morons. And you know what? she asked rhetorically, thinking of nuclear leaks, 300 billion spent in Iraq, the junk bonding of GM and Ford, the environmental degradation, pine beetle infestations, the plummeting civility of Vancouver drivers, the price of gas, and the fact that I kicked my own flesh out of bed at an ungodly hour yesterday because my intertnet wasn’t running…. they’d be right. PS it was the router.

mothers day
2005-05-10— Posted by: allegra

John is claiming that he’s offended that I didn’t mention what I got for mother’s day. Okay, he BOUGHT ME LUNCH. And Katie too.

New Clear Day
2005-05-09— Posted by: allegra

Pic is of Goliath, the 19.1 hands high Canadian born Percheron, who weighs in at 2500 pounds, stands 6 foot 5 at his withers, and has to spread his front legs apart like a giraffe to eat grass because his face is so far from the ground. He’s currently the world’s tallest horse, according to the Guiness Book of World Records.

In other news, how would you like to take a bath in this? http://www.guardian.co.uk/nuclear/article/0,2763,1479527,00.html?gusrc=rss

Why pick on him now?
2005-05-09— Posted by: allegra

Okay, this is something that blew over a long time ago, and Mother, you will forgive me in addressing most of these remarks to Liz, but does anybody remember Prince Harry wearing an armband? Pic shown hereabouts.

Anyway… quick Pause, Keith and Jeff just came back, and Keith announces that Sin City is a “bloodbath with rabies” which sounds to me like a terse recommendation never to cast my eyes over it.

Back to Armband Harry. Armband Harry is carrying the entire brutal weight of several global conflagrations on his back; he’s a living symbol of ‘the winning side’. But he’s also a kid. Part of being a kid is taking the drawers down on many cultural shibboleths.

Okay, maybe just in my family; but I always got the feeling that other kids also wanted to look at the crime, waste and anomie of the average adult’s life and express their feelings in a highly excretory way. In this case, he was thinking, as I frequently do, “What can I do to really frikkin offend everybody?” These days, of course, my ability to offend is so automatic and inbuilt that I scarcely need give it any thought. My very existence is an offence, at least the way my kids tell the story. But in Harry’s case, his sensibilities about being offensive are culturally conditioned. He knows from long experience that breaking out into

Hitler

Has only got one ball

Goering

Has two but they are small

Himmler

Has something sim’lar

But poor old Goeb bels

Has noeb bels at all

is a simply grand way of getting grandmama good and chuffed (or laughing delightedly… one never knew with HRH the Queen Mum.

There’s never been anything worse than Hitler. He’s the ne plus ultra of evil – at least if you’re a Brit. I suppose there are some who hold Thatcher in the same esteem, but she simply wasn’t as bloodthirsty, and she never got shot at as a member of a regular army, as Hitler certainly did; not that I’m trying to compare Thatcher and Hitler in terms of sheer physical courage.

Big change of subject….Katie, from the floor, “So the guy played by Elijah Wood reads the Bible all the time and eats hookers?”

Man, I want to see this movie less and less. I’m assuming the hookers were dead first. That’s always the problem when you don’t get all of the conversation.

So Liz, would you have considered this to be a piece of juvenile foolishness? Would you have considered this a classical example of “Real friends wouldn’t have let you get caught like that”, or is this just teenaged stoopidity? Does any sane person believe that he thinks Nazism is a grand notion? Is this not an obvious case of I don’t give a flying wallenda about your opinion? I’m drinking beer and having fun, and you can take your astigmatism and gastric distress elsewhere. Okay, I am going to get a lot of flack for this, but I support the right of Prince Harry to wear a Nazi armband. I think it was one of the most poignant, if pigheaded, defenses of free speech I’ve ever seen. I feel like I’ve been shown up as a wanker in a royally British way. You’d never catch me wearing a Nazi armband in public… mind you, I don’t have a bodyguard.

