What I'm watching

I thought, since most of you who read this blog are either here for the fandom or are my mother (hi, Mom!), so since there's been so little fannish stuff around, I thought I'd talk a little bit about a couple of my favorite shows and why I think you should drop everything and watch them too.

1. The Amazing Race -- Every time I tell someone to watch this show, invariably the response is "I hate reality television" or "I don't approve of shows like that." "The Amazing Race" is, however, different from the reality shows that have given the genre a bad name (ie "Paradise Island," "Hot or Not"; the survivors like "Survivor," "The Apprentice" etc., are really quite good). In "The Amazing Race", pairs of contestants with a pre-existing relationship race around the world in 30 days. Along the way, they have to perform stunts native to the part of the world they are in, and somehow navigate through foreign countries without knowing the language.
   
   The contestants' relationships are also tested, and this is what I like the best about this show. Having spent two months traveling through Europe with someone, I can really identify as to how relationships evolve and change -- either for the better or for the worse -- as you face the stress of not only the *travel* portion of the race, but also the fact that the first team to the finish line gets $1 million. The show is really well put-together and has amazing scenary. Until last season's "TAR", I had no idea just how lush Senegal was, nor did I realize just how gorgeous Iceland was in its ice blue beauty. Check it on CBS, 9 pm CST, on Tuesdays. It's the next best thing to actually globe-trotting yourself.
   
   
2. Without a Trace -- this show always took a backseat to ER the first couple years it was on; I'd only watch it if ER was being especially annoying or was a repeat. This season, I've been sucked into the show and have barely given ER -- a show I watched faithfully from its very first ep back in 1994 -- a second look. At first glance, "Without a Trace" looks like every other crime drama on television, but it's different in its ending: you don't know whether the missing person is alive or dead, whether he or she is a victim or not. There's always a hope that there will be a happy ending and sometimes there is, sometimes there isn't.
   
   The show also makes excellent use of flashbacks and digs deep to find out what exactly is going on with the missing person. I also enjoy the subtle character interactions between the five-member team led by Jack Malone; there's no anvil falling on the viewer's head. Hints about the characters, their personalities, their family, their likes and dislikes are sprinkled throughout the season. Especially riveting is the dynamic between Jack, Samantha and Martin; how that 'love triangle' has been playing out all season has really gotten my attention. "Without a Trace" is also one of the best acted shows I've seen in a long time, and it's especially amazing when you learn three out of five of the actors aren't even from the US and the one with the best New York accent -- Marianne Jean-Baptiste -- is from the UK. Tune in on Thursdays on CBS, 10 pm EST.
   

You know you want to.

Thought

Today was the kind of day that if you could put your arms around weather, you'd totally want to hug it and never, ever let it go. The day was THAT spectacular.

Things that make you go hmmm

Tim Bray talks about why blogging is good. I disagree with most of his statements, especially with numbers 1, 2, 3 and 10. But it may be just a perspective thing; if you are a subject matter expert in your field and that's what you're blogging about, then yes, pointing to your blog is probably a good thing. I can hardly imagine, in regards to number 3, how I'd bring that up to my boss.

"Hey, google me! My site is number one*=!"

"Cool, what keywords?"

"Uh... Seema unbound*?"

You see how badly this conversation could turn out, don't you?

And number 10 is really a crapshoot; most bloggers don't have an audience of size enough to actually matter to one's career. The fired bloggers get their audience after they get fired. I'm glad someone can see how blogging would be good for one's career, but me, I prefer to keep my head down.

*For less Net Nanny offensive search terms -- such as 'Trek fanfic', 'X-Files fanfic', 'JAG fanfic'e etc -- the site comes up in spots 2 to 4 on google; still, not quite promotion-worthy key words.

It takes more than spoonful of sugar

Tonight's blog entry is brought to you by the computer in the apartment's front office because my Internet connection at home is dead. How dead, I do not know, but I am hoping the network Gods bring it back online tonight. How hard can it be for Ma Bell to keep an entire city's phone lines functioning and numbers working, hmmm?

That being said, the apartment's computer has Net Nanny on it. Which is rather annoying considering I deal with a Net Nanny at work and then to come home, and there, there she is again! And Net Nanny is no Mary Poppins; like the work Net Nanny, she decides to block off sites that are decidedly not ############* or reprehensible in anyway. The annoying thing then is even after Net Nanny has wagged her finger at you, she won't let you leave the offending site. So you're stuck on a half-downloaded page (in this case, Dooce), with a beepy Net Nanny and if you click "okay", she goes away for the second it takes to continue downloading the page Net Nanny doesn't want you on anyway. You say, "Well, then, close the window." I would do that but because Net Nanny's warning keeps popping up on the still downloading page, it's impossible. Hence, this awful, awful vicious loop. I can't get off the page Net Nanny hates because Net Nanny won't let me; talk about mixed messages.

Net Nanny's insistent and incessant beeping combined with the ISP's annoying 5-note chime and "Thank you for your patience, we'll get to you shortly" repeated at thirty-second intervals, has slowly eaten away at any remaining sane brain cells I may have when it comes to technology. If you don't hear from me, it's because I've done away with Net Nanny and run off to South America; I hear the weather's great there this time of year.

* Word censored by Net Nanny; I'll give you a hint -- it starts with a P, is followed by an O, has an R in there, and an N, and ends with the word 'graphic'. I'm not actually sure whether the word is censored on your screen, but just in case. Obviously, Net Nanny means business.

Cooking with water

Back in college, one of my prized possessions was my rice cooker. We weren't, technically, supposed to have any cooking type things in our dorm rooms, but that didn't stop my roommate Sam and I from accumulating enough to have our own little kitchen beneath our beds. Along with the rice cooker, we also had a coffee maker, a plug-in kettle, a toaster oven, and not one, but two mini fridges. We didn't have a microwave, but there were enough people around who did, and there was also one in the kitchen in the lounge. Incidentally, once I burned a bag of popcorn in the kitchen microwave and then stood beneath the fire alarm. Two minutes later, campus security -- which could never be found when actual crimes were going on, such as who was actually responsible for the weekly smashing of the front lounge windows -- were circling my bag of popcorn with suspicion.

The rice-cooker, I learned, didn't just cook rice. If you were patient enough, you could also boil a can of soup or make spaghetti. This was very convenient in casa Seema and Sam, as going down to the kitchen with an armful of pots and pans was a pain. My usual MO was to put the soup in the rice cooker, run off and take a shower, and by the time I came back, 30 minutes later, it was usually done. The pasta would take longer -- maybe 30 to 40 minutes to boil -- but still, it was so much better than say, DC food.

That being said, as much as I loved my rice cooker, there's no way I could possibly talk about them for two hours. Yet another reason to fear Fidel Castro.

Drive by blog

From the world of unsolicited advice: mothers speak. Some of these stories are funny, some sad, and some will just have you picking your jaw up off the ground.

How you got here

I'm always amused by my stats (unless you're a livecam! Then I want no part of you! I don't care how fun you are, Miriam!). But here is a rundown of some of the search terms people use to find this blog:

• Sidney Lindsey Greenbush -- this is a favorite. I had NO idea just how much interest there were in the twins who played Carrie on "Little House on the Prairie" until I blogged about them.
  
• Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen -- I blogged about these media moguls once -- once! -- in the spring of 2001 and since then, people keep coming; I'm afraid they must be sorely, sorely disappointed when instead finding dirt on gossip-worthy blond rich girls, they get me. Sorry!
  
• IKEA -- believe it or not, I'm not the only one who has trouble putting together IKEA furniture as my logs bear testament that there are many, many people out there searching for a way to assemble their flat furniture into something they can use. I feel your pain!
  
• How to put a futon together -- Uh... see above.
  

Other search terms that come up usually have to do with 'royal' subjects: The Reluctant Queen, Jean Plaidy, Plantagenets, and Royal Blood; amazingly, Star Trek hardly comes up at all.

Confidential to Kite Runner readers: Don't pass go, don't collect $200, just read the book already.

Confidential to blogger Clorox MBA: yes, an MBA program will make a blogger out of you, but stay away from the Clorox! You're paying good money for the stuff they're putting into your brain!

Confidential to google searcher: Sarah Jessica Parker weighs a lot less than either you or me. Unless you're five. In which case, you have permission to weigh less than SJP.

A question of stone tablets

The Supreme Court is currently hearing the case on whether the Ten Commandments can be displayed in public/govermental buildings. I don't *like* the idea of Ten Commandments codified on governmental property, but I don't necessarily *mind* it. What I do mind is the inherent idea that one religious tradition is better than others, that there is only one way to God, and that everyone *must* fall in line behind Christian theology, which leads to my main objection to religion public areas. It seems to me such displays are meant for Christianity and the promotion of that religion alone; no other religions can or will be tolerated.

I'm all for the Ten Commandments on display if equal space and weight can be given to the Koran, the Gita, and the Talmud. I'm all for prayer in public space if Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, and Catholics are allowed to have their voices and religious traditions heard. If that happens -- and I'm certainly not holding my breath! -- then sign me up as a supporter of public display of the Ten Commandments. Until then, I'm going to have to be a firm supporter of the separation of church and state.

