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October 30, 2006
Halloween Costumes of Yore - Redux
Just for laughs, allow me to describe some Halloween costumes I have donned in the past, sometimes requiring last minute preparations, since I was never much of a seamstress or one to spend a lot of money on something I would only wear once, including a wedding dress. Come to think of it, I should have worn my first wedding dress as a costume for Halloween - it qualified as hideous and macabre.
I tend to avoid anything ghoulish, bloody, vampiresque or political, and usually gravitate toward historical or culturally significant. One year in college I went as drug paraphernalia, something called a “Power Hitter,” which is a barrel-shaped pipe that you squeeze for extra smoke. Without the handmade sign indicating what I was (which drew quite a few laughs), I doubt most of the fellow revelers would have recognized it.
About an hour before a party one year, I dressed myself as a bag of jelly beans, using small, oval colored balloons enclosed in a clear dry cleaning bag, cinched at the neck with a ribbon. Beneath the bag I wore a navy long-sleeved leotard and tights, and taped a good resemblance of the purple and pink squared “Brachs” sign on the front of the bag. Throughout the night I had to avoid people threatening my beans with lit cigarettes (this was back when most people smoked), but it was a good, cheap costume that was easy to wear.
The most elaborate costume I ever created was the Human Dart Board. It took me weeks to construct; using a large sheet of thin sponge board, razor knives, silver contact paper I cut into dozens of narrow strips as faux wire, two jars of poster paint, and the final touch of a little plastic music light clipped to the top. I wore it like a one-sided sandwich board, which had to be removed in order for me to sit down. My date that night went as a Human Dart, and I made his costume with cardboard flights attached to a belt, and a paper party hat I put a #9 nail through the top covered with silver contact paper as the dart tip. He looked a little like the Tin Man with a strange skirt. Unfortunately, we were upstaged by the California Raisins and didn’t win the costume contest, since some of the voters confused my costume with Wheel of Fortune and kept asking where Vanna was.
My favorite last resort costume is Cleopatra, which is easy to make the afternoon before a party, and is worth it just to do the eye makeup. I have done the toga style (which is precarious), and a gold robe (recommended), with a cheap, thick gold collar necklace I never wear for any other purpose. I like to make the asp crown with a child's plastic headband, metallic gold cardboard, and stripped wire ties to give it a sinewy bend. Another fallback costume is the ever-popular elf, but I can only pull that off if I am on the skinny side that year. I have a two-piece emerald green short and top that I wear over tights and a Danskin, with a Peter Pan hat. With pixie cheeks and puppet eyes, it's a cute getup but not very warm.
One year I went to a Mardis Gras party dressed as a mime. One of my floor mates in the dorm who did the makeup for the college theatre did my costume and my face with perfect precision. Unfortunately, I only lasted fifteen minutes without speaking, so I think I violated some kind of mime code. My date went as a cowboy. There must be some metaphorical significance to this: Cowboy + Mime? Sounds like the Bushes.
These days, it’s all I can do to organize my children’s Halloween activities and make the Trick or Treat rounds dressed in a sweatshirt and jeans hiking up and down the neighborhood streets inspecting their loot and keeping them from cutting across lawns. It’s fun to see the parents who dress up with their kids or who have elaborate decorations on their porch with sound systems, movie projectors, creepy music and dry ice in cauldrons. I think Halloween is hilarious; it’s probably my favorite holiday.
Posted by lorelei at 11:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (27)October 25, 2006
The Gulls Next Door
Since the fall foliage is such a disappointment this year, the most interesting subjects for photos on the lakeside are the sea gulls. Thank heaven for little gulls -- without them what would little buoys do?
October 21, 2006
Autumn on the Lakeside
In what has become a blog tradition, allow me to offer some new shots taken this evening at near dusk that show some autumn foliage and interesting colors on the lakeside.
Later in the week, if we have another day without rain, I can get some good shots of big trees turning down by the park that will be much better.
October 19, 2006
Iraq for Sale
If you don't watch another video before the election, don't miss this one. This should serve to anger just about everyone from every political flavor. As taxpayers, we should be outraged that our hard-earned money is being squandered without oversight. For those with loved ones in the military, you will be outraged that our troops are treated like second-class citizens and subjected to perils beyond the normal course of war. Parents whose kids are being recruited; women whose husbands are being taken advantage of and put in danger for profit should be incensed. Business owners and their employees should be outraged that so many contracts are going to so few companies.
I don't care who you are, this movie is going to make you really, really angry.
By the way, if you don't boycott WalMart already, this documentary should convince you:
I've shopped at WalMart fewer than five times in my life, so they won't miss me.
