The greeter at my AA meeting tonight, a tall, slim beauty named Steph, was greeting folks at the door, not with the usual extended hand and "Hi, welcome," but by repeating, "200-to-90. 200-to-90." Electoral votes. That was at 7 o'clock. SEVEN O'CLOCK!

By 8 I was on my way to what… Read full post »

Hard not to think about the character of the girl who would grow up to be Barack Obama's mother: Stanley Ann Dunham. I heard Michelle Obama speak back in the winter, and she described her mother-in-law as a "free spirit" who always followed her heart despite the proscriptions of society. I… Read full post »

My granddaughter, Clementine, who just turned 1 in August, was sitting on my lap this morning. She touched my Obama button, looked up at me and said, very clearly, "O-ba-ma!" I don't know what I'm more proud of: her intelligence or her politics! (One is actually an expression of the other!)… Read full post »

I'm so nervous I may puke!

I have been through divorce in sobriety. And I stayed sober. The loss of a job has never made me pick up.  Deaths in the family, ditto. Faithless boyfriends? Don't make me laugh! No, I'm the girl who loses it when I'm on top of… Read full post »

I thought that voting early would ameliorate my Obamania, but things are only getting worse as the timer ticks down.

My friend Kathy called me yesterday. She has insulin-dependent diabetes, fibromyalgia, and another ( potentially fatal) illness. She wanted my support and advice regarding her tr… Read full post »

The frenzied thrashing, the desperate flailing, the unrestrained keening emanating from the Stench Talk Express in these last hours of the 2008 presidential election remind me of the end of the movie Fargo, when William H. Macy's Jerry Lundegard -- cornered, trapped, and facing his final doom -- &nbs… Read full post »

I've given birth to three sons, and my water broke with the commencement of each labor.

With the first child, I was asleep, early in the morning, dreaming that I was in a submarine with a small dark-haired Mexican boy. The rivets were popping and the water was gushing in,… Read full post »

OK, this is what we do. First, we get Obama elected. Then, we get a Nobel Prize for Pete Seeger. You remember Pete; If I Had a Hammer, Guantanamera, Little Boxes, Bring Them Home,  the reason the Hudson River is clean today -- THAT Pete. 

Pete Seeger is an ambassador for Peac… Read full post »

Have you seen or read Hellboy? It goes like this: In the waning days of World War II, the Nazis, in desperation, try black magic to ressurect their dying cause. As the Nazi ceremony is taking place, a demon - "Hellboy" - is conjured -- just as the Allied forces raid the camp. The… Read full post »

You know what I could really go for right about now? A Sarah Palin sex scandal. No, not the one that has her not really being Trig's mother. That's sex as in reproduction.

No, I mean a nice, juicy, John-Edwards-meets-Bill-Clinton-meets-Republican-senator-of-your-choice sex scandal. With motel room r… Read full post »

Greg Randolph posted elsewhere on Open Salon:

"Sarah Palin came out today and said that if she and John McCain lose, she will seek the Republican Candidacy in 2012, Katie Couric just reported."

I don't think she has a chance, but given what her home life must be like,… Read full post »

I can't get myself worked up about Gay Marriage. The thought that runs through my mind is "I dunno why they wanna get married and ruin some perfectly good relationships." So Gay America, get married! But be warned: marriage has a 50% failure rate -- worst than most brands of condoms!… Read full post »

You know how presidents get tagged with shortened names, like FDR, or JFK, or LBJ? (Is it a mark of the current occupant's relationship with the English language that he is reduced to one letter of the alphabet?)

I was on my morning coffee run, driving into the beautiful Las Vegas… Read full post »

Driving home this morning, I noticed a lone vehicle still flying one of those American flags that fit over the car window, which became ubiquitous after September 11, and I thought: Wow! I want one of those, and on election day, when Obama wins, I'll put it in my car window and… Read full post »

I saw this on the internet, so I know it's true. (The Huffington Post, actually.)

John McCain told his wife, within earshot of reporters, "At least I don't plaster on the makeup like a harlot, you cunt!"

Then, more recently, he made a speech in which he said "rates have been cunt,"… Read full post »

Thanks, Leigh Bailey, for your Yeats-inspired posting. Here's another great and timeless poem, by WH Auden.  

September 1, 1939 

I sit in one of the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear
Circu… Read full post »

Oh, Lord. Colin Powell, the man who mispronounces his own name as part of the human digestive system, the man who lied to the world at the UN, now endorses Obama.

Can this possibly help?

Or is it a Republican October Surprise?

  Read full post »

I received my order of 100 red, white and blue buttons saying "I'm voting for THAT ONE" on Wednesday at noon. It's now Friday at 9:30 and I only have about a dozen left.

I've sent them (by request) to friends and friends of friends in New York and Indiana… Read full post »

I'm not asking out of any kind of outrage; I'm just curious. Since retiring from my (yes, I know it's a cliche), high-stress corporate job in March, I've been working part-time at a daycare center to make benefits and supplement my writing income. (I'm Scholastic's anti-JK Rowling, Yin to her Yang;… Read full post »

Stephen Baker writes, in his new book, The Numerati, published by Houghton Mifflin and excerpted on KNPR.org,

"Those of us wielding cell phones, laptops, and credit cards fatten our digital dossiers every day, simply by living. Take me. As I write on this spring morning, Verizon, my cell phone compa

… Read full post »

OK, I have to ask; Is that a wig?

OK, maybe it's because I'm battling a stomach bug and two days of 100-101 temps. But I just woke up from a stupor,  fever dream to think, "Wow! Wouldn't it be great if we could get Sacha Baron Cohen to reprise Ali G, and interview Sarah Palin? And you know what… Read full post »