STRANGE ITEMS AT VALUE VILLAGE

MissEight and her best pal had a playdate today, and the three of us made a little side trip to the local Value Village thrift store. I gave them each a modest amount of spending money and let them ponder their choices.

While they did that, I went over to the "Knick-Knacks" section. Experience tells me I can always count on finding some unusual decor there. I wish I could have a conversation with the people who once owned these items, asking them why they had them to begin with, and why they no longer did. That might make a good book or meme-y website, eh?

I bet you that you, wherever "you" are in the world, will never go to Bulgaria, ever. I don't even know if Bulgaria still exists. I think it does, but I think it's not somewhere that will soon see a surge of tourism. I feel like I should have bought this, but then I would have to deal with people in my house saying, "OMG, you went to Bulgaria??" and me saying, "No," and the people staring at me.

I am always amazed at the Things That Can Be Made Into Clocks. I am not sure at all what would provoke someone into thinking that a copper clock of the African continent was something they needed.

Dandified statue children class the joint right up.

"Look, Ma...no hands!" This seems socially irresponsible. Two hands on the baby, Colorful Asian Doll!

I have no idea who Coach Donovan is, but she's FREAKED OUT.

Every home needs an overly-cute statue devoted to The Town Ho.

This chicken is flat-out shocked, just SHOCKED. I think it's because of the Town Ho statue.

Hey Kelly. How's it goin'. Nice to see you here at the Value Village.

Wooden Vampire Pirate Baby Jesus?

And finally...the Cabbage Patch Baby In Utero.

The girls bought a dart board, a plastic guitar toy, a rainbow-striped fuzzy scarf, and a drinking glass with plastic fish encased and floating in hot pink liquid. I bought MissEight a couple of shirts and I'm still thinking about going back for the Bulgarian plate. Stare away, people.

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BEAUTIFUL/HORRIBLE: IMAGERY OF JAPAN’S TSUNAMI DISASTER

As the world is sadly aware, an earthquake of stunning magnitude and the resultant tsunami has devastated  the country of Japan. It hit last night just as I was getting ready to head to bed here in Seattle, as the initial bursts of information came through with the figure of 7.9, then revised to 8.0, then 8.4, 8.8, and then 8.9. It took a few minutes to wrap the mind around what that was really going to mean. As the quake rattled buildings all over Japan for minutes, the waves were on their way to shore. There is something particularly awful in knowing that in a few minutes, you are going to witness total devastation;  a normal, sunny spring day in a coastal farm area will transform into a total wasteland. The minutes between them are each felt with some kind of hope that some lives will be spared by rushing to higher ground, and excruciating certainty that many will not.

I sat in my living room last night, watching a helicopter video feed as the water crashed through, creating a massive and swift hell comprised of mud and trees and boats and cars and houses, and I watched as it swallowed everything in its path. I sat there and watched, live, people consumed as they desperately tried to escape in their cars or on foot, as did millions of other people all over the globe. I had never seen anything like this, as it happened; the surrealism of it was off-the-charts as huge boats and apartment complexes on fire battered around like tiny toys in some kind of strange movie special-effects water world.

The sky view of the disaster led to a feeling of detachment, so I tried to mentally zoom in and place myself there. I imagined the smells: the fresh beginning green of the spring farmlands, the heaviness of the briny ocean muck, fish and kelp and mud and sand, the wet wood of broken trees and buildings, the metallic sting of gas and oil spilled and swirling in the water, the acrid choke that comes from the billowing black smoke of uncontrolled multiple fires. The sounds as the surge came closer, the roar and whoosh, the snapping of trees and power lines, cracking and breaking and booming as structures bend and break, alarm sounds, car horns beeping, a few voices screaming, barely heard over the noise of the monster. Most painful was to imagine those stuck in traffic, who could not have seen their fates until it was directly upon them, or those who could never run fast or far enough, or those who were still sleeping peacefully in their homes, unknowing.

I think of those now stranded, still alive, on the rooftops of the buildings that survived, who can see nothing but chaos in every direction, wondering if there will be another wave that will come for them yet, or wondering if another human will come to their rescue first. There is no food. There is no shelter. Some will know that they have lost family members and friends. They don’t know yet how bad it is in other places, and it seems like the end of the world. They wait.

And in this devastation and disaster, there are photographers who have the presence of mind, incredible skills, and nerves of steel to deliver images to us that are both beautiful artworks and horrible reality. They know how important it is for the world to see what has happened, to document what is a profound natural disaster. I am speechless in my respect for what these journalists can accomplish under these circumstances. Again, I try to imagine what I would do if I were there, and somehow had my camera with me. What instinct would pull me the hardest?  “RUN!” is what I would surely do, with no hesitation, but if I felt I was in relative safety perhaps I would be able to take some photos. If I were stuck…I don’t think I’d give a damn about a camera. If you are thinking you may be seeing the last of the world and that you are going to die, I don’t know what the hell you do. I hope I never know.

