Some Pig

Requiem For A Man-Child

When I was a kid in the 70's, all my parents listened to was public radio.  I knew Robert J. Lurtsema's sonorous baritone well before I knew about Top 40 radio.  I had to go over to my best friend Kari's house to listen to WIGY on the clock radio (the kind that had the numbers written on flaps that flipped over every minute with a definitive snap) or to her big sister Kelli's record albums.  That's how I became familiar with ABC, 1, 2, 3 and Rockin' Robin and the other Jackson 5 hits.

When I was a preteen in dance class, we did cross-floor moves to Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough and Workin' Day and Night.  Years later I sampled a couple bars of the latter for my JV cheerleaders' competition dance routine.

I was a sophomore in high school when Thriller went supernova.  Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Prince presented an alternative version of pop culture in a corner of the world that had previously been much more aligned with Foghat, Bad Company, and Lynyrd Skynryd.  They were an urbane, edgy, and glamorous presence on MTV and Friday Night Videos, and I loved every minute of watching them.  One kid in my class even wore one glittery glove to prom, and if you don't think that took huge cojones in rural Maine, circa mid-80's, think again.

I rolled my eyes in college when Michael Jackson tried to protest in that sweet, high tenor that he was really, really Bad.  MTV stopped showing videos, Nirvana and Pearl Jam made rain-soaked, plaid-shirted West Coast ennui cool, and Michael Jackson became increasingly known for his eccentric behavior and appearance as he retreated farther and farther into a world of his own making.

In wedding reception after wedding reception in my 20's and early 30's, white people danced awkwardly and enthusiastically to the old Jackson 5 hits.  They were songs the DJs knew would get people my age up and dancing without offending the older generation.

I started coaching cheerleading.  Michael Jackson only made the news when he did something weird or was brought to court, while I tried to teach the girls to mimic the sharp-yet-fluid, totally synchronized dance style he made famous (with widely varying degrees of success). 

I was at home on the porch when my coworker (who was in eighth grade the year I started teaching) texted me the news that Michael Jackson had died.  Thriller came out literally a lifetime ago.  The Jackson Five were long ago consigned to the oldies stations.  Shawn Johnson danced to PYT on Dancing With the Stars last season.  And Michael Jackson had been working long, hard hours to prepare for a tour he was hoping would bring him back to relevance.

I know many people will say he died too soon, too young, tragically.  I hesitate to say that.  For this man-child, the boy who performed like an adult and the man who hid behind the mask of childhood, I wonder if this isn't the kindest outcome.  The consummate performer and artist always was an enigma as a person, unreachable behind the sunglasses on his increasingly altered face.  Some part of him seemed forever trapped in his heyday, longing to return to that time period.  We all know people like that, people for whom high school or college was the apogee of their experience and who struggle to recapture that part of their lives until you become embarrassed for them.  It's sad enough to witness in your high school classmate who can't get over not being in the popular crowd anymore; it was tragic watching Michael Jackson do it for so many years.

I feel sad for his children.  Their existence can't be an easy one to begin with, and now they have lost the central parent figure in their lives. 

I feel sad for his family, many of whom went on their own strange tangents as well.  Fame ultimately was not kind to them on the whole.

I feel sad for my generation.  We stand on the cusp between young and no-longer-young, and, as much as I would never go back nor give up anything I have, loss of youth is always a melancholy thing.

I wish peace for Michael Jackson, who looked to be such a lonely and ultimately solitary soul.  Whatever troubles or struggles he knew in this life are behind him now. 

He stood with one foot in our past, the past that included the hit-making machine of Motown and disco beats and 8-track tapes, and one foot in the first days of globalized, visually-based, 24-hour information and entertainment.  Whatever else he may have done, perhaps his most lasting legacy is that he both witnessed and helped to usher in this era.

So long and farewell, Michael.  So long and farewell.

Fashion Distraction, Winter Edition

Those of you SP readers with long memories may remember a public-relations kerfuffle a few years ago involving the first President Bush (motto:  Looking better by comparison to the other Bush presidency all the time!).  The brouhaha revolved around Bush pater and mater claiming their legal residence as an anonymous hotel in Houston for tax purposes when the only residence they owned was the family compound at Walker's Point in Kennebunkport. So the question arose, Are the Bushes considered Texans or Mainers?  Steak or lobstah?  Rodeos or the Fryeburg Fair?  Tall tales or Yankee reticence? 

