what's the matter with san diego?

Egads.

Up to 70,000 people are expected to pray and fast in support of Proposition 8 at the Q [Quallcomm Stadium] -- while opponents will stand in unity during a candlelight vigil on Saturday night. The prayer event is called "The Callout" and will take place from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. "It's going to be 12 hours of thousands of people coming together to worship and fast and pray for California, for our nation. For God's blessing on this state," said Lou Engle, event co-founder.

Weird how they can't get 70,000 together to pray for an end to hunger, homelessness, or any Jesus-y stuff like that.

halloween

Doh! I almost forgot to dust off my hey-you-damn-kids-get-off-my-lawn, grumpy-old-man, anti-halloween rant!

Well, here it is.

khalidi anti-protest

Ezra Klein has a good idea.

Presumably, this experience has not been a pleasant one for Khalidi. But it would be nice if some good emerged from it in the form of broader familiarity with his important works. So next time you hear Hannity explain how Rashid Khalidi urinates on a Haggadah during full moons, head over to Amazon and pick up a copy of The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood. Its an important book on its own terms, and its purchase is a worthy counter-statement to this type of anti-Arab fearmongering.

And, and Yglesias points out,  it's only $10.40 with free shipping at Amazon.com.

quarterback controversy

No, not who to start in my fantasy league (though, that is a good question). It just seems that the quarterbacks of my two favorite teams appear to be douches have political philosophies diametrically opposed to mine.

Philip "Marmalard" Rivers, QB, San Diego Chargers:

Phillip Rivers, starting quarterback for the San Diego Chargers, contributes $10,000 to Yes on Prop 4 Campaign, confirmed Charles Gallagher, Campaign Manager and Chief Strategist for Yes on 4. 

Prop 4 being the "Abortion Waiting Period and Parental Notification Initiative", otherwise known as the "If Your Piece Of Shit Father Rapes You And You Get Pregnant, You Must Get His Permission To Have An Abortion Initiative".

Tom Brandstater, QB, Fresno State Bulldogs:

Brandstater supports McCain and plans to vote. He describes himself as "very much a Republican" but said "it doesn't look like my guy's gonna win."..."I am a believer that the war in Iraq is a necessary evil," Brandstater said. "It's not the ideal situation but it has to happen." 

 Sheesh. Now, I'm in an ethical quandary. Do I root for these jackasses or not?

I'm (mostly) kidding. I realize people can respectfully disagree on things. But respectfully disagreeing doesn't change the fact that Marmalard is still a male, and Brandstater hasn't volunteered to go to Iraq to fight in a war he believes so strongly in. Whether his brother did or not is irrelevant.

the khalidi libel

Josh Marshall: 

The McCain campaign has been throwing around so much mud and smears in recent weeks that it's easy to miss just how ugly and shameful their character assassination of Rashid Khalidi is. This is an entirely respectable, highly respected scholar. To go further into making a case for him would only be to enable and indulge McCain's sordid appeal to racism. For McCain, personally, to compare Khalidi to a neo-nazi, it's just an offense McCain should never be forgiven for. It's right down in the gutter with Joe McCarthy and the worst of the worst. Khalidi is in this new McCain set piece for one reason -- as a generic Arab, to spur the idea that Obama is foreign, friendly with terrorists and possibly Muslim. 

 Tru. 

http://ping.fm/p/RZQxc - Vegas, Baby

Testing ping account

rashid khalidi

The McCain campaign is now in a frenzy because Obama might have a...brace yourselves...Palestinian acquaintance. The horror!

The Palestinian in question is Rashid Khalidi. Go ahead, Google him. Find out all the dirt on him. He's a professor at Columbia, and previously taught at Georgetown. His crime? Being a Palestinian-American who, get this, supports the rights of Palestinians. The horror x 2!

Is that no longer allowed? Is the criteria now that even a Palestinian must support a 100% pro-Israeli position, and any refusal to do so is controversial? Ridiculous. This marginalization of anything and anybody Palestinian is disgusting, not to mention un-American.

I am hoping that Obama takes a strong stand against this sort of Daniel Pipes-ian anti-Palestinian bullying. The politics of the issue make me doubtful that he will. My hope is that over time the "Israel is 100% right and Palestinians are 100% wrong" viewpoint will wither away and a more nuanced and realistic viewpoint will take its place. 

It's one thing to be pro-Israel. It's another thing to be anti-Palestinian and treat an entire population as something to be distanced from. McCain has chosen the latter path.

