Sparks on the Fringe

Sallee's Best Quinoa Salad Ever

2009-05-26T01:52:00.003-05:00

Quinoa is one of my favorite grains. It is very high in protein and is very easy to cook and digest. This has been my staple potluck dish for many years. I am constantly varying the recipe - it is very flexible. The apples are essential. I chop them with a hand chopper - they give a backdrop of sweetness. Then whatever you add is up to you.

Quinoa Salad

2 and 1/2 cups dry quinoa - cook with 5 & 1/4 cup water for 15 minutes and let cool

When cool, fluff up the quinoa, then add:

3/4 cup diced celery
3/4 cup chopped parsley (I prefer curly, but my husband usually buys the flat-leaf.)
1 diced red pepper (optional)
1 medium red onion, diced (optional)
1/2 cup chopped scallions (optional)
1 cup toasted pine nuts (other nuts can be substituted,e.g. slivered almonds - I toast the nuts on the stove top in a skillet)
1 cup dried cranberries, chopped (craisins) (other dried fruit can be used as a variation, e.g. raisins, currants, or diced dried apricots)
1 T orange zest (optional)
1/2 cup olive oil (or less for the diet conscious)

Juice 2 to 3 limes (lemons, oranges work equally well as a variation or a combo of lemon and lime, or orange and lime)
2 or 3 diced apples (granny smiths are great, but could be any kind of crisp apple) - Add to lime or lemon juice first, then add to quinoa.

Salt, pepper, cayenne to taste:
SALT -- approximately 1.5 to 2 tsps
Pepper -- severral good turns of a pepper mill
Cayenne -- approx. 1/4 to 1/2 tsp - or more to taste - the cayenne gives it a kick that the pepper cannot reach

This makes a big bowl of salad and is a welcome change from usual potluck fare. Enjoy!

Last Encounter with Kate

2009-05-25T22:52:00.010-05:00

for Linda and the rest of the family:

Last time I saw her - we had met for coffee at the original Starbucks across from Pike's Market in Seattle. The kids are skeptical about our claim that we are sisters. They keep hoping they can trip us up in a lie.

We walk through the market admiring flowers and the displays of perfect rows of zucchini and radishes, Japanese eggplant and glistening salmon tossed through the air by fishmongers.

She has made an appointment for later with the oncologist and in her subdued and stoic commentary she tells me "the news isn't all that good, spots on the sternum in bone scan. Linda is freaking out, but well..." There. She's told me - no drama and on to the next topic, or the next food stand where we sample some pepper-ginger jelly. It's a brief visit but we cover a lot - cover the basics: fine, not fine, happy, not happy. In this moment, just the pleasure of the moment -the vivid market of colors and life, fish tossed about for entertainment.

We are headed toward the new library -and she walks us part of the way. When we part ways as we have parted ways now - she to another destination, we say goodbye and she walks off as we continue where we were headed.

Later in that trip, I get a call from her, "I'm going to come meet you in Portland." "I'm not going to be there," I say. "I'm leaving the family there by themselves for a couple of days." I try to be discouraging as I'm not sure Richard wants to deal with her on his own. It doesn't work out - we don't connect.

Plans are proposed, here and there, but nothing materializes, the parting of paths now complete, complete for now. Moments shared, remembered, captured in photos or on video, added to websites, added to the collective memory of who this being was and what she meant to us all.

What was that? - A light, a laugh, a wit? Oh yes, a wit - sometimes sarcastic, biting, though not ill-intentioned, wit coming from a deep place, an open raw, vulnerable wounded place - laid open and exposed without drama or pretense or bullshit, frankly without the blah-blah. How hard is it to live like that? Only she could say - disappearing into it for months on end to sheepishly resurface begging her friends for patience and forgiveness, which would give or would not give her absolution.

