AirBeagle

Yesterday I overheard two people waiting in line at Espresso Royale talking about the defeat of Proposal 2. One was saying to the other that he didn’t understand why the religious right felt compelled to discriminate against “those people.”

Well, that’s exactly it. As long as even squishy liberals stand around and talk about gays and lesbians and describe us as “those people,” as though we’re some sort of separate alien caste, discrimination will reign supreme.

I think « this piece by Garry Wills » is one of the best discussions of the state of the Empire I’ve read this week:

‘America, the first real democracy in history, was a product of Enlightenment values – critical intelligence, tolerance, respect for evidence, a regard for the secular sciences. Though the founders differed on many things, they shared these values of what was then modernity. They addressed “a candid world,” as they wrote in the Declaration of Independence, out of “a decent respect for the opinions of mankind.” Respect for evidence seems not to pertain any more, when a poll taken just before the elections showed that 75 percent of Mr. Bush’s supporters believe Iraq either worked closely with Al Qaeda or was directly involved in the attacks of 9/11.

‘The secular states of modern Europe do not understand the fundamentalism of the American electorate. It is not what they had experienced from this country in the past. In fact, we now resemble those nations less than we do our putative enemies. Where else do we find fundamentalist zeal, a rage at secularity, religious intolerance, fear of and hatred for modernity? Not in France or Britain or Germany or Italy or Spain. We find it in the Muslim world, in Al Qaeda, in Saddam Hussein’s Sunni loyalists. Americans wonder that the rest of the world thinks us so dangerous, so single-minded, so impervious to international appeals. They fear jihad, no matter whose zeal is being expressed.

‘It is often observed that enemies come to resemble each other. We torture the torturers, we call our God better than theirs — as one American general put it, in words that [the Emperor] has not repudiated. [The Emperor] promised in 2000 that he would lead a humble country, be a uniter not a divider, that he would make conservatism compassionate. He did not need to make such false promises this time. He was re-elected precisely by being a divider, pitting the reddest aspects of the red states against the blue nearly half of the nation. In this, he is very far from Ronald Reagan, who was amiably and ecumenically pious. He could address more secular audiences, here and abroad, with real respect.

‘In his victory speech yesterday, [the Emperor] indicated that he would “reach out to the whole nation,” including those who voted for John Kerry. But even if he wanted to be more conciliatory now, the constituency to which he owes his victory is not a yielding one. He must give them what they want on things like judicial appointments. His helpers are also his keepers. The moral zealots will, I predict, give some cause for dismay even to nonfundamentalist Republicans. Jihads are scary things. It is not too early to start yearning back toward the Enlightenment.’

A hearty amen to that, Professor Wills.

A note:

I’m probably going to be one of the few people left who think Bush remains an illegitimate occupier of the White House.

My personal viewpoint is that he wouldn’t have even been in Tuesday’s election had he not stolen the 2000 election thanks to the Imperial Supreme Court.

And he has never acted presidential; a president leads humbly, rejects hubris, rejects imperial pretensions.

He is a usurper and acts like an emperor, not a democratic president.

Therefore, on this website, George W. Bush will still never be referred to as ‘the president,’ nor will he be in my speech or other writing.

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck. And Dumbya looks like an emperor, walks like an emperor and he certainly quacks like an emperor.

The only concession I will make is that I won’t call him the Boy Emperor anymore. He’s now grown up and doesn’t need his regency anymore. I hereby acknowledge that he’s calling the shots; it’s ALL his mess, his death and destruction and extremism.

This ‘blog was created in August 2001 to document the excesses of an Imperial administration and yell, ‘Tripe!’ whenever he served it up. I had hoped to be able to make it softer and less snarky during a restoration of the presidency under Kerry. Unfortunately, that’s not a luxury that those of us who oppose the imperialization of the White House can afford. We ALL must yell ‘Tripe!’ and yell it loudly for the next four years.

And with that: George II is the first American Emperor. Heil Bush!

So, what to say or think now?

Remarkably, I’ve settled into a mood of sang-froid or c’est la vie rather than despair or depression. I’m shaking my head at the folly of it all, but pretty much resigned to it.

I can see where this is all headed. I’ve known for a very long time. And it concerns me, greatly.

