The Past Few Weeks

Wow, the past few weeks went fast and school is about to begin. From the 4th to the 7th, my friend came to visit. He was my best friend growing up and though we had a separation a few years back, we are working on regaining our old friendship. We went to Mystic Lake and met up with his twin brother and had an absolute BLAST! We ate at the buffet and pooled money together on the slots just like old times. We also went out for a friend's birthday party, up to training camp and the boyfriend cooked us an awesome steak supper.

Then we had a long weekend of work before we were back into fun mode.

Then we spent a few days in Kasson, MN with a friend from college who was house/catsitting while the owner's went to visit family. Each night we had "tub time" in the hot tub and ate twice at the Country Pleasures Cafe, which was delicious. We went to Treasure Island Casino in Red Wing, MN and I won all the money back that I lost and the boyfriend won his back to for the most part so in total we only lost $15. That's a pretty cheap afternoon. We also went to Rochester and Winona for an afternoon.

This last weekend we went to Plainview to hang out with the boyfriend's family. It was incredible. I had an absolute blast with the girls who will one day be my sister-in-laws. And I sort of made some ammends with my future father-in-law, not that we didn't like each other but I have more of an appreciation for his sense of humor and his love for me. I felt like a part of the family more so this time than any other- it was like I was already married in and it felt great....totally different than the previous times. It was obvious that future F-I-L was glad that all his kids were home together and that Chris (the already son-in-law) and I were able to be there as well. It was an AWESOME experience.

Sunday we worked at Corn on the Cob days in Plainview. Future F-I-L is an excellent cook, as is boyfriend, so together they are dynamite. Amy, Abbey, Chris and I sold the food and had an AWESOME teamwork situation- in total we worked from 830am until 5pm and sold: 350 hamburger patties, 120 porkchops on a bun, 200 Wild Rice Brats, and 5 cases of pop. My feet were, and still are, killing me. But, for the family that will someday soon be mine officially (even though I already consider them family already, as do they me) it was worth it. Score one for marriage.

A Hit to the Republicans

Well, they fucked up again. Republican Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska was indicted on 7 counts of failing to disclose thousands of dollars in services he received from a company that helped renovate his home. Tisk tisk, Mr. Senator. Prosecutors said Stevens received more than $250,000 in gifts and services from VECO Corp., a powerful oil services contractor, and its executives.

From May 1999 to August 2007, prosecutors said, the 84-year-old senator concealed "his continuing receipt of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of things of value from a private corporation."

The indictment unsealed Tuesday says the items included: home improvements to his vacation home in Alaska, including a new first floor, garage, wraparound deck, plumbing, electrical wiring; as well as a Viking gas grill, furniture and tools.
He also was accused of failing to report swapping an old Ford for a new Land Rover to be driven by one of his children.

Justice Department said Stevens will not be arrested and will be allowed to turn himself in.

Fun Summer Outing

On Thursday, July 25th, the other special education teachers and I went to lunch at Neopolitan's pizza in Eden Prarie and then to see Mama Mia at the Eden Prarie theatre. Awesome day!! The next teacher outing is scheduled for August 21st in Mankato- shopping at Gordmans, Lunch and mini golf. It was good to see them again after the June outing and it will be good to see them for some fun before school starts again. Lovin' it!!!

Busy Week's End/Weekend

Thursday: Went to the premiere midnight showing of Dark Knight. It was phenomenal- we got home at 3am.

Friday: Left Mankato at 3pm to go to Jackpot. Gambled until 7pm before going to the Sebastian Bach Band concert opening at 8pm before the headlining band POISON opened at 9pm. POISON played until 1030pm. We then gambled until 230am and got home at around 4am.

Saturday: I worked from 3-10pm

Sunday: I work from 3-10pm.

Monday: I work from 6a-10p....should be a blast.

