« Our Life in Michigan – Fall Campus Colors »

Fascinating (and welcome) ghost-town feel to Ann Arbor today (the grim Scandinavian weather added to that feel). The center of town was completely deserted. Liberty Street was like a graveyard. Ambrosia, which has more and more become almost impossible to find an empty seat in, was blessedly empty except for a couple of students and an employer interviewing an earnest applicant and telling him that he wouldn’t be able to offer him health benefits (“I don’t get sick a lot” was the applicant’s response). Campus, likewise, was eerily quiet. I wandered into Angell Hall to use the color printer and there were so many empty computer stations I scarcely knew where to sit. Work at GovDocs was quiet until about 1.00, when everybody seemed to descend on the room at once. I went to Michigan Book & Supply and the art department upstairs was so dead that the clerk had NPR’s “All Things Considered” on (tuned to Bush blathering about what a “national security risk” Kerry is) and took, oh, a good ten minutes to count up the 30-odd pieces of card stock I was buying (she was so bored she lost count and had to start over). The only un-tomblike place was the drivethrough at the Michigan Credit Union office on William next door to the District Library, which, like every other day, was a miniature version of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

I know for a fact that ASquared wasn’t ever this dead during the summer. I don’t think it was even this dead last year, though come to think of it we may have been out of town ourselves last “fall study break,” I don’t recall for sure.

I wonder where all the students go on their “fall study breaks”? Florida? Mexico?

When I see the kind of ominous, implacable steel-gray overcast skies I saw today, I start wondering if maybe Dixie Franklin wasn’t right when she called post-summer Michigan a “sunless horror, devoid of joy and hope,” except that with a year’s experience, I realize that the weather here can change on a dime. It’s supposed to be sunny on Wednesday and Thursday. We’ll see.

It’s cold, my hands hurt. The fall colors are gorgeous and I wish I were a better photographer who could capture some of the magic.

I love October best of all, but it’s also sad, because one of my least favorite months, November, is howling like a wolf at the door.

In November, my skin dries out and is itchy and historically my deepest depressions/anxiety attacks have happened. It’s a nasty month, with all the leaves gone and everything brown and barren-looking, waiting for snow to cover it up.

But for now, I will enjoy the last of October. God it’s beautiful around Ann Arbor right now.

Meanwhile, « badly mismanaged Delta Air Lines reports that it is running out of cash »:

‘Delta Air Lines, which is struggling to avoid a bankruptcy filing, said yesterday that it expected to lose as much as $675 million for the third quarter and that it was using cash at a steep rate. The news from Delta, reported in a regulatory filing, renewed speculation that the airline could seek bankruptcy protection as soon as late October. If that happens, half the country’s old-line air carriers would be in bankruptcy proceedings.’

In other words, the executives at Delta, who have horribly mismanaged the airline for decades, are about to sneak into bankruptcy court and smash the unions.

Sad. So very sad.

I was feeling sorry for myself on the way home last night (the usual grad student complaints and kvetches, not worth going into detail about) until a trio of first-year biz school students got on the bus and started exchanging grim graveyard jokes with one another about how they were failing all of their classes but it really didn’t matter because you couldn’t flunk out of biz school without at least a warning first, right? I got off the bus and started my walk home, happy in the knowledge that I’m not failing in (or flailing in) a stats or accounting class.

Yesterday was the beginning of the term “study break” (what a joke) and also of (true) autumn: rain most of the day (not heavy, but not sporadic, either), windy conditions, and cold that that was deep enough to make me actually rue not having brought my gloves and a heavy jacket. I waited for the bus last night, and, predictably, the one that should have showed didn’t show until 20 minutes later and by that time I was across the street waiting for another bus that would show five minutes after that one. It was not a pleasant wait, despite whatever affection I may have for the presence of seasonal weather. I walked from Stadium and Packard home and was bone-cold by the time I made it through the door. On the plus side, traffic was relatively light, both pedestrian and vehicular. I actually made it across Stadium without having to wait for five minutes for all the cross-traffic to clear.

It’s currently 39 on its way down to 35 degrees overnight.

It’s the 16th of October.

I’d say I want to move back south to New Mexico, but I’m told Santa Fe got a huge snow dump the other day.

I’m not going to be warm again until May, am I?

Banned from the bike though I am, I did manage to sneak a ride tonight.