As for the Canada thing, well, when the Canadian government announces that gay American couples can come to Canada and apply for refugee status and their cases will be individually heard, that brings it all home to me.

‘Move to Canada’ isn’t mere hyperbole or angst or ridiculous over-reaction for me. The next four years could see anti-gay hatred appended to the U.S. Constitution. And if history teaches us anything, it’s that the tyranny of the majority can be total and deadly. I’d rather be part of the group allowed to leave for safer havens than part of the group on the train to Auschwitz.

Again, as I’ve said many times before, Godwin’s Law be damned, if you can’t see the parallels to 1930s Germany here, then A.) I pity you; B.) you’re an idiot who knows nothing of history; and C.) bite me.

Face it folks, it’s 1935 all over again. In 11 states, and potentially the entire empire as a whole, the Nuremberg Laws have just been passed.

Short history lesson: Among other things, the Nuremberg Laws were propagated to ‘protect traditional marriage’ from undesirable, filthy Jews. The first law was titled, ‘The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor’ (sound familiar?). Jews were prohibited from marrying Aryans and vice-versa in order to keep marriage sacred. The second Nuremberg law stripped Jews of their citizenship and was based on America’s Jim Crow segregation laws, promulgated after the Great Compromise of 1877 and which were upheld by Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896.

History is repeating itself. First we had a quasi-legal accession to power; then we had our Reichstag Fire (11-Sep); then we had our Enabling Act (the USA PATRIOT Act) and now we have our Nuremberg Laws (Protecting Traditional Marriage amendments). The next step is the second law: stripping us homos of citizenship.

Our fight from here on will be to keep us from sliding further towards 1939. I see us as being 1935 between the two Nuremberg Laws.

Hysterical hyperbole? The only answer I have to that is … ask the Six Million. Read Victor Klemperer’s diaries. And when you know more about history, get back to me.

I have to say that it’s nice to be in Ann Arbor right now. An overwhelming majority here rejected the Gay Hate Amendment and voted against the Emperor. There’s a great deal of depression and sadness here this week.

And it helps to be around high school kids today. They give hope that the next generation is more tolerant of diversity and differences, less tolerant of fascism.

Kids in my second hour western civilization class this morning were talking about who’s gay and who’s bi and why it didn’t matter. Election results were still the topic of conversation. They are in the majority here.

And they take no crap from anyone. Two boys, who spoke as if they were ‘part of the tribe,’ obviously took no guff from anyone. Another boy, big and football-player looking, looked at them during their conversation and one of the boy — smaller, thin, blond and with braces — let him have it.

That’s a huge, wholesale change in the 22 years since I graduated from high school. We gay members of the class of ‘82 NEVER exposed ourselves in conversation like that, much less challenged the straight jocks to mind their own business and shut up. There would have been blood in the hallways.

So in some ways and places, progress has happened and probably won’t retreat, thank god.

There’s some concern about the draft. One 15-year-old in my third hour class said he wasn’t worried about the draft; he plans to join up voluntarily. He also admits to being a Bush supporter. In three years, he’ll be out of the protective cocoon of Ann Arbor adn his family and doing raids on suspected ‘insurgent’ hideouts in Teheran, Damascus or Baghdad.

But that’s just my opinion, and fear talking.

I guess my bottom line is this: American voters deserve what they are going to get in the next four years. The 20th century’s progress will be rolled back. Gone will be social security, corporate regulation, environmental protection, safe-legal-rare abortions and us homos will be put in our place. There will be great death, disease and war in the mideast. A draft of some form is inevitable as thousands of our troops will die. And a major terrorist attack once again on Imperial soil is now inevitable and unavoidable.

And in 2008, I can simply sit back and say, ‘Told ya so. You Bush voters got what you deserved. You CHOSE this path. You must now reap what you have sown.’

Ironically, when the next attack happens, it will be the Kerry voters in a big city which get hit and suffer. And the Bush voters in the countryside will all scream and want to get all patriotic and send blood and groceries and money to the devastated city. I think that city needs to throw their donations back in their fascist faces; Bush voters brought on the attack, they should have to travel to the target area and clean up the mess.

Not that I’ll be gloating or happy about all this. It will be incredibly sad. I hope my family and friends get through it unscathed. But with all seven of my nephews and nieces being of draftable age during the next four years, I have my doubts. And there’s still the imminent special skills draft, which can take people up to age 44 which could even snare me.

