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The
Soap Box Sunday, October 31, 2004 Oy Veh! It's just after 7 pm here and we have gone through 11 pounds of candy. 11 POUNDS! We have about a quarter lb of tootsie rolls left. Then the lights go out and no more candy. I swear, people must bus their kids in from all over the city to my neighborhood. It's just unreal! You know, now that I'm an adult, I find the whole trick-or-treat thing very odd. We train our kids to go to strangers' houses and beg for candy? Hmmm... UPDATE: We ran ot of candy at 7:45pm. Friday, October 29, 2004 All Will Be Well on Tuesday I walked outside to check my mailbox today around 12:30 and a woman approached me and asked if I planned to vote for Kerry. Seeing as I have a Kerry sign stuck in my front yard, it was a pretty good bet. She went on to tell me Kerry was going to win. God had told her so and now that she had found me, she was sure of it. Apparently, God made me come out of the house at that exact moment that she was passing my house looking for a yard sale and this was no coincidence. That I was there to hear her testify regarding what God had told her convinced her that what God told her was true. So there it is. Kerry is going to win...from God's mouth to a 66-year old woman's mind to my blog. I can't figure out if it's a miracle of God or of technology. In Case You're Still Undecided or Voting For Dubya Bush Relatives For Kerry because blood is thinner than oil. Mothers Opposing Bush because this administration's policies endanger our families and our country. Republicans for Kerry. Country before Party. Billionaires for Bush because the deficit isn't growing fast enough. Thursday, October 28, 2004 We Voted... ...me by mail and Nick today by standing in line in the cool Autumn evening until it was his turn to vote early (approx. 20 mintues). Now I don't have to resort to this. Wednesday, October 27, 2004 UNBELIEVEABLE!
Oh, BTW... Back in the spring, a Navajo medicine man, who also was a Code Talker in WWII, gave the Red Sox a blessing...the same Medicine Man, dressed in his Red Sox jacket, gave John Kerry a blessing when he was in Albuquerque yesterday. May both team and man win! Sorry... ...This blogger is busy watching the World Series. However, she swears she is not getting so into the game that the Red Sox could possibly disappoint her if they lose...but then again, Nixon almost just hit a grand slam... Monday, October 25, 2004 Wonderful Surprise As you may or may not know, I was raised in a small suburb of Boston. We werekinda lower-middle class. Certainly never when to bed hungry but was never gonna get those Jordache jeans. I usually got clothes at Filene's Basement, which was a real basement with no dressing rooms. You had to try clothes on right there in the store which always mortified me. However, my mom somehow knew that it was important that I was "cultured" to a certain extent and took me to plays and musicals, both in Boston and on Broadway. I can't even name all the plays I saw but they include: A Chorus Line, Cats, Phantom of the Opera, Evita, Les Miserables, Gypsy, and West Side Story. I admit it, I'm a musical snob. That's the reason why I haven't seen one single play or musical since coming out here to New Mexico seven years ago. I'd rather not see a play than see a badly acted/sung play. However, I heard Les Miz was in town and I really wanted to see it for some reason. It's my favorite musical and I guess I figured that even a bad production of Les Miz would still be good. It was playing at Popejoy Hall, which is on the UNM campus. It's a tiny theater with a tiny stage. I know. I've sung on that stage as part of the UNM chorus. (Funny, I've been in Popejoy to perform but never to see a show.) So I went to the show yesterday and it does not bode well for the show that MY seat had been double sold so I couldn't sit there. Next, the house manager pulls me and my friend Mary out of the theater and said "sorry, we don't have seats for you." Hello? Fuck that! These tickets were over $50/piece and that's EXPENSIVE for po-dunk-middle-of-nowhere, somewhere-in-the-southwest, USA. I'm arguing with the guy, the curtain has gone up and I was pissed. He said he'd find other seats for us but that we couldn't see the first 13 minutes of the play! OMG I was rip shit. Some nice young, handsome man heard me bitching (and I think saw my hottie friend Mary) and said he'd let us watch from the "media room" for the first few minutes. OK, fine, whatever. Better than not seeing at all. So we are in this pitch black box at the back of the theater for the first 10 minutes, then we're told we have seats and we need to wait outside the theater doors and they would shoo us in when they could. Now we're standing in the lobby, waiting to go to our new seats. We can see and hear the show from a closed circuit TV in the lobby and I'm trying to pay attention to Jean Valjean's lament about being a parolee when I am astounded! This man has an amazing voice! I mean, I was brought to tears by this voice. It wasn't until intermission that I found out his name is Randal Keith and he played Jean