Thought of the Day

"It's not easy being green."

- Kermit the Frog

Word of the Day

Merriam-Webster’s word of the day is poikilotherm (poi-KEE-luh-therm), which means an organism (such as a frog) with a variable body temperature that tends to fluctuate with and is similar to or slightly higher than the temperature of its environment. Had I only checked that before my delightful CLE training, I would have definitely been able to stump my classmates during the rousing game of hangman that ensued. Evidently, “exsanguinate” and “Sisyphus” were entirely too easy for them, and no little stick man ever got hanged.

An unenlightened soul might question my proclivity toward hanging little stick men during an educational outing, but I have discovered, through three years of law school, that there is a direct relationship between the amount of time I spend multi-tasking (that would be the politically correct term for playing hangman, passing notes, or spending time on instant messaging programs) and the amount of information I ingest during any particular training session. In short, the more I dicked around, er, multi-tasked, the better grade I received. I therefore view hangman as no mere frivolous distraction, but as an integral component of seasoning my brain cells to receive the bevy of continuing legal education launched at me this morning.

P O I K I L O T H E R M

Franken-Snarky

As many of you know, probably because I ranted and raved about the evils of high-velocity soccer balls, I broke my forearm rather fantastically in April, had it reset and then fall out of alignment over the next four weeks, and then had to have it surgically re-broken, wherein they added (a) a piece 'o my hip bone and (b) a lovely metal plate with accompanying screws. But did you all know that I was keeping photographic evidence of my travails? I bet not! A camera phone in the hands of a formerly pre-med, currently under the influence of Oxycontin individual is a beauteous thing.















One week after surgery. I about pissed myself when he took the temporary cast off. "Just a little scar," he said. Bull honkey - it looks like my forearm got raised from the dead in an altogether arcane fashion.















Now, we're at three weeks post-surgery. The scar is starting to looks less like I'm an undead zombie and more like I just tried to off myself with a razor blade. My favorite part is the waffling of the skin due to my water-proof cast. It gives my arm a certain International House of Scabby Waffles allure.















And here we are at present day scarring. The scar looks positively radiant next to the street atlas my veins form under fluorescent lighting. I've started to look at the bright side of the scar looking vaguely suicidal - I can use it to weed through the dating pool. If they seem to dig my scar without explanation, well, I can run away quickly.

CIA Goes High Tech to Recruit Cheerleaders

In an apparent effort to compete with military recruiters for 16-year-olds willing to forgo four years of drinking and drama in order to serve their country, the CIA now features a high-tech, yet low-IQ, personality quiz designed to appeal to the pimply-faced, "I watch 'Heroes' every week and wish I could fly" population. So, waste a few minutes and check it out. For the record, I tested as "The Thoughtful Observer," which means I'm totally ready to infiltrate evil lesbian nuke-smuggling rings in Eastern Europe. I got mad skillz.

Gender-Queer Emo Smurf, Anyone?

Seattle has been an eye-opening experience thus far - my eyes are now open to the hippie, granola, veggie-bacon lovin' world that is the Northwest. In and amongst the reusable sea sponge tampons and essential oils for every potential medical affliction, there is the wonder of the personal ads from "The Stranger," Seattle's alterna-paper. My favorite ad -

"Gender-Queer Emo Smurf Seeking Freaks" (definitely a sub-species of human not found in the wilds of D.C.) - "mutual consensual brutality, anyone? approachably sarcastic dykes with soft spots for sci-fi tastic baby butch geeks encouraged to apply. craving female companionship - sick of being sorely lacking. just want to be all kinds of sore. P.S. I've got got great hair." (something tells me that this girl has been lost since Xena conventions went the way of the dodo bird).

