I’ve Seen What’s Ahead of Me

Our enrollment is up and it will grow a bit more through the week.  We’ve got new software and new equipment, which in turn necessitates ongoing training.

It is job security, if nothing else.

I continued getting my “War of the Worlds” class together today, along with placement.  I felt bad about placement, though.  I had to entertain the students for about 30 minutes and I wasn’t on my best game.  It was terrible.  They were as relieved as I was when the testing time started.

I’m sure it’s just a little sadness that I won’t be here with the guys all day.  It’s a funk I will work my way out of.

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I Win the Day!

Today was an unexpectedly good day.

A little background:  My 70+ year old mom has been redoing her living room for months now.  She has had a foggy vision of what she wants, and has worried my poor sister over it for the same amount of time.  First I had to go over there and stitch on a quilt clamped on an enormous contraption just so she could tell one of my nieces that I had done so.  This had to be done before the couch that would allow my poor short mother to put her feet on the ground while sitting in it arrived the next day.  I also was tasked with  taking ownership of a pretty ugly burnt orange recliner that had no home in her newly envisioned living room nor any other part of the rest of her house.  Oh, and not only did my mom used to have a gift shop (read she has tons of crap) but also, she’s been digging out every last thing my dead father owned and made it a shrine to him.

So, yesterday I missed my chance to just go get the recliner (it takes two people) because I’m a numb-skull.  As soon as my buddy R left, my sister called, exasperated.  She’d called in every chit to move furniture and Mom was still not happy.  This makes my sister not happy and not amenable to my jokes.  I had a mission on my hands.

I woke up this morning and cleaned the damn house.  I could have my house as clean as an ICU and it wouldn’t be good enough for my mom.  I did my best.

I got out to their house on time and with a vision in my mind.  My sister had given me all of the failures of other furniture arrangements.  I knew, without measuring what I would suggest.  It’s all about the angles.  And the space.  I only eliminated two small pieces of furniture, in a graceful way (making sure I didn’t insult the furniture and my mom by proxy).

We angled the couch, got the weird behind the couch table in the right place, figured out how to keep all the chairs she wanted, and in the end found a nice way that the behind the couch table stuff reflected off the mirrors in the big-ass curio cabinet that I thankfully didn’t have to move.

As I suggested subtle moves of furniture that didn’t task my sister and I much, my mom liked it more and more.  My sister opined that it “just takes a different eye” and we did high-fives when mom wasn’t in the room.  Seriously, it had gotten to the point that my mom was “just letting my sister live there” in my sister’s mind yesterday afternoon.

Having gotten the furniture arranged, we went out for lunch and came back to hang pictures.  Big-ass pictures.  One in particular had some weird connection to my dad and couldn’t be looking toward the door, like he was leaving.  We worked it all out and got them all hung.  The last one might get re-done because by that time my sister and I were just happy that mom was happy and mom was happy in every place she sat in the room.  My poor sis may have to rehang it later.

We loaded up the burnt orange recliner and headed to my house.

Murphy and Tammy were not nice to them.  Murphy in particular wouldn’t come in from the front yard and neither my mom nor sis — big dog people — would get close to the fence.  Murphy was particularly crazy — running in eights around the yard and not minding me.

While inside, my sis had all sorts of ideas for my house.  In the past, I had always thought that she and her big bag of money could do it, but today, not so much.  I know she sees my house as a project.  I’m trying to make it better.  She was so grateful today, it almost made me cry.

I let Dora out in the yard after mom and sis were outside.  Good Dora was sweet and licked their hands.  She remembered them.  When we started talking about the backyard, Dora got barky.  I changed everything to “Dora is gonna do this that or the other” and Dora got all wiggly and happy again.

My mom is not so mad at their dog Stormy, having experienced my dogs.  This can only be good for Stormy.

As she was driving away, my sis did a low 5 and tried to grab my hand, though I didn’t get it at the time.  Mom was looking forward to continuing her living room redecoration.

Today, I made my sister’s life easier.

It was such a simple thing to do.