I had a meeting with a client on the UM campus. So I loaded the Bobcat into the Jeep and drove to a parking spot as close as I could get, then got out the bike and rode the six last blocks. I hate walking all that way; truth is, my feet are in almost as bad shape as my hands when it comes to walking long distances, especially if I’m in a hurry. Everything tenses up and starts hurting; they have since my San Francisco days.

The ride was very nice, even though dodging cars on East University was dicey. It was lovely to fly through the diag without trudging along.

I really miss my bike riding and hope the surgeon relents next week when I see him.

Little-noticed news today includes news that Gulf War Syndrome-suffering veterans are probably suffering from exposure to toxic chemicals, something the Pentagon has been lying about for over a decade; a revealing report in the Times that shows that private freight railroads have been engaged in a decades-long pattern of death- and injury-causing neglect and have then hidden behind Amtrak, which means they’ve passed on the expensive consequences of their bad behavior to the taxpayers and, in corporate news, that the Ford Motor Company is shamelessly resurrecting dead people to shill for cars they probably would have hated—in this case, Steve McQueen, who has been dead for 24 years. « Read more »

There’s just 19 days left until the big election, when we get to find out if our countrymen will embrace the Boy Emperor’s uniquely Amurrican brand of nascent fascism or if we get to step back a bit from the brink for four years. In the event of a renewal of Imperial power, Canada is looking mighty good to me.

On the homefront, I still am trying to be careful with my wrists, but it’s not easy. I’m getting better and better, but it’s taking a very long time (not to mention expense and pain). It’s much easier to quickly update links on The AntiFascist than it is to write longish entries here in my ‘blogs, so that’s primarily where the action is these days, I’m afraid. But I’m still not going anywhere; as my favorite quote goes, ‘I shall yell “Tripe!” whenever tripe is served!’

Good night, y’all.

A couple of law students were on the bus this morning. East Coasters, from the sound of it:

“We had a big fight this morning.”

“What about?”

“She started shouting at me. ‘I can’t believe you made me move to this sh*t place!’”

“Dude, that sounds rough.”

“Yeah. Well. I told her, ‘At least we aren’t in Ithaca!’”

“I’m doing really well. It’s really brutal, and I’m really stressed out, but I’m doing well.”

A first-year grad stuent, apparently, on her cell phone.

The crowd in the Diag on Friday was relatively small (only about 100, if you believe the Daily), but everybody there was passionate and in a defiant mood, even though the overriding mood of the times is one of fear and (sometimes) despair. Ralph Williams, who has been in the English Department here since 1969, gave a short but powerful speech. As I stood there, I couldn’t help but recall all of the similar rallies and other events I strenuously avoided in White Plaza at Stanford when I was an undergrad. Those were different times. It’s strange how these times seem so much “better” in many material ways yet somehow also on the brink of being suddenly, frighteningly, and unimaginably worse. Proposal 2 is just one close-to-home and concrete example of that paradox.

The Michigan Daily carried a headline in yesterday’s edition: “Coming Out rally highlights empowerment.” That has got to be one of the dullest, innocuous, sleep-deprived headlines ever. (I know because I wrote a lot of the other dullest headlines ever when I was a page editor in college.)

Anyway, the other unsuccessful aspect of this article was that it spoke briefly about Proposal 2, which it called “a ballot initiative seeking to amend the state constitution to ban gay marriage and similar unions.”

Folks, Proposal 2 will not just ban “gay marriage and similar unions.” It will take away health and other benefits from any unmarried couples, whether they’re gay, bi, straight, or any variation thereof. The proponents of this amendment want to destroy any relationship that is not defined by the rite of holy matrimony. That isn’t just gay relationships, although they would love you to believe that.

The University’s Regental By-law 14.06, revised in 1993, reads as follows:

The University is committed to a policy of nondiscrimination and equal opportunity for all persons regardless of race, sex, color, religion, creed, national origin or ancestry, age, marital status, sexual orientation, disability, or Vietnam-era veteran status.

I’m no lawyer, but you don’t have to be one to know that the legality of that bylaw will be in serious doubt if Proposal 2 goes through.

Please remember that when you go to the ballot box on November 2.

And a big fat jeer to the Daily for not pointing out how pernicious and ominous Proposal 2 is, and how many people’s lives at the University of Michigan – not just students, but employees – this hate amendment will affect if it goes into law.

