I'm supposed to go and hang out with friends who want to spend the New Year's eve trolling up and down the Embarcadero. OY!!! It's supposed to storm tonight, and I hate being out in the rain.

There's a party I could go and hang out at as well, but all these activities involve leaving home and I just want be warm and under the covers and have it be quiet, and not deal with noise, drunken people, crowds, rain and worst of all, trying to get back home in San Francisco on a rainy night after a big event.

I think I'd rather stay home, meditate on the past year, write new year's resolutions, drink champagne and eat ice cream.

So I was trying to convince myself that I really need an iPod, but this morning SFGATE.com is reporting that Apple might be putting out a cheaper one.

iPod at center of buzz Rumors predict new affordable player at Macworld.

My inner Jack Benny says now I have to wait to find out if it's true.

I was watching Hard Ball with Chris Matthews, and Christopher Hitchens was on and I was blowing kisses at the television because I so love Mr. Hitchens and I so want to marry him. He is the most brilliant man.

Okay so maybe I don't really want to marry Christopher Hitchens physically because he's actually not very good looking, but I definitely want to marry his mind because he is just so smart and so wise.

But definitely if the situation came up, and Mr. Hitchens appeared in my bed, I would totally jump him and not boot him out of bed. I'd sooner boot Brad Pitt or Antonio Banderas out of my bed first, before I'd ever boot out Christopher Hitchens.

They were discussing the presidential 2004 election, and Hitchens said he can't stand Howard Dean as well. God, I so love Christopher Hitchens!

This is a good sign. I needed two more calendars for my place, and I was planning to wait until after New Year's to buy calendars for cheap. My inner Jack Benny is going strong again.

On Sunday I went to the mall, and the calendar store had already marked on sale for 50% off. I bought two that I really liked, and a box of christmas cards for half off as well.

Later that day as I was going through the Sunday paper, I found a free Shrek 2004 wall calendar in the paper.

Three calendars, one free and two 50% off ... such a deal! My inner Jack Benny is so happy because it thinks that it's so bad to ever pay full price for anything.

The repair guy came to my apartment this afternoon to fix my heater and my fridge. I smelled gas in my apartment on Saturday, and made PG&E come over to check out my heater. After checking it out for an hour, they told me my heater was broken.

PG&E wrote me up a hazard notice and turned off my gas. I had to call the building owner and let them know, and they sent over a repair guy this afternoon to fix the heater and also check out the fridge.

The repair guy was so great! He fixed my heater and fridge in a couple of hour. I have heat again, and my fridge doesn't leak anymore. YEAH!!!

The repair guy said my gas heater was clogged and needed to be cleaned. The same thing was true of my fridge. Is this a sign of something going on in my life? I'm stuck and that's why things aren't working.

Whatever. It's just nice to have appliances that work again.

So I have so "instant karma". Like I can't get away with anything bad without instanly getting caught. I wouldn't wish instant karma on my worst enemy, it's that bad.

Anyone who says San Francisco is a big city has obviously never lived here. San Francisco is a city made up of small towns/neighbourhoods linked together. It totally feels like you're living in a small town sometimes instead of a city with a population of over 850,000.

There is no anonymity in San Francisco because you run into people you know all the time. It's horrifying. I stopped going to Whole Foods for awhile, because I kept running into guys I had dated or people I knew but didn't want to have conversations with.

There is nothing more embarrassing than hiding in the back of some store, hoping your ex doesn't see you and praying that he leaves the store right away so you can get your grocery shopping done.

At church today, someone came up to me and said she saw me walking up Fillmore early this morning going to the sister church. I didn't say anything, because I was like so shocked. Then she laughed and said, "it's good to go church shopping." How embarrassing!

The only reason she saw me was because her mother attends our sister church and teaches preschool there, and they live in the neighbourhood.

It's a time like this that I wished I had moved to Manhattan instead of San Fran. I grew up in a small town, where everybody knew who you were and knew your business. One of my biggest youthful dreams was to a move to a big city where I could be anonymous, and not be somebody's daughter or somebody's relative. I wanted to live freely and not have anyone know what I was doing.

But in San Francisco it's practically impossible. I can't even church shop without members of my own church finding out. I so hate this small town living! I hate life in the San Francisco fishbowl.

I bought a three-ballet ticket series with a friend of mine, and instead of me having to pay, my friend paid for my portion and said it was her Christmas present to me.

Ballets tickets for Christmas ... tres cool!

In the NY Times Online edition this morning, there was an article entitled, Judging 2003's Ideas: The Most Overrated and Underrated.

This idea was considered underrated, and I think it's the most exciting political movement I've read about in ages.

"Hip-Hop Politics

Countless local hip-hop activist groups around the country are on the cutting edge of grass-roots activism and politics that matter most to the hip-hop generation. Organizations like the San Francisco-based Ella Baker Center for Human Rights; the 21st Century Leadership Movement, based in Selma, Ala.; and the Hip-Hop Political Action Committee in Chicago have been in the trenches laying the groundwork for organizing the hip-hop generation into a concrete voting bloc. Four signs point to their growing influence: Active Element Foundation's publication of the "Future 500," which documents grass-roots youth activists nationwide; presidential candidates arming themselves with hip-hop to reach out to young voters; the much-discussed National Hip-Hop Political Convention in the works for June 2004; and the often-overnight platinum sales of hip-hop CD's that, once channeled into votes, will mean the end of politics as usual."

I wonder if Howard Dean will suddenly admit he likes rap/hip hop music, like the way he's now saying he's a JC believer.

I just remembered that while I was at that one corporate job during the Clinton years, I had to keep my mouth shut at meetings that I was a Clinton supporter.

I would be at these meetings with corporate directors, vice presidents, executive VPs, and the president/CEO of the company, and they were all republican hating Clinton people. And there I was, a lonely analyst, and probably the only Clinton supporter. Those guys would after awhile would start Clinton bashing, and I would just sit there and say nothing and smile.

Those guys all outranked and outearned me 4 or more times to 1. My boss, my boss' director, and the VP our oof our department were all there, and they Clinton bashed their hearts out. What could I have said? They signed my paycheck.

Not that they cared what I thought anyway. I was a woman and a lonely analyst. What did I know?

My boss knew and he used to tell not to pay attention to any of it. It was all just testerone flying around and the guys were one upping each other, and besides, they all figured I was a Clinton supporter anyway.

This was his way of trying to make me feel better, but it didn't help except I did learn to smile and agree and keep my mouth shut when I didn't agree with someone. A lesson that has served me very well in corporate america, I might add, because I kept getting promoted yearly at that place.

I had one manhattan too many at a cocktail party, given by a friend of mine who is obsessed with "Sex and the City", but I have to relay this story.

My friend, who hosted the cocktail party and who founded her own theatre company and runs another theatre company as well, told me I had convinced her to vote for Gavin Newsome. She was all set to vote for Gonzalez, but we had a long talk and she said what we discussed made her change her mind. I thought for sure that what I had said had no effect on her vote. She voted for Ammiano, so I was sure she would vote for Gonzalez. Besides she lived in Gonzalez' district, so I expected her to vote for her supervisor.

So when told me tonight she had voted for Newsome I was happy. But as the party progressed the talk turned to politics, and I started to feel bad. Most of the people were there had worked for my friend, because she directs as well as produces play in the city. The actors and other theatre types had all voted for Gonzalez, and my friend hadn't told them she had voted for Newsome.

I couldn't participate in the Newsome bashing, but then I thought I was safe because the discussion turned to Bush. I don't mind a good Bush bashing discussion myself, but then everyone there seemed to be anti-war freaks.

Feeling out of place I decided to leave, and as I was leaving I told my friend I was feeling uncomfortable with all the political talk. My friend looked at me and said, "What about me?" I felt guilty then.

I felt good that I had helped to convince her to vote for Newsome, but I felt bad that I had put her into an awkward position with her friends. My friend told me not to worry about it. None of the people there except for her directed or produced plays; they were actors or technicians. They had no power over her in the theatre world, and in her position as a director or producer who has hiring/firing power over actors and technicians, she has the upper hand.

But then she reminded me that directors and producers have all power, and that's why she became one. Actors and technicians have to suck up to directors and producers to get jobs.

Still I felt bad though. I didn't mean to get her in trouble with her group of friends. I didn't even think I had any influence over how she was going to vote, but she told me I had.

Elections are lost one vote at at time, but in these partisan times that we live in, voting seems to be hazardous unless you're in a position of some kind of power. That's horrible isn't it? My friend doesn't care that she voted for Newsome, but she wasn't going to announce it to any of her acting friends either.

I decided that I didn't want to offend anyone either, so I just left the party. Too many manhattans had made me way too bold, and I didn't want to say anything I would later regret.

Maybe our parents were right when they said that "one shouldn't discuss politcs in polite company." It's way too dangerous.

