Excuse Me — My Brain Is Full

I’d say time to take a break but I’m watching Tha Eagle on Rachel’s show, just having watched Keith and flipped through Huffpo, rawstory, TPM and pollster. Also got to tell the NRA caller today (probably got my name from all the mags I get coz I’m not a member) that I was a gun owning liberal Democrat who had been hunting this weekend, had nothing to fear from an Obama administration, and that I had already voted for Sen. Barack Obama and the entire Democratic slate. Furthermore, I told Ms NRA Lady, the NRA does not care about habitat, which an Obama administration would act to protect. Left her sputtering “but Mr. RML, did you know that . . . ” as I hung up.

Here is how I keep sane. If Obama wins the Kerry states, which should be no big whoop, he will have 252 electoral votes. All he will need is one big state, or a couple of small ones, and he is golden. And he is leading in so many states, even if there is a bombshell of some kind, he just needs to carry a couple. This is how I sleep at night – this is my Ambien.

I’m so with you, so so with you, I am an exposed nerve, everything makes me want to scream. I am nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rockers. I can go from triumphant and exultant to despairing in the blink of a headline.

And there’s the election, too.

Music helps.

@homofascist: I stay sane with Gin, boxed cabernet, and lexapro, and ritalin. So far its an epic fail. Sanity is overrrated anyway.

Xanax. It’s your friend.

Movement? What movement?

@Mistress Cynica: I have tons of xanax stockpiled, but I am loathe to combine it with my new ritalin prescription, it seems kinda Elvis-y to me.

I wish I could get my hands on pot. That would totally do the trick, but I have no idea, no connections, no ability at all to find it.

@chicago bureau – I have discovered that Stoly and Orangina works very well – makes the vodka nice and light and … wonderfully drinkable!

@homofascist: Agreed, but I still won’t rest until I know the outcome of Prop 8, which means even if Unicorn takes Va. (and lord please NC & OH & FL) early on, I’m still going to be up wayyy past my bedtime.

I’m with y’all, even Nojo’s graphs don’t do it for me. As D Boon counselles, maybe partying will help.

@rptrcub: Tied in the opinion polls right now, apparently. I’ll have some kind of overview Saturday morning, and then Ped & I will be photoblogging San Diego HateFest ’08 at Qualcomm Saturday afternoon. (Probably 6 p.m. Eastern.)

Maybe this will take your mind off the war for 31 seconds.

And at least you aren’t these guys.

@nabisco: Look at it this way: Barry has had a commanding electoral-vote lead since before Saddleback — this chart only counts states where either candidate leads by more than 5 percent. And the lead has been growing since then. It’s the consistency of the chart over time that’s telling.

The only pothole is the Palin fad. That was obviously a fad at the time, and like any fad, was obviously going to collapse — the only question was how long it would take. (I was figuring four weeks, max, and that was before the economy collapsed first.)

This is not 2004, this is not 2000. Most people have had their minds made up for months. Only something equivalent to the cultural moment between the Friday announcement of Palin and her Wednesday script-read is going to budge the needle, but McCain can only pick a moose-shooting veep once.

My only concern is how many people will be prevented from exercising their constitutional right to vote. We already know the will of the people.

Lots of good beer will help. I also started watching the Fox Soccer Channel again this week. Will watch as many soccer and NFL games as possible this weekend and try to avoid the news. I’ll be thankful when November 5 arrives…

@nojo: you are wise Sensei, and of course it makes sense. My reptilian brain, however, resides among Prom’s rocking chairs. My biggest problem is that I no longer use any of the chemicals to help me off the ledge.

Oh good news: all of our yard signs survived trick or treat night! A gaggle of tween girls asked if we were supporters, and I choked back a “what gave it away?” when I remembered that is the way the kids start conversation. They liked my daughter’s devil costume too.

Bill. Kristol. Is. A. Fucking. Tool.

How does one go about getting pot?

@nabisco: Wyatt Cenac had a great bit on the Daily Show the other night — something to the effect of “I want it over now!” There’s still room for mischief, and I’m not thinking beyond Tuesday night.

