I'm having a hard time concentrating. I can do OK at work, I focus on putting one foot in front of the other; I focus on the fact that I am there to serve others. That gets me through. Please believe that I love you and care about you. But I can't seem to concentrate on reading and remembering....I'm sorry.

I think the Northern California site is wonky. The main ACLU site let me donate successfully.

Here's hoping they are getting too many donations for their system to handle!

At the Art Wine and Chocolate Fair, there was a booth for a local gym that teaches a sort of mixed martial arts and their big focus is on kids, kids who are bullied and kids who do the bullying, trying to reach both and teach them how to wield their power for good. They also offer free self-defense classes for women. I should get in touch with them, take a class, see what else i can do to support their work.

Leonard Cohen is more than I can process right now.

{{{WindSparrow}}}

Doing chem in school was already hard, but even harder now. Perhaps because she didn't know what to say, my prof didn't acknowledge the way the election turnout may have increased stress (my community college is largely Latino and Asian, many immigrants). I am happy to see online friends in teaching and librarianship are very sensitive that way and I admire them for it.

I'm trying to do hard-for-me STEM work, figure out how to get on my feet again now that a new regime has been added to the challenges, figure out how to fight off the depression I suffer before it robs me of my energy and hope at the time I most need it, and I'm also trying to strategize how I can carve out energy/time/resources to help others in some way. And, of course, worrying about my friends in various communities that this campaign targeted.

I was heartened by this tweetstorm relating a conversation with a co-worker that voted Trump that was reachable and wants to turn around now that she realizes the mistake she made. [link]

I think there needs to be a push to teach girls self-defense so they can take down gropers.

We have been going to a bunch of craft fairs over the last couple of weeks and at every single one there has been a Damsels in Distress booth. They are a MLM that sells self defence tools - alarms, pepper spray, tasers... I've heard about them for a few years, but this is the first time they have been so visible.

I'm 41 fucking years old and there's google, but I really want to ask instead my ap history teacher, Mr. Smith (fer realz) is there precedence for this re: protests in Baltimore and else post general. Because he was so soothing and fucking honest (it was his voice and demeanor, he told is the awful shit so nice you'd absorb and then erupt in fury.)

I kind of want to fight every fight right now.

Yep. I think we need to be relentless in telling our legislators what we want them to do and constantly remind them that their legacy is at stake. Are they actually willing to let the GOP become the White Nationalist party? Cause there's no coming back from that.

I'm trying to figure out how to talk (in a productive way) to people who (probably) voted for him. I really want to send my mother a link to all the day 1 stories of bullying and harassment and ask "Do you still think he's not dangerous?" but she would probably just feel hurt and that's not my goal.

I also want to be prepared for the worst. A resistance movement will need secure communications, right? So I'm trying to learn about that. This is not my skill set.

I also haven't slept much, so we'll see if this still makes sense in a few days.

I was heartened by this tweetstorm relating a conversation with a co-worker that voted Trump that was reachable and wants to turn around now that she realizes the mistake she made.

Which is exactly the same thing as was reported after Brexit. Many people just protest-voting for the hell of it and being surprised when they won. But everybody has to live with it.

From my outsider perspective, I'd say it's really important the next four years be spent working on voter registration and inclusion, and against gerrymandering. The majority of Americans now does lean towards more liberal measures. That majority has to (be able to) vote.

this fucking year!

Yeah, this FUCKING year. Bowie, Prince, and now Cohen. Fuckity. Not to mention all the rest of the shit that has gone down. DAPL, among many other things. Those poor folks must feel so bad: they've been so fucked over by the whites, and now they know that unless Obama does something unprecedented in the next 8 weeks, the Apricot Demagogue will probably send in troops with live ammunition.

And anything Obama does, would just be reversed by the AD anyway.

I was in the city for dinner, and on the way home I ran into two big traffic jams; the first was because the protesters went up onto the freeway again I think. Oy. Good on them, but Trump's tentative pick for DHS thinks that such protests should be "quelled".

... I signed up for a VPN service today. Consider doing that, if you don't already; the NSA/Security state apparatus in the hands of Trump, Gingrich, and Pence does not fill me with complacency.

Still angry, still scared here.

Leonard Cohen passed away on Monday: [link]