Out of the Horse Latitudes…

...and into the Doldrums.

Don't you hate those days when you just feel blah? I'm having one. I don't feel ill or anything, just sort of floating along through life. It wasn't a bad day at all, and I got some things done, did a little laundry (washed my new T-shirt…it is the awesomesauce!), got caught up on correspondence...I wasn't bored.

But I missed seeing my Colts this weekend. What am I going to do when the season and the playoffs are over? I go through this every year. I'm really hoping that they make it to the Super Bowl, because if they're out early, I'm going to be really bummed. I wish they could play all year, although I suspect they might take a dim view of such a schedule. They probably need all of the off-season to recuperate. "Hey guys, Beth wants us to play all year! What do you say?" I'm guessing the answer would be no.

I also crapped out on doing the rest of my wrapping. I just need to get it done, because it's hanging over my head like some sick holiday version of Damocles' sword, all tarted up with red and green baubles and glitter...glitter that gets stuck to your skin and you don't realize it until you look in the mirror and see a piece stuck to the end of your nose and wonder why the fuck no one told you about it, because it had to be reflecting the light enough so that it looked like you had some sort of radioactive zit.

I was also frustrated by Rock Band yet again. I even practiced the guitar solo in a slower mode, and still couldn't make it all the way through. One way or another, "Green Grass and High Tides," you're goin' down. I'm going to make you my bitch. I will conquer you, and when I do, I'm going to kick you when you're down; when you're crying, I'm going to get all up in your face and taunt, "Cry, just CRY!" I'm going to dance on your grave, and then I'm going to stand arms akimbo over it and laugh triumphantly as I imagine your rotting corpse beneath my feet.

You will pay, "Green Grass and High Tides." You will pay dearly.

Gee, I guess I'm in a bit of a mood, aren't I?

Never fear. I am able to put things in perspective and realize that compared to the problems that people have all over the world, I am a very fortunate person. When I think about all the pain and misery experienced by millions, I understand that my problems and frustrations don't amount to a hill of beans. Of course, when I think about all the pain and misery going on in the world, it makes me all the more frustrated at seeing the political idiocy going on here and elsewhere. The hatred, the lack of compassion, the inequality, the fear, the hunger, the death and disease. Putting people last because you're worried about whether or not you're going to get reelected, pandering to the people you think will most help you in your climb, or who will provide the biggest bankroll.

I've grown so disillusioned, especially with this health care debate. Something that should have been a common goal for everyone because we care about human beings became a political hockey puck, and the brutal checking got ugly. For millions of Americans, this is not a game; I am appalled that it ended up as politics as usual. Religion ended up as part of the debate, with some people actually praying that this would be defeated, and yeah, I'm talking to you, Bachmann, you sick bitch. Praying for millions to continue to not receive the health care they need? Praying for people to die because they can't afford treatment? Praying for people to live in agony because their insurance doesn't cover the prescription drugs that give them relief? Praying for people to lose their homes because their heart attack and rehabilitation left them with thousands in medical bills?

That is fucked. And yeah, I'm pissed. I'm pissed that one of the most prosperous nations on earth is apparently so goddamn cheap that we're willing to let people die just so that we can hang on to a little more of our filthy lucre. I'm pissed that we're stuck in two wars, one completely unjustified, because our previous administration was hell-bent on some kind of holy war. In this time of celebration, love, and compassion, I'm pissed that we, as a nation, just don't seem to care about what happens to those who are less fortunate than ourselves. I believe this bill will pass, but it is a weak sister compared to what could have been. So if I don't seem to be properly in the Christmas spirit, I do have a reason behind my scrooge-itude.

I guess the good news is that I'm not totally in the doldrums. I've still got some fiyah in me.

Wrapped and wiped

I mostly wanted to play Rock Band tonight (yeah...I'm addicted), but figured I'd better buckle down and wrap some shit.

So I spent a couple of hours doing that.

Good times. For whatever reason, wrapping is just not fun for me. Maybe it's because one year, I spent an entire fucking day wrapping presents for three people, and by the end of the day, I just wanted to scissor off my own head. Maybe I have PTWD.

At least I got most of it done tonight, but I tell you, it's exhausting for me. I enjoy giving presents, but with each snip and fold, each attempt to make a crisp pleat and neat end, it's like a little part of me dies. I didn't cry, but I felt like a laborer at the Triangle Factory looking for a way out during the conflagration. Yeah, it's just about that bad for me.

You know, I could write some more stuff about how the Colts are now the only unbeaten team in the league, or about today's trials and tribulations with Rock Band, or about how I was a good girl and did my workout today, or about my new T-shirt (oh, just you wait...!), but I just don't have it in me tonight. I'm not sure I could get fired up if Palin herself came knockin' on my door and told me she had a bone to pick with me.