To be honest, if the special skills draft happens and I’m targeted, I’m throwing the gay-homo thing right in their fascist faces. Among other things. I will serve my community in the education realm; I won’t serve the nation which holds me in contempt and has abandoned me by supporting its wars and its imperial administration.

And that’s my childish stamp of the foot for today.

Ambrosia was full of students yesterday morning. One was on his cellphone bemoaning the onslaught of “crazy lunatics,” presumably referring to Tuesday’s election results. A table of grad students at the back was having a grand old time. One guy had a shaved head and a turtleneck, another was lanky and wore black socks with faded sneakers, and the third was a woman wearing blocky dotcom-denizen glasses and a funky perm. They could have easily been regulars at any cafe in the Mission or the Haight.

They were commiserating about Tuesday, too, of course, and they were uproariously ridiculing the Timothy LaHaye-Jerry Jenkins Left Behind series. The woman didn’t know about the series and asked what it was. She was incredulous that it existed. None of them could identify the authors; all they knew was the series title. The three of them had a good laugh about the rapture and those nutso fundies without knowing the first thing about them or their belief system or why they’re not just an outlandish joke dreamt up by Comedy Central.

It’s one thing to castigate the right for not knowing anything about the people they attack and for operating solely on the basis of stereotype, but the left has got to face up to the fact that they are just as guilty of this offense, if not more so. Not just the left, but the media as well, which consistently underestimated and dismissed the religious right throughout this election cycle (ever since the beginning of last year, with the Janet Jackson garment malfunction episode and the wave of same-sex marriages in San Francisco, both episodes which inflamed the religious right), just as they have in election cycles since 1980.

That is one lesson of this election. For folks who pride themselves on tolerance, diversity of opinion, and open-mindedness, those grad students seemed pretty narrow-gauge when it came to understanding why Tuesday happened and why the beliefs that shaped Tuesday are on the rise, not on the decline, in this country. You underestimate the power and the influence of the right at your peril.

That table of self-satisfied grad students guffawing about Ann Arbor being wiped off the face of the earth in the end times didn’t get that memo. They’d be incredulous, no doubt, to know that the hair salon owner in Springfield, OH or the construction firm owner in Ely, NV who’s read everything LaHaye’s written have more of a finger on the pulse of the nation right now than those grad students do in their solipsistic, moldy academic strongholds with their well-worn copies of Derrida and Foucault.

For being the only counties in the state where the majority voted against Proposal 2 (60% to 40% against in Washtenaw, 53% to 47% against in Ingham).

From the brink of tasting victory to the abyss of defeat …

Shellshocked. The only word to describe the feeling this morning, not only in my own head, but it feels like everywhere I look. ASquared is not a particularly happy village this morning. The skies are overcast and the chill of oncoming winter is in the air. The conversation on the bus was bitterness about Kerry conceding too soon and ignoring the provisional ballots in neighboring Ohio (though frankly the likelihood of those ballots making a statistical difference was nil or close to it). The campus was practically deserted and people on cell phones were expressing incredulity about the closeness of the results. The GovDocs room was a graveyard, except for one lone student who bent ober his laptop in sleep-deprived despair and mumbled about his feelings of misery to a friend who walked by (the friend was ebullient, so he probably voted for Bush). A worker in the pharmacy at Village Apothecary joked that he should have driven to Ohio to cast his ballot there so he could have affected the total.

Then there’s Proposal 2, which I don’t even want to talk about. How can people be so cruel?

After checking the ‘Immigrating to Canada’ guide, I’m off to bed. It’s looking mighty grim.

Good night, y’all.

I’m tired and very discouraged at the moment. But. I’ve kept this ‘blog for over three years as a documentation of the Boy Emperor’s excesses. But I don’t know if I can continue for four more years.

I’ve slacked off lately only because of my hands. I was just simply trying to get to this night. And now … Imperial citizens just extended the agony. I’m not represented in this country any longer. I don’t see myself in the US anymore. I don’t see myself fitting in in almost any way. I don’t see myself in Canada or anywhere else either, but the alienation with the US is pretty extreme.

The next year could be very interesting.