Valjean from February 2003 until Les Liz closed ON BROADWAY! Holy cow! A Broadway star out here in the desert? How amazingly cool is that? All the actors were great. The lighting sucked and man, that was the smallest barricade I've ever seen (yes, I've seen the show 4 times previous to this) but shit, they pulled it off! It was such a wonderful surprise that a Broadway caliber cast was playing in this tiny theater on my campus. Now if they could just work on not double selling seats, I might go see another show while I'm here. Quote of the Day "Just like any artist in America, she has a backing track that she pushes so you don't have to hear her croak through a song on national television. No one wants to hear that." - Joe Simpson, father and manager of Ashlee Simpson, regarding Ashlee's use of a vocal track on SNL. Nice. Sunday, October 24, 2004 Nice Fuck-up So, Ashlee Simpson was the musical guest on SNL last night. When it came time for her second song, you hear the drums start, then her voice comes in, except she's not singing into the microphone and she's REALLY embarrassed. Then her guitar players start and they are obviously really playing. Ashlee didn't know what to do so she just kinda jumped around like an ass then walked off the stage! Her band continues to pay for like 30 more seconds and then they cut to commercial. The never went back to her (trying to) perform. They filled the time with some stupid videos starring highly evolved bears. (Don't ask me. I didn't find it nearly as amusing as the Simpson debacle.) My theory is that all her vocals were pre-recorded and they started playing the vocals of the wrong song and Ashlee was too scared/dumb/mortified/untalented (take your pick) to try to sing one of her own songs live, on her own. At the end, when the whole cast says good bye, she claimed she was embarrassed because her band started playing the wrong song except when her recorded voice started, it was before the band was playing except the drummer. And if her voice track wasn't messed up and started pre-maturely, why not just sing whatever song the band was playing instead of jumping around like an idiot then walking off stage of a live show? Ahhh, I'm telling you, it was classic. If you ever wanted to know if Ashlee could sing live, you have your answer. Saturday, October 23, 2004 Holy Crap! Johnny Pesky, of Red Sox fame, is still alive! Who knew? Quote of the Day "Here's what I wonder about Dick Cheney, and the reason that maybe they keep him only in loyalty-oath audiences: If he becomes angry, I do believe he turns into the Hulk." -The Daily Show's Jon Stewart on CBS's 60 Minutes. Things That Make You Go Hmmmm... Here are the facts: The US gets ALL of its flu vaccine from England and France, about half from each. The French maker delivered as promised. The English maker fucked up. During the second debate, President Bush said that US citizens shouldn't get their medication at lower prices from Canada because the FDA couldn't guarantee the quality of the drugs even though many American citizens, probably millions by now, have been getting their drugs from Canada and I have not seen a single news story about the drugs being tainted or not what they were advertised as. During the third debate, President Bush said he was looking into getting millions of flu vaccines from Canada for the American public. No mention about possible tainted or incorrect vaccines were mentioned then. My questions are as follows: Why isn't there any fucking flu vaccine made IN THE UNITED STATES? The Flu mist is made here (I think in California) but has been deemed too expensive so no one was using it although now with the huge price gouging for the flu vaccine (like 200% and that is not an exaggerated figure) the general public may find $16 for a vaccine delivered by nasal spray to be a bargain. Was the production of flu vaccine one more example of something America desperately needs being made overseas, ergo giving American jobs away in order to save a few bucks? Why are Canadian prescription drugs deemed unsafe but the flu vaccine not? The even more scary thing to me is all the people going over the southern border into Mexico for their shots. You think Canadian drugs aren't as rigorously tested as they are in the US? Try Mexico! Besides, there is a language barrier for most US citizens. You could ask for an influenza shot and get only God knows what! Reminds me of an ER episode where some guy was told to take a pill once a day. Well Once means eleven in Spanish and the poor guy ODed...but I digress... Perhaps if the damn vaccine was made HERE and sold to England and France instead of the other way around we wouldn't be in the predicament of having a possible epidemic here. Perhaps if we could buy prescription drugs a little cheaper in Canada, we could afford to keep more essential manufacturing jobs in this country. Perhaps not... Either way, as I have to work with veterans aged 65 and older for a research project, does anyone know where I can score a flu vaccine for myself? Didn't think so... PS: Since the President has reported that he will NOT get a shot for