knowitallgirl

Bicycle Blues

On Monday, I sent my Kryptonite locks off to the factory to be exchanged for new ones that can't be compromised by a BIC pen. On Tuesday, I returned to the 16th/Mission BART station after ten hours at school to discover my bike had been stolen, on the first day I'd ever locked it up using only my Kryptonite cable lock.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

What a month. My car was sideswiped, Deneb's bike was stolen, Bush won, and now my bike. What gives? Maybe God really does hate liberals.

Growl.

Purple states

Just in case you blue state inhabitants are getting dismayed at the many maps you've seen with almost the entire US painted in red, here are some views that take population into account as well as actual percentages of voters. Here's a view based on percentages by county:
And here's the version taking population into account:

Sorry, everybody.

Dear World,

I'm sorry from the bottom of my heart. Here's some more apologies from the blue half of America.

Election 2004

Ok. The disbelief wore off slightly, I went to the gym, listened to some post-election analysis. I'm ready to deal now.

Anyway. Working the election yesterday was quite fun and surprisingly mellow. My fellow poll workers were cool, and after the rush of people from 7 - 10am it was busy but not crazy for the rest of the day. I took my camera just in case there were scenes of chaos and pandemonium, but since we had no supervisorial elections in District 8, the day was amazingly calm. We only had one guy with a bug up his ass because his polling place had changed, and one freaky dude who showed up weaing a very dirty white bathrobe, soccer shorts, shower shoes and a towel around his neck. He claimed to be from West Hollywood and wanted to know if he could vote. Sadly, we had to turn this earnest citizen away.

I did, however, witness one great accomplishment in action - the Optech Eagle optical scan voting machine. I'm not exactly sure how elections officials have been bamboozled into buying touchscreen voting machines -- probably promises of not having to deal with paper ballots -- but in terms of a technology that was screamingly easy to use for both poll workers and voters (it had the best error messages I've ever seen from any electronic device), it gets my thumbs up. According to a few e-voting experts I heard speak a few weeks ago, optical scan machines are one of the most accurate methods of counting votes around (I'm too lazy to find a reference for this right now, so you can do your own homework if you want). I hope more counties adopt these machines instead.

Ok, time to drown my sorrows in homework.

Ugh

I want to vomit. Apparently it's true that things need to get much, much worse before they can improve.

Then again, Nixon was reelected and got his hand caught in the cookie jar. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so perhaps it's just a matter of time before these cowboys get caught with their pants down. Maybe they'll only come down one DeLay at a time.

The day before the agony or the ecstasy

We survived our second Halloween in the Castro, despite moments last night where it sounded like a combat zone outside our apartment. There were constant sirens from 8pm to midnight, and helicopters sweeping the neighborhood, LA-style. School sapped me of my ability to make a real costume this year - I scrambled around and came up with a Weapons of Mass Destruction outfit that was passable. It got a few laughs and photographs (none of which I have) at one of the parties we attended, but as always, any costume that both requires you to read AND think isn't the hit that, say, the dudes I saw dressed as Ghostbusters were. During the short jaunt we made into the Castro on Saturday night I saw two guys dressed as Undecided Voters, with dunce caps on their heads and signs around their necks. I was impressed, as I tried fruitlessly to come up with a concept for the same thing. (I'll abstain from my rant about who on earth could still be undecided at this point.)





We love bad girls with goatees!

At any rate, despite the sirens and screams, the neighborhood is mostly in one piece. DPW was already out at 10am this morning, sweeping up the broken glass, feathers, candy wrappers, candy (all the candy lying on the street is stuff I can't imagine anyone eating; it must be the cheap crap people buy just so they can give out something at the door), glittery headbands, and, since this is the Castro, condoms.

Today is one of those absolutely perfect late fall California days where despite an undertone of chilly it's decently warm this afternoon, and the sky is crisp and clear even without my glasses (maybe my slightly blurry vision is a myth - it's all just smog? Haze?). It feels unusually calm, maybe because of the exhaustion left over from the craziness last night, or maybe because of the insanity we know awaits us tomorrow. I'll be laboring as a poll worker tomorrow from 6am to 9pm, with my portable radio along so I can play along with the election returns. Here's my wager -- Kerry will win the popular vote, but the electoral vote's going to get hung up on some idiotic state like Florida for the next few weeks while we battle it out in the courts. Seriously, if Florida screws this thing up again, I think we'll see people in the streets. Insanity. If we actually have a new president by midnight PST tomorrow night, I'll be shocked. And if it's W, well, I can't even type after thinking about that one. Sigh. Fingers and toes crossed.