Cat People Gone Crazy

I have seen few things more disturbing than the November 2006 edition of "Cat Fancy" magazine. To be fair to November 2006, it's the first edition of "Cat Fancy" that I've ever seen and I don't think I will be sending in my subscription card anytime soon. The magazine is like the sick love child of kitty Cosmo ("From FAT to PHAT - Give your tubby tabby a makeover"), kitty's Health and Fitness ("Take Charge of Inflammatory Bowel Disease!"), and kitty Playboy (there is a fold-out centerfold of a Chartreux cat, which is described as having a "robust body with finely boned legs" and a dense coat that is "mauve and blue like the breast of a ring dove"). The magazine failed to comment on the centerfold's favorite romantic activity or what she looks for in a tom.

Only Too True

A hilarious and all-too-true look at the dating world through the eyes of a lesbian...

Philosophical Rumination of the Day

I’ve been reading a lot of texts lately that talk about living “in the moment,” which is something that I’ve always been bad about. I’m always looking for the next moment, just over the hill, the next moment because it has to be better than this one. And I see a lot of wisdom in not taking this moment, or this day, or whatever feeling you have for that hour for granted. A lot of good comes from appreciating that life is a series of moments, linked only by our perspective of them. But I think it’s important to have a sense of future perspective, too. It’s important to remember that however we act in that moment, that hour, that day, we can’t do over once its past . We can never go back and change our moments, as much as we might like to do so. It should therefore be important, when we’re in the moment, to make it one that we won’t want to erase in the future. We can’t control the future, but we can at least control how we look back on ourselves, on our moments, when the future comes.

A Side of Marriage, Hold the Polygamy

Polygamists in Utah are evidently taking a page out of the gay playbook to start pressing for polygamy marriage equality, with some success. They’ve managed to persuade the Attorney General of Utah to stop prosecuting people for bigamy, and without a Supreme Court edict, I might add. Though, before we go too far in comparing gays and polygamists, a few important differences should be noted. The structure of modern marriage is currently (and has been for centuries) defined by a two-person, monogamous commitment. Gays seek the right to be allowed equal access to that system, and have proven over time that their entry into that system will not create negative externalities on society (i.e. almost all studies conclude that children fare fine in two-person gay relationships and gay marriage in Massachusetts hasn’t seemed to do anything other than prove that marriage will continue to exist as a hallowed two-person institution just as it does currently).

In contrast, polygamist are not seeking to enter the system that exists on equal footing, but are seeking to redefine the current conception of marriage. There is no doubt that one could make arguments that the current system of marriage is strange (human monogamy for 30, 40, or 50 years is not exactly most in-keeping with human desires and biology) and had many negative externalities at its creation (i.e. exchanging women as property), but it is one thing to argue that you should be allowed equal access to an existing institution that has proved its good and bad points to society, and arguing for the creation of a new institution. Moreover, as of today, polygamy has shown itself to have a huge number of negative externalities, including child rape, female slavery, the creation of armed, separatist societies, and a lack of gender equality (I have yet to see the polygamist society where women are allowed to marry multiple men).

So, let’s not go comparing the two quite yet, mmkay?

Of Bondage and Poor Taste

Uplifting note of the day - I am finally free from the bondage of physical therapy! My wrist is now fully cleared to engage in its regularly scheduled programming of bending, flexing, and strutting. The strutting is provided care of the small amount of hip bone that is now fused to my arm bone, giving a whole new lyric to that bone song - “The hip bone’s connected to the arm bone.” That’s alright...I already have a few other extra connections - I sneeze when I’m hungry, leading me to hypothesize that my nose and stomach are connected by more than a mere esophageal tube.

In less uplifting news, it appears that Michael Richards (most famous for playing Cosmo Kramer on “Seinfeld”) decided to unleash his inner KKK at a stand-up comedy routine in Los Angeles last Friday. After evidently tiring of a black heckler in the audience, Richards shouted, “Fifty years ago they’d have you hanging upside down with a fucking fork up your fucking ass,” and the repeatedly referred to the man as a “N-gg–.” The video of the outburst can be seen here. Now, if we could only get Richards and Mel Gibson on a stage, together . . .

