eat drink

Our drive through eight states was a grand success: Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine. Normally, where I was raised, 660 miles might get you two or three states – eight was a number that required flight. We cut the trip down the middle and spend Wednesday night in Middleton, NY, appropriately enough. We arrived at the farm in Gray, ME at 1pm sharp and walked into Christian’s full-fledged Thanksgiving cookery show. My attempt to jump in upon arrival – as planned in my own little mind – was thwarted by my forgetting to score the chestnuts before roasting. What you get in that type of situation is the first exploding nut causing everyone to hit the ground in avoidance of shrapnel. X immediately recognized the sound – experience teaches – and Chris pulled the pan out and immediately covered the ammo with a towel. There was much exploding and chestnut guts on the kitchen floor. We managed to save more than was needed and had a good laugh at my well-deserved expense. Chris flew through the Turkey, mashed potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes, roasted mushrooms, parsnips, and beets, gravy, brussel sprouts with green beans, pumpkin and cherry pie, a beautiful apple crisp, and lord knows what else. I did the apple and chestnut stuffing along with a way too big pan of oyster stuffing. Christian’s mother brought along a fantastic pile of pearl onions and the homemade cranberry sauce to finish out the spread. I think that covers it all but I’m making no guarantees. Amongst the eight of us sitting around the Norman Rockwell farm table we might have damaged about 10% of the product.

We all headed into Portland this morning for shopping, tea, and menu planning – as if we need more food. Christian and I parted with the rest of the crew and he showed me the dreamy food shopping available in the city. We have five live lobsters that we’ll (he…with my oohing and ahhing) turn into fresh stuffed lobster pasta that he’s throwing onto of the lobster bisque. I’m going to try to put together a lobster-spinach pizza thing as an opener for the clan when they start sniffing about the kitchen.

Our last stop on the way out of town was at an Italian shop (restaurant and personal shopping) where I stocked up on a bunch of stuff I can haul home for the kitchen. But, the most awesome part of the joint was the baker who presides over his oven and goods. He does primarily fresh bread and pizza that come out on 30-minute intervals indicated by signs that keep the folk away from the artist. We waited for the bread train for about twenty minutes and grabbed a half-dozen loaves of the most amazing bread I’ve ever eaten. There was some idea of driving back to the farm with hot, fresh bread in the backseat – and we did drive to the farm – but one loaf was quickly devoured by those in the front seat.

It’s a bit cold. It’s November. It’s Maine.

Happy belated Thanksgiving to all.

t

on the road

Here’s a brief interview with the man responsible for designing the “O” Obama logo. Like many of the people that posted comments, I’d like to see some of the other original options – just as historical perspective. Maybe the older folk remember political logos or buttons that were memorable but I don’t have any to ponder from my voting lifetime; certainly nothing so preeminent or pervasive (is that redundant?). I also found it horribly interesting that so many people didn’t see the logo, initially, as an “O”, but merely as a sunrise over the red-and-white stripes which were meant to represent the country as a whole. That’s the sign of some good work, isn’t it? I actually had a hard time not seeing it almost purely as the letter “O” was other bits added for accent.

I’ve sorted out our drive map from Falls Church to Portland, Maine for this week’s journey. Apparently, we’re taking the “man’s” route that will swing us out through Harrisburg, PA and shoot us across a portion of New York state and through Harford, CT before we turn and scream north. We’re planning on driving about halfway on Wednesday night before stopping for a bit of a sleep and finishing up Thursday morning. The trip back will be one long run on Sunday that will hopefully avoid any major traffic as we’ll be bypassing any traffic danger amongst the New Jersey / NYC vortex. We’ve been loaned one of those automatic toll tags so I’ll have my first long trip where I’ll be able to zip through toll booths like a regular. I know it might seem like small potatoes to many in my readership but it’s exactly the kind of thing that provides my mind with more trivial details to ponder as I drive through our little section of America. I’m easily entertained, as you know.