There was once a time I really did respect McCain. Those days are long gone.

UPDATE: This makes such Palestinian-bashing even more disgusting:

During the 1990s, while he served as chairman of the International Republican Institute (IRI), McCain distributed several grants to the Palestinian research center co-founded by Khalidi, including one worth half a million dollars.

 What a pathetic opportunist. 

slate on obama

Like it does every four years, Slate writers and staff publicly expressed how they will be voting. Although Slate is infamous for it's "up is really down, black is really white" contrarianism, it was still no shock that Obama handily won the site's endorsement.

Here's my favorite reasons why you should support Obama. I agree with all of them.

• Because I'd rather have a president who is intellectually curious, shrewd, even-keeled, eloquent, and analytical than one whose chief campaign selling point is being unpredictable. Because I'd like to keep the number of Alitos on the bench to one. Because I think Obama will be more cautious about withdrawal from Iraq than people think. Because world opinion does matter, and the United States needs rebranding. Because I don't care about health care choice, I just want to see an affordable doctor. Because I don't want the Clean Air Act to be a misnomer anymore. Because the thought of Sarah Palin in the Oval Office makes me want to drink.
• I'm so tired of the partisanship that has been a staple of the Bush presidency and the McCain-Palin ticket. To infer (and to do so in such an overt, unapologetic manner) that somehow small-town America is the "real" America, the America with good values and moral judgment, is such an insult, especially when it's convenient for them to use New York City and Sept. 11 as political props.
• You want me to count the reasons? Nah, you don't have that kind of time.
• It's important not to ratify failure, and the current Republican administration is a failure.
• I wasn't going to include any reason why—because duh—but then a friend pointed out this line from David Sedaris' latest New Yorker column: "I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. 'Can I interest you in the chicken?' she asks. 'Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?' " So, yes, I'm having the chicken.
• McCain picked Palin.
  Already 72.
  Might die in office.
• As for the accusation that he doesn't have enough experience: No one has enough experience. Nothing prepares you for the presidency. Nothing can. 
• Two words: Supreme Court.
  

vegas roadtrip mix tape power rankings

10 - Neutral Milk Hotel - King Of Carrot Flowers, Pt 1 [Yeah, I can be a hipster douche with the best of 'em when I want.] 

9 - J Church - Cosmonaut [I am sucker for whoa-oh's as a chorus device.]

8 - Beastie Boys - 3-Minute Rule [People like to say Paul's Boutique was years ahead of its time. But even by that standard this should sound old almost twenty years later. It doesn't.]

7 - Built To Spill - They Got Away [One of the mellower anti-Iraq war songs you're likely to hear. BTS goes reggae, and I like it. Who knew?]

6 - Scared Of Chaka - Straight To The Office [Good God I forgot how good these guys were. IMHO, the New Bomb Turks are the only better garage punk band.]

5 - Oxford Collapse - Young Love Delivers [See comments for NMH.]

4 - Off With Their Heads - Call The Cops [Best white trash punk love long ever?]

3 - Radon - Rehab Barbie [On the surface (like many Radon songs) this song seems lighthearted, with the Weekend At Bernie's references and all, but at its core there's something profoundly sad about it.]
 
2 - Dillinger Four - The Classical Arrangement [This anti-religion song is a bit of a musical departure for D4, but I like it a lot, and the moment where the song transitions from gloom to uptempo makes me want to cry, it's so perfect.]
 
1 - David Cross - My Immigrant Mom Talks Funny [I've heard this a million times, and it's still funny, especially the part towards the end about Texas style sodomy. Completely inappropriate, yet hilarious, and makes its larger point quite well. The smile and laugh it invoked in SC was the highlight of the trip.]

what's the matter with nevada?

So SC and I took a quick overnight trip to Vegas. We just got into town, when at a stoplight, SC tells me that the guy behind us is heckling me. Oh, I should mention I have an Obama sticker on my car. That's kind of important to the story. Anywho, sure enough, the guy is yelling something to the effect of "If I had an Obama sticker, I'd have my windows rolled up, too." I'm not quite sure what that is supposed to mean, but I'm sure it was not a compliment. So, of course I rolled down my window and shouted, "Well it's down now, so I guess I'm not you." The discourse elevated from there:

Him: "He's gonna fuck everything up."


Me: "Yeah, cause things are going soooo great now." 


Him: "NO-BAMA!"

{I should mention here that my improv skills and insult capabilities leave a lot to be desired.)

Me: "Read a book."

