People! Ya know I love 'em!

''We shouldn't make policy decisions based on human rights and legal advocacy groups,'' retired U.S. Navy Cmdr. Kurt Lippold said in a telephone interview.

he was talking about closing Gitmo prison.

Yeah we wouldn't want those kinds of things happening.

How can you not be pissed?

HOUSTON – Exxon Mobil Corp. on Friday reported a profit of $45.2 billion for 2008, breaking its own record for a U.S. company, even as its fourth-quarter earnings fell 33 percent from a year ago.

The previous record for annual profit was $40.6 billion, which the world's largest publicly traded oil company set in 2007.

By JOHN PORRETTO, AP Energy Writer

Seriously? Everyone and everything is tanking but a Texas based oil company is making record breaking profits. BTW their exploration budget hasn't changed in 20 years. So don't let them sell you that bill of goods anymore.

And don't ask, "Well, what do you want me to do?"

DO something! Make some noise. Otherwise it'll just keep going and going until they bleed us dry and want more.

Hot Guy Friday!

Thomas Jane is one of those guys who is so hot he simply can't be believed. He's a good enough actor, but I think those looks get in the way of his success. He's (thank God) not bashful about taking off hsi clothes either, and that's gonna be necessary I think. As I understand it he's about to star in an HBO series called HUNG. A title that leaves me speechless.

So here's Tom:
(he's so rockin that pornstache)








Love

The winds of change are a blowin'

Not that I'm unusual, but I hate change. Let me amend that. I hate change I do not instigate. I hate change that effects me, in which I have no input. That change I hate.

I may have mentioned that we keep getting memos from the director at my job telling us how dire the economic circumstances are and that we can expect changes. I am friendly with a woman who is administratively in the know, and a couple of weeks ago I alluded to the impending changes and she said, "Oh, have they already talked to you about that?" It wasn't my intention to make her spill the beans, but I was glad she did.

The problem is that this job, since it's inception,when I managed to piss off the current director, has only had reverse gear. I keep attempting to move into other things, perhaps something with a creative bent, and I keep getting either passed over, or moved backwards ever so slightly. I think the days of ever so slightly are over, or at least on the wane.

During the time it took,(forever) to create my full time position here I managed to let the asst director, who is now the director, know that I am someone who not only is pro-active, but someone who thinks for themselves.

She is not fond of this particular predilection.

So ever after I've been in the admin doghouse. When I applied for a position as Public Relations Coordinator I was not interviewed, and a young white woman from within the organization was hired. When I applied for a position as Humanities Specialist, one for which I would think my Masters in Fine Arts would qualify me, I wasn't interviewed and a young white woman from the same department as the first was hired for it. When I applied for a volunteer position as a storyteller, I wasn't interviewed, and an old white woman from the SAME department was selected. That particular program subsequently bombed and was discontinued.

Now, I'm getting emails asking me how long it takes to do this, and then how long it takes to do that, etc. The winds of change are making me nervous.

What I think makes me most unhappy is that I find myself in a position that I promised myself I'd never be in. Here I am, car payments, credit cards, and I'm likely to lose my job. I could just kick myself for believing.

So, I have to wonder if the automatic assumption that my particular position is so readily adaptable is because I'm a middle-aged white guy with a Master's degree, or if it's because men here are only allowed to do technical stuff and to lift and tote.

In any case I'll be looking at options. It may be time for me to look at that move I've been putting off for several years. It may just be time to find myself that place to settle and get myself setup to spend the rest of my life in some form of simplicity. Those who know me know that simplicity is not a hallmark I have exactly lived by all these years, but it sure sound good about now.

Perhaps it really is time to trade that damn car in on a truck, get a trailer to haul my horse in and head, literally for the hills. You suppose I could make a living making pottery and riding horses? It's been done by others I'm sure. I'll never be rich, but knowing I am in charge of change would be nice...for a change.

Maybe that's all the security one can ask for in this life.

Do I care?

Do I care about Ted Haggard? Honestly, is Ted worthy of my time in any way?

He's a hypocrite who lied to himself his church his wife and everyone else he came in contact with.

He's decried the church's ability to "straighten" him. He's acknowledged that not only did he hire guys for sex, but that he solicited it within his own congregation.