Links of the day were kindly provided by Liz Logan. The Ten Commandments and the legal tradition and who knew there were so many different versions of the Ten Commandments?

Yipppeee!

The Tax Man cometh but he giveth. In other words, I buckled down and did my taxes this morning. Also, I worked some more on the turn of the century HTML on my site. I think the entire VOY directory has been re-done. And oh! I cooked! And other than curry splattering all over my stove due to over-enthuasiastic boiling, there was no disaster where dinner was concerned. Yes, good feelings all around :-)

In the darkness, the trees are full of starlight

I saw one of my favorite musicals Thursday night, "Les Miserables". "Les Mis" is one of those overpowering, overwrought orchestral productions with lots of singing and dying, but not a whole lot of dancing. And it's got angst, plenty of it, but it's still good enough to bring people in the audience both to their feet and to tears. I didn't cry this time, mostly because it was past 11 pm, thus way past my bedtime and for God's sake, would Jean Valjean hurry up and die already?

Lest you think I'm completely heartless, I did get a bit emotional when I saw "Les Mis" the first time. Picture it: London, September 1999. FG and I were suffering from jet-lag something fierce as well as a remarkable aptitude for misplacing ourselves. Six hours off the plane and we walked out of the Piccadilly Circus station and into a production of "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Unabridged." There's nothing more English than tea and William Shakespeare, but in this case, the cast of the William Shakespeare oeuvre was played by four American guys in bad wigs and togas and who, somehow and very convincingly, managed to reduce "Hamlet" to a single scream. Take that, Mel Gibson.

The next day, we decided to watch a musical and FG picked "Les Mis." We had lovely seats and I was on a high when we emerged from the theater eight hours and 26 minutes later (yes, "Les Mis" is *really* the longest musical in the history of musical theatre; let's just be glad Schonberg and friends didn't decide to set "War and Peace" to music). It was after midnight and while the theatre area was hopping, I felt uncertain about traveling this late back to the hotel. I suggested a cab. FG called me a wimp and while I'm totally not ashamed of my wimpiness, I succumbed; when in London, do as the Brits do and look to the right when crossing the street and take the underground.

We arrived at our station -- Baywater -- with little incident and the fun -- a term I use very, very loosely -- began when we couldn't find our hotel. We recalled the hotel had only been a few blocks away from the station and we thought we'd come from the left but nothing looked familiar, so we went the other way and ended back at Baywater.

Mystified, we started tackling the side streets and I freaked when I saw a large park across the street. "We're gonna get mugged," I told FG. "I'm never ever going to fulfill my dream of stalking Henry VIII's ghost because we're going to die right here." FG, however, is not one for dramatic declarations. She marched into the only store still open (ignoring my comments about how late-night convenience stores are perfect targets for hold-ups, even in the civilized and refined UK) and asked for directions, while I bought chocolate bars and water for FG and myself. If life as we knew it was going to end, I was damned if it was going to be on an empty stomach and parched throat.

We ended up finding our hotel about fifteen minutes later in one of those "duh" moments, realizing we'd been only a block or so away the entire hour we'd spent looking and at one point, had just been around the corner, but because of the darkness, hadn't noticed the street we were on didn't actually dead-end, but made a gentle jog to the right. The moral of the story is always, always walk to the end of the street and look both ways. I was ever so relieved when we finally boarded the creaky elevator and walked down the creaky hallway to our tiny hotel room.

The next morning, we decided to visit Kensington Palace -- home of the late Princess Diana and other royals -- as we heard it was in the neighborhood. The way FG and I tackled London, you'd think we were men; we didn't believe in actually asking for directions *before* heading somewhere. We had this thinking that if there is a subway, then how hard can it really be to get anywhere, especially when there's a stop called 'Kensington'? It's not like Sweat Sock City where road names change or highway exits are moved on a whim or are under construction (or sinking into the swamp, but that's another story entirely).

We got on the train at Baywater, rode a couple of stops, got off, changed trains, and then got off. FG needed to take a picture for her underground/bus pass so we came out of the Kensington station, walked a couple blocks to our left in search of a photo studio and ended up in front of the Baywater station. Yes, indeed, we traveled 15 minutes by underground and switched trains just to end up two blocks from our starting station. And then we discovered Kensington Palace was the 'park' we'd found the night before, where I'd been convinced we were going to get mugged. Getting mugged by a member of the Royal Family -- now there's a story worth passing on to the grandkids.

Even though the American version of "Les Mis" is also eight hours and 26 minutes long, it's super comforting at that hour of night to know exactly where you parked and more importantly, how to get to your bed with minimal drama.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

One sure thing

I'm like the last person in America who hasn't done her taxes. I'm not actually tax-phobic, just procrastinatory. I really like the idea of running right up against a deadline and there are still six weeks to go until April 15. No sweat.

I'm also an old-fashioned tax girl; I do my taxes out by hand and that means I have to find the perfect pencil. Not just any pencil will do. I need to have one with a nice, big eraser and plenty of lead in the barrel, because not only do I do the dang thing by hand, I also make duplicate copies by hand, which makes me think I'd have done great in that time before the Guttenberg press. Also, I don't believe in e-filing (except for that year when I was so poor HR Block e-filed for me for free) and no direct deposit; there's just an indescrible feeling when you hold a crisp, clean Treasury check in your hands.

This year though, I'm thinking about actually starting sometime before 11:59 on April 14th. In fact, this weekend. I'm just getting so excited about spending a Saturday or Sunday afternoon with the 1040 and Schedules A, B, and D. I can hardly stand it. And I'm even more glad that this year, we get to deduct our sales tax paid in. It actually makes me laugh when I read the 1040 book and it says, "Gather up your receipts and figure out how much sales tax you paid in 2004." Uh, I am doing so well in kicking my paper accumulating habit that while other people might be pissed off about paying taxes, I'm more pissed off that Uncle Sam is enabling one of my Really Bad Habits (tm).

But seriously, who saves 365 days worth of receipts? And if anyone does, and if they are organized and patient enough to add up all those pennies, I don't want to hear about it. Nope.

Links o' the day: Fangirls should know that starting your own church won't save you from the Tax Man and if you do business with a naked person in Utah, you're gonna get taxed.

The new lexicon

Mouse potato -- the on-line wired generation's answer to the couch potato

Percussive maintenance -- the fine art of whacking an electronic device to get it work again

404 -- someone who is clueless

Ohnosecond -- the miniscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've just made a BIG mistake (eg. accidentally sent emails that were never supposed to leave the inbox)

Indulgence

I have permission from Lori, via Jemima, to be a lazy blogger tonight. That's pretty much been the theme of the evening. I did work out tonight, after squeeing with Jerie who too shares my deep love and admiration for all things "Without a Trace", but after that, it was futon!time, just in time for Reality Stars Fear Factor.

My love of reality television has no shame.

Because it was such a lazy, lolling around kind of day, I had a lazy, lolling around kind of dinner. Namely, a samosa -- very oily, -- and nachos, drenched in cheese and salsa.

Every now and then I just really like to eat junk for dinner. I don't really munch much -- usually tortilla chips or crackers are my snack items of choice. I also like yogurt and sliced apples and I tend not to eat that much between meals. But every now and then, it's like, "I want SUGAR! I want GREASE! I want FAT!" And so then, out comes the salsa, chedder cheese and nachos, and there's dinner.

For any mothers who might be horrified, I should probably also mention in my family, it was perfectly acceptable to eat cake for breakfast. Ice-cream was also considered an acceptable meal in a pinch (I have an extreme weakness for ice-cream; hence, I rarely ever have it at home). When it comes to indulgence and food, my family definitely lives to eat.

Feeling productive

I've been on a mad rampage this whole weekend and now, at just before 5 pm on Sunday, I'm feeling a little at loose ends because I don't have the usual "Oh my God, I have to go to work tomorrow" routine to start. It's just weird knowing all the laundry is done, put away, that there are no dishes to take care of, and there's plenty of food in both the fridge and pantry. Yes, there are still a few things that need to be done, but nothing major -- well, I do have taxes to do -- standing between me and Monday. It makes me both happy and nervous at the same time, like there's something I've forgotten.

I haven't been this efficient or productive in months.

Editing

I've written about self-editing before, but the other part of the process is having someone else look at what you've done and give you their opinion. An editor can serve many roles -- muse, plot doctor, grammar expert, support system, fact checker, and sounding board. The writer holds primary authority and responsibility over what the final version of the story looks like, but an editor can help and offer a fair and honest and unemotional assessment of what's going on. When I'm looking for someone to edit a story of mine, here's what I look for:

• Someone with a good command of the English language, and not just in terms of vocabulary and understanding, but also for grammar. Ideally, the editor should be able to point out the misplaced commas or the misuse of words. So many times I've read stories where I look a the words used and think, "Oh, the writer didn't mean *that*." Ex. 'Disinterested' and 'uninterested' are not the same thing and most people mean the latter, rathern the former which means 'neutral'. Also, the editor should be able to differentiate between affect/effect, their/they're/there, your/you're, its/it's -- you get the picture.
  
