MoveOn held a contest to have ordinary citizens create 30 seconds commercials about the Bush junta, er, administration. The 15 finalists are now ready for viewing at bushin30seconds.org.
Go there.
Watch.
Be aware that the Internet and home computers have changed the landscape of politics in America forever. The “big boys” are no longer the only people who have a voice in this country.
Now speak out.
For the past several years I have been enjoying reading books electronically. With the gift of a palm m515 handheld computer from my wife a couple of years ago I discovered that it was, among other things, an excellent platform for reading books.
Combined with the free book reader from Peanut Press and the diverse collection of titles offered there as well, I have amassed a large collection of books. At last count 476 titles from 87 authors; all in less than 188 MB of disk space.
Over time I have noticed that more and more books are presented in this format, and more publishers are making good use of the “e” part of the format. In-line images, chapter and footnote links, and cover art are now common place. While I am aware that reading books via the limited screen of a handheld computer is not for everyone, I for one am sold.
If you have a palm, or other handheld computer, and you enjoy reading, I strongly urge you to explore the growing world of electronic books online.
The future is wide open, and I am ready to go where my life takes me. Who knows what I’ll have to say this time next year.
Michele and I had a wonderful five days of Christmas this year. Family occupied three of the days, and the other two days were just for us. We had a wonderful holiday filled with drama, humor and spirit.
Christmas Eve we traveled to my parents home for the, ah, traditional Christmas Eve spaghetti dinner and opening of gifts. When I was an adolescent, my mother worked full-time as a nurse and every other year she worked on Christmas day. Therefore we started opening gifts the night before instead of Christmas day itself. Now that she has two grandchildren she wants to be apart of their Christmas experience, opening some presents the night before allows her that pleasure. Michele and I were pressed into service making the marinara sauce, which we did the Sunday prior. All in all it was a good evening.
By the time we arrived back home we were exhausted and basically collapsed in front of some taped Nick-at-night before going to sleep. We were up in the night talking about the emotional “presents” the evening had provided us, as well as the fears for the upcoming day. We are also making some decisions about our future that have been weighing heavily upon us. After about two hours of talking we were able to go back to sleep.
Christmas day we traveled to my brother’s home were we gave his children their presents from us. We spent the day there eating and visiting. Lisa, my sister-in-law, prepared an awesome dinner and we all sat down to a huge table (11 of us) and feasted. There was some tension this day, but none that cast a pall over the day. I had a good time, but I was glad to finally get home again. After two long visits with family I was ready for some time with just my Sweetie.
Friday was our Christmas. We had deliberately held back the presents to each other, and we had our own turkey to roast. The day was quiet and relaxed. Our gifts to each other were simple and brought smiles to our faces and tears to our eyes. The turkey was fantastic, moist and full of flavor. I’ve started roasting them upside-down which makes the breast meat very tender and full of moisture. We had cranberry sauce, yams, Brussels sprouts, and dressing along with our turkey. It was a wonderful day.
On Saturday we again traveled to my brother’s house so that I could join Chris and his two boys in seeing “The Return of the King.” Michele spent the day with Lisa, and the girls watching a couple of chick-flicks. It was nice to connect with them without the pressure of a holiday or parents around. But it was yet another long day away from home.
Sunday we again had a quiet, relaxed day at home. Naps were taken, and little work of any sort was contemplated. We did venture out briefly to collect a take out dinner from a new Mexican restaurant. Otherwise it was just the two of us doing what we like best, being with each other.
It was a wonderful Christmas holiday, one of the best I’ve ever had with my family, and I am sorry to see it pass. But I am looking forward to have another long weekend with just my beautiful wife this coming weekend.
Last evening we decided to have Mexican take out. There is a wide lane between the restaurant entrance and the parking lot proper, so I pulled up to the curb by the door and ran in to get our food. As it was ready I was only inside for 4 or 5 minutes. During that time Michele waited in the car.
