I watched Obama's speech last night. The first time I have ever watched a state of the union address that I can recall. It was really good (too much clapping, imho, but it's to be expected). Hell, I even teared up a few times when he started talking about how things are going to get better. I hope so. I really do.

The Republican "response" was a JOKE. I know I'm not alone in that. I actually gasped outloud when he commented that the government was wasting money in the stimulus package on "something called" volcano erupting. Um, WHAT? Really? THIS is what you find to be wasteful? I don't live anywhere near a volcano. I was only 3 when Mount St. Helens erupted but I remember it VIVIDLY. He went on and on about how "Americans can do anything." Yeah, a lot of us can, but there's a whole lot who can't.

You would think after the trouncing the Republicans got in the last election that they would try to figure out how to win their base back. The response speech shows that they are completely clueless as to how to influence people. The entire speech was purely pandering to the most rabid, non-critical-thinking people in this country. Even Fox News couldn't spin it as a good speech!

A friend of mine compared him to Kenneth the Page from the show 30 Rock, and I thought the comparison was apt. It is unfortunate that those with strong southern accents are automatically thought of as stupid or ignorant. I have quite a number of friends from the south, and the prejudice against southerners is something they have to deal with quite a lot.

I watched a documentary over the weekend that Nancy Pelosi's daughter filmed on the campaign trail with the Republican party in the last election. I was shocked at the unapologetic ignorance that so many displayed. Obama was right, a lot of those people cling to their guns and religion out of fear. It was quite an eye opener. It's not just the southerners that she highlighted. There was the infamous woman from right here in Minnesota who got national attention after calling Obama an "A-rab". Seemingly normal people just spewing such HATE towards people who live in cities, who don't go to the same church as they do, such ignorance of basic economics....

I have friends who are staunch Republicans, and I feel bad that those ignorant people get the most attention from the media as typical conservatives. I know that most people who identify themselves as conservative are not hateful people. I used to be conservative. Mostly because of the abortion issue (I'm Catholic), but for a lot of other reasons. I identified with the Republican party in my youth. I even voted for George W. Bush in 2000.

From the beginning, with the dispute over vote counts in Florida, and as the war in Afghanistan and Iraq spiraled out of control, and the corruption became so obvious and so many in the Bush administration were so...smug about their war profiteering, I knew I could never support such a party.

As far as the abortion issue, I just came to the realization that despite all their talk, there has never been any actual effort by the Republican party to ban abortion. They talk the talk but they never have walked the walk. This epiphany led to realization that whether abortion is legal or illegal, there will always be women who will want to, for various reasons, terminate a pregnancy. We can have those women have the option of the procedure performed by a trained professional in a sanitary environment, or we can have women get sick or die from botched procedures. So while I could not imagine a situation in which I would willingly have an abortion myself, my conscience cannot say that I should force my morals on someone else, or force women in bad situations (rape, incest, economic situation) to have the child anyway.

Ideally, no one would ever be raped, there would be no sexual abuse, and no one would ever have sex until they were in a committed relationship and both mentally and financially ready to have children. We don't live in an ideal world. Enough babies come into this world unwanted. I think the solution to the problem is education about effective birth control and the importance of waiting for sex until one is ready. I did some amazingly stupid things in college, I was lucky enough to have never been put in the situation of an unwanted pregnancy.

I was LUCKY.

So many women are not.

hello economic crisis

In the past six months, I have gone from a total news junkie to someone who completely avoids almost all semblance of real news.

I just hear so much crap at work from customers who have lost their jobs, I can't stand to even care about what's going on in the world. I still subscribe to the daily paper (I'd feel guilty if I canceled it, knowing newspapers are having such a hard time right now), but very rarely read it.

I don't know what's wrong with me, but I don't even read fark.com anymore. Even funny headlines about crappy news stories can't get me through. It's like things are so crappy, I can't even find the crappiness funny anymore.

Instead, I focus on pop culture and other mindless things. I'm too depressed to do much else.

but if you solve it, you will remember all of it

My favorite song from one of my favorite albums of 2008.

The album version is like a wall of sound, so many layers, I just love it. But this acoustic version is pretty cool too.

You can tell the economy is pretty crappy because while in the past I have had four to five cranky customers a day, lately I have been having really mean and nasty people. Obviously they are stressed over not having money, but the language they use is pretty appalling. One guy told me my husband needed to shut me up. It's laughable now, but in the moment I wanted to tell him to shut the fuck up. I came so close to going off on quite a number of customers today. I obviously really need a break.

It snowed last night and will snow again Friday. So much for my hope that winter was over.

I finally got curtains up in my bedroom, so my room is pretty dark now at night, which I love.

Speaking of bed, I am going now. Really. Tearing myself away from the computer as I type this....

Happy Valentine's Day

It's funny how viral an idea can be on Facebook. I'm not sure who among my FB friends started it, but there's this meme where you write compliments about people from your friends list, tag them, and let them guess who matches which compliment. My friend Erin tagged me in one and when I read it, I was feeling slightly dark (you know, V-day upcoming and all), and her kind words just set me over the edge.

But really in a good way.

It just kind of hit me that I am really loved. I know that sounds silly, but I never had thought about it too much. One of the joys of rock bottom self-esteem is that you never take things at their face value. There's always a hidden agenda.

When someone goes out of their way to write nice things about you, it's such a rush. I'm still a bit teary over it.

So, I did one of my own last night. It took me a while, but it was worth it because by the end of it, I was feeling so positive about MYSELF. These are people who I care for and who care for me. Before last night, I would probably have written "seem to care for me" but I am fairly certain that there is genuine feeling there and that is such an amazing gift.

No, I don't have a Valentine. I don't even have a potential Valentine. But I'm more than ok with my current lot in life. I haven't felt like this ever.