(Reuters)

(Kyodo News/AP)

(Itsuo Inouye/AP)

Here is a link to more of these incredible, full-sized photos and I encourage you to view them. Here is a link to donate to the Red Cross for relief efforts in Japan.

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THE INDIAN BUFFET & THE COSMIC OVERTALKER

Off to another lunch with CouchTeen today, this time to a pleasant little Indian restaurant we both enjoy. Ah, there's nothing yummier than a good Indian lunch buffet, really. For your ten bucks or whatever, you get this marvel of flavors and textures like no other cuisine seems to have. Vegetarian CouchTeen appreciates having Not Pizza every so often.

As we sat down and started to eat our delicious plate plops, we both quickly become aware of the low constant hum of the conversation in the booth behind me. There are two women there, one younger with long braided dreadlocks and yoga clothes, the other older, matronly, plump, in a red sweater and dark pants. The younger one never seems to stop talking. She is on a roll, barely taking a breath between paragraphs of rant. There is a particular cadence to the speech of this kind of fervent believer -- a monotone recitation of building concerns, with a slight matter-of-factness dripping over the edges. Now, I am really damn good at remembering long stretches of dialogue, as I must be to come back and report MissEight and Mr12's car chats here, but this stuff was coming so fast and rich that I just can't remember it all. I have to go consult with CouchTeen now.

Me: What do you remember about what the Cosmic Overtalker said?

CouchTeen: That the government was poisoning everyone with vaccines and by purposefully contaminating our food and water. That she had been to other worlds and became enlightened and travels there all the time.

Me: Oh. And that people need to wake up to reality. And that we all have to reject everything we know in order to listen to the messages we are being sent. Thank you.

CouchTeen: Sure.

So just take that and stretch it out over 30 minutes or so. I don't know what the other woman thought of all this as I could not make out the few words she did say. I do know that the Cosmic Overtalker did not teletransport away from Indian restaurant -- I saw her walk out myself.

The Indian Beatles

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SONG FOR A TOUGH POLITICAL NIGHT: "I'M ALIVE"

I don't feel too much like writing. Regular readers will know that I have been deeply upset by the political situation in Wisconsin. With the GOP jamming the union-busting component of their Budget Repair Bill through on legislative slimery and admitting that, nah, it was never about balancing the budget, it was about doing everything possible to defeat Obama in '12...anything I write now will not be very kind or peaceable. So instead, I do what I do when I want to feel better, which is turn to music. "I'm Alive," which I first owned as a kid as the flipside to Tommy James' "Crystal Blue Persuasion," is a song with great punk/soul groove, and there's no other way to do it than (forgive me) balls out. It's positive, energizing, and makes me feel for at least two-and-a-half minutes that I can take on the world and win.

The original:



Fabulous screamer version by Johnny Thunder (not Thunders, of New York Dolls fame, you may note). I also sincerely doubt that Mr. Thunder had anything at all to do with his Kinks-song namesake.



This one by British dude Don Fardon in '69 now sits in the Dutch Top 20 in March 2011. GO DUTCH!



And last one goes to Tom Jones. Power it out, man! Love that guy.



So I feel a bit better having listened. And I feel even better listening to this "music" being played around Madison and the Capitol tonight.

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GUEST PHOTOGRAPHER: MISS EIGHT

I was pleasantly surprised when I uploaded these photos that MissEight took in our backyard with one of our small Canon cameras. She made the choices with post-processing (with my technical help). 

They made me smile and I hope that they make you smile, too.

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ME AND IMAGINARY BIG BIZ SIT DOWN FOR A CHAT

BB: Marianne, thank you so much for being here today.

ME: Thanks, Big Biz. I’m delighted to be able to discuss things. I have a lot of questions for you.

BB: Fire away. I’ve got questions for you as well.

ME: OK. Well, let me start with this: what do you think of the current polarized political situation in America? No one is happy, it seems, and no one is getting the things they need.

BB: We’re all in a tough place now. But we’ve got to be responsible, bite the bullet, stay the course, and get this deficit monster off our backs, and reduce government bloat.

ME: Yes, of course.

BB: I know some liberals and loud-mouthed union bosses don’t want to hear it, but what we are doing in DC and in the State legislatures is for everyone’s good. They’ll all come around someday when they’ve got a little more money in their pockets, and want to keep it!

ME: Everyone wants to be able to support their families and not worry about where their next meal is coming from.

BB: Now, missy, this is where you are wrong about people. You’ve got a lot of people in this country who have no intentions of working. If the government will pay their ways, they’ll just sit back and take the cash. We have generations of people who think they are entitled to handouts!

ME: Ever look at a bell curve?

BB: Sure. Distribution. Mean, medians.

