in the bleak midwinter

Perhaps I was too enthusiastic in my wishes for a snow day last Thursday.  I just meant ONE DAY, okay, not some ridiculous week-long storm.  My flight home leaves tomorrow evening, so please say a prayer or five to whatever deity you worship that I a) get to the airport and b) that my flight takes off.

Oh, also, a word or two about me getting across my landing and down the front steps wouldn’t go amiss either.

Trust me, all the nutty wamajama I've seen in my life, I'm whatever the opposite of a skeptic is.

I’m sure that I have complained before about how all of Seattle shuts down the two times a year we get a few snowflakes, but I suppose I have no right to complain when the busses start running adverse weather condition routes and I get to stay home from work.  Snow Day!  Suck it, work!  I am wearing mismatched comfort clothes, sipping hot cocoa, and watching Freaks and Geeks at 11:39 on a Thursday morning—LEGITIMATELY.  God Bless you, Convergence Zone.

unleash the casey

Oh, my friends, this is wondrous.  I am always nerdily impressed by those people on the internet with too much time on their hands who cobble together brilliant videos like this one, 40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes.  I suggest you ladies out there with fond memories of adolescence pay special attention at the 44 second mark.

God bless you, Matt Belinkie, whoever you are.  (If you are a single, cute Jew, please call me.)

Gentlemen, Let's be Logical. This Came from an Elf.

It’s been a crazy couple of weeks:  I got laid off (as of 1/29/09); I survived another drunken Thanksgiving; Bart Bass totally died and Chuck went nutbar, but turned it around in the end and cried like a baby in Blair’s arms.  That last part may have actually been on Gossip Girl. 

In other news from another universe, Bruce Wayne…died?  Or didn’t die?  I HAVE NO IDEA.  For those of you unfamiliar, the last few months have played host to the Batman RIP story arc in the Batman, Dectective Comics, Robin, Nightwing and Batman & The Outsiders titles.  These issues have gotten an insane amout of attention (dude, even Perez Hilton reported on it) because the writer, Grant Morrison claimed that the events of these comics would end Bruce Wayne’s stint as Batman, either through death or through some other ridiculous plot contrivance.  After throwing away 3 bucks an issue on this horseshit, all I can tell you is that I don’t know what the crap is going on.  Batman RIP?  Batman BRB?  Batman WTF?!?  I mean, he’s not dead? Simon Hurt is draining his memories and putting them in Clayface?  What?!  But Robins 1 and 3 and Alfred think he’s dead or they think he’s missing? I mean, they didn’t have a funeral or anything or show how Dick and Tim are going to explain things over at Wayne Enterprises.  I hate to break it to you Boy Wonders, but SOMEone is going to notice that Bruce Wayne isn’t showing up for work anymore.  I don’t know what’s going on! Explain it to me, Grant Morrison! Small words!

P.S. Suck it, Morrison.  You go right ahead and try and kill Bruce Wayne.  IT WILL NOT TAKE.  He’s Bruce Wayne!

In other news from this universe, overheard in the breakroom at work:

Blond guy: This is science! Girls are born different.

Bald guy: Did you just figure this out?

Blond:I know, but not just physically, inside their heads! Men are interested in things like sports and drinking.Women are interested in clothes and baking. That’s how they’re created to be.

Me:  :O

eat it, grandpa!

Last year,  my mother sent me a box full of my old report cards and school projects that she decided she was no longer nostalgic enough to keep.  The overwhelming theme of my grade school comment slips was that while I was well-behaved and bright, I tended to socialize excessively.  I think my favorite comment was “Keahe is clever and cheerful…but she TALKS.”  (“Talks” was actually underlined three times, but I couldn’t figure out how to do that here.)  Tucked in among the crayon- and magic marker-penned assignments (one of which proclaimed that I wanted to be a doctor when I grew up so I could give my older brother shots) was a letter to Santa that perfectly sums me up both then and now.  The faded construction paper is not dated, but judging by the childish scrawl and also by the act that I had not yet switched to joined-up writing, I’m guessing I was in the first grade.  I transcribe it here for your amusement:

Dear Santa,

My name is Keahe and I think I have been a good girl this year.  For Christmas I would like

a Jem costume

a big piano

long hair

pink shoes with bows

a Ewok the little kind

a big ball to bounce on

dinosaurs

a horse

a rocket

a pirate ship with pirates

a airplane

transformers the dinosaur ones

Gleek

a bath suit with a skirt on it

my own room to not share

a rock

Mele Kalikimaka, Keahe

That’s kind of you to say, but I’m pretty sure my girlish screams in the face of danger gave me away

This is still bothering me: Before Twilight, the movie theatre screened a Coca-cola commercial which featured Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade characters chasing after an errant coke bottle balloon.  I don’t know if you know this about me, but escaped, sentient parade balloons are MY WORST NIGHTMARE.  I am NOT OKAY with this commercial.  It is not light-hearted and whimsical; it is terrifying and ominous.

have you some kind of mental affliction?

Rira, Carrie, Wilfred and I convened at the Meridian for an afternoon viewing of Twilight and can I just say: wow. That movie?  AWKWARD.  We laughed so much and not, you know, where laughter was entirely appropriate.

