LAURAL'S DISH
Laural is our dog, my dog. Everyone else heads off to school, "people like me and Laural" stay home. He's a fine companion, but you have to understand. If he's having a really good time he tries to bite you, me, anyone. Not hard, just…similarly, if you're scratching his belly real good, but then shift to his (apparently less preferable) ears, he'll growl at you. The irregular spelling of his name results from the time that Alexandra and I were mulling the possibilities, in a tunnel in Newton Abbot, when we came across the graffiti: Laura L is a dog.
Laural loves to eat more than any living being ever created, and he will eat absolutely anything. We've weaned him from rocks but he once tried to eat an unopened can of Carlsberg Export. surprise! So his dish frequently has unusual things in it, bits of this or that, absolute treasures that others might consider slightly unfit for human consumption, for whatever stupid reasons.
Beneath please find my literary reflection of Laural's Dish:
Laural's Dish comes out on Fridays, before lunch, usually.
26 November 2010
BREAKING MAJOR NEWS: KASMIRA AND WILL HAVE ANNOUNCED THEIR ENGAGEMENT!!!!! He even asked me first-in the finest chivalrous tradition-so I had to wander around for a few days with this heavy secret... We couldn't be prouder of them-or happier for them-and I'm delighted to say that the so recently affianced (man do the French have a way of making cool words that sound like what they mean, or what?) couple is upstairs at this very moment, preparing for a reggae show in Bristol....YEAAAAAAAAH!!!!!
And SO....in the story below, please understand that Will WAS Kasmira’s boyfriend at that time, but within 48 hours would be her fiancée!
It's kind of weird having Thanksgiving overseas, out of the states. No one here particularly cares that the Pilgrims got along with the Indians for awhile, and for the most part-and probably would have something else to say if you bring up the subject of honkey American/American Indian relations generally-and they don't even celebrate that at least the pilgrims left here...so it's very much an expatriate thing. But it's too big-and important--and fun--not to do up, so we always do. No one gets Thursday off either, so we had Thanksgiving Sunday.
It's not like Christmas-I've never found anything totally magical like Christmas-but energy levels run high. People had barely started getting up before Alexandra (now 17!) was recruiting Amelia (15) and Myles (10) into a plot to play "the vomit game." The game being, basically, to pretend that whatever food Theresa makes is so awful that it's making you vomit, and so they sit around the table, you know...aaaaaarghing.
The only particularly interesting thing about this was when I said something about how Amelia was pretty good (or at least better than Boo) about not playing the vomit game, at which he she feigned authentic outrage and hissed, "I invented the vomit game." Alexandra disputed this, and the origins of the vomit game were then traced-over a period of about 20 minutes-to Amelia's regard for Cottage Pie, at which Alexandra conceded invention of the game, but maintained her role as its most able and abundant practitioner.
I guess I kind of got into the spirit of it all, too, because I was kind of following Alexandra around and found Theresa telling me "You can sort baseball cards, you can listen to music, you can read..."and then to Alexandra, "On days like this Papa has to find something to do."
The feast was just that. Of course as Theresa was proudly presenting it Alexandra and Amelia were engaged in a loud conversation as to whether or not they should stay, both of them enjoying Kentucky Fried Chicken coupons in their bags. Yeah, well, Theresa's turkey and mashed potatoes and stuffing and salad and cranberry sauce and...and all like that...put an end to all that. In fact let history reflect that it was so good that they all entirely forgot to play the vomit game.
