monday punch-in-the-face blogging

i was angrier than usual for a significant stretch of time last week over the shameful, media-fueled misapplication of the term "hoax" and associated criminal charges, and it made me uncomfortable. i'm a placid individual by nature, and i'd much rather smile at something goofy than send a barrage of fuming e-mails off to city hall. but i believe in justice above all else, so i stayed angry until there was nothing more i could do, and now i'll just have to monitor the case for new developments. i am, as i mentioned, optimistic, since even the judge at the arraignment couldn't stop himself from asking the prosecutors if they were sure the charges they put forth were really something they wanted to pursue . . . but we'll see.

anyhow, i know i owe you a rant today, and i have a list of items that i plan to explore in detail: the second gold rush in recent history to threaten a significant portion of the brazilian rainforest with mass deforestation and mercury contamination; the slimy way in which the bush administration is attempting to distract us from iraq by reiterating, almost word for word and with the same dearth of evidence, its road-to-war rhetoric in opposition of iran; the incredibly late admission that the u.s. military has not come anywhere close to adequately training the iraqi military--a report that makes me batty largely because it got swept under the rug with such head-spinning, breakneck speed--coupled with reports that bush understated the number of troops he plans to send to baghdad by about fifty percent, even though the soldiers already on the ground in iraq have declared an increase in ground forces of any size will be a losing strategy if it isn't coupled with a dramatic increase in support from iraqi citizens, which no one in washington seems to think they should have to work to win . . .

ohhhh, so much to be angry about that i have not taken a second to unhunch my shoulders in days and days, and my body isn't wired for this kind of turmoil. i'm training it to bear the load, one extra pound at a time, because i want to play a part in every fight i say is worth fighting--but i can't go at it 24/7 just yet. i needed a reprieve.

and i got it. lesson of the week: nothing bolsters one's strength like a little jelly.



but first that jelly depletes one's strength by inducing a giggly, breathless languidness. i imagine i'll recover with great haste, but today my golden gloves are bedridden.