October 11, 2008 - Saturday
To all my friends and family...see you Vancouver or London!
Yeah you read right. I've now embarked on my next mammoth undertaking. Oh come on. You can't act that surprised. Like you didn't know I was gonna be up to something. You know me, and for those of you that do, you know I can't stay away too long from something new and exciting. Soo....yeah this next chapter involves grad school and I've officially submitted one application with three left to do.
I've decided that I most definitely want to go back to school for a variety of reasons. Chief among them being that I'm about over this real world stuff. It's been interesting now that I've been in it for about six months now, (last year really doesn't count since even though I was working and earning money, I could save every dime because I really wasn't paying rent or anything like that) and it's fun to think that there are times that I can truly can places I want and do what I please, but the other flip side of that coin is...if I have the energy to do it! Which most of the time, I don't. Not mentioning if I can get the time off to actually do it, hence the question when all of my friends back home keep asking me when I'm gonna visit. They don't seem to understand that unlike me, they can just announce to their teacher that they'll be missing for an upcoming Friday class and get the notes or whatever ahead of time, assuming that their teacher is of course, okay with that. But me, on the other hand? I'm not able to just get up and walk away. If I want to sneak an extra day off, I've got to do it with the understanding that I'm simultaneously losing anywhere from $88.00-$150.00 a day. Which in the grand scheme of things is bad. I did that earlier this week when I didn't come in Monday or Tuesday, and it was a very relaxing time to not work, but it's gonna bite me in the ass on that next paycheck. Speaking of which....
I lost my wallet. In downtown DC. In Georgetown. .With everything in it.
With that being said, I've managed to cancel all my cards and get them all reissued to me, (which is a pain in the ass, since Michelle Williams' new cd is out and I can't even purchase it without a credit card!) so that's fine. But I had my state ID in it and my original social security card. My mom's gonna kill me. But I can get it replaced. I'm just not sure how at this particular moment.
Anyway, the reason for this blog. I've decided to go back to school and I've set myself on this path yet again because I want to go back to the world of academia. More than that, I want to go farther than my parents' did in their education. It was nice because now three of us have an official degree and graduation day couldn't have been anymore perfect if I had planned it out myself. But I want to do it again. I want to go further and know that I have a Master's degree. Hell, I'll probably end up with a docorate, just to say I have it. So now that I've thought about it. The next step. Where to go. I've been thinking about this for the last few months, and I've decided that I don't want to stay in the States, if I can help it. I've been here for years and after the total exhileration that was Germany, I definitely have to leave. So with that in mind, I thought about the places I've always wanted to go. And there's Canada, England and Australia.
I'm still working on Aussie land because I can't seem to get any kind of reputable information off any of their schools, but we'll see about that. As far as the other two go, I've locked down a school in both places and I'm submitting applications to them both. I've already done one to Roehampton University in downtown London, and I'm working on getting the next one in for the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Hopefully one of them will come through, and then I have to make a very, very hard decision as to which place I'm gonna go. Coincidentally, I haven't excluded the States completely, and I'll be applying to UNC-Wilmington as well. But it's my third choice at this point. We'll have to see. I don't know where this course of action is going to take me, or even if I'll get into the schools, but the way I look at it, you can't get in if you don't apply!!!
P.S. I've been watching with absolute horror and disgust at the way that the political race has been going (I've already voted for Obama by the way), and I can't believe that the Republicans are getting away with televisioned hate speech at their rallies. Some people may call that extreme, but in my view screaming "terrorist, kill him, and treason," count as hate speech in my book. What the hell is McCain and crew doing? They make it sound like their going to erupt in rioting if Obama is elected, which he will be. This kinda worries me....
Saturday 11 October 2008
Tuesday 7 October 2008
Tina Fey, You Get Mad PROPS!!!!