Nahhh, you know I'd get fired up for that. [limbering up my ass-kickin' leg] Hey, I forgot to mention that I had a visit here the other day from Wasilla, Alaska. That was pretty funny. I wonder if it was friend or foe?

I'm off to Snoozeville soon. Who knew that wrapping was so hazardous to your health? Or at least to your mental well-being?

Idiocy Ad-visor-y

You know, I wasn't planning on writing about this, because I'm getting a little tired of wasting my time on this silly bitch.

That's right. You heard me. The previously entertaining sport of picking on Palin grows tiresome to me. ::yawn:: I mean, it's just so easy. It's a constant parade of ignorance, arrogance, and just plain bat shit craziness, and it's all so...yesterday. [flapping hand] The ennui is stultifying, darling. I need more of a challenge.

I couldn't let this one pass by, though. The Palins are vacationing in Hawaii, and photographers got a shot of her wearing a visor. Not just any visor...it was a McCain for President visor. But she had taken a Sharpie or something and scribbled out the logo! [photo from TMZ]

The woman got a multi-million dollar book deal for a book she didn't write, she's vacationing in Hawaii, and she can't spring for ten bucks for a new fucking visor? She takes a Sharpie to a campaign leftover?!

Crackuh, please. The trailer park is calling and it wants its white trash ho back!

I’m no fashion maven, but even I know that it’s not cool to color your clothes with a marker. Jeez, she didn’t even stay in the lines.

Oh, and the former First Dude of Alaska was spotted wearing a T-shirt that said on the front, "If you don't love America" and on the back, "...why don't you get the hell out?"

And there are people who think that these window-licking Deliverance rejects would be good representatives of the United States of America. Who think that it would be just dandy to have her at the helm. If you think we were hated under the Bush Realm, just vote Palin into office and see how seriously the rest of the world takes us. I'll move to Canada, I swear. Good beer, good health care, good times. A Palin-free Zone.

I’ve got the knack

No, not that one.

I don't enjoy stirring things up, but I seem to have the uncanny ability to do so.

Okay, I lied. I do kinda dig stirring things up. I love making people think, I love pushing the envelope, and I love to get people to explore their own thoughts about issues, maybe question a long-held belief. When I posted my entry about how Christmas is based upon a pagan holiday, and not really Jeebus's birthday, on Facebook, my friend Doug wrote that I was brave. Haha! I don't know about brave, but it certainly generated some interesting responses. Rather than making another entry about this, I left a fairly long comment on yesterday's entry. Feel free to check it out. I feel very strongly that everyone has the right to believe what they want or to not believe what they want.

I have taken another step in my Rock Band journey (I was proud of myself for not going through too bad of a withdrawal while on vacation). Note that I have bescarved the mic stand, a la Steven Tyler, or maybe Janis Joplin. My friend Greg will be so proud! Since I did that, I had to get back to my vocal band, Dirty Pleasures, and made it to the next level there. I sang "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" and was wishing like hell for a cow bell! I will order one. Then I switched back to my favorite, my guitar band Gravitas, and did a couple of songs there. "Flirting With Disaster" was surprisingly fun considering that I'm not a big fan of Southern rock, but I guess I channeled my inner Georgia peach. I did live there for a while, so I've got my peach cred. Oh, and if you look in the background, you'll see a cabinet full of penguins. I have a few.

I should also mention that I’m not getting Christmas cards out this year. A week away really put a crimp into things, and I’m just not going to fret about not getting them out this year. I appreciate any cards I’ve gotten from some of you, and rest assured that if you don’t get one from me this year, I haven’t forgotten about you, and I still love you!

Work it on out, baby!

I thought I was pretty clear in my entry yesterday, but I think I need to clarify a little bit.

I don't hate Christmas. I celebrate Christmas. I have fun at Christmas with my family. I often say, "Merry Christmas." I'm not trying to force anyone to celebrate Christmas in any way other than which they already do. My issue is with the constant idiocy about the "war on Christmas," and about how it's all about religious persecution against Christians. That is simply not taking place, and my point is that Christmas did not begin as a Christian holiday, so don't try to create the fallacy of some "war on Christmas" as a persecution against Christians. If you look at the history of the holiday, it's a ludicrous argument. People were celebrating this holiday for thousands of years before Christianity existed. Christians really don't have exclusive rights on it. :)

As my friend Paul and others have pointed out, you don't have to be a Christian to celebrate Christmas. See previous entry for the full explanation.

Oh, and that reminds me of something I read on Facebook about gay marriage. If marriage is a religious institution, why is it perfectly okay and legal for atheists to get married? Hmm? Riddle me that, Batman! You can keep talking till you're blue in the face about it being a religious institution...although I try to see most things from both sides, try to understand the opposition, I have no problem in this case saying that you are wrong. It is a civil institution. Gay marriage is a civil rights issue, not a religious issue. It's past time for people to wrap their little brains around that and give every citizen the rights to which they are entitled. I find it shameful that we are still debating this. I am also confident that it will soon be the law of the land.

