More News From the Fakefamily Household

Confession:  I smoke cigarettes.  That makes me a member of a dying breed.  Ha ha, consider that my version of dark humor.  But here’s what happened:  last night, I was having a bit of Haagen-Dazs vanilla ice cream (the only brand I’ll eat), topped with a bit of Creme de Menthe, prior to going to sleep.    The only thing wrong with that totally satisfying picture was that I was out of chocolate syrup.  Haagen-Dazs vanilla ice cream, Creme de Menthe, AND chocolate syrup, is pretty much my definition of Nirvana. 

So then, I dropped it.  Please note that most accidents happen within a mile or so of your home, and are most likely, in fact, to happen within your home.  Also please note that Murphy’s law applies to accidents within your home.  If you drop a stick of butter, it will not hit the floor with the waxed paper side down.  It will hit the floor butter side down. 

So as I watched in horror, the Creme de Menthe spilled onto my next-to-last pack of cigarettes.  The open one.  Given Murphy’s Law rules, the Creme de Menthe could not have spilled onto the floor or onto some other spot on the coffee table. 

Today, I learned that you can smoke green cigarettes, as long as you let them dry out.  Not bad actually.  A little sweet-tasting, but what the heck.  It beats spending another five bucks.

Okay…Now I’m Afraid

A couple of the reasonable conservatives on my hometown newspaper…uh, let me rephrase that.  The only two reasonable conservatives on my hometown newspaper, both solidly pro-McCain, have both said that in the end, it really doesn’t matter who wins.  Not that they don’t passionately care who wins, it’s that the system constrains the winner, who won’t be able to fulfill most, if any, of his promises, and won’t be able to do as much damage as it appears they might in the course of campaigning.  The day after the election, we’ll all go back to living our normal lives, and we’ll mostly get over our disappointment for four years, at least.  I mostly agreed. 

Well you think I would be smarter and have a longer memory than that.  Gore losing in 2000 was indeed something we got over, but look at the costs.  I need not enumerate them.  “Constraint” was not a word in the Bush/Cheney vocabulary, and let’s face it, Congress rolled over and played dead for the last eight years. 

I’m not sure why Congress has such a low approval rating across the country, but I can sure tell you why I have a low opinion of it.  It’s because it abdicated its responsibility to declare war, and let George Bush do it for them.  It created the imperial presidency by default.  Remember that thing about having a system of checks and balances?  The Executive, the Legislative, and the Judicial Branches?  Today, the only check on the power of the Presidency is the Supreme Court, and it’s doing a surprisingly good job, considering that King George W. tried to appoint justices who would only follow his agenda.  Meanwhile, Congress, which last I checked is supposed to MAKE LAWS, which presumably apply to the President, is busy trying to find its ass with a map and a flashlight. 

What’s disappointing about that is that Congress, in reality, is the closest we citizens come to actual representation.  Let’s face it.  Our access to to the President and the Supreme Court is nil.  Our access to our Senators and Representatives is minimal, but they’re our best hope.  When they’re asleep at the wheel, we might as well all be clinging to a roof somewhere in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. 

Now, today, Nicholas Kristoff of the New York Times points to the potential consequences of a McCain win and it is enough to scare a pitbull into hiding under the bed.  http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/28/opinion/28kristof.html?ref=opinion

But even that was not enough to scare me into politely asking the pitbull to move over and give me some space under the bed.  It took this post on Tallahassee.com by jackster to really, really scare me. 

http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=PluckPersona&U=69c784b9dea8455dbcdb5ae9aa1282fb&plckPersonaPage=BlogViewPost&plckUserId=69c784b9dea8455dbcdb5ae9aa1282fb&plckPostId=Blog%3a69c784b9dea8455dbcdb5ae9aa1282fbPost%3ada4a75b8-cb96-427c-bd9e-a2c7b85841ae&plckController=PersonaBlog&plckScript=personaScript&plckElementId=personaDest

If I were smarter, I could just post the video, but I’m not.  The second video she includes is one in which McCain, offscreen (at least during my view of the debate), twice says “Horseshit” to what Obama is saying.  Obama was unfailingly polite, warm, and respectful, and in fact was criticized for being too nice.  I myself said, prior to the debate, that I hoped Obama would NOT be too nice, and would make John McCain mad, exposing him for the unsuitable candidate that he is.  Well, it seems he did.  I just didn’t know for sure until today.  Now I feel differently:  I’m glad that Obama, no matter what the provocation, did not stoop to McCain’s level. 