When Liz and I were much younger and a trifle more juvenile, we wrote stories. We made fun of people with German accents, saying in these stories that they handed out Nazi armbands as party favours. “Haf an armband! It’s on me!” So when Harry turned up in the papers sporting the symbol of horror and depravity…. I have to admit that my outrage all leaked away into my urge to grin. Bad bad girl. If I’d grown up Jewish in Berlin in the 30’s I’m sure I’d feel quite different.

sundry and various
2005-05-07— Posted by: allegra

I woke this morning with a joke. That’s never happened to me before, and it was kind of startling. As I came to consciousness, I thought, “If there’s skullduggery, is there cantankery, and is there gin involved?” I immediately passed this on to Paul, who snorted.

Jeff is off at his buddy’s place, and will proceed from there as a member of the wedding party. Funny thing though, he left the gifts here so he must be coming back.

Paul and I had a simply lovely walk through the neighbourhood last night. I didn’t want to walk all the way down to Dinosaur Rock, so we strolled through the alleys and back ways of Burnaby between here and Robert Burnaby park, and were much rewarded because there were hardly any barking dogs (I like dogs, but not when they sound like their biting decision tree is flopping between my ankle and my throat) and every blossoming shrub is divine. There’s a purple wisteria down on 18th that covers a third of the front of the house; the trunk of it is six inches (15 cm) across at the base. I could smell it before I could see it, and stood there poleaxed, looking around wildly, trying to figure out where the heavenly scent was coming from. Then Paul said, (understatement) “I think this is it,” and even he could smell it (Paul has virally triggered anosmia, which I don’t recommend). Then we saw flowering shrubs with totally bizarre, flat, butterfly shaped, ice cream white flowers, have no idea what they were (no scent) and then in against a fence, a white wisteria, and we had a nice long chat with the woman who rescued it from the dumpster at a garden center. She had a fine, small, pale purple clematis that had self-started in the garage doorway, which she was very fond of as it was quite hardy. Then her rescued animal companion (detecting a trend about this woman), a rotund kitty with a white and tabby pattern reminiscent of Zeek!’s, came out and viewed us. Somebody was playing Bhangra drums live so we went to check where the sound was coming from and Paul admired the new Camaro parked out front, saying that it was a nice looking vehicle. The drums stopped just as we arrived in front of the building.

Pic is of wisteria, borrowed from the taleofgenji.org website.

Muppets bought by Disney
2005-05-07— Posted by: allegra

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7-1599218_1,00.html

Now THIS is punchy entertainment news mixed with commentary. Hi YAH!

Jeff is here
2005-05-06— Posted by: allegra

I coulda watched something art-ay about Mongolian camels last night but NO Jeff said here, try Bubba Ho-tep. The plot, if one can so dignify it, is that a guy who thinks he’s Elvis (Bruce Campbell) and a guy who thinks he’s JFK (played by Ossie Davis) team up to destroy a mummy who’s sucking people’s souls through their hind ends. A penile growth, a ‘very large cock-a-roach’, and some truly hysterical dialogue feature prominently. There’s nothing in it scarier than the average Buffy episode and it’s really well acted, all things considered. Part of the charm of the movie is that the guy who thinks he’s Elvis actually IS Elvis, or so we are led to believe. The filmmakers even try to explain how a mummy ended up in West Texas in an old folks’ home. I won’t give away the ending.

Danny Schechter, News Dissector
2005-05-06— Posted by: allegra

http://www.newsdissector.org/blog/

I frankly love this blog. I read it every day. I don’t always agree with what he says, but I don’t always agree with anybody, including myself, so that’s okay.

I love his blog for the following reasons:

1. He allows his critics air time, and he doesn’t truncate their comments or take them out of context.

2. He’s a human being, with a network of family, friends, and children, and that network is crucial to both his work and his worldview.