I have some cooking / menu planning to do tonight. Maybe I’ll be the stuffing guy once I get up there and put together a few pans of chestnut and oyster stuffing. Mmmm.

t

sevens around

(Chef/owner Morou)

We managed to sort ourselves out and get together at Farrah Olivia in Alexandria for a double celebration dinner last night. Corey and I joined the WonderTwins to toast X's successful Mass Bar result and we all toasted the November 4th election victory. I think we were waiting on big, fat paychecks before unleashing the fury of used plates, silver, and wine glasses upon the fine staff at our newest favorite restaurant. In the face of better judgment we decided to order the 7-course menu that included not only jewels of food served in a well-timed symphony but accompanying wine tastings to match what the chef imagined in his "I'll served many things with foamed acoutrements" head. You don't generally think that seven small courses (appetizers, openers, main, dessert) is going to much of a problem because if he's willing to chuck a 14-course option on the menu (reserve ahead of time) then the seven must be perfectly nice. And it was. It also put a few of the party over the edge: X couldn't even muster the willpower to dip into her creme brulee (it was fantastic) or touch the final dessert pieces (truffles, petite cookies, and peppered jellies). The truffles, wraps and all, ended up in someone's purse. The wine selections were excellent, all the food was amazing, and the service outstanding. We wound up our perfectly lovely 7pm reservation at 10:30pm and headed home. There was much groaning, meek complaining, and shaking of tiny fists in the car at the silliness of attempting the seven-course engagement. Of course, we'd all do it again if properly warned.

The major Sunday mission is procuring a new cat entry/exit window install so we can remove the towel-covered makeshift door to the back porch. I think the cold winter draft and desire to have even more light into the living room makes it essential. I'm not sure how happy the royalty will be if they have to walk all the way around the house in order to patrol the back jungle. They'll either manage it or they'll complain enough that we breakdown and give them everything they desire. Oh wait, we already do that...

t

500

There was a dead spot sometime in 2005 or 2006 where I didn’t do much posting or my numbers might be even more spectacular. I’m not much for milestones but the fact that I’ve bored people, yelled at the public, harassed the government, laughed at Alberto Gonzales (often), pushed my candidates, passed along my school yard adjudication skills, and generally done nothing more than typ-type away for a few years - and that it’s amounted to a vast and honestly wasted field of ones and zeros that make up 500 entries- amazes me. I hate writing, or at least I did when I started this endless chore. In fact, my lack of love for writing is how this came to be – it seemed easier to write one blurb about my life than it was to e-mail everyone with the same story sent to the inboxes of the World. I know, it comes to your inbox anyway – or your Google reader – so I haven’t actually done anything to save time or effort. Except for the fact that I can now easily get away with a standard form letter that needs no personalization; and, I don’t have to make sure I didn’t forget anyone in the to: address line. I often say to X, “refer to my blog” when I start recounting my ideas about Scalia, Bud Selig, music, 7-11, or any other matter of great import to the citizenry.

There have been some entries that were merely links to stories, pictures, videos, or whatnot, but I’ve tried to mostly blab on about what’s going on in my little life-neighborhood and the deep, deep thoughts that run through my mind…laugh at will when considering my ‘deep’ thoughts. If this became nothing more than passing along anecdotes or purely a venue for venting then I’d quit doing it.

I’ve totally made up my own grammatical rules while writing. I could look up the proper uses of colons, semi-colons, dashes, ….. , and italics but that would make this more work than it’s worth. (I often look up grammar but not for blogging.) I wanted everything to a bit more free flow with some personal writing – or speaking – intricacies included. My proofreading isn’t always the best but that’s based on the proportional relationship of how much I’m getting paid. I think my most basic writing skills have gotten better over the years and I’d guess that blogging can stand as a substitute for the olden days of diaries and journals: practice makes writing easier and smoother. We should all write more often because these days we’ve been forced into the communication vortex controlled by the evil triad of e-mail, PowerPoint presentations, and Word documents, so we need the practice in order to get better at putting thoughts to ‘paper’...and to avoid pissing me off as I sit through your horribly constructed presentation.

Sorry, I couldn’t help it.

There’s a beta-version Web site that will analyze the ‘type’ for your blog. This is what came back when I chucked the Paddle into the mixer:

“The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves.

They enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions.”

Stick around awhile and I’ll dance for your entertainment. I'm not so sure about the soft fabrics result.

