awesome new word i just learned: Brailler (machine to write Braille) and also the verb “to Braille” as in “I Brailled the paper using that Brailler.”

Man: “She didn’t tell me she was my daughter.”

Benson: “When did you find out? The first time you had sex with her?!”

“Dating is for ugly people.” (teens hooking up online)

Every year after I moved out of my dad’s year he has forgotten my birthday.  I was his only kid.  Every year this pissed me off.  You can’t remember your ONLY CHILD and ONLY LIVING RELATIVE’s birthday?  He just didn’t find it important.  A few years ago I started to not care anymore. Sort of.  I guess I still cared, but I figured one year maybe he’d accidentally get it right and I should give up hoping for it.

Which is why today I bawled when I realized that my dad would never forget my birthday again.

I realized it would take a long time to feel better about my dad dying because I loved a lot of things about him; I never realized that the shitty things would also continue to make me feel bad.

Really,

In chicago that yoga studios really love puns. I’ve seen them a little bit elsewhere but never to this extent.  I mean here, they’ll go for a pun even if it’s a slam against their business, or makes them look way not serious.

My favorites are Om on the Range and Self Centered Yoga.

1. I got Jamba juice Cherry Berry Pecan oatmeal for a dollar.  I love oatmeal and this is the best.
2. I had my favorite lunch near work–turkey & bacon on cinnamon toast.  And someone else bought it.
3. The waitress gave us free ice cream at lunch.  And I got the chocolate kind while everyone else got sucky vanilla and strawberry.
4. I had a jillion really awesome, interesting conversations with people who are smart about metadata and my long term concerns about a data model. And everything was fixed and agreed upon.  We had several disagreements which were all interesting and based in actual concerns for a project, not petty work squabbles.  And people totally respected each other’s opinions.
5. I sent out all those thank you for coming to my dad’s funeral cards which felt like a little bit of closure.
6. I had tea with an aspiring metadata librarian and we geeked out about metadata.  And it made me realize what I’ve accomplished in the last few years. Go me.
7. I was told awesome rare beers would be delivered to me tomorrow at work.
8. I got around 5 awesome pictures when I usually have to try hard for one.
9. It was sunny for the first time in ages, and I realized my desk gets great light, making it the first desk I have ever had where a plant might survive.
10. The weather was perfect and beautiful.
11. I realized all of my coworkers are kind of awesome.
12. I finished a book and started a new one (which I always love doing).
13. Hopslam drops at my local liquor store tomorrow.
14. I made plans to see the movie adaptation of one of my favorite books tomorrow.
15. I did not have to use my AK.

A lot of people don’t understand how a librarian could be useful to sears.com.  But today a project I’ve been helping with should give you a little more insight into that.  Today we launched Marketplace, which allows people to buy over 10 million items from thousands of sellers through sears.com.  So now if you need to buy an album called Satan’s Kicking Yr Dick In, you should come buy it at Sears.com.  Want Letters to Penthouse? We got it.  Perhaps you are interested in the album “Fuck World Trade” by Leftover Crack.  You know where you can get it?  SEARSDOTCOM!

Perhaps you want to buy a pool, a trampoline, a bouncy castle, and a chainsaw. Perhaps you need live plants for your “hydroponics” project or rum flavored shampoo.  Or maybe you want someone to come clean your ducts without ever having to speak to another human.  Or you could get this sweet USSR flag patch (though, comrade, if you need to buy a patch to show you are hep to the cause, perhaps purchasing it on the largest capitalist websites on earth, perhaps you are misguided. though I will surely not stop you.)  I am categorizing all these things so you can purchase pretty much anything on sears.com.

Now I am going to buy balls and an inflatable hot tub so I can make a ball pit!

Last night, some friends were talking about what the most horrible year of being a kid was.  And one of them jokingly said, “ha year 30!”  And I thought, “exactly!”

This year was great and awful.  Maybe it’s just an odd coincidence but a ton of people I know seemed to have a lot more horrible things happen to them this year than ever before.  So 2010 can’t come fast enough for me!