  By no means, if you find the grammar/language editor of your dreams, does this exempt the writer from knowing the rules. Using language and grammar improperly is not an option for anyone who takes writing seriously. Learn the rules, and then find someone who can help you make sure you're enforcing them.
  
  
• An editor shouldn't be solely critical or positive. If they lean too far to either direction, it's time to take another look at whether they're actually helping or not. If the feedback is consistently negative, without giving reasons *why* or *how* to fix them, then this may not be the best editor-writing relationship. If the feedback is consistently positive, pointing out just the things you do well and nothing else, then again, it may not be a good relationship. Editors should be able to point out the good and the bad both. They should be able to hone in on your weaknesses and help you emphasize your strengths. Carping on the weaknesses only can undermine confidence, while emphasizing strengths can lead to overconfidence.
  
  
• Based on the above, if someone tells you something your editor has never mentioned before, or anyone else for that matter, it might be worthwhile to listen. I've heard many times people saying, "Oh, that can't be right. No one has ever given me *that* criticism." While criticism stings, take a step back and look at it dispassionately. Some people criticise for the joy of criticising; it's your job as the writer to be able to tell the difference. If someone says, "Okay, this story is a little too wordy and by the way, I don't understand what this means," examine the story in that context. Maybe they're right, maybe they're not; either way, just because no one has ever said something before doesn't mean it's untrue.
  
  
• I define constructive criticism as "Here's what I like/dislike about your story and this is why and here's how you can fix it." It's not easy to get constructive crit, no matter how politely worded, but it's a necessary step in putting out a quality final project. Ideally, an editor will be able to tell you how to fix the weaknesses. If not, then it's up to you to come up with a solution. Editors are there to help, but it's up to the author to actually come up a solution that works for them. Which leads me to my final point.
  
  
• Having an editor, by the way, does not exempt the author from self-editing or even critically considering what an editor has said. Anything an editor says is merely a suggestion or an opinion -- not a hard and fast "you must do this or ELSE" type statement (at least, they should very rarely be worded that way, unless it means the difference between getting published or not -- in which case, the final decision about what to do still lies with the writer). The editor isn't always omnipotent and all-knowing, but if they are competent, they also won't be off-base most of the time. It's important to evaluate all statements made, and learn to tell the difference between pettiness and things that will genuinely help. In the end, it's up to the author to decide whether to implement what an editor says.
  

Pondering

I wish there was a 'rebuttal' book to the bestselling "He's Just Not That Into You" (HJHNTIY) and if I had my way, it'd be called "You're Not That Into Him and This Is How You Call It Quits." Because, as much as it sucks when you like someone who doesn't like you back, it sucks just as much when you realize that while you value your relationship with the person, you're just not as into them as they are into you.

In my case, because on the surface everything makes sense, I keep hanging on, thinking "I can work on this, obviously, it's *me* and I just need to be *logical* because all of my desired variables are present." Even when I decided very recently that a relationship *wasn't* working and I had discussed the situation many times with S. about ending it completely, I still didn't have the guts to pick up the phone to call it quits. Instead, I kind of let it just drift away, only to be startled a few weeks later by a "Dear Seema..." email. In circumstances like this, I wish I'd just gone with my gut and made the first move; I wasn't that emotionally invested in the relationship, so I don't know *what* was holding me back from actually having the "we need to talk" conversation.

Unfortunately, relationships aren't mathematical and you can't ever make a gross generalization about your interactions with another person; in the end, you can't force something, no matter how much you want to, and you can't be as nice about it as you want to be either. If only it was possible to be as glib about ending a relationship as HJHNTIY makes it sound -- no matter what side of the equation you're on.

Preparing for the worst, hoping for the best

Newsday columnist Mike Thomas talks about Terri Schiavo better than I can. The story is incredibly sad, but the legal battles just brought home the reality of just how important it is to make sure those you leave behind know exactly what you want.

The idea of preparing a last will and testament as well as a living will freaks the heck out of me. That's not something someone my age does, but now that I have two pennies to rub together, I need to make sure the state doesn't get all of the mullah. I also want my family to know exactly what my wishes are if I am unfortunate enough to end up like Terri Schiavo. You have to let those who have your best interests at heart know what you want -- whether it's letting you die if you are so severely incapacitated there is no quality of life or desiring all measures taken to keep you alive, regardless of quality of life; you can't assume those who love you know or even can make these difficult and emotional decisions. In fact, it's probably even best to designate ahead of time that person who will make these kinds of decisions for you, so you don't end up stuck between two warring parties.

No one wants to think about death or dying. No one wants to think about what happens if the only quality of life is sustained by machines. Nor do you want to be the one sitting at a bedside wondering what your loved would have wanted. It's not enough to verbally tell someone; you have to write it down, get it witnessed, and then make multiple copies and distribute. I'm not sure Terri Schiavo would have ever intended for her life to be turned into some kind of rallying cry from both the right-to-die and the right-to-life crowds; what she probably would have wanted most is the dignity that both sides have denied her.

Cutting clutter

I get about 2 to 3 credit card offers a day, and most of them are filled out with everything except my signature, which can be an issue when it comes to protecting yourself from identity theft. I usually shred any applications I get before throwing them away. Until today, I had no idea that the credit bureaus are in the business of selling information to the credit card companies and that's how you end up with those 80 gazillion applications.

If you want out, like I did, you can go here and opt-out from all credit reporting agencies at once or you can call toll-free 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (888-567-8688). The other option is to snail mail each credit agency -- TransUnion, Equifax, Experian and Innovis -- separately.

I'm also slightly amused at reports that Choicepoint is now going to tighten security. Isn't that a little like shutting the gate after the cows have wandered out?

A trip down memory lane

When I was driving back on Sunday, I found an old tape from the early 90s. When I was in high school, I used to tape hours of radio on end and I got a kick out of listening to the scratchy quality, and of course, the DJs whom I'd adored so fervently when I was a wee one. A few of the songs on the tape I remembered as they are classics -- "We Are The World", "Physical," "Eye of the Tiger" -- but then there were other songs I barely remembered by one-hit wonders. Yet, I'm sure, when I was 12 or 13, I thought these guys were the best and I would never, ever forget them. Those were the days, natch, when the radio was pretty much surgically attached to my ear.

Who knew, more than a decade later, I wouldn't be able to remember the last time I listened to the radio?

I also found a mix tape I made for my aunt years ago. I never gave her the tape -- Real Life (tm) interfered in ways I would have never imagined and so the tape is still in my possession. I was listening to it tonight on my way to meet a friend for dinner. Some of the songs on that tape are still among my favorites, including Billy Joel's "Goodnight Saigon." I also had taped my 'relaxation' song, the one I listened to before any big test in college -- Everything's Alright from Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Jesus Christ Superstar." Of course my version is the one sung by Sarah Brightman.

Try not to get worried, try not to turn on to
Problems that upset you, oh.
Don't you know
Everything's alright, yes, everything's fine.
And we want you to sleep well tonight.
Let the world turn without you tonight.
If we try, we'll get by, so forget all about us tonight

Bon Appetite

This weeked, my brother, S-i-L, cousin and I cooked dinner for my mom's birthday. Dinner was Thai -- my brother's current obsession. I made the soup and amazingly, it was not a disaster. Here is the recipe:

Clear soup with spinach and tofu

2 quarts vegetable broth (or any broth you prefer)
6 green onions, finely chopped
8 oz firm tofu, cut into 1-inch squares
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon sugar
A handful of spinach leaves, stemmed if you'd like
10-12 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
Freshly grated pepper to taste
Salt to taste

Bring the broth to a boil on medium heat. Add all ingredients except for spinach. Cook for about two minutes. Add spinach. Cook for another couple of minutes and then remove from heat. Season to your taste.

Broth recommendation: Pacific Foods

Without a trace

As I was driving home this afternoon, I looked up at the the giant screens that line our interstates every 3-5 miles within city limits. Usually the billboards give up to date information -- weather info, construction updates, or the famous 'Click it or ticket' -- in reference to our seat belt law. Today, the sign read "Child Kidnapped." The lights at the top of the screen were flashing for additional emphasis. The sign gave no other information other than a description of the vehicle -- blue Dodge SUV and a license plate -- and a message to call the police in Big City to the North.

For the entire 3-hour drive, I checked out all the cars, looking for a blue Dodge SUV. I repeated the license plate number under my breath. I wondered if the child was a boy or a girl and how old he or she was. I wondered if the child knew his or her kidnapper. Why did the kidnapper do this? Was it a disgruntled parent on the wrong side of a custody battle? A stranger? Who witnessed the kidnapping and managed to get the license plate number? Did they happen to see if the kidnapper went north or south? If they were coming south, then maybe I'd come across them. Mostly I hoped by the time I hit the first sign in my Current City, that the Amber Alert would be replaced with the usual "This city is STILL under construction" message; unfortunately, when I got to the city's outer limits and the first 'achtung' sign, the headline was still "Kidnapped child."