Okay, maybe a little Wednesday morning. But not much.

And if you’d like some Election Porn, there was a clip on KO or Rachel’s show tonight showing (or implying) miscalibrated touch screens. We had chads for years in Oregon, but I’ll take anything paper over any alternative any day.

@Promnight: One has friends who know. If one’s friends do not know, one smokes Camels. One does not hit the streets.

@homofascist: Not to worry, Bill’s going down on with his candidate. The long knives are already drawn, but we have to wait until Wednesday for the backstabbing to begin in earnest.

@Promnight: Do you know anyone who works in a restaurant? They can help you.

@Promnight: One sees a “dealer”.

@Mistress Cynica: I’m gonna have to do this deli thing just so I can find a source among my employees.

Cynica, you are a constant source of warm chuckles for me, I thought I was the only Episcopalian elder in the world who has trouble finding pot.
I came close to considering the priesthood, but then I saw my priest at my fathers deathbed, and I realized, I am way to empathic to be able to survive being there at someone’s deathbed on a weekly basis. My priest, my buddy, said, “oh, they teach you to let go of the empathy,” but I wouldn’t want that either, to let go of the emotion.

You are way cool.

@redmanlaw: One wants to see a “dealer” who will not knife one, sell one shit, or turn one over to the cops. Thats the tricky part. I like these nifty little hydroponic “herb” growing setups that are being sold now, you know, to give you a supply of cilantro and basil?

Report from my foray into United Nations election monitoring in Nevada. Here’s some hope for you – 42% of Nevada’s voters have already voted early as of tonight per my sources 375,000 votes cast in Clark County (Vegas) and 95,000 in Washoe County (Reno) since Oct. 18. Early voting ends tomorrow, and tomorrow is a state holiday and turnout should be through the roof. Breaking heavily to registered Dems statewide and county wide. I’m proud to say that only two provisional ballots issued out of the 1,250+ cast that I’ve observed in the past two days, one person turned away w/o a provisional ballot and I got the info on all of them. Teevee cameras happened to catch one of the provisional ballots at my polling place, if video from the 11 o’clock news is up by tomorrow I will post it and who knows, you may see a glimpse of me observing in the background.

@Promnight: That’s why you need to open your deli/cafe ASAP. Kitchen staff always have the best pot.

@SanFranLefty: tomorrow is a state holiday

For the election, or for Halloween? Because either would be way cool.

@Promnight: I’d refer you to a guy I know from back home that I last saw carrying around a brick of the goods at the famous Green Onion bar in Santa Fe (part of “North Country”) was shot there, but unfortunately he’s in the hole now and won’t be available for the next few years.

Great burgers at that place, and you know the kitchen is unsanitary as hell.

ADD: I remember reading on toolnavy.com (where I used to hang out before settling in amongst this fine crowd) about this legal stuff called salvia which apparently has some short term psychedelic effects. Have not gotten around to trying it yet. (Nursing a medicinal black tea, honey and Turkey).

@nojo: The state holiday is for neither the election nor Halloween, though Halloween would be super cool; but rather, it is for Nevada Day, the anniversary of the state’s admission to the United States in 1864.

Also, one must know the correct pronunciation of the state’s name with a flat a, kind of like knowing how to properly pronounce Oregon in two syllables.

Nevada – Nuh-vaaaaa-duh (not Nee-VAH-dah)
Oregon – Or-gun (not Or-y-GON)

@Promnight: You and Mrs. Prom need to come out on a trip to Cali. I’m sure that whether you go to SoCal or NorCal, your stinquers could help you. Shit, I walk by two different medical marijuana dispersaries every day on my commute.

Mrs. Prom has just told me that she wants her husband back. My talking to you all is apparently intolerable to her. She affects a look of long-suffering victimhood, and much of her communication is through sad, beseeching looks and expressions of victimhood. She flinches and acts as if attacked no matter what I say to her, and says she is so accustomed to my horrible awfulness that its my fault she accuses me of awfulness when I have not been awful, because she says I have beaten her down into a pathetic state in which she assumes I will be horrible and awful and it has become a reflex for her to flinch whenever I say anything. Yet she is an accomplished and succesful woman, far more succesful than I am, and I admire and respect her more than she appears to know.