I ask you that if John McCain can’t restrain himself in a mere debate with his rival for the Presidency, whether or not he will be able to restrain himself when he’s across the table from the leader of another country whose name he can’t pronounce.  Oh wait–I forgot.  He wouldn’t be there in the first place.  He would bomb first and ask questions later.  You don’t have to worry about pronouncing the name of a dead guy. 

I can only hope that enough people saw the debate and his dismal performance to think twice about voting for him.  Honestly–we cannot allow this man and his airhead VP to win.  It’s just too frightening to contemplate.

Miscellaneous News from the Fakefamily Household

I’m a big fan of Nature, but she keeps trying to kill me anyway.  With friends like Nature, who needs enemies?  On Friday evening, I felt a painful sting or bite on my shoulder, right at the base of my neck, and managed to capture the beast and smush it, but I really didn’t pay much attention to it.  I’m not sure if it was something that dropped onto me from a tree as I sat at the picnic table earlier, or if it was a flying beast that came through the open door as I sat at the computer.  Whatever it was was rather small and black.  Could have been an ant, or a spider, or a small bee of some kind.  In any case, by yesterday, I had a a red, swollen lump the size of a chicken egg at the site of the bite or sting.  It doesn’t hurt or itch, but as of this morning, it’s oozing, no doubt as the little white cells in the blood rushed to my defense. 

So here’s what I say:  Death to all insects which bite, sting, or suck blood!  This means you, mosquitoes, fleas, fireants, hornets, and any other of your ilk that I’ve forgotten to name in person.  The hell with that food chain thing.  Anything which requires your existence as food will just have to learn to eat something else.  Something harmless to yours truly. 

In another display of Nature At Work, yesterday the girl cat caught another lizard.  This time it was a green Anole, and I’m very fond of them, so I made a special effort to intervene.  I was of course alerted by the special cat noise that means, “I caught something”.  Amazing how they can make that noise, or any noise at all, with a mouthful of lizard.  The first step in lizard rescue is to make the cat let go of it.  Choking the cat didn’t work.  Then I remembered that if I just waited, the cat would let go of it voluntarily.  Because eating the prey right off the bat is not the Cat Way.  It must be played with (translation: tortured) first.  (Why, oh why, do they do that?  Like, just kill it already, would you?)

Sure enough, she let go and I was there to grab her and hold her back, giving the lizard enough time to scurry into the corner where neither me nor the cat was likely to be able to get to it.  Great.  So after several minutes of scuffling, I won and managed to capture it.  In all modesty, this was a very selfless act on my part, since as much as I love them, there is a huge Ick factor to holding a squirming lizard in your bare hands.  Usually I try to do it with a plastic cup.  You scoop them up, and then put your hand over the top of the cup.  Then at least all you have to contend with is them poking their little faces into your palm. 

So I got the lizard to a safe place and observed it carefully, and it didn’t appear to have a single broken place on its skin.  (If it had been severely damaged, it may have been kinder to give it back to the cat.)  This is another amazing feature of cat hunting :  that the cat with all those sharp, deadly teeth, could hold this little creature in its mouth without puncturing its skin whatsover.  I’m personally familiar with those teeth, since when I first adopted her, she used to bite me regularly.  Affectionately, I’m sure. 

After observing the lizard, it seemed there were no lasting effects.  It was a sort of sickly mottled color and was breathing heavily, but it eventually recovered and scampered off.  Now it will have a great story to tell its grandchildren.   

Yesterday after posting “Critter for the Day”, I decided to switch my little icon thingie that shows up when I make comments from the basketful of baby possums to the picture of the cassowary.  That’s because I have aspirations to be one of the world’s most dangerous birds.  Alas, I can’t figure out how to do it, so I guess I’ll have to remain a possum.  And speaking of possums, did you know that possums don’t really play dead when faced with danger?  Research shows that they actually faint.  I have that from a highly unreliable source, so don’t quote me.  But if it’s true, it would be a lot more in keeping with my real personality.