Posted by lorelei at 09:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (23)October 15, 2006
The Church of the Holy Smokes
The increasing restrictions on smoking in public and private buildings, along with the constant punitive measures taken by state (especially Ohio) governments in taxing smokers above and beyond any other patron of (legal) vice, inspired the idea of making smoking part of a religious rite in order to protect it as a First Amendment freedom.
Thus was born "The Church of the Holy Smokes" and its attendant ballad to the melody of that famous 60s dirge, "House of the Rising Sun." If L. Ron can have a religion, why not smokers?
MIDI for your sing-along pleasure
There are some laws across the land
To take away our smokes
It’s inspired the rise of many a new faith
Our worship is no joke
My mother was a smoker
She came a long, long way
My father was a Marlboro man
Puffed three packs a day
Now we come to where the flavor is
We’d rather fight than quit
Yeah, we’d walk a mile for a Camel, now
Our vices we admit
------ organ solo ------
Oh mother tell your children
Not to take those first few tokes
‘Else they’ll spend their lives in ministry
In the Church of the Holy Smokes
Well, we love those Tiparillos, too
And clove vanilla sticks
We’ll stand outside in freezing rain
To get our nickie fix
The bars, the jails and now our cars
Our desperate prayers provoke
We kneel to Phillip Morris’s shrine
In the Church of the Holy Smokes
October 14, 2006
Why I Like Sherrod Brown
Bearing in mind the adage that “All politics is local,” let’s look at the Ohio Senate race between Congressman Sherrod Brown and incumbent Senator Mike DeWine. My endorsement for Brown doesn’t deviate entirely from my “Throw the Bums Out” campaign, since DeWine has held the office for two terms and deserves to be fired for being nothing more than a sock puppet for the Republican party. Brown has taken some very unpopular stances in Congress, including voting against NAFTA, the Patriot Act and invading Iraq. For those gutsy votes alone, he deserves my support. Unlike the majority of useless rubber stamps, he was actually representing his constituency: what a concept!
Sherrod Brown is one of those rare, genuine career politicians who embodies the spirit of public service. He was elected in his twenties as the youngest member of the Ohio House of Representatives during the Rhodes Regime when the position was a low-paying part-time job with the minority party. As Secretary of State during the Celeste administration, he ran one of the most effective, incorruptible departments in the past 25 years; which, if you know anything about the history of Ohio’s government, is saying a lot. I met Brown on several occasions, socialized with some of his staff, and participated in a number of “get out the vote” activities where Brown was right in the thick of it with the proverbial rolled-up sleeves. His youthful looks and gravelly voice remind you of a character from the old sitcom “Happy Days.” He’s always been in tune with the needs of his district, from the working class disenfranchised by the failing steel industry to the burgeoning population of elderly with critical issues involving Social Security and Medicare. Sherrod is the kind of neighbor you would trust picking up your mail and keeping an eye on your house when you went on vacation. He’d probably cut your lawn, too.
Brown and DeWine debated on “Meet the Press” a few weeks ago and more recently in Toledo with a panel of Ohio newspaper journalists. The recurring issues are the war in Iraq, each candidate’s voting and attendance record, the so-called “war on terror”, and the Ohio economy. Those of us in Ohio have seen thousands of jobs vanish, manufacturing and industry drying up, college tuition rise, wages stagnate, health care costs soar, and young taxpayers fleeing the state in droves. (I don’t think they’re leaving because of the weather.) Brown has consistently voted against increased defense spending, increases in the “intelligence agencies” that failed us so miserably on 9/11, tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, domestic wiretapping, torturing prisoners of war, and renewing the unconstitutional Patriot Act. I would have voted exactly the same way. I don't care what party he's with, we need this man in the Senate!
I think instead of Brown defending his voting record and soft-pedaling his opinion that US troops should have been out of Iraq by now, he should stand his ground. His job is to represent the interests of his constituency, not those of defense contractors and oil companies, the only entities currently benefiting from the occupation. Brown shouldn’t lose sight of what has endeared him to the voters throughout the years: his integrity – an endangered commodity in Washington these days.
Posted by lorelei at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (15)October 11, 2006
Divided We Fall - Reprise
For united we stand, divided we fall
And if our backs should ever be against the wall
We'll be together, together, you and I
~Brotherhood of Man
Religion, ethnicity, politics, sports teams, property, clans, socioeconmics, and countless other aspects of modern life serve to divide people. We are a culture embroiled in competition and rivalry and are programmed to pick a side from the earliest childhood games. Because of this universal fixation with “winning” and “being right,” it is natural that when people are most frightened by diminishing control of their environment, they seek divisive conflict to gain some superficial comfort.