It was kind of chilly yesterday, but today it was back to sun and nearly 70-degree temps. I see the National Weather Service is predicting “showers likely” for the rest of the week; I’ll believe it when I see it. Today I walked around campus in a bulky zippered sweatshirt because I thought it would be cold. I felt like a dork.

Very sad news in the paper this morning:

’ The Yankee Air Museum, a popular air history attraction at the Willow Run Airport near Ypsilanti, burned to the ground Saturday evening when a fast-moving fire swept through the building, destroying priceless aviation artifacts and two airplanes.

‘Three of the museum’s most prized aircraft—a C-47, B-25D and B-17G restored to flying condition—were saved because the crew of the B-25 had just returned from a flight and was able to move the planes out of the burning hangar.

‘The fire was reported at about 6:30 p.m. and soon had engulfed the 50,000-square-foot hangar, which was built in 1941 by Henry Ford for the production of B-24 Liberator bombers. No one was injured and no cause had been determined Saturday night.’

Being the classic airplane nut that I am, it’s sorrowful news; but at least they saved the three most important restoration aircraft.

I ran over to Willow Run to see if I could get some pics, but the fire department is still pouring water on the smoking ruins, so I could only get a few from far away.

Also, autumn color is in its full glory this weekend, and the weather is perfect. This is my favorite time to be in Ann Arbor; it’s just glorious. Breathtaking. Some pics (which don’t do it justice):

« Our Life in Michigan – Autumn Sunday Afternoon »

Yet another gorgeous, mild, cloudless October morning in Ann Arbor … what is this, California?

Yesterday we took a drive during the big game between UM and Minnesota and the trees had exploded with color seemingly overnight, with a riot of reds and yellows and oranges everywhere you looked. Absolutely stupendous. If there’s no other reason to live in Ann Arbor, this is it.

« Our Life in Michigan – Autumn Day at Delhi Park » Actually, it’s pronounced ‘Dell-High’ …

[What, no questions about us faggots and our families and how evil we are?]

Kerry:
1. Won’t cede sovereignty over US, but our country is strongest when we lead alliances.2. I have plan to hunt down and kill terrorists and get things better in Iraq.
3. We have a crisis here in the middle class … healthcare … schools and teachers …
4. I ask you privilege of leading nation to be strong and respected again.

Bush:
1. We’ve been through hell … lists some dubious achievements.
2. We’re at war.
3. We need big energy.
4. More work to be done.
5. Terra.
6. WMDs
7. Haters
8. Faith, liberty, freedom on march
9. God bless

Whatta tool.

Three instances of your mistakes and how you corrected it:

Emperor says … he has made decisions.

Beat.

Says he’ll take responsibility for tactical problems in war.

On big decisions in Iraq and Afghanistan weren’t mistakes. Trying to trap me into saying it was wrong. Again gets hyper defensive on Iraq. Goes way off on Saddam. And tax cuts.

Made mistakes in appointing people, won’t name names on TV. (?!)

Kerry’s response: Bush made huge mistakes. Look into your hearts: Was war last resort? No plan to win peace. Incompetent in delivery of services. Beyond pitiful and embarrassing. Saddam’s intent is an excuse.

Bush gets defensive on equipment and Iraq. He gets clipped.

Kerry says which is worse, how I talked about $87 billion or invading Iraq? Invokes Halliburton.

Kerry on abortion:

I respect the belief about life and when it begins. Raised a Catholic. Helped lead me yesterday and today. I can’t take an article of faith and legislate it for someone who doesn’t share it. I can’t do that. I can council people. I can talk about responsibility and abstinence. I have to represent ALL the people. Don’t deny poor people the right to have Constitutional rights. Brings up international family planning.

Time for the Fascist Fundamentlist answer. Emperor says we’re not spending tax money on abortions. Brings up partial birth abortions. Supports parental notification. Unborn victims of violence act. Create culture of life. He’s much calmer. Did they give him a shot? Tell him to chill out? He’s much more effective this way.

Kerry’s follow-up. Slams Bush’s warping of his record. It’s not as simple as Bush wants you to believe.

Bush says it is that simple. Simple things for simple minds. You can run but you can’t hide.

Emperor: ‘I’m NOT TELLING!’

That’s supposed to be funny?

Strict interpretation. Personal opinion. Here’s who I wouldn’t pick. Invokes Pledge case. Dred Scott case (??!!). What appalling ignorance of American history. No litmus test except for interpretation.

