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Happy New Year!

And welcome to my first post of twenty-ten, not two-thousand and ten. Goddamn language Nazi…

While it's not officially the beginning of a new decade, (much like 2000 was not the beginning of the new millennium) people are still feeling relief that the "aughts" (or is that naughts?) are finally over. There is no other way to describe it: the past ten years have been horrific. Yesterday on Twitter, someone hash-tagged the phrase "ten years ago," and that got me thinking about what was going on in my life back in 1999:

I was still living in San Francisco. I was working for PG&E Energy Services, a long-defunct subsidiary of Pacific Gas and Electric that was created in response to the energy trading frenzy whose unbridled greed eventually brought down Enron and the rest of the industry. I still had a perfectly functioning voice. There was no one special in my life, but I was surrounded by good friends. The beginning of the George Bush nightmare was still a year away. Looking back now, while I can't say in all honesty I was happy, I was at least contented.

Then along came the decade from hell: Bush/Cheney, war, scandal, unemployment, leaving San Francisco, cancer, religious nutjobs, a rapidly receding hairline, and a general rise of teh st00pid in public discourse. Not exactly what I had envisioned the first 10 years of the 21st century looking like. It's no wonder "good riddance" was on my lips as often as "Happy New Year" last night…

But without all those horrific things having happened, I wouldn't be where I am now and would never have made the long-overdue re-examination and refocusing of my life me that ultimately brought me here; a place where I am now truly at peace with myself and yes, even honestly, happy.

◆ ◆ ◆

While 2009 in particular was one annoyingly big steaming pile of crap for the U.S. and most of the rest of the world, for me personally it wasn't really all that bad.

Yeah, I lost my mom last April, but in so many ways her passing was a blessing. None of us wanted to see Alzheimer's rob her of her memories of us, and thankfully she was gone before it had a chance to. Ben and I marked our one year anniversary together in September. Last February I bought new living room furniture (a very big deal for me) and Ben and I had the opportunity to see the Chihuly glass exhibition at the Desert Botanical Garden. In March I finally joined the 21st century by purchasing a flat screen television. Throughout the year Ben and I took several road trips: Flagstaff, Sedona, the Rim Country (no jokes, that's what it's called), Tucson, and White Sands New Mexico. In July I drove cross-country to inter Mom's ashes in Wisconsin. In September I was transferred from the hospital where I'd worked since 2004 to our insurance company—a move I'd initially dreaded but one that has turned out to be the best thing that's happened to me since I've been with this company. After being a dyed-in-the-wool Windows user for over twenty years, last October I made the switch and instead of upgrading to Windows 7, went out and bought a Mac. It the best thing I ever did.

I'm hoping that (except for the people dying part) when I sit down here to write here a year from now 2010 will have provided me just as rich a year to document.

Here's to a great new year!

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The Godless U.S. Constitution

Found at Proud Atheists:

Many Americans today claim that the United States is a Christian nation. "In God We Trust" is on our money and the phrase "under God" was inserted into our Pledge of Allegiance. Even the the Declaration of Independence refers to "nature's God" and "Creator" in a very deistic sense and only in the first two paragraphs.

However, the U.S. Constitution does not mention God, Jesus, the Bible and Christianity within its texts. Many of the "founding fathers" may have had Christian backgrounds, but they dared not insert their personal faiths or even their choice of deity…into our nation's legal foundation. This document was created with the intention of secular governance.

The authors of the Constitution had the forethought that others of different faiths will sooner or later enter this nation, and should be allowed to do so without the fear of legal discrimination and bigotry. This is the foundation of our great country, not God.

Nor is there any requirement in the Constitution to adhere to, be a member of any specified religion or even be a believer in any god. Freedom from religion is just as important to some individuals as the freedom of religion.

The First Amendment reads:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

The Second Amendment affords us the "right to bear arms", but in no way does it require any type of firearms ownership…nor is gun ownership a requirement to run for public office.

Our Constitution was written and tailored to afford us personal freedoms, not requirements to submit under peer pressure to conform to religious views and laws.

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Several of You Have Asked…

…how I'm getting on with the new Mac, having left the Wonderful World o' Windows behind last Friday night.

In a word, fabulously!

One of my favorite features!

In all honesty, it was a little touchy "the morning after." I had a brief, "My God what have I done?" moment Saturday afternoon while attempting to do something that was rote, second nature to me on my Windows box and it was causing me no end of frustration. Ben, sensing my mounting aggravation, suggested we go to Borders and see what kind of books might be available to help ease me through the transition.

I picked up Switching to the Mac, and it has been incredibly helpful in navigating the familiar, yet strangely back-assward-to-what-I'm-used-to way of life on the new machine.  I know I have to be patient with myself; I've been on Windows for the last 20 years; I've been on the Mac only 4 days.

But I have to say, now that I've calmed down and have a decent reference book at my fingertips (so I'm not constantly bothering Ben with "How do I…" questions) I'm back to totally loving it. I'm using Entourage for email, and while it was a bit of a pain to bring all my data over from Outlook and its feature set is nowhere near as rich, last night I was doing something on it and caught myself thinking, "Why doesn't Outlook do this? (Microsoft is supposedly returning Outlook to the Mac platform in their 2010 Office for Mac release.  Go figger.)

