I don’t know exactly when I noticed that my cat liked watching animal video shows, but now that I have, I turn them on occasionally. Fun for him and me :).

Phew. I had thought I had plenty of time to get a house for Thanksgiving for this year’s “Meet in the Middle” in Deep Creek Lake. Not!

If you’re not familiar with it, Deep Creek is great … it’s in western Maryland, half-way between DC (where my sister and I live) and Pittsburgh, where the rest of the family is. So a few years back, I started getting a house for right after school let out. It’s always a challenge to rent a house from the Internet, but we’ve had pretty good luck.

The pic above was the “lakefront” of the house we had in 2006. What a hike … even the kids only made it down to the lake once that week. But the view was incredible, and the house itself was great for yakking, eating, and playing games.

Anyways, this year I thought that instead of Deep Creek in June, we would get together for Thanksgiving. And several weeks ago, I had even picked a monster house with indoor pool (but was debating if I really wanted to plunk down the several thou for it).

A moot point now. I had put it off long enough that, as of this weekend, there were only six houses with seven bedrooms still available. Yikes!

But in doing the math, I decided we could get by with six bedrooms, and after doing a lot of surfing, found a great house on the lake that should fit all 15 of us nicely. Yay!

Yikes, I’d been putting off upgrading my blog platform, and it finally came back to bite me. It looks like the only casualty was an inability to upload images (I hope). But thanks to the nice support folks at Dreamhost, they quickly got me unstuck, and I’ve finally updated to the latest version.

Now all I need to do is figure out all the changes!

BTW, I added a new spam filter, as even good ol’ Akismet was allowing too much spam thru, and I logged on one day to find over 1,500 spam comments that I needed to delete. So if your comment got lost, let me know.

My grandmother taught me to crochet, and I did quite a bit of it when I was younger.

Now I do it once at year, as part of my company’s annual day of service (too hard to do it at home…it drives the cats crazy!).

These squares will be combined with those of my fellow crocheters and knitters and submitted to Warm Up America, where they will be stitched together to make afghans for those in need.

is following ICHCheezburger. This recent one made me laugh out loud:

So, after reading Liz’s post yesterday (and having seen Liz and Mike twittering away on their Facebook profiles), I finally signed up and am now officially all a-twitter.

This follows a semi-recent foray into Facebook, which has been spreading like crazy where I work. So after a few weeks of paying a bit of attention to what my co-workers are watching and giving and doing (and having not so much success in finding older friends and school chums on Facebook because I’m such an old fart), I thought this article from Salon — on the darker side of carefully constructed lists of favorite books, music, and movies, etc. — worth a bookmark here.

And now that I’ve bitten the Facebook and Twitter bullets, looks like it may be time for another: the new iPhone!

Jack Cafferty (CNN) asks:

One idea being tossed around as a way of dealing with [high gas prices] is the four-day workweek. Several states are considering it. Staggered work schedules would be necessary in order to keep government offices open five days a week, and some have suggested that would end up costing the taxpayers more money. It’s also an idea that may gain traction in the private sector. I, for one, think it’s a terrific idea.

Here’s my question to you: Would shifting to a four-day workweek be a good way to save fuel?

I don’t know about the fuel, but I sure would prefer a four-day workweek. Seems about right…work four days, spend one day doing the essentials (shopping, laundry, etc), and still have two days o’ weekend!

I’ve updated my friends who blog blogroll (on the right on the blog index page). It pretty much matches my Bloglines folder (save for those of you friends whose blogs are on hiatus). If you’re a friend and I’ve missed you, let me know!

Like many siblings, these guys get along really well. Except when they are fighting like cats and dogs…or I guess that would be cats and cats!

if/when Barack Obama is actually opposing someone who isn’t a (supposedly) respected peer, he might fight a bit more?

Time for another quick lunchtime post. I saw this kid this AM on GMA and had to search out the clip.

Boy, as much as I liked some of the winners on our side of the pond (particularly the ladies: Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, and Jordan Sparks), their voices didn’t make me cry.

So there’s this kid this season. The Brits also had this guy last year who had the same kind of incredible voice:

Both videos are well worth watching in their entirety — for the stories as well as the songs.

Ouch. Tonight, Tweety had a Republican talking head who suggested that Bill needs to stop “helping” Hillary for the same reason that doctors cannot operate on family members … one’s emotional connections create real problems.

So, The Last Lecture hit bookstores this week. But according to its author, Randy Pausch, the lecture he’s most proud of (see 3/25 entry) was not this one, but instead, one on time management.

It’s funny (or serendipitous if you go for that sort of thing) that just this AM I was thinking about how much easier my life would be if I did the things I was reluctant to do sooner, rather than put them off and spend way more time thinking about how I didn’t want to do them.

