Martha Stewart's Fall Favorites for You and Your Family to Enjoy

First of all, happy halloween and happy birthday to Lola and Jon! and happy belated birthday to Ted! anything else happy in the world? i think that sums it up. furrowboofrown.

when jaci and i were eating dinner tonight, she suddenly whispered SHHH! and her hand shot out with panther-like agility and precision and she flipped off our light switch. what?? i hissed back over our now-shadowed lasagna. "i hear trick or treaters! and we don't have any candy!" wow, no sound passeth thru my lips henceforth. but we giggled. and hovered. in the dark. until we were sure kids would bypass our door and we wouldn't have to face them. To add to our unusual hollow-ween spirit, i actually heard jaci say on her cell phone that she "expects our pumpkins to be smashed against our door by the morning". i do not think that will happen. a) they are the small kind, not the rotting carved kind- decorative, autumnal; not a fire hazard or a satanic symbol. b) delivery guys never find our door; assuming drunk local teenagers will seems almost arrogant. we'll see...

Second, sweet potato pie is the best dessert on the planet. Make it from scratch and make it immediately. My tongue does not appreciate dessert while on chemo, but my memory does.

Third. At Fletcher, you are expected to take 4 courses per semester. Go-getters who clamor for 5 receive the gentle lecture about how they would miss out on too much of the experience that transpires outside the classroom: the speakers, the cultural events, the parties. However, I remember the only complaint I really heard consistently during my stint there was how, still, the worse thing about Fletcher was having to choose between classwork and attending the speech of a foreign dignitary, a festival celebrating a country's culture, or even touring Boston's main historical sites. So, dear professors, if any of you happen upon this, my friends/your students are learning a ton, but they seem so overtasked by midterms that their Fletcher "experience" is stymied. There are people at the school who feel that the "D" in the MALD degree has been forgotten; from an ex-foreign service officer, Diplomacy is best learned and practiced at happy hour. Just some unfiltered observation from a drop-out.

Politically-sensitive, pls skip next paragRANT. Apathetic or progressive, rock on.

Number Three, speaking of mid-terms... does anyone care about the mid-term elections coming up? i'm sure adam seiden and susan massey are on top of it, but anyone else? did moveon.org's servers crash (or did their grassroots internet magic die when the supreme court got to pick our pres?) and who's willing to give the Young Dems their cell phone number in the effort to mobilize via mobiles. not me! i'm just sad that politics are so stale. i'm sad that the commercials on TV seem like they could have been written by the same old mud-slinging/cheesy campaign managers. Everyone "hates" politics BUT everyone has an opinion. Everyone can see straight through the smoke and mirrors of campaign promises and most people agree that it is unfair that you need to be rich to mount a successful attempt at higher public office. but what changes? AND, every four years (can't wait for 08), when people again question "why do we have an electoral college again?" "did YOU elect our state's 'electors'? who are they?'", we scratch our heads and believe that there must be something good about it. Like the theory of relativity which has been explained to me by various patient geniuses, I just cannot get it through my thick skull where the electoral college's place is in modern presidential elections. But, like the rest of our mass citizenry, I forget the illogical non-democratic system that elected our current president despite losing the popular vote, only to be reminded when the media pretends to question it four years later. I'm pretty sure the Men in Black use a satellite version of their forgetfulness-flasher on all of the US just before inauguration day. Thank goodness. (I just feel bad for the rest of the world who doesn't get the placating effects of a forgetfulness-flasher [read: economic prosperity, wag-the-dog press,a million staged "reality" shows], so the rest of the world thinks we're silicone-wasp-cowboys & playgirls and we wonder why. don't be a hater Osama, don't be snobby Pierre,come on duuuude.) One more thing, if you don't think about anything but gay marriage and abortion when you go to the polls, please please read more. My blog is mean-spirited and slanted and angry- go to your state's non-partisan election guidance page(start here maybe). and, if you're too busy or you live in the famously-prop-happy state of California, you can just google "voter information" and certain groups (like gun activists or pro-choicers or hispanics) will TELL you who to vote for.

Jaci is taking a course on the madness of crowds and although i rant and rage, I am a cow in the best herd on the planet. the US has glorious faults, but i wouldn't trade our history or our system for that of any other country. patriotism is an essential part of a constructive rant and it's only because i care that this stupid stuff keeps me up at night. Moooooo.