This year was very extreme.  I moved to a place I didn’t like and never wanted to live in again where I felt pretty alone.  I left a place with an apt. I loved and lots of friends I hated leaving.  I quit a secure job that sounded very impressive for the world of contracting in the middle of a tanking economy.  I spent the first time of my life as an adult in the same city as my family.  I delivered inexcusably crappy work (for the first time ever) to a freelance client I loved because of a crazy stress freakout.  I took care of an elderly ailing person.  I saw the person who raised me (and the last person other than me born with my last name) die and had to deal with (and continue to deal with) the aftermath pretty much alone.

On the plus side, I discovered a new subset of my field that I loved, and got a great job doing it with people I really like in a non-toxic environment.  I work with a partner who I could not trust or agree with more.  I spoke at conferences and taught classes in my field.  I was surrounded by people professionally who encouraged my development rather than some of the discouraging experiences I have had in the past.  For the most part, professionally, this year rocked, especially as I came into it pretty doubtfully.  I still feel like there’s not a huge group of people I can talk to professionally–there’s not really a conference or group I’ve yet felt fills this need.  I guess that’s a goal for next year.

Despite the long view of this being a positive year, I can’t say I am ending it as the happiest person ever. I couldn’t be happier to bury 2009. But, I don’t have any regrets for what I did in 2009, and that’s much more than I thought I could ask for going into it.

So happy & healthy new year everybody!

My friend Mary refers to my house as “The Best Doctor’s Office Ever.”  I have a problem with magazines.  I have absolutely no idea how many I get, and, since I pay for few of them I am always in an ebb and flow state of which I am subscribed to at this moment.  I am employed as a generalist, and my magazine selections definitely confirm this. As a kid, I would beg my parents to take me to magazine shops to buy Factsheet Five, a magazine, essentially, of magazines you could get.  A friend asked me for magazine recommendations today and it’s a subject I feel eminently qualified to speak about.  Here’s a rundown of what I can remember currently being subscriber to.  Bolded magazines are those which I HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

Paid Subscriptions:

The Week (The best news source IMO)

Ready Made (have always loved it but generally get around to it only on vacation. I save the archives.)

Free:

Macworld (I will never get computer magazines, because why wouldn’t I be reading this on a computer?)

Men’s Journal (good outdoor writing)

Esquire  (consistently good non-fic)

Men’s Health  (good outdoor writing)

Field & Stream (fun gun articles; some outdoor writing that’s good)

American Cowboy (good rodeo coverage, historical articles, and interviews)

Cosmo (cheesy but fun)

Marie Claire (surprisingly good. I wonder if they got the bulk of Jane’s writers.)

Spin (I dislike keeping up with new music, but I do like music writing)

Martha Stewart Living (pretty–I keep archives)

Garden & Gun (The best new magazine.  Southern culture. beautifully printed)

O (Shockingly I like this mag. It’s not chintzy–beautiful printing and it’s FULL of words. It’s the anti-Cosmo.  I always pick it up while rolling my eyes, but I end up ripping something out of it every time.)

Popular Science (meh diagram porn)

Shape (It’s awful! Boring and faddy and horrifyingly poor health advice.)

Wired (Always good, pretty printing, takes a long time to get through.)

Woman’s Day (okay, some good recipes)

Glamour (cheesy fun)

Islands (cool photography. I have a minor obsession with esoteric islands)

Conde Nast Traveler (Pretty good!)

Cruises (Esoteric islands are generally encountered by boats)

The Advocate (Bitchy, gossipy, and sexist, but eh)

Psychology Today (It’s pop psych but somewhat smart and a ton of fun. Really odd & slightly pornographic photography, too!)

La Cucina Italiana (pretty uppity and boring. And northern)

Magazines I Consider Paying For

Bitch/Bust (I don’t get these because they will make me hate feminism though I did enjoy their content when I got them.)

Dwell (it’s jenny house pornography. Fills me with the seven deadly sins for furniture.  It makes me go on Googling blitzes till 3am about pre-fab housing.  I don’t think I should be allowed to have Dwell.)

