Kerrystock ended, and I feel good about my candidate. What made me happiest? Was it his one daughter identifying the core value of her father as "integrity"? Was it his speech? Was it his band of brothers, his Swift Boat crew, standing behind him? Was it that he truly is a war hero, and our war president is an AWOL dolt? Nope. None of that. It was that he entered the hall to the strains of "No Surrender." And it wasn't a cover version.

"Blood brothers in the stormy night with a vow to defend
No retreat, baby, no surrender."

The fact that Bruce hasn't issued a cease and desist is what makes me the happiest girl in the world.

Tonight is movie night at the Casa de Zapatos. We're having a special showing of "Bubba Ho-Tep", arguably one of the odder cult films of recent history. It stars Bruce Campbell (he of "Army of Darkness" fame) as Elvis Presley. In a nursing home. Fighting to save the residents (and his own soul) from the death kiss of a rogue mummy (the titular Bubba Ho-Tep). It co-stars the incomparable Ossie Davis, as JFK. It's a redemption story. It's a mystery. It's a horror story. It's a hoot.

I have been the recipient of some pretty nasty offers of some pretty nasty porn, coming in through the spam transom. But the names the spammers are using these days is so amusing, I have to share:

Monologging J. Fairies
Jubilation L. Bobbin

Now I, myself, do not like to speak in front of large crowds, but have, on occasion, done so. Neither do I consider myself to be an expert on the art of public speaking. Having said both of those things, let me critique last night's oratory at the DNC.
There is a tendency, and I don't know when it started, to have a catch phrase that the audience chants along at intervals. Maybe this is a nod to the call and response of traditional Black churches, but let me tell you now, it just sucks when some stiff white guy tries to get it going. *

It does nothing for the message, either. I mean really, who's going to be quoting "Here comes hope!" when you can use "I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death."? Right. Not one soul. Not even the hack who wrote it.

If I were the person who scheduled the speakers, I would not have led with Barack Obama on Tuesday. He was too hot, too passionate, too good to be wasted on day two. Last night we had the Rev. Jesse Jackson, and, in my humble (yeah, right) opinion, he has had his day. His delivery was off, his rhetoric was stale. He's lost the fire in his belly.

Al Sharpton? Better than I expected, but still not the kind of rallying, blood-boiling speech that one wants on day three. Oh, and that stiff? Marvin? Melvin? O'Malley? ( I had to look him up: Mayor Martin O?Malley of Baltimore) Oh. My. God. He sucked. He sucked big. He sucked so badly, that even I, political junkie from Yellow Puppyhood, had to turn the sound off.

All I can think is that they needed people who'd make John Edwards look good. Not that he needed that much. Is it just me, or does he have that whole Dennis Quaid thing going on? Not that there's anything wrong with that.

The high point of the whole night for me was the video from the Firefighters Union. The photography was chilling, riveting. And the music? Well, we know where I fall on that, don't we. They used one of the best of the best, Bruce Springsteen's "No Surrender." And must have had permission to do so, as it was a real version (I think it was from the New York City Live shows, but I could be mistaken). The last time someone tried to co-op one of his songs (Reagan and "Born in the USA") he shut them down in a heartbeat, and even went so far as to explain to the Republicans that it was a protest song, you morons, and not a paean to the glory of being an American.

I couldn't stay awake for my very favorite part of any of these conventions, the Roll Call. Is there anything more quintessentially American than the roll call? I just love it: "The Great State of East Elbow, home of the quadruple cheeseburger on rye with onion relish, Silverfish Capitol of the Universe, and center of everything to the left of Cleveland, proudly casts its fourteen votes for...." They had the Roll Call on after eleven p.m. Who the hell would or could stay awake for that after an evening of mediocre public speaking and even more random musical acts?

Oh, yeah. The music... Uh, John? John Mellancamp? A little Queer Eye advice: stop with the dying and teasing of that pathetic mop of what used to be a magnificent head of hair. You look like Elton John before the hair transplant. And another word, if I may? Do not, under any circumstances, ever, ever, ever repeat the lyric changes in "Small Town" to reference the fact that your wife was only 10 years old when you wrote the fucker in the first place. It caused me, and probably many more folks to do the math, and all I can say is: EWWWWWWWWWWWW.

