Don't forget to VOTE!

It's your right as a citizen of these United States of America (or divided states, if you choose) that when you reach your 18th year and you have filed the one page paper to register, you go vote. We live in a nation where the leaders have turned their backs on the importance of taking care of our people at home. We are fighting in an unpopular war that was started under false guises to topple the recently convicted Saddam Hussein in order to make ourselves feel safer. What can we do about it? We can take the steps to get off our duffs and go down to the local voting precinct and cast a vote for change. You can cast your vote to keep things status quo too, that is your right. I am a blue person in a red state (yes, that means I am a Democrat in a stat that is normally Republican). We have issues on our ballot this year that ask us weather or not to deny someone rights. One issue is for the right for two gay people to considered themselves "married" with all the benefits and drawbacks that come with that term. Traditionalists have come out in droves to say that this should be denied because they believe that the only way to be married is to have a man and a woman. I am a believer that all folks of any coupling (men and men, women and women or men and women) should be allowed to be married if they go to the courthouse and pay their dues just like everyone else. What is the big deal? Wake up to the real world folks! This isn't asking you to agree with what others do, that is their business. Why would we as folks who fight for the freedoms we have every day, deny these rights to someone within our own nation? People have long come to our country for a new start, the freedom of religion, choice and the pursuit of happiness. What is happy about not living the way we would like? Do you like being able to stay with your loved ones in the hospital and to help make choices for them if needed? Do you like being able to keep them insured and beneficiaries of your hard work when you are no longer able to carry on? Why then would we take these freedoms from folks who live an alternative life style? We are so blinded by wanting to take away these rights of folks who deserve them, we take up the time we should be using to fight poverty, better the education system and bring affordable housing to the people. We still have people who are starving in our own country.
Do yourself a favor and take a stand, it's your right and your job. Use your voice to affect the world or you are only part of the problem that we allow to continue in the status quo by staying silent.

Rough Week

The last week has been pretty tough on us as a family. We knew that the end was coming soon for our kitty Ashes, but it came too fast. We had to put her down on Thursday morning and it has hit us all in different ways, but to be expected. It took me a long time to win over the heart of this kitty, she and I hissed at each other for almost a year before I was accepted. After that though, she spent a lot of her time snuggled up over one of my shoulders or on my lap at night. It's still weird not to find her waiting for me each night. She helped me get through the days when I was stuck at the house alone, always sending out a meow to show that she was still there and she was also seeking to see if anyone else was around. We found a spot just outside the house to bury her so we will always know where she is.
On top of the hard week, it was pager week for me so we couldn't really go any place over the weekend. I finished a second book in two weeks, first I finished Angels and Demons, then I finished The Davinci Code. Both books are written by Dan Brown. Always fun to read a controversial book but the links between Paganism and Christianity really come forward in these two books. Even if you are devout to the Christian part, I think that they make a good read for the mystery and travel to some of the places they go to. I need to choose my next book. I have another Dan Brown book, but I think I may go back and finish Eragon before the movie comes out in December. Morgan's Harry Potter Club is renting a theater for us to go and see it. It's another long one and the family gets concerned when I get lost in my books, I guess it's an uncommon thing. Different for me because it's a good fiction book instead of a technical manual. A good escape nevertheless...