GOOOOOOO DUCKS!

<---- This of course should be self-explanatory, with the Civil War coming up and all. The Ducks are undefeated and if they beat the Beavers (AND THEY CAN!) they go to the BCS championship. And Eternal Glory and all that. ;-)

I didn't watch/listen to the game Friday. When I do, they lose. Not worth the risk.

I spent the week with David and Lydia and her Amazing Expanding Belly. The twins are getting pretty big and she is getting tired of being pregnant. She's into week 33 though, and getting close. And except for the fact that at the moment they're presenting breech, everything's cool. We keep telling them to turn over...

Their @%^&$@ roommate finally started moving his crap out. He left about a month ago but didn't start getting his stuff out until Saturday. David showed me... oh.my.god. The walls are absolutely filthy. But we have to get it clean so the baby stuff can be moved in there. Big job ahead though.

Dinner was nice- James was up and Stephen came over (something about 'Mom Food') and after dinner we played Dominoes. Stephen is Evil at board games. That is all I'll say about that. :-P

Last week I went to the 12:01 showing of the new Harry Potter film, and Wednesday I took David and Lydia (probably the last time they get out before the babies are here). I thought it was really good. The scenes right at the beginning were powerful- I was in tears before the title board came up. And I sobbed through the ending. Harry burying Dobby was too much. I knew it was going to happen (who didn't?) but it was still hard.

People watching is great though- there was a group of kids who came as the Potter Puppet Pals, in costumes made of craft felt. They were really well done. There was the usual assortment of kids in school uniforms, a girl who wanted a picture of herself with me (several, actually) and at the last moment pulled up her sleeve to expose her Dark Mark- I jumped back and whipped out my wand before I realized what I was doing. The resulting picture was great- I wish I'd had the presence of mind to ask them to send me a copy! There was also a girl in black leather with a mound of black hair who ran through the halls screaming "I killed Sirius Black! I killed Sirius Black! EEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEE!" just like Bellatrix. It was pretty cool. :-)

And the last film isn't out until July. ARRRGGGHHH!!!

A couple of notes on the economy-

I just read a very interesting blog post by David Friedman on the current economy and the differing approaches of the US and the UK (http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/2010/11/most-expensive-research-project-ever.html). I haven't decided how much I agree or disagree with, but I thought it would be interesting to post my remarks here:

An interesting observation. However, something I think we seem to be overlooking here (and which was not an issue during the Roosevelt Administration), is the vast increase in outsourcing. How does that affect (or not) the GDP? Also, the outsourcing and automation of many jobs that formerly supported a significant portion of the working population has changed not just the employment rate, but the nature of consumption. Why pay an American a decent wage when you can buy cheap crap from China? Something that I have noticed in the past decade is that we all want jobs that will support an upper middle income (or higher) lifestyle, but we don't want to pay the costs of goods and services that support the jobs that support that lifestyle. It becomes a downward spiral- the more we demand low prices, the more goods are imported and jobs are sent overseas. No jobs or lower-wage jobs increase the demand for lower prices of goods... I think it's the economic version of the saying "Everyone wants to get to heaven, but nobody wants to die".

Of course, I don't have any brilliant ideas for stopping that spiral, or reversing it. And it appears that no one in the Treasury Department or the Federal Reserve has any bright ideas either.

And soggy Autumn is upon us...

We had about two weeks of lovely weather, with sun and impossibly blue skies. and the leaves beginning to turn. Ainsworth Blvd was especially lovely- so many trees there were brilliant yellow or an orange-red. There is one that grows around a streetlight, so at night the whole tree is lit up. An oak down the street from there always has multi-colored leaves, mostly a brilliant red- it makes me think of an aging bawd, throwing open her clothes to show the ancient glories in all of their decay...

And now the rains are here in earnest. The leaves are about halfway down, and the streets and sidewalks are slick with their slime. I have to be careful even crossing the sidewalk between the car and the house. We've been having a lot of thunderstorms, and the sky is always dark grey. The sort of skies that make you think of depressing poetry. Dylan Thomas maybe, or Sylvia Plath.

I've had some good times though. I went down to Lydia's and spent a few days. Mostly cleaning, but we did go to her doctor appointment, and to the shower that the ladies at her dad's church threw for her. She got some very nice things, much of it with monkeys on them. I think we have a theme. :-) I found some cute fabric with monkeys on it several weeks back, and we made some buntings out of it. We also made some out of some polar fleece- it was striped like tiger stripes, only in two tones of pink. They came out really cute. I also have some flannel with tiny purple and pink flowers on it that will be made into several different things. We're kind of having fun making tiny clothes.

