Missyisms

The Day After

I'm feeling this big let down.

Yesterday I was 10 minutes shy of being part of a lock down at one of the biggest malls in the United States. Today...nothing, nada, zip. No almost-anything!

I've gone from the zenith of almost-excitement to the drudges of actual-reality. Nobody almost-threatened me. Nobody practically-forced me. No maybe-gun sightings and no stage knifes to be seen. People were actually courteous and nice. What's with that? My adrenaline can't take it. The roller coaster dive from one extreme to the other is unbelievable.

What a let down.

And yesterday in itself is a bit of a let down, now that I think about it. I don't mind that I missed being locked in Woodfield Mall for several hours...there's no fun in that...but I missed the chance to display my Rambo-esque rescue skills! I could have taken down that possible-gunman and saved them all! I'm faster than a pseudo-bullet! I can leap speed bumps with an awkward jump! But 10 minutes. 10 minutes got in the way and it never happened.

What a let down.

Well, at least my Herculean imagination is still working in overdrive! There's something to be said for that.

I have to go now; Reggie wants out and I have to valet the doors. But I'll protect him if there are any almost-dangers out there! No moon-glare reflecting off the new coat of shiny white snow is going to hurt my dog! Not while I'm around.

What a let down. From possible-guns to non-vibrant moonlight.

Woodfield Mall

Late this afternoon I ran a few boring, but mandatory, errands. One errand required stopping in at Woodfield Mall. It was about 4:00 when I got there and I was pleasantly surprised to find the parking lot fairly free of cars. I parked, strolled into Macy's and from there entered the Mall. It was pretty quiet. There was a young couple taking their children to the new, and for once completely empty, play area.

It was a short distance to the store I needed to go to, and I was surprised to see that it was closed and a few employees were standing outside the door. I asked what was going on and was shocked when they said there had been a lock down. I glanced around and all the other stores I could see were open and somebody was opening the gate to the store I wanted to go in. "In this store?"

"No. Woodfield has been in lock down for hours because somebody was seen with a gun. They've just reopened everything."

Oh. Are they sure it's safe? Do I need to check the news before I come to the mall from now on?

Here's a link with more information, but notice all the conflicting information in the comments. Also, contrary to what the article says, one of the employees told me they had been in lock down, but that the store had never been searched by police.

I guess timing really is everything. Of course, this blog would have been a lot more interesting if I'd been in the Mall during the lock down...but it was safer this way, except they never found the gun, so was it?

Gotham, Illinois

You've probably heard that the governor of the state of Illinois was arrested and indicted today. This was NO SURPRISE to the good residents of Illinois. No, the only person that seems surprised that the governor was arrested today...is the governor himself! Yeah, Blogo really and truly is that stupid.

No, the good citizens of Illinois were not surprised that Blogo was arrested, we're just surprised it took this long. 

And, there's another surprise...why weren't there more arrests? Clearly this doesn't end with the governor and his chief of staff. Remember, the FBI has said today, "If it (Illinois) isn't the most corrupt state in the United States, it's certainly one hell of a competitor." They didn't say the governor was the most corrupt...they said the state, and since they were discussing the government when the statement was made, we can safely assume they meant the government was corrupt...so why not more arrests? And the U.S. Attorney? What did he say? He said, "Gov. Blagojevich has been arrested in the middle of what we can only describe as a political corruption crime spree." I repeat, where are the other arrests? Let's see, Democratic Machine in Chicago? Illinois Congressional reps? IL reps at the federal level? More arrests better be coming! This is so over due!

There was one slightly humorous note today: We've now learned that Blogo was trying to blackmail the Chicago Tribune. The Tribune has been very hard on Blogo (and rightly so), so he was trying to get their editorial board removed by blocking any incentives to help with the sell of the Chicago Cubs. In their entertainment section today, which was published before Blogo was arrested, the Tribune had a short article about the release of the DVD for the movie The Dark Knight. The reviewer was disappointed that the DVD extras did very little to highlight Chicago as the shooting location, and thus the background, for the two latest Batman movies. Hmm, Chicago...Gotham...Chicago...Gotham. Ouch.

Of all the days to be wanting Chicago to be exposed as Gotham, today was just too close to the truth.

Voting U.S.

...I hope you did also!

Election Day

If you are an American citizen, remember to VOTE today!