Kerry’s response goes to Bush’s words four years ago … we need conservative judges. His two favorites are Scalia and Thomas. I don’t we need a good liberal or conservative. I subscribe to the Potter Stewart standard. Mark of good justice is if you can’t tell the decision is written by a label. Supreme court and justice dept. is at stake. Brings up right to choose.

Embryonic stem cells (here we go).

Kerry says he respects the question and feeling, invokes Nancy Reagan and Michael J. Fox and Christopher Reeve. We can do it ethically. Embryos from fertility clinics not from abortions are available. It is respecting life to reach for that cure. Bush has chosen a policy that makes that impossible.

Emperor whines a justification of his policy. Says it requires destruction of life. He’s first to allow it. (?!) Hopes for cure too. He’s totally lost in this and he knows it. Claims it’s destroying life to save life (?).

Kerry: Bush is a waffler!!!!! The lines he’s made available are not adequate. 11-20 now. Not enough, they’re contaminated. We have to do it.

Bush justifies his flip-flopping. YAWN.

Defend the Orwell Act, Boy Emperor …

Bush says your rights aren’t being watered down. Every action being taken against terrorists requires court order and scrutiny. (?) Justification, oversimplication, lie, idiotic statement, blah blah blah. TERRA!!!! It doesn’t abridge your rights.

Kerry reponds. Republicans want the act changed. Many folks are concerned about it. Inspector general of Justice Dept. found it abused rights. Notes sneak and peek. Notes incarceration. Notes lack of intent. I voted for it. I believe in those portions that make us stronger. But some parts change Constitution.

Manufacturing competitiveness:

Kerry talks about ways to be competitive, cites examples of administration failure … incentives to move offshore. Tax benefits for companies that stay. Manufacturing and new jobs credit. Cost of healthcare is hurting business more than anything. Boo-YEAH! Education is important … especially science and technology … energy independence … great entrepreneurial spirit to free ourselves from mideast energy dependence.

Bush keeps going back to tort reform … insurance pooling … health savings accounts … claims Robert Rubin says Kerry’s plan won’t work … claims energy plan is stuck in Senate … Kerry misses votes … keep taxes low.

Gibson horns in again.

Kerry says you can’t stop all outsourcing but you can create a level playing field. Bush just lied. 96% of small businesses won’t be affected.

Bush is confused. Whut? Invokes some yokel in Ohio.

Emperor on the environment:

Off road diesel engines … increase wetlands … refurbish inner city sore spots … Clear Skies Orwellian Initiative … conservation reserve program … Healthy Forests Orwellian Initiative … hydrogen auto technology … unClean Coal Orwellian … I’m a good steward of the land … LOUD GUFFAW!!!

Kerry: Emperor isn’t living in reality. Don’t throw labels around, they don’t mean anything. Labels don’t fit. One of worst administrations in modern history. Orwellian names. We’re going back. His chief EPA investigator resigned … backwards … science.

Bush jumps on Kyoto treaty … it would cost jobs. Popular in halls of Europe. Good god, he’s such a tin-foil hat Freeper.

Kerry: Kyoto was flawed, but it was a start … Bush didn’t try to fix it … we walked away from 180 countries work over 10 years.

Explain your spending and lack of vetoes.

Emperor: We have a deficit because of Clinton recession. It ain’t my fault. We’re at war. TRIFECTA!!! Money, ammunitions and pay! Security! We have an obligation to spend that money. Everybody got tax relief. Trickle down!!! Voodoo economics! Haven’t vetoed anything because we’re working together (?). I won’t shortchange our troops.

Kerry responds. My healthcare plan is not what Bush says it is. You have the choice and control. On deficit. Bush was handed $5.6 TRILLION surplus. He now has a $2.6 TRILLION deficit. First in 72 years to lose jobs. Tax cut during war. 1% of America, the highest in America got $89 billion tax cut. Tax cut for less than $200,000.

Gibson cuts in with ‘How you gonna cut the deficit?’

Bush whines about it’s all Clinton’s fault. What a whiner.

After 9/11 and after the end of the recession, Kerry says Bush lost millions of jobs and gave money to the wealthiest. $25 billion giveaway to corporations. ENRON!

What about Trial Lawyer Edwards?

Kerry says he and John are for tort reform, look it up. Is it a problem? Yes. Do we need to fix it? Yes. But it’s less than 1% of the total cost of healthcare. $3,500 up in Missouri, 64%. 5,000,000 have lost healthcare under Bush. I have specific plans. It can happen, but we have to roll back unaffordable tax cut for those over $200,000 a year.