This is just what I need, right now.

What the fuck, you know? What the fuck. I think I suck. My parents always told me I suck, Yes, they literally did, my favorite exchange with my father was when he said to me “you’ll never have any friends, because you’re an asshole,” and now my wife is reiterating my utter worthlessness.

Guess I better go take my drugs now.

@SanFranLefty: Nevadans are insulted if you pronounce the name of their state as it would be pronounced in the original spanish. Fuck yeah, we’se amurrican.

@Promnight: Maybe y’all could bond by sharing a Xanax. Couldn’t hurt.
And you’re not worthless. You’re good enough, you’re smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like you!

@SanFranLefty: Hey, U.T. gal — Colt McCoy? WTF? Was “Floppy McPenis” taken?

@Dodgerblue: Huh huh huh? Wha’ happened to Colt before the Texas Tech game? Nothing bad, I hope? Or are you just now learning of and mocking his name?

@Promnight: Huh huh huh huh huh? WTF? I echo Cynica, maybe some shared Xanax w/ the Mrs. would help. Or maybe you turn off the computer at dinner time, perhaps? Mrs. Prom is a doll and it makes me sad to think that she is a sad panda. Are you using Flying Chainsaw type language around her and Prom Jr.? I would probably give you sad looks after hearing that spoken out loud.

@SanFranLefty: Whoa, whoa, whoa…

“Orygun.”

That’s three syllables. Unless you’re from east of the Cascades, but of course that means you’re in Idaho.

I also grew up saying Nuhvaaduh, but somewhere along the way I got corrected to Nehvahduh. I’m happy to know I was right all along, and plan on punching somebody out as soon as I get the wayback machine working.

CB,

Time to get serious about your rage, confusion and paranoia. Time to get really fucked up on white liquor, get in your car and drive through the night, running over McCain/Palin signs all over Chicago. Once the sun is up, you can drive over to the Illinois McCain HQ and ask to see Palin because you want her to have your babies to grow up and kill Al Qaeda regulars who will take over America if Obama is elected. If you make the evening news tomorrow, we will buy you a beer.

FCS

@FlyingChainSaw: Only problem – there really aren’t any McCain/Palin signs in Chicago, and they have already hitched up the camping trailer that was McCain’s Illinois headquarters and driven it over to Indiana. But CB is a fabulous host, and deserves a beer for that alone.

@SanFranLefty: It’s the name thing.

@Dodgerblue: Where’s Jamie Sommers when I need her to back me up on this conversation.

It’s the name thing.
Uhh, as opposed to the previous UT quarterbacks and their made for TV names, Vince Young and Major Applewhite?

Srsly, you cannot make up these UT quarterback names. And besides, how can you – of all people – hate on a team that generated Ricky Williams and spanked the shit out of the University of Spoiled Children in the 2006 Rose Bowl nailbiter that elevated Vince Young to saint-like levels in Austin? Oh, and then there’s Earl Campbell. But I’m still recovering from the level of verklemptitude I achieved watching the 2006 game. I will probably be on the same level of manic-ness and alcohol consumption on Tuesday when I’m cheering on the Unicorn and No on Prop. 8.

Well it’s the weekend for me now. So I can dump all my cares at the front door for two days and leave them there until Monday.

Thankfully the cricket is on and so there is no news, but that of flanneled fools taking tea on the subcontinent. The most controversial topic is “Does Australia have a spin bowler that can take wickets in India” Nothing about the stock exchange, or global warming.

Except for the province where they are playing seems to have converted all it’s public transport vehicles to CNG, and the tuk-tuks and all new vehicles must run on CNG.

Test cricket, the soothing balm of doing nothing all day, with drinks and meal breaks.

@nojo: Hey, I’m from east of the Cascades….and not Idaho! And yes, we say “Or-ih-gun,” but the “ih” is heavily deëmphasized.