himself, how funny would it NOT be if he did get the flu then passed it to like thousands of people during his last few days of stumping, actually creating an epidemic all by himself? One Step Closer to Vegetarianism So I ate at a well-known family friendly restaurant last night (rhymes with Crapplebees) and I had a dish I've had before which was marinated steak tips. The other time I've had them they were AWESOME! OMG! With a peppered gravy? So I got them again last night but they weren't as good. They tasted kind of...old...and well...they took the express train through my digestive system...and I feel like total crap today. UGH! Nick and I were gonna do fun stuff today too like go to a pumpkin patch and a corn maze and now I just wanna curl up and die...only temporarily die...like for 24 hours. And then I want to spring out of bed and feel great. What are the chances of that happening? Thursday, October 21, 2004 Need a Larf? Check out this eBay auction. Woo-fucking-hoo! The funniest TV show cancelled before it's time (besides Futurama) is finally on video -- Greg the Bunny! I once actually signed an online petition to get this show on DVD. I can't wait to watch it! It even contains 2 episodes that never got to air. Dayam that show is funny. Especially the "Count Igit-Blah" episode. Now I know what I'll be doing next weekend when I should be studying for my stats test! Tuesday, October 19, 2004 Test Score I got the lowest score in the class on my psychopathology midterm. Charming. I think that is the first time that's happened. Not a great feeling. Now, having said that, I was 0.5 points from a B+. Also, there are only 8 people in the class so I guess someone had to come in last. So, I know I should be happy with an almost B+ but damn! I don't like being last! Monday, October 18, 2004 Does It Really Take 5 Phone Calls and Over an Hour
To Pay A Bill? If your phone service is MCI, it does apparently. I had a discrepancy on my bill to the tune of a few hundred $$ and there was no way I was paying that without at least a fight. So I call the customer support number. The recording tells me there are many calls ahead and I should pay online. Yeah, right. I waited...and waited...and waited...made dinner from scratch and still waited. I got a live person exactly 30 minutes after I called. I explained the situation and the guy (who I must admit was very nice) and he immediately said he's call the "high-credit" (?) office and could I hold? Sure. What's a few minutes now? He comes back perhaps 10 minutes later and says I'm getting 300 some-odd $$ in credit. Thank you!!! I ask if I can pay my bill right now. He says "sure, I'll transfer you but in case we get disconnected, here's their number." Ok, whatever. And then I'm transferred into automated telephone hell!Fuck it, I'll try to pay with the automated system. It tells me I owe over $500 and do I want to use Visa or MasterCard? Over $500? Neither! I'm not paying that! Total time on phone: 52 minutes. OK, let's call the number the guy gave me. Another automated phone hell. Press 4 for customer support. Ok. I press 4. "For customer support, please call 1-800-555-8188." What? I hang up, call the 555 number, auto phone hell number 4. I press whatever it is to talk to a real person and start waiting all over again. I actually check to see if I can pay the outstanding balance on the Internet while I'm waiting. I have time to sign up, get a user name and password, try to pay online and they say I need to call ANOTHER number! I call it and am in ... can you guess? Yes, phone hell number 5! My incredibly yummy dinner is drying out. I'm fed up. I hang up. I eat dinner and call back afterward. I get a real person rather quickly this time and she wants me to pay the $500+ bill and I said "No, I'm paying $100+, no more." She can't find the credit. I don't care. I'm paying the $100+ and that's it. She wants to know the exact amount the credit is for that I got earlier and well, I dunno! I just know how much I owe. Why is paying my fucking bill so damn hard? I REALLY hate those automated dealies. I mean do they really help ANYONE? Lesson learned: even phone companies have really sucky telephone customer support. PS: I'm trying not to get too excited about the Sox so that they can't disappoint me later... Saturday, October 16, 2004 Red Sox Suck! Having grown up in Boston, I'm used to the Red Sox losing. In fact, I don't even expect them to win. I don't watch them during the regular season. That way, when they are still alive in the post-season, it's a nice surprise. But yet, when they are in the play-offs, I can't help but watch. You'd think that considering they haven't won the World Series since loooooooong before I was born, I'd stop letting the Red Sox suck a few hours of my life away forever in October. Nope, I watched the game, almost the entire game...even though it was obvious in the 4th inning they would lose. But yet...I'll still probably tune in tomorrow...I mean they can't ALWAYS lose, can they? Sunday Night Update: OK, the Red Sox temporarily don't suck. Thursday, October 14, 2004 Quote Of The Day "People can worship whether they