Saturday, October 30, 2004

Election coming at us fast

We're almost there-- I have this feeling that a lot is suspended while we wait to find out how it goes-- how many votes will be stolen, people whose names are similar to names of convicted felons denied the vote, etc. etc. Not sanguine, nervously hopeful.

We finally got lawn signs, by the way, and they were stolen Wednesday night-- a whole group of houses on Prospect Street! But I got more signs and deposited them on people's porches. Ha! Take that, sign stealers!

A week ago today, we were with Joel at Brown: Sue, Joel, and Andy.

Sunday, October 17, 2004

Atlantic City

We just watched Atlantic City on DVD. I saw it long ago and had totally forgotten-- I remember thinking Burt Lancaster was sexy-- maybe I was surprised twenty odd years ago to see sex in an old guy. Now it's the silly wasted lives I see, and the change in Gracie the poodle lady that I liked. The young seem more callow, the old more hopeless.

Tuesday, October 12, 2004

Off to West Virginia

I'm off to Shinnston, West Virginia, where I don't have access to the Internet-- actually, it isn't that Shinnston lacks access. My friends there are extremely computer-active, having found the Web a perfect way to be in touch with the world fully and still live in Almost Heaven-- it's rather the household where I'll be, my parents', age 85 and 87, that isn't wired to the Internet. And even that isn't entirely true. My mother after much nagging finally accepted a gift of a Mailstation, which is a small dedicated e-mail machine, and she likes it and uses it, but isn't interested in a computer. So it's going to be me and my aged portable computer without a modem, plus the mailstation for emergencies, telephone, of course, lots of neighbors dropping by, bowls of candy to stave off neurosis.

Saturday, October 09, 2004

Can't get lawn signs in New Jersey!!

Well, after months of having a peace sign on our lawn, we finally decided we wanted one for the Democrats, and I've been on the phone to Washington, Trenton, and a local guy in Essex County, and there are no more signs! They aren't pushing them in NJ anyhow-- assuming this a (I always forget the color-- are dems blue or red??) Democratic state, but somehow there seem to be tons of signs for the Republicans around.

The reason, by the way, that I'm not using the names of the candidates is my own personal protest in favor of issues over personalities. I'm really not voting for a man, but for a handful of ways in which the Democrats are infinitely superior to the Republicans: Pre-emptive war; environment; participation rather than bullying in international affairs; choice of Supremes and other judges down the line; stem cell research; women's right to choose, etc.

Thursday, October 07, 2004

Anybody depressed besides me?

It's the election. I am usually pretty good at imagining various people's outlooks, but I honestly can't see why millions of people aren't pulling back in horror from what our present administration has done. A lady started talking to me in the grocery line yesterday, one of these people who can't be not talking, and she was looking at a copy of Black Enterprise with a picture of the guy who spoke at the Democration COnvention, Obama? She started in on how people are being fooled, which I was about to agree with, but she meant by the ones who are considering voting Democratic. "All that matters is our safety," she said. "I know the facts." I was both dumbfounded and in total coupons-for-groceries mode, so I didn't engage her. A lost opportunity: I might have actually learned something about the answer to my question, How can you support liars and bullies, warmonger and corporate shills? Well, maybe she answered it: fear?

She said she lived twenty years in Miami. Might she be an emigre Cuban? Will I have to make up a story to have this make sense for me?