It was also a very rude awakening on Monday when i went back to work and had to deal with Dell again. For the first time in my life their construction (which had always impressed me, especially in relation to other manufacturers and the slew of home-brew clones I'd lived with over the last two decades) now really seemed flimsy and hacked together.

Last night I found a free VNC server application for Mac, and while I haven't had a chance to test it from the office, I have used it successfully on my local home network, so if I can verify that it will allow me to connect to home from work, my old Dell Inspiron can be retired and given a much needed rest. (I'm not going to get rid of it; I bought it from Ben about a year ago and it does have a certain amount of sentimental value.)

The only thing I had been outright missing from my Windows box until this evening was ThumbsPlus, an incredibly full-featured graphics cataloging/editing program that I've been using for at least the dozen or so years.  But Adobe's Bridge comes close, and since I just learned how to change the default image viewer from Photoshop to the built-in Mac Previewer in Bridge, this may not even be an issue any more.

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Turning To The Dark Side

No, I'm not becoming a Republican.

Last night, after nearly twenty years of supporting Windows on the PC platform, I finally had a come-to-Jesus moment and bought a Mac: a sleek, sexy MacBook Pro to be exact.

What caused this paradigm shift in my computing universe? To be honest, it was a combination of things. Until about a month or so ago I was extremely excited about the new version of Windows that officially went on sale a few days ago. I'd been running various iterations of it on my Dell Inspiron laptop since the first public beta was available, and my initial reaction was that Microsoft had finally gotten it right. But one Sunday afternoon, all of a sudden it simply stopped displaying my chosen wallpaper. An admittedly small issue, but it was nonetheless profoundly annoying. After extensive troubleshooting and finding no answers through the Google, I wiped the drive, pulled out the RC-1 installation CD and began reinstalling. Immediately after typing in my license number (taken directly from my email from Microsoft) it refused to proceed. "Invalid Registration Key" or some crap. I double-checked the number and typed it in again. Same thing.

Fuck me.

This was the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back. I turned to Ben and said, "This is bullshit. I've had enough. I'm getting a Mac!"

"Yay," he said! "My first convert!" (He's had a Macbook since 2008.)

My first impulse was to get an iMac to replace my rapidly aging Dell GX270 desktop unit, and after playing with a one of them at the Mac Store, I fell in love. (In the interest of complete disclosure, we were actually in the Mac Store because Ben had to take his MacBook for service because of a power problem.) But as the days drew on, the more I realized how foolish buying a desktop unit would be. 90% of my computing time was now happening wirelessly in the living room, and if I got a Mac desktop unit I'd be glued to it (and away from my Bubba) way more than I think either of us would like. So deciding on a laptop was a no-brainer.

I'm still getting rid of the GX270. It's way beyond its expiration date, and my laptop is a much better unit to keep around until I can figure out how to remote desktop from my work PC to the new Mac.

So what do I think of the new machine?

Love it. I know that Macs are not trouble-free, and when they crash they tend to crash spectacularly, but it's worth living with that risk for the sheer joy that has returned to my online life. It's sort of like how I viewed living in San Francisco near the major fault line in the United States for 16 years. The earth could shake at any moment, but until that time…damn what a ride.

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Through the Glass Darkly

The Shuffled Music Meme

Some people say that if you want an answer, ask a question and play a random song on your music player. The title is the answer. My questions and answers are below.

1. Put whatever your digital music player is on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS!

What is your Motto?
What Have You Done for Me (Jayne Montgomery)

What do your friends think of you?
Whatever Lola Wants [Gotan Project Remix] (Sarah Vaughan)

What do you think about very often?
Crystal Gayle Killed Frank Herbert (Tom Smith)

What is 2+2?
Love Hurts (Boy George & Culture Club)

What do you think of your best friend?
Hell is for Children (Pat Benatar)

What do you think of the person you like?
Happiness [B+M's New Re-Edit] (Bini+Martin)

What is your life story?
Color My Love (Fun Fun)

What do you want to be when you grow up?
She Will Never Learn (Simon Deewogab)

What do you think of when you see the person you like?
You Look Like the Sun (2 Colors)

What do your parents think of you?
In the Flesh? (Pink Floyd)

What will you dance to at your wedding?
Robotboy (Robyn)

What will they play at your funeral?
Dosvedanya Mio Bombino (Pink Martini)

What is your hobby/interest?
We Are Family [Sure is Pure Remix] (Sister Sledge)

What is your biggest secret?
Body Rock (Maria Vidal)

What do you think of your friends?
All I Need [Jimpster Remix] (Blue Six)

What's the worst thing that can happen?
Echo (Cyndi Lauper)

How will you die?
Love Vigilantes (New Order)

What is the one thing you regret?
Runaway (P!nk)

What makes you laugh?
The Man I Love (Dinah Washington)

What makes you cry?
Broken Vows (Dead Can Dance)

Will you ever get married?
From Here to Eternity (Giorgio)

What scares you the most?
Living in a State of Allowing (Abraham – Hicks)

Does anyone like you?
All is Well (Chicago)

If you could go back in time, what would you change?
Where Do We Go From Here? (Chicago)

What hurts right now?
Six Cold Forties (Shirley Q. Liquor)

What will you post this as?
Through the Glass Darkly (Annie Lennox)

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The Creeping Sludge, Part Deux

If there's anything I hate more than wasting one perfectly good sick day on actually being ill, it's when I have to waste two.

