Friends, Macs and Moore

Despite the disturbing lack of clarity in that mushy grey matter between my ears lately, I thought it necessary to give my fingers a keyboard workout today. It was fucking glorious to have my three oldest, dearest friends brave a 22-seat propeller plane hop from San Francisco to spend a wonderful, silly weekend with me, exploring my newly-adopted environs. Much belly-laughing emanated from within my living room as we perused--with occasional face-reddening--the aging evidence culled from 20 years of friendship, lingering over old cards, letters, yearbooks and (aack!) photos. So much has changed, but refreshingly, so much hasn't changed, at least with respect to the dynamic of our friendships.

Aside from Sunday morning's torrential downpour and "Oh shit, your cat's making me wheeze" issues, I'm happy to say my friends escaped a weekend in Humboldt County relatively unscathed. Here's hoping they'll soon return for another round of Bon Boniere, redwood trails and revisiting our mid-80s heyday to the tune of hysterical, 30-something, estrogen-laden laughter.

In other news, after days of impatient head-scratching, I am semi-functional on my new iBook. Yes, thanks to Aviva, I have quite eagerly re-enlisted in the Cult of Mac (my last foray being my 1995 acquisition of fabulous Performa 405 complete with state-of-the-art Simpsons sound effects). Not that my two-year-old Compaq Presario caused any major headaches. On the contrary, it was a fine machine that only occasionally elicited the fits of frustration inherent with Windows' unpredictability. So, said Compaq is now in the capable hands of a dreadlocked 20-something skateboard-wear designer who paid cash for it and will no doubt use it to spread his sunny skateboard gospel to impressionable youth everywhere.

Speaking of spreading gospel, I was pleased to hear Michael Moore on NPR's Fresh Air this afternoon, reminding listeners he is a registered Republican who has never met John Kerry nor openly supports the Senator or the Democratic Party. I think this is important, in the wake of Republicans everywhere scrambling to label Moore a lackey for the Dems or, worse yet, illegally trying to swing the election to Kerry's favor. No matter how irritating or invasive Moore's style of filmmaking, people need to realize that his role as propogandist is not intended necessarily to benefit the Democrats, but merely to emphasize the misdeeds of our current mis-administration. His attempts to bring truths to the surface (truths no one can dispute, otherwise the GOP would have spent millions polluting our courts with Fahrenheit 9/11-related lawsuits) can hardly be compared with illegal actions such as, say, GOP election tampering.

Two all-important weeks left, folks. I'll admit I'm entirely too anxious about this election; my body's reaction to reading the daily news manifests itself in that bizarre, fidgety feeling like I constantly have to pee, though I really don't. Come election night, I plan to rely heavily on cocktails or other chemical assistance to guide me through what will no doubt be a nail-biter down to the final minutes before the outcome is officially announced (with any luck that night and not weeks later, after the Supreme Court gives in to GOP threats and declares Bush the winner again despite his having not actually won). Oops... did I say that out loud?

Posted by ayelet at October 18, 2004 02:07 PM