@CheapBoy: My one trip to Oz included a bunch of cricket riots across the country and forest fires outside of Sydney. I found cricket riots hilarious on their face. All the pubs in Adelaide and Sydney opened at 9 am to begin the drinking. Aussie rules football, or soccer/football, or rugby, sure I can understand the riots…but cricket?! WTF? Isn’t that just a baseball game dragged over three days? (hello JNOV Phillies!)

@BRB: You’re from Montana?

@, BRB, nojo: I am writing a brief for a case in the Fort Peck Tribal Courts at the moment. They’re in the way eastern part of the state by North Dakota.

I’m keeping myself occupied with my Halloween costume — Jack the Ripper. I’ve been trying to load up Gravatar to give y’all a picture, but it ain’t happening. Gravatar seems to have developed themselves into an infinite-reload loop. It’s kind of fascinating to watch, but doesn’t do anything towards helping me update my micropic.

@redmanlaw: Don’t listen to Nojo. I grew up near the Colville reservation (and yes, our high school mascot is the Indians, and yes someone always dresses like an Indian chief and rides around on a horse for football games, and no, it’s never one of the Native kids who does).

@nojo: I’m not listening to you! Your accent is impenetrable anyway.

@BRB: Real Oregonians have the blandest accents in the country, probably because we don’t grow up with chaw in our cheeks.

HEY ROME GIRL! You’re not the only one watching West Wing on infinite loop. Matthew Santos, meet Barack Obama.

Oh holy fuck, if I’m half as excited as the night that Santos won come next Tuesday, SFL will be a very happy camperette.

@SanFranLefty: I almost ran with that this morning, and then I decided to rant about Politico instead. It came down to the fact I tuned out after Sorkin was fired; plus I’m also pissed at Sorkin for Studio 60.

@SanFranLefty: No No No!! Not baseball at all, except for the obscure statistics and the inability to “get” the game unless raised on it.

Yes, they both have a bat and a ball and obscure rules about when a delivery/pitch is legal. But cricket lacks the dugout clearing brawls and essence of manliness.

Cricket is meant to be played by gentlemen who believe that “It’s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game” Overbites, gormlessness and aristocratic in-breeding an advantage. Like most things English it is meant to reveal a chap’s character.

For me, it’s about listening to how the commentators fill in the long periods of nothing that is the soul of test cricket.

Although, Twenty/20 cricket (20 overs each team) is more akin to baseball than cricket. It’s all colour and movement and frenetic activity, more a sense of kill or be killed.

@SanFranLefty: The RMLs were all about West Wing last cycle up to a couple of years ago, now it’s just following the coverage. Din’t Rachel look great tonight? Did they shoot it in high def or what?

@CheapBoy: But if it is so gentlemanly, why are there cricket riots on the streets of Sydney when when the Aussies lose to Pakistan?

P.S. to all – Letterman’s little spoof commercial of Unicorn’s infomercial featuring Sarah Palin as someone Obama would help made me giggle.

@nojo: West Wing didn’t totally jump the shark after Sorkin left, because my boyfriends Toby and Josh and my girlfriend C.J. were still on the show. And Martin Sheen is my favorite Catholic for a bunch of reasons.

@SanFranLefty: Ah because the spectators are a bunch of drunken oiks.

Spooque? Oh It’s All Hallow’s Eve!

Better switch the lights off and pretend I’m not home tonight…

Oh Australian lurkers? Better get yer Tax return in by midnight tonight (If you don’t have a registered tax agent). Visit http://www.ato.gov.au and download e-tax to prepare and lodge your return over the intermanets.

The Tax Office will pre-fill your Interest earned, Dividends, and PAYG Witholding amounts. And yes, the ATO will fine you for late lodgment even if you are in a refund situation.

@CheapBoy: There’s a Brit pub down the hill from my place — the real deal, not a marketing fake. I like going there because they have international satellite sports on all the screens, and I have no fucking clue what’s going on.

Best part is during World Cup years. You can hear the cheers at 6 a.m.

