I'm in Ohio for the week but I may find ways of posting... we'll see.
Although I'm sure Christina's depressed, I can only assume that Mr. Applegate is laughing about this somewhere deep in the depths of Hell, and adding a new verse to "Those Were the Good Old Days..."
"We're not doctors, we just play them on C-SPAN."
- Barney Frank, (D-Mass)
Sorry, somehow a famed Monty Python line sounds both funny and kind of rude right about now.
Anyhow, here is a link to download Living Will forms if you are in NY, NJ, or CT. If you're in other states, well, I'm sure there are easy ways to find them...
I'm filling mine out and getting it notarized... It helps to have a colleague who's a notary.
In other news, I'm going to the Costume Shoppe tomorrow! I'm going to be the Easter Bunny this weekend at Ye Olde Motel... Whee!
I know, I'm spending a little too much time on this issue. But I have to say, I am pleased that the appeals court ruled as it did (I bet you expected that...)
What I really want to say, though, is this:
Remember when I linked this article, about how President Bush cut his vacation short? Here's what I realized: He's willing to cut his vacation short to overstep his position to deal with this one family's crisis, yet on a day of national crisis, he refused to put down the book he was reading to a classroom of children, even as the towers burned?
Guess you can't spell hypocrisy without "W."
Well, Spring is off to a roaring start. Tiny, little, roars, though, like the roar of the mouse that I caught in my trap today.
I hate mice.
Ugh.
'nuff said.
So yesterday was a day of silly linguistic situations.
I had lunch with a German colleague, bue we were discussing Italy. Particuarly, Venice.
She described one of her favorite spots in the lovely city of Venice. "It's just off the Marcusplatz," she informed me. I found it astonishingly droll that she, as worldly as she is, would use German words to rename Venice's gorgeous Piazza San Marco.
Later in the evening, I even got to tell this funny story to an Italian woman, in my broken (yet understandable) Italian.
(Yes, I speak a lot of languages.)
1: Did you read John Lahr's review of Spamalot from the New Yorker? It reads to me like he never heard of Monty Python before. He spends half the review spewing the same jokes from the movie all over again. Makes no sense to me how this is a "high caliber" review.
2: What the fuck is up with Congress? I am appalled that they would create this legislation "for" Terri Schiavo. Have they not heard of separation of powers? The Schiavo case has gone through the court system, including up to SCOTUS, who declined to hear the case. They insist that this doesn't create any precedent for future cases, I find it hard to see how it does anything but. Now, whenever The GOP Congress Leadership Inc. isn't happy with the way something turns out in the Courts, are they going to just going to have it moved to a different court where they know that the judge is also a conservative appointment? I thought they were opposed to "activist judges."
I think it's really terrible how they keep referring to this woman as "alive." We have to save her "life." The woman is in a persistent vegitative stage, with no hope for recovery, according to every doctor who has done any serious examination.
It's particularly ironic, methinks, that Mrs. Schiavo (the mom) would say this:
"Please don't use my daughter's suffering for your own personal agenda."
First off, if her daughter is suffering, what the heck is she doing trying to have it extended even more? Second of all, I think that everyone in the House or Senate who voted for this crock of "legislation" is promoting a personal agenda. This has no place in the Legislative Branch.
And did anyone else notice that this, Terri Schiavo-gate, is the first time that W (ugh, I hate even having to type the word President next to the name Bush) has interrupted his vacation and come back to the White House for an "emergency" situation? And this is the first time, in quite some time, apparantly, that a president has interrupted his vacation to deal with a "domestic issue." (Related Article here)
3: In total other news, I have to say that I'm a bit mad at myself for never making it to the Cafe Carlyle to see Mr. Bobby Short, and now, I never will be able to.
RIP, Mr. Short. I'm sure that heaven will have a lot more people in their piano bar now...
In *$ the other day, I heard a woman actually ask the cash registerista what, exactly, was a latte.
This Link is to an article in today's Times. The article's on Europeans rallying against the US-led war in Iraq. But the lead photo on the article shows a woman holding a sign that says "No War on Iran."
Excuse me?
In other news, I had a really weird dream last night. It was sort of work related but it didn't take place at work, it took place in more of a bathhouse type environment, but my hotel guests were there. And I had a special new computer program which allowed me to do almost everything right there from my computer - it linked me into the travel agent computer system, it tracked all the work I did and had to do, and so forth. And then a guest asked me for seats aboard a commercial airliner merely so that she could have dinner.
It made no sense and you probably didn't want to hear about it anyhow, but then again, hey, maybe you didn't even read all the way to this part!
(Before and After is my favorite category from back when I used to occasionally watch "Wheel;" I love when I come up with things like that, and this one came to mind at breakfast this morning.)
Today was a long day. A lot of walking, a lot of talking, an ice cream soda and three nightclubs, each more filled with drunk straight people than the next. Oy, drunk straight people. I know, I know, what was I doing in their bar... I don't want to go into it.