ME: Right. There’s a natural bell curve to almost everything in our world. There are the people you talk about down the very end, or people who by physical or mental circumstance or choice cannot obtain paid work. There are people like you at the other side, who are super-achievers, or inherited a great deal, who have almost every advantage one could have in life. But the vast majority of people are in the middle somewhere. Most have good ability to work, and honest motivations to support themselves fairly.

BB: Honey, that’s just naïve. Someone offers you a free cookie, you gonna turn that down?

ME: I like cookies, but I don’t need them all.

BB: You like people stealing the cookies you worked for and bought yourself?

ME: There is a difference between want and need. Why don’t we leave the allegorical talk behind for a moment? Let me get back to my point. In the natural world, there are poor and there are rich, those who are challenged and those who are gifted. And most people are a little bit of it all. The problem is that you’ve skewed the curve, and that messes up the natural order.

BB: And just how is that?

ME: You’ve bought up all the cookies. But instead of building a cookie factory here to make jobs and goods available to others, which supports order, you’ve eaten the cookies, banked them, or sent them off to pay for far cheaper labor pools in other countries.

BB: It’s un-American to tell me how to run my business. This is a capitalist country, not a daycare or a charity ward.

ME: It’s un-American to deprive those less-fortunate of opportunities to work by hoarding resources and outsourcing to unprotected workers in 3^rd world countries.

BB: I have a right to keep my success! If workers here weren’t so greedy with their increasing demands for health insurance and pensions and vacation time, we’d give them the work. American workers have priced themselves out of the real-world market. They aren’t worth it. I can’t afford them and continue to build my business.

ME: You can’t afford them and continue to make as much profit. But you would still profit, plenty.

BB: By limiting my vision, you limit my motivation and my potential. I’ll pack up and take my business to another country, how about that?

ME: You can do that. Many have. But many haven’t, because they’ve been able to infiltrate into our highest levels of government. You’ve paid for politicians who repay you by making sure your taxes are low or nonexistent through loopholes and concessions. They put through legislation that gives you more authority and your workers less. They make sure the pile of cash you worship stands taller than the Statue of Liberty.

BB: Typical bleeding-heart nonsense. I’m a patriot!

ME: What makes you a patriot if you have absolutely no investment in your fellow citizens other than what you can squeeze out of them? You don’t care if they are undereducated. You don’t care if they can’t make their house payments and end up in a motel. You don’t care if they can see a doctor if they are sick. They keep telling you, so many millions and millions of people, that they are drowning. And not only are you not listening, you are pushing their heads below the water, even those who are strong swimmers.

BB: You can’t make this my problem. People sometimes need to hit rock bottom before they get tough with themselves and work harder to achieve what they want.

ME: It is your problem. We all live in the same house. When you purposefully deprive others of being able to access the things that build a strong foundation, your house – your house – will crumble someday. People get ill and then stay ill. They aren't getting what they need out of the educational system, or are burdened by crippling college debt. They are angry and even in their best efforts to achieve, get nowhere. Look at what can happen to very large populations of disenfranchised people. You risk radicalizing them. Don’t think it can’t happen here. When it gets to the point that people have nothing left to lose, they will come to you, one way or another. If you shut off their ability to have a say in how their lives go, they will do whatever it takes to be heard again.

BB: That sounds like a threat.

ME: No. I have hope things will never get that bad. I still feel that most people just want to live modest lives, enjoy their families in peace and not be worrying how they are going to survive.

BB: So your solution is bigger government, a social welfare state, with all the mess and corruption and waste that goes along with that, and a country that feels just fine with taking something for nothing. I’ve heard this all before. It doesn’t work.

ME: Big Biz can assist government by working with them to modernize and restructure and streamline, to find inventive solutions to reduce bloat. But government is not a business, it should be noted. It is there to serve and protect the citizens, to do the things that keep everyone strong. “Give us your tired and poor” must have more meaning than “Give us your tired and poor, if I can profit off them.”

BB: It’s not like I don’t give back. I have a foundation.

ME: For tax reasons.

BB: There’s nothing wrong with that.

ME: You go to church?

BB: Every Sunday.

ME: So…what would Jesus do? What was his message?

BB: Well…look how he ended up.

ME: Sigh. Big Biz, I’m not making my point here with you, am I.

BB: Nope. And I’m not getting through to you either, right?

ME: You and I pretty much represent how divided our country is, about almost every issue there is to work on.

BB: Yup.

ME: Well, I’ve got to get going. I’d wish you good luck, but you’ve already had so much. You hardly need it.

BB: Not luck, sweetie, hard work. Hard work and smarts.

ME: And all those people who supported you, the nurses and teachers and cops and factory workers and electricians and systems analysts and accountants and…

BB: There is only one winner in a race.

ME: And when they cheat they get disqualified.

BB: Endless. You never shut up.

ME: Nope.

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THE INCIDENT

(The after-school commentary remains a constant source of smiles for me, Designated Driver.)

Mr12: (discussing the Nintendo 3DS he would like for his upcoming birthday) : It's coming out on the 27th. It's going to be really cool.

