Happy Leap Year!!

Look what we found sitting on our back fence a couple Saturday's ago!



Brigham and his "Potato Volcano" with corn lava.




Mosey trying to entertain himself with tape, while cooped up at home with me all day.




The cool Solumedrol delivery system. The medicine is in this sort of balloon type thing inside the container (a little hard to see), and kind of squeezes the medicine out as it deflates. Much more convenient that lugging around an IV pole!!




Yes, our tortoise actually eats! He is so clandestine in his eating, we've never actually seen him do it! We've seen him drinking water, and he's stayed alive for 2 months, so we figured he must be eating, although not much. There's always plenty left over in his food dish that just gets dried out under the heat lamp. But yesterday he ate CARROTS! Tons of them! Right out of our hands!!


Happy Leap Year everyone!!

Warning, long somewhat venting message enclosed. Feel free to skim.

So I called my doctor and got started back on a 5-day course of Solumedrol on Wednesday. Just from home, thank goodness. Today is day 3, and I'm already seeing improvement, so that is good. The nurse put the IV in my hand this time which is a lot easier to handle than in my forearm, for some reason, although a little more painful during the infusion. I'm actually up walking about the house a little, so maybe we can put the wheelchair back in the garage for a while!

Joseph was VIP for his class this week! It has been fun for him. We made a poster with a bunch of pictures of him growing up, and some of his favorite things (pets, vacations, family, etc.). He helped me pick out the pictures and then I stayed way up way too late matting the pictures and laying them out. But it looked nice. He could bring in things all this week, so one day we made mini blueberry muffins (blueberries are his favorite fruit), one day he brought in some of the Harry Potter audio CD's, and today he got to do an experiment in class. I was worried the school had a no-homemade-food policy (like our last school), but I included a list of ingredients, and it was fine. We made one batch with a mix, but even though I followed the instructions exactly for mini muffins, and even took them out of the oven 2 minutes earlier than the minimum time stated on the box, they still burned. Ugh. So I ended up making a batch from scratch with frozen blueberries, and they were soooo much better. I'll never bother using a box for muffins again, these were so much better, and not much harder.

Joseph decided to do "Mayow's Experiment" showing how the air is composed of 20% water. You secure a candle to the bottom of a glass pie dish (just melted it on with some wax), and then fill up the pie dish partway with colored water (easier to see with colored water). Then light the candle, and carefully lower a glass jar or cup over the candle. It will burn for a few seconds until all the oxygen is consumed, and then it will go out. Water is then drawn up into the glass, equal to the volume of oxygen that had been consumed. It is pretty cool, and the kids really enjoyed seeing it. Joseph was able to explain it pretty well, and invited his classmates up 5 at a time to see the experiment closely.

I worry a little that I've embarrassed Joseph. I've gone into his classroom a few times with my cane, and invariably a couple of kids will ask what's wrong. I'm just tell them my legs don't work very well and I use a cane to keep my balance and help me walk. Well today I came in with my cane AND with an IV sticking out of my hand. I could hear little voices saying, "Look at her hand!" and "Oh wow, she has another owie, she broke her hand!" I debated telling the whole class before we started the experiment that I was getting medicine through and IV in my hand to help my legs, just to defuse all the conjecture, but it felt awkward, so we just went on with the experiment. One little girl did ask me what it was, and I told her it was for getting medicine to help with my legs. I figure Joseph is pretty equipped to explain to his friends what is going on. But now I'm second-guessing myself. Poor Joseph; 6 years old is pretty young to have to explain stuff like that to kids that find anything "different" a potential point for mockery. Maybe I'll email his teacher and ask if any of the kids seemed worried about it, and then tell her to feel free to tell the class it was just an IV for getting medicine. Or maybe I'm making much ado about nothing.

Joseph made me laugh a couple days ago. He was playing with his tortoise, talking to it and pretending to be some sort of larger scary animal. He said in this growly, scary voice, "Friendly! I am a CREDITOR, and I'm coming to eat you up!!!" I had to laugh at that word choice!! Sadly appropriate.

Mosey made me laugh, too. A few days ago we were in the backyard, and he had poured some water on the cement patio. As he was watching it evaporate in the sun, he said, "Look, mom, the water is disapparating!" Think we've been listening to a bit too much Harry Potter around here?!

Ben's car started acting up again this week. It had been stalling on him a few weeks ago, so he took it in to get the fuel filter changed, and the transmission fluid replaced, and it seemed good as new. Then it started doing the same thing, and failing to downshift, and some other stuff. So he was thinking maybe the Sonata is reaching it's lifespan (almost 10 years old, 150,000 miles on it), and he started researching a replacement car. He took it in to be diagnosed, and it turned out only to be a faulty sensor that was replaced for $170. Phew!! I think Ben might be secretly a tad bit disappointed, but I'm relieved. That Sonata has given us so little trouble, it has been amazing. What a great car. It definitely looks 10 years old, and like it's survived 3 little kids, but it's been so reliable and cheap to maintain.

Ok, now a confession and then I'll try to end on a positive note. Tuesday, Mosey and I went to Walmart for a short grocery run. Tuesday was a very bad day for my legs. Just getting from the handicapped spot into the entrance of Walmart where the ride-on carts are kept was a colossal effort. It's hard to describe how it feels to try to walk when you feel like your legs weigh 150 lbs each and you can only move them by swinging them from your hips. It is so incredibly difficult and scary just getting across the parking lot road. And then the shopping trip, getting Mosey on and off my lap to get things for me, trying to get the groceries into my car (Walmart is cheap, and you get what you pay for in terms of service), then attempting to get the groceries from the car into the house. Simple tasks you take for granted take on these enormous proportions. The main reason we went was because we were out of lunch meat, which is a staple for Mosey around here, since he asks for a "meat and cheese sandwich" at least once, maybe twice a day. Well, I managed to get the groceries into the house, but then I absolutely could not walk another step, so they stayed on the counter for a while. Long enough for Mister to smell the meat, grab the package, take it outside, rip it open, and eat about half of it. The boys saw him outside with it, and I just freaked out. I really just totally flipped. I HATE IT WHEN MISTER STEALS FOOD FROM THE COUNTER AND TABLE. And he knows it. He'll never do it unless he thinks we're not looking. It makes me so furious, unreasonably so. But this time was the straw that broke the camel's back. It wasn't just the meat or the money (only $3 or something), it was mostly just what the meat represented. All the enormous effort and energy expenditure and a whole morning and entire day's worth of energy totally wasted in about 30 seconds. And it meant I'd have to undertake another colossally difficult excursion to replace it. I was so mad, I dragged myself onto the back patio and just screamed at him. He came over, his tail between his legs, his head down, the picture of shame, but I just screamed and screamed at him and hit him really hard once on the back. Then I realized I was out of control and really being a horrible, scary example to my kids, so I went inside and tried to calm down. It scared me. It was scary to see how much rage could come out, that I didn't even know was there. I tried to stay calm for the rest of the afternoon, but inside I was still seething with frustration. Not just at Mister, but at everything. The house was messy, not overly so, it would normally take me maybe 10 minutes to pick up, but for me at that time, I wouldn't have even been able to pick it up in 10 hours. The boys are so good about helping out, but even having them help is just so difficult. It is so hard to explain to them exactly what they need to do, exactly where things go. It takes so long and makes me and them so frustrated. So I waited until Ben got home and then told him I was at my breaking point. He told me to go lie down and read a book and he'd take care of things, which he did.