I woke up feeling like crap and was still hacking my lungs up this morning, but I am feeling much better now.  I'm still coughing more than I'd like, but they're productive coughs and the fever is finally gone.  I was even feeling well enough to get out and meet Ben for lunch at Paradise Bakery.

I've gone a little crazy catching up on my blog posts today (as you have no doubt noticed), and while I'm still not writing much, no one seems to be complaining.  And until I find something Obama does to really get my ire up, I prefer to focus instead on the things in my everyday life that I appreciate, and leave the bitching and moaning to the reich-wingers who are still evidently in a state of denial about the sea change that's sweeping this country.

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Goodbye 2008!

I was going to try and write something profound, but for some reason words are eluding me this afternoon.  All I can say is that I am reminded of what I wrote a year ago, "Yes, 2008 is definitely looking up, and I can only hope it's filled with as many pleasant surprises as 2007!" and think of the phrase, "Be careful of what you ask for, because you will get it."

2008 began with a new apartment, and ended with a new relationship, neither of which were even on my radar screen a year ago, and now I look ahead with nervous anticipation at what 2009 may have waiting in the wings.  (All of it good, but no doubt a lot of it also completely unexpected.)

All I can say for certain on this last afternoon of 2008 is that one year from now I will be changed—and changed for the better—from whom I am today.  I look forward to the wonderful new chapter in my life that meeting Ben and beginning our journey together has brought, and eagerly anticipate to the changes that will be brought about in our country by a having new President in the White House.

(Unlike some of my fellow bloggers, I'm still willing to cut Obama some slack; he's a newbie and is bound to make some horrific errors as he gets his footing as our elected leader.  If, however, two years from now he's still making the sorts of mistakes that have some of my copatriots up in arms, I will have to reconsider.  But for now…I'm willing to just wait and see how it all plays out.)

So with that thought, I sincerely wish all of you a Happy New Year, and hope the next twelve months will be as good to you as the last twelve months have been to me!

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To Be Filed Under Cool

I've often wondered why this hadn't been done…

From I New Idea:

LG Display has developed a 14.1 inch LCD panel for notebook PCs that are illuminated by sunlight instead of the backlight unit (a backlight unit is an illumination source used in LCDs. It is usually made up of several fluorescent lamps, a light guide reflectors, and brightness enhancing films) when used outdoors. This is the first LCD panel to allow users to easily switch from backlight use (transmissive mode) to outdoor reflective mode with the touch of a button. The display's outdoor energy consumption falls to one fourth the level of indoor energy consumption, providing a significant increase in battery life.

In addition, this new product resolves visibility issues with a contrast ratio exceeding 9:1 when used outdoors in reflective mode. The display's contrast ratio ranges from just 2:1 to 3:1 for conventional notebook PCs when used outdoors, implying difficulty in viewing the screen. During CES 2009, LG Display will showcase its new 14.1 inch sunlight Illuminated LCD for notebook PCs, as well as its newest cutting-edge display technologies featuring improved motion picture response time (MPRT), eco-friendly displays and more at the Bellagio Hotel.

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Time to Reboot America

From Thomas L. Friedman:

It actually started well, on Kau Sai Chau, an island off Hong Kong, where I stood on a rocky hilltop overlooking the South China Sea and talked to my wife back in Maryland, static-free, using a friend's Chinese cellphone. A few hours later, I took off from Hong Kong's ultramodern airport after riding out there from downtown on a sleek high-speed train—with wireless connectivity that was so good I was able to surf the Web the whole way on my laptop.

Landing at Kennedy Airport from Hong Kong was, as I've argued before, like going from the Jetsons to the Flintstones. The ugly, low-ceilinged arrival hall was cramped, and using a luggage cart cost $3. (Couldn't we at least supply foreign visitors with a free luggage cart, like other major airports in the world?) As I looked around at this dingy room, it reminded of somewhere I had been before. Then I remembered: It was the luggage hall in the old Hong Kong Kai Tak Airport. It closed in 1998.

The next day I went to Penn Station, where the escalators down to the tracks are so narrow that they seem to have been designed before suitcases were invented. The disgusting track-side platforms apparently have not been cleaned since World War II. I took the Acela, America's sorry excuse for a bullet train, from New York to Washington. Along the way, I tried to use my cellphone to conduct an interview and my conversation was interrupted by three dropped calls within one 15-minute span.

All I could think to myself was: If we're so smart, why are other people living so much better than us? What has become of our infrastructure, which is so crucial to productivity? Back home, I was greeted by the news that General Motors was being bailed out—that's the G.M. that Fortune magazine just noted "lost more than $72 billion in the past four years, and yet you can count on one hand the number of executives who have been reassigned or lost their job."

My fellow Americans, we can't continue in this mode of "Dumb as we wanna be." We've indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can't afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating and immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world's best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.

