Fight Song a capella - for Hillary

I am so verklempt about this. Choked up. Sobbing. And delighted.
Glass ceiling?  Broken

photo source: DailyKos

Jump

Affirmations work.
But only when you work too.

Post It Jump ad. (If I find an embeddable version I'll add it.)

EDIT:

Squeaky shoes

"Oh no! Now I'm happy!"
 (I am reminded of this Angry Duck incident with D)

But it is simply not possible to stay mad with squeaky shoes.

Hell No! by Ingrid Michaelson & Deaf West Theater

Ingrid Michaelson, who I already loved for her ridiculous Time Machine¹ video with Donald Faisson, Rainn Wilson, Jorge Garcia, et al, released a redo of her latest single, Hell No, which is fully ASL & English.

People magazine ran an article which seems to have the only video link currently available.  Go watch it and come back!  I love that Ingrid was inspired by Deaf West Theater at the Tony's and asked them to work with her to broaden the audience. 

Hearies, if you ever wondered the difference between word-for-word and concept-for-concept interpreting, look at how many different ways there are to say "hell no!"  And it's not just the hands, it's really the facial expressions. 

Side note: one of my "that's a cool sign" signs shows up: WHATEVER.  Yes, it's done as a big ole' two-handed W, but I like it as a two-handed W with the wrist twist.  Super expressive.  You can hear the boredom and the flippancy within the visual. 

1 Time Machine does a lovely play on video running backwards to illustrate reversal of time. But if you want a geeky version, there's also Entropic Time, a parody of Billy Joel's "For the Longest Time". It's scientific!

EDIT: YouTube now has the ASL video.

I'm with Her

source: Susan Walsh, AP

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Charlotte's got a lot.

The first time I flew into Charlotte Douglas International Airport and saw that verbage on all their signs, I snapped a photo and sent it to an NCF friend whose daughter Charlotte, then 1yo, evidently had her own ad campaign going.

Today, Charlotte's primary draw was the current president and the presumptive presidential nominee, the pair of whom were once rivals in a similarly protracted primary runoff.  Then one campaigned for the other, and now the reverse is true. 

Picked up some swag:
A signature pin, a Madam President, and (sorry about the glare) a Rosie the Riveter.


I mistakenly thought arriving before the doors opened would be sufficient advance to get a reasonable seat.  (3pm rally... 1pm doors open... 90min drive...totally doable.)  As it happens, there were thousands of people ahead of me in line; I consider myself fortunate to have made it into the final overflow room.  (CNN reports that the Charlotte Fire Marshall told [Clinton aides] there were 7,000 people in the main hall and 2,500 people in the overflow room, making this Clinton's biggest event of the campaign.)  Ninety minutes of queuing up the street around the corner, down and back thru the (closed for the day) outdoor train station concourse brought me as far as the security checkpoint to the live-streaming-in-another-building overflow room.  But the line was peaceful, and the only protesters I saw were a lone cardboard-sign-bearing Bernie supporter and a trio of pro-lifers with an offensively graphic 8' banner.

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The biggest message was that we're in this together, for the good of America and its people.  All people.  And as the woman sitting next to me remarked, it was like United Colors of Benetton in Hillary's rally -- all ages and every hue of flesh.  The cheering of "Hill-a-ry!" and "I'm with Her!" may have drowned out some of the words, but the meaning was clear:  “Hillary Clinton has to be the next president of the United States,” Obama said.  “I’m here today because I believe in Hillary Clinton.”

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/election/article87726277.html#storylink=cpy

 

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Once Hillary and Obama left the mainstage, those of us in the overflow room made ready to go, but most were stopped at the doors by volunteers and staffers who let us know that if we were willing to wait, there "might be two special guests coming to this room".

I owe a debt of gratitude to the super tall man next to me who was willing to hoist my phone aloft. He got some great shots!

This was as good as I could see -- a rather clear phone photo of a tablet shot from a few rows up.

The takeaway from all of this is: VOTE!

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Wall Street Journal article
CNN article
Charlotte Observer article (this one has the best pictures of the event, including of the queue)


(Hillary Clinton & Barack Obama come out at 1:25:45)

(side note: one unexpected, one-time cheer that drew positive response but was really not the point of today was "Obama for Supreme Court!")

(EDIT for clarity: I've been with her/Ready for Hillary/Hillary for America since 2008. 2007? I think primary season is getting longer and longer. But the one previous Hillary rally I went to was in Harrisburg PA prior to the 2008 PA primaries, and I knew things like where to park so I could walk to the event. And it was at the Forum, where I'd had my tap shows, and which seats 1700 max.)

If good fences make good neighbors, so too do new basketball hoops

When we moved into Credo, we acquired an in-ground basketball hoop.  Just the hoop, really; the acrylic backboard was gone, leaving just a hoop and its steel frame, and a pole embedded in concrete.  And being the avid basketball players we are  given our great height and athletic ability it literally has only impacted our lives when we told our RV-dwelling friend that she could park in our driveway and then we discovered that RVs are taller than hoops.

But it's been on the list since we moved in as a reasonably easy fix to just throw up some plexiglass, or even just tack some plywood up there so it was useable instead of useless.  And we've actually had it in mind to host youth events since reading the previous owners' letter to prospective buyers; that was something they did, and something that resonated with us.  We have hosted movie nights, and "no school now what?" days, and most recently, a youth group game night that devolved wonderfully into roasting marshmallows and tossing a football in the backyard.  And tossing a basketball thru the backboard rather than thru the hoop.

We also looked at just taking it out; we certainly wouldn't miss it.  And our RV friend wouldn't either.  And every time we back out of the garage, we wouldn't have to think about how to miss it.  But the internet was humorously unhelpful, particularly this forum which variously suggested 1) dynamite, 2) a "please don't steal me" sign, and 3) saltwater and a case of beer while you watch it rust.  Bonus, ours had a head start on rust.

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Before:

 

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Disassembly of just the parts needing replaced¹:

1 That is proper Penn Dutch grammar. There is no "to be" in Penn Dutch.

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Then, although the entire rig is meant to be assembled on the ground and then hoisted aloft and installed on the pole, we had a good bit already installed from the previous backboard that we did not bring down.  We also are fortunate to have good neighbors.

Today's QOTD:

Next door neighbor C: So the springs go on there...
me (interrupting): What are the springs for?
C: It's for when you dunk.
Big Frog (directly to me): Yes, for when YOU dunk...!

<later>
C (tightening bolts): How tight should these go?
me (consulting instruction sheet): It says to desired tension.  So basically, season to taste.
C (directly to me): So when you DUNK...

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Taaaaah daaaaaaaah!

I will have you know that I pulled out the basketball right away, stood at the foul line, and made a basket on my very first attempt.  Big Frog will vouch for me, and not just because he's obliged to in the marriage vows².  But of course it's not on video because it is basically unprecedented, and there was absolutely no reason to believe this shot would be a success.

2 We did make oddly specific promises at our wedding, but somehow basketball never did enter into it. Until now?

Got a lot of practice to put in.  Free shots, of course, and also dunking.