Perhaps most heinous, he's loosed the likes of Mike Jones on the media, who lap up every senseless morsel that comes out of his mouth, and then share it with us

I do not care about this guy nor his ilk. I do not want to hear about his "human" foibles. Nor his denial of himself and his willingness to exploit it, and therefore us,in an effort to win...what? Acceptance? Notoriety?

Probably money.

Somehow, someway, somebody is probably paying him big bucks to keep this whole thing very public. He's a buffoon, and someone keeps listening to it.

Stop!

Please!

Yesterday a California court told a Los Angeles (Riverside county) school that it was ok to expell two young girls who professed to be lesbians because the school isn't a business and therefore doesn't have to follow the state statute that governs such.

I think perhaps my favorite quote is this:

"The school's attorney claimed the court was right in determining '[the school's purpose was to] teach Christian values in a Christian setting pursuant to a Christian code of conduct."

Great! So Christians, who hate are now legal in California. They're legal everywhere else,they may as well be in CA too.

I can't help but think that one day, if they're right, these good old Christians are going to find themselves at that long professed day of reckoning, and if their God is really as just as they profess him to be, they're going to have a whole lotta shit to answer for.

Let the games begin I say.

Ted Haggard can stand at the front of the line.

Showing my age

I just ran across an article over at Towleroad.com about a guy who introduced his fiance on Wheel of Fortune. The fiance, of course was male. And I'm not sure how I feel about this.

Of course, my immediate thought is "oh, you old fool, you're just showing all that training you've been given by straight people these many centuries that tells you to hide who you are and not offend by getting in anyone's face."

The pragmatist in me says that I'm not so offended by my straight people training as that it happened on Wheel of Fortune with Pat and Vanna in attendance, while the contestant was buying vowels.

Yeah I think it's the tacky factor that bothers me most.





On the other hand I'm ready to go toe to toe with most Chicagoans over the appointment of the very capable and certainly most adorable Ron Huberman to head Chicago's schools. Some concern has been voiced over the fact that he doesn't have a lot of experience in a classroom. An issue that doesn't seem to bother them when hiring people to work IN those classrooms. But bothers them when the Administrator who will never be standing in front of a class to teach isn't a tenured prof. Seriously?

It seems that no one even understands how education SHOULD work, let alone understand how it DOES work and what is wrong with it.

Now, Ron Huberman is gay, and god knows he's drop dead cute, but let's let the guy do his job awhile before tarring and feathering him.


Which of course brings me back to Wheel of Fortune.

Yeah, it's the tacky Wheel factor. I loved that some guy told the world he's engaged to another guy on national television. Why couldn't it have been on Charlie Rose, or something smart.

Wheel of Fortune...FUCK!

And btw the price of oil went down another .45 yesterday. Gas went up .07. Enjoy.

Love

And so it goes...

Urban living is so interesting. Last week the city decided that due to back taxes that hadn't been paid and the need to clean up the oh so attractive urban area where I work that they would raze the building next door to us.

When I arrived for work this morning it was on fire.

How coincidental.

There were cars and motorcycles in the basement, at least one of which I could have used I'm sure. But alas, they chose to burn everything up. The front of th building has already fallen in and the entire street is covered with ice from the amount of water they've poured on it so far.

Tonight I finally get to meet my acting class. The poor things are scheduled on Monday, and the first Monday of the semester was enrollment, the second was the Martin Luther King holiday, so today they start class. Then they have class for three weeks and are interrupted for President's day! They'll be getting huge consideration due to all this. Of course, they have Spring Break in mid-March so they get classus interruptus yet again.

Makes continuity tough.

It seems that everyplace is laying off everyone. I'm hoping I can hang on. It'd be truly disappointing to find out that the smoke and mirrors economy that George and Co built was going to swallow me up too. I'm wondering if I'd give up then. If it might just be time to say "Hey, can't pay you..EVER! Sorry."

I'd hate that. But one must eat first and have a roof, everything else waits if necessary.

Well, it's Monday, we're dealing with enough, no point dwelling on the possibilities.