Friends

2009-04-14T18:23:00.000-05:00

Sometimes earthquakes throw people into each other's laps and a friendship is formed. Such was the case of the 89 quake that hit the World Series and the city of San Francisco, shaking up Kate so badly that she fled to the Iowa cornfields where it was safe. At least that was the hope, that was the motive, but when she called me and said "Help!" - that was the moment that the falling into laps had arrived, the moment when somehow I managed to give her permission to dance and I discovered the deep soul and brilliance of someone who had been prior to that moment, only an acquaintance. Now she was a sister, folded into my heart in such a way that even chaos, craziness, manic-depression, bipolar - any sort of diagnosis could not override or supersede the baseline truth. While on the surface that was all there, the truth I saw and knew about Kate existed on another level.

What happens when two fiery, cynical, slightly bitter, angry and otherwise good people choose to be friends? Well, it could be pretty short-lived - or it could be that each gives the other truth - a perfect mirror like having a twin. You get to observe and see yourself walking the planet in all your glory and all your pain, heightened to the max - visible in the bright light of truth.

Claiming My Sisters

2009-02-17T13:51:00.002-06:00

Kate on Bainbridge Island, c. 2000 - a glorious day!

written 2/8/06

A quiet, unassuming, and kind person – friends from a shared interest in writing, expressing, being vulnerable, being Iowan cat lovers, Claudia. Claudia I see you happy for your release from a body, broken and no longer serving. Kate, Kate, Kate – we play together in the words of the Scrabble Board – neither of us has other words to post to the other, just this sad game where the points flip the scale with – every turn, an evenly matched competition – well, she usually has a 10 pt edge on me, knows how to play those 2 letter words for double/triple points. Kate, living with cancer, living with bi-polar, which, has almost been more deadly, the downs worse than the highs which drove away all the friends. How we became friends – I gave her a counseling session after she moved here, shaken too much by the 89 quake and seeking solid ground in the Midwest. I let her dance and move in her session, gave her permission to be the ballerina the 3 yearold never got to be and is trying to be. She can dance now, move, breathes – shakes a little too loose at times for the comfort of others. Some need that kind of freedom. Some need to break those boundaries. My kids don’t believe she is my sister. And keep asking my brothers if they have another sister, thinking they caught me in a lie. It isn’t a lie – she is my sister, Claudia is my sister, too – I’ll claim her – she deserves me more than she deserves Sylvia. In this circle of women, she has a real home and family.

The Need for Coffee

2009-02-17T13:44:00.003-06:00

written 11/30/2001

Kate's sister Linda asks her "Do you really want to die"? Every decision for her at this point becomes an existential question. Whether to drink coffee or not may or may not be a matter of life or death. The sister, trying to be rational – your hormones, sis – think of your hormones, and Kate just wanting the taste of Java, the taste of this one small pleasure of life in the sucking vortex of stage whatever breast cancer. She tells me about her retreat for breast cancer survivors and how they tried to coach her into a decision. That decision of their agenda – get the radiation, they say, is a decision of a knife slice in hard rock, goes nowhere, against the surface with a dull thud, doesn't get to the broken wall of pain. Kate says all the women there had too much to lose, families, children, wealthy baubles of houses in Darien, Connecticut, but she has nothing to lose – can't get behind the belief that there is even one good reason to live, except for the occasional coffee at Starbucks, sitting in the sumptuous chairs staring out at the rain with a friend in conversation waiting for the rain to stop.

Bee Aware

2008-07-11T04:44:00.002-05:00

Colony Collapse Disorder is threatening the very foundation of our food supply. When the bees disappear, how will we produce food? Our eco-system is SO fragile! There's a lot of smoke and mirrors around what the culprit is for CCD - cell phones are getting blamed or proposed as a possible cause. That was probably cooked up by Bayer to delay any real discussion about the real cause - rampant use of neonicitinoid pesticides. Another reason to eat organic and fight the big chemical companies. They are destroying the planet as fast as they can.

Evil Monsanto

2008-06-30T14:48:00.009-05:00

Click on the title of this post to access part 1 of a 4 part documentary about Monsanto. This documentary shows just how corrupt our FDA really is. They clearly have not been protecting citizens for a long time. If you are still drinking Diet Coke, if you still think that GMO food is safe and don't eat organic, if you use Roundup weed killer in and around your garden, if you drink regular non-organic milk contaminated with BGH and feed that to your kids - you NEED to watch this.