Now I'm wondering whether the kidnapper saw the Amber Alert. I wonder if he left the highway. But mostly, I wonder about the child and pray that the alert worked, that the blue Dodge SUV was spotted and that the child has been returned to his or her home.

Things I should talk about

I made a list today of all the things I should blog about if I wanted to be a 'power' blogger and so to spare everyone statistics and propaganda, I hereby give you the Cliff Notes version of what I'd say on major issues. Some of this is redundant, but I'm nothing if not redundant.

• Social Security reform -- Neither social nor secure, discuss. In a nutshell: it's not as broke as the Bush Administration would like to believe, but not as solvent as the Democrats would like us to think. My take: raise the cap on payroll taxes, increase retirement age, cut some benefits and start personal accounts for those under 55.
  
  
• Internet trolls -- Go away already. Sheesh.
  
  
• "Without A Trace" -- Are you watching this show? You should be watching this show. If you take away NOTHING else from this blog, take this.
  
  
• Bloggers and the media -- Bloggers are not journalists. Nope, nothing, nada, zip, zilch. Stop pretending they are.
  
  
• Abortion -- There's nothing wrong with acknowledging that an embryo has value, that it is a baby and can feel pain. There is nothing wrong with acknowledging that this is a difficult moral decision for many people. There is nothing wrong in acknowleding that abortion should be rare but safe. That being said, America, I don't want you picking out my socks for me; I certainly don't want you to tell me what I can or cannot do with my body. Get out of my uterus already.
  
  
• The Amazing Race -- Best. Reality. Show. Ever. I'm not happy about Rob and Amber (from "Survivor: All Stars") on this next edition, but I shall get a fiendish glee out of seeing them getting booted (and I may scream if they win the $1 million prize).
  
  
• The War in Iraq -- Nothing will ever persuade me this was a Good Idea (tm). Spin it any way you want, and even if a purple-fingered Iraqi woman hugs me, I'm still not going to think it was a good idea.
  
  
• Margaritas -- Still. Totally. Rock.
  
  
• Gay marriage -- It's not fair to blame people who can't get married on the deterioration of marriage in this country. If you want to talk about people who shouldn't be married, take a look at J.Lo or Britney Spears. Good grief. Take away THEIR right to get married already.
  
  
• Enterprise -- I'm not sad that there won't be Trek on television next year; I am sad that Enterprise is getting the heave-ho just when it's getting really good and I'm starting to recognize the show I love.
  

No one can hear you scream in cyberspace

Every now and then you come across a person online and you just wonder what they are like in Real Life (tm). Every now and then I read a post or an exchange between individuals and think, "I hope I never ever in 80 gazillion years ever run into this guy in a well lit alley, let alone a dark one." It's not secret the relative anonymity of online life -- the fact you can choose what other people know about you and hide other facts -- has people acting in ways they wouldn't otherwise. Of course, when you see obnoxious or rude behavior online, you have to wonder what that person really is like.

I wonder if the person who disparages everything and claims cliquishness online is perhaps insecure and wants to be liked, but puts up a "This is why your [insert noun of choice] sucks" as a defensive mechanism. Or what about the people who go around leaving insulting comments in blogs or on forums? In Real Life, are they the quiet and shy type, the type who just really want to have their say but can't summon up the courage? Some people might be just as bold in RL as they are online, but more often I think it's a case of projection -- "This is who I want to be, this is what I want to say, and since no one knows who I am, and no can stop me, I'm going to be as obnoxious as possible."

ps. Hi Dave!

Geekity

I'm having problems with my yahoo! email account -- seemag1@yahoo.com -- so if you email me there, I can read, but I cannot respond. I've tried fiddling with my firewall, lowering the level from 'high' or stealth mode down to medium and I've added mail.yahoo.com to my trusted sites list. However, for some reason, Yahoo!mail won't render correctly for me -- images are missing, scripts, etc. So when I hit 'reply' on an email, nothing happens. When I tried to access the site in that spawn of the devil, IE, the browser crashed. This is the only site I'm having this problem on, so I'm guessing the issue is on Yahoo's end and not mine, but gah, it's annoying.

Annoying things

On my way home from work today, I was behind a navy blue Buick. All was well until the Buick slowed down in the middle of the intersection and turned on its right-turn signal. So I thought, like any reasonable person, the Buick was going right. The Buick didn't go right. It kept driving ahead, slowly, with its right blinker going and going and going. For SEVEN BLOCKS. Who signals SEVEN BLOCKS before they have to turn? And then there was the person in the black RAV 4 who came to a COMPLETE STOP in the middle of the road even though there was a) no stop sign or b) traffic light or c) had any intention of turning. WHAT IS UP WITH THESE PEOPLE? Do you WANT me to crash into the back of your car?

Also, nothing like a good blog flounce.

Heart Day

It's a little late to do my usual blog rerun of Valentine's Day; I instead got a bit het up over bloggers attacking the mainstream media, instead of going after the pink and red holiday. I'm not sure exactly what the bigger tragedy is: bloggers who think they are journalists or the commercialism of romance.

Jessica and I went out for Mexican fastfood and had margaritas. Later, FG called me and said, "I am disheartened by Valentine's Day." My response will not go down in history in anyway. "Bummer," I said. "Bummer all around." And then I pointed out to her that by not celebrating the V-Day, she was not contributing to the exploitation of developing countries. I said, "Nothing says 'I love you' like child labor."

In the end, Valentine's Day is just, I don't know, one of those holidays I wouldn't mind eradicating from the calendar. It's right up there with President's Day as space-taker-uppers on the calender -- nothing more than a reason to either a) sell cards or b) have a huge big sale so people can go out and buy stuff. What we need is a solemn holiday where NOTHING is open, not even the movie theaters, and you can't buy gifts; a day where you're forced to spend time with the people you care about and tell them, face to face, without pink things or shiny balloons or a brand new bling, how you feel about them.

The NY Times recently published an article about the the 'power' of bloggers, this time noting conservative bloggers had brought down Eason
Jordan at CNN. Earlier this month, liberal bloggers went after fake
Jeff Gannon, Fake Reporter (tm), who was working for a conservative publication, and who seemingly had unrestricted access to the White House press corps. Before that, there were the bloggers who went after Dan Rather. The whole thing makes me a
little nervous, because it feels a little like "Oh yeah, you take one of ours down? We're going to take one of yours." I think it's fair to say *most* people think there's a bias in the media; I don't buy into the notion that it's entirely a liberal bias (the conservatives, for instance, rule the radio waves), but I do agree some people may think there is a liberal bias.

I think it's worthwhile for people to question the media, to point out facts. I will say some bias is unintentional, a lot of it coming down to deadlines and not being able to get both sides of the story for whatever reason (it reminds me of the time I wrote a feature on swimming lessons and interviewed only the instructors but forgot to talk to the kids and their parents). At the same time, I'm wondering whether there's a taste for blood and power now in the blogosphere and as a result, are we going to lose reporters on either side of the aisle? Are bloggers sitting at their
keyboards and sticking their tongues out at journalists like me* and say, "Ha, ha, we're watching you, and never mind we have no idea how you do your job or the pressures you're under or the fact when something is 'off the record', it is *off the record*."

I honestly don't care about whether it's conservative or liberal bloggers going after the media; what I take issue with are bloggers, who can say anything they want and
aren't bound by a code of ethics or style or even a journalistic organization, have elected themselves as the media watchdog.

Link: Another article on jobs and blogging.

* Former journalist

How much clean do you have to clean if you could get clean

The bathroom has been driving me nuts for the last couple of months because I've been trying to kill the black mold between the tiles and on the caulking and nothing has been working. I've soaked it in Lysol, scrubbed with a brush, and still it grows. I'm convinced that when the greenhouse gases finally snuff out all the oxygen and turn this place into a pressure cooker, nothing will be left but black mold. It's THAT strong. Yesterday, I went after it again, and despite my heavy application of elbow grease, all I got back was gray mold.

To give you a little history, black mold is like THE cause celebre in my neck of the woods. It's the quickest way to get your house condemned, and easiest way to squeeze insurance companies out of a whole lot of money. My last apartment had black mold in the ceiling, thanks to the leaking upstairs bathroom. When I complained -- multiple times -- to the management, they finally sent over someone who PAINTED over the mold. We won't even talk about the moldy carpet in the bedroom, because of the leaking foundation -- the carpet that wasn't replaced until about two months before I moved out. I spent A LOT of money on Glade air freshners during the 18 months I lived in that place.

So of course, now when I see black mold in my shiny sparkly new apartment, I panicked. Black mold is a lot like cockroaches. Once you've got it, it's nearly impossible to get rid of; that's why houses with the mold can be total losses. Well, yesterday I was so motivated, I attacked the mold. One of us HAD to go, and as far as I know, I'm the only one paying rent. Well, the mold REFUSED to move out; it just kind of went pallid and grey, thus annoying me. I contemplated ripping out the caulking and then having the apartment people come and re-do it, but then I realized that that could be construed as wanton destruction and I do want my half of the deposit back.