Saturday

Saturday is North Mankato Fun Days. We can start setting up chairs and blankets tomorrow morning at 7am so I will be up with Aaron at 650am getting the chairs onto the lawn to set them up before some moron decides our lawn looks good. I think people should have first dibs on their own fucking lawn, that's why we pay for it. But if anyone tries to set up in our yard I will promptly throw their shit onto the neighbor's lawn. So there.

We have approximately 20 people coming over so we are covering the WHOLE lawn with chairs and blankets. It will be like an impenetrable fort. I win!

Al Franken and Norm Coleman

I hate Norm Coleman. In fact, the last time he was elected I swore that if he continued to be elected in Minnesota I would leave. I'm still here, but if this election shows that the people of Minnesota once again elect a boring, party-switching, hypocritical career politician, then I think I WILL leave. However, I figure that as long as I vote I have the right to bitch if the opposition is elected and screws up. People who do not vote or feel it is a waste of time to get involved, in my opinion, have no right to bitch. So, as the election begins gaining steam, I feel it is now time to say my peace on the Senate election. I like Al Franken. I like him because he was born in Minnesota and remembers what it was like to go through the Minnesota education system. He's smart and well educated. He's funny and down to earth. He also spoke with high regard about Tim Walz, who has been a constant champion for the cause of MN, including the education system (Walz was an educator at West High School in Mankato) and who I hold in high regard as well. I found a funny article about the Franken/Coleman race on MSN and found an excerpt that was brilliant:

Coleman is a man of no interest, a run-of-the-mill political hypocrite who started out as a standard-issue long-haired student rebel leader on Long Island in the 1960s and surfed the zeitgeist: Now he is a standard-issue pro-war, tax-cut Republican. Franken, by contrast, needs no introduction and would be one of the most interesting people in the Senate from day one. Interesting isn't the most important quality in a senator. Honest, smart, and (for my taste) liberal are more important. But interesting would be nice.

Franken's problem is that he spent three decades as a professional comedian before turning to politics and has a large inventory of potential gaffe material to explain away: a 1995 magazine article describing Franken proposing rude, unfunny jokes about rape at a Saturday Night Live staff meeting; a 2000 article in Playboy in which he fantasized about three-way sex with robots (or something); an ungallant crack about women in Afghanistan (a place Franken has visited repeatedly with the USO); and so on. Take the SNL staff meeting. None of Franken's rude fantasies made it onto the air, and there is no evidence that he especially wanted them to. He was thinking out loud, an activity vital to professional comics and fatal to professional politicians. The only way a meeting to plan a comedy show can possibly work is if everybody feels free to say absolutely anything. If comedy writers are thinking, "I'd better not say that because it may not be funny and in 13 years I may decide to run for the Senate," we will end up with fewer good jokes on TV and fewer interesting people in the Senate.

Franken is in a quandary. He can't stop his campaign to defend every joke he's ever written that someone now finds offensive—or pretends to. Trying to explain a joke is notoriously pointless, anyway. But Franken also can't let his opponent create the impression that he is some kind of sexist monster rather than the long-married, deeply uxorious family man that he is, with the progressive views on abortion choice and related issues that you would expect from a Democratic liberal. If the voters of Minnesota would rather be represented by a hack like Norm Coleman than laugh off a few jokes that didn't work, then they should stop complaining about being stuck with professional politicians. And the real joke will be on them.
-Michael Kinsley is a columnist for Time and the founding editor of Slate.

The 4th of July

This 4th of July was awesome. We spent it with my friend and the 20 people she invited. Aaron and I went over early to clean and arrange things while she was at work. We were there from 2pm until 1:00am. It was a long day but fun. The kids were doing smaller fireworks for a bit before the town fireworks started. Then, the town fireworks were actually pretty good this year. After the grand finale, the kids had some more fireworks to finish. After the fireworks were all done, one of the other guests, let's just call him Charlie, was playing his small guitar...kind of like the ukalele ones but not exactly. Anyway, then he let the kids take turns playing it. The bonus? No matter what the kids played it sounded pleasant. Then, those of us who were between ages 18 and 32 sat in a circle and chatted- 14 of us in total. So, it was just a nice, relaxing evening.