Not exactly proud of my response there, but it is the first time I've ever been openly confronted about a bumper sticker. It was pretty odd, and SC was shaken for a moment. I chalked it up to an insecure dickhead, since Obama seems to be holding a lead in the typically Republican state.

So I get home tonight, log into my Google reader, and see this from Wonkette.



Yowza.

waaaaazzzzzzzuuuuuuuuuuppp

the last tour

Because I am a West Coast elitist and not a "real American," of course I read the New Yorker. Well, a few weeks ago, William Finnegan wrote a piece called The Last Tour, the tragic tale of Travis Twiggs, an Iraq War veteran who suffered from PTSD. This should be required reading for anyone who claims to "support the troop".  The story makes clear that that our collective responsibility to those we send into battle does not end when they are out of the war zone. In many cases, that's when our responsibilty really begins.

You can read the article in full by clicking here. 

socialism

I must have missed a memo. When did a progressive tax system become the defining characteristic of socialism? Obama wants to make some minor tweaks to tax rates, and suddenly he's a Marxist who wants to "spread the wealth around".

If a progressive tax system truly is socialist, someone should probably inform people that we've been living in a socialist country since at least 1913.

Also, Adam Smith = Marxist.

The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.

dramatic mccain

DUN-dun-DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN.

debates

So, I'm reading the reaction to the debate, and I am confused. I keep reading that McCain did "well", that this was his best debate, but not enough. Was I watching the same thing? With the fidgeting, smirking, the rolling of the eyes, the heavy breathing into the microphone, the obvious disdain he has for Obama - and I haven't even discussed what he actually said, which may have been worse - McCain came across as desperate and bitter. He didn't do "well'. It was a disaster. Yet there were the CNN analysts praising his performance. Luckily, the public agrees with me that Obama pretty overwhelmingly won the debate. But it wasn't because Obama was so great. It was that McCain was so petty and awful. Why couldn't the people who get paid to discuss these things see that?

Why do I see things so differently than the pundits? The easy answer is that I'm biased. And I am. But most of them are too. You have your Begala's, your Castellanos', et all. It's not like they are not biased. Like them, I try to view the debate in a detached manner. Apparently I fail. In 2004, Kerry absolutely wiped the floor with Bush, yet the pundit consensus was "draw". I was completely baffled then, too. Kerry lost, so maybe I shouldn't trust my debate-watching skills.

troops to teachers

It was a laugh-out-loud moment for me and SC (a teacher) when John McCain stated his support for Troops to Teachers. Here is the exact quote:

We need to encourage programs such as Teach for America and Troops to Teachers where people, after having served in the military, can go right to teaching and not have to take these examinations which -- or have the certification that some are required in some states.

On what planet does that sound like a good idea? So I checked the website for Troops To Teachers, which states:

Troops-to-Teachers provides Referral Assistance and Placement services to military personnel interested in beginning a second career in public education as a teacher. The DANTES Troops-to-Teachers office will help applicants identify teacher certification requirements, programs leading to certification and employment opportunities.

That certainly sounds different than what McCain said. So either McCain misspoke, he doesn't understand the program, or I am missing something about the program. I don't think he misspoke; his statement is pretty clear. But minimizing the impact of things that most people find pretty important - teacher credentialing, "spreading the wealth" (we have a progressive tax structure if you haven't noticed), nuclear safety, "health" of the mother - seemed to be McCain's theme.

Truly odd. 

sarah palin parking lot

And here I thought Jesus Camp was the scariest thing I've ever seen. Take a look at what Wonkette has aptly deemed  Sarah Palin Parking Lot. Yikes. I think if these geniuses put their collective intellect together, they might, might, be able to come up with a single original thought not dictated to them by Sean Hannity.

shadenfreude

Yglesias says that I should be more sympathtic to the victims of the housing collapse, Well, that's kind of difficult for me, as I've witnesses many peers living the high life because of home equity loans, while I kept on renting and trying to correct my own financial mistakes of the past. I'm kicking the tires on a ten year old used car, they are treating themselves to new SUV's. I'm looking for a sub $700 rental, they are buying mini-mansions with $3000 a month mortgages. I have no second cars, no ATV's, no jetskis, none of these suburban trophies. The reason I never bought them is because on my salary, I could not afford them. $3000 is still a very big deal to me. So excuse me this one moment of "I told you so". Years of having to endure real estate amatuers insisting that I must buy a house, that I gotta get in on this, entitle me to at least that. And I'm not using "they" for dramatic effect. This stuff was said to me over and over again by various people. So, sorry, not sympatheic.  In over your head, I say, walk away. If you can afford a $3000 mortgage, then a $1500 rental is easy, and it's not the end of the world. In effect, you'll be paid $1500 for that credit ding. Take your lumps, you'll be fine. The lesson you learn will be invaluable.

atm's

Atrios:

Who Were The Suckers?


