Senator McConnell says Judge Sotomayor lacks the objectivity he wants in a justice. He says he is worried that her opinions would shape rulings from the bench. Senator McConnell lacked objectivity by bashing her record before she got to the hearings.
How does he get away with hypocrisy. Do GOP lawmakers need to take the Hypocritic Oath in order to serve?
A woman who looks like a retired anthropology professor — unkempt gray hair, chino shorts, fanny pack and birkenstocks — had cobalt blue nail polish on her toes.
A man who was trying to look like Mick Jagger, Keith Richardson and Rod Stewart — impossibly skinny with the UnDead look, with form fitting bizarro clothes and lots of necklaces and sunken eyes — failed miserably.
Ok, I hate flying more than ever. Before blogging, I gave the following report via blackberry to my friends while I was in the San Franscisco airport some months ago. It was a turning point in my view of air travel as a pleasant means of getting from point A to B.
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There is a woman walking around with a pillow. A full sized pillow with a case that has a pattern of small flowers. She is our age. I see her point but I am not wearing my jammies and fluffy slippers.
Did you know that wheel chairs come in LARGE now? I wish that I could read a book but I am too uptight and stressed. All I want to do is get on that plane and drift off to sleep.
Oooohh, give me a seat boys, come free my soul, I wanna get lost in my reclining seat and drift away. Music fades.
There is a screaming child. A screaming child on a red eye. Excuse me while I throw myself onto the tarmac.
I am freezing in this airport and other people are wearing thin clothes. I know it’s California, but it was cold and wet today in San Francisco.
I have to go to the bathroom but it has probably gotten too much use today and maybe I’ll wait and be the first on the plane to use. It is a delicate balance.
Should I ask the man across the seats why he picks his nose so blatantly and then rubs his discovery on his pants? Maybe I can borrow his books. Noooooo.
Baby’s cryin’ and my patience is all gone…. Oh, S. Frisco. (As in JT’s “Mexico”).
So, my brother-in-law had an art show in the Hamptons. I am the designated driver for three generations (we are all born and bred city dwellers). I rented a Ford Expedition and I feel like Shirley Partridge carting everyone around. (That reference will really separate the under-40-year-olds from their elders.)
My brother-in-law has been out for a few days installing the show, so my sister (his wife) was part of the caravan.
Three generations, ranging in age from 7 to 88, in one car. Even coordinating rest room stops with each generation’s different “plumbing issues” would have been epic enough. Three people each had a portion of the directions. Sounds like a Dick Cheney staff meeting. No, it was the quintessential “don’t-worry-about-it-I-know-what-I’m-doin’,” but I was the driver and I just followed orders. My dad got us over the 59th Street bridge, my partner got us to East Hampton and my sister had the address of the gallery. That was my sister’s stated rationale for being in the navigator’s seat — the gallery address — but, in truth, my partner was the true navigator although she was relegated to the back with child and father-in-law, G-d bless her.
My sister and I played a game of who caught Dad’s annoying behaviors first because we didn’t have cousin Bernie’s behavior against which to bet. I think we came out about even although at any point one of us was a few thousand dollars ahead.
I think my sister’s purpose in sitting in front with me (other than those already surmised) was to watch the speedometer and keep an eye on the “crazy drivers” as my mother called them. At one point when I accelerated, I wasn’t sure if my sister was putting her foot to the floor as if to compel me to put my foot on the brake. Driving with Mom, you could feel her right foot slamming on the passenger side floor. (I must ask my sister about this.)
Anyway, we arrived at the show after slogging through Route 27 traffic. My father’s interest lasted about 7 minutes. My son’s lasted a good bit longer, I am proud to say. But a 3.5 hour car ride for 7 minutes of viewing, lunch and then a jitney ride home is epic, especially an 88 year-old.
Artistes don’t sell their work in their lifetimes. Since I love my brother-in-law and want him to be financially successful AND live a long time, I set about giving the hard sell to anyone who came into the gallery. After a few hours of trying to hard-sell in this economy, I joined my partner and son with my partner’s extended family, for an epic afternoon and evening. I still need to process that experience before writing.
Civilization is rounding the drain. Here is my experience from last week.
The hem of my pants fell so I was forced to staple the hem to the lining of my pants. So I am wearing a custom made jacket and pants but I am really put together by spit, scotch tape and now staples. As goes the economy, there go I.
Ooh, some nice, loud gum cracking and it is only 79th Street.
