Ree’s musings

"Insults are effective only where emotion is present." Fascinating, Spock, just fascinating. The original series still looks good decades later. Nifty.

I turned the computer on just to save this quoted thought. Now ear points remind me of dear Hirax & Co. and there's those damn essays. Best get started.

Did anybody really expect me to comment on the recent election results in my state? All I'd been particularly following was Diedrich vs. Herseth for South Dakota's sole House seat, left vacant by a certain crazy wanker (Janklow, whose consistent speeding killed a man and got him in jail, leaving South Dakota without anyone in the House of Representatives until we could finally have a special election. Stupid Wanklow).

Anyway, the vote was 51% to 49%, giving Herseth the win. I didn't vote. I meant to -- even watched a hideously boring debate to know what both candidates stood for -- but in the end, I just didn't know. Is it really better to vote just for the sake of voting if you lack an opinion?

I'm still not sure how I feel about Herseth. In the debate, Diedrich came off as a poor off-the-cuff speaker, but a right honest man. Herseth, meanwhile -- I liked her at first, but I quickly realized that she's slick as hell. Lawyer lady, trying to say she'll speak for South Dakota farmers just because she grew up on a farm. I did too, missy; that doesn't mean a know a blessed thing about what farmers need in their government. Diedrich happens to be a farmer, which I thought rather showed.

Who would I have chosen? The sincere farmer whose thoughts get muddled in his speaking and is way right-wing, or the shrewd woman with that secret smile every time she knows her liberal view on an issue runs contrary to her constituency? I don't know. Looks like it'll be Round 2 in November after a mere four months of watching Herseth do her thing, so if she seems awful I can vote Diedrich in then, or vote to keep her if she's helpful after all.

What is it with this state? Who the hell let Janklow into the House after we put up with all those terms of having him as governor? And we keep voting Daschle back in why? I think it's just because he holds a position of power disproportionate to the importance of South Dakota. We vote him back to make us feel big, but what's he doing for us? I haven't found anything on the subject. There's people angry at Daschle who want him out, people who aren't even South Dakotans (which confused me at first because yes, I really am that slow to piece things together).

Politics. Bah.

It still kinda weirds me out that people on a national level are paying attention my my state politically. While paring down my online news reading, I found a page of interesting comments over at the Daily Kos. The one that really nettles me is this:

"...considering the low population of South Dakota, someone would probaby have to drive 250 miles just to find a gay person!"

Signed, [name] in Berkeley.

I'm not sure if I should giggle (which I am) or be insulted. Dude, I've been operating on stats that roughly 1 in 10 Americans are gay. South Dakota is not exempt from this just because you happen to think we are backward.

250 miles? I share a house with two gay men. (Three? I haven't determined the new housemate's orientation yet.) There's a GLBA (but not GLBT -- we are slightly hickish after all) right in my town.

In conclusion, would people who don't know South Dakota from South Africa please shut the hell up about, well, either. Yes, we're not a populous state, but we have our own voices, thanks.

These dreams are getting darker. First that damn scorpion as scalp covering, stinger swinging along my nape, and then the teeth dream. Anybody out there ever have the teeth dream, where they just fall out and when you spit, more come out? It's unnerving as hell. Well, not unnerving as Hell.

I've heard time and again that the teeth dream means a fear of losing control (or, variously, power). Yeah, like it takes a dream to expose that particular phobia. I just didn't expect it to fly up in my face so dramatically. Being still a young person and waking up toothless is creepy.

I'm out of adjectives now, so -- yay posting! I fell off the planet for a week there. No worries. I'm just dreaming myself into dentures is all.

WTF. Whoa.

Webmonkey returns! Yeehaw!

Yeah, I know -- quit reading the webdev stuff and do your damn school reading, right? I got a road trip in about an hour, during which I shall make with the textbooks.

Right now, I'm cracking up over this wiki page on browser wars. I remember back when Netscape 4.x was a valid browser choice. I still have it on an old hard drive, come to think of it. (Nobody should use it today if they can help it. Its CSS rendering is atrocious.) Of course, the final line of that wiki article just makes me smile. Smart money right here, honey.

Make with the packing. I know.

(Wish I knew what was up with this crossposting. I had to manually copy-paste my last half-dozen entries for Xanga and now LiveJournal spits an error back at me, requiring another button press before posting my entry. This is getting to be a serious pain.)

So tall! So thin! So tragic! Like a race of supermodels.

Can't breathe. Laughing too hard. Buwahaha. If Lord of the Rings carries pretentious elves, try the Silmarillion, I dare you. It's the only fantasy novel I've ever read (and I have shelves of the things) that completely failed to deliver.

I just spelled Silmarillion correctly on the first try? I need to steel-wool my hands now. So dirty, so unclean!

(Hey, let's watch crossposting break again! Feck.)

I probably won't be on instant messenger at all for at least several days. I'm having to trim back what I do online more and more to catch up on classwork. I wish to complain, but as I got myself into this, who would listen? Certainly not this girl.

I can still be reached at school*msree.cjb.net (replacing the asterisk with the good ol' at-sign) for the duration of the summer semester. I probably won't have great reply time, but eh. I'm still checking comments on this blog as well.

Man, I could go for something alcoholic right now. Oops, there I go, talking about myself again. Good heavens, how terribly rude of me to speak of the one thing I can actually know well. (Friendships not going well because I am the world's suckiest judge of character.)