Crashed. And burned. Ohio looks gone, Iowa is teetering. Four years of fascism and extremism. 11 states completely destroyed their gay and straight unmarried couples and their families. The Freeper gloating will be extreme. Rehnquist will be retiring immediately after he administers the oath of office at the re-coronation and the Supreme Court will begin to fall.

And I’m not kidding here or going off half-cocked or employing hyperbole. I’m seriously trying to figure out how to get across the border to Canada.

All this even as imperial troops pound Iraq, car bombs are going off in Baghdad, our troops are dropping like flies and I may be caught up in a special skills draft before I turn 44.

We need a miracle now.

My mood bounces back a bit when David reminds me that Florida has a million absentee ballots and early votes to count …

TV ‘news’ drives me nuts. I discover that we can pick up the CBC in Windsor with the rabbit ears. We bail on ABC and their ultra-annoying coverage. I can only imagine what the others are like; ABC is about the best of the bunch. And that’s so very sad.

Oh, Canada!

Sinking feeling. 94% of the precincts in Florida are in and there is a 300,000+ lead for the emperor. Kerry is running behind in Ohio as well. If he loses Ohio, it’s pretty much all over.

Not a good night. At this point, my cautious optimism has given way to quiet alarm.

The Boy Emperor announces an unprecedented event: he invites the press into the White House’s intimate setting so he can use the power of the office to address people still voting in open states and beg for their vote.

First, it’s outrageous, typical of him. Second, it’s a sign, to me, that Rove et. al. is a bit nervous about either the electoral vote or the popular vote or perhaps both. As Peter Jennings on ABC said, he may be looking for an overwhelming popular vote mandate, an erasure of the 2000 fraud.

And god help us all if he gets a so-called mandate to stay on the throne. You think this four years was rough? Stay around for Part Deaux. Jeebus.

We’re at 102 for the Emperor and 77 for Kerry. A bit nail-biting, but the evening is VERY young …

And now more states are called. Kerry has 77 EVs and Bush 66. So far, so good.

CNN’s coverage is beyond awful. And I’m NOT tuning in to the Fascist News Network for love or money, until it’s time to see their downfallen, crestfallen faces when Kerry gives his victory speech.

Mood remains cautiously optimistic.

So. Here we go. Are we going to dump the Emperor and his fascist extremist agenda? Is sanity returning to the White House?

Officially, Kentucky, Indiana, West Virginia and Georgia have been called for Bush; Vermont for Kerry.

But exit polling looks good.

‘Cautiously optimistic.’

Yeah, baby. I just voted an hour ago. It totally rocked.

Our precinct is at Temple Beth Emreth on Packard. I arrived at 16:00 and got a great parking spot up front; I left at 16:15. 15 minutes from start to finish.

There was no one in the ‘M to Z’ line and I filled out my ‘application to vote’ slip and went to pick up my ballot. My voter card was checked, a bar code was applied to the book and the longest part was waiting behind five people for an open voting table.

The precinct worker told me it had been steady all day and none of them had been able to take a break.

I quickly marked my ballot, making sure that not a single mark was placed next to the name of any fascist party member. There was no wait to put my ballot in the optical reading machine.

The machine counter said my ballot was #869.

Honestly, I was a bit surprised. I was prepared for there to be no parking and to stand in line for an hour or two. While it was nice, it did make it appear that tales of long lines and delays weren’t true.

Still, it was a lovely voting experience in all.

On my way out of the polling place, a young lady asked me if I was a Kerry voter. I asked, ‘And who are you who wants to know?’

She said she was with Move-On.org. I said yeah baby. Apparently, they were checking off a list of Kerry voters who had promised to show up at the polls. There were a bunch of people on her list who had already shown up.

Cool.

Rock the vote. If you haven’t voted, get out there and do it. And if you’re in Michigan, VOTE NO on Prop. 2, the Kill-The-Fag-Families Amendment.

If you did vote no on Prop. 2, Frank and I and others like us thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Hopefully, the long, four-year national nightmare will end later tonight.

A victory speech from President-Elect Kerry would almost be enough to send me to my knees thanking Jeebus and God and all the angels. First exit polls seem to be surprisingly good news.

‘Cautiously optimistic.’ That’s the mood around the AirBeagle household this evening.

Peace, y’all.

