Frankie pestering the large bull

This is proof that our dog is crazy, look how she runs away from those horns, abandoning us! Well, not really, I managed to take this photo in the diversion while we were running up and away from where cloven hooves can go!

Ahh...the Weekend

My weekend began Friday night with Roarke screaming at me from 8:30 at night until 9:50 pm when he gave up, exhausted, and went to sleep. Saturday Roarke woke up at 6:30 am and proceeded the angry fest from the previous night, "YOU. ARE. SO. MEAN. MOMMY!!!" Dude, I just woke up, I haven´t even had a chance to be mean. Well, we make it through Roarke´s anger gradually, by ignoring him while he tattoo´s his arms with a blood red marker. Now it´s official we are staying in for the day, Roarke refuses to wash off his tattoo´s and I refuse to receive the scorn of Mexican Señoras today because my kid is filthy, he did it , blame him, not me!!

Staying at home in the country with 3 kids can be so damn tedious. There are acres to run and play. Go away and play let me sit here with my Tecate at 2 in the afternoon, sheesh! Finally, I cave in and let them watch one movie, 5 minutes into the movie...boom! The power goes out. Is this a cosmic joke? Is this Rudolph Steiner haunting me and saying "You are a very bad Waldorf Mother, I will punish you now!" because it sure feels like it. What are we going to so now, because no one will go outside and play (what is WRONG with them?!!) Luckily I had just purchased watercolors pencils I set them up and cracked Tecate #2 (now we´re cooking) and we
drew some great pictures for daddy. All of the kids were amazed that this is a painting pencil, oh, the simple joys. Just as we were finishing up, the cows came to graze.

A herd of cows in the yard is an answer to one prayer, namely who will mow the grass while Richard is in the States? Then this herd of 22 loping animals came into the yard to help a sister out, thank goodness. Roarke and I walked among the cattle until Frankie, the dog, decided to go loca on the big white Brahma Bull that also has the largest horns of the group. He lowered his head and made for Frankie and I picked up Roarke and ran for higher ground, no time for painful buttocks while parenting solo! We went and watched the baby cows and were going up the stairs to our other patio when a big bull saw us and started ambling toward us, crikey enough with the bulls! Again I run away and this bull continues toward us. Just as I think he is going to fall down the stairs to the patio and we´ll have filet mignon and hamburgers, for free, for months he stops and just chews while watching us. I´ve had enough of the outdoor animals for a day so I go back inside to the indoor animals. Still no electricity. At 8:00 Saturday night I crank up the generator so I can sleep in my bed with only one kid, keep a hall light on and keep my food frozen.

At 8am on Sunday, the gas ran out of the generator, still no electricity. Called a neighbor, she had electricity so she calls CFE, the Mexican power company but the are unaware of any power outages. Later, Sebastian and Isabel are away, playing with friends so I managed a market date with Roarke. We ate a milanesa de pollo torta and had a giant serving of fresh squeezed orange juice for $30 pesos ($3USD). While eating at the little torta stand Roarke says "Look Mommy a bug!" Yes, it really is a cockroach climbing on my purse. I go to shake it off my purse and instead of landing on the floor, it lands on a little boys pant leg. Well, I can´t leave this kid with a cockroach climbing on him so I gently kick it off of him and try to squash it when it flips to his mothers shoe and disappears. Other Mother is looking at me like, "why the hell are you kicking my kid?" To which I can only say "Lo siento, es uno insecto." And that probably isn´t how you should really say it. When I finally sit down I think, oh, that cockroach came form this stand...hmmm, why are we the only one´s sitting here but all the rest are full? Oh shit, when will the salmonella begin, do I still have medicine...just then two people walk up to order "para llevar" so I feel a little bit better but I´ll let you know for sure in a couple of days if the roach was a foretelling of events to come.

That was enough excitement for me, we came home, filled up our gas can on the way home, which promptly tipped over in the back of the Land Rover when we went across the train tracks. Great now I have a stinking car, but, Roarke is asleep!! Now I feel like a rock star, but smell like a gas station attendant. We get home, no power. This is nuts, over 24 hours and no electricity!!!!! Some little voice in my head said, check the fuses. I am no DIY Queen, that would be my friend Kelly, but I check the fuses and discover why I have no electricity, burned out fuse. Well, I am certainly feeling proud of myself now, I still reek of gasoline and now I´ve fixed our electricity! This weekend I feel like I´ve graduated up to a new me, that doesn´t freak out over the inconsequential, well, except the roach and the bulls. When I step up to the plate I´m going to fix it and make it better, amazing what changing a fuse can do for my soul!