I wonder if we'll ever know the answer to that question. Some people losing their homes were victims of bad lending practices. Some people, however, saw their houses as ATMs. In some cases people might have been pulling out money to fund emergency expenditures, but given the apparent volume of mortgage equity extraction it's hard not to conclude that lots of people were just enjoying the extra funds. There's a weird psychology to all of this. I stand by my earlier take that people didn't really think they were taking out loans, but were instead essentially selling off a piece of their home to the bank. That's what "mortgage equity extraction" would really be.

Still the question remains if, on the whole, those who were more prudent will come out ahead or if those who are defaulting on their home equity loans ultimately made the right decisions.

dear sacramento airport java city

If you are going to advertise "Iced Coffee" on your menu, it would be a good idea to have a pitcher of brewed coffee in a refrigerator somewhere. I guess, in a technical sense, pouring hot coffee over ice qualifies as "Iced Coffee", but not in the spirit of the law. By the time I sit down, all my ice has melted and I am left with "Watery Lukewarm Coffee". Furthermore, the "Iced Coffee" in question is the exact same coffee as the hot coffee, yet you charge more for a smaller cup (not even counting the spatial displacement of ice) of "Iced Coffee" than a hot coffee. I chose you because my other choice was Starbucks, and while my anti-Starbucks feelings have waned, I still try to support alternative forms of coffee whenever possible. In this case, I should have gone with the familiar. In short, what I am saying is that the totality of your concept of "Iced Coffee" equals

stfu about the community reinvestment act

...and read this.

debate postmortem

• If you live in Tennessee, you can get a health care plan in Arizona? W. T. F? Oh wait, I get it, wormholes !

• Using my powers of logic, if we had identified where Osama Bin Laden is, and that turned out to be in Pakistan, and Pakistan refused to target him, John McCain would absolutely not target a strike against him. Obama says he would, and McCain seems to think this is some sort of abominable stance. Color me confused.
  

• If McCain knows how to get Osama Bin Laden, as he claims to, maybe he should put "COUNTRY FIRST!" and share that intelligence with the military. Just a thought. Telegraph your punches to Petraeus, dude. 

• "That one." Yikes. McCain is a bitter, bitter man. 

• If you didn't catch it, McCain patted Obama on the back, and when Obama went to shake his hand, McCain turned away, leaving Obama left to shake Cindy McCain's hand. See above bullet point. 

• These debates are hella boring. Obama is crushing, but I think we know all we need to know. Can we vote now? 

• I am back in Sacramento for a few days, so the use of "hella" is fully justified, thank you very much.
  

• If your drinking game had "fundamental difference", "my friends", "Petraeus ", or "I've been there," I hope your hospital stay for alcohol poisoning is going well. 

• Apparently John McCain's foreign policy boils down to: "Ask David Petraeus ". I respect Petraeus , he's brought an intellectual (elitist?) approach to counterinsurgency that seems to work. But God he is not, contrary to what McCain thinks. The President's job is to lead. If you want to consult with Petraeus , and use his strategies, that's fine. But at least pretend you had something to do with it fer chrissake. Shit, if all it takes is saying "whatever you say, General Petraeus ", then I could be president. Heck, then Sarah Palin is qualified to be president, although that sentence may come out as "say Petraeus you whatever General".
  

• Trying to be impartial as I can, which means not very impartial at all, I just can't see how this debate was close. McCain certainly wasn't awful (except for the "that one" thing), but on issue after issue he simply lost. It seems like the default setting for political commentary is "John McCain wins on foreign policy", but can someone please explain to me why? Obama nailed the foreign policy issues. How to deal with Pakistan. Sitting down with our friends and enemies to get shit done. Repairing our international stature and diplomatic relations. On and on. Where exactly is McCain is correct on foreign policy? All of you shouting "THE SURGE!", please google "Anbar Awakening ".  

• I'm at a hotel with limited television choices, so I am on my third viewing. There is no question Obama won the debate going away. Is it possible to have a layered, nuanced debate? This is like watching Syriana repeatedly, discovering some new angle every time. 

w/r/t dfw, r.i.p.

David Foster Wallace is dead. Suicide.