To top it off, we've fallen into a trend of diverting and rewarding the best of our collective I.Q. to people doing financial engineering rather than real engineering. These rocket scientists and engineers were designing complex financial instruments to make money out of money—rather than designing cars, phones, computers, teaching tools, Internet programs and medical equipment that could improve the lives and productivity of millions.

For all these reasons, our present crisis is not just a financial meltdown crying out for a cash injection. We are in much deeper trouble. In fact, we as a country have become General Motors—as a result of our national drift. Look in the mirror: G.M. is us.

That's why we don't just need a bailout. We need a reboot. We need a build out. We need a buildup. We need a national makeover. That is why the next few months are among the most important in U.S. history. Because of the financial crisis, Barack Obama has the bipartisan support to spend $1 trillion in stimulus. But we must make certain that every bailout dollar, which we're borrowing from our kids' future, is spent wisely.

It has to go into training teachers, educating scientists and engineers, paying for research and building the most productivity-enhancing infrastructure—without building white elephants. Generally, I'd like to see fewer government dollars shoveled out and more creative tax incentives to stimulate the private sector to catalyze new industries and new markets. If we allow this money to be spent on pork, it will be the end of us.

America still has the right stuff to thrive. We still have the most creative, diverse, innovative culture and open society—in a world where the ability to imagine and generate new ideas with speed and to implement them through global collaboration is the most important competitive advantage. China may have great airports, but last week it went back to censoring The New York Times and other Western news sites. Censorship restricts your people's imaginations. That's really, really dumb. And that's why for all our missteps, the 21st century is still up for grabs.

John Kennedy led us on a journey to discover the moon. Obama needs to lead us on a journey to rediscover, rebuild and reinvent our own backyard.

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Goodbye 2007!

New Year's Eve has never been a night of raucous partying for me. More than anything else, it's that time when I look back and quietly take stock of the preceding year and give thanks for the blessings it's conferred.

2007 has been an interesting year. Leaving the deteriorating state of our country out of the equation (because it's such a mood killer), it really wasn't a half bad year for me personally.

A year ago I knew Marc only through his blog; since meeting him in February he's become one of my best friends in Arizona. Likewise I never would've expected to meet Adam, or that I would actually drive to Wyoming to meet Knottyboy. One year ago tonight if you'd told me that I'd be buying a new car—and a MINI at that—just three months later, I would've laughed uncontrollably.

On the other hand, I had been expecting the continual good reports on my throat that came through, if not the unexpected surgery in November to clear away some cobwebs. And while the satisfaction level with my job dropped almost to the point of forcing me to look for another position late last summer, even that returned to normalcy and this coming April I'll be celebrating a four year anniversary with the company.

Speaking of anniversaries, at the same time I'm celebrating the four year employment anniversary, I'll be celebrating that all important five-year mark of being cancer free.

Yes, 2008 is definitely looking up, and I can only hope it's filled with as many pleasant surprises as 2007!

Something else that was expected was Mom going into assisted living. Both my sister and I said a year ago that because of her advancing Alzheimer's, one year hence she would no longer be living on her own. We're actually going a bit over one year on that prediction, but it's come to fruition nonetheless. The coming year should also only be good for her, as she moves into an environment that can provide the increasing amount of care and attention that she will need as the disease progresses.

And just think…in only 385 more days, we'll have a new president and our long national nightmare will finally be over!

Hopefully.

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My Planned New Mexico Adventure

I'm taking a week off later this month. I put in the request at work quite a while ago, without any real idea of how I was going to spend it. I had considered driving up to San Francisco, but despite the fact it's been five years since I set foot in The City and I miss my remaining friends there terribly, the thought of actually going was a complete turn off. I don't want to return as a visitor, having been a resident for so long. It just wouldn't feel right. (Sentiments that are amazingly echoed by a coworker who lived in SF the same time I did.)

Not wanting to stick around town either (I did that last year, and it felt like I had no vacation at all), and with Anderson itchin' to get out on the open road, I was trying to come up with some alternative. Then it hit me: New Mexico! Many years ago, while still living in the City, I took a week off and drove down to Roswell. (I'd never been there, and it was shortly after the 50th anniversary of the supposed crash, so my curiosity had been piqued.) Roswell was fun—and not at all what I was expecting—but it was the rest of the state that blew me away with its beauty and some of the best Mexican food I've had evah. I was especially impressed with White Sands, vowing that I would return one day.

This time, it won't just be a quick jaunt to Roswell. I want to see more of the state than before. So my plan is to first enjoy a bit of Northern Arizona and head to Flagstaff to see the Lowell Observatory (yes, I am a geek), followed by a visit to Sunset Crater and then a stop at Meteor Crater. I'll cross over into New Mexico on I-40 and overnight in Gallup, and the next morning head to the Petroglyph National Monument and Albuquerque in time for a late lunch in Old Town. That afternoon I'll drive to Roswell and visit the UFO Museum. I'll overnight in Roswell and the next morning take one of the bus tours out to the crash site (something I didn't do last time). Or maybe I'll forgo that and just get back on the road and head to White Sands.