But I digress. Change of subject.

Remember me writing about my recent health screening, and how I was going to start working out again? Yeah...I kinda procrastinated about that. Well, you know, going on vacation, the holidays coming up...ummm...okay, I was just lazy. No excuses. I called on Monday and got registered with the program and set my two goals.

First is strength training. I want to get more toned, I want to get stronger, and with some loss in bone density, I need to work on improving that little problem. I want to do some treadmill work and really focus on weights...but I just generally need to get off my lazy ass and DO something! I got busy today--if not quite jiggy wit' it--and did a little on the treadmill, did some weights, and did some crunches on the Ab thing. Man, I have really lost strength and tone and I'm looking forward to getting some of that back!

My second goal concerns skipping meals. I can easily go all day long without eating anything until dinner, which is usually late, around 9 PM. That's a long time without eating, but I've always been that way and it doesn't really bother me. However, I know that's not a good thing. I know that it fucks with your metabolism, and your body goes into a sort of "survivor" mode. I don't overeat at dinner to compensate, but that's still a long time without eating and can do more harm than good. So I'm starting to eat a little something in the morning, whether it's a yogurt, some cottage cheese, or a grapefruit like I had this morning. I have a feeling that the combination of kick-starting my metabolism by actually eating more and starting to work out might make me lose a pound or two.

Anyhoo, I can tell you that it felt really good to get out there and get started. I put on the Ting Tings and that was fun and upbeat and got me moving! ♪♫ That's not my name! That's not my name! ♪♫

I also want to thank Kyle over at Out Left for giving me a blog award, the Circle of Friends. I met Kyle through some other blogging friends, and we think alike on so many things! We really do have a little "circle" (I could easily make a naughty joke right here, but I won't be a jerk) going on, and it's a pleasure to know not just Kyle and the gang, but all of my fellow bloggers and readers. As I always do with these awards, if you're reading, you're in the circle, so feel free to snag the award for yourself.

The Reason

This entry has been percolating for a while now, since I started seeing Christmas decorations in the stores before fucking Halloween.

I'm not a Scrooge, I enjoy being around family and friends during this time, and who doesn't like presents? I love getting presents! Oh, and giving them is fun, too. Haha. However, I grow weary of the rampant commercialism, I don't like sappy Christmas music, and don't even get me started on the constant, annoying Christmas-themed commercials! ("More seasons greetings to you all from Menard's!" GAAHHHH! Someone shoot me!)

What is really rankling me, though, is the continued brouhaha about the "war on Christmas." Just. Shut. Up. There is no "war on Christmas"—it’s merely a bunch of whining fundamentalists who seem to feel that they have bragging rights about Christmas being a Christian holiday. As usual, anyone who doesn't believe the way they do is not only going to hell, they're apparently going there as a passenger in Santa's sleigh. And naturally, everyone is out to get them, and trying to stop others from celebrating Christmas as a Christian holiday. Hey, celebrate however you want to! Bake Jesus a birthday cake! Sing happy birthday to him! Knock yourself out!

There's just one problem with that, though. Christmas is not a Christian holiday, and Jesus wasn't born on December 25.

Winter solstice celebrations predate Christianity by many years, and took many different forms in different cultures, all celebrating the lengthening days and the return of the sun. (The sun…get it? The son?) The Roman winter celebration of Saturnalia is where the tradition of gift-giving began; popular Christmas symbols and traditions such as evergreen trees and branches (the Asherah cult), mistletoe and holly (Norse mythology and Druid rituals), and the Yule log (more Norse mythology) began in pre-Christian Europe. The early Catholic church was having a hard time getting people to give up their pagan holidays and embrace Christianity (go figure), so they decided to co-opt most of the pagan celebrations and hope people wouldn't notice. Such tricksters!

As for December 25, it was the last day of Saturnalia, and it was also the birth date of Mithras, the Persian sun god. In 350, Pope Julius I decided that Christ's birth celebration would take place on December 25, again hoping that everyone would fall in line and sort of get used to the Christian thing while they were singing "Happy birthday, dear Mithras." Most historians put the birth of Christ somewhere in midsummer.

Christianity also doesn't have the market cornered on the virgin birth thing, and they weren't the first to come up with it. Such legends go back to ancient Egypt with Horus the Younger, and again with Mithras. Who was also apparently said to have "healed the sick, made the blind see and the lame walk, cast out devils, and raised the dead." Sound familiar? For an eye-opening read, I recommend this great article by Tom Flynn. (Thanks to Darren for the link.)

