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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
my_rain_face's LiveJournal:
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| Tuesday, May 26th, 2009 | | 3:42 pm |
California = permanent shitlist. That is all. | | Thursday, January 15th, 2009 | | 12:16 am |
I've noticed that something tends to happen when I go to see the family in Seattle, Florida, or wherever. It's kind of a process. It goes like this: I go back to Seattle, Florida, or wherever, to see my family. Generally, this is because I'm on a break from school and therefore have a light or nonexistent work burden. As a result, I enjoy vegging out in front of the TV occasionally. This is genuinely a treat for me, as I don't have a TV in my apartment, nor do I have any desire to get one. When I watch TV, I tend to gravitate towards procedurals. I think this is because I only watch TV occasionally and therefore find it difficult to get into the shows that have multi-episode plotlines. I have, over the years, had two favourite procedurals. One was the original CSI, but my interest has waned a bit since the departure of my two (soon three) favourite characters. My other favourite procedural is pretty much everyone's favourite procedural: Law & Order: SVU. So when I go back to Seattle, Florida, or wherever, to see my family, I end up watching a lot of SVU. And then, for a few days or weeks after returning to Bloomington, I have to fight the urge to change my computer desktop to the image below as I find myself nurturing a rather amusing and devoted fictional character crush on the NYPD's hottest (fake) detective:  Gaaaaaaaaah. So hot. | | Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 | | 12:04 am |
For your viewing/listening pleasure: So. Awesome. | | Thursday, December 18th, 2008 | | 1:52 pm |
Obama defends choice of evangelical pastorBut Obama told reporters in Chicago that America needs to "come together," even when there's disagreement on social issues. "That dialogue is part of what my campaign is all about," he said.
Obama also said he's known to be a "fierce advocate for equality" for gays and lesbians, and will remain so.You've been talking that talk for awhile, Obama. After having supported you for such a long time, I have to ask: how long before you start walking it? ETA: Thanks to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) ninja_turbo for hooking me up with the email address for Parag Mehta, the LGBT liaison on Obama's transition committee. It's parag.mehta@ptt.gov -- I plan to write to him. I hope you do, too. Or at least, those of you who are American. | | Tuesday, December 16th, 2008 | | 11:13 am |
Study break. Stole this meme from circe_pleading because it looked like fun. I'm not including all of my cities on here -- just the ones that fit best into the categories provided. At the risk of sounding like a horrible pompous snob: it would take too long to list all the cities I've been to and loved. CITIES THAT BROKE MY HEART Montreal. In so many ways. CITIES WITH WHOM I HAVE HAD BRIEF PASSIONATE ONE-NIGHT STANDS Hiroshima, La Spezia, San Francisco, Paris, Manchester, Toronto (I guess? Toronto might have been more of a "short-term casual relationship where we parted amicably and could conceivably get back together" than a one-night stand). CITIES I'D TOTALLY HOOK UP WITH New York, Barcelona, Salvador de Bahia, Melbourne, Igloolik, Porto, Bangkok, St. Petersburg, Talinn... CITIES I HAVE LOVED London, Tokyo, Montreal (yes, it broke my heart, but I still love it - it's that kind of city), Kingston (in a very fraternal kind of way). | | Monday, December 15th, 2008 | | 5:04 pm |
 That is all. | | Sunday, November 30th, 2008 | | 10:52 am |
euryale000, this one's for you (pilfered from liminalliz). Oh, how the mighty have fallen. And, for good measure: euryale000 and I played this at the election watch party we attended, and got the entire crowd jamming. It was a high-five-worthy moment. | | Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 | | 11:02 am |
| | 1:26 am |
Oh. My. God. I think I actually teared up. We WON. I spent the countdown across the street at a cafe packed with supporters, in the company of good friends. Everyone cheered at the screen when a new state kicked over to Obama. We ate cake. We drank beer. At the end of the night I drove a few of my friends home, and after dropping off the last one, I had to cross Kirkwood -- the main drag here in town -- to get back home. There were people outside, shouting, and I heard a flute from somewhere. It was only as I crossed the street and looked back in my sideview mirror that I realised that the flute was being played by Ras Anebana, a friend of mine from my capoeira group. He, and a bunch of other people, were literally dancing on the street corner. I parked my car back at my lot and decided to put off sleep a little longer to walk back to Kirkwood and say hi to him. As it turned out, he was with a couple of my friends from capoeira, all of them playing a djembe and the flute and smoking a lot of weed and chanting "Yes