Election day is here …

It’s amazing to me, more than anything else, just to hear the conversations around me today. The media likes to portray the American populace as thoughtless, partisan, and angry. I saw just the opposite today. There were thoughtful, reasoned, sober discussions on the bus, at the polling site, everywhere I went. People have been thinking, they’ve been pondering, they’ve been deliberating. It’s impressive.

There were jokes, too, of course. But this ritual is probably the last remnant of what it means to be an American that can’t be spun or marketed or discounted. It’s awe-inspiring and amazing.

Well, I guess there’s one nice benefit to all of this argument over gay marriage: better scripts from Hollywood.

Riiiiight.

I was listening to some “undecided voters” whine about their conflictedness on the radio. If you’re still undecided on November 2 about who should be in the White House for the next four years, after over a year of relentless news coverage, attack ads, vituperation, vitriol, controversy, and fury, all I can say is, “Huh?”

The 40+-mph gusts this weekend have put an abrupt end to fall color, at least in my neighborhood. Almost all the trees were bare and stark this afternoon when I walked to the bus stop. The trees on campus seem to have weathered it a little better, but they’re starting to fade, too. Autumn is short this year.

There’s supposed to be snow showers later in the week …..

All this crazy Scandinavian can say is, it’s about time …..

I found this info at the excellent site Electoral-Vote.com this afternoon that is worth distributing as widely as possible.

• Find out today where your polling place is by calling your county clerk or checking www.mypollingplace.com.

• Alternatively, call 1-866-MYVOTE1 to find your polling place.

• Check the hours the polls are open with your city or county clerk.

• Print the League of Women Voters’ card in English or Spanish and put it in your wallet or purse.

• Bring a government-issued picture ID like a driver’s license or passport when you vote. Some states require it but if there are problems, you will certainly need it. If you have a cell phone, take it to call for help if need be.

• As you enter the polls, note if there is an Election Protection person outside the polling place.

• If you are not listed as a registered voter, try to register on the spot. Some states allow that. Otherwise, talk to the Election Protection person if there is one or call 1-866-OUR–VOTE for instructions. If neither of these helps, ask for a provisional ballot, but you will need a picture ID to get one.

Washtenaw County Clerk: 200 North Main, Ann Arbor. 734-222-6700.

Ann Arbor City Clerk: 100 North Fifth, 2nd Floor, Ann Arbor. 734-994-2725.

Ypsilanti City Clerk: One South Huron Street, First Floor, Ypsilanti. 734-483-1100.

Saline City Clerk: 100 N. Harris St., Saline. 734-429-4907.

Chelsea City Clerk: 305 S. Main St., Suite 100, Chelsea. 734-475-1771.

Ann Arbor Township Clerk: 3792 Pontiac Trail, Ann Arbor. 734-663-3418.

Dexter Township Clerk: 6880 Dexter-Pinckney Rd., Dexter. 734-426-3762.

Pittsfield Township Clerk: 6201 W. Michigan Avenue, Ann Arbor. 734-822-3120.

Scio Township Clerk: 827 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor. 734-665-2123.

Please vote.

Tomorrow is pretty much the most critical election I’ve seen in my 41 years on the planet. Voter turnout is expected to be the highest it’s been since I was a child.

Fascist volunteers will be at polling sites in key states, just waiting to pounce on the unwary who are in the wrong polling place. They know that the national fascist party cannot win unless they suppress the vote.

So, know before you go: « a new website called My Polling Site » can help you find the correct polling place before tomorrow. I highly recommend it.

If you’re in Michigan, « the Secretary of State’s website » will also tell you if you’re properly registered or not. Be sure and check it out as well.

And go vote. Giving the Emperor another four years will absolutely devastate this country. We need a result that will send a strong message and can’t be overturned through fascist voter fraud.

Go. It’s your duty, lad.

Tomorrow is pretty much the most critical election I’ve seen in my 41 years on the planet. Voter turnout is expected to be the highest it’s been since I was a child.

Fascist volunteers will be at polling sites in key states, just waiting to pounce on the unwary who are in the wrong polling place. They know that the national fascist party cannot win unless they suppress the vote.

So, know before you go: « a new website called My Polling Site » can help you find the correct polling place before tomorrow. I highly recommend it.

If you’re in Michigan, « the Secretary of State’s website » will also tell you if you’re properly registered or not. Be sure and check it out as well.