Thankfully the next day I started on my Solumedrol, so I should start to feel a lot more in control over the next couple of weeks. It just makes me realize how very much I hope this transplant will work. It is hard to really imagine living the rest of my life with that level of frustration and feelings of loss of control.

And it really cemented in my mind the fact that my standards of house-cleaning are not really dependent on the actual state of the house, but on how much effort I anticipate it taking me to clean it up. Before MS, my standards were way lower, because I knew I could get it picked up and cleaned with reasonable time and effort. Now, even a few things out of place is completely intolerable to me, because I just don't know how I'll ever be able to clean it up myself. Weird, huh?

No news from insurance yet. I called and left a message for the transplant nurse at UHC. I hope she calls back on Monday.

The weather here has been nice. Leaves are coming out on the trees, and I saw some trees starting to blossom. It's been a nice, mild winter. The crickets woke up from their hibernation last week and now we can have the windows open at night with the cool breeze and the sound of crickets. Well, some of the windows, anyway. We're still trying to find the screens to some of them! :-)

There's a lot to be happy about. The boys both got their book reports done this month. Joseph had an incredibly good attitude about the book reports, which have sometimes been a bone of contention between us. He was happy and cooperative and good-humored. He made a flag at school (they're studying flags, and each child made their own flag with personal symbols), and he made a rectangle with 5 stars for him and his four best friends. And Brigham was one of them. :-) He only had one difficult day, which was Tuesday (also my difficult day). I finally told him to go upstairs and lie down for a while, which he did at about 5:00 PM, and didn't wake up again until 6:15 the next morning. I think he was tired! He finally seems to be beating this cough that's been wearing him down for several weeks. And he's been such a pleasant, helpful, kind, happy boy the rest of the week. I think about how worried I was about him a year ago, having such a tough transition moving from Florida, and I'm just so proud of how far he's come. He's doing really well in Tae Kwon Do, he's got his Do Son (spelling I'm sure totally mangled) pattern memorized, and is on his way to getting his senior green belt pretty soon. They've been working on "extreme kicks" in the black-belt club, and it's pretty cute and funny to watch them.

Mosey is loving reading. He's on lesson 56 in our reading book (Teach your Child to read in 100 easy lessons), so if the book starts at pre-K level and ends at second grade level, I figure he's at a 1st grade reading level! He's not too far behind his brothers. His teachers are going to kill me when he finally goes to school in 2009. Sorry for the brag there. I know it's annoying. But I do want to record it for posterity's sake, you know! :-) His grandkids are sure to care, a lot. He also made a huge leap this week with drawing and writing. He hasn't been very interested (well, at all interested) in drawing actual things, and then suddenly this week he's drawing cats and flowers and trees and suns and octopuses and all kinds of stuff! And he wrote his first words, sounded out by himself. We read these little stories on the starfall.com website, and after the story there's sometimes these sheets you can print out that ask you to draw pictures and describe what happened after the story. He read a story about a dog, and on the printed sheet he wrote, "Mo Mo" on the top (writing the S really gets him, so Mo Mo is easier for him than Mosey at this point), and at the bottom he wrote, "wut hapind he jumt!" (What happened is he jumped!). I was so proud of him!

Brigham has been a good boy, sweet and helpful. And very talkative! :-) And he is the VIP for his class next week, so it will be fun to work with him on his picture collage and everything else. He brought home his first clay creation from school. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but he's proud of it. And he brought home a very good drawing of an iguana. He also was picked to be the main character in a little class play they are doing! (The Brave Little Tailor). He told me the girl who is playing the Princess, whom he marries at the end, told him they were going to kiss at the end. And then he was quick to assure me that it was only going to be a fake kiss. We had baked potatoes the other night and he made a potato volcano with corn coming out of the top like lava, and then asked me to take a picture of it so he could remember his creation after eating it up. He had class pictures this week, and asked me to cut his hair the day before, and then on the day of, he planned out his outfit-- his nice grey school pants, a short-sleeved button down blue shirt, a very nice coodinating blue tie, and then his suit coat! Boy, did he look spiffy! I told him maybe his teacher would want him to take off his jacket for the class picture, so all the kids would look uniform, but she let him wear it, and he was so proud of himself, he wore that suit jacket all day, even on the playground. They also got individual shots done, and they'll send home the proofs so you can decide if you want to order any. I'm excited to see them. I think Brigham's eagerness to get all dressed up is so endearing. AND, we found his long-lost Sunday shoes (well, Ben found them while cleaning the house after my nervous breakdown on Tuesday), so Brigham is one happy camper.

They are all three such sweet boys, I couldn't be more blessed. And I'm feeling better and calmer and altogether things are looking up!

Moral Dilemmas

This is a quick one since I'm so tired and have to go to bed. (Well, quick for me anyway).

So Brigham got invited to another birthday party, the third one this year, and also the third one held ON SUNDAY!!! I'm so sad. It would have been really REALLY fun for him, too, because it's being held at the InnerSpace Caverns (really neat caves up in Georgetown). He was so excited to get the invitation, he opened it up, saw it was on Sunday, and his eyes just filled up with tears. My heart about broke for him. I held him on my lap and kissed him and told him Heavenly Father was so happy and proud of him for making big sacrifices for keeping the Sabbath Day holy. Grrr. Why does that have to happen to my sweet little guy?!

And here's another moral dilemma (well, the previous wasn't really a dilemma, at least not for us), this one involving Joseph. The elementary school holds a silent auction each year as their big humongous fund raiser. Each class puts together a big basket of stuff (each class comes up with a theme, or at least, the classroom mom does), and the kids all bring in $5 towards the basket. So I just got an email from the classroom mom, with a picture of the basket she put together. Here's what it says on the outside: "TAKE HOME YOUR OWN MARGARITAVILLE CHILL PILL! Just add ice and wash away your worries with: Tequila, Margarita Mix, Shaker, and Salt, Chips, Queso, and Salsa, Pitcher, Glasses, and Napkins. Mrs. Martinez's first grade class."
Hmm, interesting choice of theme for a FIRST GRADE CLASS, isn't it? So I guess I just bought liquor for the first time in my life. At least, sort of. I suppose this isn't really a moral dilemma either, since I already paid my money. I'm not going to raise a stink about it now. I guess that's what I get for not being involved in the PTA.

