1. Stop talking about politics for a moment or two.
2. Post a reasonably-sized picture in your LJ, NOT under a cut tag, of something pleasant, such as an adorable kitten, or a fluffy white cloud, or a bottle of booze. Something that has NOTHING TO DO WITH POLITICS.
3. Include these instructions, and share the love.

Sometime in seventh grade, I stopped eating. I'm 5'1" and naturally slim - I've never had a weight problem that didn't require me to eat more food, and I've had no delusions about that, either - but for some reason, I just didn't eat. This, I think, was the first year I had to pack my own lunches. Eventually, I wouldn't bother. For a while, I made myself peanut butter sandwiches. I'd eat them ravenously, sitting alone in the room that housed two classes full of students who were not willing to talk to me. Then I started going to my mother's classroom - second grade - under the pretense of "tutoring." Making the sandwiches was a waste by this point. I knew I wouldn't eat them. I wasn't hungry. So for a few weeks I brought nutrigrain bars - apple - unappetizing. I don't think I ever ate them. They remained at the bottom of my schoolbag until the wrappers broke and the crumbs permeated my notebooks. Eventually I brought nothing at all. I watched 8-year olds eat and it made me feel sick. I would not break my fast until 4pm or later, when I would binge on bag after bag of potato chips. We bought the large cardboard boxes of the tiny bags that come in vending machines. They never lasted more than a week. When they were gone, there would be a layover until we visited Sam's Club again. During this period I would rarely eat at all.

I didn't really start eating during the day again until junior year, when my desperate mother began making me lunches again. Even then, I gave the majority of it to Molly. Anticipating this, mom would sometimes make two sandwiches. Sometimes I gave those to Tracey.

Today, I've eaten one-fourth of a granola bar. I bring soup to work, and I am happy on the days Elly decides to order out. I enjoy chicken fingers with honey mustard. I've never counted calories, and I've never thought I was fat. I don't know what to call this eating disorder. It seems I've taught myself not to eat and it's been hard getting an appetite back after these years of the fast. I speculate this was seventh-grade Rachel's attempt at self-punishment. But I've never heard of anyone else with this sort of neurosis before. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough.

Ron Paul wants to define life as starting at conception, build a fence along the US-Mexico border, prevent the Supreme Court from hearing cases on the Establishment Clause or the right to privacy, permitting the return of sodomy laws and the like (a bill which he has repeatedly re-introduced), pull out of the UN, disband NATO, end birthright citizenship, deny federal funding to any organisation which "which presents male or female homosexuality as an acceptable alternative life style or which suggest that it can be an acceptable life style" along with destroying public education and social security,, and abolish the Federal Reserve in order to put America back on the gold standard. He was also the sole vote against divesting US federal government investments in corporations doing business with the genocidal government of the Sudan.

Oh, and he believes that the Left is waging a war on religion and Christmas, he's against gay marriage, is against the popular vote, opposes the Civil Rights Act of 1964, wants the estate tax repealed, is STILL making racist remarks, believes that the Panama Canal should be the property of the United States, and believes in New World Order conspiracy theories, not to mention his belief that the International Baccalaureate program is UN mind control..

I'm just gonna put this out there: I am super super sick of people using hatred of Hillary Clinton as a screen for their misogyny. I don't like her but this whole "Hillary is satan" thing kind of puts me off. Some of it has to be legitimate dissent with her many political problems. But I think there's a pretty huge precedent for misogyny being a big factor in Hillary-badmouthing. A couple centuries' worth of precedent.

why am i listening to the beach boys

Demonstration to Close Guantánamo!
Friday, January 11, 2008
12 noon
Demonstration begins in front of the Federal Courthouse, 6th & Market Streets, Philadelphia
January 11, 2008, marks the six year anniversary of the first arrival of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay. Join the the Nationwide Day of Action to Close Guantánamo!
The demonstration in support of the closure of Guantánamo. The demonstration will begin with a vigil in front of the Federal Courthouse, 6th & Market Sts., where the names of Guantánamo prisoners will be read while people chained together wearing black hoods and orange jump suits will stand. The "prisoners" will then will be "pulled" in a procession with banners, signs, and bell-tolling through the historic district of Philadephia, past the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and concluding in front of the National Constitution Center.
Co-sponsored by the Brandywine Peace Community and the ACLU of Pennsylvania.

http://www.reason.com/news/show/123454.html

"The afternoon rolled in on Philadelphia's Independence Mall, Ron Paul supporters kept streaming onto the green, and a Temple University student named Matt Sullivan stalked the crowd handing out flyers. The headline: "Think you know what RON PAUL stands for?" The text: Four paragraphs from a 1992 edition of the Ron Paul Political Report, the issue with an essay about 95 percent of black males being criminals."

THIS WAS ME! THIS WAS ME! i was there this was me

who's in

SEND ME THE SONG "TAKE ON ME" BY A-HA

I NEED IT

RIGHT NOW

Un. Cuando te cepilles los dientes,
me pongo mi falda azul.
Es mañana. Los pájaros
cante. Oímos y entendemos.
No, me no siento muy solo.
No, no vuelvo.

Dos. En el jardín,
encuentro un pájaro muerto,
un firmamento pequeño.
Entierro el. Me enfrasco en
la acción. Puedo oír
sus cantos.

Just finished taking my third Spanish test. I think I did really well on this one. The first one I got an A, and the second one I bombed. I think I would have been much happier overall if I had jumped into Spanish 201 as opposed to getting some review. My precalc class is my favorite because of how hard it is, and I'm acing it. I hope I haven't permanently fucked myself, Spanish-wise. If all goes well, I'm going to spend May in Argentina, with Aileen. And I really, really want all to go well.

BUENOS AIRES, HERE COMES RACHEL. With her original Spanish Marquez books in hand, stuttering and conjugating with a horrible accent.

It's my birthday tomorrow.

"Anderson’s beautifully filmed and bizarre characters, who somehow made madness, dysfunctional families and alienation seem not only manageable but funny, were like friends who reminded me that I wasn’t alone. There were many times that Anderson’s movies comforted me with the message that yes, everyone gets lonely, and yes, there are still reasons to live through it. It was like Wes really got me.

But here’s the thing about Wes Anderson: he positions himself as an outsider, and his protagonists are always outsiders, painfully awkward and deeply deficient in social skills but also desperately seeking love (and you will notice that his white characters are capable of longing for love in a much more profound way than his characters of colour will ever acheive). But at the end of the day, what is so outsider about Wes? He’s an extremely succesful, wealthy, white dude. That’s not to say that rich white dudes can’t ever feel alienated. But to position yourself as an outsider, while making art that ensures that people of colour are truly outside, is obscenely fake."

--http://www.shamelessmag.com/blog/2007/10/wes-anderson-the-ultimate-heartbreaker/

Soñé una vez yo estuve embarazada.
Mi estómago fue una bol porcelana
llenó de leche y cereales,
y yo temblaría con el peso
sobre piedras a la costa.
Si yo caí en la mar,
yo tendría la sensación de
mi brazos y piernas crecido,
paralizado de miedo, inútil,
llenaron de arena.
Mi pulmón y
el pulmón de mi pequeño
llenarían con mar.