Of course turkey's the national tradition, but Scooby-Doo Monopoly is the family one. We used to play more, we still play a few times a year, the Scooby-Doo Monopoly game was the only thing Amelia wanted for one of her earlier birthdays. So she gets to always go first, and be the Mystery Machine. In fact, to give you some sense of the magnitude of the tradition, we record a written commentary on each event on the board and now pages attached (these used to be invariably written by me, but given my penmanship someone else--usually Alexandra-does it now), the following being extracts:
"Alexandra gave Papa (who already owned [Boardwalk]) [Park Place] in lieu of a $52 rental, so that she wouldn't have to break a $500..." (12/21/02)
"Recession and cash shortage reached the point where Alexandra bought Green Ghost Tavern at auction for $1. She then refused to mortgage for $160 because she "don't do that." (2/2/03)
"Alexandra & Blackberry has world domination with the ginger and the person that came last is Picasso" (with clarification in other handwriting: "Sadly for the Boo, the above is inaccurate...") 31/8/03
"Papa's so offending I couldn't play but if I had would have won...(4/1/05)
"First place: Kasmira with her smelly yellow feet..." (Thanksgiving 2005)
"And it doesn't matter that Mama came in last because as she said, 'I'm rolling in love!' A great game, but next time I'll win and not open the piano lid when there are 3 bottles of vodka on it!!" (Thanksgiving 2006)
"Myles deserves a special award for being a butch banker slipping everyone $500s and having tattoos of the Easter Monster on his arms (in pen)." (Easter 2007)
"Papa and Amelia talked in very posh accents mostly about waffles and me and mama the communists. They even said things like, "I can't pay six, I'll have to pay ten..." (12/26/07)
You get the idea. The Thanksgiving Scooby-Doo Monopoly game's the Super Bowl and World Cup and Wimbledon Mixed-Doubles Final and Monty Python all rolled into one. The stuff of legend, like the grand finale shoot-out in a Western. Suitably, there was a lot of trash talkin' between me and Will going in. Face to face, and on Facebook. But then with a few weeks to go, it all quieted down, like those small towns in the wild wild west, with the principals facing down across the empty street, hands poised above holsters.
We didn't even consider the six other players. Will was confident, given that he'd won the only game he'd previously played with us, and having not lost in Monopoly in something like five years. And he plays with his dad all the time. My own confidence was based on my having won the most recent game and, I thought, most of the others. Having since reviewed the record it turns out that I'd won less than half the time, and only once more than one individual.
And that individual took the opportunity to tie my all-time wins mark. No one would land on my property, or Will's either, for what seemed like forever. I couldn't even roll my signature double-fives to get out of jail and land on Free Parking. In fact I got my ass so totally kicked that if Myles hadn't quit moments before-over a rules interpretation that he'll be putting up for a vote before the next game-I would have come in totally last. Alexandra, Jorge and Theresa followed after a respectable period of time, and then Kasmira (who had remained in the game despite never having enough money to even build a snack shack). Will had rallied, as the fallen (starting with me) started wrecking on his properties with dizzying regularity. But it was not to be, for the dashing young man from Devon.
Amelia repelled his comeback efforts, relying on a quirky strategy and distinct sarcasm. It was a helluva Thanksgiving for Amelia: won the Scooby-Doo Monopoly game by tying the all-time record and being recognized for her contribution as inventor of the vomit game.
Man, I've got a lot to be thankful for. I am. Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!
Amelia plots her attack, as Kasmira and Myles look on innocently and amiably, like lambs to the slaughter.
--------------------
Kasmira and Will are not the only happily engaged couple in England this week, just the coolest one! There is the matter of this rawthuh...ah’m, well lesser isn’t wrong I suppose, decidedly less fortunate...
http://www.theawl.com/2010/11/unemployed-english-girl-to-wed-soldier-from-welfare-family
Jorge, Alexandra, Amelia and Will
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_theticket/20101119/ts_yblog_theticket/millionaires-to-obama-tax-us
How far out of whack did the Reagan/Bushes/Clinton/Obama economic approach have to get for this to happen?
Back from the smoke break, DJ T plots her next outrage. Among the selections were 50 Cent and Dolly Parton. The other players consult with their Monopoly advisors via text.
Ok, I worked really hard on this week’s top 10 list--no, really, I did--but it just didn’t quite work out. So instead I present this entirely half-assed TOP TEN FIRST THINGS I PULL OUT OF MY HEAVY ROTATION CD STACKS:
We used to have birthday parades all the time, on people's birthdays. We'd march around the house and yard banging pots and pans and generally making a fine spectacle of ourselves. This one's from Orcas Island, very early 21st century probably.
19 November 2010
This week Laural's Dish is populated with the art of Myles Trapp
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20101114/tuk-west-cannot-defeat-al-qeada-says-for-dba1618.html
We can't defeat them, but we have to contain them. They're easier to contain, the fewer of them there are. Their number one recruiting tool is Western occupation of their lands. Can someone please explain to me what we're doing in Afghanistan nearly ten years after the fall of the Taliban?
" The work we did together was not just about winning a single election, but about building this movement. "
--email from Mitch Stewart, Director, Organizing for America
You have to love the way the Obama people always say the right thing. You can only despise them for what they fail to mention. The missing part here is "A movement for universal healthcare, to end rather than consolidate corporate hegemony of the economy, from oil to green energy, and bring the troops home."