All Martha Stewart titles–especially Everyday Food

Cook’s Country/Cook’s Illustrates (well printed & thought out)

Skeptic (good, if sometimes hateful magazine which busts conspiracy theorists & fakers)

True Confessions (This is a guilty pleasure, but nothing has taught me more about modern America than this magazine.  The crazy ass shit that flies in this magazine, while being advertised next to ceramic dolls would be illegal to film in most countries).

I am a huge Zappos fan. Who isn’t these days? I have ordered shoes from them for probably 8 or so years now. Growing up in a house full of podiatrists can make a girl picky about shoes, and having big feet doesn’t help either. So their selection has always blown me away. That’s why I first liked them–the shoes! But I am also a cheapskate and an internet addict, so their free shipping and deals, and the fact that I didn’t have to go anywhere or talk to anyone to get new shoes.

Then I became an organizer of things on the internet. A devotee of Ranganthan. An obsesser of faceted search. And then I started to love Zappos even more. But admittedly, I saw some problems with their tagging/metadata. At that point I went to their booth at SxSW and, in a demented, obsessive, and maybe slightly tipsy state, started discussing their metadata with someone on their web team. I am sure he was frightened by my zealous fire for shoe categorization (I think people don’t frequently raise their voice about metadata in an excited matter and hop around while flailing their arms quite as frequently as I do), but he gave me a lot of zappos free stuff and chatted with me politely and suggested I get their culture book.

And I think it’s around then that I drank the kool aid.

The culture book was totally awesome. The culture was the thing I didn’t like about the job I was in at the time, and it was like a breath of fresh air to read the Culture Book. I had just presented about how librarianship was losing a lot of quality librarians because of the oppressive anti-tech culture they worked in. This all synced up with what I was reading in their book.

In the time since then, I have emailed with a lot of Zappos employees and asked them to be on panels I have been on. So when I got an email the other day that they were having a Zappos Boot Camp for people who want to learn more about how they do what they do, I was totally excited.

But then I learned it was $5,000. And that is not really in my budget. But if it’s in yours, I highly suggest you go.

They also have scholarships, which I am applying for. Let’s all hope I get it!

If not, I’ll still feverishly go to their website to look for all the new things they’re doing. Not just to buy shoes. I SWEAR.

People often do not understand what I do for a living. I avoid this:

best. photo. ever.

If you use the internets enough to read my website you’ve probably heard of Kiva.org.  In case you haven’t, people (mostly from Africa, but from all over) sign up for loans they need to start businesses or keep their businesses running.  It’s not charity–they pay you back, admittedly without interest.  But hey, for a lot of people, in their country, $100 goes a long way.

I have been meaning to loan some money on Kiva for a while.  In addition to getting your money back, I like the idea that you give the money to a specific PERSON.  It is hard to decide who though–there are many people on Kiva with valid business propositions.  However, when I found Yaa Bomo, I knew she was the one!  Yaa sells smoked fish in Ghana.  I love smoked fish above pretty much everything.  Go Yaa!

And I put it on my credit card, for which I get money back.  So I actually earned money lending Yaa money!

She still needs $350.00.  I know times are tough anywhere, but if you can, please try and help the people of Ghana enjoy smoked fish!  Or something else, I GUESS.

I love reality tv.  For the most part I do not defend it.  If you think it’s stupid and bad for America, good for you.  You’re so better than the rest of us who enjoy entertainment.  However, I beseech you to watch “I’m a Celebrity….Get Me Out of Here.”

First, Patty Blagoevich is on it and talks about her political scandal with her friends on the show in a way I think she’d never talk in an interview.  And she convinces everyone in camp that Rod is totally innocent.  In “civilization” you can get multiple news sources, but when you’re in the jungle there’s no other person to tell you what happened.  So why wouldn’t you believe the nice lady?

That’s the other thing.  I LIKE Patty.  She seems COOL.  She seems to BELIEVE Rod is actually innocent.  It’s amazing. She’s just extremely normal and honestly, it’s the best PR move ever.

What I also really enjoy about reality tv though is highly reflected in this show.  Two people have a conversation that is filmed. Then they talk about what happened and both of them have a COMPLETELY different view of what happened.  This helps me.  In conversations you always assume people are on the same page as you but they are so infrequently in the same mindset.