In Hawaii we have our own version of Santa Claus - Menehune Santa. Below are the words to an actual song I learned as a child. Translation for the hawaiian words are in parens.

Menehune Santa

Menehune Santa, Menehune Santa, with a big opu (tummy), bring Christmas presents in his red canoe.

Menehune Santa, Menehune Santa, under the coconut tree, seaving hats for keikis (children) and for you and me.

I know you only work at night, building Christmas toys, with many little people helping bring Christmas joys.

Menehune Santa, Menehune Santa, bring me a flower lei,
So I can give the one I love a kiss on Christmas Day.

From way up high the mountain tops you've seen just once a year, While all the little keikis dream an eastern star appear,

Menehune Santa, Menehune Santa, bring me a flower lei, So I can give the one I love a kiss on Christmas Day.

Written By:Larry Rivera

Mele Kalikimaka - a Hawaiian Christmas song

Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say
On a bright Hawaiian Christmas Day
That's the island greeting that we send to you
From the land where palm trees sway
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way
To say "Merry Christmas to you."

This song was written by R. Alex Anderson (Robert Alexander Anderson), who was born in Honolulu in 1894, and from high school on to his death in 1995 composed nearly 200 songs.

He wrote Mele Kalikimaka in 1949 and though I am not sure who first recorded it, it was probably Bing Crosby. Crosby made a record of it in 1950 with the Andrews Sisters (maybe on the backside of his White Christmas single?), and it was an instant big hit.

The friend whom I went out to dinner with last night, asked me if I wanted to go to the 11 am service on Christmas day at our sister presby church and I said yes.

So I went to church this morning, and attending two services like that reminded me of growing up. My family always went to midnight mass on Christmas eve, and then on Christmas day we went to the morning service. We couldn't open our presents till we came home from Christmas day mass.

When I was little we would open presents after church, eat and then one of the relatives would take all the kids to the beach. Growing up in Hawaii, I always received a new bikini/bathing suit every Christmas as did all my cousins.

And when you're a kid growing up in Hawaii, Christmas day is all about going to the beach to frolick around and swim in your new bikini/bathing suit and to have fun with the cousins, some of whom you don't see very often.

I think the relatives appreciated having all the kids out of the house as well, so they could visit with each other. When we'd come back, there'd be a huge Christmas day feast being prepared to eat later that night.

I think if I was in a hot climate for Christmas day, I would spend the day at the beach just to relive my memories of my childhood Christmases.

Christmas at the beach ... how perfect!

I've been thinking about my grandma lately who was like bizarrely catholic, so when I ended going to the Christmas Midnight Mass at St. Ignatius Church next to USF I wasn't surprised.

I've been there to mass before, and it's always crowded and they put on a good show. This time however, I was shocked to see the number of San Francisco Police people patroling the service and the church. Even at a Christmas eve mass in a catholic church, one cannot escape the realities of the war on terrorism.

The priest gave a quite a good sermon, which was also shocking because I almost never hear decent sermons in catholic services anymore.

Merrry Christmas! It's sunny here in San Francisco, although the air is nippy and chilly.

A friend and I went to Boulevard for Christmas even dinner last night. "In the Zagat Restaurant Guide for the year 2000, Boulevard was rated the #1 Zagat Restaurant in the Bay Area for the 3rd year in a row."

Boulevard was crowded with people, and we had to wait 20 minutes for a table despite the fact that we had reservations. We had planned to have dinner and hit an 11:00 pm mass at the sister presbyterian church.

The service was relaxed and slow, so by the time we had our dessert it was too late to drive to church. I was kind of miffed at this, although my friend didn't really care because the food at Boulevard was quite good.

Their appetizers are probably the best thing on the menu, but all of their dishes are very complex so you always feel full and happy after each course. And food presentation as is customary was excellent.

I had a triple creme brulee for dessert; eggnog with a dollop of whip cream, tangerine and cream with a snow flake shaped sugar cookie, and peppermint with a candy cane. Isn't that a cute idea for a sweet? You get three mini creme brulees, and they added extra things like a candy cane and a snowflake sugar cookie.

Boulevard adds nice little touches like when you go to the restroom, someone comes by and folds your napkin for you. Of course such luxurious treatment and great food doesn't come cheap, but it's worth it to do on special times like at Christmas.

Sometimes I get really down on myself for my progress in writing, but I didn't know I wanted to be a writer till 1999 and it wasn't until sometime in late 2001 that I decided I wanted to pursue writing for the rest of my life and that maybe it was some kind of calling.

My earliest memory of wanting to be a writer was when I was in 4th grade, but isn't that an idea that all ambitious teachers put in their students' heads at that age? My 4th grade teacher had the whole class write stories, and then we bound our books up and donated them to school library where they could be checked out by other students.

I remember thinking at that age, it would be fun to write children's books. But then the idea went nowhere sort of. Oh, it resurfaced from time to time. Like in 6th grade when I discovered the playwright Eugene O'Neil and decided I want to write plays. Or like in 7th grade when we had to write a children's story in English class. But then writing got pushed back to some remote corner of mind. Always kind of there but only allowed out briefly every few years or so.

When I graduated from highschool, I saw myself as in the following two careers.

1) russian language interpreter at the United Nations. I thought it would be so cool to work for the UN and live in NYC. I chose russian because I was into the russian revolution, and wanted to restart the revolution over because communism had been such a failure.

2) Madison Avenue advertising executive living in NYC. I wanted to be one to change the way ads are put out. I wanted to put a social conscience in advertising, and decided to change the system I needed to be a part of it.

Being a writer wasn't something I thought about doing after high school or in college. I was told by countless people I was a good writer of stories, but I was like so. So what? Doesn't everybody write well and have vivid imaginations?

I wish I was one of those people who grew up wanting to be a writer. It must be so great to have started that young, and to have that writing ambition grow with you through life instead of disappear the way mine did.

I guess I should just be grateful my writing desire surfaced again, but it did so only after acting bug started to fade.

I sometimes wonder if writing is my thing, but I keep being drawn to it and it's kept me interested so far. I suppose once it starts to seriously bore me, I'll something else. But stupifying boredom hasn't set in yet. Serious frustration yes, but serious boredom no.

When I popped over to Mills College over in Oakland a few weeks ago to check out a painting exhibit, there was a glass outhouse in front of the college art museum. You couldn't see in but it was mirrored all around. I had to desperately use the facilities, so I went into the glass outhouse and did my business.

As I was sitting there, I noticed that I could see out of the bathroom and I briefly wondered if other people could see my sitting there. But then I thought so what.

I've used the bathroom outdoors before here, in NYC, Wash DC, GG Park during a concert, Shoreline Amphitheatre after a concert, doesn't matter. If I have to go, I do it. Who cares. It's better than having an accident in your clothes right?

But I guess other people have issues with going to the bathroom in public so to speak, as evidenced by this article in the NY Times about a similar see through bathroom in London; Blushing While You're Flushing, and All for Art's Sake.

I haven't blogged about this before, but my church is dissolving its relationship with our current pastor. It's kind of big deal for me, because I really liked the guy and I personally feel that there was a certain vocal minority in the church that didn't give him a chance.

No one is blameless in what happened, but I was left feeling very unhappy with my church. My unhappiness has been coming on gradually for a long time, and the pastor's resignation was the straw that proverbially broke this camel's back.

A friend who doesn't attend anymore said that "when she goes to church she gets a sad feeling, it's not a happy place." I have to agree with her. Sometimes I felt like I was watching a bad train wreck, and I couldn't pull myself away. This is a not a good way to think about one's church.

It's probably going to be about two to three years before my church hires another pastor full time. In the meantime, they will have a steady stream of interim pastors. I hate this kind of instability in a church. The world is just too crazy and stressful, and I don't need the stress of never knowing who will be preaching or worrying about the quality of the sermons.

I made a decision to start attending our sister church. It's a bigger church with two services, and it's four times the size of my current church with over 1,000 members.

We have a sister church, because part of the church's congregation split off during the time of the Civil War. The members who were Confederate sympathizers split from my church, and started their own church. The sister church is still spoken about in hushed tones by some of my church's members as those people who supported slavery.

Our sister church tends to be a little more conservative, and wealthier. Their building is located in Pacific Heights, which is one of the more richer hoods of San Francisco. Since it's a bigger church, they attract quite a diverse crowd and there is actually more diversity in their congregation than in ours because of their size.

And as an added bonus, there seems to be more single men attending there than at my home church. I had a dream last night where my grandparents were in service with me at the sister church. What my very catholic grandparents would be doing in a protestant church is one big mystery to me, but they were there and my grandma was pointing out all the cute single to me. Is this dream a sign or what?

I won't abandon my home church right away; that would be too weird and cruel. I don't know why I have a thing about that, but I do. I don't know why either, because people have left my church before without warning. Just last month, a couple I was in class with for a year just stopped showing up. When I asked around, someone told me that they had decided to leave.