For a brief shining moment Obama was the leader of that movement, now he's just another barrier to be overcome.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20101114/twl-suu-kyi-hails-freedom-of-speech-41f21e0.html
Amen.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20101115/twl-guantanamo-detainees-to-get-millions-41f21e0.html
Bullshit. No one pays out millions to save time, especially not a Western government with any defense at all against accusations of human rights violations.
It's probably time to admit that the evidence we've relied on to imprison people in Guantanamo Bay for years without trial was little better than the "weapons of mass destruction" nonsense. They no doubt got a real terrorist or two, but too many were guys in the wrong place at the wrong time, talking to the wrong person or even less.
See anything un-American about that? Think it helps al-Qaeda recruit?
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2010/11/18/2-madoff-associates-arrested-in-ny-case/
Yep, ok that's it! Let's round up everyone who ever had a conversation with Madoff and imprison 'em in Guantanamo Bay! And anyone who looks or acts like Madoff, for that matter...
I know that I have been virulently anti-pope in this...dish...recently and previously, and that is both my position and my right. A lingering concern being that others will confuse this with being anti-Catholic. In fact I am not a Catholic, do not consider myself a Catholic; but feel closer to Catholicism than any other denomination. Ironic I guess, given that the one thing about Catholicism that I find so absurd is the main thing that sets it apart from the rest of Christendom. As such...as a Christian of a somewhat existentialist slant...as a human...and considering the Catholic church a subset of Christianity and humanity...I feel quite comfortable, as a non-Catholic, telling Catholics what's "good Catholicism" and "bad Catholicism." Some Catholics may in turn feel comfortable believing that I'm going to hell. Seems unlikely to me, I think the best thing I've ever heard about it is Gandhi's "There will always be as many religions as there are individuals. Anyway...TOP TEN THINGS I LIKE ABOUT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20101117/ten-uk-ryanreynolds-90f61ed.html
Ok, it was funny at first but this is just getting ridiculous! I mean, it was bad enough when they pretended it was really Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp, but...some clown who's going to be the Green Lantern ?!!
Ok that's it! Let's throw everyone who works for People Magazine in jail forever in Guantanamo Bay....and, and everyone on the subscribers list...hey, actually that's kind of sounding like a pretty good party, as long as they don't dilute it too much with those Madoff people...
12 November 2010
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101107/wl_afp/spainvaticanpopesantiago_20101107012823
Let's see...home and birthplace of The Spanish Inquisition....why would anyone in Spain be "anti-priest" I wonder...and in the 1930s when the Catholic Church was backing the fascists in the Spanish Civil War, hmmm...and, say wasn't that about when the pope was working for Hitler? I suppose we won't be seeing hypocrisy denounced-or individual moral courage celebrated-under this most particularly pontficatory pontiff.
I understand that there are all kinds of attitudes, concerns and prejudices about sexual behaviour, and particularly the sexual behaviour of others. It may even be fair to assume that a virgin priest might be beset by these problematic thoughts even more than are individuals who behave more in accordance with nature.
But I have to ask this: how many good faith positions are there on this question?: What's more scandalous, vexing or offensive: two loving, entirely and enthusiastically consenting adults kissing....or an ex-Nazi in a ridiculous hat saying that God only speaks directly to him and bewailing the plight of the fascist church in the '30s (for being unpopular, rather than concern over its fascism), all the while hopelessly distracted by the horrors of condoms (and I'm not talking aesthetic concerns)....really.
There's only one conceivable and rational answer to that question: there's nothing offensive, vexing or offensive about kissing, and this pope is a schnook.
I was trying to raise the subject of the pope's visit to Barcelona (one of our favorite cities in the world) with Alexandra. She started laughing. I must have looked bewildered and she explained, "Oh papa, when I think of him running around all over the world looking like that and saying those things...it's such a joke. I just can't stop laughing."
UP WITH HUMAN RIGHTS! DOWN WITH FASCIST APOLOGISTS!! GOD BLESS THE FUN-LOVING SPIRIT OF FREE SPAIN!!!!!
http://criminaljustice.change.org/blog/view/losing_a_baby_over_a_poppy_seed?me=nl
Ok my aging but no doubt ever fun-loving Reagan Youth, can you run that "pro-family, moral superiority of drug testing" argument past me one more time?
http://www.youngjewishproud.org/
Feel free to compare and contrast, and reach any authentic conclusions. I love this. This is great. If you watch five minutes of video this week, this should be it.