Apologies

I am going to go out on a limb and apologize for bringing up the issue of Sarah Palin´s downs baby. This is why, this whole issue is a deviation from the seriousness of this election. Two weeks ago this was a non-issue for this election year, then John McCain picks this obscure woman, from obscurity land with minimal experience in the political realm, Republicans go ga-ga, a woman on the ticket, a working mother! Guess what, we are all working mothers, and as my friend Laura points out the Dem´s already put a woman on the ticket in 1984, Ferraro. This means for 24 long years women of the Republican party have waited to be put on the ticket. Hmmm....hardly the party for progress and if this is the best you can do, then really, you CAN give me a break because this is a farce. So I am sorry I played right into the hand of Republicans by reacting the way they wanted me to react.

This is not hate rhetoric being spewed by an Obama supporter. This is me, a woman looking at the qualifications necessary for a serious job. My point about the downs syndrome kid was this; anti-abortionists (and I´m using anti-abortion not pro-life from now on because as I posted previously I don´t think all anti-abortion advocates are pro-life across the board, neither am I, I believe it is a woman's choice to have an abortion, and I believe the children in this world deserve a civil society which does not endorse war or turn our heads away as children starve globally, I´m leaving at that.) are so proud of Palin not aborting a child with downs syndrome. I will freely admit that the statistics of aborted fetuses with downs syndrome is very high, I have problems with breeding a perfect baby because as I tell my kids "you get what you get and you don´t throw a fit." But that definitely does not put me in league with Sarah Palin or mean I think she is again...qualified.

At some point we have to come to the political round table and recognize what is truly important in an election, yet every election we the American public turn a blind eye to GLOBAL ISSUES and fall hook line and sinker for the abortion issue. So...there is a global economic disaster headed our way (which we started, aren´t we fab!), child-trafficking all over the world, wars in Africa where children tote guns to kill and be killed, entire ethnic populations are cleansed globally, the price of rice had inflated by 75% in April of this year continuing to climb hence, death from hunger is on the rise. Yet let us insulate ourselves from these issues, and turn the election process into a sideshow based on Palin; her bangs, her downs syndrome baby, her gun toting, her pregnant teenager. I swear this is the sort of thing Karl Rove and his cronies would craft. Should you actually want to learn about the new crafters of the neo-con Republican Party click on the title of this post, it will take you to "Capitol Crimes" on Bill Moyers Journal at PBS.org.

Overall, I see the GOP as out of touch with the public. I believe the level of bigotry in the GOP party has always been out of control, I grew up in a sea of Republicanism so don´t even try to dispute that fact, I have ears that heard all the nasty words about gender, color, religion, and I will be forced to call you mis-informed if someone says otherwise. Do all the candidates have flaws, absolutely! But McCain/Palin I cannot endorse just because a vagina is on the ticket and am disappointed that once again, come election time we aren´t talking about the issues we all face everyday. REAL ISSUE: Jobs lost in August in the U.S. 84K, that leaves an unemployment rate of 6.1%, healthy economies need to see unemployment in the range of 3-4%. REAL ISSUE: $575 billion dollar war in Iraq. Our economy is sick and it needs fixing, that is a HUGE priority. McCain and Palin here is what I say; Sarah, honey, stay out of my vagina, I´ll stay out of yours. McCain if you can´t fix my pocketbook and can´t make peace but can make war, please excuse yourself and your precious puppet from center stage and fall back into oblivion, I need some real change in my life and Bush Light and Ms. Bangs aren´t doing it for me.

New Thoughts On Supply and Demand

So, I just got off the phone with a friend, she tells me gas is $4 something a gallon in Indianapolis. HUH? The price of oil has gone down drastically, how is this possible? Consumption of the product is down, what in the world is going on, this is not following economic models, by golly! Well, I did say in a "perfect market" in my previous post. We are living in a flawed market, which means our wallets are still empty. Collectively we are saying, as we avoid the gas pump, "this is crazy!" and the consumer is being totally ignored. I´m still proud of the decrease in consumption and still raging at the oil industries, they have us by the short hairs people! However, maybe this is all a ploy to initiate folks into green energy, okay, I´m all settled down now. Still, the oil companies are wrong. In our protest of gas prices, let´s take this opportunity to cut down our dependence on oil, and I say this as a 2 car family (not small cars either). With that it appears that this weekends project for the kids will be...drumroll...build our family a solar powered car (after all we´re in Mexico, plenty of sunlight!). They should be done by the year 2020.