I know reality tv is not at all real, and situations are manufactured to increase this miscommunication.  But when Janice Dickinson talks to Stephen Baldwin you can tell 100% she’s thinking he’s being mean to her, when he’s actually trying to get her baptized for Jesus.

In fact it is the most Jesus-oriented show on television.  Jesus + the Jungle shouts Jonestown to me.

Grace posted something about a discussion she was having regarding whether or not people on food stamps “deserve” facials.

Regarding this topic, I guess I feel like you are in charge of your own money UNTIL you are getting money from me.  That’s sort of the breaks.  In the same way, “my house, my rules” works.

As someone who has used their food stamps at Zupans (like a Whole Foods, but more uppity), I feel I am eminently qualified to talk about this (Although how many subjects do I not feel eminently qualified to talk about?).  From my times hanging in the food stamp office, I would say the majority of food stamps are spent on non-nutritive instant foods a la Nestle Quik.  Cuz there are a lot of kids on food stamps.  Though most of the people I chatted with there were indignant about how they were treated when they bought seemingly “luxury” items or foods that were bad for you.  Fancy cheese was the most often mentioned.  Should I be making decisions on what other adults eat?  No.  But when my parents bought my food as a kid, they got to make the call.  In the same way, when the state provides your food, they get a say in how you spend your money.  How would they regulate facials?  I have no idea.  But when I was on food stamps I did feel bad when I spent money on things that were frivolous.  So did most everyone I ever talked to in the food stamp office.

And it is that experience which makes me state that no one is entitled to fancy cheese.  Do I love fancy cheese? Yes.  Would I want to live without it? No.  But if you’re buying my groceries next week, would I buy it knowing you’re paying the tab? No.  And that’s what it comes down to for me.  If someone else is paying, you’re beholden to them. Do poor people deserve facials?  No.  But neither does anyone else.  But when you have money to blow that you made yourself you get to pick.

And that longwindedly leads me to a point that I have been thinking about for a while.  Alcatraz Regulation # 5:

Regulation 5: You are entitled to food, clothing, shelter, and medical attention. Anything else that you get is a privilege.”

It hangs in my house for several reasons.  First, because Americans who are not in prison, who have done nothing wrong, don’t get all these things.  That’s a good thing to remember.

And second, because I am kind of sick of whiners.  Look, by being born, and by being born American, you already got a lot.  A lot more than 99% of the world.  By the fact that you’re reading this, you have computers, internet, & free time, you’re fucking rich.  I don’t care if you think you’re broke, you’re not.  You’re probably inside and clothed and fed.  Feel lucky.

And I feel especially at the age I am and the current economic situation, all around me I hear people using the news as a crutch to do nothing.  Now some people are unlucky, of course.  Some people weren’t born as lucky as you or I, and I truly don’t begrudge them.  But if you have a college degree and the time to whine to me about how broke you are, and it doesn’t revolve around a medical issue, you’re probably not working hard enough.  I am really sick of people telling me how horrible their lot in life is, how broke they are, how they can’t get anywhere when they’re not attempting to do anything to change any of their lifestyle.  Not trying to better themselves.  Not being thankful.

So next time you feel you’ve been given a raw deal, that you’re entitled to something and not getting it, think about Regulation 5.  I know I do.  And then DO SOMETHING.

Buying books would be a good thing if one could also buy the time to read them in: but as a rule the purchase of books is mistaken for the appropriation of their contents.
- Arthur Schopenhauer, Parerga and Paralipomena

I have never been a big book acquirer.  The books I like to own are generally those I think I will not be able to find again, those out of print/odd finds I get in a dollar bin, and those I use for reference.  I personally can’t understand owning a copy of a novel that is in every bookstore or library in the country.  I am all for other people doing it, I just have never had that sort of attachment.

Despite this, and mainly due to Bookmooch and a friend who works for a publishing house, I have acquired A LOT of books recently.  My Bookmooch list is mainly things I have not been able to find in a library, and most of the books, due to my bizarre interests, hardly ever have a supplier.  So when someone has a book I want, whether I am going to read it immediately or not, I grab it.  Leading to too many awesome unread books.

