Vote Early and Vote Often: April 7

The towniest of all townie holidays is upon us and the local selectman elections are certainly heating up. On April 7th, about 10% (if we're lucky!) of the electorate will head to the polls to cast their votes for the wicked local pol they feel best represents their personal, professional, and financial self interests. If "all politics is local", as the late Sen. Tip O'Neil once bemused, then the local selectman races certainly impact us more than November's presidential race.

Lawn signs dot the suburban landscape of Canton, and apparently there are three people running for two coveted selectman seats. My dad is volunteering for a campaign in Stoughton (and proudly displays a lawn sign so all 12 cars that drive by my childhood home know exactly who he's voting for) which has sparked my interest in the selectman race in my new hometown.

Last year Canton passed a 2 1/2 override which had a direct, $500 a year impact on me. This time around the biggest local issue in my life is the fact that the right hand cut out lane between Washington and Bolivar has been replaced with a ridiculously oversized sidewalk. Additionally, the new (state funded!) traffic pattern/quagmire in the center of town means that I often have to park upwards of 25 feet from Takara. Sometimes it's so bad that I'm forced to park on the opposite of the street, which means that I have to bang an illegal u-ey in order to avoid a light going back to my place. Heaven forbid my uncooked fish turn cold during this stressful process.

(My life is complicated, I know.)

Two of the local pols are incumbants while the third candidate is looking to make an strategic vertical move from the planning board to selectman. One of the incumbants, Avril Elkort, is an out-of-the-closet Republican, which in Canton is the equivalent to taking out a Pennysaver ad to announce that you have a venereal disease. She's definitely got my vote.

Jeremy Comeau, the wanna-be selectman from the planning board, is the other candidate I'm leaning towards. His website decries the lack of parking in front of the local packie (an issue near and dear to my heart!) as well as the dangers of turning in and out of the 7-11 convenience store. Since I don't have kids, I consider any politician who comprehends that the balance between safety and grabbing a party size bag of Doritos is absolutely as crucial to Canton as the quality of public education, to be an honest and genuine person. I also happen to like the style of glasses he's sporting in his homepage photo.

There it is, folks. Just when you thought petty high school student government elections were forever out of your life, you marvel upon the fact that selectman races are a bi-annual occurance. I can hardly wait to stand and be counted among the 50 voters who will likely jam my polling precinct this April 7.

The Most Intelligent Thing I've Read All Day

MSN asked its's readers to submit questions for Barack Obama's press conference tonight. It will never make it past a message board but it's compelling nonetheless:

Mr. President, please explain "toxic" assets in the following context by contrasting the following to the current housing crisis:

If I buy a new $10,000.00 auto with 10% down and financing at 6% APR for 60 months and I drive off the lot.....6 months later the open retail market on THAT used car is now $7900.00. Is that asset now TOXIC? Does that asset become more toxic as time passes even though I am reducing the principle? Shouldn't the focus be on keeping people in their homes and not worrying about the perceived value of homes? Why should the government establish a "bad bank" to buy up the banks' mistakes? Why can't we compell them to restructure loans by lowering interest rates and/or extending loan terms to 50 years until the market recovers?

On another note, mortgage rates are under 5% (no points) and should be for the next few weeks. If you're paying anything over 5.5 and plan to stick around for a while, it may be a good time to consider a re-fi.

MGMT - Kids

Since it'll be in your head all summer anyways:

Wicked Good Grammer

My blog crush Adam G at Universalhub commented that he heard an older guy at Logan complain that he lived too far away to take the rattler to the airport. Rattler? Why, it's old school Boston slang for subway or streetcar of course. My dad, like so many upstanding South Shore rats, still uses this phrase fairly frequently. Then again, my dad also eats spuckies and becomes visibly upset if he forgets to DVR Saturday morning candlepin. It's definitely a generation thing.