3. Despite everything, he doesn’t give up. Leading by example is hard, but he’s doing it.

4. Despite everything, he doesn’t lose either his sense of humor or his sense of outrage.

5. This is going to sound sort of fannish, but he was in the crowd, in Washington, watching Martin Luther King deliver the I have a Dream speech. He’s like a living breathing textbook not only about American civil rights (he was 17 or thereabouts when he became a civil rights activist) but of the reportage during Vietnam, Watergate, and every scandal and triumph since. He reported on the election in South Africa and still has very close ties there. For me, he represents everything solid, decent, progressive and thoughtful about America. And sometimes he says or reprints things that are so tragic, and so funny, on the same page, that you’re left gasping at the sheer effrontery of his emotional and logical reach.

Oh, and he’s finally writing about Peak Oil. I wondered when he’d get around to that.

Tex Avery
2005-05-06— Posted by: allegra

I am a big Tex Avery fan. Here’s one of his heroines.

not enough sleep
2005-05-04— Posted by: allegra

It’s 4:26 in the morning, and I’m up staring at this expanse of brilliant white and contemplating the collapse of civil society. I just deleted this next paragraph because it’s work related. Sigh. The bread maker is making its thumpus bumpus noises. Kira is leaning over from the edge of the couch onto my shoulder and letting me know her feelings about breakfast. I have reminded her that she don’t get breakfast until she sits in my lap for a while.

I miss Bounce. If you’re not allergic and don’t hate them, a lap kitty is a fine accompaniment to a writer’s life.

Mind you, what woke me up was the itching from a fleabite, courtesy of the same cats… Domesticating felines had its downside.

Feminine protection
2005-05-04— Posted by: allegra

Love the purse. That would go over big on Fetish Night.

I wish I had the real name of the man who said in a post to Rawstory.com “The truth is an oiled, spastic newt.” I’d kill to have thought of that first.

Science action figures
2005-05-04— Posted by: allegra

Sorry, no pix.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000DE05C-EDF3-1FD3-A7EA83414B7F012C

Mum, I saw this and thought of you. Specially given your fondness for two of the Steves….

watermelon carving
2005-05-03— Posted by: allegra

First cousin once removed Gerald came up with this. Stunning, isn’t it?

Freedom of speech?
2005-05-03— Posted by: allegra

Cazart! Mother of babbling god!

http://lawandpolitics.blogspot.com/2005_05_01_lawandpolitics_archive.html#111500586671576091

But don’t go there unless you want to get mad. (Mind you, it is really funny.)

The intentions of the founding fathers
2005-05-03— Posted by: allegra

If anybody thinks that the current flavour of the US administration is in accordance with the intentions of the founding fathers, kindly read the two letters at

http://www.au.org/site/DocServer/Washingtons_Letter_To_Touro_Synagogue.pdf?docID=146

I especially love the expression – to bigotry no sanction; to persecution no assistance.

enough sleep
2005-05-03— Posted by: allegra

Not allowed to talk about any of the things that are exercising me at the moment; this too shall pass, this next line deleted.

All hands on deck meeting at work today. Rob of Nine suggested a couple of meetings ago that we push our chairs onto the walkway that surrounds the cafeteria. Within seconds, where nobody had stood or sat before, there were thirty people.

I try to stay ahead of the herd, but it never lasts; I am a very slow moving individual, especially these days, when the least amount of exercise leaves me faint, I feel like I’m breathless all the time, and the specialist tells me there’s nothing wrong with me.

vaccinations
2005-05-03— Posted by: allegra

I’d like to publicly express my disdain for people who don’t get their children vaccinated against preventable diseases.

http://www.canada.com/health/story.html?id=28cc66e0-c833-4aaf-a22f-8e7472fafbca

Is the Dutch Reformed Church going to take on the cost of the deformed babies born as a result of them choosing to be menaces to public health?

Paul and I have a clear recollection of a conversation we had when Keith was coming up on his first vaccination. We knew there was a small but non-zero chance that he would be permanently damaged because of a vaccination gone wrong. Sh*t happens. Batches can be contaminated – or contain live viruses – or other stuff can go wrong. But Paul and I believed that it was an acceptable level of risk.

Dang! They love fetuses so much, how will it make them feel that their behaviour CAUSES a woman who wants the child to have an abortion? Grrr. I’m gonna go straight to hell when I die, and the folks from the Dutch Reformed Church will be in the lake of fire with me.