Party Politics It Aint

2008-06-30T12:07:00.016-05:00

Because of the recent Iowa flooding, we barely had a quorum at the Iowa State Democratic Party Convention in Des Moines on Saturday. Out of the 2500 possible delegates we had around 1100. I was the only Jefferson County delegate for John Edwards even though there were initially four. I had been an alternate until last week when one of the delegates gave me his slot.

We broke out into preference groups and caucuses first thing in the morning. Rob Tully, the chair of the convention was also the head of the Edwards camp. He informed us that we weren't viable, that is, we didn't have the 15% needed, but that Obama had offered us a deal. We could nominate 3 delegates from our camp that would go to the convention as Obama delegates. This gave us the opportunity to send strong Edwards people to the National Convention in August.

I understand that the same deal was offered to the Clinton camp, but I have no idea what they decided on. The Edwards people, for the most part, were happy with the deal.

An interesting note is that most of the platform committe was made up of Edwards people and some of them missed our first preference group meeting and were a bit hot-under-the-collar about the deal until Rob explained it to them and they got it. We could have no delegates or three - which do you really prefer?

So what happens at a state convention? Well, mostly you sit on your butt most of the day listening to speech after speech, Tom Harkin, Chet Culver, Jean Carnahan, and various others including my former step-sister Becky Greenwald. Becky is running for the U.S. Congress in Iowa's 4th District. If elected she will be the first woman ever elected in Iowa to the Congress or Senate. Iowa and Mississippi are the ONLY two states in the nation that have never elected a female congresswoman or senator. Isn't that pitiful and unexpected? You'd think Iowa wouldn't fall in this category, but it does. GO BECKY!!!!

What you also do is cast a lot of votes and do the work of democracy - building some kind of concensus. Not only did we vote for delegates to the National Convention, we also voted on who is going to represent Iowa on the DNC, we voted who would be chair of the affirmative action committee, and who will be going to the electoral college and be the electors from Iowa. Each position had numerous people running and usually we would get a one minute speech from the candidates on who they were and why they should get the position.

Sometimes there were so many people that it would take several votes to winnow down the field to where we had a winner. The rules were such that we needed to have 51% for a winner and it would take awhile to get someone to that point. We were given a packet of ballots and ran through quite a few. We also got to vote on the platform - all the "planks" on the platform and also voted on the top 3 priorities of the party, which turned out to be: 1. universal health care 2. environment 3. civil rights. We debated various minority positions on platform issues and various revisions in wording. The most heated debate was over the wording of the Israel/Palesinian issues.

The work of democracy is work - it isn't a party. But thankfully, I had Judy Stevens cracking me up at every turn. When the big burly guy from Iowa City got up and started making a speech to the last 2 rows (which at that point in the day consisted of the Jefferson County Hillary contingent and myself because most of the Jeff County Obama delegates had split hours before) about how to be an effective precinct captain, Judy asked him if he sold Amway. I don't know why he thought he should make a speech, and why he chose us as his audience, and why he kept going on an on about it. Maybe he just was tired of sitting there all day listening and maybe he got frustrated with some vote that didn't go his way. I don't know.

The one vote I wasn't happy about was the vote not to include wording and support for a Department of Peace and Non-Violence. This is Kucinich's baby and apparently is not well-received "out there." Sigh. But the good news was that we passed every plank on the platform with at least an 80% majority.

Obama as Lightworker

2008-06-10T23:02:00.003-05:00

I really like this article and do feel it is true so I am publishing it in part, below. Obama does seem to be cut from a different cloth than most politicians.

Barack Obama and good vibrations
by Mark Morford - SFGate.com

"I find I'm having this weird little debate with colleagues, readers, liberals and moderates and deeply depressed Republicans and spiritually amped people of all stripes and, in particular, with those who seem confused, angry, nonplussed, as they all ask me the same thing: What's the big deal about Obama?

I, of course, have an answer. Sort of. It goes likes this:
Barack Obama ain't really one of us. Not in the normal way, anyway.