HOORAY FOR THE PEACEFUL SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF MOSES!!!!!
This is tragedy of some lesser magnitude. But it's likely to become of increasing magnitude when we see what we get stuck with. Rumours abound that it's going to be some Bill James disciple who thinks you can tell more by looking at glow-charts with dots where balls bounced than actually watching the game.
Joe got hacked because they think he's a dinosaur. The reality is that he's an observant instinctualist, light years ahead of where reaching the top of their game will ever get them.
Oh, he gets stuck on things, things that he thinks are important. There was an extended period of years where a casual observer might have reasonably reached the conclusion that Joe thought the world revolved as a result of "bat speed," and the minute you heard the term you know that he was about to mention Gary Sheffield at least ten times. Of course Joe was just trying to say what the better Bill James fanatics are ("home runs, rbi and batting average don't measure everything, and miss some very meaningful stuff"), and his contribution, as contrasted to OBA (which is a useful thing) or WAR (which is such a bizarre and gross simplification in the wake of intellectual gymnastics that I'm surprised the pope's not using it), is that it's important to swing the bat through the strike zone quickly: it gives you longer to see the pitch, it gives you longer to adjust, just as obviously as it allows you to generate more power.
I'm going to use an oversimplification: I'm going to call all the "new stats" guys Bill James for awhile, the rest of this essay. This is unfair to Bill James because he's a genius and many of his followers are idiots-the proverbial dweebs in the basement-and also unfair to some of my favorite commentators, including Joe Posnanski (who writes so beautifully about the soul of the game one day, and gets stuck in the muck the next), Rob Neyer (who loves the new stats but stresses the limitations) and Keith Law (perhaps the foremost advocate of the esoteric art of scouting), who loosely would fit in the group but are miles ahead of the pack.
The Bill James guys are fundamentally wrong because their stats isolate individual performance, and baseball is a team game. Isolated performance is interesting and useful, but too many of them take it as definitive. It's like limiting a discussion on racing to how the sparkplugs are firing, without considering the track in detail or the cars around it much. Baseball is a game with effectively infinite possibilities, and statistics are by definition an effort to categorize. But while that's all good and very interesting....there is certainly some merit to many of the new stats-though they're not as direct a reflection of anything as important as rbi (yes, the runner has to be on base already or the guy has to hit a home run...) or wins (yes, that's right, the pitcher's team has to win the game...this is the point of the game, and the teams that do it most go to the PLAYOFFS, which is even more important than BA in LISP, though hardly unrelated)...it's totally missing the point here.
People who watch baseball games fall into too many categories to categorize: stats nuts, casual guys in bars, baseball stat fanatics of the many Bill Jamesish mind-sets, traditionalists (this is, admittedly, probably where I most fit in), etc. But the stats nerds already know more than any announcer is going to be able to tell them in fifteen seconds or less, hell they're sitting there watching the game in their proverbial basements with no less than three computers going so they can cross-index BATVORP against endocrine-LISP;;; nothing wrong with that in my opinion, and it's not pointless just inadequate...but the rest of us want-in some other way-to be entertained.
And Joe Morgan is an entertaining commentator, and an insightful one. He's long on esoteric observations bordering on mysticism....I've seen him regularly suggest pinch hitters with terrible averages against the guy pitching (small sample, I know, the better Bill Jameses don't care about it but too many do) and situational stats, and similar pitcher stats...and on those rare occasions that the manager actually does it he's been right more often than not (more than .500? I've got to quantify this!) My favorite time was when Joe kept suggesting some scrub utility guy, and Jon Miller was pointing out that he was in a 1 for 29 slump and hadn't reached base against the pitcher in like thirty lifetime plate appearances, and Joe was getting all stubborn and the manager (must have been Dusty Baker, right?) sent the guy up and on the second pitch he hit a game winning double and JOE SCREAMED "STATISTICS TELL YOU WHAT HAPPENED BEFORE!!!!!"
Which is difficult to dispute.