Love to all.

t

broken axl

Back in May of 1992 I spent a long Saturday standing on the field at (the old) Wembley Stadium for the Guns n’ Roses show. The openers that day were Skid Row and Nine Inch Nails – nothing like some Seb Bach and Trent Reznor to put someone to sleep whilst trying to remain standing. I think this must have been Reznor’s early days and his portion of the show was horrid. Of course, even when NIN hit their heyday I didn’t much care for the music. That weekend was a few short days before the release of Use Your Illusion I and II – two albums that would have been a better single issue.

What brings this all up today is Chuck Klosterman’s review of Chinese Democracy in this week’s Onion. Chinese Democracy? Really? Let’s see if I can put together a short history of how we got here. After Use Your Illusion was released the band ran a long World Tour and then basically imploded. It’s hard not to completely blame lead singer / songwriter Axl Rose for the dissolution of the band; he’s a huge pain-in-the-ass, always has been, always will be. The rumor of the great Chinese Democracy album must have started sometime in 1993 and its ‘sightings’ floated in and out of the media over the next five or six years as Rose tried to corral band members, songs, mixing, labels, his screwed-up personality, and anything else you could possibly imagine. The hushed rumors continued until the early 2000’s as Rose occasionally showed up in public and sang a few songs; a mix of old and new. His lead guitarist is/was a guy named Buckethead who’s allegedly a damn good player even if he chooses to wear a KFC-like chicken bucket on his head. (I had thoughts of thrashing him for the bucket-on-head wardrobe when I suddenly realized that Slash pretty much wore a bucket on his head all those years…even it was actually a hat.) The last I thought about Chinese Democracy or Axl Rose was sometime back in 2003 when he showed up on TV looking like a cross between Bo Derek, George Hamilton, and Joe Piscapo (in the muscle days). And yet, I open up the Onion today and find Klosterman reviewing Democracy? (He gives it an A-.) It can’t be. What the hell is this thing going to sound like if Rose has finally mastered the perfection he was chasing when he started the project 15 years ago? Maybe I’ll go home tonight and crank up some G n’ R and see if those albums from so long ago still hold up today. I suspect they will. I’ll also presume that even though we’ve heard nothing like them over the airwaves in 15 years there will be a number of strong cuts. Will I buy it? Nope. Do I want to hear it? Sure.

Back in ’92 we waited an extra two-plus hours for Axl to get his shit together and start the show. We knew his personality quite well by then and the delay was expected – I’m sure he must have been doing one part spiritual stuff and two parts drinking and/or irritating me. But when they did finally crank it up, they were incredible. Aside from the original drummer who’d been gone for quite awhile, this was the greatest line-up they ever had. If I put together a 15-song compilation of the best the band had to offer it’d be a screamer. Do we think I can get away with blasting some G n’R from the Merc as I drive around suburban Virginia? I’ll let you know.

Man, I was still in my late-20s when this all started…just a kid. I’m in my early 40s, I’ve been married and divorced (again), I’ve retired from the military (I still had 13 years to go when I saw that show), I’m living in Virginia (what?), and we have a black man as President. That’s some change. And all Mr. Rose has given us is one album?

t

mezzo review

I’ve got a few under my belt and I can make a broad assessment: a lot of time passes while little happens. You could wrap up the events of an opera in a 15-minute infomercial if your feet were to the fire. The six-word version of what happens in any opera is this – they met, they loved, and death. I defy you to find an opera that doesn’t follow that storyline; feel free to fill in the middle bits with whatever you find interesting. While you’re building your masterpiece you need to remember that at the stroke of death…the curtain drops, no carrying on allowed. As X pointed out, this isn’t like Hamlet where there’s death overflow until no one’s left standing: Polonius, Ophelia, Claudius, Queen Gertrude, Laertes, and Hamlet. That play drags on and on – there’s no single DeathCurtain moment. The opera doesn’t play that game and I fear that about a hundred years ago all the ideas had been mined:

(imagine a street outside a cigarette factory)