And thus I am going to start on a fool’s errand, one I have tried many times.

The Read What You Have Challenge!

Basically as soon as I read something, I get rid of it generally, and as I currently own ZERO bookshelves, it would be a good thing to get rid of a few.  So other than

• books I might read for a book club
• audiobooks I dnld
• books I require to meet an immediate need

I am reading what I own.  That last one is a copout, at least for me it is.  I feel about reading non-fiction books the same way Johnny Five does.  I need a lot of it and I consume it addictively.  So I might bend my own rules.  I am going to try not to.

On the other hand the Readers’ Advisor in me is sort of against this.  I definitely believe in reading the right book for the right mood.  And sometimes that book is in the library.  But I have a coterie of awesome books around the house, so I don’t think it’ll be that hard to find some good stuff that excites me.

Anyone tried this before?  Success?

Hey if you met me/heard me talk/want to talk about metadata/want to know what to do in your case, follow my twitter feed @jennybento, or email me at jenny bento at gmail.

Things I have not done in more than a month:

1. Drunk more than 2 beers in a row.
2. Read a non-electronic book.
3. Listened to my music library.
4. Read a magazine.
5. Been home alone.
6. Been naked for more than 10 mins.
7. Cooked anything.
8. Eaten salmon
9. Had the Internet at home.
10. Read an audiobook.

Since these are my favorite things ever, this is sad. Soon these will be rectified, but in the meantime, in the words of Morrissey, if I seem a little strange, well that’s because I am.

On the way to work I pass by a synagogue.  Next to the synagogue is a Wendy’s.

I know very little about food service, but you have to think that they make the batches of bacon at Wendy’s for the bacon cheeseburgers all in one fell swoop.  So at one point in the day the synagogue must reek of bacon.  i would find it very hard to believe I was chosen if God kept pointing out so clearly how tasty bacon was, and how I could not have it.

I read a whopping 59 books this year, and that doesn’t even count all of my travel books.  That’s a whopping 15 more than last year!  I have started to include books I consult for travel, though I am still inconsistent on that because I try not to add it unless I really have gone through the whole thing.  I also added a “gave up” category.  I think giving up on books really allowed me to get to books I wanted to read!

47 non-fiction/80% (27 last year/41%>last year)

12 fiction/20% (17 last year/41%<last year)

I was consistent for the last two years, so this is amazingly different.  Screw you, fiction!

16 were audio, a few less than last year.  My love for the NYPL digital library has gone a little south.  The search and hold systems are painful to use.

This year I tried a lot of new authors, and have been reading a lot of self-help-type books.  I am very interested in life coaching after reading things last year like “The Four Hour Workweek,” “Stumbling Upon Happiness,” and things of the GTD ilk.  All of these seem like real common sense to me, and convince me I should be a life coach.  Food books, as always, were prominent, with more gardening books.

I have only met two of this year’s authors (Kinky Friedman and Simon Winchester), but I have sustained some personal correspondence with one (Ben Woods), and seen two in person (David Sedaris and Chuck Palanhiuk).

Biggest surprise:

Biggest letdown: Now You See Him-compared to Donna Tartt, moody, tense with no payoff. It was billed as mysterious and shocking and was neither.

Favorites: All Michael Largo and Matt Ruff books, Micronations, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, Finding George Orwell in Burma

Most Overrated: Now You See Him,

Books I could not finish this year included: Slackonomics; Dear American Airlines; The Wicker Man; Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys; Tweak

I most recommend: Anything Matt Ruff; George Orwell in Burma

Best book tech this year:Magnetic bookmarks! Goodreads–helps me keep track of what I am reading, and I love seeing what other people are reading.   And I converted to Bookmooch this year; Also, Powells.com lets you sell books on the Innernets! I guess magazines in Google Books, though I find it annoying to search

Worst book tech: Espresso Book Machines in libraries. Um, all libraries already have a better quality copy of Tom Sawyer, NYPL.  I get how hot the machines are.  I love them.  They make me all excited.  They are just not library relevant right now.  Try a better ebook system if you are so bug nutty for tech.