want to or not." - President Bush from last night's debate. The Place to Be Apparently, New Mexico is the place to be this year. MTV's Road Rules/Real World challenge was filmed halfway between Albuquerque and Santa Fe this summer (I think it was this summer). And because we are a "battleground" state, we've had Margaret Cho, Kerry, Cheney, and Mr & Mrs Bush hanging around. This Monday I found out that John Cusack was on campus the previous Friday. Just my luck! After talking about the election he gave out autographs and took pictures with people but *I* didn't even know he was around so I missed him! Wahhhhh! I LOVE John Cusack! Oh and of course Michael Moore has been here. I believe he said something to the effect of "I don't really care if you vote for Kerry but I have three words for you. Get. Bush. OUT!" I didn't see him myself. Nor did I see Kerry at his rally in Albuquerque last Sunday. You wanna know why? I was studying for that fricken psychopathology midterm! Ugh! Tuesday, October 12, 2004 WTF Am I Doing? The 3 hour psychopathology midterm sucked major ass. The class is usually at 9 to 10:15 but the midterm started at 8 am! Ok, first, who thinks at 8 am? Then we had to diagnose like 5 scenarios. No biggie. Then we had to write a plan for screening subjects for 2 research studies...not so easy. Then we had to state the hypotheses and dependent variables in two articles we read. Sound easy? We read over 30 articles already this semester. We're talking 30 research articles that are written in Greek just to frustrate the fuck out of any poor student trying to read them. So that means we basically had to memorize the hypotheses and dependent variables for all 30 articles in case one of the articles popped up on the test. OK, it wasn't really quite that bad. She had picked out 9 articles that she said were prime candidates for this type of question. Then there were questions about the etiology of posttraumatic stress disorder and social phobia. And then the limitations of the theories we just mentioned for the etiology. And then there were some more questions that I honestly don't remember right now. OMG it was terrible. TERRIBLE. I used the entire time and my hand hurt from writing when I was done. You know, I've always imagined that medical school would be the hardest professional school around but today, I'm not so sure... Monday, October 11, 2004 "High Holy Days" According to Air America Radio, tomorrow will start the "High holy days for the east coast beer guzzling" crowd as the Yankees and the Red Sox meet up for post-season play. I must admit, I am not a big baseball fan and found it difficult to be a Red Sox fan growing up in Boston when they would trade away the best players for 3 half-assed players. How can you be loyal to a team when the roster was changing so frequently? However, once the stakes are high and we're talking about their arch-enemy, my Red Sox fever strikes again. The good part is, I assume in the end they will lose so when they do, I'm only a little disappointed. If I'm gonna be honest, I expect at least one good brawl during the series if not per game. And after I survive my psychopathology midterm tomorrow I can sit on my ass and watch the whole game if I want! Woohoo! Sunday, October 10, 2004 Oopsie! Smokey the Bear balloon bit the big one as a gust of wind blew it into a 750ft radio tower today, the final day of the 2004 Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. The 69 year old pilot and his two passengers, aged 10 and 14, had to climb down 650 feet on the structure's internal ladder before being picked up by emergency crews. Smokey is no more and the tower sustained about $10,000 worth of damage. Click here to see a picture of poor old Smokey. Saturday, October 9, 2004 More JibJab Here's another funny Flash political cartoon from JibJab, this time to the tune of Dixie. Friday, October 8, 2004 OMG! I found out the morning on my way to school that Melissa Etheridge has been diagnosed with breast cancer! She will be canceling upcoming tour dates in order to go through treatment. She is expected to make a full recovery. My grandmother had breast cancer as does her sister as did a friend of mine here in town but I was still shocked when I heard the news. I'm not sure why. I guess the rich and famous seem immune to such things to me yet they clearly are not. I wish the best for Ms. Etheridge and her family during this difficult time. Thursday, October 7, 2004 More Balloon Stuff Just in case you think that balloonists just get off the ground, hover around in the air then come down when they are out of propane, I wanted to set the record straight. Every day of the Balloon Fiesta has a little target practice involved. Once the balloon launches, they go on a search for an "x" on the ground. The pilots will fly low to the ground and toss a weighted bag out of the balloon aiming for the center of the "x". The pilot closest to the center gets 1000 points while the next closest gets 999, etc. At the end of the week the person with the most points wins something cool like a new truck or new balloon! Just for throwing a bag on an x!