Well, after many years and several subsequent presidencies, I finally have an answer.  Bush pere is clearly much more aligned with New England than the Lone Star state.  How do I know?  Well, I have photographic evidence.  I couldn't figure out how to save a screen shot of this, but I was able to link to it here. I'll wait while you take a look, then meet me back here.

So, did you notice what I meant?  I'll give you a hint:  It has to do with the thing that looks like a large, dead wolverine perched smack dab atop George 41's head.  Yep, on that most significant day in our nation's history, the former leader of the free world was wearing - an ear-flap cap.  Millions of eyes the world around are trained on that stage, and George Herbert Walker Bush looks like he bought it when he saw it at Marden's (That phrase may be meaningless to those of you who live south of the Piscataqua Bridge, but trust me, it resonates for us.).  From the neck up, he could have been going to the inauguration or down to the Paris Farmers Union for some more rock salt, there's no telling which.  And that is proof positive the Maine ethos is lodged deep in his soul.  Jeezis, it's cold as a bahstid up theyah on that stage in Janu'ry; no point gettin' the pee-neumonia just 'cause a buncha them teevee peoples are lookin' atcha, is theyah?

To elaborate:  Living through winters in Maine deprives one of all concerns for fashion, style, or even general aesthetic sensibility when it comes to outerwear.  The point of one's outer garments is to keep the elements far, far away, and if something works, form comes way, waaaaay behind function in priority.  This is why I continue to wear my shapeless, dorky, and totally unflattering winter hat even though it resembles (as I have already mentioned) a large gray fleece marshmallow and makes me look like a 'tard. (Sorry, all you politically-correct-type peoples.  There's just no other way to describe the total effect and do it justice.) (Oh, excuse me - to stay true to my roots, I'd have to say "it makes me look like a wicked 'tard."  My oversight.)  This is why, when I am fully decked out in all my winter gear, I can safely say that not one item coordinates even slightly with any other item.  It is also why, now that India's choice of accessories is under my purview, I am bringing her up to follow in my aesthetically uncoordinated footsteps. Just recently she was rocking a pair of red and white striped gloves with her pale lavender coat, navy snowpants, a pink fleece hat, and bright-purple-and-black boots.  Celeste, on the other hand, often looks like she stepped out of a winter-wear catalogue (courtesy of the gp's largesse), but soon I will have her mixing and mis-matching with the best of them.

Now that I am older and wiser and possessed of disposable income, I suppose I could make more of an effort to present a coordinated front, but some part of me just won't do it.  There's a small, stubborn spark of New England Calvinism in me that sees such efforts as wasteful or show-off-y.  After all, if it's dry and warm and keeps the snow out, that should be good enough, right? And given that this winter has been, in the words of a friend of mine, "relentless," there will be many more opportunities for me to look completely devoid of fashion sense in the near future.  That ear-flap cap may not be such a bad idea!

P.S. That Maine sense of, um, eclecticism isn't limited to outwear.  I ask you, what's an appropriate outfit to wear to a second wedding taking place in the early afternoon?  Apparently the answer is, anything from jeans and a oxford shirt with your favorite baseball cap to a long velvet evening gown and all points in between, ranging from a black cocktail dress trimmed with electric green to a sweater and khakis.  Gotta love a place where you can point to what you are wearing and call it your "best dressy T-shirt" with a straight face, which is how one man of my acquaintance identified his clothes.  A former principal of mine tells a story of going to a wedding in Brownsville Junction, to which she wore a pantsuit she often wore to work.  In her words, "I was dressier than anyone else in the place, including the bride." 

Toasty Sent Me

FIVE DAYS TO GO!!!
Damn, but I get the shivers. Every. Single. Time.

Strange Days Indeed

I never thought I'd see the day when my opinions would be simpatico with those of Mitt Romney. But in this case, they are.

Keep your eyes peeled.  I expect pigs to fly and fish to ride bicycles any minute now.

What Didn't Happen Today

I think it's important for all of us to note, whether we be Dems, Republicans, independents, PUMAs, Naderites, Trotskyites, McCainiacs or Obamabots, just what is so remarkable about the American election process.

Yesterday, people all across the country went out and voted.  Yes, there were issues, such as hacked emails and ballot readers that didn't work and various and sundry lawsuits threatened in the offing - but they affected only a small percentage of the total electorate when you look at the numbers (I'm not saying any issues are acceptable, I'm just saying the issues were negligible comparatively speaking).  The votes were tallied and reported, and even though the MSM is too eager to prognosticate the outcome and jumps the gun rather too often, the final vote count so far supports the conclusions reported last night.  One candidate lost, and he admitted as such.  One candidate won, and was accepted as such. 

