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Month: October 2006

i ain't no dave barry

i ain't no dave barry

i love halloween. it is quite possibly my favorite holiday because it gives a person the chance to be someone/thing they aren’t for the day. it’s also the culmination of my favorite season. oh, and there’s the whole mysterious druid background. i like that too.
growing up in the country was difficult for halloween. there was the year i was 5; i was raggedy ann and my cousin took me to the mall (which was the motherload of candy handouts), but other than that year, candy pickings were rather sparse. there were people across the street and down the road, but nothing like urban neighborhoods.
so every year there would be pumpkin carving, and you can tell a wallace pumpkin carving from a mile away. my dad pulled out the huge, blackened knife that he used for slicing meat to do the carving of the pumpkin meat. first the hole in the top, with one awkward side to make sure it stayed put, then pulled out the innards. after all the stringy, goopy insides were safely in an ice cream bucket, face carving commenced. triangles for eyes, a triangle for a nose, and the toothy grin with 2 teeth on the top and 3 on the bottom. classic.
the pumpkins went down on the fenceposts at the end of our long driveway to let the 5 trick-or-treaters who came to our house know that we were, in fact, handing out candy and to make the long trek to the top.
after supper, we donned our costumes and set out, parentless, to the surrounding houses. there were always the petersons, the other petersons, the rushes (?), and a lot of other people. some neighbors invited us into their homes and gave us whole sacks of candy because there were only 10 kids or so who would trick or treat.
we trudged home in our costumes with our bounty, trick-or-treated one last time at our house to see if mom recognized us, and dumped out the candy and traded.
but the best was yet to come.
dad pulled out his dusty donald duck comicbook collection from the back corner of the hutch. the box was old, it smelled of must, but the comicbooks in there i’m sure are today worth thousands.
and he always pulled out the halloween special comic about donald, his nephews, and how they tricked witch hazel (yes, she was a witch and her name was hazel) and her crafty broom into leaving their candy alone. disney also made a cartoon of this comic, and it had a catchy little tune – trick-or-treat…trick-or-treat…trick-or-treat for halloween – which they always showedon tv on halloween along with the legend of ichabob crane and the scary night on bald mountain from fantasia (is it just me, or are there less and less holiday cartoons on these days?).
but halloween was not complete without the donald duck comic, read craftily by our dad, which was then carefully placed back in the box to be kept there until the next halloween, after pumpkin carving and trick-or-treating, when we would once again sing: trick-or-treat…trick-or-treat…trick-or-treat for halloween!

it's that time again

it's that time again

to vote! in a week, the polls will be open, and you, yes YOU will be expected to do your civic duty! so vote!
now, for those of you in MN who think you’re like-minded with me, i have done some research on the gubernatorial race (that’s governor to you). i think pawlenty slashed way too much, and mike hatch has some flip-flopping issues that he needs to deal with (not to mention his position on video games).
so, i’m voting independent.
peter hutchinson is the independent candidate for governor, and here’s what i especially like about him:
“Politics is broken by close-minded partisanship that has paralyzed our government. Most partisan politicians say they are ‘for’ schools, roads, health care or the environment but focus their energies on the threat posed by the ‘other side’ on the 5Gs: guns, gays, God, gambling, and gynecology. On every issue, and especially the 5Gs, the partisan extremes have made enemies of those they disagree with. They have used fear to divide us from our friends, neighbors and community. As a result we have lost sight of the common sense core that connects us. We have been voting our fears and are only more afraid. It’s time to claim our independence from close-minded politics and fear.”
not only that, BUT, he has a plan for the issues that he does think are important. at the bottom of each of his “issues” pages, there is a link to a PDF with a plan. now that’s a guy i can vote for.

another explanation

another explanation

this one is more related to what’s going on!
TORNADOS : Hurricanes can be symbolic of extreme stress in your life and an inability to relax. The skies in dreams generally link to the future and the possibility of change. So if they are disturbed then there is no clear outlook for how things will be. But tornados may symbolise lots of things. They may link to bad things that are about to happen and problems that you are anticipating. [KEY WORDS : Uncertain, unforeseen,changes, weather forecast, stress]
seeing’s how in 2 months i have NO IDEA what’s going on, jobwise, this might be it!

dreams

dreams

i just woke up from a nap and another tornado dream.
i have a LOT of dreams about tornadoes. they are always close, always deadly looking. another thing about them is that i am ALWAYS with immediate family doing family things. i have never had one with nate in it or friends. if other people are in the dream, they all leave by the time the tornado comes around. and the tornado never gets me or anyone else i know in the dream.
one time it was in the red house (austin house) with my family, even though we hadn’t lived there in a long time. another couple times it was in the new london house, and one of them the tornado went right past the living room window! scary! always with something intrinsically familial and familiar.
the one i just woke up from we were camping, of all things, but we were all discombobulated. it was me, jane, charlie and dad, and we set up our tents, but they were about 20 miles from the city we were visiting. liz was in indiana, and mom was coming the next day because she was working, erous “storms” that one needs to shelter oneself from. Does this make sense?
Because the dream started when you were very young – you may also want to think back to the age when they began – and try to recall what was occurring in your family life and childhood at the time. If you grew up in an insecure environment, you may have feared that you would be “swept away” from your family – or conversely – that one of your family members would be swept away from you.”
both those emotions i have never felt with my immediate family, so i don’t know how to interpret them.