While I grew up hearing phrases like b'dayduh (potato), spuckie (small sub), and "having a time" (going to a party), I generally avoid using them because quite frankly I get made fun of enough. A couple of other phrases you'd be hard pressed to hear in some of Boston's leafier suburbs:

Cahm Ya Livvah (calm your liver): Cool Your Jets

Basement: Synonym for bathroom. People actually use this phrase. Be cautious if a person over 70 comes to your home and asks for directions to the basement.

Garbage (not to be confused with Trash): Garbage is classified as stinky stuff that a modern day garbage disposal would take care of (eg: grease, vegetable peelings, etc). Trash is the non-stinky stuff (eg: paper, packaging, etc). Back in the day the city would have designated "garbage" and "trash" days and people were expected to know the difference. Of course growing up in the bucolic suburb of Stoughton my parents didn't have sewrage, so the tradition of seperating garbage and trash continues.

No Suh!: This is not a polite way of saying "no, sir" but really a polite way of saying "are you effing serious???". Big difference.

Rat: a fairly common phrase that I used earlier (eg: like so many upstanding South Shore rats). It's a borderline term of endearment to describe someone who is native to a particular geographic area (aka: a townie).

Tonic: When I waitressed the old folks would ask for tonic, which confused the hell out of me. Tonic is an old school term for soda (eg: Coke), but it also means tonic water, which apparently is not the same thing as seltzer. Luckily the place where I worked had a tonic button on the soda gun, which cut out a lot of the confusion. No need for anyone to cahm their livvah, at least when a smiling pahkcah02 was their waitress.

I Wanna Be Too Big Too Fail

Ok, seriously, is anyone out there actually surprised that AIG doled out over $160 million in bonuses this weekend? Really? Because if so, they obviously haven't been paying attention.

See, here's the deal folks: the executives that received bonuses did so because of a contract they signed last March. The AIG ship was sinking but their crafty lawyers drew up paperwork that entitled them to bonuses regardless of their performances. The US government should've dotted the i's and crossed the t's before their 80% takeover of AIG but they didn't bother - AIG is "too big to fail".

The government could've either a) ignored the payout schedule or b) let AIG collapse in manner of Lehman, Bears Stearns, etc. Here's the thing though - most government pensions are funneled through AIG. If AIG disappers, so do the retirement payouts to millions of local, state, and federal employees. AIG wasn't too big to fail but its demise would've jeopardized the golden years of America's payroll patriots. Much better to let the robber barons syphon $160 million taxpayer dollars as bonuses. Our elected leaders think that we're too dumb to notice anyhow.

There's been a lot of outcry over the payouts to AIG brass and I haven't heard of one former executive coming forward to denounce their colleagues. Maybe it's because I haven't had cable TV since Monday, but I seriously can't recall reading or watching an interview with a single AIG employee who refused a $3 million taxpayer sponsored bonus because he felt that accepting it was just a tiny bit wrong.

The point is that until the collapse the majority of Wall Street was made up of Greedy Fucking Bastards, with egos only second to those of professional athletes. We live in a culture that fills out airwaves and broadband pipes with stories of bling, glamour, and get rich quick schemes. Sex scandals bring down governors, 1 out of every 4 American girls vies to be an unwed teenage mom, and the former chairman of the SEC steals $50 billion in a Ponzi scheme. The AIG bonus scam rips open the wound that our country has become.

We've become a nation that rewards short term gains at the expense of long term results. We award every youth athlete a trophy, guarantee homeowners who default on mortgages 2% interest loans, and rescue failing banks all while ensuring that AIG execs get their piece of the pie. In short, America is now a nation that not only encourages failure, but makes failure worth our while. Better to fail than to succeed, as both efforts in the end will yield the same results.

I can't offer any advice on how to get out of this other than to state that we totally did this to ourselves. We've become the biggest, baddest, greediest country on the planet while Brazil, China, and India pour themselves a shot of Johnny Walker Blue and collectively laugh their asses off. Welcome to the new millenium where the electorate is apathetic and the political pages read like the script of Mean Girls. Unfortunately, unlike AIG I doubt that America is too big to fail.