This is what I find myself offering up in response to the whiners and to those with broken or sadly dysfunctional karmic antennae, to all those who just don't understand all this chatter about Obama's aura and MLK/JFK-like vibe, and, therefore, even if they're liberals, they're refusing to vote for him because they just aren't feeling that deeper connection or, worse, they actively dislike Obama, believing him to be a slick and dangerous pawn of some sort of sinister machine they can't quite define.

To them I say, all right, you want to know what it is? The appeal, the draw, the ethereal thing that keeps drawing millions of people in from all over the world, that keeps opening up and firing into new channels of the culture normally unaffected by politics? No, it's not merely youthful vigor or handsomeness or even inspiring rhetoric. It is not fresh ideas or cool charisma or the fact that a black president will be historic and revolutionary in about a thousand different ways.

It is something more. Even Bill Clinton, with all his effortless, winking charm, didn't have what Obama has, which is a sort of powerful luminosity, a high-vibration integrity.

Dismiss it all you like, but I've heard from far too many smart, spiritually attuned people who've been blown away by Obama's presence - not speeches, not policies, but sheer presence - to say it's just a clever marketing ploy, a slick gambit carefully orchestrated by hotshot campaign organizers who, once Obama gets into office, will suddenly turn from perky optimists to vile, soul-sucking lobbyist whores with Obama as their suddenly evil, cackling overlord.

Here's where it gets gooey. Many spiritually advanced people (not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual) I know identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of calmly enlightened being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of connecting with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a high order, and they reignite the soul.

The unusual thing is, true Lightworkers almost never appear on such a brutal, spiritually empty stage as national politics. This is why Obama is so rare. And this is why he is so often compared to JFK and Martin Luther King Jr., to those leaders in our culture whose compelling vibrations still resonate throughout our short history.... Read the rest at the source.

The Story of Stuff

2008-06-10T22:42:00.002-05:00

Click on the title for an awesome video that is a must-see on the real and hidden costs of our consumerism!

Stepping Onto the Path

2008-02-09T15:47:00.000-06:00

When I sink into my heart, Maharishi is there. Guru Dev, Maharishi, Amma, Maa - blessed beings have taken up residency in my Being. These past few weeks, knowing that Maharishi was leaving this 3rd dimensional existence, I have been sending him light, sending light and scanning all my past interactions with him, all my feelings and emotions, to make sure that I had no residual negativity, no residual hurt or anger or disappointment and I could not find anything but gratitude, gratitude for the multitude of gifts, the teaching, the wisdom, the blessings, even the outrageous plans that made us all think outside the box - the visions of a visionary.

How could I have known when I took my purple irises and peach roses to that funky little house out on Lower Muscatine in Iowa City, May 1972, to get initiated by a former junkie, how could I ever have imagined this life, this path, this journey? I was only going so I could use more mental potential, maybe be more rested and alert as a student, maybe be a happier person. Little did I know that I'd go off three years later to become a teacher of Transcendental Meditation, a follower, a chela, a governor of the Age of Enlightenment, a minister (albeit unanointed minister), a sidha, a chela again for another guru, a disciple. All these labels were not in my vocabulary in 1972. I was going on the testimony of my friend Leroy, some recollection of the Beatles' foray to India in the late 60's and because the poster on the door of Things, Things, & Things with Maharishi's face had beckoned me to show up at the Main Library that night.

This is it, I thought - now is the time and so I went that night to the introductory lecture and later asked permission from my parents to spend the $35. The night before I was to be initiated I barely escaped getting either arrested or clobbered by the National Guard with their batons when they cleared off the intersection of Burlington and Riverside Drive of anti-war protestors. I thought I'd better move if I didn't want to get arrested and miss my initiation the next day, so I did. Priorities, you know? But what I didn't know was that the journey would be and become the big priority - the driving force of my life.