we can!" and "Si se puede!" at every passing car. Several of them are Rastafarians, so you can imagine how they must be feeling. We all hugged and cheered. I honestly can't believe this. People: remember where you were today. Buy a copy of tomorrow's newspaper and save it. Today is historic. Just like our parents who remember where they were when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, or when the Berlin Wall fell, or when Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at the Mall, we will be telling our grandchildren about where we were today and the things we did to make this happen. There will be high schools and freeways and maybe even a holiday named after Obama one day. I've been defensive of this country in response to people who have made xenophobic or prejudicial assumptions about it when I was living overseas, but I have never, before today, felt proud to be American. Right now, riding the high of this victory, I can honestly say is the first time in my entire life that I find myself thinking, maybe this country can become something I can believe in, after all. Before anyone jumps on me for melodrama: contrary to what many of you may think, I don't actually think that Obama is the way, the truth, and the light of American politics. I just think he's as close as we're likely to get right now. And my present optimism comes in small part because I think he has the potential to do great things as President, but even more because until I watched it happen, I never, ever would have believed that this country was ready to elect him. This may sound incredibly cheesy, but for right now, hope really is the word. | | Sunday, November 2nd, 2008 | | 11:36 pm |
| | 2:45 pm |
I have finally gotten off my ass and gone to volunteer for the Obama campaign. Already, if we don't win I'll feel guilty for not having gotten more involved, but at least I'll have done something now. I knocked on doors for three hours yesterday and again today, and then will be volunteering for 3-6 hours on election day. People weren't all nice, but they weren't all bad, either. I'm here to urge all of you to contribute however you can in these final days. Make phone calls. Volunteer. Call up your local Obama office to ask how you can help out on election day, by standing at doors or entertaining people in line to discourage them from leaving. If you can vote early, vote early. If you can't: bring a book when you go to stand in line. Bring your iPod or your portable DVD player or a book of Sudoku puzzles. Bring a folding chair. Be prepared to wait for 2 or 3 hours. But above all, be sure that you VOTE. | | Monday, October 27th, 2008 | | 9:36 pm |
I have spent the past. . . WAAAAY too long puzzling out grading stuff for my freshmen. By the way: all my friends on here who are undergrads or recent graduates? I blame YOU for my current misery. See, you can write. And since you are the extent of my exposure to undergrads for the past several years, before this one? I allowed myself to believe that all undergrads could write. I was wrong. I was so very, very wrong. ANYWAY. So I had this idea for a mix CD I want to make for myself, and I thought I'd make it into a meme. So hey: pass it along if you want to. Here's how it works: We all have songs that drag us, kicking and screaming, into previous times and places in our lives, because for some damned reason we just couldn't stop playing them. I want to know what those songs are for you. So: 1. List the years of your life, as far back as you care to go. Then pick one song (no more!) that takes you back to each of those years. 2. List one song that's stuck with you through all your flings with the others. Here's my list: 1998 - Goo Goo Dolls, Iris 1999 - Matchbox Twenty, 3AM 2000 - Elastica, Stutter 2001 - Everything But The Girl, Walking Wounded 2002 - Evanescence, Bring Me To Life 2003 - Lamb, Gorecki 2004 - Tori Amos, A Sorta Fairytale 2005 - Carina Round, Monument 2006 - Carina Round, Sit Tight 2007 - Tegan and Sara, The Con 2008 - Thom Yorke, Black Swan And the song that's never gone away: Massive Attack, Protection I can connect people with almost any of these songs if you want them. Current Music: Do yourself a favour and pack your bags, buy a ticket and get on the train | | Tuesday, October 7th, 2008 | | 11:07 pm |
Daily Show dude who's not Jon Stewart: Governor Palin brought up Joe Biden's quote about raping the ocean floors this evening. Some dude at the debate: . . . Yes. Daily Show dude who's not Jon Stewart: Does Governor Palin support the ocean floor paying for its own rape kit? Have I ranted here yet about how much I hate the use of the words "free" and "freedom" in politics? If not - should I? With specific reference to Palin's wankery about how if we're not careful, some day in the future, people will tell stories about a time in the past when men and women in America were free? And, notably, how she said it with a big shit-eating grin on her face, as though she was looking forward to this future period of nostalgia? And can anybody tell me where the fuck our freedom (or what's left of it post-Patriot-Act) is supposedly going, and who's taking it there? (note to self: stop whining and go finish your homework, Sarah.) | | Friday, October 3rd, 2008 | | 12:54 pm |