Parade
2005-05-02— Posted by: allegra

So my fondest memory of the May Day Worker’s March yesterday was the effigy of Gordon Campbell, flanked by the effigies of two vultures. That was inspired. John and I ran up ahead to get a good look at the effigies; John opined “He’s stiffer in real life” whereas I contributed, “and the smile on the effigy is more genuine”. Full marks to the folks who did the work on that.

The loonies were, of course, in full force. Somebody was wandering around with “information” about chemtrails. I have researched contrails (why not put ‘chem’ in front of EVERYTHING, like, say, chemsex or chemcoffee or chemcars – everything is chemistry, dipstick!) thoroughly and this guy was not serving the cause of socialism. Silly widgeon. I didn’t have the nerve to go up to him and engage him, especially since I know how polite and charming fanatics tend to be.

If I was the benevolent dictatrix of the world
2005-05-02— Posted by: allegra

I would triple the fireworks budget.

I would ensure that in every part of this beautiful jewel of the world, everybody got a day (or a day in lieu) off in the middle of the nicest weather in that part of the world. A day off is no fun if you don’t have the weather to go with it.

I would kick off this campaign by putting Rebellion Day in the calendar the second weekend in June. Now I know, and you know, that the Battle of Batoche took place in May, and Riel was born October 22, and he was hanged on, coincidentally, my birthday, November 16. But let me ask you a question…. Do you want any more freaking holidays in November or October? Do you think we could get another one in May? Nope, Rebellion Day must, I regret, be put in June. It is for the good of this land. It is for our healing. It is to acquire the warrior spirit by acts of great merit. Calling it Riel Day would be problematic; unless it was something like “Riel ran out of Toilet Paper Day” which is about the state of new ‘holidays’ anyway. Enough holiday talk.

I would arbitrarily command some men to wear robes with cute corded sashes and really cool hoods.

I must pause in my deliberations a moment and listen to my cat. He snores like no other creature I have ever encountered; when he lies under the bed snoring I sometimes feel like an extra in a horror movie; at least half a dozen times, I have felt my eyes go wide and my bladder go uneasy. I think “Myyyy Gawwwwwwwwwwd what IS that noise?” and then I realize it is Zeek! Snoring. Again. He’s made me think he’s something monstrous when he’s a butt lazy middle aged eunuch cat with FLEA HOTEL tattooed in his ear. How often do our fears really accord with the size of the hazard?

Back to being the benevolent dictatrix of the world.

I would have a “Hallway of Unwelcome Activities” in every community. This would be where activities that are technically legal but disapproved of would be allowed to take place. I will leave the details to those lawyers that I have allowed to survive.

I would only allow people to keep grass on their properties if they were growing it for fuel purposes.

I would find a magician to put a spell on my cat so that she would sit in my lap when I’m at the computer.

John insists on pointing out that Zeek! is by no means as bad a cat as I make out.

I disagree – that cat has left NO vermin, whatsoever, on my back deck for at least two weeks now.

I would mandate that ecologically grown cacao was a world food priority. A universe without chocolate? How desolate that would be…

That’s enough for now. Laundry awaits.

overcast
2005-04-30— Posted by: allegra

So we got on the 7 pm ferry to Swartz Bay no problem last night and had a very pleasant journey across. Katie amused more than one person by being deeply absorbed in the book The Idiot’s Guide to Being a Sex Goddess. I won’t repeat the discussion we had in the car about birth control; I’d probably be laughing too hard to type, anyway.

pOp loaded up the fridge with things he’d never even dream of purchasing if teenagers weren’t coming into the house. Paul and I slept really well, so we’re feeling chipper. Off to see Granny at her residence around 1 pm and then back here and then home – just a flying visit. Sure is weird to be here without Mummy being here, but Gadget House is still a great place to hang out.

I have learned that Katie’s non-boyfriend has named his guitar after me. I wriggled like a Lab puppy myself when I heard that; I guess I remain absurdly easy to please.