Now here's the borderline-miraculous part:  There were no bloody riots. There was no widescale looting or pillaging or destruction.  Seventy-four days from now, the current resident of the White House will be finished with his term of service.  Presumably there will not be a coup d'etat betweentimes, and a new resident of the White House will take his place.  And life will continue on for us all, Luddites and technophiles, boxers and briefs, standard and automatic alike. 

Lest we forget, the idea that power could be held outside a single person, to be transferred peacefully from one individual to another, particularly when those individuals do not hold the same philosophies - well, that idea was so revolutionary at its inception as to be thought laughable.  When this neophyte country first put that "Constitution" of theirs into practice, the established nation-states of Europe waited gleefully for the grand experiment to fail, for the people to awake to chaos and confusion and beg for a global power - any power - to step in, set things to rights, and not incidentally to take over the resources and manpower available in the new and growing land.  Much to their surprise (and subsequent annoyance), the nascent nation stubbornly refused to descend into anarchy.  This so irritated the global superpower of the time that Great Britain eventually lost patience with waiting for the inevitable and tried to force the issue, resulting in the War of 1812.

For many years after that, conventional wisdom held that a system involving transfer of power would never last.  After all, George Washington was a brilliant leader and outstanding statesman, so of course the US would hold together under his rule, but no one else's.  Then Adams and Jefferson and Madison and Monroe followed, but they were all founders, and surely once their generation passed the system would collapse on itself.  Then a son of a founder was followed by the first "man of the people" who was neither a founder nor a direct descendant of one, and by that time the ideas of separation of powers, of divided leadership, of checks and balances were so well-established that they ceased to be novelties.

Now consider the rest of the world.  Think about Mugabe, that corrupt asshat in Zimbabwe who had his opposition arrested and accused of murder, then promised to agree to a "powersharing" agreement, and finally simply refused to relinquish power.  Look at Castro, who led a revolution and wound up liking power so much he stuck around.  Look at any number of tin-pot dictators, corrupt oligarchs, party apparatchiks, and ideologues currently and formerly active on the world stage.  Then think about our system:  As corrupt, venal, hidebound, money-driven, and superficial as our government is, it is a model of transparency, openness, and accessibility compared to most of the others.  This is why I agree totally and absolutely with Winston Churchill's view of our governing philosophy, to wit:

"Many forms of government have been tried and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried from time to time."

A Little Greyer

If you're alive enough to be fogging up a mirror, you know that Paul Newman died this weekend.

I can't claim to be Newman's greatest fan (tho' I do loves me his Fig Newmans!), but I became very fond of him after I heard this anecdote.  So here is my Paul Newman story.  Be forewarned:  It's not much - but sometimes it's the little things that you remember.

I went to UConn for grad school, not far from one of Newman's Hole In The Wall Gang summer camps.  These camps are one of his many charities, and they offer camping to children who are critically ill.  I think, if my memory isn't too faulty, that this campus also offered outdoor ed to disadvantaged kids (e.g., Hartford inner city) of any ilk, but I could be wrong.  Anyroad, the camp offered more than just capture-the-flag and s'mores.  Their nature-based curriculum was extensive, to the point where the camp had a placement for a student teacher in the sciences to do experiential stuff with kids who probably hadn't ever seen anything more nature-based than dandelions in the cracks of the sidewalks.

We were trading war stories about student teaching one night, as new teachers are wont to do.  The kid placed at the camp (yeah, kid - maybe 22 years old?) told us that as he was in the middle of opening a lesson, Newman himself wandered in and sat down.  Everyone introduced themselves, and he said, "Hey, I'm Paul" - no "Mr. Newman," no attempt to raise the fact that he was the one paying for all these kids to have this experience, just a guy hanging out with a bunch of kids.  Naturally, the student teacher totally lost his shit and needed a moment to get it back together, but the kids didn't bat their collective eye.  They had no idea that they were sitting in a room with one of the biggest celebrities in the history of movies, and Newman didn't let on.  So the poor sod (the student teacher, that is, not Paul Newman) struggled through his lesson somehow (probably with a little voice in his head screaming PAUL NEWMAN!!!  I'M SITTING IN A ROOM WITH PAUL NEWMAN AND I'M TEACHING A CLASS!!  WITH PAUL NEWMAN!  RIGHT THERE!!!  PAUL NEWMAN!!!!).  At the end, Newman walked by, caught his eye, and said something along the lines of, "Good lesson, thanks!"  That may not seem like much, but Newman didn't have to stay for the whole thing, and didn't have to go out of his way to say something reassuring to the nervous young man at the head of the classroom.  From everything I've read, this is just the way Newman was - nice, kind, considerate, and low-key.  Now compare that to the asshats you read about in the supermarket rags who moan about how hard stardom is and how no one understands and you see what a rare quality that kind of class can be.