In a OK Carroll style showdown, I poured the toilet bowl cleaner all over the mold and let it sit there for 10 minutes. I turned out the lights, put on the fan, and went and sat in the living room and watched part of "Speed 2: Cruise Control." I admit, I was feeling a little guilty about using toilet bowl cleaner on my tub, but really, people, how many chemicals do you need to clean your bathroom? I have three -- the Windex for the mirror, the Lysol Tub & Basin, and then the Clorox with bleach for the toilet. That's not counting the bleach and blue stuff pellets I throw in the toilet tank because of the water problems here (don't ask) or the Liquid Plumr I use because the drains don't... drain. Obviously, if there are SO many different kinds of cleaners for the bathroom, I was probably breaking some secret law somewhere akin to ripping off the tags on a mattress by using the toilet cleaner on the tub.

When I went back into the bathroom and wiped off the tub, I saw that the mold was GONE. Gone, gone, gone. I'm not ashamed to admit I did a little jig. The lesson of the day is that it IS okay to mix chemicals when cleaning the bathroom; manufacturers just want you to think that you HAVE to have this special thing for the tub and you HAVE to have this other thing for the mirror (well, okay there IS the problem of streaks on the mirror). Meanwhile, I'm just hoping the Valentine's Weekend Mold Massacre lives in infamy for all of moldkind; see if they try to move in here again.

Must Read

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini is one of the most amazing books I've read in a long time. The novel tells the story of Amir and his friend Hassan -- the Kite Runner -- and of their childhood in Afghanistan, just before the Russians rolled in. Amir and Hassan are the best of friends despite their differing social status, until one day something happens to change their relationship forever.

The novel uses simple but effective language and some of the most killer moments in the book are the quietest. There is a lot of violence in this book -- some of it quiet and subtle -- and others more physical and obvious. It journeys through the 'good old days', explores Afghanis reactions to the arrival of the Russians, and then the horror of the Taliban regime. One thing I thought interesting was the attitude of the Afghanis who had been forced to remain behind after the Russian invasion towards those like Amir who managed to flee to America. One character remarks those who fled didn't bleed like the Afghanis who stayed behind.

This is one of those books that stays with you long after the last page has been turned. Some of it is over the top and some of the coincidences are a little bit much (and it's Bollywood, not Lollywood), but the character interactions and development and the violent journey Amir has to take in his quest for forgiveness is hard to forget. Even in the most brutal sections of the book -- for instance, a Taliban execution that Amir watches -- Hosseini very skillfully cuts in and out of the action, so the whole horror is there, despite the lack of play-by-play. It's as if Hosseini knows the exact details to use to drive home the point and make you see what has happened, despite not taking you by the hand and walking you through a scene.

I ver much admired the sparse prose used in this novel -- the author manages to squeeze so much life and energy out of a few words. As a reader, I felt there was no excess verbiage or scenes. Additionally, Hosseini uses repetition to his advantage; usually repetition can get on one's nerves, but since all of the incidents used were very telling ane necessary to the plot, it only served to re-enforce the larger picture -- of a boy who has grown up and is now searching for redemption. It's an intelligent novel, a bit hard to take at times, but well-worth it.

It's not what you do, it's what you say

The Washington Post had a good article about bloggers getting fired. I have to admit, these days I'm thinking a lot more about what I blog. The self-censorship has now extended beyond personally identifying details to who I talk about, what I talk about, and occasionally I write posts and then delete them thinking, "This is going to get me in TROUBLE."

This is a far cry from when I first started online. I started this website either late 1997 or early 1998 on my university's server. I was SO excited that I told everyone about this website. I didn't even care that people knew I wrote stories about Star Trek characters. When I started my first job, I told co-workers about the website and gave them the link (the former Geocities location for this site); heck, when I got awesome FB on ASC, I even told one of my co-workers about it and showed her the actual post. I even blogged about that job here, though I never did mention the company by name (being on the tech side for a while, I knew that the company had spiders out looking for illegal mentions of their name online). Obviously, times have changed and discretion is the way to go.

These days, I keep my web activities strictly to myself. At Very Big Publishing Company, only S -- who I've been friends with for many years now -- and a fellow fangirl knew about this site. At the current job, I haven't said a word there either and I'm not likely too. I'm not sure there is anything in this blog I could be fired for -- I'm not mentioning my companies by name or co-workers -- and I certainly don't give away secrets or other identifying information and I don't have any plans to blog about the job or the people. However, people are starting to get fired for content in their blogs that isn't directly related to their jobs. So then I wonder about the content here and I think, "Okay, there's nothing here my mom won't approve of" (Hi Mom!) but still... I can't help but feel a little uneasy.

I don't think I'm going to make any changes to this blog, not for the time being. I think the best policy is continue as I have been -- keep the content about current events and silly personal stories -- and keep the workplace strictly out of it. There's just a question of how far self-censorship goes; I think bloggers do need to take responsibility for what they post, but I also think there needs to be guidelines somewhere on what's acceptable and what's not.

What Mozilla needs

I may have totally missed where this feature is, but what Mozilla really needs is a place where you can go and cancel/delete your unsent messages. Right now, when I queue emails to be sent later, if for some reason they fail or I change my mind, I have no recourse to delete them. Either they all fail or they all go. As a result, I've sent some emails I didn't mean to -- for whatever reason -- and I also have emails queued up in my 'send later' folder that I no longer need to send later because I've already sent them. In theory, these 'unsent letters' should end up in the local folders, but that doesn't always happen (I don't know why). In the past, I think I've gotten around this problem by actually going into the program files and deleting out the unsent mail file; however, there has to be an easier, less techy way of dong this. Help?

Self-censorship

I'm incredibly giggly right now, but unfortunately, I can't tell you publicly why I'm so giggly because I have NO idea who's reading and I'd hate for the person who caused my giggles to stop by and think, "Oh no, she's laughing at me!" and get all upset. Really, what I should say is: I'm not laughing at you, I'm laughing because of you. THANKS, I needed that!

Good deed of the day

Bloggers of the world, help out a group of undergrads and take a survey. I think it's about ethics and blogging. My opinion: Ethics. Good to have 'em. Blogs? Can be a self-centered soapbox and as such, ethics and logic -- not always there.

The management needs you to know

I've been woefully irresponsible about updating the blog lately. There are two reasons for it. First, I realized I'm on the wrong side of the political aisle and hence, none of the opinions here are paid for by the DNC or the Kerry campaign and so I'm basically spouting propaganda for FREE. How wrong is that? Which leaves me two choices: continue to pontificate for FREE or head over to the White House and see if they have any opinions I can endorse; I'm a bargain too, I wouldn't ask for more than a thousand bucks or so. That's at least 10 times cheaper than anyone else out there shilling. Blogging would really be easier if I had a cat that I could post pictures of. Or a dog. Or a life. Either way, this blog would be WAY better with pictures.

Second, I have the sore throat from hell. It started innocuously enough last week as what seemed to be a mild cold and now it's like someone's not only dropped a bowling ball at the base of my throat, they took a razor to the inside of it too. And because I don't actually look sick, the throat obliges so when I speak, my voice comes out like a squeaky but fading blowhorn and each word hurts, so I've been reduced to croaking out monosyllables. So consider yourself warned: if you call, you will get NOTHING but heavy breathing. How's that for creepy?

Things that make me cringe

Is it just me but does anyone else know instinctively that when anyone on "American Idol" says they're going to sing a song by Whitney Houston that it's going to be bad? I mean, how many times really has there been a good rendition of a Whitney Houston song? It's a sign; 9.8 times out of 10, if you go in planning to sing "The Greatest Love of All", you're so not going to Hollywood. I'm just sayin'.

Correcting an oversight

I've been reading in various circles that certain people are unhappy that certain other people haven't celebrated the successful Iraqi elections properly and publicly. I apologize for this blog's oversight: I was consoling my car, which failed its very first state inspection on Saturday and wasn't able to blog. In a nutshell, I am very happy the elections came off relatively smoothly, that 57 percent of the population made it to the polls, and that for the first time in 50 years, Iraqis got to vote for their leaders. It's an impressive and historical milestone for the country and let's hope this is the first step in a journey to a true functioning democracy.

However, I take issue with people who take this election as a justification for what we're doing in Iraq. I do not believe this election validates two years worth of bad decisions. I do not believe you can say that the ends justify the means; if we cared so much about people voting and spreading democracy around the globe and saving lives, well, I've got a list of countries that could certainly use our help. I never agreed with the war in Iraq. I never agreed with the premise of why we were over there and I certainly didn't agree with how the invasion took place.