But I do have friends at church, people I've known for a long time and whom I totally respect and admire religiously, politically and intellectually. So leaving is a big deal for me. My biggest fear about leaving the church is my fear that I won't find people at my new church that I respect and admire for their religious, political and intellectual smarts.

But my departure I fear is inevitable. I've been praying about it for a year now, and it is only now with the pastor's termination that I've felt it's time to leave.

It will probably be a year until I transfer my membership, which is the process you go through when you change churches in this denomination.

The sister church has an early service, and I'll probably end up going to two services every Sunday for awhile. It's a ton of church, but I think the back to back comparision of the services will help to either reinforce my decision to leave or show me why I need to stay.

I'll get good consistent preaching at the sister church, and I'm grateful for that at least. I hate churches where the sermons are awful.

It will be a serious test of my democratic loyalty if Howard Dean gets the nomination to be the democratic presidential candidate, and I have to vote for him.

I'm not an anti-war democrat, and besides that I don't like anything the guy has to say. Dean doesn't have a constructive plan for what to do with Iraq, other than to say we should get out. What kind of sense does that make? We're there. We can't just pull out.

Dean's whole platform to me is only likable if you are vehemently against the war in Iraq, and you're a strident Bush hater. And I am neither of these things. I hate political campaigns based on hatred of the other candidate. I want a campaign based on issues, not hatred and angry rhetoric!

Just heard a hot song on the radio tonight, "Naughty Girl" by Beyonce. The song is off of her Dangerously in Love cd.

I found out a friend, who wrote her first screenplay and entered the Cinequest Screenwriting competition, was picked as one of 37 semi-finalists out of a field of 271.

She received feedback on her screenplay, and is now busily rewriting her movie.

I need to think about entering my screenplay in some competition.

There was another friend of mine who entered his screenplay into another contest last year, and was picked as one of 45 first round finalists out of 550 submittted. His screenplay wasn't even that great, and he got picked.

Part 2 - The Screenwriting Panel - The ideas are out there, and anyone can access them.

There was another woman there sitting on the other screenwriting panel whom I'd met at other screenwriting functions. I asked her about her screenplay which she was working on last year. She said it had been produced and I was like WOW! I congratulated her, and then she said "No, I didn't sell my screenplay."

When I asked her what she meant she said that another movie had come out this year with her same title "Cowboy Up", and pretty much her plot. The movie starred Keifer Sutherland.

I was dumbfounded and expressed as much to her, and she said it happens all the time. You get an idea for a story, and then you see it published or made into a movie. She said, "the ideas are out there for anyone to make into a story and sometimes somebody else beats you to it."

My screenwriting colleague wasn't fazed. She was already at work on another screenplay, that she's planning to direct herself. One of her previous films was chosen for the Sundance Film Festival, and one of her documentaries was shown at the Orinda Film Festival and the Los Angeles Film Festival.

Trippy! But maybe not. That screenwriting teacher I took a seminar from a couple of months ago who sold his San Francisco 1906 earthquake screenplay, said that there were other earthquake screenplays in various stages of deals and development in Hollywood. Those other earthquake screenplays were all dropped by Hollywood in favour of his 1906 movie.

It's kind of cool to think that there might be some kind of creative stream that writers can all access, because this means that practically anyone has the chance to make it as a writer.

The downside to everyone having access to this creative stream, is you can work for months and months on your story only to see a similar story published or made into movie by someone else.

From Sean David Morton, TWELVE-CHAKRA WING ACTIVATION

This is a means of re-energizing the dormant energy fields of the body, including the rarely discussed 11th and 12th chakras, and also of igniting the long-dormant Wing Chakras in the back.

People get elves and fairies confused all the time. Elves have no wings, and they're not tiny. The idea of the wings come from the activation of the wing chakras, but elves had no need for wings to fly since they could astral travel. The average elf height was 5 ft to 6 ft. They were short compared to humans, who at the time the elf population was fully alive, were 9 feet and up.

Elves also have some kind extra bone on the sides of their body that connected the hips to the shoulder.

Some sort of cataclysm happened during the time of Atlantis where the human race had to repopulated. The new humans were shorter, more fragile.

All the otherkin races were wiped out, although I think some exist in spirit form all over the world. The present day stories and legends come from the spirit of the otherkin races, but the memories of their former kingdoms were wiped out.

There was 6.5 quake down south and people are saying they could feel it up here, but I didn't feel a thing.

So the electricity goes out last night arond 6 pm just as I was trying to decide what to watch on TV.

I have a coleman camping lantern in the living room but the switch is kind of spotty, so of course it doesn't go on when I tried to use it. I head to the bedroom and turn on the camping lantern sitting on my bedside table.

I lit the candles on my bedside table, the one in the living room and the one in the bathroom, changed the batteries in my emergency radio, and turned on the news.

There's a fire in some substation in the Mission, and I figure it's going to be awhile before I get any electricity. My sony stereo boombox has batteries in it, so I put on Christmas cds so I can listen at least listen to music in the dark and I light more candles, and think about how I wish I had bought that handheld portable TV that I keep thinking I should own for emergencies like this.

I look for the spare non-electric telephone so I can plug it in, in case I need or get emergency phone calls. I get my cellphone and the battery is low, and I make a mental note to remember to always keep the battery charged.

I decide my emergency flashlights are in the wrong places, so I hunt them down in the dark and put them where they're more accessible.

I spend the rest of the evening putting things away in my bedroom and cleaning up by candlelight, so I can conserve the batteries in my lantern in case the blackout goes on all night.

At 8:50 pm, the electricity come back on. I blow out all the candles, forget to juice up the cell phone and go back to watching TV like nothing happened.

Around 9:50 pm, the electricity goes out again. I relight the candles on my nightstand, light one extra candle at my desk, turn on the radio, and get in bed wondering if I should read by candlelight.

The thought of sleep becomes too overpowering, so I blow out the candle at my desk and lie and drift in and out of sleep listening to the news on the radio.

At around 2 am I hear my computer turn on and when I open my eyes, the christmas lights are back on. I get up, unplug the lights, turn off my computer, turn off the radio and go back to sleep.

This is a quote from an interview with Shawn Lawrence Otto, who cowrote the screenplay for Andre Dubus III novel HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG.

WS: Your first screenplay, SHINING WHITE, won numerous awards. What was the appeal of the competitions? Would you encourage emerging screenwriters to enter competitions, apply for fellowships or other awards? Did the publicity that came with the awards throw open doors for you? Was the public relations self-perpetuating or did you have to work on it?

SLO: I think the competitions are a little like the farm system in baseball. They are the minor leagues. You can play there and get feedback and hone your craft, and then if you get lucky you get called up. That's usually by an independent producer looking for fresh material or new voices, but sometimes it's an agent or manager. You just need to be careful that it's really someone who has good relationships in Hollywood. These days it's how a lot of new writers have gotten their starts. It's how I got mine.

I read "House of Sand and Fog", and although I liked the novel, I thought it was deeply flawed. I dislike passive characters, and thought the female character was too much of a "I can't help it, I'm a victim" type. Like girl, get a clue and into therapy and get over yourself.

But the novel was hugely popular, being an Oprah book and all, so I think many readers related to passive victim character.

I wish I could read a book where the main character walks into their messes with eyes wide open, knowing it's bad, but goes anyway just because they want to, because it's seductive, and because it's fun. I want to see a main character in a book cop to their BS and then get on with life.

I guess if I want to read a book with this kind of character, I'm going to have to write it myself.

Strange things I've noticed this week:

At Costco, there was a woman buying 8 20-pc dish sets of Royal Albert Old Country Rose. It's a good dish set being bone china, but kind of tacky because the roses are shocking pink and they're decorated with gold as well. Why was the woman buying 8 sets of this stuff?

Walking past a car brake and muffler shop, I happened to glance in the window and there was a television in the office with a naked girl talking. Porno at the car fix-it place? So not original, but now it's a naked girl talking on TV and not just a calendar of naked girls.

The SF police are doing a stakeout in Golden Gate Park. As you drive southbound from Park Presidio to 19th Avenue, there's a bunch of cop cars and cops on motorcycles. Not sure what they're looking for, but they're all there blocking traffic in the rain.

Walking down Geary street this afternoon, I could smell hippie lettuce ganga burning. Having grown up in Hawaii where the stuff is grown, I can recognize that smell a mile away. I turned around thinking there was someone smoking a doobie behind me, and there was no one there. I looked up ahead and noticed there was a Hemp Center store. Guess they were sampling the merchandise.

Well the blog is fixed now, but I had to republish my entire site. I kind of liked that it was in different colours in different months.

Oh well! At least it's working now.

