I only occasionally check the Kernel… only when I am very, very bored, but one of my campus talk-to’s told me about this, and I just had to face-palm.  I mean, seriously.  It amazes me how stupid people are.  Since when does your belief Christianity define how a country without a state religion should be run?  But ah, well.  Of course this dude is afraid of transgendered and transexual people being given “special rights”… it’d challenge the monopoly on special rights that Christian[-variant]s have enjoyed since Day One of American History.

Speaking of transgender issues, November 20th is Transgender Day of Rememberance.  An email was sent through the OUTsource circuit with names, CODs, and their dates, with a link to the case of Duanna Johnson. Reading about her attitude, pride, and defiance against the local po-po made me smile… but of course bit at my sides to know that such wit and strength was wasted, stolen, and destroyed for no good reason.  That I have friends that could meet the same fate for the same reasons absolutely terrifies me… it makes me sick to the heart and head to know I live in a world where people I love are in such danger…

Last on my big gay agenda: HOLY SHIT I NEED TO WRITE MY SW PAPER.  Due first thing in the morning.  I suppose, with all this, I should be able to write easily on why the GLBT community needs advocates in the field of Social Work, but ease isn’t as much an issue as time.  I can’t even start on that til I whip out my German homework, which is due tonight at midnight.  There isn’t enough coffee in the world to save me.

Three more days to plow through before my flight out to Tamparrrrgh… two more class days.  Once I get this paper done, it’ll be a breeze.  A breeeeze right into Kev’s warm, strong, loving and very nommable arms.  Arms and hands and smile and gaze and LEIJFLIJGLEIRIEWK!!!1  I start thinking like that, and three small days seem like three months of time between.  Hurry hurry.  I mean, after I get to sleep tonight, hurry.  I don’t mind having the time to wait while I need it to do class-things, hah.
Mmmm… ahhhh.  AAAHHH!!

Good news is that I’m only really missing one lecture next week, since everyone else pretty much decided to cancel classes on Monday and Tuesday.  German still meets, but it’s a “fun day” where Lissi has decided to have a Q&A and teach everyone to curse in German.  On the one hand, I’m glad I’m not missing testable lecture.  On the other, GODFUCKINGDAMMIT that’s what I wanted to know most!! XD

Raise yo hanz if you’re claiming your free Starbucks tomorrow.  Hells yes!  Well, maybe.  One of the disadvantages of living in rural hell is the lack of a Starbucks, so claiming my deal would require a trip to Paris at the very least.  And I might just do it.  Free caffeine, I mean.  But let’s not forget WHY there’s free coffee in the first place.  Looks like a done deal, but upsets have happened before… I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

Between voting and probable coffee-slurping, I have two main obj… no, three.  Three main objectives.  First, read my ecology books for the exam Thursday.  Second, keep up the good progress on NaNoWriMo (oh yes, there is progress.  I’m impressed with myself!)  Third, get back to Twilight.  I finished the first book yesterday evening, and stayed up late chewing through the first bit of New Moon.  Why I waited so long to start on this, I don’t know.  I have a habit of ignoring hype until it’s gotten to be “old news”.

On NaNo, progress has been better than I expected so far.  I dragged up my old notes, some old “quotes” I’d think every now and again, working them in to scenes… I found and old letter I wrote long ago and realized it definitely had a place (accidental artistry!), so I broke it up, filed it down, polished it up, and it’s on the sidelines, waiting for its chance to be introduced.  Actually… that’s how I’m writing the whole thing.  Writing quips, scenes, full ideas in pieces and parts, which will be arranged and fused later.  Why I never thought of this approach before, I dunno… it only made sense in my mind now, though.  One of my main struggles before was the linear fashion in which I wanted to write… beginning to end, with maybe some second-thought embellishments later.  But this way I stumbled on all frantically seems to work so far.

I’m toying with the idea of having cameos from my more ‘celestial’ of friends.  We’ll see.  I don’t think this story is going to be what I originally planned, but it’ll be what it’ll be.

And now, ladies and gents, we present to you, the Religious Right’s finest corn-fed hick, Tracy Kerlee!:

ETA: Oh, snap!  They took it down.  Conspiracy!  CONSPIRACY!
Sorry if you missed it, folks.  Especially sorry that she still exists, somewhere in the wilds of Virginia…

Been milling over some things, and listening to other people, and for once, I actually have something to say in relation to the political arena.  Not that I’m political myself — to be honest, I couldn’t give a rats ass about all these cheats and liars.  But there are a lot of ways in which I am just bumfuddled.

Point A… hai doodz, the economy was a problem long before WaMu took it up the ass.  We’ve been saying it for ages, and what did you fellas up on Capitol Hill do?  Basically, told us we’re all insanely paranoid and there’s nothing wrong.  “Recession?  What recession?  Stop talking like you know anything and go back to studying your navels.”  Which I found mildly annoying.  Then everyone else starting catching on, and I’m wondering what took them so long to figure it out.  And now, it’s an overnight “crisis”.  Now it’s finally being taken seriously (and taken as if it’s all their idea, and we said nothing while we were suffering down on “main street”).  And I find this highly fucking offensive.

