Happy Birthday, Ginger!

I will have to go back later to see cute kidlet pictures. Right now I am attempting to sort through all of the California proposition, and my head is killing me. There are propositions I'd normally support that I'm ambivalent about (because I really do think this "bonds will pay for everything without new taxes, really!" talk is bullshit), and yet when I look at the "no" sites, I'm disgusted by some of the groups opposing and some of the hateful language these groups use. For example, I would absolutely love to see a high speed rail system in CA, but there's a pretty convincing article in AAA's magazine Westways about why this particular proposition is so badly flawed as to make it unworkable. But the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, who runs the No site, horrifies me. They're the ones who pushed for Prop 13 back in the day and decimated California's schools. And Prop 3 is all about funding children's hospitals, which I'd normally be all for, but can we afford it right now? Yet the No site for them is limittaxes.org, which spends most of its time railing against those evil liberals and what they're going to do to our country.

Also, I'm faced with this massive list of local judges and such with no information on any of them.

ARGH! Voting in Connecticut was so much easier.

I voted today!

It was simple, painless and pretty darned quick. Less than 20 minutes not including travel time. I didn't even have a chance to read the book I brought.

It's weirdly anti-climactic. It is, for all intents and purposes, over for me but I'm still getting robocalls and literature through the door.

I unintentionally, but most definitely dissed a prominent local politician who is a write-in candidate...DCistas, I'm sure you know who I mean. She walked up to me and asked if I was a DC voter...I breezed right past her with, "Yes, I am. And I know who you are. And I've already made up my mind."

I suppose I could have just told the truth. "Hell, no, I won't vote for you. But good luck with that."

I do feel good about chatting with a few people about THEM voting early. People just don't seem to know that they can.

I vote yes on high speed rail because even if this proposition is bad, and won't work , I need the yes to transportation to be heard.

as for three --- I have heard ( but not researched) that they laid off workers -- but this is for building -- and I think they need people more than buildings ...But really, I need to do a bit more research

In general -- if I can't see my way clear I vote no on propsistions. If they can't be written clearly enough for me to understand -- they really aren't good.

Also , my understanding is that part of the budget constraints are due to propsitions -- money is hard to shift around.

I do not vote on judges because I know NOthing about them

Mondday is my day to go through things

For judges, I follow the Dem party line, 'cause I don't want to risk accidentally voting for a right-wing judge, or even helping a right-wing judge by not voting for a centrist or liberal. Right-wing judges scare me.

From Andrew Sullivan's blog -- a photographer does a series of pictures of friends that she's inveigled to dump stuff on their heads:

[link]

Made me laugh and laugh, and is totally work-safe, too.

The photographer has a video, too: [link]

Happy Birthday Ginger!

Buffista children in costume pictures have killed me ded.

Thanks, Tom -- love the expressions.

I just discovered that somebody I knew from writing workshops and online discussion groups (GEnie) is a regular writer for Daily Kos. How about that!?

Happy Birthday Ginger!

This waking up early on weekends thing is getting old. Despite going to bed at a fairly decent time last night, I woke up at 6 and haven't been able to get back to sleep when I've tried, resulting in me feeling vaguely headache-y and tired all day.

Did track down an $11 hibachi lobster lunch special and do laundry though, so at least the day wasn't entirely unproductive.

HMOG, Terry Tate has returned!

This made my day. Too funny.