Now, if I could just stop crying with happiness and get about my day.....

So Tek is resigned to the Red Sox and A-Rod admitted to using steroids (or whatever) in 2003.

Spring training starts this week and it could not come soon enough! I am so ready for baseball, this winter has been killing me with the baseball withdrawal.

I am getting a nice hefty refund back on my taxes which makes me pretty happy. Nevermind that it doesn't take me out of debt, just makes me able to be slightly more comfortable. Right now, waiting for the refund, I'm barely treading water. I have about $100 to my name. That refund cannot come soon enough!

you wanna dance, i'll bet you do

Lady Sovereign - I Got You Dancing

The funeral was uneventful. I felt like I was in a room full of familiar-looking strangers. There's talk of a family reunion this summer. How will I manage to get out of it? I'd rather not see any of those people ever.

We've had some nice warm weather here this week, the snow is melting during the day and turning into ice overnight. Oh it is SO my favorite time of year....who doesn't love the prospect of bodily injury every time they walk out the door?

In the past week, I have changed the furniture in my living room at least four times. I ended up putting it back exactly the way I had it. I was perfectly happy with it, my mom decided I should try something new and rather than argue with her, I gave in. She didn't like any of the changes either, so allowed me to put it back the way I had it without comment.

I had hoped to spend this long weekend getting more cleaning done than I did. Oh well, maybe next time. This song gets a lot of radio play around here lately and it's a great song to clean to. The video...well. Misguided is too kind a word.

oh death!

Not a lot going on. My mom's oldest sister died Tuesday. What is sad is that I had to check my LiveJournal blog to verify the day because I couldn't remember. It means so little to me that she died. I feel bad that she's dead, don't get me wrong. But it's similar to hearing on the news that some guy died. I just don't feel particularly sad.

My mom's family is so screwed up and they are so hateful to each other that my mom didn't even get a call when her sister went into the hospital LAST THURSDAY. One of her sisters called her after the other died.

This sister was technically my godmother. But we've never been close, she never tried to get to know me at all.

I have to go to the funeral because my super-concerned-with-outward-appearances brother would kill me if I didn't go.

I'd rather be at work.

A week before my high school graduation, a fellow senior in my 200-member class killed himself. It was the most surreal experience: leaving high school behind was emotional enough. The suicide of someone I was in choir with and had known for six years just made everything strange and I felt so disconnected from everything that entire week.

After senior prom (which I did not attend), the boy who killed himself hosted a party with a few other friends in a field behind his step-father's business (small town Kentucky). I went to the party with some friends and stayed out all night. Less than a month later, he was found in that same field with a gunshot wound to the head.

I'm thinking about him tonight because a facebook friend from high school mentioned him in one of those "25 random things about me" posts and so now he's on my mind.

When I originally started on facebook, I had planned to just use it for my college friends and Gomez forum people. I made the mistake of friending someone from high school who I wanted to find out what he had been up to and the floodgates opened. I haven't spoken to any of these people since June 7, 1996 and they're all adding me to their friend lists.

I'm tempted to just delete them all. I might just do that.

I don't like dwelling on painful memories, and high school was mostly that. I didn't attend my 10-year reunion, I have no desire to attend the 15-year.

But they keep adding me. And I'm too polite to say no.

In other news, Gomez announced a spring tour that does not involve the midwest or west coast. So, I'm thinking summer will be when I see them again. I had hoped to see them in more than one city, reconnect with some forum members, maybe in Chicago or Milwaukee. Right now, current financial situations means there's no way in hell I can go to see them anywhere else but here, which is bumming me out.

Also, they're still trying to figure out a way to cut my pay at work by as much as $7 an hour.

Maybe things will be better this summer.

Obama love

I watched the swearing-in and the inaugural speech today. I walked into the break room right as he was about to be sworn in and I stayed for the entire speech. I only had 15 minutes but of course it all lasted longer than that. So, I got a tardy mark today (lost out on 7 minutes of pay). Oh well, it was more than worth it. Talk about history.

After the speech started, two of my co-workers, whom I did not know, came in and watched it with me. They were both black women. It was just amazing to watch and we talked about how in the past we never cared about elections as strongly as we did about this one.

When I saw the mall, and the nearly 2 million (or more?) people crowded in, some miles away, I was overwhelmed. It was so moving to see so many people caring so much about this new president. It's like 3/4 of the country stopped for a half hour.

My co-workers who were McCain supporters were very subdued today. Which was nice.

Beyonce sang "At Last" for the first dance between President and Mrs. Obama. They looked so nice up there on stage together. It is so obvious that they adore each other. It's beautiful to behold.

President Obama. Boy does that sound nice.

how cold is it?

it's so cold....

black ice!!!!

I grew up in Minnesota and have so far lived about 2/3 of my life here. I have heard of this concept of black ice but have so far been lucky enough to avoid it. The past week, there have been hundreds of accidents around the metro due to black ice, lots of my coworkers have called in late to work because the roads have been so bad with all the accidents.

This morning, when the temperature was -22, I was driving to work and I hit a patch of black ice. The road looked perfectly clear, almost dry. Suddenly, the car lurched to the right, then the left and I was completely out of control. Luckily there was no one in the lane next to me and no one near enough ahead or behind me to cause anyone else any threat of danger from my car. I was freaked out, worried that the car was going to go into a ditch. My mom, riding in the passenger seat, was screaming. I remained calm and steered my way out of the skid.

As we drove along, my mom asked me, "Were you shitting your pants during that?"

"No, to be able to shit my pants, that would mean I had a relaxed rectum. I was CLENCHING!"

We had a good laugh. My mom actually complemented my handling of the driving and not freaking out even afterwards.

I am so freaking ready for spring.