bunny rabbits say "hop, hop"

Sunday afternoons are exciting times

It's a tiny town, and everybody knows what you been doin'

Random neighbor dude woke me up in the middle of the night by ringing the doorbell* repeatedly. At 2:30. My truck was parked on the next street over, and the lights were on. He was sorry to wake me, but wanted to let me know so I could turn the lights off and make sure the battery wouldn't be dead in the morning.

To clarify: when I say "random neighbor dude" I mean, I didn't recognize him. We haven't actually ever met, to my knowledge. And yet, he knows which house goes to my truck.

I haven't decided exactly how I feel about this. Famous? Important? Conspicuous? Flattered? Nervous? It's hard to say.

I didn't go turn the lights off because I was too asleep to function. Now the battery is presumably dead. Who wants to come help jump it?



*It makes the lights in my room flash on and off and the bed shakes. That's how.

Listen to those congressmen arguing!

If this bill becomes a law*, maybe it will be easier to find a captioned version of its biopic.**


(click through to the youtube page and then click underneath the video for a transcript)

*It passed in the House. See 01:58-02:02 of the video for a visual aid about what happens now.
**It won't. Youtube videos aren't covered.

Happy birthday, limited civil rights

The ADA is 20. Tom Harkin says pretty words, but since Glee has already been signed on for a third season, I don't think we're really winning.

creepy/fascinating*

Abby came over the other night and reminded me of this video.

(warning: probably not safe for small children or those who are prone to nightmares about insects)

d
by Run Wrake. Via.

*where "fascinate" has its old-timey witchcraft meaning.

This is where the term "political spectrum" is originally from

Constitution City is notorious for its high numbers of monuments, presidential ghosts, politicians in suits, and chicken bones on the sidewalks. A lesser-known phenomenon in Our Nation's Fine Capital is the interesting and unusual election process.

The rule is simple: if you want to run for City Council or Mayor, you have to change your name. You can keep your old name for private and tax purposes, but your new politician name must follow this format:
[Vincent] [optional middle initial/nickname] [color term of your choice].

During the campaign season, rallies are held at which supporters wear the candidate's color (usually garments, but face and body paint are becoming more and more popular). Occasionally an especially fervent supporter will paint her house to match a candidate's promotional material. Finally, on election day, each DC resident finds an item of the appropriate hue and brings it to the voting booth, where an instant photograph is taken of the object. Many residents take this opportunity to once again wear colorful clothing and face paint to show their support, but any object (napkin, pencil, earring, bottle of nail polish, power tool, etc) is acceptable, as long as at least 80% of the surface area is a candidate's color. When the photo booths close, the Spectrum Committee sets to work creating a portrait of each candidate from the votes. In each race, the candidate with the largest photomosaic wins.

Choice of last name is a complicated tactical matter; most candidates hire teams including psychologists and linguists to find colors that are perceptually salient but not too common, and color names that balance the distinctive with the familiar. Color terms can win or lose elections- analysts believe that the outcomes of several races have been influenced by candidates' choices of color words that were not well-known (Vincent Viridian lost to Vincent Rose in a landslide in 1992; exit polls indicated that only 12% of voters could identify viridian on a color wheel) or have unclear referents (the 1978 three-way race between Turquoise, Green and Grey took three extra months to decide. In the end, Grey was declared the council member for Ward 5, but controversy continued around reports of vicious arguments in the Spectrum Committee Chambers over whether some 6,000 votes were turquoise or green. Several committee members resigned amidst rumors and accusations that they had called the race for Grey purely in order to end the bickering about the turquoise/green votes).

Once elected, the DC Spectrum Committee provides each council member with a wardrobe and a vehicle in the correct color scheme. Pictured below is the current council.

d
(standing) Vincent Periwinkle, Vincent Plum, Vincent Pewter, Vincent Blue, Vincent Red, Vincent Marionberry, Vincent "Phil" Brown, Vincent Mustard.
(seated) Vincent Black, Vincent Kelly, Vincent Gray, Vincent Navy, Vincent "Kwame" Brown.

The current election season is especially exciting, because it involves the first-ever Vincent Orange! Orange is challenging Vincent "Kwame" Brown for Vincent Gray's Council Chair seat (Gray and Vincent "Michael" Green are challenging incumbent Vincent "Fenty" Red for the mayor's seat). Historically, council photographs have been dominated by Browns, Greens, and Grays, with an occasional marionberry suit in the back row or the Mayor's office. It would be nice to get some brighter colors in there, although Orange may have a tough time with the electorate, as orange is not a flattering color on many people.

Do I ever encourage a near party atmosphere because of my comfort with using humor?