Then there was the 'bait and switch'; there were no WMDs and the war was sold on the presence of WMDs. This administration never took responsibility for the bad intelligence or bad decisionmaking. Would it have been so hard for George Bush to get up there and say, "I'm sorry. I made a mistake. I thought the weapons were there, but they weren't. But now we have to stay because I made a mistake and I need to fix it." Instead, we get this rhetoric about spreading the 'fire' of freedom across the Middle East and the elections, well, that's just the oil in the fire. Watch out, Iran, the flames are coming to you next!

So you see, I'm of two minds. The Iraqis have been freed from an oppressive and brutal dictator (I have always agreed, btw, that Saddam Hussein was a boogeyman of the very worst kind) and they are finally getting a taste of what it is like to have opportunity. But don't ask me to applaud the decision to go to war and don't call me a traitor for wanting to bring the troops home.

Comfort zone*

I try to blog daily, and some days, it's easier to come up with topics than others. On days like today though, I find it difficult to come up with a respectful transition from talking about tragedy -- whether it's the tsunami or the death of a friend or a concentration camp -- to something more light-hearted. Sometimes, I wonder if I should make this blog more one-note -- maybe a shrill liberal manifesto, or maybe I'll only talk about the things I did or link various interesting news items with no commentary whatsoever -- it would certainly make it easier to move from topic to topic without feeling I'm disrespecting the previous topic.

I blog on the fly -- a brain dump, if you will. The topic closest to my heart at the moment I sit down at the keyboard is what appears here. I'm not sure what people like to read here or what they prefer, but then again, this blog is all about ME -- the only place in the world where things can be all about ME. In other words, I'm just not sure how to handle the kinds of situations, but I think it's important to talk about the world, the things that happened, but at the same time realize that bad things happen and then it's okay to laugh.

* Freshness: canned

Never again

I took this picture at Dachau, a concentration camp outside of Munich, in the spring of 2002; it is a memorial to those who died here and elsewhere and the banner reads 'Never again' in four languages.

Even though it was my second trip to a concentration camp and even though I already knew what I was in for, I still was not prepared for the overwhelming echo of suffering, of pain, and horror that must have gone on here. Auschwitz was but one of many concentration camps set up by Nazi Germany and it is the most infamous for over a million people died -- mostly Jews -- died in the gas chambers or by other methods, some of which are too horrible to even contemplate.



It is not easy to visit a concentration camp and see how terrible human beings can be to each other, but I recommend it; only by walking on such ground can you truly feel the true enormity of what happened.

Et je suis revenue
Ainsi vous ne saviez pas,
vous,
qu'on revient de là-bas

On revient de là-bas
et même de plus loin

-- Charlotte Delbo

In memory

Today, I found out someone whom I had worked with in college passed away last spring. Casey Kane was 28 and even though I haven't spoken to her since a couple years after graduation, I'm shocked and very sad to hear the news. She was one of my fellow editors at the Collegian and in some ways, we 'grew up' together. She came on staff a semester after I did, but we became section editors around the same time, and we ended up on night staff around the same time. I was always impressed by Casey's gumption. She went for Sports -- the only female on the staff for quite a while and she handled those guys like a pro when she became editor of the section. Casey knew how to fill that newsroom with her presence and she was just an amazing person. It just doesn't seem right she's not here any more.

Nope, not the first

I'm always amused by articles about blogging these days -- about how blogging is changing the media, going after journalists, and what a radical departure and oh the power, the POWER of blogging. I always have such a She-Ra moment after reading about just how powerful bloggers are becoming, but I come quickly down to earth when I remember this blog's credo: there will be NO breaking news in this blog, no bringing down high ranking members of either media or administration because I only played a journalist at work, not at home.

Jessica sent me today's relevant link: Chill out, bloggers. The article in general is fun, but this line made me smile: The printing press gave Luther a way to distribute his thesis - an early version of blogging. Next thing, we had Protestants. Now that's power.

Queued Up

Today, I ran to the post office near my office for what I thought was a quick mailing of packages -- 10 minutes, roundtrip, I thought confidently. I'd be back before anyone realized I was gone. Ha! But this was before I got to the post office and realized that lunch at this particular banch was at THREE O'CLOCK. And so there was only one person at the counter, and about two people in line waiting. I hereby propose the following theory: one postal worker + limited amount of time + people who need to mail complicated packages = standing in a line for a very, very, very long time.

The lady who was first in line had a platinum blond rat-tail, close-cropped salt and pepper hair and platinum-hued bangs. She was wearing blue jeans, with a wee bit of thong showing, and a cotton shirt. She held three packages, none of them labeled or addressed. She wanted them to go to the Big City to the West and she wanted them there by Saturday. "Will it get there by Saturday?" she asked. The postman said yes, of course, probably in a couple days. And then she considered. "Do you deliver on Saturday?" And forgive me for my unkindness, but I remember thinking, as she juggled her various packages, "Oh my goodness, I'm standing behind the one woman in America who has never ever used the mail system at any time in her life." To her credit, she did step aside to actually label her packages, and then the next guy went and he was just holding about six or seven envelopes.

I let out a sigh of relief too early, because apparently this guy, well, he didn't label his envelopes properly and he actually had the address wrong on one of them (actually, it kind of scared me when the post man said he knew every street address in the city by heart. This is a city of THREE MILLION PEOPLE AND 80 GAZILLION HIGHWAYS -- I barely know the streets around my area, let alone in a city that's considered among the largest in America). And also, every single one of those envelopes needed to be insured and delivery-confirmation. When that was finally finished, the first lady came back with her packages and now, she wanted to send one of the three packages Cash on Delivery.

I didn't even know the post office still did COD. I don't think the postman knew about COD either, because he kind of looked at her and said, "Huh?" And the lady answered, "Well, I want the recipient to pay me for whatever it would have cost me to send this package." And the postman just kept staring at her. And the lady explained it again. She wanted to mail the package with the works apparently -- insurance, delivery confirmation, express mail -- and I kept staring at the package wondering how something so flat could be worth $100 worth of insurance ( The Scream would be worth more than $100, though I'm not particularly fond of the painting myself).

Meanwhile, the line behind me kept growing. I stared at the clock. I'd been at the post office now for nearly 20 minutes and the postman was sitting there figuring insurance and all the post office works by hand (on a pink sticky, as a matter of fact). When I turned around, I saw a woman with a few packages, all labeled in bright blue market on all sides "John Smith" -- and this made me smile because I assumed she was sending care packages to her son who had just returned to school after the winter holiday break. The guy behind me kept looking at the two packages I was holding and I showed him the front, just to assure him that I'd already addressed them and all I needed was the postage.

Finally, COD lady was done and it was my turn. I gave him the packages and said, "Media mail, please." The postman stuck the postage on the packages and said, "Anything else? Delivery confirmation? Insurance?" And he looked relieved, so very relieved, when I said, "No, thank you." I managed to walk out of the post office at a rather sedentary pace, but the minute I was out the door, I ran for it. Note to self: platform heels are not made for running.

When commutes go bad

So, here's the deal. I've changed my job but my door-to-door commute stays about the same: 15 minutes. This commute is even simpler than my previous one; I drive west two blocks and then north 15 blocks. Easy, yes? I go to work one way and come home the other way. The way to work passes below a railroad bridge, the way coming home, I drive over the railroad tracks. Today, there was a train stuck there just hanging out with absolutely no thought to the fact that it was 5 pm and I was starving because it had been approximately 30 seconds since I had last eaten. So I turned around and went down the side street I had NEVER been down before. Now, smart people would have said, "Why didn't you go home the way you came to work?" My excuse is that my blood sugar had dropped perciptiously in the 30 seconds since I'd last eaten and my brain had left my skull and had already hopscotched over the non-moving train, leaving just me -- brainless and hunger -- in my car.

So I drove down the side street and took the first major street south that I could. All was going well, until I realized I would have to actually veer East, because the road I wanted to continue on was, well like every other street in this city, under construction. I could still see downtown so I figured, "No big deal, I'll just go that way." Until I realized downtown was to the west of me and so I was officially East of Downtown (tm). Now, if this was a horror flick, this is where the ominous music would start playing and this is where you, the audience, would start screaming at the screen at me saying, "Turn around! Go away! Don't you know there's a GUY WITH A MASK BEHIND THAT DOOR?" But of course, as all heroines in any horror flick do, I kept going EAST OF DOWNTOWN (tm). Just to put this in perspective, I was last East of Downtown (tm) over a year ago, when I was brand new to the city. I headed that way to see a fellow fangirl and when I went to work the next day and revealed that to my co-workers, they were aghast.

"You went EAST OF DOWNTOWN? You're the first person who know who has gone and come back ALIVE."

I am NOT kidding about the all caps. The all caps are part of the experience. My co-workers than elicited a promise from me to never, ever go anywhere without checking with them first. And until today, I was very good. I never went past downtown and hung out in my own little neighborhood.