My blog is broken. I've been writing posts, but they haven't been updating since yesterday afternoon. If the blog is updating, I can't see it.

If you can see this post, please email me and let me know.

If you're a fan of Philip K. Dick, the famous scifi writer whose stories were the basis for movies such "Minority Report" and "Blade Runner", you'll appreciate this article on him.

The Second Coming of Philip K. Dick: The inside-out story of how a hyper-paranoid, pulp-fiction hack conquered the movie world 20 years after his death.

One of the greatest advantages in having a political map like Sullivan's is, a president candidate's organization can easily focus their resources on the region that has the potential to swing.

The drawback of course is, the other regions get ignored.

Here's Sullivan's detailed descriptions of each region, The 10 Regions of US Politics.

"Our regions are based on voting returns from both national and state elections, demographic data from the US Census, and certain geographic features such as mountain ranges and coastlines. Each region represents about one-tenth of the national electorate, casting between 10.4 million and 10.8 million votes in the 2000 presidential election. "

San Francisco is part of Upper Coasts.

"The communities in Upper Coasts are known for both civic responsibility and civil disobedience. This two-part region is anchored in the east by Boston and in the west by San Francisco, but both cities tilt decidedly to the left. "

On to the 2004 Presidential Election

I'm one of those guilty people, but I've used the famous 2000 election blue and red state map to talk about politics. It's a simplistic map, and therefore a simplistic way to talk about presidential politics.

Here's a different analysis of the red and blue presidential race map, Beyond Red and Blue.

Sullivan divides the country into 10 regions, and does a much more in depth analysis of how the state votes for president in the 2000 election. It's also a political road map for Bush and the other democratic candidates on how to win in 2004.

"If either Bush or the eventual Democratic nominee in 2004 can carry a sixth region, as Bill Clinton did in both 1992 and 1996, he is virtually assured to win in November. As political campaigns pull out their maps and sharpen their pencils, setting a course for November 2, 2004, they should consult our cartography - if only to determine where their opportunities lie, and where they're wasting their time. "

Sullivan explains his rationale for 10 regions in this article, Continental Divides.

"American politics always comes back to geography. One reason for this is the Electoral College, which doesn't award votes based on which candidate was favored by soccer moms or NASCAR dads. On election night, all that matters is who won where, and the 10-region model shows the long-term trends that both parties must take into account in trying to assemble an Electoral College majority."

If I think about it long enough, I bet I could come up with a similar geographical map for San Francisco and a strategy for a candidate to win the mayor's race. Gore won in the big cities, but lost in the heartland and the suburbs. Gore won the big populous states like California and New York, and lost the smaller states.

Gonzalez won in the inner city, but lost in the outer city or as we say here, "the suburbs of San Francisco". But in San Francisco, most people don't live in the inner city they live in the outer city. The neighbourhoods and districts that Gonzalez won accounted for about 30-40% of the San Francisco population.

A San Francisco mayoral candidate popular in either the inner or the outer city, would need to win enough hoods in the opposite region to win the mayor's election. Newsome won because he carried enough neighborhoods in the inner city, as well as dominating in the outer city.

Check out these San Francisco mayoral race maps, Runoff Maps.

This is from the russian paper Pravda so who knows if it's true but I wish it would happen to me, E-mail letters from the future: People receive warnings from their future selves.

I wish my future self would let me know if I'm ever going to make it as a self-employed writer, and answer other burning and important questions in my life.

I was reading a political blog from someone who is a Gonzalez supporter, and a well known San Fran political writer, and at the end of his entry he penned "Gavin Newsom is white trash."

Is there a difference between the GOP and the Progressives in San Francisco?

Didn't the GOP and their commentators for eight plus years call Bill and Hilary Clinton "white trash"?

Didn't Dick Cheney say at the 2000 GOP convention that "He and Bush were going to clean out The White House"? Which by the way, sounded a ton like Gonzalez's campaign slogan of "Anyone but Newsome" and "We're going to get rid of the Democractic machine"

The Progressives keep harping on how they're not "politics as usual", but to my eyes, they're mirroring the GOP tactics right down to calling Newsome "white trash".

So much for being a different party; more like "The Left Wing GOP."

Watch! The Greens probably already have a plan to put a Recall on the ballot next year.

There's no more demanding and stressful job than being an NFL Coach. Poor Jim Fassel, coach of the NY Giants was canned, New York Giants Fire Coach Jim Fassel. The season isn't even over, and he already got his pink slip.

Look at George Siefert. The 49ers fired him, and he has the NFL's best-winning percentage of all-time.

Part 1 - The Screenwriting Panel

As I mentioned earlier, I sat in on a screenwriting panel last week at The Academy of Art College.

If you want to sell your screenplay to Hollywood, one way is to go before a screenwriting panel. Basically, you have two minutes to pitch your screenplay before two to four Hollywood types either coming from film studios or production companies.

It's basically a two minute sales pitch where you tell them enough to get them interested enough in your movie to give you their contact information. The screenwriting panel has the opportunity to ask you questions, but then your time is up and they boot you out.

Most screenwriting expos have them, and there will be an opportunity at the end of the January in the SF Bay Area to pitch your movie. The whole process reminded me of an audition, although not as intense. At least you're selling a product like a movie, and not yourself as actor to play a role.

In a screenwriting panel, you sit and it's almost conversational and you actually get to see the people. In some theatre auditions, it's just you alone on stage and your reviewers are sitting in the audience and you can't see them.

There's a line of people, you get about five minutes to pitch your movie, they yell next, and then you leave and the next person gets a turn. And some places are very strict about time. If you talk too much and you're not done, tough luck, you're history.

One of the guys on my panel went to LA two weeks where he paid $25 every time he pitched to a pane. He ended up getting 11 Hollywood types who said they would read his script.

Now it's not a guarantee of a sale, or you might not even get feedback so you can improve. The guy I mentioned heard within two days after sending his script out, that a couple people weren't interested. They didn't say why, just no thank you.

It's a brutal process, but going before a screenwriting panel is one of the few ways an amateur without an agent can sell a script to Hollywood.

And screenwriting is just like acting. Everyone wants to do it, and the competition is stiff. Everyone thinks they can act, and everyone thinks they can write a better movie than the ones they've seen.

I spoke to my brother this morning and he's Mr. Extremely Frugal, but in this situation I think he's going a bit too far. So my brother is flying to Florida to pick up a BMW that he's buying from a friend. Then he and another friend are driving the BMW cross country to LA, and shipping it to Hawaii.

I'm like, why go all the way to the other side of the country to buy a BMW and have it shipped across the ocean. Okay, I can understand maybe wanting to drive cross country in a car but then shipping the car home? Maybe the BMW is like some tricked out luxury car that he's buying for a totally insanely cheap price, but then what about shipping costs?

But I'm the big sister and like my life is any better so I say, "Great, have a fun drive!"

I still haven't gotten around to getting a christmas tree, but I bought everything else instead.

I bought a two foot poinsettia, it's more of a bush than a plant, for the living room. I also bought a tiny poinsettia for my bedroom. For the pinetree smell, I bought a christmas pine wreath. The wreath is sitting on my coffee table and gives off that nice pine scent.

I've also strewn christmas decorations on every available surface. I might not have a christmas tree, but I've got a ton of christmas decorations around the place right now.

I got up at 7 am this morning, turned on the TV and watched as Tom Brokaw announced that there was special news. For a moment my heart stopped thinking of 9/11, but instead he announced that Sadam Hussein was captured.

Is it really him? I thought the guy had three doubles, or was dead. Where the heck did he get $750K in US cash? And the most important question, what happens to him now?
War crimes tribunal? What about his two sons? What happened to them? Are his people going to try and rescue him, and we get a scene like in the movie "SWAT"?

Still immersed in studying for my modern art history final. Dwelling on questions and issues such as:

1) differences between minimalist and post-minimalist art
2) factors in minimalism that lead to conceptual art
3) characteristics of postmodern art
4) explaining Jean Baudrillard's theory of "Simulacra and Simulations" and how it applies to postmodern art
5) the wider significance of Christo's art
6) the wider signficance of Philip Guston's later work
7) the changing paradigm of beauty in modern art, especially the work of body/image artists of the 1990's.

I'ved been busy studying for my modern art history final on Monday. I love taking classes, but the tests I could do without.

I've had such a busy week too, with events every night until Wednesday. On Thursday I felt happy just to have a free night with nothing to do, that I ended up going to bed early.

I have to do some Christmas shopping tomorow, so Saturday is devoted to studying. I have a great story about sitting on the screenwriting panel at The Academy of Art College Wednesday afternoon, which I hope to write about sometime this weekend. There were even three movies presented that I thought could potentially be made into films, which was a first for me since I started doing screenwriting.

More later.

This is an interesting essay by Warren Hinckle, An Old Town win, on the San Franciso mayoral election.

