What could you live without?

Here's an item in the news supporting the "less is more" philosophy. I'm working to downsize this year, and stories like this help.

The earth quaked in Haiti

I can't imagine standing in my friend Karen's shoes right now. She's from Haiti and is now an American citizen and works in Belgium. She hasn't heard anything from or about her family in Haiti although she's been trying to get through to anyone to check on them.

news. . . or not

Several friends have commented in emails that they've meant to check out my updates in my blog but haven't. . . oh well, they haven't missed a thing.

I DO want to update this thing. . . and work on the new blog that I've created but haven't written in yet. It's about life as a PhD attending community college. When I finally start it, I'll post the URL.

More to come.

I've never laughed so hard

On MSNBC, Joe Watkins, a GOP strategist, explained the perils of letting "one of the most gifted speakers that the world has ever seen" speak to impressionable children.

What if next time, he asked, the president made a strong argument to kids [on a controversial topic]. . .
(from Maureen Dowd's editorial, "Less Spocky, more Rocky")

Good grief. Who comes up with this crap? Why is it the Dems and the GOP are so violently opposed to each other that they can't even pretend to get along? Why would anyone in their right mind oppose the President giving a back-to-school speech to schoolkids?

Would a president really be DUMB enough to think he could get away with injecting political malarkey in the middle of such a speech? Okay, maybe g-dub would've allowed such a thing, but most presidents have been smarter than that.

Of course, another outrageous Republican faux pas happened during the President's talk on health care reform the other night. "You lie!" Sen. Joe Wilson (R-SC) yelled. It's not fair to lump all Republicans into Wilson's category of idiotic, disrespectful people who ought to know better, but he definitely gave Republicans a black eye.

What we say among friends is one thing. . . Heaven knows I've bad-mouthed g-dub enough. But he was the President, and I do believe the office (and therefore the officeholder) deserves respect, at least in public arenas whether I like them or not.

Alive and well

I'm alive and well, back from the road trip to New Mexico, and I think I'm going to start writing again soon.

Visited states

And here are the US states I've visited. . . or at least driven through.

visited 43 states (86%)
Create your own visited map of The United States.

Visited countries

The number of countries I've visited has gone up very little in my two years in Europe. I can only add Iraq and Ireland, the latter being the favored location, of course!

visited 33 states (14.6%)
Create your own visited map of The World.