observations

I am enjoying a bottle of Hefeweizen from Gordon Biersch, a local brewery, when I notice that the label describes the beer as being full of "citrus, bubble gum, clove, and banana" flavors.

I stop and imagine what it would be like to mix those ingredients together in a bowl and dip a spoon into it.

Gak. I am no longer enjoying my bottle of Hefeweizen.

~ ~ ~

Alain de Botton's The Architecture of Happiness is quite good. It's a look at the buildings and styles that have inspired us throughout history, woven into a convincing explanation of what that all means about our own beliefs and longings as humans.

However, I'm noticing a certain undercurrent in de Botton's similes and asides that makes me wonder if the author's home life wasn't on a, uh, solid foundation at the time he was writing the book...

P.12: People "...have imagined living in unattainably expensive houses pictured in magazines and then felt sad, as one does upon passing an attractive stranger in the street."

P.22: "We may need to have made an indelible mark on our lives, to have married the wrong person, pursued an unfulfilling career into middle age or lost a loved one before architecture can begin to have any perceptible impact on us..."

P.182: "Over generations, these codes prevented architects from using their imaginations; they hand-cuffed them to a narrow palette of acceptable materials and forms, and, like the institution of marriage, restricted choice in the name of delivering the satisfactions of restraint."

dems in da house!

Excuse the painfully obvious title, but for the past six years I've been waking up on the second Wednesday of every other November with a pit in my stomach and coal in my stocking -- and now, finally, it's like Santa finally figured out what I really, really wanted.

And it's like the gifts keep on coming: Not only have the Democrats taken the House, but Rumsfield is out as Defense Secretary, and the Senate race is (as of right now) down to one seat. Just one! What did we do to deserve such riches?

Oh, that's right: paid more and more for healthcare each year (for fewer services), offered our own money and time when the citizens of New Orleans were left without coordinated disaster response for days, attended protests to show our support against a strange plan to invade another country without provocation, gasped as the government found a way to legally condone torture, promised everyone we met in every country we traveled to that the practice of secreting people away to clandestine prisons was not a policy that many people in the U.S. agreed with, donated more and more to non-governmental organizations with the hope that they would be able to do something to bridge the ever-widening gap between the poorest and the richest people in the country, shouted at the television when members of the White House confused Iraq with Afghanistan and Al Qaeda, voted against every measure that tried to prevent our friends and family from marrying whoever they want to (unfortunately to little avail), wrote editorials pointing out how the the Administration was suppressing important scientific findings in order to protect their own interests, watched helplessly as committees debated red herrings like flag burning and steroid use in baseball rather than issues like education and the environment and the increasing inability of two-income families to make any progress....

literalists

People say dumb things. Things they don't mean. Things that just come out wrong. Things that are exaggerated. Things that are embarrassing. And they do it all the time. It's just the nature of verbal communication.

And for most of us, it's just not that big of a deal. We usually know what the other person meant to say, or else we'll ask for clarification and will get it and will move on.

In the case of American politics, though, it seems that even the smallest slip sets off a tidal wave of gasps and accusations. Oh my GOD, John Kerry said you should get an education lest you be stuck in Iraq -- he must truly hate everyone in the military and their families!

Look, if you watch the video, it's pretty clear that he was going for some joke or emphasis and it just came out awkwardly. Stuff like that happens to all of us. In fact, if our enemies hired assistants to follow us around all day taping everything we said in public just so they could catch us when we slipped up -- as is the case in most political races now -- I'm sure we'd all be embarrassed. So can we move on?

And unless you think I'm just making excuses for the Democrats, consider that I find the outrage over Republican George Allen's "macaca" comment to be just as manufactured. Was it in bad form to publicly make fun of someone? Completely. Was Allen's possibly inadvertent use of an old East European racial slur (that most Americans have never heard) a sign that he secretly wishes the KKK would call him some time? I doubt it. (Now, whether other evidence shows he has a more deep-rooted history of racist actions is another story altogether -- but even then, "macaca" would barely have a part.)

The good news is that it seems people can actually get over an embarrassing remark. Remember McCain's "gook" comment back in 2000? (It was insensitive, he apologized, and we moved on.) I just wish we could get to that point sooner this time around. We've got an election coming up with real issues at stake. Can we get back to that? Are you listening news editors?