I like Ron Paul but I don't "like him" like him

Ron Paul was on Jon Stewart last night. I seriously like this guy - he's one of the very few straight shooters ever elected to Congress. He always makes just enough sense to draw me in before he starts the crazy talk. Last night, they didn't really get into the crazy talk. I can see people who don't follow politics that closely thinking, "Hey, I'd vote for that guy."

Of course, most of those people don't watch Jon Stewart.

This morning when I got up, Percy came to meet me. I discovered that he eats more if I pick him up and pet him before I feed him. Got him all taken care of, but where the hell were Megan and Lizzie?

I took my air conditioner out of the window last night but I didn't remove the wooden blocks so I can't shut the window completely. There's about a 4" x 4" gap - just enough room for an enterprising little kitty like Megan to squeeze through and fall three stories. I had it blocked with scrunched up groceries bags but she could've pushed her way through. Whew - the bags were still in place.

It took a lot of coaxing and opening a can of food before they both crawled out from under the couch. Then there was a loud crash and they both dived under it again. Mystery solved.

There are roofers on the building next door, prying the shingles off and tossing them into a big dumpster right under my window. That's the whole reason I took the AC out. The young cats are terrified. Percy is amused by their terror.

Lizzie's eyes are better today after the eye drops I gave her yesterday. Fingers crossed - I saved $50 on a trip to the vet.

Quote of the day

This is not a time right now for wishful thinking that governments are going to sort things out ... The governments don't rule the world, Goldman Sachs rules the world ...

For most traders we don't really care about having a fixed economy, having a fixed situation, our job is to make money from it ... Personally, I've been dreaming of this moment for three years. I go to bed every night and I dream of another recession ... When the market crashes... if you know what to do, if you have the right plan set up, you can make a lot of money from this.

- British trader Alessio Rastani

False hope?

Percy ate 3 times yesterday - that I know of. I've been giving him his favorite pate foods mixed with water and he eats 1-2 tablespoons at a time. Not enough to sustain a normal cat but this is Super Zombie we're talking about. Now, he's a lot more energetic.

Last night, I left four bowls of his special soup plus extra bowls of water scattered around the apartment. The soup was all gone this morning but there's a greedy little kitten who probably ate most of it. I might start locking the girls in the bathroom instead of the birds to see if he'll eat more.

Meanwhile, Lizzie has an eye infection. It's getting better so one more day of treating it at home before I spend another $50 at the vet.

Afternoon delight

Look what I stumbled in on today. First time all three of them napped together.

I made an executive decision, then changed my mind

I originally posted the following yesterday:

I was up all night [Thur-Fri] trying to decide what to do with Percy. The options: 1) let him go on starving to death (he doesn't seem to be in pain), 2) try to force feed him, or 3) have him put to sleep. A few days ago, he was hiding in the closet and sleeping all the time so I was going with option #1. But yesterday and today [Wed-Thur], he's been socializing more. He's drinking a little water and he sniffs the food but the smell makes him gag.

Google told me the gagging is caused by dehydration. So last night [Thurs], I forced him to swallow a couple of kiddie syringes of water. Now I'm giving him water mixed with baby cereal (which has probiotics). He kept that down, so the next step is water mixed with chicken baby food.

He's not happy about it but every signal he's been sending me is that he's not ready to die. I wish he'd given me those signs sooner. He would've had a better chance if I'd started doing it a couple of days ago.

I was having doubts about my new plan but I babysat for my friends this afternoon [Fri]. I reminded myself how many times I've forced a kid to swallow medicine. They hate it but they always forgive you.

Saturday morning: I took the above post down last night because I changed my mind after 4 or 5 forced feedings (about 2 tsp each time). He hated it and I couldn't bear to have possibly his last night on earth spent with both of us upset and miserable.

The first thing I do every morning is look for him to see if he's still alive. Every morning, at first glance, I think he's not. Then he lifts his head.