I’m going to cruise around the hard drive and see if there’s something worth posting….ah. This is my cousin Derry. She died of cancer in her twenties, and she was really an amazing woman; her family are putting a remembrance book together for us which I am looking forward to reading. I’ve been told there is quite the family resemblance… personally I think she was always way prettier than me.

Don’t you DARE blow your nose on me!
2005-04-30— Posted by: allegra

In other news, Paul bought 4 pairs of shoes at Birkenstock today. In his defense, they were mostly on sale. Imelda lives!

there’s a happy man
2005-04-29— Posted by: allegra

Happy family news
2005-04-29— Posted by: allegra

My cousin Rawd and his partner Graeme are getting married. I know that as an anarchist, I should fulminate about how marriage is propertarian and not required between two free people and blah blah blah woof woof; but I can’t help being pleased anyway.

I just reviewed this whole paragraph and deleted it.

It was funny, and it was true, and it was very disrespectful to the woman who would be my mother in law if she hadn’t told me how to run my wedding.

Anyway, my mum is off to Regina for the wedding, and her email, which I won’t quote for privacy reasons, reminded me of nothing so much as a lab puppy squirming with joy to see its master come home in terms of its emotional tone. I think this is the first same sex marriage in our family and I’m sure it won’t be the last. I know some people find same sex marriage is appalling, but I think they don’t get the “God is Love” thing. And, as a Christian minister in the US pointed out once, there are something like 1000 injunctions in the Bible about how to treat the poor, 60 or 70 about how straight people should behave, and something less than five about homosexuality. If the Bible is really God’s word – and you’ll have to admit this is not universally accepted – a true Christian is more concerned with poverty than the sexual behaviour of any of his or her neighbours. But if you tell real Christians that, they get upset.

My favourite two questions are “If Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ daddy, why does the Bible go into his genealogy with such detail?” and “Why does the Bible call bats birds?” NOTE: There is no right answer to either of these questions. Generally Christians I mention this to say they’ll have to take it up with their pastors, and then they perplex me by never getting back to me on the subject.

this is what I wrote to the newspaper
2005-04-29— Posted by: allegra

I just shook my head when I read the article entitled Spanish-language
TV billboards strike a nerve.  Mr. Gheen's a racist, and should get
called on it.

Which layer of racism is more offensive? The fact that he's having a
little trouble dealing with the demographic reality of California
circa 2005, or that he forgets who was there first?

The First Nations - or aboriginal peoples, or autochthones, or Indians
- were in California first.  Then the Spanish pushed them out of the
way.  Then the Americans pushed the Spanish out of the way.  Now Mr.
Gheen is crying about how 'fringe elements' are not paying attention
to American territorial claims.

It doesn't seem to me that Americans have ever given a tinker's cuss
about anybody's territorial claims but their own; given California's
history of changing hands when somebody bigger comes along, maybe Mr.
Gheen should just fold his hands in resignation, or go kick President
Bush's door down - he's the one shamelessly pandering to the Hispanic
vote by changing his tune on the immigration issue depending on who is
voting and where.  California's economy would collapse without
economic migrants, a fact Mr. Gheen is choosing to ignore in his
readiness to be offended by the purchasing power (and sense of humour)
of the Hispanic community.  Besides, history shows that empires come
and go.  Why not the American empire?

Of course, as an urban Canadian, I view the whole issue of cultural
assimilation differently.  Within 10 years, I'm going to be a member
of the white (or as I prefer to put it, pink) minority in Vancouver.
It's no big deal by me.  If Mr. Gheen isn't jiggy with the advantages
of multiculturalism, maybe it's because he's not making money from it
yet.  Or maybe he's got a nice sinecure being a not so closet racist.
It seems in modern day America, you can always make a living from
hatred, especially if you wrap it in a flag.  I can deal with the
hatred - I can even understand it.   It's the wilful ignorance of the
reality of the interrelationship between the state of California and
its many flavored & layered Hispanic community that makes me wonder
about Mr. Gheen.

enough sleep
2005-04-28— Posted by: allegra

http://www.whittierdailynews.com/Stories/0,1413,207~12026~2839954,00.html

Okay, the story is about how a Spanish language billboard advertising a Spanish language TV station crosses out the CA in the legend Los Angeles CA and replaces it with Mexico.

