Weekend Wrap-Up

Having a little bit of trouble keeping up with life of late. Work, migraines, some bummer stuff too. I haven’t been able to keep up with my online reading like usual. But I thought I’d pass on some links to some good stuff.

Abstraction has an amazingly good post about body image.

Meagan at I Kicked Cancer’s Ass always inspires me. She’s a young cervical cancer survivor who is also finishing law school. She’s opened a coffee bean site, Get the Bean, and she’s got contests going on over there. She also fundraisers for various cancer causes.

Joan Didion, one of my all time favorite authors, has a great article over at Salon, Election by Sound Bites.

Don’t Worry It’s Only a Movie had the video clip of Powell up before I was finished watching it on the news.

And of thistles and maple leaves had a link to a friend who had a friend who had the link to this a great little test. It’s called your political compass and after answering some very pointed questions about important issues, it shows you where you are placed in a political spectrum. I was pleased to see I landed in the general area as Gandhi and the Dalai Lama. Quite interesting and a reprieve from the blue and red counterpoints going on in American politics.

And speaking of politics a little, I found a new blog, UppercaseWoman, where there is a wonderful post of a first hand account of "health" (John McCain's air quotes - not mine) issues a woman might have that would cause her to seek to terminate a pregnancy.

I’m probably putting up melancholy pictures the rest of the week.

Monday Mixed Plate

October is breast cancer awareness month. Think pink. Encourage someone to get a mammogram if you know they have been putting it off. Check out Thistle’s idea of having a group mammo outing: The Pink Ribbon Club.

If you haven’t been knocked silly with Palin news coverage, consider these:
Michael Berube’s thoughtful article.
Or at Salon there is The Dumbing Down of the GOP or How Sarah Palin Blew It.

I got an email with a copied and pasted post on the Alaska Women Reject Palin Rally. I googled it and found the original post, which was September 14th, so I imagine it is old news for most. But it was the first time I’d seen it. The post says to share the pics so here are a few.




"So, if you’ve been doing the math… Yes. The Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was significantly bigger than Palin’s rally that got all the national media coverage! So take heart, sit back, and enjoy the photo gallery. Feel free to spread the pictures around (links are appreciated) to anyone who needs to know that Sarah Palin most definitely does not speak for all Alaskans. The citizens of Alaska, who know her best, have things to say."

"Never, have I seen anything like it in my 17 and a half years living in Anchorage. The organizers had someone walk the rally with a counter, and they clicked off well over 1400 people (not including the 90 counter-demonstrators). This was the biggest political rally ever, in the history of the state. I was absolutely stunned. "

For more pics plus a video, head on over to Mud Flats.

Manic Monday

For a brief moment, I am caught up on grading. This is how I got there. I stayed home; I did not go to Bookclub on Friday (but mostly because I had a migraine coming on and went to bed instead), I did not go to the beach, I did not go surfing, AND I did NOT write the post that was twirling around in my mind.

I did a dorky thing and figured out what I did with my time.

1. Grading papers 10 hours (48%)
2. Preparing lessons 2 hours (10%)
3. Reading online 4 hours (19%)
4. Border Collie 5 hours (23%)

I wanted to write someting about the election, but ah....well. That's going to take some effort and finesse.

So, before I go off to work I leave the links to some good reads from this weekend.

On Sarah Palin:

New York Times Article on Palin

A Letter about Sarah Palin from Anne Kilkenny

The Pastor Who Clashed with Palin

Other stuff:

New York Times Op Ed Article Making America Stupid

Made Man

Hypocrite: One Who Subscribes to One Set of Values and Does Another.

Check this out. I'm just saying...