This morning, I fed the other cats then offered Percy some of his favorite beef-flavored gourmet food mixed with water. He sniffed it, really sniffed it like he was hungry, then walked away. He didn't gag this time. So I opened another can of tuna, poured about a tsp of the water into a dish and mixed it with regular water. Then I took it to him. He drank it - voluntarily. Only half of it but enough to give me hope. I've never seen a cat with such a strong will to live.

This week, I went back and read the last 2 years of posts about my cats. I've spent much of those 2 years worrying about him and watching him get so sick that I was sure he was almost dead then nursing him back to health. I'm ready for it to be over. He's not.

So I'll keep doing everything I can to help him and I'll keep preparing myself for the unavoidable day when that's not enough.

My little zombie

This is my dying cat - the black and white one on top, Percy. I ended up being gone most of the day. When I came home, I felt sick to my stomach as I walked up the steps. I just knew he would be gone.

I opened the door with a sense of dread and there he was on the couch, sleeping close to Lizzie. Megan was also sleeping nearby. I should go away more often.

He still won't eat. I microwaved a slice of bacon, which usually brings him running. Tonight, he wasn't interested, even when I held it right under his nose.

Should I try the kitty version of Ensure?

There's a monster in my closet and it's carrying a scythe

In October, it will be 2 years since Percy was diagnosed with heart disease. At the time, the vet didn't expect him to live much longer than a few months. I can't count how many times he's been so sick that I went to bed expecting to find him dead in the morning. Then he'd bounce back.

When I got Lizzie 6 months ago, it took Percy a little while to adjust but then he was happier and more active than he'd been in a long time. They would chase each other and play fight. He'd groom her. But he's been declining for the last month or so. Sleeping more, eating less, hiding in the closet.

I kind of hoped a new kitten would perk him up, although I knew there was also a chance the stress could make him worse. For a couple of days, he seemed to like Megan. He would rub against her and lick her head. Then he took a turn for the worse.

He hasn't had anything to eat or drink for the last 48 hours. I've offered him his favorite foods and favorite treats. He sniffs them and turns away. He won't even drink the water from a can of tuna, which he's never turned down no matter how sick he got. Tonight I put some water in a kid's medicine syringe to see if he'd take a few drops. No go. I thought about forcing it down his throat but couldn't bring myself to do it, just like I couldn't bring myself to force him to swallow one of his heart pills. He's been off his med since March. Although he's been doing better without it, maybe it would snap him out of it now.

He's 15 years old. He's got a bad heart. I'd do anything to keep him alive forever but that's not possible. Should I try to prolong it?

The vet tried to convince me to put him to sleep 6 months ago. I know they wouldn't hesitate to do it now and they'd tell me it was for the best. But I want him to go the way that Jasmine did. I want him to curl up in his favorite hiding spot and die peacefully in his sleep.

For the last 2 days, I've been going to the closet to pet him. He purrs for awhile then gets up and walks away. Sometimes I pick him up. He purrs and nuzzles up to me then wants down. A couple of hours ago, he jumped up on the bed. I lay down beside him and he stayed for half an hour then went back to the closet.

Soon after, I came out to the living room to write this post. I was crying then I noticed him sitting in the doorway staring at me. I called him over but he didn't come. He didn't jump on my desk and beg for a treat like normal. He didn't sit on the keyboard or climb on my shoulder to lick my hair. Instead, he went back to the closet.

Waiting for him to die is more stress than I can handle.

Update 7:15 a.m.: I gave him his pill this morning. Now he's pissed off. I have to leave for a few hours and I don't know what I'll find when I get back.

Update 8:05 a.m.: 45 minutes after I gave him the pill, I found him drinking water. He looks a little perkier, like maybe he's not ready to die.

Elizabeth Warren for President

It doesn't always get better

He committed suicide on Sunday. He was 14.

