Solidarity in Wisconsin

As you may recall (RECALL, get it?) I took one of my twins to Madison WI for a college visit.  For me the purpose was twofold: 1. to visit the University of Wisconsin and 2. to expressed my solidarity with Wisconsin public workers.  Their next step is to make sure their Supreme Court stays neutral.  The incumbent David Prosser has stated that he'll be a nice complement to Scott Walker.  Way to stay neutral there bud.

Above is the famous State Street.

  While walking this funky avenue I took photos of several business windows:

 

 Above is me, on the Capital grounds.  I talked with several sign-carriers and thanked them for continuing the fight.  One gave me the "SOLIDARITY" arm band I'm wearing.  I wore it proudly for the rest of the day.  We were there on a Sunday/Monday so the large crowds were gone.  Evidently Saturday is action day.

Hawkeye vs Badger

Sunday is our next round of college visits.  Last Fall we took the twins to my alma mater - The University of Iowa. 
This weekend we head to Madison to visit The University of Wisconsin.  Can this Hawkeye survive a trip to Badger-land?

And yes, I'm planning to spend some time with a sign in the capital rotunda.  Sign suggestions?

Let's Play a Game

I say it's time for a game.  Play along!  I want to see your answers.  Copy and paste onto your blog and let me know when you're done.
It's dreary and dull here - I really hate this time of year.  Need some FUN!

1.  Name one book that has really stuck with you.
For me that would be The Education of Little Tree.  I still can't read it without crying.

2. Name one non-family adult who influenced you for the better.
My HS choir director Jim Sexter.  He brought such emotion and spirituality to our music.

3. Name one really great thing about today's teens.
It seems that being gay or straight to them is absolutely NOT an issue.

4. If Barack Obama dropped out of the race today, who should be the Democratic nominee?
I would choose Senator Jim Webb from Virginia, but I guess he's not running for office again.  He's far too sensible to deal with politics anymore.

5. What would YOU do about Libya?
First, I would pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan.  THEN I would consider our actions.  Seriously?  3 wars in 3 different countries???

6. The perfect Spring Vacation would be:
Anywhere warm with a pile of books, lots of drinks of every kind.  Preferably right on the beach.

7. You win $50,000 to spend on your house.  What do you do?
Put a down payment on a house of our own again

8. You win another $50,000 but you have to give it away.  What do you do?
Give it to Habitat for Humanity, because home is everything.

9. Your worst guilty pleasure(s) is:
Twofold: 1. sleeping in.  2. Pepsi or coke over ice.

10. You HAVE to go back to school.  What do you study/earn?
My teaching or school counseling license along with an MA.  In social studies or ESL.

Gack

Been an emotional couple of weeks, and I for one just want the world to hold it and take a deep breath.

My kids and I are utterly exhausted from the Rock-n-Roll Revival production.  This is an amazing show put on every other year.  I'm a volunteer and the twins have big parts.  It's all good, but so time consuming.  On top of that it's been a little wicked at work - with budget cuts looming my job my shrink.

My extended family also seems to be limping.  Two relatives have had some serious health issues.  Also some stupid emotional BS that I won't go into. 

Add to that my sprained ankle after I fell on ice at work.

Then the world at large starts to unravel from it's already tattered state; tsunamis, nuclear meltdowns, union busting, handing over entire towns and cities to corporation, and our never-ending Minnesota winter.  Crazy dictators killing their own people and the threat of yet another American war front.

Can't we all just chill out for a minute?

Goodbye America

I'm just dumbfounded.  America as we've known it is disappearing down the corporate drain.  Michigan is going to hand over entire cities to corporations after dismantling democratically elected governments.  Wisconsin has summarily dismissed workers rights with a brush of the hand. 

Thanks a lot GOP/bagger voters.  Thanks for wrapping up our freedoms and handing them over in a nicely decorated package.  You allowed yourselves to be scared by the FOX bogey-man.  They got you all convinced the liberals were coming to take your guns, you bibles, and put you all in reeducation camps.  They got you all to bungle the words Socialist and Communist because they sounded so darned EVIL.  They got you to see a terrorist in every Democrat you know.

So when we're all working slave hours for slave wages and being harassed by the corporate-owned "police", will you still blame us?  When your weekends have disappeared will you blame Obama?  When your corporate-owned drinking water comes out of the tap in brown chunks, will you rail against Keith Olberman?  When your teenage daughter is ordered to "service" the corporate elite at their next BBQ will you point the finger at Hillary Clinton?  But don't cry when no one comes to help you, because YOU created a world where there are no teachers, no social workers, no city council, no EPA. 

You're going to be begging for a little "Obamacare" when you're sick and in pain but there is no more socialized medicine. Hell there won't even be commercial medicine available to you because you won't be making over $2 per hour.  And there are 100 hungry desperate Americans waiting for you to croak and create a job opening.

But goddammit you sucked me and mine into this hell hole with you.

Missed You

Have you missed me my darlings?

Well I'm right here growing ever fatter by the day.  How can I be this busy and still be putting on pounds like some sedentary sloth?  Pretty soon my  poundage will just seep its way out of the car and slosh/roll its way to my office a good 10 feet ahead of me.  I won't even need clothing because my body features will just meld into a gelatinous life form without any obvious structure.  Except my mouth of course.

And don't you DARE bring up that McGriddle I had for breakfast.  That was a once-every-six-months treat.

The healthy news is that I've almost completely given up pop - or as you  Easterners call it "soda" or "co-cola" to the Southerners.

The strange news is I have a throbbing eyeball.  Know when you get those weird annoying muscle twitches right around your eyelid?  Well evidently I have one deep in my eye socket that's thumping on my eyeball - for real - this can only happen to me.  It's been making my vision in one eye jump to the left with every heartbeat. Doc says it's stress.  He's a genius.  Anyway I told him that my life is a poster story for stress.  So he wrote on his prescription pad "Give Mom a Break" and gave it to me.  It's posted prominently on the frig.

So how is life without my blog posts?  I'd blame it on my wicked schedule, but it really has more to do with sharing a computer with one working husband, two academically inclined teens, and a 6th grader who has found Disney shows online.    The latter I can boot off with nary a second thought, but the first 3 have priority dibs that I have to honor.

So enough about me.  How have you been?