Some things are too awesome not to share. | | 12:41 am |
After very brief deliberation, I have decided that the following two points were my favourite parts of the Vice-Presidential debate (which, for what it's worth, was a bajillion times more entertaining than the Presidential debate). First: Palin on nuclear ("nuke-ular") weapons. "Nuclear weaponry of course would be the be-all end-all of just too many people and too many parts of our planet, so those dangerous regimes again could not be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, period. Our nuclear weaponry here in the US is used as a deterrent and that's a safe, stable way to use nuclear weaponry. But for those countries -- North Korea also, under Kim Jong Il -- we have got to make sure that we're putting the economic sanctions on these countries and that we have friends and allies supporting us on this to make sure that leaders like Kim Jong Il and, uh, Ahmedinejad are not allowed to acquire, to proliferate, or to use those nuclear weapons. It is that important. Can we talk about Afghanistan real quick also, though?" . . . seriously. What did she just say? Do you have any idea? I have no idea. But I'm looking forward to tomorrow's Daily Show because I'm thinking Jon Stewart will have some great ideas. Second: Palin on our military leader in Afghanistan: "Well, first, McClellan did not say definitively that the surge principles would not work in Afghanistan." Problem 1 with this: General McClellan:  General McKiernan:  I'm thinking the latter of these is the guy she's talking about, since I'm thinking McClellan was too busy with Civil War issues to be worried about Afghanistan. Especially since Afghanistan didn't come to exist as a political nation until long after McClellan had died. Problem 2: Let's look at what McKiernan actually said about Afghanistan and troop surges. "The word I don't use for Afghanistan is 'surge,'" McKiernan emphasized, saying that what is required instead is a “sustained commitment” to a counterinsurgency effort that could last many more years and would ultimately require a political, not military, solution." Taken from the San Diego Union-Tribune. If this woman ever becomes the one with her finger on the trigger, I'm running. Fast. | | Thursday, October 2nd, 2008 | | 2:21 am |
I'm in that kind of stretch where I'm up until 2:21 am even though I'm trying to kick a cold and should be going to bed at 10:00 pm. I really wish that "apply for grants" season didn't fall at the same time as "write your AFS paper" season and "get ready to grade midterms" season and "finish up all the work you didn't finish in the summer" season. AFS, by the way, refers to the American Folklore Society, whose annual meeting is coming up in October, and for which yours truly has been accepted to present a paper which she has not yet written. It's only, you know, the biggest, most important conference for our discipline. GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. It hurts. I need to sleep. | | Wednesday, September 24th, 2008 | | 8:16 pm |
Okay, new entry just to say: I have a lump on my elbow from capoeira. Yes, I know. I can read your minds. Wow! you're thinking. She must be tough, to have a bump on her elbow from training in MARTIAL ARTS!And I'm just going to let you keep thinking that. I'm not going to tell you that I got the lump from bashing my elbow on the radiator while we were jogging around the room in circles to warm up. You will never, ever know the truth. | | Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008 | | 7:38 pm |
So. . . I seek the thoughts of wiser people on my friends list. There's all this talk about a $700 million government bail-out of the country's major financial institutions, virtually all of whom seem to be on the brink of implosion. Government financial advisors are all going "Dudes! PASS THE BILL AND GET THE MONEY OUT THERE!" but Congress is dragging its heels. I don't understand how this works. I don't understand what the pros and cons are, or how that $700 million would be distributed and disbursed if it passes. I would like to develop a more informed understanding, and perhaps eventually an opinion, on the matter, but I don't know where to look or who to ask. Thoughts? Suggestions? Recommendations? Opinions? | | Sunday, September 14th, 2008 | | 2:52 pm |
This is honestly the best SNL skit I've seen in years. Tina Fey is a genius. | | Sunday, September 7th, 2008 | | 4:25 pm |
I just have to share this. I'm listening to NPR right now, and there's a show on featuring interviews with delegates from the RNC. One woman is on about how history is about to be made because "we're about to nominate a woman for vice-president." Apparently this woman has never heard of Geraldine Ferraro. Who was a hell of a lot more qualified than Palin could dream of being at this stage. |
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