Mosey got new shoes. I got so sick of the lace-up tennis shoes he has. He takes them off every chance he gets, so I have to put them back on him again several times a day. And when he takes them off, he doesn't know how to undo the double bows, and so the laces end up in big knots that I have to undo before I can get them on him again. So we got some really cool light-up velcro shoes at Walmart.
This morning he was belly-aching about going to preschool ("I'm not GOING to preschool today, mom!"), which he does every once in a while. We went back and forth about it for a few minutes, and then I finally said, "Hey Mosey, you have to go to preschool because you need to show your teacher and your friends your really cool new light-up shoes!" He immediately said, "Ok!" and ran and got his shoes and asked to get dressed right then. It was about 7:45 and he said, "I think it's time to go to school now." I told him school didn't start till 9:00, but we could leave in about an hour. Then he said, "I am going to go into the kitchen and look at the clock and then I'll tell you when it is 9:00." LOL No, he didn't stand there looking at the clock for the next hour and 15 minutes, but it was pretty cute how eager he was to go to school, just for the chance to show off his new shoes. Should I worry that Mosey is getting a bit too vain and materialistic? LOL

I'm calling my doctor tomorrow for steroids for sure. I've been putting it off because I just don't wanna go down that road again. I'm now in the wheelchair 75% of the day, which is very inconvenient, to say the least (I cut all the boys' hair today, including Ben's, and had stay seated and have them sort of maneuver around in front of me. It was really difficult. Cutting hair should not be a workout. But try doing it without being able to move around the person whose hair you are cutting. My back and shoulders are aching).
But I can tolerate inconvenience, and if it were just the walking, I'd probably hold off longer. What I can't tolerate, though, is not being able to drive, and today it was noticeably awkward and difficult to get my foot back and forth from the gas to the brake. Difficult and not too safe. So I'll be getting back on the Solumedrol band wagon I guess. I made it 2 1/2 months this time, so maybe I'll make it to my transplant on this dose. I'll ask Dr. Tallman to give me another tapering dose of Prednisone as well, since I think that did give me 2-3 extra weeks this last time.
I definitely won't be in the hospital, so don't worry. My legs are giving me lots of nonsense, but my breathing is pretty good, so I still feel like I'm doing a lot better than I was at the end of last November. I'll be getting a Hickman Catheter (central line into my chest) for the transplant and all the stuff before-hand, and I kind of wish I could just have it now! It is quite annoying to have an IV sticking out of your arm for 5 days while you're trying to go about your normal daily routine with kids and everything. And last time it clotted up just before my LAST dose, and the home nurse had to come back and start ANOTHER IV just for the last dose. >:-/
Sorry I'm so whiny. Seriously, I do realize how fortunate I am to be able to get treatment when I need it, and I am very grateful.

Ok, off to bed for me.

Obama-nation or Abomination?

Obama-nation or Abomination?

Yeah, I know, I crack myself up. This has probably been "discovered" before, but I just thought of it today and have been chuckling ever since.


In this depressing election cycle, you gotta find laughs where you can, I guess.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

So I had fun making the boys' valentines this year. The only glitch was that my camera decided to go on the fritz after 3 shots of Joseph. I am very bummed about this. I've done everything I can find out about online (I'm getting the dreaded Error 99 code) with no luck, so I think I will have to send it in. Which is a pain because it will be expensive, and I'm wanting to upgrade my camera anyway, and don't really want to put money into this one. But I'm not ready to jump in and buy the upgrade either. What to do??? So I took most of the shots with my point-and-shoot which is not nearly as good. Ugh.
So these first two pictures are what I printed on the front and back of cards to grandparents and cousins.



The boys with their photo-shoot bribes. Brigham had been wearing blue pants to match his brothers, but he really wanted to be dressed in "all red" for Valentine's day, so he changed into his red shorts.




This was the last shot-- finally given permission to dig in!

So for the Valentines to be sent to school, I took pictures of the boys pretending to hold a giant lollipop (I photoshopped in a lollipop so you can see the effect). Then I took an exacto knife and cut slits on the top and bottom of the boys' hands, and slid the stick of a real lollipop between them. I took some pictures (crappy pictures, sorry) of the final product down below.

Front and back of Joseph's card

Front and back of Brigham's card

Front and back of Mosey's card

This is what was printed on the inside. I took a picture of the heart candies to photoshop around the poem.

The final product of Joseph's and Brigham's cards. I forgot to take a picture of Mosey's before he took them to school. They looked like this, though, with the lollipop through his hands. The Kinko's guy had the HARDEST time printing these out. I hope he was new, because it really wasn't that complicated... He gave me about 25 free "mistakes." Next time I'll get these done earlier and have them printed through WHCC. It will save me a bunch of time trimming and stuff, too.

The inside.

The back.

Two boys, very sick with Chocolate fever!


Joseph told me that at school on Thursday his friends told him "Your brother looks scary!" Maybe I overdid the dark circles under Brigham's eyes... He has much fairer skin than Joseph, though, so the dark circles show up a lot more! I kinda think Joseph looks like the scary one in this picture!

Overdue Update

Hi Everyone,
Sorry for the long-overdue update. I'll jump right in I guess.

Last Sunday Mama came out to help me for the week. Ben dropped me off at the airport after church and I rented a car and mama and I drove back. I left for Houston in the rental that evening and stayed in a motel so I could make my 9:00 AM appointment. I met with a bunch of people that day including the hem/oncologist who will be my doctor during the transplant. His name is Dr. Popat and I liked him a lot. He was friendly and explained everything very well and answered all my questions. He did the normal neurological testing again, minus the walking test, and listened to my heart and lungs. I've been told I have a small heart murmur, but he couldn't hear anything at all so he didn't think it would be an issue. I also met with his nurse as well as the nurse assigned specifically to the study patients (just me at the moment), the transplant coordinator, the business/insurance person, and got some blood work done at the lab. It was a busy day with a lot of waiting for appointments. :-)

M.D. Anderson is a pretty amazing place. It is in the middle of this massive medical complex basically right across the street from Rice University. It is like its own little city. There were a ton of patients in on that Monday morning, but things went surprisingly smoothly. When I went down for blood work, the waiting area (a BIG waiting area) was completely full, with people waiting down the hall. But amazingly after I signed in, they called my name within 20 minutes.

The stem cell transplant center is up on the 8th floor, which is also the leukemia floor. It was odd sitting there waiting for my appointment with a bunch of other people also there for pre- and post-transplant appointments. I felt like I didn't really belong there since I don't have cancer. I didn't know how to feel. On the one hand I'm extremely glad I don't have cancer. On the other hand, a great many of those patients will be completely cured of their cancer after their transplants, and can go back to a normal life. I don't know if I'll ever be "cured," or how long I might remain in remission, if I do achieve that. And no matter what, I'm going to be left with some permanent impairment, so that kind of stinks. But mostly it was nice being there moving forward with my best chance at slowing this thing down. And the leukemia floor is not a bad floor to be on. When I first got there and was going up the elevator, a little girl, probably 8 or 9 years old got on the elevator with her grandmother, and pushed the button to the 9th floor which is the spinal and brain cancer floor. She was so cute with her little bald head, and it reminded me forcibly of when Jacob was sick and I felt so jealous of those families whose kids "only" had leukemia. What we wouldn't have given to trade Jacob's cancer for leukemia. She was only one of a few children I saw there that day (patients, anyway), which was good I guess. It's way easier to see adult cancer patients than children.

It was interesting meeting with the business representative. She broke down all the costs for the transplant. It ends up totalling an estimated $204,000. Ouch. Thank goodness for medical insurance!

So anyway, at the end of the day they told me there had been a scheduling glitch and I wasn't scheduled for my heart tests. They told me they'd try to squeeze me in, and they'd call in the morning to let me know. So I went back to the hotel totally beat since I'd had to walk around the hospital quite a bit from appointment to appointment.

