rant

it really seems like it's time for bed.. so i will go to bed. in a little bit. i want to have something interesting to post. but since i should be sleeping i'll post only this..

i was thinking about how i really enjoy comparing mr. bush to president harding, the one before coolidge. this is the president who was elected based entirely on the unpopularity of woodrow wilson after he led the united states into world war one, and we lost people. anyway. the americans at the time said: "we hate you democrats, and we hate you everyone who isn't american" and the roaring twenties were born.. one important thing that made them roar was the obscene tarriffs enacted by harding and his republican successors, coolidge and hoover... americans after the turn of the century seemed prone to just do as they were told, so long as they weren't suffering directly. for instance during the 20s the tarriffs prevented any of the european economies who were so badly damaged from WWI from recovering. we really set the stage for the socialists and fascists to take hold.. at the same time we discouraged them in our own country by having witch hunts in the 20s (yes,we had them again in the fifties) and the big reason people didn't want communism was because the middle class was doing so much better than they had been before the war. our non-agricultural economy was doing really well, only because there was no chance of foreign competition, but we naturally assumed it was because of the superior quality of our services and goods. anyway. since it appeared to work, the false economy devoid of all foreign influence, we kept up with the trends and just kept raising tarriffs.. by the time of herbert hoover they had set tarriffs on certain goods so high it was no different from declaring economic war on europe..

back to GW.. i was reading about harding's bombastic wind-bag speeches.. GW doesn't give really bombastic speeches.. no one has in years.. he gives cowboy speeches, but i think they both sound dumb in the same way. that bombastically written post about the poopsmith (which i wrote that way on purpose) sounds a little dumber for trying so hard.. the cowboy sounds dumb when he is dumb, not becuase he's a cowboy. plenty of those sounded smart. GW does not sound smart because he uses inappropriate words and many of the statements he makes are just plain jingoistic nonsense. nonsense. there are a handful of people in the world who hate freedom and none of those people are terrorists. they are international bankers and dictators who have not realized how to manipulate the illusion of freedom to their advantage, as our leaders have. that being the case it sound ridiculous to say that terrorists hate freedom. they hate you GW, they hate McDonalds.. they hate MTV.. hell, there are lots of people in this country who hate those things.. probably more than there are terrorists.. that's a thought for you..

and relating that to harding... when harding died in office of some massive heart attack it was a big shock.. his partial term in office was littered with spectacular scandals involving his friends (whom he appointed to their positions) and thier misappropriations of government and military resources. blah blah.. but the people still loved him. they said "aw.. shame on those people who used such a simple man.. he is of mediocre mind" and he died with coat-tails.. it makes no sense.. but if-you-distract-us-with-money-we-will-look-the-other way is what i think is the answer. economy coudldn't be better? do whatever you like.. but if we think it's crappy, then we'll see you in hell.

does anyone remember the simpsons episode called "mr. lisa goes to washington" about lisa entering an essay about our country in a reader's digest competition and winning to go to the finals in DC.. while she's there she observes the senator or whatever from springfield taking a bribe from someone who wants to deface mt. rushmore for some kind of industrial gain.. i can't remember if it was oil or not.. anyway. he takes it and she is crushed and writes this cynical piece about the stagnant swamp that is our capital, and names the crime and within minutes everyone knows andeverything gets fixed. anyway.. i'm still in that cynical phase. it's probably not the best way to think, but i can't get over it right now.. this post has gone in entirely a different direction that i had started out with. but whatever. it's long and something to read. so it stays. goodnight.