And having watched a bit of the lecture at lunch today, I’m very amused to hear him talk about this very subject, and sharing the wisdom of eating frogs: if you have to eat one frog, don’t look at it too long, and if you have to eat three frogs, don’t start with the smallest.

He’s got a point!

So, I’m doing my normal post-work thing, catching up on the blogs and watching Hardball. And according to Tweety, there is a new poll out that says New York voters prefer McCain/Rice over either Obama/Clinton or Clinton/Obama.

Pardon me, but huh?

I just don’t get this. It really makes me wonder if there is either voter fatigue or something else at work.

Like maybe more lying.

I’m one of those people who just outright lies when asked to provide personal information, like birthdate, on a website in order to register for non-essential services like reading news sites. Heck, I think the Post thinks that I’m a 23 year-old male.

I don’t think that people do it maliciously, but maybe just because all of this is starting to feel really personally intrusive. Or something.

I’m the farthest from a Hillary fan, but as far as I know, she’s a popular Senator in that state. So I just don’t see how “100 years in Iraq” McCain winds up a winner there. And perhaps New Yorkers like the smart Condi Rice (even though many find her the worst Secretary of State ever). But while New York is not Massachusetts, the last time they voted for the Rs was in 80 and 84 for Reagan (thank you archives.gov).

Seriously. Does this poll make any sense?

Ah…pretty view on my morning commute.

Ooh. Bummer. Nasty commute home in the rain! And not-so-pretty view of the same monument (on right behind trees).

I hate a late commute home, and a late commute in the rain just has to be the worst. As I’ve said for a long time, DC drivers start having accidents when the humidity goes over 80%. Sigh!

At least this city is very pretty in the spring.

Between the cold and the tourists, I didn’t manage to spend as much time down at the Tidal Basin as last year. Since I got more of the cliche shots then, I kinda took a low-key approach and did more along the river and down by Hains Pt. Here’s a PDF map of where the trees are.

I’ve got the rest of the photos on Flickr. They aren’t as good as Kathleen’s shots, but I’ll do better next year!

A gloomy morning, but the cherry blossoms are definitely close to peaking.

And if I say so, not a bad shot given I just pulled my PowerShot out of my pocketbook and rolled down my car window while waiting for the light at 15th and Independence!

A quick lunchtime blog so that I can bookmark this post from Ali Eteraz on HuffPo re Obama. Ali suggests that we should vote for Obama because he is Nietzschean:

Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher. In the nineteenth century he predicted that over the next two centuries, the philosophy of nihilism — purposelessness and despair — would take over the Western world, leading to an unprecedented level of violence and world-wide war. Obviously he was correct.

However, Nietzsche only made this prediction so that he could also posit a way of defeating nihilism. He put his faith in Art.

To be more specific, Nietzsche recommended that the way of defeating nihilism was for each individual to treat his or her life as an ongoing and unfinished work of art. The simple work of “giving style” to ourselves, expressing to the world our “overflowing creativity,” would give us a way to “Say Yes to Life.” This, argued Nietzsche, would stifle nihilist pessimism.

There’s more for the inclined.

I quoted this section in particular because I (like hundreds of thousands of Oprah fans) have been reading Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth and am seeing a parallel between the discussion of ego in that book and personal attachment to candidates, as indicated by this Gallup poll that says that many Clinton and Obama supporters will vote for McCain if their candidate isn’t elected.

I’m sympathetic…I really am finding some of what’s going on on behalf of Hillary problematic (Richardson as Judas?! Really?). But as Josh Marshall writes in TPM:

But to threaten either to sit the election or vote for McCain or vote for Nader if your candidate doesn’t win the nomination shows as clearly as anything that one’s ego-investment in one’s candidate far outstrips one’s interest in public policy and governance. If this really is one’s position after calm second-thought, I see no other way to describe it.

Me? I will vote for Hillary if she’s the candidate. But either way, I think I will do a lot more thinking about making my life an ongoing and unfinished work of art.

I may be an Obama fan, but this made me go ouch: Clinton Pursuing ‘The Tonya Harding Option’:

The delegate math is difficult for Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, the official said. But it’s not a question of CAN she achieve it. Of course she can, the official said.

The question is — what will Clinton have to do in order to achieve it?

What will she have to do to Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, in order to eke out her improbable victory?

She will have to “break his back,” the official said. She will have to destroy Obama, make Obama completely unacceptable.

“Her securing the nomination is certainly possible - but it will require exercising the ‘Tonya Harding option.’” the official said. “Is that really what we Democrats want?”

The Tonya Harding Option — the first time I’ve heard it put that way.

It implies that Clinton is so set on ensuring that Obama doesn’t get the nomination, not only is she willing to take extra-ruthless steps, but in the end neither she nor Obama win the gold.