@CheapBoy: How’s the shit gelato at Coogee Bay? Not sure whether you caught that the other morning…

@nojo: Nojo, well… the scoop (pardon the pun) is the vats the gelato was taken from have been cleared from contamination, the Chef has volunteered for a DNA sample (Where will they put the swab? ) and the wait-staff are all looking nervous and sweaty.

State Health authorities are being given a kicking over this one, but no one is going to lose the liquor licence over this, even though part of the licence conditions is the ability to serve food (minimum standard is a cheese sandwich).

Another fun part of the liquor licence includes food and water for horses.

And well, I sorta saw it coming when you said “I’ll make you a star”. At least you didn’t want to put me in a porno movie like the last person that said that.

@CheapBoy: Under the laws of the state of New Mexico, property owners must provide access to springs and streams for purposes of watering horses.

@redmanlaw: There was a case where a university student turned up to their exams on horseback, and was refused stabling. And thus passed their exams because the university rules said that the university would provide stabling for horses of students undergoing exams.

Ahhh, probably spent too much time examining university rules than revising the topic in question.

@CheapBoy: I made it through my undergraduate years and earned a bachelor’s degree without taking any math because careful review of the university handbook showed that I could take other science courses to meet the requirement, so I took anatomy and physiology, astronomy, etc. A vice president for academic affairs was shocked when I told him how I got around the math requirement and the provision was changed soon after that.

@redmanlaw: The establishment hates those that use their rules against them.

The rules are there just to give the illusion of fairness, they’re not meant to be actually exercised!

Hey, here’s an interesting factoid. The edit countdown does not reset until it has expired.

The edit countdown does not countdown per comment, rather, it counts down per user.

@SanFranLefty: My Stillers drafted the still-unproven Limas Sweed.

Here in the ‘bisco household we’re hoping for a UT-Penn State bowl, because the former gave me a degree and the latter helps pay some of the bills.

@Promnight:
you don’t know where to get pot? heloooooooooo?
i realize i’m a geographically undesireable dealer, but i have a tip:
i went to universal in orlando last summer with all of my college roomies. natch, we were looking for pot. i asked the guy working in the hard rock cafe at the hotel and he said….valet! all the valet guys had a system wherein they would put the pre arranged amount in your glove compartment when they brought you your car. i’m told this is standard valet service at most better hotels. now you know!

while scanning the news yesterday, i came across this tidbit that gave me mixed emotions. a whopping 25% of all americans living outside the states are living in…jerusalem! i saw footage of the polls they set up for the american expats to vote. i was all excited til the results were announced and they’re voting for mcInsane 3 to 1. this was disheartening to say the least, but they are routing for the one with the ichiest trigger finger, which i guess is understandable. i can’t believe i’ll be living there for maybe up to a year, if RB and i can stand each other.

my daughter is working the polls in dade county. obama all the way! she said the biggest problem is the geezers trying to but up in line, she said it’s hilarious. old people feel entitled to sneak in line ahead of anyone younger, anyone under 75 gets pushed back in line. she’s getting a whistle and a striped shirt for the duration.

prommie…you’re so fucking twisted and entirely adorable. you are so loved, and you damn well know it.

@redmanlaw:
i thought i was the only one EVER to take anatomy and physiology and end up with BA. it’s the hardest undergrad course you can take!
it’s on my transcript as an elective. are we nuts? (i was pre med before pre law…”what’s the diff?”)

@homofascist: Chicago Bureau can come on downstate IL as we got lots of BIG fucking McCain/Palin signs all over the place and we can go road soaking, get out the ball bats and take out a bunch of them muthas (since all the Obama signs have been vandalized with swastikas and slurs).

@CheapBoy: And rooms. It was nice living there, knowing if I was walkabout in a small town and didn’t make the last trains back to Melbourne or Sydney (where I lived in different phases of another life) I could ask the publican for a key and for $30-40 I could get a clean room. Might not be heated or have a sink, but I wouldn’t be stuck on the street.

@AARPrick: That’s the spirit!

@AARPrick: Being from downstate, I feel comfortable saying that I would rather stay in Chicago.