Dictator Mitt

So, let me get this right...most conservatives think that we should leave the gay marriage debate to the legislature and away from bad, activist courts, but when the legislature decides to keep gay marriage legal, then it’s okay to use the courts to make the legislature rethink its position? Because why exactly? Because then it’s a bad, activist legislature? Or is it really because conservatives, when they use the “activist judge” lingo really mean to say that any judge who rules against conservative principals is an activist, and should be denounced as such, but any judge who rules in favor of conservative principals is an ardent defender of separation of powers? Actually, I think I’m going to go with choice (c) - because conservatives like Governor Mitt Romney, and to a lesser extent, President Bush are the kind of conservatives that believe that the executive branch should be judge, jury, and executioner. I think any person desiring to be the executive should have to read the Constitution and the Federalist papers, and then take a test. Call it the No Executive Left Behind Act.

Flipper is Fucked in Japan

So, every year in Japan (you know, the modern, industrialized country that owns a good deal of America?), the government sanctions an annual “dolphin drive,” in which it gives permits to Japanese fisherman to club and butcher thousands of dolphins (21,000 permits were given out this year). When asked to defend the process, the Japanese government could only come up with three excuses:

(1) it is an important cultural activity (I’ve seen this excuse before...where was that? Oh yeah...for female genital mutilation and Southern slavery.);

(2) the government issues permits only for the number of dolphins that can be slaughtered without threatening the species’ survival (It’s one thing to say that you’re issuing permits to hunt animals to keep ecological population balance, but another to say that you issue just enough permits to make sure the animal doesn’t go extinct.); and

(3) the practice is limited to economic development zones with struggling fishermen (Honestly, the ecology of the world would probably be improved by less human population - see point #2).

Importing Cultural Traditions

If Ethiopia doesn't respect Spain's cultural tradition of letting two consenting adults of the same sex marry each other, then I don't see why the United States has to respect some Ethiopians' cultural tradition of lopping off their female children's genitals with kitchen scissors. When in Rome...don a toga. When in Georgia, leave the kitchen scissors for coupon-clipping.

Tipping My Velvet to Sofia Coppola

So, the buzz is that Sofia Coppola is going to direct a film version of "Tipping the Velvet," a well-written, yet luridly trashy Victorian lesbian novel by Sarah Waters. I'm very excited...Victorian pulp mixed with the angst and disillusionment of life that is Sofia Coppola's trademark could be a very intriguing mixture. And it probably wouldn't make me feel quite as guilty about liking the novel as the BBC's TV adaptation, which was a rollicking good time, but I had to shower the schlock off afterwards. Plus, it'll be fun to see how Coppola deals with the pivotal "servants disobeying the mistress by playing with the mistress' leather dildo" scene. I think that scene should be the make-it-or-break-it audition tape. Yup.

Thought of the Day

"Open me. Wide. Narrow. Pass through me, and whatever lies on the other side, could not be reached except by this. This you. This now. This caught moment opening into a lifetime."

Jeanette Winterson, "Lighthousekeeping"

My Chocolate Milk Obsession is Independently Verified

No longer can my friends mock me for pouring chocolate milk into my cereal in the mornings...I am vindicated! (Of course, to actually make use of of my morning pseudo-cocoa puffs, I will actually have to now work out instead of relying on post-breakup trauma for all of my weight loss. Damn.)

People and Their Consoles

I'm hoping that the new Playstation 3 has new games that simulate dates. Because I can't imagine a man who tells someone else that he's 31 and camped out for three nights to be the first in line to buy a new Playstation 3 is going to be getting a lot of actual booty.

Article II or III? I Can't Decide

There’s an interesting editorial today by a couple ex-Justice Department lawyers in the New York Times, arguing that the gay marriage issue shouldn’t be decided in the courts or by constitutional fiat, but exclusively by the legislature.