Hinckle describes old town San Francisco voters as "politically centrist, big labor orientated, pragmatic, tolerant-look-the-other-way about life and sex styles". This is me exactly!

I just read FJGallager's Blog. I like this guy; his political comments are so insightful.

I hope Newsom keeps his political organization together, and they work to get supervisors who think like him elected come next November. Heck, I'll go and even volunteer to unseat some of these freaks. The GOP has been doing this kind of stuff for 20+ years with impressive results, so the Demos in the city should just copy their tactics.

I hope that the positive effect of the Gonzalez campaign will be that more people will be interested in politics and pay attention to issues 24/7. There really should be more than 15% of the population of the city and county of San Francisco deciding the future of this great place.

But already the pundits are weighing in and saying that the energy created by the progressive party campaign won't last; Despite loss, Gonzalez remains hopeful.

But look at Tom Ammiano and what happened to him after his 1999 run for mayor. Ammiano was a write-in candidate, talk about serious grass roots, but where is he now - he's still around but hardly influential.

Politics like life is a slog. I give credit to the Newsome campaign because they've been at this since Care not Cash. They were organized, and they worked really hard. I don't expect those suppporters and organizers to go away.

I went to his first campaign rally, and the guy definitely has something. I'm not even sure what it is, but he's definitely got his own kind of political charisma. I've been down to the Newsome campaign HQ for volunteer meetings, and his people have high hopes for him.

They were talking even Governor of the state, and those people were serious and probably started planning their long term strategy from day 1 of Care not Cash. Newsom's people are taking a page out of the GOP winning playbook. They know that politics is a long term process that can take years to have any success. They say Bill Clinton has presidential ambitions in his mind in college.

It's the tortoise and the hare story all over again. The tortoise is slow, but it wins the race. Much of life is like a tortoise race. They say writing is like a tortoise race. Writing is a slog, and you can work for years and years without any hope of success. Those writers who are successful are the ones who've been working day after day, day in day out, with their attention always on the long term result.

The progressives have some great deas, and I hope they keep at it. We need everyone's ideas and energy to make the city a better place. Only time will tell.

Another disturbing factor that was brought out in post-election coverage was the number of people actually voting.

There are about 750,000 people who live in San Francisco. Of that number, about 466,000+ are registered to vote which is about 50%. But in any given election, only about 200,000+ people actually vote which is about 25%+ of total population.

A political consultant was on a program saying that a candidate doesn't have to appeal to all the voters, but just to the 25% or so who actually vote. And of that 25% of the population who vote, the candidate needs to really just reach 50% plus one to win an election.

That's sad. Any candidate running in San Francisco has to appeal to only 110,000+ people to get elected which is about 15% of the population.

15% of the population of the city decides how the place will be run. What a sad comment on our voting process. It's like those 80/20 rules isn't it?

Here's a couple of interesting points that I've now heard twice about the SF Mayor's race.

Anyone running against Newsome would have automatically gotten 42% of the vote. Apparently Ammiano back in 1999 received the same amount. So if it was Leal, Ammiano, even Aliotio running against Newsome, wouldn't gotten 42% of the vote.

5 percentage points that went to Gonzalez was due to a Willie Brown backlash. There was so much hatred of Willie Brown, that there were people in San Francisco who wouldn't have voted for Newsome just because Willie Brown endorsed him.

Pundits are also saying that many people are tired of the Demo party machine, and that weariness brought The Gropenator (new term for Arnie courtesy of Bernie Ward) the Cali Republic's governor seat, and brought many votes to Gonzalez.

It makes you wonder that if there wasn't the Willie Brown factor, would Newsome have won by 12 percentage points as did Kamala Harris in the DA's race.

The big loser is the San Francisco Bay Guardian. They endorsed Hallinan and Gonzalez and lost on both endorsements.

I was listening to all the post-election night coverage, because I love politican spin and I wanted to see how this election would be spun.

The funniest bit I heard, and perhaps this is indicative of the intelligence of the Green Party campaign, was the Green Party saying that they were going to go after Newsom's supervisor seat.

Newsom ran in the Marina district, which is a yuppie enclave with one of the highest per capita median income levels in the districts. Most people there are conservative, and I would even venture to say many of them are republicans as well. Marina people and their self-centered, rich and selfish ways are the butt of many inside SF jokes.

How the Green Party thinks they're going to take the Marina is something only they know.

If the Greens do get a supervisor to win the Marina district, then I think the Demo party in San Francisco has something to seriously worry about. But I think not.

I'm proud to say I'm one of those absentee voters who voted for Gavin Newsome, and elected him the mayor of the city and county of San Francisco.

I was nervous on the way back from my writing seminar. I knew Gavin would win, but I was still remembering when I thought Al Gore had won the 2000 presidential election and the disappointment I felt afterwards. I was tempted to ask someone on my muni ride home, but I was tired and didn't want to get into a political discussion.

I even half convinced myself that I was going to go to bed as soon as I got home, and not worry about who won till the morning. But my curiousity was killing me, so I turned on the TV just in time to see Newsome give his victory speech.

I was clapping with joy alone in the dark in my living room and thinking to myself, yes Brenda, despite what people say, in San Franciso there is a God.

Here's an interview with Andres Serrano, by noted art writer Coco Fusco. This guy is a trip. He's lately been photographing members of the Klu Klux Klan.

Shooting the Klan: An Interview with Andres Serrano

We talked about the following artwork, Piss Christ by Andres Serrano, in my modern art history class last night.

This art piece has caused controversy where ever it has appeared, because of the title and the nature of the artwork. It's a photograph of a cheap crucifix submerged in a container of urine that's been lit to look red.

First off, Andres Serrano is seriously catholic and my art professor said his home in Brooklyn is filled with religious artifacts. Serrano has said that his main objective for his art is to make things beautiful. He objects that people label him an anti-christian bigot, and that he is in fact a religious artist.

I wasn't looking forward to the discussion, simply because religious discussion in a public school in San Francisco can be so tedious, but I was so surprised by what my fellow classmates said.

There were a couple of people who said it was just ugly and disgusting, but there were others whose comments were so interesting and inspiring.

One woman said that she thought it has something to do with communion, and that if you eat the body and blood of christ you have to wonder if it comes out in your waste.

Another woman said she thought that the the crucifixion was still beautiful through the piss.

One man said that he thought the piece was deeply religious because it shows Christ's power of transformation. Christ can transform something so filthy and human as piss and make it holy and beutiful. That Christ came here to cleanse the world of sin by being becoming human, and was literally submerged into "human waste".

When I heard the last comment, I was so awestruck by what I think was an amazing and deeply spiritual interpretation. I don't expect such comments outside of church, and I was very surprised to hear it in public school college class.

When I first saw it, I thought to myself "Hmmm, that's interesting. I didn't necessarily think it was anti-christian, and instead thought how the cross was glowing in the red urine." Then I heard the transformation comment and thought, how beautiful and how true.

I finally finished up reading I Heard the Owl Call my Name by Margaret Craven. What a good book, and it made me weep at the end.

Right before my grandmother died, there were owls hoohooing outside my window every night. It was so creepy, because I'd never heard them before and I haven't heard them since that time.

Owls, in indian lore, are symbols of death, so the story had a personal meaning for me. I hope I never have to hear owls hoohooing again for a long time.

While we quibble about who will be mayor of San Francisco, the Cali Republic wrestles with budget problems.

Shortfall in Car Tax to Hit Home: Local governments this week will receive two-thirds less from the state than anticipated. Officials may resort to higher taxes, lawsuits.

"As a consequence, local governments across the state likely will have to begin cutting programs ranging from fire coverage to libraries, government officials say."

Below is a sad but true statement of the importance of San Francisco politics from SFGate.com, San Franciscans ready to pick next mayor, OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: Suburbanites see city as political funhouse

A telling quote from the story:

"For the rest of the Bay Area, San Francisco's election has been an engaging spectator sport -- fun to watch, even an opportunity to root.

But the race for mayor is an event that many of the region's residents and governmental leaders say will have minimal impact beyond the city's borders.

"San Francisco provides us with entertainment, but other than that, it's not terribly relevant," said Contra Costa County Supervisor Mark DeSaulnier, owner of TR's Bar & Grill in Concord.

The city is increasingly isolated as its politics have become more insular and moved further to the left.

"San Francisco is not the heart of the Bay Area, politically," said Larry Tramutola, whose Oakland political consulting firm has done work at the local level in every county in the Bay Area.

The city is increasingly isolated as its politics have become more insular and moved further to the left.

"San Francisco is not the heart of the Bay Area, politically," said Larry Tramutola, whose Oakland political consulting firm has done work at the local level in every county in the Bay Area."

The city has voted itself into irrelevancy.

People are speculating that the Demos are throwing in the towel to Bush for the 2004 presidential election, because Al Gore is supposedly going to endorse Howard Dean tomorrow.

