(no subject)

[mallorys_camera]

As you can see, I'm not striking. I'm a businesswoman, the new owners -- be they Russian or American -- have to be able to monetize the business somehow. Twenty dollars a year is actually cheap for a paid account.

Anyway...


Richard Price has a new book out. If I survive the next two weeks, I intend to buy it for myself.

I felt conflicted about The Speech.

On the one hand, it was absolutely brilliant, the most beautifully sung lullaby to the Eight Hundred Pound Gorilla you could possibly imagine, every syllable of it palpably, demonstrably true.

On the other hand, truth doesn't make it in politics and you'd think Obama would know better than to talk about the black man's rage during an economic downturn. Nobody wants to hear about anybody else's entitlement theories when money is going south.

The Speech won my heart, but I also think it made Obama unelectable. He won't win against McCain – unlike Kennedy, the last politico who rode a wave of "change," Obama doesn't have a rich daddy to buy him the election.

And what's up with the Obama campaign releasing that photo of Wright and Slick Willy? Strictly amateur hour, that.

In other news, the Last Homeless Guy On Cannery Row held court in the local Starbucks today, terrorizing the barristas. "You're out of half and half," he would snarl, walking the pitcher up to the counter. He sat at a table near the door, eating sugar packs and reading the newspaper.

This is the one guy whose story I've always wondered about because he's not an alcoholic or overtly nuts the way the rest of them are. I'm not going to ask him what his story is, of course. I'm just going to make one up for him. His life mushroomed out of control. Maybe he owned a hot sauce store once.

Speaking of hot sauce stores, this week has been very much like a pleasure cruise on the Titanic. Iceberg to starboard! Whoa, Nellie! Turn that wheel, pilot! But, wait! Who's that on port? Why, a band of human flesh-eating pirates led by Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp seems to have filed his teeth to sharp points and his eyes are twisting pinwheels. Aiuto!

I've lined up about 4 K of outside projects that I can bill for throughout the coming month. So if only the plucky phone calls work and I don't die from overwork and despair, I oughta be able to get the sucker under control. It's tough though.