A few days after Thanksgiving

And I'm trying to figure out what to be thankful about. It's not that there aren't good things in my life. Things are fairly good, actually - I think I've finally found my footing at work, my next novel is beginning to take shape, I'm learning the piano, and my wonderful spouse has decided to take up the drums and roller derby. All and all not a bad time.

Yet then there's the world. I look at it, and I'm just not sure what to say anymore.

WaPo Actually Reports Some News

The Washington Post is usually pretty solidly behind neoliberal education reforms, so it's nice to see them highlight a report questioning the research basis for many of those policies.

Some Things Never Change

"Every demand of the simplest bourgeois financial reform, of the most ordinary liberalism, of the most formal republicanism, of the most shallow democracy, is... stigmatized as socialism."

-Karl Marx in "The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte", 1852

Monsters

Demonstrating in favor of a man who was fired for protecting a child rapist is....is....I don't even have a word for how awful it is.

A Little More Than An Homage

So I of course forgot an important ingredient for the dinner I'm making tonight and had to head back to the grocery store. I turn on the radio, and begin to hear what I suspect is a cover of a song by the Pixies. Then it turns out not to be a cover at all, but rather a "new" song called Aberdeen by some group called "Cage the Elephant."

When I got home I googled "aberdeen pixies ripoff" and got this review. Now I love the Pixies, and think it's great to pay homage to them, such as Nirvana did with "Smells Like Teen Spirit." But man, this song is NOT an homage. Or if it is, Vanilla Ice's "Ice Ice Baby" is an homage too.

Hey, if you don't believe me, check out this mashup.

Now I will go cook dinner and listen to an actual Pixies album to get the taste of felony out of my skull.

Thank God They Can't Do This

Cats texting. Nothing more to be said.

Our Representative Democracy

And I'm sure the fact that they're soooooo much richer than their constituents has absolutely no effect whatsoever on the policies they vote for. (h/t) I mean, it's not like really wealthy people don't have any sympathy for the little guy, right?

Totally Awesome Idea

Irritate a financial institution: Send back the credit card applications!