Bizet: Ciao, Giacomo. I’ve written another opera.
Puccini: Georges! Fantastico! Tell me of it.
Bizet: Ah, yes. A guy meets a girl in the opening scene. Let’s call her something diminutive like…Carmencita.
Puccini: Bellisima! Tell me more!
Bizet: They fight all the time. Every single scene. Long, drawn out arguments that devolve into much declaring of love and hatred. Ah, amour!
Puccini: Buono! What happens next?
Bizet: Well, they’ll be forced, or maybe they’ll choose, to live in exile on an island, or in the mountains, or maybe in a cold artists’ studio in a European city.
Puccini: Scintillante! How does it end?
Bizet: Maybe he dies. Maybe she dies. Curtains!
Puccini: Brillante! You should add some lengthy songs in French. Maybe songs that reflect such indecisions as love, fear, warmth, or death.
Bizet: Extraordinaire!

I haven’t misled anyone, right? I enjoy the opera. I enjoy all live performance because it’s become something so foreign to people. There’s either a lack of availability in some areas, the cost is prohibitive, or the cable box / dish owns the entertainment attention. Last night’s show was pretty good but not stunning. As so often happens, there were secondary male and female characters or actors, Escamillo and Micaela in this case, that outperformed the leads. Being that we didn’t have Denyce Graves playing Carmen it’s hard to judge the outcome of the real Carmen v. Micaela duel. If nothing else, Bizet managed to write some famous and memorable diddies for this opera. There must have been at least five pieces I recognized but didn’t know came from a single opera. I bet all the other opera writers thought his stuff was too poppy sounding. Maybe they considered him a sellout – his stuff would have been used in Ford and Apple commercials back in the day.

Our next outing will be Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross at the beloved Keegan Theatre. I thought of watching the movie again before seeing the stage rendition but I don’t want to dull the drama of competing for a Cadillac, steak knives, or your job.

58

It looks like that’s the number for today; Alaska Senator Ted “No!” Stevens has apparently lost his bid for reelection. This leaves only two undecided Senate races from Election Day: Minnesota and Georgia. Georgia law provides for a rerun if neither candidate earns 50% of the vote and it will take place on December 2nd. The Obama campaign has contributed a portion of its Presidential ground game in Georgia to support the election of Jim Martin. Minnesota began the recount today in a race between Sen. Norm Coleman and Al Franken: it starts with a 215 vote difference among the 2.9 million votes cast. These two races could provide a filibuster-proof 60-member caucus now that the Democrats have decided not to seriously crackdown on crazy Joe Lieberman. Even though Lieberman certainly wasn’t helpful during the campaign, the fact remains that we have a short memory: the Democratic Party abandoned him and installed a Democratic challenger as their selection for his seat in 2006 (ironically enough, as punishment for his support of the Iraq War and President Bush). Lieberman kicked them in the shins and ran as an independent and secured his seat as an outsider. I don’t much like Lieberman but the caucus needs him and they already welcomed him back, once, back in January 2007. I think they made the right choice in not stripping him of his chairmanship because it would have seemed petty when measured against what Obama is trying to push in Washington. I don’t think Lieberman has any illusion that he’ll spend the rest of his term on double-secret probation.

I’m more interested in the Eric Holder nomination as our new Attorney General than I am the Hillary Clinton move at State. Until the Clinton offer becomes more certain, I’m withholding my thoughts. I like Holder on first look. What is interesting to me is the conservative gnashing of teeth at Holder’s ‘nomination’ because he’s a “Clintonista”. It’s a built-in, knee-jerk reaction from the ‘refuse to scratch the surface’ crowd. Holder was appointed to the D.C. Superior Court by Ronald Reagan, he served as Acting Attorney General of the U.S. under Bush 41 prior to Ashcroft’s confirmation, and then served as the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia and Deputy Attorney General under Clinton. He’s been in private practice since 2001 and now appears to be our next Attorney General. I’m onboard.

As the incoming Administration is being built and vetted I keep looking to the title of a new CD that I’m digging. Why it runs parallel to the happenings in D.C. is because I remember Obama’s reply to an interview question about being elected President as the house of cards is falling around our collective feet – how he probably never thought winning an election would immediately insert him into the middle of an extremely difficult time in history. He smiled and told the interlocutor that it was the hard times that you ask for when you want to prove yourself – a time to be tested and a time to succeed. Isn’t that when you want to be President? Anyway, the title of Atmosphere’s new CD should be our new motto:

When life gives you lemons, you paint that shit gold.