MissEight: And then I should get your DSi XL. [CouchTeen] took my DS because of the "incident."

Mr12: You mean when you used a scissors for a stylus on his DS. You stabbed it.

MissEight: We need not speak of this.

********************************************

(MissEight and I get out of the car and walk over to the coffeehouse. She is skipping.)

MissEight: I'm so happy we live in a place with so many condiments!

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AD: KOCH BEER

Wisconsin, I made you an ad.

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I RUINED THE MONKEES

One of the strange components of acting is, well, the basic idea of acting -- accepting pay to spend your days pretending, like being an undercover spy or a hooker. But what happens when the public won’t let an actor leave a role behind? What if you have a ghost that never leaves you? Do you let typecasting ruin your career, do you roll with it and be the ghost, do you try to do anything you can to bury the ghost for good?

Oddly enough, I got to thinking about this in regards to the ‘60s TV pop group, The Monkees, and an announcement this past week that three of the group would reunite for a tour this year. The four original members – Davy Jones, Peter Tork, Mickey Dolenz, and Mike Nesmith – either had the best timing or the worst, depending on your view.  “The Monkees” were developed for NBC-TV by Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider as a weekly series based loosely on the Beatles’ sunny/snarky personality-defined pop of “A Hard Day’s Night.” There had yet to be a group that had stepped into the “American Beatles” role, though many had hoped, tried, and failed. Everyone at that point was scrambling to hook into the Beatles’ magic, and millions. So a TV series, which served as a marketing platform, was written and a “group” formed via open call audition.

"The Monkees" NBC-TV end credits

It was destined to succeed, because of kids like me. I LOVED the Monkees! Their music was very good, adorable import Brit Davy Jones broke the Cute-O-Meter, and the pacing, look, and dialogue of the show seemed fast and fresh. I wasn’t looking into artistic integrity; I was 4 1/2 years old! I watched the program faithfully, and badgered my parents to buy me the 45s as each came out as well as all the products the group was required per contract to pitch me. I bought Monkees coloring books and View Master reels and gum trading cards and comic books. I made goo-goo eyes at on-screen Davy Jones, and wondered if he was worth pitching Paul McCartney for as my future husband. All the little kids, tweens, and teens powered “The Monkees” to success – the mid- and tail-sections of the Baby Boomers.

The show was also destined to fail with a resounding crash within two years. One reason for the demise of the franchise was the year “The Monkees” debuted on TV: Fall 1966. If the show had been delivered a full year or two earlier, it would not have so quickly run into the creative differences and audience turn-around that it did -- once again, because of the Beatles. In 1964 when the Beatles made their iconic entry into the States and “A Hard Day’s Night” was released, the pop music business was still in the hands of the old school Brill Building, Tin Pan Alley type of operation. Most artists were not songwriters, nor expected to be. Many played no instruments. The record company team and agents and managers were expected to find appropriate songs from “pro” writers, bring in session musicians to fill the holes or replace less-than-perfect group members on recordings, and groom the image with rehearsed press quotes. But by ’66, heavy hands-on formulaic pop stars were fading fast, replaced by the growing expectation that ALL groups should write and perform their own material, and “do their own thing,” as the Beatles had. The slicksters in the industry were seen as hopelessly uncool, from another era, and definitely a representation of “The Man,” and The Man was having real generational issues then.

The Monkees themselves, front-end Baby Boomers, almost immediately ran headlong into the difficulties caused by the weirdness of portraying a band, but not being a band, and being musicians and wanting to actually participate with choice in their recordings, but being treated like actors in a very long commercial jingle. Each of them chose to sign a contract to be a Monkee, seemingly with very little foresight into exactly what that would mean. What do you do when you are singing on “Last Train To Clarksville” as “Mickey Dolenz” and not Mickey Dolenz without the quotes? That’s still your name, your voice, your face…but you are owned. You remain “Mickey” even when you aren’t that Mickey. The guys made strong attempts to represent themselves as who they really were on their records, but it was an uphill battle that in the end was too hard to fight.

So, yes, I helped to ruin the Monkees. The teens were going along with the Beatles again to the harder and more individualistic sounds of “Magical Mystery Tour” and “The White Album.” It was the little kids like me who were still little in 1968 when  “The Monkees” went off the air, and I was crushed. I still loved pop singles and was totally not OK with the Beatles having facial hair. Little comic-clutching Kool-Aid-stained-mouthed kiddies were not groovy then, unless you were one of The Banana Splits. I remember reading in 16 Magazine how the Monkees’ show was being canceled and how we all needed to write NBC and call our local TV stations to protest, and I asked my brother to write a letter for me while I dictated. I can’t remember now if he did it, but I’m sure I was plenty obnoxious about asking. It stayed on in Saturday syndication for quite some time, but the world had changed. The snappy fun of “A Hard Day’s Night” lived on in “Laugh-In,” and not so much in music.