Eddie Cibrian is a Don Draper wannabe

Mad Men is my favorite drama currently on TV. Last night, it won its 4th Emmy in a row. Jon Hamm is the biggest reason why. He's charismatic and gorgeous. The series is set in the early 1960s. This year, the networks are trying to capture some of that mad magic with a couple of knockoffs. ABC has Pan Am. NBC has The Playboy Club.

I just watched the first episode of Playboy Club. They have their very own Jon Hamm lookalike in Eddie Cibrian, and he's playing a suave, sophisticated man's man with a dark, mysterious past. In other words, he's playing Don Draper. And they have their very own Betty Draper in a bunny costume. Then they added a dash The Sopranos with their mob boss subplot.

They're trying too hard but in all the wrong ways.

That was an ordeal

Megan just survived her first trip to the vet. He said it's a virus that's going around. Usually it starts earlier in the year and is done by now, but this year it started later. He gave her a shot of antibiotics to keep it from developing into pneumonia and said it takes about 8-10 weeks for the virus to run its course.

Lizzie's got goopy eyes today so she's probably catching it, but the vet said the older cats probably won't get as sick. Percy's been in such a decline for the last month that I'm afraid this could do him in. I think he's already used up 8 of his lives.

They raised their office visit fee from $35 to $39, which isn't bad at all because they hadn't raised it in probably 10 years. The shot was only $10. I keep reminding myself that the first year and the last year of a cat's life are always the most expensive.

Please ignore the furry mess behind her. That's what happens when you put navy blue curtains in a house full of cats.

Scum of the week

This week I'm choosing all the idiots who have dogs and cats and don't get them spayed or neutered. According to the ASPCA, 5 to 7 million dogs and cats end up in shelters every year, and 3 to 4 million are euthanized. Sixty percent of dogs who go to shelters are euthanized, and 70 percent of cats.

Seventy percent. That's why it was so hard for me to decide which cat to bring home on Thursday. I knew there was a chance that whoever I left behind would die. Every single one of them was sweet and lovable and crying for attention.

Cornell University says euthanasia of healthy animals is the number one cause of death for dogs and cats.

This video will break your heart.



That's why irresponsible pet owners are my Scum of the Week.

Sneezing and mites but no fleas

The composite picture is Megan (Sept 2011), Elizabeth (Mar 2011) and Jasmine (Oct 2009) all sleeping in the same spot. The bottom picture makes me sad. Percival misses Jasmine as much as I do.

Yesterday, I bought a guillotine for my cats. That's what Petco calls the fancy-schmancy claw trimmer I got. The one I've been using was about 20 years old and probably dull.

Megan is sick. She started sneezing on Saturday and it got worse throughout the day. By evening, her breathing was kind of raspy, like she has a head cold. I spent an hour holding her in the bathroom with the vaporizer going. I don't know if it helped her but it drained my sinuses.

It might be an allergy. Every time she uses the litter box, she starts sneezing. I'm going to get unscented litter to see if that helps. Then the debate is whether or not to bathe her. Normally, I'd never bathe a sick kitten but her fur smells like the perfume from the litter. She's eating, drinking and using the litter box. (Once again, I'm reminded that kitten poop smells worse than cat poop.) If the change in litter doesn't fix the problem, I'll take her to the vet.

I'm really worried about what could happen if she's got a virus like feline leukemia and Percy catches it. I'm kicking myself for bringing another kitten home. Lizzie's had all her shots but he's been too weak to get his.

The good news is the transition went much more smoothly than it did when I brought Lizzie home. Percy nuzzles up to Megan and licks her head. Lizzie play fights with her. I have to break them up sometimes because Lizzie gets too rough but Megan keeps coming back for more.

The birds are stressed out. Lizzie had settled into just watching them, which they didn't mind, but now Megan's harassing them. The females - who've been getting the most attention - are having wet poop, which can be a sign of stress. I'm going to have to lock them in the bathroom so they can have some peace.

Oh, and Megan has ear mites. I bought the medicine for it yesterday but I can't give it to her since she's sick. I'm also not 100% sure she's more than 12 weeks old. No sign of fleas so far.

