miracles of the modern world

my grandma hazel was born in 1910. when she died at the age of 93 she had lived through incredible changes in the world: the automobile, the origin of air travel, antibiotics, modern surgery, the computer. its hard to fathom how much the world had changed in those 93 years.

i am a strange creature, a lover of things old and things new. i have already stated my love for my clothes line, my singer featherweight and my pressure cooker. but i love my imac and digital camera just as much.

i discovered a new modern miracle that i know i could grow to love: skpye.

last night our single mama's group gathered at our house to skype mary in china. mary is in guangzhou adopting little emme, and will be there another 10 days or so. she is not a blogger so i have been desperate for images and news of how it is all going. kelli brought her lap top since i had a web cam built in. she pushed a few buttons and viola- THERE WAS MARY IN CHINA WITH HER BABY! we could hear her in real time, but the images were kind of choppy, not fluid. but there she was with her baby! it was so crazy cool.

all i could think of was, what the heck would grandma hazel think??

buster

we love this old guy. who can resist that face??

musings

in 1976 when i was in 8th grade, our class decided to bestow awards upon graduation. you know the usual: best hair, best smile, best body, most likely to succeed.i was given the honor of being "most liberated woman". the male counterpart was "biggest male chauvinist pig" . this was bestowed upon bradley , who is now the ceo of a huge global lumber company. and i am a working single mom of 2 by choice.hmmm.

i don't consider myself to be political. in fact i have a sign on my door that says "no soliciting, no religion, no petitions no politics please." however, despite not wanting to be, i suppose i am by the fact that i care about how things work in our government, i am passionate about the environment and i vote. if i have to be categorized i am a liberal left leaning democrat.

the last 2 elections left me deeply disappointed, upset and disheartened about what was happening to our world and our country due to the leadership that reigned in washington. i was completely disenfranchised .i strongly dislike the electoral college because you can win that and not win the popular vote, something that seems wrong to me.

i couldn't watch the election this year, it was too important a moment and i was terrified that it was going to go the other way. when obama won, i was shocked in a good way. i was impressed at mccains concession speach, but not with his supporters who boo'd when obama was mentioned. obama's speech was uplifting as was the positive response in grant park when he spoke of everyone working together to make change. i feel hopeful that although there is much much hard work and many difficult things ahead for all of us in this country, the legacy we leave for our kids will be better because of who we elected.there is a lot to fix and undo after 8 years of gw , war and bad decisions. but hope is a powerful thing.

i was taught that you don't ask people about politics, religion or money. in general you don't really have to ask, you just observe. you can figure out where people are on the spectrum pretty easily.

i have been stunned into silence what has happened since the election. the people who are happy here and around the world are jubilent.i have been moved to tears watching the reponse of the world to our election. the people who are displeased with the results are showing that racisim is alive and well in the 21st century. the lies perpetuated by the conservative media flabberghast me. i have heard things and read things that are so obviously false it is stunning. the number of people who are bitter and angry that the legacy of gw is ending astounds me.

there have been bitter arguments and controversies on almost every china adoption related yahoo group that i belong to. one particularly poisen person on 2 of my groups was a reader of this blog. although i did not know her personally, she was a fellow adoptive mom and when she asked to join i said yes. after reading her posts and then her blog, i immeditately removed her from readership. i just could not have a person who had such a twisted view of the world be a reader in this place where i share my hopes and dreams good times and bad.

no doubt there will be others in my life who share her racist and conservative views. i can't just delete everyone who is that way. i'm not sure how i will handle the conversations when they happen. but one thing is certain: as a thinking person, an environmentalist, a believer in the future, and the mother of 2 asian kids, i must speak up.

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from my pal jimmy

i got this from my pal jimmy. it pretty much sums up my feelings. don't forget to vote, even if you are red.

Dear Red States:

If you manage to steal this election too we've decided we're leaving.
We intend to form our own country, and we're taking the other Blue States
with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon,
Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, and all the Northeast. We believe this split will be beneficial to the
nation, and especially to the people of the new country of New California.
To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave
states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the
Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. We get Intel and Microsoft. You get WorldCom.
We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss. We get 85% of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs. You
get Alabama. We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states pay
their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22% lower than the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families.

Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war,
and we're going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need
people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently
willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if
you don't show pictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish
you success in Iraq , and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we're not willing
to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80% of the
country's fresh water, more than 90% of the pineapple and lettuce, 92%
of the nation's fresh fruit, 95% of America's quality wines, 90% of all
cheese, 90% of the high tech industry, 95% of the corn and soybeans
(thanks Iowa!), most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias
and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech
and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88%
of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92% of all
U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100% of the tornadoes, 90% of the hurricanes,
99% of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100% of all televangelists, Rush
Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.
We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38% of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually
swallowed by a whale, 62% believe life is sacred unless we're discussing
the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44% say that evolution is only a
theory, 53% that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61% of you crazy
bastards believe you are people with higher morals then we lefties.

Finally, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they
grow in Mexico

Peace out,
--Blue States

me-ow