Book tech I am still not into:  Though I like it in concept, and I love the people that work there, I still have no idea why anyone would want to catalog their personal library.  I catalog things when people pay me to do so and I jettison books as soon as possible.  Sorry, Librarything.  Kudos re: early reviewer copies and Santathing though.

Book Wish(es) for 2k9: An e-book reader I can somehow check books out from the library with; Less crazy DRMs on ebooks I check out from Overdrive (hey, why can’t I check a book back in?!); A more universal book wishlist export standard (so every time a new book website comes out, I don’t have to put all 658 books on the new list manually.  Seriously people, Amazon is the standard.  Find a way to import it.

And now for my favorite historical holiday evar.

Today, December 5th, is Repeal Day in America.  Dec. 5, 1933 is when we Americans got our right to drink alcohol back.  How do you celebrate?  Drink!

My family isn’t a big pack of giftmongers.  We have a grab bag.  It’s 50 dollars.  It’s hard to think of a gift that is $50 and easily transportable in luggage that I wouldn’t have already bought myself.  Everyone gets everyone gift certificates.  It’s the pricey business I won’t buy for myself.  Here’s what I really want:

1. A cute, portable, USB record player with built in speakers.  While the Ion is the audiophile bet, I am in love with this one.
2. New knives and a knife skills class.  I have admitted that I am out of my depth here.  Please someone teach me to wield a knife right and proper.
3. A tour of North Korea during the Mass Games
4. A Stalin bust.  I prefer the turquoise but it’s all sold out.
5. A mini PC. That is powerful enough/has a large enough hard drive that I can bring it on trips to watch movies and email.
6. A Google Android.  I accept you as my overlords, Goog!
7. A see through clear umbrella
8. A year’s worth of cleaning ladies.
9. A breadmaker.
10. Lots of cute flowerpots, and the self watering bulb doohickeys.  I have a small army of succulents that I worry about.
11. Noise canceling headphones that do not go IN your ears, and are durable and very very portable.
12. A new messenger bag similar to this, in a dark color, that is washable and has many pockets for doohickeys and closes.
13. Brunch at Aquavit
14. Lunch at Momofuku Ko
15. Fish of the Month Club membership
16. A salmon fishing expedition
17. Tuition to sideshow school
18. Conjuring Arts Research Center Membership
19. Wii!
20. An RFID key chain such as this
21. A phrenology head
22. Etsy things! Like this necklace in silver, everything in doleangeliman’s store, especially this skeleton print and this sign print, a wood ring, this anchor in sterling, freak show signs like this, or a squid necklace.

What do you want?

Wah I made the mistake of looking at Etsy.  Whenever I go to Etsy, I find something my life cannot go one without.  And this was no exception.

Book shadows made of vinyl records

Librarian necklace

PASTIES MADE OF BOOKS!

The market for crafty things that are librarian themed is boundless, but recently I saw this theme:

This made me sad.  So not useful to me, an actual librarian.  I am sort of weirded out by the whole “my job as hip thing to pretend you are” thing.  I mean, let’s face it, there’s a very easy path to librarianship.  It just doesn’t seem glitz and glam enough to make people buy pins about it, but I guess I am glad people like us!

I love stuff made out of other stuff.  Sure, I could say it’s because I love mother Earth, but in fact it is mostly aesthetic.  I covet things made of gum wrappers.  I have a wallet made of lawn chairs.  And I have always wanted something made of movie posters.

But I really, really want a messenger bag made of tires.  I am very picky about my day to day bags, and so far I haven’t found a tire one that meets my weird needs.  This one is pretty, but a little BDSM meets weekend LARPer.  This is the ideal shape but too small.  This bike tire one might fit the bill.  But it’s a little out of my price range at the moment.

In the meantime, while looking for this, I discovered a boatload of other awesome items, like this steel wallet, this awesome gum wrapper cuff, and this reasonably priced laptop case, which I would have immediately bought if any of the movies appealed to me.  Ecoist has really good deals.  I highly suggest it.