And go vote. Giving the Emperor another four years will absolutely devastate this country. We need a result that will send a strong message and can’t be overturned through fascist voter fraud.

Go. It’s your duty, lad.

Happy Hallowe’en from the Scary Angel Beagle, everyone!

From the crowd that brought us ‘shrink the government to a size where it can be drowned in a bathtub’ comes « a truly brilliant idea »:

‘The Bush administration is threatening to shut an airfield at Midway Atoll in the mid-Pacific that has been available as an emergency landing site for decades. The airlines say the closing would force many two-engine planes flying between North America and Asia to make a long detour to hug the coastline of Alaska and the Russian far east, and could force some flight cancellations. Three- and four-engine planes are not required to stay within a certain range of emergency fields. But safety experts say that these planes will still face increased risk in flying the mid-Pacific route, because they will be farther from land in case of fire, system failure or passenger illness, which are the main reasons for emergency landings.

’The airlines are furious. “It seems like the government has just lost sight of the importance of Midway,” said Gene Cameron, the manager of flight dispatching at United Airlines. Dispatchers plan aircraft routes based on prevailing winds and, especially in flights over water, availability of alternate landing spots. But the Transportation Department, which has paid $3.5 million to the Interior Department to keep the airfield open for the last few months, is determined to stop. “There is no other airport available to commercial interests that we pay to operate,” said Brian Turmail, a Transportation Department spokesman.’

As Duane Woerth, the president of the Air Line Pilots Association, said:

‘I’m really ripped about this ridiculous loss of safety … This is an inherently governmental function. They keep trying to outsource this inherently governmental responsibility.’

Well, that’s the Emperor’s M.O., Duane. The market is God. Worship the market. The market can do no wrong. Screw safety and everybody and everything else. The market must be appeased.

Ridiculous indeed.

Speaking of Ohio, « Johnny Reb Asscroft is up to his usual tricks »:

‘Bush administration lawyers argued in three closely contested states last week that only the Justice Department, and not voters themselves, may sue to enforce the voting rights set out in the Help America Vote Act, which was passed in the aftermath of the disputed 2000 election. Veteran voting-rights lawyers expressed surprise at the government’s action, saying that closing the courthouse door to aspiring voters would reverse decades of precedent.

‘Since the civil rights era of the 1960s, individuals have gone to federal court to enforce their right to vote, often with the support of groups such as the NAACP, the AFL–CIO, the League of Women Voters or the state parties. And until now, the Justice Department and the Supreme Court had taken the view that individual voters could sue to enforce federal election law. But in legal briefs filed in connection with cases in Ohio, Michigan and Florida, the administration’s lawyers argue that the new law gives Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft the exclusive power to bring lawsuits to enforce its provisions. These include a requirement that states provide “uniform and nondiscriminatory” voting systems, and give provisional ballots to those who say they have registered but whose names do not appear on the rolls.’

Like I said, Tuesday is gonna be a wonder to behold.

      

« Our Life in Michigan – Strolling Around Northside Elementary School »

Wow … fog in Ann Arbor. Who knew? Reminds me of San Francisco.

Another summery (sort of) day today, though it was windier and a little chillier. It’s supposed to start storming again tonight, though, so we’ll see how long the rain lasts.

Last night there was an amazing lunar eclipse, the last that will be visible in Michigan till March 2007 (seems a long time away, though 2 years and 4 months isn’t really a long time at all in the scheme of things), according to the news. The moon started vanishing at a little after 9.00 and by 11.00 it was hidden behind the earth’s shadow, a tint of deep maroon. Incredible.

« No comment needed ».

There was a big article on the front page of the Michigan Daily this morning about a student who got hit by a car yesterday evening as she was crossing Bonisteel and Murfin on North Campus. A Department of Public safety representative said that speeding is more rampant on North Campus because there are fewer stop signs on North Campus. I’m sorry, but the only thing that curtails speeding behavior on Central Campus is physics. If there is no vehicular traffic between East University and State, I guarantee you that most cars and trucks and motorcycles will treat South University as though they were on I-94. Now, I’m not saying it’s all the fault of the vehicles. If I were a driver and I were trying to get anywhere in the center of town most days, especially the area around State and William, I would be highly frustrated by the almost practiced obliviousness of the pedestrians in that area, most of whom act like State Street is some sort of pretty concrete footpath and that the big shiny vehicles all around them don’t exist.

