my friend ddb took a good picture of me at applecon earlier this spring!

here is where it is.

to answer your question, i have no idea what i was doing. but it's obviously something interesting.

dear homophobic jerks at the place i was eating dinner tonight:

thank you for loudly discussing how the mormon church had recently declared gay marriage to be sinful, and the ways you'd heard of to get money to people fighting the decision in california.

because i'd been meaning to donate money to people fighting *for* the decision, such as marriage equality usa. but i hadn't gotten around to it.

but now i have. and i donated more than i was going to.

no love,
betsy.

wedding pictures from california, day two, posted here.

they're all so cute and so happy.

here is why you should buy and read maureen mchugh's _mothers and other monsters_.

i read. i read a lot. there is not enough time in the day for me to read, so i combine it with other things. i read while walking places. i read while crossing the street, for pete's sake. this all works out fine. i don't walk into things, i don't get hit by cars, it's all good.

i brought _mothers and other monsters_ to dinner tonight. read it during dinner. read it while waiting to pay. read it while walking out to the car. was reading 'wicked', a short short in the middle of the book, and opened the car door smack into my leg. ow.

(no bleeding, didn't tear my jeans, but i'm expecting a bruise in the morning.)

maureen mchugh: good enough so that i maim myself, when no other author has ever caused me to do so.

go buy the book.

okay, i'm back! sort of. for now, have a poem.

Little Dog's Rhapsody in the Night (Percy Three), Mary Oliver
He puts his cheek against mine
and makes small, expressive sounds.
And when I'm awake, or awake enough

he turns upside down, his four paws
in the air
and his eyes dark and fervent.

Tell me you love me, he says.

Tell me again.

Could there be a sweeter arrangement?
Over and over
he gets to ask it.
I get to tell.

(in case you were wondering why anyone would ever have a small dog? this. this is why.)

here's yet another note on why you should get your children vaccinated. dianne odell was born before the polio vaccine.

For more than 50 years, Dianne Odell lived inside a 7-foot-long metal tube, unable to breathe outside of it but determined not to let it destroy her spirit for life.

From her 750-pound iron lung, she managed to get a high school diploma, take college courses and write a children's book about a "wishing star" named Blinky.

But a power failure shut off electricity to the tube and stopped the pump drawing air into her lungs, leading to the death of Odell, 61, on Wednesday.

more available here.

woohoo california! woohoo!


from the sf gate article on the supreme court decision:

(05-15) 10:31 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- Gays and lesbians have a constitutional right to marry in California, the state Supreme Court said today in a historic ruling that could be repudiated by the voters in November.

In a 4-3 decision, the justices said the state's ban on same-sex marriage violates the "fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship." The ruling is likely to flood county courthouses with applications from couples newly eligible to marry when the decision takes effect in 30 days.