Infamy

I want to read No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin. It is about the Roosevelts and discusses this time period is pretty great detail from what I understand. 

Anyway, it's Pearl Harbor Day. Let's keep remembering. 

The tenth month?

Well, it is December. Which mean Mr. Logo will celebrate his natal day and I am expected to do some shopping. 

 Additionally, my mother-in-law is visiting. While she is here we plan to go see King Tut and watch The Nutcracker. The PNB is suitably proud of it and the Maurice Sendak designs.

I am really looking forward to December 21st. The days will start getting long again, yay! Call me greedy if you like but I think anything less that 8 1/2 hours of day light borders on cruel and unusual. Clearly I would not survive in Alaska. Anyway, come on, December 21st!
I am looking forward to Christmas break; time to hang out with the offspring and getting to sleep in, yay!
It is rather odd to think another year is almost over though.
Times flies and all that. 

I luffs to share.

I have discovered a new thing, Upworthy.
The graphic above is from their site, as are the following two videos;


a promo for Goldie Blox, which my niece will be receiving,

AND

the best safety video in the history of the interwebz.

Upworthy, I luffs it too, PLUS it is all about the sharing, which we already established I luff.

Say what now???

Colonialism is a practice of domination, which involves the subjugation of one people to another. One of the difficulties in defining colonialism is that it is hard to distinguish it from imperialism. Frequently the two concepts are treated as synonyms. Like colonialism, imperialism also involves political and economic control over a dependent territory. The etymology of the two terms, however, provides some clues about how they differ. The term colony comes from the Latin word colonus, meaning farmer. This root reminds us that the practice of colonialism usually involved the transfer of population to a new territory, where the arrivals lived as permanent settlers while maintaining political allegiance to their country of origin. Imperialism, on the other hand, comes from the Latin term imperium, meaning to command. Thus, the term imperialism draws attention to the way that one country exercises power over another, whether through settlement, sovereignty, or indirect mechanisms of control.(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) 

Recently I've heard from a couple different people that President Obama is an anti-colonialist. In my current events class in October when we were doing pros and cons for President Obama and Governor Romney this was mentioned as a con for the president. 
I was puzzled. 
In fact, I didn't even write it on the board because I assumed the child has misunderstood. After all, colonialism is something America rejected pretty firmly a couple hundred years ago and I tend to assume that people who favor American-style democracy are also — by definition— anti-colonialist.

However, this point has come up since then... a couple times. Conservative people are discussing anti-colonialism as if it were a bad thing and I am wondering about whether or not they have thought that position through. 

Have conservative Americans really decided  that the subjugation of one people by another is a good thing?
And if so... why?

 Because, let's be clear here, if you oppose those who object to colonialism, 
YOU ARE IDEOLOGICALLY SUPPORTING THE SUBJUGATION OF ONE GROUP BY ANOTHER.

When exactly did the Republican party decide that was a conservative American value???


Now, I have been made aware of the origin of this bit of political equivocation but I am not discussing someone ideological bait and switch boloney right now. I am focusing on the fact that we now have people in this country who are discussing anti-colonialism as if it is a pernicious evil instead of a foundational piece of doctrine in the American political view.  

I am anti-colonialist. I believe people have the right to be self-governing, whether I agree with them or not. If you believe that then 
YOU ARE ANTI-COLONIALIST. 

Low expectations are the key to happiness.

I recently was show a graphic that looked like this, and it explained why I am annoyed by all that is wrong in my world.

You see, there is a gap between expectation and reality and in this rendition of these two aspects of life the gap between them is labeled frustration. The gap between expectation and reality is where frustration lives, frustration with our situations, our loved ones, and ourselves. Typically, people try to alleviate this frustration by forcing reality closer to our expectations, but that is extraordinarily difficult.

In most cases, it would be much more sensible to bring our expectations into closer proximity to reality. This is not to say, of course, that we shouldn't have standards, or just accept anything and everything that comes along. But how much needless frustration have you suffered because of an unmet expectation that was just too far away from reality? 
I know I've experienced plenty!

OK, so that is the speech I plan to open with when I explain to my sister why I am so bad at remembering to call her. What do you think? Am I off the hook?

Veteran's Day

To all the vets, but especially the ones I love, thank you.

Oh well, next time

In other news, hoping my east coast peeps stay dry, warm, and powered.