If only you knew the conversations on this bus. You’d be surprised how many kinds of macaroni and cheese a person can have in her pantry. The kind obviously matters. Apparently, one could be in the mood for let’s say Swanson’s but not Chef Boyardee. The third option was to go to the store, not for something entirely different but for a different kind of mac’n’cheese. I didn’t hear the outcome of this woman’s conversation with “Johnny” but I’ll try to remember to watch local news to find out what happened.
A young man on the bus is presenting paranoid obsessive behavior. No ability to modulate his voice. Stops in mid-sentence. Keeps talking about all of the records he is keeping about his boss’s refusal to acknowledge overtime and saying that his boss would rather kill him than pay him for five hours of overtime work. He is well-kempt and his keeps mentioning that his mom wants him to come home and live with her, so he is not alone (and he also has his not-so-sane friend who is listening to him). It is too sad for words.
Even I can’t make snide remarks. There but for the grace of G-d go I.
There is a (former) banker-type committing the inexcusable crime of cell-yell which crime is only further aggravated by the subject matter: his brother’s court date (and I don’t mean for a squash game).
There is what appears at first impression to be a couple (because they are conversing and have near identical shades of tan). But as I am rocked to and fro by the potholes, I hear the following snippet: “where did you get YOUR tan” asked he. “Central Park and a salon near me” said she. “Ahhhh” said he as our erstwhile Romeo moved slightly away to avoid further conversation.
The bus clears out somewhat at 86th Street and reveals a man with the most abominable toupe that hangs down to the tip of his oversized sun glasses. Imagine Peter Sellers (of the Pink Panther movies) in a schtick about the hapless undercover spy or a character in those early 1970s movies about the swinging singles apartment buildings.
Two men get on the bus through the back door at 96th Street. One fits the stereotype of a fare cheat; the other seems solidly middle class. If I were truly my mother’s daughter, I would sit next to each of them in turn and explain the importance of paying one’s fare.
I then came to a frightening conclusion — the mildewy smell that is mixed with pungent body odor (which has had time to ferment no doubt) is in the fabric of my seat and back rest, does NOT belong to the ever so grim man next to me. Just like the Seinfeld episode, the smell will follow me even after I disrobe. I may have to have my body dry-cleaned. It is almost sport to see how many times you can travel on a bus before you get tagged with someone else’s gross body odor. The thrill of the challenge and the agony of defeat.
Time to get off the bus.
I ducked into a place to have a seni-leisurely drink before going home because these days the subway trip is not sufficient to decompress. I figured I woul return emails from friends and tweet or draft blog entries. A gay man who was at the bar was pointedly seeking my attention by talking in my directionabout the differences in picture quality between the two TVs above the bar. Since he was talking in my direction, I looked up. He immediately slid closer to talk with me.
He kept chatting along, moving from one subject to another. But it was an insane topic-hopping. He is just an older man without family in New York whose friends have died or are enfeebled and he probably didn’t talk to anyone that day before he caught my eye. I listened and engaged in conversation for about one-half hour. Then I had to go home to my family. And I realized what a gift that is: having someone waiting at home.
I think I’ll call my dad now.
This weekend, there is a show of four live, breathing, artists in the Hamptons. These are real people who have day jobs and still manage to create art.
Everyone who is going to the beach, remember, it may rain. Take down this information:
Ashawagh Hall, 780 Springs Fireplace Road, East Hampton, NY., Jul 18-19, 10am-6pm . Check out one of the artists, Alan Messer
Click on Alan’s name.
Because we can’t control the world around us, we have to look for ways in which we can reduce the stress.
For me, cleaning and organizing are by far the best stress-reducers. Those who know me remember that I was the consummate slob — even through my post-college years. I was so lazy that, in college, I tried to have my underwear dry-cleaned. The dry cleaner refused, so I had to buy more because doing the laundry was beyond my skill set.
Now mess gives me stress. I have a great coach in organizing in ways that work for me. Check out this website. http://www.GothamOrganizers.com.
Let Obama clean up the national messes. I just concentrate on reducing piles of paper and cleaning domestic messes.
An old friend emailed to me, “reading your blog is like catching up over a coffee because you write exactly as you speak.” I shared that with another friend who understood exactly. These are friends regardless of the time that passes between visits. I urged both friends to guest-blog so that I “can catch up over coffee” with them. So far, one friend is reviving her blog and I have linked it.
Lindsay Graham said at the start of the Sotomayor hearing that unless she had a meltdown, she was getting confirmed. And, further, he didn’t think she was going to have a meltdown. So why did we have to waste all that time? Just to allow us to showcase to the world the endemic and virulent prejudice that pulses below the surface of our society, and worse, at the highest levels of government?
Gee, Senator Graham, thanks for the reminder.