Crazy cat lady

This is Megan:


This is Lizzie attacking the camera strap while I was taking pictures of Megan:


The local shelters are overpopulated and Lizzie needed a playmate, so I adopted a new kitten on Thursday. So far, there's been a lot of sibling rivalry but all three cats were in the same room tonight with no hissing or growling. I was gone for a few hours this afternoon and it seems like they all came to some kind of understanding.

I went to the same shelter where I got Lizzie. There were so many kittens to choose from that it made me angry. WTH is wrong with people? These were not feral kitties. A whole lot of people didn't get their cats spayed and abandoned the babies that resulted. The shelter is so desperate to find them homes that they lowered their adoption fee to $10.

The kitten I was most attracted to was about 4-5 months old, a long-haired calico with a bad case of ear mites. I almost took her but when I put her close to the cages with other cats, she was afraid of them. She would've been the perfect companion for Percy, but she'd be too intimidated by Lizzie.

Second choice was about 1-2 months old, long-haired and cream colored. They identified her as a Siamese mix. She was very playful - would've been great for Lizzie - but she had a respiratory infection (sneezing, goopy eyes) and I was afraid it might be too much for Percy's heart if he caught it.

Then there were about 30 other cats and kittens I could choose from. The only thing that kept me from bringing a dozen of them home is the fact that I live in an apartment with a manager who pays attention to what's going on. There was a gray tiger-striped baby who was maybe 6 weeks old - so little that Lizzie would eat him. A gorgeous adult Maine Coon that probably weighed 15 pounds - so big he could eat Lizzie. A Russian blue, several torties, several tabbies, several black ones. I loved every one of them.

Then this little girl kitty caught my eye. She sat patiently at the front of her cage while all the others meowed for attention. When I walked over to her, she held her paw out like, "Hello, how do you do. You can take me home now."

She's a perfect Megan. That was going to be Lizzie's name but it hadn't fit her. I always dreamed of having daughters named Megan and Elizabeth. Now I've got them.

Quote of the day

"The diameter of the urethra in a man's penis is just a little narrower, but because eels are quite slippery, its body worked as a lubricant and so it got into the penis smoothly."

- Chinese surgeon Jin Wang

(Maybe I should've given a warning for the squeamish.)

To my friend and favorite movie critic, Moose Briller

I anxious awaiting your review of this film. Make sure you take your heart medicine before you watch it.

I'm such a drama queen

Last night, I was so scared that I wouldn't be coming home from my colonoscopy that I wrote out explicit instructions for how to take care of my pets. I even added a page about what to do with them in the event of my death, including info about their medical records and a desperate plea for someone to take care of Percival.

So? The gastroenterologist called me this afternoon. No cancer, no polyps, no need for biopsies. And no radiation damage. Just big hemorrhoids inside that are causing my bleeding. I'm not going to die of colon cancer - or metastasis from my endometrial cancer. At least not this week.

I spent way too much time googling last night. According to the American Cancer Society, I have a 58% chance of being alive four years from now.

The disclaimer is that the statistic is based on studies of women who were diagnosed between 2000-2002. The info that they didn't include is that endo cancer is being treated more aggressively now than it was even a few years ago. Ten years ago, some women who were Stage IIIa (my stage) received no treatment other than surgery. Some got radiation only. Some got one chemo drug only. From what I've been told, very few, if any, got six rounds of chemo with both carboplatin and paclitaxel (Carbo-Taxol) plus 28 external radiation treatments.

In other words, according to my gyn-oncologist, I have "an excellent chance of a full recovery." As if a pessimist like me will take any comfort from that.

I'm already convincing myself that the colonoscopy doctor - who is morbidly obese despite the fact that he used to specialize in gastric bypass surgery and, if I recall correctly, went through the procedure himself - and who also has the bedside manner of a constipated Simon Cowell with a bad hangover - wasn't really paying attention when he had his camera up my ass.

In other words - what, me believe good news when I hear it? Ha.