Thanks, I'm done now.

*OK, so Springsteen can do the revival call and response like a a first-class tent preacher, but then, he is hardly the definition of a stiff white guy.

Oh, baby, baby, baby. I got a new political hottie: Barak Obama. Did you guys see him? Did you hear him? Oh. My. God. I have seen the future of rock and roll. Or politics, what ever.
He is the face, the true story of America. A first-generation born citizen, who lived the dream his grandparents set in motion. He is eloquent and passionate, and not afraid to say the things that need to be said, and that have been suppressed by political correctness for too, far too, long.

I loved him. I stood up in my living room and applauded. I cheered. I clapped. I believed in America again. Now, I just have to see if he actually wins his election.

And Teresa Heinz Kerry! Oh. My. God. The first (potential) first lady with actual flair and style since (dare I say this?) Jackie Kennedy. (Swoons) Did you see her stand-up collar? Her hair? She speaks five languages, which is five more than Bush. She's an (another bad word coming up) intellectual, God bless her little heart.

And that old, not-yet-toothless lion of liberals everywhere: Teddy Kennedy. He looked great, and not at all like a bloated parody of himself. He did the thing that only he can do: he invoked the words, the works and the spirits of his dead brothers. He contrasted the intelligence and noblesse oblige of those two men with the callowness and self interest of the current administration. And he can. Because he's the last one.

But wait, unless you readers have cable, you didn't see any of those things because the three major networks didn't show any of the Democratic Convention in prime time. They cite low ratings. They cite disinterest. They are remiss in their duty to the American people. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, but sometimes exposure to raw information is more important than profit. (Try not to faint.)

So where is the liberal media bias the right keeps yawping about? If there really were a liberal media conspiracy, wouldn't the Democratic convention have been broadcast into sports bars and gyms everywhere? Wouldn't the spin be something other than Teresa Kerry told a pushy, asshole reporter to shove it? How come that makes her a bitch, but telling the Senate to go fuck themselves makes Dick Cheney a real man?

For the answer to that question, just listen to Ms. Heinz Kerry herself:

"My right to speak my mind, to have a voice, to be what some have called `opinionated,' is a right I deeply and profoundly cherish. My only hope is that, one day soon, women -- who have all earned the right to their opinions -- instead of being labeled opinionated, will be called smart or well-informed, just like men.''

The C-Span camera cut to Hillary Rodham Clinton at that moment, and on her face I read "oh, yeah, sistah, been there, done that, got enough t-shirts to make a fucking circus tent."

See you tonight on the couch, for day three of Kerrystock.

I have found my reality TV addiction. No, it isn't one of the scripted pieces of dreck on Fox, it is the C-Span coverage of the Democratic National Convention. No commercials. No commentary. No "fair and balanced" talking heads. Nope. Just pure convention, all talking, all the time.
I've loved watching the national conventions since I was just a Yellow Puppy.

Last night was some of the best stuff I've seen in years. It was wonderful to see Jimmy Carter (sounding, however, like his dentures were loose, or he'd just come from having a root canal) blasting the Bush policies of unilateralism and intolerance.

And my old flame, Al Gore. I'd seen Al speak in person way back in the old days, before he was anything other than a rising Young Democrat. I never understood why people thought he was stiff and humorless, except that is what the pundits decided during the last election cycle.

Last night he was funny, and eloquent, and yes, bitter about the last election. As well he should be. And he gave the people in Boston a direction for their own bitterness: Don't let this ever happen again. Don't let the Supreme Court ever select another President, and don't let this President select the next Supreme Court.

Like Al, I've never forgotten how Bush came to be in the White House. Nor have I lost my bitterness. It's a lot like my divorce. I had to remember all the hurt, and all the cruelty to maintain the fight. At the same time, I had to channel that energy outward, and not inward, so that, although the bitterness and resentment informed my actions, it did not change me into a bitter and resentful person.