When I was home for my dad’s wedding, not too far from his house was this HUGE McCain/Palin sign that someone had built in their yard. It was a straight up fucking billboard with all of these cheesy lights. I was so mad at myself for forgetting my camera, because it would have been good for a stinque jam.

The strangest thing I have seen in a couple locations is a bunch of Republican campaign signs and then a Durbin for Senate, in with them. WTF?? The epitome of socialism and terrorists appeasement?

@homofascist: But those farm boys are teh Hott in those jeans and seed corn caps.

@AARPrick: Not as strange as you might think. There will be a fair number of ballots cast for Obama-McConnell, Obama-Sununu, Obama-Chambliss, etc. Bush’s remaining supporters like to counter his low approval ratings with Congress’ even lower approval ratings, but voters tend to like their delegation just fine and merely disapprove of the body as a whole.

@SanFranLefty: Well, yes, beating USC is devoutly to be desired. Go, Beavers!! But, Vince the Prince has been kind of a dud in the NFL, and is now being portrayed in the press as a head case.

4 more days!! I know dozens of people from LA who have gone to Nevada to knock on doors etc. Good luck in Reno!

@Dodgerblue: Colt McCoy will play another year at UT, then enter the NFL with a shitload of experience. I feel bad for Vince Young.

@baked: Anatomy & Physiology, three semesters of calculus plus organic chem, and I still only ended up with a BA…stooopid college party culture!

@nabisco: Three semesters of calculus, differential equations (Twice!), two semesters of chemistry and two semesters of physics, and a BA in English. Not to mention Fortran, Statics, and Dynamics. But I failed those, so I guess they don’t count. Fucking statics exams, 3 questions, if you blew one, you got a 66 and failed, no curve at all. I basically cut class, all of them, one entire semester; showed up one time to see the professor handing back the graded midterms, ooops. I still have nightmares in which I have an exam coming up the next day in a class I enrolled in and never attended.

@nabisco: Mrs. Prom went to UT, moi, UF. There is a day each September when we do not speak. When UF beats UGA tomorrow afternoon (I just got done checking for last minute air fares, damn, can’t do it, I am gonna have to start driving around 11 tonight, if I decide to go loco), then we should cement our BCS bowl and maybe get to meet one of those wimpy western schools and show them how football is played.

@Dodgerblue: Vince is being portrayed as a head case? umm, OK.

After his college career is over, Tebow will ascend to heaven, in bodily form, rising on an ascending pillar of light as squadrons of angels play the Gator fight song on their celestial trumpets, to take his place on the heavenly all star squad.

@Prommie: Me too: I still have nightmares in which I have an exam coming up the next day in a class I enrolled in and never attended.

i should not be surprised that other stinquers also took the hardest undergrad science courses and end up with a BA in english.
you realize we are retarded, right?

@AARPrick: If it makes you feel better, one of the only McCain/Palin signs here (and not even an officical campaign sign) was defaaced with peace symbols.

@baked: I bailed on my biology major 3 days before I started genetics, which was the infamous hell class at my school (the professor wrote the textbook and the software program). And I ended up a happy sociology major/women’s studies minor.

@AARPrick: I wrote that this morning and then on my walk to work today I strolled past a house with a prominent PG/Talinbunny sign in the front yard.

@baked: I took Geography as my science requirement and would up with a B.S. — in marketing, appropriately enough.

jason and mistress cyn…..NOT retarded. i minored in quaaludes and family pressure. that’s my excuse for ending up in the wrong classes.

the only obama signs around here are deep in rastatown, which is so adorable because no one see’s them and they can’t vote. love them.

@baked: The anatomy fit in well with my EMT certification and life drawing classes. I was in the most left wing of the liberal arts degree programs at New Mexico where you could basically take whatever you wanted and still graduate. I was literally the brochure (not poster) boy for the program since I somehow became gainfully employed after all that.

@Prommie: dropped out of a UCC course on Thursday afternoons because I could not see myself in there as the weather got nice during the spring semester.

@redmanlaw:
that damn course is so difficult, it should result in employment!
full disclosure: this is the only course i ever got a C in. i’m bitter.