Michael Shermer is an ass, but an amusing one:

1. Who are you voting for in November? I’m voting Democrat because I think lawyers should run the country, because the last two years under their control has gone so well, because the government has done such a great job with FEMA that they should also be in charge of our school choices, health care choices, and retirement choices, because they protect me from crime so well that I don’t need a gun, because I want to pay more taxes (especially Capital Gains), because unions need to be stronger against evil corporations, because trade with foreign corporations is anti-American and we need to protect American jobs, and mostly because I’m tired of having so many choices and want someone else to make them for me.

This is from Reason Magazine’s interviews with some public figures about who is getting their vote. It was interesting, and I was glad to see an interview with Stephen Pinker who is my favoritest public intellectual evar.

I am a registered voter.  I am registered Working Families Party, at the moment, though for some reason NYC doesn’t put that on your card.  They just put “Independent.”  Whatever.  I know I live in a voting district which will OBVIOUSLY go for Obama.  But aside from a postcard in the primary for Obama, I haven’t recieved ANY information for any candidate in any office this election.  I think that’s a first.  Apparently politicians are lazy this election.

Gain some weight!

This study says fat chicks are getting busy way more often than those uptight skinny bitches.  Word.

It also says some fairly negative things about how doctors don’t treat large ladies properly.  Lame.

I really like the idea of America.  Like, really like it.  Like, broke down into tears at the Library of Congress like it.  I like OG America though, not really new America.  And though I call myself a Libertarian when pressed to choose a party, many people have argued I am not because several of my beliefs are completely out of line with Libertarian thought.  Which is wildly true, but 1. there’s not any other party which is CLOSER to my political beliefs and 2. We live in a country that is democratic and a republic, and thus, as the country was set up, some non-libertarian things must stand (notably, public education).

So, if you are sick of my snarky frustrated comments that are equally anti-McCain and Obama this season, you might want to stop here.  Otherwise, herein (woo–constitutional!) I will identify my strong political beliefs and we can all decide who I should vote for.

1. Immigration– I haven’t seen that big green lady with the sign up close, but I am pretty sure her whole deal is we accept anyone in any condition.  I don’t believe in illegal immigrants.  I think it’s hypocritical to have quotas.  While I am all for a citizenship test, and say, a certain number of years residence, I would prefer someone who busts their ass to get here and make a living be a citizen over a person born here who couldn’t answer the questions on the test.  I think it’s awesome that lots of people want to live in my country!  I think the main reason people are anti-naturalization is benefits.  So perhaps we should hinge that on other things?  I dunno.

2. Health care–Holy Jeebus, socialized health care is the only way to go.  At the very least for emergency health care, although I think study after study has shown that’s way more expensive than doing preventative health care as well.  The whole idea of a government is to protect their citizenry from harm.  That’s mainly taken to mean a standing army, but in this time period, I can’t imagine anything that prevents people from experiencing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness like poor health care and bankrupting insurance.  And if the government has a monetary interest in the health of people, then maybe lobbyists for

3. Drugs–In the short term, I am for the legalization of all drugs (all.  all.  yes, heroin.  yes, all.) regulated in the same way cigarettes or booze is.  States can determine more extreme laws to regulate that if they want, but clean, taxed, less stigmatized drugs equals a lot of money for most governments and less people dying of bad drugs/wacky dosages.

4. Abortion–I am a very rational person, generally.  This is an area in which I am not rational.  Abortion, legal all kinds, all times.  No consent forms.

5. Taxes–I am no economist.  This is generally out of my depth, as it is for most Americans.  But I am very pro a waaaaaaaaaaay more simplified tax situation.  No writeoffs, religions (and religiously derived non-profits) are taxed, including property.  Companies are taxed.  No, really, how they actually should be, no writeoffy lobbyists.  Flat taxes for them!  Woo!  And no tax breaks for having children.

6. Education–All the Education money gets divided equally per student, with maybe some differences for cost of living. Definitely kids should be allowed to go to any public school, regardless of district.  More magnet schools, including for disadvantages as well as advantages (i.e. magnet school for kids with XYZ learning disability).  Way more stringent rules on home schooling.  No funding for school sports.  Again this is an area I could know a lot more about and I don’t have a complete solution.  But I strongly believe as, say, Thomas Jefferson did, that a democracy rests on an educated electorate.  I would also like it if religions could not have schools.  But I think that’s not based in any reason.  Just my personal dislike of religions.

