Brighten Up Your Friday

by clicking your way over to Skippy’s List.

Most of us are not, thank God, in the military. But Skippy’s list of official things the the brass have told him NOT to do is undoubtedly cheering.

Be Careful What You Wish For

Certainly the Bay Area wasn’t a weather-free zone yesterday. I’m sorry for the damage, but the fact is, I enjoyed it. Even when I was picking up a prescription in the rain.

Here are the numbers:

Inches of rain in SF: 1.5

Inches of rain in Napa: 3.0

Additional inches of rain expected today and tonight: 1.5

Wind gusts: up to 70 mph

Residents who lost power: 390,000+

Wave heights, in feet: 27+

Bridges whose lights blew out: 1

Bridges closed because of flying construction debris: 1

Airport buildings that blew down in the wind: 1

Roads closed: many

Fenderbenders from midnight to noon on Thursday, compared with the same period on Friday: 39: 133

Injury accidents from midnight to noon on Thursday, compared with the same period on Friday: 8: 42

Total snowfall expected in the Sierra Nevada by the end of the storm, in feet: 2-5

Bread and Roses

What the woman who labors wants is the right to live, not simply exist — the right to life as the rich woman has it, the right to life, and the sun, and music, and art. You have nothing that the humblest worker has not a right to have also. The worker must have bread, but she must have roses, too.

—Rose Schneiderman, August 1912

Yeeeeeeehahhhhhhhhh!

Wrote about 3,000 words today after getting home from a doctor’s appointment. (My surgical incision is infected.) I had a few hours before I had to leave for Covenant class, and the words just flowed. It was wonderful. I am now up to 7172, which is still a bit behind, but I can catch up. For one thing, I made a breakthrough in the way I’m putting the book together, as well as in sheer verbiage. So I have great hopes.

An Atheist’s Take on the Boy Scout Mess

No, I am not an atheist. But my much-loved friend Joe is. He gave me permission to post his thoughts on the situation.

Not to knock the Boy Scouts, but this article does illustrate the kind of situations atheists can find themselves in. I was in Catholic school when my change came. I was particularly impressed by the comment that an atheist cannot be a good citizen and that the Scout leader could not remember if anyone had ever been shunned for being grumpy. (I remember John Boswell writing that hypocrisy is condemned in the Bible in much stronger terms than homosexuality, yet no one ever suggests hypocrites are unnatural.) Belief in God seems to be the one issue that everyone gets exercised about, but given how subjective talk about God always seems to be, it’s the issue with least real meaning. We must declare for God; after that we’re on our own.

That final line resonates, doesn’t it? (Joe is a very fine writer.)

And an excerpt from the article he sent; his source was The New York Times.

November 3, 2002

Eagle Scout Faces Official Challenge Over His Lack of Faith

By DEAN E. MURPHY

As for the other 11 points of the Scout Law, Mr. Shields could not say whether anyone had been ejected for being untrustworthy, disloyal, unhelpful, unfriendly, discourteous, unkind, disobedient, cheerless, unthrifty, cowardly or sloppy.

California: Weather-Free Zone

W. H. Auden, native of a mild and rainy island, once said that North America’s climate — too hot, too cold, too rainy, too dry — is so extreme that it clearly isn’t intended for human life. And California? Too temperate.

I don’t necessarily agree with his other observations, but I sometimes agree that California is too temperate. Many of my Eastern friends think I’m boasting of the perfect weather here. I don’t think so. The fact is, I have always loved weather, and here there isn’t any. Just a pleasant vacuity where weather ought to be, the meteorological equivalent of Muzak.

I miss the change of seasons. Spring doesn’t mean much when roses bloom in January. Winter is a joke when snow is a once-in-a-century miracle. Some trees are showing fall colors, but their radiance is lost in the general dazzle. And what is summer without a thunderstorm?

I swear that one reason Californians have earned their reputation for goofy good nature (what I used to call “being laid back to the point of imbecility”) is that they can count on months and months of sunshine. It’s true that dark weather encourages emotional gloom. I am not suggesting that we all become Scandinavians, with that culture’s bipolar oscillation between wintry Kierkegaardian despair and frenetic summertime exuberance. I would just like a taste sometimes of the kind of weather that commands attention, that reminds me of risk and danger, that suits another mood than perky cheer. Weather with an edge, weather with some passion.

I miss the slow buildup to a thunderstorm, the rising wind, blackening sky, the first shattering strokes of lightning, the onslaughts of rain, the sound and spectacle of great forces clashing, the still freshness afterward. I miss the occasional pensive grey day, what my mother always calls a good day to stay inside and sew. I miss variety. I miss appreciating the rare perfect days as the gift they are. I do try to keep enjoying the soft perfection of California weather, but people look at me as though I’m a lunatic when I say, “What a beautiful day.” Every day is equally beautiful here, thus equally bland and humdrum.

All this is in response to a completely outrageous headline in today’s San Jose Mercury News: “First storm in six months is expected Wednesday.”

The article continues that the storm “will end a long dry spell going back to May 21, when 0.10 inches of rain dropped into the San Jose Civic Center’s rain gauge.”

I knew the weather was good when I moved here. But still. That’s outrageous.

If You’re Still Thinking It’s Too Much Trouble to Vote. . .

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more terrifying Harper’s Weekly Review. There are a couple of bright spots, but I won’t quote them; you’ll need them to recover from the shock of the rest of the news.

Russian president Vladimir Putin gave a speech about the Chechen hostage debacle and declared that Russia will attack terrorists wherever they may be (“I stress, wherever they may be located”), suggesting that the Bush Doctrine, which disregards traditional principles of national sovereignty, has become the new international norm. . . . Russia’s press ministry was already applying the Bush Doctrine domestically in a new assault on the media (websites were shut down, newspapers were raided), and a bill passed the lower house of parliament giving the government even more authority to ban any reporting deemed a hindrance to the war on terrorism. The United States Department of Justice defended its use of secret evidence in a case against a Muslim charity accused of giving money to terrorists but acknowledged that the use of secret evidence should be avoided in a free society whenever possible. A federal appeals court heard arguments about the detention of Yasser Esam Hamdi, an American citizen who as an “enemy combatant” has been denied counsel, a hearing, or any outside contact; Hamdi’s lawyer argued that the detention is unconstitutional.

Damn it, we used to be a good example to the world. Didn’t we?

Also, check out John Scalzi on voting and party affiliation.

It’s Election Day!

Get out and vote. Rachel will tell you why it matters.

And if even her eloquent screed doesn’t persuade you, remember that today is also Guy Fawkes Day. Blowing up the government is not the way to change what you don’t like. Use your constitutionally guaranteed political power instead.

Lunchtime Writing

Amazing how much better I feel when I get a few pages done.

Lines I Wish I’d Thought Of

Old friend Joe does the studio quiz:

What turns you on?

Intelligent conversation & nude photography—preferably both at the same time.

What is your favorite swear word?

“Fragonard.”

If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say to you as you enter the Pearly Gates?

“Uh oh.”