The Real Power of Supply and Demand

My hobby has become the study of global economy. I watch currencies like a hawk, because Richard does intraday trading on the FOREX market, and am fascinated. When I was taking economics in college, why did no professor really show you how a market works, how all these bits and pieces tie in to strengthen or weaken currencies. Maybe that came in later but I was so bored with Econ-101 I thought my eyeballs would fall out of my head. The one lesson I recall is the law of supply and demand. In a perfect market, the supply of a product goes up when the price grows beyond equilibruim, this means your demand is shifting downward.

Over the past several months, we have all watched in disbelief as the demand for the dollar has been regarded as the red-headed step child of the global markets. Low dollar meant skyrocketing oil prices, of course inflation. The standard of measure for oil is the dollar, if the dollar goes down, oil producers have to raise prices to make a lousy buck. I mean come on what else would you have them do! What the oil producers forgot about were their customers, those of us that own cars and drive and fly away for lovely summer vacations.

Guess what you the consumer did! You drove down the price of oil by cutting consumption. That is an amazing effort, especially in the States where public transport is sketchy in most places. The price of oil has dropped from an all time high of $147.27 a barrel in July to almost $108 a barrel today. That my friends is a real lesson in supply and demand now the oil producers are listening, I think.

Well, this is what Market News had to say about oil, you will all be very interested, even though this is a boring subject, this is your real money after all!


OPEC meets on Sept. 9, with some expectations the cartel may opt to
cut oil prices to prevent a build-up of surplus stocks that could deepen
the slump slump in prices, which have fallen sharply from a July record
high of $147.27 a barrel.

Iran has said the producer group may need to cut oil supplies by as
much as 1.5 million barrels per day, or nearly 5%, to balance global
markets by early next year.

The U.S. government inventory data also showed total demand for oil
products, such as gasoline and distillates, over the past four weeks,
fell 3.5% from a year ago, continuing a trend of weak consumption in the
midst of an economic downturn.

Okay, okay, so we aren´t out of the woods yet, but look at the statistic out of Iran, they will have to cut oil production by up to 1.5 million a day. That is crazy and amazing. Look how much gasoline consumption has gown daown from one year ago, 3.5% may not sound like enough but that´s a start. Times are tough and we are finally exercising our rights via our wallets to say "Enough already, you are flippin´ bankrupting me to go to the grocery store." We are still worth something people and it makes me proud.

Sarah Palin´s Downs Syndrome Child

So, I really have to add one more thing in my rant against Palin. Go back to 2005, I was turning 35 and pregnant with Roarke. My midwife asked me, as she is required by law to do, would you like to have an amniocentisis done? I asked of course, why? Well, you are getting older and the risk of birth defect increases with age. I pondered for a moment when Betsy my midwife said "Elizabeth, will you love your child any less if there is a defect?" my response "Absolutely not! Forget the amnio, it´s risky, especially for the baby, we´ll deal with birth defects later on if there are any." To the media, who cares that Palin knew her baby had downs syndrome and didn´t get an abortion, would other women? Maybe, most likely not. Because she has a baby with down´s syndrome her job as a provider becomes a bit harder, but let´s not hand out medals here. If she is so anti-abortion, why bother with a tricky amnio, just to prepare yourself? Inherent in motherhood is the situation of never being totally prepared, don´t play yourself to be the heroine Palin because you choose to have the baby with Down´s Syndrome and not abort. A friend of mine recanted what her father-in-law says "I´m against post-natal abortion." Me too. There I´ve said it, hate me if you will but I´m tired of the hullabaloo. Good for her, she´s a female on the Republican ticket (gasp!), that doesn´t mean she is qualified to lead the citizens of the U.S. Get to the real issues, like fixing the economy and bringing soldiers home alive from a fruitless occupation of Iraq, oh wait we can´t because we´ve schismed that country. Oh, what to do...

Train Wreck Headed Our Way!

Most of you know I have fairly liberal ideas of the role the United States should play for us citizens and our global neighbors. Looking at the hub-bub around Sarah Palin´s nomination for V.P. is bringing a rage in my soul. Today I searched for information on why I should want her to be No.2 for my country, I found very few reasons why I should. I have been a registered voter since 1988 when at the behest of my dad, I voted for Bush Sr. After the debacle that came with the reign of George the first, I made a pact with myself that I would vote with my head and my heart and not just vote a party in. Since 1988 I have been waiting for a woman to be on the ticket, regardless of party and see can she speak for me and my family? This is what Palin said that has my ire up and I want to whack her between the eyes with a spoon that has been at the bottom of a deep freezer for ten years, so cold it will stick to her cranium and wake this woman up!

"Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God. That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there is a plan and that plan is God's will." -Sarah Palin

Are you even kidding me? Do not presume to have a personal telephone line with a God that sends sons and daughters to war to kill or be killed. Every day I say to my boys, no guns allowed, people with guns can kill other people. Yes I know, people can die and be killed in a multitude of ways but war...what has the war in Iraq solved for us? Osama bin Laden is still on the loose apparently so why the hell occupy Iraq? Sadam Hussein would never have allowed bin Laden in his country, he was a megalomaniac and supreme dictator, he would never have sought an alliance or allowed someone else to rule over him.(Case in point, The U.S. put him in power, he got power hungry to rule his own country without our intervention, we bagged him.) Please tell all of the loved ones of the 4,152 dead soldiers that you are praying for a plan that is God´s will, all I see is a gross abuse of tax dollars and the reverence for life. The God I believe in is not the poster dude or spokesman for your war.

Palin says she is anti-abortion, hey I am pro-life also! I´ve chosen my path as a mother but stay out of my daughter´s body. My goal is to rear children that respect life in utero AND the people in this world, it is the job of a parent to teach that indeed your body is a temple and you must respect all human beings. However, Voltaire once said: "I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to my death your right to say it." Palin, say what you want I will defend your right. I will also defend my daughter´s right to have some autonomy over her body if I know she has come to the best decision for herself and is within her constitutional rights. Having children is hard, I won´t resign a 17 to raise a baby unless I feel I can step in an be a good guide. Kudos to Palin for stepping up to that plate, she is standing up for what she feels is right, let my family stand up for our values. War is not one of our family values because we are pro-life.

The pro-life debate has long been a bone of contention for me when I meet anti-abortionists because I want to know; are you anti-war and pro-peace, are you against the death penalty, are you pro-adoption, if you are white would you adopt a child of color? Because if you respect life this much, your view should rightfully encompass all living beings otherwise I am want to use the H-word, hypocrite, in capital letters. I could rant on this subject for paragraphs because of the incongruities but on to the next quote which irritated me.


"I think God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get the gas line built, so pray for that."- Sarah Palin

HI-larious. So big business is God´s will? Getting a gas-line built and drilling for oil (which oil industry admits will take about 10 years to accomplish) is God´s will? Hmmm...it becomes clear with that statement that it is God´s will we wreak havoc on this beautiful planet that is bountiful for all creatures. But we humans apparently have divine right to treat the planet with reckless abandon. Get a smaller car, get a bicycle, go solar, become a better steward of how you use the finite supply of natural resources which is God´s gift to all of us, not just the companies that supply the consumer. I´m one of the people and I am not interested in drilling for more oil, I´m interested in real long-term solutions so this old world will be here for my great-great grandchildren.

So let´s talk about poverty for minute. This info came across Reuters today:

"As the convention was under way on Tuesday, a peaceful march on behalf of poor people by more than 1,000 demonstrators led to a brief confrontation of some of them with police. Pepper spray and teargas were used to drive the protesters away from the downtown Xcel Energy Center where the convention was being held."

Why was there even a kerfuffle? Poverty is an issue IN the United States, especially with the dollar loosing reputation and the sub-prime crisis the great Republic of States created. Poverty is not just inner-city these days, it´s people like me that were middle class until the sub-prime crisis swept away my husband´s lucrative commercial construction business. The blurb says a peaceful march, how did it come to tear gas and pepper spray to drive protesters away? We the people are listening to what the politicians say, we are force fed all of their opinions. Politicians should have to listen to the people and like Voltaire says ¨defend to the death your right to say it." Apparently not the case, it will earn you itchy eyes and you will choke as tears run down your face while your voice is silenced.

This is my rant, I am one p-o´ed citizen of the United States. What is worse, I have no control over the sinking of the Republic, I can only vote and pray that my absentee ballot will be counted this election. Sarah Palin, I am praying that God has a plan for us, all of us, to unify we the people and hold irresponsible politicians (republican, democrat, libertarian, hell you could be martian for all I care at this point!) to task. I pray to God that war will end and reparations can be made for the lives lost. I´m praying that poverty becomes non-existent and no one on this planet has to perish because they are malnourished. I think this would be more in line with God´s will and I think Jesus is rooting for this also. Jesus was one of the greatest revolutionaries of a millennium taking a stand for the little guy, like you and me, and I think Jesus would be greatly offended that this woman is asking God´s will be to unify the people and companies to get a gas line built.