As I remember, that portion of the drive—through Carizozo and Alamagordo—is quite scenic with plenty of photographic opportunities presenting themselves along the way. I'll plan on a late lunch at hopefully the same great place I stopped at last time, and then spend a few hours at White Sands. I'll overnight in Deming, and then head to Tucson the following morning.

I'll should arrive in Tucson shortly after lunch, so I'll plan on having dinner and celebrating my birthday with the ex and friends there, and then head home.

Nothing is set in stone, so if anything interesting catches my eye along the way, detours may occur.

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A Note to the Local ABC Affiliate

I think your "investigative journalists" need to go work for an organization where their talents can best be utilized. I was thinking perhaps the Weekly World News. I swear that if your stories don't involve sex, children or animals (hopefully all three, because you will have hit pay dirt that you can milk for days) it isn't news.

How about paying attention to the fact that Bush is thumbing his nose at the will of Congress and the American people? Or maybe that our civil liberties are being eroded on a daily basis in the name of the "war on terrah"?

That would be too hard, I know. It's much easier to take a hidden camera into an adult bookstore to film all those nasty ol' queers having sex under a screaming headling of "Protect your Family!"

And I know that reporting on actual NEWS that might question the edicts of Beloved Leader would be too much to ask, since it's obvious from simply WATCHING your programming that your network is nothing but a shill for the White House.

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Quote of the Day

Seems to me the Repubs are in a bit of trouble. 70% of the country, give or take, is just bitterly opposed to everything the party has done for the last six years—but that other 30% are the people who are going to show up at primaries and pick a candidate. So the candidates have to play to the radical nut cases, which is great, because whichever old white guy wins, everything he says now while trying to appeal to the 30 percenters is going to be repeated over and over and over and over on YouTube and The Daily Show and all over the Internet during the actual campaign.

So go ahead, old white guys. Spin your fantasies about banning abortion, and science, and Muslims. Spew all the sewage you want about how we're going to bomb and shoot people until they agree to live in suburban houses with white picket fences and 2.4 children and an adorable dog, the way God—our God, the REAL one—tended people to live. Tell us all about how you're going to roll the clock back to the Eisenhower administration. Every word along those lines that oozes out of your mouth is one more voter in the primary, and 100 less in the general election. It's music to our ears, over here on the left."— LegalCat at Huffington Post

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No Lesbian Sex in the Stacks, Please!

From Violet Blue, special to SF Gate:

It probably started out like any other serene, sunny, safely heterosexual day in the Bentonville Public Library. But the lives of some Bentonville, Ark., residents changed forever on that fateful day, after a wrong turn down the dark back alley of a card catalog led to a nefarious lesbian sex guide that would steal their innocence, stain them with the gay agenda and probably totally show them where the G-spot was. We can only begin to imagine the harrowing ordeal Earl Adams and his 14- and 16-year-old sons, Kyle and Ryan, went through after the boys discovered "The Whole Lesbian Sex Book" — an ordeal fraught with anatomical drawings and lesbian relationship advice at the hands, nay, lubed fists, of local lesbian author Felice Newman. Unfortunately, it's an ordeal that resulted in the book's removal and a threatened lawsuit for obscenity.

Two weeks ago, "The Whole Lesbian Sex Book" was removed from the Bentonville library shelves at the e-mail request of Earl Adams, after his sons allegedly had found the sex guide while browsing for "military academy" reading materials. It no doubt took the boys hours of page-turning trauma in the stacks to fully register their horror — and we can only guess that once they learned about female ejaculation, the damage was done.

Being a concerned father who would in no way want his adolescent sons exposed to any shred of accurate sex information outside of the abstinence curriculum in public schools, or examples of lesbianism that conflict with what his sons will later pay to see in strip clubs across town, Adams initially e-mailed a complaint to Library Director Cindy Suter. She responded by relocating the book to a less accessible spot, perhaps in the football-field-size NSFC (Not Safe for Christians) section.

But for Adams, the threat posed by the safer-sex sections in "The Whole Lesbian Sex Book" evidently plagued him night and day. When he tucked his sons in at night, visions of happy lesbians with strap-ons danced in their heads, he was sure of it. Adams sent a deliciously retro letter and fax to Bentonville Mayor Bob McCaslin, threatening a lawsuit if the book were not removed, a book Adams said was "patently offensive and lacks any artistic, literary or scientific value" (neatly copying and pasting from the Wikipedia entry on the Miller test, minus the inconvenient "political value" part).

For some inexplicable reason, Adams could not stop thinking about the lesbian sex book and the deep personal tension it caused him — release, he knew, could only be found with total elimination of the book. Oh, and a $10,000 settlement per child, the maximum allowed under the Arkansas obscenity law.

Adams had stated in a previous complaint e-mail to McCaslin, "My sons were greatly disturbed by viewing this material and this matter has caused many sleepless nights in our house." After the Library Advisory Board voted unanimously April 3 to remove the book from circulation, Adams stated, "God was speaking to my heart that day and helped me find the words that proved successful in removing this book from the shelf."