The Poopsmith

Now i know the agonizing pains, paralyzing highs, panic-stricken lows and rapturous joys of which only the poopsmith knows (from homestarrunner fame). since now i know not everyone who stumbles upon my brogg is someone i know, they might not know about our kittens. they also might not know that our kittens had a problem when we got them... this problem was one so foul, so feculent indeed that it could only be a sign that these kittens were meant for our family. this problem, which i shall henceforth refer to as tremendously overpowering gas, had us completely stunned. imagine, two tiny creatures, about the size of a boot, weighing in the neighborhood of 8 lb-- give or take a half--could produce something so bombastic and awe-inspiring as to render us both incapable of finishing a sentence. naturally our first assumtion was that it was related to their food. we checked the bag and noticed that we were feeding them adult cat food. this was alleged in the shelter to cause diarrhea, but no mention of foul sour gas. in my mind if you can attribute a symptom to stress it's as good as done, so the next thing we thought was "well, these poor babies have lived in a shelter for 1/3 of their lives.. and now here they are,in a strange place.. wiht new food and two crazy people watching them" ... ok. so despite these assumptions, we wanted to make sure they didn't have anything seriously wrong with them. Cat scheduled an appointment with our favorite vet, and we were gonna just watch and see..

.. oh, yeah.. and they said we needed to bring in a "sample" .....

so.. the day comes for the appointment.. i am not sure what to do about the sample, but we only leave ourselves 10 minutes to get up and round up everything we need to get to the vet. i grab a small ziplock back (at the advice of my mom) and fold it inside out and pull out a gigantic litter-covered chunk of what used to be pancake-batter type kitten poo. i was now poopsmithing. i have reached one of my newest life-goals.. because ever since i saw homestarrunner.com and saw the poopsmith he's been my favorite character. he embodies everything i think is good and wholesome.. 'eww' you say.. as you read this and suddenly i am a more disgusting person to you. but no, really,. the deal is this: he works very hard maneuvering the waste of the king of town. who for some reason produces a severe amount of waste for a small cotton-ball resembling man.. anyway he never complains.. he just wears big gloves and has flies around him all the time. it's symbolic.. really, it is.. of what i dare not speculate. so i'll move on.

we took the sample to the vet, and after physical inspection of the kittens and chemical and biological analysis of the specimen, it was determined the kittens were more or less fine, but required a supplement to their intestinal flora, and to get a little more used-to our house.. the gas has subsided, it's at a manageable level tonight.. but that does not mean that we would hold it against them if it remained.. i mean, we'd be quite the hypocrites if we did.. being proud gas-bags ourselves.. or was that wind-bags?.. no .. probably not.

soldering is fun.

this title will have been misleading by the time you get to the end.

it's been terribly long since i posted. offensive i'm sure to those who check. but keep in mind it's nothing personal when i am delinquent in updating.. i'm both busy and inarticulate most of the time.. so when the rare moment comes that i am lucid and not occupied by something else, i am more than happy to post. this is about how often that happens.

Today i got a prize for having 100% on my audit scores for all of july. technically i had 100% in june too. so i felt pretty good about it. for those of you who don't know what that means (all of you, since i know exactly who is reading this)... anyway. that means off all the claims i processed, i did all the ones that anyone checked correctly. if i were making lots of mistakes, it would show up when they get audited, however, since i apparently have not made gross oversights frequently at my job i have had some good audit scores. i had one error in august i think, maybe the first week.. so august i might have a lower audit.. but i hope things stay good. anyway. that made my day cool.

I also got to explain Chinese medicine in overview two four people,which is always a challenge. sometimes my voice gets so tired. sometimes my brain gets so tired. i probably could have eaten more before that. or been less busy in general. the week after a vacation is always hard. i thought we'd be really prepared this time, because i anticipated that coming back owuld be rough, however, it seems there's always gonna be something i forgot. itcould have been much worse i'm sure.

I want to have a funny haiku battle so someone needs to challenge me in the comments section. here is one:

diligently eat
ground turkey with talons and
beaks. you will enjoy.



take that malison.

whoopuhlent

i have to say, that despite generally not having been a good week today i got an unexpected surprise. Catbones made comments on my blog. so the two of you who know of it can tell me what you think.. or tell the other person who reads this thing what you might think about what i think about whatever i'm thinkingabout. mmm.. good stuff. i'm sure that the people who read this have not read it in at least a day.. so this will be a big deal.. parties might be thrown.. gifts may be given.. comments may be offered up. so start now. right this second. don't wait till later, because you know you won't do it. tell me my posture is atrocious. tell me i'm using words incorrectly... how else will i learn? ok... excellent. now i will go.