Oh, I Get It: She Meant His Own Vice President Might Assassinate Him

Yay, Obama has enough delegates. Should Hillary be his running mate? Are you $%!%&$# joking me? A couple of months ago, I would have said that by all means she should be his running mate, or he hers, on the theory that, between them, they would get nearly all the Democratic votes.

But that was before the “You should have seen me running from sniper fire in Bosnia,” the “No one’s going to vote for a black guy,” the “What if the black guy gets assassinated?”, and the “Per party rules, Michigan and Florida delegates shouldn’t be seated. Oh, wait …”

Then there was the stuff about how the superdelegates should choose based on how their constituents voted (when that favored Hillary), or then again, never mind that, they should choose the better (whiter) candidate, when THAT favored Hillary.

At some point, one of her people said something like, “It’s not a numbers game.” It’s not? What on earth else is it? To say, “I don’t care who voted for whom, I am the better candidate” is profoundly elitist.

Her campaign has been an enraging display of lying, racism, fear-mongering, failure to play fair, and divisiveness. I just don’t think I’d choose a running mate who had speculated in public about my being murdered.

Remarks by her supporters on sfgate.com have been disappointing, a lot of, “If Obama is the candidate, I’m voting for McCain.” Kinda like, “If you’re not for us, you’re for the terrorists.” She should be thoroughly ashamed of herself.

Grill you, Hillary.

I was in Michigan last week and talked to a couple of people who didn’t bother to vote in the primary because their preferred candidate (Obama) was not on the ballot, and who were severely ticked off when Hillary changed her mind about seating the Michigan delegates, as it seemed blatantly unfair.

But never mind that, I have news of my bathroom. I left for Michigan on Saturday, May 24. On the Thursday night just prior, the building manager pounded on my door while I was taking a shower to say that water was dripping into her apartment. I ended my shower as quickly as possible, leaving one and a half legs unshaven. The plumbers came the next day and were unable to re-create the problem.

I was afraid they would say they needed to tear my tub entirely out, meaning that I would have to cancel my trip, because I wouldn’t have wanted to leave Hammett alone in the apartment with that kind of work being done.

It was afternoon before I found out that the plumbers hadn’t found anything and I decided to cross my fingers and leave on my trip the next morning. Just about then, my work PC went absolutely haywire, with at least four different applications behaving extremely strangely. For instance, when I opened an email, the contents would immediately shrink down into minus 10 point type, making the email unreadable. When I typed “e” I got “wer,” and since my password has an “e” in it, I was unable to log back onto my PC after restarting it. Fortunately, it was 4:30 by then, so I just came home and packed for my trip.

To be on the safe side, I didn’t shower, so I did feel a bit grubby by the time I got to Detroit on Saturday, plus one and a half legs’ worth of hair was even longer.

I wore my new super-baggy pants to travel in, which earned me a full pat-down at the airport, where it did not escape the attention of a TSA worker that I could easily have a surface-to-air missile in each leg. She asked if I wanted a screen and I said that wouldn’t be necessary, but next time, I will definitely request the screen, as I feel having my chest patted down in front of 100 complete strangers provides a bit too much entertainment.

The first thing I did when I got to my parents’ house was to join my mother and sister in the vegetable garden for some weeding. It’s so nice just to be outside feeling the breeze and smelling the green things and the dirt. When I step out of my San Francisco apartment building, technically I’m outside, but there aren’t a lot of green things right nearby, though there is always the wind and the sun (or the fog or the rain).

Over the course of the week, I spent time with my parents and ate several of my father’s healthy and tasty dinners, and plenty of my mother’s homemade bread and oatmeal-raisin cookies, and we spent four evenings watching the Pistons play on TV, and we watched a few DVDs, and I had lunch twice with Amy, once at Seva and once at Café Zola, and I had lunch with my Uncle Rick, also at Café Zola, and my sister let me listen to her iPod for several hours, which caused me to have to buy eight CDs and the below-mentioned headphones as soon as I got home, plus I will have to buy a few songs on iTunes. Have to!

My mother lent me a pair of headphones to use with my sister’s iPod, little folding headphones, and I could not believe the massive bass sound. It sounded like I was sitting in front of a pair of enormous speakers. They were Sennheiser PX 100 Collapsible Headphones. In retrospect, I also realized they were remarkably comfortable. After years with the Walkman, my ears can take only 30 or 60 minutes with headphones on, but I probably had these Sennheiser earphones on for the better part of six hours without feeling even a twinge.

The last afternoon I was there, both my parents, my sister, my sister’s friend, my sister’s friend’s two nieces and I spent a few hours working on the front yard, which was again really enjoyable, and inspired renewed visions of myself in a little house and yard of my own in Michigan, though I don’t think I could live there without a car, and I would have to work at home. I appreciate that my boss is willing for me to work at home all the time, but I think I’d get lonely and isolated, and having a car would cost a fortune, and I’m sure I’d get less exercise. I like my car-free life.

But if the desire becomes overwhelming, I’m sure a perfectly lovely Michigan life could be crafted.