Maybe some opera review later.

t

kick in the teeth

Do you know what I love? Meetings. Meetings that are allegedly scheduled for a given time that start late and then devolve into an unmoderated, heaping pile of junk. It happens all the time: 90% of the meetings held in the business casual environment are completely unnecessary. And, if you’re going to ‘hold’ a ‘meeting’ you need to have an ‘agenda’ published ahead of time. “Hey guys, let’s get together and blindly say words and communicate via incomplete sentences concerning fragmented thoughts while staring at poorly constructed PowerPoint slides. It’ll be great!” Today I’ll be hostage to a telephone conference / meeting. Nice.

I’m back from my week out West and have settled into some cooking, a comfortable bed, and the cool weather of the greater Metro area.

The Eleven is off to the Opera tonight to see Carmen. The mezzo-soprano, Denyce Graves, is apparently the “greatest Carmen of our time” but we won’t see her – the understudy is doing two shows and one of them is tonight. We have horrible luck with these opera gals – Angela Gheorgiou (La Boheme) ditched us on closing night at the Met in NYC last Spring, and now this. We’ll be riding the Metro and then the Kennedy Center shuttle after learning last outing that parking is $17. At those kinds of prices they could charge $700 for occlusal guards.

Speaking of occlusal guards, my dentist came up with a cost of $719 for a pair. I went in yesterday for the taking of molds – imagining that plastic teeth guards that prevent grinding – and thinking it would run me something like $200. As they are in the middle of doing my uppers the office manager comes in to “let me know” how much it’ll cost and whether or not I want to have the guards fabricated. Apparently, the cost to them is about 15 minutes of time because they send the molds off to be made for $570. There’s also a mysterious $150 lab fee that isn’t covered at all by my insurance. She tells me the lab fee is for some type of special molding-canoodling that makes the guards more comfortable to wear at night. What? They are made for nighttime wear…shouldn’t that be standard. “Anyway, we can give you these night guards but they’re made of wood splinters. If you want them to actually be comfortable we’ll be needing some extra money.” I called back this morning and cancelled the whole thing. I’ll put a bullet between my teeth at night and call it good. Of course, I fell for the same old dentist junk: always ask and agree on cost before Dr. Doolittle gets you in the chair. Unfortunately, most that I’ve come across in the last two years are some shady financial characters.

I’m thinking of putting in for some government bailout money. Has anyone found the application forms online?

T

what is this magic transmission?

I’m off to the great Northwest tomorrow morning and will fly back to the D.C. area on Friday. X is very concerned about a number of things: who will feed her, who will pet Lemon every night, who will keep her warm through the dark nights of Autumn. I left a few canned goods, I had a little talk with the cat, and I added a blanket to the bed. Deed done.

The Eleven took in the Caps v. Rangers game last night – her first hockey game – and I had to quell her “I think the Rangers are better, more organized, and I love their goalie” commentary. Of course, I couldn’t take seriously her organization argument because the first thing she threw out before the game was, “I don’t think the Zamboni drivers have a plan,” as if she’d know a Zamboni from a goat.

A few weeks ago she sent off for some digital TV converter boxes after trying to sort out the over-the-air / broadcast TV signal. We grabbed one at Target a week ago – using our socialist $40 coupon – and hooked that baby up yesterday. We suddenly have about 12 channels and another 20 sub-digital channels and are perfectly happy. I’m watching football in passing. We’re bona fide.

It’s turned cold here on the Hilltop and we’ve got the fire burning. Stop by if you’re in the neighborhood.

t.

frittering while it burns

All the tired seems to finally be wearing off and I’m almost recovered from a very long Tuesday – a twenty-hour day takes much more out of you at 43 then at 29. It also takes much more out of you when you’re massively out of shape. I’ll begin to remedy that very soon.