Here in Albuquerque, we have some unique winds called the Albuquerque box. Flying low will carry the balloon south. Go up a little higher and you will catch westerly winds. Up higher will get you northbound winds. Somewhere up there are also eastern winds. All in all, a good pilot can fly in a rectangle and land back on the field, which is basically what we did yesterday. Not good pilots can land anywhere. At least 3 balloons landed on the UNM campus this morning. So, what do you do when you are having a tailgate party in the middle of a field and want to make margaritas? You get a gas powered blender of course!
Notice all the empty gallon jugs of Jose Cuervo products at the bottom left. Just for the record, that picture was taken at 11:16am and that blender has been filled and emptied repeatedly already. Wednesday, October 6, 2004 More Pictures In case you want to know what daybreak looks like in Albuquerque from a balloon, it looks something like this:
Although you can't really tell, just below the clouds are the Sandia mountains. The peaks of them are covered with clouds. Very cool! Click here to see more ballooning pics from today. I Made It! Yup, I got up at 4am and went to the Balloon Fiesta and even got to go up in a balloon! It was extremely cool. It's very quiet up there. The only noise you here is from the burners for the balloons. I found out that balloonists are very generous and gregarious people. After the flight, which both took off AND landed right on the field, there was a huge tailgate party where the pilot of the balloon we rode in and his wife cooked breakfast for about 50 people. Of course, as soon as you land, which is approximately 8am, you start drinking. There was a lot of tequila flowing as 2 different tequila companies are sponsoring balloons this year. There is also a vodka sponsored balloons but I didn't see any samples of that being passed around. Anyway, here are 2 pictures from the "dawn patrol" to prove I was there. I'll keep posting pics but prolly after I get some sleep!
Tuesday, October 5, 2004 It's Official... ...I must be insane. I'm gonna get up at 4am to be on a crew for a balloon at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. It should be really cool and I figure is a once in a lifetime thing but still, volunteering to get up at 4am? And on a weekday? Ugh! Hopefully, I'll have pictures to post tomorrow. Of course, that means I actually got out of my nice warm bed that I just put flannel sheets on and got my ass down to the field in time. Tune in tomorrow to see if I was successful... Monday, October 4, 2004 Lookie What I Did! Somehow, and I'm not sure how, I made a baby quilt for my friend Julie, who gave birth to her first child at the end of last month! Yay Julie! Anyway, I took a weekend and blew off all my homework and made the quilt below:
Yes, it's very colorful but supposedly babies like bright colors. Here is a closeup of the quilt:
Congrats Julie! Enjoy your quilt Colton! :) Sunday, October 3, 2004 ROFL! From September 17th issue of Entertainment Weekly:
My sentiments exactly! (And that is the first and last time you will see a link to that whiner's blog on this site.) Saturday, October 2, 2004 Question for You (Warning: Possible Spoilers) So I watched The Quiet American last night and it made me wonder. Why do some movies let you know in the first 5 minutes of the movie that one of the main characters is going to die? In Quiet American, we know that Brendan Fraser dies in the first scene, just like in American Beauty where we know Kevin Spacey is going to die. For me, it totally decreases the tension of the movie. When I heard that Fraser's character was wanted by some Vietnamese, I knew I must be at the end of the movie and he wasn't going to make it so part of me kinda shut off. So what is the purpose of exposing the ending of a movie within the first 5 minutes? Can anyone tell me? Disgusted So, I made the mistake of turning on the news when I woke up this morning and was unfortunate enough to see footage of a place we bombed in Iraq. They were pulling small children out of the rubble. I don't know if they were dead of alive, but I'd put my money on the former. It made me instantly feel sick. We did that. My country did that. And the government has the audacity to say it was a precision strike. So we now have 3 choices to believe. 1) they are fucking liars, 2) they are not as precise as they think or 3) they are targeting innocent people, including children. As a taxpayer and a citizen born in this country I say STOP! Do not injure or kill one more person in Iraq or any other country in my name. Do not dare say it's for my freedom. Before you fire another bullet or launch another bomb, make sure -- absolutely dead certain -- that that person you are about to kill deserves it. Show me some proof. Give me a witness. If you can't do that, don't take ONE MORE LIFE.
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Blog Name: The Soap Box
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