The years roll down - memories, memories, but what presses through to the front is that permeation of influence on the entirety, on my Being, on my soul's path and grace, grace, grace. How blessed I feel to have been part of this history, to have met and breathed in his presence, to have been guided and supported by his work.
Jai Guru Dev

Maharishi Takes Mahasamadhi

2008-02-09T11:36:00.000-06:00

Maharishiji has merged into the effulgent light, into the cosmos. Yes, there is much rejoicing in that. I know that he has not really left, death is an illusion. Yet, I also feel sad - no one has had more of an impact on my life that this beautiful soul, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

Without Maharishi I would never have survived the burden of despair and grief that I inherited, that the world inherited. He brought the sunshine.

The first time I ever saw him on Johnny Carson I sat up and took note - someone was teaching me something different, something more - life is bliss, so simple. But no one spoke like that in the 60's. Life was hard, hard work, people were literally rioting in the streets, bombs were being dropped and here was someone who had a completely contrary message - a message of peace, lightness, bliss, and hope. He spoke of using our full mental potential for the good of the world.

The night he passed I was watching Obama's speech after the primaries and had the thought, we would never have had an Obama without Maharishi's vision, without his teaching, without his message which has permeated the consciousness and the thinking of so many and has extended to transform the entire culture in the last 60 years.

With deep gratitude. Jai Guru Dev!

Definition, part 3

2008-01-30T02:13:00.000-06:00

Sallee:
1. verb - to spin out into ecstatic waves of bliss;
2. adj. - metaphysical term describing pulsation, light, vibration and beingness;
3. noun - a person who takes delight in the wholeness, one who is exposing the hidden joy, another name for divine goddess, also known in some circles as wild woman

Free Stuff

2008-01-26T13:20:00.000-06:00

Phoebe says she wants a world in which everything is free. She doesn't like the fact that we took away allowance and now she has to earn her money by meditating or reading. I said, we wouldn't have things to buy without the "profit motive" and Richard picked up the bottle of Newman's Own Ranch Dressing on the table and thus began a conversation about who was making a profit from that one bottle, down to the farmers, the plastic producer, the label maker, the owner of Everybody's grocery store who sold it to us, and the gas companies who sold the fuel for the truck that brought it to us, etc.

Then of course, we talked about our "system" vs. how it was different under communism in Russia. (Always have to give the little Russke something for self-referral purposes, and then of course we were off on a digression about Russian blood, Uzbeki blood, etc.etc.etc.)

Rich and I saw "Eastern Promises" last night. In this town, I don't usually recommend movies this dark or this violent because this is a delicate bunch - people like to be uplifted and inspired here and abhor violence. But I really thought this was a well-done, richly textured movie, fabulous script, intense acting by Viggo Mortensen. Definitely avoid if you are averse to dark and violent movies. Slight spoiler here: I'd never seen anything like the scene in the bathhouse ever - really gritty stuff.

In one of the special featurettes on the making of the film, Viggo talks about going to Yekaterinburg to study the Russian mafia. Yekaterinburg is where Phoebe is from and is 850 miles east of Moscow and kind of the frontier. Though it is not technically Siberia, it is the gateway to Siberia which lies even further east. Yekaterinburg is in Asia... eastern slopes of the Ural mountains, which I think partly sheds light on the hidden psyche of our Miss Phoebe, who has that untameable core.

When we were there in 98, there was a lot of talk about the rich mobsters. They seemed to be the only people living in nicer housing, though we didn't see much nice housing as the whole place seems to look like Cabrini Green in Chicago - one big city of 60's style, run-down housing projects. Our driver Sasha pointed the mob owned block out to us - it was nicely landscaped and looked a bit more upscale than all the other buildings.

Sadly Vindicated

2008-01-12T21:22:00.000-06:00

If you get the chance to see "Uncounted" by all means this is a DO NOT MISS movie. If you care about democracy, if you care about the future for our children, you must see this movie. It is a well-researched and well-documented account of the extent of just how poorly we are doing in maintaining a free democracy.

There are some fantastic heroes in "Uncounted:" Steve Heller - the whistle blower in California who completely exposed Diebold for the lying cheating thieves that they are, and Clint Curtis - who quit his job after being told to write the vote-flipping code for voting machines in Florida, and then ended up switching his party allegiance to Democrat and actually running for Congress against his former employer. Please go to http://www.uncountedthemovie.com/ and view the trailer. It is sickening how corrupt the system is.

