How can anyone keep up? Here comes Lent

How anyone has the time to really keep up a blog isn't clear to me, unless they really want to be a writer/commentator.  There are so, so many issues in our families, towns, states, countries, the world, the universe that it is impossible to stay on top of it all.

Lent is coming right up.  It is a chance to reflect and try, very, very hard to not be distracted by the unnecessary.  Yesterday afternoon my husband and I were talking at lunch.  We were discussing current events and he asked, "What is important in life?"  (We were discussing big philosophical questions over tacos.)  Without a lot of thinking, what popped out of my mouth was, "Love yourself, love your family, love your neighbor, take care of the animals and the plants, the earth and the sea.  That pretty much says it all for me."  You can decide for yourself what is important if you go back to those precepts.

Peace.

Where Have I Been?....

Once again life got away from me.  This blog is just an electronic diary that someone may stumble on via the ether now (or later) rather than by digging through all my old books when I'm dead and gone.  I suppose most people blog or write a diary for themselves, not really for anyone else.  It is the one place there isn't any editor/English teacher looking over your work and you can say pretty much whatever you like.

The last month has been mostly working on getting the opera Hansel & Gretel up for Illumination Opera.  It took all my waking hours, but now it is over and there is more music to learn, Christmas is almost upon us (Lessons and Carols Sunday - my favorite service of the year), and all the dreary house chores are still waiting for me.  How I wish with all my heart that I was like Martha Stewart.  I have suddenly realized that I have such a great imagination that I have imagined how nice the house could be so well that I don't feel like I actually have to DO anything to make it happen.  It is pretty daunting anyway when you have to do it all yourself.

There are so many things to write about seriously, but I just can't today.  Here's what I want to know now:  Why is Jennifer Aniston in our face everywhere, everyday?  She must have the greatest publicist on the face of the planet.  I have not seen any indication this woman has any real talent at all.  Other than having snagged Brad Pitt and having had the incredible good fortune to be on Friends, she has done nothing of merit that I know of, but she continues to be thrust in our faces.  I sure wish the little boy in the Emperor's New Clothes would show up and point out (I started to say that she was naked, but apparently she just posed nude for GQ, so that would be pointing out the obvious) how little talent she has compared with thousands of other actresses. After World Peace, Ending Famine, etc., my wish would be for Editors all over the world to come to their senses in the new year and stop featuring JA or anyone else whose fame is just being famous.  Don't tell me about how JA has become a great humanitarian because there are lots of people who have been walking the walk for a very long time who are more deserving of press.  

That's my rant for the day.

Onward and upward

History Has Been Made

I am so proud of my country and couldn't let this historic night pass without saying how much I wish my father could have seen Barack Obama become President of the United States.  He would have been so happy.  We would have been dancing around our living room.  

Now we have to get to work. 

God bless America.

Hair On Fire

The NYT reports today that the President says privately it is a darn good thing he is the decider during this economic crisis.  This from a man who ran his own oil business into the ground and I don't mean he drilled with success, just the opposite.  According to the story today, Bush had to be told that he needs to reassure people that everything is going to be o.k.  Imagine the POTUS needing to be told he needs to be a LEADER.   In a truly bizarre twist, the fact that he hasn't may be a sign that he actually KNOWS that everything is not going to be o.k.  

All the people we have been told were the great financial gurus are spinning like dervishes. Everyone's hair is on fire and no one knows where it will all end.  So why should the Decider? 

We were in California last week.  Boy, do I miss my home state, even after 33 years of living in the east.  My daughter-in-law said there is a German word for the place where your heart is...Heimat.  That place is definitely the Bay Area. If the world is going to hell in a hand-basket, I think the best place to be would be there.  You can actually sit with the windows open this time of year, no air-co, no heating.  Sunshine, sunshine, sunshine...did I mention sunshine?