Fucker.

It's taken me a few weeks to write about this. Not because I have been incapacitated due to grief, but because, from a completely vain standpoint, it is intimidating to write about him. I, who can't write for shit and have no patience for proofreading, am going to write about a legend, and expose myself to anyone who stumbles across this page as a lightweight, psuedo-intellectual fraud? I am a delicate flower; tis not easy.

Any-who. 

Until I discovered DFW, I was happy in world of commercial horror literature. Clive Barker, Steven King, that sort of thing. Not horrible stuff - I'm certainly not embarrassed - but also not particularly challenging. But then I read a Newsweek article* on Infinite Jest that piqued my interest. The AA subplot in particular interested me, since my mother had tried and failed the AA path. Reading it was a long, difficult process, even more so for someone new to the genre. So, Infinite Jest was my gateway drug into "serious" fiction. But, that's sort of like using black tar heroin as your gateway drug into Extra Strength Tylenol.

DFW immediately became my favorite author, and remained so until very recently, when I realized that maybe I do prefer the simpler narrative of Kurt Vonnegut. But DFW was a close second, even if it took me four times longer than usual to read some of his books (Infinite Jest and Everything and More [which is basically a philosophy of math book, so it makes sense it took me so long - I read it out of a sense of duty]). Infinite Jest, however, remains my favorite book, and some of DFW's short stories are seared into my memory. His literary essays opened my eyes to a ton of authors I probably would have never read. In short, DFW was the single biggest influence on the development of my reading habits. That may sound like a pretty insignificant fact, but there are only a few things more important to me. 

I don't think there's any doubt that DFW was a genius (I don't think he gets quite enough credit as a pop philosopher - his style of deduction often sparked in me that "Aha!" moment that I rarely achieve with other authors) . But he's probably the only genius that it seems like I could have been friends with (repeat: seems like).  It's absolutely amazing how versatile his knowledge is (ugh, was). It's a cliche, but that level of brilliance is a curse of its own. I don't want to imagine what it is like to be able to, on some level, comprehend almost everything you see, and continuously ponder what you cannot. The fatigue - you just want your brain to stop, a chance to catch your breath, but you can't, and it becomes unbearable.

Or, quite possibly, the opposite. This world bores you.

Now, both of those are overly simplistic, romantically cliched, and incredibly presumptuous explanations of DFW's final act, and neither are probably even close to the truth (the actual truth is much more sobering). But it's what I choose to believe. I think we ought to be allowed some leeway in remembering our idols.

If you're interested, here's a roundup of the DFW obits and remembrances.

Slate: Remembering David Foster Wallace

Benjamin Kunkel

McSweeney's

Will Leitch (Deadspin)

Radar (David Zweig)

Salon (Laura Miller)

And Finally, Harper's has made the stories he wrote for them available online.

Below is Incarnations of Burned Children, originally published in Esquire.