Peter Tork was the first to bail from the Monkees, buying out his contract at a huge financial price in 1969. The other three continued on for awhile, with Mike Nesmith leaving next, and Mickey Dolenz and Davy Jones – the two “actors” of the four – stayed on until the franchise was completely dead. I have somewhat mixed feelings about them now. On one hand, each signed up voluntarily for the Monkees Army, each took some pretty hefty checks home, and each became famous, which we can assume they all wanted. But they have each been so burdened with the criticism of being phony, musically-illegitimate candy floss. It’s not at all fair. Each one of the group were talented, but not in ways that were going to mesh well together in the real world, especially after the series had ended but the contracts for recording were still in force. Take a listen to this performance from Nesmith, Dolenz, and Jones from “The Johnny Cash Show.” After you get over thinking that “Whoa, the Monkees were on the Johnny Cash Show, “ you can hear...it’s lovely.

None of the four were ever able to be bigger than the Monkees, in the same way that Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney will never just be individuals – they will be Beatles first and foremost forever. The Monkee men have come together a couple times over the years, or a few of them at a time anyway, but rancor has seemed to rule the day. Not a surprise. They didn’t come together naturally; why should they be expected to ever gel? Cynics could answer “money,” because there’s a chunk of that in reunion tours these days. Idealists could answer “shared history,” because like the Beatles, only those four guys know exactly what it was like to be a Monkee.

1966 is a long, long time ago now. All the Monkees are AARP-aged. Their hits are still played and played and played on the radio, and people still love them. For all the good and bad of the experience,  however hard it was to haul ghosts around all these years, it would be nice if these gents could remember that music outlasts us all, and brings great happiness and comfort to the world. Wear your idealist Monkees t-shirt proudly, I say! And Nesmith, I’m looking at you.

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SONG & VIDEO: "BORN IN WISCONSIN"

In my apparent on-going quest to bring back the Hootenanny, I have written my SECOND protest song! The first was "How Can You Tell?" because I was (and am) so disgusted by Arizona's blatant anti-immigrant legal garbage. This one, because...well, I betcha you can guess, oh ya! As the title says, I was indeed born in Wisconsin, proud of it, and outraged by the multiple legislative horrors that Governor Scott Walker and his Capitol Cronies are attempting to inflict upon the working- and middle-class folks of Wisconsin in the name of "fiscal responsibility." So I do what I do, which is write and play and be silly and be serious and maybe it can help. At the very least, I hope it will bring a smile to those folks who have been so dedicated to not letting Walker steam-roll his way through the state. Please pass it on! You can also download the song as an MP3 here which I promise will add nothing to the deficit nor take anything from your pension. Or please do a COVER of it so I don't have to listen to my wobbly musicianship! Thanks.

(All the video photos are my home stuff, or from the ones I took at the pro-WI-union Rally To Save The American Dream in Olympia, WA. on February 26, 2011.)

BORN IN WISCONSIN

I was born in Wisconsin, I grew up in that state

I threw snowballs at my cousins and I swam in the lakes

I ate cream puffs at the State Fair and made friends with a cow

I grew up strong and healthy and this is why and how

I had a teacher who taught me how to write well and fair

She told me how reporters all must fact-check and then share

Her ideals, they stayed with me, and I know this is true

There ain’t no palm trees in the state except on Fox News

There was the nurse who held my hand when I was hurt and in fear

The firefighter who told me jokes so I could laugh away my tears

The cop who called my mom and dad to say I’d be OK

I had people caring for me when I needed them that day

We were all from Wisconsin and so proud of our state

With our cheese and our beer and our Packers we were great

We all learned to polka, from West Allis to Green Bay

And we all worked together so that each would have a say

Now there’s thousands at the Capitol, locked out and in the cold

There are workers being frozen out of justice young and old

The Governor and his buddies say the state is just too broke

Their motto for Wisconsin is: Things Go Better With Koch

But I was born in Wisconsin and I am smart and I am strong

I know that those who lie will be revealed before long

I stand with those workers who served me; now I can serve them

We all must come together, Republicans and Dems

I was born in Wisconsin, I grew up in that state

I know what is happening there will determine all our fates

I was born in Wisconsin, let’s stand up and moo

If you can stand with us, then you are from Wisconsin too.





 Born In Wisconsin by MarianneSp

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BEST. SPAM. NAME. EVER.

You should sometimes check your spam email in-box.

The Rolling Stones, "Stupid Girl"

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IT'S 11PM PST & I HAVEN'T EVEN HAD DINNER YET

I know today began sometime, and I know it's going to end reasonably soon, but today was such a blur of doing and going that it all turned into one big mush-brain festival for me. I worked on something special that I thought I would post up today, but I think I'd like to do a bit more with it, so look for it tomorrow (hint: if you are dead sick of me talking about Wisconsin, take tomorrow off, eh?).

