Thoughts from watching the RNC and the DNC

For my sins, I ended up watching a lot of both conventions this year - what can I say?  I'm a glutton for punishment. Obviously, I saw lots of differences between the two, but...

The most effective speech I saw from the RNC was Ivanka Trump introducing her father.  She made him human, and she obviously loved him.  I was almost at the point of being willing to consider looking at him.  (Unfortunately, then he came on and started spewing obvious lies and fear.  The crime stats he used were misleading at best and flat wrong in some places.  He didn't offer any concrete facts or plans for what he would do to make sure that crime came to a stop January 20th, 2017 - although he used the line several times.  It just didn't work at all for me.)

I saw several great speeches from the DNC - loved Michelle Obama's speech the first night, and I fell for her obvious affection and pride for her friend, Hillary.  (Considering the fairly vicious fight for the nomination in 2008, the fact that they are now friends makes me impressed with both of their characters.)  Bill's speech on Tuesday was a total love letter, but an effective one - while telling the story of their lives together, he also managed to bring out her relentless activism for the disadvantaged and downtrodden, and brought up things I didn't know about her - and as I might have mentioned, I'm a bit of a politics nerd.  And of course, the passing of the torch by Barack Obama on Wednesday just made my heart lift...

But the bit that really showed me that the democratic party is where I belong, and that I can feel safe with my vote going to Hillary even though I voted for Bernie in the primary, was Khizr Khan's speech, with Ghazala standing with him.  They're the gold star parents of Humayan Khan, and if you didn't see the speech, or the introduction to it, it's so worth going back for.  But while the speech was incredibly effecting (it made me cry, and I think I may have seen a tear or two in Roger's eyes as well), it also pointed out the stark difference between the two conventions.  The reason that the Khans (who were not necessarily Democrats, by the way) were at the convention is because Hillary Clinton had found out about them during one of her listening tours during the primary race, and recognized their sacrifice and their unwavering loyalty to this country, even after they lost their son.  This is the sort of thing that we should be celebrating as a country, in my opinion, and I'm so glad both that she was listening and that they were given a national outlet. 

Recovering from the Weekend

It was a great weekend, but...  I was reminded fairly vividly that I'm not able-bodied.  While the guys were loading up the car with leftovers, I decided that it would be a good idea to go try to get the scooter back out to the road - and I ran out of battery power.  About 10 yards from the road.  Just stuck.  Plus, I had been sitting in the scooter long enough that my knees had locked up, so once Roger did manage to find me, I had a scary couple of minutes where I wasn't sure I was going to be able to get up into the car.  And of course, even though I sat under the trees for most of the time, and I was pretty much fully covered, I still managed to sunburn my face and arms...  Those Twilight twits don't know from sun aversion. 

Anyway...  I'm trying to decide whether I'm becoming agoraphobic, or just realistic.  The world outside truly does seem to be out for me. 

I'm Feeling More Hopeful

I got to spend Saturday at a lovely Portland park (Peninsula Park) watching these two get married, catching up with old friends I haven't seen in way too long, meeting new friends, and enjoying my version of America - people in tuxes, people in running shorts, a utilikilt, a couple of people in BDUs, a guy in a really incredible purple suit with an orange vest, rocking wing tips, all coming together to celebrate life and love. 

There was a pot-luck lunch, little kids running around blowing bubbles, conversations about dogs and dresses and (oddly enough for my crowd) almost no politics... it was a lovely day.  And then, in the gazebo where Daniel and Davey just pledged their vows, there was a lovely young woman, celebrating her quinceanera in a beautiful purple dress that extended into the next zip code, accompanied by a troupe of mariachi... It just doesn't get any more American than that. 

Post-Midnight Meanderings

This... this is his "What are you doing up?  I put you to bed!" look

Scene:  1:45 am body call...

*Clickclickclickclick*
Oh, rats - did I remember to latch the door...
*nudge*  *creak*
No.  No I didn't.
*clickclickclick*
Judgmental stare from the Moose.
"Look, I get to go to the bathroom.  What's more, I'm entitled to be alone when I do so."
Stare.
"Ok, ok... I'm coming..."
*clickclickclick* stand in the bathroom doorway staring until he's sure I'm actually standing up*
*flush*
*clickclickclick* down the hallway, turning his head every fourth step, just to make sure I'm coming.
Sliding into bed carefully, even though I know Roger can sleep through anything, including having a cat land on him from the window ledge.
"Well?  Are you coming?"
Slightly plastic *clickclickclick* up the ramp, followed by a doxie walking up the entire length of my body, waiting for me to lift up the blanket slightly so that he can slip under it, and then stretching out along my back, followed shortly by dueling snores from my two guys.

Flames... Flames on the side of my face...

I hadn't realized how angry I still am at the medical establishment, on behalf of me and every other fat woman on the face of the earth, but mostly on behalf of my mother.

