Celebration

My advisor and I have uncannily similar personalities.  It is possible that I have met my match in cynicism.

Last night while speaking with my husband, I was complaining about the hullabaloo everyone was making out of the inauguration.  I think it’s stupid that the “Obama business” is a quarter of a billion dollar business.  And do we really need a celebration with a carbon footprint which would take an average household 60,000 years to generate?  I don’t think so.  I got yelled at for this.  Don’t get me wrong, I am really excited that Obama is president.  I just want him to be president, not a king.  Can our country really afford this affair anyway?  It seems like a weird thing to do when the economy is going down the crapper.  If I were Obama, I would have demanded it be cancelled or scaled down.

So what was the first thing my advisor said to me today in our meeting?  It was “How was your break?”  The second thing he said was “I don’t like the hoopla everyone is making about the inauguration.  It’s stupid.  It’s like a coronation.”

After this, we clanked glasses and toasted sparkling apple cider to Obama being president.  Just because we think the inauguration is stupid doesn’t mean that we can’t be happy he is president.  That was all that we talked about from September to Novemeber, after all.

NU-CLEE-ER vs. NU-CU-LER

Why is it so hard for people, prominent people especially, to say nuclear correctly?

A reason to eat less meat

Let me preface this by saying, I’m not a vegetarian…at all.  In fact, I love a nice juicy steak, medium-rare.  I am not at all advocating vegetarianism (especially vegan-ism) because you are depriving yourself of necessary nutrients.  Eating some meat is natural…buying 5 pounds of meat from a grocery store a week is not.

Meat is expensive – in both direct $$$ and environment resources.

Approximately 50% of water, 70% of the grains grown and 30% of all fossil fuels in the US go to feeding, caring for a transporting livestock for human consumption.  The “feed cost” of an 8 ounce steak could fill about 50 bowls worth of grain (Diet for a small planet).  That’s right, when you eat your 8 ounce steak, you can think of it as eating 50 meals worth of grain.  That’s how much indirect food it takes to get that steak on your plate.

With all of our problems in America with oil and the economy…cutting down on meat consumption seems logical.  Eating less meat means less land would be used to grow livestock grain and more land could be used to grow high quality grains for direct consumption (which would take 1/50 th of the amount of land to feed people meat).  With the left over land, more of that land could be used to grow corn for ethanol or other bio-fuels.  Not to mention that there are starving kids in Africa that could use the grain exports…

So if you really want to be a socially-conscious person like you think you are, eat less meat!

I wish I had like 8 hours to make this blog totally awesome with more sources and wittiness, but I do not.  If you are interested in not being a greedy American carnivore, do you own damn research.  I may expand later…

Sarah Palin reminds me of…

principal Victoria from Southpark.  I think it’s the Fargo accent.

…and also Miss Geist from Clueless.

No?

Archives from my husband’s future employer

scary, read with caution…be sure to check the publish date

My archnemisis

After 16 years of having Dr. Claw as my archnemisis, today I changed it to Mitt Romney.

“Last year the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court struck a blow against the family, as I’m sure you know. The court forgot that [traditional] marriage is first and foremost about nurturing and developing children. Its ruling meant that our society is supposed to be indifferent about whether children have a mother and a father.” – Archnemisis on gay marriage…That’s funny, I thought marriage was about love.

To protect our children, Governor Romney will require the Department of Justice to enforce our existing federal obscenity laws. Even though the interstate trafficking of obscenity is illegal, federal obscenity laws have not been adequately enforced. – on porn from Archnemisis’ website…uh oh…better clear out my Asian porn stash from under the bed.

“Americans should have the right to own and possess firearms as guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.” – as Archnemisis says to reporter while holding gun to her head

Today’s commute

It’s good to be riding the train again.  I get to encounter so many interesting people for such a small fee.  This morning, there was a woman in front of me.  She was reading the Jehovah’s Witness newsletter that they give you when they come around to your home trying to sell you their religion.  I took note of this, as I was about to bust out ‘The God Delusion’.  This amused me that we could be reading such opposite literature and be sitting so close to each other.  I checked on my Jehovah’s Witness friend about half way through the train ride to see what interesting subject she was reading, and I noticed that she was highlighting this document, much like I highlighted my physics textbook as an undergraduate while cramming for an exam.  It made me sad.  I was about to knock on her metaphorical door and see if she wanted a complimentary copy of ‘The God Delusion’ but wussed out.

What also made me sad was the I left my GD MF umbrella on the train today.

Also, today is the day that I start using tags.