a little commentary

a little commentary

http://news.yahoo.com/s/thenation/20061025/cm_thenation/1131964
taken from the above article
michael j fox is appearing in commercials for democratic senate potentials that promote embryonic stem cell research because he’s got parkinson’s disease, and one of the theories is that stem cell research will hopefully provide answers and solutions to not only parkinson’s, but alzheimer’s and other diseases.
so, in response:
“Rush Limbaugh and other right-wing commentators who once trashed Wellstone are now attacking Fox. Limbaugh has gone so far as to claim that the actor “is exaggerating the effects of the disease,” while claiming that the commercials are “purely an act.”
why on earth would anyone exaggerate the effects of parkinson’s. limbaugh has obviously never met a person with parkinson’s disease. my aunt colette has parkinson’s and without her pills, the disease just takes over: her limbs flail about and her mental capabilities just aren’t all there. even with her pills she has these problems. it slowly eats at the mind, and people around the afflicted suffer as well, watching this disease take over a life.
anyone questioning the effects of a disease needs to have their head examined and needs to spend a day in a nursing home or home care situation.

next two manic weeks

next two manic weeks

i got my final exam paper topics on monday. i have books and stuff for one of the three questions. i have to finish all three papers in the next three days.
why?
of course, everything i could have possibly scheduled is scheduled in the next two weeks. next weekend is flogging molly. my tuesdays are absolutely full to the gills. next monday (not this monday), when the papers are due, i have an interview in white bear lake. today i drove to marshall for a secret shopper (worth $100!!!), and that took all day. so, in the next three days, i must find 30+ sources and write 18-24 pages of crapola.
YAY! (/sarcasm)
the end is in sight….i can see it. 🙂

shameless plug

shameless plug

clicky clicky!
it’s time for christmas shopping almost!
and if you or anyone you know has someone on an xmas list who likes famous art (or, unfamous art even), go check out my link. those are the pics that i have in my house waiting to be not in my house (i.e. sold).
/shameless plug

another topic

another topic

These are the best kind of books.
New books are nice. You walk into the bookstore, all ready to buy a book that you’ve been thinking about the whole way there. Maybe you know what you’re going to get; maybe you don’t know. You walk into the bookstore and already you’re at ease. You become completely relaxed because the one thing you can totally rely on to be there in times of need, surrounds you.
Maybe you walk to the history section, the fiction, the cookbooks, the maps, the tech, the mental health, and the religious, whatever. You know what your mood is wanting. The rows of books await you. You slide your fingers along the spines, some shiny red, matte black, white letters jumping out, calling your name to read them. After minutes of poring over titles, authors, jacket flaps, you decide on a book. Perhaps you’re finished. Perhaps you go to another section and find something else.
You walk to the counter with your prize in hand; there is nothing like acquiring a book. New, used, falling apart, borrowed, the feeling is the same. It’s an anticipation of filling your head with something new.
The bag is crisp and you grab the handle, walking out of the bookstore with confidence that you’ve chosen correctly.
That night, you open the book. Its pages are full of words waiting to be read. It smells like paper – new, old, musty, crisp. However it smelled before, it now smells like book.
You read it and you love it. You read it again. And again. You decide that you don’t need a bookmark and start dog-earing the pages, or you turn the jacket flap in to mark your spot so many times that the edges become ragged. Something strikes your eye and you make a note with your pencil; it’s your book! You can do it! It’s so well read you know the story by heart, and still you read it often.
Soon it’s falling apart. Pages are accidentally ripped out from when you jumped off the bed when the cat shoved her claws in your thigh. Once while reading it at the table, you spilled hot chocolate on the pages. You’ve read it so many times, that there are dog-ears on every other page. You forgot it on the porch railing one evening and it rained that night, then the next day you left it in the sun to dry, and its pages got all crinkly.
But you can’t throw out a perfectly good book. It’s a travesty to throw out a book. It’s wasteful and shameful and honestly, abhorrent – you don’t throw out a friend. So instead, you place it on your bookshelf in a spot of honor. You know that it will be worth something to someone eventually. They will read your notes and become enlightened; they will see the coffee stains and realize this book was loved with a passion. But you don’t want it to die.
So you go to the bookstore again, and you walk carefully to the aisle you purchased your first copy in. you stare at the spine, knowing that you are replacing a friend. Maybe to help, you buy a paperback instead of a hardcover, a 10×7 instead of a 6×4. You grab the copy quickly to ease the pain and scurry out of the bookstore, hoping no one will see how anguished you are at buying a book.
Every time you read your new copy, you glance at the old one, resting, peacefully retired on the bookshelf. Its spine watches you softly as you start the process all over again.

lottery

lottery

in the past 10 years, i have bought maybe 5 scratch tickets. i bought one tonight and won $25! i was impressed!
today i took picture of angie and chad for their engagement announcements and stuff. i was really pleased with how they turned out! of course some of them are doofs and they have eyes half closed or weird looks on their faces, but i was really happy with how they turned out overall.
here they are:
PICS
nate says i should put a wordmark on the pics when i get them printed…