For somer eason Ken Olin came to mind this morning. What a cutie he is/was. I havent' found any stills of him when he was really fine, but this one with Cybill Shepard is the best I can do for Monday Morning. Maybe Ken will get featured on Friday, that might be fun.

Hot Guy Friday!

Let's not kid ourselves about my inclination to be attracted to men of an Asian persuasion. I considered the eye candy of living in San Francisco one of the great pleasures of my time there.

In that spirit I give you images of one Archie Kao. Don't tell me you've somehow managed to overlook that really hot Asian guy on CSI (the original, not one of the imitations) who is often relegated to short little scenes in the dark lab where he can display his genius, but little of his hot-ness.

I thought I'd remedy this oversight on the producers part and bring Archie to your attention.

Enjoy.

Other People!?!?!

This day is about everyone else! Way too much going on to get anything done completely. I hate that.

Well tomorrow is HGF and we all love that. Don't we?

PLUS! Teaching tonight! I can't wait! Especially since I got the book this morning and have no time to sit and read the chapter they're supposed to be quizzed on.

Won't I be a good teacher today?

Shit.

Oh well, Archie! Archie! Archie!

Curious now aren't you?

Maybe Dr. King was right

He said that the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

hmm let's make a little comparison today.





I have to wonder why one made me think of the other.

For some reason I feel safer today.

now that's a long way

Are These The Front LInes?

There has been, for some time now, another civil war going on in this country. We all know it, we all realize it's been many years since its inception, and we also realize that there is no resolution in sight.

This one is no less important than the last. It is no less urgent than the war fought for the rights of Americans who had been relegated to sub-human status. It is an assault on the rights of all of us.

The argument that America is for some and not all is invalid. It holds no greater promise than for those who are oppressed. Than for those who seek its promise. Than for those who wish to know the sweet taste of true freedom.

And, as we know, we are none of us free when others are oppressed.

Today we must put all that aside. We must come together as one united citizenry. As a people, of all colors, all faiths, all orientations, and demonstrate to not only the rest of the world, but to ourselves most importantly, that we are a nation that meets its challenges head on, that though we may have faltered these past few years, we are still strong, and determined to lead. We are more capable and willing than ever to take the world by the hand and lead it into the light that is everyones, by the simple right of their birth.

I hope we are capable of such a feat.

Shortly after President Obama finished his inaugural speech I passed the African American custodian in the hallway. I knew he'd watched the inauguration as I had in my office.

He gave me the thumbs up. I looked at him and crossed my fingers.

He smiled and nodded.

"Amen brother", he said.

"Amen"

A lack of verbosity

I'm not feeling very chatty today. Just stuff going on, and with the holiday from work I've gotten a late start.

I missed Gene Robinson's prayer yesterday, but I've read the text, and I've seen the youtube. I found some comments on a episcopal website denigrating the prayer as depressing. Myself I thought it was rather Catholic. They were all i thought of while Robinson was talking. It seemed a glass half empty prayer, and though I'm sure Robinson meant well, and that most people didn't notice, he came off as not very hopeful.

Myself I'm reserving judgement about our new President until he actually does something and hopefully before it's too late. I can't see that anyone really gets how dire our economic circumstances are.

George Bush and Co through their audacious and selfish behaviors have weakened this country to the point that it is more vulnerable than ever before. And I hope the history books see that. If this thing goes to hell I hope that it is noted that he alone is responsible.

Mr. Bush, on this the eve of your long awaited departure from office may I offer you this heartfelt wish for your future.

Rot.

Here we go again. Plus Hot Guy Friday!

Yesterday a human being did an incredible thing. He met a challenge he had prepared for and trained for all his professional life. In so doing he saved hundreds of lives. Yes, I'm talking about Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III of Danville, CA, who landed a US Airways plane in the Hudson without killing anyone.

Sully did what he was trained as a pilot to do, he not only did it incredibly well, he was the last person to leave the plane.

And the poor guy can't get a break. He's been upstaged by God.

IT'S A MIRACLE!!!!!! Screams everyone on the tv and in the few remaining newspapers we still read.

No it's not you fucking idiots. It's a guy doing a good thing! Give the poor bastard some props will ya?

Like God had something to do with it. It just pisses me off that all you good Christians can't give credit where credit is due, you just gotta give it to some mythical being, cause humans can never do anything that well.

