Shameless Promotion for a Good Cause/PLEASE SPONSOR ME!!!

From May 16th to May 20th, I'll be taking the Live Below the Line challenge and eating and drinking on just $1.50 per day to raise funds for CARE and Global Poverty Project. CARE’s maternal health programs, which seek to safeguard women’s health during pregnancy and childbirth, and ensure mothers have access to emergency lifesaving health care. Healthy mothers are essential to poverty reduction. I hope to raise awareness about the issue of extreme poverty and encourage others to join the cause. I will do the challenge individually, but in concert with thousands of other people across 3 continents. I hope to be a voice for change.
My fundraising goal is $300. If everyone on my friends list gave just $1.00, I would exceed that goal.
PLEASE SPONSOR ME by clicking through to make a secure donation.

A few thoughts about coverage of Elizabeth Edwards's impending death.

So yesterday we found out that Senator John Edwards's ex-wife is discontinuing cancer treatment. The news coverage I have seen since is driving me nuts for a few reasons.

1. They keep saying how "treasured" she is to the American people. I'm sure to some, yes, but to all of the American people? A bit hyperbolic, no?
2. They keep describing her as "resilient." If I were her, I'd be, like, "Really? The best you could do was the title of my freakin' book? Don't you even have a synonym for resiliency??"
3. They keep saying how she is teaching America about a new way to deal with end of life choices. Um, not really. Tons of people die at home under hospice care and surrounded by their family every day. Soooo...thanks for acknowledging those people and their families existence and all that...
4. They keep saying that John Edwards is at her side "for the kids." Nuh-uh. They were life partners, business partners, co-parents et cetera, for how long?? He's there for her. And probably for his conscience. Yes, a bit of atonement is good for your own soul.

Weepy Patriotism

These past few weeks, I have been feeling blinding anger about the new TSA procedures which include the "backscatter" machines and the "enhanced" pat downs. (Remember the last time we added the word "enhanced" to something in the "War on Terror?")
I've been fighting the good fight, so to speak, over on Facebook because, apparently, a lot of people don't mind giving up their rights for an illusion of safety.
So I've been pretty exhausted as far as writing anything here. But I do want to state one thing unequivocally here for posterity.
Over my lifetime, because of my über liberalism, I have been accused many times of being the antithesis of a patriot, literally called a "traitor." Yet I doubt many of those people (who usually call themselves patriots) would say what I'm about to say and feel the truth of the emotion behind the words.

I would rather die with my Constitutional rights intact than fly "safely" without them.

My PSA for the day

I'm sharing this, not because I agree with the author, but so I can comment that sexual assault has many different forms and it isn't always for sexual pleasure or about committing violence. I, too, have been sexually assaulted, but I understand that sexual assault is about power; power being taken away from the victim and given wholly to the perpetrator.
Yes, the case of the mother who was not informed what was going to be done to her, nor allowing her to consent to it is sexual assault. Her breasts and her labia were touched without her consent and without any warning. It traumatized her. That's it. That's sexual assault. If a person came up to you on the street and cupped your groin and breasts and you called the police, they WOULD arrest the person who committed the act.

I understand some sexual assault is violent or more physically invasive than what happened to this woman, but we spend years telling our children, "If someone touches your 'bathing suit areas' without your permission it is not okay," then we tell adults, "Hey, touch away, no permission needed. It's open season on my vulva/scrotum. Have at it!"

• Voice of Dissent: It's NOT Sexual Assault, so Please Stop Calling it That.
• TSA - Sexual Assault
  