Bush is swamped. Kerry is the most liberal senator of all. Nyaah nyaah nyaah. He’s gonna tax us all!!!! AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH! Frivolous lawsuits!!!! AAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!!!! Federal government will run healthcare! That’s what li-bruhls do! Rationing! Ruin quality of care!

Kerry we should look at limitations. Bush is trying to scare with labels. Compassionate conservative: Biggest deficits in American history. Dropping kids off insurance rolls.

Bush: Trial lawyers! Senate votes! Blah!

Why did you block importation of Canadian drugs to save 40-60%?

Bush: I want you to be safe and protected and all huggly-wuggly and safety-wafety. Slams the third world. Pisses off his Big Pharma buddies by weakly touting generic drugs. Shillls for drug card scam. Blathers on and on.

Kerry: Notes that the Emperor four years ago was asked same question and said it was a good idea. He lied. Notes that Senate passed it. We’re talking about American drugs, not third world ones. Slams the Emperor on Medicare and bulk buying. Bush sides with corporations.

Bush blames Clinton. Kerry doesn’t have any accomplishments on Medicare in 20 years in the Senate.

Kerry: Actually in 1997 we fixed Medicare and I was one involved. WE BALANCED THE BUDGET TOO, something you don’t know how to do!

AWESOME DUDE!!!!!

Why no more terrorist attacks and what will you do about our safety?

Kerry notes that Emperor has told us it’s not a question of if but of when. These people wait and plot and plan. I agree we have to go after them. I can do it far more effectively. We need the best intelligence. We need better cooperation in the world. Better homeland security. 95% of containers are not inspected. Bags are x-rayed, but not cargo holds of aircraft. Notes Bush choice of massive tax cut over homeland security. Overcrowded hospitals.

Bush says he tripled the homeland security budget. Brings up some unrelated 1993 Kerry vote. Says we have to be right 100%, we have to be offensive. People are working hard. Loves the PATRIOT Act. Says Kerry wants to weaken it. Kerry can’t succeed in Iraq and it will be a haven for terrorists. Dredges up same old talking points. Yadda yadda yadda.

Gibson asks Kerry if he thinks terror is inevitable. Kerry says Bush said it is. The test is not if you’ve added money. He chose a tax cut.

Bush says he’s worried about our country. Way to defeat the enemy is to spread freedom.

The Emperor on the draft:

Rumors on the internet: We’re not going to have a draft period. Volunteer army is best to fight 21st century wars. We don’t need as much manpower on Korean peninsula.

I can’t follow him any longer. He’s off the rails, making no sense. But promises no draft while he’s the emperor.

Kerry responds that he doesn’t support draft and proceeds to highlight his military supporters (generals) and then talks about the Emperor’s failures and the way he’s overextended the military. National Guard, Stop Loss, back-door draft, underpaid military, hurts communities. I will add 40,000 active-duty forces. My foreign policy will build alliances, not going it alone.

Emperor is about to have a cow. ‘Tell Tony Blair we’re going alone!’ About to split a gut.

Kerry says eight countries have left the coalition. Missouri would be third largest country in alliance (in population). 90% of costs coming from our pockets.

Asks Kerry about Iran.

Iran is a huge threat and you can’t just rely on sanctions, notes that threat has grown while Bush was preoccupied in Iraq. Talks about North Korea’s capabilities and notes Emperor’s failure to engage. We were safer before he came to office. We have to join with the Brits and French and Germans and lead the world to crack down on proliferation. Bush slow even in Russia. He wants to take 13 years. Kerry plan is within four. Talks about bunker busters and proliferation. We will get tough with Iran if we have to.

Bush: ‘That answer almost made me want to scowl.’ Naive and dangerous. Claims that he’s following Kerry’s plan. More and more petulant. Almost shouting. We did what Clinton did and it’s wrong it doesn’t work (?).

A woman’s family travelled overseas and noted intensity of hatred to US …

Emperor says, ‘We’ve got a great country and I recognize I’ve made some decisions …’ Invokes Reagan and the Cold War. He made decisions because it was best for our security. Slaps Arafat. Slaps Europe. It was unpopular but the right thing to do. Democracy. Blah blah. Terra. Blah blah. International Criminal Court. Blah blah. Sometimes decisions are unpopular, but right. Presidency is not popularity.

