Had my 20th high school reunion tonight. Saw a couple of the people I'd really hoped to see, which was great; but also found out that one of them had died.

How old does news have to be before it loses the ability to hit you hard? If you find out that someone you had known and cared about died last year, five years ago, ten years ago, what's the statute of limitations on that?

Allison Fisher, a friend and classmate, a lovely young woman who I performed together with in a high school play, died of breast cancer nine years ago. I last saw her fifteen years ago, at our fifth high school reunion, perhaps the most vivacious person there. Now, I regret missing our tenth.

Very interesting project here: PeaceTags.

They are selling silver "dog tag" style necklaces with quotes about peace, from folks ranging from Walt Whitman to Pope John Paul II to the Dali Lama. Proceeds benefit the Wounded Warrior Project and the Voices in Wartime Education Project.

The mission of PeaceTags is to ignite peace in our hearts, in our homes, and in our world by spreading the words of wise sages through the ages. We raise funds and awareness for innovative non profit organizations helping troops, their families, and communities.

They ain't cheap, but it's a good cause.

From the too-cute-to-ignore department: according to AP, "A stray kitten has found a new mother in a golden retriever, who began producing milk for the gray tabby after hearing its cries."

Working more on the "favorite shirt" idea for a piece...

Now I pretty much grew up on "Star Trek" - original series. I mean, my parents have a portrait of Kirk and Spock hanging in their living room, ok? And one thing you learn from watching Star Trek is, never wear a red shirt.

'Cause every damn time, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and some poor sucker in a red shirt beam down to the planet - and guess who gets all the salt in his body sucked out, or gets a knife in the chest from some warrior-culture alien, or catches the horrible disease that dissolves your whole body into a pile of powder? Right. The dude in the red shirt.

But then I grew up. And then they did the whole "next generation" thing, where the captain wears a red shirt, and the guy in yellow always buys it.

And then one night on the cable TV classic movie show I saw "Rebel Without a Cause", where James Dean wears this cool red jacket - which technically isn't a shirt, but close enough, right?

Anyway, point is, eventually I learned to love the red shirt. You grow, you learn, you put away childish ways, that's what life is all about.

so i'm gonna wear my red shirt tonight



gonna wear my red shirt tonight

gonna wear my red shirt tonight



it's my favorite shirt

it's the color of passion

it's my only red shirt

I don't care if it's in fashion

ummm-hmmmm

So last weekend was Playa Del Fuego. Fun but sort of mellow. Nothing really extraordinary to a Starwood veteran - though the naked slip & slide was fun. Also nice hanging out with the Zelda's folks at our camp, I think we did a good job of drawing people in, getting folks involved in our writing exercises.

The big bonfire ("burn", in the lingo) on Saturday night was actually a little disappointing. The fire was nice enough; there were some fire performers, which is cool but I'm getting jaded and not that interested unless they're really good; and there was a little bit of drumming, but not much and not for long. No dancing. I don't see the point in a bonfire without dancing around it in a circle.

But I had a good afterward hanging out at "Whiskey and Whores", a bar theme camp. Met a girl who spun poi, who finally gave me the key to figuring out the three-beat weave; met a few pretty women. which is always a favorite pasttime.(What happens at PDF, stays at PDF, so nothing more to say on that. :-) )

This is the weirdest, most disturbing thing I've heard about in a while. It illustrates so well the dangers of the human impulse to submit to authority.

Friday, a jury awarded $6.1 million to Louise Ogborn, who said she was subject to a strip-search in a McDonald's back office after someone posing as a cop called the restaurant and accused her of theft.

Ogborn claimed McDonald's was negligent when they failed to warn her and other employees about this caller, who had already struck other fast-food joints. Yes, this wasn't an isolated case: there were over 70 such incidents.

It's sad to see how much heat Barak Obama draws when he says the most commonsensical things.

Following the lead of John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan during the Cold War, you're willing to talk to leaders of nations at odd with us? Then you must be "inexperienced" or "naive".

You're willing to take a nuclear first strike off the table? You must be "irresponsible". (No matter if the one criticizing you made the same statement last year.)

Now he's getting criticized for his fashion choices, for saying that he decided that he ought to display his patriotism with actions than with an American flag lapel pin. (One probably made in China.)

The whole thing reminds me of the great old John Prine song Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore.

Something I recently posted to Slashdot. It's old news but I get tired of the misinformation around this.

They even had a non-partisan group do a recount after the fact, and the paper trail showed that Bush in fact did win Florida.

No.

Data from the NORC recount shows that under the legal standard in force at the time, the "intent of the voter", more ballots were cast for Gore than for Bush.

As the Washington Post admitted (though only deep into an article whose headline and lead tells how recounts would have favored Bush):

At the Zelda's camp at PDF. Misheard by me from Karla: "I should burn the mind that I always forget".

Our writing exercise was postponed due to the bonfire getting lit: it would have been a poem with synesthetic descriptions.

Among the major party candidates, my favorites (so far) are Obama and Kucinich.

While they're both 100% wrong on gun control, I don't think a president can do as much damage on that as they can on foreign policy and on due process (habeius corpus, right to a genuine, speedy, and public trial, and so on).

Obama gets triple points this week for announcing that he would work toward nuclear disarmament.

And Kucinich is the subject of this interesting profile in the Chicago Tribune.