I gotcher Spider Pig right here:

Okay...I admit it. The primarysphere, in all it's nightmarish glory, is draining my energy. It seems as though everywhere you turn someone is not liking something. And I confess to having this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach...it's almost as though the funny is quickly draining out of me.

And I must not let that happen...not when I live with little miss cuteness:

So instead of letting the everything get to me, I'm working on trying to locate the things that make me smile, laugh, and realise that the world really does have some good qualities to it no matter how much dread and anger boils up in me when faced with yet more crap emanating from the Capitol Building.

So I see that there's lots of back and forthing out there. It's been a crazy day of cleaning and puttering here at Castle Kredwyn.

As I pulled stuff off this one shelf, I found a plaque one of my students gave me. It's from her country--Romania and is a depiction of Castle Dracula.

So now it's hung on the wall facing my desk--along with an old flyer from the Paul Hackett campaign, a watercolor of Gleann da lough picked up at an art fair in Dublin, a "Thou Shalt Not Whine" sign, and a bunch of other stuff. Very cool addition.

So naturally, I started thinking about my own travels and so here we are...

Okay...

I've read the letter. And I've read two Kossacks interpretations of what the letter means. Or rather...what Greg Sargent thinks that the letter means.

His entire analysis rests upon one clause and concludes:

She wants him fired.

And I'm wondering...did he have a Magic 8 Ball with him when he skimmed through the letter and jumped to the conclusion that because HRC said "Nothing justifies the kind of debasing language that David Shuster used and no temporary suspension or half hearted apology is sufficient" she was calling for his firing?

Cause that's not how I read it when I went through the entire letter.

(Primary Free Zone Alert)

In his A Daily Show interview, Tim Gunn pointed out that

"I'm the first to encapsulate this realistically. Nobody needs it. We need clothes, do we need fashion? No. And fashion, when it's good, comes out of a context that's societal and cultural and historic and economic and political -- so it's of a time and a place."

That kairos idea with regards to fashion in larger context makes sense...and kind of explains New Wave. (heh)

Most recently Mitch McConnell has been at the forefront of trying to help President Bush get telecom immunity through on the FISA legislation. And even though he's been part of the negotiation process to come up with some FISA legislation that will...quite frankly...not suck when it comes to little things like constitutional infringements, we know full well that POTUS will be less than appreciative of Democratic efforts.

Even as POTUS signs a 15 day extension...the GOP is out there trying to figure out how to "protect" the telecommunications companies from 'We the People.'

It's with that and the email from a student who just told me that he's been sworn into the Marines going on in my head that I opened an email from Paul Hackett:

Mitch McConnell, the obstructionist Republican leader, orchestrated more filibusters last year than any Senator in our country's history. Washington needs to take action to confront the countless challenges created by this administration, but McConnell has used every weapon at his disposal to stop progress from being made.

Yes...yes...I know. Y'all are trying your darndest to be evil, calculating, evil, hard hitting, critical advocates, shills, tools, and partisans for your preferred candidates.

But deep down 'neath that evil, hard edged, critical, contrary exterior y'all are good people with big hearts who are more than willing to help out a fellow Kossack, or human, in need. And it's because of those big hearts that everyone around here is working their darndest to see that the person they think will best represent us gets into the big white house at one end of Penn. Ave.

But because of all the heart, passion, criticism...and sometimes blindered vision...we sometimes miss some things that we might not normally miss.

Okay...I saw yesterday's video of the otters on the Front Page and totally went Awwwwwww!!!.

Hell...only the coldest of hearts would not melt at the sight of otters floating around on their backs holding paws. Yes, Rudy...I'm talking to you.

If I could, I'd sit for hours watching the otters play down at the National Zoo. One time we were there, my roommate's baseball hat fell off due to a gust of wind. Needless to say, that quickly became the otters' play toy for quite a long time.

She never did get it back.

But watching the "devil may care...just gonna have fun" attitude of the otters really has a way of making me smile deep down where it counts in a way that few people have ever been able to connect with.

There's like one person I know who embodies this playful spirit...and as always, I am grateful that she is my best friend. Cause if she weren't, my life just wouldn't be the same.

There's been a lot of back and forth with regards to the primary delegates that will be coming out of Florida--and the one in Michigan because they had the temerity, for whatever reason (there are different ones).