You haven't been reading my blog very long if you thought a little thing like a doctor telling me I don't have cancer was going to make me skip through the meadow with bluebirds singing.

Quote of the day

"It's like Miracle Whip endorsing mayonnaise."

- Stephen Colbert on T-Paw's endorsement of Romney

Not sure I should be bragging about this ...

... but I won a contest.

The cat ate my homework

The magnesium citrate bottle says "Pleasing Lemony Flavor." They lied.

Someone on the gyn cancer forum told me that it goes down better and faster with a straw. That was true. It wasn't nearly as bad as last year. But I had to keep pushing Lizzie away because she was trying to steal my straw.

She has a new hobby - eating paper. My desk has a pile of the most recent drafts of chapters with my writers group's comments on them. Apparently, Lizzie doesn't like their critiques.

If you enlarge the picture and bend sideways, you can read the first page of Chapter 25 of my novel. The pages were stacked in a nice, neat pile before she started messing with them.

I had grand plans for today. I was going to clean the bathroom and the bird cages and vacuum, but I haven't done a thing. This morning, I woke up feeling panicky about what will happen to my pets if I don't come home from the hospital tomorrow. I have this sense of dread that I'm going to have a heart attack or stroke out or something. Or they'll find cancer and decide to cut out my colon without telling me.

So I'm writing detailed instructions on how to take care of Percy and the birds. Lizzie's easy - she'll eat anything (see the photo). Percy needs to be fed four times a day (too much at once makes him throw up), and he's very picky about what he'll eat. Plus he's lactose intolerant and he needs hair ball remedy on a regular basis.

Well, it's time for me to choke down the second bottle of that "Pleasing Lemony Flavor." I'll be camped out in the bathroom the rest of the night.

Scum of the week

Considering the date, the obvious choice for this week's scum of the week would be Osama bin Laden. But I think he's the scum of the century.

For scum of the week, I've chosen Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush along with every other ignorant and self-righteous prick who authorized the torture of prisoners in the aftermath of 9/11.

Tonight 60 Minutes featured Ali Soufan, an FBI interrogator who was part of the team investigating al Qaeda before and after 9/11. He talked about how he was getting information from the prisoners by building a rapport with them. Part of the reason they became terrorists was because they had been taught that Americans are evil. He would offer them coffee and sit down and talk with them. He says:

"That scares them. That shakes them because they were trained that we are so evil and we torture and we kill. And that is the reason of the rage against us."

He and his team had already extracted a lot of important information from the prisoners and were continuing to make progress. Then the CIA torturers-for-hire took over and "enhanced interrogation" became the perfect recruiting tool for al Qaeda.

That's why Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush, and friends have been chosen as Scum of the Week.

The end is near

Okay, maybe the universe isn't totally, irredeemably evil. I just experienced two random acts of kindness at Walmart. On the way out to my car, a woman in a pickup called, "Ma'am." I turned around and she pointed to a bag of rolls that had fallen out of my cart. Then, after I loaded everything into my car, I started to take my cart back and another woman smiled and took it for me.

Kindness at Walmart - that has to be one of the signs of the apocalypse.

I was there to pick up 2 bottles of magnesium citrate. If you've never had it, imagine drinking a cup of lemon juice mixed with half a cup of salt and half a cup of water. Yum. I had to take it the day before my staging surgery last year. This time, it's for the colonoscopy I'm having Tuesday.

Somebody must be running a special on colonoscopies because Walmart was completely out of mag cite last week. Today, there were only 3 bottles on the shelf.

I had decided I wasn't going to submit my ass to candid camera because I don't want to know if I have colon cancer - or if, more likely, my uterine and ovarian cancer had spread there. Then a couple of weeks ago, I started having more bleeding back there and got scared. Most likely it's from radiation damage. So the theory is, I'll get the test done and the results will reassure me and I can stop panicking every time I see blood in the toilet.

But now to what's really on my mind. Percival has lost weight again. He hasn't looked good the last couple of days and today he's weak and tired. He's still eating but not enough. I think his heart is giving out.