She's due January 15, but I suspect that we'll have little girls by Christmas. Lydia is very big already- at least as big as I was when he sister was born, and put together, the babies weigh as much as Annie did. Lydia is at about 29 weeks and we have a ways to go yet.

David doesn't have a job yet, but there is a good prospect, and we are all holding our collective breath.

Also in the news- I am no longer speaking to my father. Things have been rocky for some time- I was the last of the kids to be in contact with him, and I had been holding on mostly out of a sense of duty. I'm the oldest and all, the 'good girl', so this has been hard. He'd been rather nasty for some time, mostly about my political leanings. Condescending even. But a few weeks back, he said something on my Facebook page- in public- that went beyond condescending and into contempt. I'd been out for a few hours and came back to find that my page had sort of exploded. My siblings came out in my defense- even the brother who is quiet and never says anything to anyone. All of us kids had a Private Message conversation, and I 'unfriended' and blocked my dad. It was very hard, but I'd just come to the realization that I'm 45 years old, and I don't have to take this. He made my childhood a nightmare, and I don't have to let him do that to me as an adult.

Strangely, I feel really free.

In other news, I have become more active at church (St. Matthew's Episcopal)- I've been the lector twice, been helping in the kitchen and with potlucks, and have been going to the sewing circle on Tuesday morning. I'm getting to know other people a little better, and that is kind of cool. The parish is really small right now, but it's beginning to grow a bit- we ran out of bulletins last Sunday, which was a good thing.

I think it is time to go back to bed. I have to be up at 7:30 to get out the door for an event. I have a new gown to wear, and I'm taking my friend Judy with me. It should be a good time. :-)

My letter to the President.

Yes, I haven't posted for awhile. Been sick, been busy, been sucked into Facebook. Anyway, I wrote a letter to President Obama today. It's going in the mail tomorrow. And it's one of my better efforts, I think.
*********************************************

Dear Mr. President,


I come to you today to tell you the stories of some of the people who voted for you two years ago.

My son-in-law is a 99er. His job went to India. The job market in Eugene is worse than it is here in Portland, but they can’t afford to move. My daughter is in the middle of an unplanned pregnancy- and carrying twins. They have gone through their savings and have nothing left. They are facing eviction, and I cannot help them. What have you done for them?

My roommate and I have a young couple living in our basement (if not, David and Lydia would be there) who came out here from Indianapolis. Dan managed to get a job after about four months. He is an engineer and physicist and had been out of work for about a year. His wife Ellen is doing temp work. She is a librarian, and due to funding cuts all over, the libraries are cutting staff, not adding it. What have you done for them?

My son is hanging on desperately to a minimum-wage job because it is all he can find. He’d like to go back to school, but student aid packages are really slim these days, and he can’t figure out how to make up the difference from his current paycheck. What have you done for him?

My fiancé is an Instructional Aide in a middle school. Budget cuts there have cut his hours back to half time. He lives in a college town and at 46 cannot hope to compete in the market for part-time jobs. He had been working on a teaching certificate, and has one term left to go– the student teaching. But he has run out of money. He can’t take out more student loans due to current outstanding ones. He can’t find the money for the tuition, much less the living expenses for a semester while he teaches. At the moment, he is lurching from month-to-month scarcely keeping the rent paid and the lights on. What have you done for him?

My oldest daughter ran from her second job and stood in line for two hours, dirty and smelly from work, to vote for you. She’s a college graduate, bright, skilled, and juggling two, three, sometimes four part-time jobs so she can keep her apartment in Brooklyn. She would like to go back to school for her Master’s, but as she says, she has this filthy habit of eating, and she just can’t give it up. She’s the hardest working human I know, and she’s still skating on the thin edge of ruin. What have you done for her?

My roommate works for the federal government, and she’s 63 and nearing retirement. She crossed party lines to vote for you. She’s scrimped and saved and made careful investments and in the past two years she’s seen her retirement money cut in half. She owns her house, but thanks to the housing market, it is worth more than she can sell it for, and she must pay taxes on the higher value. She is facing the future with no small amount of fear and trepidation. What have you done for her?

I have friends who unemployed, underemployed, or hanging on to jobs they hate because there’s nothing else out there. Friends are losing their homes, have lost their homes, have gone from nice family-sized homes to seedy apartments in an attempt to stay afloat financially. I can think of three people who would be living in our basement were it not already occupied. We don’t have room for any more. I have friends who are hard workers, skilled, conscientious, who are on food stamps because they can’t pick up enough contracts.

Mr. President, what are you doing for us?