Courtesy of My Good Friend, Flutterbyblue

I'll raise a l'chaim to that this St. Patrick's Day!

Wise Beyond Her Height: The Troll As a Role Model

The Troll updated her Facebook status this weekend by informing everyone that she was ditching digital cable. "Yeah, right", I thought. "She'll be back". To be fair here, the Troll and I have never experienced life with rabbit ears. When Cablevision came to our street in the early days of 1982, our family was the first on the block to sign up (and dad hasn't left the couch since). When I moved out on my own I considered a tricked out cable package to be a basic human right, second only to potable water. Therefore it never even dawned on me that paying $100/month for television is absolutely absurd.

Here's the kicker, tho - I have a 46" HDTV with an HDMI input that plugs directly into my laptop. I can get HD through the TV's QAM tuner and can watch online content directly on my TV. 95% of what I watch is either available through basic cable or online. Watching the latter just means that I have to draw up an Internet page rather than click a button on a remote. The truth is that I've just been really lazy. After a heart to heart with the Troll, I realized that my laziness was costing me big - to the tune of $90/month.

Considering the switch? Consider this: The difference between my super duper Comcast package and my new basic cable subscription is $90/month. This adds up to $1,080 over the next 12 months. That much extra cash can buy all of the following:

One round trip ticket between Boston and New York on Acela
A one year membership to Netflix (1 DVD at a time option)
An 8GB iPod Nano
2.5 lbs of Kona Coffee Beans
A Sylvania 22" LCD TV
A pair of Gap Low Rise Boot Cut Jeans
One Jiffy Lube Signature Oil Change
One Passion Pink Haier Mini Cube Fridge
A case of Sam Adams Beer
One Coach Signature Clip Demi Flap Purse

Basic cable probably isn't for everyone. In fact, I'm not even sure that it's for me. However, I'm willing to try it out for a bit to see if it suits me. If it doesn't, I have absolutely no doubt that Comcast will still take my money each month (they're good like that).

Being Pahkcah02

I've been seriously captivated by two new shows this year: Life On Mars and Being Erica. Incidentally both shows were ripped from foreign stations, which may help explain why they've been so downright brilliant and engaging. Life On Mars follows the story of a modern day New York police detective who after being in an accident was transported back to 1973. It is not clear to the viewer whether the main character, Sam Tyler, is dead, went insane, or is legitimately living the life of a 1973 police detective. While the mystery of Sam's fate is the show's major plot line, I find the subplot of Officer Annie Norris just as fascinating.

Dubbed "No Nuts with the Donuts" (or "no nuts" for short), Annie is so marginalized by her male co-workers that, like the title suggests, it's like she's living on another planet. Armed with a masters degree in psychology, Annie makes coffee and acts as a quasi-social worker while her male co-workers do the "real" police work. However, by 1973 things are clearly changing for Annie and American women in general. Tired of being constantly under minded, Annie bravely demanded this week that her lieutenant promote her to detective. As someone who started her professional career in the new millennium, Annie's struggle to be taken seriously is something that as a woman I can totally appreciate.

On the flipside, Erica Strange, is a typical Generation Xer who re-lives her past on Soapnet's Being Erica. Bouncing from dead-end job to dead-end job despite having two English degrees, Erica's life is full of regrets. Serendipitously, Erica runs into Dr. Tom, a psychologist who speaks in famous quotes and transports Erica back in time to "do over" the moments she wishes would've gone differently. Whether it's being initiated into a secret society or standing up to a demanding professor, Erica learns that sometimes the events we obsess about the most aren't as life altering as we would like to think.

Life on Mars is on every Wednesday at 10:02pm on ABC. You can catch Being Erica on Soapnet at 10pm on Thursdays.