Kerry responds. Sounds calmer and more in control. Bush sounds like he’s spraying spit all over the state. Kerry notes Bush’s words four years ago about what he would do in war. Brings up Shinseki. Notes betrayal by administration of what had been promised. ‘He rushed to war without plan for peace … he broke his word.’

Bush says he asked the generals if they had what they needed. Sounds petulant. Blames the generals.

Kerry notes that winning the peace is larger than the military. President’s job is to win the peace. He didn’t do what he was supposed to do. Our kids are being killed … KICK ASS!!!!

To Kerry: Proceeding with same plan in Iraq?

Kerry responds of course not … trots out Republicans who oppose the way things are being handled in Iraq. Attacks vociferously the current way things are going in Iraq. Talks about training troops faster and getting allies back in the game.

Bush says ‘From tyranny to elections! Iraqis love to be free!’ Says not to listen to political rhetoric. Lays claim to Kerry’s plan. Attacks idea of summit on Iraq. He’s getting shriller and angrier.

Kerry followup: The right war was Osama and Afghanistan and Tora Bora when we had him cornered.

Bush followup: It’s a misunderstanding that the war on terra is just Osama.

Pathetic.

To the Emperor: ‘What about the whole WMDs in Iraq thing … is this a reasonable justification?’

Each situation is different … you have to use diplomacy first. [Lying sack of …]

From there on, he’s just repeating, ‘9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11!’

Now he’s linking Al Quaida to 9/11 again …

Now he’s bringing up the Freepers’ UN Oil for Food shibboleth … and he sounds testy and slurring and there are plenty of pauses between his sentences.

Kerry’s replies … ‘The world is more dangerous because the [Emperor] made the wrong choices … he took his eye off the ball.’

Sorry, I know I’m partisan, but Kerry is kicking the Boy Emperor’s ASS. It’s that simple.
Bush comes back with a lame-o attack. ‘Saddam! Terrorists!’

Kerry comes back with a direct slap about sanctions … KICK BUTT!!

First question to Kerry: Do you have a reply to the Fascists calling you a flip-flopper?

Answer: Bush is running a campaign of mass deception.

No duh.

His answer encompasses a whole lot of ground.

The Emperor just repeats his campaign stuff. ‘He’s wishy-washy because he is.’ Pathetic.

Listening to the Town Hall debate on CSPAN Radio on XM … and thanking Good God Almighty that I don’t have television in my home.

I’m on way in a couple of hours to get an MRI done of my hands and wrists.

Yes, in a couple of hours. My MRI is scheduled for 00:20 … that’s 20 minutes after MIDNIGHT. Weirdest time for a medical test I’ve ever heard of. It’s been scheduled for over a month and I wasn’t given much of a choice. Strange stuff.

I have to go to the ER at University Hospital and go ‘past the Psych ER’ into the basement. At midnight. Sounds like some bad teen horror flick. Then when I’m done, I have to pick up a red phone and ask for security to let me out of the place.

I had to warn them 72 hours in advance if I had a body piercing(s) (I don’t, so I didn’t).

MRIs are notoriously claustrophobia-inducing; since I’ve never had a problem with that, I’m not worried.

And after Monday’s Electromyography/Nerve Conduction test, this is gonna be a piece of cake.

In case you’ve never had or heard of an EMG/Nerve Conduction, well, see what they do is they stick electrodes on your fingers and then zap your arms, wrists and hands with electrical current. It’s basically an electrocution and your hand jumps around. This test measures the speed that electricity travels up the nerves in your arms and indicates if those nerves are damaged (i.e., if you have Carpal Tunnel Syndrome).

Once that fun little exercise is complete, the real torture begins. They stick these needles and wires directly into the muscles in your arms and hands and listen to the electrical signals which result when those muscles are at rest or flexing. Again, this tests nerve response and whether they are connected properly to said muscles.

Having a needle stuck into your muscles and then wiggled around in there until the resident finds a signal is … well, not pleasant. I was sore and bleeding slightly afterward. And in my left deltoid, the resident couldn’t find a proper signal, so the attending had to come in and do it. It was quite interesting.

Add in some bloodwork and a flu shot and I was poked by large ugly needles some 17 times on Monday.

The good news/bad news: I don’t have CTS, but I do have something wrong and nobody knows what it.

The final indignity that day was a visit to the dermatologist where I had an encounter with a cupful of liquid nitrogen in order to have a slightly embarrassing problem taken care of by a couple of residents, one of whom was younger, I swear, than Doogie Howser.