And then we had Herself, Ms. Rodham Clinton. Wowza. I loved that she pointed out that SHE had been at Ground Zero on September 12th, unlike someone else, namely the duly appointed President of the United States. (Maybe he was still digesting the plot of My Pet Goat.)

The evening wrapped up with Bill, another reminder of my first marriage. I never cared much for Bill Clinton, because his personality was so much like the AntiChrist: slick, insincere, a survivor of childhood abuse, and over-driven because of it. Unlike the AntiChrist, though, Clinton was not a sociopath, and did honestly care about other people. His presidency was proof of that. Last night he was in rare form. In my opinion, it is Bill Clinton, and not Ronald Reagan, who should be remembered as The Great Communicator.

So yes, I was glued to the set by the spectacle of reality TV. I'll be there again tonight. And the night after that.

In closing, let me leave you with some quotes from great politicians of the past:

"I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies another this right makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it." -- Thomas Paine, 1783

"Free speech exercised both individually and through a free press, is a necessity in any country where people are themselves free." -- Theodore Roosevelt, 1918

"The truth is found when men are free to pursue it." -- Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1936

"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." -- George Orwell, 1945

"Any time we deny any citizen the full exercise of his constitutional rights, we are weakening our own claim to them." -- Dwight David Eisenhower, 1963

"What is objectionable, what is dangerous about extremists is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant." -- Robert F. Kennedy, 1964

"Go fuck yourself." -- Dick Cheney, 2004

I've had an earworm all week: Elvis Costello's "Less Than Zero". I've even listened to it, since that will usually run one off. It didn't. I'm still walking around spontaneously combusting into "Hey!, Whey-Hey!".
For the past two days, people have chosen to sit next to me on uncrowded trains, despite the fact that my big tote bag was already occupying that seat. This morning it was a man of great heft who opted to drop his fat ass on my Vera Bradley. Unfortunately for all of us, I'd already removed the knitting needles. Thankfully, however, he missed the i-pod, or the security guard would have had to keep me from plunging said bamboo needles into the fat bastard's heart.

Just in case you thought that the absurdity of my work life had diminished, it hasn't.

I took a photo of my PHB, sleeping at his desk, and had it posted for the past two days, but discretion being the better part of Valerie, or, because I listened to common sense advice from others, it has been removed. Rats.

Yesterday was a hukilau, with the PR department sending me information to post ASAP (since it ties to an ad that's running this weekend, someplace). Yes, of course it was a PDF, and they wanted text to accompany it. So for the zilliontyseventh time we did the PDF lecture. This resulted in the text coming over as a Word file, which I should use to create an HTML page and then link to a PDF (which I could just make myself from the Word file). So I did. And then, as I read the file, I realized that there were typos and missing information.

I sent a note to the PR person, pointing out that children do not usually have an age of ??, but actual numbers. People do not get TD booster shots, at least to my knowledge, but I am familiar with TB.... like that.

Oh, they were so happy that I have such a good copyproofing eye. And then they said, oh, don't work on this until it comes back from the ad agency, because you shouldn't waste your time.

Too late for that, ace. I've just blown an hour dicking around with your crap to this point. And if it isn't ready, why send it to me? Really, I think that the last 12 years would qualify as a waste of time.

But, it's Friday, and we all know what that means: ALCOHOL!!!!

I saw a bumper sticker on the back of an FPL* truck this morning. Context is everything, y'know? This is what it said:

"Working people who vote Republican are like chickens who support Colonel Sanders."

And I have a rhetorical question for all those young'uns wearing their pants below their butt cracks: If they slide and you have to hold/pull them up (and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. I, of all people, understand the pull of cool and how it is the overriding motivator of youth) why must you hold/pull directly over your nads? Huh? How come you can't grab the sides, why must you pull your pud in an effort to keep your pants up?

I'm just asking.

* Florida Power and Light, also known as Florida Plunder and Loot