Which kind of thinking is exactly the reason we're in the mess we're in. No one thinks people can cut it. The American Disease of not accepting responsibility extends to robbing those responsible of credit where credit is seriously due.

I knew no one on that plane, I haven't flown US Air in years, I do not know Sully Sullenberger.

But on behalf of all those ungrateful sons of bitches who won't give you the proper credit Sully, I'd like to say thank you.

Thank you for being a master at what you do, and thank you for believing in integrity and staying with your plane until all the passengers were out. You're truly a man of honor in my estimation. Thank you again.

And Anrew Wyeth died yesterday. The following excerpt from the AP article on Wyeth today explains why I love his art:

-"The world has lost one of the greatest artists of all time," George A. Weymouth, a friend of Wyeth's who is chairman of the board of the Brandywine Conservancy, said in a statement.

A Wyeth retrospective at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 2006 drew more than 175,000 visitors in 15 1/2 weeks, the highest-ever attendance at the museum for a living artist. The Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, a converted 19th-century grist mill, includes hundreds of works by three generations of Wyeths.

It was in Maine that Wyeth found the subject for "Christina's World," his best-known painting. And it was in Pennsylvania that he met Helga Testorf, a neighbor in his native Chadds Ford who became the subject of the intimate portraits that brought him millions of dollars and a wave of public attention in 1986.

The "Helga" paintings, many of them full-figure nudes, came with a whiff of scandal: Wyeth said he had not even told his wife, Betsy, about the more than 200 paintings and sketches until he had completed them in 1985.

Wyeth's world was as limited in scale, and as rich in associations, as "Christina's World," which shows a disabled woman looking up a grassy rise toward her farm home, her face tantalizingly unseen.

"Really, I think one's art goes only as far and as deep as your love goes," Wyeth said in a Life magazine interview in 1965.

"I don't paint these hills around Chadds Ford because they're better than the hills somewhere else. It's that I was born here, lived here — things have a meaning for me."

Paradoxically, he said, he loved Maine "in spite of its scenery. There's a lot of cornball in that state you have to go through — boats at docks, old fishermen, and shacks with swayback roofs. I hate all that."

Wyeth was a secretive man who spent hours tramping the countryside alone. He painted many portraits, working several times with favorite subjects, but said he disliked having someone else watching him paint.

Much of Wyeth's work had a melancholy feel — aging people and brown, dead plants — but he chose to describe his work as "thoughtful."

"I do an awful lot of thinking and dreaming about things in the past and the future — the timelessness of the rocks and the hills — all the people who have existed there," he once said. "I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure in the landscape — the loneliness of it — the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it; the whole story doesn't show.

"I think anything like that — which is contemplative, silent, shows a person alone — people always feel is sad. Is it because we've lost the art of being alone?"

Wyeth remained active in recent years and President George W. Bush presented him with a National Medal of the Arts in 2007.

Wyeth remained active in his 90s, but his granddaughter, Victoria Wyeth, told The Associated Press in 2008 that he no longer gave interviews. "He says, 'Vic, everything I have to say is on the walls,'" she said.-

This guy knew me, I swear.

Farewell Andrew, I'll think of you this weekend while I'm at the gallery looking at your work.


And now for something you'll really like.

This week I thought I'd do a little sports feature since Tom Brady was out this season after his little incident locally, and the opportunities to gawk at him were few. And since I'm having serious baseball withdrawal I'm combining David DeJesus and Tom Brady into one glorious HGF post.












A little side note on David, last summer I was working at the grocery and this really cute hispanic guy comes up to me and starts asking me questions about where to find stuff and of course I was more than happy to help. So while I was finishing up I asked him for his card that the store ostensibly uses to dispense discounts, but actually uses to track marketing trends, and when I scanned it the name popped up on my screen David DeJesus. I was near to swooning to realize I'd been talking to my idle for several minutes without realizing it. Luckily I managed not to gush. I figured he didn't really want to be recognized, and I didn't really want to look like a goofy fan with a crush. I smiled and nodded. He smiled and blushed. It was a near perfect moment.

So Happy HGF! Enjoy your weekend I'm riding horses in the cold and snow and then I'm looking at Andrew Wyeth paintings.

