True Story

Today when I was driving Patrick home from school out of nowhere he asked me "Mama, why is Sarah Palin hot?". Exsqueeze me? "Patrick, where did you hear about Sarah Palin?" I asked. And like he loves to answer me, he said "Mama, I know everything". Further probing did not produce any details about where he heard this so I let it drop for a while. I brought it up again this afternoon and he told me Sarah Palin was "Sean McCain's helper" and that they were running for president. Now we watched every debate at home but I am pretty sure Patrick was not paying any attention to these. A few months ago he started getting excited every time he saw Barack Obama on the TV, but I really don't think he knew there was a campaign going on, he was just excited because he was convinced that Barack Obama was from Morocco. So anyways, I questioned him about it again tonight and he told me he had heard about Sarah Palin from Andrea and Matt. As in my cousin Andrea and her new husband, who we had dinner with last weekend. I know we talked politics but I am confident "Sarah Palin is hot" and "Sean McCain" were never mentioned. I tried hard to contain the laughs. A quick phone conversation with Andrea confirmed that she and Matt hadn't whispered sweet nothings about Sarah Palin into Patrick's ear. So where on earth did he pick this up? I am guessing it had to have been at school today. Why are 4 year olds discussing politics with each other? I imagine he will learn all sorts of interesting things next year in kindergarten. Oh boy.

Maria, Maria

Guess who I got to meet tonight? The first lady of California, Maria Shriver. She had a private book signing for the Silicon Valley Moms Blog, and somehow my friend Leticia (who can be found at her blog Tech Savvy Mama, and on the DC Metro Moms Blog) managed to get an invite for me. It was an interesting event, there were some completely hard core bloggers there (as in they had their laptops out and were typing away during the Q&A, I have absolutely no idea what they found so compelling). Maria talked about her books, and signed copies afterwards. I had received an advance copy of the book but failed to actually start reading it until this afternoon. The book is short. Very short. I finished the entire thing in less than 15 minutes. But it is sweet, it mas a nice message to spend some time every day thinking about who it is you want to be, as is something that evolves.

And Maria was completely nice. She asked me about my kids, I knew she also had a son named Patrick so we talked about what a great name it was. Still not sure I'd vote for her husband though ;)

Vote For Me

Super Tuesday is here, which was exciting for Californians because we now vote in February rather than June. I've spent the last few weeks going back and forth, back and forth trying to decide who to vote for. I didn't decide until this morning, nothing like waiting until the last minute! I voted late this afternoon, and I got one of the last few Democratic ballots that was left (like seriously, I think they counted out 5 more after I got mine). So it seems like people turned out in droves, a good thing!

And on to my rant of the day... I took Patrick and Molly to the Picture People this afternoon to get Valentine cards. Every time I go there the experience is more awful than the last. My mom came with us today and she was just shocked at how long it took. I kid you not, we were in there for 2 hours! It's supposed to be snap and go, they take your pictures, upload them, pick your favorites and they are printed right there. There is no reason for it to take 2 hours! I think someone is going to be getting a nastygram from me about that one. Hmph.

Freedom

Happy election day! (well, happier for some than others! ;)

It amazes me how much the pendulum swings every so often. It will be interesting to see how everything works out in the senate. Democracy can be exciting! Even Patrick got into the spirit today, proudly wearing my "I voted" sticker.

And speaking of democracy, if you haven't yet seen it, I highly recommend watching Hacking Democracy on HBO. It's a documentary about the electronic voting process and some serious flaws in the system that allow for hacking and vote manipulation. Very scary, no matter which way you vote. If you don't have HBO we have it on Tivo, come on over and watch :)

American Boy

Have no fear for the future of America, look who voted yesterday...



OK, so maybe he didn't really vote, but he got the sticker!