So today what you get here are two iPhone photos of epic clouds and a tiny lil Space Needle taken from my nemesis, I-5, and an amusing video that CouchTeen passed on to me. Seacrest out!

Jesus Is My Friend (Donk Remix)

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"AMERICA'S GOT TALENT" IN SEATTLE, OR, FAT, DRUNK, & STUPID IS NO WAY TO GO THROUGH LIFE, SON

I've never seen a full episode of the NBC-TV talent show, "America's Got Talent." I've seen some clips on the internet, but truthfully, I get that show mixed up with "The X Factor" and sometimes with a cable-access variety show. So, why, you ask me, why, Marianne, would you get tickets to go to a taping of "America's Got Talent" as it swings by Seattle? BECAUSE I COULD, is the answer. When I got the email from the Paramount that AGT would be coming there for 2 days/4 tapings, and that audience tickets were free, I thought, HMM, well, that might be an interesting experience, why not? Then I wrote my nice photo editor at Seattle Weekly and said, you want I should shoot this, ya? She wrote back and said, oh ya ya do dat, and I said OK I WILL. But she couldn't find anyone associated with AGT to ask for a photo pass or access, so we agreed that I would shoot the crazy/interesting acts that would be standing in line to audition for the show.

Well, no, I wouldn't, because as it turned out, the general Seattle AGT audition call was already held a few weeks ago in Tacoma, and the acts for the taping whittled down and already chosen. D'OH, we said, my editor and I. I brought my camera tonight anyway, but there were no lunatics in sight in the very, very long line to get into the Paramount at the 6PM taping -- just a whole lot of people getting intermittently battered by wind and rain, which is nothing visually remarkable in this town. So nothing for SW, because AGT had a strict policy: NO CAMERAS, NO CELL PHONE, NO WAY.

AGT had some other audience requirements as well, which you may find interesting:

DRESS: NICE, UPSCALE ATTIRE IS REQUIRED!!! BRIGHT COLORS ARE APPRECIATED!! Attire: PLEASE DRESS UP!!!! DRESS CODE IN EFFECT! Please dress upscale attire as if you were going to a nice restaurant. When you look great, the show looks great. No shorts, hats, or jeans. Absolutely no white attire or clothing with logos or writing will be allowed into the studio. You must adhere to the dress code. IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THE DRESS CODE YOU WILL BE TURNED AWAY.

Unfortunately for me, there was no rule against being a GIANT DRUNKEN ASSHOLE. Oh, man. I had the luck to sit next to three rotund boors, who continued to drink during the show taping (why, Paramount, why?) and did nothing but inappropriately chat, swear, scream, bump into people, yell out the name of one of the stage managers, talk when the three show judges were talking, and just generally made me pissed off and uncomfortable. AGT encourages a LOT of audience participation with cheering and booing and standing up and sitting down and making all kinds of gestures -- it's kind of like a cross between "American Idol" and "The Jerry Springer Show." But HELL. These guys were as annoying as a bulging hemorrhoid and twice as ugly. One of the guys had a shaved head and from the back he had a quad-roll of scalp/neck fat that looked like a litter of Shar-Pei puppies were camped out there. I swear they must have drove in from Short Bus, WA. for the taping.

So, MC Nick Cannon came out. Girls like him. Judges Piers Morgan, Sharon Osbourne, and Howie Mandel came out, and everyone liked them. They said stuff to the mostly-mediocre acts that came out that seemed as spontaneous as a recitation of the phone book. A B-boy dance act from Gilbert, AZ. came out first with giant white no-lace hi-tops and mullets. A girl from L.A. did pretty good impressions of other humorous females. A Swedish woman from Bellevue sang like Whitney Houston, but whiter. A magician crawled into a balloon for a card trick. A group of girls from Moses Lake, WA. tapped and clogged their way through a strange dance act. The Costa Rican Tom Jones appeared. People cheered and booed more. The audience fluffer, the guy who keeps the audience "up" between acts, had high schoolers dance and beat box poorly for us while the stage was cleared for the next act. This is my artistic representation of the stage, which I feel is about as high-quality as the show and my nearby seatmates:

After about two hours in, with about two hours left to go, I was alternately falling asleep and wanting to strangle those dudes by me, except there would be no way I could actually GET MY HANDS AROUND THEIR FAT NECKS. So, I left and got a nice dinner instead.

The End.

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WHAT DO WE DO?: HOW TO START BEING POLITICALLY ACTIVE

"okay my blood is boiling! what do we do, mar?"


My friend Stacy in Florida posted this comment today in response to my post detailing my frustration with the difficult political goings-on in the country right now. I was going to reply in comments, saying something like, "Well, gee, I don't know, I don't have all the answers I'd like to have to solve things and I..." and then I thought again. That's a cop-out, because if I have written something that has inspired someone to act, it's my responsibility to not leave anyone in simmering frustration. I don't have all the answers or ideas, but that's not important. Leaving readers with a few ideas about positive things each one of us can do to peacefully participate in our government is what I should have done at the end of that post! Lo siento, y'all.