So Joe has a special insight into the game, and that's entertaining. He also has some personality quirks that I personally find entertaining though others might not. He loves the fact that he's a Hall of Famer, a if not the key cog in one of the greatest teams ever...and so of his place in society, the best part of which is unquestionably in his opinion (and he's definitely on to something here, too) Jet society. He'll say stuff like "Yeah, over the weekend I was doing Bill Cosby's charity golf tournament and on Sunday we were all having a bar-b-q over at Bill's house, Quincy Jones was there. I was standing around talking to Colin Powell and Ken Griffey, Sr. about bringing baseball to inner Philadelphia, and Harry Belafonte came walking over with Sidney Poitier and said..." And it turns out not to have been anything all that important, but it was an important moment to Joe, and he wanted to let us all in on what he thought is important. I loved it when he did stuff like that.
But the corporate morons (no doubt after consulting some demographics chart drawn up by a boardroom geek) at ESPN say Joe's out, and I'm gonna miss him. But PLEASE ESPN, please-I'm begging you-don't bring in some politically correct "color man" who hangs out with Bill Clinton and and Kenny G, and the statsgeek from the basement lagoon!
Take a chance, go aesthetic! Get the opposing pitchers' moms, and the drunkest guy in the local sports bar, somebody who doesn't know anything about baseball but enjoys a comprehensive understanding of cricket, a Tea Party Yankees fan and a Marxist Red Sox'....the last fucking thing we need is for baseball announcing to get any more boring...and Joe was one of the last bastions of intelligent commentary from the human heart.
I wish the Mets would hire Joe Morgan as manager. But they won't because Sandy Alderson-though he's a decent and maybe even very good choice for GM-has too much sub-Bill James in him. But the world goes around and Laural's Dish must have a list towards the end. TOP TEN CHOICES FOR METS NEW MANAGER:
Yes, yes! Film update...how about cross-indexed according to (i) how many talking dogs they have in 'em, then (ii) the quantum extent ratio to which they might have benefited from a talking dog or two...
5 November 2010
We went down to Cornwall-me 'n' Theresa and Myles-to visit Kasmira & Will for a few days. It was such a pleasure. They are the consummate hosts, having given a good deal of thought to what we might like to do. We went down to Charlestown see the ships from Pirates of the Caribbean, wandered that coast and then over to Mevagissey, where we encountered a fine aquarium including all sorts of dogfish and crabs. Kasmira may be the best cook in the world that isn't her mother and we dined on the best steak I've had in years, we all hung out and watched the outrageously witty and philosophically French Son of Rambow with Myles. Kasmira and Theresa went on a charity shop trawl...it was all so lovely.
But what it really brings home is only peripherally related to any of that. What it really brings home is how sacred and special that feeling is...having an adult child who is so loving and gracious, who cares so much and who is moving forward so comfortably and confidently into a career that she loves, and with a young man who not only loves and respects her, but is equipped to engage in witty repartee with even the likes of me! Aw, man....it's all just too much! I just love this life.
Theresa and I decided long ago, nearly two decades ago now, that any grandchildren that we might have (and we figured to have pretty many, given our initial estimation was that having 17 children of our own might be perfect) should call us "Oma" and "Opa," the way German children do. It just has that ring and gravitas to it.
I mean, I guess they're not technically even engaged, but that seems a mere formality. They discuss marriage as that happy and obvious and natural inevitability, the way Theresa and I did so many years ago.
Yep, the happy salad days of Oma & Opa can't be far behind. Bless.
One of Theresa's best friends' daughter is going to see The Queen of England. One of the daughter's friends mother is recommended for an OBE or MBE or some such, anyway she gets to go visit the Queen at Buckingham Palace. The nominee mother has two children-one of whom is autistic, subject to irreverent statements of most every sort, and so the thought is to keep him away from The Queen, even though it strikes me as a particularly good idea.
So Theresa's friend is going to hang around London with the autistic gentleman for the day, while the daughters visit with The Queen. Theresa's friend says, "I got the good part."
I've always liked Halloween, like pretty much every other American kid ever made. You gets lots of candy. But over the years I started getting edges of another Halloween-that mischievously psychological release that powered such social diversions as the Feast of Fools, back in the days when they weren't otherwise allowed to have any fun at all. That special deviousness, well meaning in some distant manner but decidedly....you know, devious....in immediate intent.
Europe follows America...there's no point in saying that it doesn't....in virtually everything, and for better or for worse. As General Electric and McDonald's spread their economic wings beyond the span of the globe, so Halloween expands through mind and spirit.
