mom placation was ironing by which mens perrypops in a womansuit is the new child mystericating teats that can taint baconated digestive broads plastercasting gnostically from the great gospel wwjh

Dan, he's totally bought into the OMG OBAMA IS A TERRORIST MUSLIM SOCIALIST WHO WAS MAYBE NOT BORN IN THIS COUNTRY thing. I tried to pick some of it apart with, you know, actual FACTS last night, but it's kind of hopeless. I've always kind of known he was a racist, but it was just an entirely disheartening conversation. (Sidenote: he also loves Palin and thinks she will be the first woman president. UH.)

suzy - you're exactly right about what he is doing with his customers; I did not bother to try to explain selection bias to him because at some point what the heck is the point.

Dan, don't bother to run up and say "BOO" to him unless you are not only Black, but also willing to pretend to be a Muslim. That seems like kind of a hard part to play. (Not dogging on your acting skills here... actually I would be thoroughly entertained to see you stop a conversation with him and say, "uh-oh, it's time for me to face Mecca and say some prayers. Back in five!")

I'm honestly to the point where I feel sorry for my Dad more than angry with him. He acknowledges that he's getting his info from only right wing sources, but it's like he's afraid even to think outside that box. It's really kind of unnerving.

due to the conversations i have had with customers in the store, i am only barely guardedly optimistic about tomorrow, so it isn't just your dad hearing what he wants to hear.

maybe it's just that the sort of people who talk to people in stores are all republicans for some odd personality reason, but i'm getting about 75% McCain/Palin from the people around here o_O

Thankfully, for sanity reasons, everyone I work with (minus one person who isn't pushy or obnoxious) is pro-Obama as is most of my entire city. And my family.

But I am still only guardedly optimistic. The past two elections really did me in.

I am always only guardedly optimistic, because I'm naturally not an optimist. But yeah, the last two elections did not help.

Still have to give slightly more credence to pollsters than to what anyone randomly hears in one spot. For example, if you took my nursing program, I think you'd get a 24/2 Obama/McCain split (and one of the two Republicans was wavering). But for all I know mostly liberals are attracted to nursing programs that are set up for people who have already graduated from college!?!

my main point of comfort has been falling back on the "LOL U LIVE IN MN VOTE FOR ALL THE MCCAIN U WANT DUDE" aspect of the electoral college, but i am still nervous.

i have not actually been saying these things aloud. i am very agreeable to the political views of people trying to give me money, at least temporarily.

i am very agreeable to the political views of people trying to give me money, at least temporarily.

^^^ best way to not lose business, obv!

I should also point out that John looks like a stereotypical Republican, and was once thanked for his service in the Marines based on his bumper sticker.

All told, I'd be astonished if MN went to the R column this year - especially after the past 8 years. We haven't voted for an R since Nixon.

SUSA poll of MN has us 49 Obama, 46 McCain; meanwhile every other poll gives O much better margins here.

So..... ?????

As a totally not-related aside, I really don't feel like going to class tonight.

I am always only guardedly optimistic, because I'm naturally not an optimist. But yeah, the last two elections did not help.

this!!!

still cant vote :(

That sucks, sunny. On the other hand, you won't be confronted with a bunch of things that you have no idea how to vote on. (See - bright side to everything!)

(Seriously, I always get to the judges and odd county positions and have no idea where to go with them. I should check more into local politics. SIGH.)

i always vote against local ballot initiates except for schools and transit. my mom gets mad

OK my mom's just been on the phone. She's voting McCain because he has 'earned the job' and is a 'good senator'. Obama is far too inexperienced and obv controlled by the Chicago machine; she argues it's not a race thing but I argue back that she's making him be twice as good for the same job as a man she likes because 'he didn't have to choose the life he led, he didn't have to work'. Note: this is the rich white guy version of that Chris Rock sketch about men going for kudos for meeting basic responsibilities. I say this is the first sign of the Generation Gap since she didn't trust people over 30, and it's an institutionalized race thing on her part.

Then: OMG. She says she's heard O's kids aren't allowed birthday or Christmas presents (from 6-16, neither was she; her parents went Jehovah's Witness) and What Does That Mean? I had not heard this about their kids and doubt it is true, obv. She'd kick the ass of the person who criticized her own dad BTW (he got around it by getting big-ticket family presents) so I said so. Next gambit: are you not concerned with some of the friends he has? I'm all, please dude, I went to Sarah Lawrence - I recall you paid for some of that - so you paid for me to get to know the kids of Black Panthers and Communists, none of whom thought their parents were wrong, exactly. Mom: 'gotta go, customer..."

I have not heard that about Obama's kids either. I saw him trick-or-treating with one of them this weekend! (well, not like with my own eyes but on the news.)

i always vote against local ballot initiates except for schools and transit.

wha? I voted yes on all of them this time.

sometimes they are very important! like when i was still registered in sc and there was one to abolish tax on 'luxury items' like boats and cars over a certain $amount (high). because that makes sense. let rich people skip out on taxes for their 4th car...

My mom spent a full five minutes whining about those TorT photos because they added grist to the 'puritanical parent' meme; she had no candy bag therefore that's on the ban list too. Says the woman who without fail made me give 50 per cent of mine to UNICEF. DUDE WELCOME TO THE LIFE OF A KID WITH SECRET SERVICE PROTECTION.

It kind of depends on the referendum for me.

xp suzy, it seems like your Mom has been looking for an excuse to vote for McCain for a long time - but I'm only basing that on your posts, and I probably haven't read all of them.

(tbh, I didn't think McCain was that bad until he picked Palin, but since then I've been disgusted/appalled with him almost every day)

She claims to consider him the least worst option; when Obama was winning early primaries she loved the message it sent to the world about the US also he was beating HRC; once he was onto a winner she suddenly discovered how liberal and inexperienced he was. Her boyf is also a Vietnam vet who had to be told to stop fwds to me of Bill O'Reilly opinions. <- I think that's the real answer there.

