The Who Are You and What Are You Doing To My Country? Playlist

Me: Mosquito-bitten, farmer-tanned, sleep-deprived. The usual summer state, except it is too early for a beer.

You?

Oh, and for the record, Bong Hits for Jesus.

Had a very fun and outraged political discussion last night and began assembling a mix CD. Haven't posted one in a while, so with little else to talk about, and even less time to post it, here it is, the "Who Are You And What Are You Doing to My Country?" playlist:

1. State of the Union, by the Cloud Cult
   
2. Memorial Day, by The Perceptionists
3. Rich Man's War, by Steve Earle
4. Television, the Drug of the Nation, by the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
5. New World Order, by Ministry
6. Gas Chamber, by L7
7. American Idiot, by Green Day
8. Life Music, Fakts One
9. Orange Alert, by the Briefs
10. Fight the Power, Public Enemy
11. Youth Against Fascism, Sonic Youth
12. The World's Gone Mad, Handsome Boy Modeling School
13. It's a Hit, Rilo Kiley
14. Burn One Down, Ben Harper
15. Bulls on Parade, Rage Against the Machine
16. Men of Worth, Mary Black (brilliant bit of back story on this one)¹
    
17. Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore, John Prine
    

Suggestions? A few up there are pretty obvious, although I'm quite proud of managing to include songs sampling both Dubya and Dubya's Daddy (#1 and #5) on one mix CD. Thought about including some Ani Difranco or some other relevant artist, but again, sleep deprived.

¹"The Archie Fisher-penned "Men Of Worth" has an interesting background. As the liner notes indicate, it was originally composed for a BBC program celebrating the new oil economy but was rejected due its ambivalent message of questioning the wisdom of trading a way of life for easy company money." http://www.rambles.net/black_song.html

Bong Hits For Jesus

Bong hits for Jesus.
Bong hits for Jesus?
Bong hits for Jesus!
Bong.
Hits.
For.
Jesus.
B.
O.
N.
G.
H.
I.
T.
S.
F.
O.
R.
J.
E.
S.
U.
S.

Probably at least six people decided to engage in illegal drug use because I typed that and it passed before their eyeballs. The mere display of such a phrase, by virtue of its insidious power, is a threat to mom, kittens, and the future return of red salmon at Chitina.

Insane Summer Road Trip #1: Ninilchik for Razor Clams

Myself, the S.O., two dogs and a coworker will pile into the Soob on a mad dash (after work) tomorrow to the Kenai Peninsula for one of my favorite summer hunting/gatherings activities: digging razor clams.

And what's a mere 600 miles, anyway?

Digging clams beats fishing for a number of reasons, mostly because they are a heck of a lot easier to get and require nothing more than an enthusiasm for playing in the mud and a clam shovel.

It's been a bit tough to post lately, what with the 1.5 job thing. But a synopsis of all the posts I'm not writing:

The world continues to flumox, amuse and depress, does it not? At the CabinDwelling Compound, beer has served as a remedy of sorts on several occasions. There was the 'Someone Gave us Half a Half Barrel of Silver Gulch' celebration, followed by the 'We Still Didn't Manage to Finish Off The Keg Somebody Gave Us' get together, followed by the 'Significant Other's Birthday' fete.

Besides beer drinking, numerous attempts have been made at the Chicken Coop to Be site. (Attempts made without beer involved for safety reasons.) It's a fixer upper project which means that we'll spend more time fixing it than would be required to just build a damned new one. If we were sensible, we'd just knock the whole thing down and start from scratch. I planned to just nail a few pieces of scrap wood here and there to the frame to make it stable enough to hold press plates and chicken wire. (And keep the birds in. And not collapse on them and kill them before we do.)

Thanks to the delays, (and there are always delays in construction, whether it is half-assed construction like I practice, or the professional kind) - it is getting late to get chicks. After all the talk of our planned Great Chicken Massacre of 2007 - it turns out we might not actually raise them.

The S.O. has suggested a substitute for chickens: Rabbits. I believe I agreed sometime around 1 a.m. to the idea and now face the possibility that we will be killing bunnies this fall. I'll cook rabbit, but I'm not killing any. And yes, there is a story behind that.

But must run off, have to pack up the Soob for two frenetic days of digging razor clams and trying to find a place to fish not entirely overrun by tourists.

Photo above found at http://wdfw.wa.gov.

Suddenly, Everyone is Paying Attention to the Money

Over at Alaskan Abroad, and at the ADN, there is the news that investigators are now looking at contributions to Uncle Ted and Don Young, a.k.a. That Bozo We Keep Inflicting on Ourselves.

Oh, go read the coverage, no need for me to summarize their stuff. Even the big dogs are on the story at the New York Times.

After reading about the latest possible scandal, I took a look at their finances as outlined at open.secrets.org (links over at the right.) How fascinating. For the time period reported, only 23.9 percent of Young's money comes from Alaska. 76.1 percent comes from Outside.

Why Knowles Lost: It Wasn't Just the Anemic Campaign

As part of Job 1.0 today, I met the Governor. And I can now report with certainty why she, not Tony Knowles, is our governor:

Men, even liberal, enlightened types, will vote for a pretty woman over another dude even if said woman is a Republican. The comments I heard from the dudes around the Job 1.0 workplace, on hearing that I would meet/had met Palin amounted to: "Ooh. Palin. Give her a big kiss for me," and "Oooh. Palin." I pointed out that:

1. Planting one on Palin would not be the best publicity for Job 1.0
2. She's not really my type

... but they were probably already too lost in typical male fantasizing about that sort of thing to really notice.

Even the woman present at Job 1.0 suggested we have bumperstickers printed that say, "Our Governor is hotter than your Governor."

Even Ish over at KoKon has a case of Governor Lust.

It was with some dismay that I realized that the Republicans merely need to keep running attractive women for governor and we will never elect another Democrat unless they find a more attractive one to run against her.

Tomorrow: chicken coop update. Maybe. Photos. Maybe. If I ever finish the damned thing.