You know, I have never been a fan of SNL. Hell, I don't even know what that show is about half the time. I usually just hear about it the week after it's over and someone's recounting a funny skit they saw (that I wouldn't understand anyway, being black and all.) But Tina, Tina, Tina. Tina Fey has been on fire for the last three weeks in a row as she continues to bring her now infamous impersonation of Gov. Sarah Palin on the show over and over, each time to higher ratings. The one, I just couldn't pass up.
Saturday 4 October 2008
I Totally Disagree With This But It Was Too Just Too Funny (Palin vs. Biden)
The VP Debate: She Won Fersure, Also
.. --> begin blogger thumbs -->.. --> end blogger thumbs -->
Well, darnit all, if that dadgum girl (wink, wink) didn't beat the tarnation out of Joe Biden. Maverick Sarah Palin fersure surpassed expectations and said everything under the sun, also. And Biden smiled and smiled.
Palin is a populist pro. She hit all the notes that resonate with non-elite Americans: family (Hi Mom and Dad!), "Can I call ya Joe?" personal responsibility, Wall Street greed, children with special needs. Her most effective technique was speaking directly to the American people and letting Joe know that's what she was gonna do, doggonit.
Stylistically, she used the language of the people to great effect. And, you know what? If you want to know what the American people care about, you can go to a kid's soccer game on Saturday and ask parents how they feel, and "I'll betcha you're going to hear some fear."
I'll have to go to the transcript to figure out what Palin actually said and try to figure out whose facts were right. But there's no question: She won the debate on popularity. She did her homework, studied hard, and delivered with spunk. Still, I had the uneasy feeling throughout that I was witnessing a data dump from a very appealing droid. Even the winks and jaw juts seemed slightly programmed. And the question remains: Is she ready to be president should the need arise?
P.S. I was gonna stop here but this one's even better.
Joe, and Sarah Six-Pack
By Dana Milbank
Friday, October 3, 2008; Page A03
ST. LOUIS, Oct. 2 This week, Sarah Palin gave a curious rationale for her candidacy. "It's time," the Republican vice presidential nominee said, "that normal Joe Six-Pack American is finally represented in the position of vice presidency."
When she took the stage Thursday night here at Washington University for the vice presidential debate, Sarah Six-Pack all but popped open a cold one. Wearing a glittery flag pin on her jacket, she blew a kiss toward the audience. She gave a wave that Tina Fey would probably describe as adorable. Then she regarded her Democratic foe, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
"Nice to meet you," Palin told Joe Biden. "Hey, can I call you Joe?"
"You can call me Joe," the senator obliged.
"Okay, thanks," she said brightly.
"Thank you," Biden replied.
"Thank you," she told him again. "Thank you, Gwen," she told moderator Gwen Ifill. "Thank you, thank you, thank you," she told nobody in particular.
It was going to be a long evening.
Palin's intellectual fitness had been put into question by her disastrous interview with Katie Couric, which was filled with panicked silences, flustered non-answers and even a promise to get back to the interviewer with more information. But when Palin took the stage with Biden last night for what may have been the most public IQ test ever administered, she had no problem meeting the exceptionally low expectations. She had talking points adequate to fill the 90 seconds on the various topics Ifill tossed her way, and often forced Biden to defend Barack Obama.
On the other hand, it wasn't exactly a confidence-builder. Palin, in her 90 minutes on the stage Thursday night, left the firm impression that she is indeed ready to lead the nation -- with an unnerving mixture of platitudes and cute, folksy phrases that poured from her lips even when they bore no relation to the questions asked.
"Let's commit ourselves just everyday American people, Joe Six-Pack, hockey moms across the nation," she proposed when asked about the mortgage crisis.
"I want to go back to the energy plan," she said when asked about the federal bailout plan.
"I want to talk about, again, my record on energy," she said when asked about bankruptcy.
Biden grew frustrated. "If you notice, Gwen, the governor did not answer the question."
Replied Sarah Six-Pack: "I may not answer the questions that either the moderator or you want to hear, but I'm going to talk straight to the American people."
And, indeed, she stared into the camera, largely ignoring Ifill, Biden and the audience.