Probably! Well, I'd like to think so, at least. Could I start my next meeting, presentation, or conversation by telling a funny story? Why, yes, yes I could!

I feel confident, therefore, that I am an Expert at Humor, one of many Competencies in which I am all-too-rarely evaluated or praised. Although, I have to admit that the fact that I am not psychic has left me a little behind the field on Strategic Ability and Innovation Management ("Creates highly effective strategic vision and has an uncanny sense of how situations can unfold; prepares well in advance to take fullest advantage of the changing environment") and Managing Vision and Purpose ("Is a gifted visionary, anticipating future trends and artfully crafting a broad vision incorporating many groups and organizations"). Who knew Microsoft liked hilarious prophets so much?

A Competency I did not even know existed is Managerial Courage. Someone who is an expert in this area "Has a commanding but undaunting presence" and "Forcefully and definitively takes negative action to quench trouble", which sounds more like Being a Superhero to me, except, what does "negative action" mean? So maybe a Supervillain instead.

The best part of the Humor page is the recommended readings. Dilbert! Is this a complicated joke involving several levels of meta-humor? I can't tell! Which just makes it funnier. Good job, Humor Competency Writers!

Summary: if you want a cubicle job in today's economy, you should be a clairvoyant stand-up comedian with superpowers. It is your choice whether to use the superpowers for good or evil, but you should probably replace the words "good" and "evil" with "positive" and "negative" on your resume if you want to be called for an interview.

Football

I spent the weekend watching the superbowl with some Australians. It got sort of depressing on Sunday afternoon, but then again, there was a keg, so. Every cloud, or whatever.

Elizabeth spent a lot of time writhing around on the floor screaming, to show us how Italians play soccer. Ben spent a lot of time screaming at the refs, because they hated justice and beauty. I spent a lot of time refilling my cup, because it kept getting empty. The children spent a lot of time taking their clothes off, because that is how they do.

Tomorrow I'm going on vacation in Minnesota, because Constitution City hasn't been humid or mosquito-y enough for me lately. It's barely even like a swamp at all. Twin Cities here I come!

Gog versus Magog, take 2

Update!!! New extra evidence!!

4. The earth is disintegrating beneath our very houses.

Death Fight 5000: Gog versus Magog!

So, it seems pretty clear that we're in the End Times and the apocalypse is impending and the Constitution Gods are about to come back and rule over the ruins of the memorials and whatnot. Evidence:

1. The oceans are turning into some non-water substance.


2. Facebook finally turned into the Mark of the Beast. Everyone knows your birthday and your favorite sitcom and how many friends you have, now. Just like the bible said.


3. There are frogs shutting down highways in Greece.

In an effort to keep the populace soothed and nonrioting, the New World Order has put together a crack team of genius PR dudes to spin the story. At least part of the story- no one seems to care very much about the RAINING FROGS IN GREECE.

Meanwhile, back in Constitution City, the weather continues charming and the pool across the street is open. So that's where I'll be until Ghost Abe Lincoln shows up to collect the faithful. See you on the other side of the rainbow!

The real pool opens on Saturday

This is a better solution for the under-4-feet-tall crowd than for the rest of us. Or maybe I just need some bigger buckets.

Negative energy

Alyssa and I started going to Spa World last winter. Warning! The website I just linked to, there, is extremely irritating! It has music and popups and many moving flashing things. It is not a website for the faint of heart, nor the prone to migraines/seizures.

It is, however, a website full of incredible and fantastic prose and information. And the real-life entity to which the website belongs is also chock full of fantastic and incredible, which is why we keep going back even though it is located very far away (30 minutes by car!) in a State.

Spa World is basically a hybrid between a Korean bathhouse and an episode of Star Trek. You go in and trade your shoes for a little orange outfit, and then head to the baths. The baths include

1) BASHER WALL: adding 3D to typical pool, it provides the place to relax within the pool, and inside of water curtain has different atmosphere

which is okay, but I don't really care about different atmospheres or 3D. I like

2) DREAM BATH: bath that analyzed the lying position, it massages the tension in muscle by using high pressured water stream from JET nozzle on sole, calf, femoral region, waist, shoulder. (5 minute at a time)

the very best, along with the steam sauna.

After a few hours of that, it's time to dry off and put on your orange outfit and head for the Poultice Rooms and the food. The restaurant serves gigantic portions of delicious Korean food, and the juice bar serves tea, terrible fruit-free all-synthetic smoothies, and ice cream sandwiches that are shaped like fish.

The Poultice Rooms and the food area are arranged around a large general area, which is full of mats and plastic pillows and people in shorts outfits stretching and sleeping and chatting and reading and typing. It is also full of large television monitors which are showing various news and sporting events. There is free wi-fi and a number of big leather chairs. This is the part that is like Star Trek. Everyone is wearing identical clothing, sprawled out on mats on the floor, and using technology. That's what Star Trek is like, right?

