PA is usually a battleground, but Obama is up by more than 10 points.

michelle was on the daily show last night being generally awesome, although not quite as awesome as usual. she looks a little tired, although who can blame her.

I don’t know if I pity or envy Kevin’s optimism since is claiming iowa, missouri, colorado, nm, florida, virginia, ohio will all flip. Of course, despite my outward doom and gloom, I hopehopehope for an Obama victory.

Of course, my Libertarian friends could come up with plenty of ways of how Obama is just as bad as McCain and in some ways worse. I don’t think this is true because of the foreign policy issues, and also, I have complete faith in the Democrats to get absolutely nothing done.

Go Donate.

It tugs at my cold, black heart every year. If I can be unemployed for many months and have a HUGE ER BILL, OMFG to pay, and have no job security and donate, you can too.

Is that too obnoixous a statement? Probably.

I have a bunch of other things to say about the DNC, especially since my hero, Bill C, spoke last night. (No. I am not giving in my Libertarian decoder ring.) But it was requested by Ellie that I post this.

[insert some nonsense about Hugh Laurie and his hotness]

Me: The DNC is making me want to have Barack Obama’s babies. And i HATE babies.
Ellie: But you like baby kittens, right?
Me: Obama holding a kitten would be adorable. A stray kitten. That he rescued from the South side.
Ellie: And it would have soft paws and little pointy ears! And would teach him about the joys of limited government. Yes.
Me: And the kitten will grow to be an adorable and intelligent cat, that will photogenically prance around the White House, and lounge on that big table they use for important meetings where they decide issues of national security and stuff. And it will be vocal and meow and demand attention. And he will indulge the cat’s demand.
Ellie: And Obama will shred the Patriot Act and put it in the litter box. And the cat will be friendly-pushy, and when heads of state come to visit, it will get up in their laps and purr and knead and require petting and stroking. And the heads of state will be so overwhelmed with its cuteness that they will agree to friendship and huge trade agreements with the US.

We are NOT obama girls. We are not.

Me: I want to marry Barack Obama. That’s totally wrong.

David: How so? He’s a handsome cat

Me: He’s not a libertarian! But he’s all well educated and well spoekn and when he speaks, I swoon.

David: That’s because he’s a politician with a normal haircut, which is rare.

Me: I already posted about this, about how I really can’t give a detailed political explanation (at least one that would be acceptable to Libertarians) on why he is better than McCain, but god I want him to be prez more than McCain

David: McCain is a pruned up old warmonger. War costs a lot of money. That money has to come from somewhere. That’s enough.

Me: Oh, true. I remember at Skidmore they had up a poster “What would you do with 87$ billion for everyone to write their suggestions.

David: Hookers and blow

Me: I don’t think that costs $87 billion.

David: High class hookers and blow.

Coffee Is Serious Business, Yo

While I ideologically think the coffee shop, as an independent business, has the right to refuse certain drinks, I don’t get why they would. I worked at a chain coffee shop all through college (B&N Cafe, No We Are NOT a Starbucks) and customers would request some screwy things & I never thought about in terms of ruining the integrity of coffee. You make the drink the customer requests & charge accordingly…in this case there wouldn’t even be a question. You just charge for the espresso & maybe at some places they charge for another cup/ice. (This may just be in NYC/other big cities)

I kind of like the customer response, just because I don’t see the point in imposing coffee snobbery on others, but with his attitude, I probably would have wanted to punch him in the face.

As for tipping, there are times when I throw my change in the tipbox at Starbucks, DD, etc. And I’ll admit that when it’s a cute guy making the drinks, I’ll make eye contact, smile, & wish I tipped more, because barista boys tend to be very cute.

Quote: Maybe I’m too cynical, but it”s all gotten to just be noise to me. Barr’s the most libertarian candidate…I am a libertarian, therefore I will vote for Barr and sleep soundly at night. 

Courtesy of one of my favorite libertarians:

NO! THE BOMB IS TICKING AND YOU MUST CUT ONE OF THE WIRES!

If you cut the blue wire, YOU WILL BLOW EVERYTHING UP! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

If you cut the red wire, YOU WILL BLOW EVERYTHING UP, BUT EVEN MORE! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

If you cut the gold wire, YOU’RE JUST THROWING YOUR VOTE AWAY! THE GOLD WIRE DOESN’T DO ANYTHING! EVERYTHING WILL STILL BLOW UP! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

And if you refuse to cut ANY of the wires, EVERYTHING WILL BLOW UP ANYWAY! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE! BECAUSE YOU DID NOTHING!