Why I called this post "Sadly Vindicated" is that I knew about most of this stuff 4 years ago after the 2004 election, the vote flipping in Florida and Ohio, the mess of Jim Crow tactics in Ohio. We all believed and knew that the 2000 election was stolen, but nobody really wanted to believe that the 2004 election was stolen and we just didn't like Kerry all that much anyway, did we?

After the 2004 election, I recall my own husband, my brother Sam, my husband's best friend Steve, my dad, and probably others I now have forgotten, refused to even discuss this with me and wrote me off as a conspiracy nut. Consequently I chose to be silenced by their dismissal. Yes, I do feel vindicated seeing this movie and Richard now says he never thought I was a conspiracy nut (though I think he still thinks I am a nut when it comes to 9/11). What I didn't know or realize was that the extent of the mess in 2004 was far more widespread and went far deeper than just Florida and Ohio. I don't think any of us understood just how bad it really was or is. Nobody wants to believe our system is THAT broken and none of us can be blamed for just not wanting to go there! It is pretty heart-breaking.

I am happy now that people are finally talking about it. Kucinich has called for a recall in NH. I am sure this is a tactic to expose the voting fraud taking place in an attempt to wake up the country to this issue before November. He has nothing to gain from it personally and despite how silly it looks to the rest of the world, I completely understand what he is trying to do. Bravo for the fearless Kucinich!

Demockery?

2008-01-10T03:49:00.000-06:00

So the problem is that if you start a blog, people expect you to actually post something. Truth is I work too hard and though I have a high ideal that I'll post daily, I haven't yet developed the discipline.

I have some serious concerns about the results we saw in the New Hampshire primary. Richard thinks I'm a conspiracy theory nut. I make no apologies here. I question everything. I believe we are totally manipulated by the media.

What do they tell us about John Edwards? NOTHING. Exactly nothing. He has been totally dismissed and is now not considered newsworthy. Of course, we hear tons about Dr. Phil and Britney and whoever else they plaster all over our psyches to keep us asleep and distracted.

John Edwards is a threat so he has been summarily shuffled out of the public's awareness. Here is how Fox News managed to smear him early on, calling him a "phony" and an "intellectual lightweight."

http://youtube.com/watch?v=WNcV1S2H-3Q

So what do you think about the NH primary. I think we have to question whether or not there was black box fraud. Here are some interesting stats in a comment on the Zogby blog.:

"I used the Comma delimited database: NH municipalities hand count vs use Diebold machines from BlackBoxVoting.org to see if there was a deviation between the results from precincts which used hand counts and those which relied on Diebold machines. The results were astonishing. :

Updated: 5:05 AM (EST) - Results tallied for 209 out of 236 of the municipalities.

By Percentage
Method Hillary Clinton Barack Obama
Diebold Machines 53.23% 46.77%
Hand Count 47.47% 52.53%

By Votes
Method Hillary Clinton Barack Obama
Diebold Machines 82860 72807
Hand Count 18898 20912

By Number of Municipalities Won
Method Hillary Clinton Barack Obama
Diebold Machines 54 33
Hand Count 43 77

About 81% of the votes will be "counted" by the Diebold machines
Reply Parent posted 04:41 pm on 01/09/2008"

This was a comment made on Zogby's blog, which is interesting in itself. Zogby can't really explain the discrepancies from the polls to the final count! Zogby's blog post on NH.

More evidence of the loss of democracy.

And if there was fraud, what are the motives behind it? What do you think?

BTW, I absolutely HATED that the media made a big deal about Hillary on the verge of tears. It is a manipulative sexist smear and I was offended. I saw Biden on the verge of tears this summer when he spoke about the war. I like to see people who are passionate and committed and moved to respond with heart-felt emotion, male or female! Some, including Zogby say that Hillary's crying is what turned the NH primary in her favor - people saw her human side. Puh-leeze! I still find it dismissive and a disgusting tactic. I don't agree with Hillary on probably several counts and she is not my first choice in candidates, but this is a subtle dig that I know they will exploit and milk for all it is worth and bravo for her comeback "Whose cryin' now?"

