Durham to Tulsa

I just got back from Tulsa for the Thanksgivng holiday and posted some photos from my trip. Three new photo sets.
I'll write about it later this week.

Stupid Realtors Part I

I saw a bumper sticker on a car today that said "I would HEART to be your realtor!"
That was it. No name. No phone number. No other contact information.
So what is a person to do if you want this woman to be your real estate agent? Honk and make her pull over? Follow her to her house?
Thanks for making it so easy. I would hate for you to be my realtor.

This and That

This morning I had a prefectly ripe banana in my cereal. Something about bananas and milk, especially in a banana shake, that tastes so good.

I love how the temperature outside and inside is just right so that when I hop in bed the sheets are crisp and cool and then my down comforter keeps my heat in for just the right temperature and I sleep really well. When I got my down comforter over a year ago the salesman said I only needed the lightweight one because in the South it never gets cold enough for anything heavier. I went with the regular weight comforter, one just a little thicker than what he suggested and I wouldn't have been bad off at all with the heaviest one they had. He didn't know what he was talking about. I have consulted other friends who say the same thing: get the heavier comforter.

This morning I saw for the first time this year the Folgers comemrcial where the guy comes home from college on the wintry day and wakes up his family with a pot of Folgers. Who still makes Folgers? Even my parents grind their own beans. They use one bean per pot but they still grind it fresh in the morning.

The holidays seem to have come up quicker this year. I like this. Maybe it's just my perception since I stopped watching local news and watch less TV in general. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Why? Pie. Forget Turkey Day. We could call it Pie Day as far as I'm concerned. I loves me some pie.

Oh, local news. Local news is evil. Evil. Evil. Evil. Kenievel. All except the weather and that can be pretty scary too. One "news report" after another about how something new is going to kill you and in a way more gruesome than you could possilby have imagined.
"Your children could be at risk..."
"What you don't know about the cleanliness of your favorite restaurants..."
"Local elderly couple had their life savings stolen..."
"Did we mention your children dead? And what lousy parents you are? And how you are not feeding your children enough green vegetables and you let them watch crap on TV? More after these comemrcials for McDonalds and crappy TV shows."
"Something that is killing you. Right now. Even as we speak. And will continue to take years off your life if you don't act immediately to stop it. That story and more after "Deperate Housewives"."
Evil.
Fear and loathing in local news.

Flea Market

I went to the Flea Market in Raleigh with my friend Claudia on Sunday. It was cold but fun. Lots of knickknacks, bric-a-brac, gimcracks, curios, didos, doodads, baubles, trifles, trinkets and toys.

Believe (or Not)

I saw a preview of the new animated film "The Polar Express" on Saturday. It has a fun and adventurous story and beautiful animation unlike anything we have seen before. I highly recommend it.

One of the central points of the movie (and many Christmas movies and specials in general) is there is more to the world than what we can see and if we give oursleves over to believing in what we cannot see we will be happier, better people. To quote one of my favorite Rankin-Bass Christmas specials as a child "Twas the Night Before Christmas" about a clockmaker and a family of mice who save Christmas for one small town, "There's more to the world than meets the eye...Let up a little on your wonder-why and give your heart a try." (The ... represents "(something, something)... give your heart a try" but I can't remember the words for those five notes.) If we just believed in the wonders of Santa Claus and unicorns we would all be so happy and every day would be Christmas. The irony is that in both Polar Express and TtNBC the one skeptical character in each really only believes in Santa once he sees him. They never really have to make much of a leap of faith.
Ok, there is no Santa Claus. So why do people persist in telling their children he exists and encouraging the fantasy that belief in this unreal person is a wonderous thing? Santa is at best a metaphor of Christmas spirit. He represents the spirit of giving and the rewards for being well behaved. Sound like someone else? Old guy with a white beard who lives in some far off place surrounded by sexually ambiguos servants singing all day and this old man knows everything that you do and if you are good you will be rewarded with things that you want, especially those who communicate with him and tell him their needs and especially those children who are Christians since they are the only ones to really celebrate Christmas. Why not focus on the thoughts and actions represented? Sure, we can create stories to illustrate the ideas. We humans love stories. But we often confuse the stories for reality.