HRC, not my favorite candidate (actually none of the top three are my favorite candidates...but I will vote for any one of them in the GE as I did in 2004), has taken a great deal of heat for making this statement:

Statement by Senator Hillary Clinton on the Seating of Delegates at the Democratic National Convention

"I hear all the time from people in Florida and Michigan that they want their voices heard in selecting the Democratic nominee.

cont'd below the fold...

Classes have begun...so I'm feeling like things are beginning to get a little bit busier, which is a good thing cause I seem to work better if my plate is full and I'm grousing about it.

Don't know why, but that's the way it feels.

So I've started working on the end game...or at least the second part of Act II and movement into Act III.

Is it possible to transport through space by way of pathways through Faerie so that you leave Northeast US and wind up in Italy? I hope so...

Do I have to deal with all of the possible physics related to it? I hope not...

Scanning through the diary list, I'm seeing mostly candidate diaries. All fine and good I suppose but I'm noticing that there's a lot of kicking the same stories around from various and sundry angles.

So I thought that I'd do a brief write up of the news that's going on elsewhere...

Sitting here working with a cat curled up (paws, ears, and tail now toasty after her scampering out on the back porch) nearby, I look out into the snow coming down out in the back yard...

My thoughts turn from the hurly burly of the world outside my corner of the world and towards the deep silence out back as I watch the small clumps of flakes fall.

Well...here's the thing. No one, to the best of my knowledge, dies, per se. Maybe someone could get killed somewhere along the line, but my protagonist already knows who would be doing the deed and why.

In some ways, it's a race between two different groups to get to the object. A form of Capture the Flag, if you will, with the protagonist's group being just ahead of the curve...but not by much.

But the puzzle is there...but how does one drop clues about the location of the object without giving the damn thing away at the very beginning.

It's a mystery...

The question asks "What is your novel about?"

The answer starts out "It's about" followed by a word, a sentence, a paragraph discussing what the novel is about.

In my case, it's a first person narrative about a woman who is invited to come and help take care of her aunt's bookstore while the aunt goes on a long needed vacation. When she arrives at the store, she finds that things are not quite what she expected...including the fact that the aunt takes off in search of the pirate's object even before the protagonist gets there. And that's where things start to get interesting...

Okay...I ran away today. I spent the afternoon wandering around doing errands and just generally not thinking about politics, primaries, and spin meistering.

The weather was great. The sun was shining. And the cat, once we woke up, was bouncing all over he place.

She has now gone out for a ride with the housemate. She loooooves going for rides. When she hears one of us rattle car keys, she will move from where she was to the front hall table in seconds. A grey streak...as it were.

She will jump up from the floor to the table and sit looking at the door until one of us picks her up and takes her out to the car with us.

The days that she can't go...oh boy...the pouty look that comes with being left behind. ::chuckle::

Ok...

At first I thought I liked him cause he was the grumpy oldster who said so much and spoke with so much passion that it made me smile.

Then I thought it was because I'd been totally turned off by the scary bloggers who thought so highly of their candidates that they were more than happy to tear down anyone who seemed like a "real" contender in this Primary Nightmare that calls itself a "discussion" on Democratic principles.

Heck there've been lots of thoughts going through my head...some for each of the top tier candidates...some growling at them for stupid shit...some not understanding why anyone would need to do Z, X, or Y. That kind of stuff...some in applause.

Lots of discussion today and yesterday...much craziness going on out there. So I figured that it might be time for another musical extravaganza for those who are dodging the falling primary diaries and hoping for and island of solace of some variety.

And though I can't promise you a sitting zazen experience, I thought that some tunes might bring some of us down from the edge.

So without further ado...

First there are Characters. And there are sketches of characters. And after that you've got the Character Arc.

Each one of these items is connected to giving the character more depth in order that the reader be able to identify with the character.

And while a lot of attention is generally ladled upon the main character, other characters including the bad guy and the supporting characters need a certain amount of development also.

It's prolly a good idea to try and give your bad guy some semblance of a soul. I know...soul might be stretching it. But hey, some depth might be helpful in better understanding why the bad guy is...well...bad.

After all, it's a total waste to just say that the bad guy is evil, eats kittens for breakfast, and not give a rationale for such weird behaviour.