What's cool?

Friends are cool. I have a friend named Ron who gave up the better part of his day to help me rip out the vanity in one of our bathrooms and to assemble its replacement. He refused payment. That's friendship. I was able to persuade him to join me in a beer or two and smoke a bowl of tobacco as we sat on the tailgate, swung our legs, and solved the world's problems. That's friendship too.

Vote What?

Some of my favorite people have a decided aversion to our Chief Executive Officer. Given the press the guy gets, this is understandable. The fact that he is The Man is not assurance that he is always, or even often, correct. I'm okay with that. If enough people dislike the job he's doing we'll see moving vans at 1600 Pennsylvania next January.

What I don't understand is the notion that the answer to a leader that one finds distasteful is "Vote Democrat." I could be naive, but voting straight ticket, which that sentiment seems to suggest, is likely to replace one motley bunch with another. I need a little more than that.

I want to know about the personalities involved. I'm feeling centrist. I would like to see a fair-sized crop of new (to Washington, D.C.) public servants, full of p**s and vinegar and out to set the world on fire. I'd like to see them balanced by enough elder statesmen who know how to move legislation through the system and who have enough connections and favors to call in to get the job done.

Since we're wishing, I wish the whole lot of them would develop an aversion to fixing the world's woes with my tax money and that they would simultaneously develop a sense of shame and remorse for all the crap that has preceded their time in office. I wish they would struggle mightily to persuade me to take some money back and encourage me to give it to private charities that are not motivated by more than mercy and a true spirit of caring--balanced by the will to work to make a difference.

But back to the main point. I'm not sure it's the party. Maintaining that one is right and the other is wrong seems to me a monochromatic, misguided point of view. It's all about the people. Each butt in each seat of Congress, the Executive mansion, and the Supreme Court is part of a person. I'll concur if you opine that some of those posteriors are stretched beyond comfort by trying to contain their owner's head, but that only underscores that each is near an individual heart as well. I don't care so much about party affiliation if the intent of the person is to do his or her best for whatever constituency sent them to Washington.

So there it is. Cheers for the jack or jenny (has that ever been established?) or for the pachyderm, exclusively, appear to offer a simple path to continued grief, albeit of a different flavor. "Boo, hiss Bush!" seems too strident. It may be raw and heartfelt, but I sense something missing. Like a viable alternative.

Up for Air

Saturday evening and Sunday were nice. After 8 hours in the workplace on Saturday, we tried to go see "Hidalgo" (sold out), and ended up at Blockbuster. Two flicks and a bowl of buttery fresh-popped popcorn late (no microwaves, thank you very much), we settled down in front of our cathode ray friend and lazed through the evening. How refreshing.

Sunday, we didn't go into work. In the morning OR the evening. We visited family, came home, and watched the second movie.

We're still tired. Proposals just have that effect on the folks who work them. But 400 jobs are on the line if we don't do it right. Two of them are ours, so that's sufficient incentive to keep showing up and refining our work.

Let's hear from the folks in Pennsylvania, Florida and Indiana. 'sup folks!?