By making our fellow citizens adversaries, we are playing right into the hands of the callous conquerors, who would like nothing more than for us to continue to scuffle over “red states” and “blue states,” rehash the 2000 and 2004 elections ad nauseum, and focus our attention on the minutiae of differences between the “parties” and philosophies while they add fuel to the bonfires of the pep rallies and beat the drums of war.
Why can’t we, instead, agree to disagree about certain issues and find common ground that will connect us in our desire to protect our nation from the constant barrage of injustices, violations, and rampant lies that are leading to the disintegration of these “United” States? There are many important issues at stake here with which we can concur such as:
- Protecting and defending the Constitution and its Bill of Rights.
- Demanding accountability from our elected officials that includes fiscal, moral, legal and ethical responsibilities that they have sworn to protect and serve.
- Leaving our children and grandchildren clean air and water, a sound education system, and opportunities to be whatever they want to be.
- Questioning the practices of banks, businesses, government bodies and organizations that are siphoning and squandering our resources and wealth, and creating the greatest class divisions in our nation’s history.
- Boycotting an ineffective Press and its sponsors for disseminating vast distortions, disinformation, outright lies that serve to spread racism, sexism, chauvinism, intolerance and fear.
Their “Agenda” is to divide and conquer simultaneously at home and abroad, and they are doing a bang-up job of it with our permission, if not our blessing. We must resist this by changing our focus from the inconsequential differences between us to the greater perils of this insidious strategy. What once seemed a vital concern will soon become utterly irrelevant once we are all prisoners. There is only one hill worth dying on, and that’s the one on which we defend our freedoms.
Reminder: Throw the bums out - it's one month until election day!
Posted by lorelei at 09:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (31)October 08, 2006
A Rare Exquisite Day in Pleasantville
There are few days as beautiful as today on the shores of Lake Erie. Join me for some autumnal serenity as a momentary oasis from the chaos.
October 05, 2006
Take Back America
Good midi – jazz piano version – click on the little radio button to play or download and play.
I was going to write a song parody today to spoof the Foley Follies and other distractions that are playing on mainstream media and talk radio, but I suddenly stopped finding it amusing. Dennis Hastert, current (and likely outbound) Speaker of the House announced this afternoon that he was not going to step down after reports that he and other House leadership knew about Foley’s propensity to flirt inappropriately with Congressional pages via instant messages, emails and other communications. So be it. I think Hastert will go down with the ship next month when the voters do one of two things: vote out all the incumbents (the “Throw the Bums Out” movement), or elect mostly Democratic candidates to reclaim the majority in the House and Senate. In either case, Hastert will lose his position as Speaker. We can only hope he loses his reelection bid as well.
Media is seizing on the Foley story because, let’s face it, sex sells and sex with underage boys sells even better. We suffered through months of the sordid Clinton-Lewinsky scandal and embarrassing impeachment proceedings presided by another adulterer (Henry Hyde) that made the Republicans look like even bigger hypocrites than the Democrats. The current finger-pointing and sanctimonious outrage is laughable.
What’s not laughable is that Congress just passed two pieces of legislation that we hope will eventually be declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court: the “torture” bill that disregards the Geneva Convention, and the domestic surveillance act. Moments after those horrendous laws were approved, the Foley follies hit the front page. Coincidence? No such thing in politics. This pathetic side show is designed to pander to the sweaty masses who are too lazy or stupid to realize what is happening with salient issues like the war in Iraq, the continuing erosion of our constitutional rights, massive trade deficits, crushing national debt, and daily revelations that the administration lied not only about Hussein’s possession of weapons of mass destruction, but what they knew prior to September 11 about al Qaeda and the plan to attack America.
Fortunately, there are several movements at the grass roots level that are keeping these issues on the forefront. Today, a nationwide walk out called “The World Can’t Wait” occurred in cities across America. Did the mainstream media cover it? I hope so, but I doubt this important event would trump “Foleygate.” The message is clear: we need to take back America from this fascist regime and restore our laws and freedoms, and stop this insanity before there is nothing to defend anymore. God help us.
Posted by lorelei at 08:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (69)October 02, 2006
Another Drunken Drowning or Murder?
Another young man, Lucas Homan, a student at University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, has gone "missing" after partying with some friends at the Oktoberfest:
He fits the profile of the previous young men who were found drowned in the Mississippi River after disappearing from a bar in La Crosse. Homan is 21, an athlete, tall, and caucasian, similar to Jared Dion, the student whose "drowning" instigated a Town Meeting in La Crosse where citizens demanded an investigation into a possible serial killer.
The (theoretical) killer took a year off, or moved to a different location, and has returned to his favorite stomping grounds. Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the bars.
Even the Crime Library has a story about this mysterious set of "coincidences."
More to follow - here is another story that includes Homan's picture:
Posted by lorelei at 12:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (97)