So I'm going through the cafeteria check out line ...

... looking down at my lunch tray as I wait to pay, and I start to cry a little because it hits me that Joey is no longer in the world.

He was a wonderful companion. He was always gentle and, as long as there was a warm place to nap, happy. As I wrote of him back in 2009, when I was preparing for my colonoscopy, "Today my best feline friend has been my big old gray and white tub of guts, Joey. He's been very affectionate and attentive surrounding today's festivities. He has seemed more in tune to why our daily schedule was off and he's been very sweet about it. I've said it before -- Joey may be my dopiest cat, but he's my hero. He has an unfailingly sensitive, positive nature."

Thank you to everyone who commented on my post about his passing. I appreciate and find comfort in your kindness, because this has been very hard.

A TR/Bikini Kill mashup

I know Hillary has had a hard time touching younger women. I suppose I understand it. Younger women weren't there in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. But watching this reminds me she was. Totally present and always working hard within the system (even when the system didn't welcome her).

While I remain deeply ambivalent about HRC in some aspects, I admire her greatly for her ongoing involvement. She's always been, to paraphrase Teddy Roosevelt, a woman "who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions ..."




Look at the "next up" videos YouTube recommends after you watch this one. They're cruel and overwrought and hysterical. She doesn't deserve it, but she withstands it, and gets up every morning to fight another day.