I’m back after three sleepless days in California scoping for neighborhoods and visiting USC. Saying out loud that I’m moving to California feels strange in my mouth, as if I have to whisper so no one hears. It seems that each step towards going back to school only gets harder and more complex. I keep thinking as I meet each deadline that I have passed the rough part. No more forms, transcripts, test scores, or essays, but now comes the part where my decisions become real. It is no more an arbitrary statement that, oh yeah, I’m moving to Los Angeles. Now I actually have to MOVE to Los Angeles. It becomes a strange test of my hold on reality to sign that registration form. A decision I can’t back out of, which is why I’m waiting until the last minute. Nothing like a little procrastination to ease the soul.

The Annenberg building at USC

More on the trip later…

i had another one of those conversations last night. the ones where you find someone that can talk about more than tv or celebrities or the weather. so you have at it and discuss and debate everything under the sun with no real direction or purpose except to let your ideas and thoughts escape from the cobwebbed cave they live in for most of your days. that pang of sunlight breaks in and they burst forth like an undammed river – our words and thoughts on politics, globalization, human nature and our role in the universe tumble and flow through tributaries and streams until they clash into a rolling sea of the true conversation i crave. and it makes me miss V.

i almost got a tattoo of this

oh, and also go see Hot Fuzz. we went to the preview here (thanks, Matt!) and it was brilliantly funny and grotesque and i loved every minute of it. except for last night, my mind decided to smash elements of Hot Fuzz and the trailer for 28 Weeks Later and create the dream from hell. seriously, it was fucking scary. it was weird and complex and creepily involved the exact type of format and storyline as a film. maybe i should turn it into a screenplay. it would make the perfect movie based on the last scene alone(yes, my dreams have scenes). M. and i and two other people that were trying like hell to escape the zombies swam across this crystal clear tropical bay. when we reached the other side, we split up into two groups and m. and i jumped into his car and sped off but we don’t know what happened to the other two people. when you’re being chased by zombies there’s really no time to look. while we’re driving and feeling like we’re finally safe, i remember that we were indirectly told (voiceover?) that out of the large group of people that started being killed by the zombies – only one survives. we look at eachother and painfully realize that its not over. and that was it. end scene.

Gonzales ‘testified’ before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, apparently to exonerate himself from the scandal involving the fired US attorneys last year. He is taking quite a beating but I am doubtful he will lose his job over the event. If so, he’ll join the ranks of disgraced administration personnel that slip out of the public consciousness long before the residual effects of their actions have faded.

But Bush’s unwavering support of Gonzales, although not exactly shocking, just makes me wonder what an administration official would have to do to get fired. I think that someone should find out. I’m waiting for the Secretary of Energy to run across the White House lawn naked. But since he serves ‘at the pleasure of the president’, it’s all okay.

Jon Stewart’s take on the ‘pleasure of the president’ line. Awesome.

Yet, I think we’re in for a fun year and a half as the RP’s get pounded for only a fraction of their misdeeds during the past six years, but at least it’s something. It just saddens me that the media attention and “outrage” over the administration’s failings cover only the superficial events and gloss over the real issues affecting our basic human rights. It shocks me how cases of human rights and civil liberty abuses get glossed over in favor of smaller, less pervasive scandals.

How much do we hear about the Military Commissions Act, which revokes the constitutional right of due process to anyone, citizen or not, that the president declares to be an ‘enemy combatant’? Are we okay with a ‘redefinition’ of torture to however the administration sees fit without any consideration for the Geneva Convention or basic human rights? I’m not saying we should give anyone a pass on the lesser issues such as dismissed US attorneys. It’s a real problem that those responsible absolutely need to be held accountable for. If any administration can dismiss an appointed US attorney based on political preference, we have a major problem. But I wish that our Congress would stand up for the things that don’t fall into the category of scandal of the day or the most current national distraction. There are good people out there that are sponsoring legislation to fix many of the problems created since 9/11, but the fact that we have to fight for legislation to protect our basic human rights is a symbol of a greater issue that we can’t fix through votes.

New blog! It’s not very fancy, but I promise fantastic upgrades in the near future. If you have your own blog, website, or favorite chuck norris discussion group you would like me to link to, please let me know.

If you’re reading this you probably know me already. I’m going to be moving again this summer so if anyone wants to know where I am or what I’m doing, it’s probably found here. I can’t promise excitement, enlightenment, or any other word ending in -ment, but in case you have any interest: here is my life and notes.