Iowa Caucus

2008-01-04T00:44:00.000-06:00

Wednesday a.m. - 2nd St. Cafe, Fairfield - John Edwards on the campaign trail ---->

It was the largest caucus I have ever been to - 264 people! I proudly stood and organized for John Edwards, the most progressive viable candidate. We spilled over into the aisles and it was hard to get the count as we were clearly the largest group.

We had to pull chairs from the Biden table, where one lone hold-out sat until it was obvious no one else was going to join him. I love Biden - he is a great leader and we SO NEED him. He clearly has the most expertise with regards to foreign policy and deeply understands what is needed to solve the mess we have created in Iraq, but Edwards got me on the heart level from the first time I saw him when he came out and straight out apologized, giving me exactly what I needed to hear - that he deeply regretted giving GWBush the authority to go to war with Iraq. He acknowledged his mistake and acknowledged that he would not continue to defend it.

Tonight, we got 4 out of the 8 delegates allotted to our precinct, Obama had 3 and Hillary only 1. Sometimes I feel that caucusing in central Fairfield is a bit like being a voter in San Francisco - it is just a bit more to the left than the rest of the county or the state or the country, for that matter, and I often forget that what feels like a real upset (Oh yeah for Edwards) turns out to be a local blip of demographics, highly educated baby boomers nestled in our more liberal pocket of the world.

Before we even walked out the door, we had heard the real results - that the state had already been called for Obama, with Edwards and Clinton in a dead heat for 2nd. Richard, who had caucused for Obama, was happy. So was Nathan, who had insisted on coming out to observe. He's only 11, but he is an avid follower of the political scene. Nathan and Phoebe got to sit right at Obama's feet this summer at a huge rally in Ottumwa and got to shake his hand and Nathan has been solidly for Obama from that moment on. Phoebe, on the other hand, was swayed by me to support Edwards, and was pleased to ask him on Wednesday morning what his favorite color was when she shook his hand before getting back on the campaign bus. "Blue," he said. Would you have expected anything different?

It was a grand night though - very exciting and especially gratifying to see so many young people participating in the process. Many people were caucusing for the first time ever.

The one remaining Kucinich caucus-goer made a statement that she would continue to stand for Kucinich viable or not, and would never do anything BUT that. We all applauded her, as we know her as Kucinich's biggest supporter and kind of a local eccentric and we love her for that, but unfortunately we had to move on. She had made a valiant effort to recruit, but her cohorts had defected quite early in the game - some many weeks ago.

Our cluster of Edwards supporters were many of the tried and true seasoned veterans of this precinct, friends and neighbors that I know will always be thoughtful and well-informed, the usual suspects I've seen reliably at caucuses over the years and many new faces also. Thanks to all who came out!

I get to go to the county nominating convention in March as a John Edwards delegate... of course, by then things will be over after Super Tuesday, Feb. 5th, but it doesn't matter. Iowans have our process and we are proud of it.

The speeches tonight were fabulous. I am still backing John Edwards, and still believe he is the best man for the job, but I have to give Obama high marks for a blow-out powerful speech. His cadence, his simplicity of words, his energy and charisma are something I have not witnessed since Bobby Kennedy in 1968. WOW! It was impressive. Yes, he's got the charisma. He will clearly have MY vote if he wins the nomination and after the clear victory tonight, it is looking more and more like he will.

Just last night at our Edwards organizational meeting, sitting with Daniel Sheehan talking about RFK and 1968 and someone asked Daniel what would have happened had RFK not been assassinated. This brought back a whole flood of memories and disappointments and sadness from that mess of the Chicago convention to Nixon's election and ensuing years of Vietnam, Watergate, etc. etc. etc. It was an interesting though useless digression of "What ifs..." almost unbearable to look back on now, especially where we have landed NOW. So I think the message of HOPE is appropriate and welcome and desparately needed.

