Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

THE sun descending in the west,
The evening star does shine;
The birds are silent in their nest.
And I must seek for mine.
The moon, like a flower
In heaven’s high bower,
With silent delight
Sits and smiles on the night.

from “Night,” William Blake. (1757–1827)

“Okay, let’s see… In mellow-speak, that would be… ‘Oh, wow, look at the moon.'”

“Doonesbury” translation of the above, May 16, 1979.

In the two years plus since my mom died of cancer, I’ve been haunted by
dreams where I struggled in vain to save her. Sometimes she was sick,
and I had to wade through rivers, searching for medicine I couldn’t
find. Sometimes she was lost, and calling me on the phone, again and
again, asking me why I didn’t come rescue her. Sometimes–but, never
mind, I’m sure you get it.

Then one night, in one dream, I knew–she had died. Half knowing that I was dreaming, I looked for her
anyway–and my dream let me find her, looking as if she were sleeping.
I woke up still feeling so happy, and so sad.

I want to be free of remembering my mother as if her whole being was
wrapped in the sickness that killed her. I want to remember the many
trips she and I and my daughters took together.  I want to remember her rooting up weeds in the garden and
lobbing sticks for her dogs–Hilde, Annie, then Puppy. I want to remember her pleasure when I was
a kid over every poem or picture  I made for her. I want to
remember her sure knowledge, long ago, of everything that I wanted to know for myself–for example, how to hold a puppy so
that it feels safe in your arms.

So it seems that my mother is no longer dying–not even in my dreams. I
look forward to spending some dream-time, maybe even having some
dream-time fights, with the hundreds of other mothers I remember.

Wait, let me get my breath here–it’s Ahnuld and Tricky Dick–no, wait, damn, I’m trying to type here. Sorry, I have to go peek at it again.

Remember a billion years ago–maybe last month–when critics of Bush kept protesting, over and over, we didn’t hate US soldiers or love Saddam? It’s funny how dodging those negative cliches gives more power–not less–to people who want to hurt people just like us.

Am I getting in touch with my own inner “Dainty Lady“? Ewww, I hope not. I don’t want to be suddenly scared of mice. I’m a billion times more scared of being perceived like that than I would be if 25 mice climbed up over my sneakers.

But you know what? I don’t have a magical business card that proclaims “Don’t judge Betsy Devine by whatever ugly cliches you believe about women in general.” I suppose I could print up some business cards like that, but…

(And you too–yes, you men as well as you women–if I had a magical business card franchise going, what would you buy? “I’m NOT too old!” No? Then maybe “I’m NOT too young”–“too big”– “too male”–“too lonely.” Guys, if I had those magical business cards, I’d give you all plenty, for free.)

The “Dainty Lady” made me laugh with her pretense of superiority. But there isn’t a woman on the planet who couldn’t be caricatured as a “Dainty Lady” by some man or woman she dared to criticize. (A man criticizing the same person would be some other cliche, but not a Dainty Lady.)

So my point–and I do have one–is this: When people like you are accused of being just too darn “bleeargingledly”, figure out which side you’re really on.

Your instinctive response might be, “But I’m not bleeargingledly at all–they might be bleeargingledly, but not me!”

A far better response is “What are you trying to prove by calling a lot of my friends bleeargingledly?”

It’s a lovely eleven morning
I heard eleven worms yawning (yawn)
I saw eleven cows sleeping ‘midst the buttercups
I said, How’s the cottage cheese?
And they said, Oh, dry up!
Oh!

Eleven little birdies in the trees
Bright yellow beaks and pinky knees
Eleven chicks hatching
Eleven cats scratching
Eleven’s the number for me

Eleven ducklings quacking
(quack-quack-quack)
Eleven pigs, lips smacking
One two three four five six
Seven eight nine ten eleven
Eleven’s the number for me
Don’t you see?
Eleven’s the number for me!

This morning I heard myself humming “It’s a Lovely Eleven Morning.”

Good grief–why *that* song?

The Sesame-Street cartoon featured a shepherdess a la Marie Antoinette–long-gowned, wasp-waisted, and swoony–you laugh when she ends up by tumbling into a pigpen.

She moved and talked and sang like the kind of woman no tomboy wants to grow up to be. I used to make my friends laugh and roll on the grass with my scabby-kneed imitation of a fictional woman I called “The Dainty Lady.”