This causes chaos and misconception. I was in France for Halloween a few years ago. It had never really taken off, but that year some high-ranking Cardinal or Bishop or Pope or someone had-with pointed nose and demonstrably straight face-denounced it in a manner that could breed nothing beyond or short of that combination of hilarity and consternation that teenagers find so immediately and authentically in the wake of the most inane proclamations of adults...and so they figured it might be worth looking in to, after all.
They didn't really know how to do it, so they all dressed up as variations on the same thing: kind of a vampire thing-but not a vampire and without fangs-big dark shroudy clothing, lots of face whitener and red red lips and bloody stuff, and stitches and hammers hanging out the tops of their heads and stuff. It worked pretty good.
But the best part was their determination. When I was at the Supermarket on November 3, half the cashiers were still wearing their suits.
And so it occurs to me that Americans are really good at Halloween, and I should do my part about decorating the import with the garnishes of glee. I'm not really good at it, and I guess I don't put that much effort into it, but we always do something.
I mean, the British don't do much of anything. The best cheerfully hand out miniature candies to polite trick or treaters, and the worst just keep their lights out and do nothing. There's no chicanery .
Except at our house. I got a Frankenstein mask, and Theresa agreed to put on this absurd spider hat that I got from Poundland with a veil hanging down, and even a bunch of make-up. I kind of gathered around my accoutrements to see what might work. I opened in the bathroom window, just above the front door. I'd let 'em get close then dive-bomb my purple cloth balloon bat at them, screeching "Beware of my bat!" or "Have you seen my bat" or something like that in a wicked voice. It scared a couple of 'em pretty good, most notably Amelia, who was dropping by to pick up her own costume. "Oh my God, you guys are so American," she muttered, "I've got to get out of here." But she was pleased, in that Amelia way.
I decided to move out to the van, with my plastic werewolf cup thats eyes glow and it makes a weird electronic space sound when you push a button on the bottom. That way I could attack even more directly, but from sideways. I perfected hunching, like a Hunchback Frankenstein. I would emerge from the shadows, my Chinese witch lamp hanging from the van door.
The first two were Alexandra's friend (17) and her little sister. I emerge from the van stage left and in very heavy voce announce-proferring the werewolf cup blazing and full of eyeball candies-"Have the eye of a newt... and tell the future!" They were terrified, and so I knew that I was on to something.
And I was, I got a group of teenage boys really good; and had to tone down the act for smaller children. It was brilliant. I would often pull up my mask in mid-act if they got too scared, and no one was much the worse, for long. Somewhere along the line it came to pass that I realized that for the older kids I could brandish the cup kind of like a laser gun, and it would scare them even worse.
A group of five, including a boy maybe aged ten or so in a skeleton suit. I leapt from the van, werewolf cup blazing and yelling something about eyeballs....his own eyeballs rolled into the back of his head and he turned around in a 180 degree spin and started running as fast as he could....straight into the Rosemary bush, which collapsed backwards, him sprawled across the ground just beyond most of it, but with his foot caught forever!...it was absolutely glorious, a moment to be savored every time the moon goes full and the witches do fly.
As the evening wore on I could hear some of the parents discussing whether or not to even go to our house, word was spreading throughout the St Thomas estate Halloween community that there were strange goings on, as usual, at "the American house." The kids pretty much wanted to come anyway, because we're pretty generous with the candy.
I jumped out the door at two little girls, a princess and an angel. They looked up at and smiled: "What's your name?" "Um...I am, er...Frankenstein...would you like the eye of a newt so that you can see the future?" "Yes thank you. Happy Halloween."
Yep, that's it. I think what scares some of the other ones even more than the possibility of being lasered by an extraterrestrial Frankenstein with the means of seeing the future is that...any adult human would be willing to act like that in the first place. What sort of man would dress up in such a garish manner with the intent of frightening children? In the states the answer is, of course, "Everyone I know's dad," but here it's apparently something to be pondered.
Halloween spirits rising across the seas...I'm sure we'll all be the better for it. Braver too.
I am neither surprised nor horrified by the outcome of the midterm elections. President Obama defused his historically enthusiastic base by failing to play hardball with corporate America on the bailouts, settling for half-assed healthcare reform that cost at least as much as the real thing, irrevocably back-burnering the transition to green energy sources, and sending ever more troops to Afghanistan. The Republicans, as usual, ran by opposing everything they didn't think of (i.e., just about everything) and offering no solutions. What the hell did you think was going to happen? TOP 10 THINGS TO NOTICE ABOUT THE MID-TERM ELECTIONS:
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