These same people say that the Demos are conceding the race to Bush, so they can concentrate on getting Hilary Clinton into the White House in 2008. Supposedly Hilary beats any democrat including Dean when pollsters ask who do you want to be next president.

I'm taking a writing class tomorrow night by Linda Seger, who has published a bunch of books on screenwriting and creating characters. I love taking a writing class from an author before buying their books. You get to see if you like them and what they have to say, and if you do, you buy their books. If not, you pass.

Here are some books Seger has written:

Making a Good Script Great

Advanced Screenwriting: Raising Your Script to the Academy Award Level

Creating Unforgettable Characters

This is new. I just got a call from the Newsome campaign, saying if I wanted a ride to my polling place they would pick me up and take me there.

Too bad I already voted, because I would have loved to see if this offer was legit.

I've been thinking about how long I've been interested in politics, and I can honestly say I've been following politics since I was 12 years old. I have my parents to thank for that. My dad was a union leader, and union people always get involved in politics.

It's trippy to think I've been arguing politics since I was 12 years old. That's a long time. I couldn't wait to turn 18 and vote, and I've been doing it and having political arguments ever since.

I wonder if it's true what the conservatives are saying about the left wing political agenda in publics schools, and how they don't teach kids the importance of civics and voting. I've heard it said on talk shows that left wing teachers are so anti-US government, that they teach kids to protest but not vote. That's a shame, if it's true.

Talk about karma at work as well. Karma says to always do the right thing, and the right thing I feel in teaching is to teach students to study both sides of any issue. Then it's up the student to decide for themselves what is right and what is wrong. A teacher's job is to teach the student to make decisions based on an informed choice.

My left wing hippie teachers rammed it into our heads about the importance of voting, and how one person can make a difference in this world. They cited Martin Luther King Jr, Ghandi, Lincoln, etc. I can almost hear them now saying, "One person can make a difference, one vote can change everything. You can't be a participant is this great experiment called democracy and not vote. It's your duty to study both sides of every issue and make an informed decision. Don't let the media or anyone else tell you how to vote. Cherish your vote. It's one of the few chances you have to make your voice heard in government."

In school we used to study the local, state and Federal elections, and then you would have to debate both sides. I'm not saying there wasn't a left wing hippie liberal bias in my schooling, but at least they presented both sides of any issue. They forced us kids to think through logically what we believed, and why, and to defend it logically as well.

I like politics because it forces you think deeply about issues, and to always clarify for yourself what is really important about government and what you want government to do.

Politics is never black and white, and you have to figure in so many issues when you vote on candidates or propositions. You have to read stuff, read in between the lines, figure out what the bias is, the agenda, etc. You have to compare what a candidate actually says, as opposed to how they vote and what they say in interviews, on their websites, their campaign literature, etc.

My brain gets some serious exercise every time I do my political investigations, and I like it. It's good to think.

These items are pretty funny in an amusing and sick kind of way: Conservative Political Toys for Christmas

Amuse your conservative friends and annoy your liberal neighbors with the brand new Ann Coulter Talking Action Figure

Move over Saddam -- Hillary is the new Ace of Spades. While Saddam still tops the Iraqi "Most Wanted" list, Hillary tops a new deck of cards: The "52 Most Dangerous Liberals in America."

Donald H. Rumsfeld Talking Action Figure

George W. Bush Top Gun Action Figure

Controversy is everywhere, even in the sports world.

All the sports guys are just ranting about USC getting punked in the BCS. The SC Trojans, the number one team in the nation who pummelled OSU on Saturday, will not be playing the Sugar Bowl for the number one college football ranking. Once again, the Pac 10 gets the short end of the stick.

Instead the number two and three teams, LSU and Oklahoma will be playing. The Rose Bowl is great, but it's not like they'll be playing for the college championship.

And I love it too, because everyone seems to blaming Hawaii because they got whacked by Boise State. "Carroll called it "wrong" that the Notre Dame-Syracuse and Boise State-Hawaii games had some effect on who plays in the national championship game. (ESPN)

I have friends that went to USC. They loved the school, but said it was was very smoggy there.

I just heard Alistair Cooke, from the BBC, reading his current "Letter from America".

Mr. Cooke finally spoke about the Iraq War, and here's what he said at the end;

"I've put it to many people, including a famous philosopher and a leading delegate of a major member of the Security Council.

Last March, if you had a choice of agreeing to invade or having the UN approve a three-month round of more inspections, what third alternative would you have had in mind? No answer.

The true, unconfessed alternative was to say - okay, Saddam, you win; go about your missiles and your labs. We'll wait till you try to shatter Israel overnight, acquire a flock of allies and become king of Arabia, and then by golly we'll start to fight you.

That was, in March, the true alternative on everyone's mind that dared not speak its name. "

Here's the full letter to read if you're interested, Why the war couldn't wait.

I finished my art history paper, but I have no idea of whether it's good or not. I have no idea of what professors look for in an art paper. I received A's on my last two art history class papers, so I don't think I'll do too badly.

I have my modern art history paper due tomorrow. What a drag! Writing papers is my least favourite part of school.

At least I've got a title:

Painting Common Objects: The New Image Paintings of Jennifer Bartlett and Elizabeth Murray

So here's another thing in common I have in common with some of my friends.

We hate Ralph Nader with a passion and wish to God the stupid idiot would stop running for president!

This is how weird things are in San Francisco with regard to politics.

First, read this article out; S.F. Mayor's Race 2003: View From the Neighborhoods
A Green enclave Family-oriented Outer Sunset is largely Newsom Country -- but Gonzalez reigns by the dunes.

Apparently you're a conservative, according the left and the greens, if:

1) you own your own dwelling and don't rent
2) you want to live in a quiet neighbourhood
3) you're married and have kids
3) you have kids and want to live in a district that has good public schools
4) you own your own business
5) you're considered working or middle class.

How messed up in the head do you have to be to think like this? I was so insulted by this article.

I lived out at the Great Highway for a time, and our neighbours were working class people who were struggling to raise their families. What the heck is wrong with that?

I don't understand why normal people get so dissed in San Francisco. It's so weird, it's so bad, it's positively evil, and frankly it's incredibly bad, bad karma!

Reading that SFGate article made me realize why the GOP is able to gain so much ground against the Demos. Is it any wonder that democrats and the left are being outflanked politically in a serious way by the republicans?

If you're "normal", the left and the democrats sure as heck don't want your kind polluting the party. And that's not good, because the majority of the country is working or middle class, wants to own property, has families with kids who attend public school, and just want to be able to take care of their families in the best way they can, and live a good life.

I finally came up with a way to end my novel. It's a little sappy, but it fits the characters and it's a love story after all so it's okay to be sappy.

When I finished outlining the ending, I was saying "aawwww, I like it, it's so sweet."

Now if I can just finish the darn thing!

If this article is correct, China's huge thirst for oil set to change world's energy flows, this development will have interesting ramifications for geopolitics.

This article in The Guardian UK, The end of the west - Europe is no longer the centre of the world - the future belongs to the might of Asia, also says all new golden roads leads to China.

I'm worried about Taiwan. China definitely wants the island back, and I think the world will bow down and let them take it.

Sadly, the Cali GOP is already licking their chops because of what may happen in the San Francisco's mayor's race, Green win could have impact beyond city race.

" Green victory here not only would raise the fledgling party's profile but also could hasten the defection of liberals from the Democratic Party. After the Oct. 7 election of Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, political analysts expect the state Democratic Party to move toward the political center to compete with the popular former actor and his centrist policies.

That would alienate liberal Democrats and send them to the Green Party, analysts say. If enough Greens desert Democrats, Republicans could solidify their hold on the governor's office and perhaps win seats in Congress. Democrats hold a 35-20 advantage in California's congressional delegation.

A Green ascendancy in California also could have national political implications. If Greens siphon off enough Democrats, Republicans could win a plurality of the statewide vote, handing California's 55 electoral votes to a GOP presidential candidate.

''If you really had a serious Green candidate taking votes away from a Democratic candidate, you could flip a state that's fairly liberal in a Republican direction,'' says Bruce Cain, a political science professor at the University of California-Berkeley. ''So it would be a huge boon to the Republican Party to have the Greens thrive in California.''"

Bible Reading:
Advent Stories, the birth of JC

What I'm pondering:
What variation of red nail polish should I paint my fingers and toes for the Holidays.

What I'm remembering:
Bad combos of nail polish and clothes.

Fun with Political Labels

So apparently there exists all these political labels that you can put on yourself.

First groups that really fit anywhere:

Single issue voters - gun control, a women's right to choose.

Flavour of the month voters - I'm going to vote for the candidate because he or she is cute, all my friends are voting for him or her.

Next, the right and left and variations thereof:

I'm not sure if I understand all of them, but here they are and from one extreme to the next.