I started to minorly freak when I came across blocks and blocks dilapidated warehouses, hotels and an abandonned house that had the words "KEEP OUT" printed on the corrugated aluminum siding covering the doors; the words were orange and I knew, without a doubt, they were talking to me. Fortunately, the next block I saw the exit for one of the 80 gazillion highways that intersect this city and even though my goal in life other than never going EAST OF DOWNTOWN (TM) is to stay OFF the highways at all costs, I took it. Not only did I take one highway, I took a second highway after that and breathed a sigh of relief. I was finally, finally back into my neck of the woods. No bright orange signs telling me to keep out here!

However, highway number two had some kind of back-up on the eastbound lane, and remember, my brain had already gone home without me, so when I exited, instead the turning on the road I usually take to go home when my commute hasn't gone so wildly wrong, I was like, "Let me drive along the highway..." Ha. Everyone else wanted to drive along the highway too becuase they didn't want to be stuck ON the highway. So surprised was I by the traffic that I didn't even realize when I'd gotten into the WRONG LEFT TURN LANE. And because of all the traffic, no one would let me back into the lane I needed to be in. Keep in mind, folks, I'm literally a block away from my apartment at this point and I've driven on this road a gazillion times and yet I still got into the WRONG LEFT TURN LANE.

So I ended up behind the bread factory and couldn't figure out how to get out. So I saw a parking lot that seemed to lead out to the road that I had wanted to turn left onto in the first place. So, being the smart person I am, I drove across the rutted, gravel pot-holed parking lot and ended up staring at MORE TRAFFIC. A nice guy in an SUV let me through (Thank you, Nice Guy in SUV!) and then I somehow, my heart in my throat, managed to cross two more lanes so I could take a left turn. Just to keep all of this in perspective, the bread factory faces the road I actually live on. So the fact that I had to turn right, and then make a left turn was just another annoyance -- especially since I had to sit through two cycles of the light. And then, when I finally got myself in the right place, I couldn't take a left turn because cars were blocking the intersection and so I ended up doing another U-turn so I could turn on the opposite end of the street.

I finally got home around 5:45 -- a full 45 minutes after leaving my office which is 15 minutes away. You'll all be pleased to know my brain was here to greet me on my arrival. Also, moral of the story: shortcuts ALWAYS work against you. And now, I need a margarita. So, how was your day?

Tech schmuck

I've called my ISP twice over the weekend to ask why oh why can't I post to the newsgroups? I can download messages just fine, but no posting. The first guy I talked to on Saturday was like, "Huh, we have newsgroups?" Now, I know newsgroups aren't as cool as blogs or mailing lists, but they exist and for God's sake, if you're tech support at a company that offers newsgroup access, shouldn't you know what they are? I called again today and the tech I got knew what newsgroups were but then said, "Oh, you have the wrong news server. We changed it." So I changed it to the new news server as directed and that worked even less good than the old allegedly defunct one.

When in doubt, go with your gut. So I deleted my newsserver account, re-added the old allegedly defunct server, so I knew password info etc., was correct and then I re-subbed to my groups. I still couldn't post, even though I was able to download messages, so I turned off my pesky firewall -- to no avail. So I thought I'd give it one more try and voila -- I figured it out. Basically, because of the multiple accounts I've set up through Mozilla, I have two seemag1@yahoo.com identities -- and even though you might think all seemag1@yahoo.coms are created equal, they are not! There is the regular email account through Mozilla and then there's the newsgroup identity and they shall never meet. Basically, I was trying to post to the newsgroup using the email seemag1@yahoo.com instead of the newsgroup seemag1@yahoo.com and therein lies the problem.

Yeah, I don't get it either. I'm just glad I can finally post again.

Buried

I've finally emerged from the piles of laundry that threatened to overtake my apartment. The fact that my apartment is nearly 900 square feet and there was some article of clothing etc., on nearly every square foot means I spent most of my time jumping from place to place and wondering when on earth was I ever going to dig myself out. The laundry piles, which include bedding and towels from my family's visit last weekend, were literally everywhere and spilling out into the kitchen at one point (laundry room is off the kitchen; I'd have preferred it off the bathroom, but whatever).

In addition to the dirty laundry awaiting its turn in the washer/dryer, I also had clean clothes lying flat to dry. I'm pretty sure, given the sheer number of piles -- clean and dirty -- some stuff got done twice. Here's the moral of the story: do not wait until the very last minute to do laundry because then you end up wearing white socks with black pants to work and you will spend the entire day hoping no one will notice. Also, you will spend the entire evening hopscotching, because laundry does not do itself or put itself away.

Two things

First, it's cold here. Some of you may say I'm a wimp, because it's surely not as cold where I am as where you are. I'm just saying, the competitive advantage of this gym-sock smelly highway spaghetti bowl barking dog police infested road rage driving city is the weather and having had to wear gloves and my winter coat four days in a row now, well, I think the weather is falling down on the job.

Second, see elk, see dog see dog in elk. Thanks to Rocky for the link.

Who's afraid of the big bad wolf?

Liberal bias in the media is one thing, but a lot of people complain about liberalism on college campuses as well. I've never actually understood the latter, because I believe if you have solid logic and reason for what you believe in, then the professor's bias should have no bearing on the way you think. Is it uncomfortable to hear your point of view assailed or questioned? Sure it is. And I admit, it's not easy spending your time with people who hold views that are polar opposites of your own. When I ended up on easily one of the most conservative campuses in America for my grad school, people were amazed. "Why would you go there? They will eat you alive!" was a common refrain, along with, "There is nothing to do in that town except drink." (BTW, this town is also where I developed a true appreciation for eating burritos the size of my head).

I kept my politics mostly to myself during the two years I was there. It was not easy to say no when a classmate kept asking me money for an anti-abortion group and it was certainly not easy to sit there when a professor harangued 'tree huggers' for nearly 10 minutes in the middle of what I thought was international marketing (not to mention, his endless tales about buying an oriental rug in Turkey. Please). Most of this stuff just rolled off my back because honestly, it was part of the learning experience. Annoying, yes, but it's always good to at least acknowledge there are other points of view out there. I think what got me was when I was shot down for expressing my view that the war in Iraq was a bad thing. There were only five or six of us in the class who were brave enough to say anything and the reaction was amazing and swift, because choosing to question the President's policy in itself was treason.

To me, that's the sad part of all of this polarization. People talk about bias, whether in media or on campuses, as if one opinion is the One True Way (tm) and there's no room for any other ideas. It's almost as if we think we'll be 'polluted' if we even come in contact with the other side and heaven forbid if we should ever be in a situation where we're forced to confront and examine our own beliefs.

Thoughts on the media

Kizmet made a comment here, and I'm responding here, because it's easier for me to think out of the comment box. I thought her comments on the integrity of news reporting and the validity of reporting were interesting. I think it goes without saying this is a liberal blog (g), and my second bias, which most of you don't know about is my strange affection for Dan Rather on the basis that I think he looks like my dad -- even though no one else thinks this. I've always watched Dan Rather because of that; so now you know -- I'm totally shallow about the way I chose my news media.

I used to be a journalist in a past life, so I understand just how important it is to hold on to your integrity and make sure you're reporting the facts. I am not saying in any way that Dan Rather and CBS didn't make a huge mistake in putting this story on the air and people got fired or resigned (and I believe Rather's departure in the spring is related to this story as well, no matter what CBS et al say). Still, CBS isn't the only organization to get their facts wrong -- it happens every single day in every single media because in the end, regardless of bias, media organizations are still human. I understand what feels like to think you have a scoop in your hand, the big story, and the adrenaline -- the idea you have something no one else has and what it will mean when you spill the news. It's a fast-paced environment and you have to run with it, because after all, being first to the wire can often be your media's selling point.

The report on the story from an independent panel says there was no political motivation behind the report, just the aforementioned adrenaline rush. Of course, there is no way any pro-Bush supporter (which I am not, obviously) will believe this. Just like no pro-Kerry supporter (like I was, obviously) will ever believe the Swiftboat Veterans for the Truth was anything but politically motivated.

Which, in the end, still does not excuse the media's softness on Iraq and the lack of WMDs. If the media is truly the watchdog it is, it should have gone after the administration harder, questioned harder about why we were over there; human lives ought to not have bias of any kind. The media's softness is one reason why so many people still believe Iraq was behind 9/11 -- before this war, no American had died at the hands of an Iraqi.

But here's the thing -- it doesn't matter who reports what or how often, because we, as consumers of media, will always take our information from sources we inherently agree with. We liberals (me included) will always read and believe Newsweek and the NY Times and we'll running screaming from the likes of Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, etc., and the conservatives will always stick with FOX News and believe that Dan Rather et al are out to get the President. Just like there's no freedom of speech, there's no unbiased media. If CBS has to take hits for left bias, it's only fair FOX News be held accountable for its conservative slant.

On a lighter note, I am also heartily sick of the Aniston-Pitt marriage collapse. You know the media's gone overboard when there are now stories appearing talking about just how many stories were put on the break-up. If there was anything to knock a human tragedy on the scale of the tsunami off the front page, you know it'd have to be something with the far reaching consequences of Yet Another Hollywood Marriage Going Bust (tm). ::snore::

Also, did you all hear me squee last night? Michelle Kwan wins record-tying ninth title.

