Catch Up

So October is looking pretty skimpy compared to September when you look at the number of blog posts. It's been a busy month though with the museum opening and trying to work on my Masters application. I'm pretty amazed that I managed to fit our yearly fall trip with Sky and Anna into the month. We had a good time and went down to a little town called New Hope and then did some patriotic sightseeing in Philadelphia. I'll have to give a "ri-cap" of the trip later, but here are some pictures to tide you over and make up for my lack of posting.

From 10_19_08

Race on the PATH

The PATH train is just like the subway, only it goes fewer places, and one of those places is New Jersey. I also think it's a little cleaner, but it's got to be tough to keep a place like that clean. About 242,000 people go ride it each day. During rush hour it can be crowded, sardine-like even. This evening wasn't any different, I stood there trying to read my magazine while I snaked my arm under the shopping bag of the person standing next to me in order to hold on to the pole to keep from careening off into the lap of some lucky person with a seat, or worse to create a domino effect of falling people. Anyway, there is a stop on the way home where a large percentage of people get off and a limited number of seats typically open up. At the end of a long day people will push frantically to get off the train and others will try to be Salmon swimming up stream because they don't want to get pushed off the train and they want to get back to where the exiters came from to snag their seat. I usually coordinate where I stand with the person who I think is most likely to get off the train first so I don't have to struggle and I can snag a seat quickly. I may have had to squeeze/bump my way through a couple exiters to nab a seat, but I figure I was helping them because once I sit I am out of their way so they can leave without trying to go around me. So tonight after gaining a seat I am still reading an article about the election and about white middle class voters who probably won't vote for Obama because of race issues and I was marveling at the idea that such things still exist since it seems so ridiculous to me to care about a person's skin color. As I'm reading and contemplating how I am going to vote, I hear "What did you say?" In a very aggressive tone. So I did the furtive eyeball and I see a young black girl probably a senior in high school talking over her shoulder to a late-twenties-ish white man in a black pea coat. He repeated what he must have originally said "We're all going to the same place" as the girl and the woman she was with sat down in the seats next to me. I don't remember exactly what the girl said in response, it was something about them being rude and possibly something about them not having a good job. This is about the time when the white woman who was with the man pipes up and says "Your mother is probably on Welfare." "My mother has a good job with the state" responded the girl. The Woman responded with some comment implying that the girl was too stupid or just plain stupid, but it was really her tone that got my blood boiling. I couldn't believe the way she was throwing around racial stereotypes coupled with an argument on intelligence. As if she were so bright. The argument devolved from there into what job did the woman have and whether it was the girl's business to know and how the woman (who had a short bob haircut) should grow some hair before she started talking. Finally the woman sitting next to the girl, who I figured out at that point was her mother told her daughter to be quiet and to quit talking. Repeatedly cutting off her murmers of white people who did mumble mumble. Meanwhile the white couple is standing off in their corner mumbling about welfare and unintelligent some more sounding all righteous. The mother told her daughter to rise above petty fights like that as the girl still tried to say "I'm not that lady!" "What's her name? Who gave up her seat?" Her mother replied "Rosa Parks, and she didn't give up her seat." All through this I was just bursting. I wanted to say something, anything to show these people that an argument about a seat was petty in the first place, but in the second place to bring ridiculous racial stereotypes out as an argument was the worst kind of ignorance. I wish I could have thought of something to say, I know everyone in the train was listening. I wanted to say something that would be snarky and make people laugh but at the same time make them realize how ridiculous the racial remarks were. I also wanted to thank the mother for teaching her daughter a valuable lesson. In the end as we exited the train I told the mother to have a good night and that I hoped they ran into nicer people. Maybe there wasn't something to say that wouldn't have just made everyone more defensive and gotten me into a fight. But I really wanted to stand up for what was right. A friend said to remember what they looked like. Just in case I run into them again, anyone have any ideas? What would you have said if you were going to say something?

Crazy Drivers

For any of you who may have attempted to drive in New Jersey, you know that the drivers here are crazy. I never cross the street when the hand says to go because I just know some bus driver will try to turn left and plow me down. I always wondered about the crossing gaurds who I see on the way to work. They never seemed to be nearly cautious enough. They'd just walk into the street and wave the pedestrians through the intersection, or more likely they'd stay standing on the corner and watch as people made their own way across. Appparently you only get gaurded crossing the street if you're a kid. I always thought they should do a little more whistle blowing and "stop" hand motioning. So on Friday morning as I kissed Scott goodbye I told him to "look both ways before crossing the street." Jokingly of course, but I didn't think that the caution would be so timely. As I walked out the door and up the hill I saw the poor crossing gaurd sitting in the street in front of a car. Apparently someone had hit the lady, and was at least calling for help. But she didn't seem to be ready to get up and walk out of the street.

On another note, I got the Red Velvet cake that I won in a raffle. Soooo delicious. It's tough to stop eating it.

Wiretapping not focused on al Qaeda Suspects

Well, I'm not too good at blogging about what it is that I'm doing, so instead I'll bring some more politics to your attention. Remember when Bush said that all the wiretapping the NSA had been doing (think back to 2005 now) was strictly for use against al Qaeda suspects and that no American civil liberties would be violated?

Yeah, no surprise but that was a lie.

It seems wiretappers would intercept and then share some of the juicier tidbits coming out of Iraq, from military officers to volunteer relief workers (American Red Cross, for example). ABC just did a whole report on it, if you're following that.

Maybe next time I post it will be about something cool and science-y instead of depressing and politic-y. At least it's not mavericky.

Ceramic Sightings

I think I am somehow magically linked to Macayos. I have always enjoyed their lovely margaritas, but what is more entertaining than a few margaritas, or perhaps more entertaining after a few margaritas is the ceramic mugs that they come in. Known coloquially as "Bob's" and "Cha-Chas" these distinctive mugs are easy to spot, but it amazes me that I have now spotted them not only in their native Arizona habitat, but also in Vietnam, and now in a New Jersey Good Will store. Really, what are the chances that of all the Good Will stores in New Jersey that the one that I happen to pass by every day has an authentic Macayos mug? It's where I had my wedding rehearsal dinner, then when I went to Vietnam on my honeymoon, we were sitting at the bar and what did we see propped up along with the bottles of liquor, but Bob and Cha-Cha. These things are following me. If there's a message here, I'm not sure what it is.... collect ceramics? Drink Margaritas? Return to Arizona? Perhaps its just the ghost of Arizona past.