The Daddy was around the side of the house hanging a door for the tenant when he heard the child's screams and the Mommy's voice gone high between them. He could move fast, and the back porch gave onto the kitchen, and before the screen door had banged shut behind him the Daddy had taken the scene in whole, the overturned pot on the floortile before the stove and the burner's blue jet and the floor's pool of water still steaming as its many arms extended, the toddler in his baggy diaper standing rigid with steam coming off his hair and his chest and shoulders scarlet and his eyes rolled up and mouth open very wide and seeming somehow separate from the sounds that issued, the Mommy down on one knee with the dishrag dabbing pointlessly at him and matching the screams with cries of her own, hysterical so she was almost frozen. Her one knee and the bare little soft feet were still in the steaming pool, and the Daddy's first act was to take the child under the arms and lift him away from it and take him to the sink, where he threw out plates and struck the tap to let cold wellwater run over the boy's feet while with his cupped hand he gathered and poured or flung more cold water over his head and shoulders and chest, wanting first to see the steam stop coming off him, the Mommy over his shoulder invoking God until he sent her for towels and gauze if they had it, the Daddy moving quickly and well and his man's mind empty of everything but purpose, not yet aware of how smoothly he moved or that he'd ceased to hear the high screams because to hear them would freeze him and make impossible what had to be done to help his child, whose screams were regular as breath and went on so long they'd become already a thing in the kitchen, something else to move quickly around. The tenant side's door outside hung half off its top hinge and moved slightly in the wind, and a bird in the oak across the driveway appeared to observe the door with a cocked head as the cries still came from inside. The worst scalds seemed to be the right arm and shoulder, the chest and stomach's red was fading to pink under the cold water and his feet's soft soles weren't blistered that the Daddy could see, but the toddler still made little fists and screamed except now merely on reflex from fear the Daddy would know he thought possible later, small face distended and thready veins standing out at the temples and the Daddy kept saying he was here he was here, adrenaline ebbing and an anger at the Mommy for allowing this thing to happen just starting to gather in wisps at his mind's extreme rear still hours from expression. When the Mommy returned he wasn't sure whether to wrap the child in a towel or not but he wet the towel down and did, swaddled him tight and lifted his baby out of the sink and set him on the kitchen table's edge to soothe him while the Mommy tried to check the feet's soles with one hand waving around in the area of her mouth and uttering objectless words while the Daddy bent in and was face to face with the child on the table's checkered edge repeating the fact that he was here and trying to calm the toddler's cries but still the child breathlessly screamed, a high pure shining sound that could stop his heart and his bitty lips and gums now tinged with the light blue of a low flame the Daddy thought, screaming as if almost still under the tilted pot in pain. A minute, two like this that seemed much longer, with the Mommy at the Daddy's side talking sing-song at the child's face and the lark on the limb with its head to the side and the hinge going white in a line from the weight of the canted door until the first wisp of steam came lazy from under the wrapped towel's hem and the parents' eyes met and widened--the diaper, which when they opened the towel and leaned their little boy back on the checkered cloth and unfastened the softened tabs and tried to remove it resisted slightly with new high cries and was hot, their baby's diaper burned their hand and they saw where the real water'd fallen and pooled and been burning their baby all this time while he screamed for them to help him and they hadn't, hadn't thought and when they got it off and saw the state of what was there the Mommy said their God's first name and grabbed the table to keep her feet while the father turned away and threw a haymaker at the air of the kitchen and cursed both himself and the world for not the last time while his child might now have been sleeping if not for the rate of his breathing and the tiny stricken motions of his hands in the air above where he lay, hands the size of a grown man's thumb that had clutched the Daddy's thumb in the crib while he'd watched the Daddy's mouth move in song, his head cocked and seeming to see way past him into something his eyes made the Daddy lonesome for in a strange vague way. If you've never wept and want to, have a child. Break your heart inside and something will a child is the twangy song the Daddy hears again as if the lady was almost there with him looking down at what they've done, though hours later what the Daddy won't most forgive is how badly he wanted a cigarette right then as they diapered the child as best they could in gauze and two crossed handtowels and the Daddy lifted him like a newborn with his skull in one palm and ran him out to the hot truck and burned custom rubber all the way to town and the clinic's ER with the tenant's door hanging open like that all day until the hinge gave but by then it was too late, when it wouldn't stop and they couldn't make it the child had learned to leave himself and watch the whole rest unfold from a point overhead, and whatever was lost never thenceforth mattered, and the child's body expanded and walked about and drew pay and lived its life untenanted, a thing among things, its self's soul so much vapor aloft, falling as rain and then rising, the sun up and down like a yoyo.

Rest in peace.

*1996 me = Stephen King/Newsweek/Plymouth Sundance/WalMart bookcases. 2008 me = David Foster Wallace/New Yorker/Convertible Saab/Ikea bookcases. You've come a long way, baby, and have become a yuppie cliche.

is this offensive?

I'm not saying it is.  But I'm not a woman. I'm just curious.

vp debate

My initial reaction is that Palin was a trainwreck.  But she was coming from a position of being the Hindenburg, wrapped up in the Titanic, nestled in a box of clusterfuck (thanks David Cross), and therefore she will be lavishly praised on how well she did.

This debate wasn't close, but that is not how it will be reported.

Just keep in mind: a trainwreck is still a trainwreck.

fallout

Admittedly, this is going to paint me in a bad light, but I'm actually a little happy with some of the fallout of the financial meltdown. I keep being told that credit is tight and it's difficult to get loans. Well, good. Easy credit and stupid loans are part of the root problem. I hear how it'll be harder to get a home loan. Again, good. People with sub-$100K salaries should not be purchasing +$400K houses anyways. Now I'm hearing many car dealerships may be going under. I see no problem there, either. You don't need a new car avery three years, and I've never quite understood why and how people who positively make less than my meager salary pay over $400 a month on a vehicle. Now, it sucks that people will be losing jobs, no way to spin that into a positive. But hopefully we willl come out of this mess a bit wiser and more restrained in our spending habits, We need to collectively stop chasing the Joneses.