Also, YOUR MISTAKE WILL BLOW UP NOT JUST YOU, BUT EVERYONE ELSE TOO!

Good luck. We’re all counting on you.

Quote:

Maybe I’m too cynical, but it”s all gotten to just be noise to me. Barr’s the most libertarian candidate…I am a libertarian, therefore I will vote for Barr and sleep soundly at night.

 

NO! THE BOMB IS TICKING AND YOU MUST CUT ONE OF THE WIRES!

If you cut the blue wire, YOU WILL BLOW EVERYTHING UP! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

If you cut the red wire, YOU WILL BLOW EVERYTHING UP, BUT EVEN MORE! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

If you cut the gold wire, YOU’RE JUST THROWING YOUR VOTE AWAY! THE GOLD WIRE DOESN’T DO ANYTHING! EVERYTHING WILL STILL BLOW UP! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE!

And if you refuse to cut ANY of the wires, EVERYTHING WILL BLOW UP ANYWAY! AND YOU WILL BE RESPONSIBLE! BECAUSE YOU DID NOTHING!

Also, YOUR MISTAKE WILL BLOW UP NOT JUST YOU, BUT EVERYONE ELSE TOO!

Good luck. We’re all counting on you.

I’m no Obama acolyte. But McCain MUST BE STOPPED. At all costs. If you think Bush is bad, wait until you see what a war with Iran and a full-frontal assault on what liberties we have left will do. I will probably still vote for Barr because NJ will never be a swing state. But a fellow Libertarian started a discussion about why Obama really is the much lesser of two evils in this election. I personally didn’t need convincing, but we had a good discussion.

I thought I might be over sensitive, but this was actually a kind of not-nice thing to do.

OLB wrote: [on a public message board. that he knows I read, and thus knew I would read this]
There’s this girl I know, and a while back I thought we might have something going – she’s pretty, she’s smart, she seemed into me – but then when we hung out a bit more, something just didn’t quite click. Oh well…it’s too bad, but you can’t obsess over these things, because that way lies stalkerville.

Which is fairly neutral (even though “smart” and “pretty” are basically the most impersonal words you can use to describe someone, and yes that’s how he described me, further proving that he was Just Not That Into Me, but I knew that) but it still stung to read, and he ALSO knows about the other stuff going on that may make me even more sensitive, so why would he post this? What was the motivation? I love “wise” posts like this. It shifts the blame. “Didn’t quite click” makes it sound like as if I disappointed him rather than “well i was coming off a 10 year relationship and didn’t really feel like investing anything.

But I wanted to check with the ever-reliable David if I was the one in the wrong. But he agreed that the post was definitely a dick move, and also wondered “WTF?”

Yeah. WTF?

This is what I get for dating in the Internet age.

I am sleeping with an incredibly well-read, intelligent, politically-compatible, man, who can also make me laugh, makes me coffee in the morning, and sometimes even holds my hand in public (which, considering some former suitors, impresses me.) He likes me too, and I know that.

But.

It’s all the wrong timing and all the wrong circumstances, and we both know it. When he looks at me, he is seeing something else. I understand why it is this way. Not only is he just barely out of a long term relationship, he also dated this girl in high school, so she is his whole life. I will never be her, and I will never know him the way she does. And I’m just the rebound, and a security blanket. No one is this affectionate with someone they’re just fucking.

And as for me, I cannot let myself be the last on someone’s to do list. I have always been of the opinion that if you really like someone, etc, you MAKE time, you don’t ‘have’ time. He does not make time for me. I don’t think it’s malicious of his part, but being someone’s rebound really sucks. In other circumstance, we may have had potential, but we don’t here, and I’m trying to figure out how to be strong enough to make the “this isn’t going to work” speech, because I am NEVER the one to give this speech. I just wait for it, wait for the other shoe to drop.

He is essentially a good guy. He listens when I talk, but I don’t know if he hears, and him, he doesn’t really talk. I wish he did.

It’s frustrating, because it’s the first time in a VERY long time that I actually met someone that I like-liked. But I should probably end this, because I don’t want us to dislike each other, because neither of us are at fault here. It’s just not right, because of right now.