Let's begin at the beginningest beginning of all...


1. Get INFORMED. This takes a LOT more effort than turning on FOX or CNN. You have to search a variety of sources, whether it's on the internet, your local library, or listening to or speaking with the people directly involved in the issues you are concerned about. As much as it might frustrate you (more), you must seek out the best-quality sources of opposing views as well, if you have interest in finding out WHY and HOW, to seek common ground or understanding, or know exactly what you are up against. Try hard to find neutral sources of information for data. Polls and stats can be spun endlessly by political factions. Get your hands on court documents and a legal dictionary, and see in black-and-white what laws are being proposed, passed, or are precedent. It's hard, but trying to dig out some kind of reality in the constant stream of information being thrown out there is YOUR job. You can't always leave it to someone else. And you have to be prepared to take in things that are going to upset you, from all sides. Think for yourself to know what you believe.


2. Register to VOTE and then ACTUALLY VOTE in EVERY election. Your right to vote is precious and powerful, but sometimes it takes the consequences of apathy to understand that. So many people see the bickering and see-sawing of Democrats vs. Republicans and think it's all is a useless merry-go-round and that the United States is owned by oil kings and Disney anyway. That doesn't excuse you from your responsibility as a citizen and to all your fellow citizens to be involved. What you do matters deeply; you just may not be able to see it or feel it at that moment you pull the voting booth lever.


3. Know who represents YOU and make contact. Most people, even people who faithfully vote, will never once contact their political representatives. But you should -- they are there to serve YOU, after all, and at the very very least, should make note of your particular concern. How can they know how you feel if you don't SAY something? Write, call, text, whatever, but make it count. That means that if you oppose or support a particular bill, law, or proposal, reference it by number or title so the staffer who takes your message can route it properly. Randomly ranting about how things suck will get you nowhere. Be brief but specific, be polite, state your concern, give your contact information, and wrap it up. The "be polite" thing goes extra-super-double when speaking to a representative whom you loathe. Have a couple of beers later or something.


4. Join up with other like-minded folks. As we have seen, even small groups, if ardent, well-organized, media-savvy, and consistent, can achieve tremendous results. Participating in a political organization can give you many different options of working for the change, and can be a great morale-booster when you are feeling down about the state of the world. It's important to know that you don't stand alone in your beliefs. You can choose your level of involvement, from something as simple as signing a petition to helping run a campaign. Whatever it is you can do to help, there's a group that needs you. For instance, I am not good with cold-calling voters; that's not my thing. But I can write a persuasive PR release and I can take decent photographs of rallies or meetings or speeches, and I can throw a few bucks in sometimes as well. I can make coffee and bake brownies, do research, and attend events. I can lead a group cheer that is not only incredibly loud, it's on-key.  And remember: you can form your own group, too! This is America, and if you want to gather up a bunch of your friends as "Go-Go Girls For Grift-less Government," you can! Frug on, ladies!


5. Be there or be square. Your physical presence can be an extremely strong political tool (see: Egypt). When there is a visual aspect to your political beliefs, whether you are the Silent Majority or Silent Minority or the Loud Median Folk or the Moderated Tones Fringe Aspect, when people can SEE you and COUNT you, it makes a big impact. Don't stay home and let others "be the change." YOU have to be it. Even if you are just standing there, you count more than you think to those in power, because they know that for the one that gets up out of the chair to attend a rally or a meeting, there are many many more who aren't there, but will back the ones who are. And it bears repeating: your behavior must be beyond reproach. That means you must conduct your business peacefully. Avoid slurs and swears. Absolutely no violence against person or property. Show respect, even if you aren't getting much in return. You can be angry and passionate about your cause, and speak your mind. But if you lose control of your emotions and your behavior, you make things a whole lot worse for everyone. If you are too much of a hothead and/or a slob, stay home and send in an extra donation check.


This all sounds obvious and simple, but it isn't. It takes real commitment and dedication, and the willingness to fit one more thing into what is probably already a very busy life. Even if you can do only one small thing, do it. Your voice is important. Make it heard.


As we can see from this very-extremely-recently unearthed clip, Governor Scott Walker just could not persuade the head of "Go-Go Girls For Grift-less Government" to sign off on his budget repair bill. Nice try, sir.

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HOW TO RADICALIZE A 2ND GRADE TEACHER

What a mess. What an awful, shameful mess we have on our hands here in the good ol’ USA. Some beacon of democracy we are! Why should other countries struggling to forge new democracies look to us now? We are flat-out failing. So many of our lawmakers represent only those who have paid for their campaigns or their idea of serving their religion, so few of them able to engage in genuine open-minded and intelligent discourse. The rest of the world points to us and says, “The deadlock of American government is the fault of every single one of you. These are the people you elected to serve. You have no one to blame but yourselves.” Everything now is black or white…or, rather, red and blue. And the world’s disgust in us is well-earned.