On occasion, she unilaterally revised policy for John McCain, as when she said Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "is not one whom we can allow to acquire nuclear energy, nuclear weapons." At other times, her answers defied comprehension, as when Ifill asked about her trigger for using nuclear weapons. "Nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people in too many parts of our planet, so those dangerous regimes, again, cannot be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, period," she answered.
Iffy, but not the alarming sort of answers she gave Couric on CBS. Then, Palin couldn't identify what newspapers or magazines she reads, couldn't cite a Supreme Court decision she disagreed with other than Roe v. Wade, or any regulatory effort McCain had supported. Asked to name a favorite vice president, she cited Geraldine Ferraro.
In the canned debate format, Palin's platitudes held up better than under Couric's follow-up questions. "Oh yeah, it's so obvious I'm a Washington outsider," she said with a shy grin when Ifill asked about putting troops in Darfur. "And someone just not used to the way you guys operate." Asked about the possibility that she would assume the presidency if the president died in office, she found herself saying, "I think we need a little bit of reality from Wasilla Main Street there, brought to Washington, D.C."
When Ifill said she was changing the subject to foreign policy, Palin tilted her head to the side, gave a slight shrug and made a wary grin. Still, even then, she was able to fill up all 90 seconds of her allotted response time. "Um, your plan is a white flag of surrender in Iraq," she told Biden in a playground taunt. "You guys opposed the 'surge.' "
Smiling through entire sentences, she was relentlessly folksy and unafraid of the trite. The credit squeeze, she said, is "affecting Main Streeters like me." On Middle East policy: "I'm so encouraged to know that we both love Israel."
Predatory mortgages a problem? "Darn right," she said. Tax relief? "Darn right."
Ifill asked Palin if there were any campaign promises she would have to scale back because of the financial crisis. "How long have I been at this?" Palin shot back. "Like, five weeks?"
When backed into uncomfortable terrain, such as defending the Bush administration's economic record, she exploded into cliche and non sequitur: "Say it ain't so, Joe. There you go again pointing backwards again. . . . Now doggone it, let's look ahead." Before finishing her answer, she mentioned her "brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here's a shout-out to all those third-graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate."
"Everybody gets extra credit tonight," the moderator assured Sarah Six-Pack. "We're going to move on to the next question."
.. --> begin blogger thumbs -->.. --> end blogger thumbs -->
Well, darnit all, if that dadgum girl (wink, wink) didn't beat the tarnation out of Joe Biden. Maverick Sarah Palin fersure surpassed expectations and said everything under the sun, also. And Biden smiled and smiled.
Palin is a populist pro. She hit all the notes that resonate with non-elite Americans: family (Hi Mom and Dad!), "Can I call ya Joe?" personal responsibility, Wall Street greed, children with special needs. Her most effective technique was speaking directly to the American people and letting Joe know that's what she was gonna do, doggonit.
Stylistically, she used the language of the people to great effect. And, you know what? If you want to know what the American people care about, you can go to a kid's soccer game on Saturday and ask parents how they feel, and "I'll betcha you're going to hear some fear."
I'll have to go to the transcript to figure out what Palin actually said and try to figure out whose facts were right. But there's no question: She won the debate on popularity. She did her homework, studied hard, and delivered with spunk. Still, I had the uneasy feeling throughout that I was witnessing a data dump from a very appealing droid. Even the winks and jaw juts seemed slightly programmed. And the question remains: Is she ready to be president should the need arise?
P.S. I was gonna stop here but this one's even better.
Joe, and Sarah Six-Pack
By Dana Milbank
Friday, October 3, 2008; Page A03
ST. LOUIS, Oct. 2 This week, Sarah Palin gave a curious rationale for her candidacy. "It's time," the Republican vice presidential nominee said, "that normal Joe Six-Pack American is finally represented in the position of vice presidency."
When she took the stage Thursday night here at Washington University for the vice presidential debate, Sarah Six-Pack all but popped open a cold one. Wearing a glittery flag pin on her jacket, she blew a kiss toward the audience. She gave a wave that Tina Fey would probably describe as adorable. Then she regarded her Democratic foe, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
"Nice to meet you," Palin told Joe Biden. "Hey, can I call you Joe?"
