Month: September 2006

Yet, the idea of either Condoleeza Rice or Hillary Clinton running for President fills me with deep disappointment, because I would be loath to vote for either them.

Condi is easy to dismiss as a candidate, assuming she’s even interested: architect of our failed foreign policy, especially in Iraq. Yet, it saddens me. Not only a woman, but a black woman, and I’ve had to write her right off.

Hillary is more problematic. A few weeks ago, Molly Ivans wrote a story about her which captures my ambivalence, at best, about her. She is running in the primary next week to maintain her seat, and unlike Joe Lieberman in Connecticut, has no chance of losing her party’s nomination*. Still, I will vote against her on September 12. Given the situation, with perhaps the political balance of the Congress at stake, I haven’t decided (yet) to vote against her in the November general election. I believe the word I’m looking for is conundrum.
***
A nonsensical rationale for not covering certain candidates. The ersie comment is mine.

Greg on American imperialism, which just happens to mention Ms. Rice. At least one person has a comment.

1. A month before it happens you’re told you’re going to lose your memory. How do you prepare for it and do you attempt to regain what you’ve lost?

Why does this remind me of the movie Memento? Anyway, some sort of redundancy- notes in the house about work, church; notes at work about home, work. Plaster my blog URL all over the place; maybe the reading will remind me. Label pictures of important people.

2. How do you describe your outlook on life?

“Life is a carnival, believe it or not.”

3. You fall in love with your soulmate, decide to get married, and then find out that person is going to die soon. Do you marry them anyway?

Absolutely. (But here’s the thing about soulmates: I’ve never believed that there’s only one.)

4. What are three of your favorite ice cream toppings?

I like strawberry, hot fudge, and Cherry Garcia.

5. Is there one article of clothing you love to wear no matter how out of style it is?

Only one?

6. Is there one color you wish would go away in fashion?

A color? Well, there DOES seem to be a notion in some circles that “orange is the new black”. More than that, though, most fashion is dumb, cyclical, and no reflector of most people’s real bodies.

7. What’s the first department you head to when you go shopping in a department store?

Increasingly, I hate going into department stores, particularly when they’re in malls. That said, when someone drags me there, I end up hanging out in the record/CD section.

8. How far away do you live from your parents?

772.62 miles from my mother, according to Mapquest.

9. Growing up, who was your favorite cartoon character?

Popeye the Sailor, who got me to eat spinach when I’d eat no other vegetable, save for peas and corn.

10. You plan a romantic evening and everything goes wrong, including the fancy dinner you burned. What do you do?

Smile on the outside, sulk on the inside, then order Indian food, apologizing profusely.

11. What’s the last thing you bought at the store?

I bought cottage cheese at the grocery store.

12. Have you ever walked out in the middle of a movie?

No, but I came very close with Fellini’s Satrycon.

13. What celebrity do most people say you look like?

No one has ever compared me to a celebrity. The high school science teacher at Albany High School, who I don’t know.

14. Is there any piece of jewelry you always wear?

I wear my wedding ring. That’s it.

15. Have you ever tried to pick someone up?

Maybe in college, but it most certainly was unsuccessful.

16. What’s the one thing you always manage to lose on your way out the door?

It’s never the same thing: sometimes it’s my keys or my wallet, or a list my wife gave me of things to pick up.

17. Out of these creatures which one are you most afraid of:
A.) Snakes
B.) Spiders
C.) Rodents

Snakes. It’s the slither thing.

18. What’s the last gift you bought for a friend?

A pass for a massage.

19. Do you ever buy people things for no reason?

Occasionally, when the item “speaks” to me.

20. What’s your favorite way to spend a lazy summer afternoon?

“Regret The Error reports on corrections, retractions, clarifications and trends regarding accuracy and honesty in the media.” This is a GREAT site, so great that I’ve added it to my weblog, in the News/Opinion section. Check out the Error/Correction Roundups.

Save The Catskill Game Farm. The Game Farm, maybe an hour from here, is a place I’ve visited maybe a dozen times, starting when I was three, but probably not in the last decade.

ADD’s blog about Criminal by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips, because he really has nothing else to do.

The relaunch of Journalista: The Comics Journal weblog.

Bush’s Last Day. And I don’t mean Billy Bush, who irritates during the Emmy pre-show.

An interesting Next Blog find: Fear Allah as He should be Feared: ISLAMIC ARTICLES AND QUOTES

ARTICLES

Music to Soothe the Savage Searcher: Classical Music Databases and Web Resources by David Mattison, Access Services Archivist, British Columbia Archives, Royal BC Museum Corporation

Greg’s news from around our bizarro world. So bizarre, in fact, that I just had to respond.

Yet, I have no cogent response to the Katrina anniversary. Go read A Failure to Communicate: Politics, Scams, and Information Flow During Hurricane Katrina by Paul Piper, Librarian, Western Washington University and Miguel Ramos, Library and Archive Paraprofessional, WWU

Another Katrina piece: The New Blaxploitation by GayProf

The amount of nicotine in a cigarette has increased steadily over the past six years. Here’s the full report. This is disturbing news, yet not particularly surprising.

Lefty offers up free music, a great mix he put together, and directions to download free music by Christian artist Derek Webb. “[The album] Mockingbird has been somewhat controversial in the Christian community because it doesn’t tow the conservative line.”

The U.S. Bureau of the Census projects that by 2030, 20.8 percent of upstate New York’s population will be aged 65 and over, a share still slightly higher than for the nation as a whole.

Thank you for participating in the Times Union Reader Network.

Got a call indicating the fact that they’re interested in using an expanded version of my response. Here’s the original:

“I went back to graduate school at age 37, started working a librarian at the age of 39. I’m now 53, and I have a 2-year- old daughter, which means I’ll be 69 when she graduates from high school. And then, presumably, she will want to go to college.
Retirement just doesn’t seem to be part of my mindset right now.”