In the morning they called me and let me know they scheduled me for the rest of my tests for Friday. Ugh. Too long, obviously, to hang around Houston, so I'd have to go back home and then go back to Houston Thursday night. Oh well, I am just glad I wasn't flying in from out of state!

I drove back to Austin, returned my rental, and rode back home with Ben. Mama of course had everything running like clockwork at home.

Wednesday was nice and relaxing, since Mama pretty much took care of everything! Thursday was Valentines day and the boys had a "Chocolate Fever" day at school, based on the book by the same name. The 1st graders all came to school dressed in PJs and slippers and covered with eye-liner "chocolate fever spots." All day long they had chocolate-themed activities, passed out Valentines, and had a fun day. Mosey and I went to lunch with Ben. Yes, a very romantic Valentine's lunch out with my husband... and four year old. LOL! Actually it was nice, Mosey is a very well-behaved lunch date.

My legs are giving me more and more trouble and Mama got worried about me going to Houston by myself that night, especially since my appointments the next day were on different floors and on opposite ends of the hospital, so we made arrangements for the boys, and drove out to Houston together that night. We have good friends out here who are so willing to step up at a moment's notice.

So we drove back to Houston that night and stayed in a motel for just a few hours before getting up and ready for my 8:00 appointment. We were early which ended up being a good thing, because after my first appointment for the PFT (pulmonary function test), the nurse asked around to see if I could just do my echocardiogram and EKG right then, instead of having to come back at 10:15 and then 1:30. They weren't too busy yet, so I was able to get all 3 tests done right then. After that, all I had to do was more blood work, so by 9:30, I was completely done! Wow! I have never gotten out of doctor's appointments AHEAD of schedule!

I think all my tests went well. It's hard to tell since the technicians pretty much don't tell you anything. The EKG was super-fast, literally only a few seconds, so I assume everything looked good there. I have no idea how to read echocardiograms, but it was pretty interesting to see my heart beating away. The PFT was the most unpleasant test. You have to do all these breathing exercises into this apparatus that measures oxygen input and output. The nurse would tell me to breathe normally, and then tell me to breathe in as hard as I could, and then YELL at me to blow out as hard as I could, and keep trying to exhale for a count of ten. This is hard! She said it would feel like I had blown out all the air, but that I hadn't really. It was physically difficult to keep trying to blow out air once it was all gone, and made me really out of breath. Yeah, I know, wah wah, whine whine. A little violin is playing a sad song just for me. The PFT technician was a little confused as to why I was there. She was filling out my paperwork and asked what my diagnosis was. I told her MS, and she got a confused look on her face and asked why I was here at MD ANderson. I told her I was getting a stem cell transplant here, and so she asked why I was getting the stem cell transplant. I told her for my MS, and she was even more confused. "So you don't have cancer?" No, I don't. I explained briefly that I was in a clinical study, and that MS is an autoimmune disease and how a stem cell transplant can affect autoimmune diseases. I think I'll probably be having that conversation a lot.

SO. All the preliminary testing is done and now everything will be sent to the insurance company for approval. I talked with the transplant nurse from UHC and she looked at my policy and seemed very encouraging that approval would be pretty quick. We shall see.

Mama and I were on the road back to Austin by 10:00 AM, and back in town at 1:00 PM. Very fast trip. Joseph had been sent home from school with a fever (not a chocolate fever, but a real one!), and Ben had to come home from work to pick him up. Poor kid. He perked right up with Tylenol though, and yesterday and today he's been just fine.

Yesterday morning we got up and got ready to go to Dallas. It takes us forever to get ready and out of the house with all the kids and stuff. But we got up to Dallas by around 1:30 and spent the afternoon at the Museum of Nature and Science, which is a nice museum with a good children's section. We saw an IMAX movie and then went out to eat at Carrabas. Mama had to leave before the food came to get ready for her talk at the Eccles study group. Luckly Carrabas has good bread you can pretty much fill up on before your meal ever comes. Ben dropped me off at the Eccles so I could hear mama talk, and then took the boys to our hotel.

Mama's talk was fantastic. She talked about raising a strong family, and used scriptural references to the "house" of the Lord. The Hebrew word for house is the same as the word for family, and it really was fascinating to read all the scriptures about temples and the physical building of temples, substituting the word family for house. She did a great job and we had a good discussion afterward. I guess it was a small crowd (a very COLD and RAINY day in Dallas that day), but I thought it was very respectable. There were probably 10 people there, which is more than I've seen at some of the Miller-Eccles gatherings at our house, and that group has been meeting for years and years and years.

After her talk, mama drove me out to the hotel, which was really far away. Sorry mama! Ben did get an amazingly good deal on the hotel room, though, if that's any consolation (you can find great deals if you're willing to sort of stay anywhere). Probably not much consolation, since mama was staying at the Eccles' house anyway, and, going back, ended up going the wrong direction on the turnpike and drove all the way out to the airport (very far out of town) before realizing her mistake. She didn't get back until after midnight! I feel so bad. Texas is very tricky for a California girl since there are no mountains to which to orient yourself. At night you can easily get yourself turned around 180 degrees without realizing it. And Dallas is weird because you have all these freeways that are not very accurately named. I-35 East actually runs north south, for example. Anyway, she's on her way back here now after speaking at a fireside in Dallas tonight, and I think she is going the right direction now!

So, that is my very long update for the week. I have some cute pictures from Valentine's day, which I shall post above.

The legal purpose of marriage

Marriage isn’t about individual couples. All children are protected by the State, regardless of their birth. If couples split, married or not, any parent can certainly petition the courts for visitation, custody, etc. This applies even to unmarried gay couples! I personally know one woman whose partner was killed in a car accident, leaving her biological daughter (via IVF) without a legal mother. The dead woman’s family attempted to gain custody of the little girl, but my friend was able to successfully petition the courts and was granted full custody and legal guardianship of the child. Which is as it should have been. Marriage protects children only in a general sense. Marriage ties parents together, making a child less likely to be abandoned by one or the other. This is how marriage protects children.

The only reason why government ever got into the business of marriage was in an attempt to lessen the costs to the state of abandoned children. Without some incentives, sadly, the male nature is frequently to move on to greener pastures. The children abandoned by the fathers then were at far greater risk of becoming a financial and societal burden upon the state. It made sense for the government to impart some benefits on couples to encourage them to stay together and co-parent their children, as this would "cost" less than the burden placed on government without such measures.

The state doesn’t grant marriage benefits to male/female couples simply because it likes them, but doesn't like any other type of couple. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the couple at all. It has only to do with lessening the risk to the state by encouraging parents to stay together for the sake of their children.

It makes no sense for government to give benefits to couples who will not have children, as there is no burden to society if such unions should break up. It also doesn't make sense for a government to give benefits encouraging the formation of family units that will not benefit society, but which will ultimately "cost" government more than the cost of the benefits. It's a pretty cold-blooded way to look at marriage, but that is the only reason government ever got involved. Church marriages and vows before God or family, or whatever, have nothing to do with government interest in minimizing the burden to society. Churches can solemnize marriages between whomever they choose. So when looking at a legal change in the definition of marriage, you have to come back to this equation. Will the expansion of marriage benefits ultimately cost the state more or less? And this cost needs to be evaluated both in terms of actual dollars and in terms of the healthy propagation of the sort of society the government wishes to advance.