It’s an interesting perspective. To be sure, I’m sure that most gay marriage proponents would wish that legislatures would be progressive enough to realize what the parliaments of foreign countries are starting to get - that gay marriage isn’t the end of a great institution, but simply its next evolution. Yet that seems to be happening in this country at about the same pace that blacks were given equal access to schools and restaurants, and perhaps for very similar reasons - although a particular state or federal legislator might not have a problem with gay marriage, the gay constituency in any particular area (with the exception of perhaps San Francisco and D.C.) is going to be small in percentage, and certainly smaller than needed to get re-elected. Gay politics are not majoritarian politics. In the early part of the 20th century, black politics were not majoritarian politics, either. Legislatures work hard for the people, and can get do a lot of great work, but when doing what is ethically correct intersects with going against the grain of the majority, well, legislatures tend to be a little chicken, and for good reason - it’s hard to find a guy or gal who thinks that getting voted out for a noble cause is worth more than sticking in there, getting re-elected, and trying to change things slowly over time.

Changing things slowly over time sounds like a good idea, in theory, but what do you tell the gay person who wants to get married, start a family, be able to visit his/her partner in the hospital, leave his partner his estate if he dies intestate, etc. while the legislature is slowly changing things over time? “Sorry, buddy, it’s just not the right time for you?” The struggle between individual minority rights and majority rule has always been that the minority is put in the position of waiting until the majority is willing to be more inclusive. If you’re part of the minority who’s waiting around for the majority to get the right idea, well, it kind of sucks. It’s hard to be told to just wait a little longer to buy that ring or ride in the front of the bus or live one day without your lifestyle being mentioned on at least one political program.

That has been one place that courts have always stepped in throughout our history - to protect the minority, whether they be gay, black, Whigs, Communists, or Japanese-Americans, if the majority oversteps the boundaries of the Constitution. The problem arises, of course, in interpreting a document that people presume to be all-knowing and insightful, but takes up less space than a fancy dining napkin. The Constitution is a wonderful document, but it is not an instruction manual.

Moreover, the problem is that legislatures are created to deal with the population at large, while courts must decide the case of the individuals before them. Legislatures make decisions based no what most people want, or what they think most people want; courts make a decision about what the individual before is alleging, and whether such a claim is constitutionally supported. Legislatures and courts, therefore, work in vastly different ways and have wholly different considerations. But that’s what works about our system of checks and balances - the legislature has the right to pass a bill based on majoritarian needs, but the courts get to assess whether that bill unfairly burdens certain individuals that may not have been adequately considered by the majority.

I think the gay marriage movement has made the mistake of concentrating too much on the courts. Desegregation happened because the executive branch and the legislative branch backed up Brown v. Board of Education. Right now, there’s not a lot of legislative and executive support for some of the recent pro-gay marriage decisions. And I think that’s where the gay marriage movement has to go - appeals to the legislature and executive. But I can certainly understand the plight of the individual who says “enough is enough” and sues for his/her right to be treated equally. And though there has been backlash from the decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, legalizing gay marriage, the fact that at least one state in this country has gay marriage and hasn’t gone to hell in a handbasket is a nice example to show to other states’ legislatures - “See, the entire state won’t self-immolate and burn in a fiery pit for all of eternity if you do this.”

Calvin & Hobbes: The Real Story

Or, the funniest thing I've seen all week...

South Africa - 1; Roman Catholic Church - Negative 666

South Africa is now the fifth country in the world to legalize same-sex marriage, following in the footsteps of the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, and Canada. It’s so nice to see the rest of the world, including a country that had legalized racial discrimination during my lifetime, kicking the United States’ ass when it comes to protecting citizens’ equal rights.

In less exciting news, the Roman Catholic Church (along with those crazy Baptists and Presbyterians) is cracking down on those within their ranks that might see gay behavior as anything less than sinful. America's Roman Catholic bishops recently declared that same-sex attractions are "disordered." Because, you know, after the Crusades and the Inquisition, what Roman Catholic bishops say should be given a lot of weight.