"You can call me Joe," the senator obliged.
"Okay, thanks," she said brightly.
"Thank you," Biden replied.
"Thank you," she told him again. "Thank you, Gwen," she told moderator Gwen Ifill. "Thank you, thank you, thank you," she told nobody in particular.
It was going to be a long evening.
Palin's intellectual fitness had been put into question by her disastrous interview with Katie Couric, which was filled with panicked silences, flustered non-answers and even a promise to get back to the interviewer with more information. But when Palin took the stage with Biden last night for what may have been the most public IQ test ever administered, she had no problem meeting the exceptionally low expectations. She had talking points adequate to fill the 90 seconds on the various topics Ifill tossed her way, and often forced Biden to defend Barack Obama.
On the other hand, it wasn't exactly a confidence-builder. Palin, in her 90 minutes on the stage Thursday night, left the firm impression that she is indeed ready to lead the nation -- with an unnerving mixture of platitudes and cute, folksy phrases that poured from her lips even when they bore no relation to the questions asked.
"Let's commit ourselves just everyday American people, Joe Six-Pack, hockey moms across the nation," she proposed when asked about the mortgage crisis.
"I want to go back to the energy plan," she said when asked about the federal bailout plan.
"I want to talk about, again, my record on energy," she said when asked about bankruptcy.
Biden grew frustrated. "If you notice, Gwen, the governor did not answer the question."
Replied Sarah Six-Pack: "I may not answer the questions that either the moderator or you want to hear, but I'm going to talk straight to the American people."
And, indeed, she stared into the camera, largely ignoring Ifill, Biden and the audience.
On occasion, she unilaterally revised policy for John McCain, as when she said Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "is not one whom we can allow to acquire nuclear energy, nuclear weapons." At other times, her answers defied comprehension, as when Ifill asked about her trigger for using nuclear weapons. "Nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people in too many parts of our planet, so those dangerous regimes, again, cannot be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, period," she answered.
Iffy, but not the alarming sort of answers she gave Couric on CBS. Then, Palin couldn't identify what newspapers or magazines she reads, couldn't cite a Supreme Court decision she disagreed with other than Roe v. Wade, or any regulatory effort McCain had supported. Asked to name a favorite vice president, she cited Geraldine Ferraro.
In the canned debate format, Palin's platitudes held up better than under Couric's follow-up questions. "Oh yeah, it's so obvious I'm a Washington outsider," she said with a shy grin when Ifill asked about putting troops in Darfur. "And someone just not used to the way you guys operate." Asked about the possibility that she would assume the presidency if the president died in office, she found herself saying, "I think we need a little bit of reality from Wasilla Main Street there, brought to Washington, D.C."
When Ifill said she was changing the subject to foreign policy, Palin tilted her head to the side, gave a slight shrug and made a wary grin. Still, even then, she was able to fill up all 90 seconds of her allotted response time. "Um, your plan is a white flag of surrender in Iraq," she told Biden in a playground taunt. "You guys opposed the 'surge.' "
Smiling through entire sentences, she was relentlessly folksy and unafraid of the trite. The credit squeeze, she said, is "affecting Main Streeters like me." On Middle East policy: "I'm so encouraged to know that we both love Israel."
Predatory mortgages a problem? "Darn right," she said. Tax relief? "Darn right."
Ifill asked Palin if there were any campaign promises she would have to scale back because of the financial crisis. "How long have I been at this?" Palin shot back. "Like, five weeks?"
When backed into uncomfortable terrain, such as defending the Bush administration's economic record, she exploded into cliche and non sequitur: "Say it ain't so, Joe. There you go again pointing backwards again. . . . Now doggone it, let's look ahead." Before finishing her answer, she mentioned her "brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here's a shout-out to all those third-graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate."
"Everybody gets extra credit tonight," the moderator assured Sarah Six-Pack. "We're going to move on to the next question."
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