Mother Blood is Boiling

My mother blood is boiling.
Why?
Erica Jong's WSJ article.
She misunderstands so many of the points she is cutting down, and I was going to address them bit by bit, but then I read this sentence, "It's a prison for mothers, and it represents as much of a backlash against women's freedom as the right-to-life movement," and decided to stop reading. (Don't worry, I will revisit the article once I calm down.)
The second wavers who still espouse this crap make me ashamed to call myself a feminist and seem to want to make me ashamed of having made the choices that I made in my life. I wanted to be a stay-at-home mother long before I had any idea of who I would end up with and regardless of the fact that my mother spent my childhood telling me about all of the cool things I could be when I grew up.
It was and still is my ideal career choice, whether or not 2nd wavers or the government consider it a career.
And if I wanted to cloth diaper, make my own baby food, co-sleep and wear my baby, that was my choice, too. When I was doing that stuff it was mostly considered weird at the time, so it was hardly a matter of being "imprisoned" by society or the patriarchy or whatever bullshit these people espouse it to be.
I'm so sick of this type of thinking from the 2nd wave that it is extremely difficult for me to be grateful for the work they did for and before the Third Wave. Just as they seemed to be ungrateful for the generation before them, but they don't like to talk about that, ahem...
I support and respect women who work for pay, whether they have children or not, so when will the unpaid work of women (and increasing numbers of men) be supported and respected as well?

~~~~~~~~~~~~
UPDATE: I have to add that I also resent Jong's use of the term "right-to-life movement" instead of the anti-choice or anti-abortion movement.

A Tad Fragile

I guess the elections have me feeling a tad emotionally fragile.

I just got weepy--yes, actual tears--at a CTIA commercial. Yep, a lobbyist's commercial made me cry.

Here it is:

Drink Recipe: F*ck Me Gently with a Chainsaw

F*ck Me Gently with a Chainsaw
a.) On Election Night tell all of your Facebook friends this:

"couldn't decide if I should venture into the cold and cry into (an admittedly delicious selection of) beers or put my cozy jammies on and hide under a blanket on the couch. I've opted for the latter accompanied by a heap of Peanut Chews, a huge Iron Man cup of HFCS containing ginger ale and Hoarders and NCIS on the DVR. No live TV for me tonight."

b.) Immediately start checking Facebook, Twitter and online news media and commence live-blogging for close to four hours until everything is pretty much over.

c.)pour

• 2 oz Knob Creek into a shot glass

d.)then in a highball glass mix:

• splash of unsweetened orange juice


• 2 maraschino cherries, muddled and a splash of juice from the jar


• splash simple syrup


• 1-2 shakes Angostura Bitters


• 2 (or 3 or so) oz Knob Creek


• some ice

Directions
Shoot c, then sip d.

Alternate names for this drink are "shot of bourbon with ghetto old-fashioned back" or "Post Election Sorrow Drowner: Democrat Version."

Quickly, from my phone

A few election day observations:

• I'm seeing a higher number of lefty bumper stickers than I normally do, so I'm hoping they're all out and about because they're voting.
• Even when I vote straight ticket, I still like pushing each individual button rather than the straight ticket button.
• Parked next to my car at the poll was a red new beetle with a big "run on biofuel" sticker and an HRC sticker. When the guy came out I said, "Oh, I thought I was the only one in Penbrook. He laughed, then made a joke about the Republicans prayers for rain being thwarted because it's such a gorgeous day. I wanted to say, "Will you be my friend?" But I figured that would be too weird, lol.

"Just a quote" note

"Because we know, instinctively, as a people, that if we are to get through the darkness and back into the light, we have to work together. And the truth is there will always be darkness, and sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel isn't the promised land. Sometimes, it's just New Jersey."--Jon Stewart

blahg-er is blah

Words haven't been floating around in my head so much the past week or so. Images, ideas, pictures, maybe other people's words if I feel like reading for a bit but I'm just not chatty. Not in real life, not on paper, not on the screen. Or in a box with a fox eating lox.
I think the stressing out over the lady parts and the fact that I fucked up and missed my ultrasound on Wednesday and now have to wait until Election Day for the damn thing is just too much to think about so my brain has decided to just not think the way it normally does. Or I had a stroke. (Ah, just kidding. )
So Election Day promises to be... interesting? As I've said before, I do not have the good luck with which my husband has been blessed. For him November 2 is a promising day. For me? It's a terrifying prospect of Republithugs and hysterectomies.
On the other hand, if they see something during my ultrasound, even if it's not good, at least I'll have an answer and hopefully a treatment will be decided for me. Because if they see nothing then I have to decide if I want to roll the dice on a hysterectomy since "it may or may not help with the pain of unknown causes." I'll probably vote no; Nate feels the same. But we are both also hoping for an answer. Ack! This whole thing is just one big-ass conundrum. I don't want to have something "wrong" with me, but I know something is wrong because I don't feel "right." But the doctors--so far--say it is nothing, basically.


As a side note: I finally disconnected my Tumblr account from my Facebook account because I was overwhelming too many people with posts. I know I'm usually too prolific for some people, so the addition of tumblahgblahgblahg to my normal load of blergh scared some people off from reading my page at all anymore.

Down with Socialism!

Government needs to keep it's nose out my healthcare, medicare, social security, roads, libraries, police departments, fire departments, education and schools, our stock exchange, our oil cleanups and disaster relief, our national and international protection, the prices we pay for milk and eggs and cigarettes and bread, air and water quality, public transportation, the railroads and ports by which all of our consumer goods reach us, the water treatment and sewers and trash disposal and, finally, our justice system. I just can't take anymore of their fucking interfering with everything.