What Gracious Co-workers

You know, I don’t much care for my boss, but I would attend her funeral and be nice about it.  I would definitely attend any of my co-worker’s funerals.  (And I must add a knock knock knock, twu twu twu, because I am superstitious.)

Not that Ted Kennedy was their boss or anything, but he was their co-worker at the very least.  Nevertheless, neither Cornyn nor Hutchison could be bothered to attend Kennedy’s funeral.

Kay says she had meetings.  We all know what that means:  she didn’t want to go because the she needs the nasty people to vote for her for governor.  Cornyn, on the other hand, was caught flat-footed.

And just for good measure, could Michael Berry explain this logic to me?

Many say the dead deserve respect, but if he showed no respect for the death of Mary Jo, then why should anyone respect his death?

I’m not talking about the facts here, but rather the logic of it.  It seems to explain a lot to me about how people like Kathleen and perhaps Michael Berry think.

But what I really want is for Michael Berry to compare my writing to Kathleen’s writing — on air and just identify her as Rightwingsparkle or Texassparkle on the Houston Chronicle.  It would be a great head-to-head with Michael Berry being the arbiter.  That would make my day 😉

Katrina

I hadn’t started this blog at that time, though I was commenting by that time.

Tomorrow marks the four year anniversary.

This one catastrophe in the U.S. marks us more than any other.  Our government refused help.  Our government relied upom a man who only had experience with horses and political campaigns.  Even Michael Berry’s KTRH had Michael Brown on today to give his opinion.

Katrina scared us so much that we took extraordinary precautions when Rita came.  And that fear led to people dying.

It also led to a lot of racism.  Chris Baker called people from NOLA “Katrina trash” and many on talk radio lied about what was going on at the Astrodome and the south side of town.

I just remember feeling frustrated.  I went to Good Will to sort donations.  It was as if rich people had decided to dump their trash there.  I’ll never forget sorting through empty jewelry boxes and bustiers.

What is perhaps worse is the Bush administration’s attempt to take over the school system in NOLA.    It’s the whole ‘taking advantage of a disaster to do what couldn’t be done before.’  They focused on that instead of working to rehabilitate the damaged parts of the city.

I’ll never forget how eerie it was before Rita.

I’ll never forget how crappy it was after Ike.

So Very Very Stupid

Some may remember Lisa Shiffren*.  Well, she’s gotten no smarter:

Who better to succeed the greatest Senate advocate for welfare, labor rights, and nationalized health care, than . . . former governor Mitt Romney. As Peter Roff at U.S. News suggests, should Romney run for and win that seat, he would actually be in a position to make a real difference in the health-care debate. Needless to say, proving himself effective in that role — and why wouldn’t he? — would put him in a far better position to run for president in 2012.

Mittens doesn’t live in Massachusetts anymore.

I don’t think you can run for a senate seat in a state where you don’t live.  I know, I know, Hillary ran in New York, but at least she lived there when she did.

Update:  Surprise!  Even the mouthpiece for Malkin, the NewYorker who hangs out with this guy, thinks Mittens is good to go on the senate seat, and almost all the people agree!

Joe Biden on Ted Kennedy

“Teddy spent a lifetime working for a fair and more just America,” Vice President Joe Biden said today. The former and longtime member of the Senate from Delaware and Kennedy colleague called the late senator’s wife this morning.

“For 36 years, I had the privilege of going to work every day… and being a witness to history,” Biden said in an emotional personal statement in Washington. “In that process, every day I was with him, and this is going to sound strange, but he restored my sense of idealism and my faith in the possibilities of what this country can do…. It was infectious… He made everybody he worked with bigger, both his adversaries and his allies…

“He was kind of like an anchor,” said Biden, speaking at length about the personal comfort that Kennedy had lent him during his own personal tragedies, the loss of his wife and child in a car accident early in his Senate career. “It was never about him, it was always about you.

“We will never see the likes of him again,” Biden said.

Quote from here.

When I heard him on the radio just a bit ago, it made me cry.

Rest in peace, Teddy.  You will be missed — already are.

While Flawed, This Gets at What I See to be Right

Our country’s sad decent into oblivion.

