#49

We started the day out in Oklahoma City and ended it here in Dallas.  You know, it's funny but when, before visiting, I thought of Oklahoma City, my first thought would have been the bombing of the federal building on April 19, 1995, and, unless it's football season, my first thought of Dallas would have been the assassination of JFK on November 22, 1963.  Today, in the same day, I visited the sites of both of those tragedies, and, curiously, I felt I had already been in both places before.  Maybe my first thoughts from now on will be what these cities are really like.

Notes so far:  Jerry and I agreed that if we were forced (at gunpoint, no doubt) to live in one of these two cities, we'd pick Oklahoma City.  And, only based on what we've seen so far, I've liked Oklahoma overall better than Texas.

But I've done my self-imposed duty and have seen Texas, making it the 49th out of the 50 states for me to visit.  Oregon will be #50 for me, maybe later this year.  My brother Davy, who lives in San Antonio when he's not in China, thought that I was saving Texas for last.  I wasn't.  I mostly just didn't want to come here while Bush was President.  And now the current Governor of Texas thinks the state should secede from the Union, so maybe I got here just in time.  Now I say, "Let 'em go!"

great expectations

January isn't a great time to be moving into a new house, but I bet the Obamas won't be carrying any boxes into the White House in the next few days so it won't likely be a problem for them... The job I'd like is being one of the movers getting the bush family the heck out of there -- as fast as possible, maybe breaking some furniture along the way (like real movers).

I for sure don't envy Barack Obama as he becomes President. There are only 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week -- Where does he start to undo the disasters of the past eight years? Yet the pressure on him to perform is intense.

As 2008 ended, I heard so many people say how glad they were to see the year end and how they expected 2009 to be so much better. A lot of people found 2008 to be a total downer, for financial reasons, for personal reasons, whatever. I can understand that, but at the same time I've never been glad to see a year end. I'm never even glad to see a day end. There aren't enough of them.

And I admit I've always been better at looking back than at looking forward. And looking back at 2008, I'd rather think about the good -- at least, selfishly, my own personal memories:

--- November 4, Election Night.
--- (Without getting too corny) all the time spent with family and friends.
--- The Phillies winning the World Series.
--- Vacations, in particular the week in New England in September and the four day trip in August to Alaska (pre-Palin).
--- Labor Day in St. Paul -- Marching in the anti-war rally against the Republican National Convention (and not getting arrested).
--- Some great theater -- especially the touring production of Jersey Boys, the Jungle Theater's The Gin Game, and the Guthrie Theater's A View From the Bridge.
--- All the books I read during the year. My favorites: Pictures from a Revolution by Mark Harris and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz.

With that, I'll lay 2008 to rest. I apologize for being a Pollyanna.

Best of luck, President Obama... Show them how it's done. Hope you like the new house.

nightmares do end eventually

one year from today, bush becomes an ex-president (if he doesn't get impeached before then), and then the debate will start: whether he was the worst President ever -- or merely the worst President of the United States ever.

rollerskating with Hillary Clinton

last night, doing some desperate channel-surfing, I landed on one of those presidential-candidate debates, this time Republicans. These are really painful to watch, but, even though I will end up voting for whoever the Democratic nominee is, somehow the Republican debates are easier to watch. When they screw up or make total fools of themselves or call each other names, I'm kind of happy. When the Democrats debate, all I can do is cringe, because I have to vote for one of those stiffs.

I don't know why anybody would run for President these days. Who but a fool would go through the humiliating process? I mean, it's kind of amusing to watch Rudy Giuliani pretend to be religious or any of these Republicans pretend to care about public education, but how refreshing would it be to see real debate, to have these candidates say what they really think? And the media outlets are disgusting in their coverage of all the wrong non-issues! I must admit, though, as I look up at that line-up of even these Republican candidates, that any one of them seems to least have a brain, unlike the current holder of the post. I don't have the patience for this campaign and wish we could ignore it, but I do look forward to that magical date: January 20, 2009, when somebody else moves into the White House.

Tom, my son, prides himself on being non-political, but the other night he had a dream that we all went rollerskating with Hillary Clinton. My question, of course: was she wearing one of those hideous pantsuits? Can she possibly look all that bad in a dress?

Hillary isn't so bad. I could vote for her. The main issue I, like many of my fellow Democrats, have with her is that she voted for the Iraq war and until recently still supported the idea of that war. Other people that I know, people who would normally vote for a Democrat, say they wouldn't ever vote for Hillary because of the possible "dynasty effect" -- a potential 28 years of 2 families in power: Bush, Clinton, bush, Clinton.

but then there's Barack Obama, who has the limpest handshake of any man that I've ever shaken hands with. Doesn't a handshake say something about a person?

Or John Edwards, with that annoying accent?

What is remarkable is how all these candidates are making non-candidate Al Gore look so good. I of course am thinking that maybe he wouldn't look so good if he were standing up there at the debate podiums next to all these other chumps. Still, if he were running, I think he would be my guy.