Liberterians - No government.

The Far Right - the extremists, they tell you what's right and wrong and how to live your life, and make you feel guilty. If you don't believe in JC, you will go to hell. Us vs. Them.

Paleoconservative - characterized by Pat Buchanan, isolationist foreign policy, social programs are bad and bankrupt the government.

Conservative - vanilla conservatives

Neoconservative - The Project for the New American Century, neoconservative strategy of coercive democratization. "Neocons believe that the United States must use a high-pressure approach to compel Arab regimes to change, by force if necessary." (Wash Post) What's a little debt if you're defending the country and spreading American Democracy.

Urban Crunchy Conservative - National Review twist on Bobos (bourgeois bohemians), lives in cities, votes republican.

Everyone else, some vote, some don't.

Blue Blazer liberals - another twist on Bobos (bourgeois bohemian), votes democrat, lives in cities but mostly found in the suburbs because the schools are better

Neoliberals - Ellen Tauscher, Joe Lieberman, Zel Miller, fiscal discipline, don't bankrupt the government for social programs or foreign policy. "Neoliberals believe in political preemption first and military preemption only as a last resort. We supported the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq because we concluded that force was the only way to lance these boils." (Wash Post)

Liberals - vanilla liberals

Paleoliberals - Dennis Kucinch, Ted Kennedy, Barbara Boxer, big government, class warware, what's a little government debt if it means more social programs.

The Far Left - the extremists, progressives, greens, they tell you how to live your life, and make you feel guilty. Forget class warfare. If have money, you are the enemy. Us vs. Them.

Socialists/Communist - all government, all the time.

Is Europe becoming increasingly anti-semitic? If you read this article, Ritual Murders of Jews in Paris, it does make you wonder.

I have to honestly admit, that what turns me off the most about the left wing progressive platform, is its views on Israel and what I see as an increasingly anti-semitic tone in their rhetoric.

I support the legitimacy of the State of Israel in the middle east, and I'm proud to say it. I don't necessarily agree with everything that Israel does, but I certainly do not consider Israel as the greatest threat to world peace.

We light a candle during each service as part of a four candle wreath during advent at my presbyterian church, but I had no idea that it's kind of a catholic custom.

"The four weeks prior to Christmas, observed in the Catholic liturgical year, is called the season of Advent (Latin: an approach, Second Coming, appearance, something's coming). On tables in Catholic homes around the world stands a wreath holding four candles, three violet (royalty) and one pink (love). Each week one more candle is lit. By Christmas all four candles are alight. Representing the light to come in the midst of increasing darkness, Advent reflects ancient times when, with no electric light on our planet, darkness was feared. The candles gave the people hope. Celebrating Advent, especially with an Advent wreath, revivifies ancient ceremonies and feasts of light."

More on the lighting of the four candle wreath; The Advent Wreath.

Just when I was writing yesterday about the importance of voter turnout, I see this article this morning on SFGate.com; GOP may decide S.F. mayor's race Close election could be decided by one voting bloc.

I think it's kind of interesting that some republicans will support a green party candidate, but if they do vote that way I think it's only because they don't like democrats.

Here's the referenced article by Rod Dreher on "crunchy granola conservatives", Birkenstocked Burkeans.

I did a google search, and apparently this essay caused a stir in all kinds of places. I even came across the term, "metropolitcan conservative".

But then again, maybe I'm "blue blazer liberal".

"Call them "Blue Blazer Liberals." Contrary to what you might expect from people with progressive politics, these dedicated Democrats are devoted to their children, care deeply about their careers and are determined to make a good living. BBLs go to church regularly and, afterwards, they might even eat a hamburger or two — real ones! Not tofu! — at a cookout….They are as comfortable in the worlds of business and high finance as any conservative Republican."

From Jonah Golderberg at the National Review Online.

Here's an interesting piece by an outsider on the SF Mayoral race, Altered consciousness in the city by the bay.

I've been conservative noticing this trend as well, although I think it will be a long time before San Francisco has a republican mayor. But then again, I didn't think The Terminator would become governor of the Cali Republic.

Maybe I'm a "urban crunchy conservative." I like this term. I had a boss tell me once, "you know beneath that expensive wool suit, pearls and expensive perfume, you're really a crunchy granola person aren't you?" I was so insulted, but he was right.

I am partially a crunchy granola person, I just don't want to smell or dress like one or vote like one either. I'm a pragmatic voter who wants a mayor to fix the city's problems, with valid well thought out plans on how to do it. How simple is that?

It's been interesting talking to my friends about the mayoral election. Sometimes I think the only thing I have in common politically with them is that:

1) none of us voted for Bush, and
2) we all can't stand him.

Other than these two related points, that's about it. I have pro-Gonzalez friends and pro-Newsome friends. And they're all voting for their candidate of choice for all completely different reasons.

One thing I am excited about, that I discovered about myself, is that when push comes to shove I'm a loyal and faithful democrat.

I used to think that the reason I couldn't see myself becoming a political consultant, was because you have to choose a party. You can't work for a democrat campaign, and then go work for a liberal and moderate republican campaign. Politics is too partisan to do that. I wanted the freedom to work for the best political candidate who can get the job done. It's the way I vote, after all.

Not that I've ever voted for a republican ever, but I like to think because I'm a fair-minded person that if one came along whom I actually liked I would vote for that person, even if he was a republican.

But with the 2000 presidential election debacle, the GOP taking back the south, Cali having a republican governor, and now this crazy SF mayoral election, I've learnt that if the democrats are ever going to retake the White House, the congress, the senate and the south and other regions of the country, the local race is where it starts.

The GOP political long term strategists figured this out a long, long time ago, and started getting their people elected at the local level, then at the state level, then into congress, and then into the senate, regions of the country became GOP voting blocs, and then ultimate political prize, the white house. It took them over 20 years to do it, but they did it, and they're still making gains.

This is not the time to split the party or jump to another party. I don't want another 4-12 years of GOP control of the executive function, the legislative function, and then at some the judicial function of this country.

I heard a politico qouted as saying, "All politics is local." They're right. The battle for the senate, the house and presidency starts with the local election, and I'm a good soldier who knows how to fight.

What's really going to be key in the San Francisco mayoral election is voter turnout. The GOP understands this, and has used voter turnout to their advantage in elections all across the country.

I'm still getting the feeling that I'm being played by the San Francisco media, and they're making the election more into a horse race than it really is.

And I'm a numbers person, who makes a living tracking and studyng historical trends.

So unless things in this world change very drastically, I don't expect voter turnout to be that high. Take it from The Matrix. People don't escape their programming that easily. Most people will choose the blue pill .

"You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and you believe whatever you want to believe," and you don't vote.

Below are two interesting perspectives on the San Francisco mayoral race from two SF political blogs that I really like.

Where's Gonzo?

A View from the Field

The second link brings up an interesting point for me, and you can blame it on my stint as a long term strategic business analyst.

What happens after the mayor's race?

The legacy of Willie Brown has been the whittling down of the power of the San Francisco mayor's office, with the power going back to the district supervisors. Most of the power to get things done in city hall really resides with the president of the Board of Supervisors. Oh sure, the mayor's seat is still important but equally if not more important is the President of the Board of Supervisors.

So I'm thinking, Newsome can't lose. He either wins the mayor's race, or he becomes the president of the Board of Superviors, an equally if not more powerful although not as glamorous job.

One thing which the dotcom CEO also brought, was that if you're at the top you have to be professional at all times. My ex-boss female CIO tried to instill this point in me. She never gave away her true feelings ever in public; she was always polite and professional. She told me that "you never know when you'll have to work closely with or need a favour from someone that you totally hate. It's best to be on a friendly basis with everyone."

Whoever wins the races, one thing is for sure; they're going to have to work with each other in the future. Whether they can or not is going to be interesting to watch.

I was just thinking of getting my hearing checked because I've been hearing this persistent hum in my ears right before I go to sleep, and then I came across this article from the NY Times.

People Hearing Persistent, Mysterious Hum Aren't Alone

I wonder if I'm hearing the same hum for about the last three weeks.

I had my hearing checked a few year ago, and the tests were normal except for the fact that the doctor told me I can hear very high pitches. The doctor said that most people lose their ability to hear high pitched sounds as they get older, but apparently I hear the normal high pitches that you have at birth and the ones that most normal people can't hear.

Creepy, creeepy!

Here's an amusing passage from my novel. This is the male character talking, Marshall Raker.

"I don’t why I let her talk me into taking to her that Kennedy museum, but like a fool I agreed to go there with her for our third interview. What is it with democrats, liberals and Kennedy? They worship the man like he’s a god, when in reality he was nothing but a good looking ineffectual president, who had a hell of a speech writer. It was those damned horses. She looked so helpless and dreamy looking at them. When a girl looks like that in front of a fellow, it makes you just melt something fierce deep inside."

