Patrick @ 26: While I hadn't heard about Caesar and the shaving cream, I know that Mackenzie King did talk with his dead mother on a regular basis through seances, mediums, crystal balls, and ouija boards, and he spoke with his dead dogs (all named Pat) in the same way. We the people didn't find this out until after, of course...
That said, Harper is one mean son of a bitch, and unusually vicious even compared to bare-knuckle brawlers like Jean Chretien. Parliament will be a much better place without an ideologue who can't play with others, like him.
Following up on Germany, Tuebingen, and old buildings:
In November of 2005, I was visiting friends in Tuebingen with my family, and we decided to go to the Christmas market at the Schloss Hohenzollern (a real castle, rebuilt after an earthquake in the 1800s to Victorian Gothic standards), which isn't that far away. It was uncharacteristically cold, with snow on the ground, and my feet were frozen. The schloss is on top of a small mountain, and when you stand on the ramparts, you can see all around, across fields and small forests, all the way back to Tuebingen. As the cold wind whipped my hair about my face, I kept thinking of the song "All Along the Watchtower," and of how long you would have to wait, once you saw the riders racing across the fields below, until they reached you and told you what they had to say.
McCain=Do Not Want.
We have our own troubles up here with Conservatives. They do not need reinforcements.
There really is no way of understating the 'wow' of this. It truly is comparable to the Protestant Reformation in audacity and scale, and on religious, social, and political levels. Do expect schisms; do expect explosions and other violent acts. A true reformation does not come easily at the best of times, and that's not now.
However, I do believe that the Turks can get this done, if anyone can: they have a history of a strong centralized and controlling government, a very strong sense of themselves as a nation (both practically and idealistically), and a ruthless hand in enforcing centralized decisions. Additionally, they have a strong history of secularism, since Ataturk, which may also be helpful to them.
This is remarkably, amazingly, shockingly brave. I never expected to hear of this kind of thing in my own lifetime.
This is so hideous. My own son's name is Jamie, and I've been holding him ever so much closer since I heard. He's only three. My deepest sorrow and thoughts to the Bishops. I can't begin to imagine their grief.
Involuntary laughter and a desire to email all the medievalists I know (and they are legion), but no cucumber.
I have mint in the middle of my front lawn, thanks to a tenant in the other side of the house who has, of course, since left. That and the yarrow are fighting it out in full sunshine, and the mint is winning. I'm digging it up as fast as I can, but I have to leave the newly cleared area bare for a week or two before I seed it because I always miss some root somewhere, and that's when the new mint pokes its head up.
I don't recommend hops vines either (verrrry hard to get rid of). And I've been digging bellflower out of my garden for five years now: I have the upper half of the garden, and it rules under the forsythia. I'm planting mint, knowing what I know, under the dining room window, where nothing else grows but bellflower. I will enjoy seeing which side wins.
In addition to vinca and sweet woodruff, I like lamium as a groundcover: very pretty purple or pink flowers, and silvery, variegated green leaves.
The strawberries did fabulously until the squirrels found them. The raspberries need staking, and the petasites japonica (or fuki) have utterly taken over the shady (official) front garden--you can only eat so much of it in the spring (this is the plant that the Totoro is using as a hat during the bus stop scene in My Neighbour Totoro).
Mr. Ford, my husband thanks you, after living with an obsessive, cranky me for over a week.
Brian Boyko: Taking a time out doesn't mean checking out entirely: if you don't take a step back and take an evening, a day, or even a week to recharge and decompress, then you aren't in any shape to deal with what comes next. Certainly I won't be, and so I go to watch some West Wing and look at my sleeping baby.
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| 2008 | 5 |
| 2007 | 1 |
| 2006 | 2 |
| 2005 | 1 |
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