i'm gonna learn to sew. i think. i hope. i haven't done well just teaching myself. books and text don't seem to translate to my brain in this instance. do any of you have any favorite how-to sites? recommendations for learning how? i've looked for classes at like the vo-tech and the community centers, but no dice.

got any decent leads?

Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show

saw the frida exhibit today. everyone should go. it's an amazing collection of her work, as well as a lot of photographs and some of diego's work. anyway, i'll probably write about that some other time, perhaps on my personal blog or here, but when i got home i wanted to get a book about her. in my looking around online for a good one, i found this.

http://www.painexhibit.com/

artwork by chronic pain sufferers.

The Way We Live Now
Why Bother?
By MICHAEL POLLAN
Published: April 20, 2008
NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-lede-t.html?ex=1209528...--read more >>

Dear MoveOn member,
If you missed the Democratic presidential debate on ABC last night, Editor & Publisher called it "perhaps the most embarrassing performance by the media in a major presidential debate in years."1 (Click below to see video excerpts.) --read more >>

interview with presidential candidate mckinney. it's long, but good:

yeah we narrowed our vacation choices down to the country. congratulations to canada for beating out mexico, ireland, the US and england.--read more >>

ok, i was reserving judgment on it, because it made me very nervous that authorities could storm in and round up hundreds of people like that. but i've kept up on it now, and i now feel like they did the right thing. i also think they really got that call, it wasn't some elaborate conspiracy to persecute FLDS for their religion.--read more >>

yeah, so it's national poetry month. i thought to post about it reading an interesting article about marginalizing woman poets in yesterday's guardian. made me wish i was more into poetry, maybe i should give it another shot. my dd is into poetry, i'm not so much. last year, dd brought "phenomenal woman" to school. this year, every class is incorporating poetry. and i do mean every class, including health and art.--read more >>

i read about it on the huffington post.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/10/randi-rhodes-quits-air-am_n_960...

then i looked it up and saw that she already has another job lined up:
http://www.novamradio.com/

good for her. i love her. don't always agree with her, but she was one major reason i listened to air america. the other reasons were al franken and marc maron, both of whom are no longer there. al leaving to run for senate, and marc being so unwisely canned. love him.

you can go to the blog here to hear him interviewing her about what actually happened with AAR. --read more >>

ok, soon i will be in a position to take my first vacation in a while. it's actually, for the first time ever, possible that i can go wherever i want...--read more >>

i'm just reposting because i think it's cute as hell.

Mom Jenny Slam Dunks AAP Docs on Larry King

by Barbara Loe Fisher --read more >>

The Department of Homeland Security announced plans Tuesday to issue two waivers that would bypass 30 laws and regulations so 267 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border fence can be built this year in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. One of the waivers applies specifically to Hidalgo County's levee-fence project.--read more >>

the mother had been getting slapped with fines for interfering with a visitation order, after he had stated that he would kill the children to punish her.

ROCKVILLE - More than two years ago, Amy Ashley Castillo pleaded for help in court papers, saying that her estranged husband had threatened to kill their three children to punish her by leaving her alone in the world.--read more >>

--read more >>

so dd's illness, which kept her out of school all week, is the flu. she's better now. i have it. my whole body hurts. like i can barely sit here and type this hurts. i'd be in bed but that hurts too. i actually got it earlier this week, but i had that new job that i didn't want to lose so i went to work anyway. not a good call. i may lose that gig, which is through a temp agency anyway, but i'm totally ok with that. turns out that this particular employer is hostile toward illness.--read more >>

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gy_FocuLcPyslOqVeaOFan8yo7eQD8VLUSO01

Parents Pick Prayer Over Docs; Girl Dies
By ROBERT IMRIE – 4 hours ago

WESTON, Wis. (AP) — Police are investigating an 11-year-old girl's death from an undiagnosed, treatable form of diabetes after her parents chose to pray for her rather than take her to a doctor.

An autopsy showed Madeline Neumann died Sunday from diabetic ketoacidosis, a condition that left too little insulin in her body, Everest Metro Police Chief Dan Vergin said.--read more >>

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/03/25/walmart.insurance.battle/index.html

http://www.runcynthiarun.org/

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/03/24/7858/
(article from original source has links i did not include here)

Monday, March 24, 2008
By Chris Hedges, Common Dreams, March 24, 2008--read more >>

how long is that, is anyone counting? i actually don't even want to know how long it took to find this one, it's too depressing. i do know that i've been living here six months without working outside the house. blech.--read more >>

those of you who do easter, that is.

yes, yes, we do easter. yes, i grasp the irony, being all vocal about the atheism and all. but we have fun with it. check out my myspace photos to see how we color eggs, those pics are (i think)two years old.

on the saturday before easter, dd colors eggs and leaves them in a basket for the easter bunny. then while she is asleep the trickster easter bunny hides the eggs, decorates the basket, and fills it with candy. dd LOVES this holiday. i always did too, as a kid. --read more >>

dd had discovered taking my camera and filling the card with pictures of teh following sort.

mommy opening the refrigerator. oh, it's a hoot to take pictures of the back of your mother in the midst of mundane tasks:

as is mommy's ass, when she's sat on the tape you placed so playfully on her chair:--read more >>