Anyone who condones any of this is just wrong.

My only question is why ABC just found this out now.  Where were they in 2006? or 2003, or 2001 for that matter.

Oh, enough of this already

I’m sick and tired of the myth of that republicans/conservatives don’t do protests unless they are really really motivated.  I drove by the local Planned Parenthood site late last Saturday morning and the protesters were out there, just as they have been for years.  And this video shows that people have been out in rage for a long time — it’s dated 1989.  And let’s not forget that those republican/conservatives have long used their children as props — whether it is about abortion or end of life issues.  I can’t be the only person who remembers children — egged on by their parents — trying to give Terri Shiavo a sandwich.

So when people like me get preached to like this, I take it for what it is.

The thing about conservatives, especially non political conservatives, is that they don’t take to “protesting.” They see it as silly for the most part.

As I pointed out, they have been protesting since 1973.

We conservatives tend to be very busy. We work hard to pay our bills and taxes. We go to school. We raise our kids, and we spend our weekends watching our kids play sports, and going to church. We don’t have time to “protest.” Most of us don’t even have time to pay much attention to politics, other than what we catch on the nightly news. We vote and we give to campaigns we agree with, and we have always felt that that was enough.

I must point out that Kathleen has been unemployed for years now and has spent a good number of the last few years hanging out on the internet, relaying lies and smears.  (Much like the rest of the unemployed wingnuts.) I’m quite certain that she regrets not being able to bash Clinton online while he was in office and regrets that Obama won the nomination — and not for the reason you might think — she was just waiting with Hillary bashing galore!

But back to her view of republicans/conservatives — when asked about this statement, she responded:

I think you are simply reading into it things that are not there. I in no way imply that if you aren’t conservative you have the opposite qualities. I have good friends who are Democrats. I know we share many qualities. I was simply describing the conservatives that I have known my whole life and why they haven’t been politically active and are now.

Uhm, no, that’s not quite right. Her whole point was to emphasize that republicans/conservatives are way too busy with life’s requirements to do something like protest — implying both that they never had before today and that they are employed types who are religious and focus on their kids and church.

She’s been an activist for a while now according to her comments, when it is convenient for her, but not when it isn’t.

As Sean Hannity emphasizes — it’s retired people and stay at home moms who are fueling the anger at town hall meetings.

Most of us liberals are still at work — even though I am on vacation this week — again — yay! (I earned it, dammit!)

Houston Forced Prostitution Ring Busted

The details from the indictment are pretty horrible. Minors were taken from their homes and brought to Houston, forced to prostitute themselves and the pimps kept all of the money and beat and threatened them.

One of the “businesses” where this was taking place was  Taboo Modeling Studio North, which is just up the freeway from my house — I pass by it often.  Before today, I had always thought about the movie Paris, Texas. To think that those poor girls were there all this time — it breaks my heart.

Now, neither one of our local radio yakkers could pass up taking a swipe at this story.  Chris Baker‘s first thought was that the victims were more likely than not illegals.  (The first link, which was published in time for Baker to have read it during his show, says specifically that they are not.  I sent him an email to inform him.)

Michael Berry‘s take on the indictment is that it’s oh-so-very-funny that the Chronicle reporter had to identify the accusseds’ nicknames.  HA HA HA.  So everyone who calls into his show today has to have a pimp name.

An Update to my Rant about Red, White & Blue on Houston PBS

I was pretty ticked off this past Friday night when a show that I had praised (and enjoyed) for a long time decided to put a local talk show host on to debate the health care issue with an elected state representative and another guy (economist?) against reform.

I sent an email to the general manager of the station on Friday and got a reply today.  He states that no elected officials wanted to come on the program.

It seems to me that Dan Patrick himself was unwilling to come on the program, so he sent his employee instead.

But if that is not the case, it speaks badly for local conservatives/republicans that they were afraid to go on a local program that is in some ways connected with one of their political allies.

Where are the local republican’s town hall meetings on health care?  I seem to only find Democrats holding them and tea party people advertising them.

I’ll include a Michael Berry vanity tag to this post even though it’s not about him.