One could argue that shelving "Whole Lesbian" in the West Point section could happen to anyone. Or that separating the sex and military shelves with a couple of copies of Boys' Life might give someone the wrong idea. And that anything that makes young men fantasize about lesbian sex is surely a threat to the very fabric of society. Of course, no one would know these things better than Felice Newman, author of "The Whole Lesbian Sex Book," co-founder of local, quarter-century-old, woman-run, human sexuality/gender studies/human rights publisher Cleis Press, and Bay Area resident. I got a minute to get her comments about the lawsuit and whether trading her handsome flattop for a flowery dress might get her book back in the good graces of Bentonville's heterosexual agenda.

Violet Blue: Did you know your book was in public libraries?

Felice Newman: Definitely. Library Journal recommended "The Whole Lesbian Sex Book" for all collections. Many public and university libraries have ordered the book.

VB: How do you think it ended up in the military section? Don't ask, don't tell? Or is there a section on uniforms in the book?

FN: Perhaps the book ended up in the military section because the boys hid it there. Or perhaps, having found the book in its proper section, the boys were reading it in the military section, where they had told their father they would be researching military academies. Someone catches them smack in the middle of the fistf-ing chapter and they make up the story as an alibi.

VB: According to Adams, his two sons, ages 14 and 16, were "greatly disturbed" by their discovery and apparently underwent "many sleepless nights" as a result. Do you want to comment on these statements?

FN: I imagine they went through a change of bed linens as well. Do you think the court will award them damages for a nice set of military-themed boys' bedsheets from Wal-Mart?

VB: What could they have learned from the book? Safer-sex techniques for lesbians?

FN: The first five or so chapters are really a general guide to women's sexuality. So I hope I've helped those lads find their way around a vagina and clitoris and G-spot and anus and know what to do with them.

VB: Adams is also accusing you of "pushing an immoral social agenda" in your book. So what are the juicy highlights of that agenda? Can you pencil us in?

FN: Everyone should enjoy ample pleasure, frequent and copious orgasms. Every person should know how she or he best likes to get off and should be able to tell partners in great detail just how to make that happen. Everyone deserves to feel proud of his or her fantasy life. Every woman should experience my fist buried deep inside her … er … oh my, I'm getting carried away …

VB: What's your opinion on people leveraging religion to censor the content of public libraries?

FN: Libraries are meant to be free of censorship. Librarians are professionals who sift through book catalogs and reviews of the tens of thousands of books published each year. It's best left to them to figure out what will make a well-rounded collection that will serve the public. Well-rounded, by the way, means that there should be something to piss off just about everyone, and that includes you and me. So if the hysterical Christian right wants to write a book about their ideas, I say, fine. Let the good librarians shelve it in the open stacks. If you or I wish to write a rebuttal, they can shelve that, too.

VB: Library Director Cindy Suter stands by her decision to carry your book. Library Advisory Board member George Spence thinks it's "crude" and "ought to be replaced by something more clinical." What does the notion of making LGBT sexuality more clinical say to you?

FN: Well, for starters, I'm not sure what Spence means by clinical. Some people say my book is pretty clinical, in that it gives basic health info, etc. But if by "clinical" Spence means boringly technical, I can't see who is going to write it, let alone read it. Really, even if someone wrote a lesbian sex guide that read like a car manual, he'd still object to it, wouldn't he? ("Insert phallus-shaped object into the lowermost anterior bodily orifice …")

VB: Any other thoughts?

FN: Finally, here's what I think: If there was one teenaged lesbian or bisexual girl in America who didn't know there was a book about the sexual experiences she so desires, she knows now. Thank you, Fox News.

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One Month. Still in Love.

It's hard to believe that an entire month has passed since Anderson came into my life. Except for that little tire incident a couple weeks ago, it's been smooth sailing and I'm still looking for excuses just to be motoring anywhere. With the current situation at work, some days the mere thought of getting in that car at 4:30 and driving is the only thing that gets me through the day.

A little surprisingly, the more I drive it, the happier I am that I opted for the 2006 model instead of the 2007. (I wasn't 100% sure at first.) I was thumbing through the 2007 brochure that I'd picked up when I started looking at Coopers the other night and what struck me so profoundly was how so much of the redesign just didn't look right. Yep. I definitely made the right choice.

It's still strange catching my reflection in a store window, or—more likely—in the tailgate of some behemoth 4×4 ahead of me at a stop light. After six and a half years in the Beetle, it had become such an integral part of my life and my image that it's a shock to see that new, silver and black bulldog reflection staring back at me…

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Why Sentence Structure is Important

The boss had to fire somebody, and he narrowed it down to one of two people, Debra or Jack. It was an impossible decision because they were both super workers. Rather than flip a coin, he decided he would fire the first one who used the water cooler the next morning.

Debra came in the next morning with a horrible hangover after partying all night. She went to the cooler to take an aspirin. The boss approached her and said:

"Debra, I've never done this before but I have to lay you or Jack off."

Could you jack off?" she asks. "I feel like shit."

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Which Side of the Road, Mate?

Dark blue: Drives on the left (UK and British ex-colonies).
Light blue: Used to drive on the right, now on the left (Nambia).
Purple: Used to have a mixed system, now on the right.
Light red: Used to drive on left, now on right.
Red: Drives on the right.

I found this and several other fascinating maps here.