While she was there an older Toyota pulled up past our car and the punk-ass in the passenger seat shot a paint ball at our car. Michele said that she saw him lean out the window and heard the “plop” as the ball hit our car. The fuckers sped off in their car immediately, so quickly that she wasn’t able to get a plate number.
It had been raining, and since I was back to the car within in a minute of the incident, the paint was still quite wet. Using some paper towels from the trunk I was able to wipe off all the paint. It appears that our car wasn’t damaged but it still frosts me that some asshole got a new “toy” for Christmas and immediately started vandalizing other people’s property.
My hope is that they paintball someone else. Someone with no impulse control and problems with expressing their aggression in socially acceptable ways. Someone who with scare the shit out of them while beating the same out of them.
or Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas by Major Henry Livingston Jr. (1748-1828) (previously believed to be by Clement Clarke Moore)
‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads; And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap, Had just settled down for a long winter’s nap,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter. Away to the window I flew like a flash, Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below, When, what to my wondering eyes should appear, But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick, I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick. More rapid than eagles his coursers they came, And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
“Now, DASHER! now, DANCER! now, PRANCER and VIXEN! On, COMET! on CUPID! on, DONDER and BLITZEN! To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall! Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!”
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky, So up to the house-top the coursers they flew, With the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too.
And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof The prancing and pawing of each little hoof. As I drew in my hand, and was turning around, Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.
He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot, And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot; A bundle of toys he had flung on his back, And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.
His eyes – how they twinkled! his dimples how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry! His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth, And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath; He had a broad face and a little round belly, That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf, And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself; A wink of his eye and a twist of his head, Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work, And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk, And laying his finger aside of his nose, And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle, And away they all flew like the down of a thistle. But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight, “HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!”
The American Family Association has an online pole gauging the support of people for homosexual marriage or civil union. Since the AFA is a conservative organization I think it’s safe to assume that they were hoping for a ground swell of opposition to the idea. They claim the results will be submitted to Congress, but given that as of today (12.22) the results are nearly 2 to 1 in favor of homosexual marriage I have to wonder if they’ll honor this claim.
Cast your vote.
Michele and I were up early this morning. We’ve both been experiencing some stress as the Christmas holiday draws near. Time with family isn’t always easy or enjoyable and we find ourselves struggling to express all the little things that bug us about the whole situation. This morning was no different.
Both of our fathers are cold, remote men whose approach to emotions is tumultuous at best. We each have deep scars from our childhoods that get reopened around the major holidays. In her case her father was physically aggressive and angry, once destroying Christmas dinner by throwing it on the floor, or another time smashing the tree by tossing it out the window. My father is coldly uninvolved in the whole affair. After my sister died on Christmas Day in 1973 he has never talked about her or shown any feelings about her or the holiday what so ever. By cutting himself off from his emotions he also cut off the rest of us from him.
In my father’s case, not expressing his emotions leaves a smoldering core of unexpressed feelings that can, and do, explode to the surface inappropriately. Several years ago he harbored a misunderstanding for over a year before raging at my wife and me. He wanted to exclude us from family functions as it “caused too much tension” for him. Having my father explode with emotion like that scared both Michele and me. In her case it reminded her of the explosiveness of her father, and left her wondering when the other shoe would drop. She has never really been comfortable in his presence since. For me, seeing my father so unreasonably enraged and out of control was a new, and frightening, experience for me. However, I found that his tantrum helped to strip away the blinders I had been using when looking at him.
I see him as a man now, and not as some mythic figure. Growing up I thought he knew everything and could do anything. Even as an adult I tended to revert to this childish view of my father, sometimes to my own detriment. Having him explode in my face forced me to re-evaluate my take on him. He isn’t the be all and end all man I imagined as a child, and the hurts that I felt weren’t about me not being good enough to please him, they were really about his inability to connect with me in any real way.