Love

Repent!

It's the end I tell you! Well, maybe not exactly the end, maybe the end of an era, I doubt it's the end of days. I was looking around yesterday about that phrase, and it seems everyone has a take on it. Being human and having everything end, we just seem to need to put an expiration date on everything.

Let's take a look at some of my ending dates:

6/11 the expiration date on the first credit card I pulled out of my wallet this morning.

5/11/09 last day of classes this semester

5/26/1997 the last day I was an official smoker

but there doesn't seem to be exact dates for other stuff, like the demise of civilizations.

Let's take a look at a microcosm, the street where I work.

Here it is in 1957, year o' my birth:



and five minutes ago:




Now I ask you when exactly was the expiration date on this place?

I assure you if someone had known they'd have sought to extend it.

Yesterday oil prices went down another 5%

Gas went up 6%

AGAIN!

When do we put a stop to this? WHen do we say enough? When do we stand up and say:
No more!
You've screwed us enough! You've taken and taken and we not only cannot, we will not give anymore. We truly have no more to give.

Is your income going up exponentially? Does the massive increase in your income compensate for the massive increases in your expenditures to meet your daily needs?

I have three jobs. Well, ok, five, but we don't count the free one, nor the one that's not paying its own way right now, so make it three.

I'm single and a senior citizen by all accounts. Unless you know lots of 102 year old men. How long can I be expected to keep up such a pace before I just fall over?

Enough I say!

I'm not interested in who's to blame. I am only interested in making it stop.

What is going on???

The very words I used this weekend while watching the latest Hayden Christensen vehicle, Jumper.

Rachel Bilson is fine, I like her, and Samuel L Jackson can do anything and I'll watch. Which I proved when I watched Snakes On a Plane. That's a movie during which one does not ask what is going on, rather one asks, Why is this happening right in front of me?

But Jumper, true to its title, Jumped around from one subject to the next without ever actually finishing a thought. It was quite like teaching college in fact. He's here, he's there, he acquires a sidekick, he kills sidekick,(I think.)

Either the director didn't know how to finish a thought, or the writers (there were three of them, not counting the author of the book. Does THAT tell you anything?)weren't sure where to go from anywhere.

I think the idea was interesting, though it seemed very much like it had all been done before on tv with Jerry O'Connell. But in the movies the hero could do bad stuff too. Like rob banks at 15.

Christensen, Bilson, Jackson, et al, plundered through many many pages of whatever the fuck it was that they were doing, valiantly though. Diane Lane, a woman I loathe since she gets Josh Brolin regularly, worked for maybe a whole day on her two scenes. Just goes to show, if ya got good actors you can do anything.

Hayden could have disrobed a couple of times, THAT would at least have provided something interesting to look at. Besides three second clips of travelogue.

And if you think they were cold on top of Everest in Jumper, you should be here.

Table for 10% please

It is said, depending on which pundit you're prone to listen to, that as much as 10% of the population is homosexual.

Rick Warren says it's 2%, but he's got an agenda so I think he might be using figures for his own purposes. Kinda like he's using Melissa Etheridge.

We'll stick with the old standard 10% for the sake of today's discussion.

If 10% of the American Public is gay where are they? Why aren't they standing up and raising hell like they should be? Does isolation really work that well? Is the fear of violence, retaliation, discrimination etc, really that effective?

Can "the man" keep us down by the mere threat of reducing us all to clerks at Macy's? Providing, that is, that Macy's still exists after the George Bush economy is done running down everyone and everything.

I've long said that we're not going to get a place at the table unless we demand it. Unless we stand up and vociferously force the hand of those who would keep us from making progress.

In God knows how many years of trying we still haven't succeeded in getting anti-discrimination legislation passed on the federal level. Why?

Are our enemies that formidable? Are our adversaries willing to go the distance to keep up from sitting across the table from them? Is Christianity so firmly entrenched in the outdated, outmoded, outrageous idea that we're so evil as to need to be kept at bay and away from decent people?

I don't think they are?

I think we're poorly represented. I think those who would champion our cause aren't that committed to our cause.

It seems we're on a laundry list of to do's.