It was almost muggy tonight when I walked home from campus at around 7.30. The temps were in the low 60s, but the humidity was up in the 70-80% range.

It’s almost the end of October, and it’s like the middle of summer.

The only way you can tell it’s autumn riught now is that we’ve passed the peak of fall colors. Central campus is covered in carpets of yellow, red, and orange leaves, and it’s like a scene out of “A Charlie Brown Thanskgiving.” It’s great (except that it will soon be over and the leaves will be gone).

The ASquared database was hosed last night; thank god for Google caching. If you made a comment yesterday, it’s probably lost, however.

We apologize for the inconvenience. Our web host, Textdrive, is very dissatisfied with the server farm in Texas and is moving to a new provider. They’re ironing things out and it should get better soon.

It was a busy week, one of the busier I’ve had at SI. I had a poster presentation on Wednesday afternoon based on some of the work in my summer directed field experience with the IPL (as did about 60 or 70 other SI students, based on their various DFEs), and I had a screening interview on Friday afternoon for a fellowship at North Carolina State. Both went reasonably well, I think, although I think I may have flubbed a question in the interview. Nonetheless, it was good practice, if nothing else. They seemed to like my resume. They wanted to know why I had chosen to go to library school after my previous work experience in law firms and civil service (although my jobs in high school, during summers in college, and my first job out of college were all library jobs), a question which I have a feeling I’m going to get a lot and am going to have to form a coherent answer about.

The poster presentation was a lot of advance work. I began planning the poster a couple of weeks beforehand. We had to submit a title for the poster on October 1, but other than that, I hadn’t done much work on it. (I can’t believe I actually “planned” this thing, because I’ve never put together a poster in my life unless it was a really crappy one in junior high that I’ve completely forgotten about.) I struggled with ideas for days and days and finally the little light bulb went off over my fat head and a burst of something approaching creativity ensued. There was a map to be obtained, and there were JPGs of covers of newspapers to be found, and there were articles to be read about the distinction between print news and online news, and there were sections to lay out on PowerPoint, and there was much gritting of teeth over the uselessness of PowerPoint in its Windows incarnation, and there was sleeplessness and worry. This process somehow unfolded deliberately and did not completely collapse into confusion and ennui, which surprised me.

The actual physical labor on the slides for the poster and the poster itself didn’t really start up in earnest until the Wednesday or Thursday of the week prior to the event. I got a lot of help from Steve; in fact, although the poster would have gotten done with or without Steve’s help, because it had to be done to receive credit for the DFE, the poster wouldn’t have been nearly as effective without his good eye for detail, his visual instinct (an instinct I just don’t have), and his hard work. Steve and I (mostly Steve, because he’s better at it) sat at the dinner table for hours on Tuesday night cutting out letters for the banner with scissors and Exacto knife only to discover that the banner ended up too large for the final product. Then there was the mishap in which I forgot to include one of the words of the banner (our banner titles were submitted in advance, and I had no clue whether it would be an issue if the final title on the poster didn’t exactly match the submission) and we had to drive to Angell Hall at midnight to print out that single word.

Anyway, the final product looked great, and the event was well-attended, not only by the presenters, but by professors, potential employers, and other SI students. A lot of the other students had fantastic posters and fantastic DFEs. One student who’s in my cataloging study/work group had a really great poster on his work adding blogs to the IPL, complete with photos of the front pages of dozens of blogs flying off the sides of the poster like a blizzard. A friend of mine had a terrific poster of her experience going through a culinary archive.

One first-year student asked me about my experience at IPL and I was able to talk to him at length about the worthwhileness of having worked there. A number of people paid compliments. I was nervous at first but acquitted myself fairly well, I think. I could have rehearsed my spiel a little better, but I managed.

The poster ended up winning what I gather was the equivalent of an honorable mention (there were two $25 Borders certificate winners and five $10 winners, and I was one of the latter), which was surprising and gratifying. I gave the gift certificate to Steve, of course, but I owe him way more than that for his help (and his patience when I was starting to fray at the edges late in the night).

It’s official: Snow due anyday now, since Dairy Queen is now closed for the season.

      

« Our Life in Michigan – Rainy Saturday Afternoon | Fall Peak Colors »

      

« 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.