What I do want to express my sadness about, though, is the fact that a bunch of the great sleazy parts of the Meatpacking District are now trendy restaurants and bars. I think this is sad. Sure, trendy is popular, but seedy is character.
Oh well, the straight people are not the only ones who are tipsy. I think I need to get to bed...
(Before and After is my favorite category from back when I used to occasionally watch "Wheel;" I love when I come up with things like that, and this one came to mind at breakfast this morning.)
Today was a long day. A lot of walking, a lot of talking, an ice cream soda and three nightclubs, each more filled with drunk straight people than the next. Oy, drunk straight people. I know, I know, what was I doing in their bar... I don't want to go into it.
What I do want to express my sadness about, though, is the fact that a bunch of the great sleazy parts of the Meatpacking District are now trendy restaurants and bars. I think this is sad. Sure, trendy is popular, but seedy is character.
Oh well, the straight people are not the only ones who are tipsy. I think I need to get to bed...
Preparing for the Pope to Die. Of course, he's gonna live forever. But I thought it was really interesting to read about how they're planning for the TV coverage, and it's really odd to read news reporters talking about the process of turning an event into news.
In other news, happy Monday!
Have we not had enough snow yet? What the heck?
Anyhow, saw "Spamalot" last night. It was not all it's cracked up to be. I think it's rather a case of the whole not equalling the sum of the parts, on some level, but many of the jokes fall flat. The new ones often are not funny, or are too cliche, and the Python jokes, well, they've been done before, and so much better.
Except, maybe, when John Cleese, as the pre-recorded voice of God, tells Arthur to "Stop looking up my skirt!"
If you go, though, make sure to read the program from page one. Don't just open to the middle. Just trust me on this one.
Oh, and speaking of white, I have to say that this was the whitest cast of any musical I've seen lately... that was rather odd, given that Broadway has been seeming rather multi-cultural lately. Anyhow, I don't have time to discuss that further, as I have to get to work.
When Torment is Baby's Destiny, Euthanasia is Defended
I have to say, personally, I'm in favor of euthanasia. And there's precedent for it, if you think about it. In the "old days," if a baby was born with some horrid ailment, what did they do? They left it out for the vultures, pretty much.
People talk about the sanctity of an infant's life. While I think that babies are wonderful, and life is wonderful, and so on, I also think that an infant is about potential. For example, if a lioness doesn't have enough food to eat, she feeds herself before she feeds her babies. Why? Because she can have more babies. But the baby, without a mother, can't even have a life.
I hope that doesn't sound bitter or cruel, because I mean it in a way I think makes sense. And I don't think that life support, with all the drama and cost it creates, is the best option, whether for a baby or for someone like Terri Schiavo, the woman in Florida at the center of all the controversy. I mean, the woman's been in a coma for 15 years. Her husband said he knew that it would have been her wish to not be kept alive artifically, and this instigated a riduculously expensive legal battle. How much money has this cost her family? How much money has it cost the state? Just in legal bills? Forget the inordinate amount of money which has been spent on her medical care.
I mean, I feel sad for the woman, but let's be realistic. Even if she comes out of the coma (and what are the odds of that? Less than a snowball's chance in hell), she's almost definitely brain damaged, and she's missed 15 years of her life. She's not going to understand why she looks so much different than what she remembers (if she remembers anything); she's not going to understand that her husband has tried to move on, and she sure as hell won't understand how the world got to be the way it is.
I guess that part of my attitude to all of this "sanctity of life" stuff really got a big jolt when I was in Africa last year. Because there, at least amongst the animals, it's the "Circle of life" that really prevails. You see the delicate balance of creatures who prey and creatures who are preyed upon. From the dung beetles to the grasses to the herbivores and insects to the insectivores and carnivores, there's a balance of numbers. There are enough gazelles to maintain a genetically stable population, and enough that the lions can eat as many gazelles as they need without causing the gazelles to go extinct. But the lions have their own dangers, as well. The hyena try to kill their babies; they sometimes even get attacked by the animals they're trying to hunt.
People, however, have removed themselves from the "Circle of Life." People think it's about the renewal of life, from youth to old age to more youth, but it's not. It's about the delicate balance of species, and since we're rather invincible, there are too many of us. There is not enough space. There is not enough food. There is not enough medicine.
And people are distressed that doctors think that it's OK to help a baby die, when that baby has no chance at a life?
All I can say is, get your priorities straight.
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each of these three levels' questions correct. This is an exceptional score. Remember, these are commonly confused English words, which means most people don't use them properly. You got an extremely respectable score.
The Commonly Confused Words Test
Odd that I beat him on "Advanced" but he's a Genius and I'm just advanced Guess it's all about the "Expert" points...
New Jersey is adopting an official state vegetable. Only they've chosen a fruit.
Speaking of homos in suits, in case that is your kind of thing, well, there's an interesting website featuring men in (and out of) suits. Mmm!
Yesterday, I heard a woman actually say the following words:
"Oh, I got smegma on my boobie!"
I really wish I were making that up.