The world's a little greyer without those famous blue eyes in them.

Brain Lint, Back to School Edition

Turnabout Is Fair Play

School has started.  We began with a half day, and are taking Friday off, and are heading into a long weekend that will make next week short, too.  There's a lot to do to get the school year rolling, and if this week is terribly inconvenient for parents, well, we can't help that.  And then, as soon as the day ends, I have to bolt for my car to pick up my kid because her preschool isn't offering aftercare for the first week of school because the kids need time to adjust, and I just have to say that this is all terribly difficult to try to juggle her schedule with my schedule and ... oh.  Huh.  Whaddya know. 

An Object Lesson

Just in time to introduce myself to my new crop of students, I got poison ivy on my right arm and knee.  I've spent the past two days standing up in front of rooms full of kiddos, alternating between scratching desperately and trying desperately not to scratch.  (BTW, I've done all the stuff you're supposed to do, the special soaps, the steroid creams, blah blah blah.  For some reason, my skin seems to be particularly sensitive to poison ivy and it takes FOREVER to get rid of it.)  What started out as insect-bite-sized welts and bumps on Monday has transmogrified into a suppurating mass of red, weeping, leathery skin.  Doesn't that sound attractive?  (And do you know how much fun it is to work 'suppurating' into a blog post?  I love that word!  Suppurating!)

Here's the kicker:  Know how I got exposed to this lovely member of Mother Nature's outdoor delights?  Weeding the garden.  That'll teach ME to be a diligent homeowner.  Next time, I'm hiring the guy from the garden center to hack at the crabgrass while I sit on the porch and sip some lemonade.

The Tides of History are Lapping at the Shores of Necessity; Or, Stop Me Before I Analogize Again!

You may not see me around these parts as frequently over the next few weeks.  In addition to needing the time to organize my folders (patterned folders! so cute! much better than the old red-blue-yellow-green options we had for so long), I've become addicted to the 24/7 election news coverage.  So much so that my arm hurts from all the pointing and clicking I've been doing.  Not to mention the fact that the girls basically tear the house apart and fight incessantly when they sense I'm disengaged from them (Is there any sound more piercing than the scream of a toddler frustrated by the complexity of Legos?  No.).  In all honesty, I find myself getting worked up into a fever pitch of anxiety over this coming election.  I won't bother to belabor the point, but the upshot is, I have to take a break from the computer for a little while so I don't obsessively search the web for the latest poll results (up two points! among left-handed cow-herders!  in a swing state!) and work myself into a swivet of either joy or despair, depending on the news.  It's getting to the point where my plans to set up a bulletin board about the candidates with bumper stickers and the like (after all, it's a US History class in an election year) are tentatively on hold, because I'm at the point where I can't be sure I won't go off on a kid who voices an opinion I disagree with.  That is definitely not acceptable.  So after this post, I'm going on a weekend-long, self-imposed news sabbatical, and then if my blood pressure falls back from the "human fountain" range, we'll see.

Having said that, if you've been following events at all, I'd love to know:  What did YOU think of "the speech"?  And what do you think of McCain's Veep pick? (Although, really, her son's name - Trig?  What if she has another kid - will it be called Differential Calculus?) I promise, I won't flame you if you're not on my side of the fence.

Letters From A Broad: I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar Edition

Dear MegaBookMart,

As an institution purportedly focused on customer service, you have some customer serving to do.  Given the fact that you cater to a (supposedly) literate and (therefore equally supposedly) enlightened segment of the population (albeit one inordinately fond of Dilbert mugs and gardening calendars), I assumed that your restroom facilities would reflect that enlightened status.  So imagine my surprise when I sent the redoubtable Warren off to the mens' room with a small daughter sporting a bulgy behind and a dry diaper, only to see him reappear mere moments later, bearing said small child, bulgy bottom, and dry diaper, all status quo ante.  "Here," he said, not bothering to contain his glee as he thrust said small child motherward, "you have to change her.  They don't have a changing station in the men's room."