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Movies I Love to Hate

The Matrix Reloaded

I stumbled upon this mess today on TNT. I saw Reloaded originally on the big screen back in 2003, but I was so disappointed after seeing the original that I almost walked out of the theater on more than one occasion and haven't seen it since. But like a bloody wreck on the side of the freeway, when I happened upon it today I had to stop and look.

Like so many others, after I saw The Matrix I was thrilled to hear there would be two more films in the series. And I had such high hopes for those flicks. The original Matrix was of course outstanding, blowing everyone away by raising the bar on special effects and addressing several heretofore (at least personally) unexamined questions about the nature of what we call reality. The impression I got from Matrix II was that the writers and director only needed a bridge to get to the third act, and the easiest way to do that was to take all the good points of the original and just turn them up to mind-numbing volume, throwing all restraint and subtlety to the wind. I found it pretentious and just plain bad on so many levels: over-long fight sequences (especially the hundred Smiths in the ghetto school yard – hey, if fighting one Smith is good, fighting dozens has to be great, right?), the albino dreadlock twins, the existential mumbo jumbo ramped up to the n-th degree, and the completely unbelievable (even keeping in mind the characters by then knew how to "play" the matrix to its full effect) 101 freeway chase sequence that I didn't think would ever end.

It almost made me wish I was watching it on disk instead of on-air so I could fast forward though those parts.

In all honesty, I did end up flipping between Reloaded and episodes of Movin' Up on TLC (I think the host, Doug Wilson, is kinda cute and I love the way flirts with the gay couples that occasionally appear on the show), and finally abandoned it altogether during the last ten minutes to watch a bit of Breakfast at Tiffany's. Damn, George Peppard was hot back in the day. Sizzlin'. I had a thing for him even when I was a kid. (And he grew old damned gracefully too. Woof. We miss ya, George.)

The only thing worse than The Matrix Reloaded would be the bastard that followed it, The Matrix Revolutions. Ugh. Don't even get me started.

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Gingrich Admits Extramarital Affair During Clinton Impeachment

Hypocrisy

Pronunciation: hi-'pä-kr&-sE also hI-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -sies
See Republican.
Etymology: Middle English ypocrisie, from Anglo-French, from Late Latin hypocrisis, from Greek hypokrisis act of playing a part on the stage, hypocrisy, from hypokrinesthai to answer, act on the stage, from hypo- + krinein to decide — more at CERTAIN
1 : a feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one does not; especially : the false assumption of an appearance of virtue or religion
2 : an act or instance of hypocrisy

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Doing the Happy Dance

I got the results from my PET scan today. I'm all clear and Not. Going. Anywhere.

So beyotches, it looks like I'll be around for many, many more years to poke sticks into the eyes and ears of political and religious hypocrites wherever they may be hiding on the internets!

Furthermore, my ENT said today that I was a very unusual case. I don't know if I really believe him or not, but I am supposedly one of only 7 other people in the entire country whose disease was diagnosed and treated at the same stage and same time as I was and who are still alive and healthy today.

Mom always said I was special…

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The Best News Since November

Vermont votes to Impeach Bush and Cheney.

No, this isn't a joke.  It's time for the other states to get their acts together and pile on, hopefully turning this snowball into the avalanche that finally brings down the Bush/Cheney crime syndicate and restores our country to the rule of law.

We the people have the power—and the responsibility—to remove executives who transgress not just the law, but the rule of law.

The oaths that the President and Vice President take binds them to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." The failure to do so forms a sound basis for articles of impeachment.

The President and Vice President have failed to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" in the following ways:

1. They have manipulated intelligence and misled the country to justify an immoral, unjust, and unnecessary preemptive war in Iraq.

2. They have directed the government to engage in domestic spying without warrants, in direct contravention of U.S. law.

3. They have conspired to commit the torture of prisoners, in violation of the Federal Torture Act and the Geneva Convention.

4. They have ordered the indefinite detention without legal counsel, without charges and without the opportunity to appear before a civil judicial officer to challenge the detention—all in violation of U.S. law and the Bill of Rights.

When strong evidence exists of the most serious crimes, we must use impeachment—or lose the ability of the legislative branch to compel the executive branch to obey the law.

George Bush has led our country to a constitutional crisis, and it is our responsibility to remove him from office.

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Body Worlds

I went to see Body Worlds at the Arizona Science Center this evening. I'd been hoping to somehow be able to see this exhibit since I first got word of it back in the late 90s, but I figured the chance of that ever happening was remote at best. Not only was it only touring Europe and the Far East at that time, it seemed to spawn controversy wherever it went. And knowing the uptight, body and death-phobic attitudes of my fellow Americans, and how Christofascists certain, umm… "narrow-minded" individuals had the propensity for raising a stink about anything they disapproved of, I figured the exhibition would never be allowed into this country, much less that I'd ever get a chance to see it in person.

I had all but forgotten about Gunter von Hagen's work until billboards for the show started appearing across Phoenix. Imagine my surprise when I learned that not only had the exhibit arrived in the U.S., it was going to be on display in this backwater, armpit-of-a-city!

Despite nearly a decade having passed since I learned of it, I still wasn't sure if I'd be completely disgusted or totally enthralled when I actually got around to seeing it in person.

