Time is fleeting ...

In looking back at some of these posts, I see that I seem obsessed with time. Interestingly enough, I'd not be interested in going back to change things. Right now, in spite of all the nasty things going on in my and my family's lives, I'd be scared witless to go back and "fix it". I mean, suppose things got changed and I didn't like the changes any better. I know, this old song has been sung in a lot of movies and stories. Is that the moral to the story? Take things as they are, they could be worse. Hm .. on second thought, maybe I'm giving up too soon. I'll consider the time machine after all - if only because I don't like giving up without a fight...

Where have all the days gone ...

Politics. It's nice for it to be over once again. I'm in Washington state, where just a few hours ago we finally appear to have elected a governor. It's just another time to make people understand that their vote does indeed count. Our final count for the governor's race came down to a measly 261 votes. That's out of millions of votes - down to a tiny fraction of a percent. If 262 more Democrats had gotten off their rears and voted, we might have Gregoire for gov - or if 262 more Republicans had voted, it might not be possible for a recount to make a difference. Ah well .. stick to your armchair for another four years.

Thursday at last ...

I never liked Thursdays particularly, but they are a means to an end, being a signpost of the weekend. When I worked at a theatre, Thursday was the day we got in the new movies and they had to be set up and spliced and test run. It wasn't bad, and after a while, I had an assistant to do it for me on that day. Still .. it's probably marked me for life.

Friday, now there's a day. Ever notice it's getting ever more prevelant that most of the staff, especially management, goes missing on Friday afternoon? Not that I blame them, I also tend to vanish Friday afternoons if I can. But today's not Friday. Yet.

I had fish a few days early this week. Guess that means no fish for me on Friday. Don't worry, I'm not Jewish .. or whoever it is that has fish on Fridays. I do like the idea of a lot of places having clam chowder on Friday though. One problem with that: if the idea is that it's a FISH type meal - does it cause a big problem for a lot of clam chowder recipes to have bacon in them? Hm .. enquiring minds want to know.

Bye!

It's over ..

Nice to see we've made it through another election. I guess that Kerry is more of a man than I gave him credit for, since he's conceded defeat. I guess the speech at 3am last night (or this morning) was for his followers to have something to take home with them. Of course, Gore may have almost had a leg to stand on in his legal attentions - the vote was very close and he was ahead in the popular election. This time, Bush was some 5% or 4 MILLION votes ahead. I think it would have been seen as purely playing politics and trying to gum up the works. I suppose Mr. Clinton might have stepped in too and said "Step down, John. Hillary wants to run next time and you ain't going to screw it up".

What kind of a life is it that your kid is depressed, your stepkid is probably going to jail and if he goes to jail your wife will plan on leaving town because she doesn't want to live in a town where her kid is in jail. And your ex-wife hates your guts. And every other part of you. I'm tired of it. It would be nice to get some unmitigated good news for once. I mean, after paying some $3000 in legal fees, I at least expected he wouldn't have to go to jail. Even in Monopoly it's only $200 for passing go. I know that makes no sense, but I'm tired.

Maybe I'll listen to Rush for awhile - I'll either cheer up or get even more depressed. Change is good.

Is it Wednesday yet?

I have a worry about the elections. I guess I'm just old fashioned, but I believe in people following the rules because they are the rules. Not because you might get caught, but because we follow the rules. The problem I can see is that with rules like "look both ways before crossing the street" and "always stop at stop lights and stop signs" it's obvious that after awhile of ignoring these rules, the system will exact payment. That is, you will be smashed flat in the street because Joe Darling was on his cell phone and didn't see YOU, and you didn't bother to look for him. Our rules that define and regulate America are less obvious in their extraction of payment. Cleaning the gene pool won't happen in the same way as being squashed while jaywalking. End of subject, end of a bad chunk of DNA. With the rules of America, it's far more subtle. And we aren't a particularly subtle people. So we can ignore the warning signs for a LONG time before it is noticeable to the wider population.

I guess what I'm trying to point out is that each election has gotten nastier and nastier. And to what end? I mean, in the end one of 'em wins and one loses. Of course, that may not be so cut and dried this year - just as it wasn't four years ago.

But that's part of the issue.

Candidate Kerry has already promised he won't give up without a fight if the election goes against him. He'll call up his team of lawyers to file suit in every conceivable way that might give him an edge. And that's the crux of my fear .. that we will pay less attention to the actual law and more attention to the decisions of judge and lawyer. Just as more and more often it's becoming "ok" to behave badly in school, for instance, and hope you don't get caught.

Are we less moral now than we were 40 years ago? Less intelligent? Beyond that - less SMART?

Or does it just look that way because most of us have no personal experience with being a young adult from 40 years ago. And many of us that DO have such an experience tend to see it in the "rosy glow" of the past. It just wasn't that bad when we were kids.

Was it?

Speaking of going to hell in a handbasket .. do you suppose anyone from Helena, Montana has considered opening up a store called Handbasket?

What more perfect advertisement:

Where did you go to lunch?
Lunch? Oh, we went to Helena Handbasket .. it was great!

Uh huh ...