Uuuuhhhhh ... WHAT?!?!?!

Hello, MegaBookMart?  Have you ever actually looked at your customer base?  A bunch of them are men!  Of the male persuasion!  And a bunch of those come replete with children!  So why, pray tell, are your diaper changing facilities limited to the ladies' room??  How antediluvian an attitude is THAT?? Did you need those extra two square feet for something else - the latte flavorings counter, mayhap, or the extensive displays of designer-fabric-covered journals and mini-book-lights?  Furthermore, have you looked, I mean really looked at the men who frequent your store? To put it kindly, they do not tend to suffer from excess testosterone syndrome.  They trend toward the sensitive-crunchy-vegetarian- wearing-sandals-and-socks type, leavened with a generous helping of stylistically-challenged-techie types and - important to note here - harried-looking-father-of-small-child-in-a-front-pack types!  So what happens when one of the latter, diaper-wearing child in tow, tries to, oh, say, give the child's mother a much-needed break by getting the little vermin angel out of the house and out of her hair for an hour or two, and the angel in question has a poopy butt?  Is he supposed to ask the multi-pierced, barely articulate barista to change his pride and joy?  Or do you expect him to stand outside the ladies' room and ask random female passers-by to change his child's befouled bottom?  And what of the children of single dads?  Or those who have two daddies?  What are those kids expected to do - sit in their wet, stinky diapers until their poor paternal family figures can find an establishment whose policies are firmly rooted in this century, never mind millennium?

Okay, okay, I realize you will shuffle your feet and mumble something about "perverts" and "lawsuits" when I bring this up, so I'll offer this compromise:  How about adding a single-stall, unisex bathroom with a changing station in it?  That would cover multiple bases at once, and stave off the threat of the protest I have in mind:  A mass poop-in!  Yes, imagine your aisles of mugs, bookbags, stuffed animals, picture frames, and incidentally books, all filled with daddies changing babies who have been fed a steady diet of cauliflower puree, raisins, and apple juice and chanting, "Hey, hey!  Ho, ho!  My baby's gonna go!" 

There's still time to mend your ways, my friends.

Signed,

Some Pig

My darling Warren, light of my life, partner of my heart, man of my dreams,

We are in MegaBookMart on a desperate hunt for a last minute birthday gift for one of India's little friends, the selection and purchasing of which has to transpire immediately if not sooner.  Upon clapping eyes on the childrens' section of the store,  the fruit of our combined loins start to head down divergent paths with but the same goal:  Total and utter decimation of every book, game, and toy display in sight.  "So which one do you want," you ask merrily, as our children bolt in opposite directions, "the small destructive one, or the large destructive one?"  To which I answer, "How about you watch both of them, and I'll pick out the gifts so we can get out of here faster?"

And then you say, in a sort-of-joking-but-serious-underneath tone of voice, "But that's hard."

Uhhh ... YEAH.  Here's a news flash for ya:  Doing anything with two little kids in tow is hard!  Try grocery shopping with these two, especially when it's creeping up on the arsenic hour and they're hungry and tired and cranky.  Try going to the garden store and asking about the strange bugs on the lilies while your two kids do their utmost to manhandle every delicate decorative gewgaw and tip over every tropical plant in sight. Try talking coherently to the freaking computer repairman on the phone while the baby clings to you screaming hysterically and the older one lies on the couch moaning, "Nooobody's taaaaalking to meeeeee ... nooobody's taaaaalking to meeeee ..." ad infinitum.  This, my friend, is why I sometimes beg and plead with you to take just one of the little buggers darlings with you once in awhile when you have to run to the hardware store.  And why I stomp off in a huff when I ask you if I can leave the kids home now and then to make a run to the grocery store, and you give me the old "I'm in the middle of __________ (insert manly and vaguely dangerous household maintenance chore here) and it's hard to stop now," speech, and why I double stomp off and roll my eyes when you add, just a touch impatiently at the end, "can't you just take them with you?"  For while you are an incredible, involved, in-touch father and husband who supports and cares for his family beyond my wildest dreams, this is the one thing you just don't "get".