There’s a temp here this week, and lets face it, I’m starved for conversation here in YHWH & babies land. So I’ve been hanging out with him and we wound up discussing Israel, economics, and European railroads. In the middle of my rant about fetishized socialism he asked me if I was a Libertarian.

I am officially amazing.

Oh my god.

The Libertarian meeting was  actually really, really good. I saw an Astoria acquientence of mine, and talked to interesting people, and of course I was one of the only girls there (of course).

The speaker was Rob Kampia from the Marijuana Policy Project, and he was very good, and even kind of good looking, and most people asked decent questions, and the only really annoying people were a large bunch of these younger guys, who all knew each other from the Ron Paul meetup group and were frat boyish and loud.

There were two other women besides me. All of us are pretty, young things. One of them actually knows one of the guys I know from the Message Board of Note, because she worked with Ron Paul in New Hampshire. I half thought about inviting her , but WHY SHOULD I INTRODUCE COMPETITION? Plus, I think she would be way, way too cool for any of us anyway.

Afterwards, everyone was like “wow, so many girls showed up this time.” Also, there are a LOT of crazy much older Libertarians. They are insane! But they’re old, so they’re allowed to be that insane at that point, but they’re CRAZY. They’re like the older former hippies that look as if they had one great acid trip that they never came down off of, except they like capitalism instead of peace, love, & understanding. Now I kind of want to go to the National Convetion. This is very wrong isn’t it?

I almost called O-L-B to rave when I was walking back to the subway, but I didn’t because I figured he’d either be out or he’d be like “why the hell are you calling me?” and then it’d be all awkward. But anyway, libertarians!

Better now.

Last week wasn’t all doom and gloom as one may have judged from Thursday’s entry. A Libertarian friend was in town on Wednesday night, so the New York contingent took him out. Although that led to what I guess qualified as a fight with O-L-B. Which I think is ok now.

Saturday I scored Billy Joel tickets, which brings me way more joy than it possibly should, because there are few things on earth that make me more joyful than Billy Joel live.

Sunday was Xina’s engagement party (and I will write more on this later) and other good things.

So this is just the public version, in which I check in, and vow to have something more interesting to say soon.

I’m all for the second amendment. I’d like to go to a firing range someday, because learning to fire a gun sounds like it could be a marketable skill. (By marketable, I mean “useful for impressing Libertarian boys. Just kidding. Sort of.) But as much as I love Libertarians, I don’t get the gun fetishes that many of them have.  I basically only want to own a gun because the government doesn’t want me to.

I don’t really get the drooling over guns. Or collecting them. Maybe it’s like women and shoes. Which I also don’t get, but I understand more than guns.

Classic:
Wayne: What is it?
Stacy: It’s a gun rack!
Wayne: Stacy, I don’t even own one gun, let alone many guns that would neccesitate a gun rack. Are you mental?

Well, it was a completely unproductive week at work, because with Important Boss out things tend to fall to the wayside anyway, and because my entire department has been ridiculously sick. I had an ear infection and cold earlier in the week, and Thursday I’ve been diagnosed with the strep throat that’s been going around the department.

I am still being anti-social. I am okay with this except that it’s not a healthy anti-social, due to the amount of time I have spent lying on my bed/thinking too much/waiting for the phone to ring.

Which brings me the boy situation. Okay, I need a moniker. There was Nice-Libertarian-Boy. There was Hot-Libertarian-Boy. There was Unfortunately-Gay-Libertarian-Boy. So I dub this one Older-Libertarian-Boy. OLB for short, because when I dubbed HWSNBN originally, I used to write the whole thing out, and that just got tiresome. Anyway, Things are about the same. We saw a movie together last Saturday, but I was actually really irritated with the way planning with. we don’t talk on the phone, because neither of us are phone people, but for making plans one would think a 10 minute phone call would not be too much to ask. I basically threw my phone across the room in frustration when I got a text message Saturday afternoon.

But of course, I still went out with him, and of course, I still stayed over, and of course, we spent the morning being all couple-y. But we went out for breakfast and then for a walk before I had to take the subway home, and he’s just so quiet around me, and it makes me lapse into quiet, and while it isn’t awkward, it’s frustrating.

Jill told me very blatantly that I’m letting him have all the benefits of having a girlfriend type figure without him having to do any of the work, and how do I know he’s not seeing other people too, since there’s been no talk of exclusiveness, and JIll, as usual is probably right.