Ike Updates

My cousin's home inland from Beaumont is okay, but that entire area will be without electricity for some time. The grid is under floodwater. My cousin's husband has been building them a second home on the Galveston peninsula. They haven't been able to get to this home, but have seen it on a web cam. Their house has apparently survived better than those around it, but has lost it's garage and patio. Many of the houses near it are completely gone. Her husband knew what he was doing to build a secure home. They don't know when they'll be allowed to get to this home.

We haven't heard anything from my uncle. Since they were in Colorado, they might not know about their house yet. A friend of Mom's is at her mother's where they have no electricity, but no damage. It's going to take Texas a while to dig out of this. They're in my prayers.

Ike continued influencing the weather here in the Chicago area today with lots more rain. They're saying we've set 1-day and 2-day rain records, but I haven't heard the totals. (There are certain records that are better off NOT being set. This was one of them.) I saw more flooded and closed roads today. And very sadly, the news is reporting at least three weather-related deaths. It's scary how fast the water rises and catches people. Even though it finally stopped raining this afternoon and the sun (what's that?) is supposed to shine tomorrow, we're still under flood warnings.

I went to church in a deluge this morning wearing a long dress rain coat in an attempt to keep dry. It seems like we're either bone dry here or it is poring down rain. I think I need to give in and buy a full-sized umbrella. All I have is the small collapsible ones. Where does one buy a full-sized umbrella that won't fall apart during it's first use? Speaking of umbrellas, since this is record breaking rainfall and everybody was using umbrellas, they asked everyone to open their umbrellas during church so they could take a picture. The sanctuary was flooded with colors. I hope they'll put the picture on the web.

Here's another picture from my sub-division that I took this afternoon:

There are two baseball fields and a soccer field under the water.

Not So Hypocritical After All

Yesterday I felt hypocritical...today I still do, but not as much. Here are a few pictures from the Chicago area today:

Copyright Chicago Tribune submitter.

After driving through several flooded intersections, I got to the one above and gave up and came home. This is about 3 to 4 miles south of my home.

Copyright Chicago Tribune.

Above is a car floating on the Eden's Highway. (Thankfully, I was nowhere near this.)

An image I took less than a mile from my home. (Click for a bigger view.) This is a retention pond that has crested it banks. None of the trees, including the ones in the background and the far left, should be in the water. I'd say the water is 40 or more feet beyond it's banks in this direction. On the far side of the image, the water was across the street and might be inside of some of the homes. I'm thankful that the inside of my house is still dry. 

But still. Many in Texas have it much worse than we do. 

Copyright Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Copyright AP.

And it will continue raining the next day or two for many of us. And here's why:

Hurricane Ike is also the cause of the system causing so much flooding in Chicago. Scary. And more rain to come.

I don't know what I was thinking last night when I said I thought my cousin was far enough away from the storm to be OK. She was, but only because she and her husband had already evacuated their home. If you've been seeing news out of Beaumont, Texas, my cousin lives one city inland from there. They're 90 minutes west of Houston and the area was hit hard. We don't know how theirs or my uncle's home north of Houston faired.

In Remembrance

Copyright: Might be The Guardian, U.K.

Mr. Plagiarism

I don't talk politics often on this blog, but this is unmissable. The rumors are running rampant that Senator Barack Obama has chosen Senator Joseph Biden as his running mate.

For the last twenty years I've known Sen. Biden as Mr. Plagiarism. Here's a scan of from a paper I wrote 20 years ago during my senior year of college. Click on the image for a better view.

 

At the time Biden gave this speech he was trying to win his party's nomination. His well publicized plagiarism sent him home in shame. But, he's back.

It's so amazing what this speech tells us about Joseph Biden:

1. He's a documented plagiarist. You can read it above. I won't be surprised if clips of the speeches end up on YouTube.
2. He's stupid. When Biden steals from others, he doesn't choose unknown people in secluded corners of the world...he plagiarizes from the United Kingdom's Neil Kinnock, the Leader of the Opposition and Labour Party (1983-1992). How dumb can you get?!?!!
3. He's a liar. The statements in Neil Kinnock's speech are the truth. The plagiarism in Biden's speech are lies.