So let’s examine same sex unions in these terms. First, if there are no children involved, then there is no reason for government to grant marriage benefits. The costs of courts, judges, and lawyers in divorces, not to mention lost revenue in tax benefits, etc., are a burden upon the state, with no compensating benefit to the state. Thus in our cost-benefit equation, clearly there are far more costs than benefits to the state in benefiting childless unions. (Remember that we’re talking about general groups here, not individual couples-- obviously the government shouldn't deny marriage to a couple based on their individual ability or lack thereor to have children). Up until quite recently, the vast majority of gay couples did not have children. Thus no reason for the state to grant marriage benefits to same-sex couples.

Times have changed, and more and more gay couples are now attempting to have children, either through adoption or insemination/IVF. So now the government needs to decide if the benefits of encouraging these families outweighs the costs of expanding marriage benefits. There are a few ways of looking at this issue. First, in terms of actual dollars, second, in terms of societal costs.

There has not been a great deal of sociological research done on children with gay parents. This is one of the biggest reasons why so many people are hesitant to embrace gay marriage. We simply don’t know enough about the consequences of such a societal change, and we know that life has a way of bringing about unintended consequences. But there are a few things we can deduce from existing research.

There is no question that children raised by single mothers are far more likely to cost the state more than children raised by a mother and father. Single mothers are statistically far more likely to be dependent upon the state for welfare, Medicaid, food stamps, etc. And their children are statistically far more likely to commit crimes and end up in prison (huge cost to the state), and perpetuate the cycle of poverty. Clearly it is not in the state’s best interest to encourage single-mother families. This is why it is such a terrible idea to increase welfare benefits every time a woman has another baby. This does nothing but encourage the mother to have more and more children in a situation and environment where they pose a significant risk of costing the State enormously. There are very few single-father families so we don’t have the data to be able to determine if the same patterns exist for single-father families. (My opinion is that the influence mothers and fathers have on children are both equally crucial, but very different. I think there are likely serious consequences to children (on a statistical level) raised without a mother, but they will probably be different than the consequences of not having a father.)

So the question is this. Why are single-mother families so much less likely to succeed by society’s standards? Is it because of poverty? Or is it because of the lack of a father in the household? Well, poverty certainly is a risk factor, but you can tease out the effect of a lack of father in the home by comparing single-mother families with mother-father families in the same socio-economic bracket. And sure enough, you see that single-mother families are at far greater risk than mother-father families. So how does this relate to gay marriage? Are two-mother families at less risk than single-mother families? (Controlling for poverty, of course). If so, then clearly the presence of an additional parental figure in the home, regardless of gender, puts a child in a lower risk category. This would seem to support of the legalization of gay marriage, and it does, except for the fact that this very line of reasoning applies equally well to the legalization of polygamist marriage. You can’t have one without necessitating the other.
It is also possible that children of two-mother families (controlling for poverty) actually have the same risks (in terms of costs to the state) as children of single-mothers. If this is so (again, research is paltry and there is no conclusive evidence one way or the other), this clearly implies that it is the presence of both genders in the home, and the unique way in which they interact with each other and influence their children that stabilizes the family. This certainly would support the position of leaving the definition of marriage as-is. It does not benefit the state to impart financial benefits to unions which will produce children at equal risk of costing the state, as if the union had not been formalized by the state. In this case, the cost of the benefits to legalize such unions outweighs any potential reduction of cost to the state of the children.

So if you decide that it is worth it for the state to benefit and encourage gay marriage, you must also agree that it is encumbent upon the state to encourage and benefit polygamist marriage. One logically extends to the other, and there is no way to legalize one without legalizing the other, because the same reasons why the government would decide to legalize gay marriage (our cost-benefit equation), apply equally as well to polygamist marriages. The same reasoning also applies to the argument for legalizing marriage between incestuous couples. If the only thing that matters is that another adult is in the home, then why should it matter if the two adults are siblings? (The risk of homozygous genetic disorders in children born from closely-related parents is actually very small, not much more than the risk of genetic disorders in children born to older mothers. I think the argument against sibling marriage based on the genetic risk to resultant children is a straw-man).

But the issue doesn’t end there. Let’s say that children of same-gender, polygamist or sibling parents truly are not at any greater risk than children of mother-father parents. This would lend support to changing the legal definition of marriage to include, at least, gay couples, sibling couples, and polygamist groups. But part of the equation the government must evaluate, is the costs to the type of society the government chooses to advance. A society built upon the basic unit of mother-father-children is different than a society built upon the much expanded unit of mother-mother-children, father-father-children, multi-adults-children, sibling-sibling-children, etc. They are not the same, and the government needs to decide which sort of society it wishes to advance, because it cannot simultaneousy advance both.

The big question is this: Who gets to decide if we should change the fundamental unit of a society? In a democratic society, I believe it should be the voice of the people. If we, as a society, decide that we want to encourage and increase the formation of different kinds of families by expanding the legal benefits of marriage, then we need to follow democratic procedures. This is already being done on a state-by-state basis, and that is fine. I may not like it, but I can always choose to live in a different state. And if as a nation we decide we want to formally change the definition of marriage through Constitutional amendments or what have you, again, I may not like it, but such is the cost of living in a free society. Sometimes the people will freely choose something I don’t like. However, what most proponents of keeping marriage between an unrelated man and woman so vehemently oppose, is the strong-arm tactic many people on the other side of this issue are using: the use of the courts to mandate something that a) may not be in the best interest of the state, and b) is in opposition to the will of the people.

This is why people on the right desire strict-constructionist judges. Not because we insist that everything in our society remain exactly as it was in 1790. Obviously times change, societies evolve. That is the beauty of the amendment process. But we want judges who will respect, not only the Constitution, but also the rule of law in the United States, and respect the will of the people and the amendment process. That is why it is so galling to us to see "progressive" judges taking end-runs around the Constitution and the will of the people, and forcing their own opinions and interpretations and desires upon all of us. That is not the democratic way. I would not oppose the people attempting to amend the Constitution to secure marriage rights for any sort of couple. Well, I wouldn’t vote for such an amendment, but I wouldn’t oppose the people’s attempt, if that makes sense. But I vehemently oppose the tactic of shopping around for judges who will simply make rulings in favor of a specific group, Constitution and the people be damned.

Remember that none of this has anything to do with individual freedoms. The government does not prevent single mothers from having children, nor does it prevent lesbian couples from undergoing inseminations, or gay couples from adopting infants from surrogate mothers, or anyone from adopting waiting or special needs children. I would be opposed to the government trying to impose such restrictions on these individual liberties, no matter how much I disagree with the particular exercise of freedom.

The question of gay marriage is this: Is it in the best interest of the State to encourage (and therefore increase) the formation of same-sex parented families (or polygamist families, sibling-couple familes, or what have you)? Yes, gay couples are going to have children. That is a fact. And the state will extend any and all available benefits to those children as it would to any other child. This is not a question of whether or not the State is going to protect children. In fact, it is easier for some of these children to qualify for benefits since the income level required for benefits is less for single-parents than for married parents. The only question is whether or not the government wishes to legalize, normalize, and, inevitably, increase the formation of such families by imparting financial benefits to various couples (or groups of people) in "exchange" for their commitment to stay together and raise the children. This has nothing to do with what is "fair" or who is "better" than whom, or whatever. That is why arguments based on issues of equity or fairness are completely irrelevant to the question of whether or not the state should change the legal definition of marriage and expand marriage benefits.