1.) Negotiate with OPEC to control the price of oil
2.) Negotiate a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas (again)
3.) Negotiate a deal to save the American Economy from itself.
4.) Negotiate the demise of the labor union
5.) Negotiate a middle-of-the-road Cabinet through the selection process
6.) Negotiate the price of laundry services
7.) Negotiate the social calendar of the residents of the White House
8.) Throw the fags a few crumbs.

Surely that's moving the issue way up on the agenda.

We're not going to get anything near what we want from this or any other administration until and unless we insist. Until we find a way to stall something they really want immediately and force them to take us seriously.

I say let's intervene in the Middle East peace process, it's a sure bet since it's a never-ending show, and get Hamas to agree that there'll be no cease fire unless we get our rights as Americans.

That'll show 'em.

Defective?!?!?

Reparative

The definition of this word according to Merriam-Webster's online Dictionary indicates that whatever is being effected is defective.

This brings to mind the term "reparative therapy" for gays and lesbians. Seriously?

I'm defective? I'm broken in some way? Because I choose to live my life honestly and openly I am in some way deficient? I see people every day of my life who live lies. They cannot, for reasons passing human understanding, get far away enough from themselves so they make themselves into people they're not. They give credence to the notion that there is something amiss in the minds and hearts of those who love someone of the same sex.

And it's wrong.

Edmund Burke, a British statesman and philosopher of the 1700's said,
“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
It's a very popular quotation on the internet these days, yet I have to wonder if anyone really knows what it means.

Has any one of you really found themselves in a situation that if no one did anything you were totally and completely sunk for the rest of your life? I don't mean just losing a job, or a relationship, or passing a class. I mean your entire life.

Anyone?

Well, I have, and let me tell you it's lonely out there when you dare to stand up for what is right and get cut off at the knees. It's scary when there is a mob out for your head and there isn't anyone to come to your defense.

The whole world is watching this drama over gay rights unfold here in the U.S. and most are standing idly by.

I see that Gene Robinson is delivering the opening invocation at the inaugural. I fail to understand why Rick Warren was mentioned to the public first when Robinson had been included all along. What's up with that?

Warren has opened the doors of Saddleback Church to those who have chosen to split from the episcopal church over the church's stance of accepting gay and lesbian members. How Christian of everyone involved.

Hey! You guys! You that hate gay people enough that you'll leave your church! Over here! Come on in! We'd love to have you!

Hey! You gays! You people that are so defective that you'll have to undergo REPARATIVE therapy before we'll accept you as one of us. Come on in and get some incredible psychological abuse and learn,through some good old fashioned brainwashing, to be what our version of God says you should be. We'd love to have you...for lunch.

Talk about a lion's den.

Do you suppose they actually read that book they thump all the time? Or is it just a prop?

See, things aren't as black and white as the religions of the world would have it. You're either with us or against us, is their philosophy. If you choose to be with us you're ok, you're aces, you're the bees knees.

If you choose to be without us, well then, you're choosing Satan and hell and all things evil, and you're embracing the devil.

And they call us dramatic.

HGF!!!

Aaron Eckhart is quite the California surferboy made good. He's so cute I even wanted him when he looked like this.



It does give me pause when I read that he graduated from BYU and worked a religious mission for the RLDS church right after high school.

Not so much pause I can't admire his hotness. But enough that I'm not going to join his fan club.

But enjoy Aaron, he's hot. Even if his moral compass is questionable.

Lavender blogs

I've made a few changes to the blog this week. I'm still not sure how I feel about the lavender, but I thought it was worth a try. The banner needed resizing and while I was at it I decided the border had to go. I found this great picture of what apparently is a riding trail in Puerto Rico, but it never fit very well, so I photoshopped it. I may have to go there and find that trail though, it looks pretty fucking cool. I may chuck all the changes next week but for now this is it.