Anyway, the Poultice Rooms are big fancy saunas that emit things to heal you. For example,

When using oak wood charcoal poultice room, one feels better, refreshed, and quickly recovers from poor health. One view of sickness and malaise is a lack of electrons in the body. When the body is warmed via heated charcoal, it emits infrared rays and warms the body for a long time, which improves blood circulation and relaxes muscles fatigue. [my emphasis]

This is absolutely my favorite view of sickness and malaise. A lack of electrons! Do you see what this means? It means that all of my sicknesses and malaises are caused by having too much positive energy in my body. I need more NEGATIVE energy, and then I will be cured!

So: anyone who would like to join me on the back steps for bourbon and complaining, please inform. It's good for me, it's good for you, everybody wins.

Family update: China edition SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCE FINAL INSTALLMENT!

Guest post by my mama. Featuring: police handlers, Attractive Sheep, Hello Kitty, primal screams. This is the final Mom Email from China; my mother & stepfather will be back in the Wild West sometime next week, where antics and adventures of a different sort are sure to ensue.



Shenyang is a small city that you never heard of- about the size of Los Angeles- about sixty miles north of North Korea. We spent the weekend there for Jim’s last police training, and except for the cigarette smoke, it was fun. There is a smaller version of the Forbidden City that is in more pristine shape, and a good museum. The police are always very considerate hosts, and I was “handled” by a young policewoman named Miss Ho who toured me around to see things and shop.

I asked to go to look at some handmade folk art or some crafts, and she said, “I know just what you want!” Then she took me to a mall where you could pay to paint a plaster copy of Disney characters or Attractive Sheep, the big cartoon character in China. Oh well, anyway, it’s a nice city.

Each night there was a banquet, as always, and one night they took us to a North Korean restaurant- the food was good, with dancing girls to entertain. The Boss Dancing Girl came into the room and said grudgingly, (in Chinese) “Well most Americans are really bad people, especially the soldiers, but you guys seem to be okay.” After the dances, they served a dish of cold noodles, and some stewed dog. Jim ate this but I could not. Also I felt guilty that we had all the food for the whole PRK on our table.

Our hotel was a beautiful old one on a main square with a famous statue of Mao. We were on the third floor facing him, right at his eye level, and it looked like he was waving hello as he peeked into our room. Lots of people were gathered in this square all the time, doing tai chi, or dancing or roller-skating. Some people had the semi-interesting Chinese habit of standing outside at dawn and doing a primal scream. Since Shenyang is about halfway to Vladivistok, it is about 600 miles east of Beijing in the single time zone of China, that means dawn is somewhere around 4 a.m. right now, and I was bored of the screaming after the first day.

At the end of the training the police gave Jim a complimentary police badge. It is brass and weighs two pounds; it’s at least eight inches across. They put it into a Hello Kitty! bag to present it to him.

After the training we went to the end of the Great Wall where it goes into the ocean, and to the first fort, all of which has been restored a lot, but it is still very pretty and interesting. Then we took a train to the resort where all the leaders of China like to go for vacations, called Bei Da He- on the ocean. Our friend Kaho brought spirit lanterns, little hot air Chinese lanterns that we set off on the beach after dark, and watched them fly up over the water.

We stayed at a hotel that is owned by the Department of Building Oversight. It was actually called a “sanatarium”, not a hotel, and it was staffed by a group of bewildered, fluttery girls who never seemed to know quite what to do about anything. We were the only people in it, possibly because none of the plumbing worked. It seemed as if this was run-of- the- mill - Leslie went down to tell them that her floor was flooded, and the girls came and looked at it and then went away.This is the best way to do oversight. She had to go back twice and complain before they switched her room, but the same thing happened in everyone’s room- water just poured out all over the floor during each use of the faucets. But the beach was lovely, and the air was fresh, so it all seemed good. We got back last night, and are in Beijing for the last week before the movers come.

Also, governments need to stop calling people "hooligans". It just makes them sound silly.

This NYT article is a brief, dispiriting, but unsurprising look at Rwanda. In excellent journalistic style, the NYT makes sure to examine all the pluses and minuses of having a police state. Is Rwanda a police state? Yes, it is. Now, granted, there's no free press. But the streets are so clean!

"[S]omething of a central African utopia", though, seems like a bit of a stretch. I've certainly never met anyone who thought of Rwanda as any kind of utopia. Actually, many people I've met seem to assume that there is still an active genocidal war going on there, and that they just haven't heard about it recently because the media got bored. Which is also fairly dispiriting, on several levels.