Love,
Your Wife

Dear Mainstream Media,

Do you mind if I call you MSM, Mainstream Media?  After all, given how much time I've spent following your every doings, I feel as if I know you.  And I have to say, I'm a little disappointed in you, MSM.  For the past year, watching you has been like watching one of those skits where a nice but not particularly bright straight man observes the comedian choking or drowning or otherwise facing imminent bodily harm and takes an exceptionally long time to figure it out. First, one major Presidential candidate is referred to as a "bitch" in front of another major Presidential candidate, and little note is paid.  Then you seemed to miss seeing the Hillary nutcracker almost completely.  Then you take little notice of John McCain calling his wife - his wife, mind you, she of the millions of dollars and personal airplane, without which Johnny would be back in the Senate as yet another Republican also-ran - a See You Next Tuesday!  In public!  I won't even write what he called her, that's how vile I consider that statement to be.  And then, after a couple "soul searching" articles to the effect of, "Gee, some people think we're vaguely misogynist?  Huh.  I wonder why that is," you let slide the by-now-infamous crackbrained commentary calling Michelle Obama a "baby mama" on Fox News! 

HELLO?  Not only was that comment derogatory for being sexist, it was also derogatory for being racist!  It was a twofer, and if it hadn't been pounced upon by the left-wing blogosphere, it would have gone practically unnoticed!  Why aren't you jumping on this with both feet, MSM?  Why am I not hearing stories about that commentator being censured, or demoted, or fired, along with editorial broadsides from the major news outlets warning against future displays of such troglodyte impulses by the Fourth Estate?  Why isn't every pundit and personality of note seething with public fury about this?  Why, David Brooks' face should be as purple as the lovely tie he's wearing here over this!  The furore in the MSM should be just barely dying down now, instead of dying down almost as soon as it came to life!  The head poohbahs at Fox should be manning the barricades right now, just having come from wiping the egg off their collective face and taking their collective foot out of their collective mouth.  Every other professional in the MSM should be inching their seats away from the Fox reporters and giving them the "I don't see you" body language message when they run into each other in public until Fox gets the hint that that shit don't fly in a civilized society.

How bad is this?  Well, replace all the derogatory comments made over the past year that were based on being female with derogatory comments based on race.  Replace all the female-based negative descriptive terms (like "cackle") with race-based negative descriptive terms ("shuck and jive").  Now imagine what the public reaction would have been to the use of those terms.  See what I mean?  DUH.  Now all of you in the MSM call your mamas right now and apologize.

Don't make me come over there,
Some Pig

Letters From A Broad: Political Edition

Dear Hillary Rodham Clinton,

I want to thank you and congratulate you for running an epic, historic campaign.  I watched your speech last night and it was emblematic of your approach - dogged determination coupled with a ferocious grasp of current events, liberally (ha! political pun!) seasoned with the faintest whiff of pugilism.  While some people may hear pejoratives in that, I do not.  You were one hell of a contender on the campaign trail, adapting as you went along until you finally hit your stride as the bolshy broad who wouldn't take 'no' for an answer.  Some of your biggest obstacles in your campaign were internal (Mark Penn's pathetic excuse of a strategy, your "better" half's tendency to get a little loopy around the edges when not carefully monitored) and yet you rose above them and kept on a-chuggin'.  For 50% of the population, you have showed that, truly, anyone can grow up to run for President of the United States (provided, of course, that s/he is a natural born citizen over 35 years of age and ... oh, I'll stop showing off my intimate knowledge of the Constitution as soon as it gets annoying.  What?  Too late?  Oops.).  Your campaign will be the case study against which future female Presidential candidates - perhaps even you - measure themselves.

But.

It is now time for you to find some way to stop fighting within the party and start fighting FOR the party.  Please.  I am begging you.  As someone who has two little girls herself, girls who might themselves want to be the next Hillary someday, I plead with you to come to your senses and realize that we stand at a fork in the road.  Down one road lies a graceful exit from this race with a burnished reputation and a heightened influence on internal party matters, influenced in no small measure by everyone's realization that you could have roiled the waters to a much greater extent and caused much more anguish for the party than you did.  Down the other road lies internal and external division, and an extended and inglorious wind-down to the inevitable conclusion, leaving a weakened Democratic candidate and sore feelings all around.  All hail President McCain!