I’m sick at heart over this. There are protestors sleeping in heaps of blankets outside my home state’s Capitol building in subzero weather, there are lawmakers in Arizona writing bills to make American newborns with migrant parents into instant tiny criminals, and the honorable intent behind “fiscal responsibility” has turned into a well-planned agenda to take away funding from those evil havens of left-wing nutjobs, Planned Parenthood and public broadcasting. The Supreme Court flings the doors wide open to unlimited political campaign spending by both foreign and domestic corporations, and far-right Governors want to ensure that workers’ unions have little or no power anymore. Wall Street criminals walk free, and a Georgia lawmaker wants all women who have miscarriages to prove they didn’t abort or go to jail.

Before you call me an agenda-led kind of girl, an evil left-wing nutjob, let me tell you this: I’ve been on all sides. In my life, I’ve been poor enough to qualify – for years – for food stamps. I’ve been wealthy enough to pay the top tax rate – for years. I’ve sat in the middle class, where there were no government financial adjustments for being poor or any extra cash from being rich – for years. I came from a Republican family, but my mother was once a proud owner of a Wisconsin teacher’s union card. My father served in WWII for five years, and my mother worked in a munitions plant, and both have been more than generous to their family, friends, and employees. Both my parents graduated from a state university, as I did. I saw my family slowly build a business to success, and how that business being taxed in two different countries at high rates at times seemed very unfair. I also saw a police officer come to our door and put a lien on our house – a house that had three mortgages on it. I saw my mother look in the bottom of the clothes washer and under our couch cushions to try to give me school lunch money for that day – and that day only. And I’ve enjoyed a lifestyle that most would call quite privileged, and I’ve gone without when it seemed everyone I knew didn’t.

So. One side would tell you, look, there’s an example of people who were poor bringing up their status by hard work, building a business that ended up supporting our family and others. The other side would say, in a country so wealthy, no citizen should be deprived of basic housing, healthcare, food, or education, for opportunity and ability are not always aligned to make every person a financial success.  And I say, WHY can’t we figure out how to be both responsible and compassionate? WHY? The development of business and entrepreneurship in a capitalist country is and must be a big priority – it’s how we roll here. But it doesn’t make any sense at all to fund it on the backs of the people who will never have much scratch to spare, and many of those who are in service to YOU AND ME, who make that choice to serve everyone, rather than serve only themselves. Get it? Whatever problems you may have with teachers or the police or unions in general, and of course there are problems in anything, they aren’t trying to take down Big Biz or lay back and eat bon bons in the break room. The vast majority want to work, want to do their best. It is galling that some government leaders are attempting to disallow their meaningful say in their own employment.

How in the hell can anyone, especially after 9-11, not GET how police officers and firefighters are INCREDIBLE? I’m not going to let Officer Pissy Ticketer or the few who seriously don’t belong in uniform take away from that fact, no way. Hey, how about nurses? Who sat by you in the hospital after visiting hours and made sure you were as comfortable as you could be, and maybe sat with you and held your hand for a few minutes? Who doubled-checked your chart, and found a med error from a too-stressed-out doctor, and corrected it? Who treated you like a human being, instead of a “patient?” And teachers? You ever try that job? I have. Your responsibility is overwhelming. It’s up to you to figure out how to work with every student so they learn what they need to on your watch.  You have to deal with special needs, district mandates, kids who are too tired or hungry or stressed to focus, supplies that are depleted by December, and parents who are just not interested. Your day never ends, with lesson planning, grading, and worrying that goes on most every evening. You often look for supplemental income in the long summer break. And everyone blames you for everything that’s wrong with education.

These are not the people who have bankrupted our country, either financially or morally. Don’t look in the middle – look up. Way way way way way way up. Unchecked greed by those with millions and billions to play with from their own personal bankrolls did, not Ms. Smith, the 2^nd grade teacher who earns 50K a year, nor all the Ms. And Mr. Smiths put together. When you pick away at the poorest folks, you can often get away with it. When you pick on the middle class, you risk radicalizing millions and millions of people who are dead tired of being disrespected to begin with, and who will not be able to stand for being smothered by the government that is supposed to represent them, too.

Our deficit is an atrocious nightmare, and it needs to be seriously dealt with.  But you cannot be taken seriously as a lawmaker when you only choose to cut programs from “the other side.” Worse, you should have your asses booted out of town for trying to do everything you can (some of which is very very legally suspect) to suppress the legitimate concerns of the other side. All of us must commit to stop playing war games inside our own country. All of us need to take responsibility and make sacrifices. And all of us must return to the idea that America is not just one thing, one side, one vision, with only one way to go about things. For those that serve us every day, for those who served and died, for those who face an uncertain future because we can’t get our shit together, for the biggest and smallest of us all, think again about what democracy is supposed to be. The world so counts on us.

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