My father has an idea of what I, as a son, should represent. He loves the idea of me; he doesn’t love me. He was very good at projecting this ideal son image onto me as I was growing up. Whenever I fell short of the ideal I always felt I had failed him, or that I wasn’t good enough. Throughout my adulthood I have struggled with feeling inadequate; I rarely allow myself to feel proud of my accomplishments or abilities. Finally breaking through the façade of his “ideal” son has allowed me to see that I am good, I am accomplished, and I have tremendous abilities.
It also opened up a deep place of hurt, one that I have harbored since I was a child. It is that place where I put all the feelings of inadequacy I had when he couldn’t reach past his ideal image of me to the real me. Tearing down the walls I put around this part of me in our talk this morning will allow me to start healing myself. I can be the father figure my inner child needs now. I can let go of the need for my father to change who he is and how he relates to me. And as I heal my hurts and father myself, I will be able to bridge the gap between his image of me, and the real me, thus providing a way to start a better relationship with him.
I know that my perception of this is the truth for me. It does not matter if anyone else, even my father, sees it this way. Seeing my truth and embracing it is the only way I know to grown and change for the better. It is the only way I want to live.
For sometime now I have felt depressed, weighted down, and generally uninterested in many aspects of life. I wanted to make this the return of my annual depression, but somehow I knew there was more to this than just seasonal unhappiness.
During the night last night, Michele had a nightmare about going poor and having to live on the street. We talked for a while in bed and then got up to talk at length. As she explored her fears and discovered her truth about our situation, I discovered the way out of my malaise too. Put simply: our time in Springfield needs to come to an end.
Three and a half years ago when we first started planning a return here my thinking was focused on the earning potential working for myself held. My fantasy was that we would be able to save a significant amount of money and that when we were ready we could leave Springfield and move to a more liberal, open-minded location for the remainder of our lives. This has indeed proved to be a fantasy as we not only haven’t been able to save money, we find ourselves in debt and struggling to regain our financial footing.
What has happened in place of the illusion of financial freedom, is the reality of the best relationship possible with the members of my immediate family. I no longer look to my father or mother for affirmation that I am a good man, or that I am a success. I recognize the true role the hold in the play of my life and in doing so, I have freed myself from my childhood once and for all. I now see myself as an adult with them, and not as their child. The strain I had felt with my father is gone as I now share details about my life with him not to get my needs met, but rather just to share. I meet my own “father” needs now. My relationship with my mother is also vastly improved as I no longer harbor anger at her for not showing her love and affection for me in my manner. I have learned to feel the love she has for me through the actions and comments she makes. In other words, I take her as she is and I don’t try to force her to be what she isn’t.
The relationship that is most improved is the one with my brother. I see him for the adult man he is now, and I hugely respect his accomplishments as a father and husband. I understand clearly that his growing up experiences were different than mine. No better or worse, just different. To expect him to behave or think like me was disregarding his life, and it created a barrier between us. Now that I have come to see him in his truth I feel that barrier is gone. Recently he and I have connected at a deeper level than ever before, and I take that as confirmation he feels the same openness between us.
I always knew that returning to Springfield was a chance to grow up and become the adult I am away from my family in their presence. The illusion of making lots of money was a pretense, a story for publication. Coming here has been a vital and necessary part of my development. It meant setting aside some needs for a time. Now that I have achieved my goals vis-à-vis my family, those pushed aside needs are clamoring for attention.
I want, and individually so does Michele, to live somewhere open and spiritual. Some place with natural beauty and diverse cultural currents. A place with a variety of opportunities personal and professional. I no longer feel the need to make working about money, money, money. Instead I see it as a means to a greater end; my philosophical and spiritual growth. Staying in a part of the country that feels repressive and angry is not going to help me grow. In fact I view the recent troubles with my contract and the reduction of my contract rate as a blunt hint that this place is about to become hostile to me.
It is time to move, on my own terms, to a place I feel at home. Knowing this at my core gives me a lightness of being that I haven’t felt for a long time. I don’t know where Michele and I will end up. Canada? New Zealand? Boulder? Who knows, and who cares. The point is not the destination but the journey. It feels good to set off on my journey once again.