OKAY

• Edward, with his Babyshambles dishevelment was undeniably sexy, even if he is full of eyebrows.
• Emmett also displayed a certain jockish, bohunk charm.
• Okay, the baseball scene was pretty rad.  They crash mid-air and it sounds like thunder!
• The cherry-coke I got at the concession stand.  It was delicious.

AWFUL

• Bella: awkward Jacob:  awkward.  Jasper’s hair:  awkward.
• I could not stop cringing at the dialogue and the acting. Rira was so embarrassed for these people that she actually hid her face in her jacket! Are you happy now, Twilight, Rira couldn’t even look at you!
• Bad dye jobs OMFGFAIL.  Is it really that hard to find a natural blonde? 
• Every single wire stunt, especially the ones in the trees.  You have GOT to be kidding me.
• All of Edward’s ridiculous, brood-a-licious expressions.  Great job, Babyshambles, you’re really selling that vomity self-loathing.  P.S.  Nice body glitter, Ziggy Stardust.
• Two words: Newsie Vampires.
  

LOL-ALARIOUS

• EVERYTHING, EVER.  I mean, was I dreaming?  Was everyone involved in the making of this movie extremely high and/or totally nutballz? It was all just bad, so bad in a very bad way.

who among the 80 will stand up for the 20?

As previously recounted, on the evening of November 4th, Seattle went balls to the wall nutso.  I’m talking full-tilt jungle madness—a rousing, jubilant, spontaneous dance party the likes of which I have never seen in this city.  I almost didn’t even mind that a kajillion people partying in the streets two blocks away from my house meant I didn’t get to sleep until the wee hours and I rolled into work almost an hour late and my boss totally caught me.  You know who else didn’t care?  My boss!  Who, in response to my apology for tardiness, said simply, “I brought doughnuts!”

Yesterday, a similarly large and energetic group took to the streets, not in celebration, but in protest of the passage of Proposition 8 in California.  The sight made me want to clap and chant, but mostly, it made me want to cry, cry, cry.  The total, utter bullshit of this proposition passing is crazy upsetting.  I suppose that I am fortunate to be young and to have grown up in a liberal state with a diverse population, raised by relentless hippies and educated in the same environment that produced the first African-American president of the United States, but it is so difficult for me to understand how ANYONE with a soul could vote in favor of anti-gay measures let alone how something like the props and initiatives in California, Arkansas, Florida and Arizona could even have gotten onto a ballot in the first place. You cannot put the rights of the minority up to a majority vote.  That’s, like, democracy 101!

In regards to politics and religion, I am generally an agree to disagree kind of person.  I understand that everyone has a different point of view as a result of varying socio-economic-religious backgrounds.  I need to be very clear: I do not think that everyone must agree with me.  I’m not anti-conservative or anti-religion, but I am anti-douchebaggery.  I cannot say it any plainer that this: if you voted for anti-gay measures in any state, you are a douchebag.  Also?  A bigot.  Yes, I said it and I will say it right to your face if I ever get the chance.

In other, lighter news, that mad genius Ben Edlund has struck again with his entirely throwaway, completely brilliant B-plot of a girl wishing her Teddy Bear to life.  Watch it over and over again until you are half-dead from laughter:

Sam and Dean: Teddy Bear Doctors

Teddy Bear Suicide

I said ‘take care of her” not “douche her up!”

As previously discussed, I watch a lot of TV.  Trufax.  The sheer volume of showage enables me to track trends in content and advertising:  you start to notice oddities, you know, like during a procedural drama there are ALWAYS commercials for dish soap and new cars.  Always.  Which leads me to a recent trend, or really, I should say, annoyance:  why do all the menfolk on the CW have buttchins?  Of varying degrees, to be sure, but buttchins nonetheless.  The CW is just lousy with them:

JPad

JAckles

Clark Kent

Oliver Queen

Doomsday

Inappropriate 90210 Teacher

Guy on One Tree Hill who isn’t Chad Michael Murray

A cleft chin has always seemed to me part of a hyper-masculine ideal of chiseled male beauty—the feature seems to go with that classic American image of a square jaw, broad shoulders, you know, the Cary Grant type, but I swear, I don’t see them often on people I actually encounter in real life.  Why are there so many on this television station?  This is bothering me; I am bothered!  I can’t stop looking at chins!

Today our concern must be with that future. For the world is changing. The old era is ending. The old ways will not do.

Are you ready for this, people, because I’m about to lay something on you I’m sure you don’t get much of around this blog:  simple, honest, non-italicised, non-capslocked sincerity. 

I am so happy right now.  After 8 years of mind-boggling stupidity, ridiculous shenanigans, blatant abuse of power, economic mismanagement, lies, lies and more lies, I finally have something to look forward to politically.  Do not douche this up, President-elect Obama. 

So, in the words of the greatest fake President, “What’s next?”

P.S.  I am totally bragging that we went to the same school forever.

Update on Tuesday, November 4, 2008 at 12:21AM by ahe

Seattlites are going sincerely crazy tonight—I’m talking thousands of people celebrating in the streets on Capitol Hill and Downtown.  There are actually police helicopters hovering above Broadway and Pine and police on the street, presumably to prevent…wilding, I suppose.  This is super intense.  I am never getting to sleep tonight, am I?