Manic Monday #7

Manic Monday was notsomuch yesterday. I am very, very glad I dropped CivLib so that I get a three-hour break in there. Still, the last 6 hours of class... start to hurt by about the second hour. Despite the fact that I love both my afternoon courses.

My Drafting prof Marilla Cuthbert was ( in fine form, too )

***
Looking at the "where have I been" map with Chris the other day, I was somewhat surprised to realize that I could really only definitively locate 11 states (Alaska, Hawaii, California, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Michigan, and New York) on the map. The rest? I knew roughly where they were, but couldn't say with 100% certainty which was which.

"I wish I could do what Al Franken did," I said. "Draw the whole 50 states freehand."

"Al Franken, from SNL?"

"Yeah, I saw him on the Weekend Update right before one of the elections, he did the whole thing on a whiteboard - said it was his party trick."

"All of them?"

"Yeah, it was amazing."

"Holy shit. ::pause:: I couldn't even do that for Canada. I'd be like, did the Northwest Territories split up or something? There's a lot of snow up there, right? And Newfoundland - is that still part of Canada?"

See, this is why the Canadian pastime of mocking American ignorance is so amusing to me. 'Cause scratch us just a little and you'll find that under the surface, we're just iggerant rednecks too... in tuques ;)

***
Watched the last bit of the SNL show on elections through the years. Man, I'd forgotten how funny some of those skits were. Dana Carvey doing Bush Sr. and Perot in one debate was just priceless. And I'd never seen the guy who currently plays Kerry. Seriously? I couldn't tell the difference between the fake Kerry and the real one ;)

I was (and am) fairly disturbed at one thing: I have been utterly unable to remember who ran against Clinton in 96. I went back and could rattle off all the other (main) contenders since before I was born, but not the dude who ran and lost in 1996. Early Alzheimer's?

Later Edit: Got it. Had to look it up. ( FYI: Losers Since 1960 )

Make it go away or make it better

heathers, I've had the image and quote from your icon stuck in my head for the last few days.

I would like it to be tomorrow already, and I would very much like for there to not be a long drawn out battle wrt who won what. I would also like to personally bitch-slap anybody who is able to vote today and doesn't. Because, please. This is the first time I can ever remember being jealous of my American friends, who get to help choose who will lead the rest of us for the next few years. We'll all have to live with that choice. If you could have a voice in that decision, and decide not to? Then I hope you get polyps.

Preaching to the converted, I know. Most of my American f-list has already voted. But just in case you see coworkers or friends who have decided they can't be bothered to go vote today, give them a little slap. For me. 'kay?

(no subject)

I must remember that when I tell myself "Don't look at online polls" I should really, really not look at online polls. Because I went to CNN's election site soon after the first polls closed, and nearly projectile-hurled.

::calm blue ocean, calm blue ocean::

CNN tidbit

World watches with great intensity
High emotions over U.S. election are common overseas
Tuesday, November 2, 2004 Posted: 9:02 PM EST (0202 GMT)

BERLIN, Germany (AP) -- People outside the United States could only watch, wait and vent as Americans lined up to vote Tuesday in an election that provoked an extraordinary degree of emotional involvement beyond U.S. borders.

( Read more... )

Here's the link:

World watches with great intensity

just make it go away

Can't stay up to watch Dubya win Florida. Can't.

I hoped to stay up long enough to see Ohio and either give bear a high-five or a big hug depending on what happened there. But it looks like Ohio might take a little longer to tally up than anticipated. (Later Edit: Although, dude, I'm so sorry. I just saw the gay marriage ban news. ::hugs::)

I may get up and check results every few hours. But for right now, I'm going to take some echinacea & vitamin C, take my very ill partner to bed, and watch some LOTR. Because escapism is a good thing.


Oh, and in completely unrelated news, Daniel got his "advanced English book" from Mrs. I. In our meeting, she had expressed concern that, although Daniel's language level was fairly advanced, he was not doing the English advanced book because I took him out of school so often that she couldn't be sure he'd be able to keep up with the class on his own. I offered to make sure he always did his English homework, and she agreed to give him the book.

Well, am I glad we got that taken care of. Because today Daniel had some English homework to do, and let me tell you, it's a good thing he's got that book. The book that asks him to pick which four words (in a ten-word list) have the short 'u' sound (upon, cut, up, and sun), then asks him to identify the word that had the short 'a' sound (hat) and short 'i' sound (hit).

Just to put it in context: in French spelling this week he's got abeille, semaine, oreille, and 7 others, and last week he had déjeuner, tête, élèves, and 7 more.

WTF? This is French Immersion. The kids are anglophones being taught French. And the only ones who get sun, cut, and up are the 'advanced' kids?