Anyway, back to financial inferno.  On the plane back home the movie was "Kit Kittredge".  A kid's movie set in the Depression.  It is all about home foreclosures.  Have we gone back to the future?  Are we going to have to start taking in roomers (we do have three empty of people bedrooms)?  I have low-grade fear.  You know that thing that is always there, even when you aren't thinking about it.   I have always said that if we go down, everyone will be going down with us.  We got out of the market and moved to cash just before the first crash.  Not because I'm brilliant, but because my husband is.  He also cashed in so we could purchase our first new car in more than 10 years (we drive cars until they drop and I have bought junkers to drive in the snow) literally a month before the crash.  If he hadn't done that, we wouldn't be driving that Highlander Hybrid that's in the driveway.  We are very, very, very lucky.  I fear for us, but not as much as for those living on the edge.  When the "Decider" made his first calming speech a couple of weeks or so ago, who did he blame for the troubles?  Here are his words:

"Easy credit - combined with the faulty assumption that home values would continue to rise - led to excesses and bad decisions...Many borrowers took out loans larger than they could afford assuming that they could sell or refinance their homes at a higher price later on."

I don't deny that this is part of the problem, but I don't think the collapse is because of people trying to buy homes or flip houses. I'm still trying to figure out how the banks can give you only 2% interest on savings, charge 24% interest on your credit cards and lose money.  Somebody has some splainin to do. 

My last comment is about an interview with a broker on NPR.  In essence he said he wished Paulson would just shut up because everytime he made a comment the market went down.  I'm not waiting for any comments from the Decider.  The election can't come too soon...VOTE OBAMA-BIDEN.

One Debate Down...

Tonight was the first debate.  I'm sorry to say that I am disappointed in my candidate.  He let McCain interrupt him and he also kept saying that he agreed with McCain.  The Republicans will certainly use that to their advantage.  All in all it lacked energy and was, frankly, boring.

The most exciting part of the night came after the debate when Biden did the follow up.  He was dynamic, energetic, positive.  And then who spoke on behalf of McCain? Uh, that should have been his running mate, right?  Nope.  She is missing in action, so who stepped in?  Rudolph Giuliani. 

How pathetic.  The Republican VP candidate can't be allowed to speak on her own.  Get this:  a friend told me that given McCain's age, health problems, etc., actuaries say there is a 66% chance Sarah Palin would become President in McCain's first term.  I'm with Jack Cafferty, that does scare the hell out of me.  God help us all.

When will he learn?

Here I am back thinking about Clinton.  Bill, not Hillary.  Would Bill just shut up?  Could he just say nothing, if he can't say anything nice about Obama?  He continues to give aid and comfort to the Republicans that we don't need right now.  Has he forgotten that he was the leader of the Democratic Party?  Has he forgotten that he got us into this mess?  Has he forgotten that the Republicans have used every dirty smear they could think of against him, his wife, and his daughter?  Now is not the time to say anything, and I mean anything, that could possibly be construed as positive about McCain and Palin.  Just STOP calling McCain "my friend."  McCain is most certainly not your friend Bill.  He is an acquaintance, but not a friend.  Those swing voters, you know, the ones who voted for you, are needed now.  Any bit of praise you give to McCain/Palin will be an excuse for those voters to say to themselves, "Well, Bill thinks they're ok."  The First Dude doesn't need your advice, so just keep it to yourself.

  

Spontaneous Patriotism

Last night was the opening of the Metropolitan Opera.  The performance was simulcast in theatres all around the world.  Before the performance began, the evening started with Maestro Levine leading the orchestra playing The Star Spangled Banner.  Here's what happened in Lowell, Massachusetts:  the entire movie theatre audience rose and many sang our national anthem.  I don't know when I have felt more connected to my country.  No one told anyone to stand.  It was spontaneous, by choice, and moving.  No announcer said (like at baseball games), "Please rise for the singing of the national anthem."  I wish just that act of patriotism could be shown on television so people who think those who attend opera are unpatriotic snobs, etc. could see otherwise.  It isn't just country music fans who love our country.

Oh yeah, and Renee Fleming was the diva to end all divas and sang pretty darn well too...