Worse, if this meme sticks, it’s not just a case of losing this election. It’s a question of tarnishing her legacy and making her future in politics a bit of a crapshoot.

After all, look where Tonya is now.

So I was watching Hardball tonight, and heard Michael Smerconish talk very positively about Barack Obama’s book, Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.

The paperback is just $9, so I went ahead and sent it to my younger sister, who is leaning towards Clinton. I’d send it to my Dad, but he’d vote for McCain over Clinton, so he’s a definite Obama voter in the primary. And I’d send it to my brother, but he’s a former Promise Keeper, so I’m guessing he can’t vote in the Dem primary.

Given the number of weeks between now and April 22nd, I think this is a great tactic for those who have friends and family in PA. I’ve already sent the suggestion to both MoveOn and the Obama campaign.

Hmmm…I wonder if there are other ways to get books to potential voters?

Like Liz, I was bummed after March 4th. More so when I talked to a colleague in the biz whose take was that Hillary had the nomination. Yikes.

I’m feeling hopeful again. And I really, really hope that my peeps in PA show that it is more like Wisconsin than Ohio. We’ll see. I consider it a plus that PA is not an open primary state, which means that the Rush Limbaugh minions won’t be a help the way they appear to have been in Ohio, Texas, and Mississippi.

But for other fans of Obama, I point you to this on NPR … it’s the Obama campaign’s annotation of a Clinton campaign’s email re PA:

The path to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue goes through Pennsylvania so if Barack Obama can’t win there, how will he win the general election?

[Answer: I suppose by holding obviously Democratic states like California and New York, and beating McCain in swing states like Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Virginia and Wisconsin where Clinton lost to Obama by mostly crushing margins. But good question.]

After setbacks in Ohio and Texas, Barack Obama needs to demonstrate that he can win the state of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is the last state with more than 15 electoral votes on the primary calendar and Barack Obama has lost six of the seven other largest states so far — every state except his home state of Illinois.

[If you define "setback" as netting enough delegates out of our 20-plus-point wins in Mississippi and Wyoming to completely erase any delegate advantage the Clinton campaign earned out of March 4th, then yeah, we feel pretty setback.]

Pennsylvania is of particular importance, along with Ohio, Florida and Michigan, because it is dominated by the swing voters who are critical to a Democratic victory in November. No Democrat has won the presidency without winning Pennsylvania since 1948. And no candidate has won the Democratic nomination without winning Pennsylvania since 1972.

[What the Clinton campaign secretly means: PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE FACT THAT WE'VE LOST 14 OF THE LAST 17 CONTESTS AND SAID THAT MICHIGAN AND FLORIDA WOULDN'T COUNT FOR ANYTHING. Also, we're still trying to wrap our minds around the amazing coincidence that the only "important" states in the nominating process are the ones that Clinton won.]

Check out NPR for the rest.

I’ve been reading the litany of “why I’m for Obama” or “why I’m for Clinton” posts on HuffPo for weeks now, and this one really resonated for me. So it was funny to find out it was written by the actor who played/plays Charlotte’s hubby on the Sex and the City series/movie.

In I Can’t Believe I’m Standing Up for Obama… But I Am, Evan Handler writes:

I am not a devotee or disciple. I am a skeptic, and remain somewhat skeptical. Still, over the past few weeks I have become convinced that Barack Obama is the better choice for the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee. And, well… God help us all if that’s not enough to make him president.

My conclusion is based on several components, but coheres around one theme. Besides what I have experienced as his superior demonstrations of strength, composure, restraint, and reasoning during their last two one-on-one debates, Senator Obama has structured his campaign around what I feel is an irrefutable truth: the United States government will never again function efficiently unless United States citizens force it to do so. His insistence that the U.S. government must serve its citizenry, and his acknowledgment that it will do so only if the citizenry once again holds its government accountable is a statement so simplistic that it is, for some, dismissible. It also happens to be a truism so profound that it might, I have come to hope, be unstoppable.

There’s a lot more I agree with (including the discussion on their relative policy positions), but this is the kernel of it for me … and when you couple this with Obama’s 50-state strategy, it tips the balance for me.

That said, I was really surprised to hear this morning that 11 out of 12 of Chris Matthews’ regulars think that Hillary will drop out if she doesn’t win both TX and OH on Tuesday. Yes, she will have an unsurmountable delegate shortage, but me, I think it will be good to let PA weigh in (assuming that Hillary goes the Huckabee route … if she goes incredibly negative, then that would be really bad).

This contest is bringing a lot of new voters to the race (as the numbers in Texas, in particular,
illustrate). And while Texas may not go blue in the presidential race in November, all those D voters can make a big difference in a whole lot of Congressional races this year.

Hmmm, I didn’t post much this week, but at least I managed to post on Leap Day!