My mom is a special woman in a lot of ways.  She's smart as hell, she's driven, she's devoted to her family, she's got a dry sense of humor... and she's obese and has been for most of her life.  She's been fighting it most of her life as well, with the usual diets and exercise and...  And she gets the same thing that I get, every single time we go into the doctor.  Whatever the issue we have, the answer is always the same - lose some weight.

And here's where I realize that I'm not really mad on behalf of my mother.  Well, I am - the woman is incredibly fit, considering.  She's come through uterine cancer with barely a blip, she walks every day, she does channel walking when she's here in Portland...  she's got healthier habits than most of the 20 year olds that I know.  And yet... she's having oxygen difficulties, to the point where she might be on oxygen permanently.  She told me yesterday that her doctor suggested losing some weight, and I went ballistic.  Overly ballistic (I know, this shocks those of you who know what an even-tempered soul I am.) 

But then I realized... it wasn't her doctor I was mad at.  It was every other doctor that looked at me, and immediately assumed that I just wasn't trying.  Every doctor that I saw when I had the flu who told me that my weight was causing it.  I was mad about the 3 weeks I had to wait to get a CT scan because Kaiser had no idea how to scan someone my size.  I was mad about not being able to get surgery to get this damned tumor out of me - yes, I understand that may have saved my life, but still...  (I wouldn't have been so mad about that part if Mom hadn't gotten the same opinion - come back when you lose 100 lbs - when she was already 150 pounds less than I was.)  I am angry about the medical establishment's assumption that if you are significantly overweight, you are a bad patient risk and can be shuffled off to the side with little consequence.  But mostly, I'm angry at the shame I feel for just inhabiting this body of mine.

Rachel from Credit Card Services has a boyfriend, apparently...

One of the disadvantages of teleworking (and now retirement) is being home during the day, and having to deal with Rachel from Credit Card Services.  I don't know if you've been afflicted with this wench, but...  she always calls from a spoofed phone number, which changes every couple of weeks or so, and she starts off with this computer monologue about how she's calling because she's worried about one of my credit cards (never states which one) and how she can get me a much better deal, yada yada yada.  I've tried everything I can to get rid of her - I'm on the do not call list, I've tried asking to be taken off their list, I've tried asking to speak to their supervisor (they hang up on me at that point, usually), I've even changed my phone number, which usually gets me a couple of months of respite before she finds me again.  She calls once or twice a week, usually when I'm trying to nap or in the bathroom...

She's now been joined by her boyfriend, Peter from Microsoft Computer Services (with a suspiciously thick foreign accent), who calls 2 or 3 times a week (also from a spoofed number) to tell me what a stupid girl I am and how my computer is about to blow up unless I follow his specific instructions.  Mind you, he doesn't have a clue even what operating system I'm running, but...

My home phone is practically unusable now - the only calls I get are from family, these jerks, and polling companies (and the polling companies tend to assume I'm a Republican, for some reason.)  There can't be that many people falling for these scams, can there?  I mean, yes, I'm sure it's a low-overhead operation, but at some point, they've got to run out of suckers - how are they keeping this going?  Where is the money coming from?  And how can I take them out?  I've tried the FCC, but that's pretty much throwing info down a well... 

Very Long Night

It's my own fault.  I shouldn't have bragged about how fireworks don't affect Moose at all...  it was a recipe for disaster.  Especially in my neighborhood, where the fireworks start in June and last until the budget finally runs out sometime next week.  And we're not talking the legal stuff, like pretty fountains or sparklers - we're talking airborne mortars going off until 2 or 3 in the morning.

He was actually doing ok, until last night - but last night, he finally broke.  It's not that he was scared by the loud noises... he was definitely not scared.  Pissed.  He was really pissed, but not scared.  Lots of patrolling, lots of barking his fool head off (I think he may have strained his throat).  He'd give off a flurry of full-throated protection of his mama's lap, finally settle down... and then the idiots would set off another round, starting him up all over again.  I finally know just how to say "Hey, Kids, get off my lawn" in canine...

Random Political Mutterings

No one will be surprised by this, but... I'm a liberal.  I've mentioned this a few times before, but really...  I believe in Government.  More importantly, I believe in the United States Government.  It's my country, and I honestly do feel that it's good-hearted.  However...

I think we lost our way in the past few years.  I think that we got terrified by 9/11, and started down the wrong road completely, and one of the biggest signs of that was our willingness to turn a blind eye to torture.  (And yes, water-boarding is torture, in my mind.)  One of the best parts about the American experiment is our desire to treat everyone equally - we started out seriously shaky in that regard, but we keep getting better and better, more inclusive each generation, but the torture... that was going backwards.  Fortunately, we finally got our collective heads together and turned back around.

But now... one of the two major party nominees is saying that we need to go back there.  That our enemies consider us weak because we're not willing to be as barbaric as ISIS is.  That we need to kill children and families, we need to torture and behead and... I don't know where he means to draw the line, but I know that it's not somewhere I can go.  And the fact that people are willing to listen to this man, follow him, vote for him, scares the hell out of me.