Adventures of a Maude in Training

S. is sick with some sinus thing and I was up with him until 4:30 this morning. Thankfully he finally slept and stayed asleep until 11:30. He cannot breathe when he is lying down so he doesn't want to sleep. Poor guy.

I have officially hit the final-weeks-of-pregnancy-wall. I am so tired I don't want to do anything. Seriously. Unfortunately we have a whole lot of stuff to get done. Just putting one foot in front of the other.

ptor has an in-person interview today and another (at a different company) tomorrow. We are hoping something comes of either or both of them. However, now that we are so close to Baby Pickle showing up it is not great timing, but we need the income so we will do whatever we need to do. I am very disheartened that Adobe is laying off 680 employees, Applied Materials 1,300-1,500, and EA is cutting 1,500. These are all huge tech employers in the Bay Area and that is a whole more jobs just gone. Not to mention Sun's recent massive downsizing and the impending NUMMI plant closure which will eliminate nearly 5,000 jobs at NUMMI alone, not to mention the tens of thousands that will be affected by the plant's closure.

The weather is finally sorta kinda changing around here. No longer feels like the end of summer.

I am jamming away on a baby blanket for the baby, and also need to get a hat done for my nephew and for S. We also need to take care of holiday gift shopping very soon. I'll put it on the list.

The political climate continues to distress and depress me. The Stupak Amendment to the health care reform bill is just one glaring example of why. It is clearly the goal of far too many to restrict access to abortion to a level which would effectively make it illegal once again. It's just wrong and tragic.

And with that I should go fix S. the blackberries he has requested and convince him that we need to rest today because he is SICK!!!!

Really.

This is just straight-up crazy, fucked-up, bullshit. The presence of confederate flags, blatant racism, and total disrespect for what actually happened under the Nazi regime just makes it all even more infuriating. Of course, every single person in those photos is white, white, white. It is all just appalling.

The ignorance just burns.

Aside from being disgusted that Prop 8 is even on the ballot, I am further disgusted at the "Yes on 8" television ads. In particular, I am disgusted by the one that basically tells us if Prop 8 gets passed then our precious children will learn about same-sex marriage in school and this is WRONG and EVIL and BAD. I hope my children grow up in a world with schools where children do indeed learn that men can marry men and women can marry women. It makes me sad and disgusted that anyone hopes otherwise and wants to make sure that my children are taught that same-sex relationships as less than opposite-sex pairings.

Bleah.

I am also horrified that we have another fucking parental notification proposition on the ballot. Fuck. That is just bad news for so many girls if that gets passed.

I am trying not to get too over-depressed about this election but what I am seeing depresses, disgusts and horrifies me. Everything from these propositions and the rhetoric I hear people using to defend them, to the frightening amount of racism I see surrounding the presidential race. I am so sickened by the Obama=Arab=Muslim=TERRORIST bullshit that I see flying all over McCain's campaign. I have no words to even describe how it makes me feel to see people using Obama's name (and, let's face it, his skin color) to "prove" he is an evil terrorist. Actually, it is the evil "other" they are afraid of and the racist underbelly of this country is revealing itself with vigor and a despicable amount of pride these days. I am scared for all of us right now. It is no great nation when so many of its proud inhabitants, and leaders, cannot even parse the basics of what Arab and Muslim actually are and mean and have no shame in vilifying same. It is no great nation that discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation. It is rather a sad and backwards place, where "San Francisco" is still used as code for "place where the scary gays with AIDS live" and racism is embraced as patriotism. I knew things were bad, but I didn't realize just how bad until the past few months.

I have nothing pithy to say about it. It just scares me and I fear for our future, and I am not even talking about the economy which is fucking scary in its own right. I really will cry if McCain wins and/or Prop 8 passes as more than what they immediately indicate, it is a sign of worse things to come.

Best-selling author and columnist Molly Ivins, the sharp-witted liberal who skewered the political establishment and referred to President Bush as "Shrub," died Wednesday after a long battle with breast cancer. She was 62.

::sigh::

Molly Ivins wrote a great piece about the abortion ban in South Dakota:

South Dakota is so rarely found on the leading edge of the far out, the wiggy, the California-esque. But it has now staked its claim. First to Outlaw Abortion This Century. The state legislature of South Dakota, in all its wisdom and majesty, a legislature comprised of sons and daughters of the soil from Aberdeen to Zell, have usurped the right of the women of that state to decide whether or not to bear the child of an unwanted pregnancy. THEY will decide. Women will do what they decide.
...
But who is she to make that choice when [Senator] Bill Napoli can make it for her? He explains: "When I was growing up here in the wild west, if a young man got a girl pregnant out of wedlock, they got married, and the whole darned neighborhood was involved in that wedding. I mean, you just didn't allow that sort of thing to happen, you know? I mean, they wanted that child to be brought up in a home with two parents, you know, that whole story. And so I happen to believe that can happen again. ... I don't think we're so far beyond that, that we can't go back to that."

I find this so profound I am considering putting Sen. Napoli in charge of all moral, ethical and medical decisions made by women.
...
In South Dakota, pharmacists can refuse to fill a prescription for contraceptives should it trouble their conscience, and some groups who worked on the anti-abortion bill believe contraception also needs to be outlawed. Good plan. After that, we'll reconsider women's property rights, civil right and voting rights.

Full text at the link.

It is very frightening where all this may be headed.

I am going to thwrap the next person who tells me the US is so damned spiffy and free.

Just last week abortion became a felony in South Dakota. Think you are safe because you don't live in South Dakota? Think again. If it can happen there, we are all at risk.

And don't get me started on the fact that same sex marriage is legal in that bastion of the Catholic faith, Spain, but gay people in Florida cannot adopt children, let along get married there or in any other state in the good 'ol US of A expect Massachusetts.

And then there is the institution today of the FDA's Accutane registry, iPledge. Among other things, iPledge requires the following:

"As part of the ongoing risk management of isotretinoin products, it is crucial that a female of childbearing potential selects and commits to use two forms of effective contraception simultaneously for one month before, during, and for one month after isotretinoin therapy. She must have 2 negative urine or blood (serum) pregnancy tests with a sensitivity of at least 25 mIU/ml before receiving the initial isotretinoin prescription. The first pregnancy test is a screening test and can be conducted in the prescriber's office. The second pregnancy test must be done in a CLIA-certified laboratory according to the package insert. Each month of therapy, the patient must have a negative result from a urine or blood (serum) pregnancy test conducted by a CLIA-certified laboratory prior to receiving each prescription.

Each month, the prescriber must enter the female patient's pregnancy results and the 2 forms of contraception she has been using in the iPLEDGE system. The iPLEDGE system verifies that all criteria have been met by the prescriber, patient, and pharmacy prior to granting the pharmacy authorization to fill and dispense isotretinoin. The pharmacist must obtain authorization from the iPLEDGE system via the program web site or phone system prior to dispensing each isotretinoin prescription for both male and female patients."

I do not even know what to say except that this is one of the most disgusting invasions of privacy I have yet to see. I'm suprised they didn't find a way to justify this under the Patriot Act.