Happy birthday

The blog is four years old today. Here's the very first post.

Friday Round-Up

I have neglected to mention the so-called DeLay Rule has been repealed. It hurts me, readers, to have to mention something positive in conjunction with Tom DeLay's name, but I must, in the interests of being fair and balanced.

Also, most bloggers aren't journalists. My career as a professional journalist with Very Big Publishing Company nothwithstanding, what goes into this blog is very different than what I did on the job. Writing about one's cooking disasters or what one did all day does not a journalist make. Bloggers may be the brave new frontier, but do not discount the expertise and professionalism of journalists; there is still much to learn.

If the whole deal with private accounts and Social Security is Greek to you, check this artcle out; it's very informative and gives examples of exactly what it means if Social Security is privatized. Either way, fellow Gen Xers, we're out of luck.

The liberal media has fallen down on the job and failed to run with the utter lack of WMDs in Iraq. It boggles my mind how the fact these weapons haven't existed for decade or so and yet no one cares, despite that it was the flat-out insistence on the presence of WMDs that started the Iraqi war, which has cost countless lives. Yet, the so-called liberal media is falling all over itself to chastise one of its own -- Dan Rather. Dan Rather or no WMDs -- which is more important?

'Creationism' is now masquerading under the name of 'intelligent-design'. I have no problem if people prefer creationism over evolution; I understand it's a religious viewpoint. But because it is a religious viewpoint, it has no place in public schools. It can be taught at home or in a church. However, these days 'intelligent-design' is starting to gain foothold across America. It should come as no surprise I believe very strongly in evolution, for the science is indisputable. But don't take my word for it; National Geographic had a superb article not too long ago titled Was Darwin Wrong? The answer is 'no', and the magazine does a wonderful job of setting out the facts in a clear and articulate way. You have to subscribe to the magazine to read the whole article, but it's really worth it.

Places to go, things to read

I came across an article titled The Myth of Peak Oil today and it's long, but good and fairly easy to understand, even if you have absolutely no idea of how the markets work (or too much knowledge, as the case might be). I enjoyed the underlying cynical humor. To wit:

I doubt very seriously anyone at Exxon called the White House and said "invade Iraq for us so we can get exploration and production contracts." If there were commercial quantities of oil in Hell, Exxon executives would not call God and demand regime change. They would buy an extremely nice lunch for the Devil, and they would talk contract and concession terms.

That pesky First Amendment

Some of the bloggers who have 'signed' the Bloggers Bill of Rights have done so because they are concerned about their right to freedom of speech. Let's make one thing totally and perfectly clear: there is no such thing as freedom of speech, or at least not in the way most people want to think about it. People have the right to talk as freely as they want in the United States -- it's the consequences of that speech people don't want to deal with. People only talk about losing their 'freedom of speech' when they say something and as a result, there are consequences -- such as getting fired for blogging about your job, for instance.

When fanfiction.net stopped accepting NC-17/R fics a few years ago, people started saying their 'freedom of speech' had been taken away. No one stopped to think for a moment that fanfiction.net is a private enterprise and Xing, the webmaster, gets to make rules about what he will allow on his server. As a private citizen, he can do that, because see, the First Amendment refers to government, not to the private sector. It's like private organizations -- like say, the Boy Scouts or golf courses -- which can make legal decisions to restrict membership to homosexuals or African-Americans or women because they are private.

It comes down to this: your speech is 'free' as long as no one pays attention and no one cares. Once the words are out there, though, anything goes.

* Generically and generally speaking

Blogger Bill of Rights

The Queen of the Sky (aka the Delta Flight Attendant who got fired from her job for blogging pictures of herself; you can read it yourself here) has proposed a Bloggers' Rights bill. Lots of people are jumping on the proverbial bandwagon to sign up and you'd think my bleeding liberal lovin' heart would be right there too. But, believe it or not, I disagree about the whole idea of bloggers having special rights of free speech.

Here's the thing. When you choose to blog, you choose to become a public person. When you choose to blog, then you have to choose what you will or will not make public. The people in your life, they may or may not choose to go public with you and that's their right and ought to be respected. The same applies for the company you work for. Whether you name the company outright or not, whether you talk about your co-workers in a public forum or not, you take the risk of getting disciplined for what you say.

A company's reputation, the reputation of its workers, those are intangible assets that must be protected at all costs -- even if you think the information is only going out to a handful of people, it's still out there for the world to see. You can't just go around talking about the company anyway you want; when I was working for Very Big Insurance Company and Very Big Publishing Company (neither of whom can fire me now, btw, since I'm already gone), we had strict guidelines on who we could talk to and what we could say. When in doubt, transfer to PR. So even on company time and in company atmosphere, I couldn't speak freely about company affairs, so why is it any different on the internet?

If I chose to blog about people and company in an unflattering way in this here blog and my supervisor found out about it, yes, I would expect disciplinary action of some kind. See, here's the thing, as bloggers, we control what we write about, we control how we write about it, and we control who sees it.

Employment is 'at will'; you don't have a 'right' to a job. You are able to leave at any time, your company is allowed to let you go at any time. That's how it works and unless you're a whistle-blower or otherwise protected by the EEOC, bloggers aren't a protected class of citizen and given the amount of freedom bloggers have inherently over their actions, I don't think they ought to be. Instead, I take the responsibility on myself to watch what I say about people or the company I work for.

Discretion may feel overrated in the anonymous, "let it all hang out" blogosphere, but seriously: Don't. Blog. About. Work. If you can't take precautions to screen your audience, keep your writings away from the general public, then don't do it. It's seriously that easy. See, the company has to look out for itself, and the company can easily say, "I have a right to not be talked about on the Internet in a way that's not approved by my PR department and is not put out by our PR people." And let's make one thing totally clear: you don't get fired for the actual act of blogging, you get fired for what you blog. Big difference.

A fiver

1. Describe the condition of your keyboard:

Good condition, though some letters, namely the 'S' and 'A' seems to be fading with time. Also, after three years, lots of dust and crumbs have accumulated as well.

2. Can you sing, or are you always out of key?

Always and atrociously out of key. Singing is for the car. It'd be for the shower too, if my shower didn't jut up against someone else's apartment. I would never willfully inflict my singing on anyone, except if you're my brother, in which case, I'll sing at the top of my lungs.

3. What keys do you carry with you?

Car keys, mailbox key, apartment key and that's it. I have lots and lots of keychains though, all hooked up together. It's a little scary. My keychain includes: a flashlight, a 'one year anniversary' keychain from Very Big Insurance Company, and a rubber keychain with my insurance agent's info on it.

4. What is the key to personal happiness?

Being comfortable with who you are and where you are in life, and accepting you can't always control the outcome of things, and to always be the best person you can be and to give, freely and unconditionally, without expection of personal reward in return, at all times. Okay, so that's many keys, but I believe you can't be happy without the above. I'm still working on all of them.

5. What gets you keyed up?

Inconsideration. It's one thing if you don't know you're being rude or obnoxious; it's another thing if you know and you still keep doing it.

Hmmm...

I'm sitting here debating about dinner. Not that there's much to debate -- either eat the 'boring' stuff in my fridge (which needs to be whipped together still, btw) or go out and make like cavewoman and hunt and forage, but of course, in 21st century style, namely in my car, with real clothes -- not bear skins -- on and shoes. The shoes are extremely important. You can't hunt or forage these days without shoes. Or a shirt for that matter. Pants, those are optional, apparently.

When I was driving home, I saw an SUV with a John Kerry sticker on it. It amazes me that I still see John Kerry stickers in this red city in this red state. If mine hadn't gotten stolen two days before the election, I would have ripped it off anyway come the concession; my loyalty, apparently, doesn't extend past defeat. But I admire the people who are still driving, proudly, with their John Kerry bumpersticker. It makes me want to go buy a third one (pay for the Ohio recount, hmmm, maybe?) just so I can say, "I'm one of you."

In other news, 30 percent of Americans gave tsunami aid and you go to the polls with the country you have.

Places to go

Check out this really cool archive site. Enjoy :-)

Seema-isms

I not only typo when I'm, y'know, typing, but I also typo when I'm talking. Today, I said, "It's five miles as the pigeon flies." At least I'm putting an original twist on my cliches!

The blog year in review

This was the year of exploding eggs and charcoal pancakes, IKEA and the futon, and politics of a very liberal flavor. This was also the year the blog got a CSS facelift, making it pretty much the only CSS page on my site. This was also the year I ventured out and added new blogs to my sidebar -- places to go, people to read -- and in 2005, there will be still more blogs to add. This was also the first year I made an attempt to blog every single day, though I didn't always hit the mark. Thanks to improvements at blogger itself, I was able to 'can' posts in advance and always have something on hand when inspiration didn't strike.

I want to thank everyone who stops and reads and leaves comments or sends email. My resolution for 2005 is "more of the same," though the politics will be not as much. I can't promise no politics at all, but I will try to keep it light and funny, as much as I can. Thanks!