We’re out here, struggling, meanwhile the top 2% have the unmitigated gall to demand more tax cuts. People are homeless, and hungry, and yet the rich have the audacity to demand more. How dare they! Mr. President, we thought that you were there in Washington to change the world– for us. Right now we aren’t seeing any change. Making speeches about fighting for the middle class does nothing if you don’t take that fight to Capitol Hill. The Republicans have made it clear that they care for no one but those who can line their pockets. They don’t care about my daughter, who wonders if her babies will have a home to live in. They don’t care about her husband, who they’ve labeled a deadbeat though he lost his job through not fault of his own. They don’t care about anyone, so long as they can get fat checks for their re-election efforts.

Mr President, it is time– no, *past time*– for you to stand up for the people who put their faith, the money, their time into you and what you said you would do. It is time to you to tell the Party of No that you say Yes. It is time to walk up the hill and tell them you are there for the people, not for the corporations. It is time for you to tell them that you have a responsibility to protect the interests of the 98%.

Mr. President, it is time that you started doing– for us.


Sincerely,

Laura Minnick

Why do I do this to myself?

So I need to make a new dress for the SLUG Queen Coronation next Friday (the 13th!), because nothing I have fits. Not even sorta. I got this pattern last year (http://www.folkwear.com/140.html), thinking that the Flamenco Dance Dress would suit Queen Carmen Slugana.

Oy.

I spent more than three hours just cutting it out. My hand hurts. And this is the most complicated pattern I've ever used. I'm really feeling intimidated by it. I sure hope I can get it done on time.

In other news, Wanda is in New Orleans this week, and I am on kitty duty. I finished putting the ermines on Sumayya's blue and violet wool brocade gown, and she picked it up. The two polka-dotted bliauts are painted- I just have to heat-set the dots and sew up the gowns. And I got a couple of patterns for wee babies, and some fleece and fake fur to make Thing 1 and Thing 2 outfits. Heh.

And now I think sleep would be good...

Yeeee-Haaaaaww!!!

Alright, I know it's been six weeks. I've been busy. So there.

First there was the BIG NEWS! Lydia and David are expecting! And not only that- there's two of the little buggers! Twins! Oy! So there is much fussing to be done. They are getting married on Monday, at the courthouse. Here's to hoping things look up for them soon. They sure need it. She hasn't told her dad yet about the babies. Not sure how he's going to take the news.

So I've been busy this last week making a wedding dress for her. She came up with me on my way home from spending the 4thof July weekend with James, and spent about a week while we goofed off and sewed. Then I took her home and we spent a day cleaning at her house (it needs it). I still have to put the hem in her dress, but that shouldn't take long. Dunno what I'm going to wear though...

Also been busy (still) with making clothes for Gabriel and Sumayya. I'm behind where I wanted to be, but the wedding dress kinda shifted the schedule. Life happens. Bethany knows what is happening so we're all cool. I've been up there busting my rear for weeks, and I really need a few days off. My body kinda decided to shut down for the past couple of days- I guess I needed it.

I actually bought myself some new makeup the other day- some lip stain. Stays on better than lipstick and isn't sticky. I can add a bit of lipstick over to gloss it up again if I want, but I don't have to. I kinda like it.

Aaaand the SLUG Queen Coronation is in a couple of weeks- I'm hoping to make it this year. Maybe I'll even get my dress done!

Oohhh... I'm in love...

The concert was... oh my god. I already had an incredibly high opinion of Sting, but I confess I spent a fair amount of the first set with tears running down my face. Here's a bunch of music I love, and a musician I adore, there in the flesh, and he wrote and arranged all of the orchestral parts to go with his music. It was jaw-dropping. The man is a genius. We were in the upper nosebleed seats and I couldn't see as well as I'd have liked, and the sound was probably better farther down, but I was there. It was something I'll never forget.

And he's funny! You would have laughed- he did 'Wild About You', which was based on the story of David and Bathsheba. He gave a brief rundown of the story, with the reference from Samuel, and then turned the page on his score and said "Thus endeth the lesson" just before launching into the song. The lady in front of me turned around- she clearly didn't know why I was laughing and I couldn't stop laughing to tell her... (He's RC, BTW.)

In other news- Egils was lovely, the dinners went off very well, the fitting of Gabriel for hose went off well with a bit of harrumph!Manlyman! stuff. It was very amusing. And Annie has one of Gabriel and Sumayya's guards in love with her, I think. And the rain held off until... packup, naturally. So the back of the car is still wet. :-P

Still sewing, sewing, and sewing. I have two weeks. Oy.

Think I'll go upstairs, listen to Sting, and get some work done...