7. Marriage–I don’t want gays to be able to legally marry, but I also don’t want heterosexuals to either.  Marriage (as currently construed) has no place in a legal venue.  It’s a religious bond.  Yay.  So civil unions for everyone, which include property/financial rights, next of kin, custody, etc.  No tax breaks for getting married, either.

8. Transportation–Driving a car should be extremely more expensive in America.  And carry way more responsibility.  Drinking (or drugging) and driving should ban you from operating a car, first time, for years.  Five, maybe?  Also, in urban centers, cars would be banned from most places in Jennylandia.  And by banned, I mean prohibitively expensive.  Taxing vehicles in large urban centers would give us enough money to build a far more extensive public transit infrastructure, a la Europe.  Driving tests would be way harder and driving instruction far more professional/required.  I love that there’s all this talk about finding new driving technology so we are not so dependent on other countries’ oil, when this country used to have a public transit infrastructures in most cities that would have avoided the need for cars in most places.

9. Environment–More nuclear power plants, simply.  Water, wind, wolar, that’s cool too.  Some research on alternates to gasoline for the short term.

10. Guns–I like them.  I feel very uncertain about how to legislate them.  Essentially, if you force people to register their guns, you are defeating the purpose of having them in case of a rogue government.  I know legal gun owners aren’t the problem.  And I think legalizing concealed weapons is great.

11. Foreign Policy–I know the secret to “why they hate us”–it’s that we are in a freaking codependent relationship with Israel.  We need to cut that out.  I know it’s unpopular to say, but historically we have always backed terrorists who kill tons of innocent people.  We just happen to like certain terrorists more than others.  Let’s stop that.  Also, can we start treating Putin like the crazy, crazy KGB agent he really is?  And not be all buddy buddy with a dictator who kills all opposing forces in the media?  That would be amazing.  Also, could we stop bombing civilians anywhere? I agree that just leaving Iraq tomorrow would make that whole region way more unstable, but I don’t think forcing people who hate us to make a “democracy” that idolizes America will work out either.  Do we really need another country where we will have military bases FOREVER?  A hasty look at the pornography of Germany and Japan says that our intervention has seriously messed up those countries in a deep, deep (no pun intended) way.

12. Civil liberties/torture– Uh clearly PATRIOT is evil, and I wouldn’t vote for anyone who voted for it.  The president and even federal government should not have as much power as it currently does.  Also, all people “detained”/arrested should get the full rights of any American citizen–habeas corpus, miranda, charges and arrest before incarceration, lawyers present, no torture etc.  Torture, while a moral issue, is more important here as an information issue.  As these are my areas of expertise (information AND confession.  it’s a useful intersection of expertise at this juncture), unlike, say, the economy, torture produces a lot of information.  Information that is unreliable, and, unless you have some other way to corroborate it (and, if you did, why would you be torturing someone?), is useless.  There are about 4 trillion studies that also show that people who torture will get crazy, and will not be able to keep it professional/aimed at actual answers.  Has anyone who is pro-torture ever watched Lost?  Seriously it doesn’t work.  http://dir.salon.com/story/opinion/feature/2004/06/21/torture_algiers/index.html

13. Military–not my area of expertise either, but I think universal military service is a great idea.

14. Foreign Aid–Helping other people is good.  And I’ll be all for helping other people in other countries when everyone in this country is adequately fed and clothed, well, and literate.  Get back to me when that happens, Bono.

Alright these are the basics.  So who should I vote for?

I could not make this up.  The evangelical born-again ministry of Kirk Cameron is having a conference.  Oh, that’s nice.  What’s it called?

DEEPER

It’s almost so easy, I feel juvenile for laughing.  Almost.

I am very particular about bookmarks.  While I will use a tattered reciept or old baseball ticket in a pinch, I have a true obsession for the good bookmark.  I am currently obsessed with magnetic bookmarks, but form might beat out function when it comes to the book on fire bookmark.  Holy jeeb that’s awesome.

You can take the librarian out of the physical book world but you can’t take the books out of the librarian.  No, siree.