Until this point, I have agreed with your contention that you had every right to stay in the race.  I also agree that you have faced the challenge of unacknowledged, insidious, institutionalized sexism and bias from the media - just as Obama has faced the challenge of unacknowledged, insidious, institutionalized race-based prejudice and bias from certain groups of voters.  However, at this point, it is time to face facts.  Michigan and Florida chose to hold their primaries when they did, and they earned the consequences they received.  The media did what they did and said what they said and you can't change that.  Your advisors did not serve you well and they can't roll back time and call for do-overs.  So, please, let this end - with no veiled threats, no backroom deals, no holding onto the hope of last-minute changes of heart in the delegates.  Please.  

I thank you in advance,

Some Pig

                                                                                                                                                                               Dear Hillary Supporters Who Are Threatening Write-In Campaigns or Defections to McCain:

If this doesn't make you think twice about voting for a spoiler, just mull this over:  Supreme Court Justice Alberto Gonzales.

That makes me break out into a cold sweat.

Some Pig

Living In a Glass House, Chucking Stones Anyway

I have a confession to make.  At the same time as I was composing my anti-drug screed yesterday, I, too, was operating under the influence.  Under the influence?  Hell, I was flying.  Even as I was righteously denouncing those who choose to alter their perspectives, I was one of their number.  Let's take a look at all the physiological responses to stimulants:  Raised heartbeat?  Check.  Dilated pupils?  Probably.  Temporary sense of well-being followed by craving for more of same?  Uh-HUH.

What, pray tell, could turn this ordinary suburban matron into a member of the psychedelic underground?  Coffee.  Real, gen-u-wine, honest to goodness coffee, with none of its wonderful, life-enhancing properties leached out.  I had a cup of high-test jet fuel yesterday, and it was gooooooooood.

I gave up caffeine in, oh, the Pleistocene era, I think.  No, wait, it was at the beginning of Doomed Pregnancy #3, and since I was convinced that I would get pregnant again in a jiffy, I figured I would just stay off the caffeine for the duration.  So I have been caffeine free since July of last year.  My fortitude amazes me.  But yesterday, I fell off the wagon.  I have a standing date with a high school pal once a month.  We meet at a local coffee house, buy plate-sized sweets and coffees as large as our heads, and gossip.  When I walked into the coffee shop and didn't see Amy, my angelic side told me to go pick up India and spend an extra hour stimulating her intellectual and emotional growth.  From my other shoulder, Lucifer hissed in my ear, Free time! To yourself!!  No one will know!!!  The day's New York Times beckoned from the paper rack.  The sun shone enticingly on the blond wood tables and floor.  "I Fooled Around And Fell In Love" played softly from the speakers.  Over it all, the siren song of coffee, heavenly elixir of the noble bean, called me forward.  And I crumpled like a cheap suit.

Had my cell phone not run down, I would have known Amy was home with a sick kid and I wouldn't have gone to the coffee shop in the first place.  So really this is her fault.

Since I had fallen from grace already anyway, I figured what the hell.  When the nice counter lady asked me what I wanted, I pointed to the Latte of the Day and said, "One, please."  Normally, I stay honest and stick to the decaf.  I don't know what got into me.  I thought about asking her to make it a decaf.  I considered calling her back from the espresso machine, with its rows of gleaming chrome levers and buttons and mysterious appendages, and saying I had made a serious mistake.  But I didn't. Instead, I took my steaming cup o' joe and the store copy of the NYT and basked in my solitude for a full forty-five minutes.

The buzz didn't start immediately. It took about an hour for me to notice that I hadn't subsided into my usual late-afternoon fugue state.  I took India for a walk.  I worked through my weekly hot yoga class like a Gumby doll and I didn't doze off the way I usually do in savasana.  I sat next to Warren at the computer while he worked on our finances and I didn't even yawn.  I stayed up past ten o'clock - ten o'clock! - chatting with Warren about our days, our daughter, and nothing in general.  Most of all, I was in a really, really good mood. Why can't life be like that all of the time?

This morning, however, my better judgement prevailed and the devil once again took the hindmost.  If yesterday was my personal caffeinated Mardi Gras, today is my penitent Ash Wednesday.  How can I justify putting myself and my family through all the hassle - the Clomid cranky fits, the cough syrup, the monthly Bataan Sex March, the rollercoaster of maybe I am/definitely I'm not - if I'm not willing to make a small sacrifice like giving up caffeine?  Besides, I know the benefits are partly psychosomatic anyway, given the fact that I know my morning java has no kick to it, but I still clutch at it the way a drowning man clings to a life preserver.  The day will come when we have our second kid or not, and I'll be free to drink all the lattes I want either way.  Besides, I can stop any time I want.