I forgot to mention, 'Suela, that I'm so glad that your mother's medical problems seem to be getting figured out anyway. The house situation sounds difficult, but it's good that you can go clean up and say goodbye. Hard, but good. Will family be going with you?

If you like it that much after only the first six eps, Lib, you're going to have fun. Because you're not even on the rollercoaster yet. You're, like, in the middle of the line.

Ooh! Between disovering B5 (Fortunately, I'm borrowing a season at a time from a friend, so this isn't on my Netflix queue. Unfortunately, they have huge spoilers for future seasons on the commentaries, so I have to watch through all, then go back and borrow again for commentaries) and Farscape, I feel like I'm all SciFi all the time. I got some movies (not SciFi) from the library, and it feels almost wrong to watch them.

I really don't think that Bush is racist. I think it's one of the few good things about him. I think that he doesn't care very much for people he doesn't know, and that he pretty much only knows some superrich people. But honestly, I think he would have been just as much of an insensitive ass if they were white.

This is really my take. With him, but also people like Chertoff and Brown, I don't think there is a glimmer of caring, or even awareness, of people not in their own privileged millieu. But for Bush, at least, I honestly don't think race enters into it.

I view him much like Jeremy Roenick — an egotistical self-absorbed prick whose one good quality is that he isn't a bigot.

Indifference is a weapon of mass destruction.

From Dennis Kucinich's speech on the House floor. I think that this man is on par with Jay Hammond, which will probably only mean anything to Juliana, but if anyone else remembers my comments on Hammond's recent passing, you will know that this is about the highest compliment I could give a politician.

Like, explain how you could leave the Wild Animal Park after only a morning.

Well, we left at about 2:00 PM because it was 1000 degrees and sunny and not much shade. Also, we have reservations to go on a sleepover there in late October. So we didn't feel compelled to see everything this time. We didn't even make it up to the condor ridge.

What we did do:

Took the monorail around the park. There were issues with power from PG&E so our train was stopped for about 15 minutes. We were super early so we got to see a ton of rhino farily close to the train. The prey animals (you know, those with hooves) are so much more impressive at the Wild Animal Park where they get to hang out and roam more than they are at the zoo.

We walked around for a little bit, including going to Lion Camp. Listening to the male lion roar was unsettling. The females were markedly unimpressed. I like the fact that with the Lions you casn see them relatively close to through the windows or you can see them across the ravine.

We then headed through the newish "Heart of Africa" enclosures. These are both beautiful, shaded and pretty awesome. The primates on primate island were hiding, but you could see them in a hole in the log. We got a refill of lemonade (yay lemonade!) in our animal sippy cup that we bought last visit and then we watched the giraffes. you could feed them acacia leaves. We opted not to feed them, but the keeper came. As soon as they saw her, they were grabbing branches out of her truck, she'd gently push them away. Keep in mind that a full grown giraffe's head is about half the height of keeper.

Eventually a baby came walking up. The baby giraffe apparently still had an umbilical cord attached. Baby so didn't understand what was going on, but was cute nevertheless.

On our way out, we stopped at the nursery and at the ring-tailed lemurs.

We didn't go gawk at the big cats (the tigers etc) because the night before we got to see all the big cats (jaguars, leopards etc) super active at the zoo. Early evening is the best time to go, apparently. It was mid morning afternoon by the time we would have seen the cats at the Wild Animal Park and that didn't seem worth it.

FTR, I still love the saimangs and orangutans (at the Zoo). AND the teen panda was super active.

I'd like to pay the minor fortune to see the cheetahs run.

I tend to agree with libkitty and brenda about Bush. I also think this was just sheer incompetence at the Federal level, and is as--or nearly as--disturbing as either ignorance or malice. I know nothing about Brown or Chertoff, except that they should have been fired on Thursday morning.

— an egotistical self-absorbed prick whose one good quality is that he isn't a bigot.

Perzactly.

I also think this was just sheer incompetence at the Federal level, and is as--or nearly as--disturbing as either ignorance or malice.

I think, after tossing this around in my mind the last few days, that it's a combination of single-minded focus on their own priorities tied in with utter confidence that conseqences are things that happen to other people.

It's just their bad luck, or rather, the luck running out, that this one is too big to handwave.

Well, we left at about 2:00 PM because it was 1000 degrees and sunny and not much shade. Also, we have reservations to go on a sleepover there in late October. So we didn't feel compelled to see everything this time. We didn't even make it up to the condor ridge.

Now I am jealous that you live close enough to say 'maybe next time'. I go by the philosophy of "Live each visit to the San Diego Zoo and/or Wild Animal Park as if it were your last. Ooh, condors!!"

We didn't even make it up to the condor ridge.

Wha????

I go by the philosophy of "Live each visit to the San Diego Zoo and/or Wild Animal Park as if it were your last. Ooh, condors!!"

I can see the smoke from a brush fire that is 18 miles away from me. This is wrong. I kinda hope they get it under control about five minutes ago.

The one good thing about my dad moving to the central coast is that LA will be just as inconvenient to fly into as Oakland, so I might actually get a chance to see the San Diego Zoo and/or Wild Animal Park for the very first time.