And what got us here?  The government’s unwillingness to discuss these topics openly… the idea that if you ignore a problem, it will go away.  Which brings me to point two: McCain’s ribbing Obama about open-ended talks with other world leaders that may have policies that we find unsavory.  Question, McCain: How is it that refusing to talk to someone until they agree to our terms encourage them to agree to our terms?  How are we supposed to work things out unless we talk openly?  The “my way or the highway” does not work.  “Surrender or we’ll fuck you up” does not work.  On a micro level, taking a small-scale hostage situation into consideration, that approach is a fine way to come up with a handful of dead hostages.  On the macro level where world-powers with nuclear-powers are concerned, well, you get the picture.  Yet if we make the effort to come face to face and discuss the matters at hand as real people, with flesh and breath rather than faceless demands in confusing documents, you come to better understandings.  Again, on a micro level, evidenced with my online/offline experiences with people.  It’s much easier to argue your point, and much harder to be cocky when you’re dealing with an actual person rather than faceless ideas.  Does that work in world politics… well, I’m not sure, but I do have the crazy idea that politicians are human, and it works on humans.

As far as open-talks giving the impression that we agree with opposing viewpoints… I still don’t see where that idea comes from.  Sorry, it’s just ridiculous to me.  Someone explain how diplomacy is the same thing as saying “dude, I so agree with you”, eh?  I don’t know about you guys, but I know there have been many times where I’ve had to sit down with people I did not agree with at all just for the sake of getting their side of the story, calming them down, and hoping to find some sort of resolve that would, at least temporarily, bring some peace on both sides of the fence.  I’d say most of us have done that sort of thing.  It’s not a bad strategy… and in some cases, it’s the only strategy.  You have to be willing to grit your teeth, swallow the bile, and be civil.

There’s also the energy crisis issue.  Energy independence, ra!  Which I agree with.  Something has to be done about that.  I, for one, would love to see shitloads of windmills thrown up around the country.  We’ve got us some real wind-tunnels, peeps.  Stand out by the POT on campus and you’d know what I’m on about.  Solar energy?  Good, let’s go for it.  Ethanol… retarded and inefficient, seeing as it takes 1.3 gallons of petrol to make 1 gallon of ethanol.  Scrap that idea right out, folks.  Offshore drilling?  Sure, if you want to wait til 2030 to see any benefit from it, if we see any at all (consdering that oil could easily be sold overseas), and fuck an already volatile marine ecosystem.  Nook-yoo-lar… right, call me old fashioned, but I’m not keen on the idea that McCain seems to be pushing.  Not that the idea of nuclear itself is bad.  It is cleaner and safer if done correctly, but pardon me if I refuse to believe it will be done correctly, with all the Homer Simpsons that really DO exist in the good ol’ US of A.  Besides that, since we are still a “Nevar Forget!” nation, imagine the destruction that could be done if we had 45 more targets on our backs.  If someone can plane the Pentagon, there’s no reason they can’t take out some power plants.   Yeah?  Yeah.  Amazing how so many people say “nevar forget!1!” and yet… they do.
Then again, if they really gave a shit about targets on home ground, the gubment might stop cramming their thumbs up their asses about the accident-waiting-to-happen in Richmond.

FInally, I’ve heard it so many, many times already… that McCain didn’t look at Obama even once.  Which I understand, considering his limited mobility.  I doubt severely that it was personal… dude just got fucked when he was a POW.  Although it does make me think of how great it would be to see McCain cut loose and do the robot.  It’d be hi-larious.  You know it would.

Now, now now now… we have the VP debate to look forward to.  I, for one, will love the chance to see Palin go all, “duhhhhh, whut?” again.  She wouldn’t be so bad if she would just stop talking.  Just stand there and look pretty, Tits… c’mon.  That’s really all you’re good for here.

Oi.  After… what, four hours of stressin’, I think, I finally have the article assignment finished.  It’s not as if I intended to leave it to the last second… no, I wanted to do it this weekend.  Unfortunately, this weekend was filled with other things such as German, emo, and making falls which COULD have been put back to a later date, but you know what?  I wanted the damn things to be done, so I did it.  Back to the topic, though, neither is it that the assignment was particularly difficult… the only problem was that it just started off badly.  My first area of research turned up nothing… by which I mean, turned up useless articles which I did not find out were utterly useless until I sat down four hours ago.  So I had to start over again with a new topic, with major printer problems (which just fucked me off after having so many Acrobat problems earlier today with the lappy).  And on top of all the technical problems was the fact that I am more than likely coming down with the creeping crud that has been going around campus AND home.  I’m tired, dizzy, my throat burns, and my head isn’t too nice, either…

So yes, I was (and am) quite a mess.  Thank holy lovin’ fuck I can come home and stress and panic and cry and wail and get nice, calm, caring support from the Kevbot.  I went from freaking out to the point of nearly flipping into a nervous breakdown to being on the ball (mostly, save for my goldfish-like attention span).  Gotta love that.  Gotta gotta.  Gotta love random flwrs, too.  If there was ever a day I needed lillies, today was that very day.  It may be by accident that he always hits it when I REALLY need the cheering up… but I’m going to say it’s intuition anyway ;P

But all is done, and I am finally satisfied.  I can now devote tomorrow’s break to catching up on Micro.  Should also probably see if there’s still a desk position available at the OUTsource… I need to get those four hours in… and desking would do it.

Other news?  I got a wicked bitchin’ new monitor… a nice 22″ widescreen dealie.  My original plan was to get two 17″s for a dual set-up, but meh.  This wound up being cheaper.  And it is fantastic!  Also fantastic, my ThinkGeek order came in the mail today.  I know have CAMP SPOONFORKNIFE.  Why the fuck do I need that, you might ask?  Cos of tuna, duh.  Also nabbed the Ladies’ T-Qualizer, OMG PWNIES, and a SpazzStick.  Party!