I so want to take a vacation from writng, but I know if I stop now I'll never finish my novel. I have to get through a chapter tonight.

Not sure if I'll stick to the 1,667 words a day total that was my writing rhythm during November. It's not a bad way to measure progress though, because it's about 4 pages of double spaced text a day.

I've got my christmas lights up, and they're so pretty! I love christmas lights. I'm still debating about getting a tree. It was so nice not to deal with the hassle of putting up a christmas tree last year. I'll have to think about it.

I went to my favourite fruit and veggie market on my lunch hour to pick up a few items, and I was shopping to the Grinch song from Dr. Seus' "How the Grinch Stole Christmas".

Sometimes I think I'm just a cranky SF food freak, because it irritates me that my fave fruit & veggie store doesn't carry Acme Bread which is the only type of fresh bread I like to buy.

On the way home I was thinking that if I ever become become obscenely rich, I will donate the majority of my money to food banks and services like Meals on Wheels, which deliver meals to the sick and elderly.

There is nothing more basic to human survival than food and eating, and it's utterly disgraceful that they are people who live in this city who for whatever reason can't feed themselves.

What is up with that?

While idiot politicians and candidates in the San Francisco Bay Area and around the country rant on and on about political ideology, speaking and living in their own virtual political world that no one else seems to live in, this is desert of the real world of San Francisco.

It trips me out that the San Francisco Food Bank is thinking of putting a food pantry in the my new working class hood, and my old working class hood.

Interesting article on politics and religion, American voters increasingly split along religious lines.

I go to church once a week sometimes more, prayer is an important part of my life, and I vote democrat. The majority of the people who go to my church vote democrat as well although we do have a vocal progressive minority, but then again we are a church in San Francisco.

While the people in San Francisco are fighting over how "really democrat and progrssive" are you, Strong Green challenge in San Francisco worries Democrats, The NY Times is reporting today that Shifts in States May Give Bush Electoral Edge.

As much as I so detest Tucker Carlson, the man did make a good point on the Chris Matthews Show when he said that if all Howard Dean has to on is his opposition to the Iraq War with no way graceful, diplomatic, pragmatic exit strategy for Iraq which makes sure that the country doesn't turn into another Afghanistan, then the democrats are sunk for 2004 presidential election.

With so many high profile GOP wins, like Bush getting his medicare bill to pass the congress and the senate and Arnie fulfilling on his two campaign promises of repealing the vehicle license fee hike and giving illegal aliens driver's licenses, what is the democrat strategy to take back the white house, the congress, the senate and the states?

Honestly, it makes me think that the democrats and the greens like that the repuplicans control the white house, the congress, the senate, and most of the governorships and state legislative bodies including the oh so left state of the Cali Republic, because if the GOP wasn't in control, what the hell would there be to protest about?

The Greens are supposed to be protesting Al Gore today, the champion of the environmental movement which I thought the Greens were supposed to represent, so maybe there's your answer. If we can't protest the opposition, we'll protest against the people who think like us. There's a really bright idea for you.

I heard Bill Press say that only in San Francisco would there people be fighting over Al Gore.

Protests are good for something. If it weren't for protests, where would progressive guys pick up chicks and get their voices in the media?

Here's something interesting.

From the CDC website, INFLUENZA SUMMARY UPDATE - Week ending November 22, 2003-Week 47

The flu is all over the world with children dying from the flu in Colorado, England and Scotland.

So there I was traipsing around downtown San Francisco the day after Thanksiving wearing a gray and white striped knee length dress, creme white tights and black Mary Jane flats, when I hear a group of tourist chicks say in back of me "look there's a miniskirt".

For whatever reason, their remark made me very self conscious. My self consciousness about my mode of dress was made even worse when I started watching the TLC show "What Not to Wear", and they started ranting about women wearing white tights and what a fashion faux pas it was.

So naturally like any good researcher, I typed "how to wear opaque white tights" into google and found all these web pages saying the "mod" look is in, and that short miniskirts and opaque tights with mary jane flats were the outfit du jour for anyone wanting to achieve the "mod" look.

Minis on the Move

The Mini is here to Stay

The Mod Squad

I love wearing white tights. It reminds me of being a little girl, and it reminds me of mod girls from the 60's. Okay, so what if they make my looks pasty white and like white fat logs, I like wearing white tights.

Tights are the perfect thing with a short skirt or a short dress. Somehow the dress doesn't seem so short if you're wearing opaque tights, because it's not like you're showing any skin.

I never wear skin coloured hose or tights. The few times I've worn them with a short skirt, I received too many annoying looks, comments and wolf whistles. What a bother! Better to wear ugly white tights than to have some icky man oggle your legs in public.

And I do love wearing a miniskirt, and god only knows you can never have enough black miniskirts in your closet. But as a gesture to the folks at "What not to Wear", I'm going to exchange the two pairs of new white tights I bought last week with a pair of grey and navy ones. I need gray ones to go with the gray and white striped minidress, and I need navy ones to go with the two knee length navy and blue dresses I just ordered.

All the astrology sites are saying, that as an Aquarian I should be glad that the planet Uranus is finally moving out of my sign after being there since 1995. Uranus, being the planet of change, causes many upheavals in one's life and it sure did in mine.

Let's see.

I'm on my second car, after swearing in my youth that I would never own one because it was bad for the environment. (that inner hippie was raging in my 20's)

I changed jobs 3 times.

I moved into a bigger place, and I'm paying about twice as much rent.

Four people very near and dear to me died; Amy, Paul, Reid, and Grandma.

I decided I needed to find a creative outlet, and I went from acting to writing. I performed in one play, did a couple of solo performances, wrote a couple of screenplays, started 3 novels and hopefully will finish one this month, and finished 24 short stories.

And then there's this bloggie of mine.

The astrology sites say that Aquarians can relax because Uranus will now be the sign of Pisces for seven+ years.

But guess what. My rising/ascendant sign is Pisces, so I think the next seven or so years will be just as eventful. And what's worse, Uranus will now be in my second house of Finance. Like I really need upheavals where money is concerned.

So doing the Nanowrimo got me into such a writing mood, I sent an email to the Turkish Embassy in DC and expressed my regret for the terrorist bombing in Istanbul. I wanted to send the email directly to t5he country of Turkey, but I couldn't figure out where it needed to go.

Here's the email I received back:

From: Turkish Embassy [mailto:turkish@erols.com]
Sent: Monday, December 01, 2003 8:09 AM
To: 'Brenda Elfgirl'
Subject: RE: Expression of Sadness

Dear Ms. Elfgirl,

Thank you for your kind concern in the wake of the acts of terror in Istanbul that took the lives of over 50 innocent persons and wounded 750 more. Your reaching out to our Embassy and thus to the Turkish people at this trying hour is greatly appreciated. The scourge of terror can only be defeated through the joint effort of all nations.

Sincerely,
O. Faruk Logoglu
Ambassador

-----Original Message-----
From: Brenda Elfgirl
Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2003 4:30 PM
To: info@turkey.org
Subject: Expression of Sadness

I just wanted to express my sadness that the country of Turkey was the victim of a terrorist attack last week.

I think Turkey is a exemplary model of a modern Muslim democratic state, and it's horrible to think that there are people out there who are willing to destroy it.

At some point, as much as I love it, politics bores the heck out of me. All that media hype, all that meaningless mudslinging by the candidates, and sloppy journalist reporting is just boring.

That's when I turn off the new stalk radio programs and listen to sports talk radio programs. Sports is always interesting and always changing.

Okay, the 49ers and the Raiders are each sucking the big ones right now. But there's the NFL football playoffs to think about, the college bowl games and the mysterious thing called baseball transactions in the off season.

Curt Schilling, that fantastic pitcher from the Arizona Diamondbacks, was traded to Boston after the Yankees came sniffing.

Oakland traded away Terrence Long and Ramon Hernandez to the Padres.

I just finished reading The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield. Screenwriting marina hottie boy told me last year that the book was modelled on the Bhagavad Gita, so I decided to read it.

It's a golf book, and I don't do golf, but I loved the book! The author mentioned that Vance came from Mu, which is Lemuria and I was so floored. I'm setting my elf stories in Lemuria, and I was so freaked that another writer actually used the name in a book. Lemuria, according to the legends, was the mythical land and civilization before the fabled kingdom of Atlantis.

I've been reading the Bhagavad Gita off and on since I was 13 years old, and it was so fun to read this philosophical tract in a fictional book. I haven't read the Gita in ages, and it makes me want to read it again along with the Mahabharata and the Ramayana.

Pressfield apparently wrote a couple of other books on war, and I want to read those as well. On Amazon.com, some of the reviewers mentioned another book called "Golf in the Kingdom" by Michael Murphy and now I want to read this book too.