Quote of the Day

It's the birthday of Carl Sagan born on this day in 1934.
He once wrote, "For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love." I think that pretty well sums it up.

Reason Number One Why People Dislike Traditional Realtors

Re-Max commercial.
Father and son in a cornfield at night. Corn stalks bent down in a crop circle. Bright light overhead. Father tells son, "Don't be afraid."
Cut to large hot air balloon hovering over field. Realtor with a blow horn shouts to the man, "The house just passed inspection. We can close next week. I wanted to tell you in person."

Conclusion: Realtor really don't do much except pass on information and will go to elaborate lengths to make their job seem more important than it is. The realtor could have called but that wouldn't justify the enormous commission she is making on your home.

More post-E-day thoughts

Some more thoughts about the election. A lot of generalizations and stereotypes. So be it.

1) The Youth Vote: I have heard a number of people talk about the youth vote in the election. "If only they had come out to vote in the numbers they were eligible, Kerry would have won." My left-thinking young friends were again suffering from a mental block that keeps them from seeing that not everyone believes the same way they do. Driving through the campus of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, probably the most liberal town in the state, I saw more Bush signs (outside the fraternities mind you) than Kerry signs the day after the election. So my friends on the Left, not everyone agrees with you/us. The liberal ideas that have founded this country and are the basis for all of our freedoms are not self-evident to a lot of people in this country/world. If you/we want to convince them, you/we'll have to work a lot harder.

2) Majority of Americans:
"Sometimes the majority means all the fools are on the same side.” – Anonymous.

I heard on NPR yesterday someone say that the election clearly showed that the majority of Americans are behind Bush since the majority of Americans voted for him. This is not true. The majority of people who voted, voted for Bush, but the majority of Americans either voted for Kerry, a third party candidate or didn't vote at all. Bush won 51.1% of the votes cast but that number represents only 28.7% of all Americans of voting age and 21% of Americans of all ages, according to the 2000 census numbers. But in this game only the voters determine which piece gets crowned. So, the irony in quote above is that the majority didn't vote and sometimes that means they are the fools.

3) People who play the game get to make the rules. Why did Bush win? Because the people who voted for him saw that he represented the vision for this country that most matched their own.
I don't agree with this vision. In fact I would say that W. Bush is the worst President in the history of this country. To me he represents ignorance over intelligence, faith over science and reasoning, instincts over intellect, fear over hope, laziness over hard work, greed over charity, big business over everyone else, lip service to principles over actions that conform to those principles, close-mindedness over seeing the world (especially the United States) through the eyes of the rest of the world. To the voters though he represents common sense over "book learnin'", certainty over complexity, suburbs over big cities, the known over the unknown, America over the world, single-mindedness over cooperation.
This election and the direction of American politics in the past decade show that people who can unite behind an idea and then act upon it get the ear or microphone of the government. People against abortion, against gay marriage, in favor of throwing out the division between Church and state, those who take action change the political landscape. So the Republicans made this election about moral values to the people for whom moral values is a big issue and those people voted. They convinced people that one issue is THE most important and they were are the only candidate who will see that issue turned in their favor.
It's harder for those who do not have a single vision of how the world should be to create that world. Certainty is much easier to act upon than complexity and ambiguity. But the complexity and ambiguity are where true freedom lies. If we are in favor of freedom (the current government isn't, but merely says they are) than we have to be open to choice and ideas that don't match our own (so long as those ideas still give us the freedom to have our own contrary ideas).

That said, I still believe strongly in civil disobedience and rights of individuals over the rights of the state or federal government. And when any form of government becomes destructive to these ends ... Well, let's hope it doesn't come to that.

4) Stop talking down to the poor and middle class. The poor and middle class want to be rich. Many don't think of themselves as belonging to the economic class their tax returns would put them in. When you start talking about how you are going to go after those wealthy elite and punish them with more taxes if they make over $200k a year, a lot of people believe they too will one day fall in that category. The Republicans keep holding up those highest-branch grapes and telling people they will some day be able to taste them. The statistical reality proves otherwise but they win the “vision thing” argument on this issue.
When you tell people you are going to help the poor and disenfranchised, most people who vote don't think of themselves in those categories and believe you are going to give their money to someone else.