Going to Houston

I'm too depressed to write anything political, so you are all spared.

I got the go ahead to have my evaluation for the bone marrow transplant. I'll be going to Houston for Mon.-Wed. next week for a bunch of tests. I think they're all just to make sure I'm healthy enough to go through with the procedure. I'll be at M.D. Anderson and meeting the Oncologist, Dr. Popat. It will be interesting, as I have a lot of questions. I hope nothing unexpected comes up. My mom is coming out here Sunday to take care of things while I'm gone.

I took a few pictures of Moses yesterday for your enjoyment.

He either looks really cute here, or slightly evil. I'm not sure which.

And this is the look I got that let me know he had reached his quota of pictures. "No more pictures, mom!"

Gay marriage

I've been corresponding with a friend about various political/social issues. Here's my response to her question about my position on the issue of gay marriage. What do you think? Strengths? Weaknesses? Anything glaring I've left out? I'm trying to keep things non-religious, because obviously religious arguments will hold no weight with nonreligious people.

I really appreciate you asking me about this stuff. It gives me a chance to clarify my own thinking, and it is so nice to actually be able to have a reasonable discussion about these issues.

One of the really unfortunate consequences of such a polarized society such as the one in which we live, with people divided into "left" and "right" on nearly every issue, is that people tend to get very emotional about their positions, and as soon as emotions become paramount in debate, rational discussion ends. People quit listening to each other and start calling names instead.

On the issue you bring up, as you might expect, I am opposed to gay marriage. However, despite what many people on the other side of this issue may think, it has nothing to do with homophobia, or hatred, or mean-heartedness. I have no desire to hurt gay people, or to deny them any of the good things this life has to offer, or to imply that they are less human than anyone else. This is what I mean about emotions getting involved. People on the "left" in this issue become very emotional, and rightly so when they don't think about the issue in any terms other than "fairness."

First of all, marriage is not a "right." It is a legal contract sanctioned by the government. It is *not* a right. As soon as marriage starts being thought of as a "right," things get very complicated. If it is my "right" to be married, does that mean the government is therefore obligated to provide me a marriage partner?? Clearly not. Marriage is not a right.

Second, when we consider changing the legal criteria for marriage, we need to think very seriously about the consequences of such changes. There is another huge issue when it comes to gay marriage, and that is the "slippery slope" issue. If we open the door for gay marriage, there really is *no* legal basis to deny marriage to siblings pairs, to parent/child couples, to polygamists. And I think it would be a very bad move for a government to lend its sanction to incestual and other questionable kinds of unions. We do need a "bright line" distinction in this area, and the only one that holds up is the criteria of unrelated male and female.

I think most people don't really understand the purpose of marriage. The legal contract of marriage was originated for one purpose. For the protection of children. Marriage really has very little to do with the adults involved, and has everything to do with the protection of children that might result from such a union. I have *no* problem *whatsoever* with gay couples being awarded the same legal rights as married couples when it comes to benefits, inheritance rights, etc. No problem whatsoever. But the specific legal contract of marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman, in my opinion. And this opinion is based on the fact that children are best served when they are raised by a genetically unrelated mother and father.

I think there are fair questions about whether or not gay couples statistically are just as able to raise children fully capable of entering and maintaining stable society. My opinion is that there are essential differences between the genders (despite what Betty Friedan and other feminist movement proponents believe), and that society is best served when the majority of individuals are raised with an equal contribution of feminine and masculine influences. (And, not to be redundant, government should obviously not sanction anything that does not best serve the interest of the society). But I also concede that this is a matter for debate. As a society we simply have not had enough time to do the sociological studies to examine the long-term effects on children raised entirely without the influence of one gender or the other. And I think it would be very unwise to change the legal definition of marriage before we have a much greater level of undestanding in this area.

But really, are there any serious questions that children are *not* protected (and society *not* best served) when born to a father and mother who are full siblings, or, even worse, a mother seduced and impregnated by her own father?? Are children truly protected when born to the 15th wife of one man? (And I say this being the great-great-grandchild of a polygamist man and his 4th wife). Are there any real questions that such children run a significant risk of being less able to fully participate and contribute to a stable society?

I think as a people we should be *very* certain about the wisdom of changing such a fundamental platform in society as marriage. We better be very, very sure that there are not going to be terrible unintended consequences to our actions. As I said before, the question of marriage is much, much, much larger than simply two individuals who love each other and wish to be married. If it were *only* about that, there would be no question in my mind, at least, that gay marriage should be allowed. Unfortunately all the tangential issues make this issue much stickier than how it appears at first glance.

Here's just another example of possible complications and unintended consequences. Many churches are involved in adoptions. My church and the Catholic church in particular are very involved in placing children for adoption. At this point in time, my church can legally restrict adoption to legally married couples. What if the government were to grant full marriage privileges to any couple, gay, siblings, or whomever? Could my church be legally compelled to place children with couples, to whom it has deep religous objections? The inevitable consequence would be for the LDS church and Catholic church (just to name two) to withdraw from the adoption service. This would be a tragedy. Such a move would certainly would not be protecting these children.

So that's basically my position. I believe that too many people look at this issue in a very shallow way. Many people on the left see it simply as a matter of government treating gay people "unfairly." And some people on the very religious right, simply look at it as government sanctioning something about which they have deep religious or moral reservations. Both views are entirely too simplistic. I certainly wouldn't be opposed to having a full and open public debate about this issue. But few people on the left (sorry, but this is true) are willing to actually debate the real issues. They get stuck on the "fairness" issue and can't get off.

Super (???) Tuesday

Ok, here is what may ultimately be the best case scenario:
McCain will take the nomination, but Romney will be respectably close.
I don't know who will be the Democrat nominee (don't care) but I think they will definitely win the national election.
In 4 years the democrat will have gone crazy with spending and a million new programs and amnesty for all illegals and giving away goodies to everyone, and our country will be in an impossible financial situation. Four years from now no one will be able to ignore it because it will have taken on emergency proportions. I'm hoping that we don't have another 9/11 with the inevitable scale back of national defense. Yes, it would help our cause, but that is too big a price to pay.
In four years McCain will be out of the picture. He'll be too old and he won't run again, having been soundly beat four years previously.
Romney (or some other real conservative) will come in and finally start talking sense. The media might actually even report it because our country's financial situation will be so bad. Americans will finally realize that the government can't keep spending money we don't have, and they'll finally see the need for someone who will come in and drastically clean things up.
Conservatives will have 4 years to do some real soul-searching, and come back to their senses and to their conservative roots.
The way will be paved for Romney, or someone like him (I hope it's Romney, though), to take the 2012 election and save America before we spend ourselves to death.
Maybe it's even better that Romney not take the nomination this time around. It could very well be that the country is not ready to elect him. Given the reluctance of "conservatives" to fully embrace the only conservative left in the race, this is a very real possibility. And if he did get the nomination and didn't win the national election, he would have the same problem McCain will, and won't be able to run again.
Additionally, in four years the fact that he's Mormon will be old hat, and won't have the shocking, scandalous quality that it has now.
So, I'm now hoping, not that Romney comes from behind and takes the nomination, but that he comes close enough so that it makes sense for him to run again in four years. No matter how things look tomorrow, I really hope he'll stay in the race until the end.