I'm not saying that Christmas should be banned; quite the contrary. I say enjoy your time with family and friends, appreciate the joy of giving, and celebrate the fun of the season. I know that I will! If you choose to recognize it as the birth of Christ, that is certainly your prerogative—many in my family do, and everyone should certainly feel free to celebrate in their own way. But pardon me if I disagree with you when you tell me that "Jesus is the reason for the season," because that is not the case. Not at all.

Simple reasoning—and research—shows me that that is the truth of the matter.

Look out…I’m back!

After a week of warmth and sunshine, it's back to the cold weather. Ah well, it's always good to get back home. At least there were no delays coming back, but it made for a long day of travel. Going through Customs, Immigration, and two more bag screenings was time-consuming, but relatively painless and uncomplicated. Oh, and my ankle held up okay with all the walking. Those of you who are friends on Facebook saw that I twisted the hell out of my ankle one evening because I was looking around instead of down, and tripped on a big gap in the sidewalk. Ohhh, it hurt so bad, but I could walk on it and it didn't swell, so I knew I didn't have a fracture or a sprain. Probably just a badly pulled muscle. You should see my bruise. It is quite breathtaking.

I'm also probably a little rusty with writing--I didn't bother much while I was gone since I couldn't get a good connection on my computer, which has all my programs and pictures. I got a lot of reading done, too, finishing Ground Zero (the latest Repairman Jack novel, by F. Paul Wilson), and Pirate Latitudes by Michael Crichton. I'm more than halfway through Ford County, John Grisham's collection of short stories (fantastic!). I'll get back into the swing of things this week as I try to come back to reality. No more dinners out, so it's back to cooking, and tomorrow I begin my ascent on Laundry Mountain. I might have to fit a little Rock Band in there somewhere, too! Today, it will be just a few pictures and a little commentary.

I previously mentioned the smooth tequila at Cabo Wabo. I had no idea tequila could be that smooth! Usually, when you think of doing a shot of tequila, you think of downing it, choking a little, maybe making that little wheezing cough...this was just warm and smooth, and went down as easy as can be, with a bite on a lime slice afterwards. (I don't think the natives do salt at all, just bite on a lime or lemon afterwards, if even that.) Oh, and in the U.S., National Tequila Day is July 24, but I see no reason why I shouldn't extend the shot glass of fellowship, good cheer, and drunken revelry to our global neighbors. I hope everyone will mark it on their calendar, and maybe we can all do a shot that day! I want to get a bottle of Cabo Wabo, but I checked the price up here, and it's $47! I could have gotten it for $38 down there, but didn't feel like messing with bringing it back in the suitcase. I still think I'll get a bottle, though. That was just too tasty to pass up.

While watching some people do shots of tequila in the hot tub, I saw an older guy do the choke and the cough, and thought, "Pussy. You need to man up." hahaha Or at least drink some better tequila.

Above is a picture of me with my Cabo Wabo shot. I noticed that because it was a hot walk downtown and I worked up a bit of a sweat, I developed a devil horn in my bangs! This cracked me up, so I knew I wanted a Mexican wrestling mask with horns. This is the one and only souvenir I got. Isn't it awesome?! It was kind of funny when they were showing me all the masks they had, and I was mimicking devil horns on my head. Heehee! They probably thought, "Loco gringa." Now that I think about it, I could have made the horns sign and said, "Diablo!" but that might not have gone across well.

There was a cat that hung around by the pool and patrolled the restaurant for treats from the diners. Turns out they call him Banjo, and he was a sweet little guy. Surprisingly svelte for all the food he was being fed! I know when we saw him at dinner, he dined on shrimp and sea bass. When he was checking out the bucket of beer during the day, he made me think of Cartman and his pot pie. He just wandered all over the place, and it was kind of funny to see various women try to pet him. Not that I did that. Okay, a couple of times.

Oh, and the place was rife with Canadians. Everywhere I turned, it was all "oot" and "aboot" and "eh?" What's up with that? Darren? Ziggy? Ted? Do you guys migrate? Well, if you pass through on your way to warmer climes, stop by and we'll have a shot of Cabo Wabo! Okay, I'm totally kidding about the oot and aboot stuff. But not about the eh. Or the tequila shot. :)

And here's a picture for David. The waiter at a place called Los Ajos was such an adorable little guy! I had to get a picture for DD! Again, he was probably thinking, "Loco gringa." All in all, I found everyone so warm and friendly, and most were really, really pretty! I've got a couple more pictures, David, so stay tuned. As a loyal Dust Bunny, I was on the case! I'll end with a video of one of my favorite bands, Los Straitjackets. They do surf music, and they always wear Mexican wrestling masks. One of my favorite songs is "Sleepwalk," and although I prefer Brian Setzer's version, these guys do a fine job. Whammy!