I finally got my Christmas boots replaced. I was given the wrong size and since it was an e-commerce thing I had to send them back and then wait. But now my Christmas haul is complete. There were obviously new cowboy boots, several new hats, (which I love and can't believe people thought to get for me.) There's a cap, like a driving, or golfing cap. There's a cowboy hat, which fit, and that's very rare since I have this odd shaped head. And then there's a Fedora. Now, this is quite the accomplishment since nowadays everyone thinks those hats that K-Fed wears are Fedora's. They're not. They're some 60's throwback jaunty thing(closer to a Trilby than a fedora) that would look no more than silly on the head of a 50-something man. So I was pleased when I got an actual gray Fedora. Someone did their homework. A rare thing in my family. There were fireplace tools, and itunes gift cards. There were scarves and gloves, and practical things like sheets and towels. There were impractical things too Thank God, like the levitating globe from the National Geographic holiday catalog that I mentioned in passing one day. It's truly one of those things that you can't believe you'll have to haul around for eternity, but that when it's sitting on your desk you just love. I'm so gay.

For reasons passing understanding I realized this morning while in the shower that I have not revised my syllabi for the semester that starts Monday. Oops. Guess I'll be doing that today huh?

I've made a colossal mistake in the new tire department. I've ordered them online. I suppose it's great to have them delivered, but one at a time? That's weird. And I'd really prefer not to have to have them in the apt. They smell. Next time I'll know better and just get them locally and have them put directly on the car. Absent mindedness strikes again.

A friends son got dumped by his girlfriend this week and she wrote and told me. I've been singing "You must not be drinking enough" by Don Henley on the way to work everyday since. It truly is the best medicine. (yes, both the drinking and the singing)

There is a great weather forecast for Friday and I'm certain I have this thing coming on that will prevent me from working that afternoon.(ahem.) I'm also certain that riding is the only cure, so I've sent out emails looking for riding companions.

I'm going at any rate. I never ride alone anymore, but I will if I have to. Things could turn ugly in the weather department any day and if they do they may stay that way for weeks, so I have to partake when I can.

Love

Whadda ya bet the price of gas goes up anyway

Last update: 3:50 p.m. EST Jan. 7, 2009
Comments: 89
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Crude-oil futures tumbled 12% Wednesday, marking their biggest one-day percentage drop in more than seven years, after government reports showed U.S. crude inventories jumped last week and as data indicated deteriorating troubles in the economy.
The nation's stockpiles of crude reached 325.4 million barrels in the week ended Jan. 2, up 6.7 million barrels from a week ago, the Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts surveyed by energy information provider Platts had expected a buildup of 1.5 million barrels.
"The stock build should be enough to chase the bulls back into the barn," said James Williams, an economist at energy research firm WTRG Economics. "The substantial builds in crude oil, gasoline and distillates ought to bring the bears back from a short hibernation."
Crude for February delivery tumbled $5.95, or 12.2%, to end at $42.63 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, its biggest daily percentage loss since Sept. 24, 2001.
Wednesday's loss came after oil topped $50 a barrel on Tuesday, a level not seen in five weeks.
Also Wednesday, the EIA said gasoline inventories increased 3.3 million barrels in the latest week, while distillate stocks rose by 1.8 million barrels.
Total petroleum products supplied over the past four-week period averaged 20.1 million barrels a day, down by 2.9% compared with the same period last year, the EIA reported. U.S. refineries operated at 84.6% of capacity last week, higher than the prior week's 82.5%.
Crude inventories at Cushing, Okla., the delivery point for crude futures contracts traded on the Nymex, jumped 15% to reach 32.2 million barrels, the highest level since at least April 2004, when the government started collecting Cushing data.
On the Nymex, February heating oil futures fell 5.1% to $1.5431 a gallon, and February reformulated gasoline skidded 9.5% to $1.0764 a gallon.

God we're stupid.

Just say no

Read this very interesting article at the Daily Beast about Rick Warren and his AIDS in Africa ties.


This is the guy who will be the official religious rep at the Inauguration.

Here we go...

It's on

Nathan Runkle is a 24 year old activist who, at 15 started an organization called Mercy for Animals. Last week Nathan added another milestone to his impressive resume. He became a victim of a hate crime.

As always I am outraged by these irrational attacks on those who are considered less than, because they're different. I am outraged because the federal government does not count these crimes in their statistics, nor do most states. I am outraged because there is not a hue and cry from the populace that someone walking down the street can be beaten unrecognizable for no other reason than he is gay. And none of you do anything about it.