In other words, tonight’s MRI should be a complete piece of cake. I can’t wait.

Good night, y’all.

My government docs class took a field trip to Lansing this morning to see the Library of Michigan. (No pics, because I thought there would be security checkpoints, which, surprisingly, there weren’t.) Very handsome newish (1990 or so) building, impressive collection, a cool assortment of rare books, sharp librarians. We didn’t see much else of Lansing other than a few older-looking houses along West Kalamazoo on the way to the freeway. There were at least three large Bush-Cheney ‘04 signs on farmland along the side of I-96 that I saw as we passed through Ingham County on the way back to the island of Kerrydom that is Ann Arbor.

I had a conversation with a fellow in my class who said that he was carrying a Kerry-Edwards button on his backpack but didn’t have that much enthusiasm about the Democrat. Nobody I know has much enthusiasm about Kerry, and that says far more about Kerry than he would be willing to admit. He is a cautious, cerebral, plodding man, aloof, patrician, and very New England, reminiscent in some ways of two failed Democrats of past presidential campaigns, Walter Mondale and Michael Dukakis. The only reason that Kerry will win this race (if he wins it) is that he isn’t Bush, and when you think about it, that’s not really much of a reason to vote for anybody. If Kerry hasn’t given us more of a reason to vote for him, he has nobody to blame but himself.

The start of October last year was unseasonably cold, although according to the National Weather Service, on October 8 last year it got up to 80 degrees. So far, this year seems to have been much more on the Indian summer side of the ledger. No rain yet this month, and it’s supposed to get up into the high 70s tomorrow and Friday. Today was almost like the first day of spring in some ways. For whatever reason, tonight the area around South U and East U was packed with chattering, fun-seeking undergrads, along with a few rowdy out-of-towners poking fun at the safe sex shop on South U near Forest; the burrito place I often go to, which is usually close to empty, was filled with customers. There wasn’t even the hint of a chill in the air when I was waiting for the bus.

Time is on my mind. Time is always on your mind when you get to be a certain age, and while I’ve always been obsessed to a greater or lesser extent with the passage of time (when I was in college I kept tally of where I’d been on a given exact date five and ten years previously and made predictions about where I’d be five and ten years hence), as you get older, the obsession is no longer a hobby or a pastime – it’s simply an inescapable reality, as close to you as your dreams when you’re asleep. There are occasions when I’ve got another five hours to go in an already long day and want this whole grad school experience to be “over.” Yet at the same time I remind myself as often as I can that it will be all over, in a matter of less than seven months, which is amazing, considering that when I started this whole journey it seemed like it would last forever. And then what? Who knows. We are going to be here another year at least, given that Steve needs to get his education degree. And I will work, at something, hopefully gainfully. Yet time seems to press on you. I especially think of how looming time becomes when I walk around campus among a crowd of kids that are close to half my age. They are all so blithe about time; it’s their insidiously ingratiating friend, they have nothing but time, they don’t think of it at all except as something to take for granted. It’s elastic and boundaryless, like a virtual-reality playground. I know this because I had the same feelings about time at that stage in my life myself and can feel the vapor of those exact same feelings rising from the undergrads as they stroll by, laughing, happy, oblivious. I concede that I was much more the brooding sort than most undergrads when I was at that point in my own life, but even so, time seemed generous and warm and full as many days as not, indeed it sometimes felt lazily voluptuous in its abundance (especially in a serene environment like Northern California), and it took effort to remember time and how little of it was left, except when I was blindsided by it every now and then, like in the cataclysms of world events, or in the realization that there was only a month of my year overseas, or only a semester of college, period. Now those deadlines feel at once more mortal and more mundane. Funny how that is. You expect the shocks of time as you advance in years, particularly as people and other loved ones around you move on or pass away, or as cultural icons that shaped your life pass on, and even when those shocks startle you and throw you for a loop, as they inevitably do, you are still somehow less naïve about them, less strangled by their cruelty. I don’t know when that feeling of expectation (not to say vigilance) starts to grow on you. Probably in your mid-20s. It’s something I ponder when I look at those carefree undergrads during these autumn days.

