Hello.

Ninja Blog Post!

So

A Rand Paul staffer curb stomped a woman's head yesterday and Mr. Paul issued the world's most half-assed apology. "It was an unusual situation to have both sides jockying back and forth and it wasn't a situation I liked."

No. You know what you say there? You say, "No one, regardless of what they believe or who they support deserves that kind of treatment. Everyone has the right to protest peacefully and safely without fear of being assaulted or attacked. The attack on Ms. Whoever was thuggish and uncalled for and this campaign and I personally want to apologize to her for Mr. Whoever's actions. He is no longer part of our campaign".

You don't try to explain it. You don't say that she was there as part of some political stunt. You know what? It doesn't matter. She was excercising her right to free speech and freedom of assembly. For a poster-boy of a movement that supposedly elevates the rights of individuals over all else, Rand Paul certainly seems to be ascribing to the major party "rights only apply to those who agree with me" mentality.

After the whole "aqua buddha" catastrophe I was considering a write-in candidate for Senate. But now? Definitely voting for Conway. Paul is a sniveling weasel of a man. I'd rather have geriatric Bunning or conniving McConnell any day over a guy who apparently things assault on women by his campaign staff is merely "unusual".

Jackass.

I suck

At blogging. I think this shall be my semi-private (as in, no one reads this and I don't care either way) blog. Its nice to write with a theoretical (rather than actual) audience. Hello, vast internet of possible readers! Hello, future me! I'm assuming future me is the only one who will really read this.

I watched Rachel Maddow for the first time in a long time today. That must be why I feel like writing. I'm feeling politically oriented. Melissa Harris-Perry (formerly Harris-Lacewell) was on tonight talking about the particularly nasty and racially-oriented political discourse this election cycle. She always makes what feels like a dire situation more hopeful. "Its hard to hear above all this noise, but I think what we're hearing is the death rattle of American racism". What a nice thought.

Tomorrow is "spirit day" in honor of all the gay teens suffering from abuse and discrimination. The color is purple. So, I'm wearing purple tomorrow. And I will listen to Gogol Bordello. And I will hope that the uptick in violence against gay teens is the death rattle of American homophobia.

The courts have forced the federal government to cease implementation of DADT. The world has not crashed in around us. This has to be a good sign.

Ana Marie Cox was also on Maddow (my favorites! all in one night!). She talked about that crazy lady who doesn't believe in separation of church and state. Christine O'Donnell. I think. Something like that. She (Cox) referred to her (O'Donnell) as "baby-Palin". My reaction, out loud, alone in my living room was, "not another one!". It's at times like this I miss George Bush. At least he had the common decency to, on the day after 9-11, to go to a Mosque and eventually proclaim that we were at war with Al-Qaeda, not Islam.

Maybe this anti-mosque movement is the death rattle of American Islamophobia.

Maybe I'll move to Canada. Or Fiji.

Stuff no one is interested in but I feel like writing about anyway

I had the longest day at work today. I think for the last 2 hours of it I just stared at my computer screen, I was so tired. I normally like my 10 hour days, but today I was pretty useless after the first 8.

It started out with the mystery of "Why is someone else's letter scanned into my case file and where did MY letter go?" Not thrilling, but I needed answers. I was seriously concerned that the mayor of Lynch, KY (I shit you not) got a letter intended for some random gas station. Turns out that all was well. He called me to tell me his mom's dying (there's always a dead relative lurking in the shadows in this job) and needs to reschedule our meeting. If I had a nickel...

So then I had to track down a missing check. The attorney for this case SWEARS they sent it in, but we do not have it. There was much hand wringing. I told them to just cancel the check and send us a new one. Seemed simple to me, but that's bureaucracy for you.

Umm, what else? A random pointless meeting to update us on stuff we could look up for ourselves, rescheduling of the afore mentioned meeting with Lynch, dealing with an upset citizen who's afraid she's getting black lung from a mine I used to have an open case on. Dealing with our regional office and mining's regional office to get one of them to actually do something about the coal ash all over this lady's house. Technical mysteries with data issues between our database and EPA's database and the software we use to report from ours to theirs.

What did I really want to do today? Start on the six new cases I got yesterday (it never ends!) and schedule some conferences.

Blah. I like my job and most days I have the luxury of dealing with whatever I feel like dealing with that day, which is nice. Today was just one of those days when everything happens all at once.

In less stress-y news, I am kicking ass in my family bracket challenge. Because I know all.

The end.

Hey ya.

So... Not a lot new beyond more wedding stuff. And some minor family drama which I don't really feel like getting into. But everything's rolling along pretty smoothly. I kind of thought I would have some horror stories about my future in-laws, or my co-workers or whatever and their reactions to our quasi-non-traditional nuptials, but people have been cool so far. Color me pleasantly surprised.

I guess the other thing consuming my non-work and non-wedding time is looking at houses. We're not QUITE ready yet, but we hope to be able to buy something to move into right around the time we get married. My lease is up in August, so it would be good to not have to renew. We shall see. And we need a new car. But that will have to come after house-buying due to credit and debt-to-income ratio strategy. I've got a plan! I'm lucky, Jimmy's cool with letting me do my thing.

I never know how to end these things.

Our Photographer

I am not a planner.

Some people are amazing planners. Me, not so much. I'm good at the whole conceptual part of planning but I'm awful at the practical making-it-happen part. Which is why I'm a good month or so behind on meeting caterers. But we have three appointments now, so thats underway. And I've narrowed photographers down to three choices, so we need to meet with them. thats next. And I ordered save the date magnets! Yay! And we got our request in to Jimmy's mom's timeshare company for the honeymoon...

Huh. I'm actually kind of on top of this. For me.

In other news, we're going to see Wicked this week! We have fancy box-seats. I'm pretty excited. Jimmy's been working way too much, so it will be fun to have a date night. We went to the UK-Vandy game last weekend and went to the martini bar across the street from where we got engaged. This weekend, however, is a lazy d0-nothing weekend. I'm really enjoying it.

I'm off to make some blueberry muffins and the Sungergos coffee I picked up at Whole Foods! Hope everyone's year has been fabulous so far.

Later Days,
Laura