Ketchup List

Not that really anyone reads this, but I haven't posted in a month and four days. I've been going thorugh a lot and trying to get back in the groove at work. And...I got addicted to Facebook.
Argh! I didn't even want to join FB, but now I can't stop!
So since last episode:
[I'm going to do this as clinically as possible so as to keep this from rambling on for a jillion words.]

• I had a pregnancy scare.
• It turned out to be false.
• But the negative test was the false thing.
• Because I had a miscarriage.
• I'm now waiting for a second ultrasound because I have polyps or fibroids or something and they need to see them at a different part of my cycle.
• I've spent the past few weeks worrying about surgeries, d&cs, menopause, and on and on. (Tuesday. Just two more days until the next step.)
• I cannot seem to get in the groove at work since my xmas holiday because of the above, the weather and general health problems discussed in this blog that are still unresolved. (My GI appt is this week, too, as is my general practitioner appt, so we'll wait and see what the next step is with my GI system and the neuropathy.)
• My mental health has been suprisingly good considering the above. I'm still generally happy with life, just sad over events. And my moods have been quite stable, thank you very much.
• I'm qute happy with the Obama administration so far and was in awe of the inauguration, and also glad I didn't go regardless of the historical significance of being there. Because I had a much better view from my couch and it was warm there, too!
• So, that's about it for now. I'm no feeling to creative or chatty...FB might be killing my creatitivty gene, lol. OrI'm just preoccupied a few things right now. I don't know.
• But it is quite cool catching up with long lost friends and acquaintances lives. A lot of them are very suprising to me, which is good and bad in many ways. And the pictures that have been posted of me are acting as a mild motivator to get my fat ass moving at the gym, but I still get sweaty palms thinking of a gym. So I'm not quite there yet, but soon. Really soon...
• Holden has a serious girlfriend for the first time and it makes me feel much older than I did right before he started dating her. And a little bit like I've lost a bit of him I'll never get back, now. Sad. But necessary.

You must remember this...

Yes...we did. But DON'T start resting on your laurels. Remember:

Voting Shifts from '04 to '08

(Click it to enlarge)

This is a neat little map from the NYTimes which shows the percentage higher that people voted Democratic Party versus in the '04 election.

Pretty, innit??

Palin' in comparison to even herself.

Newsweek has an interesting round-up of now-known election secrets in which they touch on Palin's spending among other things:

Hackers and Spending Sprees
Highlights from NEWSWEEK's special election project.

But this article in an Aussie paper delves a little deeper into the sheer idiocy that was almost--well, not really, but could have been, maybe--our VP.

And she is not being gracious about the revelations:
Palin: McCain aides ‘Jerks’

Post-Election 'Toons

At risk of seeming like an ungracious winner...

(Reminded by my bestest, non-husband friend that I seemed a little like a poor winner, I will now get my gush on...)
I let my children stay up until 11 p.m. to see the US of freakin' A being called for the First Black President of the United States and his bee-yoo-tee-ful First Family. (And then we all shared a bottle of 2002 Perrier-Jouet Rose Champagne and watched the speeches; I admit I cackled and yelled all through McCain's gracious and kind speech--I'm like that; you should know that by now. Hope the kids can get up in the a.m....) Until about a year ago, I though this was not something they'd see in their lifetime, much less I in mine. Ignoring what this means to our country now, at this moment in history, PLEASE pay attention to the meaning of this man, with his history and his family and his skin color, for goddess' sake, being not only POTUS, but arguably, Leader of the Free World. This is more historic than for which I have words. I've been teary and on edge and ready for today for weeks now, weepy all day and *weeping* since 11 p.m. I'll let the tears speak for me. Amazement and awe and love for my country leaks from my puffy red eyes and probably will for some time. And then start all over again on 1/20/09. For weeks or months. Can you imagine the weight on Our Man's shoulders right now?? Crushing. And I do not normally pray, you all know that (as my readers are pretty much my friends and family and y'all know about my agnostic/seeking/confused/whatever-it-is-ive-ness) but I will be *praying* for this man to fulfill our hopes and dreams and to be safe and to not change from the Man--capital M--who he is and who we elected. I will teach myself to pray to What/Whoever-Is-Out-There for him. We all need to do so to the best of our abilities right now, and we all need to REVEL in the utter history of what we are are living for at least a few days, and then get to fuckin' work for this Man who has committed his family and life to Us.
Bless you all BLESS YOU ALL BLESS YOU ALL for making history tonight. Let's continue to live it and be worthy of the man with whom we made it and worthy of the children and the world for whom we made it.
LOVELOVELOVE,Kayly
P.S. I wish I could hug you all tight to me right now. I am in awe of my beautiful, wonderful country right now (and I laugh in utter joy as I write that right now, as the irony of me--me!!!!--writing that phrase without any irony WHATSOEVER; who knew???)!!!
P.P.S. For the Sincoffs: I know the Obamas said their girls' dog will be a shelter dog, and I think I heard the First Lady Obama (god! I love that!!!) say it would be a small dog, so here's hoping it's a shelter-Shih-Tzu. It'll give you, and thus me, a leg up in the friendship battle, lol.

Words I thought I'd never hear on November 4th:

"Montana is too close to call."

(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

HEY MCCAIN YA FAT FUCK!!!

HOW YOU LIKE US NOW BEE-YOTCH?!?!?!?!?!?!
wooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Too many tears of joy right now.
This is TRULY HISTORIC!!!!!!

I heart Ronnie Howard. Hard.

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

You KNOW he's serious when he shows us his gut AND his bald, bald head!!