In reality, I had neither reaction. All I can say is that it was interesting. I had wanted to be a doctor when I was a kid, and since I had grown up building Renwal's Visible Man model (and dozens of variations thereof), the basic nuts and bolts of human anatomy weren't exactly foreign to me. In fact, the pieces of the Body Worlds exhibit reminded me of nothing more than incredibly detailed plastic models. It was hard at times to keep in mind that these had at one point been real, living people.

I didn't see anything that I personally would consider controversial or in poor taste, and if anything the atmosphere in the exhibition hall seemed to be one of reverence. People were talking in hushed tones and seemed to be very mindful of what they were seeing.

What surprised me the most about the anatomical displays themselves was not the unusual posing of the subjects (another source of outrage from certain segments of society), but rather seeing the actual size of the internal organs. Some are much larger, and others much smaller than I had ever believed. It's one thing to intellectually know the bones of your inner ear are small; it's quite something else to actually see them. Did you know that your trachea is at most the diameter of your middle finger, or that your kidneys are about the size of those small, portable laptop computer mice? It was an intriguing, thought-provoking hour, but by the time I'd made my way through the entire exhibition, I'd seen enough and was ready to go home.

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Worst Person in the World

Yes, even worse than Preznit McFuckwit. Ann Coulter, the walking, talking, mass of festering pus who put the c in cunt has been at it again. No need to repeat her hate speech here. Suffice to say it's already circled the planet at least a dozen times, but this time it's not playing very well anywhere except in the vacuous skulls of the hate-filled "christians" of the far reich wing. No two ways about it, every time this attention- starved meth-head opens her twat piehole, nothing but toxic waste gushes out. If there's one person even more deserving to be taken out by an errant meteorite than the wanking chimp himself, it's this skanky ho.

At least someone at CNN is paying attention.

There are those who will undoubtedly say that by calling her names I'm stooping to her childish level.

I. Don't. Care.

The Democrats seem to have have this twisted view that they need to be above all the name calling and mud slinging that the Republicans are so well known for. On a purely philosophical level I definitely agree with that. It's a lesson that was drummed into most of us by our parents when we were growing up. "Don't sink to their level." But on the other hand, the only way to take on a schoolyard bully is to stand up to him and kick him in his fucking nuts. And someone needs to do that very publicly to Coulter and her ilk. If the Dems would show even half the spine that the American people apparently believed they possessed when they voted them back into the majority last November, the entire Bush administration would be buried in subpoenas by now and would be lawyering up against imminent impeachment proceedings. But sadly, that isn't so. Because Democrats are "nice," we get toothless non-binding resolutions that can't even be brought up for discussion, much less the full-fledged purging of the Executive branch that this country is crying out for.

Jeezus Fucking Christ! Is it any wonder that most of the people in this country are walking around seething with anger? It's not because of our fellow citizens; we're for the most part united in the belief that our country is being led down a very wrong path by an administration that has exhibited no respect for the rule of law and has demonstrated time and again the only thing it excels at is incompetence. We're angry because of what is (or rather, what is not) happening in Washington!

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Not the Worst Film I've Ever Seen

But after Marc and I threw a couple Hamiltons away on Ghost Rider this afternoon, I can say without reservation that it definitely falls squarely in my personal Top 10 list of flicks that should never have seen the light of day. It wasn't so bad that it warranted asking for our money back (I only did that after seeing Nightfall many years ago) but from overhearing comments from fellow movie-goers as the theater emptied, we were definitely not alone in our less-than-favorable opinions.

And a personal note to Nick Cage: Lose. The. Rug. The color's wrong. The style's wrong. Either spend the bucks on a good piece or take a clue from Bruce Willis and just shave it all off, because what you've got going on right now just isn't working.

Maybe it's that whole flaming skull motif the designers were hoping to mirror, but Cage looked dreadful in this flick. Dreadful as in worn-out, washed-up and run over with a tractor.

In my opinion, they should've stayed with the actor who played the young Johnny, Matt Long, and reconfigured the story to reflect the actor's younger age. I mean c'mon…would you rather share a ride on a hog with this:

Or this:

Be honest.

I have to admit, I come with a pre-existing bias. Matt appeared in the short-lived series Jack and Bobby, which had been one of my major guilty pleasures until the WB axed it after only a single season.

I mean, even the bad guy, Blackheart, played by Wes Bentley (who sharp-eyed viewers will recognize as the video-obsessed teenage drug dealer from American Beauty) looks like he'd be more fun in bed on a bike than ol' Nick.

Okay, so my sideburn fetish is rearing its ugly head again. Shoot me.

With all this being said, it was still good to spend some time with Marc, so the afternoon wasn't a total waste…

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To Be Filed Under…

Why do the cute ones always hook up with the shrews?

I saw this piece of hotness-on-the-hoof on some home improvement show on TLC a while back. He was a sweet, good-looking guy who did all the work while she sat on her fat ass and directed. In a spasm of what appeared to be completely out-of-character generosity, the bitch finally "allowed" him to have one piece of his artwork in their her living room.  All I can figure out is that women like these must give great head.  Why else would these men—who could do so much better—stick with 'em?

Dude, "Ditch the bitch and make the switch."