Hey, at least she's not all OMG MUSLIM SOCIALIST EVIL VAMPIRE SPY or whatever!

omg rip obama grandma ;_;

I'm swallowing tears over here so not to look like a weirdo. But d*mn.

1 day. *sigh*

Okay, I read that about five or ten minutes ago and have been crying at my desk like an idiot.

Glad I'm not alone in being upset over it, though.

I have been crying for two hours while watching news analysis BBC style. ONE FUCKING DAY. Know how the man must feel; two weeks before I went home for Xmas last year, my dad died. He was supposed to pick me up from the airport two months after all-clear from cancer; heart attack got him when he was shoveling snow instead.

xpost to SRC, no, my mom is not a bizarre conspiracy theorist because she's got enough to go on with, saluting the magic of the GOP/Fox Talking Point. She says them verbatim and is completely oblivious to the idea that I might have figured that out. Maximum LOLs when she asked me what I'd do if I had 'friends' like O's and I said not so much, and I probably did have friends 'like that', being as I was friendly with granddaughter of electrocuted Reds and/or daughter of prominent Black Panther at college alone. She paid for this expansion of life experience, naturally and was all 'customers, gotta go!'

it is horribly sad, i've been crying too.

and suzy, i'm very sorry you lost your father last year, i didn't know.

It's sad, but what's really sad is my thoughts right now re. dad are less of the RIP and more of the 'oh shit, one less vote against Michelle Bachmann.'

I'm really sorry, Suzy.

reading 'oh shit, one less vote' cheered me up a bit.

i am about to throw my computer out the window because it does NOT like Word, and yet my homework requires it. glitchy. stupid form. i hate forms you have to fill in in word because they never let you do what you want. asldkagjasl;dgkj.

suzy, I think your father would appreciate the way you remember him.

tza, I am so sick of computers+homework that it is not even funny.

Hey, it's Election Day over there on the East Coast!

it is!! i ahve to somehow hope that my polling place line is not horrendously long so i can get to work on time. this sucks because i wanted to attempt to go in a little late so i could stop by jw/3xc3pt0r's show before work, but i got a text asking if i could try to be in as close to 10 as possible. damn jobs ruining my election fun!!!

Since the kids will be in school, I'm going to go vote sometime during the day - when I suspect (hope?) the lines will be shortest. I'll take the kids to vote after school in the KidVote thing (apparently they both can vote - J. might need a bit of help with the reading part...).

Grrr, we never had KidVote. What is wrong with our parents' generation?

(do not answer)

I'm glad you didn't want an answer, because wow, I don't have that kind of time!

Alex and J are pretty psyched about voting. It should be fun for them. We're ordering pizza for dinner tomorrow night and I'll probably let Alex stay up to watch some of the early returns. (Actually, I let him watch the first half hour of one of the debates, and he was REALLY ready to go to bed after that. I don't know that election returns are quite as soporific to a 10 year old, though.)

I'm going off to sleep, too. Happy Election Day, guys. :)

i remember in elementary school, we had a fun project to color the states on the us map blue or red as each one was called. it was totally a fun way to watch the returns - maybe he'd like to do that!

also: geography lesson (maybe he is more advanced than this, i forget how old he is!)

i hate forms you have to fill in in word

Big word. I always have to beat my clients about the head to convert stupid Word forms to PDF.

Man I've been so stressed and beaten down with this new job. It's not the material of it necessarily. Working with student radio, tv, newspaper and a humor magazine is WAY more interesting than working with dumb departments like human resources. But this department is so behind web-wise and the workload and expectations that were handed to me are insane.

It occurred to me on the walk in that I've only been in this job TWO MONTHS and have gotten TWO BRAND NEW SITES up in that time. I seriously had no idea that I've been in place for that short amount of time and amazed myself to realize what's been accomplished. I'm going to be sure to point that out to my boss and highlight that, hey, those timelines are not normal by any stretch.

Family has been killing me too. Besides my father getting out of prison last week my aunt (who's like a mom) is in the middle of a nasty divorce and is sitting in her house without electricity b/c she can't afford her house payment and bills on her own. My brother and his family have had their water and lights turned off this week. And my stepfather (who is a union electrician) lost his job last month. The fourth time this has happened this year. Their only other income is my mother's disability.

Anyway, I've been funneling so much of my money to them but still feel helpless and depressed b/c it doesn't seem to help much.

argh. Sorry for the massive dump.

oh susan, i'm so sorry!! it's admirable that you accomplish so much while dealing with all of this!

JUST VOTED BITCHES

not sure when i was last up this early, the world is very bright and sharply defined

am now enjoying a "good on you voterguy" breakfast feast from the AWESOME ANCIENT BAKERY in my neighborhood. today is going to be a good day.

Thank you, TZA.

I've been losing it the past couple of weeks and just need to take deep breaths. It's just hard b/c I've been unhappy with my career for awhile and have been trying to plan a change. But I feel the need to ensure a good money flow. I really want to build my savings and investments up so I can start college funds for my four nephew/nieces. It's just hard to plan for the future when you're trying to keep your own and everyone else's head above water.

I've been told repeatedly that I shouldn't feel compelled to give my family money but it's really hard to know they're suffering while I have a positive balance in my account.

well luckily coworker txted and said she is going to be in close to 10 bc i slept through alarms (yes, plural!) again!! of all days! woke up at 9 instead of 6:45!!! asl;dkgj. hope my line is not horrendous.

i have seriously ceased functioning well at this point and i need to jump start or something, but i don't know how, or when i will have the time.