“A mouse, eeee! Oh, teddible, teddible. Oh Jeeves, help me climb up on this antique table. Oh Jeeves, bring me my smelling salts–no, not those, the ones in the silver bottle…..”

When my daughter Mickey first heard the Eleven song, she turned from the TV and said, “Look, Mummy, she acts like the Dainty Lady.”

So, for the record, I’m not a Dainty Lady. I might be singing her song, but she’s not me. I’ve rarely been stopped by scary or dirty or hard from going the hundreds of places I wanted to go.

Today, I feel like singing her silly song.

And if I fall into a pigpen, feel free to laugh, because I will.

I don’t see why Dean should have to refuse big donors for “moral” reasons–Bush won’t refuse them. What I’d like to see Dean do on moral grounds is refuse special favors to donors–which Bush has not. I worry more about the techinical problem: If Dean limits donations, he gets matching funds. If Dean foregoes matching funds, will big donors give enough to make up for the lost matching funds? OK, I’m an engineer, that’s how I see it.

http://www.deanforamerica.com/

I have heard Dean talk about the guys with Confederate flags and their kids with no health insurance since February at least. I knew what he was talking about, and so did everybody else.

Did Dean offend the black community or southern whites–way back when he first started saying expressing his “big-tent” ideal in this colorful way?

Hell, no. And that’s not what the ruckus at last night’s debate was about.

So now, Dean has apologized for any pain he might have caused to black people or southern whites. That is all the apology he owes anybody, IMO.

But I sure would like to hear some other apologies–from the candidates who tried to twist Dean’s words in a way that is sure to hurt us in 2004–no matter which one of them runs.

Who owes America an apology?

• I’d like to hear an apology from Kerry, for saying that Dean’s ‘pandering’ to the National Rifle Association gave him an inroad to ‘pander to lovers of the Confederate flag.’.
• I’d like to hear an apology from Edwards (“The last thing we need in the South is somebody like you coming down and telling us what we need to do”).
• I’d like to hear an apology from Sharpton (“Imagine if I said that I wanted to be the candidate of people with helmets and swastikas.”).

Those are the apologies I’d like to hear.

Who’s watching out for our $87 billion? Hey, I’m in favor of helping to rebuild Iraq, but I’d like some government oversight of how its spent.

Republicans disagree. According to
Klaus Marre in The Hill

A decision by the House Republicans to strip the Iraq supplemental bill of an anti-profiteering provision has outraged the Democrats…

The provision — included during the Senate Appropriations Committee markup with unanimous support but removed in conference — would …slap penalties on those who “materially [overvalue] any good or service with the specific intent to excessively profit from the war, military action, or relief or reconstruction activities in Iraq.”

OK, call me suspicious, but this missing provision sounded good to me. Why? For a number of reasons….

• Last week, the Center for Public Integrity reported that Halliburton, Bechtel, and other big winners so far of Iraq reconstruction contracts got billions in contracts after giving mere millions in campaign contributions.
• Last week, even conservatives like David Brooks expressed outrage that a cushy lease deal for Boeing in Iraq, on the fast track thanks to Republican intervention, would cost taxpayers $5.6 BILLION more than just buying the airplanes we need.
• Last week, Halliburton had to reply to charges that it was charging the US three times the going price for gasoline in Iraq.

But, as the old joke says, “Who’s counting?”

Not our Republican leadership, that’s for sure.

The SCO Group intensified its war against Linux today, issuing this public  statement:

The “law of gravity”, for which Isaac Newton claimed credit, is in serious violation of our rights. Secret details hidden deep in our  software will, if we ever choose to reveal them, prove that we own prior rights to this so-called “law.”

Therefore, all parties making use of said “law of gravity” without  paying compensation to SCO, are violating the US Constitution, as well as copyright, antitrust and export control laws.

Lawsuits against Isaac Newton and his heirs are in progress.

City officials in Newton, Massachusetts, and attorneys for Nabisco’s  Fig Newton division, acknowledged receipt for demands from SCO for  unspecified damages.

Slashdot readers chose to look on the bright side. Said EnlightenmentFan, “If the law of gravity is uneforceable, I won’t have to shell out money for airplane tickets.”