And yes, this is me trying to feel better about the way things are shaping up.

Birthdays and stuff

Lest you all believe I have been completely caught up in my own angst the past few weeks, I have not been unaware of a few birthdays that have passed by. I am just a jerk and forget to acknowledge them in my letters.
So, Eva, I hope you had a great birthday! You are now a Mia Maid! If you were in my ward that means you would be in our giggliest, silliest, noisiest class of Young Women. You might think the Beehives would be gigglier and sillier, but this is not so. It stinks that you had finals the week after your birthday weekend. I hope you had some fun and didn't only study. Fourteen was a good year for me. It was my freshman year in high school and overall it was a pretty good year.
Abe, now you are 19!! I don't remember my 19th birthday at all, sorry. I know I was beginning my sophomore year at Rice. It would have been the very beginning of the semester, and I don't remember if I did anything or if anyone really knew it was my birthday. Probably my friends did, I just don't remember. Most of that year was pretty rough on me. But I met Ben when I was 19, decided to transfer to BYU when I was 19, and overall, at least the end of 19 was very good for me. I was thinking of you on the 2nd. It's good to have a birthday on Saturday if it is during the school year. Did you wear the T-shirt Eva sent you?! :-)
I also have been thinking a lot about President Hinckley over the past week as many people have, I'm sure. I have a feeling that has also added to my emotionalism this week. I am so happy for him, but I'll miss him so much as well. I'm old enough to have very clear memories of President Kimball, President Benson was "my prophet" for most of my growing-up years, and of course I remember President Hunter, but he wasn't prophet for very long. President Hinckley definitely connected with me best of all the prophets in my lifetime.
I really loved him. He had the perfect mix of humor and solemnity. I felt like he could really challenge us to be better, but did so in such an encouraging way that you couldn't really feel defensive about anything he said. He made me laugh at least once in every talk. And his energy and optimism were totally unmatched, in my opinion. He was amazing and I will sure miss seeing him at General Conference. It seems like he was the guy who conducted GC for years and years and years. His face is inextricably connected with GC in my mind.
Although this happened just in the last General Conference, I will always think of him "knighting" President Eyring with his cane as just being quintessential President Hinckley. He made carrying a cane almost seem cool.
I watched the funeral on Saturday and it was very sweet. I cried during the slideshow set to that beautiful song "My Shepherd Will Supply My Need." I've had the hardest time singing that song without crying, so to have the slideshow superimposed onto that song was really, really touching to me.
It's hard to imagine having another prophet, but I guess it's like having another child. You can't really imagine it until it happens, and then it seems like it was meant to be all along. But I will really miss him.
My boys and husband are doing well. Brigham lost another tooth Sunday morning, one of his bottom teeth. He's now lost all four of his bottom middle teeth. He was actually really happy about this tooth because it is one Joseph actually hasn't lost yet! The morning then took a negative turn for Brigham, though, because he couldn't find his Sunday shoes. Now Brigham loves to get all spiffed up for church. He had given me one of his church shoes earlier in the week for me to polish for him, because it had a few scuff marks. But then Sunday morning he couldn't find the other one. He was so sad! He cried and cried at the prospect of having to wear his dingy old school shoes. But somehow he survived.
Brigham has the hardest time with his shoes. I have a "shoe box" out in the garage where the boys are always supposed to put their shoes. They come home with gallons of sand in their shoes from the school playground, so I try to make sure they take their shoes off in the garage and put them straight in the shoe box. But still, Brigham manages to misplace his shoes at least twice a week. He actually lost his school shoes for almost two weeks, and I went to Payless and bought some new ones. Of course that very afternoon he found his shoes (outside, where I had told him several times to look), and Joseph showed me his shoes which had a hole in the toes. So Joseph ended up with the new shoes.
Ok, enough for tonight. I didn't get any steroid treatments this week. I told you all last week that I was suffering from a bad cold, right? Well, sickness always exacerbates MS symptoms, and I started to feel a little better by Wednesday when my cold started abating. And I never did get a call back from my doctor here about what he and the Houston neuro decided. But today has been bad on my legs. I think I overdid it yesterday, so maybe I'm just paying for it today. We'll see how tomorrow goes. I wish the steroids weren't so yucky so that the decision to do another round of treatment wouldnt' be so hard.
Dr. Tallman had me start back up on Rebif at the beginning of last month, as a "just-in-case" measure while I'm gearing up for the bone marrow transplant. Boy, I hate Rebif. I'm not even up to the full dose yet (although I'll start up on the full dose this week). The shots sting really bad going in, and you have to rotate your injection site for each shot, and 2 of the 4 acceptable sites are on my legs. Now, you might think that my legs would be a good place for shots, since they're mostly numb anyway, right? Not really, though. I have what's called "clonus" in both my legs. Basically it's hyperreflexivity, and causes my legs to jerk involuntarily periodically. The clonus is triggered by any weird sensation in my legs-- itching, getting poked, whatever. So the shots make my legs jerk really, really bad. When I do the injection, I'm supposed to leave the needle in place for 10 seconds to make sure all the medicine is injected. Well, try to keep a needle in place while your legs are jerking uncontrollably!! It's not easy, and it really hurts because it makes the needle dig all around in my leg. Copaxone didn't do that, because the medicine didn't sting going in. Copaxone caused quite a bit of soreness in the injection site after the fact, and Rebif doesn't, so I guess that's good, but I don't know how to do the shots without making my legs to crazy. And I hate the Rebif because it makes me crazy. Irritable and grumpy (yeah, that's probably had something to do with my discontent this week as well) and just not like myself. Ask Ben, he'll vouch for that. AND I really think it's pointless. It didn't work last time, and Rebif has never been shown to be effective for any form of MS besides RRMS, so I'm going through all this misery for nothing. And I know once I hit the full dosage this week, all the flu symptoms will return. That's what was really the kicker for me last time, feeling like I had the flu constantly-- fever, body aches, the whole nine yards.
Ok, that is quite enough moaning and groaning for one night.

Frustration

This has been a very frustrating week for me. I'm not sure why, I've just had this underlying feeling of frustration and irritation. Maybe it's anxiety about the bone marrow transplant stuff, I don't know. I have been really upset about politics, but I'm not sure if that is a cause or a symptom of my underlying discontent. But it's certainly been on my mind a lot, so if you don't mind I'm going to emote a bit. Don't say you haven't been warned.

I guess what is annoying me MOST about politics right now is the feeling that we are allowing everything everything to be decided by the mainstream media. I mean, if American Republicans *really* do want McCain, then fine. I'm not sure I will be Republican anymore, but still, I can handle the voice of the people making that decision. But I don't feel like that is the case. I feel like most Americans are too lazy to look at the candidates closely and actually use their brains to decide who would be best. I think most Americans have totally abdicated their decision making over to the media. I mean, they work hard all day and when they come home, we want them to have to actually *think*?! What??!! In this out-sourcing society, I think most Americans have out-sourced their thinking to the people on TV.