My old pal Buzz came to town last night and we plopped ourselves down in the front row of the club section at the Verizon Center for the Capitals v. Hurricanes game – he’s a ‘Canes fan; not much can be done about that. No talk of politics, just a hockey game and an exciting finish with the home team winning on a great goal with ten seconds remaining. When Alexander Semin scored the winner the place erupted and I sensed that all of D.C., so intense and divided over the last two years, was plenty happy to just cheer for a home team and not worry about anything for a few hours. It was quite nice.

Now, about baseball. I’ve made little secret of my lack of respect for the performance of Bud Selig as commissioner of baseball. Unfortunately, my calls have not been heeded and Sire Bud is still sitting in the commish’s office in NYC. Is my blog not powerful enough to bring down anyone? What we’re dealing with now is the endless ‘for sale’ sign hanging off the façade of my beloved Wrigley Field. It’s no surprise that the politburo of baseball owners would feel threatened by Mark Cuban’s ownership of the Cubs. Why? Because there’s not a single one of them that has any idea how to market the game, bring back the fans, or kick Bud Selig in the shins. Did anyone watch the World Series? Would I want to hang out with Cuban at the house on a Friday night? Nope. Would I want him to own the Cubs and re-energize MLB? Damn right. Under whatever rules exist (or were written by the oligarchy in charge) in baseball, there is a requirement for two-thirds owner approval before a team can be sold; Selig and his Great Lakes boys, who took over the game in the early 90s, can certainly hold off any real chance of Cuban winning the bidding war. Don’t think for a single minute that Selig isn’t the driving force behind keeping Cuban out of the club. David Stern can handle Cuban in the NBA after years of butting heads with him; Stern is a very smart man and could easily see that he’d have to find middle ground with the Mavericks owner. Selig isn’t smart enough to do that and he’d rather not have to use his limited skills in dealing with an aggressive and very successful owner. I don’t know what’ll happen in the end – maybe Chicago’s own Jerry Colangelo will win the beauty contest – but the Cubs and baseball will be worse off for not having Cuban in the league. Of course, Selig’s modus operandi is to do everything he can to ruin the game while making money. Nothing new. I’ll miss not seeing Baby Steinbrenner yapping at Cuban during some Winter meeting and getting smacked down for being a fool…I can dream, can’t I?

In the mass of birthdays (WonderTwin2 and G.), elections, traveling readiness for the boys, I neglected to mention that my lovely was notified on Monday night that she successfully passed the Massachusetts Bar. Much like the excitement shown by Pinnochio upon realizing he was real, I think she took a look at herself and realized she was finally, and in fact of letter, a real lawyer. And not a minute too soon as her partner in the firm had already dubbed her impertinent.

t

and finally...

A wrap from the Hilltop the afternoon after that beautiful moment just after 11pm when the election was decided, once and for all time.

Tuesday seemed to go on forever, particularly after the 6-10am flood of voters in my precinct. We maxed out at a wait of about 1 hour and 15 minutes during that time and it receded to no line for the remainder of the day. When looking at the absentee / early voter list, which included about 15% of my precinct's voters, we realized that by 10am the deed was done – there was no massive pile of voters left to descent upon us later in the day. I’d say that 99% of the voters were in grand spirits and happy enough to get to the booths in a fairly reasonable amount of time. There were dozens of get out the vote, freedom of vote, and voting rights members outside the polling place and everyone got along swimmingly. The new building manager at my polling center was fabulous – he supplied coffee and water to voters all day long, got us fans and A/C units when it got hot, and welcomed voters with balloons and kind words throughout the long day. The entire day was much more exciting and different from the normal Election Day drag, and that’s always a good thing.