Quote of the Day

"We're here, there, not here, not there, swirling like specks of dust, claiming for ourselves the rights of the universe. Being important, being nothing, being caught in lives of our own making that we never wanted. Breaking out, trying again, wondering why the past comes with us, wondering how to talk about the past at all."

Jeanette Winterson "Lighthousekeeping"

Mid-Flight Boredom

No matter how many times I play my computer at chess, it kicks my butt every single time. I prefer the good 'ol Chessmaster 3000, when you could set it on the "novice" level (aka the computer plays like a drunken sailor who's only vaguely familiar with how to move a knight), thereby assuring yourself of a victory now and then. On my Mac, I only have two settings, "computer plays stronger," in which my assortment of royal pseudo-wooden pieces are massacred in the space of ten moves, and "computer plays faster," in which I last maybe 15 to 20 moves. I am still trying to find my inner prodigy, and it ain't Bobby Fisher.

In more positive news, my Mac's dictionary has the words "snarky," "snark," "snarkiest," "fuckwit," "ass bandit," "bitch-slap," "wanker," and "wonky" in it. Such are the electronic joys that I discovery when I'm bored on a night flight to Austin.

Zombie Sunday

There are certain things you should not do on a mere two hours' sleep.

(a) Laundry - lest you wash your clothes with your Burt's Bees lip balm, thereby effectively making your jeans smell pepperminty fresh;

(b) Working Out - lest your body decides to say, "Fuck this!" and thinks about passing out and throwing up at the same time. I have managed to avoid that combination of activities for 29 years now - I really don't want my first time to be all over the bench press in my shi-shi gym.

Where Disappointment and Regret Collide

First and foremost, I would like to congratulate my home state of Arizona for being the only state in this election that did NOT pass the same-sex marriage ban. I’m proud of you, baby! Finally making bollo ties and aquamarine shirts look good! (Unlike Colorado, who not only passed a same-sex marriage ban, but struck down a domestic partnership law. I hope at the next Colorado rodeo, all the bulls line up, tie a rope around all of your testicles and ride you, Coloradans.)

I was also excited that the Democrats took back the House (and perhaps the Senate), though I was underwhelmed to see the rise of the socially conservative Democrat in this election period. I probably agree with Lincoln Chaffee (former Senator - RI) a heck of a lot more than Brad Ellsworth (new House member from Indiana). What party does a girl have to sign up for to get the socially liberal, yet fiscally conservative candidate?

In less inspiring news, I’m at day 13 post-breakup (but who’s counting) and have now lost 7 pounds in that time period. It’s a toss up between best diet I’ve ever gone on and cruel and unusual punishment to my body. But what is there to do? Food has lost its appeal and it makes me sick to eat it, anyway. I feel like I’ve become an after school special for anorexia.

There’s really nothing more heartbreaking than realizing your own part in a relationship’s death. That perhaps you could have saved the relationship long enough for it to work out had you only been able to do this thing or that behavior. It doesn’t even seem to matter much whether you couldn’t bring yourself to do this or that because its not in your permanent psychological makeup or because you simply lack emotional maturity and depth. Either way, it plays with your head and makes you wonder why you haven’t learned more in your 29 years on this earth. It seems like you should have. In my case, I found most everything I wanted in one person and I was so very scared that I would lose it, that I crushed her with the weight of my expectations. In the end, my own fears led to the very thing I was most afraid of - pushing her away. And now there’s nothing there. No relationship. No friendship. Just a lot of sleepless nights where disappointment and regret collide. (Yes, that’s a reference to a great Death Cab for Cutie song - “Title and Registration.”) And the painful realization that despite the fact that I’d cut off a body part to have her back, I can’t give her what she needs right now. I just don’t have it in me for some reason. Heartbreaking.