Time magazine wrote of Biden's plagiarism:

• "it underscored the prior concerns that he (Biden) was a shallow vessel for other people's ideas."^a
• "a candidate (Biden) of style rather than substance."^b

According to FamousPlagiarists.com, Biden also failed a law course because he plagiarized in a paper and they add:

"Biden initially denied any wrongdoing, claiming that this was just an inadvertent lack of acknowledgement. Yet there were other instances of rhetorical borrowing from speeches made by Robert F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey. And the fact that Biden had given other speeches using the Kinnock passages without acknowledgment suggested that the lifting was more than just an inadvertent oversight."^c

Yes, these things happened twenty years ago, but it is who Biden is. And only last year, Biden demonstrated he's still a shallow vessel when he said: "I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," Biden said. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."^d Hmm, can anyone say Jesse Jackson? CNN used to have a video clip of Biden saying this as a link from this page, but they've replaced the video with speculation on who Obama is choosing. (Is CNN covering up for Biden and Obama?)

And this, Mr. Plagiarism, is who Sen. Obama thinks is the best person available to run on his ticket? Mr. Plagiarism. I wonder if Senator John McCain will choose as badly. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."

Footnotes:
⁵ "A Case of Plagiarized Passion?," Newsweek, 21 Sept. 1987, p. 35.
⁶ Ibid.
^a Walter Shapiro, "Biden's Familiar Quotations," Time, 28 Sept. 1987, p. 17.
^b George J. Church, "And then there were six," Time, 5 Oct. 1987, p. 24.
^c http://www.famousplagiarists.com/politics.htm
^d http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/01/31/biden.obama/

Shake, Rattle and Roll

About 4:35 this morning I thought I was on a boat. I was softly rocking back and forth. My bed and I were softly rolling over waves on a quiet sea...WAIT...my bed is neither water safe nor a flotation device. "Oh, we're having an earthquake."

WAIT...an earthquake? No. It must be a dream.

Reggie didn't react, but he was downstairs and I was upstairs in my bed. It didn't last very long and I didn't hear any sounds.

It couldn't be an earthquake, could it?

It was.

The news this morning confirms a 5.2 or 5.4 earthquake centered near West Salem, Ill. I live over 250 miles from West Salem and I still felt it! Wow! The reports are saying that buildings in Chicago and Indianapolis shook. St. Louis is closer and probably really felt it. One person told me a Chicago-area highways has been damaged, but I haven't seen that on the news. Most of the damage, if there is any, will be down south near the center of the earthquake. They're still collecting news and data about the tremor.

This is the fourth or fifth earthquake that I've lived through. Yes, my friends in California are laughing. This one is unique because it is the only one I've actually felt! Mostly for my own interest, here's my quake experience:

• In the late 1980s (I think) about 6:30 in the evening, I was walking down the stairs at my parent's home when I suddenly tipped sideways and brushed my shoulder against the side wall. I remember being shocked and thinking I must be pretty tired, but 10 minutes later a news flash came on the TV saying we'd had an earthquake. Other than my gaffe on the stairs, no one in the house felt anything.
• In the early 1990s I was on a business to the Oakland area of California. Our second or third morning everyone at the office excitedly greeted us with "Did you feel the earthquake?" We had not. We were staying in a new hotel and it must have been built on rollers to absorb the movement. They were very disappointed that their business guests had missed the quake.
• In 2002, I woke in the wee hours of the morning to the sound of my windows rattling and Reggie barking. It was odd because I didn't hear a plane or train (which sometimes cause my windows to rattle) and I couldn't hear the wind. I went back to sleep when Reggie settled down and was shocked a few hours later to learn it had been an earthquake...I hadn't felt a thing!

I think there was another one while I was at my parent's house, but again we didn't feel it.

So today has already brought me a new experience...I felt an earthquake. And, I lived to talk about! Oddly my next door neighbors slept through it, my mother felt it and heard the door or windows rattling, but my father slept through it, and another friend said she slept through it. I'm sure people closer to the epi center didn't sleep through it. Aftershocks anyone?

I don't mean to make light of this...a major earthquake in the midwest will cause horrendous damage because most of our buildings are not built to withstand earthquakes since we don't have many. There's a hole in this building philosophy...there may not be many, but the Big One is a strong possibility. A lot of midwesterners don't know about the New Madrid fault and are always astounded when we have quakes. I've known about it for years, but must thank Chats for the above link, which I was too lazy to find myself. ;-)

UPDATE: They are now saying on the news that today is the 102 anniversary of the BIG ONE in San Francisco.