I just can't stand that Americans are so stupid and that they let the media have so much power. I love the idea of the debates. It's a great way to be able to compare candidates side-by-side. Even when half (or more) of the questions are ridiculous and meaningless, at least it's a chance to actually listen to these guys. But few people even watch or listen to the debates. And most people who are even aware that the debates are going on, will rely on post-debate commentary to decide what to think. But the debates get so *little* coverage, and what coverage there has been, is about as insubstantial as you could possibly get. And I don't think most people pay attention anyway. You could have a debate, or many debates, in which one candidate truly emerges as the strongest on issues, the strongest in experience, the strongest in leadership. But if he wasn't the one that had the wittiest come-back or the most charming mannerisms, it literally will not matter.

It is so clear to me that the average Joe out there really does not care what the candidate's actual positions are. What their actual plans are. All they care about are meaningless things like who has the nicest smile or appears most comfortable in front of the camera. Or ridiculous dead-horse issues like abortion (something the President has NO CONTROL OVER except in whom he appoints as judges--so why don't we spend ALL the time that has been given to abortion instead talking about judicial appointments??). But it doesn't matter. Nothing of any meaning or substance seems to matter in American politics today. This is even more obviously clear on the democrat side, but I'm not even going to talk about that. It's just so incredibly discouraging to me.

I have pin-pointed exactly what upsets me most about elections. It is the fact that the stupidity of Americans is constantly thrust in my face. I can't ignore it or pretend it away. And it is very discouraging that the future of this country depends on stupidity. Maybe this is the way it has always been. Ben thinks so.

And I don't think Americans are stupid just because they're making a different decision than I would make. Truly, I'm not. What leads me to the stupidity conclusion is the method with which most Americans form opinions and make decisions.

The thing is, I would love real debate. Contrary to what many of you might think, I don't think either side is always right or always wrong. (Well, that should be obvious if McCain is the Republican candidate.) I think our country is strengthened when we have real debate over real issues. Please, can we PLEASE talk about issues of substance?? If the other side wins, that's ok as long as we've had real, honest debate over real, honest issues. If people truly understand the issues and truly understand the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate, and still choose someone or something else, I can really, really accept it. May the best man win and all that. I might be disappointed, but I wouldn't be filled with the despair that comes over me whenever I listen to the news these days. But the contest isn't over who has the best ideas or the best track record, or anything real or substantial. The contest is over the most meaningless things, and isn't even a fair contest since most Americans get all their information from the main-stream media which is so biased and so uninterested in actually presenting candidates in a fair way, or even talking about anything of importance. Big Hollywood stories get a hundred times more attention than any serious issues that will actually affect the future of our country. Even blogs depress me. You can read blogs on the left and blogs on the right, and at least you're getting some balance. But it's just one slanted, biased, dishonest view balanced with another slanted, biased, dishonest view. True, some are better than others, but still it's hard to know what to believe. Journalists, who once-upon-a-time actually thought their job *was* to uncover the truth, by and large don't even consider that to be in their job description. At least, they sure don't act like it!!

Politics has just become a sport in America. It's all about the polls and the predictions and the drama. It's such a mockery and it's so sad to me. I wish I could just not care. But I've got this stubborn part of me that *does* care, and that so desperately wants America to fulfill its potential. I don't want to believe that most politicians are corrupt and most Americans are stupid, or at best, totally apathetic. But every time elections roll around, I'm pretty much forced to acknowledge both of these sad truths.

Sigh... I know I'm being totally doom-and-gloom. It can't be *that* bad if we actually do have a good candidate who is #2 in line for the Republican nomination, and who still has a decent chance. Although in my opinion this is due strictly to the strength of the man, and not due to any virtue on the part of the media or Americans in general. Maybe it just seems like things are getting worse in America because I'm just becoming more aware of things. Still, it seems like we keep traveling further down the road of big-government, toward the ultimate cess-pit of socialism (which I will STILL insist is simply Satan's plan adapted to government). Sometimes we have someone who *almost* is able to make a difference, but just... not quite.

Maybe I'll be surprised. Maybe things will turn out really great on Tuesday. Maybe, somehow, Americans will actually start to care about something more than their daily dose of Hollywood gossip, maybe they'll actually start making decisions based on something other than their *feelings* or their pocketbooks. I have no idea what would ignite that kind of change. It would have to be something huge and terrible, and that is even more frightening to me. How many times have we seen this story in the Book of Mormon?

Anyway, enough. I have a headache. I still love this country. It's still the best country in the world, despite all it's flaws. I just wonder how long we can continue to be the best country in the world.

Romney and McCain

I wrote out a post about my annoyance with politics and the media which I will post above. I had originally included this bit about McCain and Romney but decided to separate it out. I think what I say above should probably ring true to most people, regardless of what they think about McCain vs. Romney.

I think that the media has wanted Anyone-But-Romney ever since he emerged as one of the front-runners. In my opinion it is because he would be by far the most formidible candidate, and the left-leaning media does NOT want that, since he is also by miles and miles the most conservative candidate still on the ballot. I knew, just KNEW what was going to happen if McCain won Florida, and I have been exactly right. And it absolutely, positively ENFURIATES me. I knew that if he won Florida, no matter how close it was, the media would be saying, "Finally, a front-runner has emerged in the GOP primaries. It's been neck-and-neck thus far, but now it looks like we've got our guy." This bugs me so incredibly much. The media has absolutely ignored every primary Romney has won. Some attention was given to Michigan, but as soon as he won, the spin was that of course he was going to take his home state (as if it had always been a foregone conclusion which is so far from the truth). No mention was ever made, it seemed, of the fact that Romney had far more delegates than any other candidate for several weeks. Why was there no "front-runner" then? But NOW, even though McCain didn't win by that much, HE is the OBVIOUS front-runner. Ok, whatever. If Florida wasn't a winner-take-all state, Romney would *still* be ahead!

The media has now crowned McCain as the inevitable winner of the GOP primaries, and sadly that's probably exactly what will happen. He's got the name recognition, the media will only play the most flattering sound-bites, and everything said or written about him will be sloberingly positive and stupid Americans will follow like sheep. They won't know anything about him, they won't remember any of the really terrible decisions and bills he's been a part of. The main-stream media will conveniently forget to mention any of that stuff. They'll only see his big smile and remember that he was a war hero, and that will be it.

McCain won't win the national election. I don't even think it will be close. Real conservatives can't stand the guy. And there aren't that many die-hard moderate independents out there to secure a win. There's too much negative stuff out there that will be paraded out only AFTER he wins the GOP primary. That's another thing that's so pathetic. The media is slobering over him *now,* just long enough to make sure he's the candidate. But from then on it will be a totally different story. And, sadly, that's probably ok with me. If he's the candidate it might actually be better for America in the long-run for the Democrat to win. And I've never thought that before. I've always thought you have to choose the lesser of two evils. But I don't know this time. I don't trust McCain. I suppose I'll have to wait and see who the candidates are and how things look in November, but I might just stay home.

Hill-Billy

Hill-Billy


Too funny not to share. I mean, no matter what side of the political spectrum you fall on, it's funny, isn't it??