The Morning After

... or as most of my friends world say, Mourning After.
Well, Bush has won. Kerry has conceded. My thoughts after this intense election:

1) My streak continues. The fifth Presidential election I have voted in and I have never voted for the winner. Yes, I know this means I've flipped-flopped in parties, but so be it. The country has always survived.

2) The real winner in this election: Howard Dean. Kerry's loss frees up eight to sixteen years for another Democrat not on yesterday's ticket to enter the race and lead the Democratic party in a new direction, two things it surely needs (leadership and new direction).

3) No president in recent history elected to a second term has had an easy time of it. Especially true with a war on. Clinton, Reagan, Nixon have all had second terms marred with scandal which sidetracked much of their agenda.

4) I promised myself four years ago I wouldn't rely so heavily on "liberal" media for my sources of information about who was going to win. This election they did the same thing, especially Salon.com, my morning homepage, in predicting the sweep that Kerry would create. Slate.com predicted in their exit polls yesterday afternoon Kerry taking Florida and Ohio. Both wrong. Again.

5) Observation Why Kerry Lost: The political left in the United States ALWAYS underestimates the American people and is as close-minded or more so than the close-minded right they abhor when it comes to understanding the other side.

6) To those who are so upset with Kerry's loss that they are talking about leaving the country: Get over it. It's your country too. Don't give it away. Fight for what you believe. Get engaged in the issues you believe. Don't give up. Force the opposition to listen and compromise. Exercise your liberties. Do not concede your rights. Practice eternal vigilance. It's the American way.

Kerry Nation

one state, two state, red state, blue state

Looking at the map in the New York Times predicting which states will go for each Presidential candidate it struck me how the cities with the largest and densest populations, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago are solidly in the Democratic column whereas the least populated and most spread out states, Montana, Wyoming, Alaska are all Bush states. What is the correlation between living a hundred miles from your closest neighbor and voting GOP? Why do those who live so closely with people from every other culture have a more liberal view of the world? I can understand the self-reliance of the quiet people in the hinterlands, their distrust of big government, their "fend for yourself" attitudes but I don't see any of those beliefs reflected in the current administration which pays lip service to those ideals while increasing the size of government and the national debt, sending America's children overseas to fight wars we have no business persuing and infringing on rights and freedoms of all Americans. I don't understand how people who believe in small government and self rule so quickly

Vote Early

First, let's do away with the Electoral College. Yes, a constitutional amendment the majority of America can agree on. All this stuff about states' rights and power afforded political parties is outdated notions for small states with five mile an hour communication infrastructures. Popular vote, tallied at the national level, no red states, no blue states, just individual citizens deciding on federal elected officials. And while we're at it, standardize the voting process so it is the same for everyone. Yes, it is expensive but as the politicians tell us time and again, we are the richest nation on the planet. Oh and that voting process must have a paper record. Whoever came up with the new electronic voting machines which produce no paper trail should be tried for treason. That's just plain duplicitous. Nevada has electronic ballots with a hardcopy record. Florida doesn't. Go figure.
Next, let's do away with Daylight Savings Time. We are not a nation of farmers any more. We mainly work in office buildings with few windows so we need all the sunlight we can get when we leave at 5:30 in the evening. We don't need to be driving home in the dark all fall and winter. Too many accidents.
I need to go home and take a nap. This time change just rattled me and I woke up at 4:30 this morning. I made some breakfast and looked up the sample ballot online again to make sure I knew how to vote for the judges and county commissioners. By 8:30 I was at my polling place, a small church in Chatham county. There was no wait. I didn't remember the county school board chairman on the ballot so I voted Democrat figuring she was more likely to support teaching history and science instead of religion and chauvinism. I was struck by how the names I had seen on yard signs and television commercials for the less well known positions popped out at me from the ballot. Money talks. There were a couple other offices I didn’t have a strong opinion on so I just voted against the incumbent and if there was a Libertarian on the ballot I voted for him. Shake things up. (How in the world did the Libertarian candidate for President get on the North Carolina ballot but not Ralph Nader? Nader was a write-in option. If you can’t even get organized to get on the ballot…? I know, I know, the system works to keep him out.)
I voted for Kerry-Edwards for P/VP which was mainly a vote against W.
I have no predictions. I am hopeful, not that Kerry will win, but that we’ll all get by like we have after every other election.