Applause, applause

In 2010, the top ten countries with the most executions were China, Iran, North Korea, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Bangladesh and Somalia - and oh, yes, the US ranked at #5. And the good Christians who vote Republican couldn't be prouder.

Aargh!!!! Computers!!!!!

So I get a pop up notice that there's a Firefox update available. I'm working on something so I ignore it, will do it later. After awhile (maybe half an hour), my Firefox window suddenly closes with no warning. When I try to reopen, it says it's installing updates so I have to wait. Updates install. The browser opens and restores the tabs I was working on. Okay. I'm annoyed but no harm, no foul.

Then it says my Flash Player's out of date. So I update it. Have to close my browser. Update complete, it automatically reopens the browser. Won't restore my tabs from previous session.

Fucking Firefox. Fucking software developers. Fucking computer - which I can no longer live without.

Where's her other leg?

It's a publicity photo for the new season of Dancing with the Stars. I don't know who either one of them is but I think they photoshopped her left leg out of the picture. They've got her butt cheek curved to make it look like she's got it up, but there's no way it's perfectly lined up to hide behind her other leg, and if she's got it bent, you'd think her foot or her knee or something would be visible. I don't think he's got enough of a grip on her to be supporting her weight so she must've been standing on her left leg with her right leg kicked up. That's my theory anyway.

Quote of the day

"What are you going to do, vote for Rick Perry?"

- Keith Olbermann on Obama's campaign logic

Scum of the week

Dick Cheney. Once a dick, always a dick.

We welcome our corporate overlords

The police in perhaps the most liberal city in America have now demonstrated they are a wholly owned subsidiary of Apple Corporation. Awhile back, some nimrod who works for Apple took a prototype iPhone to a bar to show off. He got so drunk or was so busy getting blown that he left the prototype behind. Someone else made off with it.

Apple, being the evil geniuses they are, had planted a tracking device in their top secret doohickey and they followed its tweeps to a house in San Francisco. This is where the cops come in.

A retired cop who now works for Apple persuaded some of his cop buddies to stand guard outside the house while he and another dick who works for Apple searched it. They even tried to intimidate the family, who happen to be Hispanic, by asking if anyone in the house was here illegally. Badges were flashed but it's not clear who flashed them.

Allegedly, the missing phone was sold on Craig's List.

Not only have corporations taken over the federal government, now they're running the cities too and invading our homes.

Oh, and just in case that's not enough proof that corporations own us, let's take a look at Standard and Poors. They're the credit rating agency that downgraded the US from AAA to AA. But they're still rating subprime mortgage securities AAA. You remember subprime mortgages, right? Those are the little darlings that played a major role in destroying the world economy three years ago. S&P is one of the little darlings who aided and abetted them back then. Corporations and their gluttonous CEOs get richer while the rest of us sit around doing this.

What does the future hold for average, everyday Americans? Picture Ned Beatty crawling around the woods in Deliverance.

Now let's you just drop them pants and squeal like a piggy.

Lizzie loves Rachel Maddow

Rachel Maddow might be my favorite person on TV right now and Lizzie seems to agree. Jon Stewart's the only competition. But Melissa Harris Perry has been guest hosting a lot and I might like her even more than Rachel. One of the best things about her is she brings on experts I haven't seen over and over again. Hopefully, she'll get her own show soon.

Lizzie also has a new favorite sleeping place - behind the bathroom door. When she disappears for a while, that's where I always find her.

Note the bird seed all over the rug. My whole apartment looks like that. The birds scatter seeds all around their cages, and Lizzie rolls around in it then spreads it everywhere. I don't know why I even bother to vacuum.

9 months post-chemo

I guess my soft reddish brown, wavy hair is gone forever. Now it's too curly and almost wiry to the touch. But it's long enough that I need a haircut - just to get it shaped a little. I have no idea what to tell the hairdresser because I don't know what kind of cut will work with this mess.