Note the response of an American commentator – from the story, if the link is broke…

About 75 billboards went up last week in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, but mostly in Los Angeles County.

Opponents, however, say Los Angeles County, where Latinos make up 44 percent of its 2.3 million residents, is part of the United States, not Mexico.

It’s not even cute. What is upsetting is that the fringe elements within the illegal-support community do not recognize the territorial claims of the United States, said William Gheen, president of Americans for Legal Immigration. They are consistently saying It is our land, and we are taking it back.

Okay, kids, your task for today is to figure out which aspect of the two layers of racism this guy is wearing is more offensive. Yupperooni, those crazy Spics stole California fair and square from the Injuns, and – Hey, wait a minute. The US didn’t steal the land from anybody!!! Nobody was living there. Move along, nothing to see here. These aren’t the colonial swine you are looking for. We can go about our business. Everybody back to sleep.

Whaddaya mean, Sisyphus was a myth?
2005-04-28— Posted by: allegra

My brain is working about as well as a Three Stooges short … “I try to t’ink, but nuttin’ happens!” Hm, if I feel like that I’m better off going in to work and getting paid for it.

Got one of the all time nicest customer service emails from a happy customer on Monday; I had to break every rule in the book to get him that happy, but fortunately my merry band of pranksters at work – the people who don’t report to me but do what I tell them anyway because their rabies shots aren’t up to date – obeyed my whims and it all ended up working quite nicely.

Sometimes I think that if customers knew how hard it is to serve them they’d cut me more slack – but that just makes me happier when somebody DOES notice that I wanted to help and actually got that Sisyphean rock to hold up for a while. Course, then it rolls downhill again.

I highly recommend The Bridge, by Iain Banks. There’s a reference to Sisyphus so hug-self-and-chortle that it ought to be required reading for humoristas. The rest of the book is pretty damned good, too.

make your own marshmallows
2005-04-28— Posted by: allegra

http://science.howstuffworks.com/question128.htm

Paul, can you put corn syrup on the shopping list for me? Also gelatin???? Hey Brooke – I bet you really want to make this, don’t you!!!?

You’ve gotta be kidding
2005-04-27— Posted by: allegra

http://www.bumpernuts.com/

Yup. Somebody is sick, and I think it isn’t me this time.

enough sleep
2005-04-27— Posted by: allegra

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1114611118103_36/?hub=TopStories

Okay, sounds scary, right, support for separatism is growing? Skip to the bottom, where it reads

49 per cent favour another referendum, while 46 per cent oppose it

48 per cent said they were confident renewed federalism was possible, while 45 per cent said it was not. When asked whether a vote for sovereignty still meant that they wanted Quebec to be part of Canada, 56 per cent of respondents said yes while 40 per cent said no.

Based on interviews with 1,008 eligible Quebec voters conducted between April 21 and 24, the poll is considered accurate within 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out 20.

Okay, we can all go back to sleep. If it came to the vote, it would be close, but the separatists would still lose. The only way Quebec can separate this century is through a violent revolution, which means that the half of the army which is Quebecois would have to either side with the Queen or jump the fence. Which do you consider more likely? And if, once AGAIN, capital flees Quebec and the job sitch gets grim…. you get the picture. Quebeckers are proud and have an illustrious history, but they are just as practical as everybody else when somebody shouts into their wallets. They are angry now, but their anger will cool.

enough sleep
2005-04-27— Posted by: allegra

350 episodes…. amazing. Yes, I don’t have permission. No, I don’t care.

I am reading a book called Natural Capitalism. It is the single most hopeful book about the coming crisis I have ever read. Yes, it details, at some length, the crisis we are already in and looks at the potential for it getting worse. But it also proposes solutions, and LOTS of them. It’s a life changer, for sure.

Keith had his first real job interview yesterday. I could burst with pride. He’ll know in about a week.