Bleh.

And my throat feels like I’m swallowing razorblades.

Something is going to give soon.

It was not until I saw him standing on Second Avenue, smoking a cigarette Sunday morning, that I was reminded how much I miss him as a daily presence in my life. For over a year, I saw him every single weekday, and most of them he made me laugh, and he is also the first friend I made when I moved to the city the first time.

I saw CK Sunday morning. I emphasize “morning” because he decided we should get to the Libertarian meet-up we were planning on attending at 10:30, instead of 1 PM. I thought this was idiotic, but went along. And you know, I now further understand why people are so turned off to Libertarian Party. I mean, people who want to be left alone are the type generally attracted to Libertarianism. But these people were definitely suffering from the geek social afflictions that Ellie posted about last week  We were swarmed. CK was freaked out, and dragged me out of there.

Because CK has always had me wrapped around his finger (not in any romantic sense) I didn’t really protest. Desperation is really ugly. Just leave us alone and let us be here.

Oh and of course the short time we were there I was the only woman in the room. Earlier, CK had teased me, when we were wondering aloud wtf we were doing out so early on a Sunday, if I was using the event to pick up Libertarian men. “I’m not going to be your Libertarian wingman Rachel. It’s too early for that. I can’t believe you got me out of bed this early.” “I didn’t hold a gun to your head,” I replied, the perfect LIbertarian response. But apparently, I’m really predictable, because I had already been accused of using the event for the same reasons. I’m glad everyone realizes what my priorities are.

And so I let him buy me brunch and then we walked around the East Village. He made me laugh a lot, as usual. We exchanged our typical cynicism and pragmatism (prag-mat-a-a-cist) and had our little silences where we both realize; “Damn. That’s accurate.”

We hugged  good-bye before getting on the subway, and we made vows to get Ukranian food & beer sooner, rather than later. I delayed going home by stopping at the Strand, and having conversations in the history section. At home, I started cooking a giant pot of stew and watched My So Called Life DVDs. I really shouldn’t be so anti-social, but the morning was social enough for me.

There’s a libertarian drinking game where where we drink everytime someone says  “if you were a true libertarian then…” (for like, supporting reasonable, realistic forms of gov’t regulations).

If this were actually played, everyone would be dead from alcohol poisoning.

So I’m watching “My Boys,” which is surprisingly good for a half-hour TBS original series: premise female sportswriter has all male friends. It’s actually quite cute and has good dialogue. As a girl who grew up being one of the guys, and yet reveling in some of my girliness, I find much of it very realistic. Except she’s totally into sports and I’ve never been a tomboy.

Anyway, I thought this line was perfect:

“So you gave your number to a guy you were not remotely interested in, and then YOU called HIM and asked him out?”

I think Brenty has probably said extremely similar things to me.

On second thought, lets go to the AIM log.

Just Rachel 129: i’m going out with [nice] Libertarian boy again tomorrow night
NascentIgnorance: i was going to ask about that
NascentIgnorance: but figured no news is good news
Just Rachel 129: no, no news is technically bad news, in the sense that i’m pretty sure he’s too nice for me
NascentIgnorance: oh right
NascentIgnorance: he doesn’t treat you badly or make believe that he doesn’t like you
Just Rachel 129: well hey, at least i’m going out with him again
Just Rachel 129: and giving him a chance to prove that he can be emotionally manipulative and infuriating
Just Rachel 129: plus his voice kind of annoys me, it’s too enthusiastic
NascentIgnorance: oh you need something droll and fatigued
NascentIgnorance: you should ask this guy if [way too inappropriatete]
NascentIgnorance: maybe then that’ll get something going
Just Rachel 129: it’s too late; he already calls me before midnight and wants to hold my hand in public
NascentIgnorance: well what do you expect?
NascentIgnorance: you went out with him because he reads the economist and probably voted for badnarik

JustRachel129: were you watching the daily show?
NascentIgnorance: no i never watch the daily show
JustRachel129: i’m trying to confirm whether jon stewart really just refered to himself as a downtown libertarian, or if i’m just projecting
NascentIgnorance: he probably did
JustRachel129: it’d more proof that libertarians are all hot
NascentIgnorance: right obviously
NascentIgnorance: i’m sure that reason.com is full of hunks