Everything I Learned About Networking, I Learned From Pirating MP3's in Coolidge Tower

I may be dating myself a little, but put your seatbelt on and humor me for a bit. Back before ratio-servers, Napster, and iTunes cool college kids would pirate MP3's by sharing music folders on the school network. Music lovers would pillage through other people's hard drive and simply grab whatever music caught their fancy. With a basic understanding Microsoft Network architecture, even the most computer un-savvy could share and pirate gigs worth of late 90's hip-hop, rap, and indie rock.

Fearing lawsuits college administrators eventually tried to do away with file sharing through school networks but the love of Microsoft Networking never dies. Sure most normal people would choose to back up their precious work contacts, e-mails and documents on CD, external hard drive, or Internet, but as you may have figured out by now, I'm not totally normal. I am however, grateful that I listened to the sage words of Daddy Dearest by backing up my desktop a few weeks ago. It came in handy yesterday when my P.O.S. HP pretty much stopped working.

I was able to salvage 80% of what I needed through that one-time backup I performed. I was able to get almost 95% of it by sharing my desktop C drive on my network (FYI, totally not recommended) and copying it onto my laptop. The desktop needs to be flattened and I would've been wicked screwed with a capital F had I not done that initial back up. Basically years worth of work data would've been gone in a blink of a Windows error message.

Why am I boring you with all of this? Because seriously, folks, we need to remember to floss, change our underwear, and back up our hard drives on a fairly regular basis. If my network behaves I may be able to get out of this one with almost 100% of my data intact.

Another Example of Minnie's Superior Intelligence Level

Everyone thinks that their dog is the smartest, most intuitive creature to ever roam the planet on four legs. I, however, know for certain that Minnie is head and shoulders smarter than most dogs (and people) out there. If you think about it, dogs don't have a ton of responsibilities. They don't have to wake up early, juggle a career, or worry about what to cook for dinner. In fact, dogs honest-to-goodness have nothing better to do all day then to observe you, your routine, and your world (oh, and sleep). Their attention to detail makes them pretty astute pets.

One of my tires has been acting up lately and since I'm off to Connecticut in a few hours, I really couldn't ignore it any longer. I borrowed my mom's car for the day and realizing that their house was on the way to her office/the tire shop, I figured that Minnie would enjoy going for a short ride. Left to her own devices all day, Minnie was absolutely psyched to see me and started going nuts when I asked her if she wanted to go for a ride.

Halfway between home and mom's office Minnie started shaking like a Frenchman in a thunderstorm. She was obviously terrified about something which had me pretty worried. Luckily the princess act ended once she stepped paw into the office (she likes to visit). Why all the canine drama? Well, it turns out that my mom's office is one block away from the place where she gets her baths. Minnie sensed the scenery on the way over and thought that she was going to be subjected to a round of suds, water, and nail clipping.

Like most dogs, Minnie hates baths. In fact, if you say "Minnie, do you want to take a bath?" she'll answer you with a short growl. However, also like most dogs she rolls around in dirt so a trip to the puppy spa is warranted every few weeks. My parents can play bad cop by taking her to these appointments; I'll retain my role as good cop by using different roads to get to my mom's office when playing chauffer for Minnie. As if Minnie weren't smart enough already, she's also managing to keep me in line.

House Hunters Maryland Style

I spent the weekend in Maryland helping the Troll pick out her first condo. Prepared with a clipboard and checklist, I sat like a fly on the wall while the Troll ran off her list of must-haves (in unit laundry, carpet in the bedroom, etc). At the end of the day she made an offer on a short sale and is in "wait and see" mode while the bank reviews her proposal.


It's got an open living room/den with an attached open dining room (which you can't see in this photo). Basically it's big enough to play a regulation football game in.


Despite popular belief, people in the South get their very own bathroom as well!


The bedroom is actually a loft. Edgy, yet conservative.

Good luck!!!