School is very busy; I’m not feeling quite as crushed with the volume of labor that I was last term, but that’s not to say I’m coasting by any stretch. The schedule I have, I think, is what’s kicking me up one side and down the other. I have classes in the evening from 5-8 twice a week (Monday and Wednesday night), and most of the other days I have work or my Government Documents internship. The schedule is making up in time pressure what it may lack in volume-of-work pressure. I fortunately do have pockets of break time during most of my days, though, which is welcome, and Thursdays I only have to be on campus until 2.00 most weeks. And I’m learning a great deal.

I spoke too soon when I said autumn was stomping in; it’s more like a tentative creep. The temps are noticeably lower each night. We had to drag in Steve’s pepper plants from the patio last night because the temperature was expected to drop to 29 degrees. But this morning, while chilly, was not as chilly as yesterday morning, and the day warmed up considerably as the sun ascended into its midday position. I wore a fleece pullover that turned out to be somewhat superfluous until it became close to sunset. The geese are flying in circles, it seems, unsure of whether to stay or go. Most of the trees along the Huron seem to be still green. It’s a prolonged Indian summer, and though autumn’s knocking politely on the door, it’s not fully here yet.

Seems that a misprinted Michigan absentee ballot for one precinct made some news in the last few days.

Lordy is 2-Nov gonna be wacky or what?

An undergrad talking to her friend on the bus tonight:

“And she was like, ‘You told me to shut up!’ and I was like, ‘I tell all my friends to shut up!’”

I was startled to hear the opening synth line from Prince’s “1999” as a ringtone on a cellphone this afternoon. I guess Prince has no copyright control over his Warner Brothers material, though, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at that as much as I should that that particular song’s being used as a ringtone.

Another day, another weather pattern. Much more summery and mild today. It was pleasant weather to walk home tonight in short sleeves.

No sooner had I posted the last entry when, boom, in stomped autumn, ready to open a can of whoop-ass. Today was cold, windy, overcast, dreary, and even drizzly at points. When I was in the area around Liberty and Fifth around noon, the streets were almost deserted. Nobody wanted to be out unless they had to be out. Campus was a confused-looking place. Students looked either harried, bewildered, or else determined to completely ignore the weather altogether, either by barreling through the wind and rain with their cell phones glued to their ears as though talking into them non-stop would make the weather go away, or by continuing to wear yesterday’s shorts and flip-flops and T-shirts, as though defiant apparel would do the same trick. This was probably the first time in four or five months that I really didn’t want to be outdoors if I could avoid it. I was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt and was still underdressed. I sat on the church steps at State and William waiting for the bus tonight, and while the chill was not bone-deep yet, I definitely felt like Hans Christian Andersen’s Little Match-Seller. Yet there, across the street, strode an undergrad wearing his shorts and T-shirt, as though hoping that at 8.00 the weather would suddenly spring back to summery life. Such is youth.

The rest of the week’s supposed to be partly cloudy/sunny, according to the National Weather Service. We’ll see.

Weather’s getting gradually cooler, but it still feels like late summer (despite the change in our page colors). Today there was scarcely a cloud in sight, the temps were up in the 70s, and it felt more like May than September. (Well, it felt like May would have felt if May hadn’t been rainy and cold.) It was windy on Sunday, but it was a warm wind, not a chilly autumn one. The flora and fauna seem stymied. Some trees are turning, and some are staying put. Squirrels are still rushing around, with a noticeable increase in nut-gathering afoot. I startled a skunk rooting around in a front yard as I was walking home tonight. When we walked the beagle in the park on Saturday, a blue jay chattered at us angrily from a tree. I saw a flock of Canadian geese flying past one day last week, but it was unclear to me whether they were migrating or merely flying to another part of town. It hasn’t rained in quite a while; I don’t recall the last time it actually did rain. This will all be over sooner than later, though, I suppose. The nights are definitely starting to come earlier.

I saw a guy studying at a desk this afternoon who was wearing a big white sweatband and a powder blue sweatshirt. I felt like I was looking at a Xerox of John McEnroe circa 1981.

And was that old-school KRS-One I heard blasting from an SUV tonight while I was waiting for the bus? It sure sounded like it.

An ‘incendiary device’ discovered on a Virgin Blue 737 in Sydney « may (or may not) have been a hoax ».

But buried in the article on the find is this priceless ‘graph:

‘A baggage handler found the device on Monday in the cargo hold of the plane when it landed in Sydney after an internal flight from the state of Queensland. He then breached security procedures by carrying it into the terminal.

What a prize idiot. Glad to see they have ‘em down under and they’re not just running around the Empire.