go_team

Happy Birthday, pants_of_doom! I am wearing The Devil's Pants, but it was totally an accident until a few seconds ago, when I decided it was clearly my brain's way of honoring your birthday.

So yesterday, because I am insane, I got up at 6 AM to wake up theshytiger so we could drive pants_of_doom to the Portland airport, then drove back home, got changed, and rode my bike to work for about 9 hours. In my professional opinion, the nooner shift (from anywhere between 11 AM and 12 PM until far too late) can suck it. The 2 PM till far too late is okay, though, which is weird, but whatever. It probably would've been less sucky if I hadn't been so damn tired, but still. ( Being tired makes me a danger to myself and others, but mostly myself. If you don't want to read about my various and sundry work-related injuries and in particular if you hate reading about blood, skip this section. )

nedthealpaca

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Today I am resting and being nice to myself and pondering the chocolate cheesecake recipe in The Vegetarian Epicure, Book Two, which Penny insisted I buy when we were at Smith Family earlier in the week (I also got The Vegetarian Epicure and The Door in the Hedge by Robin McKinley). I'll probably do laundry at some point, since my sock and underwear drawers are both pretty empty, BUT most importantly of all, ( I'm going to fill out an application to cook for Sundance Natural Foods! I'm so excited! )

If y'all haven't read pants_of_doom's National Coming Out Week wish list, go do so now. It's good stuff. On a similar note, here's a link to the discussion that ensued when I posted grumbling about President Bush's announcement that federal government lawyers are working to legally define marriage as a union between a man and a woman (because apparently it's not enough that states keep passing laws that say the same thing, and the Defense of Marriage Act says it's okay for states to disregard each other's laws concerning same-sex marriage --- this has to be a federal issue, too... but I digress). It was a good discussion, I thought, but it made clear to me that a lot of people don't know very much about the legal issues surrounding marriage and domestic partnership and such. Since this is kind of a hot-button issue for me, I'm full of fun facts about it, and I figured hey, why not share? To start off, here's something I wrote to someone who thought I was common-law married because Peter and I are registered as domestic partners with his grad student union, so I can get cheaper health insurance.

By the way, October 11 is National Coming Out Day, and this year the Human Rights Campaign is encouraging people to come out in favor of same-sex civil marriage rights (as distinct from religious marriage/commitment ceremonies, which are available to everyone, though not from all religious denominations, and either way don't confer legal benefits). I think this is a good idea, although it sort of misses the point that marriage as an institution has other problems besides the fact that it discriminates against same-sex couples. I'll post about that later, but for now this post is long enough.

Update, 18:36: Ok, it was long enough, but I want to remind myself that I also want to write about the Bush Administration's Marriage Protection Week bullshit (timed to coincide with National Coming Out Week, no less), and maybe post links to resources like the Alternatives to Marriage Project (probably my primary source of information on this issue), so anybody interested in learning more can do so. Am I forgetting anything important? If so, please leave a comment. coldtortuga, I remember you were curious about my personal views on marriage; these posts should help make them clearer but I could write something to address that point in particular...

...and because there's sweet, sweet free Internet in the lobby of the Phoenix Inn Suites in Wilsonville, where most of the olstad wedding guests hung out and Peter and I were able to crash last night, this is to let y'all know that Peter and pants_of_doom and I are heading into Portland soon, for breakfast and as much trouble as we can make before Penny has to catch a plane home around noonish. We tried to call friendly Stumptowners for hangy-outy goodness, but nobody picked up the phone (I know, I know, it's early by normal people weekend standards). Oh well. We'll have to see you next weekend for chocolatesmudge and nedthealpaca's housewarming party and Pirates of the Caribbean and suchforth. Yo ho ho, and a bottle of rum, even though I didn't actually get to booze up as planned last night (weddings make me twitchy).