No letters to your Senators, and Representatives. No public demonstrations on behalf of those you know personally who are at risk. Nothing. It seems an apt demonstration of your concern.

The following is a link to the story on the huffingtonpost website about it. I hope you'll read it. I hope you'll at least attempt to understand the enormity of the need for federal hate crime legislation. I hope you'll at least attempt to understand that no one should have to live in fear because of who they are. I hope you'll attempt to understand that things change only when one person at a time stands up and says NO MORE. I hope...


A Hate Crime You Won't See in Statistics

I've heard a lot of you talk a good story over the years. But we're still dying.

Settling back in

Well the routine is almost back to normal. Once I get the seemingly interminable stacks of stuff in my office down to a manageable level I'll feel better.

Working on a/v materials for lesson plans for this semester. I think I'll show them a play a month and work on that and hopefully get them in understand the workings of it all that way.

Maybe just two. If I do a straight play and a musical(not one word,) I should be able to cover most of what I'd like them to know.

Last semester I followed the lead of the dept head and required them to do 15 crew hrs. THAT was a disaster, so this time I'm only requiring them to see and critique the shows at our school this semester. I'll give them extra credit if they want to go to something else and critique that.

On an entirely different subject. Has anyone noticed how Jeffrey Dean Morgan


has managed to forge a career by playing characters on series that don't actually exist?

This guy is on three series that I know of and he never has to show up?

Other than being a handsome ne'er do well, how does one get THAT job?

The problem is that his characters are always likeable dead guys. I mean, I'm always rooting for Judah Botwin, and particularly John Winchester. Somebody's got a great agent.

Welcome to 2009!

Greetings! Welcome to the New year! We're about to get a new President. Our first African-American one. We're probably going to get a new stimulus check, which means they're sending us our children's money. We're about to see Melissa Etheridge, the apparent new arbiter of all things gay, and Rick Warren embrace in an effort to convince the rest of us that evangelicals, and Christians in general are worthy of our love too. The reverse is apparently not true. But what the hell, just because it's a new year we shouldn't have to change all our spots at once. We've laid a whole lot at the doorstep of this new guy and I hope everyone isn't all mad at him when most of it doesn't come to pass. He never said he'd do most of it, it got made up in someone's head. So if he gets 10% of what he did say he'd do accomplished, then we should be happy, for us and him.

I'm wading back in to the work thing cautiously. There is plenty to do and I need to get on it, like sometime last week. But I'll get there.

I read this morning that a Catholic Church in San Francisco was tagged this weekend. Not sure that's very cool. Catholics aren't my favorite people, but they build cool churches. Or at least they used to.

I've caused a big row at my apt. I've been getting awakened for weeks now in the night by someone or something banging. It stops as soon as I awake, therefore I have to assume it's due to my snoring, which is puzzling since I hear no one and I can't imagine they can hear me. But something is causing this and last night I got up around 1:30 and headed to the loo and banged into the closet door. Now, I use this door to convey my displeasure when the banging awakens me and apparently someone took exception to it last night cause they went nuts and banged and banged and yelled a LOT. I believe the phrase is, tough shit. Daddy don't sleep, nobody sleeps. I figure I'll hear from the office today. Maybe now that someone else is going to complain something will get done about it. I can't figure what though, since none of us can figure what's causing the banging to begin with. To borrow a phrase...bother.

Gas is on it's way up again. This is largely my fault. Saturday I was riding and talking with the woman I was with and I mentioned that I wanted to get these horsemanship training dvd's I'd seen on the internet and that if the price of gas would stay down through 2009 I'd be able to come to the stable more often and hopefully be able to employ some of what I will learn. Gas has gone up .20 since I said that, and is reportedly set to go even higher. Maybe I should just bring a horse home with me and park the car.

I do have high hopes though for 2009. Though I think economically it might be tough at times I still think there'll be some innovation in the job market and some things that have needed to exist for a while will come to pass. I am very hopeful that education will get some of the overhauling and $ it so badly needs.

But as for today, and this week. Have a good one

And here's some wonderful Jude Law-ness. Ain't he amazing?






Love

Oh! I've added a couple of websites to my blogroll about anti-christianity. I haven't read much on the sites yet and I'll try to get to it this week, but I thought I'd share.