Definitions Part 2

2008-01-03T04:40:00.000-06:00

A. sal·ly /ˈsæli/plural -lies, verb, -lied, -ly·ing.
–noun
1. a sortie of troops from a besieged place upon an enemy.
2. a sudden rushing forth or activity.
3. an excursion or trip, usually off the main course.
4. an outburst or flight of passion, fancy, etc.: a sally of anger.
5. a clever, witty, or fanciful remark.
6. Carpentry. a projection, as of the end of a rafter beyond the notch by which the rafter is fitted over the wall plate. –verb (used without object)
7. to make a sally, as a body of troops from a besieged place.
8. to set out on a side trip or excursion.
9. to set out briskly or energetically.
10. (of things) to issue forth.

[Origin: 1535–45; <>
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

B. sa·lu·bri·ous /səˈlubriəs/ [suh-loo-bree-uhs] –adjective
favorable to or promoting health; healthful: salubrious air.

[Origin: 1540–50; <>-ious] —Related forms
sa·lu·bri·ous·ly, adverb
sa·lu·bri·ous·ess, sa·lu·bri·ty /səˈlubrɪti/ [suh-loo-bri-tee] noun
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

C. lu·mi·nous /ˈlumənəs/ [loo-muh-nuhs] –adjective
1. radiating or reflecting light; shining; bright.
2. lighted up or illuminated; well-lighted: the luminous ballroom.
3. brilliant intellectually; enlightened or enlightening, as a writer or a writer's works: a luminous concept; luminous prose.
4. clear; readily intelligible: a concise, luminous report.

[Origin: 1400–50; late ME <>lumen, -ous]
—Related forms
lu·mi·nous·ly, adverb
lu·mi·nous·ness, noun
—Synonyms 1. lucid, radiant, resplendent, brilliant. 3. bright, intelligent. 4. understandable, perspicuous, lucid.

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Definitions

2008-01-03T03:49:00.000-06:00

A. Spark –noun
1. an ignited or fiery particle such as is thrown off by burning wood or produced by one hard body striking against another.
2. Also called sparkover. Electricity.
a. the light produced by a sudden discontinuous discharge of electricity through air or another dielectric.
b. the discharge itself.
c. any electric arc of relatively small energy content.
d. the electric discharge produced by a spark plug in an internal-combustion engine.
3. anything that activates or stimulates; inspiration or catalyst.
4. a small amount or trace of something.
5. a trace of life or vitality.
6. sparks, (used with a singular verb) Slang. a radio operator on a ship or aircraft.
7. (usually initial capital letter) a member of Camp Fire, Inc., who is five years of age. –verb (used without object)
8. to emit or produce sparks.
9. to issue as or like sparks.
10. to send forth gleams or flashes.
11. (of the ignition of an internal-combustion engine) to function correctly in producing sparks. –verb (used with object)
12. to kindle, animate, or stimulate (interest, activity, spirit, etc.): These bright students have sparked her enthusiasm for teaching. The arrival of the piano player really sparked the party.

[Origin: bef. 900; (n.) ME; OE spearca; c. MD, MLG sparke; (v.) ME sparken; c. MD, MLG sparken]

—Related forms:
sparkless, adjective
spark·less·ly, adverb
sparklike, adjective
—Synonyms 4. jot, bit, flicker.

B. Fringe –noun
1. a decorative border of thread, cord, or the like, usually hanging loosely from a raveled edge or separate strip.
2. anything resembling or suggesting this: a fringe of grass around a swimming pool.
3. an outer edge; margin; periphery: on the fringe of the art world.
4. something regarded as peripheral, marginal, secondary, or extreme in relation to something else: the lunatic fringe of a strong political party.
5. Optics. one of the alternate light and dark bands produced by diffraction or interference.
6. fringe benefit. –verb (used with object)
7. to furnish with or as if with a fringe.
8. to serve as a fringe for, or to be arranged around or along so as to suggest a fringe: armed guards fringing the building.

[Origin: 1325–75; ME frenge < OF (F frange) < VL *frimbia, metathetic var. of LL fimbria, L fimbriae fringe] —Related forms:
fringeless, adjective
fringelike, adjective
fringy, adjective
—Synonyms 2. edge, border, skirt, rim.

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.