The result? The Eleven was on the couch and watching PBS reporting on the returns and speeches into the late hours. We heard about Ohio coming in as we drove home from the elections office – soon followed by Pennsylvania and then Virginia (!!!) being declared after we made it home. Shortly after 11pm EST, California was called and it was over…finally. Florida came home later with Iowa and Nevada in tow. The scenes in Grant Park as our elected President arrived on the stage were stunning. His speech couldn’t have been better, more generous, more humble, or more welcoming to all of America. I sensed that he felt a massive weight had been lifted from his shoulders – it was over. Deep down I think even he was amazed that after two years of campaigning, and four years since he burst on the scene, he was finally standing before 100,000 people as President of the United States. I had tears in my eyes. As the camera panned the crowd we caught glimpses of Jesse Jackson; I could almost feel, seeing his stoic face during the speech, that maybe he felt as if he was watching what he believed was his calling and that it had passed unfulfilled. Maybe some envy. By the end, as the Obama and Biden families took the stage, we had a last glance at Jackson. Regardless of your feelings about Jesse Jackson’s politics, successes and failures, that picture – of Jackson with tears streaming down his face – was the symbolic moment of the night. He laid a lot of the groundwork for Obama’s rise and there he stood, in his city, finally seeing the fulfillment of a dream he’s carried for over forty years.

I disagree with a lot of the pundits when they put forth the idea that it was the economic crises of the last two months that put Obama over the top. The reason I’ve been so passionate about him is simple: he’s a leader. Beyond that, everything else falls away. He inherits a morally bankrupt country: not people, country. We’ve allow ourselves to stand idly on the sideline while our Constitution, civil liberties, and dreams have been crushed by an Administration that is guilty of violating American law, International law, and committing war crimes. The remedy to that misery is the ideal that we are so much better than what we’ve allowed to happen over the last eight years. Christine and I decided – driven by fear of standing by on the sidelines – that we needed to get out and walk the streets to do our part in bringing about that change and leadership. If you've follow Obama at all then you know that as he delves into the morass left behind he’ll inquire, study, assess, and then decide upon a course of action that serves as many as possible. None of us will agree with everything he pushes to the Congress. But what we do know is that we now have a thoughtful, inquisitive, curious, stable, and dedicated leader. Those are characteristics that went extinct over the last eight years. Obama is our next President because people craved leadership that defines us, not leaders that desert us.

And so it is.

todd

Yes.

Beyond the personal aspects of my life, it's the greatest moment I'll ever know.

(photo: Justin Hankins @ justinhankins.com)

Yes. We. Can.

Vote.

you kids be quiet!

Our cats either decided to lay down the law over the weekend or other cats on the Hilltop determined it was time to test the newest neighbors. I don’t remember if this was mentioned before but there’s a biggish black cat that decided a few weeks ago to hang around inside our house during the night. We ran him off two mornings in a row and he hadn’t been back since. At about 3am Sunday morning a massive cat fight started in our living room. It sounded like some ultimate fighting (I know, I’m supposed to call it MMA…) under card that startled us awake. As I leapt from the bed in the dark of night and bolted for the bedroom door with cat-like quickness, I realized I can’t actually see anything without my glasses – nor in the dark. In my role of Mr. Magoo I was left to give X a quick “baby, I can’t see crap and the cats are dying” call for help. I managed to find my specs as she kicked down the door and let out the worldwide recognizable cat-fight-stopping call of “Shooo! Get out!” which managed to shuttle the intruder and our larger, de-clawed (we didn’t do it) cat out the chute and into the dark of night. The smaller, clawed version – better known as my girlfriend, Lemon – eventually came out from the front of the house with a puffy tail and her fighting twitch on display. Neither cat seemed worse for the wear after round 1 but round 2 took place last night around 11pm when I think Lemon once again engaged the enemy in our backyard. Christine again deployed the “Shooo! Get out! Knock if off!” technique successfully from the dark of the back deck. Lemon showed up a bit later with another damaged ear, a well-scratched and swollen eye, and a very dirty coat. She seemed a little better this morning when we left for work but I suspect there’s at least one more round before everything gets sorted. Unfortunately, Pumpkin has the size and strength to fight but has been sentenced to only being able to scare the other cats away until such a time as they realize he has no claws. Now, if we called “no scratching” to the rest of the cats, he could do some damage.

I see that Starbucks is giving away free brewed coffee to anyone who votes tomorrow. What this immediately begs is this: why not simply have everyone vote at Starbucks? There are more Starbucks than there are polling place – walk through, place your order and vote, pick up your coffee. Deed done. “Yes, I’ll have the double decaf skim latte and a vote for Obama.”

Another 36 hours or so and it’ll be over.

t