My achilles tendons hurt like hell tonight, worse than usual. Chemo sucks.

The batteries on my camera died a couple of days ago. I had to go to three different Walmarts to find the right ones - and when I finally did find them, they were hiding behind a stack of the wrong ones. But I was finally able to download all the pictures I took in the last couple of weeks.

In general, I've had more energy and haven't been as depressed as I was before. The increase in Lamictal seems to have done the trick. But tonight I felt really down. Friday night at Walmart will do that to you.

Quote of the day

Registering them to vote is like handing out burglary tools to criminals. It is profoundly antisocial and un-American to empower the nonproductive segments of the population to destroy the country ...

Encouraging those who burden society to participate in elections isn't about helping the poor. It's about helping the poor to help themselves to others' money.

- American Thinker thinker Matthew Vadum

I'm a bad mommy, plus some quickies

Yesterday while I was cleaning the bird cages, I left one of the doors open on the boys' cage. I didn't notice until Lizzie went into a frenzy trying to catch an escapee. She had him pinned down on the floor before I could get to her. I grabbed her and he hopped away, a little too stunned to fly. I scooped him up and returned him to the cage, undamaged.

Once again, a bird's life was saved by the fact that Lizzie's declawed.

I was so distracted by rescuing the fugitive that I forgot to put the food dish back in one of the other cages. So two of the birds went almost 24 hours without food. Not good. One of them was showing the effects today - she was fluffed up and hiding her face under her wing. Tonight I put a millet spray in her cage and she started gobbling up the treat. Hopefully, she'll be okay.

Lizzie is a mighty hunter. Last week, a spider was racing across the floor and she caught it and ate it in one swift pounce. If only she could fly - I'd never have another spider web to swat down.

But today, she keeps going back to the spot where she caught the bird, sniffing for him. Mean old mommy took away her toy.

A few quickies:

• Psst: Bill O'Reilly's wife is cheated on him. Psst Psst: With a cop. Pssssstt: Bill O promised a big donation to the police foundation if internal affairs nailed the boyfriend. All this according to Gawker. They previously reported that Bill O's wife bought a new house and moved into it alone, even changing her address for voter registration.

• The Pima County, AZ, Republicans are raffling off a Glock, the same kind of gun used to wound Gabrielle Giffords and killed six others. Are they just lacking sensitivity or are they trying to send some kind of message?

• Just now, when I double checked the number of victims, I googled "giffords shooting." Three of the top 10 suggestions were: "giffords shooting faked," "giffords shooting staged" and "giffords shooting hoax." The internet would be so boring without the nut jobs.

• News about my favorite soap: I'm pissed off that Shelly sold out Jeff and Jordan, but this is ridiculous.

• Ahhh, aren't they cute? They match.

I'm having a flashback

Yesterday there was a big brouhaha over the jobs speech Obama wants to give to a joint session of Congress. He's been planning this speech for weeks. But apparently, no one on his staff thought to check the calendar to see what else was scheduled for that night. They scheduled his speech for the same date and time as the Republican twits and twats debate. Boehner objected, Obama gave in. Now there's lots of debates of the ins and outs of the whole matter, but to me it comes down to poor planning on Obama's part which left him, once again, looking like he won't stand up to Republicans.

BH, one of the readers on Talking Points Memo, commented:

At this point in an Obama presidency, I am weary of trying to figure out how yet another move on his part seems to be so politically naive. I no longer have confidence that he and his team are doing these kind of bone-headed moves as part of some hidden brilliant strategy that the rest of us can't see but will ultimately pay off, win the day and make him the adult-statesman in the room ... Obama continues to reinforce my worries that he just DOESN'T GET IT when it comes to the backroom forceful fist that is needed to twist arms, make the deals and set the agenda. I am so disheartened.

Welcome to 2008, BH. Those of us who supported Hillary have known this all along. You voted for a miracle-working ninja but all you got was an inexperienced politician who doesn't know how to dig in and fight for what he believes in.